Kidsreads.com - BLUE WOLF by Catherine Creedon

BLUE WOLF
by Catherine Creedon
HarperCollins
ISBN: 006050868X
Ages 8-12
192 pages

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Chapter One

Dear Jamie,

Your father writes that you are, as always, perfect. He also tells me that the exact nature of your perfection has recently escaped him. Perhaps you should come for a visit? I would enjoy your company, and it would give him a much-needed opportunity to miss you. The choice is yours.

Love, Aunt Louise

"Nothing." Fourteen-year-old Jamie Park slid the letter under his French textbook. His teacher narrowed her eyes at him but turned back to the chalkboard. He peeked at the letter, then traced the odd, spidery writing with his finger. As far as he knew, he didn't have an aunt -- let alone an Aunt Louise.

Jamie pushed his thick black hair behind his ears and tried to pay attention. Usually he enjoyed French. His mother, a linguist, had shared with him a love of words and stories.

His father spoke to him, if he spoke at all, in two different languages: English and Korean. (Three if you counted all the technical terms connected with his research in paleozoology.) And the many scholars and scientists who passed through their home spoke such a variety of tongues that it often sounded to Jamie as if large flocks of birds were seated around the dining-room table. But today his mind wandered. He bent his head and sniffed the letter. Wood smoke, he thought, wood smoke and wet animals. Dogs? Not exactly. He sniffed again, ignoring the stares of his classmates. Wolves. It smelled like the wolves.

"Jamie," snapped Madame Mahoney as the bell rang, "you will stay after class."

"I have a track meet." He had to go. The wolves might be there today.

Madame Mahoney tapped a pencil, eraser end down, on her desk. Jamie knew she was trying to decide what to say to him. Though older and stricter than most of his teachers, she was his favorite. Her hair was dyed flaming red, and when she smiled he could imagine the girl she'd been in Paris before marrying an American and coming to the United States.

Why was she so comfortable here, when his own father, born in Korea, still had trouble fitting in? His dad had lived in Seattle for years but seldom looked beyond the activities of his lab at the university. He'd never even been to one of Jamie's races. Jamie sighed at the thought of his father. Madame Mahoney cleared her throat. Jamie snapped back to attention.

"Jamie," she said, then shook her head. "Here." She handed him a piece of paper. "This is tonight's homework. I noticed that you didn't copy it down. Find me tomorrow at lunch if you need help."

Jamie waited for her to continue, but she flipped the pencil over, bent her head to the desk, and began to correct papers.

Lecture over, thought Jamie. Both relieved and embarrassed, he wondered when the teachers would stop being so nice to him. He hoped it would be soon. Their tolerance, combined with the silence of his classmates, made him feel as though he didn't exist -- as though he had died along with his mother. He shoved the assignment and the letter into his pocket, then headed for the locker room.

Jamie jumped up and down, shaking his arms, trying to stay warm. It was the beginning of June, but the rain made it feel more like March. He jogged toward his teammates. They stopped talking as he approached; some shuffled uncomfortably, others just looked away. Jamie pretended not to notice and began to stretch. He was the fastest distance runner in the school; no one could pass him in the fall cross-country meets. He had to work a little harder at the shorter distances in spring track, but today was the last race of the season, and he was determined to win his event.

It was nearly time for the start. He stood with the other runners, flexing his knees a bit, when he heard it. A panting sound, faint at first, but steady. It was the wolves -- they always ran with Jamie when he needed them. When he'd first heard them, at a cross-country meet last fall, he'd been terrified. The wolves had followed him along the trails, and he had run hard to stay ahead, breaking out of the woods just in front of them. They'd caught up with him on the open sunlit field and crossed the finish line first. Jamie's time for that race had set a state record.

Since then, he'd heard them at most of his races, and if it was rainy, he could sometimes smell their wet fur. But he'd never seen them. And although he was unsure if they were real or imagined (no one else seemed to notice them), he was no longer afraid. Now he greeted them as friends. He relaxed a bit. It would be a good race. He wasn't alone after all.

Jamie had told his mom about the wolves when she was sick -- not because they bothered him, but because he thought she'd like the story. As she listened, her eyes held their old fire. When she spoke, her voice, though sad, was strong. "Of course they run with you, Jamie -- they are your family." She paused for a moment, and then spoke again with difficulty. "I should have known they would find you. Jamie, love, don't tell your dad about them just yet."

"My family? What do you mean?" He didn't know what he'd expected her to say, but it wasn't that.

She mumbled something about the flute music she was studying, then drifted off into the restless dreams that had occupied so much of her time in the days before she died.

Jamie was sure he felt a slight nip at his ankle as the starting gun went off.