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

[arboreal_priestess]

"I thought you'd like it," Verity said. "...Why didn't you go into any of the other ones around town?"

[firstofitskind]

Cast glances that one might categorize as ‘curious’ and possibly even ‘longing’ at those other blanket forts, yes, but go in? Absolutely not.

“I didn’t really feel like I was supposed to,” he admitted, after a beat of silence. Not because he was an adult, exactly, but because he didn’t have that nostalgic connection to them that so many others seemed to.

[arboreal_priestess]

"Why?" Verity asked, tilting her head. "They were there for everyone."

[firstofitskind]

“Yes, but,” he frowned. “When you saw them, how did they make you feel?”

[arboreal_priestess]

"Happy," Verity said immediately. "Comforted."

[firstofitskind]

“Why?” he pressed.

[arboreal_priestess]

"Because it brought back - ah," Verity said, understanding. "But still, I know you were curious." She'd seen it. Which was why tonight had happened.

[firstofitskind]

“Yeah,” he admitted, because denying it was pretty pointless. “It’s something that so many people had a connection to,” and across some of those cultural and species barriers, even! “I wanted to understand why.”

[arboreal_priestess]

Verity nodded. "But you didn't really ask me about it," she pointed out.

[firstofitskind]

"I didn't," he agreed. "I don't always know how."

[arboreal_priestess]

Verity leaned over to bump his shoulder, her hand sliding down his arm to clasp his hand. "With words," she said, a glib answer above but deep beneath. "You can ask me whatever you need to know. I'm always here to answer, even if we both have to grope our way towards finding the right words."

[firstofitskind]

“Sounds simple when you say it like that.” Affection, pure and steady, thrummed between the connection their hands had made. “I used to ask a lot of questions, when I was new,” he admitted. ‘Younger’ never seemed like the right term to use. “Didn’t get a lot of answers.”

[arboreal_priestess]

"Yeah, but all of those people were assholes," Verity said. There were maybe four exceptions to that. Maybe. "I'm your wife, remember?" Verity still glowed when she said that. "You get to ask me stuff. It's in the contract."

[firstofitskind]

Four was being pretty generous, honestly. “Next to the part about only making tall-person-friendly blanket forts?” he teased gently.

[arboreal_priestess]

"Yeah, jury's still out on that one," Verity teased. "But that other stuff...always."

[firstofitskind]

“Hmph,” Liam pouted, but only for a second, because in the next moment he was pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Love you.”

[arboreal_priestess]

"Love you, too," Verity said, snuggling into him. "This is...Everything about everything is better because you're with me."

[firstofitskind]

“Partnership, babe,” Liam said. “Thank you. For knowing that I wanted this even though I couldn’t figure out how to ask.”

[arboreal_priestess]

"If you think I haven't spent the last few years figuring out exactly what makes you smile, you haven't been paying attention to me," Verity said, voice warm and loving.

[firstofitskind]

“Paying attention to you is one of my favorite pastimes,” Liam said, offering her one of those smiles just now.

[arboreal_priestess]

"That's one of the reasons we're so good together," Verity murmured with a soft laugh. "Because we pay attention."

[firstofitskind]

"Wouldn't want it any other way," Liam said firmly. The portrayal of marriage as some sort of 'trap' or otherwise terrible fate? He'd never understand that.

He shifted slightly, smile creasing into a slight frown that had nothing to do with the topic of conversation and everything to do with the fact that he could feel something lumpy behind him as he leaned against the back of the couch.

[arboreal_priestess]

Or 'the old ball and chain'? Verity didn't just love her husband, she liked him. That was why they'd gotten together in the first place. "Yeah, I - what are you doing?"

[firstofitskind]

"There's something..." Liam reached back behind him to grab the offending object, and then held it out in front of him, frowning quizzically at it.

"What the hell?"

The offending object, for the record, being a plushy rabbit... with soft, velvety antlers?

[arboreal_priestess]

"A stuffed jackalope?" Verity said, tilting her head at it in confusion. "Where did - is that yours?"