Page 2 of Shroom for Improvement

I peeked through the glass again. Sonny had stretched his impossibly long legs out and propped his grubby, trainer-clad feet onto the table, getting street crud all over the vinyl. His nose was buried in an ancient-looking leather-bound book. He wore headphones, and a T-shirt with a cartoon sunglasses-wearing otter driving a convertible car. From where I was standing, I couldn’t make out the text on the shirt, but it didn’t matter, I’d seen that one before, several times. It read:Grand Theft Otter.

Ironic.

Those were the first three things I knew about Sonny—if that was even his real name. He’d probably stolen it like everything else. Frankly, I was better for not knowing. Did he have a job? Or was he a professional grifter? Did he have a family? Or had he stolen someone else’s? It was anyone’s guess.

Even still, I didn’t want him to see me. Because the fourth and final thing I knew about Sonny...

That magpie fae was one loquacious bastard.

“’Scuse me!” A dragon shifter wearing a polyester business suit barged past me. He clenched his abdomen with both hands and flung the door to the train’s toilet open, then slammed it shut behind himself.

I eyed the door of the lavatory. I could stay here, and wait for whatever horrors might bleed through the gaps where the door didn’t fully seal itself against the panelling. Or I could take my chances withhim, and whatever gods-awful conversation he might attempt to throw at me.

“Oh, hell,” the dragon shifter whimpered a moment later, echoing my exact thoughts.

There was no other option. I held my breath, and on tiptoes, I slid into the caboose carriage. Sonny glanced up from his book, nodded an indifferent acknowledgment in my general direction, and returned his attention immediately to its pages.

My shoulders dropped in relief, and I folded onto the seat next to the window, keeping him in my peripherals because, well, nobody was stupid enough to turn their back on a magpie fae.

I’d gotten away with it. He hadn’t realised it was me—

“Claude?” Sonny removed his legs from the tabletop, pulled his headphones off and turned his book upside down, open to whatever page he was on.

I’d never told him my name, and it said onlyC. Stinkhornon my badge. He must have asked Ken or Pat for it at some point.

“I didn’t think I was going to see you today,” he said. “I had to buy my ticket from someone else. Patricia? She’s nice, isn’t she? She showed me pictures of her daughter’s wingball team. Cute.”

I blinked at him. Patricia had said a grand total of four words to me since I’d met her six years ago.“You must be Claude.”That was it. Not spoken a word since. Which I liked. And appreciated. And was why I’d probably rank Patricia among my top five favourite colleagues.

“Almost didn’t recognise you without your uniform,” Sonny continued, obviously having gleaned nothing from his time with Patricia. “Those are some... serious looking civvies you’ve got on there. Did someone die? Or do you always dress like a fusty librarian when you’re not working?” He laughed at his own non-joke, evidently expecting me to join in.

“Yes. To both things,” I said, totally not relishing the fleeting foot-meet-mouth moment that played over Sonny’s face.

Someone had indeed died. My father, actually, though I seldom saw the man. Wouldn’t even remember what he looked like if it weren’t for the generic shroom fae appearance that graced us all. The same light brown skin, same rust-coloured hair, and the same pale grey freckles wherever the sun kissed our skin, especially on our noses and the tips of our pointed ears.

Angus Stinkhorn. Famous explorer. On a perpetual quest to discover... gods knew what. New glamour, new flora and fauna, new women? Maybe all three. In fact, this was how he’d met my mother. In a small, middle of nowhere town in the Kingdom of the Fae. He’d paused his expedition just long enough to spread his spores, and was gone before I’d been born. He’d written to me a few times—spelled my name wrong moreoften than not—and had visited once per century, but otherwise, I hadn’t heard a peep from him.

Then, this morning I’d received a letter, hand-delivered by a spritely young fae with leaves in their hair, berries around their neck, and what seemed to be an entire holly bush spilling out of their sandals.

I’d read the letter, immediately changed out of my housecoat and slippers, and caught the first U-train into town.

So, the second part of Sonny’s question-slash-observation was also true. I didn’t mind the slight because yes, given the choice, I would always dress like a fusty librarian.

People just didn’t understand proper style these days. With their threadbare jeans, and their knees and butt-cheeks hanging out, and their midriffs all... midriffing. Give me brogues over scruffy canvas trainers any day. Waistcoats over exposure-induced hypothermia. Real wool coats over accidental public indecency.

“Someone died?” Sonny said, bringing his hand up to his mouth. His fingernails were painted forest green. I’d forgotten what we were talking about. “Shit, sorry, I didn’t mean to... Were you close? To the person, I mean. Are you going to the funeral right now?” He brandished his decorated hand towards my suit.

Why didn’t this guy ever stop talking? I figured the quickest way to shut him up was to give him what he wanted. Or some semblance of that. “My father. No, we weren’t close. No, I am not going to his funeral.”

Sonny opened his mouth to speak, evidently decided better of it, and snapped it shut again.

Good. I win.

Somebody had left a newspaper on the empty seat beside me. I picked it up, opened it at random, cleared my throat,and pretended to read the article, but it was merely shapes and letters and breakfast-grease-smudged ink.

Sonny sat back, ran the fingers of one hand through his silky raven hair, and drummed the others against the vinyl tabletop. “You’re a shroom fae.” He grimaced, muttered “why?” to himself, and rolled his eyes to the ceiling.

I didn’t let mine appear to leave the newspaper. “And you’re a very observant chap.”

---