Years alone in the Lair, and Pitch found himself missing the sun.
Which made no sense. Pitch was a being of darkness, of shadow.
But shadows can’t exist without a light to cast them.
And Sandy had been HIS light for millennia.
It made no sense to think of Sandy that way. He might have been a Star Pilot at one point, but he himself was not a star.
Sanderson Mansnoozie lit up the night with his dreamsand. He was not a creature of daylight. He brought rest to the weary and good dreams.
Nocturnal dreams. Not diurnal ones.
And right now Pitch was having a daydream.
Pitch wanted Sandy to be HIS star.
His sunlight.
It made no sense.
But it was what it was.
He could almost imagine what Sandy would say to that if he were here, and what Pitch would say in return.
You’re being pedantic, Pitch.
“Well, if I can’t be pedantic, who can? It’s not like that’s ever stopped you from listening to me.”
His own words, spoken aloud, echoed in the Lair. A Nightmare snorted, startled.
Pitch started pacing, angry at himself for even considering what he was about to do. His mind started to argue with itself.
He’d listen, if you apologized.
Apologized? Apologize for shooting him in the back? There’s not a hope in hell that he’d accept an apology from me.
You won’t know until you try.
Fine.
The Nightmare King gathered the shreds of his dignity around him and concentrated on making his way to the Isle of Sleepy Sands, currently floating on the sunny side of the world.
The mermaids hissed at Pitch when he approached them; their expressions changed to smirks when they saw the hangdog look on his face. One streaked away to alert Sandy.
The Guardian of Dreams floated over, looking wary.
Pitch held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I know that we’ve had our differences, but you and I have too much history for a small disagreement to come between us.”
He cringed inwardly at those words.
Sandy seemed to think that amusing, because he broke out into silent giggles. He sent up some dreamsand symbols which read Murder as a small disagreement?
“Well… I don’t kill just ANYONE, you know. I have standards to uphold! Face it, old man, you’re powerful. You were much more of a threat than the fat man and the feather duster and the overgrown fur factory.”
His counterpart took that on board, and then signed, I suppose I should feel complimented. But why are you REALLY here, Pitch?
Trust the Sandman, despite seeming to be sleepy and lazy much of the time, to incisively cut to the meat of the situation. Pitch sighed.
“I miss the old times. I miss when you and I would meet in forests under the stars, when we would talk, when we would guide minds together as the humans were evolving. I miss when you and I were not… opposed.”
Sandy seemed taken aback. He was quiet for a few minutes, and then replied, I miss you too. The you who could keep up with me in our conversations. The you who’d encourage creativity and inspire writers and artists. Is that you still in there, somewhere? Or is that you all buried under anger and destruction?
A flicker of hope sparked itself in Pitch.
“I think that me is still there. But don’t expect me to be all rainbows and starshine.”
I never wanted that. Just you.
The sun in the sky never looked as bright as the growing smile on Sandy’s face.
Written for the 2025 RISE OF THE GUARDIANS Stocking Stuffer event.
Prompt #59 - "Nightmares protecting the Burgess children"
@rotgsecretsanta
------------------------------
“My Nightmares are ready, old friend. Are your Guardians?”
Pitch Black moved his chess piece as he made his ominous statement.
The Man in the Moon, sitting across from him at the chessboard, frowned. “Why must you always make it sound as though you’re not a Guardian?” he asked, his tone half-plaintive, half-annoyed.
“Because, my dear MiM, I enjoy our little games. Sanderson and I have been guides to humanity as a whole, not merely the protectors of children, for millennia. Long before you came on the scene. If I’m to ally myself with you, it will be on my own terms, unlike the others. I shan’t be *your* Guardian. I’ll leave that to the fat man, the feather duster, and the overgrown fur-factory.”
Pitch considered the layout of squares in front of him as he contemplated his next move. He said in a more conciliatory tone, “At least Sanderson agrees with me that there’s something in the wind that needs our direct involvement.”
MiM sighed sharply, but decided to change the subject back to the REAL matter at hand. “It’s good that your Nightmares are ready, I suppose. I don’t even know *what* we’re getting ready for, but it all seems to be centering in a mid-sized town in Pennsylvania called Burgess. The children there seem to be more sensitive to the spirit world.”
“I suspect I know why that is, but I’d rather hear it from you.” Pitch sat back in his chair, the chess game forgotten.
The round, almost-childish face of the Man in the Moon suddenly settled into lines that showed exactly how old he was. His shoulders slumped as though bearing the weight of the world.
He replied, “They’re more sensitive because they’re living next to a cosmic rift that opens to other worlds… and one of those worlds is one where you are the embodiment of fear to children everywhere. A world where you and I are enemies. A world where the walking corpse that threatens those children now is viewed there as a hero, and as an avatar of fun rather than the dangerous trickster you and I know him to be.”
MiM suddenly reached across the table, knocking chess pieces over willy-nilly, and grasped Pitch’s gray hand in his own pale one. “Kozmotis, help me,” he gasped. “I’m frightened.”
The shadow walker knew exactly why his old friend was frightened, as well as he might be.
MiM, after all, had been the one to resurrect what was now an undead abomination, in the mistaken notion that the drowned boy would be the same selfless person after death as he had been in life.
And in the three hundred years since, that drowned boy had only grown more cunning, and thus more dangerous.
Pitch theorized that the creature focused on children in general, and the children living near the lake where it had lost its human life in particular, because it still thought it was one of them.
It only wanted to play.
Pitch squeezed MiM’s hand back in a show of reassurance, his own heart thumping anxiously. “I’m here,” he murmured. “I’ll help. You can count on me.”
If ever the children of Burgess needed a Guardian of Caution, it was now.
----------------------
Jamie Bennett was walking home from school, his nose buried in a book about cryptids that he’d gotten for his birthday. He was completely oblivious to his surroundings, and thus didn’t notice he’d managed to miss his own street and had walked almost all the way downtown, where car traffic was much heavier.
He also didn’t notice the blue-skinned boy, dressed in rags, who stood on the roof of a shop. The strange boy was muttering to himself and making odd gestures with his hands, as though he were sculpting the wind.
A moment later, several things happened at once.
An ice slick formed out of nowhere in the middle of the street.
Jamie started crossing that street without bothering to check for traffic.
A car started skidding towards him, having lost traction on the ice.
The noise of screeching tires and blaring car horns finally woke Jamie from his book-daze, but there was no time to get out of the way.
He dropped his book and fell to his knees, fully expecting to die, when he suddenly felt something YANK at the back of his jacket. He was lifted into the air, his feet dangling, and then whatever had grabbed him turned around and deposited him back on the sidewalk.
Jamie blinked, and then sat down hard on the concrete, the adrenaline running out of him.
He looked up, and up, and up some more.
The tallest horse he had ever seen was wheeling away into the crowd. No, it was passing through the crowd, as though it were made of smoke.
Was the only person who could see it?
