Who: Avis, Tomas, and Geoffrey and Yorick
What: Some skeletons come out of the closet. LULZ
Where: Avis' office in their house. Fancy!



Avis still wasn't very good with Geoffrey.

It wasn't that she was insensitive, it was just that ... she didn't know how to entertain someone with an IQ less than hers unless it was Tomas. She furrowed her brows and glanced down to the little boy, who was frowning most firmly at him. Instead of returning the discontented look (Merlin, when had she become so soft), Avis turned to Geoffrey.

"Okay, okay. We'll do it your way, Geoff." She shifted over to her desk and picked Yorick off her pile of paperwork, kneeling down next to Geoffrey and setting Yorick down on the soft carpet. Geoffrey squealed quietly and then squirmed down onto his stomach, babbling nonsense to the skull.

So, he was good for now. Avis grinned and pressed a kiss to Geoffrey's forehead before moving back over to her paperwork. Now that Geoffrey was sufficiently occupied she could get back to her last-minute filing. Tomas should be home soon, too, and Geoffrey rather liked Tomas.

Even though it was insanely cool to have a top secret mission directly from Corner, Tomas was regretting the later and longer days. He wouldn't have minded a year ago, but now he had a wife and kid, and he was a family man at heart; if he couldn't sit down and have dinner with his family, then his day wasn't complete. So, as much work as he was getting done at the office, Tomas was feeling extremely proud at the fact that he hadn't missed dinner once this week.

"And wheeeeeeeere's my beautiful wife and----what the hell is that doing near the boy?" Tomas let out, dropping his briefcase in a chair and crossing Avis' office. He bent down in front of Geoffrey and the skull---Yorick. "You don't want to play with that, Geoff. That's gross and yucky and makes people think Mummy is crazy."

"I'll have you know that Yorick," Avis started, "Is about the only thing that Geoffrey will play with concerning me." She couldn't play the fun games like Tomas could, apparently -- he would much rather talk to the skull. Honestly, she couldn't say she blamed him -- it was certainly more convenient than having to entertain him herself, too.

Geoffrey made a face at his father (okay, he probably knew that Tomas wasn't really his father, but kids weren't supposed to retain long-term memories until they were four or so) and then went back to telling Yorick about how his day had been.

Avis merely shrugged.

Tomas ignored Avis' little lecture and reached to grab the skull to put it out of reach of Geoffrey. But, before he could take hold, the boy shrieked and swatted near his hands, making Tomas frown greatly.

"It doesn't talk back! It's just a---weird piece of---dead person."

"Grammba!"

His hands stopped reaching for the skull mid out-stretch, and he watched as Geoffrey sat down, looking happy as could be, sitting beside a skull. He was now truly Avis' son.

"It's name is Yorick for some nerdy reason," Tomas said, not at all feeling bad for the comments; Avis was letting their son play with the skull she talked to and acted as if it were her friend. She had no reason to be called normal at thee moment. "If you're going to call it something, call it--that."

"Grammba?"

Tomas looked at Avis with a dubious expression. "What does 'grammba' mean?"

Okay, so maybe she was more pleased than she should have been that Geoffrey was defending Yorick. Yes, she knew that it was just a skull, but the fact was that for most of their relationship she'd kept him mostly out of the way so that this very conversation would not have to happen.

Avis made an attempt to look innocent when Tomas glanced over to her, firmly planting her nose in her paperwork. Maybe she could just ignore the whole situation and it would go away, right? Right.

"Why don't you ask Geoffrey? He's smart enough to answer you back." Ha, that would work. Just reflect the question back to the little kid. If that wasn't an indication to Tomas that Avis was hiding something then he hadn't been paying enough attention in the years that he'd known her for.

She realized that fact belatedly, though, and internally scolded herself. Hmph.

For a second, but just a second, Tomas was ready to turn to Geoffrey and ask what the hell grammba meant. But before he did, he caught her sarcasm and frowned deeply at his wife. Grammba? Grammba.

