Dear Diary,

"Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated."

- Confucius

I dunno, man. I've said it before, I'm a simple woman. I like life simple. Food? Eat. Kid? Play. Wife? Fuck. If that were my life twenty four seven, three sixty five, for the rest of my life, I'm pretty sure I'd be fine with it. Okay, no, now that I think about it, I'd probably get bored. It might take a really fuckin' long time, especially with the sheer variety available within those simple directives. I mean, shit, Marie's cooking is both awesome and ever evolving. One of my wives has thousands of years of fucking experience, and the other is a shapeshifter, as am I, and all three of us are capable of being in more than one place at a time. As for the kids, not only do we have six of the little buggers now, but we've got three functional uteri, that whole 'shapeshifting' thing means we don't need anybody else to bake up more any time we feel the urge. I have strong suspicions we will more than double that number before we're done, which is just wacky to me, coming from a world where people got side eye from having four kids, and wound up the butt of jokes if they had more than that.

Here and now I don't know quite how to feel about that. Like, back in Eastside, nobody needed a million kids. Hell, nobody needed kids, really, and if somebody had kids so they wouldn't die alone, given that there are so many kids out there in foster care and shit that would love somebody to love them just for, y'know, existing, I gotta throw some shade their direction. Eh, I dunno if my reasons are any better. I mean, I wanna have kids because I love doing the 'taking care of kids' stuff, and we've already adopted five, and I don't think we're gonna stop adopting and shit, but I wanna see a fuzzy face with my here and now nose and eyes and shit, or see an itty bitty Saffron scale me, or better yet a me scale Saffron. Something like that. Just... y'know, I wanna make kids with them. Don't fuckin' judge me, at least I want to have kids because I like having them, not to use them as little playthings and shit.

Fuck, do any of us really do anything for any other reason than 'the fucked up programming I was born with told me to'? I dunno. But I figure 'this will make people happy' and 'this will make sure everybody has enough to eat and a roof and clothes and shit' are better than 'for the greater Glory of my big cock'. Fuckin' Zeus, man. Hell, at least Zeus, from all that I've heard, actually has a schlong that would impress an elephant, unlike his fuckin' son Ares, who is practically the definition of 'overcompensating toxic rage'.

But yeah, life gets complicated sometimes. Last night after the post-dinner birthday cheesecake, I got to open presents. Before any of the other presents, I gave Conrad a big old hug for his, telling him how perfect it was, without saying anything about exactly what it was. The ROTC crowd rolled with that. Sigyn and Loki looked maybe a little disturbed, but chose not to comment. Then I got to tear into the packages and bags. Despite what Saffron said, I did not wind up playing with the first gift for hours. Not with any of them, really. That has nothing to do with the fact that none of them were actually, y'know, toys. Not even like fidget toys.

Most of the gifts were really practical shit. Socks. I got socks. I got cute black ankle socks that matched nothing I owned, but were adorable, and I thanked Carruthers with a maybe a little bit overzealous kiss, but nobody did anything but laugh and clap and maybe congratulate the poor dumb bastard on his gift giving skills. I also got a rock. Okay, technically a 'hearthstone' cut from the foundations of Lancaster House itself, which I totally get is multiple kinds of huge deal, but... I still got a fuckin' rock from the richest guy in my friend group. Bonnie got me a bolt of silk fabric, like a big one. When I gave her the same fairly chaste hug I gave Larry for the rock, she whispered, "I didn't know your sizes, but she does," with a nod toward Marie.

Angel got me a chunky ring. Not gold or silver; brass I think, maybe bronze. Saffron told me later it's supposed to be a signet. That tracks, although the symbol's pretty simple. Just three jagged lines across a blank background. Looks pretty cool, and when I kinda gave her a questioning look. she reached out and touched the scars on my right hand, then half whispered, "something we have in common."

I pulled her in for a hug, and whispered, "you sure we're good? Don't need to take a few swings at me?"

She laughed and held me at arms length after. "Nah. We're good. How many people actually have scars from this." When I tilted my head she said, "you gotta live to get scars."

