TOMMY - TWO MONTHS LATER BACK ON ELTAR

Sitting on the couch and trying to finish what's left of my school work, I'm nearly through reading the needed chapter when the distinct sound of a door slamming breaks my concentration. Well, either Jacob and the twins are home from school or- "This is not up for discussion!"

Zedd and Mara Jane are having their midday argument - again. I sigh heavily as I hear Mara Jane respond in frustration, "But I don't understand why, Papa!"

They come into the living room and I mark my page, knowing full well that I'm not going to get any further while this is going on. Zedd turns on our eldest. "Because you are too young to start courting at all, that's why! Never mind that young males are only after one thing! They are horrible, vile, evil creatures –"

"Jacob and Sullivan."

"-your brothers excluded!" he finishes up, not even sparing me a glance at my reminder.

"Oh lord, they're at it again." Moving into the room as well to see what all the commotion is about, Megan heaves a sigh as she is all too familiar with this battle much like myself.

"He's being completely unreasonable!"

"I'm trying to keep your virtue intact!"

"You're being insane! Not every boy out there is only after mating!"

"Yes they are!"

Watching their back and forth quietly for a minute, Megan finally speaks up as there's a small break in the yelling to allow the two time to glare at each other. "So what about me?"

"I- what?" Zedd sputters.

"You said that she can't date boys and I'm not a boy, so by your logic, she could date me, right?"

Zedd's practically shaking in fury at the girls' attempt to get around his parental directive, not to mention the girls' twin smug smirks. I quickly bite my lips so I don't start grinning as well and make damn sure that he can't feel my amusement through the bond. "That's not funny."

"I'm not being funny. I'm making a point. If your only problem is concern over how men behave and think, then you should have no issue with allowing her to be courted by another female."

Opening his mouth to argue; only to close it again as he realizes he's been backed into a loophole of a corner, I watch as Zedd goes with the last thing he can think of, given the circumstances. "GINA!"

"What?" Quickly joining us, wiping her hands on a towel as she comes from the kitchen, the woman looks at Zedd expectantly.

"Tell your daughter to stop undermining my parenting!"

"Well, I would" the elder human replies, looking at her grown child for a moment before turning back to my mate. "If she wasn't, you know, thirty."

"What the hell does her age have to do with anything?"

"It means I'm an adult" Megan smirks, before turning to her mother. "Dating argument."

"Again?"

"Yep."

"I'm going back to my baking." Shaking her head and leaving us be, I can't say I blame her for not choosing to get sucked into the matter any further.

"It's not an argument, it's me simply informing my child she is not courting at such a young age."

"But she's not that young" Megan protests wearily. "My mom was married at thirty, Zedd."

"Besides, Papa, Daddy was my age when you took him as a mate."

Uh oh. Zedd's grinding the hell out of his teeth, looking between both girls and seeming to finally settle on ours. "And what does that have to do with anything?"

"Well by your logic on how all men think wouldn't that mean that you were just using him for that 'one thing' since again - by your logic - he'd have been too young to know the difference? Just like me?"

"I'm not answering that."

"Oh, yes you are, Zedd or she's not going to be the only one sleeping alone." I know he's irritated by my interference, but this really needs to be spelled out for Mara Jane or she's never going to understand. Not to mention, I'm a bit curious about what he's going to say and see how it differs from my understanding of what happened.

His hands clench into fists. "You can't be serious."

"Now, Zedd" I answer gently. "It's important."

"First of all, young lady, don't you ever dare imply again that I ever used him. Long before we ever became mates, I made it clear to him repeatedly that I wasn't just after using him. Unless you'd care to suggest that he was using me and if that's the case, you'd better understand that he didn't exactly jump into a physical relationship with me. And it doesn't matter a damn that you are the same age he was then! He wasn't MY child!"

Realizing that he's insulted and angered far beyond what I'd expected, I stand, rapidly cross over and set a restraining hand on his shoulder. "I was also still fully human at the time and therefore much older in a sense than you are now, sweetie. Not to mention that, since I was older, I'd had a bit of life experience that you lack."

