If I Know You

Chapter 8

After Mini had been born, I'd had a few nights of struggling to sleep, but trying to sleep through my niece's baby squawks was nothing compared to trying to sleep in the same room as a lady human.

One of the mushrooms from the soup she made must have gotten stuck in my throat and made my palms sweaty and made me afraid of talking to her.

All the mushrooms' fault.

I stayed curled up, staring at Moss, who was wearing a tiny snake coat that she had put him in before we'd blown out the candles. The tight Earth clothes were squeezing all the air and blood out of my body.

The terror hadn't truly set in until Pippa had changed into a nightgown and offered me a set of sleeping clothes and I realized that death wasn't going to release me from my terrible decision. I was going to be here in a room with the girl that I didn't want to fall in love with and was eventually going to shove at a fairy from Earth.

This was probably the third worst decision of my life, but as long as I didn't speak to her, or look at her, or do anything that could be considered interacting with her, I would probably be safe from the dangers of love and happiness.

That was something I could do. I'd been practicing hiding from social interaction for years.

"Rory?"

"Gah!" I jumped, whipping around.

Don't look at her face, I told myself as I stared at her face.

Pippa was on her belly, laying across the bed. She propped her head on top of her fist. "Are you awake?"

I looked down at myself. "No."

"I can't sleep either. Do you want to go exploring?"

"Together? With you?"

Any other human would have looked at me like I had no brain, which was very possibly true, but she only smiled her sunshiny smile. "Yes. I thought that maybe we can get used to this whole living situation faster if we do something that we used to do."

She hated me. I knew it. I'd ruined everything. Or I'd done exactly what I'd set out to do. It was getting hard to remember what I wanted.

"It's not weird or anything," I told her quickly. "Remember that one time we spent the night in Tory's room? Because, um, I remember it."

I looked at the ceiling, willing it to fall down and break my mouth off my face.

"I remember that I was four," Pippa said thoughtfully. "But it's been a while since then. Come on, let's go. The forest is most alive at night."

I hated living things, but I gladly go run around a dark forest with her. My body answered her before my mouth could make a response grunt. I sat up and reached for my canvas shoes.

"Your clothes are interesting," she remarked as I pulled the shoes back onto my feet and started throwing the laces around in a way that would hopefully hold. "The fashion in Ki has changed a lot. I like it."

Her approval made my heart sprout fuzz, but I knew that Pa would probably strangle me with these pants if he saw how tight they were. He'd nearly exploded when Tory had decided that not wearing a shirt was his new favorite hobby. Earth fashion would have been thrown into the nearest volcano, by royal decree.

She zipped up my hooded jacket over her nightgown, but didn't bother putting on shoes, and we walked out of the angry witch cabin.

This was the first. It was only now that I noticed the first bits that made Somnia different from the real world. There was a moon providing light, and there were a few chirping crickets, but there were no stars in the dark sky. I looked around cautiously for any happy horde people.