Half a broken Wing - 8. Chapter 8

~Riley~

He was dreading the conversation with his family. It was just a matter of informing them - the days of asking permission or asking for the bride's hand were long gone - but he could imagine the reactions.

A family of moths flew past him. While the father lamented being late again, a child complained Grandma's about Grandma's food, and a teenager whined that she was wasting too much time on these silly family matters.

Riley only half heard the mother's annoyed reply, but it all sounded familiar.

He landed and shook out his wings. The smell of food wafting through the humid night air made his stomach growl.

“Didn't you have breakfast?”

At Wayne's sudden question, Riley flinched and turned around; his brother was just touching down on the ground. “Not really.”

“A good breakfast is important,” Wayne said in his father-voice, folding his wings.

Instead of a real answer, Riley rolled his eyes in annoyance and then stepped up to the doorbell. “Riley and Wayne.” he said as a crack sounded through the intercom.

The hallway smelled of curry, but Grandma didn't like curry, so that came from somewhere else. In fact, the apartment itself smelled strongly of roasted meat and spinach.

“Hey Grandma!” Wayne called out and Riley flinched because his brother was right in his ear.

“Hi mom!” he called back in the same way. Seeing Wayne's shoulders hunch and his antennae quiver let petty satisfaction rise in him. After a scowl, they both entered the kitchen.

“Hi.”, Troy said, his tone overly sweet; Eric obviously wasn't there yet.

Since Wayne claimed Grandma first, Riley leaned down to Mom instead. “Hi.” he said again, giving her a smile before kissing her on the temple.

“Riley, sweetheart...” She looked distinctly tired and her fingertips stroked his cheek in a rather erratic manner.

“Don't you dare touch anything here, Wayne! Your hands look horrible!” Grandma protested at that moment.

“They've been washed! Do you think I've been running around with dirty hands since I got off work yesterday?”

Riley approached hesitantly.

Grandma's reaction to his presence was to offer him her cheek as she scrutinized Wayne. “Those hands get washed, young man, and they get washed now.”

“They are- Yes, ma'am.”

“I'm going to wash my hands too,” Riley mumbled in between after greeting Grandma, getting only a shoo-shoo gesture in response. As he stood in the small guest bathroom, Wayne scowling as he soaped his hands beside him, he asked, “Why are you even arguing with her?”

Wayne made an annoyed noise. “It doesn't matter whether I say anything or not.”

“Yeah, but it happens every time.”

“She's old, Riley, and old people don't change their habits.” Wayne sighed deeply. “Sometimes she even sniffs my hands because I once dared to just pretend to wash them. 'You don't smell like my soap, young man.' I mean, seriously?”

Just barely Riley stifled a chuckle. Instead, he gave a shrug. “Grandma insists on her ways.”

“You don't say...”

Back in the kitchen, Wayne dropped into his usual seat and immediately pulled out his phone; Riley sat down as well and took one of Mom's right hands. They might be numb, but Mom loved the gesture anyway.

Troy set the pot of potatoes on the table hard enough that Grandma gave him a sour look.

However, the small glasses for the warm blood clinked as well when she placed them on the table in front of her. “Where's your brother?” she then asked sullenly.

“I'm here, Grandma!” it sounded from outside through the kitchen window - they all flinched. “Open up!”

With an annoyed sigh, Troy threw the oven mitts on the worktop and pressed the door opener on the intercom hanging in the kitchen before he went to open the front door.

A little later they were eating. Grandma had given Eric a telling off for being late and, in her opinion, looking a mess (in Riley's opinion, she was right and Eric smelled unpleasant too, but he wisely kept his mouth shut), Riley and Eric had swapped blood glasses under the table again and now Riley was enjoying the spinach omelette as it literally melted on his tongue.

“What kind of meat is this?” Wayne wanted to know, his face contorted critically.

“No idea,” Troy replied. “I took what was on offer.”

“Tastes funny.” Eric mumbled with his mouth full.

