Maggie L

Second Scene - Protagonist Zach has just returned home from the mountains, tired from a long night of being a werewolf. Introduces roommate, alludes to events that spurred Zach leaving the police force, provides some logistics about the werewolf thing, and provides characterization for Zach.

 

It was mid-morning by the time he stumbled back into the townhouse, exhausted and stinky, his duffel bag hung over his shoulder. Lyle wasn’t usually home at this time of day, which made it kind of a shock to find him sitting on the couch watching TV.

Lyle said, “Hey.” Then he saw Zach, processed it, and added, “Jesus Christ, what happened to you?”

Zach let the duffel fall to the floor. “Why aren’t you at work?”

“It’s Saturday. Is forgetting the day of the week an unemployment thing, or because of - “ He waved vaguely in Zach’s direction, the remote in his hand. “All this?”

“The second one. I think.” Zach lurched over to the couch and flopped down next to Lyle. “It’s really Saturday?”

Lyle sniffed the air and scowled. “You don’t smell like booze or weed. But you do need a shower. If you were out partying all night you did a terrible job.”

“Thanks for the feedback.”

Zach hadn’t told Lyle about the whole werewolf thing. He hadn’t told anybody, but he’d strongly considered Lyle. Mainly because he’d needed to explain why he’d wrecked his room.

The first time he’d wolfed out, he’d been locked in his room and woke up to find the place trashed. Obviously not sustainable, and one of the neighbors called management to report their secret dog. Which, there wasn’t one, and even if there was, what business is it of yours, Kevin?

Oddly, Zach’s very first thought upon waking up in that ruined bedroom was, Oh shit, I’m a werewolf. Rational explanations came after that, or at least tried to, but he just knew. Didn’t doubt it for a minute. Welcome to the pack, Zach.

It took a good twenty minutes to loop around to Lyle’s gonna be pissed.

Lyle was a roommate-level friend, which was perfect for everyday living. Not so distant he was a stranger, but not too close to yell at if he accumulated every single bowl in the house on his desk upstairs. Not really trust-with-biggest-secret level. So instead, he told him he’d had a minor breakdown about work stuff, and promised to cover the security deposit.

The minor breakdown also explained why he’d quit and the nights he didn’t come home. At least, they did to Lyle, who switched off the TV and turned to look at Zach. “Zach, do you need to talk about something?”

“Hey. I was watching that.”

“You were not.”

“I was. I love that show.”

“What show was it?”

Zach stared at Lyle for a long minute. Trying to remember what had been on the screen turned into trying to remember the name of any TV show. Maybe he’d get lucky. “Uh. Colombo?”

“Wha- why would I be watching Colombo?”

“Because it’s a good show!”

“Sure, but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna pick it for casual Saturday viewing.”

“Alright, fine. Cheers.”

“Zach.”

“Star Wars.”

“Stop guessing.”

Zach sighed and let his head fall back onto the couch. “I’m just tired.”

Lyle shook his head. “You know, there are plenty of therapists who work with people who don’t have insurance. And there are some organizations that provide mental health resources, especially to ex-cops.”

“Huh, really? That’s nice.”

“I mean you.”

“Listen, thanks for the concern, but I don’t need therapy.” What he needed was a shower and a silver bullet. Wait, did that cure werewolves or kill them? He really should look that up.

“Literally everyone needs therapy. Actual, linguistically correct literally. But especially unemployed ex-cops who got traumatized by some bullshit ‘officer-involved violent incident.’” Lyle accompanied his mocking tone with finger quotes. “You’re a grown-ass man who can make his own choices or whatever, but dude. Whatever you were doing last night was not good choices.”

What if he did tell Lyle? Right now. Say, “I’m a werewolf, and last night I drove into the mountains so I could be a wolf and do wolf things and eat a rabbit.” It probably wouldn’t make Lyle any less concerned for his mental health. Unless Lyle was also a werewolf. No, because if he was, he wouldn’t have been at home last night to notice Zach wasn’t. Haha, checkmate, Lyle. Can’t pull one over on Zach Chase, ace detective. Maybe he could become a private eye. A werewolf private eye.

Fingers snapped in front of his face, jolting him back to awareness. “Zach. My guy. You good?”

Nope. “Yeah.”

Lyle looked at him sideways, brows furrowed. “I’m turning the TV on,” he informed him, “not because I believe you, but because I’ve been informed that this is the episode when they finally kiss, and I’ve been waiting for that for three seasons.”

“You didn’t watch all three seasons last night, did you?”

“Shh.”

“There’s not much kissing in Columbo.”

“Shh!”

