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Nimona grabbed a fistful of popcorn and shoved it in their mouth, chewing loudly and smiling amusedly as Ballister tackled his husband to the ground.
The blond squirmed in his grip as her boss tried to keep him down. The man sat on his back, and Goldie tried to shake him off, kicking his legs.
“Let me go!”
“Where?” Boss demanded.
“Somewhere!” replied Goldie, trying to crawl away from under him. “Ballister, get off! You're heavy!”
Nimona gasped, “Boss! You'll let him talk to you that way? He called you fat!”
“I didn't-”
“You did, and that's why you hid them, didn't you?!”
“Wh- no!”
“Liar!”
Nimona snickered to herself as she kept eating her snack, watching as now Goldie managed to get out from under Boss, and tried to make a run for it, grabbing onto the couch. But the other was quick on jumping on him again, wrapping his robotic arm around his neck and giving him a chokehold, making Goldie lean back uncomfortably given Boss' round belly between them.
“Where are they, Ambrosius?”
The other let out a strangled sound, “I'm not- not telling you!” he tried to take the robotic arm away from his neck to no avail.
Nimona knew that it could easily choke him to death if Ballister wished. Of course it wouldn't, because the man was a simp that loved his dear husband, and would be sad if he died. Oh, also he was pregnant, surely Boss wouldn't like it for Baby to be one father short.
So corny, she thought, shaking her head and shoving more popcorn into her mouth.
“Tell me!”
“No-”
“Where, Ambrosius? Where are the Ambrositos?!”
“I’m not telling you! You asked me to hide them,” tried to reason Goldie.
“Oh, so you love the Ballister from two hours ago more than me, is that it?” Nimona raised her eyebrows at his seemingly genuine angry frown. “I can't believe you!”
“Yeah, I love him better because he's not choking me!” said the other and Nimona muttered to themself a curse.
Ballister stopped his choking and relaxed his grip in surprise, Goldie wasted no time in getting out of his reach, standing up and stumbling back.
“...what?” Boss asked, from the floor, looking like a round-bellied puppy that got kicked under the rain.
Ambrosius pointed an accusatory finger at him, “You heard me. He wanted me to hide them, and I'm going to be faithful to him,” he said, placing a hand over his heart.
“But… why?” asked the other, sounding nearly heartbroken.
Nimona looked from one to the other now.
“Because,” Goldie slowly sat back down on the floor, wearily eyeing his husband. “The other day you ate all of them in one go and got sick.”
“...I wasn't going to eat them all in one go this time,” muttered Ballister, drawing circles in the rug with his index finger.
“I don't believe you.”
“I don't believe you either,” Nimona chimed in, with their mouth full. “It has happened lots of times, boss.”
“Three times it's not lots of times, please…”
“It's enough times,” reasoned Goldie. “Also, I don't know why'd you buy them if you'd ask for me to hide them!”
“Because I craved them at the moment,” reasoned Boss. “But then I realized I don't want to get sick.”
Goldie tutted and shook his head, sitting with his back to the couch, arms crossed. Ballister imitated his posture, but rested his crossed arms over his belly.
“I don't even like gummies,” he muttered. “This is all Baby's fault.”
“It could be worse, you could be craving… rocks or something.”
“Or hair,” said Nimona.
“Or buttons.”
“Or-”
“You two watched that show about strange obsessions again?”
“...yeah,” both said.
Boss sighed, and took his hand to prod at Goldie's cheek, a bit too roughly, forcing his head away with each jab.
“Thank you for listening to me, and for not listening too. I really hate getting sick.”
Goldie smiled, holding the hand that was prodding at his face, wrapping his fingers around Boss’ and letting their joined hands rest on the floor between them, “You're welcome… and, I'm sorry?”
Boss smiled, and Nimona huffed. They always made-up way too quickly.
After a few seconds of silence, where only Nimona's chewing sounded in the place, Boss talked again.
“Is it the top counter in the kitchen?”
Ballister was tall but not tall enough to reach there without getting up on something.
“No, it's not.”
“The… closet?”
Why would it be the closet? The man himself usually hid his snacks there, Nimona knew because they went to steal some from time to time.
“Nope.”
“Hmm…” Boss thought hard about it, wondering where it could be. It was that same wondering that had led to him going physical on Goldie to pull the answers from him.
“Boss,” they called, mouth full. “What if it's somewhere lower? Because you can't lean down to pick stuff anymore.”
