“Honestly, the fact that it came in handy once was kind of a surprise,” Vell said. “Horseback riding is a pretty anachronistic skill.”

“You’re going to get at least one more use out of it this year,” Leanne said. “I’d put money on it.”

“Maybe. I hope Dr. Ernest isn’t around next time, at least.”

Leanne might have had a response to that, but she never got to say it. She noticed Harley approaching and quickly clammed up. While she had gotten more comfortable conversing with Vell, she still kept her distance from Lee and Harley. Emotional distance, at least. Harley was closing the physical distance with surprising speed.

“What’s the rush, Harley?” Vell asked. “You already find out what’s going to blow up today?”

“Sort of,” Harley said. “No sign of the apocalypse but I do know about a disaster headed our way.”

Harley took a moment to catch her breath and then put her hands flat on the breakfast table.

“Lee’s parents are coming to visit.”

“Is that a-”

Vell’s question was cut off by the sound of a chair squeaking across the floor. He glanced over at Leanne’s chair and found it empty. He looked around the room for a second. Leanne had all but vanished.

“Jesus,” Vell said. “Is it that bad?”

“Oh it’s worse,” Harley said. “It’s so much worse. If you want to duck out, now is the time. I won’t hold it against you.”

“I’d hold it against me,” Vell said. “What’s going to happen, and what do we need to do?”

“Well I wish I could tell you but it’s about as unpredictable as our usual routine,” Harley said. “Lee’s got a lifetime of bottled-up resentment and it can blow up in a lot of different ways.”

Lee’s feelings towards her parents could best be described as “borderline homicidally psychotic”, but Vell had only ever seen one side of that that horrific family dynamic. He didn’t want to know what the full family unit looked like -and what Lee might look like with a chance to lash out at her parents without consequence.

“So the usual routine, then,” Vell said. “Plan for the worst, find out it’s even worse than you planned for, start improvising.”

“You are really catching on,” Harley said. “Anyway, just keep an eye on your phone and stay close to places Lee knows you hang out. She might come running around the corner and sec-”

Lee came running around the corner.

“Okay shit,” Harley said. “Just be cool, be supportive, and try not to let her get too crazy.”

Vell gave a quiet thumbs up and tried to act casual. He kept his cool right up until Lee made it to the table and grabbed his shoulder hard enough to make him wince.

“Vell, I need you,” Lee spat. “Come with me.”

“Sure, okay, what’s up?”

Vell stood, hoping the act of compliance would get Lee to release him. It did not. She kept her hand locked on his shoulder and dragged him out of the dining hall towards her dorm.

“My parents want to meet you,” Lee said. Vell could practically hear her teeth grinding as she spoke. “They were quite insistent on it, actually.”

“Wait, I thought you hadn’t told your parents about me?”

“I haven’t,” Lee hissed. “They’ve been ‘observing’ me.”

“What the fuck?”

“It is nothing new. Just come with me and play along.”

“Play along with what?”

“I haven’t really decided yet,” Lee said. “But I trust you to improvise.”

“You shouldn’t,” Vell said. He was historically bad at acting under pressure.

“You’ll do fine,” Lee assured him, quite incorrectly. “Oh, and one more thing, my parents still think I go by my birth name, so don’t call me ‘Lee’.”

“Right, so if I have to, do you have like a nickname, or do I call you X-L-”

“Vell, if you finish that sentence I will slap you,” Lee said.

“Shutting up.”

“I don’t ever want you to call me that,” Lee continued. Vell nodded in agreement as they stepped up to her door. “Give me a moment.”

Lee took a deep breath and held it as she opened the door to her dorm. A wave of cold air swept out of her dorm the minute it cracked open. Vell never thought to ask if Lee had lowered the temperature in her room out of petty spite, or if her parents somehow chilled the air with their very presence. The introductions distracted him.

Vell had seen Noel Burrows before on trade magazine covers and news broadcasts, but being face to face really put the details of his absurd appearance into perspective. His face was too small for his oddly rectangular head, a disproportion made all the more noticeable by his barrel-shaped torso. His thinning hair had been very obviously supplemented with hair transplants, and he wore an equally obvious layer of makeup designed to hide his aging complexion. The leather jacket that was designed to look cheap (but had almost surely cost hundreds of dollars) rounded out the appearance of a man who was much too concerned with looking younger than he really was.

