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morvantmortuary · 6 months

Text

paint the town red --

(Maxi Morvant x non-binary/genderqueer plus-sized Reader, 18+)

(summary: Maxi returns to you after some night work. You don't hate the result.

warnings: smut, minors dni. dead dove do not eat for the following: blood kink, minor descriptions of gore, Maxi goes down on Reader after some light cannibalism. oral (afab receiving, some anatomy mentioned), oral wound fucking (reader giving), pain kink, handjob. some possessiveness, mentions of stalking. some allusions towards a homophobic/transphobic politician who gets got. serial killers are serial killing, don't act surprised. needless to say: don't fucking try this at home, for all sorts of health reasons.

general: Reader is, as always, non-binary/genderqueer, fat/plus-sized, and also just plain Queer. afab anatomy is referenced for reader, so just be advised. otherwise, everything else is meant to be relatively neutral to let people have a more seamless experience, and suggested tweaks to that language are always appreciated.

general: well. this was meant to be part of @jmathesonandsiblings's Spooky Season in the Barrens (for 'covered in blood' and 'gore', in case you couldn't guess!) but life was Not Cooperating. :'D so! here's this, better late than never!!

'...hey rae wtf is with that warning section' buddy, your guess is as good as mine, honest to god.)

Standing on the back porch in the dark always reminded you just how far the House was from anywhere else in Greymoon.

The autumn chill was still nowhere to be found, the last crickets of the warm weather singing uneasily around you. The cicadas had fallen silent weeks ago, leaving the evening air feeling almost… too big. Too capacious.

Like something else would ooze into where the familiar bayou lullabies should have been, concealing itself in the silence until it jumped out to surprise you.

But tonight, you couldn’t bring yourself to worry as usual. The moon was full, pendulous, threatening to drip harvest honey all down the dangling strands of spanish moss and throwing your world into soft, gauzy focus.

You, however - your mind, your sight, the sense of certainty in the center of your ribs - had never felt clearer.

Your senses felt like the scalpel’s cold edge; the sussurrus of every breeze sounded like a chorus of whispers. The shadowy shapes in your peripheral vision, in the darkened corners of the porch and near the waiting light of the kitchen door, couldn’t draw your attention like they would have before. Like they wanted.

It was impossible to even think of those late shades when you were too busy listening to the sheer life all around you. Pulsing just beneath the night and your own skin was your heartbeat, calm and dependable and steady —

And one more besides, providing a counterpoint to the rhythm you could swear was filling the air around you.

You glanced down at your wrist again, the scarlet mark as fresh and vibrant as an open wound, glowing to rival the moon in your own tiny universe.

You hadn’t put much stock in any kind of invisible string when you were younger, red or otherwise. But when you brushed the sigil with two of your fingers, you almost swore you felt an answering tug from some distant spot.

A tug that you swore was growing stronger, more insistent, with the passing minutes. Something in the vast night was pulling you towards it, or itself towards you, already on course for an inevitable collision.

It must have gone well, you thought. Maxi had told you that the full moons always had more magic in them, even for that as necrotic as the Morvants’.

But the seasonal moons, the ones the world quietly turned around without anyone noticing anymore? Those were best of all.

All three of them had crept out tonight with some mysterious errand or another, each of them notably distracted during the daylight hours. You knew Hex and Rora wouldn’t be coming back before daybreak — they had their own people to visit, after whatever terrible deeds they’d done in the dark.

Maxi - or the Reaper - one of them - had promised they would come back for you, though.

They had even asked you, all sweetness and kisses, to wait for them, right at this spot.

So of course, there you stood. The unseasonably warm autumn caused your nightclothes to cling to your skin and every passing breeze to ghost a finger down your spine, somehow leaving you chilled and sweating all at once.

But he was near. He was so close, you were certain of it.

You had no idea how you knew — you’d barely seen him leave, already asleep in his bed when he’d kissed you goodbye and slipped near-seamlessly into the pitch black. But somewhere in the last hour, you had awakened instantaneously, as though you’d never even dreamed. You’d been walking down the stairs before you fully knew why, with not even a phone or a flashlight to guide you.

You had, however, at least paused to light the lone backyard jack-o-lantern to keep you company. You knew - again, no idea how - that he wouldn’t need it to guide him back to you. But you thought he might at least enjoy the welcome when he did arrive. A cheerful diabolical little smile he could see even from far away.

Your body sang, heady without so much as a single glass of wine. You wondered if your heartbeat always filled the world around you like this, consistent and assertive, and you’d just never bothered to really listen.

And there, again, just underneath - what had to be his, slightly slower, slightly harder. The reverb to yours, solid and deep.

Something dark to it, though you couldn’t say what or why.

Inhaling felt like drinking the warm, perfumed air, and you closed your eyes to let it wash more completely through your lungs. Your nerves twisted agreeably in anticipation of something, everything in you straining against the shroud-like black to catch every rustle, every ghostly step —

The taste of copper hit your tongue, heavy and brash, even before something took your hand.

You didn’t even realize you’d been extending it to the empty dark, only seeing when you finally opened your eyes that you’d been standing on the edge of the top step, your palm facing out as if expecting something.

And in answer, Maxi’s chilled hand clutched yours in his long fingers, the whole of it awash in clotting burgundy.

He was staring up at you from the bottom of the porch steps, eyes fully black behind his blood-spattered glasses. The usual red of his iris was everywhere else tonight - all over his face, clinging in his damp hair, utterly soaking his clothes. You knew immediately there would be no saving any of the fabric, even with hours of soaking. The knees of his trousers in particular were blooms of something near-black — stomach or arterial blood, you were willing to bet.

If you had been anyone else - if he had been anyone else - this would have been a vision that took away every chance you’d ever get at sleeping soundly again, until you finally breathed your last.

But instead, you found yourself smiling.

You stepped back, gently tugging him to follow you.

He walked up the steps as if asleep himself, almost immediately leaning down to be eye-to-eye with you as soon as he stepped onto the porch. For his perfect silence, his gaze felt searching, his face close to yours but still careful to leave you just enough room to lean away. To choose to remain clean of this, whatever new stain he’d brought home with him.

When he had you backed against the wall, his hands came to rest slowly at either side of your head as he continued to stare unblinkingly, his gaze an inescapable void. You knew from the way his palms were light as gossamer against the wall that you could break his stance and turn away if you really wanted. You could go back upstairs, leave him to come to and clean himself up. Pretend this whole thing wasn’t the life you had decided you wanted after all. He would understand when he was… sober, to speak. He really would. You knew that with absolute certainty.

With the slightest stuttering tilt of his head, there was an unspoken question he let hang between the two of you, as pendulous as the moon.

You reached up to his face, his skin sticking slightly against your palms as the blood continued to cool, and fully licked the waiting red from his lips.

The space between you was sealed by this. He was ravenous at your mouth, claiming yours with tongue and nipping teeth and a hunger that felt like the edge of a bottomless dark pit. You were caged between the sticky warmth of him and the solid wall behind you, his hands clutching at your waist, your stomach, his hips pressed impatiently to yours.

You shivered as his mouth moved lower, down your throat that you willingly exposed to him, at your clavicles, leaving bites sharp enough to bruise like they were jewelry. His knees dropped to the wood of the porch with a thud that would’ve made you wince if you hadn’t been so distracted, and you felt him mouthing, needy, at your chest and your stomach through your shirt.

You could only curl your fingers through his hair in response, your hands having to force their way through the tissue and heavy clots of blood that had tangled in it somehow. You would’ve worried about pulling if you knew he didn’t enjoy the pain, and when you broke through a lock plastered to his scalp, you felt him shiver lightly.

The hiss through your teeth was unbidden as his mouth dropped to the underwear you were wearing under your borrowed nightshirt, his tongue pressing a curious lick to the thin layer of fabric between your sex and his heat. When you pulled on his hair a little harder reflexively, he looked up at you, resting his chin on the softest part of your stomach under your navel.

He still said nothing, his eyes blacker than space itself, but the tiny exhale through his nose was all you needed to know what he was asking.

He stayed still as a statue as you bit your lip, pondering, scanning the backyard. There was no one here, you knew that. The nearest living neighbors were miles away. The dead ones — well. There’s nothing to say they wouldn’t watch.

