Chapter 2- Close Call
I open my eyes, and see my wolf-wife leaning over me. Her ears are bent at the middle, the tips sticking out. "Good morning," I say while smiling up at her.
"You were having a bad dream, I tried to wake you." She lays down next to me, propping her head up on a paw. She runs a claw tip on my chest, drawing patterns in my fur. "What were you dreaming about?" She asks softly.
"Nothing important, just regular stuff." Her ears flatten out.
"What's nine line?"
"I talk in my sleep?"
She nods, I delay my answer, trying to think of a good lie.
"What IS nine line?" She asks again, looking annoyed that I'm taking too long to answer.
So I tell the truth, kind of.
"It's a military code for medical evacuation, I probably heard it on TV or..." I glance over and see the clock! Fuck it's 9:30!
"Fuck!" I leap out of bed, I run into my closet and grab a pair of khaki slacks and a blue t-shirt with white stripes. I come out of the bathroom hopping on one foot trying to get my pants on. My wolf-wife is sitting on her knees, watching me. "Where are you going?" She asks.
"I'm...I'm late for work?" I stop and look over at her. She's sitting on her knees naked, watching me with her phone in her paw.
"It's Sunday..." she says, rubbing her forehead with her palm.
"I don't work on Sunday..."
"Ok, husband, come here." She shifts into a cross legged position, and pulls herself closer to the edge of the bed.
I walk up to her, but she just points to the bed next to her and says "Sit."
I sit and face her, my two legs hanging off the bed. I look at her and I must have looked super pathetic because she said "don't look at me like that," and grabs my ears rubbing them up like she was milking a cow.
"I'm not mad at you, I'm worried about you. I need you, Gavin needs you to be ok. So I am going to call Dr. Grover..." I try to interrupt "C'mon, I'm..." She reaches out and gentle holds my mouth shut with her paw and continues. "I AM going to call Dr. Grover, he said he was free today till noon. He can be here in 15 minutes. Talk to him, let him look at you... Please." She sounds so concerned.
"Ok, ok." She pats my cheek and starts to walk out of the room towards the hallway. Do people here just walk around naked, with no concern for modesty?
As I complete that thought process, she turns around "Maybe Dr. Grover should look at me. I'm losing my mind too." She laughs, ruffling her head fur with both paws. She steps into the bathroom, emerging moments later wearing a silky blue robe.
I guess I ruined our lazy Sunday morning. I stand up and stretch. Today's as good a day as any to start working out again.
I start doing pushups, I get to 20 and then they started getting exponentially harder. Push-up, sit-up, my-wolf wife came in looking concerned while I was doing burpees. She just looked at me, and said "Dr Grover will be here in 10 minutes... make sure you tell him about this." She gestures at my burpee performance.
I use the bathroom with far greater proficiency, only peed on the floor a little this time. Brushed my teeth, quickly brushed myself out. I sniff myself, I don't seem to need to shower as often as I used to. Normally I'd be real ripe after 2 days.
I look at myself in the mirror. I flex my muscles. I do a few different poses, and well, let's just say if I was selling tickets to the gun show these baby's would be on discount. I'm low fat, and I don't look too skinny, but when I poke myself, I can tell there is like an inch of fluff hiding how skinny I actually am.
I decided to wear the khakis I pulled out earlier, and a navy blue collared t-shirt.
"Dr. Grover is here!" I hear my wolf-wife call out.
I step out into the hall, I hear the voice of another man, sounds older with a bit of a South African accent.
I walk with a bit of a strut, feeling good about myself.
"Kyle, my friend, what are you feeding this little man, he's getting huge!" Asks a giant lion, easily twice my height. Gavin barely comes up to his knee. He has to hunch over to avoid hitting his head on the ceiling arch that separates the kitchen from the living room. His fur is pale yellow, with some grey fur around his muzzle, and his mane is dark brown. He's wearing white button down shirt with red tie, green corduroy pants, white jacket, a brown trench coat over that and some little round glasses on his perched on his nose.
He looks at me and his smile fades, he looks back at my wolf-wife. She just gestures at me and shrugs, "This is what I was telling you about."
"My friend, you look like you've seen a ghost."
"Nah, I'm good." I go to lean on the wall, but I've left the hallway and there is an extra 2 feet between me and the wall I'm trying to lean on. I catch myself before I fall.
Gavin starts laughing hysterically. Little fucker, I literally cared for your ass yesterday and this is the gratitude I get.
"Kyle, how long have we known each other?"
30 seconds? I think to myself but I say,
"A long time?"
"Yes, a long time. Why do you seem frightened by me?"
"I just haven't seen you in a while is all."
He takes a deep breath, and looks at my wolf-wife. I'm pretty sure I answered that question incorrectly.
My wolf-wife's ears are bent at the middle again, like when I woke up from my nightmare. That must indicate concern, or fear. I reach up and feel my ears, they are flat to my skull and jetting out like wings, I look down and my tail is poking out from between my legs.
"Indeed." says Dr. Grover.
"What?" I shrug.
"This started yesterday morning? 4am?"
"Yes, he was having a nightmare, and when he woke up he was different. He looks sad and worried all the time. Last night I tried to... initiate with him, and he acted so frightened." She puts her paws on Gavin's shoulders and holds him tight.
"Kyle, come here, let me get a better look at you." He gestured at me to come with his huge paw, the claws extending from his fingertips are bigger than my fingers.
