Uncharted Waters
Anne sincerely did not understand why anyone would intentionally want children and while Dan could understand it he still didn’t want any, he saw plenty of them at work and he wasn’t that impressed or interested in the whole thing to be honest. But they both cared very much about the Brock family so they wanted to drop by and help out. They knocked on the front door and were surprised that Agony opened it.
“We’re coloring! Do you wanna color with us?” She greeted them exuberantly.
“We definitely want to color with you! But first we need to see your parents, where are they?”
“I don’t know!” She answered running off back into some other part of the house.
Well that wasn’t a great sign but they found them in the living room, Eddie passed out on the couch with Sleeper doing the same thing right next to him.
“Oh wow, he’s...completely asleep isn’t he? Just right in the middle of whatever he was doing.”
“It’s okay, I am watching them both.”
“Venom, aren’t you tired too? Or at least bored?” She wondered out loud.
“Yes to both. I don’t really need sleep per se but I typically rest and recover energy when Eddie does. Offspring make that more difficult.”
There was a pause before they prophetically added:
“See?”
They all looked down and yep, Sleeper was up and Eddie must have noticed because he woke up too and looked around like he had no idea where he was.
“Hi Eddie. We’ve come to take over for a few hours so you guys can have a break.” She smiled.
“Seriously? Isn’t this not really your thing? Like really not your thing?” He looked skeptical.
“I should be offended but I’m not because we’ve been friends for a long time.” She raised an eyebrow at him.
“Okay, if you’re really sure…Um…It’s bath time for Sleeps and then he’ll need to eat and then it’s bed after that. It’s the others you’ll need to watch out for, they can get...rambunctious.”
“We both have advanced post graduate degrees. We’ll be fine.”
“We trust you both.”
“Come on, get out of here and do something fun. Or go to our place and sleep, we don’t care.”
They didn’t need to be told twice, they took this golden opportunity and bolted. Not that they didn’t love and adore their children with the passion of a thousand burning suns, they just really needed a break. Just a little one.
“Okay, bath time. Let’s get you all clean, hmm?” Anne bounced Sleeper feeling confident.
She took him to the bathroom while Dan went to color with the other kids. They only got about four minutes into bath time before she was sure she was more soaking wet than she’d ever been without actually taking a shower herself. He was in a tiny mini baby tub inside the big tub and there wasn’t even that much water in it so she really didn’t understand how he was doing this. He was squirming and squiggling and splashing water literally everywhere and while the baby soap smelled nice she couldn’t even tell if he was getting clean or not.
“Come on Sleeper, hold still for me?”
But he just whined loudly, he really was not enjoying this. She held out a colorful toy to him but he batted it away before the whining turned into full on screaming and with that she was out of ideas.
“Dan! Dan, come in here and do what you’ve been professionally trained for!”
A minute later he appeared in the doorway.
“What do you- God what’s happening in here?” He looked around.
“He’s freaking out. Trade places with me, you’re better at babies. I’ll watch the older kids.”
“Oh yeah sure, I can take over in here.” He relieved her of bath duty.
She dried off as best she could and walked into the dining room where the kids were supposed to be coloring and yeah they were coloring when she got there, just on the wall. Great. Should not have left them unsupervised.
“Uh, what are you guys doing?” She asked and they looked up at her with faces that told her they obviously knew they weren’t supposed to be doing what they were doing.
Especially Carnage who looked like they may have instigated the whole thing.
Watching kids she was cool with but disciplining them? No way, not her forte. Aunt’s don’t discipline, aunt’s are fun. So she did the obviously adult thing: took them into the living room and left the mess for later. When Dan came in with a towel wrapped Sleeper he raised an eyebrow at her.
“What happened in there?” He asked clearly referring to the crayon mural in the other room.
“You have to stop asking me that every time you enter a room tonight, honey.” She scowled.
