Author's Note: I appreciate so much the comments I have received. I hope that you all who read this are enjoying the story thus far, and will continue to read what I write. I would like to thank my editor End of Story for help with my improper use of words. Also thanks to the rest of those people, you know who you are. Yes, I would name them, but you want to read a story, not my notes.
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Chapter 15: Kitchen
I awoke to the sounds of...clattering? No, not clattering... Rattling? Clanging? Clinking? I give up. Sounds woke me up! I rolled over and looked at the alarm clock. The red digital display was proudly showing the time, it said, "12pm." Joy. Six hours sleep may be enough for some, but getting home that early in the morning and realizing I had forgotten to buy sheets for Lucretia's bed made me cranky. That's why normal people make lists, so their poor overworked brains don't have to deal with that crap! The...sounds continued, and seemed to be coming from the kitchen.
I got up and started to run in place lightly for a minute or two to get warmed up then began to stretch. I thought about what happened last night while doing this. I hated the fact that my friends and I had that standoff. I went over it again in my mind and saw several ways I could have gone about things differently, but I knew that was pointless. Normally we go over our mistakes to learn from them. I didn't see much I could learn from that situation last night. Then again, I'm not the brightest bulb in the box, so maybe I missed something that could help. I need to talk to William; he would probably get one hell of a shock meeting my new roommate! I went downstairs, walking past the kitchen to get to the basement and poked my head through the doorway to see what was making the noise.
What the heck?
I saw my succubus, sitting at the kitchen table, sorting through gold coins. No, sorting is the wrong word. She was stacking them in little towers to see how far up she could get them before they fell over! Even as I was watching, one of the towers started to lean, and then tipped to the table making that odd sound I was hearing upstairs. Her tail seemed to lash in minor frustration as she promptly pushed the coins aside, clearing a space in front of her. Then she selected one of them, looked it over, and swallowed it!
"Hey!" I shouted, stepping into the room. She started in her chair, knocking another tower over causing some of the coins to roll onto the floor. She looked up in surprise as I loomed over her and grabbed her chin. She started to struggle but I held on determinedly as I started prying her mouth open. "Don't you eat those, gold is not good for you! Trying to poison yourself?" She began growling as I hooked my fingers behind her jawbone and pulled.
"Let go!" she snarled.
"Open wide and say Ah." I replied.
"I'll bite you again!"
"Don't you dare you jumped up excuse for a fruit bat." I muttered.
I fished around in her mouth and...there! I found it just to the back of her tongue near her uvula. I got two fingers on it and pulled it out, her saliva dripped from it like clear syrup...EW!
"What was that about Greg?" She asked hotly. I wiped off the coin on the corner of my sleep shirt and set it back on the table. I looked at the pile of gold and then it hit me. There was a lot there! I remember showing Mother the jug and saying I wanted the value of it. She must have misunderstood, or she purposefully misunderstood. I only met her once but that sounds like her. I had maybe, $500 or so, in change in that milk jug I showed her. I think she took the value to mean the WEIGHT of the jug. I was now looking at a plastic milk jug filled with gold coins shaped like quarters, nickels, dimes, and no pennies. Huh. I guess golden pennies were too much to ask for.
"This is my gold right?" I asked.
"Obviously." Lucretia replied in a huff.
"Then shouldn't you ask my permission before eating my gold?"
She thought about it, and I saw her black eyes narrow. Then a sheepish expression crossed her features. Her tongue extended towards the table and I had a moment of shock. It was long, pink and pointed, probably as long as my hand and wrist. It was also very thick; I wondered how it fit in her mouth! A moment later her throat started making convulsions and several more gold coins fell out on the table! This was followed by a few odd looking rocks and what looked like a white agate of some sort. Lucretia quickly picked up the rocks and the white agate and swallowed them again.
"What the hell was that?" I asked, feeling a little green around the gills.
"The contents of my crop." She said plainly.
"The what of the what?" I asked faintly.
"I use stones and such to help grind the food I eat. It fits in my crop." She patted the lower part of her neck with a clawed hand. "I looked at some of the stones here, but most are too brittle. I tried one of the coins and it seems to work well."
I was still trying to wrap my head around the whole "crop" thing, but then the original thought came back to my head. "Gold is poison to us, like lead. I take it it's not poisonous to you?"
"Nope." She looked down, then scratched at the base of one of her horns and wouldn't meet my eyes. "Sorry about taking your things Greg. I thought you wouldn't mind."
"Really?" I sounded unconvinced.
I was quiet, waiting for her to say something. She squirmed in her seat. Silence, wonderful weapon commonly used by wives, angry mothers, and smart schoolteachers! The silence grew, and I knew she had to be feeling uncomfortable with it. Finally...
"Okay! I didn't even think and just did it all right? Are you happy now?" she grumbled.
I chuckled in my throat and then slid the coins back over to her. "Thanks for asking, you can put those back in your crop, or whatever you call it." I watched in queasy fascination as she took the handful of gold coins and swallowed them in a gulp. That's just...weird! I wonder if she has to actually chew her food before she...
Ah well, that's a thought for another time. I started to head down the stairs.
