She hadn’t felt attracted to someone the way she did Moss for a long time, if ever. Frankly, while she was taking care of her dad, she just hadn’t had time for it. Oh, she’d had plenty of sex and short-term relationships, but nothing that she felt like she maybe wanted it to last. She wondered if all that possibility was ruined now.
Ruined by the prospect of a baby.
“It sure makes things more complicated,” she muttered under her breath. At any rate, the cards pointed to something big and Shaggy was starting to get an inkling of what that was. For the first time in her life, she wanted something she did to matter. Not her mother’s money, not her father’s success. Shaggy. On her terms.
She wanted to matter.
The door opened, and in walked Moss, brow creased and mouth drawn with worry. He wore a long sleeved, green Earth First T-shirt with a fist on it, under that big, gray, knitted cowl he liked. She gave a little wave and he headed to the table, weaving his way through the other two tops before swinging a messenger bag from his shoulder and dropping it into the chair across from hers.
“Do you need anything else?” His smile was swift, half-distracted.
“I’m good, thanks.”
“I’ll be right back.”
Shaggy fidgeted with a napkin as he ordered, wondering how to even start this conversation.
Finally, he was back, setting down a cup of coffee and bag of salt and pepper chips. Strange combination, but whatever made him happy.
“So, I’m glad you texted,” he said.
Shaggy felt her face burn.
“Yeah, I’m sorry I put you off, but I’ve just had a lot to process, you know?”
He was silent, stirring his coffee, waiting for her to finish her thoughts.
Damn. Just when it would’ve been useful to have a blowhard who wanted to leap in and start asking questions, she had to get a patient man.
“Before I decide whether or not to stay pregnant—but you should know I’m leaning against—there’s a couple things I need to talk to you about.”
Moss shifted in his chair, as if he was uncomfortable and wanted to leave. Then he inhaled, straightened up, and faced her head on. As if he’d made an internal decision. He looked calmer and less worried, and more present somehow. She wondered if it was some witchy thing.
“The other day, when we were talking, you mentioned a friend of yours. An organizer…”
“Terra?” he asked.
“Yeah.” She lowered her voice and leaned forward. “You know I study aerial work, right?”
He nodded.
“Well, I talked with my teacher and we were wondering if you all could use some help with Saturday’s action. I remembered you said Terra trains people to do banner drops and stuff, and I’m wondering if she has the equipment to keep us tethered to the bridge.”
He leaned back and huffed out a breath. “Damn. That is so not what I expected this conversation to be about. We should power down our phones.”
“What?”
“Security,” he said, taking his phone out of his pocket. Shaggy did the same.
“All the way off?”
He nodded and watched as she complied. Then he leaned across the table this time. “You really want to suspend yourselves from the bridge? You can actually do that?”
Shaggy nodded, excitement brewing in her chest. “If we have the right safety equipment, we can rappel down on colored silk, right over the water.”
“That is so freaking cool. Wow. Shaggy?” He looked at her with a cocky grin on his face, not distracted anymore. “You’re in. We’re going to make this happen.”
“Really?” Optimism bloomed inside her chest for the first time in way too long.
Moss nodded and picked up his coffee again. “But after we get through this weekend, I really hope you’ll let me in on the pregnancy stuff. I’m not going to be an ass about it, but…I still need something. You know?”
Shaggy snaked a hand across the table and touched the fingers that wrapped around the mug, just briefly.
“I know.”
But she was glad to have a few days’ reprieve, and something fresh and exciting to focus on. Something that might make a difference in this world.
25
Moss
Moss walked past the closed shops on Hawthorne with a spring in his step, smelling the cool autumn evening. After the conversation with Shaggy, he felt relieved, even a little bit excited. They’d even shared a sweet, chaste kiss before parting ways. After all the anger and frustration from earlier, his heart felt light. He still didn’t know what was going to happen between him and Shaggy, but at least now she was talking to him. Baby or not, that alone made it feel like everything was going to be okay.
He turned off the main drag, heading into the darker residential streets. He loved the houses here, the old Craftsman-style bungalows, with an occasional, peak-roofed Victorian dandy thrown in. Clustered in the yards lit by the dim yellow streetlights overhead still grew wild riots of flowers and late vegetables, grown by homeowners who lovingly tended them. Their own small way of trying to change the world. The scent of night blooming jasmine wafted by. Its scent would linger through October.
None of his close friends could afford a house in this neighborhood. Maybe fifteen or twenty years ago, but not anymore. His coven mate Selene’s boyfriend lived around here somewhere, but must have bought during a dip in the market, he guessed.
Laughter boomed from across the street, two men on a late night dog walk, with a Siberian husky and a great Dane in competition to see who could tug harder on their leashes. The men fought the dogs valiantly, but it was clear this was a struggle they went through every day. Moss smiled. Maybe someday his life would feel settled enough to get an animal companion, but for now, he had to think ahead to Saturday’s action, and the magic the coven was planning, hooking Shaggy up with Terra…and fixing his damn windshield.
As he approached his car, the spiderweb of cracks caught the streetlight, and his heart sank. Right. Shit.