They gathered everyone in the living room for a game so they could both keep eyes on all of them at once because they stood a better chance as a team. She was feeding Sleeper and this was easier, this she could do. Dan set up a Jenga tower and they all sat around it in a circle taking very carefully thought out and strategized turns. For the most part they played it safe and took blocks off the top but Carnage ever the thrill seeker tempted fate by only taking blocks from the bottom half sending the whole tower shaking every time.
Agony and Phage started throwing Jenga blocks at each other for no apparent reason other than it was a mildly entertaining thing to do. Could they get hurt doing that? Venom was mostly bulletproof but Eddie definitely wasn’t so where did hybrids fall? Fire? Bad. Certain levels of sound? Bad. Small wooden blocks? No idea. But before they could question or intervene the siblings got bored and stopped as abruptly as they started.
“No throwing?” She tried because it still felt like she should say something.
In the middle of Lasher’s turn, which was very long due to his careful consideration, Anne glanced down at Sleeper again.
“His eyes are still closed, should his eyes be closed like that for this long? Am I doing it wrong?”
She immediately panicked as she realized that despite what she told Eddie she knew literally nothing about small infants. At least the other kids could walk and talk and knew not to stick their fingers in electrical sockets. Infants didn’t know anything and they were terrifying when they were your responsibility.
“It’s fine, Annie.” Dan chuckled a bit at her panic.
“He’s just happy to be eating.” He assured her.
“But shouldn’t he be more, I don’t know, stimulated? Babies are supposed to have stimulation. I read that.”
“Well we want him to sleep soon so no. Really, he’s perfectly fine...Trust me, I’m a doctor.” He added cheekily.
“I really don’t get the appeal here, Dan. Babies are just like tiny, fragile old people who can’t control their bodies and can’t be coherently understood by anyone. And people always say babies are cute but they’re not cute, they look like unsalted peanuts...Well, this one is cute but that’s only because he’s half alien.”
“I know he’s making you nervous but you’re doing a great job, Annie.” Her husband said the last part while looking at her with sheer love and fondness in his eyes and she couldn’t help but blush and look away for a second.
The tower came toppling down after an especially daring move by Carnage causing the others to shriek in surprise and disappointment. All kids apparently took all games extremely seriously. According to the routine it was time for the littlest one to be put down for bed. After putting him down she found the others in a hastily constructed blanket fort, even Dan who was way too big for it. The fort was even filled with cushions and pillows.
“He went right down.” She stated with little victory fist pump.
“Come in the fort!” Phage yelled.
Because it’s probably a cardinal sin to tell a six year old no if they invite you into their blanket fort, she got on her knees and did her best to squeeze in with the five children and one other adult into the four-foot by four-foot space. The kids passed a flashlight around to hold under their faces dramatically as they took turns telling made-up scary stories, they were more silly and nonsensical than scary though. They turned on a movie and it wasn’t long before they all fell asleep among the many pillows and cushions. But because they were spread out like little sleeping landmines her and Dan were stuck where they were.
“You think you’ll ever want one of these?” Dan asked her, keeping his voice down.
“God no. How about you?” She twisted around to look at him.
“Never.” He responded very quickly.
They both struggled to suppress their burst of laughter.
“How do they do this all day, every day? We’ve only been here like four hours and I don’t know if I’ve ever been this tired from doing next to nothing.”
The two of them sat there unable to move but enjoying the familiar comfort of each other until they heard a key slide into the front door followed by footsteps. Eddie came into the living room with Venom and they both smiled seeing the group huddled inside the blanket fort.
“Your son hates baths by the way.” She told her long time friend and one time fiancé.
“Yeeeah, he’s going through a little bit of a phase right now. Sorry.” Eddie rubbed the back of his neck.
“I’m really impressed, Annie. I know you hate kids.” He winked at her.
“I don’t hate kids, Eddie...Well, I don’t hate your kids.”
The next morning Anne got a phone call asking what happened to the dining room wall.