"That's how it is when you love someone. You joyfully give unreciprocated head." ~Y. Euny Hong
Kami knew why Marie called her to meet up.
She did so every time she got fed up enough to outright demand Kami carve out some space in her somewhat new "mom-schedule" so that she could nod at the appropriate times whilst Marie ranted.
That was what friends were for, after all. And as Marie's friend, Kami had a responsibility to make sure she was, if not happy, then at least not bottling everything up. Don't get her wrong, it wasn't as though Marie didn't take the effort to phone in and see Kami for other things, such as leisurely hanging out or bitching about how yet another person vomited glitter in the pet-store bathroom. No, it was just that with Maka turning six and Spirit going from being her pain-in-the-ass boyfriend to her pain-in-the-ass husband, Kami was more than a little busy and didn't really have the time for a meet-up that didn't involve gushing about Maka's report card.
But with Azusa off in Japan, studying abroad for the summer, someone had to make space to let Marie get everything off of her chest. Spirit was out, considering he was Spirit, and she clearly couldn't go to Stein.
Not if he was the subject of her annoyed flailing.
So, there they were, watching The Real Househusbands of Death City, already having polished off an entire tin of cookies within the span of half an episode.
"Do you want more coffee?" Kami asked, and Marie paused mid-pout, some crumbs still settled into her lipgloss.
"Tea would be fine, thanks."
Kami complied, getting up to dig out whichever packet of tea she had in her kitchen shelves. There was still some boiled water leftover from the last cup of tea, so she refilled the mug and chucked the teabag in before walking back to her sitting room. She set herself in front of the floral tablecloth she kept on her coffee table before handing Marie the cup.
She didn't turn to face the television, again. Instead, Kami took a sip from her mug of coffee, her dark brown eyes clearly staring her friend down, watching Marie bite at her lip and adjust herself multiple times in her chair.
The Househusbands were just background noise, a slight distraction, and Kami grabbed up the remote to lower the volume, not breaking eye-contact the entire time.
The famous once-Sato-now-Albarn stare was impossible not to crumble under.
Alright, not really, but Marie looked ready to spill. Kami was glad that Spirit chose that day to get Maka from school- Kami loved her daughter more than anything else in the world but she imagined if Marie waited much longer to talk to her, the poor woman would have a panic attack.
After twenty seconds of awkward staring, Kami determined that maybe, just maybe, the Sato-Albarn stare could only do so much to the Pulverizer. So, Kami supposed she was going to have to provide an opening.
"Marie? Are you okay?"
She looked up from her tea, opened her mouth once, twice, a third time, then looked back to her cup of tea and sighed. "Not really."
Ah, so she wanted a bit of a chase. Marie never liked feeling like a burden, but Kami often wished she would just come out with it like they both knew she would.
"Okay, that was a silly question. So, what is it?"
She already knew what it was. Kami started counting down in her head, three, two-
"He's just so... so... infuriating!"
Ah, there it was.
"What did he do-slash-not do this time, Marie?"
Marie's lips twitched into a smile at how forward her friend was, but it slid off her face immediately afterward and she scrunched her mouth to the side when she remembered her complaint. Kami leaned back, draping an arm across the back of her couch. She squinted at her and waited.
"You know, for being in medical school, he definitely acts like he's clueless."
Kami didn't want to tell her that she, everyone, told her so. It wasn't her place. And frankly, after three years, it would be somewhat pointless.
"He just isn't looking for a relationship, Marie. You know that."
"I know but- I mean, we're basically in one, aren't we?"
Kami blinked at that, setting her mug on the table.
Marie's mouth was pinched when she put her own cup down and it landed right on the iris of an embroidered daisy. Marie stared into Kami's eyes before she pushed her teacup away from its spot in front of her and set her elbows on the table.
"Sorry. I know we aren't-"
"No, you're pretty much right," Kami agreed, easily. Honestly, everyone thought so. No one ever said it aloud, but it was common knowledge among anyone who knew Stein and Marie that they were pretty much, or would be, in a romantic, monogamous relationship if Stein ever pulled his big boy panties up and acknowledged it.
