Theo could hear the ruckus from the Rainforest Cafe the moment they emerged from the Piccadilly tube. There was a long queue to get in but the host smiled at Scott and waved them through. The dim lighting did nothing to lessen the assault upon his senses and good taste. It was a cacophony of crowd noise and piped-in animal chirps and growls. A riot of artificial colour assaulted his eyes and the malodour of fried food invaded his nose. Fake snakes draping from fake tree limbs hissed at the tourists and fake tree frogs blinked and croaked.
"Scott!" Three children galloped up - astride an enormous black panther.
"WHOA!" the boy in front called.
The panther turned its head. "If you mistake me for a horse again, Master Richard, I shall dump you in the fish pond."
Theo started. The animatronics were amazing. He'd swear the panther was real. Also, the panther was obviously female from the voice. But if she was real, three children wouldn't be riding her, of course.
The girl, sitting between the two boys on the panther's back giggled. Each was wearing a name tag, Richard, Susan, Peter, and the boys were twins. All three leaned over, somewhat precariously, and Scott gave them each a kiss.
Theo could see the panther physically bracing herself as the children's weight shifted on her back. What a remarkable feat of engineering.
"It's good to see you again, Scott," the panther said.
"And you, too, Lela." Scott shook a finger at the children. "You know the rules, anyone who is wet doesn't get birthday cake. Now, are you going to be polite and say hello to..."
"THEO!" the children chorused. "Jambo! Jambo bwana!"
"No need to pretend to understand," Scott said, laughing, "They're showing off their Swahili."
Each child insisted on shaking his hand, while balanced on an animatronic leopard.
The boy in the back, Peter, gestured for Theo to come closer. He probably wanted to whisper but given the noise, it ended up being almost shouted. "Aslan's on the move, Theo! Better stay sharp!"
"Aslan?"
"Listen!" Susan said.
Theo heard, which he recognized only from Sir David Attenborough programmes and the MGM logo before movies, a lion roar. Close. And loud.
"Twende!" Richard cried, which evidently meant something like "Let's go!" Lela set off, lashing her tail and grumbling.
Theo thought Richard would be in the pond long before the cake was served.
"Aslan?"
"Yeah. The Cat."
This was confusing because he'd thought The Cat was The Cat in the garden.
Scott took him by the elbow and steered him into the crowded restaurant. Really, the animatronics were absolutely incredible. He'd never seen the like, even at Disney World. Monkeys were swinging from the ceilings and swooping down to steal things off diners' plates and birds were flapping about and squawking. Feathers were drifting down from the rafters and it was amazing how realistic it all was.
"This place is unbelievable!"
"Yeah," Scott said, sounding really dry. "Almost like magic."
They went past the gorillas and elephants that children were climbing all over. The elephants raised their trunks and flapped their ears. It even smelled a little gamey. No wonder the place was so popular. Curious, he put a hand out to feel one the elephant's legs and it felt like tough, leathery skin. He'd never touched an elephant before but imagined it would be just like this. And then the big head turned and the trunk batted his hand off.
"Do you mind?" the elephant - male - rumbled.
"Scott? Did you…"
"Just roll with it."
They wove through the tables, slaloming right and left to avoid the animals darting about among them. Two children hopped by with a lemur jumping along with them. The parrots overhead were discussing how much they disliked the green melon in the salads.
"Bitter, it is," said one.
"It's cheap," said the other parrot. "If they're going to put melon in it, at least it should be the orange or red kind."
Theo was surprised that the Rainforest Cafe audio track voicing the fake animals included criticism of the honeydew melon in the restaurant fruit medley.
Scott gestured toward a table a few meters away. "It's 4:30 and there's Grandpa and Grandma, true to form and right on schedule."
Sir Peter Pevensie and Lady Pevensie were, Theo realized, the sort of people that one really did notice in the crowd - tall and compelling, they both really drew the eye. Of course, the fact that there was some giant spotted cat next to them wasn't something easily ignored, either. Was it a leopard? A jaguar? Cheetah?
He'd obviously watched all the wrong programmes.
The Pevensies were standing at the table, chatting with a young couple. Sir Peter had a little notebook out and was writing something down. No one seemed the least bit put-out by the large carnivore also at the table licking a paw - the cat's head was almost even with Lady Pevensie's shoulder.
Lady Pevensie saw them first. She smiled and waved at them. "Peter! Scott and Theo are here!"
Sir Peter smartly closed his book and shook hands with the couple at the table. Then, the ruckus in the Rainforest Cafe seemed to melt away as he stepped forward to greet them, smiling and arms wide.
What amazing genetics. "You didn't tell me Sir Peter was hot."
Scott looked mortified - and he looked a lot like Sir Peter Pevensie, except 50 years younger and with more hair. "Just stop it, would you. That's my grandfather."
