by Lola Gabriel
“I forgot the new key,” he said. “Tomorrow, I promise. I’m going to go and see Pen now. You can see yourself out?”
“Sure!” Easton said, looking slightly taken aback, he thought.
Ash paused on the bend of the staircase and listened to Easton leave. He listened to her car choke a couple of times and then start. It was only when she’d driven off that he realized he was standing right opposite a picture of Rebecca, one of the only ones still up in the house. It was a candid image: she was looking over her shoulder at him, and her hair was unkempt. She’d hated that picture, made him hide it after he’d had it framed. She was into family portraits, wedding portraits, to hang in the house. School pictures, probably, if she’d seen Penelope go to school.
She’d been a woman of extremes. Incredibly proper in how she wanted the world to see her, but absolutely wild when she didn’t think anyone was looking. They’d had fights that involved plates being thrown and Ash doing a lot of ducking. And she’d loved shifting and how opposite being a bear was to being her straight-laced self. It was the wild part of her Ash had fallen in love with, he supposed, but that was what had gotten her killed, too.
“Shut up,” Ash said to the picture. He knew Rebecca would be mad about Easton, about her not being a shifter. And also that she would laugh at him for having a crush on the nanny. She would tease him mercilessly for it if she were here. But of course, if she were here, then Easton probably wouldn’t be.
“I’m going to check on Pen,” Ash said to the photograph on the wall.
6
Easton
Easton banged on Hannah’s door. Hannah answered, wearing gray pajamas.
“Hey, did you bring wine?”
“Duh,” Easton said, handing her friend the bottle. “Hang on, if you’re in PJs, I’m going to change. Also, can Pickles come over? Sweet Mr. Pickles…” She batted her eyelashes.
“You’re codependent with your cat.” Hannah shook her head. “But of course he can. Poor boy has been alone all day. Oh, I fed him at six, though. He was meowing, and I could hear it.”
“Thanks!” Easton called as she opened her door. Then Pickles was winding himself around her legs. “Hello, my sweet Pickles,” she greeted him, bending down to stroke him. She could hear Hannah laughing from across the hall.
Once she was changed into boxing shorts and a t-shirt, Easton picked up Pickles and headed across the hall. Hannah already had the TV on and a mug of wine in her hand. She held up another mug for Easton. Neither of them had wine glasses in their apartments.
“Thanks.” Easton flopped down next to Hannah. “Have they picked a house yet?” She and Hannah watched property shows together. It had been their thing since California, where they had met when Hannah was working down there a few years ago. Easton let go of Pickles, but he just flopped down in between them with his tongue half out.
“This is the last choice,” Hannah said in reference to the TV program. “The others were ugly as hell. Loads of gold fixtures.” She shifted a little and petted Pickles. “Hi, weirdo,” she said to the cat. Then she turned her head to Easton. “How was your day?” she asked. Easton took a gulp of wine.
“It was good,” she said. “Pen’s so sweet. She’s started calling me Easty already. Actually, it sounds more like ‘Easy,’ but I’m not taking that to heart. She also painted me a very inaccurate picture of a monster today.”
Hannah raised her eyebrows. “A monster?”
“I think so,” Easton said. “I asked her what it was, and she growled. Maybe it was a bear or a lion or something. Very hard to tell at that stage of hand-eye coordination.”
“I see.” Hannah nodded. “Well, my day was nothing as exciting. I did manage a swan on a latte, though.” Easton put her palm up for a high five.
“Nice one,” she said. “Sitka’s best barista!” The friends were silent for a short while. Then Easton spoke again. “Hannah?”
“Oh, man,” Hannah said, “that is not real marble!” She glanced at Easton, her gray-blue eyes narrowed. “Wait, what? Why do you sound like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like… sheepish. What did you do?”
Easton let out an indignant noise, and the cat jumped off them.
“Nothing!” she cried. “In fact, I think it’s your fault.”
“What’s my fault?” Hannah asked, turning to Easton fully.
“You said I shouldn’t, so now I want to. That’s how it always works.”