But between the elemental contrast of his eyes and the moon above, you’d already made your decision.

When you looked back down at him and nodded, one hand left your thigh to yank your underwear down your legs with a force that nearly ripped it. You had barely enough time to see him lick his own lips in anticipation before there was a searing heat against your slit, and you gasped aloud to the now-silent yard.

There was the distinct smell of blood warming as he voraciously devoured you, sucking at your clit in a way that made your head fall back against the wall. He kissed your entrance like a man condemned receiving a reprieve a minute to his execution, like he thought he’d never get to taste you again. His hands clutched at your thighs, and every so often he would turn his attentions to one of them, kissing and nipping at the inside with a fervor that would’ve seared your face if the blood wasn’t already elsewhere.

Whenever you tried to move, your body shuddering and writhing at white hot electricity racing down your nerves, he would force your hips back against the wall with an iron certainty, pinning you there as he laved your clit and pushed his tongue into you the best he could.

As you gazed upward, unfocused, struck speechless and your breath elusive, you swore your vision was flickering.

Snippets of scarlet flashed in and out, your senses overwhelmed briefly with the impressions of somewhere else entirely: a ribbon of red that followed the sleek, precise strike of something silver.

Flesh opening itself to the impatient ripping of hands and steel, a rib cage being revealed like a boudoir.

A heart that still trembled in its home of muscle and bone even as an echoing scream died away, as the bespoke-suited man ( you recognized him, distantly - a state senator?) trapped and pinned between your (his - your?) thighs started to convulse from shock.

When the hands that now clutched your hips tore the heart from its proper place, holding it aloft as it ceased to clumsily twitch and spurt, the sound you made was something unholy.

You remembered faintly why you usually avoided wearing white, even to bed — the borrowed undershirt of his was now blooming with rust-colored stains, handprints overlapping over where the cloth covered your hips and stomach, swipes of red where his head had rested as he dipped the hard bridge of his nose just so to make you gasp, or grazed his cheek against the fabric as he circled your clit intensely enough to make your leg begin to shake.

You were barely aware of the world around you, but just enough to feel an insistent grinding against your shin, your surroundings coming into focus just enough for you to put together that he was already aching for attention from this alone. When you moved your leg just a fraction of an inch closer to his hips, he groaned gratefully while he still had the tip of his tongue in you, which in turn had you seizing his hair again just for the sake of having something to anchor you to earth.

You were trying your best not to double over him or fall, but your thighs were traitorous, too-warm and shaking slightly as you felt your juices already dripping down them - from your own cunt or Maxi’s panting mouth, you weren’t entirely sure, but it was all the same. Distantly, you were still aware of him rutting lightly against your ankle, and just the faintest sensation of something slick through the fabric of his pants.

You heard a sound that it took you a moment to realize was a word, and then a repetition to realize what was being said —

“Please,” a voice with an echo like something frigid rasped between lingering strokes of his tongue. Against your leg, you could feel the slightest shaking of his own thighs, the muscles taught with need.

Your hand clenched in the hair at the back of his neck as you finally let out a groan from the shadowed parts of you, shoving your clit roughly against his waiting tongue as you rode out the storm that felt like it had been building in you all night. He moaned low in his throat, holding admirably still so you could grind against his mouth with abandon until every last drop of your orgasm had pooled like liquid fire onto his tongue.

When your knees finally gave out, sending you sliding down the wall, he wordlessly moved his body further between your legs so he could catch you against him.

The two of you sat like that for a while, you straddling his lap, your chests heaving against one another as the smell of blood and sex permeated the air with every gasp and pant.

Your hands found their way to his chest, feeling almost blindly down the fabric of his vest, then his arms and his mussed rolled sleeves, as if to make sure he would stay solid under your touch. He pressed his forehead against yours in response, and you felt a mixture of blood and sweat transferring to your own skin with a heat that was near-searing.

His eyes were still pitch black as he gazed at you, mouth still slightly slack as he tried to catch his breath.

You couldn’t help but smile once more, your hands catching at his shoulders to pull him closer. Planting kisses to either side of his mouth, you hummed, soft in your throat. “What’d you do with the heart, lover boy?” He had to have known you’d seen. There was no way he hadn’t felt the memories, visions, whatever they were, passing from him to you as if he’d licked them into your skin.

The demon behind your beloved’s face leaned back slightly to give you a slow grin that exposed almost every tooth, tell-tale pieces of thin red tissue caught between a few towards the back.

“Oh yeah?” You were still checking him over, palpating flesh and bone gently in your palms to search for any sign of something wrong, something that might have been missed in the adrenaline of the chase and the subsequent catch. “You could’ve brought it home. I would’ve at least seared it with some seasoning for you.”

He made a sound from somewhere deep in his chest, pushing his face into the side of your neck to lave his tongue lovingly over the marks he’d left in his frenzy.

You giggled at this blatant affection — until a feeling under your palm made you suddenly still. A spot on his side was too warm, the blood too fresh even after his journey back. When you pressed cautiously, another warm wave covered your skin.

“Baby,” you said, leaning back to inspect the spot more thoroughly. “This is yours.”

Maxi followed your gaze even as his hands remained clawed at your hips, his still-pitch eyes looking more distractedly curious than concerned.

Your fingers discovered a rip in the fabric before you could tell it apart from any other bloodstain, parting the damp cloth to discover a wound that made you hiss through your teeth again.

“Maxi,” you whispered, even though being overheard had hardly been a concern mere minutes ago. “What happened?”

Your lover’s ribs had been grazed by something — experience you couldn’t imagine having years ago now told you, based on the angle and the specific marks of damage, that it was something close-range but not too sharp. An attempted defensive wound from the quarry, you guessed, remembering the brief scarlet flashes of Maxi pinning the man down for the prize between his ribs.

His own flesh was torn: too deep for some hydrogen peroxide and a bandaid, but hopefully able to fix itself relatively quickly with his own magic and a couple of sutures to hold it closed through the night.

“Come on,” you coaxed, trying to force yourself to your feet despite your body’s exhausted protests. “Let’s go get that clean.”

Maxi - or the Reaper, or the combination of them that had made enough peace to share his flesh for now - made a sound that was somewhere between a protesting groan and a sullen whine, caging you more insistently in a hug and nestling his ear over your own heart. You knew this now for the tell it was.

“I’m not saying we won’t still cuddle,” you said, unable to help a smile at his peculiar priorities. He was always clingy, but especially so when he wasn’t… entirely his human self. “But you can’t have an open wound in our bed, babe. You’ll drive yourself crazy with the bleach in the morning trying to get it clean before we open. Not to mention, you just changed the sheets yesterday, remember?”

Your demon was quiet, and though it was harder to tell when his eyes were monochrome, you got the distinct impression he was glancing off to the side as he always did when trying to recall something.

“Please?” You angled your head to kiss the end of his nose, causing him to blink in an owlish way that was almost entirely human. “You said I needed the practice, after all.”

He sat there, seeming to consider this, and for the briefest moment, a tongue that was slightly pointier than it usually presented probed absently at his teeth, as if searching for remnants of the evening’s ritual.

Before you could entreat him again, though, his eyes locked back on yours - and for an instant, you wondered just how that snide little grandstander, one who’d whipped his constituents into a frenzy about the ungodly corruption lurking in schools and public libraries, had felt when he realized just what kind of “demonic influence” he’d failed to take into account.

A secret part of you, one you would’ve refused to acknowledge not too long ago, hoped he’d felt every second of it.

But before you could linger too long on this thought, Maxi gave a small sigh through his nose - assent, you guessed, combined with a sleepily satisfied urge to return to closeness quickly.

“That’s my good boy.” Your smile grew to a grin. Demon scion of an ancient line of necromancers or not, he was still quite agreeable when it counted.

The grin stretched his features again, eager and weirdly sweet despite the deep red stains on his teeth.

As you tried to stand again, he lifted you to your feet as though you weighed next to nothing, taking a touch too long to gaze at your exposed thighs at his eye level before he drew himself up to his full height.

“Come on, you.” You rolled your eyes, taking his cold fingers in your own and leading him back inside.

He followed, a deeper, darker version of his familiar laugh echoing as the door closed behind you both.

The jack o lantern snuffed itself, though neither of you had bothered to check.

