by Selena Kitt
“But my wings!” I glance behind me, forgetting again that they’re gone.
He smiles at my forgetfulness, shrugging on his coat and pulling keys out of the pocket.
“Let’s go for a ride.”
The snow’s been falling for hours already. There’s a good six inches on the ground already and the flakes are thick and heavy—the sort that make flying difficult. Driving too, I suppose, because Zeph is going slow, the windshield wipers slapping back and forth. The whole world is white.
“Hey, look at that, Wal-Mart’s open.” He pulls into a nearly empty lot, parking close to the door. “Twenty-four hour convenience, even on Christmas.”
“Does this mean I get blueberries?” I perk up, peering out the water-beaded window. It’s fogging up because it’s so cold outside.
“You can have anything you want.” Zeph’s hand caresses the back of my neck, fingers massaging gently. I sigh and shiver, feeling my body melt under his touch.
“Not everything.” I look over at him in the orange glow of a streetlight, feeling the weight of it, time ticking by, relentless, the digital clock on the dash glowing ghostly blue on our faces.
He just looks at me, a little sad, and then leans in to kiss me. His mouth is soft, his lips cool, like kissing rain, and I drown in him, putting my arms around his neck, feeling everything, just everything, all at once, the sadness of losing him, the joy of having him, the sweet ache of wanting him. It’s all too much.
“Sam,” he whispers, a hand in my hair as we part, his eyes searching mine. “I want you...”
“I want you too.” It’s become a constant throb in my belly.
“No.” He shakes his head, his voice hoarse. “I want you… to stay.”
“I want it too.” I nod, feeling a quiver in my lower lip. Of course, it’s impossible. I’m only here for a day, such a brief blink in time. It’s unimaginable to think about. I don’t want to leave him. “I want to but…”
We both know.
He closes his eyes, pressing his forehead to mine. We stay that way a moment, listening to the ticking of the cooling engine, snow falling softly, blanketing the car.
“Let’s make this the best Christmas you’ve ever had.” Zeph gets out of the car and I follow him, tripping along in the snow in my too-big boots. He laughs and catches me as we go through the automatic doors. It’s bitter cold. The wind is like a knife, even through my clothes.
The store is eerily quiet. It’s all decorated for Christmas, with candy and last minute wrapping paper and scotch tape near the registers. The only ones open are the self-serve lines and there’s a lone woman standing there, looking morose.
“Blueberries!” Zeph picks up a plastic container, showing me, as we enter the produce section.
“Gimme!” I’m already eating them, bright blue flavor bursting in my mouth.
“We have to pay for them first,” he says, but I shake my head, giving him a blueberry smile as I turn away, hoarding my fruit.
“Strawberries!” I exclaim, grabbing those too. “Don’t these only grow in summer?”
“They ship them up from down south somewhere.” Zeph has a basket swinging on his arm and I put the strawberries in. “What else do you want to try? We’ll have a Christmas picnic.”
“That’s not a Christmas tradition, is it?” I laugh, putting more food into the basket.
“We’ll make it one.”
“So how come you don’t do Christmas?’ I ask, unable to resist the rows of delicious fruit, adding apples and pears to the basket. “I mean, no tree, no lights…?”
“I’m not big on holidays.” He shrugs.
“Any of them?” I cock my head, a green apple in my hand. “Humans seem to like to celebrate. Even the fey…”
“I know.” He smiles as I put the apple in his basket. “One wish.”
“You were my wish,” I breathe, putting my arms around his waist. We have far too many clothes on, I decide, wiggling to try to get closer. My cheeks are still stinging from the cold.
“And you were mine,” he whispers, nuzzling my ear. Then he pulls back to look at me, eyes bright. “So do you really want to do Christmas?”
“Yes!” I exclaim. “I love Christmas! And sex and—”
“Shh!” He laughs, kissing my words away.
Zeph abandons his little basket for a big cart when I choose a table-top tree and flashing, multi-colored lights. I add box of shiny ornaments and an angel for the very top of the tree to our haul. Something about this makes me happy, but I don’t quite understand it.
