Kieran

  Kieran knew that the wait between their Thursday night raid session and the following Tuesday would be simultaneously long and short.

  Putting work on Friday and Monday aside, the weekend itself was going to feel long, simply because he wanted more of the raid and couldn’t have it. It was like waiting those last few days before a new game was released, or the days leading up to a vacation. The last few right before were always the longest.

  He planned to entertain himself over the ‘break’ by playing some Mag Mell each day, though he wasn’t sure if playing the game without touching the raid stuff would make the break from the new content feel even worse.

  After the group said goodnight and went their separate ways on Thursday night, he left his office and relaxed with Natalie and their daughters in the living room for the remaining hours before bed. It was a school night, so that only really amounted to a little over an hour, and only then because they let Aoife and Kat fall asleep in their laps on the couch before finally getting everyone to bed.

  Thankfully, Kieran’s day at work on Friday was absolutely jam packed with things to do, so his mind wasn’t able to wander as much as it had earlier in the week. Instead, he had back-to-back classes to teach most of the day, with an hour break for lunch - which he ended up spending on grading papers. When he left the campus, similarly to Thursday, he went to pick up his girls before heading home.

  Given that it was Friday and he didn’t have any standing plans, he took Aoife and Kat to the grocery store with him on the way home to pick up ingredients for dinner that night. They decided to make a simple stir-fry, using some ground chicken, peppers, onions, and some sauces they had at home.

  When they got home, Kieran helped Aoife with a little bit of homework she had remaining. It was some fairly simple math, and while Kieran was more than happy to help, he thought some of the instructions and methodology on the worksheet was confusing. Without much to be done about it, though, he shrugged and help Aoife work her way through the problems.

  A little bit before Nat was due home, he got to cooking. He pulled out the large wok that he had bought recently, which he had been using regularly the last few weeks. It really did just cook some meals better than average pans.

  The chicken went in to brown first before he threw in the peppers and onions. After that came the soy sauce, hoisin sauce, and oyster sauce, because he had been on an Asian flavor kick recently, and the girls all seemed to love it too. Once the combination was flavored to taste, he checked on the rice cooker that they had set up when they first got home, just to be sure that it was finished.

  When Nat walked in, he finally got around to plating the food for everyone else, before adding some chili garlic sauce to his own portion, because no one else in the house liked the spiciness that came with it, despite the flavor really tying the whole thing together in his opinion.

  After dinner, the family played some games together on the living room TV with the Switch for a while. Once they all grew bored with the more party-style games that allowed Kat to take part as well, they transitioned into playing Pokémon Sword together, where Aoife and Kat backseat gamed while Kieran had the controller.

  That lasted basically until bed, when both girls were nodding off on the couch. Once they were herded into their beds and tucked in, Kieran and Nat retreated to their own bedroom where they settled in for the night as well.

  Saturday and Sunday were good days. The family ate out together on Saturday, dropping by a nearby Mom and Pop Italian restaurant that they frequented, because the effort that went into making a really good Italian sauce was simply too much to do often.

  Otherwise, Kieran spent both days bouncing between housework - laundry, general cleaning, picking up the toys scattered about, and the like - leisure activities, and spending time with the family.

  After attempting to go in and do his dailies in Mag Mell on Saturday, he decided - at least for this week - it was a bad idea. He had managed to match up times with Marissa, Jazz, and Ash, so they were able to run through things together, but playing just made them all more and more excited to face [Scathach] again. And the desire just got worse as they talked about it more and more as they worked through their dailies.

  So, he decided to avoid playing again until Tuesday.

  Instead, he doubled up his time on errands and chores. He did a full grocery shopping on Sunday morning, bright and early to beat the rush of other people. They also had gotten some snow, which he opted to shovel before the day started to warm up so the sun could take care of whatever he was too lazy to actually scrape off the driveway.

  By the time noon rolled around, Kieran was well and truly out of things to do that day. As he was standing in the kitchen with a mug of hot coffee to warm up after his time out in the snow, he watched Nat and their girls playing a racing game together.

  Once they finished the last race in the set, he asked, “What do you guys think? Should we do something today?”

  Nat was the one that turned toward him on the couch, perching cutely on the arm. “Like what?” She asked, her voice bright and happy.

  “I don’t know,” Kieran said, taking another sip of coffee. “There’s not a lot of snow left here, but I bet we could go find some? What about going sledding?” He said, thinking about some of the areas outside of the city limits that could be good for it. They had never really taken Aoife sledding because by the time she was old enough to enjoy it, they had Kat, who was too young. But this year seemed like prime sledding territory.

  “I wanna go!” Kat said quickly, jumping up off the couch.

  “Me too!” Aoife shouted.

  “I know where some good spots are, if we’re keen to drive around a bit. There’s a bunch of parks around the city that have great sledding hills.” Nat said, trying to leaf through her childhood memories. “Admittedly, they may be busy, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

  Kieran smiled, then drained the rest of his coffee. “Why not? I bought those sleds a few years ago and they haven’t been used yet. Let’s get some snow on them.”

  Stolen story; please report.

  The girls cheered, jumping up and down excitedly before Nat finally told them to go get dressed. They were still in their pajamas, and that wouldn’t work for being in the snow for a few hours.

  Once they ran off toward their rooms, Nat stood to follow. “I’ll make sure they wear snow pants. And generally dress warmly.” She said.

  “Good call. I’ll clean up out here then swap with you so you can go get dressed, too. I’m already snow-ready.”

  “No you’re not,” Nat said with a grin. “You better wear snow pants too, or you’re going to track so much wet into the car that you’ll have to clean up after.”

  “That’s…yeah, that’s a fair point.” Kieran allowed. “I’ll go get changed, too, then.” He said, clicking off the TV and game console. “Let me wash the breakfast dishes first.”