Most of the other stuff was like that. Little knickknacks that were either practical or personal, sometimes both. Lots of little craft stuff from the kids. Even a couple shiny rocks, which I loved. I mean, yeah, silk clothes, awesome, hearthstone from the foundations, cool, but for a kid, a shiny rock is like, ultimate treasure, and they gave them to me. That shit's going somewhere special in the new house, but for now it's going in one of the shelves in the New Bed, because I've got no place else to put it.

The only other one that stood out was Raven's. She'd done another painting. This one of me. I felt some kinda way that where Saffron's pic had obvious imagery hinting at me, Marie, and even Mimic, this one was just me. Not even me in The Dress and her boots, but me in a ragged uniform, crossbow bolts sticking out of my legs, one glowing blue one dangling from my arm. I had Slayer in one hand, his blade not intact by any means, but still a single length of steel rather than a nub. Behind me the Dragon's head filled the painting, gore leaking out between two teeth that had cracked apart like it had tried to bite through something harder than its teeth. Along with looking like I'd had the shit kicked out of me, I looked... I dunno. Tired? Satisfied? Maybe a little bit smug, if I looked at it right? I guess the kind of look I'd expect to have if I'd just cleaned up the house, because I sure as shit didn't look the same kind of 'tired and satisfied' I'd looked earlier in Saffron Rae's breakfast nook.

Everybody else thought it looked amazing. Something about 'capturing my essence'. I gotta say, it looked like here and now me, like almost photo quality, but better, like some kind of movie promo poster. When I gave Raven a hug that felt a little obligatory for both of us, since she'd held out a hand to shake, and I was cool with that, but everybody else in the room looked some kinda way about it, she whispered, "when is your Maenad's birthday?"

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"I'll find out." I whispered back. Then we pulled away and did the handshake we'd been planning on.

After presents, after everybody went home, after we had the kids in bed, I got the final present of the day, the after-birthday celebratory cheesecake. Before I got that, though, Marie handed me one final box to tear open. When I did, the top layer was a nice pair of black gym shorts. The basketball player kind that hangs down to near the knees, all loose and floppy and light and airy. No elastic, I'm guessing because rubber isn't really a thing here and now, not that I've seen, but the waistband had a drawstring sewn in, and it's not like I don't have hips. Right below that was a basketball jersey. At that point I wasn't quite sure how to respond, but I thought it was kinda cool to have a white jersey with my name on the back and 'Alliance' on the front. It took me about three seconds to puzzle out why they'd decided on eighty-one as the number.

There was more in the box, but Saffron said, "close your eyes." Ever the obedient wife, I did as she said, and listened to rustling and giggling, trying to ignore how much of the giggling came from Marie of all people. Then Marie picked me up and set me on the divan, leaning me back against the wall. A few moments later, Saffron said, "open your eyes, love."

They stood there, Marie giggling, Saffron maybe blushing, in cheerleader uniforms that matched mine. Then they launched into a little cheer routine. Their innate athleticism helped. The six by ten space they had to work in did not. Neither did the apparent lack of any kind of coherent choreography. It was awful and adorable. They sucked so bad, I smiled and laughed until they finished, at which point they got way less cheerleader and way more stripper, and sucked me into the night's activities with wild abandon. They also sucked then, but I have zero complaints about that.

The most notable thing about the evening, other than how the bed and mirrors were absolutely Conrad at his 'engineering meets artwork' best, was that not a single stitch of clothing came off. Loose and flowing for the win.

I felt a little bad for Saffron getting short sleep the next day, so for the day's exercise I set her up on one end of the Practice Yard with instructions to not stop cheering, then made a pair of hoops out of the shittiest of the practice swords, mineral bonded them at about ten feet up opposite walls, and wound up stealing a basketball from Eastside when I couldn't figure out how to make one. All I can say about playing basketball with a seven foot six millennia old incarnation of murderfuck? Don't. That shit was embarrassing. Getting pwned by a hot chick in a cheerleader uniform might have made it worse, I'm not sure.