"There's nothing so attractive as a man who really owns his baldness. No comb-overs."
Theo was very optimistic for the prospect of growing old with Scott.
"I'm going to…"
"Scott!"
So they were a handshake and hug sort of family. Scott got both from his grandparents.
"Grandpa, Grandma, I'd like you to meet my boyfriend, Theo Baker."
The hand was already out and Theo took it, gratefully. "The pleasure is mine, Sir Peter."
"It's Peter, please, Theo."
"And I'm Mary. By all means, though, call Miriam "Lady Pevensie" and she'll bake you things and offer translation services and theological argument. We're delighted to finally meet you, Theo. Scott's been most unfair keeping you all to himself."
As it seemed everyone was playing along, Theo decided to wade into the promised bedlam that, so far, was indeed delivering. To the big, spotted cat, he said, "Good afternoon. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"And yours. I am Jabarl."
Theo didn't want to ask if Jabarl was a leopard or a cheetah as he didn't want to broadcast his ignorance and it somehow seemed vaguely impolite.
Animatronic, he reminded himself sternly.
"Was that a former constituent?" Scott asked as they moved toward the back of the restaurant.
"No, just a young man who served in the Iraq theater who probably contracted Gulf War Syndrome and isn't getting what is owed. I'll make some phone calls tomorrow and then knock some doors and heads."
"You should let me come," Jabarl said. "I'm very persuasive."
Theo tried looking for the microphone. Someone had to be listening and feeding the lines. How did they get the mouth to move so naturally? Those looked like real teeth in Jabarl's mouth.
"Is something wrong, Theo?" Jabarl asked.
Theo felt a heavy, furry tail thump him in the back. "No. Not at all. It's my first time here. It's a mite overwhelming."
"We saw Richard, Peter, and Susan riding Lela when we came."
"Lela was charming," Theo tried. "But I would not blame her a bit if Richard gets a dunking."
They all laughed, and harder when Jabarl growled, "I'll help."
"I'm just glad they removed the otters from the pond," Mary said.
Scott had mentioned that before. It was very mysterious. "What's wrong with otters?"
Peter grimaced. "Unbelievably foul-mouthed."
"The children were picking up the most dreadful language," Mary added.
"I see." Theo didn't actually see at all. Why would the manager at a family restaurant permit audio tracks of cursing animals?
Peter clapped him on the back. "Theo, the prospect of meeting you was so momentous, it brought my brother here at a reasonable time."
"Though it did take both Miriam and a border collie."
Theo wondered if the dog was animatronic, too.
Two children, Naomi and Eddie, who had switched name tags, ran up and smashed into Scott. And, damn, that was no dog with them. A wolf? It was huge.
The children gave their cousin a very cursory hug and then stuck out their hands for Theo to shake. He called them by their presumably incorrect names. "Very nice to meet you, Naomi," he told the boy. "I'm Theo. Eddie, it's a pleasure."
To the wolf, he said, "How do you do?" Surely it was better to be polite with a wolf, even an animatronic one, though this one looked really real.
"Good afternoon. I am Varu."
Eddie, who was really Naomi, burst out first. "Have you heard, Theo? Aslan is on the move!"
"I have. But tell me, Eddie, where is Aslan moving to?"
There was another very loud roar. Naomi, who was really Eddie, rolled his eyes with the superiority only a ten-year old could manage. "Aslan's everywhere."
"Perhaps you'll introduce us then." He asked the question relevant to every child he'd met over the last year, "Have you read Harry Potter, yet?"
"Yes!" "Four times!" "Six!" The children were talking over themselves in their enthusiasm.
"The sequel, about Harry's second year at Hogwarts, comes out in July. I have it on reliable authority that there is a flying car. I can certainly get you discounted copies once they go on sale."
The children squealed and tried pulling him into the dining room; an argument about what Houses they would be sorted into would come next unless a daring rescue was executed.
Help, he mouthed at Scott.
"Hold on there, you two," Scott injected. "You are not going to prise secrets from my boyfriend." He handed Naomi and Eddie the cloth-wrapped gift books. "Take that to Anne. It's for her, with extra copies for John, Lucille, and Tommy. And stay out of the pond!"
The children seized the books and, with Varu, bounded away.
He was pleased when Mary said, very approvingly, "You have a wonderful means of ingratiating yourself thoroughly within the family, Theo. The children are wild about Harry Potter. Have we admitted a Slytherin into our midst?"
"I'm not talented at chemistry." Theo didn't think this would be the time to admit he lacked vaulting ambition and driving thirst to prove himself. Out of deference to their environs, he lowered his voice and added, "Nor am I especially fond of snakes."
"You are a Ravenclaw, I think, like myself," Mary announced. "Peter is a Hufflepuff, through and through."
