The Wild Things by Dave Eggers

Stratego against himself, and cards against himself, and had pitted his animals and soldiers against each other, and had read two books about medieval wars.
    Now he wondered if he wanted to just spend another weekend in his fort. It seemed a good enough idea. He had some thinking to do, about this news about the sun expiring and the resulting void inhaling the earth, and he wanted to steer clear of Claire, who might yet want retribution, and he was angry at his mom, who seemed to forget for hours at a time that he existed. And any time he spent in his room ensured that he didn't have to talk to Gary.
    So he had a choice. Would he stay behind the curtain and think about things, marinate in his own confusion, or would he put on his white fur suit and howl and scratch and make it known who was boss of this house and all of the world known and unknown?

CHAPTER XI
    "Arooooooo!"
    The howling was a good start. Animals howl, he had been told, to declare their existence. Max, standing in his white wolf suit, stood at the top of the stairs and, using a rolled-up piece of construction paper as a megaphone, howled again, as loud as he could.
    "ARRROOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
    When he was done, there was a long silence.
    "Uh oh," Gary finally said.
    Ha! Max thought. Let Gary worry. Let everyone worry .
    Max pounded down the stairs, triumphant. "Who wants to get eaten?" he asked the house and the world.
    "Not me," Claire said.
    Aha! Max decided. That only puts her higher on the menu!
    He strode into the TV room, where Claire was pretending to do her homework. He lifted his claws up, growled and sniffed at the air. He wanted to make sure that Claire and everyone knew this terrible fact: There was a bloodthirsty, brilliant, borderline-insane wolf in their midst.
    Claire didn't look up.
    At least she'd spoken to him. It was a window to reconciliation, so Max had an idea. He removed a wooden dowel from a nearby curtain. It was about three feet long and bore magic marker lines across its width. Claire, seeing Max approach with the dowel, rolled her eyes.
    "You want to play Wolf and Master?" Max asked.
    Claire had already gone back to her book, strenuously ignoring him. She didn't even need to say No. She could say No a thousand ways without ever uttering the word.
    "Why not?" Max said to the back of her head.
    "Maybe because your wolf suit smells like butt?"
    Max quickly sniffed himself. She was correct. But he was a wolf. What else would a wolf smell like?
    "You want me to kill something for you?" he asked.
    Claire thought a moment, tapping her pencil against her lower teeth. Finally she looked at Max, her eyes bright. "Yeah," she said, "go kill the little man in the living room."
    This idea had a certain appeal. Max smiled at Claire's description of Gary as a "little man."
    "Yeah," Max said, getting excited. "We'll cut his brains out and make him eat 'em! He'll have to think from his stomach!"
    Claire gave Max a look she might give a three-headed cat. "Yeah, you go do that," she said.
    Max walked around the corner and found Gary lying on the couch in his work clothes, his frog-eyes closed, his chin entirely receded into his neck. Max gritted his teeth and let out a low, simmering growl.
    Gary opened his eyes and rubbed them.
    "Uhh, hey Max. I'm baggin' a few after-work Zs. How goes it?"
    Max looked at the floor. This was one of Gary's typical questions: Another day, huh? How goes it? No play for the playa, right? None of his questions had answers. Gary never seemed to say anything that meant anything at all.
    "Cool suit," Gary said. "Maybe I'll get me one of those. What are you, like a rabbit or something?"
    Max was about to leap upon Gary, to show him just what kind of animal he was -- a wolf capable of tearing flesh from bone with a shake of his jaws -- when Max's mom came into the room. She was carrying two glasses of blood-colored wine, and she handed one to Gary. Gary sat up, smiled his powerless smile, and clinked his glass against hers. It was a