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For being such an important day to the manakete population in Ylisstol, it was almost bizarre how empty the parking lot at the community center was as Nah pulled up in her tiny car. She’d anticipated needing to park down the street instead of in one of the lots near the door, but she supposed that the snowy weather had something to do with people choosing not to show up for their night of revelry and celebration. The start of the year of the dragon was a big, important time for them all, and she was glad to be old enough to choose to come to the festivities rather than be dragged along unwillingly to them, but with the lack of people present she was beginning to suspect that there weren’t many festivities to be had at all.After parking and putting her gloves and hat on, she got out of her car and tramped across the snow-covered sidewalk to the entrance of the center, taking a second to look around at the eerily pink sky and the heavy snowflakes falling all around her before heading inside. The hallway was decorated with streamers and dragon-shaped banners that proved that something was meant to be happening, but she couldn’t hear any music, any voices, or any other proof that people were actually there in the first place. “This is sort of a bummer,” she muttered, kicking snow off of her boots as she passed by an empty room on one side of the hall. “If I’d known this was what I was agreeing to come to, I would’ve convinced Mom to just celebrate at home instead.”She shook her head, thinking about how much her mother had not wanted to be responsible for any year of the dragon celebrations that night. “But whatever, I’m sure there’s someone here to make this worth my while.” So Nah continued down the hallway, finding a single room occupied by a small gathering of people, every single one of which she recognized in some way. Her mother was there, as was her father, and they both greeted her with waves and smiles. Also in attendance were some people she’d grown up around, friends of her mother’s that were involved in the manakete culture to some extent. Some of them were more devout than their family was, while others were not even close to as serious about tapping into their manakete side.And then there was Morgan, standing off to the side of the room on his lonesome, his phone in his hand and his attention focused solely on whatever was currently on his screen. Nah’s eyes lit up at the sight of him, and she used her small frame to squeeze through everyone else who was there to get over to where he was standing. “Let me guess, your mom’s idea to come, wasn’t it?” she asked as she got close enough for Morgan to hear her, his eyes immediately shooting up from his phone to look at her. “I get it, same here.”“She said that, because we’ve got manakete lineage somewhere down the family tree on both sides, it would be a good learning experience to come and see how you all honor your big year,” he explained, tucking his phone into his pocket, only to pull it back out and show Nah something that he’d been looking at. It was a page on some shoddy website talking about manakete culture and how it was meant to be celebrated every twelve years, giving off information that Nah could only guess was half-accurate at best. “Then, get this, someone else who showed up started arguing with her and they took it outside to settle things. I don’t think she’s coming back.”“I can drive you home,” Nah offered, knowing that a little snow didn’t scare her, even when it came to getting all the way across town to where Morgan lived. “It’s no big deal, and if you don’t want to risk it in this weather, we’ve got space at home for you to crash.”“Hm, crash in the snow or crash at your house, I think I’d pick safety over possibly dying at your hands.” Once again putting his phone away, Morgan was too preoccupied with getting his pocket stuffed properly to dodge Nah hitting at him with her now-removed gloves, which made for quite the weapon to wield. “Hey! I’m just saying, everyone knows you’re not the best driver.”She rolled her eyes, but didn’t try to refute that claim. She’d heard far too many times about her scary driving skills, and she wasn’t even going to pretend that she was halfway decent at following the rules of the road. “Well, I probably shouldn’t be offering up space at home without asking my parents first, but it’s not going to be a problem. It’s never a problem when they decide to offer the room to their friends, after all. So I’m committing to this.”“Dinah, aren’t you going to come over and say a proper hello, instead of talking to your little friend?” The question came from one of the elder manaketes that she’d known all her life, and hearing her legal name being used didn’t faze her too badly, but the combination of being addressed in such a way as well as being asked to turn her back on her friend made Nah instantly disinterested in heeding the request. It was only when it was posed a second time, with a bit more force, that she apologized to Morgan but promised to come back over to him, before going to meet the green-haired manakete revered as one of the most important in all of Ylisse.“Sorry, Tiki, I was just…” Nah’s apology didn’t go anywhere beyond that, as she stared up at the older woman, someone she’d remembered spending time with for as long as she had memories. This was a woman that every manakete knew about, and even other dragon cultures were familiar with Tiki and her sage-like reverence. “I don’t know what I was doing, honestly. You’re not upset with me, are you?”“Goodness, no! I’ve known Morgan since he was a child as well, I’ll have you know. Why, once upon a time, his sister was meant to become an apprentice of mine in learning the ways of the culture, but she stepped away from that path for reasons I never understood.” Tiki paused, looking at Nah with a playful glint in her eyes, before raising a finger to the younger woman’s forehead and pressing it gently. “You, are you friends with Morgan’s sister?”
“Y-yes, I’m friends with Lucina. Can you maybe not touch me?” Stepping back to get out of reach of Tiki’s hand, Nah reached up and adjusted her hat so that it was properly covering her forehead, coming down right to her eyebrows. “I’m not even sure how these things are connected, Lady Tiki.”“They aren’t, dearest Dinah, and there is no reason for you to think they are. But now that we’ve established you being friends with her…could you please do your best to bring Lucina back to the light of the church? It aches this old heart to see such a brilliant and promising young woman stray so far from her path.” Tiki sounded so genuine and concerned that it would have been a request worth considering, had it not been completely illogical for Nah of all people to be given it. She wasn’t one for being a part of the church either, having given that up at about the same time she’d started going to college, claiming that she didn’t have enough hours in her week to make it all work.But she wasn’t sure if Tiki, in her ancient ways, was even aware of that fact, so she slapped on a forced grin and said, “Of course I can try, but there’s no promises. At least the church still has people like Morgan going to it, which I’m…sure he’s a good replacement for his sister. Totally sure.”She was positive that wasn’t the case, but she was trying to get out of the conversation, something that Tiki didn’t seem to pick up on. Thankfully for Nah, salvation came in the form of her mother, coming to collect her with a smile and a firm hand. “I’ll be stealing Dinah from you now, Lady Tiki,” Nowi announced without even a moment’s hesitation, noticing the awkwardness that was beginning to brew. “It’s important that we get our family time tonight, after all.”“Oh, of course. Good to be able to speak with you, Dinah.”“You too,” Nah mumbled, as she was escorted away by her mother, who seemed beyond amused at what she’d just walked into. The moment they were no longer in earshot of Tiki, she turned to her mother and said, “Thanks for that, Mom. She was trying to use me to convert someone else. Can you believe that?”“Given how many people she’s directly responsible for having join the Church of Naga? Yeah, I completely believe that.” Nowi, standing barely taller than her short daughter, looked every part the traditional manakete that evening, with her light green hair falling in waves and her ears, slightly pointed at their tips, poking out from underneath her tresses. In looking at her, Nah felt like she was in the wrong place, given that she’d inherited her father’s hair and didn’t have as much of a connection with the culture as she would’ve liked. Her only true manakete trait was her own pointed ears, which she framed with her bangs and her short braids that hung down behind her earlobes. “Why are you staring at me, Nah? Is there something on my face?”She hadn’t realized that she was staring at all, and being called out on it made Nah grow defensive in an instant. “No way! I was just thinking about tonight, that’s all. Big night for a big year, and I’m actually old enough to understand what it all means.”“Not that there’s much to it beyond tonight, if we’re being honest.” Rolling her eyes, Nowi made it overdramatic as she twirled her entire head to look around the whole room. “It’s a lot of going to church and hearing sermon after sermon about what the Book of Naga says about the manaketes and what blessings they’re meant to bestow upon the world but, like, do we really care about that?”“Do you want me to actually answer that?” Nah scrunched her nose, knowing that her mother had only posed the question because of what she’d said, not because she was looking for a real response. “I’m looking forward to being able to connect a bit better with this side of who I am, because it really seems like it’s irrelevant for eleven years then pops up as being super important for the twelfth year.”“And that’d be because it truly only is important every twelve years, whether we want to admit that or not.” Nah laughed at her mother’s honesty, which Nowi met with a chuckle of her own. “But you know what? I’m glad that I’m able to share this year with you. You’re quite the well-adjusted kid to be thrown into this sort of nonsense, unlike…” She trailed off as she looked over to where Morgan was back on his phone. “Ahem. Did you hear what happened with his mother?”Nah took a second to decide whether or not she wanted the chance to hear the full story, but chose to pretend like she hadn’t heard a thing. “Sure didn’t. I’m guessing she was supposed to be here but couldn’t make it for some reason?”“Ha, as if! She was actually here, but then that flighty broad Aversa walked in and started causing drama, and naturally Robin wasn’t having any part of that, so they walked out and haven’t been back. I’m hoping that Robin told her what’s up and got her to never show her face around here again, but manaketes are stubborn and never learn their lesson, no matter how diluted your blood is.” Taking in a deep breath, Nowi nodded at her presentation of the information, which Nah couldn’t take with a straight face. “I know, it’s quite funny to think about. Just imagine if we’d had more people here and it wasn’t snowing, we could’ve gone out and watched a middle-aged woman catfight if we’d wanted.”Hearing the suppressed giddiness in her mother’s voice, Nah felt almost obligated to point out that watching anyone fight wasn’t fun in the first place, but she knew that the words weren’t necessary. Instead, she looked past where Nowi was standing, over to where her father had grabbed himself a chair and was doing a bit of reading from a newspaper—and based on how he had the paper folded over itself, he was looking at the classified ads. “Are you aware you’ve got Dad here trying to get work done?” she asked sweetly, snapping her mother’s attention straight to where the paper was now being flicked at. “I think someone forgot to tell him he’s got to be a part of things.”“I’ll set him straight, don’t you worry!” With a wink, Nowi hopped backward and attempted to spin around with a dramatic flourish, but she ended up nearly taking herself out over her own feet, her stumbling over and falling into her husband’s lap, disrupting the reading he’d been doing by causing him to have ripped the paper in half.Her jaw dropping, Nah silently prayed that her name would stay out of any explanation for what had just happened, but her prayers went unanswered. “Dinah, why are you telling your mother lies about what I am doing? I was just doing some reading, there are no jobs to be picked up at this time of year.” Her father’s voice was stern-sounding, but the warmness that it carried was enough to tell Nah that she wasn’t in trouble (as much trouble as a nearly twenty-four-year-old woman could get in from her parents, anyway). “And now she’s here, like…this.”He gestured to how Nowi was laying over his legs, her hair brushing the floor on one side while her feet dangled on the other. “Look, I was just trying to get her to stop acting like a teenager about people fighting. I didn’t come here to hear about women having a catfight, and I thought I could, you know, use you as a distraction or something.”“It would be appreciated if you chose someone else to be your distraction. There has been a lot of big news in sports lately and I was interested in seeing what it all was, but then this happened and my paper is no longer readable.” He waved the two halves of the paper to demonstrate what he was saying, only for Nowi to reach up and snatch one of them from his hand. “Uh, what is that for?”“I’m calling shenanigans on you for this one, Gregor. You’ve never been interested in reading about sports and—yeah, okay, there isn’t even a sports section in this paper!” Kicking herself up back to her feet, in a feat of athleticism someone her age shouldn’t have been capable of without injury, Nowi rolled the half of the paper she held and used it to bonk Gregor on the top of his head. “You were definitely taking time out of our special night to try and find some work to pick up. You don’t have to lie about it.”“I already said, there are no jobs to be picked up at this time of year. Handymen, sure. Skilled tradesmen, naturally. Guys who can drive big trucks for hauling, of course. Men like Gregor here? Nothing until spring.” Returning the favor by rolling up the half he still held and bonking Nowi’s head with it, Gregor chuckled. “There is no sports section in this paper but there was a news piece on the situation anyway. Believe me or choose to not, either way I know I speak the truth.”Watching the display between her parents as they began bickering about if he was really telling the truth or if he was trying to cover himself anyway, Nah decided that she wasn’t even going to give it any further energy and headed back over to where Morgan was still on his phone. “I’m back,” she told him, watching him as he didn’t even look from his screen this time. “Any news from your mother yet?”“She said that she got so angry about seeing whoever it was that walked in here that she just, well, went home without me. So if I could cash in on that room offer, I’d really appreciate it.” It was then that Morgan looked over his phone to see Nah’s eyes staring straight at him, unblinking as she’d been waiting for his response. “Hey, I don’t mean to sound rude, but you’re starting to scare me with how focused your stare is right now.”“Right, sorry, I forget that not everyone likes when I do that.” It was actually no one at all that liked her talent, but Nah still tried it out every once in a while anyway. “But cool, we can ride back home together and then you’ll be able to get the guest room. If I’m being honest, going now before this place empties out even more might be a good idea, but it’s up to you on that.”“Up to me? Aren’t you the actual manakete here who’s supposed to be doing things to mark your year or whatever?” Morgan seemed surprised that the ball was in his court, and he was more than happy to push it back onto Nah’s shoulders. “You tell me when we’re leaving and I’ll be ready, this place isn’t really interesting to me.”Nah turned to look around at everything that was going on in the room they were in. Tiki had moved on to talking to a different group of people that were gathered on the other side, a small child clinging to her leg as she spoke in her very slow and tired manner. Her parents were still bonking each other with their halves of the newspaper, acting as if they were much, much younger than they actually were. There were others in the room as well, but they were manaketes that Nah didn’t particularly associate with, or didn’t want to spend time and energy talking to. Not that they were bad people, they were just more similar to her mother than to her, and she already could barely connect with the kind of person her mother was. There was no way she was willingly going to pursue those sorts of interactions.“I think I’m down to get out of here,” Nah said after considering all options, knowing that there was very little that this letdown of a party had to offer that she couldn’t just get taken care of at home. “Let’s get going and maybe no one will even notice that we’re leaving.”They were almost successful in getting out without any attention being pushed on them, but Nah made the mistake of stopping in the doorway on the way out and she could hear Tiki back in the room calling out her name. Naturally, she chose to ignore it and told Morgan to head down the hall toward the outer door, while she hustled to keep up with him, but before she could make it to the end she heard her name again. “Dinah. You aren’t planning on leaving without giving proper farewells, are you?”“I’m going to see you all again in, like, a few weeks. I think I can do without making some huge to-do about it all.” Nah looked back over her shoulder, to see the crestfallen expression on the elder manakete’s face. “Sorry, but that’s never been my style, Lady Tiki. That’s forever been something that you and Mom like doing, but not me.”“Perhaps you’re beginning to stray further from the light than I expected. What a shame, you’ve always been a lovely girl to watch growing up, but I suppose it only makes sense, given the fact that you’ve turned your back on your heritage so many times already.” With a sniffle, Tiki went back into the room, leaving Nah standing there knowing that she was being guilted into going back inside with her.“Come on, Nah, it’s starting to snow worse,” she heard Morgan call, and she knew that her mind wasn’t changing from what she’d already decided.Under her breath, she muttered something about how manakete culture seemed to be a lot of stuffy old folks making rules they forced on the younger people, before she ran to catch up with Morgan and get outside into the near-blizzard conditions. She was thankful that they’d made the plan to go back to her house instead of try to travel to his, because even with her best attempt at driving carefully she was still a terrifying person to have in charge of driving in those conditions. There were plenty of moments where her car went skidding out through intersections that she shouldn’t have been in, her and Morgan both screaming at the top of their lungs as it seemed their doom was upon them, but miraculously they made it to the house without any damage done to the car.Although the damage done to them personally was another story, it seemed. “Okay, remind me to never, ever get in the car with you again, ever,” Morgan panted once they were safely inside the entryway to the house Nah lived in, both taking off all shoes, hats, gloves, and jackets and tucking them into the closest closet. “I thought my dad was bad when he’s in a rush to get somewhere, but I’d rather be riding with him when he’s late to a business meeting than ever do whatever that was again.”“Not even the first time I’ve heard someone say that to me in the past year,” Nah replied, not bothered by the lack of confidence in her driving because it was commonplace at that point. “But I get it, I could’ve handled driving that a lot better. Who would’ve ever guessed that going under the speed limit is recommended in the snow?”“You’re joking, right?”Nah blinked at Morgan as she considered ignoring answering his question for the humor of it, but she chose to give him the peace of mind of knowing she was indeed joking. “I wasn’t going that fast out there. Faster than I should have been? Yeah, definitely. But as fast as I would go normally? Not a chance.”“Aren’t you scared of getting caught speeding around like that? I doubt you want to have to pay for a speeding ticket, or even have one on your record. Wouldn’t that make you look bad for your job or something?” Morgan’s question was a good one, and it was one that Nah would have loved to answer, but she was distracted by the sound of a timer going off somewhere in the house that she needed to go take care of.The kitchen was where the culprit was located, the oven timer beeping that it had run its course, but she couldn’t figure out why it was on in the first place. The oven was off, and there was nothing sitting idly inside of it, and there wasn’t anything on the stovetop that would require timing as well. “I think Dad might’ve been making something earlier before he got dragged to the manakete ‘party’ and forgot to turn the timer off in his rush to finish up. I’m honestly surprised there isn’t a random loaf of bread or a cake or something just sitting here getting stale.”“Does your dad spend a lot of time baking?” Morgan asked, eyes glancing around the spacious kitchen they were standing in. “I know he’s made things for us in the past, but is that a normal thing for him?”“When he’s not working, it’s normal. When he’s got an actual job to do, not so much.” Nah knew that she’d started a whole ordeal at the party by calling attention to it looking like her dad was searching for some freelance work to do, but she also knew that he truly wasn’t going to be finding work in the wintertime. He was a freelance physical labor sort of man, and had been as long as she could remember, and it was completely typical for him to take time off every winter until spring weather rolled around and people needed a guy to step in and do some heavy lifting for them. “Which means that right now, it’s more unusual that there isn’t something here than anything.”“I see, I see.” Morgan’s reply made it very clear that he didn’t see anything at all, and Nah was amused that he thought she wasn’t going to pick up on that. “So since there’s nothing in here, you want to make something instead?”“W-what? Where did that come from?”He shrugged, before turning around and jumping up onto one of the clean countertops, sitting himself down on it and kicking his feet into the cabinets below. “I’ve never really been over to a friend’s house like this, only ever Owain’s place and even then, he’s not a friend so I don’t think that counts.”“Well, for starters, you really shouldn’t be sitting on countertops in other people’s houses. We were literally just talking about all the baking my dad does, and now he’s going to be baking somewhere that you were sitting.” Nah scrunched her nose in Morgan’s direction, but he didn’t seem to care about what she was saying. “But, uh, I’ve honestly never been one for going to spend the night at other people’s houses either, so I don’t know what a sleepover’s supposed to look like. Does this even count as a sleepover?”“I’m sleeping over, so I think so?” Tilting his head back to lean it against the upper cabinets, Morgan sighed before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his phone. “Would you look at that, a text from my mom asking if she needs to go back and get me. Do I tell her where I am or do I say I found somewhere to go? I don’t want her driving more tonight.”A realization flashed through Nah’s mind as she thought about how he should respond, one that involved his mother reaching out to her mother and that being the way that Nowi found out there was a boy in her house. “How about you say you’re staying with a friend tonight and leave it at that? You don’t have to tell her the details.”“She’s going to ask for the details.” Even still, Morgan did as directed and only mentioned that he had somewhere to stay, which brought a sense of relief to Nah until she remembered that her parents were going to come home at some point and they were going to find out that Morgan was there when they got back. While she began to mentally grapple with that, he got down from the countertop and motioned for her to stay where she was as he headed out of the room. “She wants to call and hear that I’m fine. Don’t follow, got it?”“Don’t lie to her about what’s going on! I don’t want to be the bad guy in all of this, I’ve got to go to your house on Tuesday!” Nah was fine with needing to stay in the kitchen, and took the moment to wipe down the counter in the general area that Morgan had been, cleaning it with soap and water until she was sure it was now back to being free of his germs. Out in the living room, she could hear him talking with his mother, awkwardly laughing at things she was saying and assuring her over and over that he was sleeping somewhere safe that night.When he came back, he looked like the conversation had exhausted him in many ways, something that Nah almost pointed out until she was instead using her breath to keep him from getting back up on the counter. After explaining that she’d cleaned it and that she’d really like it if he didn’t sit there again, he chose to lean against it instead. “So that was an interesting talk she wanted to have. Apparently the police got involved with the fight she was having and that’s why she had to go home.”“The…police,” Nah repeated, blinking a few times as she waited for Morgan to say he was joking. But when he stayed silent and nodded, she felt like she was being tricked even more than before. “Because a middle-aged woman decided she needed to throw hands with someone at a party for manaketes?”“More like, because she decided she needed to get in an argument with someone who legally has to stay away from our family and called for backup to enforce the law.” Morgan was beginning to fiddle with his phone in both hands, passing it back and forth without looking at it, as his eyes were fixated firmly on Nah’s unamused face. “You’ve heard about my not-actual aunt Aversa before, right?”“From my mom, yeah. Apparently she’s a bad person that’s got a bad reputation in manakete circles, but that’s all I’ve ever gotten.” Nah didn’t know how else to answer that, beyond admitting that she’d heard far more about the woman from her mother than she’d ever thought she’d need to know. Nowi was exceptionally good at weaseling her way into friendships with people much younger than her (as was the case with Morgan’s mother) and getting them to spill all of their dirty secrets and things they’d rather have taken to their grave. “I’m sure she’s not even worth the breath you’d need to use to tell me about what she’s done to deserve this treatment.”“You’re right about that, Nah,” Morgan said with a laugh, firmly catching his phone in one hand before tucking it into his pocket. “She’s not worth anything at all, not even the energy to think about what kind of person she is.” That was when he froze, before looking around in a rather frantic, skittish manner. “You don’t think she’s got this place bugged and that she’s listening to our every word, do you?”“What kind of conspiracy theory nonsense is that? I’ve never met her in my life, I highly doubt she’s got this place ‘bugged’ in any sort of way.” Nah looked out the large window just outside the kitchen, where the snow was coming down just as hard as it had been when they’d gotten there. “And I’m willing to bet all my money on her not being outside spying on you, so don’t you worry about a thing.”Giving a relieved sigh, Morgan explained, “Sorry to jump to that conclusion, but I’ve always been taught to be on edge whenever she’s around. I guess, when I was just a baby, she tried to do some stuff to me and Lucina and ever since then, she’s been completely unwelcome in the family. I don’t remember any of it, but Lucy might?”“Of course, because I’m going to sit here and call your busy sister to ask her if she can spare a moment on this Saturday night to recall a traumatic childhood event.” The way Nah said it, she’d tried to make it clear that she was being sarcastic, but the fact that Morgan was abysmal at picking up those social cues had slipped her mind and she was left having to tell him that she didn’t actually mean that she’d do that. “Look, you’re getting super invested in getting me caught up with your family drama, and I’m sorry but it’s not something I actually want any part of. I wouldn’t rope you into my family’s stuff.”“But your family doesn’t have anything interesting like that. You’ve got a mom who doesn’t work and a dad who only works when the weather’s good, you don’t have sisters or aunts or anything like me.” Morgan looked at Nah, expecting her to admit that he was right, but instead he was left watching her walk out of the kitchen to get closer to the snowy scene in the window. “Where are you going? Why are you walking away like this?”“Because I’m not interested in comparing traumas, that’s all. I’ve spent enough time having to do that with everyone else, I’m not doing it with you too.” As Nah approached the window, she found herself wishing she hadn’t been so kind as to offer her friend a place to stay overnight, because he was getting on her nerves. She was always the sensible one, unless a very specific set of events was taking place around her, and she hated when people didn’t respect that aspect of who she was.After gesturing wildly as he tried to collect his thoughts, Morgan followed her over to the window and stood behind her, resting his arms down on the top of Nah’s head. “I didn’t mean for it to seem like that’s what I wanted, I hope you know. I get that you don’t have much of that stuff in your life anyway.”“You’re still not helping matters.”“I’ll stop talking, then.”The silence brought on by that agreement lasted exactly fifteen seconds, before the front door to the house came open and Nowi’s voice rang through the home, her calling for wherever Nah was. “You’re in so much trouble with Lady Tiki next time you see her!” Nowi continued, seemingly oblivious to where her daughter was at the moment. “She was pretty upset about you leaving like you did, and honestly? Can’t say I blame her.”“Those roads are not for driving on, even by those with all our experience,” Gregor followed up, as he shut the front door behind them. “You should have let us do the driving to get you back safe, especially since—uh?” Whatever reason he had to offer was cut short with a surprised sputter. “Why is there a blue-haired one in our home?”“There’s a what?” Nowi repeated, before she seemed to catch a glimpse of the back of Morgan’s head for herself and she screeched, “You do not belong in this house, sir! What in Naga’s name are you doing here?”“I, uh, I was invited by, um, you know, your daughter?” Morgan managed to spit out, as he turned around to face the two overbearing and protective parents who were quickly coming toward him. Nah, realizing that she’d just been implicated in things, tried her best to remain invisible by hiding behind Morgan, but when he unexpectedly stepped to the side she was all too visible to hide any longer. “My mom left me at the party and she offered me a place to stay tonight, I promise I didn’t invite myself!”Nowi’s eyes narrowed as she gave Morgan a menacing stare, before shifting her gaze toward Nah. “And what do you have to say about that, Dinah? Did you think you could get away with sneaking a boy in here?”“No, actually, I didn’t think that at all, because he’s seriously only here because the roads are atrocious. Wasn’t Dad literally just saying that I should have let you two do the driving? Would you have rather me having driven all the way over to Morgan’s place to get him home, then drive all the way back here, and by myself?” Nah was fully prepared to stand her ground as needed, but at the same time she knew that her mother wasn’t going to argue with the facts she’d just thrown down. It would have been beyond bizarre if Nowi didn’t see the truth for what it was.Except, as it turned out, she could accept that Nah had invited Morgan over because of the weather, but she couldn’t accept him staying there. “Nope, sorry, but he’s got to go. You’re not keeping a boy in this house, not unless you’ve got something you need to tell me about your relationship with him.”“He’s not my boyfriend.”“Y-yeah, she’s not my girlfriend!” Morgan chimed in, knowing that speaking his own defense wasn’t going to do him much good but that he needed to do as much as he could to help Nah out. “First of all, she’s not really my type—sorry, Nah, but you knew that. Second, if I was dating her then I’d probably have some…other guys wanting to put me in my place over it.”“Other guys are interested in my daughter?” Nowi’s eyes opened back to their normal wideness as she looked at Morgan, waiting for him to elaborate further. “Wait, how do you know that, exactly? I need to know if you’re just saying it to save yourself, or if you’re really meaning to get my hopes up for the future.”As Nah groaned over what she was hearing, Morgan came forward and nodded slowly. “Right, uh, I know this because we talk about it a lot after our game sessions on Tuesdays, after Nah leaves. Sorry that this is how you’re finding this out, by the way, but it’s true. Me and Brady and Owain and anyone else who happens to stick around for the afterparty get to talking, and those guys…man, they sure do love talking about you.”Jaw dropping, Nowi glanced to her daughter to see what sort of similar reaction Nah was having, but when she was met with a completely blank, neutral stare, she instead spun around to face her husband instead. “Are you hearing this, Gregor? I think this kid just gave you some names of some people you need to investigate.”“Mom, you guys know them already. They’ve come over here before a bunch of times. Are you starting to go as senile as Lady Tiki, or are you just pretending to forget these things?” Nah waggled a finger at her mother, who wasn’t looking in the correct direction to see it, and as soon as it seemed Nowi was about to turn around, the finger came down. “They’re the same guys you’ve known since we were all kids.”“Huh, you mean there aren’t a bunch of people with those names hanging around town? I guess we have known them a long time.” Nowi raised a hand to stroke her chin thoughtfully, which she did in an overdramatic way simply to irritate Nah. “I take back you needing to investigate them, Gregor, because I’ll do it myself. I’ve got ways.”“I don’t like the idea of you investigating my friends, but…if it gets you off Morgan’s back while he stays here tonight, then I’ll let them be subjected to this nonsense. Can’t even say it’s the worst thing they’ll have put up with because of me.” Nah paused, before leaning forward to get serious with her parents. “That does mean that you’re letting him stay here and not harassing him further, right?”“That would seem fair, yes,” Gregor said with a nod, while Nowi didn’t seem as eager to accept the terms of the deal. “Nowi, please, allow this to happen. After all, the snow is bad and none of us should be out in it. Not even Gregor here wants to meet death in the snow!”“Fine, the boy stays for one night only.” Crinkling her face as she playfully gestured in her daughter’s direction, Nowi turned serious for a moment as she added, “But he gets the couch down here, and doesn’t come anywhere close to your bedroom! It might be the start of the year of the dragon but you’re not doing anything life-changing today and that’s an order.”Nah groaned as Morgan, completely clueless as to what that referred to, looked at her for an explanation. “By ‘life-changing,’ does she mean going out in the snow or what? I thought we just decided I get to stay.”“Mom, Dad, go to bed so I can apparently teach Morgan about the wonders of life before heading to bed myself,” Nah grumbled, her annoyance far more prevalent than she would have liked for it to come off as she was merely trying to joke around. She did get a laugh out of her mother, and her father seemed relieved to hear her cracking any sort of joke in that moment, and they were soon on their way upstairs into their bedroom. Once she heard a door close upstairs, she turned to Morgan and let her shoulders drop. “You seriously don’t get what my mom was referring to?”“I didn’t at first, but then you mentioned wonders of life and I think I get it. Maybe.” He awkwardly smiled at her, only for her to turn back to looking at the still-falling snow outside. “Your mom doesn’t really think that we’d be doing that sort of thing, even after all the talking I did about other guys being interested in you and stuff like that?”“She wasn’t being serious when she said that, I don’t think. She’s always been really weird about the idea of her little girl going off and finding someone who loves her, but maybe that’s because she didn’t find love until she was in her thirties.” Pressing her forehead against the cold glass, Nah felt the chill of the snow on the other side and almost wished she was out in it after all. “It’s just a huge thing for manaketes to mate for life, and she doesn’t want me rushing into anything until I’m ready for it.”Morgan came to stand beside her, putting a hand on her shoulder after brushing one of her reddish braids to the side. “Okay, but she didn’t need to think that I’m here to get you wrapped up in those kinds of things. I’m not, I’m only here because of this weather, you know that I wouldn’t do anything like that.”“Of course I know that, if I didn’t know that I wouldn’t have invited you over.” A pause, followed by Nah tacking on, “Plus, you’re too busy coming up with things to throw at us during the next session to even think about anything romantic. I can’t believe Mom even knows you’re the one running the game and she thinks you’re here to get in my bed with me. You’ve got bigger things to worry about.”“Well, duh? Everyone else we play with is in fact much bigger than you.” Cue Nah reaching up and pulling Morgan’s hand off of her, while he laughed about her reaction to the joke about her height. “Sorry, that was kind of mean of me to say, even if it was true. But I do have bigger things to worry about, like if this is all gonna be cleared up before Tuesday or if I’m going to need to take a crash course in running sessions online.”“I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to be prepared in case the roads aren’t better by then, but you know how things get around here. They’re either super on top of clearing the roads and it’s safe within a day, or you’re trapped for a week. Not much in between.” Her eyes watching the heavy snowflakes falling down on the piles that had already built up, Nah found herself hoping for the latter option, even though she knew the former was the correct choice. “I’m sure you’ll be home tomorrow safe and sound, and we’ll all be over at your parents’ house on Tuesday like normal. Like nothing ever happened.”Nodding solemnly, Morgan stepped away from where she was standing, before he jumped out of nowhere and ran toward one of the couches in the main room. “Nothing’s going to even have the chance to happen because I think I’m going to go lay down. You don’t mind turning all the lights off and heading upstairs now, do you?”Nah stepped back from the window and turned around right as Morgan leapt onto the couch of his choosing, the force sending one of the recliners thrusting out and creaking underneath him. After rushing over to make sure that the couch was okay—not even concerned with Morgan’s well-being on that moment—she said, “I’ll head on up and make sure my parents see that I’m up there by myself. So, uh, just a warning in case they come down to make sure you’re really down here doing your own thing.”“Warning noted. Thanks for helping me out tonight, Nah.”“It’s what friends are for.” She smiled at him before going around and turning off every conceivable light in the lower part of the house, the last one being the light that illuminated the stairs she climbed to get to where her bedroom was. On the upper landing, she could hear Morgan down on his phone, calling who she could assume was one of his parents to check in with them, and she shook her head at how strange the night had turned.Before she went into her bedroom, she knocked on the door to her parents’ room, which she could tell they were both awake on the other side given the fact that she could hear their voices talking in not-so-hushed whispers. “Oh, it’s you,” Nowi remarked when she opened the door, her hair done up in a twisted towel to dry. “You’ve made good on the agreement, haven’t you? No boys up here?”“No boys up here,” Nah repeated with a nod. “Just like we agreed. You have a good night, I’m going to my room and staying there until sunrise. This has just been…one of the days of all time, that’s for sure.”“You’re a good kid, Dinah, don’t forget that.” Reaching out and gently tapping Nah on the nose, Nowi’s whole face lit up at the display before she retreated into the room, closing the door before there could be any retaliation. Nah’s hand came up and touched exactly where her mother had just touched her, smiling softly at the whole display of affection.They weren’t a traditional family, and her parents often got on her nerves, but at the end of the day, Nah was thankful for what she’d been given in life and she couldn’t have asked for anything different. Well, except for the snow and the driving and the being teased about bringing a boy into her parents’ home, but that was normal for her life and she wasn’t about to expect anything else from it.Nah's work schedule had been a thing of beauty ever since the beginning of the current school year. She'd been hoping that someday her degree and all of the effort she'd put into finishing college in a timely manner would pay off, and it did. The payoff, almost immediate after her graduation, came in the form of four different jobs on four different days of the week, all under the same title and job description.The school district she'd gotten hired in had been insistent that she focus on a different school every day (with Fridays as a day spent for appointments and weekday-necessary activities because she couldn't take off any other day unless it was a life or death situation). At first she'd been apprehensive about taking on such a schedule, but after going to trainings at each one it had dawned on her that doing things the way they wanted would work better than just being stationed at one school. However, when she'd gotten to see which school she was at on which day of the week that she'd realized just how interesting her schedule actually was. The reason for that boiled down to one particular student that attended the particular school that she was working at on Tuesdays, the same day as her weekly gaming session with Morgan and some other friends.At first, at that Tuesday school assignment, she'd made it a point to stick to her actual role of assisting the younger students per what her education level had deemed appropriate. But curiosity had gotten to Nah around the fall break in classes, and she'd ended up taking a stroll through the upper grade hallways just to see what kinds of students she could find roaming around there. It took quite a while before she made her pass on a day where the students could actually see her, but when that finally happened one early winter day, she'd immediately been made to regret ever making that decision in the first place.That was because of one Ribbon Leichtfoot, middle child of the last taguel family and overall gremlin of a girl, spotting her and trying to get her attention. Nah didn't think too much of the prolonged eye contact she'd made with Ribbon that day, and figured that it could just lead to running into her more frequently in the halls; what she got out of it was a request from Nowi to make arrangements that would use her location on Tuesdays to benefit multiple people. "It's one day a week and the girl gets to spend time with someone outside of family or friends, how bad can it be?" Nowi said over dinner, a question that made Nah inwardly groan because she knew that it could only be bad.And now that it was once again Tuesday, and she was once again at Ribbon's school, Nah had to once again face the reality that she had a job on top of the job she was actually there to do. She liked her actual job, working with the kids who were barely old enough to be able to explain their actions who were struggling academically, but the additional job she’d been thrust into because of her going through the hallways when she shouldn’t have was a lot less likeable. In fact, it was so unlikeable that she’d thought many times of begging her mother to reach out and put a stop to it, because there was no way she was going to do it herself.“Nah! Why are you down on this side of the school?” Ribbon’s voice called out, the girl cupping her mouth to yell down the hallway despite classes going on around her. “Last time I checked, you’re supposed to be with the littles, not us big kids.”“For the last time, Ribbon, if I am in this place for work purposes, you are to call me Miss Balakin,” Nah replied, after hushing the girl and checking their surroundings to make sure no one else was listening in. She motioned toward her name badge, which had originally said her full, legal name on it, but she’d covered the first two letters in Dinah with a sticker and had covered her last name with a slightly transparent sticker to obscure it as much as she could get away with. “Seriously, I get that you know me outside of here, but I’m professional when I’m in this place and you’ve got to treat me like I am.”“Right, okay.” Dropping her hands to her hips, Ribbon stood menacingly from where she was further down the hall, her shoulders hunched forward slightly but her still standing taller than Nah did. “Still doesn’t explain why you’re down here in the first place.”“I’m walking to the student services office, that’s why I’m down here. Still not the way you should be speaking to someone who works at the school, but you’re getting better about it.” It wasn’t true at all, there was nothing “better” about how Ribbon interacted with Nah on the days she was there at her school, but Nah wasn’t about to get involved in any sort of drama that would drag Ribbon’s mother into the equation. She knew it was best to let the girl do as she wanted, and let someone else handle it. “Why are you out of class right now, anyway? Shouldn’t you be, well, learning something?”“I needed a drink of water.” Ribbon took a single, giant step closer to where Nah was, which was in the general direction of the closest water fountain. “I forgot my water bottle at home and I was thirsty. Is there a problem with that? You want to—”Nah cut her off with a shush. “You get your drink of water, then, and stop speaking to me like we’re personal friends. I get that I’m kind of your babysitter on Tuesdays, but you’ve really got to get out of the habit of talking to me like we’ve been friends all our lives.”“—sorry about that, I’ll get my water.” Now that she’d been put in her place as well as she could be, given the circumstances, Ribbon kept walking down the hall with her head hanging low, her hair obscuring her face as she came closer and closer. Nah stood there and watched her until she made it to the water fountain, at which point she decided she’d get back to what she should’ve been doing and left the girl to her own devices.This was, unfortunately, a rather common occurrence every week, because despite being told how to act multiple times, Ribbon was convinced that she could get away with being much more casual with Nah than what was appropriate. On the flip side, Nah appreciated that there was someone in that building, or even in the entire school district, that would refer to her with the name she preferred, but she knew that allowing Ribbon to get away with the first-name basis would introduce a lot of questions from the school administration. It was already a problem when the tiniest students were calling her Miss Dinah instead of Miss Balakin, and that was already a huge concession that Nah had needed to make to be more approachable by those students. She could only imagine the sorts of issues they’d take with a single student calling her a nickname instead.She was just about at the student services office when she heard footsteps behind her, followed with a laugh that she immediately recognized as Ribbon’s. “You need to go to class, Ribbon,” she reminded, not turning around to give the girl the satisfaction of getting the attention she wanted. “I can go pop into your classroom and let your teacher know that you’re out here following me around.”“I was just wondering,” Ribbon started, a quietness to her voice, “if you were still taking me home today after school. Dad said that he’s going to be home late and…I know what you do on Tuesdays after you drop me off. You can’t miss that.”A chill shot down Nah’s spine as she slowly, deliberately turned around until she was staring slightly up at the much-younger girl who’d been behind her. “When was anyone going to tell me that your father isn’t going to be home on time? I assume this means your mother isn’t going to be there either?”“She’s been out of town since before the snow started falling this past weekend, something about visiting old family homes or something like that? I don’t know.” Ribbon half-shrugged, before stepping back a bit. “I can try and see if I can call Dad to see if he’ll be home but I don’t know if that’ll do anything…”“Just go to class, I’ll be the one to figure something out here. As the adult in the situation, it’s basically my job to do that.” Mentally cursing out the person responsible for this scheduling conflict (which wasn’t either of Ribbon’s parents, even though they certainly could’ve done better at letting her know what was going on with their schedules), Nah waved for Ribbon to finally walk back to where she belonged. Once Ribbon was back in her classroom, that was when Nah was able to finish getting into the office she used on the days she was at the school and take a seat at her desk, thinking about how to solve the new problem at hand.She couldn’t fault the girl for letting her know that plans had changed when she did, although some warning ahead of time would’ve been appreciated. Life was pretty fluid and hectic, and Nah fully understood that people could have unpredictable schedules that would leave her in charge of a twelve-year-old girl on the night she was supposed to be going to her friend’s house to play some tabletop games. It wasn’t going to be too much of a problem if Ribbon was there—she wasn’t some stranger to the people that were playing alongside Nah, so they’d be accepting of her presence. The problem came in the fact that Morgan’s house was so far away from everyone and everything else, and if Nah got called to take Ribbon home mid-session, it would ultimately eat up all of their time.Therefore, there was one option and one option only that seemed to make sense, and so Nah sent her mother a message begging her to step in and watch Ribbon that night, because her plans were too important to be derailed by the girl. Nowi’s response came almost immediately, and the two letters that it contained caused Nah’s blood to start boiling a little. “How dare she turn me down like this?” Nah seethed, tapping on the phone keyboard but not knowing what she was going to say in return. “She’s the whole reason I’m stuck with Ribbon tonight in the first place, the least she could do is help out when I need it!”’She didn’t send any other messages to her mother, choosing to take the high road and not be seen as a disrespectful daughter because of the situation. Instead, she ended up telling Morgan that there’d be a guest coming along with her, and that she was sorry if she caused everything to be disrupted or pushed to the next week. He wasn’t nearly as quick to respond as Nowi had been, to the point that Nah wasn’t sure if her message was even going through, but just before the end of the school day she got a response in the form of a thumbs-up emoji followed by a grinning one, which she took to mean as complete understanding.She was beyond wrong on that, but she didn’t find that out until her and Ribbon were standing outside the lovely house that Morgan shared with his parents, both of them with teeth chattering due to the cold wind that had picked up on their drive over. “Th-this is miserable!” Ribbon called out, her arms rapidly flapping around to try and generate heat. “Why’d y-y-you have to br-bring us here?”“It’s for a game night,” Nah replied, her breath warm on her face and only causing her cheeks to grow even colder as they continued to wait. “I come here every week to play games with my friends.”“D-d-does that mean that Yarne’s going to be here?” Despite feeling so cold, there was a warmness to the question that Ribbon asked, and Nah felt genuinely bad having to tell the girl that no, her brother was not going to be there. “Man, that would’ve been cool. So I guess this has got to be a really scary game. Or, or, or…maybe it’s a violent one? He doesn’t like violent things.”“Trust me, I know that about him already, but that’s not the reason he’s not here even if it makes sense for it to be.” Honestly, Nah couldn’t remember the exact reason that Yarne had turned down the invitation to be a part of the gaming group, but it had something to do with it starting not long after he’d gotten his new position at his job and he hadn’t wanted to try and juggle a game alongside everything else on his plate. “Maybe someday we’ll get him included in a similar game, I don’t know.”Ribbon opened her mouth to say something more, but the door opened at the same time and Morgan, bundled up nice and warm inside, tilted his head at the presence of the two standing there outside. “Is this the guest you were telling me about?” he asked, pointing toward Ribbon. “I thought you were talking about—”“My brother?” Ribbon helpfully suggested, even though it had just been established that he wasn’t a part of things.“—I mean, sure, it could’ve been him. I thought more like maybe a coworker, or someone you know from the manakete stuff, but…” Morgan raised his eyebrows at Nah, who shrugged out of an uncertainty of how to explain what was going on. “I guess I’ll come up with something for her to do while we’re playing, since there’s no way I’m letting an actual child get in on the game.”“Look, if it’s a problem for her to be here, I’ll take her home. The problem with that is that she has no idea where her dad is and her mom’s unavailable, so she’s kind of stuck with me until she’s got a parent to watch her.” Without waiting for an invitation to come inside, Nah pushed past Morgan and entered the house, feeling the relief of the warm inside air as soon as she was fully surrounded by it.The first thing she noticed upon entering was that she wasn’t the first person to get there, as there were a couple of others sitting over at the big dining room table, in the middle of a conversation that involved calling someone’s character a waste of space. She stood there listening to them for a few moments, until she had a freezing cold hand placed on top of her head and a shrill, young girl voice in her ear. “I don’t think your friend wants me here,” Ribbon bluntly said, which Nah wasn’t going to argue with.“Uh, does someone want to explain why she’s here?” one of the men at the table asked, being pulled out of his friendly conversation to look directly over at Ribbon, before his eyes fell on Nah instead and pinned her as the culprit. “Of course it’d be somethin’ to do with you, wouldn’t it?”“You’ve got me there, I’m always just getting myself wrapped up in everyone else’s problems,” Nah replied, trying to push Ribbon off of her but failing at the act. “Mom arranged for me to take her home on the days I’m at her school, but today it turned into an actual babysitting gig.”Scoffing at the statement, Ribbon retorted, “I am not a baby to be babysat, thank you very much. I’m barely even a kid at this point. And, oh, I’m taller than you too!”“Congrats, you’ve achieved something that most people are also successful at, would you like your prize now or later?” Having her height mentioned wasn’t a big problem for Nah, given that she was incredibly short when compared to just about everyone she spent time with, but when it was being thrown at her by someone half her age, it rubbed her the wrong way. Her response certainly could have been worded nicer, but it did its job as it got Ribbon to back off and mutter an apology before bounding off into the heart of the house.“So are you getting paid for watching her like this, or is it out of the kindness you clearly want to share with everyone?” Morgan asked, looking for some clarification on why there was a child in his family’s house. “If it were me, and my parents asked me to do something like that, I’d want money out of things.”Nah rolled her eyes, taking her shoes and jacket off before heading to the table, sitting down next to the taller of the men who were already there. “If there’s money involved in this, it’s not coming to me. Like I said, Mom arranged for all of this to happen, she’s the point of contact that Ribbon’s parents go through. I just do the work.”“That’s unfortunate. You really should look into speaking sense into everyone involved, it seems like they could use it.” The man she hadn’t sat next to was looking at Nah with a big smile, his head nodding as he continued, “I’m sure if we went through the list of spells, we could find something that could assist you on that quest to get what you deserve. I cannot be the one to cast the spell, naturally, but I can at least try finding it.”“I’m absolutely surprised you didn’t open your mouth to tell me about how you’re going to go chase my mother down with a sword, so…thanks for that, Owain.” Nah was holding back a laugh, trying to resist poking more fun at the most eccentric person currently in the room. “I’ll be fine without someone’s spell trying to motivate me, I’m sure. Usually taking Ribbon home isn’t even a problem, it’s just…today.”“If it’s any consolation, Laurent’s going to be late today and Noire isn’t even planning on showing up because of her own family drama,” Morgan told her as he took his spot at the head of the table, where he had a screen set up to block everyone from seeing what sorts of things he had set up in front of him. “So there’s a very, very real chance we could be doing this with just the three of you.”Ribbon popped up from behind the wall separating the dining room from the kitchen, a curious look on her face. “Can I play with you guys? I promise I’m good at following directions, if you explain them to me.”“I’m not having a child in this campaign.”“If that’s the case, then why’re you letting Nah play such a young elf? Technically her character isn’t an adult, so…” Owain shrugged, while Morgan gave him a very narrow-eyed look. “Sorry, just reminding you of that fun fact.”“Let me rephrase it, then.” Morgan took in a deep breath, before pointing over his screen at Nah. “She’s an adult player playing a young character. Ribbon is an actual child who would be playing far over her head. Is that what you want to see happen?”Owain took a second to think that over before sighing. “I suppose not. As interesting as it would be to watch a comrade fall in battle, I feel it wouldn’t be appropriate for said comrade to be controlled by someone so inexperienced.”“Ugh, this is so stupid, it’s always adults getting to do adult things and me being left out,” Ribbon pouted, before disappearing back on the other side of the kitchen wall, her silence going forward more suspicious than it really should have been.But, as long as she was keeping herself mostly out of trouble, there wasn’t much that Nah could ask for from her, other than having some supernatural ability to prevent herself from being called to go home right when things got started. These Tuesday night plans were one of the things Nah looked forward to every single week, being able to get weird with some of her best and closest friends at the request of someone that she hadn’t ever seen herself becoming close with until he had the idea to give them this space. She enjoyed being able to let down her façade of normalness and seriousness around the people she trusted, and to get to spend a few hours each week playing as an otherworldly creature was so far out of her normal that it felt great, honestly.In fact, it was so great that she didn’t care that the guy sitting next to her had somehow backed into playing as the complete antithesis to what the manaketes believed a dragon was supposed to be like. When they’d been crafting their characters the September before, someone in the group doing that had started as a joke, because no one wanted to step on the toes of Nah’s culture if they could avoid it. Even Morgan had said that, despite “dragons” being firmly in the title of the game, he wasn’t going to include killing any for her sake, and for the sake of his family who could very much overhear them playing if they were home. She hadn’t asked for that, even if that possibility did sit in her mind as one she didn’t want to have to deal with, so hearing it had been a nice surprise and a welcome change to the game.This was followed immediately by Owain declaring that he was going to have his character be a gnome with a giant sword, in order to make sure that Nah’s character wasn’t the smallest in the party. That suggestion didn’t go over quite as well as the removing most dragons one, because she took it as a negative comment on her height and she wasn’t going to let that be something she tolerated every week. It took a lot of pointing out reasons why he was being a bit offensive to get him to change his mind, and so Owain had to start the journey of figuring out a better race for his character, and he scoured the books looking for the perfect suggestion.Laurent, who had previously built his character the moment he’d been approached by Morgan about putting the whole game together, sat next to Owain trying his hardest not to break his neutral expression, because he’d done the work to be as considerate as possible in what kind of cultures playing as a tabaxi could represent. On his other side, Noire was still tinkering with what class she wanted her character to be, but she’d fully settled on making them into a tiefling, which didn’t have the baggage of representing cultures in Ylisse to contend with. This news came at the exact same moment that Owain had stumbled upon the tiefling for himself, and despite being told repeatedly by Morgan that it was okay if they doubled up on races, he resigned himself to letting Noire have the cooler race and took playing as a boring human as his final decision.And then there was Brady, who had only gotten involved because every other person Morgan had wanted in the group had either turned down the invitation, or was going through enough in their personal life that it wasn’t feasible to even consider them being there. Brady, who’d heard that both Owain and Nah were going to be there and decided he’d needed to be a part of things to keep them from targeting each other with friendly fire, and once he knew about Noire’s inclusion that became even more necessary.Brady, who took one look at the possible character races, glanced at Nah, and asked in his rough voice if he could play as a dragon, just to do justice to “someone that he respected.”Morgan’s initial reaction was to tell him no, but Nah, being the one that had more manakete lineage to her name than the person in charge, held up her hand and said that she trusted that if anyone was going to represent dragons right in the game, it was going to be Brady, so she didn’t have a problem with the decision. At the time, it felt like a good choice, but when his stat rolls were pitifully low almost entirely, it became a really bad choice because the dragon man could hit things hard, but was about as brilliant as a piece of wood with the personality to match. Yet, despite all of that, Nah didn’t mind having to hear him bumbling through the campaign next to her and her stately elf character, because he was having fun with it and he was always checking with her that his decisions weren’t seen as offensive.If nothing else, they were having a good time interacting with each other and following the plot of whatever it was that Morgan was trying to achieve with his story, so it felt okay that perhaps there was a bit of misrepresenting what dragons were like. They weren’t even similar to manaketes in any way beyond both being labeled as dragons, so when things got weird (and they did frequently), and Brady was stuck sitting there trying to make the most out of the bad situation, Nah could find humor in the whole thing instead of the sense of being made fun of. That was, in all honesty, the reason she’d been fine with Brady picking a dragon-person to begin with—because she knew that he was going to do it as well as possible just to make her happy.It was right around the typical session starting time that night that Nah’s phone went off, her mother messaging her asking her where she was, and more importantly, where Ribbon was. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she grumbled as she excused herself from the table to go make a call in return. Nowi answered on the first ring, and was met with Nah’s answer: “I’m down at Morgan’s place, exact same place I am every single Tuesday night. You’re not about to tell me that I’m supposed to take Ribbon home right now, are you?”“I mean…her father is pretty worried about her, since she isn’t home and he wasn’t told where she was going.”“Mom, seriously? He wasn’t home when she got done with school, was I supposed to drop her off at her front door and wish her the best?” Closing her eyes, Nah took in a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, trying not to let her irritation come through too much. “I’m a staff member at multiple schools, all of which have rules about child endangerment and how I’m supposed to handle knowing a child is in danger.”As if she’d been summoned, Ribbon herself popped into the room, looking at Nah with wide eyes. “I’m in danger?” she asked, repeating the last few words and figuring it had to be about her. “I didn’t realize that.”“Shush, you, you’re ruining my plans tonight even more than you already have.” Silencing the girl with the rather harsh statement, Nah knew she didn’t have the time to start feeling bad about doing such a thing when Nowi was on the other end of the phone call. “Mom, you’ve got to tell him that he’s either got to come get her himself, or you’re doing it. I am not sacrificing a night with my friends over something you volunteered me for.”“Last I checked, I wasn’t the one who took a child that isn’t their own out for a night with friends. You might want to rethink what you think is possible here, or else—oh, that’s the doorbell, got to go!” Just like that, Nowi ended the call, leaving Nah standing there muttering under her breath while Ribbon stared at her, her eyes just as wide as they’d been before.“Am I in trouble, Nah?” the girl asked, a scared tone prevalent in her voice. “I don’t want to be in trouble with you, or with anyone…”Taking a second deep breath, Nah shook her head as she headed for the doorway, knowing that her hands were tied on what she was going to have to do. “Nope, you’re not in trouble because you didn’t do anything wrong. I’m going to be taking you home now, though.”“But your game and your friends, don’t you want to stay around for that?” Ribbon tilted her head slightly to the side as she continued to stare at Nah. “I know that if you were Yarne, and he was here with all of his friends, he’d choose them over getting me home. Aren’t you going to do the same?”Nah knew without a doubt that Ribbon was completely, utterly wrong about that statement, and that she’d somehow inflated her brother’s courage and ability to stand up to others in her mind, but she wasn’t about to correct that. “If I did the same, I could lose my job over being accused of kidnapping you, even if it’d be far from the case. I have to take you home to your dad before he gets too worried about where you are. Let’s go.”Even as Nah was leaving, Ribbon stayed right where she was, her face twisting and contorting as she thought about what she’d just heard. “But I don’t want to go. I want to stay here, I want to know about your game and what you’re doing and all the fun adult stuff that I never get to know about.”“There isn’t anything fun and adult about what happens here on Tuesdays. Now seriously, get your feet heading this way because I’m not about to learn what it’s like to be arrested over you wanting to act more grown up.” Her patience beginning to wear thin, Nah motioned for Ribbon to follow her again and again until the girl relented, dragging her feet across the floor rather than walking properly. When they got back to the table and the gathered players, Nah told Ribbon to go get her shoes and jacket on, before turning to everyone else and saying, “Sorry to bail out on you guys, but my apparent other job calls and I can’t stick around tonight.”“Seriously, someone else can’t come get her and take her home?” Morgan asked, annoyed as he watched Nah roll her eyes and shake her head. “That’s so dumb. Sorry that this happened to you, we’re gonna miss having you around tonight.”“I’m going to miss being around tonight, that’s for sure. I was looking forward to getting to see how Farona handles taking on this new dungeon, but I guess we’ll be waiting a week for that, now won’t we?”“I guess so.” The dejected tone Morgan spoke with was plenty disappointing to hear, but he was able to follow it up with, “Or maybe not?” when he checked his phone moments later. “You won’t be devastated if we run this without you, will you?”Confused, Nah replied, “I mean, I won’t be, but you’re not considering running it with two players, are you? That’d be insane, not to mention completely stupid.”“Laurent’s just about here, if he’s around they should be fine.” Morgan looked from his phone to Owain and Brady, then back to his phone. “Emphasis on should, I guess. Provided that the dragon actually manages to do something other than miss all his hits.”“Look, I’m over here tryin’ my best, I can’t help that the dice you let me use were clearly weighted to completely screw me over,” Brady grumbled, before standing up from the table and approaching Nah. “Sorry that you’re gonna be missin’ everything, but I’ll keep you updated, if you’d like?”Nah shook her head. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll get a recap next session. Focus on good rolls and hitting things.”“Should’ve known you’d say somethin’ like that,” he said, before giving her a quick, very small hand-clasp on her shoulder, him shuffling back to his chair before she had a chance to react to the touch. “Drive safe, we’ll miss you.”“He speaks for us all when he says that,” Owain chimed in, giving a small salute-like wave as he spoke. “Personally I would wish you a fond farewell, but he feels that’s a bit too overdramatic. Maybe even a bit too personal? Not quite sure.”“Yeah, okay, leaving now.” Nah at least let Owain finish that thought before she was heading to the door, getting her things on and leaving with Ribbon following right behind her. She hated that this was how the night was turning out for her, but she wasn’t going to take it out on the girl she was carting around in her back seat, even if it was easy to do just that.It was even easier when Ribbon opened her mouth and said, “I think the tall, dark guy has a thing for you, Nah. Did you see the way he put his hand on you? It was almost as awkward as watching my brother try and be romantic. Just with a lot less…crying.”Rather than answer, Nah tried to think about how she’d felt when she’d been touched by Brady’s hand, and she couldn’t say at all that she felt any sort of sparks or romance from the gesture. It had just been a friendly little deal, and of course a twelve-year-old would see that and run with it as if it was straight out of some fairy tale love story. Even still, Nah’s mind began to shift to the what-ifs, to the possibility that maybe Ribbon was seeing something that was truly there after all…The fact that, despite being told he didn’t need to do it, Brady sent a long recap of what happened in the night’s session after it had finished was only a bit more evidence in favor of the girl’s overactive imagination. By that point, Nah had come to terms with what had happened and how she’d been ripped away from what she’d wanted to do, and to get that little reminder that she’d been missed felt good. Seeing who it had come from felt a little better. And reading the follow-up message that her character would’ve been so useful in the combat encounters made her pride soar.This was met almost immediately with the realization that Nah couldn’t do a thing about this without making something uncomfortable to handle, and she groaned at that, setting her phone aside and throwing a pillow over her face. “The first time in my life I get proof that a guy’s into me, and it’s over a tabletop game,” she muttered, feeling like her whole world had just been turned into a joke. “I don’t even know what to do about this.”One thing was for sure, she wasn’t going to be acting on it when that was the only evidence she had. She didn’t need to get an entire game’s worth of people angry at her for ruining things, and she certainly didn’t need her parents down her throat over a second guy within a week’s time.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Every week was the same routine, with the same rotation of schools to work at, the same day off each week, and the same plans for after school on Tuesdays. Nah enjoyed how predictable everything was, and so when things came about that disrupted the rhythm, she didn’t handle it super well. Losing out on her session to having to take Ribbon home was one such disruption, and she went into work the next morning a bit irritated over things, but mostly fixating on the other element the situation had dredged up. She couldn’t stop herself from thinking about how overly kind it had been for Brady to catch her up like he had, and she couldn’t wait to see him again to thank him properly for what he’d done.Because of the nature of her life, she knew that it’d be the next Tuesday that she’d get that chance, so she had nearly a week to prepare for the encounter—until she rounded the corner at the school of the day and saw someone she immediately recognized as Brady’s mother standing in the front lobby of the building, looking fairly prim and proper as she waved students inside for the day. “Oh for Naga’s sake, what is she doing here?” Nah asked, stepping back behind the corner as to not be seen by the woman.It wasn’t that she’d had bad experiences with the woman in the past, because she truly hadn’t—every time she’d met her while over at Brady’s house she’d seemed nice enough. It was more that she was thinking about how nice and kind and caring her son was, only for her to be right there, acting as a road block between Nah and the other side of the school. “Well, no point in hiding forever,” she lamented, realizing that she could go nowhere but forward in that situation. “If she sees me, she sees me.”If it wasn’t for one of the students loudly calling out her name and running toward her, perhaps Nah would have had a chance to get by without being noticed. But the second that the words Miss Dinah! rang through the lobby, the well-to-do blonde woman was looking straight at her, a curious expression upon her face. Nah gave the child a quick hug as requested before coming to stand by the woman, looking anywhere but at her. “Why are you here right now?” she asked in a whisper, as the woman’s attention went back to welcoming the students in for the day. “This isn’t something I’ve ever seen you do.”“We had a school board meeting last night and one of the high concerns parents had was about student happiness upon entering the buildings, so I took the day off work to come do some investigating.” That made sense, as Nah knew that Brady’s mother had been on the school board for the district since they’d been in school themselves, her wanting to be as involved as she could be with her son’s education before realizing that she actually liked being able to make decisions for the entire district. “Surely you understand, seeing as you see these kids every day.”“Uh, no I don’t,” Nah replied, realizing that she was speaking to someone who didn’t seem to know the specifics of how her position worked. “I’m only here on Thursdays, every week. I rotate between schools on a daily basis to, you know, help out where I can with the kids that need it most.”“How could I forget that? Another concern brought up was the lack of support for struggling students in the district, and how what they are receiving is a pittance compared to what they deserve.” The woman turned up her nose as she shifted her physical presence away from where Nah was. “Tell me, Dinah, do you notice that the students you serve need more than what you can give them in the time you have?”“My name is Nah,” she reminded the woman, almost like she’d done that many times before, “and I would say that that’s the case, especially since I’m only at each school I work at once a week, no more and no less. Why, do you plan on fixing that?”The woman’s shoulders stiffened as she stopped focusing on greeting the students and looked back at Nah. “Your mouth needs to be watched, especially in this setting. Shall we meet after the doors close so we can discuss this in an appropriate place?”“Uh, sure, I’ll be in my office.” Side-stepping away, Nah hoped that the woman wouldn’t know where her office was and that the entire encounter would be over and done with, but she knew that wasn’t likely. She knew that she’d be looking for anyone who could direct her toward the office, calling her the legal name that she so deeply resented to everyone she could get the attention of. And sure enough, the woman was walked down to the student services office that Nah had a desk in by one of the school administrators, looking very uptight about being able to lead a board member somewhere in the school.“Dinah Balakin, I have some concerns to address with you,” the woman stated the moment she was in the small office alone with Nah, who promptly reminded her what her preferred name was. “No, none of that, you are a professional and will be addressed professionally. None of this nickname nonsense that you have yet to grow out of.”“Right, because the name I’ve chosen to go by as long as I can remember is the biggest problem here.” Leaning back in her chair, Nah motioned around the cramped office, which was cluttered with several adult desks and multiple student ones. “Aren’t you, and shouldn’t you be, more concerned with how shoddy special education services here in this district have turned out to be? They’ve got me, someone qualified to work with the students in need of the most supports, switching between schools every day to try and fill gaps I just can’t fill.”There was a moment while the woman looked around the office, at how many case files were visible on the adult desks and how many textbooks littered the floor around the student desks. Then, without any indication of what she was doing, she pulled her phone out of her purse, tapped on the screen as she held it to her lips, and said into its receiver, “Maribelle here, there are deeper issues than what we’ve been informed of at the most recent meeting. Before next month’s meeting we need to find a way to start addressing them.”“How do you plan to fix this?” Nah asked, watching as Maribelle lowered her phone and sent her voice message off on its way. “I doubt there’s enough qualified people in Ylisse to give every school someone in my role, which means that schools are still only going to be able to get by with one visit a week by someone who can help their most special students.”“We will have to look into some options, perhaps try and entice people from outside of Ylisse to come work for our district. There is always the possibility of offering competitive pay to support these struggling students, but…” She shook her head. “I personally have no faith in that option panning out. The legal elements are far too involved for me to wrap my head around, and I work with law as my day job.”“Trust me, I’m well aware of what your day job is,” Nah snarkily replied, thinking about all of the times Brady would tell her that she needed to be on her best behavior because of his mother’s role as a lawyer for the higher-class members of Ylissean society. “How does that work out for you, balancing the school board thing with law?”Once again, Maribelle’s nose turned up at what she heard Nah saying. “It goes far beyond anything you would personally understand, sorry to say. Even with the complications of your particular role here at the school, I feel that what I handle on a daily basis is far more complex. Then you add in the things I do for the board and it becomes more than one pair of shoulders should bear, but here we are anyway.”“Right, because you can immediately say that you have it harder than someone who works with the most difficult of students.” Nah’s eyes rolled without her thinking about the consequences of the action, and she was instantly met with a spindly finger pointing in her face, waggling back and forth in disgust.“Miss Balakin, how dare you speak to someone who is directly responsible for your raises here at the district in this manner. I am appalled that you would find that remotely appropriate in any way.” Her finger slowing its waggle until it was merely pointing straight in between Nah’s eyes, Maribelle made it very clear that her unhappiness with what had happened was not a merely performative action. “Perhaps I should speak to my fellow board members and eliminate your position entirely, instead of trying to alleviate some of the stresses you put up with…”Taking in a series of deep breaths where each one was shakier than the one that came before it, Nah tried to compose a way to respond to such a stupid comment but found herself only growing more frustrated with what had just happened to her. “You do that, and you ruin education for vulnerable children. That’s the truth, sorry to tell you.”“You may not have a vulgar mouth, but you’re just about on par with people who do.” Dropping her finger entirely, Maribelle turned her head to face away from Nah, before saying, “No wonder my son enjoys spending as much time with you as he does. All the riffraff has to stick together.”“Hold on one second.” While she had figured from the start that the sudden animosity between them would call back to Brady in some way, Nah hadn’t expected it to be brought up so casually. “You’re going to threaten me with losing my job because I’m not afraid to be honest with you and that makes me similar to your son? Are you really doing that?”Maribelle rolled her eyes, grabbing her phone and beginning to start another voice message, before she sighed and put it away without saying a word. “I suppose when you put it that way, it does paint my motivations in an unflattering light. But, dearest Dinah—”“Nah.”“—Dinah, you must understand that I raised that boy to be a functioning member of society, and he became…well, must I even point out his flaws to you?” There was a pause as Maribelle resumed looking in Nah’s direction, even though Nah was not interested in meeting her gaze in any capacity. “He has zero redeeming qualities beyond being devoted to loving his family. His hobbies, his choice in friends, his inability to finish school, all of it puts shame to our family name. And then there’s you, someone he speaks highly of, who has proven herself to be capable in many ways but so, so disappointing in others.”Glancing at the clock and seeing that it was well past time that she needed to be with a student, Nah sighed and waved toward the door. “I’d love to get to hear more of your disdain for your son and how it somehow makes it okay to hate me as well, but I have a job to do. You’ll have to meet with me during my office hours on a day that’s convenient for you, or we can perhaps meet after school another time, Mrs. Hoffman, but I do need to get…”She trailed off as she realized that Maribelle was looking at her with a shocked expression, her mouth hanging slightly open and silent. “What, did I say something wrong?” Nah asked, confused as to what had garnered such a response. “I seriously have a job that I’m being paid to do, and I’m sure not doing it while I’m talking to you.”“None of Brady’s friends ever call me an appropriate name, they always call me Ma like he does or just go straight for my first name. Perhaps I’ve misjudged you, Dinah.” Seeing that Nah was opening her own mouth to correct the usage of the proper first name, Maribelle let out a defeated sigh. “Sorry, but I draw the line at referring to a capable and professional young woman with a name as hurtful as the one you’ve chosen.”“Too bad that you don’t get to dictate what’s a good name for me or not, but if you’re going to stick with formal names can you please go for the professional one and not my first name? I can at least somewhat tolerate someone calling me Miss Balakin on the regular.” Nah would’ve been fine if she didn’t get that agreement made, but Maribelle seemed fine with that change, and they were able to walk out of the office with a shaky understanding of each other that hadn’t existed that morning.However, it came at the steep cost of Nah receiving texts from Brady that night whining at her about why she would’ve spoken to his mom at all, and why she would have reminded Maribelle that he had friends that were better at life than him. “I couldn’t help it, she was at my workplace and we just got to talking about special education services,” she started her response with, speaking the message as she was writing down a legal note about one of her students and couldn’t spare the time to type the message out, but she knew that a million different reasons wouldn’t make Brady feel better about feeling incompetent compared to his friends. “Besides, you can say you’ve done more school than most of our friends, shove that in your mom’s face and see how she reacts.”She waited for his response, but when it didn’t come within five minutes she began to wonder if she’d struck a nerve with him that he’d rather not have had touched. Rather than pursue him for further information, she set her phone aside and accepted that she had probably just ruined one of the best things her life had to offer at the moment, and she went back to focusing on her work. This went well for a little while, until it wasn’t her phone going off again that was interrupting her, but rather a frantic knock at her bedroom door, Nowi standing on the other side looking to speak with her daughter.“Do I want to know why I’m getting late night calls from someone I only know because she ran the cultural events at your high school?” Nowi asked, and Nah knew at once that she hadn’t gotten any sort of answer from Brady because he’d gone straight to his mother about things, and she’d naturally gone straight to Nah’s mother in retaliation. “Something about having an ungrateful child under my roof, I really wasn’t paying much attention to what nonsense was coming out of her mouth after she called you a disgrace.”“Uh, thanks for letting me know she did that,” Nah replied, wishing she hadn’t opened the door to invite this conversation into her life. “I’m not surprised, honestly, given the sorts of things she was saying to me at the school earlier today. That woman really needs to sort herself out and stop worrying about policing others.”Laughing, Nowi seemed amused by the response she’d gotten. “You’re right about that, but I think she’s let all the social power she’s got get to her head. Does that even make sense? I don’t know if that makes sense. Would you tell me if it makes sense?”“Mom, it makes enough sense that I get what you’re trying to tell me, but I don’t get why you’re telling me this now. Couldn’t this wait until it isn’t past your bedtime to be handled?” Nah reached over and gently tapped her mother on her forehead, Nowi looking up at where she’d been touched before laughing again. “See, you’re completely exhausted if you think me doing that is that hilarious. Off to bed with you, go.”“You really need to learn how to loosen up.” Nowi’s words came as she turned to head back to her bedroom, the urgent part of the conversation having ended. “You’ve always been an old woman in a young body, and it hasn’t gotten any better even as you’ve gotten older. Maybe you should look into ways to, I don’t know, reclaim your childhood or something like that. Just an idea.”Shaking her head, Nah waited until she saw that Nowi was just about back to her bedroom door before she replied with, “What do you think my Tuesday night plans are for? I’m not sitting around a crowded dining room table playing games with characters from my imagination because I’m getting anything useful out of it.”As she closed her door and went back to working on her documents, a thought crossed her mind that she hadn’t considered previously. Maybe she was a part of Morgan’s whole gaming group simply because it was tapping into aspects of her mental state that she’d sorely neglected while growing up. It seemed reasonable enough when she thought about it, her having always been more serious about things and never quite as interested in playing games or building elaborate fantasies like some other people she’d grown up around. Now that she had an avenue for being creative and getting silly, she was finding enjoyment in it, but was it because she wanted to enjoy it, or because she felt like she was forced to do it by the other people involved?That was fairly par for the course in Nah’s life, she knew, being forced into situations and activities that she would have rather not had any part in. The biggest, most prevalent example was her being required to carpool Ribbon home once a week, but that was only biggest and most prevalent because it was current and ongoing. There was also the example of which college she was expected to go to, lest her mother get her scholarships for being a manakete revoked on the grounds of her not actively practicing most of the culture’s beliefs. Then there was the whole thing about manakete culture in general, something that Nah felt very loose ties to that she was still somehow being pulled back in by over and over again.She sighed, setting aside the work she knew she needed to get done and laying on her bed, staring up at the posters hanging on her ceiling. There were some fond memories attached of getting those things up there, her being propped up on a friend’s shoulders so she could get the pins pushed into the ceiling. Nowadays, she doubted she’d have the courage to get up on anyone’s shoulders unless they were a strong, well-built man, but she’d love to change the posters to turn them into something more appropriate for a grown woman. It did bring her comfort to see the young faces of the musicians she loved when she was in high school, but it would’ve been even better if it was a landscape waiting up there for her to look at every morning and every night.“I don’t get what the big deal about wanting to ‘reclaim’ one’s childhood is,” she said to herself as she looked at those young faces staring down at her. “I’m perfectly content with being my current age, both physically and mentally—I don’t need to look into how to connect with my kiddy side. In fact, I think I’d prefer it more if I could completely disconnect with it most days.”Chuckling as she reached up and traced fake mustaches onto the faces of the men on the poster, Nah thought for a second about how doing exactly that was considered childish, but she was alone in the comfort of her bedroom. What behaviors she took part in behind closed doors were hers and hers alone to worry about.Until her phone started blaring with a tone that showed that someone was trying to call her. Not a message, not asking for permission to speak with her, going right for calling. She groaned as she sat up and grabbed her phone, staring at the screen and how it was Morgan calling her. “Do I…have to answer this?” she asked herself, before rejecting the call and messaging him that she was busy doing work and needed focus and quiet. “He’ll understand, I think. He usually does.”As she settled back onto her bed with the eyes fixated on the men on her ceiling yet again, Nah’s mind went back to where it had been previously. She was alone in her room, the place she’d called hers since fairly early in her childhood, and there was nothing stopping her from doing anything in there that she wanted. Sure, there were activities that would be frowned upon by her parents if they knew they were taking place, but she was a grown woman and she needed to act on that fact every once in a while. That was especially true after stressful days or nights spent being called ungrateful by snooty women that held unnecessary grudges against her.She rolled over on the bed to get closer to the wall, where she reached down and pulled up a bag that was covered in little dragon shapes. Putting the bag next to her, she got as far as unzipping it before her phone started ringing again, and just like before she met the sound with a groan and going to check on who it was that was calling her that time. Once again it was Morgan, and once again she replied by ignoring the call and telling him she seriously couldn’t spare the time to speak with him.For all he knew, she was being honest about needing to focus on work, and if she was in the mindset to be productive and not shoot herself in the foot, she definitely would have been getting those documents written. But she wasn’t planning on finishing that work that night, and she wanted to take care of her mental health by prioritizing herself physically over getting work done. The collection of toys she’d amassed was nothing short of impressive, given that she looked impossibly young and had to buy each and every one of them in person, since shipping things to the house would mean Nowi would be inspecting them to make sure they were safe and appropriate for manaketes to use. This time she got as far as selecting a sleek little bullet before her phone went off once more, and the surprise of the sound had her dropping the toy back into the bag before she loudly told her phone to leave her alone and let it ring without interruption.Morgan wasn’t going to listen to reason, so she was just going to ignore him. A solid plan, until the sound of the ringing phone was enough to get Nah’s parents coming to investigate what was going on. At the sound of the first worried knock at the door, Nah had her toy collection getting shoved back under the bed where it belonged, her incoming phone call getting ignored again, and her somewhat flustered self going to speak with her parents. “Is all okay in here?” her father asked, concerned as he looked down at her when she opened the door. “There has been a lot of unusual noise.”“And we’re trying to sleep, so it hasn’t exactly been appreciated,” her mother chimed in, scrunching her face in Nah’s direction. “Can you keep it down in here, or are we going to have to look into finding you your own place?”“I can…try to keep things quieter, but you know I have to keep my phone on overnight in case the school tries to contact me about something.” As she was saying that, her phone began ringing once more, causing her to roll her eyes, close the door in her parents’ faces, and finally answer the call. “Morgan. You are—”“Nah, I know it’s late and you’ve got important work stuff, but you need to come get me. I’m scared and I don’t know what’s going on.” By how many gasping breaths he’d taken in what he was saying, it was clear that Morgan had been crying, panicked in trying to call someone to get him out of whatever situation he was in. “My parents aren’t answering, Lucina’s not answering, no one was answering until you finally did, and I need you. Please.”“—you’re going to get me killed, I hope you know,” she hissed. “My parents are outside my door and I’m going to get an earful from them about this.”“Would you rather get an earful from them, or have me stuck in a place I shouldn’t be? Come on, Nah, use your head and come rescue me!” He hung up on her then, giving zero indication of where she needed to go to save him, but she used the time to reopen her door, meeting her parents’ stunned looks as she explained to them that she needed to go and pick a friend up from some bad situation and that she’d be back at some point.The two looked between each other, before Nowi said, “Of course you’d be the responsible friend, the one who would never get caught out in the world doing things you shouldn’t be. People must be so, so happy to have a stick-in-the-mud friend like you.”“Nowi, this is far from the time for that. If she’s the friend to rely on, we should be proud of her.” Smiling at his daughter, Gregor took a second before clasping a hand on Nowi’s shoulder. “Now back to bed for us, the morning alarm waits for no one.”Nowi allowed him to lead her away a few paces, before she was calling out, “Don’t take this as a reason to not come back tonight, though! I expect to see you in the morning!”“No promises,” Nah muttered under her breath, not sure in the slightest what she was about to get herself wrapped up in trying to find where Morgan had gone off to. She made herself slightly decent, choosing to keep her warm pajama pants on but electing to properly dress her upper half for the occasion, and while she was getting her sweater on she received a message from Morgan that had an unfamiliar address attached.It was so unfamiliar that Nah didn’t have the slightest idea of what part of town it was located in, and when she looked it up on her way out to her car she found it wasn’t in town at all. If her map was giving her correct directions, Morgan was stuck off some dark, lonely road far past the outskirts of Ylisstol, in the parts of the country that people didn’t ever drive by themselves after dark. “Of course you’d be out there, why couldn’t it be somewhere safe for me to get?” she lamented as she climbed behind the wheel of the car, taking in a deep breath before she began backing out of the driveway and following the directions that her phone was speaking out to her.When she got within a few minutes of the destination, Nah had a realization strike her about the general area she was driving in; this was not the first time she’d been out in that particular area of Ylisse, even though it had easily been five-plus years since she’d last been around there. The specifics of the place she’d gone before were long lost to time, but she knew who lived there and why she’d been there in the first place. And if it was the same place, for whatever reason, she would be picking quite the bone with Morgan about why he was panicking in calling for help in getting picked up from his cousin’s house.The good news was that it wasn’t the place that Owain’s family called home, but the bad news was that it was within a stone’s throw of the farm that they lived on. Morgan was sitting on the side of a dirt road, his phone cradled in his hands as Nah drove up beside him, rolling her window down to speak to him. “What are you doing out here?” she asked, watching him jump when he heard her voice. “You weren’t out here visiting Owain and forgot how to get home, were you?”