"I've wondered at the appropriateness of the book, frankly," Peter replied. "There is a lot of violence and abuse in it directed at children."
"Too violent for children?" Mary retorted. "Yes, do tell me more, Sir Peter Wolfsbane."
Theo didn't think Wolfsbane was part of the British honours system.
He glanced at Scott who just motioned with his fingers and mouthed, Roll with it.
The restaurant had been mere bedlam. Entering the private room for the House of Pevensie birthday party was a circus with performing animal acts. Monkeys were perched in the fake trees throwing things at one another and screeching. Crows were perched on chair backs - he had not thought crows were native to a rainforest but, then again, he had watched all the wrong television programmes. There were more wolves and a tiger.
There were also animals sitting on one of the dining tables eating from an enormous platter of what looked to be chicken wings and nachos. Some of them were small and sleek and looked like ferrets - maybe weasels or something. Others were bigger, with spiky gray hair, skinny tails and big eyes. Large hairy brown things that looked like enormous cavies were in a corner munching contentedly on English garden salads out of glass bowls. Parrots and monkeys sitting on the backs of the pig-like animals were discussing bananas and figs with two black-furred, whiskered things hanging from trees overhead and an elongated spotted cat with a long, ringed tail was perched on a branch next to them.
He must have been staring too obviously because Mary said, "The rodents were upsetting the guests, so they've been excused. The capybaras were permitted to stay, naturally. Everyone loves capybaras." She pointed to the huge cavies eating out of the salad bowls. They must be the capybaras and they did seem very placid amid the chaos.
Mary continued with her lecture. "The big gray animals on the table are opossums - they might be unfamiliar to you. The smaller ones are mustelids, that is, weasels and polecats. In the tree in the corner, with the capybaras, are the binturongs and a genet."
"And the wolves, primates, and great cats, of course," Peter said.
"There are cheetahs and lesser cats." Jabarl injected, sounding pretty haughty about it.
Theo supposed that meant Jabarl was a cheetah.
A table at the private room's entrance was piled with name tags. Given the number of people of the House of Pevensie already milling about, it was daunting to see how many tags were still unclaimed. He wondered if Emma had made name tags for the animals.
Scott slapped a name tag on his chest. Theo Baker - Scott's boyfriend was already printed on the tag, which made him feel very welcome.
There were squeals of Scott! Theo! They were then mobbed by a scrum of children brandishing the books and waving like banners the African textiles and yarn that had wrapped them. "Thank yous" were jabbered in at least three languages and he couldn't begin to guess at the nationalities. Eddie and Naomi's name tags were on different people and his own hand was shaken with effusive thanks at least six times. Wolves and leopards circled around them in ways that, were they not animatronic, would have made Theo feel like he was on the Rainforest Cafe menu along with the hamburgers and chicken sandwiches.
Obviously accustomed to the chaos generated by small, excited persons, Scott shooed them all away. "Go! Read to the capybaras! They're always good listeners. I'm sure they would love Harry Potter."
Theo's own imagination was stumbling a little over the prospect of the children sitting in a corner with capybaras and whatever a binturong was, reading, "Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much."
A pair of tinny, squabbling voices pierced through the general ambient noise. Two weasels on the table were fighting over a chicken wing, snatching it back and forth and hissing. One of them snapped its teeth and cried out, "It's mine, you fuckwi…"
There was a whoosh as something whizzed by his ear and then an ominous thunk. Theo tracked the sound and spied an arrow sunk deeply into the fake wood paneling of the Rainforest Cafe decor. An awed hush blanketed the room. "That's quite enough," a woman said. "No vulgarity, please."
With a still quivering arrow embedded in the wall just above their heads, the weasels surrendered.
"Alright. Fine," one of them muttered. The weasels went to work splitting the last chicken wing.
"Peter, would you please, since you're already up?"
"Fortunately, Su, you are still as accurate as you were on D-Day." Peter went over to the wall and, with some effort, pulled the arrow out. He returned it to the woman who, smiling the whole time, remained smugly seated at the table. A huge wolf sat next to her and audibly sighed.
Scott didn't seem to be worried about getting so close to the armed woman. He kissed her on the cheek and gestured him over. "Theo, may I introduce you to my Great Aunt Susan?"
Dame Susan couldn't shake hands immediately as she was fitting her crossbow back into her very large handbag. She looked exactly as what he'd first assumed everyone in the family would be like - smart set, perfectly done hair expertly coloured, carefully applied lipstick with barely a smudge on her wine glass, immaculately plucked brow, manicured nails in a neutral shade, cardi over her shoulders, a string of tasteful pearls and matching earrings. Restraint. Elegance. Class. Extremely Dangerous.
"How do you do, Theo? It is such a pleasure to meet you. Scott has been so very happy since you entered his life. There can be no stronger recommendation than that."
