From: "nikolai kingsley" <nikolai@warehouse.net>
Newsgroups: talk.bizarre
Subject: FTSD: were
Date: Tue, 1 Dec 1998 00:23:10 +1100
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she appeared at my doorstep with the reddened eyes of someone who'd stayed
up all night crying. i knew the drill; turned off the Ren and Stimpy video,
prepared a hot mug of Milo, swapped the L7 cd for Avrigus and dropped its
volume to almost-audible. the soft old flannel pillowcase was ready in case
she wanted to start crying again.

"i hope you aren't going to start by saying it was your fault," i put in
before she started telling me what was wrong. 'because it wasn't. so. is it
over this time?'

she squeezed her eyes shut and sipped hot chocolate. 'yeah,' she murmured
with a catch in her voice. 'he's dead. <pthptthpth>, how much Milo did you
put in this?'

dead, huh. i wasn't surprised. i'd been expecting this ever since i'd heard
about the two of them getting together. 'six teaspoons. now, what ever
possessed you to fall in love with a... a were-... uh.. what was he? a
were-polymorph?'

she laughed bitterly. 'i never found out. he told me that he'd been
something different every full moon for the past two years. a lot of the
time he couldn't tell what he'd been. by the time i came along he'd worked
out a system, locked himself in a basement room every few weeks. there was a
pool of water in case he became a fish.'

there was an awkward pause. i waited for her to tell me how it had ended,
and she waited until she was ready to tell me. i was content to wait, but
this was obviously something she needed to get out.

'the night before last, he locked himself in down there. he would never let
me stay with him, in case he turned into something dangerous. well... this
time he turned into a were-wood-borer and had dug two feet into the leg of
the coffee table before the sun came up and he turned back into a man. he
changed back while he was still inside the wood.'

i put as much sympathy into my voice as possible, but all i could say was
'ahh.' she looked up at me ruefully and nodded. 'look, did you ever think of
looking for a boyfriend who wasn't an OTO dropout? why don't you find
yourself a nice guitarist named steve?'

she had to smile at this. 'do you know any?'

nikolai
---
ps this is true