The Lunar Destiny Series

Chapter 16

June came with a raging heat, sticky and humid. The weather forecast was looking consistently hot for the whole week, thank goodness for Frederick Jones; having been the genius who created the air conditioner. Officer Rollards had paid me another visit to tell me that one of my neighbors claimed to have seen a young man hop over the fence in my backyard before hearing a loud bang. The bang they heard must have been the sound of my back door being turned into splinters. Officer Rollards was looking for anyone else who had any information on what happened, but I hoped they would just give up. If the police found out what really happened, Lio and everyone else who wasn’t human would be in danger.

Celeste and I sat on my front porch painting each others’ toenails. She had chosen a clear polish with a rainbow shine for herself and I had chosen a cherry red with glitter. It had been a long time since we had some girl time.

“So where’s Lio?” She asked, focused on carefully painting my big toe.

“He’s at work. We’re supposed to be going to the carnival later if you want to come with.” I said smiling.

“Sure. Is it the one in Betrys County? Or the one in Eleri? Because the one in Eleri is the largest one with lots of rides.” Her eyes were bright with excitement as she spoke about the carnivals.

I enjoyed them just as much as the next person but for Celeste it was like she was going to Disney World or something.

“I think we’re going to the one in Eleri.”

The carnival in Eleri County was the largest, and from a unanimous vote by the people living here as well as the tourists, the best. It was in Delwyn’s sister city Zepa. I try to go there every year but sometimes my job interferes with my plans.

“Are you going to be Baltasar’s date?” I asked with a grin.

The question must have caught her off guard because her hand slipped and she accidently painted the side of my toe. She cleared her throat before grabbing the nail polish remover bottle. She smiled, embarrassed.

“Probably. We have been spending a lot of time together lately.”

She took the polish remover top off and pulled out the small removal tool that was inside. After she cleaned up her mistake she began painting my toes again.

”That’s good. You two make a cute couple.”

Celeste’s smile grew wider.

“You really think so?” She asked, sounding as if she didn’t believe me.

“Of course I do. It has nothing to do with the fact that I want us to go on double dates together.” I said, looking away from her.

“No, not at all.” She said, starting an eruption of laughter between us.

I heard the phone ringing from inside of the house and we both looked towards the door.

“I’ll get it.” She said.

“No, it’s okay. I’ll get it.” I said setting the nail polish down and running into the house, mindful of my wet toenails of course.

I picked up the cordless phone in the living room right before the last ring. I answered so fast I hadn’t bothered to look at the caller ID.

“Hello?”

I soon heard my mother’s panic stricken voice on the other end of the phone.

“Astraia did the police find out who broke in over there!? I’ve been waiting to hear from you for almost two weeks now!” She said.

I sighed heavily. I was suddenly regretting answering the phone.

“Mom calm down, I’m sorry that I haven’t called to keep you updated.”

While being in the middle of all of this werewolf business I’d almost forgotten about the stuff going on in my human life. I knew my parents worried about me constantly since I was their only child. I should’ve called them more often to avoid this kind of panic.

“Well? Is there anything new they found out?”

She asked, her voice sounded calmer and less panicked now.

“No, everything was left untouched. The police are taking care of things even though they don’t need to.” I said, becoming irritated at the thought.

“That’s odd that they wouldn’t take anything. Well other than that how are you? Still working at the art gallery?” She asked.

“Yeah, it pays very well. I’ve been doing great; I even met a nice guy.”

I felt myself smiling at the thought of Lio and I was glad she couldn’t see it.

“Oh really? What’s his name? Does he have kids? You don’t need any extra problems with jealous women.” She said, sounding a bit over protective.

Good lord, if she only knew about the two jealous women in his life she would have a stroke.

“His name is Vasilios, and no he doesn’t have any children.” I quickly added.

She had become suspicious of everyone I’ve dated since my bad break up with he-who-shall-not-be-named.

“Good. I hope this one’s a keeper because I want lots of grandbabies.” She said with a chipper lilt in her voice.

“Mom come on, we haven’t been dating that long. I appreciate your enthusiasm but children are the last thing on my list right now.”

I heard her sigh heavily. “You aren’t getting any younger Astraia, neither am I.”

She said, sounding a bit sad.

“I know. I’ll make sure to be married and give you loads of grandchildren before I get too old.” I said laughing.

“Your father and I want to see you. It’s been almost five months since we all got together. Can we come by sometime this week?”

I thought about my schedule briefly before answering.

“Sure, we can have a nice dinner and catch up like we used to.”

It was silent for a moment before she said anything.

“Mom?”

I heard her clear her throat nervously.

“I was just wondering...Will you invite your boyfriend? We would love to meet him.”

I sensed an ulterior motive in her words, but I knew they would have to meet at some point. Especially since I found out what my birthmark meant to his people. A part of me was still strongly in denial. Either way I thought about this situation, it kept coming back to Lio and I. It seemed unavoidable.

“Yeah sure, I bet he’d love to meet you guys.”

I finally said after a moment of silence.

“Great! How does Saturday look for you?” She asked with childlike excitement.