“Look, I’ll explain when you’re driving me home, it’s…it’s a lot and I want to forget any of it happened.” There was evident shame in Morgan’s voice as he spoke, and even after he’d gotten into the vehicle and Nah was turning around, her new destination being his house so that she could avoid any drama in the morning about a boy being in the house again, he seemed like he was embarrassed to bring any of it up. But he’d said that he would tell her when they were in the car, and he made good on it once city lights were flooding the air around them. “I tried getting out to Owain’s place, but I got dumped right there and couldn’t bring myself to walk all the way up to the house. He’s not even home and I don’t want to be bugging my aunt and uncle at this time of night and…”“How did you get dumped out there?” Her hands gripping the wheel in case she needed to try and fight someone on her friend’s behalf, Nah slowed the car to give them a bit more time to discuss, given that they were rather close to his house coming into the city on the side they entered on. “That doesn’t just happen to people, Morgan, and you and I both know that. So what gives?”“Remember the manakete party and how my mom left because she got into a fight? Well, the person she was fighting with…ugh, I know I shouldn’t have let her talk to me when she saw me, but she offered to buy me dinner and I wasn’t going to turn that down. She seemed really nice, Nah! Nicer than most people I’ve been told are horrible.” Morgan bit his lip as he looked away from Nah and remained silent for a few moments.Nah used that silence to her advantage, trying to remember who the person in question was. “That was that Aversa person, wasn’t it?” she questioned, listening to him sniffle in response to confirm her guess. “Right, well, I know very little about her aside from the fact that she’s not a great person at all, so I’m sure your family’s super thrilled to know you fell right into her clutches.”“I didn’t want them knowing, I really didn’t. But then she forced me into her car and told me that I needed to be a good kid and just go along with her, so I…did, until she started talking bad about my mom and I couldn’t take it, so I demanded she take me home.” He froze, glancing at his phone before shaking his head. “I remember the look in her eyes at hearing that, which told me that she was obviously going to use taking me home to her advantage, so I might have…given her Owain’s address to get her as far away from my parents as possible, and I think she realized we weren’t going to my house so she kicked me out there where you found me.”“That’s horrible, Morgan. I’m so sorry for not helping you out sooner.” Nah did feel a bit of regret in ignoring his calls and trying to do something a bit more self-serving with her night, but she hadn’t had any idea what the reason for his frantic calls were and didn’t know that they dealt with such a pressing matter. “Do you want to go get your car before you go home, or what?”He shuddered. “My car’s at home already, I was out with the guys when Aversa saw me in the first place. That’s why I know Owain isn’t home, because he was going to be hanging out with Brady tonight and I know that’s going to end in him just crashing on his couch. Hopefully. I think they’re past sharing a bed when they have a sleepover?”It shouldn’t have done anything to her, but the way the color and heat began to rise in Nah’s cheeks when she heard that fun fact was a bit abnormal. “Uh huh, well, I’ll get you home safe and sound and then we’ll never speak of any of this again. Sound like a plan?”“The sooner I can forget about how stupid I was to let any of this happen, the better. Thanks for being such a reliable friend, Nah, I’m lucky to have you in my life.” The subdued way that Morgan was speaking made it clear that he’d truly suffered in some way in all of the night’s events, and she felt bad for him because of it. But she wasn’t the one that had decided it was acceptable to go out for dinner with an estranged family member, so she couldn’t feel too bad for him in the end.When she got home nearly an hour later, her eyelids were barely staying open and she was ready to crawl back into her bed and actually go to sleep this time. Based on how the house was completely dark, she figured that it would be safe to assume that she would be meeting the questions about why she’d needed to leave in the morning after all, and that was perfectly fine by her. It gave her time to figure out how to lie to her mother about what Morgan had gone out doing, because she knew if she mentioned Aversa’s name in any capacity, she’d have a completely different problem on her hands.The issue there, though, was that Nowi was too good at sniffing out Nah’s lies, and she’d be living on borrowed time if she actually lied in the first place. But that was a problem to handle in the morning, and she carried herself to bed with full intention of thinking about how to handle it until she fell asleep, only for sleep to come on swiftly. Then when the wake-up call came in the morning and Nah was asked about her night’s activities, she had zero idea of how to lie about any of it in a believable way.In one of the dumbest things she’d ever done in her life, Nah opened her mouth, looked her mother straight in the eyes, and said, “I had to rescue Morgan from a date gone wrong. Turns out that when someone’s dating profile says they’re a dragon, he should’ve known they’re not actually a dragon, if you know what I’m saying.”Nowi did, in fact, know what she was saying.She didn’t believe it for a single second.And just like that, she knew that Morgan had gotten involved with the darker side of manakete culture, and there was no way that was being kept secret from anyone.If anyone was going to share what Nah had gotten up to that night, they would have done it fairly soon after it had happened, so when a few days had passed and nothing had come of it she felt it was safe to assume nothing was going to happen at all. Of course, she hadn’t exactly spoken to Morgan since dropping him off at his house, so for all she knew something had happened and she hadn’t been informed of the details. But Tuesday was coming and she knew that she’d find out details that she may not have gotten anywhere else.There was one thing standing between her and that possibility, though, and that was an afternoon spent taking Ribbon home. She knew that the girl was at school that day, she’d seen her in the hallway a couple of times but hadn’t tried to get her attention and hadn’t been followed when she shouldn’t have been. That alone was enough of a red flag in Nah’s mind, but she wasn’t going to call any attention to it until she knew that it was a genuine red flag and not just a false one.When Ribbon came to her office that afternoon after school, she looked rather downtrodden and couldn’t meet Nah’s eyes when the older woman tried speaking to her. “Look, something’s wrong and I’m here to help you through it,” she said, hoping that the assurance that she was a support that the girl could use. “So please just tell me what’s bothering you.”“Nothing’s bothering me,” Ribbon replied, grabbing her long braids and pulling them in front of her face. “Nothing at all. Can I go home now?”“I mean, I can’t legally keep you here and I’ve got plans tonight, so…” Trailing off, Nah watched as Ribbon began to wrap her braids a bit tighter around herself, tugging on their ends, and all of the training she’d been through kicked in as she grabbed the girl and wrestled her hands away from her hair. “What in Naga’s name are you trying to do to yourself right now, Ribbon? Is this appropriate?”“Do you really think I was going to strangle myself with my hair?” Ribbon’s breath had been stolen in the sudden tackle she’d just endured, and she sounded quite scared with each word she spoke. “I wasn’t going to, even though I’ve tried. D-don’t tell my parents that I’ve tried.”Those feelings of her training kicking in for a second time, Nah forced the girl down into one of the chairs in the office, thankful that she was in there completely alone in the time after school. “Legally I have to report this to the city, so they can investigate what’s got you acting on these self-harm urges,” Nah explained, opening her laptop but watching Ribbon over the lid just in case she tried anything else. “You’re not doing anything more than experimenting with stuff like this, are you?”“I’m not even experimenting with this,” Ribbon said, rolling her eyes and throwing her head back against the wall behind her chair. “I’ve just been doing it to get people to leave me alone. No one wants to mess with the girl who isn’t afraid to wrap her hair around her neck.”“Until someone sees it as an opportunity to grab the ends from you and pull it tightly. Your hair’s so thick and long that it could easily double as a rope, and that’d be the end of you if they’re mean enough with it.” Already typing out a report in the loosest sense, just to keep herself in line with the law, Nah sighed before asking a follow-up question she knew she didn’t actually need to ask. “Do your parents suspect that you’re doing things like this?”Ribbon seemed to freeze up, her eyes darting from side to side, until she shook her head. “I think Dad might suspect that I’m dealing with bullying again, but Mom doesn’t care at all about it and she wouldn’t ever guess that I’m using my hair as a weapon to combat it.”“Bullying? Can’t people just leave you alone?” While Nah hadn’t personally witnessed a single moment of the bullying that Ribbon had been going through all of her life, she’d heard enough stories about it from everyone who’d been handling her up until that year that she knew it was serious business. “You’re really going to benefit when you can get out of this school and go somewhere with a bunch of new faces.”“Why, so that they can all pick on me too? Between being the middle child when my brother’s twelve years older and my sister’s twelve years younger, being one of the last of my culture, and having a mother that’s known for coming in and giving the most boring speeches to entire schools, I’m doomed to be bullied wherever I go. I’m seriously considering just asking if I can be homeschooled instead because this sucks.” There was no denying how serious Ribbon sounded as she spoke, showing that the years of being bullied had serious effects on her mental state. “But I know my parents won’t allow it, they can’t afford the time to devote to me. Surprise, surprise, am I right?”“I…understand, but there has to be a plausible solution to this problem that doesn’t involve your parents making such big sacrifices. Plus, I don’t know if I’d trust either of them being responsible for your education at this point in your life.” Nah jotted down a detail about the student she was reporting on requesting alternative schooling, knowing that any information about that desire would strengthen the report itself.“Yeah, but I’d rather be stupid than have to deal with being laughed at every day that I’m at school. Which, you know, is every day because my parents won’t let me stay home for any reason ever.”Nah’s eyes narrowed as she looked at Ribbon carefully, judging just how honest the girl was being with her delivery of facts. But there was no denying that she was telling the truth, especially as she looked so forlorn and devastated as she spoke. “Have your teachers done anything about this for you, this year or in years past? I know that my mom has told me to keep an eye out for you and how you’re treated, but there’s only so much that I can do with my job being as hectic as it is.”“They’ve tried, but some of these kids have gotten really sneaky about what they’re doing to me and you know that teachers don’t have the time or energy to deal with some of the super sneaky stuff. The notes they’re drawing about killing bunnies and about ugly long-haired girls and stuff like that…yeah, teachers aren’t paying attention to any of it.” Ribbon grimaced, before adding, “Oh, yeah, and the time someone threatened to throw rocks at my head because I’m tall and they wanted to aim at me like a basketball hoop.”Sending the report without gathering all of the information, Nah stood up and motioned for Ribbon to do the same, something the girl only did after some hesitation. “We’re taking this to the administration, right now,” she stated, something that had Ribbon going right to wide-eyed and staring at the woman with a scared expression. “You can’t be expected to just sit around and take that sort of treatment, Ribbon, even if you think you have to. No wonder you’re miming trying to strangle yourself, you clearly need an out from this situation.”“No! I can’t let someone else start fighting my battles for me again, that’s when the bullying only gets worse and I don’t want to be called a crybaby and a loser for getting the principal involved in everything. Please, Nah, you can’t make me go up there and talk to them about this, please!” Tears were beginning to flood the corners of Ribbon’s eyes, as she looked to Nah for the support she wanted without needing to put in any more effort. “I just have to survive until the end of the school year and then maybe, when we all go to new schools next year I can luck out and—ha, yeah right. What am I saying? Me? Luck?”“I’m sorry that you feel like you can’t bring this up with the people in charge of your safety, but I can’t just stand here knowing this and not do anything about it. You’re being bullied to the point of threatening to strangle yourself, there’s something that has to be done here.” Nah’s hand reached for the door handle, her fingers gripping it at the same time that Ribbon’s hands grabbed her shoulders and began trying to pull her back. “I know, you don’t want this to happen, but you’re the one who confided in someone who has to do something about what you’ve said.”Ribbon’s fingernails dug a bit into Nah’s shoulders, her wincing at the feeling of being clawed at. “It isn’t fair! I should be allowed to tell you whatever I want, and there shouldn’t be any consequences to it! This is a huge, huge, huge consequence!”“And I’m sorry about that, but what I’m doing is what I have to do, by the word of the law here in this school district. Now either you come with me, or I’ll consider telling your parents all about what I know.” There was no chance at all that Nah actually would tell Ribbon’s parents a thing, leaving that up to administrative choice, but the girl didn’t need to know that it was an empty threat. In fact, it was enough to get her to comply with following along, the girl’s feet dragging down the hall as they headed up to the front office area together. The principal was still in her office when they got there, which Nah was thankful for but Ribbon didn’t want to see at all; just their heads appearing in the doorway had the principal setting her current work down and waving for them both to enter.What transpired next was something that Nah wished she could’ve stayed far away from, but something that Ribbon desperately needed at that point in her life. Through the retelling of what had happened back in Nah’s office, as well as what had been happening over the course of the school year thus far, Ribbon painted a picture of herself as a helpless, bullied student that was everyone’s favorite target to aim at. The principal, listening with a kind heart and worried eyes, nodded along as names were dropped, classes were references, and entire incidents were relived through excruciating detail. “You know,” she said after Ribbon had brought herself to sobs with recalling everything, “you are far from the first to bring these sorts of things to my attention this year. Are you aware that these students are targeting several others as well?”“They are?” Ribbon asked, sniffling as she reached up and wiped a stream of tears off of her cheeks. “I mean, I’m not always in class with them so I guess it makes sense, but…”“Yes, Miss Leichtfoot, they are quite the group of bullies that we’ve been trying to put a stop to. Do you know how hard it is to handle situations like this when students are afraid to speak up about them, and teachers don’t pay attention to what’s happening?” The principal looked to Nah, who grimaced at the attention she was being given. “Miss Balakin, do you know why you’ve been confided in with this today? As far as I’m aware, this young one isn’t on your caseload.”“Oh, uh, Ribbon’s a family friend, and I take her home on Tuesdays as a favor to her family. I noticed that she was feeling off when she came to my office after school and things sort of…spiraled out of control from there.” None of it was a lie, and Nah knew that she was being as truthful as she could about how she’d learned things that day. “I’ve already gone through with putting in the official report, per training standards.”The principal nodded, her dark hair bouncing as she did. “Very good, on all accounts. I’m glad that a student such as Miss Leichtfoot can turn to someone like you in her time of need.”“So, um, is anything going to happen to my bullies or…?” Ribbon’s question was very hesitant, as if she recognized that she wasn’t asking at the greatest time, but she was looking for the answer right away. “I want to know if I’m going to be able to come to school tomorrow and have a good day or not.”“Seeing as you’re the second student I’ve spoken to today about this same group, more or less, I think I can say that you should be able to have a good day here tomorrow.” The principal gave Ribbon a small smile, before once again turning her attention solely to Nah. “However, Miss Balakin, in order to ensure that she is able to have good days going forward, we may need to discuss restructuring your contract with the district. Since she’s clearly more comfortable in confiding with you than anyone else present, we may need you on campus more frequently.”“I can’t give up my other placements, not mid-year like this,” Nah said, knowing that in her heart she wanted to be able to help not just Ribbon but the other bullied students as well. “I do have availability on Fridays that I could use to come sit in the building and be present in case they need someone to speak with, but Fridays are my designated day off due to the nature of the work I provide for the district.”Nodding sagely, as if she’d just been enlightened in some way, the principal seemed to be hearing Nah’s words but wasn’t fully sold on following them. “I will speak with the other schools, and the board if I have to, in order to give students such as Miss Leichtfoot a fair chance at feeling safe at school.”“Yeah, because I’d rather tell…her things that are happening than anyone else, that’s totally right,” Ribbon stated, motioning toward Nah when she realized that she couldn’t just drop that nickname in conversation with her school principal. “But I don’t wanna be a problem with her jobs that she does at other schools, please don’t make her stop working where she wants to just for me.”“That’s not a decision that I want her to have to make, not at this time,” the principal assured Ribbon, eyes focused on Nah’s reaction to her words and finding that she was doing her best not to react at all. “I do think that being available as a confidant to students who feel that you’re a safe place will do many good, though.”“Then I can step in for a little while on Fridays starting this week, that’s fine. But this should be a temporary fix, not a permanent one.” Nah didn’t truly want to give up her extra day off, but if it meant being seen as a hero to the students at the school, then she would be okay with it on a short-term basis.“Naturally. Thank you, Miss Balakin, for understanding the gravity of this situation and being willing to take action when you can. I will be speaking with the students involved tomorrow and, well, we’ll see what happens from there. Thank you ladies, and have a good night.” With that, the principal motioned for them both to leave, something that Ribbon seemed relieved to do while Nah was decently eager in her own steps as well.They didn’t talk about it until they were out in the car, Ribbon throwing her backpack in the back seat before hopping into the passenger’s side seat and slamming the door behind her, all while Nah was taking her spot behind the wheel. “I never would’ve guessed that there were other kids getting bullied too, I always thought it was just me with those people, but I guess they’re just mean all the way around.”“That’s pre-teen kids for you, they don’t know how to be decent when they think they need to be mean to be cool.” Starting the car, Nah wanted to say more on the matter but she felt that any words she had to offer weren’t going to matter. She’d just gotten her way, getting the help that she needed in the situation, but things had gone so far off the rails that she was convinced that she’d just ruined the rest of the year for herself. “I’m glad that you won’t have to deal with them, and that it won’t be obvious that it was you who ratted them out.”All of the happy feelings that had been building in the time since she’d heard the good news dissipated immediately, as Ribbon slowly turned to look at Nah with wide eyes and a tremoring bottom lip. “I…did rat them out, didn’t I? They’re never going to believe it if I say that it wasn’t me who did it, because I did do it, even if I wasn’t the first one that said something to begin with. They’re going to chew me up and spit me out and make everything horrible every day until the end of the school year and then—”“Stop, stop, you’re starting to jump to uncomfortable conclusions and I think you need to calm down about it.” Nah reached over and placed a hand on Ribbon’s knee, squeezing it as much as she could with her small fingers. “You’re going to get yourself all worked up and then your parents are going to know something’s up and then I’m going to be late to my session tonight because I’m stuck talking to them.”“—you mean you’re not going to tell my parents what just happened, for real?” Her jaw dropping at that news, Ribbon did a small dance in her seat before picking Nah’s hand up and removing it from her leg. “You’re so great, Nah, like seriously. I don’t know what I would be doing without you.”“I can come up with some ideas for what you might be up to if I wasn’t around,” Nah said, thinking about how one option involved Ribbon’s impossibly long braids and using them for self-harm purposes. She hated that she’d seen the little girl in that sort of vulnerable state, and she hoped for her sake, and for the sake of everyone in Ribbon’s family, that there was never another instance of that again.After a few minutes, they were driving up to the front of Ribbon’s house, the girl looking thankful to be home as she told Nah she’d see her again next week before jumping out of the car, barely remembering to grab her belongings before she was bolting up to the front door. Nah sat outside waiting for the door to visibly open and for Ribbon to be let inside before she drove off, and her cue to leave that day was a small, thanking wave from the girl as she was greeted at the door by her father. “I hope Ribbon has it within herself to tell her parents about what happened today on her own, before someone from the school or the district reaches out looking for answers about why she was trying to strangle herself,” she mumbled as she started to drive away, not wanting to be the one to address it so that she could say that she stayed true to what she’d assured the girl.Thoughts of the situation weighed on her mind as she drove across town to Morgan’s house, and as she made her approach in his neighborhood they were beginning to be replaced with memories of her last encounter with her friend. She still didn’t know what had come of his little nighttime escapade with someone he wasn’t supposed to be interacting with, and she doubted that she would be getting any insight into that matter while she was there with the whole group that evening. Yet, the hope that she’d be pulled aside and caught up to speed on where things were lingered in the back of her mind, even as she parked her car outside of his house and came inside to a decently full dining room with the entirety of the party already gathered in one place.“I didn’t think I was going to be that late,” she joked, bowing her head as she came to her spot at the table next to Brady, who greeted her with a shaky smile. “What gives, why is everyone here so stupidly early this week?”“It just kind of worked out that we all got here around the same time this week, except you, that is,” Brady told her, cutting off several of the others who seemed to be trying to say roughly the same thing. “I mean, I’ve been here for over an hour now, which I know ain’t possible for you with what you do before gettin' here and all.”“I mean, if everything was perfectly normal and I was able to leave work at the usual time, I could’ve been here, like, half an hour ago, but things happened.” Nah paused, thinking about what she could say on the matter, and what she should say. “Things that I won’t be dwelling on, at any rate. What’s got everyone else here so early too?”Across the table, Owain shrugged. “I got here not long after Brady did, but that’s my normal time of getting here. I didn’t exactly have anything going on before this, though, so if I had wanted to I could have arrived as early as this morning to take the position as first person present for the session.”“We all know there is zero probability of him actually doing that at any given point,” Laurent commented from his seat at the table, his head resting on his hands as he looked at everyone else who was gathered. “There are far too many games for him to sit at home playing for him to consider arriving somewhere with any amount of haste.”“Dude’s got a point,” Brady said, motioning toward Laurent. “Which, by the way, good on ya for actually arriving ahead of time today.”“If I am late to the session it is not of my own volition. Mother is requiring a lot of extra support in getting her shop open for business and I have been doing my best to keep the numbers crunched in her favor. Even though my specialties come in the sciences, Mother respects my ability to keep a ledger organized.” Lifting his head, Laurent tilted it toward Noire, who sat in the seat next to his, her arms folded over her chest. “I would be wrong to neglect to mention Noire and her ability to keep worker morale high with encouraging words when they need it most.”“And, like, a bunch of donuts from the café down the street from where the shop’s going to be. I’m spending so much time running back and forth, and for what? To be ogled by the worker guys who think they’re going to get snacks and a show?” Her shoulders were visibly tensing up, as Noire was growing agitated with her own retelling of her day’s events. “I am not a piece of meat for those wretched men, I’ll tell you that much!”“Maybe you should find someone else to do snack runs,” Nah remarked, getting up from where she’d sat to dash around the table so that she could try calming Noire down herself, while Laurent reached over to do something with the same effect. “I don’t think spending time around a bunch of construction lunkheads is going to be the greatest for your mental state, Noire.”“It sure the hell isn’t,” Noire seethed, trying to push away all of the hands that were now coming at her, but she was unable to buck off all the contact and she was able to be calmed down relatively quickly. Once she was apologizing for her outburst and going back to being her meek self, Nah was able to return to her seat, and all eyes were focused on the man of the hour, who’d been allowing his party to talk amongst themselves while he’d finished setting things up for their early start.With a commanding cough, Morgan brought all side conversations to a stop as he quietly counted that everyone was there, and that everyone seemed to be ready to begin. “Hello, some of you missed last week and I think we should catch you all up to speed before you get started on conquering more of this dungeon,” he said, his voice trying to match the volume of the cough he’d given but failing miserably. “So, uh, there was a lot of logic traps and even a couple of dead ends, and then what happened after you guys finally found the real path?”“Roshan almost got eaten by a fake statue of his patron god,” Owain answered with a nod, before realizing that he was getting looks from the others at how nonchalant he was about the situation. “Okay, I know it doesn’t sound great, but hear me out, he kind of walked right into it, thought he could sneak in some worship time, and the rest is history.”“Yeah, and then he got saved by a giant dragon that wasn’t my giant dragon,” Brady added, motioning toward a piece on their drawn-out dungeon map, which Nah recognized as coming from a game set that she’d bought for Morgan and his sister years previously, a game that had nothing to do with what they were playing. “She’s friendly, she’s here because we were down two explorers and Morg thought we’d be in need of some extra firepower.”Morgan nodded, before tacking on, “I only made her a dragon in honor of you, Nah, I swear I wasn’t trying to be offensive or anything. She’s named after my mom, too, because she’s also kind of a manakete and she thought it was a good idea.”“I’ll tell you I did no such thing,” Morgan’s mother interrupted from the kitchen, where she came out with a giant knife in one hand and a cutting glove on the other. “I told him that I thought including a character to fill the void was a good idea, I said nothing about species, gender, or class, and he went wild from there.”“Mom, seriously with the knife? You’re making it seem like you’re trying to be scarier than you really are,” he replied, flustered at the presence of his mother but collecting himself once she’d returned to whatever it was she was doing. “So anyway, we’ve got Robby the dragonborn along for the dungeon, although now that we’ve got the whole party back I suppose she could go back to her cave within the dungeon and leave you all to your own—”At once, the three who’d been there for the previous week’s session told him, in various ways, to keep the dragon woman exactly where she was. “Yeah, I think it’ll be fun letting Farona get to interact with yet another dragonborn,” Nah said, steepling her fingers together as she thought about all of the entertaining ways those interactions could have gone if she was given the chance to have them.“—well, I mean, if the majority of the group says to keep her, I guess she can stay until you’re done with the dungeon at the absolute latest, but who knows if she’ll even make it that long. Come on now, let’s get started and see how close to over with this we can get before you all need to go home.” With that, Morgan began setting the current scene for what was happening in the game, and for the next several hours, their little group was able to slip from reality and play around in the world of their friend’s creation, fighting monsters and solving puzzles that he’d arranged for them.Time seemed to fly while Nah was pretending to be her elf instead of herself, the character she’d built from the ground up someone that she could only aspire to be. She was brilliant, she knew her way around most weapons and even had some spells that she’d inherited access to (but never used), and she was a born leader to the rest of the group. Farona’s one flaw was that she had to spend her time more or less babysitting her less intelligent companions, which really boiled down to Brady’s dragon and Owain’s average human, although the latter of the two was more because Owain felt it was funny to play dumb.Their session was interrupted partway through by Morgan’s mother coming into the room with a covered platter of different meats she’d cooked for the occasion, hence the knife she’d been wielding earlier in the night. “I figured brave adventurers could use some protein in their lives,” she told them all with a laugh. “That, and Morgan asked if I could make something tonight so you all wouldn’t have to contend with the delivery times.”“Last week it took over an hour for pizza to arrive, I wasn’t subjecting any of us to that a second week in a row.” Morgan thanked his mother, who seemed more than happy to be of help to her son’s friends, before he called a temporary pause on the session for them to all get to eat to their hearts’ content. Getting a meal provided right there saved Nah the trouble of needing to get food on her way home, which she was thankful for, but she was a bit underwhelmed with the options given to her there at the table. She wasn’t the most fond of nothing but meat, although she knew it smelled delicious and certainly tasted the same; this was undeniably a result of her spending so much time with other cultures similar to the manakete, a lot of which were either fully carnivores or were vegetarian in nature, both extremes making her happy to be right in the middle.Still, she stomached enough of the meat to feel satisfied in her dinner, and once everyone had finished eating they were back to muscling their way through the dungeon, Morgan having way too much fun throwing different obstacles in their way. “You’re a monster, you know that?” Noire stated out-of-character after a boulder narrowly missed squashing her tiefling into a messy pile of blood and guts. “I’ve worked so hard on getting her to where she is, and you almost ended her like that?”“Not my fault you can’t roll well, it’s just lucky that you barely rolled better than me on that one, or else you’d be sitting here watching everyone trying to avenge you. Against a boulder, not even an enemy.” Morgan grinned, before narrowly dodging the plastic cup that Noire lobbed at him in retaliation. “You know, violence against your DM can result in serious consequences. Do you want to risk that?”“It’d be best if you didn’t, and took vengeance against what almost fell you in the heat of combat later.” Owain winked at Noire, who grumbled a few choice words before demanding that they get back to playing without further interruption.The second half of the session was even more intense than the first half had been, beginning with the boulder incident and culminating in a battle against a band of goblin thieves that took their new dragonborn friend hostage and threatened to cut her to pieces unless they swore they’d leave the dungeon forever. Nah’s initial reaction was to comply with the demands, but her character had a different perspective and therefore acted on a completely separate set of morals, to the point that she was bargaining with the goblins in whatever way she possibly good. “I refuse to let you slay Robby in this manner, you fiends,” she spat, the words carrying so much power when they were coming from a stately elf, not a small little manakete woman. “So it seems you need to make good on your threat, because we are not leaving this place without her.”“What are you doing?” Brady’s dragonborn asked, him speaking quietly to try and make it seem like he was genuinely in character and looking for explanation, even though in real life he was already aware of what Nah’s angle was. “They’re gonna kill her because you’re talkin’ to them like that!”“They are bluffing on this matter, there is simply no—”“Without any hesitation,” Morgan said, in his best narrator voice, “one of the goblins brandishes a knife and holds it against the front of Robby’s throat, slicing enough just to draw the tiniest amount of dragon blood. ‘Do you really think we won’t do it?’ the goblin asks, sneering at you. What do you say to that, Farona?”“I say they can meet the business name of my weapon,” Nah replied, the spirit of her character taking over her as she looked around at the party, all of them nodding in agreement with the turning of the tides in the situation. “Come now, everyone, to battle!”They were able to blitz through the band of goblins with relative ease, although there were several close calls with hits barely missing on the side of the enemies, and hits barely connecting on the side of the party. There was a moment where it seemed the goblin with the knife was going to be able to cause more damage to their hostage, but Noire’s character was able to swoop in and shoot his weapon out of his hand before he had the chance to do anything more. “Nice hit, Zelaia,” Laurent said as his tabaxi jumped to take on one of the other goblins, knocking them to the ground defenselessly without any hesitation. “We work together almost purr-fectly, wouldn’t you say?”The use of the cat pun, while something that had been established as part of the character’s behavior, was something that snapped Nah out of the focus she’d built on the session. At once, she was no longer her elf leading a band of adventurers in battle, but rather just a woman sitting at a table with friends, playing a game that existed mostly in their imaginations. “I…think I need to head home soon,” she realized, knowing that the timing was off given that there were still ends that needed to be cleaned up in their battle. “It’s starting to get late and I never know how things are going to be driving home in the dark.”“Give it ten more minutes, then you can go,” Morgan whispered toward her, before calling for the next player to make their move. For those last ten minutes, Nah’s entire mindset toward the game was nonexistent, her focusing on how utterly ridiculous it was that they were getting so attached to these characters they’d made up for themselves to play once a week. Every time she heard people talking about the actions they were making, she grimaced and reminded herself that this was something to be ashamed of, pretending to be fighters in a dungeon that needed cleaning from some bad guys.When her turn came back around she inhaled deeply, trying to get into the swing of her character just long enough to make it seem convincing. “I, uh, take a stab at the nearest goblin and hope that I don’t miss,” she declared, before rolling her dice, averting her eyes at seeing what she’d rolled for as long as she could before the pause was no longer dramatic.It was, without a doubt, the worst roll she could’ve made, and she couldn’t hide that fact from the eyes all trying to get a glimpse of her dice in front of her. “That’s going to miss,” Morgan told her with a flat voice, before inspecting the table and how their characters were all arranged. “Or, should I say, it’s going to miss the goblin you were going for. Instead, Farona takes a stab and pricks Byacek right in the backside. Go ahead and roll to see how much damage that is for Brady.”“Why am I not surprised you’re over here touchin’ Byacek on the rear,” Brady said, putting his foot on top of Nah’s under the table and gently stepping down on it as she rolled for his minimal damage that his character was now having to account for. “Sounds like someone’s a bit distracted in all of this, huh?”“I wouldn’t say that much,” Nah replied, mumbling her words as she felt embarrassment beginning to course through her veins. She, thankfully, wasn’t expected to be in character again for the rest of the session, and the second Morgan called things over and done with, she was bolting for the door, needing to get away from the situation as fast as she could.No one could get her to turn back around and rejoin everyone for the closing of the session, and she was heading out to her car within three minutes of the last action in the combat. She hated the feelings that were all colliding and connecting with each other inside of her mind and in her heart, and she wanted nothing more in that moment than to curl up in her bed and sleep until morning light. That wasn’t in the cards, especially since she still needed to drive home and inevitably talk to her parents when she walked in through their front door, but she was at least going to be closer to that goal than she would be if she was still sitting there at the table.Her phone began ringing inside of her purse, which she ignored consistently given that she was driving alone in the dark and she didn’t want to be responsible for wrecking on her way home. After one call was ignored and sent to voicemail, another would come in after it, and the cycle went on and on for as long as she was driving, whoever was calling her being quite insistent on getting her to answer. Finally, once she was parked in her spot outside of her house, she checked the phone to see that every single person who’d been at the session had been calling her, and almost none of them left a message for her to listen to.In fact, the only one who had left a message was Brady, and that felt simultaneously predictable and like the worst possible scenario she could’ve been faced with. “Please, tell me that I forgot to bring something with me and you just want me to know that,” she begged as she called to listen to the message she’d been given.The message came on after a few seconds of silence once the voice telling Nah she had one new message had quieted down, and in those few seconds Nah felt like she had just been called on accident and that the message wasn’t actually anything at all. Then, out of the silence came the voice she was dreading hearing. “Look, I’m not even gonna pretend like I know what’s gotten into ya lately, but something’s off about ya and it’s got all of us worried, especially me. Please don’t feel like you can’t be a part of things, ‘cause we’re gonna be sorely unprepared for a lot of things if you leave on us like that. Just…remember that we care about you, no matter what, and we’ll see you next week.”Another pause, Nah’s breath catching in her throat as she wanted to snarkily say something about how serious Brady was but she couldn’t find the words for it. “I’m lookin’ forward to seeing you more than any of them, though, just remember that.” The message ended there and she deleted it without a second thought, not wanting to have that evidence lingering around where someone could find it.“He…cares about me,” she whispered, looking at her reflection in her phone’s screen and knowing that she’d always felt like someone caring about her wouldn’t happen in life. She looked too young, came from one of the oldest cultures in Ylisse and surrounding countries, acted super mature compared to her age, and all around wasn’t the most interesting person to spend time with. “He cares about me. Even when I run out on the session. Even when I pick fights with his mother. He cares. I…wow. Okay.”She glanced toward the house, where she knew her parents were waiting for her to come back inside and prove she was home safe and sound. “One of these days, I’ll be brave enough to ignore them and chase you down, and that’s a promise,” she said confidently, tapping her phone as she thought about the message she’d heard. “But not today, and tomorrow’s probably not it either. Someday.”And with that, she got out of the car and headed inside the house, a lightness to her steps that she hadn’t anticipated would be there with how bothered and upset she was. There would be time in the coming days for people to reach out and try and smooth things over about what had happened, but by the time anyone was able to get through to her she’d mentally moved past it all and was raring to go for the next week’s session. However, there was one small road block that she’d failed to consider in that being the week that she let things start to eat a bit too much at her, and that came jutting up in front of her before she had the chance to react to it.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
On her lunch break on Thursday, Nah was sitting in her office scrolling through her phone when she heard a knock at the door. Typically it meant that someone needed urgent services and that she needed to swallow down her current bite and hope that her food would still be warm when she got back to it, but when she looked at the in-door window and saw that it was one of the other special education teachers, she got up and let them in without question. It was only when she opened the door that she noticed the teacher was holding an envelope out at her, brows furrowed as she looked for explanation.“This is from the board,” the other teacher said, pushing it down at Nah, “but it’s obviously not a piece of official mail. Who on the board are you getting personal cards from, and how did you make this happen?”It didn’t take any thought at all to know who the culprit behind this mystery mail was, and the fact that the envelope was pink and sealed on the back with a lacy sticker told Nah all she needed to know. “Uh, the mom of one of my close friends serves on the board, she’s like president or something? I don’t know why she’s sent me mail here of all places, it’s not like she doesn’t know where I live.”“Is that even legal, for her to have your address for personal reasons?” Nah shrugged because she didn’t know the answer to that question, and the other teacher accepted that, coming inside the office and pulling out her own lunch. “Whatever, as long as we don’t lose you over it. The kids here really like you; they’re responding well to your focus on their education and I’ve been seeing a lot of growth in some of them.”“Thanks for that, I’m glad to hear it,” Nah said with a smile, pulling the office door shut as she went back to her seat with her envelope in hand. The last thing she wanted was mail from Maribelle, of all people, but she supposed she shouldn’t have been too surprised that she was receiving something from her delivered to her workplace. As she sat back down, she considered simply throwing the envelope in the trash without opening it, but she knew that it would find its way back to her somehow and she couldn’t just go without acknowledging that she’d been sent something personal by someone in a position of power over her.So, naturally, she sat there and neglected eating her lunch just to open the thing and see what kind of nonsense Maribelle was sending her. The fact that she opened it to reveal a handmade invitation elicited a gasp from her, as she glanced from the paper she was holding over to the other teacher and back. “I’ve been invited to something by her,” she explained, the other teacher gasping as well, clutching her chest at the news. “What it is, I don’t know. This kind of feels like, uh, a baby shower invitation? Maybe a birthday party for a small child? But I know for a fact that she wouldn’t be inviting me to either of those things.”“Open the invite up, you’ve got a curious mind sitting here waiting!” her coworker called, a smile growing on her face. “I’ve never been present for something this bizarre happening to someone, and that’s really saying something!”She understood that this poor teacher had no idea what kinds of things this could be an invitation for, but Nah respected the enthusiasm and couldn’t help but crack a smile along with it. “Right, okay,” she started, before opening the little card and being inundated with a bunch of carefully-penned words that no one else but Maribelle could have possibly put into the card. “It, uh, it says a lot of things so let me read it before I start telling you anything about it.”It started with a couple of low blow insults that Nah fully expected to receive, about how she was ungrateful and a horrid person and how she didn’t deserve a lick of kindness or respect, and not a word of that was worth reading out loud. “Oh, okay, it’s inviting me to a function where some of the board members are going to be,” she said as she continued reading, the truth being that she’d spoken only part of the story. There was indeed a function where a couple of the board members would be present, but it wasn’t anything more than a birthday party that Nah was invited to.A birthday party taking place that night, no less.With her mouth open slightly as she continued reading, Nah found herself unable to properly represent what she was reading to someone who had no idea what her relationship with these people was like. This envelope, addressed from the board and delivered to Nah’s workplace instead of her house, was Maribelle’s way of inviting her to a surprise birthday party for Brady taking place that evening. “I don’t get why she did it this way, but I guess I’ve got to show up to this function and try to impress some people who are on the board, maybe to get some extra funding for special education programs in the district? I don’t know what the reason is, she didn’t exactly say anything about it.”“That’s super sketchy, what if she’s going to use this party as a way to get you fired for rubbing elbows with the board at a private function?” The other teacher’s excitement and curiosity had diminished to nothing, as she went to focusing on eating her lunch. “We can’t afford to lose you and your dedication to the job, Dinah.”Nah winced at her name being used, especially by someone she’d been working on building a good relationship with, but she didn’t mention a thing about it. “Right, and I totally get that, but I think I don’t have much of a choice but to go to this thing. There’s got to be some reason why it’s me and no one else being invited, and I think she knows that.”Of course there was a reason it was only Nah being invited, because Nah was the only one who knew Brady and it wouldn’t make sense for a bunch of strangers to be brought in to his surprise party. “I’ll be hoping for the best with you, girl,” the other teacher said, leaving Nah to thank her quietly and go back to eating her own lunch as well.The rest of the day dragged on, which Nah was thankful for as it meant that she had plenty of time still to figure out what she was going to do about the birthday party she didn’t have much of a choice about attending. It was a no-brainer that she would be going, given that if she didn’t, she would certainly be talked negatively about to Brady and she didn’t want him spending his birthday hearing that sort of thing. Besides, he’d made it clear already that he cared about her, and she wanted to be able to show him that the same worked in reverse. When the end of the day hit, Nah did her final tasks of the job and headed out the door as fast as she could, stopping by the store to grab a birthday card and a small gift card that she figured Brady could get some use out of, before heading home to change and get ready for the night’s events.Nowi was waiting by the door when Nah got home, arms crossed and a sour look on her face. “Did Maribelle’s invitation get to you?” she asked before Nah even had a chance to speak a greeting to her mother. “She came into the office this morning losing her mind that you haven’t responded per the RSVP request in the card and I told her that I wasn’t the person she needed to be asking but here we are anyway.”“I just got it today at lunch, since she sent it to the school I’m only at on Thursdays. I hope she remembers that about my job and doesn’t hold it against me, because I’m going to this party whether she’s expecting me or not.” Nah wasn’t even slightly surprised that things had turned out the way they did, given that Maribelle was always insistent on things going according to her plans and to no one else’s. “The second I saw it was a surprise party I knew exactly where she’s having it.”“Yeah, I popped by the church earlier to check and make sure she had everything sorted out for the night and she’s really made a lot out of nothing. I told her that if she ever wants to use a place that’s actually meant for gatherings, she’s welcome to look into renting rooms from the manaketes, but she didn’t seem super interested in that.” Nowi shrugged, as if she was signaling that she understood it was someone else’s loss. “Anyway, bet you want to get on your way here soon so I’ll just…go find something to do with my night.”“Is Dad not here?” Something about the way that last statement had been delivered was sending red flags up in Nah’s mind. “I didn’t realize he had a new job that he needed to be at so late on a weeknight.”After wavering a bit on how to answer, Nowi took in a deep breath before saying, “It was a super sudden sort of deal, he found out last night that he was needed on this job but it’s going to have him away for a couple of weeks. Maybe a month at most. Nothing too crazy.”“Maybe a month? You mean I’m going to have to put up with you being lonely and sad that he’s not here for that long? Naga help me on that one.” Nah had to expertly dodge a hand batting at her for that comment, but she felt that she was well within her right to call out her mother’s somewhat clingy behavior. “I’d invite you along with me tonight but I’m sure you got a whole earful about how this party’s a private event and all that, so you already know that’s not even an option. I’m sure you’ll be able to find something to do on your own, though, you usually do.”“It’s feeling like a ‘curl on the couch and watch sappy movies’ kind of night, if we’re being honest. If you get home later and that’s not where I am, check the bedroom and make sure I didn’t fall asleep with snacks in the sheets. Totally embarrassing when that happens.” Laughing herself off into the heart of the house, Nowi seemed to have decided that it was best to leave Nah alone to her own devices, and Nah was thankful for it.One quick shower and an outfit change later and Nah was already back out the door, ready to subject herself to whatever nonsense this party had to offer. She got as far as driving down the road before realizing that she didn’t really want to go, but couldn’t bring herself to turn back around and go home for the night, and so the majority of the drive to the old church that had been renovated for these purposes was spent battling with herself over what was a better use of her time. Based solely on the number of cars in the parking lot outside of the church when she got there, staying home would have been the correct choice.She went inside carrying the card she’d bought in her hand, heading down a dark and empty hallway to the single entertaining room in the back of the church, a place she’d been to plenty of parties and social gatherings in the past. When she got to the doorway she peered inside and was met with Maribelle and only Maribelle, who was sitting in a folding chair with her legs crossed in front of her. “You’re surprisingly early, Dinah,” she said, before reaching up to cover her mouth at her usage of the technically incorrect name. “Please tell me you properly read the invitation before deciding to show up.”“I mean, of course I read it, and I’m not that early, not even half an hour. I kind of figured it’d take me longer to get ready than it did, but you know what? I’m here and your son isn’t, so I think you should be grateful I’m not just turning and walking out.” Plastering a fake smile on her face as she came into the room, Nah was prepared to have to square up with Maribelle if needed. “Now do you want to tell me why you sent my invitation to the school or do I need to guess it for myself?”“I knew you wouldn’t receive it before today, and therefore would have little chance of ruining the surprise for my sweet Brady. I did the same thing with everyone else I’ve invited to our little soiree, which…” Maribelle trailed off, before standing slowly from the chair she’d drawn for herself. “Since you’re here, you can make yourself useful and assist me in setting up for the occasion.”“And that’s why I try to show up early when I can, so I can be people’s workhorse,” Nah dryly replied, setting the card down on the very chair Maribelle had vacated before waiting for directions on what to do. It turned out that she needed help on getting a table put together for the meal that they’d be enjoying at the party, but in setting that up it came to Nah’s attention that they were only setting up for a grand total of five people. “Some party this is going to be, if it’s this small,” she remarked, catching a side-eye from Maribelle for the comment. “Well, it’s true.”“I understand that it seems a bit…small for the occasion, but it was something that was planned out of love and I couldn’t bear to spend more time than necessary figuring out who to invite to dinner. Brady simply has so many friends—an issue that I understand personally, given my own social prowess—and I had to pick which ones he considers his closest companions.” Maribelle gestured to the table and its five place settings. “And on that note, I could only decide on two friends.”Nah pointed at herself, confused. “You think I’m one of his closest friends? Have you ever heard him talk about the stuff he gets up with some of the others?”“Oh, of course, the gaming and the playing and the things that I’d rather him not be doing, I’m very well aware of those activities. While I understand that his closeness with you has only grown since you started playing that game every Tuesday, he has indeed considered you someone he’s fond of since far before that arrangement began. The same cannot be said for most of the others that you meet with.” Maribelle’s eyes rolled before she happened to look down at what had been her chair and turned right back to Nah, looking for an explanation as to what was sitting there.“Birthday gift, because I’m not some uncivilized animal that shows up to a party without one,” Nah said, an answer that Maribelle deemed acceptable, before she went on to start tackling the rest of what had been said. “I feel flattered that he’s considered me close for a while, because I feel the same about him. He’s honestly my second-closest friend at this point, behind someone I’ve been close with since we were in all the same classes in school, so he’s pretty high up there.”“That’s very sweet of you to say, but I’d prefer to know that you hold my son in such high regard that—” There was clearly more to what Maribelle was trying to say, but a crashing sound from out in the hallway cut her off, and she charged toward the doorway to investigate, Nah deciding it wouldn’t hurt to follow. When they both got to where they could see the culprit behind the noise, they were met with the visual of a bunch of oversized balloons clogging the hallway, as well as a broken light fixture shattered on the floor.“I heard the footsteps,” they both heard Owain call, “and I understand that this looks fairly concerning, but I assure you that I have all of it under control. Mostly. Mrs. Maribelle, can you come help me with this because I might’ve gotten glass in my sock?”The corners of Maribelle’s mouth firmly tilted downward into a deep frown as she looked down the hall, before accepting her fate. “Anything for you, Owain,” she said, motioning for Nah to stay where she was as she went to meet Owain and the balloons down the hall.Now that she knew what had caused the interruption, Nah honestly didn’t care about seeing it come to a resolution, so she went back into the room and took a seat in the same folding chair from before, crossing her legs exactly as Maribelle had been doing previously. “I’m going to take it that Owain’s here because he’s the second person Maribelle thinks Brady is close to, which…yeah, I get it. I’d make that same assumption, especially since all of Owain’s other close friends have abandoned him for various reasons.”Scrunching her nose as she thought about one friend in particular, Nah inhaled deeply before exhaling all of the negative feelings she had on the matter. “It’s a good riddance that he’s stuck back in his home country and isn’t around here bugging everyone about things he doesn’t have any business talking about.”“Ooh, by chance are you referring to Niles?” Owain’s voice was a lot less welcomed that time, and Nah just about fell out of the chair hearing it, not realizing he and the bundle of balloons had made it into the room until he’d spoken. “I miss that guy, hope he’s doing well back in Nohr. One of these days, I hope to make the treacherous journey to meet with him and resume our daily shenanigans, but there’s a lot standing between me and making that happen. First and foremost it would require separating from my parents and their loving care, and I don’t quite think that I can bring myself to shatter my mother’s heart like that.”“But you certainly could shatter one of the antique fixtures on the wall out there,” Maribelle coldly replied, all pretenses of pretending she was happy about things dropped on the floor. “I cannot replace that without paying a small fortune, and this place simply is not worth that type of money. Would you be willing to pay for it instead?”“No way! My money’s getting saved up for two things, a trip to Nohr and a new game system because I haven’t gotten one in years and I’m itching to play new things.” Owain let go of the balloons, them promptly staying nearly in place because of the weight tied to the end of the bundle that fell to the floor and kept them locked together. “Maybe you can ask my uncle if he can hook you up? He’s always got money to share with people who need it.”Her face reddening, Maribelle’s eyes narrowed at Owain. “I would never ask for money from someone as well-off as your uncle is, for many reasons. That would be like asking for money from an older brother figure, and I couldn’t bring myself to do that even if I was on death’s door and needed money to survive.”“Kind of dramatic, don’t you think?”“Coming from the king of drama, I feel that’s more of a compliment than anything.” In traditional Maribelle fashion, she turned up her nose and took her attention away from Owain, who seemed ignorant to why she was so bothered by his suggestion. That didn’t mean she looked anywhere near Nah, though, and that was perfectly fine by the young woman, who was more annoyed that asking someone for money was something that these people considered okay to do.They stood around for a few minutes in awkward silence, before Owain realized he could talk to Nah about things that were happier and on better terms for them both. “So, I know the last session went pretty rough for you, but are you feeling better about things? Going to be able to make it next week when we hopefully conquer the dungeon?”“I don’t know what came over me to make me act like that,” Nah lied, hoping that Owain was too wrapped up in his own life and thoughts to pick up on her deception. “I should be perfectly good to go when we meet next week, but I’ll keep you posted.”“I’m just saying, it would be horrific for team morale if we made it this far into the dungeon just to lose our cleric to…whatever’s bothering you.” Owain seemed to be serious about this, and Nah appreciated it, even though she knew she couldn’t ever tell him the specifics of what was bothering her simply because it was so ridiculous that she felt bad about it. “At any rate, if you do need to step away, I think the definitely not-Aunt Robin dragon will be a good replacement yet again. Morgan was thinking hard when he came up with that character to include, and I applaud him for it.”“Your aunt has gotten dragged into playing your little pretend game?” Maribelle asked, having overheard only that part of what Owain was saying and deeming it interesting enough to be worth replying to. “I feel for her and what remains of her sanity if she feels that’s a worthy use of her time.”“She’s not playing, Morgan just made a character based on her because Nah and Noire both didn’t play last week and we couldn’t go into the dungeon down two players. I’m surprised that Brady hasn’t kept you up to speed on this stuff, Mrs. Maribelle. It’s not that hard to keep track of.” With a huff, Owain walked over to the doorway and looked down the hall, before turning around and shaking his head. “When’s he getting here, anyway?”Maribelle pulled her phone out and checked the time on the screen, before tucking it back into her purse. “They should be on their way right now. I encouraged usage of the front door, since we would all be parked behind the church, but I already know that when they pull up outside, Brady is going to use that brilliant mind of his to piece together why he’s here. I’m hopeful that he doesn’t figure out who all is invited, make that the true surprise of the evening.”“Owain, please move out of the doorway, these bags are heavy and you are a much better door than a passageway.” It seemed that, in the short amount of time between Owain checking the hall and him getting the answer of when people would arrive, the very people they’d been talking about had shown up, as Brady’s father was standing there with his arms holding two large delivery-style bags of food. Once he’d realized that he was indeed in the way and making things difficult, Owain stepped aside and allowed the night’s meal to be brought in, followed by the man of the hour coming inside as well.Predictably, Brady didn’t look too thrilled with the gathering, but he was quick to count how many people were actually there. “Uh, Ma, did you invite others that just didn’t show, or is this really all the people you think I’m friends with?”“I did some deep thinking and picked the people I assumed you were closest with, rather than invite the scores of friends you have and expect them to attend with all of their baggage they’d be bringing with them.” Waving off the mere idea that her guest list not be perfectly curated, Maribelle took dainty steps toward her son, greeting him with open arms that he stared at for several seconds before meeting for a hug. “Happy birthday, my dear. You are lucky to find yourself surrounded with the people who care about you most tonight.”“I’d say I’d be luckier if I had more of my friends here, but I get what you’re tryin’ to do with this limited invite list. Guess I can’t be too upset that you did get it right with who you asked to come.” While he was hugging his mother, Brady looked at Owain and winked at him, before glancing at Nah and staring her down until the hug was over and he could find himself looking at other things. “So I’m takin’ it that we’re doing dinner and then going our separate ways tonight?”Brushing herself off from the extended hug, Maribelle looked toward her husband, who was setting their meal up at the poor excuse for a party table. “That’s something we still need to discuss, is it not, Frederick?”“I assumed you would come up with those plans and inform me of them once you had them,” he replied, not breaking his focus from serving food on paper plates he’d had to fish out of one of the bags. “When you said nothing else on the matter, it came across as this being the extent of the plans for the evening.”“Well that just will not do,” she said, tutting a little as she watched the meal preparation for a moment, then went back to looking at her son. “I’ll tell you what, while we eat I will think about what else there is we can do tonight to celebrate you, but for now we’ll consider your surprise birthday party nothing more than an unexpected dinner. Does that sound fair enough to you, dear?”“Ma, no matter how I answer that, you’re gonna do exactly what you planned on doin’ anyway, so…yeah, it sounds fair enough to me.” The second his mother turned away from him, Brady gave a big shrug that both Owain and Nah had to resist chuckling at. He followed that up with a quizzing glance, as if asking the two of them what they knew about being there, but neither of them responded in any way. It was far easier to maintain the idea that they’d been invited out of nowhere with little in the way of explanation than to say that they’d had any indication that there was going to be something resembling a party.Without much fanfare, they all sat down around the table and Maribelle looked at everyone else with a big, content smile on her face, until she reached her hands out to signal that everyone else needed to do the same. While she was easily able to get three of the other four on board with the pre-meal prayer, Nah didn’t budge even when poked in the arm by both people on her sides. “What’s all this for?” she asked, feigning ignorance about why people would be linking hands before eating. “Wasn’t aware we did a campfire routine before we got to eat anything.”“Dinah, this is called a prayer, and I know for a fact from your mother that you at least attended church devoutly for some amount of time, so you should be familiar with this sort of blessing before dining.” Maribelle’s words were spoken with venom behind them, as if she was going to die on the hill of forcing everyone there to take part in her prayer. “Now take their hands and at least pretend that you answer to Naga above, or else…”As she trailed off, Maribelle’s gaze hardened into a glare fixated entirely on Nah, who was trying her best to keep calm at what had just been said to her. As dramatically as she could manage, Nah huffed before grabbing both hands and squeezing them tightly, both Owain and Brady telling her to loosen up a little before she broke their hands. “There, I’m doing it, are you happy?”“Absolutely pleased, thank you for not causing a scene about this, Dinah.” Breaking into a standard prayer, Maribelle completely missed the disgusted look that Nah shot her over the second use of her real name in such a short amount of time. In fact, Nah maintained that look until she saw Maribelle was about to look in her direction again, at which point she stopped and acted like she’d been praying along. The problem Nah had with the whole scene was not anything to do with the religion being practiced, given that they’d all attended the same church back when she’d gone (even though she’d attended the sessions that were meant specifically for manaketes and Maribelle obviously didn’t go to those). It was, rather, a problem with her own relationship with the church and how the group she’d been a part of had become so smothering that she couldn’t handle it.Not like praying before eating was a mandatory action, and not like ignoring it to just sit there and make nasty faces wasn’t permissible if she wasn’t caught doing it. By the time they were all eating, the food was clearly cold in places, and Nah wanted to blame the fact that they’d spent time praying, despite her knowing that there were several other reasons for why that was the case. “It would have been much better had we been able to dine in the restaurant this evening, but the reservation book for tonight was closed when I called over there last week and I could not bring myself to chance waiting upon arrival,” Maribelle explained, twirling her fork in the air as she spoke. “Thankfully, they were taking orders for pickup so I placed one for what I assumed would be enough food for the five of us.”“We could’ve gone somewhere else for dinner, Ma, I wouldn’t have minded if we’d had a different place this year,” Brady replied, his eyes looking down at his plate instead of toward his mother. “I know that this is kinda the tradition you’ve had for my birthday since I could eat real food, but missin’ out on it one year because we’re celebratin’ with friends isn’t the end of the world.”“I already made the sacrifice of ordering pickup food, I wasn’t changing plans any further than that.” With a haughty hmph, Maribelle’s fork fell to the table with a small clatter as she turned to look away from everyone else. “This feels uncivilized, I had to be assured that it is socially acceptable to dine like this before I made it happen.”“Don’t worry, Mrs. Maribelle, it isn’t like we don’t eat like this all the time on our own,” Owain said, him trying his best to keep things from going off the rails. “Mom always says that eating your favorite food at home is so, so much better than eating it at the restaurant, because you don’t have to act all uptight and proper and stuff.”Making a similar sound to what she’d done before, Maribelle turned to focus her attention on Owain this time. “Yes, of course, because your mother has the best opinion on this matter. I love my sweet Lissa dearly, but she married a farming man, I highly doubt that her opinions on classy matters actually, well, matter!”“Maribelle, calm yourself and focus on your meal instead of speaking ill of others, you are using your time rather foolishly right now.” With a stern voice, even though he didn’t look like he was trying to be stern at all, Frederick only gave his wife a single glance before he was looking over at the three younger adults, trying to make them understand that, as far as he was concerned, everything was perfectly fine and normal there at the dinner table.For someone like Nah, who had parents that were complete goofballs with each other and never forced themselves to act so pretentious, even in the presence of others, it was clear that what they considered normal was far from it. She knew that she was already in hot water for how she’d acted about the prayer, though, so she merely kept her head down and pretended like she wasn’t picking up on the awful vibes coming from the others at the table. Next to her, Owain had been stunned silent by what had been said about his family and wasn’t talking even to himself, which was a huge warning that something was wrong, and on her other side Brady had been just about silent since sitting down and nothing seemed like it was going to change that fact.For being intended as a birthday dinner, it sure was far from celebratory and one of the most painful experiences of Nah’s life, and she was grateful to see it come to an end on Maribelle’s terms instead of anyone else making the decision. After all, no one else was really eating the food they’d been given, and she was the only one who’d forced herself through what she’d been served, so when she said they were all done eating, it was like a queen dictating the decision to her subjects. “I hope no one was saving room for dessert, because we may have neglected to provide anything of that nature here,” she said with a laugh, before her eyes fell onto her son. “We do have something for you waiting back at the house, but that is for you and you alone, Brady.”“Kinda figured that much if it’s at home. Like hell you’d invite these guys over there on short notice. Even though it’s a surprise that you’re invitin’ me over when…you know, you’re always treatin’ me like a guest these days.” Brady couldn’t meet his mother’s eyes, although he clearly knew where she was and how she was looking at him, because he kept shifting where he was focusing to avoid her entirely. “But it’s good that you’re gonna let me come over for birthday treats after this.”“I would do nothing but the best for my dearest son,” Maribelle told him, which was met with an unfriendly smirk by the aforementioned dearest son, offending her to the point of pretending to clutch invisible pearls around her neck. “I beg your pardon? What was that expression for?”“Ma, we all know that you actin’ like you give me the best is just an act you’re puttin’ on because I’ve got friends here. That, and because it’s my birthday and you’re always pretendin’ that you’re great to me on my birthday.” Brady’s eyes finally looked at his mother, who was staring back at him with complete shock across her face. “Sorry to break it to ya like this, Ma, but your act isn’t gonna get bought tonight.”Before Maribelle had a chance to get her thoughts out in any sort of words, Frederick interjected to try and squash any animosity before it could begin bubbling over further. “Brady, you know that your mother has high standards for the life she leads and that sometimes she expresses her feelings in ways that seem harsh on the outside, but she truly does care underneath. How she treats you is one such situation.”“Right, because it’s normal for a guy to get told he’s a complete loser by his ma on the regular, forgot all about that.” Standing up and leaning down onto his chair, Brady looked more physically imposing than he had while he’d been sitting at the same level as everyone else. “This is definitely the kind of conversation I wanna be havin’ on my birthday, though, definitely makes it feel like a true family experience.”“You could come home with me tonight,” Nah blurted out, not realizing what she’d said until the words had left her mouth, and the horrified gasp that Maribelle gave upon hearing them was almost musical to her ears. “N-not to stay, Mom would have a heart attack if I invited a second guy over for the night this month, but she’s home alone and I bet she could make your birthday a real good one if we let her.”“Mrs. Nowi does have some fun ideas of what to do when you give her the chance,” Owain agreed, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “One time, she came to help my parents with some farm things and she turned wrangling the animals into a game that…I think Dad won? But I don’t remember, I was just a kid when it happened. Mom and Dad still play it every year, though. Got a scoreboard for it and everything.”His eyebrows furrowing as he looked over at Nah, Brady said, “I don’t know why you’d think I wanna go over to your house to spend my birthday chillin’ with your mom, of all people, but I appreciate the offer. It’d definitely be better than what this has turned into.”“What this has—Brady! This has turned into a nightmare simply because of you being an ungrateful son despite everything I have ever done for you!” The redness in Maribelle’s cheeks was growing deeper with every second that passed, to the point that she was quickly turning to the color of pure red paint. “If you wanted to spend the night with your girlfriend and her mother, I would be happier for it!”“Girlfriend?” both Nah and Brady repeated, neither of them happy to hear that being the modifier she’d been given in that sentence. He was the one that continued to speak after the fact, though, saying, “Ma, I don’t know how many times I’ve gotta tell you this, but Nah’s just a friend and that’s not changin’ any time soon.”“That’s what they always say, so until you find someone else to date I’m going to believe that I am the one that’s right in this situation.” Maribelle paused, looking between them both. “That does apply to the two of you, not just one or the other.”“Because I need you dictating my romantic life for me, totally,” Nah said, grumbling. “Thanks but I’m perfectly fine with staying single until I find the right person for me, and if that means waiting until I’m in my thirties to do it like my mom, then so be it.”There was a quick twitch to Maribelle’s eye at that statement, before she turned her focus entirely to Brady. “Fine then, I’ll be waiting for you to bring someone worth your time home to me, and when it’s inevitably Dinah…”“I don’t plan on makin’ any dating decisions anytime soon, Ma, we’ve been over this.” Brady stood back to his full height before stepping away from the table, walking over to the bundle of balloons floating idly away from them all. “And why in the world do you insist on callin’ Nah anything but the name she likes? If you’re so insistent you’re right about me and her gettin' together someday, you better get better about callin’ her the right name.”Without being invited to comment on the topic at hand, Owain sagely remarked, “You see, I think Mrs. Maribelle would have a better time referring to Nah as such if it was a cooler name to say. We might need to workshop a title into it or something to make it better.”“I’m not changing my name more than I already have, Owain. But thanks for looking out for me there, I guess?”“Any time, Nah, protector of dragons and slayer of idiotic religious practices.” He heard her grumble at the added parts to her name, which he met with a gentle pat on her back. “I know, you’re stunned by how genius it is.”“Ahem, names and potential dating issues aside, this is a gathering for a birthday and we should treat it as such, even if some people among us want to do otherwise.” Ever the level head in a situation, Frederick tried his best to get everyone back on the same page, and he succeeded just long enough to get a rather lifeless rendition of a birthday song out in the open, before Brady decided he was done with the party and requested to be taken anywhere but where he currently was.Within three minutes of that request being made, he and Owain were leaving together and Nah was running out behind them, if only to make sure that Brady got the card she’d bought him and that it didn’t end up being possessed by Maribelle of all people. They got outside at the same time, barraged by the cold air and the even colder wind, and when Nah tried to hand the card over, Brady rejected it at first, his fingers curled up as he struggled to zip his jacket to provide himself with warmth. “No way, that’s gotta be somethin’ Ma put together and I don’t want any more to do with her nonsense tonight.”“Actually, this is from me,” Nah chattered, her teeth hitting each other ridiculously hard as she waited for her friend to take the gift. “Swear on my life that I bought it without consulting with your mother about it.”“If you insist. Thanks for this, Nah.” She only waited as long as it took for him to be holding the card in his hands before she was running to her car to get home, listening to him call out another thank you followed by Owain giving a much more dramatic one.Nah sat in the car for a few moments before turning it on, her breath thick with how frigid the temperatures were, and when she did turn the key in the ignition and listened to her car’s engine sputter to life, she had second thoughts about actually leaving right then. Maribelle was in a position of power over her and her job, and her deciding to abandon the party before it was technically over could come back to bite her in some way. But then she thought about Brady, and how done with his mother he was, and she decided that sticking with her friend was more important than trying to kiss up to a member of the school board.She drove away without a single regret on how the night had gone, and only one pressing concern that kept floating back into her mind. She’d just been called out for having some sort of attraction to one of her closest friends, and he’d been called out for having the same about her, and they’d reacted by denying everything. Now, Nah knew that she did actually feel something for Brady, but she didn’t want to think that it was to the level of needing to try out dating him; did that mean the same went the other way as well?Based on how she got a text from him later that night calling her the greatest friend he could ever have, the jury was out on that.If there was any chance of Maribelle’s meddling affecting Nah’s job, it was going to have to wait until the next school board meeting at the earliest, so she was able to wake up the next morning without the fear of facing consequences about what had happened. It was Friday, sure, but Nah remembered that she was going to be losing her free Fridays going forward, so she needed to make the current one count as much as possible. There was nothing she needed to get done related to work, and she didn’t have any errands that needed completing, which did make her consider just heading over to Ribbon’s school and making herself available already, but an idea struck her before she even left the house.She went into the kitchen to find that it was spotless and there were no signs of her mother having been in it before she’d headed to work, a good sign because it meant that there was a chance Nowi wasn’t actually at work after all. Instead of creep back upstairs and check her parents’ bedroom for any sign of her mother, Nah simply collapsed into the couch and called her mother’s phone, listening for any ringing. When there was none, her enthusiasm faded slightly but she didn’t let her spirits fall too far at the possibility that her mother was truly at work. Instead, she tried calling again and again until she finally heard the tell-tale sign that Nowi was still at home. “Nah, you’re getting so annoying,” Nowi called from upstairs, knowing that the culprit for all the phone calls was predictably downstairs. “You’re not getting anything from me doing that.”“Sorry, but I needed to know if you were still here or not,” Nah yelled back in return, setting her phone aside and waiting for Nowi to join her down on the couch, looking like she’d just rolled out of bed compared to her daughter being fully put together already. “I’m even a bit sorry if I woke you up doing that.”“If it were a normal Friday I totally wouldn’t be here, but I’ve got today off because of your father leaving and not wanting to drag myself into work after being up all night watching sappy movies without him.” Stretching her arms dramatically, Nowi reached over and wrapped one over Nah’s shoulders, pulling her in closer. “And since it’s Friday, I know that you’ve got nothing going on yourself, so maybe we can do some mother-daughter bonding and get back to that movie marathon I started last night?”“I appreciate the offer, Mom, but you know that’s not really my thing.” Nah scrunched her nose at the mere idea of having to sit there watching tissue-worthy romance movies with her mother, who would eat them up like they were the best movies in existence. “I did have an idea of something better we could do, if you were free and up to it.”Nowi’s eyes widened, making her look even more youthful than she already did. “Is it something that your father would approve of if he was here?”“Uh…” Nah had to think about the answer to that, before deciding that yes, Gregor would absolutely approve of the idea if he was around to hear about it. “I think he would think it’s pretty fun and wish he could be a part of it himself, but he’s not here so we’ll have to do it with just the two of us. Only if you’re down for it, that is.”“You haven’t even given me a hint about what it might be and you’re already wondering if I’m going to be down for it.” Giving a soft hum as she thought about how she would respond to the offer, Nowi scrambled to her feet and stared down at Nah with a smile. “I’m not used to having days off like this, so it’d be pretty fun to get to go wild with you and do whatever you do for fun. As long as it’s not playing that silly game of yours.”“Trust me, Mom, that’s only on Tuesdays.” Smiling back at her mother, Nah waited a few moments before she elaborated on what she thought they could do together. “So, uh, last night I might’ve done one of those things you’ve tried to teach me not to do. Might’ve spent a bit too much time talking back to Maribelle about things that she was saying. And it’s not like she didn’t deserve it, and it’s not like I was alone in doing it, but I know how she gets and I know you’re going to get a whole earful about it the next time you see her.”“Thanks for being aware of that, because it’s true.” Nowi shook her head, her face falling into a particularly neutral expression. “I’m pretty sure that I’m one of the top people she vents to these days, which is really weird to me. Who comes into the human services offices just to talk to one of the people working to give people the help they need, and they’re not someone who’s looking for help? Clearly she does.”“Her and a bunch of others, from what you tell me, but that’s not important. What is important, though, is that you have a little apology gift from me on hand to give her when she starts trying to pick a fight. I already know she’s going to come in swinging with the ungrateful comments and the nasty child comments and everything else under the sun like that, so…we’ve got to make it good.” There wasn’t anything particularly compelling to make Nah think that this course of action was a good one to take, but she didn’t want to subject her mother to that drama when she hadn’t done a thing to deserve it.Nowi seemed to think about what Nah was suggesting at her, slowly backing away from the couch and pacing around the room with her fingers running through her unruly, un-brushed hair. “I don’t know about this one, Dinah,” she said with a serious tone, her use of Nah’s proper name a sign that she meant business. “It feels like you’d be rewarding Maribelle for acting like a diva at me, which is only going to make her do it more often. I think if this is the route you want to take on this one, you’ve got to seriously limit your time interacting with her son going forward.”“That’s not happening, Brady’s one of my best friends and we have far too much fun together for me to cut him out of my life over his mother’s behavior. I’m not thinking of getting her anything big, or expensive, just something that’ll prove to her that I’m not all that bad.” It was going to be a tall order to make that happen without something going catastrophically wrong, but Nah wanted to give it her best shot. “And once I’ve bought it, whatever it is, I need you to give it to her when she starts coming at you to complain about me.”“Like, I get that and all, but it’s not going to work. Maribelle’s a different kind of person, one that you’ve been really lucky not to have to deal with up until now. But I spent a lot of my life before you were born dealing with people like this and…all you’re going to do is feed her complex that she’s right and that you need to be groveling at her feet for forgiveness.” Shaking her head, Nowi took a second to look around the room before her eyes fell on Nah once more. “I don’t want you being trapped in that loop with this woman, no matter how much you think you’ll be able to change her mind with this action.”Nah, still sitting on the couch watching her mother’s thinking stance grow more and more agitated, began to doubt herself and her ability to solve the problem she’d come into, but she couldn’t go down without a fight. “Mom, you and Dad taught me that no matter what others think or do, I need to do my own thing. Forge my own path. Do you remember that?”“Of course I do, like you said we taught you that.” Nowi tilted her head slightly to one side. “Why do you bring that up now?”“Because I’m invoking that right this second. I’m forging my own path on this one, regardless of what you think is going to happen. I’m getting her an apology gift and you’re giving it to her for me, and that’s that.”Taking in a deep breath, Nowi’s nostrils visibly flared as she accepted that she’d just been played with her own words. “I suppose if your father was here, he’d be clasping on me the back and saying something like, ‘Great job, Nowi, you taught her how to be forceful and make good decisions’ and I’d be like, ‘But Gregor, this is a horrible decision’ and we’d go back and forth for a while before I admitted defeat. So we’re going to skip those theatrics and I’m just going to admit defeat now. You get your way this time, Dinah, but it won’t work as well as you hope it will.”“That’s fine, I’ve got to learn how to cope with making mistakes sometime, don’t I?” Laughing, Nah stood up and met her mother in the middle of the room, grabbing her in a surprise hug that had Nowi gasping at the sudden physical contact. “I’m thinking we can head to the mall for this one, since it shouldn’t be too busy with it being a weekday and all.”“Nah. The mall doesn’t open until noon on Fridays.”That was a realization that Nah hadn’t had until Nowi pointed it out, and she glanced toward the oversized clock hanging above the room, its metal face illuminated by the daylight coming in through the windows. “Right, forgot about that fact. Guess we can go do breakfast before we hit the mall? It’s been a long time since we’ve done that.”“Ooh, Gregor is going to be so upset that I’m getting this sort of quality time with you while he’s not around to get some for himself,” Nowi said with a soft giggle, pulling Nah’s arms off of her so that she could head to the stairs. “I’ll take a quick shower and get ready, then we can head out to breakfast. And, since you suggested it, I’m expecting it to be your treat.”“I wouldn’t have suggested it if I didn’t expect that to be the case,” Nah replied, winking at her mother as she began her way up the stairs. The moment she was alone downstairs, she fell back into the couch, cursing her lack of time awareness because she didn’t exactly have the money to be buying breakfast and a gift of the quality that Maribelle would need to be appeased even a little bit.For the entire hour or so that Nowi was getting ready, Nah was on the couch using her phone to do a bit of pre-shopping, trying to figure out what she could possibly get that would work in any way, shape, or form. There were a lot of potential ideas that were bouncing through her mind, but most of them were put to rest simply because no store at the mall sold anything that would make them work, and several others were dismissed due to their cost. By the time Nowi was downstairs and ready to go, the list of gift ideas was around eight possibilities that were all feasible, and it was going to come down to which one Nah liked most when she saw it. “So, uh, where do you want to go for breakfast?” Nah asked her mother, who was getting her shoes and jacket on while humming a soft tune to herself. “I’m not a huge breakfast gal, you know this.”“I was thinking we could do coffee and donuts, like we used to do in the mornings before you’d go to school. Do you remember those days, Nah?” Nowi sounded like she’d been doing some remembering of her own to call back to that particular brand of memory, but Nah nodded that she did in fact remember it herself. “You would always get the donut and take it to school, but you sure drank the coffee sitting there with me.”“Most of those donuts got eaten by Noire or Owain, whichever one of them got to me first, but sometimes they were part of my lunch,” Nah recalled, thinking about the way those two would congregate around her searching for her unwanted breakfast every single day. “I think there may have even been a time or two when someone else got to it before they did, but it was usually those two.”“See, those two asking for handouts is fine, I know they’ve both always had some complex family situations and needing breakfast in the morning might never have been something that was never on their minds. Brady, on the other hand…” Nowi trailed off, muttering some choice words under her breath before perking back up. “If he ever begged anyone for something, that is simply uncalled for, given how haughty his mother is about her money and her status in the world. That’s all.”Nah’s eyes narrowed and shifted from side to side as she tried to think back specifically about how Brady handled interacting with her in the mornings, but she failed to recall anything at all. “I think he was always in the band room for violin practice before school started, I can’t remember ever seeing him around before classes. That, and he was a year ahead of me so I didn’t always run into him because of that, too.”“How could I forget that he wasn’t in your grade level? That’s kind of embarrassing to admit, but it did slip my mind there that he’s older than you by an entire year.” Pausing, Nowi grabbed her purse and pulled out her wallet from inside, opening it to reveal a faded picture of herself and Gregor she carried within it. “Imagine having that sort of age gap between yourself and someone dear to you.”“Mom, you’re seriously how many years older than Dad, saying things like that?” Then it was Nah’s turn to pause as the implications hit her. “And hold on, why are you saying it like me and Brady like each other? His mom was doing the same thing yesterday and it’s seriously ridiculous. We’re just friends. Promise.”“’Just’ friends sounds pretty rich, coming from the girl who’s going to be buying his mother a gift as an apology for tearing her down verbally,” Nowi teased, which made Nah wish that she hadn’t already asked for breakfast before shopping because she was no longer feeling generous with her time and money. “But I get it, you don’t want people making assumptions just because you’re a girl and he’s a guy and you’ve been making lovey-dovey eyes at each other since the first time you met back when you were kids.”“And to think that you were acting like you didn’t know who he was back when Morgan got stuck over here and was talking to you about him.” Nah shook her head, as she finally got around to getting her own shoes on to head out the door. “Sometimes you act as immature as a teenager, Mom, and that’s not a compliment.”Nowi reached over and gently flicked the side of Nah’s head, the younger woman flinching at the contact. “I’d take looking and acting like a teenager over being mistaken for a woman my actual age,” she said, her voice lowering. “And since I know that people have mistaken me for you before, I wonder if it works going the opposite way as well?”The mere idea of being mistaken for a woman more than double her age made the hair on the back of Nah’s neck stand on end, and she grimaced at the prospect of that actually happening. “I’ve never been asked if I’m an older woman, and I highly doubt it would happen even with us side by side,” she said slowly, deliberately choosing her words to cause the least offense. “I definitely don’t look that much older than you, and I think most people know that I’m your daughter when I’m next to you.”“I guess we’ll just have to see if that stays true today!” Nowi sounded so chipper and so eager to be mistaken for someone decades younger than her, that it almost seemed rude to point out how unlikely it was to happen. Still, Nah hoped that no one would even bat an eyelash at the two of them, and if anyone did say something she hoped that it would be confusing them for being sisters instead of switching which one was the older of the two.There were moments on the drive over to the café they’d spent all those mornings at back in the day that had Nah wishing she could just turn around and forget she’d ever suggested leaving in the first place. At one point, she skidded through an intersection with a police officer sitting across the road from her, and her whole chest tightened as she feared she was about to receive the first ticket of the year for herself, but nothing ever came of the whole ordeal and she was able to breathe easy. Another point that came up was her realizing a bit too late that the particular shop they were going to had been mentioned to her earlier that week. “Mom, is there any way we can go somewhere else for breakfast?” she asked, hands on the wheel twitching to turn and go a different direction. “This place has at least one other location somewhere in town, right?”“Nah, you were perfectly okay with this before we left, did something happen that made you realize you don’t want donuts after all?” Nowi asked in return, looking over at Nah to see her shake her head. “Then what gives?”“I…don’t want to run into any of my friends while spending time out with you, and there’s a very real possibility that I could do exactly that if we go there. You know that Laurent’s mom is finally getting her ‘magic’ store open, don’t you?” Nah didn’t actually wait for an answer before she continued talking, her worries beginning to get the best of her. “It’s literally right down the road from where we’re going, and they’re always sending people down to get donuts for the construction crew. Wait, why am I saying sending people, it’s one person in particular and I know if I see her, I’m going to spend all my time talking to her instead of you.”Nowi nodded in understanding, but when she replied she didn’t seem bothered by what she’d heard in the slightest. “Look, if it’s Noire you’re talking about, you know that I love that girl as much as I love you. I’d gladly let her sit with us and enjoy some donuts and maybe a drink or two before she gets back to whatever job they’ve got her working.”“She doesn’t do coffee, Mom, it messes too much with her medication and she doesn’t like when her medication isn’t at full strength.” While that was probably a piece of information that didn’t need to be shared, Nah knew it was something that Nowi had heard about many times previously, given how close she’d been with Noire since they were little kids. “But I bet she’d appreciate some time to not have to be around all the construction guys. Laurent doesn’t get how much she hates being ogled by them, but he’s not even doing anything that involves them, it’s all book work at this point.”