It wasn't Raine's first day on the job, but she was still in her probationary period. So why, why did they think it was a good idea to leave her in charge of the 1 year old room... by herself? There was an aide, but Raine didn't envy the part-time girl. She was swamped in sobbing, drooly kids who were both try to grab her book and also too sad to listen to the story she was reading.

"I'm sorry the sign in sheet is just... gone. It-it's the Holidays, I guess there's a lot of people that are sick or-"

"I don't really care if you have the right papers or whatever so long as you take him, the diapers, I packed snacks- don't let that Milton kid eat our snacks."

Raine accepted the cherubic child, the overflowing bag, the instruction and... "Oh uh- he's got a diaper, huh?"

"Thank you! I'll try not to be late in picking him up this time!"

The back of him... oh no. It was squished all up the back. Raine didn't even know his name, just the name of the baby that supposedly ate all his snacks for him. By the heft of his jowels, Raine figured that missing just one snack wasn't going to deplete him of all energy. She started to call out to the mom who was walking away, but then she spotted it... the sign in paper. It had fallen in front of the daycare window, down onto the tiled entryway floor.

That could wait, hypothetically.

"Wipes. Wipes. There are supposed to be wipes in this bag." And a name. Scrawled in Sharpie on each item in the bag was what looked like the word 'kelp' or maybe 'Kylo' of the StarFight persuasion. And of course no wipes. What if he was allergic to aloe? She would be able to know that if she knew his name...

In an ideal world, Stephanie would spend her days with Malia and make her money at night. That hypothetical ideal world also treated theft as a form of employment you could use to justify your revenue. If the young single-mother spent her days playing with her daughter with no signs of a day job in sight, she would be asking for the authorities to look into her finances. She was still a young thief in her prime, full of potential, and not about to go down to some Al Capone bullshit.

Using the initial accumulated funds of her first successful job, Stephanie was renting out a very modest studio. Freelance photography made laundered money more suspicious than money that passed hands through a legitimate business.

Daycare was going to be necessary, and not just for her cover. Quite frankly, Stephanie was still getting a handle on the whole parenting thing. Convinced she was doing everything wrong, she hoped a reputable daycare could mitigate some of the damage she must be doing to her pride and joy.

Double and triple checking the address on her phone to make sure she was at the right place, Stephanie pushed open the door into the entryway so she could guide Malia’s stroller inside. It was a relief escaping the New York City chill. Even with a coat over her sweater, she was mentally longing for the transient time of her life when she could hide away down south for the winter.

Except she could not live that life anymore. She had Malia, and she was not going to raise her little girl into a life without stability. Malia would have a good life with a mother who loved her in a city with boundless possibility. Steph could deal with the cold for three to four months of the year.

Before she got to the window where she assumed someone would attend to her and Malia, Stephanie noticed a paper on the ground. ”Huh. Did y’all lose your signup sheet?” She turned back, away from the window so she could bend down and pick up the stubborn paper. Nothing felt quite as awkward as trying and failing to pick up a flat sheet on a flat surface, particularly when such a simple task took several attempts and a pathetic nunmber of seconds.

"Got it! I can officially sign in now!" When she finally coerced it away from the tiles it laid flush with, Steph got to her feet and turned back to the window, holding the sheet up victoriously for anyone who might care to come to help her.

Raine had wrestled little Kenlpo- Kelopy- Keylo? onto the changing station. So of course she already heard the next parent on their way down the hall. She rushed, squishing the chubby little arms back through the onsie and stripping him down to his- "Oh that is really, really heinous, Kelpy. Extra credit on eating there, buddy. Good job." Because what else could she do? It was in his hair, it was in each valley, and every single crevice.

She heard a feminine voice and that meant she was totally out of time, but not yet out of places to wipe. Raine redoubled her efforts.

"Uh- yeah! Just a second!" A mom would understand. If that were her baby, she'd want it to have a fresh diaper and new clothes, too. She grabbed the extra clothes and had to really stuff him in there. "I think I need to tell your mom you've grown."

