Chapter 70: Younger Sisters are Tasty

“Sophia?!?” A girl bearing a strong resemblance to Candice exclaimed in surprise after regaining her balance. “What are you doing here? And why were you leaning against the door?”

“Uh, hi Lynn, sorry,” Sophia stammered as a burst of warm air from inside carried all sorts of distracting smells past her. “Candice invited me.”

Lynn rolled her eyes and sighed dramatically, sending a strong wave of cheese and ham at Sophia. “‘Course she didn’t bother to tell me that. Typical.”

Ew, her deodorant stinks.

As if on cue, Candice’s raised voice echoed from upstairs, “Lynn, is Sophia here?”

“Yeah, thanks for letting me know she was coming,” Lynn yelled back sarcastically. “Anyone else I should know about?”

It certainly smells like Candice’s house. There were more scents than Sophia remembered, but the familiar scent of the lavender essential oil Candice’s mother liked still dominated. I hope that never changes.

“So, uh, are you going to come in?” Lynn asked as Sophia continued to sniff the air in the open doorway.

“Oh, yes, sorry,” Sophia said with an embarrassed laugh and stepped in far enough for Lynn to close the door.

Despite paying minimal attention to how her friend’s home smelled in the past, there was a familiarity to it that put her at ease.

Everything inside looks the same, too. Sophia’s head turned towards the living room as she replayed that fateful night in her mind. Everything and everyone stayed the same, except me. Her tongue flicked up in yet another failed attempt to moisten her nose. I wonder what it all smells like?

“Tea wasn’t lyin’ about you getting weirder since the party,” Lynn commented sardonically, studying Sophia. “And you were already pretty weird. Love the new contacts, though.” She suddenly perked up. “Oooh! Is it true you’ve got wolf teeth now? Can I see?”

Did Candice tell her? Sophia grimaced. Well, it’s not exactly a secret.

“Fine, sure.” She opened her mouth.

“Aww, that’s it?” Lynn said after a moment, sounding disappointed. “Just small fangs? I was imagining something more like Ginger Snaps. You know, something more ‘rawr’.” She raised her hands like claws and made an exaggerated snarl. “Still, they look almost real; better than braces.”

Sophia was unable to resist. “Oh they’re very real, and you look tasty…” Taking a step towards Lynn, she slowly ran her tongue over her upper teeth.

“Ha ha, very funny,” Lynn said petulantly, but took a nervous step back. “Still, I’m too old to believe in werewolves and magic and all, but… what happened to you at the party? You seemed almost possessed.”

I still don’t really know. A shiver ran through Sophia.

The sound of Candice coming down the stairs reverberating through the house saved Sophia from needing to respond.

“Lynn isn’t bothering you, I hope?” Candice asked as she descended. “Because if she is…”

“Hey!” Lynn responded indignantly. “I had to interrupt my dinner to let her in!” She threw a strawberry-blonde braid over her shoulder. “Do Mom and Dad know she’s here? I thought Dad was pissed at her.”

“I told them,” Candice answered, coming to stand next to Lynn. “And Dad doesn’t have a problem with Sophia.”

Huh, there’s something about them that’s more alike than I remember. Sophia unconsciously took a step towards Lynn, breathing in. If only she wasn’t wearing that awful deodorant.

“Why are you sniffing me like a dog?” Lynn asked uncomfortably, taking a step back. “It’s kind of freaking me out.” Then she put her hands on her hips. “Oh, I get it, you two are playing a joke on me and pretending the silly ritual worked. You think I’m so gullible.”

Heh, of course, she thinks this isn’t real. Sophia forced herself to step back. If I have to be human, I might as well have some fun.

“Nope, I’m really a werewolf, now,” Sophia announced, drawing a shocked glance from Candice. “And you smell delicious.” She slowly licked her lips and then clicked her teeth together several times. “I bet you taste sooo sweet.”

“Yep, the legend was true,” Candice joined in. “Better behave tonight, or I’ll let her eat you.”

“You should eat Candice, there’s more to her,” Lynn suggested sassily, and then lifted the necklace she was wearing. “Besides, I’ve got silver!”

You know, I hadn’t thought of that. Can silver hurt me?

“Can I have just a taste?” Sophia pleaded to Candice, taking a step towards Lynn while keeping an eye on the necklace. “Please? I’m sooo hungry.”

Like, if I touched it, would it burn me?

