Priam and His Customers

11 • mismatched socks

mismatched socks

HE DIDN'T KNOW why things suddenly turned out this way, but apparently, he's a landlord now.

After that debacle with the man-eating book, June has temporarily occupied one of Priam's guest rooms. Not that he had a say in it. He just found out that most of June's belongings had somehow gotten in the room the night after the incident.

His house is a fucking traitor for allowing this.

The bare cream walls of the guest room were now full of fandom merch posters, band posters, and is that a wholeass bookshelf full of manga and novels? And are those acrylic stands and figurines? What the fuck.

When the fuck did June manage to get all of this in here in less than 24 hours?

"June, you can't stay here," Priam says after gaping at the thoroughly changed guest room.

"Of course I can. Here, I have a permit." June hands him a card.

Priam stares blankly at it. "This just says I do what I want."

"Exactly."

Priam doesn't throttle him, but it's a damn near thing.

He doesn't know where June manages to pull out this confidence considering the shit he pulled with the mint weeks ago that had almost ended with first-degree murder. Vampires are so weird; treating threats of bodily harm as playful banter so long as it's not by stake or silver. Or maybe that was just June, since his mother, Mrs. McCoy, was as pleasant as he is feral.

If only Mrs. McCoy wasn't so scary, Priam would have gone through with cleaving June in half, but oh well, details.

"Well, if you're lounging here like you own the place, you might as well pay rent," he decides instead, thoroughly succumbing to the sweet call of capitalism.

June has a sour look on his face. "With what money?"

Priam gives him an unimpressed look, knowing full well that the McCoy's are richer than all of The City residents' annual salaries combined. "Shut the fuck up, you trust fund baby."

June, knowing he has lost, nods sagely. "Alright, you got me there." He proceeds to pull out a sleek, black credit card and stretches it towards Priam. "Here's my card. Withdraw whatever amount it is needed to rent here and oh, the ATM pin is—"

Priam sputters, panicking. "Y-You can't just hand people your credit card and give out your pin number!"

The vampire seems to take this as a challenge and loudly declares his ATM pin, tosses his card into the air, and whoops as it shoots inside Priam's apron pocket. "Score!"

Priam sighs exhaustedly and walks out of there. "You know what? Whatever. Good night, June."

He makes a beeline to his own room and collapses on the bed, then falls asleep the moment his head hits the pillows.

It only occurs to him in the morning that he'd need official papers if he's taking June in as a tenant.

God, why is this his life.

____

He's making nougats in his personal kitchen when the air dangerously turns cold.

Priam squints at the sudden appearance of a tear in reality that is everything and nothing all at once. A moment later, from the void that popped out just beside the walk-in pantry, emerges a man who looks distinctively like him, only older, and who *might* be him, but is clearly doing a very terrible job at it.