—

The bright lights of the embalming room activated as you walked through the drop-off door together. The tools needed were already carefully laid out on the embalming table, pre-sterilized and arranged in order of procedure as always. You hardly ever needed them - thankfully - but it was still a ritual he performed before every solo trip out of habit.

Too many years of having to fix himself alone made him overly prepared, you’d realized. There was still some part of him - you didn’t know how much - that always quietly expected the worst.

“Up,” you said as you washed your hands at the sink, too light to be a real order. You were already glancing nervously at the curved needle — it was new, fresh out of the wrapping, but the severity of the tools for the dead always made you a little gun shy when applying them to your still-mostly-alive soulmate.

Maxi hopped up on the table, his feet kicking just slightly as he watched you with keen interest. He could do this in his sleep — hell, he could probably still do it now, not entirely in his own mind. But you doing it seemed to delight him in some strange way.

“Shirt off.” You’d crossed to the table, now focused solely on trying to thread the thing, your hands shaking just a little as you were watched. You knew he would only ever offer gentle correction or guidance, but still. There were studies about how people were worse at things if they knew someone was looking at them, right?

There was motion in your peripheral vision as he wriggled free of the sticky dress shirt and the thin undershirt, the two of them tangled together as they were soaked all the way through. He tossed them lightly towards the crematory, as if also having come to the conclusion they were unsalvageable. His skin still had a rust-ish tinge even bare, small crystalline red clots occasionally dotting his dark chest hair.

“I’ll get your glasses next,” you added, glancing up at him as you set the needle down to pick up a sterilizing solution for the wound itself. “It’s a wonder you could see at all on the way home, handsome.”

Something laughed, too deep to be human. As used to the sound as you were now, it still set off goosebumps as some deep primal part of your brain tried to warn your body.

Run for your life, it whispered, generations of your ancestors echoing in your ears. Death is here, and it won’t leave until it has you.

He already did, though, you thought. Body and soul.

“I say something funny, love?” You looked back to him, the eerie grin, the empty eyes. You could tell the difference by now between a threat display and genuine amusement - this really did seem to be the latter. “This might sting,” you warned, reaching towards him with the cotton pad and stopping short so he could give you permission.

He nodded, and when you dabbed at the wound, you heard the sluice of air between his teeth. It wasn’t a pain reflex, though — at least, not all of it. It sounded too close to when he had his hair pulled.

“Didn’t need to see,” he hissed softly, his voice still double-layered. He closed his eyes, shuddering lightly as if enjoying you tending to the raw wound.

“No?” You trapped the tip of your tongue between your teeth as you cleaned, making sure you could tell where his prey’s blood stopped and his own continued to run and start to clot. “So why’d you need your glasses, then?”

Maxi made a soft, exasperated huff and nudged you gently with his elbow. The Reaper, as familiar as the two of you had gotten with each other — as intertwined as it was with the man you loved, as much as you didn’t quite understand where it ended and he began — was at least becoming more willing to joke around with you about its dark agenda.

“S’different,” he rasped again, his voice submerged in the otherworldly presence that still possessed him.

“Yeah?” You were stalling a little bit, the needle clutched in your dominant hand as you stared down the wound. For your relative lack of squeamishness with everything else about this arrangement… you still hated this part. The actual piercing of flesh.

He was already hurt, and you knew at his rate, it would be a mere flowering bruise by morning. But you were still somehow scared of hurting him more, despite everything. Despite the violence that had engendered it, the life that had already been taken.

A bloody hand covered your wrist, and you turned your attention back to the thing sitting in your partner’s body.

The fathomless eyes were somehow gentle, watching you, and you realized they were just beginning to lighten: the voids were sliding slowly from black to deepest maroon, the iris starting to somewhat distinguish itself from the sclera. The Reaper was giving the reins back, at least a little.

“I saw you,” their voices spoke again, and the ominous timbre had given way ever so slightly, like someone was fiddling with knobs on a speaker for balance. “Through the darkest parts of the night, I saw you there, bright as fire.”

You tilted your head, trying to figure out the metaphor, but he only nodded at the wrist he was covering.

“You think you don’t call to me like I call to you? I can always find you,” he said, and there was more of Maxi there. “Anywhere. In the pitchest black of this world or the next, you are mine.”

That would be utterly terrifying, if those teeth and eyes and that voice were coming from anywhere else.

But it was Maxi that tapped the back of your hand softy with his index finger - twice. Two squeezes, two taps, two knocks: your universal signal for ‘are you okay?’.

You exhaled slowly through your nose, trying to force your heart rate to slow so you could think clearly. “I’m fine,” you said, trying to sound more certain than you felt. “I do want to do it,” you added, looking at him so he could see you were genuine. “…Unless you rather would.”

You looked back to the wound again, frowning. You didn’t blame him; he’d been doing this so long, he could probably stitch up a whole body with his eyes closed when he needed to.

…Okay, maybe not quite, but you bet he could get pretty close.

“Try,” the thing said, and there was a stronger undercurrent of your partner in there than there had been yet. The smile was less tooth-y, but still a touch manic. “You can’t hurt me, pretty baby.”

“I wish I was that sure,” you mumbled. Even just looking at the wound again made your mouth automatically tug downwards at the corners.

But you took another deep breath, and the thing in your boyfriend’s lean frame sat up straighter, giving you better access to the angry red gash that split his pale skin.

You reached forward with the needle… before your hand stopped itself mid-air, second guessing yourself.

Glancing (what you thought was) surreptitiously to him, you startled ever so slightly when you realized he was still watching you, unblinking.

“All you have to do is look first,” he said. “Just look. See the shape of it.”

Nodding, you set the needle down on the steel surface, grateful for any excuse to get it out of your faintly trembling hand.

You stared at the wound instead, just as he said. You winced automatically at the angry red edges - you supposed you should be grateful whatever swiped him hadn’t been more serrated. But even if it wasn’t as deep as it could have been —

You didn’t realize what you were doing until your fingers rested, feather light and unsteady, at the very border of the torn flesh.

The Reaper inhaled sharply through his teeth, reminding you exactly what you were touching, what it was, and you went to withdraw your hand like it had been scalded…

Until you heard the tiniest little sound at the end of that hiss that made you pause.

A small, punctuating groan from deep in his chest, rich and dark — But one you recognized from another context entirely.

…No, you had to be getting some wires crossed somewhere. You leaned back in the chair, searching his face while your hand still hovered anxiously in place.

Once again, his gaze was riveted on you — but this time, rather than finding the void of space waiting in the sockets of his skull, you recognized the color of a deep wine.

No pupils still, so Maxi wasn’t alone. But he was definitely in there. No words passed between the pair of you, but the twitching, jerky tilt of his head was a question.

When you didn’t immediately voice the logical response - ‘no,’ obviously, there’s no way, not to mention the sanitary concerns… the response any other person would have given by now - the frozen, toothy smile somehow spread even wider.

Your brow furrowed. This was… not something the two of you had discussed before, as extensive as your discussions of desire often were.

And yet. Your eyes drifted to the wound again, scarlet and dark and… inviting. A split pomegranate, red with promise.

…Well. This was… new.

The Reaper shifted ever so slightly where he sat, and you clocked the way his thighs were pressed together, hopeful. The way the dress trousers seemed tighter than they had when you’d walked down here.

You sat all the way back in the chair, taking him in, nervously wetting your lips with your tongue. Even with the feeling of a double pulse racing now under your skin, you had to be totally sure.

“…Use your words,” you prompted, your voice hushed even in the sterile silence of the embalming room.

His head tilted the other way. “Kiss it better?” the layered voice asked, higher than usual, a note of pleading. He knew what he was asking, then.

Your eyes moved between those of the thing sitting in front of you, to the wound in its side, and back again.

You recognized a point of no return when you saw one.

A distant facet of you reasoned from the depths of your mind, as if in a dream: Did Thomas the Apostle not inquire of the wounds of his returned Lord, after all? Did he not part the flesh with his own to find his own proof of divinity, to alleviate his fear?

Was this really any different? Another form of worship, without the doubt?

Did that not make your love all the stronger, that you already knew you had nothing to be afraid of?

You got to your feet, resting your hands on the embalming table on either side of Maxi’s knees.

