Fae were a small minority in our town, but common around the world, even outnumbering humans in some places. Their homes could be far from ordinary. On a single street, there were typical houses made from brick and stone next to odd properties constructed on clouds or even underwater.
Fairies were tiny creatures that didn’t need a lot of space, so they could turn a single tree into a nest for 20 or more. Seeing unusual homes was something I and most people got used to. Still, it was always like wandering into another world when I got to visit Wesson’s house.
When I made it to Wesson’s place, he was waiting for me on the front porch. He let me inside and took me to his bedroom upstairs. His parents didn’t own cars, so I wasn’t sure whether we had the place to ourselves. Once inside his room, he shut the door behind us.
“You said you needed my ears for something,” I asked while Wes jumped into his bed and lay in it.
He stretched out while I took a seat across from him in a wooden chair at his hand-crafted desk.
“Yeah, man,” he sat up before he continued. “So I have this snake in my wall,” he said.
I’m sure there were several animals throughout his house, but how he spoke told me the snake was an irregularity. His family’s home had windows and doors, but those were the only normalities clearly present.
Of course, a family of satyrs lived differently from a family of humans. Their house appeared to be carved from a single dark wood tree with bark strong enough to stand changing weather. Their plants grew like a garden on steroids. The sides of their walls were covered in vines, moss, and various overgrowth. There were always wild animals like squirrels or raccoons in their bushes.
Most satyrs were animal-loving, light-hearted naturalists, so it made sense that they preferred to live in a place similar to the wilds of a forest. Their house took every opportunity to mirror the outdoors. The floors were a type of lush grass that imitated carpet. They had electricity and running water, but it was sparingly present throughout the house.
I loved visiting Wes at his place. Hanging out in his bedroom was like going camping without giving up Wi-Fi.
“Why is there a snake in your wall?” I asked.
“It got out of its tank,” he said, as if he’d answered the actual question.
“Since when do you have a pet snake?”
“It’s not mine. It’s the schools.”
“But why do you have the school’s snake?”
“They were gonna cut him open in biology class.”
“Ok...” I said, waiting for him to continue.
“Ms. Harper told me to bring him back, and if I don’t, they’ll expel me from school.”
“There’s only a week left in school, though.”
“My dad won’t care if it’s one week or 10,” he remarked.
Wesson’s parents weren’t strict by most standards. They let him go to school without wearing pants after all, but the standards magical creatures held their kids to in our town could often be high. Or so I was told.
“I’ve never hunted anything before,” I said as we stood up.
“You can hear really well, though, can’t you?”
“Sure, but you can talk to animals.”
“I have to know where it is before I can talk him out. Come on, man, I’ll owe you.”
“Alright, Alright.”
I didn’t want to promise I’d find his snake when I still hadn’t seen my pet rabbit after six years. Unsure of where to start, we both stood around, waiting for me to do something. It felt awkward, but eventually, I did the only thing I could logically think of. I put my ear to a wall and tried to listen.
I usually tried to tune things out. The constant barrage of loud noises could be bothersome, so it was often best to avoid focusing on the surrounding clamor. That may have been my first time legitimately using my ears like sonar. It was a little surprising how well it worked.
I could hear the sound of pipes first. The AC was the next thing to catch my attention before I started to notice things moving around. Every home had some amount of bugs in its walls, and some houses even had rats or birds that could go completely unnoticed. I had to tune everything out before I could focus and make out the sound of slithering. I followed the sound throughout the house, keeping my ear to the wall. Wes stayed behind me, watching me work. He tried to be supportive, but couldn’t follow how I was making progress well enough to know when to cheer or stay silent. After a while, we ended up in the hallway outside of Wesson’s bedroom. I took my ear from the wall and held my hand to the spot where the snake was resting.
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“It’s here,” I said
“It’s there?”
“Yeah.”
“Ok, watch out,” he said before moving my body out of the way.
“What are you gonna do?” I asked, but I got my answer just as quickly.
Without any hesitation, Wes punched a hole in the wall. It wasn’t my place to tell him what not to do in his home, but I was pretty sure no one’s parents would be happy to come home to holes in the wall.
“Wes,” I said, still shocked at how reckless my friend was. I laughed, but I was concerned.
“Don’t worry; the house is made of living wood, remember? It’ll fix itself,” he said as he reached his hand through the hole and dug around.
“If you say so,” I replied while I watched.
He must have found the animal because he started speaking in some language that mimicked snake hissing. Before long, he pulled the scaled creature out and held it around his arm.
“Thanks, man,” he said as he turned in my direction.
“Any time.”
