4/29/11 P.U.L.L. Post

Disclaimer: I do not own Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup. I do not own a Pillow Pet named Bartholomew, though one of my friends does. She's lucky. :P I own nothing. It's depressing, really.

This is a silly thing... and yes, it is a one-shot, so do not put it on your story alerts or I will be annoyed... if you're going to take the time to favorite, you might as well review... review... don't forget to review...

And please, enjoy. :)

It started with an exploding can of Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup and a grungy old Pillow Pet named Bartholomew, some cold sniffles and a good dose of well-intentioned stupidity, but mostly it was Angel, our resident telepath, and the nosy little Voice that resided in her curly-haired head.

And, alright, it was kind of my fault to begin with. But I was only trying to be helpful.

Iggy was sick. I don't mean the kind of sick where you have a sore throat or a headache, I'm talking full-on sniffling, sneezing-so-hard-I'm-surprised-your-sexist-pig-brains-haven't-flown-out-by-now sick. The kind of sick where you can tell it's going to turn the entire flock into a drippy, miserable mess if it's not stopped right away.

So, like a good flock leader, I went to make him a can of soup. I still don't really know what happened. One minute I had it in the microwave on high, everything going great, and then next thing I know, there's this giant boom like one of Gazzy's homemade bombs went off right in front of me.

Iggy probably thought it was one, too, because he was in the kitchen faster than I could blink, in all his stuffy-throated, phlegmy glory.

"Were you trying to cook?" he asked in this weird, horrified tone. Seriously, you'd think I committed a crime against humanity or something.

"I was warming you up some soup," I said defensively. "Come on, Ig, I can at least handle that."

"Huh," said Iggy, and took in a big whiff of smoke-scented air. "If you say so." Then he wandered out of the kitchen and into the living room, but not before tossing over his shoulder with a smug smirk, "Just please get one of the kids to watch you next time you decide to blow the microwave."

Great, I thought, staring venomously at the spattered-brain-shapes on the inside of the microwave door. I am getting so much crap for this.

And I did. For the next week, Iggy shut up even less than usual. It was like having the Nudge Channel on 24-7, but Iggy-style: sarcastic, teasing and more than a little annoying. So I decided to shut him up the only way I knew how.

I shoved Angel's Pillow Pet in his mouth.

Okay, so it wasn't that sanitary, but since when I have I cared about that stuff? Besides, Angel hadn't touched the thing in months; it was squeezed into a corner on the couch, all neglected and squished-looking, and it was the first thing I touched when I reached out to grab something to use in the place of duct tape.

Iggy flailed and succeed in spitting it out, along with some very impolite words, but I got right back in and jumped him. Yeah, it was a Pillow Pet named Bartholomew and it was shaped like a faded, fat bumblebee, but it was going into his mouth darn it because he just wouldn't shut up.

So, that's what happened. Nothing too out of the ordinary, you know—and then Angel, perched pretty on the other side of the couch, tore her attention away from the TV, observed the situation, and announced primly:

"Max, you shouldn't strangle your future husband with a Pillow Pet. Especially since he's gonna need his mouth for kissing you later."

Whoa. What?

Everyone stopped what they were doing. Nudge froze in the process of painting her nails, not even noticing that she was spilling on the carpet. Fang looked over from the TV with a slightly less deadpan stare than usual—his version of shock. Gazzy covered his mouth and broke into a fit of giggles, and Angel just turned back to her cartoons, completely oblivious.

As for me and Iggy, we were stuck in this awkward position on the couch, me almost on his lap, my hands still clutching the Pillow Pet he was trying to fend off. It took a second for the exact meaning of Angel's words to sink in. I looked at him. He looked at me.

We sprung apart like we'd just discovered the other was a snarling, drooling Eraser.

"Whoa whoa whoa—" stammered Iggy. His face looked like he'd been in the sun too long, flushed and startled. "What are you talking about, Ange?"

"Hmm?" Angel blinked and glanced over at our stunned faces. "Oh, that. What about it?"

"You said…" I swallowed and tried to speak again, but it was like someone had filled my throat with superglue. The words kept getting stuck and by the time I pried them loose, I managed to end up looking like a gaping idiot for a good five seconds. "You called Iggy my husband. My future husband."

"Yeah." The little telepath rolled her eyes and huffed when I kept staring. Obviously, what she said made perfect sense and I was so slow for not accepting every crazy thing that popped out of her mouth.

"Really, Max? It's not that hard. It means you're going to fall in love and get married."

"I know what you meant!" I squawked. "But—how could you even know something like that? Not that it's gonna happen."
Iggy looked affronted. "Hey. I'm not that bad."

"Ig, I'm not talking this over with you."

"But he's going to marry you," Angel pointed out. "Communication is good for the relationship."

Apparently, this was too much for the rest of the flock. Fang let out an amused huff, Gazzy snorted outright, and Nudge nearly keeled over with giggling glee. Before she remembered that yeah, nail polish stained the carpet.

"Don't worry," said Angel, "you don't have to worry about getting married right away. It'll be years. You guys are really slow."

