Page 24 of Culture and Curiosities
“It’s fluffy. I have lots more stuff but I didn’t bring all of it. I wanted to but Pierce said I could only bring four suitcases so I had to leave stuff home.” Wren’s cousin Pierce seemed to have taken good care of my mate in my absence.
Wren made a startling sound I thought was considered a snort. “He said we weren’t moving to Mars, but I’m starting to think he was wrong. Not that you live on Mars, but it’s probably just as far. Do you know how far away from here that you are?”
When he stopped talking, I realized he was ready for my part in our conversation, but I wasn’t sure where to start or what to do about Klynn’s grumpy face peeking out from around a tree. “I do not have to have diner discussions no matter who this local is.”
This was a time when the phraseoh dearmay be acceptable.
I needed to check my notes to make sure, however.
Chapter 7
Wren
Oh, another alien.
The grumpy one.
I was going to have to tell the diner men that I’d found him, so they didn’t need to worry.
“I’m Toman’s mate. He’s my Daddy. I’m little. I like the diner men but I won’t talk to you about diner stuff if you don’t want to. But we brought you dino nuggets and bananas and brownies that I’ve been very careful with.”
Hmm.
He was thinking.
Oh.
I looked over at my confused Daddy. “Everybody knows I’m Team Binkie, so they’re going to know you’re my Daddy. We can’t hide that.”
Daddy nodded. “I do not have the same privacy concerns as humans seem to have. However, we will need to discuss the concept of limits around what information is publicly shared.”
“Okay.” Kissing his cheek, I turned back to the grumpy alien. “Daddy? Tell him I’m nice.”
“He should understand that as my mate you are wonderful, but yes, I will confirm you are a nice little and a good boy.” Daddy leaned over and kissed my head. “I would give you appropriate back rubs but this is not the environment to set down food.”
“It’d get dirty.” Giggling, I shook my head. “You can give me more hugs and rub my back later.”
Grumpy alien was still grumpy, so I gave him a big smile. “I’m going to be nosy too, but not yet. You can get used to me first before I ask you about stuff. Oh, but I’m going to take you to a store soon. It’s got books. You’ll like it. We’ll do it tomorrow because tonight is mate stuff. I’m not going to talk about that because you don’t like diner stuff.”
He might’ve started looking less grumpy but it was hard to tell.
So I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
I was a really good boy.
“Fine.” Still frowning, Klynn the fin and the grumpy member of Team Binkie nodded. “I like books.”
He tried to be subtle but he looked at Daddy.
“He knows you’ve got good books.” I shrugged. “Sorry. I didn’t know it was a secret until it was out. I’m going to help you to get new books, though.”
That would help fix it.
He huffed.