“If I’m fine with Noire spending time with us, and you’re fine with Noire spending time with us, then I see no reason for us to go somewhere else and prevent her from getting to spend time with us. The plans stay exactly as they are.” Nowi smiled at Nah, who took a second to accept that she was getting her mind all in a tizzy for nothing. “Besides, this place doesn’t have any other locations and I’m not picking subpar breakfast foods that cost more over some of the best donuts in town.”She wasn’t kidding that they were some of the best in town, and the crowded parking lot and long, winding drive-thru line was proof of it. Nah was able to get a parking spot near the building, even if it was probably not an actual spot that cars should have been parking in, and the pair walked inside to be greeted with the longest line imaginable for a Friday morning looking for coffee and donuts. “I’m rethinking listening to you after all,” she whispered toward Nowi, who shrugged and told her to just get in line and wait.It was fifteen minutes before they got up to the counter, and the employees on the other side were predictably frazzled and stressed at how busy they were, but the two were kind and patient with being told there were going to be waits on fresh coffee and the selection of donuts was thin for the moment. “It’s that construction happening up the road,” the cashier explained to them as they finished their order with what was available. “Every morning when we open they come in and somehow manage to order more donuts than they did the day before. Doesn’t help that there’s another construction group that orders a bunch several times a day, too.”“Yeah, we’re familiar with one of those groups,” Nah told the man, before elaborating so he didn’t think they were associated with them. “My best friend is the donut runner for the group building the natural goods shop, she’s got brownish hair and is kind of tall and—”“Oh! I know who you’re talking about, she was just in here not that long ago. That’s a big part of why we’re so backed up right now, she came and bought up the majority of our basic flavors when she was here.” The cashier looked down at the register, then over at Nah with a shake of his head. “I wish we could turn away that sort of business when it means that people like you are stuck here waiting forever, but it is what it is.”“Don’t worry, we’re super fine with waiting,” Nowi jumped in with, winking at the cashier. “We’re on a mother-daughter breakfast date, and I bet you can’t guess which one of us is the mother and which is the daughter.”“Ma’am, I don’t want to offend you, but I can tell without hesitation that you’re quite a bit older than her.”“…Wow, okay, way to break a woman’s heart.” Fake sniffling, Nowi stepped away and went to secure a table while Nah apologized for her behavior over paying for what they’d ordered.When she found where Nowi had gone to sit, she noticed that her mother was covering her face completely with her arms, as if she was trying to obscure herself for some reason. “Come on, Mom, what he said was the truth, and it’s not like he called you an old broad or anything. He just said he could tell you’re older than me.”“It’s the wording he chose to do it that hurt me,” Nowi replied, her arms muffling her voice slightly. “Quite a bit older than you? At most I look, like, ten years older than you.”“If people can be believed and I look to be in my late teens at the oldest, that would put you as looking in your late twenties and there’s no way anyone would fall for that. Maybe late thirties at the youngest, but you’re not quite as deceiving as you pretend to be.” Since she’d grown up around her, Nah was completely aware of her mother’s actual age and was also aware of the realistic guesses that could be made for how old she was, but they were things that Nowi herself didn’t want to hear. As such, Nowi stayed there with her face buried in her arms until they had their breakfast in front of them, and even after it had been served she was still trying to hide herself as much as she could.While they were sitting there eating, the shop slowly cleared out until there wasn’t any line to speak of, and the drive-thru was able to whittle itself down to just a couple of cars left. The employees inside seemed to enjoy getting the chance to collect themselves and catch up with what needed to be done inside the store, but another wave came trickling in soon enough, not nearly as bad as what had been there before but still fairly crowded. It was around the time they’d finished what they wanted to eat and were getting ready to leave that Nah looked outside and saw the congregation of construction workers standing just beyond the doors, discussing something between themselves. “Uh, Mom, we should go before we can’t walk out of this place,” she said abruptly, pointing toward what she could see, but Nowi wasn’t paying her any attention and had gone back to covering her face. “Mom, seriously? Get over it, he didn’t mean to offend you and you’re acting childish.”“I’m acting as young as I want to feel, thank you very much.”“Okay, well, if you’re going to act like that, then I’m leaving you here. I’ll see you around later or something.” Standing up, Nah made her way toward the door, looking over her shoulder to see that Nowi wasn’t budging from the table. She sighed, considering turning back to fetch her mother, but decided that it wasn’t worth it and that getting out of the less-than-legal parking spot she’d picked was far more important.After getting to the car and turning it on, Nah waited a few minutes to see if she was ever going to be joined by her mother, or if she was going to make it over to the mall by herself now that it was closer to the time the place opened. Right as she’d decided that she was going to leave, the passenger’s side door opened and Nowi slid into her seat, looking far more happy than she’d been the last time they’d seen each other. “Guess what happened after you so rudely left me,” she started, a statement Nah didn’t even want to touch. “One of the burly construction guys came in and asked me if I was looking for a job, because they’re hiring cute little front desk workers at the place they’re building.”“Mom, that didn’t happen.”“Yeah, you’re right, he asked if he could have my table, but he did thank me and told me I look cute, so there’s that.” Nowi’s smile seemed to radiate her happiness, even if it was clear she was mostly deluding herself into thinking she’d received a compliment where one had never been made. “Let’s get over to the mall and see if we can keep this momentum going, shall we?”Without answering, Nah made her decision clear by backing out of her spot and driving away, passing by the construction site where she knew that Laurent and probably Noire were both working. While she wished she could have seen one or both of them while going by, she did get to see the finished exterior of the building, a place that had only existed on paper that time a year prior. The progress was pretty impressive, even though there had been plenty of empty buildings nearby that could’ve served the purpose just as well as building an entirely new one could, but Nah knew that it was a choice made by Laurent’s mother to build something new for her vision. “Hey Mom, do a lot of people come into your office looking for money to build things like that?” she asked after they’d passed the new construction and were well on their way to the mall. “Or is that something that the people you deal with don’t even try?”“You know, I’d be a pretty rich woman if I had money for every time someone’s come into the office searching for some handouts when they aren’t in need of them, but I can’t say that anyone’s come in looking for money to build an entire store with.” Nowi tapped her fingers against the car window, thinking about some of the stories she could’ve told, but she shook the whole train of thought off. “I’d rather think of the silly and stupid stuff like that than the really sad stories I get to see on the regular.”Pulling her eyes off of the road for a second to look at her mother, Nah was struck with the realization that her calling to be a special education teacher for the school district came from a similar place as her mother wanting to work for human services for the city. They were both filled with the need to help others in some way, and while their methods were different, ultimately they came from the same place within their hearts. “Mom, if you weren’t working for the city all these years, do you think you would’ve gotten into teaching?”“What? Of course not, I’m not qualified to teach!” Laughing, Nowi made a face at Nah, who shouldn’t have been looking to see it but saw it anyway. “But seriously, I probably wouldn’t have gotten those sorts of qualifications, but I could’ve easily gotten into administration with some of the qualifications I do have. Just don’t have the right types of degrees to be a teacher around here.”“I should’ve seen that answer coming, yeah.” Nah nodded in acceptance of what she’d heard, even though their conversation was one that was ultimately just filling the time to get to the mall. Once they were there, it’d be buried and forgotten about, something that neither of them would probably acknowledge again as long as they lived.The mall was freshly opened when they pulled up, Nah getting a front row parking spot to the entrance of her choosing that was actually a parking spot that time. They got out of the car and headed for the door as quickly as they could, Nowi wanting to get the shopping trip over and done with quickly and Nah wanting to avoid running into anyone she knew so gladly doing the same. She’d come up with a rough outline of where she wanted to go to search for the gifts she’d thrown onto the consideration list, and right inside the entrance they were going through was the first of the shops they needed to visit.“Don’t you think this place is a little outside your budget?” Nowi asked when she saw Nah making motions to go inside that first collectables store. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m sure there’s plenty in there that Maribelle would love to receive from someone, but it’s going to be pretty pricey.”“That’s why I’m just looking, then if all else fails I can come back here and get what I find. I’m kind of hoping that some of the other things I’m looking for will be cheaper somewhere else, but who knows what’s going to happen here.” Nah’s optimism was unusual, but she had a good feeling that she wasn’t going to need to get something inside that overpriced store and she wanted to ride that positivity as long as she could.As it turned out, she was misguided in what she was getting optimistic about, because while there was ultimately nothing in that store that was affordable and within Maribelle’s interests, there was something else that Nah knew someone would like. And given that the particular someone she was thinking of was someone doing something decently big for her, she almost felt obligated to buy the statue when she saw it. The only reason she didn’t (at least, not right then), was Nowi looking at the statue of the deep purple and black dragon with a dice embedded in its hand and scowling at it. “You know what this reminds me of?” she said, loud enough that anyone in the store could hear her. “It reminds me of the anti-Naga propaganda certain manaketes would bring by the church to try and convince others to join their cult.”“Really? I don’t see that at all,” Nah replied, getting a closer look at the dragon and how bright its eyes shined in the store’s light. “I see a cool dragon like the ones the books Morgan uses have all over their covers. I really think he’d like this if someone got it for him.”“Sounds like he’s beginning to slip into the teachings of that wretched aunt of his, then.”“…Whatever then, I won’t buy my friend the dragon statue.” It was a bit more money than Nah would’ve liked to spend on Morgan out of the blue, so it wasn’t a huge problem to have to turn her back on the piece, even if it did linger in her mind as they went down the mall corridor to the next store on her list.Between jewelry shops, a clothing store for a high-end brand, and several other collectable stores, it seemed that everything that Maribelle might’ve liked receiving was either too expensive or simply not in stock. Nah’s list was in shambles, and she was beginning to suspect that the universe had seen her trying to do something good for someone she did not like and decided to smite her for it, but she wasn’t going to give up all hope without a fight. That was led her and her mother to one of the strangest stores in the mall, a place that catered to older women who were insecure about their lives, and came across a gift so out of left field that Nah had no choice but to buy it.“I mean, it’s technically a gift certificate, so if she brings it she can pick what she gets with it in the end, but it’s…a doozy of a certificate to receive,” Nah said after having picked out the box that she’d decided made the best present. “But I don’t really get why people are buying these things and giving them to others, then expecting them to come here and cash them in for some shady spa services.”“You couldn’t pay me enough to get me to do it, but I don’t need any of their ‘youthful regeneration’ packages so I don’t think I’m the target audience here.” Nowi stopped walking for a second, snickered to herself, and then caught back up to Nah like nothing had happened. “That reminds me of some videos I watched the other day…”“Mom, you’re not talking to me about any videos you watch on that stupid app, I already hear enough about them from Ribbon and the kids at the schools. If you’re not the right audience for older women spa days, then you’re definitely not the right audience for that sort of content.” That was enough to get Nowi to laugh about it, which was enough to make Nah smile at how jubilant her mother sounded, and they were able to leave the mall with the so-called “blood roller” package firmly in tow and a plan for how it was going to be presented to its recipient without causing any problems.On the way home, Nah nearly blew through another stop and caught herself at the last possible second, slamming on her brakes and sending both herself and her mother forward, almost into the dashboard and steering wheel. They were both fine, if not just a bit breathless at the suddenness of the stop and the whiplash they’d received from it, but in resuming normal driving Nah realized that something had gotten under her foot when she’d stopped. “Do you think you can reach down there and get whatever I’m stomping on?” she asked Nowi, who looked at her like the question was completely out of line. “Seriously, Mom, I think the present has slid under my seat and down to the pedals and—”“One, the present is over here under my feet, and two, whatever’s down there will have to stay down there because there’s no way I can reach under there with these short little arms of mine.” To illustrate her point that mattered, Nowi reached down and grabbed the box from the spa, holding it up so that Nah could see it, then set it back down carefully. “I bet it’s, like, a water bottle or a piece of trash or something. Your car is pretty messy, after all.”“I guess that makes sense,” Nah replied, shaking off the idea that she was stepping on something that was worth the effort of grabbing it. However, the truth made a whole lot less sense than her mother’s idea, and when she got home to find out what had gotten lodged underneath the pedal area she was stunned into a deep silence that she didn’t know how to react to. “I…don’t recall having this?” she mumbled as she grabbed the offending material, pulling it out and staring it down. “And I definitely don’t recall buying it.”It was a dragon almost identical to the one that she’d seen at the collectables shop, the one her mother had claimed was an anti-Naga piece. The major differences between what she’d seen there and what she held now were the size and the fact that this one held two dice in its hands, one showing a five and the other showing a three, rather than the twenty that the one at the store had been displaying. “I wonder how this even got in here, I swear I’ve never seen this thing before in my life.”At once, a chill went down her spine that had her suspecting the worst in the situation. She recalled the night she’d driven out of town to pick Morgan up, and what he’d been doing before he’d ended up abandoned on the side of a farm road. It didn’t seem logical, but the chances of this belonging to him and having been given to him by that anti-Naga aunt of his weren’t exactly zero. If he’d left this behind to try and forget he’d run into her in the first place, then it would make sense, but to leave it in the car of someone who, at one point, had been a devout worshipper of Naga was a bit…questionable.“What was tripping you up down there, Nah?” Nowi called from the front door to the house, her cradling Maribelle’s gift under her arm like she cared about its safety. “I told you it was a water bottle and I was right, wasn’t I?”“You sure were,” Nah lied in return, not wanting to address what she really had seen with her mother after their previous conversation at the collectable store. “I guess I should’ve just listened to you from the start instead of letting my mind run wild about what it could’ve been. Let me just…” She trailed off as she threw the dragon down in the passenger’s seat of the car and slammed the door, intending on giving that back to Morgan when she saw him next. “I’m heading in, go on without me and I’ll catch up!”“Sounds like a plan, I’ll set this on the table and get a movie started.” For once, it seemed that Nowi didn’t suspect a thing when it came to Nah’s lack of truthfulness, and that came as a surprise given that this was a rare moment where she would’ve been justified in prying for further details on the matter.The fact that she hadn’t been called out on her deception stunned Nah temporarily, but she shook it off when she accepted that she’d rather be believed than be drilled on what she was just looking at inside her car. “I’ll have to ask Morgan about that next time I see him,” she decided with a firm shake of her head. “He’ll probably have some weird answer I won’t fully understand, but any answer’s better than just thinking that the damn thing appeared in my car out of nowhere.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
While the idea to call Morgan to ask him where the dragon statue had come from did cross Nah’s mind several times over the weekend, she was stopped every time by the idea that he was somewhere that talking about it could be a problem in some way. That was the same reason she’d given herself for why she wasn’t going to just arrange to meet with him for snacks or dinner or something. If it did indeed come from his aunt he wasn’t supposed to have contact with, and it had ended up in her car because she’d been the one to pick him up from his late night farm adventure, then she completely accepted that she’d need to do something a bit more discreet to get the information out of him.Asking him if they could step into his room when she saw him on Tuesday was, of course, not the smoothest or stealthiest of options, but by the time she was done dropping Ribbon off and was on her way to his house, that was the only idea she’d come up with. To her credit, she’d been doing a lot of fixating on the fact that she was putting her gift to Maribelle in her mother’s hands, even though she’d rather have handled it fully by herself to make sure her intentions were fully understood. Sometimes things just couldn’t work out according to plan, though, and Nah accepted that she couldn’t have all the control in the situation.She could, however, walk into Morgan’s family’s house and not be met with him or his parents, but rather his older sister, in the process of getting her jacket on to head out for the evening. “Oh, hey there, Nah,” Lucina greeted, waving with a gloved hand as she zipped her jacket up to just below her chin. “I forgot that you’re one of Morgan’s gang here on Tuesdays, sorry about that.”“I don’t know why you’re sorry, I’m pretty forgettable,” Nah replied, trying to force a smile but instead coming off as looking mildly annoyed with the turn of events. “Looks like you’re going out, let me guess…it’s on a date?”Lucina raised a single finger as she thought about the way to answer that, before shaking her head. “As fun as it would be to classify it as a date, I don’t think that’s quite appropriate. Unless friend dates are a thing, I suppose?”“I’d say they are.”“Then yes, I’m going on a friend date, that might become a real date if Gerome can swing by and meet up with us later.” Lucina stepped around Nah to get to the door, but froze and looked at Nah when she realized she was sounding pretty cryptic about things. “I’m going out for drinks and dinner with a former coworker of mine, not anyone any of you guys here know. Don’t worry, I’m not planning friend nights that you’d all be missing out on.”“Good, because I’d be a bit miffed if that was the case.” It wasn’t that Nah couldn’t reach out to some of their other friends here, but rather that she didn’t want to intrude on anyone’s time when it was a valuable commodity no one had enough of. “Hope it all goes well, and that Gerome can get there and all that stuff. I’m looking forward to when we can spend time together again, though.”“Seriously, it’s been far too long since we’ve last done that without things being crazy all around us. I’ll be waiting to hear about your ideas. Gotta go now, bye!” Without anything else to add, Lucina ran out the door and left Nah there to close it behind her, grumbling the whole time about how she didn’t want to have to be the one to plan events anymore. She’d done enough planning in the past year to last her a lifetime, and even little get-togethers had started to mentally stress her out.“Did Lucy leave already?” Morgan called from somewhere else in the house, followed immediately by his fast footsteps that came to a stop in front of Nah as she was approaching the table. “I’m taking your silence as a yes, she did.”Nah blinked at him, not sure why he would do such a thing but knowing that he was completely right to do it. “I mean, she pretty much trampled me at the door because she was in a rush to get to her dinner with her friend. So yes, I’d say she’s left already.”“Good,” he said in the same breath as a long exhale. “Our parents are currently out of town and she came by to make sure I hadn’t burned the place down on accident, and she made it seem like coming out here to check on me was this huge problem or something. I didn’t ask for her to do it, she just kind of…chose to do it on her own.”“I’m going to guess that’s what being a big sister is like, having to make sure that any younger sibling is out of trouble when the parents aren’t around to do it for themselves.” That wasn’t something that Nah knew from firsthand experience, but she’d spent enough time around people who had siblings and worked with enough children to get the gist of how the relationships went.Morgan didn’t seem super pleased to hear that being the direction Nah went with things, and he made his displeasure quite known. “Sure, but she’s got her own life doing her own things, and I’m an actual adult here, I don’t need her babying me just because she thinks she needs to step in. If I needed help, I would’ve asked.”“Maybe your parents asked if she’d keep an eye on you while they’re gone? Or, more realistic option because you are an adult, they asked her to keep an eye on the house and since you’re here at the house, it just came off that she’s watching you.” One of those was the probable answer and Nah knew it, but she didn’t want to keep standing there debating this topic with Morgan when she had other things they needed to discuss. “But anyway, I was—”“How is it that when I try getting here early, I fail at the task, but when I have no intentions of making it happen, it happens naturally?” Owain’s voice yelled into the house, him entering the front door with Brady right behind him. “At any rate, we have arrived for yet another rousing session of fun and intrigue and dungeon crawling!”“—never mind, forget I tried saying anything in the first place.” Nah awkwardly reached out and patted Morgan’s shoulder, her friend merely staring back at her for the contact. “We need to talk later when it’s just the two of us, though.”“Hey, what’re the two of you doin’ gettin' so close like that?” Brady asked, coming inside without taking his jacket off and approaching the pair. “I don’t know if I wanna be here with you both if you’re gettin' all kissy-faced at each other.”Morgan’s head shook rapidly, while Nah took a big step away from him. “We’re not doing anything like that, I don’t even know why Nah was all in my face to begin with,” Morgan said, although his words were far from convincing.“Uh huh, and what do you have to say to that, Nah? Gonna back him up or what?”“I’m going to say that he’s speaking the truth, even though it’s kind of dumb that you’d want to hear it from both of us instead of simply accepting what he says as the truth in the first place.” Nah took another step toward the table, only to get the back of her shirt grabbed by a large hand to hold her in place. “Please unhand me, Brady. I’m not scared of you.”“But you’re scared of Ma, and that’s what I need to talk with you about.” He pulled her backward just a bit before realizing he was stretching the collar of her shirt and needed to stop, but when he let go Nah turned around to face him anyway. “Yeah, so…Morg, you cool if Nah and I go somewhere private to talk for a bit? We don’t all need to be hearin’ about the drama involving my mother.”After doing a quick head count and making sure they weren’t ready to start the session yet, Morgan gave permission for them to go use one of the bedrooms on the lower floor to have their talk. Brady thanked him and led Nah out of the room and down the stairs, having to duck at the bottom so that he didn’t whack his head on the low ceiling. “It’s funny, I need to have a private conversation with someone that’s going to be here tonight too, yet you got to me before I could get to them,” Nah said as she followed Brady into a room that was clearly an unused guest bedroom. “This wasn’t the place I thought I’d be talking to someone, though, that’s for sure.”“I mean, same, but…” Brady trailed off, before sitting on the edge of the bed and kicking his legs up on the mattress. “I might’ve done a bit of lyin’ up there to get you to want to come down here with me, but that’s no big deal, right?”“A bit of lying?” Nah repeated, not sure she’d heard him correctly.“That’s what I said. There’s not really any drama with Ma, beyond what you’re already aware of, and honestly? She told me she thinks she was actin’ out of line at the birthday dinner and your gift was far too nice to someone as rude as her.” Brady shrugged, as if he hadn’t been made aware of the specifics of the gift his mother had received. “She was super thankful about it, though. Wanted me to make sure to thank you on her behalf.”It took a solid minute for the meaning of those words to fully permeate Nah’s mind, as she’d been so caught up in the idea that Maribelle wouldn’t appreciate the gift or would take up problems with what it actually was, that she hadn’t even considered the idea that she’d like it after all. “I mean, what else was I supposed to do after offending her and being as nasty as I was to her that night? I don’t like her, I’d rather never have to deal with her again in my life, but I should’ve been better on your birthday and she needed an apology for it.”“She appreciated it, even if you don’t seem to think that she’s worthy of that sort of thing. Ma’s a hard pill to swallow most days, but it’s because she cares about everyone and everything far too much. I don’t even know how she can handle being so loving without losin’ her mind every single day, but here we are.” One of Brady’s legs bent upward and he wrapped his arms around his now-bent leg, resting his chin on his knee as best as he could while he looked at Nah. “Now, question is, where’d the money for that gift come from, and how’d you afford that after gettin' me as much as you did just the other day?”“You’re not about to tell me that you’re returning the gift I got you because I gave you too much, are you?” Nah asked, trying to avoid explaining where the money had come from because she didn’t want to admit to it. Living at home with her parents who made more than enough money for them to all live comfortably had allowed for her to have a little extra spending money than most others in her same job, but she still shouldn’t have dropped as much as she did on the presents. “I gave up some of my fun money for the month to make it happen, that’s all.”“The same fun money you’ve been tryin’ to replace for half a year now?” He raised an eyebrow, looking at her primarily through the eye that had a scar running across it. “Somethin’ tells me you’re not bein’ as honest about this as you could be.”“Look, I’m not lying to you about where I got the money from, and you’re right that it’s the same fund that I’ve been trying to rebuild since…well, you know what I spent far too much on, but it was worth it for making some friends happy. Uh, most of our friends happy, I guess?” That was an experience that, while it was a very good time across the board for everyone who attended, Nah had zero interest in ever being in charge of again, and the mere thought of throwing a multi-purpose party for someone a second time made her start to feel sick to her stomach. “Point is, I’ve made back most of that money and got to spend it however I wanted, which in this instance was on you. And your mother.”While he didn’t seem overly convinced that he was hearing the full truth, Brady also didn’t seem like he wanted to keep lobbing accusations of that nature toward his friend, so he visibly relaxed as he sighed. “Understandable, I guess, even if I don’t really agree with you doin’ it in the first place. You gave me more than my parents did, and they’re loaded with money, so it kinda makes it feel like you care more about me or somethin’.”“If we’re being totally honest with ourselves, I think I might care more about you than they do, definitely. Not like that’s a hard bar to reach, given…well, you know.” Nah grimaced as she realized that she’d just doomed herself to needing to say one of her inner thoughts about Maribelle in specific. “Your parents aren’t exactly the most outwardly caring people, even if they clearly love you.”“Hey, I agree with you on that, even if I’d like to pretend Ma cares. Her way of lovin’ me is a lot more rough than most people’s love comes off as.” Laying his leg back down and then kicking them both over the edge of the bed, Brady looked at Nah again, this time less judgmentally and with a bit more peace in his gaze. “Not everyone can be blessed with havin’ parents as cool as yours, Nah.”She couldn’t help herself and ended up snorting and doubling over in laughter at that statement. “I’m sorry, but the word ‘cool’ doesn’t exist in conjunction with my parents. A guy who speaks sort of broken language and a woman who acts like she’s a teenager all the time, that’s so far from what ‘cool’ should be that…I don’t know, maybe you need to get your definition of the word brushed up on or something?”“But your dad literally works all the jobs that people think are too boring and dangerous for others to do, and he does ‘em with a smile every time he’s working. Then there’s your mom, and yeah she acts young, but she acts like a friend and that’s better than Ma and her whole condescending asshole-ness, if you get what I’m sayin’?” Standing most of the way up, Brady leaned over and put his hands on Nah’s shoulders, gripping them tightly until she was looking up into his eyes. “I’d do anythin’ to have parents who were as fun as yours are, Nah, and that’s no exaggeration. You’ve always had the coolest parents out of just about everyone I know.”At a loss for words, Nah found herself just staring up into Brady’s eyes and wishing that she knew what to say in that moment. There were jokes she could crack, comments she could make, requests she could speak into existence, but none of them felt appropriate for the position she’d found herself in. He was so close to her, looking down at her with a wild desperation in his eyes that she’d never seen before, it was almost—The door to the room they were in, which had been left open a crack, came swinging open to the point of hitting the wall behind it loudly. Just like before, Owain’s presence ruined an entire moment, although the current one was a lot more heated than the last one he’d destroyed. “Hey, are the two of you in here getting romantic, or can you put a pause on your conversation and get upstairs so we can start playing? Noire and Laurent are here and they’re ready and I’m obviously ready and that means we just need you two so Morgan can get this show on the road.”“Oh, uh, we’re definitely able to put a pause on the conversation we were having,” Nah muttered, reaching up to try pulling one of Brady’s hands off of herself but finding that he noticed she wanted out and moved his hands before she did. That led to her not grabbing his wrist as intended but instead linking fingers with him for a second, which did nothing but set cylinders in her mind firing that she needed to get out of the room right away.As she was flying up the stairs, she could hear that the guys were still down on the lower floor and were obviously talking about her, but she couldn’t bring herself to care about listening to what they were saying. These Tuesday sessions were starting to become more of a mental drain on her than she’d ever anticipated something becoming, and if things kept up at their current pace she was going to have to quit their campaign outright to keep her sanity intact in some way. Back in the dining room, the others were sitting at the table and seemed happy to have her with them, although it was obvious that Noire was trying to piece together where Nah had been and why she looked so upset about it.No one said a word about what had happened once all of them were in their spots, though, and that was something Nah found herself incredibly thankful for in that moment. Once Morgan started the session and allowed the players to once again immerse themselves in the world of his creation, it was easier to forget all about what had happened downstairs because their real-world problems were no longer worries they needed to contend with. For the next several hours, they were their characters, and their characters weren’t actively dealing with problems such as flirting with each other and giving presents to people’s parents and finding weird dragon statues in their cars, for just a few examples.Nah, able to slip into character as Farona fairly easy all things considered, was once again in the heat of battle and choosing to fight rather than to play support, because she knew that lingering on the sidelines would allow too many thoughts to seep into her mind. She positioned herself where she could flank Noire’s character Zelaia as she lobbed arrow after arrow at enemies before breaking into her rage that she threw into battle every once in a while, and together they made a fairly formidable duo.The only way it could’ve been better would have been if they were able to get another long-range fighter on their side, but everyone else was better at the up-close combat, and they were more than happy to jump into the heat of battle and retreat as needed to get patched up by their dedicated healer. “You know, one of these days, one of you is going to be felled and I won’t be close enough to save you,” Farona said, while Nah looked around at the table before her eyes narrowed toward Owain. “Especially you, Roshan. You are going to be the detriment to this whole group with your reckless nature.”“Those are some big words coming from you,” he replied, holding up his pen to shake towards Nah like a sword. “If we weren’t on the same side of this whole thing, I’d probably challenge you to a fight.”“No fighting within the party,” Morgan sternly reminded him, breaking the illusion that the characters themselves were conversing for just a second before going back to silently watching what was unfolding.Brady cleared his throat to get everyone’s attention, and once he had it he spoke, as his character. “The big voice out there’s right, no fighting within our group. We’ve gotta be a unified team if we want to make it out of here alive.”“Unified? I’d rather fight for myself and happen to have you around as backup,” Laurent interjected, putting on his best cat-like voice to really sell who he was speaking as. “Once we’ve solved these problems and cleared this dungeon, I feel that it’ll be time we go our separate ways, take on the world as individuals rather than as this pathetic team we’ve built.”The banter went on for the next ten minutes, everyone chiming in and going back and forth about what they should do once they finished clearing the dungeon and how none of them particularly liked each other and would be better off separating. Eventually, it got to the point that Morgan had to throw a random encounter at them to get them to shut up, and the team once again fell into their usual roles to take care of business. This time, Nah’s role as Farona was not just to hang back and help out with keeping others from dying, but rather to lob magic spells that she wasn’t sure she was even using correctly.That was because, in the heat of the battle, Brady’s phone had started going off and he’d been reluctant to ignore it, and understandably so. The call was coming from his mother, and everyone there knew just how much of a problem it could become if Maribelle was ignored in any capacity; because of wanting to be alone when he answered it, he had to step away from the table and therefore skip out on his turns as combat continued. Since his character was the group’s bard, and had been doing a lot of magic-lobbing himself, in his absence it was either Nah or Owain needing to fill in the void, and there was no way that Owain was ever going to let his human warlock do anything but slash at enemies.Not that it was a big problem for Nah, given that she’d taken on the cleric class to fill a gap that existed within the overall team composition and she needed to learn how to do the magic casting at some point. Morgan was able to walk her through her offensive spells quickly, and even remarked on how she’d set herself up for success with the choices she’d made on her spells. Even if the rolls she made were less than ideal, the spells were still hitting with a decent amount of force behind them and she was being helpful in the battle where she wouldn’t have been otherwise.When Brady returned to the table, he looked like he’d been crying and sat down without saying a word, only to reach up and rub at the corner of one of his eyes. “Sorry about that, Ma called me to tell me about somethin’ that happened earlier and she forgot I was here doin’ this and she was…gonna try and save it for later but she mentioned what it was and I needed to hear all of it, got it? Just let me cry and handle it myself.”“I wasn’t planning on taking a break during this part of the session, but I think we need it right now,” Morgan said, sounding slightly defeated as he had to change his plans to accommodate the needs of others. “We can meet back at the table in fifteen, and hopefully we’re all emotionally good to go at that point.”The first second it wasn’t going to be seen as a disruption to everyone else, Nah reached over and grabbed Brady’s arm, holding it as tight as she could. “Do you want to talk about what happened, or are you still trying to process it?” she asked quietly, trying to give him the dignity of not making it everyone’s problem.“It’s just stupid and dumb and you’re gonna laugh about it if you hear me tell you about it,” he replied, his voice cracking a bit as he spoke. “That goes for everyone, this is gonna be the funniest damn thing anyone’s ever heard if I tell you why I’m cryin’ and that’s the truth.”“I don’t plan on laughing if I hear it,” Noire said to him, holding up her hands defensively. “Even if it’s as silly as you say it is, I promise I won’t laugh.”“Same here, you know I’ll treat whatever you have to say with respect.” Nah gave a small nod to show that she was in agreement with Noire’s words, yet Brady still seemed unconvinced and didn’t want to speak.It wasn’t until Owain, Laurent, and Morgan all stepped away from the table for their individual reasons that Brady took the ladies up on their offer. “Ma called because she was just at the instrument repair place and they said that there’s nothin’ that can be done to fix my violin,” he whispered to them, both ladies looking at each other before back at him in disbelief. “Yeah, I know, kinda stupid and dumb and all that, but I’ve had that thing since I could even play a violin and now it’s broken and it’s all my fault for bein’ dumb with it.”“Neither of us are laughing at you, we don’t think this is stupid at all,” Nah pointed out, although when she glanced at Noire she could see that there was some sort of negative thought brewing in her friend’s mind. “Come on now, we all know what it’s like to find out that something we love can’t be repaired.”“I mean, you’re right about that, I suppose.” Noire’s eyes shifted down to the table and their little character tokens still set up all over it. “I’ve lost my fair share of things I loved because of my own recklessness.”“And I’ve…I don’t think you guys need to be reminded of this, but I’m not the best driver around and I’ve lost a car or two over being so bad at driving.” Nah wasn’t going to mention the addendum to that fact, that she hadn’t actually ever wrecked a vehicle, but had lost them in various other ways that had resulted from her bad driving. “So I get it, losing your violin’s tough and it’s going to be hard to work through this sadness.”His eyes closing, Brady took in a shaky breath before saying, “That thing’s how I make my money, you know. Goin’ around, taking part in shows and workin’ for people who just want a bit of classical music in their life. And now it’s broken into three pieces and those pieces ain’t gettin' put back together.”“That really sucks that it happened, and I hope you can get a new one or something.” Not sure what else there was to say, Nah thought for a second before adding, “If you need help with getting the money for it, I’m sure we can—”“Don’t rope me into raising money for a musical instrument. I’m not helping there.”“—fine, since Noire wants nothing to do with it, I’m sure I can help you get a bit of money to replace it.” When she’d come up with that offer, Nah had imagined it as being a crowdfunding type endeavor where everyone pitched in a little bit to help with the cost, but the second Noire had spoken her disapproval, she realized it would probably be just her trying to offer money. “The church, I bet they’d be open to helping with getting funds for the replacement, since I know you’ve played for them in the past.”“That’s really sweet of you to think about that, Nah, but Ma’s already said she has a plan to get me a new violin sooner rather than later. She’s got the money burnin’ a hole in her pocket, after all, so it’s not gonna be that huge of a problem for her to solve. Biggest issue I see is findin’ one that my hands and arms can play comfortably, since a lot of violins are just…too small for me to hold in a way that doesn’t hurt.” Brady raised his arms to give a visual demonstration of what his problem was, but because neither of them had ever used a violin for themselves, it wasn’t the best explanation.“You get your problem all taken care of, or should I step away again?” Morgan asked as he approached the table once more, looking at the three who hadn’t left. When he didn’t get an answer he took a single step backward, before shaking his head and coming to his seat again anyway. “I’m taking the silence as an invitation to get back so I can get ready to resume the session. Don’t mind me, I’ll be preparing more enemy encounters.”Before she had the chance to open her mouth and sass Morgan for what he’d said, Nah heard her phone ringing in her pocket and she blinked a few times before checking it. “Why’s my dad calling me?” she asked out loud when she saw the screen and her father’s picture on full display. “He’s not even in Ylisse right now, this doesn’t make any sense.”“Better hope he’s not dealing with broken violins,” Noire teasingly told her, waggling a finger in Brady’s direction to remind them both about what they’d been talking about moments before. “But seriously, hope everything’s okay with him, your dad’s pretty neat.”Nah didn’t even have time to think up a reply before she was answering the call and rushing toward the staircase heading toward the lower floor. “Dad, is everything okay?” she asked immediately upon getting her phone to her face. “You never call me, and you definitely never call when you’re doing work stuff.”“Hm? Oh, everything is fine here with Gregor and the guys,” he replied after a tense handful of seconds during which Nah had made it down the stairs and back into that guest bedroom she’d been in before the session. “Are you at home right now, or are you with your friends?”“Friends, definitely with friends. Is Mom not answering her phone?” A pit was beginning to form in Nah’s stomach at the mere idea that her mother, who was perpetually connected to the digital world as a reclamation of her youth (even though the digital world hadn’t really been a thing until she was an adult), was unable to answer her phone for some reason. Despite how she acted, Nowi was a lot older than she would care to admit, and any sort of problem that would leave her unable to receive a call could be a serious one.“Your mother was on the phone with me when she suddenly left without saying why, and there has been no explanation since then. It’s no secret to Gregor that you like your time with your friends, Nah, but could you please go check on my Nowi for me?” There was a hint of genuine desperation in Gregor’s voice that Nah couldn’t ignore, and she wasn’t going to tell him no, no matter how much she wanted to stick around for the second half of the night’s session.“I’ll be on my way home right now. Thanks for calling me and letting me know about this, Dad. I hope everything’s okay.” Nah said her goodbyes after repeating her assurances a couple of times, and soon she was back upstairs looking a bit downtrodden as she came to tell her friends the bad news.“Let me guess, your dad needs you to go home for some reason,” Morgan dryly guessed, looking up from his materials to see Nah give an uncertain expression before nodding. “That’s how it always seems to go around here, isn’t it?”She already was worried about the reason she’d been asked to head home, and now Nah was having to deal with disappointing one of her friends, but family had to come first in a moment like that. “Sorry, but my dad’s worried sick about what might’ve happened to my mom and I’m not letting her suffer alone if something’s really wrong. I’ll be here next week, and that’s a promise.”As she turned to go get her things and head out, another voice chimed in to stop her in her tracks. “If it’s no problem with the rest of you, I’d like to go with Nah to make sure things are fine. If something is wrong, she’s not strong enough physically to get her mom off the ground or anything like that, and I’d like to be able to help where I can.” She turned around just in time to see Brady standing from his chair and striding toward her, and she wasn’t about to tell him he wasn’t welcome.Instead, she asked him the question that came to mind when he made his request of the others. “Isn’t that going to leave you without a way to get anywhere, since you drove over here and all?”“Didn’t drive over today, got a ride with Owain. Don’t know why I did that, but I guess the reason for it makes sense now.” He clasped a hand on the top of Nah’s head for a second before continuing on his way to where the jackets and shoes were gathered. “Let’s get goin’ before there’s the chance anything else can happen.”On one hand, Nah was more than happy to have someone stay with her to calm her nerves if she started getting too into her own mind about things. On the other hand, she wasn’t exactly thrilled that it was going to be Brady of all people. And on the mystical third hand, she was still annoyed that Morgan was going to get to escape explaining himself for the dragon statue for at least another week. “Thanks for tagging along, and sorry about this again, everyone! I promise next week will be different.”“Care less about appeasing us and care more about checking on your mother,” Laurent called in return, sounding the most concerned Nah could ever remember him being, which wasn’t saying much in the slightest.“He’s right, you know,” Brady said, in the process of getting his shoes on. “It’s not exactly a short drive from here to your place, even though I’m sure whatever’s happened isn’t bad enough to be time-sensitive. Better safe than sorry, though, yeah?”“Y-yeah, better safe than sorry,” Nah repeated, the warmness she’d felt in the past when talking to and about Brady beginning to course through her veins again. When they walked out to her car, she was mentally fighting with her inner voice telling her to reach over and grab his hand, but she resisted given the circumstances of why they were leaving together in the first place. As she got into the driver’s seat, she went through the mental checklist of all the warnings and reminders she needed to give someone riding with her, but when she opened her mouth to verbally deliver them, he hushed her on the spot.In fact, the only thing he said when getting into the car after moving his seat back as far as it could go, was asking about where to put the decorative dragon that was currently residing in the seat. He didn’t seem to think anything of it, strange or unique or any other qualifier he could’ve had in mind, but when she asked him to place it gently on the back seat, he chuckled. “For it bein’ something that lives in your car, I wouldn’t expect you to want me to be gentle with it.”“Look, it’s not actually mine and I don’t want it broken, just in case the person it does belong to wants it back in one piece.” That felt like the best way to approach that topic, given that she was only mostly sure that it was Morgan’s, but if he’d wanted it or was trying to pawn it off on someone else, she didn’t know. “Can we not worry about the dragon and just get going? I don’t want to get home to my mom dying on the floor or something.”“…Should you be drivin’ if your brain’s jumpin’ to those kinds of conclusions?” Brady asked her, a valid question to raise given that she was clearly not being as rational as she should’ve been. However, Nah answered him by buckling herself in and demanding he get into his seat and do the same, something he responded to with a whimper and following the directions. Yes, she shouldn’t have been driving because her motivation to get home was emotional and led her to make risky decisions while driving, but they didn’t get into any trouble and she didn’t run any stops that she shouldn’t have, so the return trip was a success, somehow.Upon getting into the house, Nah was met with Nowi sitting on the couch, bundled up in a bunch of blankets with a cheesy romance movie on the TV screen. “You’re home early,” Nowi said when she realized her daughter was standing there, followed by looking at the tall, physically-imposing man standing directly behind her. “And you’ve brought someone home with you.”“Mom, what’s going on?” Nah asked, trying to sound commanding even though she was more confused than anything else. “Dad called me and told me that something happened to you because you dropped mid-call and didn’t reconnect with him, and he wanted me to come by and check to see if you were okay.”“Oh, is that what this is about? I guess the call stopped when the phone hit the…” Nowi trailed off, looking at the TV long enough to pause her movie before standing up from the couch and shedding all of her blankets. “I dropped my phone into the bathtub while filling it for a nice, lovely bubble bath. Must have not stayed connected to the call after it hit the water, so Gregor didn’t hear me yelling about dropping it in the first place. Mind letting me use your phone to call him back?”“Depends, are you going to drop it in the bathtub too?” The look Nowi gave Nah for that comment was particularly icy, and the younger woman flinched from it, grabbing her phone and handing it to her mother without another word. “Thanks, Nah, I always know I can count on you. Let me patch things up with your father, and then you can tell me why you’ve brought another guy into my house.”Nah rolled her eyes and turned to Brady, who seemed to still be dealing the confusion the whole situation had brought upon them. “I knew she’d act like that the moment she saw you around with me, but I sort of…figured it would’ve happened later, because I thought she was dying or something.”“Ma does the same stuff, back in the day she used to be a real pain in the neck about bringin’ Severa over.” Shaking his head, Brady took a small side-step toward the door, almost as if he was ready to leave already. “Come on, I don’t think either of us wanna be dealin’ with the conversation your mom’s gonna have with us when she’s done talkin’ to your dad.”“Normally I’d agree, but she’s kind of got my phone and, well, you know me and driving aren’t exactly friends. I’d rather know I can call if something happens to my car than be at the mercy of needing to actually drive safely.” Motioning for Brady to follow her, Nah headed to the giant window overlooking the back yard, which was covered in shadows outside of the area the indoors light streamed out to. “If the weather was warmer, I’d suggest going out there and doing some stargazing or something like that, to pass the time while we wait for Mom to finish with my phone.”“Why would you bother with tryin’ to stargaze here in town, when there’s so many city lights that you can barely see anything?” Brady sounded like he knew a thing or two about the way to properly stargaze, and so Nah looked over her shoulder to see what he was doing. He was about halfway between where he’d originally been standing and where she was now, eyes narrowed as he looked toward the window directly over Nah’s head. “Back when we were younger, I’d go out to Owain’s place all the time and we’d be out on the trampoline in his backyard, starin’ up at the sky until it was covered in stars. Those were some good times, that’s for sure.”“So what I’m hearing is that we need to get out into farmland to get to see all the stars in the sky, got it,” Nah said with a nod. “My backyard’s still pretty good for it, since we’re not really in the thick of Ylisstol. But yeah, I bet it’d be better out there where it’s pitch black everywhere you look.”“It’s an experience, that’s for sure. Been over a decade since I last did it, but I’d do it again if I could. Bet Owain would be happy to have us out there.” Brady paused, before stepping closer to Nah and looking down at her. “I still spend a lot of time with him, and it’s been even more lately because all of his other close friends aren’t exactly available anymore, but I know one of these days that jerk friend of his is gonna come back and he’s never gonna want to hang out with us again.”“Jerk friend…oh, you mean that Niles guy, don’t you?” Nah’s face scrunched at saying the name of the man she’d only run into a few times, but that she’d hoped she would never have to meet again. When Brady nodded to confirm her guess, she gave a long sigh. “Of course that’s who you mean. I don’t get what Owain sees in that guy, he’s gross and rude and is always making nasty comments about others.”The corners of his mouth turning up in amusement, Brady said, “I know exactly what he sees in Niles, and it’s somethin’ I’d rather not think about. N-not that it’s anything particularly bad, it’s just that…Owain sees Niles as a way out of Ylisse, and he’s hopin’ that he’ll be able to make that happen one of these days. Then he’ll be gone just like Sev is, and while that’s fine, that’s great honestly, it’ll suck for me who gets left behind.”“He wouldn’t ever dream of leaving Ylisse and all of his family and friends behind!” Nah felt slightly impassioned as she spoke, even though she knew that Owain did in fact intend on finding Niles back in his home country. That was something she didn’t want to mention to Brady and make the situation even worse than it already was, so she kept her lips firmly zipped on the matter and pretended like she was ignorant to the truth. “I highly doubt he’d go without his parents, at the very least, and we both know they’re not leaving this place.”“Y…yeah, I think you’re right on that. Thanks for remindin’ me of reality here, Nah. Greatly appreciate it.” That was when Brady came over to scoop Nah up in a big hug as part of his way of thanking her.And that was when Nowi reentered the room, holding Nah’s phone out in front of her and calling for her daughter to come get it. As Nah was being hugged at the moment, she couldn’t do anything to stop the inevitable drama that was about to unfold, and she had to be helpless as Nowi saw that Brady had his arms all over her daughter. “Excuse me, sir, but who gave you the right to be like a bear on my little girl just now?”“Mom, please, we’re not doing this…” Nah muttered, as she was released from the hug so that Brady could turn around and face Nowi in all of her annoyance and disappointment.“Mrs. Balakin, I didn’t mean any harm by huggin’ Nah, she was just helpin’ me understand that one of my fears isn’t rational and that I’m gettin' worried over nothing.” Brady, for being tall and physically intimidating, seemed to shrink back and get smaller as he was stared down by the absolutely tiny Nowi, with her empty hand curled up on her hip. “You can even ask Nah herself, she’ll back me up.”“Of course she’ll back you up, the two of you were probably in here arranging the cover story while I was on the phone with my loving husband.” Nowi gave a long, drawn-out breath as she leaned forward, trying to look scarier than she was capable of being. “Do I need to call your mother and tell her what behaviors you’re up to?”“Behaviors? I wasn’t up to anythin’ at all!”Nah stepped around where Brady was to get in between him and her mother, reaching out for her phone and snatching it from Nowi’s hand so that it couldn’t be used as a bargaining chip in the whole situation. “Mom, seriously, I don’t know what your problem is with me having friends that are guys, but you need to cool it! I was honestly just telling Brady that the stuff he’s thinking about isn’t realistic, and he hugged me for it.”“Likely story.” Her nose twitching as she scrunched it slightly, Nowi locked eyes with Nah for an extended moment. “I don’t want you rushing into things that you’re not ready for, with guys that you barely know.”“Now I know you’re just being annoying for the sake of it, you know I’ve known Brady for most of my life at this point.” Nah matched her mother’s nose scrunch, before getting her mother to break into a fit of laughter at the absurdity of what they were currently arguing about. “See, told you that you’re just being annoying.”“Ever the old woman in a young lady’s body, you can’t put up with even the slightest of jokes,” Nowi said, reaching up to brush her long bangs out of her eyes so that she could see properly. “I’m getting back to watching my movies, but I need Brady out of here as soon as possible, before I’m falling asleep on the couch and he’s still here and the two of you are getting up to Naga knows what.”“Mom! Stop implying that I bring guy friends over to sleep with them!” The irritation in her voice came off a lot stronger than the situation called for, and Nowi’s reaction to it was to mumble an apology to her daughter before returning to her space on the couch. As she walked away, Nah looked at Brady with an apologetic expression of her own. “Sorry about all of that, but I knew it’d be coming. She seriously does this every single time a guy comes home with me.”“It’s a bit more extreme than what Ma does,” he conceded, almost surprised that he’d just witnessed something that his mother didn’t do in a more infuriating manner. “But I’m down for following your mom’s wishes and gettin' out of here soon. Ma’s probably expectin’ me over at the house soon anyway.”The mere thought of having to potentially cross paths with Maribelle after everything else that had happened that night made Nah feel slightly sick, but she wasn’t about to tell Brady he needed to fend for himself on his way home. “Right. I’m ready to go if you are.”He nodded at her, and they went back across the house to the front door, ignoring Nowi and the trashy movie she’d gotten back into watching. No one said a word until the two were in the car and able to feel like they could breathe without being judged in some way. “Your mom hasn’t always acted this way, has she?” Brady asked abruptly. “I don’t remember her doin’ all this stuff back when we were younger.”“It’s something to do with this being the year of the dragon. She’s always been on edge about me bringing people home but lately it’s been even more intense. I think she’s worried that I’m going to fall into behaviors that I don’t actually have any interest in.” Nah waved a hand in the air as if she was trying to brush off that thought. “I don’t plan on making any dumb choices this year, and if I did make any, it certainly wouldn’t be those kinds of choices.”“Yeah, can’t say I’m followin’ you on this one, but if you think you know what’s goin’ on, then that’s good enough for me, I think.” Brady punctuated his sentence with fastening his seatbelt, then as he pulled his hand away he froze and looked at Nah with horror plastered across his face. “Wait, I think I’m followin’ you now, are you sayin’ that your mom thinks you’re gonna start sleeping with guys out of nowhere?”“I don’t just think that, I know that she thinks I’m going to. Which, uh, hello? That’s not me, that’s never been me, I’ve had cutesy little boyfriends in the past but we never even got to hand holding, why would I suddenly be jumping from struggling with commitment to full on sexual behaviors?” Nah began letting her car roll backwards down the driveway, slowly as to not rush them through their conversation. “I mean, I get why she’s scared of it, given that…other cultures apparently push that behavior? But she’s forgetting that I’m her odd duck of a daughter and I’m not going to fall into those traps.”“Sorry, but you’ve never even held hands with a guy before?” Brady’s mind was clearly trying to fixate on the less problematic parts of the conversation they were having, and honestly, Nah couldn’t blame him. She confirmed that he’d understood her correctly and he gave a sound of surprise about it. “I never would’ve guessed that’s the case, I know some of those boyfriends you had were pretty handsy.”“They might’ve been with others, but with me? Not even close.” The car was almost entirely out in the street before Nah started turning the wheel and shifting into gear to get driving, but she didn’t mind that she was once again acting reckless with her driving. It wasn’t like they lived on a busy street where the action would’ve been dangerous to her safety. “I know that you’ve had quite the list of relationships yourself, and at least one of them went places I can’t even imagine.”“Who’re you talkin’ about with that? Sev? Because if you heard it from her, I want you to know that she’s nothin’ but an overdramatic liar about that sort of thing. I never slept with her and I definitely never slept with her.” The look on Brady’s face having to make that assertion was one that Nah wished she could’ve seen more of, but driving was more important than seeing how serious he was that he hadn’t been sleeping with his most notable former girlfriend. “Closest we ever got was somethin’ I’d rather not think about ever again, but it wasn’t even that close.”“Noted, thanks for sharing.”“Look, you’re the one who started talkin’ about that, and I can’t let you throw that sort of accusation my way without defendin’ my honor. Ma would have my damn head if I’d even gotten close to gettin' intimate with anyone back then.” Brady paused, then groaned. “I mean, she’d have my head if I did it now too, unless I was already married to whoever it was, and even then, who knows how she’d handle it. Would probably depend on who the lady is and how she feels about her.”While it wasn’t an appropriate time for making the kind of comment that had come to her mind, Nah found herself unable to resist saying something. “Then I guess it’s settled, we can’t ever become a thing because your mother absolutely hates me and would never let you be happy about the relationship.”“Uh, well, then it’s good that I don’t think I want to date you right now?” He said it as a question, but it was clear that Brady wasn’t looking for any sort of answer to what he’d said. The words hit Nah hard, given the feelings she’d been grappling with over him and how he could’ve been someone she saw herself getting romantic with eventually, but it wasn’t something she was going to talk about. “Maybe someday in the future we can look at that, if we’re both thirty and single, but right now we’re…you know, mid-twenties, still a lot of life to live, don’t need to strap ourselves to one of our closest friends just to get a little bit of companionship in our lives.”“Totally agree with you there,” Nah replied, masking her true feelings on the matter with a forced smile. “But I’ll hold you to that. This time, six years from now, if we’re both still single then we’ll have to consider just, you know, getting together to say we’re with someone and go from there.”“Tax benefits, that’s what Ma calls those kinds of relationships. I can’t say I get it, but she’s a lawyer so she probably deals a lot with dissolvin’ marriages that only happened for the money.” Turning to look out the window at the dark houses they were driving past, Brady made a few noises that showed he was trying to come up with something else to say, but words never formed.That was fine by Nah, because she didn’t know what there was she wanted to say either. She felt a little upset by the turn of events there that evening, on top of everything else she’d had to experience prior to being called home earlier than intended. It almost felt like the world was dead-set on making her suffer in one way or another, and given that the year they were living in was apparently meant to be good to the manaketes, it made her wonder if there was anything she’d done that had caused Naga to want to punish her in all these ways.When she pulled up outside Brady’s house, she could barely muster a goodbye before feeling like she was just wasting her time on things. She didn’t want to make it obvious that she wasn’t thrilled with how their conversation had gone, so she forced herself to sound happy as she chirped out a good night, but the second the door was closed and he was on his way up to his front door, she was peeling off into the street, her emotions getting the better of her. “I never should’ve let myself get convinced that he felt anything for me,” she cried as she drove, her foot easily hitting the floor of the car as she sped off, faster and faster with every second that passed. “I’m stupid for thinking anyone would ever actually want to date me. If someone wanted to do it, they would’ve done it by now!”The only reason Nah snapped out of her upset behavior was the tell-tale flashing lights of a police officer catching her speeding down residential streets, and no matter how much she thought her day had sucked before, it could only get worse by having to talk to a police officer and deal with paying for a speeding ticket. Not even the saddest puppy-dog eyes and insistence that she’d just gone through a breakup (which she hadn’t) was enough to get the officer who pulled her over to even reduce the fine slightly, and she was forced to face the immediate consequences of her actions. Things sucked before, they sucked even more now, and the money she could have easily dropped on paying her speeding ticket had already been spent on a guy that didn’t like her and his mother that hated her.Ever since the start of the year of the dragon, Tuesdays had been nothing but horrible for Nah, and she was looking forward to when that would finally change.Of all the weeks to start her new role at Ribbon’s school, that one was simply the worst to do it on. Nah’s mind had been scrambled with how hard she was trying to avoid needing to tell her parents about the ticket she’d received, as well as thinking about how she was going to try and patch things up with Brady as well as get to the bottom of things with Morgan and the dragon statue in her car. She simply hadn’t thought much at all about how she was going to be a fixture at that school twice a week, and so when Friday morning came around and she was driving up to the school she’d typically only gone to on Tuesdays, nothing seemed planned out at all. There was nothing set up for what she’d be doing, no blueprint for the kinds of guidance she’d be there to provide, nothing at all.And that lack of planning and preparation was what led her to spending the whole day writing reports in her office space, with Ribbon occasionally popping by and looking into the room before scurrying off. The first time it happened, Nah didn’t think much of it, but after the fourth hour where she saw Ribbon’s face in her window without so much as a wave, she began to suspect that something was amiss. By the time lunch came around, Nah had decided that she was going to go grab the girl and check in with her then, rather than potentially subject her to bullying during that break time, and so she tucked her paperwork away and headed toward the cafeteria.Upon Nah entering the spacious room, the gathered students began to fall quiet, and even though there never was true silence in that space, it was just quiet enough that it was obvious everyone’s eyes were on her. Not that it mattered to Nah, but she knew it would matter to Ribbon if she called any attention to her in that way, so she quickly had to divert her path away from where the girl was sitting by herself to try and shake off the idea that she was there for Ribbon specifically.“Hey, mind if I check in with you guys?” Nah asked a group of girls who seemed snooty enough that they could use some redirection in their lives. Most of them stared blankly at her and laughed, before the supposed leader of the group said, in a very haughty tone, that she and her friends didn’t have special needs and didn’t need her help. That irked Nah, to the point that she sat down in the open space next to them anyway, letting the comment roll right off her shoulders. “On Fridays, I’m not here as a special needs instructor, I’m here to monitor mental health of students. And guess what, you’re students so you’re on my caseload today. Congrats.”“We’re not weirdos, we don’t have ‘problems’ like that,” the leader replied, batting her eyelashes that were clearly fake and glued to her face. “I think if you want to make sure that people aren’t going to try and kill themselves, you might be looking at the wrong table.”Nah’s eyes widened as she realized that some of the girls there were motioning over in the vague direction that Ribbon was sitting in. Still, she couldn’t make things worse for Ribbon by making it clear she was the reason for all of this in the first place, so she had to scramble to come up with a response. “Suicidal ideation isn’t the only reason for mental health checks,” she explained, knowing that she was speaking far out of her element on that one. “Delusions of grandeur are also a reason for them.”“I don’t know what that means,” one of the other girls said, her face caked so heavily in makeup that she must have cost her parents a sizeable allowance on the regular for her beauty regimen, “but I do know that you’re an adult, and adults aren’t welcome here. You’re going to make the boys think that we, like, follow rules or something.”“We’re above the rules here,” the leader added, most of the others nodding in agreement. “Teachers can’t punish us, our parents won’t let them.”“You’re all like twelve years old, there’s no reason for you to be this way.” Standing up as she realized that she was not going to make any progress with that group and didn’t want to be wasting her time with them any longer, Nah shook her head at their entire posse. “I’m ashamed to now know what the current generation thinks is appropriate. You ladies all can do much, much better than this.”As she walked away, deciding that mortifying Ribbon would be fine after all, Nah could hear the girls snickering and calling rude names after her, as the roar of the cafeteria picked back up to what she assumed was its normal volume. “Don’t sit here,” Ribbon firmly told her as she came closer. “I want to have lunch alone.”“Sorry, Ribbon, but I’m here for you and I’m not letting you push me out.” The nearest kids were several seats away, and there were some faces turned looking at them as Nah sat down and put her hands on the table in front of herself, but she needed to do this for Ribbon’s sake. “Has the bullying kept going, even after what happened before?”“The girls you were sitting with, they’re some of the ones doing it. I guess they heard what I tried to do somehow and it’s been…worse than it’s ever been.” Ribbon’s eyes shifted to the table. “I don’t know why I even told you about it.”Making the mental note to go to the principal and discuss how that was a problem in plain terms, Nah glanced toward the gaggle of girls, several of which were looking over at them and one having grabbed her hair and wrapped it around her neck, only to turn back to Ribbon and see her shrinking down toward her lunch. “I’m not going to talk about any of that, then,” she decided, tapping her fingers across the table slowly until they were on Ribbon’s lunchbox. “Did you make this lunch yourself?”“Dad made it this morning, it’s all leftovers from last night’s dinner but it’s still good.” Ribbon’s voice was quiet and small, unlike her in every way possible. “I wish I could’ve eaten it at home, though.”“Is your mom at home right now?” Nah asked, feeling like she was making progress in getting through to Ribbon, if only a little. “I would assume she is, if you think you’d be able to eat at home.”“I don’t know. You can call and ask her.”Letting her head knock back slowly and then come forward once more, Nah wasn’t sure how to respond to that, given that Ribbon had just closed up yet again. “I’m not calling her to ask anything, sorry.”“Then have your mom do it.”“Ribbon, no one is calling anyone right now. If anyone is telling your mother what’s happening, it’s someone who’s responsible for this behavior in the first place. Not you, not me, and especially not my mom.” Just the mental image of Nowi being responsible for relaying information of that nature to someone was one that Nah quickly scrubbed from her mind. “I’m planning on speaking to—”She was cut off by Ribbon sliding down under the table. “Stop speaking to people for me! You’ve only made things worse!”“Ribbon, get up from under there.” No response. “Seriously, that’s dirty and you’re making more of a scene than you probably want to be.” Still no response, other than a small sniffle. “I’m not joining you down there, just so you know.”“I don’t want you down here anyway.”None of her training had ever prepared Nah for needing to deal with this sort of situation, but she wasn’t going to let a group of preteen bullies get the upper hand on a child she genuinely cared for. While she waited for Ribbon to emerge from her hiding place, she thought about all of the ways she could approach bringing those girls to justice, only to find that every possibility didn’t matter when the children were the ones in control. As long as the teachers and staff at the school had no power over the students, there would be no solution to the problem that had been plaguing Ribbon for as long as she’d been in school. “I think I’m going to go back to my office now,” she said after giving it several minutes but still not having Ribbon emerge from under the table. “You know where to find me if you want.”She wasn’t followed out of the cafeteria, wasn’t called after as she left, and wasn’t chased down by those rapid-fire footsteps she was so used to, and the lack of any of that showed Nah just how deeply this bullying was bothering Ribbon. So even though she’d said she wasn’t going to be doing any calling, she went back on her word and called the district offices to let them know about the serious undermining of staff and endangerment of students taking place at the school. It wasn’t technically a lie she’d told Ribbon, because the person she spoke to wasn’t one of the ones that had been mentioned, but she did know that it was potentially going to have consequences that Ribbon and the other students would have to face.Nah went back to her paperwork after that, and spent the rest of the day in that office doing the opposite of what she’d expected she’d be doing while there on her former day off. As dismissal came near, she checked her email and saw that the principal had messaged out to everyone employed in the building that an “anonymous” report had come in that there was a lack of respect from students to the staff and that there needed to be training done in the future regarding how to handle that sort of behavior.“It’s a start,” Nah said under her breath as she deleted the email, “but something tells me that’s not going to be enough to turn this place around, not with brats like those girls thinking they’re running everything.”A couple of minutes later, a knock came at the office door and Nah looked up from her laptop to see Ribbon there at the door, her eyes piercing through the little window. She waved her inside and the girl came in, looking like she’d been through hell and back in the time since lunch. “I finished a test early and got to come down here as a reward,” she explained, still quiet like she’d been in the cafeteria. “I asked if I could come see Miss Dinah and my teacher was chill about it. Are you proud of me?”“For which part, using one of my professional names or actually asking to use your resources?” Nah replied, cracking a smile at Ribbon, despite getting nothing in return. “I am proud for both parts, by the way. You’re really showing that you’re growing.”“Right, yeah. I just wanted to get down here to get away from the mocking. Mom’s going to be so mad at me but I’m asking to get my hair cut after this, because I can’t take this anymore.” Ribbon grabbed her long braid and swung its end around a few times before throwing it behind her, slamming herself down into one of the chairs in the office. “I already know that Mom’s going to get upset because it’s not taguel-like to have short hair, but I just can’t take it. I really can’t.”While it felt instinctual to ask Ribbon if she was making her choice on impulse or if she’d really thought about it, Nah decided that she wasn’t going to address it at all. That was something that Ribbon would need to take up with her mother on her own. “I understand that you’re going through a lot right now, so just make yourself comfortable right there and when the bell rings, you can head out and go home for the day. I’m not going to ask you anything, I’m not going to try and be all professional therapist or anything with you, I’m just going to sit here and keep doing my own work so you can decompress.”Ribbon raised her eyebrows at Nah but didn’t say anything, merely pulling her legs up into the chair with her so that she was somewhat curled up in a ball as she sat there, waiting for that dismissal bell to blare through the room. The silence between them was almost bizarre, almost, given that usually when they were together Ribbon was talking about whatever was on her mind and Nah was trying to get her to go do something else. If only it hadn’t been prefaced with such a broken admission of what was going to play out after school, then it really would have been the most bizarre experience possible.After several minutes of that silence, Nah looked at the time in the corner of her computer and saw how close to the end of the day it really was, taking in a deep breath as she glanced toward Ribbon and how she was still curled up. “How are your parents doing, by the way?” she asked, hoping to fill the silent air with a bit of light conversation while they let the last couple of minutes before school ended pass them by. “I feel like I never hear about how things are going.”“Ask them yourself.”The expected response, muffled by Ribbon’s knees pressing against her face. “Right, I suppose I can do that,” Nah said, nodding slowly. “How about your sister? How’s she doing?”“Ask my parents when you ask them how they’re doing.”More words, but still nothing that Nah really wanted to hear. She looked at the clock again, noting that there was under a minute before the bell would ring and Ribbon would be bolting out of the office to head home. “What about your brother?”“I know you know how to ask him how he’s doing.” At least that time, Ribbon’s head perked up a little so that she could give Nah a very annoyed glance. “And before you even try it, ask him about the others, don’t ask me about them.”“It was worth a shot,” Nah admitted in defeat, knowing that she had been successful in doing one thing during that exchange: she’d gotten Ribbon to at least look at her while they were talking. “I’ll reach out to all of them this weekend, I suppose.”Right on cue, the bell rang through the office and Ribbon sprung up from the chair, not even giving Nah a goodbye as she headed out the door, letting it slam behind her. At least, that was the case until she came back moments later, hanging her head slightly. “Thanks for letting me sit with you for a bit, Nah,” Ribbon said, lifting her head only to give Nah a playful smile, one that felt right at home on her face under normal circumstances. “I’ll see you on Tuesday…and I’ll let my parents know you were asking about how they’re doing.”“Thanks for that, Ribbon. Have a good one.” It was strange, watching the girl leave the office again with a bit more pep in her step after everything that had happened, but Nah had no idea what she was supposed to do about any of it. She had no control over the bullies, no control over how the students at the school reacted to authority or their classmates, and there was ultimately very little she could do for Ribbon, except offer her a safe space to hang out when things got bad.Something told her that things were going to stay bad for that girl through the end of the school year, but she couldn’t be certain of that. Nah wasn’t in a position to do much, but as long as she had her job at the school, she was going to try doing as much as she could. As she packed her things to head home for the weekend, her eyes fell on an envelope that she’d thought she’d thrown away and she had a sinking realization that perhaps there was something else she could do beyond anonymous reports and going to the administration that seemed ineffective in their power.But how desperate was she about things to try reaching out to Maribelle about getting involved in some way? That was going to be the last resort, going to the actual president of the school board of the district to see what could be done about the rampant bullying taking place in the schools. But given everything that she knew about how the school was faring, it might’ve already been time to go through with the last resort option. “Ugh, I’ll think about dealing with her next week,” she declared, shaking her head to try and clear the idea from it. “I don’t want to spend my time off thinking about one of the nastiest people I know.”If only Nah knew that she wasn’t going to be able to escape dealing with difficult people over the weekend that easily.It had been at Nowi’s suggestion that Nah went out to the store that Saturday, because Nah was more than content with just sitting at home and doing nothing with her day. “Come on, I’ll even let you keep the change if you go out for me,” her mother had said, waving a fair amount of cash in Nah’s face as they stood in the doorway to the younger woman’s bedroom. “I just don’t want to have to put pants on to go shopping. I’m sure you understand.”“I’ll do it, if you promise me that you’ll give me an actual list of what you need from the store, instead of telling me some vague details and expecting me to fill in the blanks.” Nah reached her hand out for the money, but Nowi didn’t relinquish it right away, as she hemmed and hawed over the idea of making a true shopping list. “Mom, seriously, I’m down to do this but you have to tell me what you actually need.”“Hold on, I’m thinking about what I need!” Huffing, Nowi actually pulled her hand back with the money in it, rocking back and forth as she thought for far longer than it seemed she should have needed to. Eventually, she held out the money once more. “Here, I’ve got it. You head to the store and I’ll just text you the list once I know exactly what I need you to buy. This is for a very important occasion, after all.”Nah pinched the bridge of her nose as she took the money with her other hand, fully aware that she was setting herself up for being screwed over by not having enough cash to pay for the groceries. “Yeah, I know, you’ve only been telling me that you’re hosting a manakete dinner tonight for weeks now. I honestly should’ve seen it coming that you’d need me to run to the store for this.”“Well, I’m glad you’re doing it for me anyway. Be on the lookout for the list, I promise you’ll get it by the time you get to the store!” Nowi gave her daughter a big smile before stepping away from the door, leaving Nah to sigh and begin getting herself ready to head out. She didn’t like needing to be the errand-runner for her mother, but it was better than turning her down and getting talked negatively about at the manakete dinner that night.As expected, when Nah arrived at the store she still hadn’t gotten anything remotely close to a grocery list to follow, which irked her beyond belief. Several minutes of texting back and forth with her mother later and she received a few items to grab, with a note that she needed to wait for more because more would be coming. “Of course you can’t even give me everything at once,” Nah grumbled, as she grabbed a cart to carry what she knew would be a huge load of groceries when all was said and done. “I don’t know why I expect anything to be easy when it comes to helping you out.”“Oh my gods, listen to you complaining for anyone who bothers to listen! Color me shocked that you’re whining like a child yet again.” The voice came from behind her, and the hair on the back of Nah’s neck stood on end when she heard it. “Boo hoo, I have a mom that asks me to do things for her and doesn’t demand it, I’m going to complain about you all day until someone chooses to pity me.”“I’m sorry, can I help you?” Looking back over her shoulder, Nah knew what she’d be seeing but she didn’t want to believe it until her eyes confirmed it; the last time she’d actually spoken to Severa had been at the party she’d thrown nearly six months previously, and she’d been more than happy to keep that as their last interaction. “Aren’t you supposed to be out of Ylisse or something? Why’d you come crawling back?”Placing a hand over her chest as she gave a very fake, exaggerated gasp, Severa took a few large steps to be right at Nah’s side as they came into the store one alongside the other. “You see, I’m doing something that you’re too much of a self-centered bitch to take care of. Something that you couldn’t even bother turning down like a decent person.”Her forward progress slowing to a halt, Nah did a double-take as she stared at Severa, expecting further elaboration but getting nothing but a smug smile. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said, hesitant to say anything at all but knowing that she couldn’t stay silent unless she wanted to open herself up to ridicule she didn’t ask for. “As far as I’m aware, I’ve been more than open with every request that’s been made of me lately.”“Right, right, because you’re little miss perfect and ignore anything that isn’t what you want to do, I get it.” Rolling her eyes as she grabbed her phone and dramatically unlocked its screen, Severa pressed a few icons before carefully reading something, then looked over at Nah again with a sneer. “If that was the case, then I shouldn’t have gotten this message begging me to come back to Ylisse to help plan something. But that’s not the case, and I got that message, and I’m here doing the work you flat out refused to do.”“I mean, I’m over planning things, but I wasn’t asked to plan anything?” Now Nah was beginning to doubt herself, wracking her brain for any idea of what Severa was yapping about. “Like, not even joking, the last time someone mentioned me planning something was in passing, and I highly doubt Lucina convinced you to come out here on a spur-of-the-moment trip because she wants me to plan a friend day with her.”“Tsk, always trying to act like you’re so innocent when you know you’ve done something wrong.” Tucking her phone back in her small purse, Severa’s sneer didn’t fade away, even as she began to walk faster than Nah and the cart were going. “I guess we really do like to delude ourselves into thinking we’re perfect, don’t we?”The temptation to knock the cart into the back of Severa’s legs was real, but Nah kept herself from doing it by breathing slowly and deeply, thinking about how bad it would look if she chose to act so aggressively. “I’ve never pretended to be perfect, so you can kindly stop projecting yourself onto me, thanks.”“I’m well aware that I’m far from perfect, but I’m at least a decent enough person to drop everything in my life to come plan a gods-damned baby shower for one of my best friends!” Severa’s voice had raised as she said that, to the point that several other shoppers were now looking at the two women as they were staring at each other in front of the baking goods aisle at the store.“I…I’m sorry, but I’ve never been asked to plan a baby shower in my life.”Her whole face scrunching as she heard that statement, Severa took in a very deep breath, eyes rolling as far back as they could until she exhaled slowly, deliberately. “Why are you standing here lying to me like this? At the very least, you can stop acting like I’m stupid and ignorant to the fact that you literally planned one last year.”Maybe it was in the wording that had been used, but Nah was not about to let herself be put down over a misunderstanding. “Technically it was just a party that had some baby shower-esque aspects to it, but I wasn’t asked to do that. That was all on me, to help out some of my friends in a moment of need. And since then, I haven’t been asked to plan anything even close to it again, and if I was asked, I would ask if they could find someone else because that was a lot of time and money I spent that I don’t exactly have anymore.”“Okay, whatever, so that one was on you and your idea. Doesn’t change the fact that you ignored being asked to plan another one, for someone just as deserving.” Severa motioned toward her purse with a very pointed gesture, venom in the aggressive way her fingers moved. “How do you explain the messages I got about this, hm?”“Someone’s very mistaken about something, I think. I mean, I wasn’t even aware that there was a need for anything right now. Surely that means something to you.” Putting a smile on her face, Nah tried to move her cart away so that she could get on with her shopping trip and not have to deal with this nonsense any longer, but Severa wasn’t about to let that happen.The cart was grabbed in a very forceful motion, pulled forward before being pushed back until the handle hit Nah and made her gasp in surprise at the impact. “You’re such a bad liar, and I hope you feel horrible about turning this down and making me do all the work. No wonder everyone hates you.”“No one hates me,” Nah replied, slightly out of breath from how hard Severa had hit her with the cart. “I’m really not sure where all of this is coming from, I had no idea anyone wanted me to plan something for them and that’s the truth.”“Just stop lying already!” Again the cart got pulled forward and pushed back, but Nah was expecting it the second time and tried to push it away from herself with all her might, leaving her and Severa entangled in a game of tug of war, until Severa gave in and let go, sending the cart forward instead. “I’m so glad that you’re not going to be there, having to see your dumb face right now is making me sick.”As she collected herself and her cart, Nah looked at Severa completely confused. “Seeing as this is literally the first time I’ve heard about any sort of baby shower happening any time soon, I’m glad I’m not going to be there too, I think? What do you even want from me in all of this?”There was a flicker of anger behind Severa’s eyes at the question, as she strolled up to get right in front of Nah, looking down at her with her nose scrunched in disdain. “Your dumb girl act only works on people who aren’t aware of it, you know,” she spat, her head shaking as she locked eyes with Nah’s utterly confused ones. “I’ve heard about you playing around with my sloppy seconds and I hope you know that he’s way, way too good for you.”Nah’s shoulders sank as she felt the weight of Severa’s words bearing down on her, before she realized that she’d just been attacked for two completely different, unrelated things. “I’m not interested in whatever romance drama you want to throw at me, I want to know about this whole baby shower thing that I’m clearly not in the loop with!”“We’re already past that, you chose to play dumb and I’m not letting you think you’re outsmarting me with it. Now we’re onto the fact that you’re a little bitch who thinks you’re good enough to date someone leagues better than you.” Leaning down, Severa got almost close enough to put her nose on Nah’s before she stood up and backed away, flicking her long, dark hair behind her and hitting Nah with it. “Maybe if you weren’t so stupid, none of this would have happened.”“I’m not…ugh, this is why everyone was happy you left in the first place!” The moment the words left Nah’s lips, she covered her mouth and wished she hadn’t lost her composure in that moment, but the damage was already done. Severa had frozen in place, slowly turning around to face Nah with the most threatening smile on her face; Nah knew that she was about to be chewed out, so she chose to double down instead of back off. “I meant that, no one missed you when you left and—”“If no one missed me, then why did I get messages begging me to come back? Why have I been called almost nightly by people? Why am I standing here right now helping plan and organize a party for someone who you claim was happy when I left?” With every word, the anger and hatred building within Severa grew stronger, and it was clear that she was seconds away from lashing out in a spectacular way, so Nah did exactly what she needed to do in order to avoid making more of a scene.She left her empty cart and walked quickly out of that store, choosing her dignity and her emotions over getting the last word in an argument with Severa. When she got to her car, she checked her phone for the first time in all of that and saw more of the grocery list from Nowi, as well as another message that she wished she’d seen beforehand. One that explained everything that was happening, that was prefaced with a huge apology that she was supposed to have been asked to help with planning something months before but it hadn’t happened but it was thought that it had happened, so Severa had gotten dragged in and if she was encountered she was probably feeling spicy and would need to be shown that message to clear things up. “Too little too late on that one, Cynthia,” Nah grumbled, not even bothering to respond to what she’d just gotten and choosing to delete it instead. “Now you can clean up the mess you just created for me, and we’ll see if anything comes of it.”With that explained but not solved by any means, Nah chose to text her mother that the store was busy and that she was going across town to a different location instead, and took that route to avoid needing to see Severa again. Of course, as luck would have it she was getting called by someone before she pulled into the other store’s parking lot, only making her time out on this simple errand even longer, but Nah was used to things never being easy for her. “Let me guess, Severa called you and chewed me out at you?” Nah asked upon answering, pulling into a parking spot at the back of the lot to make it easier to take the call.“How’d you know?” Noire’s soft voice replied, her sounding awfully calm for that being the situation. “She seemed pretty heated about you being a really nasty person, which I know can’t be the truth. You’re a bit weird, but not nasty by any means.”“Weirdos attract weirdos, I guess. What’d you tell her to get her to leave you alone?”Noire took a second to answer, laughing before she spoke. “You know, I didn’t actually say anything, as weird as that sounds. She was tearing into you and stopped when she got a text, then hung up before she said anything about it to me. On that note, were you aware that there’s a baby shower next weekend that I’m supposed to be at?”“I literally only learned about that when Severa started ripping me a new one for forcing her to plan it when it was apparently my job to do it to begin with. Clearly someone forgot to tell me that important detail. I don’t even know why I would’ve been the one doing it in the first place,” Nah continued, glancing from side to side as she spoke, as if Noire could even see her. “Pretty sure that the person who does that planning is supposed to be a close, dear friend of the person in need. Doesn’t exactly make sense for it to be me on this one, because I’m definitely not that close to Cynthia at all.”“Plus, isn’t the whole deal that someone’s supposed to offer to plan it for you? Kind of rude to be throwing that on you when you didn’t even ask in the first place.” Noire sighed on her end of the phone, causing Nah to do the same in return. “I think that you just ended up in the middle of a huge misunderstanding that now I’m involved in too.”“Funny how that works, isn’t it? Neither of us asked to be included in this and then—” A knock on her back window made Nah scream, dropping her phone onto her lap and audibly hearing a similar scream come from Noire on the other side. She couldn’t hear any responses, but Nah kept talking anyway. “—someone’s trying to get my attention from outside my car! Noire, stay on the phone with me in case they shoot me or something!”Her heart racing, Nah looked into her backseat, then out the back windshield, seeing that, of all the people in all of the places she could run into them, Morgan was standing there, his face pressed against the glass and cupped by his hands. “Morgan?” she yelled, picking her phone back up and breathing heavily into the receiver. “Noire, I think that’s Morgan out there. I’m nowhere near his house, why’s he literally staring into my car?”“I’m not a mind reader, I can’t tell you what his thoughts are!” Noire replied, sounding a lot less level-headed than she had been prior to the screaming. “I’ll stick around on the call if you want to go ask him yourself, promise.”As if Nah’s shopping trip couldn’t have gotten any worse, she was now having to deal with a friend that she actually did enjoy the presence of. With her heart still pounding in her chest and her breath coming out heavy, she turned the car off and opened the door, hearing Morgan call her name as she stepped outside. “I knew it was you!” he announced, coming around the car to meet her on the side, only for her to hold her free hand out to keep him at bay. “H-hey now, why’re you so hostile?”“Do you not realize how absolutely terrifying it is to have someone come banging on the back of your car when you’ve stopped to take a call?” Nah asked him, hearing Noire confusedly ask why she was being asked that question on the other end of said call. “Not you, Noire, I’m talking to Morgan.”“You’ve got Noire on the phone? Can you tell her that I need Laurent to message me back about something related to our campaign?”“I can hear him, tell him I can do that!”Closing her eyes in frustration at how absolutely stupid the situation had become, Nah rushed a goodbye into the phone before hanging up on Noire, so that she could focus entirely on Morgan. “Sorry, but she said that you need to handle that yourself. And handle it somewhere that isn’t the creepy back part of a parking lot!”“Noire definitely didn’t say any of that.” Morgan blinked a few times at Nah, watching as she tried to make herself bigger and more intimidating despite him seemingly having done nothing wrong in his perspective. “But whatever, I can try reaching out to Laurent again, I just know that he’s been really itching to get some development on Plume, but I kind of need him to let me know what he’s been imagining before I plan anything.”With her still-outstretched hand, Nah raised it and mimed grabbing her friend’s lips and shutting them tightly to get him to recognize that he needed to shut up. “Morgan. Why are you here?”“I’m here because I was down the road at the library, got hungry and decided I was going to grab some snacks, then walked over here and saw you pull in and thought I could come say hey. Is there a problem with that?” The innocence that Morgan spoke with made it obvious that he was telling the truth, and Nah was thankful at the very least that he wasn’t trying to deceive her in any way. “Oh, that reminds me, don’t go to the library looking for books on manakete history, they’re all checked out and on loan for months now.”Nah nodded slowly, her mind trying to process why that was something Morgan was doing to begin with. “Thanks, I’ll keep that tucked away in my—wait!” As quickly as she could, Nah rushed unlocking her car and dove inside, sitting in her seat as she closed the door and rolled down the window before grabbing the dragon statue that had appeared inside mysteriously. She held that up and out the window, hearing Morgan gasp at the sight. “Does this belong to you?” she asked, realizing it was the perfect opportunity to address that problem. “Because it sure doesn’t belong to me.”“How’d that end up with you? I bought that to be a figure in our campaign in the future, since enemy dragons are part of the name of the game and I’m not letting you take those from everyone.” Making grabby hands toward the dragon statue, Morgan realized something wasn’t right when Nah wasn’t relinquishing it to him immediately. “Uh, Nah? Dinah? Something the matter?”“Mom says that this kind of statue isn’t a good omen for manaketes. Something about them being used as part of anti-Naga propaganda.” Nah, admittedly, should have looked into matters further than her mother’s word, given that Nowi was apt to make things up just to sound smarter, but she knew the consequences of searching manakete-related terms online. There could only be so many “surprise” visits to the house from Lady Tiki before someone grew wise to the reality of the situation. “But I don’t know how it ended up here, in my car, of all the places in the world.”Morgan pursed his lips together, his face morphing into a display of deep thought before he relaxed entirely and shrugged, continuing to make the grabby hands at the statue he still wasn’t being given. “You know, you spend so much time in my house that it could’ve been slipped into your car as a prank by one of our friends,” he said, an answer that wasn’t satisfying or realistic to Nah. “That, or it could’ve just ended up in your things one day when you were leaving.”“Nice try, but I know that you have to have been the one to put it there. I’m pretty sure it happened when I went to pick you up from being stranded in the middle of actual nowhere. Ring a bell, Morgan?” She waited for him to admit she was right, but the reaction she got instead was a bit more unexpected--he lunged at her window and tried to take the statue from her, with a ferocity that she’d never seen before.Thankfully, being that she was in her car still and he wasn’t, there wasn’t much he could do when she instinctively threw the statue into her passenger’s seat and stared blankly at Morgan and how feral he’d just gotten over it. “That’s mine, give it back!” he hissed, as she rolled up her window to where there was a mere crack at the top. “Dinah, you’re being so unfair right now!”“And you’re acting like a literal child over it. Tell me the truth about how it got into my car, and maybe I’ll give it back to you.”The sound of Morgan’s nails scratching against the window was grating to Nah’s ears, but she endured it as long as he kept going, as she waited for him to wizen up to her game. Eventually, he stepped back, took a deep breath, and hung his head. “Okay, you got me. I bought it when I was out with Aversa, she convinced me to because she thought it looked pretty cool and was fitting for our game. That’s all. Can I have it back now?”“One second,” Nah told him, as she gingerly reached over to grab the dragon statue once again, shuddering at the feel of it under her palm now that she knew the truth behind how it had come into her friend’s possession. “You said that she told you to buy it. Did she mention anything about it and how it relates to manaketes?”“She might have, yeah, and that was when I knew she was bad news and I never should’ve met up with her in the first place. I told her that I’m not using it for religious purposes and that it’s just for our game, and I’m standing by that as the truth. As my truth.” Lifting his head to see that Nah was opening her window to pass the statue off to him, Morgan nearly clapped in giddiness before taking what was his back into his possession. “Thanks for not just throwing it out when you had the chance, Nah. I promise you’re going to see this bad boy show up in our campaign eventually.”“Let’s hope I miss that session…” she muttered, rolling her window back up to fully closed as she watched Morgan wave a farewell at her before continuing walking on his way. She sat in her silent car for several minutes, just processing the bizarre chain of events that had just taken place. For how large of a city Ylisstol was, it was almost unheard of to run into someone out in the wild like that, especially in a place neither of them necessarily were meant to be at any time. She could excuse running into Severa at the other store, if only just a little, but having Morgan approach her car when she was parked at an unfamiliar store in the far back of the lot? That was the sign of divine intervention.And if Naga was currently intervening in her life to get her to hand off a potentially-cursed statue to its rightful owner, she wasn’t going to complain. That thing had given her the creeps since she’d first found it in her car, and she was thankful that it was gone. Of course, Morgan’s behavior before getting it back had a lot more red flags going up around it, but she was focusing on being rid of the statue right then, not worrying about what had possessed her friend to act so weird.After assuring herself that everything would be fine if she didn’t dwell on it, she started her car and moved closer to the store’s entrance, running inside the building and buying everything that Nowi had sent her on the never-ending grocery list, finding that her mother’s list of needs for her dinner was a lot longer than actually anticipated. It was a lot of money to drop on something she hadn’t been expecting to pay for, and Nah knew that there wasn’t enough in what she’d been given to cover it all, which meant that, yet again, she was shouldering costs for her mother. Not that she could, or would, say anything about it when she got home with all the groceries, Nowi chiding her for taking so long but thanking her that she’d only bought what was necessary and seemingly spent all of the money she’d been allotted for the task.“If I didn’t know any better,” Nowi said, as she looked over the sheer amount of things that Nah had bought, “I’d say that you spent at least double what I gave you in the first place.”“Wouldn’t say double, exactly, but you’re on the right track,” Nah grumbled under her breath, catching her mother’s ear with some of her muttered words before having to walk them right back. “It wasn’t that much more, not anything unrealistic for me to have to cover for you. You did ask me to buy a lot more than expected, after all.”Nowi nodded, smiling at her daughter. “That’s for sure, but every time I thought the list was done, someone would call or text me asking to make something else and I couldn’t turn them down. The last thing we need is for Lady Tiki to come in and be disappointed that we don’t have everything that she and her friends asked for.”“Right, totally get that.” Just hearing Lady Tiki’s name after what had happened earlier made a knot form in Nah’s stomach, and she knew that she didn’t want to be anywhere near the house when the manakete dinner took place. Unfortunately, she knew that she would be there for the whole thing, because her mother wanted to keep up appearances and Nah had to be a huge part of that game. “I’m going to head up to my room and get some work done while you cook, just let me know when you need me.”“Sure thing. Thanks again for doing the shopping for me!” For being someone who was going to be working on preparing a dinner for the foreseeable future, it was nice to hear that Nowi was keeping her spirits high. That didn’t really matter to Nah, though, as she went up the stairs and into her bedroom, closing the door tightly behind her and moving furniture in front of it to keep it locked from the inside. Work wasn’t actually her intention, because she needed to get her mind off of real-world matters for a little bit, and the last thing Nah needed was for her mother to come barging in for various reasons.This time, she made the wise choice to silence her phone before pulling out her bag of toys from under her bed, eliminating the problem from last time. Nah knew she had at least half an hour to herself at minimum, before Nowi was up there trying to get her help with making dinner, and she was going to relish every single moment of alone time she could.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
