Cycle of the Werewolf   ::   Кинг Стивен

Magically, the beast's other eye blows out like a candle in a stormwind! It screams again and staggers, now blind, toward the window. The blizzard riffles the curtains and twists them around its head—Al can see flowers of blood begin to bloom on the white cloth-as, on the TV, the big lighted ball begins to descend its pole.

The werewolf collapses to its knees as Marty's dad, wildeyed and dressed in bright yellow pajamas, dashes into the room. The. 45 Magnum is still in Al's lap. He has never so much as raised it.

Now the beast collapses… shudders once… and dies.

Mr. Coslaw stares at it, open-mouthed.

Marty turnes to Uncle Al, the smoking gun in his hands. His face looks tired… but at peace.

“Happy New Year, Uncle Al,” he says, “it's dead. The Beast is dead.” And then he begins to weep.

On the floor, under the mesh of Mrs. Coslaw's best white curtains, the werewolf has begun to change. The hair which has shagged its face and body seems to be pulling in somehow. The lips, drawn back in a snarl of pain and fury, relax and cover the shrinking teeth. The claws melt magically away to fingernails… fingernails that have been almost pathetically gnawed and bitten.

The Reverend Lester Lowe lies there, wrapped in a bloody shroud of curtain, snow blowing around him in random patterns.

Uncle Al goes to Marty and comforts him as Marty's dad gawks down at the naked body on the floor and as Marty's mother, clutching the neck of her robe, creeps into the room. Al hugs Marty tight, tight, tight.

“You done good, kid,” he whispers. “I love you.”

Outside, the wind howls and screams against the snow-filled sky, and in Tarker's Mills, the first minute of the new year becomes history.

Afterward

Any dedicated moon-watcher will know that, regardless of the year, I have taken a good many liberties with the lunar cycle-usually to take advantage of days (Valentine's, July 4th, etc.) which “mark” certain months in our minds. To those readers who feel that I didn't know any better, I assert that I did… but the temptation was simply too great to resist.

Stephen King

August 4, 1983