Black finished her last bite of cheesesteak, then yawned and stretched. “So, now that we’re all settled in and cozy, you wanna see my secret place?”

  Proto coughed, almost choking on his lemonade. He looked at her.

  She smiled. “I know, exciting, right? Come on, it’s downstairs.”

  Rising, she led him into the bathroom hallway, then around the corner into the Employees Only area. They turned again and reached a downward stairway—which was blocked by four trash bags.

  “Oh, for F’s sake, Jakeson! Of all the days!” she groused.

  “That your secret place?” Proto pointed at the trash bags.

  Black sighed.

  “Hey, it’s cool! Judgment-free zone here,” said Proto. “So my girlfriend is Oscar the Grouch. That’s cool.”

  “‘Girlfriend.’ Hmph. Wanna go to the ice cream social, boyfriend?” she grumped in a cutesy voice. “How about ‘my girl’? Or ‘my boo,’ if you insist on being cutesy?”

  “My ball and chain?” suggested Proto.

  Black frowned. “Don’t you dare start talking like a Boomer Dad.”

  Proto waved toward the trash. “Welp, time to take the trash out for a walk. Gotta escort this trash to the curb.”

  “Stop it! Stop it right now! You sound like Tim Allen in 1998!” admonished Black.

  “Time for this garbage to go on its farewell tour—” he continued.

  “That’s it! Farewell to you.” She turned and walked away, then paused. “Unless you take all that trash out right now. Show off those muscles of yours. It’s a man’s job, right, Boomer Dad?”

  “Aw. Want to help?” he said.

  “Hm. I don’t think so,” she responded. “Last time I was doing the trash with you around was, I have to say, not the best experience of my life.”

  It took Proto a second to realize what she was referring to. It had been a couple years ago, after all.

  “I’m sorry!” Red cried. “I forgot I was wearing lipstick today! You have a hickey on your nose, Proto! Something to commemorate the day!”

  “Alas, I think this memory’s going to wash off,” noted Proto.

  “Well, next time, I’ll do better.” She squeezed his hand, then scurried into Starbucks, her long and loose-bound ponytail of black swishing in her wake. He admired her with a dumb smile on his face.

  It was only after a good ten seconds that he saw movement from a shape in the corner of his eye. He glanced over.

  It was Black, taking out the trash from her bar upstairs. She was wearing a worn-out Muse T-shirt—in fact, the very one she’d worn to that concert eight years ago. For an instant, he seemed to see her hazel gaze upon him.

  “Ah,” Proto awkwardly managed. “Well, um . . . you won?” He winced a smile out.

  “I did. Well said,” replied Black. “You think that fixes it?”

  Proto shifted nervously. “Um.”

  “Nope! Now I hate doing trash. So, trash duty’s on you! Forever!” She beamed. “Nah, just kidding. Maybe in a few years we can start switching up. You on weekdays, me on weekends.” She wrinkled her nose. “Maybe.”

  He nodded grimly. “Ruthless.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s lesson #1,” she affirmed. “Anyway, I forgive you. I’m like George Harrison. I totally would’ve forgiven Clapton over the whole Pattie Boyd thing. Cool on the outside, total pushover on the inside.”

  “In short, late-stage Gen X,” he observed.

  “Proto, I was specifically avoiding that. For multiple reasons!” she admonished. “Number one, all three of them were pre-Gen X, not late-stage. Number two, it’s a good joke, but I need some new ones. I don’t want this to be my American Pie!”

  “Forgive me.”

  “Already have! Again. Late-stage Gen X, can’t help it,” she waved. “Also, speaking of forgiveness, don’t worry, my V-friend and I are cool again too.”

  “Oh. Red’s okay?” Proto felt awfully relieved to hear that she had weathered the Pandaemonium safely, though he tried to look only casually so.

  “Yep!” affirmed Black. “Nice sweet barista girl’s out living the hippie commune dream in a big house on a rock in the middle of nowhere, like the goddamn Band writing the Big Pink—her!—while groupie girl Black works at a country diner, listening to Don’t Stop Believing.”

  “So it goes, huh?” she mused. “Always the ones you least expect! Like that Harvard guy who became Baba Ram Dass the Acid Guru. Or that guy teaching English at a grade school full of nuns who became Sting.”

  “You give the best examples,” said Proto.

  “Get trashing.” Black waved him toward the exit. “Thank you in advance. You’ll be rewarded in due course.”

  So, idly marveling that trash collection continued after the end of the world, he grabbed the black bags and walked away.

  They were considerably heavier than he’d expected. He hadn’t strained so much hefting two bags in one hand since carrying Somnus’ Breath Tokens back from Anima’s fairy garden.