"What the hell is 'grammba'!" he said, exasperated with just a few seconds of thought. Dealing with death eaters? Sure! Trying to figure out baby gibberish? No thank you. Geoffrey 'spoke' clear as day when Tomas had him, it was when he spent time with Avis that he picked up strange words like grammba.

"Gram---pa!"

"Gram---GRAMPA? GRAMPA? AVIS DID HE SAY----" Tomas stood up, but not before he swept Geoffrey up in his arms, nearly sending the kid slinging around his body. Why, all of a sudden, all of this just happened to click, Tomas did not know, but at the moment he had just bloody realized that the skull Avis carried around was that of her deceased father.

"AVIS THIS IS BEYOND SO MANY LEVELS OF CREEPY."

Okay, so now he was going to make a big deal out of this. Avis should have expected that he was going to flip out, but honestly -- "Tomas, it's not that big a deal. I don't understand why it would be creepy. Lots of people keep mementos of their family members after they die."

Hers just happened to be her father. "And it isn't like you ever asked who he was, you know. You just assumed that I kept him because I was weird and eccentric and it didn't occur to you that I might've had sentimental feelings for him." She sighed, pushing herself to her feet and turning to face Tomas rather than just paying attention to her papers. This wasn't something that was just going to go away.

"Calm down, Tomas. There's no reason to be shouting." She picked Yorick off the floor lovingly and set him down on the pillow (yes, he had his own skull-pillow) she had on her desk.

"They keep pictures, Avis, they keep old letters and--and jewelry, and---and not body parts!"

No, no! He was not going to feel guilty about this! Of course he thought this was just some--random skull Avis had been able to snatch from the morgue or--or something! Why should he think that she would find carrying her dead father's skull around as something normal! And she was weird and eccentric, that was what he loved about her, so there was no denying that on either of their parts.

"Avis!" Tomas let out, Geoffrey now on his hip, and boy did he look confused. "Avis, I mean---I mean, that--I just." Tomas had no idea how he would react to having a piece of his father like that just lying around, and--and okay maybe it would be nice to talk to him once in a while but, but not to--that was---it was weird, right? It wasn't just him being mean, like he normally was? This was weird. He wouldn't be the only one freaking out about this, right?

"I just---thought he was---your first, thing. Body. Person. I don't know, but--I mean...you--that's. It's not." Tomas' mouth shut into a tight line, having literally no coherent words to say on the matter.

Tomas could be so close-minded when it came to things like this. She set her hands into her hips while he spoke, appearing very much unimpressed as he ranted about jewelery and letters and pictures. "The fact is that those things were never important to me, Tomas. I do much better with literal things than figurative symbols, you know that."

She furrowed her brows while he continued to speak, giving Geoffrey what she hoped was a reassuring smile since he looked so confused. Avis blinked at his last statement, though, and let her gaze soften a little.

"And who's to say that he wasn't? We were just getting into the serious bit of training and do you really think I would let anyone else lay their hands on my father even after he had passed away?" She'd probably just crossed over into a whole new world of weird -- but if Tomas hadn't divorced her over Yorick then he probably wasn't going to.

Okay, so maybe he hadn't thought about it like that. But still! It was not normal to keep body parts lying around. Cremation was a little better, but even then that was still bloody weird (what if you knocked it over?).

But, even though it had only been a minute or two since he'd realized it was her father's skull sitting there, Tomas was already finding himself concerned with some other issues that had popped to mind. He frowned, lips pressed tightly together.

"Why didn't you tell me?" His wife should be able to tell him stuff like this. How long had he bloody known her? Forever?

"You never asked. Geoffrey asked and I told him." She arched her brow at him, "And I'm sure you can see why I didn't outright bring it out considering how you reacted just now. I'm sure it would have been much better to tell you while we'd been in training." Right, so he could have made fun of her even more than he did? Yeah, no.

She pursed her lips and then sighed, resisting the urge to run her fingers over Yorick's skull. By now it was a comfort mechanism. Avis shrugged, tugging on a lock of her hair absently.

"I didn't think it was that big a deal."

