The Last Wolf

His skin felt like a burner after water had just been boiled on a stove top, too hot to touch. Some of his bones hadn’t adjusted back into place, the break in his spinal cord jutted out causing the skin to stretch unnaturally across his neck. There was no one in sight; not Rose, any of the partygoers, or his friends. Even the wolves that seemed to be attacking everyone in sight were gone. The whispering breeze filled my lungs with air as the sound of rustling leaves and tree branches filled my ears. Underneath the smell of alcohol and bad perfume or cologne pine, and decay smothered my nostrils.

My cell phone barely had one bar, so I dialed the first number that popped into my mind. “Hello, this is 911 dispatch; what is your emergency today?”

“I need to report a murder,” I whispered. I was afraid that if I said anything to loudly…

“Ma’am, I’m having a hard time hearing you. Did you say ‘murder’?”

“Yes, please help me! There was a…” she cut me off.

“Where are you?”

“I’m in the woods just outside of Sutterlane Park. There was a bunch of us partying, and then these wolves…”

“Wolves?”

“Yes, wolves. Now there’s a boy, and he’s dead.” I was sobbing. His skin had cooled, I could touch him now.

“Stay calm, there’s an officer on his way. Paramedics and animal control are coming too.”

“I think I…” I trailed off. The tears got the best of me. I killed a wolf. A wolf attacked me and I kicked it. He turned into a…


Three hours later, sitting in the police station, my parents finally arrived after they’d been called. Officer James showed us to an interrogation room where she sat on one side of the table and my parents and I on the other. “Would you care for anything? Water, chips, a soda maybe?”

“No, thank you,” we answered in unison.

“Now, please state your name and age for the record.”

“My name is Dahlia Raven Waters; I just turned sixteen.”

“Tell me what happened, Dahlia.”

I started from the beginning. The party Rose begged me to go to, the boys flirting with us, the boy staring at her, and her dragging me over to him. I told her everything except that the boy who was killed wasn’t a human boy when I killed him.

“Can you name anyone who saw you there?”

“Just my friend, Rose, but I couldn’t find her after the boy...I fought with him. Please, just go find Rose!”

“We’ve already sent a car to Rose Davenport’s house. We’ll find her.”

My stomach clinched with fear and worry. I could feel bile stirring again. I raced to the garbage can as I threw up. “Are you sick?” Officer James asked in a concerned tone. I couldn’t tell if it was real or faked.

“No,” I answered before gagging more. My mom rubbed my back.

“I’ll bring you a ginger ale, maybe it’ll help.”


The clock read 5:30 a.m. when I walked through my front door. My skin was cold and clammy, my heart raced, and my stomach ached. I could feel each bone in my body as if I’d been hit by a Semi. “Are you sure you’re not sick,” my mom questioned. She put her hand to my forehead then snatched it away. “Luke, feel her head!” My father repeated my mother’s actions.

“Good Lord, child, you’re roasting. Sam, go run her a cool bath, I’ll go make soup. We’ve got to break that fever!” He rushed off in the direction of the kitchen. I knew he was going to call the ‘doctor’ who is actually just an old witch doctor from an Indian tribe. He is wise, being the last of his peoples' tribe, he must’ve done something right to survive.

My joints screamed as I muscled up the stairs; the bed in my little corner bedroom was calling my name loudly, but my mom wouldn’t let me go fall into its comfort. She ran a tub full of cool water while she helped me undress. I lowered myself into the bath steam rose off my dry desert skin. An eternity passed by while I was submerged in the water, I drifted dimly in and out of reality.

“I know what’s wrong with her,” my father’s whisper echoed loudly through my dreamy conscious.

“We can’t be sure! White River said there was a possibility,” My mother started.

“He said because of who her real parents are she might be cursed!” My father barked.

“No, he said there was a possibility that she’d be normal as long as she didn’t…” my mother trailed off.

“She killed someone tonight, Samantha. She may not have saw a human form, but it was still murder.”

“NO!” Mom hissed. “It was self-defense, and that cannot count against her!”

“But it does!”

“We’ll find out on the first full moon,” Mom sighed.

“That’s tomorrow night.”

“I know.” Suddenly Mom was sobbing, Dad was shushing her… Am I adopted?

I tried to speak, my lips wouldn’t move. I tried to move my arms, but they were too sore. I opened my eyes; no one was near me, footsteps pounded in my head. I could hear the dial tone of the landline before someone began punching numbers. “Are you alright, sweetie,” Mom asked. I shook my head frantically. “Let’s see if we can’t put you to bed, I think you’ve been in the bath long enough.”

“Mr. White River? This is Father Waters. Can you please come and check on Dahlia; she has a high fever, says her muscles and joints ache, and she keeps throwing up?”

“Mom,” I croaked in a whisper.

“Shush, save your strength for the doctor. Alright? He’ll be here…”

“At noon? Yes, that’s fine. Sam or I will be home. Thank you.” Dad finished, the phone clinked against the receiver.

“He’ll be here at noon,” I cut my mother off in that same whispered tone. Five minutes later Dad knocked on my bedroom door confirming what I’d told Mom. I almost missed her shocked expression.

“Get some sleep, Dahlia.” I took a sip of the tea she’d put by my bed, before I lay back against my pillow. Nightmares of growling wolves and dead bodies filled the backs of my eyelids.