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Susie asked to stay over at Kris’ house a lot. It seemed like her own home was constantly hanging on by a thread: Kris, can I come over? Our heating’s out. Kris, can I come over? We’re out of groceries and my mom won’t be home until the end of the week. Kris, can I come over? The landlord’s replacing the carpeting. Yeah, because of the mold.
Toriel was of course, willing. She’d assure them both that the worst thing a teacher could do was ignore a child in need. And Kris, of course, did their best to adapt their house to accommodate a reptilian, putting a space heater by Asriel’s old bed and a spray bottle in the bathroom for when her skin started shedding.
Today Kris made the offer before Susie could even ask. A week ago she’d dropped her tail in the middle of class, sending their teacher into a panic and making several other kids scream in disgust. She then picked up the wriggling limb and waved it in front of them, earning her lunch detention as soon as the nurse sent her back to class. That never actually happened; the school nurse wrapped her with bandages and sent her home for the day.
Once she was back in class Susie was uncharacteristically quiet. It was easier getting work done without her constantly trying to distract them, but Kris was missing the chatter after a few days. Which is why, when the bell rang, they asked if Susie wanted to spend the weekend with them.
“You sure it’s okay?” she asked “Your mom won’t freak out or anything?”
Kris nodded. “We’ll just stay upstairs.”
“Thanks, Kris,” Susie sighed.
They reached the sidewalk in silence, then Susie said, “I have the tail in the fridge, you wanna touch it?”
So they stopped at Susie’s house, where she let herself in with a spare key hidden under a potted plant. There was a stale quality to the air inside, simultaneously dry and dusty and damp like mildew. It wasn’t messy by any means; there was an accumulation of dirty laundry that didn’t spread beyond the hamper, and the dirty dishes were confined to the sink, but Kris got a sense that the carpet hadn’t been cleaned since the day the landlord had it replaced, and that the rest of the house was maintained similarly.
Seemingly out of nowhere, a woman appeared in the kitchen.
“Susie, I got the call from the nurse. How did this happen? Have you been keeping the bandages clean?”
Susie stared in disbelief. “Mom?”
“What, Susie?”
“Nothing,” Susie said. “I change the bandages every day.”
Her mother nodded. “Is this Kris?”
“Yes,” said Susie.
Kris awkwardly waved hello. ”Susie was going to stay a few days at my house, if that’s alright with you.”
“Oh that’s perfect,” Susie’s mother said. “If you’re taking care of her then I can be on my way.”
“Yeah. Bye,” Susie responded flatly.
As though on command Susie’s mother left to change back out of her house clothes. Kris looked at Susie puzzlingly.
“She’s not usually around,” Susie explained in a hushed tone. “I don’t know why she’d want to check on me over a dropped tail, I’ve dealt with worse.”
“I thought a dropped tail was really serious?”
Susie opened the fridge and pulled out a bundle of paper towels. “It doesn’t actually hurt that much,” she explained.
They poked at the tail together and watched how the muscles still twitched as it warmed back up, and Susie explained all the parts of the cross-section.
“It’s nice having at least one friend who thinks it’s cool,” Susie said, grinning.
“Oh yeah, Noelle would freak,” said Kris, reminiscing on how easily frightened she was. As a little kid, Kris would claim to be a ‘werewoof’ and run around barking and howling. Every time they did, Noelle would shut her eyes and plug her ears, repeating over and over again to herself that werewolves weren’t real.
They both talked and laughed on the way to Kris’ house, and Kris was relieved to see Susie acting like herself again. The house was empty when they reached it, but the odors wafting from the kitchen said that Toriel had been there soon before, and some sort of baked good was underway. A sticky note on the fridge told Kris to turn the oven off when the timer rang.
Like they usually did at Kris’ house, Kris and Susie didn’t do much of anything. They’d lay in bed or on the floor with music or internet videos playing on Asriel’s desktop computer, talking about whatever crossed their minds. Sometimes Kris would pull out a sketchbook, skipping over tween drawings of themselves with wolf ears and horns standing next to Asriel’s self-portraits that featured giant colorful wings, and they and Susie would try drawing. Sometimes each other, sometimes darkners from memory. Susie once made a terrible rendition of Rouxls Kaard that became their most-referenced joke for a week.
That day they had the music turned up high and a box of crackers to split between them.
“So how does it grow back?” Kris asked. “Your tail, I mean.”
“It can’t regrow the bone, so the new one ends up being squishy and harder to move around,” Susie explained. “They store fat more than anything, so I feel kind of hungry and tired all the time.”
“I can get you more to eat if you want,” Kris offered.
Susie let out a sigh of relief. “Thanks man. I was too embarrassed to ask.”
