"Stanley, wake up~"
Stanley woke up to the sound of a familiar soothing voice. Fluttering his eyes open he found himself in the arms of his girlfriend now untangled from the sheets and practically glowing with happiness. It took only a moment for his brain to be rebooted and his memories restored causing him to groan.
"How long did we go at it?"
"Two hours and forty two minutes."
Damn, he wasn't even able to make it to three hours?
'I must have been more tired than I thought.'
"How long was I out?"
"Five hours and twelve minutes."
"What time is it?"
"Almost four in the evening."
He hummed while sitting up causing Ezraphel to let go and give him space which was odd enough for him to notice since usually she was reluctant to let him go from snuggling.
"What?"
Ezraphel sat on her knees with a pitiful expression as she wrung her hands with anxiety.
"Stanley" she began hesitantly "a-are we…good?"
Stanley blinked as he stared at her with a neutral expression however in his silence his mind raced.
Then after what felt like hours he answered "no."
The Lilim immediately deflated "o-oh."
"In fact, I don't think I will ever fully trust you again" he admitted bluntly.
As he finished the Lilim's expression became miserable with the beginning of tears showing at the corner of her eyes. Seeing this Stanley suppressed the wince and reflexive need to backtrack and comfort her.
'Not this time' he thought fighting his 'natural' instincts and asserted his sense of self through the one thing that has always separated humanity from the beasts, logic and reasoning.
So he continued "but that's par for the course with all my relationships."
Ezraphel paused her tears remaining unshed as she gave a confused expression "h-huh?"
"Ez, I haven't fully trusted anyone since High School" he raised his hand listing off names "not my friends, not my family and not even myself. So don't look at it as if you've lost my trust because you never had it completely to begin with."
As he finished his peace Ezraphel stared at him with mouth agape and moving yet words failed her until eventually she summoned up the wherewithal to respond to his frankly ludicrous claim.
"That…does not make me feel better at all!" she exclaimed.
"It's not supposed to" he shot back "it's supposed to make you understand a fundamental aspect of myself."
"Fundamental aspect?"
"Yes"
"…I don't believe you."
"Why?"
"Because…" and he did not elaborate further as if that's supposed tp answer everything.
Ezraphel felt her eyes twitch. The idea that her Stanley never trusted her fully to begin with was just false.
'Unless…'
Moving past the cloud of despair and confusion Ezraphel came to a conclusion and through that could not help but ask a question.
"Are you saying all this to make me feel better?"
"…no."
At that her expression turned dubious "are you sure?"
"Yes I'm sure!"
"Because what you're saying doesn't make any sense."
"Really? It's pretty simple to me" he replied with a shrug.
"I can sense your emotions Stanley" she informed.
"I don't see what that has to do with anything" he replied calmly without missing a beat.
"I…you…" once again words failed her for a moment as did her powers of empathy eventually causing her shoulders to deflate "can you please explain?"
Stanley pursed his lips before he replied "you know what? No."
Ezraphel recoiled "no?"
"No, I'm not going to give a TED talk on the inner workings of my feelings. Just know that my feelings about you haven't changed. I still love you and it's not because I'm technically 'stuck' with you" he reached over to hold her hands as he held her gaze steadily "even though you can be a pain in the ass and make stupid decisions that may send my blood pressure up I will always love you Ezraphel."
There are certain parts of that speech she would not like if taken at face value however she could also sense that he wasn't really have malicious intent. He truly believed that telling her she did not have his complete trust was somehow a good thing…and damn her she was eating it up.
With that Ezraphel internally sighed 'I'll take it, I suppose.'
On the outside she asked "then where does that leave us?"
At this he pursed his lips for a moment before replying with "not gonna lie I'm gonna be scrutinizing every move you make from now on. I don't care if this incident is a one off I will always assume you're hiding something from me for whatever reason so expect to be randomly grilled with questions every time I feel like you're up to something."
Ezraphel blinked as she digested his words "that sounds…"
"Unreasonable?"
"Unnecessary" she replied with a frown of dissatisfaction.
"And whose fault is that?"
"I said I was sorry!"
"Apologizing isn't going to fix this Ez" he retorted "sex isn't going to fix this" he further emphasized "you're not gonna find a spell that can solve this."
"I-"
"And I don't want you to try!" he added cutting her off from any bright ideas causing her brows furrow in consternation. Seeing this he took a breath his gaze softening a bit "this is one of those things that doesn't have an easy fix, we're just gonna have to live with it."
