Chapter Text
“I- listen,” Calliope said. She visibly sweated and she gulped, as she tried to decide whether to make eye contact or not.
Kiara was still staring, blankly, at the pregnancy test in Calliope’s shaking hands.
“It’s not like we’re, married, or even dating or anything-“ Callie forced a smile. “We’re good friends.”
Kiara blinked. Her face remained impassive.
“B-best friends, even- listen- listen- “ Callie said, ever more desperately, “and- and that doesn't mean I don't, you know,” She pontificated in a way that didn’t add clarity to her statements.
Kiara finally moved- to turn away from Callie. “You can do what you want, Calliope,” She intoned.
“Kiara- wait,” Callie reached out, but then she pulled her hand back. Since Kiara was facing the wall she didn’t notice.
Callie took that opportunity to try to regain her composure. “You know how much I admire Coco.”
“We all do,” Kiara said, to the wall. “She’s a mentor to the five of us, after all.”
“Y-yeah! And she isn’t, unattractive…” Callie scrunched her mouth to the side as she felt her cheeks heat up.
“She isn’t,” Kiara intoned again. Callie didn’t see her facial expression.
"She's really tall...."
"She is."
“And, you know I’ve always been the type to not, shy away from difficult situations. And- considering how unlikely it is for Dragons and Shinigami to conceive anyway, I thought, this might be like,” Callie tilted her head to the side, to try to explain something she herself didn’t fully know how to articulate, “you know, destiny, or something?”
Kiara didn’t move.
“And she, gave me a… piggy back ride…” Callie finished, lamely.
“I saw pictures,” Kiara said.
“And that doesn't mean I don't, you know,” Callie grit her teeth, “Care about you and junk!”
“And junk,” Kiara repeated, flatly.
“Listen-” Callie only managed to say, “L-listeeennnnn-”
“I’m listening.” Kiara’s voice had a tinge of annoyance, for the first time-
Callie backed off. “I-. Well, you can also do what you want, you know. But, you liking me, was all your business, and- “
It might have just been the pregnancy hormones, but Callie’s voice cracked and she teared up, “And, if you want to, you know. Do your own thing, now. That’s always been fine. It’s- it’s okay if you hate me now-”
And then Kiara turned around- and her face was as warm as always- that expression of, warm enamourment and admiration and for some inexplicable reason an attachment to Calliope despite the centuries of being opposed to each other because of the whole ‘death vs immortality’ thing-
And maybe Callie’s memory was faulty because she suddenly wondered if it has always had that latent tinge of resigned melancholy behind the smile-
And Kiara hugged her, also warm as always- and Callie found herself returning the hug.
“Oh, were you worried?” Kiara said, “Nothing you do could make me hate you.”
And once Kiara was sure she was alone she allowed herself to slump against the wall and cry.
-OOO-
Callie settled back into her routine pretty well. Cutting back on strenuous activity was already something she ended up doing once she started focusing on music, but otherwise her regular schedule of work continued uninterrupted.
She supposed there were some notable changes, however.
“Kikkireki!” Kiara called out, after she entered Callie’s abode.
Callie looked up from her workstation. It was normal for your friends to have keys to your place of residence. Shut up. Especially if they were going to stay over for the weekend. Which was also a normal thing for friends to do.
“Hi, Kiara!” Callie said. She refreshed her smile and walked over to the foyer.
Kiara took off her coat to hang on the coat rack and she kneeled down to untie her sneakers. “How are you feeling?”
“Well, it's not, any sort of problem for like, mobility, yet,” Callie patted her abdomen. “I’m a little tired and cranky but I'm actually always tired so, that’s just more reason that this is- fine.”
"Well, do you want any specific food?" Kiara glanced down at a couple of grocery bags she had placed on the doormat. "I brought, a little bit of everything."
“Oh, you don't have to do that," Callie said.
"But I want to," Kiara said. "I once got good at cooking when living alone, before I ditched that skill and instead got really good at making the minimum amount of food necessary to survive," Her smile beamed. "So you could say, this is actually a selfish thing I'm doing, in order to use you as a test subject while I journey towards self-improvement as I re-learn how to cook.”
"Hmmm," Calliope pondered aloud.
Kiara glanced at the ground and her cheeks tinted. "Plus, this is practice for when I get a baby of my own, so really, you're the one helping me out, here.”
Callie coughed, loudly, and she quickly tried to change the subject. "Well, in that case, I'm really craving..."
She tilted her head back and to the side and tapped her chin. "A, pickle and peanut butter sandwich, on whole wheat."
Kiara scrunched her mouth to the side. "You’re really craving that?”
“Well not the whole wheat, but I know that’s supposed to be healthier," Callie said.
Kiara chuckled under her fingertips. “Ah, I understand.”
Callie smushed her lips together. "And, speaking of, babies, um..."
“Oh, of course-” Kiara said. She shuffled her hoodie around, to let her cats crawl out.
“Ohhhhhhh~~” Callie beamed, reflexively, as Kiara’s cats crawled out and started mewling around.
Kiara chuckled, slightly. “I know you only invited me over to play with my cats.”
"That's- that's not true," Callie said. It came out a bit more frantic than she wanted, and Kiara started looking into her eyes, expectantly-
Callie briefly broke eye contact, and smushed her lips together. “It’s also for the home cooking.”
-OOO-
Kiara was at a quiet cafe on the corner of town, on her laptop doing the kind of mindless but necessary busywork that was involved in doing most media-related things.
And then a light bell tingle of a bell rang out and a Totally Human woman bundled up in a beret and scarf entered the cafe.
“Ina!” Kiara called out to her co-worker at the entertainment conglomerate. (Ina’s regular segment involved drawing, while Kiara’s was a talk show.)
"Kiaarrraaa," Ina said, as she wobbled over. "Are you doing okay?"