Riley skeptically shoved a piece into his mouth, but although he agreed with Eric, he didn't say anything.

“Eat.” Grandma only said in a stern tone.

“Really, at these prices, it would make sense to reconsider our meat consumption,” Wayne began and Troy and Eric sighed in annoyance.

Riley still kept his mouth shut. Better still, he filled it with food. Not with meat though, the aftertaste was really too unpleasant.

“As long as the rabbinits are multiplying faster than you can shoot them, they're unlikely to raise the price,” Grandma remarked coolly between bites.

“They should worry about baby food instead. We paid 20 doubloons for a pack of baby nectar for Mike back then. Now with Aiden it's 30,” Wayne continued the discussion.

“Another reason not to have children,” Eric grunted with his mouth full.

“Kids are a wonderful thing, Eric, once you-” But Mom was drowned out by Troy:

“As if any woman would want some with you.”

While Eric raised three middle fingers, Grandma remarked, “Accidents happen.” The way she looked at Troy implied she meant him.

Riley's eyebrow twitched up.

“Mom!” Mom protested, her indignant expression looking scary through her paralyzed face half.

“Velma, dear, you can tell me what you want, but Alfred and you-”

“Do I want to hear this?” Troy looked a little horrified.

“No one wants to hear this,” Wayne murmured, strangely conciliatory.

“Your father wasn't right for your mother and Grandpa and I said so from the beginning!” Grandma snapped, her antennae- faded to a pale gray due to age- stiff but trembling. “Well, we've seen what came of it.”

“First of all, we came out of it,” Eric said, strangely amused. “Even though I really don't want to know about my parents' sex life.”

“You,” Grandma said, now looking venomously at Eric, ”should shut up. You're a disgrace to the blood moths.”

“I didn't choose what I was born as, Grandma,” Eric returned, relaxed. His lack of respect made Riley suspect he wasn't completely sober. Whatever he'd popped or smoked...

“But it's your own responsibility what you've become. And the answer is: nothing.”

“But I'm free.” Eric smiled, almost a little enraptured.

Riley had to pull himself together not to make himself small next to him.

“No wife, no annoying children...”

“No job, no home...” Troy mumbled innocently.

“Oh shut up-” Eric started, but Wayne remarked:

“The only positive thing about being a blood moth is the immunity to genetic shit like wing rot.”

Pointing at Troy with one hand, Grandma looked accusingly at Mom, who already seemed to be wrecked from the discussion. “See? Alfred brought that on, too. Wing rot. Velma, your own child is rotting before your own eyes and you-”

Riley squeezed his eyes shut and massaged the bridge of his nose, trying to block out Grandma's nagging. The last time she'd been this completely unhinged was after she'd put Grandpa in the nursing home. He'd never known her to be overly affectionate, but having to listen to her was hard.

“Eat, Riley!”

He winced. “Yes, ma'am!” Hastily, he shoved a piece of potato into his mouth.

Mom sniffled. “Alfred may have made bad choices, but he was a wonderful husband and always a good father.” Tears ran down her cheeks.

Making an approving sound - another came from Wayne and Troy - Riley forced his hands to still. He would have liked to wipe Mom's tears away, to comfort her, but he certainly didn't want to get into Grandma's focus. And the way the mood was right now, he certainly didn't feel like telling his family that he was marrying a male diurnal butterfly.

“He's ruined your children's lives, Velma!” Grandma snorted, stabbing her fork so hard into a piece of meat that the tines screeched across the plate. “This wouldn't have happened with a blood moth.”

“Says who?” Troy- in the end still the only non-bloodmoth at the table- muttered offended. “Just look at Eric.”

“Eric takes after your father.”

“Blood moths are not the crown of creation, Grandma,” Wayne said carefully. “Otherwise we wouldn't be so unpopular.”

“We drink blood and not even real one and all these flies who only eat meat and preferably only when it's half decayed are acting up like crazy!” Grandma slammed a fist on the table.

Eric demonstratively pushed the meat on his plate away from him.

