Jem…Chapter 162

*Before…

I was going to say something else but she kisses me. “In love with you as you are and as you’re going to be whatever that will be.”

Okay I tear up at that and I kiss her back for a good long time before we get up and actually quickly use the shower to wash our hair and get cleaned up before heading out into the rest of the house in our bed clothes.

Me and a pink band tee shirt and underpants and a light set of jamma bottoms and she’s just in a black band tee shirt and panties and we hold hands and it’s late so we head to bed.

I can hear Brooklyn, Mike, Molly and Carmen downstairs and as they hear us they’re clapping.

I’m so blushing on the way to our rooms and at the same time Rayne and I end up laughing together and I set our clock on both of our phones so we definitely wake up and Rayne climbs into bed and she squiggles around to create friction to warm up the sheets and I slip in with her and snuggle into her really contentedly.

*And Now…

You would think that I would be really, really tired and that I would be really, really sore after the day and night that I had and all of the sex from last night and having sex with Rayne using that on…well inside me.

I don’t know if I’m sort of getting more used to it since it’s been a couple of times but all I feel is sort of stretched? Not like pain but like I’m really aware of things and at the same time It’s all spun together and connected with all of that yayness so…

I think I feel laid?

The thought makes me giggle.

Rayne does the sleepy move and moan and she does that amazing whole kitten-stretch thing and I just watch her with this really happy and kind of amazed grin on my face.

She gives me a bleary look. “Mmm…what?”

“You’re beautiful.”

She smiles and it’s a shy smile. “You’re biased.”

“I am but I’m serious too.”

“Angel…” she has that protesting but not protesting sound in her whine.

I move and I straddle her and lean down and I kiss her really long and deeply and do the thing that she does to me with the yay and the tongue.

There’s this one perfect moment too when it’s just her face and mine and my hair hanging down and curtaining off the universe.

And we break the kiss to just stare into each other’s eyes.

She gets the shimmery eyes and they have almost tears and she says really quietly but we’re really, really close. “Angel…Oh fuck Angelle I’m falling for you so hard baby. It’s never been like this…ever…no one…”

These really sweet heart moving and wrenching in a good way happy tears spill out of her eyes and she has this huge, huge smile on her face.

We kiss again and again and then there’s a knock on the door and Brooklyn calling. “Wake up goddammit!”

We laugh because it’s funny and it’s her doing a line from a movie we watched all together called *Talk to Me.*

But I look at her as I get up and get a handful of easy morning clothes and she’s getting up and I say.

“Rayne?”

“Yes babe?”

“I’m falling in love with you too, and I don’t think it’s just something that’s like teenager love. I mean it’s all light and wonderful and stuff like all those clichés and stuff like flower petals on the breeze and sunshine through leaves.”

“Angel…” She’s looking at me.

“Rayne it’s so much deeper than that…it’s deep like us together turning into something slow and beautiful like glass ground down so perfect on the beach…broken but taken up, lifted off the bottom and tossed together and still just like becoming y’know something beautiful.”

I blush and I bite my lip and I start getting dressed and she’s staring at me and she’s still staring at me when I’m in my double panty set and training bra and a band tee shirt and a set of heavy sweats.

I go over to her and I kiss her and she blinks and she looks at me and she kisses me really long and soft and slow and she’s blushing really hard and her nipples are hard and she’s squirming as I kiss her and she breaks the kiss.

“Angel…I…please…can we…”

I nod… I had plans to do some other stuff but that stuff can wait for a little while at least and I sink to my knees in front of the bed and open her legs and pull her over the bit of sheets until she has her legs over my shoulders.

I slide my face over her drenched panties and I can feel the heat, the wetness and how swollen she is.

Nose the fabric a little…bite at the fabric grazing and pull the fabric away from her skin until my teeth loses their grip and it pops back.

Oh wow she actually cries out at that.

She’s playing with her breasts right now too.

I mover her panties aside and she cries out at my first touch…I thought I was done after last night too…but all of this, how vibrant and loud and just so amazing she is and the way that I hear her crying out all these dirty things, all these sexy things over and over I sort of get past the whole I’m an awesome girlfriend thing into openly wanting so much more and sort of almost synching with her so that when she has this really loud orgasm I emotionally boil over my edge a pop too.

