Simone was fixing Lewis’s plate for him. “I made sure to save you your favorites,” she said as she kissed Lewis. “Good morning my love.”

“A fire? That’s no good…” If Simone knew anything she was hiding it fairly well to Rex.

“It was blue fire,” Rex spoke up.

“Blue fire? Oh my goodness do you think there’s another night phoenix roaming around?” Simone asked Lewis with a lot of surprise in her voice.

The kids weren’t all falling for it as they were eyeing Simone. “What?” She looked at her kids. “I don’t have any idea what Rex is talking about.”

“Mom… You had to get dragged off Natayl because you were punching her in the face.”

“Oh, dear… I can’t remember it was such a long time ago. It’s not good for the baby to think about it.” Simone made an excuse and put her hands on her baby belly. “Think of little Camille.”

Lewis nodded along with Simone. “It’s quite a shame that we’ll never know what happened to her or her family.” He shook his head slowly. “Poor girl, going missing.”

Rex gave his father a dead stare. “Yeah, I know exactly what happened.”

“Such a shame,” Lewis repeated.

“Well, I’ll let Hazel know to call off the search. You wouldn’t happen to know if the same thing happened to Alice, would you?”

“That girl who is probably still after you? I can’t believe you’d even consider apologizing to her. She’s crazy,” Lewis replied immediately. “Veronica is probably still in the Vilpamolan coast, but last I checked, she took up piracy so I wouldn’t recommend seeing her. Chastity…well, she’s moved on from Adeula and started the farm life. Something about being a horse girl…don’t really get what that means…oh, and Destiny. Lucas was actually just talking about her. Apparently she runs a bakery now. Makes great bread.”

Rex blinked. “And Natayl?”

“Shame that poor girl went missing. I wonder what she was like,” Lewis replied with a dead stare.

Momma’s Boy

There was disturbances happening in the Terrowin household every once in a while. It happened ever so often and Simone squinted her eyes down at Remy when he came to get on her lap. This was always how it started. Remy who was normally very independent came over to be lovey-dovey with his mother.

She, of course, could never say no to some snuggles as she put her arms around him and kissed his head. “How are you doing today Love?”

Remy looked up at her with the biggest smile. “Good Mommy I just missed you an awful lot.”

Her heart! Simone melted and snuggled up to one of her youngest children. “I missed you too.” It was suspicious. Almost too suspicious.

Her suspicions were confirmed when Janus rounded the corner to the great room to join Simone and Remy stuck his tongue out at both of them. He snuggled into Simone some more and who was Simone to tell Remy he shouldn’t snuggle her? He was antagonizing not only Janus but also his father.

Right now… Simone was Remy’s and he was basking in it.

Janus could feel that something was wrong. He and Lila had been exploring some of the island again, making traps for anyone not paying attention enough (see: Rex), and overall contemplating general mischief. He looked up from the spring trap he was loading, and looked around. “I’ll be right back.”

Lila looked up, and sighed. She could feel it too. Not exactly what her brother was feeling, but their resonance was something unique. He was in minor distress. “You really need to stop,” she said knowingly. “It’s getting a little creepy.”

“Nobody asked you,” Janus said as he continued down the path towards the house. It was rare for them to ever disagree, and this was one of the major things that they fought about. “You just don’t understand.”

As Janus got farther away, she sighed again. “No. It’s really clear…you’re the biggest mama's boy I’ve ever met.”

Janus came around the corner just in time to see Remy cradled in Simone’s arms. He was living for the attention, but it was immediately evident what the real reasoning behind it was.

Remy stuck his tongue out at Janus, and immediately the boy’s eye twitched. “That little bra-”

A firm hand grabbed Janus’ shoulder. It was Lewis.

“Dad?” Janus replied, surprised at the sudden intervention.

“Do you not realize what’s happening?” Lewis asked, looking over to Remy, who was absolutely hamming it up. “Can you not see what has become of you?”

Janus’ eyes widened as the realization dawned on him. “No. It can’t be true.”

“It is, my son,” Lewis said as he got on Janus’ level. “You’ve become that which you hated most.”

