Daily Life With A Lilim Chapter 31

~Between The Sheets~

When Stan stormed into his office he quickly booted up his PC with the intention of settling in and immersing himself in his Steam library catalogue of unfinished videogames. He didn’t want to think about the last half an hour or so of his life right now or he’d just be perpetually pissed off which did no one any good. And so there he sat for the remainder of the evening yet even with him trying to deliberately distract himself there was a part of him that kept a metaphorical ear out for anyone attempting to disturb him.

Occasionally he would glare at the door whenever someone so much as approached it. So far he intercepted Natalie…and Ezraphel though unlike his sister the Lilim’s probing attempts were less physical and more esoteric. Unfortunately for her Stanley was too locked in to overlook anyone or anything attempting to disturb him and more or less blasted ‘intent’ whenever he felt her presence.

He wasn’t even that angry at her but he was in that mood where he was pissed off at everything and everyone. He was also self aware enough to recognize his volatile mindset and thus was determined to let this run its course without any interruptions. Somewhere in his mind he knew that his vehement rejection of her was negatively impacting Ezraphel, hell he could feel it like a dull ache in his heart but once again his anger won out and he merely ignored the feeling and her to focus.

And so he ended up spending all of the evening all the way up to the mid morning of the next day inside his office gaming. It was nonstop too meaning no breaks for drinks or snacks and the only time he paused was to load up another game. Thanks to his Incubus physique he was hardly hampered spending upwards of twelve hours straight sitting on his chair staring at his monitor screen.

The only reason why he stopped was so he could use the bathroom and for a moment he toyed with the idea of just going in a bottle only to discard it. Of course as soon as he pushed himself out of the chair he felt the effects of his decision and had to take a minute to get the combined stiffness and numbness from his body. He might have loosened up more than he meant to because nature went from calling to knocking to using a battering ram on his bladder.

“Shiiit!”

He yelled out immediately rushing to the door and opening it only to find not the hall but the bathroom attached to his bedroom.

‘…roll with it’ he decided before going to relieve himself.

During this brief period he thought about what his next move would be. The fact that he was thinking about it meant that his anger had subsided for the most part. He could think clearer and that meant he didn’t have the excuse to properly address the elephant in the room.

Ezraphel really screwed the pooch on this one and the only reason why Stanley wasn’t more concerned about it was that despite everything the Golem seemed to at least be sensible. At the very least she had both the tact and maturity to navigate through life on earth. This even extended to the relationship she pursued and currently maintained with that guy. At least that’s what he got from her retelling of events. Now she could have lied to make herself look better but Stanley didn’t think so because he put the fear of Him in that woman.

When he asked her to tell him everything she took that order to heart but more than her words it was her delivery. She spoke as if she was giving an oral report giving a detailed yet succinct description of events from the last time he saw her to the moment he caught her. It was honestly exactly what he asked for even if he didn’t quite mean it to be, clouded by rage as he was when he demanded she tell him everything.

He was glad for it though, because it gave him clarity even if he didn’t appreciate the when he initially received it. With a clearer mind though he could understand that while Ezraphel’s unfathomable decision to keep A’s existence a secret from him while allowing her to roam free (even under her supervision) was undoubtedly stupid and reckless, nothing terrible had really come from it.

As a matter of fact with the way how everything was described to him he couldn’t really think of a way that him knowing about it would help the situation. Not to say that him knowing would be detrimental but A (and Ezraphel by extension) handled the situation so well that he could not see anything of substance he could have added.

With that in mind, could it be possible that he overreacted?

…FUCK NO, BRUH!

This was a secret that didn’t need to be kept because even at his most terrible his reaction would have been significantly less visceral than yesterday. Everything he said in his rant to Ezraphel still stood including him breaking off the relationship if they were a normal couple. Keeping secrets at this point in their relationship was a red flag if he’d ever seen one and thinking about it made him genuinely weary of the future because they should have been beyond keeping secrets of this magnitude.

Did he still feel as if he would break up with Ezraphel now?

Not anymore and he’s aware that in that hypothetical alternate timeline where they were normal people that him breaking up with her would have been in the heat of the moment. Maybe it would have stuck and he would have come to regret it but he’d get over it…and probably swear off relationships for a while. That wasn’t the case here and while he didn’t regret his outburst he didn’t want this rut in their relationship to persist.

At the same time he felt obligated to dish out some kind of punishment lest Ezraphel develop the idea where she felt she could just get away with this kind of bullshit. Hell it might be because she already felt that way why she decided to keep this secret. Maybe this was her poking and prodding at him to see how he would respond, seeing what she could get away with because she’s planning to do something even worse.

Shaking his head he zipped up and flushed before making his way to the bathroom sink. Turning on the faucet he lathered up with some available liquid soap before washing his hands. Afterwards he splashed his face with some water before using the soap to wash off the grime from yesterday. He also rinsed his mouth a bit before turning off the faucet to glare at his reflection.

He looked like a disheveled not-quite-mess which made him snort. Even now he still looked like the Hollywood version of unkempt which kind of pissed him off. He didn’t look how he felt right now and that was messing with him more than he thought it would.

Eventually he calmed himself to get back on task ‘pull yourself together Stan. We’ve been over this, she’s not that kind of woman.’

He scowled at the thought of him rehashing old fears and it wasn’t just of Ezraphel but of the reasons why he never bothered with entertaining a relationship in the first place. Being a simple man he wasn’t built for dealing with complex social issues let alone complex relationship issues.

‘And yet I have no choice.’

He was in too deep and so now the only thing he could do now was to suck it up and deal with it.

‘…how am I supposed to do that?’

You know what really sucked about his situation right now?

There wasn’t much he could do to enforce consequences here. The only reassurance he had that she was taking it hard was the distant feel of her emotional turmoil that could be felt through their bond. It was chipping away at his resolve even now. Then you combined that with the knowledge of how she handled A and Stanley was finding it hard to stay mad at her. The raging fire of his anger had reduced to a small bonfire which was perhaps the perfect state for him to have a conversation with her.

So it was with this thought that he made his way to the door and placed his hand on the knob.

“Ez, I want to talk, let me in.”

There was a moment of stillness as if the very space held its breath waiting for a response. He received it in the form of his senses picking up a shift behind the door and he opened the door to find he was now in their bedroom. The lights were off, the blinds blocked the window and the TV was on showing an episode of early SpongeBob with the sounds muted.

With a frown on his face he went ahead and turned on the lights and set his sights on Ezraphel. The Lilim lay on the bed ‘hidden’ under thick bed covers surrounded by candy wrappers and an empty gallon tub of ice-cream with a silver spoon sticking out of it. He raised an eyebrow as he took in the rather slovenly scene before approaching.

Cartoons, candy and ice-cream. He didn’t need to be a genius to figure out these were Ezraphel’s go to comfort items. There was one other thing and he’s sure she has it underneath those covers not that he cared about that thing right now.

Standing at the foot of the massive bed he spoke “Ez, we need to talk.”

“…” she didn’t answer.

Stanley almost sighed “I’m not mad anymore.”

That got a response as her body shifted under the covers before he face barely peaked through.

“Y-you’re not?”

“I’m upset” he clarified “but I’m not mad. Now I’m mostly just confused. Why’d you keep it a secret?”

“…no” came her reply in a faint voice.

“What?”

“Don’t wanna.”

“You don’t want to tell me the reason why you kept A a secret?”

“Nuh-huh.”

He stared at her for a moment before speaking “it’s really that stupid huh?”

“…” she seemed to curl in on herself under the covers.

Stanley’s frown became more pronounced at her silence “you’re not even going to deny it’s a stupid reason?”

“…” once again she remained silent.

In response he clicked his tongue “fine, don’t explain.”

He could hypothesize what her reasoning might be and that would have to do for now. He might have pressed her further in better circumstance but this right here was new. Childish as she was acting right now with their close proximity he could feel her emotions more clearly. To put it bluntly Ezraphel was devastated to the point where she was literally hiding from him. He’s pretty sure that she would break down and cry if he so much as raised his voice.

He couldn’t help but pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration ‘now I’m starting to feel bad.’

Even worse this reaction necessitates that he talk her down, have a heart to heart and reassure her that despite this rough patch that they’re going through things will be alright, that they will be alright. Given her mental state it would take time for him to get through to her and it was guaranteed to be a very emotional conversation.

‘…yeah no, fuck that’ he thought after which he started stripping.

As he stripped he noticed that Ezraphel’s body shifted and he felt her staring. She didn’t say anything though even as he took off his shirt, kicked off his shoes, pulled off his socks and hopped out his pants leaving him in an undershirt and boxers. Taking off said undershirt revealed a decently toned body reminiscent of the mythic ‘swimmer’s build.’