"Thank you, Dame Susan. I couldn't ask for a better, kinder partner." What else should one say under these circumstances? He assumed that impeccably coiffed DBEs did not usually carry crossbows in their handbags. "If Scott had any faults, which he does not, I certainly would not mention them given your accuracy with a bow and arrow."
She laughed and sipped her wine. "Well, thank you. I understand you are at Bloomsbury Press?"
How the hell had she learned that so quickly?
"I am."
"I do hope you can speak with my daughter, Julia. She's at the pond right now, trying to keep her daughter and the twins out of it."
Scott snorted. "I threatened no birthday cake."
"And threats are so very effective in this family."
"What is a crossbow bolt through a raucous crowd if not a threat, Aunt?"
Dame Susan awarded Scott a very stern look and her slim eyebrow rose in a formidable and devastating arch of disappointment.
"If not threat, perhaps incentive?" Theo offered.
"Yes, thank you, Theo. Scott, you've been lunching with Daniel again. It always manifests in tiresome quibbling."
Scott had said that Daniel Pevensie was Right Honourable Never Sir Edmund Pevensie's oldest son, the barrister in the family, and a bit of a disappointment as he occasionally complained about taxes, drove a Range Rover, and didn't recycle consistently.
"As I was saying to Theo, Julia is looking to shop her next book. Perhaps you might speak with her?"
Theo was flattered, and incredibly pleased at the generosity. It would surely come to nothing but having a role in bringing an author like Julia Walker into the house would be a very nice boost to their non-fiction line - and his own prospects.
Fuck, did this mean he was a Slytherin now?
"I'll do that. Thank you so much."
"Don't mind me, trapped and exiled over here," a male voice called above the din that began rising again now that the crossbow had disappeared.
Dame Susan tilted her head. "The monkeys have tied Edmund down already, so you'd best satisfy his insatiable curiosity. And if you desire for more tedious argument, you may take it to him. For scintillating conversation, you may return to me."
Directing him to the table of the Right Honourable Never Sir Edmund Pevensie and Yes Please Call Me Lady Pevensie, Scott whispered, "Aunt Susan killed Nazi snipers on D-Day."
"With a crossbow?"
Scott nodded.
Theo hadn't yet read that book in the Commoner Royalty series and figured he should remedy the shortcoming swiftly.
Wolves, cheetahs, and a septuagenarian with a crossbow in her purse were all pretty intimidating. The tiger next to Edmund Pevensie was truly terrifying. And so life-like. Its eyes blinked and its whiskers twitched and, when it opened its mouth to yawn, Theo saw very long teeth.
"Steady there," Scott said and squeezed his hand.
"Of course." It wasn't as if it was a real tiger sitting at a dining table in a private room at the Rainforest Cafe. For all that he'd spent a year reading about magic in kids' lit, Theo was glad his imagination wasn't especially overactive.
The Right Honourable Never Sir Edmund Pevensie and Lady Pevensie didn't have the glamour of Sir Peter and Mary, or Dame Susan's classic styling. Nor did he think there would be a crossbow secreted somewhere. This Pevesie set would have cat hair on their clothes, socks and shoe leather would be worn thin, and there would be tea cups and three-week old crosswords, completed in pen and with no corrections, all over the house.
Scott kissed them both and Lady Pevensie bounced to her feet for a hug.
"Welcome, Theo! I'm Miriam! We spoke on the phone." She warmly shook his hand.
"Lady Pevensie, it's a pleasure." He nodded. "Mr. Pevensie, I'm honoured."
"It's Edmund of course. I credit Scott with schooling you properly to avoid Sir, so my thanks for that."
"And he doesn't like Sire, either," the Tiger said, which made no sense at all but everyone just laughed.
"Please sit and join us. I apologize for not being able to gain my feet but I am all tied up at the moment." Theo heard in Not Sir Edmund's speech a sharper edge than was evident in his dress. "Some vile monkeys have been at their usual tricks and as a consequence I am table-bound."
Before he could probe this curiosity, a short-haired teenager thrust out a hand. "Hello, Theo, I'm Nate. Is the next Harry Potter book really coming out in July and is there really a flying car in it?"
Nate was dressed in a man's shirt, jeans, and a black leather jacket, and sported dark eyeliner and piercings Theo would have deeply envied less than ten years ago. Scott had also told him beforehand, and emphatically, that Natalie was now Nate and apart from professing admiration for otters, the surest way to earn the scorn of everyone in the family would be to get their name wrong.
"Yes, Nate," Theo replied solemnly, shaking their hand and avoiding the spiky rings on their knuckles. "And though sworn to secrecy, I am also at liberty to say that..."
"DUCK!" Nate shrieked, and they all dove down.
