"Mom, you have got to see this." Kara says visibly struggling to keep her voice both low yet audible to the more human ear as she gingerly tugs on the sleeve of her mother's sweater. Eliza sighed inwardly at her younger daughter's enthusiasms.
Over what this time Rao only knew considering Kara and Ryan had spent most of the morning out of the house.
"Alright, Kara I'm coming." She promised sliding off her glasses and setting them down beside Kara's open laptop. The Danvers mother had made a deal with her middle child just before the auntie and nephew had gone out earlier in the morning. She'd read over Kara's latest article for any errors Kara herself might have missed if Kara took charge of bringing back her grandson's smile.
The result was Kara coaxing Ryan down to the beach a few blocks away with the promise of both ice cream and a few lighter stories of his mother when she was a teenager. The young boy having found more pictures of Alex during her 'surfer phase' as the twin's dubbed it in his hunt for slideshow stock for Alex's upcoming party. Naturally, he'd become curious about the sport that seemed to have made his mother so happy.
Eliza offered to pay her grandson a dollar a picture for his efforts with all funds he'd earn being put on the charge card his Auntie Linda had already helped him set up so Ryan could track his progress. The idea this small thing would be so important to the young boy he'd become angry when he'd read 'Detective D's' offer to not only drop the price for him but also take off the shipping costs Eliza had felt tears of pride stinging her eyes.
The young boy sent back a rather sweet yet argumentized message helpfully typed up by his auntie Kara whilst Ryan himself helped his Grams make fresh-squeezed lemonade to work out his annoyance over the matter. The answering message ran along the lines of 'You're my friend, I wanna help you too.' Even after he'd been reminded by the seller themselves of the timeline of the original posting. The seller eventually and no doubt grudgingly agreed to keep the pricing the same much to Ryan's delight.
"I'd thought you two would be gone longer." the Danvers mother chuckles. "It's still technically morning." She reminds making a quick check of the mantel clock just to be sure.
"It wasn't intentional." Kara pouted as she dug in her pant pocket before offering over a few seashells. "but he did earn a whole dollar in quarters." She laughed remembering her mother's more subtle attempt to help the young man along with his earning. She'd give him a quarter for every 'pretty rock or seashell' he brought her back from their day trip. "and it's also how the two first met actually, but he was so happy. They were so happy I just couldn't separate them." She goes on her tone now a shade guilty as she talks.
Kara nodes once "but Ryan has already come up with a solution, the clever boy." she hurries on "that if you'd want to that is you can keep her here with you, but Ry thought if Alex says no, at least you won't be so lonely when the rest of us can't get away to visit." Kara rambles as she guides her puzzled mother towards the house's newest addition of the half bathroom, they'd added to one of the first-floor hallways.
Mostly for Ryan's use after the adoption had been approved to give the boy more of his own space during visits considering he'd be in the house with four women.
"Hang on Kara I'm still stuck on the they. Who are They?" Eliza asks confused
Rather than answer Kara only lifts her hand to knock twice on the closed bathroom door.
A nervous whimpered bark answered her before Ryan gives a calming "You're okay Mayarah, that's just my auntie Kara coming to check on us. You liked auntie, Kara." Before giving a much louder "just a sec." call over the sounds of sloshing water from what Eliza guessed was the bathroom sink.
Trust Linda to think of stopping off at the local animal shelter to spend some time playing with the current supply of puppies and kittens was a sure-fire way of brightening her sister's sulking mood.
"Your apartment allows pets, yes?" Linda asks once again holding up her phone to take another in a long string of pictures of her elder sister currently being used as a puppy jungle gym. "I think the little one is trying to hide in your jacket to go home with you." The blonde notices with an envious pout.
Three others having been displaced when Alex had been forced to uncross her legs before she'd lost feeling in them completely only for, them and one more return to either use her now offered legs as pillows for a nap or make a game of play biting at cuffs of her jeans. Two mix breed pups juggled awkwardly in her arms and another making it his mission to lay spared eagled across Alex's now hunched back to get better access to continue smelling the laughing woman's short, cropped hair.
"Smile, Alex." Linda pouts as her sister only glares in her direction as much as she was able at the moment.
"My apartment super lets you and Kara into the building regularly enough so yeah, I think he lets his other renters keep pets." Alex answers dully. "I stand by my earlier statement about you two being humanized puppies." She teases catching Linda's flicker of confusion at the comment.
At first Linda's response was to stick her tongue out at her laughing older sister only to give a cool scoff at the teasing dig with a huffed "Just smile, dummy." As she lifts her phone once more. "I wanna send this to Mom and Papa Bear."
"Popular today, huh sir?" Vasquez jokes now leaning back a little more casually in her chair still eyeing the newly assigned detective from across the small café. Maggie having stepped away for a few moments to get a refill of her coffee. It wasn't completely wrong considering the growing number of times the agent had heard the vibrating hum of her boss's phone in the last few minutes alone.
She was sure even Sawyer had picked up on a few of them given how often it had happened since they'd sat down.
"Jealous, Vasquez?" J'onn chuckles pulling the once again buzzing device from his jacket pocket
"Not really."
J'onn didn't need his abilities to tell it wasn't all a lie as yet another of his collected Earth daughters refused to meet his more relaxed gaze as she nervously nibbles at the edge of her coffee cup. Another of her more subtle giveaways if the fact she was actively guarding her thoughts was an even bigger tell of her unconscious frustration at feeling left out.