No, there was a man standing about half a block away, gesturing to the horse. Once it reached him the man leapt onto the horse’s back without needing a saddle or stirrups, his long black robe flaring and flapping around him.
Wait a minute. A robe??!!??
“Hey kid, are you okay?”
Jamie snapped back to attention to find a small crowd of concerned adults surrounding him. One of them handed his book back to him, only a little worse for wear. By the time he stood up and told them all, multiple times, that he was fine, the man and the horse were out of sight.
He wanted to yell, “Did you see how cool that horse was!!!” But something stopped him. This was classified knowledge.
If that horse and its rider were real… then he, James Cameron Bennett, had just seen some kind of cryptid.
Right here in Burgess.
He couldn’t wait to tell Claude and Caleb about this.
------------------------
The twins, as it turned out, had their own stories to tell about strange horses that looked like smoke, but felt solid.
Horses, plural.
Horses that had dragged them both out of the marshy part of the lake that had a treacherous tendency to have varying depths.
The boys had been tossing a basketball back and forth after school, goofing around on the lakeshore. Neither of them had realized how close they’d gotten to the water’s edge, nor could either of them explain where the wind had come from that ripped the ball away from them, ending up in the lake itself.
Caleb had meant to just wade in to get the ball, but it was though the ball had a mind of its own, bobbing just out of reach. Before he knew it, he was out of his depth, his clothes dragging him down and terrified that there was nothing under his feet.
Claude saw the trouble his brother was in and dived in to help. He too suddenly had trouble keeping afloat; he panicked and started flailing, which swamped Caleb and made him slip under the water.
Which is when the horses showed up and dragged them out.
Neither of the twins remembered how they ended up back at their own front door, but somehow the mystery horses had done it.
------------------------
Further conversations with Jamie’s friends revealed similar stories.
Pippa had seen snow falling outside her bedroom window. On a sixty-degree day. She’d opened the window and had been tempted to lean out further than she would have normally.
And then she’d seen the horse looking up at her as it paced on the sidewalk. And she could have sworn that it looked her right in the eye and shook its head in warning.
Monty wouldn’t say how or why he’d climbed onto the roof of his backyard shed, and just mumbled, “That horse saved me.”
None of the five friends was brave enough to ask the gruff new girl why she was drawing black unicorns with long smoky manes and tales in her math book, but they suspected she’d had an experience like theirs.
Later in the year, when Cupcake had become one of their group, she confirmed it.
Over time, the six of them, sometimes separately, sometimes together, would see the mysterious horses in different parts of town. Sometimes the man that Jamie had seen the first time was with them. Other times he could be seen leaning casually against a building, his hand on the back of what must have been the tallest horse of all.
But no adults seemed to notice the man or his horses. And Caleb could swear at one point that he saw both man and horse dissipate like living shadows if townspeople came too close to them, and reassemble themselves a moment later once the danger of collision was past.
The Burgess Believers, as they called themselves after Claude came up with the name, started comparing notes as to when and where they were seeing the Nightmares. Pippa’s name for the horses seemed the most fitting, even though Monty protested that half the time they were around in daylight.
It was Cupcake who came up with the answer for “why”.
------------------------
One afternoon, they were all in the Bennetts’ backyard, watching Jamie’s little sister running around and chasing something that only she could see. At first.
Sophie was giggling and shouting, “Cold boy! Cold boy! Wanna fly!”
“What’s she talking about, Jamie?” asked Pippa.
“I dunno. Maybe she’s got a new imaginary friend.”
Cupcake spoke up. “You mean you guys don’t see that kid?” She pointed up at something about ten feet in front of Sophie, and a few feet in the air. “Because I sure do. And I don’t think he’s alive.”
The twins shot to their feet. Caleb growled, “I see him too. And that’s not Casper the friendly ghost.”
And suddenly all six of them could see what Sophie was chasing after - a boy with blue-gray skin like something out of a zombie movie, hovering in the air and reaching down to pull Sophie up into the air with him—
—and suddenly three Nightmares appeared out of nowhere.
One grabbed Sophie by the back of her shirt.
One put herself bodily between the Burgess Believers and the dead boy, all flashing fiery eyes and distended nostrils.
And the third horse was the tall one, and she had the shadow man on her back.
And he was carrying what looked like a very sharp scythe. He waved it at the dead boy, shouting something in a language that none of the kids understood, but which sounded awesome and threatening.
The first Nightmare gently deposited Sophie on the grass, where she sat down hard and burst into tears. Cupcake was the first to reach her, brushing past the second Nightmare and giving her a pat on her flank. She went down on her knees to pull the little girl into her lap for a hug. Jamie ran to Sophie’s side and petted her messy hair, saying, “It’s okay, you’re gonna be okay.”
Because Jamie and Cupcake were distracted, they missed seeing what the other four saw happen.
Monty was the one to put it into words later.
“I don’t know what Shadow Guy said, but it sure made that flying guy sad, you could practically see a cartoon broken heart over his head.”
The dead boy had floated down to stand next to the man on his horse. Frozen tears made their way slowly down his face.
The man looked down at the dead boy for a long moment and then gave a big sigh. He made his scythe disappear and held a hand out, saying something quietly that only the boy could hear.
A minute later, the dead boy was seated on the back of the horse, in front of the man, who put one arm around him and gently tugged the mane of the Nightmare with the other. The other two Nightmares followed them as they leapt over the backyard fence and galloped away.
------------------------
“And what did you say that got through to him?” asked MiM, breathing a sigh of relief at Pitch’s report that the creature **HE** had created would no longer be a threat to the children of Burgess.
Or to any of the children on Earth, for that matter.
Pitch leaned back in his chair and shot a feral grin at the Man in the Moon. “It was quite simple. ‘We don’t have to be alone, Jack.’ It’s all he ever wanted to hear.”
“Hmmmm.” MiM eyed the chessboard, set up for a new game. “And how do you propose to ensure that?”
“Again, simple,” Pitch replied. “He can play with my Nightmares, and with Bunnymund’s walking eggs, and Tooth’s fairies, and North’s elves, and Sanderson’s mermaids. There are plenty of immortal beings who would revel in the chance to put down their duties and cares for a brief spell. And he won’t do permanent damage to them the way he would to mortal children.”
He moved his first pawn. “Finally! Somebody who knows how to have a little fun.”
A short Swatchton fic for Valentine's Day, set in the Spamsician AU created by @penbwl.
Fandom: Deltarune
Pairings: Swatch/Spamton, Elnina/Lanino [mentioned], Miss Mizzle/Tasque Manager [mentioned]
------------------------
It was a rainy day in Castle Town, and a particular musician was beginning to feel a bit of cabin fever.
“This Lightner holiday is going to [[running up that hill]] me right into the ground,” complained Spamton.
There was no real bite in his voice, though. Swatch knew that their spouse was just letting off steam.