There’s almost nothing there but it still happened and I’m still buzzy and yay from it and breathless as I went to crying out and breathing hard to getting swept away with her.

I’m panting and kissing her thighs which are trembling and I can feel her running her fingers through my hair and she’s lying back and I can feel her panting.

There’s a crying sobbing sigh from her. “Oh…how…how do you say things like that?”

I kiss her right thigh again. “You do too.”

“Not like you do, it doesn’t feel like I do.”

I kiss her left thigh again.

“It does from here….for me. The things you say Rayne even without saying them they’re…they things that I never ever honestly thought that I’d hear from anyone…ever.”

She moves to sit up and I push to stand up and we look into each other’s eyes and slowly kiss each other just going for that loving you soft and tender girl soaking into her girl thing.

We break the kiss and I head out after a lingering hand hold and arm thing and we both get fresh clothes and head to the shower and we do that pretty fast and I get our bedding then head downstairs were everyone’s up and there breakfast done from the smells and I got to the basement to do our wash personally.

Carmen doesn’t need to see certain stains.

Well really no one does either.

I can hear Rayne getting grilled and teased and I look around and Carmen’s there sewing and there a whole lot of stuff out for all of our costumes.

I get things going and she coughs looking at me. “Holy lesbians Batwoman I hear you two this time from all the way down here.”

I blush. “I…uhm…that was Rayne.”

“Nooooo…that was you being a Supergirl girlfriend to Rayne.”

I blush though laugh too. “Okay, okay enough but great geekette references.”

“Blame Molly, seriously she’s into all that stuff it kinda stuck.”

“She’s into comics?”

“Comics, anime, goth stuff, feminism.”

“I’m into all of that.”

Carmen makes a face. “I wasn’t ever really exposed to it. Mom was really down on any of that stuff. She said that it wasn’t good for modelling or getting ahead in life.”

“Really? I know there’s lots of models that do cons and stuff to get started and that like goes on to other stuff and even acting.”

Carmen makes a face. “I’m way more comfortable on this side of the hair and make-up thanks.”

I nod. “I can get that, before I was in the band I wasn’t…I never really thought about doing this. I though songwriter and maybe get into radio or like produce jingles or something.”

She grins. “Actually Lucky’s and Jake’s and the stuff on the site you’re still doing that.”

Okay we both laugh.

She looks at me. “Sit in the shampoo chair we might as well get a jump on getting it ready.”

I sit and she finishes sewing this little red number and then comes over and she gives me a shampoo and then starts changing my color and I’m going still pink for this but it’s a style that will need some pre-care as I’m going for volume and hair height with the costume.

Once I’m done and my hair is wet she actually puts in the extensions so that she can style all of it together.

I get my head wrapped in a towel and after that head upstairs and she tells me to send Brooklyn down first.

I head to the kitchen to be greeted by a plate of banana bread French toast and bacon from Kimmie who’s smiling and she looks like she’s really happy.

“Banana bread French toast?”

“Yep, just sort of learned it from Max’s mom.”

“Oh…so you passed the Mom test?”

She grins. “I hope so, I mean I was actually not trying I was just being myself.”

“But…she gave you the recipe, that’s a thing.”

Kimmie squeals and she dances on the spot. “Oh my god I know right!”

I’m laughing and eating at it’s really, really good with like my homemade bread dipped in a thinned out batter and I thing rolled in something like flour but not? “You’re making breakfast more often right?”

She grins and she’s eating some too. “Totes, it was such a cool night Angel.”

“Night?”

“Yep, up again with Max all night.”

“That’s going to be a thing with him isn’t it?”

“Yeah he takes part time shifts on clean up at the mill so he can leave after Janey’s gone to bed and stuff.”

“That’s actually pretty cool.”

“It is he’s so about her, he knows it’s all going to go to shit with her when she’s older and she starts teen angsting about stuff with her mom. He wants to get in as much quality time and stuff like before that becomes an issue.”

“It’s kinda messed up he’s even thinking about that.”

She nods. “Max is thinking about her everything, he has like seven accounts for her all saving for stuff.”

“Seven?”

Kimmie nods. “College, Braces, Prom, Wedding…all those kinds of things and he like puts a little in at a time and stuff because he said that it’s better if he even pays less when stuff like those things happen.”

I’m eating and nodding and thinking….that’s not a bad idea actually. It sounds good I think.

