Starling- A Lovecraftian Comedy Chap. 4 Same Old Story

It was a tiring but productive day. I returned to [[Marti]]'s  feeling better about myself. Marti wasn’t home yet- probably boozing it up somewhere. Ah well. Can’t knock a millennia-old girl for liking to party. Wait, is that the plural for millennium? What even were the rules of grammar at this point? Barely even guidelines! Not important, not important. [[Lavinia]] was growing well, already showing the teensy-tiniest little true leaves. Just a darling little overachiever. Yes she is. Yes she is.

I made some cooing noises and did a little dance. Marti might have been right about the seedling’s rate of cognitive development, but I wanted to be that good, supportive kind of dad, you know? Not some deadbeat. 

“LIKE YOU, DAVID!” I snarled, snapping my head around to glare out the window. There was no one there.

“See, Lavina, it’s not just about doing it when you know you are going to catch someone. You do it all the time, because some day, it will work. I did that once, and I made a ghost cry. Really, it’s a true story. I spent DAYS working through all this misplaced rage and correctly placed guilt that ghost had. Eventually they got enough resolution to move on to whatever’s next.”  I smiled fondly at the tiny seedling. 

“Hell, presumably. That ghost was a complete piece of shit. I mean, he beat his kid into permanent brain damage, made his alkie wife believe she did it, and when she committed suicide, refused to use the life insurance money to bury her. Ashes into the aqueduct. Yeah, pretty sure he wound up in Hell. A good deed, I think.”

It’s so important to start their moral instruction at a young age. Education can come at any time, but morals must be taught from the cradle. Without them, we are nothing. Nothing. Mere thieves, liars, and killers. Driven by base lusts. 

I briefly contemplated doing something about my base lusts but decided against it. I was tired, and Marti had a freakishly good nose on her. Not that she had the slighted objection to anything sexual, just that it was too early to start down that path. 

Contrary to how she acted, Marti was very particular. A one-night stand is good for a meal. A long-time lover is… something. Didn’t she have a saying about this? Oh well. If it was important, I would remember later. And so to bed.

Morning came, and with it, hunger. Hunger most carnal, in both senses of the word. Marti was her usual pleasure to watch, though it was anyone’s guess which was growling more- my stomach or my loins.

“Do you have a noisy dick or something? That’s seriously creepy.” She said, in an unbecomingly judgmental way.  

“Don’t be obscene. I learned ventriloquism years ago. Belly talking. And I am very hungry.” 

“Are you, by God?”  

“Am I?”  

“What?” She tilted her perfectly symmetrical head to one side, dainty ear pointing up in confusion.  

“By God. I’ve always wondered. You hear all those “footprints in the sand” things but it frankly sounds like some kind of stalker or pursuing spirit.”  

She tilted her head more, to ninety degrees off vertical or maybe a little past. Then straightened up. “Let’s get you something to eat, huh? I can’t believe I’m asking this, but do you have health insurance?”  

“Perfectly fit, thank you. Though I do know where some truly excellent healers are in this city.”

“Any psychiatrists?”  

“Oh Marti, you may be a little odd, but don’t let anyone tell you that you are crazy. You are beautiful and wonderful and fascinating just how you are.” I smiled sincerely. “If you ever need an understanding ear, I have two. I’m happy to listen, whenever you need me. Within reason.”   

Always got to include that last bit. People take horrible advantage otherwise. Believe me, they do.  

“Yes, I don’t really know what I expected there. Breakfast? I can do a lot of things before breakfast, but confronting my lodger’s growling penis is not one of them.”  

“Breakfast would be lovely, thank you.”  

“Eggs?”  

“Got any meat?”  

“A man after my own heart.”  

“Oh heavens, not until we have the plants grown! Not that I’d say no, of course, never that! I’m sure your heart is wonderful. It would be an honor and a pleasure. I’ve never eaten your heart before.” Seriously, Marti is so great. I really hadn’t eaten her heart before. I was suddenly dying to have a taste.  

“Wait. You want to eat me?”  

“I’d be delighted, but really the plants are the priority. Oh… what the heck. We can always go around again if we have to. Let’s get that heart out!”  

Marti’s head had, at this point, done a full rotation. I don’t know why she was so confused, she was the one who brought it up.  

“Or we could do some bacon and sausages, with a bit of fried tomato.”  

“Well. Yes, that would probably be more sensible. Rain check on the heart?”  