“Hmm, trouble is, biting her might make her into a werewolf.” Candice put her finger on her lips in mock contemplation. “She’d like that, but I don’t think Mom and Dad would be very happy about it.” She moved to grab Lynn’s shoulders. “Here, let’s take her to the kitchen, and I’ll cut off a piece.”

“You two are so immature.” Lynn rolled her eyes as she squirmed free. “I’m going to finish my dinner.” Turning, she stomped back to the kitchen.

Candice and Sophia looked at each other and broke into laughter.

“Poor Lynn,” Candice quipped. “Wound up with two big sisters for the price of one.” Then she gestured to Sophia. “You going to take off your things? You’ve got to be roasting.”

You can say that again. Reminded that she was sweating from head to toe, Sophia hurried to unzip the front of her snowsuit.

Candice wrinkled her nose at the same time Sophia registered her own concentrated body odor.

Oh, come on, there’s nothing wrong with my smell.

“Yeah, I’m a bit overdressed,” Sophia replied, carefully pulling off her hat so it didn’t chafe her still painful ears. “I need to… What’s wrong?”

Candice's eyes had gone wide before Sophia’s hair had finished falling from the hat.

“Uh.” Candice glanced towards the kitchen and then murmured, “Your ears… They’re uh… well… different.”

“What?” Sophia replied, reflexively moving her right hand up.

They’ve been achy, but they don’t feel any… Her hand froze as her fingers reached the top. Oh, huh, that is different.

She traced the outer rim of her ear again. Instead of forming a smooth curve, the outer helix felt like it had pulled into a soft point. Aside from the point, she didn’t find anything else different. Moving her left hand up, she confirmed the same was true of her left. Checking the underside of the helix, she noted a more pronounced indent than she remembered.

That explains why they’ve been hurting. The burning sensation on the skin of her pubic region became more acute for a moment as her mind turned to it. I wonder what’s going on down there.

“Cool,” she said aloud.

“‘Cool’???” Candice repeated in disbelief. “Sophia, it’s getting worse! How are you going to explain...?” She again glanced at the kitchen and finished by frantically gesturing at her own ear.

“No one said anything today,” Sophia pointed out, continuing to take in the changed shape. “If it’s that big a deal, I can just cover it with my hair.”

“Come on.” Candice roughly grabbed Sophia’s free arm and pulled her up the stairs.

“But my boots..!” Sophia protested.

“I’ll clean up any mess,” Candice told her, continuing to tug. “Please, before Lynn sees.”

Lynn already thinks it’s a joke. Though puzzled, Sophia stopped resisting and followed Candice, her boots loudly clomping as they went up the stairs. Why would that matter?

At the top of the stairs, Candice continued to pull Sophia until they were in her bedroom. After Sophia was in, she shut the door behind them. Inside, a faint, but familiar, strawberry aroma seemed to suffuse everything.

That’s not the only smell… Sophia looked around, sniffing, and then blushed slightly. Nope, definitely not the only smell. I really wish I could smell as well as a real wolf; there’s so much I could learn about Candice with my nose!

“Why do you have to be so happy about this?” Candice asked bitterly as she walked over to her desk in the corner opposite the door and plopped down on an office chair in exasperation. “Nevermind, go ahead and get your boots off.” 

I’ve been in her room so many times, but it feels both familiar and unfamiliar.

“Sophia?” Candice prompted when Sophia didn’t respond.

“Hmm?” Sophia looked at her friend. “Oh, right.” Kneeling, she started unlacing her boots. “Why are you worried about Lynn seeing my ears? Won’t she think it’s part of the prank?”

“And then she might say something to Dad,” Candice pointed out. “He’s already been exposed to your… quirks and might start asking questions.”

“Alright, fair point,” Sophia conceded as she stood while tugging off her boot. 

I want to explore everything in here so badly, it hurts. Maybe she’ll let me, if I ask…

“After I get my stuff off, can I…” She blushed again as she pulled her foot out. “Well, can I smell your room?”

“What?” Candice asked in confusion, staring at her.

How can I explain this…

“You know how you want to look at everything, and it’s frustrating when you can’t?” Sophia asked as she worked her other boot off.  

Candice nodded, still looking unsure of where Sophia was going.

“Yeah, it’s really frustrating when I can’t check out how something smells, now,” Sophia finished quickly, trying to flatten her ears.