“Are you doing okay?” Ina said. She held out her arms and tentacles for a hug, and Kiara immediately grabbed her friend around the back to squeeze her tightly, tentacles and all.
Kiara had her first inkling of doubt upon hearing Ina’s tone of voice, but she figured it was equally likely it was an language upbringing thing. Like, every couple weeks she found out she was pronouncing an English word wrong and that didn’t mean anything except that words were weird.
“I am!” Kiara said. “The talk show’s going well, and I’m working on a couple of other projects that are going, as well as you can expect.”
“That’s great!” Ina said. “And how about with, Callie?"
"Oh," Kiara said. She refreshed her smile. "That's fine.”
Ina’s face softened a little. "Are you sure?"
"Well, why wouldn't it be?" Kiara said.
“I mean,” Ina blinked. “Isn’t, it, obvious?”
Kiara tilted her head to the side. “Enlighten me.”
Ina grinned and briefly glanced at the purple, antediluvian book that always hovered next to her in rapturous abandon of the shadows of the glimpses of the untold tenebrous depths, filled with cyclopean madness, “In other circumstances, that would be a poor choice of words. But, um, you know,” Ina said, “The person you like, got pregnant with someone else?”
“Well, that’s,” Kiara furrowed her brow. "I mean, we basically have the same relationship as always. Except now she lets me cook for her, so it’s a net win!” Kiara folded her arms and closed her eyes.
Ina looked at her for a couple seconds, before she smiled. “So, you’re trying to get to her heart through her stomach?”
Kiara scrunched her mouth to the side. “I suppose I am. Do you think that would work?”
“You could say,” Ina said, “That sounds like a feastable plan.”
-OOO-
And a few months went on like that, where Kiara would come over regularly- occasionally backing off for just long enough for Callie to drop a really tsundere message over email about how it was ‘fine if she wanted to come over or whatever’. Kiara was fine with it: it meant Callie just needed some time to warm up to her.
Today, Kiara got to Calliope’s apartment without any additional groceries since she had just stocked up her place the previous night.
So, if you judged the use of ‘her’ by how often you spent time there, rather than who was actually paying for it -which was grammatically correct in English, right? Like, hobos still had shelters and whatnot, and you called it ‘their’ place despite not paying for anything (At least, the three hobos Kiara knew did)- this was also starting to be Kiara’s apartment too, since she was edging close to being here 50% of the time. (Maybe she could split the rent and officially move in?)
Kiara took off her coat to hang on the coat rack and she kneeled down to untie her sneakers-
And then she heard voices- multiple- coming from the living room.
Kiara blinked, and double-counted the shoes and the jackets, and there werent any extras-
But then she picked up a distinctive southern American twang in the laugh of the second person-
Kiara took a breath.
So it was Coco. And that made sense; she tended to keep her jacket on most of the time and she also didn’t wear shoes in casual dress. Plus, she was the one who got Callie pregnant.
So Kiara crept over to the wall that lead into the living room, and she pulled her hat off so she could peak out into the living room just enough to see-
Callie was on the couch, next to a giant dragon, who was currently rubbing gentle circles around her engorged abdomen.
Kiara felt her heart fall into her stomach, but some part of her kept her still and silent.
“You know, whatever you want to do, I’m okay with it,” Coco said. “Really. I’ll give you the money. There’s dragons who care about populating the race and all but I want is for you to be happy.”
“I am, though,” Callie said. She smiled, gently, into the face of the non-gestational parent of her unborn child, “And, she’s going to be a part of you. I wouldn’t be so careless with such a gift.
"Awww,” Coco said. She stood up on her knees and leaned over where Calliope reclined on the couch. “You’re such a sweetheart.”
And Coco planted a tender smooch on Callie's forehead-
-and Callie blushed and glanced at the ground as her mouth wobbled-
And Kiara stifled a hiccup- it definitely wasn’t a sob or anything, just one of those random bubbles of air in her esophagus, like what Ame got all the time-
And she ran over to the front door as quietly as she could and loudly knocked on it, three times.
And then opened it, and then closed it, and then refreshed her smile despite nobody watching.
“Heeeyyy~~” Kiara called out, as excitedly as she could.
There was an immediate rustle from the living room.
“K-ki- guh- Kiara!” Callie called out.
And when Kiara walked into the living room, Callie was still on the couch, and Coco was standing, formally, stretching her back. “Heeyyy Kiara-chan!” Coco said. She spread her arms out for a hug and Kiara obliged, and not just because she was a hugger.
Coco gave great hugs. Being a giant dragon probably had something to do with that, or maybe it was just from being tall.
Callie had stood up too, by now, and out of the corner of her eye Kiara noted the height difference and idly also recalled all the times that Callie has opined about how height differences were cute
“ここで何をしていますか?” Kiara asked.
Callie opened her mouth and visibility, mentally translated.
“Oh, just visiting,” Coco said. “お元気ですか?”
“Oh, I know that one-” Callie said.
And Kiara went to make tea and sandwiches for the three of them, while keeping a healthy conversation going with Coco about their careers and current events and recent pop culture and also exultations for their coworker’s accomplishments, all the while, maybe, just a little, using all the biggest words in her Japanese vocabulary.
She and Coco sat at a corner of the kitchen table, and Callie took the seat opposite Coco, just politely watching the two of them make conversation and nodding along. And really, if Callie didn't understand what they were talking about it was her own damn fault for not working on her Japanese.
Callie sipped the tea and nibbled on the sandwiches Kiara made for the three of them.
It was really nice seeing how passionate Kiara was about every part of her career. LIke, Calliope joined to be a musician and Ina joined to be an artist, but Kiara always wanted to make people smile, and, come to think of it, that was Coco’s stated goal as well.
And Callie felt her Japanese improving, just trying to follow along with the conversation.
Coco bid farewell, with one more hug for each of them.
