"Bugs and slugs!" Greg exclaimed and yeah, that was kind of impressive for a girl - was that sexist? Probably. He just didn't know any girls who'd like bugs. Maybe Phee did but that totally went hand in hand with her earth-witchery. Jen was a little weird so he supposed it shouldn't be surprising she had a room full of weird pets, he just couldn't imagine her brother liked it much. "Reclaim your territory, Aurie," he said. "Don't let some other dog piss on your mailbox." He snickered and used the moment to turn to Phee and kiss her again. They had to stop anyway, it wasn't like he was stalling.
Phee tittered as well and happily allowed herself to be kissed, pressing in against Greg’s warmth. She had an admiration for bugs and slugs, since they were essential parts of nature and all, but she didn’t particularly want to keep them as pets. It was cool that Jen did though, and Phee wanted to go over sometime and see them all. Sometime when she actually spent the night, which she really needed to do if she was going to keep asking Jen to cover for her. As the kiss broke, she wanted to make some joke about being his territory but not wanting to be peed on, but none of the phrasing came out right in her head, so she didn’t. She took his hand again to tug him along. “So you know once my dad knows about us, you’re going to have to come over for like, family dinner as my boyfriend,” she said, tossing him a half-amused grin. “Hope you’re prepping for that weirdness. Eventually.”
Greg gave her a defeated sigh and nodded. "I'm prepping like yo," he promised and it wasn't like he hadn't gone over there for dinners when he was younger, this was just different. So very different and steeped in awkwardness and Greg didn't do awkward, that was Bash's thing. Bash would probably be there too and Greg didn't know if that would make it more or less weird. "Unless your dad kills me first," he jested, putting on an exaggerated worried face. "You gonna protect me, babe?" He somewhat regretted not paying more attention to Phee's relationship with her dad as he had no idea just how protective James was of his girl but he supposed he was going to find out soon enough.
She laughed, even though she knew he was actually nervous. Making it into a joke helped, she supposed. “Uh, totally,” Phee answered, like that should be obvious. She rolled her eyes and then grinned. “I’ve got like, superpowers when it comes to my dad. Just gotta bat my eyelashes and say ‘please, daddy’ just right, and it’s all in the bag.” Phee waved her free hand and hugged Greg’s arm to her side again. To be fair, she didn’t know for sure how James would react to the news -- she’d never had a boyfriend before, much less one that they’d all known since childhood. But Bash had taken it so well and her mom had taken it so well, Phee had a feeling that once James saw how happy she was with everything, he would come around too. “Like, none of them hate you or anything, I dunno why they would start now.”
Greg could think of a few reasons why they might hate him now and most of them had to do with Phee having sex. He couldn't imagine a world where James McCarthy would accept that. He didn't start listing them though, Phee looked happy and confident and he didn't want to be pessimistic. He'd handle it when it happened - if it happened. There was no use being fretful prematurely. "Well, bat your lashes really hard at him this time, I still wanna take you to the dance." Was she going to tell her dad before that? God, Greg hoped not. Meeting parents before dances always sucked.