Каран Андерс - The Book of Firsts

"I can’t guarantee hour-long, but I think I can manage daily for official boyfriends. Or even secret ones." I paused, a little helplessly. "I guess I’ll rotate in alphabetical order."

Rin proved he was listening by looking up and saying: "My full name starts with A."

"If you’re okay with us calling you Arinn, we’re okay with you taking first," Kyou said.

"You don’t like being called Arinn?" I asked.

"Family name—there’s three others currently, and a long list in the family tree." Bran smirked faintly. "If you want to annoy him, call him Arinn."

"Stick with Rin," Rin said, after a long pause, glanced at his notations, then put down the pen and wound an arm around my waist. "No-one’s ever given me a city before."

"When it’s done, I want you to name it," I said.

Rin leaned forward, then glanced at the audience on the other side of the table. "Close your eyes."

"If we’re going to do this at all…" Bran said, but then shrugged and picked up the tray, heading for the summer house.

Kyou collected leftover cups and followed, and Rin turned his attention back to me.

"Do you really think this is possible without you three tearing each other apart?" I asked, finding my face was a little hot. Being affectionate when we were all together was very different to separate rendezvous.

"Yes," Rin said. "We’re very motivated not to lose you, and we…" His lips curled toward wicked. "We’re thoroughly used to the idea of sharing you, since discussing you has long been our favourite topic of conversation. Not that there won’t be occasions when we feel possessive, particularly if I was wanting to throw you over my shoulder, only to find Bran or Kyou had already whisked you off. We’ll work out ways to avoid that."

He gently touched my cheek, but didn’t go further. "Just now I’m far too inclined for that shoulder throwing to indulge too much. It wouldn’t do to get caught on the last day here."

"I don’t want to sleep on the plane anyway."

"Underneath this makeup, you look like you haven’t slept since we last spoke, so why don’t you want to sleep?"

"Time zone adjustment mainly, but also not necessarily a good idea when travelling alone."

He frowned. "If you’re in a seat next to someone who invades your space, ask a flight attendant to change."

"Not my first solo flight," I told him.

He paused, then shook his head. "While I don’t recall ever travelling alone. I should probably be more worried about your actor, anyway."

"Christophe is so completely besotted with Millie that you don’t need to worry about him putting a hair out of place on this trip."

"And does Millie like Christophe?"

"Quite a bit. The hurdle at the moment is she doesn’t believe in him."

"A figment of the collective imagination?"

"A very beautiful and charming boy who has women throwing themselves at him at every opportunity, but only wants her," I said, with a wry smile. "Even if she lets herself believe that’s true, she doesn’t think it will last."

There could not be a more obvious parallel.

"Well," Rin said, after the longest moment. "I’m not sure my imagination is broad enough to produce you, but I certainly hope you’re a lasting delusion."

I laughed, and couldn’t help but blush, and that brought a triumphant light to his eyes.

"I live to make you flustered," he added, and was reaching toward me when a murmur of voices gave us a bare warning, and then the garden gate swung open.

Rin had changed his movement at the last second, and collected my journal instead of me. The Principal and Vice-Principal at least did not seem to have seen anything suspicious, and took me off for more photographs, some of which were posed beside my model of the Sunseeker Bridge. By the time I was done, Rin and Bran had left, and only Kyou remained to guard my luggage.

"Your turn," I said, as we headed out of the building to the teachers' carpark.

"They’ve gone to bring Rin’s car around, but yes. Even though we think we’re going to enjoy, ah, sharing, time alone together is important. Not that I was expecting to have to compete with the faculty today. Are you pleased with your results, Mika?"

"They’re about what I estimated. Being Dux might help with the course application. I don’t have much in the way of competition results or other extra credit activities."

"Good news, then. I admit to being surprised. I knew your score would be high, but I didn’t expect you to beat Bran, especially when he’s in such a good state. This, incidentally, is when you mention that you can’t house-hunt until you get the course offer, and I respond by offering to rent you a room."

"How close is it to the university?"

"It’s on the west end, not far outside the grounds, so we’ll be able to walk to class. Although, given the bulk of the lecture halls are on the east end, we’ll probably take the tram when we’re in a rush. The nearest tram stop’s around four minutes' walk away."

"Walking to class sounds irresistible," I said. "How much do you want for it?"

"How much do rooms rent for?" Kyou asked, clearly not concerned. "Perhaps half whatever you’re paying for your apartment?"

"That’s probably an extreme bargain for the university district," I told him.

"Given how much we owe you, I wouldn’t charge at all, but it adds a level of truth to the cover story, not to mention sidestepping some of the social complexities of moving you into our house so we can take advantage of you."

"Mm. Yes, I’d definitely rather be a rent-payer, when you put it that way." I resisted the temptation to reach out to him, just smiled and said: "If escaping the trap gave you a windfall, does that advance the schedule you’d set for your game releases?"

"Not really—we don’t want to expand too quickly, particularly if that means compromising on the personnel we hire. We did spend a lot more on the technical equipment than we were initially intending: we’ll have one of the best motion capture setups in the country. And we’re negotiating purchase of an old dairy farm out in Noonerry as a site for the larger office."

"Is that a suburb?"

"An outlying town. A total backwater, currently, but I had a technician do an analysis of the best alternate route for the high-speed rail, and she predicts they’ll put a stop right on the edge of Noonerry, which will make it perfect for employee commuting."

"Sure it’s not another trap?"

"Trying to predict the route is purely my own speculation, and if it works out, we’ll owe you an even greater debt, because I only started investigating after you said the current route would be delayed or unviable."

"Now I’ll worry whether I’ve lost you money."

"One thing about land is you rarely lose money on it. If it doesn’t come off, well, we’ve enough liquidity to keep a bunch of abandoned paddocks until someone wants them. Besides, it’s a very pretty area, and I’d like to build a house there, for when we want to get out of the city. Do you like horse-riding?"

"Yes. I wanted a pony when I was a kid, but couldn’t find one that would fit in a suitcase."

Kyou reached out and brushed the back of his hand against mine. "Is it too soon to say I want to build a home for you, Mika?"

"Probably. But you make me want to see it."

An odd whirr heralded the arrival of an enormous cherry and black Hummer, and cut short any response Kyou might have made.

"Electric," Rin explained, after my luggage was stowed, and Kyou and I had climbed in back with Bran. "The law requires it play a noise when travelling at certain speeds."

"Does yours do the same?" I asked Kyou. "I didn’t notice."

"It pretends to make car noises," Kyou said, smiling, and then stopped me from buckling my seat belt. "One thing I like about this behemoth is that Rin has more than the legal amount of tinting on the side windows."