Dear Diary,

Y'know how last Friday I bitched about wanting my old Fridays back? Yeah, fuck life. It gives me my old Fridays back when the best part of them is deployed to go-fuck-yourself-istan.

So after binging on pie and cake and turkey and ham all day yesterday, I collapsed into bed and fell directly the fuck asleep the moment my head hit the pillow. Thankfully with Saffron gone, Marie's decided to sleep over pretty much every night, and she's way better at getting Insomi to sleep than I am. At any rate, head hit pillow, I fell asleep, and I lay there all night trying to focus on my psychedelic tadpoles rather than the itchy shit going on across my left side. Weird thing, the whole sensation from the tadpoles reminded me of something, but despite trying to remember all night, no joy. Well before false dawn lit the sky in the east, an entirely different sensation woke me up.

I opened one eye to see the menace looking back up at me, trying to get her nom on. I shook my head, sighed, and Mimicked Saffron. "You know, Menace, at some point we're gonna have to teach you about personal space. Maybe after you're done nursing. Which ought to be done soon, right?" She gave me such a horrified look that the nipple dropped out of her mouth. I ruffled her hair and snuggled her. "Chill, Menace. I mean 'soon' like 'in a couple months', not like, 'before the week is over'." She let out the cutest little sigh of relief, then went back to her morning nom.

Yeah, it's still kinda weird, but I'm getting used to the weirdness of it. The closeness of it required zero getting used to; somehow it really drove home the whole 'I'm a Mom now' thing. Well, okay, according to the offspring in question, I'm Momma, but still, you get my point.

So after we lay there a while with her getting her nom on and me getting my mom on, I shifted us both to the floor and cuddled up with Marie. She rooched around to surround both of us and went back to sleep for a bit. Dunno how long I lay there like that, but eventually she stretched, yawned, and got up to get dressed. I detached Isnomi and did the same. By the time Marie and I had ourselves presentable, the menace had her uniform ready for tying and buttoning. We made much of her big-girl-ness and then I sent her on her way with Marie for the day.

I trudged my way down to breakfast. Leftover turkey and pies. Like, somebody failed to eat turkey yesterday. Shame on them. I did my part to rid the world of leftovers, then wandered up to Remedial Celtic. Lyman met me at the door, and we went in and got started showing Sister Cheryl how I now had the mad Celtic writing skillz to write up an entire enlistment contract by hand.

"That's fantastic, Tabitha!" After a moment of me sitting there silently, she frowned and asked, "you don't seem pleased by your progress?"

I couldn't bring myself to reply, so I turned to Lyman. "I think Tabitha has something else on her mind. Or, rather, someone."

She frowned, "you mean the two of you...?"

He chuckled, "we've never really been an item, Sister. Our relationship has grown from the merely professional to something closer to friendship, but I think both of us find the idea of a romantic relationship unpleasant. Not to mention that we both have spouses we adore."

"Spouses? But you're so young!"

"I'm older than I look. Sometimes I think our Tabitha is even older still, somewhere deep inside. Still, entirely aside from that, the heart goes where it wills."

She waved her hands around, clearly distressed by the idea that two of her Remedial students were wed, and not to each other. "But... married so young! How will you deal with the inevitable challenges of married life?"

Loki barked out a laugh. "As I said, I'm older than I look, and I've been wed longer than you'd believe. This is actually my third marriage, and it might have been my third divorce, had Tabitha not stepped in and acted to smooth over our troubles, remind my wife and I who we were, and why we were together."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Wasn't I the cause of those troubles?

Oh, hush. She need not know that.

Sister Cheryl just stared at me, slack-jawed. "Really? Tabitha?"

I forced something akin to a smile onto my face. "Yeah. I'm apparently not quite as clueless as I seem. Who knew?"

I knew, dear Tabitha.

Careful Boss, you might get in trouble with Sigyn again.

I assure you, I have no intent to disrupt either of our wedded blisses.

Yeah, but I'm all alone and melancholic and shit. Who the fuck knows what I'll do next? Or who?

