“Your special somebody is staring at me.” Luna said dourly, levitating a cup full of pretend tea. “Make him stop.”
And so Thomas was.
His brown, wide and owl-like eyes blatant as they stared over the rim of his plate. The plate he hid behind, using his curious tiny hands to lift it over his face. A hiding tactic of his own devising, which would have been much more clever had he remembered to hide the rest of his body.
Instead, he chose to reside at the front of the table.
He and I waiting for Luna to take a sip.
She did not.
I heard her clearly insightful observation and responded in kind, slurping loudly my fellow empty cup. I won't pretend spittle didn't fly. It did. Mercilessly. And how I didn't control it.
Encouraging it, in fact.
I lowered my cup, engaging in giving a fat raspberry in her direction. With my tongue, not actual fruit, as the modern expression goes. How much of the modern expressions Luna understands, I worry a great deal. Luna joined us with certain expectations and I'm sure those very same expectations are letting her down.
Not me, of course.
On a roll, I sent her another raspberry that she managed to duck.
I am the very model of adult maturity.
Thomas giggled, his pudgy and perfect cheeks alight as he watched my little act. Foals under the age of five always had a keen love for the cruder humor. I'm sure the same applied to him and his, the huemons. Thomas always attempted to spell them as homans but I'm certain he means huemons. He was a bit smaller and shorter than the typical foal but he certainly ate well here and at home.
His ticklish chubby belly and adorable stubby toes proved that.
Indulging myself just a little too much, I levitated the boy over and messed up his yellow mane. He loved it when I did that, capturing him between my hooves, him calling out all sorts of foreign oaths like “With the power of Thor, I will escape!” and “I'm going green!” Thomas changed colors so often that I thought huemons must be right. Perhaps, he will go entirely green and it will be easier to convince him to eat his vegetables. He has as much of a sweet tooth as I did and if it weren't for doctors and magic, I certainly would have lost mine.
I let him go once his cheeks turned a well-tickled pink and he shimmied his way free and out of my lap.
And then as if I hadn't caught him at all, he went back to work to the kitchen. Declaring himself a master chef and shouting out that “It's raw. Do it again.” ever so often. Foals.
Throughout all of that, Luna's lips hadn't even wiggled into a grin. She was always too serious but at least, she had the sense not to the act that way completely around the child. I considered giving her a slap on the shoulder but that would likely give her grounds to stab me. With her horn. And no, that is not a expression. The two of us sat in silence, Luna perhaps waiting for Thomas to get fully entranced with his play, before attacking.
She waited only thirty seconds.
“Celestia, you will cease this foolishness. This is not the Tommy I was promised. If this is some trick, let's see how many nights you can go without sleep.” She growled, knocking heads with mine. Our horns crossed and I contemplated crossing my eyes to incite her even further. “Stop playing around.” Luna huffed, overzealous and unbelievably overdressed.
In her madness, she had donned a blood-red velvet dress with a split along the hip almost obscene and starry hair pinned in a side-bob. I can imagine in any other setting she would've have had the eyes of the room. But here, in this playroom I've set up for Thomas, she looked, forgive me, a fool.
The bright orange and white palette I picked for the room did her no favors. Making each shade on her figure a sagging and out of place shadow. The color of her exquisite dress, now a cheap and pale red. And herself, by her actions and mood, a dark and grumpy cloud attempting to rain on our happy parade.
Thomas comes only ever so often, and she knows it, I won't allow her ruin this. The child winks into this world because of some innate magical talent, coming and going freely in a blink. He's far too young to know how to control his powers so I've taken certain steps to guarantee his safety. A few necessary spell safeguards on his form to keep him from winking into a wall or a solid object when he comes to visit. A dousing nexus in the middle of this room to keep him visiting other worlds that might be too inhospitable for a child at this age.
For whom she thought was playing around, I had only two suspects. Thomas, playing with his miniature kitchen set I acquired for him, was pretending to bake us a mighty cake. He already told me his most secretest of ingredients. Real jelly worms to top the inedible cake.
