‘I am fed up with hiding from the world,’ Alastair said kicking the corner of the table and snapping away his bottle of beer.

His demented sister Rita stared at him and grimaced, while Rick punched the same table. He was having enough of his beta’s tantrums. But the truth was, ever since Alastair had managed to scratch his right eye away, that he had felt he could outrank the alpha. He shouldn’t have bitten him on that cursed Blood Moon night. Now, not only Alastair desired to become the alpha as he also desired something else: the love – or perhaps lust – of Rick’s alpha partner, Mariel.

‘You guys please stop this nonsense,’ Mariel demanded as she dutifully cleaned Rick’s forever wounded eye and changed his bandage. She couldn’t deny and Rick knew it. He smelled it. His tall, broad-shouldered stature and bronze skin had attracted her and had made her agree to only have Rick in her life, but Alastair’s rebellious character pleased her. She loved his half-shaved head contrasting with the other, long-haired half. It gave him a wild look. But alphas mate for life. And the only way for her to be with Alastair was something she dared not even dream of. It was the highest treason in their world which would inevitably end with the death of the traitor.

The four of them had lived in that house in the woods, away from everybody, for over fifty years. Rick had tried to control the pack but even a wise alpha like him could lose it during the Full Moon. He had lost count of the people they had killed, whether on a spree or whether someone got lost in the woods and found their lair. They could not afford to let a stranger go back to town and reveal their secret. It wouldn’t take long until the house was set on fire, or they would be perforated by silver swords and bullets. That was why Rick had to tame Alastair. That was why Rita was also transformed. So that Rick could keep Alastair under control, even though Rick now sensed he no longer cared about his sister and wouldn’t mind let her die.

The alpha and the beta would often get involved in fights both as humans and as werewolves. Getting iron cages didn’t work either. It was easy for Mariel and him to push howling, foaming Rita inside and lock themselves too but Alastair had just refused.

‘Alastair, you do know what’s at stake,’ Rick reminded him as Mariel finished tying his bandage.

But Alastair just stared at Mariel who bowed her head, embarrassed, yet pleased for being the love interest of two gorgeous men. If only she could have both.

‘You transformed me,’ Alastair growled at him. ‘I never asked to serve you.’

Rick swallowed hard, trying to remain calm.

‘I made you powerful and immortal,’ he hissed.

‘What’s good about being powerful and immortal when locked in a cage during Full Moon? And another Blood Moon is coming, you should take the chance to grow the pack. Maybe find yourself another partner.’

Mariel blushed. Rick got up, his massive body knocking his chair down.

‘How dare you, mutt?’

Alastair looked at him in the eyes challengingly. Rita laughed but Mariel just rushed outside, unable to bear the fight.

She sighed as she got to the woods and took her hand to her heart. She loved Rick. She loved the sense of protection he inspired in her, the fire in his eyes whenever they made love and how he would do anything to show her his love. She had always been sure she loved him back equally. Until Alastair joined the pack. Submissive at first, he didn’t take long to show them he was not one to follow, rather to command. Mariel knew too, that he desired her and as much as she desired him back, she couldn’t tell if he loved her or just lusted her. That’s why she wanted Rick around. Rick would protect her. Alastair… deep inside she knew he only wanted power and having her as his mate would be nothing but a display of might.

‘You deserve much better than to be the mate of a loser,’ she heard his voice and the same time her nostrils caught his scent. ‘We are werewolves, and all that idiot wants is for us to be locked in a cage during Full Moon.’

‘He doesn’t want to hurt people and you know it,’ she answered back but she knew he could sense the weakness in her voice.

‘Screw that,’ he growled again.

Suddenly, before she could do anything to stop it, he pulled her to him and held her in his arms, his mouth dangerously close to her ear. She gasped as a guilty warmth invaded her body.

‘Let’s just get rid of him once and for all,’ he whispered, seductively. ‘We are three, it will be easy. My stupid sister will help.’

‘I can’t… They…’

‘Screw them! We’re meant to be free.’

‘They will kill us, all the others. They will know. It will run in their blood, and they will come after us.’

But her words were baffled by his full lips, and she found herself taking her hands to his half-shaved, half long-haired head. He followed and ran his fingers through her beautiful thick red hair before holding her waist and staring at her deep in her eyes.

The sky was getting darker and soon the moon would reveal herself and force her bloodthirsty power on them.

