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“Wanna go put on your pjs, Eddie?” Stede asked.
“Yeah!!” Ed said, before shooting off like a rocket. Stede didn’t think much of it as he hummed to himself and washed up from dinner. Ed was on the older end of the age he regressed to, closer to 8 than 4, and when he was a bigger little he loved running around and playing one on one sports with Stede in the backyard. Sure, maybe he shouldn’t’ve been running in the house, but Stede tried not to scold Ed unless he did something really wrong, which hardly ever happened.
But maybe he should’ve, because maybe three minutes later, Stede heard a tumble and a wail. Stede quickly dried his hands and rushed to the staircase, when Ed was sitting on the landing between the first and second floor, curled up with his head against the wall, crying.
Stede immediately sat down and pulled Ed into his lap, who then buried his face in Stede’s chest.
‘M sorry,” Ed said quietly, trying to stop the tears.
“What are you sorry for, little love?” Stede asked. As far as he could tell Ed wasn’t even hurt that bad, nor did he break anything.
“F’r… for falling,” Ed said. “Bein’ loud an’ ruining everything…”
“Oh baby,” Stede said, kissing Ed’s forehead. “You didn’t ruin anything. You didn’t do anything wrong. You just fell down the stairs. Did you hurt yourself anywhere?”
Ed shook his head.
“You sure? It’s ok if you hurt yourself.”
Ed looked up at him with big eyes and sniffled. Then he pointed to the other side of his forehead.
“Here,” he said, very softly. Stede kissed where Ed pointed too very softly. “An’ here…” he said, pulling up his right knee where it looked like he got a bit of a carpet burn. Stede kissed Ed’s knee as well. Then Stede just held him for a moment, and Ed hugged back as his ragged breaths returned to normal.
“‘M sorry I was running in the house,” Ed said in a small voice. “Know I’m not s’posed to…”
“It’s alright, bun,” Stede replied. “You were just excited. “
“Jus’ wanna watch ‘Emperor’s New Groove…’”
“Aww,” Stede cooed. “You wanna get up and go to the couch? I can get us some ice cream too.” They only had dairy-substitute ice cream in the house. Stede had finally gotten Ed to admit the pain that came from real milk ice cream was much worse than the pleasure he got from eating it. Stede hated seeing him hurt himself, especially since there were so many yummy alternatives. Stede helped Ed up and they walked hand in hand to the couch. Stede went to the kitchen while Ed snuggled up and made two bowls of ice cream (one of the benefits of almond milk ice cream was that it was soft straight from the freezer). When he came back, Ed hadn’t queued up the movie yet, he was just looking up at Stede with big eyes. Stede suspected that the fall might’ve made Ed regress younger, so he sat down and handed Ed his ice cream while grabbing the remote.
“Want the tiny spoon,” Ed said dejectedly. Stede looked at the teaspoon in Ed’s ice cream and smiled softly. While big Ed and Stede always used teaspoons instead of dastardly evil tablespoons, little Ed, for some reason, liked to eat ice cream with a tiny little demitasse spoon. So Stede picked Ed’s spoon out of the bowl, put it in the dishwasher, and returned with a demitasse spoon, which Ed took and started eating his ice cream. Stede queued up the movie, cuddled Ed, and ate his own dessert.
“Stede?” Ed said in a soft tired voice, after Stede thought he’d gone to sleep.
“Yes, Eddie?”
“Really didn’t mean to fall.”
“I know.”
“‘M really sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for, little duck. You did nothing wrong.”
“Still love me?”
“Always. Always, Ed.”
“Thanks. I love you too.”
“I know you do,” Stede said, brushing back his hair to kiss his forehead again.