“Wait, when did you have a chance to talk to her?”
Although the first part of the day had gone by insanely fast for me, everything had definitely slowed down once I got to spend one-on-one time with Felicia. If somebody asked me, I could recall every minute we’d spent together. Every word. Every micro-expression that had crossed that beautiful face of hers.
“Dude, multiple times. Especially since Arietty kept running up to her for some reason.”
Ah yes, Arietty. The whole reason we went on a date in the first place. Now that I thought about it, it probably was pretty darn suspicious for me to just pop up in the middle of the city with three giant dogs in tow.
Was I that oblivious? Or did I just have a blind spot when it came to gorgeous bakers?
“I see.”
Chris patted my shoulder. I appreciated the comfort, even if now I felt stupider than ever. “Hey, I know this isn’t ideal, but it’s not like you’re the only one who dropped the ball. Besides, maybe you’re not the only shifter she knows. She handled the reunion so well and was super chill about lying in a pile of wolves. Maybe she’s the one who bungled telling you she knew about our world.”
If that was the case, then I’d really embarrassed myself by bolting out like that. Still, the possibility was comforting, because imagining Felicia was a serial killer who hunted my kind made my stomach twist and my mind rebel. “Let’s look her up.”
“Shouldn’t be too hard if she’s a regular human.”
I wanted to argue that there was nothing regular about Felicia, but I figured it wasn’t really the time. Especially if she did turn out to be a hunter.
First was a general search using the standard engine, and a lot of information about her bakery came up. There was a small article in the paper as well as some advertisements. I had a hard time believing that a prolific hunter of shifters, fairies, and other magical folk would be running Facebook ads for cakes.
Still, I supposed stranger things had happened-such as wolves and Irish Spring-so we pressed on.
Bit by bit, we used slightly more involved methods until I knew where she’d gone to college, what she’d graduated with, and we’d even found an article she herself had written in high school for a competition with a $5000 prize package for a night on the town and a day at an exclusive spa. Nothing to sneeze at, that was for sure.
It felt like an intrusion to read it, but I did anyway, and what I found matched up with everything that she had told me. It also contained so much more, painting an even starker picture of the journey that had led Felicia to where she was now.
I miss my father.
I don’t know how I can miss someone I never met, but I see and hear his echoes everywhere. In the pictures on the mantle. In my mother’s sighs. Sometimes in the mirror. I wish I could have known him, but I will always carry his stories.
I think he would be proud of me. That he would taste every cake and bread I make, even the burnt ones. I imagine that he would smile at me and tell me I’ve already improved so much. And that he would mean it. I think that he and my mother would very seriously reserve my time for their anniversary cake, saying they had to get in before I was too famous.
But my dad is gone, so it is only my mother doing everything.
Every day. Every. Single. Day. She’s there for me in any way that I can ask. So that is why I’m entering. If I were to win this prize, I’d take her out to the steakhouse she’s always eyeing but pretending not to. I’d make sure she had flowers waiting for her after her spa day, along with cold water, a freshly made bed, and the laundry done. If I could just pay back a single iota of everything she’s done for me, I would be happy.
I’m not some great writer, or next world wonder, I’m just a daughter who’s eternally grateful to the woman who’s shaped my life in every way possible. So I humbly hope that this letter conveys all the love and admiration I have for her.
–
Felicia Nga
I sat back, digesting that. I’d already known her journey hadn’t been easy, but I hadn’t expected that.
“I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that doesn’t really sound like some hunter to me,” Chris said cautiously, after what felt like a literal age of silence. “I know some things can be faked, but not a whole life. And besides, most of those guys are super racist from ancient
European families that haven’t changed their views since the witch trials.”
He had a point, but Felicia was definitely ambitious enough to be the first Asian and female hunter I’d ever heard about.
Still… that was seeming less and less likely by the moment.
“It’s pretty sad, isn’t it? Did you know about any of this?”
“I knew her mother had passed,” I said, pulling myself out of my contemplation. “And that her mother immigrated here and raised her alone. I didn’t know her father had died too. I guess I assumed he was just out of the picture.”
“I’m gonna be real with you, Cas, I just don’t think this woman is a Wild Hunter or even associated with hunters. Say what you want about the fairies, but they’ve made sure not a single one has managed to be successful in our state, which is largely why we put up with them in the first place.”
That was a generous way to put it. Most of us accepted the will of the fairies because they had the money, the power, and the magic. The deals they’d struck with our ancestors were iron-clad, protected by the fact that the contracts had been willingly signed. Maybe we could find a loophole or wiggle out of them with some hot-shot witch who wanted to re-ignite the centuries-old conflict between magic casters and the fairies, but honestly, most of us didn’t want to challenge the status quo considering the lasting peace we’d had for so long.
“Then what? She’s just a random woman who figured it out and now we have to deal with the very real possibility that she’s going to expose us to the world to go viral?”
“Yeah, that’s definitely a possibility. But another possibility is that she figured it out and accepted it anyway.”
I blinked at him, wondering if my brain had short-circuited. “You wanna run that by me one more time?”
“I mean, think about it. You said your date was great, right? And she wore something that she heard wolves liked. Maybe I’m just a hopeless optimist, but doesn’t that kind of seem like she was trying to impress you?
Both sides of you?
“She’s not the first human who’s managed to puzzle some things out. We’ve just been lucky that most of them are dismissed as crazy cryptozoologists online.”
“They are crazy cryptozoologists. The fairies specifically hired shifters to reveal themselves to people seen as delusional for plausible deniability. They’ve been doing it pretty much since the printing press.”
“Right, I forgot about that. Still, I’m sure there are some humans who put two and two together on their own.”
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