  Absently, he wondered what Anima & Co. were up to these days. Probably flapping about the flowerscape and gallivanting under rainbows as always. Probably Anima was leading someone or other on some chase. Had Somnus finally visited? Were the two Element siblings, even now, sharing a drink in the dream realm? Sheesh, these bags are heavy.

  Proto thus was shaking out his weary arms, ruminating on fairies and rainbows, when he rounded the corner and beheld a rainbow.

  Well, no. Rainbows aren’t girl-shaped, he realized. And they may be beautiful, but rarely hot. Also, they don’t plant a hand on their hip and stare at me expectantly. Still, it took him a moment to parse exactly what he was seeing.

  Black was wearing the gossamer rainbow dress he’d given her ten years ago.

  If not for its many hues, the dress might’ve looked witchy and elfin and mysterious. This, though, had a psychedelic paisley design that used all seven shades of the rainbow. The pattern would’ve been unspeakably garish on most outfits. Somehow, though, on this wispy, ethereal, fantastical dress—nay, this raiment—the cheesy excess just made the brooding feyness fun.

  He’d never seen anything so absurdly beautiful and beautifully absurd. The closest was Anima with her red and purple butterfly wings and a matching dress. And even that was awfully different.

  Proto had never seen Black wear this. Literally minutes after giving it to her, a decade ago, he’d found out she’d told a friend she’d dated him to get a free Muse ticket. He’d dumped her that same afternoon.

  He recalled how she’d shrugged and replied, “Okay,” as cool as ever, and how he’d only seen her cover her face in the mirror as he walked away.

  As he took in the moment, his once-and-future girlfriend shifted awkwardly. While she might be a many-colored marvel from neck to toe, Black’s face was uncharacteristically red. “It fits,” she mumbled finally. “I think.”

  At his lack of a reply, she glanced away nervously, then firmed up and faced him. “Trust Tracksuit Moo to know my exact measurements, down to the millimeter!” she chided, playful but wide-eyed. “Probably studying my smallclothes in his spare time!”

  “Black, all your clothes are small clothes,” he managed.

  “Not this! I’m so wispy I look like I’m leaving a vapor trail!” she replied. “I look like Stevie Nicks after eloping with a leprechaun! Why do I like it so much?!”

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  “I feel like you just answered your own question,” he said.

  “Shut up!”

  Laughing quietly, Proto took her hand. “Hey. It was worth the wait.”

  She looked up at him, her narrow eyes blinking wide; and, for once, she had no immediate reply.

  “There’s just one thing I don’t understand,” he continued. “You drove up here right before the fires fell. And you haven’t been back home. So how . . . ?” He trailed off, staring at the rainbow dress.

  “Well. It was in my trunk stash,” she mumbled, then cleared her throat and tried to firm up her voice again. “And you know how trunk stashes are. They never get emptied out. You get a new car, you move the old trunk stash to the new trunk, and you don’t even check what’s in it. And, even if hypothetically I did check at some point, I wasn’t specifically going to take it out. Cause, you know, where would I put it? I couldn’t just throw it away. And I don’t get to Goodwill as often as I . . . what? What?!”

  “You’re telling me you kept my rainbow dress in your trunk for ten years?” Proto managed to suppress laughter, but not a broad smile.

  “ . . . this was a bad idea,” replied Black, now as red as her hair. “I’m gonna go change.”

  “No, please! Thank Heaven for trunk stashes!” he laughed, taking both her hands now. “And for late-stage-Gen-X sentimentality.”

  “Yeah, you’d better thank Heaven!” Her lips curved up despite her visible resistance. “Sheesh, I’m like a cover model for Clapton’s Rainbow Concert.”

  “Like a cover model,” agreed Proto.

  “Stop blacknosing!” chided Black. “Or rainbow-nosing!”

  “Yeah, maybe Clapton, or maybe the Stones,” he continued. “She’s Paint It Black one minute, She’s a Rainbow the next!”

  “Psh.” She looked her colorful self over.

  Proto gestured toward her. “Like 1960s rock, she embodies the full spectrum of human emotion! All at the same time! And by some strange sorcery, it works!” he acclaimed. “But then, when you’re dressed like Gandalf the Grey’s hippie sister, Karen the Kaleidoscopic, perhaps strange sorcery is par for the course.”

  “Moo, I’m this close to putting on a frumpy black turtleneck!” threatened Black.

  Proto zipped his lips.

  “Good plan.” She patted his cheek. “As Karen the Kaleidoscopic always says, nothing gets things unzipped like zipping up!”

  “That doesn’t even make sense!” grumbled Proto, gesturing at her dress. “You’re not even wearing pants, let alone a zipper.”

  “Pants? Where in the world is your mind, Proto? Let’s try to keep this PG-13! We’re in a rural diner!” She retrieved her black purse from a pocket, unzipped it demonstratively, and zipped it back up.

