Nora-Bora

♡

Laffery went to town on the can of tuna laying at Nora's feet, scarfing it down like it was the fat cat's Last Supper. Occasionally, he'd press pause on his feasting to close his eyes and lick his whiskers, offering a prayer to the kitty messiah for that day's pretty rocking breakfast.

Nora slurped her coffee, a thick, cooled sludge of cheap knock-off brand coffee grounds purchased at the local 7/11. On the counter behind her, her toaster popped, displaying a burnt piece of rye despite the machine being on its lowest setting.

Frowning, Nora took a butter knife to the toast and set to scraping off the charred parts. It left her with little more than crumbs, but considering her stomach was a mess of knots and nausea, she decided a lite breakfast was ideal.

She took intermittent bits of toast, followed up by gulps of syrupy coffee while staring at her laptop screen. It displayed HEA's website in the browser in its full red, pink, gold and black color scheme. At the top was its unique, trademarked font that combined a romantic, handwritten cursive with the harder lines of Serif. Several diaper-wearing winged babies bobbed in and out of the page.

There was already a tab for success stories. A curvy woman, blond hair, blue-eyed and balancing on six inch heels stood next to a demon double their size. A dwarf stood in front of a roaring fire beside their partner, a beard-having business man, their facial hair intertwined, a tangle of wiry brown and orange hairs as they flashed the camera identical joyful grins. A golden-haired, tawny-skinned Fae draped in a toga gown cinched at the waist with braided gold cord was mid-kiss with a spritely looking woman who flaunted bushy red curls and a smattering of freckles.

Nora clicked the tab that opened her profile page. It read WinterMint23 in the top right, her four-am-and-not-so-sober created username.

The pic she'd used for per profile was from a year ago, snapped at the last family bbq she bothered attending. The picture showed Nora just after she'd graduated; once she'd shed the nose piercings and under eye circles. Her gaze was more focused than it ever had been, having cut back on the joints and looking less like a strung out dragon sprawled on her dorm room floor. She was smiling, and it'd seemed genuine. That's why she'd chosen it for her profile.

After that matter was finished, the rest of her profile set up came easily. She identified her pronouns, a requirement these days given the broader acceptance of gender fluidity, especially since many in the majjo community identified as third or non gendered.

Then she'd filled the 'about me' section with little tidbits about herself, nothing too personal while shying away from boring cliches (enjoying long walks, #saltlife, sunset selfies, etc). She wrote about her journey from college student to adult freeloader to first-time job getter and shortly after, job quitter.

She avoided the things she disliked and added the things she liked to keep her profile mostly positive. Things like the 'fancy' way she made her cup ramen, setting aside a pinch of the uncooked noodles for a crunchy topping post-microwave. How she loved gardening but couldn't get a weed to sprout, even if she begged. How a fat, gray-furred interloper was eating her out of house and home.

After that, she'd had her first interaction with the app's AI. The Fairy Godmother assigned to Nora called herself Tess and had a manic, distinctly feminine chirp. It reminded Nora of Tinker Bell, if Tink had dosed one too many times at Coachella.

Tess quizzed Nora about attraction, if she was open to dating beyond her comfort zone (given she was on an app specifically designed to set up humans with majjos, that question seemed a little redundant), what she looked for in a potential mate, her ideal date, etc. Standard fare given Nora's familiarity with other dating apps.

Then Tess notified Nora it could take anywhere between twelve to twenty-four hours for her to have her first match. That'd been on Saturday night. And here it was Monday morning and Nora still had zero notifications, zero DMs, and she hadn't heard a peppy peep out of Tess.

Maybe no majjos were interested in her cat-loving, plant-killing ways. Maybe none of them liked cup ramen as much as she did.

Finishing the last of her coffee, Nora tossed her mug into the sink. It clattered against a week's worth of dishes, most of which were covered in pizza guts and wing sauce stains.

Laffery sat on his haunches, next to the empty tin, looking up at her with big, round yellow eyes, tuna juice dripping down the fur on his face. He ran a tongue over his nose a few times, never breaking eye contact with Nora. "You better not try to lick me tonight, fish breath," she warned. The cat arched it's back as it got up and head-butted her calf. Soft purrs floated to her ears.

Giving him a quick smile, she reached down and ran a hand over his back. "Yeah, yeah. You're welcome."

He stretched up, placing his paws on Nora's thighs, claws out as he ran them over her nude satin stockings. "Hey," she swatted him off her as soon as the stench of oily fish meat reached her nose, "what'd I say? Either sniff out a mint and suck on it, or you and I are estranged acquaintances for the time being."

Laffie meowed. Nora shook her head. The cat gave his version of a shrug, thumping his tail on the floor, before settling down on his butt to clean himself.

Sighing, Nora got to her feet, her eyes running across her laptop screen again. She tapped her F5 key to refresh the page. No notifications popped up in red. No Tess voice squealing in unbridled excitement through the speakers.

And here, Nora had thought access to HEA would rocket her into stardom, but all she saw before her was the slow, agonizing death of her dreams, bundled with the painful realization that maybe no one wanted to date her. Maybe WinterMint23 was a loser.

