Tit for Tat

by JS Harker

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  Lulu stared at him as if he had grown a tail suddenly. “They are fragile beings.”

  Human frailty was one of the most common complaints among the fey. While she had no reason to lie, Flynn figured she had to be exaggerating to make her point. “It doesn’t kill them right away. That’s just silly.”

  “You don’t know time very well. It can happen pretty fast.”

  Flynn scoffed, but Lulu had on her “I’m not kidding” expression, so he took out his smartphone and opened the search-by-speech function. “How long does it take a human to die in winter?”

  The internet spewed information at him, which took a moment to decipher between the language he’d barely learned and the lies humans propagated. Some of the accounts had to be fictitious—humans excelled at lying, especially when no one watched them closely—but merciful ice, Lulu was right. Exposure could kill a human quicker than he’d known.

  “Maybe I should have warned him,” Flynn murmured.

  “And say what? ‘Here, have my magic candy cane. Don’t suck too fast’?”

  Flynn squirmed, and his ear twitched. If anything happened to Derek because he didn’t know what he was doing, the blame would be Flynn’s. “Something like that.”

  Lulu shook her head. “That’s the quickest way to get them to do it.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  Lulu took her cookie to the edge of the coffee table and sat down with it. “Mortals love to disobey rules and guidelines. It’s their one reliable trait after lying. They break promises and disregard cautionary tales with abandon. All because they would rather have pleasure than balance. And they’re only getting worse with time.”

  That didn’t sound like the people Flynn met at the mall. “For being such a human expert, I feel like you don’t know them well.”

  Lulu gestured at the television. “It’s what their stories are about.”

  Flynn pursed his lips. She had a point. She had visited the mortal realm more than him, hence why he’d asked her to stay with him. Perhaps she was right, and he would only know the truth when he had enough experience.

  Not wanting to focus on an unpleasant topic, he took the remote from the coffee table. They had been indulging in a human behavior known as binging. “We could watch more Once Upon a Time.”

  “Only if the next episode has Mulan.”

  “Gregory said she’s not in it much. We might be past her part.”

  “Then pick one we’ve seen.” Lulu grabbed another cookie from the bag and dragged it to her watching spot on the other side of the coffee table.

  “Okay.”

  “Can you cook one of those pretzels?”

  “Sure.” Flynn switched on the streaming service and their program. “Anything else?”

  “A glass of soda.” Lulu gestured with her arms. “A big one.”

  Flynn got her the requested glass of soda and then turned on the oven.

  Snow fell outside. If Derek did eat both candy canes in one evening—no, Flynn wouldn’t worry about what might be. He couldn’t be responsible if Derek ate the candy, only if something terrible came about because of his negligence. Derek wouldn’t have any reason to suspect magic since humans didn’t have it in their lives the same way the fey did. Which was silly. Magic was everywhere, even in the limited mortal reality.

  Would Derek think Flynn was silly for believing in magic? Did a single mortal’s opinion matter? Derek was kind, and he was pleasant to watch. Flynn had noticed him several times over the last week. He liked the way Derek smiled.

  Flynn fussed with the plastic bag around the frozen pretzels. Living in the cabin with Lulu for the past three weeks was fun. Better than staying away from mortals, but he didn’t have contact with anyone else from home. At work he spoke mostly to customers, Gregory, and Nate, the man who played Santa.

  That had been enough, but Flynn wondered if he could get to know Derek better. For the sake of learning more about humans. Not because he wanted to know what made Derek laugh or if he liked honey and nuts in his eggs. Or if he would taste like peppermint if they kissed. Or how warm his lips were.

  The oven beeped, and Flynn put the pretzels in.

  He would simply have to find some excuse to speak to him. Sooner rather than later. His time in the mortal world was limited, and he didn’t want to waste a moment.

  Chapter Three

  “YOU ruined our Christmas,” the woman said. She had such conviction in her voice and glare that Derek was on the verge of believing her.

