Why
I'm going to put my notes before the story begins rather than after, because I want the story fresh on your mind if you do decide to comment. I took this competition fairly seriously, as you can tell I chose to write a pretty serious story. This short story is a bit long, I remember Goddy saying something about how it shouldn't be too much more than 5000 words, well it isn't too much longer than that. All in the name of chocolate, I guess.
I kinda wanted to hold my cards a little longer and maybe post on the 4th but I decided that I wasn't going to do anymore with it, so I'm posting it now. I guess I'm impatient in that sense. Well, anyway, I hope you guys really enjoy it. As I enjoyed making it.
A few warnings: This story deals with adult themes, like Rape and stuff. I take these topics pretty seriously in this story, so if you don't like it, well, neither do I. But I guess if you don't want to read it, it's fine by me. Unless you're a judge. Then can you please read it anyway?
Why
It was the witching hour, nothing so crude as midnight of course. Anyone can be a witch at midnight under a full moon. It was past 3 am and he had been awoken by a hand on his shoulder, shaking him urgently. His eyes opened to an unfamiliar ceiling and the usual questions of "Who am I?" "Where am I?" "Am I wearing clothes?" filled his head and were promptly banished. A finger pressed against his lips and words were whispered into his ear barely above the threshold of hearing, the voice one of a distant memory his sleep addled brain could not yet recollect.
"I want to tell you a secret."
With those words the three questions came back and Alex realized who he was, though where he was was still unanswered. Everything was unfamiliar, from the extremely uncomfortable bed he was in to the monotonous ceiling he was staring at. He found himself shivering as well from the cold. He wasn't covered by a blanket and he was in his usual bedtime garb, a single pair of blue boxer shorts. Being a white mouse with short fur didn't help his feeling of cold, either. He wanted to sit up but he just remembered that someone had said something only seconds before. The words were repeated, this time with more aggression.
The voice those words belonged to was undeniably familiar, masculine, but Alex couldn't quite place it. The question "Who are you?" arose in Alex's head. He intended to say something but was cut off before the words formed in his mouth.
"You shouldn't worry about who I am", the voice said calmly, but with precision. "Nor should you worry about where you are."
Alex realized that, though he was in a possibly life threatening situation, he didn't want to allow himself to miss a beat. "What should I worry about?" He always taught himself to be quick, always be on his feet, even when in the midst of danger. Stump the enemy first, buy yourself time, don't show weakness.
There was a pause, this pause allowed Alex a second to see his attacker and his surroundings more clearly. He was a shirtless gray wolf with very short fur and intricate designs and tattoos all over his well defined chest, abs, stomach, shoulders and arms. The tattooed wolf was kneeling near the bed in which Alex found himself on. The room was a dimly lit and plain, no decoration or color on the four walls that formed a rectangle around the two. The bed itself was a small single bed with a hard mattress in the corner of the room farthest from the single door leading out, it had no covers and seemed to be made only to be the most uncomfortable thing one could sleep on. The only other thing in the room was a small, plain table with a dim lamp shining an orange light from the top of it and a wooden chair beneath it.
The wolf must not have anticipated a question so quick, he looked as if he were caught in his thoughts. He rose from his initial kneeling position and started walking to the other side of the mid-sized room. Near the lamp table.
"Well, Alexander, you wonder what you should worry about?" The wolf looked back at Alex. "I think you should worry more about why you are here more than anything else."
Alex looked at the tattooed wolf incredulously, he wasn't surprised to find out this wolf had known his name, the freak probably stalked him the past few years. No doubt they must have met at some venue. "Why?"
Quicker than Alex realized, the wolf was back by the bed looking straight at him. The wolf's eyes were penetrating. Each eye seemed to have a unique pattern embedded into the soft blue, almost gray, iris. The pupils were small, so small they almost seemed nonexistent, but they were there, and the white, what was supposed to be white, was only slightly darker than the color of the iris. They were eyes that could haunt dreams, and the wolf knew it. He had a menacing grin on his face.
The eyes scared Alex so that he sat up in the bed and retreated from the wolf, looking away from the tattooed attacker. "I... I'm warning you.... I don't scare easy!"
The wolf broke out into a sinister laugh. "Scare you?" The tattooed wolf looked at him with a smile, "I'm not here to scare you!"
"What do you want from me?"
"I don't want anything from you, you silly boy," The wolf gave a sly grin. "You ask an important question, though. What do I want from you... what does the world want from you..." The wolf rose and began walking to the other side of the room again.
