weldedtomyspine | Room 322 [Sunday morning]

It was a relief to find that Mei was smart enough to go to the Trooper station when lost. Though she did show her age when told by her parents that she had to leave behind some book about cows because it didn't belong to them. Two pieces of licorice from Momoko's pocket, however, quickly stalled any imminent tears and Mei was carried out of the station with no complaints.

There were many complaints, however, from Sophia and Elena. About how long it had taken, how they hadn't gotten any candy or cocoa, that it was cold, how hungry they were and how they didn't want to eat anything but papa's pancakes. "With choc'aty chips! The right way!" reminded Sophia, swinging her papa's hand as they quickly walked back to the dorms. Luckily, Jaime was able to find a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips in one of the kitchens, as well as a pancake mix.

Breakfast over ("It's late, so it's really brunch!" corrected Elena, as she smeared her pancake into the syrup.), there was clean up and then a trip back to Momoko's room to feed and torture poor Moshi, and then trooping down to Jaime's room to watch a movie, since he no longer had a roommate. After the movie, was a trip to buy actual clothes, shoes, and coats that worked for the totally not-El Paso weather (bye-bye rainy-day-cake savings) and then an argument about dinner. Momoko was out-voted and it was take-out from Ching Tai that escorted them back to the dorms and to Jaime's room for another movie.

It was during the second movie that Momoko had the hardest time. The rest of the day there had been Thing To Get Done, but now? In a darkened room, with nothing to do but hold Mei asleep in her lap, let Sophia leaning heavy against her, trying so hard to stay awake, and watch Elena tugging on Jaime's arm asking some question about how some machine thing on the screen worked? It was hard to not think about how nice it was, how relaxed, how comfortable...

Which was more than she could say about her situation right now. Momoko frowned and shifted, trying to fall back asleep despite the thump-thump, thump-thumping noise her pillow seemed to be making, and the sound of girlish giggling and a phone being dropped.

"Shh! Careful, silly! You'll wake them and we'll get in trouble!"

[You guys know how this works: door closed, post open.]

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"Totally silly." Elena agreed and leaned against him, glad her lecture seemed to be over. "Momma gets mean and tricky when you dare her."

"And you keep doing it!" wailed Sophia. "We didn't eat dessert for a week papa!!"

"I'm pretty sure I apologized about that." Right?

"After a week," Elena sighed. "You kept saying it was nice being healthy, and momma would get madder and then we had no desserts again."

"And it was almost my birthday!" Which was particularly why Sophy remembered it.

"But you still got cake!"

Jaime was pretty sure he'd have made sure of that. And that Momoko would have relented for birthdays.

"I did." Sophia pulled her feet up and pouted at the memory.

"'cause I cried!" Mei cheered from Momoko's lap, kicking her feet happily.

Momoko thought that happy reaction was... odd. "You cried?"

Elena nodded. "It was part of my Plan. And then you finally said you give up and momma won and then she kissed you and then you made a early cake to 'pologize!"

Jaime chuckled. "Very devious of you."

He flushed slightly as he looked over at Momoko. "She kissed me, huh?"

Momoko covered her blushing face with her palm. She'd been trying not to think about the stuff the other Jaime and Momoko did. "Thank you, Elena."

"Yeah," Jaime agreed with a little snicker, "thank you, Elena."

Because now he was thinking about kissing Momoko...

Elena looked confused. "For what?"

Momoko moved her fingers to chuckle at the girl, still trying hard to not think about... things. "For being smart enough to know how to get your little sister a birthday cake?"

"Yes. That."

Wow... Jaime knew that was pretty unconvincing of him.

"..." Really unconvincing. Momoko eyed him, finally dropping her hand and using it to tickle Mei some more.

"Oh! 'Welcome!" Elena reached for Jaime. "But you really should stop daring momma, you know. You always lose."

"He likes to lose." Sophia sighed.

"I do, do I?" Jaime asked, snickering at Sophia.

Because she was right: he did.

Sophia nodded. "It's cause losing means you get kisses to make it better."

Momoko nearly choked. "WHAT?"

Mei took advantage of the pause in tickling to sit back up and pull some of Momoko's hair around to play with.

"Papa! You do it on purpose?" Elena pouted up at him. "That's mean!"

"Would I do something like that?" Jaime asked with wide-eyed innocence.

Only to be answered with a chorused "YES!" from both Elena and Sophia.

Okay, Momoko had to laugh at that, as embarrassed (and totally jealous) as she was.

"So what does momma get when she wins, then?"

Sophy made a face. "Papa says that she gets to help him put us to bed early."

She apparently didn't like going to bed early.

"That totally doesn't sound like a fun prize, sending you kids to bed." Momoko looked up at Jaime quizzically. Jaime got a kiss for losing. Why would winning something from Jaime mean she wanted the girls to be in bed earl...

...

!!!

To be any redder, her face would have to leach the colour from her hair.

Mei giggled and pointed. "Mommy red!"

Elena giggled too. "That's what she always does when he says that, Mei. You know that!"

Sophia groaned. "Augh! We don't hafta go to bed early tonight, now, do we?"

"NO!" Momoko was quick to respond.

"No!" Jaime said at the exact same moment.

And now Jaime was the same color as Momoko was.

Sophia blinked rapidly, trying not to cry. She was totally caught off guard at her parents' reactions.

"I jus' wanted so we could watch another movie."

Jaime mustered up a warm smile. "We can watch another movie," he told her. "What do you girls want to watch?"

"Space Battles?" Sophia mumbled.

"Nooooo!" Mei chimed in, upset and tugging on Momoko's hair. "Pa'cakes!"

"Ow! Mei-chan, let go of momma's hair, please."

Mei looked up at her sadly. "Papa sai' pa'cakes, momma."

"We can do pancakes and movies," Jaime pointed out, reaching out to gently disengage Mei's hand.

"'K!" Mei let go of Momoko's hair and leaned forward, asking for her papa to take her.

"Can we help make the pancakes this time? Can we?" Elena asked eagerly. "And can we have fruit inside or do we have to have it sep'rate?"

Sophia pouted. "I wan'em sep'rate!"

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