MHA #6 Saturday Afternoon

[arboreal_priestess]

So, with the past week, Liam had had plenty of time to experience being around blanket forts, but Verity was pretty sure he'd still never had the fun of building one. So she'd sent him out to the store for some snacks, citing a long-overdue call with Sarah for why she couldn't accompany him and after said call (in which she harangued her cousin to at least talk to Artie, for god's sake, and also to come back to Baltimore), she stripped all the linens off their bed and grabbed everything from the closet and left it all in a giant pile on the floor for Liam to spot when he came home.

Shut up, this was totally for Liam's benefit and not at all because the past week had Verity feeling nostalgic or anything.

Comments

[firstofitskind]

Yeah, there had been forts at the station, at most of the shops- hell, the cheese panda had even been happily ensconced in one at Turtle and Canary just now- and even technically in the Kincaid-Price household, though those last had all been mouse-sized. Liam had about a hundred pictures on his Global of how adorable they were, even.

But Verity was absolutely correct in that he had not actually stepped foot in any of those (the cheese panda had thoughtfully(?) chucked a package of cheddar at him as he'd passed the fort in T&C, though).

"Uh," Liam blinked, as he stepped in from the hallway and saw the massive pile of blankets and pillows. "... Is it laundry day already?"

[arboreal_priestess]

"Nope!" Verity said. Well, okay. It probably was. She did not keep the best track of things like 'laundry'. "We're correcting a gross oversight of your childhood."

There were air quotes around childhood. As was right and proper.

[firstofitskind]

"... We are?" Liam blinked at her over the bags of snacks. "What is it this time?" he asked, curious.

That was not the first time he'd heard those words, no.

[arboreal_priestess]

Yes, but unlike many of those other times, no weapons were involved today!

"I figured I'd teach you the fine art of Blanket Fort Architecture," Verity said, her smile...okay, her smile was pretty smug.

What? She liked being able to surprise her husband with things that made him happy.

[firstofitskind]

"The fine at of...?" Liam echoed, and then trailed off, glancing between that pile of linens, to Verity's adorably smug expression, and back again, as realization set in. "Oh."

[arboreal_priestess]

"You haven't been in a fort all week," Verity pointed out. "I figured that clearly what you needed was a sense of ownership over a fort before you'd be comfortable having adventures in one." She looked up at him, her smug grin turning into a beaming smile of pure pleasure. "You got the snacks, right? Those are a key part of the blanket fort experience."

[firstofitskind]

Liam held up the bag of snacks, which ran the gamut from things like chips and pretzels to gummi candies and cookies.

"So that's lesson one, huh? Proper provisions."

[arboreal_priestess]

"The longer you can stay in the fort, the longer before you parents say you have to put the blankets back," Verity said nodding. "Alex used to have a one of those constellation projectors and we'd put it on in the fort and eat snacks by the glowing light of the stars." Her eyes were warm. "They were good times."

[firstofitskind]

“That sounds nice,” Liam said, notably without the tinge of jealousy that sometimes reared its head when other people talked about their childhoods. Yes, he’d missed out on a lot of things, but Verity was doing her damndest to make sure he got to experience them now, and he just.

He loved her so fucking much.

[arboreal_priestess]

"So put that bag over here on the couch," Verity said, hopping to her feet and over to kiss him, quick and soft. "And let's start building this blanket fort. It's actually going to be a lot easier than when I was a kid, let me tell you. We're taller now."

...shut up.

[firstofitskind]

"We are, huh?" Liam said, grinning down at her as the kiss ended. And then darting out of her reach over to the couch to put down those snacks as requested.

[arboreal_priestess]

That didn't stop her from trying to swat at him as he darted by. Here in the house, she didn't often bother with shoes, so her height - or lack thereof - was readily apparent. "See if I teach you how to make a blanket fort now," she grumbled, pouting at him.

Ever so sincerely, yes.

[firstofitskind]

"You wouldn't!" he gave her his very best puppy-dog-eyes look. "Verity."

[arboreal_priestess]

"Teach you to make fun of me for being short," Verity declared, her hands on her hips. "Short people are always ready to throw down. It's because we're closer to Satan."

That was one of Alex's favorite jokes.

[firstofitskind]

"That tracks," Liam agreed. "Even if you say that like you don't make fun of me for bumping my head on things," he grumbled back at her.

[arboreal_priestess]

"The world was built for tall people," Verity declared blithely. "That you're still having problems is a you-thing."

She was dimpling at him something fierce. "We gonna get this show on the road then? I wanna watch TV in our fort!"

[firstofitskind]

"Bossy," Liam said, as if that wasn't one of the things he loved most about her. "Lead on, then. What's next?"

[arboreal_priestess]

Verity's bit top energy might have been the first thing about her that he'd noticed.

"Well, first you've gotta look around your construction site," she explained. "Are there any sections of it that you want to incorporate in your fort?"

[firstofitskind]

... Yeah, that absolutely tracked.

"Well," he bit his lip, surveying the living room. "If we're watching TV in this fort... should the couch be inside or are we supposed to be on the floor?"

[arboreal_priestess]

"Technically, there's no wrong way to build a fort," Verity said, knowing Liam's fear of Doing It Wrong. "But laying on the floor is closer to the spirit of the fort. Also, the couch is far enough from the TV that the roof might dip down and obscure our vision."

[firstofitskind]

"Okay," Liam nodded, absorbing that information. "But we could flip the couch around and use the back as a wall?"

[arboreal_priestess]

Verity snapped her fingers and grinned at him. "Now you're picking up what I'm putting down," she told him. "Let's flip that around. Though we're also gonna take all the couch cushions off first so we have stuff to sit on."

[firstofitskind]

"More comfortable than right on the floor," Liam agreed, moving to take the couch cushions off.

And stack them neatly according to whether they were seat cushions, back cushions, or the throw-pillow style, because he was that type of nerd.

[arboreal_priestess]

Verity watched him, mouth twitching. God, her husband was positively ridiculous. She adored him.

"We're also going to have to find a way to give ourselves a little height," she said as he finished. "A floor lamp works, but only if it's never on." ASK HER WHAT COULD HAPPEN, LIAM, GO ON. ASK. "Tacking it to the ceiling usually works."

[firstofitskind]

"... You tack the floor lamp to the ceiling?" Liam blinked at her in momentary confusion, not realizing those were unrelated statements.