15. Cricket

The sky was barely greying toward dawn when Cricket left. It was cowardly, sure, but what the hells else was she supposed to do?

She should have known better. Should have known Avery would backpedal the minute she got what she wanted out of her. Gods, she even offered an out, but Cricket was too stupid to take it.

You didn’t have to walk me back.

It would have been so easy to say good night and walk away at that, but no. Cricket had to go and flirt and touch her face and want more when it was so obvious all Avery wanted was distance. It was so Gods-damned unfair. Why couldn’t she get infatuated with someone who wanted to be with an inhuman, instead of a human who took what she wanted and shut down the moment Cricket showed interest?

And she’d been so receptive! So pliant under Cricket’s hands, her pussy so hot and wet, and, Gods, the noises she’d made. Each tiny whimper and needy mewl rang through Cricket’s ears as she curled into her nest of blankets on the floor. Because, yes, she slept on the floor. There was no way she was going to sleep in Avery’s bed, even with the girl pouting at her from the pillows.

Adrenaline.

That’s all it was. Adrenaline and fear clouding her judgment. A near-death experience sending Avery running into the arms of the closest being, which happened to be Cricket. She didn’t want more. She didn’t want Cricket. She was just being kind and taking pity on the poor, limping inhuman.

… so why had she looked so hurt when Cricket refused to sleep in her bed?

And why had Cricket even bothered cleaning and bandaging her wound?

“Ugh!” She threw her hands up, stomp-limping in an angry circle. The lack of answers was more frustrating than the human. She should have known better, should have known Avery was playing with her. She seemed so innocent half the time, asking her weird questions like she’d never been around an inhuman before.

This is the first time I’ve lived apart from my family.

Alright, so maybe … maybe she hadn’t been around inhumans before this. Cricket leaned against the fence in Mac’s backyard, thinking back to the guitar lesson she’d witnessed and how abysmally Avery had managed the students, replaying it beneath a different filter. Not one where Avery was prejudiced against inhumans and treated them poorly, but one where Avery simply did not know how to manage the situation.

“Huh.”

Her ears twitched, a new image of the girl painting itself in her mind. All the questions, the frustrations, the adorable blushes that Cricket could still feel warming her palms. How she’d reached for Cricket’s ears that first time and hesitated the second.

“No, she knew.” She had to know. It had to be a performance because she’d hummed like she knew what touching a faun there would do … but then again, the girl had ground herself against Cricket’s thigh. She had kissed Cricket. She had pressed her breast into Cricket’s hand. Avery had led every moment of that interlude only to flinch away, and it made no Gods-damned sense. Either she was a damn good liar or was a really fast learner because Gods-damn she’d given good ear.

She shivered at the memory, running a hand down her front and feeling the hardened nubs of her nipples beneath her cotton shirt. Avery’s face floated into view, delightfully flushed and oh-so-pink. The human girl blushed so damn easily, she was probably incapable of lying. Her neck would go bright red if she tried. She’d bite her lower lip and look anywhere but at Cricket. Instead, she’d held her gaze, even after that flinch and again when the howl tore through the woods, those spring-blue eyes silently pleading with her to stay.

“Fuck.” She scrubbed her face with her palms and stormed up the steps and into the Director’s Cabin, the backdoor slamming closed as she stopped short.

A figure stood beside the coffee pot, their dark, wild curls haloed by the rising sun.

“Ramble?”

The faun spun around, ears stock straight, eyes wide. Their waist was thicker than Cricket remembered, but their face was just the same: warm, oak-bark brown eyes, a smattering of dark fletching across the bridge of their nose that looked like freckles, and a soft, smiling mouth.

“Where,” they gasped out, blinking from their stupor. “Where have you been?”

Before Cricket could reply, Ramble rushed across the kitchen, gathering her in soft, plush arms. They’d always had thicker haunches and more curves than Cricket, but a decade of living among humans had left its mark on her cousin. Ramble was sturdier than other faun, softer around the edges but no less strong. Cricket sank into the hug, wrapping her arms around Ramble so tight she thought she might never let go.

“Oh my Gods, Crick, we thought you were gone.”

“I left.” Ramble’s hair muffled her words. She nuzzled their neck, seeking comfort in the cousin who had left and found a new home. A safe home away from Green Bank.

“I know.” They loosened their arms, gripping Cricket’s shoulders and leaning back to see her face. “I went to Green Bank for a visit when the camp road stayed closed. They said you’d left, and with the reports of a monster in the wood …” Cricket’s stomach sank. How had Ramble known? They hadn’t been back to Green Bank in ages, not since before the monster began stalking the human homes. And for the last few days, it had been stalking the camp, bedding down in the woods, and—and Cricket slept during the day, and that howl last night had come from a distance. Who knew what the creature got up to during daylight hours? “One of the border patrol came back with your jean jacket. We thought that thing had gotten you. There was so much blood, and you—” their voice hitched, and Ramble blinked rapidly. “You love that jacket.”

