Trading Names For Polite Sprites by Laura Greenwood

Author:Laura Greenwood [Greenwood, Laura]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Drowlgon Press

Twelve

Byron

* * *

I knock on Essie's bedroom door, already a little nervous to be in her flat. Her flatmates are the kind who will start asking questions about what's going on before she even appears, and I'm not sure how she wants me to answer them.

"Come in," she calls.

"It's me." I don't want her to think that it's one of her flatmates and be surprised when I step into her room.

"You can still come in, Byron."

I push the door open and step inside the familiar room. Very little has changed since I was last here, other than the position of what I now know to be a tank.

"Hey, Newton," I say to the newt.

He wiggles his whole body happily through the water and then climbs up onto the land portion of his habitat.

"You should be careful or he's going to want to use you like a climbing frame," Essie says with a note of amusement in her voice.

"I'm good at many things. Newt entertainment is one of them," I say, turning around to face her. My mouth goes dry as I take in the gorgeous sprite in front of me.

"They're not the same socks, but I hope they're acceptable," she says, gesturing down.

"I hadn't even noticed," I admit. "You're beautiful."

A blush crosses her cheeks and she glances down at the ground. It seems as if she doesn't know how to deal with the compliment. Which is fair, we've been in a strange place recently, and we both swore that things weren't serious before.

"Are you ready?" I ask.

She nods. "Just let me grab my keys." She picks up a small bag from her desk and stuffs her phone and ID in it along with the keys. She pauses by me and goes up on her toes to kiss me on the cheek. "I'm glad we're doing this."

"Me too." I open and close my hand, trying to work out if it's okay to hold hers.

This is going to take a lot of getting used to.

Essie seems to realise what I'm doing and reaches out with her hand, entwining our dingers. She lets out a soft sigh, seeming to like the way our hands fit together.

I don't blame her. It feels right to be showing one another affection like this.

"So, where are we going?" she asks.

"Dessert After Dark," I say. "I know it isn't fancy, but we haven't really given ourselves much time to plan."

"It's perfect," she promises me. "It skips to all of the good parts of the date." She leads me out of her flat, successfully managing to avoid any of her friends in the process.

"Dessert is your favourite part?"

"Yes."

"You're going to have to explain that."

"Maybe I just have a sweet tooth."

"I know you don't. You once told me that your favourite snack is a jar of pickled gherkins."

"That's not what I said. I told you that I once ate a whole jar. There's a difference," she counters. "But no, it's not because I prefer dessert. It's just that if I'm on a date and I order dessert, it's because I'm enjoying the company and I want to prolong things.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.