We also stop by the women’s clothing section so I can pick up something to wear. I know I won’t be here long, but it’s nice to have something to wear that fits. And I like the way Zeph looks at me when I’m modeling—even if it’s just a pair of jeans and a t-shirt.
Zeph uses a card at the checkout and we pack everything into the backseat of the car, except the strawberries. I take those with me into the front seat.
“We could build a snowman.” I reach down and grab a handful of the cold white stuff before getting into the car. It holds no danger to me anymore. No worries about wet wings!
“Whatever you want to do, little one.” Zeph starts the car as I watch the snow melt in my hand. It’s like magic, leaving just water behind. And so cold! It makes me shiver.
“I want to be with you.” I look over at him, opening the strawberries and putting one into my mouth. There’s a sweet tang to them that explodes on my tongue
“You’re not supposed to eat the stems.” He laughs as he pulls out of the lot.
I put one up to his lips but he shakes his head.
“You eat them. I like watching you enjoy them.”
Strawberries are even sweeter without the crunchy green stems. I leave the stems in the container and have polished off all the berries by the time Zeph pulls into his driveway. His house is small, inconspicuous, tucked away between two other houses, a whole row of them, all alike, except his is the only one that’s dark. The rest are strung with lights.
“Let’s go do Christmas!” I hop out of the car and help him carry in the groceries and our impromptu tree and decorations, bracing myself against the cold.
I kick off the too-big boots and we take off all our winter gear and leave it drying on the foyer. Zeph puts the food away in the kitchen while I unbox the tree in the living room. It’s wholly unsatisfying. It smells harsh and opens like an umbrella. I clear a table beside the sofa and put it up, frowning at the strangeness of a plastic tree in the room. It isn’t until I start wrapping the lights around it that something starts to happen.
I keep tripping over the sweatpants I’m wearing so I take those off and continue decorating wearing just Zeph’s white, button-down shirt. In the kitchen, Zeph is humming a tune. He’s turned on the radio and Christmas carols are playing. I hum along—I’ve heard enough Christmas carols to be familiar—while I hang the ornaments.
“Zeph, come see!” I call as I unpack the very last thing, the angel tree-topper.
“I like you in my shirt.” His eyes light up when he comes around the corner and sees what I’m wearing. I feel my cheeks fill with heat at that hungry look in his eyes. My body does things all on its own, especially in relation to him. Right now it’s heating up like a tea kettle set to boil.
“You want to do the honors?”
He takes the angel from me, looking at it thoughtfully as he sets it on top of the tree. I turn out the light in the living room and gasp. From the time I’d opened the box to the time he put the topper on, something’s happened. It’s been transformed into something bigger than the sum of its parts. Instead of something artificial, it’s become magical. And I don’t even believe in magic.
“Like it?” He smiles, taking my hand as I approach the little tree. I just smile and nod. “Now I just have to find a present for you to put under it.”
“You’re my present.” I squeeze his hand.
“I do have something to put under it.” He reaches fo
r the blanket on the couch, the one he’d first covered me with, and spreads it out onto the floor. “Have a seat.”
I sit on the floor with my back against the sofa, looking up at the tree. I’ve seen human Christmas decorations throughout my whole existence. I’ve seen them change over the years, from real trees draped with popcorn and dried fruit strings, littered with candles—oh how many lives I’d saved in those days from house fires!—to these artificial things with blinking, multi-colored lights, but I’ve never really paid this kind of attention before. Maybe because it’s never been mine—my own, personal experience.
Is that the thing about being human? Is it that personal connection to things that makes them so sweet? Or maybe, I think, looking up at the angel tree-topper, it’s the blink of time humans spend here in this realm. And even they have longer than I do, I realize, glancing down at my exposed legs, feeling my body, familiar and yet not. My skin’s flushed but feels cool.
