Each bump in the road brought Amy's head down with a jolt, breaking her fragile sleep. If only they had a car. The old truck was unforgiving. It jittered and shook even along the smooth highway. It also didn't have a back seat for her to curl up on.

Amy had barely slept in two days. The only shut eye she had gotten either day was the hour or so after dawn once her transformation was complete.

A period of total oblivion always followed the change back. It washed away nearly everything of the wolf. Or it used to.

It used to be that only fleeting glimpses of her nocturnal rampages were left in her memory. They were jumbled and unreal, like fragments of a dream half-remembered. But this morning she remembered the journey. Not all of it. Things did not find purchase on the beast's mind. The trivial slid off like rain on the oils of her fur. So Amy could not say she remembered the whole night but she didn't feel like there were any gaps either.

Determination had driven her feet and although there were many opportunities to hunt, she refused to be distracted. Once out of town, she kept to the empty areas and away from people. Part of her wanted to shed blood—how easy it would have been to kill and kill and kill until there was no one left still breathing and the sun was hovering below the horizon. But she held her goal in her mind like a talisman and used it to ward of the rage. Despite the circuitous route, she knew her way. Whether it was by smell, or memory, or the stars, which she could sense even when not looking, Amy inexplicably knew the way back to the dead mesquite tree and to R.J.

The freedom of being the wolf meant she could have gone almost anywhere. So why go back?

The truth was: where else did she have to go? In the whole world, there was her childhood home and there was The Music Box, everything else was the great unknown. 

 And R.J. would take her far away, across the water. She secretly wished that they were heading further than Mexico. If only she could sail across the ocean and be so far away that not even the wolf could find her way back here.

Amy brushed her sweaty hair from out of her face and tried to get comfortable as they bounced down the interstate. She cradled her head against the top of the seat at an angle that mimicked a pillow in bed and folded her arms against her chest. With her eyes shut, she fell into a warm darkness and the world around her shrank away.

Not only had the wolf stayed with her in her memories but it was lingering on her features too. A glance at the side-view mirror as she climbed into the pickup had shown her that more of her hair had gone white. The light blonde streaks now looked dark bronze in comparison. And he had no doubt about her eyes anymore. They were changing.

She had run her tongue along her teeth to see if she still had fangs but so far they seemed normal.

Would the day come when there was no longer a girl, only the beast?

"You'll always be my little girl," her mother used to say. Her voice seemed clear and present. The sweet-tartness of lemonade lingered on Amy's lips. The sun blazed across the recently watered lawn. Some game was being played—running and laughing—peek-a-boo!

The truck seemed to leap into the air and Amy's chin came down sharply against her collarbone.

"Sorry," R.J. said.

Amy grunted and shifted back into her sleeping position. She longed to roll over and sprawl across a bed.

This time sleep wasn't so quick to find her. Instead, Moore's image floated in front of her clenched eyes. His sweet face hung there and her hand stirred with the desire to caress his cheek. But too quickly those last few horrible moments they had together were replaying themselves.

Amy shut her eyes tighter, pressing the lids together until she saw bursts of red. As much as she wanted Moore, she didn't want to relive that memory for the thousandth time.

It had been so wonderful. With the cold and the snow raging around them, the heat of their bodies drew them closer until they were almost one. Lips against lips creating a connection that short circuited her brain and left her as a being purely of sense and instinct with a great need building in her core. Then it all exploded. Their mouths joined. She opened hers. He opened his. Amy never knew she could feel so physically close to someone else.

But the beast was lurking in the background. It didn't care what she felt—what she wanted. It tasted human flesh and Amy's desire had doubled in intensity as hunger.

She suddenly wanted to feed so badly she almost shifted right then without any conscious thought. It would have been as natural as exhaling. One careless breath and she would have destroyed him. She wasn't even sure what held her back but she was grateful something had.

She pulled away from Moore and it felt like a thousand thoughts were screaming in her head and she was unable to hear a single one over the deafening roar.

"What's wrong," he said and Amy ran.

She ran into the storm and away from him. He followed but she easily outpaced him and dashed from the cemetery and through the playground. Amy threw  the jean jacket on the snow covered ground behind her, followed by the sweater. A clear path to the open country stretched before her. Far in the distance, Moore was calling for her. Calling for his Ylva.

Amy stopped to pull the shoes and slacks off. She rolled the muscles in her shoulders preparing for the change. She was so lost in her raging emotions she didn't notice the crashing in the brush until it was too late.

From a narrow path in the bushes, a boy came bursting through. His sprint turned into a stumbling stop when he saw her.

Terror and shock wafted off little Kevin Walsh.

For a split second Amy stood stock-still, naked and feeling dirty and as monstrous as she knew she was. But it was too late to stop.

Through wolf eyes, she could see the frantic beating of his heart, the micro vibrations of the veins in his neck. She heard his scream before he began to make it, while it was still building slowly from the depths of his gut. She smelled his meat and could already taste it.

"Ylva," the cry came closer.

Amy leaped past Kevin and tore through the wilderness, leaving home behind for the final time.

Ylva. He would only ever know her as Ylva. A strange girl he met and who ran off never to be seen again.

The real Ylva had been right: Human life isn't for you. It will only lead to tragedy.

She had told Amy that a normal life wasn't possible. To not even try to have one. People would get hurt. Now Amy understood. She had been so stupid but not anymore. She was a monster. She understood that now. Monsters don't get to have boyfriends.

The other prophetic warnings Ylva had given still confused her. More people wanted Amy dead than she knew and she should trust the sign of the snake. How many people? Why more than she knew? Did that mean some people who wanted to kill her she knew and others were strangers? Or that that they desired to kill her more than she could imagine? And what snake? Weren't snakes symbols of evil?

How long until those warnings made themselves clear? And would their meaning be as hideous to her as the realization that she was destined to kill everyone she loved, like she had her her mother and father, her brother Donny,  Jamie, and almost had done to Moore.

"R.J.?" she said. "Once we get to where we're going—wherever it is we end up—where will we live?"

"I haven't really thought about it too much. I've mostly been worrying about getting us to that boat."

"I think we should live in the jungle far away from other people."

"Amy, did someone hurt you when you were on your own."

"No."

"If someone did anything, it's okay to let me know. I'm not here to judge. I'm here to help."

"Haven't you learned by now? I'm always the one doing the hurting."

The battered old pickup drove down the interstate for a good mile before R.J. replied. "From where I'm sitting, it sounds like you got plenty hurt."

Neither of them said anything after that and Amy didn't sleep any more.