“I understand now,” Janus replied, his eyes welling up. “All those years I played for attention. I never knew it felt this way, looking in on the outside…” He looked at his father. “I’m sorry.”

“I understand,” Lewis replied.

Remy pulled his mother down to kiss her cheek and she cradled him to give him all sorts of kisses all over his face. There was so much laughter but still Remy was looking at Janus. This was a competition and he was winning.

Simone looked up to see Lewis talking with Janus and the tidbits she caught in the resonance now that she was paying attention… were interesting.

Now that Lewis was in the room Remy turned up his attention-seeking behavior with Simone. Simone was incapable of telling her little boy no. She was all snuggled up with him and sweet talking him. When Simone wasn’t looking Remy stuck his tongue out once more to both his father and Janus.

He was winning and victory tasted good.

Simone, of course, could see what Remy was doing through Lewis’s eyes. She kissed her little man’s forehead. “Why don’t you go play with Damond?”

Always the peacekeeper.

“I guess I could,” Remy slid off his mother’s lap and walked by his father and brother with the biggest shit grin he could muster before running up the stairs.

“What a little… He’s almost as bad as you were when you were when you were small.” She hugged Janus to her and chuckled a bit. “You can’t be jealous of your little brother… Even though he was absolutely taking potshots at you.”

“It’s not fair,” Janus replied almost immediately. “He gets all of the attention and-”

Lewis crossed his arms, “All of it? Is she not giving you attention now?”

“I-” He looked to Lewis and then to Simone. “..yes…”

Lewis gave his son a hug along with Simone. “No one single person gets to have all of your mother’s attention. And believe it or not, she divides it perfectly to fit everyone’s needs.” He ruffled Janus’ hair. “Trust me. She’s an amazing woman.”

“I know,” Janus replied, blushing. “But it’s hard. I don’t want to grow up and leave her behind like everyone says I have to.”

Simone felt bad for Janus just a bit as she snuggled him close to her in the group hug they were having. “Oh… Janus…” She kissed his forehead. “I’m always going to be your mother and I’m always going to be here for you. That’s never going to change even when you get older. Even if you don’t live here. I’m always your mother.”

That was when the gears began to go into overdrive for Janus as the realization came to him. “You’re right I can always come back!” His eyes were glistening with this realization.

Lila rounded the corner with the leftovers of their traps, “You… are always going to be the biggest mama’s boy I have ever met.”

Janus gave his sister the stink eye, “No, I’m not.”

“I think we need to take him to Uncle Xeik. Janus is suffering from denial,” Lila put the spare trap parts in a box in the great room. “All done.”

“What… have you two been doing on the island?” Simone looked down at Janus and then over to Lila.

“Nothing,” both of them spoke up.

Suspicious… So suspicious.

In the distance, Darren let out a scream.

Janus and Lila high-fived in front of their parents.

All according to plan.

Big Brother to Big Bad

It was a downright tragedy. He didn’t even write home daily. He didn’t draw her pictures. He knew she couldn’t read but why was he sending home scribbles? Of course, Daddy always came to the rescue and read these scribbles to her. It was all about his day. He would send them weekly but this wasn’t good enough.

She marched right out of her room with her giant dragon plush in tow. “Come on Blanc,” she waved the little tit to come with her. He was ever faithful to his little owner just like his father before him! Noble and graceful… and only hit a few door frames on the way out.

“Silva…” Camille got all the way downstairs to the kitchen where Silva was prepping for lunch. She got up on her tippytoes and looked over the island of the kitchen the best she could.

“Yes, little miss?” Silva could understand her! Silva was always supportive of her!

“I’m having trouble,” Camilla spoke up as quietly as she could not alarm her parents for now. “I want to write to JanJan and I’m angry.” Silva came around the island and knelt to the youngest of the Terrowin family.

“I would recommend red pastels then Little Miss,” Silva smiled at her and Camilla clapped.

“You always have the best answers… Can you get me down the pastels please?” She ran into the dining room and hopped up on a seat. Silva was most attentive to bringing her paper and some pastels.

