Chapter 12 Lina #2
I got them dried and into pajamas, Rowan insisting on smelling each pair before choosing the dinosaur ones. Because apparently his nose needed to approve his clothing choices now. Thea picked her unicorn set, because she was nothing if not consistent in her magical creature obsession.
Dinner was spaghetti because Tuesday meant spaghetti in the Winters household. Don’t mess with tradition, or toddlers. We gathered around our small kitchen table, Thea attacking hers like it had personally offended her ancestors, while Rowan carefully wound each bite like he was performing surgery.
“Mama, can we have ice cream?” Thea asked around a mouthful that would make a chipmunk proud.
“If you eat your vegetables.”
She stabbed at her green beans with determination that would make a samurai proud, and that’s when it happened. The fork bent. Not a little give, not a slight curve, but a full ninety-degree angle that defied the laws of physics and my sanity.
“Oops,” she said, trying to straighten it with her fingers. The metal groaned in protest. “Hungry, Mama.”
I stared at the mangled utensil, mentally adding it to my collection of bent cutlery. At this rate, I’d need to buy stock in a silverware company.
“Here, baby,” I managed, handing her a new fork. “Remember, forks are friends, not enemies to be destroyed.”
“I’m always gentle,” she said, which was such a spectacular lie that even Rowan looked up from his surgical spaghetti procedure to give her a look.
“Thea broke another one,” he observed, because siblings were born to rat each other out.
“Tattletale,” she shot back.
“Okay, okay. Finish your dinner, both of you. Before Thea declares war on the rest of our utensils.”
They cleaned their plates, even the vegetables that Thea had apparently forgiven for existing, and I let them have small bowls of vanilla ice cream.
Watching them eat dessert with the same intensity they brought to everything else, I felt that familiar mix of love and terror that seemed to define my existence these days.
“Bath made me tired,” Thea announced when she finished, rubbing her eyes.
“Then let’s get ready for bed, sweetie.”
Teeth brushing became its own adventure when Thea snapped her toothbrush in half. Her third one this month. At this rate, I’d need a bulk supplier.
“Too strong again?” I asked, pulling out a spare from my stash.
“Sorry, Mama.”
“It’s okay, baby. You’re just growing so fast.”
We settled into Rowan’s bed for stories, because they always ended up together anyway. Why fight the inevitable? Three books later, they were both yawning.
“One more?” Rowan asked hopefully.
“You said that two books ago.”
“Please?”
But Thea was already asleep, curled against her brother’s side like a tiny, exhausted koala. I kissed them both, tucking the blanket around them.
“Night, Mama,” Rowan whispered. “Love you.”
“Love you too, baby. Try not to develop any new superpowers overnight.”
I left their door cracked. In the kitchen, I poured myself a generous glass of wine and opened my laptop. The search history from the past few weeks stared back at me like evidence of my declining sanity.
“Children with unusual strength” brought up superhero wikis and fitness programs for toddler athletes.
“Toddlers with enhanced senses” led to development milestone charts that my kids had blown past years ago
“Kids who can hear things far away” suggested hearing tests and articles about imaginary friends.
Nothing. Nothing that explained why my four-year-olds seemed to be developing abilities that belonged in comic books, not real life
I closed the laptop with a sigh, whispering to the empty kitchen, “Maybe I need to find a specialist who won’t immediately call child services when I explain my daughter can bend metal.”
But what kind of specialist dealt with children who could hear through walls and reorganize furniture? Professor Xavier wasn’t real, and I was fresh out of ideas.
Unable to sit still, I checked on the twins one more time. They’d shifted in their sleep, now completely entwined like puppies. Thea’s arm was thrown over Rowan’s chest, and his hand gripped her pajama shirt even in dreams.
The moonlight illuminated fresh marks on the wooden headboard. I stepped closer, my heart doing that thing where it forgot how to beat properly. Deep scratches arranged in groups of four. My brain helpfully supplied “claw marks” before I told it to shut up and stop being dramatic.
Standing in their doorway, the weight of raising them alone hit me full force. No partner to share these worries. No one to tell me if this was normal. No one to help me understand what was happening to my babies.
Gray eyes flashed unbidden in my memory. Fuck. No. We weren’t doing this tonight.
But my traitorous brain continued the highlight reel. Strong hands that had held me like I was everything. A voice that had called me mate with desperate hunger. A man who’d fucked me into oblivion and vanished like a fart in the wind.
My hand moved to my collarbone, fingers finding the spot that sometimes still burned with phantom heat. Five years and my body still hadn’t gotten the memo that he was gone. Still ached for touch from someone who’d made it crystal clear I was just a convenient hole.
I dropped my hand, disgusted with myself. “Get it together, Winters,” I muttered. “You’re pathetic.”
He’d made his choice. Spelled it out in small, cruel words designed to cut deep. And I’d survived. Built a life. Raised two beautiful, possibly supernatural children alone.
“Whatever’s happening,” I whispered to my sleeping babies, “we’ll figure it out. Just like we always do. Without him. Because we’re badasses who don’t need anyone.”
The words were my armor, my mantra, my middle finger to the universe.
Back in my room, I lay staring at the ceiling while my mind raced through possibilities. Each day brought new challenges, new abilities to hide, new reasons to think I was losing my mind. I was drowning in uncertainty, grasping for explanations that didn’t exist outside of comic books.
One thing I knew for certain: my children were special in ways that went beyond a mother’s typical “my kids are gifted” delusion. They were developing abilities that shouldn’t be possible, and I had no idea why.
The phantom heat flared on my collarbone again, and I pressed my palm against it until it faded. “Fuck off,” I told it. “Read the room.”
I closed my eyes, exhaustion finally winning over anxiety. When morning came, I’d face whatever new ability manifested. I’d smile and redirect and pretend everything was normal while secretly googling “is my child a superhero” on incognito mode.
The thought that their strangeness might be connected to the man who’d left his mark on more than just my heart crept in uninvited. What if the father they’d never know had passed on more than just gray eyes and dark hair? What if he’d known? What if that’s why he’d run?
“Stop it,” I told myself firmly. “You’re being paranoid. Kids are just weird sometimes. Some kids collect rocks. Yours bend forks and hear through walls. Totally normal. Completely fine. Nothing to see here.”
Sleep pulled me under eventually, but my dreams were full of beasts and impossible children and gray eyes that held secrets I’d never learn.
And somewhere in the back of my mind, a tiny voice whispered that normal children didn’t leave claw marks on their beds.