drowning on a dry land [ls]

Chapter 6: Kids are fun

"Congratulations Mason," Louis pats the boy's head, and earns a smile.

"I'm a big brother now." He stands on the couch. A sketch pen falls from his lap with no lid on, it makes a purple line on the cream color. Louis beats the boy in the race to retrieve it.

Kids are fun!

"I'm a big brother now!" He exclaims, jumping lightly. He then places his hands on his lap and looks at Louis with a sincere facade. Like he was a part of an office meeting. "He told me you have a lot of little siblings," He holds out a finger towards Harry's retreating figure. Harry just shrugs before walking towards the kitchen.

"I want you to teach me everything I need to know." He took out a writing pad from his bag and snatched the sketch pen from Louis' hand. "Would the little baby be okay with us sharing parents? What if he finds out that Mom loves me more? I want to share my chocolates with him but Dad said he doesn't have teeth yet. When would he get his teeth? Can babies talk to their toys? Would he be able to tell me why my teddy bear is missing an eye?"

Louis fish-mouthed, not knowing how to answer the verbal questionnaire flung at him. "Harry?" He asked his boyfriend to help him out.

"Let's start with breakfast. After that, we'll play Monopoly with you, only if you promise us that you won't multiply the numbers on the dice." Harry called out from the kitchen.

"Okay, Dad!" Mason mocks him by poking his tongue out. He swiftly gathers his stuff and keeps the bag under the table. "Let's go, he told me he's making pancakes for us." With that, he skips away, leaving Louis behind with a swirl of emotions inside him.

He doesn't- this is absolutely not because of the idea of a little child referring to him as 'dad.' They hadn't discussed anything about this, like ever. Then why does he have an unsettling feeling in the pit of his stomach that makes him want to run over to another block and throw up there?

"Louis, we're waiting for you." Harry's voice snaps him out of his train of thought. He dumbly follows the source of the sound and soon finds himself settled beside him on the kitchen table.

"Yummy! You're the best." Mason praises as he digs into the pancake on his plate. Louis doesn't miss the sparkle in Harry's eye at the compliment. The syrup has been poured in such a way that it forms a smile on the top. The little boy proudly flaunts it to him in a way that screams 'I get a smiley and you don'!' "So fluffy!" he further remarks, never taking his eyes off the plate.

It all feels so- domestic that Louis can't help himself from reaching over to Harry and kissing his forehead. Harry doesn't move away from his touch, until he does.

"I'm done," Mason soon announces. He leaves his plate on the kitchen table and dashes towards the drawing room, screaming behind him, "You promised to play Monopoly with me. Don't forget it."

"You go set the game pieces, I still haven't done the dishes yet." Harry ushered him. "It won't be too long."

"You stack up the dishes like it's Scandinavian architecture, don't tell me it wouldn't take too long." He says good-naturedly. As he turns around, a light slap greets his ass. "You little shit," he moans. Harry winks at him.

༺❀༻

It had been forty-five minutes into the game and to put it in simple words, he'd rather suck a cactus than hear any more of Harry bitching and moaning about almost going bankrupt. It's his fault for letting Mason evade the rent every time his pawn landed on his property!

From a mile away, he can sense that his overly-competitive husband is gonna end up acting like a sore loser. He knows that it's getting close. As much as he is well aware that Harry won't lash out in front of a child, he knows that this means that Harry would be rotting in his bed this evening.

Harry sulks a little, shifting closer to Louis' side with an audible groan. Mason grins from where he is sitting cross-legged beside him. Louis rubs Harry's back soothingly and kisses his cheek.

Is it too late to offer his soul for Mason to pick another game?

"Looks like you are losing this one," Mason further adds salt to the injury by poking his tongue out. Harry mumbled something under his breath. He clutches the dice in his sweaty palms before saying a solemn prayer. He strategically rolls it. He gulps when his pawn lands on the 'community chest.' He carefully draws out the card placed on the top of the deck.

"He- Holyyeah!" he cheers clutching Louis and swaying his hips in a victory dance.

"Does your card say 'You get out of washing dishes for a month'? " Louis shakes his head. Harry just grins. "No, my god, does it?"

"Are we gonna ignore that you both just said 'no my god' and 'holyyeah'?" Mason takes a jab.

"Yes!" They both sang in unison.

"Alright," Mason mumbles. "Now would you please tell us what your card says?"

"It says I'm supposed to be getting ̶M̶ 200 because I won a beauty contest." He beams.

"You deserve it, babe, here you go," Louis reaches over to the monopoly money placed in his lap, only to realize that he didn't have money in the required denomination. He shrugged before reaching over the 'bank box' to exchange 10 notes of bright yellow ̶M̶ 100 instead of his pale yellow ̶M̶ 1,000 note. He placed them in his lap and took out 2 notes of ̶M̶ 100 to give to Harry.

He could notice Hary eyeing him curiously. He chose not to comment on it. Mason gathered his money to hand it over to Harry, but he firmly declined.

"How come you have two notes of 10,000? We only gave each player one?" Harry looks over to the money lying on his lap.

"I got it in exchange for the property I sold back to the bank," Louis simply shrugged.

YOU CAN'T SELL PROPERTY BACK TO A BANK! Louis has no fucking idea where the note came from. Harry seems to have read his mind, he tilts his head and sighs. He braces himself for Harry to flip the board and stomp out but it doesn't come.

Harry passes the dice over to Mason who once again lands on Harry's property and snickers away when his next turn arrives. This charade has a much longer run than he estimated. When Louis gets a turn, he lands on 'chance.' Unlike Harry, his card turns out to be one that gets him to incur a loss of ̶M̶ 400 over some natural disasters.

"Oh man," he sighs. "Here you go," he collects the notes and inches his hand towards Harry. To his utter surprise, the man tightly grabs his wrist. Caught completely off guard, Louis curses under his breath.