Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 75457 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75457 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Sounded good to me.
Wait.
“You have bubble bath here?” They had soap…well, something that was close enough to our soap to call it that, but it was always in small cake form and asking if they had liquid soap had made everyone look at me like I was a talking dinosaur who’d just knocked on the main gate.
Klynn’s snicker said he was feeling very proud of himself.
“I snuck it.” Throwing his arms around me, he hid against my shoulder and laughed. “I did it. And I got it. And I was so smart.”
I was missing context and at least half the story.
“That’s amazing. How did you get bubble bath, silly boy?” Doing something sneaky was clearly the answer, but I waited for him to stop giggling.
“I went to the Walmart place. By myself, Daddy.” His giggly tone said he was amazingly proud of himself too. “I did it. I bought stuff by myself.”
How?
“You were amazing.” Praise first and question for felonies second. “Was it scary?”
Walmart could be stressful for anyone, but Klynn being a dragon and an alien and not very comfortable with people would make it even more challenging.
“People were everywhere, Daddy.” He was a bit wide-eyed as he pulled back and straightened. “It was like the ants pouring out of the little mounds if you accidentally step on them.”
Yeah, I’d felt like that a time or two as well.
“But you did it.” And hopefully without incident. “So you bought bubble bath, tater tots, and nuggets. What else did you get?”
Did he have new toys hidden away somewhere?
Leaning closer, he dropped his voice to a whisper. “I got chocolate but don’t tell or we’ll have to share. We don’t have that here.”
He wasn’t wrong.
“I promise not to tell.” But how did he get it? Lorne had said something about trading him for the ereader but even their Walmart wouldn’t put up with that level of nonsense, would it?
Who was I kidding?
They’d have definitely done it.
“Did you trade them for the goodies?” Had he wanted more things and just couldn’t afford the trade?
“No. I traded Lorne for more money. He’s helpful and nice if you have sparkly stuff. Sparkles are his hoard.” Klynn shrugged. “Everyone knows that, so I don’t have to hide it.”
Okay, yeah, everyone did seem to know that because of some story with watches and hidden cameras that didn’t make any sense at all.
“What kind of sparkly things did you trade with Lorne?” I thought I knew the answer, but I had to ask anyway.
“Diamonds.” Klynn gave me a pleased-with-himself grin. “We got lots and he loves them.”
Good grief.
“Lots, huh?” His excited nod said he wasn’t exaggerating. “I’m glad you found something good to trade them for.”
We were going to have to be careful not to upset the Earth’s diamond market.
“They just kind of fall out of the ground.” Klynn shook his head like it was ridiculous. “But we brought all kinds of stuff we guessed might be smart. Those worked best.”
I had questions…lots of questions.
“Did you get anything else with your money?” An unsupervised little with diamond-level money should’ve been dangerous in Walmart.
“No.” His dramatic pout said he had a lot of big feelings about that. “There was too much stuff.”
Ah, decision paralysis.
“That’s okay. We’ll go back another time and do a bigger shopping trip.” I said it without really thinking but Klynn’s head cocked in a clear signal to the slightly confusing human in the room. “It’ll be a fun thing to do on vacation?”
He giggled.
“Earth people are so funny.”
At some point he was going to call me out on my nonsense, but I still hadn’t gotten my date yet.
“We are.” And this funny Earthling would grow up eventually. “But you’re very good at taking care of your Earth person.”
And he seemed to like taking care of me, so really, I was doing both of us a favor.
“Next time you can help me pick.” He expertly moved us past my issue and changed the subject. “I like blocks. The boys in my stories have them. But they have other stuff.”
Americans especially were the masters of creating too many toys, so I could understand how he’d gotten overwhelmed.
“How about we look at different kinds of building sets? Not just the regular LEGO ones but sets that will make castles like yours.” He’d done an amazing job with the project and I was curious to see what other kind of building he’d like. “They’re not magic, though.”
Hmm.
“Unless someone can make them magic?” Wait. “Oh, privacy. Um, what if I asked one of the mages who are a Daddy on the other side of the portal for help with that?”
Would that be enough to fix the privacy issue?
We weren’t talking about little stuff with people on this side of the portal but what about the other side?
Klynn didn’t seem to know right off the bat but his human-looking thinking face said he wasn’t too upset. He’d have gone blank and possibly lost his little headspace if I’d fucked up too much. “Maybe. But I don’t know the Daddies.”