As she drove off from Ribbon’s house the next Tuesday, there was a lot on Nah’s mind that she couldn’t ignore for too much longer. One thing was the whole situation that had happened inside the store with Severa, and how she needed to address one aspect of that with Brady when she got the chance; the other thing related back to Morgan and the dragon statue, and how feral he’d acted about it. She’d stupidly brought it up at the manakete dinner, asking about the truth regarding those statues, and while Nowi was mortified that it had been addressed yet again, Lady Tiki seemed happy to explain the significance of them in manakete history and why they were not acceptable to be in the presence of Naga-fearing folks, because they were a symbol that degraded her.“It’s odd,” Lady Tiki had said, stroking her chin with a delicate finger, “because I hadn’t thought once of those statues in years, and now they’ve come up several times in the past month. I fear that a resurgence of worshippers of the Fell Dragon may be upon us soon, and if that is to be true…let us hope that those devout to Naga can set them straight.”The silence that had fallen over the group of older manaketes in the dining room after that had been said was unforgettable, as was the appearance of Lady Tiki’s shaky finger being pointed toward Nah as she stared back at her. “You, Dinah, you have the makings of a great manakete, if you can put an end to the teachings of the Fell Dragon.”Nah had no idea of how she could possibly do such a thing, but she had a sinking feeling that she was close friends with someone who was getting a bit too invested in the world that Lady Tiki was afraid of. “I’ll try my best to do that,” Nah told her, crossing her fingers under the table to make her words non-binding. “I’ll do whatever I can to protect the church from this crisis or whatever it is.”That conversation had lingered in Nah’s mind for days, and now that she was driving back to Morgan’s house, she knew that she needed to talk about it with him because he was the person she was worried about. It just didn’t make sense for him to have wanted that statue back so badly if it weren’t the case, and if by some miracle she was interpreting things wrong, it was apparently on her shoulders to make sure that Morgan didn’t fall into the darkness of the Fell Dragon. The issue was that she didn’t have the slightest idea of how to bring that up with him, without it coming off as being preachy. “Eh, I’ll come up with something eventually,” she said to herself as she turned into the neighborhood. “I always do, even if it isn’t quite what I need.”When she pulled up outside the house, the only other vehicle present was the one belonging to Brady, which gave her hope that she’d be able to tackle that conversation first and foremost. But after she’d parked and gotten out to investigate if Brady was still in his car or if she’d need to meet him inside, she was met with the unmistakable sound of someone crying—and she knew exactly who it was, and where it was coming from. She came up to his driver’s side window and tapped on it, watching it slowly roll down to reveal Brady inside, tears staining his cheeks and his eyebrows furrowed. “Don’t worry about it,” he said to her, not changing his expression even slightly as the window went right back up.Unable to get any words out while she wasn’t blocked by the glass, Nah did what any self-respecting person would do and tapped on the window again, allowing the cycle to restart itself. “Congrats, Brady, but I’m worrying about it. Something happen with your mother that we should be aware of?”This time the window stayed down, if only just far enough that the top of Brady’s dark-haired head could be seen. “This is nothin’ to do with Ma, somehow.”“Then is it really worth crying over?”The window lurched up again, before coming down to better expose Brady’s face once more. “Yeah, actually, it’s pretty worth cryin’ over! I’m losin’ one of the people I’m closest to in the whole world, and I’m handlin’ it the best way I can!”One of Nah’s eyes twitched as she thought about the person that he was most likely talking about. “She’s not a great person, Brady, we’re all better off if—”“I ain’t talkin’ about Sev! I know she’s back, and I know she’s been causin’ trouble for lots of people, but I swear this ain’t about her.” He drew in a deep breath, before unlocking his car and motioning for Nah to go around and get in with him. She lingered in her spot for a moment, considering what it would look like if they were caught in the driveway together like that, before running over and jumping right in. Once they were both in the car, he rolled the window back up and locked all doors tightly. “You didn’t hear this one from me, but somethin’ big’s happening tonight and I’m not ready for it. Don’t think Morg’s gonna be ready for it either.”Nah’s vision blurred for a second as she spaced out, thinking about who Brady could possibly be referring to, but when it struck her back into reality, she visibly jumped. “This is about Owain, isn’t it?”“From what he told me, him and Sev got to talkin’ over the weekend and he’s wanting to follow her off to wherever-the-hell it is she’s been livin’, just so he can chase down adventure after realizin’ how boring Ylisstol kinda is. Not that I blame him, dude’s livin’ in the middle of nowhere and refuses to come into the city because he thinks it’ll squash his chances at adventure, so why wouldn’t he just up and leave like that?” Tears were rolling down Brady’s cheeks as he was explaining what he’d heard, and Nah felt just bad enough about listening to him recount someone else’s news that she didn’t know how to respond. This was a happy thing for their adventure-seeking friend, but if she expressed that, then she knew she’d offend Brady by diminishing his feelings on the matter.Instead, she reached over and gently pat Brady’s shoulder several times. “I get it, it’s going to really suck that your best friend from childhood has finally decided he’s old enough to leave home, and has chosen to act on that by leaving the country. But if there’s any indication from your ex-girlfriend, it’s that coming back to visit is completely on the table. We all know Owain’s going to be unable to keep himself away from here forever.”“Well, yeah, he’s gonna miss his parents and his family and his friends and be chargin’ back the second he can, but the fact that he’s leavin’ just kinda sucks.” Brady gave a sniffle, leaning his head over onto Nah’s hand, which did nothing but drip tears onto her fingers and make her cringe at the feeling. “But don’t tell anyone I told you, let him tell everyone and you’ve gotta act shocked and surprised when he says it.”“I figured that was going to be the case anyway. Thanks for giving me the warning ahead of time, Brady, because if I heard this one without any knowledge, I might’ve laughed at the absurdity of the whole thing.” Her honesty may not have been appreciated in that moment, but neither was being cried on so Nah felt that it was a bit of a getting-even situation they had going on.It took a few minutes for Brady to calm down enough to feel comfortable with talking about anything else, and of course when he was finally able to speak without sobbing, he went right for the thing that Nah had thought his tears were about. “Sev told me she ran into you at the store this weekend, said that you picked a fight with her and she wasn’t sure why you were actin’ so nasty with her.”“That’s definitely not what happened, but she can continue living in her delusional world if that’s what she wants.” A grimace appearing on Nah’s face, she turned to look away from Brady in case her truth offended him. “Let’s just say she went off on me for things that I was completely unaware of, then doubled down and called me some nasty things. Did I retaliate? Of course, I’m not a pushover, but she definitely started it.”“Not doubtin’ you one bit, because it isn’t like you to just walk up to someone in public and start a scene like that. She’s gotta understand that puttin’ you down at me isn’t gonna do anything about how I think about you.” Brady paused, giving Nah just enough of a moment to hope that something good was going to follow that. “Also, I kinda knew it wasn’t true when she said that you were callin’ yourself my girlfriend at her.”Those hopes were dashed immediately, even though the statement that was made was so bizarre and unlike herself that Nah did crack a smile at it. “Yeah, we’ve been over that before, tax benefits when we’re thirty. I wouldn’t call myself anything but your friend, even to try and get under Severa’s skin. So I’m glad that you knew she was lying to your face, but it sucks that she was able to get someone else on her side in all of this too.”“Right, that’s still a thing we’re gonna be dealin’ with tonight. Just…remember, I didn’t tell you a thing, you’re hearin’ it all from Owain for the first time.” Miming zipping his lips, Brady waited until Nah did the same motion back before he shut the car off and opened his door. “Well, enough just sittin’ here going nowhere, we should get inside and get ready for tonight’s session.”“I’m right behind you,” Nah told him, opening her door and stepping out in time with him, their doors slamming shut simultaneously followed by the honking of the car lock. She remained behind him all the way in through the front door of the house, where it wasn’t Morgan meeting them, but rather Lucina, looking at them both with a shine in her eyes.It was several moments of silence before Lucina coughed to clear her throat. “Morgan’s not home yet, he said he needed to go to the library to do some printing and Mother took him. I said I’d be here to let the first people in, but that’s as late as I can hang around tonight. I’ve got plans with Gerome.”“You know, Lucina, sometimes it feels like you still live here, with how often you’re here when we show up on Tuesdays.” Nah stepped out from Brady’s shadow and looked up at Lucina, who laughed at what she’d said. “Well, it’s true. If I hadn’t heard stories of people getting lost going to your place, I wouldn’t think it exists.”“What can I say, I’m devoted to making sure I keep in touch with my family. Something that I’m sure both of you understand quite well.” Whether that second sentence was sarcasm or not, they couldn’t tell, but Lucina seemed to be playing it straight. “I still have my bedroom and a good number of my belongings here, so it kind of is like I still live in this house, even though I spend just about every night somewhere else.”“Somewhere that Gerome ain’t staying too, if you’re always goin’ out with him for dates and plans and stuff,” Brady remarked, only to get Lucina shaking her head at him. “What? Come on, you’re really tellin’ me you live together too?”“Only sometimes. He’s still got a lease to live out before we can officially move in together. I mean, he probably could just end it early and pay off those fees, but we’re deciding if we want to pick his place, my place, or find somewhere of our own.” Lucina looked around the living space there at the house, at how spacious it was, and shrugged. “I’m leaning towards the third option, since I’d prefer to live somewhere more like this, or at least more like the house his parents have in Ferox. I know neither of you saw that place, but it was really, really nice inside, even if the outside could use some work.”Realizing that they’d not only distracted Lucina from needing to leave, but had invited her to start gushing about her life plans, Nah decided that she needed to tap out of the interaction and wordlessly walked over to the table, sitting in her spot. Brady noticed this, then looked back at Lucina to see her looking surprised at how she’d just been abandoned like that, and decided that he was going to be the one to end things properly. “I bet it’s about time for you to get goin’ to your date, don’t you think?” he asked her, watching as that realization dawned on Lucina as well. “We’ll see you around, yeah?”“Of course! Give my cousin a hard time when you see him, I feel like I never cross paths with him these days and it’s seriously getting old.” Lucina waved farewell to them both, collected her things, and headed out the door, and the moment she was gone Brady was back to sniffling, her parting words striking him in a nerve he wasn’t prepared to have hit.“Get over here, and calm yourself down before someone walks in and thinks I’m making you cry,” Nah called, patting the chair that Brady usually sat in, but he didn’t seem to be listening to her. He just stood in place, crying for a few minutes, before choosing to sit on the other side of the table instead, as if he was trying to avoid physical closeness with Nah.On one hand, she understood completely, given that he was upset and probably didn’t want to risk her trying to hug him to comfort him. On the other hand, it felt like a personal attack that he was changing up his spot after she’d asked him to come sit down, rather than just go with it and let things stay somewhat normal for the time being. She blinked a few times at the empty chair next to her, before her eyes slowly drifted over to where he was sitting, watching as he leaned forward and rest his head and arms on the table. The sounds of his sniffling and attempts to calm himself down were loud enough to drown Nah’s thoughts out completely, both a blessing and a curse to her.Morgan wasn’t the next person to come in, either. That ended up being Laurent, who stepped into the living area of the house, heard that there was crying, and muttered something very loudly in a different language before coming to the table. “Based on your proximity to one another, I take it that this is not your fault in the slightest?” he asked Nah, who nodded in return. “Understandable. Is there anything that you would like me to do for you, now that I’m here?”Brady either didn’t realize that he was being spoken to, or he simply didn’t have anything to say in response, because he continued on with his sniffling instead of providing any sort of meaningful conversation. “He’s seriously been like this since I got here,” Nah said, hoping that she wouldn’t need to elaborate further.“I would assume that it is a big deal, whatever is bothering him, but given his crybaby nature, that assumption might be too much to make.” Laurent looked between Nah and Brady’s crying figure several times before taking his usual seat, pulling out his materials for the game they were about to play. It was only when he’d gotten everything set up that something clicked in his mind and he was looking at Nah once more. “How are we in the house without Morgan being here?”“Lucina was still here when Brady and I showed up, she let us inside and told us that her brother should be back eventually. Pretty sure she mentioned him going to the library.”“I see. Given how often he is going there, we may need to chip in and buy him a personal printer and ink to print with. I shudder to imagine the costs of printing he’s accrued since beginning this campaign.” For being so analytical and methodical, it was nice to hear Laurent coming up with a simple, easy-to-manage solution to a perceived problem.Before Nah had the chance to say that thought out loud, though, they all heard a car door slam, followed by a banshee-like scream that came immediately before the front door to the house slamming open and Noire barreling inside. “I wish that vile woman would leave me the hell alone!” she seethed, coming to the table as quickly as she could before draping herself over Laurent’s shoulders and beginning to sob nearly as loudly as Brady still was. “I have spent all day being dragged around like her little pet, and for what? For being reminded of how much of a total failure of a child I am, that’s what! I wish I could just slice her open, watch her blood pour out of her wounds, laugh as she dies at my blade, that sort of thing!”“One, you’re starting to let Zelaia mix more into your personality than you probably should,” Laurent pointed out as he awkwardly began to pat Noire’s shoulder and back as she kept sobbing, “and two, you could have used coming to assist with the build as an excuse to avoid spending time with your mother.”“Don’t you think I tried that? She’s just the worst, I can’t escape her even when I really want to, and I always really want to!”Even though the yelling and crying was right in his ear, Laurent attempted to stay as neutral-sounding as possible, using restraint in getting heated for himself. “Calm yourself, Noire, you’re far too worked up right now.”“Far too wo—are you kidding me? That woman is vile, Laurent, you know this!” Throwing herself off of him, and nearly taking his arm off in the process, Noire slammed herself down into a chair next to Laurent before glaring across the table at Nah, who was merely watching what was happening. “What’s with the smug look there, manakete? You want to rub it in that you’ve got a good mother and I don’t?”A lump formed in Nah’s throat as she tried to speak, not liking the animosity with which her background had been slung at her. She knew that she was in the minority of their overall friend group when it came to having two decent parents, at the end of the day and despite their shortcomings, but she didn’t like that the fact that she had a solid relationship with her mother was being used against her in that way. “I wouldn’t ever think of rubbing that in at anyone, especially someone who’s experienced as much parental abuse as you have. All families are different, but yours is a special case, and I recognize that.”“Cut the psycho-analytic crap and tell me exactly what you want me to hear, so that I can rip you apart for it!” Noire bellowed, her eyes going dark for a second as she seemed to completely lose herself in her anger. “I didn’t come here to be yapped at by your stupid ass about anything, but here we are anyway!”Stammering, unsure what she was supposed to do when she was being torn into like that out of nowhere, Nah looked to Laurent for support, but he seemed just as shocked at what Noire was doing. “I-I’m not really…I can’t say there’s anything I want you to hear?” Nah finally said, realizing that staying silent wasn’t going to do her any favors. “I just get that you have problems with your mother, that’s all.”“Making it sound like it’s my fault, not hers!” At once, Noire threw herself onto the table, reaching for Nah with her outstretched arms; it was at the sound of her literally clawing her way over that Brady lifted his head and picked himself up, standing just tall enough to be able to firmly reach over and grab Noire’s shoulders. She shrieked unintelligible words as he pushed her back toward her seat, where Laurent had collected himself enough to guide her back to sitting.“I’m not gonna pretend like I know what’s goin’ on here, but that? That’s not what we’re gonna have happen tonight. You sit back down and calm yourself before you try talkin’ to Nah again, got it?” Even though he was still somewhat choked up as he spoke, there was a commanding nature to Brady’s voice that made it impossible to ignore, even though Noire certainly tried to mouth off at him again and again until she finally did calm down.The four of them ended up having nearly half an hour of silence between them all before anyone else came to join them, it being both Owain and Morgan coming in through the front door unaware of anything that had taken place previously. “Sorry for how late we are, the library was crazy and then Owain showed up and I rode over with him instead of Mother, so that she could get some shopping done or something, I don’t know.” Morgan waved his stack of papers around over his head as they approached the table, slowly noticing the somber mood that was shared around its edges. “What gives? Aren’t we excited for tonight’s session?”“Excited is far from the word any of us would use,” Laurent replied, choosing to speak for the entire rest of the group despite not knowing all of the details across the board. “Perhaps we could have an abbreviated session this evening?”“That actually sounds like a fantastic idea,” Owain chimed in, “because I’ve got something I kind of need to discuss with my comrades in the campaign and it might take a bit of time to get it all out and settled.”“Uh, sure, we can make things shorter tonight, if that’s what you all really want.” No one was about to argue against the idea, with all of their personal issues they were grappling with, and after settling on a time to wrap things up, Morgan pretty much shoehorned them right into the meat of the night’s session.Nah’s mind was still reeling with the anxiety of being screeched at by Noire, as well as the ache of seeing Brady so distraught over his friend’s pending disappearance, so she wasn’t at the top of her game all night. Combat was choppy at best, and her quips and interactions with her fellow players were slow and half-hearted. “Farona, you seem distracted, is there something that can be done to put your mind at ease?” Laurent, as Plume, asked her character, and she could visualize the oversized cat-man curling his pawed hands underneath his chin as he looked at her elf. “You simply seem unlike your usual self.”“I’m fine. Everything’s fine. Don’t you think you have someone you could be trying to kill for dinner or something?” Farona shot back, as Nah gave Laurent a look to tell him to back away from her and her character in that moment.“I suppose there may be a goblin or two that I can flay for dinner. I’ll check in with you again later.”“Don’t waste your time with it, honestly.” It wasn’t that Nah didn’t want the interactions, because she loved getting to play Farona off of the other players and their characters, but she just couldn’t bring herself to play the role convincingly. She was bothered, and she was letting it bleed into her playing.This was something that was obvious to everyone around the table, and so when the session was called slightly earlier than they’d planned for, Morgan made his reason clear. “I still don’t have any idea of what happened before me and Owain showed up, but I know that it’s something big that’s bothering all of you. I’ve never, and I mean never, heard you guys sound so upset about things in my life.”“I might’ve had a breakdown and done some things I shouldn’t have,” Noire admitted, hanging her head as she waved over in Nah’s direction. “Mostly being a complete and total bitch toward my best friend, but what else is new.”’Nah nodded, not wanting to verbally second that statement but wanting to be clear that Noire wasn’t just making things up as an excuse. She looked at Morgan, who scrunched his nose as he thought about what that could have been like to be around for, before turning her attention over to Brady, who was firmly looking at Owain. “My mind’s all sorts of places that ain’t here, honestly,” he explained, finally prying his eyes off of his own closest friend to look back across the table at Nah, meeting her gaze for a second before turning it to Morgan. “Sorry about that, but it’s the timing of it all.”“What’s eating at you, big guy?” Morgan asked, a deliberate choice to not look for further explanation about what had happened with the ladies to focus on what seemed like a more harmless situation. “Is this about your mother and your violin again?”“Uh…if it’s what I think it is, it’s why we’re ending things early to begin with.” Owain, with a big grin on his face, seemed to be a little apologetic with how his eyes kept shifting around, but the expression spoke novels about how he actually felt. That was, well, not upset at all about what he was about to drop on the group. “So, yeah, time for me to tell you all the incredibly amazing plan I’ve been building the past few days.”“Spare us the dramatics and get to the point,” Laurent said, waving a dismissive hand at Owain. “Some of us have already far surpassed our quota for dumb things this evening.”With a nod, Owain stood up from the table, stepped a few paces away from everyone, only to jump and turn around at once, landing on the floor with heavy feet as he waved his arms around excitedly. “I’ve decided that living life here in Ylisse is just getting too boring, so I’m heading out with Severa when she goes back to Nohr and seeing what they’ve got to offer me there instead!”He let his arms hang in the air for several tense seconds, while everyone still at the table stared at him with equal parts annoyance and surprise—except for Brady, who had buried his face at the first mention of life being boring. At once, all of their voices began shouting out questions and concerns, some of them curious as to why he was going while others were worried about his mother and father and how they’d be taking him leaving. He didn’t answer anything that was lobbed at him in that moment, merely walking back up to the table and putting his hands down on Brady’s shoulders.“Get your mitts off of me, you traitor.”“Yeesh, that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?” Owain did as commanded and instead side-stepped over to Morgan, where he did the same action and wasn’t met with such a gruff response. “Sorry that I’m throwing our whole campaign into disarray on this one, but Severa’s made some really good points and I couldn’t just let her have all the fun out in the world, now could I?”“I mean, you easily could have,” Morgan huffed, giving his cousin a side-eye of disgust, “but I get it. You and Roshan are kind of similar in being total boneheads, after all.”Laughing, Owain replied, “I’m really going to miss being the embodiment of ‘no thoughts, head empty’ here with you guys. You’ll all have to carry Roshan’s goals and dreams in my place, if that’s cool with all of you.”There were some murmurs around the table about the possibility of making that happen, but Brady lifted himself up and glared at his friend once again. “If you think I’m gonna spend my time over here playin’ this game without you, you’re dead wrong, Owain. You’re not allowed to leave us and expect for everythin’ to stay fine.”“Whoa, you want me to give up the chance for adventure because of a game? Which I guess is kind of about adventure itself, but…” Owain shook his head. “Not important! You can’t abandon your team because of me. Byacek can’t abandon his team because of Roshan. You get it, don’t you?”“Before you make some snarky comment back, I’ve already been thinking about the possibility of someone finally leaving town or moving too far to get to weekly sessions,” Morgan cut in, seeing that Brady had opened his mouth to respond. “I’ve actually been doing a lot of research on the idea of taking the sessions virtual, and there’s a bunch of resources we can use to make playing possible even with the distance. All we’d need is a computer each and a way to talk, and we’d be set.”“Sounds fantastic! I don’t have a personal computer and I’m not using my work laptop to play with you guys.” Nah hated that she was being pretty quiet in the whole situation and was now putting a knife into what Morgan had come up with as a solution, but she was going to stand strong on that stance. There was no way that she was going to get into any sort of game on the laptop the school district had given her, and she wasn’t about to drop a fair amount of money on a computer she’d be using once a week at most. “Is there any way that it could work on my phone?”Morgan shrugged. “Didn’t look that far into it, but I bet it would. Although, since you’re not planning on leaving town too, I bet you could just go over to someone else’s place and share computers with them for sessions.” He pointed at the other three at the table, all of whom shook their heads back at him. “Wait, what? She can’t hang with any of you?”“My computer is Mother’s as well, and she prefers to keep people out of her office if she can help it,” Laurent explained, before gesturing toward Noire. “And I think Noire’s situation goes without saying, but she would most likely be coming over to use the computer I just described, given that she’s one of the people Mother trusts with her plans and whatnot.”“Ma hates Nah and would probably blow a gasket if she saw her comin’ into the house, and I’m not figuring out some way to lug my computer somewhere that isn’t my desk. That’s what I get for buyin’ a desktop to play games with a gods-damned traitor.” Brady’s last sentence was clearly aimed at Owain, who finally looked somewhat sheepish for the chaos he’d now caused.Taking all of that in, Morgan slowly nodded, before his eyes widened. “Lucina’s got an old laptop up in her room I’ve never seen her use. I bet she’d let you borrow it for the occasional session, now that I think about it.”“I’d rather not borrow your sister’s computer without it being her telling me I can do it.”“She’ll let you! Bet she’d only let it happen if you’re using it here, though.” Pursing his lips together, Morgan finally shook Owain off of his shoulders, only for his cousin to try grabbing them again. A second brushing off was enough to get him to realize he wasn’t wanted there in that moment, and once he had a clear path, Morgan got up from his chair and began pacing around the dining area. “I think that’ll work out really well, actually. Me and Nah can hang out here, Laurent and Noire can be together at his place, and Brady’ll be at his house, which leaves you and only you, Owain. What are you going to do?”“Seems like I’ll be joining you guys over the computer, however it’s going to work! Here I was, convinced that the saga of Roshan was over, but it might just be getting started!” Even though he sounded happy, like nothing was wrong at all, everyone knew based on the look on his face that Owain recognized how much everything was needing to change to accommodate him. He seemed like he’d accepted that he was being a pain in everyone’s lives just to chase adventure, but now he was getting the chance to still be a part of things despite abandoning them all.Nah stood up as well, feeling like she was ready to get out of that house and away from all the drama that had transpired that night. “Well, if this is the last time I see you before you go, I hope your whole move ends up going smoothly,” she said to Owain, him looking at her puzzled as she spoke. “I can’t say I’m exactly looking forward to taking this to a digital version, but we’ll make it work somehow, I’m sure.”“What’re you talking about, you’re going to see me again this weekend, aren’t you?” Owain voiced his confusion, only to be met with a similarly-puzzled look coming back at him from Nah. “The baby shower? Or…whatever it is that Severa decided she’s calling it, to justify inviting guys to it?”“I wasn’t invited to any baby shower,” Nah replied immediately, knowing that she still hadn’t had much clarification about what was going on with that. “Glad to know that it’s something that everyone else is on the loop on except me, though.”Morgan stopped pacing long enough to wave in Nah’s direction, telling her, “I’ve been invited but I’m not going because I wanted to work on planning stuff for future sessions. Maybe you can come over here while they’re all doing that and we can figure out the laptop business together?”“Eh, I appreciate it, but I’ll pass. Either I’ll get a late invitation or a nasty, scathing call berating me for not showing up to something I wasn’t invited to in the first place.” Shrugging flippantly, Nah began walking to the door, ignoring the calls of her name from everyone else trying to get her to stop. She only addressed them as she was putting her shoes on, looking over at the group with a forced smile. “Look, it’s not a big deal that Severa’s forgotten about inviting me. She knows what I think of her, I know what she thinks of me, there’s no love lost between us and it’s honestly best this way.”It would have been a lie if Nah didn’t acknowledge how she looked at Brady more than anyone else while speaking, watching him stare back at her without saying a word in her direction. “I’ll see you guys around,” Nah continued, shoes firmly on her feet and ready to take on the outside world. “Because I know that we’ll all be together again, someday.”That time, she didn’t let any of their calls get her to say something else, and she headed out the front door without a single regret in what she’d just done. Naturally, that meant spending most of the drive home teary-eyed as she processed the fact that she was the afterthought in the group, the person always considered last for things. At the very least, she wasn’t going to be excluded from further sessions because of her lack of computer, and the fact that Morgan had jumped to borrowing his sister’s computer for her sake did tell her that, despite his weirdness and strange behavior at times, he did care about her somewhat.When she got home, the house was oddly quiet, and she came inside to a dark living room, Nowi nowhere to be seen. “Mom, you awake?” Nah called out, voice somewhat unsteady from her emotional ride home, but also because she wasn’t used to her mother not being on the couch watching her movies. When she got no response, she tried again. “Mom, seriously, are you awake or did you forget I wasn’t home?”There was still no noise in the house outside of her own breathing, so after locking the front door and checking the entire lower floor for any signs of life, Nah scrambled up the stairs and pressed herself against the door to her parents’ room. Their light was visible through the crack at the bottom of the door, and thankfully Nah was able to hear discussion on the other side. “You don’t think she’s going to start getting ideas about doing that, do you?” she heard Nowi ask, a question obviously about Nah herself. “It’s a slippery slope, seeing everyone else do it then doing it yourself too.”“She has a good head on her shoulders,” Gregor replied, which brought a small smile to Nah’s face, hearing her father speak positively about her. “Any decisions she makes will be her own, not decisions made because of others.”“I really hope you’re right, but something tells me that you might not be. It’s just…that’s a big, difficult choice for anyone to make, but especially a manakete. And in the year of the dragon, too. I just think it might happen because others are doing it, and she’ll be helpless in stopping it.” There was an unusual seriousness to Nowi’s voice as she spoke, which struck Nah as strange but she felt compelled to keep listening in to see if she could get any explanation for why that was what they were discussing in that room.There was no further talking, though, and after a few minutes of just listening to her parents shuffling around, getting ready for bed that night, Nah decided that her time was better spent going into her room for herself. As she went, she couldn’t help but process what her parents had been discussing, trying to piece together what had happened in order to get them to start talking about something so mature and serious. In fact, Nah wasn’t sure what had prompted things but she did know that she was going to prove her parents wrong. After all, she knew what they were talking about, even if she hadn’t heard the beginning of the conversation.And if her parents were convinced that she was about to start following in her friends’ footsteps and having children before she was ready, then she was going to prove to them that she could be a grown woman without dragging herself down in that way.Rash decisions were not Nah’s strong point, even if she was a bit predisposed to making them thanks to the personalities of her parents and how she’d been raised. That didn’t mean that she wasn’t able to make them, but instead that she was fairly bad at making them unless she was super into the idea behind making them in the first place; of course, that meant that she was rarely good at making them at all. The last time she’d jumped blindly into making a decision and hadn’t thought twice about it until it was already said and done had been when she’d planned a party for her friends, and that had been nothing short of a disaster in getting it all organized without losing her sanity.(Perhaps that fact about herself was part of why Nah felt so strongly about proving her parents wrong, because she felt that having children was quite a mature choice.)At any rate, Friday when she went to Ribbon’s school and spent the entire day working on updating paperwork in her office instead of making a young girl’s life worse, Nah had a realization strike her after seeing the due date for some of the updates she had to complete. “Huh, my birthday’s coming up soon, isn’t it?” she remarked, before her fingers pulled away from her keyboard and she reached over to touch the date on the calendar beside her desk. “Wonder what Mom and Dad are going to buy me for the occasion. Knowing what they think, condoms, probably.”She snickered to herself for a second, thinking about the sheer embarrassment they’d all experience if that were the gift they wrapped their loveless daughter, before her finger trailed up to a date the following week. Tapping the square on the calendar of the following Thursday, she hummed a low note before shaking her head. “No, I’m going to be reasonable about this. I’ll ask Ribbon what she thinks her brother might want for his birthday, then get him something at her suggestion. She’s bound to know better than me.”Ribbon did not, in fact, have the slightest of clues as to what her brother would’ve wanted as a birthday gift. As they were pulling out of the school parking lot that afternoon, Nah having been asked to take Ribbon home out of convenience for her family, the girl had been presented with the prodding question and gave the most honest answer she could muster. “He’s got so much in his life that I don’t even know what I want to get him. I bet we could go to the store together and pick some things out, if you wanted, but I’ve got no ideas. I know what our parents are getting for him, though!”“Your parents are getting him something?” Nah asked, genuinely surprised to hear that given what she knew about that family’s relationships and how strained they often were. “Color me shocked. Want to tell me, or do I need to hear it from him myself?”“It’s more of his old game things, Dad said that they went online months ago and found a bunch of games that Yarne loved when he was younger than me, and they bought them so he can replay them as much as he wants.” Ribbon shrugged, seemingly disinterested in what she was talking about. “I don’t really get why he wants to play that old stuff, but that’s his choice, not mine. I see people in videos playing some of those old games, and they’re really boring. Don’t you think they’re boring too?”“I wasn’t super into video games at any point, so I can’t really answer that one.” It was true, Nah’s parents had been pretty strict about what kinds of media their daughter was exposed to growing up, and in the era of video gaming being a huge force to reckon with, they’d fought hard to keep anything more money-intensive than mobile games out of their home. That wasn’t to say that Nah hadn’t played games at friends’ houses or while waiting for after school events to get started, but she wasn’t nearly as savvy about them as everyone else in her age group. “I do know that Yarne really likes his gentle games, though.”“Oh yeah, the super boring ones,” Ribbon said, pretending to gag after her sentence. “He’s tried to get me to play those with him, especially back when I was really little and he still lived at home, but I didn’t like them at all.” Her nose scrunched up as she looked at Nah, who was focused on safely making a turn rather than continuing the conversation. “I bet he’d like it if you got him a new game to play, that isn’t one of those old games Mom and Dad are getting him.”While it was a suggestion, it wasn’t one that Nah was going to do anything with. “I’ll leave buying new games to him, don’t want to get him something too scary that he’d never play. Besides, if I bought one—even for him—my parents would get all up in arms about it.”“Nah, I think your parents are more protective than mine, and that’s saying something.”It was, truly, a bit embarrassing that a twelve-year-old girl would make such a statement about someone almost twice her age, but Nah played it off like it was nothing. “That’d be because I’m my parents’ only child, whereas you have an older brother and a younger sister for your parents to have to care about too.”“Right, I guess that makes sense.” Ribbon’s voice grew smaller, and she mumbled something under her breath that Nah didn’t quite catch, only for that to be the end of the conversation entirely. When she got out of the car at home, the girl didn’t even thank her ride, merely gathering her things and getting up to her front door as fast as she possibly could.Nah let her car idle in front of the Leichtfoot home just long enough to see that Ribbon was able to get inside before she was driving once again, knowing that she had nowhere else to go but her own house at that point. Along the way, she thought about the question she’d asked and the answer she’d been given, and how it hadn’t helped her in any way that mattered. “I’ll think about it over the weekend, then come to some conclusion about what to do Monday or something,” she decided, hoping that she’d remember that was the decision she’d made.Fate had a funny way of playing tricks on her that weekend, though, and Nah woke up the next morning feeling completely under the weather, her face aching with how full her sinuses were and her head pounding from a headache like none she’d ever experienced before. By Sunday night, she was feeling even worse, with a moderate fever on top of it all to make her have to call off work for the first time in her life. Monday and Tuesday both were washes of days, and she felt horrible that she’d needed to not only call off work a second time but that she’d needed to call Ribbon’s parents and let them know that she wouldn’t be taking their daughter home that week.However, she didn’t feel quite as guilty about needing to text Morgan to let him know that she was coming down from illness and couldn’t make the session, especially when his response was that there wasn’t going to be a session anyway and that he’d forgotten to tell her that fact. “Well, that’s fortunate,” she muttered, setting her phone aside so that she could focus on resting up instead of getting into a fight over being an afterthought on information being passed along.By Wednesday morning, she felt well enough to go back to work, although she was quite lethargic and spent a lot of time before heading off to the school in her bathroom, steaming out her face with a piping-hot shower. By midday, she was regretting her decision to go in after all, but she knew that putting students on the backburner any longer wasn’t a great idea, especially since she needed to make a difference in their lives when she had the chance. But, even though she was forcing herself to be physically present, she knew that she wasn’t doing her best work in reaching the high-needs students in the ways they needed.When she got home that night, she barely had the energy to say a word to her mother before she was trudging up the stairs, feet dragging like she couldn’t lift them up from the floor for more than a second. She changed into her pajamas and crawled in bed, fully intending on sleeping for the whole night and being prepared for the next morning, when her door came open and Nowi walked inside the room, hands on her hips looking concerned. “You’re not hiding anything from me, are you?” she demanded, leaning forward to try and seem more forceful in her questioning. “This sickness feels like it’s coming from a place of guilt, or shame, or maybe even regret.”“Mom, seriously, I work with children, they’re germ-infested little brats and they’re coming up on a break, they’re all sick throughout the school. It was only a matter of time before I got what they’ve been passing around.” In her bed with her covers pulled up to her chin, Nah gave her mother an unamused look. “The only place of ‘regret’ I’m getting this sickness from is the same place as regretting getting my degree.”Nowi stood up taller, shaking her head as she came closer to her daughter’s bedside, before sitting down next to her legs. “I want to believe you, Dinah, but there’s…been a lot of talk at the church about some less-than-ideal decisions being made by members of our community and I want to make sure that this isn’t Naga smiting you for doing something dumb.”“I swear that I haven’t done a single thing that’d make Naga disappointed in me, especially not to the point to give me the respiratory crud that schoolchildren thrive with.” Nah wasn’t actually sure how the rumors she knew her mother had been hearing would equate with getting this sort of illness, but she’d long since accepted that Nowi wasn’t the brightest of women. “I’m just living my life and doing my job, and this is the price I’ve paid for it.”“As long as you’re sure you’re not doing things you’re going to wish you hadn’t,” Nowi said, patting Nah’s legs a couple of times before standing back up. “If you get hungry, we’ve got a bunch of soup downstairs. Lady Tiki heard you weren’t doing well and had some of the ladies put together a care package, but most of it is stuff that your father took with him for lunches this week. All that’s left is soup and some juice.”“I’ll think about it if I feel up to it. Thanks, Mom.” Nah didn’t actually want to thank her mom for anything, but she knew it was what was right to do in that moment, and it got Nowi out of her hair that much faster. As her door closed, she sighed and closed her eyes, sinking her head further into her pillow and hoping that sleep would take her sooner rather than later.It was a double-edged sword, falling asleep so late in the afternoon as opposed to waiting until it was a more reasonable time. Nah did wake up for a late dinner and slunk down to the darkened kitchen to reheat some of the soup from the manakete ladies, and enjoyed it with a nice glass of orange juice that was clearly home-squeezed, given how much pulp and how many seeds she was contending with to swallow it down. She then sat on the couch, still feeling tired but having her mind wide awake and racing with all the things she needed to get done before returning to bed, and turned the TV on to see if she could find some sappy movie or old show to watch a bit of before heading back upstairs.The channel it had been left on was the main channel for the cheesy romance films that she knew her mother loved, and Nah chuckled to herself as she watched the opening credits for one she’d actually seen before roll across the screen. “Oh man, I remember when they first premiered this movie years ago,” she said to herself, turning the captions on so that she could enjoy the movie without needing the volume up too loud. “I remember that me and Noire had a sleepover right here, and we watched it with Mom and talked about how the romance was so unrealistic. Good times, good times.”Twenty-five minutes into the movie and Nah’s eyelids were beginning to grow heavy, as she curled up under a blanket on the couch to try and muscle through more of the… At the mere mental reminder that she needed to be strong and make her way to the end of the movie, she shot back up, all tiredness temporarily erased from her mind. “I was so focused on not dying this week that I forgot all about getting Yarne a present,” she groaned, right as the strapping male love interest in the movie showed up for the first time, an exchange student coming from a war-torn region where he was one of a handful of living bachelors left alive. “I’m seriously the worst friend ever if I forget to do anything for him.”At least she was awake enough to finish watching the movie, but after the ending (in which the male exchange student and his hockey-loving bride rode off into the sunset, their destination a small airport to charter a private flight back to his homeland), she felt like she wasn’t going to sleep at all until she solved the problem she’d put off until far too late. Sitting on the couch under her blanket as she stared at the promos for the next cheesy movie about to begin, Nah found herself blinking slowly, processing all of the mistakes and problems she’d been through that week in order to put her exactly where she was. “I bet if I explained why I didn’t do anything for him, he’d get it, but at the same time…would I accept that sort of excuse if it happened to me?”She picked herself up off the couch, folding the blanket and draping it over the arm of the furniture before turning the TV off and heading for the stairs, taking the steps one at a time as quiet as she could. The last thing she needed right then was to wake either of her parents up and need to explain that she’d been downstairs far longer than necessary just to watch a stupid movie (although she knew that Nowi would fully support that decision). Thankfully, her careful movements were enough to keep their door firmly closed, and she was able to get back into bed with relative ease and lay awake for a long while, thinking about how she was going to dig herself out of her current hole.Somewhere along the way, she fell asleep, her dreams vivid with anxious decisions and activities that she’d never take part in while awake. When her alarm went off, she cracked open her eyes to see that she was, in fact, back in the waking world, before turning the alarm off and pulling herself out from under her covers to get ready. Without a single solid direction for how she wanted to approach her current predicament, Nah accepted that she might have just made the quickest turnaround from “really good friend” to “absolutely horrible person” that she could possibly have done. If something were to save her from the problem she’d created, she didn’t know what it would be or where it would come from, but given that it was her supposedly lucky year, perhaps it would be possible.Salvation came in the form of a push notification on her phone that arrived right at the start of her lunch break, after half a day spent wrangling children for their extra lessons and filing more paperwork. The mere presence of the notification was usually an annoyance, given that ordering lunch to any of the schools she worked at was a bit of a nightmare, but when Nah saw it that afternoon, it was like a message directly from Naga. “I wonder…” she started, swiping the notification away as she grabbed her lunch and rushed out of her office, finding an empty, unused room to dine in that day.Once she didn’t have an audience to entertain, she continued her thought, speaking it aloud to make sure it didn’t sound as crazy as it felt it was. “I wonder if my card information ever got deleted after last time. I bet a nice dinner on my dime would be a great gift, and one that doesn’t have to happen tonight if they don’t want it.” A smile started to creep across Nah’s face, her feeling like she’d just solved a puzzle that had been intended to stump her forever. “Bet there’s only one way I can check that, though.”After shoveling a couple of bites of the previous night’s soup into her mouth and swallowing it cold, having forgotten all about reheating it, she grabbed her phone again and scrolled through her contacts, finding one that she hadn’t interacted with in months and hovering over the call button. The thought of being a burden and calling at a bad time crossed Nah’s mind, but she knew that merely sending a text wouldn’t necessarily be enough, especially if her message went unread for too long. She couldn’t leave everything up to chance right then, so she silently apologized to Naga for putting things off like she had before pressing the button and putting the phone on speaker, hoping that she’d get an answer instead of a voicemail box.It felt like it was ringing forever before she was, as she feared, sent to voicemail, which she chose not to deal with and hung up before the tone was given. But before she was able to try calling again, her screen lit up with the return call coming at her, and she accepted it and put it back on speaker in an instant. “Uh, is something going on or was this a really weird pocket dial?” Kjelle’s confused voice asked on the other side of the phone, as if she hadn’t answered initially because she was surprised at what she was seeing. “Last I heard, you’re not even at Ribbon’s school today, so I…you know, don’t think it’s anything to do with that.”“Nope, nothing to do with Ribbon, but not an accidental call either,” Nah replied, giving a laugh at how those were the two options that were given. “I didn’t interrupt anything by doing this, did I?”“I mean, just some studying, but I’ve got time to get that done. It was almost time for a break anyway, so this might’ve been my excuse to take a bit longer away from the class.” It took Nah a second to realize what in the world Kjelle was talking about, before remembering that she’d decided to start on chasing her dreams and getting into some sort of program for physical trainers. “So are you going to tell me why you’re calling me, or are we going to sit here going back and forth for a while?”Nah blinked once, trying to piece together the exact train of thought that had led her to making the call in the first place. “Right. I’ve been sick this week and forgot all about getting something together for Yarne’s birthday and was—”“No, you’re not going in on what I’ve gotten him.”“—that wasn’t what I was going to ask, but I’m glad that you’re keeping whatever that is to yourself. Pretty sure I don’t want any part of it.” Once again, Nah tried to get her story in order to fully explain what her intentions were. “Like I said, I’ve been sick and hadn’t gotten anything for his birthday, but then I remembered something that you might be able to do for him, for me.”There was a moment of silence, before she got a laugh as a response. “Look, I’m sure there’s a lot I can do for him on your behalf, but it’s all going to require money, and…”“And that’s why you should hear me out on this, okay? I promise that if it works the way I think it will, it’ll be my money you’re spending, and it’ll be worth it for both of you.” Nah felt like she was having to be a bit forceful, but she understood that it was originally coming off as her asking for Kjelle to buy something on her behalf. “Are you ready to listen to what I thought up?”“As ready as I’ll ever be.”“Okay, so, remember when I snagged your phone and ordered lunch for Yarne and the guys under your name but with my card? Did you ever remove my card from the list of payment methods on there?” It was a total shot in the dark, and Nah knew that, but the answer she got wasn’t anything close to what she was anticipating.At the very worst, she thought that she’d get told that the card information had been deleted, and at the best she’d hear that it was still there. “I don’t think we’ve used my phone to order anything since then? So I don’t see why it wouldn’t still be on there?” Kjelle sounded unsure, and her words were followed by the obvious sounds of Nah being put on speaker for some investigating to happen. “Yeah, it’s still the most recent payment method on there. Are you seriously offering to buy us dinner as a birthday present?”“Given that I’m still somewhat sick, and I doubt you’d like me sharing my germs in your house, yeah. That’s exactly what I’m offering.” Nah knew she couldn’t be seen, but she smiled at the phone anyway, hoping that her generosity was being taken seriously. “It’s just about the only thing I can do this late, after all.”“I’ll be honest, this isn’t something I ever expected getting called about. You’re not saying this now, just to dispute charges when we do order something, are you?”“Do you really think I’m that kind of scumbag?”“True, you’re not the type of person to do that. Thanks for this, Nah, I think it’ll really make Yarne feel better about things for at least one night. He’s all sorts of stressed and worried and working himself too hard—you know, things that have always been typical for him, but have only gotten worse lately. Bet you can’t ever guess why that might be.” As if right on cue, something happened outside of the range of the phone’s receiver, followed by Kjelle sighing deeply. “I’ve got to go take care of that. Sorry to cut this short, but…thanks, Nah, we really appreciate this gift.”“No prob—oh, she’s already gone.” Nah looked at the ended call screen and her smiled faded a little, although her spirits were still lifted from how she knew she’d done something good right then. A free meal, without any stipulation for how much it could cost or where it needed to be from, was always a welcome treat to people. She could only imagine that it would be doubly welcomed by a couple that needed a night to stop worrying about all of the other things going on in their lives and just get to enjoy themselves. “Well, if she really takes me up on that offer, I’ll know sooner or later when the money gets pulled from my account.”With that good deed done, she focused on eating her cold soup and watching clips from movies cheesier than the one she’d spent the previous night watching, inwardly grimacing at how bad some of those movies were. By the time her lunch was over, Nah had come up with a short list of movies she needed to sit her mother down to watch, and a shorter list of movies that she wanted to watch on her own, and she was feeling good as she went back into her office to tackle the second half of her day. Even still, she had the present and the call lingering in her mind, as if she was anxious about how the whole thing was going to turn out, and if there were going to be any issues on making it work out.The only word she got about things not going according to plan was a single text message later asking her for her card’s expiration date, but even then that was a simple question to answer and hopefully an easy problem to have solved. It wasn’t until much later that evening that she got a second text, coming from a different number than the one she’d been communicating with before, thanking her for the meal and for her kind gesture to pay for it outright. Replying to Yarne’s thank you (which she could tell had been typed with teary eyes, given how many weird punctuation marks had made their way into the body of the message) was honestly harder than just about anything else she’d done that day. But still she made it happen, wishing him the happiest of birthdays and going on with her night knowing that she’d done a good deed.Despite her not saying a word of it to her mother, Nowi seemed to figure out that Nah had been up to something over the course of the day, and when they joined together to watch an episode of an incredibly trashy “real” romance show, she simply had to do her best to get all the information. “I heard that you were buying things for others today,” she said, catching Nah by surprise at how matter-of-fact her tone was. “Not that that’s a problem, I mean, you’re such a giving woman that it makes sense you’d do that, but…why not buy something for us?”“We’ve still got Lady Tiki’s soup, we don’t need to be spending money on food right now,” Nah replied, not sure how this had become the topic of conversation. “Maybe once it’s gone I’ll think about buying dinner. Sound good to you, Mom?”Nowi took in a deep breath, letting her shoulders rise as high as she could get them, before blowing out all of the held air and letting herself deflate. “I suppose, but I’m getting really tired of having soup around here.”“You’re the one who accepted the manakete care package, not me.”“I suppose that’s true. Come on, Nah, why are you always so reasonable and mindful about finances and that sort of thing? Can’t you just treat yourself for a change?” The answer Nah knew her mother wanted, and the answer she would inevitably give, were two vastly different answers, but she couldn’t just drop her morals to break loose and have fun. It wasn’t her style, much like being spontaneous and reckless wasn’t in her typical wheelhouse.Their conversation fell flat there, until they were partway through their episode and Nah looked over at her mother, having decided that her curiosity needed to be satiated. “How did you know about me buying something for Yarne, anyway?”“Oh, you know, word gets around,” Nowi knocked her head gently from side to side before laughing. “And in this case, it was his father asking me if I was aware that you’d bought them dinner tonight.”“…I bought them dinner?” Nah repeated, eyes going wide as she reached over to grab her phone, opening up her banking app and logging in to see that yes, in her pending charges was quite the hefty amount waiting to be withdrawn. “I mean, should’ve seen that coming, but I was expecting to just buy dinner for two people, not an entire family.”“Guess your giving heart got the best of you on this one.” Winking at her daughter, Nowi watched as Nah tucked her phone back away and grumbled something under her breath, which was met with another laugh. “I bet you’ll think twice about letting someone buy things with your money, won’t you?”“It’s not the end of the world, I’ve got more than enough to cover that several times over. It’s just unexpected how much money they spent on dinner, that’s all.” Honestly, if Nah had thought it would potentially happen like it did, she would’ve been much clearer to Kjelle about who all she was willing to pay for dinner for, but the whole family getting together for dinner for Yarne’s birthday shouldn’t have been as much of a surprise as it was. “But this means we’re waiting even longer for when I’m buying us dinner, sorry.”Nowi’s mouth opened slightly as she went to say something, then thought twice about it and closed it right back up, putting her hand on Nah’s shoulder instead. “I think I understand why that’s the case, and I accept it. I don’t like it, but I accept it nonetheless.”As they got back to watching their episode in relative silence, Nah couldn’t help but start to think about what things her mother wouldn’t be so accepting of, and she wondered if moments like this between them would be ruined if she did venture down a path she shouldn’t explore.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Right as her life was beginning to feel like it was turning into something she’d never anticipated, Nah was thrown right back down to reality by means of her involvement at the manakete church. It was Nowi’s fault entirely, because Nah had more or less stopped attending regular church services but her mother certainly hadn’t, even though she wasn’t a weekly visitor to the congregation by any means. That meant that, when Nah was loudly awakened by her mother coming into her room blasting music that Sunday morning, it was the week that Nowi decided she would head to church again. “You’re coming with me,” she told her daughter, receiving a loud groan as a reaction. “Nope, I’m not hearing that whining, this is what we’re doing and that’s that.”“Mom, you couldn’t have warned me last night when we were playing board games that you were planning on dragging me to church today?” Nah wasn’t going to ever be able to elaborate on why she would’ve appreciated a bit more warning, but the collection of toys under her bed were freshly disturbed and wouldn’t have been touched had she known she’d have an early wake-up call. “Couldn’t have bothered to drop this on me then, instead of doing it now?”“I wasn’t going to make you come with, but then Lady Tiki called this morning and…well, it’ll be best if we go to the church together to hear what she has to say.” Shutting her music off, Nowi stepped backward toward the door, before looking around her daughter’s bedroom a bit. “If what she warned me of is true, I think you’ll want to hear it.”“You’re not forcing me to go because she claims that music is the avenue for Grima to overtake our souls and push Naga out, right?” It sounded like a joke, but Nah remembered all too well the time Lady Tiki had tried convincing her that her enjoyment of boybands in her teenage years was going to open herself up to the Fell Dragon’s influence. “She wasn’t right then, and she wouldn’t be right about it now.”Nowi’s eyes lingered on the posters on the ceiling for a little bit, before snorting in laughter. “No way, you and I both know that that’s just her trying to get people to go back to listening to the oldies. This involves someone you know, that’s why I want you there.”Sitting up in bed, Nah felt her stomach sinking at the way her mother had gotten more serious when she’d said that. “I don’t know anyone that would be causing trouble for your church, and definitely not anyone that’d be causing problems for Lady Tiki.”“Dinah…you’re coming with me.”Rather than retort the use of her full name, or try to argue her way out of having to go to the church and its stuffy service and old folks a-plenty, Nah kicked her blankets off and let out another loud groan. “I’ll get ready, but I’m not going to like it. This is ridiculous that Lady Tiki couldn’t have let you know about this sooner.”“Trust me, I wish she’d given me the call yesterday rather than at five o’clock today,” Nowi replied, turning to leave the room. Before she closed Nah’s door, she gave a final message on their day’s plans: “Be ready in half an hour so we can get there before the service, per her request. I’ll drag you kicking and screaming if I have it.”Once the door was closed, Nah stood up and put her hands on her hips, leaning toward where her mother had just been standing. “I’m not a child anymore, I don’t need to constantly be treated like one,” she stated, waggling her head with every word. While she understood that her mother didn’t want to let their biggest religious figure down by telling her they weren’t going to show up, it certainly would’ve been nice to not need to get up incredibly early unexpectedly to entertain her batty antics.It was nearly an hour before the posted services began when Nowi and Nah pulled up outside the church, the only other vehicle there belonging to Lady Tiki and her girlfriend, both of whom were still sitting inside of it. “She’s allowed to bring backup, why couldn’t we bring Dad to even the score?” Nah jokingly asked, to which Nowi waved a hand at her to get her to shush. “Well, it’s true. Dad loves having to come to church.”“He would’ve come if he wasn’t going to work a new job here in a bit, you know that. Lady Tiki and Say’ri come to services together every week, they’re probably staying here after we’re done having this talk and…oh good, Lady Tiki’s getting out.” At the sight of the elder leaving her vehicle, Nowi began to do the same, but she froze and re-buckled herself seemingly out of nowhere. “She doesn’t want me out.”“She doesn’t want you out?” Nah repeated, looking toward where Lady Tiki was now standing in front of the car, one hand gesturing for Nowi to stay where she was while the other was beckoning Nah to come to her. “I-I don’t know what this is about, Mom. Why does she want me but not you, when she called you about this!”“I don’t know, but you can’t leave her waiting.” Nowi took a deep breath, before leaning over and patting Nah’s leg. “You’ll be fine, she’s not nearly as scary as people make her out to be.”Nah had spent a lot of time having to talk to Lady Tiki, and she’d never really enjoyed any moments that had been wasted hearing the religious ideology and why following Naga devoutly was the only way for manaketes to find success in life. She was wary of being wrapped up in a one-on-one conversation with the elder, especially under the current circumstances, but every second she hesitated on getting out of the car was another second that she was setting herself up for being chewed out about her choices. That meant that her hand was ultimately forced in what she was going to, because there was no way she was going to be able to convince her mother to throw the car in reverse and get them far away from that parking lot.The moment she opened the car door and began to get herself out, Nah heard Lady Tiki’s voice directed right in her direction. “Hello, Dinah. It’s a pleasure to see you this morning.”“He-hello, Lady Tiki,” Nah replied, wanting to correct her name so badly but refraining from making things worse. After she’d closed the door and given her mother a pointed, pleading look, she made her way up the curb to face the elder with a shaky smile. “Is there anything I can do for you today?”“I want to discuss something I’ve heard rumbles of throughout the manakete community, something that I know you may be familiar with.” Tiki took a few steps back toward her own vehicle, waving for Nah to follow. When the younger woman hesitated in stepping in line with her, she sighed and looked back at Nah, shaking her head. “Perhaps this conversation is unnecessary. Your behavior is already admitting guilt to turning away from the church that raised you.”“Hold on a second, you can’t just accuse me of that!” It had the effect of getting a pep in Nah’s step, as she scrambled to find herself next to Tiki, who then continued walking forward, heading toward the entrance to the church with small strides. “Lady Tiki, I promise you that I’ve never once thought about finding salvation with any god or goddess except for Naga. Hasn’t ever crossed my mind.”“Yet you spend your time in the house of one who is falling into the clutches of the Fell Dragon, unable to be watched by anyone but the people present.” There was a grave tone to Lady Tiki’s voice, as if she was speaking about a life-or-death matter, not just the religion that their culture found its backbone in. “Come with me, child. I want to know more about what you know.”Nah winced when she realized that this was going to be about Morgan and his strange behavior, but she knew that she wasn’t really familiar with what was happening there, beyond Morgan getting himself wrapped up with the wrong people. “I can’t say that I know much about any of this at all,” she admitted, but she followed Lady Tiki inside the empty church, down into the giant altar room with the statue of Naga on full display. This was a space that Nah had spent many, many hours with her parents in her youth, and while she’d shied away from coming to church as frequently in her adult age, she still felt the importance of the place when she was inside.An air of silence fell between the two as they both looked at the statue, Lady Tiki bowing her head to pray for a moment while Nah watched her, unsure of if she should pray as well or not. It certainly wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that she could whip up a prayer worth giving in the presence of such a notable religious statue—there were students she worked with that needed prayers for their growth, and looking beyond that her social life was a bit messy at the moment, that could’ve used prayer as well. But when Tiki’s prayer seemed to drag on for minutes, Nah decided that she’d throw one that was short and sweet in the statue’s direction. She bowed her head and closed her eyes, giving a slight huff before very quietly whispering her prayer to the world.“Naga, goddess who leads all manaketes no matter how wayward their hearts, please guide my friend back to the light before he shuns it forever. Thank you.”When she lifted her head, Lady Tiki was looking right at her, crinkles in the corners of her kind, tired eyes. “When his parents first attended this congregation, it was in preparation for their marriage. His mother had turned her back on the church of the Fell Dragon, which she’d been born into, and his father had been raised here under my watchful eye.” She tilted her head slightly to the side, to the point that Nah thought she was beginning to doze off before she kept speaking. “He and his sister were both raised here, and I always thought that his sister would become someone notable in the name of Naga, but her life has unfortunately carried her elsewhere.”“Yeah, we’ve talked about that before,” Nah reminded Tiki, knowing that it hadn’t been all that long ago that she’d been asked by the elder to try and get Lucina back into the folds of the active church community. “Lucina’s got enough going on right now that I don’t want to add to everything else by asking her to come back to join us for services.”“I understand that. I wouldn’t even ask you to ask that brother of hers to join us either, but you need to convince him that spending time with active members of the Fell Dragon’s church will do nothing to bring him peace after life.” Lady Tiki straightened her neck back out, looking at the statue with her eyes still mostly closed. “But he came to our celebration of the year of the dragon, and that’s where I’m certain he fell into the clutches of evil. How could we have failed him like that?”While she didn’t know how to respond to such a question, Nah did look at Lady Tiki, before turning her gaze to the statue as well. Slowly, she went back and forth between looking at the two figures, one living and one simply a deity, and for the first time she realized how much Lady Tiki looked like a physical version of what they presumed the goddess looked like. They weren’t identical by any means, but it made sense why the manakete population in Ylisse seemed to revere Lady Tiki like she was a living goddess. “I’ll do whatever I can to convince Morgan to stay under Naga’s guidance,” she said after making her realization, and the elder woman smiled when she heard it. “That’s all I really can do at this point. I know he’s gotten ideas in his head that I probably can’t erase, but I can try.”“Trying is all I ask, Dinah.” Lady Tiki held out a hand for Nah to take, which she did with only a second’s thought about if it was the best thing to do. “No one in this world is perfect, but if we work to protect the sanctity of Naga’s domain, we have done all we can.”Nah shook her head slowly, knowing what message Tiki was trying to give her with that statement but feeling like it hadn’t had the intended impact. Now she felt like she’d already failed the goddess by knowing that her friend had dipped his toes into the darkness and she hadn’t done anything to stop him yet. Sure, she’d tried to convince him that it wasn’t a good idea, and she’d helped bail him out when things had gotten bad, but there was so much more she could’ve been doing the whole time.Tiki seemed to sense the conflict within Nah’s mind, as she used her hand to send a powerful squeeze to the younger woman. “You haven’t failed me, or Naga, or anyone, and as long as you stay true to your upbringing and your church, even if you fail to bring him back, you haven’t failed any of us, including yourself.”“I…right, yeah, that makes sense.” This time, Nah’s head shook faster, like she was brushing off the doubtful thoughts she’d let consume her mind. “Thank you for asking for me to be here this morning, Lady Tiki. It’s been helpful to recenter myself where I need to be, what I need to do for the best of the manaketes, all that stuff.”“Now live up to your expectations. Your family, your culture, your church, we all know what you’re capable of, Dinah, and we want to see you rise to those goals.” That was the last thing Lady Tiki said before trying to turn to leave the altar room, and Nah had to quickly follow her because she couldn’t bear to pry her hand out of the older woman’s. It did mean that they ended up leaving the church building and walking back to the cars still hand-in-hand, and it was only when they were in front of the vehicles that she finally let go.Rushing another thank you for the conversation, Nah bolted back to her side of her mother’s car, banging on the window until Nowi unlocked the door to let her in. “What was all that about?” Nowi asked her once all doors were closed on the car again and Nah was sitting in her spot, breathing somewhat heavily now that she’d had time to accept what had happened. “I’ve never seen Lady Tiki lead someone into the church by herself like that. Say’ri and I were discussing how…bizarre this whole thing is.”“Lady Tiki’s caught wind of a friend of mine starting to get interested in the Fell Dragon, which I guess is my problem to solve and not his, even though he’s the one doing it. I think she just pushed the whole church’s needs onto my shoulders with that one. This is apparently a problem of Naga potentially being destroyed if this isn’t stopped, so…” Nah leaned back into the seat and buried her face in her hands. “I’m just a special education teacher for one of the most corrupt districts in Ylisstol, and I’m being asked to prevent a battle of good versus evil in the religious sense.”Without batting an eyelash, Nowi replied, “You’ve had to tolerate Maribelle, and she’s a devout Naga worshipper herself. I don’t think that ‘good versus evil’ works here.”“When it’s literally between Naga and Grima? Yeah, I think it does.” Just saying the name of the Fell Dragon in a serious context made Nah feel uneasy, as if she was only fine with uttering it when she was making a joke. “Although I do think it’s funny that you mention Maribelle right now. Maybe I should enlist her son to help me with solving this problem.”“As long as there’s no boys unattended in my house, you could ask every person who has chosen Naga as their goddess in this city to help you, manakete or not.” Nowi winked at her daughter, who didn’t see it because her face was still covered out of her annoyance at what she’d gotten roped into. “I can see it now, Nah. You putting together a giant group of people with the one and only goal of solving whatever you need to solve to put this problem to rest. I know that the majority of people in Ylisse overall worship Naga, so you’ve got a lot of choice on who you can pick.”“Don’t you think I already know that?” Dropping her hands, Nah gave her mother a no-nonsense look that had Nowi stunned from the seriousness. “I know that just about everyone you meet in this city worships Naga, and I know that it’s even more likely to run into a Naga fanatic outside of city limits than inside. That’s why it’s so frustrating to me that one of my closest friends is falling into not being one of those many, many people!”“I’m sure you’ll be able to figure something out. You always do.”It wasn’t going to be easy to do it, and having to think about what she’d try while she was listening to the day’s sermon only made her desire to get it right stronger. Nah wasn’t about to give up on Morgan, though, and she now knew that it wasn’t just herself expecting her to make a change in his life. But making that change for him was going to require making a change for herself as well, and that was where she was getting stuck. What did she need to do in order to make it end well for both of them?Two nights of being able to plan things out was a blessing and a curse. It was good that she’d had enough time to really think through her course of action before she made any sorts of impulsive choices that would lead to costly mistakes. At the same time, however, Nah dreaded what she knew was coming for her after work on Tuesday. She was stressing so much about what would be going down that she allowed for it to impact her leaving time that afternoon. And in fact, it had such a heavy impact on when she was leaving that she probably wouldn’t have left when she did had she not gotten a call from Ribbon’s father, asking where they were and if everything was okay. After apologizing profusely about causing any sort of concern, she scrambled to pack up her stuff, wrangle Ribbon from throwing basketballs in the empty gym, and get out into the car to get her home quickly.“Do you think you can convince my parents to let me stay this late with you every week?” Ribbon asked, sounding a lot happier about having been at school so long than a typical teenager would. “I kind of liked being there playing by myself.”“I mean, we can ask, but I don’t exactly intend on ever being there this late again,” Nah replied, already formulating a plan in her mind for how she was going to handle her problem later that night. If all went as well as she hoped it would, she wouldn’t have something to dread on that note ever again, but it was pretty unlikely that it would work out. After all, how was one of her closest friends going to truly take her telling him he needed to stop messing around with the wrong people?When they pulled up to Ribbon’s house, there was an atypical car sitting outside, the sight of which made the girl gasp and begin bouncing in her seat. “Oh my goodness, Yarne’s here!” she chirped, clapping her fingers together in her excitement. “Nah, oh Nah, are you going to come in to say hi to him?”“I can’t, I’m already kind of late to getting down to Morgan’s house…” While she would have preferred to spend time with Yarne (and the rest of Ribbon’s family) than Morgan in that moment, Nah knew that simply not showing up to their first “virtual” session would not fly with everyone else in the group. “Maybe next time he’s here, I’ll have the time to pop inside and say hello.”“Or maybe you can just go see him at his house. He always tells me that you never see him, and that I spend way more time with you than he does.” Ribbon was able to contain her excitement long enough to get herself out of the car before she leapt and jumped all the way to the house’s front door, Nah waiting to see her get inside before she drove off. As the front door to the house opened, she saw the familiar figure of Ribbon’s older brother in the doorway, but he was more focused on greeting his younger sister than he was seeing who was in the car that was now driving away.She took the long way to get to Morgan’s parents’ house, knowing that it was already a decently long drive to begin with and not wanting to get there with any sort of speed. Entering on the far side of the neighborhood and weaving through countless streets that took her in unnecessary directions was enough to add nearly fifteen minutes to the trip, but eventually the extra roads ran out and she approached the familiar house with anxious worries beginning to gather in her stomach. There was no telling who’d be on the other side of the door when she walked in, and if there was anyone there aside from Morgan, talking to him about his behavior suddenly became that much more difficult. She considered just leaving without explanation and leaving him hanging, but that wasn’t the right thing to do. There wasn’t much of a choice except to face him, in the comforts of his own home.When Nah opened the door to go inside, she didn’t hear anyone walking around or doing anything of note. She could see Morgan in his usual spot at the table, a laptop in front of him that he was focusing entirely on. “Hey, am I good to come in?” she called into the house, seeing her friend turn around and wave for her to enter. “Okay, cool. Kind of weird coming inside without your sister here to jumpscare me or something.”“She left not that long ago. Had to help me get this thing up and running, but it should be good to go for the session tonight.” Morgan was already back to focusing on the computer, which was a good sign to Nah’s worried mind. “I’ve been playing around with it with Laurent for a little while now and it’s working pretty well. You’ll just want to be careful with closing windows on it, since Lucina’s background is…”“Let me guess, her and Gerome?” Nah threw out, scrunching her nose as if she wasn’t happy for Morgan’s older sister and her one true love. Somehow the actual answer was worse, because the background of the computer was a compilation of different screenshots put together that were all titled with romantic-themed names. “I never would’ve taken your sister as being a hopeless romantic, but here we are I suppose,” she said after seeing it for herself, reading a few of the dry, yet overly gushy, messages and beginning to feel like she shouldn’t have been reading them at all.“Now you get why I said be careful,” Morgan replied, putting the window he’d been actively using back on the screen to hide everything else. “Now let me explain to you how this works, because I’m going to be downstairs on my computer and I won’t be able to help you if something gets weird for you.” He broke into a long-winded explanation of the different features the website had, starting with the fact that he’d made her an account and that he’d need to hand over ownership to her before she left that night.That struck Nah as strange. “Why not just do it now?” she asked. “I’m right here, you’re right here, we can get it done in a second.”“Because I need to explain all of this to you, and then we’re getting right into playing. If you’d shown up on time, maybe we would’ve been able to do it before we started the game, but that’s your fault, not mine.” The last few words Morgan spoke were a lot colder than everything else he’d said, and when he got back to his explaining, he’d returned to his cheery self yet again. It stunned Nah into a silence she couldn’t shake, even when Morgan asked her if she had any questions, before he retreated down to his bedroom and she was left up at the table with Lucina’s computer and a whole bunch of unrelated thoughts swarming her mind.Playing a session virtually instead of all at the table was one of the weirdest experiences that Nah could say she’d had in their time playing the game. Hearing everyone’s voices, but not seeing anyone’s faces, was something she couldn’t quite wrap her head around, and no longer having a physical tabletop board to move pieces on was strange for scene-setting purposes. She dearly missed the way that they’d all played off of each other’s energy when getting into the roleplaying aspects of the game, but not being distracted by what anyone else was doing was a bit of a perk to the new set-up. However, no matter how great and flawless Morgan tried to be with running the show, it wasn’t going to make her want to play this way forever, even though she knew it was this way or nothing at all.Partway through the session, they had to take an unexpected break due to the internet cutting out for Laurent and Noire, her texting everyone about what had happened and that they were trying to fix it as fast as they could. “Who knows how long they’ll be out,” Nah heard Morgan calling up the stairs, “so why don’t you come down here so we aren’t completely alone right now?”Chills shot up Nah’s spine at the idea of going down to Morgan’s room in a house that was empty outside of the two of them, but she couldn’t think of a good reason to reject the offer. “I’ll be right there,” she called back, closing her eyes and reminding herself of what her job that night was, before rising from her chair and going down the stairs in a slow, methodical way that made every step deliberate. When she got to the bottom, she saw Morgan standing there, eyes wide as he looked straight at her. “Is something on my face? Why’re you staring at me like I’ve got two heads?”“You look like you’ve got something important on your mind,” he told her, going back into his bedroom with her following slowly. “I know that you’re a really serious lady a lot of the time, but you’re seeming even more serious than usual. It’s probably a waste of breath, but do you want to tell me what’s bothering you?”“I…it’s nothing much, just stuff with the church.” Nah swallowed down several other choice words, not wanting to jump right into what her problem was. “I got asked to be there early this weekend to have a private conversation with Lady Tiki. I guess she thinks that I’m meant for the same lofty roles she thought your sister would get when she grew up.”“Oh, Lucina’s told me all about those weird talks she’d have with Tiki. She was expected to replace her as the moral leader of the church after she passes on, but Lucina never wanted to do that and she kind of chose to leave instead of get thrown into that role.” Morgan took a seat at his computer, clicking a few things while Nah lingered in the doorway, unsure of how she should respond to such a revelation. “I bet she’d tell you all about it herself, and about how you’d be better off leaving before you’re asked to do the same thing.”Nah knew that leaving the church wasn’t a possibility for her, given how strongly manakete blood coursed through her veins, but she wasn’t going to let that little detail derail everything. “I’ll think about it. It’s a heavy topic, thinking about Lady Tiki dying someday.”“I suppose it is, but everyone dies. Even stuffy old ladies who think they run a church.”“Why do you suddenly think it’s necessary to speak about her like that?” Nah clasped her hands together, knowing that getting heated then would only make matters worse. “Even if you disagree with her role in the church, she’s still an elder manakete and you should still respect her to some degree.”“All she does is shill the word of Naga, which anyone with eyes is able to read for themselves. Sometimes, it sounds like she’s trying to convince anyone who’ll listen to her that she personally knew Naga and had the word delivered to her personally.” Again with the clicking, this time more forcefully, until Morgan stopped and looked straight at Nah. “The site crashed, everyone’s gotten kicked out and we’re trying to get back in. Guess that means we’ve got the time to keep talking about this.”She inhaled deeply, trying to remind herself that she needed to stay neutral and level-headed, even though it was clear Morgan had lost his mind about some things. “Great, so we get to have the whole religious debate that everyone’s been having since the time of the original dragons. You’re not on Naga’s side anymore, are you?”“What? Of course I am. I’m just learning more about the Fell Dragon because that’s part of my heritage, even if it’s an unpracticed part.” Morgan paused, eyes shifting around as he had a thought dawn on him. “Wait, are you treating me differently because you think I’m falling into the clutches of the Fell Dragon, like seriously?”“I mean…”“Why would I do that? I’ve been a part of the church of Naga since I was born, I couldn’t turn my back on the place that raised me.” He looked concerned, brows furrowing as he kept looking from Nah to his computer and back. “I’m not sure why you’re treating me like I’ve abandoned the church, but I haven’t. Swearsies.”