I was hoping that she’d want to come by next week instead, but I suppose since I’m dating again she was in a rush to meet him.

“There’s nothing going on that day. Can you come by around six o’ clock?” I asked.

“I don’t see why not. We’ll see you Saturday evening then sweetheart. Take care, I love you.” She said.

“I love you too mom.”

I hung up the phone and went back out onto the porch. Celeste had finished painting her toenails during my absence.

“Let’s get yours finished now.” She said smiling.

“Yours turned out good.” I said, looking down at her feet.

“Thanks. Who called? If you don’t mind me asking.” She quickly added.

I sat down in the chair across from her and she resumed painting my toenails.

“It was my mom. She wants to come visit this weekend. She’s so eager to meet Lio it scares me.”

Celeste giggled a little.

“Why? Lio is a good guy. He’s been very good to you too from what you’ve told me. I know your parents will approve of him.” She said.

I loved Celeste like a sister because she was always supportive of me. However, she had no idea how my mom had a habit of making my boyfriends feel like they were being interrogated. I hadn’t thought about Lio meeting my parents mainly because of the fact that he wasn’t completely human. Lio didn’t usually display any non-human behaviors in front of people by mistake but it didn’t make me any less nervous.

The sounds of cars pulling up made me look up from Celeste painting my toes. I saw two cars slowing down as they got closer to my car. I recognized Lio’s red Kia Sportage, but the black Tahoe behind it was unfamiliar. Lio parked right behind my car and the shiny black Tahoe parked right behind him. Celeste’s attention was drawn to them as well and I knew she was waiting to see if Baltasar was with them.

Lio, Baltasar, and Naremi got out of Lio’s car with warm smiles as they came up to the porch. Baltasar winked at Celeste and I looked at her to see a wide grin on her face. Kyra, Lisette, Priam, and Githinji got out of the black Tahoe. The expressions on their faces were neutral. I couldn’t tell if they were happy or anything else for that matter. Celeste’s grin faded into a frown before she leaned in towards my ear.

“Why the hell did they bring her along?” She whispered.

Lisette suddenly smirked and I knew that she’d heard Celeste’s comment. I was sure Lio was trying to be nice to her for the sake of the trip, or she didn’t give them a choice. I guess it wouldn’t really be fair to exclude her from their outings just because of me. I honestly didn’t want her here either but I was going to be the better woman and leave it be.

Lio came up the steps wearing a teal shirt that had beige fraternity symbols on it and beige shorts that came down past his knees a little. He was wearing his all white Nike Airs, his hair was flowing free. I noticed how shiny his curls looked in the sun; I wanted to stand up and run my fingers through those silky curls. He came up to me and bent down a little so that he could kiss me. Normally he would have given me the ‘wolf’s greeting’ but in front of other humans he gives me a normal, sweet press of his lips.

“Awe…” Celeste cooed, making me nudge her leg with my foot.

The rest of the group formed a semi circle at the bottom of the stairs.

“You girls ready to scream your heads off on some rides?” Kyra asked, looking around at the three guys.

“I bet they’ll cry like babies on the zipper.”

Baltasar teased. Kyra slowly looked over at him grinning.

“By ‘girls’ I meant you and Priam, genius. Did you think you weren’t included?”

Baltasar shoved her enough to make her slightly stumble and she laughed. Kyra tended to play around a lot, even more so with Baltasar. I thought the two of them were an item before. When Celeste and Baltasar started seeing each other I became confused. Was he playing with her heart? Or were Kyra and Baltasar just really close? It wasn’t my business but I didn’t want to see my best friend get hurt. I must have been frowning because Lio looked down at me with a worried expression.

“Astraia? Are you alright?” He asked.

“I’m okay, you worry too much. You know that?” I smiled as genuinely as I could, but I could tell he wasn’t convinced.

“The drive to Zepa is nearly an hour. We’d be wise to get going now.” Naremi said, coming up to the third step.

She was wearing white wedge heeled sandals, dark orange shorts with white frills at the hems, and a white t-shirt that hugged her breasts. Her long, luscious red locks were pulled up into a high ponytail.

Baltasar was dressed casually in a white t-shirt that had a lion logo on the chest pocket, dark blue jeans, and white pumas. Kyra was sporting a yellow tube top with gold swirl designs on it that came down above her navel. She completed the outfit with a matching pair of Capri pants and flat sole, gold thonged sandals.

Lisette went all out as usual with a pink, jean mini skirt and a matching spaghetti strap tank top with her cleavage revealed in the middle. Her sandals had a two inch heel and a pink dragonfly in between her big toes and second toes. How disgustingly cute. Priam had on a dark red cardigan with no shirt underneath and faded blue jeans with white Reebok sneakers. Githinji wore a solid gray tank top with blue jean shorts that came down past his knees and gray high top Nike Airs. They all looked like an ad for Aeropostle.

Celeste and I sort of matched except that her shorts were violet and mine were red. Her t-shirt was violet and mine was white with red, glittery lips on it.

“Let’s get going then.” I said excitedly.