The rain beat down on me, soaking me through as I ran towards the lake, the mud squelching between my toes as I raced all the way to the bottom of the hill. I fell to my knees before the water and stared up at the grey sky, thinking of all the horny little ferret ladies that had succumbed to such an unjust fate.
“Why?!” I broke down, buckling forward and pressing my hands into the mud as my hair swung forward to cover my face. My tummy was ouchie and all I wanted to do was curl up into a ball and eat chocolate and bed bread, but now my bed bread was ruined and I’d eaten all the chocolate in the house last night. It wasn’t fair.
“What do you need, Rook?” Jack knelt down at my side and lifted the curtain of hair covering my face so that he could peer in at me. I glanced over my shoulder with a sniff, finding Mateo and Niall arguing back at the house while Brutus barked at them.
I sniffed again, looking out at the lake as the rain made the surface dance with ripples. “I need a hug.”
Jack drew me into his arms and he was so big, he easily tucked me in against his chest, rising to his feet as he held me, just like the time Niall had kicked him out of the house. I nuzzled into his neck, his masculine scent floating over my senses and calming the erratic beating of my heart.
“Maybe you should take the ferret shirt off and put something else on, baby,” Jack suggested, using our special mind connection to communicate with me and I sniffed again.
“It’s a weasel,” I said.
“Oh…well, I can only tell the difference between them and stoats,” he said and I looked up at him with a frown.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“A weasel is weaselly recognised, but a stoat is stoatally different,” he said, his lips twitching with the joke and my eyes widened before I burst out laughing.
“Oh my God, that’s so funny.” I clutched my sides as I laughed and laughed and Jack carried me back to the house with a grin on his face.
Niall and Mateo fell quiet as they spotted me laughing and Mateo tugged the bottom of his jeans out of Brutus’s mouth as he played snappy snaps with him.
“Are you okay now, mi sol?” Mateo asked hopefully.
“Yes,” I said brightly. “Jack told me a joke. Tell them the joke, Jack.”
“He can’t string a sentence together,” Niall scoffed. “He didn’t tell ya nothin’, Spider.”
“He did! There was a weasel and a stoat. And he said that weasels are stoatally cool or something, didn’t you? Tell them, AJ!” I said excitedly, bouncing in his arms, but Jack just gave me a roguish look and I tapped his nose, realising he wanted to keep our secret mind language talk between us.
“Poor fella, he ain’t got two words to rub together,” Niall said, shaking his head sadly. “Ain’t that right, big man? Yer a good boy though, aren’t ya? Do you want a snack?” He took a protein bar from his pocket. “Here ya go, keep those muscles nice and big now to protect my Spider.” He tossed Jack the bar and it hit him in the face before dropping into the mud. Jack didn’t even flinch.
“How about I try and tell the joke?” I said, tugging on Jack’s loose fitting tank top before turning to the others again. “There was a bit about a ferret, I think. Ferrets being ferrety, or…dammit, I can’t tell it right. Oh no,” I gasped, remembering the ferret fact I’d learned earlier and my throat closed up, my mood plummeting out of the sky like an airplane that had been hit by a missile.
“The lady ferrets and their horny deaths,” I whispered as my lower lip wobbled.
“C’mere.” Niall reached for me and I let him take me from Jack’s arms, scooping me against his chest as he walked inside and Mateo looked down at me over his shoulder.
“Can we round up all the lady ferrets who don’t have husbands and find them their mates?” I asked Mateo. “We could make an app.”
“I’m not sure that would work, mi sol,” he said gravely and Niall shot a glare at him as I let out a wail.
“Shut up, Mateo. Get workin’ on that app right this fuckin’ second,” Niall commanded, but Mateo just kept following us to the lounge where Niall laid me on the couch.
I rested the back of my hand to my forehead, hiccups of woe leaving me as the three of them came closer and started pulling off my wet clothes. I kept sobbing even when Niall stripped off his own t-shirt and tugged it over my head and Mateo tucked a snuggly blanket around me.
“Can we get you something?” Mateo asked as he pushed my hair behind my ears.
“I need chocolate,” I sniffed as I curled up like a cat. “And a hot water bottle, and a lump of fresh bread, and some Coco Pops, and a glass of milk, and some nuts to nibble on – not stupid almonds though, they don’t even count as a nut – oh, and I want a magazine about gardening to soothe my mind, and I want someone to read it to me in a German accent as that’s the most soothing accent of all. And I’d like a doughnut with cherry filling and some sprinkles on it, and I’d like a coconut. Not to eat, just an emotional support coconut. And I want a surprise gift. A really good one. And then I want a big hug from all of you while we watch that Disney movie with that person who’s stuck working and working and working, and then they realise they can live out their dreams instead.”
“Cinderella?” Mateo guessed and I shook my head with a frown.
“You know the one. Where they get to go out at night doing all the things they really want to do, but they can’t tell anyone.”
“The Incredibles?” Mateo guessed again.
“Nooo.” I threw my head back against the cushion behind me with a huff.
“Oh, you mean American Psycho,” Niall realised and I perked up.
“Yes! That one. With the stabby man living his dreams,” I said with a grin.
“Alright then.” Niall turned to Jack. “Get the telly on, big fella, and get her a hot water bottle, el burro. I’ll make a call to organise the rest.” He headed away upstairs while Jack moved to set up the movie and Mateo walked off into the kitchen.
I snuggled deeper into my blanket and after a few minutes, dreamland called to me and I slipped away into a lovely snooze.
***
“Little psycho,” Niall’s voice carried to me from afar, his fingers prodding into my side. “Wakey, wakey.”
I growled, burying my head deeper into my blanket and jerking every time he prodded me.
“I think we should let her sleep,” Mateo said.
“Nonsense, she’ll wanna see what I got her.” Niall prodded me again and I cracked an eye open as he drew the blanket away from my face. He shook a shoebox at me and wiggled his eyebrows. “I got ya yer surprise.”
I realised my head was now resting on Jack’s lap and I yawned as I pushed myself upright, eyeing the box curiously.
“It better be worth ruining my nap for, Hellfire,” I said, narrowing my eyes at him.
“I’d say it is.” He brushed his knuckles over my cheek and I lunged for the box in his other hand, but he held it out of my reach, chuckling as he enjoyed teasing me.
“Kiss me and I’ll give it to ya,” he said, leaning forward and I let him take a kiss from me, his tongue sinking between my lips which I decided to bite when he took too much time.
“Fuck,” he jerked back, bringing his fingers to his tongue and blood marked them when he pulled them away. “Ya little psycho,” he growled like he’d enjoyed that.
Mateo appeared with a hot water bottle and moved to take the one that was already in my lap, swapping it over.
“Thank you, Dead Man,” I breathed and he smirked darkly at me before sitting at my side.
Jack played with my hair as I reached for the box in Niall’s grip again, and this time he gave it to me. I ripped into it like an animal and took out the gift from inside, finding a black gavel with a gold band around it alongside a wooden block for hitting.
“I told ya I’d get ya one,” Niall said with a wide smile.