Under My Skin

  "I'm not. But I'll look it up on the Internet. How hard can it be to fix?"

  She looks like she's going to say something else, but then she shakes her head and turns away.

  "Just finish your shower," she says in the same tone of voice that she had when I hit a baseball through the front window a couple of years ago. "At least you weren't hurt."

  I close the door slowly and look in the mirror again. I can't see any trace of the mountain lion. It's like it was before, just me, except this time I'm soaking wet. Finally, I turn away. I drop the towel and get into the shower.

  Marina

  I really don't want to leave Josh's place, but the detective won't let me stay. I think about hanging around until after he's gone, but who knows how long that'll be? From where I stand on the sidewalk, I can look in through the living room window and see them talking. I'm dying to hear what they're saying, but then the detective glances in my direction. He's got that smirk on his face again, so I turn my back to him. I drop my skateboard on the pavement and push off, heading for school. I'll just be a little early for my first class.

  I'm not sure whether Josh will even show up for school today. I know he'll tell me everything that happened when we do see each other and that's bound to be soon—after school at the latest—but the idea of having to wait is hard. We're never far apart for long, even though I'd like to be close in a different way. I'm just not sure that he feels the same toward me.

  Desmond rolls up on the sidewalk outside school at the same time as me.

  "Dude!" he yells, even though I'm right in front of him. "Did you check the newsfeeds this morning? Josh got himself kidnapped by some big-ass tiger or something! We've got to put a posse together and find him."

  "Jeez, chill, would you?" I say. "He's okay. I just came from his house. He walked in the door ten minutes ago, all on his own."

  "What? Crap, I hate being the last to know. How is he? Is he all scratched up? What happened?"

  "Who knows? Other than wearing a ridiculous pair of sweats and a Hannah Montana T-shirt, he looks fine. There's not a mark on him. But there was a cop at the house and he made me leave before I could find out what happened."

  "You should have texted me."

  "It all happened so fast I didn't think of it."

  Desmond nods, then he grins. "Oh, man. Hannah Montana. That's pure gold. He's never going to live it down."

  Seeing the look of anticipation on his face, I wish I'd never mentioned it. He's going to rag Josh mercilessly.

  "Dial it down, Wilson. We don't know what he's been through. We shouldn't assume that everything's fine until he tells us so himself."

  He grins. "Overprotective much?"

  I know he's teasing, but I bristle all the same. Des is a sweet goof, but sometimes he makes me want to smack him. Like right now.

  He catches my look and pretends to cringe.

  "Sorry," he says. "I get it. Let me buy you a slushie at lunch to make up for it."

  "That's more like it, gringo."

  We head up the walk and through the main doors, our boards under our arms. The school lobby is buzzing with gossip about Josh. Kids are standing around in little groups trading stories, trying to figure out what happened. Josh would hate this. He can't stand being the center of attention.

  As soon as the other kids notice Des and me in the lobby, we get a few stares because they all know we're best friends with Josh. The volume goes down some, but it doesn't matter. Every second word is still cougar, tiger, lion.

  I know, because my Wildling hearing is so acute.

  Josh

  I'm sitting in front of my computer looking at a list of plumbing sites that I Googled. So far, I haven't found anything useful to my real problem. Getting the sink fastened back to the wall and the pipes reconnected—that doesn't look too hard. It's the plaster that broke away from the wall that I need to figure out how to replace.

  I'm about to click on another link when my cell rings out the theme to that old TV show The Twilight Zone, played by The Ventures. Considering how things have been going for the past twenty-four hours, it seems all too appropriate.

  When I check the display, I see there's another text from Desmond: Dude yr back? Call me.

  It's the latest of a bunch from him. There's also a couple from Marina. I send them both a message to meet at the parking lot by the pier after they get out of school, then I turn off the phone, close down my computer and go out to the garage.

