House of Wolves

Werewolves aren’t so bad, you know. Trust me on this. I know it for a fact. How do I know?

Because I am one.

You seem surprised. What’s that line from Dracula? “Such thingsdo exist!” (Oh, and by the way, vampires exist, too. I’ll get to that part later.)

But before we continue, there are some things you need to know.

Werewolves are not vicious killers. We do not steal babies from their cribs in the night. We are not governed by the phases of the moon. And a bullet to the heart will kill anyone, be it made of lead or silver. I mean, come on, people, what are you thinking?

Oh, and for the record, I haven’t chased a car since I was six years old!

With certain obvious exceptions, werewolves are people, just like anyone else.

While we’re on that subject, I suppose I should introduce myself. My name is Ray Toro, and I play guitar in a band called My Chemical Romance. Have you heard of us?

My bandmates know about me, of course. How could I hide it? We travel together for weeks, months at a time in a cramped bus. (The bus is an upgrade, actually, it used to be a van.) We work together, eat together, sleep together, spend every waking moment in each other’s faces; there’s no way I could keep a secret like that.

And I wouldn’t want to. I have to have someone to confide in. And these guys are like my brothers. I would trust them with my life. They keep my secret, and they keep it well. Well, Frank let it slip once, but he was drunk, and nobody listened to him. I think they all figured he was being a smart ass about my hair.

And before you ask, no, I will not bite you so you’ll turn into a werewolf, too. For starters, that’s not how it works. Werewolves are born, not made. It’s a genetic thing, like having curly hair or being short.

Beyond that, werewolves don’t eat people. And we don’t go around ripping the throats out of unsuspecting animals, either. We eat foods just like any other person. Except I like my steak rare. About as rare as I can get it. In fact, if it came down to it, I’d prefer it raw, but the guys tend to gag and complain when I do that, so I settle for what I can get. I’ll never forget the looks on their faces the first time they saw me bite into a half-cooked burger... It was priceless!

Although it was hard to control when I was younger, I hardly ever wolf-out anymore. That is, I don’t transform unintentionally. Well, it’s rare that I do, put it that way. I’ve got to be really pissed to lose control like that. The last time it happened was when some crazy drunk kid started punching Gerard at a party. Something about him being a pussy Goth boy who should just kill himself and get it over with. What an asshole. But, in any case, he went after Gerard, and Frank, naturally, jumped to his defense.

Poor Frankie. He just can’t seem to do much damage unless it’s accidental. So of course, once he had jumped in, this kid’s friends joined the fight and ganged up on Frank and Gee and... God, it was a mess. I’ve never seen so much blood pour out of Frank’s face. Gerard wasn’t much better off himself.

Do you think I could stand by and watch my bandmates, my friends, get pummeled like that and not get angry? Hell no.

So before I knew it, I was the Wolf Man. I’m sure those little twerps pissed themselves silly when it happened. A werewolf’s transformation is usually pretty frightening to witness.

In the first place, you tend to grow about a foot and a half when you shift, sometimes more. Now, I’m already over six feet tall naturally, so my werewolf form is pretty fucking huge. If you’ve seen that movie Van Helsing, that’s actually pretty true to life (though I’m sure the producers don’t know that). Don’t get me wrong, I’m not totally muscled and toned like their werewolves - a sexy beast I am not - but as far as proportions and appearances go, it’s fairly similar. My nose and mouth elongate into a snout, and my fangs are rather formidable. The claws are pretty scary, too. I have to be so careful not to scratch the shit out of everything with them.

And the fur. Oh God, the fur. That’s the weirdest part, feeling it growing out at super speed. And with my fur, I’m the pansiest-looking werewolf around. My hair is naturally a reddish-brown, almost ginger color. I’ve only just recently dyed it darker for The Black Parade. But when I shift, the dyed part grows out almost completely - I have to re-dye it every time I change. Admittedly, it’s a pain in the ass, but the darker look is so cool with our Black Parade costumes that I just can’t bear to go back to the red yet.