Kami sighed. Her two friends — or, rather, her friend and her friend's crush since high school - started having casual sex with one another right about the time Marie was dumped by her long-term boyfriend, Joe Buttataki, and Stein broke it off (rather messily and after all too many bottles of cheap, dishwater beer) with Medusa Gorgon.
Kami blamed herself. She was the one to introduce Stein to the damned bitch in the first place after meeting her on the playground. Maka was just so attached to little Crona, and Medusa seemed, well, nice enough. After the catastrophe that was their relationship, Stein was left emotionally ruined, Maka was out a friend that she really adored, and Kami and just about everyone else had to watch the mess between Marie and Stein unfold.
They were friends for a long time before Hurricane Medusa and Monsoon Joe hit, so it just made sense to them, to take comfort in one another. The problem was that Marie thought it was something more, and so she ended up biting off far more than she could chew.
How could she possibly know that for the next three years, she'd have to pretend she didn't have embarrassingly deep feelings for the man she was having sex with? Marie was the kind of woman who never understood a relationship like that. She didn't just want sex, she wanted intimacy and adoration. But by the time the hammer of truth finally hit her, that Stein was looking for no-strings-attached, she was forced to keep everything secret. She had a fear that not doing so would ruin their friendship, their relationship, in one fell swoop.
If you asked Kami, that wasn't exactly healthy. But no one asked her, so she kept her opinions to herself.
"Maybe take a break, Marie? There are a million guys who'd line up to date you."
Marie cringed. "I just… No, I don't think so. It just doesn't... feel right."
No one else ever felt right for Marie. It made sense: she was arse over elbow in love, though no one really understood what she saw in the guy. He didn't want any of the things Marie wanted, didn't really like the things she liked, either.
Stein was Stein. He didn't want kids, he didn't want a family, and Medusa scarred him deep enough that he had an aversion to any sort of romantic attachment at all. He was the living proof that the woman knew how to suck the life, the sanity, the happiness from your very being.
Kami remembered how Mira pulled Marie aside after she found out about her and Stein's "arrangement" and warned Marie that she didn't know what she was getting herself into, that she should get herself out immediately. Stein was damaged to love: he didn't want it, want her, like she wanted him. What he wanted was a booty call. One he could watch television with and complain about medical school with and eat dinner with. One he could kiss when he felt like it and call when he had a problem.
A girlfriend without the acknowledgement. Everything but the responsibility or the title.
He was a coward, in Kami's opinion, too scared to open himself to Marie. Selfish, too, never thought about what Marie wanted. He wanted everything, but not the commitments, though last she checked, Marie was the only woman he so much as looked at with any interest.
He had wanted sex. He had wanted to be cared about and adored and touched lovingly. But he didn't want to be vulnerable and he found someone who'd give that to him, no questions, no ultimatums, asking nothing in return.
To his face.
Marie picked her cup up and drank some more tea, crossing and uncrossing her legs beneath her billowy peasant skirt. She looked into the murky water, her one good eye drooping. "I dunno, Kami. I don't know what I'm doing anymore."
Did she ever? Everyone knew what Marie wanted from Stein, but they also knew he was too cautious of a man to do anything. And Marie was just too invested to make a big gamble. Kami reached her arm out to comfort her friend and the younger blonde smiled, extending her own arm and linking their hands.
"It'll be fine, Marie. You're a catch. Anyone would be lucky to date you."
"Thanks, Kami."
"Of course. I can't let you wallow about Mr. Monochrome by your lonesome now, can I?"
Marie giggled and perked up further when she heard the front door open and a small, high voice jabbering excitedly.
"And and I did all my mul-muli-muliplations!"
Spirit's laugh was joyful and Kami's face took on the warmest glow of fondness. "Wow! Maka! You're so smart!" the man exclaimed, and Maka let out little squeals.
Kami stood up from her table, Marie following, to stand at the doorway and see her daughter. The girl was up in the air, her father's arms sturdy beneath her armpits.
