Scents
 

 by Michelle Wilder
 
A story of another world

-

Dane laughed and squirmed almost the same way I had, and kissed my cheek.

"Yes, we kiss and even have... ~sex~!" He made big eyes and grinned his head off, his ears all over the place. "But nobody becomes Waere from our human forms."

His smile drooped at the end. I thought of all the things Father'd told us, about what even Waere used to think we were. About the curse and devil stuff. About Mum.

"Hey, Maisie..." Dane hugged me closer.

"Not everyone wants the same things. He loves me and I love him... it's just something he doesn't want."

-

"How did you meet?"

Dane had been describing Tony's amazing record collection that he bought at yard sales and used shops and how he had some of just about every kind of music and they'd have parties where their friends danced and sang along to whatever was on...

His eyes kind of looked at something that wasn't where I could see and he smiled whenever he thought of him. I wanted to hear him smile like that even more.

"We both took the same evening class at the college downtown. Small business accounting." He really grinned, bigger and bigger. "He came over and asked if the seat beside me was taken and just introduced himself. So I said sure, no, hi, and thought, hey, another ortho boy I can't even talk to..."

I laughed at his face, one ear back and the other almost waving. He giggled.

"Exactly. Except he ~wasn't~ straight, and he ~wasn't~ hard to talk to, and by the end of that first class we were already friends and just kept getting friendlier..." He winked and I cracked up at it, and how bad he was at it compared to Father.

Thinking of him, picking up Mum and what I'd have to tell her, I lost my smile pretty fast.

"How did you tell him? That you were a Waere..?"

"You mean, how are ~you~ going to tell your mother?" Dane smiled un-funny. I didn't smile at all. His hand was suddenly too interesting to look at anything else, too...

"I dunno how I'm going to tell her about anything..."

Dane twisted his hand around to hold one of mine tight and pulled me over a bit. "Hey. It's not that bad... Let me tell you about me, okay?"

He pulled me over a bit and hugged one arm around me.

"Wellllll... we'd gone out on some late dinner and dancing kind of dates and I gradually found out Tony was really liberal, like he was against ortho or conservative stuff... and then I asked what he thought about magic people, like healers and sorcerers and, finally, when I was pretty sure I was falling head-over-heels in love with him and couldn't really go any further without starting to lie, I asked Aya, and she knew him from taking him to her place and her coming over and we'd all gone out together... and well, she said she thought he was worth the risk," he made a face like, grrrr, "and who'd even believe him if he freaked? And there aren't any other fey Waere south of Whitehorse, believe it or not, and so I raised the topic of Waere, like if they were real..."

He grinned at me. "And he was all like 'Ohmigawd, wouldn't that be incredible?!' And, 'I remember this old movie from England!' And.. he even used to pretend he was a Waere." He made a silly smile.

"But he doesn't really want to? Be Waere?"

"No." He smiled like it was okay, though. "That was just a pretend thing, and it was pretty different when he didn't even know we were real."

"What did he say when you told him? How did you?"

"Well, I told him at my apartment, and I had Aya there too, just so I'd feel less nervous, and we'd called Mom and Dad that afternoon to tell them I was gonna tell him and they said as long as we trusted him and he was 'worth the risk.'" He made a grrr face again.

"Anyway, I guess he figured something big was up from how freaked I was, but I just took a breath and said, 'I'm so scared I'm shaking, but I love you and want you to know before we go any further, but I'm Waere.' And he got big eyes and froze a bit while I guess he decided if I was crazy and we waited to see if he'd freak and if he did Aya was going to tell him I was joking and I was really a mental patient, but he finally said, "Really?" and I nodded, and the rest is an ~epic~ love story!"

"And you got married?" It sounded like the perfect end to an epic love story...

"This spring." He smiled and wagged and waved my hand around a bit before hugging it. "He asked me last Steven's Day, got on his knee and gave me a silver ring and everything!"

"That's so sweet..." I changed my mind to more romantic than epic.

"It was. He is. I can't wait till you can meet him..."

"You've been here for days! He must be worried about you!"

"No, I told him what we were going to do and Mom and Dad keep him up to date, between Aya and me calling them and Alfaarr talking to them last night when they were out for food. He knows I'm okay." He shoulder-bumped me. "And he knows staying with you for now is important."

"I'm glad you're here..."

I heard something, and then a second later... the noise of Father's car.

It stopped on the street and we could hear an occasional word. Waere. Jacob.

They'd already told her.

They sat out there a long time. We listened a long time, but still only heard single words.

"It's gonna be okay, Maisie. She loves you. She isn't a crazy ortho. She'll still love you." Dane pulled me in tight and licked my mouth. "I'm here for you. We're all here for you. And I bet Alfaarr's told hundreds of people! He must be an expert at it."

We finally heard the car doors open and Mum talking.

"... still don't know if you I believe you or not, Mr Alfer, but thank you for the ride here."

"You're very welcome, Maryanne."

Dane made a face and snickered. "Mr. Alfer?"

I pushed against him.

Had they really told her already? She was being polite, not scared or... How could she be so normal?

