Deerly Departed

It'd be their word, only their word,

semi-selective, fluctuating activity roleplay blog for December Holiday from Deltarune

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“You know, Dess? Your mom and I thought you’d be a gymnast someday. Can you believe it?!”

He leans over to his daughter, giving her that smile -- the one that he gives before preparing to tell one of his stories.

He strokes his goatee in an exaggerated attempt to look like he’s struggling to remember the moment. “Ah, yes. It’s as fresh to me as the feeling of your hoof smacking my face!”

“Back before we moved into our big house, we lived in a tiny two-bedroom apartment. Mom used the spare room as an office, so we were all sleeping in the master bedroom. I’d say you were... two?? Small enough to still be sleeping between your mom and dad.” He chuckles. “I’m tellin’ ya, you wiggled and wobbled like a caterpillar every night. Must have been dreamin’ about future adventures!”

”One night, we put your head on a pillow for bedtime. You wiggled so much, you flipped upside-down and... BAM! Did the splits and kicked both our faces in!” He bursts out in laughter. “Must have been helicopter-kicking a baddie in Dreamland!”

-- "Hey, you don't gotta say that completely in past tense, I reckon I'd make a pretty good gymnast now!"

Dess jokes, rolling over on her bed so she's actually facing her father.

-- "I mean, I can still stick a whole hoof in my mouth, I dunno what more you need."

It's a time-old conversation- or at least the concept is, Dess's pretty sure she's never heard that particular retelling before. She's always adored it, though, just the mental image of her mother and her father being able to stand each other long enough to willingly sleep in the same room, and feeling like she was important enough to care for on top of all that? That's practically paradise, at least in her eyes.

She'd been just mindlessly scrolling on her phone, batting a conversation back and forth between her and Asriel like two cats with one dangly toy between them, but Dess pretty much immediately abandons both ideas at the sound of her father's voice and tosses her phone onto the nightstand beside her.

-- "Actually, if mom'd let me take up more sports, I think it'd take gymnastics as one of 'em. It just looks so fun, y'know? But, alas."

Dess sighs.

"Dess, which tie would make a big splash at Mom's big city council meeting?"

He has three neckties laid out: (1) one with "HO HO HO" in big scrawly letters, (2) another with "YOU SLEIGH ME!" in fancy writing and a silhouette of a sleigh at the bottom of it, and (3) a red-and-green ugly Christmas sweater pattern of reindeers.

So. Many. Terrible choices.

((Am I doing this right? lmao))

(@reindeer-dad)

Dess presses a hand against her mouth, not sure whether what she's trying to hold back was a laugh or a noise of utter pain.

The trouble was that the tie that was most sensible (the tie that her mother would probably appreciate most) was hardly the objectively funniest.

She was the responsible child, sure, but she was also the one who'd received several mischief classes from Chara, and right now the latter was far more deciding of her judgment--

"--erm, that one!"