“But- Nimona,” admonished Goldie, between teeth.
Boss gave the other an unbelievable look, “That's where you hid them?”
Goldie shrugged, apologetically, “You don't lean down that much anymore…”
Boss let go of his hand and pushed the other’s shoulder harshly, making him fall on his side.
“Oh, c'mon, I didn't push you that hard.”
Goldie pushed himself up with his hand on the floor and sat correctly again, snickering. “You didn't.”
Boss smiled now, pleasantly, “So…?”
“No.”
Boss' smile turned into a frown immediately.
“Whatever. Who needs you, anyway?” he said pettily, now preparing to stand up, grabbing against the couch and Goldie's shoulder.
“Exactly, boss, you tell him,” Nimona cheered, raising a fist.
Both Nimona and Ambrosius stared as Ballister tried to get up, watching him struggle. Nimona chewed on popcorn, Goldie just looked with pressed lips, patiently.
Ballister threw them both a look, and frowned, “Stop looking at me.”
Both averted their gazes.
“Do you need help?”
“Not from you.”
“From me?” asked Nimona. “I'm eating popcorn, help yourself.”
“You're a terrible sidekick,” muttered Boss. Nimona gasped offendedly at that and threw him one single popcorn, which landed on the floor far away from him.
Goldie threw a look at Nimona's bowl. He extended his hand, “Can I have some?” he asked with a big smile, showing his teeth.
“Yeah, sure,” she offered the bowl, but then remembered that she didn't like him. “I mean- no, go make your own,” she claimed, pulling the bowl from his reach.
Goldie’s smile dropped. “Fine.” He looked back at his husband. “Balli, you still haven't gotten up?”
“I'm trying!”
“Let me help you.”
“No. I'll do it myself.”
“C'mon, or we'll be here all afternoon.”
“Fine-” Boss snapped. Then, in a softer, quick voice, “But only if you tell me where they are.”
“I'm not–” Goldie ended up laughing. “I should be the one conditioning you!”
Goldie stood up easily, making Boss' hand slip from his shoulder.
He made a show of stretching, groaning dramatically.
“I love standing up,” he said, placing his hands then on his hips and doubling over to be closer to Boss’ eye level. “Don't you too, love?”
Nimona snorted in amusement at Ballister's furious expression.
Then she pulled a wince at his suddenly wet eyes, and the subsequent covering of his face with his own hands, and Goldie's fretting, as he quickly straightened his posture.
“No, Balli, I’m–”
He interrupted himself when Ballister uncovered his now teary face and tried to pull himself up again from the floor, sniffling. Nimona left their bowl by the side and prepared to stand up and help him. They doubted the man would want Goldie's help any more than he did before.
And sure enough, “Let me help you u–”
“Don't,” Ballister snapped at him, and Ambrosius stepped back and held his hands to himself, being it him who looked this time like a kicked, scolded puppy.
“Boss, I can–”
“I don't need your help either,” he said harshly this time to Nimona, who shrank in place for a second at the tone, before insisting.
“C'mon, boss,” she said, trying to step forward and support him, placing her hand on one of his arms, but he shook her off, tense with anger.
“Ugh, Nimona! Just–!” he stopped trying to stand and just covered his face again, breathing harshly. “Leave me alone, both of you!”
He kept crying, out of frustration, she realized. Nimona had grown used to the different tones during the last months. Sometimes it was sadness, other times it was anger, sometimes he'd even feel so happy that he started crying too. Now he seemed to feel impotent at not being able to stand up as easily as Goldie did, or as easily as he would've been able to, months back.
Her and Goldie exchanged a brief look before heading to the kitchen, both leaving Ballister alone in the living room, on the floor.
“And you stay quiet too!” they heard him exclaim between his sniffling, to Baby most likely.
Once in the kitchen, Nimona and Ambrosius stared at each other awkwardly, before the man sighed and crouched close to the drawers under the counter. Opening one, he pulled from there a family-sized pack of bear gummies.
It wasn't even hidden too hard, Ballister would've been able to easily spot and grab them anyways.
“What are you doing?” Nimona inquired, hands at her hips.
“I'm going to apologize,” he said, as if it was obvious, heading to the kitchen’s entrance. Then his steps flaked and he stood there.
“Coward,” Nimona muttered in an unimpressed tone.
“Yeah,” sighed Goldie. Then he groaned quietly to himself, quickly hitting over his mouth with his fingers a few times. “Idiot! I shouldn't have made fun of him.”
