Page 36 of Too Many Beds

Pillow Biting

BL Jones

“We should’ve kidnapped Mei and brought her with us,” I tell Caleb, looking around the large, open-plan bed shop in mild dismay. “She would know what togs are, and why there’s a rating system for them.”

There are at least two dozen beds lined up on either side of us, in varying sizes and designs, gated off by thick ropes like we’re at a car show or a very boring zoo, where the exhibits are made up of fabric and foam.

Caleb shrugs, although he seems equally overwhelmed by the vast number of beds to choose from. “It’s a duvet thing.”

We moved into our new flat last week and got away with sleeping on the floor with a mix of blankets and pillows stolen from the agency’s barracks… until Mei found out and almost died from sheer exasperation. She ordered us to put on our big-boy pants and go get proper beds like the adults the law mistakenly declares us to be.

If it weren’t for the weird tension still floating around between Mei and Caleb, she’d have probably marched us straight into town and harangued us into buying all our furniture at once. She would’ve drawn up a list and checked each item off one by one, leading her two pet idiots from shop to shop.

In another life, I’d be living in a new flat meant for four people rather than two.

It was always the plan for us to all move in together: Caleb, Mei, Rex, and me. But then Caleb and Mei had their final—this is it, this is the big one, fuck you, and goodbye—breakup, and Rex is gone, with no determined date as to when he’ll be back, if ever.

No. He will come back, he has to. Caleb needs him. We all do.

“Duvet? What the fuck is a duvet.” I shoot Caleb a dubious look. “Now you’re just making up words. You’re as bad as Tim the clipboard king over there, with his bloody togs and his bloody thread-counting, or whatever the fuck.” I jerk my thumb at a short, alabaster-skinned man with a pencil moustache, wearing a cheap suit and a name tag. He’s hovering nearby, waiting to swoop in and try to hock the shop’s overpriced, foamy merchandise.

“What are you on about?” Caleb frowns, slapping at my raised arm. “Stop pointing aggressively at Tim, or he’s gonna call security, and I am not getting banned from another big shop because of you, mate. I refuse. It took us years to shred that rep last time. We only just got our mall privileges back after the water fountain-seagull incident.”

“Because of me?” I scoff, offended by the insinuation. “Bollocks.” I whack his chest with the back of my hand. “You’re the delinquent who goes around punching mannequins and stealing beads.”

Caleb makes an indignant squawking noise of protest. “Okay, hold on, I didn’tsteal beads, you pushed me into a ‘make your own jewellery’ display, and some accidentally fell into my hoodie.” He grabs at his hood for emphasis, like he’s going to tip a load of beads out of it and recreate the consequences of my betrayal, which is bullshit. It wasn’t entirely my fault. We were shoving each other, and I just accidentally pushed him into that display. He’s the drama llama who chased me out of the shop ina mad need for vengeance before checking that he didn’t have beads in his hood. Him getting tackled by the jewellery-shop police was a situation of his own making, and quite frankly, I will not be blamed for his negligence.

“But you did punch a mannequin that one time,” I point out, mostly just to see Caleb go off.

“You threw it at me!” Caleb accuses.

“I was testing your reaction time,” I say blithely. “That’s what fellow vigilantes do for each other.” I cross my arms, grinning at him. “You arewelcome.”

Caleb grumbles irately. “Keep talking and I’ll smother you with the next hefty winter duvet that I see.”

He’s stupidly easy to poke sometimes; it’s ridiculous. He’s a ridiculous man. I love him so much it hurts to look at him, all grumpy and gorgeous as he is. I want to kiss that scowl off his face, just so I can keep putting it back there and taking it away, over and over again. But I’m used to suppressing those needs after so many years of practice.

“Again with the fake word,” I scoff. “Duvetis not a thing, Cal.”

Caleb strides over to a bed, stepping over the rope—absolute bloody rebel that he is—and all but punches the edge of a queen-sized bed, decorated in a plumage of blue-and-white pillows. “What’s this, then?” he demands, like he’s a detective and this is the final piece of vital evidence that wins him his career-making murder case.

“That’s a duvet,” I say guilelessly.

Caleb pulls an exasperated face. “Yeah, T, that’s literally what I just said.”

“No, you said doo-vet,” I argue. “It’s pronounced doo-vay. A doo-vay is a cover sheet on a bed. A doo-vet is a lie.”

“Nah,” Caleb says, obstinate. “It’s doo-vet, mate. That’s how you say it.”

“I mean, you’re very wrong, but okay.”

Caleb gets immediately and hilariously defensive. “Piss off, I’m not wrong, I’m?—”

I clutch at my chest, smirking. “You’re so wrong, you don’t want to be right?”

“What’re youon?” Caleb punches the innocent bed again. “That doesn’t even makesense?—”

Like a magician at a children’s party, Tim suddenly appears in front of us, clipboard held tightly to his chest as if it’s his one and only shield against bickering shoppers. He slaps on a frighteningly wide smile and says, “Hello, can I assist you two with anything today?” He has a very strong Midwestern-American accent, which is jarring. Danger is a pretty multicultural city, by England’s standards anyway, but I haven’t met that many Americans who aren’t tourists.

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