Hannah muted the TV. Serious stuff. “Are we talking about Ash?”
Easton grimaced at Hannah. “Yeah. Full on crush, Hannah.”
Hannah threw the remote at Easton. “Easton! You cannot. He’s your widower boss. You just got here; don’t mess it up.”
“I know!” Easton replied. “But it’s like, electric! Sorry. Gross. Argh. I won’t do anything, I’m not insane. But it’s distracting.”
Hannah shook her head. Easton knew what was coming: the classic, ‘Typical Easton, always jumping into things without thinking. Always led by her heart, not her head.’ Not like Hannah, who always thought things out and had been in a relationship for a never specified but apparently very long time.
Hannah, however, surprised her with, “So what you need is someone to think about? You’re just bored?”
“I don’t know,” Easton said. “Woah, is that a sauna? Turn the sound back on.” Hannah did as Easton asked.
“Totally a sauna,” she said. “Why don’t we have a sauna?”
“I don’t know,” Easton answered. “Maybe we should rent a third apartment and turn it into one. Think the landlord would mind?”
Hannah snorted with laughter. “Judging by how not thrilled he was with Pickles, I doubt we’d get away with it.”
“Hmm,” Easton said. “Shame. One day.”
They watched in silence for a while longer. Hannah poured more wine, and Pickles jumped back up to his spot between them and stretched out.
“Hey,” Hannah said, passing Easton’s mug back to her, dripping red wine, “how about we find you a new distraction?” Easton was licking the wine drips off her mug.
“Huh?” she asked when she was done. “You what?”
“You should go on some dates! New place! At the worst, you’ll get to know some people.”
“I know people!” Easton argued.
“You know me, Easty.” Hannah looked down, petting the cat. “And Pickles. And your boss and his toddler.”
Easton sighed. “You’re right, I suppose. Urgh, but dating. Can’t you go on dates, too? We can double up.”
“I have a boyfriend, remember? You know him.” Hannah continued to play with Pickles’ ears. Easton raised her eyebrows.
“Different time zones, so it doesn’t count.” Hannah hit her friend.
“Don’t say that,” she said, “or I’ll think you’ve been whispering that in his ear in LA.”
“Ouch!” Easton feigned injury. “Yeah, he’s cleaning up back home. Handsome man, Zack.” Hannah looked so moody that Easton quickly followed up with, “He misses you, Hannah. As if he could do better. He knows what side his bread is buttered. And he’ll be up here in a few months.”
“Give me your phone,” Hannah said, “and I won’t be mad at you.”
Easton knew Hannah was far from mad, but they had this teenage-girl dynamic to their friendship. It was fun; carefree. Not that they weren’t there for one another when needed. And Easton had been needed a lot in Hannah and Zack’s relationship, especially when she had been living close to him and Hannah hadn’t. Easton grabbed her cell from beside her and put it in Hannah’s open palm. Hannah typed in Easton’s lock code (her mother’s birth year) and opened a dating app. She held out the phone so Easton could see, but she was the one swiping left.
“No, no, no, no… maybe… Look, Easton?” Easton glanced at the screen.
“He looks like he has hair extensions,” she said.
“Maybe he does,” Hannah replied, “but he might be nice!”
Easton stuck her tongue out at Hannah.
“Nice, schmice,” she said, leaning over to look at the screen. “Maybe him,” she said, but Hannah had already swiped left. All the men looked outdoorsy. No one seemed interesting to her. She was too hung up. Classic impractical Easton.
“What’s with all the bear emojis?”
“Dunno,” Hannah said. “Maybe some Sitka in-crowd thing we aren’t in on. Or some dating-app thing. Oh, or a fetish! Either way, we’re not cool enough.” She quickly swiped left on another dude who had led with a bear emoji.
“Okay,” Easton said. “How about him?” She held Hannah’s hand back.
“He’s hot,” Hannah commented. “Look at his other pictures.”
Wavy brown hair, gray eyes, dimples. There was a picture of him on a boat, a picture of him in a bar, and a picture of him with a dog. No emojis.