It's not as if he wanted this either but if there was one thing this incident managed to accomplish it was creating a reference point for his mind to incite his paranoia about Ezraphel going forward. Now no matter what he will always believe that she's keeping secrets. As he said before it was unreasonable but then there's always that question of what if?
For a long moment Ezraphel remained silent her gaze leaving his to look away before closing her eyes. When she opened them they no longer held despair or hesitance. She straightened up slouched posture causing Stanley to tilt his head upwards to meet her gaze.
"Alright then Stanley, challenge accepted."
"Excuse me?"
Her smile widened, her chest puffed out and wings fluttered as she continued "you claim this is not a problem that cannot be fixed, challenge accepted."
Finally catching on to what she was implying he closed eyes with a groan "no, no."
"Yes!"
With a tug of their still connected hands she pulled him into her embrace. With a yelp his face landed on her naked chest as his body slumped forward. With his face in her cleavage he forced his head up to glare at her. In response Ezraphel gave him a cheeky grin devoid of any doubt, sadness or hesitance to which he closed his eyes.
"Whatever."
"Hee~ hee~" the Lilim cheered.
The moment was promptly interrupted by the rumbling of his stomach causing Stanley to grunt having remembered he had not eaten since breakfast the day before.
"Looks like someone's hungry~" Ezraphel sang.
'Why do you have to say it like that?'
"Yeah, yeah" he grumbled separating from her and making his way off the bed "I'm taking a shower."
"I'll join you."
With his back turned towards her he gave her a look over his shoulder "we're not doing a quickie Ez."
"Ooh drats" She snapped her finger with faux annoyance.
Stanley opened the door to find not the normal bathroom he used earlier that day but the extravagant bath house primarily used by Ezraphel. Before he could say anything he felt the familiar weight of a pair of breasts rested on his head followed by dainty arms wrapping around his chest.
"What did I just say?" he grumbled.
"I know" she answered "no sex but that doesn't mean I can't still wash your back~"
"You and I both know that's not going to happen."
"Oh ye of little faith" the Lilim huffed playfully "then how about this, I promise I'll have dinner ready just in time for Natalie to arrive. Let's bet on it."
"That's a sucker's bet" he grumbled "also, Natalie's not here?"
"She left earlier this morning."
Stanley hummed for a moment before the thought occurred "how did she leave?"
"Hm, well~" she dragged out and Stanley felt a pit of gorwing indignation form in his stomach.
One Bath That Wasn't Just A Bath Later…
"Son of a bitch!"
Not only was Natalie gone but she also took his car and the Golem with her as well. Surprisingly he wasn't as angry as he normally should be in most other circumstances. As a matter of fact he only felt the kind of annoyance one would feel if they checked the refrigerator only to realize they were out of soda because they forgot to stock up when they went grocery shopping.
"Annoying but it's whatever" he thought to himself as he plopped down on the sofa.
He closed his eyes 'it's not bothering me…it's not bothering me…'
His eyes opened as he scowled "it's bothering me. It's bothering me a lot."
'Natalie YOU BITCH!'
He exhaled swinging his body to lie across on the sofa for a few minutes.
"…what should I do now?"
According to Ezraphel it's going to take some time before dinner so he needed a way to waste time until then. Obvious answer was to go back to his office but the thought of getting back in that chair and continuing where he left off after upwards of 12 hours doing that the day before made him cringe. Besides now that he's on the couch he didn't really feel like moving so whatever he's about to do had to be from that spot.
Stanley started looking around for something but did not find his tablet and he knew for a fact that his phone and laptop were back in his office so no browsing the internet or doom-scrolling for him right now. At least that's the case unless he got up off his ass for a few short minutes to make the trip to his office and retrieve the devices.
'But I already sat down and I'm comfortable' he thought to himself.
Then he could just call out to Ezraphel and have them delivered via magic.
"…not an option" he muttered to himself feeling a sting to his pride at the idea of bothering Ezraphel due to his inherent laziness in this moment.
'Guess I'll just have to make do with I have in this room' he looked around as best he could from his position lying on the couch.
Eventually it became clear that he did not have a lot of options and scowled "fuck, that's annoying" he grunted before his eyes went to the TV.
'Should I just watch something?'
He almost snorted. He didn't feel like watching anything right now and was just as likely to spend the entire time flipping through the catalogues of various streaming services than committing himself to watch something.
"Today's just full of surprises."
