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Pollux closes his eyes for several long moments. Finally, he murmurs, “I know, dear one. I know. Don’t worry. You didn’t do anything wrong.” He drags his gaze to me. “What concerns can I address for you to help clarify the…situation?”
I tense because the concerns I have aren’t exactly the sort I can easily bring up. Especially not like this when he’s so calm. It’s throwing me off in ways that leave me entirely unsure how I’m supposed to proceed.
Pollux’s brows knit as he turns off the heat. “Why did you just do that?”
I plaster my tried-and-true smile in place. “Do what?”
“Constrict all your muscles.”
I unconstrict them. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His mouth opens, and closes. He takes a breath, letting it out slowly. “Is this a conversation for us to have in private, dearest?”
Restarting my brain, I wait for the Windows logo to load up. I’m hearing things. Dearest? Did he just call me dearest? Where did that come from? I am entirely out of my depth. What am I even doing here right now? There’s nothing I can say that will make anything better. If I attempt to assuage my concerns, I may get Andromeda in trouble, then who knows what might happen behind closed doors after I leave?
That soft, gentle dearest has to be an abuser tactic of some kind. One I’m unfamiliar with. It’s the part where Pollux recognizes he’s a conventionally attractive man and is aiming to distract me from important things with tenderness.
Well. Listen here, sir. I shan’t be fooled!
While I’m waiting for my stupid brain to calibrate, Alexios releases a massive sigh. “Okay, this is actually painful to watch.” Sitting in the seat at the table closest to the front kitchen window, he plants his chin in his hands and grins. “Yet, I am ever the masochist. Do you know what A would call this?”
Andromeda gasps and raises her hand as high as she can. “Me! Me! Pick me! I love Alana trivia!”
Alexios points one gloved finger her way. “Yes, Meda?”
“Miscommunication trope!”
He claps. “Very good. Now…do we fix it, or do we watch it all go up in glorious flames?”
“Xios,” Pollux grumbles.
His teeth flash in a wicked smile. “Yes?”
“Three bites.”
His smile vanishes. “Cruel and unusual punishment.”
Pollux shoots a perturbed look over his shoulder, and Alexios pouts. Running his fingers through his hair, Pollux turns his attention back to me and murmurs, “I want to respect you if you don’t want to share the truth right now. It’s not miscommunicating to allow you the right to share your thoughts and feelings when you’re ready. Just know that we speak openly in this household. There’s nothing you’re not allowed to discuss—either in front of both Xios and Meda or just between the two of us. I want everyone I care for to be comfortable. It’s important to me that…that my family feels safe.”
I am so confused right now.
This has to be a new form of gaslighting not yet covered in my child protection courses. The videos they show us every couple of years never do seem updated. In fact, the last one still had flip phones and treated the internet like a strange alien monster coming to cyberbully children all on its own.
Pollux could be pretending to be sincere in order to get information out of me. Well, bucko, joke’s on you because I am fully capable of being vague. Shifting Chai’s carrier to the other hand, I say, “Earlier, I was a little worried that Meda was upset, but she seems to be doing better now. Even if I don’t fully understand the situation, as long as she’s happy, I’m happy.” And I won’t even picture roasting you on a spit. Slowly. For hours.
Pollux nods once. “I know we’re a lot for you to take in, and my panic cut things short the last time we saw each other. I would like to talk to you in private, later. If…if you wouldn’t mind.”
I open my mouth to respond about how I would just love to talk to him in private later, with absolutely zero witnesses, but Chai’s raging meow whines into the air before I can express my sincerest self.
My little kitty grips the mesh wall of his carrier as he screams.
Pollux doesn’t waste a moment. “Meda, get some of the kitten food from the other room, please.”
“’Kayyy.”
While Andromeda pounces off down the hall opposite the kitchen entrance, Pollux carts the steaming pans to the table and sets them on hot pads.
Alexios’s face twists as he sits straighter in his chair. “I am against this.”
