As there was when Edith arrived a day prior, Michael found himself awoken by the annoying doorbell.

“We’ve got to make that quieter.” Michael said, sliding out of bed. Michael was the only one able to hear the annoying noise from such a distance because he was a vampire. Werewolves also had good hearing, but Michael found that when David slept, it would take a freight train to wake him up.

Mael walked into their bedroom holding his teddy bear and wiping his eyes like he’d just woken up. The teddy bear in his arms seemed to be the only thing Mael was really attached to from before he had arrived here, with Michael and David. Mael would never say where or who he got it from, either because he couldn’t remember, or because he didn’t want to talk about it.

“Daddy, the doorbell keeps ringing.” Mael complained, tugging on Michael’s shirt. Michael pushed his blond bangs out of his face and blinked his eyes a few times to wake up. It didn’t occur to him that Mael was able to hear the doorbell from this far away.

“I know. Check who it is in the window, and then you can answer it. I’ll be down in a minute.” Michael said, preparing to wake up David. David was the one who wasn’t nocturnal, like Michael had been when they’d first met. Michael agreed to start living in the daylight when they’d started going out. In other words, David never woke easy.

“What’s going on?” David squirmed under the covers when Michael tried to gently wake him up. Michael knew that was what David always said when he wanted to seem awake, but really wasn’t. David would fall back asleep just after saying that, every single time.

“Get up, we have company.”

“Just make them go away.” David said, rolling onto his side. He faced away from Michael now, and hoped he’d leave him alone. Michael knew better than to give up, and pulled the sheets off, one by one.

“Daddy, Aunt Marie and Uncle Carl are here!” Mael sounded joyful as he called out from the front door. David’s eyes seemed to pop out of his head when he heard that. Marie was his sister, a loud woman with two loud demons who liked being wolves rather than humans. David knew he’d never sleep again with those monsters around.

“You’re sister is here?” Michael questioned, but before he could get an answer out of him, Edith walked into the bedroom. Michael tried to control himself. He didn’t like anyone in their bedroom besides the kids. It was a territorial thing, and even David would get a little upset when he smelled someone else in their room. David groaned loudly.

“Why is she here so early in the morning?” David said, sitting up and throwing the rest of the covers off of him. The noises coming from downstairs were already overwhelming. David had made it a candid rule to only ever invite his sister over for Christmas, and that was it. He only needed to lose so much wolf hair from stress each year.

“We need to break the news to her slowly.” Edith said, digging in the boys’ closets for a nice shirt and pants to put on. David had forgotten that Edith was still under the impression that Marie thought he was a she still. When in fact, David had come out to her nearly nine years ago, and they had celebrated every Christmas together afterwards. Marie would visit their mom and dad on Christmas eve, and then use the same ‘my kids aren’t feeling well’ excuse every time to get out of staying the night. It was the same for David’s brother Cole, who actually only lived about six miles away.

“What news?” Michael asked, trying not to shred Edith to pieces for not only encroaching on their room, but digging in their closet.

“Well, you know, David is a man now. Marie and Cole don’t know that.” Edith said, waving her hand at Michael like he was the stupid one. Edith went back to shifting through their clothes and when she’d picked a neat purple striped shirt out, Michael had to take a deep breath to not lose his cool.

“Mom, that’s Michael’s shirt.”

“Oh. It’s just so hard to tell. You nearly have the same size, you know.” Edith said, putting the shirt back. She looked over at the distressed Michael, who had veins popping out of his forehead. David came over to him and resting his hands on his shoulders from behind, trying to calm him down.

“What’s wrong with him?” Edith said, pulling out a shirt from David’s side and handing it over to him. Edith didn’t look as much concerned as she was afraid. Edith didn’t like vampires, and for good reason. Vampires seemed to find that werewolves had a special taste in their blood that humans didn’t. It was that small desire that made vampires all that much more of an enemy.

“You’re invading territory, his brain is having a miniature aneurysm.” Edith looked a little bit relieved when David had said that. David assumed it was because it meant that Michael didn’t want to attack and eat her. That was a big fear among old world werewolves.

“David? Are you still sleeping? It is nearly ten O’clock, it’s time to get up. You too, Michael!” Marie called as she made her way up the stairs. Naomi walked out of her room and greeted her aunt before diving into the bathroom for a nice cold shower. Bear was next to come out of his room, and greeted his cousins by bearing his nonexistent fangs at them like a wolf would.

“She calls you David?” Edith said, staring at her child, not sure what to even say. David nodded slowly, looking like he’d just attempted to swallow a brick. Which wasn’t a far off description when considering the position he’d put himself into.

“In here, Marie.” He said. Michael didn’t realize how meek David was feeling until he’d heard him say that. Michael eased himself, trying to think of anything else other than the fact that yet another wolf would be entering their room. Michael may love David, and he may not hold any prejudice against wolves anymore, but damned if he was going to stand there and let so many be in their room at a time.