“W-what are you doing?” he heard Ezraphel stuttered.

‘Speed running through your depression.’

Of course he didn’t say this and instead went with “I’m going to fuck you.”

“O-oh.”

“Take the covers off.”

“…n-no thanks I…” she paused to swallow “I-I’m good.”

You know he would have been shocked that she of all people was refusing sex except for one thing.

‘Ez, I can literally smell your arousal” he tapped his nose.

He’s pretty sure given a few more seconds and she’ll be leaving stains on the sheet, it wouldn’t be the first time. Mamono were weird like that.

When she spoke her voice was at a higher pitch “w-well b-be that a-as it m-may I will have to d-decline.”

Stanley was not at all impressed with her ‘resistance’ which was made sufficiently clear by his deadpan expression and question delivery “are we really doing this right now?”

“I have no idea what you mean.”

‘She lost her stutter’

And in exchange gained a breathy almost anticipatory cadence to her voice that absolutely reeked of lust.

Internally he sighed ‘I guess we’re doing this.’

A moment later he lunged he grabbed at sheets and pulled “GET OVER HERE!”

“KYAA~” yelled the Lilim as she was pulled towards him.

Once she was close enough he lunged managing to clear the gap in a single leap to mount her while she was still under the covers and the two proceeded to wrestle with each other. Stanley had the upper hand as Ezraphel was confined under the thick covers which he made no attempts to get her out of. Instead he worked to get her even more tangled in the sheets. With some difficulty he managed to roll her upper half in the sheets effectively turning her into a sheet burrito.

“Stanley~” came the familiar if muffled whine from the Ezraphel burrito.

“See this is what you get for being difficult.”

“I’m sorry”

“Too late for that, you like the sheets so much there you go now you’re a sheet burrito.”

“I don’t want to be a sheet burrito~” she wiggled pitifully unable to get herself untangled.

She only got her legs free if only because he focused on tangling her top half. Why that is became very apparent when he seized her shapely thighs earning an “eep!” from her as her body went still.

“So, looks I have you at my mercy” he noted while lightly rubbing her thighs causing her body to shudder “question is what are you going to do about it?”

As he said this he let go of her legs and folded his arms while kneeling before her.

“…” without saying a word Ezraphel opened her legs revealing to him that she wasn’t wearing anything.

‘And there’s the stain.’

“Nice~” he nodded approvingly his boxers already painfully tight.

Time to blow off some steam.

~One Of Those Days~

“Stanley, wake up~”

Stanley woke up to the sound of a familiar soothing voice. Fluttering his eyes open he found himself in the arms of his girlfriend now untangled from the sheets and practically glowing with happiness. It took only a moment for his brain to be rebooted and his memories restored causing him to groan.

“How long did we go at it?”

“Two hours and forty two minutes.”

Damn, he wasn’t even able to make it to three hours?

‘I must have been more tired than I thought.’

“How long was I out?”

“Five hours and twelve minutes.”

“What time is it?”

“Almost four in the evening.”

He hummed while sitting up causing Ezraphel to let go and give him space which was odd enough for him to notice since usually she was reluctant to let him go from snuggling.

“What?”

Ezraphel sat on her knees with a pitiful expression as she wrung her hands with anxiety.

“Stanley” she began hesitantly “a-are we…good?”

Stanley blinked as he stared at her with a neutral expression however in his silence his mind raced.

Then after what felt like hours he answered “no.”

The Lilim immediately deflated “o-oh.”

“In fact, I don’t think I will ever fully trust you again” he admitted bluntly.

As he finished the Lilim’s expression became miserable with the beginning of tears showing at the corner of her eyes. Seeing this Stanley suppressed the wince and reflexive need to backtrack and comfort her.

‘Not this time’ he thought fighting his ‘natural’ instincts and asserted his sense of self through the one thing that has always separated humanity from the beasts, logic and reasoning.

So he continued “but that’s par for the course with all my relationships.”

Ezraphel paused her tears remaining unshed as she gave a confused expression “h-huh?”

“Ez, I haven’t fully trusted anyone since High School” he raised his hand listing off names “not my friends, not my family and not even myself. So don’t look at it as if you’ve lost my trust because you never had it completely to begin with.”

As he finished his peace Ezraphel stared at him with mouth agape and moving yet words failed her until eventually she summoned up the wherewithal to respond to his frankly ludicrous claim.

“That…does not make me feel better at all!” she exclaimed.

“It’s not supposed to” he shot back “it’s supposed to make you understand a fundamental aspect of myself.”

“Fundamental aspect?”

“Yes”

“…I don’t believe you.”

“Why?”

“Because…” and he did not elaborate further as if that’s supposed tp answer everything.

Ezraphel felt her eyes twitch. The idea that her Stanley never trusted her fully to begin with was just false.

‘Unless…’

Moving past the cloud of despair and confusion Ezraphel came to a conclusion and through that could not help but ask a question.

“Are you saying all this to make me feel better?”

“…no.”

At that her expression turned dubious “are you sure?”

“Yes I’m sure!”

“Because what you’re saying doesn’t make any sense.”

“Really? It’s pretty simple to me” he replied with a shrug.

“I can sense your emotions Stanley” she informed.

“I don’t see what that has to do with anything” he replied calmly without missing a beat.

“I…you…” once again words failed her for a moment as did her powers of empathy eventually causing her shoulders to deflate “can you please explain?”

Stanley pursed his lips before he replied “you know what? No.”

Ezraphel recoiled “no?”

“No, I’m not going to give a TED talk on the inner workings of my feelings. Just know that my feelings about you haven’t changed. I still love you and it’s not because I’m technically ‘stuck’ with you” he reached over to hold her hands as he held her gaze steadily “even though you can be a pain in the ass and make stupid decisions that may send my blood pressure up I will always love you Ezraphel.”

There are certain parts of that speech she would not like if taken at face value however she could also sense that he wasn’t really have malicious intent. He truly believed that telling her she did not have his complete trust was somehow a good thing…and damn her she was eating it up.

With that Ezraphel internally sighed ‘I’ll take it, I suppose.’

On the outside she asked “then where does that leave us?”

At this he pursed his lips for a moment before replying with “not gonna lie I’m gonna be scrutinizing every move you make from now on. I don’t care if this incident is a one off I will always assume you’re hiding something from me for whatever reason so expect to be randomly grilled with questions every time I feel like you’re up to something.”

Ezraphel blinked as she digested his words “that sounds…”

“Unreasonable?”

“Unnecessary” she replied with a frown of dissatisfaction.

“And whose fault is that?”

“I said I was sorry!”

“Apologizing isn’t going to fix this Ez” he retorted “sex isn’t going to fix this” he further emphasized “you’re not gonna find a spell that can solve this.”

“I-”

“And I don’t want you to try!” he added cutting her off from any bright ideas causing her brows furrow in consternation. Seeing this he took a breath his gaze softening a bit “this is one of those things that doesn’t have an easy fix, we’re just gonna have to live with it.”

It’s not as if he wanted this either but if there was one thing this incident managed to accomplish it was creating a reference point for his mind to incite his paranoia about Ezraphel going forward. Now no matter what he will always believe that she’s keeping secrets. As he said before it was unreasonable but then there’s always that question of what if?

For a long moment Ezraphel remained silent her gaze leaving his to look away before closing her eyes. When she opened them they no longer held despair or hesitance. She straightened up slouched posture causing Stanley to tilt his head upwards to meet her gaze.

“Alright then Stanley, challenge accepted.”

“Excuse me?”

Her smile widened, her chest puffed out and wings fluttered as she continued “you claim this is not a problem that cannot be fixed, challenge accepted.”

Finally catching on to what she was implying he closed eyes with a groan “no, no.”

“Yes!”

With a tug of their still connected hands she pulled him into her embrace. With a yelp his face landed on her naked chest as his body slumped forward. With his face in her cleavage he forced his head up to glare at her. In response Ezraphel gave him a cheeky grin devoid of any doubt, sadness or hesitance to which he closed his eyes.

“Whatever.”

“Hee~ hee~” the Lilim cheered.

The moment was promptly interrupted by the rumbling of his stomach causing Stanley to grunt having remembered he had not eaten since breakfast the day before.

“Looks like someone’s hungry~” Ezraphel sang.

‘Why do you have to say it like that?’

“Yeah, yeah” he grumbled separating from her and making his way off the bed “I’m taking a shower.”

“I’ll join you.”

With his back turned towards her he gave her a look over his shoulder “we’re not doing a quickie Ez.”

“Ooh drats” She snapped her finger with faux annoyance.

Stanley opened the door to find not the normal bathroom he used earlier that day but the extravagant bath house primarily used by Ezraphel. Before he could say anything he felt the familiar weight of a pair of breasts rested on his head followed by dainty arms wrapping around his chest.

