Despite Ezraphel holding back the rain it still took some time for the couple to arrive at their destination and true to Ezraphel’s word the rain came back with a vengeance. Stanley had his friends’ private discord up and running on his phone the whole time to keep appraised of the situation. Turns out Ezraphel and Stanley weren’t the only ones getting fucked by the weather. None of them expected it save for Liam but he’s the outlier as the only one of them who actually watches local news, freaking weirdo.

“We’re here.”

The Airbnb that everyone chipped in to rent for the weekend was a modest 4 bedroom house with two bathrooms, a kitchen, a dining room and living room. Truly nothing special save for the fact that it was relatively cheap, close to their destination and the owner put the place up on a virtual tours site so they knew what they were getting into beforehand. Its only flaw was the lack of a driveway and the walkway that seemed extra long especially in the rain.

“This is going to suck” he muttered.

“I could teleport us to the door” Ezraphel suggested.

“Too conspicuous” he gave her a once over “and you’re not going out in the rain in that.”

Ezraphel looked down at herself. She was wearing a black halter top and a pair of tight jeans.

“Can you conjure up a hoodie?”

With a snap of her fingers both of them now wore matching hoodies. His was grey while hers was pink and accentuated her curves.

“Good enough.”

Hopping out with his newly acquired umbrella which was in fact his umbrella he left at home. Stanley retrieved the luggage from the back with help from Ezraphel whom he couldn’t help but notice wasn’t getting wet despite the rain clearly hitting her.

“Can’t be completely dry Ez”

“Trust me” she winked.

“…fine.”

The two locked the door and hustled to the doorway where they entered the room.

“I already told them I’m coming in so just wait here until I give the signal.”

“Okay” she gave him a thumbs up.

Taking a breath Stanley walked into the living room proper and seeing it populated by four people he was now very familiar with. The first was Liam a fairly tall and rather handsome man of Indian descent with short cut dark hair, a 5 o’clock shadow and a strong jawline. Beside him leaning on his shoulder was his fiancée Amelia, a tall, pretty woman with fair skin, red shoulder length hair and a smattering of freckles. They were on the couch with the TV on though it was being clearly showing content being casted off one of their laptops.

On the other side of the common room sequestered by herself on a single seat sofa and ignoring the world around her to pay attention on her phone was the only other woman of the group, Kendall. She stood out from the rest as she adopted the punk rock style which included wearing dark clothes, using dark makeup, putting in green highlights in her hair and having several piercings in her ears and a single nose ring.

Away from the common room near the kitchen and seated around the dining table were the final two members of the group Kendrick and Jamie. Kendrick was a tall lanky black man with short dread locks wearing a pair of blue square frame glasses. Jamie was a shorter man with shoulder length straight black hair, a trimmed beard and visible tribal tattoos on his exposed forearms. Both men had their laptops out and were engaged in what seemed to be a FPS videogame from Stanley’s observation.

So far none of them seem to have noticed him something Stanley immediately fixes by shouting out an appropriate greeting.

“WUBBA LUBBA DUB DUB PUSSIES!”

The reaction was immediate with everyone in the room casting their attention to him…and kept staring. Now Stanley wasn’t expecting them to give a standing ovation and break out the bubbly at his appearance but the way how they were staring was staring to get to him.

“What?”

“Stan?” asked Liam.

“Who else would it be?” he walked further in the room.

“What happened to you?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You look…different.”

Stanley scowled at first before realizing that he completely forgot he was no longer the greasy unkempt manlet he was when they last met and since he didn’t put pics of himself online none of them were aware of his change.

With that in mind he straightened himself up “yeah well I made some changes since we last met” he licked his lips.

“But why though?” Jamie asked the pertinent question.

“I got a girlfriend.”

The bearded man raised an eyebrow “that’s a bold claim.”

“True” Kendrick agreed.

“What, you don’t believe me?”

“Yeah” Kendrick nodded “I straight up don’t believe you.”

“Show pics or it’s not true” Amelia piped in.

“I’ll do you one better” he then looked over his shoulder while secretly fishing out his phone “you can come out now.”

Ezraphel poked her head out a bit from the frame startling a few of them which was nothing compared to when she strutted into the room, long legs making easy strides, swinging her wide hips and giving them all a dazzling smile. Walking next to Stanley Ezraphel giggled a bit when he snaked a hand around her waist and leaned into his embrace.

