Chapter 4
Chapter Four
At three, I sent a text to my mom; the storm still whipped outside, but the snowfall had let up. You still want me over there?
Yes. Are you not coming? My mom’s reply made me frown. But I dressed, adding layers and gathering Xavier’s chocolate cake for the trip.
On my way, I sent as I stepped out into the cold.
Across the Veil, storms were more like spectacles of crackling electrical hurricanes woven from pure magic. Xavier had warned me to stay clear of windows during the worst of it, though I’d never admit how often I’d pressed my face to the glass anyway, mesmerized by the dancing lights.
Here in the mortal world, the blizzard meant business.
Empty streets stretched before me, sidewalks buried under feet of snow.
I trudged through tire tracks, cake box clutched to my chest like a life preserver.
My winter coat, hat, scarf, and mittens might as well have been tissue paper for all the good they did. Each gust cut straight to my bones.
As another icy wind sliced through me, I fantasized about that stormy beach from my dreams. Warm sand. Salt air. Even nearly drowning seemed preferable to this frozen purgatory.
By the time I reached the front porch, my fingers were numb inside my mittens, my clothes were wet, and my face stung from the cold. I regretted not driving, but only because I thought getting my car stuck might have been a valid excuse not to come.
I knocked, shifting from foot to foot. The door opened, and my mother stared at me with a forced, frozen smile on her face, though she stepped aside when she saw me.
“Luca, sweetie, come in.” Her gaze flicked to the glowing orange band on my arm, visible through my sleeve, marking my shifter variance, but she said nothing.
“Happy Thanksgiving,” I said awkwardly, holding up the cake box and stepping past her. “Brought dessert.”
“Oh, look at this,” my mother said as she took the box.
I closed the door behind me as she slid open the lid of the box.
The cake was a masterpiece of death by chocolate delight.
Three layers of dark chocolate ganache gleamed under the foyer light, with each tier separated by spirals of espresso-infused buttercream forming a subtle swirl design.
Sugar balls clung to the sides like pearls, while ripples of frosting decorated the top like dark waves of chocolate foam.
My mom’s breath caught. “This is beautiful.” She turned the box to study it from another angle. “Never heard of this bakery before.”
As if I’d tell her the shop was across the Veil. “My boss’s favorite place,” I said.
“You’re still at the accounting firm?” my dad asked, appearing in the doorway from the living room.
Stepped right in it, hadn’t I?
“Ah, no. I’m a personal assistant for a CEO now.” That sounded important, right?
Mom rotated the box again, revealing the chocolate waves crested into delicate sugar seashells. “This looks and smells divine.”
I gave her a strained smile. “Fit for a god.”
“Absolutely,” she said. “Let’s head to the dining room. Dinner is ready anyway.”
I shed all my winter stuff by the door, still feeling cold and wet, but followed them to the dining room, where my sister, Laura, sat and completely ignored me. Rosemary and turkey flavored the air of the dining room, a reminder of endless strained holiday dinners.
Why had Xavier insisted I see them? The purview of gods and all that. If left to my own devices, I’d have ignored the holiday altogether. We passed dishes around in stiff silence. The table spread with bowls, platters, pies, and the cake I’d brought.
“What happened to the accounting job?” my dad asked.
“It wasn’t a good fit,” I said, trying to keep everything neutral.
“It’s probably because he’s a demon now,” Laura said, pointing her fork at my arm.
“I’m not a demon.”
The silence after my protest was deafening.
“Laura has news,” Mom said after a few long, strained minutes of plates scraping.
She patted her completely flat stomach. “I’m fourteen weeks along. Due in the spring.”
I blinked, processing those words and a dozen other things. “Uh, congrats. Where’s Steven?” I assumed the father was her boyfriend of three years, but as I couldn’t recall him ever coming to a family holiday, I hadn’t noticed him missing.
“His mother wanted an immediate family only dinner,” Laura said as if it didn’t bother her to be excluded.
“I’d think if you’re pregnant, that would make you immediate family,” I pointed out, thinking it was a big red flag. “Since you’ve been dating for years.”
“His mother is having issues letting go of her baby boy.”
Said ‘baby boy’ was in his thirties, but I pushed my green beans around on my plate rather than commenting, not that I ever brought anyone to meet them myself. The mashed potatoes swimming in gravy reminded me of the waves in the painting, and I wished I were home.
Dad didn’t look up from his plate. “Your mother has already turned the spare room into a nursery.”
“My old room?” The words came out quieter than I’d intended. I set my fork down carefully, the weight of their decision settling between my ribs. The thought of having ‘no home to return to’ burned in my chest.
“You seem to be doing well,” Mom said. “We didn’t think you’d mind.”
