Sunlight warmed my body stretched over wooden floorboards.
Rainbow light swirled around the room from the light catcher spinning above the kitchen sink; throwing all sorts of fragmented shapes through the air.
The smell of fresh tea twined with the soothing light. There was the juiciness of berries and their wild leaves accompanying them. Somewhere in there, sweet mango softened the edges around the hot tea itself.
A wind chime jingled from the verandah. It tinkled it's soft melody as the breeze played with the tiny chimes glinting in the bright sunlight.
I heard the tea being poured behind me. A chair scraped out at the table, before another.
Footsteps approached me. Bare skin slapped across the floor until it stopped just to my side.
A soft hand touched my head, giving it a little rub. Smaller ones then joined, squeezing at my skin playfully.
"Care to join me?"
I smiled and lifted my weary body upwards.
Stew waited as I turned and stretched out my back legs to try and get them moving again.
Quincy was held against her front securely. With the world at his fingertips, he beamed and kicked out his little legs in excitement.
Both red eyes followed me to the white wooden chair she had pulled out. Lifting myself up into it, I sat at the small kitchen table with her.
A lace tablecloth hung over it, stained in some places and missing a few fingers from the tassels that dangled from each corner. In the middle was a round vase of flowers ripped right from the lush ground swaying outside the window to my right.
Towards me was a stack of coasters decorated with colourful children's finger paintings.
Stew bubbled at my company and set Quincy down so she could turn to bring over a clear pot of golden honey and a jug of milk. The honey had a wooden dipper inside that had dark grooves along the wood. Drowning in the bubbled sweetness, it only made it look more appetizing.
Seeing Stew had nothing to set the objects on, I quickly pushed the coasters towards her, crumpling up her tablecloth in the process.
She giggled and placed the coasters around the table so she could free her hands. I hurriedly smoothed down the cloth when her back was turned, sitting back in my chair as she returned with a board of crusted bread and a jar of jam.
The last thing to find it's place at the table was the teapot itself, which has its own padded bottom to prevent it from adding to the marks on the cloth.
Stew finally swooped up her wobbling toddler again to smother him in kisses as took her seat again, lifting her cup up towards me with a warm smile.
"Are you going to drink with me today, Soup?"
I looked down at the cup, still remembering how frightened I had been to lift it way back when Missy was still fluttering in my heart.
Now, it just reminded me of the human side I frightened her with in the darkness.
Nothing about it felt natural, not even with Stew sitting across from me without a lick of makeup covering her pale features or contacts smothering her red eyes.
She wouldn't mind. Still, something felt wrong about accepting that side of me.
"It's delicious" she tempted me, swirling the honey to dribble some into her cup.
It really did look good. I watched the golden liquid drop into the tea she stirred, clinking her spoon on the side before looking over to me.
Even Quincy got a little fingerful that he sucked on happily.
Peering down at the purple tea, I wrapped my hands around the cup to soak in the warmth.
Berries coated the back of my throat through the aroma alone. They also teased me, making me swallow down the saliva pooling in my mouth.
One sip couldn't hurt.
Trying to slip a finger through the handle like she had, I caressed both curved hands around the cup, ready to lift it upwards before a noise caught my attention.
Stew sighed at the thundering of feet, and instantly snatched up her cup in one hand and the jug of milk in the other. She lifted them above her head in one swift movement.
Quincy tried to copy her from her lap, looking up with a grin.
"I suggest you do the same" Stew warned me.
Confused, I did so, only to find out the reason why.
Sage came bursting through the door, gumboots muddy and hands cupped together as she squealed and rushed for the table.
Her short, curled hair was messed and tangled with leaves. I swear I saw a stick poking out somewhere too.
Trailing muck behind her, Casserole tried not to step in the path as he chased after her, flustered and reaching out to try and snatch her as she squirmed under the table and popped up on the other side between us, dumping a handful of bugs onto the table with a gleeful noise.
Stew's blank expression showed this wasn't the first time this had happened. She just sighed and looked at me while I saw the squirming critters try to flee.
"I'm so sorry" Casserole breathed as he scraped a hand over the table to try and scoop them up, picking up a wriggling centipede trying to crawl up the bread and pulling a face of pure discomfort as he recoiled "I know you wanted a relaxing tea."
Casserole's red eyes looked over to me as a hand picked up a worm writhing in front of me. His eyes followed up and down me sitting on the chair before he grinned.
"Glad to see you finally at the table" he beamed.
I heard the little laugh behind his voice. My human stance as a beast amused him.
Scowling, I lowered my cup back to the table. Instantly, both Stew and Casserole gasped.
