Pumpkin Pie 12
Author: Casey
Story: Nothing is Ever Easy universe, Pre-NIEE: Real World AU
Challenges: Pumpkin Pie 12 (fearsome creatures), Green Tea 24 (bedtime), Papaya 26 (when you least expect it)
Toppings & Extras: Whipped Cream (Rylia is 7), Chopped Nuts (RWAU), Sprinkles (Ry and Isabelle)
Word Count: 2,016
Rating: PG
Summary: Ry and her foster parents finally connect…over Firefly’s Serenity
Notes: Winter, 2008. Opinions completely coincide with mine, only I got scared in my early 20s by Serenity, not when I was 7. I also turned on almost every light in our college apartment and called my mommy at 3am. She laughed at me after she realized I wasn’t in trouble. Zombie cannibal torturers totally freak out my subconscious. This ended up sickeningly cheerful despite the Reavers.
Ry knew she was supposed to be in bed asleep, but she felt awake and restless. After staring at her ceiling for a while, she crawled out of bed, pulling a pair of socks and a sweatshirt on over her pajamas. She glanced at the clock, seeing it was only about 10pm, but figured her foster parents were already in bed or at least in their room. No one in this house, except sometimes her, were late nighters.
What she didn’t account for was the fact it was a Friday night. She made it to the bottom of the stairs and then paused, tilting her head at the noises she could hear. Curious, she crept forward, peeking into the family room where she was surprised to find Daniel and Isabelle spread out on the couch, a bowl of delicious smelling popcorn and oranges in various stages of being peeled sitting on the coffee table in front of them. There also sat four bottles of beer, two already drunk. Not only that, but they were almost cuddling like normal people. It was like walking into the Twilight Zone, or maybe into someone’s house like Jez and Colin or Bri and Jay.
The TV was on, showing…Ry blinked. What in the world were they watching?
Isabelle reached forward and snagged a handful of popcorn.
Ry edged forward, intrigued by both the movie and the snacks, not to mention the fact her uncool, awkward foster parents were watching something that looked amazing. Focused on the TV, she missed Bean’s toy train and tripped over it, catching herself before falling but also creating more than enough noise to draw the pair’s attention.
“Ry!” Isabelle said in surprise, scrambling upright as Daniel snagged the remote to pause the screen. “We thought you were asleep. Do you need something?”
Even after four years, Ry often felt awkward around the pair. They just had a hard time finding common ground, even if they had gotten much better at cohabitating over the years. She still worried, constantly, that they would send her away and keep her brother. To Bean, they were Mom and Dad and wonderful and the just four-year-old asked her constantly why she didn’t call them that too (but didn’t seem to wonder why they all had a different last name). She bet it never occurred to Bean that they could send them away any day, probably because she couldn’t see them ever deserting her brother.
“No, just…couldn’t sleep.”
“Us either,” Daniel said with a quick smile and then tentatively offered her the popcorn. Bean also slept when he was supposed to, but then, Bean hadn’t had the instincts Ry constantly fought with engrained in him almost before he could stand.
She stepped around her brother’s toy and took a handful. “Thanks.” She glanced at the paused TV screen. “What’re you watching?”
“It’s called Serenity.”
“What’s it about?” This was probably the most interest Ry had ever shown in their activities and they all knew it.
“It’s…like a pirate western set in space.”
The seven-year-old blinked. That sounded as amazing as it had appeared to be. “Oh.”
There was a momentary awkward pause and then Daniel glanced at Isabelle. “We just started. There’s a while until the Reavers.”
Isabelle turned and addressed Ry directly. “You’re welcome to stay for a while. It probably won’t make a lot of sense, though.”
“That’s okay,” she said quickly, wanting to know what Reavers were.
“Have a seat,” Daniel said and then tossed her an orange. Isabelle snuggled back in next to him.
She caught it and set to work peeling it as best she could without taking her eyes off the screen. She was instantly engrossed as she settled at the other side of the couch. Finally, during a pause while Isabelle ran to the bathroom, Ry glanced at Daniel. “I’m still not tired.” Even if she had been, she would have lied through her teeth to get to see more.
He hesitated. “The Reavers are pretty scary. They’re like…cannibal zombies.”
“I promise I won’t wake you up if I have nightmares.”
For a moment, the two of them stared at each other silently. “You can, you know. That’s why we’re here.” He smiled crookedly. “To scare the crap out of you with cannibal zombies and then make it all better later.”
