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"Are you serious? A rainstorm, on my amusement park date?"
"It's more likely than you think," says a soft voice behind her. Zoey does her best to avoid cracking a smile and fails: he's been picking up a lot of her memes lately.
She turns from the windowpanes, quickly becoming more and more heavily veined with fat raindrops, and does a little come-hither motion to the lanky figure looming in front of the couch. Her mouth opens, but he's there with a faint puff of gently aromatic smoke to lean his chin on her head before the sentence she was about to begin can leave it. He always smells mildly floral, like lilacs — maybe his hair is secretly made of really tiny strings of lilac flowers, she ponders, leaning up and tilting her head to sniff the back of his ear and enjoying the small whuff of delight and light nuzzle against her face in return — and that's why his scent is so sweet.
"Mmm," Zoey says, nuzzling back and taking one last breath of Mystery from his skin, cool to the touch as it tends to be. "You're always giving Bath and Body Works, babe."
"Hm?"
"Aw — never mind. I forgot you've never been in a mall, like, ever."
"You took me to a store that one time. The one with the very bright lights."
Zoey knows she shouldn't chuckle at the subtle indignance in his tone or the suggestion of a pout around his lips, but it's hard not to indulge when she finds everything Mystery does so charming. "Yeah, I remember. Was it really that bad? You pulled out your hat and everything. It looked kinda silly with the sweater vest and stuff."
"I'm sensitive."
"Yeah, you are." She grins and pecks his cheek, sending a faint lavender blush out from the point of impact. "You want some hot cocoa?"
Maybe the sudden storm was a blessing after all, Zoey thinks, drawing both legs up next to her on the couch cushion as she dips her head to tuck it under Mystery's chin. It had been somewhat of a shock when she first noticed that he doesn't actually breathe unless he remembers to, but these days it's comforting to lie on his chest and feel as steady on it as the pillows on her own bed. Claiming it's getting cold because of the clammy air outside gives her an opening to snuggle close to him "for warmth" and get cozy.
"I'm always cold. So it won't warm you that much," he insists whenever Zoey uses this excuse, but he's never passed up the opportunity either — seven hundred years of relative isolation must leave a MF touch-starved, because whenever they're in the same room together, Mystery is almost always the first one to make contact, as long as he's given a signal that he's allowed to. He really is a good boy, she thinks with fondness. As soon as she beckons him he'll be right there with arms around her, leaning on her, always exactly as physically affectionate as the situation permits.
"Can we have the lights down?" Mystery asks as Zoey banishes the TV screensaver, scrolling through her still-open and perpetually-added-to watchlist to find a movie to show him. She can hear the popcorn still blowing up in the microwave from the open kitchen door.
"Yeah, of course. What do you wanna watch? I can choose, or you can if you see something that looks interesting."
He shrugs and noses her hair as she pulls up the smart home app on her phone and pulls the slider for the dimmer switches to the left, letting the grey of the natural light illuminate the living room. Somehow, despite the high ceilings and open concept leaving plenty of space around the couch, it still manages to feel cozy with just the two of them, the background noises of a home being comfortably lived in, the glow of the screen and the rain, falling gently around them and their little bubble of the world safely outside. "Happy with anything."
Zoey hands him the remote, making sure it's the right way round because he doesn't always pay attention to such things. "Here, hon, look through while I get us some snacks." In the kitchen the microwave is shrilling, and she's already thinking about grabbing some drinks and sweets as well. Just a few little extras, like a box of cookies and a couple packages of pop-tarts and a bag of candy and a bowl each of ice cream. Unless they should share one. That'd be cute. Oh, but what if he's too cold for ice cream? Does she have time to make two hot fudge sundaes?
When she finally makes her way back, arms laden with treats, Mystery has opened a meditation-style video: a simple looping animation of a city skyline accompanied by gentle smooth jazz. Most of his body is swathed in a throw blanket wrapped so neatly around his torso that he looks like a croissant filled with lavender cream, and he's curled up snugly in the very corner of the arm of the sofa. Zoey is reminded of her childhood cats and how they would sleep as if preserved in amber for hours at a time.
She can wait till he's all the way asleep to pull up Blair Witch.