Blending In

by RJ Blain

  “I’m more fun than a basket of ferrets. Go home, Miriah. I’ll pick you up early, and I’ll even make sure Caleb makes it to school.”

  I’d need to find extra presents to repay Tiana. “Thank you. I owe you one.”

  “You sure do, but I’ll accept juicy gossip about your quest to validate your tramp stamp in exchange.”

  “I’m swiping left on your generous offer.”

  “Live a little! That divine didn’t bar you from all of life’s pleasures. Look on the bright side. Any man who gets past that curse ain’t kidding around. No doubt, right?’

  “I don’t find that comforting right now.”

  “It’s only a few weeks. How bad can it be?”

  Chapter Two

  Expecting to spend most of December as a chameleon, I headed home to make plans. I couldn’t disappoint Caleb; last Christmas, his divine and time-impaired father forgot to visit, and while my son did his best to hide the hurt, I’d caught him crying.

  Caleb loved Gavin far more than he deserved, which made the damned curse even harder to swallow.

  I tried, but I couldn’t be my son’s mother and father. Unfortunately, the curse made it difficult to find a step-father for Caleb and did a good job of ensuring I played both roles when Gavin wasn’t around, which was most of the time.

  Chaos greeted me when I stepped through the door. Despite the two-week rule for Christmas decorations, someone named Caleb was sorting through my ornaments, a tinsel explosion ravaged most of the living room, and a mountain of shining lights overwhelmed my coffee table.

  As far as child-created disasters went, I could deal with a holiday-themed mess without losing my temper. My son didn’t create messes without a good reason, and nature would run its course within a few hours. His father’s divine influence would take hold and manifest as some form of OCD.

  If my son couldn’t restore the apartment to rights within three or four hours, I’d have an epic temper tantrum and general meltdown on my hands, the kind I’d only resolve through helping him with copious amounts of cleaning and decorating.

  It wasn’t Caleb’s fault he carried a god’s genes and tendencies, and despite Gavin’s best efforts, everything had a place and purpose, and when something fell out of place, he needed to fix it.

  I closed the door behind me, fighting my initial urge to snap at Caleb for breaking the rules. For a twelve-year-old, he rarely broke my rules, and when he did, there was usually a reason for it.

  Sometimes, that reason involved him being his father’s son.

  All I needed to do was rein in my temper long enough to figure out why my son had taken leave of his senses and broke our tradition of decorating the tree two weeks before Christmas.

  It took me thinking through the situation twice to find the silver lining: I wouldn’t have to test all the damned little LED lights to make sure they met my son’s standards, which meant perfection. If one was even slightly too dim, I’d have to replace the entire string. No matter how many times I argued to replace just the one light, he wouldn’t hear anything of it.

  The entire string would have to go, replaced with a new, perfect one.

  The lights needed to be perfect.

  Christmas needed to be perfect.

  Maybe it would do me a little good to lift my standards to his and care less about how much money I spent satisfying him.

  No, I would not allow my frustrations to hurt Caleb. I drew in a breath, held it, and waited until my annoyance bled away to nothing. I exhaled. “Thank you for testing the Christmas lights. What’s going on?”

  Caleb flashed me a brilliant smile. “Dad’s bringing a tree tonight. He felt bad about last year and called asking if we had a tree yet. I told him about your two-week rule because you’re worried about live trees catching fire. He promised he’d bring a good tree over tonight, and it won’t be a fire risk! He promised.”

  Every time Gavin came around, my temper flared, boiling beneath my skin and threatening to erupt. Every time I thought we’d settled in his long absences, he showed up and renewed our son’s excitement, which made for a difficult few months while Caleb hoped his father would stick around for just a little longer.

  Gavin couldn’t leave my little family alone, could he? He pulled the same crap with the other mothers and the children he’d created on his spree thirteen years ago, I bet.

  “No, I don’t,” the deep voice of Caleb’s father announced behind me.

