104: Why is my name on your list?

104: Why is my name on your list?
Willow pov

I should’ve been more specific when I went to find grandpa Khan.

“I need comfort,” was the opening Khan had been waiting his whole life to hear. 

Unfortunately, I realized that only the second his arms locked around me and his brain left the building.

“I got you,” he said into my hair. “I also have a plan.”

Right after, Enzo’s voice came from the doorway, already tired. “No, you don’t.”

“I do,” Khan insisted, still hugging me. “It came to me while she was walking down the hall. Very powerful, very healing and possibly historic.”

I tried to pull back enough to see his face. “Grandpa, I only wanted a hug.”

“And you received one. Phase one is complete. Phase two requires movement, snacks, and emotional honesty at a volume that frightens sadness out of the room.” Khan announced proudly.

From the corner of my eye, I watched how Enzo walked in with two mugs in his hands, already sporting an expression of a man who had seen this movie. “Willow, blink twice if you want me to get your mother.”

“I can hear you,” Khan said.

“That was the point.” Enzo grumbled and set the cups on a table nearby. 

Khan finally let me go, grabbed both my hands, and started walking me toward the couch like I was late for an appointment I hadn’t agreed to. 

“Please don’t let him talk you into decorating the castle without adult supervision,” grandpa Enzo muttered quietly.

“Sit,” Khan said, pointing at the couch. “Center cushion, that’s the comfort throne.”

I sat, mostly because arguing with him would use up the energy I didn’t have. “If you bring out glitter, I’m leaving.”

“No glitter,” he agreed, but managed to sound offended for multiple generations at once. “Don’t worry, this is a classy operation.”

Enzo set a mug near me and flashed a weak, tired smile. “He has a drum in the hall.”

Grandpa Khan gasped and turned to look at me with wide eyes. “That drum is for emergencies.”

“This is not an emergency,” I tried to reassure him, but deep down, I knew he wouldn’t hear a single word I said. 

Khan gasped so hard he had to put a hand on his chest. “Your father is gone, so is your mate and your family is hiding reports, that is an emergency. You also came to me saying you needed comfort. If that is not an emergency, the word has lost all meaning.”

Enzo groaned and muttered, “here we go.”

Khan ignored him and started pulling things out of a basket I hadn’t noticed until it was already too late. 

A pink blanket, a second pink blanket, a tin of honey cakes, a notebook with FEELINGS written on the front in letters big enough to be seen from the garden and, you guessed it, an emergency link blanket. 

I stared at the notebook. “What is that?”

“A journal of healing.” Grandpa Khan gripped before he flipped it open. The first page had my name and three stars. “I prepared it last night in case you ever said the magic words. Look, there’s a section for worries, victories, and a section titled -People Khan Is Allowed To Roar At.-”

Enzo leaned over, read the list, and sighed. “I’m on there twice. Why is my name on your list?”

“You earned it.” Khan said without looking at Enzo.

Honestly, I knew I made a mistake the moment I found Khan, but now, I started feeling like I opened the gates for a flood.

I spoke to him as gently as I could, “grandpa, I love you, but I need you to be a normal amount of extra for ten minutes.”

“I don’t know what that means,” Khan said, wrapping the first blanket around my shoulders before he added a second and a third. Once he was done, he took a step back, scanned the cocoon of a human being I just became and grinned, “yes, you look emotionally insulated.”

“I look like a pastry.” I whispered, “a croissant, maybe? Those have layers right?” 

“A beloved pastry.” Khan teased me and shoved the tin into my hands, “eat, grandcub, sugar tells the brain the word is still beautiful and tasty.” 

Enzo sat on the couch across from us, and for once, I swear he looked like he was so bloody tired, he might disappear into thin air any moment. “The world isn’t ending, Willow, please don’t listen to him. Your grandpa is just allergic to sitting still while someone else has a feeling.”

“Correct,” Khan said and sounded proud of it. “Willow, tell me your current level of doom.”

