"Happy Birthday Hamish." Vera hugged him and smiled a little when he held her tighter.
"You really didn't have to do this, especially since I know you aren't the biggest fan of my parents."
"Well they are still your parents and besides Emma said it wouldn't be fair if I invited just her. Your parents really want to see Theo." It was understandable, they had been out of the country when Theo was born and were only just back now. Granted she wasn't the same tiny squirmy newborn she had been when they first got the news that Theo had come into the world. She was a far more active infant now who was really trying to work out how to move around without help. Even now she would get up and try to crawl but without a real understanding of how to move her back legs and after a while would just lay back down and try it again. "Also I made you cheesecake for your birthday and it's very rich so we need to split it between a lot of people because it's chocolate and strawberry."
Hamish looked down at Vera with a little spark in his eye. "Vera, if we weren't already engaged I'd ask you to marry me because you must be the most incredible human being in all the universe for making me that cake for my birthday. I am so sad Theo can't have any."
"She can have a little, just a tiny bit."
Hamish seemed even more excited to get to share his favorite dessert in all the world with his daughter. That was if Theo even ate it, last time when he tried to give her icecream she had just spit it back out and cringed from the cold. What a perfect waste of good icecream too. "You know Vera if it was just us and my sister's and parents weren't coming i'd take you upstairs and…" He kissed her neck going down to her shoulder before Vera stopped him.
"Hamish." She gave him that 'no you behave' look and then nodded towards Maddox who was looking at them both before turning back to Theo.
"I'm sorry you still share a room with them Theo." He whispered to her. "I'd suggest you could stay in my bedroom with me but I don't think Vera would agree to it. Then we could stay up reading comics." He smirked at the baby he was coming to consider more and more a little sister. After all it seemed Pug actually liked him a lot and enjoyed reading comic books with him. Even really looked at the pictures when he showed them to her.
"You're right, I can't flirt with you in front of your boyfriend." He teased her knowing it made her very uncomfortable to know Maddox had a crush on her and had confirmed it to Hamish during their guys only time, well guys only and Theo. Of course at the same time he'd also brought up a girl at his school and what was the best way to talk to her. Hamish had just admitted that Vera had been the one to sort of talk to him first but he'd given him a great one liner.
"Hamish." Vera glared at him and held him back a little. Putting his arms around her he picked her up off the ground using her small size against her again. It was only safe to do this when Vera wasn't being serious though. He was sure if she was being serious or cranky he'd end up with his insides on his outsides.
A loud knock at the door startled Hamish though, his sister Emma looking in through the glass as she shouted at her brother. "Hey, Hamish, get off her. Poor woman already has to put up with you." Hamish put Vera down and turned to his sister at the door.
"I don't know if I should let you in." Emma glared at him as Hamish finally walked over and let her in.
"Happy birthday Hamish, look at you old man." She teased him and walked over to hug Vera because clearly she was far more important. Vera actually really loved Emma and vise versa. They got along so well which made Hamish happy since someone in his family had to get along with her. "Congratulations Vera, on the engagement and the baby." She took a step back looking over Vera. "My god you look stunning, you slimmed down so much faster than I did. First baby it took me a year to get back to my old self and the second one I still feel like I'm recovering from him." It was even more impressive knowing that Theo was her second baby but maybe having a kid so young didn't count as far as bounce back time. "Speaking of baby."
Vera motioned to the livingroom where Maddox was still hanging out with Theo on her blanket. "Theo is in there." She followed Emma as her two boys ran around the yard outside. "Hey Maddox, do you want to play with the other boys outside?"
Maddox looked out the sliding glass door and then back down to Theo looking like he really didn't want to. "Sure." Not like he'd get to be around Theo much anymore anyways. Getting up he set the comic book down on the table and headed outside with the two younger boys.
Emma picked up Theo making the baby girl stare at her a little concerned that a stranger was picking her up and holding her. "She's so beautiful Vera." Vera had a sense of pride in that little girl, as soon as she smiled Theo looked over at her mother and smiled back reaching out to Vera.
"Vera did an amazing job." Hamish walked over to them seeing his daughter kick her legs excitedly to see her dad walking up to her. "I was not aware that having a baby was so stressful until I was there in the room with her. I suddenly feel a little bad for you." He told his sister as he tickled Theo's belly and made her shriek excitedly.