"Please..." The front door opened and I smelled all three of them. I was already standing and Dane stood too, which was good, since I was afraid to let go of his hand. Father stepped in and held the door, and smiled at us. A real smile.

Mum came in past him, pulling her silk scarf off, as normal as any other time, and she looked over at us and froze. Stopped walking.

My chest suddenly felt hollow. I couldn't understand her expression, like she was seeing strangers.

She looked at Dane and me and then at our hands and then just at me... and then up at Father. He nodded towards us. She looked back, and then into my eyes.

"Jacob?" She took a step towards me and dropped her scarf. "Is that you? You look..."

Her eyes opened really wide. She ran the last steps.

"Oh, Jacob! Are you alright?! You're so skinny..." She stopped hugging so tight and stepped back, holding my arms and looking me up and down.

"But you're- " She looked back at Aya and Father at the door and then at Dane.

"Why is he smaller? He looks like he did in school..."

"Mum..." I finally found my voice - and realized she was almost as tall as me. She stared at me.

"It wasn't the phone lines! You sound like when you were ten!" She hugged me again and looked at Father.

"You didn't say anything about this! Is this all some... story... to hide a spell?! I want the truth!"

She was holding me really tightly and I could feel her anger and I didn't understand it. What she was angry at, because it wasn't me...

Father looked at us like he didn't know what to say. Aya stared at me like she'd never even seen me before.

"NOW!!" Mum yelled at them, and Dane too.

"What have you done to my boy!"

"Mum." I didn't understand what she meant. Dr. Vivian said I was shorter...

"Mum." I took a breath and said it louder, and she looked at me. She smelled really scared, and it was scaring me more, too. She was scared of Father and them...

"They didn't do anything! I'm just... I'm different than they thought, but it's not their fault."

I tried to smile, to show her. To tell her.

"I don't know what they said... but I'm... just... Waere." I reached over and touched his shoulder. "Dane bumped into me and scratched me by... by accident... and, and I changed... on Thursday night, and I'm okay... and they're really nice people..."

She looked all over my face, confused. She still smelled scared and her eyes were too wide. I was starting to feel faint.

"But you're... younger. Why are you smaller? It must be a spell! Are you sick?" She sounded more worried for me than anything else, then, but she felt... the anger wasn't gone. I still could hardly breathe. Every time I tried I filled up with too many feelings...

"I... I turn..."

I was afraid. I was afraid to move too much and make her madder. Dane put his hand on my neck.

"She turns into a puppy."

I could hear him smile and he leaned in and whispered, "I was going to tell her you were crazy to think all this, but I think she believes you..."

"And he seems to somehow weigh less each time when he returns to human form, which he can't control just yet." Father didn't sound like he was smiling, but he was when I looked. Like everything was okay.

"She? Did you say she?"

Mum was staring at Dane. He smiled again and nodded.

"He turns into a female pup."

Before I could even ~think~ what I was gonna do to Dane for just saying it like that, I realized something terrible! Something else!

"Father! Dr. Vivian!"

I almost fell down trying to reach him. I couldn't breathe... Mum held me up and I could feel how confused she was, but I had to tell him.

"She'll ~change~!"

-

"She... she asked me to... to... lick her..." I looked at Dane and then back at Father. "Like Dane."

We were all sitting, except Father. He was pacing in the dining area.

He was a hundred different feelings too, all bad. He was mad at Dr. Vivian that she asked me to heal her and hadn't talked with him about it first, that she used me, he said, that she didn't even know if there were risks...

Explaining to Mum that there was a doctor who was a woman seemed to make him even madder, too. I thought it might be just that she was interrupting his worrying, but maybe just that it was secret... that she was.

He kept asking me what I could remember about what Dr. Vivian said, and tried to call her on the telephone three times but there was no answer. When he came back after the third try, I remembered something he hadn't asked.

"I think she was really sick."

"What? Sick?" Father looked at me and Mum.

Mum said, "Sick?"

"There was sour stuff, and a thing like a tree, or it tasted like one, and like apples, or the way they smell..." I tried to remember everything in the right order.

"I felt it when she examined me... and, and the second time, too, and the tree thing, it was in her chest and her ribs on that side and her..."

I didn't want to say it in front of Mum, but I knew it might be important. I still had to look just at my hands.

"It was in her... breast... bad... and it hurt her to breathe, before..."

Mum took a sharp breath. When I looked, she seemed mad, or confused...

She smelled scared again.

"She told you... about..."

"Maisie is a healer, Mrs. O'Hara. She healed a cut on my arm, and she made an old scar on a bone disappear at the same time, without even knowing I had it."

Mum looked at Dane's foot where he was waving it in the air. He grinned at me all crazy.

"I just realized! What if you turn me into a girl!? What will Tony say?"

I stared at him like he ~was~ crazy! "How can you joke about that?! She might change!" He just smiled.

"And if she does, she certainly knew what might happen. I'm not going to worry about that part, and I don't think you should. She's not going to panic or anything, and her husband must know about us because he knows about ~her~."

He was looking at Father at the end. And he was right, I guessed. Father had a look like he knew it too, with his ears up for the first time in minutes.

I still felt like she'd... betrayed me.

-

End of Part Eight