In Sickness and in Health
Chapter 1: A gift at a price.
You were born to be together, and together you shall be forevermore.
Caleb looked around the meadow that he was standing in with a content smile on his face, skimming past the lake and into the forest. He wasn't just idly admiring the scenery, for he had been here enough that the awe it had originally inspired in him had long ago worn off; no, he was looking for the girl that he had often met here, a wolf girl that was very human-like except for the fact that she had a wolf's tail and ears, a snout in place of her normal nose and mouth, and that she was covered in smooth black fur from head to toe, in addition to having a normal head of shoulder length black hair. Said wolf girl was currently hiding from him, in a playful game of hide and come get me that she often initiated with him when she was in a good mood. Catching a glimpse of black moving through the woods, he grinned and took off running towards his newly found target. Once he broke the line of the trees though, she saw him and took off running in a wide arc away from him and towards the lake. Even though they were both running as fast as their legs could carry them, there was no wind blowing in their face to slow them down, so they were able to circumvent the area with little trouble. Eventually though, as they were passing by the lake, the wolf girl got exhausted and had to sit down to catch her breath, so he slowed down as he closed in on her and sat down beside her.
"Hello again Ashley," he said warmly, smiling at her happily. "I missed you these past two days, what happened?"
The wolf girl - now identified as Ashley - smiled back at him, trying to mask the nervous look on her face, and looked away towards the trees. "I just had some business to take care of with someone I know, and he couldn't wait until after I was finished with you. Sorry that I couldn't make it."
"It's no big deal," Caleb replied, trying to decide whether or not he should ask what happened with the meetings. Before he could finish weighing the options, however, a wind kicked up out of nowhere and started blowing sand off of the ground a couple yards away from the two of them. Quickly, the sand started swirling around and formed into a being, or rather what appeared to be a human. The person looked at least 6' tall, with shaggy dark red air that hung almost to his shoulders. He wore a dark red shirt that almost matched the shade of his hair and loose white pants with a rope belt in them. On his face was a serious look that just dripped with aggravation.
"You don't listen, do you?" the man said, glaring at Ashley. She looked like she was about to say something back to him, but he turned towards Caleb, pointedly ignoring the girl. "Well, since she obviously didn't inform you, I suppose that I will fill you in on what's going on. It has become clear that you two are getting too close to each other, and your kinds aren't allowed to intermix with each other, so it's my job to make sure that you don't see each other from this point forward."
"What?" Caleb sputtered, "but this is just a dream - my dream, none the less - and we've been seeing each other here for ages without anyone saying anything. How can you just come in here and break us apart?"
"I can because that's my job," the man responded, "and just because you got in under my radar for this long doesn't mean that you are exempt from that rule. And the fact that this may be a dream is irrelevant. Spirits communicating in dreams are bound by the laws of the universe just as much as anyone else is." He looked between the two of them, and sighed as he saw the girl crying silently. "I'll tell you what though. I'll offer you a deal, but first you have to answer this question. Are you willing to give up your whole life as you know it just for a chance with her? I don't want your answer now; I'll give you one week to decide, then you must have your answer. If you accept, your life will come crashing down around you, but you will have her by your side. If you decline, you will never see her again from this night forward, but I'll be nice, and if you decline my offer, you'll go from the bottom of the social food chain to being popular, and you will get a good job that will give you as much money as you could need. You have one week from now to decide between life and her." As he finished speaking, both he and the world around him dissolved into sand, and Caleb woke up from his slumber.
Caleb sighed as he sat up and ran his hand through his sandy brown hair, cursing his luck at being caught and forced to make the decision between his life and the girl that he dared to say that he had fallen in love with, even if she was just a character from one of his dreams. Dozens of questions bounced around in his head, demanding answers, but the loudest of them was also the simplest - 'What did I do to deserve this?'
"Wake up, Caleb," the voice of his mother called as she banged on his door, "you'll miss the bus if you don't get up."
"Alright," he shouted at her, "I'm up, I'm up already. I'll be down to grab some breakfast in a few minutes; just let me get dressed." Despite what he had just said, he collapsed backwards onto the bed again, dreading going to school for another day. He, like every other teenager, hated school and couldn't wait to graduate, but unlike most other students he often had to deal with flak about his choice of religion because he accidentally let it slip that he was a Wiccan. One would think that since it was the twenty-first century that people would learn to accept other people's religion, but he had no such luck, as he lived in a small town in which a lot of the population still equated his religion with Satanism. Regardless, he had learned to deal with other people, and even managed to make a couple of friends. He sighed and got out of his bed, more worried about what was going to happen with him and Ashley than what the closed minded kids at school thought about him. He tried not to be too worried about the whole give up his life for his love choice, but it would be a lot easier if he knew what would happen after he made the decision.
