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Sound of Mind
by Feech
It never gets easier. It should, I think.
The more times you try it, the longer you live,
the easier these attempts at friendship ought to
become. But I am as shy now, in college, as I
ever was in my teens. I plan as carefully and
come away as disappointed when I fail.
In terms of romance, I feel as much the
bumbler I was at thirteen. I may be able to write
plays, to design sets, to create the very world in
which actors move. But for now my world revolves
around one approach, one line... Sure, we theatre
people are outgoing. But the hesitation increases
with degree of caring. And while I may sit down
to write a play the moment inspiration strikes,
when approaching a human I circle, test, shy away,
return. Once words are spoken, they can never be
retracted.
I look at my hands, idle in my lap, and sigh.
The theatre office is empty save for myself.
It's ridiculously early for anyone to be hanging
around here, but I was restless at home. Couldn't
sleep. Can you believe it? Kent Dryer couldn't
sleep.
The office is cluttered, too cluttered for
thinking. The random spacing of the furniture and
various scripts, books and pieces of outerwear
scattered about is distracting. Normally, I only
spend time here when it's full of people, when
there is a conversation to hold my attention.
I rise to my feet and move soundlessly out of
the office. Thinking about my purpose.
When I see him today, what do I say? Is
there an excuse to get him alone? He's been out
of the hospital two days. I forget whether I was
open to company when I was first released. After
a bad bout with Flu at thirteen, a boy bounces
back pretty quickly.
On the other hand, if I approach when he is
vulnerable, weak... Not quite back on his feet...
I know which part of Kent Dryer is beginning
to engineer this.
The black box, a cube theatre smelling of
many-times-walked-upon latex paint, is empty. I'm
so early that even Shadow has not arrived. The
black room seems tired. I can't think here,
either. It is a nighttime place to me.
Out the back corner of the black box. Into
the plastic-smelling hall, near the stairs down to
the costume shop. My nose is working full-tilt.
I let the instinct take over. The theatre
department has been the only place for me, ever
since I came to this university. Inhibitions are
not necessarily required for those of us who dwell
within the Performing Arts buildings.
I reach into a slacks pocket for my scene
shop keys, but as I begin to apply one to the
small hallway-access door I see that the bolt has
already been undone. Someone else here with set
work? I doubt it. Even the regular Tech people
won't be in until eight.
I slip my tall frame easily, silently into
the cavernous shop. Tentatively sniff the still
air near the door.
My senses are at their height, as they often
are when I am emotionally stressed-- for better or
for worse. My ears would catch any sound now, but
the enormous sawdusty cement-walled place is
deathly quiet. I realize that if I turn on a
light I will be able to use my eyes, as well.
The wolf within me is sending inexplicable
messages of nearby prey.
Funny, isn't it. I often see it in terms of
a graphic novel. A comic book. Whatever. Told
in white squares patched over striking drawings of
heroes with solid white teeth.
"Young Kent Dryer, walking home from school,
is the unwitting victim of a seepage of radiation
from the nearby plant..."
Sure, make a disease into an enviable state
of super-prowess. What do we give up? Our
normalcy. Any prowess we may have had that is
compromised by the alter-ego of the virus. Looks
good on paper. "Young Kent Dryer is found
unconscious, in a coma from which he will not awake
for a long time..." Young Kent Dryer is found
unconscious, laid low on the sidewalk by the sudden
onset of Martian Flu.
The light flickers, buzzes and becomes
stable. The one switch I have thrown illuminates
a shadowed patch of cement floor. Pine set pieces
in various stages of metamorphosis lean on the
wall and on each other. Amber eyes reconcile the
sights with the smells that enter attentive
nostrils.
My heightened senses were attributed to
fever, my remarkable new voice to the change all
boys go through. The silver-grey grizzling
suffused my blond hair so gradually that the only
comment was,"You know, your mother's hair went
darker, too."
"Mild-mannered Kent Dryer," the intense
handwriting announces, "Mysteriously transformed
by the radiation, finds himself the bearer of
remarkable powers."
I slink further into the shop, puzzling over
my wolf-insistence that there is-- there! A
smell... A person-- no, a ... wildebeest.
Can't be. I won't believe my luck could be
that good. Another whiff. It is. It's Gabriel.
Approach him now! Sings the friendly she-wolf.
He may not want me, though.
The she-wolf decides to approach diffidently.
I have to laugh, inwardly, when I think of
it. Thoughts in bubbles. Voices in jagged
rectangles. In the graphic novels, I would be
Kent Dryer, alias Kana, the swift and graceful
creature of the forest. His only weakness being
that he has no idea when she may appear...
How do I show someone my true identity? Yes,
the tall, slight man before you is the real me.
But although I have gone into full morph only
three times, the silvery she-wolf is very much a
part of the mind behind the man. Unable to
control the frequency of her appearance, how can I
now be honest with Gabriel? I cannot demonstrate.
It's hard to explain to someone who might not
accept-- to someone I very much want to accept me.
I'd like to say, never mind what anyone else
thinks, but it hurt when my parents "suggested"
Hayden Heath. Not that I would give it up for the
world, now. But besides the fact of the
brochure's specific welcoming of those with SCABS,
it seemed to me a bit too convenient that I came
to college in Minnesota while my family resides in
California. And it was their idea.
