24. Proslo
24
PROSLO
T he young had all been on their best behavior the entire vacation. The introduction to foster parenting course Betty and I completed while the children slept at night had let us know that this was common. Children either remained withdrawn and possibly even defiant, or tried to be what they thought we’d see as perfect. One reaction was to try to go ahead and get the rejection over with, while the other was a desperate attempt to get us to want to keep them. In either case, our job was the same - to wait for the children to feel emotionally secure and settled.
The first cracks appeared our first night home.
“But I want to sleep with Maui!” Mo-mo screamed as she was led from the bathroom to her room for bed.
“No! It’s my room and no girls except Mommy allowed!” Maui shouted from his own room, where I was trying to read him a bedtime story.
“Come on, you can say goodnight to him,” Betty said placatingly. “If he doesn’t want you in his room, you have to stay out. Just like he does with yours.”
“I’m not saying goodnight because I’m going to watch TV!” Mo-mo now insisted, flouncing past Maui's open door towards the living room.
Betty took a deep breath. Akoni came to her rescue.
“Oh no you’re not!” he scolded his little sister. He took her by the hand. “You’re acting like a grouch. You don’t want to grow green fur and have to go live in a trash can do you?” He led her past Betty and I could now hear them in Mo-mo’s bedroom.
“No,” she whined.
“Then don’t let the grouchiness get you.”
“How?” she demanded.
“Well, it’s trying to keep the sleepies away so you stay super duper tired and grouchy, so you gotta get in bed and let Mom read you a story and then go to sleep.”
She must have climbed into her bed as Akoni reappeared in a moment.
“She’s ready now, Mom.”
She smiled at him. “Thank you, Akoni.”
“No problem. You know what to tell her now to get her to stop.”
She laughed. “Yeah, I do. Thanks again.” She waved at me and I returned my attention to the story I was reading our youngest son, another classic recommended by the library app. This one was ‘The Adventure of Jimmy Skunk’ and followed the woodland antics of Jimmy and a host of anthropomorphized animals in an Earth woodland as they lived their ordinary lives.
A message appeared in the corner of the tablet, letting me know that Betty had started ‘Winnie the Pooh’.
When I finished the chapter I was reading, Maui was still awake, though drowsy, so I pulled a picture book from the nearby bookcase and left him to look at it with the lights dimmed.
“Good night,” I said, pressing a kiss to his head.
“Good night, Daddy,” he murmured tiredly back. I hummed happily as I left the room. He’d be asleep in no time. Betty emerged a minute later and seeing Maui was still awake, she went in to kiss him goodnight once more, the first one having been as he came out of the bath.
“She asleep? I asked, tilting my head towards Mo-mo’s door.
“Yes. I barely got through three pages before she conked out. Don’t go in case you wake her.”
I’d kissed her goodnight on the way to her bath as I took Maui to his room, but disappointment still filled me. I couldn’t get enough of showing our young affection, loving the way they soaked it all up.
We both went into the living room where we found our eldest two children playing with Pumpkin, waving a wand that dangles a felt fish stuffed with catnip. They were giggling at the cat’s antics as he sat on his hind legs, batting at it with an intense expression that reminded me all too much of that day he’d gotten the catnip induced zoomies.
“I’m beat,” Betty said. “I’m going to grab a shower and read in bed.”
“I’ll make us all some hot chocolate," I replied. “I’ll bring you yours once you’re out of the bath.”
“Thanks, babe,” she replied gratefully, brushing a kiss across my lips before withdrawing.
“I’ll help,” Kaia said, following me.
“I’m just going to replicate it.”
“I can take it to the table,” she insisted.
“I’ll get some cookies to go with them,” Akoni announced, coming in and began looking in the cupboards. “Result! There’s Oreos!”
“Can we have whipped cream and marshmallows?” Kaia asked me. “I’ll be extra careful brushing my teeth.”
I smiled at her before replicating her cup just as she wanted it. She beamed in reply, taking it from the replicator and carefully carrying it to the dining table.
“No marshmallows on mine,” Akoni requested and I obliged, making us each one with just whipped cream.
“Mm, this is good,” Kaia said, sipping hers.
I knew she meant the hot chocolate, but this moment here really was. Families had their ups and downs and we’d weathered them all so far, from Kaia’s illness to Mo-mo’s tantrum.
“It sure is, honey,” I agreed.