"Yeah, my boys were 8lb's and 7.5lbs" It was lucky Theo had been healthy considering she was early and small but Hamish was finding she took after her mother in that regard. He didn't even think she had been born small but just proper size for how big she was going to get. Even now she was only just hitting a whopping 10lbs. "She's so cute." Emma held her up closer and gave her a kiss. "I wanted a baby girl so badly. I almost considered having a third baby after I found out I was having a second boy but I just don't have that much patience." Vera couldn't blame her, she was looking after Maddox and a baby, it was stressful and on top of it she had a stressful job and was Grand Magus.
"You want a drink?" Hamish asked his sister as he walked into the kitchen and started pulling out the glasses.
"Considering I'm on my own with two boys in a hotel room tonight, you bet I want a drink." She looked over at Vera. "Get Vera a drink too."
"Oh, I can't have one right now." She crossed her arms over her chest. "It doesn't work with her feeding schedule right now."
"You haven't started her on solid foods yet?" Emma had been the sort of person who had tried to push both her sons to grow up as fast as possible until they were potty trained and fairly independent.
"Vera wants Theo to get food allergy tested first." Hamish spoke up knowing it was a very sensitive subject to talk about. He tried to avoid too much detail when Vera was standing there because it always cut into her and made her fears for Theo that much more present. "And if she doesn't have food allergies we are exposing her to everything so she doesn't ever develop them." It made it so much worse knowing Theo was only two months away from that terrifying mark for Vera. He really hoped once Theo got past seven months old that everything would calm down and Vera could stop being worried.
"I can respect that." Was it how Emma would do things? No, but Theo wasn't Emma's baby and she respected Hamish and Vera for bringing her niece up however they saw fit. "Mother might not agree though, you know how she can be."
"Yeah, she gave me a shot of whiskey when I had a stomach ache to knock me out." Hamish added.
"Well, that explains so much." Vera was shocked actually how that could explain a lot of things with Hamish. Meanwhile Vera was afraid to drink anything alcoholic because she didn't want Theo to get tipsy off of breastmilk. Perhaps she was a little overly cautious or perhaps she just cared. It didn't just come from a place of loss from her older daughter but from the failure of her own mother to have ever been there for her.
"Hello, hello." Vera cringed at the sound of her voice and reached over to Emma taking Theo from her so she could at least keep her mostly away from that harpy.
"Speak of the devil and she will appear." Emma added.
"I'll make another drink." He knew the three of them could agree that his mother was best tolerated when she was just a little tipsy, fully drunk no but delightfully tipsy.
She'd let herself in, something that bothered Vera since this was her house and she felt it was rude and disrespectful to just come walking in. "Who's rugrat is that little boy out there?" She asked turning to Hamish's father and handing over her scarf and jacket to him to put away. Despite being the man of the house it didn't distract from the fact he was still under his wife's thumb.
"He would be mine." Vera claimed him, well not fully claimed him but Maddox was her responsibility now and she was his legal guardian.
"You have ANOTHER child?" She judged Vera a little wondering how many brats she was going to have coming out of the woodwork.
"No, not really. I'm fostering him. His father and I were." She looked over at Hamish knowing the next words to come out of her mouth were utter bullshit but he was here to back her up, not judge her. "I was friends with his mother and father." She was also responsible for his father being trapped in a book until the end of time so there was also that.
"Poor thing." Even if she intended to make that sound like she was sympathetic to Maddox and his situation her voice was still pretty cold. And here people called Vera an ice queen and a robot. They clearly had never met Hamish's mother. She looked like Snow White next to her. Maybe the acolytes needed to meet Hamish's mother so they knew her being hard on them was just another form of love. She finally realized Vera was holding Theo and typical of most grandparents she went a little softer when setting eyes on the baby. "My goodness, this must be Theodora." Vera tensed up, her back going stiff as the wicked witch of the west approached them both and reached for Theo. If her aunt had been unsettling then her grandmother was a monster.
Theo picked up on her mother's tension and held nothing back when she looked the woman over and burst into tears. Leaning into Vera's shoulder she kept sobbing and screaming. "It's okay baby." Vera bounced her and patted her back. "She's not that good with strangers."
