Everything smelled like popcorn. Not movie theater popcorn, but an earthy, stale confection with traces of caramel and the road. Lance felt his stomach flip with each breath, the cloying scent pulling him around the concourse. He ditched his friends, desperate to escape that smell. 

His father was right. He never should have come.

Walking fast, he scratched at his neck, a flush rising from his shoulders. Lance turned into a space between the balloon darts game and a cotton candy stall. He swiped at the sweat beading on his forehead. 

This was too early. He was nowhere near ready.

The cacophony of rides and riders dimmed in the clearing beyond. He knelt in the space between two pick-up trucks, hidden, and breathed deeply. Lance looked up at the clear night sky, the moon a thin crescent—waning or waxing, he didn’t know.

If only it were that simple.

The werewolf comparison was how his father explained it. For generations folklore provided cover between the Nox and the humans. Lance’s father was an original Nox, impossibly old but never aging. His father transformed at will until the disaster in West Virginia. In 1970, he stayed human shaped, married an understanding woman, and took a shot at the American Dream. Lance’s arrival that year fit nicely into his plan.

Sixteen years later, kneeling in the dirt behind the candy floss stand, Lance willed his body to calm down. He struggled once to stand, thinking his legs underneath him would give him an advantage, or at least a chance to run. The second time he fell forward, only his grip on the pickup’s door handle kept him from going face-first into the mud. He pulled down accidentally and the door opened.

Lance pushed at it only to be met with the largest pair of glasses he’d ever seen. He pulled back. “Sorry…I fell.” The magnified eyes peered at him and even in the low light, Lance could see traces of red in the irises. They drew him in.

“Fell?” A long finger pushed the glasses back along a thin nose. “You were already in the mud when you started.” The face pulled back to reveal a lanky teen about Lance’s age. “I’ve been watching you from the window,” he said. “Y’alright?”

In one moment, Lance realized the sounds of the world had disappeared. In the next, they came roaring back: the cycle of screams as the chair swing reached its peak speed, the pieces of conversation as guests passed the gap between the stalls. He could even pick out the song each ride played, as if listening to them one after another like on the radio. Lance stood up, looking back down toward the lights of the carnival, hearing the world clearly for the first time.

“Ah,” said the watcher. “You Nox?”

Even the popcorn smell returned, more intense, the flat, airy aroma of the kernels disappearing into the full round scent of … “What did you say?” 

The eyes behind the glasses blinked. “You Nox? Looks like yer changing.”

Lance grabbed his own chest, shoulders, arms, and hips. He put his hands on everything he could reach—everything—to see if a transformation had really started. It all felt normal. He took a long look at his hands, flipping them over and over, believing for some reason that the change would start there. But he was still Lance-shaped.

“Nah, not outside. Inside. Nox change inside first when they young.” The long finger returned and poked Lance in the forehead. His jaw and neck muscles strained as he resisted the urge to bite the finger clean off the hand.

“Ooh,” they said. “You’re gonna be a feisty one. Where your paps?”

Lance pretended not to look Medra up and down.

“Imma boy tonight,” he said and then, “Medra is my name. Call me that, kay?”  

Lance nodded. “What do you know about Nox?” 

Medra smiled. “I know enough that a new Nox ain't to be about without his pappy, specially one as strong as you.”

Lance leaned against the other truck. “I don’t really know what’s happening.”

“Oh. I do,” Medra said, stepping closer. Lance felt the flush return and this time it brought along a budding predatory urge. His fists wanted to both grab and punch at the same time.

“See. I can see ya in there. I’m tripping all sorts ‘a switches,” Medra giggled, closing the distance between them. 

“I’m a Nox myself.” He cackled at the look of disbelief on Lance’s face. “Ah see, you only know yer own sort.”

Lance felt his spine lengthen and his shoulder blades spread. He held his arms close to his sides, trying to contain the change. “What kind…are you?” he asked as a distraction. He struggled to get the question out, his breaths coming fast and deep. If he kept talking, he thought, he’d stay human.

Medra tilted his head and frowned. “Let’s say, I’m a helper.” He watched Lance trying to hold himself together. “Hey now, you working hard there.”

Lance struggled as the seams of his shirt split open. “If you’re a helper,” he grunted, trying to hold on to his jeans and his dignity as much as possible, “then help me!”

Flinching at the shout, Medra took the hint. He smacked his own truck. “You get in back there, tell me where your pappy is. I’ll take ya.”

Lance made a move toward the cab, but Medra slammed the door. “NO! Back there. Not gonna have you eat me while I’m driving. Go.”

Lance climbed into the bed of the truck feeling his whole body shudder in transformation. As something fought to grow out of the base of his spine, Lance looked at the crescent moon and found no help there.

“Boy-o! Address?”

Lance growled it at him.

“Ooh eh?” Medra said, hitting the gas. “The governor’s mansion it is, young master.”