Chapter Text
“This is even more ridiculous than the other costume,” Agatha gently mutters, adjusting the stuffed neck of the newest dinosaur costume ontop of Nicky’s head.
Nicky waves a tiny fist that is poking from the end of the cloth flipper attached to the arm of the costume, trying and failing to stick his fist in his mouth. The blue flipper flops in his face and on his nose, which he wrinkles in displeasure.
Finally, he sticks the flipper in his mouth instead, gurgling up at Agatha. Spit bubbles from the side of his mouth as he coos, releasing the end of his flipper sleeve and waving the wet fabric around with a series of babbles.
Agatha scrunches her face at him, leaning down to blow a raspberry on his damp cheek. Her heart swells when he shrieks in delight at the action, his little feet kicking up at her.
She gently grabs at his uncostumed toes, patient as she guides the baby’s squirming limbs into the feet of the costume. “My, my, you’re so squirmy!” She coos to him, blowing another raspberry on his tummy before zipping up the costume.
Nicky reaches for her face with a smile that crinkles up his eyes and shows off his two, tiny front teeth. He grabs a hold of her cheeks, chanting, “Mama, mama, mama!”
Agatha beams, nuzzling her nose against his. “Mama, mama, mama,” she repeats back to him warmly, pressing a series of soft, tender kisses to his cheek. She gently grabs his hands and pries them from the death grip they have on her own cheeks, pressing kisses to his tiny balled fists.
She pulls back to adjust the head of the costume on the baby’s own and the plush tail that she’s tucked off to his side so he’s not laying on it.
She steps back a little to admire her work, placing her hands on her hips. She tilts her head, grinning down at him on the changing pad. “You look absolutely ridiculous,” she tells Nicky fondly. “I can’t wait til your daddy sees you. She’s gonna freak out.”
Nicky kicks, the flippers on his feet flailing wildly at the action. He brings his arms down to his side, his voice going a little deeper when he repeats with a grunt, “Dada!”
Agatha beams, hoisting Nicky up from the changing table with a small grunt of her own. She blinks in surprise when the snout of the costume’s head comes up and bonks her in the nose. She narrows her eyes back at the tiny, black beads. “Watch it, Nessie.”
Her response makes Nicky squeal and laugh, reaching up to grab at her face again. He grabs a fistful of her cheek and some of her hair, tugging.
Agatha puffs out her cheeks, the action causing Nicky to let go of her face. She looks down at him with a playful scowl, tickling his stomach with her fingers after gently prying the strands of hair from his fists. “Oh, you think that’s funny, huh?”
Nicky just beams up at her, lifting his arm to chew at the sleeve of his costume once more.
Agatha presses several quick kisses to his cheek. “Come on,” she murmurs, adjusting the baby to lean him against her side. “Let’s go show your daddy your new costume.”
She leaves the door to Nicky’s room open as they exit, wandering down the hall past their bedroom, a bathroom and a storage closet. She finally pads out to the living room, turning the corner to head upstairs.
Past the study, past a guest bedroom, and finally coming to a stop in front of the last door. Taped to the door is a paper yellowed with age, the sign reads “Rio’s Spider Room” written messily with black Sharpie. A terrible illustration of a black widow is drawn on the bottom right, the body just a massive black dot with a red hourglass in the middle, all eight legs drawn from the center mass without much symmetry or consistency.
Agatha adjusts the top of Nicky’s costume one more time to ensure it’s perfect before cracking open the door and peaking inside.
The “Spider Room” is one of the smallest rooms in the house, plain pale blue walls with a large sliding glass door at the end of the room that leads out to a small covered balcony. In the winter, it often lays bare, but now in the springtime the balcony is covered in potted plants and flowers.
On the left side of the room is a black garage storage shelf that goes from floor to ceiling. The shelves hold various geodes, crystals and fossils Rio’s collected and been gifted over the years. Some lay in cases and shadow boxes, others are simply held up by metal displays, and other lay bare on the shelf.
An identical shelving unit lays parallel on the other side of the room, though this one hosts all of Rio’s spiders.
Thirty locked tanks of varying sizes line the shelves, all beautifully planted and decorated specifically for each tarantula species each enclosure holds. The very bottom shelf holds a plastic bin filled with cardboard scraps and newspaper for roaches: the spiders’ main food source.
