(A/N: hello I'm back with another Layton au that nobody can understand without reading pages of context beforehand
reader: why
me:
me:
me: I blame Dawndragon)
"Alfendi! Give that back!"
"The flesh of this beast is not enough to satiate the sacrifice I crave, and your piece is bigger."
"Daddyyyyyyy!"
The petite woman sitting at the head of the table stifled laughter as her husband rubbed his temples and walked over to the bickering pair of kids.
"Alfendi, give your sister her turkey back."
The girl crossed her arms as a wave of calm washed over her brother. He smoothed his hair and slid the stolen plate back in front of her, the annoyed look in his eyes still evident.
"Sorry," he apologized obediently, if not entirely sincerely.
"Hmph." Katrielle turned away.
"Now, say you accept—" the duo's father started, but was interrupted by a tug on his jacket. "Hm? What is it, Flora?"
"I think I might have left the chocolate cream pie in the oven too long," the older girl said nervously.
"The— what?!" Doing an admirable job of keeping his gentlemanly composure, the Professor hurried into the kitchen with his teenage daughter who was undoubtedly trying her absolute hardest to help with the Thanksgiving meal.
"Claire," asked a young woman sitting near the oldest two, "did we ever hear a response from Uncle?"
"Oh, yes; sadly, Descolé won't be able to join us this year," Claire responded, although the sincerity of her statement might have matched that of Alfendi's apology (who had resumed fighting with his twin the moment his father left to address the pie disaster).
"Oh," Emmy replied, fiddling with her thumbs. She fought off a trace of disappointment (Uncle Descolé always made the holidays more interesting) and instead opted to ask "So, when do we get to eat?"
"Not until Luke gets back from the bathroom to lead the prayer," Claire replied, raising her voice above the discord around the table.
"The pie might look a little, ah, melted," Layton announced as he returned to the room, "but it should still taste fine. I think." (Doubt was written all over his sweat-covered brow. The kids exchanged various glances of concern and discomfort.)
"I'm back!" a small boy yelled as he scrambled up onto his chair at the table, having missed the pie fiasco. The rest of the conversations died down into silence as he closed his eyes and folded his tiny hands like a church pastor leading the congregation.
"Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for this food, family, and time to be together. We ask for your blessings and protection. And I thank you for this great big house we get to live in." (In truth, the house was barely a suitable size for a family so large, but Luke was always a grateful soul.) Proudly, the boy squinted one eye open and nodded to Katrielle, who was seated next to him.
"I thank you that we have enough food for all of us to eat," she said pointedly, "and for the wonderful gravy that Emmy always makes."
"Aw," Emmy exclaimed, forgetting for a moment to be silent.
"I," Alfendi announced, "thank you for the nice clothes we have."
There was a silence as everyone expected him to continue, but when he didn't, Flora spoke up from the other side of the table.
"I thank you that the pie didn't burn, and for this time of warmth and charity, and of goodwill for all mankind," she said quite sincerely. She tapped the girl next to her (who was dressed in especially old-fashioned attire, even compared to everyone else's Sunday clothes) to remind her that it was her turn.
"Oh. I thank you for, ah, this lovely feast. And for all my siblings, and Father, and Mother, and Uncle Descolé, who couldn't be here today."
Claire reached over and squeezed her husband's hand proudly.
"I thank you for this time off from work," Emmy spoke up, "and that Luke still plays Mario Kart with me, even though he always loses."
It was hard for her to repress laughter as Luke made a noise of disdain, both at the slight against him and the interruption of the family tradition. Kat or Alfendi using the Thanksgiving prayer to jab at each other was normal, but Emmy should've known better.
"I'm thankful," Claire said in a firm, calm voice before discourse could break out, "that we are all healthy and safe."
The sound of the silence somehow shifted as the kids all became uncomfortably aware of how true their mother's words were. Claire had the unique gift of being able to speak words that hit the heart, which was the reason Layton was usually called in to resolve arguments instead of her. Even the Professor's harshest scoldings were more tolerable than Claire's ability to stir up guilt.
"I ask for your forgiveness of our sins, and for your continued blessings on our family." She nodded a little and Layton's calm, commanding voice finished off the prayer.
"We thank you for your Love, and for sending your Son down to sacrifice himself so that we may enjoy all the blessings that we've thanked you for thus far." (This part of the prayer was the same every year, but it always seemed to impact everyone more than they'd expected.) "We thank you for your peace and stability to carry us through this chaotic time of year. Please bless this food for our bodies, and our bodies to your service. Amen."
"Amen," the chorus echoed. The kids started digging into their food ravenously, with Katrielle in the lead.
"Mmmm," she exclaimed as she shoved forkfuls of turkey into her mouth. "I'f really good thi'f year!"
"Kat, don't talk with food in your mouth," Claire reprimanded gently. Alfendi took the opportunity to stick his tongue out at his twin before taking a swig of cranberry juice.
"Remind me not to compete with you when you're old enough to drink," Emmy commented. Alfendi grinned at this, a cowlick of hair springing up as he lurched forward to slam his half-empty glass on the table.
"Flora," Aurora asked, turning to her closest sister, "why don't we dress like this every day? I like our special-event attire."
"Well, you can if you want to," Flora replied, her voice the quietest and least disturbing of all the conversations around the table. "But you may get funny looks. I mean, this isn't very modern."
For a moment, Aurora's expression was unreadable. Then she shrugged and turned back to her food. "That's fair, I suppose."
"Hey, Luke," Flora called, "do you still want that video game for Christmas? The, er, Mario Par—"
"Friendship Destroyer 8?" he asked with a grin, evoking a giggle from Katrielle. "Definitely! Did you see it on sale somewhere?"
