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They had been in the human realm for a few months now, and Willow still wasn’t used to the rain.
She kept a routine when it came to rain on the Boiling Isles, one that involved risking a few burns to make sure her plants were covered. Even in the middle of the night, as she slept, dead to the world, the sound of rain would rouse her enough to pull the plants on her balcony inside.
Maybe that was why she found herself lying awake one night, listening to the rain as it drummed against the roof. Habit told her to get up, but there were no plants to protect from this drizzle; they blossomed in this kind of weather.
Still, her mind didn’t seem to want to go back to sleep.
Willow blindly reached toward the bookshelf behind her and Amity’s beds, in search of her glasses. It took her a moment to find them in the dark, but eventually, her hand found the cool metal frames resting on top of the floriculture book she’d been reading before bed. After a moment’s deliberation, Willow grabbed the book as well and, taking extra care to not wake the other three in the room, she stood and made her way toward the door.
Tea had always helped her fall asleep back home. Though, something told her the human realm didn’t have the kind of tea with small doses of sleeping nettles that she drank on sleepless nights.
Willow wasn’t surprised to find the living room already inhabited, having seen the light coming from downstairs as soon as she exited the bedroom.
It surprised her even less to see that it was Hunter who was still awake.
He was sitting on the green couch, his head propped on his hand, a book in his lap. His reading glasses—courtesy of Camila—were perched atop his nose, dangerously close to falling off. Flapjack was nestled next to his arm on the armrest, fast asleep, and the only light in the room that of the floor lamp he had pulled closer to the couch, likely so he could see his book.
Her stomach fluttered as she watched Hunter, a soft smile tugging at her lips.
A small, self-indulgent part of Willow was content to stand there, peering around the edge of the archway, watching as he read: he was relaxed—far more relaxed than she was used to seeing him, though it had been more common since they’d arrived in the human realm—and she wasn’t sure she wanted to interrupt that peace.
Another part of her told her he probably wouldn’t mind.
“Hey there,” Willow said, her voice somewhere between a whisper and her normal volume. Nobody slept on the main floor of the house, but still, she didn’t want to wake anyone else. Hunter looked up, his eyes widening for a fraction of a second before a smile flickered across his face.
“Captain,” he greeted, his voice subdued. “What are you doing up so late?”
The circles under his eyes seemed darker, more pronounced, though Willow wasn’t sure if that was because of the dim lighting or his penchant for late nights and early mornings.
“I think I could ask you the same.” Willow laughed softly as she padded across the living room and sat next to him on the couch, setting her book on the unoccupied armrest. “The rain woke me up. Just came down to get some tea. Whatcha reading?”
“It’s this book Gus told me about called Cosmic Frontier! It’s about these humans who get stuck in space, and—you… probably aren’t—”
“Tell me more!” Willow interrupted, peering over to look at the book, her eyes scanning the open page. Some of the words on the page were unfamiliar to her (What was a phaser? A wormhole?), and a quick glance told her Hunter was almost halfway through the book.
A flush spread across Hunter’s cheeks, barely visible in the dim light.
“So, there’s these humans, right? And they’re travelling through space, trying to find their way back home, but then, there’s this enemy planet…” As Hunter explained the plot of the book, careful to avoid anything he deemed a spoiler and occasionally breaking off on a tangent about the various characters (“there’s this character named O’Bailey, and he’s secretly a clone” and “I think you’d like Security Officer Quando—she likes plants, just like you!”) Willow allowed herself to settle in, tugging on the patchwork quilt that hung over the back of the couch so she could drape it over her lap.
“And that’s as far as I’ve gotten,” Hunter said, breaking off in a yawn. “Gus only told me about it earlier tonight. I didn’t want to keep him up with the light so”—he waved his hand, a sheepish grin lighting up his face—“I came up here.”
Willow smiled, that fluttery feeling in her stomach returning. “It sounds super interesting. I’ll have to read it sometime, and—ooh! Maybe the three of us could have our own book club!”
“Y-yeah, sounds good!”
A quick glance at the clock on the wall told her it was past two, and yet Willow felt no desire to go back up to bed.
With a quick twirl of her finger, she summoned a vine to bring her own book within reach. Hunter yelped as the vine approached, earning him an annoyed look from a sluggish Flapjack.
“Uh…”
“Sorry, sorry,” A small laugh escaped Willow at Hunter’s startled look. She lifted the edge of the quilt, offering it to him. “Mind if I stay up with you for a bit? I brought my own reading material.”
“Wha… No—no, of course not!” He coughed to clear his throat, and in the dim lighting, Willow could make out the almost imperceptible pink tinge to his ears. “Ah, I mean—stay as long as you want?”
Hunter’s eyes trailed down toward her hand, still offering up part of the blanket. Burning even brighter, he took it, covering his legs with the old cotton fabric.
Willow hummed contentedly, sinking into the couch as she opened her book to the page she’d dog-eared earlier that night. Instead of turning her attention to the page, however, she let her gaze linger on Hunter as he once more lost himself in the world of Cosmic Frontier. Every so often, he would mumble something under his breath, or his ears would twitch in response to something he read.
It was cute.
He was cute.
She let her focus drift back to her book, trying (and failing) to ignore the warmth blooming in her cheeks.
Reading.
Reading about human floricultural techniques would quiet her heartstrings, right?
It wasn’t long—maybe five minutes of Willow re-reading the same paragraph for what felt like the millionth time—until she felt something brush against her thigh. She peeked up. Hunter had slumped over, eyes closed, snoring softly. At some point, he had pulled his legs up onto the couch, his feet pressing lightly into her thigh, his tall frame too cramped for a single couch cushion.
A fond smile tugged at Willow’s lips, and she shifted to let his legs stretch out a bit more before adjusting the quilt so it covered him better. Hunter let out a peaceful sigh as she went back to her book, and the fluttery feeling in her stomach returned, far more intense than before.
Oh, Titan, help her.
✿
A bright flash of light woke Willow the next morning. She squinted as she opened her eyes, the early morning sun greeting her, along with the blurry form of Gus standing in front of her.
Her glasses had migrated to rest atop her head, tangled slightly in her hair. Willow pulled them down to rest on her nose and spotted her camera in one of Gus’s hands, and what appeared to be a freshly taken photo in the other. She opened her mouth, a clumsy remark about how she already knew she slept in odd positions, she didn’t need more photographic proof on her tongue when something—or rather, someone—shifted next to her.
Oh.
Oh.
Heat rushed to Willow’s face at the smug expression Gus wore, the photograph held in his hands like some sort of prize.
“I think this one’s a keeper,” Gus said, a satisfied grin stretching across his face. “Deserves its own page in the scrapbook for sure, don’t you think?”