Phantomverse Stories

Ghost Wolf - Tape 4

This is the last part!!! Yay! Disclaimer: it is not Halloween, or, it wasn't when I wrote this. It just is in the story. Plot devices baby! Also warning this one is pretty long... 3158 words :o
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Tape 4. The camera immediately turns onto Daniel staring gravely at the camera. His eyes are red. Dramatically, he waggles his fingers in the air in a spooky fashion.

Daniel: Happy Halloween! (scoffs) This actually never was my least favorite holiday. Especially this year. (shyly gives a fist pump) New moon! (Yeah). (his face now takes on a more serious look, and he seems slightly uneasy) It's been a week since I last talked about me and Gwen. I needed some time to...pull myself together. (snaps) I need to finish this. Or I'll never be free. Or as free as I can be. Here we go.

As if he'd never stopped, Daniel resumes the tale exactly where he last left off. The scene must have never left his mind.

At the Amateur, over fries and a basket of chicken fingers, we learned more and more about each other, I sharing things I'd never even shared with my parents about myself: hopes and dreams and passions. Like, I used to want to be an astronaut. She was raised by parents who both worked hard her whole life, her dad a mechanic and her mom working retail, and they encouraged her to dream big, so she wanted to find a cure for genetic diseases someday. Looking back, maybe I could have asked her to find a cure for me. (sighs, realizing something)

The thing about my...condition...is that it is basically like a disease. The name on paper is lycanthropy, in which...(mumbles as he tries to remember exactly what it is) according to my parents it is a transmitted disease through the infected saliva...then it does stuff to your cells, sort of, well, mutates them to respond by changing your body's appearance and mind each night in response to it's chemistry change as you get ready for slumber. Or potential slumber, that never happens for me. (shrugs) I don't completely know how the moon works into the equation. That was my parents' research, which I never paid as much attention to as I should have. If only I'd asked Gwen. (groans) No, she would have thought I was crazy.

I selfishly held onto her (holds out hands in the gesture) grasping tightly onto the small glimmer of light and hope in my life for as long as I could. (stare gets a little distant) We spent a lot more time together after that. Maybe just a walk together around campus other days, but because of my busy schedule, (looks regretful) the one and only real lie I've ever told her, that I took night classes, we only met for late night dates on the new moon. No, she never suspected anything. Why would she? No one who knew of the existence of the werewolves were perfectly ordinary.

As we spent more and more time together, I started to let go, to forget about the burdens fate had bestowed upon me. Sometimes I found myself staying later than I should; my rule was to be home by six, at the latest half past. Some days I was pushing it to quarter til. There were never any close calls, as I could be a little paranoid about the timing of the nightly transformations, but deviation from my schedule could never be a good thing. That's the one and only thing I've ever learned from my sister that I consider remotely good advice.

Then came the climax of this dream: when it became a nightmare. We'd been dating for probably about four months now. It was January. Exams were steadily approaching as the first semester was coming to an end. It was also approaching Gwen's 19th birthday. I'd already survived New Year's, because neither of us felt like staying up late, and I was feeling pretty confident that I could celebrate long enough for her birthday then return home without much trouble before dark. (scowls) I innocently asked what day her birthday was for probably the tenth time that month, and she graciously reminded me again; (mimics her voice) "It's the eighth you goofball." (re-enacts the worried look he probably had in response) "The eighth?" I said. Later that day I checked my phone, which has a phases of the moon app, (sarcastically) because obviously why wouldn't I have an app for that. (low tone of voice) It was a full moon.