#serial fiction
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Dance of Wolf and Raven: Prologue
Hi guys, this is the new Romance serial novel I've started featuring our mother, Adelina!
There'll be new chapters every Friday on Patreon, that are already scheduled and primed to release using Patreon's scheduler thingy every Mountain Standard Time 4pm.
There's currently 11k words written to give me a head start, of which 2 chapters are released.
A lot of it came about due to the worldbuilding spree I went on last year, and since I didn't want any of it to go to waste nor include it in the main game cause of bloat or fatigue, thought this was a good idea to do it!
So without further ado, here's the prologue!
Dance of Wolf and Raven: Prologue
It is the winter of 599 A.L.
Almost 600 hundred years have passed since the Belthean people landed upon these shores.
600 years After Landfall.
600 years of blood and conquest.
Today, just weeks before the turning of a new century, the continent of Nareth is unified by way of the spear.
And her father is to blame.
"Princess?" A familiar voice whispers worriedly.
Adelina, youngest princess of the Belthean Empire turns to her lady-in-waiting, Lady Valerie. She waits for her to continue.
Lady Valerie fidgets, her eyes looking everywhere within the carriage except the princess, who offers the nervous girl a hand on her knee. "Speak Valerie, there's no one else in here but us two."
The words and gesture seems to calm her down, though she still gulps before asking, "Was the empress able to…?"
Princess Adelina rolls her eyes as she crumbles back into her seat, a heavy and long sigh escaping her lips. She slumps further and further into her seat before Lady Valerie giggles and helps her sit straight again. But the worried look remains on her face.
Hesitantly, she places her hand upon that of the princess's. Gripping softly, she whispers, "Wrinkling the dress would only serve to anger your father, my lady," she says this sadly, her expression that of defeat.
And defeat it may have well been.
Her mother had tried protesting her daughter's marriage to the Butcher's son, both in public and in private. But her father wanted this alliance badly enough that her mother was ignored and overruled.
Thus, she was betrothed to the prince of a kingdom who had betrayed their allies and sided with her father in his invasion of the western territories.
If that wasn't bad enough, the father of the prince she was to marry had become infamous for massacring entire noble families in a single bloody night. He was known as a cold and emotionless man, ruthless in his decision making. And she was to marry that man's son.
Princess Adelina grips her dress in anger, causing Lady Valerie who notices to bring her close for an embrace.
Again, the princess stifles a sob, refusing to let tears come out. She made a promise to herself that she wouldn't cry.
She had been alone for too long. Abandoned by even her dear brothers who'd always protected her in the imperial palace.
Her eldest brother, Gareth, had fought alongside her betrothed in the war against Lymark, and she had waited for any letter of his to reassure her. Or perhaps express his support in canceling this arranged marriage.
Anything.
But none had arrived.
She didn't know what to make of it, even Daerin her second eldest brother hadn't been able to communicate with her. No one had.
Alone in the capital she had waited.
Her brothers off to wage the war started by her father, later followed by her mother once rumors of a marriage were being whispered at court.
Those shrews for sisters had already married before the invasion to stabilize the empire.
It wasn't long after that she was ordered to ready herself for marriage, but not with a high lord from the empire, or someone she at least liked or knew how to handle.
But with a foreign prince from a kingdom that had betrayed its ally.
She was to be an offering of peace sent by her father, like something that could be given.
Like an object.
The iron inside her heats again.
She straightens herself, gently pushing Lady Valerie off her. She nods thanks to her lady-in-waiting.
'That's right…' she thinks to herself. 'That man pretends I don't exist until he needs a daughter to marry off.'
Her eyes narrow as she focuses on controlling the growing storm within her.
Her mind is set.
The emperor of the greatest nation ever forged, calling for the forgotten and unwanted princess to arrange her marriage without an honor guard. Without scores of retainers. With only one lady-in-waiting, who volunteered.
Only a temporary escort was given.
A single carriage, with a single cart loaded with whatever she could fit inside it.
Lady Valerie had tried defending her father when the journey started.
"Who would dare?" She said.
The princess knew deep within that it made sense. That the lands were now pacified, now moreso than in any other time period.
Who would dare face against the emperor of all Nareth? The king of kings, the Goddess' representative on the mortal plane, and most important of all… the wielder of one of two most powerful weapons in all creation, A'luthean Armor. Handed down throughout the generations by her family, it has impacted the world in numerous ways.
Depending on who is asked, it is either a curse or blessing that only a single member of the imperial bloodline could possess that artifact at a time, as it bonds with that person for life. No other, even with the Ravenea bloodline running through their veins, can use the holy relic crafted by the Goddess Herself for Her Champions during the A'lethic Era.
Her ancestor, Garland the Conqueror, founded the Belthean Empire with it.
Her great-great-grandfather, Emperor Saldwin, used it to bring a nation to its knees, and forced another to become "Imperial Friend and Ally".
These and other such acts forced the Archpriestess to ban the use of such relics in wars, or to proclaim excommunication upon those who broke the decree.
'But how could the Archpriestess force an imperial dynasty to not use its most powerful weapon?' was a question she had asked her tutors when learning of this proclamation.
Excommunication meant losing the accounts, support, legitimacy, and administration provided by the church, but was it enough to stop her family from imposing its will?
She knew it wasn't.
Princess Adelina feels her mind racing once more as she pictures executing her plan, and a small smile sneaks its way across her face.
"Valerie," she rests her left elbow the side of the carriage as she gets her lady-in-waiting's attention, "what can you tell me about the kingdom, or more specifically, my husband-to-be?"
Lady Valerie smiles at the informal use of her name, though she quickly regains her professional demeanor, "Why, you should kno-"
The princess cuts her off, "I'm only refreshing what I know, don't worry," she responds quickly waving a hand dismissively, "Please, think of it as an exercise or an escape from the daily boredom."
Her counterpart rubs her thighs as she knew all too well how uncomfortable it was to travel via carriage for so long a distance.
"Okay…" she replies, a bit absentmindedly as she begins to recount all that she'd learned over the journey to aid the princess.
With smile still in place, the princess innocently presses on, "What's so special about my betrothed?"
Lady Valerie, either ignoring or not catching the tone, answers immediately, "Why, that'd be either his eyes and hair, his status as the future king of Argent, or the fact he belongs to the only other A'luthean bloodline in Nareth."
Princess Adelina excitedly claps her hands, only to lean forward towards her friend, "And what exactly does that mean?"
A knot of worry forms on Lady Valerie's eyebrows as she carefully answers, "… it means he will be given his family's complete set of Blessed Armor, given to their line by the Goddess Herself, the A'luthean Armor of Argent?"
The princess laughs at her friend's textbook answer, "Oh Val! How long did you practice memorizing all that?"
Lady Valerie however saw the change in the princess' face when she gave her answer. "Lina… what exactly are you planning?"
Princess Adelina slowly sits back into her seat, making herself comfortable. "Nothing… just happy to hear my match is of such a Blessed bloodline!"
The smile on her face however, doesn't reach her eyes.
'The Archpriestess could only stop the imperial family from using their A'luthean Armor with the threat of another,' she thinks to herself as she leans back on her seat, her head on the puffed headrest. 'The other belonging to a royal family on the other side of the continent, in the Kingdom of Argent.'
She was to be the wife and queen of the one who would inherit such power, power enough to equal her father.
Princess Adelina was to become Queen Adelina. Here in this foreign kingdom she would be treated with respect. She would ensure it. Never again will she have to be under her father's control, never again will she be discarded and used in the negotiations of men.
And all she had to do was seduce her soon-to-be husband.
The plan going forward is this.
For the sfw thread, at the end of the month ill be posting the Patreon version of the revised demo.
The NSFW KaE Thread will receive the Silverhill Martial Route four weeks after the Patreons receive it.
No deadlines will be publicly given.
I'll be posting and releasing more things as time goes on, thank you!
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Resources for finding fiction on Substack
Did Dracula Daily make you realize you like serialized fiction in general? Have you looked at all the tumblr book club list posts (thank you people who made those posts) and wished there was more original fiction on it or more in general?
Well there's a ton of people posting their fiction on substack (the platform Dracula Daily uses), but it has a big discoverability problem. So a lot of fiction authors on the platform have been banding together and making resources.
The List: Exactly what it says, The List is a list of fiction substacks built with Notion by an author who has been hunting to make it as comprehensive as possible. It includes if the substack is free or paid, posting frequency, the kind of writing (i.e short stories vs serial), and genre.
The Library: Fiction substacks are sorted in different sections by genre with blurbs about each, like you're browsing a library. This relies on user submission for its catalog. As a substack itself it sends out weekly emails informing subscribers of new additions.
Talestack News: Posting twice a month, it collects news that fiction authors send in. Note that it's part of the author's own fiction substack, but it can be set to only send the news. I do like their fiction though.
Lunar Awards: A writing contest for fiction posted on substack, so naturally you can read the entries. It also has a regular feature where people post pitches for the fiction they've posted.
Biblio-File: This one literally just started with no proper posts yet so it's a bit risky to already put it here, but according to the author their intent is to highlight other fiction on substack through their personal recommendations.
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(prompt response) You're the villain that the Chosen One is meant to defeat. Once they arrive, you notice they're just a teenager who barely knows how to swing a sword. Angered by your opponents sending children to do all their dirty work, you decide to help the teen get revenge.
The Silent Parliament may have been ruthless, but they weren't stupid. They knew that Odin was turning their populace against them, and they remembered that Odin's opening move in the war was contacting possible sympathizers through the vehicle of dreams. So they'd taken countermeasures. While I was gone, they'd erected obelisks at the barriers of the city, and although I couldn't make heads or tails of how they worked, it was clear what the end result was. The few times that Odin did try to show up in people's dreams, the reports were that they were fuzzy and incomprehensible, their attempts to reach out to anyone in the Silent Peaks stymied.
