The Experiment Ch 2

I woke up to the cold. I no longer had any blankets. Looking over at Dimitri, I saw that he had made himself a little cocoon of our covers. I almost laughed at him. All I could see was his face peeking out of the bundle.

He looked to peaceful for me to wake up so I got out of bed and grabbed a blanket from the chair in the room. Pulling it behind me, I climbed back in bed and snuggled up next to Dmitri. As pay back, or what I called pay back, I put my head on half his pillow.

I woke up a second time to Charlie crying through the monitor.

"Dimitri," I said, shaking his arm, and feeling him stir, "Before the sun rises he's your son."

"You being able to quote Lion King shows that you are more than capable of helping him yourself."

I slapped his arm, "You're not going to see him for a while. Go take care of him."

Dimitri untangled himself from the covers and made his way to Charlie's room. Through the monitor, I could hear him soothing Charlie. The sounds took a while to soothe the baby, but almost no time to soothe me.

The third and fourth time I woke up was to people entering the room. Dimitri came back from Charlie's room, and, not an hour later, I felt my empty side of the bed bend down and little hands shook me.

"Alec?" I asked, moving over to my other side so that I could look at the boy, "What's wrong?"

"Fire everywhere," he said, burrowing his face into my chest, and falling almost immediately to sleep.

"Just for tonight," I said to myself, "Then you'll go back to your room."

Surprisingly, I slept through the rest of the night. I was hoping to be able to sleep in the following Monday, but I knew the kids probably wouldn't let me. Imagine my surprise when Lissa dropped onto the bed beside me, shrieking at me to wake up.

"You have got to be kidding me!"

"Nope, it's Sunday, you've already slept through church, the least you could do is get up to be with your family."

"Lissa!"

"Up. Dimitri's already left to talk to Kirova."

"Talk to her about what?"

"His schedule. He said he talked to you about it."

"Right. That."

"Is he asking for less work time?"

"Uhh...something like that."

"What is he doing then?"

"Getting more hours."

"MORE?!"

"Yes," I said, getting up and going downstairs.

"Why would he be getting more hours?!"

"Shh, Lissa. Don't let the kids hear you," she shot me an annoyed look, "Dimitri and I can't pay for everything the kids need on the income we have. He won't let me work so the only thing left is for him to take more hours."

"You all could have asked me for money!"

I stared at her for a minute, telling her what she already knew, "If we did that we would never be able to live with ourselves."

We spent the day doing homework, taking care of the kids, hanging out, and getting ready for our first school day with the kids.

"That wasn't so bad," I said, laying in bed, watching Dimitri come in and change out of his guardian uniform, he put on a tshirt over his boxers before joining me under the covers.

"That's good, maybe this will be easier than we thought," I twisted my body so we were facing towards eachother, still under the blankets, "Are you going to steal my pillow again tonight?" he asked through the foot of space between us.

"ONly if you take my half of the covers."

"I saw what you did for Alec."

"I thought you were asleep."

"I know you did. That's possibly why it's so incredible. You're a natural mother," I shrugged as he continued, "I hope you get to be a mother for real one day."

I knew what he meant, of course. Sure, he wanted to be with me, but he didn't want me to give up what I do 'naturally'. He would give up any chance of being with me to make me happy.

"I refuse to get knocked up by some random Moroi."

He laughed a little, "I know. But you have Adrian."

"You hate Adrian."

"If he makes you happy...I could probably deal with him."

I looked at him for a second, then turned my head away from him, "Thanks for the consideration."

He smiled softly at me and played along with my joke, "You're welcome. I've been told I'm very considerate."

I laughed, laying down on my back, "What are we doing? We are trying to fit our old lives into this new one, but that's not possible. We have kids to take care of, and, as well as they're doing now, I don't think things are going to stay this way for long."

"You're right. Things are most likely going to go haywire, but that doesn't mean you can put your life on hold for two months.

"I can change my schedule to accommodate them, but if they need you during school what are you going to do?"

"Run out of the room, I guess."

He smiled softly at me, "Even though I know it won't make a difference, can we save running out of class for emergencies?"

"Yes, sir," I said, saluting him.

He leaned over me, "I'm serious. The experiment is not your priority, your education is. Don't be running out of class for kids that aren't yours."

We stared at each other for a while, then I turned away from him, "They deserve a family."

"They do, but not us. This is temporary. We can't give them a permanent family. In two months, the kids will go away. Maybe occasionally they'll think of us, but that's it. Charlie won't even remember us."

When I didn't say anything back he whispered, "It needed to be said."

"I know."

"Take care of yourself before you take care of them. They aren't Moroi."

They come first. The kids don't. Just the Moroi. Something seemed wrong about putting the kids' lives lower than someone else's because they are of a different race.

Lissa had said I would love these kids, and, even now, I knew she was right. Would I be able to put her life over those kids'? And, if I was, would it be the right thing to do?