Page 5 of Full Moon Frenzy

His voice cut off at her interruption, watching her mouth struggle over the words, finally shifting into a strained, sad smile. Not one that was part of the scripted repertoire.

“I’m leaving. I accepted that job.”

Her emphasis on the word “leaving” momentarily wiped his mind clean, obliterating all memory of which job she was referring to, the conversation coming back to him several beats later.

It had been months ago, shortly after the start of the year.

She had been withdrawn that whole month, since the holidays, if he were being honest. She’d gone home to Alden Arbor for a long weekend without him, just before her school term resumed in early January, while he was on duty at the firehouse. She’d come home from that trip quiet, even quieter than she’d been before she’d left, mentioning the job opening at the elementary school her niece attended, just blocks from her childhood home.

Trapp closed his eyes briefly, letting that night unwind in his memory.

It had been snowing. He loved the cold, crisp smell of falling snow and had been standing at the sliding glass door off his living room, his face out several inches, inhaling deeply, hoping it would carry through to the following week’s full moon. Julia had been curled up on the sofa, her hands wrapped around a steaming mug of tea with a blanket over her shoulders.

“One of the fourth-grade teachers is leaving at my niece’s school,” she’d murmured, so softly he’d almost not heard her. “She’s finishing the year, but they’re moving over the summer. I-I really do miss that age. They’re still so sweet. I don’t know if I have it in me to stick it out at the middle school.”

He had crossed back to the sofa after closing the door, folding a leg under him as he’d sunk into the corner of the sofa, careful not to upset her tea. “It’s an adjustment for sure. I don’t think your kids are as bad as the junior high, but they’ve all got a lot going on at that age.”

“It’s horrible.” Trapp remembered being surprised by the vehemence of her words. “They’re all drowning in hormones. The weres are all on the verge of changing for the first time. I had a mothboy start literally cocooning to his seat. His parents had to come in and bring him home with the chair!”

“I mean, it’s a hard age. I get it, I was one of those ‘wolf howling beneath the skin, first turn is almost here’ kids. They can’t help it, you know. But I get it, you’re the one who has to deal with it all day.”

Julia had looked away, her hands tight around her mug.

“One of the girls — not in my class, thank stars! — She went into her first heat during the day. Came to school thinking she just had a stomachache. By lunchtime, she was out of control. You know what twelve-year-old boys are like! They had to put the whole wing on lockdown just to restore order, practically smuggle her out a window!”

“Puberty is a hell of a drug,” he’d laughed, throwing his hands up in defense at her glare. “I’m not going to pretend I didn’t get up to some shit when I was in middle school.” He didn’t share that by the time he was in high school, sniffing out who was on the verge of their heat had practically been a game, knowing she wouldn’t appreciate it. “And some of these parents are a little too woo-woo about things like heat suppressants. You can gentle-parent behavior, not biology. Those are the breaks in a mixed-species school. It’s always been that way; it’s not that your kids this year have been any better or worse. But I am sorry you’re the one stuck dealing with it.”

“I don’t know if I can for another whole year,” she’d sighed, leaning into his side, and the conversation had drifted.

He hadn’t realized she’d brought up the job opening as anything other than a segue into her complaining about her sixth graders, that she’d been considering it all along . . . back in her hometown. Human town, human school. Back where she belongs. Trapp flinched as the thought moved through his mind in his father’s voice.

“Wait,” he choked out in the present, shaking away the memory of that night. “The job at your niece’s school. Did — have you already signed the contract?”

He knew enough about teachers unions and the regulations on job postings and searches; knew enough to infer what her acceptance of the job implied. They had talked about this job months earlier. And she applied for it then. Without telling you. Applied and likely went through several rounds of interviews. She might have even gone back to interview in person. His firehouse schedule was forty-eight hours on, ninety-six hours off, and the first day of the off rotation was spent dead to the world, asleep. She could have easily popped out of town without his notice over the course of those three-day cycles.

She nodded, keeping her eyes fixed on the countertop before her. “I signed it last month. I just didn’t know how to bring it up.”

He bristled. A month ago. She knew a month ago that they were running down the clock, and had evidently been planning it for half the year by then. “Without even discussing it with me?! What about us, Jules?”

“What us, Trapp?”

He flinched again, not prepared for the bluntness of her voice. The windows stood open against the warm spring air, he realized, and the distant sounds of the town square floated through the screens in fragments of music and distant laughter. He hadn’t contained this well enough.

“What us am I supposed to be clinging to? The pretend-perfect couple everyone sees? Do you think it’s easy for me, deflecting every single time someone from the post office or the grocery store asks when you’re going to ‘pop the question and make an honest human’ of me? This is . . . it’s for the best. The school will be better off finding someone better equipped to deal with that age group. And I . . . I need to go back to a classroom where I’m not fighting against the tide every day. And I’m not starting from square one there; I already know the neighborhood and some of the administrators. After the holidays came and went . . . I needed something to change.”

Trapp stiffened. He knew what the holidays came and went meant, hearing nearly the same thing from his own mother. I can’t believe the holidays came and went and you didn’t get engaged! What are you waiting for?

He hadn’t known what to say then; still didn’t know what to say now. He didn’t know what they were waiting for, only that something wasn’t in place. He and Julia had discussed marriage early on in their relationship, both agreeing that they wanted to be on the same page with things . . . now it seemed they were holding two completely different books.

“So, this is because I haven’t proposed?” he demanded. “Or because you want to go back to teaching human kids? Because it sounds to me like it’s definitely one of those things, but you’re conveniently blaming the other. If you wanted to get married, why didn’t we ever discuss it again like adults?” He didn’t like his tone, liked the petulance of his words even less, fists clenching and unclenching at his sides, but Julia only shook her head.

“I did, in the beginning. And I told myself I had to be patient because you told me you’d gotten married too fast once before. So, I waited. And then I realized what that would look like. You’re happy here. I don’t know if I am. And I didn’t want it anymore. And if we’re not moving forward, then what are we doing? What’s the point?”

The point is, we were a team. The point is, we were supposed to decide these things together.

“I can’t deal with figuring out these kids and your commitment issues. I’m tired.”

“I don’t have commitment issues!” His voice was louder than he’d intended, dragging a hand down his face, breathing hard. “I’ve been committed to you from day one, Jules.”