  Proto pointed at the purse. “You didn’t pull even anything out.”

  “I see no need for pulling out,” she instantly responded.

  He opened his mouth to reply, then blinked. “PG-13, my ass!”

  “Your rear end, Moo,” she chastised, lightly exasperated. “Do we have to wash your mouth out?”

  After a moment of pondering, he decided he was unlikely to win this verbal duel; and, in any event, he’d probably rather lose it.

  “As long as it’s at least 100 proof and aged a couple decades, wash away,” he replied.

  “Now you’re speaking my language,” she nodded, turning and walking back toward the diner’s main room. “Fortunately, we’ve got just the thing.” She lifted Glen’s whisky bottle from where Proto had set it on the counter and poured a dram for each of them.

  “Not bad. Not bad at all,” he mused after his first sip, eying the “29” on the bottle. It was no eighty-year-old armagnac, of course. But compared to what one expects to drink in a postapocalyptic society—say, radioactive gasoline run through a broken water filter—this was flabbergastingly tasty. “Very good. And awfully old.”

  Black frowned. “Proto, twenty-nine is not awful, it’s not old, and we’re just months away from leaving it behind us! You’re having some real word-choice problems!”

  “Oh, don’t get me wrong,” smiled Proto, shaking the whisky a little and sniffing it. “Some things only get better with age. Smooths out the rough spots. What’s left is the pure core. No more distractions, just the thing itself. And if it’s bad, or there’s not much left, that tells you something, right? But if it’s good—well, it sure makes the long wait feel worth it. Even a whole decade. Hence why I’m feeling awfully good right now.”

  “I’ll pass your compliments on to Stonkey Fruitbeard,” replied Black, rolling her eyes. “But what do you mean, a whole decade? It’s twenty-nine years old!”

  “Oh, you were wondering about the whisky?” Proto sipped it casually. “Yeah, this is good too.”

  Black opened her mouth—then, blinking twice, shut it. Her lips curved up.

  Visibly, she tried to curve them back down, but that just made her smile’s grooves deeper.

  “Round one goes to Moo,” she finally mumbled.

  Proto extended his hand for a fistbump.

  “Why the F do you keep trying to do that to me?!” Black flicked his knuckles. “I’m not your bro! Drink more whisky! . . . And keep making more remarks like that last one.”

  Proto obliged—well, with respect to the whisky. “Ah. Gives you chills, it’s so good. But I’m dressed for it.” He tugged the cuffs of his tracksuit a little further toward his hands. He flipped up his collar and zipped it higher.

  Black sighed grimly, eying him like a mother after her teenage son had just discovered cologne.

  “Yes, some things change a lot in ten years, and some things stay exactly the same,” she lamented. “And in case there’s any doubt what I’m referring to, it’s the thing that, three decades into its life, is wearing a high-school Saturn logo.”

  “Not three decades, 29.5 years!” retorted Proto, finger raised. “Also, I have good justification. Today’s my Saturn Return!”

  Black’s forehead furrowed. “What the F does that mean?”

  “Not important,” waved Proto. “Speaking of which, you remember our Saturn mascot? Used to jump up and down on the sidelines?”

  “Yeah, that was Quart, right?” she answered. “You told me that at the one and only high school football game I went to. He used to play cards with you and those twins, right?”

  Proto nodded. “Yep.”

  “ . . . ‘yep’?” repeated Black in a yokel voice. “That’s really it, huh? Nice banter. I’m proud o’ you, Moo.”

  “Good, yeah, I’m glad you remember that,” he replied cheerfully. “Remember how I got you to go to that football game?”

  After a brief frown, her hazel eyes went wide. “ . . . oh, no no no no no no no.”

  “As I recall, I agreed to go to a Radiohead concert. You agreed to do two things,” recounted Proto blithely. “One, go to the game. Two . . . what was number two?”

  Black sighed grimly again.

  “You have a good memory, right?! Just gets better with age!” he enthused.

  She looked less enthusiastic. “Ugh.”

  “And you made me go to Radiohead!” he continued. “Quite possibly the most wantonly cruel thing you ever did—”

  “Fine! Fine. I’ll do it.” Black grimaced, but her lips quirked up a little. “You know how much I thought about this, during that last twenty-four hours we were dating? And wondered about it most days since then? About what would’ve happened if . . . ? Anyway, yes. Yes, I’ll do it.”

  “Looking forward to it,” he replied.

  “Hmph.” She turned away and sipped her whisky. “It’s your fault, by the way, that I didn’t do it earlier. I won’t be blamed for that!”

  Proto waved dismissively. “No worries! I’ll view it as delayed gratification.”

