Page 7

S imon tipped his glass, swirling the wine round the bowl and watching its colour change.

‘She just turned up one evening. She just stepped out of the forest wrapped in a blanket. I think David spotted her first, or maybe it was Henrik. They thought she was thieving but it was hard to see what she was supposed to be stealing, given that she was naked. The others weren’t very friendly at first though Sue was pretty good.

She decided to be pragmatic and found something for Sky to put on before they started interrogating her. ’

‘But I thought you were in the middle of nowhere,’ said Rose, frowning.

‘We were. We couldn’t get her to explain anything.

She said she lived in the forest and was interested in us.

It was as if we were the wildlife and she was the naturalist. We didn’t really know what to do.

There was no way we could get her to the police for days.

Henrik was worried she was some sort of lost woman who was hiding from something, but there was no sign of any kind of abuse or malnutrition or addiction.

She wasn’t even dirty. She was clean as a whistle from her head to her toes.

In the end, Sue just got practical and gave her something to eat.

I can’t remember what we were eating but whatever it was she looked at it as if it was a plate of slugs. ’

‘Let’s guess, she actually looked as if she would have preferred a plate of slugs.’

Simon snorted. ‘You’ve got it. She liked the fruit.

But she said she wasn’t hungry. In the end, we gave up trying to make sense of it all and just decided we’d keep an eye on her.

She tried some beer and spat it out. Eventually Sue took her into her tent for the night, but by morning she’d gone, leaving the clothes behind. We left someone on guard after that.’

Rose tried to remember what David had told her. Not much. ‘David said she hung around you all the time. And you obviously care about her, so presumably she came back.’

‘Yes, she came back. Night after night, she turned up naked and wrapped herself in a blanket. In the end, Sue left clothes out for her so that she could get dressed in the trees. We got used to her being around. She was fascinated with the films we’d taken.

She’d watch the footage of the wolves and laugh.

We couldn’t work out what was supposed to be funny but she told me so much about them.

She knew how the pack worked, the relationships within the family, where they roamed, what they ate.

She was so enthusiastic, I was mesmerised by her.

And her singing…. well you’ve heard it. Only they were happy songs then, I think. ’

He paused and got up to stare out of the window. ‘You fell in love with her.’ said Rose.

‘That’s ridiculous,’ argued Simon. ‘I knew nothing about her, she seemed more than a little bonkers and she looked young but sounded wise.’

‘That’s falling in love for you. Never makes sense.’

‘You’ve never liked my girlfriends,’ Simon went on.

‘That’s because they never liked me,’ Rose countered, thinking of all the model perfect women with their silly laughs and sly eyes, ‘and you have to admit, there were quite a few of them. You sort of checked them in and out like library books. I never knew who was going to be round at breakfast complaining about the lack of organic yoghurt or quinoa or whatever.’

Simon shrugged. ‘Sky was different.’

He became silent, staring down at the table. Rose was used to his noisiness. She started to fidget, unsure what to do with the silence. Then Simon put the glass down and rubbed his eyes with his thumbs. Her voice choked. ‘I thought she was dead.’

Rose sighed and reached out to touch his hand.

‘I think I could like Sky, if I knew a bit more about her.’ she said.

‘There’s something about her that makes me think she’s real, more real than those designer girls from the city.

Apart from the food thing. She strikes me as just as bloody picky.

Maybe if she comes back on the “next today”, I’ll get off to a better start.

It would just be nice to work out whether the “next today” is today or some other time. ’

Simon gave a choked laugh. ‘Yes she seemed more real, only she wasn’t.

That was the thing. David had the cameras set up to film the pack at night.

We had very limited success and he moved them around.

Then one morning, he called me over and showed me what he’d filmed.

It was a wolf, on her own, creeping towards the camp.

She was young, just reached maturity. She stood at the end of the trees, sat down and turned into a naked woman. Into Sky. Sky is a wolf.’

Rose’s hand froze and then started to tremble.

‘David got rid of the footage before anyone saw it,’ Simon continued, ‘said something had gone wrong with it.’

Rose, feeling nauseous, found her voice, and stood up. ‘So she’s a werewolf? So she’s the one who…’

‘No!’ Simon shouted, then said, ‘No. Sit down. Sit down, Rose. She’s not a werewolf. She’s a wolf who’s also a shapeshifter. Like a selkie is a seal that’s also a shapeshifter. She’s nothing to do with what happened.’