  As was his way, the bastard had managed to open the door without me noticing.

  “I should be yelling at you about fire risks for putting the tree up too early, but it seems you’ve informed our son you have found a magical fire-resistant pine tree.”

  “Magic, dear Miriah. It won’t dry out or catch fire. I know how much trees worry you, so I wouldn’t bring a fire hazard into your apartment. Have you given any thought into moving into a house? There’s a nice one I’ve got in mind for you.”

  Alarm bells went off, and I turned to face the father of our son, planting my hands on my hips. Any other day, I would’ve been exchanging basic courtesies and running away so they could visit without my bad mood getting in the way.

  When Gavin normally mentioned houses, he was the primary part of the picture. It was his house I was moving into, and he always phrased his question in such a way it was clear we knew he hadn’t given up on his quest to marry me.

  “No, Gavin. I’m sorry my apartment offends you. I’ll allow the tree, but I’m going to my bedroom while you two handle it. I’ve been transferred today, and I need to email my new boss.”

  Caleb sighed. “Fired again, Mom?”

  His assumption stung despite it being justified. “No. Transferred until after Christmas. My boss is helping someone he knows with a business problem. I’m qualified to do the work, so I’m being loaned out. I wasn’t fired.”

  Yet.

  “Wow. Good job, Mom!”

  Gavin’s brows rose. “What he said. I’m impressed, Miriah. It’s a new record. Given a few weeks, you’ll have held the same job for six entire months.”

  Why couldn’t I smack the smug look off the divine’s face? Oh, right. He’d find some way to worsen the curse. To add insult to injury, my son expected me to be fired despite having found some stability at my current job. “No thanks to you, Gavin.”

  “Maybe if better men interested you, you wouldn’t be in your position right now.”

  “Dad,” Caleb protested. “Mom’s been doing really well lately. Be nice.”

  “Why? She won’t marry me.”

  Our son rolled his eyes. “Duh. You’re inconsistent. Mom hates that. You’d kill each other within a month. I love you Dad, but you’re not good for Mom.”

  Elation surged through me. “Thank you, Cal. Now, I do have some work to do. You two have fun with the tree. No fires, and make sure you get rid of the strings of old lights that run hot like you promised.”

  “I boxed them to be thrown out,” my son replied.

  I smiled, detoured on my way to my bedroom long enough to kiss my son’s cheek, and retreated to safety. “Try not to cry over your loss, Gavin.”

  “You haven’t won this yet, Miriah.”

  Like hell I hadn’t. “Whatever you say, Mr. Divine.”

  “You don’t need to be mean,” my son’s father complained.

  “Stop whining, Dad. If Mom was being mean, she’d yell at you to leave. She even stayed home this time. She’s being nice.”

  There really was no hiding anything from my son, was there?

  I emailed Chase with a list of everything I needed to play corporate spy, and I giggled over my addition of a chameleon-compatible harness with a camera attached. I informed him about the realities of corrupted or modified data; unless the source remained clean of tampering, his numbers might never add up. As I wanted to regain control of my life as quickly as possible, I detailed what sort of information I needed, how I’d use it, and at what points industrious saboteurs might modify the data.
>
  As part of my job, I’d hunt for discrepancies, but I could only do so much unless he provided me with complete financial information and permitted me to do a full evaluation of his business.

  To make it clear how much work needed to be done, I wrote up an example spreadsheet, explained the finer points of creating an accurate projection, and left a list of potential candidates behind the discrepancies. At the top of my list was someone within his marketing department, who had the most to lose for poor performance.

  I worried tomorrow would test my patience, skills, and luck.

  The email ate three hours of time, and the murmur of conversation in the living room warned me that Gavin lingered. I figured his magic warned him whenever his curse activated, and I’d spent an enormous amount of time as a chameleon lately and would continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

  It was only a matter of time before he poked his nose in my business again.

