Page 82 of A Light in the Dark
Still giggling, I led him to my upstairs craft room, which was one room over from where I’d set up my computers. “I will be nearby if you need me, the machine confuses you, or you’re just that excited over the machine. I’ve played with it long enough to hem my cross-stitch projects, and she’s a beauty. You’ll have to treat her gently. She’s a virgin for clothes still.”
“I will whisper sweet nothings to her and tell her how beautiful she is while I work,” Joel promised.
Lucky machine.
“Just don’t play with the embroidery settings without me. Those settings cost me a fortune.”
He chuckled. “I’m aware. I have a nice sewing machine, but nowhere near as nice as your new one. I’ll be visiting your machine as often as you’ll let me, I’m not going to lie. I’ll be doing most of these suits with a machine, but one is going to be hand sewn from start to finish. That is going to be my extra nice suit. Honestly, an excellent sewing machine with someone who knows what they’re doing can trick people, but the suits are considered cheap because someone didn’t spend fifty hours of their life making it. Daily wear? I go cheap. For special events or business meetings with large buyers, I dig out the ones I’ve hand sewn. And as I’m spoiled, I learned the art of making my own suits by hand. I like being unique, and it doesn’t get much more unique than that.”
That was one way to put it. “How many suits are you going to be walking out with tonight?”
“That depends on when you kick me out. I’m hoping for three.”
I pointed at my drawer of buttons and other odds and ends useful for making nice things like suits. “Please feel free to rampage through my supplies if you need zippers, buttons, or anything decorative in nature. If you need linings, I have some satin fabric, but it isn’t fancy luna moth silk.”
“I’m good on all the fabrics I need, but I might take you up on the buttons, as I tend to only use one button type.”
“Variety is the spice of life. Make your buttons spicy.” I headed over to what used to be an extension of my craft room but now held all my computer junk. I needed to clearout all the drawers and move it into the craft room, but I’d deal with that another day. Once seated in my new computer chair, I booted up the work laptop, dug out my phone, and began the tedious process of researching refugees. A text to my boss won me a link to the website Stonecreek employers could use to check on the bonus status of applicants. He also sent me the business information needed to make the website work, as it was locked to eligible companies.
I determined if I opened twenty browser tabs at a time, I could copy-paste the relevant info into the boxes and bulk check refugee status, saving myself time and sanity. I wrote an email to my boss with the status of each potential employee, their refugee identification number, and their status. Half of them weren’t eligible for hiring bonuses, half of them were, and most of the refugees who had been previously hired had been let go for having completed the projects they’d been hired for.
I read between the lines: those refugees were at the highest risk of being targeted.
Aware my boss had similar feelings, I organized the results by my general opinion on which people were best for the job, and of those, I put the ones who weren’t eligible for a bonus at the top. Once I finished that, I texted my boss that I’d finished the initial status check.
At the same time, I texted the Hunters with the refugee identifications and their status in our system, information I hoped they could use.
A few moments after sending my email off, my phone rang. Grinning, I accepted the call and said, “I’m not a miracle worker. I just opened a lot of tabs at once, copy-pasted the company info into all the tabs, and then pluggedin the refugee identification numbers. After submitting them all, I recorded the result and did the next batch. It went quickly.”
“You processedhundredsof records in less than two hours, Valerie.”
“It doesn’t take more than a few minutes to do a batch of twenty. I mean, I’m pleased with my level of efficiency. I’ll be observing my guest sew on my new machine. It’s been silent in my craft room, so he’s either indulging in an affair with the machine, he’s asleep at my table, likely drooling on his precious silk, or he’s rummaging through my button collection, spicing up his suits. He brought me a bag of luna moth silk as a present, and it’s hanging by my door, and the first time I have several hours without interruption, I will be learning how to spin it.”
“We’re going to have to check in with you, as I fear you may develop Yolana’s problem.”
“Oh, you’ve met Yolana?”
“Everyone in the flutter has. Those of us who need a few extra bucks sell our excess silk to her. This upsets Joel, as he doesn’t think anyone inhisflutter should need extra money. If he ever suspects you’re short on cash,Iwill have hell to pay because you’re under my hire.”
“I’m fairly confident in saying that I’m being paid far more than my education level and experience implies I should be paid.”
“You’re underpaid for your performance, and the management is fixing that before Joel can tear me a new ass—and they know he will. Anyway, Yolana will disappear into her workshop after hours and never be seen again. Someone with the key has to go in, pull her away from her spinning,and force her to handle the basics, including shower. She’ll be clean from fingertips to elbow and a walking disaster everywhere else if left unattended.” My boss snickered. “Joel’s parents usually take care of checking in on her if Yolana’s parents don’t. But a lot of us luna moths have fixation problems when it comes to our hobby of choice. Since we don’t have the same lifespan issues as mundane luna moths, we tend to express that part of our nature through fun activities. That is a good thing, else we’d just chase each other around and try to unsuccessfully have many luna moth babies.”
Interesting. “So luna moth shifters can’t have themselves a good time when shifted?”
“Yep. That’s the price we pay for survival, the ability to eat, and our natural enjoyment of roses and other certain flowering plants.”
“That’s harsh. Clearly, it doesn’t apply when human, as Joel and your wife exist.”
“That’s correct. Once shifted, we’re inclined to stay close to our partner and find plants to stick our noses into. Once we get stoned off the plants and have no desire to do anything other than find more plants, we loiter until we get hungry enough to go look for actual food. Then we get a good nap, and all is well. Fortunately for us, we’re one of the more magical of shifter species, so we don’t have to worry about mundane predators. Our glow does a good job of repelling them.”
The glow was a survival mechanism? Interesting. “It won’t prevent me from locking in any luna moths who are dumb enough to come into my home on Friday or Saturday nights,” I warned him.
“You have indoor roses in bloom. Nobody is going to care if we’re held hostage until morning. The luna moths you capture will be too stoned to be bothered with moving, and you leave out fruit plates for us. Those of us who aren’t enjoying your roses are shaking their heads at those of us unable to resist the lure.”
“So, if I were to lock Joel in, would anybody care?”
“We’d only care if you failed to release him in the morning,” he replied with laughter in his voice. “And if you’re angling for more silk, just tell me you’re holding him hostage and require a bag of silk to release him.”
