The rest of the day was a blur. Fyn continued to work as usual, but he was on autopilot. Celia noticed, of course, but thankfully she didn't say anything on the matter.

In the evening, the journalist went home to a dreadfully empty apartment. He had gotten so used to Eondar's presence that his home now seemed cold and deserted. No delicious smell wafted from the kitchen, no gentle voice greeted him. And no one would thank him for a mug of hot milk in the middle of the night.

The lifebearer sat down on the sofa and stared out the window. The sun was just about to set over the skyline of the city, turning the sky into an ocean of colors. It was such a beautiful and romantic sight, and Fyn felt a big lump in his throat. But he wouldn't cry over this. It wasn't worth it.

Just as the journalist decided to get up and make himself dinner, his phone rang. It was Kalish.

"Fynnie! Sweetheart, how are you? I'm guessing you had just as bad a headache as I did this morning. Anyway, I wanted to ask you if you'd meet me and Rick for lunch tomorrow?"

Fyn didn't hesitate. He wouldn't mope around! "Yes, of course. I think I can also get some time off in the afternoon. My boss owes me one."

Kalish laughed. "Great! Listen, would you be a dear and help me find the perfect outfit for the bonding ceremony? You're the only one I can trust to give me an honest opinion and help me decide. Pretty please?"

"Well, I can't let you walk down the aisle in a horrid outfit, can I?" Fyn answered with a fond smile. He just wasn't able to stay mad at anyone for long, and he truly wanted Kalish to have the perfect bonding ceremony. He walked into the kitchen and put the phone on speakerphone to have his hands would be free to make dinner.

"Thanks, you're the best!" Kalish hesitated a moment. "Listen... Rick told me everything about him and you this morning. I must admit I was really surprised, but I do hope you guys will get along. After all, we're all gonna be a family."

"I know. And I want to get to know him, Kalish. Not necessarily as a parent, since I already have the best parents on Wyndrah, but as my best friend's bondmate," the journalist replied as he pulled a soup can from the cupboard. "And I guess he's really not so bad. We just need time."

"Of course," Kalish said. "I understand that. And speaking of bondmates... did Eondar behave last evening?"

Fyn sighed and put the can down. Sooner or later, he had to talk about this or he would go crazy. And after their fight about keeping things from each other, he wasn't about to start having secrets from his best friend. "Well... I guess so. But... I didn't. You know the saying about drunken people not lying? Anyway, nothing happened. But now it turns out that..." He paused. "He isn't really interested in me, just as I said from the beginning." In short words, he told Kalish about his earlier conversation with Eondar while his dinner heated up on the stove.

The other lifebearer was silent for a moment after Fyn finished, then he said, "Are you sure? Did he really say that this Sharelan was his destined mate?"

"Well, he said that he thought so back then. What does it matter?" Fyn asked.

"A lot, you dork! And what did you say?" Kalish demanded to know.

"I said I wanted to stop working with him under these circumstances, and that was it." Fyn balanced his soup as he made his way to the kitchen table and sat down. Damn, his leg was hurting again. "What else should I have said?"

"You should have let that poor guy finish!" Kalish practically yelled, making the journalist almost drop his spoon. "Don't you see what he tried to tell you? You're the one he's been waiting for! It's not you who resembles his dead fiancé, that lifebearer resembled you! Forests, Fynnie, how can someone as smart as you be this dumb?!"

Fyn frowned. "Nonsense. He didn't say..."

"He didn't say anything because you threw him out! And now he thinks that you played with him all along. Damn it, call him and clear that up! And don't you tell me that you don't love him!" Kalish huffed. "I've known you for ages, and you haven't made doe eyes at anyone since that bastard back in high school..."

"Don't remind me!" Fyn interrupted him. "And I'm... I'm not denying anything here, okay? But I thought I didn't have a chance anyway..."

Now it was Kalish's turn to sigh. "But you do, sweetheart. Your Eondar is an honest and sweet guy, and he's every bit as lonely as you. Call him and give him a chance."

