“Now you have no excuse not to keep in touch,” Sylvia declared triumphantly.
“Or try modern dating,” Joy added with a wink.
The room erupted in laughter at Henry’s horrified expression. He forced his face into what he hoped resembled gratitude rather than panic.
“It’s already activated,” Logan explained, clearly enjoying his brother’s discomfort. “Joy loaded all the family contacts. Even downloaded some useful apps to get you started.”
“Like mate.com,” Joy stage-whispered to raucous family amusement.
Henry suppressed a groan. “The right mate appears when the time is right,” Aunt Maria said kindly, perhaps taking pity on him.
“Mate.com sure helped Jessie and me,” Aunt Dana added. “Sometimes you need technology to find what fate already knows.”
“Henry would make some woman an excellent mate,” Joy insisted, nudging him. “He’s just hidden away where no one can find him.”
Henry maintained stoic silence, his expression growing more wooden by the minute. His bear instincts were growling for escape, for the peaceful solitude of his cabin where no one discussed his love life or lack thereof.
“Look at Henry’s face,” Mason laughed. “Like we’re suggesting he wrestle a mountain lion.”
“A mate might actually be less dangerous than Henry’s preferred company,” Logan added. “At least she wouldn’t have claws and fangs.”
“Unless that’s what he likes,” quipped Uncle Jessie.
Henry endured the teasing with gritted teeth, counting the minutes until he could reasonably excuse himself without offending his father. When the enormous birthday cake appeared, he briefly contemplated using the distraction to slip away unnoticed, but his mother’s watchful eye caught his glance toward the door.
“You’re staying the night as planned,” she informed him quietly but firmly. “Your old room is all made up.”
He knew better than to argue. As the party gradually began to disperse, with uncles and aunts gathering their respective families to return to their own houses scattered across the ranch property, Henry felt the tightness in his chest begin to ease. Logan and Mason announced plans to meet friends in town, earning envious thoughts from Henry about their easy escape.
Finally excusing himself, Henry climbed the familiar stairs to his childhood bedroom. The space had been converted to a guest room years ago, but still contained enough remnants of his youth to feel uncomfortably personal. Trophy buckles from teenage rodeo competitions. A bookshelf still holding well-worn field guides and wildlife journals.
The contrast between this room and his cabin struck him anew. Here, everything spoke of the wealthy, socially connected family he’d been born into. The expensive furniture. The framed artwork. The plush carpet beneath his feet. His cabin, with its handmade furniture and practical simplicity, reflected the lifehe’d chosen instead. A life where success was measured in quiet moments of connection with the forest, not business deals or social engagements.
He sat on the edge of the bed. Logan and Mason had adapted to their roles in the family business while maintaining active social lives. Even Uncle Cyrus, similarly uncomfortable with crowds, had found his mate and created a life on the farm.
Why was it so difficult for Henry to do the same?
The new smartphone sat accusingly on the bedside table. With a resigned sigh, he picked it up, turning the sleek device over in his large, calloused hands. Technology had never come easily to him. He preferred tools he could understand, with visible moving parts and straightforward functions. This glossy rectangle seemed designed to confuse and frustrate.
“Damn thing,” he muttered, pressing what he hoped was the power button.
The screen flickered to life, displaying a setup menu that might as well have been written in ancient Greek. Henry squinted at the tiny text. Just as he was about to toss the device aside and call it a night, a text message notification appeared.
Joy: “Don’t forget to set up your mate.com profile! Already downloaded the app for you. No excuses, cousin! ”
Henry groaned, tempted to power off the phone and “accidentally” drop it in a cattle trough. But guilt nagged at him. His family genuinely worried about his solitude, even if their methods of addressing it drove him crazy. Joy had gone to the trouble of buying the phone and setting it up for him. The least he could do was look at the app once before deleting it.
He reluctantly tapped the mate.com icon, bracing himself for an equally frustrating setup process. To his surprise, the interface was relatively straightforward, clearly designed for even the most technologically challenged shifters to navigate.
The profile creation asked basic questions. Name, age, shifter type. For his photo, he grudgingly selected the picture Joy had already loaded to the phone. When prompted for a self-description, Henry typed with deliberate bluntness. “Forest ranger. Live alone in a cabin miles from town. Prefer solitude and wildlife to people and parties.”
There. That should scare off any potential matches. No woman would read that and think, “Yes, that’s exactly the social isolation I’ve been looking for in a relationship.”
He completed the personality questionnaire with minimal effort. When asked his “spirit vegetable,” he scowled and randomly selected “potato.”
He wasn’t looking for a mate. He was completing this profile solely to get Joy and his mother off his back for a few weeks.
He hit “Submit” with a sense of finality, ready to power off the phone and collapse into much-needed sleep after the social marathon of the evening.