“But giving in to the instincts makes you change faster…” Candice objected. “I know you feel like that’s a good thing, but…”

“Please?” Sophia pleaded, pulling off her snowsuit. “I’ve been trying to ignore it the whole way here. It’s like an itch that just gets worse the longer you ignore it.” She folded up the snowsuit and placed it and her boots in the space between the door and the closet. “I just need a few minutes…”

 “Fine.” Candice sighed, rubbing her forehead. “But, damn it, if you start growing a tail…”

If only…

“Thanks so much!” Sophia exclaimed in relief as she sank onto her knees, muscles in her lower back twitching.

Putting her face down to the carpet, she wasted no time in fulfilling her lupine needs. The room doesn’t have Shadow’s or my smell, but it does remind me of Candice, at least. Moving along the closet, she sniffed along the sliding doors, parsing what materials she could detect on the other side. I wish we were outside; being inside smells so… wrong. The bracket in the center of the closet was particularly rich with smells. Heh, that doesn’t get vacuumed very often.

After gleaning as much as she could from the bracket, she moved on.

“You really are a wolf,” she heard Candice comment quietly as she relocated.

“Hmm?” Sophia looked up at her friend to find her leaning forward in her chair, watching intently.

“Isn’t that difficult?” Candice asked with a frown, gesturing at Sophia. “Moving on your hands and feet, I mean. It was always awkward when I tried it, like I was going to fall over.”

How else am I supposed to move? It took Sophia a moment to realize Candice was referring to how she was moving on the balls of her feet.

“Not really?” Sophia replied. “I mean, moving on all fours feels natural to me; it’s my body that feels wrong.”

Ooh, that smells interesting. She tried to lick her nose and started towards Candice’s clothes hamper in the corner, next to the closet. I smell blood, but it’s kind of weird, like… Sophia’s face reddened, and she forced herself away. Oh… Yeah, Candice probably wouldn’t like that.

“Doesn’t it bother you?” Candice asked as Sophia took to sniffing along the wall. “Having to do what your instincts tell you? Not being in control of your own body? You know… like… like an animal.”

What is she talking about? Sophia looked up at Candice in confusion.

“What do you mean?” she asked aloud.

“Instead of being rational, like a human,” Candice clarified. “You know, free will.”

“I still don’t understand; behaving like a wolf makes sense to me,” Sophia said, cocking her head. “It doesn’t seem any different than before. I still have control of my body and can choose whether I do something or not. Sometimes I act without thinking, but that’s true for humans, too.”

Was I ever fully human?

“What do you mean behaving like a wolf ‘makes sense’?” Candice asked quizzically.

“I guess I mean the reason for doing wolfy things is intuitive. Not knowing what a place smells like means a wolf isn’t aware of her environment, and that could be dangerous.” Sophia shrugged. “On the other hand, the way humans act often doesn’t make sense to me anymore and it takes more effort to behave that way.”

“Like not smelling everything?” Candice’s lips pulled into an amused smile.

“Exactly,” Sophia confirmed. “It’s actually kind of weird; I remember liking or disliking different things before I started changing, and it making sense at the time. Like, certain smells that I remember liking are awful now.”

And the other way around.

“That doesn’t bother you?”

“If anything, it’s a relief.” Sophia pushed herself back to sit on her knees. “Being human has never felt right. Acting like a wolf, imagining myself with the body of a wolf, thinking like a wolf does.” She looked down at her jeans. “Like, the feeling of clothing against my skin just feels wrong and uncomfortable all the time. The only thing on my skin should be my own fur.”

“As in you want to run around naked?” Candice asked, sounding horrified.

Sophia hesitated. I’m a wolf; why do I feel shame around nudity because two-legs don’t like it?

“I guess so, yes,” she confirmed uncertainly. “I still wear clothes because I have to, and well, it’s cold without fur. But I hate it.”

Ooh, there’s an interesting smell coming from her bed. A faint body odor caught Sophia’s attention, and she went back onto all fours towards Candice’s neatly made bed on the other side of the room. 

“Okay, now I know you have to be messing with me,” Candice said in disbelief, sinking into her chair.

At the foot of Candice’s bed, Sophia pushed herself up on her hands and started sniffing along the thick, pink quilt. Luckily, there had been enough time since it had been washed for any detergent residue to have dissipated.

Not much to find on top, I’ll have to go under the covers. Dropping to the floor, she ducked under the edge of the quilt.