And a minute later the low rumble of a heavy object jumping out of the parking lot signaled that Coco turned into her full dragon form to fly back home.
“Hey, um,” Calliope said, as Kiara finished cleaning the dishes, “So, do you want to watch a movie or something?”
“Well, don’t you have work to do?” Kiara said. “I believe you mentioned needing to finalize something by the end of the weekend?”
“Oh. Yeah, I, do,” Calliope said. She bit her lip and tried to come up with an excuse for Kiara to do.
“And I have things to do as well," Kiara said. "And I made some extra sandwiches for you, for the rest of the day.”
Callie scrunched her mouth to the side.
"Well, what if I want, something else?” Calliope said. She patted her abdomen. “Like, for the baby. Would you help me, make some stew or something?”
Kiara glanced at the wall and scrunched her mouth to the side, and then scrunched her mouth to the other side. “Well, okay. But just for the baby.”
Kiara set up her laptop on the dining room table to do stuff, and Callie brought her sketchpad out to the living room to work on designs for her album cover art.
And Callie kept stealing glances at Kiara's face, Illuminated by the soft glow of the laptop light that was also reflected in the adjacent window.
Kiara’s feathers were always lovely. And her kind, lilac eyes with skrellington shapes in them were one of the first things Callie noticed about her.
Callie suddenly found inspiration for her album art.
-OOO-
"Ahahahahah," Amelia chuckled, wildly, after Kiara finished telling the story.
Kiara also laughed along, but she realized that hearing someone else immediately react to her predicament with laughter felt, a little bad. Like, when she had to convince Ina that it was all fine, it felt like an affirmation, but Ame just laughing kind of felt, off.
Kiara tried to take her mind off it by resuming helping Amelia translate Ad copy into Japanese. Amelia had a variety show that aired after Kiara's talk show, and she was distinct among their batch in that she had the worst grasp of Japanese, and also was not a mythological creature.
Like, most members of their company in every batch were mythic monsters being rehabilitated into modern life- thats why Callie wasnt reaping souls and Kiara wasn't, like, ripping out that fire guy's liver every afternoon or guiding Conquistadors to cities of gold. (Coco did still seem to be piling up gold and playing riddle games with short people, though). Kiara's working theory was that Amelia was secretly a criminal, working off a debt.
"So, you want me to ground pound Coco or some<hic>thing?" Amelia said. "In the original use of the word, I mean,” she pontificated with her hands in a way that didn’t add clarity to her statements, “It’d be just like… Dragon... Drop! Ahaha!”
"Yes, you know I thought there was only one definition of that word for a long time," Kiara said.
"Well, the colloquialism, has the like, wrestling move type thing, and the video game thing which might be the same thing, and the, other one.” Amelia smirked, “And yoooou were enthusiastic about wanting to see me ground-pound various people. Mostly of the motherly persuasion. I figured you knew what I meant.”
Kiara puffed out her left cheek, in mock outrage. "You really thought that'd be something I'd be into?”
Amelia blinked, and smushed her mouth to the side, and then to the other side. “Yes.”
Kiara puffed her cheek out in mock annoyance. “Well, I’ll have you know I’m actually a very pure-hearted and innocent person. Like, I don’t even know how dragons reproduce with shinigami. Like, don’t reptiles lay eggs?”
“Well, my investimagations into the reproductive cycles of Dragons <hic> indicate-” Amelia began.
“Ahhh!” Kiara suddenly yelled, and she stuffed her fingers into her ears and kept yelling.
"Indicate they lay eggs," Ame said.
"Ahhh- oh, you meant, that sort of reproductive cycle,” Kiara said.
"But shinigami, I would think I would have to ask you the specifics," Ame said. She took a sip of her tea.
"I- what?” Kiara said. “Why would you think that?”
“What, you mean <hic>, in all the squillions of years you've known Callie, you've never learned anything about her anatomy?”
Kiara shrunk into her shoulders and blushed. “I haven't…” she said, softly.
"Not even just, accidentally while fighting?”
"I- what? How do you accidentally learn that while fighting?” Kiara pontificated with her hands, “is she just, going to end up all the way naked in a way that’s helpful for anatomical studies?”
“I mean, I’m sure that can happen," Amelia took another sip of her tea.
Kiara scrunched her mouth to the side. “I well. I guess I will agree with you, but I also do not understand.”
“And Callie’s never offhand mentioned like, whether or not she would lay eggs, or reproduce by budding or via inscrutable commands from the celestial bureaucracy?” Ame speculated irresponsibly, “Nothing like ‘oh dang, I guess <hic> Death-sensei needs more reapers to accommodate the growing population, I gotta cut off an arm to grow a new me’, or anything?”
“I, no,” Kiara puffed out her cheek. “Not to me, at least..."
Amelia paused and sat down, and then reached out her right hand to lay on Kiara’s elbow.
“Hey. Tell me to shut up about Callie if it's annoying. I know this is hard for you.-
“Everyone says that for some reason,” Kiara said. “And it's actually going pretty well, actually.”
“Actually?” Amelia said.
“Actually actually, actually,” Kiara said. “Like, since she can't drink alcohol, that means everytime we drink, we can share all our drinks now, when usually it’d just be her making different cocktails for me and me not liking them so she’d just finish them.”
“Oh that's right,” Amelia said. “Well, it's a good thing you’re there to help her relieve stress now that one of her main pastimes is off limits to her- wait!” Amelia's face lit up.
Kiara blinked. "What is it?”
Amelia’s eyes narrowed and her cheeks tinted slightly and a grin grew over her entire face. “I just realized, Callie's going to be a mother soon-”
And Kiara karate-chopped Amelia's head.
