Page 57 of Eat My Moon Dust
“It’s a gift, son. You don’t ask for something like that,” I chided, squeezing his shoulder with my lower hand. The excitement in his mane fell slack.
“Sorry,Na’maan.”
I swallowed hard, hearing him call her honorary mother for the first time without Zufi there to fool. My tendrils burned.Na’maanorna’baanwas also a gift, one that children bestowed at their own discretion. She thought it was similar to some other common word in her language, but that had translated asmaan’ipa,and was a legal term.Na’maanmeant my brood wanted Tinsley to stay for good.
My heart raced every time they said it, but I couldn’t tell her how important it was. Not yet.
Tinsley wiped her eyes and cheeks with her forearm. “It’s okay,” she insisted, laughing as her eyes continued to leak. She patted his mane. “I don’t have any brothers, so let me think about it, okay?”
“Okay,” Ladh agreed eagerly.
Tinsley gave him one more pat, sniffed, then opened her bag. “Reha, I made us matching necklaces,” she said, pulling out two short black chains. Every inch, a blob of a different color hung from the chain. “Twinkle lights.”
Reha took it with a raised brow. “It’s pretty ugly…”
I hissed in reprimand, but Tinsley laughed as if that was the best response she could have gotten. “Isn’t it? That’s what makes it fun!”
A rare laugh tinkled out of my daughter’s lungs and shivered her tendrils. She covered her mouth with both hands. “You’re so weird.”
“Yeah, well,youlike it,” Tinsley nudged her shoulder and looked up at me, hand stretched towards me. “Ready to go?”
Speechless, grateful, I took her hand. “Yes–” I choked back the word I wanted to call her, a word I hadn’t used in a very long time. “Let’s go.”
20
?TINSLEY?
I held Hunar’s hand the entire way to the playfield, where Zufi had decided we’d have dinner. The place was lit and sparkling, all of the festival booths decorated and ready for their vendors. Handmade stockings embroidered with ribbons, bells, and a variety of names draped across one. Ornaments and tinsel decorated another. The only things left to add were the Christmas tree and glitter on the ferns, but even without, there was magic in the air.
Zufi apparently thought so too, though with how much the shilpakaari obsessed over color, I wasn’t surprised. We arrived to a spread of colorful cushions and rugs on the deck, their long, beaded tassels draped over the edge of the purple wood platform and catching the twinkle lights in a spectrum of color. He’d had Bajora print up a feast of universal foods too, including some from Dharatee and Samridve that were safe for human consumption.
Begrudgingly, I had to admit that the universal foods were incredible. They tasted real in a way that human food from the food bays just didn’t. While Zufi talked to Hunar about business, I fixated on pulling pastry pockets apart, tasting one versus the other. Was there too much acid in this one? Was the heat perfectly distributed or were the tops just a touch more golden brown in that pleasing, homemade way? Was the bottom slightly too soft?
It didn’t taste like they’d been printed in a food bay at all. There was no underlying processed taste, like a machine mimicking real ingredients.
Hunar got up for seconds and my investigation stalled as his lower hand brushed across my knee.
“Are you uncomfortable?” he asked, tapping my tights while Zufi excused himself to get a round of drinks. He sat with one knee up, balancing his weight on one palm as he used his other three to slide my uneaten food onto his own plate. “Your dress is restrictive.”
I shifted my hips, a little pulse between my legs. My ankles were sore, but the cushion I sat on was comfortable. “No, I’m fine. Actually, I really love this,” I sighed with a smile.
He took it upon himself to pick up new foods for me to investigate and taste, a quirk in the corner of his lips. “Yeah?”
“Mhm,” I confirmed, obsessed with his hands and glancing at his bright red throat with a pink tinge in my cheeks. “Do most shilpakaari eat on rugs and cushions like this? Your unit has a dining table.”
Hunar picked up a glistening bright yellow ball dusted in gold glitter and set it gently on my plate. “Mostly. We decided to add them to the units here after looking at human furniture in the archive.” He sucked the sticky yellow syrup off his thumb and forefinger, and I stared at his mouth. He caught me as he held out the plate, striped bronze eyes dilating, a low chorus of hollow clicks emanated from his chest.
We both jumped guiltily when Ladh gasped. Something crashed to the deck and broke, immediately snapping Hunar’s attention away.
“Ladh, are you okay?” he asked.
I took the plate as he glided to his feet and bent down to help his son. The boy was keening with embarrassment as they bent down together to clean up a spilled drink and shattered glass.
“So how are you two getting along?” Zufi asked as he crossed his legs and sat next to me. He slid a flute of fizzy pinkfurzamy way and took a sip of his own drink, something black and iridescent like oil. I imagined it tasted like licorice, even though I knew better.
“Great!” I said, taking a sip of the fruity not-champagne, distracted. The kids lined up as Hunar poured them cups of some green juice, adding berries and flower petals per each of their requests. The cups were tiny in his muscular hand, but he took so much care…
He thought he was getting the whole dad thing wrong, but he was acing it.
