Who: Miguel + Navi What: Cat play date. Obviously. When: May 26 Where: Navi’s place! Rating: Lower'n limbo. CAPSLOCKS. Status: Complete
Freakin' yesssss, friends! Friends who used capslock gratuitously! And maybe sometimes even some punctuation! When it suited. If not, that was cool too. Ahem.
Miguel was super excited to go visit Navi and meet her bar brawlin' looking cats. And introduce those cats to his cats, who were not bar brawlers, but instead tiny kittens who were ninjas in training. He went to her place because when you knew pregnant ladies you didn't make them pack up into a car and drive places. You went to them. Duh.
Anyway, cat carrier in hand and tiny mewling kittens in the cat carrier, Miguel arrived, and was all grins and smiles and overenthusiastic rainbows when he knocked.
Navi’s house looked like a fairy lived there; it was a 1940s style bungalow that had been in the family for a while. Every plant out front looked meticulously cared for and loved, and if one could see the plants in the back garden, the same would have applied there.
When she heard the knock, Navi moved to answer it, Zora already standing on her shoulder. “Eeeee!” She squeed and bounced when she saw the kittens.
Tulio had not been wrong -- these two would make the perfect pair for easily encouraged excitement, whimsy and ridiculousness (although that last bit was kind of rude, and really Tulio should work on that because jeez). Miguel, as if on cue, gave a little excited noise of his own. “Shoulder cat! Ohhhhmygosh!” Instant best friends, just add cats.
“Oh, Zora’s always been a bit of a parrot.” Responding to her name, the cat meowed. Zora’s meow sounded a bit like she’d smoked three packs of unfiltered Camels a day since she was a kitten and chased it with scotch and razorblades. But her purr was unmistakable, and so was the headbutt to Navi’s chin. “Come in, come in!”
Navi’s home looked cosy and happy, just how one would imagine the blue fairy’s house to be. Her bump was obvious, and she looked every bit the glowing mother.
“I wonder if Ghost or Shadow wanna be shoulder cats.” Zora did look kind of pleased to be up there, even if it really did sound like a cat that could own every man in a bar fight, as earlier described.
Miguel happily followed her into the place, looking around and coo-ing happily. His own house was still a bit uh... boxed. So he could really appreciate a place that looked put together. “I like your house! And you had some really nice flowers out there! I’m gonna let my kitties out now, is that okay?”
“Oh, I run a nursery, if my flowers looked sad I’d never forgive myself. And of course it is.” Zora had given birth to a couple of litters before Navi had taken her in to get her tubes tied, and bam - pet.
“A nursery for -- flowers?” Was that an odd term, or was he just a bit dim? Miguel was sure that he’d only heard it in context of baby-type creatures before. Still, he set the carrier down and released the krakens, er, kittens. The little balls of white and black fluff tumbled out of the cage happily and skittered across the floor, smelling everything there was to smell and more.
“Yup!” She smiled and flailed her arms once there were kittens. Zora and the younger cat ran toward the kittens, sniffing and meowing under their breath. Moving closer, Navi was ready to step in in an instant. “Lookit the babies!”
It was like a ohmygosh hold your breath kind of moment, and Miguel looked on with an expression that spoke all his hopes and dreams for the moment. Please get along kitties. Be all of the adorable and do not fight and love each other, but not too much because you’re fixed and nothing good will come of it and awwwww. Basically, there was always an awful lot going on in Miguel’s head at any given time. It took a very special sort to actually tolerate him on the long term.
Zora moved closer, huffing the kittens for a second before bopping one who bit her. But it was a gentle bop, a no claws bop, a CHILD SIT THE HECK DOWN bop. And soon enough she was laying down with kittens climbing all over her.
“Oh my gosh I am going to die from cute right now and my firefairy baby will never get born’d and I’m so sad but so happy and oh my god.”
That sentence didn’t actually make any sense to Miguel but he was so certain that he loved it anyway, that he’d just go with it, man. He did that. The blond was doing this thing where he was flexing his fingers in the direction of the ball of happy cats as if he couldn’t possibly state how adorable he thought it really was. Instead, have a spazz of a gesture!
“I can’t handle this,” he said, tone a bit a squeak. “So adorable what is a firefairy baby? Are you having one? How is that a thing?” Obviously, she was preggers, but the rest of that was all crazy talk. He was from Texas, man, and they didn’t have no firefairy babies there. Just Armadillos.
Navi blinked, then winced. “Uh, have you uh. Dreamed yet?” Maybe he wasn’t a Dreamer! Oh, he’d think she was a freak.
“Uhhhmmmm?” Miguel asked in response. And it was probably the most telling an answer could be, even if it wasn’t a real word. He’d read a bit about crazy dreams on the internet, but still. Firefairy babies?
“Oh, so you haven’t. NEVERMIND DO YOU WANT PIE?” Segways! What the fuck are those?