“What did I just say?” he grumbled.

“I know” she answered “no sex but that doesn’t mean I can’t still wash your back~”

“You and I both know that’s not going to happen.”

“Oh ye of little faith” the Lilim huffed playfully “then how about this, I promise I’ll have dinner ready just in time for Natalie to arrive. Let’s bet on it.”

“That’s a sucker’s bet” he grumbled “also, Natalie’s not here?”

“She left earlier this morning.”

Stanley hummed for a moment before the thought occurred “how did she leave?”

“Hm, well~” she dragged out and Stanley felt a pit of gorwing indignation form in his stomach.

One Bath That Wasn’t Just A Bath Later…

“Son of a bitch!”

Not only was Natalie gone but she also took his car and the Golem with her as well. Surprisingly he wasn’t as angry as he normally should be in most other circumstances. As a matter of fact he only felt the kind of annoyance one would feel if they checked the refrigerator only to realize they were out of soda because they forgot to stock up when they went grocery shopping.

“Annoying but it’s whatever” he thought to himself as he plopped down on the sofa.

He closed his eyes ‘it’s not bothering me…it’s not bothering me…’

His eyes opened as he scowled “it’s bothering me. It’s bothering me a lot.”

‘Natalie YOU BITCH!’

He exhaled swinging his body to lie across on the sofa for a few minutes.

“…what should I do now?”

According to Ezraphel it’s going to take some time before dinner so he needed a way to waste time until then. Obvious answer was to go back to his office but the thought of getting back in that chair and continuing where he left off after upwards of 12 hours doing that the day before made him cringe. Besides now that he’s on the couch he didn’t really feel like moving so whatever he’s about to do had to be from that spot.

Stanley started looking around for something but did not find his tablet and he knew for a fact that his phone and laptop were back in his office so no browsing the internet or doom-scrolling for him right now. At least that’s the case unless he got up off his ass for a few short minutes to make the trip to his office and retrieve the devices.

‘But I already sat down and I’m comfortable’ he thought to himself.

Then he could just call out to Ezraphel and have them delivered via magic.

“…not an option” he muttered to himself feeling a sting to his pride at the idea of bothering Ezraphel due to his inherent laziness in this moment.

‘Guess I’ll just have to make do with I have in this room’ he looked around as best he could from his position lying on the couch.

Eventually it became clear that he did not have a lot of options and scowled “fuck, that’s annoying” he grunted before his eyes went to the TV.

‘Should I just watch something?’

He almost snorted. He didn’t feel like watching anything right now and was just as likely to spend the entire time flipping through the catalogues of various streaming services than committing himself to watch something.

“Today’s just full of surprises.”

First brushing off his sister’s ‘theft’ of his car then willingly rejecting the idea of sitting in his office playing videogames and now he’s not even feeling up to watching a show or movie.

‘And since I literally just woke up I can’t even take a nap.’

This time he sat up and rested his forearms on his thighs “what the hell is wrong with me?”

If he were to describe it then Stanley would say that he’s experiencing one of those days. Rarely so often Stanley would get in a mood where he would deviate from most if not all his usual established patterns of operation. These inexplicable mood swings were not frequent but left an impact on his memories solely based on how bizarre it was in hindsight.

He remembered the last time he got into such a mood he ended up taking a drive to the city. There was neither a particular reason for why he did it nor was there a rational explanation for why his mood turned out like that on rare occasions. Not that he put much stock into finding out anyway as he didn’t hate it despite his general disposition.

All he could really do was acknowledge the weirdness and move on.

With that said his eyes eventually found something he wasn’t expected “huh, so that’s where she left it.”

Not everyone was built for the modern hermit lifestyle like Stanley. Frankly the fact that Natalie managed to last as long as she did could only be attested to her learning magic from Ezraphel and hanging around that Golem while exploring the various pocket dimensions in the house. Whenever she’s not training with Ezraphel or exploring spirit realms she liked to cause him grief in a number of ways. One such way was that ever so often she would sneak into his office and steal his videogames.

He says ‘steal’ but in her defense she actually asked him before taking it because he took these things very seriously. Unfortunately despite essentially treating his office like a public library of sorts she didn’t take it seriously enough to return the damn things whenever she’s done with them. Case in point his Nintendo Switch was sitting on the entertainment center next to the TV.

“…I’ll let it go this time.”

And so with some reluctance Stanley got off the couch to set up his console and play some games. At some point his sister and Golem A returned with the former joining him for a Mario Party session while the latter wordlessly stuck around for a bit before leaving to help Ezraphel in the kitchen.

Later…

“Dinner’s ready!”

“About damn time” Stanley muttered as he closed the game.

As always Mario Party turned out to be an absolute mess of RNG bullshit and his suggestion for them to switch to Smash Bros was summarily denied. It wasn’t as if Natalie was winning either he was pretty sure she was comforting herself with his suffering.

‘Seriously fuck that game, no wonder I stopped playing.’

The two arrived to find the table being set by Ezraphel and A the latter of whom froze at the sight of him. He deliberately ignore her or at least he tried only to receive a dope slap to the back of the head causing him to glare at his sister who gave a stern glare and gestured with a motion of her head to the Golem who was about to leave.

“Hey” he called out causing the Golem to flinch and turn towards him “just wanted to say sorry for the uh, interrogation yesterday” he glanced to the side for a bit “I wasn’t in a good place.”

The Golem still looking a bit hesitant nodded at him at the same time Ezraphel came in the room having apparently overheard his apology.

“I’m glad you apologized Stanley it would have been a bit awkward considering I set a plate out for A this evening. She will be joining us for dinner for the foreseeable future. I hope that isn’t an issue Stanley.”

“Why would it be?”

He literally just apologized.

“Just making sure~”

After setting the table and taking their seats they all began to dig into the meal. It took roughly ten minutes into said meal before Natalie decided to start a conversation.

“So Stan’s not telling me anything about how you guys made up so do you mind enlightening me Ez?”

Stan didn’t even bother acknowledging the conversation taking place to focus on the succulent meal before him.

“Stanley and I made love” the Lilim informed happily with a healthy blush.

“Yeah he said as much but I need details. That can’t be all there is right?”

“You would be correct.”

“So how’d you manage to pull it off. I can’t imagine him being in the mood after what happened.”

“Why don’t you mind your own damn business huh?” Stanley snapped

“Hell no” Natalie retorted “I am way too curious and invested in this relationship. It’s like watching a TV drama playing out in real time!”

“…”

He really hates that she’s right about that.

“At least wait until I’m not in the damn room” he grumbled.

“Nope” she answered popping the ‘P’ before looking to Ezraphel “So spill girl, how the hell did you seduce him into going along with it?”

“I didn’t seduce him, Stanley came to me.”

“Oh really?”

“Yes, he came to an epiphany and confronted me in my hour of need” she paused directing a cheerful gaze towards the curious Wight “and that is all I will say on the matter.”

“Seriously?” Natalie looked between the couple “you’re going to leave me hanging too?”

“Let it go Natalie” A spoke.

Ezraphel’s gaze snapped to the Golem as she pointed at her.

“HA! I KNEW YOU COULD SPEAK NORMALLY!”

~Breakfast With A Golem~

With the resolution of Stanley and Ezraphel’s relationship things didn’t go back to normal or what counts as normal in that household where the population of normal humans was zero. In any case things couldn’t go back to the way they were for the simple fact that ever since Golem A was revealed she was no longer content with hiding in the proverbial background. So of course the very next day she was found sitting on the couch playing the Nintendo Switch Stanley and Natalie left out.

The first one up was of course Ezraphel who paused at seeing her “oh, you’re already up.”

“…” A said nothing as she seemingly kept her gaze on the screen while playing Mario Kart.

The Lilim frowned “you know now that I know for a fact that you can talk you don’t have to do that ‘silent speech’ thing right?”

“…”

“What do you mean only Stanley has that privilege!?”

“…”

“So what if he’s scary? I am your creator.”

“…” this time after crossing the final finish line in the game she gave Ezraphel the side eye.

In response the Lilim’s eyes narrowed “your lack of respect is noted” she stated before turning her nose up at the Golem as she strutted away.

A let out an exasperated breath through her nose before

The next person to greet her was Natalie who came in with a steaming cup of coffee.

“Morning” she grumbled.

“…”

“Oh you’re still doing that pseudo telepathic thing”

“…”

“Why bother? I mean you kinda gave away your ability to speak normally.”

“…”

“Hey I drink coffee because it’s been part of my morning routine for over a decade now. I don’t want to lose touch with the habits I had as a human. Besides this stuff actually does do things for me…somehow.”