  Mom's parents own our house, which is why we can afford to live here, just a couple of blocks east of the boardwalk and the beach. Gramps was in on the whole Silicon Valley dot-com thing, but he got out before the bust, so he didn't lose his shirt like so many others. He bought this place because he always loved Santa Feliz—I think he used to vacation here when he was a kid—but he and Gramma live in Costa Rica now, which I guess they love even more. When Dad walked out on Mom and me, they insisted that we move in.

  I wasn't even in kindergarten yet, so living here is all I know. But even though we don't own the house, Mom insists we look after it like it's our own. I've learned how to do all kinds of things—from rebuilding a stone wall to replacing window panes.

  In the garage, I check under the workbench and sure enough, there's some screening left over from when we redid the windows last summer. I may not know how to fix big holes in plaster—yet!—but I know how to fix the damage I did to the screen door yesterday. I grab the roll of screening and some tools and step out of the garage on my way to the backyard.

  A prickle starts up at the nape of my neck and my gaze goes down the street to where a white man in a dark suit is standing in front of the Evoras' house, looking at a map. He's got one of those little Bluetooth headsets in his ear—the kind I always assume just drug dealers and people trying to look important wear—and it occurs to me that it could just as easily be some Secret Service communications device. I know. Paranoia. But he shoots me a look and hurries off as soon as he sees I've noticed him.

  I watch him turn the corner and Cory's words come back to me.

  Word is they're even snatching kids off the streets, or right out of their homes.

  The prickle at the nape of my neck intensifies, then slowly fades away.

  I stand there looking out of the garage for a few minutes, but he doesn't come back. I try to tell myself that it was nothing, but I can't remember the last time I saw somebody in a suit and tie on this street who wasn't a cop, like the detective who took my statement earlier today. The adults around here all wear golf shirts and chinos or shorts.

  Finally, I head to the backyard to fix the screen door. Mom comes out and actually smiles when she sees me at work.

  "I have to get back to the office for a few more hours," she says. "Will you be all right until I get back?"

  "Will Steve be coming around?"

  She shakes her head and gets that look in her eye that I know too well.

  "I told you," she says. "Steve won't be coming around at all anymore."

  "I'm sorry, Mom."

  I'm not, but it's the right thing to say.

  "Don't be," she says.

  I walk her to the car.

  "I was going to meet Desmond and Marina down by the pier when they get out of school," I say. "Is that okay?"

  "Of course it is. Tell them I said hi."

  I lean in her window after she gets into the car. She puts a hand on my arm before I can speak.

  "Stop looking so guilty," she says. "I should have seen it coming."

  I agree, but I keep my mouth shut.

  "Pizza tonight?" she says. "You can invite Desmond and Marina if you want. I'll pick up an extra large."

  "Sounds great."

  I watch her drive off, feeling the way I always do. Sad for her. Happy for me. Guilty because I feel happy.

  Why does everything have to be so complicated?

  Then I think of what else is going on in my life. Complicated doesn't begin to cover it.

  I'm sitting o
n a bench at the end of the pier watching the gulls when Desmond and Marina come rolling up on their skateboards. Desmond does a fancy dismount, steps on his board so that it flies up into his hand, then plonks himself down on the bench beside me. Marina does a circle around the bench before she drops down between us. I always get a kick out of how neither of them fits their image.

  Desmond looks like a surfer: tall, tanned, long blond hair tied back in a ponytail, wearing sneakers, baggy shorts and a loose T-shirt. But although he's got the surfer look, Des can't swim very well and doesn't even like the water. He's a skater, through and through.

  Girls love him. Marina says he's got a glow—a shine that draws like honey. I wouldn't know. I'm sure not the player he is. I've never even had a steady girlfriend.

  Marina, on the other hand, always gets mistaken for a skater. Brown-skinned and trim, her wild dark hair tamed under a skullcap, she's wearing baggy pants and a tight sleeveless T under her hoodie. But she only skates because it's what Desmond and I do. Her family may have come from Mexico, but she's an American surfer girl through and through. Her heart's out there with the waves, big or small. I paddle out with her sometimes, but I'm crap at it and I'm always falling off one of her spare boards.

