Standard Disclaimer: check the prologue
Thank you to all my reviewers!! I was worried about how the Christmas chapter would be received. You put my unease to rest! This continues to the morning after.
The sunlight streamed through the wooden blinds onto my face momentarily blinding me through closed eyes. Great. There's no escaping the sun for more sleep. I may as well get up and eat… oh right, there's a guest in the guest—WARREN PEACE!
Should I clean up? Fix my hair? Shower? Oh man! Why did I insist he stay over? Because he's your friend and you didn't want him to drive across town butt tired, Oshi. Right, and he's hot. Stop thinking that! But, it's true! Who cares? Every girl in his school and yours, remember?
Great, I'm having a conversation with myself. The growl of my stomach alerted me to the original hunger task… food, Oshi need food. Well, after I brush away this morning breath.
Yawning, I made my way downstairs to the kitchen. The servants weren't going to be back for another few days, but I know I can manage the toaster and microwave at least. I just hope Warren won't mind… oh girl stop thinking like that! This is your house and you'll be damned if you care what the hell Warren Peace thinks! As I stepped into the kitchen I stopped short, it was blackened from the smoke and flames from last night. Shit! I promised I'd clean up today and it looks so much worse than from last night. Glancing at the clock, I realized it was still early and decided now would be a good time to clean. Since I physically can't do domestic stuff on my own, I pulled a few X-men cards from a drawer absorbed the powers and got to work.
"A revolution, Is the solution, A revolution, Is the solution, I won't feel guilty, No matter what they're telling me, I won't feel dirty and buy into their misery, I won't be shamed cause I believe that love is free, It fuels the heart and sex is not the enemy…" I danced around to the sounds of Garbage in my pajamas as my artificial powers made the blackened kitchen less dingy.
"True love is like gold, There's not enough to go around, But then there's god and doesn't god love everyone? Give me a choice, Give me a chance to turn the key and find my voice
Sex is not the enemy…"
Spinning on the balls of my sock covered feet; I popped waffles into the toaster as the orange juice carton floated from the fridge to my hand and into the two glasses on the counter. Getting caught in the music in the morning is very effective in chasing away any black thoughts.
Just as I put the orange juice back and used my hips to close the door, I yelped and fell on my butt because Warren decided to be the silent audience of my dance. "Don't do that!"
He stared at me for a moment before helping me up, in the morning light I could see the defined lean muscles of his arms as he effortlessly took my hand an pulled me up. Warren obviously decided to forgo the flannel pajama top that went with the pants now riding low on his slim hips, which is absolutely fine by me. Josephina Fox, those are not the kinds of thoughts friends have about friends!
"Hungry? The waffles are good."
"I thought you couldn't cook." He took the plate and moved to the island stool with an uncommon grace of a predator. How strange Warren likens to a predator… a sexy, dark, yummy…STOP IT!
"Funny, believe it or not, I can work a toaster." I retorted turning off the CD in favor of the local top 40's station. The whiny voice of some pre-pubescent pop singer came on with lyrics he shouldn't even be considering at that age; the sounds made me recoil before shutting it off with a shudder. "Ew. Well, Mr. Peace, since you are a guest in my home, what music would you prefer with your frozen waffle and juice?"
"Silence."
"You're joking."
"No."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Why?"
"What's with the questions?"
I tapped my lip with my fingers, "Well, if we're gonna be friends, I'm allowed to know some things about my friends, right? I mean, honestly, all I know about you is that your name is Warren Peace, you work at the Paper Lantern, speak a dialect of Chinese, and go to Sky High… in the sky."
"You forgot the part about being Baron Battle's son." He deadpanned.
"Why bring it up?"
"Everyone does."
"Exactly, so it's pointless to bring up some fact that the rest of the Super community already knows. I'm going for variety." I sat across from him spearing my whole waffle with my fork only to have it move around my plate away from me. Yes, cutting the damn thing would've been smart, but getting a knife kind of meant getting up. Struggling with the waffle started to melt my resolve and with a groan I started to get up only to have the plate yanked from my hand and see Warren use his knife to cut the waffles in manageable pieces.
"Here." I stared. He had cut it with his knife. "It's not like I have cooties."
"Are you sure?" I teased, "You didn't have to do that. I'm not a baby, I was gonna do it myself." Warren cut my waffle to practically pre-chewed bits…gross!
"Sure?" He smirked as my tongue poked out indignantly, "Your stabbing was getting annoying."
"Sooo… how does a big intimidating guy like you get a bussing job at the Paper Lantern?" I brought up spooning my waffle mulch with the fork.
"I needed a job, somewhere I wasn't seen as the evil son of Baron Battle. Everybody knew my father and expected I'd turn out like him, so a lot of places wouldn't hire me." He sounded slightly bitter and faint tendrils of smoke curled from his body, the steel fork slowly twisted and melted in his hand. "It didn't even matter that I wasn't headed the same way as him, it didn't even occur to people that my mother is Olive Peace." Olive Peace had the ability to speak every known language therefore create strong and fair peace treaties between warring nations as well as fly, she was known as The Mediator.