There was a violent chattering overhead and something landed with a gooey splat in the middle of the dining table. Figs? There, fortunately, weren't any chicken wings, nachos, or artichoke spinach dip on the table so nothing was upended, but the silverware and glasses were badly splattered.
The tiger snarled and there was no mistaking this threat. Another form of deterrence followed - the now familiar whosh of an arrow and the solid thunk of when it embedded in a fake tree trunk. The monkeys, screeching with fear, swung away, and back out into the main dining room.
"Thank you, Nate, for preserving what little remains of our dignity," Edmund said.
"You're welcome Grandpa. I can untie your shoes, if you like."
"The monkeys will just tie them up," Miriam put in.
Theo was again floundering. "Shoes?"
"It's very tedious," Right Honourable Never Sir Edmund Pevensie replied with a sigh. "The monkeys and I have a longstanding enmity."
Nate handed their grandmother a relatively clean napkin and began scraping the fig off the table with a pocketknife. The energy they were applying to the task was leaving deep gouges in the finish. "It's because they always used to throw things at him. Disgusting things."
"And when was that?" Theo asked conversationally. Had Right Honourable Never Sir Edmund Pevensie once worked in a zoo? Scott had said there was a zookeeper in the family.
"A long time ago, in Narnia," Nate said. "So now the monkeys, possessing some sort of collective grudge across space and time, always tie Grandpa's shoes together when we come here and bombard him with whatever foul things they can find."
"Like sauerkraut." Miriam shuddered.
"And calf liver, which is especially cruel," Edmund added.
"I do it prefer it raw," the Tiger said. "I agree about the sauerkraut, though. The only thing worse than vegetables is pickling them."
Theo didn't want to broadcast his ignorance but he'd never heard of Narnia. Perhaps it was a safari park.
A round of cheers rose as another couple entered the room - from their age and timing, Scott's Great Aunt Lucy and her husband Jack had joined the fracas.
Aunt Lucy did not have the sophisticated polish of her sister, Susan. Her hair was short, cropped, and naturally gray, she wasn't wearing any make-up, and she was dressed as Nate was, in jeans and a shirt and jacket so big, they probably belonged to Jack. Theo immediately decided he liked Jack as the man had a tray with pints and a waiter was following behind with more.
"Bring those over here, please!" Edmund called. "We're thirsty!"
The waiter set down the drinks on the fig-splattered table, took one long look at the tiger, and ran out of the room, leaving Theo to wonder why the staff would be so afraid of an animatronic animal.
Unless maybe it wasn't animatronic his imagination suggested. Theo's mind throttled that possibility and he reached for a beer.
Scott brandished his camera bag. "I need to pop off and take some photos. Do you want to come?"
Great Uncle Edmund was tied to the table so it seemed impolite to leave him, Miriam was a jolly person, Nate would surely talk his ear off about Harry Potter, and Jack had brought beer. Why would he leave? He held up his pint.
"Right," Scott laughed. He shook a finger at his nearest and dearest. "Don't scare off my boyfriend. Most of the furniture in our flat is his and I still don't know how to use his espresso machine."
Aunt Lucy gave him a hug before he could even put down the pint. Spilled beer joined the fig goo on the table. "Theo! We're delighted to finally meet you! I would have been very cross to have missed you before we go back to Boston."
Jack slid into the seat Scott had vacated and raised his beer. "What Lucy said." He pulled out a chair and his wife flopped down into it. Theo felt an immediate warm kindness from Lucy.
"Where is the birthday girl?" Lucy asked. "In the pond?"
"No! Not yet at any rate." Miriam was still trying to wipe up fig goo and just gave up and tossed the napkin aside.
"Cheers." Edmund clinked glasses with everyone. "We're enjoying more quiet than the usual thanks to Scott and Theo. They gave Anne Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, and three extra copies, so they've decided to read to the capybaras and wait until later to mount a raid of the gift shop."
"That's the book about the boy wizard they've all been talking about, who is going to a school called Hogwarts?"
"It is, Lucy, yes," Theo told her. "It's been out for a year here, with a sequel in July. You won't be seeing until the fall in the U.S. - I imagine it will be in all the Scholastic book fairs."
Lucy tried to take a sip from her husband's pint but Jack wrested it away. "You steal my clothes, you're not stealing my beer, which you don't even like." He slid a glass to her. "I got a cider, just for you."
"Thank you, love."
"So, Theo, I understand you dreamt of the talking Cat." Jack raised his glass. "Welcome to Arkham!"
Recalling that Lucy and Jack had named their daughter Alice, and glad he caught the Arkham reference from Scott's Batman comics, Theo surprised himself with a worrying bit of Slytherin cunning. "But I don't want to go among mad people."
