Chương 415: Day Four Hundred And Thirteen

Dear Diary,"Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth." - Henry David Thoreau Yeah, old Hank here is definitely a child of privilege. Not saying he's a bad guy or anything, but you ask anybody who's lived a life where they're not sure about their next meal, the roof over their head, or whether the next round of winter colds is gonna leave them crippled for life whether they'd rather have money or truth?

Most of 'em are gonna ask if the money's counterfeit, but if it's not, or the counterfeit is enough for them to pay rent, fill the pantry, and stock up the medicine cabinet, they're gonna be all, 'lie to me, baby' and shit. Same goes for love; somebody who's affection starved, touch starved, needing that human connection is gonna jump at the chance for anything even vaguely resembling love. How the fuck else do you think the abusive douchebags of the world wind up with hotties all the time?

Not sure about fame, but given how much being famous can get you, y'know, invited to dinner, or having people let you crash on their bed, or make your GoFundMe for hospital bills fill up in a matter of minutes, I'm guessing the same thing applies. Hell, if you're famous enough, you can even get some of that 'I can't believe it's not butter love' to rub all over yourself, and a lot of it's gonna be self-lubricating and auto-rubbing, too.

Plenty of other people agree with me on this one, what with all the celebrities living in bubbles out there. Before anybody says 'oh, but they're idiots', remember who you're talking to here. Y'know, that reminds me of that old phrase about, uh, I think it was love and money. No, wait, air? Yeah, I don't think it was ever more than two things, but I've heard it a couple different ways, with all kinds of stuff like love, money, air, food, water...

I think I might even have heard 'space' once in a discussion about micro-houses.

'What do love and money have in common?'

'They only matter when you don't have enough.' So, y'know, whatever else Mr. Thoreau had or didn't, it's pretty clear he always had enough love, money, and fame. I... holy shit, I just realized that I've pretty much got all that anybody could ever want of all three of those. Funny, though. I've got more love than I know what to do with and I'd still probably take some more if somebody plated it up like Marie delivering trays of spicy eggs.

Fame I've even got maybe too much of, although whatever part of me gets the Happy Brain Chemicals from Worship just told me to shut my whore mouth, so I guess maybe I'll back off on the 'too much' and put it at 'enough fame for now'. Okay, that should probably have been shut my slut mouth, because if I'm gonna get pissed at people for using 'sex worker' as an insult, my inner monologue needs to cut that shit out too. Money...

honestly I still don't have any money except my coin purse, but as Saffron once mentioned, that shit is bottomless. Also, y'know, why would I need money when my food is free, my family has two suites, a modest townhouse in Camden, and we're building our own... well, shit, from the foundations we're building a fucking mansion on a chunk of land we own. So last night... holy shit. Just putting this out there, if there are no entries in this Diary after tonight, it is absolutely the way I wanted to go out.

Shit, last night they didn't even open the blessed toy drawer, or even pull any of the fascina from the headboard. Apparently Saffron decided to 'save that for tonight'. I'm fuckin' doomed, but holy shit what a way to go. Gotta say I'm kinda curious about that saddle, though. Wanted one since I saw that shit on a clip from the Stern show. Really fuckin' spendy for a kid on a fixed income though.

Gotta thank Conrad at some point for that, and now I've definitely squicked myself, both because he's technically my son and because, y'know, Conrad. So Mimic dreamt of the super chibi chefs doing their telekinetic massage while Marie shredded layer after layer off of the Tentacle With No Name. Never seemed to get any smaller, but Her Dark Fatassness seemed to take great delight in slurping it clean of shredded outer layers and Marie both every so often. Like, I dunno, string cheese or some shit like that.

Her Kraken were still too pissed to party, lurking in the water and throwing threatening gang signs at the parts of Calverton where Mimic dare not squat. In the morning during bath time, more than a few of the women had gotten into a routine of spilling their cares and woes all over Confessor Saffron. I envied them.

I tried really hard not to be jealous, because my favoritest High Priestesses in the whole wide world are of the considered opinion that jealousy is stupid and possibly toxic, and I don't want to get toxic all over my favoritest toys. People. Women. Wives. Shit, I'm not sure which of those they might take offense to, which ones they'd figuratively or literally get off on, and which ones they'd go all gooey and melty for.