Sitting with her legs crossed legged in front of the spider shelf, long lock of hair spilling free of a messy bun with her frame drowning in a large, dark graphic tee and shorts is Rio. In her hand is a large, orange arachnid that crawls across her palm slowly.
The specific spider Rio holds is known as an “Orange Bitey Thing”, a species known to be extremely aggressive, flighty, and, yes, bitey. Though, with years of determination, Rio has the thing tamed down and can handle it with no problem, and had given the large arachnid the non-threatening name of “Otis”.
Agatha stares for a moment, chest squeezing at how in her element Rio looks in at this very moment. She’s completely relaxed in a situation most would never want to be in the first place, looking completely content as the large spider pads slowly across her palm.
Nicky blows a raspberry, knocking both Agatha and Rio from their respective transes.
Rio gently blinks, turning her head to the door with a wide smile. “Hi,” she says gently, carefully lifting Otis and letting the orange spider crawl from her hand and back into her enclosure. She gently shuts his door, threading a lock through the enclosure’s front and snapping it shut.
She turns back to Agatha, displaying the Super Mario style graphic on her shirt. The font, also reminiscent of the Nintendo game, reads “Super Daddio” in colorful blocked letters.
Rio slowly rubs hand sanitizer in her hands, tilting her head to the side. “What’s up?”
Agatha adjusts Nicky, still hidden by the door, against her side once more. “Nothing,” she says innocently, turning briefly to smile at Nicky before turning to her wife. “I just… have a surprise for you.”
Rio places her hands on her hip, tilting her head to the other side with a smile so reminiscent of Nicky’s, it makes Agatha’s heart soar. “A surprise, huh?”
Agatha is silent as she carefully bumps the door open with her shoulder, slowly swinging Nicky out towards Rio with a grin. “Ta-da!”
Nicky is still chewing at the flippers attached to his sleeve, the ones at his feet dangling limply. His tail sways slightly, and the head of the costume sags on top of the long neck, the beady black eyes trained on Rio.
Nicky blinks over at Rio, eyes widening. He reaches out, whining slightly. He kicks in Agatha’s grasp, squirming. “Dada! Dada!”
Rio’s response is everything Agatha could have ever asked for and more.
“¡Cariño!” Her eyes widen and her mouth bursts into a wide, toothy grin, the excitement clear on her face. She scoops Nicky from Agatha, gasping as she looks him over. She lifts him in the air with gentle flourish, turning to her wife. “You found him a Plesiosaur costume! That’s my favorite prehistoric animal!”
She boops Nicky’s nose with a grin as she lowers him, securing her hold on him. “Well, my favorite prehistoric marine reptile,” she clarifies, laughing in delight when Nicky claps.
She leans in, nuzzling his cheek with her nose. “My favorite prehistoric animal is Ornitholestes.” She uses her hand and scrunches it down so it is barely a few feet from the ground, looking at Nicky the entire time. “Little raptor guys,” she clarifies for him. She tickles her finger against the front of his costume. “Don’t tell the other dinosaurs at the Natural History museum I said that.”
Nicky sticks the same flipper he’s been chewing on back in his mouth, staring at her unblinkingly.
Rio beams anyway, pressing a kiss to his temple. “I’ll teach you about some of them later for bedtime, cariño.”
Agatha watches on with a fond eye roll, heart squeezing pleasantly as she leans up against the doorframe. “Nerd.”
Rio grins at her, adjusting Nicky in her arms. “Nerdiness is part of my charm, baby.” She stands up straight, looking at their baby with a wide smile. She adjusts the costume’s head slightly, inspecting the blue costume closely. “Where did you even find this?”
“I had a lot of help,” Agatha says as convincingly as possible, hoping that Rio never looks at the recent purchases on Amazon to find a Loch Ness Monster baby costume.
Hey, at least this costume was the most accurate and not exaggerated. Agatha would know, considering Rio goes on an excited tangent about the extinct reptiles at least once a week.
“I owe the Coven big time,” Agatha adds offhandedly to really sell it.
“I just need to spam the chat with pictures of this adorable little man…” Rio coos, kissing Nicky all over his face, wagging his balled fist gently. “—And they’ll forget about anything else!”
Agatha grins, folding her arms loosely across her chest as she watches the two loves of her life. “This is true.”