Gabriel. He's behind the curtain in the dark
wings of the mainstage, where the scene shop and
the performance space connect. He seems to have
sensed the one light flickering on. Now he waits,
alert, perhaps a bit-- frightened.
He's on the defensive, but he's alone!
Approach him now.
I make a slow, direct line for the curtain.
"Kent Dryer possesses the super-senses of his
wolf cousins."
I remember the first of the three times.
It didn't hurt, really. Maybe it did. But I
was so amazed at what was happening that all
sensation was greeted with pubescent curiosity.
I was alone, playing music, my earphones on,
and by the time they no longer fit I was
completely rearranged. Soft and muscular at the
same time. Gangly with my adolescent age but...
feminine. And I changed back, just like that. I
have no idea what triggers it.
My mother found hairs in the carpet near my
stereo and guessed the truth.
Suddenly I was a freak in my own house, a
teenage boy perfectly normal to outsiders but
whose hair and eye color were abhorrent to his own
parents.
I guess I wasn't completely normal, either.
The sight of a young man out on the street howling
to the neighborhood dogs was not exactly accepted
in our town. So I quit that. Easy. I felt
smothered, but at least I could still sing.
That's something that won't get into the
graphic novels: Young Kent Dryer pounding
joyfully on the steering wheel of his car, belting
out 'eighties tunes at the top of his lungs,
giving in to the delicious desire to sing.
'Eighties tunes, of course. Those long-drawn-out
notes with lyrics so easily followed.
DOOOON'T forget me when I'm gone....
Go with what works, I guess. It was
perfectly normal for an enthusiastic boy my age to
_sing_, as long as he did it in _human_. Oh I
FINALLY DECIDED my FUTURE LIES beyond the Yellow
Brick ROOOOAAAAAD!
Gabriel is silent behind the curtain and as I
draw nearer to my prey I suddenly realize the
significance of his fight with SCABS.
Feminine. Masculine. He told Feech, back in
the hospital the night we found him in the black
box. "One good thing could have come out of this
disease..."
And so he fought it, fighting the end. The
inevitability of his man's body, be it wildebeest,
human or human-wildebeest.
I remember what it felt like. The she-wolf
taking the boy. And I... liked it. A surprise to
me at the time. But Gabe was older when he went
down, and his war with the virus was a deliberate
one. One which he lost. But perhaps he's
ready... Ready to consider...
The approach never gets any easier.
The she-wolf within me balks as I enter the
wing of the mainstage and draw aside the curtain.
She reminds me that Gabriel is as tall as me since
his change, that he may be a formidable opponent
should he reject my company.
Yet he is alone, I am alone, neither of us
surrounded by other theatre friends. The time has
to be now.
I step beyond the curtain. Gabriel is seated
on a pine step, some piece left here from the last
show. He looks up with those serious grey eyes
and the corner of his lip twitches in a barely
perceptible welcoming smile. "Oh, s'you."
I steel myself for the first line of the
upcoming pursuit.
And speak. "Hello, Gabe. Mind if I sit
down?"
He moves over and motions to the space left
on the step beside him. As soon as he's not
looking I draw in a deep whiff of the scent of his
blue-grey hide. "So, Gabriel," I say, "What are
you here so early for?"
"Couldn't sleep. _Blue Window_ auditions
tonight."
His voice has changed, is the characteristic
organ-like grunting of the maned creature he has
become. I find it an attractive complement to the
high, smooth voices of so many of the people in
the department.
"You're Griever, easily," I tell him. I
feel and hear the slight vibrato in my voice.
Easy, I tell myself. Stay stoic and calm. It's
just a conversation.
"I don't know," Gabe says listlessly. "My
voice... and I'm so tired. Before-- well, you
know-- that night-- I would have said I had the
part of Griever in the bag. But now..."
"You're different. All actors are striving
for difference. From themselves, from others. Go
in there to get the part. You will. Remember the
faculty knows you."
He smells relaxed, but sad. I allow myself
to adopt a more vulnerable position, facing him,
making no attempt to keep my face above his eye
level.
He gazes around morosely as he speaks. "I
know they know me, Kent. But when they see how
different--"
"Ah."
He actually smiles. His dark lips upturn in
a charming line on the large head. "Yeah, yeah.
I know. Different."
He continues. "By the way, what are you
doing here? I thought you only arose before noon
if your house was on fire."
I can't keep my eyes on his. At the same
time, something rash and giddy within me is
saying, what are you waiting for... I speak in a
growling tone that I know he is going to notice
right away. I can't help it. "Oh, nothing much,
Gabriel. I hope I'm not interrupting your
audition prep. Just thought since you happened to
be here too I'd sit down for a minute."
"Kent, you okay? I don't mean to be pushy,
but do you have SCABS? Because I noticed just now
a little change to your voice..."
I turn to him. "Actually, yes, I
do have SCABS. I'm all right for now, though.
It's just my wolf's voice you heard."
I can't believe we're talking about this. I
feel as though I'm running on a hunt, the wind
sucked into joyous lungs. DOOOON'T FORGET ME!
Gabriel has made absolutely no move to avoid my
company.
"Oh, okay. Just checking. I _thought_ there
was something a bit predatory about you."
"Yes, well, um, there might be kind of
another reason for that..."
What the hell.
I kiss him.
To my immense surprise, Gabriel turns a
gentle face to me and licks my cheek.
The prey has turned on the predator.
The she-wolf luxuriates in the success of the hunt.