“You always seem so, like, embarrassed by your kraken form.” He moves a tentacle to rub his octopus face. “I thought you’d think I was extra gross.”
My smile falls. As someone who got rejected by his parents for being gayandfor being a cephalopod, you’d think I’d come off as more accepting. “I will always look out for you. We’re family.” He doesn’t reply for a beat, so I continue, “Hey, whydon’t you take a sick day from school, and we take your new form to the beach?”
“You wanna watch me swim?”
“I’ll even swim with you.”
Aisen shifts down to his tiny kraken form, with his six tentacles where his legs were. “Really?” he asks in his squeaky, prepubescent voice.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t you have work?”
With a shrug, I reply, “I’ll just work from home after lunch. What do you say, Eyes-and-ears?”
He smiles and nods. “Okay.”
“Perfect.” I stand up. “But don’t get in the habit of missing school. This is a one-time thing.”
“I got you,” he replies, and we share a smile. Minutes later, I drive Aisen to the beach. For the first time in years, we swim around each other in our tentacled forms, chasing after schools of fish, and generally having a good time, de facto father and son. It’s one of the rare moments I truly feel like I’m doing this parenting thing right.
The next two weeks are a breeze. Aisen has finally made shifter friends, and they socialize both at the Institute and at school. He’s accepted his giant octopus form, and everyone at the Institute is thrilled to be able to help him adjust to this new part of his life. He has more pep in his step, and I’m comfortable waving him off to go on his Halloween overnight field trip to visit museums in Northern California.
Which leaves me with a particularly quiet house. I have the whole weekend to myself, on Halloween, no less. My brother and I used to have fun on the holiday, since we’re both sea-based monsters. But life happens, and I haven’t partied on Halloween in ages. But I have no work, no nephew, and plenty of time on my tentacles.
Sitting in my living room, I stare at my phone in silence for two whole minutes before gathering all my courage to push a button. To my surprise, the phone only rings twice.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Skyler,” I yelp. I clear my throat and lower my voice. “It’s me. Reed Sung.”
“I do, in fact, have you in my contact list.” He chuckles over the phone.
“Right.” I stare at my coffee table and nerves thrum through me. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”
“Not at all. Just leaving work. How’s Aisen? His trip thing is this weekend, yeah?”
“Yup. I just dropped him off. The kid couldn’t hop on the bus fast enough.” We both laugh.
“It’s going to be quiet without the teens at the Institute this weekend. But we have some stuff for younger kids during the day.”
“And the evening?” I ask.
“Nothing planned for work. Why, what’s up?”
My heart is pounding in my throat. Just get it over with, Reed. “Do you want to do something? Since we’re, you know, friends.”
“Don’t you have work?”
“Actually, no.”
“Wow. No nephew, no work. What do you do for fun?”
“Well, you.” I wince. “I mean, I was hoping you could, uh, tell me something fun to do.” I shake my head. “Sorry, I’m really shit at this whole, free-time-as-an-adult thing.”
Skyler gives a friendly laugh. “Ah, I see. Well, I myself am not an activity.” His grin is somehow audible over the phone. “However, Halloween night is actually Razorjaw’s birthday. We were going to go to Dagat, the waterfront bar. My friends and I were gonna party it up.”
“That sounds nice.”