As I approach, he moves towards my couch and sits down. Even sitting I'm barely eye to eye with him.
"Relax, this won't hurt, I assure you."
He takes a wooden stick out of his trench coat, "Open your mouth."
I hope I'm his first patient of the day. I open my mouth and he puts it my mouth pressing down my tongue. He flicks on a light I didn't even see him pull out and shines it down my throat. Then he puts the wooden stick back in his pocket.
I just lost all faith in the medical practices of this world. Maybe after this guy leaves, I can see another doctor for the strep throat he just gave me.
He puts his big paws around my neck and I can feel his finger pads gently prodding the underside of my jaw and sides of my neck.
He leans forward and looks in my eyes shining a light.
"Kyle, what did you do yesterday?"
"When she left, me and Gavin hung out, he played a game on my phone. He showed me some of his books, and then went for food..." He raises a finger.
"Showed you his books? Which books?"
I start to answer but Gavin jumps in to throw me under the bus some more.
"My animal book, and math book. I taught Daddy different mammals, and math... he needs work!" Gavin says with a strong nod.
"We were.. ya know, playing. Daddy son bonding time"
"Kyle, what's 60 times 50?"
"300" I say
"See, it's 110." says Gavin.
"Gavin, I'm very impressed you can add such big numbers, he must get that from his mom." I wink at my wolf-wife. Gavin stands tall, feeling proud of himself.
"Kyle, what am I?" Says the doctor.
"You're a lion."
"What are you?"
"A Wolf"
"May I?" He gestures at the tv remote.
"Sure."
He flips through channels asking me what various animals are. I get them all right except I call a fox a coyote, much to Gavin's disappointment.
"What's your address?"
"Why all these questions Doc?" I inquire.
"I mean no offense, I'm just checking your mental faculties. What is your address?"
I saw my ID, "3215 Carter Dr, Happytown."
"Ok, that's good, very good". I smile, try and ask me a hard one, ya dumb lion.
My wolf-wife speaks up "So he's OK?"
"Yes, he's Ay-Oh-Kay"
"So why is he acting so strange?"
He turns to look at her "He doesn't know us."
Ugh, wait I can salvage this! "Of course I know you, you're Dr. Grover, my family doctor. She's my beautiful wolf-wife, and that little guy is Gavin, our son."
"You said all of our names, except Rachel's, why didn't you use her name?"
I look at my wolf-wife, she looked confused when he said Rachel, nice try lion! "That's not her name." I give him a smug smile.
"No, I suppose not. So what is her name? Or Gavin's birthday? Or your mom's name?" Fuck! My smile fades.
He sighs, "that explains why said he hasn't seen me in a long time, despite seeing me 2 days ago. He didn't feel comfortable being intimate with you because from his perspective he just met you. He's afraid because everything is new to him. And sad because, well he's lost and confused."
I look at her and she looks at me, her ears flatten out. She walks over to me, and takes my paw against her face. "Kyle... my love, what's my name?" I open my mouth and hesitate. Her eyes start to water.
"What's my name, please, please say it?" Her pleas are urgent, she's been so strong this whole time. But I can see she's about to break, and it's my fault. I just exhale and shake my head "I'm sorry." She brings her paws to her mouth, as tears start to fall she steps towards me wrapping her arms around my neck. "It's ok, we can fix this." She says through tears.
I'm stunned, I stand there in shock for a few seconds. Then I curl my arms around her waist, and hold her tight.
Gavin starts to cry "mommy why are you crying?"
She pulls away from me, and crouches beckoning Gavin, he runs up and she hugs him, picking him up.
She asks "How can we fix this Dr. Grover?"
I'm not a very emotional person, I don't remember the last time I cried... but I feel myself getting choked up, all this emotion, the fact she still has faith in her husband after learning he doesn't even know her name. Although, no one seems particularly interested in telling me, even now..
"I do not know, the good news is that he seems to be able to form new memories. He memorized his address, and the different kinds of animals thanks to Gavin." He takes off his glasses and cleans the lenses with a little cloth from his pocket. "Maybe all his memories come back, maybe they never do and you have to form new ones together."
"How did this happen to him?"
"It must be related to him becoming ill at work, his toxicology hasn't come back yet. It seemed mild and of little concern, I never imagined...I expect to have results by Wednesday. I'll call the moment I learn anything. I may need you to come to my office for more tests." He pulls a notepad out of his pocket and writes something. "This is a doctor's note, to excuse you from work if need be. I'll be in touch." He stands up and walks to the front door. My still yet unnamed wolf-wife walks him to the door, thanking him for coming in such short notice.
I sit on the couch and hold my head in my paws. What an emotional Sunday morning. I hear the front door close. Gavin sits next to me, I bring my paws away from my face so I can see him.
He smiles at me, "Do you want to work on your math?" He asks.
I smile back "Sure."
Note from the author:
I originally wanted to write the nightmare sequence.
first I wrote accurately about a personal experience. but it was too difficult,
second i created a fictitious experience with realistic tones. that was also too difficult.
i felt it was better to be vague about everything. but if i do write any details about this guys trauma, i am going to use all fake names and locations.
so if you are a vet or just enthusiast you might say to yourself "hey! that sounds like Khyber Pass, but that's not where the real Khyber Pass is!" this is why.
criticism is appreciated,