  I steeled myself for exposure to the jealous divine and marched into the other room. A tinsel disaster, a half-decorated tree, and a bucket of fried chicken from my favorite waited for me.

  If the pair hadn’t saved me any, I’d find out if I could strangle an annoying divine.

  “Having fun?”

  My son ignored me as expected, lost in his work. Every ornament would be hung just right, and he had his ruler out to ensure perfect placement. On a bad day, he cleaned the apartment, measured everything five times, and otherwise drove me to the brink of insanity because nothing ever met his standards. On a good day, like today, he focused his effort on decorating a tree.

  Artistic yet perfect.

  Gavin smirked. “Have fun working?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes.” Despite the one-sided nature of it, I’d spent three glorious hours helping Chase.

  It suited me very well, and I wouldn’t let some jealous divine ruin my good mood.

  “We saved you some chicken,” he added.

  I scratched murdering said jealous divine from my schedule. “Thank you. How long are you sticking around for this time?”

  Caleb froze at my question.

  “A while.”

  “You still have that loft near Caleb’s school?” To give credit where credit was due, Gavin kept a property in New York City where he could spend time with Caleb without me underfoot.

  “Of course.”

  Of course. Divines conjured money at their whim. “If you swear to get Caleb to school on time every day and bring him back sometime Christmas morning, go do whatever it is boys do in December without me getting in the way. Morning is a period of time up until noon, not one minute after noon, not exactly noon. Before noon. Caleb, you’re responsible for reminding your time-impaired father which day is Christmas.”

  Caleb’s OCD would keep them around for at least six more hours as he wouldn’t cut corners to leave earlier unless I took steps to break the cycle. “I’ll finish decorating the tree, Caleb, so please leave notes on how you want it decorated this year, and I’ll make sure it’s done properly.”

  “You mean it, Mom?” my son squealed.

  I wasn’t sure which excited him more: going with his father or knowing I’d finish for him to his standards rather than mine.

  “I mean it. Can you handle him for a few weeks, Gavin?”

  “Will you provide an instruction manual if I require help?” he countered.

  “You can call me. You can also ask Caleb. Despite his short stature, he can handle the basics with minimal help.”

  “You’re never going to cut me any slack, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Mom,” Caleb complained.

  Why were they both complaining at me? I stole the bucket of chicken and checked to see how much the gluttons had left for me. Amazingly, I’d have leftovers tomorrow, and I spied at least three drumsticks demanding my immediate attention. “I’m not even going to be upset if you leave the decorating to me and go get packed.”

  The instant my words left my mouth, my son bolted for his room.

  “You’re such a liar,” Gavin muttered. “You’re going to be sobbing your eyes out the instant we leave.”

  I grabbed a drumstick and pointed it at the divine. “But I’ll do it with fried chicken in hand.”

  “How classy.”

  “Just remember the rules, asshole. No teaching him bad habits, he’d better be the happiest young man in New York, and if the cops call me again because you got him into trouble, I will end you.”

  “You’re blowing that out of proportion.”

  “A police chief came to my house to tell me I had to bail your divine ass out of prison. He laughed at me.”

  “He was laughing with you until you transformed into a chameleon because of a cute cop. Also, that cop? Total dick. You should be thanking me for the curse for that time.”

  “I wouldn’t have cared if Caleb hadn’t witnessed the entirety of that fiasco.”

  Gavin smirked. “I know something you don’t know.”

  “You know a lot I don’t know. You’re a god. I’m not.”

  “You could just agree to marry me, you know. You’d save yourself a lot of hassle. I’ll even behave for however long you live.”

  Remaining loyal for my lifespan wouldn’t be too much of a burden for a divine; from what I could tell, Gavin counted his age in millennia. I’d die in a blink of his eye.

