“I know you didn’t.” Obaachan studied Skylar for a moment. “But it was quite enjoyable, I must say. Nothing upsets Angela more than not having her way. It’s been educational for her. Learning she does not own her adult children taught her a lesson in humility. Come. Come join me.”
Then she ushered Skylar inside and spent the next hour doting on my girlfriend, treating her to sweets from her stash of Japanese goodies she saved for only her favorite guests. Though unable to eat them anymore, she enjoyed giving them to visitors.
Then she made her tea, flickering in and out of the Twilight while wandering back and forth gathering her favorite matcha bowls and supplies. As our attic was so spacious, we’d compartmentalized it into three rooms years ago, one for storage of Christmas goodies and holiday crap, one room for grandma, and another room for extended guest stays.
“You look surprised.”
Skylar blushed. “Sorry. It’s just that while I knew spirits could interact with the world, I didn’t realize you could have such fine control.”
“Not all do, but I’ve had a few years to work it out.”
“You’ll learn more about ghosts and specters this year and next,” I told her. “Some of my favorite classes.”
Obaachan swatted my hand, the sensation a strange mix of cool mist and buzzing sting. “My Gabriel could exorcise me from this place if he so chose.”
“Which I would never do. We love having you here.” Even if we sometimes wondered if we were keeping her from happier places.
When tea was finished, Sky took care of the clean-up in a literal snap, much to my grandmother’s delight. She adored magic. As a mortal, glamours and even our illusions never ceased to thrill her, so we’d put on shows as kids for Obaachan’s amusement.
“You will fit in among this household just fine,” my grandmother declared, kissing Sky’s cheeks. She smooched me next then faded away, leaving us to our own entertainment. Even though I’d hoped and expected she would like my girlfriend, it still came as an immense relief.
“C’mon, I’ll show you where you’ll be sleeping.”
Despite its position in the attic, the guest room had a tranquil ambience. The stained glass diamond-shaped window cast water-hued colors across the room when the sun shone through it at the right angle, and the queen sized bed barely consumed a fraction of the large space.
“This is nice, actually,” Sky said after taking a look around. She sat on the end of the pillowtop mattress and gave it a test bounce, her smile brightening.
“Did you think we were going to stick you in a dusty room with a pad on the floor?”
“Well, no, not exactly.”
A slight lean forward brought my lips to her brow. “You’ll be okay up here at night?”
“Yeah. I mean, you’ve seen me fall asleep in the school library, and this bed is way more comfortable than that couch. Plus, as you promised, your grandma is a peach.”
“She really is.”
“You keep a lot of things up here, for a guest room.” She wandered over to a tall bookshelf filled with old movies, books, and photo albums.
“Don’t you keep stuff in yours?”
“Well, yeah, but yours is so neat and tidy. We have boxes scattered all over our attic and definitely no room for someone to comfortably sleep.” She tugged out an album and carried it to the bed. She flipped it open, revealing Halloween photos from my childhood. “Why are all these up here?”
“Because we have so many there’s no place else to store them. Besides, Obaachan likes to see them.”
Skylar twisted around, sweeping her gaze over the room. “Where is she, anyway?”
“I’m not entirely sure where she goes when she vanishes. Ghost parties? Heaven? She never says, no matter how often we ask.”
“Huh.” She flipped to the next page in the album. “Aww, look at you. You were so scrawny.”
“I was six in that picture. Of course I was scrawny.”
The next page of photographs showed me with Ama when she was a chick covered in tiny pin feathers and bits of down fluff. Looking at that photo and how close we once were made my chest hurt, a deep pang cleaving into my heart. I studied the ragged scab on the pad of my index finger.
Tomorrow, it’d be gone, but the memory wouldn’t fade. Ama had bitten me with deep and furious aggression I hadn’t known her capable of displaying to anyone. Not even Sky. Ama hadn’t acted this way in years.
