Epilogue
“It is exciting that we shall be training together!” Cloudtree stood on the other side of the bar at the Boudoir—the customer side—wearing a very glittery outfit that Cleste had to have loaned him. She was the only person at the Boudoir who even came close to Cloudtree’s broad frame.
“So exciting,” Theo said as he assembled the garnish skewers.
Cloudtree wiggled around. The sequins on his top moved, catching the light.
“Celeste says she has not decided in which way I shall labor.” He leaned in. “But I have indicated a preference.”
Theo glanced at the neckline of his top. “Let me guess.”
“I wish to give pleasure to all those who seek it.”
Theo sighed. “You didn’t let me guess.”
Cloudtree blinked. “Oh, apologies. Celeste asked the same thing earlier, and she says it’s hyperbolic, which she says means it’s rhetorical and to ignore it. But go ahead. Guess.”
Theo picked up a lime slice with just a bit too much force, and the squeeze of juice hit him square in the eye.
“Motherfucker!”
“Are you well?” Cloudtree puffed out his chest, clearly unable to not do so when he thought someone needed help.
Lilo, the bartender-in-chief came over. “Hey, you good, old newb?”
“Perfect. Just lime juice in the eye.”
Lilo sighed, his purple lipstick looking gorgeous with his olive skin, even with the corners of his mouth turned down. He was wearing false lashes with tiny pink hearts at the tips of the feathery hairs, which to Theo looked about as painful as the juice.
“Go wash that out. It happens, but it can really irritate your cornea, and then everyone’s going to wonder if you have pink eye.”
“Fine, fine.”
He rounded the bar only to be confronted with Cloudtree’s broad chest on the other side.
“I will show you to the employee bathroom,” Cloudtree intoned, once more in such a way that it made Theo think he’d only just learned the words today.
The bathroom was past the break and prep rooms, and all of them were on the left after the entrance and required a keycard to enter. Cloudtree swiped his, with a satisfied little smile when the mechanism beeped and the door opened.
“This is wonderful,” he informed Theo. “Not your eye juice, of course.”
Theo cackled. “Yeah, who’d want my eye juice?”
Bunny and Jasper looked up, Bunny from doing her eyes at the break table and Jasper from scrolling on his phone next to her.
“You guys good?” Bunny asked.
Cloudtree stopped. “Theo needs his eye washed.”
“Call me Puck, please. And I’m good. Lime juice to the eye.”
Jasper cackled. “Fuck. I got dick juice to the eye the other day. My sympathies.”
Cloudtree ushered Theo into the bathroom, and he came in with him, which made it awkward, given there was just the toilet and a sink.
“You could’ve waited outside.” Theo turned on the water, collected it in his palm, and began rinsing as best he could without getting his shirt wet.
It was one of his old work shirts, somewhat see-through to begin with, and probably even more so when wet.
Peter had looked at it in barely contained horror, and even if he wasn’t here, Theo wasn’t going to make it worse for him.
“Yes, but…Theo—Puck—do human dicks produce juice? Like a flower does sap?”
“Nectar. Flowers make nectar. And are you really asking that? Wait, are you telling me Fae don’t, you know, come? When you…come?”
Cloudtree met his eyes in the mirror. “Oh. Well, certainly, with pleasure. Although I have only ever enjoyed my own hand. A pillow once. But it’s not juice, just seed.”
Theo turned the water off and blinked a few times. His eye looked okay.
“Whatever euphemism you like. That means different people call it different things.”
Cloudtree nodded, looking very serious. “I will remember that, although Celeste said it might be better if I try with less talking for the time being.”
“Yeah. It’s important to take it step by step. Look, we should get back, and you’re blocking the door.”
“Oh. I thought you might maybe want to relieve yourself.”
“Not with you here I don’t. And I was hoping I’d get to make at least one cocktail, so open that door.”
Cloudtree nodded. “As you say. Is a cocktail another word for a man’s—”
“No! Fuck, isn’t there a dictionary for people like you?”
“Laurette said I would pick up the colloquialisms best with exposure.”