“Come here,” you whispered, but it was somehow less tentative than your earlier hush.

Maxi moved to the edge of the table, taller than you again when he was this close, and you leaned up to kiss the questioning smile.

You could taste yourself on his tongue, still, and more besides. Just the faintest trace of blood, not yours, not his.

Blood from too deep down to taste like a surface wound.

Maxi’s hand curled possessively around the back of your skull, and you wondered what it would feel like for your teeth to pop the thin membrane around the human heart.

Your hands were steady now in their purpose, moving between the two of you to free his cock. It was already hard again and leaking, and when your thumb slid the pre-cum along his slit, his hips bucked into your hand.

“Please, pretty?” he rasped against your lips, the need returned in full force.

As your hand moved lazily along his shaft, causing him to shiver and sigh, you looked again at the wound, leaning down as best you could without giving up your grasp on your prize.

The scarlet mouth waited in his flesh, hopeful, expectant.

With a bit of careful angling, you leaned closer. Your breath shook just slightly before you probed it with the very tip of your tongue.

Maxi was abruptly racked with a full-body shudder, his hissed curse somehow ethereal and unholy.

In your hand, you felt him spasm and flex, warm and heavy against your palm.

You swallowed the first mouthful of your lover’s blood like communion wine, searching inside yourself again first. Making sure.

Anything given in less than total faith in your love - in him, in you, the life you were building amidst the bones of those before - would be sacrilege.

The way he moaned when your tongue pushed further in relieved you of all doubt, however.

You weren’t entirely sure what to make of the feeling of blood flooding over your teeth and tongue as you kissed the gash in his side, lapping at the edges with the same greed he’d shown you. But you could feel the way his cock was achingly hard in your hand, the way his thighs began to shake as you could feel your mouth being coated with a red in a mirror of his when he’d arrived here. When he’d found you.

You used your free hand to hold his hip firmly in place when he tried to thrust against the hand gripping him, his fingers curling in your hair possessively.

“More,” he growled from somewhere down deep, and it was hard to tell which of them you were hearing speak. “Please, pretty, more, that’s perfect, that’s exactly…” He lost his words to something between a keen and a groan as you deepened the kiss, the warmth slicking your cheeks, your lips, dripping hotly down your chin.

You picked up your pace, your strokes faster and harder now as his mouth fell open and he outright panted, unable to hide just how much he was enjoying this. You sucked delicately at one edge of the wound, laving the place where the skin parted, and his head fell back with a moan.

“There, just there, that’s—” Maxi did his best to restrain a whine, his hips nearly arching off the table to meet your hand as your face was smeared in his blood.

You ran your tongue along the length of the injury, a bit dazed yourself in just how warm it was. How soft and willing the flesh was to part, even when it shouldn’t.

You heard his breathing hitch and felt him shift under your attention, turning slightly.

When your eyes flicked upwards to see what had changed, they locked with his, and his hips spasmed hard as his now-visible pupils ballooned black again to swallow the lingering red.

With a strangled guttural shout, he came over your hand messily, warm, coating your palm and fingers almost as much as you’d coated your face at his side.

You stroked him through his orgasm as he shook and whined desperately, wanting everything he had to give just as you’d given him.

You only stopped when he seized the front of your ruined night shirt and pulled you upright, seeming just as eager to taste his own blood in your mouth as you’d been to taste your orgasm.

There was an instant where the change from your tongue in him to his tongue in your mouth felt seamless, where you weren’t sure whom was gently probing at the delicate insides of the other, and the shiver down your spine was electric even as your stomach flipped dizzily.

“Thank you, sugar,” he whispered, peppering your face with kisses after the initial claiming. His hands were everywhere again, on your hips, in your hair, his arms encircling your back to keep you close. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, you damned beautiful creature.”

You laughed, half-breathless, one hand tangling in his hair to kiss him fiercely again. “What,” you whispered, your lips brushing his as the two of you half-swayed together. “The fuck?”

Maxi giggled, high and manic, and he tucked his face against the side of your neck - his favorite place. “I don’t know,” he whispered back, and there was a shake to his nervous giggle. “I don’t know. But god, did I like it.”

“I’ve - I’ve never done that before,” you turned, your lips against his cheek now as he pressed needy, open-mouthed kisses to your throat. “I’ve never thought to… I don’t know.”

“Well, I should hope not,” Maxi’s arms tightened their embrace slightly on your back, and you caught the scarlet gleam of his eyes through his hair and his glasses, his tell for ‘mine.’ You knew the Reaper was still there — if it had been just him, he would’ve been less concerned with that than other logistics.

“It’s just you, Maxi,” you soothed, kissing the corner of his mouth. You stood between his thighs as he sat on the embalming table’s edge, and he tilted his head to catch your mouth again, the two of you still out of breath even as you couldn’t let each other go.

When you went to clean the mess off your hand, still waiting for you, he leaned over, his tongue brushing against and even caressing yours as you licked your palm clear together.

Maxi continued to suck hard on your index finger after, his eyes never leaving yours, until you pulled ever so slightly on the hair at the back of his neck. He shivered agreeably, and you kissed the other corner of his mouth.

“I don’t know what possessed me,” you said quietly, resting your forehead against his. “I’ve never done… anything like that. You’re just the only person I’ve wanted to let under my skin like this.” You nodded dreamily at your wrist with your mark, the obvious thing, but your other hand rested just at the edge of the open gash you’d just tongue-fucked.

Maxi chuckled, the sound still layered underneath by something demonic, and he tilted his head without separating from you. “You’re the only one I’d trust enough to undo me, darlin’.” He kissed the end of your nose, weirdly gentle even as both of your faces were still thoroughly coated in drying blood. “It’s not a wound when I’m with you. It’s just… opportunity.”

You actually laughed - a real, genuine sound, both your arms wrapping around his neck as he kissed your cheek with all the sweetness in the world.

The two of you lingered like that for a bit in the silence of the surrounding dead, your hearts beating confidently in sync despite the separation flesh between them.

If this was your forever, you thought to yourself, captivated by the hush of your shared breath, then you were fine with that. More than fine.

You weren’t sure who moved, who decided it was time, but at some point, the two of you wordlessly took your original places. In a comfortable, sleepy silence, you thoroughly cleaned the wound like you would have cleaned him off in your bedroom. Like he’d cleaned you countless times, lovingly and with ardent attention.

You were halfway through closing it, your stitches surprisingly even and measured, when he spoke again.

“There was a part of me,” Maxi said quietly, and it was all him. The Reaper had fully abated now. “That was convinced I could only ruin you.”

You glanced up at him, automatically skeptical as you continued your work. “Yeah?”

Maxi laughed, and it was low, with only a sliver of nervousness still. “I was convinced you were too good for all this. That you should have somethin’ else. Somethin’ better than… well.” He gestured around at the embalming room, at you working on his side. “A nice house in some suburb. Someone who loved you who was… safe. Who would never come home to you with so much dark at their heels. Who would never dream of — of contaminatin’ you with it.”

He looked away from you, and when he spoke again after a time, his voice was small. “I guess that part was right about me, huh.”

You snorted audibly, pausing what you were doing to meet his gaze. “Maxi. Look at me, baby.” When he complied, you spread your arms wide. “Do I look I’m here against my will?” You gestured to handiwork as you picked up the needle again. “Do I look like I’d be content to just sit and twiddle my thumbs in someone’s dollhouse, somewhere?”

He gazed at you, and you saw his eyes were just his again, a rich brown bordering on burgundy and looking vaguely dreamy as he studied your face.

Slowly, tentatively, he shook his head.

A part of you melted inwardly at how, even after all this time, a small smile crept over his face the longer he drank you in. Like he was always pleasantly surprised to recall just who had his heart, and vice versa.

“Really look, now,” you urged softly, leaning close to him again so you filled his vision. You gestured with a hand to the blood that thoroughly covered the lower half of your face. “Do I look like I think I’m ruined?”

Maxi’s eyes moved from yours down your face, lingering briefly on your lips before they met your gaze once more.

You leaned your forehead against his again, closing the gap between you. “All I see in this is a mirror of the person I love more than anything,” you whispered. With the hand that wasn’t hold the needle, you smeared some of the blood from your face on your fingers, then added it to the blood coating his skin. “That’s all.” You repeated the gesture in reverse, adding some of the blood from his skin to yours - even though you were sure it had transferred in your original acts, as well. The important thing was that he needed to see you choose it.