The next photos captured other moments together, including Jada feeding Ama pieces of mango. I remembered that day. The memory remained fresh in my mind, an afternoon on the patio with Jada on the swingset. She and I were both gross and sticky and covered in mango juice, the fruit brought by my grandfather during a visit.
Life had been good then. Simple and easy as hell. Loving Jada hadn’t been hard because she’d been my best friend.
What the hell had happened to us? I may not have romantically loved her anymore, but I did miss the easy friendship we’d had as kids. That had been absent from our lives for a long time, before we entered PNRU.
It probably started to go downhill around the time I turned fifteen and our parents decided we should actually behave like a dating couple. Jada’s father sent a chauffeur to take us out for a night on the town. My dad had shoved a credit card and a wad of cash into my wallet. When other teens had to sneak off to make out and lose their virginity, our parents stashed condoms in weird places for us to find and cleared the room after we turned sixteen.
That wasn’t even the worst they’d ever done to us. For my seventh birthday, Dad sat me down and explained Jada and I were going to marry. No one asked us. We’d been children, growing up thinking marrying your best friend was just a thing you did.
“Gabe?”
“Sorry, was lost in thought.”
Her eyes softened, gaze locking on mine. “About?” As a fae, I had no doubt she had an inkling about what bugged me, so I didn’t even try to hide it.
“How my friendship with Jada turned to shit.”
“I’m sorry for my part in that.”
“What? No, trust me, things were a mess long before you ever arrived in my life.”
She shut the album and slid it back in place on the shelf. “Still, I’m sorry. It sucks losing a friend. I’d be a mess if Mindi and I ever had a falling out.”
I shook my head again. “Not your fault, Sky. I miss how it used to be though, you know? Gaming with her late at night. Checking out stupid B-list horror movies.” I paused. “The shit I do with you, but without sex and stuff.”
“We don’t have ‘sex and stuff’ yet.”
“We have ‘and stuff.’ That counts.” Cheering a little, I teased her by pulling off a suggestive eyebrow raise. “I seem to remember you really enjoying ‘and stuff’ when we were in New Orleans.”
Heat rushed to her face. “Shhh. Your grams might hear us.”
Messing with Sky was definitely the best way to shake off a solemn mood. “Pfft. She’s my biggest supporter. Obaachan wants great-grandkids. She says she’s just hanging around waiting for Jiisan to die and wants to see children from all of us first.”
“Uh huh. Well, she’s going to have to wait a little longer.”
Wait a little longer? That wasn’t a definitive “no.” That sounded like a “possibly.” My dick took it as a “not now but maybe later” and stiffened a little, apparently liking the idea of Sky carrying my kid. Shit. I really liked that idea.
In fact, there wasn’t a day that passed that I didn’t think about a future with Sky and the babies I hoped we’d one day have if she accepted my claim.
* * *
The next few days we kept busy out of the house. We toured Houston, went horseback riding, and spent a night in Galveston with Teresa and Alex in tow so we could enjoy the beach. Eventually, though, we had to spend time with my folks. Dad was good about it all, but Mom kept her distance from Sky, treating her politely but never warmly.
Baby steps.
“So let me
get this all straight in my head,” Sky said as we drove out to the reunion in my sweet-ass new ride. I couldn’t wait to show my cousins. Alex bummed a ride with us, and everyone else rode in the SUV with my folks. “Rodrigo’s dad is your mom’s brother.”
“Yes,” I replied.
“So he’s human and he married a bear.”
“Right again,” Alex said from the backseat. “The Morales family.”
“So how many shifters will be at this reunion, then? It’s his dad’s side of the family, right?”
“The Gutierrez family is mostly human, yeah, but there’s another branch that married into some wolves. They don’t always make it out for the reunion since a lot of them live in Spain. There will probably be about two dozen shifters, and that’s including us.”
“Cousin Carolina married a mage, don’t forget,” Alex reminded me.
“Oh yeah, so one mage in attendance this year, too.”
Every year the Gutierrez family took over the community rec center for our reunion. When we arrived, cars were jammed into every space in the parking lot, and big-ass pickup trucks, RVs, and trailers were parked in the grass. I pulled my car onto the road and parallel parked in the first vacant spot beside the grass.