Isabelle came back right then and neither of them acknowledged the comment again, but neither did Daniel make her go to bed. The Reavers were as awesomely amazing and scary as Daniel had warned.
When the movie ended, Ry quickly wiped away a few stray tears from the climax.
“Okay,” Isabelle said as they switched it off, standing and stretching, “off to bed with you, kiddo.” Her foster mother seemed much more relaxed in the semi-darkness of the evening. She never ever called Ry, kiddo.
The seven-year-old felt something loosen just slightly inside her. “Thanks for letting me stay up.”
“Glad you enjoyed it. How about we start with the regular series next weekend?”
“How about tomorrow?” she asked hopefully.
“One late night a week is more than enough. It’s at least midnight.”
“Then next weekend,” Ry said firmly, not liking to admit, even to herself, that it reassured her she had at least another week before they might send her back. And Firefly was a whole fourteen episodes. That meant, she absently figured it out in her head, at least 7 weeks, if they watched two a weekend, a whole 14 if they didn’t.
Isabelle went upstairs with her and tucked her in, a nightly ritual that Ry actually appreciated this time. Her room seemed awfully dark.
It came as perhaps no surprise to Daniel and Isabelle, but lots to Ry, who thought herself pretty darn fearless, that she woke three hours later with an unwavering certainty that Reavers were in her room and, if she opened her eyes, they would get her. After ten minutes, she convinced herself that peeking and squinting was different from opening. Eyes only partially open, she bolted out of bed and down the hall to Isabelle and Daniel’s room, thankful for once that they left their door open in case she or Bean need anything. She paused in their doorway feeling a bit calmer now and uncertain what to do now. She rarely asked the pair for anything and now she wanted to admit something she had insisted on watching scared her.
She swallowed hard, turning to leave, but something woke Isabelle. “Ry?” she asked around a yawn.
“Hi, I, um…”
“Reavers?” Isabelle asked, flicking on the lamp by the bed.
Daniel mumbled and flopped over on his side away from it. It was weird to see him without his glasses.
“Yeah,” she said in a small voice.
Isabelle glanced over at the clock and winked. “Three hours. Not bad. Daniel woke me up after two when we saw Serenity in the theaters.”
Ry felt herself smile. “You’re joking.”
“Dead serious. They’re in your room?”
The girl was shocked she understood but nodded. “Yeah.”
Then, to her everlasting surprise, Isabelle patted the bed between them. “C’mon. Our bed is Reaver-proof.”
Rylia’s natural skepticism took over even as she edged forward. “Nothing is Reaver-proof.”
“I promise you’ll be perfectly safe here.”
Both of them were aware of the double-meaning in her words but, as usual, neither commented. After another moment of hesitation, during which Ry was certain the Reavers had to have made it down the hall by now, she scrambled up the end of the bed and into the nice comfortable, safe space between them. “Thanks, Isabelle,” Ry mumbled as the woman pulled the covers up comfortably over both of them.
“My pleasure, kiddo.” She switched off the light.
*
The next morning, Ry was gone before Isabelle woke. Daniel rolled over and kissed her briefly as he put on his glasses. “Was it my imagination or did we have a visitor last night?”
“We did and not the usual one.”
His eyes widened. “Ry?”
“One and the same.”
His face relaxed into thought. “Reavers.”
“Yup.”
“Oops.”
“Actually, seems to me maybe we had a breakthrough last night.”
“Agreed. Our little Rylia is a hard nut,” Daniel said and flopped onto his back, rubbing his hands together. “Oh, I have so much to introduce her to. I never imagined she’d be interested!”
Isabelle laughed and then pursed her lips. “We should talk to her this morning. I hate to see that look in her eye when she’s calculating how much longer she’s certain she’s safe.”
Daniel sat up and pushed his glasses up his nose in his typically endearing way. “Do you think she wants it?”
“I’ll admit, it’s hard to know what she’s thinking sometime, but I think she’ll be okay with it. If nothing else, I think she’s aware everyday that we’re a better option than what she had.”
“I wish she would let herself see we love her just as much as we love Bean,” he said with a sigh.
“We’ll just have to keep working at it. I think, deep down, maybe she does know, but her worries over being sent back overshadow it.”
Two hours later, after the four of them had had a lazy breakfast of waffles, Isabelle pulled Rylia aside as she went to go curl up with a book. “While Bean’s busy with his train, can Daniel and I talk to you?” She hated the instantly suspicious and nervous look that spread across Ry’s face.