“Nothing to be done about it right now.”
Oh, the coven had offered to lend him money, and he knew his parents would front for it, too, if it came to that, but Moss hated asking anyone for that kind of help. He still had a lot of unease around money, and all the systems around it. Raquel told him that constriction was affecting the flow of his magic, and she was probably right.
“Just because we’re working to dismantle these systems, doesn’t mean we don’t live inside of them, Moss. You’ve got to learn to make some kind of peace with it all, or you’ll just keep tripping, and cutting your magic off at the knees.”
Despite the mixed metaphors, Moss knew his mentor was right. But that didn’t mean he’d figured it out yet. It was probably going to take a shit ton of shadow work, and he always felt like there was too much else on his plate to take that on.
He smacked his palm on the roof of the car before fishing out his keys. With a swift apology to the kami of the car for the blow, he unlocked and opened the door. Flinging his messenger bag in the passenger seat, he got in. Once the car was powered up, he connected his phone. Francis and the Lights began to play. Singing along, he pulled out, heading north, then west. His brakes felt a little funny at the stop sign, but then he felt the regenerative brake system push through to the ordinary friction brakes. He exhaled in relief. Must just be touchy because of the weather change or something. Spring and autumn were always weird for temperature, moisture levels, the whole thing.
Moss continued through the residential neighborhood. The street fed him onto the busy thoroughfare of Cesar Chavez, all streetlights, grocery stores, and bars.
He turned north, continuing up Cesar Chavez, mind filled with Shaggy, their brief kiss, and the upcoming action. The Willamette still tugged at his solar plexus and the night’s working with Raquel and the coven hummed in his body, flowing through his bloodstream. He barely noticed that the light had changed until it was almost too late.
“Shit!�
�
Hitting one of the city’s ubiquitous potholes, Moss tapped his brakes, felt them engage, and pushed all the way down. Nothing. Pumped again. Nothing.
Moss gripped the steering wheel, grit his teeth, and pressed his foot down a third time. He down shifted as the car slid toward the busy intersection. In desperation, he yanked at the parking brake. Blinding lights flashed at his left side. His body jerked sideways against the seatbelt. Unearthly grinding sound. Pressure. Pain. The scent of blood. Moss hissed through his teeth.
Then everything went black.
26
Shaggy
Moss lay on a queen size bed, half buried beneath a green comforter, purple shadows beneath his eyes. Shaggy perched on the one chair in the room. It was set in a nook under the window, next to a big dresser filled with objects that looked like some sort of altar. It felt strangely intimate to be here in his bedroom, and to see Moss this way, just lying there, looking as if his fire had gone out. The whole situation made her want to crawl under the covers and hold him close, which seemed like a strange response, but there it was.
They weren’t quite friends or lovers, but in this moment, they felt tied together all the same.
Alejandro had texted from Moss’s phone to tell her Moss had spent half the night in the hospital. She’d felt the beginnings of a panic attack when she read the text. Her heart started beating fast and she could barely breathe, finally ducking her head down between her knees and breathing into her cupped hands.
Yeah. And she was avoiding thinking about that response. Her old therapist would call bullshit, but there that was, too. If she could just get through the week, she’d be fine. She always was.
She inhaled, catching the scent of old incense, and stifled a sigh. Moss wasn’t hurt badly. He was going to be okay. Just some bruised ribs. Mild concussion.
“So, Alejandro said your brakes failed?”
“They were cut,” Moss said, then coughed and reached for the steel water bottle on his bedside table.
Shaggy leaned forward and raked her hands through the short waves of her hair. “Who would want to cut your brakes? What the hell?”
Moss coughed again and winced. His head must be killing him, but other than a small cut on his forehead and the fact that he seemed weak, it hardly looked like he’d been in an accident at all. But that didn’t make the whole situation less scary. Shaggy was used to the slow moving, controlled crashes of lingering addiction and disease, not this fast moving shift with the power to alter the course of someone’s life.
“Turns out someone’s been sending notes to a few of the tribal elders and local activists. Threats. I just found out that Terra got one, too. Kiyiya called after he heard about my accident to tell her about the other notes. How did these people even find out? I mean, there was the big meeting, but we didn’t even have a clear target then. GranCo hadn’t even had that damn press conference yet.”
Shaggy couldn’t even begin to fathom the ins and outs of corporate and environmental politics. If she was going to involve herself, she’d have to learn. Right now? She felt completely at sea.
Moss adjusted himself on the pillows and winced again. “Damn that hurts. Everything hurts.”
She watched for a moment as he struggled with the cap of an aspirin bottle before taking it from him, gently. The fact that he barely resisted was a sign of just how weak he was. She lined the arrows up, snapped off the top and dropped two pills into his outstretched hand.
“They didn’t give you something stronger?”
“Didn’t want it. It’s not that bad.” He popped the pills into his mouth and downed them with another swig of water. Sighing, he leaned back against his pillows and closed his eyes.
