I didn’t say anything, because my brain refused to produce any dignified words. In fact, it kept squealing girlishly. And no wonder.
The man who stood in front of me was…
He was…
Flawless. Beautiful. Godlike.
Taller than me—so tall, I would have to stand on my toes and grab the back of his neck for support if I wanted to kiss him—not that I was thinking about kissing—but if…
Yeah, I was thinking about kissing him. Because he had the most kissable lips. Full and a bit pouty, and just so perfectly shaped. Smooth, too. And dark pink. What was it they said about the color of male lips…?
But before I could figure it out, I was distracted by the smoothly shaved skin of his chin and cheeks. Again, flawless, but with the barest hint of a shadow. And then his nose. Straight and noble, it complemented his face perfectly.
I opened my mouth, biting back a sigh when I looked up into his eyes. They were light brown, almost golden, and they seemed to shine with an internal light as he watched me back, openly curious.
He had the longest, most beautiful eyelashes I had ever seen.
And thick, well-shaped eyebrows. A broad, unlined forehead. And short hair that looked soft and just bristly enough to make me shiver if I ran my fingers through it.
I took a deep breath and released it with a shaky giggle.
“You’re not real,” I gasped out, while tears of laughter streamed down my face. “Oh my God, I did it. I fucking went and made myself crazy.”
He frowned and cocked his head to the side. I kept laughing until I got a stitch in my side, and then I doubled down, holding my stomach, and laughed some more, while the top of my head brushed against his sternum.
Which felt undeniably real.
I straightened, my laughter cut as if with a knife. I looked at him more closely while he watched me without blinking.
No, he couldn’t be real, could he? For one, he was too perfect. Not the exact male specimen I had imagined, but close enough. He looked like a male model advertising some high-end underwear. Add some black-and-white filter, a nice crotch-exposing pose, and voila.
And yet… All my senses kept telling me he was actually there, in front of me.
I inhaled and choked as the faint scent of a man’s fresh sweat, a luxurious aftershave, and then something sweet and honeyed hit my nose. My backyard didn’t smell like that. I certainly didn’t, either.
I looked up again, noticing how clearly I could see him. Dream visions were fuzzy and sort of airbrushed. I could see this man’s pores and the small beads of perspiration on his forehead. His nostrils flared slightly with every breath, and when he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbed.
Oh no.
He was real, then. As my horror dawned, I looked down, biting back a whimper when I saw his beautifully shaped pecs, and lower down, a six-pack, his chiseled abdominal muscles perfectly even, with deeper shadows pooling between them.
There was one last test. Because while reason said this divine male could not truly exist in my garden, my senses told me he was here. I saw him, heard his voice, and I smelled him. All that was left was to touch…
And lick him.
I gurgled with a sort of panicked, nervous laughter and hesitantly raised my hand. It hovered between us, shakily, and the man looked down at it, his breath fanning the hair above my forehead.
“Oh, right. Shaking hands,” he muttered, sounding a bit exasperated. “These human rituals are so complicated.”
He raised his right hand, positioned for a handshake. Without looking at his face, I bit my lip, knocked his hand aside, and laid my palm fully over his abs.
Jesus.
He gasped, his muscles flexing under my hand, and I jumped back, curling that palm into a fist.
Oh God, oh God, oh God.
He was real. And I had just touched his six-pack.
“Alice, why did you just…” he started, sounding breathless and confused.
I looked up, struggling to get my footing in this new situation. Because fondling a product of my imagination was one thing. But, as this touch just proved, this man was real. And I had just touched him inappropriately.
My cheeks burned with shame even as my body grew hot, while the imprint of his smooth, tanned skin lingered against my fingertips.
He had felt gorgeous. I would take that memory to the grave.
Scratch that. I would touch myself with that hand and come harder than ever.
“Oh no,” I moaned, taking another step back.
What was I doing? He was most likely someone who got lost and came to my yard to ask for directions, and I had not only assaulted him, but also kept fantasizing about him while he was still here!
“Alice, what’s wrong?” he asked, coming closer, concern marring his perfect face.
“Please stay back,” I said, raising an arm in front of me. “You really don’t want to come closer.”
He seemed so young, too. I was thirty-two, and he seemed to be… twenty-two? A sudden flash of terror swept through me, freezing my thoughts. What if he only looked like an adult and was actually underaged? Had I just… fantasized…
Oh God!
“Oh, right,” he said, smacking his forehead. “Forgive me! What was I thinking? Stupid, stupid. Of course, you are afraid I am a burglar, a mugger, a rapist, or another type of criminal. I apologize. I assure you, I am a good person. I have never committed a crime in my life. Please, believe me.”
His words shook me out of my idiotic stupor. Dear heavens, he was right. I took a deep breath, stamped down on my panic, and told myself I was a fucking adult and should get a grip.
I looked up with the firm intent of telling him to leave and never come back, but my thoughts got side-tracked.
“…What are you wearing?” I asked, sizing him up.
I should have realized something was wrong, but my brain was so fuzzy with the recent daydreams, and then confused when I thought he was too perfect to be real, that I didn’t truly pay attention.
But now I saw him with cold clarity.
His chest and stomach were bare—obviously. He wore light-blue jeans that sat low on his hips, and there was the faintest trail of light brown hair above the waistline… Right. I sharply averted my eyes from his bulge—I wasn’t looking, nope, not me—and looked up.