  The place where we really come together is our music. We're all crazy about surf and spy instrumentals and have been playing in Desmond's garage for a couple of years. Marina on drums, Desmond on bass and keys, me on lead guitar. We've yet to play out anywhere—we haven't even agreed on a name—but we practice whenever we can.

  "What the hell happened to you?" Desmond asks.

  Marina nods and bangs her knee against mine. "Yeah, you really had us worried, Saunders."

  I'm still trying to decide what to tell them. They're my best friends, so I don't want to hide anything from them. But what if telling them puts them in danger? And what—I hate to think this—but what if this thing I've become turns them against me? Some people obviously have a lot of negative feelings toward Wildlings. When you think about it, it's pretty much the same as racism, which makes me feel kind of ashamed that I've never called my friend Dillon on it. What makes me feel worse is that I've called them freaks myself.

  I've thought about Marina and Des a lot since talking to Cory in the diner, how it would go if the roles were reversed and it was one of them instead of me. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't let it make a difference. Sitting here with them, feeling their concern, all I can do is give them the benefit of the doubt.

  "Don't look right now," I say, "but did you notice that black SUV parked at the far end of the lot?"

  Desmond starts to turn around but Marina elbows him in the side.

  "Jeez, Des," she tells him. "He said don't look right away." Then she turns to me. "What about it?"

  "I'm pretty sure whoever's in it has been watching me. It showed up just after I got here and nobody's gotten out of it in the ten minutes since."

  Desmond laughs. "Paranoid much?"

  But Marina gives me a considering look.

  "Why would anybody be watching you?" she asks.

  I take a breath and let it out.

  "That thing that's going around," I say. "It's happening to me. I've become a Wildling."

  Desmond grins. "Shut up."

  But I'm facing Marina as I speak. I see the flicker of something in her eyes—I don't know quite what—before she drops her gaze. When she looks up again, whatever it was is gone.

  "Oh, Josh," she says. She puts a world of empathy into the words.

  "Yeah," I say. "I know."

  Desmond jumps to his feet. "What's with the 'Oh, Josh'? This is awesome." He punches the air, once, twice. "So it was really you who laid out Steve?"

  I nod.

  "I never liked that guy," he says.

  "Who did?" I say.

  "Well, your mom, for one."

  Marina grabs his arm and pulls him back onto the bench. "This is serious, Des."

  "I know that. But come on. He can turn into a freaking tiger. How cool is that? I've always been afraid if it happened to me I'd end up like that kid who's some kind of South American tree frog. I mean, how useless would that be?"

  "Mountain lion. Not tiger." I say.

  "Whoa! Cooler still, dude." Desmond is practically bouncing, he's so excited.

  Marina shakes her head and turns back to me.

  "How do you feel?" she asks.

  "Scared. Confused. A little bit excited."

  Desmond grins. "Sounds like a good name for a tune."

  "Don't you ever stop joking?" Marina says.

  "I'm not. I think it would rock."

  "You know what I mean."

  Desmond nods. "Yeah, I do. But I think it's cool. Seriously. Do you know how often I lie in bed at night trying to decide what I'd want to be if I was a Wildling?"

  "Lay off, Wilson," Marina says.

  "It's okay," I tell her. "I'd rather get a response like that than the two of you screaming and running off."

  "We'd never do that."

  "I know. That's why I told you. But you can't tell anybody else." I look from one to the other. "Seriously. You can't. Swear to me you won't."

  Marina looks at me strangely. Maybe this isn't so okay with her. She seems uncomfortable, but I guess I can't blame her. It's not as though it's just some little quirk I have.

  "Sure," she says. "Of course. How did your mom take it?"

  "I haven't told her."

  Her eyebrow goes up and I know what she's thinking. I pretty much tell my mom everything.