“I love you,” you reminded him softly. “And everything that comes with you.”

You returned your attention to the wound, tying off your stitches before opening a fresh bandage. “So what if that looks different on us?”

You smoothed the bandage and some clean gauze over the incision, sealing it off behind its protective barrier. You knew by morning, it would have no need of any of those things, already miraculously closed.

Your eyes returned to his, your hand lingering over your work nonetheless. “I already told you, there’s no one else I’d let under my skin,” you said, your lips barely an inch apart. “And you’re the only person I’d want to be with when I do something that scares me. When I might even scare myself.”

You didn’t think your eyes glowed like his, but for just an instant, you swore this is what it would feel like. This certainty. This resolve.

You let him see it on your face. “I chose you,” you said quietly. “And I chose this too. Whatever shape it takes. Or I take.” You wrapped your arms around his neck. “You’re the only person I’d trust with whatever I become, love.”

Maxi’s arms encircled your waist, and the way his eyes sparked with light again, you could swear the two of you would burn if you stayed this close.

“The dark is so much better with you in it,” he whispered. “If you’re happy, then I’d spend an eternity here with you.”

“Good.” You smiled, reveling in his closeness. “Because I’m happy.”

The moon outside was the only thing that came close to how bright you felt against that endless night when he kissed you again.

— If the mortuary opened an hour later the next morning, no one complained.

It couldn’t be helped — it had been a hell of a time getting all that blood out of your bed sheets.

Even then, with all the remaining tinges of rust, you’d both eventually conceded to relegate them to being for “fun” rather than for regular sleep.

They wouldn’t be the last set you ruined, by far.

(so uh. a very dear friend of mine mentioned they'd sent this blog to someone they liked irl. and I would just like to say, on the offchance they're still reading this at all -

sup ig. [waves]

anyway! if you've read this far, as always, you're a saint and also wow what are you doing a the devil's sacrament buddy :'D

this might be the last long-ish piece I post for a while bc I have to make a mad dash on my dissertation before the end of the semester, but I will still be here, circling, reading every word directed my way, thinking deeply on them, appreciating them, taking forever to respond as always

Ilu all <3 happy belated halloween, cheers to spooky season year-round for the believers)

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morvantmortuary · 7 months

Text

sugar high -

(Hector Morvant-Casares x Reader)

summary: Hex invites you along for an afternoon errand.

warnings: brief descriptions of a depressive episode. a shit-ton of fluff. like, syrupy, frothy fluff. I’m not kidding. you watch your teeth.

general: for Spooky Season in the Barrens: apple cider, candy corn, skulls. 🍎💀

I’ll be honest, Hex is not usually my go-to fluff guy, but goddamn if he doesn’t have a whole mushy side when you let him talk a bit.

Any corrections on his Spanish are appreciated - I double-checked everything and tried to stick with Mexican localization, but I’m still learning. :’D

also, I know so much more about the making of calaveras than I did last week. hot damn, those can get involved. any suggestions or needed corrections there (or with any discussion of the holiday) are also appreciated.

reader is as always genderqueer/non-binary (but I stuck to feminine endings for Spanish bc those are what I’m more familiar with, sorry :’D), and I write them as bisexual but that’s not explicitly mentioned here. any tweaks to language so people can have a more seamless experience are always helpful.

okay, hope this helps brighten your day a bit. 🖤

You didn’t even have to look up from your book to know who was calling you, and wasn’t just texting like a normal person.

Without looking up from your page, you reached over and answered with the tap of one finger, then put him on speaker with another. “Who dares?”

“Hey, so, I’m madly in love with you. Do you wanna go out with me? Like, right now, or I’ll die of loneliness?” Hex said it like he was asking about the weather. The mustang’s motor purred in the background, and the faint thud of some dance remix on low drifted through your phone’s speaker like a tinny distant dream.

You smiled, closing your book and setting it beside you on your mattress. “Hmm. That depends.”

“Depends? Ouch. After my very sincere confession?” Hector laughed, making you smile wider. “Depends on what?”

“We-ell.” You stretched the syllable out as you stretched in turn, then collapsed back onto your pillows. “I’m very busy having a lazy afternoon, you see.”

Pale autumn sunlight danced in dappled patterns on your ceiling. You’d successfully managed to change from your pajamas to your comfiest sweats after taking a luxuriously long bath. This was only topped by the fact that you were currently cozy in a bed with a book that had been on your TBR for months, that you’d been swearing you’d get around to, for real this time.

“Is that so?” You heard the click of his turn signal, apparently not given pause by your demurring.

“Yes, and I’ve had it scheduled all week. I simply can’t cancel on myself again,” you explained, waving a hand lazily. “…Unless.”

“Te escucho,” Hex prompted. You heard him tapping on his steering wheel with his index fingers, restless. “Come on, lay it on me.”

“I could only be convinced to cancel on me if you had some really, truly spectacular, showstopping way to sweep me off my feet, that I just had to drop everything for right now.” You fought to keep your tone as serious as possible. “So this better be a really fabulous proposal, whatever comes next. Lots of pressure. Definitely overthink it.”

Hex sucked his teeth audibly, pretending to think. “Damn, I was just gonna ask if you wanted to go grocery shopping with me.”

“I’ll get my jacket.” You slid off your bed, stretching again from where you’d be laying there in a marathon session with your novel. “How close are you?”

He laughed again, low in his throat with that little bit of rasp that felt like his fingers in your hair. A second later, you heard the short beep of a car horn in your driveway.

“Oh, shit. Be right there!” You grabbed your phone off your bed and hustled now for the door to your room.

“Relax, baby, no hurry,” Hector said, his voice echoing slightly in your hallway as you moved. “Maxi just asked me to pick some stuff up for this pre-need thing he’s throwing tomorrow.”

“Yeah?” You slid into your shoes where they were piled by your entry way, and then grabbed your bag for whatever wouldn’t fit in your pockets - charger, headphones, anything you’d want if you headed to his place after. “…What’s a pre-need again?” You topped all this off by pulling on one of Hex’s hoodies that you’d stolen from him ages ago, fitting you comfortably as it did every time. You’d have to sneak it back into his laundry soon, you knew — it was beginning to smell more like you than him.

“Ugh, don’t worry about it.” Hector sighed so loud you could almost hear his eyes rolling. “Basically lots of little old and anxious people start getting antsy and thinking about death in October, because skeletons, so he offers this afternoon thing where he teaches them how to set up all their funeral stuff in advance. Es hella aburrido, which is why he has to offer the free food.”

“Ah. That all makes sense.” You stepped outside and made a point to lock your door. Granted, Hex was the only person you could conceive of who had ever broken in - or who would ever want to break in - but still. Greymoon was a weird town.

One never knew what, exactly, was going to turn up as dusk claimed a larger and larger share of the hours.

You hung up the call as you pulled the passenger door open, leaning over to kiss him before you closed it. “So what all do you serve at a funeral tutorial-thing?”

“Oh, you know— hey,” Hector paused, eyeing your clothes critically before looking at you with theatrical levels of suspicion. “You told me you hadn’t seen that one.”

“What, this?” You feigned innocence, looking down at his hoodie. “Oh, I thought you meant your… other one.” The man had like ten, this wasn’t impossible. “Do you want it back?” You widened your eyes and pouted just the tiniest bit, certain he wouldn’t say no, but wanting to lay it on thick.

“Let me see.” He leaned over abruptly to take an exaggerated sniff of the hood and your hair, making you giggle and try to lean away. “Nah,” he concluded, sitting back up. “That needs another day.”

You were still giggling, adjusting the hood around your shoulders. “Another day for what?”

Hector took the car out of park, looking over his shoulder to pull out of your driveway even though he could do it in his sleep. “It needs time to get that good You smell in there. What is that, anyway? Perfume? Shampoo? Essence of angel?”

“Shut up, corn lord.” You swatted his shoulder, making him smile. “I only wear it as long as it smells like you, anyway.”

“Really? Aw. Sorry about that.” Hector grinned when you laughed again. One of his hands fell to its usual place on your knee as he pulled out onto the main road. “The hell do I smell like, anyway? Film developer and sadness?”

