Not Your Ordinary Wolf Girl (3 page)

I dumped my dishes in the sink, got a glass of water in case the thirst roared to life again, and climbed up to my loft bed. Exhausted, I drooped on the edge of the ladder and let my dirt-encrusted jeans fall to the floor.
Even naked, I felt strangely warm. When I pressed my fingers to my forehead they came away damp with sweat. Should I take my temperature? Call the doctor? Instead, I made the stupid and careless decision to give in to the siren song of sleep.

The instant my eyes closed I was dreaming about misty trees rising from the darkness, abnormally large dogs with eerie brown eyes, and drunken hipsters gyrating to cheery estropop. At some point in the night the images turned downright nightmarish: hairy four-legged monsters chasing me through desolate streets, jumping onstage while I was playing, and mauling my band—but leaving me untouched.

A sharp pounding woke me. My first thought was that my heart was beating loud enough to hear. I bolted upright, ready for anything, and saw that I was safe in bed. The downstairs neighbours were hammering at five-thirty in the morning, settling the score for my elevator thumping.

The skylight above my bed filled with pre-dawn colours ranging from dark blue to neon orange. Sunrise through the pollution. The banging stopped. I closed my eyes and tried to sleep a little more, but my nasty subconscious treated me to another disturbing slide-show. And I was soaked with sweat. Gross.

Peeking at my arm, I discovered it was completely
healed. The only sign of the dog attack was a jagged pinkish scar. My forehead wasn't even tender. That couldn't be normal. I climbed down from my bed and changed into yoga shorts and a tank top. While I downed three glasses of water and five toaster waffles loaded with raspberry yogurt and fruit, I worried about how far those downstairs neighbours might go for revenge. I lived in fear of leaked paparazzi photos. Once I'd had a photographer snap me changing in a dressing room after a show. There was only one way to see inside my apartment: through the windows four storeys in the air. The couple could get onto the fire escape from their place. The clothes nook underneath my bed was fairly discreet, but the loft was open concept. Maybe I needed to invest in blinds.

I went into my office cranny and opened my laptop. I'd read in the
Times
about animal rights activists who wanted to reintroduce wolves into the Adirondacks in upstate New York. Was it possible a couple of the creatures had somehow made their way south? The internet didn't illuminate, though I found out the activists had given away quite a nest egg to the cause—several hundred thousand. I wondered if they'd followed through on their plan, but couldn't find any concrete reports. Anyway, those wolves would have to travel pretty far to get to Manhattan.

I was still feverish, so I gave in and took my temp. 101. A cool bath would help bring that down, but it wouldn't do anything for its root cause. I popped three ibuprofen, submerged myself in icy water, and lay there until the shivering became intolerable.

Based on the state of my arm, no doctor would believe I'd been attacked last night. They were more likely to assume I'd slashed my wrist a week ago, and Twitter and the blogosphere would have a field day. Did I have to wear long sleeves for the rest of my life?

Vinnie was always pushing me to cultivate more of an edge. No thanks. I'd never get another second alone from the press or my mom. Not to mention I'd step on Jules's toes. She owned the bad girl persona. Malika was the sexy, bookish one. And I was the loner tomboy.

I carried my bass and a two-litre bottle of soda over to the couch, where I flopped down and chugged until grape fizziness exploded from my nostrils. Setting aside the bottle, I opened the silver latches on Janis's protective shell, held her up to the light, and ran my fingers over every inch of her red surface. Not so much as a hairline crack on the instrument, though the case wasn't in great shape.

When it came to instruments, I was totally anal: they needed to have perfect pitch, look hot, and possess
the elusive vibe that allowed me to picture one of my musical idols rocking out.

The effects of my cold bath were already wearing off, so I put away the bass and switched on an overhead fan. I didn't exactly feel sick, but at seven in the morning, alone in my apartment, the whole rabies theory was starting to feel like a real possibility. I went back to my computer. All the websites said to get immediate treatment.

