Page 1 of Emerald Moon (Pitch Mountain Pack #2)

one

“Come on this trip with me, Wil. Please?” Jo pushed the plate of light pink raspberry macarons across the rug in their bedroom towards their packmate sitting across from them. “I made you macarons.” They made as pitiful of a face as they could manage.

Wilma sat cross-legged with her skirt arranged neatly around her. “And I appreciate the beautiful gift, but I am not going camping with you and Cass.” Picking up a macaron, she looked at it carefully and gave Jo a pleased smile. “You’re really improving.”

”Thanks! Are they good enough to convince you to abandon your pack Gamma duties and come with me?”

She took a bite and waited until she’d swallowed to continue. “Our ancestors started building houses for a reason. Why would I sleep outside on purpose?”

“But it’s going to be so awkward! Krista has to work, so it’s just going to be Cass and me. It was supposed to be a way for me to hang with Krista and one of her packmates from the Crooked Creek pack, but now it’s just going to be camping with a complete stranger from a different pack.”

“Cass isn’t a stranger. She tends to keep to herself, but you met her when we were at their pack house before.”

“And I don’t remember her. That’s a million times worse than being a total stranger, actually.”

“You really don’t remember her? Cropped black hair? Muscular? Tall? Well, everyone’s tall compared to you.” She chuckled.

“Ha. Ha,” Jo replied with a deadpan tone. “What if I ask you again, but I’m more pitiful this time?”

“As much as I love you, my answer will not change. Camping sounds horrible.”

“But camping is the best!” Jo grabbed a macaron and popped it into their mouth whole.

They chewed just enough not to choke before continuing, “It’s the only time you’re allowed to be gross, and it’s expected!

No one cares if you have dirt under your fingernails or you didn’t shower.

And it’s great to just melt into nature.

If I could, I’d walk out into the woods and never come back, just become one with the moss. ”

“I support your moss dreams, but I would miss you.” Wil laughed. “Maybe Cass will want to become moss with you.”

“Maybe.” Jo groaned, falling backwards to lean against the edge of their bed. “I’ve got to bail.”

“Why? Just because of some perceived awkwardness? What if you have a great time?”

“What if it’s awful?”

“Then it’s two weird days and one weird night and that’s it. No big deal.”

Jo threw their arms wide. “The biggest deal! The social anxiety is real. I’m, like, already sick about thinking about it.

How am I supposed to act? Should I pretend I remember her?

Do I admit that I don’t? What are we going to talk about?

I’d have to plan all these conversation topics and who knows if any of them will work. ”

“Or you could just go and enjoy yourself.”

“If only it were that easy.”

“I know, Jo.” Wil tilted her head to the side. “Sorry it’s so tough. If you need to bail, that’s fine, too. Boundaries exist for a reason and if that’s a hard line for you, then that’s what it is.”

Jo reached forward to get another macaron.

“The weird thing is, I was looking forward to the trip, so I do want to go. I just wanted it to be the three of us. Now that it’s changed, I’m being all weird about it.

But I feel like I’m going to burst if I don’t get to go outside and immerse myself in the forest soon. I’ve got to shake off life for a bit.”

“I wish I could make the choice for you.”

“Me, too!” Jo laughed. “Can’t you be my external brain? The one that’s inside my skull is busted.”

“For what it’s worth, I think the pros outweigh the cons and you should give it a try.

You’ve got nature, hiking, being gross and dirty.

There’s just the social awkwardness and, who knows?

That might not be so bad. You’re an easy person to talk to.

Your personality makes everyone around you feel comfortable. ”

“Thanks. That’s sweet of you to say. Just wish I could make myself comfortable, too.

” Jo sat up and took a deep breath. “You know what? You’re right.

I’m having a pity party and I’m tired of it.

I’m going to go. What’s the worst that could happen?

” Jo chuckled weakly, already imagining all the worst-case scenarios, but pushing them out of their mind.

Sometimes they got so tired of their brain and lived life in spite of it.

Cass pulled up to the front of the Pitch Mountain pack house in a mud-splattered hatchback.

She hopped out of the car with her cropped black hair pushed back, wearing a light blue button up shirt covered in bright, tropical birds.

She had every button fastened, all the way up to the top.

