Chapter Eleven
I Have My Checklist Ready
Miles
Today, I wake up with a purpose and a plan.
Bellamy didn't seem to hate me as much yesterday when we were doing the scavenger hunt. I mean she didn’t even hex me once yesterday which is…
progress. Also, she touched me…on her own.
I don’t want to get too excited, but something tells me that we are onto something here.
Sunlight filters through the window as a warm fall day should. It’s screaming at me to come out and enjoy it. I stretch like a man on a mission—which technically; I am. I’ve got a checklist, a plan, and a witch who hasn’t hexed me today. Yet.
Rubbing my eyes, I go to reach over to my nightstand until I realize that something is on my chest. Something warm and jiggly. Blinking my eyes, I realize Toad is sitting on my chest with the same bored, judgmental expression he was sporting all day yesterday.
His beady black eyes seem to stare into my soul, as if he is weighing my sins. Not great. I didn’t realize that my wish would backfire this spectacularly.
“Okay,” I mumble, as I throw the blanket back. “You’re still here. That’s…great. Permanent frog familiar for the win! Love that for me.”
Toad only croaks in response.
“And I can’t understand a word of what you say, so what is even the use of you being here?”
I think if he could have shrugged his shoulders, he would have.
He croaks once. Loudly. Definitely disapprovingly and heavy on the judgement. I get it, he didn’t ask to be here either. Fair.
Throwing the blanket back, I sit up, judgy toad in tow, as I lean over to my nightstand to grab my phone. Apparently not wishing to take part any longer, Toad jumps down onto my pillow. Ew, gross. Don’t they carry diseases?
He only stares at me, daring me to judge him as hard as he is judging me.
“Fine, but like…don’t pee on my pillow. It’s the only one I got and I don’t have a washer and dryer here.”
Nyx, the snarky fox who does nothing but judge me from Bellamy’s side, I expected. Frodo the Judgy Toad? Not on my Romance the Witch Bingo Card.
Still rubbing sleep from my eyes, I open my notes app. I have to see where I’m at in this operation and what I could potentially mark off today.
Oh yeah! The ghost cupcakes! I definitely want to bring her one of those today! Extra frosting. Maybe not one that’s possessed? Is that a possibility…or nah?
I nod to myself, satisfied with my plan in mind. I’ll grab our coffees, hopefully she doesn’t have one yet, and then stop by the bakery to grab one of the ghost cupcakes. Well, maybe a dozen because who doesn’t love cupcakes, right?
Toad croaks from my pillow, still judging me for everything.
“You don’t even have a checklist or a voice,” I grumble, rolling out of bed and ignoring his long, slow blink of judgment. “What do you even bring to this dynamic, huh?”
Toad snorts. Actually snorts. And hops towards the bathroom as if he actually needs to freshen up for his big day. He even stares at me after he jumps into the shower. Does he expect me to turn that on for him?
I throw my black hoodie that says, “Hex Me, Baby, One More Time”, over my head and run my hands through my hair…
Wait. What the—
Rushing into the bathroom, I stare at myself in the mirror.
My hair is pink.
Not subtle, pastel pink. Not cotton candy pink. We are talking unicorn-threw-up-on-a-Barbie-dream-house-pink. It even shimmers in the light.
“Bellamy.”
I run my fingers through my curls along the top of my head.
Not going to lie, I actually like it. I lean close to the mirror; it’s like each curl was dipped in shimmery pink.
Somehow even my roots are pink, but my curls?
Soft, fluffy, and bouncy. Probably the best my hair has ever looked.
Is this something that The Hex Appeal Salon could keep up for me?
I literally look like I walked out of an anime convention with a hairstylist named Stardust, who wears pastels and seventy pounds of accessories.
Toad croaks from the bottom of the shower.
“I know,” I say as I turn my head from side to side. “She totally did this and I actually love it.”
He lets out a long croak. Maybe he doesn’t agree with my thoughts.
Milo groans. “The longer this goes on the more concerned I become about you. Why is our hair pink and glittery?”
Smiling into the mirror I say, “Clearly Bellamy is thinking about me this morning. I mean look at this, it has her name written all over it. It’s basically a love letter from her at this point.”
“Someone please save me from this human. Surely the Goddess can give me another human, right?”
“Oh, hush. I’m not that bad.”
“You’re joking right?”
Ignoring Milo, I turn around to where Toad is still sitting in the bottom of the shower. “Are you expecting me to turn that on?”
Croak.
“I’m going to take that as a yes. We need to come up with some kind of morse code or something for you buddy.”