It had been Spamton’s idea, a few years ago, to offer his songwriting services to couples, throuples, and polycules to help them celebrate the Love Day festival that Darkners had co-opted for their own midwinter parties. It had taken a little while to catch on, but with the influx of new Darkners this past autumn, suddenly this year seemed to be THE year where everyone wanted to serenade a sweetheart or two. Or three, or more…
Swatch made themself comfortable in the wingback chair nearest the fireplace, watching Spamton flex his jointed fingers as he sat at the piano. “You’re not fooling me, my dear. I think you’re enjoying yourself tremendously. I should probably get you a set of wings you can strap onto your back. You’d make an adorable Cupid.”
“You’re forgetting that Cupid has a bow and arrow, not just wings. You wouldn’t want to get in the line of… fire,” Spamton’s voice started to trail off. “Wait a minute, ‘I live my life as if I'm a projectile’, I need to write that down.” He grabbed a sheet of paper from the always-present stack of paper on the top of the piano, while Swatch handed him a fresh pencil. After all these years together, they were quite used to these bursts of inspiration from Spamton, and were always equipped to handle them.
The bird did feel a need to point out, “I’m not quite sure that projectiles belong in a romantic song.”
“Hey, not everyone has the [[muskrat love]] that you and I do.” Spamton looked startled at the particular songbite that had come out, and rushed to correct it. “I mean, [[This is not the best place to find an archer]] some folks are unhappy in love and expressing THAT is how they get through this holiday.”
“ ‘Love is a battlefield’, eh?” Swatch couldn’t resist tossing a song lyric back at their spouse.
“Exactly.” Spamton waved his pencil at Swatch to emphasis his point.
“Which makes me wonder what you’re going to come up with for Tasque Manager and Miss Mizzle.”
“Don’t remind me,” Spamton groaned. “I wish I’d never taken that pair on. [[Save me from the half-hearted cat]] [[Baby's got no torrents]] One’s electric, one’s water? How does that even work?”
“And how does it even work between a bird and a puppet?” Swatch said with a smile, getting out of their chair and coming to stand behind Spamton, wrapping their wings around his middle. Spamton leaned back to rest his head on Swatch’s chest.
“You’ve [[really got me]] there.”
He leaned forward again and absentmindedly started running through a set of scales on the keyboard. Outside, the rain continued to fall, the splashing on their attic roof making a pleasant counterpoint.
“Now, on the other hand, speaking of torrents [[everyone is tandem sometimes]], that nice weather couple is a dream to write for.”
“Elnina and Lanino? I agree. The Swatchlings adore them.”
Spamton nodded, and kept playing scales.
“Which of the two commissioned you?”
“The [[fly me to the]] moon-faced gent.”
Swatch gave a sigh of relief on hearing that. “Good, then there’s no conflict of interest.” They went back to their chair, making sure SimiLee hadn’t used their brief absence to curl up there.
“Oh? She wants you to paint something for her beloved?”
“Indeed.”
“Something with [[nimbiferous, when you're nimbiferous]] clouds, or a [[scorching orb]]?”
“Something ‘as sunny as he is, the light in my sky!’ “ replied Swatch. “Love is certainly bringing in the kromer.”
Spamton made a sound of acknowledgement and asked, “Do you want to hear what I have so far?”
“Always, sweetheart.”
Their spouse closed his eyes, lowered his head, and began to sing.
Baby, I love your storms
And now your raining is on repeat
I need a stable tempest
Where every shower is complete
When you're gone I feel cold
Rainstorm, rainstorm - I feel just like a rainstorm
Save me from the chill squall line
When I'm with you, all I have is roaring thoughts
It's time we had some whirlwinds
Windstorm, windstorm - I feel just like a windstorm
Will you hold me tight and not let me blow away
Swatch was silent for a moment, and then said quietly, “I think they’re both going to love it.”
“I do too.”
Spamton got up from the piano bench, stretched, and then flung himself into Swatch’s lap. “But I can’t [[so tired of waiting]] until I can write love songs just for you.”
Swatch nuzzled their beak through his hair. “Ditto.”
Fandom: Deltarune [human AU, college/university setting, canon-divergent, can be read fandom-blind]
Characters: Spamton Addison, Swatch Paletta, T.M. Tinker, Eos Addison, Ballew Addison, Sienna Addison-Timothy, Saffron Timothy-Addison, original characters.
Chapter notes: Content warnings for classism and implied disapproval of polyamory.
Chapter summary: The first night of Spamton's birthday weekend shows some of the oddities of the Addison household to those who didn't grow up under its roof.
===============
At the very last moment, Spamton lost his nerve and let Sienna show Swatch and Trez to separate guest rooms.
He hadn’t been expecting Sienna to be the one to greet them when they arrived; he’d thought Eos would be the one acting as host. But his sister was the only one in the hallway as he, T.M., and Swatch brought in their bags with Ballew’s help.
Ballew didn’t seem to notice, but to Spamton’s eyes Sienna seemed to be a bit on edge. Oh, she was sweetly welcoming to his beloveds, but her voice was higher-pitched than usual.
And Saffron was nowhere in sight.
---------
The slim woman with the strawberry-blonde mane was stronger than she looked, as she hefted Swatch’s duffel bag and T.M.’s suitcase with one hand and Spamton’s in the other, leaving them each to carry their own garment bags to the second floor.
Swatch took the time to observe Spamton’s only sister, as the three followed her up the long staircase and along the gallery. Far from the serene presence he always described her to be, Sienna seemed… well, “brittle” was the first word that came to mind. She kept up a steady stream of conversation about how lovely it was to have “Gainsboro’s friends” here for a visit, sounding more like an elderly aunt than a close sibling. She emphasized the point that both guest rooms were “not far” from the bathrooms, and if either of them needed anything to just “sing out”.
It was, quite frankly, a relief to duck into the room where they were expected to stay.
Although it seemed they were expected to stay there without Spamton.
---------
Is this woman for real, with her tour guide persona? This place looks more like Downton Abbey than like somewhere real people live.
This is bizarre. Would everyone hate me if I took an Uber to the train station?
T.M. was apparently getting shown to her room first because she was the “girl”... Sienna actually said that out loud and with a straight face. Swatch caught her eye and gave her a look that was just short of an eye-roll… it was good that someone else thought there was something off with Spamton’s sister.
So much for women’s lib…
Once she was alone, T.M. unslung the garment bag from her shoulder, making sure the pocket with her hat was on the outside and not getting crushed. Her suitcase had been placed on a wooden rack that looked like it actually belonged on ANTIQUES ROADSHOW. The rest of the furniture seemed to be a little more modern, but it was made of more solid-looking wood than she had ever seen in her life. “IKEA this ain’t,” she muttered to herself as she laid the garment bag on the bed and unzipped it.
---------
I’ll see if I can find the kitchen, Swatch thought to themself. That seems like a logical place for people to hang out.
I’ll see if I can find the kitchen, T.M. thought to herself. That seems like a good place to dig up some dirt.
Let me see if anyone’s in the kitchen, Spamton thought to himself. That makes sense that they’d both head there.