Silva placed the pastels and paper in front of Camille. She couldn’t write just yet but the intent was there as she grabbed the red pastel and went to work. “Dear JanJan,” she looked up at Silva. “That’s how you start a letter right? Daddy has been awfully busy writing his own letters lately.”

“Yes Little Miss,” Silva patted her on the head and Camille continued with her angry thoughts.

“I’m very, very mad you moved all the way to…” She stopped and looked up at Silva. “Where did he go?”

“Iria,” Silva chuckled a bit.

“Ir-i-a,” Camille scribbled out on the paper. “And I’m very, very angry you haven’t written home daily. VERY ANGRY.” She had a chaotic mess of red lines but the intent was there.

“You sign it off with Love, Camilla. When you are done,” Silva once again patted the top of her head and Camilla nodded as she sighed off on it.

“I’m going to go show this to Daddy. He is an expert on angry letters,” Camille had caught him writing many letters, and when she asked he told her he was angry. So he would understand her angry letters! She pushed the chair out and hopped off the seat with her letter. “Thank you, Silva!”

“You are very welcome little miss,” the maid bowed a bit and cleaned up the young girl’s mess.

“Daddy!” Camille yelled up and down the halls as she ran all over the castle looking for him. Finally, she found him in Simone’s study writing more letters. “DADDY!” She was out of breath as she smacked her letter up on the desk for him to read.

“What do you think? It’s for JanJan. Do you think Blanc could deliver it for me? Can he even make it to…” Camille struggled. "Ir-i-a?"

Lewis was in his office writing away on his next letter. His desk was, for once, neatly arranged. To his left was a cup of coffee, steam gently rising up. He loved his coffee. It was, perhaps, the only thing that let him write away deep into the night until he was inevitably called to bed by Simone. In front of that cup was a perch for Snowball, who was peacefully dozing. He had a very important job to do once Lewis finished. And to the right of the letter was a stack of almost one-hundred letters, pre-written by Lewis.

He looked down at the most recent letter, and smiled. It might have been his best yet.

Dear Soon-to-Be-Eunuch,

I am once again writing to you to remind you that your days as a loving husband may be numbered. If you are wondering about the frequency of these letters, it is to instill the maximum amount of fear that I possibly can into your pathetic little soul. As you may recall, you’ve stolen my daughter’s hand in marriage, and though she seems to tolerate your presence, the need to constantly remind you of what is at stake compels me to write these letters.

I know where you eat. I know where you sleep. And the moment my dearest Alshaya tires of you, you know what awaits.

As always, if you tell anyone about these letters, your world will burn.

Love,

Your Father in Law, Lewlew.

He smiled. That last part had been an influence of Camille. She was precious.

As if on cue, the five year old burst into the office with her own letter, and Lewis looked it over. “I see. And what does this part here say? I’m afraid I don’t know this particular dialect.” He smiled as he pulled her into his chair and let her put the letter over his. I think Iria might be a little much for Blanc. He’s still young. I’m sure Snowball wouldn’t mind, but you might need to bribe him with birdseed.” He gave the bird a look. “But not too much.”

Camille puffed up her face at Lewis. Did adults not know how to read her letter? Well, JanJan wasn’t an adult just yet! He would be able to read her letter perfectly fine. She waited to be lifted up into his lap and snuggled in. Looking up at her father she smiled up at him. “Okay! I have some birdseed I mixed with Silva!”

Blanc was tweeting in front of Camille in a panic. “Not your birdseed Blanc… That’s special birdseed just for you.” Blanc looked to be relieved and hopped on the desk away from the letter now.

“I’ll read my letter to you.” Camille looked at her letter and cleared her throat.

‘Dear JanJan,

I’m very, very mad you moved all the way to Iria. And I’m very, very angry you haven’t written home daily. VERY ANGRY.

Love,
Camille’

“Silva helped me write it in red pastels so JanJan knows he’s in serious trouble with me.” Camille seemed pretty pleased with it. “Does it seem okay Daddy?” The five-year-old was once again thinking. “Can I have Snowball chuck it at his head?”