Croak.
Turning the shower on, I set the lavender soap on the floor beside him.
He just stares at me. “Look I know it's not the pond, or your lily pad, but it’s warm water, lavender soap, and something clean. Croak once for like yes I guess, twice for no, and three times for don’t insult me like that again. Fair enough?”
Croak.
“Alright, I’m going to just take that as a yes and assume you agreed to it.”
I slide the glass door shut, and leave him to do whatever it is a toad does in a shower. I have to say, living in Pumpkinridge sure has its quirks compared to Jasper. Can’t say in the twenty-four years I lived in Jasper that I even had a quarter of these things happen to me.
I’m busy brushing my teeth when I hear the glass door slide open again. I check the mirror only to find Sir Hops-A-Lot glossy, deep green, and staring at me.
“Do you need a towel? Do I dry you off? How does this work?”
He jumps down and continues to hop his way out of the bathroom. Okay then. Guess he just air-dries. Who knew?
I turn off my sink, put my toothbrush back, and head back into my room.
“Alright, Sir Hops-A-Lot, are you staying…”
Milo groans. “Please tell me you didn’t just name a magical toad that?”
“I think it’s charming. Might just pick him up a tiny toad necktie.”
“I think I might have been assigned the wrong human. I swear I did something wrong in a past life.”
“Cheer up Milo, life is meant to be enjoyed.”
I grab my cell phone and my keys, pocketing them into my hoodie. I turn to walk out the door, only for Sir Hops-A-Lot to jump onto my shoulder. Alright, then. Magical toad familiar perched on my shoulder, pink hair glimmering in the sunlight, and a wolf who loves me the most.
“Who told you that?”
“It’s in all the warm feelings that you give me each time you grumble. I think secretly you love being my wolf.”
“Help.”
Ten minutes later, I’m strolling down Main Street with a tray balanced in one hand and a bag of ghost cupcakes in another. They keep moaning through the box and it’s causing people to stare at me like I’m the weird one here. Do people not buy them?
Clarissa didn’t even blink when I asked for Bellamy’s usual, a hot apple crisp oat milk macchiato, extra cinnamon. Or when I asked her for the Trouble Latte. She only smiled and winked before she started making them.
I’m not saying that I’m trying to win her over or anything. But, if I was…I definitely think cupcakes and coffee are the right place to start, right?
Am I doing all the right things? I’m only following the example that I was given. Maybe I should ask the man who taught it all to me.
Wiggling my phone out of my pocket I dial the best person to ask. It only rings for a few seconds before his deep baritone voice fills my ear. I didn’t realize how much I missed my dad until now, when his voice brings me back to my childhood.
“Hello son, I wasn’t expecting to hear from you today. You usually call your mom, and I am pulled into the conversation.”
A smile spreads across my face picturing my mom plopping down on his lap and holding the phone in front of his face, ensuring he can’t see his outdoors channel instead of her phone.
“Yeah, as much as I love Mom, I felt you were the best person to ask advice from.”
“Oh, is that so?”
“I’ve been working on winning over my mate. I’ve even googled how to win her over, but you always make momma smile. She always looks at you like you hung the moon in the sky.”
His rumbling chuckle fills the air. “Yeah, she always has seemed to look at me as if I’m a God.
Can’t say that it doesn’t get to my head from time to time.
There’s not a real big secret to it son.
Honestly, I show up every day as if it’s the first one and I always bring her things that remind me of her.
You will learn what your mate loves, I’m sure of it.
Give it time. For now, be you and show up everyday for her.
It won’t take her long to fall in love with an Everhart. Trust me, I would know.”
Now it’s my turn to laugh, because that's the cockiness he just mentioned. But if his mateship is anything to go by, I can see why he’s that confident. “Alright Dad, you’re right. I just worry that because she isn’t a wolf that maybe she won’t feel the same.”
The thought of her not accepting me twists my stomach, the first couple of sips of coffee souring in my gut. I moved across the country for her, to be with her, and if she doesn’t take me–I don’t know what I’ll do.
The crisp air blows through my hair reminding me just how much she thinks about me and my nerves settle a little more.
“Son, give her time. Just because she isn’t a wolf doesn’t mean she won’t feel the draw to you.
But our bonds aren’t the reason we love our mates.
It’s just what brings us to each other. Think of it more like a guiding hand to bring two halves of a soul together.
The only difference for Bellamy is that she didn’t know she had a fated mate before this.
Unlike you who knew there was one out there somewhere waiting to be found. ”