Kynlon was set down on his belly to seal flop toward the toys and Raine was washing her hands.

"I'm on my way! I haven't forgotten you." She wiped her hands, found a hook for the bag, and then turned into a stupid, bumbling idiot. Because the woman at the door was amazing. She looked so... so cool. So put together and she had the paper Raine had lost and angels were singing... somewhere. All she did was walk over like the brunette had engaged a tractor beam.

"I- Thanks for patient. I mean- you being." How cringe was she being? Oh god. She was salivating. WHY WAS SHE SALIVATING!? "I- uh. We're out of ratio. That means, we- uhm. We're full. Because there's not enough people. Lots of babies." And Raine spied that this woman had a baby, too. Because of course she did. This was a daycare.

Stephanie expected someone to be waiting behind the counter when she stood, but the only employee in sight was still a ways off and, though Steph could not hear any words, had the kind of energy of a woman juggling plates.

Eventually, the blonde-haired woman called out and squared things away before turning to head her way. She seemed… occupied by something? Clearly, she had a lot on her plate today, and—okay, Stephanie, that was two plate metaphors. Diversify, at least. Kids were a handful, and this woman was dealing with a room of them, so Steph could empathize.

The next sentences, or attempts at sentences, required Stephanie to piece them back together. ”Spending the whole day with babies makes words hard, I imagine,” she joked lightly, hoping the good-natured tease would not offend. She did not need to piss off the daycare attendant on day one.

Assuming this would be day one, which the blonde seemed to think was impossible. Evidently, they were overbooked for the amount of people they had working. Steph wondered if she meant today or in general, but held the question. She had come all this way and she was here for Malia. She was not about to accept defeat without a fight.

Thankfully, Stephanie’s fighting came with a smile. ”Oh no! I can only imagine all those kiddos have y’all quite busy,” she consoled in her sweet southern drawl, turning to her daughter and brushing a small curl of dark hair from her forehead. ”But I was talking to Millicent, I believe? She told me to bring Malia in so we could get a feel for the place today and decide if she could stay with you long term.”

Turning her attention back squarely on the attendant, Stephanie leaned against the countertop to draw herself slightly closer. ”I know things are sorta crowded in there today, but is there any chance you can handle just one more baby girl? I don’t actually have appointments today, so I can stick here and be an extra set of eyes and hands, if it helps.” And of course, she may have added a bat of her eyelashes. The world blessed her with big brown eyes and Steph had no qualms accentuating and weaponizing them.

Talking to babies was thus far, an easier task than talking to an attractive woman. Normally Raine could keep it together. Boys, girls, roach-humanoids. She'd faced down bad guys with guns. Somehow this one, singular human being was throwing her entirely out of whack.

"You have no idea." Raine melted against the front counter. Words were hard. She was lucky that this woman had come to her work where she had a door to hide behind and not jumped her in a dark alley. Raine would have had no chance, then. Or... maybe then it'd be better.

"I'm sorry." She caught a glimpse of the aide and pulled herself together. This really was no moment to fall apart. They had to do a diaper check before first snack. "Millicent is in the three to five year old room." Raine saw that the daughter had inherited the same brown hair, only with the unfettered curl that came with baby hair.

If you agree, she has to come back. The foolish, selfish part of her helpfully supplied.

Raine sighed.

What was one more?

"There's a release form you can sign... If you can just wait a little bit longer." Raine turned toward the wall with the magnet guarded paperwork and saw her aide's eye bulge out of their sockets. She walked a bit faster. If this was her first day, they had a whole packet to fill out, actually. She should invite her in...

"Here." Raine slapped a 'get to know you' packet, an allergy form, a ratio disclaimer form, a pen, and a smile in front of the mom. "I'm Raine, by the way. Can you get this filled out while we do diaper checks? You can get little..." she waited for the girl's name to be supplied "she could probably be in by snack time."

Raine sashayed away to check diapers. The aide had a few hushed and clipped words like too nice and absolute sucker, but Raine was willing to endure that for the time being.