“Yeah. Let’s call it a rain check.”  She grinned her triple row of teeth- ah no, she smiled her beautiful, perfect, fax paper white elven teeth which are exactly like human teeth in every medically significant way. She turned, displaying her extremely grabbable rump, and set to cooking.   

I didn’t stare. I don’t want to come off as a creep or a weirdo.  

________________________________________________________________________ 

Another beautiful day in Raleigh. The sky was a greeny-yellow color, shading into vivid electric blues and the occasional streak of blinding white as a superheated thread of solar plasma stretched out from the burning sky-orb for reasons I had yet to learn. Not quite beach weather, but I could see having a great time hanging out on a rooftop with some beers and good company. I smiled at some memories. 

Stuck in a time loop, you lose that feeling of urgency. You know you can just try again if you mess up. I always try to think of it like this- do I want to have to do it again?   

No. I don’t. I want something new. I want progress. So I make my own urgency. And today’s urgency took me down to Little Scuba. Got to get those pieces in motion. Gonna be the best normie run ever. EVER! Hopefully.  

This was a real blue-collar neighborhood, mostly Polynesian and Pacific Islanders from what I could tell. Though none of them had ever heard of the Pacific, or the concept of being Polynesian. It wasn’t clear to me which parts of cultural memory got hung on to- there didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.  

Keahi ran a deep-sea salvage operation. How, I don’t know, and DAMN have I looked. There is a beach in Ralegh, a wonderful one, but the world ends about two hundred yards off shore. And yet, Sunken Treasures has new product in twice a week.   

Despite repeated, intense, efforts, I have never seen them bring in any new stock, or figured out who they get it from. I have snorted a mountain of cocaine, smoked pallet loads of meth, all to make sure I didn’t sleep or so much as blink while I surveilled the loading bay. AND YET! SOMEHOW! THEY RESTOCKED!  

Still pisses me off. It was like reality just decided that there was new product in at Sunken Treasures twice a week. Contents of the resupply were fixed, no special orders possible. And, ok, it’s reality, it gets to set the rules, but come on. That’s not fair.

Once, just for the hell of it, I killed Keahi. Just to see what would happen. No new inventory. I chained him to the wall in a basement. Alive; different loop, obviously. New inventory appeared on the shelves. I can’t explain it. 

What I do know is that Sunken Treasures has some pretty unique stuff. Things that you just couldn’t get in most of the lower city, away from the sects and cultivation holy lands drifting above us.  

I walked past the curious little statues that seemed to blur the line between art and nature, their strange shapes at once humanoid and… other. Coral twisting into patterns that repeated endlessly, looping you back to their origin and out again through different roads, different paths of the mind. There were secrets there, I was convinced, profound wisdoms that would reveal themselves with the proper ritual and psychedelics. I haven’t figured it out yet, but I have time. All the time in the world.  

And speaking of drugs, there were the glass jars lining the wall near the back counter, filled with dried seaweeds and shredded octopi or other sea-stuff. They made delightful seasonings and soups or, consumed slightly differently, some deeply whacked out trips. Which is why I was here.  

“Hey, Keahi! How’s it going, man? Look I need four ounces of the Abyssal Blue, sailor cut not straight, please, the bowl that looks like it’s made from thousands of tiny minnows glued together with some vile secretions, and… let’s say two grams of straight Actiniaria. Powdered, not whole.”  

“Do I know you?” The big man asked as he gathered my order. Not scared or anything, Keahi could slap the head off an orca, or looked like he could at any rate.  

I grinned. “Well, if you don’t remember me, let’s keep it a mystery for now. Boy do I want to see your face when it comes back to you.”  

Really. It would be fascinating.  

Keahi snorted and pulled everything together. Despite the profoundly unnatural nature of his shop, Keahi was a delightful human-ish being. And his prices were quite reasonable.   

Whistling happily, I left the Little Scuba neighborhood and hopped a hippo headed towards Grover and 23rd. The hippo was pissed, of course, but I offered them a little of the Abyssal Blue for later, and they allowed that I could hang out on their back as far as Meechum Park. Which happened to be my destination, so that worked for me.   

The hippo moved fast through traffic- very quick on their feet, hippos, and surprisingly comfortable. I certainly didn’t want to walk the six miles!  

It occurred to me, as we zipped past the hotdog carts and people selling sacks of oranges at intersections, that before I came to Raleigh, I had never ridden a hippo. Now, it hardly seems worth mentioning.   

Not that the hippos did double duty as cabs or anything, it was just some guy, but hippos are so big and so heavy, and corner so badly, that it was deemed better they run on the street than the sidewalk. A traffic arrangement I totally agreed with. You just had to know what to offer if you wanted a ride and what kind of hippos would be open to taking a passenger.   

