I checked in on Jondi over the family link. I loved that he’d slowly weaved himself onto the link and now we had that parent/child link most people have with their biological parents.Not everyone. If it’s not nourished when you’re young it could easily fade away. He was in the kitchen eating a raw fish stick and laughing at Beryl who was trying to figure out how to work the waffle maker. He hadn’t flipped it upside down to turn it on and apparently it was comedy hour for Jondi.
Part of me wanted to join them in the kitchen. The other part of me wanted to take advantage of the quiet for a few more minutes of sleep or a shower or maybe to check my work email on my phone. I grimaced at my phone. Surely by now there were so many death threats that my phone was going to stage a rebellion against housing them. Remembering the world was full of assholes made it impossible to go back to sleep. So, shower it was. Under the hot water I let my mind drift. I thought about work, my family, and what I’d need to do to get Beryl’s background check done for the Temple of Juda Child Foster Program. Plus, how did I ask Jondi if he wanted a sleepover at his Uncle Eran’s without it sounding like I wanted to get rid of him?
I rested my head against the shower wall and let out a long, slow breath. I loved my life. At least I did before running Flight School pissed off people who had nothing to lose from it being in operation.
“Eat their faces so they can’t run their mouths,”my lion chimed into my thoughts from inside his inner sanctum.
I turned the water up and tried to think of anything else. Of course, my mind landed on Beryl. We’d gotten off to a rocky start but Ferrick Moonscale had everyone on edge. Plus, Jondi was finally comfortable enough to behave like a kid and a bit like a mischievous otter. What would our future look like? Would Beryl just join me in the shower one morning? Wouldhe come in and massage my shoulders before trailing his big, warm hands all over my body? Would he toy with my navel? Or would he drop to his knees and lick the water off my thighs and balls before taking me into his mouth? Yep. We needed our claiming vows not only to close the gap between us but because I was horny. That was probably the reason I was extra snappy. I couldn’t actually remember the last time I had sex and that couldn’t be a good sign.
I turned off the water and toweled off. It was time to get the day started. I’d make the waffles and warm up some fish sticks for Beryl. Then I’d swing by work and maybe on the way there I could talk to Jondi about going to Uncle Eran’s house for just a night. I’d even do his normal bedtime story routine over there with him. Then I could come home for one night alone with Beryl before life resumed as normal.
I squinted as I walked into the kitchen because Beryl had the big overhead light on. Usually, I only turned it on if we had guests or if I was cleaning up. Apparently, my mate didn’t mind the big light burning holes in his corneas. I loved the sun but there was something about artificial light that left me feeling an ick.
Jondi sat at the table with a glass of orange juice, a bowl of frozen, bitten in half, fish sticks, and a plate of waffles topped with blueberries I knew we didn’t have in the house when I went to sleep. I sniffed the air to see whether it was Vatten or Eran who came in and helped Beryl make breakfast.
“They left early this morning,” Beryl said, figuring out who I was sniffing for.
“Did you ask them to?” I asked, more gently than I would’ve if Jondi hadn’t been in the room.
“No,” Jondi answered and I smiled despite my annoyance. “I caught them leaving. They left a note. I read it. Sorry. Uncle Eran knows some big words. I didn’t get what he meant at all.”
“They were gone when I woke up,” Beryl said once Jondi had finished speaking. “I think they were ready to have their kids back in their own space.”
“He left me a note too!” Jondi said, grinning as if he played a joke on me by not telling me straight away.
“What he’d say?” I asked, sitting down at the table, wishing for a cup of coffee to teleport in front of me.
“He invited me to sleep over at his house because he slept at ours. I think I might do it. Now that you have Beryl you won’t be alone if I do. Do you think it would be okay?” he asked me.
“Do you want to sleep at Uncle Eran’s house tonight?” I asked, gently.
“I think so. I mean, I already have a nap cot there. It’s not too far away,” he said as if he thought it through. “Will you be okay for a night?”
“I think we’ll be okay,” I nodded. “I’m okay with it if you want to. Plenty of kids sleep over at their friends’ houses.”
“I’ll have to pack, though.”
“Definitely,” I nodded as Beryl put a mug of coffee down in front of me. I added the cream and sugar and took a long drink to let it hit my soul.
“Grandma brought blueberries,” Jondi said. “I figured out I can just call her Grandma because I only have one.”
“What about Bree?” I asked.
“Ohh! No! I forgot!” he facepalmed. “I guess I’ll have to ask her what she wants to be called. Why do we have second names for everyone?”
“To show how much we love them,” I said, using the same line my carrier used on me when I was a kid. “And so other people know that they’ll protect us. Like if you’re a bad guy do you want to mess with Carmine’s grandbaby?”
“He’d pick ‘em up and thump ‘em on the floor,” Jondi said. “He’d thump ‘em until their brain learned some things.”
I gave him a sharp nod and took another sip of my coffee. Beryl put a plate of waffles and bacon down in front of me. Jondi eyed the bacon until I handed off both slices to him. Beryl frowned but didn’t say anything for a long moment.
“I thought you said you didn’t want bacon, buddy?”
“I was afraid you’d make it floppy like they do at school. We don’t eat floppy bacon. I don’t want it to oink at me,” Jondi said, matter-of-factly.
“I’ll make some more bacon,” Beryl said, turning back to the stove.
“It’s okay. I’ll be fine,” I said.
