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Then his eyes got this weird happy glow like he was proud or something. I just rolled over in bed. He yanked me against him, purring contentedly into my hair. For my part, I’m weirded out every time he referred to our child as a kit.
What the hell does that mean? Is a little chimera baby gonna be trying to claw its way out of me? Also, what is it with this he nonsense? We have no clue what gender the child will be, or how they will even identify. Patriarchal bullshit is what that is. It is time he joined the twenty-first century. I don’t care how long he and his brothers have locked themselves away in this castle. If I am going to have a kid, then I am going to be loving and affirming and—
Oh shit. I’m gonna have a kid.
I rise and shake out my hands. I need to be in motion. I can’t just keep sitting here all alone or I’ll keep freaking out about this.
What do I know about kids? I’ve changed like two diapers in my entire life! And the last time I tried, the kid peed in my face and all over the diaper I was trying to put on him. I had to call his mom—my friend from college—back from where she’d gone to answer the door so she could finish.
All this thinking is overwhelming. Time for food. I make a beeline for the kitchen. It’s always my first stop, sometimes even before the bathroom, embarrassingly enough. Because whatever’s inside my belly—be it an actual little monster-baby hybrid or a tapeworm—wants to inhale food on the regular. I baked bread yesterday, so I toast four pieces, slather them in butter and jam, then head upstairs. I don’t have sharing in mind. These are all for me.
I’m surprised when I still don’t run into Abaddon, who always seems to be underfoot wherever I am. I follow the noise of banging, like a hammer, down the hall from on the second floor, munching on my toast as I go. A sharp, whistled tune cuts through the quiet. It’s a beautiful song, but very sad, in a minor key. Haunting.
I smile softly when I finally track down the source of the noise, and find Thing, by the light of a single, flickering candle, in a similar position to the last time I saw him. He has two hammers in hand, and his other four arms are variously holding nails and large boards he’s hammering into place. Building a piece of furniture that’s perhaps… a bedframe?
“Hello,” I say. Apparently, this startles him so much he misses one of his frantic double swings and slams one of his thumbs.
“Oh no!” I hurry into the room and set my plate on the ground so that I can grab for his hand and observe the damage.
His entire body jerks the moment I touch him, and I realize too late that perhaps I’m taking liberties with his personal space.
“Crap, I’m sorry.” I drop his hand and look up into his face. “Are you okay?”
He withdraws his hand and scampers back several steps, using one pair of his forearms to move on all fours like an ape. Then he lifts the thumb he smashed to his face, sniffs it, drops it, and stares at me.
Which makes me feel awkward and like I’ve intruded.
I take a step back. “Sorry to just come and invade your space.”
I start to turn to go but his voice cuts through the space. “Wait. Do not go.”
I pause and find Thing staring at me a little slack jawed. Then two of his hands go to his face, and I’m startled to discover that as he wipes them down his face, I swear it’s as if his shape… blurs a little. I blink and step forward, not sure what I just saw. Was it just the darkness in the flickering candlelight? Or did I see what I thought I saw—and he disappeared into the darkness for a moment?
But then he moves slowly, looking fully solid again, approaching me as I approach him.
“Why do you stay?” he asks. “You should go. We are monsters.”
I blink again, then force my eyes to stay open so I don’t miss it again if he does that blur-into-the-darkness thing. I shrug. “Monster is a subjective term. Kids used to call me things like that when I was younger because my back was bent, and I wasn’t like them.”
Thing tilts his head at me. “It is not our backs. It is our souls. Our insides are bent. Some monsters are real.”
I look at the piece of furniture he’s building. It’s not quite up to the exacting engineering standards of Romulus, I imagine, but he’s planed the wood down to a beautiful smoothness. And it looks sturdy, with a full headboard. Rustic, but quite well-made. Back in the city, they’d freak out over a piece like this.
