Cursed

I couldn't believe that kid! I mean, he called me cute. Since when is a guy cute? Since when is a werewolf cute? Okay, so he doesn't know that about me, and I wouldn't let him know about it. I wasn't here to create a scene. And I really didn't want to freak people out. They'd hunt me and my family down and I knew it. Humans fear what they do not know, after all. Personally, I'd never killed so much as a spider. My parents always taught me to value and honor nature as I was part of it in more ways than one; that I was like the spider in many ways. The most prominent was the fact that I was much more afraid of humans than they were of me.

But I still hate spiders. Nonetheless, I let them go outside to save myself from a lecture from my mom.

I was about to walk down the hall to the easiest way to get to my car, until I realized that Kieran still had my jacket. Should I even try to get it back? Mom would kill me if I lost it since I griped and complained about getting it when it cost almost a hundred bucks. It's served me well though for that much. I've had it for almost a year and all that's on it is a small tear in the pocket. But on the other hand, his scent was on it by now.

Then an idea hatched in my head. If I had his scent on hand, maybe I could get myself used to it in the safety and confines of my own home.

I've only smelled a few people with such a powerful scent as Kieran's but I never had to be in close quarters for prolonged periods of time with them. Maybe if I had been around them longer, I might have found something striking about their voice and features as well like with Kieran. However, the handful of people were long gone now. I suppose the one I'd been around the longest was a transfer student who dropped out of school shortly after transferring last year. I was told she was a nice person; she was just having really bad family issues.

I sighed as I began walking back into the previous hallway. He’s lucky I can smell him from all the way across the small school. And, as predicted, the smell led me right to him. The only thing I hadn’t predicted was that he was attached at the hip to Shailey.

“There you are!” Shailey exclaims as I walk up to them, trying to ignore the fact that the two biggest nuisances in my life were most likely friends now. “I wanted you to meet-”

“Already met him,” I said, my voice causing Kieran to turn around.

“Finnegan!” He squealed. I gritted my teeth because of his unbearable smell. I tried not to look into his pristine blue eyes. Shit. Why’d I think that? Now I’m going to look at them. Scumbag brain always betraying me…

“My jacket,” I demanded.

“Aww… can’t I keep it?” He whined, snuggling to the interior of my jacket.

“I need it,” I growled. Because if I don’t have it, my mom will kill me.

He pouted as he shrugged off the jacket and handed it to me. As fervent as I was about getting it back, I couldn’t just not put it on.

As I put it on, his scent invaded my nose, overwhelming my senses. I gnawed on the side of my cheek, trying to keep myself from just pulling the fabric over my face and inhaling.

“Come on! You’re taking both of us home!” Shailey announced happily before literally dragging me alongside her and Kieran.

*~*~*~*~*

On the car ride home, the two were insufferable! Yapping away about trivial things and homework and such. Luckily, Kieran was able to take breaks in between in incessant chatting to give me directions to his house. I’d only been there via woods before and not the road, besides, it’d be suspicious if I got there without ever having “been there”.

“Okay, out you go,” I said flatly.

“Aww… Finnegan! We’re all having so much fun though!” Kieran protested. His scent was driving me insane though, so much so, that I was even starting to get a headache.

Perhaps it made me a bit edgy, okay, really edgy, because I kind of lost it and nearly yelled, “I have to get home.”

“You’re so mean, Finny!” He whined, shrugging off what I’d said. Either way, he jumped out of my car and skipped to his door.

“Jeez, Finn, what’s with you today?” Shailey asked as I drove the next mile to our neighboring houses.

“You guys were just annoying me,” I told her coldly. I didn’t have to explain anything to her anyways. She had every right to intervene in my life if I were endangering myself or others, but not my personal life. Sometimes she didn’t understand the boundary between the two.

*~*~*~*~*

When I got home, my mom was standing in the kitchen with my father and surprisingly, my aunt. My mom loved her sister but she lived a few hours away. “Hey,” I greeted.

“We were just talking about you, Finn,” My mom said.

My ears perked. “Huh? Why?” I asked, baffled.

“About that… problem you’re having at school,” Dad clarified.

“And who was wearing your jacket? You know that thing cost more than we could afford!” Mom questioned, frowning.

Wait, was the smell overpowering to them as well? “You can smell it?”

“What kind of question is that? Of course we can,” my aunt said, chuckling.

“I-Is it really strong?” I stuttered.

“No, it’s about normal… what are you getting at?” Dad shook his head and quirking his eyebrow at me, confused.

“Oh… I see, let me talk to him, Kendra,” my aunt said.

My parents obeyed and left the room.

“So, I hear that you’re getting worked up over a student at school,” she started. “Like overpowering smells and their voice and such?”

I gritted my teeth before nodding. I didn’t really know if I wanted to talk about this.

To my surprise, my aunt laughed. “Oh, Finn, you have nothing to worry about.”

“Can you tell me what this is, then?”

She took a deep breath. “You see Finn, as werewolves, we have many choices of a mate, so, naturally, there are preferences. Our kind have married our own, or humans, and, though it’s rare, even just mated with wolves. I married Vic and he was human because I preferred humans, your parents married because they like other werewolves. I think that you’re like me in our preference are humans.”

“That doesn’t explain-” She put a finger to my lips to hush my protests.

“Let a girl finish, alright? Now, where was I? Oh, yes – you’ve heard how humans have a ‘type’ of person they’re attracted to, right? Well, we take it one step further, with our heightened senses we can root out those people much easier with smell and hearing and sight.”

“Like…,” I gulped. “A soul mate?” I hoped Kieran wasn’t my soul mate…

She laughed a loud laugh. “Are you kidding? There are far too many people in the world to have just one person to be the only one! I’m just saying that you’ve picked out a person that’s much more suited to your personal tastes. You might not even be aware of your own tastes! It’s all what your brain interprets.”

“So you’re saying… it’s just… a way of finding a person that is my ‘type’ physically?”

“Yup!” She chuckled. “And you don’t have to stick with this person either, I’m sure there have been others and will be others in your future that will have the same effect on you. And you never know, their personality might not even be a match. It’s all physical, so don’t get tangled up in thinking that it has a deeper meaning than that of sense.”

“Uh… huh…,” I muttered, walking back to my room. I was… attracted to Kieran? What the hell, brain!? You’re such… a jerk…

Needless to say, I needed a nice long run after hearing all of that.