Ethan's alarm chirps from somewhere beneath Mount Laundry like a demented cricket with abandonment issues. Because that's exactly what you want when you're already questioning your grip on reality – a game of Hide and Seek with an electronic demon that won't shut up until you excavate your entire wardrobe. A wardrobe that, by the way, increasingly looks like it belongs to someone auditioning for the role of "Troubled Youth With Mysterious Past" in a Teen Wolf rip-off.
His skull throbs like it's hosting an EDM festival exclusively for his worst life choices, courtesy of Dr. Kaplan's latest attempt at chemical restraint. The kind meant to keep both his body and his overactive imagination locked in their respective lanes, prescribed in those hushed consultation sessions where his adoptive parents pretend they're dealing with ordinary young adult problems and not whatever cosmic horror show their son is starring in.
"It's just a phase," Hannah had whispered to Michael last week, when they thought Ethan was asleep. Fun fact: it's hard to sleep when your body might decide to go full Regan Macneill minus the pea soup at any moment. "He'll grow out of it."
Yeah, Mom. Just like how Wolverine grew out of his claws. Totally the same thing.
The dream clings to his consciousness with the persistence of a Twitter argument at 3 AM. Center stage in tonight's psychological theater: a boy with hair so pale it makes Arctic snow look like it needs to step up its game. He'd moved through the mist of Ethan's dreamscape like some ethereal dancer who'd found the perfect ring light, all grace and impossible beauty. And here's the plot twist Ethan really doesn't need right now – his heart's doing that thing. You know, that flutter usually reserved for when Suzy does that thing with her hair, or when literally anyone brings him coffee.
"Come find me!" The words echo in his head like the world's most ominous push notification, the boy's hands beckoning with the kind of grace that makes professional dancers look like they're having synchronized seizures. Ethan's brain had crashed harder than Facebook's servers during a major life event.
"Right," he mutters to his ceiling, which has witnessed more of his existential crises than his therapist. "Because what this story really needs is a sexual identity crisis subplot. Next you'll tell me there's a prophecy involved and I'm the chosen one. Maybe throw in a wise mentor who dies tragically in act two, because apparently being genre-savvy doesn't make you genre-proof."
He swings his legs over the bed, feet meeting hardwood with all the grace of a giraffe on roller skates. His muscles scream about midnight activities he can't remember, like his body's been running some kind of nocturnal Fight Club without bothering to inform his consciousness. Today's supposed to be normal – just another day pretending he's a regular twenty-three-year-old whose parents don't have to padlock his bedroom at night like they're housing Hannibal Lecter's more problematic cousin.
The shower doesn't help. Water drums against his skin while steam curls around him like the mist from his dream, and suddenly he's thinking about moonlight hair and graceful hands again, and – okay, brain, we get it. You've discovered bisexuality exists. Maybe we could focus on the whole possible-monster thing first? The thing only Mom and Dad know about, the thing everyone else thinks is just some vague "medical condition" requiring special "arrangements." As if putting industrial-grade locks on your adult son's bedroom is just standard parenting practice.
Hannah knocks on the bathroom door with that particular rhythm she's developed – gentle but insistent, the percussion of perpetual worry. "Ethan? Your morning meds are ready."
"Thanks, Mom. Just trying to decide if I should go for the 'troubled but approachable' look or full-on 'potential supernatural threat' today."
He can hear her sigh through the door, that sound that says she's trying not to laugh because that would mean finding humor in their private apocalypse. "How about 'birthday boy who doesn't give his mother gray hairs'?"
"Sorry, don't think I have anything in that collection."
His reflection – when he finally works up the courage to face it – looks like someone trying to cosplay American Werewolf in London on a budget, if the werewolf-to-be had spent a few months at a very specific kind of finishing school. Eyes too green, skin that makes vampires look like they need to work on their tan, and shoulders that have apparently decided to audition for a Marvel movie overnight. His favorite shirt stretches in ways that would make Bruce Banner say "dude, same."
The kitchen is a masterclass in pretending everything's fine. Hannah's arranged his morning meds on a little tray like they're having some sort of twisted tea party, complete with a birthday muffin sporting a single, almost apologetic candle. Michael sits behind his newspaper fortress, but Ethan catches him peeking over the business section every few minutes, cataloging his son's state with the dedication of a scientist studying a particularly volatile experiment.
"Happy birthday, sweetheart," Hannah says, and only someone who knows her well would catch the undertone of worry, the way her eyes catalog his state like a nurse doing rounds. The way she positions herself between Ethan and the knife block, a movement so subtle it probably looks like ordinary kitchen choreography to anyone else.
"Thanks, Mom. Love what you've done with the place. Very 'suburban kitchen meets maximum security' chic."
Michael lowers his newspaper shield. "Ethan..."
"I know, I know. No jokes about the security measures. But come on, if we can't laugh about it, what's left? Besides the crushing existential dread, I mean."