---------
Blinding white light reflected off surfaces of marble and chrome. Two people were there, neither of whom were T.M., Spamton, or any of the Addison siblings. And they didn’t look like Addison relatives… neither of them had the long pointy Addison nose.
The two women both wore white chef uniforms. One was unpacking containers of meat and vegetables and pasta from a trolley onto counters, while the other was unzipping a suitcase that held cooking utensils that were obviously from one very expensive manufacturer.
Swatch tried to back out so they would not be in the way, but the taller woman with the dark braids noticed them and said with a smile, “Come on in, we don’t bite. Not hard, anyway.”
“As long as I won’t be in the way,” Swatch replied, and sat in the chair that she pointed to, part of the set for the table in the corner. “My cousins are going into the hospitality industry when they graduate, so I’m always interested in watching professionals work.”
“Well, it’s more than our jobs are worth to tell houseguests where they can and can’t go,” said the other woman, a thin freckled redhead who had just finished offloading the last insulated food box. “You ARE one of the houseguests, right? One of Stanton’s friends?”
“Yes, that’s me. I’m Swatch Paletta.” They weren’t sure whether to identify themself as Spamton’s partner; there already seemed to be a layer of reserve by being identified as a “houseguest”. The use of the name “Stanton” also hadn’t escaped their notice.
The redhead nodded and commented, “Please don’t be insulted if we don’t shake hands. Again, more than our jobs are worth, damaging the tools of our trade, so to speak, and you look like you’ve got a powerful handshake.”
That was a subtle way to bring up Swatch’s size, they surmised. “I take your point,” they replied. “And the appetite to go with it. That all looks like some wonderful possibilities for meals.”
“Oh, you flatterer,” the dark-haired woman chuckled. “Anyway, I’m Bonita and that’s Jen. Of Bonita and Jen’s Household Meals. You can make yourself useful by telling us some of your preferences, as well as what the other guests like to eat. Usually we deliver premade meals for the two guys here, but this weekend we’re cooking fresh for a house party, and that changes everything up.”
“Other guests?”
“Well, yeah. The sister and her wife, and the other one of Stanton’s friends.”
“Oh!” For some odd reason Swatch had made the assumption that Sienna and Saffron lived here too. The house was certainly large enough. Spamton had mentioned that there were ten bedrooms and seven bathrooms.
They collected themself, realizing Bonita was waiting for an answer.
“Well, T.M. - that’s my and Spam- I mean, Stanton’s friend - she’s pretty much a fan of anything except shrimp. I don’t know much about the other two other than they’re both vegetarians.”
“Yeah, we did get that memo,” interjected Jen. “What about you, big guy?”
“Me? Well, I guess if I’m getting asked, something I can’t cook myself? At home, I tend to do Italian or stir-fry, so I don't know… maybe fish?”
Swatch was delighted to actually be asked for their preferences. They wondered whether Spamton still got the same thrill at the possibility of choice, or whether he took it for granted.
And if the thought of Spamton summoned him from the ether, their partner’s voice could be heard from the door that led to the outside. “D-Did someone say fish? That sounds d-d-delicious!”
T.M. stood in the doorway on the opposite side of the room, her expression carefully blank.
---------
Spamton wasn’t sure why, once he’d made up his mind to head to the kitchen, he ended up detouring to the greenhouse instead. It wasn’t that there was NO greenery in Mrs. Anselmo’s backyard; she had rambling wild roses, a butterfly bush, and a dogwood tree. But something in him was calling for the pots of violets, primroses, begonias, and kalanchoe that Kip the gardener set up every year and brought out to the stone-flagged patio each summer.
He’d hoped for a few minutes of solitude before he had to be sociable. But there were already people there, by the sound of raised voices.
He took his hand off the glass door and turned away, not wanting to interrupt.
Back to the kitchen it would be, then.
As he crossed the lawn to get to the rear of the house, Spamton noticed that the van for Bonita and Jen's Household Meals was parked there. He wasn’t surprised, when he walked through the French doors, to see Swatch sitting and comfortably chatting with the two chefs. He caught the tail end of what Swatch was saying and added, “D-Did someone say fish? That sounds d-d-d-delicious!”
Across the room, he could see T.M. standing in the main doorway, a peculiar expression on her face, as though she’d stopped herself from saying something she’d regret.
---------
T.M. looked back up at the curving gallery from where she stood in the foyer, trying to count the number of closed doors. She took a rough stab at guessing this place must have a dozen bedrooms and probably just as many bathrooms. Her room, and presumably Swatch’s, were in what Sienna had called the east wing, whereas the family’s rooms were at the other end. T.M. assumed that meant she’d get sunlight in the morning. That would have been her preference anyway. If only the house itself had not been creeping her out so much.
Oh well. Best not to linger here as if she were casing the joint. Logically in a place like this the kitchens were probably tucked away out of sight. “Further on and further in,” she muttered to herself as she picked a likely direction.
At least the doors down here were open and she could see inside. A room with a fireplace, big overstuffed leather chairs, and walls full of books looked friendly. A big open space with a grand piano and an entertainment center with very expensive-looking stereo equipment also seemed promising, and not as intimidating as the VERY formal dining room. That room had built-in hutches with a terrifying amount of china, plus a sideboard with enormous platters stacked on it.
Again T.M. was struck by the excess of it all. How had Spamton grown up in this house and come out even vaguely well-adjusted?
She heard voices in the next room down from the dining room, including the blessed familiarity of her bestie. They were talking about food with two people she couldn’t yet see, but could hear, and were being asked about… her?
“Well, T.M. - that’s my and Spam- I mean, Stanton’s friend - she’s pretty much a fan of anything except shrimp. I don’t know much about the other two other than they’re both vegetarians.”
“Yeah, we did get that memo,” said a sharp female voice, continuing after a miniscule pause, “What about you, big guy?”
“Me? Well, I guess if I’m getting asked, something I can’t cook myself? At home, I tend to do Italian or stir-fry, so I don't know… maybe fish?”
T.M. inched into the doorway, ready to jump to Swatch’s defense, but stopped herself when she saw the smile on the speaker’s face, The thin redhead apparently just had one of those dry voices.
She saw Spamton step into the room from a glass door that led onto a patio and caught his eye, trying to look normal.
She came all the way into the kitchen then, and blurted out, “Shit, this place is HUGE, Short Stuff!”
Great.
She wanted to die of embarrassment.
But it seemed to be the perfect icebreaker, and T.M. found herself sitting down with Swatch, Spamton, and the other two, who introduced themselves as Jen and Bonita, sampling a dish of what the chefs called Brown Butter Almond Salmon.
She didn’t want to get too used to this… she still thought it was ridiculous to have catered meals rather than takeout.
But damn, this tasted awfully good.
---------
The rest of the night turned out to be much less formal and more fun than T.M. expected.
Although there was one bit of unexplained tension.
