Page 21 of The Naga

Khush: It feels good to not have to hide stuff from you, though.

Me: I bet. I understand why you did. And I would've understood even if you'd had to wait longer.

Somehow, we ended up chatting for another few hours, even after spending the whole day talking. I'd never dated someone I clicked so well with before, and it was honestly a little strange.

How bad had my previous relationships been that this one felt so fucking perfect in comparison?

Sure, none of the people I'd dated before were my soulmate, but I had some seriously awful taste in men before Khush came along.

Scrappy stuck close to me as I made dinner, and my phone was in or near my hand at all times. My conversation with Khush jumped from topic to topic, some fun and light, others serious.

I told him how I was twenty-two when I'd figured out I was trans. How I'd waited until I finished college to come out to my parents because I'd known without a doubt that they wouldn't accept me.

Khush shared some things from his past too, like the reason behind his claustrophobia. When he told me his parents would keep him locked up because of his disability—apparently, most nagas can shapeshift between any number of human and snake forms, while Khush only had two—I wanted to go out there, hunt them down, and give them a piece of my mind. Of course, I was nothing before a bunch of powerful supes, but I didn't care. To think someone could treat Khush like that…

We switched seamlessly between topics, and by the time I slid under the covers with Scrappy curled up near me—a little bit of wet food had been more than enough to win back her heart—our conversation had turned to our firsts.

I told Khush about the first boy I'd ever kissed when I was thirteen, and about the first time I'd had sex at sixteen, and how I couldn't quite figure out why it'd felt wrong until years later when I realized I wasn't a girl after all, and how much it utterly turned me off when someone called my hole 'pussy.'

Somewhere along the way, I fell asleep with my phone still in my hand, and I dreamed of being back in the Forest and on a picnic date with Khush, with a unicorn happily tottering away in the background.

The next morning, I woke up with one very important question in my mind: were unicorns real?

Of course, I'd somehow managed to sleep in, so I had to rush around to do my morning business before putting together a bowl of cereal so I could be at my desk on time.

Then it was customer after customer without a moment of peace in between. My phone buzzed a couple times, but I couldn't even pull myself away long enough to answer.

It was only when lunch break rolled around that I finally got a moment to catch my breath, and I took a well-deserved moment to curse out the company I worked for. Because they hadn't checked their site for glitches and errors, I was forced to work double-time to smooth the feathers of all the customers they'd ruffled, and it wasn't fucking fair.

My fingers ached from all the typing, but of course that wasn't going to stop me from checking and replying to Khush's text.

Khush: Hey, good morning. Hope you have a good day!

Khush: I'm guessing you're busy with work. Make sure to have lunch on time, and let me know if I'm being too overbearing.

Overbearing? Oh please. I'd happily let him smother me if he tried to.

To spare my thumb some pain, I sent Khush a voice message instead of a text.

"Hey, Khush! I'm swamped with work today, hence the delayed reply. Stupid people messed up the website and now I have to deal with the annoyed customers. I'm eating lunch now, but thanks for checking in. It's not overbearing at all. Actually, it's kinda nice to know someone cares whether I eat or not. Hope you're having a good day too! I'll text you once I'm off work. Make sure you eat too!"

In reply, Khush sent back a heart emoji, which I grinned at for a whole minute, and a short text that said "I'll eat."

I took my time eating lunch, and returned to my desk not a second before the end of my lunch break.

To make the work easier, I drafted a few replies that I was using repeatedly, and my fingers thanked me for it when I was able to save half their work by copy-pasting.

Still, by the time 6 p.m. rolled around, I was exhausted. I didn't have the energy to get up and make myself something for dinner, so I figured I'd order out.

I still needed to feed Scrappy, though, so I turned off my computer and shuffled into the kitchen. After giving Scrappy her food—that she leaped on as if I'd been starving her for days—I groaned as I realized I'd left my phone in the living room.

Cursing everyone under the sun, I stomped my way back to the living room, then groaned when the doorbell rang.

Why?Why? Why was God punishing me like this?

Ready to either cry or break something, I hoped it was a Bible-thumper so I could go queer-crazy on them and get rid of some of this annoyance.

Instead, there was a delivery guy with the most delicious-smelling pizza.

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