-OOO-
It was almost at the point where Callie would probably try to avoid moving around too much. It seemed that a half-dragon baby was a little more draining on a regular humanoid body, and Callie had a bad habit of pushing herself a little too hard in general, so she was taking the pre-emptive step of working from home for the final month and a half of the gestational period.
Like, Dr. Choco said it'd probably be fine for Callie to do all her regular activities if she just took it easy, but again, that last part was the thing that Calliope had trouble with.
So it was actually really nice that Kiara was doing all these little things for her. Callie didn’t have to worry about food and there was someone there to remind her to rest.
Like, today, when Callie returned home, she noticed that Kiara's jacket was on her coat rack and Kiara's running shoes were next to the other two pairs of shoes she owned, and the smell of lemon and salmon wafted in from her open kitchen.
"Hi Hoooooooonn-" Callie began, before she caught herself.
Kiara peaked in from where she was preparing dinner. "Yes?"
"Oooomie," Callie coughed. "Oh, you know the thing, that's going around. I just wanted, to do the me-meh."
"The ‘meme’?" Kiara corrected
Callie folded her arms. "It's spelled 'me-me'."
"But I'm pretty sure it's one of those English words that isn’t pronounced phonetically,” Kiara said.
“Well, maybe, but the point is moot since,” Callie glanced at the wall, and then reconsidered telling Kusotori the next part, but then figured that it'd be fine, "like, I could say 'Honey I'm home', but you'd just, get the wrong idea, you know."
Kiara smiled, gently. "That does sound like me."
“So, um, maybe I should try out some other memes?” Callie said. “A lot of our senpais get a ton of mileage out of those sorts of things, maybe I should look into it too?”
“If you want,” Kiara said.
And Calliope honed her amateur standup comedy skills while Kiara finished dinner and set the table. And Kiara did genuinely laugh a couple times, so Callie considered it a success.
And after dinner, Kusotori took Calliope up on an offer to watch a recent movie. Partially to keep abreast of pop culture in order to be able to talk about it with co-workers, or in the context of providing entertainment, but also because it was a nice activity to do with someone where you didn’t have to make eye contact or do constant conversation.
And it was only natural for Callie to rest her head on Kiara’s shoulder, after they settled in on the same couch under separate blankets but close enough to not need separate blankets.
Kiara was warm. It came with being a phoenix, Callie knew, but it was nice, all the same.
And after leaving her head slightly too far to the side for a while, Callie reached back, to move Kiara's arm over her shoulder.
Kiara inhaled sharply, and Callie could feel her heart beat faster, but Callie just held her ground because things were only awkward if you made them awkward, and that position was just more comfortable to be in.
Callie glanced over at Kiara before slowly drifting to sleep.
-OOO-
Kiara made her way through the low-lit velvet hallway to find the room she reserved at the Karaoke place.
“Kiaaaaarrraaaa~!” Gura called out. She raised her right hand.
"Gurraaa~!" Kiara ran over and patted Gura’s hair, and then reached into her purse for apples to start balancing on Gura’s head. Gura was, besides her and Callie, who were timeless, the oldest of their batch of five beings hired to their multimedia entertainment company (so, oldest of three, where one was a regular human, which in retrospect wasn't a big qualifier.) Gura's specialty was singing, but not necessarily songwriting like what Callie did.
“So are you ready to party?” Gura said.
“Always!” Kiara said.
And Gura put in the number for a classic karaoke ballad, and they sang it, badly, together.
And 6 songs into their karaoke night, their drinks and snacks arrived, and they took a break in singing to chow down. Kiara had a lemonade, and Gura had a hard lemonade, and they shared a large bowl of salted pretzels.
“So are you free all night, or do you have to get home to your giirrrlll~~” Gura teased.
“I don’t know what girl you’re talking about," Kiara said.
“C’mon, what other girl would I be talking about?” Gura said. She put both hands around her can of alcoholic lemonade and drunk from it. “How's it going between you two? Callie tends to shrug and change the subject when I ask her.”
“It’s actually pretty great,” Kiara said. “Callie and I are closer than we’ve ever been."
“I see,” Gura said.
Kiara nodded. “And I get to do all sorts of things for her, now.”
“You ‘get’ to?” Gura said.
“Yeah,” Kiara said. “Since normally she doesn't, let me do things for her.” She took a deep breath and exhaled for ten seconds. “It's nice.”
“You sound exhausted, though,” Gura said.
“Well, Callie needs me,” Kiara made a smile. “What am I supposed to do?”
“Hey, hey,” Gura said. She wobbled over to look directly at Kiara. “Look at me."
Kiara nodded, solemnly, as she complied.
Gura put both her hands on Kiara’s cheeks, deforming them a little, and then turned Kiara’s head to look her in the eyes.
“The only person who needs you, is you,” Gura said.
Kiara scrunched her mouth to the side. “Well, what if I have a kid, or I end up as the leader of a small band of post-apocalyptic scavengers?”
“Well, If you want to pamper Callie, then you shouldn’t feel bad about it, is what I'm getting at,” Gura said. “There’s plenty of different purposes to devote yourself to, and you shouldn’t care what other people think, if they don’t understand what you’re getting out of it."
Gura nodded. “But at the same time, if you do feel bad about it, it's fine to admit that, and you shouldn’t care if you're not living up to your image of yourself, or if other people think you’re, like, being selfish."
“I, well,” Kiara scrunched her mouth to the side, “Is that, what people are saying?”
“Oh, no,” Gura waved her arms, “I’m just getting a ‘sad’ exhausted vibe from you, rather than a ‘fulfilled’ exhausted vibe, if that makes sense?”
Kiara took another deep breath. “I’m sorry I sound sad-”
“Hey, what did I just say?” Gura patted Kiara’s cheeks again. “It's fine if you are, and you shouldn’t be afraid to admit that. But also, if that’s only how you sound, and you really are fulfilled, I’ll drop it.” She nodded, twice, “And it doesn’t have to be either/or. You can still be doing something that makes you happy, but pushing yourself a little more than you should.”
