A/N: This chapter takes place sometime after Lily and the Heretics are retrieved from the prison world, but before Julian is resurrected.
~ Shards of Sapphire ~
"And this is our son, Damon Junior," Rose said to her mother-in-law.
"He's adopted," Damon added. "The poor child was abused in his former home."
Lily Salvatore blinked in confusion as she tried to make sense out of what her son and his wife were telling her.
They were looking at her, smiling, obviously waiting on some kind of response... but Lily didn't know what to say.
"I'm sorry, but I don't understand...?" she put forth hesitantly. "Unless I'm missing something here, this is some kind of tiny cactus. Why are you calling it your son?"
"Well, actually it was his previous family who named him that, and we didn't want to change the poor kid's name. That would have been confusing for him," Damon explained, still running with the joke.
Lily still looked utterly confused as to why her son was referring to the cactus as if it were an actual child.
Rose took pity on her and said, "It's a joke."
Lily still didn't understand the joke, but seemed relieved to learn that there was one.
The Heretics (minus Oscar, who was off on a mission somewhere) had been watching this interaction silently from the other side of the room until this point.
"Oh, I get it!" Valerie piped up. "They named it that because you're a prick!"
"Language, Valerie," Lily gasped in a scandalized tone.
At the same time, Damon said, "Yep, that's the joke."
~oOo~