My phone buzzed, startling me. I rolled over and reached across the bed to pick it up, then frowned when I saw it was from my coworkers. Our supposed-to-be-professional group chat was lit up with tons of unread messages.
All of them mocking me.
My face went hot with embarrassment.
Sure enough, Pete was taunting me about my jackalope discovery. My stomach sank. If Pete knew, Lance must've told him, and I doubted it was in a positive way.
Pete: always knew you were a dreamer Freddy but this is too much
Pete: a jackalope!!! lmao
Pete: what's next, a unicorn
His comment was followed by a mocking laughing emoji. I glared at the phone, pinching my lips together.
Jake's arms curled around me. "Now, why's my baby frowning?" he asked while stroking my back. He gave my screen a curious glance.
"My meathead coworkers," I muttered.
As Jake read the messages, I felt him tense.
"Are they talking about me?" Jake asked in a low voice.
I grimaced. "Sorry you had to see their stupid comments. I didn't mean to offend you."
Jake scoffed. "Oh, I'm not offended. They can think whatever they want about me. But I'll be damned if they talk to my mate that way."
I was surprised by how fierce Jake sounded.
"Can I borrow that?" Jake asked, thrusting out his hand.
"Sure," I said, blinking as I handed it over. What was he planning to do?
Mumbling something aboutno good sons of bitchesunder his breath, Jake set up my phone's selfie mode, then handed it back to me. When I took it, he popped into his jackalope form. The sudden appearance of his comically long ears and proud antlers shocked me into a laugh.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
Jake puffed out his chest, fluffing out his fur. "Proving those jerks wrong. Go on. Snap a pic for 'em."
"Are you sure?"
He nodded, his ears and antlers bowing. "Sure am."
I shrugged and took a bunch of pictures. We focused on his antlers, proving that they were real deer-like ones and not a result of SPV. Then we took a bunch in different positions so they could see Jake was a living creature and not a fake cryptid taxidermy specimen.
At first our photo session was serious, since Jake wanted to give a bigfuck youto my coworkers, but then it devolved into the two of us goofing off and having fun. We took a photo where Jake stood on my head, then another where he was behind me so it looked like his ears and antlers were coming out ofmyhead. By the end of it we were both laughing so hard we cried.
I halfheartedly sent a bunch of photos to the chat then closed my phone, no longer caring what they had to say. They could believe it or not. It didn't matter to me. I knew the truth. And I sure as hell had conducted better science than their narrow-minded selves.
Jake shifted back into human form with a big grin. He tilted my chin towards him and his lips found mine.
"You're so handsome when you laugh," he said.
The rest of the world disappeared, and the only thing I saw was Jake. I forgot the stress and irritation of academia and interpersonal conflicts. It all melted off my back like beads of water, replaced by quivers of pleasure.
My phone was blowing up. When we came up for air again, I glanced at it halfheartedly. As I scrolled through the flurry of messages, Pete's insistence that the photos were doctored become less and less certain. Finally he was begging me for co-ordinates, or to capture the specimen to bring back for study. I couldn't help but laugh. That was so typical of him—putting me and my research down until he wanted something from me.
"Would ya look at that? The big bad alpha's suddenly jealous," Jake said.
