Mommy Mouse (sequel to City Mouse)

Chapter 6: Traveling to Tahiti

They said good bye to Leo the night before, when he left to go back to the Cameron's house with Happy, Carol and Mike. Mouse's parents didn't mind leaving the reception early; they were too old to stay for the whole thing, anyway, they assured everyone.

"You gonna be okay?" Henry asked his son through the rolled down window.

"Yeah, I think so," Leo answered, his arm around his dog.

"Kiss me, Leo," Mouse interrupted, sniffing, as she stuck her head in the window.

"Don't cry, mommy," Leo said, putting his hands on her cheeks. "You'll be okay, it's only two weeks."

They waved to their son, and Henry planted a kiss on his new wife's temple as he laughed at her. "I love you so much," he murmured to her.

"I love you too, Henry, and stop laughing at me," Mouse said reproachfully. "I mean it," she said as his laughter grew. "Stop laughing, or no sex for you," she threatened.

They went back to their reception, drinking and dancing until they fell into bed around three in the morning, when it turned out that they were actually too drunk to even think about sex, let alone want it. Then they slept so late that they barely made their flight from Dulles, in Washington, D.C., to LAX. They spent most of that flight sleeping, as well, too hungover to do more than look dolefully at each other every time they opened bleary eyes. Then they actually had to run through the airport in Los Angeles to make their flight to Tahiti. Luckily, their luggage was ticketed straight through. And they did make it, just, and took off into the smoggy, LA evening, as their very kind flight attendant brought them even more champagne.

Henry and Mouse stared at the flutes full of the bubbling, amber liquid, then at the flight attendant.

"It is your honeymoon, isn't it?" he asked in a disgustingly perky voice.

"Yes," Mouse replied. "But could we maybe just get some orange juice?"

"Or, uh, coffee?" Henry added hopefully.

"Sure," the flight attendant answered. He sadly took the champagne away, and brought them the requested OJ and coffee, while Mouse produced some Exedrine for both of them.

"God, it's been, like, twelve hours since we had anything to drink, shouldn't we be feeling better by now?" she asked.

After some food, and some more coffee, both of them were indeed feeling better, and settled down for the nine hour, Pacific leg of their flight. They would arrive at their hotel near midnight, and would have a few more hours to sleep before the sun rose.

"Henry?" Mouse lifted the armrest that separated their seats so she could lean into him. He put an arm around her.

"Mm?"

"I wanted to talk to you about a couple of things," Mouse began. "I mean, unless you wanted to watch this movie?"

Henry shook his head, grasping his wife's hand. "No, I have no interest in this movie whatsoever," he assured her. "What did you want to talk about?"

"Well, first, um, about what I'm going to do when we get back," Mouse said, taking a deep breath.

"Yeah? I thought you didn't know what you wanted to do?" Henry said.

"No, I don't, but now that we're married, you can't keep paying me to be your nanny, right?" Mouse said, drawing her legs up and tucking them under her body. She leaned even farther into Henry, resting comfortably against him.

"Really?" Henry was surprised.

"Well, yeah," Mouse was even more surprised. "I mean, paying your wife to work for you as your nanny is just beyond bizarre, isn't it?"