I would miss riding hippos if I ever left Raleigh. Cars just seemed so bland. Of course, soon I would be riding a flying sword because that’s what cultivators do. Seemed like a lot of standing around compared to sitting on a comfy hippo, but I can admit a degree of obsession with the idea. I want to ride my flying sword. I do. And it will happen. And to make sure I get that super special Qi in as soon as possible-

“Thanks for the lift, buddy!”  

“BRhoonkHONKHONK!” Jesus Christ, they are loud.  

“You too!” I tossed the cut of Abyssal Blue straight into his enormous, foul-smelling mouth and was on my way. You didn’t want to cheat a hippo. Lousy tempers.  

Meechum Park was a lovely little wooded green around a deep pond. The willows wept gently over its waters while heatless lovers canoodled happily in their shade. There were ducks, but the less said about those sinister creatures, the better.   

It was beautiful, peaceful, cool, and comfortable, and the gelato for sale at the cart by the park entrance was nice. Not the best in the city, mind you, but nice. I got strawberry. I love strawberry ice cream, I think.  

Anyhow, off to make sure my breakthrough will be a success! I navigated around the mid-morning make out crowd and those who just wanted to read a book in peace down to the edge of the pond. I put the bowl in the water. It floated perfectly. Perfectly. Like it was on a table- no part of it broke the meniscus of the water.   

I loaded it up with the rest of the Abyssal Blue, sprinkled over the Actiniaria, and lit it up. The Actiniaria went up like thermite, and quickly got the Blue going. The combined smoke smelled like low tide at a Phish concert.  

The effects were immediate. First, the ducks. The ducks lost their shit. Literally, then more metaphorically as they started tearing into each other. I don’t know if they were fucking or fighting, it’s hard to say with ducks, but I do know that there was neither peace nor tolerance in them. Then it hit the other park goers.   

Their cries of revulsion lasted only moments, their eyes rolling up into their heads as they started speaking in tongues. Deep, guttural, quickly synchronizing, as though a score of mouths answered to only one throat. I, of course, had expected this and was holding my breath.   

The smoke exploded outwards, flooding through the park. The willows didn’t like it any better than the ducks did, and started thrashing about. The flailing tendrils of their branches created a small whirlwind, driving the dreamy blue-green smoke back towards the pond.   

The bowl had warmed up now, and began sucking back in the smoke. Soon, it was all trapped, like swirling spawn in a net of minnows. Before it could escape again, I turned the bowl over. The smoke descended into the pond. At which point things got a little weird.  

For a moment, between the chanting, and the remnant smoke and the thrashing trees, I thought I was the one trapped in a little pond, looking up at an endless world above, the smoke drifting up around me. The smokey offering beseeching Heaven's mercy. Mercy which was not strained, but dropped like gentle rain on the place beneath.   

I was just lucid enough to catch the raindrops as they shot out of the pond, bowl in hand. A double dozen. The best I had ever received. A double blessing, even. Maybe because I was being so nice this run.  

I left the park before everyone snapped out of it. People tended to be really grumpy afterward. And hungry. Terribly hungry.   

Deciding that it had been a long time since breakfast, and that I had more than earned my lunch, and I was still feeling a little disappointed about the whole “heart” situation, I stopped off at an elven joint for a bite. A freakshow blend of… I’m going to say mostly elf and cannid, the vendor flipping the skewers seemed to take a disturbing degree of pleasure in his craft. I didn’t know him personally, but the skewers had been reliable in the past.   

“Three anticuchos skewers, please.”  

“Here, roasted to perfection. Fifteen pesos.”  

“Fifteen! Brother, in this economy?”  

“Roasted to the very heights of perfection after being marinated for twenty four hours in my secret, special, sauce. Enjoy every bite. After all, beef only has one heart.” He chuckled at his non-joke joke, and laughed harder and harder as I put the money down. He tilted his head back and screamed with laughter as I started eating them, then choked on his own spit and composed himself again.  

“Tasty?”  

“As advertised. That’s great stuff. I love Peruvian food.”  

He gave me a weird look.  

“What’s “Peruvian” about it? I got that recipe from my great grandmother, and she was a lot of things but not a Peru.”  

“Personal reference, don’t worry about it.” I realized my gaffe and apologized, quickly walking away. The marinade did a nice job tenderizing the chewy heart. It was great. Really great. God, I love eating in Raleigh.  