“Swearsies, seriously? We’re not kids, Morgan, we’re adults living adult lives. If you want to worship a literal devil, go right ahead.” Inside, Nah wanted to believe her friend at face value, accepting that what he was saying was his actual truth, but she wasn’t about to let him know that. “Ever since you met with your aunt that time—”“I haven’t met with her since. Swear on my life on that one, since apparently ‘swearsies’ isn’t cool enough for you.” Now Morgan pried his attention off of his computer and let it land squarely on Nah, who was staring back at him with doubt painted across her face. “Come on, Nah, you know that I wouldn’t keep going back to her.”“I want to believe that you wouldn’t, but what proof do you have? Why should I accept that you’re just being weird and you’re not getting brainwashed into believing something harmful to society?” As she listened to herself talk, Nah understood why people always compared her to being a scolding parent, too serious and demanding answers to care to hear out the other side of things.“You should accept it because you’re my friend and I wouldn’t lie to you.” Morgan’s voice wavered slightly before he added, “And also Mom and Dad found out I met with her and I got in some serious trouble for it. Mom even threatened to drive to wherever it is she lives and go kick her ass again.”Nah gave a small chuckle, which quickly spiraled into full-blown laughter that Morgan joined in with. “I forgot that your mom did that, even though that was what you told me about the night at the rec center. Remember how my parents handled you having to come home with me?”“Remember nearly killing me in your car driving to your house, Dinah?” Morgan poked a finger in Nah’s direction, but when he touched her arm he froze in place. Their eyes met as silence fell between them, his press lingering on her for several seconds before he pulled away and turned back toward his computer. “Sorry, really uncalled for on that one.”“It didn’t bother me as much as usual,” Nah said with a shrug. “Swearsies.”Realizing what she’d just done, and how she was beginning to feel rather uncomfortable standing there in Morgan’s bedroom with no one else present, she turned and ran back up the stairs, throwing herself down in the chair at the table with far too much speed. The wood of the chair creaked under the force she threw at it, and she was thankful that it didn’t break with her in it right then, especially since— “Hey, you’re back!” Noire called, having heard the sounds of a manakete slamming into a chair as fast as she could. “Our internet’s working again and I think they’ve got the site up too. Perfect timing, right?”“Y-you can hear me over here?” Nah asked, blinking with her mouth half-hanging open, stunned at what had just happened. “How much could you hear?”“Uh, I didn’t hear anything until I heard you and your chair sliding across the floor. Did Morgan chase you upstairs or something?” Typical Noire, knowing the bare minimum about what was happening and yet being able to formulate guesses that made sense.Still, Nah wasn’t about to admit to anything more than she needed to. “Something like that. I’m guessing he mentioned that we were down in his room talking while I was away from the screen, huh?”“That’d be correct,” Laurent said, through Noire’s microphone, their shared space only making it make sense that he’d hear everything too. “He wanted to apologize for the delay in getting restarted after our internet outage, but then the site crashed and we were working on getting back into it. I suppose it was easy to assume you two were talking together the duration of the crash.”“We’re not stressin’ about them being in the same place right now, are we?” Brady asked, sounding muffled as he was either trying to keep himself quiet to not disturb his mother, or he was using an outdated piece of technology. “I’m sure it was nothin’ but talking about what their plans for this game are or something like that. Ain’t that right, Nah?”Her ears grew warm at Brady directly pointing his question at her, but Nah was thankfully about to tell him exactly what he wanted to hear, which wasn’t the exact truth by any means. “Completely right, yeah. He knows what I want to make happen for Farona, and he’s going to do whatever he can to make them happen naturally.”Their chit-chat lasted for a few more minutes, until Morgan came back into the call sounding a fair bit more serious than he had before things had gotten derailed. He was still experiencing issues with the site, but nothing that he couldn’t handle, and once they were all back focused on their campaign, idle conversation disappeared and it was back to adventuring and fighting like they’d always done. Nah kept muting herself because she could hear Morgan downstairs getting progressively more heated and loud as he portrayed a rather vile criminal, and she didn’t want his echo picking up for everyone. She really had no idea what character direction she wanted to take Farona in, and she certainly hadn’t been downstairs talking to Morgan about their campaign in any way.And she wished she had, because it would’ve been a much better use of her time than accusing him of falling into the clutches of the Fell Dragon, just to be told that she was far off on that assumption. Now she’d failed Lady Tiki on getting him back to their side, even though he swore that he’d never left it, and that failure was going to be a stain on their friendship for the foreseeable future. “I said, what’s Farona’s plan here and is she going to do something, or is she going to get slapped to next week?” Morgan asked, abruptly cutting off Nah’s thoughts. “We don’t have all day to wait for an answer.”“Her plan is to parry the slap with her weapon,” Nah replied, realizing that she’d been so wrapped up in thinking about how things had gone with Morgan that she’d forgotten to keep up with how they were currently going. “She’s not about to let this scum get the better of her, not like that.”“Then you better have a high roll coming, or her face is about to be stinging worse than it’s ever hurt before.”Stinging. That was when Nah became aware of her arm tingling from where she’d been poked, and she looked at it to see a perfectly-round mark that was raised above everything around it. Why would Morgan touching her cause such a reaction, unless he was downstairs using things that he shouldn’t have been? “I highly doubt that’s even possible,” she verbally replied, clicking the dice roller on the website and getting a pitifully low roll. “Or maybe it is, I don’t know.”Their session came to a cliffhanger right as the enemy’s blow connected with Farona’s face, because that was when the site went crashing again and everyone decided it wasn’t worth fighting with for just a little more closure. Nah didn’t even bother saying goodbye to her friends before leaving the call and closing the computer, leaving it there for Morgan to deal with as she gathered her things and prepared to hit the road. “Don’t leave yet, Nah!” she heard him calling from downstairs, followed by his thuds of running up the steps to burst out onto the main floor. “Mind helping me set up your account for yourself instead of it being on a login of mine?”“The site literally crashed, Morgan. I fail to see how you’d be able to get anything set up if it’s not working to begin with, but…” She trailed off as she saw his pleading eyes, and she sighed in defeat. “You know what? Sure, I’ll stay, but not for super long. Unlike you, I do have to work in the morning.”“Low blow,” he replied, putting a hand over his chest and wincing, before going to the computer and reopening it. “It’s not that I haven’t been trying to get a job, but all of the places that I’m interested in working aren’t hiring. That, or they want me to leave Ylisse to make working there happen. I’m not leaving Ylisse, no way.”“Owain said the same thing all the time, and now we’re having to play games with him virtually to make sure he’s still included.” Nah scrunched her nose at the idea of leaving the country, especially in pursuit of a job. “I’m sure something will come up that you can do around here. I mean, you’ve got an actual degree in…whatever science it was that you studied and got super into.”“Computer science, specifically into databases and how to program them. It’s a versatile skill set to have, and yet it’s gotten me nowhere yet.” With just a few clicks, Morgan had the site back up and running to some extent, although it didn’t look like all assets were loading in like they should have been. “Here, put in your email and stuff so this account’s actually yours and you can get into it whenever you actually get a computer of your own.”Nah grimaced at the idea of being expected to buy a computer for this endeavor. “Yeah, sure, sounds like a great plan. I’m pretty positive I’m not going to be doing that, so it being something you can access isn’t actually that big of a deal to me.”“No, I’m serious, I want you to be able to get into this on your own. Come here and…” He stopped talking when he looked over his shoulder and saw Nah standing a few steps away, her face scrunched yet again. “What, is something wrong with you now?”“I just realized that you smell awful. Is this something new? I don’t remember you stinking like this when I was downstairs.” The scent was strong enough that it was making Nah’s face start to itch, and the sensation was similar to the one she’d felt on the spot on her arm. There was a connection to be made there, but she couldn’t quite piece it together. “Whatever you did, I’m not a fan.”“It was…just some weird lotion that Lucina brought home, to help keep me calmed when I’m running a session. Okay, actually, she brought it home because Gerome was given it, and Gerome got it after stopping by Laurent’s mom’s shop to help out with organizing some of their foreign essentials. So I guess we can blame Laurent for this one.” Morgan kept looking at Nah, who was beginning to squint from how much her eyes were burning from the scent and whatever was causing it. “Uh, are you okay? You’re not looking so hot.”“Can you go wash it off? I think I might be allergic to something in it, or at least physically not a huge fan of one of the ingredients.” Backing away, Nah went backward so far that she just about ran into the coat rack, hearing her foot knock against it and stopping herself before she toppled it over her head. While she sorted that out, she could hear Morgan grumbling about having to go wash his hands off, and she only approached him and the table again after hearing the water run for an extended amount of time.It wasn’t a great solution, as the keyboard now had the stuff on it and she could feel her fingers begin to tingle when she had to type at it, per his request, but she wasn’t feeling like her face was trying to swell up around him any longer. “I guess I’m sorry about that,” he apologized, sounding half-hearted while he did, “but I didn’t know that you had any allergies, especially not to…whatever’s in that stuff. It makes me feel really tingly and calm when I wear it.”“And it makes me feel really tingly and like death when I smell it,” Nah replied without missing a beat. “Plus when you touched me downstairs, it left a weird mark. Guess I at least now know why that was.”“Sorry about that, too, then.” Morgan leaned his head back to look at Nah as she typed things into the fields on the laptop screen, rather than focusing on her keystrokes or the information she was changing her account with. “I’ll keep that in mind for next—uh, two weeks from now.”Nah’s hands retracted from the keyboard in surprise, glancing at Morgan before going back to focusing on getting her information typed correctly. “We’re not meeting next week? What’s the reason for that?”“Family plans. Dad’s got some big work thing that we’ve all got to go to, and I’m not going to risk being late to it because I’m playing games with you guys. Did I forget to tell everyone, or did you not hear it because you were trying to rush out of here?” He crinkled his nose up at her as she stuck her tongue out at him, and they once again fell into an awkward silence that was broken by her retracting her arms after finishing and telling him she was heading out. “There you go, trying to get out of here quickly again. I probably did something that you’re not telling me, and it’s beginning to feel weird.”“I just want to go home and get ready for work tomorrow, Morgan. I promise that you didn’t do anything wrong and I’m not mad at you or anything like that.” Properly stepping away this time, Nah got to the door before turning around to see Morgan still in the chair, looking back at her like a lost puppy, waiting for its owner to return. “I’m sorry that you think I think you did something wrong, but you didn’t. We’ve gone over this.”Morgan’s mouth opened to say something, but all that came out was a scream as the chair underneath him decided it was tired of functioning and the legs that had obviously bent when Nah slid in it came out in a way no chair’s legs should ever move. He hit the floor with a thud and promptly began laughing, Nah laughing as well as she came back to help him up to his feet. It wasn’t until she’d fully grasped his hand and had helped him to standing that she remembered that touching his hand, even after being washed, might not have been the best idea in the world.“I don’t know what that was about,” he said, bringing their locked hands up to his face, “but I appreciate you coming in to bail me out.” Without any fanfare or explanation, he gently kissed the back of her hand, realized what he’d done, and dropped it all abruptly, much like the chair had just dropped him.She stared at him, stunned into a complete silence to the point that she didn’t know what to think. “You can leave now, swearsies,” Morgan hurriedly said, shooing her with a hand gesture, and Nah nodded, walking out of the house and out to her car in a daze.The emotional and mental whiplash that boy was putting her through! She didn’t know how to process most of what Morgan did usually, but he’d been on a completely different level that night and she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do about him. In fact, she was now perfectly fine with another extended break between sessions, because she needed the time away from him to think about how she was going to interact with him next.[]On the morning of her birthday, Nah woke up to her bedroom floor covered in balloons–a tradition that her parents had followed every year as far as she could remember. She knew that she was expected to search through all of them to find one of her birthday presents, but as she lay in bed she contemplated saving it for after work. Then she remembered that she’d taken the day off, to save herself the mental anguish of knowing she was only hurting the person she went to work on Fridays for, which gave her zero excuse to not go ahead and look for the present.It took a lot of careful effort to shake each balloon for any indication that something was inside it, so that she wouldn’t end up spending her time going through the same balloons over and over again. When she found one that had some heft to it, or had something visibly inside, she would grab her phone and shine its flashlight into it, to see if it was a distraction or something notable. Most of the balloons were filled with confetti or candy, and Nah knew that her parents wouldn’t be cheap with their gift to her, as they’d never done that in the past and she saw no reason for them to start.As she made her way through the balloons, she did begin to question if maybe she was putting too much faith in her parents and if those cheaply-filled balloons were the gift after all. Those worries were quashed when she picked up a balloon that was more opaque than the others and a lot heavier. “Jackpot,” she said as she grabbed her flashlight and saw that the balloon contained a very distinct shadow. Without checking anything else, she got up off her floor and took herself, her phone, and her balloon down the stairs to where she figured her parents were waiting in the living room. To her surprise, it was only her father down there, looking rather pleased to see her. “Good morning and happiest of birthdays, Nah!” Gregor greeted, opening his arms for a hug that she took, even if she couldn’t return the favor with everything she was holding. “We had tried to make you breakfast this morning but your mother forgot to cook it long enough and everything was still raw.”“So let me guess, she’s running to get us a whole bunch of donuts to celebrate with instead?” Nah suggested, only half believing the story her father had just told her. She knew far too well that Nowi would do whatever possible to go get their favorite donuts. “I mean, I’m fine with it, but when have I ever had a homemade breakfast for my birthday? I’m thinking never, or at least, not anytime in the last two decades.”“That’s untrue,” Gregor asserted, waggling a playful finger at her with his arms still outstretched as if he was expecting more hugs. “There was one year that ol’ Gregor here made you all the donuts you could dream of.”“Wasn’t that also the year that we ended up having to leave the house while the firefighters came to air it out for us, since you forgot to turn the fryer off after making said donuts?” Nah’s eyes were alight with joy and happiness as she recalled the rather harrowing experience, remembering the house filling with smoke and her first experience with needing to evacuate in case of fire. Of course, while that part of the memory was not so pleasant, what had followed it was her favorite birthday memory of all time. “And then we had to stay in a hotel that night and since we couldn’t come home to get things, you and Mom took me shopping for new clothes and toys in case I didn’t have any waiting for me here? That was the year I had double the birthday presents, and I’ll never forget it.”Gregor blinked a few times, finally retracting his arms in order to scratch at the back of his head in a bit of embarrassment. “Yes, well, Gregor’s bank alerts never forgot that birthday either. You’re an adult, you can imagine how many calls we got about ‘unusual activity’ in our accounts that day thanks to you.”“Isn’t that what being a parent is about, though? Doing whatever it takes to make their child happy, especially on her birthday?” Saying that made it make sense why her family always spoiled her for breakfast every year, because it brought her happiness and they liked it when she was happy. Well, usually, if one looked past the overbearing-ness and the fact that her parents expected far too much of her.She waited patiently for her father to respond, but he never quite did. Instead of talking more on the matter, he walked toward the front door, opening it to give the front yard a quick sweep, then came back to meet Nah in the middle of the living room. “There seems to be a package for you outside,” he said, confused at what he’d seen, “and it isn’t something that was expected here today. Something big and…just go see it for yourself.”“A package for me?” Nah repeated, her heart soaring at the prospect of someone stealthily dropping off a nice gift without wanting to waste time on idle chitchat. She bounced happily, setting down the balloon she’d been carrying around and running for the door. When she opened it, she was anticipating seeing a box with her name on it on the other side; she was not ready for what was waiting there. It was an oversized vase filled with a variety of different flowers in all sorts of shades and colors, with a pick inside that carried a card and a bouquet of balloons floating above it.She stood there, staring at the display and understanding why her father had been confused to see it too, until she heard Nowi’s voice calling from the driveway for some assistance in bringing in breakfast. Nah shook her head to collect herself, went to meet her mother by her car, and came back to the door moments later with a dozen donuts in her arms, Nowi carrying a second dozen as well as a bag of drinks. “Where’d that come from?” Nowi asked when she saw the flowers. “Wasn’t here when I left earlier, that’s for sure.”“I don’t know where it came from, and I’m kind of scared to see who sent it.” There were only so many people out there who would care enough about Nah to send her something so big and over the top for her birthday, and whichever one it was, she wasn’t sure how she was going to respond to their gift. “I want to take this moment to assure you that I don’t have a secret boyfriend who’s sending me giant flower displays for my birthday, although I do have some guy friends that would seriously be in the running for the position if they did this.”“Dinah, you’re not getting a boyfriend over a birthday present.” Nowi was smiling when she spoke, but her words meant business, and Nah nodded as she accepted that some things weren’t going to be so easy to change in her parents’ minds. “Let’s get this stuff inside, Gregor can come out and bring that in so you can see who it’s from. Sound like a plan?”“About as good of a plan as we’ll get around here.”After reading the card attached to the flowers, Nah would’ve rather kept the sender a complete mystery, rather than knowing the truth. It was after they’d had their breakfast and she’d opened her balloon present (which was a box containing an old, beat-up phone with a note that said she could go get a new phone whenever she wanted and they’d front the bill) that she even thought about opening the card inside the flowers. It took some convincing, because staying in the dark seemed like it was fun, but she eventually grabbed the card and saw that it was printed on by a flower delivery company, and wasn’t addressed to her by hand, a blow to her thinking that the person who’d sent it actually cared.Then she opened the envelope and pulled the card out, revealing a little display with a puppy and a kitten curled up together in a basket, as well as the words My Sympathies for your Loss. “Uh, whoever sent this is a real joker,” Nah grumbled, although she was amused by how the balloons in the display were clearly birthday-themed, but the card was one for a much darker time. “I’m starting to think I know who it is, though.”“It better not be one of those boys you were talking about,” Nowi said, peering over Nah’s shoulder to try and get a better look at the card, then backing away when she realized that her daughter did deserve a bit of privacy in the matter. “Whatever, just tell me if it is so I can go talk to some parents about it.”Nah lifted her head from looking at the card, turning over her shoulder to give her mother an unamused look, before going back to focusing on what was in her hands. She opened it and was met with the most garish pink font she’d ever seen in her life, still typed by a machine but at least a little personalized. She had to squint to read what it said, and within the first handful of words she was ready to be done with it. Dinah Balakin, I heard through the grapevine that it’s your birthday today, and I wanted to be one of the first to wish you a successful year around the sun. Especially since you’ve become a bit of a thorn in my side, both professionally and socially.“Why in Naga’s name is Maribelle sending me a flower bouquet for my birthday?” Nah loudly asked, feeling like crumpling up the card to get whatever trash she was about to be subjected to out of her sight. She refrained from any destruction, however, after realizing that finishing reading the card could potentially give her insight into other matters. I wanted to take this moment to extend an olive branch of sorts toward you, since you are doing the district a service and I cannot overlook such noble sacrifices on your part.Nah’s mind was screaming at her to put the card down and forget that she’d even gotten it, but stubborn bitterness led her to continue reading it anyway. This by no means is my way of saying I appreciate you for being you, but it is my way of thanking you for existing and focusing on students and their education rather than becoming a better person. Let us both hope that this next year brings you growth in unexpected and needed ways. It was then signed with a typed version of Maribelle’s name, which Nah seethed to see there on the card. The whole thing felt entirely self-centered, like Maribelle felt she was doing something good for everyone by sending that, but all she’d done was remind Nah that she couldn’t stand that snooty woman. Perhaps it was for the best that things seemed to be awkward and rocky between herself and Brady, then.“I’m taking it that you got one of those back-handed compliment gifts that woman likes sending people. Sorry that you’ve somehow gotten onto that side of her, but think of it this way.” Nowi put a hand on Nah’s shoulder and gripped it as tight as she could. “She had to spend a small fortune on getting those flowers delivered this morning, and you get to enjoy their beauty while she thinks she wins by making you upset with her. But who’s the real winner there, huh?”Glancing at the flowers, and knowing that there were several in the bunch that made her skin crawl when she touched them, Nah had one way, and only one way, to answer that question. “She is, because she knows this is going to bother me and that’s her goal with all of this, to bother me.”“I don’t know, I think you’re the winner here. Pretty flowers and knowing she spent a bunch of money on you.”“Mom, stop. You can enjoy the pretty flowers all you’d like, but I’m not going to enjoy them even a little thanks to her.” That was when Nah left the room, storming out and upstairs to her bedroom to find a way to cool her head a bit. She was tempted to reach out to Brady and see if he could put her through to his mother, but she knew that wherever he was at that moment, it wasn’t going to be in the same room as her. The last thing Nah wanted to do was explain to her friend why she was mad at his mother again, so she simply chose to leave him out of things. If he reached out for a birthday message, then she’d possibly tell him the underhanded behavior his mother was dishing her way, but even then it might not have been the best time to make that sort of thing happen.By lunchtime, Nah was back downstairs mingling with her parents, trying her hardest to not acknowledge the flowers that were now sitting in the middle of the dining room table. They could both sense that she was still upset, but no one wanted to address it and certainly no one wanted to try and do anything about it. At least, not until Gregor decided that it was time to go get lunch as another part of celebrating his daughter, made it all the way to the front door, and opened it to find another present sitting outside, unannounced and unexplained. “Surely they could knock upon delivery,” he grumbled, bringing the much smaller box inside to give to Nah, who looked at it with suspicion. “Go on, this one has your name on it.”It did, in fact, say Nah Balakin on it, which was a better way of handling her name than the horrific card had done, but was still far from what she preferred. The box may have been small, but it had some weight to it, and Nah set it on the table to pry open its taped edge to get it open. What she found inside was what looked like a wine bottle, and she quickly closed the box back up before either of her parents saw it. “This is something that I’d asked a friend to get for me, to get for the two of you,” she quickly stammered, grabbing the box and heading for the stairs yet again.Nowi followed her in haste, with Gregor not far behind. “You’re not hiding something, are you?” she asked, putting a single foot on the staircase as she looked up at her retreating daughter. “This isn’t part of some elaborate announcement of any kind, is it?”“Mom, seriously? It’s just a gift I’m working on for you guys. Let me get it in its place and I’ll be down to go to lunch.” The truth was, there wasn’t any sort of gift at all that Nah was working on, and now she knew she’d need to come up with one, but there was time to do that once she’d gotten rid of what was actually in the box.She wasn’t shocked that she’d received that bottle of wine, all things considered, especially since it was labeled as a special manakete blend, but she’d heard far too many things about the quality of the brand and what it was meant for to trust showing her parents she’d gotten it. After she’d pulled the bottle out and tucked it under her bed, Nah shook the box until a little card came tumbling out of it, simply signed Hope you like it! – Morgan“If he’s trying to make amends after what happened at his house and what I accused him of, he’s going so far in the wrong direction without realizing it,” she said, ripping the card up and throwing it back into the box. “I bet he asked Laurent if he knew of any good gifts for manaketes and he suggested that because of the word on the label.” Nah paused, raising a finger as she thought about what she’d just said. “No, wait, that wouldn’t make any sense, Laurent knows what kind of wine that is, he wouldn’t be offering it off to a friend to send to another friend just for the fun of it. Morgan must’ve searched for it himself, and by being naïve and unaware of what things are, bought it because it’s advertised as being for manaketes, without knowing that it’s for manaketes to drink to make babies.”She shuddered to think about Morgan actually knowing that fact about the Laguz Gardens wine, and intentionally sending it to her with that fact in mind. “No, there’s no way he knows the truth, this is all a big accident that he’s going to laugh about when I tell him the truth of what he bought me.”Except that would require telling him the truth, and Nah wasn’t sure she wanted to ever have to utter those words anywhere near him. Unless, by some stroke of fate, he realized it first and wanted to bring it up with her, but what were the chances of that?About the same as her getting a gift from anyone else that day, probably. Nah’s family obviously was spoiling her off and on all day, but outside of the two special deliveries, there wasn’t anything else that appeared at the door for her. While it didn’t make her feel any better about the flowers she’d gotten, it did make her appreciate Morgan’s attempt at getting her a present that much more, and at the very least she’d need to properly thank him for it. If he asked her if she’d drank any of it, though, she’d tell him that she was going to save the bottle for a special occasion, because of its significance to manaketes.Over dinner that night, while fielding questions about her lack of love life and her career direction, Nah heard her phone ring in her purse and she froze, grimacing at the sound of a jaunty tune blaring through the restaurant. “I’ll take that, sorry,” she apologized, grabbing her purse and leaving the table to get somewhere private to answer the call. Privacy wasn’t easy to come by in such a public place, though, so Nah ended up answering while sitting on a raised curb outside of the restaurant. “I’m having dinner with my parents right now, is this an emergency?” she asked, hoping to get hung up on so she could get back inside.Instead, she was met with the warbling of several voices, Ribbon’s loudest of all, singing her a very off-key birthday song that lasted far long than it needed to. “I wanted to be able to do this for you,” Ribbon explained after the singing had ended, “and I convinced my dad to take me to Yarne’s to make it happen. Did you like it?”“Of course I did, Ribbon. Anything you do for me is something I like.” Untrue, but when she didn’t know who was listening in to the conversation, Nah was going to choose flattery every time. “Sorry I wasn’t there for you today, but with it being my birthday I wanted the day off for myself.”“I get it! I’ll just see you on Tuesday like normal! Happy birthday, Nah, you’re my closest friend and I love you!” With that, Ribbon ended the call, not even giving Nah a chance to respond to the statements made. It was concerning to a high degree that she was considered the closest friend of a teenage girl, given that she was a twenty-four-year-old woman, but Nah was sure that someone there in the room with her was going to talk to her about that being a problem. She was also curious about why she tacked on the love part, but it might’ve just been equated with friendship in Ribbon’s mind.Nah walked back to the table with her phone, now on silent, back in her purse and her mind focused on finishing dinner without further disruptions. “Who was calling you at this hour? Was it a boy?” Nowi asked, playing the role of helicopter parent far too well in the moment. “I hope it wasn’t a boy, he should know better.”“I mean, it was a call from a phone belonging to a man, but it wasn’t a man calling me. Ribbon wanted to wish me a happy birthday and roped most of her family in to make it a spectacle. Which, honestly, isn’t a problem with me. The girl’s weird, but she’s a good kid.” That may have been as close to a thanks for arranging the whole ride-giving situation that Nah had ever given her mother, but she wasn’t going to go any further with it because she would’ve inevitably gotten to know the girl working with her anyway. “Seriously though, Mom, you need to back off with thinking everything I’ve got going on has to do with boys. I’m an adult, I’m allowed to date if I want, and—”“Dating means marriage, and marriage means babies, and I am not old enough for you to make me a grandmother!” That was a complete and total lie, given that Nah had friends with much younger parents who had children of their own, but Nowi always liked to pretend she was younger than she actually was. “I’ll let you get a boyfriend while you’re living in my house under one condition, and one condition only.”“Is it that there’s no grandbabies?”“Nailed it in one. Is that a condition you’re willing to agree to?” Nowi tilted her head as she stared her daughter down, while Nah sighed to herself before nodding. “Excellent. Then I take back what I said, if it had been a boy calling you it wouldn’t have been a problem after all. Does that make you feel better?”Nah’s mouth opened slightly as she thought about how to respond, but it was Gregor who spoke next. “Nowi, love, is that truly the agreement you want to make with Nah over her birthday dinner? That is the sort of agreement most people make with teenage children, not adult ones.”“I’m not most people, in case you haven’t noticed.” Scrunching her nose at her husband, Nowi reached toward him and playfully pushed his arm, which he responded to by pushing her right back. They began knocking each other back and forth, while Nah sat across from them both, watching them with a blank stare.She truly felt like she was about to start living a double life, one half being the perfect daughter they expected her to be and the other half being the person she wanted to become. And, deep down, she knew how that split was going to become fully developed, and it all came from something that had happened earlier that day. One side could be the person that society (and her parents) expected, while the other side became more reckless. More impulsive. More prone to making mistakes. More outgoing and fun, spontaneous and wild, and willing to throw everything away for a taste of freedom.She needed to reach out to one of her friends to arrange something.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Sunday morning, instead of getting dragged to church with her mother again, Nah found herself driving to their favorite donut shop, parking as far from the building as she could and walking inside like she was supposed to be there. Even though it was a lovely late March morning, she wore a hoodie with the hood up over her head, the drawstring pulled enough to obscure most of her face, and when she got inside and to a table without ordering anything, she let the hood come down. “Let’s see how long it takes for this to happen,” she said, pulling her phone out of her pocket and checking the time.Her plan had been rather hastily-made, and she knew that if she’d been thinking through it a bit better, she wouldn’t have acted in the exact way she did, but things had felt dire in the moment that she’d been concocting everything. The meeting time (during the early manakete church service) and the location (the donut shop, so that she could get a snack before going home) were the first details she’d gotten her heart set on when making the plan, outside of who she was asking to come meet her. Now, had she let herself actually think things over a bit more, she would’ve definitely made it for later in the day, and perhaps invited another person or two as backup, but what was done couldn’t be changed and she felt at least somewhat okay with what she’d put in motion.She checked her phone again. It was only two minutes past when she’d gotten there at that point, and the business seemed to be its standard amount of busy. At the very least, there wasn’t anyone fighting her for the table she’d claimed, which was nice. Nah’s eyes tracked up the street, to where she knew that, at that time of morning on the weekend, there’d be some work getting done in the nearly-complete natural goods store. Maybe knowing that people were definitely over there was another part of why she’d been adamant about the donut shop was her meeting place; if things went sour, she could easily try to call Laurent and see if he was at the store, or if he could have his mother come down and bail her out in his stead.Another check, four minutes past her arrival. Her eyes went to the other end of the street, where she didn’t exactly have any landmarks to think about but it was a nice view on a cloudless, early spring morning. “If he doesn’t show up, I’ll just get a donut to go and head out for a nice, long walk,” she told herself, slowly letting her eyes track back to her phone to see the time yet again.Five minutes. It wasn’t even that she was expecting the person she’d asked to be there to be punctual, but she didn’t want to feel like her time was being wasted. The thought crossed Nah’s mind that she could just call him and see where he was, but she didn’t want to interrupt something if she wasn’t reaching out at a great time. So rather than look for answers, she just sat there, looking at the clock on her phone every one to two minutes, wondering if she’d made a mistake in arranging the meeting to begin with.After thirty-six minutes of waiting, Nah rose from her table and went up to the counter, planning on ordering herself a single donut and perhaps a large coffee for the road. She made it as far as getting waved down by the cashier when— “Dinah! Why are you late to your own meeting?” Morgan asked with a laugh, wrapping his arms around her like he’d been with her the whole time. “Did you forget when you told me to be here?”“I…what? I’ve been here for over half an hour, Morgan, you’re the one that’s late, not me.” Grimacing toward the cashier, who merely turned to go find something else to do instead of watch her getting tackled by a guy she hadn’t come inside with, Nah attempted to get Morgan off of her but failed despite multiple thrashes. “Seriously, let go of me so we can talk. I’ve been waiting for you and I’m not taking any excuses for why you’re late.”“I really wasn’t late, though,” he insisted, squeezing Nah a bit harder before releasing his grasp entirely. “I’ve been sitting here for, uh, twenty minutes or so? Outside. I didn’t want to come in, just in case you were in your car looking for me. Then I saw that your car was out there, but it was empty, and that’s when I came in. Promise.”Nah closed her eyes and sighed. She could forgive Morgan’s mistake on thinking they were supposed to meet outside and come in together. In fact, she could forgive that he spent a good chunk of time out there waiting on her. But there was one tiny aspect that was bugging her, because it wasn’t the defense he thought it was. “Twenty minutes ago would still be considered late, Morgan. So even though you thought you were waiting for me in the right place, which you weren’t, you were still late getting there to begin with.”“Well I tried my best, but Mother drove me and she…oh, right, can you take me home after this? She’s only in town for a short errand and is probably already heading back, but I’m clearly not done here with you.” Morgan looked at Nah and saw that her eyes were still closed, and he poked her cheek to try and get her attention. “Hey, open up, I’m asking you a serious question.”“I’ll take you home, on one condition.” Cracking her eyes slightly, Nah saw Morgan getting closer to her face, nodding eagerly as he awaited her request. “You have to buy me my breakfast this morning.”His nodding stopped as he considered what she’d asked, but he began nodding with even more enthusiasm after deciding he could do it. “What’s another donut and maybe a second drink between friends, anyway?” he said with a laugh, backing away from Nah to head toward the counter to get the attention of the cashier that was still away from their post. She watched him banging his hands on the tiled countertop, sighing as she heard him start to call for someone to help give them service.“He’s the only one that can help you now, just force a smile and pretend everything’s perfectly fine,” she reminded herself, plastering a fake grin on her face as she walked up beside Morgan and gently put a hand on his arm to get him to stop smacking things so hard. “I haven’t even decided what I want yet, so you acting rude isn’t going to get us anywhere at all. Calm yourself and be patient, will you?”“What do you mean, you haven’t decided? Weren’t you coming up here to order when I came in?” Morgan’s hands rest on the counter, but he was still looking around for the cashier. “I think you’re just lying to get me to stop trying to find the person who works here, who never should’ve left the counter in the first place!”He was right on that, but Nah wasn’t going to let him know. “I mean, I was going to look and see what they had to offer today, but it’s early enough that it looks like everything’s still in stock. And because everything’s still in stock, that means I’ve really got to think about what I want to order. Can’t feel forced to pick from scraps.”“You’re really going to make me look like a fool on this one.” Sighing, Morgan took a tiny step backward away from the counter, only for the original cashier to return to their post with both arms supporting a fresh tray of donuts. He looked sheepishly at the cashier, realizing that he’d been making himself look like a fool the whole time, before side-stepping to hide behind Nah. Not that it worked for him, given how small she stood even at full height with her head craning to look at the menu board, but he attempted anyway.After several extra moments of making absolute sure she knew what she wanted, Nah came to the counter and placed her order, exactly what she’d set out to order in the first place, and then she stepped aside for Morgan to place his as well. While he did that, and paid for it all too, she went back to the table she’d originally claimed, sitting down and watching her friend as he waited for their drinks and donuts and brought it all over to her. “I’m surprised you didn’t drop any of that,” she remarked as he sat down the drinks first, passing her the coffee and leaving the blended drink where it was, before placing the bag with the donuts down in between them. “Honestly I should have stayed up there to help you, but this table could’ve been taken if I wasn’t quick getting back to it.”“No one’s come in since we’ve both been in here, I don’t really know who you think would be taking the table.” Morgan sat down and promptly knocked his cup over, but thankfully the lid on it kept the icy mixture inside without so much as a drop leaking out. “Good thing that didn’t make a mess, that drink isn’t cheap,” he laughed, picking the cup up and putting it a bit out of harm’s way as he dug into the donut bag, giving Nah what she’d ordered before keeping the rest for himself. “Seriously, why do they think they can get away with the fun drinks costing so much more than the coffees?”“Maybe because they take more effort to make? Or because they require more than just water and coffee beans and a splash of cream?” Holding her single donut despite not having asked for it at that moment, Nah tried to figure out what to do with it before shrugging and biting into it. It tasted exactly like donuts from the shop always tasted, but there was something about how it had come into her possession that made her feel awkward eating it. That didn’t stop her from finishing it in a few more bites, while Morgan continued rambling on about his thoughts on the unfairness of the prices of drinks.When he realized that he was going on and on about something he didn’t have an interested audience for, Morgan finally quieted down and ate one of the donuts he’d bought for himself, commenting on how delicious it was. “I’ve never actually come in here and gotten anything before today,” he said, licking his fingers to get all of the glaze off of them. “I’ve had donuts from here before, of course, but never sitting here, getting to choose what I want, that sort of thing. I take it you do this a lot?”“Not as much as I used to, but this is a place that Mom and I still come to on mom-daughter dates all the time. Plus, on my birthday, she came and got donuts for our family for breakfast, which was pretty cool.” That felt like it was a lot further in the past than just a few days ago, and the realization of how recent that was made Nah squirm a little where she sat. “Actually, on that note…”“That’s neat that you get something nice like this twice in one week,” Morgan told her, ignoring her hook for whatever she was trying to say. “My parents don’t really do things like this, but sometimes Lucina will come by and bring things she tried to make herself. Emphasis on ‘tried’ because it’s never any good.”Nah nodded, having heard plenty of horror stories regarding anything that Lucina tried to make on her own. “Right, well, we can maybe make this a thing we do more often. Possibly. Depends on how things go.”“What do you mean, how things go?” It was like Morgan had forgotten completely about how Nah had asked him to meet her there that day for a specific reason, and she went wide eyed at the realization that perhaps he thought it was just to get breakfast together. “You’re not about to tell me you hate me or something, are you? Or, or, worse, that our sessions won’t work for you anymore? Please tell me you’re not cancelling those on me, Nah!”“None of that!” Her mind racing with all of the reasons why he immediately went to her wanting to tell him something negative, Nah recentered herself with a deep breath, wrapping her hands around her coffee before getting right to the point. She wasn’t going to say the dirty truth of the matter, so she needed to bait him into saying it himself. “I need to know what your thought process was for the birthday gift you got me. That wasn’t exactly a cheap bottle of wine to buy.”For a second, it seemed that Morgan had no idea what she was even talking about, but when she reminded him of the brand name, he laughed. “I forgot I even bought that, honestly,” he said, watching as Nah’s entire demeanor darkened and she winced at the truth. “I mean, it was a while back that I placed the order, and I never got told that it was shipped until pretty recently. I thought it would’ve been a nice surprise to show up at your doorstep after a hard day at work. It arriving for your birthday was an even nicer surprise.”“Let me get this straight, you bought it as a gift just because you saw it and thought I’d like it, and it just happened to arrive for my birthday?” He nodded, and Nah leaned back, amused at how fortuitous of a turn of events that was. “That’s neat, actually. Naga looking out for our relationship, I guess.”Morgan waited for Nah to bring her coffee to her lips for a drink to say, “I mean, Naga does always want to bring new followers into the fold.” The sheer earnestness with which he said it had her sputtering her hot drink all over herself, slamming the cup down and watching it splash out through its small hole on top. “What? Did you think I’m not aware of what Laguz Gardens is known for? Laurent’s told me a lot about the brand, they’ve got a bunch of different flavors made for manaketes specifically, as well as other cultures that have dragons as their spiritual leaders.”“So you know that…?”“That it’s primarily used as a drink to get people in the mood for making babies? Yeah, I had to check the box when I ordered it that says that I understand that’s the reputation the brand has in most of the cultures they cater to.” Morgan leaned forward, reaching out to wipe a couple drops of coffee off Nah’s face. “But I swear to you that I didn’t buy it because of that, because…well, I know how things are with you and your parents. I haven’t forgotten that night where I got caught over there with you.”None of this was what Nah had been expecting to hear, so she was quiet for some time, sitting with her drink drying and sticky on her hands and elsewhere on her face. “You never fail to surprise me in new and exciting ways, Morgan.”“Huh? How do I do that?”“I thought you were trying to make a move on me, imply that we should sleep together, something like that. It didn’t seem like there was any other possible explanation for why a bottle of fertility wine showed up at my front door, from you, with a note telling me that you hope I like it.” Nah’s eyes shifted downward as she thought about what she’d hoped would come out of this meeting, before she lifted her gaze back to Morgan’s face, seeing him confused at how she was taking matters. “Sorry if I might’ve gotten my brain wrapped around something that—”“I’ll sleep with you if you really want me to!” Cutting her off with a loud yell, Morgan’s response would definitely have caught the attention of all the patrons in the donut shop if there were any others in there. “Dinah, that absolutely was not my intention with this gift at all, but if you’re looking to sleep with me, I’m willing to do it.”“I-I never said I was looking to sleep with you, I just thought that was what you wanted out of all of this and was willing to possibly consider it.” Biting her tongue before she kept rambling on about how she’d been thinking about the possibility for days, Nah tried to smile at Morgan but it came off as more of a sheepish look than anything else. “I don’t want to ruin our friendship just because I misunderstood the intention of your gift, but I wanted to make my understanding of it clear. Does that make sense?”Morgan seemed to be on the cusp of jumping out of his chair with how much energy he was putting behind his answer. “It makes perfect sense! It’s only natural that when a guy and a lady know each other so well and for so long, they start wanting to know more about each other than they already do. I mean, Noire and Laurent probably go at it every other night at this point, in case you didn’t know that.”“I’ve suspected as much…”“See? And Owain’s probably skipped the ‘getting to know someone’ step and is sleeping around with all the Nohrian girls he can possibly get in bed with. Or Severa. He might be sleeping with Severa.” Morgan’s head wobbled as he slammed his hands down on the table, sending ripples through what had melted of his drink. “Of course this means that poor, poor Brady gets left in the cold, but I’m sure he’s had his chance.”At the mention of Brady’s name, time seemed to freeze for Nah, as she thought about her friend and what could have been. She’d truly thought that there was something brewing between them, but he’d made it very clear that they weren’t ever going to be more than friends and she needed to get past that. “He’s definitely had plenty of chances, sure,” Nah agreed, shaking her head to clear those longing thoughts from it. “I would hate for him to think that we don’t care about his relationship status, or lack thereof, though. Us hooking up might come off as a slap to the face or something like that.”Morgan scoffed. “Why does it matter how he feels about us getting together? Like I said, I’m sure he’s had his chance, and if he wants to get jealous then that’s on him.”“Right, yeah, makes sense. We shouldn’t have to consider anyone else’s feelings when it comes to what we want.” How bizarre of a statement for Nah to make, but she knew that it was long past the time for her to think about how anyone felt about what she did. “But let’s pump the brakes a little here, okay? We’re not getting in a relationship. We’re just hooking up, trial run, testing the waters.”“Of course, that’s what we’re doing now, but after it’s the greatest thing we’ve ever done, you’ll be begging to be my girlfriend.” The confidence was radiating off of Morgan, with the smile he wore that was progressively getting smugger, the way he was positioned to make himself seem physically imposing… Nah worried for a second that she was getting herself in way over her head with this plan, but she knew the point of no return had passed the moment she’d brought up the bottle of wine.On that note, she cleared her throat and said, “I’m not drinking the wine before we do this. I’ve heard far too many horror stories about what that stuff does to even risk it. Even if it’s a placebo or something, it’s better safe than sorry.”“I mean, that’s up to you. I’ll be doing my part to keep things running smooth, but if you think you can get at it sober, then power to you.” He winked at her, before settling back down in his seat. “When do we want to do this, later today? This week? I’m free pretty much whenever, but I know you’ve got your whole work schedule to contend with and I don’t think it’d be right to ask you to call off for my sake.”“Not for this reason, that’s for sure.” Nah brought a finger to her chin and tapped it twice, before her eyes widened. “I think we should be spontaneous on this one, let it happen when the moment feels right. I don’t think planning it out will do us any favors.”Nodding, Morgan crossed his arms in front of himself, trying to play nice and cool. “If you insist, then I’m cool with the spontaneous method.”“As long as the timing’s the only thing spontaneous happening here, anyway.”“What’s that supposed to mean?”Blinking as she tried to gauge how serious Morgan’s question was, Nah realized that he was genuinely asking what she meant and a gnawing feeling began to eat away at her stomach. “It was a poor attempt at a joke, that’s all. You ready to wrap things up here and head home?”“If you’ll tell me what you meant on the car ride, then sure.” She most definitely did not want to tell him what she’d meant at all, for fear of what kinds of comments he could possibly make on the matter, but in the battle of sitting in public discussing their sexual behaviors or getting somewhere private, the need to be back in her car won out. He at least took the meaning behind the joke in stride, laughing and promising her that he wasn’t going to take advantage of her in any way and that they’d be perfectly, absolutely safe.The thing was, Nah knew far too well that miracles did exist, and accidents were more than likely to happen, and if Naga wanted her way in the year of the dragon, there was going to be very little to stop those whims. And Nah was already playing with fire with going further than her parents had said she could, so adding fuel to the flames would not be a step in the right direction by any means.It was the last week before the school district was on break, and the students were looking forward to having no school for an entire week, while the teachers and staff were excited to have a short rest from their jobs. Nah shared in most of the excitement, minus the part where she knew that the return from break would be rough for some of her special friends, especially since they were leading into the last few weeks before school let out for their extended summer break.“Do you think that the kids realize that the lack of structure their parents give them over breaks is bad for their brains?” she asked out loud while sitting in her office Monday morning, the other teacher in the room looking at her and laughing. “I’m being serious. If parents knew how much their children thrive with structure, do you think they’d work on giving them what they need?”“I think you’re expecting far too much of parents,” her coworker replied, not looking from her computer screen, “and that’s never a good thing around here.”The thing was, Nah knew of a student who didn’t necessarily need the services she specifically provided who always found benefits in having structure in her life. And it was after school on Tuesday that the very student in question came barreling into Nah’s office at that campus, eyes wide and hair streaming behind her as she came screeching to a halt in front of her adult friend. “You’re still going to hang out with me next week, aren’t you?” Ribbon asked, rapidly blinking as she awaited Nah’s response with her head bouncing up and down. “Please, please, please say you will!”“I…can’t, Ribbon. I’m going out of town with my parents.” That was the truth, as Nah had been invited along on a short trip to visit some areas of interest around a work site in the north of Ylisse her father had been working at off and on. “But that shouldn’t be a problem, you’ve got so many people around you that can hang out with you in my place.”Shoulders deflating to the point that she was doubling over, Ribbon gave a long, drawn-out sigh that represented all of the wind being forced out of her sails. “Dad says that it’d be better if I had people to hang out with that are outside of the family, which I definitely, totally agree with because I’m going to have to spend all of my break with Mom and Lace and does it look like I wanna be babysitting my sister on break? I don’t think so!”“You begging me can’t change that my father really wants to show off some places that he saw while out of town for his job. This is probably the last time I’ll be able to take a trip like this with my parents, since they’re kind of old and I’m…you know, an adult with my own life.” Nah paused, looking at how Ribbon was still doubled over, then shook her head as she continued speaking. “Trust me, I know how much you’d rather be with other people, but it’ll be a good time for you and your mother to spend time together.”“I don’t want to spend time with her, because spending time with her is spending time with my sister and that basically becomes me watching Lace while Mom goes and does whatever she wants to do.” This time, Ribbon dropped down to her knees, banging her fists on the ground. “It’s not fair, Nah! It’s just not!”Nah pursed her lips together, thinking very carefully about how she could respond. On one hand, she understood that this was a pretty hard situation for the young girl to navigate, thinking that she was going to be stuck on babysitting duty for her school break. On the other, she knew that Ribbon was probably over-dramatizing things, and she needed to be called out on it. “Life’s not fair, Ribbon. Let’s not pretend that, once upon a time, your brother was probably put in the same situation with you when you were a baby.”“Huh? What do you mean by that?”“Get up and let’s head to the car, and then I’ll tell you when we’re there.” Watching as Ribbon slowly rose to her feet and headed to the door that she’d come through not that long before, Nah collected her things and followed the girl out. She stayed completely silent while on the way out the building, only waving at other staff members as they passed them, while Ribbon’s head still hung with lingering sadness and conflicted feelings.Of course, once they were in the car Ribbon was jabbering away, begging this time to know what Nah had been referring to back in the office. “Oh, you know, the age gap between you and your brother is pretty similar to the one between you and your sister, don’t you think? Wouldn’t it make sense for him to have been in the same situation as you when he was around your age?”Her jabbering and begging coming to a complete stop, Ribbon very dramatically crossed her arms over her chest and gave a loud hmph. “I’m sure I was a much, much better baby to watch than Lace is. I bet I at least played and stuff.”“Does your niece play?”“She’s a baby, Nah, babies don’t play.” Ribbon gave a head waggle that would have been quite distracting if Nah had been watching it, but she was focused on driving. “I can’t believe that you’d even ask me such a thing.”“That’s funny, because what I said was that when you were little, your brother might’ve had to watch you sometimes, just like you have to watch your sister sometimes. And you countered that by saying that you’d have been a better baby to watch because you’d play, but then you told me that your niece—who would actually be a closer match in age to you in this scenario, now that I think about it—doesn’t play because she’s a baby. But you were a baby back then, too.” One of Nah’s hands came off of the steering wheel and reached over toward Ribbon, trying to pat her on the shoulder but missing and hitting the seat instead, as the girl shifted closer to the door than toward her person driving her around. “I’m just saying that you’ve got expectations for your sister that don’t make sense.”Ribbon didn’t respond for several minutes, her face contorting into all sorts of fun and exciting expressions. When she did speak again, she was onto a completely different topic, which was completely predictable in Nah’s mind, but the topic itself took her entirely by surprise. “Do you think we can ask my parents if I can come hang out with you and your friends tonight?”“Can you what? Ribbon, you have school in the morning, I’m not carting you across town and back just to…” Nah trailed off as she remembered that she hadn’t actually told Ribbon about the changes in her game night setup. “Look, it’s all online now. I go over to Morgan’s house to use his sister’s computer to play with everyone, so there’s not even anyone there aside from me and Morgan.”“But I made my own character for your game.” Her arms coming uncrossed, Ribbon slunk down in her seat as far as she could without making herself too unsafe. “I’ve been working on her for a while now, actually ever since the time I came over and got to see things for myself. Dad’s been helping me build her, he told me that he’s happy that I found something that I’m kind of interested in and…”Nah could hear the sadness that was building in Ribbon’s voice, and her heart panged at the fact that there wasn’t anything she could do to make things better for the girl. “Look, I can’t have you come over tonight because of how things are set up these days, but I promise that I’m not going to let you have made your character in vain. What’s her name?”“Elegantia. I came up with it myself.”“It’s a pretty name, and I bet she’s just as awesome as her name is. I’ll talk to Morgan tonight and see if he can help me come up with a way to give you a game that Elegantia can play in.” Internally, Nah was cringing at the childish name that she’d just complimented, but Ribbon was just trying to fit in with someone she admired and she wasn’t going to stomp on the girl’s creativity in such a moment. “Just be patient on this one.”“See, that’s kind of what I was hoping to do with you next week, but I guess I’ll have to wait even longer now.” Ribbon may have spoken like she was handling things well, but the sadness in her voice was still present, and there wasn’t anything Nah could do to rid her of it right there. “Do you think that maybe, while you’re gone, your friends could play with me?”“Ribbon…” Nah’s chest rose and fell as she took in several deep breaths, going through what she knew she needed to say to the vulnerable young girl in that moment. “It’s not appropriate for my adult friends to play games with you like that. It’s barely acceptable for me to even consider doing it, but since I sort of take care of you from time to time, I think I can justify it. When we make this happen, I’ll definitely be there, and if not me, then your brother, whether he likes it or not.”There was the distinct sound of Ribbon’s jaw dropping, her lips and tongue smacking as she was overtaken with surprise at the concept that had just been thrown her way. “You’re really going to get Yarne to play with me? Oh, oh, that’d be so great! Do you think he’d like Elegantia if he met her?”“I mean, probably? I know he’d been considering playing with the rest of us but couldn’t due to his schedule and everything else going on in his life, and, honestly, he wouldn’t really like the way we’re playing the game. He’d definitely be much better off playing a chill version with his little sister and a friend or two.” Nah didn’t want to imagine the anguish and crying that would take place if a character died in front of Yarne (or Ribbon, for that matter), so she was certain that she’d need to come up with a lighter way to make the game happen to accommodate their sensitive hearts.Nodding solemnly, Ribbon said, “Dad already told me that sometimes you work super hard on building a character and then they get killed first time you play as them. I don’t think Yarne would be very okay with that happening to him.”“It only gets harder to grapple with the idea of your character dying as you get to know them more, so losing them in the first session might actually be easiest on you. At this point, I think I’d quit playing altogether if something tragic happened to Farona.” Bringing the car to a stop outside of Ribbon’s house, Nah looked over at the girl and saw her still looking dejected, even with the happier events they’d been talking about. “Hey, don’t feel bad about not getting to play with your character today. It’ll happen, I promise.”Ribbon’s head nodded again, but her demeanor didn’t change until she reached down to grab her backpack, unzipped it, and pulled out a small stack of papers that were covered in bright, garish colors and messy lineart. “These are my pictures I’ve drawn of Elegantia. Dad’s kept all of the stuff about how she works and what she does, but…I’ve taken care of the art.”Nah held her hand out to take the papers, but Ribbon refused to give them up, merely holding them in the air to show them a bit better. They were definitely the work of a child who wasn’t particularly artistic, but there was so much love and care put into each picture that their quality was easily overlooked. Ribbon seemed dead-set on getting to play games with her little lady who looked strikingly like a humanized unicorn, and Nah knew that she was going to need to work to make it happen. But that was thinking several steps ahead, as first she’d need to see if Morgan could help her with getting the game running in a manner that was playable.And before she could do that, she needed to actually be around him and hope that it wasn’t the time they were going to make good on their previous agreement. “I’m looking forward to when we can bring Elegantia to life,” she told Ribbon, as the girl started tucking the pictures back in her bag. “I’ll let you know when that is, but it might not be until summer at the earliest, since I might need some time to get things started.”“As long as you make it happen, I’ll try my best to wait patiently.” Flashing a smile, even if it was masked with sadness, Ribbon got out of the car and ran to the front door of the house, and Nah watched her until she was safely inside with her father closing the door after her.She waited until she was down the road before she screamed in frustration at what she’d just roped herself into, for the happiness of a little girl who always seemed to be struggling in some way. “I don’t know how to run things, and I’m really not comfortable with her having to play with Morgan running it, but what do I do? What can I do? I should’ve thought this one through before I said anything at all!” If she wasn’t driving, Nah certainly would have thrown her head against the steering wheel a few times in frustration, but she couldn’t risk getting pulled over for reckless driving and getting another ticket, not after the previous one.Instead, she kept her emotions mostly in check until she was parked outside Morgan’s house, and only when the car was turned off did she start banging her head into the top of the wheel. “I’m stupid, everything about this is stupid, I should’ve thought better about my actions before I did anything. Now I’m going to have to go inside and ask a guy who’s interested in sleeping with me if he can explain how to be in charge of a game so that I can play with a literal child. What even is my life anymore?”Right as the question fell from her mouth, Nah heard a rapping on her window and she threw herself to sitting upright, looking over to see that Morgan was standing there, confusion in his gaze. She scrambled to unbuckle herself, get the keys out of the ignition, and get out of the car, him watching her carefully until she was on her feet. “I take it you haven’t checked your phone since you left work, huh?” he asked, sounding gravely serious. “Because if you had checked, you probably wouldn’t be here right now. Or maybe you did check and that’s why you’re here, I don’t know.”“What, did something happen?” It was true that Nah hadn’t looked at her phone in quite some time, but based on how Morgan was talking to her it didn’t seem like what she was supposed to know was a serious matter. “You’re going to tell me, right?”“Uh, yeah, session’s canceled because Owain bailed on us for the night. He’s out doing things with his new friends and forgot to tell me about it until about an hour ago. And then when I talked to Laurent about it, he said that he’s fine with canceling tonight because it means that him and Noire can help his mom a bit more with her shop, since that place opens next week. Haven’t actually spoken to Brady, but he did give me a thumbs-up emoji when I texted him so I think he gets it.” Morgan inhaled, having said most of that on just a couple breaths. “So there’s no session and you’re here at my house. With me.”“Man, maybe tonight would’ve been a good night to bring Ribbon down after all, you could’ve talked to her about the game and helped her understand why she can’t play with us.” Nah shook her head, putting a hand on Morgan’s shoulder. “Let me tell you, that girl’s created her own character and is looking for a group to play with.”“I could run a game for her, maybe get Yarne involved, you can be there too. Three players in an easy campaign should be doable.”While Nah was glad to hear that Morgan wasn’t immediately turning his nose up at the idea of a child playing, and had come up with some of the same things that she had already, there was one aspect of the statement that she didn’t care for. “Yeah, um, see, I don’t know if I’d want you in charge of her game. You tend to take things a bit too seriously with this and make it way harder than it should be, especially for someone her age.”“I’d tone it down for her!” He seemed appalled that Nah had admitted such a thing to him, to the point that he brushed her hand off of himself and took a step backward, allowing for her to properly close the door to her car (instead of getting back in, which he seemed to have thought she would do). “W-wait, are you staying here?”“We’re discussing something, it’d be kind of a jerk move for me to leave in the middle of the conversation.” To prove her point, Nah locked her car and tucked her keys in her pocket. “Now would you like to keep talking out here, or would you like to go inside?”Morgan’s eyes darted around, checking the surrounding area for anyone watching them, before making his decision. “Definitely inside. Too many neighbors around here might see us talking and think we’re up to no good and tell my parents about it. The fewer questions they have to ask us about things, the better.”Letting him take the lead inside the house, Nah found herself wishing she hadn’t ever gotten out of the car in the first place, especially once the front door was closed behind them both. She wasn’t even sure what else she wanted to talk to him about, and now that they were alone in his house with no session to distract them from things, she felt like there was a chance that she was about to get into a mess she wasn’t ready for. “I…I probably should ask you about how to run things for this game for Ribbon, since I told you I’d prefer it if you weren’t the one in charge.”“You can ask all you’d like, but I don’t know what I can do to help you. I mean, you can go out and buy all your own books and I can show you the important stuff from there, but you’re not borrowing any of mine.” Morgan didn’t sound overly spiteful with his words, even though he was clearly hurt by her choice to not let him be a part of things. “I’d prefer not to have to worry about you having my books if I need them for setting up a session in the future, that’s all.”“So you’re not telling me I can’t borrow them because you’re salty about me saying you can’t run the game?”“What’s this? Dinah, using slang that she learned from the kids she works with?” He leaned closer to her, face scrunching in amusement, only for her to raise her hand and gently bop his nose with it. “Ha, but seriously, I’m not that bothered that you don’t want me involved. Even though I completely disagree with why you don’t want me there. The only reason I’ve made things so hard here is because of some of the other players, specifically the one that bailed hardcore on us tonight.”“It all comes back to being Owain’s fault, doesn’t it?” Nah asked, tilting her head back to look up at the ceiling. “Imagine the world where you didn’t feel obligated to cater to your cousin’s desires, what a better place it would be.”Morgan didn’t respond for a few moments, before he began making his way toward the stairs down to his room. “If I didn’t keep his interests in mind, our campaign would’ve run out of steam before it even got started and we never would’ve gotten anywhere,” he said, right before bolting down the stairs. This left Nah standing in the dining room area of a house that wasn’t hers, without anyone around to tell her what to do or where to go, and she blinked rapidly to make sure that she wasn’t merely imagining her loneliness there. Once she knew that she had been abandoned physically, she had to make the choice: she could chase Morgan down and see why he’d fled, or she could leave and go home for the night.A more rational version of herself would have easily chosen the latter option, but she was curious as to what had gotten into Morgan in that moment and so down the stairs she went, finding herself staring at the closed bedroom door when she got to the bottom. “Are you trying to hide from me?” she called, getting no response from the other side of the door. “I take it that you are, and that I should go.”There was a loud thud, followed by Morgan hollering for her to come on in. When she came inside, Nah saw that he’d pulled out a clear-sided bin of hardback books, all similar size and shape. “You made me realize that, now that we’re playing online, I haven’t needed to really refer back to these things, and because I’m not actually using them, maybe I can let you borrow a couple for running your game.” He popped the lid off the bin and picked the top book up, holding it out for Nah to see. “This is the big one, the one you’ll definitely need to run things smoothly. Without it, you’ve got nothing.”“Thanks, I think,” she replied, reaching out to take the book from him, but when she placed her hands on it his grip seemed to harden. “Uh, Morgan? I can’t take it from you if you won’t let go of it.”“I don’t want to give it to you yet.”Nah’s hands remained on the book as she looked at him across its cover, seeing that he seemed to be reconsidering what he was doing. She gave it a couple seconds, counted to five under her breath, and then let go herself. “Right, of course. Any reason why you’re changing your mind on this again?”He set the book back in the bin, climbed over the mess he’d created in his room, and threw himself down into the chair at his computer. “I’ve been using an online version of the book, but I’ve taken so many notes in the physical version that I…don’t want to lose if I’m letting you borrow it, if that makes sense? So I need to make sure that I’ve got the important notes written down somewhere on here for when we’re playing.”“That makes sense, I suppose,” Nah said, coming to sit next to Morgan’s chair, which meant that she was on the edge of his bed. His room seemed so small with how much of a mess there was in it, and that was on top of how cramped the place usually was. But there was something about that moment that made her feel like she was a lot closer to him than she would have been normally, and that closeness had a pit forming in her stomach. “I take it you’re going to check on that, then you’re going to let me borrow the book and I’ll be able to leave for the night?”“I guess that’s the case, yeah. Might take a little while if I have to copy over those notes, but if I already have them then this should be fairly painless.” He paused, leaned over her to grab the book back from where he’d dropped it, then sat back up and put the book on his desk in front of him. “Uh, sorry about that one, Nah. Probably should have asked you to grab it for me, instead of me…doing that.”“It’s no problem,” she replied, that pit growing deeper as it began to clench and turn inside her core. “I didn’t mind what you did too much.”“Okay, well, no looking at my screen while I’m doing this. I can’t have you finding out secrets to our campaign before everyone else.” He couldn’t exactly move himself to fully block the screen, so Nah had to find something else to focus her attention on while Morgan worked. What she decided to do was pick up a different book from the bin, one that had a pretty lady on the cover, and start leafing through the pages to see what interesting things she could find within its pages.She honestly couldn’t have guessed how long she was going through that book, but she was stopped by a hand reaching out and grabbing her face, fingers and palm tucking themselves under her chin. “H-hello?” she asked, eyes shooting up from the book to see Morgan, a dazed expression on his face, staring at her intently. “You know there are better ways to get my attention, don’t you?”“I…yes, I know that,” he stammered, coughing awkwardly after the fact, “but I felt this was the best way to go about this.” He’d turned his chair so that he was facing her directly, his computer screen still open to the website he’d had it on before, so he had snapped himself out of focusing on his work to grab her like he had. “Dinah…”“You’re using my real name again. Usually means you want something from me. What do you—” Her question wasn’t able to be gotten out before Morgan was pulling himself onto her, using her sitting on his bed as a way to get up on her lap with relative ease. “—huh? What has gotten into you?”“Dinah, I…I realized that I don’t like being in here with you like this without taking advantage of the moment.” He was speaking slowly, as if he truly was in a daze for whatever reason, and lust was dripping off of his every word. “Ever since we talked about what we want to do with each other—what we want to do to each other—I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. When our plans tonight got canceled, I hoped that you’d show up anyway so that we could…”She swallowed down hard, a sensation made all the stranger with a hand still underneath her chin. “I’m not ready for that right now,” she told him, trying to sound assertive in turning down his advances. “I’m still serious about us sleeping together sometime, but today’s not the day. Sorry if you…I don’t know, got your hopes up about it?”“That wasn’t what I was looking for tonight. Before we can go that far, I’d like to try something else with you.” Morgan moved his hand off of Nah’s chin and instead used it to caress her cheek, while he slowly pressed his upper body against hers, until their faces were barely apart. “You know, I’ve never had the chance to kiss someone before.”“I guess it only makes sense that we’d do that before we get into the raunchier stuff,” she realized, feeling her breath bouncing back at herself off his face, him giving a small smirk at her statement. “And there’s no harm in kissing, it’s all to test the waters for whatever it is we want to do.”“That’s like what we said at the donut shop. The end goal here is to sleep together, isn’t it?” Despite his already close proximity to Nah’s face, Morgan moved himself closer, a hunger in his eyes that she only caught a glimpse of before he was biting at her lower lip, trying to make sure that she was on board with what he was about to do.For having never kissed someone before, he sure was prepared to get right to the point, and the forcefulness of it all was quite surprising to Nah. She’d kissed others outside of family members before, sure, but never more than a quick little exchange that had both parties feeling awkward after it was done. This was different, this was her going along for the ride as he pushed his lips onto hers, then pulled away and came at it from another angle, over and over again. At one point she was pretty sure he was looking to go further than just simple kissing, but she was shocked at how aggressive the entire display was and couldn’t bring herself to open up long enough to let things progress.It was after thirty or forty seconds of nonstop kissing that he pulled back again, giving a breathy smile at her. “I’ve been watching tutorials on how to make this happen,” he explained, a suitable justification for why he happened to know how to kiss someone like that. “Not specifically for this moment, but for whenever a girl liked me enough to let me kiss her.”“That was a lot,” she replied, trying not to sound like she’d just been thrown for a loop, but her pretend acceptance of what had gone on was taken as an invitation for a second round and he was right back against her lips. This time, Nah felt no choice but to accept the aggression and the desire to go as far as they could together right then; at around the same time that she felt a tongue that didn’t belong to her rolling around in her mouth, she felt a much different sensation somewhere else on her body, and she pulled her eyes (which were wide and staring at Morgan in disbelief of what he was doing) down to the space between them. His hand, which she’d lost all track of in the heat of the moment, had made its way under her shirt and was creeping upward, wandering like a thirsty animal to water.She gave a surprised chirp, muffled by their faces being smashed together, and tried to pull away without causing any alarm. Unable to break things off, she raised her arm to try and get his hand away from her before it was too late, but he moved quickly and was caressing her chest with fingers much gentler than his mouth was being. Her head shook a little, her thinking that he’d take that as a hint to stop touching her, but when all it did was make the strength of the kiss grow, she knew that he was lost to the passion of the moment and she was merely along for the ride.Her eyes going back to look at his face, Nah noticed that he was still with his eyes closed, blissful in his successful conquest, but then she happened to catch a glimpse of the computer screen he’d been trying to hide from her before. It was a lot of words and pictures that were clearly work for their campaign, but there was something that shouldn’t have been on the screen there as well, and the sight of Noire’s face in a video call window, seemingly horrified at what she was watching, was enough to get Nah to forcibly pull herself out of the kiss. “Morgan, what the hell is going on here?” she snapped, pushing his hand off of her chest as he finished pulling it out from under her shirt.“I’m pretty sure we were just making out.”“I know that, but what’s with the call you’ve got going on?” Her eyes narrowing at him, she waited for an explanation but saw nothing but confusion flooding his mind. “You’re up to something here, I can tell.”“Dinah…trust me when I say that I don’t know what you’re talking about. Swearsies.” Morgan climbed off of her and got back into his chair, turning to look at the screen and going silent after giving it all a once-over. Finally, after Nah cleared her throat to remind him she was looking for an answer, he spoke again. “Oh, you’re talking about the video I had paused, is that it?”“Why in Naga’s name would you have a video of Noire on your computer?” Nah wasn’t buying it for a moment, but sure enough, Morgan really did have a video saved from their previous session, of Noire having a bit of a breakdown over a stressful moment in which Zelaia had stumbled into some lore of their campaign’s world. “Huh, that’s oddly fitting that you happened to have that up while we were doing…that.”He nodded slowly. “Yeah, if I’d considered how fast things were going to escalate, I would’ve closed that and come back to it another time. Sorry about that scare.”“It’s fine, I’m glad you’re not into shoving your intimate moments in other people’s faces.”“I’d never imagine doing that, not to you.” Morgan turned to look at her over his shoulder, giving her a small smile that emphasized his reddened cheeks. “Just like I never imagined doing that with you. That was a lot of fun.”As helpful as it would have been for Nah to speak the truth and say she wasn’t nearly as into it as he’d been, she didn’t want to ruin things when she’d put them into action to begin with. “I suppose it was. You really did learn a lot from those videos.”“And when the time comes for it, I might’ve learned a thing or two about how to really get into the mood for other activities.” Before she could make the accusation that he’d been watching porn to learn techniques, Morgan elaborated on where he got his lessons from. “It’s this channel that talks about intimacy and how to make a partner feel good in the moment. I never knew that there’s more to sexy times than, you know, the obvious part.”“If you’re not able to look me in the eye and say that you didn’t know there’s more to sex than the actual act, maybe I’ll need to ask someone else to help me here.” She wasn’t being serious about that, but Nah was beginning to question if Morgan really was the person she should be doing those things with. He was immature at times, he didn’t always make the best decision in any given moment, and he never seemed to take things seriously. One wrong move and she was going to have to put all of her trust in him for a very long time.That wasn’t something she was going to decide right then, especially when he asserted that he was plenty ready to take things that far between them. “Okay, well, when it happens you better show me what you learned,” she said to him, standing up from the bed and adjusting her shirt from where he’d moved it. “I’m going to go ahead and head home, mind if I take that book today or are you still using it?”Morgan looked at his computer and the book he’d been working from, then closed its heavy cover and handed it over to her waiting hands. “I’d like it back next week, if you don’t mind, but I suppose you can borrow it now.”With the book in her hand, Nah looked at its cover and how daunting of a task it was she was taking on by borrowing it. Just as she was about to agree to his terms, though, she remembered something important. “I’ll be out of town next week. My parents and I are going on a trip since I’ll be off work.”“Then give it back, you can borrow it when you get home.” He held his hand out once again and Nah handed it right back over to him, it getting set down exactly where it had been before. “There, I think we’ve got all that settled. You mind walking yourself out?”Without thinking about the consequences, Nah asked, “Why, don’t you want to be a gentleman and escort me to the door, after all that?”“You don’t want me doing that right now. Just make sure you close everything behind you.” She was about to ask him why she didn’t want his company, but a voice in the back of her head piped up and told her to forget about it, so she shrugged and bid him farewell.At the front door to the house, Nah crossed paths with both of Morgan’s parents and gave them a small wave as she went to leave. “Where’s Morgan?” his father asked, confused to see his son’s friend but not his son. “Did he forget he’s supposed to be here?”“Oh, he’s down in his room, doing nerd stuff. I’d recommend staying away from there for a little while, he’s got quite the mess going on.” Nah smiled at the older couple, before stepping past them to get out of them house.On her way down to her car, she heard Morgan’s mother say something about how they were lucky that their son had such a strong, positive manakete presence in his life, and how he couldn’t have picked a better friend. “Yeah, just friends,” Nah mumbled to herself, thinking about the events that had transpired on the bed. “Nothing more, never anything more, that’s just how it is.”It took getting buckled into her seat for Nah to remember that she hadn’t checked her phone in all that time, because she hadn’t actually gotten it out of the car when she’d gone inside. That made for quite the surprise when she unlocked the screen and saw that she had multiple missed calls from Noire, a voicemail from one of them, and a single text message from her as well, which read: Are you mad, or are you stupid, or did you forget who you’ve been pining for?“How in the…?” Nah looked at the message several times, then called her voicemail to hear whatever it was Noire was trying to tell her. While it dialed and connected, she ran through all the possible reasons for such a cryptic message being sent her way. Maybe someone at the donut shop had overheard her and Morgan when they were talking and somehow got that conversation back to Noire. Maybe Nah had been spotted driving over to the neighborhood Morgan lived in and the assumption was being made.Or maybe, just maybe, it was something more nefarious. The call quality was horrendous on the other end, so Noire’s voice was fairly choppy at delivering what she was trying to say, but there was enough of it that Nah could figure the gist of it out, especially when it ended with, “You can’t let him…you have to be better than that, Nah! You’re letting him…can’t you hear me? Stop! Stop! You’re making a mistake!”“That wasn’t a paused video at all!” Deleting the voicemail and hanging up, Nah put a death grip on her phone as she realized that she’d just been shown off as some prize to at least one of her friends. “What’s the point of all this?” In her hand, her phone buzzed, and she loosened how she was holding it to see the screen, which had lit up with a new message, this one not from Noire, but rather from Brady.
Ma wants us to do dinner sometime, the three of us. You in?
Her plan A had just proven himself to once again be an agent of chaos, so maybe going back to plan B was the best course of action after all. Yeah, tonight? Or tomorrow?
Tomorrow. Looking forward to it.