To his left, Lee’s much less familiar mother waved eagerly to Vell. Granger Burrows had been a famous pop musician once upon a time, but had mostly retired after becoming Noel’s third wife. She still had the overly manicured appearance of someone who would be headed to the stage at any moment. Her dark brown eyes were wide but unfocused, as if she was seeing everything at once, yet understanding none of it.

“Vell Harlan, nice to meet you,” Noel said.

“Mr. Burrows.” Vell began. He had to bite his tongue to actually force the next few words out of his mouth. “Nice to meet you too.”

“So, my sources in the faculty say you’re the man of the hour when it comes to rune tech,” Noel said. “Knocking it out of the park in every class.”

“I, uh, have some competition, but I do my best,” Vell said.

“Of course, of course,” Noel said. “I also hear you’ve been spotted around campus with Kraid a few times.”

“Unfortunately,” Vell grumbled.

“Hah, believe me, I get it,” Noel said, trying too hard to sound chummy. “That guy is no fun at parties. Or anywhere, for that matter, am I right?”

Noel laughed, Granger laughed, and Lee forced herself into a polite chuckle.

“So tell me, I assume he had something to say about that little tattoo of yours?”

“My what?” Vell said blankly.

“Oh, don’t be coy. That rune on your back. Kraid’s interested in it, right?”

“How do you know about that?” Vell demanded. He looked to Lee, who gave a slight but emphatic shake of her head. Noel just gave a mild chuckle.

“Oh come on, Vell, buddy, you’re too smart to think anything is really a secret when the price is right,” Noel said. “I knew Kraid was interested in you, so I got interested in you too.”

“It’s so cool that you’ve been so blessed,” Granger said, in her nasally voice. “Your aura is just absolutely bursting with life energy, you know?”

She giggled at nothing in particular, and Noel continued on his own.

“Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me,” he said. “And it could be profitable with me, too, unless you’ve already signed on with Kraid?”

“Absolutely not,” Vell said.

“Oh good. I was worried Kraid had found himself a new protege. He’d already got his claws on Joan Marsh, you know, and when you started dating her I was worried he was going to snatch up a two-for-one special of the school’s most promising students.”

Lee’s already strained expression became even more tortured at the mention of Joan, and it didn’t get any better as her father continued.

“Luckily you saw through that act,” Noel said with an inappropriate chuckle. “Whatever got between you two, anyway?”

The uncomfortable expression on Lee’s face snapped into one of mild delight as she found the opportunity she had been looking for.

“I did, actually,” Lee said. She took one step closer to Vell and latched on to his arm like a leech biting into a vein. “Quite literally, on more than occasion. We had a few menage a trois before Vell left her for me.”

Granger gave a shocked gasp, and Noel seemed dumbstruck by Lee’s sudden ‘revelation’, which delighted Lee to no end. She gave his arm a sharp squeeze, prompting Vell to add something to her deception.

“Yeah, it was, uh, a lot of threesomes, that we had,” Vell said. Lee violently squeezed his arm to prompt him to continue. “I liked them, but I had to dump Joan eventually, because...uh…”

Vell started to flounder, and Lee picked up the slack.

“Because of the baby!” She shouted, blurting out the first thing that came to mind. Her mind raced for a second to devise a follow-up. Lee’s face split into a devious grin as she realized her next step. She loosed one hand from it’s tight squeeze on Vell’s arm and put it on her own stomach.

“I wanted to make a special announcement out of it, but since you’re here, I suppose you should know. I’m pregnant!”

While her parents gawked in horror, Lee restrained herself from looking too delighted with their shock and confusion.

“We’re pretty sure Vell’s the father, at least,” Lee said, doubling-down on her already intense escalation. “I slept with a few people around the same time but Vell’s the only one who wasn’t using protection. Isn’t that right, dear?’

“Uh, right, yeah, that’s right,” Vell stammered. “We definitely had sex, and I, uh, eja-”

Vell cringed mid-sentence and stopped himself. Couldn’t actually bring himself to complete that thought.

“-and things happened. More than once. And a baby happened, from the things.”

With a strained smile, Lee pulled Vell slightly closer and bent in to whisper harshly in his ear.

“You’re not selling this, Vell.”

“This is fucking weird,” Vell hissed back. “Why are we even doing this? Don’t your parents know you’re a lesbian?”