It was amazing how much easier people could relax around you after an offering them a small gesture of empathy. With her struggle validated, the woman seemed to take a genuine, vulnerable moment for herself, however brief it was. Stephanie did not expect the people watching her child to be joy robots. It was nice to know this woman was human.

Of course, she had to make sure she was human and good at her job. Stephanie wanted to believe everyone working at the daycare loved kids and pushed through the exhaustion and stress of tending to the kids because they just gave a damn. Well, she assumed they would be dealing with exhaustion and stress because Steph was constantly tired and concerned and she had one kid.

Thankfully, makeup did wonders and she could look put together as she gave this woman puppy-dog eyes. The conversation with Millicent was evidently a misunderstanding, but Stephanie did not waver. She simply lingered on the woman, waiting and watching for a sign she might break.

> "There's a release form you can sign... If you can just wait a little bit longer."

And there it was. Stephanie simply replied with her brightest smile and let her own personal hero retrieve the prerequisite forms. Raine, (which suited her,) provided her with everything she needed, but left a sentence hanging. The tired mother waited two beats before piecing together what Raine was waiting for. ”Oh, right! Malia.”

Stephanie could have sworn she heard happy cooing at the mention of snack time, though that was probably a coincidence. Before Raine could run off, she quickly added, ”Lovely, thank you! And I’m Stephanie. I know you didn’t ask, but I figured you earned it since you made my day, Raine.” And that was not a lie; yes, she may have used a manipulative tactic or two, but Raine’s kindness kept her from spending the day searching for another daycare center.

Taking a seat, Stephanie worked on the forms, reading the contents carefully. She did not feel rushed, and while she was already a diligent person, she was doubly so when it came to Malia. Her daughter, meanwhile, was occupying herself with a plush spider that for some reason she was fixated on during their last trip to the store.

When she finally wrapped up the paperwork, Steph set everything aside and picked Malia up, gently rocking her baby. ”Alright Chickie, I hope you’re ready to be the best kid here today. First impressions are important, and Miss Raine is the nicest, so you’re going to be extra special good for her today, right?” Steph’s light tone and scrunched nose to punctuate her question earned a giggle from the baby in her arms.

"--and I hope you realize that you're going to have to call in someone else."

"We will. Someone else will come in and we'll have a comfortable buffer so we don't have to turn anyone away. Besides, today might be rough, yeah, but the room isn't at capacity. It's just that we're low on caretakers today. You want a job tomorrow, right?"

Frankie, who'd just opened a diaper to check, had found a present. "I don't know..."

"It'll be great." Attitude was half the battle. Raine made one day. She was gonna make Frankie's day by convincing someone who wasn't sick to come in. It was going to work.

Malia. Malia. After finishing her half of the checks and one or two changes, Raine went to grab a fresh name tag... and then realized that she didn't know how to spell Malia. It could be two L's. Was she a y kind of parent? Raine adjusted her pony tail higher because couldn't decide. But she didn't have to. There was paperwork for a reason.

"Thank you... Stephanie? You said, I think?" She had to play it cool. Couldn't freak out and prove that she'd been running the name back and forth through her brain like floss so she wouldn't forget it. Thus far, she was totally keeping it together better... until, of course, she realized that Stephanie had lips. Like. Nice ones?

"Spider. Uh! I mean, I love hers, Malia's." This was ridiculous. She had one mouth and one brain, but it somehow felt like she had two left tongues and one heart that kept trying to squeeze its way past. She wrote M-a-l-i-a on the name plate and passed it over to Stephanie.

And now, the moment of truth, Raine held out her hands with a reassuring smile. This part, at least, she had done enough times that should couldn't possibly mess it up. "I can hold Malia while you choose a cubby. I know it's on the paperwork, but is there anything major to note? A blankie she just can't live without or major allergy?"

Stephanie could not hear the conversation Raine was having with one of the daycare helpers, but the body language suggested apprehension on the other woman’s part. Raine was going out of her way to help Stephanie, and she wanted to respect that. If anything, it was earning her points as Steph’s potential favorite Malia-watcher. Wendy was nice but forgetful, making Steph leery of her go-to babysitter.