Then, bored with freaking us out, she hopped to her feet and made to pad up the stairs to her room. She paused a second and added, with a sunny smile, "Oh, and I better be the flower girl. 'Cuz if not…"

A quick, light little chuckle, and she flounced up the stairs in her dainty pink dress.

I swear, sometimes that girl is the scariest thing in the world.

Things should have gone back to normal after that. Of course, they didn't. Because, all of a sudden, Iggy finds this entire thing hilarious, and if I thought being teased about the exploding soup was bad, jeez. Was I wrong.

"I'm thinking about making Fang and Gaz my best man," Iggy said one day, sidling up to me while I was out on the porch, dutifully watching Fang and the kids as they practiced escape tactics in the sky.

"Ig, you can't have two best men," I replied. He grinned cockily, and I added quickly, "I mean—we're not talking about that!"

He whined. I swear. He freaking whined at me.

"Why not?"

"Wha? Because it's crazy!"

"Really?"

"Yeah, really."

"You sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. Why do you keep asking me that?"

Iggy leaned back on his heels. I've tried to smudge the look he gave me from my memory, but it's not as simple as that. I've tried to forget how serious his eyes and mouth became, but it's hard to, especially when it sent chills shooting through me from my fingertips to my nose. And they weren't exactly unpleasant.

"I heard once that if you make a person say no enough times," he said, and his voice was low, almost a guarded whisper, "it turns into a yes."

So that was how I was kind-of proposed to for the first time in my life. Of course, I responded by smacking him over his strawberry-red haired head and stomping off because darn in, he was laughing so hard at me that he was practically rolling on the ground, and that hadn't been funny. We were fourteen! I'd never even liked a guy yet.

Granted, half the guys I'd known were psychopathic sadists with needles and scalpels, but still.

It only got worse from there on out. Pretty soon, the entire flock was in on the joke. When Iggy and I argued, it was "like an old married couple, already." Nudge wanted to know where we were going to have our honeymoon. Gazzy wondered if he'd have to wear a tux to the wedding. Even Fang, whom I thought I could trust through all of this, started to refer to Iggy as "Max's hubby" whenever I was around.

Traitors.

And then, of course, I had to go and do something stupid and make it worse.

It wasn't my fault. It was that scruffy Pillow Pet again. I found it shoved under the couch one night while I was cleaning—just goes to show you how depressed I really was—around the living room. It was even dirtier than I remembered, coated with dust and grime, and I was already on my way to the trash can when Iggy came down the stairs and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Cleaning." I stopped, watching the way his lips turned up at the corners in amusement. And no, I was not staring. "Quit smirking like that. Someone has to clean up around here."

Iggy laughed. He made to move past me, and one of his long hands brushed against the stupid stuffed animal I clutched.

"What's that?"

"Oh." I shrugged and turned the grungy thing over in my hands. "Just that stupid Pillow Pet I tried to strangle you with the other week."

"You're throwing it out?" Iggy guessed. "Why?"

I blinked. "Igs, if you could see this thing, you'd want to throw it out too."

That grin was back, bright and teasing. "But it has sentimental value."

"I tried to smother you with it."

"It made Angel say you'd marry me."

I stopped. So. This was the game we were playing, huh? Well, fine.

"I'm not going to marry you."

"Are you really arguing with the telepath?"

"Are you really arguing with Maximum Ride?"

"It's what married couples do, isn't it?"

"Alright, that's it!" I dropped the stuffed animal on the ground and grabbed the front of Iggy's shirt, dragging him close. Given the situation, I probably should have recognized the danger in that position, but I was a little too preoccupied to care.

"You… are the most stubborn, pig-headed, arrogant guy I have ever known in my life," I growled.

And get this: Iggy just grinned and said, "I know. But if you'll have me, I'm your stubborn, pig-headed guy, right?"

I almost said no. Almost. Before I got a good look at his eyes, and saw that he wasn't really joking at all. Whatever I said next would actually mean something to him.

I couldn't say no. I just couldn't. I'm a lot of things, but a liar isn't one of them.

"Maybe," I muttered, and tried to ignore the way his face lit up, as if I'd told him we had found a way to get back his eyesight. As if I'd told him he would see all the color in the world again, here, now.

"Thanks, Max," he said, and leaned forward to kiss me on the cheek.

"Ig!" I yelled. He laughed and hurried back up the stairs again, retreating from me and my burning face, my reddened cheek, still tingling from the touch of his lips. Halfway up, he stopped and turned, his smile wide.

"Hey, Max!"

"What?"

"Would you marry me?"

All Iggy's heart and soul were in that question. So, of course, I picked up the Pillow Pet and threw it at his head. He bolted up the stairs, laughing all the way, because even though he couldn't see, I'm pretty sure he knew there was a smile on my face.

Iggy's just kind of funny that way.

xxx

The last straw was when, a little more than a decade later, I overheard Fang asking Iggy if we were going to name the baby after him.

Darn you, Bartholomew.

xxx

/End. Max doesn't mean that last bit. She loves her hubby, she really does. :P

The author will love you, too, if you leave a comment.

-Kimsa