Rusty blinked, and the strange energy brewing between them glitched and trembled. “Huh?”
“I promise I won’t say anything about the tattoo,” the Araknis said, tone sincere, expression earnest. “I wouldn’t embarrass you like that.” A tiny fang peeked out and dimpled Gem’s bottom lip. “And I also don’t want you to cockblock me for eternity.”
Gem’s words, coupled with the confusing and overwhelming emotions swirling in Rusty’s chest, caused something to bubble up and out of his throat. It wasn’t a shout or a growl or even a snarky comeback. It was a laugh, and it caught them both by surprise.
The rough chuckle exploded between them, bursting the intense bubble they’d been trapped in, and Gem startled. Rusty leaned back, scooting away until his back met the shower door again. His head met the glass, and he laughed up at the ceiling at the utter ridiculousness of the situation.
Bewildered at Rusty’s complete one-eighty, Gem smiled hesitantly, pressing several fingers to his mouth before he, too, burst into giggles. Rusty hugged himself around the middle as he gasped for air and Gem shrieked with laughter. Together, they laughed until tears streamed down Gem’s cheeks, and Rusty had a cramp in his side. Returning to Rusty’s side, Gem hunkered down and rested his head on Rusty’s shoulder.
“Oh my gods, I haven’t laughed like that in…” Unable to remember, Rusty trailed off as he coughed out a few last chuckles. “It’s, uh, been a while.”
Gem hummed and cautiously slipped several arms around Rusty’s so he could squeeze it. “Well, that’s a shame, because you have a really nice laugh.”
Angling his head, Rusty glanced down at Gem, and the Araknis beamed up at him. “Thanks, I guess.”
“You’re so welcome.” Gem lifted his top right hand and tapped the tip of Rusty’s nose. “Boop!”
With a grunt of annoyance, Rusty jerked his head away, bringing another giggle from Gem. “Don’t make it weird.”
“I don’t see how anything about thisisn’tweird. But I’m kind of here for it.” Gem snuggled into Rusty’s shoulder. “Plus, you can’t say we’re not friends now. We have a secret together, a big secret. Which pretty much makes us besties.”
“Oh, it does, huh?”
“Mhm, it’s practically a rule of nature.” Lifting his head, Gem leveled Rusty with a blinding smile and offered up his pinky expectantly. “Best friends forever, Rus. Sealed with a vow of silence.” Rusty wrinkled his nose, and Gem snickered, wiggling his pinky invitingly. “Come on, furball, you know you want to.”
With a huff of resignation, Rusty curled his pinky around Gem’s, and the Araknis wriggled in excitement, his leg and arm fur humming in satisfaction. “I have a sinking feeling that I’m going to regret this.”
“Oh babes, regret comes with the territory, but I promise”—Gem booped his nose again—“it’s so worth it.”
Chapter one
Shitty Luck
Rusty
Present Day
It was raining inLust again, and Rusty hated the rain. He hated the way it soaked through his clothes, the way it weighed down his fur until he looked like a drowned rodent. He hated how it seeped through the layers of skin and muscle and settled deep and cold in his bones. More than anything, he hated how much the rain reminded him of bittersweet memories that made his chest ache with longing.
Rusty hadn’t always hated the rain. In fact, he used to love it, if for no other reason than because his mother had loved it. And he’d loved his mother more than he’d ever loved anything.
Every time it stormed, she used to wake him up, regardless of the late hour, and they’d sit outside their little shack on the outskirts of the district limits, listening to the patter of water on the metal roof and the crash ofthunder overhead. His mother would bundle him in her lap and groom his fur as he watched lightning streak across the sky.
“The gods are battling again,” she’d say, scratching between his ears, and he’d gaze up at her in awe, believing every word. Because he was a child, and she was his mother. And gods, how he loved her so.
It didn’t matter that they were poor. It didn’t matter that everyone looked down their noses at them when they walked through the market. It didn’t matter that he ate lunch alone at school, already rejected by his peers for his ratty clothes and his Pyclese dialect.
Rusty had his mother, and that was all he needed. He didn’t care that she was a dancer at the local strip joint. Or that sometimes, when money was tight, strange men would come around, and he’d have to leave the shack until their business was done. Or that his only friends consisted of the tiny creatures he’d find burrowed in the sand or hiding under the bark of the dry, dying trees that the desert had claimed long ago.
He didn’t care because the other dancers at his mother’s job were nice to him when she’d leave him backstage with a well-worn comic book or a graphic novel she’d bought at the second-hand store for his birthday. They’d give him treats and compliment his pink fur—although he didn’t actually know whatpinkwas the way everyone else seemed to. They’d tell him how handsome he was, and how they couldn’t wait to see him grow up good and strong.
He didn’t care because the men never stayed long, and they never hurt him or his mom—at least, not in ways she ever showed. If he wandered back to the shack as they were leaving, tucking their shirts into their waistbands or zipping up their trousers, they’d give his shoulder a well-meaning cuff or slip a fewmyrelsinto his hand, saying, “Now, don’t you go spending that all in one place, you hear?”
He didn’t care because even as a kit, Rusty hadn’t exactly liked people and having friends wasn’t high on his list of priorities. He preferred the little bugs that skittered into the knots in the trees or the furry creatures that raced across the sand dunes as he chased them down, squealing with laughter. They were always nicer than the people he encountered in town anyway.
Honestly, his mom was enough for him. They were two seeds in akocapod, as his mother would say, and that was just fine by him.
So, yes, Rusty had loved the rain, once upon a time. Back when his mother had been happy. And healthy. And alive. But then she’d died, and she’d taken every ounce of wonder and hope and love with her.