"So," he said as he made his way into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, "what's for breakfast?"
"Get out of the fridge," she called to him from the counter without looking up from the onion she was cutting, "I've already made you a bowl of cereal and put it on the table in the living room, now hurry up."
"Okay, thanks," he replied absently as he walked into the living room and sat down at the table to eat. Soon the cereal in the bowl had gone, almost before he realized it, and he drank the milk out of the bowl and walked back into the kitchen to put the bowl in the sink before kissing his mother goodbye and running out of the door.
The morning passed by faster than he would have thought possible, and before he realized it he was already coming back from lunch without having paid enough attention to the day to know more than the fact that he had probably failed his math test because he couldn't concentrate on his school work. On the bright side, his favorite class, history, was coming up next, so maybe he would be able to catch a break from thinking about the decision he had looming over his head.
"Alright class," the teacher said, "please pass your homework on the conclusion of the Salem Witch Trials to the front of the class so I can collect it."
Caleb sighed as he rummaged through his backpack for his notebook, then finally dug it out from between a statistics book and his physics folder. He tiredly handed up the worksheet that he had done the night before to the girl in front of him as she turned around to see what the hold up was.
"Now then," the teacher began once again, "today we are going to split up into groups of three and work on three discussion questions that I will put on the board, which are to be turned in at the end of the period. If there aren't any questions, you may find your partners now."
"So," the guy sitting next to Caleb drawled out, turning his desk to face Caleb, " 'evaluate the significance of who was accused of witchcraft and who the accusers were during the trials.' Any ideas on how to start this one Cal?"
Much due to the fact that he was grouped with his two friends during the class for the discussion, Caleb managed to keep his mind off of his problem for the duration of his class, but when it came time for the last class of the day, Physical Education, he had to deal with a different problem, as this was the class that held the most students that looked down on him and disliked him. On the bright side, it was during this class that Caleb made the decision that tonight he would find the person in his dreams and accept his deal. Best case scenario he figured was that the guy was bluffing and couldn't do anything to him because of the fact he was only a character in a dream, but even if his power was real, he would still get to keep Ashley, who was currently one of the few things in his life that he cherished. He found it funny that all it took was a black eye from being hit in the face with a volleyball to realize that everything that he currently had was worth giving up to keep the one thing that he cared about, even if she only was in his dreams.
When he arrived at home, finally having made his decision, the night seemed to drag on, in stark contrast to the speed at which the day flew by. From the time when he arrived home until dinner seemed an eternity. At dinner, he choked down his food, claiming to be tired and want to go to sleep early, but as he finished his food his mother declared that she would make their nightly bible discussion early tonight so that he could still participate. It seemed that even though she knew he was a pagan, she was hoping that if she just forced him into the bible enough that he would see magically that there was some error in his ways, and that he could correct it by switching to her religion. Regardless, he still played along with her, not wishing to start any more arguments about his religion, for he knew he was on a fine line with her, and being eighteen, he couldn't afford to piss her off too badly.
Finally though, after what seemed like an hour of pouring through passages and talking about their significance, he was allowed to retire to his bed, where he proceeded to toss and turn for hours, trying to get to sleep with little luck. Eventually though, he found himself wandering through the desert and knew that he was finally there. Now all he would have to do was find the person who started this mess and tell him that he wanted to accept the deal, that he wanted to be able to see her again no matter the cost, but first he would have to find the guy. As if answering his wish, he slowly came into sight of a statue. At first he thought it was a pillar to some long forgotten palace, but as he came closer to it he realized that it was a statue of the very same person he was looking for. As he came closer, the sandy color started to bleed from the statue and its clothing started billowing in a nonexistent wind, and Caleb's heart lept as he realized that he was standing face to face with the man that he was trying to find. Clearing his throat, Caleb spoke up and told him that he had made his decision and that he would accept the deal that the man had offered.
"So," the man responded after a moment's pause, "you accept my offer, even knowing the consequences? You do realize that once you do this there is no turning back, and you will have to deal with hardships that you haven't even dreamed about?"
