I haul myself out of bed and shuffle to the kitchen in my pyjamas, hair doing something I am going to pretend is not happening.
Hex is standing at my counter, looking deeply unimpressed. He has rearranged the mugs. All of them. Arranged by size in a neat descending row, handles pointing the same direction, which is not how I organise them and is going to irritate me every morning for the foreseeable future.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Improving the system.”
“There was nothing wrong with the system.”
“You had a mug that says World’s Okayest Person next to one that says Hustle Harder.” He turns to look at me, red eyes glowing softly in the morning light. “I put them at the back.”
“I like those mugs.”
“That’s concerning.”
“They were gifts. Felix gave me the Okayest one.”
“I see.” He turns back to the counter. “The coffee jar was on the wrong side of the kettle. You’re right-handed.”
“I’ve been making coffee in this kitchen for six months.”
“Inefficiently.”
I press my fingers against my eyes. I need coffee before I can have this argument. “Move,” I say.
He steps aside with far more grace than is reasonable. I fill the kettle and reach for the coffee jar, which is now on the right and is, infuriatingly, easier to reach. I say nothing about this.
“The crystals on the windowsill are facing the wrong direction,” Hex says from behind me.
“The crystals are staying where they are.”
“They’re not doing anything. The wards faded days ago.”
“They’re decorative now. I’ve grown to like them.”
“They’re cluttered.”
I spin around. He is leaning against the opposite counter, arms crossed, head tilted, wearing that expression. The one that is somehow both insufferably smug and deeply entertained. The one that makes me want to slap him and also, traitorously, to smile.
I do not smile.
“Are you going to be like this all morning?” I snap.
“Like what?”
“Like...” I wave a hand at him, at all of him. “This.”
“I’m simply making observations.”
“You’re being annoying.”
“Annoyingly helpful.”
“Those aren’t the same thing!”
“They can be.” He smiles. It does terrible things to my already frayed sense of well-being. “You look very cute when you’re exasperated, by the way.”
“Don’t.” I point at him. “I’m not cute. I’m annoyed.”