“Has anyone gotten those new blood capsules yet?” Mom asked in a valiant attempt to steer the conversation to gentler winds.

There was a brief, stunned silence.

“I just got an announcement about them,” Riley replied with a shrug.

“Misty.” Wayne then said with his mouth full and promptly received a sharp look from Grandma. “She says they're good. She takes an extra one before bed and she's been sleeping better ever since.”

Riley nodded, Mom nodded, Eric grimaced. “Instead of screwing around with blood pills all the time, they could do something useful.”

“How about you do something useful for a change?” Grandma said pointedly. “Find yourself a wife, for example. Look at Wayne-”

“Nah, that'll make me sick.”

Troy grinned broadly and then grunted - Wayne had probably kicked him under the table.

Suppressing a sigh, Riley hoped that this wouldn't be followed by a hymn of praise for Wayne for making the only right decision in Grandma's eyes and marrying a blood moth.

But contrary to expectations, Grandma turned to Mom: “Velma, your boys are all a disappointment. I should disinherit them.”

“Not much to inherit, is there?” Troy muttered bitterly.

Apart from that, Mom had three younger siblings and they all had children too.

“If your father didn't-”

Riley prayed that Grandma would run out of breath soon. But in her tirade, they all finished the meal - leaving most of the meat on the plate - and sitting at the table like that was awful. Riley had grabbed one of Mom's hands again and, so as not to end up looking guilty, looked not at his plate but at Troy's across from him at the round table.

At some point, Grandma ran off steam and an uncomfortable silence fell over the kitchen.

Now or never, Riley thought, the mood could hardly get any worse.

“Wayne, do you still have your wedding outfit?” His voice sounded strangely timid and he cleared his throat. Everyone looked at him critically.

“Yes, why?”

“Can I borrow it?”

Wayne raised his brows, his antennae twitching. “Sure. Why?”

Riley's mouth twisted, his antennae curled up a good deal. “Why do you think I'm going to want to borrow a wedding outfit?” He was relieved to hear his voice sounding normal now.

“So you did deign to find yourself a wife after all?” Grandma looked half incredulous, half condescending.

“Husband, Grandma, it's going to be a husband,” Riley corrected her, feeling extremely uncomfortable under her gaze.

“Where did you dig one up?” Eric asked skeptically.

“Oh my baby is so big already!” Mom sniffled overjoyed.

Troy and Wayne snorted.

“Your baby is twenty-six, Velma,” Grandma growled dry as dust from the side.

“I'm sure he's a wonderful young man, isn't he, Riley? You must introduce him! Oh my goodness, what am I going to wear?” Mom was beside herself, and although Riley was pleased in a way, he knew that having a son-in-law in his mom's eyes only reinforced her daydream of Riley as a girl.

“You don't need to save me a seat,” Grandma stated coolly before Riley could respond to Mom's words. “I'm not going to watch this...this game of shame.”

“There's no celebration.” And Riley was decidedly glad of it.

“Well, if you don't have money, you can't celebrate,” Troy muttered and Eric snorted.

“The only one here complaining about a lack of money is you, of course, my wingless friend.”

With an indignant hiss, Troy took a breath, but Wayne held him back by the arm.

“But Riley, why aren't you celebrating?” Mom asked, puzzled.

“Wait,” Troy said, shaking off Wayne's hand and glaring at Riley, ”wait, this guy has money, doesn't he?” Oh, Troy wasn't stupid and seemed to draw a connection to the phone call he and Riley had recently had.

“Less than our family is hard to do,” Wayne muttered with a face like he was in pain.

“What's that-” Riley began cautiously, but Grandma drowned him out:

“I sure hope for your sake he at least comes from a respectable family.” There was a sideways glance at Troy, as if she was trying to analyze what his comment was about.

It was, after all, a point Riley could nod to with a clear conscience.

Grandma smiled thinly. “A good, righteous moth, loyal to the moon and-”

“Um...” Riley cleared his throat carefully and immediately got a razor-sharp look. “Well... more like no.”

