Springtime Wolf
Horror in Bloom
Short Story for the Spring Fever/Horror in Bloom event by Garen Marie & Erica Drayton
Saturday
Luke would gobble up allergy pills this time of year like a diabetic scarfing down a cupcake frosted with insulin. Spring always swooped into Atlanta with a vengeance.
Sophia had been upstairs with their daughter, Emilia. She was soundproofing her bedroom and installing steel bars on the windows. Emilia, with a pink floral dress on; wore it easily 3 days a week. She’d be turning soon but there was nothing that could stop it, just ushering in madness. She was twirling one of her pig tails while humming & singing along to Shambala, her mom’s favorite band Three Dog Night:
Wash away my troubles
Wash away my pain
With the rain in Shambala
Wash away my sorrow
Wash away my shame
With the rain in Shambala
Emilia was drawing as she habitually did on the weekends, she loved to render wolves. Exclusively wolves. She was in the last stages of coping with a changing body, the initial transformation started weeks ago as the spring showers rolled in, the blades of grass grew at a more frenetic pace, the green pollen dusted windows of homes, cars, and decks. Headaches and stomach pains ravaged her scrawny body. Her ability to stave off her inner madness started to wither away as the days crept towards a full moon.
It was a Saturday morning when Susan came knockin’ on the door. Luke let her in while noticing her RFK Jr. campaign shirt from a few years back.
“Hey Susan, you want some coffee?”
“No thanks Luke, I’m good, how are you and how’s Emilia doing? I haven’t seen her around the neighborhood as much.”
“Ah ya know, she’s got school and art classes take up a lot of her time”. Luke immediately led Susan to the opposite side of the house away from the ruckus. Luke’s paranoia went into hyperdrive, but Susan didn’t seem to pick up on anything.
“I’ll get Sophia, hang on.”
Sophia and Susan set off on one of their morning runs.
An hour or so later Sophia was cooling down on the deck, Luke noticed her olive skin and muscular legs, the morning sun was starting to kiss the nape of her neck. Luke loved it when her hair was up in a bun. Tiptoeing behind her with a large chunk of ice from the freezer Luke pressed the mini iceberg on the back of neck and Sophia screamed
“Ah!!, no! you fucker!”
“Got you again! You know you can’t let your guard down around here, especially with that beautiful neck”, Luke said handing her cup of joe.
“Real funny wise ass.”
“Hey, what’s up with Susan, she’s an RFK fan?”
“Yeah, I guess”, Sophia shrugged.
“Huh, does she talk about it?”
“No and I don’t ask either”, Sophia said while sipping her cup of black.
“You didn’t say anything to her about…...you know….”
“No, I didn’t say anything about Emilia. That’s not something you just casually break into conversation.”
“Yeah, Yeah, I know.” Luke was slowly unwinding.
“She just went on a little tangent about all the changes she’s been making to her diet and eating clean and all that. I think she makes a lot of her meals for the family from scratch.”
“Gotcha, do you think she buys into all this vaccine skepticism stuff? I mean it’s all over the news.”
“I don’t, I don’t know” Sophia said with dismissively.
“So, am I going to get some tonight?” Sophia shot him a look, and a crooked smirk crept on her face and just like that Luke saw a woman standing in front of him that was even more beautiful than the day they met. They made a life together by having Emilia and a tragic mistake continued to hit them every spring. Any moment of happy suburban life was overshadowed by what lurked underneath.
“I don’t know, are you going to be up for it tiger?”
Well at least Emilia will be relatively subdued tonight. A full moon isn’t until tomorrow.
Luke and Sophia sat on their deck basking in the morning glow and silence. A woodpecker was hard at work on the tree above their heads. They were aware of the storm that was still a few miles out at sea about to make landfall and that springtime would bring them to their knees. They had to keep a lid on things.
The cherry blossoms always started poppin off around mid-February in Georgia as everyone got a premature whiff of spring. Each tree looked like a string of pearls with magenta, pink, and white blooms all over. It reverberated throughout the Atlanta neighborhood. The birds chirped at a higher poetic octave. This meant pool season was just around the corner. The neighborhood pool was not just home to the coveted youth swim team or kids’ swim lessons or teenagers’ first jobs as lifeguards; it was home to the adults who needed an escape. It was one of the very few places’ parents could socialize in without the distraction of phones or everyday life. Most of their kids were too caught up with their friends to bother pestering the parents. A hoodlum tag existed and some lived up to it by running through woods with stolen bottles of Jack Daniels and weed while others lived on the periphery of excitement sometimes crossing the line and others simply had extracurricular commitments. Every Spring, Emilia was home schooled for a few months and was secluded in her own house, the changes were too much for her to bear. A normal childhood put on pause. Once spring passed Emilia always swam on the swim team and as 12-year-old had a faster butterfly time than the Seniors on the team.
