“M-midori? You named it?”

“Oh trust I'm not the one who named him. By the way, it's a boy. I checked.”

That last comment was a bit too much information for Norris but he supposed if she was going to shower it, she must have… he tried to stop thinking his mom seeing a little green di-

He began rubbing his chin. “But why do you have him?”

“The little shit would probably be killed otherwise.”

He thought very carefully about his next set of words. “But…” Nothing he could think of wouldn't sound insensitive.

“Why don't I let him? *Sigh* I wish.”

(“Are you seriously going to say that in front of him?”)

The goblin looked more concerned with heading back to the kitchen than anything that came out of her mouth.

“Listen, I'm taking care of him and that's that.” She tiredly commented. The goblin looked up towards her.

“Who would have thought…” he muttered under his breath.

She raised an eyebrow at this. “What's so surprising about this, huh you littl-” She rubbed her forehead and closed her mouth.

She didn't have much experience concerning how she spoke to her children, so she interacted with them how she would with any other person. Which wasn't how you interacted with your own flesh and blood (based on the way she talked to people anyway).

“It's fine if you wanna speak like that, honestly.” He said awkwardly scratching his neck.

She sighed. “Dumbass, what kind of mom calls her kid a little shit?”

She pointed to a table, took the seat nearby and dragged it over to the table. She lifted the goblin up and placed it in her lap, after sitting down.

“So what'd you want to do?” She asked.

Norris walked over and pulled a seat out, nervously. Now the initial shock from seeing the goblin had died down, his nerves had set back in, knowing who he was sitting in front of him.

“Uh, um, eugh?” He began stuttering trying to get an answer out of his mouth, with his face becoming more red, with each sound that wasn't a word coming out of his mouth.

She rolled her eyes and the little goblin in her lap began laughing.

“Don't laugh!” He shouted red-faced.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“You sure got some balls shouting in my house.” She responded with a sour expression.

He held his hands up and started pleading. “Wait, wait, I didn't mean to-”

She held a finger up. “I knew it. You're afraid of me, aren't you?”

…

He didn't respond and meekly looked away.

She clicked her tongue and slammed the table, frightening the little creature in her lap and the man in front of her.

Norris left the chair and got in a fighting position, readying himself for the worse.

“Norris, please stop overreacting. If I wanted you dead, I could have killed when you opened the door if I so cho-”

She stopped herself. Telling your child you could have killed them in mere moments isn't something a good mother would do now, would they?

She cleared her throat and restarted. “I'm your mother deari-”

She stopped herself again. Talking to your adult son the same way you would talk to them if they were a child might work for mothers more close to their sons but this wasn't the case between them. It'd probably be insulting to him to hear an old hag act like nothing was wrong between them, pretending to be a cheery old grandma.

She ran her hands through her hair trying to think of a response. “Ah screw it, what I'm saying is I'm not gonna hurt you or whatever that worthless bastard of a son told you I'd do.”

“Oh, okay.”

They were engulfed in silence until the little green guy tried to struggle out of her lap. She flicked his neck and he stopped.

“For the time being… why don't you follow me around for the day and we catch up?”

“I suppose that's fine.”

----------------------------------------

In the bathroom, Norris watched in amazement as she bathed the little guy.

(“Who could have imagined her of all people bathing a goblin? Actually, I think I might have read about something similar in an apocryphal biography I got a hold of.”)

“So I let this question slip me but, why exactly are you taking care of a goblin?”

“He has a bastard of a father for starters.”

“Hmm? (What does that answer mean?)”

“But consider it doing an ounce of good in this world. Nothing more than me trying to do a good deed to rebalance some of my karma.”

“Can taking care of a goblin be considered a good deed?” He hesitantly asked.

“If whatever God up there doesn't think so, I'll smack him across the face and force the lazy asshat to consider it one.” She nonchalantly responded.

(“Man, if a priest heard her, he might try to charge her for heresy. And they abolished that sort of thing decades ago.”)

He gave her an unconvinced glance.

“My son, you should open your mind a bit. Not everything is black and white in this world. (That sounds like something a parent would say right)?”

He shook his head. “Trust me, I know that isn't the case but… why would it be doing good to help out this goblin?”

He couldn't imagine anything good coming from raising a monster. Especially one as low-classed as a goblin. As far as he saw it, the goblin was just a glorified pet.

“(I appreciate the scepticism kid, but I'm your mom for fucks sake, show me some benefit of the doubt before you disagree with me.) For the time being, let me tell you about his life before I started taking care of him.”

----------------------------------------

A woman stood over a green baby in the forest. It was smaller than the average baby and had things not normally associated with one. Such as green skin and already visible teeth.

The woman held her foot over the baby in contemplation. She wore a sundress and had grey hair.

“That bastard’s really done it! How many of these fucking things are there!?”