“Guys I’d like you to meet my real girlfriend, Ezraphel.”

“Hi~” Ezraphel waved and at least a few of them waved back.

They looked at the stunning woman with varying degrees of shock with one of them (Kendrick) whispering not so lowly “holy shit.”

“Ez meet Liam, Amelia, Kendalll, Kendrick and Jamie” he pointed out each of the now shocked men and women.

“It’s nice to finally meet all of you” Ezraphel stepped forward “Stanley hasn’t said much about any of you.”

Her words seem to knock them out of their stupor with Amelia turning her gaze to the man “Stanley?”

“Don’t even think about it.”

“But Stanley is so cute though~” Kendalll joined in mockingly.

“I think so too” Ezraphel added earning a look which she ignored.

“See, your girlfriend agrees” Amelia smirked.

“I’m warning you” he pointed at Liam “call me that and I will take my anger out on your fiancé” he met the man’s eyes “cock shots all day Liam and you know I’ll do it.”

To that the man winced his amusement turning to mild concern “babe please don’t antagonize the pissed off manlet with a custom full auto M4 and IRL aimbot capabilities…pretty please.”

He capped off the plea by clasping his hands and Amelia after thinking about it for a while eventually granted her fiancé mercy “very well but as for me” and as she met his gaze she bluntly stated “I’m still calling you Stanley.”

Stanley narrowed his eyes “then you have chosen death.”

Her reply was to meet his challenging gaze with one of her own “bring all 5 feet of you little man.”

Challenge Accepted.

The standoff was broken up by Ezraphel giggling at their antics. There was an almost palpable loss of tension that was felt by everyone as her melodious voice filled the void of silence and the muted rainfall in the background.

Stanley recovered first and made an announcement “Ez and I are claiming one of the bedrooms for us. The rest of you will have to figure out the bunking situations amongst yourselves.”

There were four bedrooms total in the house. Liam and Amelia already claimed one so that left two bedrooms to be shared amongst three people.

Kendalll was quick to respond by looking over to Kendrick and Jamie “I am not sharing a room with you guys.”

“Damn, outplayed” Jamie mumbled.

Kendrick shrugged “not like anything’s changed much.”

With that settled Jamie escorted the couple to where he previously occupied. Stanley helped him to relocate before entering the room to see Ezraphel waiting for him.

“They seem nice” she commented.

“You can stay and mingle with them if you want.”

Ezraphel offered a cheeky smile “if I did that then they wouldn’t start gossiping about us.”

Stanley snorted as they came upon a room. It has been his designated room for about a year now ever since they decided to rent this particular house for their infrequent meets.

“You can hear them?”

“Yep~”

“What are they saying?”

“Surprised and suspicious by your change in appearance.”

“That’s expected.”

Stanley had already admitted to himself that he was far removed from the man he was before he met Ezraphel both mentally and physically. It was actually a huge blunder on his part that he failed to take said changes into consideration when pondering this meeting. All the while he was worrying about Ezraphel setting off red flags when he was more than likely to set them off himself.

“What are they saying about you?”

“They are bewildered and captivated by my beauty and your ability to secure me as your girlfriend” she said with not a little amount of smugness in her tone “though in truth I am your wife.”

The door was closed behind him and as Stanley went about unpacking he couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

“We’ve been over this.”

“I know and I am still waiting for that ring” she wiggled her fingers.

Ezraphel may have watched more than a few wedding videos when he mentioned earth wedding customs. He bemoaned the fact that most of said vides were of extravagant celebrity weddings and now he feared she wanted something just as pointlessly excessive.

Moving on…

“Hey Ez you mind checking this place for hidden cameras.”

The Lilim raised an eyebrow at that but complied and Stanley actually felt a pulse go out.

After a moment Ezraphel spoke “I didn’t find anything suspicious Stanley.”

“Good” you can never be too paranoid with Airbnb and he especially didn’t want some asshole pervert getting nudes of Ezraphel.

After that was done the two went back to the common room. Ezraphel went by Amelia while Stanley joined the boys who were all situated in the kitchen. There were a few lingering glances at Ezraphel as she went into an animated conversation with Amelia.

The moment he sat by the table Kendrick began the interrogation “okay dude spill, how did this happen?”

“Gonna have to be more specific.”

“You don’t look like a greasy troll anymore.”

“…”

“No offense” he added.

“Much taken.”

As for his answer Stanley shrugged “what can I say? Having a girlfriend really puts things into perspective.”