But all that changed after our classmate went crazy and tried to blow us off the side of the mountain.
It frustrated me that I not only had absolutely no idea what the Silent Parliament was doing to keep Odin's dreams out, I hadn't the faintest clue what Odin had done to counteract that. Trying to catch any true information about the war through the waves of confusion and propaganda was like chasing my shadow around a dying fire.
But it was undeniable that after Odin played their hand and turned the Silent Academy's mind-wiped soldiers against them, the dream-wards on the outskirts of town were no longer effective.
So when I went to sleep next, something touched my soul, and I was no longer Cienne, witch of six magics, a student of the Silent Academy who was just trying to survive the war.
I was Odin, Demon of Empathy, and I had come to expose the Silent Peaks for their hypocrisy and lies.
###
"Prepare to meet your end, foul demon!" The slim, wobbly-kneed teenager tried to swing her blade at me. Unimpressed, I simply took a single, surefooted step back, navigating the corpse-strewn, muddy battlefield with ease. Nobody had taken the time to teach the poor girl the importance of a good pair of boots, and her pitiful slog through the mud would take ages to catch up with me.
"I have a name, you know," I said mildly.
"The only name you deserve is barbarian, you monster!" The girl shrieked as she charged at me. One of my soldiers appeared, brandishing a ball of fire, but I shook my head. This was the fourth would-be hero the Silent Parliament had thrown at me, and I'd given all of the first three a nice pat on the back, a reassuring pep talk, and in one case taken in a runaway who had no stomach for the churn of endless violence that made up an active battlefront.
I may have been a demon, but I was a Demon of Empathy. On occasion, I let others into my heart—which was more than I could say for my enemies.
"I recommend you stop following me," I said, taking another calm step back.
"Never!" The girl snapped. "They said you would try to sway me from my path with your wicked words of deceit!"
"Actually, I'm just trying to point out that you've been following me into enemy lines for the past two minutes." The girl froze as she looked around and realized that the black-and-white emblem of the Silent Parliament was nowhere to be found. "On the plus side," I mused, "it's not exactly as if you can get any more surrounded than you already are."
"Then I shall go down in a blaze of glory!" The girl leapt at me, blade crackling with heat, and I raised an eyebrow. This one knew some magic, evidently. Nevertheless, it was fruitless; she'd misjudged her leap and landed in a sprawl on the floor.
I sighed, walking towards her—ostensibly to give her a hand, but this was the fourth time I'd played out this pattern, and my enemies would be predicting me. I kept my eyes on the sky, watching for the telltale flash of—
There.
Quick as a flash, I slashed one hand through the air, tearing open a rift between here and the Plane of Elemental Darkness. A fraction of a heartbeat later, an eerily silent column of holy light struck the ground around us, crisping the mud into brick and setting the corpses aflame—but beneath the shelter of the rift of darkness, the girl and I were kept safe.
"That was an artillery strike," I gently explained, "ordered by your army's commanding officer on your position, in the hopes of taking me out while I gave a fallen child a hand. Scorn me all you like, but do yourself a favor."
The girl's eyes were wide and shellshocked as they met mine.
"As long as you continue working for the Silent Parliament? Don't think of yourself as the hero."
I stood, leaving the shocked girl staring at the destruction her own commander had wrought—the destruction that I had protected her from—and went to exit the battlefield.
But before I could return to my warcamp, the girl croaked, "Wait."
I stopped, then turned, raising an eyebrow. "What is it?"
"I..." The girl swallowed. "This can't be right. They wouldn't just... they wouldn't just throw me away..."
"But they have." My gaze was not unkind as I knelt by her side. "Would you like to see how?"
The girl got to her feet, sword abandoned in the mud, and mutely nodded.
Then I closed my eyes—trusting her not to strike me—and reached into my soulspace, delicately carving away a portion of my memories. The memories of the first three heroes who had come to stop me, who I had spared, and who had been quietly vanished by their superiors without a trace.
The first one, of course, didn't believe me. Neither did the second, even when I presented him with the memories of his predecessors. The third simply broke down when I showed him the names and faces of the previous "heroes" who had challenged me.
But the fourth?
The fourth grew angry.
"This... this isn't right." The girl clenched her fists. "The Silent Parliament—they can't get away with this."
"They have so far," I gently said. "And they will, if nobody stops them."
The girl trembled with fury. "You told me that I could not call myself a hero, so long as I worked for the Silent Parliament."
Slowly, I nodded.
"Then let me call myself a hero." She held on to the fragment of my soul that I had gifted her. "Let me show everyone what happened here, so that another child like me is never tricked onto this battlefield again."
A quiet, fierce grin spread across my face, and I squeezed the girl's arm.
"I will remember you," I said. "My name is Odin, and I am the greatest Demon of Empathy to walk this world."
"My name is Haionn," she said, "and I am a hero."
Then Haionn strode to her own side of the battlefield, wielding memory and truth where once she held a blade.
###
"I don't buy it," I said the next morning.
Lucet, Meloai, and Tanryn were the only ones in earshot, but Lucet still reflexively looked around with her soulsight. We were alone in the strange vault that Lord Tanryn had built to keep his daughter safe from the last war the Silent Peaks had waged. I found it ironic that we were using it to the same end.
"What don't you buy?" Meloai asked.
"The dream," I said. "The Silent Peaks are fucking awful, but for all their evils..."
“I left a child in a warzone,” Witch Aimes snarled, getting to her feet. “A helpless, imbecilic child who it is my job to re-educate and protect from the Redlands. To protect from monsters like you, in body and idea.”
"They don't use child soldiers," I said. "And they protect their young."
"I mean, how would we know if they did?" Lucet asked. "What are we going to do, ask around if anyone had any missing children as of late? The watch would wipe our memories of the last week just to be safe if they thought we were questioning them."
"That might very well be Odin's aim," Meloai pointed out. "The watch's stockpiles of liberosis are already running low; they don't have enough resources to keep everyone safely mind-wiped. Having them waste resources on debunking an unfalsifiable accusation might be the sole goal of their broadcast."
"Well, hang on." Tanryn hopped into the conversation. "I don't know about this Odin fellow—"
The three of us chuckled. It was sometimes... endearing, how out of touch with current events Tanryn was.
"—but you said they sent you all a soul fragment, right? If it's a memory, it has to have some grain of truth to it, even if it's carefully chosen."
I shook my head. "Odin can do nonsense with soul fragments that I didn't even know was possible. Case in point: none of us have any idea how they sent the exact same soul fragment to the entire city, simultaneously. I wouldn't put it past them to be able to just... completely fake a memory. And some parts of it have to be fake. I've seen Odin fight personally, and if they had the power to casually open rifts of that size, I'm certain they would have used it against Witch Aimes. I don't know if it's, like, an intimidation tactic, or a tutorial on how to counter light magic, but it's definitely not real."
"So we're left with two competing sources of obviously false news," Lucet summed up. "Well, I suppose that's better than one."
"Not strictly true," Meloai pointed out. "I could add as many sources of obviously fake news as you want, and the situation wouldn't improve." At our blank looks, she elaborated. "As some examples of unhelpful false reports: bees are fish, snow is hot, and Iola is a good person."
I couldn't help but giggle at that. Meloai's sense of humor took some getting used to, but... I was glad we had her, during these times. I could use a smile every now and then. "Odin's lies are a little more subtle than 'bees are fish', but I take your point. We shouldn't take *anything—*either from the broadcasts or the dreams—at face value."
"So then... what do we trust?" Lucet asked. She folded her knees inwards, hugging her legs as if she was a giant egg. Tanryn gave her a scandalized look for putting her shoes on one of House Tanryn's precious chairs, but Lucet didn't even notice. "I mean, for all we know, we've already lost the war and Odin's about to kill us all. Or we won yesterday, and the only reason the Silent Academy is still showing those broadcasts is to fuel some completely unrelated conflict. And I hate that. I hate that so much."
I bit my lip, thinking. "Well," I slowly said. "The last time I didn't trust the Academy's narrative on things..." I almost laughed from how much simpler those times were, when all I had to worry about was what counted as Academic and what counted as Fell magic. "I asked someone who had been there personally."
Meloai and Tanryn gave me confused looks, but Lucet straightened up. "I thought you said Jiaola hadn't come back yet."
"He hasn't," I agreed, "but there's one person with oracular powers and a highly motivated interest in knowing what happened to him."
I stood, stretching my back, and prepared to open a rift back to realspace.
"I think it's time I paid Uncle Sansen a visit," I finished, and tore open a gate back into the Silent Peaks.
A.N.
Soulmage is a serial written in response to writing prompts. Stick around for more episodes, or join my Discord to chat about it!
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#writing#writing prompt#writers on tumblr#writers of tumblr#writblr#serial fiction#fiction#series#web serial#oc#soulmage#dark academia#fantasy#high fantasy#magic#worldbuilding
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A little end of the year list celebrating 10 great trans novels that mean a lot to me!
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The Black Bag - Part 1.
The Black Bag.
Rob Hadley
Introduction.
When I wrote The Black Bag I had it in mind that many of the people likely to read it would already have a knowledge of Tarot. However, that’s proved to have been a miscalculation. I have been pleased to see many readers have a curiosity about Tarot, but not much familiarity with it. As a result, I often suggest readers step into this journey with a Tarot deck at hand. It will help you see the cards mentioned, and to participate in a manner that gives you a deeper connection to the story. Each reader, does after all, have their own relationship to the cards. Indeed each card relates to each reader differently. As you make your way through these pages, perhaps you will have insights that will make the story unique for you.
My intent is for you to enjoy these pages, and maybe pick up a few ideas along the way. I don’t propose for an instant that any given card has set or established meanings. My own view is that context is everything. The cards tend to match up with your own particular situation and can have very different meanings at different times. I hope you’ll enjoy this journey. Feel free to reach out to me and let me know your own experiences.