Jo wondered how she could breathe in the late-summer heat.

It might be early in the morning for a werewolf, but it was still warm and humid.

They were in the mountains, but summer lasted a long time in Hickorywood.

Jo was much more comfortable in their black band t-shirt with short, brown hair that hadn’t seen a brush in days.

From the driver’s side of the car, Cass gave a salute of sorts that morphed into a wave before opening the trunk for Jo. “It’s good to see you again,” she said as Jo approached.

Jo tossed their backpack into the trunk. “Yeah, good to see you, too.” The plan was to fake remembering Cass as long as they could.

“You don’t remember me, do you?”

So much for that plan. Jo kept their head in the trunk and pretended to get something from their bag. They shut their eyes, let out a breath, and decided that honesty was better than a weak lie. “Yeah, sorry, I have trouble remembering people sometimes.”

“It’s fine. I’m not that memorable. But you, though? You make quite the impression.” Cass smiled as Jo took a step back so she could shut the trunk.

Jo panicked. In social settings, they were either bubbly and fun or way too loud and abrasive. Which had they been around Cass?

“You ready?” Cass asked.

Jo nodded, making their way to the passenger side of the car, mind reeling with the possibilities of what impression they’d left on Cass. They opened the door and flopped down into the seat, already anxious about the rest of the trip.

As they pulled away from the pack house, Jo realized there was no music playing, not even news on the radio.

It was dead silent. Cass sat in the driver’s seat with her hands at ten and two like she was in a driver’s ed manual and showed no signs of wanting to talk.

She didn’t look irritated or anything, just content with the silence.

Jo definitely was anything but content with the silence. They got one of their prepared topics ready. “So, you like camping?”

They never thought they were good prepared topics, but they were ready to go.

“Yes,” Cass replied.

Jo waited for more of a response. When it didn’t come, they added, “Yeah, of course you do, right? Otherwise you wouldn’t have agreed to go on this trip. Not that you have to love camping to go on a trip, but it makes sense that you like it.”

Cass kept her eyes on the road and didn’t say anything.

“Anything in particular you enjoy?” Jo asked.

“Being outside.”

Jo internally screamed at the minimal response, but attempted to keep trying.

“Same for me. I like the sunshine and the smell of the forest. I like at the end of the day when I smell like the forest, too. It’s all good, honestly.

I like a good hike, like roasting marshmallows, like sleeping outside, especially when you wake up and it’s all dewy in the morning. ”

“I like that, too.”

It wasn’t much, but it was something. “Do you like hiking? Do you go often?”

“I go birding.”

“Oh that’s cool! Like a hike but with an extra bonus activity.”

Cass nodded.

Jo wondered how they were going to survive this car ride, let alone the next day and half. “Do you go birding a lot?” They tried again.

“I apologize. I’m nervous,” Cass said, gripping the steering wheel and staring straight ahead.

Jo relaxed against the seat. Cass was nervous.

That made sense! Jo was nervous, as well.

This they could connect about. “Don’t even worry about it.

I’m nervous, too,” Jo admitted. “Krista is like the bubbly, adorable social glue that holds conversations together. I wasn’t sure what to do without her here. ”

“Exactly,” Cass agreed, letting out a sigh. “I’m glad you understand.”

“Oh totally. I wasn’t even sure I was going to go, but I really wanted to go camping.”

“I knew I was going to go, even after Krista had to cancel, but I was nervous about being alone with you.”

The phrasing was a bit odd to Jo, but they understood the feeling. “It’s tough for me when I don’t know someone well. I get all anxious and don’t know what to do with my face or my hands.” They laughed.

“When I feel anxious, I copy what others are doing, but I do it quietly, so I can go unnoticed.”

Jo figured it’d be hard for Cass to go unnoticed anywhere she was. She was tall and had a figure that could command attention in a room. She looked imposing and confident, but that maybe didn’t match how she felt inside.

“Kind of hard to go unnoticed when it’s just two people,” Jo noted.

“I know. So I prepared ideas for us to talk about, but I was too nervous to say any of them.”

“I did the same thing! Mine were pretty boring, though. They’re mostly all about camping and being outside, except for the things I prepared to ask about you. When in doubt, get people talking about themselves. It’s so much easier than filling the space with words from my dumb mouth.”