  However, he didn’t control the supply or demand of a popular hunk of plastic. At the woman’s insistence, he had spent a solid ten minutes trying to find the toy in their inventory. They didn’t have it. There wasn’t anywhere left for him to check, but she didn’t believe him. His job relied on politeness. Usually smiling and apologizing was enough to defuse a situation. Most people were reasonable.

  Then there were customers like this woman.

  Natalie was too busy to take over for him. Derek had to muddle through without backup. “Ma’am, I’m sorry you’re having trouble finding the present—”

  “I promised my son I’d get it for him,” she said in a tone implying it was Derek’s fault she’d failed.

  Because somehow her obligation was his burden. Derek took another deep breath. He liked his job. One bad day wouldn’t ruin it for him. He had too many hours in the next few weeks, and he couldn’t afford to quit.

  Too bad Flynn wasn’t in view. Then he’d at least have someone nice to focus on.

  “Have you tried the internet?” Derek said.

  “I did. Amazon was sold out.”

  Gee, and for some reason she thought Derek held back a mysterious stock he’d only sell to people with the secret password. “Look, ma’am, we sold out of it last week.”

  “When do you expect more? Can you check?”

  Derek wanted to scream. Online retailers didn’t have it, and suddenly a small independent store should work miracles. “I don’t know, ma’am. With the holidays, it’s hard to say.”

  “Probably after Christmas,” Natalie said as she jumped from finishing with a customer to Derek’s side. “Is there another purchase we can help you with?”

  “I’ll buy it online,” the woman said. She hefted her purse off the counter and onto her shoulder. At least she left the store instead of making more demands.

  “Yeowch,” Natalie said.

  “I’m pretty sure she’s a witch,” Derek said as he leaned against the counter. “I’m going to wind up cursed. Maybe one of those coma deals. I’ll finally get some sleep.”

  “And get wakened by a true love’s kiss from Flynn?” Natalie teased.

  Derek groaned. “Why did I tell you anything?”

  “Because we lead very boring lives, and the only interesting thing that’s happened is you finally talked to a cute boy.” Natalie sighed. “What does that say about me?”

  Derek was thinking of a response when he glanced at the store’s entrance. A man came in, and his scowl was so deep it’d compete with the Mariana Trench. Behind him was the woman who had just stormed out. She looked satisfied, as if she knew the outcome of some great upcoming battle.

  Ah, the retail life. What a pain in the ass.

  “You were rude to my wife?” the man demanded.

  What on Earth? Derek was too stunned to move. Rude? Him? Ever?

  Natalie put her hands on his shoulders and rotated Derek toward the storeroom door. She gave him a light push. “It’s practically the end of your shift,” she said softly. “Go.”

  He had ten minutes left, but if given the option of bailing or dealing with the angry-for-no-logical-reason customers, he headed for the door. He owed Natalie for getting him out of the situation, but he did always have to pull down stock from the top shelves for her. Sort of even already, then.

  “Sir, I’m the assistant store manager. You can talk to me about your problem,” Natalie said to the man as Derek slipped
into the stockroom.

  Derek tugged on his coat. Unfortunately there was no way to slip out without being in full view of the store. A tiny monitor showed the view from the security camera, but it covered the registers more than the store. The man and woman were still at the counter talking to Natalie. He definitely wasn’t getting out that way. His only other exit was the emergency door, and leaving through it would set off the alarms. Since avoiding customers wasn’t a good reason to use it, he’d lose his job. So he was stuck waiting. He slid his hands into his pockets.

  The candy canes poked at his hand. He’d forgotten about them during his shift. Peppermint wasn’t his favorite flavor, but he was hungry, and it was the only thing in his pockets. He unwrapped one and took a bite.

  Wow. The candy cane had more flavor than any Derek had ever had before. He crunched it, but it melted on his tongue almost as quickly. He took a second bite. His sinuses cleared, and it was like he’d never taken such a deep breath. The world felt right. Anything was possible. Well, except leaving the storeroom.

  Matt showed up for his shift, dropping off his coat. “That couple’s a piece of work.”

