Chapter Text
“Deburrah, it’s the weekend! Why do I have to get up so early?!” Kai’s groans filled the already noisy kitchen. Mornings at the Onceler Household were always quite chaotic in the suburban neighbourhood of The Council.
Kai was sat, messing with the food on their ceramic plate, at the small oakwood dining table in the busy kitchen. Above the table was a window with transparent orange curtains allowing the sun to pass through with a tint, illuminating the kitchen's yellow walls.
“You need to wake up early because you need to go outside and get some sun” Deburrah shot back at their annoyed kid. “And you are eating everything on that plate, breakfast is the most important meal of the day whether you like it or not.”
The frying pan of bacon slowly fizzled out as Deburrah turned to divide the 4 slices of bacon between George Washington’s and Lord Farquaad’s plates, both of which were sat at the island in the middle of the room.
Lord Farquaad struggled to try and get up into the tall kitchen stool, finally being pulled up by George Washington.
“See, If you don’t eat your breakfast, you are gonna end up as short as him.” Deburrah smirked
Lord Farquaad looked half angry and half like a defeated puppy as Kai failed to stifle her laughter.
“Some sunlight would be good for you, kiddo! Go out, visit the neighbours. Deburrah is one of your dads and it clearly means alot to ler.” George Washington said before taking another bite of bacon.
“You guys aren’t my real dads! You and Lord Farquaad literally just married my adoptive dad! You never will be anything more then the partners to the person who isn’t even related to me.” Kai angrily shot up from the table, having finished their plate of bacon and eggs, stormed out of the kitchen and out the front door into the blinding light of the morning sun.
Lord Farquaad and George Washington looked at each other sadly with Kai’s harsh words. They turned to Deburrah who looked a little more disappointed now but once forced a smile.
“I’m sure she’ll come around to us. She’s just a little overwhelmed.” lor spoke with hope “ Now, once you are both done eating, help me load up the dishwasher.”
“It's so damn bright out here! Can’t believe they woke me up at 9am to eat freaking breakfast and CaTcH SuNlIgHt! So stupid.” Kai kicked a rock down the street, they werent too thrilled with being woken up for nothing more then what she considered torture. Her friends and, more importantly, Crumpet weren’t available today. She looked around at the other houses.
One of the houses was a more traditional Victorian home with a dark wooden porch but the house was actually made out of greyed-crimson bricks. Kids from other streets rumoured that a creepy couple lived there but Kai knew the truth was that this was the house of Bridge and Polly. Polly was friendly but was always quite busy with work and Bridge couldn't be more anti-social but they were secretly endearing. They were a good writer so Kai would sometimes chat with them about how to write different things.
On the side of the street Kai was on was a traditional suburban house, mostly made of wood with a big well-cared for lawn overlooked by a wooden porch with two rocking chairs, a table and a chess board. The people who lived in this house were called Caja and Chrym, they were married but also had a tendency for redundant fighting.
Caja was kind to Kai, sometimes she’d come over with Deburrah and they’d all sit in the nicely decorated living room with bookshelves filled with books. While they talked, sometimes Kai would pull books off the shelf to read.
These books belonged to Chyrm who always had good wisdom to share with her. The house always smelled like freshly brewed coffee and old books, it was comforting. She chuckled to herself, remembering the time that the two were quietly sitting on the porch when a few of the kids from a block away tried to come up to the house via the lawn and Caja yelled at them to get off the damn lawn, Chyrm just stared at them, disappointed.
Kai continued to make their way down the sidewalk, reaching into her pocket to put her headphones into her ears, turning on her playlist. If she was going to be forced to experience sunlight the minimum that she could do is listen to music. She doesn’t know for how long she slowly walked down the pavement, watching birds fly by into the trees, kicking rocks and avoiding the cracks in the ground.
She barely noticed the yell of her name from across the street before almost being football tackle-hugged by Celerine.