“Okay, Simon,” Hannah said and shook her hand free of Easton’s grip. She swiped right.
It’s a Match!
“Oh!” Hannah turned to Easton. “Can I message him?”
“Promise you won’t be weird?” Easton asked, looking at Hannah from the corner of her eyes.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah!” Hannah said. “Please, I don’t get to do this!”
“Okay, cool,” Easton conceded. “I’m gonna watch this one about lottery winners spending all their money on mansions. You tell me when I’m engaged to be married.”
Throughout the course of the TV show, Easton could hear her phone vibrating. But she didn’t care at all. She was either thinking about the new millionaires and their bad taste, or her mind was flipping back to Ash. He’d seemed… something, when she hadn’t stayed earlier. That masculine thing where sadness immediately becomes a faux-annoyance. Self-preservation via toxic masculinity.
Eventually, she thought she should check what Hannah was doing in her name. She looked over, almost squishing her cat, who made a noise like a deflating balloon and wriggled.
“You didn’t say anything dirty, did you?” Easton asked.
“No!” Hannah said. “Just where you’re from, blah, blah. He wants drinks tomorrow!”
“Ugh.” Easton let her head flop to the back of the sofa. “Do I have to?”
Hannah gave her a look.
“Yeah, I think you do. It’ll be fun, Easty, he seems sweet.” There was a short pause before she added, “It’s set! Eight-thirty at Frank’s.”
“Ah, Hannah!” Easton grabbed her phone back. “At least let me read the conversation so I know what we talked about. And I won’t even have time to change. I’ll have finger-paint and mud and banana all over me.”
Hannah shrugged. “If he’s the one, he’ll understand.”
Easton scoffed and began scrolling back to the beginning of the conversation. This kid used a lot of emojis. And not fun ones, just the stupid faces. Ash probably used emojis sparingly, and when he did use them, they would be funny. Suddenly, Easton realized that was one of her favorite things about Ash: he was hilarious, and he seemed to think she was, too. His humor was as dry as hers, and he was quick, never missing a beat when they were sparring.
7
Ash
Easton had arrived at exactly on time that morning. Ash had said, “Hey! Bagels are in the freezer, coffee’s still hot, make yourself at home,” and passed Penelope over. Then he’d gone to work. Today, he was meeting with the Ambrosia Coven, of which many members he was friends with, to discuss the protections they provided the town. It was an annual meeting, and usually mostly consisted of gossip and eating, but he had to suit up for it and give the whole thing a veneer of professionalism.
He’d felt bad about the evening before, since he’d acted like a kid. A crush did that to people. Why had he become such a teenager?
The meeting with the coven was at a ‘neutral location,’ an old house out of town. This was a hangover from early animosity with the witches, and they kept it up despite the current excellent state of relations. On walking into the drawing room in which the meeting was being held, Ash’s embarrassment and anxiety abated a little. He had no idea how witches aged, but he was sure several he knew from childhood looked precisely the same as they had then. They aged even slower than wolf shifters.
Helena, a witch who had been an apprentice when he was a boy, immediately came up to him as he stepped into the room. She grabbed his arm.
“Ash! How are you? What’s the point in all this? All the scary old coven members look very solemn. Why don’t we make this an every-ten-years thing?”
Ash laughed. “It’s in the law, Helena. Or something.”
Helena squeezed his arm, “Wow, bone up on that, alpha. Feel like you should know.”
Ash smiled at her and shrugged. “You know how long the old scrolls are? If anyone tried to read them all, they’d die of old age before they got halfway through.”
Helena let out a snort-laugh, and everyone looked around. Ash put on his best smile and began shaking hands and giving hugs. There was a large conference table, and all the witches, Ash, and his key council members gathered around it. They were eating pastries.
“So, does anyone have any complaints about the system?” asked the austere head witch, Agnes, he thought she was called.
“Nay,” came from most of the table. There was one “yea” before Ash was reached.
“We should get cell phones,” Helena said. “Sorry, but we should. We all know the signals interfere with our emergency systems, so why don’t we join the clear movement of history? They’d be a backup measure.”
