“I love the color of your hair,” I said to Sandy. “Does someone in town do that? Or do you color it yourself?”
“Aw… you’re sweet! Thank you.” Sandy fluffed his hair as he spoke. As he moved, his messy turquoise locks shifted, and I had to do a double-take. His ears were as pointy as Spock’s. “This is all natural, baby! When I was a kid, I always wished I had sapphire blue hair like my dad, but you learn to live with what you’ve got, am I right? Now I can’t imagine any other color.”
“Oh. Uh… right.” I blinked at him. It took me a minute to remember what I was doing. My hand trembled as I guided the knife through the cake.
“I’m so excited. I haven’t had magic-infused cake for ages,” Sandy enthused.
“Magic-infused? There isn’t any marijuana or anything like that in it.” I shook my head.
Sandy laughed and slapped his leg like I’d told a joke. “Of course not.”
Oh boy.
Meanwhile, Hazel was fussing with her skirt. A protest almost burst out of me when she tugged the outer layer of her skirt free, before I realized she’d just pulled off an outer shell, and she was still wearing a skirt under it and… um… I gulped. There were legs. Not human legs. But… um… long, thin, black spider legs? No, that couldn’t be. I counted them. One… two… all the way up to eight. So, yes. I’d been right.
“Ah, that’s better,” she said when the layer was gone. Those disturbingly long spider legs stretched and wiggled.
I wanted to scream and run away. Maybe even back to the apartment I’d shared with Josh, because as far as I knew, we didn’t have human-sized spiders there.
Hazel tucked her extra skirt layer-thing away in a bag. Then she pulled out knitting needles, but no yarn. Even though I hadn’t looked away, I couldn’t figure out where her, uh, thread—was that the right word?—was coming from. I was a little queasy to realize she was making it herself. Oh God. There was a spiderlady in my grandfather’s shop, and she was knitting a small blanket with freakishly thick spider webbing.
“So, cake?” Sandy asked, pulling my attention away from the giant spider-person.
“Oh! I love cake!” Tulip exclaimed.
Did they not see the enormous spider knitting beside them? How were they so comfortable with this?
“Uh, right,” I agreed, setting the cake on the table. With a shaky hand, I dished up the cake and served pieces to Sandy and Tulip.
“Me too, dear,” Hazel said. She waved one of her knitting needles toward the corner. “And don’t forget Eugene.”
I slid a piece of cake toward Hazel, trying not to get too close. Because spider! Then I carried a piece in the direction she’d waved.
“Oh, you don’t need to worry about a plate for Eugene,” Sandy said. “We usually drop a bit on the floor for him. Doesn’t need to eat much, does he?”
Yeah. That wasn’t going to happen, particularly since the floor around where Tulip was sitting was already wet and water was rolling in that direction. The idea of watery spice cake sounded awful. I set the plate on the floor. The shadow in the corner shivered, and I got the sense it—Eugene—was happy.
“Oh, good,” Hazel said, glancing at Eugene’s plate. “He has enough to share with George, too. The poor dear must be beside himself with worry. I expect he’ll have some choice words for Elwood when he returns.”
Was she talking about my grandfather’s pet mouse? I returned to the table and collapsed into one of the seats. Was I too human to cope with all of this?
Then I heard the back door open again. Now what? I scrambled to my feet as Gideon and Az strolled in. Gideon was holding a large paper bag.
He glanced around at the others. “Good. You’re all here.”
“Isn’t anyone else coming tonight?” Tulip asked with a frown.
“Too short notice for Mellgren. I’m not sure about the others, but I think this might be it for tonight.” Gideon shook his head. Then he thrust the paper bag into my arms. It was heavy, warm, and smelled of greasy pub food. “Here.”
“What is it?”
“I wasn’t sure what you’d like, but I figured you probably hadn’t eaten yet. So there’s salad, burgers, onion rings, wings, shepherd’s pie, nachos…” He paused to sniff the air. “And I think Alvin threw in some fish and chips, too.”
I glanced down at the bag. No wonder it was so heavy. He’d brought half his menu. “I’ll never eat all this.”
“But you will eat something, right?” The look he gave me was so damn earnest that I couldn’t say no.
“Why don’t we spread it out, and everyone can take some?” I suggested.
