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 Posted: Mon May 02, 2022 4:45 pm
Devyn smiled again, a little sad, maybe. Not too much. Of course he hated being separated from Percy for so long. Minutes had been too long before. Years? Centuries? It was the worst. He’d been more upset about that than about being alone.
Her nickname was cute, and it only further endeared him to her in a way he really hadn’t thought was possible. He liked Claire very much. She was easy to be around. Fun. Worried about Michael and wanted the best for him, so they had that in common already.
“I don’t want him hurt, either,” he promised. “I’ll protect him. I’ll chase away anyone who wants to give him trouble.”
He could take him away from fireworks, and dogs, and beeping, and crowds. Get strong enough to make sure the Negaverse couldn’t hurt him. Or anyone else he cared about.
Devyn wasn’t sure if he should think that Michael kept going for this long because his starseed was waiting for you, but–Michael was stubborn. Percy was stubborn. If they shared those traits, maybe they just had a stubborn starseed.
“I hope he gets time to heal.” Not just the physical wounds, but everything else left over from a life of hiding injuries until they seeped into your bone, your spirit, your core. But, Devyn changed his mind and then said, “I’ll make sure he does. Whatever he needs. I like him, he’s a good guy. Who works too hard and cares so much, and puts his heart into everything he does because I think he figures if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right. And he’s careful with others but reckless with himself, and waiting for something bad to happen because he expects it and doesn’t want to be surprised. But then, he’s always thinking about something bad happening because he wants to be prepared for it. I think, maybe he forgets to take it easy because he’s spent so long thinking about how bad things can go. But he’s promised me we can get out of the city again this weekend. We’ve gone up to–”
Well, he shouldn’t say Sessrumnir right now, “–Percy’s, already, and cleaned some things up. Maybe we can just go out to the reservoir and take a hike or something. I don’t like the water much, but he seems to? And he says the sand squeaks out there. I want to see that, maybe we can go take lunch out there and enjoy the quiet, and have a good hike or something. I’d say a swim but I don’t know if it’s too cold right now.”
He shrugged, because cold probably wouldn’t have stopped him, anyway.
Especially not if Michael had wanted to.
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Posted: Mon May 02, 2022 5:03 pm
Maybe there were some details about Michael’s life that even Claire wasn’t aware of. After all, it had been years and years since he was a boy, living at home with her. Sometimes she felt as though she failed him in that he wasn’t comfortable talking to others, but it seemed as though just in a matter of weeks, Devyn was able to pick apart pieces of who Michael was.
And, of course, that might also be because Devyn was probably similar in many ways. Or maybe Percy was. Really, she was just happy that Michael was spending time with someone else, regardless of the reason. And as long as he wasn’t hurt. Devyn promised to protect him, so she would have to believe that.
“Oh, he loves the water,” she confirmed with a nod. “He’s always loved the water. He likes rainstorms and swimming and sailing. Did he tell you about Eulalie? It’s only just started getting warmer, so maybe not. You should ask him about her,” she said with a little wink. Of course, Michael might not have mentioned her because he knew Devyn didn’t like the water, but it might be good to have a random topic of conversation.
“But I trust you’ll keep an eye out for him. Thank you,” she said again, because anything that could help Michael got full praise in her books.
“Now… unless you want seconds, we should head down the street. There’s a perfect little salon for our mani-pedi.”
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Posted: Mon May 02, 2022 5:13 pm
Devyn could always go for seconds, but he wasn’t going to make Claire sit around while he gorged himself. He’d have plenty of time to get more later, and she kept talking about mani-pedis and he did not know what that was. Naturally, he needed to find out.
“I’m ready. And looking forward to it. And I’ll ask him about Eulalie when he gets home tonight.”
He didn’t need thanks for wanting to look after Michael, it just seemed right. He couldn’t deny that Claire’s approval made him feel good about it, though. It was a nice reassurance. Although, if she hadn’t approved, he would have still done it anyway.
She knew things about Michael that he hadn’t even dreamed to ask, and now he had a whole slew of topics he could bring up with him. Capsian, he knew. Eulalie, he did not know, but something about how Claire told him to ask about her made him curious and–what was that, nervous? What did that mean? Who was she?
He wanted to know. He wanted to go out to the water and see what was so good about it and–well, he used to like the water, before it always tried to kill him. But, maybe he could get Michael out by the water and see if that was relaxing. He could probably even pose it as something he wanted to do for himself so Michael couldn’t even push his own wants or needs off to the side.
And, again, he was excited, and briefly he worried that Michael might think he’d gotten into trouble. “Let me just tell Michael. He’s taught me how to speak into the phone so it sends my messages. And take pictures. I don’t know what I’d do without him. I can send him a picture of anything I find and he can tell me what it is. I found a strange animal this morning and sent the picture to him. He messaged me back immediately to tell me it was an opossum. And he told me not to chase it, so I didn’t.”
He pulled out his phone and began to press buttons, but it wasn’t like he had to go far; the only thing he seemed to have open was his text conversation with Michael, anyway.
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