“I bet he did.”
They walked out, waving to Jasper and Bunny, who grinned at them like two people who would enjoy gossiping about their colleagues sharing bathroom time.
When they got back out to the main room, Corvin, Mike, Will, and Basil were at the bar. No, fuck. Sage. I know the witch’s name. Corvin’s shirt read Monsterfucking 4-ever, the words framed prettily by tentacles, paws, claws, and more. He’d added but no Fae in black pen.
Lilo pointed his chin at Theo, and the four of them all turned and started waving. Theo wasn’t sure whether it was more endearing or embarrassing. When Cloudtree decided to wave back, Theo settled on embarrassing.
“Never wave at random people,” Theo said.
“Oh. But aren’t those two the men we freed from my stepbrothers’ clutches?”
Theo groaned. “Don’t remind me.”
“I did not think you had so soon forgotten.”
Will hopped off his bar chair and hugged Theo as soon as they got within reach. It was short, surprising, and over almost as soon as it had started.
“Oh, sorry!” Will’s big eyes met Theo’s. “They said you—” He looked at Cloudtree. Up at Cloudtree. And stepped closer to Theo, putting himself between him and Cloudtree.
Sage cleared his throat. “Sweetcakes, I think that one’s friendly.”
Theo nodded. “Yeah, that’s Cloudtree. He works here now.”
Cloudtree pushed out his chest, making the sequins sparkle. “I do.”
“Okay.” Will turned to Theo. “I can’t believe you didn’t text me! I always check my phone now that we text. I check it daily. You could’ve at least texted when you got back safely.”
Theo cleared his throat. “Uh. I was sort of busy. Come on, sit down. Maybe I can try making you something to drink?”
Theo threw a hopeful look at Lilo as he came back around the bar.
Cloudtree sat down next to Mike, which made it so that most of the seats directly at the bar were taken.
It gave the entire place the air of being busier than it was, even though there weren’t as many clients in the main room off the bar right now.
It was the middle of the week, after all, and not all that late yet.
“I think you can make a gimlet if you follow my instructions,” Lilo said. “Make four, one each for your friends. Good practice.”
“Gimlet sounds fancy,” Corvin said.
Mike got that sappy look when he turned to Corvin. “Fancier than the pina coladas you want for our wedding?”
Corvin looked up at Mike from under his lashes. “I don’t know about that, Pineapple Mike. What will Carl think if he doesn’t see us embodied in cocktails?”
Lilo put a hand on his hip. “Your friends invited Carl to their party, and no one even asked me whether I can come to make drinks?”
“Um,” Corvin said.
Mike looked flustered, but his nice lawyer suit hid that pretty well. “This keeps happening to us, doesn’t it?”
Will was leaning on the bar, clearly afraid of missing what was going on. “What keeps happening? What does?”
Theo leaned over to him. “They keep having to invite people to their wedding. Carl first. Then Lord Laurette. And now apparently Lilo.”
Lilo blinked his heavily decorated eyes. “I’m offering to work. I make the best fucking cocktails in this city.”
“We’ll tell Mom?” Corvin asked, looking at Mike, who sighed.
“Do you really have to call my mother ‘Mom’? You don’t have to do everything she says just because she loves the idea of you as her son-in-law. But yeah. We’ll tell Gladys.”
“We’re going to the wedding too,” Will told Sage.
“Yeah? Well, if you don’t want any live doves, we can make you pretty paper birds. Very environmentally friendly.”
Theo wondered whether Sage owned shoes he could wear to a wedding. Flip-flops probably weren’t going to do it. He was automatically reaching for his phone to text Peter about it when he stopped himself. And started smiling.
Corvin pointed at him. “Aw! That face! Luuurve! Mike, look!”
“It’s not news to me, honey.”
Theo took a step back. “I don’t—I’m not—”
Sage snapped his fingers and whispered something, making sparks explode in the air around his hand. “You said cocktails for everyone?”