She gave the house she’d just been trapped in a disgusted glance, before typing out her response, that she was looking forward to it as well. At that point, she’d rather spend a million dinners suffering with Maribelle around than have to face Morgan after what he’d just done to her. Inside, she knew that escaping the consequences of her night’s actions wouldn’t be so easy, but she was going to hope that her dinner with someone making her life miserable wouldn’t be as bad as needing to talk to a friend about why sharing their kissing online wasn’t appropriate by any means.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Nah woke up the next morning to a barrage of messages from Noire begging her to call her so they could talk about things, all sent at various overnight hours. That didn’t come as a surprise to her in the slightest, but it should’ve been common knowledge that she’d be asleep for work and wouldn’t be responding to them. So, despite knowing that giving an unwanted answer was as bad as giving no answer at all, she replied to them saying they could talk after work, and hoped that’d be enough to keep Noire from spiraling downward in her attempts to figure out what had happened.Naturally, the previous night’s twists and turns stayed heavy on Nah’s mind all day when she was trying to get work done, and even when she was working one-on-one with children she couldn’t stop thinking about the betrayal she’d experienced. No one should ever have gone through the manipulation that she’d experienced, but even with the evidence she had, she didn’t want to outright blame Morgan for what he’d done. That wasn’t the goofy, fun guy she was friends with, and she had a sinking suspicion that she knew who there was to blame for the change in behavior and the poor decision making. Was she going to call him out on that? Of course not, that would be making an assumption that could backfire on her entirely. She was merely going to let things simmer while she was out of town and see how the situation was when she got home.Once she had wrapped up work for the day, she got out of that school building as fast as she could and went to sit in her car. Making that call to Noire wasn’t possible inside the school, and it was somehow even less possible to make it if she went home, so sitting in the car was the only place that Nah felt safe enough to call her friend and talk about things. “You really should’ve done this way sooner,” Noire chided upon answering her phone. “This has been weighing on me heavily all day!”“I’m sorry for having a job and a normal sleep schedule?” Nah replied, blinking at her phone screen in surprise at how things were already being expressed. “I’m talking to you about it at the earliest possible time, trust me.”“You let him kiss you like that, Nah, and I had to just watch it happen!” She could hear Noire’s voice reaching higher registers as she grew more agitated, and Nah began to brace herself for the oncoming meltdown. “You’re super lucky that no one else took the bait and showed up into that call, because if anyone else had seen it, they’d…you know, they’d know what he did to you. Which wasn’t okay.”“Was there sound on our end?” Realizing that the way she was being told matters already answered her question, Nah hoped that she wasn’t making a nasty assumption on that point. “Like, could you hear what was being said?”Noire hummed for a second. “I don’t actually know if there was sound, I had my speakers off because I was listening to Laurent talk about something. He knows about all this, by the way. As if I was going to keep this from him.”“Laurent’s trustworthy, I know he’s going to do the right thing with this information.” It was good that Noire hadn’t heard what was said, she hadn’t heard them discussing their plans and how the activities were a trial run—something that was never going to be acted upon again, no matter how much Nah had thought she’d wanted it. “Look, I’m glad that if anyone had to see this happen, it was you, because you’re a great friend and you’ve got my back here. Morgan…more or less forced himself onto me in that situation, and thank Naga that he didn’t go any further than he did.”“He was touching your chest, I saw that much.” Humming again, it was clear that Noire was thinking about something on her end of the phone. “I also am pretty sure he was slipping you some tongue, which…ew? I can’t imagine having his tongue anywhere near my mouth.”“You also already have a serious boyfriend, you shouldn’t be imagining having anyone else’s tongue in your mouth.” At once, Nah became hyper-aware of her own tongue in her mouth, and she remembered how it had felt when it wasn’t the only one in there, a strange sensation she honestly had been mixed on until after the fact. “But, okay, he clearly had some reason for why he wanted to show everyone what he planned to do to me there in his room. Do we talk to him about this? I don’t know if I want to ever bring it up.”There was a moment of silence, where Noire seemed to be thinking about what they should do, before she gasped and said, “I remember something my mother mentioned one of the last times I was around her. It was something about Grima and something about people’s worship of the Fell Dragon and something about strange behavior because of it.”“It’s almost definitely not related to this,” Nah assured her, knowing full well that Morgan’s involvement with people who worshipped the Fell Dragon was a big part of what had happened. “I’m sure your mother was just spewing nonsense, like she usually does.”“I sure hope that’s the case, from what I understand that whole religion is super nasty and not anything I’d want any part of.” Noire sighed, before the distinct sound of her phone falling and hitting the floor brought an end to the call, the last noise Nah heard being Noire beginning to scream in panic at what she’d done.With no phone call to distract her, Nah set off for home, driving slowly to buy herself as much time as she could before she arrived at the house. The fact that this most likely had to do with her friend falling into the worshipping of the Fell Dragon was not one she was going to ignore, and she was kicking herself for thinking that she could use him to satiate some of her carnal desires. She should’ve seen it coming that he was going to manipulate the situation in some way, but she’d been so desperate on finding that connection that she’d hoped he’d take the high road. Now there was the fear that he’d recorded what he’d shown on camera, because that would be damning evidence that she was doing things she shouldn’t have been, and with someone that she wasn’t exactly supposed to be chummy with.Nah came to a stop at a light, and once her car was fully stopped she leaned forward and put her head on the steering wheel. “If there’s a video of all that, and it gets to Lady Tiki, she’s going to probably remove me from the manakete church forever, if it doesn’t outright kill her on the spot. And if she dies because I was out here sucking face with a guy who worships the Fell Dragon, then my parents are definitely going to kick me out of the house. And if that happens…ugh, I don’t even know what I’d do.”It was hard not to think about worst-case scenarios with what had happened, but Nah knew that she had something almost as horrifying to tend to that evening, and she couldn’t spend all of her energy planning how to proceed in one situation when she needed to deal with one of her least favorite people. When she got home, she went inside and straight to her room, barely greeting her mother with a hello before she was running up the stairs. Naturally, Nowi saw this and assumed something was wrong, so she came up after and was soon banging on Nah’s door, while Nah was inside changing from her work clothes to something a bit more formal. “Open up, you’re not hiding anything from your mother under her roof!” Nowi called between her knocks. “I’m not letting you keep secrets from me!”Nah at least had the decency to make sure she was modestly covered before she opened the door, nearly getting knocked in the face with a flying fist. “Mom, what’s the problem? I’ve got plans tonight, I can’t exactly waste time watching movies with you right now.”“Plans?” Nowi repeated, lowering her hand now that she didn’t need to make a scene any longer. “But it’s Wednesday, you don’t usually have plans on Wednesdays, do you?”“Not usually, but this is a special occasion. I’m honestly surprised that you didn’t hear about it at work, given who typically shows up there to give you an earful about me.” Nah began to close her door, but Nowi reached out and held it in place, so that it remained partially cracked. “Seriously, Mom, I need to get ready.”“What kind of plans have my little girl choosing them over spending quality time with me?”Sighing, Nah peeked out the crack of the door at her mother. “The kind of plans that an adult woman makes every once in a while. Why can’t you let me have this one? I’m spending my break from work with you next week, aren’t I? Isn’t that enough for you?”It might have been something with Nah’s annoyed tone, but her questions were enough to get Nowi to let go of the door and back away, her eyebrows furrowed slightly as she mouthed what she’d just heard to herself. Nah took that opportunity to close her door and resume changing, all while her mother was on the other side, seemingly coming to an acceptance that she couldn’t always hover like she’d been. Of course, that didn’t mean anything when she was still standing there, watching like a hawk, when Nah came out of her room about ten minutes later. “I’ve decided that you’re right, and that I should let you have this one, Dinah.”“Oh, here we go.” Nah looked at her mother, who had her hands pressed together in front of her mouth as if she was about to lay down something serious. “What’s the catch?”“There’s no catch at all,” Nowi insisted, but the cracking of her voice was enough to tell that she was restraining herself. “I want my little girl to be happy, and if that means going out and having plans two nights in a row, then that’s exactly what that means. I’ll just be here waiting for the next time you can make the time for me.”Her eye twitching slightly, there were many things Nah wanted to say in that moment, but she chose not to say any of the more incendiary ones. Instead, she took in a deep breath, steadied herself, and said, “Mom, this was a last-minute dinner invite with a friend and their family, it’s not like I’m rushing out to go do drugs or have wild, reckless sex. You can drop the theatrics and remember that I’m a grown adult that’s allowed to do my own things on my own time. We’ll have plenty of time to sit around and watch movies another night, maybe even tomorrow night. I really doubt I’ll have plans like this come up again.”“You better not be going out there to do nasty things with people you barely know.” Naturally it was one aspect of the whole statement that Nowi got fixated on, but Nah knew that she should probably have not said that part. “I’ll be waiting for you here, on the couch, expecting you back at a decent time. If it’s nearly midnight and you’re not home, I’m—”“Mom, I work in the morning.”“—right, then, if it’s ten o’clock and you’re not home, I’m calling you until I get a straight answer about where you are.” Nowi gestured with her still-pressed hands, trying to drive her point home. “So don’t be late, and don’t be stupid!” One of those warnings would’ve been a lot more relevant the previous night, although it was fairly stupid to even agree to going to a dinner that Maribelle was going to be at in the first place. Nah was hopeful that, whatever the reason for the meal was, it wasn’t going to end up in a situation where she was getting put down constantly for merely existing.When she got out to her car, she checked the only message she’d gotten that day that wasn’t from Noire, it being one from Brady giving her a time and a location for them to meet. Nah had already done the part of looking up the directions to the particular restaurant earlier in the day, but she was still not fully convinced she could get there without assistance, so turning on the map and having it tell her where to go was the best option. That didn’t exactly help her drive safely, as there were several moments where it needed her to make a turn almost immediately after getting onto a road and she’d be forced to veer wildly across traffic, but she got there in one piece and that was what was most important.The place was on the higher end of casual, to the point that Nah almost felt like she was underdressed for the occasion; this worry was only amplified when she saw people exiting from the restaurant’s ornately-carved doors and they were wearing fine clothing that she could only fantasize about. “I probably should’ve been a bit better about checking the dress code for the evening,” she said as she climbed out of her car, hoping that her nice blouse and pleated skirt wouldn’t cause her to immediately be turned away upon entry.“Whoa, look at you!” she heard Brady call from across the parking lot, and she turned to see him jogging over to meet her, wearing something that had clearly been sitting at the bottom of a laundry basket for some time, based on all its wrinkles. “Here I was, thinkin’ that I should’ve warned ya about the kind of place this is, but it seems you caught on without my help. That’s good.”“I mean, you invited me to dinner with your mother and I couldn’t help but assume that it’d end up being some sort of formal meal like this. I just…think that maybe I’m not formal enough. Should I go home and change?” It wasn’t like Nah would exactly have anything at home to change into, minus a pair of slacks and perhaps some accessories to spice up her choice of top, but she wanted the offer to be made regardless. “This isn’t going to cause a problem for us, right?”Brady snorted, “The place looks a hell of a lot fancier than it actually is. Ma likes it because it’s got the snooty, rich vibe but it’s only a fraction of the cost to get in and dine.” He paused, looking back over his shoulder, before shaking his head. “Ma’s runnin’ late, by the way. She said she’ll be here in fifteen or so.”“How’d she end up getting to be that late to her own dinner?”Freezing at the question, Brady took a second to process how to answer it before he said anything. “Well, you see, she might’ve forgotten that she said tonight and was out runnin’ errands after work, then when I called her askin’ her if she was gonna be stoppin’ by home or if I should just leave without her, she was surprised that she’d forgotten in the first place. So she had to rush back and get herself ready, and she was just gettin' started with that when I left to get over here. But I had somewhere to stop on my way, so it’s kind of a miracle that I still got here before you.”“You had to stop somewhere? Am I allowed to know where?” Nah wasn’t asking because she actually wanted to know, but rather just to keep the conversation going as they headed to the front of the restaurant. “Or is that one of your big secrets you’re going to carry with you for as long as you live?”“Eh, I got asked to swing by the store and I wasn’t gonna save that for after dinner. Turns out, it’s pretty easy to be able to walk in somewhere and buy fancy pens, if you’re dressed as nice as I am. Bet it would’ve been a lot harder if I was lookin’ my normal.” Brady reached the doors first, opening one with a small grunt at how heavy it was to pull, but Nah was thankful that she wasn’t having to use her abnormally small size to try and hoist the thing open herself. He followed her in and let the door come to a close behind them both, a lot quieter than one would’ve thought something so heavy would be. “Anyway, that’s an errand done and I guess we can get our table, even if Ma’s not here.”Nah looked around the foyer of the restaurant, in awe of how formal the place looked and how she’d never been inside somewhere quite so fancy in her life, and it took Brady making the important part of his statement again for her to hear him. “Oh, yeah, that sounds like a great idea. She’s bound to think that’s what we’ve done, anyway.”The wait staff at the restaurant looked just as formal as the décor did, and everyone standing around at the front seemed to sneer when they saw the two actually coming closer. All attitudes changed when Brady said what name they were there under, as the employees began to argue over who was going to take them to their table. “Uh, if none of ya can decide who’s going to do it, I know where it is that Ma likes to sit. I can lead us back, if you’d like?”There was something about the audacity it took for a guest to offer to seat themselves that got the wait staff to stop fighting and send someone with menus to lead the pair to their table, delicately set for three with wine glasses at each place setting and an iced bottle of wine in the middle. Brady did the gentlemanly thing and drew Nah’s chair for her, her thanking him as she took a seat and still glanced around at the opulent setting she now found herself in. This was completely out of the realm of realistic possibilities for her to be there, and yet there she was, sitting at a table like she belonged. “What do we do now?” she asked, her voice merely a whisper. “Do we just sit and wait?”“They won’t come take our orders without Ma present, so yeah, we just sit and wait. We could have a glass of wine while we wait, though.” One of Brady’s hands reached toward the bottle in the middle, but when he saw Nah’s face contort in disgust he retracted it with an awkward chuckle. “Yeah, good point. I don’t even think I could open it without someone helpin’ me out.”“What, you’re not going to break it to get into it?” Raising her voice a little, Nah felt like she was doing the right amount of teasing, but then she saw Brady shrink down in his seat, shoulders falling forward. “That was a joke, Brady, you know I wouldn’t think that you’d do that sort of thing.”“You wouldn’t think it, but Ma would. Ma’s still out here thinkin’ I’m some lowlife trash who can’t clean up to save his life.” His shoulders still sagging, Brady began to curl himself up into a bit of a ball there at the table, but stopped when his head almost landed on his already-there plate. “I don’t even know what her goal with tonight’s dinner is, but—”“Sit up at once, Brady, you’re attracting all sorts of attention you don’t want or deserve.” Making her presence known with such a sharp statement, Maribelle slid into the chair with the third place setting, giving her fakest smile in Nah’s direction as she did. “As for you, I take it that they had to turn you away a time or two before you were finally allowed in?”“What makes you guess that?” Nah asked in return, feeling the need to remind herself that she couldn’t be starting an argument there in such a formal place. “Because I’ll have you know that I had zero issues at all getting inside. I’m dressed perfectly acceptably, no thanks to you.”“When I told Brady that he could invite one friend along for dinner, I forgot that you would be the only logical choice, for whatever reason.” Maribelle waved a dismissive hand in Nah’s direction, only to use that same hand to snap at her son, as he wasn’t moving fast enough for her liking. “Surely he has some other friends that are a bit more palatable, somewhere.”There wasn’t enough money in the world to get Nah to speak her mind on that statement, because she didn’t want to have to put any of Brady’s friends down to make her point. Instead, she merely responded, “All of his ‘better’ friends either no longer live in Ylisse or have families to tend to. He didn’t have anyone other than me to ask.”“I didn’t want to ask anyone but Nah,” Brady pointed out, his voice mumble-like as he tried to not make eye contact with his mother. “I considered askin’ Laurent if he was interested but I didn’t wanna have to deal with him ramblin’ about the store all night, so I went with my first, original choice. The choice I’d told you I was makin’ when you first told me about the dinner.”“I would have much preferred if Laurent were able to be here over this one, Brady dearest.” Maribelle’s disgust of Nah made a lot of sense, when she really thought about it, but to those unaware of their troubled history it did seem like she was taking cheap shots at the woman. “At least he has the manners and decency to exist in an appropriate manner. Could use a bit of work on his acceptance of religion, but…not everyone can be perfect.”At the mention of religion, Nah’s stomach tensed up. “I’m literally a manakete who attends the church of Naga pretty regularly, doesn’t that count for something?”“Manakete church is a bit different, as far as I understand it’s less about worshipping Naga and more about worshipping whoever you have in charge. Maybe if you came to a sermon with me, you’d understand.” Winking, as if she’d just made an offer that couldn’t be refused, Maribelle continued, “But I suppose, at the end of the day, you having some sort of religion in your life makes you better than most of the riffraff that my son associates himself with.” At her pointed last words, Brady let out what was undeniably a whimper, which only made Nah wish she didn’t have the restraint to keep herself from chewing Maribelle out for what she was saying.Maybe it was for the best that she’d accepted the dinner offer, because it meant that Brady wasn’t going to have to suffer alone. “I mean, I guess I could try to make it to one of your church’s sermons, but I doubt that the people in charge are going to appreciate one of Naga’s chosen manaketes strolling in like she belongs there.”“What was that?” Maribelle asked, her eyes narrowing in Nah’s direction. “Speak up, Dinah, if you want to be heard you need to use your voice appropriately.”“I said, the people in charge at your church might not like it when one of Naga’s favorites decides to show up. I don’t mean to brag, but I’m basically being groomed as the successor to my church once Lady Tiki steps down.” While not completely accurate, it was flavored with just enough of the truth that Nah didn’t feel blasphemous making such a claim. “So maybe, instead of me going to your church, you can come to mine and see how much better it is to be a manakete.”Salvation in the form of their server approaching the table came to Nah’s rescue after that statement, and she got to relish in the fact that she’d gotten the final word on the matter, at least temporarily. There was no way at all she would actually invite Maribelle to her church, given that she barely attended of her own choosing to begin with, but she also had zero interest in tagging along with her to see what it was like outside of manakete circles. The server didn’t even seem to notice that he’d come in right in the middle of a spat, going through the daily specials and drink menu as he was paid to do without batting an eyelash at the animosity he’d stumbled into. Once he was gone, Nah figured that Maribelle would come back swinging at her, but she was met with silence.Absolute, sweet silence.After about a minute, Nah realized that the silence wasn’t actually as nice as she’d hoped it would be, but she didn’t know what to do in order to fill the absence of conversation. She wished she was just about anywhere but at the table, or at the very least, with anyone other than Maribelle, but she’d taken the invitation knowing that Brady had been transparent about his mother being there in the first place. All she could do was hope that something would come up that would either get her away from that restaurant as fast as she could go, or make the night feel more bearable.“I suppose I should come clean about something,” Maribelle said with a heavy sigh, shaking her head in Nah’s direction, almost like she’d been thinking far too long on their religion conversation. “It involves an aspect of my treatment of you, Dinah.”Biting her tongue to keep from correcting the full name usage, Nah nodded at her. “Go on, I’m listening. All ears, so they say.”Maribelle blinked at Nah a few times, looking visibly uncomfortable as she thought about what she was going to tell her. “Right, well, I want to preface this by saying that my invitation for you to join us at dinner this evening, whether it was explicitly my idea or not, was not done with the school board and their agenda in mind. In fact, having you here allows for me to do something that I know they would all disagree with.” She reached a hand toward Nah, as if she was trying to offer her something, but when Nah went to accept the gift she had her whole hand grabbed instead. “The district has been blessed this school year to have you on staff.”“That’s…a different tune than what you were singing last time we talked about this sort of thing.” Already in shock at how her hand was being held, Nah didn’t know what else to say without coming off as immediately trusting of the praise. “Did someone bring something up at one of your board meetings that made you realize my importance, or…?”“No, this is a statement I am making on my own, without their influence or direction. After all, what did I just say about this invitation being without their agenda in mind?” Maribelle gave a slightly annoyed eye-roll at Nah, before patting the top of her hand and laughing. “But if they had told me to say something to you, you’d be hearing the same sort of praises, because the special education programs at the schools you have been working with have flourished with your support this school year. Parents of struggling students are amazed at the growth that their children have been making, in academics and behavior both.”Nah inhaled deeply, waiting for the shoe to drop so that she could react in kind, but Maribelle continued talking about positives. “Not only that, but the support staff that are at the schools full-time have been asking for their administrations to pull strings and get you to stay at their campus longer, which is impossible because you can’t be at four schools at once. But that means that there is a need to hire more impossibly brilliant minds such as yours, and make your role a full-time one at each school.”“Right, because that’s definitely what you were saying to me last time you talked to me about my job.” Now Nah was beginning to grow suspicious of Maribelle’s motivation for this conversation, because if she wasn’t talking on behalf of the overall board, that meant there was some sort of personal reason for things. “So, are you about to break into why that’s not a plausible idea and why I’m just going to continue doing what I’m doing until I quit or retire, whichever one comes first?”That was when Maribelle glanced in Brady’s direction, her son looking at her with the same sort of suspicion that Nah was giving. “Dearest, what have you told Dinah here about the specifics about my job?”“Uh, you’re a lawyer and you do a lot of work with divorces and money.” Brady shrugged, not sure what else he needed to say. “I’ve known Nah for so long that I’ve probably told her more than that, but that’s all I’ve got for ya right now, sorry Ma.”“That is enough, I suppose, for me to get my point across.” Her eyes sliding back onto Nah, Maribelle put a very genuine smile on her face for a few seconds, before it shifted to one that was clearly angling to butter her up. “You see, when I am knee-deep in divorce cases, there are often children involved. Outside of money or cheating, issues involving children seem to be a major reason for these petitions for divorce, and I have been thinking a lot lately about how helpful it would be to get these children time with someone so skilled in breaking down barriers around their minds.”“I’m not qualified for anything in the legal world,” Nah quickly interjected, finally ripping her hand out of Maribelle’s. “Not only that, but I’m happy working with these struggling students in school, I don’t want to be someone kids learn to resent because they’re seeing me in courtrooms.”“But think of the lives you can change, by working in my law firm as a child specialist. You could prevent divorces, by reaching out to the children and giving them tools to help with whatever issues they are having in school or at home.” With her hands now free, Maribelle clasped them together in a position that made her look like she was begging Nah to consider her offer. “I know that you aren’t qualified for this, and that is something that I have spoken to the firm about, and they are willing to make things work if you’re interested.”“What do you mean, they’re willing to make things work? That’s several more years of school and I don’t make enough money to pay for that. Nor do I have the time to take on that kind of schooling while working.” Nah paused, realizing that she had an idea of what Maribelle meant by what she’d said, but it seemed so outlandish that it just didn’t make a lick of sense to her. “I’m sorry, but I’m where I’m meant to be.”“Yeah, what gives with all this, Ma? Nah’s happy with her job, you can’t just start flingin’ around offers to get her something bigger!” Brady reached toward his mother, as if he was about to try shaking sense into her, but just as his hand brushed her arm, the server reappeared with drinks and asking if they needed more time with the menu or they were ready to make their order. At once, the whole conversation came to a stand-still, as they rushed through their orders, even though none of them had actually thought through it in the slightest.Once the server was gone again, Maribelle picked the conversation back up like it hadn’t been interrupted. “Well, perhaps I am merely thinking about making the kind of people my son chooses to associate himself with a bit higher quality,” she said, giving Brady a split-second glare before looking straight at Nah once more. “Dinah, believe me when I say that I do not make this offer lightly, and I do not expect you to have an answer for it right away, but my law firm is offering to fund your education if you will come into our office upon completion of your degree and begin working to keep families from fracturing.”All of the air in Nah’s lungs rushed out, and she felt herself struggling to breathe with how much of a shock that offer gave her. Maribelle seemed so sincere with everything, which didn’t erase a moment of her mistreatment and belittling beforehand, but it did paint her in a much more caring light. “I…I really don’t know if I can do that,” she mumbled, breaking her eye contact with Maribelle to keep herself from getting guilt-tripped into agreeing to do something she didn’t want to do. “It’s a lovely offer, but my place is in the schools.”“Please, take time to think it over. This offer will not be expiring anytime soon, so you do not have to make your decision right now.” Beaming, Maribelle let her words linger in the air a moment, before she was turning toward Brady once again. “And do note,” she said toward her son, “that if Dinah accepts this offer, it renders her ineligible to become anything more than friends with you.”Brady’s face scrunched at the statement, before he shook his head. “That’s fine, she’s just a friend anyway so there’s no reason to be thinkin’ that might change.”The conflicting feelings racing through Nah’s body at the offer she’d been given only grew more agitated at hearing that come from Brady’s mouth. While she hadn’t forgotten about what had happened that night, where they’d agreed they’d marry each other if they were still single at thirty, it seemed that he wasn’t as on-board with that arrangement as she’d been. “It’s just that…well, Brady dearest, you’re starting to get to that age where guys are typically working on finding the love of their life, and you never seem to be around anyone eligible except…this one.”“Ma, you have to trust me when I say that she’s just a friend.” He looked at Nah, giving her a knowing smile that she knew the story behind. “You don’t have to worry that I’d be datin’ her, when she’s got her heart set on someone else.”Either Morgan had sent him the video, or Noire had told him about it, and both of those options were terrifying to Nah. “E-excuse me, I’ll be right back,” she stammered, jumping up from her seat and running toward the front door of the restaurant, earning gazes from everyone she passed in her rush. When she got outside, she considered just getting in her car and driving away into the night, but she couldn’t do that, not to someone who’d just offered her a brand-new career path. “Who spilled to Brady that I was considering getting with Morgan until he went off the deep-end last night?” she muttered to herself, pulling out her phone and texting Noire to see if it was her.When she got a message back in all capital letters insisting that she hadn’t told a soul, outside of Laurent but he hadn’t been paying attention when it was said, Nah groaned as she leaned against the building’s exterior. You dummy, he’s always paying attention, and he probably went right to Brady about it. Because Brady’s here right now, telling his mother about how I’m interested in someone else.Immediately after sending that message, Nah realized that she’d just ratted herself out with her feelings about Brady, and she had to rectify that problem before assumptions got made. Not that I’m interested in HIM, you know? But he knows about me having been testing the waters with Morgan, somehow.Noire’s response was a laughing emoji followed with, Of course he knows, the whole table’s known for weeks now. You’ve been getting freakishly close to that weirdo and everyone knows that it’s been romantic.Well, if it was just a case of everyone picking up on the vibes, then Nah couldn’t stress out too much about things. She thanked Noire for the sudden interruption and quick responses, then slunk back in to the table, where it seemed Maribelle and Brady had gotten into an argument in her absence. “Oh, good, now it’s awkward for everyone,” she whispered, seeing that the mother and son were not even looking in the other’s general direction. “My favorite kind of meal to be a part of.”“Dinah, please explain to my foolish son, right now, that he would be making a mistake if he permanently wrote you off as nothing more than a friend,” Maribelle said immediately upon Nah’s return to the table, her not even fully sitting back down before the statement was made. “While you are far from perfect and could use a lot of work, you show promise and could make for a suitable—”“Ma, stop it! Nah, explain to my mother that it’s not cool to try playin’ matchmaker for her child, especially with someone who’s already got her eye on someone else!” Brady was a lot more heated about things, and while it would have been fun to chime in with her own perspective of matters, Nah refused to entertain either of them, and merely stared at them both in silence until the waiter came back with their food.If the silence earlier in the evening had been sweet to start, this one only grew sweeter as the two realized that they weren’t going to get Nah to play their game. Sure enough, as soon as dinner had been served and eaten, in the time waiting for the check that could have been used to try swaying her in either direction, they all sat awkwardly at the table, her looking between them both while they couldn’t bare to look at each other. Eventually, Maribelle broke the silence to merely let Nah know that dinner was covered and that she was free to leave, but that she “really should consider the job offer and make a decision whenever she felt ready to do so,” something that Nah wasn’t even going to worry with for a while.She rose from the table without a word, merely waving farewell to the two before going out to her car. When she got behind the wheel, she pulled her phone out just to check it, and the single message she had from Brady let her know that what he’d been doing inside was an act to get under his mother’s skin. In a continuation of a long-passed conversation, he’d sent her one number: 29?Make it 28 and I’m down, she replied, setting her phone in the passenger’s seat and beginning to drive home. Perhaps he wasn’t as convinced of some hypothetical relationship between her and Morgan as she’d feared he was, and that was the biggest blessing of the night, hands down.Bright and early Saturday morning, Nah helped her parents pack up their vehicle with their belongings and her own, and after stopping to get donuts and coffee as was tradition, they set off on a trip out of town for the next week. This wasn’t something that Nah was particularly interested in, but the chance to get away from real life for a week was not something she was going to turn her nose up at, especially since it was being paid for entirely by her parents. “I can’t even remember the last time we went on a trip like this,” Nowi gushed as they passed by a large sign letting them know they were leaving Ylisstol, and to come back soon. “You must’ve still been in school, whenever we did this last.”“Mom, I technically am still in school,” Nah pointed out, her head resting against the window in the back of the car. “Just not in the same way I was back then. Pretty sure our last family trip was the trip we took out to the desert, to see the castles and to do some history tourism stuff. And if we can’t remember when it was, it probably wasn’t even that interesting after all.”“Oh, right, I remember. We climbed too high on the castle and the park guards kicked us out for being where we shouldn’t have been.” Nowi laughed, leaning back in her seat. “We tried explaining that we were old enough to be in compliance with the rules, but they didn’t listen and told your dad to keep his kids under better control next time he dared take us somewhere. Remember that, Gregor?”She looked over at her husband, who was laser-focused on the road, as it grew closer to the coastline of Ylisse. “I do remember, he was very sure that your license was fake and that you two were twins or very close sisters. That was not a good feeling for ol’ Gregor after that, being told that his wife was his daughter.” Even though he was doing a great job of watching the road, he still found the time to look in the rear-view mirror and crinkle his eyes in a smile toward Nah. “You are quite lucky, little miss, that your mother gave you her youthful appearance instead of you getting the much older one from me.”“It’s a blessing and a curse, I’d say,” Nah replied, knowing that she’d wished many a time that she didn’t perpetually look like a child half her age at best. “But I get that it’s good that I look young, it’ll help me as I get older.”“Until all your friends aren’t getting asked for ID when you go places, but they always ask you because there’s no way you’re old enough to be doing whatever it is you’re doing.” Nowi’s laugh died down, as she began to gaze out the window. “Lady Tiki talks a lot about how she’s never gotten away with doing anything without being carded, and she’s older than I am. Guess that’ll be our lives forever.”Nah already knew very well that she looked younger than all of her friends, and she’d never guessed that it would change, but the verification was good to hear, at least. “I’m looking forward to the first time that situation happens to me, then. Right now I think we all still look young, me younger than the rest of them of course, but we’ve never gotten away with anything without getting carded first.” Not that Nah had exactly tried to do anything that required being carded, minus drinking a few times. “But as we get older, I bet that’ll start changing. No idea who’ll be the first one to not get asked.”With a shrug, Nowi said, “By the time I met your father, he wasn’t getting asked every time we’d go out, but it wasn’t until after you were born that it stopped happening altogether.”“And you still get asked every time,” Gregor added, once again focused squarely on the road ahead, “and we wouldn’t have it any other way.”Nah’s faced scrunched slightly at how cheesy and romantic that came off, but she didn’t verbally respond to it. Her parents, as old as they were, definitely tried to give the youthful energy that Nah’s friends’ parents still had, and for the most part they were successful. The only problem was that they were usually trying to be more casual and friendly with her, until they had some rule they wanted enforced and then they were far too strict and demanding. Still, she wouldn’t have asked for them to be any different than they were right then, loving and caring and willing to drag her out of town on a trip she hadn’t even asked about going on.She looked out her window and, despite it being morning, flashing and flickering lights on the horizon caught her attention. “Ooh, what’s all the way out here?” she asked, squinting her eyes to try and make sense of the lights but finding it impossible to decipher at such a distance. “Is someone getting arrested? That’s a lot of flashing.”“Eyes stay on the road, Gregor,” Nowi said in an uncharacteristically serious voice, reaching a hand over to her husband’s shoulder and gripping it tightly. “No temptations, no even looking in its direction.”“Mom? What are you talking about, what’s Dad not even allowed to look at?” The lights were getting closer, but only slightly, and it wasn’t until Nah was facing them head-on from her window that she could see a sign attached to their location—Blue Sea Springs. “Is that some sort of amusement park?” she asked, excitement beginning to rise in her voice. “I didn’t know that we had one of those out in the middle of nowhere, Ylisse.”“It’s sort of like an amusement park, sure, if you want to think of it that way.” The seriousness hadn’t faded from Nowi’s voice, even as she’d let go of Gregor’s shoulder as they kept going straight down the highway. “Except it’s not meant for children, by any means, and it’s not somewhere that this family is going to be spending time together. Ever.”“Not meant for…” Nah’s voice trailed off as she kept her eyes focused on the lights, thinking about what mysteries they contained. Suddenly, the truth behind the flashy place struck her and she whipped to face forward in her seat. “Okay, so it’s not an amusement park, but when was anyone going to tell me that we’ve got a casino all the way out here? Is gambling even legal in Ylisse, or is that place supposed to be under the radar?”There was a moment where it seemed that she wasn’t going to get an answer, but then Nowi sighed and turned herself around as best as possible in her chair. “It’s legal, they just keep it out of the cities and in remote places to try and deter people from going to the casinos. That one’s a new one, definitely wasn’t out here the last time we came this far from town, but it’s not worth anyone’s time or money. Like I said, we’re not spending time there as a family, not even in your dreams.”Grabbing her phone, Nah wanted to look up what all Blue Sea Springs had to offer, but she didn’t have enough service to make it possible, so she resigned herself to waiting until they got to their destination to do her research. “I’d never ask you to go there, I’m not exactly sure I’m interested in gambling myself. I play tabletop games with dice weekly, and every roll is a bit of a gamble, that’s enough of the rush for me, I think.”“One time, back when you were a tiny little thing, there was a job building one of those casinos that I took on,” Gregor started, tensing up behind the wheel. “It wasn’t the easiest job, but the pay was better than any job Gregor had ever had before, and he is not a fool, so he took it on without question. One of the treats for working it was getting to play the games when they got installed. You’ll never guess what happened.”While she was sure she could guess the truth, Nah decided to play it safe and guess a hopeful answer instead. “You won so much money that you’re still living off of it today?”“No. It became very clear to Gregor why they paid so well, because he came home to his wife and baby daughter with less money than he’d ever made from a complete job.”“And that’s why we’re not going there, or anywhere like it, so that losing that much money never happens to us again,” Nowi finished, nodding sternly when she ended her sentence. There was so much left unsaid in that short story that Nah could gather on her own, but she would’ve been lying if she said she wasn’t curious about the whole casino life, especially with how bright and flashy that place had been from such a distance. But she knew better than to start their family trip off on the wrong foot, so she nodded and accepted the cautionary tale for what it was.They were in the car for most of the day, minus the many stops to stretch their legs and fuel up. When they did pull into a modest-sized town on the far side of Ylisse, it was after many detours and sight-seeing adventures along the way, with the promise that they’d not have to do as much of that on the way back. Not that it particularly mattered to Nah, given that she was at the mercy of whatever her parents wanted to do anyway, but she liked them giving the illusion that she had any say in the proceedings. “We’ll have to call it an early night, I think,” Nowi said after browsing her phone and looking around at all of the already-closed places near their hotel in the town, after they’d checked in and taken their luggage to the room. “Doesn’t seem like there’s that much to do now.”“That’s what you think,” Gregor told her, gently waggling a finger in her direction. “After nightfall there is quite the sight to be seen around here. Just you wait.”Also looking around what was visible of town and seeing the decently modern buildings built between historic-looking ones with thatched roofs and brick walls, Nah wasn’t sure what her father was alluding to in the slightest. There was one matter that was on her mind, though, and she voiced that thought at once. “You’re going to tell us that there’s somewhere we can eat before it’s too late, aren’t you?”“This hotel has a fantastic restaurant to dine in at all hours.” Barking a laugh, Gregor added, “But that is not the sight to be seen, even if it’s a good place. Let’s unpack before we go get food, because we may not want to unpack when we get back.”“We need to unpack?” Nah asked, glancing at how she’d tucked her suitcase next to her bed, with the bare necessities for the evening pulled out. “Why does that make it seem like we’ll be staying here a lot longer than just a few nights?”“It makes it feel like home, Dinah,” her father replied, before unzipping his own bag and pulling out a pillow he’d tucked inside of it. “And home needs all the belongings where they belong, doesn’t it?”She’d never fully understand some of the things that this man told her, but Nah went along with it with a smile and chose not to argue the point. Even Nowi seemed resigned to the fact that she’d need to just go through the motions her husband was expecting of them, and sure enough, once they’d pulled everything out of their suitcases and put them in logical places, he seemed satisfied enough to let them leave for dinner. On their walk through the hotel hallway and down to the lobby, Gregor tried his best to explain why he enjoyed the restaurant there as much as he did, but couldn’t find the words to best describe it. “You’ll understand what I mean when we eat,” he ended with, shaking his head. “Every day we’re here, this will be where we end up, I promise.”It really did make sense why the restaurant was so favored in his mind from the moment they sat down at a booth in the bar area and were met promptly by a waiter bringing waters and menus thicker than any Nah had seen before. She’d heard of places that had menus so large, but she’d never dined at one before, and she was interested in seeing what had them so proud to serve so much—only to flip to the middle of the menu to find that two-thirds of the whole book were dedicated to the variety of alcohols the restaurant had to offer. “Oh, is this like a brewery or something?” Nowi asked, also finding the same quirk about her menu. “I should’ve known that it would have to be something about drinking that would get you so excited to eat somewhere.”“The drinks do pour frequently, and for cheap,” Gregor admitted, but his menu was opened to one of the last pages, not even looking at the beverages. “However, what Gregor prefers most about this place is how you can make everything your own, no matter what it is. Anything can be whatever you want it to be, and you’ll never eat the same thing twice.”“Never eat the same thing twice, huh?” Repeating his words, Nowi turned to the same page he was on and stared down at the miniscule words printed before her. She read over it several times, her eyes flickering back and forth as she went line by line, only to hum to herself after finishing the page. “I see, this is quite the selection. Do they make it for us?”Gregor grinned. “Even with all the special requests, never once have they gotten my order wrong, and for the price you would think they would do that. This place is better than anything I have had in Ylisstol, and that’s saying a lot, isn’t it?”Her menu still opened to the middle page, where the drinks were staring up at her, Nah wanted to know what in the world her parents were going on about, but she was more curious about how such a modest-looking place could offer so much. It didn’t seem like it was in a spot to attract a lot of business, so their large menu and their healthy selection of drinks felt like it would be better suited for somewhere with a bit more business. That perception changed about halfway through the meal, when a whole swarm of construction men and weary travelers came wandering in, seating themselves in every possible place and causing the whole room to fill up within a handful of minutes.The bar came to life with multiple bartenders working to craft drinks, and servers seemed to come out of the woodwork to take care of everyone’s orders. “I take it that when you’ve worked jobs around here, you’ve been exactly like these people?” Nowi asked, looking around at how crowded the once-empty restaurant had become, and Gregor silently nodded in return. “Makes sense why you like it so much.”“It’s a perfect place for winding down after a day of work, that’s for sure.” He laughed into the rim of his drink, which was the third or fourth he’d had since arriving. “What a nice change of pace, being here for fun, not for work.”Nah played with her napkin, becoming slightly overwhelmed with the volume in their area of the restaurant. She had so many things she wanted to say, things she wanted to ask, things she wanted to discuss to get her mind off of the hundreds of voices she was now hearing, but she couldn’t bring herself to say a thing. Nowi, noticing this unusual behavior coming from her daughter, reached a hand across the table to try comforting her.But all Nah could see was the same situation from the last dinner out she’d had, where Maribelle had offered her a hand and she’d taken it, and she couldn’t bring herself to acknowledge the gesture. “Hm, do you think we could possibly get out of here soon? I think someone’s a bit tired from the travel, and don’t we have something you wanted to show us once it got dark or whatever?”Slamming down the rest of his drink, Gregor set the glass on the table and looked at Nowi, trying to figure out what had her in such a hurry to leave, before she motioned for him to look across at Nah instead. When he saw the look of disinterest painted across Nah’s face, he seemed to catch on immediately. “The two of you can head out to the lobby, Gregor will take care of paying for the meal,” he told them, and he didn’t give it even a second before he was trying to push Nowi out of her spot. “Go on now, get!”The volume level in the hotel lobby was still a lot louder than it had been when they’d arrived earlier in the day, with guests lined up to check in and people milling around waiting for various things. Nah could at least hear herself thinking out there, so she was able to calm herself down a bit, although she still wasn’t speaking to her mother. “I’m curious about what your father wants to show us tonight,” Nowi remarked, knowing that acting like everything was fine was the best way to handle the problem that had arisen. “He hadn’t mentioned there being something special we’d get to see here before we got here, so I wonder if it’s something real or something he’s made up to try selling us on this place.”“Lying to you about there being something to look at after nightfall? Why would I?” As if he’d been with them the whole time, Gregor placed one hand on Nowi’s head and the other on Nah’s shoulder, both of them looking at him with various states of surprise at his reappearance. He played it off like it was nothing, continuing with, “Let us head out to where we parked, I’ll—”“You’re not planning on driving somewhere after all those drinks, are you?” It wasn’t the smartest thing, to blurt something out like that, but Nah was already coming down from being overwhelmed, she didn’t need to add panic to the list of problems she had. “Dad, if that’s your plan, you better let Mom do the driving instead, since I…know how you both feel about me driving.”“—who ever said a thing about needing to drive? A short walk’s all we need.” With a wink, Gregor let go of them both and started for the door, and the ladies exchanged a glance before following him outside. Sure enough, when they got out to where the car was parked, he gestured down the sidewalk, along the main road through the town, and as a trio they walked a few blocks until the road seemed to dip down into a valley out of nowhere.That was where, rising from the middle of nowhere, stood a pillar of rock and vegetation, with a perfect hole cutting through it that allowed them to see the night sky on the other side. Peeking up through the hole was the moon, in the middle of rising for the day, and with it being nearly full, it was large and bright through its little frame. “Eyelet Rock, they call it,” Gregor explained, waving a hand toward the structure as if they weren’t already looking at it. “Yes, you can see the sun through it, and the moon during the day too, but…”[“But you planned this trip to be during a time when the moon would be at its brightest through the rock, didn’t you?” Nowi finished, giving her husband a smile as he returned the favor back at her. “That’s very thoughtful of you, and it explains why you think so fondly of this place. This is really, really cool, Gregor.”“It’s neat,” Nah agreed, not sure what else there was to say about a rock with a hole in the middle. “I’m glad I get to see it tonight.”“When the moon is full, the last night we’ll be here, we will come see it again. For now, just know that it waits for us.” Punctuating his sentence with a yawn, Gregor turned back to face the direction the hotel was in. “It feels like time to turn in for the night. Tomorrow, we get to go further to see where I have been working, and what all the area around it has to offer.”Once more, Nowi and Nah shared a look, but this time it was to see who’d ask the pressing question of the moment. Nowi ended up doing the honors, as Nah started walking slowly back toward the hotel. “And tomorrow night we dine at your favorite restaurant again?”“Wouldn’t have it any other way.”Under her breath, low enough that only the night air could catch her dismissive tone, Nah replied to her father’s statement, “But I kind of wish you would.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Tuesday. In a normal week, it would be the day of the next session, the day where Nah would drive down to Morgan’s house and use Lucina’s computer to play their little campaign virtually. That didn’t even feel like something that would be happening if this were a normal week, but she hadn’t heard anything saying otherwise and she wasn’t about to ruin the midpoint of her trip by trying to ask about the status of their game. As far as she was aware, nothing more than Noire knowing what had happened was the specific outcome from that horrible interaction down in Morgan’s room, so if they could just pretend none of that had happened, perhaps there was hope their game could go on.A disgusting thought, wanting to forget the manipulation and forced exposure she’d experienced because of someone’s slip of sanity, but even still Nah wanted to believe that Morgan could be saved from the darkness beginning to consume him. If bringing him back to the light meant going back to his house on a weekly basis and playing his game with all of their friends, with more explicit boundaries established between them, then that was what she was going to do. There was no way that she was going to let one bad decision of theirs (since she knew she wasn’t fully innocent in the whole ordeal) ruin things for their entire group of friends.But she was starting to let that decision ruin her time spent with her parents, as she was spending more energy looking at her phone and making sure all was well back home than she was actively engaging in their trip. Countless times, Nowi would put her hand over Nah’s phone to redirect her attention, to look at something that Gregor was excitedly trying to show to them at one of the many sites around the town they were staying in. “I swear, maybe we should’ve shut your phone off for this trip, you’re glued to it or something,” she remarked after one of the many times her hand had become a cover for the device. “You’ve never been this bad about being on it before.”“We’ve also never been on a trip like this since I had a phone,” Nah reminded her, resigning herself to putting her phone away yet again. There wasn’t a single rumbling of anything amiss back home, which should have been putting her mind at ease; however, Nah was subjecting herself to an awful lot of doomscrolling, expecting something to fall apart the moment she stopped checking. “But I’ll try to be more present, for your sake. What’s this that you’re trying to show us, Dad?”Cue Gregor getting to do the tour guide bit he’d been planning on for the whole trip, while Nowi and Nah both had to watch on, with varying levels of interest. It wasn’t that he didn’t have interesting things to tell them about—because there was a lot of neat history that the far corners of Ylisse had to offer—but rather that there were much more pressing matters that could have been taking place back home. Matters that could have had a lasting impact on Nah’s life if she didn’t catch them being talked about fast enough. Matters that she would prefer stay completely private, under wraps, and out of the public knowledge.Matters that she would never, in a million years, openly admit to her parents without being forced to do so. And since it was Tuesday, and she had no idea if there was going to be a gathering of her friends even without her being available, Nah’s mind couldn’t fully focus on the tourist part of the trip she’d willingly gone on. Her thoughts continuously drifted back to the what-ifs in the situation, the possibilities of someone else finding out what had happened, the truth being skewed and her being painted as someone much worse than she really was. But unless she resigned herself to having to tell her parents about what had happened, Nah couldn’t keep going back to looking at her phone and making sure everything was still under control, and there just wasn’t any way she was going to do that.“Dinah, seriously? Are you even mentally here with us?” Nowi was waving her hand in her daughter’s face, trying to get her to focus on something that wasn’t her own thoughts, and when Nah blinked a few times, she backed away. “I’ll take that as a no, you weren’t. What gives with that?”“There’s been a lot going on at home the past few weeks, and I’m having a hard time keeping myself away from thinking about it.” That was the most sanitized, clean version of the truth that Nah could give without technically lying. But it wasn’t enough for Nowi, who motioned for her to explain further. “I mean, you’ve heard all about some of it from Lady Tiki, she wants me trying to wrangle a friend back to the light and it’s…taking a toll on me, to say the very least.”Nowi’s nose scrunched up at the explanation, but as she reached for her own phone (presumably to call up the manakete elder and give her a piece of her own mind), Gregor cleared his throat to get their attention. “This is a family trip, let’s try to keep home things at home and fun things here with us, okay?” he suggested, approaching the two and bending down to put one hand on each of them, squeezing their shoulders tightly. “It can be tricky to do that, but the fun things here aren’t fun things we can get at home and you really—”He was cut off by the distinct sound of Nah’s phone ringing, and she quickly grabbed to see who it was that was calling her. The fact that it was Brady gave her no solace in any way, shape, or form, but with both of her parents right in close proximity and her not knowing what would happen if she answered, she made the choice to ignore the call and let him leave her a voicemail if it was truly important. “Oh, so now you’re listening to us and choosing to be present instead of focusing on people at home,” Nowi said, watching her daughter’s quick-time reaction to the call. “Took you long enough.”“What do you want from me?” Nah’s words came out harshly, which had admittedly been the intention but she’d hoped to sound at least a little nicer when she’d said it. “If I’m on my phone, you’ve got a problem. If I choose not to be on my phone, oh good, you still have a problem. Can I do anything right in your eyes?”“That’s no way to speak to me!” Raising her own voice, Nowi swiftly moved Gregor’s hand off of her shoulder so that she could get closer to Nah, trying to be as intimidating as she could be despite her small size. “I am your mother, Dinah, and I would really appreciate it if you’d treat me like that for a change!”Years of conflicting emotions and problems, which had long been bubbling under the surface, felt like they were ready to erupt there in her mother’s face, but Nah took a deep breath and accepted that it wasn’t the time or place to voice her grievances. “I’m sorry, I just…did what I thought you’d want me to do in that moment. You’ve been on me about using my phone so much that I figured answering a call would be out of the question.”“I mean, yeah, it is out of the question. This is family time, not spending time chatting with your girlfriends time.” Nowi backed away, crossing her arms over her chest as she did. “So I’m proud of you that you didn’t answer. But it shouldn’t have taken this long.”Nah wasn’t going to correct the fact of who it was calling her, because she knew mentioning that it was a guy trying to speak to her would only open more problems between them all, so she merely nodded and decided it was best to leave things in a bit of misunderstanding. “Of course, my bad for trying to deal with those things still going on back home. I’ll be better about it going forward, promise.”Despite everything seemingly being patched up after the little argument, Nah could tell that there was still some deep-seated anger and bothered emotions dwelling within her soul, but she wasn’t about to make more of a scene than she already had. In fact, even after they’d gone back to their hotel room that night, she kept her mouth shut and her hands off her phone as much as she could, even though every time she saw her screen she could see the notification of the voicemail someone had left her. She couldn’t bring herself to try listening to it, in case her mother was around and another argument got started, but she truly felt like she needed to know what Brady was trying to call her about.It was right around the time that they were heading to dinner (at the restaurant there at the hotel yet again) that she came up with an idea to get to listen to the message without being around someone who’d judge her for it. “Say, we’ve been stuck spending all sorts of time together lately,” she started, sitting on her bed while her parents stood around theirs. “Why don’t I go take a walk, so that the two of you can have a bit of alone time?”“That’s the weirdest implication I’ve ever heard from you, Dinah.” Shaking her head as she was visibly rejecting the offer, Nowi looked at Gregor to see how he’d help back her denial up, only to see him seriously considering the idea. “Whoa, seriously? She’ll know what we’re up to in here.”“I was thinking more about just getting to talk about life and the trip and what we should do before we go home, maybe plan a surprise for our daughter while we’ve got her.” Gregor winked at Nowi, a motion that Nah saw and initially cringed at, until she remembered that it was best to take her father’s word at face value. “We should let Dinah go for a walk, then she can meet us at our table in half an hour.”“You really think that…” Nowi’s voice trailed off as she too realized that Gregor was meaning what he said, not trying to be coy about anything else. “I suppose that’s fair, then. Half an hour, at the table, don’t be late.”Nah jumped to her feet and scrambled for the door, perhaps a bit too eagerly but what was done was done. “I’ll be there, don’t you worry!” she called back at her parents as she flung the door open and ran out of the room, heading down the hallway just to get away from where she knew they’d be. Somehow that plan had worked better than she’d expected it ever would, and it bought her enough time to listen to the message and call back if needed.She didn’t know what she should have been expecting to hear when she called her voicemail to hear what Brady had to say, but it certainly wasn’t what she got. “Uh, I’m guessin’ that you’re still doing things with your parents and can’t answer the phone right now,” he started, sounding hesitant and a bit worried with his words. “I’m just callin’ to let you know that Noire came over today to see Ma, and while she was here she happened to mention somethin’ about you and Morgan and I…I…” That was where Nah’s heart skipped a beat, at the same time as the sniffles and choked-up words started in the message. “If I’d known that he was plannin’ to treat you like that, I would’ve kicked his ass into next week for you. Nah, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you…”If there was more to what Brady had intended on saying to her, he didn’t ever spit it out because the remaining twenty seconds of his message were just him sobbing. Upon the message ending, Nah considered still going through with her original idea of calling Brady to talk to him about what he’d said, but she thought better of it and chose to text him instead. She was ultimately thankful she’d ignored the call when it had been made, but emotionally she knew it would’ve done Brady some good to hear her talk about what had gone on. She didn’t know the level of detail that Noire had gone into with him and his mother, but based on what she’d just heard, it was enough to put the blame of the situation entirely on Morgan’s shoulders. As long as she wasn’t being seen as being in the wrong, she couldn’t be too mad about the news getting out through someone else’s lips.Hey, got your message, my parents are hounding me so I can’t call, but I want you to know that I didn’t tell you because of the shame the whole thing made me feel. Kind of a difficult situation to find myself in. She thought about saying something more, potentially about how she appreciated his offer to get physical with Morgan, but decided it was best to keep the mood of the message a bit lighter. Don’t worry too much about me. I’ll get over and past everything that happened.When she sent the message, the immediate fear kicked in that she’d sent it to the wrong person, but after double and triple checking that it was sent to Brady and only to Brady, she felt a bit more at ease. Then the worry of when she’d get a response to her response settled into her mind, and she began pacing down the hall, not sure where to go to clear her soul but knowing that she’d be captive in her own thoughts until she could be alone for longer. Of all the times for weird and uncomfortable things to happen to her, why did it have to be the week before going on a family trip?“This whole thing is stupid,” she lamented, tucking her phone away so that she could use her hands to pound on her legs without worry of dropping something. “Couldn’t he have just been honest about what he wanted to do to me before he went through with doing it?”There was the slight issue that he’d been perfectly transparent about most of his desires, just not the one that had made everything most awkward, but Nah wasn’t about to mentally implicate herself in everything again. As far as it seemed, though, he wasn’t exactly bringing up their prior discussions with anyone, and all that was being spread around was coming from one source in particular.But that was just what it seemed like from Nah’s perspective.The actual truth was a lot less pretty, and when she found out just what Morgan was sharing about their encounter, she wished that she could go back to it only being Noire who was telling others about what she’d seen.It was the next morning, far before any alarms were set to go off, that Nowi’s phone began blaring its ringtone that was manually set for Lady Tiki’s number, the sound of which woke all three people in the room up. “What’s she doing calling before sunrise?” Nowi asked, tiredness and surprise in her voice as she reached to grab her phone, but when she picked it up the call had been ended on Tiki’s end. Instead of leaving it there, she called the elder manakete right back, assuming the worst, and whatever it was that Tiki led with had Nowi sitting straight up in the bed, like she’d just risen from the dead.“Are…are you sure about that?” she said quietly into the phone, casting a glance in Nah’s direction. “That doesn’t seem like—no, I get that that’s something that could happen, but my Dinah? She’d never do such a thing.”Pulling the covers of her bed up over her face, Nah inhaled deeply as she listed to her mother’s side of the conversation go on, with sleepy and incredulous statements being made in response to whatever it was Lady Tiki was saying. She had a hunch that it had something to do with a Fell Dragon-worshipping friend of hers, but it wasn’t until she heard her mother’s impassioned “I knew that anyone associating with a Grima follower is bad news!” that she was solid in her assumption. Now it was just a matter of what Lady Tiki had heard, and what she was choosing to share with Nowi at such an early hour.That became knowledge for them all soon enough, because the moment she got off the phone, Nowi threw herself back down against her pillow and groaned. “That’d explain why Lady Tiki feels the need to call at five o’clock on a Wednesday morning. Dinah, please tell me and your father that you haven’t been lying to us about your weekly activities with those friends of yours.”“I haven’t been lying about my weekly activities. I go play our game for a few hours once a week, that’s all.” It’d have been funny if Lady Tiki had suddenly gotten up in arms about Nah playing a game that involved dragons acting as a less-than-perfect race among other creatures, but she knew that wasn’t what this was about. “What did Lady Tiki tell you I’ve been doing?”“She said…” Nowi’s voice trailed off after two words, her humming to herself as she thought about how to sum up what she’d heard. “She received a call from someone who attends another church of Naga in town, she didn’t name names but I’m pretty sure it’s someone we both know, and that someone told her that they’d heard that you’ve been recording yourself getting up to no good with that Morgan boy.” There was a pause as Nowi processed the rest of what she’d heard, while Nah had to figure out her own response. “And, like, I guess they’d heard it from someone who’d watched the video?”Squishing her eyes closed as she mentally cursed Noire’s inability to keep this one thing secret from literally everyone, Nah decided that she had no choice but to tell as much of the truth as necessary to clear the air. “Okay, so, we definitely know who called Lady Tiki,” she started as she came out from under the blanket, meeting both of her parents in the real world once more, “and I’m not surprised that she’d do that, given how weird she’s been about me in general. Guess she took a piece of ammo, that I hope to Naga she hasn’t actually seen and just heard about, and decided to try and shoot her shot with it.”“So the recording thing is real?”Nah grimaced, expecting that question from her mother but getting it from her father instead. “I mean, sort of? Dad, Mom, you have to both believe me when I tell you this, but when I got forced into kissing him, it wasn’t by my request, it wasn’t my idea, and I didn’t know he had a camera going until I saw Noire watching and…” She gestured with her hands wildly, trying to express how unaware she’d been. “I didn’t ask for any of it. He came onto me when he had me alone and then kept a video of it because he’s deranged or something.”Gregor looked to Nowi, who was still laying down with her eyes wide, her mind working overtime to try and process all she’d just learned about her daughter. “Why have we had to wait until we’re on this trip to learn about this, Dinah?” he asked, slowly turning to face Nah, who was still grimacing when his eyes got to her. “Was there no way you could trust us with this news before the trip happened?”“It…it happened a week ago, I was kind of still processing that it had happened in the first place.” A sinking feeling was beginning to develop in the pit of Nah’s stomach, that if she didn’t act quickly, things were about to get severely out of hand. “And I swear to you both that I didn’t ask for this, and that this is all that happened. There’s no need for calling any cops, getting the law involved, none of it.”Nowi sat up at a snail’s pace, getting as far as her back mostly straight before she fell to the bed once more. “I mean, if it is who we think it is that called Lady Tiki over this, then isn’t the law technically already involved?” she said, defeat in her voice. “Not that I’d pick your legal battles for you, but keep that in mind.”“I know, I know, I’m already on it.” True to her word, Nah had grabbed her phone and was texting Brady to tell him to get his mother out of her personal issues and that she’d deal with them on her own. “This is why I was so happy to get to come on this trip, it was a reason to get away from all of this drama and figure out how to handle it, but apparently people can’t keep their mouths shut and—”“That’s why you’ve constantly been on your phone!” The realization had hit Nowi quick, and she didn’t bother apologizing for cutting her daughter off like she had. “Not that it justifies it even a little bit, but it explains why you’ve been so different than normal when it comes to your phone.”“—yep, you’ve got me there. I’ve been making sure that the one person I knew had been dragged into this hadn’t said a word, and I guess the one time I listened to you and Dad and stayed off my phone, she went right to telling the first person she could.” A text to Noire asking for her reasoning behind telling Maribelle of all the people in the world was due in the near future, but it wasn’t an immediate task Nah was going to take on. “I’m surprised that it wasn’t Morgan himself bragging about what he’d done that got it to Lady Tiki’s attention like this but, you know, it is what it is.”During that entire back-and-forth, Gregor had silently gotten up and began pacing around, and it was clear looking at him that he was overcome with emotions on the matter. “This should never have had the chance to happen to my child,” he said once the two ladies had stopped talking. “This is a failure of me, as father, and not of you, as an innocent girl.”“Dad, what are you going on about?” Coming to her feet as well, Nah went right to stand in Gregor’s way and held her arms out for him. “It’s not like he went any further than kissing me, without my consent sure, but it wasn’t anything more than that. You aren’t a failure because some guy decided he wanted to know how I taste, and did it as some weird power play over my friends or whatever. Still not sure what was up with that.”“That…could be true,” Gregor replied, standing tall over Nah before bending down to pick her up in a hug, “but it never should have happened. When we get home, if that boy shows up anywhere near our home, he is in for a fight.”While she’d expected that to be a threat that was made, hearing it only made the unsettled feeling inside Nah grow more intense, and she squirmed in her father’s arms until he’d set her back down. “I’ll need to go over to his house one more time,” she told her parents, having spent time over the trip thinking that course of action through, “but I’m going to go with a friend and leave with a friend, and it’ll be a quick stop. I need to get some things of mine from his place.”“Can’t you have one of your friends do it instead?” Nowi asked, finally sitting up for real. “I don’t know if I feel comfortable with you being over there anymore.”“I’m not really comfortable with going over there either, but I have to be the one to do this. It wouldn’t work if it was someone else going.” The particular reason she needed to be there was to see the books she’d now need to shell out for, so that she could make good on her promise to Ribbon that she’d get to play the game. There was more to it than that, and Nah had full intentions of finding a way to get Farona out of their campaign to use her in the one she started with Ribbon and whoever else would play with them, but this final visit was one that was meant to bring a new beginning to a new game.Their room was quiet for a few minutes, before Nowi decided that, since they were already awake, it was just best to start their day and, in her words, “try to pretend like none of that stuff happened, because there wasn’t anything that could be done about it while out of town”. So, for the rest of that day as they packed up and concluded their sightseeing earlier than anticipated, the weight of what had woken them up rest on all of their shoulders, but not a word was mentioned about it. It wasn’t until they were on the drive back to Ylisstol, two days earlier than planned, that anything was said on the matter, and even then it was just asking if Nah had heard anything back from the message she had sent, which she checked then and saw that her original message hadn’t even been read yet.“I’m sure it’ll all be okay,” she said, turning her phone’s screen off in sadness as she couldn’t help but wonder why Brady hadn’t seen what she’d sent him. “I mean, I did nothing wrong, nothing illegal happened even if it wasn’t a cool thing that did happen, there’s nothing that can really come from this that’s super horrible. It’ll all be okay.”If only she truly believed what she was saying, and based on the lack of response she got from saying it, she didn’t think her parents believed it either. What a way to end a trip.There were a lot of things that Nah expected to have happen while she was still off from work on break. Fallout from the situation with Morgan was one of them, as was getting to spend a lot of time chilling at home with her mother as her father would inevitably have to leave town again for another job. As painful as it was, going to the donut shop with Nowi and sharing a breakfast together was a third inevitability, and naturally getting to check on the new shop and see what Laurent and Noire were doing was something as well.What she didn’t expect was to get a knock on the door the afternoon after they’d all gotten home, and finding a gaggle of women standing there looking grim and concerned as they watched her open the house up to them. And if, for some reason, she’d expected this arrival, she wouldn’t have expected that Maribelle would be at the head of the group, her hands pressed together in a praying position. “Are you home alone right now, Dinah dearest?” she asked, her sickly sweet voice as fake as ever. “Would you mind if we came inside and kept you company, if that were the case?”Nah had to take a few moments to digest what she had standing outside her family’s home before she could even muster a response. Obviously Maribelle was there, but so were three other older women who she recognized as being Severa’s mother, Cynthia’s mother, and Kjelle’s mother, and if seeing all of them there wasn’t strange enough, standing back behind all of them was Kjelle herself. This felt like it was a majority of people who would be better suited for spending time with her mother, with there only being one person present that was someone Nah actually spoke to willingly. On that note… “I am home alone, but I’m not sure Mom would be thrilled to know I invited you all inside.”“Your mother is aware we were stopping by,” Maribelle insisted, breaking her hands apart to gesture toward the door and Nah herself. “Call it a check-in from several concerned individuals, but we want to make sure that you and her both are perfectly fine after what happened in the name of the Fell Dragon.”That explained why everyone present was at least a part-time attendant at the services at a nearby non-manakete church of Naga, because the situation had now become religious in nature. “Did you tell Mom that you’d be here trying to preach to me?”“Gods, no, that would be ridiculous.” Taking a step closer, Maribelle bounced her head so that her hair gave the motion for everyone to file in as well. “When I spoke to Nowi earlier, I had told her that we were merely coming by to see if there was anything we could do for your family in this difficult time. This sort of behavior is not acceptable in Naga’s name, after all, and we want to assure you that you are still loved despite everything.”“They also want to know if they need to do anything to that punk,” Kjelle called from the back of the group, her hands cupped around her mouth to amplify her voice. Once everyone had turned their attention to her, she narrowed her eyes and added, “I’ve offered to tackle him on your behalf. Done it once, would gladly do it again.”“That’s…also part of why we are here, yes,” Maribelle conceded, turning back to face Nah with a forced smile upon her lips. “But that part was absolutely not my idea, I have warned them that any physical retaliation could have legal consequences but I have heard from a…somewhat reliable source that attacking this boy has been a constant over the years.”Nah wasn’t really sure how to react to any of this, so she slowly closed the front door and locked it, leaving everyone on the outside long enough for her to call her mother and demand that she get home from the store as fast as she could. “What, did something happen?” Nowi asked, loud music and voices audible behind her. “I’m in line now, shouldn’t be more than like fifteen minutes or so, but tell me. Did something happen?”“Yeah, something happened, we’ve got religious stuff happening on the front step.” Nah leaned her head against the door, where she knew Maribelle and the others were still waiting. “Should I let them in? It’s a bunch of ladies you know.”The call went silent, followed almost immediately by the sound of Maribelle’s phone ringing on the other side of the door. “Hello, Nowi. Yes, yes, we have arrived at your house and your daughter is here alone. Would you mind telling her that we have discussed this and that you said we were welcome to come inside, with or without you present?”There was no point in waiting for her mother to get back if that was how the chain of events was going to go, so before her phone could go off with a return call, Nah opened the door as wide as it could go and gestured for everyone to come inside. As they entered, she took the time to speak her truth for all of them to hear. “Look, I don’t know what your plans are for this meeting, or intervention, or whatever you want to call it, but I want you all to know that I did nothing wrong and I’m fine. Everything’s fine.”“Then consider our presence here less for you and more for your mother,” Maribelle told her, clearly having been the one to put the whole plan together given that she was being the mouthpiece for them all. “We shall just sit down here and wait for her to get back, if you have no qualms with that arrangement.” Before Nah even had the chance to say otherwise, Maribelle had taken a seat in Nowi’s favorite spot on the couch and the other older women sat around her, the four of them quickly getting to talking about what they were going to do.“I promise you that I’m not here to be a part of whatever that is,” Kjelle said, leaning an arm on one of Nah’s shoulders, before shaking her head. “I mean, I’m here because I’ve been dragged into being a part of it, but it’s complicated. Honestly, once they said that slide-tackling him was out of the question, I lost all interest in being here, but Mom didn’t tell me that was the case until we were already on the way.”“He doesn’t deserve to be slide-tackled over this,” Nah muttered, giving Kjelle a side-eye that wasn’t immediately noticed. While she wasn’t actually against the idea of there being physical retribution, and the idea that there were two people offering it had her smiling inside, there were plenty of other reasons why expecting that sort of attack to go over well was a fool’s errand. “He deserves to lose his friends and have everyone realize how much of a creep his new fascination with the Fell Dragon has made him, but I don’t want anyone hurting him.”Lifting her arm, Kjelle seemed to be about to say something, before she grabbed one of the braids in Nah’s hair and tugged on it, directing her upstairs and away from the gaggle of women waiting for Nowi’s return. At first, Nah found it strange that someone she’d technically invited into her home was leading her around, but then she realized that this was being done so that they could speak somewhere in private. But, of course, as soon as they were going up the stairs, four pairs of eyes were looking in their direction, something that Kjelle seemed to have thought of as she called down, “I’m going to speak to Nah one on one, just in case you all intimidate her. Which you probably do.”“Says one of the more physically intimidating people in the room,” her own mother shot back, which earned a laugh from some of the other ladies. At last glance, it was only Maribelle still watching them as they ascended, which felt perfectly in-character with her normal behavior toward Nah.There wasn’t a moment to think about what all of that meant, however, because once they got upstairs and into Nah’s room, Kjelle had the door closed and was towering over her as best as she could—a feat only possible given that Nah was somehow smaller than Kjelle’s short height. “I need you to tell me exactly what he did to you,” she demanded, putting a serious expression on her face. “Noire gave me a rundown when I mentioned that I’d be coming to see you, because she’s in a full-blown panic over all this. Have you ever had to deal with her freaking out that she thinks her mother’s going to start romancing someone half her age? It’s bizarre as hell, Nah, and we’ve got to get to the bottom of this.”“Why is Noire’s mother somehow involved in this now?” Confused at that entire chain of events and how it even got started, Nah shook it off and thought best how to explain what had happened in a way that most likely hadn’t already been said. “Okay, but basically, Morgan made moves on me and did it on camera with an audience that I wasn’t supposed to know about, and for whatever reason, he picked Noire as that audience.”“You know why that is, don’t you? The picking Noire as the audience thing, that is.” Kjelle’s eyes went a little wide as she waited for Nah’s response, and when she got nothing in return, she sighed. “Okay, you’re going to just have to trust me on this one, because this is Mom’s word and sometimes she can get things a little wrong just to get heated about them. But apparently, Noire’s mom has been getting super into the Fell Dragon stuff and has been dipping her toes in waters she shouldn’t be touching. And apparently, there was a night where her, some weird lady that Mom didn’t recognize, and Morgan were all at a table at a bar together, just talking and…that’s what I’ve got.”“Is it possible that your mom was drinking that night and got her details mixed up?” It probably was, but it was honestly just as likely that Morgan was sneaking out to meet with his aunt Aversa, and they’d just happened to link up with Noire’s mom in the process. “Because I don’t want to think that Morgan’s that depraved.”“He literally got you on camera doing things you weren’t comfortable with, we already know he’s a sick freak. Let’s just add to the list, shall we?” Taking a step back, Kjelle went over to Nah’s bed and sat down, her face deep in thought about what else there was to talk about in specific. “That’s your cue to get talking, by the way. I’ve got nothing else.”“And you think I’ve got anything? I’m so tired of all of this, I don’t have anything to add and I don’t have any ideas of what to do anymore.” That wasn’t true, Nah did still have her intentions of going over to that house one more time, but she wasn’t letting everyone in the world hear about that plan. “I just wish we could ignore that any of this happened, but we can’t, because…”“Because Noire told Brady’s mother, and Brady’s mother went off the deep end wanting to fight for your valor or honor or whatever she’s deluding herself into thinking she’s doing with all this.” Kjelle shrugged. “I got dragged along because they wanted someone who could ‘connect’ with you better, and they had me and Cynthia as their choices and she seemed really apprehensive about showing up here for some reason.”There was a heaviness to the air after those last few words, and Nah happened to look straight at Kjelle when she said them, picking up what she was referring to without further elaboration. “Don’t pretend like you don’t know what the reason is. I got screwed over in that whole situation with Severa being here in town and…and…” She found herself unable to voice the second half of the thought she’d had, merely letting her shoulders hang instead.“Severa’s a bitch when it comes to being asked to do anything halfway right, but she’s a good friend when you give her the chance.” That seemed like a forced statement, especially when the corners of Kjelle’s mouth began to twitch. “Not like she’s been good to any of us except Cynthia over the past months, but whatever. Can’t speak ill of her, people don’t like when we call out the truth about her.”Now things were moving away from the uncomfortable Morgan situation, and while Nah still didn’t particularly want to talk about how she’d been forced to fail to be present for a friend at a happy moment, she knew that she at least had the chance now. “Well, you know what happened when she was out here, don’t you?”“I think we all do. She conveniently forgot to let you know about invitations to the baby shower, then convinced everyone that you’d just chosen to ignore the invitation. It was a huge deal, there was a lot of screaming over it. Pretty sure Cynthia’s mom was about driven to tears because of how upsetting it all was.” Kjelle raised a hand with a single finger pointed, before she lowered it quickly. “The party wasn’t even half as good as the one you’d put on, just by the way.”“Because you’re totally not speaking with bias there, nope.”The two ladies looked at each other and laughed for a moment, before it seemed a realization struck Kjelle hard and she groaned, falling on her side onto the bed. “It totally just hit me that I know the real reason why they asked me to come with them here today,” she muttered, her voice a lot smaller than it had been. “When Mom told me about this, she said that it was a gathering of concerned mothers to check on a hurting family, and that I needed to come along to be a part of things for your sake. They absolutely asked me because—”“Oh! Yeah, that’d do it!” Cupping her face, Nah couldn’t help but smile at that realization. “I like the idea that you’re here because you’re my friend, but you being here because you count as a concerned mother works too.”“—and they made it a decision between me and Cynthia, who also counts.” Kjelle put a hand on her face and sighed, almost like she felt dumb over her delayed reaction. Unsure of how to respond to it, Nah merely sat down on the floor next to her friend and looked at her, waiting for her to say anything else.Instead of more conversation being allowed to bloom between the two of them, they were disrupted by the sound of the door opening and Nowi peeking her head inside, looking straight at Nah and narrowing her eyes. “What are you doing up here when guests are in our home?” she asked, sounding quite sour. “You know how I feel about people being in here.”“It wasn’t my idea to come up, promise!” Nah protested, nodding her head ever-so-slightly in Kjelle’s direction to try implicating her as the person responsible for where they were. “But, seriously, Mom? Do you think those ladies would be causing any harm to your house?”“There are two of them in my kitchen as we speak, trying to bake things as a ‘we hope things get better between you and Naga’ gift. I’m not one to complain about treats, but my kitchen? In my house? For a gift being made for us? I don’t like that.” Her eyes narrowing a bit more, Nowi added, “I’d recommend that the two of you get downstairs and put an end to this before something goes horribly wrong.”With that, she closed the door and audibly went back down the stairs, leaving Nah in a state where she didn’t know what she should do, or how any of it was her problem. “You know how this could get worse?” Kjelle started, picking herself back up off the bed, only to leave Nah hanging when she didn’t elaborate. “No, actually, that’s a dumb idea. Let’s get downstairs, I’m sure my mother’s one of the ones causing problems and that was your mom’s way of telling me I need to get her in line.”“Would that even come as a surprise to any of us?”“Given how many times I’ve had to pick her and my dad both up after they’ve done stupid things, it’d be more of a surprise if she wasn’t down there causing chaos in your mom’s kitchen. Sorry that I couldn’t impart any wisdom or whatever the hell they wanted me to do here, but…” Trailing off as she stood up, Kjelle looked down at Nah before offering her a hand to help her to her feet as well. “You know that I’m here to pick you up when you need it. And I’ll totally, definitely kick Morgan into next week if you ask me.”It felt like a genuine pair of offers, so Nah took advantage of the one she could (being helped up) and tucked the other one into her pocket for later. No, there wasn’t any way in the world she’d go running to a friend to inflict physical harm on Morgan after what he’d done, but it was nice to know the option was there. Of course, if it came down to it, she felt that there were several others higher on the list that should get the first blows in on him, specifically Noire first and Brady second. Perhaps she could mentally slot Kjelle into that list somewhere after the two of them, and after herself.But it wasn’t time to think about a retribution list, it was time to get back downstairs and see what Maribelle and her religious gaggle had done to the house while they’d been in the bedroom talking. True to Nowi’s word, the house was beginning to smell a lot like batter for a cake or pastry of some sort, and when they got down the stairs it was clear that most of the women were indeed gone. In fact, it was all but one of them who had disappeared elsewhere in the house, including Nowi. “We put on a movie to address the ways a community can support people in this situation,” Maribelle explained when she saw that Nah was once again with the group. “Your mother said that she has seen this one before, but it is a certified classic. We can all use a rewatch of it.”Nah’s eyes tracked to the TV screen, which was darkened with an inside-car scene of a romance movie that she knew, without a doubt, she’d seen with her mother on that very couch. “Isn’t this the one that has the girl get blinded because of her relationship with the bad boy, and she only gets her sight back when her new boyfriend takes her to his weird church?” she asked, coming around the couch to have a seat because, whether she wanted to admit it or not, it was a movie that was so bad, it was worth watching a million times.“The very one. Extended version, with the cut scene of her confessional where the priest learns just what had happened to her.” Holding her arm out to give Nah somewhere to sit nestled up next to her, Maribelle only dropped the gesture when Nah sat as far away from her as she could. “Ahem, I take it that you will be watching, then, Dinah?”“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”“What about you, Kjelle? Are you going to watch as well?” Maribelle looked over to where she’d last seen the other woman standing, only to find that she was backing away from the couch and TV entirely. “Should I take that as a no?”“I…I’m going to make sure that my mom isn’t about to be responsible for a house fire, actually,” Kjelle replied, quickly scurrying off toward the kitchen. That left Nah there alone with Maribelle, with a cheesy romance movie on the screen and a world of things left unsaid between the two of them.It became fairly obvious after a few minutes of sitting there watching the movie that Maribelle did not intend on them seeing the whole film through, given how she kept fidgeting and looking in Nah’s direction. Nah intended on making her suffer in her silence as long as possible, but eventually she decided that it’d be more merciful if she just came out and asked for the truth behind the day’s random visit. “You’re not actually here because you care about Naga and the church and want to make sure that everything’s okay, are you?”“Gods, why would I lie about my intentions of appearing at your doorstep without warning?” The fake way that Maribelle responded made it clear that she’d been lying about a lot of it. “I deeply worry for your well being after such a terrible, terrible thing has happened to you.”“What, exactly, happened to me?” Nah knew that the answer to that question could be anything, but she needed to hear it come from Maribelle’s mouth to know how to proceed further in the interaction. “Go on, tell me all about what you heard.”“Why, you were coerced into kissing someone on camera without your consent, and with an audience that had not consented to things either. In the grand scheme of things, it may be seen as a minor offense, but that sort of behavior can damage a woman’s psyche, completely devastating her for any future relationships.” One of Maribelle’s hands gripped the cushion on the couch, while the other was used to flick a wayward strand of hair out of her face. “This is merely me acting on what I have been told, trying to make you feel better when things are clearly not going so well for you.”Nah nodded, trying to make it seem like she believed what she was hearing, but she couldn’t hold her tongue forever. “And it has absolutely nothing to do with my friendship with your son? Or the job offer you sprung on me last week?”“Dinah, if you think that I would put my personal matters before your well-being, I feel that you have gravely misunderstood the sort of woman I am.” Huffing, Maribelle leaned closer to where Nah was sitting, a serious look appearing on her face. “I am doing this to better myself in the eyes of Naga, and to help you do the same.”That hit a nerve within Nah, and she couldn’t keep her voice down about it. “Oh, so that’s why you found it appropriate to call my church’s elder to tell her about what had happened to me, ruining my family’s vacation just so that you could go on this power trip? What made you think that any of these ladies actually care about me being kissed on camera? None of them do. Well, maybe one does, but not all of them!”“There is no need to scream at me, you insolent brat,” Maribelle hissed in return, before sighing. “And there are two of us who care. You forget that, deep down, I do care about and respect you more than you could ever know. Because of what you mean to my Brady.”Was she going to believe that? Not in a million years. But there was something about the way Maribelle said her son’s name that made Nah’s heart pang, and she felt her anger starting to subside as quickly as it had built up, being replaced with a feeling that she couldn’t quite describe. “Okay. Sure. You care that I got kissed because of your…son…”“He sobbed after he found out from your little friend with the mother issues. Absolutely destroyed about how you had gotten tricked into such a dirty situation, by someone he considered a close friend.” Closing her eyes, Maribelle sat back up and leaned into the back of the couch, thinking about what else she could add. “This was all his idea, whether you want to believe me on that or not. He asked if I could pull together some of the women from our church and come check on you, despite you manaketes being of a different branch of the church of Naga.”“So you managed to get some of your friends to take the day off work to come drop in on me, is that right?” Nah asked, not sure if she truly believed that this was Brady’s idea but not wanting to show doubt toward Maribelle’s story out loud. “And then you showed up, and I decided to ignore most of you because you brought a friend of mine along.”“That was also Brady’s idea, he said that it would never work if it were him that came with, so we needed to pick someone else with ties to the church. Her inclusion was entirely to get you to open up to someone about things. But clearly, all you needed was to be stuck watching a movie with me in order to make that happen.” Maribelle cracked her eyes open to look over at Nah, who had turned her attention to the movie on the screen at mention of it. “What scene are we at?”“The one where the girl asks for forgiveness from her god and gets blinded as a result of the holy light that shines down on her. Her bathing of damnation, or whatever they called it.” Transfixed by the scene, Nah found herself thankful that she wasn’t met with a resentful Naga punishing her in divine ways, but rather a group of women who’d been pulled together by someone allegedly acting on her son’s behalf. “It’s pretty heavy-handed, even for this type of movie, but we’ll just deal with it, won’t we?”“In the original novel—because yes, this was a book first years before it became a movie—the punishments were much more graphic, but so too was the behavior that earned her them in the first place.” Still looking at Nah, Maribelle took in a shallow breath, before following that statement up with, “Personally I felt that they could have done without some of the violent imagery, even in the toned-down version the movie presents. Sometimes, the punishments people receive are best to be heard about secondhand.”Nah winced as she kept watching the movie, and when the scene with the light and the blinding came to an end, she shook her head to clear it but found that the dazzling bright flash was still prominent in her mind. “Yeah, with all of this that’s been going on, I think I could’ve done without that scene being shown to me again,” she admitted. “It could have easily been me in those shoes.”“Over being kissed without consent? Naga would never punish you for that behavior, the punishment should fall squarely on the shoulders of the person responsible for the decision and who acted poorly in the moment.” While it rubbed Nah the wrong way to hear someone talking like she had personal experience with knowing Naga’s divine rulings, she was glad that someone was able to speak those words into the world for her to hear. She knew she needed to not blame herself for the actions that Morgan ultimately took, even though she’d been a huge part in him thinking they were okay to begin with. He’d forced himself onto her in front of that camera, he was the one who was in the wrong.They quickly entered into a strange silence, with both of them looking from each other to the movie and back again. It was incredibly fitting that they had such a relevant movie on during their time together, but at the same time it only seemed to be compounding issues because the moral of the movie was basically the opposite of what Nah knew the moral of her story needed to be. This film ended with the girl finding love in a new church, which ignored all of her previous teachings and beliefs, and Nah was actively trying to save her (former?) friend from falling into the clutches of the “bad” church of their religion. “You don’t think that Naga will shun Morgan forever after this, do you?” Nah asked, her voice quiet as she knew she shouldn’t have been trying to make anyone feel bad about him. “I mean, I know Lady Tiki isn’t ever going to let him set foot in our church again, but…”“He will absolutely find his way back to the light. I feel, once his parents know about what he has chosen to do, they will steer him straight.” Maribelle tutted, tapping her fingers on her leg as she thought more about what could be done. “It astounds me that, all this time, he has been able to be his strange self with such well-rounded parents raising him. Then again, I suppose the same could be said for Brady, given that he is quite the character and yet he comes from a family with noble ambitions.”They were back to talking about Brady, it seemed, and Nah was slightly thankful for the return to a less awkward topic. “I don’t think who someone’s parents are really matters here, because everyone’s their own person. Everyone gets to grow up in ways that work for them, and they get to turn into whatever kind of person they choose. Brady’s a kind man who just looks mean on the outside. And Morgan looks nice and innocent, but he’s troubled and needs a lot of help getting back on the right side of life.”“You speak so highly of my son, and I fail to understand why you can continue to do that, time and time again.” Her nose scrunching slightly, Maribelle gave Nah a very pointed look. “Is there something you would like to tell me about how you feel about him?”“As he’s said to you before over and over, we’re just friends. We just care a lot about each other, because we’re friends. And that’s what friends do.” Clasping her hands together, Nah looked at Maribelle and gave her a determined nod. “Is there anything else you’d like me to spell out for you, or do you have it?”Her jaw dropping slightly at the way she’d just been spoken to, Maribelle collected herself and gave a nod. “Yes, in fact, there is something else I would like you to ‘spell out’ for me. When I told Brady that we were making this meeting happen, and that it would be ladies only just to keep you and your mother comfortable, he gave me a single message to pass along to you but refused to elaborate on what it meant.”One of Nah’s eyebrows raised, followed immediately by the other one. “What sort of message was it?”“All he said was twenty-seven. No context, no elaboration, just a single number. Said you would know what he meant, and Dinah, I feel you may be a smart girl but there is no way that a number without context makes any sense to you.” Yet, after saying that whole explanation for why she felt the message was weird, Maribelle got to watch the look of acceptance and understanding cross Nah’s face.That was because Nah, in all of the drama and conflicting emotions and miserable experiences she’d been having in the past week, had figured that once the word got out that she was kissing another guy, whether consensual or not, the whole agreement with Brady would be null and void. She never once thought that he would not only still keep their deal in mind, but that he would move the goal posts another year closer to where they currently were in life. “I’ll have to tell him what I think about that next time I talk to him,” she said after giving the entire thing some thought. “But, on that note, is he free next Tuesday night? I need him for something.”“He has plans every Tuesday, Dinah,” Maribelle reminded her in a tone that first came off as condescending, then slowly changed to one of concern. “Plans with that friend of his that he is no longer allowed to interact with.”“Yeah, I figured you’d throw that down on him, which is why I’m asking if he’ll be free. I need someone to keep me company, to lessen the blow of losing that friend time.” Nah hoped her lying wasn’t blatantly obvious, but when Maribelle didn’t give her a solid answer in return, the results were inconclusive. So, she doubled down on trying to get a plan in motion and said, “I’m planning on getting things together to start my own game, like the one we’d been playing before all this happened, and Brady’s such a good friend that I’d love for him to help me out.”“If it is for you, he may choose to do just about anything. You can ask him yourself if he has plans for that night.”Nah’s fingers twitched at the thought of texting Brady right then to see if he would be down to help her with what she wanted to make happen—but she refrained from doing it. She needed to give everything time, to let women back off and give her space to breathe and cope with what she’d gone through, to let all of the people who’d heard the details process them and move on. Asking Brady right away would only lead to rash decisions being made, but if she waited…well, perhaps she’d be able to get things back to enough of a state of normal that they could just go back to playing their game.Now if only things would ever work out that way, but a girl could dream!