Again she wasn’t about to question why caffeine affected her as a corpse though that does raise the question of whether or not the same could be said for alcohol.

Shaking her head she asked “and this isn’t about me. This is about you and your insistence on doing that pseudo telepathy thing” she took a sip of her coffee “so spill, what’s that all about?”

This time there wasn’t any communication to be had which had the Wight in disbelief.

“Now you’re choosing not to say anything at all? Fine, just tell me whatever profound reasoning you have doesn’t include you just trying to be ‘quirky’ or something.”

“…”

To her credit her expression did not at all change

“Oh my God that’s it isn’t it!? Ha!”

“…”

As Natalie laughed the Golem turned fully to stare at her and while her expression remained neutral her eyes glared with such a intensity that it cut through Natalie’s mirth causing her laughter to peter out though she never lost her mirth.

“I’m sorry!” she eventually exclaimed “it’s just that…ugh, never mind. By the way how long have you been playing this?”

“…”

“All night? Don’t you sleep?”

“…”

“Oh right”

For the next couple of minutes Natalie watched as A played a few more races in silence. Eventually the final resident of the house arrived in his rumpled tank top and pajama bottoms despite having literally rolled out of bed. He had been on a direct course for the kitchen to receive his daily top up of milk yet the familiar sounds coming from the living room gained his attention.

He wasn’t exactly sneaking nor did he didn’t announce his arrival either yet the moment he entered the game was paused and the player, Golem A’s attention turned towards him. the sudden action garnered Natalie’s attention as she regarded him.

“Oh, it’s just you.”

“Who else were you expecting?”

“The other Golem Ez has stashed in secret.”

“…”

“…”

Two sets of eyes stared at the Wight in silent admonishment to which Natalie winced “too soon?”

Stanley decided to ignore that and move on with “I thought I packed the Switch back in my office.”

That got a subtle reaction from A which Stanley noted with his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

‘Why does she look like she got caught with her hand in the cookie jar?’

“Yeah, I snuck into your little man-cave and took it out when Ez kidnapped you.”

“Uh-huh” he hummed ignoring her words for the most part to continue staring at the Golem “is that what really happened?”

‘Huh, didn’t think Golem’s could sweat.’

“Leave the poor girl alone Stan” Natalie interrupted in a more stern tone of voice.

Stanley looked to his sister to find her glaring at him. It had bite he could admit but any reluctance (meager as it would be) got completely demolished with the thought of someone going into his office to touch his shit.

“Since this is your first time I’ll let you off with a warning. Don’t go in my office again.”

You’d think living with two women who casually disregard this once sacred edict would make him loosen up a bit but nope if anything it only made him more sensitive towards that kind of thing.

The Golem nodded her head frantically “o…kay.”

“Good”

He turned to leave only to catch the glare his sister gave him and this wasn’t the I’m disappointed in you glare nor was it the you’re being an asshole glare no this was the you better fix this shit or there will be consequences glare. Considering the circumstances he had a pretty good idea of why she was giving him that glare and while he would prefer not to address it there was another thought.

‘It is way too early to be dealing with this bullshit.’

And so with a roll of his eyes he looked at the Golem though this time without the subtle pre-milk fugue haze of sleepiness. His sharper more considerate gaze made the Golem tense further owing to the inherent fear she had towards him which was kind of ridiculous if you ask him.

‘I wasn’t that bad towards her…was I?’

He didn’t think so. Frankly with the amount of fear she was showing towards him you’d think he threatened her.

‘Oh wait, yeah I did.’

Well he didn’t verbally threaten her but he definitely had a threatening aura and given what Ezraphel told him about that one episode back when they were visiting his friends the ‘threatening aura’ might have been literal. Does that mean he was exposing her to an actual fear aura while he was interrogating her?

‘Now that I’m thinking about it wasn’t Amelia a little skittish around me after that?’

It wasn’t the kind of thing that was obvious at first glance nor did he pay much attention to it back then especially with how brief it was but he could remember Amelia being a little scared of him. He hadn’t even been directing his attention to her she was just unfortunately near him when it happened.

‘Well shit no wonder she’s scared of me.’

Now he felt bad but not as much as he probably should because well he actually liked the idea of the Golem being scared of him. What can he say? After living with two women who were familiar enough with him to be casually dismissive of him the Golem’s fear, exaggerated as it was, felt like a breath of fresh air.

Was it wrong for him to want respect in his own damn house without a layer of sarcasm or indulgence exhibited by Natalie and Ezraphel respectively? He swears nowadays it feels like the two treat him less like an adult and more like a child prone to tantrums. Embarrassingly its sometimes literal in the case of Ezraphel.

…He’d rather not think about it but let’s just say he’s unfortunately dipped his toe in degeneracy most unexpected and still coming to terms with that fact.

In any case he could not in good conscience lave things off in such a negative way with the Golem.

“Despite what you may have seen or heard from Ezraphel and this freeloading corpse I don’t like people taking my things WITHOUT PERMISSION!”

He shouted the last two words with a pointed glare at his sister who looked utterly unrepentant.

“…”

“Now if you want to play any other games or want recommendations you can just ask.”

The Golem looked at him with wide eyes “t-thank you that is very generous of you.”

“You’re welcome” he nodded at the Golem before catching the look of suspicion on Natalie’s face prompting him to ask “what?”

“Since when are you”

“Tch, I can be nice when I want to.”

“But you hardly do and not for nothing.”

“Well it just so happens that I don’t have to explain shit to you so…”

He then walked away without another word.

As he left Natalie turned to A “well good news is that he likes you.”

“Is that bad?”

“Oh, so you decided to ditch the silent speech then?”

“…”

“Alright, alright” she waved off her annoyed look “as for your question he really doesn’t do nice without a good reason or at least a reason that makes sense to him. So either he feels bad about how he grilled you the other day or…” she trailed off with a considerate expression.

“…”

“I dunno” she eventually shrugged “my advice? Keep doing what you’re doing. Stan isn’t nice all the time but when he is he can be really generous.”

Later that morning the quartet sat down to have breakfast and surprisingly Stanley was the one to start up small talk.

“So what exactly is your name?”

The question got a bunch of different reactions from the gathered women. The Golem in question froze as she was prone to do whenever she so much as glance her way for more than a few seconds.

Ezraphel looked confused “you don’t know her name?”

Natalie looked annoyed “please tell me it didn’t just now occur to you that you never got her name.”

“I was distracted” he defended himself…poorly.

The three women looked at him with varying degrees of unimpressed, even the Golem in question.

Seeing this Stanley indignantly yelled “as if you know her actual name.”

“It’s A” Natalie answered easily enough.

“That’s not a name it’s an alias.”

“It’s a nickname” Ezraphel corrected.

“Seriously?” the Wight looked genuinely surprised at this.

Natalie looked to the Golem who with a flat expression subtly shook her head.

“Please tell me it didn’t just now occur to you that you never got her name” Stanley mocked throwing her words back at her.

“I thought we were friends and you never even told me your real name?”

In response the Golem shrugged before speaking “didn’t seem important plus…”

“Don’t you fucking dare-”

“You didn’t ask” the Golem finished.

“Hah!”

“Shut up Stan you didn’t know it either.”

“Yeah but I didn’t care to know until now and the first thing I did was ask.”

“…I hate that that’s a valid excuse for you.”

Ignoring his sister’s muttering Stanley turned to the Golem “well?”

The Golem took a moment to consider before replying “Anastasia, my name is Anastasia.”

“So Ana then? Gotcha” he nodded to himself

“Why that name?” Natalie questioned.

“Because it starts with A” Stanley answered between bites.

His earned a look of admonishment from Ezraphel “Stanley-”

“Yes, actually” the now named Ana interrupted “that is one of the reasons.”

“You really shouldn’t indulge him” Natalie muttered.

Ignoring Natalie the Golem continued “and I just liked the sound of it.”

At the end of it Ezraphel looked disappointed “that’s it? I was expecting more.”

Stanley rolled his eyes at this “not every decision made has to be profound or make a statement Ez. It’s just a name, not that big of a deal.”

Of course this earned him glares from Ezraphel and Natalie as well as a look from Ana “why are you looking at me like that? You know I’m right.”

“You really aren’t” Natalie shot down.

“Stanley you dunderhead.”

“Who the hell says dunderhead nowadays?”

“How would you feel if you were named something ridiculous?” his sister piled on.

“But I’m not and even then I’d like to think that at this point in my life I wouldn’t care” he shrugged.

“You sure about that?”

“Yeah.”

“Well I heard from mom that one of the names considered for you was Beau short for Beauford.”

“Bullshit” he immediately denied “I don’t believe you.”