“DO I -- HECK YEAH I WANT PIE.” Segways? Totally didn’t need them with Miguel. Far too excitable for it to matter. It was really easy to not feel weird about raising his voice in this particular home.
Sweet, he ignored the obvious segway! And she didn’t mind the yelling; she and Pete lovingly yelled all the time in the house. “AWESOME I MADE WHIPPED CREAM BY HAND.” From magical cows, natch.
Natch. But not really, because that was just as weird as firefairy babies, but clearly we weren’t talking about that anymore because PIE. “OH MY GOSH I AM REALLY EXCITED. WHAT KIND OF PIE IS IT?” Capslock was more fun in person than it was on the internet. Tulio was really in for it when he got home.
“IT’S PUMPLE.” She grinned and bounced up to go get them slices. Yeah, capslocking really was better when there were two people around to do it.
"AWESOME." What was pumple? It didn't really matter, because there was no way caps lock pie could be bad. He watched the pile of cats for a second more before going off after her.
She handed him a slice of pie almost as soon as he got into the room, with plenty of the aforementioned whipped cream on top. “Pumpkin and apple,” she grinned.
"Favorite," Miguel both said it and meant it because he was good like that. "Handmade? Ohh mannn," said with a mouth of pie.
“How else do you get pie?” Navi blinked. “I mean, I guess there’s stores who sell it, but why would I go there? I can just stay here and make one.” She was being serious.
“I don’t even know if I have a waffle iron,” Miguel pointed this out as if it had anything at all to do with pie making. Maybe it did. Sometimes you just didn’t know what the hell was up with your kitchen supplies in order to do sweet things like make pie.
“PIe isn’t ... waffles?” Navi blinked and then giggled. “I could teach you how to make pie, if you want?”
“DO I.” Because yes, he did. He wanted to make things that were called Pumple. And everything inbetween. “COULD YOU. Ahem. I mean. Could you? It’d be awesome!”
“Of course I can!” Navi hopped up and then looked at him. “Um. Do you believe in magical things? Like, that happen here? You know how people dream, right?”
Oh, they were back to this again! Miguel had sworn they were avoiding it. “I’ve heard of em. I guess I never really thought on it. Does magic actually happen? Because I think it’d be cool if it did, I mean. You know. Magic.” Why wouldn’t that be awesome?
“It does.” She winced. “I’m uh. A fairy?” She trusted him. He was adorable and kind, and even if he didn’t believe in magic or fairies, he’d just pretend he hit his head or something.
Instead of giving her a ‘that’s crazy talk take it back’ look, Miguel rose his eyebrows up high - interested and confused at the same time. “What like - uh -?” Nope, that wasn’t working, he couldn’t find the right question. “Explain?” Not meanly, just earnest.
It was easier to show him. Instead of walking to the kitchen, she flew. Her wings looked a bit like dragonflies’ wings, iridescent and translucent, and her whole body glowed a faint blue. Her wings were blue too, as was the glitter that showered in their wake. That was like the dust on a butterfly or a moth, and it tasted eerily like Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Furthermore, whenever her wings fluttered, it sounded like windchimes.
“Okay, so eating pie first or making it?”
Had those been there the entire time? He’d been told he was unobservant, but Miguel was pretty sure he’d have noticed that. He swiped at the glittery wake that was her flying and looked suitably awed for a person who had just been shown magic and fairies really existed.
Fuck, man. He wanted to be a fairy. Those dreams better start up pronto, and they’d better include some really sweet magic.
“Uhhhhmmmmm,” he said, taking a second to catch up with everything. “Yes.”
“I can put them in or out when I want,” she smiled. “I try to leave them out as much as I can - it just feels so much better. But if it scares someone, I don’t want to freak them out.” She cut him a slice of pie, smiling and moving to get out ingredients so they could make one while they ate.
“I’m jealous.” Miguel didn’t say it with envy so much as just a natural honesty. He wanted wings. It would be so awesome. He could annoy Tulio more than usual. Also awesome. He was, however, very easily distracted, so went from staring at her glitter wings to pie eating, to looking at all the ingredients she was setting out. “What kind of pie are we making? Can you do anything besides fly? It’s really cool, I’m not even kidding around here, lady.”
“I figured I’d let you pick - I’ve got pumpkin or we could do chocolate or strawberry. And I can go teeny!” Navi did so, suddenly the size of a thumb, fluttering around Miguel’s head. “See?” She was just as loud as she’d been when she was big.
“Holy crap,” Miguel said, awed all over again. He didn’t really swear, but if he did, he probably would have done it there. “That is -- the most awesome. I can’t even find a good sentence.” Spazz flail spazz. He was wringing his hands together as if he just couldn’t find a stance that properly conveyed his excitement. “Can we do strawberry AND chocolate in one? What part of this makes your baby fire-y?” Who needed one topic when you could have three all in one go?