"NO!"
Before I could react, Sage darted over to dump a handful of bugs into my tea. I saw her hands smeared with filth and crawling with more as she laughed and grinned up at me, revealing a missing tooth.
"You got bug soup now!"
"Sage!" Stew scolded "you empty out those pockets right now, young lady!"
Stew didn't dare to put her cup or jug back on the table as she flared at her daughter. The stance was comical as she sat and glared with her arms lifted over her head while Quincy did the same.
Before Stew could block the path beneath the table with her legs, Sage made another dash underneath and around her snatching father to barge out the door again.
I saw the rusted hair of her older brother, Jay, peering back at her. He quickly stepped out of the way when Casserole followed.
He was the only one of the three to be born with his mother's hair. Sage inherited her father's. And Quincy...
I looked over his blonde locks in comparison to his doting mother's.
Somewhere in the family, perhaps? There was so much i still had to learn about either Stew or Casserole's lines.
Before I could ponder, Casserole was racing back.
"Don't use the floor!" he blurted to us "just....don't move."
The mud trail was thick and circled the entire table. I looked it over, instantly sorry for them both.
Leaning over, I checked the front screen door for Stew.
"Do you think it's safe now?" I whispered to her as I only saw the verandah and the greenery of the garden that laid beyond it.
Somewhere out of sight, Sage was squealing in laughter. Casserole sighed in defeat. Jay left to try and help his father.
Stew glanced too, still maintaining her strong hold above her head.
"I.... think so...." she sighed as she replaced them back down and rubbed her wrists, grimacing at my squirming cup "I'm really sorry."
"Honestly, I've had worse" I chuckled and fished a worm out to try and find somewhere to put it.
Stew looked too while still holding Quincy in her lap. Her eyes locked onto her cup of tea that she snatched up to guzzle down quickly.
I watched in silent shock at her flash of noisy brashness when she gasped out like she hadn't breathed for the entire duration. Delicately patting her lips dry with a napkin while slipping back into composure, she suppressed a giggle and held the empty cup towards me.
To keep Quincy distracted, her other hand ripped off a piece of bread to swipe into the jam for him to eagerly chew at.
Smiling, I dropped the wet worm into the cup. Picking out more critters, she looked in disappointment at her lovely porcelain being filled with squirming creatures trying to pull themselves from the tea still soaking their bodies.
"She reminds me of you" I grinned as I dropped a swiveling slater in that promptly curled up into a ball on touching the cup.
"Don't remind me" Stew almost pouted back.
"Although, I don't know who she possibly could have gotten all that endless energy from..." I teased.
Stew grinned and shook her head, checking her collection as I scooped out a ladybug to drop in.
"Got them all yet?"
"Almost..." I dug at the worm slipping through my nails "I think there's about three others in here. It's hard to see around the dirt."
The tea did indeed look like soup. The dirt clouded the delicate purple into an ugly, clumpy brown sludge. It made rescuing the bugs much harder than it should have been.
"She reminds me more of you, actually" Stew mused as she watched me hooking a beetle in my nail that kept slipping.
That actually surprised me and made me pause in wonder. The beetle tumbled back into the muddy tea, causing me to quickly turn my focus back to it.
"How?"
"Well, she's got the same temperament" Stew replied with a smile in her voice as frustration bubbled up at the beetle refusing to stay latched on in the multiple times I dipped my nail under it.
Grumbling, I glanced to her and focused back on the cup when I saw she was trying not to laugh at me.
"She prefers things like you do too" Stew continued, finally letting out her laugh as I snagged the beetle with a cry of triumph and dumped it into the dry cup with the others.
Quincy abandoned his wet chunk of bread to try and lean for the cup instead, grunting.
He was promptly put onto the floor where he toddled over to my side, patting at my tail to try and persuade me to lower the cup down for him.
"She likes being like you do. It's a chore to get her to stay like a little girl, let alone even wear her makeup when we go out. I'm surprised she's not already tearing across the yard as an animal."
With the thought hitting her, Stew dashed to look out the window to make sure her words weren't correct, sighing thankfully over the sink.
"Why do you even do it?" I pondered as I flicked another beetle out of the mud towards her.
She turned quickly with the cup so it could hit it and slide inside. Her red eyes grinned down at her catch as Quincy waddled over to inspect it also. She bent a little so she could show him from a safe distance.
"It's easier" she replied with a hand running over his head to try and distract him from trying to grab a worm "a roof and warm bed is a wonderful thing when you've got others to share it with. I've got a loving husband and three amazing kids I wouldn't trade for the world. After everything, being like this feels....right. I enjoy being Lacie."
