“Is that your Uber?It’s yellow.”
Kai was right.The truck-car thing was very yellow indeed.
“Don’t you like yellow?”
Kai shrugged.“Wouldn’t get a yellow pickup is all.”
“Oh.Well.This was what was available.”
“I was not complaining.Not at all.Let’s get out of here.”
Fian would never tell a dreamer to their face, but in his opinion, humans were just not graceful.He had watched them sleeping, had sometimes watched them on their boats or lazing around on islands and yachts.The grace of merfolk, they had not.Any sea toad was more graceful than a trained human swimmer, and yet when Kai climbed into Zazine’s pickup car, Fian was enchanted.
Chiefly, he was enchanted by the excellent view of Kai’s butt, though that seemed basic and demeaning, and honestly, everything about Kai was as wonderful as finding just the perfect piece of driftwood on the shore.
“Hi,” Zazine said.Her dark eyes closely examined Kai before she looked at Fian, who climbed inside the car quickly and closed the door behind him.
“Hey there.Sorry, he’s Fian,” Kai said.
Fian was confused by this, but Zazine was playing along, nodding and putting her car into drive.“So we’re going…”
“To the mall,” Fian said.He knew humans liked going there although it had been more popular maybe a decade ago, maybe two.
“Exactly,” Zazine said.
Kai turned to Fian, looking up at him.“Really, thank you for this.”
Fian’s heart felt as if it were about to melt like human chocolate.He leaned forward, reaching around Kai to grab his seat belt.“You’re welcome.”He pulled the belt around his landbride-to-be and clicked it home.“But you have to help me buy a phone too, remember?”
Kai beamed, and Fian loved that there were no more tears waiting to spill from his human’s eyes.“I’m actually really looking forward to that.”
Fian had never once been to a mall.Smaller stores here and there to get those human things he owned, yes, but a mall was something else.
“This isn’t actually all that far away from Salt Harbor.I don’t think I’ve ever been here.”
Kai had his hands in his pockets and his shoulders up.Fian couldn’t easily read that emotion, but he figured keeping up with Kai’s long strides and not leaving his side would be enough.
“Sometimes when you find a good thing, you loathe that it took you so long.But maybe—you know what?You are right.I definitely wish you had given me jam before yesterday.”
Kai stopped and looked over his shoulder.“I didn’t use to make jam.”He looked around.“Let’s head in there.I really need pants.”
And Kai, that wonderful, magnificent, delicious human freed a hand from his pocket and reached for Fian, pulling him along across the smooth white floor.
Fian followed, stunned.The mall was noisy, much more like the human realm should be.Salt Harbor really was too quiet.Here, there were young humans around and old ones, loud ones and those just minding their own business.A group of adolescents ran past just ahead of them.
All of them can see us here, holding hands.
Fian had studied humans.He had possibly read more than a few human books, tasting ink as he eagerly turned pages, and he knew what it meant.Public displays of affection are good.Before, it wasn’t even a minute, and it was just us, but now, in front of all these people?He likes me!
Fian smiled, happiness threatening to unravel his human complexion.They walked past a mannequin group display, and looking at the blandness of those dolls helped Fian steady his own color, but it was a close call.As it was, he might have slipped a sucker onto the palm of his hand, but he wasn’t sure.Kai, at any rate, gave no indication that anything was amiss at all.
12
Kaiwasn’tparticularlyfondof shopping sprees, but with the maroon pants itching and that fucking blue shirt too tight around his neck, he couldn’t wait to get the clothes off.
It was the noises of the mall, the buttery scent of popcorn hanging in the air, that had soothed Kai with the strange familiarity of a freedom he hadn’t enjoyed in a long while.
A freedom?Was I caught?I guess so.I didn’t have a car, and I couldn’t leave.And Nick, Nick he…
