The Park on Sunday morning - picnic.

[hernando_fuentes]

The puddle of children had woken in the morning and asked to go to the park. After feeding them - and shooing the teenager out of his kitchen so he could have the privilege of making breakfast - Hernando walked them all to the park.

The children knew the way and it wasn't that Hernando was any sort of helicopter parent except yes, perhaps today a little bit, he was. Sparkle was making a quick dash into town to put a 'closed today on account of children' sign on the door of his store but planned to join them later.

Hernando had packed an entire antique picnic basket full of food and snacks and put Quinn to work hauling a rolling cooler behind them. The children had acted as if this were a usual thing and that made Hernando smile a bit. Abney was wearing the folded picnic blanket as a superhero cape and was running ahead with her arms out, making zooming plane noises.

There was way more food than the children would need, even if one was a growing teenager. To his rueful chagrin, Hernando found that the store had decided to help when he spread the blanket out and began to unpack. The basket never seemed to empty. He set out only enough plates of sandwiches and baskets of fruit for the moment and let the children go run. There were thermoses of tea and sodas and waters in the cooler as well.

Once free of her superhero cape, Abney lead the way to the playground and commenced burning off the energy. Quinn was more interested in reading a book but he, too, occasionally joined his sister in playing.

[Open park with picnic food! Come let the kids play together!]

Comments

[usual_suspects]

"Hi!" Marshan smiled just a little shyly at all the talk. "I'm new, I think? What are you playing?"

[forever_family]

"New is fun," Abney said, "The island is pretty weird when your new, though. I was just playing on the swings. They're fun. Do they have swings where you're from? Some places don't. I can explain it if you're from a don't-place. It's easy!"

[usual_suspects]

Marshan looked where Abney was headed and shook her head. "Not like that. Show me?"

[forever_family]

"I can do that!" Abney chirped, darting over and hopping her butt into one of the swings. "You sit like this and you hold the chains. Gotta hold 'em all the time cuz otherwise you can fall and that's an ouch you don't want."

She pushed herself back, leaning back to full arm extension so her hair brushed the playground substrate and her legs straight out in front, then bent both her elbows and her knees and leaned upright and forward enough to get a good start. "You do this to start, or if you need it, Quinn can give you a push."

Quinn heard this and gave the little blue girl a small wave and a nod.

"Then you keep using your arms and legs to swing, like this. Kick out and lean back to go forward, then kick 'em back and lean forward to go back."

[usual_suspects]

Marshan watched was she was doing, waved back to Quinn, then hopped up into a swing herself. She could use the Force to help a little, so she got herself going, then grinned as she followed Abney's directions. This was fun!

[forever_family]

"Swings are pretty great," Abney confided, "It's almost like flying, I think. You're doing really good for your first time at swings! What's your name? I'm Abney, that's my brother Quinn. That's my Papa over there with the beard and the glasses. My other Dada's off on an errand but he'll be here soon."

She gave an epic eyeroll, "He'll be the one who kisses Papa. Kissing's gross but it makes them happy so I don't mind it so much."

[usual_suspects]

"I'm Marshan," she answered. "My mommy and daddy kiss a lot, too. Grownups are silly."

[forever_family]

"They are," Abney agreed with the authority of children everywhere. "Sometimes it's pretty good, when it's silly in a neat way. Mostly it's embarrassing, like when they get all gooshy at one another. Or when they make rules like you can only have one dessert when really you are pretty sure you could eat three without a belly ache."

[usual_suspects]

"Or 'shade stalkers aren't pets'," Marshan complained, "when you have a tame one!"

[forever_family]

"What's a shade stalker?" Abney asked curiously, "I've never heard of one but that sounds neat! And you have a tame one? All for yourself? Back home, I have a cat but I have to share her with Quinn."

[usual_suspects]

"I did, but only for a day," Marshan grumped. "Then they made me put him back outside. They're nifty! They have scales, and glowy eyes, and they're all spiky, but the little ones are cute, and they follow you around!"

[forever_family]

"Oooh," Abney said with understanding, "Yeah, outside animals. Parents have a real big thing about those. I wanted to keep an Alot once and both my parents had kind of a fit. It was a little one! Your shade stalker sounds really neat! Are their eyes red like yours? That's really pretty. It'd be neat to have one that matched, huh?"

[usual_suspects]

Marshan shook her head. "Their eyes are white. But one that matched would be cool. I don't know if there's any animals with red glowy eyes, though."

[forever_family]

"None where we're from, but that's here, so.. none here," Abney put together after chasing that line of thought around, "Sometimes varren have red glowing eyes. I don't get to have one of those neither, they're too big a carnivore for this island so I only get to play with them when we go to Tuchanka. It's only like once a year."

[usual_suspects]

"Oo, what's a varren?" Marshan asked. "We've got a whole planet for one!" She swept her arms out wide.

[forever_family]

"It's.. uh.. " Abney frowned, trying to describe it, "It's big and has scales and spines and really big teeths and their eyes glow and some of them are biotic.. Oh! Are you from somewhere with Akk dogs? Do you know what those are?"

[usual_suspects]

Marshan perked up. "Yes! One of the Sith back home has an akk dog. She's really pretty. Is that what a varren's like?"

[forever_family]

Abney perked up too, hey, common ground! "Yes! They're spikier and they have bigger teeth and they're bigger but they look almost the same other than that! Some of them are wild and some were treated mean by people who owned them but if you treat 'em nice, they're really good pets! My Aunt Jack has two and Uncle Urdnot has like fifty cuz he has his own pack of 'em!"

[usual_suspects]

"Fifty?" Marshan's eyes got big.

[forever_family]

"Maybe not quite so many," Abney admitted, "It's hard to count 'em though, they don't stop moving much. There's lots, though!"

[usual_suspects]

"That sounds amazing," Marshan said wistfully. "And you have a cat? Is it like a tooka or a nexu?"

[forever_family]

"No," Abney pouted a little, "Dada says we can't bring any of those here because the environment's not right for them on the island. We have an Earth cat. They're kind of like tooka, only their heads are way smaller and they're fur all over and they have paws instead of ickle chicken feets. They're really soft. You haven't seen one? There's some at the shelter. We can get Papa to take us later if you want? Has to be Papa. Dada's not allowed in there with his wallet. It's a rule."

[usual_suspects]

"Oh! I've seen Earth cats," Marshan said, nodding. "We could go see them, though! I like animals."

[forever_family]

"I'll see if Papa will take us over after the picnic," Abney said with a grin, "You'll like the kitties there. They also have puppies and they let you play with 'em! I like animals too but we can only have the one cat for now. She only likes people, not other cats and she's scared of dogs. She likes the quokka ok, they snuggle but don't try to play with her. She's old."

[usual_suspects]

"Some of the folks at home have akk dogs, and one of Daddy's friends has a tuk'ata, but mostly there's not a lot of animals at home," Marshan said. "What's a quokka?"