The TV blinked back on, playing - well, it wasn’t Colombo. Lyle turned his attention back to it, though, which meant Zach could stop dodging questions. He’d always been an awful liar, and it didn’t help that he’d gotten no sleep the night before and apparently spent a solid eight hours on zoomies. It was sweet of Lyle to be worried. Maybe he wasn’t a roommate-level friend after all. Not all the way to werewolf-secret-friend, but maybe he was…

Zach passed out before he could figure out the next tier.

Story Statemet

A man must care for and protect his long-lost child by learning to break rules, defy systems, and work with the wild side of himself instead of repressing it. Also, he’s a werewolf. 

 

Antagonist

Milo’s father, Shoshanna’s grandfather. He raised Milo in an abusive and unwelcoming environment, leading to Milo changing his name, transitioning, and disappearing as soon as he turned 18. Now that Milo is dead, Gramps is trying to gain custody of Shoshanna. He regrets the way he treated his child and wants to build a relationship with the granddaughter he didn’t know he had

The reality is that Gramps is manipulative, bigoted, self-centered and cruel. He doesn’t want to take care of Shoshanna as penance for his awful treatment of his child. He thinks Shoshanna rightfully belongs to him, and he’s determined to raise her to be a Good Child unlike her willful and rebellious parent. He can offer Shoshanna a nice stable home in a good neighborhood, two caregivers, and financial support; clearly that would be a better environment than some random unemployed idiot. And he’s not totally wrong; materially, he is in a much better place to support Shoshanna, and legally he has a strong claim.

 

Breakout Title

Raised by Wolves - needs work, but something around this concept will probably be my favorite

How to Raise a Feral Child

 

Comparables

Susan, You’re the Chosen One by Lauretta Hignett

 

Hook Line

in my heart, the hook line is: Werewolf himbo becomes single father to precocious adolescent girl. Shenanigans ensue.

Or, in a more serious attempt at following the format:

 

6. Inner conflicts

 

Zach’s biggest internal conflict is coming to grips with his innate capacity for violence and taking ownership of it. He has realized that in the right circumstances, he can and will hurt people. That scares him enough that he winds up being too gentle and putting others in danger when he could and should be protecting them. 

 

Scenario: Milo’s father/Shoshanna’s grandfather shows up at Shoshanna’s school unannounced and Zach intercepts him. His instincts are telling him to react violently, but he actively chooses to act against them because he assumes they must be wrong and winds up overcompensating by allowing the grandfather contact with Shoshanna

 

“I want to meet my granddaughter. Is that really that wrong?”

He’d made Milo’s life so awful that he’d disappeared as soon as he could. It was his fault that Zach hadn’t seen Milo in ten years, his fault that Zach hadn’t met Shoshanna, his fault -

Zach realized almost too late that he’d gone tense all over, ready to pounce. He let out a shuddering breath and forced himself to relax, deliberately, muscle by muscle. He didn’t need to get violent. He wasn’t going to. He would handle this like a civilized adult.

“You,” he said slowly, “were a huge dick.”

The old man sighed, his shoulders slumping. “I understand. We certainly made mistakes, and we lost our child.” He looked up at Zach, pouting and watery eyed. “But don’t punish Shoshanna for our mistakes. Doesn’t she deserve a family?”

Mentioning Shoshanna made Zach bristle again, until he clenched his jaw and forced it away. He wanted to lash out, somewhere between knocking the old man on his ass and disembowling him with his bare hands, and that wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.

“You can’t just show up,” he said, lowering his eyes. “I’ll - I’ll ask Shoshanna first. And if she’s willing to give you a chance, then we can plan to meet.”

The old man grabbed Zach’s hand with both of his, and Zach nearly bit him. “Thank you, Zachary. You always were a good boy.”

If only he knew how wrong he was.

 

A potential secondary conflict includes adapting to a lifestyle that necessitates working outside the system. Before the story begins, his impetus for quitting his job as a cop was an incident of excessive force and the way other cops - himself included - rallied around the involved officer without question. Later evidence revealed that the officer was unquestionably guilty, and Zach was shaken by how completely he’d abandoned critical thought to go with the group, and how much his faith in the system overwhelmed his own morality and personal  judgment. He has always been a fairly compliant guy, who thought systems were designed with the best intentions and the best way to achieve anything is to follow the rules. Now he’s abruptly seen how dangerous that mindset can be. At the same time, he’s getting involved in some extralegal shenanigans in regards to custody of Shoshanna, trespassing on private property, sorting out Milo’s life under a name other than his legal one, etc. 

 

Situation: Zach has had custody of Shoshanna for a few days and suddenly realized she was probably supposed to be in school. He takes her to school and to the front office, where he introduces himself as not her legal guardian.

 

“Have a seat,” the principal said, gesturing at a simple chair in front of his desk as he circled around to the back. Zach did as he was told; the chair creaked under his weight.