Alex was losing patience. "Is this some kind of joke?! I don't know you!" The wolf turned to stare at Alex with a smile, his eyes asking Alex to say more, to get more angry. "I don't know where I am, I wake up to some half-naked freak whispering in my ear and I'm wearing next to nothing! I don't know if I've been molested or if... What are you laughing at?!"
The wolf was chuckling. The freak had the gall to laugh at him. Alex wanted to get up and punch the smirk of his face but the way the wolf was standing, it seemed as though he would be prepared for it. Alex couldn't bring himself to getting up and running for it. He felt intimidated and the wolf was gaining pleasure from it. He sunk back further into the corner than he already was, feeling helpless and out of control. "What are you laughing at?"
The tattooed wolf grabbed the chair, placed it near the middle of the room, and sat on it facing Alex. "You're an angry child."
"I'm not a child," Alex spat.
"Oh, but yes you are," The wolf replied calmly. "You may be twenty years old, but you don't know the true ways of the world, the evil that's in it, the sadness that comes with it. You are naive."
"I do know," Alex tried to stare the wolf down, but he couldn't keep eye contact with the freak. "Whatever,"He looked away from the wolf. All he wanted was to get out of the room, contact the authorities and find his way home. It was late and someone has to be worried about him.
"So what if I'm angry, huh? So what? No one has ever shown me respect, I have no reason to show them any!"
"No one asked you to respect them, just like no one asked you to be happy," The wolf said. "But no one ever asked you to ruin their lives now, have they?"
The mouse wasn't expecting that last question. "What are you talking about? I've never done that!" Alex was angry, pissed, at this wolf. "I don't need to be lectured. I just want to leave, it's late, and someone misses me."
"How can you be sure of that? It's Three in the morning and you went to sleep at Ten last night, remember? No one is awake, and you're safe and sound in your bed, remember? Or do you?"
Alex couldn't remember a thing from the night before. "I... I don't know what you're talking about." Alex kept himself from making eye contact with the wolf.
"You can't leave anyway, the door is locked. The window's barred, too." Alex didn't even notice the window to his left. It presented a good view of a perfectly starry night with a bunch of trees blocking some of the view, but yes, the window was barred.
"When can I leave? Why am I even here?" Alex questioned.
"That's the question I've been wanting from you the whole time. Why." The wolf stared at him.
"Why?"
"Don't you think the most important question someone can ask is why?" The wolf suggested. "It's something all people have to learn and be able to come to their own realization of. Why."
"What game are you playing, wolf?!" Alex couldn't hide his frustration. The freak had him there, hostage, yet he was trying to talk as though he were a mentor. Alex jumped off the bed to his feet and prepared himself to lunge at the wolf's throat if need be.
The wolf stared at Alex with a slightly tilted head customary to canines, Alex might have noticed a hint of sadness if he cared so much to pay attention. "Again you go and ask irrelevant questions," The wolf sighed, "Why are you so angry? Why is it that you are so intent on hurting something?"
"Why do you so suddenly care?" Alex lashed.
"Because it's my job to!" The wolf said, rising from his chair.
This wasn't the response Alex was expecting. He was caught off guard so that he backed away from the rising wolf. "Who are you?"
The wolf was slow to reply, "I'm just a wolf that is supposed to watch over you for now. Call me what you will."
"If your just supposed to watch over me, just take me home,"Alex gained a stronger foot from that, his anger compelling him to face this freak. Looking at him more closely though, this freak was at least a foot taller than Alex, and Alex himself, who was a moderate height for a mouse, was 5'4". Alex, as well, didn't have quite the muscle definition of the freak, nor did he have the look of ferocity that the wolf looked like he could have. The canine had a perfect, strong body. Still, Alex kept his footing firm. "I don't need to be here."
"You don't know what you need in life, though. That isn't a surprise." The wolf kept staring Alex down, as if he were being chastised for standing against the canine. "Besides, I don't think you want to go home right now."
"Of course I want to go home! You don't know me!"
"I know you more than you know yourself!" The wolf's voice raised a few decibels. Though voice raising never usually affected Alex in anyway, this was different. Alex actually felt bad for inciting this wolf's anger. He sure knew how to give off a strong presence. Alex felt small again, and he hasn't felt small for a long time.
"You have no right to talk to me like you know me--"
"I have every right!" The wolf's voice became like ice and broke down Alex's will. So that the mouse had to back up to his bed and sit back down. He had forgotten that he was half naked, but he was reminded about how vulnerable he was. Vulnerability hadn't touched his mind for a long time.
"Alex Field from Northern California suburbs. Moved to Southern California when you were 12 because your mother thought you were being bullied at school. You were being bullied, but that wasn't the true reason you started taking martial arts, was it?" The wolf sat back down on his chair after inching forward a few inches, pausing a few seconds to see if Alex would reply. Alex did not reply, but rather looked away from the wolf.