“He sounds pretty cool, how are you about all of this with him being all super focused on her.”

“I’m good, I’m not really there yet for super serious and Max has stuff still left over from his ex too I’m pretty sure so there’s all of that too so we’re taking our time and stuff. But it was still really cool just hanging out and talking and stuff even if we were like just doing laundry together.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” I say.

She nods. “It was actually still like really sweet because e we were watching a movie together and I was sort of leaning on him as we were like folding clothes.”

I grin picturing it. “Okay that does sound rather cool.”

We actually end up hugging and being careful with our plates and I’m happy that she seems so happy.

I finish eating and as I’m doing that Kimmie makes more coffee and I’m taking out the stuff I bought last night and I get ready to bake and it’s mostly going to be store bought cookie dough and frosting and things but that’s okay.

Because I’m baking off geek and geekette cookies.

And the first ones are easy they’re just plain circles and they’re baking as I’m rolling out the other dough and I’m cutting out dalek shapes and police box shapes with a paring knife and I do triangle sort of shapes.

I take little bits of leftover dough to add some of the edges and do the other bits for them like the bridge and those two ball things for the star destroyer cookies and then there’s the round ones that are death star cookies and the daleks get a tooth pick in them before they cook.

The biggest job is the frosting once things are cooked off and I do the dalek dots with those little metal cake balls and the edge lines are in decorating chocolate for them and the death star and a little bit of grape licorice Nib gets cut for the end of the tooth picks and I use the white decorating chocolate and do the police box.

I don’t do many like a dozen of each and we let the cool as we head out to the living room and we start to practice together the songs. I’ve been doing it off and on sort of singing along with most of these in my spare time and I think that Molly downloaded them the songs and the music too a while back.

We have had this on the books for a while now; we are ready it’s just been getting here and the costumes and well… practice.

And when we’re done we get together and we record it all but we don’t put it out online until we’re done getting all into our costumes and our make-up while Dad and uncle Mitch and The Boys all show up and while it’s not quite geek culture Billy and Davie are wearing SamCro gear for those that don’t know it’s stuff from Sons of Anarchy and Uncle Mitch is done up like male Sheppard from that videogame Mass something or other.

Dad’s actually with his short hair and some of the stuff from like around the garage and old clothes and stuff done up as the new Mad Max.

Major cool points for that and Dad has some comics in boxes with him in his truck that look pretty old and actually half are like boarded and bagged.

Yeah my generation didn’t invent any of that.

But yeah we did a making of recording of us getting in our costumes and hair and make up for the fans and when we’re leaving for the gig Molly’s last deal is to actually post it all up.

It’s packed there and I see “Ace” and he is waiting for us and he actually waves us around the back so we can go in through the back door to get set up.

“You’re busy?”

“I had to open up before you girls got here; we had people here for like an hour before opening and we’re full. Like seriously full and we had to pull some of our stuff out just to have room.”

“I noticed.” There’s a love seat and two side easy chairs they usually have for like reading and stuff or the staff to lounge on and play videogames.

He’s looking at us and he’s grinning from ear to ear. “You girls look great, like seriously great. It’s really cool that you’re doing this and getting all into it.”

Kimmie smiles quietly and bows. “It is an honor to help out as we may.” She’s like being serious and stuff but she’s really rocking the whole Katana costume.

And Brooklyn is going as the fully suited up new version of Captain Marvel which looks really cool on her and Mike’s actually in costume too as Iron Fist. And some of that’s kinda tight and some of it really looks good on him.

Molly is utterly adorable as she’s ungothed and she’s done herself a spitting image of Jamie McJack from Girl’s With Slingshots.

Carmen is actually dressed to stun and she’s the new Uhura from the new Star trek series and she’s so rocking the look and it’s kind of cool since she’s like actually showing off her being mixed race but black rather than like pretend at doing whatever she was doing.

I think Molly had a lot to do with the props she has and all of that.

And Rayne, Rayne is just stunning with herself done up as Medusa from the Inhumans and she’s in light violet like lycra and over that she had like faux leather for like the boots and gloves and her mask. Carmen did a serious job on her wig and it sort of has all this bright red hair that almost arcs from her head out and falls in these long, long cascading waves and it’s almost to the floor and it’s seriously styled to like look wild yet tamed.