His forearms and the backs of his palms were furry. Not covered with manly, dark hair, but… fuzzy with white fur. I looked further up, a kind of determined curiosity making me stand still and take him in.
There. On his head. A pair of big, pink, floppy bunny ears.
I cocked my head to the side, just watching while my brain hunted for explanations, when one ear twitched.
They looked absolutely one-hundred percent real.
“I also have a tail,” he said helpfully.
I snorted, partly with laughter, partly with hysteria.
“Here, I’ll show you.”
He turned around and, yes, there it was. A fluffy ball of a tail, blindingly white, peeked out through a hole in his jeans. I stared, and it, too, twitched slightly. As if to show me it was not a prop.
He turned back to me, his face clear and hopeful, and I stared, wondering if it was a prank. But who would want to prank me? And in such an elaborate way, too?
“Are you a serial killer?” I asked when that possibility popped into my mind. “Dressing up as a bunny to make people feel safe, and then murdering them cruelly?”
He opened his mouth to speak, a wounded look on his face, and I shook my head.
“No, never mind. You wouldn’t tell me if you were, and besides, serial killers think too seriously of themselves to pull something like this. Right. This has to end. I’m gonna ask you to…”
I was about to tell him to go bother someone else, because I wasn’t in the mood for practical jokes, when Derek burst out through the patio door. I turned to him, too startled to react.
“The Easter bunny! Mom, it’s the Easter bunny! I finally caught him!”
I opened my mouth to object that no, it was just a weird pervert who played jokes on people, but stopped myself before the words could escape. For one, I couldn’t use the word pervert because then I would have to explain what it meant. And two…
How the hell would I explain that the stranger wearing fluffy bunny ears and a tail was not the Easter bunny when it was actually Easter? Derek still believed in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and all that magic stuff.
It felt cruel to take it away from him.
I looked back at the man and did a double take.
He looked different now. His ears had grown longer, and the hair on his head morphed into something softer and shorter. Fur. As I watched, it raced down his neck and broad shoulders, covering his skin with a white and brown fuzz. And his face… changed.
It gained a decidedly rabbit-like look while retaining the bright, sentient eyes and a certain human quality around the mouth.
His pink nose twitched, and I pressed a hand to my mouth, completely lost. What. The. Fuck?!
“Hey, buddy!” the stranger lit up, looking at my son. “Yes, you finally caught me. Boy, aren’t you clever! I did so well sneaking under your nose all those years, but you totally busted me today!”
Right, Derek was here. And that… creature… was pretending to be the Easter bunny. What if he was here to kidnap my son? Or hurt him? Over my dead body, I decided, finally overcoming my confusion.
I put my hands on my hips and strode forward, about to give him a piece of my mind. It was one thing to play jokes on me, but Derek was an innocent kid. And I would never let him hurt Derek, so…
The man-slash-rabbit turned to me, his face serious, and shook his head gently, raising a hand to stop me.
It did the trick. He looked so serious and suddenly commanding that I stopped, balling my hands into fists. I watched as Derek stood in front of the stranger, looking up and shielding his eyes from the sun that shone behind the stranger’s head.
The man-rabbit crouched in front of my son and extended a hand. Not a paw, I noticed. It was still a human hand, albeit covered with thick, white fur on the outer side.
“I got your letter, young man,” he said to Derek, his face completely serious. “You know how to ask for big things. Did you give Santa the same kind of trouble?”
Derek grinned and shook his head.
“Santa doesn’t read my letters. He brings me random stuff. So I thought I would try you.”
What the hell?
I stepped closer so I could react in case something happened, but remained silent. This was getting interesting.
We used to write the letters together, because Derek couldn’t yet do it himself. He usually asked Santa for a long list of presents, and I did my best, but my wages were never enough to deliver everything.
We never wrote to the Easter bunny, though. Derek must have written a letter himself, then.
Wait. Was I actually entertaining the thought that this was the Easter bunny? He wasn’t real!
“So, did you bring him? For real?” Derek asked, bouncing with excitement. “Where is he?”
He glanced at me and then craned his neck to look behind me, as if looking for someone.
“I’m working on that,” the stranger said. “For now, you will have to find the rest.”
I opened my mouth to protest, because I hadn’t yet hidden Derek’s present in the garden, but the stranger, as if knowing what I wanted to say, threw me another quelling look.
So I stood there, fuming, and protected my son’s belief in magic. One must have one’s priorities straight, right?
Derek set out to look for the present. I moved closer to the man in case he wanted to follow my son around and grab him, but he stayed put, watching Derek’s progress.
“There are presents for him, don’t worry,” he said, glancing at me. “I might not know much, but this is my job. I do it well.”
“So you’re… the Easter bunny,” I said weakly. “I find that hard to believe.”
He shot me a smile, which lit up his strange face so much I had to blink rapidly.
“I will have to convince you, then,” he said.
I shook my head, watching as Derek darted inside the garden shed. I had once hidden a present there. A moment later, he came out, his hands empty.
“How did you do this?” I asked the man, pointing at his furry chest. “How did you change so fast?”
“It’s a skill,” he replied. “Comes with the job.”
I huffed, looking at Derek, who was prowling by the bush that had shuddered earlier.
“The job being…?”
“I already told you,” he said, stepping toward Derek, who emerged with a shout of triumph, clumsily holding a big, colorfully packaged box. “I’m called Easter Bunny.”
