All That Glitters Is Silver

“So, what are we going to do tonight?” Allison asked excitedly.

Tonight was the first night in weeks that our parents had left us alone. The mysterious mountain lion hadn’t attacked either of us for a while so we deemed it necessary that they go out and have a night to themselves. More a precaution then anything else, I was spending the night at Allison’s house. Not that we minded. We were planning a girls’ night.

“I’m hungry.” I mumbled, hearing my stomach growl.

“You’re always hungry.” Allison snorted. She trotted into the kitchen and peered into the cabinet, pushing things aside until she found what she was looking for. She turned around swiftly, and blue box of macaroni and cheese sitting deliciously in her palm.

“Yes,” I immediately replied, my mouth watering. She laughed, putting on a pot of water.

“Besides stuffing our faces with food, what are we going to do?” Allison asked, her voice slightly muffled as she went about gathering ingredients.

“Movie?” I suggested.

Allison nodded, “Something romantic and heart wrenching.”

“It’s like you read my mind.” I grinned. It faded slightly as my mind wandered to the forbidden topic of Derek. It had been weeks since I’d seen him last. My dad had been furious that the hospital had me working the empty Long-Term portion of the hospital without any security and now I was stuck filing paper work in Nurse McCall’s nice secure office space.

“How about you run out to the video store, grab us some extra buttery popcorn, Dr. Pepper, Twizzlers, and the sappy movie of your choice while I make dinner?” Allison asked, glancing in the pot of water that hadn’t started boiling yet.

I nodded, grabbing my keys off the green tiled counter. “Be back in ten.” I shouted as I hurried out the door.

My iPod played some soft indie band as I drove toward my destination. Within minutes I had arrived and that’s when I started to feel a bit sick. It hadn’t been the first time. I had been getting dizzy spells and nauseous for the past two weeks. It was just from the stress of moving and the impending attack of that mountain lion, along with the flu that was going around.

I pushed open my car door, taking a deep breath of the clean Beacon Hill’s air, instantly feeling better. The sound of slamming my door shut sounded like a bullet shooting through the night. Embarrassingly, I let out a tiny scream. I was constantly on edge after my near death experiences. I hoped that the police would catch whatever was terrorizing the town (mountain lion or mutant wolf beast) soon because I was slowly losing my sanity.

“Cass?” I heard a familiar voice call as well as another car door shut. I glanced behind me to see none other than the captain of the lacrosse team, Jackson Whittemore.

“Hey, Jackson,” I greeted, smiling slightly. Honestly, I was happy to have some company in the quiet, seemingly empty video store.

He held up the metal door for me. I heard the faint tingle of the welcome bell as I slid through, quietly thanking him. There was a slight smell of something rotting in the air but I decided against pointing it out to Jackson. It was probably just the garbage sitting in the store too long.

“So, all alone on a Saturday night?” Jackson asked, pretending to be interested in the sci-fi movies we passed by.

“No,” I shook my head, “Girls’ night with Alli. What about you? Movie date with Lydia?”

Jackson rolled his eyes, grumbling, “Yes,”

I felt a small smile tug at my lips, though I was careful not to let it show. “What movie is she making you watch this time?”

“The Notebook.” He sighed exasperatedly. “I hate that movie.”

“I’m not such a big fan of that one either. Personally, I’m a Titanic kind of girl.” And suddenly I knew what movie Allison and I were going to watch tonight.

Jackson snorted, taking a stroll further down the teen fantasy love section.

“The Notebook’s not down there. Twilight is, if your interested in that,” I joked mildly, enjoying the grimace on his face.

I led the way to where the classic romance movies were located. The light directly to the right of the designated section was hanging by its wires, as if someone who had been changing it had been interrupted and never came back to finish the job.

“Does something feel…off to you?” I questioned suspiciously. Jackson glanced around as realization suddenly hit.

“There are people at a video store instead of using Netflix or Red Box like every other sensible person?” He said sarcastically.

“Ha ha,” I answered before hearing something creak. “Did you hear that?”

“Maybe it’s the mountain lion, come to finish you off!” He said spookily. He glanced around, pretending to be terrified.

“You’re real funny, Jackson,” I glared, shoving his movie at his chest.

“I’d like to think so,” He grinned, clearly pleased with himself. I started to walk off towards the dangling light. “Hey! Cass, I was only kidding! Don’t be mad.” He apologized, hot on my trail.

I peered up at the dangling light. There was a ladder tumbled over underneath it; a few of the movies a strewn along the floor. It looked like there had been an altercation not too long ago.

“That’s weird.” I muttered.

“Oh my God,” Jackson gasped. “He’s dead!”

“Very funny, Jackson. You’re a real comedian. Shut up already,” I growled, sick of his antics.

I felt Jackson’s warm arm tug me around. A shaky finger pointed to the corpse of the man who had been interrupted while replacing the light. His neck had been ripped open; blood was spilled all over his hideous orange uniform, as well as the old grey carpet.

