#reginald!

If I’m sticking to rotating between my three fics, The Hotel at the End of the World is actually due an update next… but I have a feeling this will see the light of day first. It’s so close to getting into happy-fluffy territory and I just want to get it there!

Taylor was a bundle of nerves, and if the uncharacteristic twitchiness was anything to go by, Estela was too. As if to reassure, but taking just as much comfort in return, Taylor grasped her wife’s hand.

“It’s okay, Taylor,” said Estela, softly. “I’m scared too.” She was scared of herself, how she’d feel when she walked in that room and saw Grace and Aleister with their perfect new baby boy. They didn’t deserve the most joyous day of their lives to be clouded by someone else’s envy and longing. Gently, she kissed Taylor’s head. “Are you ready?”

It’s just a baby. It’s just going in there… and meeting a baby.

Their baby nephew. He already had their hearts wrapped around his little finger, and they’d not yet clapped eyes on him.

With a deep breath, Taylor nodded. A piece of the family she’d dreamed of lay just ahead… she was someone’s aunt now, a fact almost incomprehensible when she looked back at what she came from. There was no way in hell she was going to let her own heartache take the shine off this day. “Yeah, I am. Let’s meet that little nephew of ours.”

Aleister opened the door, to find himself pulled straight into one of Taylor’s world-famous hugs. “I really should have braced myself for that, shouldn’t I?”

Estela laughed. The only other time she’d seen her brother so completely helpless in the face of a smile that just wouldn’t leave him was the day of Niala’rei when he’d been wed to Grace. That kind of happiness was impossible not to catch.