After the chefs had chased the three of them out of the kitchen once they’d finished their “tasting”, Spamton had unerringly led T.M. and Swatch to where the rest of the family were… a living room that T.M. had missed. The couches had plastic slipcovers and the coffee table had a wooden bowl in the middle, filled with bead-encrusted velvet fruit. Carved wooden cherubs flanked several mirrors on the walls, catching the light from the Tiffany lamps on the various end tables.
The enormous flatscreen TV made quite a contrast with the rest of the kitschy decor, and reminded T.M. that yes, the Addison family was made of money.
Spamton had introduced Saffron, his sister-in-law, a toned, tanned, and athletic-looking blonde, and re-introduced Eos, who had a sweet and welcoming smile for them all.
Once he heard where they’d been, Ballew made a snarky comment about children spoiling their dinners, to which Spamton snarked back about Ballew and Eos keeping Bonita and Jen’s cooking all to themselves for long enough.
Almost apologetically, Eos seemed to feel the need to explain that, due to the hours he and Ballew pulled at work, it was just easier to have prepped meals during the week. “But it’s all healthy stuff!”
Sienna patted him on the arm. “Hey, I checked in on them earlier, and their vegetarian stuff looks divine. Thank you for thinking of us.”
She seemed a lot more relaxed than she had earlier. Until her wife spoke up, at any rate.
“Anyway,” Ballew said, and all heads turned to him. “This weekend we’ll all be eating together. Do we want to have a quick hand of cards, and then a movie after dinner?”
“That sounds great!” Swatch started to reply, whereas, almost at the same time Saffron said, "My God, not Nutdealer again. Can't we do something else?"
"But we always—" Sienna interjected before she got cut off by Saffron saying, "Sweetheart, if I hear one more 'but we always', I'll scream. Just like I did in the greenhouse."
"And we can't have that now, can we?" Sienna's mouth was smiling, but her eyes were not.
“Let’s not bicker in front of the company,” Eos said mildly.
“Awwww, you’re no fun anymore,” Spamton interjected in a silly, Monty Python-esque voice.
T.M. couldn’t help but giggle. Swatch smiled, and that gave her the courage to break the ice with her suggestion. “Maybe rummy? We don’t have to worry about how many people we’ve got, and it’s less bloodthirsty, from what I hear about you all.”
“Now that I can get behind,” Saffron replied with a grateful look. “Although I don’t know about the ‘less bloodthirsty’ bit. These guys are sharks.”
“So am I,” T.M. grinned back.
Ballew got up and pulled a card table and folding chairs out of a rack that leaned against a wall. There were multiple sealed decks of cards that he fetched from a built-in drawer in the table. “Glad to have that settled,” he commented drily. “C’mon, gather ‘round, cats and kittens. The birthday boy gets to be the dealer for the first hand.”
“You don’t trust me?” Sienna asked, good humor apparently having been restored.
“Not as far as I can throw you.”
The game went smoothly through three hands of cards before dinner was announced by Bonita. Dinner, as T.M. had expected, was served in the formal dining room, but it was set up in a buffet style on the sideboard, which relieved some of the stuffiness. In addition to the salmon dish she’d gotten to nibble on earlier, there was a beef dish in a creamy pasta, an absolutely kicking chicken curry, something that looked like a shepherd’s pie made with just cheddar and mushroom, and a coleslaw dish made with avocado, mango and coconut. There were side dishes of plain rice and noodles, as well as chopped butternut squash and steamed green beans, with separate serving utensils for everything to avoid cross-contamination between vegetarian and not-vegetarian dishes.
Spamton’s style of eating seemed to be accounted for here… everyone had divided dishes rather than flat plates, and no one raised an eyebrow when he took little portions of everything, rather loading his plate with one of the meal choices. T.M. privately thought that was rather sweet, and wondered whether the family had started to do that after his homeless stretch, or whether he’d adapted later in life to something that had always been there.
She wasn’t sure what to expect for choices for the after-dinner movie, but when RISE OF THE GUARDIANS was suggested, she gladly put in a “yes” vote. It was by the same director as Swatch’s and her beloved SPIDER-VERSE movie, done more than a half-decade earlier, and the sheer love for beautiful detail shone through. T.M. 's favorite character was Sandy, not just for his silent sass and subtle badassery, but because every bit of animation of his dream-sand was a work of art. She’d found out from a Google research rabbit hole that the movie company had actually commissioned NASA to get some of the textures right.
Eos and Ballew disappeared into the kitchen and came back juggling several massive bowls of popcorn. T.M. happily plopped herself on the living room floor, leaning against Swatch’s legs as Swatch sat cuddled up with Spamton on a loveseat, same way she would have done back at the Tibbetts Avenue townhouse.
She did notice that the two married folks weren’t sitting together, but she put it out of her head and lost herself in the movie.
---------
When it came time for the party to break up and the various family members headed to bed for the night, Spamton led the way to his own bedroom [after making sure that he knew where the rooms for the other room were]. “I m-may not have had the chance to - to play the p-piano for you tonight, b-but I’m not going to miss out on our b-b-bedtime reading.”
“Damn straight,” Trez said. Swatch stuck their tongue out at her.
Spamton’s childhood bed was a full-sized one, nowhere near as big nor as long as the king the three of them had gotten used to at Mrs. Anselmo’s. He felt the need to apologize for it, but Swatch waved it off. “This is fine, my dear, at least for tonight’s reading. I am going to commandeer the backrest, though.” And they suited action to words, crawling onto the bed and propping themselves up. Trez positioned herself between Swatch’s legs and laid her head on their chest, while Spamton slotted himself on Swatch’s other side.
The old-fashioned language of L.M. Boston’s GREEN KNOWE book flowed off Swatch’s lips like raindrops, and Spamton let the words he could quote from memory relax his body and mind.
“I'm glad this house is stone,’ said Tolly. "It smells of stone. When you come back to any house that you know, it has such a special smell. Do you think when they built this they put in some magic somewhere to make it last? Because it has lasted so much longer than houses do."
"I am sure they did—or something magic. It was a custom going right back to the first house ever made. Generally it was something under the threshold, or on the roof, or perhaps under the hearth—the three most important places."
"Have you looked?" Tolly was patting and stroking the walls as if they were alive.
"No," the old lady said. "I haven't disturbed anything. Whatever is there is working very well."
The entrance hall was delightfully enclosing and reassuring, full as always of flowers and birds' nests, the lights relayed from mirror to mirror all down its length, and all the scatter of happy living—secateurs, baskets, books, letters, and anything-to-hand lying on the tables. The coloured stairs led up invitingly, but to get to the attic you had to pass through the Knights' Hall, which, if it had been alone for some hours, had a habit of slipping back to its own century. However much you loved it, Tolly thought, it always needed a little resolution to break away into its privacy at night.
Just as Swatch was going to end the chapter, there was a knock at the door. Spamton raised his head and looked at the other two for confirmation before calling out, “It’s open!”
Saffron was the last person he expected to see poking a head around his bedroom door. But there she was.
