Page 81 of Zombies, Satyrs and Vampires, Oh My!

chapter

two

Joy

“Girl, I can hear you thinking through the walls.” My best friend, Amelia, interrupts my musing.

“You're not supposed to use your siren skill on me,” I say.

Amelia laughs. “Well, you know, I don't have a whole lot of control over that anyway, since this whole supernatural gig is new. And I have even less control when I'm tired and have had some wine.”

By now, she’s out of bed and standing in my bedroom doorway. She flips on the lights.

“In any case, I know you're thinking about him, and I just want to tell you that you should reach out to him. You should talk to him.”

Him being Malcolm, the love of my life and my husband. Or at least he was my husband before I left him.

I shake my head. “I can’t. You know that.”

Amelia comes and sits on my bed. We’re both sitting up, cross-legged, ready to talk about boys. We’ve done this since we were adolescents. Only back then, we would plan the way our lives would go when we met our forever loves.

Life hasn’t quite turned out as magical as we once imagined. Or rather, it’s too magical. Six months ago, we went on a girls’ trip, just a simple weekend away. We rented a cabin and stocked up on snack foods and rom-com movies.

Amelia had found a recipe online for a fun adult beverage that required a specific energy drink. It took a while, but I managed to find some online and ordered it. Turns out it was tainted. Not really poisoned, just enchanted or something, because once she and I drank it, our entire lives changed.

Amelia grew scales all over her body; they’re iridescent and beautiful, but she craves the water the way most of us crave oxygen. When she’s in the water, her legs transform into a mermaid tail. And she can hear people’s thoughts. We’re told it’s because then she can use her siren song to redirect those thoughts. She’s never tried to do that.

I, on the other hand, didn’t get to be a beautiful mermaid. Nope, I got stuck with some bug-like features and wings. Now you might think, ohhh, but you’re a butterfly. Wrong! I’m a moth. My wings are various shades of brown. The flying is cool, I’ll admit that. And my eyes are bigger, rounder.

“He loves you, Joy,” Amelia says, interrupting my thoughts. “In a way that I've never seen another man love. He won't care. I truly believe that.”

“He won't care?” I ask. “He won't care that I have antennas growing out of my head?” I grab said antenna and wiggle it around. “Or how about the big moth wings growing out of my back? I can't even wear normal clothes anymore.”

“Well, thank God. Screaming Woods has an excellent seamstress for that sort of thing.”

I chuckle. “Very funny.”

“I am, in fact, hilarious.”

“Okay, forget the clothes. And even my body changes. How about the fact that I’m now like some sort of animal who will go into heat? And if I don’t mate and reproduce, I’ll likely go feral? You think he won’t care about any of that?”

“I’m not saying that you won’t have some challenges and adjustments. But don’t all marriages have struggles? Malcolm isn’t going to abandon you. I feel certain,” Amelia says.

“I have no such certainty. I can’t put him through any of that.” I grab my best friend’s hand. “If I went feral and hurt him, I’d never forgive myself.” I shake my head, ignoring the tears. They’re pretty normal these days. “I just, I can't do that to him.”

Oh, how I love that man. Our courtship was fast and intense. The way he tells it is that he saw me across a crowded room and knew immediately he would marry me. He just had to figure out how to get me to fall in love with him. That’s not exactly how it happened. The crowded room was our local grocery store. I was manhandling zucchini, and after one look at his ridiculously sexy face, I toppled the entire squash display. It made him laugh. That made me laugh. We were pretty much inseparable after that.

“I can't risk it, Amelia. He means too much to me. I love him too much.”

“That's what I'm saying,” Amelia says. “You two… you were the goal. Hashtag, couple goals. The dream. Like what Vivian and Atticus have. They're happy. He's a monster. She's a human. Same with Jace and Harry, and Hudson and Rosie. The only difference is that you're the monster.” She blows out a breath.

“For lack of a better thing to call it. Are lady mothman—lady moths—monsters?”

“I think the fact that my kind is capable of being feral definitely puts me in the monster category,” I say.

“The majority of the people here in this town are gentle and loving and wonderful, monsters or not,” Amelia says.

“True. You think sirens can go feral?” I ask.