"But I was raised on Earth, I'm part human and Phaedosian, and those parts are telling me I'm not a child. Daddy you may have been fully human and that changes things for your situation, but in that same respect I'm not fully Eltarian and it's not fair to hold me to the same standards a full Eltarian would be held to." Realizing she does have a bit of a point, I however can't help my own concerns over her being courted by some of the Eltarian males I know she associates with.

"I understand that, but again my situation was different. Your father and I were also bonded remember? Never mind the fact that I was still recovering from the abuse I'd gone through and at the time I needed things between us to progress a bit faster than they normally would to help me recover. You, thank god, are not in such a situation, nor are you bonded to anyone."

"But the bonding shouldn't matter. You've even told me not all bonded pairs are mates."

"That's true, they're not, however given how uncertain I was about everything and everyone at the time, and as you pointed out, my age, it helped me see how much Papa cared for me, as I could actually feel it. There was no hiding how he felt about me, or how I felt about him. You don't have that little cheat though, nor do you have any real experience with this sort of situation to help you."

"How am I supposed to have experience if I'm not allowed to gain any?"

"You will, you just need to be patient."

"I'm sick of being patient! I've been patient for fifteen years now!"

I vaguely remember a discussion she had with Dar when I'd finished healing after Big John found and attacked me. She'd wanted him to talk us into letting her date then. I sigh as Zedd gets riled up once more. "Fifteen years? Who in all the hells did you think you were going to be allowed to date then?"

"It really doesn't matter now, does it?" she snaps back.

Before either of them can say any more and turn this into a full blown fight, I step in once more. "Enough. You both need to stop before you say or do something you're going to regret. Mara Jane, go to your room and calm down for a while. I'll come talk to you in a bit." I see her start to open her mouth to protest, but I cut her off with a calm, "Now."

She storms off and I turn to Zedd. "Go to the workout room and work off some of that anger, Zedd, and I'll come talk to you in a minute."

He stomps off in another direction and I address the last person in the room before she can escape. "Megan, I want to talk to you."

"Dr. Oliver-"

I hold up my hand to stop her. "Look, I know that Mara Jane is your friend and you want to help her. I get it. The part of the argument that you didn't hear was when Zedd said that she was too young to start courting at all. The focus turned to males since that's what she's been asking about and I'll tell you right now that Zedd's not going to be happy with you for quite a while that you've pointed out that little loophole in the argument."

"Dr. Oliver, you have no idea just how frustrated she's been since I started seeing Donovan. And trust me - the whole mixed breed argument isn't going to keep holding a lot of weight."

"I noticed. Quite frankly, I'd hoped that she'd continue to take after Zedd as much as she has to buy her more time before this really became an issue."

Megan hesitates for a minute before she speaks again. "While she is my age, she's still younger than me in a lot of ways. That's why these fights come so close to being tantrums. But between me dating, Sinai's coming out party next year, seeing Jimmy when we were home last, I think she's starting to feel, well, left behind."

I think about what she's telling me. "That kind of makes sense." With a sigh, I gesture for her to go. "I have some phone calls to make."

A few hours later, I go to find Zedd. I finally find him in the bedroom, curled up in our chair and looking out the window. I stop and just look at him for a minute. I know he realizes I'm here when he says softly, "I'm not ready for this, Thomas. I know she thinks she is, but I know she's not and I'm definitely not."

I go over and run my fingers through his hair. "Kalleimat, did you really think that she'd never grow up?"

"No, but she's trying to grow up too fast!"

"Children do that, mate. They want to do things that they aren't ready for and we have to, as parents, control that. The hard part is knowing when they are ready and letting them, but staying available in case they fall."

