Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Fiona
It’s only been an hour and they’re already at each other’s throats. This is a bad sign.
I think I’ve gotten a decent read on them, though.
Shathar is a little more worldly than Khesan, the former soldier.
Khesan, though, has a youthful earnestness about him.
I wonder how Khesan will feel about life on Earth after giving up his family’s name and wealth.
Though Shathar did say he sold his business, too.
Both of them are so serious about this, how could I possibly send one of them home at the end? I haven’t taken a moment to really consider what Gazargo was proposing: that I should live with both aliens, as if they’re my husbands, and then pick one?
What was I thinking when I agreed to this?
I’ve been mulling over in my head what to do with two alien husbands, since I’d only prepared the one room. I do have another, but it’s downstairs, where my mom lived when she was still alive. That apartment is the reason I bought this house, so we could each have our own space.
Since she died, I’ve kept it locked up and closed off. But now I have nowhere else to put my extra husband.
When we all reach the front door, Khesan and Shathar carrying their belongings in their clawed hands, their long tails looped around their feet, I turn to each of them.
“So which room do you want?” I ask. “There’s a queen bed upstairs, down the hall from me. There’s another one in the basement.”
“The closer one,” both of them say at once, in perfect unison.
I should have seen that coming.
“Okay, well, unless you want to share a single bed, which I don’t think you do, then you guys have to pick one.” I open the front door and usher them inside.
Shathar allows Khesan to go first, his eyes sliding over to me and then away again. Inside, he sets his bag down on the floor.
“I will take the basement, as you call it,” Shathar says. “It doesn’t matter how near or far you are, I will always be able to feel your heart beating.”
Jeez. These guys are so intense. But it’s also kinda hot.
“Well, let’s get Khesan settled upstairs, and then we’ll put you downstairs.”
Both of them follow me up the stairs, and I roll my eyes but don’t object. I show Khesan to the guest room down the hall from my room, and he drops his two rather large bags.
“I brought enough clothing that you should not need to purchase anything new,” he says. “I did not want to be a burden.”
“Great!” I chirp. “You’re sleeping here, then, and we’ll share the bathroom. Shathar?”
The other Arshurian nods as I emerge from the room and lead him back down the stairs, to the door I haven’t opened in ages. There’s just no reason to go down to Mom’s old apartment unless there’s a leak or the water heater needs maintenance.
I push open the door and cough as the dust hits my face.
“Sorry,” I say. “This was where my mother lived, and I haven’t been down here in a while.”
Shathar gives me that smile that shows off all his sharp teeth. “Quite all right.” As we head down the stairs, he asks, “Your mother is no longer here?”
“She passed away about two years ago.”
When we reach the bottom, I flick on a light. The main room is half finished and half not, with storage space off to one side, and then the television and couch we set up for Mom. There’s a kitchenette, and then a short hallway leading to the bedroom and bathroom.
“It’s a whole suite,” I say as I lead him to the bedroom. “Mom had everything she could need. She was always really aware of ‘being a bother,’ even though it really wasn’t a bother.”
I sigh, wondering what she would think of what I’m doing now.
Two alien husbands, Fiona? I can hear it in her voice. How are you going to handle that?
“Thank you very much for sharing this space with me,” Shathar says as we enter the small room. He places his one bag on the bed. “I hope that it doesn’t bring you pain to open this door again.”
I shrug. “I’m glad it’s going to good use, honestly. Maybe we can redecorate it or something.”
Yeah. I like that idea.
Shathar perks up, his tail lifting off the floor. “You would allow me to do that?”
“Sure.” I open my arms wide and spin in a circle. “This is your place now. You can do what you want with it, as long as it doesn’t become a bachelor pad.”
“I do not know this ‘pad,’ but I am no longer a bachelor. I am a happily married Arshurian.”
His yellow eyes settle on me, and there is a deep kindness, a true affection in them, that takes me by surprise. He is the one who placed his hand on my cheek as he said his commitments, and my skin heats immediately remembering his earnestness.
“You often turn pink this way,” he says, lifting a hand once again to the side of my face. He brushes over my cheekbone with his finger. “What does it mean?”
“It could mean a lot of things.” My mouth feels dry. “In this case, um, it’s because I, uh…” I wave my hands in front of my face. “I’m just tired, is all. I should go help Khesan get settled, too, and—”
Shathar’s tail falls back to the floor. “Of course. The other guest.” But he says it less with venom and more with resigned exhaustion. “See to him. I will be here.”
“Feel free to use the drawers and the closet,” I say brightly. “Whatever you want.”
He nods, and I flit away up the stairs to visit with Khesan.
In his room, he is opening his bags and sorting through his clothes.
He’s brought enough, it looks like, but it’s all in the same style as what he’s wearing now—a kind of beige robe over leggings, with a slot in the back for his long tail and a belt around the middle.
All of his other clothes are similar but in varying earth tones.
“How come all aliens wear the same thing?” I ask, studying him in the doorway. “Gazargo was wearing that, too, and so was Roth’kar when I met him.”
Khesan turns to me. “It is the style in the galaxy.” He shrugs and holds up one item. “Where should I put them?”
He is far more at home than Shathar, clearly ready to make the space his. I’m glad he feels so comfortable.
My home is his home now, I suppose.
“There are hangers in the closet,” I say, opening it up for him. He gazes at the door.
“So rustic,” he says with a pleased sigh. “I like it.”
I wonder what closet doors are like where he comes from.
