031. Ark

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Ark opened his eyes a little bit and he still felt sleepy, but he wanted to drink something. Sometimes he woke up like this, still very sleepy but feels really thirsty. When he did feel like this, he'd carelessly climb out of his bed and would start walking out of the room and downstairs into the kitchen, like he was doing right now.

For some reason, he wanted to drink milk. He actually wanted milk.

His mom would say drinking water was the best thing to do first thing in the morning. But water was so tasteless when waking up and he'd much rather drink a glass of milk. Besides, mom would put a little bit of honey into his milk. She thought he didn't see but he did and that was why he'd much rather drink that instead of water!

As the little echidna was making his way to the kitchen where his mom was at, he noticed he hadn't seen Crystal yet. Though, Ark didn't want think much of it since his older sister was probably having a sleepover at her friend's house. He thought he remembered her talking about it to mom and dad yesterday before they went to school.

Oh well. That meant he could play with some of Crystal's toys!

Rubbing the sleep off of his eyes, Ark yawned as he stepped into the kitchen. "Mom..."

His mother turned around away from her work and smiled at him. "Morning, baby."

He loved seeing his mom's smiles. She was always pretty, like an angel! He was so lucky when to have a beautiful mom!

But... oops, Ark shyly thought. He always forgot to greet her in the mornings. He didn't mean to though, honest! Every night when she'd kissed him goodnight, he would tell himself to greet her first thing in the morning but he kept forgetting to.

"Morning, mom," he softly greeted her back and smiled at her.

"Did you pee?" she asked him.

Ark's eyes widened. Uh oh. He forgot to do that too. Why did she always have to remind him to pee before he woke up? And when he'd go to bed? He was big enough to pee on his own!

He shook his head and hummed, "Mm-hm..."

"Did you brush your teeth and wash your face?"

"Mm-hm..." Ark hummed again.

She sighed. "Are you at least wearing socks on your feet, Ark?"

He blinked and looked down at his feet, finding that one of his feet did have a sock on them.

Oh! One foot only had one sock.

Ark looked up and wondered if she could see his other foot that didn't have a sock on it. Then he realised that there was no point lying to her. He was really bad at lying and he never liked lying to his parents, especially to his mom.

"I only have on one sock, mom," he confessed with a bubbly giggle, "Can I have some milk now, please?"

"Tell you what," his mom knelt down in front of him with another smile as she fixed his bed hair, "Brush your teeth and wash your face. Make sure to find your other sock and wear it. Pee and wash your hands, wake your father up and then come down for your milk and breakfast, okay?"

He frowned a little. Did he really have to do all that? He really wanted to drink his milk now. It was Saturday so that meant no school, so it wasn't like he was in a rush or anything. However, there was one thing that his mom told him to do and that was to go and wake up dad! Usually his dad woke up really early, so early before he, Crystal and mom would wake up because he had work. But it was the weekend and dad didn't work on the weekends, which made it the best part of the week!

"Okay, mom!" Ark happily answered, the thought of playing with his dad today exciting him.

Not wanting to waste anymore time, he rushed back upstairs into his room to find his sock. Once he found it underneath his bedsheets, the little echidna slipped it on and then made his bed. Once he was done, he made a mental checklist and went into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face. He knew his mom gave him an specific order to do everything in but she wasn't here to see him, right? It didn't really matter because he was doing everything anyway. After splashing some water against his face and drying it with a towel, he climbed up on the step in front of the sink again and stuck out his tongue as he squeezed some toothpaste onto his brush. Of all the things he had to do in the morning, brush his teeth was his favourite. He liked creating the foam on his mouth and would make funny faces against the mirror, it was so much fun!

He rinsed and wiped his mouth, then jumped off the step. He was almost out the bathroom when he realised he still needed to pee. And wash his hands.

This was why his mom would always remind him to pee. Sometimes he just got too excited and would forget to until it became a bit too much for him. He quickly peed, flushed the toilet and washed his hands with soap before scurrying off to his parents' room to wake his dad.

His mom didn't completely close their bedroom door, so Ark pushed it easily but very gently. Once he stepped inside the room, from the door, he could see that his dad was still asleep.

"Dad?" Ark called and went over to his father's side, "Wake up!"