"I'm not telling," Flora replied with a wink (Emmy had recently taught her how to wink, and the poor teenager didn't really understand what Emmy used it for), and whispered something in Aurora's ear. Aurora nodded.
"The mashed potatoes are quite splendid this year, I must say," Layton commented, smiling at his wife.
"You say that every year," she accused, smiling back.
"Only because it's always true."
Alfendi paused from violently attacking his food to nudge his sister and point at his parents flirting, making a gagging noise. Katrielle snickered and pretended to start choking herself, and the two dissolved into giggles as quickly as they'd dissolved into anger not five minutes earlier.
"Are you… putting gravy on your Brussel sprouts?" Luke suddenly noted with disgust. The object of his comment didn't hear him, so he repeated the comment louder. Emmy looked up.
"Yes, what of it?"
"That's disgusting!"
"It's wonderful. You ought to try it."
"No way," Luke spat, sounding more his age when he got mad.
"Mmmmmm," Emmy said, loudly and slowly putting a large spoonful of gravy-covered Brussel sprouts in her mouth. Luke made a disgusted face.
"By the way," Katrielle commented, raising her hand to get her father's attention.
"Yes?" Layton asked, recognizing the look in her eyes that meant she was about to ask for something.
"I was wondering if… maybe sometime soon, I could invite Lucy over to the house?"
The whole table went silent.
"Well…" the Professor started after a stunned pause. "Why do you want to invite her over?"
No amount of onlooking eyes ever bothered Katrielle, but asking what was forbidden (if not unspokenly so) admittedly took a lot of courage on her part.
"I just want to hang out," she said, trying hard to keep her tone as casual as possible, like that would somehow cause her father to forget that what she was requesting was impossible.
"Why can't you 'hang out' at her house?" Layton asked in a kind but cautious manner. "You've gone over there before, haven't you?"
"Yes," Katrielle said, "but Lucy's family isn't very— that is, I'm pretty sure I was a burden to them. And I'd really like to show her my room. Can't we just have her over for a little bit?" The young girl twirled one of her curly-Qs and put on her best set of kitten eyes (so named because of her name and because they were more devious than puppy-dog eyes). Layton and Claire exchanged worried glances.
"This time of year," Layton started carefully, "is very hectic. However, you may bring up this request again once the holidays are over and your mother and I will consider it."
Kat lit up like a neon sign as everyone else at the table gaped in awe. "Thank you, Daddy!" she replied in a half-polite, half-ecstatic voice before digging back into her potatoes. The conversations slowly started back up, but with more of a hushed kind of speech compared to the normal shouts and jokes. Nobody had ever successfully gotten permission to have friends over to the house since Emmy had been a girl, back before "the household chaos" began (a phrase that was supposed to imply the general problems of having eight people under one roof, but which everyone knew was really a code for Alfendi's split personality).
"Do you really think they'll let her do it?" Luke asked Flora in a whisper. Flora shook her head but shrugged to convey that she wasn't altogether sure. Similar hushed exchanges made their way around the food-filled table while people scarfed down their meals and refilled their plates.
However, even Rome gets boring after it's been around for a few hundred years, so by the time dinner was over the kids were once again raucously teasing, taunting, and terrorizing each other like good siblings should.
"No running!" Layton commanded with futile efforts as children rushed to put their dishes in the sink and claim the best spots on the couch as their own.
"I call player one!" Katrielle yelled hastily as she jumped onto the corner of the couch, mere seconds before Alfendi also jumped in an attempt to push her off.
"Whoever gets the controller first is player one!" Luke reminded her as he held up the black remote triumphantly.
"You can't be player one and have the black remote!" Katrielle accused, blocking her brother's punches.
"Yes, I can!" Luke retorted, walking over to Emmy. "Emmy, you can't take three people's spaces, get up."
Emmy— who was lying french-girl fashion along the middle of the couch— winked and laughed. "Sure I can. I'm not moving."
"Well, fine then!" Luke huffed, crawling up and sitting on top of her stomach defiantly.
"Oof! You're heavy!"
"Am not!"
"You ate too much turkey."
Aurora raised an eyebrow at the arguing siblings. "Why do you always fight over who has what remote? It doesn't make a difference."
"Does too!" three voices shot back in unison.
"The black remote has an advantage," Katrielle stated matter-of-factly. "Everyone knows that."
"Sure. And leaning your body side-to-side makes you steer better," Flora retorted, one of her rare smirks playing across her face.
"OHHHHHHHH," Emmy called with her hands cupped over her mouth, earning her a whack in the face with a pillow from Kat.
"Now, now," Claire said, walking over, "play nice."
Alfendi stopped hitting his sister and looked up very seriously at this remark. "This is Mario Kart," he stated in a grave voice. "There is no such thing as playing nice."
"150 CC or 200 CC?" Luke asked, already on the selection screen.
"250! What are we, newbs?" Emmy shot back. She pointed to the all-important controller. "I'm stealing that from you if you don't use it right."
Luke clutched the remote protectively and selected 250 CC on the screen. "Okay, okay. Who all is going for the first game?"
He should've known better than to ask this before all the other remotes had been claimed. Chaos ensued as people leapt up from their seats to grab controllers, or leapt up to grab the seats that were now unprotected.
As they watched the loud arguments break out once again (and the inevitable alliances that always followed), Layton and Claire stood in the kitchen and shared a soft smile. Their family was definitely not the quiet sort of picket-fence dream they'd started out with, but… well, life was full of surprises.
And they were thankful for every single one of them.
(A/N: so apparently my online-grounding does not apply to writing? so I got to post this today yay)