Celerine was like a golden retriever, always cheerful, sweet and kind. Kai gasped and heaved for air from the hug that just knocked the wind outta her.
“It's so good to see you, Kai! How are you and your dads?” Celery asked, finally releasing Kai from her death grip.
“Hey Celery, I’m alright and my ‘dads’…” Kai pulled the headphones out of her ears, shoving them back into her pocket “They are fine. You know they aren’t my real dads right?”
“Kai, I know this whole thing is new to you but they did adopt you and they care for you alot. Just give them a shot okay?” Celerine’s voice was sweet but Kai was still being stubborn.
“No. Deburrah adopted me and the other two just married ler. None of them are my real dads.” Kai responded with a sharpened snarky attitude “But whatever, how have you been Celerine?”
“I’ve been alright, what are you doing out here at such an early time. You barely so much as leave the house on weekends normally, much less at such an early time. I think it’s good for you, get some vitamin D!”
Kai turned a bit red at the realisation that maybe she does spend too much time inside- Nope! No, she's fine and she does everything just right.
“Deburrah and George Washington made me come out here. They said I spend too much time inside! Can you believe that?!”
Celerine chose not to respond to that phrase, looking at the eyebags under Kai’s eyes on their pale skin.
“How about you come inside for a chat! We haven’t talked since, well your dad’s wedding.” Celerine asked sweetly, seeing Kai not really interested in the idea of just a chat. “Maybe a cup of tea, too?” That excited Kai a bit more.
“So, what's your new room like? I heard you got an extension on your room.” Celerine took a sip from the freshly brewed tea.
“Oh, yeah we finally fully cleaned out the storage room and got rid of the wall so now I have like a little office space which is cool I guess. George helped me put up the new curtains on my window that Lord Farquaad helped me pick at the store. It was nice, or something.”
Kai was in deep denial and dislike of her new supposed “dads”. Sure Deburrah adopted Kai nicely enough but Onceler wasn’t her real dad much less her adoptive parent’s partners! Just because they took her to get stuff for her room extension or put up her curtains didn’t mean that she would just start being their sweet little daughter. If they even wanted to try and be her dads, they’d have to do a better job at bonding because right now Kai honestly doesn’t care for the way they try and boss her around!
She remembers hanging out with Crumpet alone at the house, when Lord Farquaad got home he gave her a look and once Crumpet left he tried to lecture her about being home alone with people without having told her “parents”. Kai yelled at him about him having no right to tell her what to do and slammed the door on his face. The audacity!
Kai had every right to spend time with Crumpet at home without telling her so-called parents! It wasn’t like Crumpet was her girlfriend or anything… Whatever, it’s Lord Farquaad’s Parental Power Trip that was bothering her! George Washington also got yelled at once for having tried to take Kai’s headphones so she would “pay more attention in class”. He also got a door slammed in his face. Kai didn’t appreciate being parented by people she felt like she barely even knew.
She remembered the wedding day, the chaos and the insanity. She actually did try to be supportive of Deburrah, stood back and observed lers green suit, helped out with decoration and flower arrangement choices but that was merely because she had “nothing better to do”. She still remembered Deburrah turning towards her after having cut the cake, holding out a slice of cake and opening her arms as if waiting for Kai to just rush up and give them a big hug, call her Dad or something stupid. That wasn’t going to happen. She just walked up and took the slice of cake, nodding at Deburrah and forcing a small smile. Her entire life had been turned upside down in a few months and when she was finally settling in a weird way it was all flipped again with George Washington and Lord Farquaad.
She did feel a sting of buried regret on not having tried to support Deburrah more, for having stayed with her hand on her phone, talking to Crumpet and her friends. Remembering Crumpet and her friends, the pang of guilt disappeared. She remembered who she truly cared about.
Kai just wanted to be with her friends, get through school and be with Crumpet. That was all. Nothing more. Nothing less. And she didn’t need any “dads” to do that.