“I, think that might be it,” Kiara made a smile, “I really love being able to be there for Callie. But, maybe I should take more breaks?”
Gura smiled. “Hey, I can help with that last one. And maybe I can cook stuff for Callie too sometimes, if you want a load off?”
Kiara opened her mouth and glanced to the side. “I- don’t mean any offense but I really don’t think, you should be doing that..."
“What? I always,” Gura glanced at the wall, “Sometimes, occasionally, wash my hands, when I cook.”
Kiara’s expression flattened.
“And I keep my nails long, so that way if I'm chopping stuff and miss I just chop off fingernails instead of my fingies”-
Kiara opened her mouth, and closed her mouth.
And Gura closed her eyes and folded her arms. “And I know all the best microwave-only recipes, to avoid accidentally burning down my apartment by forgetting things in the oven.”
Kiara sighed. “I- okay, that’s probably fine. ”
-OOO-
Kiara took a deep breath before she knocked on the apartment door. It was a moderately fancy high-rise in one of the more centrally located parts of town.
A short, white-haired angel answered the door. “Oh, Kiara-chan!” Kanata said. She opened the door all the way. “Are you here to see Coco?”
“I, am,” Kiara said. But she also glanced down at the tinfoil container she was holding in her hands, “But, this is for you and Coco, and possibly Suisei, if she stops by?”
“Yeah, Suisei-senpai usually comes over later in the night,” Kanata said. “So what’d you bring?”
“Oh! I made some schnitzel,” Kiara said. She peeled open the edge of the tin she brought. “I, uh, hope you’re okay with baked goods?”
“Oh, that’s fine, we’re not on diets or anything,” Kanata said. She reached out for the tin.
“Oh, ok-”
“COCO!” Kanata yelled, suddenly.
And one of the bedrooms down the hallway opened and a giant dragon emerged, making her way to the living room.
“Oh! Kiara-chan!” Coco said. She closed her eyes and then inhaled, and then exhaled. “I guess you’re here to fight. Well,” she cricked her neck, “It’s been a long time coming.”
“What??” Kiara said, “Why- why would I do that?”
"Fight Fight Fight!" Kanata said, from the kitchen.
“Because I impregnated the woman you love,” Coco said, “Obviously.”
“I-” Kiara began, “I mean, we’re not, dating or anything, and she can make her own decisions. It’s not like you did anything wrong….”
“Well, that doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to be frustrated or upset,” Coco said.
“And I want to clear the air between us,” Coco literally waved the air, "So, feel free to fight me. Like, a little more than a sparring match but less than a,” She pontificated in a way that didn’t add clarity to her statements, “‘Desperate brawl for that which is worth more than life’ kind of fight.”
Kiara balled and unballed her fists. “I don’t want to do that.”
Coco nodded, “You’re very kind, Kiara-chan. But, if you’re holding back out of obligation or because you don’t want to hurt your mentor, don’t worry! I’m ready.”
Coco scrunched her mouth to the side. “Actually, its because I’m your mentor that I think its important for you to let all your feelings out. Like, I, also,” Coco glanced over at where Kanata was cutting pieces of schnitzel with pieces of silverware she was trying not to accidentally crush, in preparation for watching a fight, “Know how much it sucks to have unrequited feelings.”
“It does!” Kiara said, suddenly. She took a breath. “And you- you….”
Coco shifted her weight back, and spread out her arms. “So, c’mon. Just, let your frustration out. I can take it, and It’s my fault in the first place.”
Kiara inhaled, deeply, twice, and on the second breath something must have got in her eyes because she was crying when she threw the first punch, at Coco’s shoulder-
And Coco took it in stride and smiled slightly and settled into a sparring stance-
But Kiara just broke down crying. She fell forward-
“Oh, hey hey,” Coco rushed over to steady her. Kiara returned the hug.
“I guess we’re built differently,” Coco said, “I'm sorry.”
And Kiara heaved another great sob.
They had a talk. And Kiara made up her mind.
-OOO-
The doorbell to Callie’s apartment rang.
“Come in!” Callie said, reflexively, and she engaged the process of tenderly extricating herself from her chair to make her way to the foyer, and it took her a while to remember that, Kiara didn’t typically knock first-
There was fumbling at the doorknob, and it opened.
“Hi Kusoto-” Callie began, before she realized that it wasn’t Kiara, because Kiara had an orange color scheme and also wasn’t three separate mythological creatures from Indonesia.
“Ohaaaaaaaaaa---!” The zombie began saying. She had peppermint hair and a ragged dress. Her fangs poked out of her open mouth.
“Hey,” the dagger, Anya, waved her right hand slightly. She was barefoot and her hair was wavy, and her default expression looked tired.
“-aaaiiiiiiiiiioooo-” Ollie continued, her voice going higher up.
The peahen, Reine, scrunched her mouth to the side and folded her arms. She was a chunk taller than Calliope, with long silver hair.
“-oooooolllie!” Ollie finished. She raised her right hand.
“Greetings, Calliope,” Reine said.
“Hello again!” Calliope said. “What brings you here?”
“Oh, Kiara told us to take care of you,” Anya said. She rubbed her eye, idly.
Reine nodded. “Don’t you know that three homeless people are the best babysitters possible for a newborn baby? There was a movie about it.”
“But,” Callie looked down at her engorged abdomen, “It's not, born yet? Does that principle of babysitting still apply? It’s not a baby in the way ‘babysitting’ means.”
“Well, it’s not ‘not’ a baby.” Ollie said. “And by the interplay of the property of additive inverses and the distributive property of multiplication, you could say it is a baby!”
Callie scrunched her mouth to the side. “Well, I literally can’t argue with that. Like, in that I wouldn't know where to start."