  "Wait a minute," Desmond says. "Why can't we tell anyone? The cops know, Steve knows—unless you whacked him in the head when he was sleeping, which I'd totally get. The guy's buff. But keeping any of this secret? The cat's out of the bag, man, pun intended."

  "Actually, it's not," I say.

  I tell them the whole story, only leaving out the bit about the Joanie Jones pictures. I just say I was listening to demos The Wild Surf has posted on their site when Steve came into my room and hit me.

  Desmond laughs when I tell them about how I wrecked the sink, but they both get sober looks as I finish up with the guy in the suit I saw standing on my street.

  "Intense," Desmond says.

  Marina nods. "So you think whoever's in the SUV is connected to the man you saw?"

  "Or they're two separate groups with the same interest in me. Whichever, after what Cory told me, I just want to keep my head down."

  "So the change is permanent," Desmond says.

  "Yeah. But it doesn't mean I have to go running around in my Wildling shape. I just want things to get back to normal as soon as they can."

  "But Steve knows," Marina says.

  I nod. "There's that. But apparently he tripped up in telling his story to the cops. Maybe he's afraid he'll get charged for hitting me, or maybe he thinks I'll come after him and finish the job. Anyway, the cops seemed to believe me."

  "Unless they're just letting the Feds handle it," Desmond says.

  "Or Steve's talked to someone else," Marina adds.

  "I know. I'm so screwed."

  She gives me a sympathetic look and asks, "What are you going to do?"

  "Long term, I have no idea. Right now—Mom said I could invite you over for pizza. Tomorrow I'm going to school and get that gawk-fest over with."

  "Going to school," Desmond says. "With what you can do, that's like somebody winning the lottery and then just going back to their crappy job."

  "What am I supposed to do? Join the circus?"

  He shakes his head. "No. I'm just saying. Wildlings should be amazing. We should treat them like rock stars. But instead, it's like everything else—just another opportunity for people to make it all scary and weird."

  "The mountain lion that's inside you," Marina says. "That's a big animal. Is it hard to control?"

  "It's not a different creature inside me," I try to explain. "It's like I can be one or the other, but when I'm in my Wildling shape, I'm still supposed to be myself. I haven't quite
got the hang of that yet. But the good thing is, I have to actually will it to happen."

  "But the two times you changed before ... it sounds like it took over."

  "I know. But the first time, it caught me by surprise, and the second time, I was stupid enough to will it to happen and then got freaked out that it did."

  "I think it would freak me out, too," she says.

  "What would you be if it happened to you?" Desmond asks her. "I mean, if it was going to happen anyway, what animal would you choose?"

  She crosses and uncrosses her legs, then deflects the question to Des. "What would you choose?"

  "I'm kind of torn between a wolf and an eagle."

  "An eagle would be cool," I say. "You could just float up there away from everything."

  Desmond nods. "I know. But wolves. You've got to dig them."

  "I might want to be a dolphin," Marina says.

  Desmond and I both smile.

  "Yeah," Desmond says. "No big surprise there."

  We fall silent. I look out at the beach. Some kids are playing volleyball. There are surfers out past the end of the pier, but there aren't any waves, so they're just hanging there, sitting on their boards. People are fishing off the pier or just ambling along. A couple of kids we know are practicing tricks in the parking lot, their skateboards rattling on the pavement.

  I've already learned how to tune down the sharpness of my senses. But if I let myself, I could count the freckles on the red-haired surfer's face. I could hear the conversation that the man and woman are having where they lean on the railing and look out over the sea. I could smell the fish in the bucket of the old man with his rod hanging over the water. But I leave it all be. If I want to be seen as normal, the best thing I can do is act as normal as possible.

  I turn to my friends.

  "So what do you think?" I say.

  Desmond shrugs. "I don't know. I could go for pizza."

  Marina elbows him again. She does that lot.

  "Head down, lips sealed," she says. "And we'll have your back." Then she smiles. "Pizza would be good."

  "Hey," Desmond says, "maybe we should invite your friends in the SUV to come along."