  “Yeah,” Derek said as quietly as he could. His voice could reverberate through walls if he wasn’t careful. He was sure of it.

  “Why are you back here?” Matt asked.

  Derek pointed at the monitor. “Natalie’s running interference for me.”

  “They were yours? Man, that sucks.” Matt patted his shoulder. “Least you’re off now, right?”

  Derek was so on he wasn’t sure there was an Off switch in his brain anymore. “Yeah. Yeah.”

  Matt went into the store, leaving Derek alone with the piles of toys. It seemed a shame they were confined, but then, they never came to life like they did in the movies. And not the creepy ones. Derek never needed that kind of toy in his life, but there had to be toys of good intentions.

  Derek had eaten half the candy cane by the time the couple left. He technically could stay on the clock another two minutes, but he logged out on the computer and left the store.

  Winter Wonderland glowed in the mall lights with a new-snow-on-a-moonlit-night way. Derek could almost believe the snowballs kids tossed at each other were made of the real stuff. Some kids were in an epic battle, and Derek was tempted to climb the fence and join their fun, but he was too old for that stuff. He leaned against the fence and stuck the open end of the candy cane in his mouth.

  There were tiny etchings in the fence. Derek rubbed his thumb over one of them. He could have sworn the wood was real, but it didn’t feel real or painted. It was some type of plastic, and the tiny etchings enhanced the appearance. If he got close enough to them, he could see what had to be letters. He didn’t know the language, but he followed the trail of etching toward the far end of Wonderland.

  People were staring at him. Derek tried waving, but they only frowned more at him. Right, because following a tiny trail of words was a weird thing to do. He opened his mouth to explain, only they continued walking. When he took out his phone to take a picture of the letters, he lost track of them in the fake grain of the fence. Maybe they were never there. Which would be a shame. Finding a strange language in the midst of a Christmastime tradition would be totally cool. He could put it into a video game, if he ever made one.

  A bright blue light flew in his face. Derek backed away from it, but it chased him. He whipped around in an attempt to get rid of it, batting at the air a little. He lost his balance and landed on his butt with a thud the whole world should have felt. Still the light came at him. He scrambled backward until he collided with the fence.

  There was a black woman with wings inside the light. She glittered as she flew, and she wasn’t buzzing so much as rustling. Like wind playing with a set of jingle bells but not quite ringing them. She landed on his knee.

  “Hello,” Derek said softly. He didn’t want to be too loud for her. That happened in movies, where big people blew over tiny fairies with their voice alone.

  “You can see me.” She scowled at him, but she reminded him more of someone concerned than angry. “Clearly?”

  “Yeah. You have pretty wings. I like the swirls.”

  “Thank you. You have brown eyes the color of a walnut.”

  “Uh, thanks?”

  The little woman nodded. She pointed to the candy cane half hanging from Derek’s mouth. “How many of those have you had?”

  Derek pulled the candy cane from his mouth. “Just this one. That’s nearly gone. Are you the sugar police?”

  “Police.” She snorted. “They are not the only authority in the universe. But are you lying to me? Have you had more?”

  “No!” He winced when he remembered he shouldn’t shout. He dropped his voice and whispered, “No. I wouldn’t lie. Not to anyone, and definitely not to a fairy.”

  The woman’s wings fluttered. “Why not to a fairy?”

  “Can’t you turn me into a frog or curse me or something?”

  She nodded sagely. “That’s completely within the power of the fey. So you better not be lying to me.”

  Derek pulled out the second candy cane. “This is the only other one I’ve got, and it’s still wrapped, see?”

  She inspected it and then went back to standing on his knee.

  “Wait, how do you know about the candy canes?”

  “I know more than any mere mortal could ever hope,” she said in a slightly menacing tone.

  Holy crap. A tiny fairy was totally going to tell on him to Santa for having too much sugar. Derek felt his eyes go wide and dry out in the same moment. Hold on. He’d stopped believing in Santa ages ago.