Loki just rolled his eyes at me and turned to the Sister. "If you're satisfied with Tabitha's progress to this point, we'll be on our way to continue said progress?"

"Oh, yes, certainly. Carry on!"

Not a lot of point with Saffron gone, Boss.

Loki just gathered up my primer, then helped me to my feet. Trust your Patron, my Tabitha. I can fill in for her as needed.

As we left the room, I draped myself over his arm. Like, mostly because depression had hit me hard enough I wanted the help staying upright, but you know me; never do just one thing for one reason when you can add some shit-dickery to the mix.

Like living dangerously, don't you, Boss?

He just twisted his arm through some kind of contortion I couldn't follow, one that left me tucked under his arm and snuggled up against him. He guided me back to my lonely cell, rubbing at my shoulder now and again when I started to slump. We got to my cell and stepped through the door into his cave.

He disappeared between one step and the next, and I collapsed onto Sigyn. Okay, I kinda faceplanted directly into her cleavage.

"Tabitha! What's wrong?"

From where he lay propped up on his bed of stone, staring at Sigyn's backside, Loki groaned out, "I think she's missing her wife."

"What happened to Saffron?"

"She shipped out Tuesday." I muttered directly into Sigyn's sternum. Warm breasts encompassed my cheeks. I nuzzled in, my arms going around her.

"Priestess Diaz, I am a happily married Goddess, and I'm not really into women in any case."

"So's spaghetti, until it gets wet." I murmured into her cleavage, chuckling at my own joke.

Loki managed to groan out, "methinks our Tabitha is far more affected by the temporary absence of her wife than either of us realized before I brought her here. If you could restrain her for the moment?"

Sigyn's outfit, which she'd modified to be even more stripperific since she got the boots, had totally distracted me from the whole 'Norse Goddess of Victory' thing she had going on. Despite my best efforts to engage in motorboating, she gently but firmly turned my head to the side, then pressed me to her. Enforced hug is still hug. I kinda melted a little bit.

"Seegee!" the Menace's squeal of joy melted me a lot more, and when she used me as a ladder to climb up and join our cuddling, I lost any semblance of self-control. I broke down crying, and she gently tugged me over to sit on the edge of Loki's bed.

"Sorry, beloved, but we'll have to finish later. Rules are rules."

I heard the smile in his voice when he said, "of course, my dearest one. I knew that when I brought them here."

I couldn't see his face, or even open my mouth to say anything, because the moment I turned my head I got a face full of black wool and lace, and Marie's subsonic purr vibrated the stone.

They held me there like that for I don't know how long. I'd kind of gotten the idea that time passes oddly in Loki's cave. A few minutes can seem like an eternity, and a day can pass in the blink of an eye. I cried. I laughed with more than a little hysteria in it. I laughed a lot more naturally at Isnomi's antics with Mister Slither. I even fell asleep a few times. Marie and Sigyn never let go of me, never let me out of that warm, comforting embrace.

Some time way later, Saffron's voice filled my head, where have you and our little Menace run off to, Goof?

Loki's

Then she was there. I lunged out of the cuddle pile and glomped onto her. Okay, I didn't so much 'lunge out' of the cuddle pile as 'drag all three of them with me'. We almost wound up in a pile on the floor, but between Sigyn and Marie they managed to turn our tumble into a flop back onto the bed.

"Tabitha, what's wrong?"

I couldn't speak, I just snuffled into her chest while squeezing her to me.

"She's not dealing well with your absence, it seems."

Thanks, Boss.

"Oh, sweet heart, you know I had no choice in this. Were it my choice, we would live out the rest of our lives in a little cottage by the sea, never leaving save to wander the shore together."

"I think I may have abandonment issues." I mumbled into her jacket.

"No, really?" She softened her words by putting her arms around my head and pulling me to her.

"Please don't go."

"You know I can't stay long, love, no matter how I yearn to."

I didn't quite catch what Sigyn said, but a moment later all three of them straight up power-glomped me. I couldn't see, couldn't move, could barely breathe. I drowned in a sea of warm, comforting darkness. Within minutes I drifted off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

I woke back in our cell, surrounded by Marie, covered by Menace and blankets.