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Ava and her daughter were experimenting to see which soda reacts more to Mentos: Diet Coke or Diet Pepsi. Ava thought it was Diet Pepsi while Shannon was certain that it was Diet Coke. Ava took a roll of mentos, tore out the bottom and put them above Shannon’s bottle of Diet Coke. “Cover the bottom until I say go then let go okay”. She took her own pack of mentos and tore the bottom out of it. She positioned the Mentos above her own bottle of Diet Pepsi.
“Ready?”, Ava asked her daughter. “1, 2, 3, GO”.
They both let go. The Mentos hit the soda and two geysers of soda exploded out of the bottle. Ava howled with laughter and Shannon started squealing in excitement. The soda hit the ceiling, bounced off and splatter all over the counters, stink, stove. Not one part of the kitchen was left untouched. Not even Ava and Shannon, who were both soaked.
“That…was… AWESOME”, Shannon laughed, jumping up and down and hugging her ma around the waist.
“Yeah it was”, Ava said laughing along with her, bending down to give her daughter a hug.
“Which one went higher?”, Ava asked her daughter.
“I think it was mine”, Shannon replied.
“I don’t know”, Ava teased “I think mine went pretty high too”. That’s when Ava caught sight of the clock. It was almost 6. Almost time for dinner. Ava’s heart stopped. Beatrice was going to be home any minute.
“Oh your Mom is going to kill me”, Ava breathed, taking in the destruction around her.
“That’s a district possibility”, said a voice behind them. They hadn’t heard Beatrice come home. They both spun around to find a very displeased Beatrice standing in the doorway, her arms crossed and foot tapping impatiently. She had on the pantsuit that she always wore to work. She looked as impeccable as always. Shannon squealed with excitement and launched herself at Beatrice.
“MMMOOOMMM”, she screamed.
Beatrice’s sternness disappeared as a grin broke across her face and she bent down to catch her daughter in her arms.
“How’s my little dumpling”, Beatrice cooed, hoisting her daughter up in her arms. Beatrice's heart clinched at how much Shannon looked like Ava. She had her hair and her face with a smattering of freckles and a slight tilt of her eyes from Beatrice. She brushed a string of sticky hair out of her daughter’s face.
“Me and Ma were experimenting”, Shannon said as if that explained everything.
Beatrice’s eyebrow raised and a smirk quirked her lips.
“Is that what you call it”, Beatrice asked her daughter skeptically.
“Me and Ma were seeing which would explode more when we put candy in”, Shannon babbled to her mother, wrapping her sticky arms around her mom’s neck.
“Well it certainly exploded”. Beatrice’s eyes locked on a very guilty and scared looking Ava.
“I can explain”, Ava started, raising her hands in a placating manner.
“I’m sure you can”, Beatrice replied with a sigh. “But first I’m going to have to give our daughter a bath. We can’t have her eating dinner covered in soda”. When Beatrice saw the guilty expression on Ava’s face, Beatrice knew that dinner was going to be a while. “Let me guess”, Beatrice said. “You haven’t made dinner yet”. At the silence that followed, Beatrice sighed again. “While I bathe Shannon you are going to clean the kitchen. Then I’ll order take out.”
Beatrice’s tone let Ava know that she had no choice in the matter. “Yes Ma’am”, Ava muttered and started getting to work. It took her an hour and a half but she got it done. Shannon didn’t seem to mind the wait for dinner. She was happily splashing in the bath. After the bath, Beatrice dressed Shannon in her favorite pajamas, brushed her hair and went to order take out while Shannon babbled away to Beatrice about how her day went.
“And then me and Ma had fun experimenting”, Shannon finished happily as Beatrice carried their daughter back to the kitchen. Ava was just finishing up cleaning the kitchen. She was sweaty and sticky. What she wanted was a shower but that could wait until they put their daughter to bed.
“Yes, I’m still waiting to learn why your ma decided to do a Mentos and soda experiment in the house”
Ava cleared her throat nervously and began.
“Well you see… I was going to make dinner like you asked but I couldn’t figure out what to make. So I asked Shannon and she said she wanted pizza. So we went to the store to get pizza but then she said that you couldn’t have pizza without soda but I knew you don’t like her having a lot of sugar before bed so I convinced her to have diet and in the process I may have mentioned that if you put mentos in a soda you can make it explode and she asked which would explode more Diet Coke or Diet Pepsi and I said I didn’t know so long story short we brought two bottles to test them and that’s how soda ended up on the ceiling” Ava finished in a rush. As if getting the story out as fast as she could would spare her her wife’s ire. As if God had answered her prayer for a diversion, the take out arrived.
“I’ll get it” Ava said immediately, getting up and following Shannon’s excited skip to the door. She gathered all the food and set them out on the table. “Come eat hon” Ava called, hoping that Beatrice would forget the incident. Beatrice’s lips pressed into a thin line but she did as her wife asked and start eating. They divided the Chow Mein, Orange Chicken and Dumplings with Shannon getting the last extra dumpling since they were her favorite.
“Hof wass you’e ay momm?” Shannon managed to get out with her mouth full of food.
“Don’t talk with your mouth full sweetheart” Beatrice chastised, pushing a napkin over so Shannon could clean herself. After Shannon had wiped her face and placed the napkin next to her plate, she repeated her question.
“How was your day Mom?”
“Well it was going extremely well until a competing ad agency poached one of my biggest clients” Beatrice griped, moving her food around with her fork, her appetite suddenly dampened.
