by M. J. O'Shea
“I don’t want to go on some huge international flight. And I don’t want to leave Gray here alone,” she said.
“Don’t you think we should talk about this on a different evening?” Madeline had asked. Gray actually had started thinking of her as Madeline rather than mom. She hadn’t acted like his mother in a long time anyway.
It was Luna’s birthday. That was the only reason he was really there. They’d already gorged themselves on one of Arlo’s huge cakes and piles of fresh-churned vanilla ice cream. Arlo was seated nervously next to Gray and had been subject to a lot of pointed glances throughout the night. Gray put his hand on Arlo’s thigh.
“Actually, Mack, I’m going to Louisiana to meet Arlo’s family.”
“Ohmygod is Sofia going to be there?” McKenna asked.
“Of course. She’s Arlo’s sister and she lives there.” Gray rolled his eyes.
“Can I come to Louisiana too, Arlo? Sofia has told me all about Vieux Chêne and I’d love to see it.” She batted her eyes at Gray’s boyfriend like that was going to work on him.
Apparently it did. “We’d love to have you, but it’ll just be a family Christmas. Nothing fancy.”
“That’s okay.” McKenna grinned. “Mom, I’m going to go with them instead.”
“I want to go to Louisiana,” Fallon muttered under her breath.
“Next year,” Gray whispered.
Madeline Haley looked like she didn’t know how to get control of her mostly grown children. Gray was actually sort of proud of his sisters. Of course a town full of Vallerand witches had to be a hell of a lot more interesting than skiing. It was a good thing Luna didn’t know as well.
It was a long two-day drive from Maine to Louisiana but Gray had a better time on that drive than he’d ever had on any of their many trips to Europe and Asia over the years. They took his family’s Land Rover and McKenna sat in the back seat and babbled half the time. The other half, they listened to Arlo’s music and sang at the top of their lungs. They’d originally planned to fly, but neither he nor McKenna had ever seen much of the country outside of the exclusive resorts they’d been booked into for trips so Arlo decreed it past time for a road trip.
“What’s a witch Christmas like anyway?” McKenna asked when they were less than an hour out of Baxter Hollow.
Arlo peered at her in the rearview mirror. “Christmas, I guess? I haven’t ever had any other kind so I don’t know if there’s a difference. There aren’t any spell casting contests or, like, dueling if that’s what you’re looking for.”
“Oh please, can there be?” McKenna grinned with all her teeth showing.
Gray assumed she wanted to have something to lord over Fallon who’d been grumbling and groaning about missing out on the Vallerand Christmas since day one.
Arlo chuckled. “I’ll see what I can put together.”
Gray reached across the big divider and put his hand on Arlo’s thigh. It wasn’t anything sexual, he just felt better if he was touching Arlo. He wondered if there was something he and Arlo needed to talk about. His level of dependence couldn’t be normal, could it?
They got into Arlo’s hometown in the late evening, three days before Christmas. The town was small and pretty, totally different than Baxter Hollow, but still familiar in a way. They weren’t too far from New Orleans –Arlo had already promised McKenna a day trip into the city – and the little main s treet and neat rows of old houses practically covered in mossy trees reminded Gray of pictures he’d seen.
“Feels like forever since I’ve been here,” Arlo said.
“When was the last time you were home?” Gray asked.
Arlo blushed. “Thanksgiving. But I didn’t really leave my family’s property so it didn’t feel like I was actually in town.”
“Wait…” Gray didn’t know how to calculate that.
“I’ll explain later.”
“You’ll explain now,” McKenna said from her perch in the backseat. She was absolutely fascinated by what Arlo and his family could do.
“Um, jumping, apparating, transporting… everyone has a different name for it. It’s not my best skill but I managed.”
“And you came all the way here from Baxter Hollow?” Gray asked. He heard the squeak in his own voice. “When you’re not very good at it?”
“Yeah.”
“What was the potential for very serious disaster if it hadn’t have worked?” Gray asked. He probably didn’t want to know the answer to that question.