"I'll think about it. See you tomorrow, Kalish." Fyn disconnected the phone and stared into his soup. As sensible as Kalish's advice was, he just had to mention that high school incident. The lifebearer hadn't thought about that in ages, but when he was brutally honest with himself, that was the real reason for not trusting sires in general, aside from the fact that nobody decent had ever shown any interest in him.

Or... maybe there had been good guys, but he just hadn't given them a chance because he had just assumed the worst.

As the journalist slowly ate his soup (too much salt, no comparison to Eondar's vegetable stew), he remembered.

Fyn and Kalish had been in their last year of high school, preparing for their final exams. Both were top students, always in friendly competition. They had become best friends in junior year despite the fact that Kalish was very popular while Fyn was more the nerdy type, buried in books all the time. A few weeks before the exams, Fyn was approached by the most popular guy in their class, Jayson Mayfield. He was a tall, handsome sire with a face like a movie star and, as cliché as it could be, the school's star football player. Every girl and lifebearer wanted to be his friend or his date. Fyn, despite knowing better, had a huge crush on Jayson, but had never dared to say anything. Now, the sire had come to him to ask him for some tutoring.

"I was so busy with football, I neglected math, literature, and biology a bit," he admitted with a smile. "I'd be really grateful if you'd help me so I can pass the exams."

Of course, Fyn agreed, delighted to spend the following afternoons in Jayson's company. They laughed a lot together, and one day, the sire gave him a brief kiss on the cheek as a goodbye. A week later, it was a kiss on the mouth.

Fyn was just waiting to be asked to the prom ball. He was completely convinced that he and Jayson had some kind of romance going on, and now it was just a matter of making it public. But things turned out differently: one day after school, the lifebearer went to the football training field to meet up with Jayson. He was a bit early, and he ended catching the tail end of a conversation between Jayson and his friends.

"Are you still hanging out with that little nerd?" one of the guys asked Jayson.

The sire laughed. "I'm not 'hanging out' with him. He gets me through the exams, and I pay him with a little affection. But really, he should be the thankful one."

"So you're not really asking him to prom, right?"

"Are you kidding, man? I have all the gorgeous chicks and lifebearers of this school standing in line, waiting for me to ask them," Jayson boasted. "What the hell would I want with a cripple at a dance? Don't get me wrong, Fyn's kinda cute – when he's not being a wise ass. Maybe I'll give him a pity fuck after I've passed the exams."

To this day, Fyn still remembered every word. He also remembered dropping his books and storming toward Jayson, beating the hell out of him while trying every Martial Arts move he had ever learned. The sire and his friends stayed silent about it since it was far too humiliating to admit to anyone that the star football player had been beaten up by a tiny lifebearer.

Jayson went to prom with a black eye and a slight limp himself, and Fyn ended up staying home. Kalish, ever the devoted friend, returned early and kept him company for the rest of the evening.

So far, not much had changed. That incident had been a long time ago, but Fyn still hadn't put it behind him. Since that first huge disappointment, he had never really tried to give someone else a chance, just assuming that everybody was like Jayson.

The journalist got up, putting away his empty plate. He felt tired and still a bit sad, and he didn't really dare to hope that Kalish was right.

But he would never find out if he didn't call Eondar, right?

Still unsure what to do, the lifebearer went to the bathroom to shower and started to clean up things around the apartment a bit afterward. As he opened the door to the room Eondar had been occupying, the feeling of loneliness was almost overwhelming. But he gritted his teeth and started to put the sleeper sofa back to its original state. As he did so, he found a white shirt underneath the white covers. Eondar had obviously forgotten it.

Despite feeling silly, the lifebearer couldn't resist burying his face in the soft fabric. It smelled faintly of Eondar's shower gel; fresh and slightly salty, like the ocean.

"Forests, I'm pathetic," Fyn murmured. He slipped out of his bath robe and put the shirt on. It was ridiculously large, going to his knees and making him look like a kid playing dress-up in his father's clothes. But it helped ease the bad feelings a bit, so he kept it on as he wandered back into the living room.

Just as the journalist decided to go to bed, there was the sound of a lock turning, and the apartment door opened.

To be continued...