Susie followed Kris out of their room, where things seemed immediately wrong once the song blasting on Asriel’s computer was out of earshot.
Shit, Kris thought. The oven.
They both ran downstairs to find the timer having gone off long ago and the faintest curl of smoke emerging from the oven. Opening it wreaked havoc; a grey cloud poured out and set off the smoke detector, which Susie fanned at while Kris felt around blindly and oven-mitted for whatever remained of their mother’s baking. Susie hit the oven with a blast from the fire extinguisher for good measure and the pie tin revealed itself, pitch black.
“Jeez, it looks like that thing opened up a fountain,” Susie quipped, voice unsteady. “Put it down quick before you start turning blue.”
“My mom’s gonna fucking kill me.”
“Toriel? Really?”
“Even if it doesn’t look like it she’s gonna be super pissed.”
Susie tapped her foot and thought hard. “We could hide the evidence? If we clean everything up really well we could make her think she never actually baked anything.”
“Yeah,” Kris said shakily. “If we hurry we can burry this in the backyard before my mom-“
Click. The latch on the door turned.
“Kris, I’m— Susie? Kris…. Kris what happened here?”
Kris didn’t say anything, just stared straight through their mother.
“Hi Ms. Dreemur,” Susie mumbled, trying to fill the silence.
“Kris, you saw the note on the fridge, right?” Toriel asked.
Kris nodded, still silent and wide-eyed.
“Why didn’t you turn the oven off, then?”
Kris made a strangled sound. Toriel sighed.
“Kris, please just answer me.”
The same unintelligible noise leapt from Kris’ throat.
“Honey, you’ve worked so hard on your communication skills. I thought you were past this,” Toriel said in the gentle tone that people used to working with kids use to disguise frustration.
“We were working on our project and didn’t get here in time,” Susie told her. “The timer had already rung when we came in the house.”
Toriel nodded, brows furrowed and hand on her chin. “I see…. Kris, I’m glad that you’re focusing on your schoolwork lately but if you’re going to stay out then you should tell me beforehand. You should be more responsible at your age.”
Kris nodded. Susie tugged at their sleeve and they both turned to head back upstairs when Toriel gasped.
“Oh Susie, what happened to your tail?”
“It dropped,” Susie said rushedly, “It’s not a big deal, don’t worry.”
Kris still couldn’t talk much once they reached their room. They made sure to quickly turn the music off before Toriel caught it and collapsed in bed.
“It’s alright now, you don’t have to keep panicking like this,” Susie told them. “We’re out of trouble and now we can go back to hanging out.”
Kris nodded but stayed silent. Susie stared at her shoes.
“You know how I said that dropping your tail isn’t that big a deal?” she mumbled. “I kind of lied. It’s not bad for you as long as you can eat and sleep afterwards but it’s not a good sign.”
Kris listened with intent, nodding along.
“It’s a stress thing. My mom’s been leaving me alone so much, and taking care of myself and the house is so exhausting, and that freaks me out because how am I going to make it as an adult?”
Kris formed the closest thing to words they could. “Mhm.”
“My tail dropped the first time my mom left me home alone, when I was seven or eight, because I had that same freak-out. Eventually I just started hoping I’d die before I got old enough to move out so I wouldn’t have to deal with it any longer.”
Kris nodded again.
Susie put her head in her hands. “I’m sorry, Kris. I never wanted to bring this up, it’s…. It’s too much.”
With great difficulty, Kris said “It’s okay.”
Susie smiled. “You Being friends with you helped, though. Taking care of each other, going on cool adventures together, it’s made everything seem easier.”
Kris got out of their bed and sat down in Asriel’s next to Susie. They hugged her, and she rested her chin on top of their head.
“You’re a good friend, you know. This all means a lot to me,” Susie told them. “Letting me stay over and everything.”
Kris took a deep breath. “I’m glad.”
“Your voice all the way back now?”
“Yeah. You deserve better than how people treat you, you know.”
“You do too, Kris,” said Susie. “We’ve both got kind of shitty homes. Just in different ways.”
“You…. You should have priority though. I don’t have a tail to drop.”
“I don’t want my friend to be struggling either, though.”
“I’ll be okay.”
“No you won’t. I’m learning to manage, but you still need help.”
“Susie, I don’t want you burning yourself out trying to take care of me too,” Kris said. “My house is a place for you to recover, okay?”
“We can be each other’s first priorities, then,” said Susie. “Well, second priority after saving the world.”
Kris smiled. “Yeah. After saving the world.”
They started dozing off together, Kris in the comfort of Susie’s bulk and Susie draped over Kris’ warmth.
“You know,” Susie yawned, “after we finish saving the world, we’re gonna have to haul ass on our project.”