“My current level of doom is please stop asking me my current level of doom.” I grumbled. 

Khan, in his infinite positivity, grabbed a pen and wrote my words into his journal - out loud. “Please stop asking. I like this, very honest answer, excellent start.”

I turned to look at grandpa Enzo, “can you take the pen?”

“I tried that in 2019,” Enzo said, looking both done with the word and crazy in love the moment his eyes landed on Khan. “He bought a bigger pen.”

Khan, completely ignoring everything but his own ideas, clapped his hands once. “Activity number one: we name the problem so it becomes smaller.”

“That’s not how problems work, grandpa,” I told him. 

“It’s how my problems work.” He pointed at me with the pen. “You. Go.”

I stared at him, wrapped in enough pink to survive a blizzard, holding a tin of cakes I didn’t want, and still somehow less annoyed than I had been in grandpa’s office. 

That, for some reason, made me more annoyed. How were grandpa Khan’s crazy ideas working and making me feel better was beyond me. 

“Fine,” I said, eventually giving in to get over it. “Dad and Ryker might be in the same area and Bastian might be there too. Everyone in the family knew plenty about those facts to avoid and keep me in the dark. There, that’s the problem.”

Khan nodded and wrote ’BAD FOREST SITUATION’ in capital letters. Just to make his activity even more ridiculous, he drew a sad face next to the words and another sad face, but with a tiny crown.

Enzo looked between the page and Khan’s face. “My love, why does the sad face have a crown?”

“Because even despair should have standards.” Khan announced, pointing at the dots he drew on the crown, “see? Diamonds, baby, those are diamonds.”

I couldn’t hold it in anymore and laughed at his serious face. Grandpa Khan immediately pointed his own at me again, “there, that sound is what we need. We’re keeping that sound. Now, activity number two is designed to produce more of it.”

“I’m scared of activity two.” I whispered, more to myself than any of them, but of course, grandpa Enzo overhead.

“You should be,” he groaned and slapped a hand over his forehead.

Using the moment of distraction, Khan disappeared into the hall and came back wearing a headband, holding the drum, and looking far too pleased with himself. “This is the Comfort Beat. When I hit it, you say one true thing that is not tragic.”

“No.” I refused without missing a beat, but he still hit the drum loud enough to make me jump. “Grandpa!” 

“Too slow, I will demonstrate.” He hit it again. “I look incredible in this headband.”

Enzo didn’t look up from his mug. “That’s not true, but I respect your positivity.”

Khan hit the drum and pointed at him. “Your turn.”

Enzo stared at the drum, at me, and finally, at Khan. “I should’ve married someone quieter.”

“Also not tragic,” Khan said. “Accepted.”

He hit the drum and looked at me.

I gave up on trying to convince him this idea was stupid. “The honey cakes are actually good.”

Khan looked like I handed him a medal. “She likes the cakes, quick, write that down, Enzo, she likes the cakes!” 

“I’m not your secretary.” Enzo grumbled.

Grandpa Khan turned to him, beaming and glaring at the same time. It was ridiculous how he could defy the laws of nature for facial expressions.

Enzo took the notebook with the energy of a man accepting a prison sentence and wrote ’cakes: fine.’

Khan leaned over, frowned, and added three exclamation marks. “Your handwriting is depressing, love.”

Enzo sighed, closed his eyes and whispered the most truthful words ever, your entire personality is loud.”

“Thank you.” Khan beamed.

I sank deeper into the blankets. “Is there a version of this where we just sit?”

“Yes,” Khan said. “Activity three: sitting with commentary.”

He sat on the floor in front of the couch, which put his head roughly at my knee level and made him look like a very large, very pink guard dog. Enzo watched him settle and muttered, “he’s going to stay there for an hour, you know that.”

“I can hear you,” Khan said.

“I know, I’m still hoping shame makes a late appearance.”