Precious cargo in hand, belly full, I decided to stop back at the apartment to drop off the magic droplets, safely trapped in the bowl. Each was about the size of a lima bean, perfectly clear, with little aqua blue sparkles drifting around in them. Quite lovely. And fragile. No hippo home for me, alas.  

It was a little tiring, walking home and keeping the bowl balanced. The other times I did this, it was later in a run and I had a sedan chair or riding beast of some kind. Right now, I didn’t own so much as a stolen bicycle. I tried to think if there was someone I could intercept for a ride, but in this neighborhood? At this time? No one came to mind. Damn. Did I have taxi money? Maybe, but maybe not, and I didn’t want to gamble on a bad driver.   

I sighed and walked down the broad, sunny sidewalk. At least there were sidewalks here. Not everywhere had sidewalks. Some places, you stepped out of the building and right into the street. Cars and snakes and seven-legged load-bearing lizards raced right past you, squeezing between stalls of people selling genuine imitation brand-name sunglasses and maddened street preachers. Others were long conveyor belts, dotted with belle époque hat makers and swagger stick sellers. 

My personal favorites were the little waving lanes of grass. They only moved in one direction, and they didn’t move you very fast, but they softly and sweetly carried you past cheese shops and bakeries and the most incredible little cafes where the grass would dance between your toes as you let your bare feet rest.   

I love this city. I love it with my whole heart.   

It was a long walk to a bus stop, but there was a cross-city snake just about to leave when I got there and I reckoned that was even better than waiting for the bus. Lots of lateral movement, sure, but you haven’t felt a smooth ride like a snake ride. And it’s free. Apparently this is a sort of cultivation for them, or something. My snake is kind of iffy, I do try to practice, but they were never a social species in the first place. Swish-swish-swish, watching the clear droplets rock from side to side, the aqua sparks in them dancing, dancing, dancing with the cross-city snake.  

Dinner that night was arepas and shredded pork, source unknown but Marti giggled darkly every time I mentioned how much I enjoyed it. I bet it wasn’t actual pork, but ork. Not the athletic, busty, tusked green skinned warrior women type orcs. Alas, those were mythical. No, these were basically oversized humans with pig faces and piggish tendencies.   

Due to the “delights” of sexual dimorphism, their men were, on average, a third larger than the women, and the women averaged one hundred and eighty centimeters. Also they were omnivores with a well known taste for human flesh, had zero impulse control, and literally bred by the litter. The only reason they didn’t overrun the city is they killed each other at high speeds, and the other species in the city tended to go selectively blind when “accidents” occurred to Orcs.   

They were also quite tasty. Oh don’t look so shocked. In this city, eating sapient is hardly noteworthy. What even is cannibalism in this place? I asked for extra dipping sauce. It made Marti smile, and wasn’t that a good enough reason to eat up? God, I wanted to eat her up. Every bite of her. Even when she gnashed her teeth at me, all I could think of was tearing into that sweet flesh. And then sex, obviously. Was this flirting for Marti? My memory was a little vague here. Eh, we would figure it out.  

After dinner, Marti put on some clubbing clothes, which were her normal clothes with extra spikes on them. She looked surprised to see that I was going out too, and in a suit no less.  

“I’m off to the Dirty Dozens. What’s got you suited and booted?” She asked.

“I’m gathering components for the breakthrough. I got all the qi pills I could need,” I pointed at the bowl, “But I’m worried about my physique. Like, what if I get a spirit root, but my meridians are trash, or you need the special Nine Dragon Pulse to really be a badass or something, you know?”

“No, because cultivation is dumb and boring. They spend almost all their time sitting in a cave meditating, and then they come out for a hot minute and start murdering each other. Which, fine, that can be colorful, but really, decades of sitting for a couple of days running around and fucking shit up. BOO!” She stuck out her delightfully tantalizing tongue, then licked her black-painted lips.   

“You make a compelling argument. Ah, I’ll have to go clubbing with you another day- I really am on the clock.” I say. Always another chance.

“What are you collecting?”

“I’ll leave it a mystery for now.”  

_________________________________________________________________________

I stepped through the door of the house, stretching my leg a bit to clear the meaty body of the goombah propping it open. His face, what was left of his face, was eternally locked in a silent scream. The flesh rotted and then lacquered onto the tendon and bone. The life ripped clean away from him. The slit throat and spray of blood across the floor were subtle clues. Clues I didn't have to struggle to read. Maida Vale had chosen vengeance.   