It seemed like his dad could hear him since he shifted a little bit, but it was obvious he didn't feel like waking up yet. But his mom told him that he should wake his dad up so dad needed to wake up. Climbing on top of him, Ark decided to shake him awake. "Daaad, wake up!" he tried again.

The shaking worked because his dad grudgingly opened his eyes. He squinted at the light but made a move to sit up, causing Ark to slide down his legs as he did so.

"Morning!" Ark said cheerfully when seeing that his dad was full awake now, "Mom said I should wake you up!"

"She did?" his dad said tiredly and placed his feet onto the ground.

"Yup!" Ark climbed up onto his parents' bed and started to jump on it. Their bed was so bouncy and he loved it! He didn't have many springs on his own bed, just a few, because mom said little kids sleep much better on a harder surface. Which was true, he loved his bed because it was so comfy! But... because it wasn't bouncy, he'd usually go and jump on his parents' bed when he could.

"Ark, you shouldn't be bouncing on the bed. You could hurt yourself."

At the sound of his mom's voice, Ark lost his concentration of jumping and fell on his bottom against the bed. Once he looked up at her, he threw her a sheepish smile because uh-oh, he didn't like it when his mom was upset with him.

But his mom only laughed and came forward to kiss his forehead. "Shadow, you should've kept watch on Ark in case he fell."

"I don't think he would've, Tikal," his dad answered as he looked at him with a small smile, "You're careful aren't you, Ark?"

He beamed at his dad. "Yeah!"

His mom shook his head but smiled at the both of them anyway. "Come on, sweetheart. Your toast and milk are ready!" she picked him up and rested him on her hip as his dad made his way into the bathroom.

He munched his toast with content with his honey flavoured milk. Mom was cleaning up and dad was sitting next to him reading his news paper with a cup of coffee. Ark didn't know why his dad even liked drinking coffee. He tried it one time and it tasted yucky!

"Amy invited us to a picnic party this afternoon," his mom said as she sat down on the table.

Auntie Amy would always throw a picnic once in a while, so hearing that made Ark really excited! That meant he could play with Dash and Mister Sonic and see Uncle Knuckles! He always loved seeing Uncle Knuckles, he was so much fun to talk to and he liked keeping him occupied when guarding the Master Emerald. One day, Ark wanted to be the next guardian and make Uncle Knuckles and his mom proud!

His dad looked up from his newspaper to look at his mom. "Yeah, I got her message as well. Is Crystal already there?"

"Mm, she's helping Amy and Hope set up some of the food," his mom answered, "I was wondering if we could bring anything?"

Ark swallowed his last piece of toast and said, "You should use the left over dough we made yesterday and bake cookies, mom! Crystal didn't get to have any so we can bring those!"

His mom hummed. "All right, we can bake some cookies. But I don't want you to eat too much of them, Ark."

"I know, mom," he said with a nod, "I don't wanna get another tummy ache anyways!"

He hated when he got tummy aches. He didn't like having to keep going to the toilet and lie in bed for most of the day. It was sooo boring!

Speaking of the cookies, he knew Mister Tails would love them. Whenever mom and dad were both out, sometimes Mister Tails would look after him and Crystal and they'd get to see his cool workshop! And then they'd help him make some cookies since they were his favourite. He'd even take them to the bakery! But obviously Mister Tails had to make sure they didn't eat too much otherwise mom would be upset again and so would his stomach.

Ark finished his glass of milk. "Thank you for breakfast, mom!"

"You're welcome," his mom smiled, taking his empty dishes into the sink. Ark climbed up onto the step and helped her wash them. After that, he went back over to his dad and gently tugged on his arm. "Dad, can you help me with my homework before we go to the picnic party?"

He had math homework. He liked math but there were still a lot of questions he didn't understand! His dad was great at it though and he wanted to learn more from him so he can be a good student! Plus, math was always much more fun when he did it with his dad.

And oh! He forgot to say something!

"Please," Ark quickly corrected himself.

His dad smiled at him and nodded. "Of course."

Yay! He beamed, watching as his dad got up from his chair.

"I'll let you two know when we're leaving," his mom said.

"Okay mom!" Ark said cheerfully. He grabbed his book bag and took his dad's hand as they went outside to the porch.

He was totally going to love this day!