The Bear With No Name by Zoe Chant

staring out the window with bleary eyes, no closer to clarity than he’d been the night before. Lauren was still curled in his arms, as she had been all night. His mind had raced all through the dark hours, endlessly replaying the same dilemma: giving up Lauren would be like losing a limb, but he would rather die than endanger her.
    It’s not that there wasn’t any room for compromise. He could imagine telling her part of the truth; he could say that he remembered something about himself that worried him, and he had to leave while he investigated whether or not it put her in danger. Maybe he could hint that it was about criminal involvement or something.
    But there was something about her, about their connection to each other, that made half a truth feel as bad as a lie.
    Not to mention the practicalities: she would never believe that it was safe for him to hike out of there alone. People had been talking at dinner last night about hiking over the mountain to Kirk, and it sounded like it would take around eight hours … for a human. If her told her he needed to leave, she and her friends would insist on hiking over the mountain with him, and then they would all spend the night, and then they would see him off on the bus or something, and that just would not do. And what if Lauren in her cheerful, determined way decided to follow him? Or what if he turned into a bear in a mountain meadow along the way and went berserk and slaughtered them all?
    What about that bear inside him? He had searched deep within himself for any scrap of knowledge of the bear. One thing he had become sure of was that the transformation was utterly familiar. As he concentrated there in the dark, he found that his control of the process was complete and nuanced. He could turn his nails into claws. He could cause fur to sprout all over his body and then to disappear. All of it felt as familiar as breathing. This was not some sudden change that had come upon him when he was injured, this must have been a part of him for years.
    The reasonable side of his brain tried to point out that if his control over the shifting really was that masterful, then surely he could stop himself from ever harming Lauren. Then the unreasonable side offered up an image of Lauren with her throat slashed by savage claws, and reason just gave the hell up. Nothing could ever be worth that risk.
    Lauren awoke with a little snuffling sound and then immediately lifted her head up, looking around. When she saw him lying right there with her, he could almost read her thoughts: Oh good, he’s still here!
    He sighed and smiled up at her. She had the most beautiful, expressive face. With a few quirks of her eyebrows and her lovely lips, she could have whole conversations. The lopsided smile she was giving him now said, Please tell me you’re done being an idiot?
    Oh Lauren, I wish I could be.
    Instead, he kissed her and said, “Your turn for the first shower.”
    Once they were ready for the day, they returned to the emergency shelter for breakfast, bringing a box of granola to share. Seeing all the townspeople there reminded David that others had struggles in their lives, too. Rev. Parrish was there sharing the news with everyone that Mr. Mitchell was recovering comfortably from his surgery, and when he thanked David again, people started applauding.
    David waved back to them, wordless with emotion.
    Another person David was looking for was Fran. He told Lauren and Ella his theory that yesterday’s bear might have been the cub’s mother, though he left out all the parts about scent. They both said they would keep an eye out for Fran so he could tell her the news.
    Fran didn’t appear until breakfast clean-up was over and everyone was spilling out into the town square. David went and told her the edited version he’d shared that morning.
    Fran took his news seriously, asking “Where exactly were you when you saw her? Which way was she heading?”
    “I was east of the ridge with