“Believe it…or don’t” she shrugged “just know that in some other reality you might have been named-”

“Beauford Berkowitz” Ezraphel finished with a giggle at the utter look of revulsion on Stanley’s face “come now Stanley it’s not a bad name. I think it’s cute actually.”

“Everything you’ve just spewed out of your mouth has made me violently ill” he looked down at his breakfast and made a face before pushing the plate away “and you made me lose my appetite!”

At this the Lilim lost her teasing expression and pinned him with a neutral expression “if you don’t finish your breakfast then I will endeavor not to make anymore meals for the foreseeable future.”

In the very next moment as if reality had skipped a frame Stanley had the breakfast sandwich he assembled himself in his hand chewing from the bite he took.

Not a word was said among the three women as they witnessed this bout of reality warping speed. While Ezraphel smiled triumphantly Natalie and Anastasia shared a look of astonishment.

Suddenly Ezraphel’s expression turned stern once again “now, I believe it’s time we have a serious discussion Anastasia.”

As she said this Ezraphel steeple her fingers together with her elbows on the table in the classic Gendo Pose^tm which made the Golem straighten up.

“When will you be inviting your boyfriend to dinner?”

There was a beat of silence at the question where Ana hesitated only for Stanley to beat her to the punch.

“Oh, I know the answer to this one” he chirped with false cheeriness “she’ll do it on nope-day at never-thirty.”

“Stanley-”

“Don’t you ‘Stanley’ me” the man interrupted “why is it so important that we meet this guy anyway?”

“I just want to meet the man who managed to garner her attention.”

“That’s even more reason not to invite him here” Stanley spoke frankly.

“What’s that supposed mean?”

“No offense Ez but I think I’d be sparing us and more importantly her boyfriend a lot of grief by keeping him away from the clusterfuck that is our household.”

“We’re not that bad” Ezraphel looked from Stanley to the other two women “are we?”

Ana found herself very preoccupied with the breakfast before her but luckily Natalie was there to bail her out.

“Eeh~” the Lilim made a so-so gesture “usually I’d agree for a meet and greet just to see if this guy is on the up and up but right now things aren’t really stable so to speak.”

“Plus Ana is a grown ass woman and she doesn’t need our approval. Not that it would even change anything even if we didn’t approve of him.”

“On the contrary it would be irresponsible of us not to ensure that her hubby can be trusted with our secret.”

“Yeah no, let’s not go there right now.”

“What?”

“First of all based on what I learned Ana is plenty responsible. Enough that I can trust she knows how to navigate a relationship without us hovering over her.”

At his words all three women stared at him in varying stages of astonishment.

“What?”

“We’re just surprised you’re willing to give her such a ringing endorsement. I for one think you’re full of shit and you’re working an angle.”

“Hey, she’s managed to go a couple months without fucking up I think she’s earned the benefit of the doubt.”

“…nope I don’t buy it. Something else is going on.”

Ezraphel looked exasperated “obviously Stanley does not want to open our home to a stranger and is willing to use anything as an excuse.”

“Who says it has to be one reason or the other?”

“You’re not even denying it” Natalie shook her head.

Ezraphel opted to bypass Stanley entirely to cast her gaze on the silent Golem “what do you think Anastasia?”

Ana had her mouth stuffed with food so her reply came out as “mmfhly mfh afghry mfh”

“…I’ll only tolerate such tomfoolery from Stanley because it is endearing” the Lilim spoke looking thoroughly unimpressed with Ana’s attempt at getting out of this conversation.

Natalie went on to add “plus you don’t need spoken words to communicate remember honey?”

“…”

“Language!”

“You don’t have to answer her Ana. She just wants more fuel for the Gossip Girl Collective.”

Ezraphel stiffened in naked shock causing Natalie to look between the couple and ask “what the hell is the Gossip Girl Collective?”

“Oh that’s the name I gave to the forums Ez likes to frequent to indulge in her relationship-related vices.”

“…you’re kidding. Please tell me he’s kidding” Natalie looked to Ezraphel who was staring at Stanley.

“When did you find out?” the Lilim asked.

“I’ve always known Ez.”

“How?”

He gave her his full attention “just like nothing goes on in this house without you knowing, nothing goes on with my WiFi without me knowing” he then looked to the other girls “and that goes for all of you bitches.”

“Are you being serious?” Natalie raised a brow.

“Do you want to challenge me on that?” he then went to eating his breakfast.

After a moment Natalie wisely decided to back off.

“That’s what I thought.”

There was a lull in the breakfast before Ezraphel looked back to Ana “I still want to hear your take on this Anastasia.”

“…I agree with Natalie” the Golem began hesitantly “if I had to choose I’d rather not bring Stefano here…no offense.”

“None taken” Stanley shrugged.

“Some taken!” Ezraphel countered heatedly before calming down “but if that is your decision I will respect it. Just know I am disheartened to know that you don’t feel comfortable enough around us to invite your boyfriend to dinner.”

“…thank you.”

The rest of breakfast passed by quickly enough and afterwards the four residents went their separate ways. Stanley retreated to his office and Ezraphel retreated to a pocket dimension leaving Anastasia and Natalie alone to play Mario Party until her phone started ringing.

“Hold up” she put a pause on the game before retrieving her device and upon seeing the number she froze.

‘Shit.’

She looked to Ana who gave her a look that said “what is it?”

“I gotta take this”

She got up off the sofa and started exiting the room. Ana heard only two words before she Natalie got out of earshot.

“Hey mom~”

~A Sibling’s Second Opinion~

When Stanley retreated to his office it was with the impression that he wouldn’t be dealing with anyone for at least a couple more hours depending on how long he’d last before a bathroom break was warranted or get peckish. So you can imagine his surprise when his sister from out of nowhere literally started banging on his door.

“Stan, open up we need to talk!”

Part of him desperately wanted to ignore her but unfortunately Natalie was the type of person who only got like this when things were serious. And when things were serious enough for Natalie to vehemently want to talk that meant he actually needed to pay attention lest he be blindsided by something.

“Dammit” he groaned before pushing off his game chair before yelling “I’m coming woman!”

He opened the door and immediately sidestepped the Wight as she stormed inside. He opened his mouth to make a snarky comment but the words died on his tongue as he saw the expression on her face. Natalie actually looked worried and that made him concerned.

“It’s happening Stan” she spoke while pacing the room.

“What’s happening?”

She paused to look directly in his eyes and say “mom wants to meet.”

“Oh” was his reflexive reply before his eyes widened as the implications settled in “ooh, well shit.”

“Exactly” Natalie nodded.

“Did she say what she wanted to talk about?”

“No, she just wants to catch up like usual.”

“Like usual?” he repeated questioningly.

“We meet up sometimes to talk about stuff going on in our lives like any new developments, maybe share some juicy gossip” she paused to stare at him “and lament about our belligerent estranged family members we don’t communicate with but still love.”

“…I can’t be the only one in that category.”

“Sad to say you’re not” she sighed before dropping into his game chair “oh wow this is very comfortable. No wonder you sit your ass down all day in here.”

“Nat” he folded his arms waiting patiently while glaring at her.

“Right so I need to get my story straight about what I’ve been up to for the past couple of months and to do that I need to know exactly what you told mom about me.”

“I mentioned we talked before and you might be going through some stuff. I made sure to be vague about it so it’s up to you to fill in those blanks.”

“Oh” she calmed down a bit “that’s…that’s good. I can definitely work with that.”

Stanley’s expression became one of curiosity before he asked “you really didn’t tell mom you had leukemia?”

“No Stan I did not” Natalie spoke in an exasperated tone.

For a moment Stanley could only stare in something akin to wonder “wow, so that’s what it feels like.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Nothing just, this is one of those rare moments when you’re the one who makes a stupid ass decision.”

Natalie frowned before muttering “it wasn’t a stupid decision.”

‘It was a selfish one’ she finished mentally.

“You going to come clean with mom?”

“Doesn’t look like I have to?”

“Well you’d save yourself some headache and drama by not telling her” Stanley informed with a shrug “depends on how comfortable you are with lying and omitting important stuff about your life from mom.”

His words caused her to slump in the chair not even its odd comfort able to soothe her.

“Ugh”

‘And to think this seemed like such a good idea back then’

Her reasoning for keeping her leukemia diagnoses a secret fluctuates between not wanting to worry her family while leaning all her hopes on chemotherapy to make a recovery in the hopes of turning something harrowing into something more lighthearted. The truth however was that it all came down to her own pride.

Despite being the oldest compared to her younger siblings she was far being special. Stanley turned his hobby into a viable career and became a wealthy multimillionaire whom she herself had to lean on ever so often for (financial) aid. Meanwhile Wendy was a brilliant young woman who despite the recent revelations of her questionable recreational activities could easily leverage her accomplishments both academic and otherwise to be on the fast track to becoming someone important.