"But there's no need for her to 'fall' at all! If she'd just listen to me-"

"Zedd, mate, it is going to happen. It's extremely rare to for someone's first relationship to be the right one and last their whole life." Taking a deep breath, I step into extremely dangerous territory. "Your father tried to keep you from 'falling' with Annwyl and all it did was make you more determined to do what you wanted. I'm not saying that we have to go to the other end and give her complete freedom, but we have to find a middle ground."

"That wasn't the same thing! I was already old enough to start courting someone! She's not!"

"Stop looking at the numbers. I've already called Alundra and Pina and they agree that she might be physically ready to be an adult. I've also talked to your mother and sister. They have already been planning her party, but waiting to do anything major since they weren't sure when it would be needed. They've been expecting another decade or so. We all think that she needs to have a full physical to determine if there's something else going on that might be pushing her to do this. It might simply be something hormonal. Being that Pina's only a quarter Phaedosian and in the best position to know, she thinks that this is like when Eltarians or humans reach sexual maturity. Her body is ready, but she's not - mentally or emotionally."

There's far too much hope in his voice. "So it might just be a phase?"

"I don't know, but we'll figure this out and we'll deal with it, okay?"

He nods and I give him a parting kiss before I go to deal with my daughter. I take a breath and knock on her door. "Come in, Daddy."

I go in and close the door behind me. "Are you calmer now, princess?"

She nods. "I'm just tired of Papa not listening to me."

"Mara Jane, honey, he is listening. You did make a good point earlier that you aren't full Eltarian and shouldn't be treated as such, but neither are you full human or Phaedosian and you can't be treated that way either."

She looks at me hopelessly. "So what do we do?"

"I've called Alundra and Aunt Pina. They're going to come in a few days and give you a full physical to determine what's going on with you. It might just be a hormone thing or you might be right and you are ready to start courting. I want you to promise me not to start any more fights with Papa until they've done all their testing and find out for sure what the situation is. After we know more, then we can figure out what to do and where to go from there."

She nods, but I hear what she says under her breath. "Or we could just go to Earth where my age isn't so damn relevant."

"Mara Jane, he's just trying to protect you. He doesn't want you to get hurt the way he and I did." I know she knows the story of Annwyl, but I've never told her about how Kimberly broke up with me. She just knows that Kim was the first female I dated and then we didn't.

"You mean when you were in rehab? Daddy, I know you won't let that happen to me."

"No, honey, that's not what I mean." I can't help but hesitate. "Hang on a second and let me go get something."

"Okay."

I head out quickly and it's only a few minutes before I return. "You know that Kimberly and I used to date. She had the opportunity to go far away to train to improve her gymnastics. Of course she went, none of us were planning on being Rangers forever. We talked on the phone whenever we could, but it was hard with my Rangering duties, her training schedule and being across the country from each other. We sent a few letters, but neither of us was much on writing. Then came the day that I got a letter from her at the Juice Bar."

I look at the envelope that I never got around to destroying in my hand for a minute before I hold it out to her. She takes it slowly. "You want me to read it?"

I nod, knowing I can't read it to her. She pulls out the well worn and heavily creased sheet, opens it and reads. Her mouth falls open in shock. When I'm sure she's done, I gently take it from her, refold it and replace it in the envelope. I speak softly. "I was working out with the other Rangers nearby when Ernie gave it to us. I didn't want to stop so I asked Adam to read it out loud, not knowing what was in it." I swallow hard. For some reason I really don't understand, it still hurts a lot - in spite of how happy I am with Zedd. "She was my first love. That's the kind of thing we're trying to protect you from."

She's quiet for a minute. "It still hurts you, doesn't it? Just like the thing with Annwyl still hurts Papa?"

I nod. "Honey, even though we don't love Annwyl or Kim anymore, it doesn't make that moment any less hurtful. We don't want you to have to go through that the way we did. I know that most first relationships don't last, but we both were blindsided by people we loved and thought loved us. Look - just think about this, okay? And please let the courting thing go until after Alundra and Aunt Pina have seen you."

I stand up when she agrees and leave her room. I return the letter to its place and head out onto the grounds. I need some time alone.