‘Let’s do it, Mariel. I will make you happy, I promise.’

She reached for his lips again.

‘If he finds out…’ she cried.

‘That’s why we have to kill him as quickly as possible.’

‘He must already know what we are doing now.’

‘Let him,’ Alastair laughed.

Suddenly, in a moment of wisdom – or perhaps fear – she pushed him away.

‘No, I cannot do that. Leave me.’

And she rushed back home only to find a raging Rick by the door. He grabbed her, his eyes glowing yellow. He sniffed her.

‘You were with him!’ he roared.

‘No… I did nothing wrong.’

‘You body tells me something else. I smell him all over you, bitch!’

And he slapped her and tore her down even if somehow it made him feel guilty. He had never beaten her, he had never been aggressive to Mariel, even transformed. From inside, Rita cried.

Tears rolled down her eyes. She saw the red moon rising the very moment Alastair knocked Rick down. It happened before they realised it was happening. Their bodies hunched forward as thick, dark as coal hair burst from their skins and their mouths and fingers grew fangs and sharp as pitchforks claws. The two males howled and growled before pouncing on each other, forming a grotesque mass of hirsute hair. The last vision Mariel saw as a human was a figure by the entrance door. Still half woman, but her crazed yellow eyes burning like hell’s flames.

When Mariel woke up, she was half naked as usual after a transformation, her clothes torn and useless. She was in the woods, but she recognised the place. She wasn’t far from home. She sniffed the air. She couldn’t spot neither Rick nor Alastair. Where were they?

She got up in a haste and, trying to cover herself up with the rags hanging from her destroyed dress, she ran back home.

‘Rick? Alastair? Rita? Where are you?’

No reply. What if they had been caught and killed?

She got home only to find the door knocked down and a huge mess of shattered glass and wood on the floor. That’s when she saw it. And nothing could have prepared her for it. The scream formed in her throat as she kneeled before both Rick and Alastair’s dead bodies. Their throats were torn, they had killed each other.

‘No, please…’ she cried, touching both their still smooth faces.

‘It’s just us now, darling,’ she heard behind her.

She turned and saw her. No sign of the crazed, demented woman she had once been. Her clothes equally torn, displaying her round breasts, her eyes fixed on Mariel with… Mariel panted. It was desire. She had been desired by three people in the pack, not just two.

‘You’re not crazy,’ she mumbled, confused.

‘I indeed am not. Rick wanted me alive to control Alastair but to avoid questions and hide my love for you, I just acted crazy and helpless. As if the whole thing was such a shock that it left me insane. I was just waiting for an opportunity and took advantage of their fights. It was funny to see them fighting for you. It was funny to feel you liked it and I cannot blame you. Who wouldn’t? I must say I was jealous of Rick, but I managed to control myself all the time. Patience can take you far.’

‘Did you kill them?’

‘Sort of…’ Rita laughed. ‘They were killing each other. So, I used my deranged werewolf self to put an end to it. They never suspected that stupid little Rita would attack them. No more power fights now. It’s just the two of us, sweetheart.’

Mariel got up and faced her.

‘The others will find out,’ she said.

‘I don’t care.’ Rita replied, caressing Mariel’s face. ‘Let’s stick together, Mariel. If they come, I’ll act demented again and you’ll just say I lost it.’

Mariel sighed. There was something tempting in Rita’s voice. Something… Alastair. Or was she being hypnotised? She had never had lesbian tendencies, but she was feeling weak now. What was Rita doing to her?

‘Shall I shave half my head to convince you, honey?’ Rita laughed.

Mariel saw it. In her normal self, Rita’s smile was just like Alastair’s. Her scent was his. She was him. How had she never noticed? Had she only seen a crazed woman? The alpha female smiled and grabbed Rita’s hands.

‘No, you don’t need to. I see him in you and I will love you.’

And Rita took her hungry lips to Mariel’s as her hands reached for her naked waist.

The first came home weeping, one child missing.

The second had a fresh start, no longer moving grocery carts.

The third, the man carried his bride over the threshold and stayed together until they were old.

The fourth raised a little boy, their faces filled with joy.

The fifth man sold his art and upon his death divided the land in parts.

The sixth lady won the lottery and later pursued pottery.

The seventh had a secret but his conscious couldn’t keep it.

The eighth was given clarity and gave all they had to charity.

Nine re-married several times and, alone, he was buried.

