Page 34 of Midsummer Phoenixes
My Soyer. My moonlight phoenix.
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SOYER
June 14
Iloungedonmycouch and stared out at the still-bright sky above the city before heaving a sigh. It was 8 pm, fucking hours before I could walk into the Moonlight without flustering Amory or getting him to worry.
On a normal day, I might have just crept into the bed upstairs which smelled a lot like him these days, but last night, during the tail end of celebrating our three-month anniversary, it had gotten a little messy, and Amory had been embarrassed to the extreme, and so I’d run him a bath, left him in the tub for ten minutes. I’d changed the sheets before I’d joined him in the warm water, and now, our sex scent was gone, replaced by Magical Forest body wash.
I sat up and looked at my screen, but of course Amory hadn’t texted. He was too fucking diligent at work, and I hated it. I walked around the house to see if there was anything—anything at all—that I could potentially clean, anything that I had missed in my regular, make-time-pass-faster cleaning sessions I’d started since the Moonlight had reopened and taken Amory away from me.
Since I was nothing if not efficient, the place was fucking spotless. Sure, normally that didn’t keep me from rubbing one out and cleaning that, but masturbating without Amory here was even worse, and the mere though bored me.
I went upstairs and changed out of my sweatpants and tee into an outfit appropriate for leaving the house, put on boots, and grabbed my coat. I needed to do something to kill the time.
Downstairs, right when the elevator doors opened, I saw the young Star-Garbed behind the front desk and smiled. He was still green enough to be fun to mess with.
I started by walking toward him, but I did it real slow. He noticed. Being a wolf, he looked down to emphasize his submission.
I stopped at the front desk, put my hand on there, and used my fingers for staccato taps against the wooden surface. Tack-tack-tack-tack. Tack-tack-tack-tack. I said, “I did laundry earlier today.”
He swallowed. “Yes, sir?”
I cocked my head and drew my eyebrows together, something he wouldn’t miss with the glances he stole at my face.
“I’m going out, and I need you to move it to the dryer.”
He exhaled with some relief. “Of course, sir. Not a problem.”
“You’re going to run the gentle cycle.”
“I will.”
I forced myself not to smile as I said the next bit. “I also need you to fold it. It’s a fitted sheet. You know how to properly fold a fitted sheet into a neat thirty-by-fifty rectangle, yes?”
He did not, because no one fucking did, and it showed. If he’d been in his wolf form, he would have whimpered and shown his belly, maybe after peeing a little.
“I…I will…I will figure it out, sir,” the pup said, and I knew he was going to call Atkins or Lola, and maybe I was a childish fuck who didn’t handle his boyfriend going back to work all that well, but the idea of the three of them Googling and attempting to figure out the stupid sheet filled me with unabashed glee.
“You better do,” I said. I’d have to throw the damn sheet right back in the laundry, because three people putting their hands all over it when I knew Amory was at some point going to sleep on it filled me with discomfort on a visceral level. I couldn’t explain that and I didn’t want to analyze it, so I didn’t.
I took all my petulant attitude and walked out of Sundial Tower.
My feet carried me to Lorenzo’s Bodega without much conscious thought. I realized it was because I was craving fried potato pancakes the moment I walked in there.
Lorenzo—the spawn form that was wearing that name tag anyway—was in his normal place by the register, but another spawn form was stocking the shelves. The latter looked much younger, like a teenager.
“Black Shuck,” Lorenzo said.
“Hi. Passing this one off as your son?”
“Nephew,” the younger spawn said.
“Hmm.” Several spawn forms meant the soil conditions in Lorenzo’s—the real thing’s—pot were just right, or it was under a lot of stress to produce an extra to protect itself. And because I was nice and neighborly, I asked, “Everything okay?”
The young spawn smiled. “Very, actually. Lord Hawthorne has just been leaving some extra bone ash with me. It makes wonderful fertilizer.”