"Happy were your parents to find that, upon moving to a nice Southern California neighborhood, their kid seemed happier, or at least he seemed relieved."
"My parents didn't move because of me," Alex kept his eyes looking out of the window. "They moved because they were going to make more money here, my dad got a raise. My parents didn't care about me."
"Do you truly believe that last statement?"
"There were times when I hoped..."
"You are well aware of the blessing you are to your parents. You would have had an older brother but he died while still in your mother's womb, and you were lucky, being premature. Your mother went barren after you were born, due to medical complications I doubt you care about. All this, and you don't think your parents love you more than life itself?"
Alex felt a tear try and form in his eye, but he fought it back, he knew this wolf was right. Even though the wolf had no right knowing any of this, Alex couldn't shut out the voice. A chord seemed to have been struck in Alex's heart because he was finding it difficult to hide his emotions. He feared speaking and sounding like he was about to break apart, so he didn't say anything.
"You were forgetting about it. But your parents kept in touch with friends and family in Northern California, and though they thought it to be sad news, you would have been better off not hearing it. Because at fourteen they told you that a certain neighbor under the name of Robert King died of unknown causes. You remember Mr. King all too well. You never forgave him, did you?"
"He destroyed my life! Why the hell would I forgive him!" Alex found himself yelling at the top of his lungs. Anger that had built up for years had shone through, his brain being overrun with memories. The whole event rushing into the forefront of his mind like an unexpected flash flood.
It was a rainy Saturday, he had just turned eleven exactly a month earlier. Mother and Father were both going to be out for a while and they trusted him to be alone for the first time. Since he was so absorbed in playing his new video game they didn't think he could cause any trouble. Little Alex was quite content being home alone. Enthralled, in fact. He had four hours to do what he wanted, though he knew that he couldn't make a mess or start a fire, even though that last one sounded appealing.
Two hours had past since his parents left him at home, he had already gotten bored with playing his game, a difficult level had him caught, and he was having the time of his life jumping on and off a white king-sized bed while watching cartoons in his parent's room. The television was at a very high volume, but Alex still heard the doorbell ring.
Confused, the boy turned the cartoons off and walked down the stairs to the door. One more ring signaled that there really was someone outside the front door, even in this pouring rain. Cracking the door open, Alex saw the neighbor Mr. King standing outside wearing large black coat and a dark blue umbrella held above his head to keep the rain off of his fur.
"Hey, Buddy! Your mom called me," Mr. King said with a large friendly smile. "She asked that I check on you to make sure there were no messes in the house and that you didn't throw any wild parties."
Though others may have noted that Mr. King intimidated them, the Field family, including Alex, never found the middle aged tiger to be worse than a pleasant man. Alex looked up to him, in fact. He never said anything mean and always went out of his way to help Alex if he missed the school bus or a similar emergency showed itself. Alex never knew exactly what the tiger did as a job, but Mother always said that he worked at home with a large corporation. "He is very good with numbers," is what she would always say. There's no reason not to trust him, Alex thought to himself. So he let the friendly neighbor come in the house.
"Thanks for letting me out of the rain," King said with a chuckle. "I won't stay too long, I understand you just want to have unsupervised fun." As he walked in he placed his large coat on the coat hanger and removed his boots, placing them to the side. Revealing a plain gray shirt and sturdy paws. He placed the umbrella by the door and looked at Alex expectantly.
"Why do you take off your boots if you're only staying a little while?" Alex asked.
"Well, even though I'm only staying a little while I don't want to get your carpets wet, do I?" The tiger responded.
"No, I guess your right. Gee... I hadn't thought about it," Alex scratched his head. Mr. King always was a very intelligent tiger.
"It's alright buddy, you wanna show me what you've been up to?" King asked with a friendly pat on the shoulder. Though Alex was still growing, he figured Mr. King couldn't be too tall as the mouse's eye level was just above his naval. The tiger's face was the epitome of kindness, and though one of his eyes were bad, it didn't bother Alex that he was half-blind. Alex chuckled and gave him a light punch in the stomach eliciting a melodramatic groan from the tiger.
"Follow me, Mr King!" Alex laughed as he ran up the stairs and went into the master bedroom were the TV was, followed shortly after by the benign tiger. Alex changed the channel to set it to the video game he was playing, and beckoned Mr. King to sit by him on the ground in front of the TV.
"You got that new system for your birthday?" Mr. King asked with delight in his voice.
"Ya, it's the newest one out! It came out a couple weeks ago!" Alex was enjoying this conversation. "Wanna watch me play my new game?"
