James and the Fey (Legends of Pinewood 3)

1. When you Stumble On An Ancient Curse

Pinewood's forest was eerily quiet at night. Silence and darkness freaked me out, so after the sun had set I had my phone playing music on a low volume inside my tent. I didn't want to attract any local wildlife with my noise either, after all.

Gloria Gaynor assuring me 'I will survive' with her hit song by the same title was the only thing that kept me from giving up on camping and walking back to town, despite it being the middle of the night.

Was it strange to listen to a playlist of break-up songs when the relationship had been non-existent and never actually got the point of a breakup being possible? Maybe. But there was nobody around to judge me for it for once.

Despite having grown up surrounded by woodlands, I never went camping, especially not on my own. I'd never had a reason to. People usually made for much better company than wildlife and bugs.

My bedroll was uncomfortably hard and my skin itched in various places—I was pretty sure I'd be half-eaten by mosquitos in the morning If I wasn't already. I also already dreaded needing to crawl out of my sleeping bag to pee, which would inevitably happen sometime during the night.

Honestly, I was grateful to have been born in the age of air conditioning, feather beds, and skyscrapers. Purposely going back to ye olden days and sleeping in a tent or even outside was an unfathomable hobby to me.

Still, this was preferable to being in town right now and facing all the rumours surrounding my and Xavier's non-existent relationship.

Was I shocked that Xavier had chosen a bad-boy-turned-town-hero with biceps the size of my head and a face that belonged on a book cover over me? No. Truly. I didn't blame Xavier for dating Aquila. If I'd been given the same choice, I'd probably choose Aquila over myself too. Who wouldn't? Not after the way I fucked up.

I wasn't angry either. Xavier was allowed to date whoever he wanted. He didn't owe me anything just because we'd flirted at a party four years ago, almost kissed, and I'd secretly been hoping to rekindle that spark when visiting my aunt and uncle's home in Pinewood. I cringed. God, it sounded even more pathetic when spelled out. 

We all had our childhood crushes that we remember fondly but will never go anywhere, and rejection happened to everyone. It sucked. It stung. But it was no big deal, and I'd just have to lick my wounds for a while and then move past it.

The 'moving past it' part was kind of complicated however, if you came from a cluster of small villages where everyone was up in everyone's business. Big things rarely happened in Pinewood's greater area, and having two gay citizens meant they must automatically end up together. It wasn't possible that either of us would go for an outsider, after all. Add the parent of the guy you like being lifelong friends of your parents, and suddenly not ending up together is a disaster of global proportions. I was pretty sure my parents and Xavier's parents had already planned our wedding, even if they denied it.

At this point I didn't know what was worse: Xavier's parents leaning in and whispering to me they would've preferred me to be the partner of their son every time they saw me, or my cousin Riley's relentless teasing about striking out. I had stupidly admitted to him I still had some lingering feelings for Xavier after the party a few years ago, and that we were going on a sort of date which, in the end, hadn't been a date. 

I squeezed my eyes shut as humiliation flooded me all over again when I realised Xavier liked Aquila. And I'd asked him if the guy was bothering him. Something they had a good chuckle about together, I was sure. And then, as the cherry on top of a huge shit cake I was the idiot who ran off in a panic, leaving Xavier to fend for himself when faced with a wolf on our not-date. It really was no wonder he'd choose Aquila. Aquila would've wrangled that wolf with his bare hands and win the fight.