Page 143 of Forget Me Not

This was what Ray was supposed to do. He understood that. But it was still strange.

The breeze was nice, that was true. Too cold for some, but he was warm enough. The tree kept him from the sun as it rose, and the air smelled of things that were notcity. Dirt and decay and grass beneath him, a squirrel chattering somewhere in the branches above.

The redwood was a baby by redwood standards, obviously planted here by humans some time in the past. But it belonged there anyway. When Ray leaned back and put his head against the trunk, sometimes it almost seemed to hum with contentment.

A thought Ray would not be sharing with Cal. Cal would laugh and tell Benny, and then there would be moremagictalk.

Ray gave the people around him another searching look, but they all seemed intent on their own problems and plans, and far enough away that he should stop frowning and do something else.

He messaged Penn back, asking if she got any sleep, relieved as ever when she responded immediately, snarking at him to mind his own business.

Which meantno.

The last few months had involved a lot of that, insomnia and restlessness and anxiety. That was all also allegedly normal for dramatic life changes. They didn’t have to like it, though. Ray worried when Penn went too silent, when any of them did. So far, there had been no direct confrontations or retaliation. Everything had gone about as Calvin had predicted—something Calvin frowned over, and was right to.

Witnesses has vanished, suspects had been bailed out and disappeared, Ray and Penn had been given the ‘choice’ to resign or face charges. They got stares now, from squad cars, from officers in line to get coffee, but nothing else for the time being.

They might have assumed Ray and Penn were dropping the investigation.

Ray was not responsible for their assumptions.

He still worried. He had time to worry more now, in fact.

In search of another distraction, Ray put his phone down by his leg and tapped the cover of the book on his lap.

Cal found it adorable that Ray preferred paper books to electronic ones, which was rich from someone who printed out as much as he did. But he’d also said, “They’re tangible, it makes sense,” and given Ray a smile before wandering off.

Ray didn’t have to read right now if he didn’t want to. In the bag by Ray’s feet, along with snacks and drinks, was a course catalogue of online and summer classes. He didn’t know how to feel about that, either, but he was supposed to be thinking, so that’s what he was doing.

Against his will, for the most part. Ray didn’t know what he wanted to do, neither did Penn, though Ray suspected she would keep to investigative work if she could. The two of them had been debating the merits of getting P.I. licenses, but working for agencies like Rainbow Wings already gave them some respectability. The P.I. licenses didn’t add much and granted no authority.

Though if they did decide to go for it, Benny was willing to help walk them through starting a business.

Ray liked investigating, liked “being on the hunt” as Cal would say and had said, often. But one dramatic change meant Ray could handle another, and he had been advised to think about anything else he might like to do now that he could.

Now that he could. Not Cal’s words, surprisingly.

“Get a hobby, dear,” Lis had told Ray over the phone, calling to let Ray know that she’d sent him another Sugarbuns sweatshirt, since no one in Madera ever wanted the were or troll sizes.

Benny had found it amusing that older fairies, like older humans, called instead of texting. Calvin had calmly told him to wait his turn and someday his children would say something similar about him.

The idea of children seemed to have never occurred to Benny before that moment. His expression had been outstanding. Ray smiled just remembering it. It was decent payback for Benny’s thoughtful, pushy insistence that Ray needed to also take some classes or something for his magic problem.

Benny hadn’t called it a problem. Ray did. A power Ray had no control over did not seem like a good thing to him. But the idea of studying and training… to usemagic… didn’t sit right.

Cassandra seemed to think Ray’s control extended to his magic too and was less concerned.

Sarah had cackled in Ray’s face about it when she’d visited over the holidays, driving all the way here so she and their mother wouldn’t have to fly.

Another problem. Another project. Ray had plenty of them. And yet, still time to reflect. Which was another project, if he labeled it honestly.

He tapped the book again; a copy of some student thesis about electoral politics, but the title hadfeltimportant when Ray had been looking up information for their work.

Magic again. He nearly snarled.

He didn’t understand why everyone couldn’t do significant magic, if it was a matter of learning. But some innate power or gift must have been involved, because Benny just shrugged. Like so many things, no one really knew.

There was so much that needed to be learned, studied, told to the world. Ray had no idea where to begin.

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