The tenth couple lost their half, sat dazed for the rest of their days.

The eleventh had a criminal opportunity, pled his case and was given immunity.

The twelfth lived a happy life, with a beautiful wife.

It was a forest for millennia And then Tribes came and stayed for centuries, Natives that cracked the stones At the creeks bank To make war paints and dye from their powders.

Colonists came and the Tribes became cities. For a century homes were made from timber And fields spanned for miles. Land given and edges marked with sandstones, Passed through generations.

Roads were paved and the town grew. Six thousand lived here for eighty three years. Farms shrunk and timber lands grew, Large chicken houses and fields of cattle And huge trucks moved trees twice their size.

Now the timber was still an industry for the town, Chickens and cattle too. A huge factory built machines in the town, And the lake was a get-away But Main Street was crumbling.

We had our chances to thrive But greed held the town back. Youth left, in pursuit of better things, Knowing we had nothing to offer Except our famous machinery.

I still live here On land that was owned since... I’ve forgotten the rough estimate. The town has not crept out to us yet And the creek bed a has dried.

If you look around though At the banks you may find the red stones, With their colorful dyes, and arrowheads, The sandstone, that marked the edge of our home And the forgotten trinkets of my family’s past.

This is my land; what is not my land is my family’s. I still have the stones of the Natives. I still have the homes of the Colonists. I still have the wagon the farmers used before me. I have chickens to tend and machines to be fixed.

Our family is sunken in this town We were simple farmers, though no longer. We were here when the town was founded And it is our fate to be here when the town lies abandoned.

There is a house I know of in South Kensington. It has chartilly lace white walls on the outside and black Georgian balconies. There are two cream white pillars in front of a shiny black door with a doorknob encrusted with gold. Beside the door are two asymmetrical potted plants neatly trimmed to round balls that remind me of giant pom-poms. This is a house I know of well. A house I love and admire. 15 people have died in this house. 52 people have lived in this house. 26 people have worked at this house. 10 people have been born in this house. The list could go on. People have came and gone and lived and died in this house and yet the house has stayed where it is, inviting others into its vast rooms and candle-lit hallways. The voices of the people who lived here seem to echo in my ears when I touch the walls- every inhabitant has left a memory of them behind it seems. As I ascend the winding staircase now I am reminded of the twins Mary and Josie that used used to live here with their father Lord Charles in the 1840s. The twins always had sly, cheeky smiles and beautiful long blonde curls and fashionable lace dresses. They loved to slide down the staircase when no-one was watching. This house was their playground of adventures that lit their eyes full of curiosity for the world. It is such a shame they died so young. And then there was Fred Hampton who rented the upper apartment in the late 1850s. He was a painter who detested other people’s company and relished being on his own. He’d be seen more frequently with a paintbrush than a pen. In the room that he painted he would smear and splash paint on on the walls when he was annoyed at something. The smears and splashes of paint formed a whole other painting on its own. It is a shame that it has all been painted over. Hampton lived half the year in Paris and half the year in London, often traveling around Europe to paint portraits of noble gentlemen and gentlewomen- he got a considerable amount of money from his clients. And then one day he left his upper apartment in Kensington. He set off with luggage containing mostly paints and canvases. I don’t know what happened to him after that. And let’s not forget the servants that used to live there. There were many of them, for it was a large townhouse to manage. Where I stand in the basement now was where kitchen maids and cooks would be frantically at work, boiling vegetables, rolling out pastry, polishing silverware or preparing trays to take up their their masters. Their lives below stairs were ignored by others but together all the servants had their own little community downstairs spreading their own petty gossip and their hopes for the future.

Years later, a rich French lawyer and his wife bought the townhouse. They were the kindest and most generous people, who established their own orphanage in London and set up charities over the country. Their wealth enabled them to help others. They chose to help others. This is why I admire them. But they also brought life and laughter to the house by holding grand parties there. Over sips of cocktails, guests would discuss politics, travelling and business. Later there would be dancing and singing. The ladies would play harpsichord whilst the gentleman plucked their violins and sang tunes. Everyone favoured these merry nights, where the outside world was partially forgotten and everyone had something to amuse themselves with. I wish I could continue to tell the other stories. Of the people who lived in the town house in South Kensington. This is only a page of people’s lives in this house. Only a very small portion of the timeline of inhabitants. There are thousands of stories in this very house. I could write chapters and chapters and books and books about it. But I’m not going to. I’m just going to remember that everyone that’s lived in this house, in their own way, has made it come alive.

