Fox Life

They spent the rest of the afternoon basking in the sun, then returned when the sun hid behind the clouds. Mila was still full of energy, so Iris tried to teach her to change back.     

It was a thankless task, though. The girl didn't pay much attention to her, and her words about sparks and taking hold of them went through one ear and left through the other. All Mila was concerned about was finding Lucy again and pulling on his fur.     

But she had already used up all of the cat's patience. Lucy had demanded for Kyro to lift him up on a dresser which was too high for him to jump on with his lame leg and proceeded to ignore the disappointed weasel.     

"I don't know what to do about her," Iris said to Kyro when Mila ran away from her for the fourth time. "She just doesn't want to listen."     

"She's three years old and away from home, so of course she doesn't want to listen. We're not authority figures for her."     

Iris sighed, looking at the little girl jumping around the dresser. "I feel like we could learn so much from her if we could just get her to talk."     

It was true, but reality didn't always work out as one wished. No matter how Iris tempted the girl, she didn't come to her anymore. In the end, Iris decided to give up for the day and try it again later.     

Kyro was back on his laptop, working on something, so she left him to it. She returned to the bedroom and lay down. In the ornaments of the ceiling, she searched for anything important in her life. Was there anything else besides her hospital year that didn't fit normal standards?     

But she couldn't decide what was out of norm and what was not. Her experiences told that that even the hospital year was within the boundaries of what was normal. Didn't other people get sick for such a long time too?     

As she thought about that, she heard a loud squeal followed by a hiss. A young voice cried out then, and Iris jumped up from the bed. Near the dresser, she saw a little girl staring at her hand and screaming.     

Iris rushed to her side and checked her fingers, but they were fine besides a few light scratches. She then looked up to see Lucy standing on all fours, his hair risen up to make him look even larger than before. His tail was whipping right and left, clearly displaying his agitation.     

"What happened?" Kyro asked, running in.     

"Mila made a mistake," Iris said while lifting the girl up into her arms. "I think she pulled on Lucy's tail to drag him down..."     

The grimace on Kyro's face mirrored Iris' own. He shook his head and went to coax Lucy into calming down. The mighty king's feathers were ruffled.     

Iris sat down with the girl in the meantime and blew on her fingers to make the pain go away. Mila at first didn't understand what she was doing, but after a few words of it being magical healing, she was all aboard the ship. Iris used that moment of distraction to wrap her in a blanket until she could figure out what they would do about her clothing problem.     

"Do you mind?" she asked Kyro when he finished up with Lucy.     

It took him a moment to understand what she meant, then he grimaced. "I've never bought clothes for girls..."     

"Oh come on, I'm sure you can do it," Iris assured him with a grin.     

The image of him shopping for children clothes had something intrinsically warm and touching about it. At that moment though, she wanted to see it happen when he was forced to do it for his own children.     

Kyro was too troubled by his own thoughts to see Iris' cheeks go a little pink, and she quickly lowered her head to meet Mila's big eyes. The girl was staring at her with confusion in her gaze, her head tilted a little to the side.     

"Fine," Kyro muttered, more to himself than anyone else, threw a last sizing up glance at Mila, and left the room.     

Iris chuckled to herself, then focused back on the little girl who was squirming around in the white sheet. "Be still, please," Iris pleaded with her, and Mila stopped to look up at her again, reproachful.     

It was somewhat expected, but Iris wasn't certain what to do at that moment. The idea of taking Mila away had seemed like a smart one when she was a little weasel, but now that she was a small child, Iris' certainty wavered a bit.     

"Cake!" the girl suddenly said. Her eyes lit up and she pointed at herself. "I. Want. Cake." She enunciated every word like she was doing something unbelievably difficult and followed her words with a lot of gesturing.     

"But we had cake in the morning," Iris said, feeling like she was forgetting something. Why did Mila speaking feel so unexpected? Like it was wrong somehow.     

"Want. More!" The girl glared at Iris, then pouted. "Cake. Cake. Cake!"     

'It won't hurt to give her some cake, right?' Iris wondered about it. She could order dinner and ask some sugary goodness with it.     

"All right,"—the girl's eyes lit up—"but you have to do something for me first. I want you to answer a couple questions."     

Her words dimmed Mila's enthusiasm, but she sat down on the bed and looked at Iris with a serious face. She was ready to do what was necessary for a cake.     

Smiling at the suddenly sombre atmosphere, Iris asked, "Do you want to go back home?"     

Mila shook her head so violently that Iris thought it was going to fall off. Tears began to collect in the girl's eyes, and she jumped on Iris, hugging her waist with all the strength in her small hands . Not a word was uttered, but Iris had her answer.     

She embraced the girl back with one hand and caressed her head with the other. "I'm not sending you back, I promise, okay? No sending back."     

It took a few moments for the girl to calm down to the point that Iris could ask her a second question. "Why don't you want to return? Did they do something bad?"     

The girl stared at her for a few moments, remnants of tears glistening in her eyes, then looked down and pushed the sheet from her left shoulder. Without looking at it, she pointed with a trembling lip.     

On a closer inspection, Iris noticed something she hadn't before—the girl's whole arm was marred with needle marks. Some of them were almost healed, but others looked fresh, like they'd been done just days before.     

"What happened to you?" Iris asked in horror, pulling the girl back into her arms and hugging her to her chest. Who could've done that to a child? She had felt that there was something wrong with that family, but who would've thought they could do something like that to their own baby girl?