“Hi, I know it’s getting late, but I’m glad I can catch all three of you at once,” she said, hovering on the threshold. “Can we talk?”
“Sure, c-come on in,” Spamton replied. He sat up and waved his hand towards the wing chair off to the side of his desk. The other two rearranged themselves so that they were sitting up, as well.
His sister’s wife came in and sat down, crossing her legs and clasping her arms around her knees. “Well,” she started, “I was going to ask if any of you wanted to come on a run with me tomorrow morning.”
That, too, was unexpected. Spamton couldn’t remember ever being invited anywhere by Saffron, let alone on what was usually sacrosanct time between her and Sienna.
Blessedly, Swatch stepped in. “I most certainly would be interested. A three-mile circuit?”
“Yeah, how’d you guess? Down that ridiculous driveway and around what passes for a block in these fancypants parts. And I’m happy to do a shorter distance or a jog if that will tempt you other folks.”
Spamton’s curiosity was even more piqued. “Why d-do I get the f-feeling you’re angling for something, Saffron? Are you - and Sienna g-going to g-gang up on us? I’m n-not the athlete in - in the house.”
Now Saffron looked awkward. “Hardly ganging up, Stanton. In fact, Sienna probably won’t even be there. I don’t know if you noticed at dinner, but things are a bit, shall we say, uncomfortable with us right now.”
Trez had been watching the exchange in silence, but spoke up. “It’s not like I have a yardstick, but yeah, I was picking up some hinky vibes. Is it because of us?”
“Not directly. But maybe, kinda. I don’t think so?” Saffron ran her hands through her short hair in frustration. “I don’t know. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea—”
“Hey,” Spamton interrupted. “I c-can only sp-speak for myself, but that f-fact that you’re t-t-talking to me at all is a big fat m-m-m-m-miracle. I’m actually kinda - kinda honored, for a change. Sure, we’ll all g-go for a walk tomorrow morning… and have a t-t-talk too.”
That seemed to ease Saffron’s mind. “Good. I’ll look for you all around back at seven o’clock then, before breakfast?”
Trez groaned. “I’ll be there, early but not bright.”
“Oh, it’ll be good for you, Moggy,” Swatch soothed.
“Says you, Birdman.”
Saffron got up, looking as though she wanted to say more, but then just left the room, closing the door behind her.
All three of them looked at each other with varying shades of alarm, not knowing what they'd let themselves in for. Finally Swatch said what all of them were thinking. “What was that about? She didn’t call you ‘Gainsboro’, she was practically friendly…”
Spamton chewed that over before answering, “I’m n-not sure. B-But it won’t surprise me if Sienna tries to g-get us alone for a t-talk, too, some t-time this weekend. I d-d-don't turn 25 every day.”
Trez stretched and swung her legs off the bed. “Well, I’m going to head to my guest quarters before anyone starts doing bed checks. I assume that’s a thing here.” Her tone was light, but it sounded like she meant it. She leaned over and gave Spamton a goodnight kiss.
Swatch got up as well. “I’ll walk you there, Moggy. At least my room has a queen-size bed. I love you, Spamton, but if I slept here I’d be a pretzel by daylight.” They kissed Spamton as well before heading out with T.M.
Spamton was left wondering what the morning would bring. He looked at the closet where his zoot suit hung, as though it held the answers.
Chapter notes: Content warning for alcohol and mentioned sexual content.
Chapter summary: Seemingly shifting sands underfoot solidify into stronger pillars of support.
===================
“So.”
“S-So?”
“So. It’s just you, me, and the elephant in the room.”
Swatch took a bite of nacho, swallowed, and continued. “Shall we toss a coin to see who goes first?”
“Oh.” Spamton stuck a fork into one of the chicken fingers, dropped it onto his plate, and proceeded to cut it into tiny pieces. Eventually he looked up into Swatch’s eyes and said, “You m-m-mean about last night.”
“Indeed. You spent time with your siblings, and I was with Moggy.” Swatch looked directly back into Spamton’s eyes and repeated, with a particular emphasis, “I was with Moggy.” They were surprised to feel blood rushing away from their head as they said the words. Some part of their mind thought that they should have been blushing, instead.
And of course Spamton noticed; his eyes widened and his fork clattered out of his hand. “And that’s a b-b-bad thing?” he asked after a minute. “You seem - seem really c-c-conflicted.”
Swatch snorted. “You could say that. And I guess I’m going first, after all.”
“Only if - if you want to. I c-c-can talk about my night instead.”
“No, I should probably get this out of the way.” They picked up the tray of sliders, put two on their plate and slid the last one onto Spamton’s plate without touching it. Then they picked up their Bellini glass and looked into it, as though it held answers. Finally they sighed and said, “It felt like… I don’t know if this is the right way to say this, but anyway. It felt like the right thing for the wrong reasons? I liked it, but I was doing it more for Moggy than for me, and she definitely picked up on that.” They took a big sip and muttered, “It couldn’t have been more obvious that she regretted it.”
“Huh.”
“Indeed.”
Spamton picked up his fork again, ate a few bites of chicken, and had a sip of his own Bellini. He seemed to be carefully pondering what to say next. What came out was, “Have you t-talked to her at all today?”
“Nope. I was too much of a coward.”
“Huh.”
Swatch felt their lips firmly curving downwards into an involuntary grimace. They didn’t want to sour the night, but there was no way they were going to keep anything from their partner. “I know I’m going to have to talk to Moggy about this, but I was kind of hoping you’d be around for a talk like that. If I had had half a brain, the three of us should have talked this out before it came to this.”
They lowered their head and devoted their attention to their food. Spamton did the same with his slider and nachos. Almost ten minutes went by before a text ping from Swatch’s cellphone broke the silence.
“Speak of the devil herself. Do you mind if I check this?”
“G-Go right ahead.”
Swatchpulled out the phone and swiped to get their message. After reading it, they squinched their eyes shut and pushed the phone across the table so Spamton could see the one line “my new place” and the attached photos. They answered Spamton’s questioning look by answering, “T.M. has lost her marbles. She’s about to move into a broom closet.”
“She WHAT.”
“She went and rented an apartment. Not even an apartment, a bloody studio. It’s smaller than our dining room.”
They both looked at each other, trying to let this sink in. Finally Spamton said, “Um, n-not for me to - to judge, b-but that seems like she’s trying to run away from us.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
“I think we three really n-need to talk. In person. Fast. Like n-no later than t-tomorrow.”
Swatch leaned over and kissed the top of Spamton’s head. “You’re a smart fella.”
“That’s what they c-call me. M-M-Mister Smartfella.”
Spamton was not being very subtle about keeping an eye on the decreasing level of the Bellini pitcher. He’d matched Swatch drink for drink, and there was maybe enough left for each of them to have three-quarters of a glass.