The principal drew a file from a drawer in his desk and laid it on the table. He flipped through it, reading a couple pages. Finally, he looked up. “So. Mr. Chase.”

“You can call me Zach.”

“Mr. Chase,” the principal repeated. “I am Principal Maddox. I understand you are taking care of Shoshanna Wolfe. Temporarily.”

“Yes sir. Uh, I mean - yes. Well, maybe.” Zach wrinkled his nose. “It might be temporary?”

Principal Maddox’s glare did not soften. “Might be?”

“Yeah. I’m not - she’s - I guess I am taking care of her. Right now. But I guess she should be with, uh… I don’t know.” 

“It was my understanding that she was being cared for by Sherry Lacoste.”

“Right, yeah. She, uh…” How much of Sherry’s situation could he reveal to this guy? He wasn’t even sure he understood it himself. “She left Shoshanna with me.”

“Mmm. What, exactly, is your relationship to Shoshanna?”

“Um…” He’d been trying to think of a way to explain it that didn’t sound insane, and he hadn’t figured it out. “An old friend of her father?”

Maddox glared at him for a long moment, with a look that informed Zach he was in so much trouble for climbing on top of the playground equipment. He closed the file on his desk. “I am aware of Shoshanna’s unique circumstances. Even before the accident, there were certain discrepancies in the paperwork that were overlooked.”

“Huh?”

“Discrepancies,” he repeated more slowly. “Like, for example, the spelling of her last name, or that of her father.”

“Oh, yeah, it’s got an ‘e’ on the end.”

Maddox pinched the bridge of his nose. “The point I am trying to make is that the administration here has been very flexible with the Wolfes. But that sort of flexibility requires some cooperation from the child’s guardian.”

“That’s the problem, though, I’m not - “

Maddox rapped his knuckles on the desk. “Mr. Chase, are you familiar with the concept of plausible deniability?”

Zach blinked. “What?”

“The difference between a typo and a lie?”

“No, I - yeah, I know.”

“Shoshanna’s paperwork has had some completely unintentional errors in it during her time here. As a result, she has been able to attend school regularly and safely, regardless of what legal issues might arise outside school grounds.”

“I’m - really confused.”

The principal sighed and folded his arms on the desk. “Do not tell me or any other members of my staff that you are not Shoshanna’s legal guardian. Our paperwork shows her legal guardian to be her father, Milo Wolfe, and it will continue to show that until such time as it becomes necessary to update it. Which might happen if someone were to tell me, to my face, that he was an unrelated adult with no legal or familial connection to an adolescent girl under his care.”

Zach frowned. “But you should update that. Or report that. Or whatever.”

“Yes, probably. But if I were to call CPS, what happens next?”

“I guess they’d put her with a foster for a while?”

“That was a rhetorical question. But, yes. They would take Shoshanna from her current living situation, whatever that may be, and she would become part of the system. And frankly, she would not thrive.” The principal removed his glasses, letting them dangle from his hand while he locked eyes with Zach. “What’s best for Shoshanna is to maintain what stability we can during an unimaginably awful time. Which means, Mr. Chase, we may find ourselves a bit delayed on updating her paperwork until things are finalized. And we don’t walk into the front office and announce that we are breaking laws. Is that understood?”

Zach shrank into the chair. He’d faced down guys a lot bigger and tougher than this, in much worse situations, but none of them had such complete mastery over the teacher voice. “Yes, Mr. Maddox.”

 

 

Setting

broadly, the setting is a small American city on the east coast. Think Frederick, MD more than DC or Baltimore. I haven’t named it or committed to a specific location. Working on it!

Sub-settings:

Sherry’s bookstore and coffee shop - a small business that aims to be a gathering place and communal space for the queer community. Business is always slim, and margins are razor thin, but Sherry has managed to keep it going for several years and doesn’t intend to stop any time soon. About half the building is densely packed bookshelves. The other half is small tables and comfortable seating, and even a small stage for events.&nbsp

Shoshanna’s school - the primary social hub for Shoshanna and her classmates. The administration is genuinely concerned about the wellbeing of students, and has accommodated Shoshanna during difficult times. Parents of other children take interest in Zach - especially the single ones, and some of the ones who aren’t - and through interactions with them he learns about another side of Milo, how he was viewed, and his struggles as a single parent. 

Mountains - about three hours’ drive west takes us to the edge of the Appalachian mountains. Zach has picked a location where he can park his car slightly off-road and be safely away from civilization on full moon nights. The transition from city to wilderness is surprisingly abrupt. The mountains are beautiful and dark. (Zach will eventually learn that his selected area is not entirely state park. He will learn this by waking up to find the landowner staring him down and holding a rifle.)