And me…

Me I’m in a white body suit with a sort of plunge not plunge neckline and big lapels on my collar and flared pant legs and big white wedge boots and hoop earrings and there’s sequins and stuff in all the right places and the only concession of me still being me is my face make-up is different and it’s silvers and blues but it’s in the shape of the ink-blot tattered butter fly.

Guess it at all?

Okay, I’m Dazzler.

I had read Dazzler as a kid, it was one of my Mom’s comics and it was I think an influence for me with music in a way I think as there wasn’t and isn’t a whole lot of rocker heroes out there in comics.

We go in and we get cheers from the crowd inside and it is pretty full actually well it’s the absolute fullest I’ve ever seen the place and we get shown to our set up corner where there’s a small stage and the guys are doing the set up and Mike and Molly are literally right beside us squeezed into a small table space.

And it’s tight but we can do it and people are complimenting us on our costumes and there’s kids there too that are kind of younger ones too as well as pre-teens and we’re talking and I’m signing posters and things from our stuff that Ace has been selling.

Once we’re set up we move around the shop looking at comics too and we’re all getting some and Mike’s got a camera with him and he’s getting Ace with us or some of the other guys at the shop and…Beatrice? Okay she’s a new face but she’s wearing a shop tee for here and she’s really smart and knowledgeable about a lot of the women in comics.

We’re getting this on camera for the ads but to also show that there’s a really good vibe from Ace’s Comics and that girls can be full on geekettes and gamers and nerds. And there’s people in costumes and some are just thrown together but there is stuff like a couple of Starfleet officers and one staffer Klingon and a couple of Jedi and with the younger kids that are really mostly girls there’s a little bit of everything including some Disney characters and even a few mash ups like Ironman-girl in the toy helmet and gloves and a tutu for ballet.

We pose for pictures and selfies with them and the parents and older sibs and near the end of it we’re handing around the cookies.

Then we get up onto the stage and we’re tuning and then once I’m done I play a little of *The Cantina band* music on my keyboard and that gets smiles and a few laughs and it’s definitely a good crowd for this.

And then we open with *A Man They Call Jane* From the TV series Firefly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dh1RkW1of6E

It’s an instant hit with the crowd. Firefly was pretty well regarded and well that’s one of the signature moments in the series that really made a lot of fans smile and be happy and stuff and ever since I looked it up and heard it well I knew we were going to play it here.

And it takes zero effort to get them all singing along with us and it’s kind of amazing too with the looks on the faces of the younger kids having this happen around them for the first time.

It’s blowing their little minds.

And when we’re done I switch over to *Faith of The Heart* Which is the theme song for Star Trek Enterprise and it’s a really good tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLs4MGTTXRU

I love geeks and geekettes and nerds and little nerds because we feel this kind of stuff. I can remember myself singing along to this just because it was a cool song and well Dad like’s Star Trek a lot too.

And just for the kids that we have here that I thought that we’d have here we play. *Magical Power Panties* By Starlight Butterfly and they freak right out with that jumping up and down screaming and happy crying and it’s very, very cool with that going on and them literally screaming the chorus with us and then there’s all of the teens and pre-teens bopping along with the song and after that we hit them with *I Want Candy* from Bow-Wow-Wow as something fun and then we go into a really cool song By The Dollyrots called *Be My Leia.*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igFBUseUdPA

And that’s one of my super punch for this show songs that when I heard it I really fell in love with it.

And that has the place bouncing all over again with it being fun to listen to for the youngest kids and all of the teens like it and the…well other geeks and geekettes here are really into it too and when they have a little bit of space we have people shaking it and dancing.

Even Ace and the folks behind the counter are shaking it.

And as we’re getting things coming to an end of that song Mike and Molly have some of the laptops turned around and Ace is popping in the DVD Molly gave him for the Big flatscreen her has in the store and Sailor Moon starts coming on but muted and I say to the crowd.

“Here it is our brand new song just for here at Ace’s comics and a super shout out for all of our Geeks, Geekettes, Nerds and everything in between and more.”

“Here’s... If I was a Sailor Scout.” *If I was a Sailor Scout* By Starlight Butterfly.

If I were a Sailor Scout.

If i had a power to transform to who feel I am.
I would fight for truth and justice...
And the Love of all my friends.