“You gave it to me,” she said dumbly.

Ramble tightened their arms around Cricket, giving her a big squeeze before releasing her. “I heard it last night when I got in. Do you know what it is?”

All Cricket could do was shake her head. “I was hoping you’d know or that someone back home had seen it.” Ramble’s ears drooped, and their lower lip thrust out. “I only caught glimpses the night I got here. It’s big, bigger than any faun or wolven I’ve seen, and it bedded down behind the camp. There was so much blood. But now that you—”

“It what?”

“Now that you’re here,” Cricket pressed, “we can go together and convince the family to move. I saw an assessor near my family’s den, which means the land sold, and the Georgia men are here.”

“There is an actual monster in the woods,” Ramble snapped, eyes narrowing. “A monster hunted you here, and the Georgia men are what you’re worried about?”

“I—”

“Crick.” They sighed, sweeping a hand through their curls. “The family isn’t going to move; you’ve got to drop this.”

“No, I don’t!” she hollered. Ramble’s shoulders shot up, along with their ears. They cocked their head toward the ceiling, raising a finger to their lips in warning. “We’re getting pushed out,” Cricket argued, this time in a whisper. “They keep buying up the land around us, forcing us to live in smaller and smaller glades, and they won’t leave!”

“It is not so easy, Crick.”

“You did it.”

“I got lucky and met someone who understands us,” Ramble countered. “And even then, half of my wife’s family refused to come to our wedding. The only place we can live without being bothered is at this camp.”

“You have a home.” Cricket’s eyes burned, her throat tightening around her voice like a noose. “And no one is trying to kick you out.”

Ramble pressed their lips together, gaze darting over Cricket’s face before gathering her into another hug. “I know this has been hard for you. It’s been hard for all of us. We lost our home and got dropped in a new one, and you were so young.”

The burn in her eyes heightened, tears threatening to fall. She held onto her cousin, fingers gripping tight. If anyone would understand, it was Ramble. Regardless of their belief that the family wouldn’t move, they understood the fear Cricket carried over losing Green Bank. The fear of being displaced yet again. Those same fears had her cousin registering for the border patrol at sixteen and moving into Elkwater at twenty.

“Stay as long as you like,” Ramble whispered, holding Cricket tighter. “We have enough room, and we can find work for you in the camp. It’s not glamorous, but it’s steady. Consistent.”

“It’s your home.” Her voice cracked, the tears she’d held at bay for days finally falling as she clung to her cousin. Her family.

“It’s my home,” Ramble agreed, “and you’re my family. You are always welcome here.”

Acorn whiskey sloshed against the sides of the bottle, burning down Cricket’s throat to warm her belly. That, at least, it could do, as it was utterly useless at erasing Avery’s face from her mind.

She’d spent the day in the cabin and, after a quiet breakfast with Mac and Ramble, had escaped to the guest bedroom to read, sleep, and sleep some more until sunset when her body clock demanded she wake and move.

But where could she go? The monster was still in the woods, and Avery was in the camp. Cricket was no coward, but, damn, a faun was allowed to have a day of brooding to themselves, weren’t they?

Ramble was no help. They left after breakfast to drive to Green Bank and let the family know that Cricket was alright.

“I won’t make you come if you don’t want to, but they need to know.”

All Cricket could do was nod and poke her granola with a spoon. Topped with berries and walnuts and sprinkled with brown sugar, it was leagues better than anything the dining hall served. One glance at Mac, shoveling spoonfuls into her mouth while gazing adoringly at her spouse, told Cricket she thought so as well.

“I’ll take Aksel with me to check out the bedded-down area,” Mac said around a mouthful of granola. At Cricket’s raised eyebrows, she clarified, “The marching band coach.” She swallowed her bite and chased it with orange juice, wiping the remnants away with the back of her hand. “He’s wolven, keen eyes and a good sniffer.”

“Gods, he found me in, what, two days?” Ramble laughed. “I thought we were being so clever.”

“Wait.” Cricket jerked upright. “They don’t know you’re here?”

“The older counselors and teachers know since they’ve been coming here for years,” said Mac. “Sanoya, Aksel, Cooky, but for the most part, Ramble is a bit of a secret.”

“Some of the campers have seen me.” Ramble hunched into their shoulders, ears and nose twitching with embarrassment. “I just don’t … like being seen.”

“Took me an entire summer to get them to talk to me.” Mac reached across the table and squeezed Ramble’s forearm. “Not that we did much talking.”

“Oh, my Gods.” Ramble’s spoon clattered to the table, and they covered their face in their hands. “I was gone for less than a week!”

“And you’re leaving again.” Mac’s smile fell. A muscle in her jaw twitched. “I don’t want you driving back at night. Not with that thing out there.”