"Yes," Caleb answered, staring the man dead in the eye. "I'm prepared to face whatever comes."
"Very well," the man replied, outstretching his hand, sending sand flying towards Caleb. Before he had time to respond, or even process what was going on, sand was all around him, crushing him, burning, and he was sure that he had even swallowed a couple mouthfuls of it. Soon all went black, all he knew was sand, and he awoke in a panic, clawing at waves of sand that were no longer there. He reached up a hand to run through his hair only to realize two things, first being that his hair was no longer there, and second being that he was covered in sandy brown colored fur. Slightly dreading what he would see, he walked up to the mirror hanging in his room with his eyes closed, then cracked one eye open. What stared back at him was a sand colored wolf boy, who looked much like Ashley did, with one green eye squinting out at him.
It was when he turned around to drop back on his bed that he got the second shock of his life, for sitting on the bed, staring up at him with confusion in her light blue eyes, was Ashley. It took all the strength that he could muster not to fall out onto the floor from pure shock right then and there, but he realized that his problems were only beginning. For one, what was he going to tell his mom? Then he had a thought that sent an icy chill through his back. Would Ashley still recognize him? For what seemed like eternity upon eternity, punctuated only by each hammering of the second hand belonging to the clock on his wall, he just stood there, staring back into her confused eyes until she finally spoke.
"Caleb?" she asked tentatively, "is that you? What happened? Where are we?"
"I don't really know," Caleb answered shakily, breathing out a sigh of relief. "All I know is I accepted that guy's offer and now you're here in my room and I'm fuzzy. What's more is that my mom is gonna freak out, start talking about the devil or something."
"What are we going to do now?" Ashley asked, "I mean, it isn't like people are used to seeing us here."
"I wish I knew," Caleb said in a downcast tone, before smiling. "It doesn't really matter though. For now, I'm just happy that I have you here by my side. All the time we met in dreams I never even dreamed that you'd be here one day. If nothing else, I'm happy to have you with me, even if I do have to go through for it."
"Thanks," Ashley said with a smile, "that's so nice of you." Before she had the chance to say anything else, however, they were interrupted by the sound of a banging on the bedroom door.
"Caleb," the voice of Caleb's mother rang out through the door, "get off of the phone and get dressed for school. You're going to miss the bus if you aren't out in five minutes."
The blood ran from Caleb's face as the moment he had been fearing since he looked in the mirror literally came knocking at his door. "I-I'll be out in a minute," he stuttered. Quickly, he ran to his closet and threw on a set of comfortable clothing. "Hide in the closet," he quietly said as he walked to the door. Once she was out of sight, he opened the door to see his mother walking away from him. "Mom? I have a problem..."
She turned around, almost in slow motion, and when she saw him her jaw literally dropped. She just stood there for a moment, not believing her eyes, before she screamed. "What are you? Get out of my house, you abomination!" She turned and ran, screaming that she was going to call the police before she slammed the door to her room and locked the door.
"Well, shit," Caleb said blankly. "That could have gone better." He just stood there for a moment, before turning around and walking back into the room. He looked at Ashley with an apologetic look on his face. "Um, I don't know how to say this, seeing as how I don't have any other place to go, and all my relatives live in other states, but we have to leave, like now." He emptied his book bag, and stuffed two of his coats in it, before running to get the cash that he kept around the room.
"What are we going to do?" Ashley asked, helplessly watching him running around the room grabbing things.
"I have no clue," he said as he finished grabbing the things he considered important from his room, which mainly consisted of his money, phone, and two jackets. "Come on, let's go down and grab what food we can before the cops get here. I don't know what's going to happen to us, but I don't think we stand a good chance if we're caught by the cops around here."
Ashley nodded to him and followed him through the hallways and into the kitchen, where she helped him dig through the cabinets for anything that could be taken with them to eat. After a short period of time, they had filled up his school bag, and he was pulling her along by the hand to his back door. Without a word, they both ran out of the house and through the yards of their neighbors houses, until they finally had to stop to rest in the yard of an old church building that stood at the edge of the subdivision.
"Oh man," Caleb said between deep breaths, "that jerk wasn't kidding when he said our lives were going to go down the tube. What the heck are we going to do now? Stuck on our own with no place to go and in a crowd of people who fear those that don't look like them?" He turned to Ashley again, who looked like she had done something wrong and this was her fault, and gave her a small smile. "Don't look like that, you're worth it to me. We'll make it out of this somehow. Eventually."