"I'm sure if you'd turn yours on, you'd have a few messages yourself that aren't from General Lane."
"I don't know what you mean sir." but not even her DEO training can complexly mask the blush in her cheeks as he mentioned her girlfriend's name.
"I'd much rather investigate what's so special about this, the cop keeps it so close I almost wasn't able to sneak it away." Vasquez says by way of changing the subject as she tugs out a small envelope from one of the many concealed pockets of her tactical vest.
"Do I need to remind you of the penalties regarding the reading of other people's mail, Susan?" J'onn questions his eyes flickering more than once between Maggie's turned back as the detective reads over a newly opened massage chain and the newly produced letter.
"Don't you recognize the handwriting sir?" Vasquez answers flipping the already opened letter over so he could read the name and address written in an obviously teenaged scrawl across the front.
"This isn't our place." J'onn reminds.
"Anything regarding my commanding officer's emotional state is my business." Vasquez scoffs. 'She's like a sister to me, J'onn. I'm not letting her get hurt again." She goes on deliberately using her boss's own mental abilities against him as she shifts forwards in her chair only to slide back after her eyes land once again on Maggie's turned back.
Despite doing her best to hide them J'onn can hear as clear as day a drunken Alex unloading to Vaz as well as Lucy about her first lost love the night the couple had decided to make their more personal relationship public. Not that it had been much of a secret to those closest to the pair. About a week before the raid that had brought Ryan into their lives.
"it was just a stupid thing kids do with their first crushes. But I had to tell her." Alex murmured now batting her beer bottle between her hands like a cat with a ball of yarn "I had to know if maybe she might feel the same way I did."
"What happened?" Lucy asks around the rim of her barely touched beer. A real achievement for her but considering both Kara and Linda had been called away on 'hero work' Vaz could understand her girlfriend's wanting to keep her wits.
"She didn't like me back like that," Alex sniffed "like you two like eachother." She clarifies as if the other two needed it as the auburn-haired agent dropped her chin back onto the arm she'd been using as a pillow. "She stopped writing me back. Stopped taking me calls." She goes on taking another deep gulp of her beer "Shouldn't have told her. Should have just kept my mouth shut. But like an idiot, I kept trying…. It was stupid. I was so stupid."
"Enough Danvers. You are not stupid and you're sure as hell, not an idiot. Not then, not now, not ever." Lucy says her voice so warm, steady, and commanding as her arms fold around Alex's shaking shoulder as the other woman cried that Susan was having trouble stopping herself from reaching over to pull her take-charge lover in for a kiss.
J'onn cleared his throat loudly shaking the remembered moment out of the forefront of his agent's mind. "I know you can't always help it, sir." Susan starts bringing her long-cooled coffee to her lips "but you might not always like what people are thinking about."
"it's not that at all." J'onn answers "you already know how happy I am for you and for Major Lane," Susan grins at the title but her commander presses on after another quick glance in the distracted detective's direction. "but if this really is what Alex had been talking about that night do you really want to invade her privacy by reading it?"
"Of course not." Susan denies "but I can ask point-blank why she'd carry the damned thing around like some sick trophy after she broke my best friend's heart."
"Maybe she hasn't read it" J'onn suggests
"Then how'd you explain this?" Vaz questions annoyed at the sudden defensiveness in her boss's voice as she flips the letter over to show the obvious signs of the thing having been opened.
Rather than answer J'onn snatches the envelope from her hand as Maggie rejoins their table with a guilty. "Sorry about that" as she runs a hand through her hair as she dropped back into her chair almost the same instant she repocketed her phone inside her jacket.
"Everything alright?" J'onn probes honest interest plain in his voice as he appraises the young detective.
"Yeah, I was just having a bit of disagreement with a new friend of mine." Maggie says in explanation as she passes over the other two refills of drinks, she'd carried back with her. "the goof is being too stubborn for his own good, bless his heart." She laughs
Again, Vasquez notices the look of shocked surprise flickering across J'onn's face before once again he'd school his expression into one that not even Alex could read.
"So, Sawyer."
J'onn shoots her one of his softer 'be nice' glares as Maggie's head turns in Susan's direction but before the annoyed-looking agent could start in Maggie was talking once again. "would either of you know where the closest animal rescue is from here?"
"Soft spot for strays?"
Maggie doesn't back down from the obvious edge to the question as she meets Vasquez's hardened gaze with a cool one of her own. "yes as a matter of fact I do, but it's more that friend I talked about earlier recently took in a rescue of his own and I want to make sure I send him the right advice on how to care for the cute girl." Maggie confesses turning her phone to show off the picture she'd been sent.
The more human of the two obviously has been cropped out leaving only the dog in the camera frame. Whether it had been sent like that or Maggie had edited it herself before showing them Vaz couldn't tell.
Its only after the swiftest of glances at his phone that J'onn answers her. "There's actually one a few blocks from here."
'Papa Bear what are you doing?' Vaz was more or less yelling in her head as J'onn gets to his feet with one of his warmest smiles as he offers a hand towards the surprised-looking cop Vaz was still trying to grill for information.
"Shall we?"
Maggie only blinks a few times in obvious surprise before accepting J'onn's offered hand to help her to her feet. Vasquez followed a few steps behind grumbling angrily behind the rim of her refilled coffee.