Thoreau

Bonus Story - War of the Words

Author's Note 7/14/24: While you're waiting for me to start The Beta's Heart (Tyler James' story), here's a short vignette that takes place sixteen year after Posy becomes luna of Five Fangs. If you haven't read the epilogue in Thoreau, the characters might not make sense to you and there might be some spoilers.

Watch for The Beta's Heart to start next week!

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War of the Words

Dad - Cole Barlow

Mom - Posy Everleigh

Van - Evander Everleigh, 8

Vo and Co - Ivo and Jericho Everleigh, 4, Van's youngest brothers

  "Running's only going to make it worse, little boy!" Alpha Cole Barlow snarled as he chased down his delinquent eight-year-old son.

Evander knew he'd made a tactical error in setting up his prank where he had. It left him too far from any hiding spots, and, sure enough, his dad caught him out in the open just as he was making his getaway.

Snagging his son's ankle, Cole picked him up and raised the boy until they were face to face.

"Why did you prank your baby brothers like that, you little hemorrhoid?" Cole yelled.

"Cole Nathanial Barlow!"

The shocked gasp from behind Cole's broad back caused both father and son to freeze in united terror. Van, quick on the uptake, realized he had a golden opportunity to not only save his own skin but also throw his father to the wolves.

"Waaaah!" Relying on one of his tried-and-true weapons, he turned on the crocodile tears as easily as a sink faucet. "Daddy called me a mean name, Mommy! Waaaah!"

"You little brat," Cole hissed through clenched teeth, immediately understanding Van's master plan to escape his crimes. "While I'm dealing with your mother, you better give your heart to the Goddess because your ass is mine, little boy! You ain't going to sit for a month of Sundays!"

"As if Mom would let you paddle me now!" Van hissed back, feeling a mite dizzy from dangling upside down like he was.

"Put him down, Cole!" Mom finally managed to squeeze her way around her mate's bear-like body and reached for her precious baby boy. "You're too escalated right now!"

Van, a master of code-switching, transformed into that precious baby boy quicker than a hiccup. He waited until he was safe in her arms, his face buried in her throat so she couldn't look into his eyes and know he was lying.

It was something he was still working on.

"Mommy, I know I was bad, and I'll say sorry to Vo and Co and clean up the mess, but Daddy," sniff-sniff, "hurt my," sniff-sniff, "little heart."

"Oh, my, my! I'm so sorry that happened." Mom tut-tutted while giving Dad the stink eye. "Apologize to him, Cole."

"The hell I will," Cole rumbled, and Van, never one to miss a cue, sobbed louder into the crook of her neck.

"Van, that's enough. Stop tormenting your dad," Mom said, her even tone telling him that his pretend crying wasn't fooling her, so he stopped. A gambit wasn't worth the energy to continue if it wasn't working. "Vo and Co said you played a mean prank on them. After dinner, we'll sit down and have a proper discussion about your responsibilities as an older brother and what consequences you'll face. For now, you're going to sit on the Naughty Step for ten minutes."

Oh, no! Not the dreaded Naughty Step! It was the bottom one on the staircase leading into the living room, right where anybody and everybody could walk past and see your shame!

Not the shame of your actions, of course! Oh, no, no, no! The shame of being caught.

Since Van's little backside polished the Naughty Step at least five times a week, he knew what he was talking about.

"Ten minutes?!" he whined, then clenched his teeth when he realized he'd just handed ammunition to his opponent.

"Fifteen then." Mom shrugged under his cheek, and he nodded once, acknowledging that she'd won this round. "Cole, I'm still waiting to hear your apology to our son."

"Honey, you didn't see Vo and Co's little faces!" He gave it a shot, but Van could have told him it was a wasted effort. "He—"

"Whatever he did, he doesn't deserve to be called a hemorrhoid! That's absolutely inappropriate!"

"He is Wyatt's exact clone! There is no other word in the English language that is more appropriate!"

"Then I suggest you go to the bookstore, buy a dictionary, and learn one!"

"I am not going to apologize!"

"So after you buy that dictionary, you can take a selfie, print it out, and paste it next to the entry for blue balls."

Van only knew two meanings for the word balls, and he didn't think his mom was referring to the sports kind. That got the gears in his head turning and, unfortunately for his twin, Darius would find out the next morning that permanent markers worked very well indeed to turn a boy's ball sack blue...

"Honey—"

"Yes, Cole?"

Van didn't even have to look to know his mom had raised one eyebrow and was staring his dad down with sparks in her dark blue eyes. Of his five fathers, the only one it didn't work on was Pa, and Pa was too wise to get himself into situations that earned it.

"Oh, for the love of the moon!" Cole howled. "Fine! Evander, I'm sorry for calling you a little hemorrhoid!"

"Thank you, Daddy." His face still tucked into his mother's neck, Van accepted his dad's insincere apology because his manners would add points with his mom, and he was determined not to lose this skirmish.

As Mom spun around and marched back toward the house, Van fired one more shot. Slyly peeking over her shoulder to watch his dad's face, he slid one hand out from under her long brown hair, made a fist, and flipped up his middle finger.

Oh, yeah. So worth getting my ass lit up, he thought with a satisfied smirk.

Cole, who had darker skin than the rest of his fathers, didn't turn red so much as went into full smash mode, his eyes bulging and the veins in his neck popping out as he clenched his hands into tight fists at his sides.

"E. Van. Der. Pol. Lux. Ev. Er. Leigh!" he bellowed each individual syllable, making Mom jump a little, and Van patted her cheek reassuringly.

"Run, Mommy."

"What did you just do, baby?" she asked with wide eyes.

"Run now, ask questions later. You're about to lose your beloved fifth-born son."

"Your mom's right, Van! You're not a little hemorrhoid!" The roars of an enraged alpha echoed all around them. "You're a fucking big hemorrhoid!"

"For Goddess' sake, Van!" Mom chided him as she started to run as fast as her short legs could carry her. "I thought you learned your lesson the last time you flipped him off!"

"Apparently not." Van shrugged, clutching her tightly as she ran even faster.