#mary goore is a ragin bisexual change my mind no you cant???

[il-papa-patata]

his name above your heart

Mary Goore forgets he got a new, sentimental body mod, and Aether sees it.

Rated T for language, Mary Goore/Swiss, past!Aether/Dewdrop, Mary Goore is Special Ghoul AU, established long term relationship, referenced polyamory, body mods, babysitter Mary, Aether’s hobby is making food for everyone

Read below~

It's not Swiss who sees it first, although it should be. Instead it's Aether, who comes outside while Mary is helping them till a garden with an unexpected good nature, and sees it.

Aether knows he and Swiss have been together a long time. A frankly absurdly long time for how you might categorize them if you knew them just surface level – Swiss and Mary were undoubtedly, and without any umbrage, sluts. That was pretty simple. Mary was a fang-tooth, rabid little man who'd fuck anything and Swiss was a big, sweet, dumb party boy who loved sex. Swiss was good at handling a one night stand, Mary seemed too impatient for anything else.

But they'd been together – years, now. A long time. The first couple years were rougher, as the two of them got used to each other, learned each other. Swiss, for the first time, could tell someone he wanted them to stay. And Mary- well, Mary for the first time had someone who /cared/ if he stayed. It was awkward at times – there were fights, although nothing like the spitting ones he and Dew had gotten into when they were still together – but the two of them always looked better, somehow, afterwards.

But it's still a surprise when Mary's ragged-sleeved t-shirt comes off, and there's a stark, scar-white “S” cut into Mary's chest, right above his heart.

Wow, Aether thinks, the glass of lemonade in his hand not the only thing chilling him. That's...

It has to be new – not so very new since it was healed, but new enough that Aether hadn't seen it before. The blooming red rose on his shoulder blade? The city map tattooed on his forearm? Those had been there before, but this S had definitely not. And there's no way in hell that it was for anyone but Swiss.

“Hey, kid,” Aether says, in his usual way, trying to keep out the edge of disbelief from his voice. Some of the kids from the creche run about – the excitable girl Giulia is pulling Tino along by his arm, but slowly on account of Tino's legs, and Mary's favorite, Marietta, is dozing under the porch in a big sunhat, gripping her blanket to herself.

“Hey,” Mary greets, wiping his forehead with his arm and smearing some dirt there.

“Here, you look pretty thirsty.” Mary takes the cup gratefully, a little rough note from his throat as thanks, and drinks down the whole glass in one long chug, some of the lemonade dripping from the sides of his mouth and down his neck.

“Shit,” he says, catching himself and a couple of the droplets against his fingers, “More thirsty than I thought.”

“I have more,” Aether says, indicating the little refreshments stand he set up, “You should take a break, you've been out in the sun for a while.”

Mary steals a look back at the plot of land – nothing crazy, but a small plot of land inside the courtyard enclosed in chicken wire. They were going to plant things for the kids to grow and watch over – easy things like tomatoes and zucchini, and a sunflower house just outside the chicken wire. He's made good progress – despite his protestations he grew up in urban squalor and never touched a fresh vegetable before he came to Italy, there's something in Mary that makes him good at gardening. Certainly the kitchen garden usually took longer to get ready for planting, and that was with a group of maybe six of the clergy, usually Aether, a few sisters, and a deacon or two.

Mary screws up his mouth, clearly dissatisfied with his work. Aether thinks to tell him – don't worry about it, it looks good – but Mary comes away anyway, leaning his hoe against the fence and swinging his legs over.

Mary smiles a sharp smile at the little table laden with food – cut vegetables, an insulated cooler of lemonade, some sweet things, some salty things, some sour things. There's even cups of the limoncello custard Aether whips up during the summers, usually at either Dew or Papa Nihil's request.

“You two are so similar,” Mary comments, taking a few morsels of everything, “Fuckin' mama birds.”

“Similar to who?” Aether asks, genuinely confused.

“Swiss,” Mary says, with an additional look of obviously.

Well that- is not something he's really heard. Maybe on the grounds of size – although his softer, broader shape was way different than Swiss's cut, Renaissance-sculpture, ballet-dancer body – but not that many people drew connections other than that.

“It's a good thing,” says Mary, who grins and cocks his head in a way that is – surprisingly sweet, and surprisingly gentle. Any time Mary talks about Swiss, it's... gentle. “You're both big caring dudes,” he says, turning back to the buffet of foods, and the little cheesecakes with little animal faces drawn on in jam, “And you both like to cook to show how much you love people.”

“And you like that?”

“I like him,” Mary says, straightforward and simple, popping a cherry tomato into his mouth, “and I like you.”

...Oh. Huh.

It wasn't so much that Aether didn't like Mary – not at all, they had a natural camaraderie, got on thick as thieves, frequently fucked – but to hear it plain and simple from the man's mouth is... well, it's kind of surprising.

“Can't say I'm not one of those people either,” he continues, “I get banned from breakfast duty when it's Swiss's dance season. Just keep tryin' to make him ham and pancakes.”

“You love him a lot.” Aether says, without thinking. Mary stares up at him for a second, almost a challenge, almost a warning, but then his face relaxes into a soft grin, infinitely proud, and he says –

“You noticed?”

Aether laughs. “Yeah, I noticed. Got that S on your chest for him.”

“Oh shit,” he says, covering the S and flushing, looking around furtively, “He's not around, is he?”

Oh. That's- cute. Mary's mussed hair falls into his eyes and he brushes it back impatiently, a faint pink that might-be-sunburn-and-might-not across his nose and cheeks.

“No- you haven't shown it to him yet?”

“No,” he says, “It was still healing, and then they all went off on that trip-”

“Lucifer,” he cusses, “He's going to cry.”

Mary nods, laughing softly, “He's gonna cry for like, an hour.”

“You have to tell me all about it when he does,” Aether says, throwing a tentative fist into Mary's shoulder, “I'll make you something you like, we'll have coffee.”

“I'll take you up on that,” he says, “But hold this, I gotta put my shirt back on. No doubt if she sees Giulia will rat me out.”

“The trials of working with kids.”

“Tell me about it,” Mary says, when his shirt is back on and he's taken the plate back from Aether. “But they're sweethearts. Hey kids!” He calls to them, and they all perk to look at him, Marietta rousing from her nap, “Aether's made us all snacks, come have a break in the shade.”

Aether graciously welcomes them over when they come running.

-

A week later, Mary is at the kitchen table laughing incredulously that while he was on the trip, Swiss came back with a tattoo of him, and proudly drags Swiss in to show off a beautiful rose-haloed rendering of Mary from the back, his own rose tattoo carefully stenciled into Swiss's skin.

Lovebirds, Aether thinks, and offers cheers over their cups of coffee.