“Better not to think about it,” Arlo said. Exactly as Gray thought. “I just really needed to see my mom. It worked out okay in the end.”
“Can you take us with you when you jump?” McKenna asked.
“In theory.”
Gray choked on the water he’d just been sipping. “Absolutely not.”
“Pfft. I’ll ask Sofia.”
He wondered when he’d lost any say in what McKenna did. Probably years ago.
Arlo’s mother was just as soft and beautiful as Gray remembered her being and Sofia was nearly as terrifying. Now that he and Arlo had worked their stuff out, she gave him a huge hug and the obligatory big sister threats about ripping his sac off if he hurt her little brother again. Gray nodded and tried not to shield himself from her future wrath. He didn’t plan to ever do anything to deserve it. Not again, at least.
Arlo’s step dad Jerome was solid and very non-magical – Gray was starting to be able to tell the difference on sight. Arlo and Sofia seemed to love him like their own. Gray realized he’d never actually asked Arlo what happened to his real father since he had his mother’s family surname and rarely said a word about the man. It seemed to be something they had in common, though. Fathers that were long since absent. He hoped Arlo’s father was at least still alive.
They had dinner that night as the six of them before he and Arlo retreated to Arlo’s childhood bedroom. They heard McKenna and Sofia giggling from the next room while they undressed for bed.
“Do we even want to know what that is about?” Gray asked with a fond sigh.
“I’m glad they found each other. Sofia and I don’t really… fit in all that well with our cousins. You’ll see. McKenna is good for her.”
“What’s up with your cousins?”
Arlo shrugged. “They’re all full blood witches. Stronger than either of us.”
“Wait, I thought Jerome was your stepdad.”
“He is, but our dad isn’t a witch either. He’s, um, fey.”
“What does fey mean?” Gray had a sneaking suspicion and a memory of thinking Arlo was some type of tempting woodland creature. He still waited patiently.
Arlo hesitated for a long time. “I don’t really like the word fairy.”
“But that’s what it is, right?”
“Yes.” He rubbed his face into Gray’s neck. “It gives us different advantages to the full blood witches. It’s why Sofia and I tend to draw people in. Some witches with fey blood are stronger because of it, but I guess our dad wasn’t.” Arlo shrugged. “He was just very charming.”
“Do you know him?”
“Sort of. He tried to keep it together for my mom, but he left not too long after I was born. He comes through every couple of years. I haven’t seen or heard from him since I was about seventeen, though.”
“Are you okay with that?” Gray asked. He rubbed Arlo’s back up under his shirt. Arlo shivered and wriggled his way closer.
“I don’t have a right not to be. I think I have a bit of him in me. Or I did. I’ve… been lots of places. I never wanted to stay anywhere until Baxter Hollow.”
Gray got a heavy pit in his stomach when he thought of how Arlo said his father had tried to stick around for his mother but hadn’t been able to. What if Arlo wanted to leave after a couple of years? He –
“I know what you’re thinking. The answer is no.” Arlo kissed Gray’s neck, like he always did when they were snuggling in to go to sleep.
“What do you mean, you know what I’m thinki
ng?” Gray leaned back to look at Arlo’s face.
“I’m not my father. I said I had a bit of him in me. I suppose I’ll always be a little wild. I also have a lot of my mom, and she loves nothing more than being at home. I just hadn’t found my home before you. I have now and I’m not going to want to leave.”
“You have to tell me if you do need to go for a while. I don’t want to control you. I… tend to like controlling situations.”
Arlo snorted as though Gray had said the sky was blue, rather than revealing something he’d never liked about himself. “You don’t say. I promise I’ll tell you. It’ll probably never happen, and even if it did, I’d want you to come with me. I don’t like being without you.”
“I don’t like it either.”
“This has gotten a little too deep for bedtime. We should go to sleep if we’re going to be ready for tomorrow.”
“What’s tomorrow?”