Smiling upon the woman’s return, Stephanie nodded a confirmation. ”Stephanie, yes. And you’re Raine. It’s a very nice name and it suits you. Hence, easy to remember!” Maybe she was turning up the friendliness a notch, but Raine was making herself easy to be nice to, and being over-tired helped.

The spider did not weird Raine out, suggesting Stephanie was not an awful parent for letting Malia get attached to the odd stuffed animal. ”I’m glad you like it, because these two have been inseparable since she picked it out last week.”

Without much of a second thought, Stephanie got to her feet and carefully offered her daughter to Raine, not letting her go until she was sure Raine had a good handle on her. Raine worked with babies; this was something Stephanie could trust her to do. She just had to keep reminding herself to trust the nice girl with the gorgeous trustworthy blue eyes. Malia seemed to, based on the happy sounds Steph heard from her daughter.

Looking at the cubbies, wondering if there was any benefit to Malia in picking one or another, Steph considered Raine’s question. Major notes. Originally, there would not have been much, but since waking up… well, evidently the older Malia had gotten further in her development and that change came back to her little one-year-old. ”Yes, actually… Malia is a mutant.” There was no avoiding the admission, sadly. Malia had a power and no control over when she triggered it, so it would not stay hidden long. ”She manifested very early. Occasionally she will glow. It’s not bright enough to hurt anyone’s eyes, though hopefully she does not wake anyone during naptime…”

"No, it's great." Raine enthused about the spider because it was great. "It's got all those legs which are great for grabbing, grip strength, eye-hand coordination. All that. You're both lucky and unlucky that she's attached. You might want to go buy 3 more of these guys." When it came to babies, it was easy to talk. She'd done about 12 hours of coursework to be able to be in here at the level she was. Psych class hadn't been a total bust.

And Stephanie passed the first test with flying colors. She didn't freak out. She still had time to bust into tears as she left, but for now Raine was happy to give Malia a little tummy poke. That earned her a one-dimpled smile endearing enough for Raine to return in kind. One dimple.

So it was a bit jarring to have a bit of real world dropped in her lap.

"Wh-what?" They couldn't ask, technically, on the forms, but children so rarely manifested in non-physical ways that this was... surprising. Raine held Malia out to give her a quick once over. Had she missed seeing a tail or something?

And most importantly, was it a threat?

> "...Occasionally she will glow..."

Raine sighed and brought Malia back into the crook of her arm and balance don her hip. Was that all? "I'm guessing it's not, like... radioactive or anything." Then they'd be quarantined, right? That was definitely what would have happened in her home universe.

"We're going to have to find you a blackout curtain for a blanket, huh?" A glowbaby. It was unusual, but she could roll with that. Malia grabbed onto Raine's ponytail and gave it a decent tug, but that was easy to detangle when the hands were clean. "Can you wave to mom, Malia? We're going to have some animal crackers in a bit and we'll be just fine."

After receiving looks from other parents and passerbys when they saw Malia’s toy, it was comforting to have someone actually justify the benefits of the spider. This was nice; Raine knew her stuff. In fact, Steph had to resist feeling ignorant for being unaware of these benefits. ”Great! I’ll totally act like I knew that when she made a fuss for me to grab it off the shelf.” This was the difference between someone trained to work with kids and an eighteen-year-old mother learning on the fly. If anything, this helped Steph trust in Raine’s ability to offer quality care for her daughter.

Things were going well, which was why it was disheartening when Raine had a surprised, almost wary reaction to Malia’s mutation. Stephanie’s brow furrowed as she re-examined the way Raine held Malia. At leawst she handled her well, but still… ”Nope, no radioactivity. Just a little human nightlight. I hope that won’t be too much of a bother,” she said pointedly. Stephanie was not out as a mutant for obvious crime-related reasons, but she was not going to let her daughter be treated like an oddity.