“Honestly, I think he'd get even angrier if you walked on eggshells around him,” she shrugged, distractedly checking her nails.
She had seen on previous times Ballister answering to Ambrosius' teasing either with laughter or an even meaner jib, sometimes even a hard smack. Goldie found him having a bad day today, that was all.
“I know, but… I keep screwing up today. Like this morning.”
Nimona raised an eyebrow.
“You mean when you accidentally killed me after he told you to be careful? In a dream?”
Goldie nodded sadly, and Nimona huffed out a laugh. Both men were so ridiculous.
“And at lunch, I made him throw up.”
“You cooked something that he asked you to, but then he suddenly got grossed out by the smell, how is that your f–” she snapped her mouth shut when she realized that she was trying to comfort Goldie, of all people. Goldie!
Goldie ignored her words. “And now he's crying, because I hid these!” he raised the big packet of Ambrositos. “I should've just handed them to him.”
“...he asked you to hide them,” Nimona said, with finality. The last bit of comfort the blond would get from them.
Goldie stared sadly at the gummies. Then he frowned angrily.
“Damned Ambrositos,” he muttered. “They’re not even that good.”
Nimona shrugged, non-committal, they weren’t bad, but she had tried better gummies.
“I mean, they're decent. But I bet he just likes them because they got your name on them.”
Ambrosius shook the Ambrositos, now with a small smile.
“I mean,” he shrugged, as if charmed by the thought. “If they made gummies named… something Ballister-related, I'd like them too, even if they weren't good.” He then stared pensively at the kitchen. “Like Ballis… titos.”
Nimona smiled, seeing that he was no longer sulking, “Ballisteritos.”
“Ballositos.”
“B… ositos… Oh, Bossitos! Since they're bears!” Nimona claimed with a big grin that Goldie returned with enlightened enthusiasm.
“Yeah!”
“Are you two done?” Ballister's deadpan voice made them both jump in surprise. He was standing by the kitchen entrance, both hands resting at his lower back.
“Ah, Balli,” Goldie straightened, now facing his husband.
He paused awkwardly and then held the gummies packet in front of himself, as if presenting them, one palm behind the packet and all, like an influencer presenting make-up.
“Bossit– I mean, Ambrosiu– I mean,” he stopped talking, pressing his lips together as he closed his eyes in exasperation at himself. Nimona noticed that Boss was staring amusedly at Goldie, who opened his eyes again and finally relaxed his posture, defeatedly, lowering the packet too. “I'm sorry, Balli.”
Boss’ smile turned softer, his eyes were puffy and red-rimmed, still with a small shine to them from tears. But he didn't seem angry at all anymore.
“It's okay, I'm sorry too.”
“Don't apologize, I shouldn't have teased you…”
“Oh, not about getting angry. About choking you,” Boss corrected. “That may have been a bit too much.”
“Oh- I mean, no, I don't mind when you–”
“Ew! Keep that information to yourself!” Nimona interrupted loudly, pulling out their tongue in disgust.
Boss turned this time to them, with an apologetic look.
“But I am sorry about getting mad at you, Nimona,” he said gently. Then he held out a fist to push her shoulder lightly. “Please forgive me.”
Nimona just waved her hand briefly, with a smile.
“Don’t sweat it,” she replied easily, and Boss returned the smile.
“By the way, it'll happen again,” Boss added quickly and Nimona shrugged and nodded reasonably. She knew.
“I love– I mean, how great are happy endings!” Goldie corrected himself mid-sentence. “So, let's put these back where they belong…” he started, walking back to the kitchen counter with the Ambrositos.
“You stop right there,” Boss pointed a finger in his direction, then he extended his hand. “And hand me those.”
“But, Balli…”
“But nothing.”
At the end, with some strategically pulled puppy eyes from Boss, joined by some of Nimona's (turned into a puppy too, she committed to the bit), the blond poured a good bit of Ambrositos in a small bowl and Boss settled with them on the couch in front of the TV, munching on them happily and leaning against his husband's shoulder as the three of them watched a soap opera.
Nimona had made herself some more popcorn and found it in her merciful heart to share some with Goldie, only because he had been very pathetic back in the kitchen.
Then, when Ballister had covered his own mouth and hurried Ambrosius to help him up, Nimona continued peacefully munching down on her snack, eyes set on the TV while expertly ignoring the background noise of her boss throwing up.