the pookas

[instar]

The following day, Bella goes with Trouble, when he heads for the park.

Comments

[megale]

"And are you any good at romancing?" she inquires cheekily.

[aeskhyne]

"No idea," he says. "Never tried."

[megale]

"Wanna find out?"

[aeskhyne]

"Sure!" he says. "Oh, but I can still make out with other people and stuff, right? I do that."

[megale]

"Is that a pooka thing?"

[aeskhyne]

"It's a me thing. I am way more a me than I am a pooka."

[megale]

"What's 'and stuff'?"

[aeskhyne]

"I dunno," he says, "stuff. Snuggles? Sex? Baking cakes for people? I really like baking cakes for people, I'd bake one for you if I could figure out how to get you and it in the same room afterward."

[megale]

"Uh, definitely don't mind if you bake cakes for people or snuggle them. The having sex with them is not going to interfere with the young adult paranormal romance novel thing? Because I'm kind of digging that."

[aeskhyne]

"Why would it?"

[megale]

"...'Cause... it usually would? I don't have a list of why."

[aeskhyne]

"Well, okay," he says, "I'm in love with another guy but he pretty much only wants me for my body and definitely doesn't care what I do in my spare time, and I also kind of have a thing for Titania but she's not into me so that's that, and then there's a girl I hook up with sometimes because we're just that kind of friends. There's nobody waiting around to swoop in and yell at you for stealing their man. So if you don't mind having your paranormal romance with a guy who sleeps around, then I think we're fine."

[megale]

"Titania? Extremely cranky pooka queen Titania?"

[aeskhyne]

"Yep. I love her. Crankiness and all. And she'd probably fire me out of a cannon into the sun if that's what it took to take out the evil cult. But then, I'd let her."

[megale]

"...Is that seriously a possible avenue of fighting the evil cult?"

[aeskhyne]

He snorts. "No."

[megale]

"Okay, 'cause, I don't actually know what I'm dealing with, here, Titania thinks I'm a security risk. Uh, I guess if my mom and dad knew what was going on and got past the whole pooka-cult-etcetera thing they would be like 'but sleeping around causes diseases'?"

[aeskhyne]

He shrugs. "I've been lucky so far. But yeah, that's true."

[megale]

"I do not really wish to have diseases."

[aeskhyne]

"Me neither. I'm careful-ish. I could be more careful if that'd help. —Uh, and I could quit hooking, that would probably help a lot."

[megale]

She blinks. "That was not on the list."

[aeskhyne]

"I haven't done it in a while, too busy being a pigeon, so I forgot. But not doing it because I'm too busy being a pigeon and not doing it on purpose are kind of different."

[megale]

"I guess. Do you even know you don't have anything now?"

[aeskhyne]

"...Not for sure, and I can't go to the doctor because in hiding and also pooka. So." He shrugs.

[megale]

"Oh, yeah, I guess that's a thing, isn't it."