Page 75 of How Not to Date an Angel

Julian snorted. “Was that a joke, feathers?”

With a shrug, Rami pushed Julian’s plate toward him.

“Now, if only we had…”

“Oh, look,” Julian said, pulling a hand from behind his back. “Wine to pair.”

Rami didn’t bother hiding the grin threatening to curl their lips. “How convenient.”

After the wine was pouredand they migrated to the living room, Rami took a seat on the couch before pausing and turning toward the leather chair they usually sat in for the morning.

“Unless you’d like me to sit in the leather chair,” Rami poked.

Julian rolled his eyes and shook his head. “Shut up,” he said, and if Rami wasn’t mistaken, he even sounded a little… fond.

“We’re having wine and pastries for dinner,” Julian pointed out.

Rami waved a hand at him. “We’re an angel and a demon—I think we’ll be alright.”

Julian took a sip of his wine before humming and motioning a hand at them. “Okay, so. Story time. Continue.”

Rami inhaled deeply before nodding. “Right. So, where to start?”

“The beginning, usually,” Julian teased, plucking a half of a cinnamon roll from his plate.

“Yes, thank you, that hadn’t occurred to me,” Rami responded dryly, then took a deep breath before beginning. “I’ve always quite enjoyed the sweet things in life. Pastries and breads and the like. So, to no one's surprise, my favorite places to visit were bakeries.”

“Of course,” Julian mumbled around a sticky bite. Rami pointedly wasn’t watching as he collected the extra icing at the corners of his mouth with his tongue.

“One of the shops I frequented had this young man who worked in the kitchen. Atticus. His father ran the front counter.”

Julian nodded to show he was paying attention, and Rami sipped their wine before continuing.

“Sometimes, if I was lucky, I’d manage to catch the baker outside, on his break.”

Julian arched a brow at that.

“We’d talk,” Rami clarified. “He’d vent about his father, and I’d listen. Sometimes he would sneak me an extra pastryeven though I promised him it wasn’t necessary, risking his father’s wrath like that.” Rami tried to keep their tone light, breezy. But the story was not a light one, and Julian must have sensed that.

Rami took another sip of his drink. “He worked… a lot. He was at that bakery more often than he was at home. Part of me thinks that was on purpose.”

Rami picked a layer off their chocolate croissant as they considered the best way to dive into the hard part of the story. Their stomach was tight with the memory, the anxiety.

Even after all this time, Rami knew the feel of the cobblestone beneath their feet, the scent of the baked breads in the air. The smell of flour on Atticus’s skin.

“He tried to run one night. Showed up on my doorstep, hurt.” They chuckled, but it wasn’t from humor. No wonder they’d felt compelled to help Julian. It was the past repeating itself. “I bandaged him up, and spent the whole night wondering what kind of person could hurt their own son.” Rami had shared their bed with Atticus that night. At that time, Rami hadn’t quite got the hang of sleeping yet, but they’d pretended, instead keeping vigil for any sign of Atticus’s father.

“Despite my concerns, Atticus returned to the bakery the next morning. I don’t know what happened, but after that, Atticus wouldn’t talk much to me. I was still… relatively new to being on Earth. So it didn’t feel like my place to intervene, even though I knew it was wrong, what was happening.” Bitterness leaked into Rami’s tone.

“Atticus didn’t come outside for his breaks anymore, and his father sneered at me every time I came in, no matter how much coin I spent on their baked goods.”

“Ungrateful bastard,” Julian muttered, scowling.

“I managed to see Atticus a handful of times after that, on days his father wasn’t in the shop. Each time he seemed… darker. His light was dimmed. I don’t know what was going on behind those closed doors, but I knew it wasn’t good. I knew I was also forbidden from interfering.”

“Fuckin’ rules,” Julian cursed.

Rami drew in a deep breath, fortifying themself for the next part. “I could have saved him, but I didn’t. And then there was the fire,” Rami continued.

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