Page 11 of Miles's Pact
"You know, you're pretty easy to hang out with. Feel free to visit me if you ever get bored. Jai and Raph homeschool me, and I don't go out much, so I'm almost always around," Alex said, and I flicked my head in agreement.
I liked Alex. I liked Mateo and Miles too, but with them, I was always aware of the fact that they were my mates, and that they had some expectations of me, no matter how much they insisted they didn't.
Alex was quiet for a minute, but then he picked up his phone, unlocked it, and set it in front of me. "Can you use the touchscreen?" he asked, and I tapped my foot on the screen, making an app open up.
"Huh. I didn't think you could. Maybe it's because you're a shifter and not an actual duck?"
I flapped my wings in an approximation of a shrug, and they chuckled, then started tapping around on the phone.
"You can read, yes?"
I nodded, and they placed the phone in front of me again. The screen now had six different words on it, each with a distinct background.
I tapped on theHi, and a robotic voice came from the phone. "Hi!"
My eyes shot to Alex, and they grinned. "I'll need to see if I can borrow Jai's tablet, but with more buttons, we can have an actual conversation."
Fondness for this kid I'd just met filled me, and I butted my head against his again, then tapped the "Thank you" button. The two words weren't enough to express how grateful I felt. Alex had found a way for me to communicate with them without ever asking me to shift back. They'd accepted that I wasn't ready, and figured out an alternative, and it meant the world to me.
"You're welcome."
We hung out for a while longer, but then I remembered Mateo had mentioned wanting to visit the "haunted house" he worked at, and I was curious about the place. I wanted to see if it was an actual haunted house. I'd gone to one for my seventh birthday, and I'd loved it, especially because Dad had been terrified the whole time. I'd found it funny.
Fuck, what I wouldn't give to go to a haunted house with my parents again.
Can we leave?I asked Mateo through our bond, and a few minutes later, we were in the sky, flying toward the center of town and to a large under-construction house. It looked like a gothic villa, which I supposed was the vibe one wanted for a haunted house.
Do you often go to places naked?I questioned as I followed Mateo through a window into what looked like a small storage room.
Mateo's amusement filtered through the bond, and he shifted before me, grabbing a stack of clothes from a shelf nearby.
"I prefer flying over driving. I drive when I'm visiting a human or a stranger, of course, but most clan members are used to me popping by as an owl, and usually keep something for me to wear."
Back when I'd first learned to shift, my family had always been so careful about when and where we shifted. It was strange to see how relaxed Mateo was about the whole thing, and I suspected it wasn't the only unusual thing I'd get to see in this town.
