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Merton decorates the dorm the week after Thanksgiving. Tommy goes to his last class of the semester- economics, which makes him want to crawl under a rock and forget numbers even exist- and when he comes back, the dorm has been totally transformed. If he didn't know better, he'd think Merton had some sort of magic, because there's… a lot going on, and he's only been gone a couple of hours.
There's a tree in the corner, small but definitely decorated with fairy lights and tiny skull ornaments, topped with what he thinks is a carved Freddy Krueger claw on top. There's garland spread over the shelves and dressers, framing everything neatly. It, and the plastic needles of the tree are, of course, black. When he squints at the tinsel, he can just make out the tiny plastic bats threaded through it. On the window next to Merton's bed, a decal Santa is sitting in a sleigh driven by eight skeleton reindeer. It's all very, very Merton.
There's a crash from the closet and Tommy sighs. He drops his bag and makes it over just in time for Merton to stumble out, his arms loaded down with boxes wrapped in shiny black paper. He catches the boxes that topple off the top of the stack before they hit the ground and steps out of the way as Merton stumbles a few steps forward.
"What are you doing?" Tommy asks as he sets the gifts down on his dresser. Merton peeks out from the side of the box he's still holding, his cheeks pink and his hair kind of wilted.
"It's the first Christmas we won't be going back to Pleasantville" Merton says, even though he's panting a little. Tommy's wheedled him into running every once in awhile, mostly under the trick of wolfing out and chasing him through the woods that wind around the campus, but he's still more likely to lay around than not. "I'm being festive!"
"Yeah," Tommy says, because he's learned that it's best to agree. "It's very.... festive?"
"You don't like it?" Merton asks. He cranes his head, looking around the room, and Tommy winces. He's used to the more traditional red and green, used to Santas hanging around everywhere and his mom bringing home sweets that smell mostly like sugar and artificial vanilla and peppermint. Their dorm smells like dust and men, a little sweaty from the clothes they're not great at washing, and kind of plasticky from the tree. It's not bad, just not really what he thinks of when he hears Christmas.
"Nah, it's good." Tommy takes the boxes from Merton and tucks them under the little tree. A couple of them have his name on the tags and he does his best not to shake them. He'll sniff them out later, when Merton's not home. "Just, uh, unexpected."
Merton grins, wide and happy, and Tommy shakes his head. He still doesn't get Merton most days, but he kind of likes it. With Merton around, his life is never boring. He doesn't think even the wolf compares in weirdness levels, which says something, Tommy guesses.
"Jim's throwing a party tomorrow," Tommy says. Merton goes a little tight around the shoulders, but his smile doesn't fade. "You should come with."
Tommy had thought, when Merton barged into his room with all his most important possessions, that they'd see more of each other than they had in high school, but it hasn't really been like that at all. College is more demanding, the homework harder and the classes longer, and college football is like an entirely different sport. He's barely got time to breathe, let alone hang out and watch movies. He's just glad the monsters and weird stuff that plagued Pleasantville haven't found their way here. If he had to go hunting too, he'd probably drop from exhaustion.
"Come on, we haven't hung out for forever," Tommy says. He slings his arm over Merton's shoulders and drags him in for a half hug.
"Yeah," Merton says. He shrugs, shoulder driving uncomfortably into Tommy's ribs. "Alright."
---
College parties are also something way different from what Tommy's used to. They're louder, full of more people and there's more liquor than bad beer. Tommy hasn't gotten really and truly drunk since the bite- Merton had said something about his metabolism spiking and gone into a ten minute spiel about how alcohol gets processed through the body, and Tommy had checked out pretty early on- but he likes how rum and Cokes taste anyway. He makes one for himself at the kitchen counter and another for Merton.
Merton's nearly vibrating at his side, his head swiveling around as he takes everyone in. Tommy can feel the nervous energy pouring off of him in waves, and he thinks about maybe cancelling it, going back to the dorm to watch To All a Good Night again. Instead, he hands Merton his drink and steers him out to the living room. It might not be his scene, but a little socializing never hurt anyone.