By mid-March, in accordance with the pool membership and board members, comprised also of neighbors, the hood participated in a soft-open of the pool, adults only function. A dry run of sorts fully loaded with a D.J., taco bar, liquor, and the annual adult water Olympics. Luke and his wife Sophia dreaded these obligatory gatherings and preferred a proper night out.
There was always an undercurrent of laden pressures and spitefulness in the neighborhood amongst the so-called adults. Then, on the fringes, just flat-out crazy. On the evening of the party, Luke and Sophie begrudgingly made their appearance. The dogwood trees were in full bloom with star-shaped ivory flowers lit up the perimeter of the small pool.
Luke looked over to Sophia engrossed in gossip with a group of gals waiting to lock eyes with her and signed with hands if she wanted a drink.
When Luke returned with her drink, he noticed a group of Moms had experienced a precipitous drop in weight, for which many thought was a dieting initiative to help support one another. These Moms weren’t athletic or known for exercise either, but the weight was coming off like they had stepped back in time and body snatched their college bods. Word on the street that the moms were poppin Ozempic.
Every Spring, Luke and Sophia always found themselves stuck in these conversations as these outdoor gatherings ramped up. They had to bite their tongues sometimes, smile, and get along. They didn’t want to be cast aways, nor did they want to be complete phonies.
Luke and Sophia were indifferent, but it was clear that Sophia was outnumbered in this group as they were talking up the wonder drug like it was wine country to a wine mom. Sophia was a fine figured woman, but she was aware it was ten times more difficult to keep the weight off compared to men once they were on the wrong side of forty. She listened more as Luke became more pessimistic.
The taco bar was open, and everyone started to fuel up so they could continue to tank up. The spread was being handled by Susan and some other moms from the neighborhood. Susan still wore her RFK, Jr. shirt from her morning run with Sophia. The proteins were grilled, fresh vegetables a plenty, refried beans with no additives, clean-label taco sauces, and Greek yogurt in place of Sour Cream. One of the mom’s had even invested in a bread maker and made all the tortilla shells from scratch.
The Ozempic moms filed through and sparingly picked through generous outlay of food opting for bite size portions. The MAHA moms looked upon them with disdain, disgust and daggers, Luke noticed.
“Oh shit, look honey,” nudging Sophia.
“Huh, what?” Sophia was hungry and had her face in a plate of food.
“Let’s get ready to ruuumble!!!”, Luke quietly chanted.
“Knock it off ya knucklehead”
“It looks like the MAHA gang and Ozempic baddies are staring each other down”.
Sophia couldn’t hold in the laughter and spit out some of her Mexican lager.
“Shut it, you’re being too loud!”
The music was jumpin with a good mix, neighbors were huddled into different groups and finishing their food, the pool president jumped on a microphone to announce the adult Olympics as both Luke and Sophia had retreated to where the DJ was spinning records. The DJ was the lone adult still going to live shows out of everyone else and Luke was jealous.
“You fucker, I don’t know how you swing it, did you sell your kids or something?” Luke would goad him grinning and sipping his beer.
“Oh my god, oh my god, look out, watch out.”
Luke and Sophia heard some incoherent utterances behind them and one of the Ozempic moms came running straight for them and DJ set. They were located right underneath the pavilion where the trash cans were. The Ozempic mom lunged and sprayed vomit missing the trash can and hitting the DJ and his equipment with a spastic splatter of chunkage like car tires spinning out in a mud pit. The DJ was cloaked with fresh vomit on half of his shirt and side of his head.
“Shit! what the fuck Cheryl!”
Silence rippled through the party with wandering eyes, mostly curious why the music stopped. Luke and Sophie had dodged the chunk blower machine -Cheryl and had pinned themselves against the fence.
Luke looked over the fence which proved to be magnificent with the wooded ravine down below, the pool was built where it shouldn’t have been 30 plus years ago, the Pool house was literally about to fall off the steep drop off and into a black hole. He started to remember Emilia as a baby and the doctor’s telling him and Sophia the crushing news-her skin cells wouldn’t be able to handle the seasonal allergies to the point where she’d be stricken with a debilitating shingles type rash every spring. The common allergy medication or shots would not work. Luke had suffered in his own right as young child from allergies, being hospitalized four times and missing two school years. The 1st time parents did not want their baby to suffer like Luke did. Luke and Sophia sought after many opinions and after many sleepless nights elected to go with an experimental vaccine that was not FDA approved.
How much chunkage could she muster up before dry heaving? Then the heaves came in like clockwork, Cheryl will try to forget this night, was this a side effect of the Ozempic?, Luke thought. He stared into the abyss seeing random pool noodles, volleyballs, and pool toys cast away down the ravine never to be retrieved like nature’s junk closet. Luke almost became despondent and started to wonder if Emilia could live down in the Ravine, he could build a hut or an enclosure or something and bring her meals down to her on the regular. Just for springtime, a home away from home.
“Luke? Luke? Are you ok, what are you staring at?” Sophia was nudging Luke as the Ozempic tribe had huddled around Cheryl escorting her to the bathroom. The DJ was cleaning his equipment when Sophia finally got Luke to snap out of it to help clean up.
