“Hah!” My hands closed over a velvety, if wet, box, and I shot up, smiling triumphantly.
“Good on you, Gren. He found it!” Alfred announced, standing to dust his jeans off and head inside the house. We’d been out here for the better part of an hour searching. I had a small search party of my male friends helping. Segrid had even recruited the Aquetori men from the Human realm to help out. I was keyed up, almost freaking out. I could breathe now.
Heading inside, my prize in hand, we all filed in and dispersed.
Alfie, Will, and I all sat on the long couch. Segrid chose my armchair in the far corner, grabbing a drink to settle into his chosen spot. All but for Dax, the Aquetoris took the love seat. Ben pulled a kitchen chair up near the couches. No one wanted to risk taking a seat on the couch Crooks had claimed.
It wasn’t two minutes before the lot of them were bickering over what action movie we were going to vegetate and watch, while I sat here plotting, planning how to propose to Aster. Human things were familiar to me yet foreign. It was strangely easier to take the plunge and ask her to combine life forces with me and make a baby, join my marsh, than it was to ask her to marry me in an otherworldly, to me, ceremony, even though we were already mated. It was weird. I was weird. And I knew it. But this had become so important to me.
I could only guess what my flower was trying to make of her odd male. My newly pregnant mate probably thought I was a few Gremlins short of a Murder.
The ladies were under the impression we actually went out and did things on these testosterone only excursions, bowling, the carnival in Minotaur Point, fishing, while they had their ladies only gatherings.
Honestly, with the exception of today, it was nice to meet up and just sit on our butts and do nothing, space out and doze off, eat a burger bigger than my head, bullshit for a while. Aster had been invited to join the ladies, but Penny said she’d begged off and went home instead. Penny and Viv were our quiet female allies in all of this— team Green Bean and Abster all the way—our inside source. I was sweating brackish water after Pen’s call. What if my flower’d declined because she was upset? What if she was thinking the worst?
“When did this become more of a men’s therapy session and less… whatever it was I was expecting this to be before?” Ben wondered aloud.
“When most of you got mated and started inviting your weird friends to join in,” Brushe offered from the small loveseat he was sharing with Seidon, his quad harem mate-husband to Permelia, grinning cheekily.
“I’m not weird, sugar boo. That designation falls squarely to you,” Seidon muttered, rolling his eyes, but then immediately buried his nose back in the book he was glued to.
Brushe grinned, fiddling with Seidon’s loose locks, his arm along the back of the couch. Seidon was so engrossed in his read he grunted but didn’t otherwise react to the large male flicking him with his own hair. Brushe was a shit starter. He loved picking on his brother-husband, as he jokingly teased the Mer-dwyn.
‘It’s a romance,’ Brine mouthed, grinning and jerking his eyes up at the sea king, seated on the floor at the foot of the loveseat, leaning against Seidon’s legs.
Seidon reached over and casually grabbed a hank of Brine’s hair to give it a teasing tug. “I saw that,” he murmured, then released his hold to swat Brushe’s hand away from him as Brushe flicked his hair at him.
“You should go to her, plant man,” Segrid advised, tossing the pillow in the chair he was in at Dax so he had something to sit on as Dax plopped down on the floor.
Dax nodded and signed, ‘Don’t let it percolate. It’ll just make it worse. Go to her, talk to her. Tell her.’
“Go,” Ben agreed. “Put a ring on it, pickle!” he boomed out in a goofy voice, making Alfie and Will, who were in on the joke, crack up.
“Pickle?” Seidon murmured, mildly amused.
“Is that a plant thing?” Brine asked.
Brushe, with his knowing, chuckled. “Kinda.”
“It is a goat boy, manclops, little doggy man, and plant man thing,” Segrid announced with a devious smile.
Shaking my head, muttering unkind things, I threatened to sic Crooks on them if any touched my female’s cream sodas in the fridge, grabbed my keys, and ran out the door. A tiny smirk of a smile twitched my lips at that lot of fools. Friends. I had a house full of them now—a family of friends. My introverted, reclusive ass had a mate and a crapton of friends. I had a life now, a really wonderful one. I had a pregnant mate to propose to and some explaining to do as well.
My sweet flower still made me nervous. Freezing as the perfect idea hit me, I rushed back into the house.
Grabbing my love blossom, I walked it to the kitchen and set it down on the table.
“I’m a self-admitted wiener, a pickle of a plant man,” I called out as I went to the kitchen for supplies. Rushing back, I held up the space themed, freshly sharpened knife I’d pulled from the block, brandishing it. “Who wants to hold my squeamish ass down and who’s not afraid of a little blood?”
“Beg pardon?” Seidon turned to stare at me, saw the love blossom and the knife in my hand, the tension filling him easing. “What am I cutting off?” he asked. Nodding, he stood and walked over.
“Dang, Seben. Metal, fish dude. Metal as franken fish,” Brushe murmured, leaning over the back of the couch but making no move to draw closer.
“Seid... babe…” Brine shot up to sit next to Brushe, his eyes wide, “you can’t-”
“I can’t what?” Seidon turned to his fellow harem male. “I can’t help him do what needs to be done to fulfill the customs of his kind?” Calm as you please, he raised his eyebrows at his mate.
“His customs?” Brine’s tone changed as he glanced from me to the sea king.
