FEVERCHAIN 11.5

Lesbian werewolves, et cetera. FEVERCHAIN is a contemporary horror-romance serial set in the fictional Pinetown, New Jersey. And as always, coming to New Jersey was a mistake.

⚠️CW: Violence, restraint

THAT’S RIGHT Emily S Hurricane’s VOICEOVER IS ALREADY ATTACHED. Aaaaaand action: 🎬

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A nice, crunchy layer of sleet makes it a perfect day to look for tracks. I’m all bundled up and moisturized, hair pulled into spacebuns, ready to kiss Mother Nature. It’s been nice to drive out of the city, get off campus, get out of the lab. Like leaving one planet for another.

I sing behind the wheel and leave the rest behind.

In the forest I brush hairballs from the rub pads we stuck to bark, note the yellow snow, dot my map. With the larger study looming over him, Dr. Leo doesn’t have time to figure out if something here is poisoning the coyotes. But the Wildlife Alliance asked our department for help—it would be super shitty if we gave up. Someone had to keep trying, offer some real explanation.

So, the reputation of our ecology program is yet again on my shoulders.

I like it, most of the time. Academia showbiz. You have to sparkle and shine to keep that fickle funding. Dustin didn’t want to commit. It’s not his thesis, it’s mine. Still, I wish I wasn’t alone, but whatever.

Small towns don’t intimidate me, nor do forests. In the city I’ve been followed. Threatened. Fetishized, dehumanized, doxxed, and more! That doesn’t mean I don’t go out.

Animals are far more predictable than people, anyway. I only carry bear spray for the potential axe murderer—there isn’t enough food to support bears in the Pine Barrens. And the axe murderer thing—my dad showed me slasher movies when I was way too young; it gave me all these irrational fears.

Bootprints do catch my eye. And, what do you know, they aren’t far from the discarded boots. After that, bare footprints. A littered baby wipe, stained red.

Axe murderer, is that you? There’s his opened duffle bag, unsuccessfully disguised under pine straw, leaves, and twigs. Inside of it, discarded clothes. A sports bra, maybe a victim’s? Or I have this all wrong. Girls can be axe murderers too—I’m the last person to be gender essentialist. I check my cell: SOS. No service.

I should probably get out of here. I hold my compass flat and aim it at the Pitch Pine Path’s parking lot, out of sight. It’s too far. If things get spooky, my safest bet is to flag someone down on the highway. Luckily, I don’t have to abandon this curiosity to get there.

The footprint trail continues towards the sounds of speeding cars. I follow them. They aren’t that big. Unthreatening feet, careful, wide steps…

A copper creek trickles through the sleet sheet. Between gnarled pines, I see the highway. Then, its carnage.

The top half of the buck is intact, a crimson line drawn from its mouth onto frosted pine needles. Its antlers are magnificent but never stood a chance against a Chevy going seventy, the poor creature.

Its bottom half stops me. Human shoulders, torso, legs, and the offending feet. The head is hidden between the ribcage.

Breath is snatched from my larynx. The deer is dead. But the person... Their bare ass is out, which seems like a bad sign. The killer’s fucked up scene, his/her/their sense of twisted humor.

Are they dead? Schrödinger’s head. My gaze pings from the earth to branches and shrubs for the hundredth time. We’re close to the highway, I mean, it’s right there, between the branches, providing potential witnesses and life rafts. That emboldens me.

The human’s midsection moves. A slow, repetitive rise and fall, AKA: breathing. Good! But why are they stuffed in a deer carcass?

“Hello?”

As I close in—cadaverine, putrescine, indole, dimethyl disulfide trisulfide. Fishy, garlicky mothballs. Death smells. I pinch my nose.