Swatch was enjoying having someone reining in what had been an unusual impulse for them. They were waiting to feel the effects of the alcohol; they had a sense of all-over physical relaxation, but that could have been the food and the company as well. But their mind still seemed clear, and they didn’t think they were slurring their speech.
They couldn’t tell how affected Spamton was. He’d mentioned blaming sangria for something that happened last night, but had he consumed more alcohol last night than he had tonight, or was it just that the Bellinis were weaker?
Hmmm. Maybe Swatch WAS starting to feel a bit tipsy, since they were starting to get more hyperfocused on petty details.
Two nachos remained; the sliders and chicken fingers were long gone. Spamton seemed to know what Swatch was thinking, because he scraped one onto his own plate, the other onto Swatch’s, and then split the rest of the drinks between their two glasses. “Bon appetit," he said in an exaggerated accent.
“Tres bon, tres bon,” Swatch replied.
A thought was starting to form in their mind as they finished eating.
“Is that bathroom as private as this lounge is?” They waved their hand towards the door Metthias had pointed out.
Spamton almost looked alarmed at the question, which gave Swatch the answer they’d been expecting. He asked a question in return, “Are you asking m-me what I - I think you’re asking?”
“Yes, if you are asking whether I want to ravish your lovely body. More accurately, I’m asking if you want to ravish me.”
“Is - is that the Bellinis t-talking?”
“No. This is what I want. I want you. Here. Now.”
Swatch twirled the ridiculously ornate bathroom key on the end of one finger. “You yourself said that sometime in the last few years, this place changed from a corporate hangout to something queer-friendly. No one’s going to even notice.”
They stood up, saying more quietly, “Knock five times, and I’ll knock back twice.”
They heard Spamton make a comment about “Shave and a haircut” when they were already halfway across the floor. They looked back quickly, just in time to see Spamton pull out some twenties from his wallet, and two more.
That apparently caught Metthias’ eye, and the dark-haired waiter hurried over. Without even letting Spamton speak, he plucked the bills from Spamton’s hand. Swatch imagined Metthias was saying something like, “Go catch up with that big beauty, sweet thing. I’ll make sure no one takes your table”, and they grinned as they turned the key in the door handle.
Ten minutes later, in probably THE fanciest bathroom outside a private home that either of them had ever seen, Swatch found themself lying flat on a padded bench with their chambray shirt pulled out of their jeans and completely unbuttoned, Spamton kneeling above them and pinning both of Swatch’s hands above their head.
On the subway ride home, Swatch listened while Spamton haltingly outlined his siblings' plan for him to split the summer between them. "If I hate it, I c-c-can crash with you, right? Wherever you end up living when - when you start work in June."
"You most certainly can, my dear. Or maybe Ratfink Freddie will let you move back into Overlook early." By hook or by crook, Catechu had managed to get Spamton added back as his and Indigo's roommate for the upcoming Fall semester.
"That c-c-could work."
Back at Tibbetts Avenue, Swatch made a point of drinking almost a liter of seltzer as they were looking over what they’d need for classes tomorrow, and they put a full glass of seltzer on Spamton’s night table by his side of the bed.
They didn’t think they were going to have a hangover tomorrow, but they didn’t want to risk it after their first actual drinking experience.
They could faintly hear music from upstairs, where Spamton was showering… something jazzy. Swatch nipped into the downstairs bathroom, stripped and threw their clothes into the hamper. They gave themself a quick sponge bath and ran some dry shampoo through their hair with their fingers. Good enough for tonight, but tomorrow better be wash day.
Swatch would miss a lot of things about this house… the way everything in it seemed to be suited for one short person and one tall person to live in harmony.
Could they find someplace like it elsewhere?
And if so, could they make it into a place for three people, equally comfortably? Swatch remembered the text exchange before Easter, about one enormous bed…
They went back to the bedroom and had just finished pulling on clean sweatpants when Spamton came in, one towel wrapped around his head, another one wrapped around his waist. The lower towel was almost big enough to use as a toga. He took off the head towel first, tousling his hair, and then pulled out a t-shirt and boxers from the dresser drawer before dropping the other towel.
Such a difference from the modest fellow who used to change into full pajamas somewhere out of sight!
Swatch, smirking to themself, lay back on the bed and spread their arms out wide, and Spamton clambered up to lie next to them.
A drop of water ran down Swatch’s shoulder, from Spamton’s still-damp hair. “I’m g-g-getting your chest all wet,” their partner murmured apologetically.
Swatch laughed at that, shivering overdramatically, and hugged Spamton tight. “Like you didn’t get me all wet at the bar? With that delicious tongue of yours?”
Despite the locked bathroom door at The Cathode Ray, neither of them had felt comfortable enough in such a public place to do anything more than a prolonged makeout session. Both pairs of jeans had stayed firmly and regrettably on.
“Hey, you know what I m-mean,” Spamton protested. “And I’m t-too tired to do anything except - except lie here.”
“Sounds good to me. Come under the covers, though.”
“You d-don’t need to ask me twice.”
Suiting action to words, they both wrapped themselves in sheets and blankets and huddled closer. As nice as the evening temperatures had been downtown, now that night had fallen it was chilly with the window open a crack. A few weeks ago, Swatch had figured out how to pull down the screens that had been slid between the old-fashioned wooden frames with the double glazing. They’d come to appreciate over the winter how much the thicker glass cut down on street noise; there was a difference now in both air and sound quality in full-blown springtime.
I wonder what this house is like in the summertime. Or a house like this.
They decided to shelve that thought for a later time, and asked Spamton a different question. “So, successful date night? I’d give it two thumbs up.”
Swatch could feel Spamton’s smile against their bare arm. “D-definitely better than our first - our first date. Although there were a f-f-few similarities.”
“Oh? Like what?”
“Like visiting m-m-my old stomping grounds and laying old ghosts t-to rest.”
“Huh. You’re right.”
“Thank God we d-d-didn’t have a staircase incident, though.”
“Amen to that.”
Spamton kissed Swatch’s shoulder. “I m-m-meant what I said back there, though. About talking m-more about your mom and your grandmother. T-Talking more about how and - and where you grew up. I’m n-not the only one who’s got ghosts to d-d-defeat. I want to hear your stories.”
Swatch felt a warmth in their chest that had nothing and everything to do with the man curled up in their arms. “You’ve got a deal,” they replied.
T.M. found herself grateful that she didn’t have to make the first move in setting up a time and place for her to meet up with the other two. She’d felt cowardly enough when she had sent the photos of her new studio apartment to Swatch and had worried when she hadn’t gotten an immediate reply. She’d been sure that they’d be avoiding her for a few days at least. And she had no idea how Spamton would feel, no matter what Swatch might have said to him, before or after she’d jumped Swatch.
But first Spamton had texted her this morning, and then Swatch had called her in the afternoon when they knew she’d be between classes, and both had asked her to come over tonight. Swatch had even said, “I can hear your self-blame from a mile away, Moggy. And there’s no reason for it.”
God, talk about reading me like a book!, T.M. had thought to herself. She’d laughed and answered that she’d be there.
