Chapter 78

Sarah POV

The show was booked for the following Tuesday, and though I wanted to swallow my tongue when Tony announced proudly we were doing two segments for a total of fourteen minutes’ screen time, I could tell Zane had come to terms with the whole thing.

In fact, I learned it would hardly be his first time being interviewed on TV, which shouldn’t have surprised me. I had just never seen him do a show before, though I suspected I had simply been too busy with Chloe and my jobs to watch it. I certainly remembered the time over five years ago when he’d been on the news every night pleading for information on his missing daughter.

After a breakfast of overnight oats with blueberries and banana, the current favorite, he invited me to his study, sat with me in front of his desk, and set up his monitor so we could both see.

“It was just before we found out she was pregnant,” he explained pulling up the video. “We were promoting co-species public schooling, and Olivia had written a children’s book called My Friend Has No Fangs, which had been banned in several territories. The prevailing attitude there seemed to be that while humans and werewolves could be friends, there was no need to ‘rub people’s faces in it.’”

The clip began, and I saw they were on a morning news program that originated from a territory that had been considering banning the book. The hosts, a Ken-and-Barbie whom I didn’t recognize, briefly explained what they would be talking about and then smiled and welcomed Zane and Olivia.

Of course, I’d seen photos of Olivia and vaguely remembered seeing her on TV occasionally several years back, but she still took my breath away. She was beautiful and immaculate, stylish and poised, yet approachable and soothing.

I truly hoped Zane wasn’t expecting me to measure up to her next Tuesday. The best I could hope to manage was “pretty and nice.” Of course, that would be “for a human.”

“No, I don’t think it’s a matter of decency,” Olivia was saying in response to the opening question about her book. “It’s a matter of friendship. We’re trying to promote a world where humans and wolves live together in that friendship, so showing a friendship between a young pup and her human friend is a vital part of that message.

“People who say it’s too much ‘in their face’ are conveniently ignoring, or pretending to ignore, that social change only happens with discussion and that children learn by example. If you don’t want to ‘see’ it, you’re saying it’s wrong, or at least that it’s wrong for people to see it. So, what’s the takeaway here? Humans and werewolves can be friends as long as they’re invisible?”

Zane then spoke for a minute or so, basically backing up what Olivia said. Then Olivia held up some of the charming illustrations in the book, which I finally recognized from the bookstore, though I’d never felt the need to buy it. Chloe already had plenty of human friends.

“You can see here that they’re just doing the same things most kids do,” Olivia explained. “They’re swinging on the swings, riding their bikes, and playing with some Star Trek action figures. The emphasis is on what they have in common, not their differences.

“But on this page,” she continued, turning a colorful leaf of the book over, “you can see that Shelia doesn’t, in fact, have fangs like her friend, Maria, does. But the girls aren’t going to bite each other, so it really doesn’t matter.”

“But that’s just what people object to,” “Ken” said. “They’re saying the book acts like there’s no difference between humans and wolves when, in fact, there are many differences both biological and cultural.”

Olivia kept her cool and even smiled encouragingly. “I’m pointing to a page in the book where the biological differences are very much being acknowledged. The point isn’t that the girls are the same, it’s that they’re not so different that they can’t be friends.”

The hosts wrapped up the segment after that, and the video ended. Zane turned to me somewhat expectantly.

I looked back for a moment, then shrugged. “I’m not sure why you showed me that.”

“Only to show being on TV isn’t so bad,” he replied with a little frown.

I laughed. “Not when you’re beautiful and brilliant and sound like you’ve had elocution lessons since you were born.”

He kept frowning.

I gestured at the monitor. “Do you think that was actually easy for her just because she made it look easy? Even someone like me knows being interviewed is like dancing: you have to practice your ass off to make it look natural.”

“Someone like you? What do you mean?”

I sighed. “I appreciate you and your family and my good fortune in being here looking after my daughter and her sister, who is also my goddess-daughter. But let’s be real, here. No one comparing me to Olivia is going to be, well, impressed.”

“No one is going to compare you to Olivia.”

“Are you joking? Everyone is! Yes, I’m not your wife. I’m not even eligible to be your wife, and I don’t know why, but that just makes it worse.”

“Makes what worse?”

He really did look clueless. I held up a hand and closed my eyes, thinking for a moment.

“I don’t like all this heroism business. I’m sure you know that.”

Zane nodded.

“But at least right now I’m just being judged by werewolves as a human. The fact I’m in any way capable is, however condescendingly, seen as a great virtue. If I get judged by werewolves according to wolf standards, I’m toast.”

Zane took over the deep thinking, frowning down at his hands for several minutes.

“All right,” he finally said with a nod. “We need to get you to see yourself differently before we put you in front of a camera.”

I didn’t much like his “let’s train you properly tone,” and I said something to that effect.

But Zane just smiled. “I don’t mean it that way at all. Please, can you trust me?”

“That’s not a fair question. Of course I do.”

“Then please, come with me.”

Suspicious now, I followed him to my bedroom door, where he stopped and gestured inside at the bed I still made up for myself every morning, despite the housekeeper’s habit of telling me to leave it.

“Please go get dressed in your brown suit and meet me and the girls at the car in twenty minutes.”

I was going to ask him why, but he looked ready to ask me to trust him again, so I just went into my room, got out the brown suit, did a light job with my makeup, and found my purse.

After about another twenty minutes in the car, Ollie pulled us up to the entrance of a small, clean-looking building in the center of town. I saw the sign, Alpha Zane LGHBTQ+ Community Center, so I didn’t ask where we were. I knew.

But I had no idea why.