“Then don’t!” Ollie said. Anya and Reine nodded. “We’re here to make your life as comfortable as possible.”
“We’re experts in creating comfort wherever possible,” Anya said. "It's a skill we've honed on the streets."
“Weeelllll,” Callie said. “So, this means, Kiara won’t be around?”
Reine opened her mouth, and emitted a weird bird noise, and then closed her mouth. “Yeah…?”
Callie scrunched her mouth to the side. “Then, I guess, this is very thoughtful of her.”
Anya nodded, solemnly, once. Ollie furiously bobbed her head up and down.
“And that’d mean, it’d be rude to refuse,” Callie said. Whatever Kiara had to do must have been important. Plus, Callie knew that people should take breaks- she had trouble following that advice herself but she’d never hold it against any of her friends for doing that.
Not that Kiara had any obligation to take care of Callie or anything in the first place. That was her business….
“Then, uhh,” Callie stepped back, to let three homeless mythological creatures into her home to babysit her unborn child, “I gueeess I'll allow it-"
And in a flurry of feathers, zombified ash, and daggers, the three of them rushed into the apartment.
A few minutes after Callie returned to her music workstation, Ollie knocked on the wall next to the open door. Callie knew it was Ollie because the strands of peppermint hair tied in buns on either side of her head meant that it was impossible to hide it when she peaked around the corner, and even if that wasn't the case Callie was pretty good at knowing when she was being spied on, if she did say so herself.
“Good evening, Mistress,” Ollie said. She curtsied, with her new maid uniform. French Maid uniform. (Callie could see almost all the way up Ollie’s thighs)
“Ah-” Callie said. “First off, back up on the ‘mistress’ part.”
Ollie blushed at the ground and then backed up against the wall. “Yes ma’am.”
“Guh- I meant, metaphorically-” Calliope said. “And more to the point I never- I didn’t ask for a maid.”
“No, but Kiara did,” Ollie said. She smushed her lips together and nodded three times.
“Did Kusotori literally hire you as an actual literal maid?” Callie said. That didn’t sound like something Kiara would do to her specifically, but only because she figured Kiara would want a literal actual maid for herself. But, maybe it was a prank, which, maybe was something Kiara would do.
“Well, not, exactly,” Ollie said, “But she said that if you were okay with it then I should go k-k-k-kkuurrreeeiijiii!” She waved her arms like a muppet.
“Well, I, didn’t, say I was okay with a maid, I’m pretty sure,” Callie said. “And I'm also pretty sure I would remember something like that.”
“But,” the edge of Ollie’s mouth twitched, and she inhaled sharply, “You also didn’t, not ask for a maid. And by the interplay of the property of additive inverses and the distributive property of multiplication, that's equivalent, basically, to asking for a maid!"
Callie scrunched her mouth to the side. “But, I’m not asking for an infinite number of things at any given moment. That doesn’t imply I actually do want any of them.”
“That is true,” Ollie said. She looked into the middle distance and her undead face started tinting a shade of red associated with increased bloodflow to the area, “So, if you tell me you don’t want a maid, I’ll stop being one.”
Callie scrunched her mouth to the side. From what she knew of Ollie, this might have just been a ploy to act as if Callie wanted her to disrobe right now.
And like, having someone to clean up and- whatever else it wax maids did (buy groceries? Run errands? Teach etiquette? Defend the household against outside threats with advanced guerilla warfare training?)
And the outfit wasn’t, uncute. So, Callie allowed it.
"Guh! Fine,” Callie said, “Just, you can wear your costume. Just, do your best to tidy up.”
"Y-yes mistress!" Ollie bowed. "I'll do my best to serve you."
“You know, when you sleep on a problem, it helps you solve it,” Anya mumbled, groggily.
“I, have heard that,” Callie said. She glanced at the wall. “And sleep is something I don’t get enough of anyway- but still, I don’t-”
Calliope pontificated in a way that didn’t add clarity to her statements, in the general direction of where Anya was sleeping in a pose that couldn’t possibly have been comfortable, but Callie supposed she didn’t know the biology (metallurgy?) of sentient daggers turned into cute girls, “really, see how that’s going to solve my wifi connectivity problems.”
Anya stretched one last time on the jumble of cables and the small black box with plastic antenna sticking out the top, before she got up and brushed her dress off.
Callie checked her phone settings. “Well, I’ll be damned. That worked.”
Anya patted the black box. “Router-kun and I just had to become homies, real quick."
Ollie appeared from around the corner with a massive grin on her face. “You mean to say, you fixed the problem by… sleeping aroun-”
Anya hook kicked Ollie in the stomach.
“Woah,” Callie said, as she stepped into her bedroom. “Wow, this is the cleanest this room has been in like, three years!”
“But of course,” Reine said. She closed her eyes and clapped her hands together, and stood up straight and puffed out her chest and opened her right eye. “You see I explicitly insist that all depictions of me in fanworks include me being extremely good at cleaning.”
“Because that’s the only way she’s ever going to be willing to do or be in any way skilled at it,” Anya said.
Reine puffed out her cheek and tried to grab at Anya’s head. “Well if you’re so good at cleaning why don’t you clean up your act?”
Anya expertly blocked Reine’s next three attacks and then stepped back into a ready stance. “Guess being tall didn’t get you any manners.”
“Huh,” Callie said. “So, you didn’t, use any questionable magic or anything to clean this up, did you?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say questionable,” Reine closed her eyes and smiled and put her hands on her hips, “Because you’re not allowed to question it.”
Callie’s expression flattened. “How about I do anyway?”
Reine scrunched her mouth to the side and also- pointedly- glanced at the closet doors.
Calliope’s expression flattened as she stepped towards her closet. “Did you really just stuff it all in there? I didn't think it'd fit-"
“NO DON'T-”
And the moment Callie touched her closet handle, like, three years of mess rumbled out of the closet-
Ollie bolted in from the other room to join Anya in steadying Callie while Reine shielded Callie from the brunt of the avalanche.
