Ninovan (Hypernaturals 10)

Standoff

We were walking up the lane slowly. Tala emerged from Alexander's house.

"Good morning dears. I hope you slept well." She greeted.

"Good morning, Mom." Angel said, and the rest of us also greeted her. Tala joined our walk to the Community Center, where we would start the day's planning session.

"Does Alexander the not-so-great need any further medical attention?" Jessica asked Tala.

"He's not in there. Alexander left last night. Interrupted my plans, but they kindly waited until I got back. I drove Alexander up into town and dropped him off on a street corner. The one he asked me to." Tala said. She sounded unhappy about that. I assume about Alexander blowing town, not the being interrupted part. Maybe the other way. It's no fun to be interrupted.

"Oh. OK. Guess he'll miss his house getting torn down, but now we can make that first in the town redesign plans." Jessica replied, showing little emotion and no reaction to Tala's unhappiness.

Tala looked at Jessica for a few moments. "Alexander really isn't that bad, you know."

"Hah!" Jessica said. "He sure as hell wasn't that good. Or any good. OK. I am going to have to go with 'bad' actually."

"I do not mean sexually." Tala said.

"Nor do I." Jessica replied. "That was utter crap too. It followed from his inability to feel a damn thing about me. If Alexander was even 10% of the man my husband is, he would have sensed I was unhappy and gotten the fuck off me, never put that thing IN me, and never felt that his completion was the be all end all. It ended with horrible sex. It started with a horrible person. To be very crisp on this: Same shape. Same idea. Same attachment points. I never call Adrian's a 'thing'. Because he is a lover. He is a lover because, at his core, he is a good person. Alex-fucking-ander is not a good person. So his is a 'thing'. Adrian builds me up. Makes me happy and whole. Your fucking boyfriend tears women down. The same way I am going to tear down that house. There shall be joy in destruction, and maybe that is what Alexander gets out of it too. He enjoyed bringing me low."

"Alexander got lost in this place, and his role in it." Tala looked at me. "Before Adrian, he used to be unique. Now he is not. He used to be the best. Now it was forcibly pointed out he is not. He needs to be out there for a while. Heal. Not his body so much as his soul. He went about all of that wrong, and he knows he can't make it right, and he is actually hurting about that. You know I am right, don't you Angel?" Tala directed the last to her daughter as Jessica appeared to care less.

"No Mom. I don't. I may be one of the most sensitive Astrals alive today, by all accounts. Alexander is hurting because his sexual conquest rejected him and made it very public. She who he brought low did not stay low. Alexander is hurting because he thought a 600-year-old male could take a rival male a tiny fraction of his age so that he could have his woman. Hah. Alexander thought Adrian was a rival and that Alexander could compete. Again: Hah. Alexander fought the man that beat William and he walked into a disaster of his own making. What was Adrain supposed to say when that clod asked to be able to have MORE sex with Jessica because HE, Alexander, didn't get enough? Adrian says 'Sure? My wife hates you but go ahead and take her. While you are at it, take my beloved Astral too?' "

Angel tapped herself. "That is me, by the way. I am his beloved Astral. In case you missed that part what with all the Kevin bopping. That is my read of Alexander. A selfish, self-centered, worthless being with a valuable skill he leveraged to get everything he wanted. I'm an Astral. I can read lust in a man. I know Adrian wants the same thing. Sex. The difference is when he wants it from me, I will be there in his arms and climbing on for all I am worth because he approaches it from love. Respect. Dignity. Caring. Tenderness. Compassion. Also lust. It's there. It's tempered by who Adrian is. If Adrian needs sex from me, my body, along with my soul and heart are his to enjoy because I will enjoy. If Alexander wants sex from me, I will run screaming in the other direction. Kevin was fun last night, but my perfect world is Vera and Adrian in my bed. In my body. In my brain and in my heart."

"Amen." Vera said.

Tala glanced at me and seemed uncomfortable with that revelation.

"Also Mom: I am a woman dedicated to her family.' Angel kept going. "Alexander hurt three members of my family deeply because he wanted a notch in his bedpost. One to go next to the one with YOUR name on it. I could honestly care less if he lives or dies at the moment. If he ever does show his face again, he had better be a different man, because I am not going to be looking to see how he has changed. Only that he never hurts my family again. I could have stopped that fight yesterday. Instead, I stopped Simi from stopping it, because I wanted it to happen. I knew it would happen, and I also knew Adrian would stop before he killed Alexander. I knew that Jessica would stop Adrian too. As shitty a person as Alexander is, that is who my family is too. That is my Gaia and her prince consort." Angel finished as we arrived at the Community center.

We paused walking. Tala and her daughter regarded each other. Despite Angel's harsh words, Tala said "I understand dear, and I admire your loyalty. Alexander is your sister Kimberly's father though, so I also have mine."

"I understand, Mom. The father of my sister versus the father of ALL my children, present and to come." Angel paused to read her mother's expression. "Yes, Mom. Adrian and I are going to have a child someday. Biological child. Him daddy, me mommy. I have not told him when yet. He'll cooperate when I do. You are my family too, so it is not an easy situation to be in. I wish you were right about Alexander, but Mother? You are not. I will not let my guard down, because I do not think he has changed, and I think for you Alexander is like what Andrea was for me. A blind spot. You would do well to avoid him unless you just like being used for his personal pleasure. Whether you know it or not, you did better last night. Alexander doesn't love you and he does not love Kimberly. He only loves himself." Angel was not giving an inch.

Arriving at a standoff, we went into the hall.