"Daddy's right, Maka. You're our smart girl."
"Mama!" Maka called out, squirming in Spirit's grasp until he laughed, walking over to Kami and handing the girl off. His arm went around her waist, lips finding her cheek whilst Maka giggled. Kami swooped her daughter up into her arms and over her shoulder, and Maka finally caught a glimpse of the other woman.
"Auntie Marie!" Maka called out, one arm around her mother's neck in a hug and the other coming out to reach for Marie. Spirit gently splayed his hand over Maka's back, securing her further. Marie grinned, holding her hand out for Maka to grasp.
Spirit pulled away from Kami slightly, enough to look at the other blonde. "Hey, Marie. Something up?"
"Not really," Marie answered easily, though her smile grew strained. "Just had to talk to Kami about a few things."
"Ah?"
"Mhm. In any case, I should probably go. Maka must have lots and lots of homework," Marie said, making a sad face at the young girl. Maka mimicked her face and Kami adjusted her daughter, pulling away from Spirit so she could prop Maka on her hip, turning to her friend.
"Do you need Spirit to give you a ride? I'd offer, but I haven't seen my smart girl all day," Kami said, bending to kiss her daughter's cheek. When Kami looked at her, the yearning on Marie's face was clear as day. Spirit caught it, too, and he cut his knowing gaze to his wife's, who silently gave him a look that conveyed that she knew.
"No, no! It's okay! It's a nice day, so I can walk," Marie replied, shouldering her purse and hugging Kami. "Thank you for the tea. I'll call, okay?"
And she was off, faster than a gunshot. When the door closed, Spirit shook his head.
"Stein?"
"Stein," Kami confirmed, bouncing her daughter.
"Honestly, I don't know why he's so stubborn about her."
"Eh, you know Dr. Jekyll and Hyde. He's just like that."
"Yeah... Hey, Maka! Do you want a snack?" Spirit asked, his face excited. Maka gasped, clapping her hands.
"Snack!"
"What do we do before a snack?"
"Wash hands!" Maka answered cheerfully.
"That's right, baby girl!" Kami put her daughter down, her eyebrows coming together in confusion at her husband's sudden attitude change.
"Now, Maka. You're a big girl, right?" Spirit asked, kneeling down. Maka nodded so hard her pigtails bounced. "So can we trust you to wash your hands, all by yourself, like momma and daddy do?"
Maka gasped, nodding harder. "Yeah!"
"Okay, baby girl! I trust you!"
After Maka bounded off to the bathroom, Spirit called out for her to keep the door open just so he could keep an eye on her from his spot in the hallway. His face changed a bit when he looked over at his wife, and he dropped his voice after he straightened.
"You must be sick of hearing about it."
Kami sighed, folding her arms. "Who isn't? She doesn't know what she's gotten into. Hell, she never really did."
Spirit nodded, bringing up his thumb and biting at the nail. "It can only end a few ways."
"And most of them are bad. Pretty sure no one even expected it to go on for three years. I had a bet down for two months."
"I remember that, yeah... did you see how Marie looked at Maka?"
Kami nodded this time. "It was kind of sad."
Spirit sighed. "They just need a push, or something."
Kami chewed at her lip, glancing down the hallway at her daughter on a stool in the bathroom, happily washing her hands and counting aloud to know that she was being thorough. She remembered how much better she and Spirit's relationship got after they had her. And then she blinked.
"I... might have an idea."
Spirit was silent for a moment before he only asked, "Yeah?" and Kami licked her previously chewed lip, nodding slowly.
"Yeah."
"You're joking," Stein declared.
"I'm not," Spirit insisted, holding the eight pound robot out with a blank look on his face.
"Spirit, I would rather re-enter high school and spend a week with you when you're stoned out of your mind than spend a day with that contraption."
Spirit gasped. "She isn't a contraption! She's... well, you get to name her, but she isn't a contraption."
"I don't mind babysitting your offspring, but there is no need for a mechanical 'child' to test us."
"I'm sorry, Stein. Kami has her reasons."
"Like what?" Stein asked, raising a brow.
