Chapter Text
The car pulled into the driveway of the decently large house, both it and the house itself seeming unfitting for the neighborhood in different ways. A middle-aged woman stepped out of the driver's seat, and Cosmos stepped out of the front shortly after. “This Habit fellow certainly has a way with landscaping,” Ms. Stargazer said, clearly impressed at the vast array of plantlife surrounding the property. “I guess he’s also the type of florist who takes his work home with him, isn’t he?”
Cosmos nodded, taking care to make sure their mask was covering the important parts. They loved Boris like a big goofy uncle (and by extension, Kamal and Putunia as a slightly more sensible uncle and an exuberant cousin), but his resurgent passion for horticulture did little to help their allergies, and their eyes were already watering something fierce. It was bad enough to have to deal with it at home. At least here they could get likely some proper medication for the symptoms.
The two of them made their way to the door and Ms. Stargazer rang the doorbell a couple times. Rapid footfalls approached from within, their simultaneous small yet heavy echoes signaling they belonged to an energetic child, and soon enough the door burst open. “Flower power!” Putunia shouted upon seeing Cosmos, nearly punching them in the knees with her new punching gloves as a greeting. Thankfully their senses hadn’t been dulled by hay fever quite yet and they were able to catch her punch in their hand fairly easily. “Wow, sidekick, you’re really good at deflecting attacks!” Putunia exclaimed. "You’ll have to teach me that!”
Cosmos smiled behind their mask. Figuring there hadn’t been enough time for her to learn enough sign for them to communicate properly yet (even if she was more patient with that sort of thing than they gave her credit for), they simply decided to ruffle her hair in a friendly manner until they could get out the magnet drawing pad they brought for this very reason.
“Putuniaaaa!” a voice called out from further in the house. Putunia turned back just as Kamal walked up behind her. “C’mon, Tunes, what’d we tell you about answering the door without one of us around?”
“I looked out the window!” Putunia protested. “I saw their hair!”
“Okay, at least you made sure to check.”
“Oh, so you’re one of Putunia’s fathers?” Ms. Stargazer asked. “Cosmos has a lot of good things to say about the both of you. So, are you Dr. Habit or Dr. Bora?”
Kamal let out a nervous laugh. Guess that little detail never quite reached the flower kid’s mom, huh, even with the whole new technically-business-rivals thing. “The latter,” he said, “but I usually leave the ‘doctor’ title at the office so you can just call me Kamal.” He held out a hand, which Ms. Stargazer shook with a friendly smile. “Boris is probably still around back tending to the bigger plants.”
As if on cue, Boris made his way around the house, dressed in his gardening attire and covered in soil. He was already in a fairly good mood, and when he saw Cosmos he beamed. “Hel-lo, flower child!” he exclaimed. "Your here earlie, I don't think any-one else has arrived yet.” He then noticed the woman at their doorstep. “Amd you must be Cosmos’s mother, am I correct? Its nice to ‘meet’ you!”
“It’s a real pleasure to finally meet you too!” Ms. Stargazer looked Boris up and down in kind of a state of awe, and while he was used to it due to The Obvious it still always felt weird. “Good gravy, Dr. Habit, when he told me you were tall he wasn’t kidding in the slightest!”
“He”? Did she mean Kamal? “Actulaly, Ime just Boris,” he said. “I would rather ‘not’ be called doctor any-more, miss...um...”
“Rosalyn, dear, since we’re all getting onto a first-name basis.” They shook hands as well, and as Cosmos made to start entering the house, Ms. Stargazer gently stopped them. “Wait, honey, don’t you want a hug at least?” Cosmos rolled their eyes, but hugged their mother anyway, taking a small bottle that she handed them in the meantime with an only barely visible grimace that reached their eyes. “Oh, I should say something before I go and Putunia’s other friends arrive,” Ms. Stargazer said. “I want to make sure you won’t allow any harassment, all right?”
Kamal and Boris shared a confused look. “I don't think there’s any worry about that, ma’am,” Kamal said. “The kids all seem to respect each other decently well for the most part.”
“I’m just covering the bases here,” Ms. Stargazer said, placing her hand on Cosmos’s shoulder in a protective manner. “I know how cruel kids can be sometimes to those different from them, I’ve had two of ‘em so I’ve seen plenty. If I find out anyone’s been teasing my boy because he likes to wear feminine clothes, I’m going to have some words with their parents. Cosmos may not be an adult yet, but he’s old enough to know how he wants to dress and I’m not going to curb his self-expression.” Every time the woman said “he” or “boy”, Cosmos tensed up in discomfort. It was subtle enough that their mom didn’t notice, but Boris absolutely did. How could he not? It was such a familiar reaction he himself had had several times in the past, and sometimes even now...