"Out of 19,999 other users," she sighed, "I can't temp one of them into giving Winter a chance." She set her head in her hand, glancing down at her cell on the counter.

Since she'd talked to Lore, things had been better between them. Lore just about flooded Nora's inbox daily. She mostly inquired about HEA, but there'd been the occasional pic of Prince. Mostly of him sleeping because that's the side of him Lore appreciated best.

The most recent pic of him, one of him being sick with drool running down his chin and snot bubbling from his nose came captioned with, "I drew the long straw!!"

Nora messaged back wondering what said long straw was to which Lore clarified: the long straw, taking care of the liquids that come out of his mouth. She immediately regretted asking, but Lore being Lore and exhibiting all the tell-tale signs of a brook in human skin, babbled on: "Junior drew the short stick. He deals with the ever-changing situation below the belt. Been miserable ever since. Prince got the runs pretty bad."

Lore had expressed feeling bad for her husband, but after following up the message with a half-dozen smiling emojis, Nora thought otherwise.

Last night must have supplied Lore with a good sleep, the REM kind, because she was on it this morning, shooting Nora a quick text. Lore wanted all the HEA goss. "Give me the deets."

Unfortunately, there was none hot off the press.

Nora responded with an indifferent shrug in word form. "Nothing yet."

Her phone, still in her hand, vibrated with Lore's response. It was amazing, the transformative power of good sleep. "Maybe your mermaid will take the bait."

"Ha. Ha," Nora typed, well and over all the fish puns, before pressing send and tossing it in her bag. She glanced up at the clock ticking away in the corner. One of those black and white cat clocks with the swishing tail. The kind that followed you with their eyes no matter where in the room you hid.

6:45. Nora had thirty minutes to burn before she needed to leave.

She checked her purse again, making sure she had everything she needed. A pad and paper for old-fashioned note taking, a sports bottle she'd used for a one-off spinning class, after which she vowed never to return because why pay good money to never feel your damned legs again?

Her Halo pass and ID were in her wallet. There was a tin of breath mints in case crap got funky after lunch. She even had real paper money, about twenty dollars in crumpled fives and ones, scattered throughout her purse for emergencies.

She glanced back at the clock. 6:46.

An urge she couldn't snuff out, one that'd been essential to her survival during her college days, the need for something between her lips, came over her. Exhaling, her eyes drifted toward the ramshackle balcony. The mass of metal limbs held up these days by rust and refusal rather than bolts and good engineering.

She could slip out, have a smoke, let the menthol clouds roll over her like fog coming off the bay, but she'd hate for her new suit, a two-piece skirt/jacket combo that'd been bogus expensive ($250.00 on sale) to reek of tobacco. Of course, she could throw on the TV, peruse the apps. Hit up Netflix and its endless line up of new majjo-centric reality shows. But watching it alone? That was a sad state of affairs. Truly Netflix and chilling.

As Nora dwindled down the list of what she could do to waste her god-given extra time, the options were snatched away; the pop-up screen on her laptop was flashing digits.

It gave her pause, her fingers lingering over the screen, unwilling to accept the call. But if she didn't, they'd call back. Again and again. Like some nosy cockroach hellbent on proving they could take a little ghosting. So finally, Nora swiped right and waited, her lungs forgetting she depended on oxygen to keep living.

Her caller refused to speak first as proper phone etiquette (being a vid chat or not didn't matter; same principles applied) required 'the called' to spew half-baked pleasantries. Feign smiles.

Nora did neither. Frowning, she looked deep at the woman on the other side of the camera. "Hi, Mom."

Her mother, Eugenia Montrose Brown-Campbell, stared at her through the screen, her brown eyes drilling holes through Nora's fancy suit.

She was impeccably dressed, even from the shoulder up. Her blouse a crisp white, collar starched. A recently acquired emerald pendant worth several grand dangled from a gold chain around her neck. It was the perfect length, depositing the pendant in the recess between her mother's pronounced collarbones.

Her hair was pulled back into a pristine chignon, her skin a bronzed, healthy glow. Her cheeks were lightly blushed, her eyelids swept with caramel shimmer. She looked like a woman in her late thirties, despite her turning forty-five later that year.

Her mother gave her a long, silent, appraising look. Nora stiffened with discomfort. She could have gone another decade without being on the receiving end of one of her mother's far-reaching stares - the ones that pulled at every flawed thread of your being until you unraveled.

Within a half-second, her mother's apple-red lips pressed into a hard line. "What about the one button blazer?" her mother inquired. "The royal blue one?" Nora clicked her faux leather heels on the linoleum floor. "Jeweled tones better compliment your skin tone."

Plucking at her dark blue jacket lapel, Nora asked, "Isn't that what I'm wearing?"

"It's a discount blue," her mother replied, voice dripping condescension. "Anyone with a discerning eye will see it lacks luxury."

"I'm sure the boss won't mind my bargain-brand suit being plucked from a department store."

