Yeah, definitely a sore point with Alix’s family. When you won’t even eat dinner with your own grandkids, that’s petulant. I am glad that Alix and Graf seem comfortable with how things are. And, we we see at the end of this segment, how things are going. Pai makes a characteristic entrance, but she and Alix are obviously trying to not ratchet up the tension. We’ll have to find out from Pai just what she and her husband do in place of a sexual relationship. Trust me, being married for nearly 35 years, it is an important componant; we are a soul-body fusion, not some Platonic ideal, so I am curious as to what their “work-around” is.

I do wonder what it was they were eating.

Enjoy my content? Buy me a beer!

Because of the kids, there was a low chainlink fence about the property’s backyard, with a locked gate to the short pier.  Alix paused them there and leaned past their children to kiss him.  “It’s about ninety minutes until dinner,” she purred, “unless you’ve already wasted yourself in her.”

“Alix, please,” he sighed, not wanting to put the kids down, “you know we don’t anymore.  Not since we all came to our arraignment.” 

“I’d like to believe you, Graf, really,” she said, turning to look at the houses on South Harbor Island, across the channel.  “But you two were just gone for what, three months, somewhere way out west, and you expect me to think you did not…”

“We hold hands; we kiss,” he said, doing so onto her cheek.  “And that’s all, physically.  I’ll let Pai explain the rest.  Oh, she plans to be here at twenty hundred.  After dinner.  Speaking of, will your mother join us?”

“You know she won’t,” she replied, leaning her head onto his chest.  Suza patted her hair like a dog’s.  “As much as I still struggle with all of this, my family does not even want to try.  Hence them not being at your wedding.”

“So,” Alix concluded, turning to face her house, “at least we four can eat in peace.  After, we, that is…”

“Your mother will watch the kids?” he clarified.

“Yep.  After all, if what you said is true, you shouldn’t take very long,” she smiled.  Back inside, she told her mom they would be busy for a bit and please watch the children.  No acknowledgement at all.  Alix tugged up toward the stairs.

Shedding clothes in the hallway, she paused at the door to her room.  “Make me pregnant?”

“Won’t that make your vision worse?”

“Graf!  Lie down, dammit.”

With Alix’s mother sulking somewhere outside now that they came down for dinner, she put Suza in her booster seat while Graf settled Tér into his highchair.  They spooned some kind of thick soup into their bowls.  Alix said her small prayer while he lowered his head.  I’ve seen too many odd things, if not outright miracles in the last three years.

“This is very good, almost more of a stew,” he said after the first bite.  “Assuming it’s not poisoned, of course.”

“Poison!” Suza called.

“Graf, don’t teach the kids weird things.  And feed our son before we’re all wearing the food.”

“Yes, Dearest.”

He saw her glance at the clock over the door to the backyard.  “About twenty minutes.  Wanted you to myself, longer.”

“I wasn’t long enough?” he laughed.

“Plenty, both times.” She looked back to him, her face softer.  “I guess you were telling the truth.  I’ve almost no room left in me for dinner.”

After finish the meal mostly in quiet, Alix wiped her mouth and leaned back in her chair.  “Can you explain what you meant earlier?  About what her, sorry, Pai, and you do get up to?”

“It…” Graf took a moment to wipe their son’s face and take his bib off.  “Remember the time we met her brothers?  At that restaurant?”

“I also recall the second time, with their mother, in that ruined city.” She shuddered.  “Awful.  I’ve been tight spots in space and on the moon, but never was scared like I was from your mother-in-law.

“In fact,” she carried on, standing to get the serving bowl and cover it to go into the fridge, “your father-in-law was a little dour, but didn’t scare me.  Married into some real winners, Graf.  Anyway, you were saying?”

“Sometimes, it’s like the restaurant.  Or a snowy forest or even a beach a couple of times.  Constructs, they’re called.  It’s gotten to where she can touch me with a finger and my heart doesn’t stop.”

“You said ‘sometimes.’”

He fell silent and also glanced at the clock.

“May I let Pai explain it?” he asked.

“Sure.  Whatever.” She was not really happy with that question.  They saw her mother through the house, followed by the front screen door opening and closing.  Then her car starting.

“Guess that’s it for her visit?”

“She’s probably going to one of the markets,” Alix said with a shake of her head.  “One of us will look for fresh vegetables in the evenings and fresh fish in the morning.”

“What about meat?”

“Didn’t I already have enough, already?” she laughed, leaning over the table for a kiss as the door reopened.

“I offered to watch you over two years ago,” Pai chuckled as Snow danced around her.  “And here we are!”

“Auntie!” Suza yelled.

After making one of her characteristic entrances, Graf walked over to her for a hug and light kiss.  “Welcome, dear wife.”  Don’t say anything rude, Alix!

He stepped aside and watched his two women stare at one another.  Alix walked over and put her hands lightly onto Pai’s hips.

“Fine,” the human muttered, “it’s my house, after all.”

Pai blinked then leaned in way to close, sniffing.

“You may need a larger one in a few years,” she smiled, leaning back out.  “You are pregnant again.”

“What!” Alix looked up to the ceiling and her room, where they had been in her bed.  “Just now?”