My eyes also change. They turn from their normal dark brown to bright yellow. If I wolf-out in anger, then the color is actually more of an orangish, almost red hue.

And all of these changes happen in a matter of moments. In the blink of an eye, I can go from being good old, easy-going Ray to bloodthirsty Hell Hound. But again, that’s only if I transform out of anger.

Anyway, when that kid and his friends started whaling on Gerard and Frank, I couldn’t stop it. Everything turned red, and BOOM. Wolfed-out.

And those little cowards ran like hell at the sight of me. Thank God they did. If they had stuck around, I might have really hurt them. As shitty as they were, they didn’t deserve to be mauled by a pissed off werewolf.

Surprisingly, Mikey was the one who calmed me down that night. Gerard and Frank, of course, were in no condition to do so. Bob hadn’t joined the band then, and Matt... I don’t even think Matt was with us. If I remember correctly, he had stayed home that night. It’s probably better that he did.

So Mikey had to be the one brave enough to grab me by the shoulders and force me to stare into his eyes until I’d calmed down. That’s the only thing that works, you see. It’s a power thing, about being the Alpha Male and all that.

But be warned; that’s not always the best way to handle things. I’m a softie deep down, so I cool off fairly quickly and easily. Not all werewolves are like that, though. Some just enjoy being angry. Try staring one of them down and you’ll most likely have your face torn off.

Not that I would have ever hurt Mikey, or any of my friends. I don’t lose my consciousness when I shift, and I don’t become some big, dumb animal. But when you transform out of anger, it’s very much like a drunken rage. You have a tendency to lash out at anyone, or anything, if it takes you by surprise. If Mikey hadn’t approached me from an angle where I could see him, I could have easily taken a fatal swipe at him before even realizing who it was that had touched me. That’s what really scares me about those instances when I lose control. But, thankfully, it rarely happens anymore.

There is a gentler side of the wolf, of course. Not merely the man-beast of horror movies, most werewolves can also transform to the shape of an ordinary wolf. Well, generally, we’re larger than the average wolf, but you get the picture.

It’s the easiest shape to change to. The wolf has a much simpler structure than a man, or the beast. It’s the only form we can take as children, other than the human side.

When I was a kid, I looked sort of like a big golden retriever. It’s the hair, that shaggy ginger coat of mine. It was even lighter when I was a puppy.

And... God, this is humiliating... Yeah, you heard me right the first time. I have chased a car or two in my time... But all puppies do it! I swear! It’s like a rite of passage! Well, not really, but come on, you’re only young and stupid once. And like I said, I haven’t done it since I was six! And boy, was my mom mad.

She and my dad are werewolves, too, of course. As are my brothers. Like I said, it’s genetic. My kids will be werewolves, too, most likely. (If I ever have any.) If their mother is a normal human, then there’s a 50/50 chance they could be like me, or like her. It’s not difficult to figure out. There aren’t any varying degrees of being a werewolf. You either are or you aren’t. I mean, yeah, human kids born to one wolf parent tend to be stronger than average, but that’s about it. They can’t transform or anything. Don’t ask me why, because I don’t know. That’s just the way it is.

So I was generally a pretty good kid. All things considered, that is. Sure, I chased a few cars every once in a while. I scared the wits out of the neighborhood cats on a regular basis. And I dug more holes in my mom’s garden than both of my brothers combined. I can’t even begin to guess how many things are still buried out in that yard; shoes, soda cans, my brothers’ action figures - ha ha, revenge! But you know, human boys do these things, too. They just don’t come in leaving muddy pawprints all over the house. But with three werewolf sons, Mom got used to it quickly.

And we really didn’t play outside much, anyway. Even for werewolves, it was a rough neighborhood. And we were just pups, we couldn’t do much to protect ourselves. Besides that, we were taught from an early age to never transform in front of humans.

Obviously, I’ve blown that rule out of the water, on multiple occasions. All werewolves have, I don’t care how careful someone is. Sometimes it’s just unavoidable. Which is why we’re good at damage control. Most of us can spin a story that even the most paranoid person on Earth would believe.

