Page 33 of The Emerald Boa's Lover
“Yeah.” He’s breathless in his admission. Like the fight had been kicked out of him.
“Because accepting these hatchlings doesn’t just makeyoua parent before you were planning on it, but me too.” He snaps his head to look at me, startled.
“You…but I thought Ucfeni don’t adopt eggs because their scent pheromones might beunpleasant.”Oh Charlie, you fool. Did he think I would leave him for taking the eggs? Had he paced here for an hour, worried I would see my own fangs and slither off in a rage? Or that I would make him choose between his honour and me? I’m not pleased he made this choice without me…but Charlie has suffered enough today. That is a conversation for another time.
“Normally,no.” My throat scales pale with what I’m about to say. There will be no turning back once I go down this route with him. One way, or another. “But Asma is stillhereisn’t she?”
“What?” He narrows his brows at me like I’ve just grown a second head. “Yeah? I-in the morgue. Why?”
“If you’re quick and you have some of her pheromones extracted, I can check if we’d be a scent match.” He stares at me like I just spoke a language his com-gem didn’t translate. “Pregnant Ucfeni secrete traces of the natural scent of the hatchlings. To expose the rest nest to their scent and get them used to it before the hatchlings emerge from their eggs. Otherwise, we’d have a high risk of rejection upon hatching, or family members being unable to stand each other’s scent.” I shrug, and Charlie still hasn’t realised what I’m telling him. “If I don’t mind Asma’s scent, then I won’t mind the hatchling’s pheromones when they hatch.”
“Oh.” Charlie rubs the back of his neck, still in a bit of a daze as he moves his other hand to his com-gem. He hesitates and then frowns up at me. “Wait, so are you saying that if you’re a scent match…you don’tmindme bringing the eggs home with us?”
“Oh I mind, because I wasn’t part of the decision.” I make that very clear, but then I shrug. “But at the same time, I still love you. You’re not raising hatchlings without me, and I’ll still support you and our new clutch. It’s alotsooner than I would have liked for us to have a clutch.” I cup the back of my neck, feeling more than a little daunted by the sudden responsibility of parenthood. “But…” I smile and my tail lifts up behind him to nudge at his back to make him stumble closer to me. “…I also know that there is no way on Thelia you are leaving without those eggs. If you promised Asma you would take her eggs, you’re going to do it, with or without me.” I know my man far too well. Charlie always keeps his promises, and he wouldn’t survive the guilt of handing the eggs over after promising Asma he would take them. “I’m just not prepared for you to ever bewithoutme. In any way.”
“Oh thank God.” Charlie collapses against my chest and reveals just how afraid he’d been of my refusal. I’m not over the moon, of course. If I’m not a scent match my nest is about to become a very pungent and unpleasant place for me, but I’ll do it. For Charlie. “Because I donotwant to be a dad without you. Nor was I letting you go.” I smile, glad and amused that he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Part of me wonders what his plan would have been had I stomped my tail down and said no, but that’s by the by now. “I think if you have any demands, having just blindsided you with ‘hey guess what, we’re dads now’, now is the time.”
“Really?” I wrap my arms around him and playfully think off to one side. “I suppose I should think of some demands. After all, Iassumethat you haveassumedthat because I work from home, I’ll also be the one doing all thechild care…?”I narrow my eyes on him, daring him to try and tell me otherwise, but his sheepish expression says it all. “My? You planned it all out in that hour of you pacing in here, trying to work up the nerve to land that on my pouch, huh? You’re going to return at last to your precious lab to work on Petri dishes, and I’m going to be at home with a youngling in each arm? Allllll planned out.”
“You’re killing me.” Charlie chuckles and presses his face to my chest. Then his arms hug my waist tightly, and his chuckling stops. “…thank you Dal. I don’t know how I’ll ever make this up to you.” I smirk.
“I have many ideas how, but for now, how about we ask for Asma’s pheromones to be extracted? So I can find out if I’m a scent match to the eggs?”
“Yeah, sure.” He leans back and I see him try to discretely wipe some tears from underneath his eyes. He cleared his throat and rolls his shoulders. Charlie does that when he’s trying to downplay a vulnerable moment. He presses his com-gem and connects to the morgue to make the request. Meanwhile, I look at the two blue eggs and wonder about the hatchlings. What kind of Ucfeni are they? Male or female? In my head I’m drawing out plans for the upper nest room to accommodate eggs and future little nest mates, and my smile grows. To think, back when I daydreamed about myself and Charlie having younglings together, that I’d get that dream fulfilled so soon! The urge to hit my workstation at home and draw out new plans, maybe even a new nest entirely, makes my tail-tip flick with excitement. “The Morgue technician says she can bring the sample up for us.”
“Good.” I nod and then coil my tail around his legs to restrain him as I lean into his personal space. “Not today, but one day, I will ask you to become bonded to me, and you’re going to say yes.” His eyes are wide, and a moment later he snorts and nods.
“You mean one day, whilst we’re raising two children together and deeply in love with each other,Iwill askyouto marry me, and you’ll say yes?”He countered, and now we’re both grinning.
“I like the sound of both of those things. How about we propose to each other one day?”
“Deal.” Charlie laughed and crooked his finger to summon me closer. I lean in and kiss him tenderly as we wait for the morgue tech. He wriggles until I release his legs and he plants himself against my chest to hug me again. I can tell he needs the embrace and his hands clench into fists at my back. Underneath his honour to uphold his promise, his love for me, and his worry for the eggs, he lost a patient today. Charlie has worked so hard to care for Asma, and they all knew she was so badly scared from her previous miscarriages and mis-layings, that her body may not be able to weather this pregnancy to the end. Asma knew. Charlie knew. Still, I foresee a lot of Plan B taking place later. I look at the eggs, hopeful that with younglings to care for, he will be kept busy. Too busy to linger in grief for too long.
An Ucfeni female slithers in, smiling and with a happy rattle at the end of her sandy tail.
“I have a Pheromone sample for Doctor Charlie O’Hara?”
“That’s me.” He chuckles.
“And that’s for me.” I accept the small vial and brace myself as I take hold of the cork stopper. I pray to the Ancestors that I’m a scent match. I don’t need the smell to be pleasant, just notunpleasant. I feel Charlie’s eyes on me, worrying that I’m not going to be a match too. I nod with a smile, pop the cork and flick my tongue bravely towards the rim of the vial. “…not bad.” I smile and Charlie thrusts a hand out to bear his weight against the wall. Asma had a fruity scent, by my scent pits anyway. I wouldn’t have minded her presence at all. I scent the pheromone sample three more times, just to be sure, and nod to Charlie. “Good.”
“Oh good.” He rubs a hand to his chest, his heart racing beneath, and chuckles at me. “Now I don’t suppose you can tell me what happens next, do you?”
“Lay-leave.”
“Lay what?”
“One of us takes Laying leave. Usually the female, but considering whatyou’vejust been through, you should take it.” That, and I work from home anyway, so this way we can both be in the nest. “You remain at home with the eggs until they hatch.”
“…oh my…do I have tositon them?” Charlie looks mortified, and the Ucfeni technician behind us giggles into her hands.
“No. At night they remain in an incubator like this one.” I wave my hand to the container, before reaching over and lifting it up carefully by the handle. “But by day? You nest with them. Skin to shell contact is very important for development.”
“So I don’t sit with them…but I…cuddle in bed with them?”
“Yes.” I leave out for now that he’ll be naked and usually the Ucfeni female would have the eggs nestled in the coil of her tail. That’s a conversation for later. “Shall we go home and start?”
“Yeah.” Charlie thumbs under his eye again, and holds my other hand in his. “Let’s go home.”