Compared to them Natalie didn’t really have any kind of marketable skill or distinct achievements. She was in effect the most mundane of the three siblings but that was okay…no really Natalie was not-sarcastically fine with being the ‘boring’ one of the sibling trio. Sure she has the occasional bout of jealousy but on in specific circumstances when she’s in a specific mood but it never really festered.

Because while she might not have the same skills or achievements as her younger siblings for as long as Natalie could take pride that she was always seen as the strong responsible older sibling. Yes for as amazing as her little brother and sister were they were also a hot mess when it came to their personal lives.

Up until recently Stanley was a bitter cantankerous anti-social incel-lite who modeled his lifestyle as if he were perpetually a college dropout living in his parent’s basement. Meanwhile despite successfully living her life under her father as a brilliant overachieving student Wendy turned to drug use as a means of coping with societal pressure. Sure its just a bit of weed smoking now but something about her situation had Natalie thinking there was more going with her little sister and none of it was good.

Compared to those two Natalie’s life was a beacon of stability. She wasn’t rich, she didn’t have a high position job working at some big company or starting one of her own nor did she have dreams of making it big. She worked through highschool with a slightly above average GPA, managed to eke out of college with bachelor’s degree, got a respectable job working at a middling company that paid well enough for her to rent a modest apartment, pay her bills and have enough leftover to save up.

Natalie was content with her lot in life while also leaving room for explorations so as not to become stagnant. Her parents, even her bastard of a father could recognize this and her siblings certainly did. As it stood Natalie was the typical dependable older sister both of her younger siblings could turn to whenever they needed a friend, advice or wanted to be bailed out of trouble. It wasn’t easy getting to this point and it certainly wasn’t necessarily deliberate on her part.

She didn’t do anything as petty as lord her perceived position over them. It was something that came naturally through a combination of her hard work, choices made and personality influence. Still she was aware of her position and despite her efforts she could admit that she did put in extra work to maintain said position on the occasions when it was warranted.

Case in point: the leukemia diagnoses.

Now as much as she hated to admit it Natalie did not take the diagnoses with grace. Actually it would be accurate to say that she had the mother of all crash outs when it eventually settled in that she might not live to see thirty. By the end of it the situation got to her enough that when she looked in the mirror afterwards she didn’t see the strong, dependable eldest sister and daughter who managed to carve out a good life of her own in spite of her mediocrity.

No what she saw was a woman in her late twenties with no boyfriend and no kids working a dead end job. Then she realized she had under a year left to live and she hasn’t achieved nearly as much as she wanted out of life. That kind of thing had never really mattered to her before but suddenly faced with an estimated deadline to her life magnified her inadequacies and she knew for a fact that it was too late to change that.

Was it stupid to keep her diagnoses a secret?

In hindsight sure but in the moment all she could think about were the ‘consequences’ for revealing such a thing to her family. The ‘consequence’ being the carefully cultivated image she managed to maintain with her family even at their most antagonistic. As time went by that image became one of the few things she could say she truly took pride in. Natalie just couldn’t bring herself to taint that image, especially not when it could very well be the last impression her family might have of her before the end.

But now that the danger has passed and she could say with some level of certainty that death was less a looming specter and more a respectable roommate in her life the question now is, was it worth it?

And honestly?

She wasn’t sure.

In an ironic twist her brother found out about it and rightfully ripped into her but the backlash was somewhat muted by two factors. First was the reveal of Ezraphel’s true nature which ultimately led to the provision of the solution to her problem. Second was that her brother wasn’t the type to dwell on these things so aside from the initial reaction all she really had to deal with going forward was the occasional jab at her expense which was easy enough to accept.

All things considered she got off easy with Stan but her mother was an entirely different. The ripples this would cause in their relationship will echo for years to come and that made the woman very apprehensive. If it were up to her she would go with Stan’s suggestion and keep the secret buried under a pile of omittance.

“I can see the gears turning Nat, what are you thinking about?”

“Just how I’m to explain my current living situation” she replied.

“Midlife crisis?”

“…”

“What? You’d be surprised how many people crash out in their late twenties and do some questionable shit that could be charitably be called ‘poor life decisions.’”

…he’s not wrong but obviously she wasn’t about to do that.

“Try again.”

“Okay, how about telling her the truth then? You got diagnosed with cancer and did Chemo in secret. Things weren’t looking good so anticipating failure you quit your job, moved out of your old apartment and started selling some stuff to fund some extravagant vacation but it ended up working and you went into remission. From there you’ve been spending the last couple of months recovering and picking up the pieces of your life.”

For a moment Natalie could only look at her brother with something akin to awe “wow that was actually a pretty convincing little story. Very dramatic if I do say so.”

He rolled his eyes “that’s the story I came up with if mom ever found out you were staying here.”

“You must have been thinking about that a lot.”

“Ever since I first talked to mom over the phone.”

“Damn.”

“More importantly I’m freaking flabbergasted that you haven’t thought about a scenario like that.”

“I do” she refuted “but unlike you I’m not a pessimist who spends my days thinking about and agonizing over different worst case scenarios. I prefer to enjoy my life not dread it.”

“And where did that kind of thinking bring you?” he mocked “oh yeah, groveling at my feet for advice.”

“I’m not exactly groveling here” she gestured to the fact that she was literally lounging in his game chair “and I’m not actually worried about the meeting. I was always gonna tell mom about the leukemia.”

“If you already made up your mind then why are you even here?”

“I dunno” she sighed “guess I just wanted a second opinion.”

“Well now you have it so do you have any other issue you’d like to consult your younger brother for advice?”

Natalie took a moment to consider this before answering “yeah, I’m gonna need to borrow your car again.”

Stanley scowled “no.”

Natalie rolled her eyes “I don’t want to drive it I just need a lift.”

“Oh, in that case-hell no. Knowing my luck she’ll end up seeing me dropping you off or something.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“Am I? Can you really look at our life right now and believe something like that wouldn’t happen?”

“…you’re being a paranoid idiot again.”

“You hesitated” he noted still not looking at her “and I don’t hear a denial. Besides why do you need to borrow my car anyway?”

“Because mom lives far away and I don’t want to pay for an Uber” she answered.

“Then just use your own damn car.”

That gave Natalie pause “my car?”

“Yeah you know the one that you swindled me into getting, the one that I had Ez stash in a pocket dimension.”

“…oh yeah.”

Back when she got hospitalized Natalie’s car had unfortunately been impounded during her stay. Following that she eventually managed to convince Stan to retrieve it while she was still getting used to her transformation. Her plan had been to put it in a rental garage however he decided to instead have Ezraphel store it in a pocket dimension where it stayed for the duration of her time spent at the house.

As the realization hit Stanley pinched the bridge of his nose “for the love of God please tell me you didn’t actually forget your car was stashed in one of Ez’s pocket dimensions.”

“Yeah well in my defense it’s not as if I’ve gotten much use out of the damn thing recently.”

She literally only left the house once in the past two months and before that she had to handle a lot of different crap. Between finding out her brother found a girlfriend who turned out to be super succubus princess from another dimension, her own transformation into an undead, coming to terms with said transformation, learning about the culture she was now part of, learning magic to better blend in with human society when she inevitably leaves and dealing with the daily drama of the household it didn’t leave much room to think about things that weren’t of immediate concern.

“Riiight” was Stanley’s sarcastic reply “well anyway as fun as this conversation has been I believe we are done here” he gave her thumbs up before hiking it towards the door “so can you get the fuck out?”

“But I’m so comfortable~” she whined sinking further into the chair.

“Natalie if you don’t take your ass outta my chair I will literally pick you up and toss you out the door Uncle Phil style.”

That only caused her to straighten up in her chair “brave of you to threaten me when I’m literally sitting next to your PC.”

And with those words the tension ratcheted up as both siblings narrowed their eyes. Within that room a battle of wills between siblings takes place.

Moments Later…

*Door Creaks Open*

Natalie flies out the room

“AAH!”

*Thud*

*Door Slams Shut*

For a moment Natalie laid on the carpeted ground staring at the ceiling with bewilderment before a look of indignation overcame her.

“He actually did it” she stated with a dumbfounded look before a scowl marred her pretty face.

Natalie rose to her feet with supernatural dignity and with an air of grace. After brushing herself off she looked to the door with narrowed eyes and spoke up loudly.

“Just so that we’re clear that was uncalled for and I will get you back for that Stanley.”

Naturally there was no reply and she could imagine he had his headphones on with the volume cranked up in a deliberate attempt to ignore her. The thought caused her red eyes to flash but she calmed herself.

“No Natalie revenge is a dish best served cold.”

And her brother deserves only the best prepackaged frozen meals.

