“My oldest kid is Jace, he’s 26. He left his family at 21 because he knew they’d never support him being trans.”
Gwen’s eyes softened a bit. “A trans man who’s also a witch – that’s got to be tough, losing most of your magic with that.”
“I think it would be for most,” I admitted thoughtfully. “Jace doesn’t care much about magic, though – he’s not like most witches. Maybe it’s just because it reminds him too much of his family and coven and he hates them all. He uses it occasionally for little stuff but he basically considers himself a human and is happy with it.”
“And you took him in as an adult?” She seemed genuinely interested.
I was always happy to talk about my kids. “He didn’t have any family anymore. He knew Milo a bit – his coven had come to Port Fylin for something and apparently he was hanging around outside and didn’t want to participate in whatever they were doing. He happened to meet Milo as he was playing on his laptop in the park and they hit it off. There’s a 10-year difference between them and initially I was a little wary of the relationship, but after I met him a couple of times and realized what was really going on, I supported their friendship. When Jace officially escaped his family and transitioned, we initially were his only friends. He needed family for the holidays, he moved in, and he’s never moved out. We offered to let him officially join the family – meaning I legally adopt him – and he was happy to do so, adult or not. Everyone needs family, and we happen to be his.” I shrugged. “Even if we weren’t born as such, we are now.”
“Hmm.” Gwen rested her chin on the palm of her hand, her elbow propped up on the table. “And your daughter?”
“Elyse is 21. She ended up in the detention center when her foster parents couldn’t deal with a blind gryphon anymore. And Elyse’s – well, she’s, um, talented in ways. She loves writing poetry and sometimes gets so wrapped up in it she writes all over anything in the house. That really bugged her foster parents and she would get upset in return when they’d clean up her poem without letting her transcribe it. She’s been with me for about…8 years, I think? She’s been a lot happier here. I think she just needed a supernatural family who could understand the particular,” and complicated, “needs of a blind gryphon poet.”
“Elyse, a poet,” Gwen murmured. “I could have sworn I’d heard of someone like that before.”
“It’s possible,” I allowed. “She has several social media accounts where she posts some of her works. Milo helped her set up a computer that basically talks to her and transcribes what she wants with precision so she can use social media without help. I know she’s got a fair number of followers and has had a couple of her poems published in anthologies.”
Gwen seemed impressed. “And then Milo you had since he was a baby?”
I nodded. “He’s 16 now. I wanted to make sure he had the best chance at a happy life as possible despite his genetic disease. I never thought there might be a chance that someone could help him.”
Gwen seemed to catch the unspoken question in my statement. “I don’t know Kade personally, but Honey, his girlfriend, says he’s brilliant and my nephew Riven seems to be convinced he’s making progress. It might help him to have a second techno vampire to work with, I don’t know.”
I considered that. “My only fear is if he can’t actually find a cure within Milo’s lifetime.” I cringed. “He’s never had hope for a cure before, and I would hate to see that hope offered only for it to not be fulfilled.”
“Then at least he has hope,” Gwen told me firmly. “He didn’t have that before. So maybe Kade won’t be able to find a cure within his lifetime – at least he’ll have had a hope for a cure, which is more than most techno vampires get.”
“True,” I agreed, but I was still troubled. “I just imagine that if that hope gets crushed, it’ll be even harder for him than if he never had that hope at all.” I thought about how hard Milo had taken his friend’s death. Facing his own would be even tougher, but if he’d had hope that had been snatched away? That would crush him. I hated to even think about what his face would look like then, his eyes so full of hope just now turned into misery.
“Then we all have to hope Kade will find the cure sooner rather than later.” To my astonishment, Gwen reached out with her free hand and briefly squeezed my hand before pulling her own back. “As parents, our instinct is to want to have them avoid any potential harm and not risk it, but sometimes they need to take that risk because they need that hope. They need to believe there is that chance. And as parents, we need to believe along with them – even if we’re afraid the chance is smaller than they want to believe. Because they need our support, not our fears.”
I definitely hadn’t expected to get parenting advice from Gwen today, but it was good advice. “I’m always on his side,” I responded instantly. “But you’re right – I think he’ll need me to believe in this as much as he wants to. He needs that hope.” And maybe even if the hope was crushed in the end, living for years with hope would be better than living all those years without it.
Besides, if Kade succeeded? That would be beyond phenomenal. It would mean a new life for not just Milo, but all the techno vampires.
We spoke about other things after that. Gwen explained some about the merfolk community. I knew there was one at Port Fylin and even had several merfolk friends, but I hadn’t interacted much with the community itself, just my individual friends. Since Gwen and Sterling were considered part of the community here because of Bruce, however, she was able to explain more about what the community was like, even explaining that Sterling’s hair choice had to do with keeping in touch with his merfolk heritage. She also clarified that the protection marks she and Sterling now had came from Sterling’s girlfriend’s oceanid parent, who apparently had once been close friends with Bruce and protected them after he died – a revelation that I again felt grateful for before immediately scolding myself for being glad that there wasn’t clearly anyone in her life romantically at the moment.
