Chapter 21: Terrible
WINTER BREAK - December 4th
Things are a little too quiet at the Marblebrooks' house. I've been spending too much time thinking about kissing Aries. I probably haven't thought this much about a single kiss since I was a teenager. It's ridiculous.
But it's because it's Aries. I know I've fucked up. Aisling's gonna be pissed.
Today, Kelyn, Elandria, and I are all in the parlor. Elandria got a fire going and we're all lying around with a different book. I've got my thumb wedged between the pages of Folk Tales of Caburh, set open to the story Aries and I had read together a few weeks ago– Orendell and Luna.
A drunk kiss between friends on its own shouldn't be a big deal. Even if it was with tongue. It wouldn't have been anything remarkable had it been me and anyone else. I knew that. I kissed people, forgot about them, found them again later, slept with them, and sometimes never saw them again. The Stag's Court was a carousel of new faces, old faces, cold acquaintances, and friendly strangers.
But Aries– I mean, it wasn't like he couldn't have done this kind of thing back in Fel. Casual dalliances weren't unique to the vampire courts. He could have had experience. He's twenty-three, kind of cute, and a literal prince. But we didn't talk about it. We've never talked about it. I had a pretty good hunch that he didn't do this kind of thing. Had he ever?
What if this was a first?
It had been a shitty first kiss. I'm not saying I'm in love with the guy or anything, but we're friends. I can admit he deserved better than that. Better than this.
Aries had crushes, obviously, I was one of them. But it really hadn't occurred to me until now that I've never seen him with any of the others. Granted some of his crushes– most of the ones I'd heard about anyway– were guys who weren't exactly available: the groundskeeper, a proudly-married librarian, the hero in the novel he'd gotten from Noodle, a few popular tabloid singers, and so on. I tried to think of others; someone he knew, someone real. But I drew a blank.
It was just me.
I didn't make it through the fairy tale. I ended up pulling out another book. The grimoire. I practiced my casting gestures. It was easier to focus my mind on the hand motions from a diagram at the moment.