“Okay,” she said quietly.
Isabelle watched her grip on her book tighten enough her knuckles turned white out of the corner of her eye. “I promise it’s nothing bad,” she said quickly and placed a gentle hand on Ry’s shoulder to direct her back into the kitchen.
Daniel was just finishing loading the dishwasher but he dried his hands and leaned back against the counter, shoving his glasses up as Isabelle sat down at the table across from Ry, where she could see both of them.
“Ry, it’s past time that Daniel and I talked to you about a decision we’ve come to.” She could see it in the girl’s eyes, the way the spark in them slowly faded, and in her shoulders, as they slumped, and she felt instantly guilty for her phrasing. “Ry, sweetheart,” she said gently before it got worse, “Daniel and I want to adopt you and Bean.”
For a moment, the seven-year-old stared at her and then her gaze flicked to Daniel and back. “Officially?”
“Yes, officially. We love you both and don’t want you to ever leave.”
“What if you have kids of your own?” she asked suspiciously.
“We can’t,” Daniel said. As much as they loved the two kids that had entered their house four years ago, that fact still hurt, although a little less every day. Isabelle was used to the feelings of guilt and uselessness. It wasn’t really a ‘we,’ it was a ‘she’. “That’s why we decided to foster in the first place, but after we got you two, we couldn’t imagine giving you up. That’s not to say that we might not want to adopt another child, but we wouldn’t, couldn’t, ever give you up or love you any less.”
“For real? Forever?” Ry asked, the suspicion sliding out of her voice, making her sound her age, which was far too rare.
“Forever. As long as you want us.”
“And I can still watch Firefly even though there were Reavers in my room last night?”
“Absolutely. And plenty of other awesome things.”
“Would I have to call you Mom and Dad?”
“You continue to call us whatever you want and are comfortable. We will never pressure you, one way or another.”
Then, with a suddenness that probably surprised Daniel and Ry as much as her, the girl was around the table and had thrown her arms around her, half in her lap. Isabelle barely heard the whispered: “Thanks, Mom,” but it was more than enough. As she hugged her soon-to-be daughter back, she caught Daniel’s eye and tried not to cry with joy.
Story: Nothing is Ever Easy universe, Pre-NIEE: Real World AU
Challenges: Pumpkin Pie 12 (fearsome creatures), Green Tea 24 (bedtime), Papaya 26 (when you least expect it)
Toppings & Extras: Whipped Cream (Rylia is 7), Chopped Nuts (RWAU), Sprinkles (Ry and Isabelle)
Word Count: 2,016
Rating: PG
Summary: Ry and her foster parents finally connect…over Firefly’s Serenity
Notes: Winter, 2008. Opinions completely coincide with mine, only I got scared in my early 20s by Serenity, not when I was 7. I also turned on almost every light in our college apartment and called my mommy at 3am. She laughed at me after she realized I wasn’t in trouble. Zombie cannibal torturers totally freak out my subconscious. This ended up sickeningly cheerful despite the Reavers.
Ry knew she was supposed to be in bed asleep, but she felt awake and restless. After staring at her ceiling for a while, she crawled out of bed, pulling a pair of socks and a sweatshirt on over her pajamas. She glanced at the clock, seeing it was only about 10pm, but figured her foster parents were already in bed or at least in their room. No one in this house, except sometimes her, were late nighters.
What she didn’t account for was the fact it was a Friday night. She made it to the bottom of the stairs and then paused, tilting her head at the noises she could hear. Curious, she crept forward, peeking into the family room where she was surprised to find Daniel and Isabelle spread out on the couch, a bowl of delicious smelling popcorn and oranges in various stages of being peeled sitting on the coffee table in front of them. There also sat four bottles of beer, two already drunk. Not only that, but they were almost cuddling like normal people. It was like walking into the Twilight Zone, or maybe into someone’s house like Jez and Colin or Bri and Jay.
The TV was on, showing…Ry blinked. What in the world were they watching?
Isabelle reached forward and snagged a handful of popcorn.
Ry edged forward, intrigued by both the movie and the snacks, not to mention the fact her uncool, awkward foster parents were watching something that looked amazing. Focused on the TV, she missed Bean’s toy train and tripped over it, catching herself before falling but also creating more than enough noise to draw the pair’s attention.