“Who do you think does all the cooking for the big family dinner?” Arlo asked.
Of course.
“At least Frankie is flying in this year to help. I made him promise.”
“Frankie is going to be here?” Gray was excited to meet the only cousin Arlo had much in common with.
“I think he’s mostly coming because he wants to meet you.” Arlo chuckled. “He can’t stand his mother. Sorry about her in advance by the way.”
“I can’t wait.”
“Is there anything else you’d like to tell me before your cousin comes over?” Gray asked the next morning.
Arlo was still in the middle of a yawn. Sofia and McKenna hadn’t surfaced from Sofia’s room yet, although he had heard a few telltale giggles. “What do you mean, babe?”
“You’re a witch, you’re half fairy, you have super powerful relatives… anything else?”
“No. Just watch out for Auntie Brigitte, like I said. Frankie’s mom. She’s a bit of a snob. So is Frankie’s brother Jean. And, well, a lot of them.”
“I can do snob. I know snob.”
“Not this kind.” Arlo shook his head. Gray had never been on the low side of the equation, and there were a lot of people in his family who didn’t have much respect for non-magic humans. But he tried to avoid them as much as possible. As did Frankie. “We won’t be over at Brigitte’s house all that long. Just enough for dinner and for us to escape with a few bottles of wine. They’re too intense for comfort in anything more than small doses.”
Intense they were. Gray and McKenna and Addison were watched with long stares eyes from toddlers up to his rather terrifying aunt Brigitte. Arlo couldn’t wait to get through dinner and get the hell out of Brigitte’s enormous house. He’d never liked being in there. He watched Gray and Addison gawk at the ornate furnishings, and tried to communicate to Gray silently that this was so not him, even if they were his family. McKenna just looked extremely jealous. If there was a way for someone to will themselves into being a witch, he figured she’d be the one to manage it.
Dinner was longer than he’d hoped, but eventually they managed to escape. They snuck out back to Arlo and Sofia’s back yard with a few bottles of Arlo’s favorite fairy wine as soon as they possibly could.
Gray went to reach for one of the bottles as soon as they were settled.
“Oh, wait, babe. We need to dilute that first.”
Gray gave him a confused look. “You don’t think I can handle undiluted wine?” He asked. Arlo didn’t answer for a while. “This isn’t regular wine is it?” Gray asked.
“You’ll like it, man,” Addison told him. “Just let Arlo dilute it first. It’s pretty potent.” Addison and Gray had developed a near instant bond. Arlo and Frankie had been smiling at each other all day because of it.
“Um, what kind of wine is it.”
“Let’s just say it comes from my dad’s side of the family,” Arlo said.
“Fairies made it?” McKenna squeaked. “Let me try.”
Arlo wondered just how much Sofia had told her.
They drank diluted fairy wine and laughed until late at night. It was chilly but not cold, and there was a fire pit to gather around. Arlo felt more content than he ever remembered feeling.
They got back to Baxter Hollow three days after Christmas. It was chilly but dry, and the town was still decorated like a little jewel box.
“I’m glad to be back,” Arlo said.
“Me too.”
“Me three. No loud sex while I’m sleeping here,” McKenna said from the front hall.
Gray groaned. “Remind me again why I didn’t send her to France?”
“Because you’re a wonderful brother and you love her. And she kind of idolizes my sister. It would’ve been cruel to separate them.”
“She wants to be a witch.”
“Sadly, it’s not something she can learn in school.”
“No magical witch academy?”
“You have no idea how desperately disappointed I was by that when I was a kid.” Arlo’s sigh was deep and heavy.
“I bet you were out there practicing with every twig you could find.”
“And instead I end up with a whisk.”
“You know, your mom told me about the whisk. She seemed to think it was really important. That it meant you’d bonded to a place and not just the utensil.”
Arlo nodded. “She told me that that whisk was heavily rooted in family. That I couldn’t have bonded to it if I hadn’t found a place for my own roots.”