He'd obviously judged correctly as everyone at the table burst into laughter and responded, in chorus, with the next line, though Lucy was the fastest. "'Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: 'we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'"
Theo put as much indignation into his voice as possible. "How do you know I'm mad?"
"You must be," said Lucy triumphantly, "or you wouldn't have come here." She clapped her hands and spilled her cider. "Oh Theo, this is splendid that you know Alice's Adventures! What a fabulous portent! It's no wonder at all you and Scott get on so well. We shall be such friends!"
Leaving him to once again wonder at just how rapidly gossip traveled in the family, Nate said, "You're obviously Slytherin if you came here prepared with that quote, Theo."
"No cramming at all, Nate. I wrote a dissertation on the fantastical in English children's literature. Alice's Adventures was one of my primary texts. I have academic pretensions and was definitively sorted into Ravenclaw."
"The children have been talking about getting sorted all weekend," Lucy said. "Which I eventually realized was a Harry Potter reference and not some tricky problem solving. Anne hasn't even read the book and insists she's a Slytherin."
As Scott had said Anne admired the Star Wars Empire and Darth Vader, Slytherin probably was a good fit.
"I can't say I like the way the book slots and divides children based upon purportedly immutable character traits, or flaws," Edmund said. "Children - and adults - can change profoundly, and mend their ways."
Like Sir Peter's observation, Edmund's was a similarly thoughtful, and very valid, critique.
"Still, there's no denying the popularity of the book." Theo related completely to the fatigue when Edmund sighed wearily. "We've all been sorted and resorted into Hogwarts Houses."
"So which House would I…"
Lucy didn't even finish the sentence before everyone around the table all said, emphatically, "Gryffindor."
"I agree with Grandpa that the House sorting system is flawed. I'd go further and say it perpetuates classism and bigotry." Nate sounded like every exceedingly knowledgeable, precocious teen that Theo had ever met. "More interesting to me than rigid, life-long conformance to what a hat tells you, is the Mirror of Erised. I'm curious what everyone would see in it."
Oh. That was unexpected.
They never half-arse anything.
"The deepest wish I would see reflected in the mirror is no mystery," Miriam said briskly. "There's no need to describe it further."
Edmund's hand covered Miriam's and Nate's face twisted in deep consternation, wiping away the adolescent smugness. "I'm sorry, Gran. I shouldn't have said anything."
Scott had told him all of Miriam's family had died in the Holocaust. "I accept your apology of course, darling." She leaned over and fondly stroked Nate's short hair. "It is a very insightful question, which we should all expect from you and it is far more interesting than being shunted into a single, defining identity at age eleven."
"So the Mirror shows you your deepest wishes?" Lucy asked.
Jack's response was swift. "Patriots winning the Super Bowl. And Newt Gingrich and every other Republican in his cabal going down to a humiliating defeat in the November mid-terms." He drained his pint and reached for a second.
Theo didn't fully understand Jack's answers, but he liked them and the man's enthusiasm for sport, winning, and beer. "And what would you see, Nate?"
"England winning the World Cup. Seeing the Good Friday Agreement signed and approved."
"And implemented," their grandfather put in emphatically.
"Yeah. Going to Nyeri with Aunt Walta and Wangari and meeting their family. I'd also see a bunch of us cousins going back to the Blue Door Cottage and finding the pink beach." There were several snickers about this, though Theo had no idea what the cottage with pink beach sand was - maybe it was a resort in Bermuda.
"And I would see me attending an American uni where I can play football and not declare a major until I'm a junior. And Theo would tell me what's in the next Harry Potter book."
"Not until July, I'm afraid."
"I should like a goat," the tiger said. "And I'll have to settle for chicken or," the tiger's lip curled over a tooth with complete contempt, "hamburger."
"I am sorry about that, friend," Edmund said with a laugh. "Perhaps, at least, it will be raw."
The tiger swished his tail and a chair went flying across the room and smashed into a wall, leaving another dent to be covered by the damage deposit.
"Grandpa? Aunt Lucy, what about you?"
Theo wondered at the glance that passed between Miriam and Jack. Lucy shifted in her seat and he heard something drop under the table. "Well, there's one deeply desired wish of mine granted."
Jack reached under the table and drew out a pair of women's trainers.
"Aunt Lucy doesn't like to wear shoes," Nate explained.
Lucy leaned her elbow on the table and rested her chin in her hand. "I find this a disturbing and dangerous question, I think. Edmund, do you know what I mean?"
Edmund took Miriam's hand in his. It seemed like a gesture of reassurance. "I do, Lu."
Theo was glad Nate said, "I don't know what you mean," because he was very curious, too. There was a serious undercurrent and he and Nate were the only ones seemingly in the dark.