“I will stay the night. Cricket’s parents will have questions about us.” They waved a long-fingered hand at the kitchen, the door, the camp beyond. “About all of this. It is best if I give them the chance to ask questions as they think of them, rather than try to catch everything and answer letters as they come.”

Cricket couldn’t argue that. It was how the faun worked, especially the older generations. Sounds or scents or a flash in the corner of their eye would draw their attention, sending their brains on a rapid jaunt from one topic to another. They could be singing a song in idle leisure, and the snap of a twig would have them regaling whoever would listen about the white oak they were married beneath. Or dozing in a glade during daylight hours when the errant scent of wildflower would have them asking another faun where they had sourced a specific oil for their leathers.

Ramble’s generation wasn’t as bad, though they still tended to lose focus and chime in at the weirdest moments with a random thought, but Cricket had definitely benefited from growing up on this earth with its cars and radios. Her focus had been honed against humans and their technology, teaching her how to recognize the crunch of gravel beneath a Honda versus a Ford.

“I will be back tomorrow,” Ramble assured their wife. They left after breakfast, knuckling Cricket’s head and kissing Mac goodbye. She’d looked away at that. They made it look so easy to have everything Cricket wanted: a job, a partner, a home. So it was little surprise that she’d grabbed a bottle of acorn whiskey from the sideboard and carried it up to her room.

The front door opened sometime after sunset. The guest bedroom had no clock, so Cricket had no idea of what time it actually was. She assumed it was after dinner and before lights out. Campers dawdled along the main path, and campfires burned from scattered pits across the grounds. Light music filtered through her open window: strings, brass, and a lone oboe.

It was lovely, she supposed, but nowhere near as lovely as the assistant director standing in her open door.

Wait.

She blinked, rubbed an eye with her fist, and blinked again.

“Yep, still there.”

Avery set a container down on the dresser and crossed her arms. A lovely little furrow formed between her brows, and Cricket immediately wanted to smooth it away. “Are you drunk?”

“Maybe.” She kicked her legs up and rolled off the side of the bed, landing on her injured leg. Her knee buckled, and she hit the mattress with a whumpf. Leaning to the side, she propped an elbow on the bedside table and grinned at Avery. “Why d’you ask?”

“Because you look and sound drunk.”

“Welp.” She shrugged. A long, tense moment stretched between them, pulling the air in the room as taut as a rubber band before it snapped. “One more thing for you to hate about me.”

The snap of her words had Avery visibly recoiling. Cricket dropped her elbow and rolled onto her back, staring at the window to keep from seeing the look of disgust that was surely crawling across Avery’s face.

A floorboard creaked, and the door quietly snicked closed. “I didn’t know faun drank.”

Cricket rolled her head to the side, hitting Avery with a flat look. “A week ago, you didn’t know what faun were.” She raised an arm, waggled her fingers, and let it fall across her middle. “See how far you’ve come.”

“You don’t have to be so mean,” Avery snapped. “I’ve been nothing but nice to you since I found you in the woods.”

“You’ve done nothing but pity me.”

“Is that what you think this is?” She smacked the container on the dresser. “You think this is pity? Last night, when we—”

“You were scared.”

“Of course I was scared!” Her voice slammed against the ceiling and shot right back down, pommeling Cricket’s chest. “A monster was chasing me, I thought I was about to die, and then you grabbed me, and all I could think was ‘this is my last chance’. How can you possibly think any of this is pity?”

“Fine, not pity, then.” She closed her eyes, straightening her head on the pillow. “Fear.”

“It’s not fear!” Her voice rose even higher, an edge of desperation entering the words. Cricket curled her hands into fists, fighting the urge to bolt across the room, take Avery into her arms, and console her. Anything to stop the tears she could practically smell. Anything to stop this shouting and make her smile and look at her like she had in that breezeway. “It’s twenty-two years of Evangelical upbringing, and I’m having a hard time!”

The floorboards creaked, and the edge of the mattress dipped under Avery’s weight. The warmth of her body, so close to Cricket, bled into her calf.

“My whole life,” she sniffled, “I’ve been brought up to think and act a certain way. I hate these stupid skirts, I hate having my hair this long, and I hate how everyone stares at me when I pray before a meal. I hate that I’m always on the outside looking in, and I’m stuck there no matter how hard I try to break through. It’s never the right word or the right action, and if I don’t get into Carnegie my dad is going to pressure me to get married and start popping out babies, and I don’t want that.” She took a stuttering breath, stifling a sob. “I don’t want any of that; I want—”

Cricket opened her eyes, biting her lip at the sight of tears shining on Avery’s cheeks. Her face was blotchy and pink in a way that made Cricket’s heart feel like it was being squeezed in a fist. She adored that blush, relished the pink crawl over Avery’s creamy skin … but not like this.

