Fox's Fire

Chapter 3: Bo

Bo's day was ruined after Tobias stepped out of the coffeeshop. Cynthia hounded her for information, not accepting "I don't know" as an answer. She botched more orders in one day than she had her entire her first year of working in the shop. Her nerves were frazzled enough that even Will—absentminded, lazy Will—noticed. She frazzled his nerves, and Cynthia slowly lost her enthusiasm throughout the day as they fumbled more orders. Cynthia pushed her out the door when six finally rolled around.

"No offense," Cynthia chimed, "but I'd probably be cleaning up a bigger mess if you decided to stay and help. Tomorrow's your day off, so get some rest." Cynthia gave her one last eyebrow wiggle as she slipped back inside. "And if anything develops between you and Mr. Hero, don't hesitate to text me all the details."

The door slammed shut before Bo could respond. All she could do was glare at a grinning Cynthia through the glass. The lock clicked, Cynthia cheerfully waved, and Bo stood alone. Bo huffed and hugged her jacket closer. Even in the glow of the setting sun's warmth, the days were becoming noticeably cooler. Bo expected the next rainfall to usher in the winter cold. If there was one fault she found in the city, it was that the cold weather crept into it a lot earlier than back home.

Bo shuffled along the sidewalk, swaying out of the way of the occasional impatient power walker. The cold aside, what was she to do with the new threat against the peaceful life she had worked so hard to achieve these past two years? From the looks of it, Tobias was determined to continue his prying. Ignoring him was an option she was familiar with, but even her patience had limits. Running was an option but running cost money. She could feel the same desperate anxiety that had driven her out of her home viciously clawed at the edge of her composure. She shoved it back through sheer force of will, refusing to feel that way again. Her childhood monsters had no place in her adult life. The very thought that she would be forced from her home again with just a small pack of clothes and a dying hope sparked a heated anger in her.

All because some punk with cat ears and a few fluffy tails decided he just had to know her "secrets." Well, she had news for him: there were no secrets. She could see things, and that was it. No spells. No scandal. No secret family members who were witches by trade. Just a freak mutation in her blood. It had always been there; nothing she had tried made it disappear.

The three blocks she walked were a blur, her body stopping and starting on instinct at each crosswalk. A prickle on the back of her neck made her skin break out in a sweat. She stopped short of the next crosswalk and glanced around without turning her head. A young man yawned beside her. An older woman clicked the screen of her phone with the tips of her long nails. A dog sniffed a pole from the end of its leash.

The air shifted by her ear. A glittering trail of dust darted to the top of a walk signal. Bo's shoulder's relaxed as the little figure stood on top of the box. Its wings caught the artificial light of the city lights, casting little rainbows. Without being too obvious, Bo kept her eyes on the little fairy. It fluttered from one end of the walk signal to the other before sitting in a huff, its elbows balanced on its knees while its hands cupped its chin. It watched the vehicles passing by them with the same boredom and impatience as the people who hugged the edge of the sidewalk. When the stoplight changed from yellow to green, it hopped to its feet and dashed across the street above the heads of the other pedestrians.

Bo smiled. There was very little to magical creatures that she liked but watching the fairies in the city adopt human habits was an interesting pastime. With wings to fly, they were not constrained to the same limitations as humans, yet the majority of the fairies she found flitting above the crowds of people always waited for the pedestrian signal to cross the street. The only one she had seen attempt to cross the street before the light changed had been thoroughly scolded by the group it had traveled with.