"Groceries?" Isaac asked.
"Yep. I'm gonna go help bring them in."
"Okay."
Babsie walked down the stairs and out of the front door. Some of the older kids were helping the deliverers to bring them in and Duke was getting the dogs out of everyone's way. Not far from the fence, Babsie saw a girl standing and watching everything nervously and curiously. Babsie would have dismissed her as a fan, if she hadn't seen a photo Xavier once showed her of his girlfriend. Jack noticed her looking.
"Just a fan," he said. "Came to the door a few minutes ago, claiming she was Xavier's girlfriend."
"Did she give a name?"
"Connie, I think."
"Hmm," to Jack's surprise, Babsie walked over to her. "Connie is it?"
The girl nodded, her streaked black, yellow, red and orange hair bobbing with her.
"Do you use a pseudonym for your 4A fanfiction?"
She nodded again, suddenly shy.
"What is it?"
"Electra."
"Ah ha," Babsie smiled. "So you are Xavier's girlfriend. I thought I recognised you."
"But... but we've never met..."
"Yes, but I've seen your photo. C'mon, if you could give us a hand getting the groceries in, we can then have a little chat."
"Okay," Electra agreed.
On that note, the two headed over to the truck and grabbed a couple of boxes. Electra then followed Babsie into the house and to the kitchen.
"Wow, you sure get a lot of groceries," Electra commented. "And the pantry is huge!"
"There are a lot of people living here," Babsie grinned.
They made a couple more trips, then Babsie and Electra left as everything was taken out of the boxes and put away. There were enough people in the kitchen!
"So, what brings you to Tulsa?" Babsie asked.
"Oh, well, I just wanted to meet you guys. Xavier's met my family and friends, I thought I should get to meet you guys too."
"Got a place to stay tonight?"
Electra shook her head.
"Well, I'll organise a room for you then. How long are you planning on staying?"
"I... I don't know... a couple of days... if it's not intruding."
"Nah. I've been looking forward to meeting you too. Xavier is always talking about you."
Electra smiled, then her eyes widened as she gazed at the hallway walls.
"Wow!"
"Tobias painted those."
"He's really good."
"I know. That's why we jumped the gun and started on yet another extension. One half is an art room, the other a gym."
"Oh cool! A spiral staircase! And a slippery dip!"
"Yeah, and there's a fireman's pole with a ladder elsewhere in the house."
"That is so cool."
Babsie led Electra up the stairs to a bedroom on the second floor, chatting about different things in the house as they passed them.
"Okay, so this is the washing basket for this room," Babsie said, picking up a plastic basket with the word 'Guest' written on it in the bedroom they entered. "When you have dirty washing, put it in this basket, and take it down to the laundry. Don't worry about your clothes getting mixed up with anyone else's - that's why there's a name on the basket, and no laundry chute!"
"Oh, umm, okay..." Electra trailed off.
"Well, what we do is we put like, Myst's, Cyke's and Esme's clothes into the same washing machine, and then the same dryer, so that when they're done in they dryer, whoever is sorting knows exactly whose basket to put the clothes in. After all, there is no chance that Myst's and Cyke's clothes can get confused for the other."
"Oh, I see."
"Is that your only bag?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. Well, why don't you just dump it here, and I'll get Cosmo to give you a tour," Babsie suggested, glancing at her watch. "I have to drive the girls downtown. We're going bra shopping."
"Oh!" Electra exclaimed, thinking of what Xavier had to say about his mum. "That... should be interesting."
"Yep," Babsie grinned, then hit the intercom. "Yo Cosmo! Can you come to the first guestroom on the second floor please?"
There was a moments' silence.
"Yeah, sure. Coming."
"By the way, Electra or Connie?"
"Either is fine, I answer to both. Cosmo is one of the triplets, huh?"
"Yep."
"Do any of your multiple births have matching names?"
"Umm," Babsie paused.
"Because I think matching names are cool. I hope I have multiple births," Electra said. "That way I can name like, a set of twins Ted and Tad, or Taylor and Tyler, or John and Joan, or Mitchel, Michael and Michelle. Well, okay that last one is triplets. I like Yasmin, Tasmin and Jasmin, or Tasmin and Thomas, or."
"Hang on, I don't get some of these. John and Joan?"
"Male and female equivalents."
"That applies to Thomas and Tasmin too then?"
"Yeah. They mean 'twin'," Electra giggled.
"Oh, I like that one."
"Ooh, you could have quads names like Holly, Molly, Dolly and Polly. Or Ken, Glen, Jen, Ben, Gwen and Sven. Or Chad, Brad and Tad. Or John, Hans and Sean, or -"
"That last one?"
"Well, Hans is the German form of John, and Sean is the Irish version," Electra paused. "Actually you could add 'Jean', that's French, Ian, which is Scottish, umm, Juan is Spanish, Ivan is Russian, uhh..."
"That's septuplets there, girl. Settle down," Babsie grinned.
"I love names," Electra giggled. "I could go on forever. Like there's Jasper and Casper, and Fred and Freda, and Larissa, Marissa and Clarissa, or Jon, Don, Ron and maybe Con, if you like that as a name. Or Austin, Justin, Dustin and Yestin. Or Zara and Zora. Or..."