Bigfootloose and Finn Fancy Free by Randy Henderson Page B

discerning.
    â€œHey Petey, how’re you doing?”
    Pete glanced back into the kitchen a second, then crossed through the dining room to join me in the entry hall as the kitchen door swung back and forth behind him. “I—hey, are you okay? You don’t look so good.”
    â€œI’m fine, Petey, thanks. What’s up?”
    Pete blushed. “Oh. Can I talk to you for a minute?”
    I sighed. All I wanted to do was clean up, drink something with lots of caffeine and sugar, and meet Dawn for our date.
    â€œSure. What’s up?”
    Pete looked down and shifted from foot to foot in that golly gawrsh way he had. “I just—I was thinking about asking Vee to marry me.”
    â€œHoly—wow! That’s awesome, dude. And quick. Does this have something to do with what happened this morning?”
    â€œA little, maybe,” Pete said. “But I was thinking about it even before that.”
    â€œOkay. But are you, well, do you know if she’s ready for that?” I asked not just because they’d only been together for three months, but because Vee had spent a good part of her adult life in the Hole, a special facility where noncriminal arcana and feybloods were “cared for” if they were unable to care for themselves, or might be a danger.
    â€œI think she’s ready. She keeps saying she spent too much time waiting for her life to start, she doesn’t want to wait no more.”
    They’d been together three months and were ready to marry. I’d known Dawn the same amount of time, at least from my perspective. So why couldn’t I even say “I love you”?
    The Kin Finder had confirmed Dawn to be my soul mate, the same as it had confirmed the connection between Pete and Vee. But what did that mean? I had been eager for some clients in my dating service, not only to have some alternative to being a necromancer, but also so I could better see just how the Kin Finder worked. The fact that it had found Sal’s soul mate close by, and near his own stomping grounds, made me wonder if it didn’t so much find your one and only soul mate as just the best match closest by. And how much of the love seeker’s expectation played into that?
    When I’d used the artifact, it had been after I’d lost my memories of Dawn, but I had been told that I loved her. Pete already knew he loved Vee when he used it. And Sal, well, why wouldn’t some part of him equate love with the comfort and familiarity of his home territory?
    But Pete and Vee truly were a perfect match. And now Pete was ready to propose. This was exactly the kind of thing that made me worried I’d lost more than just memories of Dawn, that I’d lost some important part of me, maybe part of what had made her love me, maybe even my fundamental ability to love her back, to truly love in the way Dawn deserved.
    I knew that I had fun with Dawn, and loved to spend time with her. And she certainly knew me, perhaps even better than I knew myself. But—
    Pete slumped. “You think it’s a bad idea,” he said, sadly.
    â€œWhat? Oh, no, sorry Pete. I was having a pity party in my head. Look, I—marriage is a pretty big deal, you know. Are you sure you’re ready for that?”
    Pete nodded. “Our counselor says we’re good for each other, even though, you know, I sometimes want to eat her.” He blushed again.
    â€œCounselor?”
    â€œBrightblood relationship counselor. We’ve been seeing one for a few weeks now.”
    â€œOh! You didn’t say anything.”
    Pete shrunk in on himself, and said in a soft voice, “Everybody is already scared of me. I don’t like to remind you of what I am now.”
    â€œPetey, we’re not—” I stopped. I wanted to say we weren’t afraid of him, or at least that I wasn’t afraid of him. But that wasn’t true. I realized then how far from him I was standing, that