Remi

Remi is here, and I don't think he's just visiting.

My understanding of the original plan was that Remi was supposed to be visiting for a month, but judging by the amount of stuff that arrived with him, I'm pretty sure he's planning to move in permanently.  I'm not sure if Sapphire is aware of this.  She'll probably be okay with Remi moving in, since this place is more or less a sanctuary for wayward travellers, but I think it would've been courteous for Xander to have talked to her about it beforehand.   I wouldn't invite one of my friends to come and live here without at least checking with the owner of the house first.

Anyway, Remi has been here for a little over a week now and, visitor status notwithstanding, things have been going exceptionally well.  For the first few days we didn't see much of Remi or Xander, as they were off doing whatever activities they'd planned.   They've been at home more during the last few days, so the rest of us have had an opportunity to get to know Remi a little better.

Remi is from Jamaica.  I might've mentioned that before.  He comes from a large extended family, and he's the oldest of four siblings.  He has a seventeen year old sister and a fifteen year old brother and the other brother is only a toddler.  In fact, while we were talking about our respective families, we discovered that Skyla and Remi's baby brother Marley share the same birthday.   How cool is that?  On 29th September, they'll both be turning two.

One interesting fact about Remi is that he's Rastafari.  I'm not exactly sure what the Rastafari lifestyle entails, but it seems interesting and I'm very curious to find out.   I also learned that Remi's job in retail was as a sales associate in a men's clothing store and not, as I previously assumed, as a player in some kind of illegitimate activity.  This just goes to show that preconceived ideas about people are often incorrect. 

I have to confess that I'm a little ashamed of myself for prejudging Remi.  Wrongly, I'd presumed that anyone who would want to be with Xander had to be equally annoying and inconsiderate as him, but as it turns out, Remi is actually a very nice guy.   He's quiet and friendly and surprisingly open-minded.   I guess it must be true that opposites attract, because Remi seems to be strong in all the qualities that Xander lacks.   Maybe this relationship will be good for Xander.  Maybe he'll learn something.

Here's Remi, for everyone who's curious.

Xander isn't the only one who might benefit from building a relationship with Remi.  I think having Remi here is going to be a wonderful experience for Pax, too.

Remi didn't even pause a beat when he met Pax and Sini.   Most people react with surprise or confusion when they see our Erisan family members for the first time, and sometimes a stranger will offer up a dumbass comment about their ears or the colour of their skin, but Remi just introduced himself and said he was pleased to meet them.  When Pax asked for permission to touch him, Remi didn't ask why.  He just said yes and asked for the same permission in return.  Pax has learned that when humans give their permission to touch, it means something very different than when an Erisan does it.  Pax knows he's supposed to restrict his touching of new humans to their hands and arms.

It made me smile when I heard Pax ask Remi shyly. "I can touch your hair too?"

Remi's response to that was, "Yeah, go ahead."

After a short pause in which I imagined Pax was probably fingering Remi's hair in a way that most people would find invasive and uncomfortable, I heard, "Remi hair cool!  I like!"

"Thanks," Remi said.  "I like yours.  I like the colours."

"It all natural," Pax informed him proudly.

Remi laughed, "Mine too."

Pax is totally infatuated with Remi's hair.   He wanted to know if he could grow his own hair so that he can have dreadlocks too.  Sini and I agreed that there's no harm in allowing Pax to let his hair grow.  Sini says a lot of Erisan males wear their hair long.  As for the dreads, we figure Pax will change his mind about those before his hair gets long enough, and if he doesn't, he'll be the first Erisan in history to have dreadlocks. 

I'm sure I'll have more to tell you guys about Remi in future posts.  I'm going to end this one here because Sini has just reminded me that I'm supposed to be helping her plan what kind of finger foods we're going to have at our wedding reception.  She says they have to be all vegetarian choices, so I guess those little hotdogs wrapped in pastry won't be on the menu.  I'm a little disappointed about that.  For health reasons, I don't eat a lot of processed food, but I do like those.  I also like ham sandwiches with cream cheese, but I'm pretty sure Sini would disapprove of serving those at the reception.  

Oh...just one more thing before I finish this up.  My cast is coming off on Monday!   That's only - as Pax says - two more sleeps away.  I can hardly wait!