And after like three years of mess was all over the floor in a pile next to Callie's closet, Reine brushed herself off and stood up and tried to pretend she didn’t just almost get swept away by a mess she directly created.
Ollie brushed imaginary pieces of dust off Callie’s shoulders. Anya started picking up the softest parts of the mess into a pile, and started sleeping on it.
“I’ll,” Reine made a grimace, “Try that again....”
"Actually-" Callie said, "Why don't we have Ollie be in charge of cleaning from now on?"
Ollie finished making Calliope’s bed. She fluffed up the pillow, three times, and then glanced around the room.
“Eheh~” Ollie said, sultrily, and then she jumped onto the bed, face first.
“Wangy wangy!~” She called out in the Indonesian onomatopoeia for smelling, between desperate trembling inhaling the pillow. “Wangy wangy wangy~"
Calliope scrunched her mouth to the side and backed out of the room.
And in the middle of the day, right after Callie had felt she’d gotten things under control, there was a light rustle and a shadow briefly passed over the entire apartment complex.
“Oh, that’s,” Callie began-
“DRAGON ATTACK!” Ollie yelled, at a volume that didn’t seem possible for someone whose lungs were dead.
Anya’s eyes shot open and she jumped up from the spot on the couch where she was napping. Reine looked up from the cracked, refurbished e-reader she was perusing literature on.
"Friendship fusion!" Ollie called out.
“Uhhhh,” Callie said.
Reine kneeled down on her right knee, and Anya leaped on her shoulders and put her arms out in a T pose.
And Ollie in turn climbed up to sit on Anya’s shoulders, as Reine stood up.
"What the f-word-” Callie said, looking up at the nested piggyback thing in front of her.
Reine was waving her arms vaguely. Anya had procured a knife from somewhere, and Ollie grabbed the handle of the sword stuck through her head and pulled it out with an elegant *shshshsk*-'
Before it caught at the last moment, and instead ripped her head off her neck by the seams.
"Oh, let me get that for you-" Reine said. She pulled Ollie's head all the way off her sword. Anya maneuvered Ollie’s body to align with where Reine held her head.
And the necromantic magic reanimating Ollie slorped her head back onto her neck, and after two seconds her expression returned to a doofy grin, which was normal for her.
And then the front door handle rattled with the sound of someone using a key to unlock it.
"What the actual fuck?" Coco said, when she walked in. She was wearing her dragon-embroidered tracksuit, and her glasses, in what Callie figured was supposed to just be a casual visit.
"Coco-san, watch out!" Reine said.
"There’s a dragon attacking the apartment complex!"
Coco blinked. "I'm a dragon, motherfucker.”
“No no, we don’t mean all dragons are bad," Anya said.
“Just that there’s a dragon here- you should get behind us, so we can protect you,” Ollie gestured vaguely behind the stack of three widely varied magical denizens awkwardly waving their arms while sitting on each other’s shoulders.
"More to the point," Callie said, “I’m pretty sure Coco was the dragon that just flew overhead.”
Coco nodded in confirmation.
Ollie glanced down to make eye contact with Anya, who then looked to Reine, who looked back up at Ollie. The three of them looked at Coco, and then at each other, and then in another sequence of extremely coordinated stunt work, got off each other’s shoulders and put away their weapons. Also, apparently, whatever coordination they had practiced included synchronized apologizing, but Coco interjected by hugging them all.
“So, you know, Coco?” Callie said, to the wall. She rubbed the back of her head.
“Yeah, she’s helping us with our routine!” Ollie said.
“They are among the few hobos I know that don’t want to buy asacoco from me,” Coco said.
“Well, it might be nice to just hallucinate on distilled crappy bilingual humour for an afternoon,” Reine said, “But we figured it’d be a better use of our time to just, every time we had nothing to do-"
"Which happens very often-" Anya said.
"-to just work on our routine.” Reine nodded towards Anya.
“Your,” Callie parsed, “Routine? That weird combat thing?”
“Oh, not just that,” Ollie put her hand to her collarbone. “We are simple folk-”
“As simple as we can be considering being two mythical creatures and a magic student,” Reine held up a finger.
“And all we dream of is becoming entertainers!” Ollie waved her arms like a muppet.
“Idols,” Anya said. She folded her arms. “I’m not going to settle for ‘entertainer’.”
“Are you sure you should be talking to Coco, then?” Callie said.
“What do you mean, Callie-chan?” Coco said. She put an arm around Callie's shoulder and painted an imaginary panorama with her other arm. “I’m the most shining idol in all the motherfucking land. I bring joy to children, weebs, and hobos everywhere!”
And the three weeb homeless mythical creatures nodded in agreement. They started doing a formal contra dance style thing that was also a reference to an old piece of gangster media.
“Woah, yaaaayyyy!” Coco said. She clapped her hands together quickly. “That’s so good!”
Callie made a smile. “That was pretty good! I’m sure you’ll achieve your dream.”
“Well, its not our only dream. Anya also wants to be able to sleep as comfy as possible,” Ollie said, “And I want to be able to buy a strawberry cow, so that way can get strawberry milk whenever I want!”
Coco walked over to Ollie to sling her arm around the smaller girls’ shoulder, “Well you’re in luck, because strawberry milk actually comes from creatures like Calliope-chan!”
Callie choked on her own spit. “Wait- what-”
Ollie’s mouth made a large ‘O’. “Really?”
“Yeah, see how she has pink hair?” Coco said, “And what color are strawberries?”
“Red,” Ollie said. She nodded three times.
Coco scrunched her mouth to the side. “That’s, right. But Callie-chan has an original song called ‘Red’, right?”
Ollie nodded, three times, again. “Yeah!”