Maybe it's weird, but that's really way more important to me at this point than the whole Undead Remote Control Blocker. Undead are a temporary problem, even if they're something that might recur now and then. Wife gooey making is a lifelong project that I'm one hundred and ten percent down for. At any rate, while some of the women had speed run the stages of grief and moved on to gossiping and shit, Saffron didn't give them a lot of time.

Enough to be polite, but I think she had even less patience for that than I did. Sure, spill the relevant tea, but miss me with the value judging and irrelevant bullshit. Most of the women hadn't hit that point though. I think my tiny tyrant had some kind of Ward to muffle sound around the tub, because some of the women even lost their shit entirely, splashing around and hollering, but it all came out muted, like they were keeping their voices down.

Then again, they'd just come out of hidden shelters where if they made too much noise, somebody might sell their location to the Spartans. Still, it definitely put a warm gooey center in my belly to watch her gently, quietly ministering to the women staying with us.

Part of me wants to say, 'in a secular sense', but I'm trying to accept that yes, I am a Deity, which means yes, Saffron is a Priestess, which means yes, part of her job is Clergy shit, which for the longest time back in the world of Eastside meant all the shit you'd expect therapists and psychiatric health professionals to do. The closest we had to that was Doc Glass, and from what I could tell he was the bleeding edge of his profession.

I think one of the weirder things for me were the women who came over to me and, as I draped the towel around them to dry them off, leaned into me. Like, not even in a sex way. Okay, Devorah was definitely in a sexy way, but not, like, pushing boundaries or anything. Just the kind of casually flirtatious shit you'd do if you wanted to keep somebody aware that you are, in fact, an option should they choose to take it. Okay, I'd do. Used to do.

Don't do any more except holy shit I totally do that shit without thinking about it, and I do it even when I am thinking about it when Sister Siobhan's involved. I joke around a lot about being a slut, because it just feels good to scream that shit at some shithead who tries to use 'sex worker' as an insult, but I have no idea what to do with the information that I am, in fact, kinda slutty when it comes down to it. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

At any rate, other than Devorah, who whispered, "after," as she sashayed away toward Marie, the rest just seemed like they wanted to be held by somebody. No idea why they'd pick me, what with my body having, like, two soft spots, while Saffron is just made of curves and Marie is legit warm and fuzzy all over. But hell with it, if Saffron can help out with her brain, I'll do my part with my biceps, right?

At the end of bath time Anna and Devorah both stayed behind, and if Maze looked a little put out that the adults had adult business to do, Menace scored points with everyone by asking Maze for a piggy back ride down to breakfast. Devorah pretty much spent the entire conversation shooting smoky eyed glances at me and my wives, but Anna managed to keep the conversation short and simple despite thirst monster nine thousand lurking in the background.

"Champion, we've hit something of a dilemma." I shrugged.

"No Maenads wanting to nanny for the Lancasters?" She shook her head.

"More than one, actually." When I tilted my head a little, she explained.

"Devorah has been helping, and we both found a Maenad willing to care for the Lancasters' little one yesterday."

"Okay, so what's the problem?"

"Who do we choose?" I realized right then that no matter how smart or capable somebody is, and to survive out in the middle of fuckin' nowhere for who knows how the fuck long, survive getting your arm lopped off, and jump right back into trying to help other people the moment that shit got made right, Anna definitely had to be smart and capable, people can be dumbasses. Okay, harsh word, but sometimes people just get their head stuck in one line of thought and can't pull it out.

"Who says you have to choose?" Anna nodded.

"So we leave it to the Lancasters to choose?" I shrugged, "yeah, maybe, that could work, or..."

"Or?"

"Or you keep asking around, seeing who's interested, and then gather all the Maenads who want the job and bring them all to Bonnie and Larry." She looked a little weirded out, and I explained, "we're trying to get them all inside somewhere before winter, right?"

"Yes?"

