Page 27 of Forget Me Not

“No.” Cal was decided. “I want to be a child for a while and cry to my mother—oh. Ray, you remember your mom, right?”

Ray’s heart rate shot up in a small moment of panic before he realized he remembered his mother just fine.

Cal’s eyes narrowed, but then he nodded, correctly interpreting Ray’s colors or something again. “Oh good. Do you want to call her? I mean, I sort of did already, and I’ve been texting her so you might want to anyway, at some point. She was going to fly out, but since we’re basically just waiting and watching, and also she is terrified of flying, we thought we’d see what you wanted.”

Ray took that piece of information about the closeness between Cal and his mother and let it warm him even while he put it aside. “She’s halfway across the state,” he answered at last. “But thank you for keeping her from worrying.”

“You didn’t say no,” Cal pointed out, gentle again. “She’s pack and you’ll need that, since I was taken from you, and therefore so was Benny and everyone else.” He didn’t pause to explain who “everyone else” was. “Although, frankly, I am not sure if having us around now helps you or not. Scent helps, but then I say something and I’ll see you silently freaking out. I only even knew about the scent thing because you told me to do it. You always said if something happened….”

“I told you to do that?” Ray added confusion over this to the pile of things that would keep him awake tonight. He’d meant to ask that before.

“Oh yeah. You areveryconcerned about safety. It’s frustrating, and endearing, and, it turns out, completely justified.” Cal made sad jazz hands. “You win. I was wrong. Anyway, listen, you should eat. So should I.”

Ray had been stressing safety measures. Ray had been worried about Cal’s safety as well as his own. Cal didn’t seem to think that was strange. He spoke of it as though it had been just a playful disagreement between them.

Ray’s head began to pound. He ignored it. “How did we meet?”

“Are you testing me?” Cal huffed. “I’m tired, Raymond.”

“How did we meet?” Ray insisted, voice rough. “You worked for the department?”

Cal stared balefully at him for several seconds, then sighed noisily and looked away. “Sort of. My dad introduced us. He brought me in there, in fact, so I could help you—the department—with a case. Not like they gave a shit about being issues,” he added in bitter mumble. “I’d, um, heard about you, and seen you from a distance, and I wanted to meet you. Very much.” He looked back at Ray. “You’re one of the shiniest people I’ve ever seen, Ray. And your colors…youarebright to any fairy, but to me, your colors sing.”

Ray dropped his head, but of course, he could see no colors around himself. He saw stains on his pants from the alley and shoes that were slightly uncomfortable but in a way that he usually ignored. His headache throbbed behind his eyes.

“I remember Calvin Parker,” he said at last. Everyone knew, or knew of, Calvin when Ray had first come to Los Cerros. “There is something… maybe you? I feel like he mentioned a child, and I politely listened but that’s all. And then after that… it’s as if I haven’t seen him. He’s not…”

“No!” Cal cut him off there. “He’s fine. Don’t add that to your worries.” He gave Ray a smile more upset than pleased or fond. Ray wanted to destroy whoever had caused it, buthehad caused it. So he clenched his hands and said nothing. “I’m tired, Ray. You’re tired. And I don’t mean to pry but I can see the fear in the colors around you. You don’t have to think about this now. I mean,Iwill be, but it’s not like I sleep much anyway.”

“This is hurting you.” Ray was growling but didn’t stop it. “Your scent…”

“I’ll just—” Cal gestured toward the kitchen.

“No.” Ray shook his head, frustrated at the lack of words that were good enough. “It’s—you’re hurt.”

“Oh.” Cal’s attitude softened immediately. He studied Ray for another moment, then approached him one slow step at a time. “And instinct says you have to fix it? You poor puppy.” He was gentle and teasing together. Ray offered him a tiny, silent snarl in return and had no idea why that brought a real smile, however brief, to Cal’s face. “May I?” Cal asked once in front of Ray, his voice sweet and coaxing, before again holding up his hand and his wrist for Ray to take. “It helps you heal and rest, or so you say.” He shivered for the press of Ray’s fingers, and let his lips part when Ray’s nose brushed his palm. “Personally, I used to think you were touch-starved and you wouldn’t admit it.”

He glanced up, curious, waiting, and exhaled in pleasure when Ray didn’t pull away. “Oh, I thought so,” he carried on, taking Ray’s silence for an answer, probably the correct one. “This version of you…this you who doesn’t know me and never met me when I was at my most obnoxious…this Ray needs to be protected. They both need to be protected. Actually maybe the second more than the first. But both of them.”

“I’m were,” Ray rumbled into Cal’s hand.

Cal nodded again. His eyes were dazed but his words were dulled only by how breathless he was. “A werewolf in the city. It took me two years of knowing you to hear someone say that, to make me realize that it must be hard for you. I was younger and perhaps more foolish and frustrated about the subject of you then. There was a lot I didn’t understand until I saw you interact with another were, and I realized how—how much you give up, all the time. To fit in. Withthem.” He stepped even closer. “Once I figured it out, once you let me, I used to touch you so much. I got everyone in on it. That is how I keep you. That’s how you’re mine. You can always touch me, Ray, if you need it. Or ask me to touch you. Even if you don’t want me this time.”

Ray tightened his hand without meaning to. Cal was inches away now, blindingly bright.

“We met at the station.” Fairies were supposed to enchant people with their glamour. Bewitch them, humans from the Dark Ages might have said. Cal’s voice could have done it. Ray’s instincts did not seem to care. Ray could feel his breath heating Cal’s skin and taste his pleasure. Cal’s voice was honey. Ray had used to like honey, once upon a time. On toast, whenever he bothered to make it. “The police, then, as now, do not hire beings or magic-users and so they needed to consult someone. My father suggested me. I was… pissed at my dad at the time, and pissed at the cops, and excited to meet you. Perhaps I didn’t approach the situation the way I should have. But you weren’t exactly diplomatic either, I should point out. You were a dick to me for three days. And then for one moment, we were….”

“I claimed you?” Ray was already flushed, but his arousal at the thought must have shined like the dawn around him, because a shiver carried through Cal’s wings. “And you accepted?”

Cal blinked, blinked again, then pulled away to give Ray another sad version of jazz hands. “Then you took two more years to admit you wanted flighty little Callalily.” Cal turned away. “And that is just too painful to get into tonight. I’ll get you something to eat.”

Part of the small dining room or kitchen nook area was visible from the living room, but not the kitchen itself. Ray stood there like a fool listening to the opening and closing of the fridge and the freezer, the beep of oven buttons being pressed, and then a metallic thud, as though something had been dropped.

Ray tore off the dirty coat he’d been wearing all evening and tossed it onto his desk. Cal muttered something, more sounds than words, and then flicked the tab on an aluminum can, only to hiss and sputter at the distinct sound of a carbonated drink exploding. The can was slammed onto a counter top. A drawer was opened and the faucet turned on. Cal muttered again. This time the words were clear. “You idiot. What are you even doing? He’s going to—”

He stopped when Ray appeared in the kitchen doorway. Ray was barely aware of moving.

Cal was holding a towel under the water. An opened soda can was on a counter, but the surprise of the explosion must have made Cal tip the can over for a moment, because there was a spill of soda near his feet. A spray of caramel-colored drops decorated his face and chest as well.

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