audrey (bidabble) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-11-13 17:11:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, audrey, jonathan murphy |
Who: Audrey and Murphy
When: Recently
Where: Merlin and Audrey's place
What: Meeting the baby
Rating/Warnings: Low/None
Status: Complete
Murphy wasn’t entirely sure why half the adults in his life had decided that he was a prime candidate for meeting their small children. He wasn’t exactly what someone might call rolemodel material. But if it was going to help him get in with the witch of the west coast, it couldn’t be so bad. Besides, his experience with Neal’s kids wasn’t so bad. Babies were generally pretty easy to get along with, he found.
Which is how he found himself standing in Audrey’s living room that weekend. “Not a bad place,” he said, glancing around the house.
Newborn babies were kinda… like warm lumps that cried and pooped. Honestly, for the first few weeks of any child’s life, that’s all they did besides sleeping. Poop, cry, eat, sleep, then repeat the whole process over and over twenty four hours each day. That’s what Audrey had been doing, so she hadn’t had much time for anything else. Thank God for magic. Dishes washed themselves in the sink, clothes folded themselves before settling down in the laundry basket to be put away. Even fruits and vegetables sat still and knives chopped of their own accord.
Audrey had Bea in a little backpack thing against her chest, smiling warmly at Murphy in her foyer. She nodded. “Thank you. It’s really Merlin’s doing. He keeps up with the housework while I’m following the kids around.” She motioned toward the living room where Ben was sitting with his blocks.
It was a little strange to watch all the magic at work. While Murphy had known logically that Audrey no doubt had some kind of powers that didn’t involve wispy pigs running at demented soul-suckers, it was still strange to watch it at work on such mundane tasks as chopping vegetables.
He managed to tear his eyes away from the self-folding laundry back toward Audrey. “Does he do magic too?” he asked. He couldn’t decide if a man named Merlin having magic was too obvious to be true or not. Like a big, glaring red herring.
“He’s probably the most powerful magician in history,” Audrey said. She didn’t beat around the bush on that one, and she was ridiculously proud of her husband. He was something of a legend in her world--a rock star, even. And in this world she was married to him. It was the little things that blew her mind. “Can I get you something to eat or drink?”
Okay, so he was apparently the Merlin. There’d probably be a time in the future when Murphy would stop being surprised by things like this, but that wasn’t going to be happening any time soon. “I’ll take what you’ve got,” he said. He walked around the small boy playing with blocks on the floor and sat down on the couch. “I didn’t realize you had more than one. Who’s this?” he asked.
Ben looked up and over at the man on the sofa. He cocked his head to the side, then lifted up one of the blocks and held it out. A peace offering. Though, the boy was a little wide-eyed and mute.
“That’s Ben. He’ll be two in December.” Audrey called from the kitchen. what you’ve got meant a lot of things in the Baxter household, so Audrey was putting together a little platter. “He hasn’t shown much in the way of magical prowess yet, but I have hopes. Don’t mind if he doesn’t talk much. He’s growing up to be a bit more shy than I expected.”
Murphy stared at the little boy for a moment as though sizing him up before he took the block from him, studied it (“Yeah, that’s a nice block”), and in return dug his keys out from his pocket and handed the kid the key ring. He didn’t have much experience with infants and he really wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do, but a trade seemed fair enough. It was just too bad Murphy didn’t have something more child appropriate in his pockets.
“When do they start showing signs of magic?” he called back. The kid seemed a little young to be showing prowess for anything, but he’d always had the impression magic was something people learned when they were older. At least old enough to read.
Murphy would probably get the keys back soaked in toddler drool. And it was probably a much better trade for Ben than it was for the grown-up. Because the grown-up probably didn’t know that keys were used for opening things, like Ben did. He took the keys and started across the room to use them on every lock he could find. (And all the handles, too.) The keys didn’t open the entertainment center or the coffee table, but Ben was going to try them on everything.
“I’m not entirely sure,” Audrey said, putting things on a tray to bring back in. She was almost ready. “I grew up in a muggle household, but my daughters in my Dreams started showing signs around Ben’s age. I doubt it’ll be long now.” She lifted the tray and brought it into the living room to set on the table. “Do you take sugar in your tea?”
Murphy rarely drank tea as it was, but he glanced over at Audrey and shrugged. “Sure, I guess,” he said. It wasn’t like he’d asked for something in particular, so he couldn’t exactly complain about the tea. He took a morsel of food from the platter and turned his gaze back to Ben, chewing absently. If there was a problem with Ben trying all the doors, Murphy figured Audrey would say something, and it wasn’t like Murphy’s keys were going to unlock anything in Audrey’s house as it was.
“A toddler with magic doesn’t sound like the greatest idea,” Murphy said wryly. “Sounds like you’re going to have your hands full.”
Audrey fixed up two cups of tea with cream and sugar, then passed him a mug. No fancy tea cups in a house with toddlers and magic that liked to clink things together. Audrey wasn’t a fancy tea cup kind of girl, anyway. She settled down on the sofa with Bea still asleep in the backpack, and sipped from her own mug. “Yeeah, I’m sure of it. Though, it’s good that there’s two of us and only one of him. For now. When Bea gets to be about Ben’s age? That’s where the troubles will start, I’m sure.”
Murphy probably wouldn’t have known what to do with a tea cup and a saucer in the first place. He was familiar with mugs, and didn’t think twice about it as the cup was handed to him. He snorted, an amused smirk crossing his lips, and swiped at his nose with his index finger. “Yeah,” he said, glancing at the two children. “I don’t envy you that at all,” he said. He was pretty sure toddlers in general were a handful; toddlers who could set things on fire with their mind seemed like a disaster waiting to happen. Especially if you put two of them together.
Audrey chuckled. “I think it’s going to be wonderful. Merlin and I are a team. We’ll raise them right, put out the fires. That’s what our parents did for us, anyway, and that’s what we’re passing on.” She took another sip from her tea. “I just hope that when the time comes, we’ll be able to give him a proper magical education. I have no idea where he’s going to get a wand.”
“Yeah? Ship them off to magic school?” Murphy asked, an amused smile tugging at the corners of his lips. He couldn’t picture an idea more ludicrous. “I guess you could always make your own wand. Wouldn’t it just be a stick?”
Oh, man. Audrey wished there was a magical school in the Real World! She’d offer to go teach there. Not that she had many magical skills to teach, but… “Well, Wands in my Dream World have a magical core. They’re like, hollowed out sticks with magic stuff shoved in them. I’ve heard of wandless magic, but it’s incredibly rare and difficult to do. Then again, Merlin doesn’t have or need a wand, so maybe the kids will have his kind of magic.”
“Maybe,” Murphy said. Honestly, if his dreams were any experience, chances are the kid’s magic would be about as inconvenient as possible. “If you’re lucky.”