Page 127 of Nine-Tenths

"I don't expect to be in my dotage for at least another four or five hundred years."

"Five hundred," I repeat, suddenly feeling floppy. I prop myself against the wall, wine sloshing through my veins. "Dav, sweetie, honey bunch, cutie claws… I'm not mad, but I'm over this thing where you don't tell me big, important, fundamental truths until I stumble into them. It’s not awesome and it makes me feel like you think I'm stupid."

"No," Dav says quickly. "You're one of the most clever people I know. But… I suppose I'm afraid."

"Of?"

"That you'll leave."

My first instinct is to deny it. But to be fair, every big life-change he's sprung on me, Ihavereacted badly. Maybe it would be different if he told me in a calm, rational discussion, instead of after I've fucked something up. But then again, yeah, maybe not.

He looks sad, so I kiss him until the expression is replaced with dozy contentment. He tastes like champagne and those sticky molasses candies that always stick in my molars.

"Does it scare you?" he asks when we come up for air.

"Yes? No? Only, it’s kinda hitting me that…" I take a deep breath. It punches out as a shuddery kind of thing. "I'm going to have to watch Hadi, and Stu, and Gem get old and die, and man, Ido notlike that. At the same time, science-wise, it tracks. So, yeah, happy Halloween, eh? Helluva trick."

"I was hoping you’d consider it a treat," Dav says wistfully. There's an expression curling in the corner of Dav’s mouth that I want to lick.

It's a…

Holy shit.

It's a Peter Pan kiss.

I cup his face in my hands, and run my thumb along the edge of his mouth.

"Colin?"

"You have a kiss," I whisper. "Right here."

"I'm sorry?"

"Like Mrs. Darling."

"Ah," Dav says, catching on. "Are you sure it's not a thimble?"

"May I have it?"

"Always." Dav tilts the side of his face to me. "Forever. It's yours, my boy who will never grow old."

"At least not for a long time, I hear." The gooey, hopeless romantic center of me burbles with delight at this happy, sociable Dav. This Dav who is… is filling out his skin.Uncrunched.

"Shall we dance?" Dav whispers.

Oooh, he has good timing. Waiting until I’m all compliant and kiss-drunk to ask. Cheater.

"I don't know what I'm doing," I protest.

"Please," Dav begs, sending an honest-to-godpoutmy way. I let him pull me into the paired-off line up. "I do so love a dance."

"We never used to get Niagara off the floor," an older dragon to his left says. "And a good thing, too, for he kept all theFavorites well amused. Let us old codgers catch our breath. Glad to have you back, Niagara."

"Glad to be welcomed back, my Lord Toronto," Dav says, shaking his hand gregariously. But he's tense around his eyes.

Ha!I think sourly. "Glad to be allowed off his territory finally, more like.

Skulking by the bar, Simcoe glares like he could knife Dav in the back with the power of his disapproval alone. Laura’s petting his hair back from his cheek gently. They don't look like they're lovers—ew, I donotwant to think about that. Their body language is more like a mother, gently soothing her son. Yuck.

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