and stepfather’s house. It was close to the hospital and to the university where they both worked.
Micah started to protest, saying, ‘I’m not going to leave.’
Nathaniel had moved close to him and spoke low. ‘We all need food.’
‘I’m not hungry,’ Micah said.
‘Your beast is, because mine is, and Anita carries more than one hunger inside her.’
We both looked at our third. I don’t know about Micah, but I felt stupid for not remembering that we weren’t just human. Going without enough food had consequences for wereanimals beyond just low blood sugar. We, and everyone with us, had iron self-control of our ‘hungers,’ but iron wasn’t impenetrable.
‘You are under a lot of stress,’ Nathaniel said. ‘It makes it harder to control everything.’
‘I hate to leave him now that I’m back,’ Micah said.
I took his hand and said, ‘The doctors will call when he starts to come around, and Nathaniel is right. We don’t want your family to meet your beast unexpectedly. Do we?’
‘My control is better than that,’ he said, and sounded defensive, which was rare for him.
Nathaniel hugged him one-armed so I could keep his hand. ‘You have the most amazing control of anyone I’ve ever met, my Nimir-Raj, but no one is perfect, not even you. Don’t let guilt make you stupid, not now. You have your family again; let’s not scare them by a surprise shapeshift.’
His mother came up then and said, ‘Beth is so excited to see you.’
I wasn’t sure if it was Nathaniel’s common sense or seeing his little sister again, but whichever, we won, and off we all went.
Cousin Juliet drove us, because part of our luggage was still in the back of her SUV. She was going to help us unload and then go home to her own kids and husband. She said, ‘I’ll give you all some time alone.’
Nicky was in the front seat beside her this time. He turned around and looked back at Micah in the center of the backseat, sandwiched between Nathaniel and me. ‘We can stay in the kitchen or living room, if you want to talk privately.’
‘Thanks, Nicky,’ Micah said. ‘I don’t know what I want. I can’t get past the fact that Mom sold the house five years ago. I’ve never seen the house we’re going to.’ He sounded sad when he said it.
I squeezed his hand. ‘It would be weird if my dad sold the place I grew up in.’
Nathaniel leaned his head against Micah’s hair. ‘I don’t remember much about the house I lived in until I was seven, and after that I never had a home until now.’
Juliet asked, ‘What happened when you were seven?’
Nathaniel raised his head from Micah and said, ‘My mother died of cancer, and my stepfather beat my brother to death.’ He told the information as if there were no emotional content to it, dry, just facts. I told about my mother’s death when I was eight the same way – most of the time.
‘I’m so sorry, Nathaniel; I wouldn’t have asked if I’d known.’ She glanced back at him, her face showing what most well-socialized people look like when a simple question gets a tragic answer.
‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘There was no way for you to know.’
‘Car,’ Nicky said.
‘Turning in front of us,’ I said, pulse speeding.
‘What?’ Juliet said, turning back in time to swerve around the front end of the car that was pulling out. She got the car back under control and said, ‘Sorry.’
‘No more looking back at us,’ I said. ‘Just drive, okay?’
‘It’s just …’ I watched her hands clutch the steering wheel. ‘It’s just so sad.’
‘There’s a lot of sad in the car,’ I said.
‘What do you mean?’ she asked, using the rearview mirror to glance behind at us this time.
I sighed. I had started it, damn it. ‘I lost my mother when I was eight.’
I waited for Nicky to give his contribution, but he stayed quiet and looked studiously ahead into the darkened road. His background was as tragic as Nathaniel’s, but it was his to share. I wouldn’t make him tell.
‘I can’t imagine losing my mom when I was so little.’
Micah put his arm around my shoulders and pulled Nathaniel’s hand onto his thigh, in that casual couple way. It made both of us snuggle into him.
Juliet was turning into a neighborhood of older, modest houses. Most of them were ranch-style with larger-than-normal yards for a suburban neighborhood, but others had smaller yards, because they were tucked up against walls of rock. It