Rio plants more kisses to the side of Nicky’s face, turning her face towards Agatha with a soft, adoring smile. She squishes her face into the side of the plush neck of the costume. “Come here,” she murmurs in a voice so soft and tender, it nearly brings Agatha to tears.
She pushes herself from the doorway, taking a few big strides over to her son and wife only to freeze in place when Rio gasps.
“Wait!” she exclaims, eyes widening. She holds Nicky out to Agatha, smile squishy and wide. “Hold him for me pleaseeeee,” she drags out.
Agatha blinks, momentarily confused by the sudden shift in Rio’s mood before softening.
She recovers quickly, eagerly reaching out for Nicky. “Mama’s got you!” she exclaims as she scoops Nicky back into her arms. She tucks him close to her chest, grabbing his hand and smothering it in kisses.
The plush head of the costume wobbles and bonks her on the head, causing her to scowl. “Okay, that’s it, buster,” she mutters, unsnapping the head from the costume’s shoulders. The stuffed head and neck falls to the ground with a soft thud.
Rio gasps, fully dramatic as she reaches out for the head on the ground. “Nessie, no!”
Nicky, bursts out laughing at her reaction, his eyes shining as he looks between his parents.
Agatha groans, lips trilling before pressing them to the top of Nicky’s messy hair, hoping it hides her grin. “You could tell?”
Rio smiles fondly, placing her hands on her hips. “Oh, definitely. I love it anyway.” She grabs at Nicky’s covered toes, cooing, “You’re so adorable either way, cariño.”
Nicky drools around the sleeve he has in his mouth, waiting for either Rio or Agatha to do something he deems hysterical once more.
Before Agatha can respond that it is, in fact, really hard to find a Plesiosaur costume for babies, Rio plops herself down on the ground with a small oof.
Before Agatha can comprehend that, Rio snatches her wife by the waist. With a small shriek, Agatha lands in Rio’s lap, clutching Nicky to her chest.
Nicky bursts into more laughter, his smile wide and tiny body shaking against his mother’s.
Agatha bites her lip to keep from laughing with him—sue her, his laugh is so infectious.
She scowls up at her wife, shoulders shaking with stifled giggles.
Giggles.
God, when had she become such a sap?
“Rio Vidal,” she growls, suddenly inches away from her wife’s shining hazel eyes and gorgeously smug face.
“Yes, mi amor?” Rio asks innocently, grinning down at the woman in her arms.
Agatha snorts lightly as a result of her trying to stifle her laughter, cheeks reddening at the effort. “I hate you.”
Nicky reaches up to grab at Rio’s hair, shrieking with laugher. “Dada!” he cries out, elated.
“No, you don’t,” Rio laughs with a small wince as she carefully pries Nicky’s fingers from her head. Left in his hand is a small fistful of hair that she patiently removes. She wrinkles her nose, smushing it on the side of Nicky’s face. “Ouch,” she murmurs in a high pitched voice.
Nicky smiles over at her, patting her cheek with a wet flipper.
Rio presses a kiss to Nicky’s nose before tucking Agatha up into her lap and situating so the baby is sitting between them. She leans down, pressing another kiss to the top of his chestnut colored hair before. “See? Daddy’s got you.”
Agatha frowns, her lips twisting into a grimace as she fights back a smile, eyes shining with warmth. “You’re the worst,” she mutters, cupping Rio’s cheek with her hand and pulling her up for a full kiss to her lips.
Rio kisses her back tenderly. “For someone that hates me, your kisses sure do say otherwise,” she mutters against Agatha’s mouth with a sly grin.
“Cornball,” Agatha clicks as she pulls away.
The wide grin on Rio’s face makes Agatha’s heart skip a beat, suspicion simmering. “Rio.”
Rio’s eyes shine, lips curling into a wide smirk. She carefully slides Agatha and Nicky from her lap before crawling the few feet to her display shelf. She reaches up onto the trinkets, glancing down at her wife and son briefly before turning her focus back on her search.
“What are you doing?” Agatha wonders suspiciously.
“Looking,” Rio beams, carefully moving some displays around. “Your mami and I started dating the spring semester of our freshman year,” she tells Nicky gently. “I had only seen her a few times around campus. Heard about her through the grapevine.
Agatha winkles her nose, adjusting Nicky in her lap with a small snort. “All awful things, I’m sure.”
