KittenLasagne

As a moth drawn to a flame, I returned a week or so later. Prince Nuada was not at the same spot, but he called out to me on the way there, from another area of the subway tunnels. "Looking for me?" he asked, voice dangerously low. He was sitting and working on what looked an intricate metal puzzle. Or perhaps a piece of machinery. "Sort of," I answered. I shrugged off my backpack and sat down by the machinery, at an arm's length, of course. "What are you working on? Is it broken?" The prince answered without looking up. "I'm building it. It is a piece of technology from my people." "Impressive. What does it do?" I asked, keeping my tone light. I zipped open the backpack and rummaged inside for the crinkling paper bag of cherries. I even remembered to bring a separate container for the pits. I held the open paper bag toward the prince. "Would you like some too?" "Cherries?" I nodded. I popped one in my mouth, snapped of the stem and bit the fruit in half. "Look at

No warnings :). Enjoy. A week later I found myself back in the tunnels beneath the city. It was damper, colder, this week. Almost each night that passed since then, I had dreamed of the stranger. In some, I confronted him. Stef was missing since that day. The spear played a role too, in the dreams, but in a different way. In those dreams, he held me against the wall with the tip of the spear at my throat, before kissing me roughly. The cold sweat on my back as I awoke felt exactly as the cold concrete wall I was pressed up against inside the dream, making the sense it was real last even longer. There were noises somewhere in the tunnel. I walked the same path as that day, hoping to at least overwrite the memories of that day by creating my own. The noises grew in volume as I came closer to the open area of last time. Was he here? My heart jumped. He was, slicing his spear through the air, jumping, twirling and evading imaginary attacks. He wore only a black pair of

Content warning: attempted (sexual) assault. Stef dragged me along by the hand as we turned the corner. "Isn't this exciting?" he asked, grinning. We were underneath the city, in the intricate subway system. Rats scurried away to the darkest corners of the tunnels. "The history behind these tunnels is so rich..." he continued on with the story he told on the way, unable to trump his enthusiasm. This was our first date, although the thought of dating Stef makes my palms clammy. He's in a few of the same classes and helped me with one of the finals – in exchange for an afternoon together. Like our lives are a bad 90s sitcom. The tunnel opens to a larger area where several paths come together. In a wave of mild panic, I realised we are well and truly alone and I couldn't remember the entire way back. Now that he was no longer dragging me, he tried to interlock our fingers, but before he could, I pulled my hand back. "Well, what do you think?" "Yeah," I cleared my