“Still hungry?” Zeph carries out a tray loaded with food, putting it in the middle of the blanket. I clap my hands in delight, reaching for a handful of wasabi peas. Zeph shakes his head and says it’s a strange array of food, but I want to try it all. There’s liverwurst and little shrimp with cocktail sauce. The brie is warm and the crackers salty. Zeph’s put a bowl full of a colorful cereal called Fruit Loops in the middle of the tray that I eat by the handfuls—I’ve already made it clear I don’t want any more milk.
“Christmas isn’t complete without ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’,” Zeph says, turning on the television.
“What’s that?” I ask through a mouth full of marshmallows. They’re pillowy, soft and sweet.
“It’s a movie,” he tells me as the music starts and the title comes up on the screen.
But I’m already lost in the story of a man who wants to change his stars, alter his destiny. By the time the movie’s over, I’ve sampled everything, including the amazing stuff called popcorn that started as hard little kernels but magically exploded into something white, fluffy, and crunchy. It’s absolutely delicious with butter. And I won’t let Zeph tell me where butter comes from either.
“See, his life was exactly as it was supposed to be,” I say as Zeph turns off the television and we’re left under the blinking lights of the little Christmas tree. “You can’t change your fate. People don’t get to decide.”
“Sure they do.” Zeph’s arm goes around my shoulder and I rest my head on his. “They always have free will.”
“But what about fate?” I glance up at him. “That’s what we do. We push them in the right direction.”
“Or the wrong one.” His eyes darken.
“It’s never the wrong direction,” I protest, frowning.
He shrugs, turning an almond over in his fingers, studying it.
Something occurs to me, and I have to ask. I want to know.
“Were you one of us?” I whisper. “Is that how you know so much about us? That's it, isn't it?
“No, little one, I was never one of you.” Zeph shakes his head, a strange smile on his face.
“Then how did The Maker know I wanted to be here?” I ask. “I never said anything about you… about….”
“Maybe they can read your mind, like I can.”
The thought stops me cold. All fairies communicate telepathically, and the constant presence of The Maker is—was—always in my head. But I can’t read minds, I couldn’t even when I wasn’t human, not the way Zeph can. As a fairy, I can only know what someone wants to me know. But can The Maker hear my thoughts, the way I hear The Maker’s instructions? Has The Maker been listening all along, to my secret desires, my innermost thoughts?
“I… do you think so?” I cock my head at him, wondering if he’s reading my mind right now. The way he looks at me tells me that he is.
“What do you think, Sam?”
But he knows. He knows what I’m thinking. He knows everything about me.
“Who are you?” I whisper, not sure I really want to know anymore.
“We've got one night,” he reminds me softly, brushing soft, yellow hair out of my eyes, tucking it behind my ear. “Do you really want to waste it talking?”
But I don’t have to say anything, because he already knows the answer.
Chapter Nine
I don’t understand why humans get out of bed. Ever. Zeph tells me it’s to eat, and rehydrate, but as much as I love food, I love sex more. So much more.
“You’re so beautiful,” Zeph whispers as he unbuttons each button on the white shirt I’m wearing. I look down at it in wonder. This body is mine—I feel everything he’s doing, the way his hand cups my crotch, as if he could contain the heat radiating there, his tongue tracing my lower lip, his other hand kneading the soft flesh of my breast—but so unfamiliar to me.
“Am I?” I look up at him in the dim lamp light as he stands at the edge of the bed to undress, running my hands over my own body. My curves rise and fall, my fingers sending shivers through me as they pass over my hard nipples, dip briefly into my navel, then get lost in the soft, wet fur between my legs.
“Beyond.” His eyes say everything, the way they darken as they watch me touch myself. I remember the way Maya did it, how she rubbed in circles, and I do that, too, moaning softly at the sensation. Everything there feels swollen, hot.
“You’re beautiful too,” I tell him, admiring the way his broad shoulders taper down to his waist. He has hair on his chest, dark and curly. There’s a long, thick line of it that starts at his navel and trails down to a triangle just above his cock. He’s hard, standing at attention, and just the memory of him inside me sends waves of pleasure through my body. I reach for him but he shakes his head, taking a step back, his gaze still between my thighs.