My best wishes as you embark on this journey,
Rob Hadley
The Black Bag
By Rob Hadley
C.2024
It is fair to say that the one person you least expect to see following your mother’s funeral is your mother. Yet, as Grahame Bickerton stepped out of the small chapel and into the daylight and looked across the well tended gardens he was shocked to find himself staring at a figure in the distance that bore an unmistakeable resemblance to the very person he had just witnessed being extended that last of human dignities.
The coffin had slid silently away behind the curtain in the funeral home, and he’d been shocked to find himself craning to see the final glimpse as it moved irresistibly into the cremation chamber. And yet here, across this beautifully laid out garden there seemed to be someone that could be his very own mother sitting in mournful contemplation by one of the gravestones, their back to him.
Grahame felt a hand on his sleeve and turned. It was the only other person that had been at the service. An elderly woman with a cane, bent almost double, the result of some form of spinal deformity. The woman spoke to him gently, her eyes moist with tears.
“I will miss you mother,” she said. “I feel your loss.”
“You’re very kind,” said Grahame trying not to be too dismissive but wanting to pull away and see the woman in the distance more clearly. She’d got up and was walking away.
“I used to work with her you know, at the college. Geography,” she said. “She spoke of you regularly.”
“Geography?” replied Grahame, completely lost.
“I teach Geography at the college. We used to have tea together often,” she continued.
Grahame didn’t wish to be rude and turned and tried to catch sight of the person in the garden, but she was hurrying away.
“If I can help,” she said, “you can find me at the college.”
Grahame pulled away and started walking across the gardens leaving the old woman staring after him as he strode away.
“Poor man,” she said to herself leaning on her cane. “He’s obviously terribly upset.”
Grahame hurried across the lawns in the direction of the woman he had seen. Soon he stopped. The crows were rising from some trees by the seat the woman had been sitting on but was gone from view now. It was almost as if she’d never been there. He walked on, but after a few moments realised it was no good. He couldn’t see which way she’d gone.
“Christ,” he muttered, then thinking more clearly calmed himself.
“I have to get a grip,” he said to himself. “This is ridiculous, I’m a bloody engineer, dammit.”
With that Grahame dismissed the notion that anything out of the norm had happened. He was obviously overreacting.
+++
It was mid morning several weeks later when Grahame received the call from the car dealership. The fall sunlight cast the city in a flat light that lacked the warmth of the summer so recently ended. He stood looking out of his meagre office at the glass towers of the downtown core and the cranes that perched beside every spare inch of buildable space.
How very different those offices were from his own. From the office beside his he could hear his boss shouting down the phone at one of the project planners. The congestion on the road today was holding things up for everybody. He was well aware that they were pouring concrete on several projects today, and with those cement trucks stranded in the unexpected traffic chaos caused by this morning’s power outage there was sure to be hell to pay. As luck would have it none of his teams were pumping today, so while the atmosphere in the office would be toxic, it didn’t directly affect any of his people.
He’d been lucky, pacing himself lately. The recent death of his mother had forced him to scale back some of his work commitments. As the executor of the will there were assets to be disposed of, taxes to pay, and all the administrative chaos that accompanies the end of life. And that brought him back to the phone call. It had been the dealership he’d taken his mother’s old Town Car to. She’d loved that vehicle, but it had no business being on the road with gas prices the way they are today. Getting rid of it had been the only thing to do, and yet in spite of his having thoroughly cleaned the vehicle before leaving it at the second hand car lot, the manager had called and informed him that they’d found some old playing cards and some journals when the car was made ready for sale.
“We didn’t want to toss them out,” said the manager. “They may be something you want.”
The manager had sounded awkward. He was aware the car had been Grahame’s mother’s vehicle, being acquainted with old lady. He’d been servicing the car since he’d joined the dealership over a decade previously.
A phone slammed down in the cubicle beside his and Grahame winced. Did the workplace have to be so toxic, he wondered. Looking at his diary he could see he didn’t need to be here at present, and if he were to walk the dozen blocks to the car lot he could get away early and then slip home to work the rest of the day from there.
He placed a file into his brief case and made for the door. His boss was already on the phone to the next project manager, wringing his hands and looking intently at the screen of his laptop and chewing his lip, a nervous habit he’d nursed every day since Grahame had joined the company. He nodded as he made his way out of the building but went by unnoticed. As he walked out across the car park he felt the sun on his face and a sense of relief in his heart. It was good to be out of the cramped office space.
He loved the city, and being part of the construction trade he was enjoying the fruits of a building boom, but it wasn’t lost on him that he worked for a small consultancy firm, and the glass palaces of downtown were far from his reality. The firm he worked for may be part of the construction team, but he was under no illusions about the work. Twice in the last year his boss had been forced to ask his staff to wait a week for their wages, and if his suspicions were correct, it would happen again. In the hierarchy of the building trade, the company he was working for was not what anyone would describe as a highflyer.
He walked smartly across town, the sound of horns blaring a fitting backdrop to the stationary traffic. Another set of lights up ahead had blown out and a crew was struggling to get their vehicle to somewhere they could work on the switchgear.
Grahame tuned out the sound of the city. He thought of his mother, and that he’d only seen her three times in the year prior to her death. They’d had dinner back in April, and then he had driven out to the cottage in mid summer, and then Rose had told him she was going in for some tests. She seemed unworried about it at the time, and he hadn’t really thought much of it.
Deconstructing things later Grahame realised that Rose had suffered in silence for some time before having these tests run. Indeed by the time pancreatic cancer was diagnosed it was already far advanced. She had suffered briefly, and Grahame had visited, but soon after that last time she had succumbed, slid into a coma and within two weeks had died leaving a great chasm in Graham’s life. A chasm he promptly filled with his own guilt for not being a better son, and more available to his mother.
He was being too hard on himself, but that was nothing new.
+++
At the car dealership the manager had placed the collection of journals and other bits and pieces in a large envelope for Grahame to collect. He walked into reception and the young lady on the desk reached beneath her desk and passed it to him, recognising him from previous visits. Grahame thanked her and took the package, then decided he’d walk home through the park.
There was little point returning to the office today. He didn’t feel up to working, and the traffic chaos of the morning would soon be merging with the afternoon rush hour, as people tried to leave work early to beat the rush.
Taking a moment to sit in the sunshine he stopped at a park bench and opened the package. It contained three journals, all closely handwritten in his mothers handwriting, and one small black bag. He drew this out and inspected it. Inside he found some cards, but not the playing cards you’d expect an old lady to have should she find herself compelled to get into a game of gin rummy. These were altogether more colorful, and well used.
He inspected them and realised that these were tarot cards. He had no idea his mother had an interest in tarot. While not something he had any knowledge of, Grahame recognised some of the symbols on the cards as he rifled through them. He found the cards strangely puzzling, feeling rather like he’d discovered something secret. He slid the blag bag back into the envelope continued his journey home. They were a mystery he would examine further at a later date.
As he walked he lamented the fact that he had few of his mothers belongings, even though he was her sole heir. The reality was that his small modern apartment was hardly a suitable venue for an ancient armoire, or dining table for eight people.
When he emerged out of the far side of the park he was only a couple of blocks from his apartment. Walking to work today had been a good choice, even here the traffic was log jammed.
+++
The loss of his sole surviving parent had forced something of a pause in Graham’s life. It was a moment in which he was compelled to take stock and look at where he was.
He had recently ended a fruitless relationship of eighteen months. It had been a perfunctory affair, neither very passionate nor disastrous, but lacking in so many of the things he felt his life needed.
They’d found each other online, were both ‘self actualised professionals looking to share all life has to offer,’ according to their dating profiles, but were neither very self actualised (he still wasn’t sure what that meant) nor very willing to share very much. He’d decided he didn’t really trust the person he was dating, and realised she didn’t trust him either. They’d decided to ‘have a two week break’ two months ago and he hadn’t heard from her since.
Surprisingly he didn’t miss the woman either. It was as if the relationship had not really happened at all. And he felt no compulsion to reconnect.
If he were quite honest with himself it was much the same with his job. He’d been working as a project manager for several years, and it paid reasonably well. While his job didn’t excite him, it provided security enough for him to live in the city, pay a disturbingly high proportion of his income in rent, and to own a car that he could drive at barely 20 miles an hour anywhere he chose. And then pay a fortune for parking. Like the relationship, his job didn’t fill him with passion either.
Grahame was gradually coming to the conclusion that there were patterns emerging in his life that didn’t fill him with joyful expectation. In his mid thirties he had expected something more of life. Was this really it?
These were Grahame’s thoughts as he walked alongside the stationary traffic and glanced at the frustrated drivers in their little tin boxes. Just a few blocks from home Grahame watched an episode play out before him.
A driver in a Jeep was blowing his horn at a car in front. The yellow haired woman sat in a little pale blue convertible, studiously ignoring the increasingly insistent honking. Judging by the body language the young lady had not had a good day, sitting arms crossed and lips pursed determined to ignore the blaring of the horn behind.
“Hey lady,” came the voice. A tee shirt clad young man, physically toned and cocksure, leaned from his car window and called to her.
Finally having had enough, the young woman, her hair tightly curled up in a bun, turned in her seat and shouted back at the man, “For god’s sake! I have a boyfriend!”
She then turned and sat, arms folded defiantly in the stationary traffic, red faced and flustered now with her eyes locked on the licence plate before her. At that instant a gap opened in the lane beside her and the jeep bucked forward and pulled alongside her for a moment as vehicles shifted in the Tetris game of traffic flow.
“Lady, I just wanted to tell you,” said the man, a little more gently now, “You have a flat tire.”
Taken aback, the young woman checked behind her to see that the traffic was not moving, and then stepped out of her car to take a closer look. She wore a smart pencil skirt and lemon blouse, the picture of propriety. She came back a moment later and sat behind the wheel looking perplexed.
