I stared at him. Was he even for real? Then again, I was sitting down with the kid on my lap, so he couldn’t see my lardy thighs, dumpy butt, and the soft paunch of my belly. Though to be honest, I would have thought he’d have understood that just his face alone was much handsomer than mine. “Have you seen yourself?” I ask him.
Comprehension lit his features. “You believe I am better looking than you?”
“Well, duh. And before you ask, no, I won’t have my stomach stapled and I’m not going on some crazy diet or becoming a gym rat. I’ve always been built this way and I already take some care to not go too crazy with the fried food and junk.”
He looked aghast. “If you’re healthy, why would someone ask you to staple part of your body or deny yourself sustenance, even if it is of a treat variety?”
My heart warmed towards him immediately.
“Have you eaten enough breakfast?” he asked me suddenly. “Neal and I put aside ours in case you wished to join us for French toast.”
My mouth watered. I had eaten more than enough, but the thought of French toast was a temptation indeed. Neal loosened his grip on me to sit up. He cupped my cheek with one small, warm hand. “We gots bacon and it’s nice and crispy and there’s maple syrup, even!”
“No strawberries?” I asked. The diner scattered a few slices of strawberry across theirs, along with powdered sugar.
Neal looked at his other dad. Gah! That felt weird, but good, thinking that. His other dad, because I was one of two and it felt more right by the second.
Jolar smiled, the warmth of it reaching his eyes and caressing me as much as it did our son. It was a look I’d dreamed of my whole life, for someone to look at me with such joy and with an offering of genuine affection. It made my earlier plans feel like a mirage of what happiness would be.
“I can make sure we have strawberries and anything else you might wish with yours,” he replied.
“Yay!” Neal crowed. “So you’ll have some with us?” he asked, peering into my eyes up close, his nose touching mine as if that would influence my decision even more.
“Sure, but after what I’ve had already, I probably won’t want any lunch,” I laughed.
“We can have an early dinner,” Jolar said.
“Can we watchLilo and Stitchagain?” Neal begged.
From the look on Jolar’s face, this must be Neal’s favorite movie and they’d watched it several times I surmised.
“You know, I have to confess, I’ve never seen it,” I admitted.
Jolar gave a nod. “Then we shall watch it again tonight, but no pizza!” He sighed and explained, “We had pizza last night as we watched it.”
Anything would be better than the bologna sandwich I’d had planned for tonight. That reminded me. “I need to clear a few things out of my house and be around to show it to potential renters. Is that going to be a problem?”
Jolar glanced over at Quandar. “We can send someone over to remove items he lists and send them up or otherwise deal with them as he requests. We can also arrange for someone to show the house and vet tenants,” Quandar said with a small smile.
“Wait, I can’t do it myself?”
Quandar looked at me with regret. “The regulations state that you must go join your mate aboard the Fleet, and only after completing your full bond can you return.”
Full bond? My cheeks burned upon realizing what he meant. Me and Mr. Hunky Alien over there had to do the horizontal tango before they’d let me come back down. Still, I had been considering getting a realtor anyway, but if they wanted to do it instead, it would be one less thing to stress about.
“Fine,” I said, giving in. “I was going to scrub down the cabinets today and add the liner paper to the shelves. Can they also do that?”
Jolar tilted his head at me. “This is your former home you are seeking to let others pay you to live in?”
“Yeah, why?”
He looked at Quandar. “The entire building and its environs can be checked over to make certain all is well, can it not?”
“It shall be done.”
Whoa! These guys were going to do a proper home inspection and everything? Score!
Quandar looked over at me. “What do you need us to ship to you?”