“Is your society much more advanced?” I wish I had been given some information about my groom—er, grooms—before they arrived. But Amara had this problem, too, with the Matching Program. They gave her no information at all before she met Roth’kar.
“Yes, but we live a simple life still. We were also brought into the Intergalactic Association of Civilizations by the Frahma, and had not achieved interstellar travel. But we have adapted to alien technology over the last few hundred years and integrated it into our home lives.”
Earth has been pretty resistant to change since aliens first landed, but that hasn’t been terribly surprising. Even the spaceport still has regular old doors, not fancy space doors.
“Thank you,” Khesan says, taking a step toward me. “Thank you for having me in your home, and for agreeing to this marriage. I’m thrilled for the life we have ahead of us, and I look forward to learning more about you.”
Gosh, they’re both so romantic.
He leans down so his snout is close to my cheek, and I can feel his light breaths on my ear. It makes all the hair on my neck stand on end.
“I hope to learn everything,” he says in a whisper.
Before I can respond, he withdraws and starts hanging up his clothes.
“This will certainly be an adventure,” I quip, trying to lighten the air. I’m surprised by how my body responded to that. “I’m excited to learn more about you, too.”
Khesan shoots me a smile, or as close as the Arshurians seem to get to a smile, which is rather toothy.
I leave him to it, heading downstairs to think about dinner. I was going to cook something tonight, but I only bought enough food for two. I might have to order pizza.
Shaking my head, I put in an order for two big pizzas plus wings, because I don’t really know what Arshurians eat.
I assumed regular human food, but Shathar and Khesan are rather…
not as humanoid as I expected. Roth’kar’s main feature is his four arms, followed by the cute antennae. My new husbands are distinctly alien.
Not saying that’s a turnoff. In fact, the way both Shathar and Khesan treated me today, like some kind of queen, I won’t say it didn’t affect me. They’re romantics, and truthfully, I’ve always wanted someone to be a romantic to me.
We survive eating dinner that night, but there’s no shortage of sniping on the part of my two new grooms as they fight over the last few wings.
I knew I should’ve ordered more wings.
“This was a lovely meal,” Shathar says at the end, once the two of them have obliterated the pizzas and the wings both. “I’m delighted with what I’ve had of Earthling food so far.”
Khesan mutters a grudging agreement.
“Well, there’s lots more out there,” I say.
“Like this ‘Mexican food’ the Frahma talked about?” asks Khesan, fans flaring.
“Yes, like that.” What is it with aliens and Mexican food? “And more.”
Shathar gathers up the boxes from dinner. “Where should these go?”
I show him to the recycling.
“You have to get the food off before you can recycle it, and only if it’s not too greasy,” I explain. “Otherwise it goes in the trash.”
“Where does the trash go?” asks Khesan.
“To a landfill, I guess.”
The two Arshurians exchange a quizzical look. I think it’s the first time they’ve acknowledged one another without hissing.
“I wonder if the Frahma will bring your people vaporization,” Shathar says thoughtfully. “Very useful, a vaporizer.”
Once it’s done, we all head back inside, Shathar trying to edge his way closer to me than Khesan. They both try to go through the door at the same time, bottlenecking them.
“Imbecile,” Shathar huffs as he tries to wedge himself inside the door. “We can’t both go at the same time.”
“I was going through it first!”
They really can’t even go through a door without arguing about it?
“Shathar,” I snap, and the two of them fall still. “You first. Khesan, wait there. Let him go.”
Obediently, Khesan backs up and allows Shathar through the door, glaring at him the whole way. Then it’s his turn, and when they’re both in the kitchen with me, their tails are lying flat on the floor. They both look rather contrite as I cross my arms.
“I do have work tomorrow,” I tell them both firmly, “and I can’t have you fighting while I’m in the office in case I have meetings. Can I trust you alone for a few hours?”
Shathar gapes at me. “Of course you can. We are not animals.”
“You’re acting like animals,” I say, pointing at each of them in turn. “I can’t even trust you to walk through a door.”
Rubbing the back of his head, Khesan says, “I’m sorry. It is difficult to watch him be close to you. My heart knows that you are mine, and he feels like… an interloper.”
Shathar growls. “You are the interloper here.”
“This is what I’m talking about.” I hold up both my hands. “It won’t work if you’re at each other’s throats all the time. We need some kind of system.”
“A system?” Shathar perks up. “What do you mean?”
“I need time to get to know you, but I can’t when you’re always arguing.” I try to keep my tone calm. “So I propose we split off. Separate you two, and then I’ll divide my time between you. That way you don’t have to come into contact with each other any more than necessary.”
Khesan’s mouth opens in surprise, while Shathar is frowning.
“I would have to share you with him?” the older Arshurian asks, sitting forward on the table, his tail rising behind him. “Sit and wonder what you are doing when the two of you are alone?”
Oh, jeez. He’s already thinking like that?
“Hey now.” I raise both my hands in the air. “We haven’t even talked about intimacy yet. I just want us to learn about each other. Establish a… ground-level understanding.”
To my surprise, the two aliens glance at each other, then back at me. They both seem unhappy.
“If this is the way you want to proceed,” Khesan says, his yellow eyes focused on me, “then I will abide by it.”
Shathar snarls, but Khesan shoots him a look that must translate between them, because Shathar sits back down in his seat. His tail lashes the floor.
“Yes, this is how I want to proceed,” I say. “Are we all in agreement?”
Shathar crosses his arms. “Yes.”
Khesan nods. “Whatever my wife wishes.”
I sigh. This is going to be an interesting thirty days.