What was it with this human? How had she gotten so deep beneath Cricket’s coat that she was impossible to brush out? She’d come here to get help from Ramble, not get hung up on a human girl who didn’t know what she wanted. A human girl who barely knew how to function around inhumans. Who wouldn’t let her eat a meal in peace, followed her into the woods, and brought her dinner when she didn’t show up in the dining hall. A human girl who—

“And right when I think I’m making progress,” she blubbered, “right when I think I’ve finally figured out how to be a part of this new world instead of watching from the sidelines, I say, or I do something, and I don’t know what you want.”

Cricket’s ears shot straight at that admission. She propped herself up on an elbow, frozen in place by the force of Avery’s burning blue eyes.

“I don’t know what I ever said or did to make you hate me, but I don’t hate you, and it’s maddening.” She turned her hands palm up, fingers curled into claws. “I’m sorry I’m not good with inhumans, alright? I’m sorry this is all new to me, and I’m–I’m fu…” She screwed her face into a scowl, pressed fists against her eyes, her entire body tight and trembling as if she were gathering the strength to force out the word. “I’m fucking it all up because I don’t know what I’m doing or what you want. All I know is that I want you, but nothing I do is ever going to convince you that I—”

Cricket bolted upright before she could think better of it. Swinging her knees beneath her as she reached for Avery, cupping her cheek and drawing her forward. Their mouths met in a tight-lipped kiss. Hard and demanding for all its lack of sweetness.

Avery’s eyes flew open, red-rimmed and glassy blue, meeting Cricket’s steady, determined gaze. Her mouth softened, her brow relaxed, and then her hand clasped Cricket’s hip, squeezing and tugging the faun closer, harder against her. And in that squeeze were a thousand little details. A flinch borne from realization and not rejection. A kiss driven by longing rather than fear. A smile in the wood and a whimpered sigh of relief.

All of it compressed into one tiny gesture where Avery tugged Cricket closer. Where Avery flicked her tongue against Cricket’s lips, and Avery slid her hand up Cricket’s ribcage to cup her breast. Avery, who said she had no idea what she was doing when she was doing everything right.

Gods, how had she ever thought this human girl didn’t know what she wanted?

Cricket pulled away, cupping Avery’s cheeks and sweeping tears away with her thumbs. She leaned into the touch, eyes drifting closed as a soft smile curled her lips. Her thumb drifted idly across Cricket’s nipple, and a shiver of delight fluttered into her belly and up to her ears, drawing an admission before she could stop the words.

“You’re so brave.”

Avery’s eyes flew open, her lips parting. Now that the words were out, now that she’d spoken her true opinion of Avery to the room, Cricket didn’t want to put them away. Let her hear them; let her know what others thought of her. She needed to hear the truth. Deserved to hear it. So she stole a kiss for courage and spoke.

“You came here despite where and how you grew up. You took that chance, and you came here. When we first fell through, Gods, everyone was so afraid. We hid from people and scavenged in the middle of the night. We tried to pass ourselves off as deer and elk to avoid notice. It drove my cousin insane. I was so little when we fell through, but they were old enough to join the border patrol. Old enough to remember what we lost. They couldn’t sit still.”

“What did they do?” Her words teased across Cricket’s mouth, warm and sweet. If she just nudged forward, those lips would be on hers. She would tip over into the desire kindling in her belly with every sweep of Avery’s thumb. Back and forth. Back and forth, teasing the hardened nub until Cricket’s breathing became heavy. But she needed to get the words out. Needed Avery to know how brave she was.

“They came here—” She slid her other hand into Cricket’s hair, fingers brushing the base of an ear. Cricket closed her eyes, swallowing a tiny moan. “They met someone and never … never came back. Gods, Avery.”

Nails tickled the curve of her ear, and the maddening human urged her with a whisper. “Keep going.”

“I, ooh, oak and ivy.” She fisted her hand and lightly punched the bedspread. Heat shot low into her core, a dull throbbing growing as Avery swept her finger over soft, sensitive down. “I always wanted to leave,” she panted. Her core tensed. She was aware of her body making tiny movements, rocking and twitching, needing to be closer to Avery. To feel the girl’s weight over her. To feel her warmth. What in the hells had this human done to her? “Wanted to come here with them, but I was too–too afraid. I couldn’t do it until the Georgia—Gods—the Georgia men.”

“The company buying up land?” Avery pinched her nipple and leaned closer, her breath a brand on Cricket’s throat.

“Yeah,” she gasped. “They want us out. It was the push I needed, but you—you just did it.”

There. The words were out, and Cricket was about to combust. She gripped Avery’s arm, stilling those fingers teasing her ear. Needing the human to hear her, to understand how brave she was. “You left all on your own. You made a plan, you executed the plan, and you’re here having a full-on conversation with a monster.”