"If you don't mind my saying, your dad actually sounds like a good father even if he was—" I faltered.
"A villain? Yeah, he was. For a while, we were a normal family, Mom, Dad and me. Then during a fight one day, Mom got hurt bad and Dad changed." This was obviously a touchy subject, but it seemed like nobody actually got to hear it fully. Warren needed to unload, even though we were just new friends, I guess I was the right one to hear this. "After that Dad was hell-bent on being the ultimate superhero to keep us safe. It came to the point of villainy and since Mom couldn't reason with him…Stronghold's parents swooped in."
"…How old were you?"
"Thirteen when the Commander and Jetstream took my father away, eight when he snapped."
"Eight?" I squeaked.
"Apologizing won't change anything, so don't bother."
"Alright, I won't…" The conversation somewhat died at this point as I pushed the remnants of my mushy waffles around my plate and the silence stretched. I think he just realized how much he spoke, especially since (from what I know by reputation) he is known for being closed off and isolated. Looking up I found him studying me with his inky black eyes. "What? Do I have something on my face?"
"What time is it?" Warren changed the subject and the angsty guy from earlier vanished. As though the conversation never happened, his dark eyes were guarded and silently I acquiesced to his request.
"It's…uh-oh. I'm gonna be late!" The clock on the microwave glowed 1:45PM and I scrambled off the stool just barely avoiding falling again. At that moment I realized I had left Warren still in the kitchen, "Oh War—oof!" Don't tell me I just ran into him…I did.
"Need a ride?" Sheepishly I nodded as he pulled me up, "How fast can you get ready?"
"Mind waiting ten minutes?"
"I'll time you."
"Hi Dina, it's Oshi."
"Hey, she's asking for you."
"Yeah, I'm on my way to get her in about…" Warren mouthed 'five' to me, "five minutes."
"Okay, see you then." In the background before she hung up, I could hear the screams of glee and games.
Tucking my cell into the pocket of my pants, I turned to Warren, "Thanks again, Warren. I know you probably had some post-Christmas thing to do—"
"Forget it. We helped each other, let's leave it at that." With a smile and nod, we continued to our destination.
"MOMMY!" The excited scream was followed by a strong little force that knocked me on my rear onto the snowy lawn as soon as I was up the walkway of Super Sunshine Daycare. The little blonde head snuggled into the chest of my coat mumbled animatedly about the day's activities before I could even breathe.
"Sophie, baby, I can't breathe," I said calmly extricating the little three year old body from my torso.
"Oshi, there you are, I'm sorry but as soon as she saw you, she just got away from me." Dina rushed over; her normally serene face was etched with worry and flushed.
"No worries, Dina. But why is she so fast today? Absorbed a runner?"
"Yeah, Flash's kid." She helped me get up with the three-year old attached to my waist. "Who's your friend?"
"Oh, Warren this is Dina, she runs the Daycare. Sophie, go with Dina and get your things, okay sweetie?" Bright hazel eyes looked up at me imploringly as though to make sure I wasn't going to leave her. "I'll be right here." With that, Sophie let Dina take her back inside.
"Mommy?"
"Not mine, God Warren, I'm only sixteen and Sophie is three. Do the math; I would've been thirteen to have had her." He gave me a look, "Sophie is my niece, my cousin Nadia didn't have any powers so she went to a regular high school and got pregnant with a super at a party. Sadly, Nadia isn't one of the smartest people, or the most responsible. Aunt Paige and Uncle Rustom nearly disowned Nadia when they found out, but Mom and I insisted we'd look after the baby." He motioned for a bench we could sit at, "To this day I don't know what possessed us to promise it. When Sophie was born, Nadia kind of went back to her old ways leaving me and Mom to take care of the baby."
"So why's Sophie call you Mommy?"
"Sophie calls every woman 'Mommy', there's nothing to be done about that." Warren mumbled under his breath 'pushover' "Hey, you try telling that adorable three year old that you're not her mother and see if you can take her crying."
Dina and Sophie came back as Warren and I stood, the three year old was bundled up in her pink and purple snow suit with her tiny backpack. "Mommy!" The toddler launched at me and hugged me tightly before looking intently as Warren, who gave her a little half-smirk.
"Thanks Dina, I'm so glad Nadia at least dropped Sophie off to you."
"Yeah, no problem. Take care will you? Bye Sophie!"
"Bye-bye Mommy!" Sophie called waving over my shoulder. Warren opened the door to the station wagon for me before climbing in on the other side.
"Do you mind taking me back? I've got to get this one settled." He nodded as the engine turned over and he pulled out of the parking lot of the little happy looking building.
Sophie continued to look between me and Warren while talking in baby talk about a bug she drew. As Warren pulled into my driveway and helped me out with the blonde girl surgically attached to me, Sophie reached out to him.
"DADDY!"
Well, this is new.
Well that's it for this chapter, I know Warren is a little out of character again, however there is a reason to that which I will totally get to. But for those that can't wait, think of it this way, Oshi doesn't go to his school and in some sense she seems a little more helpless to him when he saw her alone on Christmas.
Please review!!