Regardless of that odd moment, Raine seemed ready to bring Malia in for the day. At least being a mutant was not a deal breaker; in her universe, she was sure it would be. Stephanie would stay her concerns for now, entrusting her initial vibes of Raine. ”I suppose it’s time to give up this sweetheart for the day,” Steph lamented, moving closer to Malia and Raine as she held the baby.

Stephanie placed a small kiss on her daughter’s forehead, prompting Malia to reach out to try grabbing her mother’s brunette locks. ”I’ll miss you, pumpkin. Be good for Miss Raine, okay?” Malia stared up at her with those big brown eyes. Yeah, she probably got it.

Looking back at Raine, who she now recognized she was a little closer to than appropriate, Steph took a step back and nervously smiled. ”Okay, so what time should I come back around today?”

Ah Raine knew that sharp mom tone. She hadn't meant it like that. Hell, she was a mutant herself, but since she wasn't willing to disclose that fact... Raine helped Malia wave as a way to keep her from grabbing her hair again. But waving was not enough.

She breathed in when Stephanie leaned in. Why? Maybe to say something, she wasn't sure because she caught a waft of what must have been the other woman's shampoo. So she ended up holding her breath after as Stephanie took a cute moment with her daughter. She was thinking totally pure thoughts, totally and perfectly child-holding appropriate thoughts.

"Uhm. You can come whenever." Phrasing. Oh, awful terrible phrasing. Raine's voice grew less reedy as she bulldozed past the well of embarrassment that tried to bubble up and consume her from within. She had to keep it together just a little longer. "We're open until 6pm. There's a clause about late fees to be careful about. It's $5 per minute you're late after close. So long as you are here before then, it's all good."

"Raine!" She turned and saw the aide was holding two crying kids apart as if they'd been slapping each other.

"We will be fine, mom! Have a good day!" She helped Malia wave and turned to help wade through children with Malia still on her hip. Holding usually made the transition for kiddos easier.

"What's wrong with your face? You look flushed- you're not... you're not getting sick are you?"

Only sick in the head.

"I'm fine. Just... did you not see that hot mom?" She did try to keep her voice down just in case, but.... hoooo.

Maybe Steph was being a little harsh, but who could blame her for being defensive? She had not spent much time away from Malia in her first year of parenting—often, she would arrange for one small job she could live off of for a while. One night leaving Malia with a sitter, then a month or two of doting and worrying and trying to keep her daughter happy, healthy, and loved with the limited understanding of parenting she had.

Now she was considering leaving Malia in the care of others during the day so she could work some semblance of a day job. What if the people sucked? What if they treated her poorly or ignored her? What if they did not know how to make her stop crying, because Stephanie still struggled with that half the time?

But Raine was a professional. The people here had experience and the ratings online were high. Maybe Raine was just being cautious about the nature of Malia’s mutation. Steph would give her the benefit of the doubt for now, accepting the final details. The way Raine phrased them… well, the moment passed right away, which was good, because if it lingered, Steph might have stood there with her tongue useless.

Thankfully, they moved onto the final waves from Malia and Raine. Smiling, Stephanie waved back. ”Bye, sweetheart! Bye, Miss Raine!” It felt rude not to say goodbye to Raine, or to make things awkward by making Raine think she was being called a sweetheart. She kinda seemed like one, but you know, professionalism.

Speaking of professionalism, Stephanie should get back to the small studio she managed to get ahold of at obscene New York rent. Which was saying something, considering she was paying the first month’s rent entirely with ill-gotten gains.



6:06. F*ck a duck.

The last client came in late and he decided to be fussy about his professional headshots. Stephanie could deal with fussy clients, but she had Malia on the brain all day. She was not some helicopter mom, but she wanted to know her daughter was enjoying daycare. She received no calls, and resisted the urge to call and check in—she was not going to be that mom.

Still, when her appointment was over, she locked up, rushed out, and tried navigating the subway back to the daycare. She thought she had an idea of how long the trip would take, but the subway was an annoying variable and she was still new to this New York.