“Ry!” Isabelle said in surprise, scrambling upright as Daniel snagged the remote to pause the screen. “We thought you were asleep. Do you need something?”
Even after four years, Ry often felt awkward around the pair. They just had a hard time finding common ground, even if they had gotten much better at cohabitating over the years. She still worried, constantly, that they would send her away and keep her brother. To Bean, they were Mom and Dad and wonderful and the just four-year-old asked her constantly why she didn’t call them that too (but didn’t seem to wonder why they all had a different last name). She bet it never occurred to Bean that they could send them away any day, probably because she couldn’t see them ever deserting her brother.
“No, just…couldn’t sleep.”
“Us either,” Daniel said with a quick smile and then tentatively offered her the popcorn. Bean also slept when he was supposed to, but then, Bean hadn’t had the instincts Ry constantly fought with engrained in him almost before he could stand.
She stepped around her brother’s toy and took a handful. “Thanks.” She glanced at the paused TV screen. “What’re you watching?”
“It’s called Serenity.”
“What’s it about?” This was probably the most interest Ry had ever shown in their activities and they all knew it.
“It’s…like a pirate western set in space.”
The seven-year-old blinked. That sounded as amazing as it had appeared to be. “Oh.”
There was a momentary awkward pause and then Daniel glanced at Isabelle. “We just started. There’s a while until the Reavers.”
Isabelle turned and addressed Ry directly. “You’re welcome to stay for a while. It probably won’t make a lot of sense, though.”
“That’s okay,” she said quickly, wanting to know what Reavers were.
“Have a seat,” Daniel said and then tossed her an orange. Isabelle snuggled back in next to him.
She caught it and set to work peeling it as best she could without taking her eyes off the screen. She was instantly engrossed as she settled at the other side of the couch. Finally, during a pause while Isabelle ran to the bathroom, Ry glanced at Daniel. “I’m still not tired.” Even if she had been, she would have lied through her teeth to get to see more.
He hesitated. “The Reavers are pretty scary. They’re like…cannibal zombies.”
“I promise I won’t wake you up if I have nightmares.”
For a moment, the two of them stared at each other silently. “You can, you know. That’s why we’re here.” He smiled crookedly. “To scare the crap out of you with cannibal zombies and then make it all better later.”
Isabelle came back right then and neither of them acknowledged the comment again, but neither did Daniel make her go to bed. The Reavers were as awesomely amazing and scary as Daniel had warned.
When the movie ended, Ry quickly wiped away a few stray tears from the climax.
“Okay,” Isabelle said as they switched it off, standing and stretching, “off to bed with you, kiddo.” Her foster mother seemed much more relaxed in the semi-darkness of the evening. She never ever called Ry, kiddo.
The seven-year-old felt something loosen just slightly inside her. “Thanks for letting me stay up.”
“Glad you enjoyed it. How about we start with the regular series next weekend?”
“How about tomorrow?” she asked hopefully.
“One late night a week is more than enough. It’s at least midnight.”
“Then next weekend,” Ry said firmly, not liking to admit, even to herself, that it reassured her she had at least another week before they might send her back. And Firefly was a whole fourteen episodes. That meant, she absently figured it out in her head, at least 7 weeks, if they watched two a weekend, a whole 14 if they didn’t.
Isabelle went upstairs with her and tucked her in, a nightly ritual that Ry actually appreciated this time. Her room seemed awfully dark.
It came as perhaps no surprise to Daniel and Isabelle, but lots to Ry, who thought herself pretty darn fearless, that she woke three hours later with an unwavering certainty that Reavers were in her room and, if she opened her eyes, they would get her. After ten minutes, she convinced herself that peeking and squinting was different from opening. Eyes only partially open, she bolted out of bed and down the hall to Isabelle and Daniel’s room, thankful for once that they left their door open in case she or Bean need anything. She paused in their doorway feeling a bit calmer now and uncertain what to do now. She rarely asked the pair for anything and now she wanted to admit something she had insisted on watching scared her.
She swallowed hard, turning to leave, but something woke Isabelle. “Ry?” she asked around a yawn.
“Hi, I, um…”
“Reavers?” Isabelle asked, flicking on the lamp by the bed.
Daniel mumbled and flopped over on his side away from it. It was weird to see him without his glasses.
“Yeah,” she said in a small voice.
Isabelle glanced over at the clock and winked. “Three hours. Not bad. Daniel woke me up after two when we saw Serenity in the theaters.”