Each of us grabbed something from the cars to carry over, bringing blankets, coolers, and crockpots of Mom’s special chile con carne. The party was in full swing, country music blaring from the building’s outdoor speakers. Judging from the number of people milling around the covered pavilions and the laughing horde of kids running between the playground and the wide lawn, I estimated about half as many were inside taking advantage of the air conditioning and quieter atmosphere.
“Short stuff, you made it!”
Rodrigo swooped in and picked up my girlfriend before we even had the chance to say hello. His warm welcome made my mother frown, but at least she didn’t say anything.
“I didn’t think you’d be here,” Sky said once Rodrigo set her back on her feet. “Aren’t you supposed to be with the Great Fenrir?”
“He shipped me off to enjoy a last hurrah with the family before we really get down to business.”
“You’ll have to tell us everything.” I’d never admit it aloud, but I envied the dude for landing a dream job. He’d be busting his ass day and night, but apprenticing under the leader of all three shifter clans was an honor few received. The Great Fenrir was, in a way, the grand king of all shapeshifters across the entire world whether they were raven, bear, or wolf.
“Sure will, but first, you two need cervezas and brats, then I fully expect you both to ride the bull.”
Confusion pursed Skylar’s lips, and creased a deep wrinkle across her brow. “The what?”
Rodrigo and I wore matching grins as we took in her expression. With my hands on her shoulders, I twisted her around and pointed to a gathering set away from the covered picnic areas. At that moment, a mechanical bull whirled to the right, tilted forward, then spun left and flung one of our cousins onto the padded ground below. My enhanced vision picked out an eleven on the digital scorecard.
Eleven seconds wasn’t shit. I’d set the Fujimoto family record at two minutes and fifty-seven seconds.
“It’s an actual mechanical bull. You have a bull at your reunion,” she stated, staring.
“Yeah. Big tradition. We do it every year.” Rodrigo’s grin widened. “And so shall you.”
“Um…I am not doing that. I don’t ride things.”
I cocked a brow. “You spent two hours riding a horse a couple days ago.”
“That’s different. That was a pony and all he did was follow your stallion. That thing,” she said, pointing a finger toward the bull, “is designed to throw me on my neck. I can’t rise and glitter and shine if I’m paralyzed.”
“Don’t be a pussy, chica. Anyway, Gabe holds one of the records, but I’m all set to beat it this year. You are goin’ dooooown, primo.”
“In your dreams.”
I ducked my cousin’s lazy swing. Skylar rolled her eyes and veered off with Teresa and Alex to the dessert table where we had, like, a half-dozen types of flan, but only two were actually edible. Like all family reunions, we had our share of entrees from people who thought they could cook well.
Aunt Guadalupe flagged Skylar down in passing and pushed a plate of sopapillas at her. Then she heaved an enormous slice of tres leches sponge cake onto the paper plate too. I relaxed. My aunt only served her cake to family members she liked.
Seriously. I once saw her slap a plate out of my other aunt’s hand onto the ground because she’d “rather the ants eat it than watch that bocachancla shove it in her big mouth.”
As much as I tried to tell myself it didn’t matter if Mom never accepted her, I hoped she would come around, because it meant the world to me to see Sky welcomed by everyone else.
“Well?”
Rodrigo’s question brought my attention back to him. I had the attention span of a gnat lately. “Well what?”
“How was New Orleans? Heard some shit went down, and your name was involved in the conversation.”
“I thought you were off-duty.”
He shrugged. “I get emails, so I’m up to date on the fiasco that happened. Good work, man.”
“Thanks. Not really up for talking about it quite yet.”
“Hey, I get it. Besides, there’s something I wanna know more.”
I cast him a wary glance. “All right, shoot.”
“Did you finish the claim?”
“No.” I shrugged. “We talked about it, but we haven’t moved forward.”
“You’re real nonchalant about it now for someone who tried to murder me last year for walking in on you two.”