Speedwalking through the daycare door, Stephanie finally had a moment to catch her breath. ”I’m sorry! I’m not a late mom, the subways just suck and the city layout here is just all backwards,” she called out almost immediately, looking for whoever might still be around watching straggler children.

It wasn't a bad day, all things considered, but it did end up being a double shift. Bonus. Overtime pay. Negative. Her feet here so, so tired of being inside of shoes. Raine had called around and called a few more times to double check, but no one else wanted to come in. Luckily, the kids mostly cleared out early leaving the adults time to clean and pack things away. Only a few straggler were left by 5 o'clock so Raine let the aide go home a bit early.

And the same stragglers were left by 6:00. Oliver's mom showed up at 5:01 to scoop up the sleeping puddle of limp little boy. Children could sleep with such abandon that it was remarkable. The mom chatted momentarily with Raine about his day and then it was only Malia and Raine left.

At 6:06 Raine started to worry if Malia's mom had gotten hurt. She'd promised up and down this morning that she would be back and she would be on time. The blonde rolled a ball to Malia. Malia swat at it until it rolled sideways. Malia wailed a bit and grabbed after it, but her arms would not reach. She wasn't really crawling well yet so she sat, stubbornly swatting toward the ball until Raine pushed it back.

Malia immediately smacked it away again.

"It kinda do be like sometimes." Raine nudged the ball back and this time Malia picked it up to give it a good slobber. "What do you think? Another tooth?"

Sounds of quick walking brought Raine and Malia's attention to the front hallway. Malia, like so many other kids, lit up whens he saw her mother. Unlike other kids, it was more than just a smile. She hadn't glowed all day and Raine had sort of wondered if she'd been pranked about being a mutant.

Now, she positively glowed.

"It's okay. It seems to happen to everybody at least once. C'mere, hon." She held out her arms to the glowbaby and Malia leaned in for a quick scoop up. She pointed to Stephanie and declared "Mama!" at the rate of a machinegun. Raine wasn't enthusiastic about the lateness, she'd been here for a full days work and a half already, considering that she opened this morning.

"It is so clear that she loves you. Right Malia?" Raine waited for hot mom Stephanie to sign the front desk paper and time stamp it, politely waiting for her hands to be free before handing back her child. "The front desk will add the time to your bill, if you were worried. They don't miss a dime, sorry."

Now that Raine's hands were free, she took a second to peel off her smock. It was a lot like a nurse's top, a unisex,featureless, and utilitarian rag. It also had seen cleaner days, so taking it off made Raine feel so much more like a person again. Her previously neat ponytail was askew. Her white shoes were still white, but the socks told the story that something had been spilled and they'd been wiped down. "She told me all about you while you were gone. Let's see... "

Raine wadded the smock in her hands as she looked around at the cleaned room for reminders about the pertinent moments of the day. "We had some crackers for a snack at 5, and I changed her diaper just after that so she'll probably be good for a while. She had a great first day, honestly. Took a nap like a champion with her spider."

Just the one ball to pick up and the paperwork and then Raine could also get out of here.

The front desk was clearly waiting for Stephanie, which only increased the guilt-factor she felt arriving late. Even if Malia was hopefully making a good first impression, she had to present herself as a responsible parent if she wanted this to work. This was a challenge, as she barely felt like she was good at either half of that role.

Walking into the daycare itself, Steph looked around but did not have to look hard for Malia. The child had a gentle glow in the arms of her caretaker. Stephanie wished he could have known how her power originally manifested this power, but it certainly stunned her the first day her infant happily gnawed on one of her toys and literally lit up. It was a lovely power and the relationship between her daughter’s light and her own shadow was not lost on Stephanie.

Looking up from her pride and joy, the glow warmed Raine’s features. It made the blonde in her hair more vivid. She noticed earlier, but she had been too worried to think about it: Raine was an attractive woman. At least, she was more attractive than anyone who spent the whole day with a room full of instants deserved to be. A lot of that was in the eyes, expertly accentuated with makeup and in Malia’s light, the clearest blue Stephanie had seen.

