"What? No. I mean. Yes? I—wait, no? Yes I'm into monogamy, no I'm not not into it?"
Laurie sagged over the steering wheel, forehead against it for a moment. "Oh good. Because I might be a player but I'm not polyamorous." That was the word he'd been going for. Using it probably would have made it easier for Briana to answer. "Not that there's anything wrong with that, I just…" He trailed off, lifting his gaze and staring blankly toward the fairgrounds. "Do you think that happens? Polyamorous mates? Jon thought he might have been in that situation last year, actually, when he met his mate."
"Really? Was he into it?"
"Mostly he was so confused," Laurie said with a faint smile.
Briana gave a quick, quiet laugh, then shrugged thoughtfully. "Oh. I guess it's possible, anyway. I know the whole mate thing is…like, this is your person, and everything. And I know it's supposed to mean we work everything out. But it's also kind of…you know, what if somebody's mate dies young or something? Do you think there's really only ever justoneperfect person for each of us?" She shot him a glance. "Not that I'm rooting for you to die or anything. Just to be clear. You're notthatbad."
Laurie eyed her, torn between amused and insulted. "Thanks, I think? And…I don't know. I've never thought about it that much, I guess, but I wouldn't want my mate to be alone and unhappy the rest of their lives if something happened to me. I guess I'd kind of hope there were second chances."
Briana twisted toward him, folding her foot up under herself to face him more easily. Her expression was bright and animated now, full of soft humor and curiosity. "Me too. But then, so, like, does that mean, let's say another potential mate for you waltzed by right now. Do you think you'd even notice them, or…?"
"I think if somebodywaltzedby, I would notice them, yes." Laurie grinned at Briana, who snickered and waved a hand at him, as if saying 'you know what I mean.' And he did, of course, so he finished with, "But no, I don't think they'd make my bear go 'oh hey second mate potential there!' I think it's like, uh, it's not 'there can be only one,' but more like…do you know that show that was on when we were kids?Buffy the Vampire Slayer?"
"He makes aHighlanderreference and then asks if I knowBuffy," Briana said like she was talking to an invisible audience. "Yeah, I knowBuffy."
"You make swords," Laurie pointed out. "I figured you'd knowHighlander."
"Fair."
"Anyway, so the Slayers were a one at a time thing, right?"
Briana laughed louder this time. "So you're saying potential second fated mates aren't activated until the first one dies?"
Laurie opened his mouth and snapped it shut again before mumbling, "That's exactly what I meant but it didn't seem soterribleuntil it got said out loud."
Briana laughed again. "It does sound awful, but I also get what you mean. Although I suppose if youwerepolyamorous it might work differently? But the whole idea is that mates accept you for who you are, so if you're not poly, fate won't throw you that curveball."
"Do you think fate really does always make things work out?" Laurie asked, realizing he sounded almost wistful. Briana raised an eyebrow and he shook his head. "I'm honestly not even talking about us. It's just…like, yeah, actually, everybody I know who's found their matehasworked it out, but it's not necessarily that easy. Like Bill and Gwen. Or Ashley and Penny, for that matter. Nobody expects their mate to be a rock star, is what I'm saying. What if you just can't make that work?"
"A lot of people are married to rock stars and make it work. Like, there's usually somebody that stays at home, right? I think it'd be harder if you just had jobs and lives that didn't overlap at all. Is it really fate if you've got a job in San Francisco that you love and I've got a job in New York that I adore and we can only see each other every three years in Kansas City?"
Laurie pursed his lips and turned his attention back to the fairgrounds, thinking about that before finally saying, "I guess…that must be what works for us, then. Them. The hypothetical me and you." He paused. "Why, are you taking a job in Peru, or something?"
"Hah. No, I'm just…don't you ever wonder about all this stuff? About how and why mates work? It's not a biological imperative, like, we don't find fated mates just for the purposeof having babies. That would almost make more sense to me, although it'd also be way worse."
"It's about love, though," Laurie said softly. "About finding people who will accept us. There aren't enough shifters to match us all up with each other, and without fate…" He sighed. "Well, we're facing what happens when true humans find out about shifters without fate being involved, aren't we? And I don't know what todo."
"Yeah." Briana pulled her hair out of its ponytail, scrubbed her fingers through it, and put the ponytail back in. "Me either. None of us do. It's really scary. You're right. It's stupid we don't have actualmagicto deal with this kind of thing. Something to just…fwoosh us out of true human memory."
"On the other hand, I would have used that power for no good as a teenager," Laurie said with a little grin, and finally cranked the truck's engine. "Can you imagine? 'No, Mrs McGillicuddy, of course I didn't steal the answers for that test. Or get caught mooning the other football team yesterday. Or hide in the beer tent to?—'"
"You were kind of a reprobate, weren't you," Briana said dryly, and Laurie felt himself blush.
"Maybe. Honestly, my oldest brother was impossible to live up to, so I stopped trying."
Briana shot him a quick look, and Laurie felt the statement resonate like a gong through his chest, leaving him speechless. Bill, the oldest and most responsible of his brothers, had been good at everything. School. Football. The Faire. Work. Helping their parents out. Just, everything. And Steve, the next-oldest, was almost as bad. Or good, depending on how he looked at it.
Jon, only eighteen months Laurie's senior, was more like him: flirty, funny, flaky. Allowed to get away with a lot. Maybe notquiteas determined as Laurie was to get away witheverything. But as the youngest of four, and one of literallydozens of Torbens in this town, 'Why can't you be more like your brothers?' had hung over his head for as long as he could remember. He had known he'd rebelled against it. He just hadn't ever said it aloud before, and now, saying it to his fated mate, it really felt like he had just confessed every shortcoming he'd ever had, and all the reasons behind them.
No wonder she thought he was useless. He'd spent his entire life cultivating that, because it was the only space he could carve out as his own. Briana deserved a much better fated mate than Laurie was. But she was stuck with him, and all he wanted to do now was apologize for that.
"See," Briana eventually said, "I'm the one they have to live up to, in my family. And now I feel like maybe I owe them all an apology."
"Funny, here I was thinking I owed you one." They were just about downtown now, the drive in having been heavy with thought, although not exactly awkward. Laurie fell silent again, finding a street-side parking place, and killed the engine, trying to figure out the right thing to say, since 'I release you from our mate bond' wasn't going to work.
"You don't," Briana said slowly. "You don't owe me anything, least of all an entire reversal of your personality. I've been really judgy based on what I saw of you from a distance, and I didn't make any effort at all to learn anything else about you. Iavoidedevery possible opportunity, in fact. So…yeah. Might be that I owe you an apology, in fact."