“It doesn’t matter how careful we are,” he said, “there’s always going to be plants at the meetings. That’s why we don’t discuss any sensitive information, but they know we have plans for Saturday, and the groups involved. I guess it doesn’t take much to start a harassment campaign.
“Harassment? You could’ve been killed!”
He didn’t even open his eyes at that, just sighed again, sinking deeper into the pillows. “I made myself a target at that press conference. So they escalated.”
Shaggy felt like running or punching something, but forced herself to sit still, breathing in the old incense and the slightly sour smell rising from Moss. She pulled at a hangnail on her thumb until a bead of blood rose up. She wiped it on her jeans.
“You’re sure it’s this GranCo?” she asked.
“It’s probably some people working for them. Hired flunkies. At least that’s what we suspect, but the only person who could possibly confirm with some inside knowledge signed an NDA.” Moss opened his eyes, and stared at the ceiling, mouth set in a hard line.
“Alejandro?”
Moss didn’t reply. She took it as a yes.
“That seems…surprising. I mean, it’s not like I know any of you very well, but I would think he’d be on your side.”
“He is,” he finally said, struggling to sit up again. “And he refused the contract. That doesn’t make the NDA less frustrating, though.”
“Are you all going to cancel the action?”
“Because of some threats?”
“Because your brakes were cut!”
“Hell no. The action is happening. These assholes don’t control us. Besides, the equinox celebration is an ongoing tradition. Some white corporate shills aren’t going to disrupt that.”
“But all the stuff you had planned, the lockdown?”
Moss looked her dead in the eye then, his face fierce. “We’re going forward. I’m going forward.”
Well damn. Shaggy admired his determination, but also couldn’t imagine going through what sounded like an ordeal so soon after a car crash.
“You sure that’s a good idea?”
“Look, Shaggy, you and the coven and everyone else mean well, I know that, but if I’m well enough to stand on Saturday? I’m well enough to lock down for the river.”
“That sounds pretty stupid.”
“Yeah, well…”
They stared at each other for a while, not speaking. Shaggy finally broke the staring contest, and let her eyes roam around his room. She liked it, she realized, having barely taken in anything other than the altar and the bed the whole time she’d been here. Her focus had been on him. On Moss. Somehow, the room made her like him more, too. The artwork on the walls, the altar, the feeling of sun on the back of her neck through the sheer curtains…it all felt homey. Comforting. Two things she hadn’t felt for a long time, not even in her expensive condo filled with furniture she’d picked out herself.
Finally, she turned back to him and nodded. Her heart was beating fast, but she couldn’t let fear stop her. She didn’t want to.
“All right then. If you’re in, I’m still in. What else do I need to do to prepare?”
“You meditate?”
“A little.”
“Well, buckle down. You’re going to need to be as centered as you can to deal with any possibility that might get thrown at us. Screaming crowds. Cops. The wind whipping you around under the bridge. Whatever. You have to be strong enough to face it all.”
His brown eyes still held that fierce light, and Shaggy realized that he seemed a little less sick than when she’d first arrived. His body might be weak, but was stronger than she could have possibly suspected.
Fuck, she thought. He’s not just some EDM raver dude. He’s actually a man. An adult. A person I could really fall in love with.
“Shaggy?” His eyes were questioning.
She licked her lips and rubbed her hands over her jeans.
“Yeah. I can do that. If you can face it, so can I.”
Shaggy still wasn’t sure exactly what her destiny was, but it seemed that this part of it, at least, was tied up with his.
Eyes still locked on his, slowly, oh so slowly, she leaned over him, giving him the chance to turn his head or move away. He barely e
ven blinked.
Their lips touched. Slightly, gently.
It felt sweet.
27
Moss
Behind its rusted metal and glass façade, the cavernous warehouse in northeast Portland spent most of its current incarnation as an alternative arts and performance space.
Moss’s body was killing him. The cold concrete floor made his already aching joints and bruised ribs want nothing more than to crawl back home and into a warm bath. Shit. He had no clue how dancers managed to rehearse in this space. How in the world did they ever limber up?
“Hey Moss, good to see you!”
He turned at the warm voice. Julia. She was one of the older cis women who’d been a Portland activist fixture for decades. Soft spoken and ever present, Julia did everything from sweeping floors to organizing marches and blockades. Some of the young hotheads thought she wasn’t worth listening to, which pissed Moss off.
“Julia, thanks! Good to see you, too.”
Her gray and brown hair was styled in its usual messy brush cut and her battered Doc Martens had been fixed with silver duct tape. She smelled like lemon candy.
“Hug?” she asked, holding out her arms.
“Gotta be careful, I’m pretty banged up, but yeah.”
Julia enfolded carefully him into warm, soft arms. As he pressed into her broad chest, Moss sighed. Safe. He held back the tears that threatened to fill his eyes.
As Julia stroked his hair, all the pain, fear, and anger Moss had been clinging to relaxed and slowly floated away. They breathed together for what was likely only seconds, but felt much longer.
The sounds of the meeting starting filtered into his ears, and he tensed, hissing as muscles contracted around his ribs.
“Shh. They can start without us. Just rest for another minute.”
By Dusk Page 11