Becoming the Luna

Chapter 334

Yanis wakes up for the fourth day in a row to Ruby jumping enthusiastically on him and he's starting to reconsider giving her a small island for her next birthday.

"Ruby, for goodness sake, stop doing that!" Mae is quick to reprimand her, hurrying into Yanis' room to pick up the squirming wolf-child from his body.

"I'm so sorry about this, Yani." She apologizes nervously, hoisting up Ruby in her arms who was yipping happily, beautiful brown ears flopping.

Yanis just lies on his back on the bed, feeling flattened. "It's fine, Mae." He replies in a pinched voice, vividly remembering the first time it had happened.

It was after the first night he had spent over, on a Saturday, he slept in a bit because he didn't have to be at the bookstore till noon when a weird yipping sound startled him out of sleep to a confused wakefulness and next thing there's a wolf jumping on him and licking his face enthusiastically and Yanis was screaming bloody murder while Ruby seemed to be having the time of her life rolling all over him and flattening him to the bed.

Shana had been the one chasing after Ruby but when she came in to see Ruby assaulting him she broke out into cackles, laughing so hard that she dropped to the ground.

Mae was the one to come save him, attracted by the sounds of chaos, she had been quick to pull Ruby off him, scolding both her daughter and girlfriend simultaneously as she dragged them out.

So now, Yanis was more or less used to waking up to a heavy weight rocketing herself to his stomach and being drenched in wolf spit, it almost had it's charm but he was definitely not marrying a wolf-person if he was ever going to get married he did not need to be woken up like this every morning of his life.

He eventually peeled himself out of bed to go clean up, he could go back to the Pack House today and he already missed his trusty alarm clock

He would drive down this morning, he had spoken to Hayden over the phone and although his friend sounded okay enough, he wouldn't rest till he had seen him.

Ruby wore a solemn expression all through breakfast and Yanis had to promise to take her with him to the Pack and back to the bookstore where Mae would pick her up.

Mae had been quick to protest but Yanis didn't mind, Shana didn't have a day shift so they could do whatever they wanted that morning while Yanis took their daughter off their hands.

It should be a fun drive or so he thinks

An hour later he's in the middle of trying to maneuver the car right and at the same time somehow manage to keep Ruby in the car, she had shifted and was hanging her head out the window, tongue out, happy dog style.

How did he ever predict this to be a fun drive? He half prays that any human who saw Ruby hanging out the window of Hayden's car window like that would think she was just a spectacular looking, huge dog.

He had never been happier to see the two huge buildings that signaled the Pack Houses, quickly parking so he could somehow coax Ruby into shifting back, she seemed to be the most comfortable while she was in wolf form - he noticed - because she spontaneously shifted now, quite often too and her moms said she did that a lot around people she was most comfortable.

He parks without bashing Hayden's car or anyone else's only to turn around and see Ruby grinning up at him, jacket and shoes gone and he thinks he remembers those items of clothing flying out the window when she changed.

Now she's in a frilly, sunny yellow dress, beaming up at him with unnaturally sharp teeth, eerie silver eyes staring up at him with stars in them and he has to shake off the feeling that envelopes him like he fell into some magical world.

He reaches a hand forward to push her unruly black hair behind her ear. "Next time, give me a heads up." He scolds her lightly, watching her nod enthusiastically, reaching out a hand to open the door.

Yanis stops her in time, helping her open the door and cautioning her to wait seeing as she was barefoot but really, it's Ruby.

As soon as Yanis turns to his side of the door to open it and come out, Ruby dashes out of the car with a squeal, making Yanis smack his head on the roof of the car in his haste to get out, he manages to lock up both doors in time to go after Ruby before she got lost in the Pack House.

"Ruby!" He calls in a panic, dashing after her and praying that she didn't end up shifting or worse, tripping or something equally drastic because damn, she was moving fast.

She dashes into the Pack House after a deliberate giggle at him, and Yanis mutters a curse under his breath, apologizing to the flustered people that Ruby runs into which only serves to slow him down all the more.

The chase ends with them on a hallway on the second floor that he doesn't think he's ever been to before and watches Ruby dash into a big, open , airy room.

He sighs in relief, slowing down now that the chase had come to an end.

"Pardon me for the intrusi" He starts to say, following in after her only to stop short, utterly speechless. "What the fuck?" He mutters in disbelief, pressed against the wall as a lot of much smaller wolf-children run around, yipping and mock-biting each other.

Ruby was lost in the midst of the horde and a lady noticed how distraught he was, walking over to him.

"Um, hey, got lost?" Deidre asks, staring at the weird human who looks more stunned to see so many werewolves than the actual fact that they were in wolf forms.

Yanis drags his searching gaze from the wolf-children to stare up at someone he hadn't seen before but her dark brown hair and dark blue eyes seemed awfully familiar, a questioning look on her pretty face. "More like I lost someone." He mutters.

Deidre makes a face like this. "Oh?" She prompts for more information, eyeing up the human that casual clothes couldn't hide his fluid sophistication.

"Yeah." Yanis rubs his neck nervously, still keeping an eye out in the case that Ruby decided she was done with the daycare and took off again. "I sort of lost, a wolf-child, she ran in here and shifted." He explains, very nervous now with the way the lady was eyeing him up like he was some kind of kidnapper.

"Wolf-child?" Deidre repeats in disbelief, blinking up at him.

"Yes." Yanis nods enthusiastically, clasping his hands earnestly in front of him, obviously seeing nothing wrong with the way he had described the werewolves. "Her name is Ruby, she's a beautiful brown wolf-child and please could you help me find her before she jumps out of the window, her moms would kill me." He panics.

Deidre knows who he's talking about and easily picks out Ruby who's hiding behind a fluffy cushion that's a similar color with her fur.

She keeps her face stern though, the human man was adorable when he's harried.

"I know Ruby and Shana and Mae yet strangely I don't know you, what's your name?" She asks with narrowed eyes.

"Yanis, a friend of theirs." He says quickly, getting more harried by the minute.

Deidre finally takes pity on him and walks over to where Ruby is hiding to hoist the werewolf out, talking to her softly,

When she shifts back, she leads her back to Yanis who looks so relieved to see her, instantly picking her up.

"Thank you"

"Deidre" Deidre starts to say but Ruby cuts her short, piping out an excited.

"DD!"

"Thank you, Deidre." Yanis repeats again, bowing his head slightly as he takes Ruby and practically dashes out of the room.

Deidre watches him leave with a faint smile, returning back to the Playroom. "Mila! Don't eat Reuben's paw, it's not food!" She scolds, smiling to Jazz, another one of the nannies who just put a sleepy child in one of the many cots lined up against the wall.

"What did he want?"

"Nothing important." She waves her coworker away, getting back to work.

Yanis on the other hand is scolding Ruby who is apologizing contritely and asking to be put down because she's a big girl who can walk but Yanis is having none of that.

Not only did she not have shoes on but he wasn't interested in getting caught up in the middle of another wild goose chase.

"Stay put, Ru." He says to stop her squirming. "Or I'll throw you over the stairs." He threatens lightly, understanding now why Mae had been worried for him when he suggested taking Ruby with him while Shana had been elated - she was a real piece of work.

Ruby gasps dramatically. "But that's mean." She immediately contradicts.

"And so is you running off." He reminds, still in a bit of a peeve.

"But I said I was sorry." She half whines.

"I'd say sorry too after throwing you over." Yanis argues, making Ruby let out a drawn out whine.

"Mean."