Hazel in the Demon's Den

"That sounds really fun but…isn't it a bit much?" Hazel asked hesitantly.

She wasn't sure how they got to this point. First Will happened to be awake in the middle of the night and called her out on her avoidance. Now he wanted to take her on vacation with him as if nothing had happened?

Will shrugged. "I wanted to take you somewhere anyway. You did say you wanted to travel, didn't you? I'm a frequent flyer; I can get you a discounted ticket. You would have to get a passport though."

A passport…Hazel could go anywhere in the world with a passport. Provided she could actually afford to get there. It would be the first step toward fulfilling her dream of traveling the globe and learning as much as she could.

Her mind went a million miles a minute at the thought of all the things she could see with a passport and someone paying her bills. She immediately felt ashamed of herself. She was thinking of herself like a sugar baby but she and Will didn't even have that kind of relationship.

How would you describe it? What was the word for a non-sexual sugar baby? Did such a thing even exist or was she the only one? She had no idea.

The terrible, selfish part of her thought it would be worth it to keep taking advantage of Will and his feelings for as long as possible so she could travel all over the place. But that wasn't fair. He was a nice person; he deserved better than that.

"Are you sure?" Hazel hedged. "I don't want to be a bother."

Will reached out and mussed her hair before letting out a big yawn. "It's no bother. Traveling is more fun with other people anyway. If it makes you feel any better, you can be the official photographer. The pictures you took in San Francisco were way better than anything I could do."

She flushed slightly at the first physical contact she had from him since he told her he liked her. The only people in her life who had ever done that were her father and Billy before Will came along. It actually felt pretty nice.

"Now that we're going to be travel buddies can you stop avoiding me?" Will asked sleepily. "I get that you're trying to focus but you could at least say hi or something so I don't feel like I have the plague."

"Sorry," Hazel mumbled, embarrassed at the way she had been treating him. "I think I'm done processing now."

"And?"

"And I'm still in love with a ghost. I'm sorry. You are really, really nice though and I like spending time with you. Out of everybody in that bar I'm glad I married you."

It was the truth. Anybody else would have totally taken advantage of her vulnerability. Will didn't though; proving his feelings toward her were genuine.

Hazel actually felt pretty sorry for him. It would suck to know your wife was in love with someone else and be unable to do anything about it. But it couldn't be helped. Like he said before, he knew what he was getting into when he married her.

"That's good enough for now," Will said sleepily. "Just come to bed, will you? I have to get up early."

Guilt prickled her conscience yet again. She couldn't stop screwing up, could she? Obediently, Hazel got back into bed next to him and pulled the covers over her head in shame.

===

Getting a passport was a lengthier process than Hazel would have anticipated. She had to go to a place that specifically did passport photos and was told to go to a different place once she had her birth certificate with her and fill out a form. Then it would take several weeks to process.

Because she wanted to make sure it was done in time, she immediately headed back to Will's house to get her birth certificate and made her way to town yet again. She even put a rush fee on it since Will insisted she use his card for this.

Hazel was exhausted from running back and forth but she still ended up going to the library and checking out some books and even a documentary on the Mayans. She wanted to learn as much about them as possible before heading down to see where they once lived.

Will found her reading in her favorite beanbag chair when he got home. She was taking a break from drawing because she had been working her hand too hard lately.

"Someone's excited about Mexico," he said with a smile. "Did you get your passport taken care of?"

She nodded. "Now all I have to do is wait."

He sat down on the recliner and loosened his tie. "Did you do anything else today?"

"When I wasn't running back and forth between here and town I was working on my comic and more commissions. I had to shut down the request option on my blog after a single weekend because I got way too many."

"I'm impressed. Feel free to take your time on mine."

Come to think of it…Will hadn't even said what he wanted for his commission. What would a man like him want a cartoony drawing for?

Then again, people of all sorts paid caricature artists in amusement parks and carnivals in order to see themselves looking ridiculous. Hazel had actually done that a few summers in high school in order to make some money for art supplies.

"What do you want for yours anyway?" she asked.

Just like that, they returned to their old pattern of quietly doing their own thing in the same room together interspersed with occasional conversation. It wasn't awkward at all, which surprised Hazel. Maybe they got all the awkwardness out in the middle of the night.

She couldn't help but wonder how much Will actually liked her. Either he didn't care too terribly much or he was very good at hiding it considering how much space he had given her to figure things out. And the fact that he didn't seem any more excited than usual at having her back.

It was as if she had never avoided him at all. What exactly was going through that man's head?