To get wrapped up in my light as I'm finally out!
So watch out all you douchebags
'cause I'd be a Sailor scout! (Group)

I'd get the cool boots!
I'd  get the cool gloves!
I'd step up to the bad guy's.
Without a doubt! (Group)
(Double cymbal bash)
'Cause  I'm a sailor scout!

Moon Power!

(Big guitar riffing)

I wanna be like Mina and be kind and brave.
I wanna shine like Venus and fight for all that’s great!
I wanna be as smart as Ami!
I wanna have good ideas!
I wanna be like Raye Hino1
I wanna be hot as fire!
I wanna be buff like Lita!
I wanna be true and strong!
I wanna kick some booty!
And I wanna have some fun!

Moon Power!

I'd get the cool boots!
I’d get the cool gloves!
I'd step up to the bad guy's.
Without a doubt! (Group)
(Double cymbal bash)
‘Cause I’m a sailor scout!

Cute Like Rini!
Deep like Trista!
Bold like Amara!
And to play like Michelle!
And sweet as Tomoe!

I'd get the cool boots!
I’d get the cool gloves!
I'd step up to the bad guy's.
Without a doubt! (Group)
(Double cymbal bash)
‘Cause I’m a sailor scout!

I’m gonna be a meatball head!

I'd get the cool boots!
I’d get the cool gloves!
I'd step up to the bad guy's.
Without a doubt! (Group)
(Double cymbal bash)
‘Cause I’m a sailor scout!

I’m gonna be a meatball head!

Moon Power!

It goes off really, really well because it’s one of those key sort of cartoon/anime’s that was converted over to English and I know fans have all sorts of stuff about that but it was one of those shows like Innuyasha that was on TV and not just TV but on air non-cable TV.

People know it and fans know the show really well and the manga and the untranslated stuff and it’s a song that a lot of the people here can get behind and they can just have fun with. And I tried to channel Kimmie when I wrote it and made it as fun as MPP is.

And it’s chick-pop, girl rock and it’s like so right up our alley.

They really dig it and we end up laying it twice in a row and we’re really shaking it out in here and the kids are screaming all the more and when we finish it we stop and I call out.

“Okay we’re going to be breaking for a while and there’s all sorts of like really cool stuff going on here and we’re here to have some fan fun with you all too!”

There’s a lot of cheers and then there’s so many kids and people that want to talk to us that we really don’t get out of the stage area for an hour.

Yeah an hour because I want to talk to the kids and the girls and the tweens and teens and answer their questions about music and writing songs and even showing them how to play.

I do tell those kids. “We’re going to have a booth at The Fall Fair and we will be doing different stuff but one of the things we’re going to do besides play for you guys is we’re going to have some lessons for free and play with you all.”

That goes over really, really well and after that I get into the Magic Cards Tournament with Molly and After a tutorial by Beatrice and Molly we play and I get my butt handed to me but we have an audience and we have five women playing counting me and Molly but Beatrice and Ace’s girlfriend and sex-pot Jessie is there too in a Dr. Who Tardis tee-shirt and her make-up done really well and I’m told she looks like “Rose”?

But it’s five girls/women playing a game that anytime Jason seen it played was well really guy central.

I see girls and younger women buy stuff as we’re playing.

And Kimmie and Brooklyn are playing this whole war gaming thing with Legos and Rayne is actually reading comics. And she’s reading some to the kids and then there’s just lots of stuff going on with the comics and all of the role-playing game stuff like Pathfinder.

And even people playing videogames in two places even if they have to do it standing with a Halo shooting one going on and one of my faves Spiro the Dragon.

Then it’s getting late for the younger ones and close to supper time and we spend more time saying goodbye and hugging them and taking pictures with them and giving out cards and selling our stuff like crazy as people are buying our smallest sizes for the kids and posters and we sign a lot of stuff.

And there’s food that shows up for everyone and it’s take out from Lucky’s and that’s really cool since with the size of the order it was delivered and because Ace set it up with like everything with what we are actually trying to do there was a discount.

And with that discount he’s playing our commercial spots for Lucky’s on his TV and I get Molly to do the same on our screens too that we had turned around for the If I was a Sailor Scout bit and Mike does a bit of Ace and I talking together about Lucky’s and how it’s really cool of them to deliver and it’s cool that businesses are supporting each other with things like event catering and everything.

Ace was really smart because there’s free fries and there’s free Lucky’s basic sliders and that might have cost a bit of cash but listening to the crowd here it’s won over fans and it’s won I think some customer loyalty too.

