The Orange Cat and Other Cainsville Tales (Cainsville 3.5)

"So there's local lore surrounding the swimming hole?" Liv said.

"It's cursed," Hildy said.

Jeanne sighed again and shook her head. Then she turned to Liv. "Yes, there is plenty of lore about it, but don't be asking her, or you'll get a lot of nonsense. Why don't you two come to dinner? My granddaughter's home from school. I'm sure she'd love the company."

Liv accepted, and Jeanne said they could walk back with her in an hour or so. Then Hildy showed them out onto the back deck.

"You're okay with dinner, right?" Liv said as the door closed behind Hildy. "I am curious about the folklore."

"And I thought you were just finding an excuse not to go to our room. Worried you might surrender."

She smiled. "Oh, I'm not the one who needs to worry about that. As for the interlude I proposed, I'm still planning on that. Just running on a slight delay." She sobered. "I do want to hear the lore of that swimming hole, see if it helps solve our mystery. Unfortunately, it won't solve theirs. I almost wish the fae had stolen that baby. At least then we could be of some help. But that's not how changelings work."

"I heard a baby in the forest."

"What?"

"Up at the swimming hole. I thought I heard a baby. I didn't mention it because I figured it was just a bird or something. But, yeah, that's not how changelings work. While that's the folklore--that fairies steal human babies for themselves--it's not the reality."

Hildy brought out tea and oatcakes. When she'd left again, Ricky said, "Maybe, just to be sure, you should see if Patrick or Rose know of any fae that might take babies. You could ask Gabriel to run with it. You know he would."

Liv paused, and Ricky's gut tightened. He should be happy she didn't want to involve Gabriel. Just like he should have been happy she didn't want to return Gabriel's calls. Ricky wasn't the oblivious idiot who thought it was really nice that his girlfriend had such a close platonic relationship with her boss. It was platonic--in the physical sense. But emotionally platonic? At one time, he'd tried to tell himself it was. When he got the full Matilda/Gwynn/Arawn story, though, it only confirmed what he'd always known. That there was more between Liv and Gabriel, would always be more.

So if Gabriel had hurt Liv, and she'd backed off, Ricky should be happy. Except he wasn't because Liv wasn't happy.

He looked down at the tattoo on his forearm. A Celtic moon and sun entwined. Matilda's symbol--night and day, Cwn Annwn and Tylwyth Teg. On her ankle, she had a moon. For Arawn. For him.

Every time he saw that tattoo on her, he knew how she felt about him. It was the equivalent of branding Liv Loves Ricky on her skin. It did not, however, mean Liv & Ricky 4ever. Maybe it seemed like it should. Tattoos were permanent, right? But when he decided to get his, it wasn't about saying he expected them to be together forever. It was like each of the other tattoos on his body, commemorating a thing or a person that was significant in his life. Liv was. Liv always would be.

That did not mean he had to hold on as tight as he could, spend every day worrying about when or if he'd lose her. He'd learned that lesson at fifteen when he'd gone joyriding on his dad's motorcycle. He'd had a dirt bike for years. He'd even ridden his dad's Harley around the property. But until he turned sixteen and got his license, he couldn't take a motorcycle on the road. So, in a rare burst of rebellion, he'd snuck off one day when his dad had driven the car into Chicago.

Everything had gone fine until he hit a patch of gravel. Right when a pickup was coming his way. He'd managed to come out of the skid, but in that moment, life flashing before his eyes, he'd realized he was mortal. For the first time in his life, he truly understood that he could--and would--die.

That had sent him spiraling into weeks of existential panic. He just couldn't get past it. He'd have full-blown anxiety attacks passing a cemetery.

He'd finally confessed to his dad. And, yeah, he'd confessed about the bike, too, because while he could have skipped that, it weighed too heavily on him. He told his father what happened and that he'd realized he was going to die one day, and his dad said, "Yes."

Yes, Ricky, you will die.

There was no getting around that one. He did, however, have a choice. He could live in fear, forever looking down the road at that gravestone. Or he could embrace what he had while he had it.

Ricky chose to embrace what he had. Both in life and with Liv. He knew how she felt about Gabriel. He knew how Gabriel felt about her. And he knew that someday, maybe that would amount to something. But someday wasn't now. Right now, he had her, and if he had her, he wanted her happy.

So when she flinched as he suggested she take the fae stuff to Gabriel, he said, "I can ask him if you want, but you guys know this stuff better than I do."

"I've already talked to him."

Now Ricky was the one tensing. Because, yeah, he could say her relationship with Gabriel didn't bother him at all, but the "at all" part was bullshit.

"He could tell there was something wrong," Liv said.

Of course he could.

"He kept pushing, so I told him we ran into fae at the swimming hole."

"Not the whole story, I hope."

That made her laugh and relax, taking a bite of oatcake as she shook her head. "Definitely not that part. He did offer to look into the fae thing. He's concerned--our run-ins with them haven't usually been quite so . . . friendly."