“Jay.”
Charlie has that
careful tone she does when I probably haven’t done anything bad yet
but I might have done before.
“I made coffee!”
“Yes.” She gets
out of the other bed. The motel room is small and smelly, but it does
have two begs and a counter with a coffee pot and water and coffee in
a container and everything.
“I bound the water
into the machine and the coffee into the paper cup so nothing spilled
at all,” I say, because I did and I’m pretty proud of me.
She walks over,
pours herself coffee. It makes the motel room a lot less smelly.
“It’s – definitely coffee. I’m
adding some milk, okay?”
I hear coffee being
poured down the sink, which probably makes the sink smell nice, too.
“You don’t like it, do you?”
“It’s stronger
than Starbucks coffee. how much water dud
you use?”
“I put some in the
pot. That’s where the water goes.”
“And how much
coffee in the basket?”
“Some. I didn’t
keep track,” I mumble. “Thould I have?”
“There is a
scoop,” she says, definitely trying not to laugh.
“But it was really
small, so I figured it wath for baby coffee and not adult coffee?
Right?”
“Not right. As it
turns out. The magician never had you make coffee for him, did he?”
“Honcho didn’t
truttht me around things that could explode. Not that I blew up much!
And I can bind them back togetgher and fix them anyway. Sort of.
Sometimeth.”
Charlie bursts out
laughing at that and sits down on the one bed. “Here, kiddo.”
I move over and sit
beside her on the bed.
“I see you got a
white cane and dark glasses.” Her pause is a lot like Honcho’s.
“Do I want to know where?”
“I talked to a
fae, and they thaid I should but humans will see
me now,” I whisper.
“Jay.
You can hide your nature well, but humans will still see a human
kid.” Charlie ruffles my hair gently; I try not to jump at it, busy
smelling the coffee instead. “They won’t see you, though.”
“Huh?
I’m thtill Jay,” I snap.
“Yes,
but they’re going to see a blind kid instead.”
“But
I’m still named Jay. I’m still me!”
“I
know that. Hug?” She wraps one arm around me gently. I relax a
little into that. “People are funny, Jay.”
“I
know you are.” Her hand raps me lightly on the top of the head.
“Nope!”
“Nope
to what?”
“I
can’t see you hit me, tho you can’t hit me. That’s fairer,
right?”
“And
that is my point. People are going to see ‘kid-who-can’t-see’
before anything else, Jay.”
“But
I wath joking when I said that!”
“So
if I was to put my coffee down and suggest a tickle war, you wouldn’t
run into the hallway to get help and wave that cane at people?”
“I
might not.” I grin, and Charlie laughs and pokes me gently on the
nose. This time I feel the binding before she does it, so it isn’t
a surprise at all. “Okay.
Uhm. Can you teach me how to make coffee?”
“You
don’t even drink it.”
“But
I’ll make it for you and! I’ll be helping you and that’s
important and then I tell you what I might have promithed the fae
would be do to help them and if you’re drinking coffee you can only
hit me with one hand.”
Charlie
is quiet a moment, then just says: “I marvel at your logic,” and
heads to the coffee machine. I walk after and wait. “How many cups
can this pot hold?”
“Ten.
There are numbers bound intothe glass,” I say, definitely proud I
picked that out.
“Okay.
But you’re going to have to touch glass and things when you do
that, feel it as if you can’t see it.”
“But
I can thee bindings just fine.”
“Humans
can’t. If
anyone asks, you just say you were in an accident – because you
were – and then distract them from more questions by becoming their
friend.”
“Being
friendth with someone ith a distraction?”
“It
is the way you do,” she says, and then tells me how many grinds go
into the other pot and we make a whole pot of coffee coffee. I even
drink some, but it tastes a lot worse than it smells and Charlie
doesn’t hit me at all when I explain we’ll be helping the fae
with problems for money which means I have to make her a lot more
coffee everytime I do something bad.
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