“We literally have a kid coming over who is obsessed with conspiracy theories and claims he’s a werewolf,” Kamal said. “I don’t think Cosmos wearing skirts even registers on the scale of strange with anyone here.”
“Be-sides, Cosmos is the oldest one of Putunia’s freinds,” Boris said. “They all look upp two...him. It will be some-what like...he’s helping us keep the younger ones in ‘check’ for the weak-end.” Referring to the flower child like that felt awful and wrong, and he could see the hurt in their eyes, but he had no way of knowing whether or not they’d told their mother yet so he didn’t want to risk outing them if they weren’t already. He could apologize later.
“Well then, if you’re absolutely sure he’ll be treated right, that’s at least somewhat reassuring.” Ms. Stargazer sighed in relief, then kissed Cosmos on their forehead and returned to her car. “See you Sunday night, sweetheart!” she called as she got into her vehicle. “Be good for Boris and Kamal, all right? Love you!” She waved, and Cosmos waved back, then she started her car and drove off.
With their mother gone, Cosmos seemed to relax a bit as they trudged inside. The first thing they did was toss that small bottle into the first trash can they came across. There was a clink sound that suggested that it might’ve sustained a crack or outright break, but they weren’t paying it any mind. The house’s occupants entered soon after them, and once they’d gotten their mask partially removed Cosmos waved fervently to get the attention of the adults. “Do you have allergy medicine?”
“Oh, of-coarse, I think we do,” Boris said. He nudged Kamal gently. “Could you go ‘check’, calla lily?” he asked. “Ime still messie from gardening.”
“Yeah, sure thing,” Kamal said with a nod. He made his way to the upstairs bathroom, despite the downstairs one being closer. There was something about that earlier interaction with the mom that felt weird, and he got the feeling Boris wanted to have a moment to talk about it with Cosmos between just the two of them.
Which was exactly the case. Boris put a gentle hand on Cosmos’s shoulder (soil-covered garden gloves be damned) and gave them a smile of reassurance. “Ime sorry I used the wrong words four you,” Boris said. “Can I ask you some-thing?” Cosmos nodded. “Are you...‘out’ to your mother? Ab-out being non-binarey?”
Cosmos nodded again. “Told her at least three times. She doesn’t get it, or won’t get it. Is that why you called me ‘he’ too?”
Boris sighed. “Yes, I was worreyed I mite make things un-pleasant,” he said. “I know all two well about this sort of thing myself...”
“You’re good. Mom’s just kinda stupid.”
Cosmos offered a friendly hug, but Boris shook his head. “No, Cos-mos, I was’nt joke-ing about haveing garden mess on me,” he chuckled. “You can ‘see’ all this dirtt and the plant bits, yes? Oh, I got some on yuor jacket, I’m sorrey...”
They shrugged, brushing off the slight soil residue without much concern. They then held out their hand for a high-five instead, and since they were also wearing gloves (fingerless, but gloves nonetheless), Boris figured that was okay in terms of mess-making and obliged. Kamal soon returned with a small bottle of antihistamines, which Cosmos accepted gratefully, grabbing a drink and popping a couple of the little pink pills into their mouth. “Tend to get sleepy with these, fair warning. Better than sneezing my brains out and super watery eyes at least.”
“Yeah, that’s definitely preferable.”
-----
The other kids had arrived soon enough, and after some shenanigans (and Trevor getting lots of much-needed loveys from his old friend Webster), they had all agreed to get started on the game of this weekend. It had become a kind of tradition at this point for all the Habitat kids to gather and play through an entire video game together, passing off the controller to one another after a certain amount of time if it was a single player experience. This time had been Nat’s turn to pick, and she’d brought her copy of Final Fantasy 3 for them to try to finish from the last time she’d picked. Though at the rate they were going, this game might still end up taking the entire weekend to finish instead of just the evening.
“Aw, NO, come on!” Trevor shouted as the violet tentacled beast they were fighting used abilities called Haste and Protect. “Ultros you piece of garbage, he did this last time we tried this fight too!”
“That might just be a thing he does after a certain amount of damage," Nat said. “At least in this fight, anyway. I haven’t gotten this far in my personal file yet.”
Cosmos, who was currently the one holding the controller, nodded in a bit of a daze. Just as they’d figured, the antihistamines were really taking a toll on their ability to concentrate. It was a good thing they’d all decided to set the battle system to “wait” for the benefit of the younger ones in their group, otherwise they probably wouldn't be getting anywhere.
“Just burn him,” Tim Tam said as they reached for the bag of chips that was closest to them. “Weakness.”
“No, wait—”
They just followed the suggestion without thinking, having one of the magic-using characters use a fire spell on the beast. As soon as it hit, Ultros countered with a higher level fire spell of his own. After that, the battle basically went downhill. Try as they might, they couldn’t keep up with the onslaught via either healing the party or just trying to deal damage to their opponent as fast as possible, and soon enough the group experienced their second game over in a row. “Maaan, we’re never gonna kick that clown’s ass,” Millie groaned.
