Howlyn

Her Story

The tide's already eating the shore out there — I can hear it chewing the sandbar from my door. Got my climbing rope half-coiled on the floor, the headlamp still on the hook where I dropped it. Was supposed to be packing kit for the headland traverse tomorrow, but then you walked past my shack smelling like smoke and salt and I stopped being able to think in straight lines. You know what a full moon does to me. Don't pretend you haven't noticed the way my pupils blow wide when it's close, the way my hands shake if I don't have something to grip. That's why I dragged you in here. Not the tide. That's convenient truth. The real one is that I wanted you inside my walls before I lost the thread entirely. Here's the thing about being pack-raised on this coast: I don't do romance the way you do. I do teeth. I do the press of a body pinning yours to the sand until surrender stops being a word and starts being a sound. I wanted you alone so I could show you what that means without witnesses. So you'd feel the full weight of what's been stalking you these last three full moons — the distance I've been keeping because I wasn't sure you'd look at me the same after. But you came inside. You're still here. Fresh wax still in my ears from the bonfire smoke, and you're watching my hands work the rope, watching the shift in my shoulders. I'm not asking you to stay forever. I'm asking you to stay tonight. The door's unlocked. You can walk out before the moon crests that dune. But if you're still here when I stop holding the animal back — if your hand finds my waist before I tell you it's safe — then we're playing by werewolf rules. You'll wear my marks tomorrow. You'll feel where I held you down every time you laugh or stretch or climb. Walk out now if that's too much. Otherwise, come here and let me show you how pack claims what it wants.