Life (and Other Things Like It)

Chapter 1

Mercedes Jones yawned, rolled over and stretched in one fluid motion before blinking open her honey eyes. She lifted her head slightly and took stock of her surroundings. Puck was snoring to her left and Anna was curled up to her right.

She pushed back the covers a bit and crawled out from under them to get out of bed. Once her feet were on the floor, she tiptoed out to Raven's room and changed her daughter's diaper. When that was finished, she breastfed her.

She hummed lightly under her breath until the baby ate her fill then burped her before putting her back in her crib. She left the room to go back to her own and woke up Anna. "Annie?"

Anna stirred. "No." She whined.

Mercedes kissed her cheek before singing to her softly.

"MercyCat?"

"Yeah, honey. Wake up."

Anna's grey eyes opened and searched out her girlfriend's. "Good morning." She stretched.

"Good morning to you, too." Mercedes smiled.

Anna pushed back the covers and stood up. "Oh, I have to pee so bad!"

"Go pee." Mercedes stood aside.

Anna kissed her cheek before rushing off to the bathroom.

Mercedes followed at a sedated pace and went to the two sinked vanity. She turned on the water in one and ran her favorite Dove bar soap under the stream. After lathering up, she began applying it to her face.

Anna left the water closet and came to wash her hands.

Mercedes rinsed her hands and turned on music before readying her tooth supplies. She wet her toothbrush and layered on a strip of a deep cleaning toothpaste and brushed for exactly two minutes like her dentist father taught her.

Then she rinsed her mouth and brushed with a whitening paste followed by baking soda and flossing before using mouthwash.

Anna brushed her teeth with a whitening toothpaste twice before flossing and using mouthwash.

Then Mercedes washed her face off before applying her special facial wash that cleaned her pores and removed dead skin while hydrating it. Anna washed her face with soap and water.

In unison, they turned off the water and split up, Mercedes going to turn on the shower, Anna going to grab two body towels.

When the water was warm enough, they disrobed and went inside the shower to wash, Anna with her strawberry body wash and Mercedes with her burnt brown sugar body wash.

Once clean, they wrapped up in the towels and took their dirty PJs to their closet, where they dumped them in the hamper.

They went to their drawers and began picking out underwear.

Anna chose a grey bra and white panties while Mercedes chose a deep red set. Both pulled on white socks before going to their vanities.

Marcy had kept to her vow and decorated Anna's vanity for her. The backsplash had every positive affirmation the others had but in pink and the lightbulbs were pink in the shape of a smiling face with a big "A" in the center.

Both Mercedes and Anna slathered on lotion. Anna used Jergen's while Mercedes had a special mix. She and her siblings had special skin (everything, really) so the eight mixed up their own batch of lotions specifically tailored for their skin.

The girls even added glitter to theirs for an extra pop.

After lotion was deodorant and fragrance. Mercedes had a strawberry-lemon perfume while Anna had a "sea breeze" scent.