“Let’s go down and greet them, shall we?” Michael said, quickly ushering them out into the hallway. Marie stood in the hallway, prettied up as usual, and waved when Michael opened the door. Marie jumped with excitement before anyone could say anything.

“Oh my little brother’s finally getting married! And to such a handsome man!” She jumped up into Michael’s arms and gave him a hug that could even strangle a vampire. Michael figured that if they ever had to fight off other vampires, he’d just have Marie hug them to death like she did with him. It was effective.

Marie then hugged David in the same excited way, gushing about how the wedding had to be absolutely perfect. David didn’t exactly look alive yet, but he had enough of a smile on his face to keep from looking like he’d really just gotten up and then had to fight off a territorial vampire. It was then time that Marie realized who else was in the room. She met eyes with her mother, Edith, who stood, with her arms firmly crossed against her chest.

“Mom?” Was all she could really manage to say, and then looked back at David. He gently started to push his way out of the room and found himself walking down the stairs. Michael and the rest of the group followed after, and not another word was said until they settled down at the dining room table.

“You knew? This entire time? Why wouldn’t you say anything?” Edith drilled Marie for answers. Marie looked completely overwhelmed, and had no idea what to say first. David took the lead on it.

“Marie has known for nearly nine years. I asked her not to say anything.” David said, looking over at his mother. Edith looked a little heartbroken. Michael could understand that from a mother’s point of view, that meant that David didn’t trust her. He’d figured along the way that Edith would rather not know though, and that was kind of true. She’d have fared better never knowing.

“Uncle David! Uncle David! Let’s go play cops and robbers!” The younger twin, Romas said to David. David laughed and pulled Romas into his lap.

“So early in the morning? You’re crazy!” David said, watching as the boy slowly transformed himself into a small wolf pup, no bigger than the average corgi. The wolf pup sat on David’s lap for a moment longer before climbing over into Michael’s lap. Edith watched in horror as the pup cuddled with Michael as if he were one of their own.

“This is all too much. Does Cole know?” Edith said, praying to all her stars that she wasn’t really the only one who didn’t know.

“Cole’s known since high school. He caught me trying on his clothes one time.” David said, fighting the arising smile. He couldn’t help but remember those times as happy memories. Cole had helped him out so much back then, going as far as giving him clothing when David turned eighteen. Cole was the one who had even helped him chose his name.

“I was only brought into the secret after Michael and David met.” Marie pretended to pout as she remembered finding out her sister was really a brother. To Marie, a girl who’d done everything with make-up and pretty dresses, seemed to understand it easily when David and Cole had explained it to her. It just made sense to Marie.

“And I find out now, when my daug- son has three kids and is getting married to another man?” Edith stands, clearly irritated by what was going on. She angrily gestures toward Michael, who sat calmly with Romas in his arms. Romas jumped off when Edith rose her voice, which didn’t surprise Michael. Wolves struggle to control their hearing at younger ages.

“Look, if it were up to me, I’d still have never told you. But you are here now, and that’s what matters.” David said quietly. David was trying his hardest not to raise his voice. His kids were also around, and didn’t want them to have to listen to adults yelling.

And that’s when something in Michael’s head finally clicked.

Mael was able to hear the bell this morning, even when no one but Michael could. Michael hadn’t given it much fault before, but that was highly unlikely if he was still going through his human phase. Michael stood up and called out Mael’s name, loudly.

“Coming, daddy!” shouted Mael from somewhere in the house. Mael came running into the kitchen full speed, prancing in his socks and extra long pants like he always did.

“Fang Check!” Michael said, pulling him up onto the counter like he did every morning. The others crowded around Michael, even Edith, who had momentarily forgot the discussion at hand.

Michael peered into Mael’s mouth and saw two white fangs poking out of his mouth. They were definitely fangs, which meant he was just like Michael, a vampire. Michael turns to David, and they both scream excitedly and jump up and down.

“He’s a vampire!” David said, pulling away from Michael to look at Mael’s fangs again. Mael looked happy too, but he didn’t really know what for. His daddies were happy for some reason, which made him happy. Marie got a good look too, and seeing the fangs didn’t seem to phase her at all. But Edith was a different story. She most certainly wasn’t understanding what the excitement was about.

“Why are you so excited?” She said, examining Mael’s teeth like everyone else had.

“We were worried that he wasn’t maturing healthily. But now that he’s matured into a vampire, we don’t have to worry anymore.” David explained, pulling Mael off of the counter. Mael skipped off without another word. He hummed to himself as he disappeared into the other room.

“How’d you know?” David asked, looking at Michael like he was something really special. David was trying to think if vampires could sense other vampires or not. He’d never asked, but if that was the case, vampires were a whole new kind of weird.

“He was able to hear the doorbell this morning.”