I saw her body settle comfortably against the wooden bench with her back to the view. She gazed around the room to take it in, sighing gratefully at me and her toddler she now cradled against one hip.
I don't know how she could be so comfortable as a human. To me, it was the foreign side of me. I had been like this for so long that it had become the only me I knew and loved.
I didn't even remember a name before the one Missy gave me. In a way, it was embarrassing how reliant I had been on her.
Stew circled to my side when I fished out the last creature; a fat white and yellow witchetty grub.
Dropping it in, she returned to the sink to nudge open the window and let her child help her tip the cup of bugs outside.
They said their goodbyes to the creatures when they tumbled and flew away.
The fresh breeze filtered through to sweep around the room to try and blow away the scent of rich earth. With it, Casserole re-entered the room, sternly carrying a sulking and muddy creature under one arm that had swiped the filth all over his clothing.
Stew took one look at her husband and transformed daughter before hiding a little giggle behind her hand.
She pulled out a seat to my left that was opposite the window so Sage could be firmly placed onto it.
With a sheepish look up at her disappointed father in the hope to regain his approval, her ears flopped down when it wasn't given.
With hushed words, Casserole took Quincy from Stew and left the room behind me without another sound.
I turned to watch him climbing a set of stairs that curved up out of sight. Returning to the table, I saw Stew wetting a facecloth for her daughter.
Jay's head peered around from the verandah again. He saw me and froze up for a second before he quickly dashed across the room to thunder up after his father.
Sage grumbled and groaned as her mother smeared the cloth over her face to try and clean it up. With just two red eyes peeking through, I smirked at how amusing it all was.
"Mum" she groaned, dropping her voice in embarrassment "not in front of Soup."
"Well he has to see you when you apologize to him" Stew replied simply as she looked her in the eyes.
Giving her a few last wipes, Stew returned to the sink to leave Sage sitting there to glance shamefully at me.
Stew coughed out to try and prompt her daughter. One eye watched as water ran over the cloth.
"I'm....sorry" Sage mumbled out under her breath.
She didn't look at me. Her eyes remained set on the spot on the table in front of her. She shrunk down and kept her ears flat, appearing truly guilty.
"For?" Stew pushed.
Sage glanced to her mother and finally at me.
"Making your tea taste normal" she grumbled out with a little grin at the end.
Stew made a disapproving noise that had Sage grumble again, sighing.
"Bugs don't go in tea or milk or honey or water" she mumbled through her recited words and counted off the liquids on her fingers "I'm sorry for ruining your tea."
It didn't feel genuine. She was just going through the paces so she could be free to dig in the dirt and cause havok again.
"Now, go and get your clothes, Little Miss" Stew pointed a finger to the verandah.
Sage slid down from the chair and dawdled out to the door sadly. I saw her glance to her mother and pick up the pace with her ears lifted in cheekiness when she thought she was out of sight.
"And make sure you wear them!" Stew picked her way over the circle to call after Sage who had bolted outside gleefully "you've got cleaning to do!"
I heard Sage complain back instantly.
Still, she wasn't about to test how lenient her mother's patience was. Sage returned quickly, already dressed in a smeared yellow top that fluffed at the shoulders and ruffled at her waist, and a pair of soft orange shorts that had outlines of flowers down the sides and folded above her knees.
Her pale skin was still stained with mud. The parts dipped black were even murkier under the mess.
She had already placed her encased yellow gumboots by the door so no more mud was tracked in.
Stew handed over an empty bucket with a multitude of cloths inside. There was even a bottle of coloured dishwashing liquid.
Without a word, Sage knew she was being sent back outside to fill the bucket. It wouldn't fit in the kitchen sink at all.
Carrying it out, she made a show of acting like it was heavier than it was. Both hands gripped the bucket handle and her little body bent back trying to heave the cleaning supplies by herself.
Smirking at her immaturity, we both watched from the table until she huffed and grunted her way out of the house once more.
"Just like all those times you 'died' while eating eggplant" I quipped.
I could still remember a younger Stew flopping over and gagging as she faked extravagant deaths over and over again on finding a sliver of eggplant in her meals.
Sage really was her mother's daughter.
Stew burned in embarrassment at the memory and tried not to humour me by laughing back.
My ears lifted when I heard the sound of pounding water from under the window. Stew's head followed it too, pleased her daughter was actually doing as she was told.
The top of Sage's head poked through. It was barely over her red eyes she tilted upwards as she tried to get our attention.
"Mum! It's going to take forever!" she complained.
"You had better wriggle to it then, Little Worm!" Stew replied cheekily "the inside is not an outside for a reason! We aren't animals!