Ry felt herself smile. “You’re joking.”
“Dead serious. They’re in your room?”
The girl was shocked she understood but nodded. “Yeah.”
Then, to her everlasting surprise, Isabelle patted the bed between them. “C’mon. Our bed is Reaver-proof.”
Rylia’s natural skepticism took over even as she edged forward. “Nothing is Reaver-proof.”
“I promise you’ll be perfectly safe here.”
Both of them were aware of the double-meaning in her words but, as usual, neither commented. After another moment of hesitation, during which Ry was certain the Reavers had to have made it down the hall by now, she scrambled up the end of the bed and into the nice comfortable, safe space between them. “Thanks, Isabelle,” Ry mumbled as the woman pulled the covers up comfortably over both of them.
“My pleasure, kiddo.” She switched off the light.
*
The next morning, Ry was gone before Isabelle woke. Daniel rolled over and kissed her briefly as he put on his glasses. “Was it my imagination or did we have a visitor last night?”
“We did and not the usual one.”
His eyes widened. “Ry?”
“One and the same.”
His face relaxed into thought. “Reavers.”
“Yup.”
“Oops.”
“Actually, seems to me maybe we had a breakthrough last night.”
“Agreed. Our little Rylia is a hard nut,” Daniel said and flopped onto his back, rubbing his hands together. “Oh, I have so much to introduce her to. I never imagined she’d be interested!”
Isabelle laughed and then pursed her lips. “We should talk to her this morning. I hate to see that look in her eye when she’s calculating how much longer she’s certain she’s safe.”
Daniel sat up and pushed his glasses up his nose in his typically endearing way. “Do you think she wants it?”
“I’ll admit, it’s hard to know what she’s thinking sometime, but I think she’ll be okay with it. If nothing else, I think she’s aware everyday that we’re a better option than what she had.”
“I wish she would let herself see we love her just as much as we love Bean,” he said with a sigh.
“We’ll just have to keep working at it. I think, deep down, maybe she does know, but her worries over being sent back overshadow it.”
Two hours later, after the four of them had had a lazy breakfast of waffles, Isabelle pulled Rylia aside as she went to go curl up with a book. “While Bean’s busy with his train, can Daniel and I talk to you?” She hated the instantly suspicious and nervous look that spread across Ry’s face.
“Okay,” she said quietly.
Isabelle watched her grip on her book tighten enough her knuckles turned white out of the corner of her eye. “I promise it’s nothing bad,” she said quickly and placed a gentle hand on Ry’s shoulder to direct her back into the kitchen.
Daniel was just finishing loading the dishwasher but he dried his hands and leaned back against the counter, shoving his glasses up as Isabelle sat down at the table across from Ry, where she could see both of them.
“Ry, it’s past time that Daniel and I talked to you about a decision we’ve come to.” She could see it in the girl’s eyes, the way the spark in them slowly faded, and in her shoulders, as they slumped, and she felt instantly guilty for her phrasing. “Ry, sweetheart,” she said gently before it got worse, “Daniel and I want to adopt you and Bean.”
For a moment, the seven-year-old stared at her and then her gaze flicked to Daniel and back. “Officially?”
“Yes, officially. We love you both and don’t want you to ever leave.”
“What if you have kids of your own?” she asked suspiciously.
“We can’t,” Daniel said. As much as they loved the two kids that had entered their house four years ago, that fact still hurt, although a little less every day. Isabelle was used to the feelings of guilt and uselessness. It wasn’t really a ‘we,’ it was a ‘she’. “That’s why we decided to foster in the first place, but after we got you two, we couldn’t imagine giving you up. That’s not to say that we might not want to adopt another child, but we wouldn’t, couldn’t, ever give you up or love you any less.”
“For real? Forever?” Ry asked, the suspicion sliding out of her voice, making her sound her age, which was far too rare.
“Forever. As long as you want us.”
“And I can still watch Firefly even though there were Reavers in my room last night?”
“Absolutely. And plenty of other awesome things.”
“Would I have to call you Mom and Dad?”
“You continue to call us whatever you want and are comfortable. We will never pressure you, one way or another.”
Then, with a suddenness that probably surprised Daniel and Ry as much as her, the girl was around the table and had thrown her arms around her, half in her lap. Isabelle barely heard the whispered: “Thanks, Mom,” but it was more than enough. As she hugged her soon-to-be daughter back, she caught Daniel’s eye and tried not to cry with joy.