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Elias and Caelan are already gone.
ChapterSixteen
The end of the semester means exams and deadlines.
I wish I could treasure the weekend and think of them forever, but I’m all too quickly dragged back into reality.
Thank God it’s not as bad as being an undergraduate, with an exam and project due for almost every module, and those being numerous. Doing a master's part-time has been blissful in that regard, but the work is far more complex. I force myself to put Elias and Caelan from my mind as much as I can andpay attention.
I’ve never been much good at managing my time. I always used to let things get away far, far too easily, leaving them until the last minute and still doing well enough—a dangerous precedent to set. One day I won’t be able to pull it off, and I know that, but it’s so hard to focus when I don’t really care.
That makes it sound bad. It’s not that I don’tcare. It’s that I know I’m going through the motions. I’ve come to recognize that now. There is a core of something genuine in there, the same as with my job. I do like what I do. I’m interested in my degree subject, or I was when I started, but learning for pleasure is one thing. The rigors of academics are another, and that has taken its toll. College was a means to an end. Only, there is no end I wish to achieve.
The future has always been a looming, daunting prospect. Listless and directionless. I tried to avoid thinking about it too much and was only met with apathy at best and dread at worst.
Yet, for the first time in as long as I can remember, I’m truly excited for things to come, all because of Elias and Caelan. I’m excited to get to know them more, and for a future that has them in it.
Elias has been encouraging my singing, even just as a hobby. It’s one of the few things, aside from being with them, that is both a passion and comfort. I’d forsaken it, deeming it useless, but I realize I’ve been missing the creative outlet.
Elias, of course, sings for Goëtica for a living. He sings for me sometimes during our calls, and he’s coaxed me into singing for him in return. It’s intimidating, given that he’s damngood, but he does seem to genuinely enjoy it. Whether he enjoys my voice or merely being able to encourage me, I don’t know, but it’s sweet of him.
Between them, feeling wanted for the first time in longer than I can remember, connected, understood, and pursuing something for the simple joy of it again, I feel so much happier and more confident in myself. That makes everything else easier to bear.
I’m better with them.
The end of the semester also means the holiday season. Even when I went to the gala, decorations were already going up. By the time I’ve finished my exams, Christmas is imminent.
I’m not very bothered, honestly. The holiday is enjoyable enough, but I have no real attachment to it. I was happy to put the thought of it out of my mind entirely while dealing with classes.
Elias and Caelan, unsurprisingly, do not care at all about the holiday season. Elias describes it as “quaint, but utterly irrelevant.” Of course, it is. I laugh at the notion. Why would a pair of demons have any interest in something like Christmas? I wasn’t expecting them to, and I’m not invested myself, so it doesn’t bother me that they clearly have no intentions to spend any time with me or on me for that purpose.
As for Caelan, he finds the forced cheer and incessant jingling melodies utterly infuriating. “’Tis the season tostab a bitch,” he muttered acidly when I brought it up jokingly one time. I laughed until my stomach hurt.
Elias spends most of the holidays trying to prevent Caelan from committing homicide, I’m quite certain.
In any case, they assure me they don’t celebrate the holiday in any way, shape, or form and are insistent I don’t get them any gifts. I agree, on the condition they follow their own damn rules and don’t get me anything. I know what Elias can be like with spending money on unnecessarily fancy things for me.
Despite that, Idofind that Elias has arranged and paid for me to begin singing lessons with a tutor near my college come the start of the next semester.
“After our discussions, it was something I intended to do for you regardless,” he maintains when I try to call him out on going back on our agreement. “The time of year is inconsequential.”
“Elias…”
“You are not calling me a liar, are you, Shannon?” Elias says in a smooth, deep baritone, the rumble of a teasing threat buried amongst his words. It makes me shiver, and my train of thought gets thoroughly derailed after that. All it takes is him using that dominating tone to make me melt.
I do trust him, and it’s not like I can be mad at him after he’s been both generous and that thoughtful. Gift or not, it was meant genuinely. I don’t doubt that.
Besides, even if Elias and Caelanhadbeen remotely inclined to spend the holidays with me, my family had already staked their claim on my time. There is certainly no getting out of that at such short notice, especially when I’m so terrible at keeping in contact during the rest of the year. My mom has to demand to see me as it is.
Family gatherings are bustling, and I don’t mind. The more people, the more distractions, the easier it is for me to slip through the cracks. I can simply be present and nod or hum while everyone else does the talking.
Of course, because my brother and sister are both younger than me and already in serious relationships, the questions start with, “So how come they’ve settled down and I’m still single?”
I hadn’t thought to prepare any answers for the Spanish Inquisition, and it catches me off guard.
“What about you, Shannon? Have you met anyone yet?” my grandma asks, in that well-meaning but interfering way elderly ladies with too much time on their hands sometimes have, and I flounder.
Which is worse?To say no, and get the same old, needless sympathy, advice, and reassurances of ‘oh, you’ll find someone’ that’s already grown tiresome? It’s meant to bereassuring, of course, but it is so damn aggravating to have the expectation shoved in my face.What if I simply preferred not to have a relationship?No one is any less for being single for as long as they damn well want to be, especially if they never have a relationship at all, and the simperingpityover it gets on my nerves.