"Like the fact that you threatened to curb-stomp Black*Star when Sid brought him around you."
"The kid's annoying."
"All kids kind of are, Stein."
"True, true," Stein agreed, reaching into his pocket and fishing out a pack of cigarettes. "I suppose it's a good thing there's a biological urge to reproduce: we'd likely go extinct otherwise."
As he was lighting his cigarette, Spirit snatched the matches out of Stein's hand. Which almost forced Stein to punch him purely out of reflex. Spirit brought the robo-baby up to his face as though it could be protection.
Stein looked like he wanted to pinch the bridge of his nose. "And you want to chastise me for threatening a child?"
Spirit looked more than a little guilty when he lowered the mecha-kid from its spot as his schnoz-shield. "You shouldn't smoke around kids. I quit for Maka."
"You'll be back on them soon, don't worry."
Spirit scowled and thrust the child into Stein's chest, prompting the kid to wail out. Stein looked at him, the slight air of murder around him. Spirit coughed and brought the doll back to his own chest.
"We'll reset her... that one was my bad."
"I refuse to do this."
"Stein, if I could ask anyone else in the world, you know I would."
"Just have Marie do it by herself."
"Take care of Maka by herself? Stein, would you really put her through that?" When Stein opened his mouth to inform Spirit that, no, he meant that Marie could just take care of the doll by her lonesome to prove her worthiness for the two of them, Spirit only barreled on, undeterred. "I know Marie needs a distraction, but don't you think it'll be a little too much on her plate? I would hate to see her upset."
Spirit was looking at him with a knowing glint in his eyes. Stein glanced away.
"She wouldn't be upset. Marie likes children."
"She'd be bone-tired by the second day, and she wouldn't even complain because she's so sweet." Stein seemed to fidget while Spirit continued, on a roll. "Besides, poor girl, she's been having such a hard time since the animal shelter had to close down for construction-"
"She saw Kami just a few days ago-"
"You're her best friend. She's kind of in need of some more consistent company and you're closest to her besides Azusa and she's out, considering she's backpacking across Japan or something."
Stein's olive eyes moved to take in the scenery around Spirit as opposed to looking at him. Spirit smirked, knowing he just needed one more nail until the coffin closed.
"Come on, Stein. She has that time off from work 'cause of the construction and she's probably lonely. And she can't do it alone. She needs you."
Spirit knew every way to make Stein yield: Marie was his Achilles heel and near everyone knew it. Frankly, everyone was surprised Marie hadn't melted Stein's icy heart long ago, but Spirit knew that Medusa left frostbite over everything she touched.
Stein scoffed, moving his cigarette around between his fingers before he rolled his eyes to the heavens and crammed it back into the pack, tossing it into his pocket.
"Hand it over."
Marie cooed up a storm when Stein showed up at her door with the child. "Stein, she's precious!"
"Name her," the man replied, stepping into her house and all but dumping the kid into her arms. Marie smiled while Stein moseyed into her kitchen to pick out an apple to munch on.
"How about Victoria?" she asked, bouncing after him as she poked at the child's plastic cheeks.
"'Victoria'?" he asked, the words muffled from the bite of fruit.
"Well, y'know," Marie started, "your name is Franken Stein... as in Victor Frankenstein."
Curse his parents for their blasted puns. Stein stared at her, chewing and swallowing before he lifted a brow. "You're naming a mechanical child after me?"
She only grinned at him, her eye alight. "Yep!"
"...Alright," he said, turning away from her starry gaze. It couldn't hurt. "In any case, it's our responsibility for the next week."
"I know. Kami already called in. I think we'll make great parents, Stein!"
"We are notparents. We are babysitters with ridiculous friends. Ridiculous friends who hate me."
Just then, Victoria, as Marie so graciously dubbed her, began to wail out, distracting Stein from how Marie stuck her tongue out at him. The voice was highly mechanical and absolutely grating. Stein never thought he'd prefer an actual child's howl to anything. However, he'd take the organic over the technological, in this situation, any day.