First brushing off his sister's 'theft' of his car then willingly rejecting the idea of sitting in his office playing videogames and now he's not even feeling up to watching a show or movie.
'And since I literally just woke up I can't even take a nap.'
This time he sat up and rested his forearms on his thighs "what the hell is wrong with me?"
If he were to describe it then Stanley would say that he's experiencing one of those days. Rarely so often Stanley would get in a mood where he would deviate from most if not all his usual established patterns of operation. These inexplicable mood swings were not frequent but left an impact on his memories solely based on how bizarre it was in hindsight.
He remembered the last time he got into such a mood he ended up taking a drive to the city. There was neither a particular reason for why he did it nor was there a rational explanation for why his mood turned out like that on rare occasions. Not that he put much stock into finding out anyway as he didn't hate it despite his general disposition.
All he could really do was acknowledge the weirdness and move on.
With that said his eyes eventually found something he wasn't expected "huh, so that's where she left it."
Not everyone was built for the modern hermit lifestyle like Stanley. Frankly the fact that Natalie managed to last as long as she did could only be attested to her learning magic from Ezraphel and hanging around that Golem while exploring the various pocket dimensions in the house. Whenever she's not training with Ezraphel or exploring spirit realms she liked to cause him grief in a number of ways. One such way was that ever so often she would sneak into his office and steal his videogames.
He says 'steal' but in her defense she actually asked him before taking it because he took these things very seriously. Unfortunately despite essentially treating his office like a public library of sorts she didn't take it seriously enough to return the damn things whenever she's done with them. Case in point his Nintendo Switch was sitting on the entertainment center next to the TV.
"…I'll let it go this time."
And so with some reluctance Stanley got off the couch to set up his console and play some games. At some point his sister and Golem A returned with the former joining him for a Mario Party session while the latter wordlessly stuck around for a bit before leaving to help Ezraphel in the kitchen.
Later…
"Dinner's ready!"
"About damn time" Stanley muttered as he closed the game.
As always Mario Party turned out to be an absolute mess of RNG bullshit and his suggestion for them to switch to Smash Bros was summarily denied. It wasn't as if Natalie was winning either he was pretty sure she was comforting herself with his suffering.
'Seriously fuck that game, no wonder I stopped playing.'
The two arrived to find the table being set by Ezraphel and A the latter of whom froze at the sight of him. He deliberately ignore her or at least he tried only to receive a dope slap to the back of the head causing him to glare at his sister who gave a stern glare and gestured with a motion of her head to the Golem who was about to leave.
"Hey" he called out causing the Golem to flinch and turn towards him "just wanted to say sorry for the uh, interrogation yesterday" he glanced to the side for a bit "I wasn't in a good place."
The Golem still looking a bit hesitant nodded at him at the same time Ezraphel came in the room having apparently overheard his apology.
"I'm glad you apologized Stanley it would have been a bit awkward considering I set a plate out for A this evening. She will be joining us for dinner for the foreseeable future. I hope that isn't an issue Stanley."
"Why would it be?"
He literally just apologized.
"Just making sure~"
After setting the table and taking their seats they all began to dig into the meal. It took roughly ten minutes into said meal before Natalie decided to start a conversation.
"So Stan's not telling me anything about how you guys made up so do you mind enlightening me Ez?"
Stan didn't even bother acknowledging the conversation taking place to focus on the succulent meal before him.
"Stanley and I made love" the Lilim informed happily with a healthy blush.
"Yeah he said as much but I need details. That can't be all there is right?"
"You would be correct."
"So how'd you manage to pull it off. I can't imagine him being in the mood after what happened."
"Why don't you mind your own damn business huh?" Stanley snapped
"Hell no" Natalie retorted "I am way too curious and invested in this relationship. It's like watching a TV drama playing out in real time!"
"…"
He really hates that she's right about that.
"At least wait until I'm not in the damn room" he grumbled.
"Nope" she answered popping the 'P' before looking to Ezraphel "So spill girl, how the hell did you seduce him into going along with it?"
"I didn't seduce him, Stanley came to me."
"Oh really?"
"Yes, he came to an epiphany and confronted me in my hour of need" she paused directing a cheerful gaze towards the curious Wight "and that is all I will say on the matter."
"Seriously?" Natalie looked between the couple "you're going to leave me hanging too?"
"Let it go Natalie" A spoke.
Ezraphel's gaze snapped to the Golem as she pointed at her.
"HA! I KNEW YOU COULD SPEAK NORMALLY!"