~Mother Daughter Chatter Hour~

The Next Day…

Natalie woke up, took a nice hot bath and ate a hearty breakfast before lazing around for a bit with Anastasia before getting ready. Finding a modest set of outfits among the ones Ezraphel made was something of a feat since the majority of her new outfits tend to be geared towards enticing men. Luckily Stanley managed to drill restraint into the Lilim so thoroughly that she became considerate enough to put in some casual clothing that wouldn’t be considered scandalous.

Because of this Natalie found a pair of tight blue pants, black boots and a sleeveless white blouse with frills at the end, flower patterns along the sides with a small laced up front. Her naturally shiny brown hair was curled at the end and rested just at her shoulder. With the application of her carefully practiced illusion magic her skin became a normal and healthy pallor while her eyes became a soft brown.

After reconfirming through a full length mirror that she did indeed look absolutely fabulous even as a ‘normal’ human Natalie was escorted via doorway portal to where her car was kept. Ezraphel left her blue Nissan Sentra on a nearby street outside the view of any cameras and with a subtle spell for the few people around to ignore it.

It turned out to be a good call on her part since the car itself would definitely draw some attention if left alone. Apparently Ezraphel had a lot of free time and decided to use it to spruce up the vehicle. It was actually a little more than that since the vehicle now resembled what it looked like when she bought it off the lot. Both the interior and exterior looked as if it were factory made.

It even somehow had that new car smell.

‘She definitely used magic to do more than clean this thing.’

Not that Natalie minded this as there were good odds he would have asked to get the thing cleaned up before she sat her luscious ass inside. That said Ezraphel did her a huge favor by going extra hard on the magical restoration of her vehicle. The drive to her mother’s apartment took close to an hour incorporating distance, traffic and a stop for gas.

“Alright Natalie it’s just a friendly chat with mom, you’ve done these plenty of times before, no pressure.”

After rechecking her appearance in the rearview mirror Natalie exited the car and approached the apartment building.

Moments Later…

*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

The door opened and Natalie was greeted by her mother who upon seeing her could only look on dumbfounded.

“Natalie?”

She expected as much, unlike her brother who didn’t care much for his appearance Natalie was very much aware of the drastic differences between her current appearance even under an illusion spell and what she used to look like. She could have made herself look just as she did pre-transformation however her inherent vanity just wouldn’t allow her to go through with it. Thus she settled for merely lessening her supernatural charm while getting rid of the corpse look basically rendering her the human version of her Mamono form.

“Yeah” the younger woman spoke as her mother let her inside the room “a bunch of stuff happened recently and I decided to change my look. What do you think?”

“You look amazing” Dana spoke as she marveled her eldest daughter’s appearance “like Stanley.”

Natalie quirked her lips “I know what you mean. Freaked me out when I saw him.”

“You visited your brother recently?”

“Define recently?” she chuckled a bit “but yeah I’ve seen the miracle with my own eyes.”

Her mother had a strange expression on her face as she asked “then did you meet his girlfriend?”

‘Ah, here we go.’

“I did meet Ezraphel yes” she informed before preemptively cutting off any further questions by continuing “but before we start talking about Stan and his girlfriend I need to know what happened when you met up with Stan.”

Natalie’s words made her mother’s frown become more pronounced at those words.

‘I definitely have my work cut out for me.’

Dana obliged her request and the two went deeper into the dwelling which was a spacious the two bedroom apartment. The kitchen and living room shared an open space while a small dinner table with four chairs sat in the kitchen space.

‘I forgot how much I hate this place.’

There wasn’t anything inherently wrong with the apartment, it was certainly better than her last one. The thing is Natalie would rather her mother live in a proper mortgaged house in a good community. Dana Berkowitz could certainly afford a proper house with the money she received from the divorce settlement as well as Stanley’s not-so-anonymous donation. In fact she did own real estate and collected rent but chose to settle for a modest apartment instead. According to her she didn’t need the extra space considering she would be living alone for the most part with the only guest who stayed beyond a few hours being her youngest daughter, Wendy.

The two sequestered themselves on the chair and table located in the kitchen space and Dana didn’t waste any time. For the next hour she went on to talk about her meeting with Stan. First she spoke of how surprised she was initially when he called her, how she felt a flicker of hope at rekindling their relationship and how nervous and uncertain she was leading up to the start of the meeting.

From their she went over the meeting itself including her thoughts on his appearance and how it heavily contrasted with how she remembered him to be when she last saw him in person. She went over their discussions from what he got up to over the years and any changes in his personal life. After finishing her tale Dana got back to the topic she was most interested in at the moment and started by asking Natalie a poignant question.

“What can you tell me about Stanley’s girlfriend?”

“Didn’t he say anything about her?”

Natalie knew he must have but for some reason her mother failed to mention that fact in her retelling.

“Oh he couldn’t stop singing her praises” the older woman informed “if I’m being honest I find his admiration for this woman to be a little concerning.”

‘Jesus Stan’ Natalie internally groaned.

Of all the things she thought Stan could do to gain their mother’s suspicion Natalie would never imagine that it would be for glazing. Stanley wouldn’t excessively praise anyone unless it involved his hobbies so of course him doing it for a woman would be suspicious.

‘Okay so mom thinks Stan’s compromised’

Which wasn’t exactly wrong but…

“You’re worried she might be taking advantage of him.”

“I am” she nodded then added “but I am prepared to be wrong.”

“Well as someone who has gotten to know the woman in question I can assure you that you don’t have anything to worry about.”

“Are you sure?” Dana insisted causing Natalie to half groan.

“I spent a few days at their house mom, trust me if she wasn’t good for him you would have heard about it.”

“Why didn’t I hear about it before?”

“Because he made me promise not to tell you anything because he’ll do it himself” she paused “and he did.”

Dana obviously wasn’t a fan of that so Natalie moved on.

“Look mom I don’t know what exactly Stan said about her to make you suspicious but you won’t trust his judgment then trust mine” Natalie began looking at her mother sternly “I’ve gotten to know the girl during my stay at Stan’s house and I can confirm that Ezraphel’s the real deal. She genuinely loves Stan and will literally do anything for him.”

“…”

“Let me reiterate: Stan’s not getting taken for a ride, Ezraphel’s not running a scam, she’s taking advantage of him and she’s definitely not a bad influence. She’s a nice girl and I think you’ll really like her when you eventually meet her.”

At the end of her daughter’s speech Dana pursed her lips “alright, I will take you at your word and reserve any judgment for when I meet her.”

Natalie almost sighed at this ‘sorry Ez that’s all I can do for now.’

“Great, now can we talk about something else?”

“Stanley implied that you were going through a crisis.”

If Natalie had a working heart it would have skipped a beat.

“Did he actually say crisis?”

“No but I read between the lines” she answered.

She silently cursed her brother even as she retained her calm answering “well as you can see I’m doing fine.”

Dana frowned obviously not buying it and to make her case she spoke “before today I’ve noticed for some time now that you seemed…not alright. I wanted to ask but decided not to pry because I trust you’d tell me what was wrong eventually.”

At her words Natalie winced having nearly forgotten that she didn’t immediately stop meeting with or communicating with her mother following her diagnoses and failed treatment. First there was a wait list for the treatment in question plus her health insurance refused to cover the expenses so she had to deal with that before she was eventually forced to dip into her savings. The whole process was tedious and god awful enough that she could definitely see how the experience would make her seem ‘not alright’ as her mother put it.

Unbeknownst to her daughter’s thoughts Dana continued “and then you started putting off our meetings or canceling them and when we do meet up you always look preoccupied with something.”

‘Right, that’s when I started chemo’ she sighed internally ‘Jesus, was I really that bad?’

She remembered being so weak that she couldn’t even pick up the phone let alone make a call or text. She did get better though and eventually started communicating with her mother again. She had to assure her multiple times that nothing was wrong and made up some bullshit to hide the fact that she was getting treatment for a life threatening illness that was guaranteed to work.

“Then I lost communication with you for a while altogether.”

After the chemotherapy failed for a while she started spiraling ignoring everything while she came to grips with her imminent death.

“This is the first time I’ve seen you in months Natalie. I thought something bad had happened, that you were dealing with something but then you show up at my door looking like this…” she trailed off shaking her head “now I don’t know what to think. So please, tell me what’s going on.”

“…”

Natalie didn’t reply immediately instead taking a moment to carefully think over her options going forward. In truth she had spent a significant amount of time the day before thinking about what she was going to tell her mother. Obviously she wasn’t about to reveal her new status as an undead or that she’d been staying at Stan’s house for the better part of two months but as for everything else…

‘…well I already decided I was going to tell her about it.’

And so she did.

“The truth is last year I got diagnosed with leukemia.”