“No.” You intertwined your fingers together and squeezed his hand. “You don’t smell like sadness, Señor Artiste.”

Between Hex’s constant connection to the world after this one, his resulting insomnia, and his… already artistic temperament, you knew he occasionally had to fend off the depression that seemed to run in the Morvant line. Whereas Maxi diverted his restless version into constantly fixing and cleaning, and Rora’s manifested in squalls of anger and verbal venom, Hex’s ennui would lay him out flat for days — occasionally, weeks. You’d spent time before helping him excavate his bed from under piles of unfolded laundry that he’d just been sleeping around, and braiding his hair when he couldn’t find the energy to wash it. You knew he worried about letting you see him like this, and he’d confessed to you once during one of the worse episodes that he was scared it was too much to expect you to handle.

But just like the ghosts he channeled, it would eventually release him from its grip, and he would make a point to be just as sweet to you when it was your turn to deal with your inner demons.

“News to me.” Hector’s smile was a little more subdued now. “So, what, just film developer? Dusty house?”

“No, you smell like… hold on.” You held your free hand to your face, inhaling deeply from your sweater-paw. “You smell like… cinnamon. And coffee with chicory — like there’s any other kind down here.” You took another sniff, taking your time. “And something, like, incense-y? Is that from the viewing room?”

“Oh, nah.” Hex was quiet, and it stretched as you found yourself weirdly waiting for an answer.

He kept his eyes pointedly on the road and cleared his throat. “I keep some of the stuff my ma used to use in my closet. For emergencies.”

You blinked. Hector didn’t bring up that side of the family a lot. He didn’t really bring up either side, if he could avoid it, but definitely not hers. “Your mom burn incense a lot?”

“Yeah. Just for, like… ritual stuff. She was into that sort of thing.” He paused, and when the two of you were stopped at a red light, he lifted his steering hand to smell the hoodie he was currently wearing. “Weird. I’d totally forgotten it was up there.” He held it out and scrutinized it, as if to search for visible traces on the fabric. “Guess I’m just noseblind to it now.” He shrugged, but almost a little too hard. Like he was trying to shake off the idea.

You hesitated as the car pulled forward again, wanting to respect a sensitive topic, but still curious. “…What qualifies as an ‘incense emergency’?”

“Oh, the usual. One of the ghosts in the House gets too full of itself after a seance. Rora fucks up another taxidermy resurrection. Maxi gets a body for restoration that’s been in a car for a week.” He winked at you when you shuddered at the thought. “Any of the very sexy circumstances where you’d rather smell like something burning, or burning something beats something else in supernatural Rock-Paper-Scissors.”

“Yikes. I’ll keep that in mind.” There were a million more questions about it on the tip of your tongue, but you kept them in check as he parked in front of the smaller grocery store in town — the one that had the more unusual finds, depending on the season.

You were always slightly amazed at how he managed to pull the mustang in between some of the ridiculously large trucks that populated most Greymoon parking lots. Somehow, he always found a convenient spot for his little black car. Like magic, if magic could be used for something so mundane.

As the two of you got out, there was still the slightest shadow on his face as he closed his door. “So does that not, like, bother you?” When you gave him a confused look as you closed your own, he nodded to the hoodie. “I’ve had it in my closet forever; it must smell pretty strong.”

“Oh! No.” You circled around and wound your fingers through his again as he locked the car. “I like it, actually.” As the two of you headed inside, you found yourself swinging your hands together like a little kid; you were determined to lighten the mood back up to what it had been. “It’s layered with so much other stuff — your cafe con leche, your detergent, your developer. Your beard oil,” you added, which made him laugh sheepishly as the two of you passed through the automatic doors. “It just smells… I don’t know.” You racked your brain for the word. “Safe? Yeah.” You nodded. “You smell like home to me, you know? Now.” You wanted to keep talking, distract him from that earlier doubt with your current task. You scanned the aisles. “Do you have a list, or—“

You had to fight not to stumble when you were still walking and realized Hector wasn’t.

When you turned to check on him, he was looking at you with such soft, sincere eyes, you almost forgot the two of you had come to a stop next to a cluster of shopping carts.

Quietly, he lifted your intertwined hands to his mouth, kissing the back of yours with a sweetness that seemed all the more so in his silence.

You couldn’t look away, your own tongue once again tied.

It was one of those moments that he made you feel like you were the only two people left in the world.

“…’Shut up, corn lord,’” he echoed at last, his dark eyes sparkling with mischief as he watched you over your own knuckles.

“You shut up, whatever.” You felt your face grow warm in a way that had nothing to do with the indoor heating against the October chill, and stuck your tongue out at him. “You know what I’m saying.”

“I do. But I still like it when you say it.” He winked at you again, and this time there was a trace of the casual cockiness you’d seen when the two of you had first started flirting.

The difference was that now, you knew it was a front. Hex’s confidence was low key when it was genuine — a quiet, unflappable certainty.

He only played slick when how much he actually cared could overwhelm him entirely.

“I really mean it, Hex,” you protested quietly, squeezing his hand. “You have to know that by now.”

“And take that sweet shit for granted? Qué va.” But he still took his time letting go of you.

He sighed as he had over the phone, back to pretending this was a chore. “Alright, let’s get this over with.” He shoved a hand in a pocket of his own hoodie and pulled out his phone. With a couple of taps, he pulled up what looked like a text chain — you could see “pinche maxi” as the contact, followed by three skull emojis. “Got the list.”

You muffled a laugh, not wanting to be caught snooping. “Basket or cart?”

“The hell are you talking about?” Hector jokingly looked at you like you were crazy, before nodding pointedly at something ahead of you. “This is absolutely a cart situation, Bonita, come on. Eyes on the prize.”

Puzzled, you followed his gaze - and grinned, realizing exactly why he’d picked this store.

The Halloween candy display on the far side of the room was massive… but the stock floor was blessedly deserted.

You and Hex whizzed across the vacant produce section — taking turns balancing on the cart and pushing the other person — with only a brief pause to pick up a pre-cut veggie tray.

“There,” he said, before hastily checking off multiple items on the list.

You looked from the list to the tray, positive you’d seen ‘carrots,’ ‘celery,’ ‘cherry tomatoes’ as separate items. “Yeah, that has those.”

“Maxi’s going to complain and say he could’ve done it all himself,” Hector sighed, placing it carefully in the cart. “But he forgets how fucking picky he gets about setting up the extra chairs and the projector in the parlor, and stuff. That, plus having to cut everything just-so and arrange it on his little crudité board? He wouldn’t have time.”

You shrugged. “He can still put it all on the board if he wants to. It’s not like they’re gonna know.”

“That’s the spirit.” Hector snapped and pointed at you. “Primo needs to learn about artfully half-assing stuff. He takes all this pointless detail shit too seriously.” He paused to turn back and pick up a similarly packaged collection of cut fruit. “See? Boom. He didn’t even have those on the list; I’m just that thoughtful.”

“Clearly.” You couldn’t resist a smile. “Okay, so what else?”

“Cheese,” Hector said, as if this were obvious. “You always gotta feed grief with cheese.”

“But I thought this was for planning their own stuff?”

“It is, but have you seen how expensive shit is lately? They’re going to be grieving their wallets.” Hector pulled the cart behind him towards the dairy section with you balanced behind the handle. “You thought groceries were bad, you should see getting buried.”

“But isn’t your cousin on that whole...” You squinted as you tried to remember, gesturing vaguely. “Somthing-something against funeral poverty?”

“Yeah, doesn’t mean Louisiana isn’t still broke as shit. I swear to god, if it wasn’t for the damn House…” Hector sucked his teeth as he trailed off, staring down at two different cheese plates, then squinted at his phone. “Did he say…? Nah.” Seemingly satisfied, he picked up one of each and set them in the cart.

You raised an eyebrow. “Y’all expecting a big crowd?”

“Oh, hell no. We never get more than a few people at these things.” Hector looked at you, pointing to the plate with the slightly nicer variety. “That one’s for family.” He drew a loop in the air with his finger to rope you into the collective - something that still brought a bubbly warmth to your chest, even after you’d been dating this long. “We’re having that after, let the plebians have the cheap cheese.”