The house, townhouse, really, was a beautiful thing- marble floors and marble statues of statuesque men and women, oil paintings of religious scenes from a faith unknown on my earth. The faces of martyrs twisted in ecstatic agony, a sharp relief to the pure horror of the corpses scattered like broken plates across the house. Some had weapons, others trays with drinks now shattered and spilled, forming a cocktail with the blood pooling on the floors.   

Hard to get blood out of marble. Worse to get wine out. No matter. Not their problem anymore. I walked up the elegant staircase, through another floor of corpses. I checked every room, and Maida hadn’t missed a single person. Even Ms. Phasgraph, who liked to hide in the laundry hamper in a guest bathroom when the screams started. The cursed anthem had punched clean through the wood and into her ear. Maida had served her country honorably. A Marine, she had told me once, though how she came to be in Raleigh, or what country she had served somehow eluded her.  

A good and honorable Marine, honorably discharged and working peacefully as a garbage collector in a city that needed all the sanitation help it could get. Then her family was destroyed. Her life was destroyed. More than that, it was defiled. All that love and happiness turned to poison. To lashes that beat her and beat her until pain was all she was. Pain, regret, loneliness, and the torture of “Why?” Why did it happen? Why did it happen to her?  

I turned towards the family wing. The boy’s room had a few bodies in it- the kids looked like they were fifteen, hiding out from the boring grownup party going on around them. Maybe they were plotting a raid on the room across the hall, where the girls were. Lia and her friends were quite pretty, and just sixteen. Had been quite pretty. Now they were broken mannequins of rot and horror. They had felt their life ripping away. All that youthful potential was taken away with the furious slash of a vengeful mother.  

Onward, stepping over more guards, more staff, more guests. It was a packed house. Who would dare turn down an invitation from Mr. Han? Certainly no one who knew him. Stories were told of the trash collector whose life was ruined because she was too noisy collecting the bins outside the townhouse. Apparently, the Young Master, or perhaps it was the Young Mistress, complained. Their hangover was too serious to withstand the noise. And so their indulgent father made an example.  

I opened the door to the master bedroom. The lady of the house was sprawled across the sandstone colored bathroom tile, blood leaking back into the bedroom until it was soaked up by the plush crimson carpet. Another great beauty, adorned with fat pearls and emeralds by the rope. There was usually no one else in here, but I checked the wardrobe just in case. No one. Sometimes there was a couple that got a little too frisky and stumbled in there. It would have been a sexy, romantic scene any other night.   

They must be two of the bodies in the third guest bedroom. Maida often caught them there. Once she killed the goombah at the door, there was no stopping her.   

The hallway ended, as it always did, with the shut door. Dark wood, heavy bronze door knob. The line of petitioners and clients lay scattered along the floor in front of it. They were so thickly stacked, it was hard to cross through them. They were too fragile to walk on, and the results of crushing the remains were both smelly and distressing. It was important to look immaculate for this next part. I took my time.  

Inside the study were the remains of Mr. Han, and his ever present aid Mr. Qi. It was Mr. Qi who arranged everything. Mr. Han simply waved his hand in approval. A single flick of the fingers, and two people were murdered, a woman was sexually assaulted, and Maida Vale’s life was over. Maida took her time with these two, but the Athame didn’t allow much time to play. The curse was hungry. Terribly hungry. As Maida had learned.   

This time, she made it to the guest chair before she collapsed. Polished walnut, curved back, curved arms that wrapped around her like her husband used to hold her. Like she used to hold her son. I sat in the chair next to her, dragging it around so she could see me. She couldn’t turn her neck anymore. She barely had control of her arms.  

“Ninety-nine dead. And with each kill, you got faster. Stronger. More savage. Their horror and pain spurred you on to greater and greater heights. You could hear their hearts beating. Smell them. Taste their fear and arrogance. You killed those who wronged you, along with their sycophants and enablers. Well done, Maida. You had your revenge.”  

She tried to smile, but everything hurt. It didn’t reach her eyes.   

“It was your choice, of course.” I don’t smile when I say that. I keep it calm. She deserves that much. “And no investigation will be conducted once the bodies are recovered. I think you know why, now.” She nodded, barely. We both knew her life was to be measured in seconds, not minutes.   

“I wish to offer you one final choice. There is enough curse for one more death on that dagger, Ms. Vale. If you take your own life, I will deliver the evidence of what really happened and who was really responsible to your daughter. She will be sad. Horrified, actually. But she will forgive you and bitterly regret how she hurt you these last four years. She will remember you as a brave mom, a hero Marine, not as a monster. Or you could choose to simply die as your body collapses. The time left to you is about equal either way. The choice is, once again, entirely yours.”  