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Over the following few days, the gaggle of concerned religious mothers came by to check on Nah several more times, but it seemed that they were more interested in seeing what Nowi was up to than anything else. “They keep coming in here and making me bake things,” Nowi whined after their departure one of those evenings, “and we obviously don’t have all the ingredients for what they want to bake, so they’re getting creative with things just to make it all work out.”“Creative, like how?” Nah asked, putting her hands underneath her chin to show her interest in what her mother had to tell her. “Baking’s kind of a serious art, and I’d think that at least one of them would be very aware of that.”Nowi froze for a second as she glanced back at her kitchen, where the crimes against baking she’d perceived were happening had taken place. “Uh, meat pies? Cakes without sweet stuff? It’s a lot of healthy baking, Dinah! If they’re going to use my kitchen, I want the foods they make to be fun!”One of her hands moving up her face to pinch the bridge of her nose, Nah said, “Mom, if you want them to make sweet things, maybe you should tell them you want them to make sweet things. I think they’re coming here to make meals for us, so we don’t have to stress about making dinner while things are still weird.”“Why didn’t I think of that? I’ve just been throwing away the stuff after they leave.” Shrugging, Nowi turned around to go back into the kitchen. “I’ll, uh, keep today’s creations safe for dinner then. Let me know when you’re ready to eat.”It was hard not to laugh at how silly her mother was about some basic acts of kindness that she herself had taken part in for others in the past, but Nah managed to keep a straight face about it all, following her mother’s steps into the kitchen to see the scene for herself. Flour and baking ingredients covered every imaginable surface, but there were multiple containers sealed and ready to be eaten sitting on the counter, all of which Nowi was ignoring in her quest to clean things up. “I’ll help you clean,” she offered to her mother, knowing that the mess was entirely her fault, in a way. “And while I help, I can tell you what happened to me today while you were dealing with this.”“Oh, right, Maribelle wasn’t hounding you like she usually is, since she was in here helping fold crusts. What did you and that girl get up to?”“That ‘girl’ is Cynthia, and we got up to clearing some serious drama between us that neither of us really had any part in.” That was very true, because it had all come back to Severa’s interference in their lives that had made things awkward between them. “I got a proper apology for being excluded from her baby shower, and from being told that I was supposed to plan it when I’d never heard a word about it until the day before. Then I got to apologize to her for not trying to reach out and clear things up sooner. And now I guess I’m going to visit her and her boyfriend someday soon so I can play with their kid? I tried explaining that I’m not exactly interested in that but, you know, don’t want to offend her all over again.”“But you like children, you literally work with them.” Nowi gave her daughter a confused look over her shoulder, before turning back to continue washing a greasy pan in the sink. “I don’t see why you wouldn’t want to play with a baby.”“Because babies and children are completely different, and I like interacting with babies on my own terms, by my own choice, not by being thrown into the situation just to make everyone feel good about things.” Nah considered adding on why that was the reason she was perfectly fine with taking Ribbon home, but would never dare step foot inside that house, but she didn’t want to start an argument there. “But it’s fine, I’ll manage. Just like I’ve been managing with everything else going on.”Nowi turned the sink faucet on for a moment to rinse her pan, then had some grand idea in which she let the pan fill with water, then flung it right at Nah’s face. Now dripping with grease water, Nah screamed in surprised, trying to wipe her eyes but finding that her face was incredibly slick. “Life comes at you fast, Nah,” Nowi told her, grabbing a towel and throwing it her way to help the cleaning process. “You know you go back to work tomorrow, don’t you?”“Been looking forward to it since we got home from our trip. It’ll be nice to be there to finish the school year out, it’s been great having a break but I miss having scheduled activities.” Even with the towel, the grease water was not an easy foe to defeat, and Nah quickly accepted that her clothes were as good as garbage and she’d be taking an extended shower that night. “Only a month and a half until I’m done for the school year, believe it or not.”“Only a month and a half until we’re treated to these check-ins every day, I’m sure.” Going back to her cleaning like she’d just done nothing wrong, Nowi continued, “I like the socialization those women coming over brings, but I don’t like anything else about it. This morning, when I told Lady Tiki about it, she wasn’t thrilled with them coming in the name of Naga but not in the name of the manakete church, but she accepted that they’re just doing what they can to make sure others are okay.”At mention of Lady Tiki and the manakete church, Nah nearly dropped the towel she was holding. “Uh, Mom, did Lady Tiki tell you anything about any actions they might have taken against you know who for what he did?”“I mean, she’s pretty sure he’s accepted himself as being a follower of the Fell Dragon, so he’s no longer welcome in our church. She said more would be coming tomorrow. I take it that there’s going to be a lovely church elder visit over to his house.” The way Nowi spoke was so nonchalant, like it wasn’t a big deal that those were the actions being taken, but Nah, knowing that the full truth hadn’t been painted for anyone, blanched at the idea of Lady Tiki and Say’ri and all of the others who typically joined in for elder visits showing up at Morgan’s house. But she couldn’t get over there before Tuesday, so she had to hope and pray that she was granted that much time before she’d unintentionally ruined his life.Those prayers were met with an audible silence, whether Nah wanted them to be or not. She did return to work the next day and found herself back in her comfort zone, assisting with students who’d just been out of school for a week and needed support getting back into their routines. Then, on Tuesday, she got to see Ribbon multiple times in passing while working with the students on her caseload, only for the girl to come see her at lunchtime. “Are we gonna get to play our game tonight?” she asked, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she stood in the doorway to Nah’s office. “Dad and I have done so much planning on how Elegantia will work when I get to be her.”Looking up from her phone screen, Nah shook her head. “Not today, don’t have the people for it yet,” she replied, knowing that was just a small fraction of the truth. Yes, having more people on board for playing was important, but so was having the materials with which to play, and that required going over to Morgan’s house. At that very moment, she’d been texting back and forth with Brady over riding down together, just so that he could accompany her and keep her safe if something were to go amiss. “I’m hoping we’ll get it set up and ready to go soon, no later than the end of the school year.”Ribbon gave a very dramatic sigh, leaning against the frame of the door. “That’s so far away from now,” she groaned. “I don’t know if I can wait until then.”“It’s that, or not play at all.”Another sigh. “Fine, you win this time, Miss Dinah Balakin, but I’m not going to let you keep Elegantia away from me forever.” Ribbon raised a hand to shake it menacingly in Nah’s direction, but seemed to get distracted partway through the action and stared at Nah, gears turning in her head. “Oh! Oh right! Nah, I have to ask you something!”Her eyes narrowing at the sudden change in topic, Nah asked, “What is it? Please tell me it’s nothing about playing our game or coming to watch me and my friends play, because you’re not going to like the answers I give.”“No, no, it’s about the end of school! Ugh, I don’t have it with me, it’s in my backpack, but I have something for you when you take me home later! Mom made sure that we had one for you, as a thanks for helping get me home every week.” Going right back to her bouncy self, Ribbon told Nah to remember what she’d just said before bounding away, presumably going down to the cafeteria where she was supposed to be.“What a strange child…” Nah’s face relaxed as she looked back her phone, her having received another text from Brady in the middle of that conversation. She read it over once, did a sudden double take, and read it over again. “What the…? Are you serious?” she muttered, typing out a response to the message that she’d gotten, which read Morgan just texted, we’re all meeting at his place tomorrow. Said in-person session for reasons.Do you think those reasons interfere with us going down there today? she sent in return, her stomach turning at the reality of what those reasons probably were. She wasn’t shocked in the slightest that she hadn’t gotten that message from the source, but it still bothered her that he was excluding her from the message chain.It didn’t occur to her until she’d gotten Brady’s response (a yeah, probably) that she wasn’t getting the message because all sessions had been in-person for her, and she would’ve been expected to go down there that night anyway. Morgan must’ve been banking on her being present alone again to tell her the change of overall plans, and possibly attempt to make things right with her before everyone else was around. But the time to make amends was long past, and he was going to have to accept that what he’d done had crossed a line that he wasn’t getting back over easy.“Well, this blows,” she said, sending those exact words to Brady before putting her phone away. She’d just take Ribbon home like normal, then go down to Morgan’s house with Brady the next day, to see whatever kind of chaos he was intending on unleashing on everyone, whether it was spiteful toward her or pretending nothing had ever happened in the first place. Given that it was Morgan they were dealing with, in the past it would have easily been the second choice, but now that he’d changed entirely, there was no telling how he would act toward the group.Nah couldn’t dwell or get herself set on one particular outcome, though, and she just had to accept that whatever happened was going to happen no matter what. So, with her night’s plans completely ripped out from underneath her, she went on with her day as she always did, and looked forward to when she would actually get that last bit of closure down at Morgan’s place.After school, Ribbon was back in the doorway to the office, her backpack hanging off of her front so that she could easily reach inside it to grab whatever she’d been telling Nah about earlier. “Okay, so, like I said, Mom wanted to make sure that you got one of these, and I definitely absolutely agree that you have to have one.” Rummaging around in her backpack, Ribbon eventually pulled out a slightly crumpled envelope, which she walked right up to Nah and handed over in a very flourishing gesture. “We spent time last week making these, it was actually a lot of fun. Didn’t know my mom was good at that sort of thing.”Because she didn’t know what it was in reference to, Nah kept her mouth shut and merely opened the envelope, pulling out a card that had pictures of Ribbon carefully glued to its front, adorned with actual ribbons to tie it all together. “Your birthday’s not until November, so it’s not a birthday invitation,” Nah said, looking at the cover and seeing all the different pictures of the girl. “I’m pretty sure if you were moving, I’d have heard it already, so it’s not anything to do with that, and you’re clearly not dead so it’s not for a memorial…”Beginning to vibrate, Ribbon yelled, “Open it and see what it’s for! I can’t wait for you to tell me that you’ll be there!”“So it’s something I have to attend, hmm.” After admiring the front of the card for a few seconds longer, Nah opened it and saw that it was an invitation to Ribbon’s school continuation ceremony, which came the last week of school. “Oh. Ribbon…you know I’m already going to be there since I work here, right?”Ribbon nodded. “I know, but I want you to come over for snacks and stuff once it’s done. I don’t exactly have a lot of friends, and you’re probably my favorite person in the world, so I want you to be a part of my celebrations, not just the celebrations for the whole school.”“That’s really sweet of you.” Nah tucked the card back into the envelope, feeling a sense of warm fuzziness flooding her chest. “I’ll definitely come by after the ceremony, just because you’ve asked me to.”“Mom’s a bit worried about how next school year’s going to go, with me going to a different school that you’re not working at, so I won’t get this time with you anymore.” Just about immediately, a sadness filled Ribbon’s voice, and when Nah looked at her she could tell that she was beginning to blink back tears. “But I’m not going to be surrounded by bullies that pick on me for being different, so it’ll be nice to be able to be myself in my new school. I’m just going to miss this. Miss you.”“I’ll miss you too, Ribbon, but we’ve still got plenty of time before that’ll happen, so let’s not think about that yet, okay? One step at a time.” Getting up to wrap the girl in a side hug, Nah realized that Ribbon was definitely taller than her now, which made her feel a bit awkward about being the adult in the room when she was dealing with a schoolkid bigger than she was. “You need to stop growing, by the way. Who said you could be this tall?”Sniffling as she tried not to laugh, Ribbon said, “I’m still the shortest non-baby in my family, but only by a little! Dad thinks that by my birthday, I might be taller than him, which is crazy because he’s my dad! I shouldn’t be taller than him when I’m a kid!”“Guess that’s that taguel blood at work,” Nah reminded her, giving her back a strong pat before letting go of Ribbon entirely. “Meanwhile, I’m basically the same size as my own mom, and we’re both short because that’s the chance you take when you’re a manakete. Funny how these different cultures have such different sizes related to them, huh?”Ribbon’s eyes went from side to side as she began thinking about something, but before she could be asked to make sure that it was appropriate, she blurted out, “I wonder what’d happen if you crossed the two? Do you think we could find out?”“…Pardon?”“I-I mean, in the future! There’s no way we could find that out right now, but maybe years and years and years from now, that’d be something that could be discovered. Or maybe it’s been discovered in the past, I don’t know.” Ribbon grabbed one of her braids and held it in front of her face, as if it was a suitable cover from her embarrassment. “That was a really dumb thought I’d had. Sorry about that.”Nah looked at her before shrugging the whole thing off. “It’s fine, it was kind of a curious thought that you wanted to express. Maybe in, like, ten years or so, you’ll be able to find your answer.” No, Nah really did not want to think about the fact that in ten years, Ribbon would be plenty old enough to find the answer for herself. She just wanted to move on and get out of her office for the day. “Come on, I bet you’re ready to get home and see whichever parent is waiting for you at the door.”“Not really, but I can tell you want to go. You’ve got your fun stuff and things to do after you drop me off.” There was still sadness in Ribbon’s voice, but it wasn’t nearly as prevalent as it had been before, and Nah felt comfortable leading her out of the school at that point. She didn’t have the heart to tell Ribbon that there were no plans after that, that she was just going to go home and watch TV with her mother until they went to bed. Some things a child didn’t need to be exposed to, and the entirety of the drama surrounding Nah and her friend group was one such thing.Thankfully, the next night would bring closure to the whole ordeal, she was sure of it. She just wasn’t positive on the kind of closure she’d be getting.It was a bit strange for Nah and her well-kept schedules to have to go down to Morgan’s house on a Wednesday night that week, but she kept reminding herself all day that she wasn’t going home after she got done at the day’s school. She was going over to Brady’s place, leaving her car there, and riding with him down to Morgan’s, where they’d do their business and leave before things could get too awkward for everyone. They’d decided on that being the order of events simply because, for the time being, Nah was on good terms with Maribelle, and she wouldn’t get uppity about Nah’s car being out front, while Nowi would potentially lose her mind if she found out her daughter was going places with a boy under those specific circumstances.“You can always back out now, stay outta things with him, let us all handle it in your place,” Brady told her as she climbed into his passenger’s seat, buckling herself in without so much as giving him a glance. “We’d fight wars for you, Nah. You don’t have to do this.”“I need to settle things for myself,” she insisted, taking in a deep breath to steady her raging mind. “I don’t know what he’s going to try to do tonight, how he’s going to try to make me look bad in everything, and I want to be there to watch him attempt it. I want to be the one who tells him he’s lying and that he needs to just come clean about things.”“Thinkin’ he’ll go that route with things, huh?” Brady asked, as he began driving away from the house. “I mean, I wouldn’t be shocked if he did, dude’s always been a bit on the edge when it comes to what’s right or wrong.”It wasn’t that Nah thought that she was going to be subjected to Morgan telling lies to make himself look better; it was that she knew he was going to throw her under the bus by detailing her involvement in things, and she needed to be there to make it very clear why she’d done what she did. Besides, what she’d agreed to was not what had happened, and that was a very important detail she needed everyone to understand. “Yeah, and I’ve heard that the manakete committee has visited him, so he’s probably looking for more ways to clear his name after whatever they said to him.”Brady gave her a confused glance, then turned his attention back to the road. “I take it that you know a thing or two about manakete committee visits?”“No, more like, Mom knows about them and has scared me straight about what they involve. I’ve had personal meetings with Lady Tiki before, sure, but nothing like what I’ve heard Morgan had to deal with.” She was going to leave out that her most recent meeting with the elder had been because of her prior involvement with Morgan, and that she hadn’t been brave enough to face Lady Tiki again in the time since everything happened. “I’m willing to bet he really got chewed out for what he’s done.”“Better those elders than me, that’s all I’m gonna say there.” Brady huffed, and Nah felt simultaneously thankful that he was her friend, and scared at how he was going to take the omitted details from the whole ordeal when he heard them. “I’m bankin’ on Morgan being completely normal and well-behaved tonight, since he ain’t gonna want to ruin things for all of his friends, I don’t think.”Rather than continue talking and risk slipping up on the finer details about everything, Nah decided she’d fill the silence by turning on the radio in the car, being met immediately with a promo for one of the previous month’s most talked about albums. As a song by one of music’s biggest names began playing, Nah sank into her seat, thinking about how she didn’t want things to go badly at all that night, and that she wished that she could make Morgan promise he’d keep her name clean in all of his defenses, just so that they could settle everything privately before it got any further out of hand. “Are you actually listenin’ to this? I can’t stand this woman’s music, way too overplayed,” Brady said, reaching to change the radio station before Nah could even answer him. The song that came next wasn’t much better, based on how his face scrunched at the deep vocals, but he didn’t change it again.“I think we’d be better just not having music at all,” Nah decided, reaching forward once more to turn the radio off, choosing silence over the sounds of manufactured music that got overplayed immediately on release. Yet, when she pressed the power button, and the song stopped instantly, she found herself wishing she had that white noise background for her thoughts, instead of letting them run rampant as they were.“That was completely stupid, if you’re just gonna choose to have the radio off after all.” Chuckling, Brady did nothing to change things, and continued driving on, while Nah’s hand still lingered over the button to undo what she’d already undone. Something she wished she could do with the whole Morgan situation. If only there was a way to go back in time and stop herself from ever deciding that settling for him was better than letting someone else know how she truly felt.They arrived outside of Morgan’s family’s house to the sight of the car belonging to Laurent and Noire and to the sight of Lucina’s car as well, although predictably Lucina was already sitting in it. As the pair got out and headed up to the door, she rolled down her window and shouted at them, “Be aware that he’s in one of his weird moods today. The manakete elders had some words with him and he’s a bit on edge because of it.”“Is that why you’re leaving?” Nah asked in return, while Brady nodded and kept on his path to the door.Lucina laughed, shaking her head. “No, I’m leaving because I’m going to spend time with Gerome and I needed to be gone twenty minutes ago. We can blame Noire for my delay in leaving, she’s also in one of her weird moods. Be careful when you talk to her, I’m not exactly sure how she’s going to take anything tonight.”“Noted, thanks.” That was the last thing Nah needed to hear, that her best friend and the person who’d been fighting for her the entire time wasn’t feeling her mentally best. She gave Lucina a wave as she backed out of the driveway and headed on her way out, before scurrying to catch up with Brady at the door. “I take it you heard what Lucina said, yeah?”“Nothing I couldn’t have already guessed,” he replied, going to open the front door to invite himself in but finding it locked. After trying the handle a few times, he sighed and banged on the door as hard as he could, while Nah stood at his side and looked up at him, praying to Naga that everything was going to go just fine once they got inside.Predictably so, Morgan was the one to open the door, and he stood on the inside with his jaw slightly hanging at the sight of the two on the step. “I wasn’t aware that Dinah was invited tonight,” he spat, looking straight at Brady’s face as he spoke. “Pretty sure the invitation was for you and the two already here.”“She’s part of the game, I wasn’t comin’ without her,” Brady answered, matching Morgan’s stare with a glare of his own, made all the more intimidating with his facial scar. “Now are you gonna let us in or are we leavin’?”Morgan sputtered but stepped aside, allowing Brady in without any further issue, only to come back in the way when Nah tried to follow. “Not so fast. You really think you’re welcome here after you ratted me out to the manaketes?”Now it was Nah’s turn to sputter, because she hadn’t anticipated having that accusation lobbed at her so quickly. “I didn’t tell anyone a thing, and that’s a promise,” she finally eked out, not sure if her words would be listened to but she wasn’t going to merely let him spread a lie about her behavior. “If you want to talk to the person that blabbed, they’re already inside. Both of them.”“They’d only know because you told them, Dinah. I’m not stupid about how this works.”“They’d know because one of them literally watched you do it, Morgan. You know, with the video you’re so insistent didn’t exist?” Against her better judgment, Nah put all her strength into her shoulders and pushed herself past Morgan and made her way to the table, while he spun on his toes and watched her go by, thinking of how best to respond to that.If he’d ever come up with a way, he certainly didn’t say anything in the moment, choosing instead to close the door and walk over to the table, taking his seat at the head like always. “Okay, well, we’ve got an uninvited guest but it’s fine. I’ll make it work. Owain couldn’t make it tonight for obvious reasons, so we’re running a dungeon with just thr—four players, and no NPC because someone who isn’t supposed to be here waltzed right in like she belongs with us.”Nah could do nothing but roll her eyes at the childish behavior they were witnessing, and no one knew what to say to any of it so the group stayed silent overall. “Right, well, here we go. Let’s set the scene, shall we? I’m going a bit more homebrew tonight than I ever do, hence why we have to do this in person.”Everyone adjusted themselves and readied their pages and tokens, while Morgan pulled out a typed-up page that he seemed to have prepared for the occasion. Once he had visuals that everyone was ready, he began reading. “Whatever fun journeying you’ve been doing before this has come to a sudden and brutal end, as you have been thrust into the heart of a dark, cramped, completely isolated cavern with no supplies but the weapons you carry, and no idea of what is happening except a voice telling you that there’s no turning back. No taking back what has been done. No changing what’s going to happen.”He looked over the top of his paper, an anger burning in his gaze. “What do you want to do, adventurers? Do you search for a way out? A source of the voice? What?”Slipping into character effortlessly, Laurent was the first to speak as his character. “We should search for an exit, first and foremost,” he said as Plume, tapping his little cat-shaped token over a single place on their map. “I take it that this place is dark, but with darkvision it shouldn’t be—”“Even with darkvision, you find it hard to see much more than an arm’s length away.”“—naturally, that would be the way you’d play this. Very well.” The sigh that came was mostly Laurent, but it felt in-character enough for his character to do it as well. “Ladies, Byacek, we need to get out of here sooner rather than later. I shall take the lead, but you all need to stay close behind.”“Let me take the rear of the party, I’ll be strongest against any attacks that may come from behind,” Brady replied in his best dragonborn voice, but it was clear he’d been out of practice with the actual voice he’d been using for Byacek. “We can find our way out in a straight line, I’d think.”Noire looked across the table at Nah, who shrugged at her. “I suppose there isn’t much of a choice but to go along with this, but before she gets into line, Zelaia’s going to get her weapon readied. You know, just in case.”The weight of what they were having to do was not affecting Nah as much as it probably should have, and so she wordlessly put Farona’s token into line, behind the cat and in front of the little creature that Noire was using. “Very well. The party stumbles through the cave in this single-file formation, slowly making their way through tunnel after tunnel.” Morgan paused, reading something further down on the paper before chuckling to himself. “After what feels like hours of going nowhere fast, you come into a much brighter cavern, where you hear the voice speak a little louder. This time, it tells you to lose all hope of leaving, or prepare to lose one of your own.”“Hey now, we’ve already lost one of our own, how’s that a fair threat?” That question was absolutely Brady asking for himself in real life, not asking in character. But, just as seamlessly, he went right back to being his dragon. “Byacek leaves his spot in line and tries to investigate the source of the voice.”“You don’t even need to roll for it, just getting out of line triggers the rumbling of rocks falling all around you, and suddenly the cavern you’re in dims to a much darker level of light. Then, right around the time that all of your eyes adjust to the new darkness, a light begins to flicker above you.” On the map on the table, Morgan set down a large figure, one that made Nah’s whole body shiver. “A demon dragon descends from the ceiling above, cackling and taunting you with the reminder that you’ll be losing one of your own.”“Dude, seriously? That thing’s gigantic!” Noire’s voice grew louder with every word, as she portrayed Zelaia getting more and more agitated with their current predicament. “There’s no way that four of us are going to take that down!”“Keep calm, Zelaia, we are more than capable of taking down a fantasy dragon. Why, this looks nothing like any dragon I have ever seen in any book. Ever.” The snooty air that Plume had on was not comforting in the slightest, but he was trying his best. “We just need to think things through rationally and attack.”“There’s the key word,” Morgan pointed out, gesturing for everyone at the table to roll. While they all called out numbers and he jotted them down, he kept making pointed glances in Nah’s direction, while she could barely keep herself from shaking at the choice of statue that was sitting on the table in front of them. This was deliberate, this wasn’t acceptable by any means, and this wasn’t something she was okay with tolerating. “Is something the matter, Dinah? You beginning to realize that your character’s time is limited?”“How dare you use a statue of Naga for this,” she hissed at him, resisting the urge to reach out and grab the statue for herself. “This is vile, even for you.”“Oh, boo, it’s perfectly fine. Looks like you’ve all rolled in, and wouldn’t you know it, the demon dragon goes first.” He tapped the statue’s head and slowly pushed it closer to the other tokens, getting it closest to Farona’s piece. “Let’s see, this dragon is mighty weak to radiant damage, being a demon dragon and all, so it’d make perfect sense if it goes after the thorn in its side first.”“Seriously? Are we just dropping all intentions of playing fair?” First Nah looked to Morgan, seeing the glare he was shooting her, before she glanced around at everyone else at the table, hoping that someone would speak up. “Come on, we all recognize this is targeted at me personally, don’t we?”Without so much as missing a beat, the sound of a die clattering against the table filled the air, followed by Morgan looking down to read it. “Hm, add the modifier…does a thirty-three hit poor Farona?”The silence that came over the table was heavy, as Nah inhaled slowly, before exhaling to say, “Yes, that does hit. Why wouldn’t it hit? That’s the most absurd roll to hit that—”Cutting her off, Morgan rolled what sounded like a hearty handful of dice, counting them up quickly to speed things along. And he did say a number, some obscenely large amount of damage that nothing they’d ever fought had come close to dealing in one blow, but Nah felt like, in that single moment, she got to have the last laugh, as it wasn’t quite enough to knock Farona below zero health points. But, right as she was about to call him out on that miss, he one-upped her yet again. “Did I say I was done? This thing gets a multi-attack, and given that you’re a woman of the cloth, that was only half damage on that first attack.”“Okay, now you’re getting ridiculous,” Brady said, giving Morgan a side-eye. “Don’t take your personal problems out on Nah.”“My personal problems are entirely because of her. Now, going back to combat, demon dragon’s attacking your barely-standing cleric for a second attack, this time with a vicious chomp. And…” He threw down his die, in front of everyone to see it come up as a nineteen on its face. “Aw, so close, but that’s a thirty-five. Which will hit. Do you know the death rules, dear Dinah?”Nah knew the rules. They’d discussed them in previous sessions when other characters had been downed and she’d needed to bring them back. But she knew what specific rule Morgan was angling for there, and she wasn’t going to acknowledge it. “I know them, but you’re not killing her, not here.”“With a mighty chomp,” he started, ignoring what she’d defiantly said to him, “the demon dragon bites down on Farona for—”“Stop!” Noire’s shriek brought the battle to a halt, as she pointed a finger directly at Morgan. “You’re going after the wrong player for all of this! I’m the one who was telling everyone about what you did, Nah was so brave about keeping it to herself and I’m the one who couldn’t keep their mouth shut! Don’t kill Farona, kill Zelaia so I can be done with you and your stupid, manipulative game forever!”“—she’ll be next, that’s fine.” Without hesitation, Morgan rolled all of his dice necessary, and this time the number he gave was well more than twice the first number, and he didn’t even need to give Nah the chance to say what had happened. “But this time, the dragon takes a victim and cleanly bites your dear cleric in two, killing her instantly without a chance to say her farewells. Exactly what was always meant to happen here tonight.”The world stood still for a second as Nah processed what was going on. Morgan had just destroyed one of her little pieces of happiness and whimsy in the world, as a means to get back at her for what he’d perceived as her doing something wrong, when she hadn’t said a word until others had spoken for her. She knew she was tearing up, she knew that she was starting to cry there at the table, and the moment her first tears fell onto the wooden surface that was the end of any civility. “You bastard!” Noire screeched, jumping up from her chair to throw multiple pointed fingers in Morgan’s direction. “I just told you, I just fucking told you that she didn’t say a thing, and yet you’re out here murdering her character for no gods-damn reason!”“And I told you,” Morgan replied, voice completely steady, “that Zelaia will be next. This just gives Dinah no reason to ever, and I mean ever, have to step foot in this house again. Besides, how did you find out if not for her running her mouth in the first place?”Growing more agitated and frustrated by the second, Noire was just about to jump across the table to lunge at Morgan, but Laurent stood and held her back. “I saw it, don’t you remember? You had me on a call and then you started groping her and forcing your nasty little tongue in her mouth, like you wanted to hurt her for the world to see!”His concentration on being so stern and serious broke at that detailed explanation of what had happened, and for a moment Morgan seemed to be genuinely disgusted at what he’d just been accused of doing. But, as quickly as that self-awareness had come on, it disappeared once more. “I can assure you that I’d never subject someone to watching something so private. I mean, the intention was to go further right then, and that’d be illegal to show someone on a video.”“Pl-please don’t talk about that,” Nah choked out, realizing that Morgan was about to use what he was portraying as Noire’s delusion as a springboard for giving everyone his reasons for what he’d done. “Can’t we just move on?”“Nah, do you want to leave?” Brady asked her, putting a hand on her shoulder protectively, and she shook her head, knowing that she wanted to be present for whatever came next. He could sense that she was figuring out what was happening and accepted it, but he kept his hand on her just in case.“Look, do I seem like the kind of guy who’d just take advantage of someone for fun? Nah was completely on-board with what was going on, until she suddenly wasn’t, and she decided it’d be best to play the victim in everything instead.” Morgan tilted his head back, nodding to himself as he thought about the events of that night. “She’d told me that she was okay with any of it. All of it. And then, in the middle of what she’d agreed to, she suddenly backed out and ran out of the house, realizing that she didn’t want what she’d said after all.”It took a lot of strength to spit the words out, but Nah interjected then with a reminder of her real reason for backing out. “I left because I saw Noire on the computer screen and realized you were recording us for some sick reason. Probably to prove to your aunt that you’re no longer in Naga’s light. I don’t even know.”“Aversa had nothing to do with that night’s events, and I don’t know why you’re all so insistent that there was a recording. There was no video evidence of what happened.” He paused, before he sat back up and grinned in Nah’s direction. “Except at the donut shop, there’s evidence of that conversation on their tapes. Went and asked them about it the next day, just to make sure that I hadn’t dreamt that whole thing up.”“What conversation?” Brady wanted to know, his grip on Nah growing tighter but causing her to become more squirmy in her seat. “What did the two of you talk about?”“How she’s desperate to sleep with someone and wanted me to be the one.”His words were like a microphone drop, and in the absolute silence that followed them, everyone looked at Nah, wanting to see how she handled that accusation. No one was more curious to know the truth than Brady, though, and when she nodded meekly he ripped his hand away from her and grumbled, “Oh, so I see how it is.”“I can explain, I really can,” she said, tears freefalling down her face as she looked to see the pain and betrayal painted across Brady’s expression. “Look, he’s leaving out the details and denying the parts that are the problem, I only consented to it because I was desperate and when I realized he was using me in the name of the Fell Dragon I…I…couldn’t do it anymore and backed out.”Morgan reached across the table to grab his statue that he’d placed in front of everyone. “By the way, I never was in the clutches of the Fell Dragon, not actually. Mother had asked me to do some spying on her sister, and I played the part pretty well. Got to explain that to the manakete committee yesterday when they dropped by. Gave me this statue for my duties as such a devout follower of Naga, it felt great, until I learned they’d been deceived into thinking I was going to the other side because of Dinah here.”“Lady Tiki’s the one who told me you were!” Crying out like a child in the midst of punishment, Nah came to her feet and stomped down as hard as she could. “I was doing what I’d been asked by Lady Tiki, because she’d thought you were playing around in Fell Dragon spaces, she’d never told me a word about how you were doing it to cross your aunt!”“Guess you assumed the worst in me, then,” Morgan spat, venom in every word. “Just like I’d assumed the best in you, until you chose to ruin my life and my friendships over something you’d agreed to do in the first place.”“I didn’t agree to be on camera!”’“You weren’t on camera!”Once again, Noire jumped in with her bellowing screech, “She totally was, you stupid motherf—”“She was not on any kind of camera and I’d like it if you’d stop deluding yourself into insisting she was, because she wasn’t!” Morgan’s voice was reaching quite the yell as well, and it was clear that he was adamant about what he believed to be the truth. “I don’t get why you’ve both decided that you’re going to accuse me of something that nasty, when it’s so far from the truth that it’s ridiculous!”Ever the reasonable voice in a group, Laurent spoke up before Noire had a chance to scream more about how things were wrong. “Actually, Morgan, if memory serves, the night that this all happened you had asked for Noire and myself to be on a call with you, but only she took you up on the offer. It is completely possible that you forgot that was the case and therefore there was video evidence of what took place.”Shaking his head violently, Morgan stated in a very loud, very forceful voice. “I’d recorded what I needed from Noire and ended the call, then had that playing while me and Dinah were supposedly taking part in things she’d agreed to, but clearly she saw the video and figured the worst-case scenario with it.”That story sounded vaguely familiar to Nah, but she was shaking with rage at how her own memories were being questioned in such a heated moment and therefore couldn’t bring herself to say anything about it (and how it definitely contradicted what she’d been told that night). “But that would not explain how Noire knew things before Nah had a chance to say a word about them,” Laurent continued, tapping the side of his head while he processed the information laid out in front of them all. “The only reasonable explanation for that is that you’re the one who has deluded yourself into thinking there was no camera showing any sort of video, when there clearly was.”“You have no way to prove that Dinah didn’t say a word first.” Sticking a very heated finger in Nah’s direction, Morgan continued, “In fact, she’s been so focused on getting what she wanted out of me and everyone that she forgot that we’re all actual people, with actual feelings, and that we actually might have things going on outside her.”“That isn’t true at all!” Wanting the yelling and the fighting to come to an end as fast as possible, so that she could get out of that house and find a different way to get the one thing she’d shown up for, Nah pulled her phone out and opened to her messages. Getting to the point in the conversation where a message to Noire would have been took a little time, but when she showed a distinct gap in time stamps covering the night that things had taken place, outside of the single incoming message she’d gotten, she huffed in annoyance. “See, look, I didn’t text her. Not even a small message.”It took some wrangling, but Laurent was able to get Noire’s phone from her and find the same gap in messages, minus the Are you mad, or are you stupid, or did you forget who you’ve been pining for? that Noire had sent alongside all of her frantic calls, which only angered Morgan further. “You’ve clearly been conspiring against me, so it’d make sense that you’d just delete everything beyond that.”“Oh yeah? If that’s the case, then why do I still have this?” Switching over to her voicemail, Nah turned the volume on her phone up as loud as she could and let the saved recording from Noire play for all to hear. With the end of the frantic, panicked message, all eyes fell on Morgan, who seemed shocked at what had just been thrown at him.“I…don’t remember having her on camera during any of this,” he said, voice lowering down to barely above a whisper. “If I’d meant for it to happen, surely I’d remember it.”“Something tells me that you have a lot of false memories that you need to sort through, if you believe that you are somehow still being wronged here.” Laurent carefully handed Noire back her phone, before looking in Nah’s direction. “I also believe that you owe everyone an apology, but especially the one you’ve chosen to accuse of lying about you.”“I’m not apologizing for anything,” he replied instantly, giving Nah a rude finger gesture that she rolled her eyes at. “End of the day, she came into my house, told me she wanted sexual things and backed out after a little kissing, video or no video, then proceeded to play victim to every person that found out about it.”Clearing his throat, Brady came into the conversation at that point with a rather unsteady voice, all things considered. “Uh, actually, blame me for her gettin' the chance to play victim, because I’m the one who had the idea of gettin' so many others involved. If I’d known that most of it was her idea in the beginning, I wouldn’t have even bothered caring about how she was doin’ with everything.”Nah’s whole body tensed up at how hurt and bothered Brady sounded when he spoke, and she looked at him to judge how he was feeling. What she saw was him actively avoiding her eyes, looking past her to keep staring at Morgan. “Okay, whatever, everyone here’s to blame for some part of this. Except Laurent, I guess. He’ll get to come back and help me salvage the game I’ve worked so hard to put together.”“A tempting offer, but I will pass,” Laurent said, his grip on Noire growing tighter. “Keeping this one safe and mentally stable matters more than any games you may wish to play with me. On that note…” He nodded down at the table, where their belongings still sat. “We shall be taking our leave now. We’ll leave character sheets, but everything else we provided will come with us.”Morgan didn’t know what to say to that, so he allowed the two to clean their things up and go, although he did give Noire a nasty expression when she went by him, setting her off with another round of vulgar screeches and screams until they were out the door. “You both can leave as well,” he muttered, sinking down into his chair and organizing the things he’d set up for the game. “I’m not interested in ever playing with you again, ever. Thanks for ruining my life, both of you.”Instead of respond, Nah scooped up the things that belonged to her and ran for the door, breaking down into tears once she was outside. Brady came out a few minutes later, also holding his things and looking a bit teary-eyed, but overall in better shape than she was. “Come on, let’s get you back to your car,” he said flatly, walking right past her and making her follow without any indication of how things would go on the drive back to his house.She should have gathered, by how hurt he’d sounded in what he’d said to Morgan, that Brady was not thrilled to be associating with her in that moment. But, try as she might, Nah couldn’t figure out the best words to say to facilitate the conversation to clear up things between them. She’d look at Brady and think of a million different words she wanted to spit out, but none of them felt appropriate in their current situation. Where was one even supposed to begin after all of that had come out?“So you’d started all of it after all, huh?” Brady finally asked, unable to look in Nah’s direction not because he was driving, but because of the pain he felt she’d caused. “Tellin’ anyone that you’d offered up that kind of thing to him and he’d just gone a bit too far would’ve made everything seem a little less bad. Kinda disappointed in you, Nah.”“Look, it was…I was…” It had been an act of desperation, caused by her need to feel loved and cherished and wanted, and Brady’s own behavior toward her had only made matters worse. She swallowed down hard, took a few shallow breaths, and tried explaining her piece again. “It was a moment of weakness, when I asked him if he’d be okay with sleeping with me in a no-strings-attached kind of way. I felt unloved, unwanted, like I’d never have the chance to get that far with anyone, and I jumped at him because I knew he probably felt the same way.”“And then you realized, in the heat of the moment, that you didn’t want what you’d asked him for and backed out any way you could. Got it loud and clear.”“No, that’s not it, there was the video and it unnerved me because I…it wasn’t obvious if he was trying to blackmail me or make others spread rumors or what, and I couldn’t let him get that upper hand.” After everything that had been screamed in that house, Nah felt dirty bringing up something that Morgan had no recollection of, but it was her defense for her actions and she wasn’t going to let it go. “And might I remind you that it was you and Noire who did all the spreading of the story with your details in mind, I didn’t do a thing.”Brady hit the steering wheel hard with the palm of one hand. “Damn it, Nah, you could’ve told me that you weren’t in as bad of a situation as it seemed! You could’ve come out and said that the details weren’t right and fixed ‘em up before they got spread! You enjoyed bein’ the center of everyone’s world for the past week, didn’t you?”“I can promise you that I absolutely did not enjoy a moment of this attention. I wanted things settled between myself and Morgan on a private level, not with all of these other people involved and invested.” She’d considered him one of her closest friends, after all, and now that friendship was irreparably severed with no chances of getting a re-do, not from her perspective. “I just…wanted Morgan to know that I didn’t appreciate him crossing boundaries and showing others a private moment. Had he been better about keeping everything between us, we wouldn’t have had any of this happen.”“Right, and instead of you sittin’ in here with me, you’d be sittin’ in his room blowin’ him or somethin’, got it.” Brady paused for a second before backtracking on what he’d said. “That one was unnecessary, sorry about that. I don’t think you’re the kind of girl to do that kind of thing for no reason.”“Something tells me it never would’ve come to that level anyway, but thanks for the apology and the concern.” There was absolutely no telling how far things would have spiraled had Morgan not been so deceptive that night, but Nah didn’t want to even indulge in thoughts about them. There was something bigger, something more important that she needed to use that time to talk about. “Say, Brady, how does knowing that I was interested in sleeping with Morgan make you feel?”“Are you seriously gonna ask me about that?” Judging by the tone of his voice, he did not feel great about it—or so Nah assumed, until he added, “I couldn’t actually care at all about who you wanna sleep with, as long as it didn’t involve you bein’ in love with them. But now I’m rethinkin’ our whole arrangement, so maybe you can go promisin’ your body to random guys whenever or wherever you want.”Nodding, Nah crossed her arms in front of her and leaned back in the seat. “Okay, so if it hadn’t ended this way, it wouldn’t have bothered you, but now it’s bothering you a whole lot because of everything that’s happened.”“I’m not stupid, Nah, I know why you were so ‘desperate’ to sleep with him.” Slowing the car to a stop as they got to a light, Brady waited until he could accelerate as fast as possible before he continued talking, white-knuckle grabbing the wheel as he blasted down the road. “When were you gonna tell me how you felt about me, huh?”“I’d tried, many times, and you kept pushing me away. Figured the closest I’d be able to get was with our arrangement, but deep down I knew you’d only made that to get me to shut up about my feelings.” Nah remembered the time they’d been in the car together and he’d told her all about how they would be best as friends, and how that had been the deciding factor in her finding physical love elsewhere. “I’m a woman with needs, Brady, and you weren’t going to acknowledge those in a timely manner, so I went to someone I thought would.”“Someone who ended up havin’ you on video while makin’ out with you, yeah, yeah, I’ve heard all about it at this point.” His tone was beyond dismissive and annoyed, which were not good signs to Nah in the slightest. “Well, feel free to go searchin’ for someone else who’ll give you that kind of physical comfort when you want it, because you ain’t gettin' it from me. Not now, not ever.”Everything felt like it was going well in that statement until the very last words, which smacked Nah across the face so hard she audibly whined when she heard them. “B-but our plan, our agreement…what about it?”He scoffed. “I’m not bankin’ on you bein’ available in a few years, if this is the kind of behavior you’re okay with, so I’m callin’ it off. You find love where you want it, I’ll find it where I can get it, and we’ll be fine our separate ways. Ma will be devastated to know about it, but hey, now you can take her up on her job offer and not worry about any awkward conflicts of interest in the future!”“You can’t be serious about this, Brady. You’re really giving up on our agreement because of one little mistake?”“Dinah, this wasn’t a little mistake, and you’re lucky I’m even givin’ you a ride back to my place after all this. I’m gonna need some serious time to think about how I even wanna interact with you goin’ forward.” With that, he shut his mouth and refused to say another word, even when Nah began whining and begging for him to reconsider.When they got to his house, he parked the car and got out, walking toward the door without saying anything at all. Nah didn’t accept that and chased after him, only for him to stop walking, lock his car, and push her back when she got too close. “Please, Brady, think about this and change your mind!” she begged, not wanting to lose him on top of everything else that had happened. “I can’t do this without you!”The last words she heard from him that night were simply, “Then you shoulda thought twice about what you’d asked for.” After that, he went in the house and closed the door behind him, and there wasn’t any way that Nah would bang on that door and potentially get Maribelle’s attention after everything else that had happened.She accepted defeat and went back to her car, climbing in and locking herself inside before bursting into sobbing, body-shaking tears. This wasn’t how any of it was supposed to go, she’d been so careful to not make her plans obvious to anyone and then when one piece fell through, everything else came tumbling after it. “I…I can’t let him get away with this,” she told herself through her tears. “He’s going to have to change his mind and let me back in, we’d been so good about referencing that plan over and over that he…that I…”For the first time in a long while, Nah felt a longing toward Brady that she didn’t want to vocalize or put a name to, and she accepted that she’d been so thrilled with their plan because she’d get what she wanted in the end, even if it was only romantic on her end of the deal. Now she didn’t have that, and she didn’t know if there would ever be a chance to get that back, and she was hurting because of it. That realization brought her to stronger tears, and it was a solid half-hour before she collected herself enough to drive home, safely and carefully as to not get pulled over like the last time.When she walked in the door, Nowi was on the couch like usual, a cheesy movie on the TV and the smell of fresh-baked bread in the air. “I heard about everything,” she said without looking in Nah’s direction, “or about enough to know that you got the short end of the manipulation stick. Oddly fitting that someone who tolerates bad romance films gets thrust right into the middle of her own bad romance story, huh?”Nah didn’t even know what to say or what to ask, so she flopped down next to her mother, wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes, and requested that the current movie be started over from the beginning.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Just like the act of getting the misrepresented news out hadn’t been entirely in Nah’s hands, the act of getting the truth out wasn’t under her control either. It was obvious that Maribelle heard it from Brady and that she formed her new opinions based on his hurting heart, because not a word was said toward Nah or Nowi in regards to anything. There was just a sudden lack of concerned mothers coming over and checking in on them, which brought a sense of peace to the house that hadn’t been around for some time.The only people involved in that whole visiting thing that still came by were the two who were friends with Nah to begin with, and had been visiting for her sake, not to do various housework and cooking tasks for Nowi. Given that she’d always despised Morgan from the start, it made perfect sense that Kjelle kept coming by, and Cynthia was just too kind-hearted to stop checking in on a friend even if that friend hadn’t been truthful about her situation. “I get it, someone else told everyone what had happened, I can’t blame you for that,” she said with a solemn expression as she offered open arms for Nah to take a hug. “I’m still here for you, even if everyone else might not be.”By the time a week had passed, it seemed the only people who weren’t still on Nah’s side of everything were the older women under Maribelle’s thumb, Maribelle herself, Brady, and Morgan, although Nah hadn’t heard from some others and didn’t know where they stood. She’d visited with Noire and Laurent several times, driving over to their place after work and crashing on the couch with Noire until she had to go home. She spent a lot of time talking with her mother, watching cheesy movies until her eyelids drooped so heavily that she needed to turn in for the night. And she spent several evenings over with Ribbon and her parents, planning out how they were going to play their game without the support she’d expected there to be.All the while, that date of the ceremony at the school drew closer and closer, something that Ribbon would constantly refer to and beg for Nah to attend on her behalf. It didn’t seem to matter how many times Nah would remind her that she’d have to be there just for working at the school, Ribbon would just keep asking if she’d be there and watching as she moved up in the school system. “I’ll be there, with all of the teachers and staff that work at the school, but that’s all I’ll be there doing,” she said, looking at Ribbon with a pleading expression to stop bringing it up, but the girl was relentless.No less than eight times that night did Ribbon mention the idea of Nah being at the ceremony, and no less than eight times did Nah give that same sort of answer. By the time she needed to head home for the night, she was ready to say that she wouldn’t come back by until that was no longer a topic of conversation, but the apology that she received from Ribbon’s father about her eagerness to be watched made her think twice about that. “I get it, I guess, she’s excited to have something going on that’s all her own and she wants one of her favorite people to be there. It totally, absolutely makes sense to me.”“And it’s not like she has a lot of people to invite,” he reminded Nah, which made her immediately recontextualize the whole situation. “Each student is allowed to invite up to ten people, and her classmates have been making a big deal about how they’ve had to carefully pick their invitations. But Ribbon…” He sighed, shaking his head. “Counting you, she only has nine people total to invite, and two of those are babies that don’t even count toward her limit of ten.”At once, Nah’s chest tightened as she felt sorry for all of the judgment she’d been casting in Ribbon’s direction toward the constant badgering. “I…I’ll see if the administration will let me sit somewhere that isn’t in a sea of staff members, just to be a bit more supportive,” she said, barely able to get the words out with how tight her throat had gotten. “It isn’t fair if she can’t get all of the love and support she deserves.”“Thank you, Nah. You mean the world to her, so just trying to do something will matter more than you realize.” He gave her a firm clasp on the shoulder, smiling at her wearily. “I’ve already had to make everyone else that’s been invited swear they’ll be there, just so that we don’t crush her spirits. Do you know how hard that is, when they’re holding this on a weekday and people have jobs to do?”“I can imagine that it’s pretty hard,” Nah said quietly, thinking about how lucky she was that attending the ceremony was a part of her job to begin with, and that she wasn’t going to have to ask for time off to make it. “But everyone’s going to be there, right?”The two shared a look, where Nah was able to see that Ribbon’s father was holding hope that his answer was correct, but he knew that it wasn’t guaranteed until it happened. “From what I’ve heard, yes, but all it takes is one little thing happening for someone to have to be at their job instead of being there for her.”“Then we’re just going to believe that there’s no ‘one little thing’ that could possibly happen to take away from this.” Pounding a fist into her other hand, Nah sounded as confident as she could, to try and build confidence in the older man she was speaking with. “Just like we’re not letting that one big thing that happened to me take away from the other thing Ribbon wants more than people showing up for her ceremony.”There was a pause, as they looked at each other again, before both of them awkwardly laughed about what she was referring to. “Right, right, we’ll get that sorted out alongside all of this ceremony stuff,” Ribbon’s father said with a smile. “You’ve been asking around for players, haven’t you? Do you think that one of them could prepare to do the hard work of running everything after we get started? It’s been a lot of reading and preparing to be characters that I’m not actually sure I’m built for.”“Oh, uh…kind of? I always expected that it’d be me taking control once we got a feel for how things were going to run, but if I step into that role, then we’ll be short a player and I’m not exactly finding a whole bunch of people willing to spend one night a week with me and a kid at this point…” That was very true, as Nah had only gotten a promise of commitment from Noire, who had said that Laurent was also interested in giving the game a second shot. She’d also reached out to Ribbon’s brother, but Yarne wasn’t fully sure he wanted to play, even if it was for his sister’s sake. “But I’m sure we’ll work it out, that’s how things go around here, time and time again.”“Sounds optimistic enough for me. I’m thinking we can get this started next week, if you don’t mind? Would Tuesdays still work for you, so you can bring Ribbon home and meet us here to play?” The thought of playing a new version of the same game on the same day everything had fallen apart made Nah feel uneasy, but she didn’t have any alternatives so she shrugged and accepted the idea. “Once she’s not in school, we can obviously change the day if needed. That just seems to be the day that makes the most sense.”Nah shook her head, wanting to make it clear that her apprehension was not something that needed to be worked with. “It’ll work perfectly for now. Finally Ribbon will get to live out her dreams of playing my game after school on Tuesdays, exactly what she’s been begging me for since she first heard about it.”“Good to know that some things never change about her. It’s been a wild past year and there’s been plenty of chances that she could just…become someone else, but she’s stayed true to herself and that’s what matters. That’s clearly a trait she inherited from her mother…” He trailed off, eyes glancing at Nah a couple of times before saying, “Or maybe it’s from one of her favorite people in the world, the one who’s definitely her favorite that she isn’t related to in any way.”“That’d be me, huh?” It wasn’t a question that Nah actually needed, or even wanted, an answer to. She was completely aware of Ribbon’s adoration of her, and she didn’t need to check and double check if it was still the case. What she was getting all warm and fuzzy over was the read on her character from someone that she admittedly didn’t spend that much time speaking with. She did stay true to herself through everything, and when she’d faltered she’d found a way to come back to being who she was, no matter the circumstances.Not that she would ever say she was a great role model for someone as precocious and precious as Ribbon was, but all kids needed someone to look up to. “Dad, are you still talking Nah’s ear off?” they both heard Ribbon calling from the other side of the room, and they both looked to see her smiling, waving to get their attention. “I want to talk to her before she goes home!”“Right, you’re welcome to do that right now, if you’d like,” her father called back, before covering his mouth and wincing from the volume he’d taken. At the same time that Ribbon jumped up from where she was sitting and barreled across the room, the unmistakable sound of wailing came from elsewhere in the house. “I suppose that’s my cue to fix the problems I’ve caused, sorry about that,” he apologized, slipping away and letting his daughter take his place instead.“How dare you try getting out of saying bye to me tonight,” Ribbon playfully scolded, waggling her finger in Nah’s face. “I’m so, so disappointed in you.”“You might want to watch that finger, before I try breaking it,” Nah replied, reaching out to grab it but instead finding her hand laced with Ribbon’s. “Oh? What’s this?”“A friendship handshake.”“Feels less like a handshake and more like you holding my hand.” Nah released her fingers entirely so that Ribbon could slide hers away easily, but the girl let her hand remain exactly as it was. “Okay, what gives? Suddenly you’re into holding hands with someone twice your age?”That was what got Ribbon to finally pull her hand away, giving a yuck-face at the insinuation that she’d just heard. “No! I want to hold hands with my best friend, is that too much to ask?” That was followed by a pause, before Ribbon’s shoulders slumped and her long hair fell over her face. “That was dumb, never mind. You’re too old to be my best friend.”“You know, I’d usually argue that there’s no age limit on friendships, but given that I’m an adult and literally work in your school, I’m going to say that calling me your best friend is a little weird. I’ll be your friend, but we’re not getting any closer than that.” Imagining the kinds of chaos that could unfold in her professional life if it came out that she had a student considering her a “best friend,” Nah hoped that her line she’d just drawn would be respected. “And no, this doesn’t change after you go to a new school. As long as you’re still a student in the Ylisse school system, you’re not calling me anything but a friend. Even then, let’s keep that away from school.”“Yeah, yeah, Mom and Dad tell me the same thing all the time. They think it’s super weird that I’m friends with one of Yarne’s friends, but it’s like, hello? They’re the ones who told you to bring me home once a week, they’re the ones responsible for this.” Just listening to Ribbon talk and explain her reasoning was a very good reminder of her age and innocence. The unique way she looked at the world around her was something that needed to be protected, no matter what, and Nah hoped that as Ribbon grew older, she wouldn’t change that about herself.In a flash, Nah came to accept that perhaps there were a lot of her own traits that Ribbon had picked up on, whether intentionally or not. She wasn’t going to try swaying the girl into acting any particular way overall, but she was going to do whatever she could to protect her heart and that naïve streak that the conversation had made all too clear. It was almost like a balancing act, trying to let Ribbon grow into being her own person, but also helping her become someone that wouldn’t be damaged by the cruelties of their world. At the end of the day, all Nah could do would be guide her to some outcomes, but she wouldn’t ever be able to tell her exactly how she should or shouldn’t be.She shook her head to break her train of thought. Ribbon was still staring at her, no time at all having passed since she’d spoken, completely unaware of how fixated on thinking about what was best for the girl Nah had become. “I don’t think they expected you to enjoy being around me so much, that’s all,” she finally said, knowing that once upon a time, she’d been hesitant to even spend that one afternoon a week chauffeuring Ribbon around. “And things will change about the kind of time we spend together, and it may become even harder to not see me as a friend, but for my job’s sake—and for the sake of your living situation—you need to see me as just another adult in your life.”“Hold on, are you saying I could live somewhere else if I think you’re my friend?” Ribbon’s eyes grew wide. “That’d be pretty cool!”“No, Ribbon, it really wouldn’t be cool at all. You’d be without your parents, without your brother and sister, without me.” Cursing herself for dropping that tidbit into the conversation in such a nonchalant way, Nah stood firm as she said, “It’s just best if you think of me as a friend once you’re an adult and can do that without judgment. Until then, I’m just a staff member at your school that’s friends with your brother. Got it?”There was a split second where it seemed Ribbon was going to try and say something against those wishes, but she shaped up in the last possible breath before her words tumbled out of her mouth. “Yeah, I’ve got it. Thanks for everything, Nah. You’re great!”While she certainly didn’t feel great, about this and a lot of other things, Nah couldn’t help but smile at the temporary burst of happiness the compliment from a child delivered to her. She was flawed. She was a complete disaster in most ways. Her social life had more or less imploded on itself and she was now arranging her time to play games with a twelve-year-old and her family. But she was true to herself in the end, and if Ribbon could see and accept that, then maybe someday others could as well.For the time being, though, it was all about focusing on their new game, meeting weekly to gather around a table to explore dungeons and fight monsters to protect people. Ribbon was going to get to be Elegantia for as long as the character got to live (which shouldn’t be a short time, given that she was the whole reason they were playing), and everyone else was going to be characters of their own creation. As much as she’d wanted to bring Farona back, the moment Nah had written her name down on a character sheet the vivid memories of that evening at Morgan’s house came back and she couldn’t bring herself to resurrect that ghost, so she crafted someone new for the occasion. When Noire and Laurent joined, they too brought new characters to replace the ones that had been morally massacred in that ill-fated session. That meant that everyone was starting fresh, everyone was on equal ground in finding their character’s voice and talents, and that made the game something new.Something that couldn’t be taken away from them through the interventions of the Fell Dragon coursing through someone else’s veins.Something that was uniquely theirs.And after everything she’d been through, being able to say that her happiness was located at the dining room table inside Ribbon’s house? That was something that Nah had desperately needed and never wanted to trade away for anything.Even though school had ended and there were no longer students in classes that needed to be worried about, there was still a week of work left to be done for Nah and the other staff members in the district. Given that she worked at four different schools every week, that meant four times the appearances she needed to make in classrooms and at award ceremonies, but it came with the exchange of having just about all of her paperwork done long before that final week came. All of the schools that covered the younger grades were holding their promotion ceremonies that last week, and while four was far from the number of schools there were in the district that met that criterion, it still came out to being that there was one ceremony a day, for four days, that Nah was forced to go to.Well, three of them were genuinely forced, as she didn’t exactly have many attachments with any particular students who were moving on to the next level of education. It was the fourth one, on the Thursday of the week, right after lunchtime sandwiched between a smaller school’s ceremony that morning and a larger one’s that evening, that Nah was most excited for. She’d done her best to get to sit somewhere that wasn’t with the other staff members, but the principal (who was very understanding of the reason for the request) felt that her hands were tied on where seating arrangements could be made. That meant that, for one of the most important days of Ribbon’s life thus far, Nah couldn’t be any more than just another face in a sea of teachers and support staff, and the guilt for that failing was immense.But, be it a gift from Naga or just a moment of awareness from Ribbon, it seemed that her place in the crowd was noticed fairly quickly, and the girl seemed overjoyed to see that Nah was actually there for her. She was wildly flailing her arms around, waving at Nah while also pointing toward the spot in the stands where her small delegation of guests were sitting together. “Trust me, Ribbon, I know they’re here,” she muttered, doing as much as she could to get the girl to calm down and stop drawing so much attention to herself. “I only spent like thirty minutes talking to your brother before I came down here to my seat.”“Oh, you know a student personally?” one of the teachers, who Nah had very little contact with previously, asked her. “Is it a cousin or a sibling?”“A family friend, but she’s basically my sister at this point if we’re being honest.” Nah motioned with her head toward where Ribbon was still waving wildly, and the other teacher gasped softly. “Let me guess, you know her too?”He nodded. “Ribbon was in my class three years ago. She’d told me a lot about her brother, but she never mentioned any sister-figures in her life. Must be a new position, hm?” “I mean…I’ve only been friends with her brother for a long time, and my mom is friends with their mom. And thanks to all of the craziness in their lives, I ended up being responsible for getting her home once a week.” Nah’s shoulders rose as she felt a bit of pride, thinking about what she’d initially been so unwilling to do but had gradually learned to love. “So I’d say that’s worthy of being seen as an unofficial sister.”“Ha, whatever you say.” He clasped a hand down on Nah’s shoulder, giving it a solid squeeze. “You’re a funny one, Dinah. No wonder the kids you’ve helped this year adore you as much as they do.”Unsure of what to say to that, Nah decided that a simple thank you was best, and she went silent after that. A compliment on her likability wasn’t something she’d accounted for happening that day, in the list of weird things that were bound to happen during a school event where Ribbon was around. It wasn’t unappreciated, but it was unexpected.For it being the fourth ceremony of that nature that week that Nah had been in attendance for, she was bored with the proceedings and truly only cared when Ribbon’s name was called and she was able to “cross over” from one school to the next. That girl sure did know how to work the stage, and she had her little cheering section going as loud as they could for her, but they were the only ones doing any cheering at all. It was obvious when she came down from the stage that the silence that came before and after her name was called was a huge letdown for Ribbon, but Nah thought that it showed one small improvement–the bullies hadn’t decided that they’d cause any sort of scene. In fact, Nah couldn’t be sure that any of those bullies were even there that day, probably thinking they were too cool to attend a ceremony about getting old enough to go to a different school.It truly didn’t matter, though, because it was their loss of those memories and that moment of pride, getting to be recognized for years of hard work. Teenage years weren’t easy, so having something to celebrate before reaching them was a huge deal for a lot of these kids. And Ribbon, the sweet girl that she was, needed lots of fun and exciting things to get to celebrate, so this was naturally something that she’d been looking forward to. That reminded Nah that she needed to see Ribbon when the ceremony was over, to give her a little gift to commemorate the moment.The whole thing felt like it dragged on into the middle of the afternoon, but eventually everyone was dismissed and the students were released to their parents to go home for break. Nah watched as Ribbon got on top of her chair and began looking around eagerly for where she was still sitting, but she shrunk herself down among the other teachers and staff so that she wouldn’t be spotted. That was because, when she’d seen that Ribbon was higher up, she also saw a familiar head of blonde ringlets styled in a posh way, something that caught her by surprise and marked a conversation she didn’t want to have. But if she was going to have to choose between seeing Ribbon and speaking with Maribelle, she was going to prefer the former but accept that the latter was what was about to happen. Especially since the latter choice was one that could weave through the crowd on her own and get to Nah.Sure enough, as Ribbon was forced down from where she was standing and corralled back toward her family, Maribelle came closer and closer to where Nah was unfortunately stuck standing. She braced herself for what was to come, taking deep breaths and telling herself that the worst that could happen was the same sort of conversation that used to happen back in the school. “Fancy seeing you here, Dinah,” Maribelle called, making her final approach as she pushed past a few other staff members to get to in front of where Nah stood. “Did you have nothing better to do this afternoon?”“You and I both know why I’m here, Maribelle,” Nah replied, a sour tone to her voice. “The better question is, why are you here?”She rolled her eyes, reaching forward to touch Nah’s shoulder, only for Nah to take a step back to get away from her. “I think my presence here is very well explained, if you remember what my job in the school district is. As a member of the board—”“Nope, not buying it.” Cutting her off, and ready to pick a fight now that it was clear Maribelle did not come to have a friendly conversation, Nah shook a finger in Maribelle’s direction. “If you’re going to pull the ‘I’m on the board’ card, then you can explain why you’ve chosen today, out of all four days, to come talk to me.”“—well, ahem, it’s because I did not see you the other days. Were you here? That comes as a surprise to me, given that you wouldn’t have anyone to particularly cheer for at any of the other ceremonies.” Maribelle’s face forced a smile, which was so fake and sweet that it made Nah’s eye twitch to see. “But no matter, today is the day I saw you and decided to make my approach. Shall we step aside and speak privately?”Eye still twitching, and body beginning to shake in frustration, Nah knew what she wanted to say, but she knew that causing a scene in the middle of the still-full event would only bring attention she didn’t want. “I’m not interested in speaking with you anywhere, Maribelle,” she said, trying to keep her voice level. “You can just turn around and have a nice rest of your day.”“Oh, but I insist.” This time, when Maribelle reached to put her hand on Nah’s shoulder, she came right up into her personal space to make it happen, and the force with which she put her hand down was enough to make Nah wince. “In Naga’s name, I insist that this isn’t something bad or even negative. Just a conversation between two working women.”Nah so badly wanted to jerk herself out of Maribelle’s grasp and flee the area, but she knew that things were too far gone for her to do anything more than submit. She longingly looked to where Ribbon had been escorted to her family, seeing the whole group of taguel and their associated people showering the girl with praise and love. “Can I at least congratulate Ribbon on what she accomplished here?” she asked.“And what purpose would doing that have? She has people who are supposed to care for her and watch over her, and those people do not include you.” Gently motioning for Nah to step backward, Maribelle saw that she was still looking over in the direction of the stands and sighed, using the grip she had on her to push her back instead. “Come on, Dinah, let’s go somewhere where we won’t be watched and judged for our every word.”She absolutely did not want to go with Maribelle. She knew that having a private conversation with the woman, especially after everything that had taken place, would result in a lot of anger and resentment. She couldn’t get out of it, though, given that she was already being held and it was obvious that she had some sort of rapport with Maribelle (especially to those who’d seen them interacting in the school before). “Fine, let’s go somewhere that we can talk. But I’m not interested in whatever you’re going to tell me to tear me down.”“Always the negative one, Dinah. It’s a miracle that you lasted the entire year at the school with this dour outlook on life. How you’ve managed to bring positive vibes to struggling students, I’ll never understand.” As the two of them walked to the side of the room, back behind the staging area where no one was milling around, Maribelle loosened her grip, but by that point Nah was committed to being present for the conversation. “Did you ever consider the offer I gave you, by chance? The negativity may root you a bit better in the legal world than in the general education world.”“I’ve thought about it, and I am completely disinterested in doing anything that puts me at your mercy.” Nah knew she could’ve worded that nicer, but she wasn’t going to let Maribelle have any chance of twisting her words into something she wasn’t going to say. “I have no desire whatsoever to interact with you on a regular basis, and given that I have no reason to do that right now, let’s keep it that way.”Maribelle gave a fake sniffle, as the two came to stand in a lonely corner of the room. “Your words wound me, Dinah. When have I ever done something to deserve such hatred and negativity from you?”“Do you need me to make you a list?” Nah looked at Maribelle, and the memories of the mom group coming to her house and overrunning her time with their doting behaviors came flooding back. Then came the aftermath of that situation, where the visits abruptly stopped because of the actual truth of the situation coming to light, and in that moment Nah realized that if Maribelle was holding any of that against her, certainly she would have been making that clear already. “A-actually, hold on,” she stuttered, the realization hitting her a bit too hard. “Why are you talking to me like an old friend?”“Because there’s no reason for me to speak to you in any other way?”“But what about…what happened with…aren’t you upset with me?”Her nose turning up at the question, Maribelle huffed. “I suppose I should be upset with you, but I have had to do some real soul-searching and convening with Naga to bring myself to be able to meet you where you are. Naga’s grace and kindness has allowed me to be able to look you in the eyes and tell you, with complete honesty, that I forgive you for what happened. For the miscommunication and the misunderstanding and the poorly allotted kindness that I thrust onto you and your family.”“That doesn’t sound all that forgiving to me, if you’re just going to throw all those things out at me like that. I hadn’t said anything about what happened because I didn’t want anyone knowing, and then it was completely out of my control how everyone reacted to it.” Nah puffed her chest out, before exhaling slowly, trying to keep herself as calm as she could while talking about that sensitive situation. “And then, I didn’t tell you to stop rallying your troops and getting people to come to the house, because Mom seemed to like some of the interactions and you…really seemed to like trying to help us out.”“That’d be because of how much you’d started to mean to me, Dinah. Whether you realized it or not, you’d grown on me over the past months and I wanted to do what I could to protect you and make you feel better about things that had happened.” Her lips pursing together, Maribelle seemed to be thinking about something in particular but she shrugged it off entirely. “It was a slap to the face to find out that the reason we were stepping in and protecting you wasn’t the truth at all.”“If I’d had my way, that never would’ve happened. I wasn’t going to tell anyone what had happened because it was such a stupid situation, but someone had other plans for it all.” Not that Nah was going to hold that against Noire, given the awkward position she’d been put into with everything. “I just wish that I’d never given him that power in the first place, then none of this would’ve happened…”There was a second where Nah wished she had the strength to tack another thought on to what she’d said. She was speaking with the mother of the person she’d hurt most in everything, and she couldn’t even bring herself to voice how she regretted getting him involved in any of it. The truth was, and always had been, that Nah cared immensely about Brady and had only done what she’d done with Morgan as a way to cover up her feelings she’d been told weren’t worth anything. And now, given the opportunity to bring up her feelings again, she was ignoring them for the sake of conversation.But Maribelle wasn’t stupid, and she could pick up on what was being left unsaid quite well, to the point that she had to turn away from Nah and let her shoulders drop. “It’s been rough being at home in the weeks since this all took place, what with a constantly-sobbing twenty-something living under my roof and all.”“He’s crying all the time over this?” Nah’s chest tightened at the mere idea. “Please, Maribelle, don’t tell me that’s the truth.”“I wouldn’t say it’s happening all the time, but a good majority of his waking and at-home time, yes.” Maribelle reached up and began to run her fingers through one of her well-kept ringlets, while still keeping her back toward Nah. “Not that you care about how he feels, though, given that you betrayed him so horrifically in all of this.”“I didn’t…” Stopping herself from picking that argument, despite knowing that she hadn’t ever intentionally betrayed anyone, Nah let out a long sigh. “Look, if he’s wanted to talk about it, the avenue’s there for it. He’s got my number, he’s got all the ways in the world to speak to me. He’s even got my address, he can just show up at my front door and I’ll hear him out. He doesn’t need to feel like this.”“And why, exactly, are you putting the need to clean up your mess on my son?” That was when Maribelle spun back around, a fierce look in her eyes as she stared Nah down. “He doesn’t have any reason to reach out to you and try to rebuild things, when you’re the one who destroyed everything from the start. If you want to patch things up, you need to be the one to say the first apology.”Lower jaw shaking as she thought about how best to respond, Nah took a few seconds to let all of those words sink in before she said anything at all. “That’s totally right, thanks for telling me the obvious, Maribelle. Oh, right, except I have tried reaching out to him. You think I’ve gone all this time just ignoring what happened and pretending nothing went down, and just acting like I’ve suddenly gone silent on one of my closest friends? He’s been ignoring my messages. I’ve tried calling him a few times and he’s not answered even once. Brady has no interest in speaking to me if I’m the one starting the conversation.”“That’s odd, given how he’s lamented the fact that you haven’t reached out…”“Sounds like your son is trying to play the ‘woe is me’ card and you fell for it.” A bitter taste formed in Nah’s mouth, as she felt like her emotions and heart had just been callously toyed with by someone twice her age. “Tell him that if he really wants to patch things up between us, he needs to let it happen, not just say he wants it but refuse to make it work.”She took a step back, seeing the frazzled look in Maribelle’s eyes as she tried to piece the truth of what was going on together. There was so much more that Nah wanted to add, but she figured leaving it where it had ended was the best option, until… “Dinah. Don’t just walk away without closure.”“I’ve gotten all the closure I need right here,” Nah replied, spitting her words like they were laced in poison. “You enjoy the ceremony later today, I’ll see you at the schools next year.”Without even entertaining the sputtering or the begging for her to come back, Nah headed out to see if she could find Ribbon and her family. There was no sign of the group inside the venue, and when she made it outside she couldn’t see them either. That was a situation that Nah did, in fact, want to get a last moment with, so the fact that there was no sign of anyone made her realize that her priorities had been forcibly shifted on her. She slowly stumbled toward the nearest bench, sitting down and putting her hands over her face.“Thanks for denying me something that would mean the world to a little girl,” she muttered, thinking about how none of this would have happened had Maribelle not tried wrongly picking someone else’s battle. “Ribbon probably thinks that I’ve decided I don’t care about her after all, and that’s exactly what she doesn’t need in her life.”“I wouldn’t say that she thinks that at all,” a voice behind Nah spoke up, and she lifted her head to see that it was Yarne standing there, looking like he’d been watching everything the whole time. “She’s expecting you over at our parents’ place for dinner, by the way.”“What are you still doing here?” Nah asked, as her friend took a seat next to her on the bench. “And how did I manage to miss seeing you, mister tall guy?”“You were distressed, you probably weren’t looking for me in specific, it happens.” After sitting down, Yarne reached over and wrapped Nah in a one-armed hug, as tightly as he could. “But I told everyone else I’d stay here and see if I could catch you coming out, just to personally pass Ribbon’s request on to you. She also gave me this hug to give you. Said you’d probably need it.”At once, the waterworks began and Nah’s face was covered in tears that streamed from the corners of her eyes down to her chin. “There’s no reason that a twelve-year-old should be so caring toward an adult like me, but she’s…she’s a good kid. You’re lucky to have a sister like her, you know.”“H-hey now, I can’t say that I’ve been the best brother for her over the years, but she’s gotten even luckier that she’s got a good older sister figure in her life like you.” It was clear based on how he was struggling to get his words out that Yarne was on the verge of tears himself, so Nah did him a favor and didn’t look up at him at all. “Now, uh, you’re coming to dinner, aren’t you?”“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”“Great. Can you give me a ride, in that case? I’m never ready to face death as your passenger but today’s a special occasion and I don’t have much of a choice.”Despite her tears, Nah coughed out a laugh as she thought about how it always came back to her horrendous driving, no matter the situation. “Yeah, I can give you a ride. But can we just sit here for a few minutes? Enjoy each other’s company, reflect on what we’ve been through, that sort of thing? It’s been an emotional day for us all.”One week from the encounter after the ceremony, something actually came of the conversation that had been shared with Maribelle, and Nah almost couldn’t believe it only took that long. She’d been fully prepared to wait months, if not years, for there to be any sort of follow-up to what had been said, and so when she found herself lounging on the couch the afternoon of the following Thursday, the TV on some movie channel playing “summer classics” she’d never heard of, she was not prepared to hear a knock at the door. “Probably another package Mom ordered,” she laughed, getting herself off the couch to go see what had been left outside, passing by a pile of boxes that were there for the same reason.When she opened the door, Nah didn’t see a box or any sort of package, but instead a bouquet of flowers held out in her face. Slowly, she looked up to see Brady standing there, his arms trembling as he held the flowers as steady as he could. “Does this scream ‘sorry’ enough for you?” he asked, a bit of humor in his voice, and she was too stunned to respond in any way other than scuttling back inside and closing the door.This was followed with aggressive knocking that only grew more intense as the moments passed. “Dinah, open back up, I’m just here to talk to you!” he called in a lull of the knocking, which she wanted to acknowledge but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Finally, after what felt like a small eternity, the knocks stopped, and Nah once again opened the door, this time just a crack to see that Brady was still there, still holding the flowers, still looking for her to speak with him. “Are ya gonna just keep the door like that, or is comin’ out here too much to ask from you?”“I’ll stay like this for now, thanks,” she replied, not wanting to show her hand too early with the way this was set up. “Did your mom send you with those?”“Uh, she gave me the pointers on what to look for when I went shoppin’ for them, but they were my idea.” He looked at the flowers and scrunched his nose. “I’m not a fan of them, if we’re bein’ honest. I bet I could’ve done better with pickin’ them out if I’d had more time.”Nah thought about closing the door, locking it, and never looking back, but she decided she’d humor the conversation for a little while. “There wasn’t anyone saying how fast this needed to be done. You could’ve easily taken your sweet time looking for flowers you do like and getting them when you found them. So…since you rushed and got ones you don’t like, that obviously means you’ve got some reason for why you’re here.”“I mean, ain’t it obvious?”Blinking, Nah shook her head. “It’s not anywhere near as obvious as you’d think.”“I know about you and Ma havin’ that conversation, and her tellin’ you all about how I’ve been feeling about everything since it all went down. I don’t think there’s really any reason for you to be playin’ stupid about it.” Brady thrust the flowers at where he could see the sliver of Nah’s face through the door. “Just open up and take these damn things before they start wiltin’ in my hands or something!”“They’re already cut and wrapped, they’re on a timer of wilting anyway.” Nah closed the door and latched it, hearing the completely exasperated groan on the other side. She gave it a count of five before opening it back up, more than she had before, and offering her hand to take the flowers. “I’ve decided, I’ll take them if you’re not fond of them. Thanks.”“Thanks? I come to talk to you after close to two months of no-contact and all I get is a thanks? Maybe I shouldn’t have listened to Ma about you and I should’ve just stayed to myself like I’ve been.” Still, even with that statement, Brady handed the flowers over, only for Nah to toss them onto the closest end table she could access without needing to go back inside. “Yeah, this wasn’t worth my time. Enjoy your flowers, Dinah.”This time, Nah let him turn away and start back toward his car, giving it a count to three before she dashed after him, grabbing one of his arms when she got close enough. “When did I say I didn’t appreciate them? That bouquet’s the biggest one I’ve ever seen, my noodle arms weren’t going to last five minutes holding that thing. Come on, turn around and get back to talking to me about whatever brings you here.”He jerked his arm out of her grasp, but stopped moving forward. “It’s not anythin’ important. Sorry for wastin’ your time today, Dinah, enjoy your life and all that stuff. I’m goin’ home.”“Clearly it was important if you came to talk to me after nearly two months,” she reminded him, using his own timeline to make her point. “And based on what I talked to your mom about, I think it’s something to do with how much you miss me, so…”His shoulders rose and fell, him shaking his whole body to try and rid himself of that notion. “I never said I miss you. There’s a lot of things about you I miss, but you yourself? Can’t say that you’re missable at all.”“Uh huh, and the giant bouquet of flowers says otherwise so just come back and we can talk.” Again Nah grabbed his arm, pulling it back toward the house, but Brady dug his feet into the ground and made it incredibly hard for her to move him even a little bit. Eventually he relented and followed her back to the door, where they once again took their positions they’d had at the start. With her body in the house and her head looking out the front door, Nah smiled at Brady, who looked displeased with being where he was. “So, what’s the reason you’re here?”“For an apology.”“And who needs to apologize, do you think?”He blankly stared at her, mouth agape as he looked for how to respond to that. “You do. You’re the one who did those things and said that stuff to Morgan without clueing me in to any of it in the first place.”Nah felt like she’d tried justifying herself so many times, and that she’d done all she could to explain her reason for why she’d done what she had. But as she looked at Brady, seeing the pain and confusion that resided in his eyes, even if the rest of him seemed like it was trying to be detached from the situation, she decided that explaining her side again wasn’t what she needed to do. In that moment, she accepted that no matter her intentions, no matter what she’d meant by her actions, she hadn’t been successful in getting what she wanted and she’d hurt someone dear to her in the process. “I’m sorry, for all of it,” she said, knowing that she’d just given one of the shoddiest apologies in the history of mankind. “And there’s a lot for me to be sorry for.”“I just want to understand why you did it,” he replied, clearly prodding her to elaborate. “Like, there was no real reason for ever doin’ any of that, no matter what you thought was goin’ on.”“I felt rejected by you, and turned that rejection into a sense of needing to feel like I belonged somewhere. Needing to feel like I belonged with someone. Needing to feel love and affection from someone.” This was stuff Nah knew she’d explained already, at least once to a listening pair of ears, but she knew that Brady needed to hear it in that moment. “You’d told me that you’d never see me as more than a friend, and jokingly made that marriage pact with me just to get me off your back. But I…I did see you as more than a friend, and I wished you’d see me the same way. You didn’t, though, so I looked elsewhere.”“Me tellin’ you that wasn’t done in the way that I meant for it to come out, and I went home cursin’ myself for sayin’ it in the first place.” Brady bit down on his tongue, reluctant to say more until he caught Nah’s eye. She was staring at him, her mouth opened slightly in shock at this new revelation. “Well, it’s the truth. You wanna know why?”“It doesn’t matter if I want to know why or not, I know you’re going to tell me.”He gave a soft chuckle. “Right, ‘course I am. I’d been dealin’ a lot with old friends that week, and those old friends had some pretty high expectations and standards for me. You think what Ma wants for me is bad? Ask Sev what she wants for me, it’s an entirely different thing and none of it makes any sense.”At mention of that name, Nah’s eyes narrowed. “Severa…somehow I should’ve known she was involved in this. Maybe I should’ve really listened to her sloppy seconds comment and taken that to heart, obviously she didn’t want me messing around with you.”“Because she’s a jealous, insecure bitch who doesn’t understand that this world ain’t about her and what she wants,” Brady said, not a lick of remorse in those words. “Took me a while to realize that listenin’ to her when she went runnin’ out the country without a goodbye isn’t the smartest thing, but by then you’d already gotten all buddy-buddy with Morgan and I felt that my chances to pull you were next to none.”“But you didn’t know that I was only that close with him, because I was trying to move on from wanting that closeness with you.” It clicked, in some ways, but in other aspects it felt like Brady was just trying to cover his tail and justify things with unrelated points. Nah didn’t care, though, as she now knew something she’d been hoping for. For the first time, she had a solid confirmation that the object of her affections had, at least at some point, an interest in her.They stood there, looking at each other with nothing else to say, for quite some time. Every time one of them would move to speak, they’d think better of it and go back to standing silently. The world around them kept moving, with cars going down the street and the occasional sound of sirens or planes breaking the air in the distance. This was a detriment to their position, though, as one of those cars came up to the house and someone else had their chance to enter the conversation.“Dinah, you’re not thinking of inviting this boy into our house, are you?” Nowi asked as she came up to the door, her arms full with groceries. “He’s a charming one, but his mother’s a lot to handle and I don’t think I want to have to spend more time with her than I already do. No offense to you, Brady.”“None taken, Mrs. Balakin,” he replied, bowing his head in Nowi’s presence while she headed inside with her purchases. When she was seemingly out of earshot, he added, “Although if Ma was here like she’d wanted to be, she would’ve been pretty offended at that one on her own.”“Your mom wanted to be here for this?” Nah asked, not actually surprised in the slightest to hear that. “Doesn’t she know how to give her adult son a break sometimes? She’s, like, the world’s worst helicopter parent, and that’s big coming from me, given that I…” She gestured toward the interior of the house. “Yeah. That’s my mom, that’s what I get to live with on a daily basis.”Snorting in amusement, Brady said, “Nah, you’ve probably spent more time with Ma than most people I know, you’re fully aware of how much hoverin’ she does on the regular. It’s actually a surprise that she hasn’t driven up while I’m standin’ here just to see how things are goin’ for me.”“Ugh, I’d really rather her not show up and make this more awkward than it already is, but my mom’s here and she’ll have our heads if I let you inside out of nowhere.” Nah reached up and tapped at her chin, thinking about what there was to do to solve that problem. “I mean, we could sneak in and head upstairs super stealthily, but Mom has this thing about coming and checking on me in my room, and I’m not exactly sure you’d be able to hide under my bed.” She hoped that the implication there was that he wouldn’t fit, not that there was something under the bed that she didn’t want found by someone else.“I have an idea, actually. You down to go somewhere with me?” She really wasn’t, given that she was wearing some ratty shorts that honestly had seen the best days of their life years ago, and her shirt was one of her favorites for lounging, but she didn’t want to run inside to change and allow for her mother to come out and cause chaos. So, despite knowing what the answer should’ve been, she nodded. “Okay, cool. Let’s go to the park or the store or something, just to get away from all this.”The details were a little fuzzy, and Nah wasn’t actually sure how that idea turned into its final outcome, but half an hour later they were sitting in the parking lot outside the donut shop, an order of donuts and coffee sitting between them. “There’s no way my mom will suspect we came here,” Nah laughed, knowing incredibly well that the donut shop would be Nowi’s first place to go check if she truly cared about what her daughter was up to. “And as long as we’re sitting in here, we’re able to talk about whatever we want.”“Yeah…not exactly sure what it is we wanna talk about, but the door’s open for whatever it might be.” Brady looked at Nah with a small smile, before turning his attention out his window and down at the newest building along the road. “Hey, while we’re here, you wanna pop in and see if Laurent’s working? I ain’t seen him since the last time we all got together. Seen Noire a few times, but not him.”“That’s weird, I’ve seen them almost weekly since everything went down.” At once, Nah realized that she hadn’t had the chance to tell Brady about their weekly get-togethers and how he was on the invite list if he wanted to come. “We’re playing a new campaign, with Ribbon and Yarne and their dad. You can join us, we can always use more players!”Brady seemed amused to hear the offer. “I’ll think about it. Honestly part of the fun of playin’ was seein’ all of our friends on the regular, so gettin' to see a few of them again will be pretty nice. Mind if I bring back Byacek or do I need to make a new guy?”“We all made new characters for this, but you’re welcome to bring him back if you really want to. None of us are dragons, just like last time, so his niche still exists if you’re interested in filling it.” Nah conveniently left out the part where she’d explicitly requested everyone stay away from picking dragon characters, on the off chance that Brady wanted to do exactly what he’d asked about. “But I mean, you can make a new dragon too, if you’d want.”“Like I said, I’ll think about it.” He fiddled with his thumbs for a moment, eyes still looking down the street, before he slammed one hand down on his thigh. “I’ve decided, I’ll do it, but I’ll make a new character for the occasion. You playin’ as a lady again?”“Sure am, why do you ask?”His head slowly turned to look toward her, a smile creeping across his face. “So that we can get into character with some romantic tension if needed, that’s all.”“We literally have a preteen and her father in the group, I don’t know if it’d exactly be appropriate to be playing characters lusting over each other in their presence, but…” Nah trailed off, the meaning of Brady’s words hitting her like a truck. “Hold on. Why would we be playing our characters with romantic tension? We never did that before.”“That’s because doin’ that in Morgan’s presence just felt weird. Trust me when I say that I wanted to work it in over and over, but him havin’ to react to it kept me from ever makin’ the move.” That was when Brady took one hand and reached over to Nah with it, placing it on her arm and squeezing it tightly. “Now that we’re not worryin’ about having to keep up appearances or factor in other people’s opinions, I think it’s time we get to do what our hearts are tellin’ us to do.”She could feel the pressure he was putting on her arm, coexisting with the meaning of the words he’d just spoken. There was little Nah wanted more in the world than to feel like she belonged somewhere, with someone, and splitting donuts and drinks from her favorite place in someone else’s car while they talked about a game that mattered immensely to them both felt like she’d found what she was looking for. “I’m still interested in our previous arrangement, if you don’t mind me bringing that up,” she said, her voice quiet. “Twenty-seven, I think we’d agreed on.”“That’s what we’d last said, sure,” he replied, sliding his hand down her arm until he was able to lace his fingers in hers. “But I’ve been thinkin’ about that, in all this time we’ve been not talkin’ to each other. It never really was about tax benefits and bein’ there for the other if no one else was, was it?”“I…don’t think it was, no.”“If we’d actually gotten old enough to reach the age we’d decided, there was no way Naga wasn’t gonna have smacked us both upside the head and told us to marry for love, not just so we can make a bit more money.” When Brady squeezed this time, it was holding Nah’s hand firmly, and she felt his warmth begin to course through her veins. “So I’m decidin’ right now that this agreement we had is over and done with. Null and void, whatever legal talk Ma would use if she knew the details.”“Are we replacing it with something else?” Nah asked, feeling a bit betrayed that they’d gotten this far into the talks, only for Brady to snatch the thing she’d been holding onto like a crutch away from her. “Or is this just the end of all that?”He paused, as if considering his alternative not worth speaking, before he pulled on her arm and turned her toward him there in the front seat of his car. “Well, normal people in normal relationships don’t give themselves some sort of ‘we’ve gotta be married by this time’ limit, so we’re just gonna do without that. But, if we were to decide we wanted to do one of those limits anyway, I was kinda thinkin’ we could go with twenty-six. That’s not too far out.”“Not too far—Brady, that’s two years from now!”His face lit up with a giant grin, eyes scrunching at his amusement. “Two years is plenty of time to decide if we’re doin’ this for real or not, don’t you think?”She was conflicted, because it was plenty of time, certainly, but they weren’t even officially anything so it felt like it could be rather rushed. “I mean, if we’re saying that it’s two years from today, I guess it’ll be enough time.”“Ah, so you’re goin’ right along with me, I like that. Then let’s just make this new agreement a bit official, shall we?” He leaned in to kiss her, which she was initially hesitant to reciprocate, until she realized that if they were serious about this commitment, then this kiss would only be the first of many. As they locked lips, one of their elbows knocked into the radio and the car became filled with the sounds of generic pop music, singing lyrics that would have gone otherwise ignored, except the fact that they were basically describing the situation Nah had come out of to the letter.When they broke apart, the music was immediately shut off and they shared a laugh, a donut, and another kiss or two.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
June 2nd, 2026