The day unfolds like someone's attempting to write a YA novel but forgot about the supernatural elements: Suzy appears with her fire-engine hair and baked goods that probably violate several local ordinances, completely oblivious to the way Hannah tenses when she hugs Ethan. His siblings burst in with balloons and that pure, uncomplicated joy that comes from not knowing your brother might be auditioning for a horror movie role he never asked for.
"You're coming to the party later, right?" Suzy asks, all bright eyes and hopeful smiles. "Everyone's going to be there."
Behind her, Hannah and Michael exchange that look – the one that says they're calculating risks versus normalcy, wondering if they can give their son one night of pretending he's just like everyone else.
"Wouldn't miss it," Ethan lies, because what else can you do when your girlfriend doesn't know that your RSVP depends entirely on whether the moon and your body's mysterious transformation schedule align?
Then Michael leads them all to the garage like some suburban Dumbledore about to reveal a particularly questionable magical artifact, and there it sits: a Harley Davidson that makes every other motorcycle look like it's trying too hard on Instagram. It's all gleaming chrome and leather promise, a mechanical middle finger to his current state of perpetual house arrest.
"Luke and I worked on it for six months," Michael says softly, and only Ethan catches the subtext in his father's eyes – the hope that maybe, somehow, this gift of freedom won't become another irony in their collection of "Things That Would Be Great If Our Son Wasn't Possibly Turning Into A Monster."
The picnic by the river feels like a scene from a coming-of-age movie that doesn't know it's actually a horror film. His friends laugh and joke, planning future road trips on his new bike, blissfully unaware that his parents have the keys hidden away with the same care they take with his bedroom locks. Ethan plays his part – the slightly reserved birthday boy, maybe a bit tired, nothing to see here folks, definitely not fighting the urge to sprint into the woods every time the wind changes.
But then night falls, and everything goes to hell in a handbasket made of premium moonlight and bad decisions.
Ethan wakes up in the woods at what-fresh-hell-is-this o'clock, covered in blood that definitely isn't his, staring at what used to be a deer but now looks like something out of a death metal album cover designed by someone who's trying too hard to be edgy.
"Well," he says to no one in particular, because apparently talking to yourself is the least of your problems when you've gone full horror movie protagonist, "this is less than ideal."
And then, because the universe apparently writes plot twists like it's gunning for a Netflix deal, he sees him. The boy from his dreams, standing at the edge of the clearing like some otherworldly influencer who's found the perfect lighting. His hair catches moonlight and transforms it into something holy, something forbidden. Something that makes Ethan's heart perform gymnastics it definitely hasn't trained for.
"You found me," the boy says, and his voice is exactly how Ethan remembers it – like wind through crystal, like midnight promises whispered against skin, like ASMR for the supernaturally inclined.
"I'm straight," Ethan blurts out, because apparently that's what his brain decides is the priority here, not the whole covered-in-blood-possible-werewolf situation.
The boy's laugh is like starlight given sound. "So am I!"
"Look, I'm having enough of an identity crisis without you adding sexual orientation to the mix. Can we maybe focus on why I'm covered in blood and why you keep showing up in my dreams like some discount Luna Lovegood?"
"You're asking the wrong questions, Ethan." The boy steps closer, and the air seems to crystallize around him. "The real question is: why do you keep answering my call?"
Before Ethan can process that particularly cryptic piece of supernatural flirting, the boy vanishes like an unsaved Word document, leaving Ethan alone with his sexual crisis and a very dead deer. Because apparently, that's just how his life works now.
He finds them waiting in the kitchen – Hannah and Michael, the only two people in the world who know what he really is, even if none of them can put a name to it yet. The front door hangs from its hinges like modern art having an existential crisis. Their eyes hold no fear anymore – they're way past that. Just a bone-deep exhaustion and that stubborn love that keeps them searching for answers.
"Oh, sweetheart," Hannah whispers, already reaching for the first aid kit they keep stocked with industrial dedication. "Let's get you cleaned up."
Michael just stands there, hand white-knuckled on his coffee mug, staring at the broken door like it holds the answers to questions he's afraid to ask. "We'll need a stronger lock," he says finally, voice rough with everything they're not saying. "And maybe... maybe it's time we talked about what happened to your birth parents."
And Ethan wants to laugh at the cosmic joke of it all – getting a motorcycle for freedom on the very day his cage needs reinforcing, questioning his sexuality thanks to some supernatural pretty boy who might be responsible for turning him into whatever the hell he is now. His friends think he's just the quiet guy with protective parents and a weird sleep disorder. His siblings make up stories about why his door has so many locks – probably keeping out their snooping, they joke.
If they only knew.
Instead, he just stands there in the kitchen, caught between his parents' unwavering love and the woods that call to him, wondering if somewhere in the darkness, a boy with moonlight hair is waiting for him to figure out if he's more scared of being a monster or being bisexual. Plot twist: it might be the same thing.
Welcome to twenty-three, where coming out might have to wait until he figures out what exactly he's becoming, and the only people who could attend that particular reveal party are already keeping his biggest secret. Happy birthday, indeed. At least there's cake. Even if he might have accidentally eaten something much less socially acceptable a few hours ago.