Free Life in Shadows by Elliott Kay

disbelief.”
    “Yeah,
I know what it means,” Kevin fumed, turning from Onyx back to Molly. “I am
not!”
    “You
are, too,” she teased calmly.
    “I’m
not a Mary Sue! And I’m not a fictional character!”
    “You’re
a total bad ass, you did well in school—”
    “You’re
really hot,” Onyx put in.
    “—you’ve
got an awesome cat…”
    “Okay,
first off, it’d be Marty Stu for me.”
    “Eh,
whatever,” Molly replied dismissively. “You’re not hung up on gender bullshit.”
    “Okay,
if I was a Mary Sue, I’d be able to actually communicate with my cat for real
instead of just pretending I know what he’s thinking.” Kevin took another gulp
of his drink. “And I’d have a hot girlfriend. And a unicorn. And a magic sword
or something.”
    “You
do have a—wait, what about Meredith?” Molly asked. “What happened with that?”
    “Went
back to her ex last week,” Kevin frowned. “Didn’t I tell everyone?”
    “Ugh.
The useless drunk guy she left for running up her credit cards? How ugly was
that?”
    “Wouldn’t
have been ugly at all if she hadn’t tried to take Attila with her.”
    “Attila?
Really? I’m surprised you didn’t shoot her, too.”
    “Well,
like I said, it got ugly, but that wasn’t me. Attila let her know whose cat he
is in no uncertain terms.”
    “Sounds
like a crappy recipe for a birthday,” said Onyx.
    “Yeah,
well. Like I said, I’ve had worse. I’m home, I’m not in a hospital and I don’t
have any funerals on the calendar.” He held up his shot of whiskey, clinked it
against theirs when they followed suit, and poured it into his Guinness.
“Cheers,” he smiled, and took a long pull.
    Onyx
had hers down first. “So what happens now? With your job?”
    “Now?
Two days of nothin’. Mandatory paid administrative leave after a shooting. I
wrote all my reports and statements, got my ass-chewings and my sympathetic
talk from the chaplain and yet another appointment set with the same
lame trauma counselor from my other shootings, and that’s it. They don’t want
to hear from me for two days. At all. I could practically turn off my phone.”
    “Wait,
you’re supposed to sit at home and stew on it?” Onyx asked.
    “Yeah.
Keeps you from doing anything crazy while you’re still rocky from the incident.
Lets you focus, gives the department time to figure out if you really did fuck
up and you shouldn’t be trusted with a squirt gun. I’m supposed to get my mind
off of it, but all I’m gonna do is sit around thinking about how I killed two
guys on my birthday. What gets your mind off that?”
    He
stared at his empty mug with a sigh. “Worst part is, Tyrone and I were supposed
to go talk to kids at a middle school tomorrow. Do a big summer safety thing,
be all Officer Friendly and stuff. But I can’t do that when everyone knows I’m
really Officer ShootsYourAss.”
    Molly
tilted her head curiously, glancing at Onyx. Her lover knew most of her looks
by heart. It wasn’t telepathy, but it was close enough. “So there’s no reason
not to sing yourself hoarse, throw your dignity to the wind and get hammered
tonight, right?”
    He
shrugged. “Gotta be coherent enough to get a cab home,” he thought aloud.
“Never needed dignity for that.” He frowned and patted his pockets. “Not sure I
even brought any with me in the first place.”
    “We’ll
take care of you,” Molly offered, gesturing for the bartender.
     
    *   *   *
     
    Onyx
honestly hadn’t planned on groping her girlfriend’s uncle tonight, let alone
this much. As she and Molly helped him out of the car, putting one of his arms
around each young woman’s shoulder, Onyx wound up putting her hand against his
chest, his side, and even his ass, all without any malicious or mischievous
intent. They had to get him inside his townhouse, after all.
    He
felt exactly how she expected: toned and fit without being bulky. Once again,
Onyx decided that the women comprising Kevin’s string of