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“Thank you.” But since Ruslan was not in the right headspace to understand my reservations, I smiled and pushed them to the back of my head. “Is it playtime? I was promised coloring.”
When that got me more giggles and an excited bounce, I took that as a good sign. “Wonderful. But do you need juice or something to drink while we color?”
Nodding, Russie grabbed my hand again and led me over to a cabinet. “There.”
Thereseemed to be where all the little stuff was stored because I saw sippy cups and bottles and fun plates of all shapes and sizes. “How about…the blue one so you match?”
Without a mac-n-cheese cup to go with his outfit, it seemed like the best idea and I was rewarded with another big smile. “Yes. Milk? I like milk. I like juice but milk is yummy.”
Giving his hand a squeeze before releasing it, I nodded. “Yes, as long as you’ve got milk that sounds like a great plan.”
And based on his love of anything cheesy, it wasn’t a surprise.
But the way his brows scrunched up said he didn’t know if he had milk…and a grocery run was definitely looking high on the list of options for date number two. But we were saved because there was magically enough for one last cup. “You were right. Look at this.”
Russie seemed surprised but pleased. “Yay. Daddy Dante is magic.”
His cute confusion made me wonder how long the milk had been in the fridge, but it was still in date and didn’t smell off, so I quickly poured him a cup and got us ready. “All set. What are we going to color?”
I’d met a few littles for the first time at munches but my date with Russie was a unique adventure. When I’d pictured our first date, it’d been as grown-ups over dinner where I could ask him about his little side and carefully make sure I knew what he would be comfortable with.
Winging it had never been my expectation.
But he was happy and knew what he wanted and I’d been given the go-ahead by the Dom he’d decided to borrow to help with the decision-making, so we’d just take it one step at a time.
I could do that.
“Lots.” His excited answer was more honest than I realized until he led me into the living room and I saw the spread of coloring books he’d laid out. “I like coloring.”
That was getting to be more obvious by the second.
“Jacki’s Daddy said that you liked coloring.” That was basically the extent of my knowledge, though. Coloring, dessert, cartoons.
It was like the generic starter pack of little preferences and would only help for about five minutes. Which cartoons? Which dessert? When did he like dessert? What kind of coloring did he like? How long would we color? Did watching cartoons mean cuddling or would he sit on the floor?
Pushing the questions to the back of my head with the rest of my worries, I followed him over and sat on the floor by the coffee table. “Oh, these are great.”
The variety of everything from wild animals to My Little Pony said he was open-minded when it came to the things he liked to play with. Since that seemed to mean he’d be hard to offend, I picked up a coloring book that had fish on the front. “Can I color fishes?”
Russie’s enthusiastic nod said I’d chosen well, but he leaned over and pushed the pages open. “But not Jacki’s pages. You can pick a new one.”
Got it.
“Yes, I won’t color anything that Jacki already started.” The fact that Jacki had his own pages that he was still in the middle of coloring said he came over as much as I’d thought he did. “I’m glad you have a good friend to play with.”
That got me another enthusiastic nod as he picked a Transformer coloring book and quickly found the page that he’d been working on before. “I knew him lots and lots and then he found his Daddy.”
I was pretty sure that translated into he’d known his friend for a long time and then his friend had found his Daddy, so I nodded. “His Daddy is very nice.”
Russie looked like he was completely focused on his coloring, but I could almost hear the wheels in his head turning. “Jacki’s Daddy said no more hiding. Jacki little and Russie little and littles gonna play.”
“Oh?” Bits and pieces of the story had been mentioned before, but I’d never gotten the whole thing and I’d never realized they’d been talking about Ruslan. “So you knew Jacki as a big friend and then when he found his Daddy, you became little friends too?”
Ruslan nodded, nibbling on his lower lip as he worked on what I thought was a Decepticon. “Privacy is important and not a bad thing. I don’t have to share if I don’t want to.”
“That’s very true.” But eventually, I was going to have to point out that if he was dating me publicly everyone would guess he was a little…because it’d been a while since I seriously dated someone outside the scene. “But I’m glad you were finally brave and talked to your friend. It’s nice having someone to color with.”
He gave a dramatic sigh that had me trying not to smile. “I wasn’t brave. Jacki’s Daddy got mad and tattled. But Jacki was excited to play, so I couldn’t pout.”