The Puffs were beginning a video shoot, and I had to be at the studio by ten. I wouldn't actually have to play—we'd already laid down the track—but I would have to
look
like I was playing for hours on end. The gallons of sweat might become a problem. It was too early to call my doctor. The closest hospital was only a few blocks away. Might as well get someone to check me out now. Early morning on a Friday, the E.R. would probably be quiet.

I rolled my bike into the elevator and headed down to the street. As soon as I was riding, my body felt a million times better and I cooled off. I felt strong enough to keep pedalling all the way out to Long Island and back, but a nagging doubt made me pull into the hospital's driveway.

The admitting nurse glanced at my arm, asked for my insurance card, and listened to me babble about a
dog attack. The look on her face said she didn't know who I was (thank you!) and had decided this was an elaborate scam to get a prescription. She told me to go sit on a couch in the waiting area. I sat there reading old
National Geographic
s as patient after patient—who arrived after me—was led into the inner sanctum.

When I ran out of magazines, I stared dully at the lobby TV, wishing I had something to eat. They didn't even have a soda machine. A news report came on about some brutal attacks by a girl gang on the Lower East Side. A flash of fuzzy security camera footage made me curious to see the girls involved. I jumped on the couch to turn up the volume, and immediately wished I hadn't. Why was it so much more upsetting to find out females were capable of things like that?

As I was trying to make out the girls' faces, which were too grainy to see clearly, the inevitable happened. A teenage boy who'd broken his wrist in a skate-boarding accident recognized me. I felt sorry for him and let his mother take a photo of us together with his phone. But when his mom stepped away he started grilling me with questions, like: “Is Malika Stuart gay?” and “Are you?” and “You babes are sleeping together, huh? That's so hawt.” I wished I could delete his photo. If I tried to answer, it would just get worse.

Finally, the admitting nurse poked her head out
from behind the automatic doors and called for me. I disentangled myself from the boy and sprinted across the lobby. A tired-looking doctor in her forties watched me approach through thick lenses, probably trying to figure out what the boy found so interesting.

I was sweating again at full force. While the doctor peered at my chart, I had the urge to snatch the smudged, crooked glasses off her face and snap them in half.

Whoa. Where did that come from?

“You're Samantha Lee?” she asked, glancing at the folder in her hand.

“Sam.”

“The musician?”

“Yeah,” I said tightly.

She glanced at my fading forehead bruise and blinked. “I'm Dr. Alam. Follow me, Ms. Lee. We'll get you checked out.”

She hurried down an off-white hallway with a green linoleum floor. While she walked, she glanced more closely at the papers in my slim file, reading the nurse's comments about my
fake
dog attack.

The stink of harsh cleaning chemicals assailed my nose. The smell of chlorine bleach was so powerful it felt as if my nostril hairs were being burned off one by one with a tiny blowtorch. I focused on holding my breath for as long as possible.

“Please have a seat,” said the doctor, pushing aside the pink and green curtains of a makeshift exam room and gesturing at a bed covered in starched white sheets. I hopped up, earning a frown from the doctor. For a feverish girl, I appeared to be in pretty good shape. I slowed my movements and groaned as pathetically as possible.

“How're you feeling today?” she asked, tucking a strand of long black hair behind her ear.

While I'd been waiting in the lobby, I'd racked my brain for an explanation for my hospital visit that wouldn't make me sound like a lunatic. Judging by the nurse's reaction the truth hadn't been very convincing, but I couldn't come up with anything better. “I'm feeling pretty weird. I've got this fever and—”

“The flu's going around.”

I always hated it when people finished my sentences. This time, it made me want to break her neck. I took a slow, calming breath and tried again. “I was bitten by a dog last night, in Central Park.”

“It says here you're worried you might have contracted rabies?”

“Right.”

“Can I see the … wound?”

I shrugged off my thin jacket and held up my arm.

She peered down at the scar, then up at my face. “This is weeks old, young lady.”

“I swear, it's not. I was attacked last night by an enormous dog or wolf while I was riding my bike near the duck pond.”

She jotted something in my file. “You actually saw this dog?”

“Of course I saw it. The thing jumped on top of me!”

“Right, right. Why do you think it was rabid?”

“Well, it wasn't foaming at the mouth. At least not that I could tell … It was dark.”

