We finally started walking in the general direction of my apartment and I quickly cast about for a topic of conversation that wasn’t related to why I should go and tell Ren or Honey if something happened, because I was pretty sure based on Ren’s expression that he wasn’t done with this.

     “So, um, I was curious,” I really hoped this wasn’t a rude question, “but is Honey a nickname?  Or is that her real name?”

     “Ah, yes.  No.  I mean, her name is Honeysuckle, actually.  Don’t call her that unless you want to annoy her, though.  Our parents named us all after flowers and plants and Honey probably got the worst end of that deal – at least Honey seems like a reasonable nickname, so she’s always gone by that.  She hates the beginning of each semester, though, when her teachers try to read off people’s full names.  She usually tries to go and talk to them first and beg them not to read off ‘Honeysuckle Woodson.’  Apparently then her classmates then all want to ask her about her name and she ends up coming home ranting about it every time.”  He chuckled slightly.  “Not the supernaturals that realize she’s a fairy, of course.  They completely understand the name and don’t ask.  But everyone else is like ‘what an unusual name, does it run in the family?’ and stuff like that.”

     “Do you all live with your parents?”  I inquired curiously.  I’d gotten the impression they still lived in the same place, but hadn’t actually confirmed it.  Not that I had a problem with it – it seemed nice, to be honest.  It sounded nice that they were on such good terms with their family that they all wanted to live together.

     Ren rubbed the back of his neck with one hand.  “Kinda.  Yes.  Sorrel technically has a place near his clinic, but he doesn’t stay there much unless he’s going through a super busy time at the clinic and knows he’s only going to be able to crash for a short amount of time.  Fairies tend to be pretty close knit when it comes to families, so we usually try to live near each other even when we move out.”  Maybe that was part of the reason he seemed particularly flabbergasted about my mom kicking me out, then.  “Honey’s planning to stay,” he continued, “probably permanently or at least until she gets married, I suppose.  Since she wants to start helping Dad at his clinic more and maybe expanding it, it only makes sense for her to stay.  We live over the flower shop and clinic,” he explained, “so she just has to run down a couple flights of stairs to get there, same as Dad.  Me, on the other hand, well,” he paused, taking several long moments before continuing, “I’m thinking of getting my own place soon, actually.  I want to have room for a studio and my own darkroom.  There just isn’t space at my parents’ place for that and they don’t understand my photography enough to make space.  They just don’t get it.  So I’m thinking about it, and trying to decide between getting a place to live with space enough for that or just getting a place to use as a studio.  Haven’t decided yet.”

     “What’s a darkroom?”

     My question spurred Ren on to animatedly explain a bunch of stuff about film photography I didn’t understand, but at least by the time we reached my apartment he seemed back to his usual self – happy, smiling, and bouncy.  Err, not actually bouncy, like he wasn’t literally bouncing or jumping up and down, but that was the feel he gave me.  Excitement, maybe?  Whatever it was, it made me feel comfortable and happy just listening to him and basking in his enthusiasm.

      The weekend went very smoothly.  Ren was delighted that Molly had given permission for us to use the café on the weekend to take pictures, and when I’d told him I wanted to get a significant chunk of the website assignment done this weekend, he was on board with that.  When I explained that meant I’d have to spend a lot of time in my college library on their computers, he was briefly disappointed before coming up with a solution he clearly thought was better – he lent me his laptop.  Not permanently, only while we were together.  I wasn’t willing to use it any more than that, but I ended up being able to sit in the café and start the design of the website while Ren took pictures and edited them, then keep working on the assignment back at my apartment while Ren continued chattering about something – one of his classes on color theory or something that I mostly tuned out while I was focusing – and sometimes studied on his own.  Also he insisted on bringing food, and I let him, since I figured I wasn’t going to be able to make or buy anything that would be decent enough for him to eat.  Somehow I couldn’t picture Ren eating instant noodles with me.

     It was a nice weekend, surprisingly relaxing for how much work I ended up getting done on my assignment.  By the time Ren reluctantly went home on Sunday night, I was almost done with creating the website and just really needed to make a few tweaks to the menus since they weren’t animating the way I wanted.

     I was hugely relieved that the project was mostly done, and very grateful for Ren’s help with the pictures – he refused to accept payment for that, telling me that just having his name credited for the pictures would be good publicity for him as well as the café – but what I was actually most grateful for was just the companionship.  Getting to spend an entire weekend hanging out with someone who didn’t judge me, was willing to give me the time and space I needed, but was also subtly pushing down all the barriers I had up so he could fit himself into my space and make room in my comfort zone for him to live in.  And I let him do so without fighting it because I enjoyed it.  I enjoyed spending time with him.

     The next week was more or less the same as the previous one.  Less being choked by someone, more work that thankfully went smoothly.  Beatrice didn’t bother me, although her clear efforts to ignore my existence had started to become obvious to some of my other coworkers.  Jenny had apparently forgotten to continue quizzing me about Ren, so that was nice.  And like Ren had predicted, Honey insisted on keeping me company during any breaks and talking to me as much as possible throughout the day.  I didn’t answer her much, but she didn’t even seem to notice.