She seemed nonplussed for a moment, and then composing herself turned and politely addressed the man in the jeep.
“Can you help me fix it?” she called across the traffic lane.
The young man lit up a cigarette in a slow languid style, and then said, “Like you said, lady. You’ve got a boyfriend.”
The traffic shifted and the Jeep advanced progressing up the line of cars.
Grahame, abreast of the little convertible looked at the woman, and saw the tears welling up in her eyes. He guessed she’d maybe not fixed a tire before. And with so many cars around she would be stuck blocking traffic before long as the tire deflated. He knew that on any other day he would have gone with his old habits and just not got involved, but today was just a little different.
“Would you like a hand?” he asked softly.
“That would be so kind,” said the woman, relief spreading across her face. Suddenly she didn’t seem quite so prickly.
“Just pull in to one of the spaces up here,” said Graham. “I live a block up the road, I’ll help you change the tire. Just let me go up to my apartment and change out of my office clothes. I won’t be more than five minutes.”
“That’s so kind of you,” said the young woman. “You’re like a real knight in shining armour.”
“Well, not really. But I can change a tire. Give me five minutes and I’ll be back.”
With that he left her and hurried toward his apartment.
+++
Grahame hurried along the street, the sound of construction crowding in on him after the quiet of the park. That poor woman, he thought. Some men really could be thoughtless.
He hurried into his apartment, tossed the envelope carelessly onto the coffee table, as if by reflex turned on the kettle to boil water for a cup of tea and went to his bedroom. A moment later he’d got out of his work suit and pulled on a pair of jeans and a sweater.
He turned and was about to hurry down to the street to help the woman change her tire, when he noticed the envelope had spilled its contents across the surface of the coffee table.
Not wanting to keep the woman downstairs waiting, he casually glanced at the table. Cards were slewed across the flat surface in an arc. It looked almost artistic. One card lay face up.
Grahame glanced at it, and then retrieved his keys and made for the door. As he stepped out of the elevator on the ground floor, the front door of the building opened and his neighbour, old Mrs. Willoughby entered the vestibule.
At that moment there was a terrible crashing sound from outside. Mrs. Willoughby turned and looked out at the street, a startled look of shock on her face.
Grahame rushed to the door and stared out to see what on earth had happened. Cars were stopped now, honking and people climbing from them and rushing back down the road. It took only a moment for Grahame to realise the sound had come from the building site on the next block, just by where he could see the woman’s car pulled over.
He hurried toward the car, and as he got closer realised this was the centre of the commotion. The woman was standing back, leaning against the siding at the edge of the construction site. He hurried to her side.
The little blue convertible was wrecked. It lay smashed beneath a series of scaffolding poles, looking as though it had been speared in some ghastly hunt.
White faced and shocked the woman stood back, shocked but unharmed, against the siding.
“Good god, what happened?” he said to her after he’d pushed his way through the crowd.
People were looking up, staring at a crane’s hook and some chain suspended seventy feet above the road. A man with a hard hat came barrelling out of the building site and rushed to the car. By-standers were already photographing the wrecked car, and posting them to social media on their phones.
“Was anyone hurt?” the workman was asking in panic, looking around wildly.
“Are you ok?” Grahame said, steadying the woman with a kindly hand.
“I’m ok,” she said rapidly. “I’m ok!”
She was white faced and shaking. Grahame turned to the assembled crowd and said, “Does anyone have some water?”
A bottle was developed and passed to the woman.
Grahame turned to the crowd and asked, “Who saw what happened?”
Several voices piped up. Grahame looked at the man in the hardhat and said, “Are you the foreman?”
He nodded nervously.
“Thank god no one was hurt,” he replied. “You’d better get these people’s statements. The police will be along soon. It’s going to make things a lot better if people are able to describe it.”
The foreman nodded and corralled the witnesses while Grahame turned back to the woman.
“You’re going to need a cup of tea, aren’t you,” he said gently. “Let’s get you out of here and calm things down.”
Grahame handed his card to the foreman, and one of the witnesses.
“When the cops show up can you let them know she’s at my place up the road,” said Grahame.
There was sympathetic nod and Grahame and the woman pressed their way through the crowd and made their way down the block to his apartment building.
+++
Grahame made the tea as his frightened guest sat in the open plan living room.
“You didn’t tell me your name,” said Graham, wanting to keep the woman talking.
“I’m Sunshine,” she said. “And that’s my mother’s car.”
“Oh, dear,” he said. “It’s a very nice little car. Well, it was. How did you come to be unharmed? I mean, it looks like a hell of a mess.”
Grahame poured the tea and placed a cup and saucer before Sunshine.
“I stepped out of the car to look at the tire, and that’s when it happened,” she said. “There was just this rush of air, and a terrible sound. Like bells ringing, and then those scaffolding poles all around me.”
“What a thing to happen,” Grahame said.
“I guess,” she replied beginning to calm down. “I could have been killed.”
She sipped the tea, her hand still trembling. That was when Sunshine started sobbing.
+++
The statement to the police, a visit from the foreman and an exchange of documents all took time and Sunshine seemed to go through the process in a daze. She was glad to be somewhere quiet and safe, and Grahame remained largely quiet in the background as the questions were asked and answered. It was a terribly unfortunate accident, but as the police officer pointed out, no one was hurt. The insurance companies would sort out the wrecked car which was now safely off the road. The construction company manager said the company would be up to their necks in investigations, but seemed co-operative, almost as upset by the whole situation as Sunshine was herself.
“That could have been my own daughter,” said the manager as Grahame had shown him out. It happened that he knew Grahame from the local planning department meetings that he’d sometimes have to attend for his company.
“Terrible thing,” he’d said. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Those clamps don’t just fail.”
“Thank heavens no one was hurt,” echoed Graham.
+++
At length the police officer left, and they found themselves alone in the quiet apartment. Noticing the journals and the tarot cards on the table, Sunshine asked, “What’s this?”
“Oh, it’s nothing. Just some things of my mother’s,” replied Graham.
“Don’t you see it?” said Sunshine, looking at the upturned card.
“What do you mean,” said Graham.
“You don’t think it looks like all those scaffolding poles that fell on my car?” said Sunshine as she picked up the card.
Grahame stared at the card. The Eight of Wands. He wondered what it meant.
“I suppose,” said Graham. “It’s really not my thing,” he added and then as an afterthought said, “I’m an engineer.”
Sunshine looked at the card once more, and then at Grahame trying to find the link between not being able to see the visual connection and being an engineer. She failed.
“I wonder what made you turn over this particular card then,” she said. “Probably something subconscious.”
“I didn’t pick that card. I mean, I just left some things on the table, they just fell like that, and then I came down to help you.”
“And that was before you heard the crash,” asked Sunshine with newly sparked curiosity.
“Yes,” replied Graham, noticing for the first time how the image in the card did look a little like the scaffolding poles.
“That’s quite the coincidence,” murmured Sunshine.
“Oh, I doubt it,” said Graham. “There’s probably no end of these cards look like falling scaffolding.”
His voice trailed off as he realised how he sounded. Sunshine picked up the cards and started shuffling them.
“So, your mother’s into tarot?” asked Sunshine.
“No. Well, yes,” stammered Graham.
“I see,” said Sunshine.
“I mean she died,” said Graham. “And these were among her things. I should sort them out. I don’t really know anything about the cards.”
Sunshine looked at the journals, and then asked, “Were you close?”
“Not as close as I wish we had been,” replied Graham.
“So, you never knew she was interested in Tarot?”
“Never had a clue,” confessed Graham.
Sunshine turned the cards over in her hands and then said, “You’re lucky then. This gives you a chance to get to know her through the cards.”
The words hung in the air.
“What do you mean,” asked Graham.
“Look at these cards,” she said. “You can see they’ve been well used. These are quite old. Well used. Your mother must have been adept at the cards. Can’t you see it? There’s a lot of her in these particular cards.”
An awkward silence fell between them as Grahame thought about this. It was true, the journals and these cards were like a voice reaching out across the abyss of death. They were a connection.
The silence was broken by the chirp of Sunshine’s cell phone.
She looked at the display and then said, “Mother. This might be a little awkward.”
___________________________________________
If you've enjoyed Part 1 of The Black Bag I ask that you follow my Tumblr and reblog it. To read Part 2 simply go to my Patreon HERE.
Many Thanks
RH
#daily tarot#tarot readings#tarot reading#tarot cards#tarot#free tarot#tarot community#tarot deck#tarot spreads#tarot witch#tarotdaily#fiction#short story#serial fiction#druid
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With Malignant forces quickly approaching earth, Sally's given little time to prepare a fleet to defend the onslaught, but just enough time to suit up and go it alone, in "To Bide Thee Time"
Other Timelines, Other Lifetimes Series…
Other Timelines, Other Lifetimes Series - The Astounding Wonders of Spacetime Sally, envisioned as a 1920s/30s pulp era sci-fi serial, this timeline/lifetime would see Captain Sally Hannigan as the number one ace pilot of Metropolitan Star Command defending and protecting earth’s capitol city, New St. Vivian, a sprawling metropolis and home to earth’s first spaceport.
...
I gave the above storyline blurb to ChatGPT-4 to turn into an old-timey sci-fi radio serial. Here is what it came up with:
Attention, esteemed listeners, gather 'round your radio sets, for we bring you a tale of cosmic valor and daring escapades! In this week's electrifying episode of 'Spacetime Sally,' our intrepid heroine faces a dire predicament! With malevolent forces from the far reaches of the cosmos hurtling towards our beloved Earth, the sands of time dwindle perilously low.
But fear not, for Sally, our gallant champion of the spacelanes, is braced for the challenge! Granted but a sliver of moments to marshal her forces, she finds them scant against the impending menace. Ah, but behold! With the indomitable spirit of a true spacefarer, Sally resolves to don her celestial garb and confront the adversary single-handedly!