Stein looked at Marie, maintaining eye contact as he dumped the bag Spirit gave him with the "baby bottle" and various other necessities in it on her counter.
"You always wanted a kid, Marie. I'm going for a shower," he informed her, turning away to walk to her bathroom, already knowing where she kept the towels. He already had a random bottle of body wash in her shower that he'd left over from one of their previous 'sleepovers'. Marie looked at his retreating back and down at the child, sighing while she unzipped the bag with one hand and rummaged for the bottle.
"It's okay, Victoria. Your daddy-"
"I am no one's father!" Stein called from somewhere on the stairs.
Marie waited a second, listening to his footsteps before she rolled her eye and brought the bottle to Victoria's plastic mouth.
"Your daddy's just a damn grump."
Everything was fine for the remainder of the day. Marie didn't know why Kami had always complained when Maka was a baby. Marie changed Victoria's diaper, unnecessarily in Stein's opinion considering it wasn't alive, but a simulation was a simulation, and set it to sleep without any fuss at all, which gave them some time alone. The two of them decided to camp out in the living room and Marie was currently beating Stein at Super Smash Brothers for the fifteenth time in a row, which easily brought her mind off of everything that was bogging her down.
"Ha!" Marie called out.
"Bullshit. You're a button-masher," Stein complained, leaning forward and ready to pitch the controller right into her television.
"Haha! Eat that!" Marie taunted, forcing his character off the platform.
Stein groaned, dropping the controller to the side after the screen declared Marie the winner. Again.
Marie grinned, falling back on her couch cushions and throwing her feet in the air to kick them giddily. "You looooost," she sang out.
"You always pick Pikachu. You cheat."
She pretended to be offended. "Cheat? Me? Why, I'm hurt by the very accusation!"
"Of course," Stein told her, rolling his eyes and scratching his cheek. Whenever he stayed over at her house, a habit he originally got into when he still lived with Spirit and endured his womanizing ways, she'd make dinner (because he couldn't be trusted with the stove after the chicken incident, evidently) in exchange for first choice of any and all media they partook in. An edible meal not consisting of takeout was almost always worth it, even if he had to watch "The Vow". She'd been threatening him with "Magic Mike", but he put his foot down and told her he'd just order out. Or go hungry.
She giggled, bumping his shoulder before she got up and turned the console off. She knelt in front of her DVD player. "Hey, d'you wanna watch Mama Mia?"
"Again?" he muttered, leaning back and throwing an arm over his glasses.
"Yep!" Marie said cheerfully.
"It doesn't matter."
She put the DVD in and raced back to the couch, bouncing on it twice before she tucked her feet beneath her and reached for the remote. It wasn't that ABBA wasn't oh so exciting but he'd rather be doing, oh, just about anything else.
He carefully took his glasses off so he'd at least be spared the visual aspects of the film and folded them down next to him.
He could handle almost anything but a musical. Romantic Comedies, as Marie had constantly told him to refer to them as, were about as interesting to him as watching paint dry, but they made Marie happy. He slung his arm over the back of her couch, closing his eyes and hiding his yawn.
He was bored.
Just a few minutes in his fingers had absentmindedly started stroking over her clothed arm, and Marie seemed to shiver, rolling her shoulders into the touch and giving him a glance from the side. He faked obliviousness, biting down on his grin.
They didn't even last ten more minutes. It was almost amusing that Marie thought they'd get through the film, or that they'd actually watch it, since Stein had no interest in the movie from the start and Marie found that she lost any desire to watch it just a few minutes in when Stein decided he was going to occupy himself with something more stimulating.
His mouth was hot on her, lips strangely dry as he moved down her neck, not leaving any marks until he could pull her shirt around and bite at her collarbones. She stroked her fingers through his hair, leaning her head back to give him better access, and he ran his hands under her shirt, bunching it around her ribs, just beneath her bra. As he trailed downward, stretching the collar of her sleeping shirt to access her shoulders and more of her cleavage, he tugged the fabric up higher, though he didn't take it off, to nuzzle between her breasts.