It also helps that most witnesses get called out on being drunk. I have a tendency to bring up the story about that guy who was arrested on a DUI charge after crashing into a tree and told the cops to arrest the unicorn that had been driving his car instead. True story! So it’s easy to convince others that the people who have witnessed my change have been drunk.

Beyond that, in this day and age no one actually believes in monsters anymore. (Not that we’re “monsters,” I hate being called that.) People would sooner believe that I was actually a sixteen-year-old girl in drag than a werewolf. So that works in our favor, too.

Of course, given that fact, the few times I’ve told people about me have always been interesting. The Way brothers were the first people I ever told. I’d never even told my friends in school. But if I was going to be in a band with these guys - and be serious about it - then they had to know.

I wasn’t really surprised at their reactions. They didn’t believe me at first. I tried to make it easy for them, I really did. But when they started to laugh at me, I had to prove myself. So I wolfed out. Not in anger - I just transformed, plain and simple.

I’ve never seen anyone so scared in all my life. Mikey went rigid and just froze. His eyes got so wide. He didn’t speak again for a good hour or so. And Gerard turned into a mewling little kitten. It was pathetic, poor dude. He was actually cowering; there was a moment that I thought he was going cry. For a man with such imagination, I had honestly thought he would have taken it better than he did. But he recovered fairly well, and once he had, he was convinced that this was the most awesome thing on Earth. And it inspired him! He wound up writing “Vampires Will Never Hurt You” afterwards. Why he chose vampires for subject matter instead of werewolves, though, I don’t know. I guess he just thinks they’re cooler.

Frank took it much better. He was startled at first, but within moments, he was bouncing around me like a little kid. He was so excited. He kept asking me crazy questions, like if I could pick up a car (yes), if I could smell the sweat on a guy half a mile down the road (yes), if I could leap to the roof of my house with one jump (yes), if I could run faster than a cheetah (no - but it’s a close race). He still surprises me with weird questions, even to this day.

Matt was probably the one who reacted the worst to it. I think it really disturbed him. We remained friends throughout the rest of his stint in the band, but I don’t think he ever fully trusted me afterwards. It really hurt me at first, but I’ve come to realize that it’s a lot for anyone to accept. I guess it was just too much for Matt. He was civil about it, though.

And when Bob replaced Matt, we had to let him in on it, too. He didn’t seem surprised at all.

“I knew there was something different about you, Toro,” he told me. “I just couldn’t put my finger on it.”

So in the end, it all turned out for the best, as far as the band was concerned. Like I said, I trust them with my life. And they trust me.

Speaking of Gerard writing the song, I promised I’d tell you about vampires, didn’t I?

Vampires are real, too. And they share certain traits with us werewolves. Vampirism is also a genetic trait. Being bitten by them or drinking their blood isn’t going to change you into one of them. If anything, it will make a normal human horribly sick.

Garlic and crosses and all those other “vampire remedies” are useless. Not that you’d need them, vampires are generally pretty normal people. Yeah, they drink blood. Why do you think blood drives are held every few weeks? Sure, a lot of it goes to hospitals for patients, but a lot also goes to the vampire community. They eat other food, too, but they have to have that daily dose of blood to survive.

And the sun will kill them if they’re exposed to it for too long. Even a few moments of direct sunlight causes them to blister and burn. So they are, indeed, night owls.

I honestly haven’t met many vampires; there was a family I knew when I was a kid, with two daughters close to my age, but because of their nightly existence, I didn’t go to school with them. I got to hang out with them more in the winter, when the night lasts longer. Our moms were friends, so we would play at each others’ houses every once in a while. They were nice people. I was really bummed when they moved away.

And I’ve met a few others since then, and they’ve all been pretty awesome people. As I said about werewolves, they’re normal people... Just a little different, that’s all.

So now that you know about me, and about my kind, I hope you’ll use the information wisely. The world could use a little less blind fear and hatred. I mean, I hope I haven’t put you off on any of your favorite monster movies (An American Werewolf in London is still one of my favorites), but people need to know.

Because, like I said, werewolves aren’t so bad.