  He’d also given up on fairies, and there was one standing on his knee. Maybe the guy in red was real too. Did Gregory manage to get on Santa’s Nice List? Was dumping him going to put Derek on the Naughty List? Naw. Probably not. Forgetting to call his parents was a far bigger offense. He was sure of it.

  The fairy leaned in and narrowed her eyes at Derek, observing him. “Are you all right?”

  “My head’s all buzzy.”

  “Stay here.” She flew off.

  Derek was in no way going to disappoint her. He tried not to breathe, keeping his breaths so shallow he didn’t move. Only he was beginning to shake, and his lungs burned with the need for more air.

  Then he spotted the woman from the store. Her husband was nowhere in sight, but she came over anyway. Her satisfied smirk was gone. Instead she seemed full of rage again. Derek didn’t really have anywhere he could go, and he wasn’t supposed to go anywhere. She stormed over to him—he swore he heard a crack of thunder in her steps—and glared at him.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Sitting?” Derek squeaked.

  “This area is for children. What are you doing on the ground like that? With your phone out?”

  Derek frowned and glanced at his phone. He knew why he had it out, kind of, but since the words had disappeared, he should have put it away. Oh right, the words. “There’s an etching in the fence. I think. I lost it.”

  “That is the lamest excuse I’ve heard,” the woman said. “I’m getting security.”

  “I’m only sitting here,” Derek replied.

  “The hell you are. You’re taking pictures, pervert.”

  Derek’s mind reeled to understand the accusation. “Wait, what?”

  The woman went to snatch Derek’s phone away from him, and he clutched it closer to him. “I know what you’re doing.”

  “I’m not doing anything!”

  “What’s the problem?” Flynn asked. He eased over the fence beside Derek.

  Derek almost lost track of the real world for a second because Flynn wore tights and briefs, and the elf costume went way too high when he moved like that. In fact, Derek had a hard time not staring at Flynn’s butt, as it was close and perfect.

  “This pervert’s taking pictures of the kids,” the woman said.

  “I’m not!” Derek held up his phone, showing the last im
age was of the fence. He flipped through a few more until he got to the terrible selfie he’d tried taking. He thought he’d deleted that.

  Flynn turned toward the woman. “See? He’s simply fallen here.”

  “Yes!” Derek pointed at Flynn. “He’s right. I fell. Because of the fairy.”

  “The fairy?” the woman said. “Is he high? Were you high at work?”

  Flynn frowned at him. Oh no. Flynn thought something was wrong with him because Derek mentioned seeing a fairy. Even in his current euphoria, a tiny alarm rang in Derek’s mind. Saying weird things did not get boyfriends, and Derek wanted to date Flynn. He swallowed around the knot forming in his throat.

  But denying what he’d seen was lying, and Derek promised he didn’t do that. “She’s little. Like a Christmas light. Shiny blue. Like your eyes!”

  Flynn’s eyes did seem to glow. His skin had a blue tone, clashing with his green uniform, and his hair was blonder in the light, almost white. He was strange but gorgeous. Flynn knelt down and brushed his hair back. He was worried. Derek’s second impression was turning out to be worse than his first.

  “He’s high,” the woman snapped.

  Derek got a glimpse of Flynn’s angry glare before he turned it on the woman. He shivered. He never wanted to be on Flynn’s bad side. Being protected by it felt nice, though, and he leaned into Flynn. No one had stood up for him in a long time.

  “I think you should leave,” Flynn said in a deathly calm voice.

  The woman looked ready to argue, but then Flynn muttered something Derek didn’t understand, and suddenly everything got colder. Derek huddled against Flynn’s side, only he was the source of the cold somehow. The woman shifted from angry to startled, and she walked away, glancing over her shoulder as if she was afraid Flynn would follow her.

  And Derek had thought she was an evil witch ready to curse. One angry glare from a hot guy, and she was running the other way. He giggled, and he couldn’t quite stop. Putting a hand over his mouth didn’t stop the insatiable urge to laugh.

  Flynn turned to him, making a big deal out of looking in his eyes and checking him over. “Are you all right?”