You laughed. “So glad I get to be included in the fancy cheese. I’m honored.”

“Only the fanciest of cheeses for you, mi amor.” Hex leaned up, giving you an obnoxiously loud kiss on the cheek. “Come on, we still need the important stuff.”

“Oh yeah? And what’s—” You were interrupted by your own delighted squeak as Hector rocketed with you and the cart towards the Halloween candy.

You couldn’t remember the last time you’d giggled this much while just doing errands with someone. It had to mean something that you could leave your ideal day alone to go out and do something you normally dreaded, but still have more fun than your books could have ever promised.

Hector only just pulled you to a stop before any displays suffered an unfortunate collision, and you hopped off the back of the cart, the two of you sizing up the waiting shelves.

“Maxi said I could get Halloween stuff for this, but he said it had to be ‘tasteful’.” Hector gave the word some lazy finger quotes and rolled his eyes again. “Like I didn’t just see him buy one of those twelve foot skeletons. ‘It’s for the garden out back, Hex, it’s not the same’,” he quoted some little tiff they’d clearly had, doing a surprisingly good impression of his cousin’s accent around his own.

“So we’re definitely serving bleeding eye gumballs and gummy brains then?” you joked.

“I wonder if they still sell those plastic molds of hands.” Hector stroked his beard, pretending to ponder. “We could make ice hands with red food dye to put in the lemonade.”

“Crazy tasteful.” You nodded in agreement. “Or feet molds? Do they make those?”

“Ew, don’t be weird.” Hector gave you a look of fake disgust, making you both laugh before you split apart to browse in earnest.

“What about, like, mini chocolate bars? They’ve got like a million kinds.” You scanned the different shelves for the usual variety packs, finding a plethora of different groupings in brightly colored bags.

“You’d think, but no. Chocolate can melt and smear if people forget about it. And someone always forgets about it,” he added from the other side of the aisle, with a touch of that special exhaustion that comes from dealing with strangers. “And nothing that could’ve been remotely near peanut butter or nuts, Maxi said he needs a new epi-pen for the first aid kit.”

“Sure, fair. Can’t have anyone dying at the meeting about how to plan for dying. So that rules out…” You rotated slowly in place, taking stock of your options. “A lot.”

“Hey, that just makes my job easier.” Hector popped around an end cap, holding up two different versions of those holiday-themed marshmallows that had started solely as bunnies. “Skulls or ghosts?”

“For the thing or for us?”

“The thing.”

“Dude,” you laughed. “Like those little old and-slash-or anxious people won’t flip if we give them ghosts or skulls at a funeral planning seminar? You think they have enough whimsy for that?”

“Come on, it’s like, the whole reason we’re there. They gotta lighten up, man.” Hex rolled his eyes again. “Fine, I’ll just put them in the cart for after. Maxi can’t get mad at me if I bring him some, he loves this kinda shit.”

Your eyes fell on shelf of some old-fashioned candies. “Oh my god, I’m an idiot, this is so obvious.”

“How obvious?” Hector asked from the other side of the shelf.

You grabbed a bag of candy corn, inspecting the ingredients. “Nut-free factory! That’s a bonus!”

“Man, those poor factory workers.”

“Ugh, low hanging fruit.” You rolled your eyes, picking up another bag. “Come here.”

“Make me,” Hector teased, suddenly directly behind you.

“Jesus!” You whirled on the spot, startled at having not heard him sneak that close. “Behave.” You whacked his shoulder lightly with one of the bags you were holding.

“Jesus never behaved, that was like his whole deal.” Hector just plucked the bag from your hand, inspecting it before raising an eyebrow. “Candy corn?”

“What little old person doesn’t like candy corn?” You made an incredulous gesture with your free hand. “And like, these candy pumpkins.” You picked up a bag of the traditional pumpkins with the similar texture. “It’s classic for a reason.”

“Yeah, cultural indoctrination.” Hector smiled. “I can’t believe people actually eat this stuff willingly.”

“Oh, come on, it’s nostalgic as hell,” you said, placing the bags in his waiting hands. “It’s like being a little kid in your costume again.”

“Doesn’t mean it actually tastes good.” He nonetheless held still, tilting his head to look at the bag’s contents. “But sure, he can put them out in little decorative bowls or some shit, he loves those.”

You turned to set a last bag in his hands. “You honestly mean to tell me you don’t like candy corn?”

“I mean, I’ll eat it,” Hector said, sounding resigned. “But for the same reason as when I was small: because it’s there, and because it’s what we have, but not because I actually think it’s any good. Not that one,” he said, nodding to the last one you were holding. “We have enough.”

You frowned at the couple of bags in his hands. “You sure?”

“Positive.”

“Okay, so at least there won’t be any leftovers.” You shrugged, then beckoned for him to follow you onto the next aisle.

“Are you kidding? The old people aren’t gonna make a dent in this, candy corn multiples the minute someone turns their back on it.” Hector followed you. “Don’t you know Halloween math?” He continued as you burst into laughter. “The same thing would always happen: Tia Mathilde would buy some candy corn, or those tiny pumpkins, and then the bowl in the kitchen would just keep refilling itself all season. It’d never get any emptier, even when I was sure the twins ate so much they were gonna puke.”

“Maybe she just kept buying more bags?” You looked over your shoulder at him, raising an eyebrow. “Like how it works in the real world?”

“Nope, I’d check the trash whenever the bowl was full again!” Hector shook his head. “You watch, we’ll put this out, and then we’ll still be eating it until…”

You paused, turning once again to find Hector stopped behind you. “Babe?”

Hector didn’t answer, squinting at something on a shelf you’d passed.

“Something jumpscare you?” You walked back to peek over his shoulder.

“Yeah, those.” Hector nodded to a plastic box holding three small decorated sugar skulls.

“Oh, hey! I didn’t know they started selling those here.” You paused, surveying the surrounding products. “I didn’t realize they sold imported anything here, to be honest.”

“Those aren’t imported,” Hector said, nodding at the label. Sure enough, it was one of the generic store holiday brands. “They’ve just realized they can sell them and actually make some money. Check the piping around the eyes,” he gestured loosely with the corner of one of the bags. “There are people who work for months to get the decorative ones right, the legit shit. Even the ones you give kids to eat, they take their time with. That looks like someone put the icing on with their eyes closed.”

“Oh.” You leaned forward, inspecting for yourself. The piped icing to decorate the facial features looked very haphazardly applied, some of it smeared against the plastic during transport. “I see what you mean, yeah.” You glanced back at him. “It’s like, the opposite of artful half-assing. Half-ass art-ing.”

“I don’t think that’s even half an ass’s worth,” Hector said, smiling again when he made you laugh. It faded though as he looked back the store brand calaveras. “And they’re charging how much, for that quality? En esta economía? Hell,” he shook his head. “If that’s what people will pay around here for shitty ones, I should throw a bunch together and sell them at the House. Maybe be able to afford that new lens I want.”

“I didn’t know you knew how to make those,” you said, looking between him and the sad little skulls. “I mean, I should’ve guessed, what don’t you know how to make—“

“I don’t,” Hector said, glancing at you. You giggled, and he grinned. “I’m serious. I mean, in theory, sure: it’s like — what’re those fluffy stiff fuckers — meringues, right? Eggs and sugar? Mold it and wait? But my mom always went down early and bought ‘em from this artist lady she liked. For the ofrenda, and an edible one for me so I’d stop trying to lick the decorative ones when her back was turned.”

You paused in your laughter at that image, hesitant. This was the second time his mom had unexpectedly popped up this visit, and the first time hadn’t been… happy, per se. “Did you guys do that every year?”

“When we lived here? Not always,” he shrugged. “Sometimes she couldn’t get down and back in time, so we’d just leave some extra treats out and hope people coming back to visit would understand. Plus, when Tia Mathilde was in a bad mood, she’d get snippy about what room Ma could set stuff up in. Eventually, she just kept a small ofrenda in her room so she didn’t have to deal with Auntie griping about the marigold petals on the carpet.” He sucked the inside of his cheek for a minute, his eyes distant. “…She always remembered when we lived with her folks, though.” He looked away for a moment, pretending to inspect his sneakers. “But by then I usually spent the day elsewhere. It was kinda crowded. Anyway. Come on, beautiful,” he said, looking back up at you abruptly. “We got veggies to put in the fridge, get my cousin off my back.”