Liam rolled his eyes “obviously he’s going to start caring about how he looks when he has a girlfriend guys come on.”

“About that” Jamie began “how did you manage to get a girl like that?”

“Would you believe me if I said it was the other way around?”

“I would be very skeptical.”

“I can’t explain it. Ezraphel is weird and she has weird tastes. You want a reason why she’s interested you ask her.”

There was a bout of silence as the men looked amongst themselves.

“So are we done with this? Because it’s fucking ridiculous you guys are interrogating me because I got a girlfriend and cleaned up a little.”

“A little” Kendrick scoffed.

“I’m raising an eyebrow to that” Jamie commented.

It was up to Liam to diffuse the situation since Stan was looking more disgruntled by the minute “if you don’t want to talk about it that’s cool but look at it from our perspective. The guy who showed the least interest in pursuing a romantic relationship suddenly shows up with Miss Instagram Model looking like a Douchetuber.”

Stanley damn near recoiled at the accusation “first of all Ezraphel’s not an Instagram Model” God forbid, Stanley wasn’t mentally prepared for Ezraphel appearing on social media “and second, Douchetuber? How dare you.”

Even Jamie and Kendrick disproved of the comparison with expressions of disappointment and even anger on Stan’s behalf.

“That’s low.”

“He looks different but come on man.”

“Okay that was a bit unfair my mistake” Liam backtracked “you don’t look like a Douchetuber you look like a…um…Jamie?”

“A Chad Manlet” was his succinct answer to which the others nodded. Even Stan could admit the accuracy of the descriptor.

“If you must know I got tired of people talking shit about us whenever Ez and I go out so I thought I’d make the effort to look like someone who isn’t paying for her time.”

“We didn’t want to assume” Kendrick meant it as a joke but Stan challenged him on that.

“Kendrick why the fuck would I spend money to hire a woman to act like my girlfriend when I could use that money to pay an escort for sex?”

“He’s got you there Kenny” Liam commented.

“Truly a flawless logic” Jamie added.

As far as Stanley i]was concerned the only people who hire actors to pose as their significant other are clout chasers and they all know those people are the bottom feeding scum of the internet.

“Speaking of sex” Jamie suddenly interrupted “have you two done it?”

“Yes” was Stanley’s immediate answer.

“Wow no hesitation.”

“We’re not blushing teenagers and this isn’t an anime where we have to go through a character arc before we kiss at the end of the first season James.”

‘Even though in hindsight that’s almost exactly what happened.’

Really puts things into perspective.

“So have I answered all your queries?” he looked amongst them “can we get down to business?”

To that Liam looked at his two cohorts “gentlemen?”

“I’m all tapped out for now” Jamie answered.

“Kendrick?”

Said man wasn’t paying attention to them “what the hell are they talking about over there?”

The other three looked over to see the women animatedly whispering amongst themselves. Well Ezraphel was doing most of the talking with a wide smile and doing rather suggestive hand gestures. In a bizarre twist Amelia looked like she was having just as much fun as Ezraphel as she contributed to the conversation while Kendall looked almost overwhelmed with the situation. Kendall’s pale cheeks were most certainly red and when Ezraphel brought her hands up and apart her mouth drop with an expression of disbelief.

Amelia and Kendall met eyes with Stanley in that moment before flickering back to Ezraphel before the former laughed while the latter shook her head. Amelia said something and she and Ezraphel two devolved into giggles while Kendall cracked a smile. The disguised Lilim caught Stan’s eye before winking and blowing him a kiss.

“I can take a guess” Stan grumbled under his breath in regards to Kendrick’s question before turning back to them with a question of his own “what’s the plan for the weekend?”

To that they looked to Liam as he was the one responsible for booking the Airsoft field.

He looked to his watch “well we missed our appointment window over an hour ago but we can still go tomorrow and the day after.”

“Good.”

“In the meantime I got some cool custom mods for my M40A5 sniper” Liam informed/bragged catching the others’ attention.

And so it begins.

“Well if we’re doing a dick measuring contest I need to go get my equipment” Kendrick commented with Jamie speaking next.

“Gentlemen the game is on.”

“Indeed” Stanley added before the four went on to gather their gear and arsenal in a bid to show off and flex on each other.

And with the air around Ezraphel’s conversation still being nice and polite Stanley couldn’t help but smile. Despite the hiccup that was the rain their first day was kicking off to a nice start.