"Well, Nate," Lucy began after a thoughtful pause, "in a way, your grandfather and I both had an opportunity, once, to fulfill what we thought at the time was our most deeply held wish. And, though it was a very difficult decision, we both turned it down, which as happens, was very much the right decision."
"Why?" Again, the teen would go where no one else would, though Miriam and Jack both looked happier than they had moments earlier. Jack set Lucy's trainers on an empty chair and leaned in closer, putting an arm around her; Miriam took her husband's hand, clasped in her own, and kissed it.
"Because if we were to look in the Mirror now, all of us here together is what I think we would both see, isn't it Lu?"
"It is, Edmund. Though there would surely be fewer monkeys for you."
"That's it!" Nate announced. "Cover me. I'm going in." They dove under the table prepared to defend their grandfather's shoelaces from marauding and extremely dextrous monkeys.
"What about you, Theo? What deeply desired wish would you see in the Mirror?" Edmund was asking the question but he felt all eyes on him.
He stared at the gouged and fig-smeared table. It sounded casual but it was a deeply sincere query.
They never half-arse anything.
He glanced up and Lucy smiled in a way that eased the painful knot that had formed in his stomach. "I'm with Nate. England taking the Cup. And birthday cake."
There was birthday cake, eventually. Four children went into the pond, along with the capybaras. Some part of his mind still clinging to shreds of rationality, wondered at animatronic swimming, talking rodents. The crossbow came out of Dame Susan's handbag three more times and a harried manager finally asked the party to shut down when Aunt Lucy began teaching Nate and the other teens how to throw steak knives for distance. Lucy was as accurate with knives and as Dame Susan was with arrows.
Sir Peter and Not Sir Edmund dueled with umbrellas in the gift shop, and the demonstration was so compelling, it drew crowds, applause, and a smatter of coins for the performance. Also, payment was arranged for the costs of six broken umbrellas and two smashed bins used as impromptu shields that were not up to the vigour of combat.
Theo gave sincere promises of a book party in July for the Harry Potter release. He made an appointment with Julia to talk over lunch next week about her Oxford Press contract and Miriam demanded they come over for brisket next Sunday. Mary and Peter wanted him to join them for a tour of the Cabinet War Rooms and the Natural History Museum. Lucy and Jack had the run of the Blue Door Cottage for two weeks before they all went back to the States, which was clarified to be on the Isle of Wight and not Bermuda. He and Scott were awarded a highly coveted invitation to the Cottage. He met the border collies - they belonged to Ed Junior and, oddly, seemed to be the only animals in the place that didn't speak.
He didn't know what to make of it all. By the time they left, when he was making cordial good-byes to the very charming capybaras, he was finding it really difficult to think of them as anything but mellow, kindly, oddly shaped, hairy humans who were deeply committed to a vegetarian lifestyle and water sports. He heartily and sincerely concurred when the capybaras opined that they would surely be sorted into Hufflepuff.
It was very late by the time they finally made it home. Picking up takeaway had seemed like a good idea but they weren't really hungry.
Instead, Scott made tea and brought it out to the garden. There was so much to discuss and comment upon and Theo was finding it hard to put it all into the words. Scott had been concerned he wasn't ready for the full-on House of Pevensie experience. He'd managed it pretty well, he thought. But he understood why Scott had been concerned - and why he'd kept quiet about it for so long.
"They call it Royal in the family," Scott said, handing him a cup. "Tea with milk and sugar. Maybe it's from the War when they couldn't get a proper cup. I don't know. I've not heard it anywhere else, though."
Theo sipped his cup. It was perfect. Scott made lousy coffee and excellent tea.
"How are you doing?"
"Well, I cannot very well complain, can I? You did warn me. As you said, and as they repeatedly demonstrated, they don't half-arse anything." He toyed with his cup's handle. Was he ready to ask this question? Or to hear the answer? "Scott?"
"Yeah?"
"Those animals?"
"I thought you were dealing with that uncommonly well."
"I thought they were animatronic, like at Disney World. But it wasn't, was it?"
Scott took his hand in his own and squeezed it gently. "No. And before you ask, I don't know why or how. It doesn't always happen but once you dreamt of the Cat, something uncanny was sure to follow. It only happens when something important happens."
He couldn't rationally explain what he had seen and experienced. It was, though, very good to hear that, whatever had caused it, it had surely arisen because of and out of his and Scott's relationship.
"So we're important then."
Scott withdrew his hands and shrugged. "You are, sure. They all loved you."
"Oh stop it. It's obviously both of us. You were absolutely right and they are absolutely cracked and the least restful family imaginable. But they were all uniformly lovely and gracious, and they all really love you. I am certain that had I one word of criticism of you, I would have been stabbed with something very sharp or bludgeoned with an umbrella. Your young cousins would have shoved me in the pond and left me to be eaten by the crocodile." He still wasn't sure if that one had been real or not.