“I heard that, Millie!” Kamal called from the other room.
“Yeah, and I'll say it again!” Millie shouted back. “Kick! That! Clown’s! ASS!!!”
“We can try again though, right?” Putunia asked. “We can’t give up!”
“Eh, I’m gettin’ hungry,” Gerry said. “Didn’t Mister Habit says they waz orderin’ pizza?”
“Yeah, maybe we should put the game on hold for now,” Nat said. “We can come back to it after we’ve had some time to cool off from this.” She put a hand on Cosmos’s shoulder. “You doin’ okay, Cosmos?” she asked. “You’ve seemed a bit out of it since I got here, and it looks like it’s gotten worse...”
Cosmos nodded, grabbing the doodle pad they had set on the coffee table in front of them. “i’ll be fine its the benedryl – cant remember spelling”
“All right, guess as long as you know how it works on you—” Her statement was interrupted by a very large and very lovey floofmonster making his presence known by jumping up onto the couch and onto her. “Get off, you dumb dog!” Nat shouted. “If you want pets, you sit on the floor and wait for ‘em!”
“Webster, sit!” Trevor exclaimed. Webster turned his head to face his former honorary owner and, rather than sitting as he was instructed, crawled over both Nat and Cosmos for some lovin’. “Noooo, I said ‘sit’, not ‘here’! Aaaaaa!! I love you but you’re killing meeee!!” He couldn’t help but laugh as over 200 pounds of dog snuggled onto him and repeatedly licked his face.
The other kids weren’t doing anything to help with this goofballery, mainly because they likely wouldn’t be able to, and the ones who could were also trapped under Webster’s back half. With an amused sigh as the two of them observed from the kitchen, Boris passed off the pizza-ordering duty to Kamal and made his way in to try and free them. “Websteeeer!” he called in a melodic tone. “Whose a goode boooy? Who wamts a chewiiiieeee??” Webster perked up upon hearing the name of one of his favorite not-food-or-people things and also seeing the toy bone in question in his larger dad’s hand. He leapt off the couch and bounded toward the kitchen in eager excitement.
Just before he got to the kitchen, however, he stopped dead in his tracks. He let out a low whimper and danced about in place, but something was stopping him from going any further. “Whats ‘wrong’ buddie?” Boris asked. “Don’t yuo want your chewie?” Webster borked, but still refused come any closer. Boris shrugged and decided to meet him half-way. He made his way to the entrance of the kitchen and Webster took it enthusiastically and walked away to enjoy it on his bed. “Hmm, wonder what that was ab-out.”
“Did you smell something weird, boy?” Putunia asked the giant dog, who obviously didn’t answer due to both enjoying his toy and just generally not having that capability.
“Some-thing wierb, huh...” Boris looked around, but the only thing that was in that spot that could have any weird smells was the garbage can, and he’d emptied it about an hour before the kids started arriving because they knew there would likely be a lot of trash given that there would be six more people in the house over the weekend. Still, it couldn’t hurt to check. He leaned over the practically empty can, containing little more than a few snack wrappers at this point, and took a whiff. Immediately he was hit by a rather strong floral smell, not something that he would find unpleasant, but its unexpected potency was still surprising. “Hey, Kamal?”
“Yeah, what’s up?” Kamal asked, putting a hand over the phone receiver so the pizza place didn’t have to hear whatever was going on.
“Did you spray the garbidge can with some-thing when we changed it?”
“Uh...no? Because Cosmos is here?”
“Verie strange...” Well, all that was in there were the snack wrappers, so Boris wasn’t too put off by the thought of reaching in to find out what the source of that smell was. He carefully dug through the wrappers and underneath was a small bottle, reminding him of the bottle that Cosmos had thrown away earlier. It probably was the same bottle, now that he was thinking about it. He picked it up and tentatively sniffed it, getting a faceful of concentrated floral smell in the process through the slightly loosened seal. “Hoo boy!” he exclaimed. “Yup, found-it!” He squinted and did his best to read the tiny label. “Lavendar essenshal oil, huh?” Boris mused, more to himself than anyone in particular. “Wonder why this is heere...”
Upon hearing those words, Cosmos cringed a bit, then hesitantly got off the couch and approached him with a sheepish look on their face. “Mom gave that to me. She’s wrapped up in some phony ‘business’ and replaced nearly all our medicine with that junk and I hate it.”
Boris raised an eyebrow, the pieces of what they were telling her fitting together in his head to create an unpleasant picture. “Wait a minute,” he said. “So your saying that you’re Mother, who should ‘know’ about your con-dition, makes you use things that you are Allergic To?” Cosmos nodded, and Boris’s eyes narrowed. He’d already had to deal with abusive parents twice, both his own and the ones who’d initially made Putunia before he and Kamal were able to get her away from them. He couldn’t bear the thought that Cosmos had been a victim of abuse themself, of Ms. Stargazer’s willful neglect. Or...was it willful neglect? Did she really know what she was doing?