I sat back in the chair, trying to sort through the emotions and steady myself. “I get it. Makes sense to use the space.”
“Your stuff is in the garage,” Dad said. “We didn’t throw anything out.”
“We could have. He obviously doesn’t want it anymore,” Laura said. “Since he left it all here.”
Old posters. Trophies. Art books filled with dreams broken. Dried up paints. Did I need any of it? Or did I only wish it still had value to anyone?
Mom hurriedly passed the cranberry sauce. “Luca, your boss must be very important to get cakes like that. What exactly does his company do?”
“Acquisitions,” I said, which wasn’t entirely a lie. Xavier did acquire things, usually dangerous magical artifacts and occasionally wayward shifters like me. “He handles a lot of high-profile negotiations and business dealings.” Like with the Fae.
“Sounds dangerous,” Dad said. “Accounting was more practical.”
“It’s probably how he got his variance,” Laura said.
The dining room lights flickered. Outside, the wind howled like the winter itself was angry on my behalf.
“I got a cold,” I corrected her. “A perfectly normal, human cold. Sneezing, coughing, fever, all the same stuff that could happen to you any day or time. I woke up one morning with fur and claws instead of skin and hair.” My panic over the change that first day couldn’t be articulated to anyone who never experienced it.
And while learning how to change hadn’t been difficult, the anxiety over unregulated stress causing me to shift had become a self-fulfilling prophecy that cost me the accounting job and put me in Xavier’s path, since he’d picked up my cat form from the office after it’d been called in to the Supernatural Enforcement Division.
Silence fell heavier than the snow outside. Dad viciously attacked his turkey. Mom stared at her plate like she could escape the conversation through a magic portal beneath the stuffing. Laura rubbed one hand possessively on her stomach.
And I wasn’t hungry. Why had I come here again? I got up from the table, taking my plate to the sink to clean. “I should get going before the weather gets worse again.”
“Probably for the best,” Laura said. “I don’t want my baby to be exposed to this.”
This being me?
Dad shoved his plate away and rose to his feet too. “Why don’t you look over your stuff in the garage? Tell me what you want to keep, and I’ll load it up to bring over when the weather clears.”
“You should stay for dessert,” Mom added.
But I had no plans to continue this farce of a holiday. I followed my dad to the garage. He led me to a stack of black plastic totes in two sizes and lifted a lid to show a stack of old clothes and wrapped trophies. Did I want those memories?
“I can put them up,” he said and pointed above to a set of racks he must have recently installed in the ceiling, made for this particular type of box. “You can think on it.”
“Sure,” I agreed, not wanting to cut myself open wider on this shitty holiday with a walk through my past. “Look, I’m sorry for not telling you…”
“I packed your art stuff in this one,” Dad continued like he didn’t hear me. “Sketchpads, paints, brushes.” His gaze landed on me with weight. “I didn’t realize how much talent you have.”
“Had,” I corrected. “Haven’t drawn or painted in years. Not really time for that in college.” Being a grown-up meant leaving behind all the childhood dreams. Isn’t that what they’d told me over and over?
The box with the art supplies was smaller than I remembered.
I ran my fingertips over the warped sketchbook on top.
The pages fell open to a charcoal study of the sky, clouds a hazy gray imprint that had incredible depth.
Not bad work, really. Just... abandoned.
Like the human version of me and the life I’d lived before the change.
Did I need any of this? Probably not. But I grabbed the box of art supplies anyway.
I hefted it onto my hip and headed to the door to pull on my winter gear.
Would a holiday with the kitsune twins and my cryptic boss have been better?
More exciting perhaps. And likely with less internal condemnation.
Mom handed over a plastic container with a giant slice of cake. “At least take some of this with you. It’s a beautiful cake.”
“Thanks.” The wind whipped outside, and I balanced the cake on the box of art supplies as I stepped out into the storm, unwilling to stay a minute longer.
Snow and an icy bite to the air stung my cheeks as I headed home, fighting back a lot of frustration, mostly with myself.
Did I want what my parents wanted for me?
Mostly, I thought I wanted more. More than an average job, with a family I barely tolerated and an income that hardly afforded a comfortable living.
Without the variance, would any of that be possible?
The trip through the storm back home passed in a blink, as I barely remembered any of the steps, too lost in thought.
I left the art supplies and cake on the counter, boots beside the door, and peeled off my wet layers and changed into warm pajamas, then collapsed on the bed, staring at the painting.
The sky over the cove was dark with the heavy weight of storm clouds. Somewhere between one breath and the next, my eyes drifted shut. I fell asleep with its image burned into the dark behind my lids and the dream of something waiting on the other side.