Ava reached under the table and rubbed Beatrice’s thigh sympathetically.
“I’m sorry baby. Who was the competitor?”
“Adriel Balaam” Beatrice replied, a hint of irritation in her voice.
“Adriel” Ava repeated, not knowing why the name rang a bell. “Why does that name sound so familiar?” She paused for a moment then it clicked. “Wait. Isn’t he the one-”
“-who did the advertisements for the politician claiming that gay people were evil and should not be allowed to be parents, that they were grooming children?” Beatrice finished, getting angrier the more she thought about it. “It feels so personal. As if Adriel knows that I have a wife and daughter and is trying to take everything I love away from me”
“You’ll kick his ass Mom” Shannon chipped in, making sure to finish swallowing her food before talking.
“Thank you for the confidence sweetheart but please don’t swear”
Beatrice took a deep breath. “Enough with all this talk about Adriel. What fun things do you two have planned for tomorrow?”
Shannon perked up and started chatting away about her and Ava’s plans for tomorrow.
“Me and Ma are going to see Aunt Mary and Aunt Shannon and Cousin Anne at the park and they are going to bring Zeus to play with”
Zeus was Anne’s pitbull. The sweetest dog in the entire world who loved Shannon to pieces. Shannon had been begging her moms for a dog ever since Anne had gotten her’s but Beatrice was worried about who would take care of the dog whenever they had to go somewhere and worried about training the dog not to mess in the house and or to chew on anything. But Ava and her had been talking about it for a while and decided that it was time to get Shannon a dog. Shannon and Mary would take the dog if the family needed to go somewhere. It didn’t hurt that Mary had connections in the animal shelter so she could find the perfect dog for Shannon. And Ava and Beatrice could get the dog trained before they gave it to Shannon. Ava was thinking Christmas. Clique but then so was Ava.
They continued to chat about less stressful things as they finished their dinner. Then they sent Shannon to brush her teeth while they cleared up dinner.
Ava bumped her hip against Beatrice. “Are you okay?” she asked softly, still worried about what had happened at work. Beatrice gave a little smile and pulled Ava to her, wrapping her arms around her waist.
“It still irritates me but I’ll be alright. Nothing can ruin my day when I get to be with my two favorite girls” With that she gave Ava a peak on the lips. But Ava wasn’t satisfied with the kiss and wrapped her arms around Beatrice’s neck to deepen the kiss. But they were brought back to reality when their daughter came careening out of the bathroom pronouncing that she was done.
Beatrice and Ava broke apart and went to put their daughter to bed. Shannon took her time trying to pick out which book she wanted her ma to read to her until Beatrice gently prodded her to pick one. She finally decided on Jumanji. It was her favorite because Ava always acted out the animals in the books which always left Shannon in a fit of giggles.
Beatrice leaned against the door frame and watched Ava as she read to their daughter. Her chest filled with such a warm feeling that she thought she might burst. She didn’t know how she had gotten so lucky to have such amazing people in her life. Ava was the light of her life. The person who gave her hope no matter how dark the world got. And Shannon? Shannon was her heart. Beatrice couldn’t live without her. She was Beatrice’s everything.
When Ava finished the book, Shannon tried to convince her to read her another one but Ava gently refused, telling her she needed to sleep. Ava kissed Shannon on the cheek and Shannon returned the kiss. Beatrice sat on Shannon’s bed and made sure she was tucked in.
“Good-night sweetheart” Beatrice whispered and kissed Shannon on the forehead.
“Good-night mom. I love you” Shannon replied then gave Beatrice a kiss on the cheek as well.
“I love you too my little dumpling”
Beatrice made sure that the baby monitor was on in case Shannon had any night terrors then followed Ava out the door before gently closing it.
Beatrice felt arms wrap around her waist and Ava’s warm body pressed against her back.
“Now why don’t we finish what you started” Ava purred against Beatrice’s neck.
Beatrice rolled her eyes and turned into Ava’s embrace and cuddled Ava’s face in her hands.
“I’m hardly the one who started this. I only gave you a peck on the lips”
“Yes but you know how much your lips turn me on. You shouldn’t start what you can’t finish”
“Are you just trying to distract me from the fact you ruined our ceiling?” Beatrice teased.
Ava’s lip poked out. “I’d hope you’d forgotten that” She buried her fingers into Beatrice's hair and started scratching her scalp with her nails. Shudders ran through Beatrice’s body at the feeling. She had always been a sucker for Ava’s touch.
“Uh” Beatrice tried to remember what she was trying to say. “No… it’s going to cost a few hundreds to fix”
“Well” Ava replied, sliding her hands over Beatrice’s chest “why don’t I make up for it. Join me in the shower?” Ava’s hand started traveling down over Beatrice’s stomach, heading further south. Ava started peppering kisses over Beatrice’s jaw and down her neck.
Beatrice could only focus on the feel of Ava’s hands and mouth on her.
“Fuck the ceiling” Beatrice breathed and wrapped Ava’s silky hair in her fist and yanked her head back. Ava gave a little yelp at the brief pain but Beatrice knew she loved it. Ava always did like it rough.
“You have a minute to get naked and in the shower” Beatrice said and released Ava.
Ava gave a triumphant laugh and gave Beatrice a quick kiss on the lips before bolting for their bathroom. Beatrice followed her at a more leisurely pace making sure to snag her phone so they could keep an ear out for Shannon.
Then she went to give Ava the punishment she so rightfully deserved.