The subway platform was always a little creepy after dark; muggers and homeless people were quick to harass anyone who dared encroach on their domain.
However, the couple that just entered the rail car felt no such fear as they embarked.
"You're not a vegetarian, are you?"
The two of them sat next to each other, the only people in the car.
"No."
"Good. That would've been very awkward."
Gwen rested her head on Trent's shoulder. He sighed as he caressed her cheek.
"Do you have any family?"
"Mom, dad, baby sister. You?"
"No."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. All I really had was Courtney."
Trent glanced out the window at the skyline. He sighed again. The city looked beautiful at night, but couldn't compare to the sight sitting next to him.
Trent fished the keys out of his pants pocket and opened the door of his apartment. He led Gwen to the living room and sat her down on the couch.
She nodded and caught herself before she fell. She darted around at the unfamiliar surroundings, then looked up at Trent.
"I'd have taken you home, but I didn't know where you lived."
"That's okay. Gonna be a hell of a walk in the morning, though." Gwen rested her head on the cushions. "Nice place."
"Thanks." Trent sat in a chair near the couch. "So, what did you mean, 'all I really had was Courtney'?"
Gwen exhaled. "We were very close."
"It started when we were little girls."
A playground on a sunny day. Young boys and girls playing. A brunette girl in a lavender dress sat atop the slide, ready to go down. Freckles dotted the middle of her face and her short brown hair was tied in pigtails.
Before she could slide down, a larger kid shoved her aside. As he slid down, the brunette hung off the side. She started to breathe heavily, tears forming in her eyes.
"Help!", she cried as loud as she could.
Another girl with a band through her dark hair sat in the sandbox making castles, getting sand on her blue dress. She heard the girl's cry and ran toward her mother.
"My mother got her down. She was pretty shaken up, but other than that, she was fine."
The dark-haired girl ran up to the brunette. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah. That jerk shouldn't have been on the slide."
"I'm Gwen."
"Nice to meet you. I'm Courtney."
The two girls hugged and hooked their pinkies.
"From that point, we were inseparable."
Pictures of the two girls lined the walls, from hugging and smiling in their dresses to smiling gap tooth smiles as they each held up a loose tooth, to holding onto each other in graduation robes.
The pictures rattled above a bed in a college dorm. Laying in the bed was Courtney, making love to a young man with a green Mohawk in the middle of his dark hair.
"We were pledging a sorority at that time."
Gwen walked in and dropped her backpack on the bed. "Oh, my God."
"Gwen!"
She glanced over and saw Courtney and her guest, who eyed Gwen ravenously.
"I'm sorry, Courtney. Didn't know you had company."
The brunette hit her forehead. "Where are my manners? Gwen, this is Duncan. Duncan, Gwen."
"Nice to meet you." Gwen gave a slight wave.
"Pleasure's all mine." Duncan flashed Gwen a smile.
"To this day, I'm not sure how it happened, but the two of us fell into a relationship."
Duncan and Gwen backed into a washroom and took their clothes off, kissing each other all the while.
They stumbled into a bathroom stall and slammed the door.
Outside the library, Gwen sunk to her knees and cried. Duncan took a drag off of a cigarette.
"What's wrong with you?"
"Courtney."
"What about her?"
"Us. This is gonna kill her."
"That's if she finds out. You care for her, right?"
"Yeah."
"And you wouldn't want to hurt her in any way, right?"
"Yeah."
"So it's settled: she never finds out about this."
In their dorm room, Gwen wept at Courtney's feet. "I'm so sorry about this. I swear, I didn't want any of this to happen."
Courtney opened her mouth to say something, but the ringing of her phone cut her off. "Hello?" She nodded at what was being said to her. "Fine." Courtney pocketed her phone and put on her coat.
"What's wrong?"
"Heather wants to see us. Emergency meeting." Gwen followed Courtney to the door, but she stopped at seeing the brunette's finger in her face. "And you can bet we'll talk about this later." Courtney's voice dropped to an unnerving octave. Gwen whimpered a little; she'd never been spoken to that way before, least of all by Courtney.
At the beautifully appointed sorority house, Heather stood on the front stairs. "So, ladies, on this full moon, we will be spending the night in Fairview Field."
One of the pledges - a wide-eyed girl with short, pigtailed red hair - raised her hand. "For how long?"
A wicked smile crossed Heather's features. "Until I get bored."
"Little did any of us know that there were wolves creeping around the fields."
Fairview Field. Quiet, vast. The sorority sisters ran in different directions, hoping to avoid the feral wolves.
One wolf advanced on Courtney. She froze in fear. From ten feet away, Gwen charged, knocking Courtney out of the way. The wolf sunk its teeth into Gwen's midsection.
"Gwen!", Courtney cried. Another wolf leapt at her from behind, sinking its teeth into her shoulder blade.
Screams and howls filled the air.
"As we soon found out, those were no ordinary wolves."
A loud collection of howls came from within the sorority house.
"About a month later, Courtney and I invited Duncan over."
It was around two in the morning, long after everyone had gone to sleep. The full moon shone brightly in the night sky.
Duncan knocked on the door of their room. Within moments, the door opened and he stepped in. The room was completely dark.
