“Oh,” said Meg as this percolated through her brain. “And he’s your little brother?” she asked.
“Yes. You should have seen Dad. Medium sized man, but the biggest wolf I knew of before George started shifting. He was probably just too damn heavy for the floor. Or there was a weak spot. We won’t know until we look. Meantime, we have to get to George,” he finished as he got onto a main boulevard.
“Angie must be frantic,” said Meg. “I know how I felt when you were hurt.”
“You think she’s that attached to him?” asked Luc.
“Yes. She may not know it, but I’ve never seen her look at anyone like she did the night of the dinner party and I’ve known Angie for years. Saw her go out with guys, but never look at them like she does George,’ said Meg.
“Oh boy,” said Luc as he negotiated the sparse traffic. He knew he was almost there, but the car seemed to be crawling along. One final turn and he was on 181st Street. Angie was standing on the front porch as they pulled up in front.
“Meg, you wait at the door for Jeff, and I’ll go with Angie,” said Luc. He kissed Meg on the forehead and followed Angie around the damage in the living room to the basement stairs. As he reached the basement floor, he saw George laying on a blanket that looked the size of a postage stamp in comparison.
The wolf looked up at the two of them and whimpered. Angie moved to the wolf and sat down beside him taking the huge head onto her lap. The wolf whimpered but relaxed.
“Oh George. What the hell did you do?” asked Luc quietly. He took a look at the towel around the wound and saw that blood had nearly soaked the towel. He held the paw the wolf had tapped him with and put the other on the wound, applying gentle pressure. Luc had no idea of how long Jeff would be and this didn’t look or smell good to him.
“You doing okay Angie?” he asked quietly.
“Yeah. A little freaked out at first, but I called you as fast as I could. If he fell through the floor, there was no way he’d get up the stairs, so I knew I needed help. Plus, I didn’t know the number for your doctor,” she finished. She was running her fingers through the fur on the top of the wolf’s head. A head that nearly covered her lap.
“You did the right thing Angie. Jeff will be here soon and he’ll see to George,” said Luc.
“Okay. Why didn’t George shift back to human form?” asked Angie.
“He probably hurts too much. It sort of makes our brains forget thinking logically,” he said.
The wolf whimpered as Luc said this. Angie patted the wolf on the head and murmured to him.
“I’m going to see if Jeff is here,” said Luc. He was loath to take pressure off the injury, but he knew that Jeff would have trouble finding the staircase. “I’ll be right back,” he said as he headed up the stairs.
Luc got to the front door just as Jeff pulled in next to his car. Jeff grabbed his medical bag and headed for the front door. “Where’s George?” Jeff asked.
“Follow me. He’s lost a lot of blood,” said Luc.
“Damn. I was afraid of that when Meg said it was pulsing,” said Jeff.
“Yeah. He’s on the floor down here,” said Luc and let Jeff go ahead of him down the stairs. Meg and Martha followed them down the stairs.
“George, This is Jeff. No Biting!” said Jeff as he knelt next to the huge wolf. “Angie, let me know if it feels like he’s trying to lift his head.”
“Oh, Okay,” said Angie not totally understanding why she’d been asked that.
“If he lifts his head, he might be trying to bite Jeff,” said Luc when he saw the puzzled look on her face.
Angie nodded. She wrapped her arms around the wolf’s head gently. She’d be able to tell if he so much as twitched a muscle.
Jeff smiled at her and then looked to the wolf. The towel was soaked and a puddle was forming on the blanket. He cut the bandage and looked at the wound. He counted the pulse under his fingertips and the blood seeping from the wound. “Damn!” he thought.
“Martha, hold this to the wound,” he said handing her a corner of the towel. Martha took it and pressed against the wound. This freed Jeff up and he grabbed a needle and a bottle out of his case. Filling the syringe, he grabbed the fur around the scruff of the wolf’s neck. He injected the fluid into the wolf and then started to get equipment out of his bag.
“Jeff, what’s going on?” asked Luc.
“He has a puncture. I don’t have time to get him to my clinic. I’ve got to act now,” he said. He checked the wolf’s pulse again and then began to cut fur from around the wound. He sliced open the wound area and reached in to where the bleeding was emanating. Whatever had punctured George was small. However, it had nicked muscle and a bit of the diaphragm. Jeff opened the wound a bit more and then reached for his suture kit.
Ten minutes later, Jeff was sewing up the last layers of skin. He’d sewn up the damage and was now ready to bandage the wound. Martha handed him things without a single clue that Luc could figure out. Jeff started to wrap bandages around the wolf and realized it was impossible. He stuck medical tape to the fur and skin the best he could. After one last injection, he stood up.
“Damn, what the hell did he do?” Jeff asked.
“He shifted and fell through the floor,” said Angie. “He was really wobbly and that’s when I found he was bleeding. I tried to stop it, but I couldn’t.”