“Uh, what are you doing?!” Candice asked loudly as Sophia pushed her head under the quilt.

Yuck, the detergent is much stronger under here. The quilt tented up over Sophia as she burrowed underneath, towards the center of the bed. There we go. Multiple body odors marked where Candice had slept. Heh,I’m kind of surprised she doesn’t wash the sheet more often.

Sophia looked up in surprise as the quilt was lifted off her head to see Candice standing over her in shock.

“What the hell???” Candice asked in alarm. “What could possibly be in my bed???”

“I thought I smelled something interesting in it,” Sophia stammered, and then scrunched her nose. “How can you stand your detergent?”

Candice pinched the bridge of her nose and inhaled slowly before answering, “Alright, please stop messing up my bed. I said you could quickly smell around my room, not tear it apart!”

I did kind of get carried away. Sophia sheepishly pulled herself off the bed.

“Sorry, I was really curious,” she apologized, forcing herself to stand.

“What sort of smell was it?” Candice asked, blushing slightly as she looked down at her bed.

Oops. She’d be embarrassed if I told her.

“Like… clothes…” Sophia thought quickly. “Different fabrics.”

“Well, if you want to smell clothes, I have an entire closet you can check out,” Candice said as she remade her bed. “Can you tell different fabrics apart?”

“Not unless I smell them directly, or it’s really strong.” Sophia shrugged. “My nose isn’t nearly as sensitive as a full wolf or even during the full moon, but it’s still fascinating to explore.”

“Shouldn’t you use your eyes more, then?” Candice pointed out.

“Probably,” Sophia conceded uncomfortably. “What things look like just doesn’t seem important, so it’s hard to remember. If I see something new, I want to learn how it smells. If I’ve smelled it before, I want to find out if it changed.”

“Is that why you haven’t said anything about my room, even though this is your first time in it in almost a year and a half?” Candice asked, arching an eyebrow.

Oh, that didn’t even occur to me. Sophia looked around the room, trying to remember what it had looked like. Now that I think about it, it does look different.

“You rearranged! Your desk used to be over there…” Sophia used her nose to point at the dresser at the foot of the bed. “Those K-Pop posters are new. Oh! Is that a new art desk?”

“Yep! You like it?” Candice confirmed proudly, walking over to the brown particle board desk. “I got it for my birthday last year. Lots of space to organize! The desk surface is even adjustable!” She pulled at a lever on the side and then lifted and lowered the drawing surface, which had a half-done poster for the winter formal on it.

“It’s really nice!” Sophia replied. “Sometimes, I wish I had an art desk, not that it will matter much longer."

“Another reason to stay human,” Candice said, showing off the desk’s neatly organized shelves and drawer. “Kind of hard to draw with paws. You’re such a good artist; I can’t imagine giving that up.”

But I want the feeling of the ground beneath my paws as I run. Sophia looked at her hands, suddenly acutely aware of the dissonance between her hands and what her brain expected. To feel the wind blowing through my fur as I chase prey.

“That is something I’ll miss,” Sophia agreed quietly.

“I’d kill for talent like yours, and you’re just throwing it away,” Candice pressed boldly, leaning against the desk. “And if you’re right about remembering everything, you’ll always know you lost that.”

I wonder if Shadow’s pack has art of some kind?I know they tell stories. Despite having their caps on, Sophia could readily smell the markers arrayed above the attached drawer. Would it be possible to do art with scents? Do markers with different colors smell differently?

“And it won’t be just art you’re giving up,” Candice continued. “You won’t be able to write or type. No cell phones, books, or anything. You’ll have to use your mouth for everything. Ick!”

“Why is that gross?” Sophia asked, snapping out of her reverie. “I remember it’s supposed to be gross, but it doesn’t really bother me.”

“You know, germs?” Candice answered in disbelief. “Gross stuff? Don’t wolves lick themselves down there?” She gestured sharply towards her groin. “Eww!”

How else are wolves supposed to keep themselves and each other clean?

“So..?” Sophia looked at her in confusion. “It’d be uncomfortable if they didn’t.”

Candice threw her arms up so fast that Sophia nearly flinched. “What am I going to do with you?”

At that moment, Sophia’s stomach growled, and a craving for the taste of blood, muscle, and viscera appeared in her mouth. Ohhh, I wish I had a fresh deer right now.

“I don’t know, but I could really use dinner.” She smirked. “Or I might actually try to eat Lynn!”