"Okay, so maybe Bonnie and Larry won't get my nefarious plan by osmosis, so I'll talk to them about it, but every Maenad they take in to nursemaid and nanny for their little one is one more Maenad in out of the cold. Also it's not like the ladies here at Lancaster House couldn't use some role models for being something other than a sex doll." About point five seconds after I said that, I realized I'd kinda maybe sorta put my foot in my mouth, but then everybody else in the room, Marie included, started laughing.

The Maenad herself walked over and first lifted me by my waist, then tossed me up to get an arm under me and another behind my back before she kissed me. Don't get me wrong, I am never not in the mood for Marie kisses, but it took me a second to realize why. Okay, a second of confusion painting my face followed by Saffron murmuring, only you would think of Maenads and not think of sex dolls first, love, into my brain. Heck with it.

I've learned to associate the taste of the sea with warm fuzzy wifey, and I'm okay with that. After breakfast I split off, one of me glomping Marie while she kept watch atop the mast, one of me playing seat cushion for Saffron, one of me playing ref for the boisterous kids, one of me reading with Maze, and one final one heading to class with both of my darlings in tow. Today in class Doc Z fielded a question about Assess Health which rapidly turned into a...

not a 'heated debate', but something that could have easily turned into one, as Saffron defended her choices regarding her improved Assess Health. Turns out folks who came at healing from a more secular bent had been studying the old Assess Health's detailed feedback for, well, centuries, and they had all kinds of tricks and mnemonics for knowing what information to check in what situation, not to mention how to find that information and what it meant.

"So, uh, guys?" They both turned to look at me, which gave me the biggest 'oh shit' reaction I'd had in a while.

"Yes, love?"

"It sounds like a lot of what Doc Z is talking about is super useful, but it's also, like, super, uh, not systemic... Like, it's logical. You could make a flow chart for it?" They both blinked at me.

"A what, dear?" I sighed, stood up, and walked to the front of the room, as I did, I said, "you know how your new Assess pops like, the stuff that's not 'normal' right up there on the front?" When she nodded, I said, "how do you decide what's not 'normal' for that person?"

"It's a relatively simple divination." Shit.

"Okay. Uh. Doc? You've got a whole list of things to look for, and an order you look in, right?"

"Yes, which is why we need that information available quickly." I nodded and grabbed up a piece of chalk.

"Okay, yeah, but you do it the same way every time, right?" He tilted his head back and forth.

"Well, sort of. There's the visual examination of the patient before the Assess is done."

"Okay, is that the first thing you do? Or do you talk to them?" Doc Z nodded.

"Talking comes after examination. Sometimes patients fixate on one symptom, and that's important, but often that symptom isn't a clear indicator of the problem."

"Okay, cool." I drew a box as high as I could reach, then wrote... Okay, I drew an eyeball, then beneath it a smiley face and a sad face, each with an arrow.

"So you look at them, and I'm guessing if you see something obvious wrong, you do one thing, and if you don't, you do something else?"

"Well, yes, that's..."

"Brilliant," Saffron breathed. A few seconds later one of her coding windows popped up, glowing faintly so I could see it. It had a box with 'visual exam, obvious problem? Y/N' written inside. Trust my little genius to get the idea from one fuckin' box. Of course, at that point she started grilling Doc Z for every fuckin' step in his process. Meanwhile Doc Glass and Sister Siobhan split the rest of the class and started demonstrating how to interpret some of the more advanced Assess Health data.

My one smart idea gone, I volunteered to be the target for all the Assessing. Like ninety seconds later, Doc Glass interrupted himself with a double take, then asked, "Champion Diaz, are you currently under the care of an acupuncturist?" I opened my mouth to answer, but Marie cut in with a simple, authoritative, "Yes." I looked at her, kinda freaked out by her saying that, and asked, "you know how do to acupuncture?"

Of course right then the her keeping watch on the mast of the Black Dragon lifted pleasant pincushion me who'd been glomped to her by the waist while punching a few more holes in me, kissed me lightly with a bit of a lick on the nose.

"Duh." Well. Fuck. That would explain the whole 'endorphin rush from being perforated' now, wouldn't it?