"Where are you?"
"Come by the bed." Courtney giggled.
"I can't see the bed."
"Just follow our voices."
Duncan felt around for the bed. "Come on, girls. Help me out."
The sounds of cracking and growling could be heard as Duncan continued to stumble.
Duncan fell onto one of the beds. He rolled over to perhaps get a better look.
The light switched on. Duncan paled as he saw not the girls, but a pair of wolf creatures in stretched and ripped negligees. One had dark hair with teal highlights, while the other, angrier-looking one had short brown hair.
He was at a genuine loss what to say or do.
"WANT. US. BOTH?", growled the wolf with highlights.
"YOU. HAVE. US!"
The wolves charged at Duncan faster than he could react. The sounds of snapping jaws and cracking bones filled the air.
Gwen, having returned to human form, stared in horror at what she'd done.
"I wasn't very proud of myself and I'd never told anyone about it until now."
Courtney stepped over Duncan's mangled corpse and shook Gwen out of her appalled state.
"I'd thought that Courtney overreacted a little, but I could never bring myself to tell her."
She hooked her pinky and grabbed Gwen's pinky with it. Gwen glanced at Courtney and smiled through her tears. The two of them hugged.
"We did our best to dispose of the body and we tried to go on with our lives, but Heather found out and, from then on, we were stuck in the pack."
Gwen slumped down in her seat. Trent, sat next to her. "Okay, that is an incredible story."
"The funny thing about that incident - with Duncan, not the wolves - is that it made Courtney and I stronger. We were closer than ever after that."
"I'm very sorry about Courtney, but I really think she'd want you to be happy, no matter what."
Gwen looked up at Trent. "You're right." She stood up, gazing out at the window. "So, what do you say we get a good run in while the moon is out."
"'We'?"
"Unless you know any other wolves you're meeting tonight."
Trent shrugged. "I don't know. I was thinking we could stay in…amuse ourselves, somehow." He slowly approached her.
"What are you saying?"
"I don't know about you, but I'm feeling pretty frisky." In the past, he'd have been nervous about saying this to a woman, but the glint in his eyes said that he wasn't that guy, anymore.
Gwen's nose stretched into canine form. She took a deep sniff. "I can smell it on you." Her nose shrunk back to its dainty human one. "Truth is, so am I."
"Seriously, how are you able to change your body parts like that?"
Gwen stepped on her tiptoes and whispered in Trent's ear. "If you're good, I'll teach you."
Trent rushed to the bathroom and threw open the door of his medicine cabinet. He pulled out a box of condoms.
"You're gonna need two." Trent spun around. Gwen was right behind him. "I have a feeling."
The sun peeked through the window into Trent's bedroom. He put his arm over his eyes to block out the sudden onslaught of brightness.
Through his haze, he stepped on several articles of clothing. If he'd been even semi-conscious, he'd have noticed that they were torn apart, as if ripped to shreds.
He shambled to the bathroom and flipped on the light switch. He took a look at himself in the mirror. He was completely human.
Trent focused on his shoulder blade. Two bite marks. It wasn't a dream. He turned around and glanced at his back. Reflected in the mirror were three deep scratch marks on either side. He tentatively touched one. A little sore.
He peeked out at Gwen sleeping in his bed. Definitely not a dream.
The phone rang and shook Trent from his reverie. He picked it up. "Hello?"
"Did you bring dogs into your apartment last night?"
Trent gulped. "Dogs?"
"I could hear a couple of dogs howling in your apartment last night. Almost like they were in heat."
Trent chuckled to himself. 'In heat' wasn't too far from the truth. In fact, he distinctly remembered Gwen's wolf form lying on her stomach on the bed and his own wolf form saying, "WANT. SEE. YOU."
"You know damn well this place doesn't allow animals!"
"No, Mr. Hatchett. What had happened was that I had Tivo'd a documentary on the mating habits of wolves and I was only able to get around to watching it last night. I'm sorry if it was too loud." Trent exhaled, amazed that he was able to come up with something off the top of his head like that.
"Okay. Just keep your TV watching at a reasonable volume."
"I will. I promise." The click on the other end allowed Trent to hang up.
A slight moan from his bed. Gwen stretched a little before settling back to sleep.
Trent's cell phone rang, clattering from within his drawer. He opened it and pulled the phone out.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Trent." It was Geoff. "What happened to you?"
"Happened?" Trent started to pace.
"Last night, at Electro Light's. You just disappeared."
"Well, I had to…take care of something. How'd you even get this number?"
"I have everyone's number", Geoff said with nonchalance. "So, something…or someone?"
Trent stopped as he gazed at Gwen laying in bed. "I hardly think that's your business."
"Thinking hardly. Got it." As Geoff chuckled, Trent rolled his eyes. "So, did you have a wild night?"
Gwen rolled onto her stomach, revealing three deep scratch marks on either side of her back.
Trent sighed. "You could say that."
A/N: Yet another Halloween where I finish up a story about monsters and "Total Drama". Funny thing: unlike last year, I'd planned this story months in advance...and I'm still getting it up at the last minute. Go figure.
For the few who did, thanks for reading and reviewing.