The buck’s back legs are bent, basically detached, spine exposed, a whole person under it, their head where the heart, lungs, intestines should be. I sense, rather than recognize, who it is. Oh, my god. With a surge of warm confidence, I pinch her arm—hot. I don’t know if it’s from the contrast with the air—

After a blur of motion, my hand sinks, Gwen’s head forcing it and the rest of me to the ground. I slap the forest floor, an antler piercing a spacebun, scarily close to my scalp. Crazy, stinging pressure on my hand, like a heavy beehive, venom gripping and sinking into muscles and ligaments. My muscles and ligaments. A shriek rips from me, fire shoots down my arm and into my heart—it thrashes, tries to kill me. I choke on adrenaline.

Bear spray is inches from my free fingertips, I fleeexxxxx. Released, I grab it, shaking so violently I drop and forget it. I try to stand. My hand wound fizzes. Numb thumb.

Gwen bit me. She bit me. Hard! Who does that? Was it a seizure, or something psychiatric?

Before I can speak, my mouth fills with froth. I fall forward. Behind me, stifled, squeaking sobs. In front of me, forever, screaming. No, I don’t scream like—never have screamed like that before.

The wound is burning. It must be infected.

Cadaverine, putrescine, indole, dimethyl disulf… Death smells LOUD.

When I look back, my body tenses—she’s already upon me, shoves me back, knees stabbing into each arm, pinning me to the frosty ground. She covers my mouth. I sink my teeth into the wet rubber of her palm. Snag it. Her filthy face is crying, hot tears, blood, and spit dripping on my forehead: a flavorful broth. Her palm—I chew it like bubblegum. It loosens against my tongue, spills down my throat.

Almost every tooth she has is on my neck, vibrating with indecision. Her pulse, convulsive. A growl that rattles my skull.

I gasp open, gurgle, cough. I’m boiling. Insides roiling and empty. A new, stronger impulse to bury into her, excavate tendon and bone. My vision narrows to nothing. Decay, resin, syrup, butter, sulfur, taste what I smell, salt, salty. My girldick and fingers twitch; my skin sunburned without the sun. I feel each and every hair follicle expand and retract, I’m jumpy.

I don’t like it.

Hyperventilating, Gwen shifts on me to tear a long strip of my shirt, her hand’s weeping skin flap snagging on my bra strap before she smothers my cheek with it. I savor her blood. Metallic promises fresh meat. Fear leaves me.

My neck jerks, but she’s strong. Hitch my hips, again and again, but it hurts my biceps. I imagine chomping into her naked shoulder—she stuffs my mouth with fabric. At least there’s something to bite. She keeps her good hand over my muffled cries.

Her knees are crushing my arms, crushing. When the pain becomes unbearable, I can see through my tears again and think. I don’t remember how Gwen got on top of me. The air is damp between us, a cloud ascending to meet a sad-sounding anthem from a white-throated sparrow.

A car billows down the highway like an impending storm. Under me, below the frost line, something mammal shifts in a burrow. We’ve disturbed the decaying earth, but it’s quickly settling around and inside me: a new equilibrium.

Gwen reeks of rot. Her deodorant is failing.

“Ou… ugged mee,” I speak against her hand and the soaked shirt strip in my mouth. She drugged me. There’s no other explanation.

Gwen’s tears cut through her gore mask. When she tries to speak, drool dribbles out. She coughs.

“Eee aoh!”

She won’t get off. “Wait.” Her breath fascinates me. There’s a lot of information there. Earthy, meaty, marrow, pebble, asphalt. Faint spearmint. “I gotta,” her mouth twists, “tell you something…”

“Whuh!”

Gwen sobs into her arm. It’s like thunder in my eardrums, I hear every spittle and snort separately, clearly. Her body flowing and bubbling and heaving, always movement. “Please, Erica. Don’t run.”

I nod; she takes the gag from my mouth. Sensation expands. The air tastes like something I want to roll in. Strange wants grip me. Scare me. Again, the urge to eat her carrion-marinated face off, now that I’m free. To tear into her thin throbbing throat. Why do I want that? Why would I ever?

Though I can tell, Gwen wants to do the same to me. Our eye contact is fixed, not friendly.

I force my jaws shut. Instead of crying, I grind out a plea: “Explain.”