#yes miffy says trans rights

[kentosbox]

[iris-writes-things]

Two Guys and a Baby: Day 5

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“I swear, Ezra, he talked!” Crowley said with some exasperation in his voice. Ezra raised his hands in self-defense. “I believe you, dear,” he said in a tone Crowley knew was designed to calm him down.

Or, a lot of talk of talking, but no actual talking occurs.

Chapter 7 of 20 Ongoing 2199 words Romance/Humor

‘Anthony dear.’ 

Crowley hadn’t been called that in a long time. No one had called him by his first name since he started carefully avoiding Ezra, but once he apologized to the man for almost kissing him that one time, there it was again, awakening things in him that he’d painstakingly kept dormant, even with their now-increased contact.

And he said his eyes were beautiful.

Now, that was another can of worms on its own that awakened things in him which he would have a hard time pushing down. In fact, there wasn’t much of anything more cheesy, tropey, borderline romantic one could say to someone they liked, and Ezra had gone and did it.

He’d laid awake for hours after he had come home and tucked the already sleeping Adam into his crib, mulling over what all of it meant. Ezra Zacharie Fell was not exactly a paragon of subtlety, but what it meant- no, what it could have meant, was simply too good to be true. Crowley had done nothing to deserve something like that. After all, he was always on the verge of fucking something up one way or another and this couldn’t be an exception to the rule, he felt. 

Speaking of which, his morning was going far too smooth.

Adam wailed from his crib in the living room. There it was. At least it was better than being left alone with his thoughts any longer. He got up from his bed, pulled his ‘86 Magic Tour T-shirt over his head and slinked over to the crying baby, who was standing and hanging onto the edge of the crib. The kid calmed down slightly when Crowley came into his view. He stopped screaming and looked up at the man with tearful, blue eyes.

“What’s up, Adam?” Crowley asked casually, not expecting an answer in return. 

Instead, Adam made grabby hands at him, which could only mean one thing. 

“Up!” Adam said.

Crowley frowned. “Up?” he asked.

“Up!” Adam repeated.

Lucy hadn’t mentioned anything about Adam speaking, however small or simple the words might be. The man immediately rushed back to his bedroom to grab his smartphone, pulled up Whatsapp on his way to the living room, almost walking face first into a narrowly avoided doorpost. He opened his chat with Lucy and pressed the little microphone.

“Can you say that again, Adam?” Crowley asked expectantly, smiling in encouragement.

Instead, Adam looked at him with his big eyes and made a gurgling sound instead.

“Work with me here, Adam, I just heard you say it. Come on, you can do it.”

The boy’s little face scrunched up as he seemed to give this due consideration. 

“What’s up, Adam?” Crowley repeated, in an attempt to garner the same reaction, but nothing came. He sighed in disappointment and laid his phone down in the crib. “Okay buddy, time for breakfast.”

*

“I swear, Ezra, he talked!” Crowley said with some exasperation in his voice as Adam explored the ground floor of the bookshop again and, per the older man’s request, his sunglasses now rested on his hair instead of on his nose. “Man, I wish I could have just recorded it for Lucy. She’d love to hear it.”

Ezra raised his hands in self-defense. “I believe you, dear,” he said in a tone Crowley knew was designed to calm him down. “At this point, it’s important that you keep talking around him and to him. Ask him questions, so he can start associating words with people, objects and actions.”

Crowley nodded. “Duly noted,” he said curtly and he tried not to think of the day before. About the way Ezra had looked at him. Had talked to him. “So, what do you suggest we do?” he soldiered on.

Ezra shrugged. “Just talk to him constantly, don’t even think too hard on it, but do make sure you articulate. Oh, and you could read him bedtime stories.”

“Oh, I’m very good at that,” Crowley grinned. “I used to read picture books to Anathema every week.”

“Then you best get into practice again. I know I’m not a library, but you can borrow some of the picture books I have stocked here,” Ezra said as he got up and beckoned for Crowley to follow him, which he did closely. 

“That’s actually very generous. Thank you,” Crowley whispered.

“You almost sound surprised,” Ezra smiled softly as he looked back at him. “Just kidding, you’re welcome, Anthony,” he added. His eyes sparkled with… something or other. Mischief, probably. Pride, more likely, as no one in London believed in carrying out the seven heavenly virtues more than Ezra Fell and his family. But the sparkle, the smirk… suddenly, there wasn’t a single holy thought left in Crowley’s mind. Gaping like a fish out of water, his mouth abruptly felt very dry. If he was staring, Ezra didn’t seem to mind. But in due time, he turned away from Crowley and back to the matter at hand.

The children’s section of the bookshop was next to the staircase that went up to the second and third floor of the shop, and the apartment attached to it, was stocked with brightly colored, hardback picture books, as well as novels and informative books for young readers. It was decked out with colorful little flags and bean bags. Years ago, Ezra had the idea of organizing reading afternoons, where volunteers would read to visiting children while their parents shopped. It never caught on.

“Is there anything you’d like to read to Adam in particular?” Ezra asked as he crouched by the bookcase that contained the picture books. Crowley followed suit.

“Um,” he started. “I don’t really know any of these new ones. You’re the owner, what do you recommend?”

“A lot of the little kids that come in here are particularly excited about Rainbow Fish, because of the shiny bits, but I think the Very Hungry Caterpillar may be a better jumping off point. Oh, and Dick Bruna’s Miffy books are a personal favourite of mine. They have a very good sense of rhyme and rhythm.”