There were tuts and throat-clears from the rest of the table. Ash was not really up for this fight right now, but he braced himself, clearing his own throat.
“Actually,” he said, “that’s not a terrible idea. They could work as a backup measure. You guys can cast spells that keep negative influences from a whole town and cure internal injury. You could work out how to use smartphones, right?”
The rest of the conference was grumbling. An order was put in for thirty phones and a very reasonable multi-line unlimited data plan.
“You know this is on you,” Ash whispered to Helena. “Anyone doesn’t know how to turn their Wi-Fi on, they’re up in your face.” Helena sighed.
“Worth it, though,” she said. “It had to happen eventually. They probably fought the radio and the toaster oven, you know?” Ash sighed and nodded his head.
“I suppose this probably isn’t a problem unique to our generation, but it feels like it sometimes.” Helena chewed on her sandwich.
“It does,” she said. “Well, the world is getting harder to keep out. And some of us invite it in.” Ash put down his plate.
“Not you as well,” he said. “Who told you?”
Helena looked nonplussed, her eyebrows knotting.
“Huh? I was talking about me, working at the human hospital. What have you done?” She leaned forward conspiratorially.
“You’re working at the hospital?” Ash asked, trying to keep the attention on her.
“Nursing,” Helena answered. “What we do anyway, pretty much, and I get to know what’s going on in their world.” She tugged at his sleeve as if they were young again, not that she looked a day over twenty. “Come on,” she said, “spill! What gossip-worthy thing have you done this time?”
Ash’s elbows were on the table, and he knew the older witches would be eyeing him with disapproval, but he didn’t care much just then.
“Okay,” he said. “It’s nothing, just a new nanny…”
Helena clapped her hands together. “Oh!” she cried. “You like her!”
“What?” Ash tried to scoff but just sort of snorted. Not very dignified for a leader.
“Come on, it’s all over your face! Is it—? You know, do you think she might be your…” Helena leaned even closer forward and almost whispered. “Mate?”
“What do you mean?” Ash asked, “Rebecca—”
“You loved Rebecca,” Helena interjected, shaking her head, “but we bo
th know you two weren’t mates. Was Penelope on purpose?”
“Keep your voice down,” Ash hissed, looking very unsubtly around the room to check if anyone was listening to their conversation.
“It is down!” Helena murmured. “If I get any closer to you, they’ll think we’re lovers.”
“Fine,” Ash grumbled. “God, Helena, you are difficult sometimes. No, she’s not my mate, she’s human, that’s what all the damn gossip is about.”
“Oh,” Helena said and sat back up. “Why? Pen can hardly give the game away.” Then she paused for a moment. “Those things aren’t mutually exclusive, though.”
“What?” Ash had been about to turn to someone else, do a bit of the mingling expected of him.
“Wow,” Helena said. “You look a bit intense, Ash. Yeah, I mean, it’s rare, and it’s a moral dilemma, but shifters have imprinted with humans. Some sad stories, a few that worked out.”
“Well,” Ash said, again turning back to the table, “that’s not the case this time. She’s just a very good nanny, and my daughter adores her, that’s all.”
“Right,” Helena mumbled, focusing her attention back on her sandwich, “completely believe you, Ash. Whatever you say.”
Ash pretended not to hear his witch-friend.
In the car, Ash couldn’t stop fiddling with a bit of loose leather on the steering wheel. Helena had gotten in his head. Those meetings were halfway to useless, and now he was overthinking things—things about Easton.
He was home pretty early, and it was just getting dark as he pulled his car in beside hers. He took a breath as he opened the car door and stepped out. He had finally remembered Easton’s key, at least.
Easton opened the door with a grin on her face. Again, she had Penelope in her arms wrapped in a towel. Penelope put out her arms to Ash immediately.
“Let Daddy take off his work clothes, or you’ll get his suit all wet,” Easton told her. “And he looks so dapper. Can you say ‘dapper,’ baby girl?”
Penelope looked tired. She put a hand in her mouth and shook her head.