Chapter 17
Itake pity on Kean and, picking up Lyric’s bag, I follow them to the toilets as Lyric will need his top changed, as he somehow has buttercream on it. Honestly, he’s only sixteen months old. How can he create so much mess from one little cupcake?
I smile as I walk in and see Kean and Lyric laughing. Lyric is sat by the sink, and Kean is making a game out of cleaning our son up. Not sure that’s the right way to dissuade him from doing something like that again.
“Well, you two look like you’re having fun,” I say, walking closer.
“We’re not having fun, are we, little man? Cleaning you up is a very serious matter, isn’t it, Lyric?” Kean asks him, wiping his face.
Lyric nods and holds up a clean hand. “Five Clean.”
Kean laughs and high-fives him before cleaning the last of the buttercream off his face.
“Look at your top little man. Shall we change that as well?” I ask.
“No,” Lyric said quickly.
“Well, we need to change it, you’ve got buttercream all over it,” I say.
“No,” he yells, the smile falling off his face and beginning to look angry.
“Indoor voice, please,” I tell him, as I get a clean top out of the bag.
“Arms up?” Kean says.
“No,” he shouts again, crossing his arms over his messy shirt.
“Lyric, come on, little man, look, it’s your lovely green top. You picked this out the other day,” I show it to him.
“No,” he shouts again, looking like he’s about to jump down from the side.
Kean gives a low growl and, quick as a flash, pulls his top off, taking the clean one out of my hands and putting it on Lyric. “See, all done.”
Lyric starts to cry and holds his arms out to me. I pick him up and settle him in my arms, making sure he can see Kean and me.
“Lyric, you don’t shout at us, you don’t shout no, that’s rude, and you’re not a rude boy, are you?” I ask gently.
“Ant mama, dada,” he shouts, crying loudly. “No oou.”
I feel my eyes fill, but look down and quickly blink the tears away.
He doesn’t mean it, honey. Kean says gently.
Yeah he does, handsome. That’s the hard part.
Kean wraps his arms around us and hugs us for a moment. Lyric is now snuggled up against me, still crying but now at a normal level.
“We should go and join the others. I’ll even let you have half of my cupcake,” I offer.
“Thanks, honey. Let me clean up the mess in here, and I’ll join you both,” he says, giving me a quick kiss.
I nod and take a breath before walking out of the toilets. There is no way the family didn’t hear Lyric. As I walk back to our table, I notice that a few more customers have arrived. They smile at me as I pass. I sit back at our table, which is surprisingly quiet.
“Hello, grumpy Gus,” Enoch says, turning to look at Lyric.
Lyric looks at Enoch and sniffs.
“We could all hear you shouting out here. You’re loud, did you know that? You were also kind of mean to Titus and Kean, you know that, right?” he tells him. “You should probably say sorry to them, don’t you think?”
Lyric wiped his nose on my shirt and sniffed. He looked from Enoch to me. “Sorry,” he says, leaning into me.
I drop a kiss on his head and turn him to look at Kean, who, as Enoch was talking, came back to the table and sat down. He holds his arms out to Kean. “Clean,” he says softly.
Kean picks him up and stands him on his lap so they are facing each other.
“Sorry, Clean,” he says, before launching himself at Kean and hugging him.
“Thanks, Enoch,” I say softly, looking at him.
Enoch grins at me. “Boys are hard work; you should have adopted girls.”
I burst out laughing. “Bit late now.” I look around the table and see the concern on some of their faces. I shake my head. I can’t deal with questions or sympathy right now.
“He’s right, you know, raising boys is tough,” Sly says, grinning at Xander and Enoch.
“Hey, we’re perfect,” Xander tells him, licking his fingers clean.
“You wish,” Ebby replies, sipping his coffee.
Ebby and Sly are raising Ebby’s younger brothers after they rescued them from their abusive father.
“Yep, girls are much easier, aren’t you, princess?” Jude strokes his daughter’s head.
“You say that now, Jude, but I can’t wait to see what happens when Connie wears makeup for the first time and has her first romance,” Temp says, laughing.
Jude shakes his head. “That will never happen. Connie’s going to be a nun, aren’t you, princess?”
I’m not the only one who laughs at that.
“And if she decides not to be a nun, I’m a true witch, I can turn romantic partners into toads,” Sal adds.
As we chat and laugh, I break my cupcake up and feed some to Kean. I break a bit off the bottom and hold it out to Lyric. “Here, little man, want some?”
Lyric nods and takes it from me, grinning. He eats it and then holds up his hand. “Five Tus.”
I laugh and high-five him.
We finally leave the tearoom. Lyric has fallen asleep, so Kean is carrying him. Adhan leaves with us, and Justice, Sal, Ernest and Alfred all go back to work.
“Are you both alright?” Adhan asks gently.
“Yeah,” I say on a sigh.
“It’s hard sometimes,” Kean adds.
“It’s still not even been a week,” I say. “I didn’t factor in how emotional all of this would be.”
“Me either. The workshops we took tell you it can be emotional, but until you’re in this situation, you don’t really realise how emotional it actually is,” Kean says, moving Lyric a little.
“And for some reason, I never considered this scenario when thinking of all the ways we would have a child. I never considered we’d have two at the same time,” I tell him.
Adhan shakes his head. “I can’t imagine how hard it must be when he demands his parents, and says he wants them and not you,” he looks at us. “We all heard Lyric shouting.”
“Gotta love Enoch though,” Kean says, grinning.
“He is a smart boy,” Adhan agrees.
“He is. But Lyric is allowed to miss his parents and want them. He’s just not allowed to be rude. I hope River is alright, this is the longest we’ve been without him,” I say.
“I bet Mum is having fun looking after him. Mind you, Jodie and John might be at the house having baby snuggles.”
“They are the best,” I say as we turn and walk down the road past the Turnbull’s house. John and Jodie pretty much adopted all of us as sons or grandchildren.
“I’m honestly surprised how good Lyric is,” Adhan tells us.
I laugh. “I’ll let you bathe him later, and you’ll see how good he is.”
Kean chuckles. “I swear he’s a water demon, not a Kitsune.”
Adhan laughs. “Thankfully, baby bath time is a thing of the past.”
“Hey now,” Kean gripes. “I seem to remember helping to bathe Alfred when he was little.”
Adhan laughs. “And Cam.”
“I do not need reminding that you all took turns giving me baths, thanks very much,” Cam says from behind us.
We stop walking and turn around, smiling at him.
“You were such a cute toddler,” Kean teases.
“Pretty sure Nix still thinks I’m cute,” Cam points out, walking closer.
Adhan grabs Cam around the neck and rubs the top of his head. “Cutie Cam.”
Kean and I burst out laughing as Cam tries to get free.
I love the relationship the Stone brothers have. Cam is a lot younger than his brothers; he’s closer to Alfred’s age than his brothers. But Cam is their brother, no matter the age difference, and they treat him accordingly.
Cam finally gets free and joins us, walking into the manor.