“Holy shit,” I whispered, glancing around in a panic. “We need to get outta here!”

Jackson’s attention was elsewhere as I felt sick again. This time a deep breath didn’t fix it. The rancid smell of the blood and decomposing body was too much. I doubled over, puking my last meal all over the ground.

“Cass!” Jackson cried. But, before I could look up or reply, he snatched me up and started dragging me along. I heard a loud growl echo through the empty, dark space as a few more lights went out.

Jackson and I sat behind a large display case for some new werewolf movie starring Josh Hutcherson. Normally, the only thing I could smell would be the cologne Jackson wore too much of, but now, the only thing my nostrils detected was the dead body. I rolled away from Jackson’s body, vomiting again.

“Cass,” His voice barely audible, “Are you okay?”

I shook my head, convulsing.

So many things happened at once that I couldn’t comprehensively process them all. The shelves of movies began falling down like dominoes. The videos flew everywhere as I heard that sinister growl again. Jackson reached out for me but missed, causing a large wooden shelf to land on me, lashing my temple open. My strangled scream faltered under a horrendous howl. Through my tears I could see that Jackson was trapped under a much larger shelf, bleeding as well. The painful look on his countenance made it obvious that he couldn’t help me.

But I screamed for help anyway. I felt something grab the bottom of my yoga pants, thrusting me out from under the wall of movies. “Jackson!”

“Cassie! Run!” He called. His was becoming more faint as I was dragged further into the body of the store. I struggled, flailing the appendages that didn’t hurt too much to move.

“Let go of me!” I shrieked. As if it had understood me, I was released. I tried scrambling away but was in too much pain to go far. Something soft nudged me so I was lying in the supine position. Another blood curling scream flew from my trembling lips as I saw the creature before me.

It was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. Menacing red eyes glared down upon my frightened face. Coarse black fur covered its gigantic body that was the size of small van. There were scars on the left side of its face, like it had been burned, and smelled faintly of dirt and blood. This was no mountain lion.

With quick realization, I understood that this was what I had seen a little over a month ago at the school. It was what had attacked us at the school.

Everything in that moment amplified. I could hear Jackson’s heart beat erratically in his chest, his rough breathing echoed in my ears as if he was right next to me instead of half way across the room. My ears picked up the soft pounding of the wolf’s heart. I could almost smell the adrenaline pouring through it’s veins and the fear dripping off of Jackson.

“Cass?” Jackson called again after a few moments of eerie silence. He couldn’t see us and I was no longer crying out for help or squirming away.

The wolf’s red eyes gleamed. With the adrenaline coursing through my body, it was hard to tell if it pulled up his lips to smile and me. But that’s what it looked like to me. It’s body shook, letting out some strange noise that resembled a cackle.

I let out a whimper, the smell of some sort of cologne wafted through the air as the wolf leaned deeper onto me. It smelled expensive, like Jackson’s, but much more subtle. It large, wet muzzle began to sniff adamantly at me as I swallowed the bile rising in my throat (I could somehow still smell the corpse). I didn’t think it would hurt me. I could somehow sense it wouldn’t. But that didn’t stop the terror that shook my body.

Suddenly, it pulled away, as if it had gotten what it wanted. It began trotting over towards where Jackson lay trapped when I heard glass shatter; a soft red light blinked, a silent alarm had been triggered. There was a high pitched scream that came from outside and a deep, threatening growl. A familiar smell penetrated my nostrils. A heart wrenchingly familiar smell that I hadn’t sniffed in weeks: Derek Hale.

How was that possible? How could Derek be here? He hadn’t been seen in weeks. The police were looking for him; he reached the top of the Most Wanted list in California for Scott’s lie about the event at school. And what would Derek be doing crashing through windows for someone he didn’t care about? My brain was overwhelmed with so many thoughts and scenarios that the idea that it probably wasn’t Derek took awhile to set in.

I was freaked out of my mind. Maybe this was some defense my brain was using to calm me down, knowing Derek made me feel safe. That seemed more probable than Derek coming to my rescue. Seeing the wolf again had triggered that night in my mind where Derek had saved me. Now my brain was sending endorphins or hormones or something to calm me down. How pathetic.

“C-Cassie?” Jackson questioned again, unable to keep his voice from cracking. I was beyond words at this point. I raised my body, repositioning myself to see the new intruder, but they were hidden by fallen movie shelves. I heard the same growl and the wolf let out that chilling half-cackle.

Before I knew what was happening, the intruder tackled the wolf. Movies flew around again and within moments, the newcomer earned the upper hand and tossed the wolf out the window, following quickly in suit before I could even blink. I never caught a glimpse of my savior.

I lay there, listening to Jackson cry out for me, unable to move. I didn’t want to. I had foolishly gotten my hopes up, wanting so badly for it to be Derek that had saved me. But it wasn’t. It couldn’t have been. Derek wasn’t coming back and I had to come to terms with that.