Page 9 of In This Iron Ground
For a moment, Damien wondered what it would have been like to grow up there. To have had a simple, straightforward childhood—or as simple and straightforward as a werewolf’s childhood could be in a world dominated by humans. Damien walked closer tentatively, watching in amazement as the twins he had seen that first night came careening from the side of the house, squealing with laughter and covered in dirt. A moment later, a dishevelled man came after them, growling in a way that was playful but far from human.
Damien was suddenly struck with the memory of his own mom playing with him, jumping in puddles and getting soaked in the aftermath of a spring rain. He felt as if he were observing the scene before him from far away, his body becoming tight and small and distant and scared, but the moment only lasted a second before Koko knocked his shoulder with hers as she passed.
“What’s wrong with you?” Koko muttered angrily.
“What?” Damien asked dumbly, trying to catch his breath as Mia descended the front stairs and moved towards them.
“You stink like fear!” she accused, glaring. Even Nadie and Hakan were looking at him, frowns still on their faces. Damien hunched into himself, gripping the straps of his backpack.
“Koko,” Mia admonished sharply. Koko huffed and moved towards the house, which seemed to break the spell for her siblings as they followed. Mia let them go, remaining with Damien before signalling to follow her with a smile. He lagged after her towards the house, the dread growing until the moment he stepped through the front door.
The anxiety burst like a bubble without even a sound. Damien could not have imagined a better home. It was wide and airy, suffused with warmth. He trailed after Mia, looking at the rooms he had barely been able to process during the night he had been there.
A foyer greeted them as they stepped inside, though the room could more aptly be called a mud-room. It was littered with semi-neat lines of shoes, coats, and keys hanging from hooks that had personalized nameplates above them, from childishly scribbled names to stylish, bronze plaques. A wide hallway could take you either towards what looked like a vast library on the left, or the living room to the right, which Mia led him to.
That was the room he had waited in last time, but it looked even more amazing in the daytime. A humongous, round window dominated the longest wall. The window was panelled by several sheets of glass and the whole thing was framed by a brick edging. The actual room was large and filled with a massive, U-shaped couch, several armchairs, and a large collection of pillows and bean bags in one corner, away from the TV that dominated the far wall. Another door led them to the kitchen, equipped with enough counter and cupboard space to sustain a family of this size, as well as a large wooden table to seat them all. The room was light and bright, boasting wooden furniture and creamy walls.
Damien felt the fear drain away as he took in the bustling warmth, the light streaming through the windows, the voices and music that came at him from different directions. It might have seemed counterintuitive to be relaxed by such a boisterous atmosphere, but Damien felt something settle inside him. His chest loosened, hands regaining their feeling as his heartbeat slowed down. He breathed.
When he looked up at Mia, she was smiling. Damien found himself simply smiling back.
Koko was not yet appeased. He followed her huffing form into the kitchen, settling at the wooden dining table.
The study session that followed was both amazing and terrifying. Everything about the household seemed to sing to Damien as if their energies were on the same wavelength. There, his swinging legs and tendency to talk in bursts weren’t so out of place. With this much noise, he could hardly hear his thoughts.
Koko was more easily won over than she would probably like to believe. It took Damien mentioning a comic character that resembled the person they were doing the project on to make her start to melt. The defensive tilt to her body disappeared the more they talked. Before Damien knew it, they were laughing and bickering over the DC universe. Mia didn’t seem to really mind, leaving them to it for a while before turning them back to their homework with a smile on her face.
Damien couldn’t remember the last time he felt like that. Like he was being filled up with something crystalline. Even the odd moments of self-awareness, of suddenly feeling like an intruder in a kind land, couldn’t keep the smile off his face.
Damien tried not to feel too disappointed when Koko declared she couldn’t do any more homework. He got up from the chair, wondering if the McKenzies would pick him up or if the Salgados would take him home.
“Um, hello?” Koko’s voice snapped him out of the trance he had been put in as he started clearing the table. He looked up only to see Koko flap a hand at him to follow as she moved towards the living room.
He couldn’t breathe for a moment.
He followed her slowly. He was instantly distracted by the sight of the trees through the large, round window, but jumped as the twins suddenly latched onto each of his legs. He looked down and saw that one was a boy and the other a girl. They both looked like frizzy-haired cherubs sent from a mischievous version of heaven. The girl had paint over the dark skin of her face, apple-cheeked with a wide smile.
“Play Legos with us!” she demanded.
“Uh…okay,” Damien said. The girl cheered loudly and pulled him towards a corner filled with toys. She immediately up-ended a barrel of Legos on the floor. Damien gaped. He was amazed they were allowed to do that in the living room, but nobody stopped her.
Damien tried to follow their disorganized conversation as they played. He found out they were four, were called Lallo and Diana respectively, although the latter was almost exclusively referred to as “Dee.” It surprised Damien how different they were from each other. From afar, they seemed to have the same high level of enthusiasm and energy. When observed more closely, however, Damien could clearly see how Lallo would more easily play alone and quietly, concentrating for long periods of times on one set of toys. Despite it being obvious that he couldn’t understand everything that was going on around him, he seemed to like simply observing other people with his wide, dark eyes, making Damien wonder what was going on inside that round little head of his.
Dee, on the other hand, seemed to have a gravitational pull of her own, a bright spark of movement and laughter that even her twin brother seemed to get caught up in. The combination could have been catastrophic, but Damien would bet they would feed off each other as they grew up and learn perspectives that would have taken just one of them far longer to acquire.
They seemed to be in a world of their own a lot of the time, but it was a welcoming one—or at least Damien seemed to fit in. Before he knew it, he was sinking into a beanbag in the pillow corner, reading out a story that he would have thought was a bit advanced for their age, but they were swallowing it up.
Lallo listened quietly, having taken to Damien for some unknown reason, and was pressed against him. He looked at Damien as if he were watching the story materialize in front of Damien’s lips. Dee, on the other hand, would squirm and shout and act out scenes, making slashing motion in the air at the action, demanding higher-pitched voices for the characters, and laughing herself silly in a way that was so contagious that Damien would have to stop sometimes to laugh along.
He wasn’t aware of how much time had passed until he looked up and saw that more of the family had come down. He tensed, looking around warily. Hakan was sitting on the couch, seemingly engrossed in something on his phone as Koko watched TV beside him. There were more voices and laughter coming from the kitchen, but Damien focused his attention on Nadie, who was walking towards him with one of her patented smiles.
“Wanna stay for dinner? We’re making fajitas,” she offered.
“Yes,” replied Lallo for him, whilst Dee screamed “Fajitas!” and shot across the room and into the kitchen. Damien tried to sit up in a series of undignified movements, each one dipping him further into the beanbag as Lallo latched onto his wrist.
“Um, the McKenzies…” Damien started.
“Stay, loser!” Koko interrupted, getting up from the couch and yanking him from both Lallo and the beanbag. “Nobody else appreciates my figurines,” Koko muttered. Lallo crawled out of the beanbag, following his sister into the kitchen as if story time hadn’t happened.