She leaned backward, shifting around as though to lie down on the couch, but his hands on her hips kept her seated.
He laid a bite down on her sternum, sucking on her skin, no doubt leaving some sort of hickey on her before he made his way downward, leaving a line of mouth-marks over her torso. Just when he got to the waistband of her sleep pants, hunched uncomfortably, he flicked his gaze up at her and pulled away, leaving her to stare at him while she breathed in, deep and rhythmic.
Slowly, he slid off the couch and got into his knees in front of her, looking at her as though in question when his hands came to her hips once more.
"Do you mind?"
"I'll mind if you don't take my pants off," she replied, shimmying around and lifting herself up so he could hook his fingers into the elastic of her pajama pants and panties both, bringing them down her legs in one swift motion. Her calves came up to ease the process, and he grabbed the back of her knees as leverage to put her legs onto his shoulders, burying his face between her thighs.
She would take that over most Romantic Comedies, and she closed her eyes, bringing the heels of her sock-covered feet to his back and pushing him forward.
He was taking his sweet time. She sighed sweetly when he dragged his tongue over her, seemingly in slow motion. She wiggled her hips around, a sign for him to keep going, and he spread her open, stroking her with the barest touch before he lapped at her clit. She bucked when he sucked on it, and she tangled her fingers in his hair, pulling on it.
He ran his hand against her side, pushing the shirt that had come down once more, up slightly and ghosting a nail on the skin just under the frill of her bra. Marie shivered while he swiped his tongue over her sensitive, swollen flesh. The combination got the desired effect: a sweet little arch, her back peeling away from the couch. When he sucked harder, his tongue slowly circling, her thighs came up close around his ears, blocking off what of the television was still loud enough to be heard over Marie's pleased sighs.
He hummed tunelessly, only doing so for the slight vibrations. He didn't feel like going through the trouble of pulling away and rummaging around in her room to get her vibrator, so he was going to have to improvise. Marie locked her ankles behind his head, limiting his motions, but he had space enough to pull back and blow some cool air onto her wet flesh, prompting another shiver.
He looked up at her, and she met his eyes, her mouth open and her panting audible.
"Why'd you stop?" she asked, pushing the back of his head to direct him where she wanted. He yielded to her grasp, allowing himself to be directed. "Don't stop," she told him, shifting so she could rub into his mouth.
She felt his smug smirk on her, and she found herself melting to the heat of his mouth once more, her legs resting on his shoulders while she sighed out and fluttered her eye closed.
At least, until they both heard Victoria's piercing yell echo out.
Stein stopped and moved away almost immediately, making Marie huff something under her breath that sounded strangely like, "So that's why Kami complained".
Damn cock-blocking doll.
Marie unhooked her ankles, moving away from the edge of the couch, an annoyed look on her face. Stein lifted a brow, wiping at the wetness on his chin before he brought his hand to his mouth.
"Going to take care of your child?" he teased, flicking his tongue out to lick the taste of her on his palm.
She grumbled. "I'll be right back," she informed him, swinging a leg over his head so she could stand up. "And it's our child!" she called while he clambered on the couch.
He didn't answer her, only leaning his head back and yawning.
When she came back, not even twenty minutes later, he was asleep with both his arms draped over the back of the couch.
Bullshit.
The man was practically a full-time insomniac but he chose then to get some beauty sleep.
Marie had more than half a mind to wake him up and tell him to finish what he started, but he had work in the morning, a temporary job at a research lab he'd landed. He'd breezed through getting his bachelor's degree, and was coming into his second year of medical school. Since it was summer, and Stein was going absolutely crazy with all the graduate classes, he chose to take the time off and work in the lab full-time until Fall. He barely got sleep as it was, especially not on nights when he had to awaken at the unholy hour of 10 am.
So she just caved and pulled her pajama pants back on, leaving her panties wherever they were, since they needed to go in the laundry basket, anyway. She settled next to him, not feeling like climbing too many stairs to get to her room, especially when nothing was distracting her from the beachy dance scene playing on her screen.
At least she had Mama Mia.