“Hey man, go clean yourself up, I’ll work on your equipment”, Luke said
“Shit, thanks man”. The DJ quickly went to the Pool House to hit the showers.
The MAHA moms start clucking like hens.
“Oh yeah, I heard that Ozempic makes you nauseous and throw up all the time, don’t these Bettys know no better?”
“Not to mention, chronic diarrhea and possible kidney problems too. It’s supposed to be for people with diabetes and they’re taking it for weight loss; I can’t believe their doctors allow this nonsense”.
The night winded down earlier than normal. Luke and Sophia were accustomed to drunken nights with a few of their neighbors falling into the pool fully clothed. They were relieved. Upon their arrival home, Emilia’s room was quiet. Luke planted a kiss right in the center of her forehead like every night, knelt and prayed for her safety and let his mind wade into the dark waters. It wasn’t just a premonition.
Sunday-Full Moon
The rumbling from upstairs wouldn’t stop, Sophia’s efforts to soundproof the bedroom came up short, muffled growling, heavy panting, snarling, and chains clanking were ringing throughout the house. A full spring moon was upon them. Luke was blasting Three Dog Night to quell the impending doom about to light like a dynamite stick that was their house, their neighborhood, their lives.
Sophia’s text blew up, it was Susan:
“Hey, me and some of the girls need to talk to you. We’re coming over.”
Sophie almost dropped the phone with her arm going limp and her face was a portrait of panic deferred. The feeling of inevitability set in.
Ten minutes later, Susan and some of the MAHA mom showed up at the front of the house, matching Bobby Kennedy Tee shirts with torches engulfed in flames stretching upwards toward the low tree branches of the green budded Japanese Maple above.
“Where’s Emilia? we need to see her Sophia”
“Get out of here Susan, you can’t be here right now” Sophia was standing on her front porch with a defiant calm that quickly came over her. Luke was upstairs ensuring Emilia’s room was properly barricaded trying not to hear the compounding sounds of growls and monstrous howls. He went into his bedroom closet and opened his safe. He pulled out his Glock 19 and started loading it. He then noticed Sophia’s favorite, the high capacity 9 mm, he started to picture Sophia as a prostitute holed up in seedy hotel with bright neon lights gunning down a non-paying overweight bald guy trying to screw her out of money. He snapped out of it and loaded her weapon of choice. Luke kept a silver bullet in a separate pocket
Luke snuck around the back and through the side gate around to the front yard where the MAHA moms were,
“Ladies, it’s time for you to leave. It’s really not a good time for us”. He had sinking feeling that diplomacy wouldn’t cut it.
“We already know what’s going on here, you gave your daughter that vaccine didn’t you! You treated her like a guinea pig, a lab rat!”
Like a bat out of hell, Emilia exploded out of the front door ripping it off its hinges, pushing her mom into the hedges. Emilia had turned. Large glowing yellow eyes, 2 ft taller, 50lbs heavier, muscle-bound, razor-sharp claws, limbs that were longer and superior every way, longer ears and torso. Emilia’s springtime floral dress was barely hanging on her partially shredded. Emilia pounced on Susan like she was a gazelle in the Sahara Desert with no chance, sunk her canines into her left arm and tore it off chucking Susan and her torch into the tree above setting the Japanese Maple ablaze. Emilia chased down another MAHA mom down the street and tore her chest open with guts spilling out onto the blacktop.
The rest of MAHA moms scattered, shrieking with a reckless shock that felt like the end of days.
Luke loaded up his Glock with the silver bullet.
“Luke no!!” Sophia chased after him. “No, No, No!!!!, our baby, that’s our baby Luke”.
“Sophia, open your eyes! she’s a monster! we can’t live like this!”
“But it was us, we did this to her! It’s not her fault!”
“It was our pact; you know what needs to be done”.
Sophia fell to her knees hysterically crying like Luke had never heard before, it was the shock of losing a child, hell had shown its fangs and sunk them in deep.
Emilia was feasting on the MAHA mom, stood up, looked at her father, blood dripping from her mouth down on her floral dress and thick werewolf fur. She squinted and charged Luke. Luke waited, with his Glock drawn and on her final leap towards him, shot Emilia dead center in the heart with the silver bullet. The wondrous beast dropped like a rock in the middle of quiet neighborhood street and quickly transformed back to their daughter. She laid slain, all 90lbs of her, delicate hands, pigtails, and her favorite Uggs she always wore.
Luke walked up to Sophia crying, handed her 9 mm fully loaded.
“Do it, kill me now, you remember our pact, do it.”
Kneeling in front of his bride, Luke said a quick prayer. Sophia with hot tears streaming down her face pressed the gun barrel to his head.
“Good night my sweet Prince, I love you but know I could never forgive you for this and I know it had to be done. Now we’re done. I’ll see you in hell.”
FIN
https://www.topinfiction.com/spring-fever