Join us, dear listeners, in 'To Bide Thee Time,' where bravery and wit clash against the shadow of interstellar tyranny! Will our dauntless Sally fend off the invaders and secure peace for our terrestrial sphere? Tune in, immerse yourselves in the adventure, and ride the ether waves alongside 'Spacetime Sally,' the beacon of hope in our universe's darkest hours!
#scifi#science fiction#space girl#retro futuristic#retro futurism#pulp scifi#pulp sci fi#pulp science fiction#1920s#1920s fashion#1930s#vintage scifi#vintage science fiction#serial fiction#old time radio#scifi serial#serial#scifi art#art#ai art#ai artwork#artwork#retro#scifiart#retro scifi#sci fi art
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Why is "don't change the past" such a prominent theme in SF stories? The latest Flash movie, the Flash TV show, Doctor Who, the Flash comics, too much written SF to mention. Why is there such strong condemnation of something that'll always be impossible anyway?
So part of this is a storytelling constraint in serial fiction: by the end of the story, you need to return to a recognizable status quo. Even after the most definitive run, there's going to be someone coming after you who'll have to do the next run, so it's only professional courtesy to make their job a little easier. Jonathan Hickman, who's destroyed and rebuilt the Marvel multiverse, taken the Iron Man vs. Captain America fight to its logical conclusion (i.e, death), and put the X-Men on Krakoa, describes this as "putting the toys back in the toybox."
Another aspect of this comes out of the very nature of time travel as a storytelling device. Time travel inherently brings up the question of paradoxes, being trapped in time loops, and so forth - and outside of going back in time to kill Hitler, which is seen as enough of a moral good to at least sustain a philosophical argument if not win it outright, people generally see most of these outcomes as bad.
A third reason is what I refer to as our anti-revolutionary imagination. There is a strong cultural tendency to view our current society as the best of all possible worlds and a similar strong inability to imagine better presents or futures. In the context of time travel, this lends itself to a defense of the status quo: hence why so much Alternate History depicts bad outcomes, hence why going back in time to change the past has to be shown to be a destructive act that can only makes things worse.
In conclusion, kill Hitler.
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Alright, here we go!
My speculative-evolution serial novel Fellow Tetrapod is finally live on Royal Road.
Go check it out. If it looks like your sort of thing, follow the story. It updates every weekday.
(if you want to know more...)
Koenraad Robbert Ruis used to be a paleontologist, but now he's a cook at the United Nations embassy to the Convention of Sophonts. His bosses must negotiate with intelligent species from countless alternate earths, and Koen must make them breakfast. It turns out, though, that Koen is rather better at inter-species communication than any other human in this world (all nine of them). Everyone loves to eat (certain autotrophs excepted).
Fellow Tetrapod is an speculative-evolution office comedy about food preparation, diplomacy, and what it’s like to be a talking animal.
Serialized every weekday on Royal Road (https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/59198/fellow-tetrapod) and (one week earlier) Patreon(https://www.patreon.com/danielmbensen)
Cover art by @simon-roy. Illustrations by Tim Morris.
#specbio#speculative evolution#royal road#serial fiction#science fiction#free novels#web fictions#daniel m bensen#fellow tetrapod
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POTLAS: Chapter 3, now up on Patreon!
Someone stood on the dock. Someone Corin was certain hadn't been there a moment ago.
The strange figure was clad in a black, flowing cloak and wearing some kind of mask under the raised hood. He couldn't see many more details than that, but he did sense one thing beyond a doubt: they were staring directly at him.
They were startlingly tall, and obviously rail-thin even under the black robes--with an unpleasant twist of his stomach, Corin remembered the Shrouded Pristine. Now that he was closer, Corin could see that the mask was a skull, a huge one from some terrifying predator, surrounded by a mane of glossy, black feathers from what had to be a hundred birds. Or perhaps, considering the beaked shape of the skull, a single very large one.
"Ah! Here you are! You are the artist!" the stranger chirped in an unexpectedly high and lilting voice for someone of their height, swaying like a tree in a strong wind.
"I--I am," Corin said, feeling a bit faint and reluctant to admit it. "My name is Corin. I am a portrait mage from the court of Lord Auberon the Illuminated."
"And I am a Witch!"
- - -
Read more on Patreon!
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Dance of Wolf and Raven is cool but Lady and the Wolf was the OG title for Adelina and Uriel. At least if you want to focus more in their relationship than the alliance of Argent and Ravenea
This is gonna be long and overexplained, so warning!
Im hoping the " line"read more thingy keeps the post short for people that dont wanna get clogged haha
But TLDR: I know that, it was intentional.
Lady and the Wolf is the domestic name for the event/song/dance given by the people of Argent.
Kingdom folk dont really wanna bring up the queen's familial history with the imperial line, AND Adelina herself doesnt want to promote that. She isnt a fan of the family and court that treated her as an outsider.
Speaking of, Adelina is the one who sponsors the theater(s) in the capital, so her wants and desires would be taken seriously; hence the Lady and the Wolf title.
Dance of Wolf and Raven is the actual title name of the novel, and I love it since not only did my patreons vote for the name, but I love the whole real world relationship of ravens and wolves being chill asf with each other.
The title can also obviously stand in for Uriel and Adelina as characters and not people we know personally, especially since theyre both strangers to each other in the beginning. They only know each other as being of the Ravenea or Argent bloodlines whose family animals are the Raven and Wolf respectively.
Anyways that's enough yapping from me lol, thanks for reaching out!
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The pain of writing scenes you're really excited about but they're in Arc 3 and no one but your co-writer will see them for probably years.
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artist: @monoidea
I'm sorry, but this is the prettiest thing I've ever seen. OMG. I mentioned in a reblog the other day that I had commissioned someone to do the cover for my story and ever since then, I've had the hardest time keeping it to myself.
I'm so incredibly happy with how this turned out. It's like the characters were plucked right out of my head. I feel so much more confident about the first impression my story is going to make now.
The whole experience working with the artist was such a treat. I cannot believe people trade that for keystrokes in an AI design engine.
#b: six strings & stardust#c: ben#c: naomi#writing community#writeblr community#romance writer#romance novel#character art#bookblr#anti ai art#serial fiction#coming soon
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[Soulmage] The goblins who dwell just outside your village are small and dumb –in an oddly endearing way. The villagers humor their innocuous raids and sometimes even give them advice. In the village’s darkest hour, the goblins send aid.
“It’s debatable whether goblins are even sapient,” Witch Aimes began, and I already knew today’s ‘history’ class would be nothing more than thinly veiled propaganda. “What is known for certain is that they are a subspecies of humanity, twisted over millennia by their over-reliance on the witchcraft of mischief—yes, Cienne?” Witch Aimes radiated irritation as I raised my hand—and when a witch radiated irritation, everyone in the room could feel it. A careful, grating hum filled the class, aimed at me like a warning. I am a powerful person. Do not cross me if you value your continued existence.
“Goblins are sapient,” I said.
She arched an eyebrow. “And what evidence do you have for that?”
“What evi—I lived shoulder-to-shoulder with goblins for sixteen years in the Redlands! What evidence do you have that goblins are a ‘twisted subspecies’ of humanity!”
“I’m so glad you asked, Student Cienne.” Yikes. Normally I had to piss her off a lot more for her to get all formal. Or, wait, was this about the ‘Vile Magics’ discussion this morning? That might explain her mood. The witch reached into a space only she could see, arrogance swirling around her like a cloak, and pulled out a hunched, green corpse.
Bile rose in my throat.
“We know because of autopsies,” Witch Aimes said, her glare unflinching as she stood over the corpse of a person, and for a stuttering heartbeat she was not Witch Aimes but a far older witch, the echo of the despair that had ruined my home village—
###
Ice blotted out the summer sun, the magics of misery freezing the very moisture out of the air. My mother stood between the fragile wooden door and my quavering, curled-up form. Another building collapsed under the weight of the ice-witch’s onslaught, and I could hear his glee as our village’s despair fed his growing power.
“I don’t want to be here,” I whispered. “Mommy, I want to go home.”
My mother looked around the tiny wooden hut that I’d grown up in, the battered, creaking rooftop, the bitter, chilling cold, and didn’t have to say aloud that this was not our home anymore.
“It’s going to be okay, Cienne,” Mom whispered. “The witches—they can only see despair. If you—if you just stay calm and don’t panic, they won’t know where to find you.”
I tried, I really, really tried, I squeezed my eyelids as tightly shut as I could and pretended I was under the summer sun, but I heard someone shatter like spun sugar and I couldn’t do it I couldn’t do it I couldn’t do it it was all my fault and we were all going to die and the door smashed inwards like so much cheap glass—
“It’s okay,” my mother whispered as she stood. “It’s okay, Cienne. I forgive you.”
And when I opened my eyes she was gone, and the witch of frost stood in her place.
It was my fault. It was my fault. I hated myself so much, I felt so small, I wanted to shrink into nothing and hide where nobody would ever find me, and I waited for the snap of cold to end my life—
But it never came.
The witch of frost, by some miracle, didn’t see me in my hiding spot.
Later, I would understand why. Later, when the goblin tribe searched the village for survivors and kept me fed and warm until the Academy swooped me up, I would sort the events into a linear story. This is where my mother died. This is where the trauma unlocked something within me. This is where I wanted so badly to fall asleep and never wake up.
The goblins didn’t fight the witch. They would have been slaughtered like cattle. That wasn’t my darkest hour, in any case.
My darkest hour was what came next.
###
I stood, clenching my fist and feeling the delicately patterned ornament I held. A message from an old man who may have been a friend, who knew what it was like to grow up under the rifts.
“You have your corpses,” I hissed. “I have my life.”
The words of the old man dug into my palm.
They cannot take this from you.