Scott laughed. "Or, the monkeys would have laid off of Uncle Edmund and started hurling disgusting things at you, instead."
"The monkeys notwithstanding, thank you for sharing your family with me."
"You are welcome. It was much easier to have you there. I wish I had answers, but I don't. It's the way it's always been."
Scott drumming his fingers on his leg was usually a precursor to a weighty subject.
"What is it?"
"I heard you got quiet when they were talking about that mirror, from Harry Potter."
""The Mirror of Erised. It's Desire spelled backwards."
"It shows your deepest desire?"
"Yes. Just how many of your relations raised my reticence to disclose my most heartfelt wish?"
"A few. They may be cracked but, with a few notable exceptions, they are also exceedingly perceptive. Do you want to talk about it?"
Theo shrugged and shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "Reflecting on my own family while surrounded by yours was, I suppose, unavoidable."
"I'm sorry. I should have been more sensitive and not gone off the way I did when I know your father's a wanker and your sister is a twit."
"Thanks, but there's really not much to say that we've not been over a dozen times before."
He sighed and sipped his tea.
"It's awful now, Theo, but I know homophobia and bigotry aren't fixed things. People do change."
He'd not considered it before but Nate and their family were correct - it was a good thing they were not all sorted into immutable personality categories at the age of eleven as decreed by a magic hat. They never half-arse anything.
"Even in my own familial bastion of liberal to radical thinking, it's been work for some of them. Uncle Jack tells a story about a giant talking goose biting him for ever thinking that homosexuality could be anything other than completely natural."
"A talking goose? How… You know, never mind. But, on the subject of an afternoon with talking animals, I did wonder about something else. Did Aslan ever show up or did I miss him?"
Scott shook his head. "I wish I could tell you, but I don't really know."
"They all seemed so emphatic so I found it odd that no one introduced us."
"It's not really like that, Theo." Scott gently stirred his Royal tea and set the spoon aside. "When I was a child, with Will and my cousins, sometimes, someone - usually Aunt Lucy or Aunt Helen - would say, 'Aslan is on the move! Stay sharp!' And then we'd all go tromp into the woods around Russell House or run through the streets of Cowley or an Oxfam jumble or fundraiser looking for him."
"And?"
"Sometimes I'd hear a lion's roar, or smell something really delicious, or feel a warm puff of wind on a chilly day. But whatever some of my cousins saw, I never did."
Theo heard the undercurrent of quiet bitterness and realized he wasn't the only one with elusive heartfelt desires.
I didn't see it. I was overlooked. I don't measure up.
"Scott, I want you to know that if I ever looked in the mirror, it would show you being happy and proud of who you are. You said yourself that achievement isn't measured by education or money in your family. You are as much a valued and rightful member of the House of Pevensie as your illustrious forebears, your mother the online addict, and your brother the vegetarian accountant."
"Thanks." Scott sighed. After a moment's quiet thought, he added, "It's just that when the usual milestones and markers don't apply, I've never known what success looks like, or what it even is."
Of course Scott would approach it the way he did a race, "I don't think that whether you bested your last time or what your splits were are a good measure here. You make the lives around you better, including mine. "
"Thank you for saying that, Theo. It means a lot to me." Scott stood and Theo enjoyed the warmth of his arms about his shoulders. He kissed the top of his head. "If nothing else, what we've done, what we have, is right."
"Yes, and so much more." He tilted his head back for a kiss, flavoured with coffee in the morning, beer in the afternoon, and warm, sweet tea in the evening.
Scott ruined the romantic moment by stifling a yawn. "Sorry. It's just been a day." He slipped away and collected their tea cups. "I'll wash up."
Theo started climbing to his feet but Scott gave him a nudge with hip. "No, stay, a little bit. Maybe…" He shrugged again.
"What do you mean?"
Scott pointed and on the top of the garden wall Theo could see the outline of their garden cat, perched on the ledge. His golden eyes blinked.
"There's a saying in the family that if a cat appears, you should always try to speak with it. You're part of the family now, so you should see what happens next."
Scott went inside, and left him feeling a little foolish sitting alone, in the garden, in the dark, waiting for what he wasn't sure.
Then, a warm breeze stirred his hair and the garden filled with scents of coffee, a fresh mowed pitch, and Scott's favorite cologne.
Feeling something soft brush his leg, Theo looked down and the Cat stared back at him.
In a day of talking animals, these were words that were felt, not heard.
You are cherished and deeply loved. Love my beloved in return and be welcome in my family.
The Blue Door Cottage on the Isle of Wight refers to the magical house that Eustace and Jill bought.
Thank you!
In answer to some questions about the painfully detailed family tree, I rebelled against using pink and blue for female and male and used yellow and green instead, with white referring to other than cis-gendered.