He built the house the year I was born, the house and I grew up together. 1977 in North Carolina was a year of earned blessings for Lionel . He was the living,breathing All American Rugged Individual. His success was also built upon a war.

the furniture held laughter and memories. the walls had brown spots where pictures used to hang. the doorknobs were worn down and changing colors. the kitchen was old but smelled like home. the bedrooms had beds made long ago. blankets that held tears and laughter, now laying there. waiting. rocking chairs stuck in place, waiting to be rocked. you could tell where the plates were put on the table, there were spots. the chairs squeaked softly when you sat down. the doors creaked a little when you opened and closed them. the pillows old and flat, laid on by many. you couldn’t tell who came. you couldn’t tell at all. all you could see was that there was once people. memories. laughter. talking. food in the kitchen, the couches full of cousins. you could tell there was people, you just didn’t know who.

When the house had to come down there was one last inspection, there was no real reason for it, it had just become a ritual for him, one last look like a feeling of honoring the four walls that had held generations safe. His heart always tugged at him as he walked through, the only reason for tearing down the houses was so the steel and glass of an office building could go up exponentially raising the profit for rent. Anything of real value had already been auctioned, the lamp fixtures were gaping holes and wires hung out like dried wounds. The wooden floor under his feet moaned as if it knew its end was coming. It was too scratched and pocked to be of any value and in a corner where the sun was just reaching in through a broken window, was an old rocker. The only piece of furniture which had been left behind. He thought maybe it was worth something or maybe he could restore it to some of its old shine. As he walked over to it, it began to tilt ever so slightly back and forth, maybe the breeze from the broken pane had brought it to life. Strangely, the sunlight seemed to warm in that corner and the dust there swirled away and for a moment his eyes were filled with it and began to tear. After rubbing them and opening them again, he saw the wispy form of a woman sitting in the chair with a baby in her arms, rocking both of them to a lullaby. He rubbed his eyes again, had he been working too much overtime? And when he opened them again, he saw the woman again with a small boy at her side and a different baby in her arms. Then in an instant the there were two children sitting on the floor as she read to them a story from a large heirloom book. Next they were standing and laughing and running around the chair and a man who entered with gifts in his arms for all of them. Then another breeze and shifting of sunlight and he saw the woman, now older with strands of gray in her hair looking at a letter in her hand. He carefully walked behind the chair and could see it was from the government, her son had been killed in active duty, a hero to the country. Another woman came in, it must have been her daughter grown with a young man connected to her by her hand. Her mother looked up and smiled at both of them and pulled them closer with both of her hands. Then once again she was surrounded by children reading to them, her husband now older standing behind her smoking a pipe. A colder breeze came through the window and she was sitting alone in the rocker, the only motion was her turning her wedding ring on her finger as tears rolled down her cheeks. Then he saw her, hands as wizened as the wood on the chair, her head tilted back, her breath barely there. The sun went behind the clouds, the air seemed to stop moving and then there was another young woman sitting in the chair with a baby at her breast. His knees became weak, he watched the chair hold and release five women from birth to death. Then it was dim and the dust in the air settled again. He walked over to the chair and took it into his hands and lifted it. The floor and walls made a hollow sigh and he took the rocker from the house. He had saved its soul before the walls came down.

My family immigrated to this country and before me and my brothers were born. It was my mum and dad and my three older sisters. They lived elsewhere until my mum gave birth to the brothers and me. Then we were really big and so had to move to a bigger house. The house at the end of the street.

This house is one of two houses at the ends of the street that tower over the other houses. Inversely, there are bungalows in the centre with a cul-de-sac which is an interesting setup. As a big family, all the rooms would be occupied with kids running around with toys, playing games and listening to music. As we grew up, the sisters got married and moved to the countryside with their husbands. Leaving the brothers and the mum and dad. During the recession, one brother moved to another country to teach English. Leaving one brother and myself. My brother who lived with me then moved with his girlfriend but was close enough.

Dad got old and resorted to drinking and watching TV. He passed away leaving myself and mum in this big house. Dark rooms and mountains of hoarded items that personally we could not use. Mum got old and now it is I who looks after her. This is my family home, that saw me and my siblings grow old and mature and soon it will be my home.

