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He chewed on his lower lip, his mind reeling.
There was no doubt that Fidi was the one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. He could not imagine loving anyone else the way he loved Fidi, and he knew he wanted to wake up beside him every single day—but could they even get married? How in the world was he going to explain that when he went to get a marriage license?
And speaking of licenses, it wasn’t like Fidi had a license or any other kind of personal identification. From a legal perspective, he didn’t exist as a person because he’d been hiding out as a snake for most of his life. He was a being that wasn’t supposed to existperiodbecause the only known recordings of his kind were in mythology. He could put that ring on Fidi’s finger, but did it really mean anything if they couldn’t actually get married?
He thought about previous generations of men and women who were denied marriage because the person they loved was the same sex, and he wondered if the angst he currently felt was comparable to their struggle. Even now that it was legal, there were hateful bigots who would shun Matt for choosing to love another man, but with that man also not being human…
Shit. Maybe this was worse.
There was already the danger of Fidi being seen by the wrong person—anyperson—and being taken away to some evil lab for awful experiments. Any attempt to sneak Fidi down to the courthouse wasn’t worth the risk of losing him forever, and Matt suddenly saw his desire for a so-called legitimate marriage as inherently selfish. He didn’t need a piece of paper to prove that he loved Fidi and wanted to be with him forever.
The ring itself was a symbol of that very promise, and Matt hurried into the pawn shop to buy it at once.
Crap, he hoped it fit.
Matt made his last few stops at the grocery store and butcher, and then he finally headed home. The ring was in a small box inside his coat pocket, and he couldn’t say why but it felt like it weighed a ton. He was intimately aware of its strange weight, and he fiddled with it the entire drive back to his apartment.
Even as he lugged the groceries inside, he could feel it poking into his chest and his heart was pounding away.
“Hey, Fidi! Baby! I’m home!” he called from the kitchen after dropping the bags on the counter. He turned around with a frown, surprised that he hadn’t already been tackled yet. His pulse climbed for a new reason, fear, and he hurried into the bedroom.
Maybe Fidi was still napping. Maybe he had decided to take a bath. Maybe…
Matt groaned in frustration when he found both the bed and the bathroom empty. He did a few loops of the apartment just to make sure he hadn’t somehow missed a giant naga hiding somewhere, but his search confirmed that Fidi was not here.
“He got out. Again.” Matt mumbled a few curse words into his palms, and he scowled when he sensed Maggie staring at him. “Go ahead! You can tell him all the very bad words I said about him when he gets back. Right now, he deserves them.”
With a heavy sigh, Matt tried to distract himself by putting the groceries away. He’d gotten fresh rabbits for Fidi, the long list of requested pet snacks, and two big steaks. He wanted tonight’s meal to be special since he was planning on proposing, but he couldn’t do anything of the sort without a boyfriend here to actually propose to.
Once the groceries were put up, there was nothing he could do except wait.
And it was miserable.
Television didn’t distract him, watching his pets in their freshly cleaned tanks didn’t help either, and he started doing random chores around the apartment to kill time. He made the bed up with fresh sheets, put the dishes away, and then cleaned the toilet. He was about to scrub the tub when he heard a loud thump.
“Fidi?” Matt shouted, on his feet at once.
“Here!” Fidi sounded upset. “Matt! Please hurry!”
“Baby?” Matt moved so fast that he almost tripped over himself, skidding to a stop when he found Fidi in the living room by one of the windows beside the couch. It was closed, but Matt could tell at a glance that the latches weren’t locked.
Okay,thathad to be how Fidi was getting out, but he’d worry about that later.
“What’s wrong, baby?” Matt asked, trying to get the anger out of his voice. “I was worried about you! I’ve been waiting—”
“We need help!” Fidi thrust a small scaly ball into Matt’s hands.
Matt blinked, staring down at some sort of lizard. “Wh-what happened to him?”
“I don’t know! I just found him!” Fidi’s eyes were damp with tears. “He can’t walk!”
“Poor little thing. Okay, just…” Matt took a deep breath and a closer look at the lizard.
It was an armadillo lizard, a species named for the ridges they had running from their head to the tip of their tails that resembled the titular mammal’s plating. Though Matt didn’t see any obvious injury, he could already tell something was wrong because the lizard seemed to be having trouble rolling into their natural defensive position—a little ball they achieved by grabbing or biting their tail.
“Can you please tell him I’m gonna help him and maybe not bite me?” Matt said as he carried the lizard back toward the bathroom.
“He makes no promises.” Fidi slithered behind Matt and hovered close, watching worriedly.