“I like the sound of that,” Gray murmured. He kissed Arlo soundly.
“What did I tell you two about that while I’m still here?”
“When is everyone getting back from France?” Gray asked. He sounded put upon, but Arlo knew he loved having McKenna there.
“The second. Do you really have to work tomorrow?”
“Yes, why?”
“I thought it would be fun to drive into Portland and go shopping and I don’t want to go alone. You’re not open tomorrow, are you?” She asked Arlo.
“No. I wanted a day to relax and unpack from the trip.”
“Maybe Sawyer will take me.”
Gray raised his eyebrows. “Maybe.”
Gray practically ran home after work the next day. Happiness wasn’t doing a lot for his work ethic and for once in his life he really didn’t care. Arlo was making lasagna for dinner, and they were planning to spend the evening hanging out on the couch watching TV. Gray hoped there’d be a little more kissing than watching – at least until McKenna came home from Portland where she’d managed to drag Sawyer.
Arlo and Clementine greeted him at the door. The house smelled like cookies and hot cocoa.
“What’d you make?” Gray asked. He’d learned to love Arlo’s slightly altered pastries. Especially when he realized that a lot of the love and lust that he felt in them were Arlo’s uncontrollable feelings for him.
“Chocolate chip cookies and tea. I put together a lasagna to bake for later too.”
“You spoil me,” Gray muttered.
“I like to cook for you,” Arlo said.
Gray wrapped his arms around Arlo and breathed him in. His body always felt unsettled after a long day away and it was so much better back where he belonged.
“I missed you today. Got used to being around you all the time when we were on vacation.”
“Maybe you can quit running your family’s empire and come be my full time kitchen boy,” Arlo said with a grin.
“Sounds fantastic after the day of catching up I just did. I’m really happy to be home.”
“Hey, I’m still exhausted from all the family stuff. Do you care if I take a nap with Clem while the lasagna is baking?”
“Of course not.” Gray kissed him, and gave Clementine a kiss on her downy head. “I might come up and join you when I’m done with this last little bit of paperwork.”
“Why didn’t you do it at the office?” Arlo giggled.
“Because I wanted to bring it home and be near you.”
“And I’m going
to sleep. I feel bad.”
“It’s okay. You’re here.” Gray didn’t know how to explain that his body just felt better when Arlo was near.
“Okay. Hurry with your work and then come up and nap with me.”
There wasn’t anything Gray wanted to do more.
He’d only been working on his papers for about fifteen minutes when there was a fairly loud knock at the door. He knew Sawyer was still on the way back from Portland with McKenna since they’d texted him when they’d stopped for gas. Gray shook his head and stood. He’d just gotten on a roll too.
Gray stumbled to the front door and pulled it open ready to give Leo crap for trying to wake Arlo up. What he wasn’t ready for was Caroline, standing in his doorway with a tentative smile on her face.
Caroline.
Gray hadn’t given her a single thought in months.
“Can I come in?” She asked quietly.
There was something different about his old girlfriend. She was still beautiful. She’d always been beautiful. She had long wheat-gold hair and milky skin and huge eyes. Her hair was under a hat and her cheeks were pink from the cold. She looked expensive and well taken care of as she always had, but her cockiness was gone somehow. The sheen of being just a bit too good for Baxter Hollow had been wiped away.
“Why are you here?” Gray asked.
“Can we sit?”
“Yeah. Um, sure. Sit down.” He didn’t know if she noticed Arlo’s big goofy combat boots, the ones that would never fit on Gray’s feet. If she did, she didn’t say anything about it. “I didn’t know you’d come back to town for the holidays.” It wasn’t a habit of hers. Last Gray had heard, Caroline spent the past two Christmases in Gstaad with her fashion friends.
“I stopped by a few days ago, but you weren’t here.”
“No, I was –” He suddenly realized that he and Caroline had never officially broken up. Sure, there wasn’t anything there. There never really was, and they hadn’t spoken in nearly a year, but they also hadn’t broken up.
