As promised, here’s an excerpt from Notice. I decided not to go with the opening because anyone can see that with the “look inside” feature on Amazon, so I’m taking a scene from the middle of the book. It’s one of my favorites–the scene not where Varian and Josh first meet, but the scene where they realize there is more between them than college suite-mates. At this point, Varian is very much in the closet and Josh is very much openly gay. Varian has been resisting the feeling that has been slowly creeping over him that he likes Josh in ways that go against his decision to focus on his dragon-lord responsibilities and not get involved with anyone, especially a human. This scene is a flashback, coming at a time when they’re about to face danger, and are thinking back to the beginning of their relationship. It’s from Varian’s point of view.
Here tis:
Things changed in the spring of that year. One Sunday night, I came back to school with a sprained ankle after spending the weekend at home. I’d gotten injured while helping to rescue a young dragon who’d managed to impale herself on a dead pine tree, ripping a hole right through her wing. She was safely underground and mending when I headed back to campus. I was tired and cold. I hadn’t realized how badly I’d hurt myself when I’d fallen out of the tree in human form until I took off my boot and my ankle started to swell.
At two in the morning, I lay on the couch in the suite’s common room with my foot up on pillows. I was trying to do some neglected homework where my light wouldn’t bother my roommate, and wishing I had some ice for my ankle and something to drink. But I didn’t have the energy to face the pain of getting up.
When I heard the suite door open, I admit I was disappointed that Josh came in and not one of my friends. I wasn’t in the mood for his foolishness.
He looked down at me over the back of the couch. “What did you do to yourself, silly boy?” he asked, bending to fluff my pillows like a mother would.
“Oh, I fell hiking today,” I said. “It’s just sprained. Leave it alone.”
“It needs ice,” he said, going over to the refrigerator we all shared and groping around in the freezer section. “Is the pain bad? Have you taken anything?”
“No,” I said as he came back and put a plastic bag filled with ice cubes over my throbbing joint. “Ah, that feels good,” I added, lying back. “Thanks.”
“I can give you something that’ll make you forget you have an ankle,” he said, looking down at me again.
“Ah, no,” I said. “If you’d grab me a soda, I’d really appreciate it.”
He brought me a cola and then unlocked his door and disappeared. When he came back, he had two reddish pills in his hand.
“Yeah, no thanks,” I said.
“Ibuprofen. Honest.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Fine. Swell up all night if you’d like.”
I took the pills out of his hand. They looked like ibuprofen, but I was no expert. My ankle was really throbbing. I sighed and downed them with a swallow of soda. “Thanks, Josh.”
“You’re welcome.” To my surprise, he settled down on the end of the couch next to my foot.
“You don’t have to sit with me,” I said, gesturing to my book on Queen Elizabeth I that I was supposed to have gotten through over the weekend.
He grinned. “Are you kidding? I want to see the great history major get high.”
“Josh, what did you give me?”
He just grinned wider.
“Damn you, if—”
“Relax. I told you—ibuprofen.”
“Then why are you grinning like that?”
“No idea.”
Suspecting I was doomed, I made to kick him with my good foot, which got him laughing. Within five minutes, a deliciously warm and pleasant feeling began creeping over me, dulling the aching throb. Queen Elizabeth I couldn’t possibly compete, and I let her slide to the floor. Josh laughed again.
“God damn you,” I said, yawned, turned my face into the pillow, and slipped into a deep, peaceful, and very floaty sleep.
I didn’t wake until the suite came to life the next morning. To my surprise, I found Josh waking up at my feet. I took a lot of ribbing from the other guys about that, but it was in fun, and I was kind of glad Josh hadn’t drugged me and left me alone all night. It became a joke between us—he insisting it was really ibuprofen, me insisting it had been Rohypnol or something, and neither giving in.
It wasn’t until now that I began to suspect he was right, and my sudden peace and easing of pain had been because my body recognized the presence of the one whose soul was bound to mine, even if our minds and bodies didn’t know it yet.
You can get it here: https://www.amazon.com/Notice-M-Raiya-ebook/dp/B07GSHKDLQ/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1549571518&sr=8-2&keywords=M.+raiya+NOtice