Rio beams, turning back to her briefly. “You definitely had a reputation. Half of the campus was scared of you, professors included. Most people that ran into you left in tears, but I’ve always been able to see the real you. Intensely passionate and fiercely protective, all hiding behind that hardened exterior. I’m forever grateful you let me in.”
“Stalker,” Agatha mutters with a flush before looking down at Nicky. “Your daddy was the biggest dork I’ve ever seen. She always wore these weird graphic tees and could tell you anything about any animal you could ever think of, even if you didn’t ask. But she was easy to trust. She listened when you needed her to, and never judged.” She tenderly swipes the bridge of Nicky’s nose, voice lowering. “I wanted her instantly.”
She stares down at Nicky as she continues, voice hitching with emotion, “She brought me azaleas on our first date, even though I had only briefly mentioned them being my favorites. She made me feel like my interests mattered. She gave me safety in a way Jen and Wanda couldn’t provide. She is one of the most persistent, patient people I have ever met, and never gave up on me even when I gave her every reason to.”
Rio pulls back from her shelf, expression soft. She crawls towards them, her hands resting firmly on Agatha’s knees. “Mi corazón,” she coos softly. “No matter how stubborn you are, I would never, ever give up on you. I’d never entertain the thought.”
She lifts a hand, carting it delicately through Agatha’s untamed locks. “From the moment I first saw you, I knew there was something different about you. Special. What an idiot I’d have been if I let you slip through my fingers.”
Nicky gurgles between them, blinking up at his parents with shining eyes. He flaps a flipper over at Rio, the wet fabric dancing along her front.
Rio leans down slowly, pressing a lingering kiss to his forehead. “You are the best thing to ever happen to me,” she murmurs, peering up at Agatha between her lashes.
Agatha tucks her chin to her chest, staring down at the two people she loves most in the world.
She loves her friends dearly. Wanda and Jen have been her rocks for as long as she can remember. Further down the line, lead her to finding Alice and Lilia. The tight-nit bond they all share is not something she takes for granted, and she appreciates them all deeply.
With Rio… with Nicky… It’s a type of love she had never even thought of being possible.
Rio treated her like something special and precious, something worthy of love and affection. It’s overwhelming at times just how much light this weird, ancient-fauna and rock obsessed dork brings to her life.
And Nicky… God, Nicky.
She never thought of herself as the type to want kids, not when Evanora had tainted every single memory of her childhood.
That’s the example she had to go off for parenting, and it scared her shitless. She couldn’t fathom doing that to her child, but was always terrified it would be inevitable.
Everything seemed to change once she met Rio. Suddenly, she couldn’t stop picturing the woman with a mini Agatha, or a mini Rio, balanced delicately on her hip while she told the child about animals the Earth had long ago claimed.
There were a lot of talks, a lot of tears, a lot of therapy before Nicky.
If Agatha was going to be a mother, she was going to do it right.
Nine months ago, she was crushing Rio’s hand in Westview’s only hospital, face red and dripping with sweat. When he finally arrived after hours, and hours of painful, exhausting labor, it felt like a wave had washed away all her doubts, all her fears. She knew from the moment he was pressed to her chest, screaming and hollering, that she was going to be nothing like her mother.
How could she want to harm something so delicate and precious?
And when Rio had leaned down, cooing reassurances to both her son and child, Agatha had never felt so sure of anything.
They were in this together, and they would never let the other fall. And Nicky was the perfect piece to bond them together
Agatha’s heart has never felt so full, brimming with adoration that it physically aches.
She swallows thickly, blinking back tears that threaten to spill. How she had managed to pick the best person to be her forever, to be her children’s father and to have that same person be just as obsessive and fiercely devout as she is…
It was like everything in her life had led her to finding Rio. To them having Nicky.
She would do it, all of it, over and over again, if they were the outcome every single time.
Instead of that, all of it, Agatha just reaches out and tenderly grabs the back of Rio’s head. “I love you,” she whispers fiercely, her thumb caressing the nape of her wife’s neck.
Rio leans forward, one hand cradling Nicky’s side while the other slides down to Agatha’s cheek.
The kiss was tender and deliberate, slow and unrushed. Something so soft that cracked open the emotional floodgates they both had tried to hold closed. Rio’s breath shudders out into Agatha’s mouth, who in turn just presses back firmly, more sure.
Nicky’s soft whine causes them to slowly break apart.