“Ooooh, that sounds really good.” She made herself big again. “Well, that’s where the husband comes in. He has lava fingers. Well. When he wants to. Otherwise he’s just the same temperature as a warm bath which is like, amazing for footrubs oh mygod.” Navi started to make chocolate pudding, thought better of it, and handed the bowl and box of pudding mix to Miguel. “Follow the instructions.”
“Okay.” Miguel squinted at the instructions on the box -- they seemed easy enough, and so poked around with everything until he got into a proper groove. He wasn’t a bad cook, he was usually just very distracted and missed steps due to... well, anything.
“Lava fingers? That’s -- this place is weird. I think I like it. There seem to be a lot of people who talk about a lot of cool things on the Valarnet. I wonder how that works. This pie is going to be the best of pies. Do you think I’ll get cool powers? I really want some now.”
“Oh, Miguel, you already have a cool power, you’re friggin’ adorable.” Navi ruffled his hair. “Keep stirring, and there are a lot of cool things that go on here, but some suck, but heck, I’ll keep you safe, promise. If something bad happens, come here.”
He took the hair ruffling like he was some kind of professional receiver of little head pettings, smiling lopsidedly and adorably. Maybe it really was his superpower. No one can withstand the adorable might of Miguel!
But then he looked a bit bashfully perplexed, even as he paid the pudding severe attention. “Why would something bad happen?” Despite the fact that he was in his late twenties, Miguel seemed to live in a land of butterflies and rainbows -- he liked to believe that nothing bad ever happened to anyone.
“Because that’s life, silly. You have to have good things and bad things at the same time so you can tell the difference.” Navi smiled and hip bumped him gently.
She was right, of course. Not everything was always perfect. Even if he wanted it to be. “Fair enough.” He hip bumped back. But really carefully because she was pregnant and stuff. “Thanks. I can already tell you’re basically the best, you know. Is this pudding done? I think it’s done.”
Navi grinned. Only one way to find out. She took a clean spoon and nibbled some. “Yup! Let’s get some strawberries and rinse them in sugar water - it makes them less tart, you see.” She was already planning that she’d want to have Miguel and his husband over for dinner one day.
Which he would, of course, agree to happily and then retrospectively tell his husband about. It was the way of the world, obviously.
“So smart,” he said, even though the advice should have been common sense. “Tulio was wrong you know, we are totally not being crazy and ridiculous perpetuating. This is way safer than half the things I could usually get up to, and it’ll be delicious. He worries too much.” He said it all so terribly affectionately, though.
“Well, he’s kind of an idiot about you, you know.” Navi smiled. “When did you guys get married? How did you meet? TELL ME ABOUT YOUR LIFE.”
“I do know.” Miguel’s smile was blinding, really. “OH MAN, WHERE TO START.” Not really a question. “We got married like a -- uhm. Two years ago? One?” Gosh, he was bad at dates. “WE DON’T REMEMBER IT, SO.”
“WHAT WHY?” Navi blinked.
Miguel didn’t even look embarrassed, and he wondered if maybe he should have. “Oh, you know. Celebrate gay marriage in New York. Get drunk. Wind up married? It’s a bit of a blackout, that week.”
Navi giggled. “You know what you should do, is renew your vows. So you can spoil him with the adorably sappy ceremony you know he wants because he seems the type.” Navi laughed to herself.
“Do you think so?” Miguel would never really have thought of it himself, he was the sort who was always content in the moment. But he certainly liked the idea now that it was offered over. “That’s really smart.”
“The ceremony’s the fun part, the legal stuff’s important and all but the best part is just loving each other.” She ruffled his hair again.
He giggled over that, and gave a half a shrug. “I leave all the legal stuff to Tulio. He’s better at paperwork, somehow. But a ceremony would be fun. I like a party!” It went without saying that he was totally good at loving his husband. Didn’t it? Yeah.
“Exactly! Do that!” Navi nodded. “I got married in Vegas, but that’s what I wanted.”
“ELVIS CHAPEL?” Because gosh he’d wanted that. Tulio? Not for it. Shocker, really.
“Um, obviously. And it was Halloween, so I was dressed as slutty Joan of Arc, and Pete was a monk.” She giggled. Because all Halloween costumes were slutty, natch.
Miguel blinked, and then smiled - bright and so close to a laugh without verbalization. “You guys are ADORABLE.” Halloween costumes should be slutty. And always match.
She fluttered into the living room to get a framed photo of the night that had been snapped when they’d walked in by one of Tony Stark’s people. Handing it to Miguel, she resumed cutting strawberries.
Not sure if he should be coo-ing or whistling, Miguel took the high road. Which was to say, he did one and then the other directly after. Maybe that wasn’t the high road. Phrases were weird, man. “So cute! Aww, you guys are gonna have the perfect firefairy baby!” He caught on quick.
Navi laughed and hugged him. “New favorite person!”