“Shame had other plans.” Khan announced with that bright smile and patted my blanket-covered knee. “Now, we do comfort thoughts. Ready?”

“No.”

“Excellent.” He cheered and sucked in a breath aggressive enough to address an entire stadium. “If Bane and Ryker are in the same forest, that means two of the most stubborn men you love are inconveniently close to the same headache. That is bad, but is also, in a stupid way, hopeful, because neither of them is the type to leave the other in trouble.”

Enzo looked over. “That was almost wise.”

“Don’t get used to it,” I said.

Khan continued, undeterred. “Meanwhile, you are here, which means your job is to remain alive, fed, and available for hugging. I will handle the rest with vibes.”

Enzo set his mug down and flashed me a pitying smile. “Willow, if you want, we can get your mother. If you want to lose your mind without visiting a room with padded walls, you’re in the right place already.” 

I looked at the two of them. Khan on the floor, still clutching that drum and a ridiculous headband around his head. Enzo in the chair, suffering in high definition. 

“I want this,” I said after a long, loaded moment of silence. “For a bit at least, until I’m ready to retreat to my room and face silence again.” 

Khan lifted the drum, thought about it, and put it back down. “Compromise - I will whisper my genius.”

Enzo closed his eyes. “He’s going to whisper at the volume of a leaf blower.”

“I will not.” Khan argued, and for the record, did whisper at the volume of a leaf blower. “We could make matching shirts, I know a man with a printer, met him near the dark forest the other day.” 

“No shirts,” I said.

“Hats?” Khan tried. Seeing the look on my face, he quickly added, “a banner for the front hall?”

“Grandpa.” I groaned and covered my face with my hands. 

He looked wounded, but in true Khan’s fashion, recovered in under a second. “Fine, no merch. Activity four is visualization.”

Enzo sat forward. “If you say grandbaby, I’m leaving and taking the cakes.”

Khan pointed at Enzo, beaming so hard I was surprised he didn’t break his own face. “You see? He knows me, that is true love.”

“That is self-defense.” Enzo muttered and at least one of them truly knew how to whisper.

I pointed at both of them. “Nobody says that word in this room right now.”

Khan zipped his mouth shut, unzipped it right after and said, “I was going to visualize them coming through the gates. Dirty, annoyed and very alive. Ryker would do that broody face he has since he was born and your father coming home looking like he isn’t afraid. Then, I’d visualize you hitting them both with a massive caveman bat, hugging them when they’re down and finally, making me the godfather of the moment.”

Enzo frowned. “That last part isn’t a thing.”

“It is if I say it is!” Khan insisted, sounding like a fussy child.

I actually snorted out another laugh. “You’re unbelievable.”

“I’m effective.” Khan corrected me proudly, grabbed the notebook out of Enzo’s lap and flipped to a fresh page. “Review of services provided. Hug: delivered. Blankets: delivered. Cakes: approved. Drum: nobody understands my genius. Emotional support lion: present. Sadness: killed.”

Enzo looked at me. “He’s going to frame that page.”

“I’m going to frame that page,” Khan agreed.

I leaned my head back against the couch and let the ridiculousness fill the space around me for this moment alone. None of this made me feel like the word finally started moving again, but at least I didn’t feel like dying either. 

“Grandpa,” I muttered after a while of Khan and Enzo arguing about the drum in a whisper.

Khan’s head immediately shot up, “yes, grandcub.”

“If you start roaring, I’m keeping the cakes and kicking you out.”

He thought about my threat, nodded and whispered, still too loud. “Understood, you want indoor comfort only, I can do that.”

Enzo raised his mug in a mock toast,  “miracles happen, this one won’t last more than twelve minutes.”

Khan smiled up at me, all teeth and poor impulse control. “Twelve minutes is a start, after that I planned a karaoke evening.”

“No,” Enzo and I said together.

Khan looked between us, delighted. “Look at that, I’m bringing the family together, making bonding possible. My work here is already changing lives.”