“Not yet.” He pushes my eager hands away, taking his cock in his fist and squeezing. “Keep touching yourself.”
“Like this?” I rub that sensitive little bit of flesh—it feels so much better than it ever looked!—a heat spreading slowly through my belly.
“Mmm hmm, just like that.” He nods, never taking his eyes off me. But his hand moves on his cock, up and down.
“I like watching you, too.” I lick my lips, fascinated by the motion of his fist, by the glistening bit of pre-cum at the tip. “But I like feeling you more.”
“Hungry little thing.” Zeph chuckles. “What part do you like best?”
“Every part,” I whisper, rubbing faster. “All the parts. All your parts.”
“I like yours better.” He smiles and kneels next to the bed.
And then. Then. Something I didn’t think possible. A new sensation, familiar but so much more intense. Zeph nudges my fingers out of the way with his nose, his mouth covering my mound, so hot and wet. I moan and reach for him, my hands finding his hair. Then his tongue makes those same, delicious circles my fingers had been tracing. Around and around, so good it’s almost painful.
“Oh! Zeph!” My hips rise to meet him and his hands cup my ass, squeezing and pulling me against his mouth. Oh my heavens, his mouth! I’m lost, writhing and moaning on the bed, unable to help the cries escaping my throat. I clutch and claw at him, begging him to stop, begging him not to, wanting it to last forever and wanting it to end in some final, ecstatic release.
I remember his words from earlier that night and they come out of my mouth, I’m not sure if they’re an exclamation or a warning, but I am, I’m coming. The wet lap of his tongue makes me explode with feeling, sweet surges of feeling, and I grip his hair and pull him as close as I can, grinding myself against his mouth.
I can barely breathe when he finally stops. I’m really begging him to stop now, the sensation so intense I can’t take anymore. He kisses his way up my trembling thighs, licking that little wonder, my navel, his tongue, that glorious tongue, pausing at each nipple for a taste.
“Zeph, that was…” I breathe, unable to finish the sentence. I’m not sure what that was—but whatever it was, I liked it. A lot.
“I th
ought you might enjoy that.” He smirks, but his smile fades and his eyes darken when I reach for and grasp his cock in my fist. Oh, so hard. It’s like steel.
“Do you like it too?” I tilt my head as I stroke him, the same motion I’d seen him do.
He nods, biting his lip when I squeeze. I like watching his pleasure, knowing I’m the one causing it. There’s something powerful about it. This thought leads to another question. One that fills my chest with heat.
“You’ve done this before?” I ask, knowing the answer. “Sex, I mean… with… other women?”
“Yes.” His hips move, all on their own, his eyes half-closed. “And this sounds like a bullshit line any guy would give you, but it’s true. Sam, it’s never been like this before.”
“What do you mean?” My eyes narrow. I’m suspicious. He’s probably been with dozens of women. The way he looks, probably more like hundreds. How can I be any different?
“I can’t explain it.” His mouth is right against my ear, sending sweet shivers through me. My wet pussy throbs to life again, just having him thrusting into my hand, imagining him inside of me. “I’m drawn to you. I can’t seem to help myself.”
“Why would you want to?” I rub my thumb over the tip, spreading sticky fluid.
“Because I can’t keep you,” he whispers, and there’s so much sadness in it, my heart feels like it’s breaking, and I finally understand that strange human phrase. A heart can’t really break, but I’ll be damned if mine doesn’t feel like it is. “I wanted you from the first moment I saw you. But I knew it was impossible. And then, tonight, coming in and finding you on my couch…”
“Naked,” I remind him, squeezing his hard length in my hand, remembering too. I’ve been human for just a few hours, but that moment feels like a lifetime ago. How is that possible? Time is a funny thing.
“Very fucking naked.” He groans, hips moving to match my motion. “So beautiful it hurt. It was like you’d been given to me as a gift, and I wanted you even more.”