I snorted. “I wanted to. I still think you deserved more than I did to you.”
“You folded me like a taco, and it was a low blow. How was I supposed to know you were about to give the girl the D?”
The urge to punch him again came over me but somehow I resisted. “Where’s that drink you promised?”
“Right this way.”
We joined a bunch of cousins and uncles over by the grills. I hadn’t seen these people since the last reunion considering I lived out of state and most of our family spread out from here to California.
Rodrigo fetched beers from the cooler and we fell into the same easy routine we looked forward to enjoying each year. The family went all out. There were five grills going and they had three smoked hogs already laid out on serving tables for people to pull from. Another table displayed all manner of sides, including Mama’s chile con carne and the huge pan of fried rice we’d brought along. A third table had been dedicated to desserts. Rodrigo headed to that one first and snatched a handful of mochi Dad had prepared. He’d made half a dozen flavors this year, from red bean to chocolate filling.
“What?” he asked when he caught me looking. “These go fast and I want some.”
“Aw, shit. You’re right.” I glanced around, then I scooped a handful off the plate onto a napkin too.
No one ever had to know.
* * *
We never did convince Sky to get on the bull, but even though Rodrigo beat my standing record by two seconds, I managed to reclaim my title. Three minutes and two seconds of pure fucking glory.
“That’s it, next year I’m asking them to get the mechanical shark.”
I clapped him on the back. “I’ll just beat you on that one too.”
“Fucker,” Rodrigo grumbled. He shoved a beer in my hand. “Where’s your car? Cousin Esteban said it was all tricked out now.”
“Dude, I forgot to tell you. Her dad got to it.” I paused, glancing around for Sky. I spotted her at a picnic table in deep conversation with Abuela, a plate of tamales in front of her. My mother stood a few yards away, staring daggers at my girlfriend. Man, if looks could kill, Sky would be six feet under.
“She’ll be fine,” Rodrigo assured me. “Judging by that plate Abuela set in front of her, she’s practically your wife n
ow.”
Receiving tamales from Abuela meant Sky had gained absolute acceptance into the family. And my mom was way too fucking scared of her mother to utter a negative word.
Success. Sky had one hundred percent enchanted both Abuela and Obaachan, rendering my mother completely harmless.
I led Rodrigo out to my car and raised the hood to let him ooh and ahh over the upgrades, which drew a crowd around us. After that it seemed all I did was rehash the same story over and over to different relatives, explaining that yes, I was going into sentinel work and yes, I was dating a faerie. Everyone seemed to think the latter bit was the more exciting. Sky never lacked for company, because everyone wanted to know more about the magical fae.
She soaked it up, especially when it came to the kids. At one point, she glamoured the playground and turned it into a castle fortress for a water gun fight. Dozens of delighted kids ran around having the time of their lives, and a few adults too.
By the time dusk rolled around, nearly all the food had vanished. But not the beer. After last year’s beverage drought, someone had ordered kegs to ensure there was plenty to go around.
I filled two big red Solo cups and beelined for Skylar, who had just broken away from a discussion with my abuela. I bet it irritated Mom to no end that her mom adored Sky too. My girl took it with humility on the outside, but on the inside I bet she wanted to toss her head back and laugh like a maniacal Disney villain.
“C’mon, time to hustle,” I told her.
“Huh?”
“Fireworks. A few of my uncles set ’em off every year. The real professional sort set to music and everything. The reunion is just for the family, but they do the Fuurth of July fireworks for the whole community.”
“Please tell me we aren’t gonna be listening to ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ all night.”
“Nah, not the whole time. They usually open with it due to the holiday but the rest is great. You’ll see.”
Everyone else seemed to have the same idea, people gathering up blankets and lawn chairs to spread out. A few of the kids climbed their temporary castle for a better vantage. I took Sky around the building and led her to a nearby hill. We snagged a prime spot on the slope and laid out a blanket.
Birds of a Feather: The Paranormal University Files: Skylar, Year 2, Summer Page 15