Christina Cox One Shots

Comfort Characters AU Part 1

Rye's POV
June 15, 2021

I was getting the living room ready for my first slumber party since coming home from my first year at NYU for the amazing creative writing program they have along with minoring in teaching and science, specifically zoology. But I was having friends from New York and New Jersey over. They’d never been to New Orleans before and I was super nervous.

My moms, Nikki and Nora were working on the main bathroom, again. I loved living in this house, but something was always broken down, something always needing to be fixed. I finished setting up the living room and pulled out all the movies and went through them.

Everyone was getting in around 7:45 and it was currently 5:30 so I still had an hour and 15 minutes. Mama (Nora) was in the main bathroom, painting it, this time purple instead of blue at the suggestion of Mom (Nikki).

Mom was in the kitchen, cooking dinner for us all. “Nikki!” I heard Mama yell. “Where the hell is the paint roller? I know I said I was gonna use the brush but this is taking too long!”

“It should be right outside the door! Have you checked there?” Mom yelled back to her. I turned and saw Mama peek her head out of the doorway.

“Aha. Thanks babe!” She went back to work on the bathroom and I shook my head and went back to looking at movies.

Mom and I were into the same movies: thrillers and horror with a touch of sci-fi and romantic comedy. Mama was into Disney movies and musicals which I also liked, sometimes more than others. I decided to scrap the idea of DVDs and decided we’d just use Netflix, Disney+ and Hulu. I tucked the movies back into the movie stand-case-thing and sat down on the couch, letting out a sigh.

Mama must have heard my sigh because next thing I knew she was leaving the bathroom and coming over to me. She sat next to me and rubbed my back. “You feeling okay, Rye?” She asked. I shrugged. “Are you nervous about having everyone over?”

“Yeah. I’ve talked to Nellie as she came on campus a lot since her mom was my education professor. I hung out with Vanessa a lot as she was in my creative writing class, same with Peggy. And because Nina is Vanessa’s best friend, we became friends by default. Agatha, Darcy and Wanda are all internet friends of Nellie’s and again, we became friends by default. But they’ve never been down south. What if they don’t like it? What if they-”

“Ryeli, honey, calm down love. I know you’re nervous. But they’re going to love it.”

“Hey lovely ladies, dinner’s ready.” Mom said from the kitchen. Mama and I stood up and went to eat dinner. I sat at the table and just picked at my food. It was crawfish, so basically freshwater lobster. I liked it, but tonight, even my favorite food seemed disgusting. I sighed and just pushed the crawfish meat around my plate. “Ryeli, you always love crawfish, what’s wrong sweetie?”

“I’m just really nervous is all, Mom. I just want them to enjoy themselves. They’re here for two weeks and I’ve only been home for two days!” I put my face in my hands.

“It’s gonna be okay.” Mama said and kissed my head.

After dinner, I stood up and went to grab Mom’s plate. “No, Rye. I’ll do dishes.” She said, stopping me.

“But Mom, you cooked.”

“It’s fine.”

“Rye. I want you to go for a walk with me.” Mama said. “It’s light enough out to go for a 6:45 walk. So, let’s get Bowser and head out.”

I sighed and watched as Mama put on her sneakers. I then followed suit, grabbed Bowser’s leash and whistled to get the rottweiler, pitbull mix’s attention. The dog jumped up and looked at me. “Come here Bowser, come here boy.” He ran to me, jumping up. “Bowser, down.” The dog got down, sitting paitently, waiting for me to clip on his leash.