"Well, I wouldn't be a stranger if someone invited me over more." She glanced back to Hamish while he came over and handed a drink to his sister. Emma took a sip watching their mother with both fear and curiosity. If there was a cat fight she had all her money on Vera and she wasn't even banking on Vera using magic like Hamish did. Pulling the baby from Vera's arms she looked at the crying baby and kissed her face. "Come here to grandma. No more crocodile tears from you little one." Theo looked down at the older woman for a moment, just a moment of silence while Vera took in a deep breath and glared at her. "George, come see your precious little granddaughter. Grandma is going to spoil you. Do you have any idea how badly I wanted a granddaughter?"
Awww, monsters could smile, it would almost be sweet if Vera wasn't so nervous about her baby. Miranda showed off the whining child to her grandfather only to have him glance at her once and look away as he passed her. "Very nice, yes. A bit fussy that one, would do her some good to toughen up."
"George hush, she's a baby." Miranda bounced her in her arms a little. "She's a bit scrawny though, does your mother not feed you enough? You poor thing." She patted Theo's back not really calming her down at all. "It's alright, you can't blame her, after all I'm sure she's so busy spending all her time at the university rather than you."
Vera got a look on her face and raised her hand giving Hamish the cue to run over to her side and grab her wrist before she did something nasty. "Oh, Vera, I almost forgot." He spun her around in his arms still holding her wrist and pushing her up towards the stairs."We have that thing we have to grab upstairs." He mouthed to her 'no' as Vera glared at him. "Mom, you have Theo for a bit don't you?"
"Absolutely."
"Wonderful, Vera and I will be right back." He tried to move her up the steps but she stood her ground because after all she was the Grand Magus. Unfortunately for her he could be just as dominant as she was. Okay, fine, so she chose the difficult way. Picking her up he carried her the rest of the way to the room, damn right he was using his strength against her when it came to Vera about to use magic on his mother. Closing the door behind them he sat Vera on the bed but she didn't stay there, instead she came right off the dead and walked towards him like there was about to be a war. "Vera, calm down. Take a deep breath and don't use magic on my mother."
"Hamish, I'm the Grand Magus."
"I know, that's great Vera but I'm your fiance."
"What's that supposed to be to me."
"First off, I'm hurt, second of all you might be my boss Vera but please meet me halfway for once. In the temple we may not stand on common ground but here in this house and in this relationship we need to be on common ground and work together because that's how relationships work." Was he talking back to her?
She was a little impressed and slightly turned on but she couldn't let him win either."Alright, I understand that is how you feel but as a practitioner you have to take my orders."
"But as your fiance I don't have to. If we don't try to work together then what is the point of being together at all? If we are just doing it for Theo then it's not fair to either of us. I know and I understand you are Grand Magus, Vera. I respect you more than I respect anyone else. Trust me on that." He grabbed her arms and tried to get through to her, she was so stubborn but she was a good person underneath all her Veraness. "But please for once take a deep breath, calm down, and come down to my level for once."
She clenched her jaw for a moment and looked away from him, "Don't fool yourself into thinking I need to come down to your level Hamish." She looked back at him making him feel she was about to insult him or rip his heart out. He was prepared to be hurt, he didn't want to be hurt by Vera because she could cut him so deeply. "But you already stepped up to my level." Did she just say something sweet to him? Vera was almost being romantic right now. "And I'm sorry, you might be my Temple Magus but you are also the father of my child and the love of my life and I don't tell you enough that I respect your opinions and your leadership and even your guidance despite the fact you annoy me."
"I love you too Vera." She was almost sweet when she was lowering her guard and softening her rough edges for him. It's what he loved so much about her, Vera was not an easy person to impress and she was an even harder person to earn respect from or love. "And see, while we were up here fighting my mom got Theo to stop crying."
She almost smiled until something struck her, "Or she killed her."
"She's raised three children, I don't think she's killed Theo."
"She gave you whiskey when you had a stomach ache."
Hamish put his hands on her shoulders and nodded his head. "Fair point, we should go check on her."
Vera stepped forward and kissed him, "I'm happy we are on the same level with that."