“Yes, we heal fast.”
“Yes, hunters have been a problem for centuries.”
“No, I’m not telling you exactly how many of us there are.”
He pouts a little at that last one. It shouldn’t be as charming as it is.
When the food is done, he loads up the plates. And that’s when the utensil problem presents itself.
He hands me a plate piled high with food… and a fork. The fork looks like a child’s toy in my hand.
We both stare at it for a second.
Then his eyes flick from the fork to my fingers, to my face, and I can see the realization crash into him like a wave. “Oh,” he says. “Oh no. I didn’t—I’m so sorry, I didn’t think about?—”
“My hands work,” I say, more defensively than I mean to. “I have perfectly good manners. I don’t eat like a dog out of a bowl.”
His eyes go wide.
“That isn’t what I meant,” he blurts, horrified. “I swear that’s not what I meant. I’m just now realizing that everything in your world has to be sized differently, and this is—God, Elias, use your brain?—”
He’s chastising himself now, cheeks flushed pink, eyes darting everywhere but my face. The rush of his embarrassment radiates off him.
My defensiveness cools instantly, replaced by guilt. “I know you didn’t mean it that way,” I say, softening my tone. “I’m just not used to… this. Eating with humans. Being handed cutlery the size of a twig.”
His gaze flicks back to me, brow creased. “I really am sorry.”
“I know,” I say. And I do.
I look down at the fork and then at him. At his small, neat plate and his small, neat utensils. At the table and the chairs and this attempt at something almost like a… date?
The thought hits me hard enough to rattle my bones.
I can’t believe I’m about to do this.
“Do you… want me to shift?” I hear myself ask.
He frowns. “Shift?”
“Into my human form,” I clarify.
He drops his fork. It clatters against the plate and bounces onto the ground. He just stares at me.
“You can do that easily?” he whispers, as if this is somehow more shocking than everything else that has happened.
“Yes,” I say. “It’s… complicated. But yes.”
His eyes are huge.
“Only if it will make you more comfortable,” I add quickly. “I don’t need it. I can eat like this.”
He shakes his head hard. “No, I—I mean, yes, it would… probably be easier. But you don’t have to do anything for my sake. I invitedyou.”
There’s that warmth again. That earnest, unguarded way he has of caring.
I sigh and roll my shoulders, feeling the tension bunch there. “If I stay like this,” I say, “I’ll spend the entire time worrying about crushing your table or snapping your chair or flinging a fork through your window. If I shift, I only have to worry about you being weird about nudity.”
His blush surges so fast and hot I can feel it from here.
