Sometimes we find unexpected beauty by altering our perceptions. Except I'm really tired, and I have a major exam tomorrow, and I worked all weekend, and… A snippet from my work in progress, Pixie Noir.
The woman who answered the door was wearing the most amazing shirt. Knitted silk, I think, clung to her like a second skin, and even though it was blue, managed to be transparent. I could see the shadowed curves of a truly magnificent rack, that terminated in the slightly darker shadows of her aureoles. I swallowed hard, my mouth suddenly dry. She was looking over my head, and I had seen all this in the time it took her to utter a grumpy: “what the hell?” and look down at me.
It was heroic, but I managed to meet her eyes. They widened as she took in all four foot five of me. “You’re a pixie.” She blurted.
I must have been thrown off balance by the boobs, that’s all I can figure. We’re not supposed to admit anything of the sort, dammit. I croaked out a witty response.
“Um, yah.”
She slammed the door in my face. Through it, I could make out a shouted “Wait there.”
I waited. I didn’t have much choice, really. I’d come here to get her, and even though she wasn’t supposed to know who or what she was, I’d already figured out in the brief time I’d known her that Belladonna Traycroft knew more than she was supposed to. Besides, I really wanted to look at her again.
It’s not that I have a thing for tall women, it’s that all women are taller than me. There aren’t a lot of pixie women around any longer, we’re a dying breed, and the ones I had met were all airy fairy and sparkles. Not my kind of girl. Belladonna, however, had made an impression on me, even before I had seen her. I’d been struck while reading her dossier that she was a very competent female.
She opened the door again, and now she was fully dressed, to my disappointment. The shirt was gone - or at least hidden, as I caught a glimpse of the cuff of it under the thick wool plaid shirt she had thrown on. The ratty pyjama bottoms were replaced by jeans, and the wool socks had disappeared into heavy winter boots. Like I said, my kind of girl. We kept staring at one another for a minute longer in silence.
She broke the tension with a reluctant sigh. “You’d better come in.”
I knew why she was reluctant. Pixies in your house could lead to trouble. I didn’t intend her harm, but depending on what stories she’d heard, she was right to be wary. I stomped the snow off my boots and followed her into the tiny cabin. It was warm, at least.
Why the girl had to be in Alaska, I didn’t know. And why they had sent me to get her... well, that was easier. I’m tall, for a pixie. LeBron tall in human terms, as it happens, and that mean I didn’t get the hassles when traveling in the open most of my kind do. I don’t like it, being taken for a midget and getting pitying glances, but it could be worse. My cousin had to glamour himself as a puppy and travel in a crate last time he needed to fly. I was spared that kind of humiliation.
Inside, I set down the attache case I was carrying and held out my hands toward the stove in appreciation. She eyed me for a moment. I knew what she was seeing. I’m proportioned like a human, I don’t have pointy ears or wings, but I still look like a bloody leprechaun. I hadn’t put on gloves when I got out of the car, I didn’t expect to be kept standing on the porch in who knows who many below freezing degrees. My cheeks were probably rosy above the stubble, even. I scowled at the stove, not looking at her.
“Coffee?”
She melted my bad mood with a single word. Well, that, and she had... nevermind. The hot nectar of the gods would be enough.