He drops Merton off with Chad, a guy from his ethics class that's tried to talk to him about comic books before, and wanders off to talk to the guys on the team. He misses his old team sometimes, misses knowing everything about everyone, but Greg's a good captain and Dan's always good for hanging out with when there's a game on TV. He figures he's got four years here to really get to know everyone, and then he'll be off somewhere new, anyway. It sucks to think about, but Merton will probably be with him, so it works out well enough.
Tommy plays a few games of beer pong with the guys, gets dragged into an argument about the Patriots and the Steelers, and dances with a cheerleader that reminds him of Lori if he tilts his head and squints. He's having a good time, and the stress of classes is slowly wearing away. Their break isn't very long, just a couple of weeks, but it should be enough to be able to just take some time to chill out.
When the cleared out space in the living room starts to have more people grinding than dancing, Tommy ducks out toward the kitchen. He's sweating under his hoodie, chasing the faint buzz that's finally breaking through his wolfy metabolism or whatever. He makes himself another drink, tosses it back, and pours a second one. The kitchen floor's gotten kind of sticky and gross, half of the bottles on the counter empty now and the boxes from the pizza place piled up in the corner of the room. Tommy's stomach grumbles at the whiff of pepperoni. He's hungry, the party's winding down for people that aren't planning on getting laid, and he hasn't seen Merton for a few hours. He figures an extra pizza won't go to waste back in their dorm, and they can probably still watch To All a Good Night before they both pass out.
Tommy wanders around the house, slipping past groups of people who might want to talk to him. He's got a plan in place and all he has to do is get Merton and go home. He sees Chad in the front hall, but Merton's not with him. Tommy hopes they talked for a little while at least, and feels kind of guilty for not sticking around. He can't always be there to babysit, though. Merton's mostly an adult, and one day he's got to have more than Tommy in his life, even if a selfish little corner of Tommy's mind kind of likes it the way it is.
He makes another circle of the house, checking the backyard when he turns up empty. Snow has started to fall, just a light cover that makes everything look hazy and mellow. Winter's probably going to suck, and Tommy's probably going to spend a lot of time wolfed out in the dorm during it. The fur's warm and Merton's got a thing about scratching behind Tommy's ears that he doesn't seem to realize he does.
Eventually, Tommy catches sight of the little dark spot in the house. Merton's leaned against the door leading into the kitchen, shoulders up around his ears and red plastic cup held in front of him like a shield. He's bobbing his head along to the music, the fuzzy baubles on his sweater bouncing a little. Tommy doesn't know how many drinks he's had, but his cheeks and mouth are red, and the spikes of his hair have flattened considerably. He looks… good. Tommy blinks down at his own cup and wonders if he's actually managed to get drunk.
Merton doesn't look good. He's Merton. Tommy's lived with the guy for a year, practically lived with him all through senior year. He's never looked at Merton's pointy nose or wide eyes and ever thought anything but best buddy. Merton looks and smells and sounds like home, like the dorm and the Lair and Pleasantville. Tommy's fingers go tight around his cup. He knocks it back and shakes his head. It's all the Christmas stuff. It's got to be.
A girl in a Santa hat and a green dress stops in front of Merton and looks up. Tommy follows her gaze and freezes a little when he sees the sprig of mistletoe hanging over the doorway. He wonders if Merton had seen it and decided to camp out there just in case, or if he's as thrown as Tommy is. The girl leans in and kisses Merton, her hands sliding around his neck and into his hair. Merton's own hand spazzes, shoots out, and drops his cup to the floor, beer splashing out and soaking into the carpet. He recovers pretty quickly after that.
Tommy feels his claws a split second before they rip through the plastic of his cup. Sticky soda spills out onto his hand, matting the sprouting fur, and Tommy jerks back. He glances around the room, but no one's paying him any attention. He doesn't run outside, but he's quick about getting out, the sounds of the party suddenly too loud against his ears. As soon as his feet touch grass, he races to the dorm, the cold wind whipping against his face.
When he's inside, he leans back against the door and closes his eyes, his heart hammering against his ribs. He hasn't had an incident like this since Stacy. He's worked so hard on keeping it under control, Merton's worked so hard with him, and all it took was- what? He doesn't even know.