“Gimlets.” Lilo pulled a notebook and pen from the front pocket of his apron and handed both to Theo. “There. Your bartender’s notebook. The most important notebook in your entire career behind this hallowed counter.”
Theo looked from the five people eagerly smiling at him—and very encouragingly, in Will’s case—to Lilo.
“You know I’m just here part time?”
Lilo put both hands on his hips. “What the fuck do I care? I have standards, and I take this job seriously. I’ll train you as best as I can, just like Celeste is going to train Sparkly over there as best as she can.” He pointed at Cloudtree.
“My name is—”
“Not the point, Sparkly.” He tapped the notebook. “Open. And start taking notes. You lot better show him how unimpressed you are with your drinks if he gets it wrong.”
“Oh, he won’t do that,” Will said. “Theo’s super smart.”
Sage pressed a kiss to Will’s cheek. “You’re smart, and you already filled more than one notebook with magic.”
Corvin clapped. “We’ll even drink the bad cocktails. Say, are you going to be handling drunk wedding guests too?”
Lilo shook his head. “Not my department, but don’t you have a Carl for that?”
Corvin nodded. “Fair point.”
Mike put an arm around Corvin’s shoulders. “If anyone has too much fun, I’ll sing to them. It’s going to be a wonderful wedding.”
Corvin nodded, his eyes all sparkly with…luuurve.
Theo opened his new notebook, picked up his pen, and wrote Gimlet, then underlined it in a mostly straight line. He looked at Sage and Will, Corvin and Mike, even at Cloudtree. Something was missing there. Someone.
“Hey, I just have to make a quick call, guys, okay?”
Mike gave him an amused look. “That didn’t take very long.”
Theo retreated to a corner of the bar while Lilo busied himself opening little cans of salted nuts and putting them in little bowls for the guys. The call connected almost immediately.
“Theodore.”
“Yeah. Hi. I know you’re not supposed to hang out at the bar and all, but if you’re close—if you want to—I’m learning to make my first cocktail, and everyone’s here. So if you want to come too, it would be another chance to practice.”
“Ah. That makes sense. What will you be making?”
“Gimlet.”
“I could drink. Give me two minutes.”
“Two—” But Peter had hung up. The elevator chimed as it came up from the parking garage, and Theo’s jaw dropped when the doors opened and he saw Peter’s ice blue eyes and casual shirt without the tie, the two top buttons open. He frowned. “That wasn’t two minutes.”
Peter took slow, deliberate steps toward the bar, shooed Cloudtree one seat down, and settled in next to Mike. He smiled at Theo.
“I was in a hurry.”
“Luuurve,” Corvin said again.
Will had calmed down and was focused on sitting up straight and not making eye contact with Peter, and Sage had an arm around his back. Cloudtree still sparkled. Both Mike and Peter could’ve passed for actual clients.
“Sweet-assed gods, what a production this is,” Lilo said.
Corvin crunched down on a nut. “Hey, you got yourself a shift at a wedding out of it. I mean, only if you really want to.”
Lilo crossed his arms. “I really want to. Well, now that Mr. Collins is here, can we get started, Puck?”
“I’m very excited to not have missed the show,” Peter said.
Will nodded, giving Theo a covert thumbs-up.
There was an odd sensation in Theo’s chest that was barely familiar.
He recognized what it was. Just like when Corvin, Will, and Carl had ended up going to lunch with him, this was—oddly enough—friends.
His friends were here to support him. That felt…
good. Safe. Once he had the gimlet down, he’d text Carl to come up after work to get one too, and maybe he could get Celeste to try one as well.
Suddenly, all of that felt possible; easy, even.
“Let’s get this show on the road, then.” Theo turned to Lilo. “What’s first?”
Lilo cleared his throat. “Well, there’s lime in this, so watch your eyes.”
“Because limes, like dicks, are full of juices,” Cloudtree said.
Everyone turned to the Fae. He sparkled on, looking pleased with himself for having mastered a new colloquialism.
Well, maybe Cloudtree needed a friend too. Theo made a mental note to take him along to lunch the next time they went. He was sure he could handle another friend.