Sage grumbled, dropping out of sight.
"Technically we are..."
I looked to Stew, shrugging. She was trying to hold it together.
"She's got you there" I agreed with a smile.
The water soon shut off with a squeal of the creaky tap handle.
Sage reappeared in the window, barely peeking through again. Instead of looking smug, she was worried. 177Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1ERKhuws50
"It's too heavy."
There was a noise as she tried to lift it. I snorted at her antics.
"It's fine" Stew dismissed her.
"No, really!" Sage insisted "I can't lift it!"
The noise came again. Stew went to the window to peer down at her daughter. After a little, she decided to leave the house to help her.
I stayed there, listening as Stew reached Sage. With a blow of her breath, I heard water slosh out onto the ground when they began their crawl back inside.
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Hauling the bubbling bucket down next to the dirt circle, Sage set to work slapping one of the wet cloth onto the floor and scrubbing.
Stew took her seat opposite me again.
"Before you leave again, I actually wanted to talk to you about...."
Stew tilted her head to Sage who had her own down, focusing.
Her?
"Some people, like you, make their choice later in life to continue as you are. Others make it earlier."
I looked down, seeing Sage slop the cloth back in the bucket.
What did this have to do with me?
"If you keep them from it, it gets worse. They act out. They can't ignore it. It's like a call."
Sage inched along, focused on getting her mess cleaned so she could leave.
"She wants to see things I can't show her."
"And what does this...?"
It hit me at once.
"Hang on, no! No, no, no ,no ,no!"
"You'll both find what is missing" Stew insisted.
I leant back, offended.
"I'm not missing anything."
Stew sighed and gave me a blank look.
"You need to find who you are outside her."
"And she's supposed to do that?" I jerked my head to Sage, seeing that she was definitely listening now when my tone turned sour.
Quickly, she lowered her head to keep cleaning.
"I know who I am."
Stew let the words sit for a bit so I could taste the uncertainty of them.
"Who are you then?" she challenged.
Scoffing, I searched the table, knowing exactly what to say.
Yet, it was catching in my throat. It just came out as noises.
"I'm Soup. You're Stew. He's Casserole."
"I'm Lacie" Stew reminded me "He's Elijah."
"He doesn't even know who he is. He was Mearve when we met him. It's just fake names."
"Like the ones Missy gave us?"
Her words stung. The pain stabbed through my chest and pricked at my eyes.
Without her, I was nothing.
"I'm not saying that you'll be stuck with her like you were with me" Lacie breathed out, not giving me a chance to bite back "just show her a few things on your travels. She'll get over this wanderlust for danger and see how easy it is here when you bring her back."
I glanced down again, seeing Sage still scrubbing the same spot.
She was definitely listening in.
"I'm not taking a kid with me. It's too dangerous to use it as some experiment" I grew stern "let her dig up the gardens and run through the grass. It's safer than what it is out there."
Jerking my head to the window, I noticed Sage peer at it too.
"I'd rather her be with someone who knows what they are doing than going alone" Lacie pleaded now "I'm afraid that one day she'll just disappear and she'll be alone, like I was. I don't want to think what could happen if she was me and you never found me."
Passed out in the pelting rain by the train tracks, close to death; starving and too weak to properly stand because she stubbornly chased something unobtainable....
Lacie had a chance because she had someone who loved and doted on her to help make her into someone proud of their true self.
Would Sage be the same?
The kid already was a handful. There was no sense of danger. She was loud, had no respect, and was nothing more than a liability.
"Please. I know she'll be safe with you."
I grimaced, seeing how desperate Lacie was.
"What about Cass... Elijah?"
"We've talked about this for a while. We wanted to talk to you before you moved on again. We don't know any other way to do it."
Ah, so get me while I wasn't expecting it.
"It's a lot" I admitted through a whine.
The little adventures had been fun. A run through the grass or following the tracks for a few kilometers until the kids got too tired to continue. It was nothing as big as this.
A whole new responsibility. Another young one to raise by this life. So much could go so wrong.
"She definitely wants this?" I pressed "she's not going to want to be a human? I can't be dragging around a little girl with me."
That wouldn't be possible. I couldn't force a human child to eat and sleep in the ways I did. It wasn't right.
"I can't" I sighed.
"Please" Lacie's eyes glistened "you can. Just until she wants to come back."
I felt a pang dig into my gut.
Did I want to say it? I'd regret it if I didn't.
"What if...she doesn't want to come back?"
Sage kept scrubbing. She was making good progress with her bucket; right behind me to get the best vantage for listening.