The sentence, with such foreign concepts to Mrs. Brown-Campbell as 'department store' and 'bargain anything' forced her to cringe, undoing last week's botox injections. "You never dress for what you have, Nora, but for what you desire."

"That's how you end up twenty grand in debt." She blew out her cheeks.

"Your father and I would be more than willing to invest in your--"

"No handouts," Nora snapped. "I don't need your help."

Her mother's eyes narrowed as she stared past Nora at the row of battered cabinets with their chipped paint and grease splatters. Nora bit down on her lip, a mix of embarrassment and anger making heat flare across her cheeks.

Her mother said nothing, but she didn't have to, considering it was written all over her face: You certainly look as though you need our help.

But instead of veering the conversation off that cliff where it would have nose-dived and ended up a fiery mess, her mother steered the conversation elsewhere. To another equally painful topic. "Warren was very excited he could assist in your hunt for a career."

Ah. Warren Ambrose, the white-skinned millionaire who snagged Nora the interview. Who had to be blackmailed by her father to pick up a phone and make a damned call. Who her parents claimed did it out of the goodness of his heart, but what kind of goodness could have been left in that man's shriveled cavity, save for what he'd set aside for himself?

Nora gritted her teeth as her mother prattled on, spewing enough unearned good-will and praise Warren's way to stain his Gucci's a humble, vomit-green. "You'll have to send him a thank-you letter when you get the time," which translated from mother-speak meant within the week, "maybe send him a bottle of wine, too."

"Sure," Nora said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. Laffie, who'd gotten bored with Nora's conversation as soon as it started-smart cat-laid on the sofa, head in his paws, tail coiled around him, eyes shut. His ears twitched, and Nora wondered what he dreamed of when he shut the world out. More fish? More pizza? Had to be food-related.

"Nora--"

She snapped out of her thoughts and glanced at her mother. "Supply the man with booze and platitudes," she nodded, "got it."

Her mother frowned. "Nora--"

"Hey--" Nora tapped her fingers along her counter, eyeing the clock. 7:00. She figured now might be a good time to leave. Arrive early. Couldn't hurt. "Why'd you call?"

Her mother's already arched eyebrow raised. "Why?" Nora nodded. "Because your father and I wanted to congratulate you."

If Nora'd still been drinking her coffee, she would have done a spit take. Lacking anything to spit, she simply gaped instead.

"We are proud of you, Nora-bora."

Something tightened in Nora's chest at that nickname, the one her family had given her on a camping trip; the only family-related anything she'd ever enjoyed. They'd gone to see the Aurora Borealis in Canada.

It was freezing, and they'd all huddled for warmth under a mountain of fleece, mesmerized by the light show mother nature was producing, the whole thing as magical as things could be pre-majjos flaunting their existence to the known world. Nora had come back to the states with the nickname, and a desperate, silent wish to experience more of those happy moments with her parents.

"You are finally becoming what we knew you could be," her mother added, tossing gasoline on that memory and setting the whole thing ablaze.

You are becoming what we knew you could be. You have potential. We love you for what you can be, not who you are now.

"Thanks for your support," Nora said, her tone icy, words clipped.

Her mother's frown worsened. "Why can't you ever take a compliment?"

"Oh, was that what that was?" She rolled her eyes. "Here, I thought that was more backhanded bullshit."

"Nora Rose--" Her mother's brows pinched together as her voice pitched, her anger causing her words to tremble. "Your father and I have worked a great deal to--"

"Goodbye."

Nora swiped the screen left, putting an end to the call. She hunched over, taking a few deep breaths to steady herself. With her video chat still open, she yelled a curse. Laffie started, raising his head and blinking a few times as though in disbelief she would dare ruin nap time.

She walked over, closed the balcony window, and locked it. "Sorry, Laffs, looks like your stuck indoors for today."

He gave a brief stretch, kneading his front paws into the peeling corduroy couch cushion. She scratched his ears as she bent to pluck her keys off the coffee table.

"I'll pick up a cheese and pep after work for us." The cat perked up as though understanding the jist of her words: Her. Food. Him. Fed.

Stuffing her keys into her purse, Nora stormed to her door and yanked it open. She locked it before leaving, giving her apartment one last glance as, in her mind, she ran through a list to ensure she hadn't forgotten anything.

Laffie had jumped onto the bookshelf, his tail doing some much-needed dusting as he swatted the leaves of a browning spider plant.

"Shit!" Nora yelped, opening the door wide. She grabbed a pair of worn Converse on the shoe rack to her left and stuffed them into her purse. No way was she condemning herself to walk in heels for an entire day.

Finally secure she had everything she needed, she made to leave, hand on the knob, door about to close, until...

Until her gaze landed on the laptop screen. The video chat app had closed, but her HEA profile page remained up. In the upper right-hand corner, a bright red one was beside her notifications.

A pop-up box rained virtual confetti over the screen, gilded gold cursive flashing the words, "Winter Green, you've been matched."

#possiblytheworsttiminginhistoryever #newjobnewdate #bringonthemajjos

Total Word Count: 13,437