“Oh, you’ve, heard my songs?” Callie said.
“And you know, Ollie,” Coco continued, “That lactating creatures will begin doing so in order to feed their babies- as in, when they’re pregnant.”
Callie hugged her chest. “I’m not lactating right now -”
“That’s what someone trying to horde her milk would say!” Coco said. She pointed. Ollie gasped.
Callie took a step back, and then she started running. “Stay away from my chest!”
After only a couple minutes of what Ollie insisted was only jokingly chasing around a humanoid being trying to consume parts of her (And that Callie shouldn’t stereotype the differently alive), Coco interrupted the chase by giving Reine, Anya, and Ollie a big inspiring speech that was only 30% bullshit. It was always nice, hearing Coco’s encouragement and wisdom- real and fake wisdom, mixed well enough together that it was plausible to think it was all for the memes. Callie was glad to have a mentor like Coco.
And after the speech and the clarifications, Reine, Anya, and Ollie broke into a group to discuss their newly granted wisdom, and Coco walked over to give Calliope a big hug.
“Hey, just let me know if you need anything, okay?” Coco whispered, next to Callie’s ear.
“Oh. Yeah,” Calliope said. She awkwardly returned the hug. “Is that all you came here to say?”
“Um,” Coco said. She glanced at Callie’s three impromptu caretakers. “Well, I also gave the Three Stooges an inspiring speech. But, basically, yeah.”
Calliope chuckled. “You could have texted.”
“Yeah, but I wanted to see that you were doing okay.” Coco said. She brushed Callie’s arm.
“Why, wouldn’t I be?” Calliope said.
Coco then looked inordinately sad, “Ah. Well, you always knew what you wanted.”
Calliope blushed. “That’s certainly not true-”
“And I know you care about Kiara-chan as a friend,” Coco said.
“Oh,” Calliope said. Was it weird that Coco was bringing up Kusotori? “Well, yeah.”
“Well,” Coco planted one last smooch on Calliope’s forehead. “You’re one of the most hardworking people I know. You deserve happiness, wherever you find it.”
Callie stifled a blush. "...Thank you."
Coco walked toward the door. She tilted her head back, “‘You take care now.”
Callie smushed her lips together, and nodded, meekly. “You too.”
And a minute later the low rumble of a heavy object jumping out of the parking lot signaled that Coco turned into her full dragon form to fly back home.
“So, is Coco kind of you guys’ mentor as well?” Calliope said, to her caretakers.
“Yeah, basically!” Ollie said. She nodded three times. Reine and Anya also nodded, less times.
Reine clicked the side of her mouth. “Between her and Kiara-san giving us recommendations we’re sure to be able to join the same entertainment company as you and her. ”
“Oh, is that what Kusotori paid you with?” Calliope said, “Nepotism?”
“Well, that, and,” Reine inhaled through her teeth, “Her house.”
“Her house?!?” Callie choked on her own spit.
Reine glanced at the wall. “Well, she won’t need it anymore-”
“Wait, what? Why not?” Did that mean, Kiara was going to try to move in or something-
“Well, she moved countries?” Ollie said. She made a grimace and shrunk into her shoulders, slightly. “Didn’t she, tell you…?”
Callie blinked. “She. What…?”
“Yeah, Coco set her up in with the branch overseas,” Ollie said. “Like, a bit ago, actually- It never came up?”
“Well I,” Callie said. “She- was a little weepy the last time I saw her but-”
And Calliope ran over to where Kusotori’s last gift of food was sitting in her kitchen, waiting for Callie to randomly crave raisin zucchini muffins-
And with trembling hands Callie rummaged through the basket to find a decorated envelope at the bottom of the muffins-
Dear Callie,
I’m so blessed to have known you all these centuries.
“Oh, no-” Callie said aloud-
And I'm sorry for putting my feelings on you. I know you need your space.
I wish you the happiest with you and your baby. I look forward to meeting her!
And I treasure every moment I've spent with you.
See you around,
-Kiara
“Kiaraaaaaa-” Callie cried out, reflexively-
And she scrambled over to her front door, pulling her jacket off her coat-rack-
“Woah woah,” Ollie said, “Where are you going?"
Callie fumbled with needing to bend down to pick her sneakers off the shoe rack, slightly. “The airport.”
“Well, Kiara left a week ago,” Ollie said.
“-Last Tuesday,” Reine corrected.
“So, there’s no reason to run there.”
“Especially with how pregnant you are,” Anya said. She gestured vaguely at Calliope's stomach. “I'm pretty sure keeping you from doing anything strenuous is part of our job description.”
Calliope scrunched her mouth to the side, and briefly considered that if the three of them stacked up on top of each other, she could just summon her scythe to hit Reine in the knee and knock all of them over-
“You could just call her,” Anya said.
Callie glanced at her phone. “That, doesn't seem enough. Also, I never learned her number-”
“You what?” Ollie said.
Callie grit her teeth with the realization of how that must have looked to Kiara, in retrospect. ”Ollie! You’re my maid,” Calliope pointed at the zombie.
Ollie’s face tinted slightly. “Y-yes….”
Callie nodded. “Get me to… Europe…?”
Anya’s expression flattened even more than it already had, “You don’t even know where in Europe your company has its overseas office in?”
“I mean, I can look it up easy," Calliope said, “That’s not that big a deal, right?”
Reine, Anya, and Ollie shared glances.
“But- Ollie!” Callie said, “That’s an order.”
Ollie cried out slightly, “Ah~ Yes mistress!”
“Ollie, no-” Anya tried to grab at her friend but Ollie escaped to make her way to Calliope’s computer.
Reine scrunched her mouth to the side. “Well, I guess if we’re hired to take care of you, we’ll have to help.”
Callie was convinced to sit back down. She clutched Kiara's letter to her chest.