Eventually some of the other Cadets in the Yard joined in; I taught them what I remembered of the rules, although 'fouls' were pretty much limited to 'travelling' and, well, that's about it, since nobody wanted to admit to somebody bumping into them being a problem, and 'goaltending' was a rule, but I couldn't remember what it was about. So, y'know, 'you can't carry the ball', 'throw it through the hoop for two points', and, uh, oh yeah, 'other team gets the ball after one team scores'. Yeah, the game got a little rough. Marie stepped to the side to cheerlead, although she got called in to ref shortly thereafter. When we had ten Cadets playing, I stepped aside and played coach, hollering advice. Oh, and trainer, when some idiot inevitably tried to burrow to the Library with his face.

All good clean fun though. Or good sweaty fun in the case of Saffron, who to her credit just asked for water a little more often than normal. Sadly, though her shirt went sheer when I dumped a bucket over her head, she'd worn the sports bra I'd summoned up for her. I mean, totally made sense and all, but I kinda wanted to watch them bounce in the sunlight and shit. Operating room light just isn't the same. Not that I didn't try that when the Cadets broke for lunch, but still.

Maze and I finished up Hat Full of Sky and moved on to Wintersmith. Makes me wonder if the afterlives of the world of Eastside and this one are, like, connected, and if I could find him and bribe him to write some more just for her. Or, shit, for everybody here. I'm pretty sure I could conquer an orangutan sanctuary or something. Hell, shapeshift him into an orangutan and let him just vibe with bananas and books for all eternity. Hell, I just love listening to her read, the wonder in her voice as she discovers new words, new people, new stories, new worlds.

Calverton was really fuckin' quiet. We'd hit another of those areas where most of the Undead had fucked off and left the City empty. Around noon I hopped over to talk with Olga and Swanson about it. "I'm a little worried the Killers are gonna wind up getting antsy with no action."

They looked at each other, then broke down laughing. When I just stared, waiting for them to explain, they laughed harder until Olga leaned in and whispered, "I don't think there's a single fighter in the Army who didn't get their fill of 'action' yesterday after lunch."

Yeah, yeah, yeah, laugh it up. I touched off an Alliance wide Revel at my birthday party and not only didn't participate, I forgot I did it. Still, morale's good, so that's a win, right?

Back at Lancaster House, I snagged David during Hide and Seek and boosted him atop one of the armoires. "The height doesn't scare you, does it?" He shook his head, so I let him scoot back until I couldn't see him. What with Maze being one of the taller kids, I figured if I couldn't, nobody else would. I hid under the bed. Apparently for the first time, David wound up winning. He's just a little too big to fit into the really good little spots, and too short to get to the high spots, but the boost let him to get to a spot nobody'd looked before.

Menace bitched at me about 'cheating'. At that point I gave the group of them Saffron's whole lecture to me about Rules and Cheating. Which left me being Biggest Sister and Arbiter to the least organized rules discussion in the history of rules discussions. Much to Menace's dismay, she was outvoted unanimously regarding hiders working together during 'Hide and Seek'. As Liam put it, "there's no way any single one of us can keep up with you, Isnomi. We've got to work together to even have a chance."

She didn't throw a tantrum or anything, but holy shit did she just exude 'I'm gonna cut a bitch' energy as she stalked across the circle of kids to stand in front of him. Credit to him, Lancaster genes in full effect, he didn't back away, although he did stand up. Not that it mattered to little miss 'I size how I want, fuck you very much'. Glaring at him the whole time she walked up, she looked him right in the eye, poked him in the chest with one finger, and with the smuggest grin I'd ever seen on anybody that age, said, "I'mma member that, Liam." Then she turned to everybody else and said, "Otay! Game on!" Then she covered her eyes and started counting. I had to stay there and listen to her count to one hundred. Or, since none of the kids actually knew how to count that high yet, 'ten tens'. Because I was, thanks to the new rules, unanimously elected to be the referee.

Stupid fuckin' rules.