The doorway was thick. The layers of paint throughout the years had inflated the doorway so that the door constantly got stuck in the humid months.

The door was a gorgeous oak - resealed over the years, but still the original wood from when the house was built in 1880. There were a few scratches here and there on the back side from the family dogs: Bingo (1887-1902), Clark (1920-1936), Chief (1942-1960) and BoBo (2002-).

The floors had been redone at least five times. Once in 1903 to restore some termite damage, then again in 1938 after a small fire. In 1958 the original hardwood was covered with linoleum and carpeting, which was replaced in 1973 this time with linoleum and shag carpeting. This was done at the insistence of Mrs. Mary Hart Wilson (1926-2008) who read in Ladies’ Home Journal that shag carpet was here to stay.

By the time the floors were redone a final time in 1999 to remove the linoleum and shag carpeting (thankfully), Mrs. Mary Wilson’s fashionable shag carpet had half a dozen stains and bare spots, all with a different story. A large spot of red wine stain never came out after Uncle Joe Robbins (1922-2001) knocked over a bottle of wine Aunt Suzette (1930-2010) had just opened, while playing a game of charades. Uncle Joe was animated in his impression of Mickey Rooney. The red wine stain soaked through to the hardwood underneath where it became a plaque to game nights past.

The huge crystal chandelier Mr. Joseph Paul Wilson Jr. (1856-1938) had installed in the dining room in the fall of 1906, still caught the light of the huge bay windows, casting stars of tiny rainbows across the walls. If you listened closely you could hear the walls echoing the jokes and tales and tiffs of Wilson family gatherings from the past 150 years.

If the walls of the kitchen could talk, they would tell you about the lemon tart Mrs. Jane Powell Wilson (1860-1945) created on July 4th, 1895 which she would pass on to all three of her daughters: Janet Wilson McDougall (1905-1990), Suzanne Wilson Cummings (1908-1995), and Paulette Wilson (1910-2000), which they would then pass on to their daughters and on and on. The kitchen walls would also tell you about the time Timothy Wilson (1923-) broke two windows while playing hockey out in the yard. And the time Timothy’s sister Rose Wilson Jackson (1932-) was caught by their father Jacob Wilson (1903-1984) kissing her first boyfriend on the stoop.

On the Kitchen door jamb were hundreds of markings where growing Wilson children had measured themselves against the doorway.

There were cigarette burns in floors from days gone by; pinholes in walls where once hung family portraits keeping watch over the generations which came after; a larger hole in the parlor wall where Jack Wilson (1955-present) swatted a fly too aggressively, and if you chipped away at two layers of paint in the first bedroom on the left, you would still find traces of a fresco by Caroline Wilson (1958-1988) colored on the wall with crayon (circa 1963).

Throughout the old house, in every crack and crevice there were memories and stories. Ghosts of gatherings haunted every room on the first floor, reliving the moments when they were warmest on this cold earth. Past laughter floated on the breeze which blew threw the drafts. Tears of loss and heartbreak reverberated throughout the bedrooms on painful anniversaries. There was Wilson Family soaked into the grain of the house at 14 Birch Lane, Detroit, MI.

But, no longer.

14 Birch Lane was now no longer fit for dwelling and condemned by city officials. The last of the Wilsons had left in 2006, shortly after Mrs. Mary Hart Wilson was moved out of the renovated basement and into a nursing home. Greg Wilson (1963-present) had decided to sell the Wilson house after he had been laid off from work. The tenets who purchased the home abandoned the Wilson home in 2008.

Greg Wilson currently lives in Seattle, Washington with BoBo, the dog. They have lived there since the death of Mary Hart Wilson in 2008. For holidays and special occasions, Greg makes the lemon tart created by his great grandmother in 1895 in the kitchen at 14 Birch Lane.

It starts with an elderly man,

Old and senile.

He lives alone in this new, heartless house after his wife died.

Every step he takes leaves a trail of sadness and loss.

Until one day, he stopped walking.

The next in this house was a couple,

Content and loving.

They think summer will last forever,

Until the winter comes in with its bite,

And they split, broken hearts trodden into the carpet.

After that, a single parent moves in,

Hopeful and tired.

They play across the cursed carpet,

Sadness uprooted like dust.

Things get rough, but they replace the carpet.

Now their lives are just fine.

Divine doesn’t mean it’s bound

To you and always you.

Tear up the carpet.

Create your own path.