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“Shannon!” she greets. “Good to see you survived LA. How was the rest of your trip?”
I turn to her, sheepishly realizing I don’t know how to answer even that simple question.How can I even explain anything?
Her eyes fall to my cheek, and a kaleidoscope of fragmented emotions flutter across her face. Shock, concern, anger, then she quickly schools her expression into something neutral. “What happened?” she asks, folding her arms.
“Oh. It’s nothing, Grace. Dumb accident with a knife.”
“On yourface?”
“Told you it was dumb.”
“Shannon… you’re a terrible liar. A cut on your hand or something I’d buy, but no one puts knives near their faces.” She stops and softens. “You’re okay, right? It wasn’t like a mugging or—”
“No! No,” I insist. I know where her mind must be going, and I cut off that train of thought immediately. “Nothing like that, Christ.”
“I mean, LA and all…”
I laugh. “No. LA was…” There are no words for it, really. “Amazing.” The last of my statement comes out dreamily.
Grace’s eyebrows raise. “That wasnotan oh-the-city-was-really-cool amazing. That was an I- met-a-guy-and-got-some-serious-dick amazing.”
“Grace! What the hell,” I splutter.
Shit.That is a little too on the nose. Maybe she’s right about me being a terrible liar.It’s not even about lying, really. Apparently, I just have absolutely zero ability to keep a poker face. She’s clearly ontosomething, and the way my face is heating up is doing nothing to help.
I consider it. She knows Goëtica, she was there for the concert too. I could say I ran into Elias and Caelan. That’s true enough, and she would probably buy the dreamy sigh just being a fangirl thing. The specific details don’t need to be mentioned.
Grace is friendly, and I enjoy her company, but we’re notveryclose. It’s only a workplace friendship. And it’s probably a bad idea to have anyone in a work scenario knowing anything about anyone else’s sex life. But, God, I want to spill everything.
Itwasamazing, and keeping everything to myself makes me feel like I’m going to explode. Not the demon aspect. She’d probably think I was crazy. I’m not even sure I’m not crazy myself half the time, but would it matter that much to share some of it?
I can’t decide right now.
I don’t really have the time to.
“I need to put my stuff away and get to the lab to start my shift. Can we talk about this later?”
“You’re deflecting,” Grace accuses lightly.
“For real, though. I don’t want to be late.”
“All right. You do know I’m going to come hunt you down later? I’m still not okay with you just having that cut and no explanation.”
“Accident,” I mumble.
“Uh-huh.”
She means well. Joking aside, she’d back off if I told her seriously, but who else do I have to talk to?
Well. Elias and Caelan, now. Kind of. It’s too early to have established any real post-one-night stand dynamic, but Caelan’s already taken to sending me photos from backstage and complaining about Elias being too busy supervising the sound check to give him a blow job. To which Elias promptly replied that it was a group chat, followed by:
Elias:Caelan, I can see everything you say.
Caelan had texted back with a winking smiley face.
Caelan:I know.
That made me snort alone in my apartment, just reading their exchange. They had said they worked better with someone else involved, a counterbalance to their antagonism, but I can’t help but wonder if, in some way, that was whatIneeded too. I’ve never been good at maintaining one-on-one conversations. With three of us, it feels easier. The flow is more natural.
