“You said that, and just assumed I’d go along,” Nathaniel said.

Jason aimed the grin at him. “Won’t you?”

Nathaniel smiled, shrugged, and nodded.

“Then let the flirting begin,” Jason said.

I was a little nervous about what outrageously might mean, but I’d take silly and a little embarrassing over them being sad. But as usual the flirting confused me.

When Jason had said he and Nathaniel would flirt outrageously, I thought they’d meant flirting within our little group, but when the waiter came to our booth, the plans changed. The waiter started out very sure of himself: “I’m sorry that no one’s been to your table.” I was sitting beside Nathaniel, so I got a very good look at what happened to the waiter’s face when Nathaniel looked up at him. That’s all he did, just raise that face, and those eyes, and stare directly at the waiter-who went from reasonably intelligent and competent to stammering. No, I’m not joking. The waiter began to stammer, a lot of uhs, and hmms, and words not in their right order. Nathaniel, having noticed the reaction, smiled at him, which didn’t help at all. The waiter finally, in desperation, said, “Drinks, drinks, can I bring you drinks?”

“Yes,” I said, we all said, “drinks would be good.”

He took our drink orders while staring at Nathaniel, which meant he didn’t write anything down, which led me to wonder if we’d actually get what we ordered, but we were all merciful and let him flee the table for somewhere safe from Nathaniel’s charm.

Jason turned to me and Micah. “Can he flirt with the waiter?”

“No,” we said in unison. Micah said, “Please don’t, because we’ll either get great service or terrible service, and we need to get Anita back to work.”

Then, of course, it being me, I felt compelled to ask, “Do you want to flirt with the waiter?”

“Before I was with the two of you I would have, but I know it makes you uncomfortable.”

“Which is why I asked for him,” Jason said.

I looked at Micah, and we had a moment of what I thought was understanding, but being the girl I couldn’t trust to silent communication. I had to say something. “Do we take some of the fun out of things for Nathaniel?”

Nathaniel answered, “No, I would never trade being able to flirt with strangers for living at our house with you guys. When I could flirt with whoever I wanted, I wasn’t very happy; now I’m happy.”

I kissed him, gently, since I was wearing bright lipstick. His mouth came away with a faint hint of red. Jason said, “Waiter is coming this way; if you want to play with him, you can’t be hanging all over Nathaniel.”

I didn’t argue with Jason, because if anyone knew the rules for teasing people, it was him. By the time the waiter got to us, we were just sitting there. He had our drink orders correct, which meant we might get good service after all.

He took our orders while looking at Nathaniel as if the rest of us didn’t exist. He spoke to us, even wrote down what we said, but he never looked at anyone else. Nathaniel didn’t do anything but just looked pleasantly at him. It had taken me a while to figure out that was flirting, too. Just letting another human being know that you “see” them is perhaps the most important part of flirting. Nathaniel had taught me that not all flirting is about sex. You flirt, in a way, with friends, family, even a job interviewer; you want them to like you, or you want them to know that you are listening, that you care. I’d learned that I wasn’t very good at letting anyone know I liked them unless I was trying to date them. Learning to flirt in a more broad sense had made me a more pleasant person all around, but then it would have been hard to be less pleasant.

There was silence around the table, and I realized that everyone was looking at me; finally even the waiter looked. I blinked up at him. “I’m sorry, what?”

“What do you want to order?” Micah said.

I had no idea. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what I want.”

The waiter’s eyes flicked back to Nathaniel, then at me, as he said, “I’ll give you a few minutes, then check back.”

I smiled at him encouragingly. He smiled, gave me a brilliant smile that lit his face up. I think it was only because I was sitting close enough to Nathaniel so he could flash that smile at both of us, but I smiled back, and I noticed that he was tanned and his hair was almost black, straight and tucked into a short ponytail, with a long wisp of hair escaping to trace the edge of a triangular face. His eyes were dark, and sparkling with his desire to catch Nathaniel’s attention. He was cute, and that was the problem with this kind of flirting. I couldn’t figure out how to let someone know I “saw” them without really seeing them. I couldn’t pretend to notice someone. I either noticed them, or I didn’t. He smiled flashed that brilliant white smile in his tan and left me to my menu.

“I’m glad we didn’t bet on this one,” Jason said, “I’d have lost.”

Nathaniel looked at him. “You thought he was gay.”

“The way he reacted to you-yes.”

I was studying my menu, trying to remember what I’d wanted. Some kind of salad, I think. Or had it been the pulled pork sandwich? That was always good.

“But he smiled at both of you, so I’m betting bi.”

“Pulled pork sandwich. I’m going to back to work, so I don’t have to eat light. But the waiter wasn’t smiling at me, he’d noticed he had only looked at Nathaniel and I was the only one close enough to let him look at me and still see Nathaniel.”

“You made him see you when you looked up and smiled,” Nathaniel said.

“Not on purpose,” I said.

“We’ve all started adopting some of Nathaniel’s charms,” Micah said.

I looked at him. “You, too?”

He nodded, smiled, and looked down, as if he were a little embarrassed. “I’ve found that a little charm helps a lot in politics, and you want people to like you; no one is better at getting people to like them than these two.” He ended with a wry tone and a look halfway between amused and disgusted, but ended with a smile.

Jason batted blue eyes at him. “Aw, that’s so sweet; you’ve been taking lessons in luuvv from us.”

Micah scowled at him, and I realized it was a look more reminiscent of me. Did all couples begin to pick up mannerisms from each other? I knew I’d picked up things from Jean-Claude, but I was his human servant, which meant that personality and psychic gifts literally mingled, or were contagious. But then I was Micah’s Nimir-Ra, leopard queen, and Nathaniel was my animal to call, so maybe it was the metaphysics still. I’d learned that my initial attraction to Micah had been vampire powers-mine, not Jean-Claude’s. The powers of Belle Morte’s line were lust and love, with the caveat for most of them that you could only control someone to the degree you were willing to be controlled. For me it truly was a double-edged sword, and with Nathaniel and Micah I’d been willing to be cut to the heart. By the time I’d made Jason my wolf to call, I’d had more control so we were still just friends. Though I’d bound him to me during a crisis, by accident, just reaching out for the metaphysical help that was closest, I hadn’t made us fall In Love with each other. I was relieved and I think so was he.

“Do you really not understand that he was flirting with both of us?” Nathaniel asked.

I gave him a look. “He could smile in your direction looking at me, without staring at you. I think he’d noticed he was only staring at you and it finally embarrassed him.”

Nathaniel looked across me to Micah. “You saw it. What do you think?”

He took my hand and kissed it, gently. “I think she doesn’t see herself the way we do.”

I tried to pull my hand back. “I see myself first thing in the morning, and trust me, I don’t roll out of bed looking that good.”

He held my hand tighter. “Haven’t we proved by now that we find you fabulous in the morning?”