  “Sure. Do your thang,” Nat said with a laugh as she wandered off toward the girls’ rooms to check on them.

  Half an hour later, they were all crammed into the SUV, two sleds in the back, and bundled up uncomfortably. They all wore enough layers that Kieran had to turn on the AC in the car to stop them all from sweating while Natalie directed them toward the nearest potential sledding hill. The first one was in a park that was actually fairly close, to Kieran's surprise.

  While he had grown up on the East Coast, Natalie had grown up in Minnesota, living just outside of Minneapolis. She knew most of the best spots around the area they lived in, but Kieran was realizing now that despite how long he had been living in the area at this point, he never really went out to explore much beyond normal life.

  When they rolled up to the first park, the parking lot was already pretty full. Not entirely packed, and they were able to find a parking spot in the mess of snowy tracks, but it was still busier than Kieran had imagined it would be on a normal day.

  As soon as the car was in park, the girls opened their doors, grabbed a sled each, and were gone. Natalie was quick on her feet and leapt out after them as they ran toward the hill in the middle of the picnicking area. There were already plenty of kids and parents out there, which was a good sign in Kieran’s mind. Lots of potential friends, and lots of eyes to keep the kids safe.

  He took his time getting out of the car, making sure he grabbed the hats and gloves that Aoife and Kat left behind. He double checked to make sure that nothing else important was left behind, but they hadn’t really brought all that much. The only other notable thing in the car was a few large thermoses full of hot chocolate that Natalie had squirreled away in front of the console in the car to surprise the girls with later.

  Hats and gloves in hand, Kieran scrambled up the snowy hill to the top where the girls were waiting in line for their turn to ride down the well-worn track that the other kids had made. He quickly shoved their winter hats onto their heads, and held up gloves for them to push their fingers into.

  It was a struggle to get Aoife and Kat to focus even long enough for that much with their turns to go down the hill looming. Satisfied that they weren’t too susceptible to the snow, Kieran patted them both on the head before he walked off to stand beside Natalie.

  “Good call, bringing the hats and gloves. I had a feeling you would bring them.”

  “Yeah, well, good call jumping out of the car to chase after them.” Kieran said, posting up next to his wife, close enough to bump her shoulder playfully.

  They watched quietly for a moment as Aoife helped her younger sister get comfortable on her sled, perched at the top of the hill. Kat nodded once and Aoife gave her a solid push, sending her sliding down the hill at speed. Aoife took a few steps back before jumping forward and landing on her own sled with enough momentum to follow her sister down.

  Kieran had a moment of mild panic when Aoife shoved Kat, but he held it down. It was fine. Kat was fine.

  Nat giggled beside him. “You’re gonna have to relax, big guy.” She hip checked him. “They’ll be fine. Besides, I took us to the most mild hill first.”

  Kieran took a breath, looking at the incline. She was right - it really wasn’t that steep. “Yeah, alright.” He said. “How many spots did you have planned, exactly?”

  Nat wrinkled her nose against the cold, looking up into the light flurries that drifted in the air. “Six others are in reasonable distance, if nothing has changed since I was little. I think. Can’t say I pay much attention to sledable hills these days.”

  “Six?”

  “Six.” She nodded. “And we can go in incline order, too, just to be safe. Kat’s still little enough that I don’t want her flying down any hills that are better left for teens.”

  “Well, that’s reassuring.” Kieran said. “We’ll have to see how many we get too. And how quickly they get bored of any given hill.”

  “We both know that kids could sit here sledding the same hill for hours.”

  “True…” Kieran said, thinking back to his own childhood. There was a really great hill in his neighborhood growing up that he had regularly sled down, and he was out on that same hill for hours at a time.

  “New hills are bound to get them excited though. After a few rounds, we should tell them that they have options.” Nat said.

  “And I’m sure they’ll appreciate the hot chocolate you hid in the car.”

  “Saw that, did you?” Nat laughed.

  “Yeah. You didn’t exactly hide it very well from the driver’s seat.” Kieran said, as he watched their daughters get back in line after the small hike back up the hill.

  “When was the last time you went sledding, Kin?”

  Kieran had to think about it. “College, maybe? It’s been a while. I definitely remember there being a big snowball fight in the snow my freshman year outside the dorms. I feel like we did some rather pathetic sledding then, too.”

  “Think your old man knees could handle getting on one of those sleds?” Nat needled.

  “Probably, why?”

  “There’s one particular hill that is fairly long and pretty steep - perfect for teenagers and older kids. I think we should swing by and show the little ones how it’s done.”

  “Oh, really?” Kieran said, eyeing his wife curiously. “I’m game.”

  As it turned out, the girls were very excited to have the hidden hot chocolate. They also very much enjoyed the four different hills they had the chance to ride down that day. They also had a great time watching Kieran and Nat both wipe out spectacularly on the hill that Nat had taken them to.

  Neither of them took the wipe out lying down, however, and they both rode sleds down that hill several times until they managed to make it to the bottom unscathed - including a little snowy ramp that some teens had set up. Their daughters had cheered them on the whole time.

  It wasn’t until Monday morning that they both regretted their decision. The muscle pain was no joke, and Kieran was concerned that he had maybe injured his back.

  Of course, given that they were both fine for the rest of Sunday before bed, it was probably nothing more than soreness. But the twinge of pain that accompanied most movements throughout the day was a solid reminder that maybe taking some pretty gnarly tumbles down a snowy hill was not a great idea in his thirties.

  As he sat in his office for some of his mandatory office hours on Monday, he grumbled to himself as he went over some papers. Even just the movement from drawing a checkmark or circle hurt something in his right shoulder and neck.

  “I’m never going to hear the end of this if I don’t feel better by raid time tomorrow,” was the only thought running through his head every time he flinched from the pain.