"Did I like---run out of the house and file for divorce?" Tomas blurted. "I freak out worse over---over pizza!" Which was sadly true. Now, the fact that she was, well--he didn't know if she was trying to make him feel bad, because she was, but Tomas didn't think that--he told Avis like. Everything. Except for his super secret missions, but that was ministry classified and Avis would understand.

He looked down at Geoffrey, wondering why the hell the kid had to be more apt at this kind of stuff than he was. Should he really have asked, at some point? Had anyone else ever asked? No, he bet not, because why would anyone assume Yorick was anything more than a random skull Avis was allowed to keep?

"You should've told me," he said, feeling more hurt about this than he let known in his tone.

Fortunately for Avis, she'd spent enough time around Tomas to know when he was more hurt than he was saying. She sighed, sliding over to Tomas and draping her arms around his shoulders from behind (since he was still holding Geoffrey and all). Definitely time to 'suck up'.

"Tomas," she coaxed quietly, letting one hand trail over the side of his neck, "I know you freak out more over pizza, but you said it yourself -- it's weird -- to other people, at least. I know that much, so I didn't see a reason to share before we got together ... and then more important things came up."

She pressed a kiss to his cheek.

And Tomas knew that these random bits of affection were never really random, and his brow remained creased and suspicious. He could just accept it, because how could he tell her to throw away her father's skull? There was so much wrong in that sentence that Tomas' head began to hurt, and he twisted his neck to look at Avis through a good case of peripheral vision.

"You still should've told me," he said with a pout, but he shifted Geoffrey to his other arm so he could see and play with Avis over his shoulder. He felt like he should be mad, but there wasn't an ounce of anger bubbling under his skin. Which might be a sign that he was officially grown up and responsible. "Tell Mama 'no secrets.'"

"No seekets!" the boy immediately repeated flicking Avis in the nose. Tomas grinned; good boy.

"Ow." She laughed quietly and leaned in to press a kiss to Tomas' lips. "No secrets, hmm? So you'll be telling me any day now why you've been staying at work so late..." Yes, she was teasing, but there were still a few things she was going to keep from him. Like the fling that she'd had with Corner. That was something that she was going to be taking to her grave, she suspected.

Avis brought her hand up so that Geoffrey could toy with it (dancing phalanges!) and half-smiled at him. "Dinner's nearly ready." Merlin, she wasn't sure when she'd gotten so goddamned domestic, but she rather liked it. It was a nice change from the pace of work, but it was still orderly and scheduled.

Tomas didn't bother retorting or explaining; Avis was an auror, she knew how it went. He didn't like not sharing things with her because being her partner all these years (platonic, romantic, whatever) had made it second nature to talk to her and discuss things. Now that he only had the Doges and Conway, it felt like he was missing something, andhe hoped it didn't affect his efforts.

"Dinner!" he exclaimed, causing Geoffrey to raise his arms in triumph. Lordy, was he glad that the boy had become accustomed to them so quickly. Tomas didn't know what he would've done had the boy hated his new environment, but...maybe the three of them were just lucky to have found each other.

Because of terrible circumstances, of course. But that was a detail to be ignored at the moment.

"Let's go EAT!"

"Eat eat eat! Eat food?"

"Eat food," Tomas said with a nod, grinning widely between Avis and Geoffrey. Yes, this was good. Let's get off the topic of dead fathers and their skulls.

Probably good, since they never had dealt well with the topic of dead fathers. Avis rolled her eyes at Tomas -- he was teaching their son to act like such an impulsive barbarian -- and then gave Geoffrey a gentle pat on the head, moving into the kitchen. She'd even started to be accustomed to the 'kid-friendly' food -- tonight they were having elbow macaroni with stewed tomatoes and corn -- and garlic toast, but she didn't know if Geoffrey was going to touch the stuff.

Still. She plated for herself and Geoffrey and headed to the table, taking their son from Tomas so that she could get him settled while Tomas made up his own plate. Okay, so this was ... better. At least now she didn't have to worry about Tomas finding out about Yorick from ... who, her mother? She probably wouldn't tell a soul.