Asking everyone to take two days off in the middle of the week was a tall order, but asking several of them to do it two weeks in a row was unheard of. That was the exact thought that Nah had when she’d been told that she was going to be forced to not go into work for two of the days on the last week of school, and it didn’t matter if she had ceremonies she needed to attend those days, because she simply would not be attending them. That was a hard conversation she had to have with the administration at the schools she wouldn’t be supporting those days, but there was a little something on her side that helped make it easier.Or, perhaps, a someone a bit higher up in ranks, who was just about to step down from her spot after all of her years of service on the school board so that she could focus entirely on the law side of her job. Now, in Nah’s defense, Maribelle hadn’t been thrilled with the choice of days either, but the moment she’d found out what the plans were, she swallowed down her pride and said she’d do all she could to make sure that the plans could be pulled off successfully, without anyone losing their job over it.“I do have to ask, though, why does it have to be those two days in particular?” Maribelle’s tone was curious, as she looked at Nah for an explanation. “As much as I dislike it, I understand why the next week is what it is, but this one seems rather random.”“You’d have to ask Noire on that, since she’s the one in charge of all of this,” Nah replied, thinking about how hard it was to parse her best friend’s thought processes on the regular, let alone when planning something big, exciting, and mostly secret. “All I know is that we’re leaving town that morning, and that we’re getting back the next night. I don’t even know who all’s going to be there, that’s how little I know about it all.”And that was how little Nah still knew until that morning, when bright and early a car pulled up to her parents’ house and waited for her to come outside. She’d been sitting on the steps, looking out the window waiting for some sign of things happening, and the moment she stood up to get downstairs, grab her bag, and go, she was stopped by the sound of her mother’s voice at the top of the stairs. “You’re not going to do anything stupid while you’re out celebrating with your friends, are you?” Nowi asked, shaking her head as she looked down at Nah. “I mean, that’s typically what happens on these sorts of trips. People do stupid things, relationships get ruined, you might even find someone you like more and—”“Mom, you’re not going to get me to drop everything and find another manakete to marry, sorry.” Looking over her shoulder to see how Nowi was standing there, Nah forced a smile in her direction. “I get that I’m your precious child and that you really don’t want to see me grow up, but you’ve got to let it happen. There’s only one more week of me living here, don’t you want it to be a happy week?”Nowi sniffled dramatically, coming down a couple stairs to get closer to Nah. “What do you mean, one week? You’re going to be gone today and tomorrow, that means there’s even less than one week left!”“Now you’re just being silly. I’ll see you when I get home tomorrow, and I’ll tell you all about how different this was from the movies.” Nah gave her mother a wave before fully descending the stairs to gather her things. By the time she was at the door with her bag in tow, Nowi was down on the main floor, and she refused to let her daughter leave without giving her a big, lingering hug.“Don’t let yourself get in trouble, there’s only one week until the wedding, after all.” There was a sadness in Nowi’s voice, proving that she truly did not want her little girl growing up, but she was able to let go and watch Nah leave to join her friends out in the waiting car. She did stand in the doorway and wave the whole time, though, watching everything that took place as Nah got her bag in the back of the car before climbing in to the passenger’s seat, so that the driver could take off in a hurry.“Nah, your mom’s still as strange as ever,” Noire commented as they headed down the street, her in charge not just of planning the trip but driving them there to keep the destination as much of a secret as possible. “I mean, I can’t be a judge of that, my mother would rather see me dead than see me off like that, but…ladies? Any opinions?”The silence in the car was incredibly telling, and Nah was almost thankful that no one wanted to jump in and say something on the matter. “It probably doesn’t help that my mom has never wanted to let me go, and now she’s kind of being forced to do it before she’s ready. But I’m plenty old enough to be out from under her control, and she’s just going to have to get used to that. Especially since…”“Why are you making it sound like this is going to be the end of you spending time with your mom?” Half-awake in the back seat (which was partially why she hadn’t said anything before), Cynthia reached out and attempted to put her hand on Nah’s arm, but couldn’t quite reach and ended up grasping at air for a few swipes. “If it’s anything like what happened with me, moving out made me closer to my mom! We do weekly baking classes now, it’s a lot of fun and good quality time.”“I don’t do baking classes with my mom, but we’re closer than we ever were before,” Kjelle added, not lifting her eyes from whatever she was watching on her phone. “Your mom’s just going to have to find a different reason to stay close with you.”Noire pursed her lips together, keeping her focus on the road, but it was clear that she was very much on the other side of the argument—and no one was going to blame her for it. Still, Nah could see that the positivity about mothers was making her friend uncomfortable, and so she decided to put an end to the conversation right there. “Yeah, we’ll see what happens after this wedding and everything. But, today, what exactly are we doing?”The two ladies in the back gave a chorus of uncertain answers, while the driver kept her mouth firmly shut. “Right, I take it that I’m not going to know until we’re there. Does anyone in here actually know, aside from Noire, that is?” This time, the chorus in the back answered positively, which told Nah that she was the only one remaining in the dark about what the day’s activity was going to be. “Right, okay. Looking forward to doing some historical sightseeing, then.”“You’d actually find that fun, wouldn’t you?” Kjelle asked, finally putting her phone down to lean over and look at Nah up front. “Not saying that it wouldn’t be interesting to do with all four of us together, but that’s honestly a hard pass from me.”“I wouldn’t have agreed to a night away from my children if it was something as boring as that,” Cynthia laughed, resting back against the window and closing her eyes. “It’s something fun enough to make that headache worth it.”None of this was providing any clarity for Nah, and she was getting a bit frustrated with the secrecy. So, instead, she went in the direction of boring and lame, to see if she could figure things out by saying what she hoped it wasn’t. “Well, I would enjoy doing some historical site touring, but I know, not everyone’s cup of tea. I’m going to guess it’s nothing to do with much physical activity, given that I wasn’t told to pack anything meant for hiking or exploring. Swimming’s a possibility, since I was told I needed a swimsuit, but there’s plenty of beaches in Ylisse that it doesn’t exactly narrow anything down.”“We’re not going to the beach, it’s too sunny and I don’t want any of us burnt before your wedding,” Noire said, giving just a little bit of an answer for Nah to work with. “Imagine everyone laughing at us because we’re all toasty and red.”“Y-yeah, manaketes are pretty notorious for not tanning very well.” Tapping her chin, Nah thought of all of the fun places that they could have been going, but quickly realized that she wasn’t actually aware of much to do outside of Ylisstol itself, beyond the boring stuff that had already been turned down. She wasn’t going to know the destination until they were there, she feared, and that was going to make the drive less fun than it should have been.Once everyone was a bit more awake from their early departure, conversations began being struck to pass the time. It was mostly about excitement regarding the wedding, about how everyone was looking forward to the rehearsal dinner and the ceremony itself, about how the guest list was nothing like it had been originally planned, about how a lot of things had fallen apart in the last weeks but new things had come up that were honestly better. There was a bit of discussion about how the venue, the manakete rec center, was going to be decorated and prepared in time, a discussion that Nah had to stop because she didn’t want anyone thinking they had to help, when Maribelle had already made it clear that she was going to be in charge of that aspect of things. There was even some talk about if Severa was going to come in from Nohr and make things chaotic, as she was apt to do, but when it was made clear that she was only attending if someone invited her as a plus-one, everyone seemed to think that was for the best.“I mean, if he really wanted to, Owain probably could bring her with him, but he’s got so many others he can bring, doesn’t he?” Noire asked, glancing over at Nah for a split second to see if she had anything to say on the matter. When she got a violent shake of the head in return, she knew that she was on the right track. “Yeah, what I heard from Laurent is that Owain’s bringing a bunch of other people with him…”“And there’s a chance that one of them will try sneaking Severa with under our noses, but we’ve begged him to keep her out of it. There’s no reason for her to be here for this, she doesn’t like me and it’d just be weird if she was there.” No one was ever going to argue against that, given that Severa had quite the history with both people getting married. “So I’m looking forward to seeing who all Owain is bringing, because he wasn’t sure who would be coming with him.”Now that the mood had been soured a little, talking went back to happier subjects, which mostly involved children. That was the part where Nah found herself unable to really be involved in the conversation, not because she didn’t like children, but because she didn’t want to say anything that made anyone start suspecting anything. Her plan, which she’d made very clear to her family and Brady and his family, was that she had zero intentions of ever actively looking to have children, especially in the age of social media where people would be downright nasty about it. There was no way she was going to tell that plan to all of her friends, though, because she didn’t want their opinions or them trying to convince her to think otherwise.For someone who looked perpetually like a child, it was merely the best option she could think of. There were just some things that people as young-looking at her should avoid, and that felt like one of them. But Nah had no idea that she was about to encounter a second thing that she should’ve avoided, and she had no way of knowing that it should’ve been a skip until it was too late.After several hours on the road, a glimmering oasis began to shimmer on the horizon, growing brighter and visually louder with every moment that passed. “Okay, so, we’re almost there,” Noire started, turning the car off the main road they’d been driving on to head closer to that bright spot in the distance. “Nah, have you ever been out here before?”Looking at the scene before them, Nah thought back to the ill-fated trip she’d taken with her parents, where they’d driven right by this very spot and she’d been warned of the dangers it held. “I’ve never been this way, no. That’s…uh, that’s a casino, isn’t it?”“It is, but—”“My parents will kill me if I go in there. Apparently there was this whole thing when I was a baby that my dad lost money there or something, and swore to never return? I don’t remember the details, but I know that they don’t want me getting into that sort of thing.” Pulling a disgusted face, Nah began to feel like she’d been unwillingly signed up for the worst thing she possibly could have to endure. “We’re not going there, are we?”“—I mean, yeah, but not to do any gambling!” Raising her voice, Noire seemed agitated as she continued speaking. “I put all this thought and planning into doing something exciting and different, and you’re acting like you’re not going to go along with it!”“What else is there to do at a casino except gamble, then?”“Uh, a lot, especially at this one.” Kjelle spoke over Noire making further agitated noises, trying to keep things at least a little calm in the car. “Last year, we all came out here to celebrate Yarne’s mom’s birthday, and I don’t remember anyone feeling like they had to go gamble. Did we, though? I mean, maybe a little, but it wasn’t something that I chose.”Also trying to keep things from getting more heated, Nah decided she wanted to play along a bit and dig into the story that had just been started. “What do you mean by that?”Kjelle shrugged. “I mean that when you’re sitting there drinking with your parents and they shove a bunch of money in your hand, you just kind of…go and use it.”“Why were your parents there if you were here for Yarne’s mom’s birthday?” Cynthia asked, continuing the trend of keeping Noire from getting an angry word in.“Look, I don’t know why they’re all buddy-buddy with each other, but she invited them along and none of us thought twice about it.” There was a moment’s pause where Kjelle seemed to think about what she was choosing to tell them, but she didn’t let it bother her as she continued anyway. “It was a pretty good time, from what I remember. Yes, we all stood around and watched the taguel try to use their ‘rabbit luck’ to win, but that definitely didn’t happen, and it wasn’t even the biggest part of the day. We walked through their aquarium, spent time at their indoor pool, had a fancy dinner, got completely trashed with my parents… Seriously, I woke up in our hotel room with no memory of how I got there, because apparently I got lost in the casino and ended up waking Yarne up to have him to come find me. Glad something like that’s not happening tonight.”It took a second, but at the conclusion of the story, Cynthia blinked a few times in confusion. “Wait, I thought this place was child-free, so how did all of you get to come?”“That’d be thanks to me and Mom,” Nah answered, knowing that she’d been aware of this part of the story from the moment it had started. “We took all the kids in for the night, mostly because they rightfully didn’t trust Ribbon with the job. That was the night that Mom and Ribbon both made the mistake of calling me Dinah in front of the littles, and I’m pretty sure Tjana still calls me it, even now.”“She does, she’ll ask all the time to go see her Di-na-a-a-a-ah.” Putting on her best impression of a bubbly two-year-old, Kjelle couldn’t help but laugh after she’d finished. “Look, the whole point of what I said is that there’s a lot to do here that isn’t gambling, so as long as you don’t get tricked into drinking, you’ll have plenty to spend time on.”Finally, Noire was able to get her words out, obstructing any other conversation with her loud outburst. “But I went ahead and got money for everyone to throw at machines! That’s something I intentionally chose to do, it’s literally in my pocket, if you don’t use it I’m going to be seriously mad!”“Well if you’re providing the money, and it’s not me gambling away my savings, I don’t see as much of a problem with it,” Nah quietly said, putting her hand over on Noire’s shoulder to try and get her to calm down about things. “But I’d like to be able to do things that are more in line with my interests while we’re here, since playing games isn’t really it.”“I also booked us space at their spa tomorrow morning, since tonight was all taken and I figured it could be something we do before we leave.” With a deep breath, Noire’s mood seemed to shift back to its normal, peaceful state. “I’m really excited to get to share this experience with the three of you, we’re going to have such a great time doing all of this, I just know it!”What Noire failed to mention was that her booking of their room for the night, while it was an upgraded suite so that they could check-in upon arrival, instead of needing to wait until later in the day, only provided them with two beds total, and the only other place in the room for someone to sleep would have been a hard leather chair in the corner. “I take it we’re sharing beds, unless someone wants to sleep on the floor, in which case…we’re still sharing beds, but only two of us are.” Before waiting to see what anyone else wanted to do, Nah walked into the room and staked her claim on one of the beds, which she felt was right given that she was the reason they were all there. “I’m sleeping here. Where all of you sleep, I don’t care, and that includes sleeping here with me.”“As your best friend and maid of honor next week, I call sleeping in your bed!” Jumping into the room, Noire threw her bag down in the leather chair as she sat on the bed next to where Nah had put her things. “So, ladies, if you want to figure out what you’re doing with that second bed, that’d be great.”The other two looked between each other, then at the bed, then both went peacefully to sit on opposite sides of it. “We’re both not strangers to having to share beds,” Cynthia pointed out, “which I think means that we’ll have a lot of fun fighting over blankets and space.”“Trust me, I’m used to making myself pretty small in my bed, you won’t have to worry too much about me,” Kjelle replied, elbowing Cynthia in the side as she spoke. “This already feels like it’s got more space than what I’ve got at home.”“That got settled a lot easier than I feared it would,” Noire admitted, scratching at the back of her head. “When I saw that all they had were rooms with two beds, I was worried that we’d have a huge fight and need a second room and that’d cost so much extra money, but I guess that’s what you don’t need to worry about when you’re such a great group of friends!”No name needed to be said, yet all of them knew exactly who Noire was alluding to with that statement. It was a nice change of pace that this hadn’t become an activity for all of the ladies in their social group, and instead it truly had been tailored to just the people who genuinely liked Nah and wanted to spend time with her. Usually, she was left trying to form bonds with others while they were stuck talking to people who weren’t her friends, and so for this to just be her friends was huge. “We’re a great group, yeah,” she agreed, looking around the room at the other three. “And we’re going to make this best night away we possibly can, but we’re doing it like mature adults, okay? None of that typical bachelorette party nonsense, no cakes and decorations and awkward props and—Noire, why are you looking so sad?”It was true, as Nah had been speaking, Noire had begun looking sadder and more distraught, and when her name was mentioned she tried to mask it as best as she could. “I, uh, might have brought along some of those novelty props, because I thought they were funny,” she admitted, gesturing toward her bag. “But we don’t have to use any of them! I’ll save them for the inevitable next time someone gets married, it’s not a big deal!”Stunned, and unsure of how she was supposed to take that information, Nah went over all the possible options of what was in the bag before deciding that she’d be rude to not humor Noire at least a little bit. “Okay, well, the only things I’ll allow for myself are a sash and a tiara, but I doubt you have either of those things.”She was completely wrong, as there were sashes for all of them, and while there wasn’t a tiara, there was a beautiful ornate dragon-wing clip that Noire pulled out from her bag. “This one wasn’t my idea, but when I spoke to Maribelle, she handed it to me and said she expected you to wear it while we were here.” Holding the clip up, Noire opened and closed it a few times before she went to put it high in Nah’s hair, giving her head the illusion of having small wings. “She said she’d planned on giving it to you herself, but she said I could do it instead.”“That’s really sweet of her,” Nah said, reaching up to touch the jewel-covered metal that she was now wearing. “I swear, she’s really come around on me in the past two years, if she’s giving me gifts like this for no reason.”“No reason?” Kjelle repeated, while in the middle of untangling the sashes that Noire hadn’t been careful in transporting. “She’s accepted that you’re who her son wants to marry and she’s doing her best to make sure everything’ll be okay between you. Trust me, that’s a very good thing to have happen.”“I wasn’t complaining about it, it’s just…way different than it used to be.”Blue Sea Springs was a huge, sprawling complex of activities and luxuries, with the casino in the middle acting as a gathering place before people headed off to whatever they planned on doing. That meant that, if they really didn’t want to get close to the machines, they didn’t need to cross the wall that separated the walkways from the casino itself, and that calmed Nah’s nerves on that matter immensely. Still, as they would walk around the exterior looking for what activity they wanted to take on, she would catch glimpses of machines with flashing lights and cute pictures, and her curiosity was growing by the minute. What was so interesting about them that it made people lose their senses when playing them?It wasn’t the right time to test any of them out, though, as there were experiences on the outside to be had. The plan was to save the pool for later in the day, so they could hit all of the sights that had earlier closing times first. That meant doing the aquarium, the art gallery, and the shopping mall, all while wearing those sashes that proclaimed their roles in the upcoming wedding. Never before in her life had Nah been stopped so many times by strangers trying to congratulate her—and never before had she and the others been accosted by security looking for their IDs so many times, either. “I guess we just look under eighteen as a whole group,” Cynthia said after the first time it happened, a smile on her face as she said it. “But that’s fine, looking youthful is always a blessing!”The second time, it was still an exciting compliment to the ladies, but after that, and especially when it became mostly just asking Nah and Kjelle for their IDs instead of everyone (as they were easily the two that made the group look younger), it became more of a hassle than anything else. “Okay, when I was here before, I think being around my parents and Yarne kept this from happening this many times,” Kjelle grumbled after yet another time where she’d had to stop moving to pull her card out. “Something about them making it obvious that I’m not someone underage in here.”“Oh, great, so that’s going to be a problem if we end up somewhere just the two of us,” Nah replied, feeling like that had just limited a lot of her night’s activities. “I guess that tells us that we all need to stick together all night, no matter what.”The three words in that sentence that were meant to do the heaviest lifting were the ones that ultimately got ignored. It wasn’t by choice, but rather by circumstances that spiraled out of control incredibly quickly, and it started not long after the single fanciest dinner that Nah could say she’d ever had. Multiple courses, waiters in formal clothing, appetizers and desserts that weren’t more than a couple bites, bottle service that had many different wines and drinks offered and very few taken, it was all almost unreal. And when the check came and Noire confidently handed over her card to pay for it all, that was the cherry on top. “I’d researched how much this was going to cost and set aside more than enough for this very special meal,” she explained, “and I’m glad that we were able to make it happen.”“I’ve never felt so fancy in my life, so thanks for planning this!” Nah clasped her hands together in front of her, nearly knocking over a half-empty wine glass that she knew she needed to finish off before leaving the table. She looked at what everyone else still had in front of them and quickly realized that she was the only one with a drink still unfinished.As she downed that, she kept looking around to see if her friends had anything else planned for that moment, and she found that all of their attention had been drawn to somewhere else in the restaurant. Even when the waiter brought Noire’s card back and she finished her payment, she wasn’t fully paying attention to what he was telling her, as her eyes kept glancing elsewhere. Nah didn’t know what it was that she was supposed to be looking at, so she set her now-emptied glass down, and tried to follow where the glances were going, but by then everyone had stopped looking in the same spot.“That was weird,” Cynthia said, shaking her head. “I could’ve sworn I saw…”“No, I think you did see him,” Noire added, disgust in her voice, “and if it’s him, I’m going to be very angry because I told everyone that this is a girls-only trip!”“But it wouldn’t make any sense for him to be here, so I wouldn’t count on it actually being him,” Kjelle finished, an assertive tone to her words. “We’re probably all just thinking about who’s back home and you’re probably missing him a bit too much.”“I know, but…”“What are we talking about?” Nah asked, making it clear that she wasn’t in on the potential person spotting, but nobody wanted to answer her. “Okay, well, if it’s not important, then let’s not dwell on it! Let’s go change to go swimming, I’m ready to relax and soak for a little while before we find something else to do!”’Since it was ultimately a celebration for her, no one argued against Nah’s request, and they headed back up to their room, where everyone changed into their swimsuits and grabbed towels to take down with them (as they all brought their own from home, as opposed to needing to rely on there being any by the pool deck). Once they were all ready, it was a quick elevator ride down to the main floor, then a couple minutes’ walk to the pool area.The whole group never made it to the pool, as while they were on their way, the person they’d thought they’d seen made a grand reappearance, coming out from behind the casino wall with open arms. “Ladies, what are the odds of running into you all here?” Inigo asked, slowly stopping and dropping his arms when he saw that there were four faces ranging from confusion to anger staring at him. “Hey now, I thought that one was clever. Odds, casinos, gambling, you get it?”“We sure do get it,” Noire answered, beginning to allow venom to seep into her words, “but you’re not supposed to be here, we’re supposed to be here with just the four of us. Only ladies. Not you.”“Ahem, yes, I am aware of that, but I had something I couldn’t quite wait any longer to do. The time for this was years ago, but I have been a foolish man and put it off for far too long.” As if he was actually not aware at all of the reason for the trip, Inigo came closer to them, grabbed Cynthia by the arm, and pulled her forward, only to drop down in front of her. “My love, I’m sorry that I have made you wait this long, would you—“She screamed and dropped down with him, throwing her towel over his face as she began hysterically sobbing. “Yes, yes, of course I would!”This entire display was happening right in the center of the walkway, so people were stopping and staring at what was going on, but one person who was not interested in watching any further was Noire, whose eyes were both twitching in frustration. “I’m going to the pool, which was the plan for the girls-only trip I’m supposed to be on,” she grumbled, stomping further down the corridor.Side-stepping away as well, Kjelle said, “Yeah, I’m not particularly interested in seeing how this goes. See you at the pool, okay?”Nah nodded but didn’t move, even as two of her friends went on their way. She felt conflicted, not wanting to abandon Cynthia but also not caring for the fact that her party had just been crashed and overshadowed by someone else’s decision. “Will the two of you pick yourselves up and get it together?” she finally asked, catching the attention not just of the happy couple but of many of the people around them. “I thought this trip was supposed to be about me, in the end.”“Sorry for the intrusion, Dinah, but it came to my attention that if I didn’t do this now, I would be risking leaving my love unwed going into a season where almost all of her friends are married, and I couldn’t dare do that to her.” Doing as commanded and getting himself up off the ground, Inigo offered an apologetic handshake toward Nah, which she completely ignored and he sighed at. “I understand you’re upset, but can we have this one moment?”“There’s so many other places and times you could’ve done this, coming to my party and doing it wasn’t exactly cool of you.” Rolling her eyes, Nah looked to Cynthia, who was enamored with the ring that had gotten slipped onto her finger in all of the chaos. “Now she’s going to do nothing but stare at that thing because of you, are you happy?”“Yes, actually, that’s part of why I’ve proposed to her.”“I agree that the timing was horrible, but you really should’ve done this way sooner,” Cynthia said, still staring at her new jewelry. “Besides, weren’t you supposed to be in charge of the kids tonight? Where did you leave them?”Inigo gave a laugh, showing that he didn’t feel that any of this was a big deal. “I had originally wanted them present for the moment, but this place is against children entirely, even if they’re unable to do much on their own. But I promise you, dearest, they’re safe with your parents.”“Oh, it really would’ve been better if you’d waited to do this somewhere that Harlow and Soleil could’ve been with us, but I suppose them being with my parents is fine.” Cynthia’s eyes shone as she looked at Inigo, before grabbing him in a giant hug. “This was something I’ve been waiting for, and you’ll never understand how long I’ve been waiting.”“I can take a guess as to how long, and it was wrong of me to make it last even half that time. Now I’ve righted this wrong, and we can do all the planning for the future later. Right now, it’s time you get back to spending time with Dinah and your other friends.” Inigo gave her a kiss on the top of her head, before trying to pry her arms off of himself, finding her grasp too hard to remove. “Cynthia, love, I need to drive home before it’s too late to be on the roads alone. You have to let me go.”She did, albeit very reluctantly. “Come on, Inigo, my parents are more than capable of taking care of the girls tonight. You can just stay here and—”“Nope, this is where I’m stepping out. If you’re planning on inviting him to our room, I don’t think that’ll work, so if he stays, he’ll need his own room.” Nah hated that she’d just cut her friend off like that, but she was not about to force herself to listen to whatever kind of romantic nonsense was about to be suggested. “If you’re interested in rejoining my party, we’ll all be in the pool. Hopefully see you around later, Cynthia, and hopefully don’t see you again until next week, Inigo.”With that being said, Nah stopped paying attention entirely to what the two of them were doing and went to go find wherever the pool area was. Even though it was late in the evening, there was still a steady flow of people heading to and from the water, so she was able to get there relatively easy; finding her friends in the water was a different issue entirely. It was fine by her, though, if she didn’t find them physically right away, locating where their towels were piled and tossing hers on top (with her little bag with her phone, room key, and belongings underneath it) before making her way over to the hot tub. The weather may have been warm outside, but the pool area was kept chilled, so soaking in the hot water felt like it was going to be worth it.It was, at first. Nah had just begun to let her body relax when she saw that there were casino security guards milling about, and she inwardly groaned, knowing that if they saw her, she’d be asked to prove her age, and that would mean leaving the warmth of the water. So, as she watched them looking around, she grew more and more tense, until they left the area and she felt like she could breathe a sigh of relief. “That would’ve been incredibly embarrassing, having to show ID at the pool, of all places,” she muttered. “But if it’s going to happen to anyone, it’ll happen to me.”She stayed in the hot tub for a few minutes longer, then got out to see if she could find the others in the main pool. This time, it was easy because Noire was sitting up on the side of the pool with her feet soaking, while Kjelle was in the water right in front of her. “Oh, hey, took you long enough to get here,” Noire said as Nah approached them. “Did you get roped into dealing with someone else’s romance nonsense during your own bachelorette trip?”“I’ve been here for a while, actually, just kind of…chilling.” Nah pointed at the hot tub, which had even fewer people in it now than it had when she’d gotten in. “Turns out, if I’m in there, the guards don’t even notice me.”“There were guards in here?” Kjelle asked, the surprise in her voice genuine. “Huh, I bet they were looking for someone specific, if they didn’t bother either of us.”Nah sat down next to Noire, her feet immediately freezing when she put them in the water. “I didn’t even think of that being a possibility, I just saw them looking around and got thankful that I brought my wallet with me, but upset that I’d have to leave the water to…” She trailed off as she noticed the confusion on Kjelle’s face get replaced with panic. “Oh. No. Don’t tell me…”“I left all my stuff up in the room, if they were looking for me they would’ve been able to kick me out on the spot.” Closing her eyes, Kjelle sighed before letting out a few mumbled curses. “I’ve got to go back up and get everything, just in case we’re not so lucky next time.”As she grabbed the edge of the pool to try pulling herself out of it, Noire scrambled to her feet and said, “No, I’ll go up, I’d just need to slip my shoes back on and I’ll be able to get up to the room much faster than you can, with you having to dry off before you go. The two of you just…stay here while I’m gone, okay?”“If you insist, I’m fine with that. Just be quick about it, you saw how many times we got checked earlier.” Without any hesitation, Kjelle pushed herself back away from the wall and gave a huge smile at Noire, who nodded and headed to where their things were stored. “That’s really nice of her, honestly. If it were anyone else, they would’ve told me I’d get there fastest because I can move fastest, so why not just do it myself?”“Noire’s right about it being faster for her because she’s not wet. Which, on that note…” Nah interrupted herself long enough to slide into the pool, splashing the wall and Kjelle both with the wave she created. “Brr! Maybe getting into the hot tub first was a stupid choice on my part, this water’s ice cold!”Brushing the splashed water off of her face, Kjelle said, “No, it’s been cold this whole time. Why do you think Noire didn’t want to get in with me?”“That makes sense, actually.” Still, it was fortunate that things worked out in that way, and Nah wasn’t going to complain about them. All they had to do was keep their heads down if the guards came back as they waited for Noire to return, and then once she was back they’d be fine if they got spotted. Being in the water made evading the guards easier, because when they did start patrolling the pool deck again, they just needed to stay under the water as much as possible, to keep themselves from being clocked as young-looking.Like Naga was looking out for them, it was right after Noire had rejoined them in her spot on the side of the pool that a guard came by asking them how old they were. “I’m twenty-six,” Nah answered, not a hint of deception in her voice. “I know, probably hard to believe.”“And I’m twenty-seven,” Kjelle followed up, smiling at the guard. “Again, probably hard to believe, but it’s true.”“I’m the same age as her,” Noire said, pointing toward Kjelle, “and you already know that because you checked me on my way in here.”The guard chuckled and went on his way, and once he was out of earshot Nah asked, “Why did you get checked on your way in, if you were by yourself? We weren’t there to raise suspicions or anything.”Noire shrugged. “I don’t know, security’s on edge right now about something. They even checked me when I got in the elevator to go up to our room, that’s how serious things are. Which, because of that, it’s doubly good that I decided I’d go up for you, huh, Kjelle?”“Saved me from getting kicked out, so yeah I’d say it’s great. Thanks a bunch for that, means a whole lot.”The three of them stayed in the pool until the sun outside the giant windows had gone down over the horizon, shimmering golden waves into the room as the light reflected not only off the pool’s water, but the water off the coast as well. As the room began to be illuminated with the unnatural overhead lights, and a new flood of drunken swimmers came into the room, they decided to go change back into regular clothes and spend the rest of the night doing something that wasn’t swimming. Just like Noire had said, there was a heightened security presence outside of the pool room, and they were all checked three times between leaving the pool deck and getting up to their room.Since she’d only gotten her feet wet, after she’d changed into clothes and done some quick makeup, Noire told the other two that she was going to go down to the casino and hang out. “I’ll keep an eye out for Cynthia while I’m down there, but I’ll probably be playing games until you’re back with me. Then I can give you both your money and you can play too, if just for a few spins.”“Please hold me to just a few spins, I don’t want to find I really like playing,” Nah said, wrapping herself a bit tighter with the towel she’d thoroughly soaked with her wet swimsuit. “We’ll be down once we’ve both showered and changed, so don’t expect us right away.”“Let me know when you’re headed down, my phone’ll be on me!” With that, Noire bid them farewell and headed out the door, inevitably getting her ID checked a time or two before she made it to her destination.It was just about an hour later when the two still in the room felt presentable enough to go down to meet back up with Noire. There was a lot of joking about how the two of them had somehow ended up alone together, and with how many guards were around it would be a miracle if they made it a dozen steps before being accosted for identification. In talking about that, Nah had the idea of them trying to make themselves look a bit older, just to alleviate some of the issues, but after they spent a lot of time fiddling with the makeup and hair supplies available to them, it was obvious that there wasn’t much they’d be able to change at all. The only thing that they successfully did was braid Nah’s hair up and clip it with those jewel-encrusted dragon wings, which did make her seem less childlike, even if she still could pass as a teenager with her youthful face.“I think we’re just going to have to accept that we’ll be taking twice as long to get down there as we should,” Kjelle sighed, looking at both of their reflections in the mirror with a frown. “It’s whatever, not like we set a specific time for when we’d be meeting Noire.”“I’ll let her know we’re leaving the room now, so that she knows to expect us showing up eventually,” Nah replied, grabbing her phone and opening her messages—just to find that she had a message from a number not saved in her phone waiting for her. Saw you down at the pool. Hope to see you again soon, it read, with no indication of who it was from. The number felt strangely familiar, as if she’d seen it before, but she shook it off and chalked it up to being a wrong number text, so she went ahead and sent Noire that they were coming down and thought nothing more of it.Together, the pair got as far as the elevators down to the casino floor before a guard asked them for their IDs, which they were happy to provide. That guard had a laugh at how dissonant their ages were with their physical appearances, even remarking that they were quite a small duo for being in their mid-twenties, but he let them onto the elevator without any issue. “Height doesn’t correlate with age at all, and I wish people would stop assuming it did,” Kjelle grumbled, leaning against the side of the elevator as it went down. “When I worked at the gym desk, I’d get asked all the time by guys if I was old enough to even use the equipment, since I’m so short. It was like, hello? Why does me being short matter?”“I literally work with children who are taller than me, I get it.” The number of times Nah had almost been corralled into a classroom because a visiting administrator didn’t realize she was a staff member was uncountable, and even though it was funny when it happened, she still didn’t care for it. “But I guess around here, they’re trying to make sure no one’s sneaking in while being underage.”“If she didn’t look and act so young, I bet no one would question if Ribbon could be here, given that she’s so tall.” That was true, most likely, as Ribbon had always been on the taller side of her peers, and at fourteen years old, she was just about as tall as her mother and made the two of them in the elevator look like children, a fact that Kjelle probably knew better than Nah did. “But whatever, no one’s accused us of faking our IDs or lying about our ages, so as long as that good luck continues…”“I’d think that you, out of everyone, would know better than to mention luck. Then again, we are at a casino.” Nah’s face scrunched in amusement at her own little joke, while Kjelle rolled her eyes before laughing at it as well.When they got down to the bottom floor and the door opened, both of them had their IDs at the ready, expecting to see a guard asking for them on the other side. They got as far as stepping out of the elevator and down to the main walkway before they were asked, and this time, there was salvation in the form of this guard having bright orange wristbands to give them, to stop the barrage of questioning. “They’ll still want to check in case you want a drink, because legally they have to, but now any time someone wants to ask, just show them this and you’ll be golden,” the guard said, as she put the bands on each of them. “I don’t know why everyone doesn’t hand these out, but for ladies like you…I feel it’s necessary.”“That was really kind of her,” Nah remarked as they went on their way, feeling like perhaps the luck comment had worked in their favor, instead of cursing them to have awful luck with everyone that crossed their paths. “Maybe I’ll decide to put more of Noire’s money in the machines to see if it’ll pay off.”“Dinah. There you are!” Four words, in a voice Nah hadn’t heard in over two years, and just the sound of her name in that particular cadence was enough to make her flight or fight instinct kick in, and she grabbed Kjelle’s arm as a defense. “What, aren’t you excited to see me here?”“Ow, nails in my arm, watch it,” Kjelle said, seemingly not noticing the voice that Nah had heard, until she froze and her head turned slowly in the direction the voice had come from. “Wait, what are you doing here?”Both women were now staring down Morgan, who was looking at them in return with the largest, most menacing grin he could manage. “When I heard that you all were here today, I couldn’t resist coming and seeing if I couldn’t make amends for my past behavior,” he explained, holding his hands out in front of him to show that he wasn’t holding anything, there wasn’t any hidden agenda or weapon. “After all, I only have a week left to do that, don’t I?”“How does everyone know we’re here?” Nah whined, clinging herself harder onto Kjelle’s arm, while Kjelle mentally processed what she was listening to. “I didn’t know we were going to be here until we got here, but apparently it was so obvious that Morgan found out before I did!”“I can tell you, I heard about this from my sister. Lucina was so sad that she didn’t get invited along, by the way, but she told me all about how she’s excited for the wedding next week, so I know about that too.” Morgan took a step closer to them, still holding his hands out. “So in two years you went from burning all your bridges with potential lovers to marrying one anyway, is that right? How’d you manage that?”Despite her full-blown sense of panic, and her desire to be anywhere but where she now was, Nah found it within herself to answer that question. “I managed it because the only bridge I burned was the one with you, and everyone realized how manipulative you’d gotten with me. Haven’t you noticed that no one wants to be friends with you anymore?”“Oh Dinah, I still have many of the same friends you do, they just don’t tell you they’re still my friend.” Another step closer, and with this one, the grin on Morgan’s face faded, replaced with a dark expression that felt right at home on the cover of a book of tales about the Fell Dragon. “You’re making a mistake, forcing yourself into this marriage you don’t actually want. Rethink things, give me another thought, you know it’d be better if you did.”As he came closer still, Nah began to sputter, not sure how to say her rebuttal to his idea in a way that would be taken seriously. She wasn’t forcing herself into anything, she’d gotten what she wanted with the person she’d wanted all along, and she wasn’t sure how Morgan didn’t understand that. She knew that people still talked to him, she knew that he still had friends that were her friends as well, but that didn’t mean that she needed to like or even tolerate him. And, most importantly, she was happy with the life she’d cultivated in the past two years, there was absolutely no need to let him crawl back in.Noticing that the person actively holding onto her like a spider monkey was unable to get any words out, Kjelle decided that she’d take charge and say something in her place. “Like anyone should ever listen to you,” she started, slowly prying Nah off of her so that she could get closer to Morgan without endangering her friend, and once her arm was free she was right up at him, staring him down with a fierceness in her eyes. “All you’re doing by being here is proving that you’re never going to grow up.”“This isn’t your fight,” Morgan said, putting one hand on Kjelle’s shoulder to try and push her out of the way, but in the split-second he realized how big of a mistake that was, she’d already taken action without quite having the same realization. Sure, kicking his legs out from underneath him meant that he went crashing to the ground, but with him holding onto her, it meant she went down too. It wasn’t a problem for her, though, as she was more than happy to grapple him and make him beg for mercy, something that she was not going to give him by any means.All Nah could do was beg and plead for them to stop fighting, and when security came to break things up and detain everyone involved until they had a clear picture of what had happened, it felt like the night was over. Morgan insisted he’d been attacked out of nowhere, Kjelle was adamant that he’d asked for it by putting his hand on her, and Nah had to explain that one of them was a lot more right than the other was. In all of the commotion, Noire somehow found her way to them, and she got to explain that she’d gotten strange texts from the same number that Nah had gotten them from, but her phone had saved former messages from that number and it was clearly Morgan doing some plotting that night.He wasn’t going to go quietly, though, as he was insistent that he’d been set up and gaslit into acting the way he did, but when the guards decided that they simply did not want to play mediators to this dispute and told everyone to just drop it and leave each other alone, he didn’t seem to want to listen. “I’ll be there next week to make you reconsider,” he threatened, pointing a finger in Nah’s direction. “You know, under the rules of the church of Naga, if anyone dissents to a union, they legally can’t go through with it.”“If you so much as step a foot into the ceremony, I promise you that’ll you’ll be coming away from it in a body bag,” Kjelle shot back, this time getting restrained by Nah and Noire both to keep her from getting any closer to Morgan and starting another round, even though she was being very gentle on one of her legs, her knee visibly bruised. “And I know that I won’t be alone in beating your ass when that happens, and that’s a promise.”“You’re going to let her say these things to me?” Looking at the guards still standing around, Morgan realized that he wasn’t getting any sympathy or support from any of them, and he kicked at the floor, conveniently in the direction of the trio of ladies. “This isn’t the end of any of this, I hope you know.”“Uh, pretty sure it is,” Nah said, finding her voice, no matter how shaky it was. “I’m happy with what I’ve got, with the life I’m planning on leading, and I don’t need you in it ever again. If I ever have to see your face again, it’ll be too soon.”The crestfallen look he gave when he heard her words was enough to fill Nah with the confidence to leave the scene knowing that the rest of her night would be peaceful. Together, the three ladies slowly made their way to the casino floor, where sizable handfuls of money were passed out, many drinks were ordered, and absolutely nothing notable was won by anyone until far too late in the night for some of them to really remember it. Even when she played the last bill she’d been given and came away empty-handed, Nah felt like the night had been rather successful, and she stayed up well past her usual bedtime to watch her friends play games and keep drinking until they needed to be taken back to the room.She fell asleep just about immediately after laying in bed, and woke up well after sunrise to there being no one sleeping next to her. “Huh, where’d…oh, okay,” she murmured, looking over at the other bed and seeing that Noire was half-dressed laying on top of what was left of its blankets. A moment later, and she was now trying to process how there was only Noire in a bed that she wasn’t even supposed to be in to begin with.With a yawn and a stretch, Nah sat up and looked around the room, which was a certified disaster zone. The missing blankets from the other bed were strewn across the floor, and Kjelle was laying on them, like she’d come into the room and fallen asleep without even making it to either of the beds. “I probably should have tried keeping them both more in check,” Nah said to herself, shaking her head in amusement at what she was seeing. Neither of them were going to like being woken up so they could pack up the room and go to their spa appointment, she was sure of it.She didn’t want to disturb them, if they were in as much of a need of sleep as she figured they were, so she carefully got out of bed, got her clothes from her somehow undisturbed bag, and went to change into something fresh and new. Then, after grabbing her wallet and her phone, she decided she’d go down to the main floor and find somewhere to grab something for breakfast, since she’d drank a single drink the night before and knew that there was no chance that her growling stomach was actually the sign of a hangover. That plan was fantastic, until she opened the door to find Cynthia on the other side, looking shocked to see someone already awake.“I, uh, was coming back to rejoin you all, sorry about last night,” she said, sagging her shoulders as she tried her best to look a little ashamed of what she’d done. “I stopped by the room around midnight and no one was here, but when I went back down to the casino I couldn’t find anyone, so I…kind of went with Inigo to the room he managed to get.”“It’s fine, I really don’t think you would’ve wanted to be in here with whatever the two of them ended up doing after I fell asleep,” Nah replied, motioning behind her with her head, so that Cynthia could look for herself at the mess and chaos the room contained. “There was a bit of an incident last night, and I think they both coped with it by drinking far too much.”Cynthia’s eyes narrowed as she thought about that, then she shrugged it off. “Okay, well, maybe it is for the best that things worked out the way they did. But ooh, an incident? Want to go down and get a coffee with me and tell me all about it?”Nah hadn’t expected to have company on her breakfast run, but she wasn’t about to turn one of her friends down in the quest for a moment of solitude. “You know what? I think you’ll get a laugh out of what happened, maybe even get a bit jealous that you weren’t there to watch it all happen. So, it started while we were at the pool last night…”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
January 28, 2036
Every Monday morning felt like it had the alarm going off incredibly early, but that morning in particular felt earlier than usual. Unfortunately, Nah had been staring at her phone’s screen for far too long by the time it was buzzing in her hands, and she had been dreading the sound the whole time. “Can’t there be one week where I get an unexpected long weekend?” she asked no one in particular, as she silenced the alarm and slowly made her way out of the bed. “Like, I don’t ask for a whole lot, Naga, but if you’d give me a snow day one of these weeks, I’d overlook some of the other things you’ve given me.”As soon as she stopped talking, the room fell eerily quiet, and she sighed. Her relationship with Naga, and religion as a whole, was more distant than it had ever been, but with the year of the dragon—the year for the manaketes—looming she’d been working on rebuilding that connection. Now the day was upon her, and she still felt like she’d been given no extra, beyond-the-normal favors by the deity she was supposed to revere above all others.Okay, that wasn’t the full truth, and Nah knew it very well, but she was still going to find ways to feel bitter about parts of the life she’d pieced together while having no influence from the goddess she’d been promised would take great care of her. Naga sure wasn’t the one responsible for the house she lived in, or the love that she’d been so lucky to have for all these years, or the job that she was having to force herself to get ready for, or any of the other tiny details that she wasn’t keen on listing to herself early on a Monday morning. Those were all things that Nah had needed to put her own work into, no religious influence needed. “I’m not sure how I’m going to get through today,” she muttered as she flipped the bedroom light on and used it to peer into the large closet filled with all of her work clothes. “Starting before sunrise, ending far too close to midnight…maybe it’d be better if tomorrow’s the snow day instead, so I can sleep in when I really need it.”She picked out a professional-looking outfit and went to shower before she changed into it, but when she stepped into the bathroom and turned the light on inside, there was a sticky note attached to the mirror. See you after work Monday, it read in handwriting akin to scribbles, and just seeing those five words made her smile. “The weekend’s over, you’ll be home after this and we’ll be able to be together again,” Nah said, reaching out and pulling the note down and pressing it close to her chest. “I still can’t believe you got to travel doing what you love, but I wish I’d been able to go with you. Stupid last-minute planning getting in the way of letting that happen.”For almost a week now, she’d seen that note stuck there, taunting her with a reminder that she was alone for days on end. It really had been a sudden decision for Brady to need to leave Ylisse with the orchestra he’d casually been practicing with for years, as they needed a violinist to come with them to perform and he’d proven his talent a million times over. Nah distinctly remembered the day he’d been asked to go, he’d gotten so overwhelmed with emotion from the offer that she’d needed to accept it on his behalf, because he couldn’t get through saying the acceptance. It was, by far, the longest amount of time they’d been apart in all the time they’d been married, and it had been the longest time in Nah’s life that she’d been alone, outside of spending time with people at work.All she needed to do was get through the work portion of her day, then she’d be able to get to be with her husband again for the rest of the day’s activities, which she wasn’t thrilled with being stacked as they were. But she needed to focus on one thing at a time, and right then it was getting ready for work and heading into the office for her shift. Given that it was a Monday, she didn’t need to think anything about lesson plans or what kinds of groups she was going to be working with, which did make the idea of having to work slightly more palatable. Still, it was early in the morning and she had other things her mind wanted to focus on, so getting motivated to do her job was going to be hard.A lot had changed since the last year of the dragon, besides the obvious bump in relationship status that she’d been proud of for the nearly ten years since she’d gotten married. While there were a lot of things that could have been different, or maybe should have been different, the biggest and most notable one was regarding the very job she was dragging her feet on going to. She was still working with special education children, and had amassed quite the caseload over the years, but she had one school that she called her home and she had a new title to go with the additional schooling she’d put herself through.Being the director of special education at the secondary school level was not something she’d expected when she’d first graduated with her degree, but after a lot of talks with Maribelle about working in educating students caught up in legal matters, she’d decided that there was a different, overlooked group of kids she wanted to focus on. If they were making it to her school, that meant they’d been failed and pushed through the system by many years’ worth of teachers, and those kids were beginning to feel helpless in their own education. She was teaching these older students things that she’d been teaching the primary school kids, and often they were needing a lot more repetitions before they began understanding, but seeing their growth and development made every hard day worth it.And it also made every Monday, where she did nothing but submit paperwork and arrange her schedule for the week, between teaching kids and assisting the special education aides that worked under her, feel like it wasn’t just a wasted day. While she showered, Nah kept trying to get herself focusing on work and what all was on her plate for that day and that week, but she kept having her thoughts drifting off to what her day’s schedule looked like.Work came first, naturally. Then, once she was done for the day, she would come home and get changed into something more comfortable, wait for Brady to get home, then they’d be going over to the manakete church for the year of the dragon celebration. It was a lot earlier in the day than it had been in past years, because the average age of the people at the church was well into the sixties and none of them were capable of being awake much past sunset on those early winter nights. Once that started to wind down, they’d head over to Noire and Laurent’s house for dinner, before the whole group went together to Lucina and Gerome’s for another manakete-inspired celebration. After that, it’d be home and back to bed for a full day of work the next morning.Nah sighed, wiping water off of her face as she realized that she’d gotten herself highly distracted from getting showered and ready for work. “This water’s too nice, I should just stay here and let them think something’s happened,” she mused, before dashing the thought and deciding that she was going to be a responsible adult and do her job as directed. Twenty-five minutes later and she was finally out of the shower, dried off, and dressed for the day, focusing on doing her hair and making herself look presentable for all of the dry and dull office work she was going to be doing. Naturally, that meant putting her short-cut hair into small pigtails and brushing her bangs to cover all of her forehead, before slapping some basic makeup on and covering that up with the glasses she needed to be able to see—a curse of growing older and doing a lot of work on computers.With everything taken care of, she grabbed her lunch and her purse, put on her jacket and her shoes, and headed out to her car, which struggled to start in the cold morning weather but came alive after a bit of convincing. The school she worked at now was a lot further away from home than any of the previous schools had been, but getting this particular job at this particular school had not been planned for when they’d bought that house right around the time they’d gotten married. Now, of course, if given the opportunity Nah would gladly sell the home and buy something more conveniently located, because she felt that her job wasn’t going to be changing and Brady’s job wasn’t one that had a set commute, but they loved their little house with its lack of stairs and amenities appropriately sized to accommodate both of their heights. If living there meant leaving for work long before the sun came up in winter, then that was exactly what it meant.Just like she’d been prepared for, Nah’s day was spent entirely in her office, putting logs into student records and coming up with cohesive plans for how she was going to teach her struggling students that week. The special education aides, all of whom did have classes and courses to assist with every day of the week, would pop in and make sure that they knew what they needed to do, and she was thankful that she had a team willing to check that they were doing things right. Their role was a lot different than hers was, and they weren’t teaching a whole block of students at any point, but for them to know how to assist the kids that she would be pulling out for classes every other day was crucial for their success.The hours in that office, even when broken up by people coming in to verify their jobs, were long and tedious, even if the work wasn’t exactly difficult. The major problem was how much data needed to be input into screens with tiny text boxes, which even with her glasses required Nah squinting and trying her best at reading what was going on, since she couldn’t magnify what was on the page at any given time. “I think, if special education gets a boost in budget next school year, getting access to a logging program that has bigger font might be a necessity,” she grumbled after clicking off of the last file she needed to edit for the day. “Either that, or they’re paying for me getting a bigger computer screen and seeing if that helps any.”After the data logging came the lesson planning, which was when she was able to get out of the office and see what was going on in the general education classrooms. Part of her role was to supplement what the other teachers were doing with targeted programs, and in order to be successful in doing that, she had to know what was being taught. The first year she’d been the director of special education, this was the part of the job that had taken the longest, because she’d been familiar with submitting data in her previous roles. Now that she’d been at it for a couple years, she was able to step in, see where the class was, and know exactly what subjects were necessary for success on upcoming tests, and which parts of the lessons could be safely skipped.Once her rounds were done, she was back in the office putting together the agenda for the week, complete with breakdowns of what she was planning on teaching every day and when each topic would be covered. During her arranging of the schedule, one of the aides came in and watched her, taking notes on what she was doing and what her logic behind her choices was. “I’d like to know how to do this correctly, just in case I have to step in and do it myself,” the aide explained, gesturing toward her notepad. “You’re easily the best teacher I can learn from, Dinah.”“I understand that, but do you have to be so formal with me? Seriously, just call me Nah, everyone does it.” Smiling up from her own calendar that was spread out over her desk, she looked at the aide who seemed shocked to have been told such a thing. “We go over this every week when you watch me, you don’t need to call me my first name when it’s not even what’s on my school badge.”She pointed to the badge hanging from the collar of her jacket, which did in fact not have Dinah listed on it. If she’d been able to have her way, all it would have said would be Nah, but the administrators didn’t want to open themselves up to any awkward discussions with parents if the director of special education had a one-word name on her badge. She’d then fought that they let her just keep it to being Nah Balakin, but the argument there was that her legal last name needed to be visible, because it was what was listed on the school website, and what parents would need to know if they were speaking with anyone at the district level. So she’d relented and said she’d accept it being on her badge, if the students could call her the name she preferred.And that was the exact thing that the aide brought up. “Okay, but your badge also says that the kids should call you Mrs. Balakin-Hoffman, and that’s not what you go by.”“Well, yeah, I didn’t formally take my husband’s last name because I wanted to keep using mine, but I didn’t want to let his be ignored. Doesn’t mean I want everyone throwing out that mouthful every time they’re trying to talk to me.” Flicking her badge, Nah waited for any sort of rebuttal, and when one never came she went back to doing her planning. “But, back on topic, if I wasn’t the best person to learn this from, I wouldn’t be in this position to begin with, now would I?”The aide laughed, also returning to taking notes on what she was watching. “That’s right, I’d be watching someone else, or maybe you’d be doing the watching. Who knows, really.”That was how the rest of the day was spent, making the plans and being observed in how they got done, and as soon as school let out for the day, Nah packed her computer just in case she didn’t show up the next day (even though she knew she would, she always did), and headed out to get back home. Traffic was a nightmare leaving the school, and the drive back across town seemed longer than usual, to the point that she almost felt like it’d be a better use of her time to stop somewhere and wait for the roads to get less busy. She didn’t let herself get distracted, though, and made it back home while there was still were peeks of sunlight in the sky.She knew that the next thing she needed to go was go mingle with the manaketes over at the year of the dragon celebration, and she was a bit too overdressed for the occasion. That had her going back to her bedroom and exchanging her work clothes for something more simple, a casual outfit that she’d feel comfortable wearing to church if she ever bothered to attend anymore. It was while she was once again fixing her hair that she heard the front door open, followed by a call of her name into the house. “I’m in the room, I’m almost ready to leave!” she yelled back, and her response was met with fast footsteps across the floor of the house.Within moments, there was the sound of something getting thrown down onto the bed, followed by a second person appearing in the mirror she was looking in. “You weren’t kidding, you really are almost ready, huh?” Brady asked, leaning down to put his hands on Nah’s shoulders. “Guess that means I should get gettin' ready too, doesn’t it?”“I mean, if you wanted to stay home and rest while I’m over at the rec center, I think everyone would understand and forgive it. But you’d have to be ready for dinner, and that’s…who knows when that’ll be.” Nah smiled up at Brady, visible in their reflections, and he seemed to consider the suggestion she’d made, before letting go of her and swiftly stepping out to get new clothes to change into.Nah glanced over to the room where she saw him switching what he was wearing, then back at her own reflection and the hair that she was in the process of trying to fix. She’d pulled out the dragon-wing clip that she’d gotten years ago, and was trying to figure out how she could manage to get it to fit into her hair, but with how short she’d gotten it cut the last time she’d done anything with it, the clip covered up any small pigtail and getting the hair into a ponytail was impossible. Eventually, she decided she’d just do what she could, pulled the top part of her hair up and clipped the wings up on top of it. It looked borderline tacky, and seemed more like something a child would do with their hair than a grown woman, but she liked the way it looked so she rolled with it.“Oh, that’s cute,” Brady said when he saw her come out of the bathroom, him making sure that the shirt he’d chosen to wear wasn’t too wrinkled for the occasion. “Isn’t that the clip that Ma got for you?”“Sure is, and I’d think it’s the most appropriate accessory I can wear today.” Nah gave him a once-over, shaking her head playfully when she was done. “Meanwhile, you still manage to look like you’ve just been trapped on a bus all day, but at least you don’t smell like it anymore. Little things.”“Whoa there, if I still look like I’ve been on the bus, then I’ve gotta find something else to wear. Ain’t that the point here, me looking like I’m put together or something?” He went to remove his shirt to switch it out, but Nah came up to him and wrapped her arms around him, getting him to stop.“No, I think it looks authentic, and that’s what we want. I missed you, by the way.”“Longest time we’ve been apart, and you had to do it all alone.” One quick adjustment so that he was the one grabbing her, and Brady carefully lifted Nah up off the ground, just so that he could gently kiss her on her cheek first, then a bit longer on her lips, before setting her back down and pulling his hands back, one of them scratching the back of his neck. “Sorry about that, by the way. If I’d known that it’d overlap with…”As he looked for the words he was trying to find, she shushed him. “Don’t worry about it. I’m more concerned with how many manaketes are going to be asking about where they are tonight than anything else, but it’s whatever. Your mom wanted to do something nice and her plans got wrecked and ruined a lot of other plans when she fixed them. Mom and Dad will figure out how to make things right with the church when they’re back.”“So you’re forcing yourself to go tonight to make up for them not going, right?” Making sure that he understood the reason for this step of the night’s plans, Brady seemed unenthused when Nah nodded. “Sounds like you’re doin’ your parents’ dirty work on this one, Nah. Maybe we could just skip it and go to dinner early…?”She stopped mid-nod to start shaking her head. “No way, I already told Lady Tiki we’d be there, and since this’ll probably be the last year of the dragon she lives to see, it’d be wrong of me to go back on my word.”“Got it. Then we should get goin’ to get it all over with.”“You seriously don’t have to go with me to this, I can just swing back by and get you before dinner. You sound like you need a nap.” Nah stepped to the side, with full intention of walking around Brady to leave the room, but he stopped her by outstretching an arm and holding it in front of her. “What is it? I’m trying to go.”“And I’m comin’ with you, but what’s all this about me needin’ a nap? If I need one, you need one too. You had to sit in your office and work all day, and I know that’s not what you signed up for with your job.” He had a point, and as much as Nah wanted to argue back that sitting in an office was more stimulating than riding a bus halfway across Ylisse, she decided that it wasn’t worth the effort or energy.“I swear, if you start falling asleep later, I’m telling everyone that I gave you the choice. Now let’s get going, the faster we get there the faster we can leave.”[]They spent just over an hour at the rec center for the year of the dragon celebration, the elderly age of the majority of the attendees making them all want to turn in for the day way earlier than the younger folks. Nah and Brady mostly hung off to the side by themselves, made easier without there being any parental figures there telling them to get out and mingle with the others. At one point, Nah saw Lady Tiki and Say’ri come into the room from an adjoining one, and she rose from the chair she’d taken to go greet them, but got stopped by another manakete halfway there, who was far too curious about where her parents were and why they hadn’t made their appearance yet.“Uh, my parents are on a rescheduled cruise with my in-laws, it was supposed to be a holiday present but got pushed back to this week,” Nah explained, trying to keep her eyes on where Lady Tiki was so that she’d get the chance to speak with her. “Mom was upset that she wouldn’t be able to be here, but the tickets were non-refundable and my mother-in-law was not going to let her skip out for this.”“That’s a shame, Nowi always brings an energy to these parties that we’re sorely missing,” the woman chuckled, reaching down to pat Nah’s arm. “You’ve grown up to be quite the respectable woman, Dinah. Don’t forget that.”“With how often I hear it around here, I don’t think I ever could,” Nah replied, before apologizing as she continued to walk toward where the manakete elder was. She wasn’t actually sure what she wanted to say to Lady Tiki, or if she had anything to say at all beyond a pleasant greeting, but she knew that dodging talking to her would only cause trouble.It was Say’ri who noticed her first, gently tapping Lady Tiki’s arm to get her attention before pointing toward Nah as she approached. “Dinah has come to speak with you, it seems,” she said, her voice soft as she spoke solely to the elder. “Do you care to say anything?”“Oh, Dinah, what a precious girl,” Lady Tiki replied, reaching out to where Say’ri was pointing, which was Nah’s cue to hold her own hand out to take the leathery and aged one into it. “How are things? How is your mother?”“Things are going as well as they could be, I suppose. As for my mother, you know she isn’t here this evening but she will make it up to you all when she can.” Squeezing the elder’s hand slightly, Nah stepped closer, until she was right in front of the pair. “I felt it was only right if I came and said hello while I’m here.”“This is the ninth year of the dragon I’ve been alive for, did you know that?” The question was asked in such a way that Nah didn’t know if she was supposed to answer or not, but she shook her head and said she wasn’t aware of that fact. Lady Tiki smiled, squeezing Nah’s hand on her own this time. “And this is the fourth you have lived. Do you know what happened when your mother reached her fourth year of the dragon?”Nah’s breath caught in her chest as she realized the answer that Lady Tiki was fishing for, and she quickly let go of the elder’s hand. “It was the first one she celebrated with my father as a married couple, just like what I’m getting to experience this time. And I know that there are special things that non-manaketes are expected to understand about the traditions and culture, so…perhaps I should…go take care of that.”Stepping back a few paces, Nah thought she’d been able to get out of having any follow-up comments made, but then she heard Lady Tiki say, “Now, now, Dinah, you and I both know that isn’t what I was implying.”“If it’s not what you were implying, then I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about. Enjoy your evening, Lady Tiki!” Giving a small wave, Nah got herself out of there even faster than she’d tried before, and she crossed the room once more to return to where Brady was still sitting, watching her coming back in a hurry.“Do I wanna know what just happened over there?” he asked, raising his non-scarred eyebrow as he spoke. “Can’t say I’ve seen you hustle like that to get away from someone in a long time.”“It was just Lady Tiki doing Lady Tiki things, trying to get me to talk about something I don’t want to talk about.” Retaking her seat, Nah began to tap her fingers on the edge of the table, as she looked back at where the elder and her companion were still sitting together, in the throes of a conversation that had some lovely hand gestures attached. “At least, I think that’s where she was going with that. For all I know, it could’ve been her trying to preach at me that my job isn’t fitting for a manakete or whatever.”Brady’s eyes tracked to where the two were sitting as well, and after watching them gesture for a moment or two, he nodded in understanding. “Yeah, I can’t say I know a single thing about what’s goin’ on there. So I can’t really blame you for wantin’ to get away from that so quickly, seems like it’s just a lot of crazy over there.”“She’s old, and she’s only gotten weirder over time. But like I said before, this is probably her last year of the dragon, so I can’t exactly shut her own when she’s been the elder for my entire life.” The drumming slowly stopped, as Nah sank back against the chair and thought about how grand of a life Lady Tiki had been leading, to have existed for nine different years represented by the dragon. “When she goes, I don’t know what’ll happen to our little corner of manakete religion, but it definitely won’t be the same.”“Maybe there’ll be some up-and-coming young guy who can step in and take her place?” Brady suggested, before looking around and seeing that there weren’t exactly any others there that were younger than they were. “Er…maybe not?”“Her plan had always been to have Lucina take the role, but that clearly wasn’t going to happen, and then I think she considered having me do it, but I…” Nah trailed off, thinking about all of the reasons why she would never, in a million years, want to give up the life she’d built to become a voice of Naga for an entire church. “Nope, it’s still not something I have any interest in. I can name two reasons right off the top of my head, and that’s without thinking about it at all.”“Am I one of those reasons?”She paused, looking at Brady with her eyes slightly narrowed over her glasses, before laughing. “I mean, why wouldn’t you be? There’s a reason Lady Tiki and Say’ri aren’t anything more than partners, that being that the manakete elder is supposed to live a life without attachment to anything except Naga. Keeps the Fell Dragon out of their heart.”“That sounds like there’s the implication that only married people can fall into those clutches, but we both know that ain’t the case. But whatever,” Brady said, shaking his head, “this whole thing’s a new level to the religion Ma tried shovin’ down my throat as a kid, and I can’t say I fully get it.”“Trust me, I’ve been a part of this stuff for as long as I’ve been alive, and I barely get it too. This is why it’s better when my parents are around, because Mom can explain all of it in ways that make sense, and Dad cracks jokes and makes it fun to try and understand.” For yet another moment, Nah wished that her parents were there at the table with them, but she knew that they were getting to enjoy themselves on that cruise with Brady’s parents, building bonds that hadn’t been explored in a non-professional sense. But then it dawned on her that if they were there, then certainly Brady’s parents would’ve been dragged along too, and Nah wasn’t sure how well Maribelle would handle being in a room full of people that worshipped Naga different than she did, where she couldn’t tell them off for what she perceived as small flaws.“Say, Nah, would you be too angry if I said I was thinkin’ it’s about time to leave?” Breaking her from her thoughts, Brady’s question was a welcome surprise, and it was one that Nah was more than happy to answer.In fact, she answered by standing up and motioning for him to do the same. “No one’s going to miss us if we leave, we did our duty and it’s not like this is all of the celebrating we’re doing today,” she pointed out, and if she was fine with going, so was he. Outside, the darkness of early nighttime was settling in, streetlights turning on and the world feeling much quieter than it did during the bustle of the day. That sense of peace ended as soon as they were out on the main road, where drivers adamant about getting home to their families drove recklessly and caused all sorts of honking with their poor choices. Thankfully, the drive to their next destination wasn’t that long, and they made it relatively unscathed.“Next time, how about you don’t try brake-checkin’ someone for riding so closely?” Brady suggested once he was out of the car and had looked at the rear bumper to make sure the incident hadn’t caused any sort of damage. “Dude deserved it, yeah, but we’ve got places to be, can’t get over here if we’re sittin’ on the side of the road waiting for the police.”“But we’re here and everything’s fine, so stop complaining,” she replied, scrunching her nose as he came around to join her on her side of the car, so they could walk up to the front door of the modest house they were outside together. This was a house they visited every Monday night for dinner, regardless of anything else going on in their schedule, so the routine was there and their presence was fully anticipated.They got to the door just as it opened and a small, scrawny boy with long hair curtaining his face was standing on the other side. “The camera thingy went ding and Mama said I could see who it was,” he said in a very loud, confident voice that didn’t match any aspect of his appearance, as he stepped out of the way of the door to let them inside. “I hoped it was you two! Mama, it’s Auntie Nah and Uncle Brady, they’re here for dinner!”“Lor, don’t make them stand outside forever!” they heard Noire yell in return, at which the boy motioned for them to come inside quickly, so that he could loudly slam the door to make sure that his mother knew it was closed.“Do you need any help cooking tonight, Noire?” Nah asked, cupping her mouth to allow her voice to be heard clearly. “I can come help if you’d like!”“I think I’ve got it, thanks! You just sit down and make yourself comfortable, I’ll be out in a bit!” As Noire was answering, the boy in the room was cleaning books and toys off of the couch so that there was a place to sit. “And if you’re interested, Brady, I think Laurent should be down in the study, he’s been working on some game thing again.”Brady’s eyes widened at the suggestion, and he looked at Nah right around the same time that she sat in the now-cleared spot on the couch. “You don’t mind if I go and see what he’s up to, do ya?”“Honestly, I figured you’d be asking where he was from the moment we came in, so go for it. I’ll just hang out with my favorite…” Nah paused, looking at the boy who was shoving all of his things into an already-overflowing bin in the corner. “Lor, how old are you?”“I’m seven, but I’ll be eight this summer,” Lor answered, focused on his work. “Mama says that when I turn eight, I can start doing sports with the bigger kids if I want, or I can keep doing library programs. I think I’m gonna stick to the library, but I don’t know yet!”“I’ll hang out with my favorite seven-year-old,” Nah finished, nodding toward Brady as her final approval that he go see what Laurent was working on. Before he headed downstairs, he did lean over the back of the couch and kiss her on the cheek, telling her he’d be back before dinner was ready, something that she highly doubted, knowing the kinds of nerdy stuff the two men could get into downstairs.“Auntie Nah, do you like coming over here?” Lor asked as he came back to the couch to grab more of his things and put them away. “You always come by, every single week.”“Well, do you like coming over to my house, because you’re over there every single week too.” Poking the boy right in the middle of his forehead, Nah laughed when she heard him humming as he pondered his answer, before not giving her anything at all except a laugh of his own. “But yes, I do like coming here, I like spending time with you and your parents.”“That’s silly, but I’m okay with that.” Lor looked at Nah, his eyes mostly obscured by his long hair, before he scurried back over to the bin where he was attempting to shove his things. “Mama says I let it get too messy in here, and I think she’s right. I’ve gotta get better about cleaning things up.”Taking a moment to look around at what remained of the mess, which was a lot of books on science and building materials, Nah reached over and picked up one of the leftover toys to play with as she watched Lor continue cleaning. “If I remember correctly, your dad’s always been bad about leaving things out while he’s in the middle of working on stuff. I can only imagine what kind of mess he has downstairs right now.”“I’m not allowed to go down and see his mess,” Lor said sadly, returning to the couch to scoop up everything else he had left to clean. “I guess it’s for grown-ups, but they always call it a game and aren’t games meant to be for kids? Why can’t I know?”“You know, if I know your dad well enough, and I do, then I know what kind of game he’s working on down there and it really, truly isn’t for children by any means.” Still playing with the little stretchy toy she’d picked up, Nah grabbed it by its arms and made it dance in between her and the child. “It’s kind of like a game that I used to play with your parents when we were all younger, but still very much adults.”“Then I want to play it even more. Let me play it!” With that one scream, Lor jumped onto the couch and began bouncing, wailing loudly about how he wanted to get to play, and Nah merely sat there, staring at him with her toy-playing slowly coming to a stop. The louder he got, the more aggressive his bounces became, and it got to the point that the whole couch was creaking under him, until someone rounded the corner from the kitchen with the sternest look on her face that got him to shut up at once.“I know I don’t hear someone in here being an entitled brat,” Noire coldly snapped, followed by a motion with one hand that told Lor he needed to sit down and stop his behavior. “Whatever made you decide you’re suddenly allowed to bounce on my furniture and demand things in my house, you can go ahead and forget all about it. Am I making myself clear, sir?”“Y-yes, Mama,” Lor replied, a timidity to his voice that matched his outward appearance. “I’ll sit here and be quiet now.”“Good. Don’t annoy Nah too much while you’re sitting there, you don’t want to be the reason she doesn’t want to come over anymore.” With that, Noire went back into the kitchen and the room became eerily quiet.Rather than try to drum up conversation with the child, or try to figure out why he’d gotten set off so quickly, Nah decided she was going to spend time making sure the rest of the night’s plans were still happening. She tossed the toy she was holding over to the bin, where it hit the top of the stack, then fell to the ground with a very soft thud. After that, she grabbed her phone from her little bag she still had over her shoulder, checking to make sure she hadn’t gotten any messages informing her of schedule changes. The only thing she had was a message from her mother, reminding her to go to the rec center and socialize for a little bit. “Already did that, Mom,” she muttered under her breath as she typed out the exact same words and sent them on their way.It was possible that plans had changed and she just hadn’t been informed, so she shot Lucina a quick message asking if they were still on for the celebrations that night. Almost immediately she got a positive response, which was a good sign, and it was followed by a check of who all was coming with her. “Hey Noire, are you guys still coming to the party tonight?” she asked out loud, hoping that she’d be heard in the kitchen.“If someone can keep their behavior in check, yes,” Noire replied, and it actually wasn’t obvious who she was referring to with that statement.“I’ll let Lucina know that you three are a probably, then.” There was no way that Nah wasn’t going to show up, given what the party was celebrating, and if she was going, Brady had no choice but to go as well. That meant that the message she sent was saying two were definitely going and three probably were, but that they were all looking forward to the event and seeing everyone there. Because, as Nah realized while typing the messages out, she had no idea who all had been invited, and therefore she didn’t have the slightest clue of who she’d be spending the evening with.“Mama told me that if we go, I won’t go to school tomorrow,” Lor remarked, turning to face Nah with his head hanging slightly. “Which I like school, so that makes me a little sad, but if it means getting to see the other kids…”Without thinking too much of it, Nah replied, “I wish I could skip going to school tomorrow just because we’re at this party tonight. You’re one lucky kid for getting that chance.”“But you’re an adult, can’t you just choose not to go?”She looked at her phone, then at Lor, and then back at her phone. “I mean, that’s correct, but that’s also a bad reason to not go in. There’s kids twice your age expecting to see me tomorrow, and I’d feel bad if I let them down.”“Then how about I get Mama so angry that she doesn’t let us go, and then you don’t go either, and then we both go to school tomorrow?” Lifting his head to show how serious he was about his suggestion, even though it was hard to see his expression behind his hair, Lor put both of his hands on Nah’s arm and gripped it tightly. “Come on, Auntie Nah, doesn’t that sound like a good plan?”“Hm, tempting, but I think I’ll go to the party and go to work tomorrow, even if I’d rather not.” Sometimes being a grown adult was a lot of hard choices, and even though she would have loved to have humored Lor and gotten him to act on his idea, she didn’t have any interest in dealing with the fallout of any of it. She’d rather suffer through a night of little sleep and a full day of actual working with students than skipping out on something that was partially happening because of her.A few minutes later, there was the sound of footsteps coming up from the basement, and the two men who’d been looking at game stuff emerged from the depths, both of them holding plastic bins in their hands. “We’re gonna take this with us, see if anyone there’s interested in giving it a try,” Brady explained, as he came to sit next to Nah on the couch. “Laurent’s got it worked out pretty well, but now we’ve gotta actually test it.”“I take it testing it with three players isn’t feasible, if we’re needing to recruit others?” Nah looked at the bin Brady had, taking a mental note of the sheer amount of paper and dice sets it contained, before craning her neck to look at Laurent with a nearly-identical bin in his hands as well. “Are you sure this is going to work?”“It is modifications of multiple already-existing systems, most of which have been antiquated and reworked in various ways by their original creators. I merely took the elements that I felt were most useful and combined them all into one single game, with straightforward rules and expectations that new players and veterans alike could understand without too much hassle.” Laurent shifted his bin so that he was holding it under one arm, so his now-free hand could push his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I also went through the trouble of removing any references to dragons and dragon-folk being seen as ‘evil,’ outside of not-so-thinly veiled references to one singular grim dragon, who would be the canonical big bad.”“He’s also changed up how dragon-folks work as player characters, so they’re not meant to be dumb and aggressive.” Since he was sitting down, Brady was able to get both hands off of his bin so that he could instead put them on Nah’s shoulders, as she turned to look at him with her eyes slightly narrowed. “Hey, I know that was a huge issue you’ve had every single time we’ve tried playin’ the legit stuff, so I figured you’d enjoy knowin’ that.”Nah pursed her lips as she thought about how she actually felt about that news. “On one hand, it’s nice knowing that dragons would be respected in this version of the game, but on the other, it was kind of great knowing that no one was going to do anything regarding dragons as long as I was playing.”“Except for me, right?”Her slow blink at Brady answered his question, and he chuckled. “Okay, but you getting to play as a dragon was only because I wanted you to see me doing something nice for you and think about what that could’ve meant for us.”“I want to get to be a dragon,” Lor interrupted, coming over from where he’d been futilely trying to organize his things in the corner to attempt reaching into the bin on Brady’s lap, but he was sharply told by all three adults in the room to stop. “Why can’t I get to know what’s going on? I want to be included!”Before anyone else had the chance to say something in response, Nah jumped in to stop a meltdown from happening a second time. “Lor, this is the game that we were talking about earlier. The one for adults, not for kids. When you’re a bit older, maybe in like four or five years, we’ll let you play it with us as a super special treat, but for now you just have to wait your turn.”The boy whined but didn’t argue further, and after one more whimper about wanting to be a dragon he went back to his attempt at organizing his things. “That was a masterful shutdown there, Nah,” Laurent remarked, his eyes fixated on how overly calm things were. “I take it that your years of working with children have taught you that skill?”“Oh please, we all know that I’ve been doing that sort of shutting down for twelve years now,” she laughed, before immediately gasping and grabbing her phone, almost like she was in a panic. “Ribbon! I wonder how everything’s been going with her, I know that—”“Dinner’s ready!” Noire called out, interrupting Nah’s thought and causing the entire dynamic there in that house to shift. No one was interested in caring about the bins of paper when there was a meal to be had, even if it was questionably cooked and tasted slightly like it had a few ingredients missing. It was always for the best to just let Noire do her thing and not say anything about it, in case it was enough to set her off emotionally. She seemed proud of what she’d made, even if her face contorted in disgust upon the first bite before playing it off as just biting down on her tongue instead of her food.Maybe it didn’t come as a surprise that halfway through dinner, she got up from the table, went back to the kitchen, and returned with a tray of formerly frozen snacks for everyone to eat as well. And while those were demolished in a matter of minutes, the rest of what she’d been making sat half-eaten and there wasn’t a single person (Noire herself included) that went back to trying to stomach it. Even with the lack of interest in the home-cooked portion of the dinner, everyone said things were great and pretended that nothing wrong had been served to them.Once what was edible had been eaten and the rest of the food had been taken care of in other ways, they decided there was no reason to delay leaving for the celebration any longer, and they split into the two vehicles and went on their way. Each car now had one of those bins in it, so that the men could be the ones carrying them into the house, and while Brady didn’t know if what he had was the rules or just supplemental materials, he decided that it wasn’t important enough to need to be there right away. That was how they ended up at a drive-up window getting some more food to make up for the lack of actual dinner they’d had, even though Nah insisted that there would probably be food at the party. “Sure, there’ll be food, but is it gonna be dinner? No. This’ll be worth it.”“Okay, but if there’s stuff there and we clearly aren’t eating it, then Noire might realize what we did and get mad, even though she didn’t eat her…” Nah trailed off as she looked in the rearview mirror and saw a very familiar car sitting right behind them, and she sighed, shaking her head. “If she gets mad at us, then that’ll be stupid, given that they’re here too.”“What’re the odds of that?” Also looking in the mirror, Brady ended up turning around in his seat and waving back at the car behind them, getting the three in the second vehicle all waving at him in return. “See, there’s no problem at all. You’re worryin’ about nothing, just like always.”“It was a very valid reason to be worried.”“Until it wasn’t.”Nah sighed again, shaking her head. “I mean, there’s still the chance that there’s going to be a bunch of food at the party that none of us are going to touch, and then that makes us look like we didn’t care about the hospitality being shown.”“If Noire was a halfway decent cook, we wouldn’t have been eating the food at the party anyway, so we’re just goin’ a little out of our way to still come to the same outcome. But let’s be honest for a sec, would you really wanna be eating the food at a party with a bunch of kids running around? They’re gonna have been getting their hands all in it and it’ll just be gross to even think about.” Brady gave a little nod, trying to get Nah to agree with him, but when she said nothing, he followed up with, “And you know what else?”“Actually, I don’t think I know what else. Go ahead and tell me.” Nah was curious as to what Brady could possibly have been referring to, and yet his answer was not satisfying in the slightest; he merely leaned over and kissed her gently, before pulling back as to not distract her from being focused on not running into the car in front of them. “That’s not something that goes along with what you were saying, just so you know.”“Eh, I honestly forgot where I was plannin’ on going with that. Let’s just get our food, eat it on the way, and then face whatever’s waitin’ for us there with a good attitude.”[]Even though they arrived outside the party’s location several minutes before the other car did, there was no rush on going in until all five of them could go inside together. Despite everyone knowing what had happened on the way, no one said a word about the extra stop as they grabbed the bins and headed for the front door to the rather spacious-looking house in a well-developed neighborhood on the outskirts of the city. There were several other vehicles in the driveway and parked out front, showing just how many people had been invited to this gathering, and that made everyone all the more excited to be there.Lucina was at the door to greet them with a smile, although she looked like she was in desperate need for some sleep. “I had to leave work early today to make sure everything was ready for this,” she explained as they all came inside. “Seriously, me, leaving work early, that’s not something I particularly enjoy doing. But I did it for the sake of making sure we could celebrate the year of the dragon appropriately.”“How, exactly, do you think you can celebrate it appropriately?” Nah asked, being the last one in the door and therefore not blocking anyone from coming in when she stopped in the doorway to look at Lucina with a curious expression. “That feels like something that you’d have reached out to others to find out details about.”“That’d be correct. Between Mother helping with some of the small things, and me reaching out to speak with Lady Tiki about bigger pieces, this was a group effort that I feel at peace with, now that it’s in full swing.” Clasping her hands together, Lucina looked at Nah and let her smile falter slightly. “I am worried about one tiny little thing, though.”Her mind immediately jumping to the more manakete-centric aspects the celebration could have included, Nah leaned forward, closer to Lucina. “What are you worried about? You forget to find a statue to remind everyone why they’re here?”“No, it’s…there’s a lot of children around here and—” A loud banging sound cut Lucina off, and she completely deflated, as the noises of screams and yelled apologies filled the air. All she could do was grimace and look at Nah with a glance that spoke novels about how that was what she’d been worried about.“As long as they’re not breaking anything related to dragons or manaketes or the like, I don’t think it matters if they’re clumsy and not careful,” Nah said, trying to make her friend feel a bit better about the situation. “At least, I’d hope that’s the case.”“There’s only one way for us to find out, I suppose.” With that, Lucina made motions to close the door, meaning that Nah had to move further into the entry hall so that she was no longer an obstacle. Then, once it was firmly locked (although it could easily have been unlocked once more by anyone inside), it seemed that Lucina wanted to have Nah come with her to go investigate the source of the noise. At first it didn’t make sense why that would be the case, but then Nah realized that, as someone who was identified as a manakete and had been raised entirely in that culture, she was being treated like the star of the party, even though Lucina also had quite the manakete lineage she claimed as well. But Nah wasn’t going to argue with the idea that she got to have the spotlight that night, so she went right alongside Lucina, down the hall and into the living space that was typically used for sitting around and watching movies.In the middle of the floor was a card table, now snapped in half, with a group of children sitting around it, while two adults were standing off to the side against the wall, while everyone was looking down at what had happened. “Do I…want to know the details here?” Lucina asked, not giving her attention to the kids but rather to the two adults. “This doesn’t seem like something any of these kids could’ve done on their own.”“I can tell you what happened!” screamed one of the girls on the floor, pointing a finger at the girl closest to the break in the table, who was looking around horrified and slightly dazed. “Tjana just threw herself onto the table and it broke, ‘cause she’s clumsy and always breaks everything!”“I-I didn’t mean to fall into it, I got pushed!” Tjana yelled back, pointing her finger back at the girl making the accusation. “And you saw that, Harlow, so don’t even try saying I did this on my own! I didn’t!”“Group effort, got it,” Lucina said, her eyes turning to the two girls. “Do either of you want to tell me who did the pushing, in a quiet voice? Or are we going to keep on yelling.”While those statements had been made, Nah was looking around to see if she could gather any evidence of her own, and when her gaze fell on how Lor had somehow managed to quickly get himself squeezed into a corner, hiding his face entirely, she began to piece things together. “Was it someone who just joined us?” she suggested, motioning with her head toward where Lor was sitting. “Or did you not actually see it?”“Well, I didn’t see who it was, I just saw Tjana falling into the table and it breaking under her.” Harlow crossed her arms in front of her and huffed. “You saw the same thing, didn’t you, Leilei?”As if she hadn’t been mentally in the room, Soleil’s head and shoulders popped up at mention of her nickname from her older sister and her eyes darted around, her trying to make sense of what was going on. “Sorry, I don’t think I saw anything at all,” she admitted, causing her sister to roll her eyes and mutter. “What? I was thinking about other things.”“It was…um. Um…” Beginning to move her hands around to try helping her come to the conclusion she was looking for, Tjana grew frustrated when the name she was trying to think of never popped up in her mind. “You guys, I fell really hard and my brain’s a little off right now, I can’t remember his name.”“Let me try to help you, then,” Nah said, squeezing past Lucina and getting down on her knees on the floor right behind Tjana, so that they were on equal-ish levels. Gently, she directed the girl’s attention over to the corner, where there was just enough of a boy visible to make a guess as to who it was. “Is that who ran into you?”“Yeah! You’re so smart and good at this sort of thing, no wonder Auntie Ribbon loves you so much.” The confusion and frustration that she’d been experiencing was erased, and Tjana’s upbeat attitude was back. “It was definitely…that guy.”Lucina looked over to where the attention had been drawn and she shook her head. “You literally just got here and you’re already causing property damage in my home, why does this not surprise me in the slightest. Out of the corner, Lor, you’re not in any trouble if it was just an accident.”“It was,” Lor meekly replied, pulling himself out of where he’d contorted himself to join everyone else. “I got excited seeing Atlas in here that I forgot to…walk carefully and I bumped into Tjana and she fell and I got worried that I’d get in trouble so I hid.”Having witnessed everything going on from the side of the room, Gerome took the opportunity to pull the blue-haired boy from off of his side and push him closer to the broken table. “Atlas also believed he would get in trouble, for whatever reason.”“I mean, it’s my fault for existing, right?” Atlas asked, sounding like he’d just been scolded despite nothing of the sort happening. “I’ll just head up to my room, that’s a better place for a kid like me anyway.”He ducked out the other door to the space they were all in, right as Lucina was reaching toward him to try and convince him otherwise. Her hand dropped and she took in a deep breath. “Right, now I’ll get to play mediator in this whole mess, instead of celebrating the night with my friends.” She paused, then glanced over at where Lor was sitting, arms wrapped around his legs and his hair messily covering his face. “Loire, you come with me, if anyone’s going to be able to talk sense into that boy it’ll be his best friend.”“Oh, he got the real name treatment, he’s in trouble.”“I’ll real name you as well, Tatjana, don’t even try me.” The sternness with which Lucina spoke shut Tjana right up, as well as put an end to the whispers that the sisters sitting next to her were sharing. Before she left, with Lor firmly in tow, Lucina looked at where Nah was still kneeling behind the girls and sighed. “You…try not to get too wrapped up in this pre-teen drama in here, honestly I think it would’ve been best if we’d let others deal with it to begin with.”“No, no, I’m getting out of this if you are.” It wasn’t what Nah wanted to do by any means, but she knew that the point of the celebration was for everyone to get to be together and having fun, and she couldn’t spend all of it hanging out with the children. She carefully got to her feet and went to join Lucina, but her friend had already left the room and the space was beginning to go back to normal, minus the broken table in the middle. “Right. Okay. I guess I’ll find something else to do.”She wandered out of that room and down toward the spacious kitchen, where almost all of the other adults were gathered, standing around another table covered in different snacks and drinks. “You were actually here after all,” Cynthia said, waving at Nah with one hand while her other arm was firmly holding a sleeping child against her side. “I was starting to think that Brady left you somewhere to come by himself.”“And I told you that she was probably just chattin’ with others, like she tends to do,” Brady retorted, coming to stand almost protectively at Nah’s side. “You’re gonna tell her that that’s what you were doing, yeah?”“I mean, I was, Lucina and I were finding out what that loud sound had been and we ended up in the room with all of the kids because that’s where it came from.” At that, everyone who had a child present that evening began clamoring for information, wanting to know the specific details of what had happened. Nah knew better than to throw all the names out in one fell swoop, so she merely said, “It was the typical suspects, doing exactly what they always end up doing. That is, forgetting what personal space is like and getting too close to others for them to not fall into things.”Giving a very weary sigh, Yarne stood up from one of the stools that had been brought out for the occasion, putting a hand on Kjelle’s shoulder to keep her from getting up as well. “I’m taking that as Tjana being involved, so I’ll go check on her.”“It wouldn’t happen any other way, now would it?” she remarked, before looking at Nah to see if they were right. “Go on, you can say it.”“She didn’t mean to do anything, it just happened that someone smaller than her forgot that running around can knock people over and that was the end of it.” Pausing, Nah quickly glanced at Cynthia and added, “Plus, your girls were in there making matters worse with their finger-pointing and blaming and all that.”“Were they now? With their father in there and everything?” Sounding shocked, Cynthia once again adjusted the child she was holding, before walking past to go see what was going on for herself. “I’ll go remind them what kindness is supposed to look like, thanks for the head’s up on that, Nah!”“You really show up in a room and make everyone clear out of the place, don’t you?” With a laugh, it was then that Kjelle got off of her stool and came to stand on Nah’s other side, playfully putting her elbow as close to Nah’s shoulder as she could comfortably get it. “Well, I’m here to tell you that you’re stuck with me.”Thinking about the implications of that statement, Nah couldn’t come to a solid conclusion and she decided it wasn’t a matter worth pressing. “Okay, well, in the literal five minutes I was in there dealing with kid problems, did you all decide you were going to do something I’m not aware of?”“We’re going to test Laurent’s game once we know if anyone else is showing up,” Noire answered, looking up from her phone across the kitchen. “And we kind of figured that you wouldn’t be interested in trying it out here, since there’s so much else going on…”“I’ve been interested in it since day one, though?”“But I’m here, and I’m sure as hell not wasting my night playing it.” Kjelle used her elbow to nudge Nah a bit. “Which is why I say you’re stuck with me. I’m thinking we find one of those cheesy horror-romance movies, sneak up to the guest bedroom, and watch it as long as we can before someone comes looking for us.”Brady leaned down to get a bit closer to the two women, chuckling as he did. “I might’ve pointed out that it’s got a small player limit right now, since I was just lookin’ at the game earlier, and I figured if anyone would be willin’ to sit out here tonight, it’d be you. Since there’s a lot more interest in the game than we thought there’d be.”“Who even is going to try playing it? I’m so confused, I don’t know who else is here that would be interested in it.” Nah’s eyes were darting all around the room, looking to see who there could be that would bump her from the spot in the test round she’d been looking forward to. “I can’t think of anyone else…”At once, the world inside the house seemed to explode with excitement as multiple voices began ringing out from the upstairs floor, and that sound was enough to explain everything to Nah at once. “I think hearin’ him being loud as always should probably tell you what you need to know, yeah?” Brady asked, standing back up to his mostly-full height. “Trust me, only reason I knew Owain was here was because everyone else told me, but I guess it makes sense. You know that the Nohrians he’s wrapped up with find importance in the year of the dragon as well, don’t you?”“I knew that, yes, but that doesn’t explain why he gets to play and I don’t.” With a hmph, Nah turned her head slightly toward Kjelle and pouted. “I guess I’ll go find something to watch with you, it’s been a while since we’ve done that. Might be a good use of our time.”“We’ll miss having you playing with us, Nah!” Noire called out, putting on a huge smile as she spoke. “You’ll just have to come over early next Monday to try it then!”Rather than say what she thought on the matter, Nah waved it off and motioned to Kjelle for them to go find that guest room and get something on the TV for them to watch. So off toward the staircase they went, crossing paths with Owain and the gaggle he usually brought with him (which included his bonus child Nina but not her father, just like it always did). Pleasantries were exchanged, a couple hugs were given between Nah and the two girls that were with him—she wasn’t sure why they both liked her so much, but she wasn’t going to complain about getting hugs from either Ophelia or Nina—and then they went on their ways, as to not congest the walkway in the house.As they passed the doorway to the room where the other kids were, it sounded like things were going smoothly in there, a scene unlike the one that had been taking place earlier. They even got a few waves from the children that were able to see them as they passed by. “I don’t know why Lucina thought letting them all be here tonight was a good idea, but since everyone else has it under control, I am perfectly fine with stepping away and hiding from that responsibility for the night,” Kjelle admitted, as they came to the stairs, both of them looking up to see Lucina and two boys coming down at the same time.“Are you both trying to hide from everyone?” Lucina called down at them, before motioning for them to step aside to let them pass by. When she got down to the bottom and saw the smiles on the others’ faces, she laughed. “Sounds about right. I’ve just spent time explaining to those boys that neither of them are in trouble, and I think they took it to heart, but they’re now insisting on calling each other by their full first name and that’s going to be a problem as soon as they go into that room and throw other names around. Which, admittedly, is my fault because I started it.”“As long as they don’t call me my full first name, I don’t think there’s too much harm in it?” Nah said, before looking at Kjelle to see her smile faded and her eyes narrowing. “Oh, right, Tjana doesn’t…”“I’ll go talk some sense into them before they start another round of drama.” Stepping aside, Kjelle promised that she’d be right back, before she broke out into a run to chase those boys down and tell them what she felt they needed to hear.“See, no one ever uses Atlas’ actual name, so when I dropped it on him to get him out of his room, Lor overheard it, and started using it, then Atlas went on and started using Lor’s full name, and I guess it never occurred to me that only adults can get away with using Tjana’s full name without her getting upset.” There seemed to be more to that thought than what Lucina said, but she was quickly distracted by the sound of the doorknob to her front door being jostled. “Huh? Did someone step out while I was upstairs?”Because she didn’t have any clue, Nah didn’t answer, but she was quickly made to wish that she had, when the door came open and stepping inside from the darkness was a bundled-up man with deep blue hair that immediately struck fear into her heart. She was hidden just well enough behind Lucina that she wasn’t noticed at first, but when the man came in and closed the door behind him, his sister quickly moved to approach him. “Hey, sorry I came over without warning, it’s a long story and—”“Morgan, you were supposed to be gone already, weren’t you?” With open arms, Lucina grabbed him in a big hug, spinning him halfway around before setting him back down. “I thought your flight out was earlier?”“—I said it’s a long story, but the short one is that it got delayed to three in the morning so I decided I’d pop by and see you one last time before I left. Wasn’t expecting all those cars out there, guess you’re having a party or something?” He sounded different. More mature, perhaps? More like his life had gotten pieced together since the last time they’d been in the same place. But, despite how she felt about him, Nah couldn’t help but watch the siblings interacting, even if there was the fear that she’d be noticed.“Come on, make yourself comfortable, I guess you’ll be able to see most of your friends before you go,” Lucina was saying, grabbing Morgan’s arm to pull him into the fray, but she didn’t get very far before he was putting his feet down in resistance.“Hey there, Dinah.”“H-hey there, Morgan.”The exchange took her back further than their last encounter; she was mentally transported back to the days of weekly get-togethers in his parents’ house to play games and have fun, where they’d been friends and everything had been fine between them. He brushed his sister off, telling her that he’d come find her in a bit, and Lucina seemed hesitant to listen, but she heeded after he repeated the request. “It’s been, what, almost ten years at this point?” he asked once they were alone, keeping his distance but having his gaze fixed entirely on her. “Haven’t ever thought about seeing you again since I got uninvited from your wedding.”“I…never thought I’d see you again either after all that, honestly.” She didn’t want to see him either, but she didn’t have a choice now that they were in the same place. “How are things? Lucina mentioned a flight?”“Yeah, uh, life’s been wild since we fell out.” Morgan reached up and unzipped his jacket, taking it off and throwing it down right near the front door. “I got the help I needed, realized that I was just doing things in all the worst ways, spent a lot of time wondering if it’d be worth trying to rebuild friendships and decided I shouldn’t waste my breath after everything I did. After that, I cut off the people steering me wrong and started getting my life in order. Got a job doing some big business planning stuff, moved up the ladder a bit, and now I’m leaving Ylisse, you know, later tonight to keep moving higher in my career.”Nah nodded as she listened to him, happy to hear about these positive changes but feeling awkward that she was hearing them from him. “That’s so nice for you, I’m glad everything’s going well in your life.”“After everything that happened back then? It’s good to be able to say it. What about you? You…” He trailed off, giving a wild gesture in her direction. “You look like you’re doing pretty good for yourself. Marriage still treating you well, I take it?”He hadn’t asked about her job. He hadn’t asked how things in general were going. He’d looked right at her and instead wanted to know about how her marriage was going, which felt indicative that perhaps he hadn’t changed all that much after all. But then, Nah realized that there was no reason for Morgan to care about anything else, because it had been her marriage that had been the final nail in the coffin of their friendship. “Yeah, it’s all going fairly well. Year of the dragon’s upon us, you can only guess how much pressure there’s been to do something about it. And, well…”“Your face has a glow to it I don’t ever remember seeing. Not making any assumptions, but there’s that for you.” He forced a smile, before looking past Nah entirely and nodding. “I’m going to go find my sister now, but it was nice seeing you again, if just for a moment.”Whatever feeling Nah had on the matter, it wasn’t that she felt it was nice to see Morgan again, and she couldn’t muster another word in his direction, even as he passed her by. She did get a laugh out of hearing him scream when he saw Kjelle come out of the other room, as old fears never quite went away. “Please tell me that wasn’t Morgan, and that he wasn’t over here bothering you,” she said when she came back to Nah’s side. “I could’ve sworn that he knows he’s not supposed to be anywhere near us.”“He’s leaving the country, Kjelle, I’m going to let him have this one.” In a daze, Nah started up the stairs, not sure what else she wanted to say or what she even wanted to do at that point. She’d been prepared to go watch a movie, but now she wasn’t sure she was ready to do anything more than just sit and think. When she got up to the second floor, she slowly reached out to grab all of the doors she saw, not wanting to open them and find anything happening on the other side, but also not wanting to be out in the hallway like she was.“Whoa, okay, time out.” Coming up behind her and grabbing her shoulders to stop her where she was, Kjelle took in a deep breath before prompting Nah to do the same. “What did he say, or do, that’s rattled you this bad? I’m not afraid to go remind him who he’s supposed to be scared of around here.”As comforting as it was to be reminded that she had such a good friend willing to go inflict physical violence on someone for her, it wasn’t what Nah needed. “It’s just him being here. Existing in the same place as us. But he’s not being weird or creepy, he says he’s gotten help and that’s what matters.”“If it was what mattered, you wouldn’t be acting like this.” Slowly, Kjelle was able to walk Nah over to the wide open doorway that led into a big guest living room, with an adjoining bedroom for people to sleep in, and she got her settled down on the couch. “I’m not leaving this room unless you need me to, or unless it’s clear that he needs his ass kicked. Whichever one works for you.”Blinking a few times, Nah sank back into the cushions and let out a long sigh. “I saw his face and was taken back to when he was still my friend. A lot of things have changed since then, most of them good but some of them a little more unexpected. And he wasn’t around or welcomed for any of them. But he’s here, on the same day he was around twelve years ago, and it just…it’s throwing me off.”“You’re not about to let him ruin your night. Forget about him, forget about his face and his appearance and him being here, and let’s do something more fun for both of us.” Kjelle sat down next to Nah, pulling out her phone and swiping away all of her work-related messages before getting to a text chain that she pulled up, scrolled through, and pressed a picture on. “I know what’ll get your mind off of this.”“Given that it’s you suggesting it, and you’re on your phone, can I take a guess that it’s related to your sister-in-law in some way?” Nah didn’t want to say it, but part of her thought process in that moment was how life had changed for so many of them in the past twelve years, not just in regards to her former friendship with Morgan. When she saw Kjelle merely show the picture on her phone instead of answer, and it was of Ribbon and her girlfriend excitedly holding a very small bundled baby between them, all Nah could think was that there was no way that her former student was old enough to have a kid of her own.But she’d been her student twelve years ago, and time was a cruel mistress.“If you’d sat me down years ago and told me that Ribbon would have a kid before me, I would’ve laughed right in your face,” Nah said after giving the whole situation some thought, “because she’s into women. I’m too young-looking to force myself through that, but that’s not why I would’ve doubted it happening. Yet here we are, huh?”“Something about these special years for these cultures brings out the strangest things possible happening. I can’t explain it, but it’s true.” Showing a few more pictures, Kjelle ended up putting her phone down and grabbing one of Nah’s hands. “I’ll seriously go beat Morgan up for you if you’d like me to. He doesn’t deserve to have the power to make you feel this way.”“No, it’s fine, let’s just do what you said and forget about him. He’s not worth the energy, not when there’s so much else to think about.”Nah was glad that she didn’t get asked what she thought they should think about instead, because her mind was racing with far too much to have any suggestions. This was not the way she expected the year of the dragon to start, but she had faith in Naga that maybe, just maybe, this was a sign of a good year ahead.