“Yeah, definitely.” You were sure that wasn’t what was actually what had him preoccupied, but you didn’t press. You followed him back to the cart, the two of you heading for check out. Though he was friendly as ever with the giggly (clearly somewhat smitten) cashier, you noticed Hex was subdued again, not even making his usual joke of buying out all the day-old donuts with Maxi’s credit card.

By the time the two of you walked out with your bags, you were scrambling slightly, trying to figure out how to bring him back to the present so he wouldn’t linger too long in his reverie.

As the two of you loaded the groceries into the trunk of the mustang, you spotted it: a little tent set up on the far side of the shopping center, with a handmade sign and two elderly people bundled up in lawn chairs. “Hey.”

“Hm?” Hex looked up from closing the trunk when you tugged his sleeve, eyes refocusing like he was emerging from a daze.

You thumbed towards the cider stand. “You want some?” You smiled, hoping you weren’t being obvious. “My treat?”

“Absolutely not.” Hector shoved his hand in his pocket, quickly producing his cousin’s card once again. “We’re still on a very official mortuary errand, let it be Maxi’s treat.”

“Then shouldn’t we bring him some?” Your smile felt more genuine as Hex took your hand, threading your fingers back together as you crossed the cracked little parking lot. “Since he’s being so kind?”

“Eh, it’s a had-to-be there thing, he knows how it goes.” Hector shrugged a shoulder. “Nothing personal, this is purely business.”

“Ahuh.” You muffled a small laugh. “And Rora? None for her?”

“Nope,” he popped the ‘p’ emphatically. “La Reina made it perfectly clear she didn’t wanna come along. She didn’t help with grocery shopping, so she doesn’t get to reap the rewards of honest work.”

“Damn, you guys are cold-blooded,” you teased, hip-checking him lightly.

“Hey, I warned them fair and square, I didn’t wanna mix business and family.” He spread his free hand in an exaggeratedly helpless gesture. “This is what happens. It’s cut-throat.”

You were still laughing a little when the two of you reached the tent, and you couldn’t miss the rosy-cheeked elderly couple sneaking each other a knowing smile when they greeted you and Hex. A yellow lab sat up from where it had been laying sweetly at their feet, shaking itself and mirroring its people with a panting, tongue-hanging smile of its own.

You watched silently as the cider folks poured you both a full styrofoam cup and chatted with Hex, wondering if they maybe saw themselves in you two. If they had been like you once, feeling like there were only endless unknowns ahead of them, but had finally settled into a gentle present together - from the gentleman’s brief conversation with Hector, one filled with their apple orchard and their dogs, selling homemade cider on crisp afternoons.

As the two of you took your cider (with an extra cinnamon stick for Hex, since he asked the elderly woman with a polite yet roguish smile), you both made sure the lab behind its ears, Hector reminding her in multiple languages that she was a good dog before the two of you took your leave.

That wouldn’t be such a bad forever, you thought to yourself as the older folks waved goodbye. Just the two of you doing something little to make some extra cash, sitting together in the sunlight and chatting about everything and nothing while you waited for people to swing by. Riding home - a shared home, a house for both of you - in his old car, the tired quiet comfortable like a well-loved quilt.

Your thoughts were interrupted by the happy little noise Hector made as you both leaned against the trunk of his car, and you turned to see him enjoying a long sip with both cinnamon sticks still in the cup.

“Good?” you asked, smirking.

“Mmhm.” He pulled the rest away as if to inspect it, licking his lips. “Their spice blend is really killer. Fuck a PSL.”

“That’s why Greymoon never gets a Starbucks, they just know they couldn’t compete.” You took a sip of your own, and unwittingly made a similar noise. The taste that flooded your mouth was immaculately golden, the kind of distilled late afternoon sunshine from the romanticized autumns of years past. “Holy shit, you weren’t kidding.”

“Right?” Hector nodded. “I didn’t think we had any witches around lately, but now I don’t know. Little lady over there might just be hiding a pointy hat at home.”

“Now watch, we’re both going to be magically enthralled to some ancient Apple God when we least expect it.” You took another long sip nonetheless.

“Hey, beats my current thing.” Hector shrugged, downing more of his.

Oh. Right. That.

The small hitch in your soft little idea of forever.

You took another sip, your mind torn in both directions: his mom, which was what you’d been originally trying to distract him from, and now the issue of his necromantic Chain, which you were wondering if you needed distracting from.

“You having flashbacks on me?”

You blinked, looking up to find Hector watching your face. His head was tilted, his small smile looking crooked as he searched your eyes. “Where’d you go, preciosa? You got all thousand-yard stare for a sec.”

“I’m good.” You smiled, trying to prove it. “Just… Fall.” You gestured to the gorgeous day, the drinks in your hands.

“…Ahuh.” Hector said, clearly skeptical. He took one of the cinnamon sticks out of his drink, sticking the end that had been in the cider in his mouth. “Try me anyway?”

You hesitated, not wanting to bog down the moment. “…Why do I get the feeling you did the cinnamon challenge when it was a thing?” you asked instead.

“Nuh-uh,” Hector lied, the way he turned from you slightly to chew on the stick giving him away.

You laughed, immediately picturing the worst. “It didn’t go well, huh?”

“No, because I definitely didn’t do it in a room full of people at a party. What’re you, a cop?” He pointed the stick at you accusingly as you laughed even harder, nearly snorting cider as you went to take another sip. “You got your little FBI man in your phone to go through mine for proof or something? That’s low, that sneaky bastard, he’s supposed to be on my payroll.”

“I love you,” you said through the giggles you were trying to smother.

“Obviously.” Hector threw his hair dramatically over his shoulder, but he couldn’t quite hold the bravado as he looked at you, his gaze softening back into that look from before. “…I love you,” he repeated quietly, his version somehow warmer than the cider in your hand.

You leaned your head on his shoulder, and he slid an arm around your waist as he kissed the top of your skull. You stayed there, enjoying the smell of the fresh cinnamon and the hoodie he was wearing.

“…Earlier,” you spoke just as quietly, afraid to burst this little golden bubble. “When we were inside, you said something about ‘if it weren’t for the damn House.’” You angled your head so you could see his face. “What’d you mean?”

“Oh.” Hector rolled his eyes somewhat, his hand moving your waist to fiddle with a drawstring on your borrowed hoodie. “I just meant we’d be outta here already.”

You blinked, forcing yourself to hold off on the automatic hurt that wanted to leap to the forefront. “‘We?’ Like you and the twins?”

“Eh, if they wanted to, sure,” he said, shrugging. “But we’d find each other again if we needed to, they know that. I meant you and me.” He looked down at you. “I’d take you and we’d move somewhere beautiful, like, tomorrow. Get the fuck outta here, go somewhere with something going on. A real art scene, or at least someplace with actual nightlife, maldita. Or maybe we’d be like those weirdos that live in a van,” he went on. “Move around a bunch of places for a while. Like, we’d live at the beach, until you got tired of the beach, and then we’d try the mountains or something, y’know?”

“Oh, so you’d take me, huh?” Your grin threatened to split your face, it was so hard and so real.

“Obviously,” he said, his bravado back with a wink that made you laugh again. “I’d have to, before you had a chance to think it through.”

“Hey, I might be more game than you think.” You reached up, twirling a lock of his hair around the end of your finger. “What about where you’d want to live, though?”

“That’s the easy part.” He hip-checked you gently, which just pushed you more against his arm as he squeezed you in a hug. “Long as you’re there, I’m good.”

You looked at him for a long moment, pretty sure the warmth in your chest now had nothing to do with the cider or your hoodies in the sunshine. “You wanna head back?” Your hand dropped to tug lightly on his sweatshirt. “So we can put the groceries away before we get completely distracted making out, and so we don’t have an audience?” You glanced out of the corner of your eye at the tent in the distance.

“Yeah, sure babe. One sec.” Hex’s arm supported your back as he dipped you backwards, holding you steady as he made a show of kissing you in front of the grocery store.

It took you two until the lab started barking across the lot to remember you needed to actually get in and start the car.

(perhaps I was the real corn lord all along. :)

if you read this far, I hope you treat yourself to something delicious today 🥰)

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