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The wind began to whip up the leaves on the forest floor, the tree branches swaying with the force as Nate and Kayla ran toward a creek. They ran for about five miles, and she smelled rain in the air and felt the temperature dropping rapidly. It appeared the storm had decided to drop in sooner than the meteorologist had predicted. Clouds in the dark sky turned ominously green, and lightning flashed in sheets all across the dark sky, illuminating the trees and them. Rain, when it came, couldn’t hurt them, but lightning and hail—if it was big enough—could.
They were too far from Nate’s apartment whenthe rains let loose, and then chunks of ice began to fall from the sky. Kayla hadn’t expected that! She and he raced for the creek’s bank with the same notion in mind. She hoped the creek wouldn’t overflow, but an outcropping of rocks and an overhang would give them some protection from the storm until it passed.
This wasn’t how she had planned for their outing to go. They finally reached the overhang, lightning striking a tree nearby with a thunderous crack, making both her and Nate jump a little. Then she smelled smoke. The tree was on fire! She and Nate peered out to watch it, but the pouring rain soon put out the fire, and they both sighed with tentative relief.
They snuggled together as wolves under the rock ledge providing them shelter. Their double coat of fur kept them warm, and cuddling together added to that. Only their guard hairs were wet, their undercoat of soft, downy fur keeping them warm and dry.
Nate licked her nose, and she licked his back. Despite the storm raging all around them—lightning forking into the ground, thunder booming or cracking overhead and shaking the ground, ice falling and piling up all around the outside of their shelter, some as big as golf balls—she thought about her poor car. At least Nate’s car was parked under a roof. Guests didn’t have that luxury.
All that mattered for now was that they stayed safely under the shelter. She wanted to talk to him, but this was nice too, just being with him on a stormy night in their wolf coats snuggling to stay protected.
Then she realized the water in the creek was rising. Nate nudged at her, motioning to the creek, warning her if she hadn’t already taken notice. But they had time before the water reached their shelter, and she was hoping the hail would stop by then.
The rain and chunks of ice continued to fall, the lightning never ending. Thunder blasted through the area. She had really wanted to run with Nate as a wolf, but they should have realized the thunderstorm might get there earlier and not have relied so much on the weather report, knowing it was often wrong.
The creek began to overflow the banks inches away from them. It wasn’t going to stop. Then the water was at her paws, and Nate moved around her to protect her from the water.
She smiled at him for being so chivalrous. But when the water reached their bellies, he motioned with his head to leave the shelter and gave her a little woof.
She woofed back. They would run as fast as they could to the apartment. There wasn’t any other shelter from here to there.
But to their surprise, the bank under their feet gave way suddenly. Nate slipped into the floodedcreek, and Kayla followed right after him. The creek was moving so fast, she couldn’t reach the bank, so she was just trying to keep her head above the water and saw Nate ahead of her struggling too. He kept trying to look back for her. She woofed at him, telling him she was all right. Just get out of the water!
He finally managed to scramble onto the bank, where he could finally get his footing, and she was relieved he was out of the water now. The hail was mixed, pebble-sized, which bounced off their fur coats, but larger pieces were still falling too. As she neared the location where he’d managed to get out of the water, he was staying for her. Though she appreciated the gesture, she wanted him out of this weather and not getting pummeled by the hail while he waited for her.
But when she reached his location, she didn’t have the strength to get out on her own. She struggled to pull herself up on the shore with her front paws while Nate shifted and grabbed her by the body and pulled her onto shore.
“Let’s run!” He shifted back and the two of them raced for the apartment complex.
Now she was glad he had stayed to help her out of the flooded creek.
A chunk of ice hit her shoulder, the fur helping to keep her from a worse injury, but she’d be bruised for sure. Luckily, their advanced healing abilities aslupus garouswould mean the bruise would go away in half the time.
Another hit her butt.Damn it. Now that hurt!
Nate yelped, and she glanced over at him, keeping pace with her, watching out for her. He had blood on his muzzle.
The ice finally stopped falling, and it was all rain now, still pouring down, but she felt an overwhelming sense of relief.
They were getting close to his apartment complex. She didn’t even want to see what had happened to her car. But she was glad they were nearly home.
She raced onto the covered patio and through the wolf door.
Nate ran through it right behind her. Then they both shifted.
“Man, I’m so sorry, Kayla,” Nate said, pulling her into his arms. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, but you’ve got blood on your face. Let me clean you up.”
He kissed her right above her shoulder where ice had struck her. “You’ve got blood on your shoulder.”
She glanced at it. “Uh, yeah, and bruising for sure, but it will go away fast enough. I’m just glad neither of us ended up with injuries more serious than that.” She knew large hail had actually killed people out in it who were unable to take cover quickly enough, so it wasn’t something to leaveto chance. There hadn’t been any reports of hail before they went for their run. She didn’t want to look at her backside where she’d been hit.
“Me too.”
“I hate to think of my car.”
“Aww hell, I didn’t even think of that.” He ran his hand over her shoulder.