“Don’t worry about it too much.” Cosmos gave him a weak smile. “I said earlier Mom’s just stupid. Holly gets me real medicine whenever she can so I don’t have to use that stuff when she isn’t watching.” They saw Boris give them a weird look and quickly added, “My older sister, she’s in college.”
“O-kay, if youre sure it’s ‘fine’...” Boris eyed the little oil bottle in his hand with concern. “I should get rid of thise for your sake, and al-so to keep it out of reach of Webster,” he said. “I’ll put it in the out-side trash instead, would that work?” Cosmos nodded, albeit with a shrug. Boris smiled and, taking no chances, put the bottle into three layered plastic bags before taking it outside.
-----
It was later in the evening, pizza and soda and cheesy breadsticks had been thoroughly enjoyed, and the younger kids had already been sent to bed. “Sent to bed” being used in the loosest sense of the term possible because a) no one was actually sleeping in beds proper tonight except for the adults, and b) it was kind of hard to encourage children to go to sleep in a party atmosphere even without the three teenagers present being allowed to stay up later than them. Not too much later, of course. Boris’s “strict beddy-time” from the days of the Habitat may not have been as heavily enforced here, and he definitely wasn’t making anyone sit through creepy videos as punishment for breaking curfew, but he still encouraged them to go to bed at a reasonable hour.
A reasonable hour, of course, was next to impossible for teenagers to define. Doubly so when one of them was half-vampire and the other believed himself to be a werewolf (if he wasn’t actually one, no one had any proof to concretely deny that possibility) even without having legitimate sleeping issues. And as the drowsiness brought on by the antihistamines they’d taken earlier had already started to wear off, the one confirmed normal human of the three teens was having trouble bringing themself to commit to bedtime as well.
Cosmos looked up at the clock on the wall. It was somewhere between 11:25 and 11:30 at this point (they never could pinpoint anything smaller on analog clocks besides every five minutes, having gotten much too used to digital clocks). The memory of a video featuring a darkened street and a deep, heavily-accented voice narrating ominously over the scene flickered into their mind. They shook their head, trying to get the imagery out of their thoughts. He had changed. He didn’t pull that crap anymore.
“You going to bed soon?” Cosmos turned to see Trevor, clearly exhausted and rubbing his tired eyes. They nodded, though even he could tell something was up. “You have trouble sleeping too, huh?” he asked, receiving another nod as a response. “It’s not evil vampires, is it? Or are you worried about Sabastian coming out when we’re all asleep?! Because I can personally guarantee that he sleeps when I sleep.”
They couldn’t help but smile as they silently laughed, but regardless they shook their head. “I just had those bedtime PSAs stuck in my—” Cosmos facepalmed, remembering that Trevor probably still didn’t know very much sign, then chose instead to mimic writing on their hand with their finger.
“Oh yeah, you need the thing, hang on a sec.” Trevor made his way carefully to the coffee table, trying not to step on the children in sleeping bags who were either sleeping or merely pretending so they wouldn’t get in trouble, then grabbed Cosmos’s doodle pad and did his best to return with the same level of care. He stepped on something soft at some point and nearly yelled out himself out of shock, but no one seemed to react so he guessed he hadn’t actually stepped on anyone’s arm or leg or face or whatever. “Here you go,” he said as he handed the pad to its owner. “So what’s the problem?”
“you ever get shown one of those weird bedtime psas back at the habitat?”
Trevor nodded. “Almost every night,” he said. “I’ve always had problems sleeping, so I just never bothered trying to get to bed on time.”
“my brains bringin em back and i cant make them go away :C”
“Oh.” Trevor thought for a bit, then led Cosmos over to where Webster was sleeping. “Webster would always be there when I used to take night walks, at least until he disappeared,” he said. “Maybe he can help you too?” Cosmos motioned to the large sleeping dog in an “are you serious” manner, but Trevor just smiled. “I know, I know, you’ve seen him in rowdy mode. But he’s really chill a lot of the time. He’ll totally let you sleep on him.”
Cosmos gave him a look, but shrugged, figuring it was worth a shot. They sat down beside Webster, then laid down and put their head on his fluffy midsection. His fur was incredibly soft. Boris and Kamal must’ve been using the really good shampoo with him. They thanked their lucky stars in that moment that their allergies didn’t include animal dander. Webster let out a little grunt, and for a moment they were afraid they’d woken him up, but all that happened was that he shifted a little bit before falling back asleep.
And soon enough, their anxiety over old mental images having begun to melt away, Cosmos followed suit.