Now the three of them were seated at the kitchen table at the townhouse, splitting several chicken-and avocado-on takeout entrees - chicken and avocado on flatbread - from Tin Marin. Because she’d committed herself to staying overnight at their place, T.M. had indulged herself in a six-pack of Presidente. Swatch had their usual flavored seltzers stockpiled in the fridge, and Spamton had a bottle of port wine in front of him, although he was still only on his second glass.
T.M. made a mental note to ask Swatch later about Swatch relaxing their personal rules about alcohol in the house. But for now she needed to pay attention to the matter currently under discussion.
Namely, living arrangements.
Spamton got the ball rolling. “Your n-new place looks - uh, c-cozy.”
She huffed out a laugh. “Don’t mince words, Short Stuff. You can say it’s tiny. I know it’s tiny. But the price is right, the neighborhood is right. I can move in anytime after the first of May. GiGi’s already moved in with Leroux, so there’s not much keeping me on campus between now and graduation.”
Too late, she realized how that sounded… as if Swatch and Spamton weren’t good enough reasons to stay around for.
Her bestie, however, swooped in before she could stick her foot further into her mouth. Cutting to the chase in time-honored Swatch fashion, they asked, “Does the timing of this have anything to do with Tuesday night?”
Damn. Busted.
Deciding it was better to tell the truth, she said, “Well, yes and no. I did really have appointments to see apartments this week… Desiree set those up. But I might have moved a leeeeeeetle bit quickly on grabbing one of them because I didn’t want to deal with you. Okay, let’s be honest. I didn’t want to have to deal with either of you.”
T.M. knew Swatch well enough to see, from the momentary way they stiffened up, that they were trying not to feel hurt. They disguised it well, but her heart sank a bit.
And Spamton’s next question didn’t help.
“D-d-did you think I’d condemn you? F-for spending a n-night with Swatch?”
She had to give that one a few minutes to sink in before she answered.
"If the shoe were on the other foot? Yeah, probably. Like if you'd jumped into bed with… I dunno, Catechu maybe? Or GiGi? Anyway, you jumping into bed with someone else without talking to me first. I mean, there’s no exact parallel—"
"Oh, Trez."
T.M. forged ahead. "I don't even know what you and I have, Spamton. Sure, I know what you and Swatch have. But I don't know where I fit in, other than being everyone's good time girl—"
"You were never that–"
"Oh, Moggy…"
Now all three of them were talking at once.
But the sentence that came out clearest was T.M.'s, after everyone else finished their protests.
"Can I move in here? With both of you two? At least for the rest of the semester?"
Swatch’s jaw actually snapped shut at hearing that.
She’d surprised herself with the request, but suddenly it felt like the most right thing she’d said or thought in ages. She kept gong. “Because I am excited about the new place, but I also am scared shitless of what it’s gonna mean when I can’t see either of you every day.”
Her bestie got up from their end of the table, walked to where she was tearing pieces of flatbread into shreds with her fingers, and pulled her into a standing, wordless hug.
"D-Did you think we’d try to t-t-t-talk you out of it?” was Spamton’s reply. “The new apartment, I m-mean.”
T.M. leaned forward so that she could rest her head on Swatch’s chest. “Kinda,” she muttered.
“Well, don’t. And I c-can’t speak f-for Swatch, but I’ve been wanting you to m-move in with us for a hell of a long t-time.”
Spamton got up and wrapped himself against her back, saying, “So. You’re staying here t-t-tonight. That’s a start. Right, Swatch?”
“Indeed,” Swatch’s voice was a rumble, since they had ducked their chin to rest on top of her head.
And somehow everything was alright again.
While the three of them finished eating, T.M. laid out plans for what she’d need from storage in Queens, versus what she planned to thrift in her new neighborhood. Spamton actually had some recommendations, based on what he called “local knowledge from a bygone time”, doing his best Robert Carlyle imitation.
Swatch commented that they had checked with the HR department at Addison Cybernetics and, apparently, they would cover either a short-term rental or an extended-stay hotel for the first thirty days of Swatch’s internship, if their aunt Desiree couldn’t network something in Westchester County. They looked meaningfully at Spamton while they were talking, but T.M. didn’t feel like following that yarn trail tonight.
The rest of the evening went by in a pleasant haze of beer, wine, couch cuddles, and Brendan Fraser, seasoned with delicious sprinkles of Oded Fehr, as the three of them watched the first two MUMMY movies.
When it was time to call it a night, T.M. headed upstairs to the Eyrie, where Swatch had put her overnight bag. She’d half-expected Spamton to follow her, but it wasn’t until almost an hour after she’d crawled into bed that she heard a knock on the half-closed door.
“C’mon in, Short Stuff.”
She moved over and patted the covers next to her, and he sat down on the edge of the bed. He took her hand and stroked the back of it with his thumb. With an effort, she waited for him to speak first, because he looked like he had a lot on his mind, even after the strides they’d all made in regaining their usual ease with each other.
Finally Spamton said, “I n-never wanted you to ever f-feel like you were ‘lesser’ to me than what I f-feel for Swatch. If I have, then I’m so, so sorry.”
That was something T.M. had been feeling for a long time, and she said so now. “But how do we fix this? Especially this late in the semester.”
He made a thoughtful noise before answering. “Well, something I - I realized that may be p-p-part of the problem is that you and I haven’t g-g-gone out on a date. We spend a lot of t-time together, but we haven’t d-done the usual couple things.”
“Hey, you might have a point. And I’m sorry, too, if I ever made YOU feel that I only wanted you around for sex.”
“You never d-did.”
“Good.”
Spamton shifted his sitting position, and T.M. felt a new wave of fondness. “C’mere,” she said as she pulled the blankets out from under his butt. “Stay with me tonight.”
She was rewarded with a smile and the words, “Thought you’d - you’d n-never ask.”
When he’d settled in the crook of her arm and put his hand on her hip in his usual way, he asked, “So where would you like to g-go on our date?”
“You’re asking me?”
“Is - is that okay?”
“Hell yeah that’s okay! I usually get told, not asked.”
“Huh.”
“Let me think about it, hon. I’m really, really tired. But thank you.” She kissed his forehead and closed her eyes, feeling better than she had for weeks. It wasn’t too long until they both fell asleep.
Written for the 2025 RISE OF THE GUARDIANS Halloween Challenge at @rotg-halloween
“I don’t understand how you can possibly be surprised by this,” snapped Pitch, as he and Coz tried to hold the bedroom door shut against the slimy mindless beast that was trying to break said door off its hinges.
“I don’t know why, I just didn’t think Proto’s ‘lethal chef’ side included having his creations escape from their pots and pans!” Coz retorted, half-panting, half-sobbing. “Poor Jack, he tried so hard to save Tarminator…”
That comment chilled Pitch to the bone. “Good God, what am I going to tell Piki?”
“Let’s survive this first, babe. Then we’ll worry about Piki.”
