Rowan Family Apartment
Eli's sixteenth birthday
11:47 p.m.
The living room was dark except for the soft blue glow of the aquarium and the string lights Eli had insisted stay up year-round because "they're the right kind of twinkly."
Everyone was still there.
Carol had flown in from a three-day mission over the Indian Ocean and hadn't even showered; salt still crusted her hair.
Jean had dismissed the X-Men with a psychic note that simply read family emergency, do not disturb.
Jen had cancelled three court appearances and bribed a judge with homemade flan.
Gwen and MJ had blown off finals studying.
Peter was asleep on the fire escape with a party hat over his mask because someone had to be the designated adult and it clearly wasn't going to be any of the adults.
They were waiting for Eli to come back from the bathroom so they could do the birthday cake thing.
He had been gone twelve minutes.
Twelve very quiet minutes in which Elena Rowan sat on the couch in a simple black dress, legs crossed, hands folded in her lap, looking like a queen waiting for her consort.
When the bathroom door finally opened, Eli stepped out wearing the softest pajamas any of them had ever seen (Carol had ordered them custom from some Kree fabric that adapted to sensory needs). His curls were damp from washing his face. He had a small velvet box in his hands.
He walked straight to his mother.
Knelt in front of her like this was a proposal scene in a movie.
The harem collectively forgot how to breathe.
Eli opened the box.
Inside was a ring.
Not a kid's toy. A real one. White gold shaped like radio waves frozen mid-oscillation, set with a single stone that shifted color depending on the angle (deep indigo, starlight silver, soft warm gold). It was beautiful and obviously expensive and handmade and perfect.
He took his mother's left hand (the one that already wore the faded drugstore promise ring he'd given her when he was six) and spoke in the clearest voice any of them had ever heard from him.
"I'm sixteen now," he said. "Old enough to mean it forever."
Elena's eyes were already shining, but she let him finish.
"I never grew out of it," he continued, voice steady. "I thought I was supposed to. Everyone said I would. But I didn't. I love you the most. Always. First. Last. In every universe where the Song exists, it starts with your heartbeat."
He slid the new ring onto her finger, right over the old plastic one.
"Will you marry me again, Mamá? For real this time?"
The silence was so complete they could hear the aquarium filter.
Elena cupped his face with both hands and kissed his forehead, then his cheek, then (soft, reverent) the corner of his mouth. Not sexual. Never that. But deeper than any kiss the harem had ever given him.
"Yes, mijo," she whispered against his skin. "A thousand times yes."
Eli made a broken little sound of pure joy and crawled into her lap like he was six foot nothing and she was the only safe place in all of reality. She wrapped her arms around him and held him exactly the way she had since the day he was born.
The harem watched, stunned, as Eli turned his face into his mother's neck and started crying (quiet, happy tears that soaked her dress).
Carol's binary form flickered out entirely. She looked suddenly very small.
Jean's Phoenix curled its wings around them both like a blessing.
Jen's eyes were wet. Gwen was openly sobbing into MJ's shoulder.
Peter, from the fire escape, whispered, "I'm never recovering from this," and meant it.
Elena stroked Eli's back in slow circles and looked over his shoulder at the five women who loved her son with every atom of their ridiculous, over-powered beings.
She smiled (soft, fierce, ancient).
"There is still room," she said quietly. "But the order does not change. Not ever."
Then she reached into her pocket and pulled out five smaller boxes.
Inside each one was an identical ring (same design, smaller stones, sized perfectly).
"I had them made for all of you," she said. "Because he asked me to. Because he loves you too. But you wear them knowing whose heartbeat he falls asleep to every night."
She handed them out like communion.
Carol took hers with shaking fingers.
Jean let the Phoenix carry hers to her hand like it was too sacred to touch.
Jen actually cried (big green tears that steamed when they hit the floor).
Gwen and MJ put theirs on immediately and then held each other while they sobbed.
Elena kissed Eli's curls again.
"Happy birthday, esposo," she whispered.
Eli, muffled against her chest, managed a watery smile and lifted his left hand. On it was the matching men's band (worn on the ring finger, no hesitation).
The harem stared.
Peter took a photo with the caption "I need an adultier adult" and sent it to no one because there was no one left to tell.
Eli finally looked up, eyes red but shining, and beckoned them all closer.
They went.
They always would.
He pulled them into the cuddle pile (his mother in the center, him curled against her, the five of them arranged around them like petals around the heart of a flower).
And somewhere in the soft dark, Elena Rowan held her son (her husband, her always, her first and fiercest love) while five of the most powerful women alive accepted, without reservation, that they would never be first.
And that was okay.
Because Eli's heart was big enough for all of them.
But it beat in 4/4 time to the rhythm of his mother's.
And it always would.
End of Chapter 7