Crowley took the book Ezra held in front of his face, Miffy at the Zoo, let himself fall into one of the bean bags and opened the book to a random spread. With practised ease, Crowley found his storybook voice and read aloud:

“‘They must have traveled for an hour but now they’re here, you see and Father Bun steps out and says come Miffy, follow me.’ Oh, that’s cute. I’m sure he’ll like that,” Crowley noted as he looked back up to Ezra, who pointed to the space just beside his head. When he turned around, he found Adam watching over his shoulder, enraptured with the bunnies on the page. “Did you like that, Adam?”

Adam looked at him with bright blue eyes, a broad smile on his face and gave them a resounding “Bun!”

*

Ezra sat behind the counter as he listened to Anthony read three more books to Adam from his perch in the windowsill. He found his eyes closed and any tension left his shoulders as Anthony’s voice filled the shop. His reading voice was smooth, steady and well-articulated. That this was soothing, to say the least, reflected in that halfway through the third book, Adam had fallen asleep against his chest.

“You know, my dear, if there’s anyone you should call ‘angel’, it would be Adam. As someone who has worked with children in the past, I can guarantee you that children, much less babies this well-behaved are very hard to come by.”

“Ngk,” Anthony choked. “I really hoped you would have forgotten by now.”

“You seemed to make a point of repeating it, so no. I didn’t forget.”

“Right.” Anthony sat up straighter, but kept Adam securely cradled to his chest as he laid the book down.

Out of Anthony’s sight, Ezra’s hand still laid upon the magazine.

4. He acts differently around you. 

“I’ve been meaning to ask you...” Ezra tried, but he found that the words he originally intended to say drowned in a flood of doubt. He frowned, looking at Anthony, who looked at him expectantly, if a tad uneasy. “If something were, so to speak, ‘up’... you would tell me, right?”

 “‘Course,” Anthony said almost hastily. He got up and walked up to the counter, still holding Adam like the most precious thing in the world. He looked up at Ezra, amber eyes piercing blue. “Ez, you are literally the best friend that I have, I can promise you that if something is up, you’ll be the first to hear.” There was an almost pleading quality to Anthony’s voice as he said that and a frown made deep creases in his forehead. 

“So the reason you’ve been acting so off lately is…” Ezra asked.

Anthony paled. “I…” he said, glancing down at Adam as if he would provide a well-timed distraction, as he had before, but the boy stayed soundly asleep. “I’m just… figuring stuff out, you know?” he finally admitted. “But like I said. You’ll be the first to hear.”

“When you figure it out?”

“When I figure it out.”

Ezra nodded. “That seems reasonable enough. And if you ever feel like you want to talk about whatever you’re figuring out—”

“I’ll know where to find you,” Anthony smiled apologetically.

“Good.” Ezra said with an almost satisfied nod. “And just for the record, I don’t mind if you want to call me ‘angel’. It’s just that no one’s ever bothered to give me a nickname before, is all. Especially one as ‘blasphemous’ as ‘angel’.”

“Well, like I said, it suits you. And you know I’m all about blasphemy according to your family, with my radical views on the world, what with that trans people should be able to transition, and same gender couples should be able to get married and whatnot.”

“Yes, well…” Ezra mumbled with a pout. He didn’t particularly like it when his family was brought up, especially when they’d been having fun before. He quickly changed the subject. “Anyway, it had me wondering what I should call you,” he tried. That ought to steer this conversation elsewhere.

Anthony chuckled and smiled his lopsided smirk. Ezra couldn’t help but gaze at his lips as he said, “I think I’ve told you upwards of a thousand times that you can just call me ‘Crowley’.”

Ezra’s cheeks heated up. He blinked hard and shook his head. “Well yes, but I don’t want to. That’s your family’s name, it’s not your name. I was thinking something more along the lines of—”

“Of?”

‘Handsome devil’, Ezra would have liked to have said in that moment, or ‘silver-tongued demon’, perhaps, but he quickly found that any such courage escaped him. He glanced away to the counter. “I forgot,” he lied, softly. “But I’m sure I’ll remember sooner or later. It’s a shame, though. It really suited you.”

Anthony smiled and hummed in amusement. “Sticking to ‘my dear’, then? For the time being?”

“I suppose so…” Ezra mumbled as he slid his magazine further under the counter. 

*

“Dearest ms. Device,” Ezra mumbled as he tapped the buttons on his cellphone repeatedly to get the letters he needed. It was the middle of the night, and as such, he lay curled up in his bed as he typed the electronic letter. The lights in Ezra’s room were still on, which bothered him, but the screen of his cell phone wasn’t backlit and had to be illuminated somehow. “It has come to my attention that your uncle Anthony has been behaving rather strangely as of late and I was hoping you could give me some insight into the situation, as he appears to be sending me rather mixed messages. One moment he’ll be borderline flirtatious with me and the next, he’ll be denying any such thing. It’s becoming rather frustrating, but I don’t know what to tell him. Thank you in advance. Yours sincerely, Ezra Fell.” 

He gave the string of three SMS messages another quick once-over before finally pressing the button to send them. Anathema was very wise for her age. Surely, she would know what to do. He put his cell phone down on his night stand and got up to turn off his lights when suddenly, his phone started buzzing frantically for what felt like an eternity. With shaking hands, he picked up the device and read its screen. “Ten new messages?!”

“He’s in love with you.”

“Like, head over heels.”

“I don’t think he knows how to tell you.”

“Or maybe he’s still in denial about it, tbh idk.”

“No wait fuck, he said he didn’t wanna ruin your friendship.”

“Obviously he loves you enough not to want to risk what you have.”

“While he definitely has trouble, you know, not acting on his feelings.”

“Which is kinda sweet but painful to watch.”

“But you didn’t hear that from me.”

“Love, Anathema.”

“Thank you,” he replied. Turned off the lights and his phone and crawled into his bed. “Obviously he loves you enough to not want to risk what you have…” Ezra sighed. Tears pricked behind his eyes. That wasn’t reassuring at all.