But this was not the situation to get lost in Raine’s eyes. Unprofessional, especially after she already dropped the ball with her late arrival.

Like a kind soul, Raine tried to minimize Stephanie’s faux pas. She would still feel guilty about it, but it was hard to feel anything other than love when Malia was this excited to see her. Stephanie accepted her daughter as Raine let her know the front desk would be handling the charges to her account. ”Well darn, there goes my plan to just offer to buy you dinner so we could call it even.” It was clearly a joke of course, because she was sure dads hit on Raine plenty and Stephanie did not want to add to that. And yet, she felt the need to make the joke anyway.

Bouncing the shiny baby girl with her hip to giggles of approval, Stephanie let Raine get settled by removing her smock, which was admittedly worse for wear. Actual people clothes suited her far better. ”All about me, really?” Steph turned to the innocent face of her child inquisitively. ”Did you give up all my dirty secrets? I hope you didn’t spoil all my mystery, sweatpea.” Oh, she was glad she never spoke about her real work around Malia now that she was picking up words.

The update of Malia’s day inspired confidence that Steph made a good choice with this daycare. Malia sounded like she behaved and enjoyed her time there, and Raine was clearly attentive. ”Sounds like you do great work with them. Which only makes me wanna apologize more, Raine.” She did not want her first impression to make her seem unreliable. ”I didn’t realize my last client would drag our time out, so no more late appointments. Really, I am just getting used to things here.” But that just felt like excuse making, which she couldn’t do when it came to Malia.

Stephanie sighed. ”Thank you for watching her, Raine. I’ve just been… a bit overwhelmed trying to restart here.”

Raine stuttered internally at the offer of dinner. It was an internal stutter so severe that she became all thumbs and dropped her smock.

As a rule of thumb, she thought of the parents of her daycare kids as ‘taken.’ It took two to make a thing go right and the youngest children, at least, were more likely to still have two in the picture. Totally not always the case. Raine could name a certain teammate who had apparently been dropping hints that she failed to pick up.

Raine did not fail to notice the dangling bait. Or was it dangling bait for a friendship? Raine was crushing hard, but Stephanie likely had somebody back home keeping her sheets warm. Besides, Raine couldn’t take a bribe… could she? Not if Malia was going to attend here, in Raine’s one year old room. She couldn’t show favoritism.

You don’t plan on doing this forever, she reminded herself. But then, she still didn’t know what she actually did want to do… besides chase down villains in the night, of course.

”I wish it was as easy as dinner and calling it even.” The words were hard to get out because the regret was crushing. ”It’s all on the official paperwork, you know? Otherwise I won’t get my overtime hours paid.” And money was a struggle everyone understood.

Raine at least picked up her smock and also recovered the ball, the very last toy of the day. That needed to go in the “to be sanitized” bucket, since Malia had mouthed on it.

> ”Sounds like you do great work with them. Which only makes me wanna apologize more, Raine.”

”These aren’t my kids, but… while they’re here they kinda are. Maybe that’s stupid to say to a real mom, but I just love this age group.” She did have the odd whiny parent and there were days when the kids never seemed to be satisfied, but every day that Raine worked was a day she felt fulfilled. She didn’t have swanky clients or appointments, but at least she didn’t have to dress up. Now without her smock, she was just in a long sleeved teeshirt and jeans like any other man on the street.

>”Thank you for watching her, Raine. I’ve just been… a bit overwhelmed trying to restart here.”

Friendship or fishing for sympathy? While Stephanie had been gathering Malia’s things, Raine put the last toy in its place and gathered the paperwork before stepping out into the hall beside the mom. The super mega gorgeous and almost certainly taken mom, Raine reminded herself before she put her foot in her mouth.

"That’s a mood. I’m just now able to work after all the immigration BS they put displaced universers through. At least they didn’t put us in cages, though." Flea bag hotels and temporary shelters overflowing, Raine had been welcomed with open hands by this world’s mutants. She’d been lucky.