We get done eating and we get back to playing and it’s an older and later crowd and we start in with *Iron Man* By Black Sabbath and it’s very much more a Raven song and she’s doing a great job with it using her voice’s depth to like carry it off and everything.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_6g3RKHSNE

And that’s a great segue song for us to play. *Princes of The Universe* By Queen and that’s a really great tune from Highlander. A real cult classic movie but with an even more beloved soundtrack.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZ1WyBGG_Vw

Then we’re knocking then out with *Love Song for A Vampire.* By Annie Lennox.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWzKjXhbPtU

That’s a slow song but it’s still a good song and it’s a song that’s great for like those games like Vampyre or something and there’s a whole goth thing geek thing too and Molly actually takes a break to like dance to this with Carmen and it gets a few looks but it’s not like they don’t know who we are as a band and that Raven and Jem are definitely a thing.

And we go with that flow with me going into *Who wants to live forever* By Queen and that actually has a few more people dancing as we play it and it’s one of those songs that really was an old dance tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TsOPjZEF6E

And of course that’s a perfect slip for us to go into doing Bonny Portmore and I try to always emulate Laureena McKennitt when I do this. It’s a stellar song and it’s a serious workout for the pipes too when it comes to singing it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNHShuGGtVU

And I end off our set with us doing my favorite cover of the night with us doing *Mal’s Song* By Escape Key. This is a whole so much better version than the one I had sung before here and it was actually sent to us after that by Ace.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUn-eN8mkDw

And that’s a really big favorite here with the staff and some of the regulars that are here and we get a whole bunch of people that are swaying and that are singing along with us as we play that song and then we go into *One for the money, Two for the show.* By Trooper and they’re clapping as we’re finishing and then we’re done.

It wasn’t a big song gig but we did debut another new tune and we did some stuff for our fans and new fans and we had a good time and we sort of did like a celeb thing in working the place and getting things going.

It was a good day and a good evening.

Ace is cutting a check for us and he’s waving off the cost of the comics that I did get and he’s really happy how the day worked out and from everything that I could tell he had a good time too but more than that he had a really good day businesswise.

“I have to get you girls in here again. I would love to have you in here for May the 4th.”

“Why then?”

“May the fourth be with you.” He’s grinning and I smile a little, okay that was cute and clever.

“Nerd holiday?”

“Exactly, almost sacred these days.”

“I’ll see what we can do.’

“That would be awesome really, and Angel…I mean it thanks for all of your help and working the floor with the kids and everything.”

“Hey when we all help each other everyone wins.”

Ace is nodding. “Well you did that definitely in spades I sold a huge amount of product and even better I have like ten new people signed to get orders through us with everything from the kids young comics to some people really into some of the things that you showed them.”

“Hey Jem, Rat Queens are awesome and so is Lumberjanes.”

“And we have orders for those plus Batwoman and a whole bunch of graphic novels too.”

“Very cool.”

I take our cheques and our stuff that he’s given us which includes some pretty swag posters with female super heroines and some promotional stuff and give him and his girlfriend one last hug and put my Tupperware from the cookies on all of it and head out to the vehicles.

And we’re packing up when I see Dad with the bottle for old me and it’s full of cash and lots and lots of coins.

Which has me have a sort of lump in my throat because I never figured that would happen even if I think people know through Dad that I’m Jason’s cousin.

He looks at me and he’s smiling too but he’s definitely giving it another look at it in his hand as he gets into the car.

Yeah…I know he loves me, I know he loves me as me but there’s something that’s really a heavy reminder of me and my old life.

I go over to his car. “Talk?”

He says “Sure.”

“McDonalds?”

“Actually Yeah, I think that would be good for a change.”

I look at the girls. “We’re going to go to McDonalds before going home.”

They’re nodding and Kimmie is chanting. “Quarter pounder!, Quarter Pounder!”

And I smile and Rayne takes the stuff from my arms and she looks at me. “I saw that hon, you okay?”

“Yeah I think so, I just think that this hit Dad in the might have beens maybe and we should talk it out like we used to.”

She nods but she tilts my chin up and she kisses me and then she pulls me into her arms for a strong and snuggle supportive hug.
And…and I just, just take breaths of her and soak in that strength she’s lending me.