Small Town Hero - #ONC 2024

Chapter 12

The rest of the weekend, I moped around the house, sticking mostly to my room, telling my mom I didn't feel good. Not bad enough to go to the doctor, but crummy enough to need rest. Of course, I tried to sleep but couldn't. So, with my bedroom door locked, I paced around, brainstorming for ways to get out of my predicament. I retraced everything that happened on Friday night. Yes, I played the football game of my life on a different level, displaying athletic abilities like never before. I picked up a car with my bare hands and kept it from killing me and Layla. After all that, I woke up in the middle of the woods and transformed into a freaking werewolf! Then, back in my room, I morphed into a vampire. How flipping strange was that? The question was, how could I free myself from this condition? Was I forever a werewolf or a vampire? Or both, a hybrid? A whatever? With that said, no matter how I rolled it around in my mind, I couldn't think of a cure for my illness. I just didn't know enough about the coach's pill to figure it all out.

But thankfully, the sensitivity to sunlight didn't return, nor the vampire fangs, or the excessive hair growth and muscle expansion that came with the werewolf transformation. For now, I was normal except for my body's new definition, which didn't make me look like I was on steroids or anything like that, but it was noticeable, especially when I wore a T-shirt and jeans. My short sleeves fit tightly around my biceps, and I couldn't hide the pronounced V-shape from my broad shoulders to my torso. The snug fit made me feel awkward, but I didn't care. I wasn't gonna change what I always wore or go rushing into town to buy new clothes. I was just gonna have to deal with the new me.

Speaking of that...

Sunday night, with my mom at work at the hospital, I slipped through my bedroom window, dropped from the oak tree to the ground and took off for the woods behind my house. I ran through the pine forest to see if the coyotes would attack again. I got nothing. Not a single hit. But... I didn't just run. I smoked a trail through the pines, sprinting faster than humanly possible. I don't know how fast I ran, but I knew the coyotes couldn't catch me if they tried. And there was something else. The strength it took to lift Layla's car hadn't left me. I realized this when I drove my shoulder into a pine while running, unable to stop myself from slamming into a tree. It hurt the tree more than it did me, but the abrasion I suffered in the collision healed up immediately.

Thinking about my abnormalities was too much to fathom. My mind just couldn't grasp the changes that were happening to my body.

As I got ready for school Monday morning, I toiled over the decisions I had to make today. Some of the toughest in my life. As Agent Smith said, I could hurt or kill someone without meaning to. I could even hurt someone I cared about deeply. I wanted to cry or get angry, but I couldn't afford an emotional outburst. It was too dangerous for the people around me. Truthfully, I wanted to bawl my eyes out or drive my fist through a wall. I felt trapped. If what Agent Smith said was true, my condition was permanent.

There was no going back.

I didn't know what kind of monster I had become, but I knew if I had to live with it, I had to keep it chained up. I couldn't put anyone at risk, and I knew of only one way to do that.

After first period, I opened my locker, got the textbook I needed, and closed it. I spotted Layla right away. Coming down the hall, she approached, a tender smile on her face. She was headed straight for me; I knew what she planned to ask me. But before she reached me, Lexa Thorn came up out of nowhere and stepped between us, her back to Layla.

Lexa had a heart-stopping smile on her face, along with dimples and mesmerizing sapphire eyes. "Hi, Evan."

As she leaned against the lockers in front of me, I peeked around her, beyond her silky hair that flowed past her shoulders, to see Layla walking away. A pain stabbed me in the gut like a dagger, twisting and wreaking havoc, slicing upward, nearing my heart.