Back from the dead! WIP Wednesday!
Okay, I think I'm going to start trying to post here a little more regularly again; I've been hanging out on Twitter quite a bit, but some of the fandom drama is really starting to get to me. AND ANYWAY, I've been doing NaNoWriMo, although I tapped out at 20,000 words because I really need to figure out where the hell I'm going with this book before I go even more off the rails than I already have.
So, this is not that book. This is from last year's NaNo fic, which I am trying to edit into some semblance of coherence so I can put it up on Amazon or something. Featuring werewolf siblings and fraught family dynamics:
The front door banged shut behind them. Darren sank down into a kitchen chair, then dropped his face into his palms. He was still sitting like that when Jamie crashed through the back door in a gust of cold wind and bad temper.
“Close that,” Darren said without looking up.
“Fuck you,” she snapped, kicking it shut with a bang that made the windows rattle. Outside, the Fisks’ truck was starting up with an uneven rumble, Helen’s little car already puttering down the snowy driveway. “Did you know about this?”
“What the hell do you think?” Darren asked. On some level, he wished he had the energy to snap at her, to give her the fight she was so clearly spoiling for, but he couldn’t. “No. I didn’t know. I found out today, same as you.”
“This never would have happened when Mom and Dad were alive.”
“I know,” Darren said, and oh, there was the anger, welling up the back of his throat and sharpening his teeth, twisting his voice into a lower register. “You think I don’t know that?”
“But we’re just going to stay here, aren’t we? Simon said his dad asked if we wanted to go with them, and you said no.”
“This is our home-”
“But everybody else is gone. Mom and Dad are gone, and everybody else is leaving, and you’re the one always lecturing me about being careful, but you’re staying here, and you’re making me stay here too, and there are hunters in the woods and you don’t even care as long as you get to stay the alpha!”
Her voice had been rising on every word. There was fur spreading out from the her temples, the bridge of her nose flattening, her green eyes turning wolf-yellow.
“Calm down,” Darren said. He realized almost the instant the words were out of his mouth that it had been exactly the wrong thing to say.
“Calm down?” Jamie snapped through sharpening teeth, her voice thick and mangled. “Calm down?”
“Look, could you just-”
“No,” she snarled. “I’m going for a run. I’ll be back when I don’t feel like ripping your throat out. It might be a while.”
Before he could respond, she shifted entirely, falling on all fours as a lean black wolf, fur still puffed in anger, her clothes pooling around her until she wriggled out of them. It was an undignified process that would have been comical in any other circumstances; there was a reason most wolves stripped before they shifted.
He couldn’t bring himself to laugh, though. “Just be careful, okay? Please?”
The wolf lifted her lip at him, then stalked across the kitchen, nosed the door open, and vanished out into the cold.
So, this is not that book. This is from last year's NaNo fic, which I am trying to edit into some semblance of coherence so I can put it up on Amazon or something. Featuring werewolf siblings and fraught family dynamics:
The front door banged shut behind them. Darren sank down into a kitchen chair, then dropped his face into his palms. He was still sitting like that when Jamie crashed through the back door in a gust of cold wind and bad temper.
“Close that,” Darren said without looking up.
“Fuck you,” she snapped, kicking it shut with a bang that made the windows rattle. Outside, the Fisks’ truck was starting up with an uneven rumble, Helen’s little car already puttering down the snowy driveway. “Did you know about this?”
“What the hell do you think?” Darren asked. On some level, he wished he had the energy to snap at her, to give her the fight she was so clearly spoiling for, but he couldn’t. “No. I didn’t know. I found out today, same as you.”
“This never would have happened when Mom and Dad were alive.”
“I know,” Darren said, and oh, there was the anger, welling up the back of his throat and sharpening his teeth, twisting his voice into a lower register. “You think I don’t know that?”
“But we’re just going to stay here, aren’t we? Simon said his dad asked if we wanted to go with them, and you said no.”
“This is our home-”
“But everybody else is gone. Mom and Dad are gone, and everybody else is leaving, and you’re the one always lecturing me about being careful, but you’re staying here, and you’re making me stay here too, and there are hunters in the woods and you don’t even care as long as you get to stay the alpha!”
Her voice had been rising on every word. There was fur spreading out from the her temples, the bridge of her nose flattening, her green eyes turning wolf-yellow.
“Calm down,” Darren said. He realized almost the instant the words were out of his mouth that it had been exactly the wrong thing to say.
“Calm down?” Jamie snapped through sharpening teeth, her voice thick and mangled. “Calm down?”
“Look, could you just-”
“No,” she snarled. “I’m going for a run. I’ll be back when I don’t feel like ripping your throat out. It might be a while.”
Before he could respond, she shifted entirely, falling on all fours as a lean black wolf, fur still puffed in anger, her clothes pooling around her until she wriggled out of them. It was an undignified process that would have been comical in any other circumstances; there was a reason most wolves stripped before they shifted.
He couldn’t bring himself to laugh, though. “Just be careful, okay? Please?”
The wolf lifted her lip at him, then stalked across the kitchen, nosed the door open, and vanished out into the cold.