He tried to hug me, and I might have let him, if not for the snake jumping from his arm. I should have seen it coming; of course, a snake would see a man-sized rabbit and think, “That’s my next meal.” It wasn’t venomous, but it was big. As it sank its fangs into the palm of my hand, I thought for sure it was going to come off.
“Shit,” I exclaimed as I threw the green reptile away.
Wes scolded the snake as if it were a child while I held my hand, trying to stop the bleeding. That’s when I heard Wesson’s mom yell up at us, “boys.” So they were home. Wes put the snake away in his room before walking me to the bathroom and helping me clean and wrap my hand. He thought it was funny.
“I hope they cut that thing open twice,” I said.
“He didn’t mean anything by it.”
“It was going to eat me.”
“Harold was not going to eat you.”
“Why did you name the snake!?”
“No... he already had a name.”
I couldn’t help but crack up. I was still pissed about my hand, but the way Wes was with animals was nothing short of endearing, if not adorable.
“Sorry about the jacket,” I said, noticing I had ruined it with my bloodstains.
It’s a good thing it wasn’t his usual jacket. He always wore the same hoodie I got him a couple of years back for his birthday. Come to think of it; I doubt he wore clothes before I got him that jacket.
“It’s cool, man. You mind if I take it off?”
“You know I can see your dick every time you stand up or stretch, don’t you?” I replied in a joking tone, but I was serious to some degree.
His fur often covered enough to forget he didn’t wear anything below the belt. However, things would slip through or be easier to notice depending on how he stood or walked.
“Sorry, nature endowed me so well my natural coat can’t hide it all.”
He shed the extra layer, and for a moment, I couldn’t help but realize we were sitting in a bathroom together. He was naked aside from his fur, and we were all but holding hands while he helped me with the bandages. I didn’t mean to spaz out, but I yanked my hand away to finish wrapping up on my own. I don’t think he was bothered by it, but he must have noticed the unusual tension sitting in the air.
Satyrs had a reputation for being sexual creatures. I couldn’t look them up online without finding porn or stories of lustful exploits. Wesson never tried anything with me, and we were friends, but knowing what he was, I figured it was best to avoid provoking any of his “natural” instincts. I felt a little racist for thinking Wes would be so stereotypically sexually charged that he’d suddenly do something like that. Still, it was better to be safe than awkwardly sorry, in my opinion.
“What were you and Bug Burner talking about earlier?”
“BJ wants me to apply for a magician’s internship with her,” I said while we left the bathroom together.
“I thought you hated magic,” he said.
“I hate being a rabbit.”
“But rabbits are cool.”
“No one wants to fuck a rabbit,” I joked.
We went back to his room. I stood by the window, looking through it up at what might have been stars or satellites. My dad had to have made it home from work by then.
Wes came and stood by my side before asking, “Is that why you’re doing the internship?”
“I don’t know if I’m doing it yet. BJ said even if we apply, there’s no guarantee we’ll get in.”
That tension was ever-present, less dense, but floating around. I didn’t think a jacket mattered much when Wes never wore pants, but it made a difference. With his chest and abs out, he was more naked than usual, and I’m not sure how I felt about it.
“For what it’s worth, I hope you don’t. There’s this festival coming up in a few weeks. It’s supposed to be one of the longest ever held, and if my parents let me go, I thought maybe you could come too.”
“What kind of festival?”
“STR,” he said as he left my side to find the laptop on his desk. He pulled up a website with information and brought it to me. The first thing I noticed was the lack of humans in all the advertising pictures.
“Isn’t that a Fae thing?”
“Which we both are,” he said, taking a seat in his wooden chair while I leaned my back against his bedroom window.
“I’m not,” I said.
“No one would know unless we told them, and if you’re trying to get some action, maybe you’ll have better luck if you’re open to more than human options,” Wes added.
“You mean date an elf or a troll?”
“Or a satyr.”
“Maybe,” I said, and with a grin, I added, “but let’s worry about getting the snake back to school first.”
I almost couldn’t believe Wes was my friend. Considering how popular he was compared to me or BJ, sometimes it didn’t make sense how close we were.
Our paths had initially crossed when I tried to join the high school Fae Club. There weren’t many Fae that went to our school, and the club was a way to let them all meet one another. Unfortunately, when I tried to join, someone pointed out that I was born human.
I was only a half-breed because I cursed myself.
I couldn’t join the club, I wouldn’t. Technically, they weren’t allowed to exclude me or anyone else, but I thought it best to let things go. Wes, being the best guy in the world, found me the very next day. After telling me the other kids were dicks, he deemed me worth hanging out with. From that moment on, I couldn’t remember a day Wesson and I didn’t see one another.