"Sure, but can you wait a second while I give your mother a call?" Mr. King asked.
King took out his cellular phone as Alex stated his agreement and dialed in a few numbers into the punch pad. He placed the phone up to his ear he waited a second while the phone rang, all the while looking at Alex with his good eye and giving him a reassuring smile.
"Hello, Mrs. Field? This is Bob King from next door, you told me to check in on your son?"
There was more conversation between the two over the line, nothing that Alex found interesting.
"Oh, your son is being a wonderful host! Would you like to talk with him?"
King handed the phone to Alex, giving him a big smile.
"Hi, Mom!"
"Hi, Sweetie, I hope you're behaving." She said through the speakers of the phone.
"Of course I'm behaving, Mom," Alex laughed into the phone.
"Well, I can certainly tell you're having fun. Don't be too mean to Mr. King, alright?"
"I won't, Mom, I promise. I love you, Mom!"
"I love you too, Honey, I'll be back in two hours, promise!" She finished as Alex handed the phone back to Mr. King.
"Hi Mrs. Field, I'm happy to report that there are no huge messes in your house," He said with another wink directed toward Alex.
"Alright, I'll talk to you later."
He closed the phone and looked back at Alex with a grin. "You know, Christmas is coming soon. Do you know what your parents are going to get you?"
"My parents said they won't get me anything this year because I begged them for this early," Alex said nonchalantly as he set up the game console. "But it's okay, they're probably going to get a me a new game for it anyway."
"I wouldn't get you a new game," He chuckled. "I would keep to my word. It's always good to keep your word, even if it means not getting you a game."
Alex laughed a bit, not quite understanding the joke, but wanting to play along. They sat there for another five minutes while Alex played the game. Occasionally Alex would look at Mr. King and see the tiger staring at him. It made Alex slightly uncomfortable and had him wondering when the neighbor would leave. But because Alex didn't want to seem rude, he didn't ask the tiger to leave.
When Alex had finally beat the level he was stuck on, Mr. King applauded him and rubbed the back of his neck. His hand lingered, though, and it made Alex extremely uncomfortable. He rolled his shoulders to indicate that he wanted the older tiger to remove his hand, which he did.
"I'm sorry about that," King said. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."
"It's alright, Mr. King..."
"It's just that... your fur is so soft, I like the way it feels." That comment caused fear to seep into Alex's spine. So much so that he put down the controller to start backing away from the older tiger.
"Uh... Thanks," Alex said with worry in his voice. "I think you should go, Mr. King."
King was too fast for the kid to scoot far enough, though. In short time the tiger was on top of Alex, pinning his arms down to the rug. He kept his eyes on Alex's, trying to instill a fear into him. He was ultimately successful.
"What are you doing?! Stop it!" Alex was trying to struggle. He was shivering from fear. He felt small and powerless.
The tiger pinned Alex's legs down with one of his own legs and lifted his arms up with one hand while he lifted the mouse's shirt with the other. The treatment was rough, painful, and unfair. As King removed Alex's shirt, the mouse's hands got free, in a failed attempt to get out from under the hold of his attacker, he scratched at the tiger's chest with all he could muster, ripping a small part of the gray shirt, before the tiger got his hands under control.
Alex let out the loudest scream he could, but it was masked by a thunder clap, and cut short by an elbow to the stomach. His shorts were unbuttoned by a quick working hand, and he was flipped on his back.
Though he heard stories of this happening to little kids, he didn't think it would happen to him, and he started crying. Through the tears he kept asking the tiger "Why? Why?" Only to be answered in crude grunts of effort as the tiger removed Alex's short pants and white briefs, exposing him and leaving him in the most vulnerable state he could be in.
Even though his hands were forcefully held down, he had given up on trying to escape his awful fate. The pleads were unanswered and the cries were muffled by the carpet. The pain was unbearable and Alex's last tears were burned away before it was close to ending.
"Alex?"
"He... He... He raped me!" With the last two words Alex broke down in front of the tattooed wolf, failing to hold back the waves of tears as they poured out of his eyes. "I... I should have... But... I never told anyone!" Alex squeezed out through his sobs.
The wolf rose from his seat and sat at Alex's side where he let the mouse cry on his shoulder. His heart going out to the young kid. Giving the occasional comforting words, he let the mouse get a hold of himself.
Alex, finding comfort in the wolf's shoulder, finished his sobs. "Why is the world full of evil?" Alex asked him while keeping attached to his shoulder.
"I wish I could help you with that question," the wolf said with true empathy in his voice. "But I can't know everyone's motive, my only purpose here is to find yours."