The smile fell off Grandma's face and she gave him an exaggeratedly questioning look. “No?”

“Not a moth.” He swallowed and before Grandma could interrupt him, he continued, “A diurnal butterfly.”

There was a short pause, then Eric said amusedly, “Well, at least they're usually pretty.” He ran his fingers through his short dark blue hair and gave Riley a strange wink.

“A diurnal butterfly.” Grandma put so much grandeur in her voice and rose so gracefully that the disapproval in her gaze came across as much worse.

Riley had been under no illusions from the start that his family would be thrilled. Grandma's reaction was more negative than expected, but that might have been due to her general mood. As he sat here, however, he realized that it didn't bother him too much. It was more important to him that Mom was reasonably happy about it.

“Well, Riley, I think all has been said.” Grandma strutted out of the kitchen.

Wayne whistled, impressed. “And here I thought Eric was the absolute loser.”

“Apparently you can sink even lower with Grandma. Way to go, bro.” Eric punched Riley on the shoulder, chuckling, and Riley sighed.

“It's not like I brought a hornet with me, or a dung beetle.”

A strangled sound came from Troy. “Then you never would've needed to show your face around here again.”

“Riley, darling, don't hold it against them,” Mom spoke up. “I'm sure he's a wonderful man. As long as you love him and he loves you, it doesn't matter what he is.”

“It's not like Riley has to have kids,” Eric mumbled and Wayne asked:

“Why are we only finding out that you have a” - a hesitation just audible - “boyfriend when you're about to marry him?”

Although he was used to being overlooked, Riley couldn't help the anger and bitterness creeping into his voice: “Has anyone here ever asked me about my life?”

Mom looked, well, half horrified and half offended, while his brothers all raised a brow almost in unison.

“Is the baby starting to cry again because he's not being noticed?” Troy scoffed. “Grow up, Riley.”

Wayne and Eric snickered.

“Don't be so mean, Troy!” Mom shouted, but was drowned out by the chairs of the three older sons scraping over the floor, who all stood up.

“Call me about the clothes,” Wayne said, slapping Troy on the shoulder and rushing off.

“Look forward to the pretty handcuffs,” Eric chuckled, tousling Riley's hair rather roughly.

“When you leave, take the trash out with you, yeah?” Troy just gave Riley a quick glance before he started to clear the table, clattering with the dishes.

Riley sat there for a moment, biting his lower lip hard.

Why do I do this to myself every week?

“Oh Riley please don't hold it against them,” Mom pleaded again and Riley sighed, ”You're my baby-”

“I'm not a baby anymore, Mom. Wayne and Troy and you and Grandma- you all had at least one kid when you were my age. Aiden is a baby.”

Tears shimmered in her eyes and she reached out for him, obediently he leaned toward her. “You're all my babies, always.” - Troy made a grumpy sound in the background- “But you especially.” And then she whispered as her two left hands awkwardly caressed his face, “I would have just loved to have a girl.”

What could Riley say to that other than, “I know, Mom.” ? He leaned over, kissed his mother on the forehead and then nodded to Troy. While he waited for Troy to get the trash bag ready to go, he pulled out his phone and typed a message to Cedric:

“My mom wants to meet you. Preferably beforehand. Good luck with your family.”

Cedric was asleep at this hour, but the subject wasn't the most pressing.

Troy pressed the trash bag into his hand and after a not very successful smile to Mom, Riley left. Outside the house, he shook out his wings- and then paused when he heard Grandma's voice through the kitchen window.

“Really, Velma, how is it that only one of your four children has even remotely achieved anything?”

“It's certainly not Alfred's fault.” The way Mom defended Dad, at least no one could say she hadn't loved him.

“Is it your fault? Is that what you're saying? Did I pin my hopes so thoroughly on the wrong daughter?”

With a shudder, Riley started moving toward the large garbage cans across the street. This three-generational forced living community sounded more like the stuff of nightmares.

He could only hope that his own future house-sharing arrangement with Cedric's little brothers would be more harmonious.