Of Soap and Sailors
“Mommy! Mommy!” Riya's voice cut through the quiet afternoon air as Wamii found herself being half tackled by her son. The yellow skinned female blinked, scratching her oddly shaped hair, “Yes, Riya? What is it?”
The boy speaking – a slender blonde with light skin and a metal faceplate on his cheek – looked frantic before pouting a bit, alerting the goddess that this was, in fact, one of those childish squabbles that'd need dealing with, “Steve was saying bad words! And he made the bad hand thing at me because I told him he looked pretty in glitter.”
Wamii's eyebrows hit her hairline. Bad words? Oh no! Where she came from, bad words had meant curses or evil spells but here they always seemed to mean rude or vulgar phrases. She didn't want any of those things coming out of her children's mouths! Or hands! This had to stop! And she'd heard about just the way to stop it!
Heading into Steve's room with her hands on her hips, the girl gave her eldest son a patented very-stern-mama-look. The dark haired boy glanced up from the magazine he was huffily reading and quite suddenly wished he had locked the door when Riya left. Ever defiant, however, the boy leveled a glare at his mother in response, “Yeah, what?”
Stomping her foot, the girl spoke, “Riya tells me you've been saying bad words and making rude gestures – is this true?” she tried very hard to not waver or seem infirm about her decisions but it was hard. Steve was her baby! And he was a good boy most of the time! She didn't want to punish him!
The dark haired boy glared at her, “Maybe. What's it to you?” he demanded, also trying not to waver. This was his MOM after all! Usually Steve cursed by accident or made the rude gestures since he really didn't want to hurt his siblings to express his anger, but getting questioned about it made the boy feel all nervous and weird. He shouldn't feel bad about this! He was the good boy – the responsible one! He should have the right to say what he wanted!
“He swears like a sailor.” Nolan commented, walking past the room in time for the discussion. Damn know-it-all mothers, Steve thought with a glare at her. Nolan was a much more lax parent than Wamii but he still didn't want to have to deal with two of his mothers at once.
Wamii's purple eyes narrowed and she stalked forward to take hold of the boy's arm. Boris and Natasha began to wriggle in shock and amazement, the pair having been napping on the spawn's stomach prior to this. What was going on? Steve's eyes widened in shock as he was forcibly dragged to the bathroom – what was this? And when had Mommy gotten so strong?
Immediately, Wamii picked up the bar of soap and began to soak it to wash the hand dirt off and get it good and slippy. She promptly shoved it in his mouth before taking a ruler and lightly whapping each of Steve's hands and his tentacles for good measure. This left the boy and his appendages very bewildered, confused, upset and well, very grossed out. Soap was NASTY! It was removed from his mouth after a moment by his mother who let him wash the taste away, but she was glaring sternly.
“You are NEVER, EVER to curse or use those gestures again, do you hear me Steve?” she demanded coldly, leaving the boy staring at her awkwardly, his lip quivering as he washed the water. “That was your warning – I'll really wash your mouth out with soap and really ruler you.” she said and immediately left to keep her son from seeing how nervous and shaky she was after having done that – Wamii was NOT a stern parent.
The dark haired boy sat in the room for a few moments before sliding down the sink and clutching his knees to his chest. That had been way unexpected – Mommy wasn't the yell and punishing kind, she was the give hugs and cuddles kind. It was scary not being asked where he'd learned the words and merely punished for their use. Steve knew his mother wasn't exactly very used to the whole parenting schtick but this was still scary. Biting his lip, the boy tried very hard not to burst into tears – he wasn't going to do that, not here and not over this! Almost instantly he let his lip go and gave a sour look, realizing too late it still tasted of soap. Well, he was definitely watching his mouth from now on, that was for sure.
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