Rio smoothes her fingers down the baby’s side, cooing gently and pulling a binky from the pocket on her shorts. She guides the nipple up to his mouth, brushing his cheek as he clamps around the binky with a series of harsh suckles.
Agatha laughs gently, dabbing her fingers under her eyes to dry the stray tears that spilled before pressing a kiss to his forehead.
She sniffs, carefully sliding Nicky over to Rio’s lap before reaching into the shelf. “After your daddy got me those flowers, I knew I had to get something special for her for our second date,” she picks up Rio’s story effortlessly. “I pestered your Aunt Alice and Nona Lilia like it was my full time job to see what I should bring, what she would like.”
From behind her, Rio laughs in delight. “They were so over it by the middle of the week,” she says softly. “But they were so impressed someone was trying so hard for me.” She turns down to Nicky, who stares back up at her. “She didn’t need to try too hard. I was already a goner after the first date.”
Agatha flushes with a fond roll of her eyes, still searching on the shelves. “I think I took your Aunt Wanda and Aunt Jen to every crystal and hobby store and rock and gem show within a 100 mile radius every spare chance we got before then, trying to find the right stone, crystal or fossil that screamed “Rio”. Nothing ever did.”
She briefly waves her hand out the balcony, almost offhandedly. “There’s a beach about a two, two and a half hour drive out me and your aunts stopped by. It was a day before the date and I still had nothing to bring your daddy. To say I was down about it would be an understatement. I was inconsolable.”
She stumbles upon the item Rio had been looking for with an incredulous laugh, enclosing it in her fist before turning back to her wife and son. She settles on the floor, folding her legs and staring down at her fist with a fond smile. “Aunt Wanda was trying to reassure me that I wouldn’t screw this up, and that your daddy would like me no matter what I gave her. Your Aunt Jen told me I was being dramatic.”
Rio gasps in mock offense. “You? Dramatic? Never!”
Agatha nudges her wife’s knee with her own. She turns her attention to Nicky, voice soft. “We kept walking along the beach, them tagging along while I felt sorry for myself. Then I look down just near the water’s edge and knew I had found the perfect thing for your daddy. Something small, simple, but entirely Rio.”
She opens her fist gently to expose the small, bright green, roughly shaped heart. No bigger than a dollar coin, a bright shade of mossy green, the outer surface is smooth but foggy. Shaped entirely by the tides and the Earth.
It was perfect.
Rio, cheeks now pink, tucks her head against the top of Nicky’s. “It’s still my favorite piece,” she tells Nicky quietly. “Even more than the Megalodon tooth your mami got me for my birthday last year.”
Agatha smiles warmly, holding the sea glass carefully for Nicky to observe.
Nicky reaches up, his tiny finger grazing the surface of the shape with a concentrated frown.
Both women smile fondly down at their child, resting their foreheads together.
“Long story short: your mami’s just as much of a sap as I am,” Rio murmurs quietly.
“Shh,” Agatha mumbles. “I have a reputation to uphold.”
Rio snickers, adjusting herself as Nicky leans back further into her. “Sure, sweetheart.”
Nicky hums to himself, grabbing at the sea glass without committing to the action. His eyes flutter, sucking on the binky more firmly.
Agatha carefully brushes her fingers through Nicky’s hair, smiling down at him. “Nicky,” she coos in a sing-song voice.
Nicky hums as he drifts off, flexing out in his daddy’s hold.
Rio sighs contently, gently bouncing the baby in her lap. “We make really cute kids.”
Agatha beams as Nicky drifts off to sleep. “Yeah,” she agrees quietly.
She turns only to carefully place the sea glass heart back on Rio’s shelf. She moves, settling herself beside her wife’s side and pressing close. “We really do.”
Rio stares down at Nicky, her expression shifting to something more serious. Her eyes shine, her lower lip tucked between her teeth.
Agatha slides her hand down to the back of Rio’s, lacing their fingers together and giving a reassuring squeeze. She waits patiently, never pressuring.
“You ever think about doing this again?” Rio asks softly. “Having one more?”
The question is unexpected and surprising, but not a shock. In fact, the only thing that surprises Agatha is how quickly her heart melts at the thought.
Rio blinks rapidly over at her. “Yeah?” she whispers thickly.
Agatha shifts forward, kissing her wife softly. “Yeah,” she agrees.
She finds it as easy as breathing.