Her face twitched as if she was repressing some reaction with great difficulty. “Did it exhibit unusual behaviour, strange barking, lack of fear?”

“All of the above!” I said. “There's more. I'm weirdly energetic. Jumpy. So hungry and thirsty. Almost every moment I want to shove something into my mouth.”

Her eyes opened wider, magnified by her thick glasses. “Okay. Why don't we start by taking your temperature?”

I nodded eagerly. She removed an electronic thermometer from the pocket of her medical coat and stuck it in my ear. When it beeped, she inspected the results.

“You're a little warm,” she admitted. “Nothing to worry about. Plenty of bed rest should do the trick.”

“I don't have the flu! Aren't you concerned that a feral dog attacked me and chewed on my arm like it was rawhide?”

“Your wound is miraculously healed,” she noted, raising an eyebrow.

“I swear on my life the bite was deep. I know it sounds crazy.”

“Yes, it does.”

“It's not completely healed.” I jabbed at the scar with a fingertip. “Ouch! See, that hurts. Dr. Alam, is there any disease that makes you heal fast?”

“Why don't you ask Superman?” she said, then had the decency to look embarrassed. “Look, I need you to level with me. Is it drugs? Crystal meth? How about coke?”

“No! I'm telling you the truth. I was bitten by a—”

“Giant dog. Except that from the location of the wound, you would have severed an artery, which means you would have passed out within minutes. This injury happened weeks ago. Who did this to you? Are you covering for someone?”

“Not someone—some
thing
. There was a lot of bleeding. But I used my T-shirt as a tourniquet. Test me for rabies. Seriously. Please!”

Her eyes narrowed. In that moment, I truly hated her.

“Ecstasy? Or another street drug?” she asked.

“You think I
hallucinated
the attack?”

She sighed. “You seem fine, but I'll call in a colleague for a second opinion. Maybe we'll run some blood tests.”

“Good, blood tests! You can check for rabies that way, right?”

She turned and left the room, shaking her head. I didn't care what she thought of my mental state—as long as she ran the actual rabies test. I spread my jacket on top of the hospital pillow, stretched out on the bed, and tried to play Tetris on my phone to keep myself from stalking around the E.R.

THREE

A
fter giving up on Tetris, reading all the recent Google news alerts on The Puffs, and mapping the star-patterned pinprick holes in the ceiling panels for ten minutes, I heard footsteps approach my room. Two doctors spoke quietly, thinking I couldn't hear them. I could.

“I'm pretty sure she's on something,” said Dr. Alam. “Her eyes are unfocused and red.”

Excuse me?

“Drug-induced delusion,” agreed a male doctor. “So do a chem test and call psych.”

“That's the plan.”

There was a grunt of approval. “And you're positive it's
that
Sam Lee? The girl my daughter's crazy about?”

“Not too many half-Asian rock stars come through these doors. See for yourself.”

I strained but missed the guy's response. No way was I going to let them take a drop of my blood! They were two seconds from shipping me off to rehab. I snatched my jacket, rolled off the bed, and landed on the floor with a muffled thud. Scooting backward, I folded my five-foot frame into a tight ball between the bed and a cabinet on wheels. Worst hiding spot. Ever.

One of the curtains swung open. If the doctors found me here it would confirm their suspicions that I was a drug-crazed musician. But with any luck, they'd take the empty bed at face value and assume I'd split. I couldn't wait to get off this floor. I shuddered to think about the disgusting substances clinging to its tiled surface.

“Where'd she go?” demanded Dr. Alam. “She was right here!”

“Anyone see a girl leave this room?” hollered the other doctor.

Another voice shouted back—the E.R. nurse? “Sorry, I didn't see anything.”

“Such a troubled young woman,” said Dr. Alam. She sounded genuinely concerned. I almost felt bad.

“Telling my daughter I tested Sam Lee for drugs would've made
me
a rock star,” the guy replied.

Patient files are supposed to be confidential! It took all my willpower to fume silently. I cursed the fact that I didn't carry a digital recorder. Once they'd walked away, I got to my feet.