Dead as a Doornail

the temperature for outdoor loving, and I was completely dressed. But Andy backed me up every step of the way, and there was no one to say it hadn’t happened the way I told it.
    About two hours later, they let me get back in my car to return to the duplex. The first thing I did when I got inside was phone the hospital to find out how Dawson was. Somehow, Calvin got ahold of the phone. “He’s alive,” he said tersely.
    “God bless you for sending him after me,” I said. My voice was as limp as a curtain on a still summer day. “I’d be dead if it wasn’t for him.”
    “I hear the cop shot her.”
    “Yes, he did.”
    “I hear a lot of other stuff.”
    “It was complicated.”
    “I’ll see you this week.”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “Go get some sleep.”
    “Thanks again, Calvin.”
    My debt to the werepanther was piling up at a rate that scared me. I knew I’d have to work it off later. I was tired and aching. I was filthy inside from Sweetie’s sad story, and filthy outside from being on my knees in the alley, helping the bloody Were. I dropped my clothes on the floor of the bedroom, went into the bathroom, and stood under the shower, trying hard to keep my bandage dry with a shower cap, the way one of the nurses had shown me.
    When the doorbell rang the next morning, I cursed town living. But as it turned out, this was no neighbor who wanted to borrow a cup of flour. Alcide Herveaux was standing outside, holding an envelope.
    I glared at him through eyes that felt crusty with sleep. Without saying a word, I plodded back to my bedroom and crawled into the bed. This wasn’t enough to deter Alcide, who strode in after me.
    “You’re now doubly a friend of the pack,” he said, as if he was sure that was the concern uppermost in my mind. I turned my back to him and snuggled under the covers. “Dawson says you saved his life.”
    “I’m glad Dawson’s well enough to speak,” I muttered, closing my eyes tightly and wishing Alcide would go away. “Since he got shot on my account, your pack doesn’t owe me a damn thing.”
    From the movement of the air, I could tell that Alcide was kneeling at the side of the bed. “That’s not for you to decide, but us,” he said chidingly. “You’re summoned to the contest for the packleader.”
    “What? What do I have to do?”
    “You just watch the proceedings and congratulate the winner, no matter who it is.”
    Of course, to Alcide, this struggle for succession was the most important thing going. It was hard for him to get that I didn’t have the same priorities. I was getting swamped by a wave of supernatural obligations.
    The werewolf pack of Shreveport said they owed me. I owed Calvin. Andy Bellefleur owed me and Dawson and Sam for solving his case. I owed Andy for saving my life. Though I’d cleared Andy’s mind about Halleigh’s complete normality, so maybe that canceled my debt to him for shooting Sweetie.
    Sweetie had owed payback to her assailant.
    Eric and I were even, I figured.
    I owed Bill slightly.
    Sam and I were more or less caught up.
    Alcide personally owed me, as far as I was concerned. I had showed up for this pack shit and tried to follow the rules to help him out.
    In the world I lived in, the world of human people, there were ties and debts and consequences and good deeds. That was what bound people to society; maybe that was what constituted society. And I tried to live in my little niche in it the best way I could.
    Joining in the secret clans of the two-natured and the undead made my life in human society much more difficult and complicated.
    And interesting.
    And sometimes . . . fun.
    Alcide had been talking at least some of the time I’d been thinking, and I’d missed a lot of it. He was picking up on that. He said, “I’m sorry if I’m boring you, Sookie,” in a stiff voice.
    I rolled over to face him. His green eyes were full of hurt. “Not bored. I just have a lot to think about. Leave the invitation, okay? I’ll get back with you on that.” I wondered what you wore to a fighting-for-packmaster event. I wondered if the senior Mr. Herveaux and the somewhat pudgy motorcycle dealership owner would actually roll on the ground and grapple.
    Alcide’s green eyes were full of puzzlement. “You’re acting so strange, Sookie. I felt so comfortable with you before. Now I feel like I don’t know you.”
    Valid had been one of my Words of the Day last week. “That’s a valid observation,” I said, trying to