Naturally the news caused Dana to recoil “w-what?”

Natalie continued speaking “the reason why I’ve been ‘preoccupied’ and ghosting you all these months is because I was setting up to do chemotherapy and…getting my affairs in order in case things didn’t work out.”

“Natalie you-” Dana tried to speak only to be interrupted once again by her daughter who continued

“My health insurance fell through” and Dana scowled at the memory “assholes didn’t want to cover the procedure so I had to use my savings to pay for it” her expression softened “I..I didn’t know if it would work, the doctor didn’t give me a guarantee so I quit my job and had to move out of my old apartment”

“…” this time Dana didn’t try to speak instead waiting for her to continue.

Natalie swallowed at the look she received from the older woman “after…after everything worked out I’ve been crashing at a friend’s house. They’ve been helping me get my life back together.”

“…”

“And that’s it” Natalie finished “that’s what’s been going on with me these past couple of months.”

“…”

Dana said nothing and her expression betrayed nothing which made the disguised Wight fidget in nervousness.

“Please say something.”

“I’m sorry I was just processing the fact that my daughter was diagnosed with cancer and didn’t tell me about it.”

Natalie winced with a mental ‘oof.’

“Does Stanley know?”

“He knows now” she looked away “I didn’t tell him until after the treatment.”

Technically not a lie just like everything she has said so far.

“And the treatment worked” Dana pressed “you don’t have cancer anymore?”

Natalie managed to smile regaining her confidence as she answered “I’m completely cancer free and between you and me after going through all that crap I don’t think I’m ever going to get sick again.”

“Well I’m glad you find this so amusing.”

Natalie visibly winced “sorry.”

“No. Make no mistake I am happy you aren’t in any danger but I feel the need to ask: why didn’t you tell me?”

“…because I’m an idiot.”

‘A prideful idiot.’

“You’re not an idiot.”

“Yeah well, my reason for not saying anything was stupid in hindsight so sorry if I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Were you worried about how we’d think of you?”

Natalie flinched before chuckling sardonically ‘am I that transparent?’

And suddenly the insecurities that plagued her back when she first got diagnosed resurfaced causing a mental and physical slump. In response Dana got up and made her way over to the still seated Natalie before enveloping her in a hug.

This unexpected gesture surprised the younger woman who could only stammer out “uh, m-mom?”

“Yes”

“Are you mad? T-that I didn’t tell you?”

“Oh my ‘idiot’ daughter I am disappointed and a little hurt you didn’t tell me about this but I’m not angry. If anything I’m mad that you would think I would think any less of you for something as small as being scared in a situation like that.”

Natalie blinked before she returned the hug realizing that this was the woman who literally raised her. She’d probably seen Natalie at her lowest/most embarrassing points over the course of two whole decades. Why the hell did she believe something like this would change her opinion of her? If anything she could have fucked everything up by not telling her.

‘Why the hell am I just realizing this?’

Hindsight is a bitch like that.

After a minute Dana pulled away from their embrace enough to look her in the eye. This time her expression became bit more stern as she spoke.

“By the way I know you’re not telling me everything.”

Natalie stilled her eyes widened and in the face of both her mother’s words and expression she felt her still heart beat for a single second.

“I-I-um-”

Dana pulled fully away shaking her head while giving her sad smile “it’s alright Natalie. At this point in y life I’m used to my children keeping secrets from me.”

At those words Natalie was mentally startled and a thought occurred or more like it was a series of memories.

‘Oh yeah, how could I forget I’ve never been able to keep a secret from mom.’

Dana Berkowitz was a lot of things but chief among them was perceptive, at least when it came to her children. Natalie remembered Dana as the kind of mother who could look at her or her siblings and immediately knew when something was wrong or when one of them was keeping secrets from her. Granted she might not know the particular details of the situation but she’d know something was up.

And sometimes that’s all she’d need.

As a child Natalie remembered her mother calling her out when she made attempts at keep secrets. As a teenager this didn’t happened as much which made her believe that she got away with it. It wasn’t until she was much older that she began to recognize the signs of her ‘forbidden knowledge’, namely that knowing glint she’d gain when she knew something was up but chose not to say anything or act on the information. After figuring that out Natalie found in retrospect that she didn’t get away with as much as she thought she did in her rebellious youth.

After she started living on her own the times when she was properly scrutinized by her mother became less and somewhere along the line Natalie forgot just how on point her mother’s instincts were when it came to reading her. It also didn’t help that Dana no longer treated her like a child but a proper adult and that lulled her into a false enough sense of security that she thought she could actually keep things from her.

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize. You and Stanley are grown adults now so I shouldn’t be expecting you to tell me every single detail about your lives.”

The only thing that’s changed between her now and her as a child was that her mother chose not to push the issue. It’s unfortunate to say that her not doing as such had less to do with them being adults and more to do with her experience having a strained relationship with her two youngest children. Stanley of course was the main culprit however ever since Wendy was caught with marijuana the relationship between the two have soured. It didn’t help that her father had fought aggressively for custody of Wendy and managed to win for the most part.

So now Dana felt the need to walk on eggshells around all her children in an attempt to not displease them to the point where they’d up and leaving her. It was sad and ultimately something both Stanley and Ezraphel would have to navigate but ultimately it was a mere speed bump. Frankly Natalie couldn’t imagine a world where Ezraphel wouldn’t be able to get along with her mother.

…not unless she straight up greets her in her true form or something equally ridiculous.

Still given her reaction to Ezraphel so far the Lilim was going to have an uphill battle trying to get on her good side. The same could be said for Stanley as well since it was getting less likely that he would be up to the task of keeping up the rouse. Unlike her he actually has hang-ups when it came to lying to their mother which was both weird and oddly endearing.

And speaking of their mother she talked a big game about not needing to know every single detail of their lives and alluding to trusting their judgment yet the first thing she tried to do and continued to do was fish for information about Ezraphel. Natalie could already tell her mother won’t be satisfied until she interrogates Ezraphel herself, preferable alone without Stan running defense.

‘Note to self, need to start looking for a new apartment.’

She did not want to be around when things pop off between Stan, Ezraphel and her mother. Sure she could just hide in a pocket dimension within the house but it was about time she started looking into moving out and getting her life properly on track.

“Oh, before I forget”

Dana interrupted her daughter’s thoughts leaving the kitchen for a moment to go into her bedroom. A moment later and she came out the door with a package covered in gift wrapped.

“What’s that?” Natalie couldn’t help but ask.

“You brother’s birthday is in a few days. I’d deliver it to him as a surprise but…” she trailed off looking at Natalie.

Unfortunately her daughter nodded sympathetically “probably not a good idea.”

“Oh”

Dana’s shoulders slumped by the barest margin causing the disguised Wight to hastily add “not because he wouldn’t want to see you. It’s just that Ezraphel planned to keep Stan occupied for most of the day.”

“How do you know that?”

“We keep in contact with each other. Said she was working on a project for Stan’s birthday which involved them going out.”

“Ah, I see”

‘Sorry mom, maybe next year.’

“I’ll drop it off at his house. I’m gonna give him a gift too so it works out.”

The conversation following this flowed a lot easier as they went to less heavier topics. After another hour Natalie left her mother’s apartment with a promise to call her again and extract an actual date and time from Stanley for when she would visit his house after giving him his present.

All in all things could have gone better but she’ll take this as a win in her book.

~To Be Continued~

Author’s Notes: I don’t even know what to say other than I got stuck with the next chapter and you won’t believe why. It’s not writer’s block if you’re wondering, at least not in the way you think. Basically I have forgotten how to write smut scenes and I’m sure you’ve noticed how I’ve utilized them less and less over the recent chapters. I just didn’t know how bad it was until I actually sat down and tried to write one and just got blanked halfway into it.

I know smut’s placement in a story is subjective and despite the lack me utilizing them I feel like I can’t avoid it this time around. I try to skip the smut scenes and go straight back into the story but for this next chapter in particular the sex scenes are actually important for the plot. Anyway after slogging through it for a while and being unsatisfied with the results I decided to take a break.

I was kinda getting tired working on the same two stories and needed to stretch my writing muscles a bit so to kill two birds with one stone I decided to do something I’ve been meaning to do for months…writing down my MGE ideas into stories and seeing where they go.

The idea was to basically do a oneshot with an open end that I could continue should I get the urge to. That’s what Valentina Inc. was supposed to be but I got too ahead of myself and published with the implication that it would be a new series and now it’s just sitting there like a neglected child, apologies to anyone hoping for an update to that story by the way. As for the oneshots I’m currently working I’ve actually got two of them almost done, just have to finish the smut scenes but I ain’t rushing it.

Anyway thank you all for your patience and continued support.          

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