She locked eyes with me. Unable to ask. “Yes, Ms. Vale, I promise.” With the last of her strength, she pressed the athame to her heart. The curse ensured it slipped into her, like a knife parting water, splitting the glass as it goes. Her body disintegrated, leaving ashes and dirt. I plucked the athame from the pile, wiped it clean, and hid it in my suit. I took a short stack of cash out of Mr. Han’s desk as I left. I’d need money to make copies of the evidence. I did promise, after all. And Ms. Vale had done a wonderful job. 

  ____________________________

I had finished up everything by the time Marti got home, high as a kite and twice as horny. “Hey, lodger! How’s suit time treating you?”  

“Can’t complain. Got everything I need now. Spirit root should be smooth sailing.”  

“That’s, like, a mixed metaphor or something.”  

“Could be, could be.” I grinned. She looked like sex on two legs, and her pheromones were working me over hard. But I wasn’t that easy. Not this loop. “Ants in your pants, Marti?”  

“They wish!”   

We paused for a moment. I gave Marti a look.  

“You are so weird. NO IT’S NOT ANTS.”  She smiled hungrily at me. “I’m not even wearing pants. Not one living person has gotten into these panties tonight. Except me, of course. And now I need to take the edge off. You can sit over there and watch, but there are consequences if you come closer…” She trailed a long white finger over a provocatively thrust hip, her eyes smokier than Texas brisket.  

“You do like the best thing to happen to sex since mitosis! Go right ahead,” I pulled out a bag of popcorn I had prepared for just such an eventuality. “I have snacks.”  

She gave me another look, then sagged. “You are just determined to take all the fun out of this, aren’t you?”  

“Giving me some weird vibes, Marti. I mean, GOD DAMN, do I want to do bad things to you, but I’m not feeling it. The timing’s off. I have a feeling you would do bad things to me instead, and that would just ruin this whole run. It’s going pretty great so far, and it would be a pain in the ass to start over.”  

“I was promised a generous lover for a lodger.”  

“Yeah, but not a stupid one. Watcha up to, Marti?”  

“Nothing! I’m high, horny, and looking to knock off a chunk. A mysterious chunk. Hint fucking hint.”  

“Uhuh, and I’m the Queen of Arabee.”   

“You might be, you don’t know.”  

“I might know. I’d know if I was a queen.” I argued. 

“In this city?”  

Damn. She got me. Deflect and counterattack. “Well, maybe you’re the queen. You could be a queen. I’d say you were qualified.”  

“I’m not a…” Marti trailed off, then looked considering. “What is the exact qualification to be a queen? To rule a kingdom?”  

“I think so. There may be more to it. Does someone in particular have to crown you, or is that just a regional tradition?”  

“Before we even get to that, is the crown mandatory? Or can you get by on worship and obedience?”  She asked.

“I guess you also have to run the question in reverse too- can you be the Queen even if no one knows or cares?”  

“No way, right? Then you are just a figurehead.”  Marti rejected the idea at once.

“No, people have to know you for you to be a figurehead. I'm saying you are a queen that nobody knows about, somehow. Maybe. Popcorn? I’ve got salted and caramel here.”

“Salted, caramel sticks to my teeth.” I passed her the bag. She munched a couple of handfuls, rubbing her delightful chest while lost in thought, then snapped her gaze back to me. “You did it again.”  

“Did what?”  

“Deflected me. Got me caught up in your moon logic.”  

“Nonsense. You would be completely comfortable and confident if it were moon logic.”  

She started to nod again, then glared. Again. “It’s not magic, I would be able to tell. Or pheromones, or a sonic attack, or any of that.”  

“What is? I need nouns to work with. Or subjects, or objects, or whatever. Not a grammar guy. Not since the incident.”  

“What possible incident could…” I saw her wrench her mind back into its original groove. This was pretty interesting stuff. I don’t remember a loop where anything like this happened. This was the best run in ages. She was panting now. Always fun to see, but there was something in her eyes that said it wouldn’t be fun for long. Escape or settle things down? Well, let’s see how it goes.  

“You… what are you?” She asked, in a quiet sort of wonder.  

“I’m your lodger. Now, get your skirt off. We’ve opened the snacks, so let’s have the show!” I clapped. She threw a bottle at my head and went to sleep. I dusted the glass off the couch and did the same. It had been a good day. Tomorrow would be a better one.