PHANTASMAGORIA

places a mason jar and a pack of sticky-notes on the table before her.

Stan pops the strawberry twist in his mouth, enjoying it quietly and watching as the little menace in his palm relays her colour-coded candy plans. Who ‘grandpa’ is remains a mystery to him, but then again that’s just how Athene works; ‘mystery’ might as well be her middle name!

…Does she even have a second name, for that matter?

“I think the peach ones are disgusting anyways, you can keep ‘em! Bleh!” he replies, blowing a raspberry as if it proves just how yucky the damned thing are. He may or may not be trying to avoid being touched by the fact Ibuki remembered Ari at all.

“…Ari will like that, though.” He points at the lollipop in her grip, making no move to take it. “You even guessed his favorite, somehow.” Is this literal baby psychic or something? Hardly anybody remembers Ari himself, let alone something so niche.

“ i’m know. he likes green candy ‘cause its green and green’s a good color. “

luckily for him, she’s not psychic. she’s weirdly intuitive though; the exact method with which she connected ari with the color has yet to be revealed, but she just knew somehow. he seemed like a green candy kind of guy.

" when i see ari i’m gonna give him this. “ she waves the lollipop around in her tiny fist. “ and if there’s more green candy i’m not gonna eat he can maybe have some. but only if i don’t want it, because the rest of it’s mine. “

Ibuki is by far the most polite child Stan has ever encountered. Normally by now they’ve given him a reason to make them cry and rue the day they were born, but not this little mite… That doesn’t mean he can entirely lenient, of course. Never.

“I’ll think about it, since you’re minding your manners.” he grumbles, holding his free hand out before her expectantly after. “But only if you’ll share. I’ve got a sweet tooth.”

Don’t worry Ibuki, Stan doesn’t have a real appetite and he’s not about to seriously steal candy from a baby, he’s only asking for one piece.

“ you can have one. the rest is for me. mama said she wants the peach rings though so you can’t have the peach rings. “

a tiny hand fishes around the pumpkin-shaped bag for a moment. she sets up a couple small piles in her lap; each pile was a different color, regardless of taste. gold, red, green, and orange mountains formed by her chubby toddler fingers. 

once she was satisfied with her work, she patted a strawberry twist hard candy into stan’s hand. ibuki also seemed to have a green lollipop in her fingers.

“ this red one is your candy. and the green one is gonna be for ari. “ she held out her fist with the lollipop inside, but didn’t give it up to him.