Cass grinned. “Only I wasn’t really giving you much to work with.”

Jo waved a dismissive hand. “Not a problem. You’re nervous. I’m nervous. We’re all good. It’s all out in the open now and, I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling better already.”

“I’m actually feeling a bit better now, too.”

“Great! So maybe we go back and forth and ask each other things that we had prepared? Don’t want all that work to go to waste. Oh, and I’m nonbinary and use they/them pronouns, by the way. Seems like a good thing to toss in there since we’re getting to know one another.”

“I use she/her. I’ll remember yours. I promise.”

“If you don’t, it’s fine. People get it wrong all the time. I know how I look and how I present myself, that I’m not perfectly androgynous — whatever that means anyway — but I know who I am and what I’m about, so it doesn’t bother me that much.”

“I’ll still do my absolute best,” Cass promised, sounding much too serious for the conversation.

Jo laughed and thanked her, feeling even better about this trip.

Through the friendly, but still choppy and a bit awkward, conversation that followed, Jo learned that Cass is short for Cassandra, that she grew up near Hickorywood, and that she had been with the Crooked Creek Pack for about fifteen years.

She had a twin brother who was also in the pack, named Alexander — not Alex, never call him Alex, apparently.

She’d originally gone to college for biology, but was back in school focusing on zoology, in between working at the Crooked Creek Pack butcher shop and a fellow packmate’s flower shop.

She also went birding whenever she could and collected bird shirts, which explained a lot.

Jo shared that they grew up about a six hour drive from Hickorywood in a much bigger city, that they had one sister, and that they’d been with the Pitch Mountain Pack for a little over a year.

They felt boring in comparison to Cass — they only worked at Violet Moon, the pack bakery, and had an unfinished degree in literature that they only ever used to read tons of fanfiction, manga, and fiction, though they were picky about their fiction books.

They also shared that Jo was short for Jolene. “You know, like the potential homewrecker in the Dolly Parton song.”

“I don’t think I know that song,” Cass said.

“Really? I got to play it for you! I bet you’ll recognize it once you hear it.” Jo reached for the cable that would allow them to play the song in the car, but paused, remembering that manners existed. “Do you mind if I play it?”

“Go ahead.”

“Awesome. Thanks. And if you’ve truly never heard it before, you’re in for a treat.”

As the song played, Jo tapped and hummed along, trying their hardest not to belt out the lyrics at the top of their lungs. If Krista was here, they’d be singing no problem, but, even while things were better with Cass now, they still weren’t comfortable enough to let loose their off-key voice.

They’d been singing along to Dolly’s songs for years.

She was their favorite — a standout amongst all the other emo and metal music they enjoyed.

There was just something perfect about Dolly Parton that resonated in Jo’s soul.

They even named the stray cat they took care of outside of Violet Moon after her.

When it finished playing, Jo looked expectantly at Cass.

“I liked it. Her voice is powerful.”

“Right? Powerful but smooth, like a really good honey.”

“But something puzzles me. Your parents named you after the villain in the song?”

Jo laughed. “They don’t always make the best choices.

My mom would be better suited to having a villain’s name and my dad, he — when he was alive, he was made of fun and laughs.

He probably just thought the name was pretty.

” Jo’s chest constricted and they changed topics.

“My sister’s name is June after June Carter Cash. Big country music family.”

“Can you play more of her songs?”

“Oh my god, absolutely. This car ride just became a Dolly Parton road trip!”

As Cass bopped her head along to the songs, Jo wondered if this was the beginning of another friend crush.

They had this habit of getting crushes on their friends when they first met them and Cass, after their awkward first attempt at a conversation got better, was a prime candidate.

She was interesting, smart, and, most importantly, had something she was super into — birds.

Jo liked anyone who was head over heels in love with something, whatever it was.

Getting lost in an interest meant they were a cool person, and Jo always had friend crushes on the cool people in their life before they eventually settled into a true friendship.

While they sounded harmless, friend crushes were something to be avoided at all costs.

They made Jo act all awkward and be a bit too clingy, so they always wished they could skip straight to the friend part where they could just be themselves. Maybe this time, they could.