  “You can view it as whatever the F you want, as long as you don’t laugh at me,” grumbled Black.

  He tilted back his head and laughed.

  “Bad start!” she cried.

  “I still can’t believe you made me watch Radiohead,” he mused.

  “It was a phase!” she muttered. “Many went through it with me. Scientists have proven mass hysteria is real!”

  Proto pointed at her. “Next time we disagree about something, remember this.”

  “Oh, don’t even go there, Mister Survivor-Was-the-Best-80s-Band!” she retorted.

  “I was eighteen! And male!” he objected. “And that was just exaggeration, not directly contrary to the truth!”

  “Oh? Eighteen and male, huh?” she replied. “Well, I’ve got an excuse for Radiohead too.”

  “You . . . were eighteen and female?” asked Proto.

  “No, I was F’ing crazy!” retorted Black. “What does me being a woman have to do with anything? I’m dating one of those guys, huh? Sheesh!”

  “‘Sheesh’? You sound like my mom,” observed Proto.

  “More about us! He digs himself deeper,” she cried. “Maybe you should take some lessons from Mom. Things not to say: ‘It’s cause you’re female.’ Hmph!”

  He laughed quietly.

  “Another lesson from Mom: Don’t wear tracksuits unless you’re on a track or still a teenager!” she continued.

  He threw up a hand. “I wear my blazer, and it’s too ‘slick for your tastes.’ I wear my tracksuit, and I’m a ‘teenager.’ What should I do, Karen? You tell me!”

  “Take off your shirt, Porno,” she replied.

  Proto blinked, then scanned the room. It was still empty. But he envisioned that old lady who owned the diner strolling in, any minute now, and promptly having a heart attack.

  “Go on,” urged Black. “Should’ve thought about the consequences before you made that little offer!”

  Proto’s lips curved up hopefully at this joke—right, a joke?—but her look stayed level.

  “Start unzipping, please,” directed Black.

  Proto sighed and started unzipping his tracksuit jacket, then paused. “My apologies in advance for exposing more than I’d like to. Namely, my ribcage.”

  “You forget, Proto,” she responded. “I have 70s rocker girl tastes. For some girls, it’s oysters, French accents, well-tailored suits, and candlelight. 70s rocker girls? Exposed ribcages.”

  He eyed her skeptically.

  She threw up her hands. “Hey, don’t doubt me! Ask the female, not the male, right?”

  Proto smiled away a sigh and finished unzipping his jacket. “Why do you get to be Stevie Nicks, while I’m, like, Jim Morrison or something?”

  “What, you want to trade?” Black tugged the neck of her rainbow dress away from her chest. “Nah. Hurry up. You unzip, I unzip!” After a pause, she took out her purse again and tantalizingly unzipped it halfway, opening her mouth as she did so.

  “Oh, for F’s sake.” Proto finished unzipping his tracksuit jacket and tossed it aside.

  “Yes, for the sake of F’ing! Well said.” She looked him up and down. “Yep, like I said earlier, not bad! I think you might even have less on your ribs than eighteen-year-old Moo.”

  “Must be all the running,” yawned the bronze medalist, stretching ostentatiously.

  “That or the cryogenic starvation diet,” she replied. “When did you last eat, anyway, before that cheesesteak?”

  “Um. Approximately three hours before my car accident?” He shrugged. “It’s okay, I’m still digesting a quadruple smash burger.”

  “That’s lovely.” She wrinkled her nose. “You’re like that frozen dinosaur skeleton they found with a cow in its stomach. Meat in your belly, no meat on your bones.”

  Proto peered at her. “You just made that up. No such dinosaur.”

  “Nope, they dug it up. And I’m digging you, Tyrannosaurus Ribs!” she said.

  “I endured two years frozen, for this,” he sighed.

  “Yeah, for this!” She grabbed her purse and zipped it back and forth a few times.

  Proto couldn’t help but chuckle. “Alright, round two goes to Black. One to one.”

  “I’m pretty sure I’m at three or four now, but who’s counting,” she shrugged.

  “The statistician, not the bartender?” he said.

  “Well, that’s rude,” she noted.

  “Would you prefer ‘the male, not the female’?” he offered.

  “Oh for F’s sake,” scoffed Black. She looked irked that her lips were curving up.

  Proto lifted a hand and started mock-scribbling. “Round three goes to Pro—”

  Black swatted his hands down. “That’s not a round! You didn’t win the war, you didn’t win a battle, and you scored no more than a flesh wound. A dirty one! I only laughed cause you surprised me.”

  “Speaking of unspeakably dirty things,” replied Proto, “now that I’ve taken out the trash, you want to show me your place, Oscar?”

  “Psh. Shut up.” She headed down the stairs toward the diner’s basement.