Cassie Alexander - Deadshifted

“How old were you when…” My voice drifted, unsure what I was asking him.

“When all the adults in my life abandoned me?” he filled in. “Fourteen.”

“You’ve been on your own since then?”

“Yeah. Of course.”

“Wasn’t it hard?”

“Not really. It wasn’t fun … but it wasn’t hard, either.” I twisted back to see him better, caught him staring at the ceiling thoughtfully. “It was mostly lonely.”

I found his hand wrapped around my waist, with my own, and his fingers twined with mine. “Not anymore.”

Asher looked down at me. “You’re really going to be with me, a misfit shapeshifter, for the rest of your life?”

I smiled up at him. “Yeah. I think you’re pretty much stuck with me now.”

“Good.” He nodded, and kissed my temple, and then held me as the ship rocked back and forth on the waves. We were quiet together, and I wondered what he was thinking. I managed not to ask him, though. I closed my eyes and just let the moment spin. When I opened them again, he had a questioning look on his face.

“Sleeping? Food? Or other things?”

This really was a vacation. I really didn’t have anything I had to do for fourteen whole days. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had that long off. Maybe the summer break before I got a job, back in high school.

I stretched beside him. I was hungry; my stomach was still on the other coast. “Food. And then we’ll see about sex, fiancé.”

Asher grinned. “I like the sound of that.”

It was in between breakfast and lunch, but there were certain restaurants on board that never closed. We made our way to one of these on the third floor, the Dolphin, through an indoor bar and promenade, with leather chairs facing huge portal windows showing a deck and, past it, the choppy seas outside. If I looked just right, I could see the orange belly of a lifeboat hanging down. Good to know. I wasn’t sure which was making me more green, the motion of the ship or my pregnancy, but I was fixated on getting pancakes. If only I’d had a day or two longer to get sea legs under me before everything else.

“Are you sure you want to risk it?” Asher asked solicitously.

“Yes.” I might learn better right afterward, but I was set on learning the hard way. “They’re spongy. They might help.” I wished I’d listened to all my pregnant coworkers back in the day. I’d always tuned out their pregnant-lady talks before. My current ignorance served me right. “At least the syrup might be fast calories? Maybe I can absorb some without throwing them up.”

Asher didn’t look like he thought it was a good idea, but he shrugged, willing to let me learn for myself.

This time of morning, the restaurant was mostly empty, except for the dolphins painted on the walls chasing one another. The maître d’ seated us near a window. Asher began to tell him to move us, but I quickly shook my head. “It’s nice to see outside.” Maybe if I could see the waves, I’d begin to get a feel for their motion, and separate them from my stomach. The window was bubbled out, giving a view in all directions, dark waters below, sun ahead, and behind us fast clouds pushing in.

As the waiter took our order, Asher sized up another uniformed cruise employee near the door. “Be right back.”

I didn’t have to ask what he was doing to know. I’d seen him do it at least a hundred times. He reached the man and started talking to him in his intuitively congenial way. Asher could make anyone like him. I watched him with a mixture of jealousy and awe, and the realization dawned that I was engaged to, and impregnated by, a hustler. Not that that was a bad thing, at least not in Asher’s case. But it was … a thing. Something I’d never had to deal with before.

Asher laughed and the man laughed and they were laughing together—I shook my head in bemusement, then let my gaze wander the room. This restaurant had an under-the-sea theme, with walls covered by splashing ocean waves and happy denizens of the sea swimming underneath.

I spotted the family we’d sat through the safety lecture with, the Indian couple with their kids, and I waved at them so as not to seem creepy, as the mother caught me staring a second too long. She absentmindedly waved back, clear she had no memory of me from yesterday. As a mom, this was probably like a working vacation for her. They might not be at home, but she hadn’t gotten to take a break from her mom-job.

I watched her out of the corner of my eye, trying to put myself in her shoes and failing. Her boy was scarfing down a huge plate of scrambled eggs, and her daughter was studiously drawing on a place mat with crayons. That was going to be me. Give or take eight years.

Asher returned to his seat, disrupting my reverie. “I know who to talk to now. I’ll go out after this and move things along.”

I smiled at him and snorted. “Wow, if you’re fast enough, this may be our only breakfast as fiancés.”

“I hope so, because that word sounds weird.”

“How shotgun is our wedding going to be? Am I going to have to find a white dress somewhere on board?”

He laughed, and just like the man he’d been conversing with, I found myself wanting to laugh with him. “Only as shotgun as you want.” He beamed at me. “I don’t care what you wear, as long as you show up.”

This week might be the last week I fit into the red dress I’d brought along for formal nights for a while. “I’m going to wear red then. I’ve already got that outfit, and it’s easier this way. Especially seeing as it’s just for us, and whatever witnesses we have to rope in for it to be legal.”

He grinned, then gave me a sober look. “You should get your hair done, though. And your nails. Whatever other fun things women do. I don’t want you to miss out on all of that just because I’m rushing you.”

I inspected my nails. My manicure might hold well enough for a few more days, seeing as there wouldn’t be any dishes for me to do, if I could avoid my natural inclination to use All the Sanitizer. But getting it redone just because I could was tempting, too. Wasn’t that how vacations worked? “You’re not rushing me, honest. I wouldn’t want the hassle of planning everything anyhow. This is saving me a ton of stress.” Avoiding sending out invitations, check. Avoiding endless discussions with my mother about colors, flowers, or dresses, double check. Not having to wonder if my brother’s going to show up or not, high or not, or being the worst-sister-ever again if I didn’t invite him to avoid that entirely, super-check.

Our breakfast arrived, and Asher waited until the waiter left to speak again. “Well, I’d still like it to be romantic. Even if it is practical.”

“It will be. It’s with you.” I grinned at him over my pancakes. They smelled so good—my stomach flipped a coin, and hungry won. I ate a few bites, and things held. I sank back into my chair, relieved. “What about rings? I’m not really a ring wearer—” Work gave me the opportunity to touch too many gross things.

He quickly shook his head. “Rings are too complicated.”

I blinked, as I realized he was right. People at work didn’t know I was with Hector—they’d only ever met me dating some blond guy named Asher, who just happened to never be around when Hector was. Same with my brother and folks. There would be no way to explain things at work, and the second either of us showed up wearing a ring—people there might not put us with each other, but there’d be questions to answer for sure. It would be easier without them, less chances to screw up.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“No, it’s okay, I understand.” I set my fork down and held up my ring-free hands for illustration. “I don’t like them anyway, and besides, I’d be worried about it falling into an abscess all the time.”