I let the words hang this time. I saw how uncomfortable the possibilty made Lacie at the thought of her young daughter venturing out and never coming back.
Still, she wanted life as an animal. Things were much different this way.
"Then, she can make that decision herself. We went our separate ways too once."
I felt the sadness brimming back up. Seeing Lacie so young leave on her own path tore me up. Years were spent fretting if she was alright and if she had found what she was looking for, or if she was back where I had found her; starving and alone.
Now that she was here, I was relieved life had treated her kindly, but was also tormented by how much of it I had missed because of our decision to walk in opposite directions that day.
It was hers to make, but sometimes I wondered how it could have gone if I had just dug in my heels and joined her.
Sage kept up the pace, halfway between me and her mother now.
"If she comes with me..." I started, holding a claw up when Sage gasped and smiled, turning to glow in delight "IF....she's got to travel with nothing dragging her down. No bags, no clothes; nothing. She's got to really want this. It's not easy living off what you can find."
Sage's head swiveled to Lacie to listen intently on what she had to say.
"She already sleeps out in the garden most nights" Lacie looked to her excited daughter return to cleaning more vigorously "and keeping clothes on her is already a chore. She's made this decision a long time ago. It's time to listen to what she wants."
I scowled, trying to read her expression for any doubts.
"What about C...Elijah?" I tilted my head to the stairs "he doesn't want to take her?"
"Soup" Lacie breathed out "have you known him to be like that? Our lives are just..."
She looked down on her daughter, reaching out a hand to push back a hair falling into her face she lifted as she scrubbed beside her mother.
"....different."
Sage grinned, leaning into the hand that cupped the side of her face now.
"I know you'll take care of her like she was your own" Lacie smiled to me "I trust you to show her what she wants Soup; like you did with me."
It hadn't been easy. Trust and love with the rowdy creature called Stew didn't come instantaneously. Still, she showed me new ways of life I wouldn't have otherwise explored if it had remained as just myself and Missy cruising through the same predictable routine up in that wildflower field.
Maybe.... I was missing something?
Days flew by with no purpose. It crept into years with my only accomplishment being this reunion.
I hadn't done anything for myself. I just followed the tracks to wherever they led me, too scared to make any new connections like the one that had been lost so long ago. I was aimlessly drifting with the wind; lost.
But what had I lost?
Lacie saw it in my searching eyes and smiled warmly back at me.
"There you go" she gave a little nod "you'll find it when you have a little nudge to keep you on track."
Sage's head poked up, grinning with her gap-toothed smile behind a streaked face. I couldn't help but to grin back when I imagined her excited tail beating the floor like her mother's used to do so frequently.
This was all so exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time. I suddenly didn't know what to do with my hands gripped around the edge of the table.
"Could I... perhaps have that tea?"
Lacie nodded happily, checking on her daughter once more.
"No more bugs?" Lacie looked her over in suspicion.
With her eyes suddenly down, she was as guilty as ever.
"Sage" Lacie huffed.
"Technically, it's not a bug" she rummaged into her shorts pocket and pulled out a sizable lizard "it's a blue-tongue."
Sure enough, the bright blue tongue of the grey creature poked out. Still a baby, it was manageable, but certainly larger than an ordinary one found scuttling along rocks.
"Where do you find all of these things?" Lacie blinked in surprise at the size of it.
"Near the tap" Sage replied meekly, not wanting to cause more trouble for herself.
She lowered it onto the table gently and it remained in place for a while, tonguing the lace cloth in interest.
Then, as soon as Lacie reached for it, it shot across the table on a mad dash for freedom.
Lunging to reach it, Lacie whined as the lizard scaled the side of her honeypot and looked back at her as it slowly licked the sides.
"Don't....you....dare!" she hissed at it, like it was a misbehaving child.
The lizard promptly jumped and plopped down inside to lick it's blue tongue along the honey that began to swallow it up. Slowly sinking, it was determined on licking as much as it could until it became suspended, legs splayed as it couldn't do anything but blink back.
"Well, I know what I'm searching for" Lacie bent over to eye the lizard still frozen in the honey that she used the dipping stick to scoop out "lids. Lots of lids."
Sage laughed and I joined in as the dripping lizard was taken to the sink, licking a new path into the thick golden blanket over it.
Lacie chuckled too when she gently washed the lizard and released it out the window so she could get started on a fresh round of tea.
"Peas in a pod" she commented when she turned to gaze at us both.
Sage and I both looked to each other, continuing to giggle. In that moment, it was like I was back with Stew and no time had been lost at all.
Already, I felt my smile returning and my heart warming up to the kid.
Now I just had to find what she was helping me search for.
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