“Morgan didn’t know we were unicorns back then,” she added. “They assumed we were human still. That was a point of contention between Bruce and me – he wanted to tell them, and I was afraid to do so. Sterling talked me into it last year, though. He wanted to start dating Alex but didn’t want to keep it a secret from her, so we all ended up telling them.”
“All?” I couldn’t help the question.
She paused as if she hadn’t meant to say that. “Oh, um, Riven. My nephew. He’s a unicorn hybrid.”
“With witch?” I didn’t realize that was a possible hybrid combination, but then, I wasn’t aware of all the hybrid possibilities for unicorn.
“Ah, uh, no,” Gwen grimaced. “So, um, Father wasn’t a witch. He just could manipulate his protection mark into appearing like one. He…he was Vist.”
Well, talk about a surprise. Vist, a race which was extinct, unlike unicorns, who just disappeared. Or they were supposed to be extinct, anyway.
“Percy’s Vist,” Gwen went on, “and Riven’s a Vist/unicorn hybrid.”
“Quite the family of rare supernaturals,” I murmured softly.
To my surprise, she laughed. “Yeah, I guess so. But I suppose it also makes sense that a unicorn and Vist were attracted to each other – two races thought to be extinct, hiding from everyone else, human and supernatural alike, and with similar temperaments.” She chuckled a little. “Riven got the worst of it, to be honest – both races in one. Percy and I just are strictly one with genes for the other, but Riven, he’s both. Means he’s sweet as can be, but wouldn’t defend himself if his life depended on it.” Her eyes darkened abruptly. “And then he appears human but has Vist vision, so yeah, he didn’t grow up well. Percy didn’t know about him until about a year ago,” she explained, seeing my confusion. “He felt really bad when he found out, though. No Vist kid should ever grow up without someone who knows what they are to explain things to them.”
She seemed quite fond of her nephew, I realized. Particularly given that they hadn’t actually known each other for that long. “Wouldn’t defend himself?”
She hesitated briefly. “It’s a unicorn thing. We…we don’t tend to fight back if it’s our own lives on the line.”
That startled me and concerned me all in one. No wonder she and her mother had been afraid of people finding out about them. If they wouldn’t even defend themselves, being attacked would potentially be deadly.
Gwen suddenly rose to her feet and stretched. “It’s far past time for supper. Would you like to stay and have something? I’m guessing the kids will be back soon. If not, that means Sterling will have remembered to feed Milo for you.”
I stood up as well. “Milo technically doesn’t need to eat food,” I reminded her. “He did more as a child but he’s gotten to where he only eats a meal a day and mostly energy otherwise. In another few years he’ll have completely transitioned to pure energy.”
“Oh, right, I forgot about that.” She led the way into the kitchen. “Anything I should know about food allergies or diet options before I start?” She asked.
I shook my head. “No, nothing. I’d be happy to help if you want – I usually do most of the cooking at our house so I should be able to follow instructions reasonably well.”
Gwen raised an eyebrow. “You, cooking? That surprises me.”
“Jace almost burns down the kitchen every time he tries to cook and Elyse hates cooking,” I explained. “Milo’s reasonably good about it but he’s busy with school and I rarely ask him to help. It’s not really his thing, though he doesn’t hate it as much as Elyse. So that leaves me.”
“All right, I’ll let you help,” she agreed, “but if you aren’t up to expectations I’m kicking you out of the kitchen.”
I agreed to her terms and set to work on her assignment of cutting vegetables, relieved to find that the longer this evening went, the more comfortable we both seemed to be with each other.
Maybe, just maybe, we could be friends again. I didn’t hold out hope for anything more than that, I would be content – no, ecstatic – if she was willing to be friends again, but it still felt like a bit of a long shot. Still, this evening gave me hope that maybe it would be possible. Maybe we could be friends after all.
~~~~~
I was feeling less confident the next day when I got minimal response after I texted Gwen. Maybe she just wasn’t big into texting? My family was – because of Milo – but some people weren’t. Or maybe it wasn’t that, and she’d had second thoughts now that it was morning and was rethinking just speaking to me at all. That’d be fair, I couldn’t fault her for that, but I still hoped it was more of the not liking texting thing than the not wanting to talk to me thing.
I had an unexpected opportunity to get some answers when I spotted Sterling just after my presentation ended – which was boring as expected, plus I was a bit distracted and, as a result, a little scattered during the presentation – hanging out behind the hotel in the garden.
Not sure if he’d be okay with me approaching him, I nevertheless did so anyway. Milo had enthused about Sterling last night after we got back to the hotel room and seemed to like him and Alex a lot, so I was hoping he wouldn’t mind if I came up to talk for a bit.
He looked up when I approached and suddenly grinned. “Oh hey, I am at the right place! I thought I’d try to catch you but I didn’t know when your meetings would end. Nice suit!” He added, taking in my uniform.
“You were looking for me?” I was kind of surprised about that, then worried. He’d clearly known some about what had transpired between me and his mom all those years ago. Was he here to lecture me about that? He seemed to be more in a good mood than a lecturing mood, but then, I didn’t really know him so I couldn’t be sure.
“Yep.” He pointed to the chair across from him. “Can we have a word?”
This didn’t seem promising, but I obediently sat.
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