I think Sini and I have more or less adopted Pax, or maybe he's adopted us. While just about everyone in the house helps take care of him and educate him, he seems to prefer the two of us. He doesn't like Xander at all and is still a little wary of Hunter, but he's fine with everyone else. It's Sini or me that he comes to when he's scared or confused, though, or when he wants something. I thought Pax would be like a little brother to me, but he's more of a challenge than I expected. Having Pax around is really more like having a second child; a gangly, overgrown child who competes with my daughter for my attention and who likes to steal my shoes.
Pax also likes playing dress-up. Sapphire caught him at this:
Skyla and Pax both learned new skills this weekend. Skyla can now sing the entire alphabet song. Since we've been helping Pax learn English, I've been trying to teach him the alphabet, and I thought it would be good for Skyla to join in as well. She still can't really identify the letters, but I love hearing her little voice chirping the song. By Monday evening, Pax also knew the song. He recognizes all the letters, and he's even trying to write simple words. I like using the fridge magnets to teach him because I can touch them and 'see' the words he's trying to spell.
I remember Michael and me learning the alphabet with fridge magnets when we were kids. Our parents actually ended up having to buy two sets of them for us because each set only had one of each letter, and Michael and I quarreled over the fact that we couldn't both spell our names at the same time. (We both needed the L and the E). Fortunately, we haven't got that problem here, since the only one spelling his name on the fridge is Pax. I suspect, though, that when Skyla, Jack and Cleo get older we're going to need another set of letters.
Along with tackling the English language, Pax is learning how to behave among humans. They must've had some rules for him in the place he was living before, because he certainly understands the meaning of the word no, but I'm not sure those people ever attempted to communicate why certain things were inappropriate or dangerous. I get the feeling there must've been consequences for bad behaviour at Pax's old house, though. Michael scolded him for something on Saturday, and he started whimpering. The same thing happened on Sunday afternoon when I reminded him not to leave his toys out where I might trip on them. He began crying and saying, "I sorry!" over and over. Sini came running into the room because she said she could feel Pax's panic so intensely that she thought something bad must've happened. When Sini realized what was going on, she explained to Pax that he wasn't in trouble, but it took him quite a while to calm down.
Situations like that really bring to light for me the fact that Pax is essentially a little kid. His body might be nearly adult-sized, but his mind has some catching up to do. According to Sini's best calculations, Pax is about sixteen 'Earth years' old, but his level of mental and emotional maturity is nowhere near the level of a human of that age. Sini says his development is normal by the standards of their world. Erisans have a long childhood. Lucky them.
More proof that Pax is still a child came in the form of his protest over sleeping apart from Sini and me. In the beginning, he actually wanted to sleep with us, but I said there was no way that was going to happen. To my great astonishment, Sini was extremely upset about that. Apparently, when Pax first arrived, Sini had been letting him sleep with her. The only reason he didn't crawl into bed with us on my first night back from my trip to the States was that Sini knew I'd be tired and she didn't want to spring any surprises on me. The next night, however, the surprise was well and truly sprung. When I demanded to know why in hell she'd been letting Pax sleep with her in the first place, she said most Erisan children sleep with their parents. I had a whole list of reasons why Pax sleeping with us was definitely not a good thing. Sini thought I was being totally unreasonable..
"We're not his parents," I said.
"That is not the point," said my partner, "and you know it."
"Sini, we don't let Skyla sleep with us, and she's our own child. If Skyla doesn't sleep with us, why should Pax?"
"Skyla is half human," she said, as if that was a sufficient answer.
Her tone sounded so accusatory that I was offended by it on behalf of my daughter and humanity in general. Of course, that had to be one of those times when my emotion was strong enough for Sini to feel, which only complicated things further because I couldn't deny it or hide it from her. She couldn't understand why her pointing out the simple truth of Skyla's origin should make me so angry. Oh, and how dare I be annoyed with her for wanting to do the right thing for our Erisan adoptee? For those of you who might've been under the impression that Sini and I never fight, this is the point at which I dispel that notion. We argued over this issue, and it was not pleasant.
In the end we came to a compromise and let Pax sleep in our room. He curled up on a bunch of pillows on the floor for the first week, until Sapphire got him a bed of his own. It's a little cramped in our bedroom now, but not nearly as uncomfortable as it would be if we were all sharing the same bed.
Neither Pax nor Sini is entirely happy with the arrangement. I guess it shouldn't have come as a shock to me that little Skyla isn't thrilled about it either. She's been really fussy and clingy lately. Sini says she's jealous, but I didn't need the benefit of her empathic ability to know that. I don't think Skyla likes sharing us with Pax.
My favourite girls, just because in the interests of fairness I can't make this all about Pax:
In case you're thinking this post is totally about my kids, I've got a bit more to share about my brother and sister-in-law's kids too. Now, I'm almost positive that Rommie and Michael are having another baby. Michael was digging around in the attic this afternoon, and when I asked him what he'd been looking for up there, he said he was looking for Jack's or Cleo's basket.
"Why would you be looking for a baby basket?" I said, trying to sound nonchalant
"Nostalgia," he said, and then tried to change the subject. "Are you all packed and ready to go to that conference with Sapphire next week?"
"Fine," I said. "Don't tell me, but I think it's becoming fairly obvious."
"Really?" Michael said.
And with that, I'm pretty sure my suspicions have been confirmed.
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