Rose sat down.

‘Selkies? Shapeshifters? They don’t exist.’

‘Werewolves don’t exist remember.’

They were both shaking. Simon lifted the glass to his lips, forgetting it was empty.

‘I thought she was dead,’ he repeated.

‘Why?’ Rose realised it sounded harsh and tried again. ‘I mean, what made you think she was dead? Did she disappear into the forest and not come back?’

‘No. No, she came the next two nights. She stopped being so serious and started joining in our conversations. She was really funny. Not that half of the crew appreciated it.’

‘Why didn’t David tell me about her?’

‘It wasn’t the sort of thing you could say over Skype I guess. Besides, we were getting to the end of the shoot. I wasn’t sure…’

‘How to tell her you were leaving?’

‘No, how to take her with me. The pack didn’t like her being with us, she said, and you could sense them prowling around.

They were ready to move on, she said. I didn’t know how to ask her how feasible it was to stay human and come with us.

I was going to ask David. He was good at that sort of soppy stuff but I never got the chance. ’

Soppy . Rose thought. You mean, affectionate, trusting, loving . She tried to recall what David had said about Blanket Girl but it had seemed so unimportant, she’d filed it away somewhere and couldn’t retrieve it. He must have hinted something.

Simon was still shaking. His skin looked grey, as if he was about to vomit. She frowned, noticing for the first time, little white hairs in his beard and wondered how long they’d been there. She reached for his hand again.

‘What happened?’

‘It was full-moon, during the incident… Someone told me, when I came round that is, someone told me that there was a dead wolf next to David. A young female. That she’d been shot too.

They didn’t do anything with the body, they said.

They were too busy tr ying to save David and then me.

When I heard I was just too numb to respond.

I never said “Are you sure she was dead? Couldn’t you have buried her?

” I’ve felt so ashamed. No one but David would have understood and David was… ’

Tears had filled his eyes and he angrily swiped them out of the way then hammered his fist on the table top. Rose started to cry too and sat with her face in her hands.

‘Simon please, I know this is hard for you, but can’t you tell me what actually happened that night?

I know you probably don’t want to upset me, and I know you’re really hurting too but I really need to know how David died, how you became …

what you are. All these months you’ve refused to tell me.

And no one from the crew will tell me. Why? What are you all hiding?’

‘You don’t understand,’ he said, his voice choked. ‘I can’t tell you. I don’t remember any of it. Just the last evening, saying goodnight to Sky and then nothing. Nothing at all.’

Rose gave him a squeeze and then thumped him lightly.

‘What on earth would Mum and Dad say if they knew?’ she said, making herself laugh.

Simon got up and pulled her hair. ‘Dad would say “Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t be a werewolf, they don’t exist. Stop making excuses and get back to work”.’

‘And Mum would say “Now, now dear, don’t spoil his story, Simon has the biggest head, I mean imagination. Let’s all just pretend it’s real and keep him happy.”’

‘And Dad would say, “You’re ruining that boy, look at the state of him. This would never have happened if he’d got a proper job like Rose.”’

‘And Mum would say “Rose likes organising him, she’s been finding things for him since they were toddlers.”’

‘And Dad would say “Good job someone in this family has some common sense, but isn’t it about time he looked after himself? Now why are we wasting time talking rubbish when there’s golf on TV.”’

‘It’s all their fault, isn’t it? Leaving us to fend for ourselves.’

‘Definitely.’

Rose started to clear the table.

‘You know,’ said Simon, washing his face in the kitchen sink, and drying it on kitchen roll. ‘You really ought to join that Guild. Lunch was awful, it’s about time you learnt to cook. You can even ruin salad.’

Rose flicked him with the tea towel and went to the bathroom. She washed her face too, wiping the smudges of eyeliner and mascara away and revealing her normal face. But despite the impact of the avocado suite and peach walls, her colouring was warmed the brightness of her hair and top.

She ran her fingers through her hair and puffed it up. Going back into her room, she sat at the dressing table and made up half her face, not as much as earlier, but just a little. She watched the blotchiness disappear and the eyes grow bigger, the lips fuller.