So what if Merton made out with some co-ed. Tommy's seen him kiss girls before. Not usually with so much gusto, but it's not new. He doesn't know the girl, had maybe seen her around campus, but he doesn't know her well enough to be jealous that Merton was getting a little action. He should be glad. Merton's great. The more people that know that, the better. That had been the whole point of taking him to the party in the first place.
It doesn't explain the pit of something that's gnawing at the inside of his stomach, though.
Tommy kicks off his shoes and tugs off his hoodie. He left his jacket at Jim's place, but he'll get it back later. He shoves his jeans off and doesn't bother fighting the claws and the fangs and the fur. It's comforting, kind of, and he's warm almost as soon as he's across the room and crawling into Merton's bed. It's the one in front of the TV, which had been an argument and a half when they'd been setting everything up, and Merton's never complained about ending up covered in fur before.
Tommy flicks idly through the channels, itchy and unable to settle down. The bed smells like Merton's sweat and hair gel and a little like Tommy from all the times they'd crashed together while watching movies. Tommy curls up on top of the comforter and presses his nose to the scratchy cotton. He's in a weird mood and he doesn't know what to do to get out of it.
He's still laying there when the door opens, Merton stumbling inside, face pink and eyes watering from the cold. There's a red smear of lipstick at the corner of his mouth that looks like blood. Tommy presses his face back into the comforter and ignores the clawing, strange sensation in his chest.
"You left," Merton accuses, struggling out of his coat and scarf. He always forgets to take the scarf off first and ends up half-choking himself. On cue, he lets out a strangled little noise.
"Didn't feel too hot," Tommy says. It's not exactly a lie. Merton trips over his own feet as he toes his shoes off, and Tommy can smell the lingering whiff of vodka around him. He wonders if Merton made his own drinks, or if the girl in the green dress had made them for him.
The bed creaks when Merton flops down face first onto it. There isn't a lot of room between them, especially with Tommy taking up the whole center. It's nothing new. Tommy's woken up with Merton's hair in his mouth and his arms curled around Merton's waist to anchor him from falling off, but it feels different somehow, like Tommy's intruding on space that isn't really his at all. Merton looks up and blinks sleepily, and Tommy's breath catches.
"Did you-" Tommy presses his tongue against the tip of one of his fangs. "Did you and that girl…?" The words feel slow and deliberate. He's talked to half a dozen guys about their hookups, in high school and college, and it had always been pretty easy. He'd given the obligatory back slaps and nodded along and been just the right amount of impressed. If Merton says yes, Tommy doesn't think he'll be able to muster up any sort of impressed sounding words of excitement. Merton snorts.
"She told me I kiss like a tornado," he says. He scrunches his nose up, his mouth hanging open in that dumb way that it does sometimes, and Tommy thinks oh. "What does that even mean? Is that some popular kid lingo that I missed?"
"You're drunk," Tommy says. He wants to know what it means, too, wants to know what Merton's like when he's kissing. It's maybe the only thing he doesn't know about Merton. He uncurls from his warm spot and coaxes Merton up the bed, until both of them are laying under the covers, their knees banging every time one of them shifts. Merton's still got his ugly black Christmas sweater on, but he'd lost his pants on the way to the bed.
"You're warm," Merton mumbles. He scratches lazy fingers through the fur just under Tommy's jaw, nuzzling his head against Tommy's chest and the weird patch of fur that's started to grow there. "Have you ever been told you kiss like a natural disaster?"
"Not to my face," Tommy says. He pats Merton's head and lets his hand linger there. Merton's hair is kind of greasy with gel, but it's soft and parts easily under Tommy's claws. He should probably change back, but Merton's got a good groove going against his cheek that feels really good and it'll stop once the fur is gone.
Tommy listens to the steady beat of Merton's heart, to the familiar in and out of his breath, and closes his eyes. He wants to keep doing this forever. He tries to imagine life after school, and every future has Merton there with him, right by his side. It's maybe the most important thing of all of them. He looks around their room, looks down at Merton, who's started to drool on his chest, and thinks, yes.
He didn't get it before, but he thinks he might have it now.