I shoved my chair back and stormed out of class.
A.N.
Soulmage is a serial written in response to writing prompts. Stick around for more episodes, or join my Discord to chat about it!
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Love During Robot Fighting Time: Chapter 14
Hello, lovelies! Hope y'all are doing well :)
Don't forget you can read three chapters ahead on this story, twenty chapters ahead on "A Dream of Summer Rain", and two chapters ahead on "Magical Girl Exorcist Squad", by becoming a paid subscriber on my Substack or my Patreon!
***
Zeke
12 months earlier
I squatted in the Pits, putting the finishing touches on our minibot, Gurren, in preparation for our fight with Team Bottle Rocket in twenty minutes. I was so zoned in on getting all the screws extra tight that I almost missed my phone blaring out a Kendrick Lamar song. I groaned when I saw the caller ID. “Hi, Mom,” I said, attempting to keep the stress and frustration out of my voice. It was better to get whatever ‘conversation’ this was out of the way now- if I tried to put it off and ignore her, she’d just be even more cantankerous about it when we actually got around to it.
“Hellllo, Ezeekielll,” she slurred, her words blending together at the borders of the syllables. Oh, good. “How are you this evening?”
“Uh, a little busy to be honest, Mom,” I said.
“Busy? Busy with what? It’s not like you have a job.”
I breathed in a sharp sigh through my nose. “I do have a job, Mom. It’s just seasonal.”
“Those obnoxious shows you go on don’t count as a-”
“Mom, was there a specific reason you called?” I asked, focusing on keeping the screws tight. “Like I said, I’m a little busy.”
“Too busy to talk to your dear ol’ mum,” she said, her accent starting to slip out. She’d been training herself not to have one ever since she’d moved to the States back when she was a teenager, but sometimes it still flared up. Usually when she’d indulged in one too many Screwdrivers. “That’s a problem, you know- you’ll never get a girlfriend if you hate your own mother.”
“I don’t hate you, Mom,” I said monotone.
“Love the exact phrasing there, Ezekiel. Very gentlemanly.”
The screwdriver, my screwdriver, a literal one, slipped out of my hands. And as I reached down for it, I noticed my breathing- sharp, fast, all inhale and holding my breath, only exhaling when I absolutely needed to. “Thank you, Mother, I try.”
“Don’t you get sarcastic with me, young man- that’s hardly a trait that will do you any favors with the ladies either.”
I reached for the screwdriver on the ground, but my hand trembled when I tried to grip it. It slipped out of my grasp and hit the floor once again. “Look, Mom, my match starts in a few minutes, I really need to finish these repairs on Dai Guren-”
“Oh God, I forgot you gave that stupid thing a name. How asinine.”
Cold, soggy shame dripped off of me, and I let myself inhale and exhale through my mouth.
And of course she kept going: “And that’s another thing- why is it just you doing this? Don’t you have teammates for this nonsense? They don’t appreciate you. If they did, they wouldn’t force you to do all the work-”
“They don’t force me to do all the work, Mom!” I snapped. “And I’m doing these repairs because I’m good at them. They had to go handle other stuff for the match. It’s not actually that complicated, but you refuse to understand!”
A few moments of deafening silence poured out from the other end of the line. “This is clearly not going to be a productive conversation. I think I’m done with you for the evening. I’ll call you back when you’re in a more reasonable headspace.”
“Mom-”
She ended the call before I could get another word out.
It wasn’t quiet in the pits- people were using saws to carve up metal, flames were welding parts together, drills were digging into machinery. All the high-pitched screeches coalesced into a singular plaintive wail.
A tear fell off my chin and shattered on the ground. I tore off my work gloves and wiped my eyes, hoping nobody would see me. I wasn’t much of a crier. No reason to ruin that reputation now, when I had other things to focus on. The bot was ready for the fight, and that was what I had to focus on, not the hollow pit in my chest rapidly filling with anger and resentment and freaking exhaustion-
“Hey, what’s wrong?”
My fingers parted across my visage. I hadn’t even realized my face was buried in my hands. I looked through the gaps to find Calloway there, standing across the narrow middle walkway that ran down the white room. He was standing there in jeans and a black hoodie drawn up over his head, but he pulled it back and shaked out his shaggy brown hair. His eyes always looked… Harsh, angry, aggressive. But not now, not at this moment. Now they looked… Softer. Concerned. And… Genuine, in their concern. I’d gotten pretty good at spotting the difference between genuine concern and artificial; having parents like mine forces you to learn as fast as possible. But right now, here, he…
“I… Just a difficult phone call with my mom,” I said, pulling my hands away from my face entirely, directing my gaze at the floor.
Calloway stepped forward and gave me a hug. I flinched- the guy really had no sense of personal space, but honestly… I needed it, then, so I hugged him back. “Thanks.”
“Of course.”
I mumbled, “I guess I just…”
“What?” Calloway asked.
“It’s nothing, it’s…”
“What?” Calloway said, pulling out of the hug and looking me directly in the face, furrowing his brow.
“I’m… Just surprised that you care,” I said.
He gulped and took a step backward, along with a slight bite to his lower lip that ended as soon as it began. “I, uh… Yeah, yeah that’s fair.”
“I didn’t mean-”
“No, you did,” he said, turning his head so he didn’t have to look me in the eyes anymore. “It’s fine. Really, it is. I just… I really must come off like I’m a lot, all the time, huh?”
“I… What do you want me to say here, dude?” I said, taking a step towards him.
He took another step back. “Just the truth. Just… How you really feel.”
I drew in another deep breath. “Yes. You… You do.”
He gulped again. “That… That explains a buncha stuff. I kinda figured people knew I… But I guess they wouldn’t. Fair enough.”
“Look, Calloway-”
“Don’t worry about it,” he said with a playful wave of his hand, plastering a bogus smile onto his face. “Just means I sell the heel routine well. That’s not a bad thing. And this isn’t really about me- I was asking you what’s wrong. Um… Do you… Do you wanna talk about it?”
My phone alarm hollered inside my pants’ pocket. Ten minutes till the fight. They’d be starting the introductory monologues soon. “I dunno if I have time right now, but… I appreciate it. I really, sincerely do. Maybe… Maybe next time?”
“Next time I catch you crying, tough guy?” he said, the smile edging just a little closer to genuine.
I forced out a little chuckle. “Yeah, I guess so. For now… Can I just get another hug?”
He nodded rapidly. “Of course.”
Then he went in for it and wrapped his arms around my back. And it felt… Good. Supportive. Strong, but not aggressive.
Maybe there was more to Keith Calloway than I thought.
***
NOW
I sprayed some breath spray into my mouth while I paced up and down the hallway of my apartment, my hands wringing together as I tried to keep my mind clear and focused.
I liked Kate. That much was hard to deny. She was bright and funny and passionate, just radiated warmth and empathy, and I felt like I could let my guard down around her in a way I couldn’t around other people. Including Faith.
But I liked Faith. I had for a while now. She was chill and focused and creative, a freaking dancing ray of light that always brightened up my day, who I desperately wanted to protect and take care of.
And they were both incredibly pretty.
Dammit. Dammit dammit dammit what is wrong with me? Just like my jackass of a father, can’t keep it in my pants, can’t be happy with what I have, like a real man is supposed to.
But that didn’t matter. I was going on a date with Katie tonight. I was moving on from Faith, because that was the right thing to do, because she didn’t like me back, because she didn’t swing that way and just wasn’t physically attracted to me. And Kate… She made it really easy to want to move on, and she seemed to really want to be with me, for some unfathomable reason. Holding her in my arms made me feel like the strongest person in the world; the way she’d just slid up to me and put herself there like it was the most natural fit possible… It felt really good. I felt really good around her.
My phone buzzed, and I saw from the caller ID that it was my mom.
My finger loomed over the ‘accept call’ button for a solid minute before the phone simply stopped ringing altogether. Then it immediately started ringing again, because my mom was physically incapable of taking no for an answer.
A spark of anger caught in my chest, burning my insides and sending proverbial smoke out of my ears. Goddammit, I was twenty-three years old, financially self-sufficient, and living in my own place. She did NOT get to keep pulling this crap. She hadn’t reached out to me in months and now, when I had something legitimately important to do, she decided it was the perfect time to interrupt. Couldn’t even be bothered to text first, asking if now was a good time.
I thought about a year ago, and the mess I’d become when my mom called before that match, and Kate, back before I’d known she was Kate, before she’d known she was Kate, before she and I could even call ourselves friends, let alone whatever we were now, had held me and comforted me. Didn’t have to be asked, just offered and did her best to make good on that offer. That was when it had started to dawn on me that underneath it all, she really was a kind person with a big heart.
It was also when it really started to dawn on me that my mom was an absolute bitch. Maybe she wasn’t as unbearable as my dad, but it would be a truly Herculean feat to be anywhere near as unpleasant as that selfish asshole.
I hit ‘ignore.’
I breathed out, slowly and carefully, leaning against the wall. I was emphatically not going to cry right now, because I didn’t want Kate to feel like she had to take care of me tonight. I wanted to take care of her, to show her that yes, she really was the cute, sweet, wonderful girl she was trying to be.
The tumblers of our lock shifted as the front door opened. Faith stepped through, a sad smile on her face. “Heyo,” she said. “Your hot date is downstairs waiting for you. Show her a good time tonight, yeah?”
“Of course,” I nodded, double checking my pockets to make sure I had my phone and wallet. Good to go. “You gonna be okay by yourself tonight?”
She gave an errant wave of her hand and said, “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I can get caught up on my soaps.”
“You watch soap operas?” I said, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah, old ones from the 1960s, mostly,” she said. “They’re really funny when you’re stoned.”
“Fair enough,” I said. I gave her a quick hug, which she happily accepted. “Don’t wait up for me!”
“Will do!” she said as I made my way out the door.
