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He cocked his head, his forehead creasing.

“Beer?” Gabe said, perking up.

Travis came forward and opened the thirty rack up on the coffee table. He left five out and then went to the refrigerator to put the rest in. “When will the pizza be here?”

Liam checked his watch. “Fifteen minutes.”

“Excellent,” Gabe said. He popped the top on his can and took a healthy drink before laying back down on the couch with a perfect view of the soccer game on TV.

“Who do you want to win?” I asked, taking a can for myself and handing one to Liam.

He frowned down at it as if he had no idea why we were all acting in this way, but he shrugged and followed along. He opened his can right after me as I settled deeper into his lap. Randy came around the other side of the couch and sat down next to Liam and me. “Grab me one of those, will you?” he asked.

I leaned over and passed him one. Travis took a spot on the armchair directly facing the TV as we waited for the pizza. Soon, we were all into the game after Gabe explained who he wanted to win. I shouldn’t have even had to ask. One of the teams was clearly British. God, there were a lot of hot football players.

Ha. “Hey, Gabe, I just said football in my head instead of soccer. You must be rubbing off on me.”

“I’ll rub something on you.”

I burst out laughing, then grabbed the pillow that was next to Liam and threw it at Gabe’s head. It hit its mark then fell forward, hitting Gabe’s beer which splashed up and over the edge. He turned his face, all smiles toward me. “What?”

The announcer erupting into a play-by-play got his attention back toward the screen. Shortly after, the doorbell rang, and I moved off Liam, so he could answer it. “I’ll be right back,” he said.

My stomach growled just thinking about how good this pizza was going to taste. I felt as if I hadn’t eaten in a long time.

The smell wafted in before I even saw Liam with the actual pizza boxes. He waltzed in and placed them down on the coffee table. It was a free-for-all. I’d never seen so many hands reach for something in my life as I did those guys reaching for slices of pizza. It was as if every one of them sprouted two more hands and they were all going for different slices. I sat back and waited until it was my turn, but when Liam came back, he had two plates and handed one to me.

“Suck up,” Randy said.

“You’re just mad you didn’t think of it,” Liam countered.

“Thank you,” I told him, giving him a nice juicy smack on the cheek.

Travis smiled, but then we were all silent as we chowed down on the pizza. The whole time, I just kept thinking how normal this all was. How if we looked into other people’s apartments right now, we could see people doing the same thing. Not everyone always had their nose stuck in a century old spell book or had to Google things like demonic familiars. And they weren’t tethered to their computers when they got a video call from their superiors. Nope, tonight we were just us.

The only thing separating us from normal people was the fact that we were all in a relationship. And that was the one thing we would not break up. Push come to shove, that meant more to us than anything else. We would fight for it. No matter what.

5

“You’re so lucky, Norah Girl.”

I blinked until my vision cleared. Two glaring eyes were inches from my face. I reared back until I heard a grunt. “Jesus, Granny. What the hell?”

Granny moved away, shaking her head. “I’ve been waiting for you to go to sleep. I don’t know why I even bother to come sometimes, but you sure as the crows fly keep needing my help.”

She twisted to walk away, moving through the small living room in the apartment. She moved right through Gabe and then turned back around again until her hazy clouds blocked him. I sat up and yawned, stretching my arms out over my head.

“You’re not tired. You’re still sleeping,” Granny said, her gaze focused on me again.

“How do you know how I am?”

She came forward again, the fog billowing out to get out of her way. “I know things, Girl.”

I smiled at the reminder of those words from her mouth. She used to say that to me all the time. She was always knowing things. “What’s going on?” I asked, stifling another yawn. She said I shouldn’t be tired, but I was. I was super tired, and my eyes felt like they kept wanting to close on me.

“I said,” she said, her eyes growing round again. “You’re lucky you pulled this around. I kept waiting for you to go to sleep, so I could talk some sense into you. You’re falling apart.”

I took a deep breath, trying to focus on her. She was right. We had been falling apart. “I think we’re better now.”