“Why on earth would I come out to them, of all people? Idiot,” Lee snapped back. She released her death grip on Vell and returned her attention to her parents. “Sorry, just a quick aside. Isn’t it wonderful, though? You’re going to be grandparents!”

Granger Burrows began to cry, though Lee’s initial sadistic glee upon seeing her tears turned sour when she realized they were tears of happiness.

“Oh baby, I’m so happy for you,” Granger said. Noel took a step back, looking like he’d been punched in the gut, while Granger stepped up. “You’re going to be such a good mom. I’m so proud.”

“Wh- What?” Lee snapped. Her charade gave way to genuine emotion for a moment. Unfortunately for Granger, that emotion was anger. “You’re proud of me? For what? For lying on my back and getting fucked enough times a baby happened?”

“Oh, Excy, baby-”

Granger reached out to put a hand on Lee’s shoulder, and she smacked it away hard enough that Granger nearly toppled over.

“Don’t fucking call me that,” Lee snapped. “You know how hard I’ve worked. You know everything I’ve done. But it takes getting pregnant to make you say you’re proud of me?”

As opposed to the theatrical outrage generated from their earlier pregnancy routine, Vell could see that some very real anger and resentment was now bubbling to the surface. Having already reached his limit on Harley’s requests to “be cool” and “be supportive”, Vell chose to act on her third request: “try not to let her get too crazy.”

“Speaking of pregnancy and all that, Lee, we have that, uh, baby...doctor...appointment,” Vell said. “The very important one. That we need to go to. Now.”

He grabbed Lee’s shoulder and gave a light tug towards the door. She resisted his attempts to deescalate, and Noel proved just as much of an obstacle to their escape.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Noel snapped. His face had turned an almost comical shade of tomato red. He clearly didn’t share in Granger’s joy about their nonexistent grandchild. He took a deep breath and tried to wipe away some sweat that had begun to form on his brow. “Fuck me, okay…”

Noel leaned over and put his hands flat on the table, then took a deep breath.

“You haven’t completely ruined my life with this,” Noel said. “The kid doesn’t have any connections, but he’s got brains, he’ll be useful...”

“Your life?” Lee said. “Your life is what might be ruined here?”

“Also I do want to take a quick aside to ask what you mean by ‘useful’?” Vell asked.

“I mean, as long as we get you two married before the baby pops out, the publicity won’t be too bad,” Noel said. “You’re smart enough to make a half decent member of the Burrows dynasty, Harlan.”

“Uh…”

Vell stalled, which was a big mistake. Lee took any chance to get a word in edgewise.

“I’m not going to marry him for any reason, much less your publicity,” Lee snapped. “I never said I loved him, just that I fucked him. On that table you’re leaning on, specifically.”

Noel let out a quick shout of disgust and drew his hands back. Lee managed to tear her eyes away from her father’s disgust long enough to check where her mother was. Granger Burrows had taken a seat on the couch to process her shock.

“And the couch, too!” Lee shouted. Granger jumped up with a shout. While they both went to wash their hands, having a brief marital spat as they did so, Vell tried to grab Lee by the shoulder once again.

“Lee I get what you’re going for but I feel like this is unhealthy behavior,” Vell whispered.

“What, like they don’t deserve every minute of suffering?” Lee hissed back. She then raised her voice loud enough for her parents to hear. “No, Vell, dear, I don’t want to make them watch. We can do it after they leave, though.”

“Wha- Why would you say that?” Vell demanded.

“Oh relax, Vell, they won’t even remember it. Just make them suffer while you can and enjoy it.”

Vell bit his tongue and contemplated his next move. He had gone well past the point of letting her get too crazy. Now he needed to improvise his next steps. He tightened his grip on Lee’s shoulder.

“Lee, I’m going to ask you one more time, as your friend, to cut it out.”

“You’re welcome to leave any time, Vell, but I only get a few chances to repay a lifetime of suffering and I mean to take them.”

“Okay, I, uh, hmm.”

After wracking his brain for a few seconds, Vell managed to come up with exactly zero good ideas. He went with one of the bad ideas at random. Owing to Vell’s luck, he happened to choose the worst possible option.

With a quick grunt of exertion, Vell swept Lee off her feet and picked her up off the ground.

“Vell, what are you-”

“I shouldn’t be doing this,” Vell said, as he continued doing it. With Lee in his arms bridal-style, Vell hustled towards the door and kicked it open before dashing down the hall and away from Lee’s parents.