And lastly, her. The red-hoofed culprit by the looks of it.
If she wishes us to play, then I will provide.
“Dear Sister,” I whispered, trying not to make light of her distress, “playing around is the point. Now I've tried to be civil with you.” Which Luna hated more, my words or my pleasant face, her glare couldn't make up its mind. “And you did invite yourself to this date. Tommy was very excited to meet you. Don't make him regret you coming.”
Thomas perked up at the sound of his name, proving that he was indeed listening. I turned my attention from Luna and gave him a wave. He waved back and resumed his spontaneous battle of the flying cake versus the utensil army.
I imagined that dessert might take longer than expected.
At home, Thomas must wink around the place but only when he has a great magical surge does he come to Equestria. I have been trading letters with his family on Earth but his older sister has yet to find any good fortune in convincing their parents that the boy has magic. And even in their letters to each other, the words are muddled on the transport with only images remaining un-tampered. Resorting to pictographs, they communicate and the girl appreciates the boost to her art grade oddly enough.
“Make him regret?” Her voice cracked, attempting to rise into a shout before I gave her a warning. “I regret. I regret in thinking that you were more than a obtuse prude!” I stuck my tongue out, ready to use it. “You said that you were going on a date. That you had been going on dates with the mysterious Tommy.”
“Yes, I have.” Thomas and I just had our best friend forever party last week. You don't get one of those unless you've been friends for a whole month. Ask Twilight.
“No, you haven't!” Luna's voice rose and I had enough. I pulled from her and bopped her gently on the snout. Luna blinked, anger filling her face as she snarled. “You will not treat me like some foal, Celestia.” I bopped her again. “Stop it!” She squealed, trying to screech before I bopped her once more. “You're being childish.” Luna moaned, her voice now at the perfect whispering level.
“That is the point.” I said, pulling back my most dangerous of hooves. Everyone feared the left hoof. “I just don't understand where this extremely inappropriate confusion could have come from. The moment you waltzed in with that get-up, I should have asked you to leave. Why would you come dressed like that to a play date?”
“You said date.” Luna sputtered. “I assumed you meant date-date and when you brought up play-date...! I thought you wanted me to meet your special somebody. And we would play-” Her voice lowered, husky and sultry. I did not need the mental image that her meaning of play had to entail. “on the date. We would eclipse the... somebody in our greatly vigorous...”
My sister cringed.
I tried not to cringe with her.
I failed.
“I can't even use the right euphemism around that innocent soul. Do you know how long it took me to work up the nerve to join you two? And now, you aren't even you two! I went to the spa. I had things plucked and waxed and scrubbed. I even got a trainer, wanting not to be outshined by you of all ponies in the bedroom. That is my domain alone, Celestia! I don't need it,” She scoffed, puffing herself with her wings fanning out, “but I wanted to be at my peak when I showed you up and... and... it was all for nothing! I can't simply accept that.”
I chose to ignore everything Luna implied. Such thoughts were not be even considered while I was watching over Thomas.
“Thomas is my special somebody or he was until he told me that he's a huemon.” I stated slowly, trying to comprehend how she could have made such a leap from an innocent statement made a while ago. The poor mare must have some deeper seated issues she needs to work out. As the kids say, Luna needs to get laid. “Now he is my special huemon. Does that clear up the confusion?”
My sister threw herself into her hooves. “But I thought-”
“You think too much.” I said, lifting my cup with my magic. Thomas was now fiddling with the snack bag. “Luckily for you, Thomas is too young to completely understand what we are talking about. Now smile.” I raised my voice, directing it in the child's direction. “Tommy worked really hard on his cake, didn't he?”
Thomas placed the cake, a imitation of white marble cake with a ring of strawberries, in the center of the table. We cheered for him as he pulled open the bag, with just a little help from me, and spilled the jelly worms everywhere.
Luna and I clinked our cups together, cementing my belief that Luna could never, ever find out about anything in my love life.
Tony be damned.
Author's Note
As you noticed, Momlestia fic! No angst or deeper plot at hand (yet). Just something I wanted to play with.