I headed down the stairs and out front, where Kate’s pickup truck sat in the thin driveway that led into the parking garage below my building. I did a double-take when I saw her, leaning against the front of her truck. She wore a red dress that covered her chest wholesale, but beneath, what looked like boobs protruded from the dress in question. Falsies, presumably- Faith must have loaned her old ones out. Still, it couldn’t be denied that they looked real good on Kate, bringing the whole look together. Her dress had a slit going up the side, showing off her long, smooth legs well up her thick thighs. Bright red lipstick was painted across her mouth, and my whole body was screaming at me to cup her face in my hands and shove my tongue down her throat. So, of course, in my infinite intelligence and articulation, all I managed to choke out was, “Whoa.”
She smiled the kind of smile you want to protect with every fiber of your being. “Like what you see?” Her voice was high and breathy, each syllable enunciated slowly and carefully. She’d only been out for a few days and she’d already come so far. It was astonishing. It was… She was…
“Absolutely beautiful,” I said, unable to blink.
Her jaw dropped, and she stared at me.
Then a car pulled up behind her and honked at us- I recognized one of my neighbors behind the wheel, an older, heavyset woman named Nina.
“C’mon, let’s get going,” Kate said. She gestured me into the truck and then we pulled out of the driveway. “So, where are we going?” she asked.
“Uh, Indian place on Lincoln Boulevard. It’s over by my old college,” I said, trying not to stare at her too much and venture into the dubious territory of ‘creepy weirdo.’
“Sounds good, I love Indian food,” she smiled again.
Kiss her, you idiot, my brain hollered. Wait, no, she’s driving. Bad idea. But kiss her before the end of the night! “How’d the appointment go?”
“Fantastic! I’ll be able to start hormones hopefully by the end of the week!”
“That’s fantastic!” I said. “How’d the other one go?”
She spat out a petulant sigh. “Less good. My sponsor is…”
“Is?”
“Let’s be charitable and go with ‘pragmatic,’” she said, her voice dropping low. She grunted with frustration and her eyes peeled wide as she heard her own words.
“Hey, it’s okay,” I said, trying my best to sound reassuring. “I don’t mind if you use your… Other voice.” I managed to stop myself from saying ‘boy voice’ or ‘normal voice.’ Thank God.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “It’s… It’s not that I don’t want you to hear it, it’s that I don’t like hearing it.”
“That’s fair,” I said.
“But yeah, if I want to keep Gaines as my sponsor, I may or may not have to lean into this whole trans thing as part of my ‘brand.’ Ugh, I hate that word. Gag me.”
“Is that a request?” I smirked.
She blushed redder than the Red Comet. “What if it is?”
“Then I’d be happy to accommodate.” What the hell, when did I get this bold?! It must have been my dick talking for me. Made sense- I’d spent… Several years not listening to it. How long had it been since I’d last had sex, anyway? Two years? Three?
Getting ahead of yourself, Underhill. “Do you think you’re gonna stick with Gaines?” I asked.
“Don’t see what choice I have,” she replied as she turned onto Lincoln and started driving west. “I don’t exactly have the capital to self-fund. How do you and Faith raise money, anyway?”
“Uh, a couple ways. Grant from our old college, a loan from Faith’s parents, and the money she and I raise doing temporary engineering jobs during the off-season. Usually like…, four, five months full time work with one of the aerospace companies in the city, then we spend the rest of the year working on the fun stuff.”
“I should probably look into something like that,” Kate said. “I don’t dislike working for my parents, but I’m never gonna make the kind of money I need to keep going in the ‘bot battle circuit working twenty hours a week at an indie retail outlet.”
“I have some contacts at a few places that I can send your way,” I offered. “Might be able to help you get a foot in the door, do some interviews.”
“That… Would be amazing,” she beamed. “You’d really do that for me?”
“‘Course I would,” I said. I want you to keep smiling that smile. “I just… Want you to be happy.”
“Thanks,” she said. “For… Everything.”
“No problem, Katie,” I said.
She giggled. God, her laugh was adorable. So, I said that out loud.
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
“You have a cute laugh,” I said simply.
“It’s not cute… I’m not…”
“If you’re about to say you’re not cute, just know that there’s nothing cuter than a cute girl insisting she’s not cute.”
“... Dammit. You’re right.”
“Gotcha,” I said, snapping my fingers.
We carried on like that until we got to the restaurant, where, to my astonishment, we were seated immediately. I ordered a lamb vindaloo with a side of garlic naan, and she ordered butter chicken with onion naan. We split an order of vegetable samosas as well, and we were seated by the window looking out into the street. A pair of candles sat between us on our glass table, casting a bit of glow in the darkened dining area.
“So, you went to that school over there, then?” Kate asked. “LMU?”
“Yeah, all four years.”
“How’d you wind up there?” she asked.
“Uh, well, I applied to UCLA and didn’t get in,” I said with a self-deprecating laugh. “Which is true of, uh, most of the school, actually.”
“They couldn’t get into UCLA?” Kate chuckled.
“Or USC. Or Harvey Mudd. Or Cal Poly.”
“Ahhh, gotcha. You said you grew up around here, right?”
“For a given value,” I said. “I was raised in Riverside.”
“Inland Empire, I see,” she said. “That place as horrifying as David Lynch makes it look?”
I chuckled. “Only when it’s on fire.”
“So, like, all Summer?”
“Pfft, basically.”
“It’s funny, you know, we grew up in the same neck of the woods but never met till we started doing what we do,” Kate said, resting her chin on her hands while her elbows were propped up on the table. “I know that Venice and Riverside aren’t actually that close together-”
“Especially with the traffic in this town making it a longer trek,” I said.
“Still,” she said. “It’s cool, knowing that someone like you was relatively close this whole time.”
Her eyes…
“Zeke?” she asked. “You okay?”
“Hm? Yeah, why?”
“You went quiet and started staring at me,” she said, raising her head, putting her hands flat on the table, concern exuding from her frown. “Did I lay it on too thick?”
I shook my head. “Not at all.” I reached for her hand. “Honestly, I’m worried about doing the same, so why don’t we just be ourselves tonight, and see how that works for us?”
“I’d like that,” she smiled again. That smile…
The server, a middle-aged Indian man with pot-belly and an impressive beard, brought our samosas and a few different sauces over and set them between us. And with him came, very unexpectedly, some familiar faces.
“Zeke?” Olivia asked. She was flanked by her new teammates, Tom, a medium-height black man in his late twenties with a shaved head and massive hands, and Winston, a white boy with a wild mane of brown hair who looked like he was still in college. And standing next to them were Team Forest Fire and Team Sparky-Sparky-Boom.
Forest Fire was three guys all in their thirties, each of them shredded and rocking full beards. Their captain, Lance Masterson, was a behemoth of a white man with a shaved head and some burn marks on his arms and neck; his teammates were Jake George, a tall black man with long dreads and nose ring, and Evan Hernandez, a shorter Mexican-American man built like a powerlifter. Team Spark-Sparky-Boom, meanwhile, was two people, a husband and wife team called David and Eileen Portman. David was comfortably in his early forties, hair more salt than pepper, clean shaven and thin as a rail; Eileen looked like she was in her late thirties, and was shorter and thicker, with long brown hair beginning to spark with silver.
A low-pitched groan escaped my throat, and I was surprised at how loud it was, only to look over and see that Kate was making roughly the same mouth-noise.
“H-h-hey,” I eventually choked out. “How y’all doing?”
“Not bad,” Masterson said.
“Not bad at all!” Hernandez said, snapping his fingers and pointing at Kate.
She blushed, then looked down at her food.
“So, this must be Kate,” Olivia said.
“Um, how do you know about-”
“Faith told me.”
“Faith told you what?” I said, my eyes narrow.
“Oh, just that you’d finally found a girl for you… Wait a sec. Wait wait wait a second. Calloway? Is that you under all that makeup?”
My eyes bulged with panic, and I saw Kate’s lips trembling and her hands wringing together. Oh, this was bad- she wasn’t ready to come out to everyone at work yet, she’d said as much to me in the car ride. She’d been planning to come out in two weeks when she had her next fight, with the same kind of surprise announcement that Faith had been afforded.
And now… Now she was having to come out to her work rivals by accident. For the third time in two weeks.
Goddammit.
“Yeah,” she said, her voice dropping low. Then, in her higher, breathier voice, she said, “Yes. It’s me. My preferred name is Kate, pronouns are she/her.”
Olivia’s eyebrows shot up.
“Oh, so you’re a trans too?” Mrs. Portman said.
I died inside a little bit.
“I, uh, yeah. I’m a trans woman,” Kate said.
“Wow, two of you in the tournament this year, huh? What are the odds?” Mrs. Portman said. “And this isn’t a publicity stunt?”
“Dear, hush, that’s rude,” Mr. Portman said, playfully swatting his wife on the arm, blissfully unaware of the psychic damage he and his wife had just inflicted on Kate.
“No,” Kate said, eyes dropping low, fingers drumming nervously on the table. Oooohhhh dear. “I’m just… I’m a woman.”
“Hey, listen, it’s nice to see you all, but Kate and I were just trying to have a nice, quiet dinner,” I said. “Alone. As in just the two of us-”
“That’s fine, broseph,” Masterson said, “We can all take that big table outside, leave you two to your date.”
“I’d appreciate that a lot,” I nodded, putting a metric ton of emphasis behind each syllable.
“As would I,” Kate said. Practically squeaked. Must… Protect… At all costs.
“No problem, brosephine,” Masterson said. “You look great, bee-tea-dubs.”
They all cleared out and headed for the massive rectangular longtable outside… Except Olivia, who remained standing exactly where she was in front of us with her brow creased and her hands on her hips and her jaw slack.
“Uh, Olivia, you coming with?” Tom asked while standing in the doorway, with an ‘aw shit here we go again’ expression on his face.