  I took a bite out of my chicken and arched a brow. Then, solely because I knew it drove him to the brink of insanity, I chewed and chewed and chewed until he started twitching. “While I appreciate your contribution to Caleb’s life, you and me are a disaster waiting to happen. You sampled the wares, got bored, and wandered off to sample more wares. Had you only sampled my wares and stuck around like you meant it from the start, you wouldn’t be regretting things right now. That’s fine. I can handle it. You piss me off most of the time, but I’ll never regret having Caleb, and to have Caleb, I needed you. But you’re not husband material, Gavin.”

  “Harsh.”

  “But true. Treat Caleb right this Christmas, and try to spend some time with your other kids, too. When you bother to show up, you do the dad thing fairly well.” I could give him that much.

  He tried.

  “He’ll be safe with me.” Something in Gavin’s expression darkened, and his blue eyes took on a shadowed, haunted glaze.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Gavin sighed, and the humanity of the sound startled me into narrowing my eyes and looking him over.

  Divines rarely showed the remnants of their humanity.

  “Gavin?”

  “Caleb’s the only one of my children left.”

  People died, children included, and being the child of a divine didn’t grant long years or immortality. My heart ached for him. “What happened?”

  “It’s why I didn’t show up last year. My last daughter died a few days before Christmas.”

  I added my name as a candidate for Asshole of the Year. Trying to imagine a life without Caleb hurt so much I struggled to breathe. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Icy roads, unexpected storm. Her and her mother died in a car accident.” He paused, and he pressed his lips together into a thin line. “Neither suffered.”

  Some days, I wondered what it would be like to live forever—or at least for a few millennia. But then I remembered a simple, agonizing truth: the divine had rules, and those rules dictated when and how they could meddle in mortal affairs. One day, I might understand how he could curse people like me but couldn’t save the lives of his children. “I’m still sorry.”

  “I can magic a pine tree to never burn, but I can’t fight fate. I can’t change circumstance. I can’t circumvent choice. I can’t bring back the dead, and I can’t work miracles, not like others can.”

  “Still. That must be hard.”

  While the scale differed, I thought I could understand. I raised the child of a god, and Caleb came bundled with more problems than I liked admitting. He was as much my son
as Gavin’s.

  Gavin had OCD tendencies, and I suspected it had something to do with his portfolio. One day, maybe he’d share the truth with me.

  “It is. I am always with my children when they die. They didn’t know I was there, but I watched over them all the same.”

  My traitor heart broke for the divine, and while it wouldn’t change anything between us, I couldn’t ignore what was written between the lines and in the words he wouldn’t say.

  “You should tell Caleb, Gavin. He’s old enough to understand. You’ll never be my husband, but I’ll work on pretending I don’t hate sharing space with you when you come to see him.”

  It was the best I could offer him without it becoming a lie.

  “I’ll accept a cranky friendship.”

  “If you disappoint our son, I’ll find some way to make you pay for it. Just to be clear.”

  “Understand. And just to be clear: I’m not removing the curse. If any man wants to be your husband, he better be worthy.”

  “I hope you’ll accept a very cranky friendship punctuated with murder attempts.”

  “You wouldn’t actually try to kill me. You’ll just think about it.”

  “Often.”

  “I wish you luck finding a man capable of loving a woman who turns into a lizard in his presence. You’ll need it.”

  “Not all men are sex-driven freaks like you.”

  “You’re being mean again.”

  “But honest.”

  “But honest,” he conceded. “Hey, Miriah?”

  “What?”

  “Are you ever going to show me that tattoo you keep taunting me with?”

  “Not a chance in hell, Gavin.” I checked to make certain Caleb was still in his room. “Only he who breaks my curse gets to verify my tramp stamp, and he who placed the curse never gets to see it. You’re just going to have to wonder.”

  “I could cheat if I really wanted.”

  “You could, but it would be an empty victory. No tramp stamp for you.”

  “I’m not sure if I’m the right person to tell you this, but I don’t really think it’s a tramp stamp if you’re not a tramp, Miriah.”