Page 35 of Hopelessly Teavoted
His face had shifted from muddled by lust to sharpened with hurt.
It was better that way, really. Even if she wanted, again, to push the flirtation of their friendship into something more, it was better to hold this boundary. She didn’t want to take advantage, and if she was honest, she was a little bit afraid that Azrael Hart would be something she couldn’t have just one more taste of.
CHAPTER 11Victoria
The week passed in a haze of customers, and on Az’s first staff day, Vickie got so busy that she didn’t see his text until she was already closing and too tired to reply at great length.
He had sent a picture of his cat, sitting on top of his newspaper, looking disgruntled.
Azrael:Much madness from Emily Lickinson when I don’t feed her immediately.
Azrael:She doesn’t want to be old news
Vickie:She could never
The next morning, she saw that he had tried again, undeterred by the brevity and delay of her response. His persistence, and his messages, made her smile. This part of the friendship, this unwavering loyalty from him, and the unquestionable desire to talk to him herself, this had once grounded her.
His friendship had been the charm against a cruel world, the right words to murmur, a small, secular prayer to make the more stressful bits of living more bearable.
She had missed him, more than she’d allowed herself to remember.
Azrael:I think my department chair might be, like, a vampire or something.
Azrael:No, not suave enough to be a vampire.
Azrael:But he gives me the heebie jeebies even in the group text, always replying with things like “I shan’t be participating in that, Mr. Hart.”
Vickie:MY STARS! The Heebie Jeebies? Az, your Uncle Larry called from Sunnyhallow Senior Living, and he said your slang is so old it wouldn’t even fly there.
Azrael:It’s not me, it’s HIM.
Azrael:*I* am a professional wielder of words, a connoisseur of language.
Azrael:so what I’m saying is I’m a nerd, sure. But he’s kind of an asshole.
Vickie:hate that. What’s up with him?
Azrael:He just—he’s so terse. Yesterday was the first day for new teachers, and he showed up and gave us this talk about how adults are too soft on children nowadays. I don’t think he likes kids. Or people. In fact I’m kind of confused about why he would want a job interacting with other humans at all.
Vickie:Ew, hate that. Are the other teachers at least nice?
Azrael:They’re great! Super helpful, and a good range, so some are fairly new, and then there’s the lifers, and the people kind of in the middle of their careers, like Chet.
Vickie:That is an unfortunate name.
Azrael:Yeah I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt; can’t be easy with a name like that, and a stick up his ass, etc. But get this; he got all bent out of shape at the introductory meeting today when they made us do icebreakers with the staff. Said it was beneath him as a professional. And I tried to do a quick tension tamer spell; you know, the shoulders back and relax, deep breath one?
Vickie:I sure do, that saved a lot of asses on standardized test days.
Azrael:It did nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch. It was like I hadn’t even snapped.
Vickie:That’s weird. Does that happen?
Azrael:Only when I’m stressed, or once, super high, in college. But the thing is, I’ve been feeling pretty on top of my anxiety. And I’m definitely not stoned.
Vickie frowned. That was strange. She wondered if it had anything to do with the warnings. They still needed to investigate what the ghosts had said about the town’s fake psychic, Madam Cleopatra. Though why Benedict Hart’s ghost would have wanted her to look into the local palm reader, who they all knew to be entirely nonmagical, was beyond her.
Her to-do list grew longer, and Vickie was too busy. It would have to wait for a day off. Though she and Azrael kept texting, they never brought up the almost kiss. For the best, she was sure. She had mortal and otherworldly obligations, and three souls to reap. By the time Friday rolled around, she knew Azrael was ready for the day off. The local school system followed the four-day summer workweek, which meant that this was his last free Friday for a while.