     I’d thought Ren talked a lot, but it turned out Honey could make him look quiet.  I started to wonder, by the third day of this, if Honey wasn’t actually lonely.  Maybe it was hard to be a supernatural and have to keep your guard up all the time, whether to not let humans know something was wrong or to not show vulnerability to supernaturals who might exploit it.  Obviously she had her family, and there were probably some supernaturals she was friends with – Ren had mentioned that Nathan was a friend of the whole family – so maybe I was just imagining things and she was just more outgoing because she now knew I knew and didn’t have to be careful about what she said.  But I couldn’t quite shake the idea that maybe Honey talked so much to me because she’d found someone who did know and wasn’t a threat, so she could say whatever she wanted without worry.

     Weirdly, I kind of hoped that was the case.  Not because I wanted her to be lonely or anything like that, but it felt nice knowing that Honey felt comfortable with me and I was slowly growing less wary of her presence, too.  Maybe I could get two friends out of this whole – whatever this was – instead of just one.

     The only thing that really changed much during the week was that Honey started giving me her phone during break.  I was confused the first time she did that, but she just smiled cheekily.  “Ren,” she explained.  “He was pouting about how his university is too far away for him to come during lunch and he doesn’t get to talk to you all day.  So here, use my phone, text him.  I don’t know when he’s in class, so don’t call just in case.  But it’ll be a nice surprise, he’ll like it.”

     I’d briefly thought I broke Ren – or Honey’s phone – when I sent my very awkward text using Honey’s phone, identifying myself first so he’d know it was me and not his sister, and Ren’s response had come back half gibberish.  It turned out I just didn’t understand a lot of the acronyms people used while texting so Honey had to help me translate some of his responses.

     Friday afternoon after work I went to the grocery store before heading home.  Ren couldn’t meet up much during the week due to his class schedule and university location, but we were planning to meet up tomorrow.  Ren said he wanted to take me to another play and then go for a drive.  After our discussion the other day about my finances, he’d apparently realized I felt uncomfortable about activities that involved spending money, so he was sweet enough to try to do things that were free.  I was looking forward to the play, hopefully I’d understand a bit more this time, but even if I didn’t, it had been interesting to watch last time so it should be cool this time, too.  As far as the drive, I didn’t get to ride in cars much anymore but Ren said he had to go somewhere to take pictures for one of his classes, so I was looking forward to that as well.  If for no other reason than that I was going to get a chance to see Ren in action while he was taking pictures.  That seemed like a special thing to get to see, especially since his family didn’t appreciate that side of him as much.

     I finished collecting my groceries and paid for them, starting back towards my apartment.  I had to cross back near the café, a couple blocks away, so it wasn’t entirely surprising when I spotted Honey on the sidewalk down the street as I turned the corner.  It was a little more surprising that she was with Ren, but that was fine, it wasn’t like he had to stop by and see me whenever he was free.  Besides, he’d said something about having to do some fairy stuff tonight, so maybe whatever he and Honey were doing had to do with said fairy stuff.  They were faced away from me, walking in the other direction, so they had no reason to know I’d even spotted them and I wasn’t going to interrupt whatever fairy business they were working on.

     At least, that was the plan, until I noticed something.  Rather, someone.  Halfway between me and my two – friends? – on the same side of the street as all of us, was a woman who looked early 30s, maybe.  Dark hair, flowy clothes.  She was walking somewhat slowly, but what drew my attention was the way her attention was focused on Ren and Honey.

     Ren hadn’t told me how to identify witches, but one of the people that I saw that were unaccounted for in his descriptions were people with auras.  Ren had mentioned, however, that witches had marks that gave them their power.

     This woman had a heavy cloud of dark gray hovering around her head and shoulders while on her left arm, in a wide band that went several inches on either side of her elbow, was a series of marks burned into her skin, each one dimly glowing.

     She was a witch.  I was nearly certain of it.  And she was stalking Ren and Honey.

     I knew Ren had talked about the problems they were having with witches, but he hadn’t mentioned anything lately and I wasn’t sure if anything had happened since he’d been cursed.  But I was also fairly certain something would happen.  The witch was watching them the way a snake would watch a baby bird lost in the grass, unaware that a predator was sneaking up on it, about to swallow it whole.

     I don’t have any ability to fight people, let alone one of – let alone anything supernatural.  I could try the whole get-her-attention-and-run thing, but somehow that seemed unlikely to work in the context.  So I did the only thing I could think of.

     “Ren!”  I shouted.

     Ren startled but turned immediately to find where my voice came from, Honey turning as well.

     As soon as they turned around, the witch immediately darted across the street and headed for the nearest intersection, not quite running but almost doing so.

     Ren immediately started jogging in my direction, while Honey seemed to notice the witch and watched her leave, puzzled, before following Ren more slowly.

     “Riven!  Hi!  Are you on your way back?  Shopping, I guess?”  He asked, observing the bags I was carrying.

     Not the point, so I ignored that.  “I think she was a witch,” I explained just as Honey got within earshot.

     Ren’s smile disappeared and he immediately swiveled around to look in the direction the woman had disappeared in.  “What?  You sure?”

     “No,” I admitted, “but…I think so.  She was watching you both and I thought she was going to do something.”

     Now that I’d said it out loud, I felt less sure, like this was kind of stupid of me.  She might not have been a witch.  And even if she was, she might have just been innocently going about her day.  Maybe she was watching them just because she was worried they’d do something.  Maybe I’d jumped to conclusions.

     But Honey’s face was surprisingly grim.  “I’m going to go try to see where she went, Ren, you stay with Riven.”

     She disappeared before I had a chance to point out that this was probably all my imagination.