"But that's my motive." Alex looked up at the wolf, he was able to keep eye contact this time, the wolf's eyes weren't as harsh as they were. "That's the reason I took Martial Arts when I moved to Southern California. It's what caused me to hate everyone and everything, including myself. It's because, even to this day, I still feel the ghost of the pain haunting me next to every night."
"It's why you tried covering the pain, replacing it with other men. And if they didn't work, which none of them did, you would avoid them like the plague," The wolf cut in. "It's why you got in fights that cost you more than just a black eye at times."
"It's why I turned to drugs and alcohol." Alex was starting to notice the root of his problems. He started thinking about all the lives he's ruined. All the faces he's beaten, All the hearts that he broke. All in vengeance to a tiger that died six years before.
"It's why you are in the situation you are in right now." The tattooed wolf looked him in the eyes. "Do you have any idea what you did last night?"
Alex racked his memory, trying to find the answer. "All I remember... is going upstairs and telling my mom that I was headed to bed... Except I wasn't going to bed." Alex looked in the wolf's eyes for confirmation.
"You went to your room at around ten at night, but you left through your window fifteen minutes later."
Those words came with the memory of all the events of the previous night. Starting with the rendezvous with Alex's friends down the street of his house. Followed by the drinking and clubbing that left all of them worse than inebriated. Then the idiot move that was Rachel's; promising she was sober enough to drive them all home. Which was followed by the crash...
The wolf must have noticed the realization spread across Alex's face, because he forced out a slight cough that brought Alex's mind back.
"Am I dead?" This question brought Alex to his lowest point of the night. He had felt bad before, but knowing that he couldn't do anything about all the wrong he's done was truly saddening.
"Do you remember what I first told you?"
"You told me that the most important question is why." Alex gave a confused look to the tattooed wolf.
"No, no.... before that, when you first woke up?"
Alex thought for a moment. "You said you wanted to tell me a secret, right?"
"Yes."
Alex, still very confused, asked the wolf to tell him the secret now. "I guess it's overdue." Alex looked at the wolf with a contorted smile.
The tattooed wolf looked at Alex with a slowly forming grin, "Though it won't be easy explaining the events to friends and family... You get another chance."
Alex looked at the wolf's eyes and tried to figure out if what the wolf meant is what he hoped the wolf meant. It seemed as if every feature on the wolf was smiling, happy that for some odd reason, this young kid might be able to turn his life around from heading towards certain destruction. Alex couldn't help but give the wolf the most heartfelt hug he could offer. If this was true...
"I knew you had power," the wolf said with a smile.
"You helped me find it," Alex was tearing again. Looking back at the wolf, "So when does this second chance start?"
"It starts very shortly," the wolf stated with a smile. "Promise me you won't forget this conversation."
Looking at the tattooed wolf, he smiled the biggest smile he could, he was out of practice, but he may as well try. "I promise," The mouse felt something strange in his head and his body. "Wait," Alex started. "What's your name?"
The tattooed wolf smiled warmly. "Micheal."
His vision was blurry, very blurry. It was almost impossible to see anything but the horribly bright lights above him. There were three shadows around him though. They were talking, at least, He was pretty sure they were talking. He caught a few words but most of it was nonsense. "...Several..." "...Neck, spine..." "...Walk again..." Without a clue as to what was going on he found himself drifting again.
When he woke up, he was alone, or so he thought. He tried looking around but he found it difficult as his neck was braced, so he used his eyes to see that his current location was most definitely a hospital. The bright fluorescent lights were lighting the walls and the rooms beyond the viewing glass, which was partially blocked by shades.
The next he noticed was his immobility, not only was his neck braced, but his whole right arm in a a cast and his left wrist was splinted as well. He didn't want to guess as to his legs, he couldn't even feel them. But someone saw him waking up and they came running to his side. It was his mother.
"Mom?"
"Oh, Alex, I was so worried." She looked as though she had already been crying, but she cried once more over Alex.
Don't cry, Mom, is what he wanted to say, but he found himself starting to tear up as well. "Where's dad?"
As she caressed his face and kissed his forehead, she explained that he was down the hall speaking with the surgeon. Alex felt absolutely terrible for putting them through this.
"What time is it?" Alex wondered aloud.
"It's around ten o'clock," her speech was broken between the sobs. "It's the 17th." He had been at death's door for more than a day.
"Mom?" Alex had one more question for his mom.
"Yes, honey?"
"Are you..." A lump had swollen in his throat, inhibiting his punctuality. "Are you guys mad?"
"Mad?" A new wave if tears poured over her. "We're just glad that you're alive."
He found it hard to smile, that was likely the fault of the painkillers, but he had never felt happier in his life.