The Mountain's Shadow

“This is our lab. I’ll show you the office later, but I thought you might like to keep your books at hand, not that you’ll need them much.”

“Why?”

“Because we’re dealing with something new here. It’s something we need your help tracing in the population so we can localize the genetic mutation.”

“What does it do?” I tried to keep my excitement in check. This was just what I’d hoped for—to be on the leading edge of researching new disorders.

He leaned back and crossed his arms. “Lots of fun stuff. It causes a host of behaviors like fierce loyalty to friends, inability to understand or buy into the culture’s materialistic messages, for starters.”

“And physically?”

“Early appearance of secondary sex characteristics, particularly body hair on the males. But it’s the psych stuff that’s the most fascinating. Basic drives such as hunger, lust and sleep are assessed as extraordinarily high. Somehow these adolescents find each other, bond, and disappear for days at a time, particularly around the full moon.”

“Around the what? Now I know you’re kidding me.”

“Ever hear of lycanthropy?”

I had, but it had been a long time ago and in a different context. “You mean, like in werewolves? Are you serious?”

“It’s a true disorder. I’ll have to introduce you to Iain McPherson in Scotland; he’s made it his life’s work. But yes, by adulthood, most of the afflicted isolate themselves from their families and all but disappear. Those who stay in society are described as wild loners.”

“But isn’t that rare?”

“It was. Until a few years ago.”

He’d gone on to explain this lycanthropic disorder was relatively rare until the very end of the twentieth century. Previously, one case might occur in a generation and spawn a local legend of werewolves. However, we lived in the era of impulsivity, and disorders such as ADHD skyrocketed.

CLS, or Chronic Lycanthropy Syndrome, seemed to be the latest step in the evolution of impulsivity disorders, and it soon became the new diagnostic darling of the pediatrician and child psychiatrists’ offices. Children displayed the full range of symptoms by early adolescence, and often those that couldn’t be cured or drugged into submission would just disappear or end up in the correctional system.

My research centered on finding a common thread. I’d investigated familial patterns, but I felt like there was something missing. Something was making these rare genes express, but why now? Was it some environmental toxin? A virus? Just before the lab had burned, I had acquired boxes of these children’s medical records, particularly from western Tennessee and the Ozark region of Arkansas, where families of Germanic and Scandinavian descent abounded. The Scandinavian culture had the most sophisticated spiritual explanation for werewolves…and the highest incidence of CLS.

And now, here in the Ozarks, I was face-to-face with an adult CLS sufferer. I sat across from him in the booth pretending to study my menu and bit my lip to keep the questions from flooding off my tongue. How long have you had it? When were you diagnosed? Were you a hyper kid? What illnesses did you have? Do you know anyone else with CLS?

Instead he asked me, “What are you having for lunch?”

Luckily the biscuit had been digested quickly. “I think I’m going to have the Turkey Cobb salad.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“What?”

“Why can’t you women ever eat?”

I looked up from my menu. “’Scuse me?”

“Just a salad?”

“Well, what are you going to have?”

“The steak you had for dinner last night looks good. Someone like you needs to eat to keep up her strength.”

My cheeks warmed again. “How do you know what I had for dinner?”

“I was here, remember?”

I returned my eyes to my menu. How could I forget? He and that witch, Kyra. Unbidden, the image came into my head of him tucking a stray curl behind her ear. And then of him grabbing my wrist with those fingers. I took a deep breath to loosen the tightness in my chest.

“Did you want to talk to me about something, or did you just trick me into coming here to mock me?”

He sighed and rubbed his temples again, but the gesture didn’t inspire the sympathy I thought he was going for. Instead, I felt frustration curl beneath my sternum and reach into my throat. This man could have murdered me the night before. Could have but didn’t. I took another deep breath and blew out slowly to calm myself.

“Look, if this isn’t a good time, I can catch you later.” His expression reminded me of a begging puppy.

“No, no, I’m fine. What did you want to talk to me about?”

“You’re Doctor Joanna Fisher?”

“Yes. I thought we’d already established that.”

“Of Cabal Laboratories?”

“Formerly of Cabal Laboratories.”

“What happened?”

“A fire. An affair. All my data was burned, and so was I.”

“I read your work on cultural patterns and CLS when I was in medical school. At that point, it was all theory, not something I planned on dealing with.”

The waiter arrived. Ted, Manager, was nowhere in sight. “Are you ready, Doctor Bowman, Doctor Fisher?”

Leonard raised his eyebrow. “Word gets around.”

“Apparently.”

We ordered, and after the waiter brought our drinks—sweet tea for me—I asked, “Wait a second, so you didn’t have CLS from childhood?”

“No. I would be much better able to control it, I think.”

“When did you get it?”

“The second year of residency at UAMS.”

The door opened, and a shadow flickered over Leonard’s face. I turned to face the door, but at first I couldn’t make out the features of the couple who had just entered. The host greeted them, and once the door closed against the bright light of outside, I saw Lonna and Peter Bowman. He had his hand on her elbow. Leonard sank down in his seat.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m supposed to be at home watching Peter’s wife. He thinks she’s having an affair.”

“Looks like projection to me.” Already there was too much eye contact, too many casual touches.

Leonard smiled his half smile again. “She’s too busy with their kid to think about an affair. He’s two.”

“And a terror from what I hear.”

“He’s not that bad, just a lot of energy.”

“Not that you’re biased.”

Leonard’s face lit with a true smile. “When I come home in the evening, he’ll run full tilt down the hall and jump into my arms.” He frowned and lowered his voice. “He doesn’t care about what happens after he goes to bed.”

“What does happen?” I leaned forward on my arms.

“You should know.” Leonard’s black eyes met mine. “But then again, you can’t. I don’t even know if I do.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a different state of mind. And what happens feels like dreams.” A line appeared between his eyebrows as he frowned. “I try to remember them in the morning.”

“But you can’t.” I let my breath out slowly. I had read interviews of CLS kids who had originally been