Externalizing [mxm]

Chapter 9

"Grandpa isn't allowed to come by," Marc tried to explain it to her.

Ariel stared up at him, and then back at Brendan, probably wondering why he was involved. "By why?" Ariel asked the question that Marc didn't want to answer.

Brendan knelt down next to her then. "He's done a lot of mean things," he filled in. "And it's not safe. Masden talks about that with your class, right? Safety?"

"Yeah, but that's with strangers," Ariel pointed out wisely.

"Your grandpa is a little like that," Brendan told her. "So you can't go with him, if he ever tries to come and get you from school or anything. Okay?"

"Why?" she repeated the question.

Marc sighed and cupped his hands together. "Grandpa likes to hurt people. You know how you hit Eric? Like that."

"But he wouldn't do that to me," Ariel protested, though she didn't sound completely convinced. "Right?"

"I don't know, and I don't want to find out. I just know that when I wasn't much older than you, he would hurt me," Marc had to get it across.

Ariel seemed to understand a bit better then, fixing her eyes down on her feet with a frown. "Oh," was all she said.

"You still have plenty of people that love you," Brendan chimed in then. "Your dad does. I do, and Terri does too. She has a lot of fun doing art with you."

Marc set her upstairs with all of her art supplies then, and sighed out in the hallway. Brendan had followed him upstairs and leaned against the wall. "Have you talked to your dad yet?"

Marc shook his head. "I know I need to." Obviously he wasn't just going to get the hint, or he was going to show up at Ariel's school again or something.

"Just call him if that's what you're most comfortable with," Brendan said. "Or coffee in a public place."

"Calling him is probably better," Marc grumbled. He didn't want to have to see his dad's face and know what was coming. "But I'll do that later."

Brandon raised a disbelieving eyebrow but went with it. "Do you want me to stick around until dinner or something then?" he offered.

"Yeah, maybe show me how to make something other than soup," Marc snorted. They'd been having a lot of that recently, even though he'd been buying some more food. He just didn't know what to do with it all.

Brendan agreed and went downstairs to go through the kitchen. He pulled out whatever he deemed useful and then started looking up recipes on his phone. He helped Marc through the process of making something that involved a lot of oil and soy sauce with honey, and even though it involved only vegetables, tasted savory like meat.

"Do you think Ariel will eat it if I tell her what it is?" Marc wondered. So far, she wasn't actually that picky.

"She might. Or pull the ultimate parent and not tell her what it is until after she tries it," he chuckled.

"I'm not even sure what that is anyways. Ariel just wanted it because it was purple," Marc admitted.

"Eggplant," Brendan huffed. "Try a bite." He forked up some out of the pan and had Marc try a bite.

"How do you find recipes like that?" Marc questioned, actually quite pleased with that it wasn't disgusting.

"The internet, and Blueberry looks up a lot of them, and then I just copy what she does. She's the real cook of the house," Brendan explained.

"Is it going to be enough without meat or anything?" Marc wondered.

"Yeah, shouldn't be a problem. I get by just fine without meat," Brendan paused. "I'm vegetarian."