“Yeah, I’ll be right there,” Olivia said.
Tom sighed and let the door close as he stepped outside. You tried, Tom. You tried.
“Can, uh, I help you with something?” I said, trying not to get too distressed by Kate’s thousand-yard stare. Given that she’d only a few days prior called out and challenged Olivia in front of a screaming crowd while on camera and then immediately proceeded to have a massive panic attack… I didn’t like what this was almost certainly doing to her brain.
“I just… When Faith said you’d found someone, this wasn’t what I expected,” Olivia said. “Does she… She knows who Kate really is, right?”
“Yeah, she does,” I said, creasing my own brow, “Why do you ask?”
“I just… I really just… Calloway? Seriously?! Calloway?!” Olivia said. “Of all freaking people, you choose Calloway over Faith?!”
“I’m sitting right here, you know,” Kate said.
“R-right. Sorry, I… You look nice,” Olivia said.
“Thanks,” Kate said. “Just, uh, quick question: why do you care?”
“Because I care about Faith,” Olivia said.
“Right, sure you do,” Kate said. “You care so much about the girl you brutally dumped in the most vulnerable moment of her life. Right. Definitely. Absolutely.”
“Also, why would Faith care?” I said, attempting to navigate the conversation away from Kate’s (admittedly accurate) criticism of Olivia. “She and Kate have patched things up- they’re friends now.”
“Really?” Olivia said.
“Yes, really,” Kate said. “She and I hung out literally all day today. She helped me pick out this dress, helped me with my voice. She and I are fine. And she’s fine with this.”
“Oh, honey,” Olivia said. “You don’t… Really believe that. Do you?”
Kate blinked, and her eyes went low again.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“It means-”
“Don’t,” Kate said, slamming her hand against the table.
Olivia took a step back. “Right. Sorry. It’s… Look, Zeke, I know you and I were never super close, but I gotta ask- is Faith really completely on board with all this?”
“Yes! Why wouldn’t she be?” Did someone slip me a crazy-pill? What the hell was going on?!
“I just… Can’t believe you would choose Ke… Kate over Faith,” Olivia said.
“It’s not a choice,” I said, grabbing Kate’s hand and squeezing it tightly, a fire lighting inside my head. “I like Kate. She’s a beautiful woman, inside and out.”
“Phrasing,” Kate said in a thirsty whisper, eyebrows raised.
“Babe, not now,” I said.
“Babe?” she said with a bright smile.
“Babe? Wow,” Olivia said. “This is… A lot to accept, tbh.”
“And why, exactly, do you get a say?” I said.
“I-”
“That was a rhetorical question,” I said. “You don’t. At all.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll back off,” Olivia said, holding up her hands, palms flat. “I just… Can’t help but think you’re making a mistake. You and Faith would be cute together, that’s all I’m saying.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I growled.
“You would be,” Kate whispered.
“What?” I said. Seriously, WHAT?!
“Backing away now,” Olivia said. “I’m sorry for saying anything- you’re right, it’s really none of my business. But, uh, Calloway? I still remember what you said last Friday. I’ll see you in the battle box.”
And with that, she walked away. My head spun with confusion and anger at the implications of what she said, the insinuations, the freaking hubris. And on top of it all, Kate looked ready to cry again.
Our waiter finally came over with our food on a tray and set it down, but looked at us with a worried expression. “Would you two like this to go, by any chance?”
“Yes, please,” Kate and I said simultaneously.
We waited till the food was put in takeaway boxes, and we made a hasty departure. I was pretty sure I heard Mrs. Portman shouting something at us as we walked out the front door, but I wasn’t sure what. “Where should we take all this?” Kate asked.
“I have one idea, if you’re up for it,” I said, with a grin I hoped would be the first step to salvaging this evening.
We headed for Dockweiler Beach, only a few miles from the restaurant, basically deserted in the waning hours of the evening before it was closed to the public. Waves lapped against the sand in a steady, drawling rhythm, and the rich, relaxing scent of seawater filled the air. We sat on a blanket Kate kept in her truck, eating our food while watching the tide crashing into the shore and the setting sun casting an orange-gold glow over everything. Kate had tied her hair back while we ate, but loose strands kept blowing about from the seabreeze and colliding with her face.
I reached over and brushed a strand back, and she smiled at me. “Thank you.”
“Of course. I’m, uh, sorry about what happened.”
“Don’t be, it isn’t your fault,” she said. “Honestly, you handled it really well. Way better than I would have in your position.”
“And what position is that?”
“The guy’s. You’re… You’re a really good guy, Zeke Underhill,” she said, wiping her mouth with a napkin.
I laughed in spite of myself. “That’s nice of you to say. I… I’m not really used to hearing it,” I admitted, slumping my shoulders.
“I find that hard to believe. You’re such a gentleman.”
“I… The thing is,” I started. Oh boy, I was about to admit this to her. This was big. I rarely talked about this. Not even with Faith. “... My parents… Are not the types to give out praise often, and a lot of it had to do with them thinking I wasn’t living up to their expectations of what a man was supposed to be. My Mom… Well, she’s English, she’s got all these old-fashioned, old-world ideas about men and women. She sent me to my room when I cried at a movie once when I was seven. My dad wasn’t much better- kind of a rough and tumble man’s man type. When I didn’t make my high school’s basketball team in ninth grade, he reamed me out for half an hour straight. Never mind the fact that I was short and fat back then. Which they both reminded me of constantly.”
“Jesus Christ, I’m so sorry,” Kate said, putting down her food and placing her hand on my shoulder. I gave it a squeeze. She continued, “My parents have always been so chill and supportive. I can’t even imagine what it’s like to… To grow up with that instead of what I had.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Honestly, I’m mostly over it at this point. I moved out for college when I was eighteen and never looked back. The only thing that really still gets to me is how hypocritical they were about everything. My dad… He’s a total pig, cheats on my mom constantly, and Mom just drinks to forget it every time the proof is thrown in her face. They’re both so full of shit, but I still… I still have this fear sometimes, that they’re right, that I’m not good enough, that there’s something I’m doing wrong, that…”
“That?”
“... That I’ll be a cheater like my dad, constantly balancing multiple girls, stringing along someone I’m supposed to be committed to. I think… I think that’s what bugged me about what Olivia was insinuating, like I was somehow being disloyal to Faith. Which is ridiculous, because… I… And she doesn’t even… And I’m not-”
“Not what?” Kate said, wrapping her arms around me.
“I’m not with her. I probably won’t ever be with her,” I said.
“... You really like her, don’t you?”
“... I’m not sure you want me to answer that question, Katie.”
“You already have,” she said. “It’s kinda obvious.”
“I… I’m sorry, I shouldn’t-”
“Hey, it’s okay,” Kate said, nuzzling my shoulder. “You’re allowed to like more than one person at the same time. And you’ve liked her for a while, I’m not surprised I’m…”
“You’re what?”
“... Second prize.”
“You’re not,” I said, turning around and putting my hands on her cheeks. “Listen to me, Kate Calloway. I recognize we’ve only just started really getting to know each other, but in that time, you’ve shown yourself to be… Amazing. Caring. Funny and thoughtful. Beautiful. I… I don’t know if I deserve you, but I’d like… To keep seeing you like this. To get to know you better, and to hold your hand while you go on this journey.”
Tears streamed out her eyes, and she bit her lower lip before saying, “Would you… Would you still say that if Faith liked you back?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I scoffed. “Faith is gay.”
“...”
I blinked. “Faith is gay, right?”
“I…,” Kate stammered, pulling out of my hands. “I’ve said too much.”
I blinked one long, sustained blink as the gears turned in my head. Faith… Wasn’t gay? And she… It… This made it seem like…
Like she…
No.
Just, just… No.
There was a beautiful girl who I liked in front of me, and I wasn’t gonna let her slip away. “You’re fine. And even if she did, it wouldn’t matter.”
“You… You really mean that?”
“She’s not here with me right now, on this beach, sharing this meal, this evening,” I said. “Life moves forward, not back. If Faith really liked me, she should have said something. You, though, you said something. You made the first move, and… God, I’ve had to do that myself so many times, only for it to fall apart. Do you have any idea how good it makes me feel, that you like me enough to be the one to push things forward? How special that makes me feel? Because it’s amazing… You make me feel… Amazing, Kate.”
She looked at me with those big blue eyes, shining in the multicolored light of dusk as the sun set over the horizon, her red lips spread wide, hope and astonishment and joy radiating out of every inch of her. She gulped, and then she grabbed my lapel and said, “I’m gonna push things forward again now. Is that okay?”
I didn’t answer. I just went for it, pressing her lips against mine, melting into her as we made out on the beach while the sun finished setting. My heart was alight with ecstasy, my lust burning at maximum temperature. I didn’t know for sure if I liked her more than I liked Faith. I just knew that in that moment, there was nobody I’d rather be with, nobody I’d rather be kissing, nobody I’d rather be getting to know.
For just one moment, everything was crystal clear.
“You really had to ask?” I said as I pressed my forehead against hers, reveling in her aftertaste.
She smiled. Oh, Lord, that smile. “I just had to make sure.”
We carried on like that for a while longer, her hands touching mine, my lips touching hers, our bodies interlocking.
#original fiction#serial fiction#trans woman#trans protagonist#web novel#wlw#bisexual#polycule#polyamory#love triangle#enemies to friends to lovers#first date#romcom#romance
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I never thought the day would come, yet here I am, writing about a married couple interacting with one another. I don't know how to feel.
#ao3#ao3 fanfic#fanfiction#fanfic#harry potter#james bond#moriarty the patriot#yuukoku no moriarty#bbc sherlock#crossover#weird crossover#part of a series#shorts#short story#short stories#fictive#serial fiction#serial fanfiction#eurus holmes#enola holmes#william james moriarty#holy shit do I need sleep
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