Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 69936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 350(@200wpm)___ 280(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
What started as a sip turned into a gulp, which turned into him downing the entire thing. As he finished, his eyes widened, and he took a breath. “Oh, wow. That’s amazing. Very, very sweet.”
“You like sweet?”
“This body definitely responds well to it, aside from the fact that my head feels like it’s about to explode.”
I laughed. “That’s called an ice-cream headache.”
“I thought you gave me a shake.”
“A shake is made with ice cream.”
“Oh…”
Daddy quieted and just stared at me, and we probably stared at each other for way too long before I asked, “What?”
“Sorry, just spaced into my Furker brain.”
“And what goes on in a Furker brain?”
He sized me up, and the way his gaze probed me sent a jolt up my spine. As I gulped, he said, “I don’t think it’d be appropriate to say.”
The convection oven pinged. “I should get your muffin.”
I plated it, and as I passed it to him, he asked, “What is douched?” catching me off guard.
“Huh?”
“What Eric said, about your warmed-up and douched muffin?”
I’d forgotten about his quip, and now I was left resenting having to explain. “We’ll talk about that another time.”
“Is this like Area 51?”
“Um…sure.”
11
DADDY
I was relieved Twink didn’t hate me for abducting him. If anything, my misunderstanding seemed to have brought us closer together.
As he helped customers, I enjoyed my muffin and another Javanilly, wondering about this Area 51 and his douched muffin, but mostly thinking about the way he continued to look at me, even as he was making a mocha latte for one of his patrons. Given his issues with quality, I felt he should have spent more time concentrating on what he was doing. Although, despite how unpleasant he reported his experience of working in the café to be, it was apparent he was adjusting well to the task. A sign of his adaptability—another excellent quality in a potential mate.
“So what have you been up to this week?” he asked me in his familiar, friendly way after handing the mocha to his customer.
“Fixing the Kaylog and listening to conversations in the park.”
“You do a lot of that. Is it just to pick up our language and customs?”
“More than that. It helps me see how humans spend their days. The little lies they tell friends to get out of plans they wish they hadn’t made. How they obsess over the many ways to interpret the different signals your species give to one another on a variety of topics; if one of a parental unit is upset with them; if a potential mate is interested.”
He chuckled. “Those last ones I really get. And don’t even get me started on my mother.”
“Furker mothers have an instinct to eat their young once they’ve breached the egg sac, so I can understand tensions around the subject of mothers.”
He started to laugh, but then his expression turned serious. “Wait. Did your mother really try to eat you?”
“It’s an important task in ensuring that Furkers can quickly adapt to new environments.”
He took a breath, as though he’d been holding it. “So she pretends to try to eat you, to make you adapt?”
“Oh, no. If she had caught me, she would have eaten me with my siblings. I was only explaining the evolutionary purpose behind the behavior.”
He gulped. “Well, maybe my mom’s not so bad after all.”
I intuited he wanted to discuss this further, so I went on, “Some other discussions I overheard involved the frustrations that come with housing—rent and mortgage payments. Trying to fit in a vacation within the restrictions of employers. Largely, I’ve heard about the unpleasant experiences humans have with other humans…occasionally frustrations about their pets.”
“Sorry you’re getting such a bleak perspective of humans.”
“I don’t feel that way at all. These are the struggles of being alive—some of them, at least. And there have been pleasant things I’ve had the privilege of hearing about.”
“For instance?”
“The courting rituals—dating and hooking up.”
I had encountered similar rituals among other cultures, and I definitely wanted to date Twink before hooking up with him. Perhaps it was just part of my nature. Of course, a Furker would be more interested in bonding with a potential mate, and I considered that Twink likely wouldn’t be interested in this after what happened, though our interactions, the way he looked at me, and the pheromones he gave off suggested not only had nothing changed, but it had intensified.
“And what did you find out about those?” he pressed.
“That a date can precede a hookup, or that people can hook up without the date part.” From some of the things he’d told me about mating, I figured he wouldn’t have an issue with fucking and moving on to another mate, but it wasn’t that easy for a Furker.
He assessed my dishes—crumbs on my plate and remnants at the bottom of my shake cup. “Want me to make you another shake?” he asked with that inviting look in his eyes. “Or try one of my cookies?”