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It's not really that there are more kids now than there were before, or that he's around them especially more. Ripley was two now, and he still saw her a lot. Magnus and Alec had a kid, and she was fucking fantastic and he'd loved meeting her. There always seemed like there were kids, and sometimes Kavinsky was in mind of his sister more than others, how he'd had more hand in raising her than his mom did. It was just the way that it was, he supposed.

The house was not empty, by a long shot. There were the two of them, and the cats, and sometimes Kavinsky thought about just coming home with a big, square-headed, mean-looking dog that would fit who he had been three years ago when he showed up here but also who he was now, sweet and loving and stupid. All of it was nesting in this house, this home, that they'd made theirs. He wondered when he'd started getting this way, but not really. He knew when. They'd gained and lost, and lost, and Kavinsky hated losing people.

But they had each other, and the house was more than big enough for the two of them, and their cats, and sometimes--sometimes Kavinsky's heart was really big and really full. But you couldn't just come home with a dog without your husband doing more than rolling his eyes.

He set a bottle of beer on the porch railing as he watched Newt in the garden, and leaned a little. No time like the present. "What do you think about kids?"

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Newt paused in what he was doing, straightening up on his knees and wiping his hands on the worn seat of his jeans, looking up at Kavinsky with an eyebrow raised.

"I haven't given them much though, if I'm honest." He tilts his head and studied his husband for a long moment. "Why?"

Kavinsky leaned his elbows on the rail and just admired Newt for a moment, like he hadn't just asked him a question. He'd gone even more blond in the summer, all sun bleached, and a touchy golden on the skin, and it was just a really good look, even though Kavinsky saw it every year and had since they'd met.

"I dunno," Kavinsky admitted softly when he got his head back, and then he laughed a little. "Man, that's stupid. Asking about it and then all, well shit. I dunno, just. I think about it sometimes. A family."

He's aware that Kavinsky is distracted for a moment, and he gives him a moment to come back, doesn't interrupt. He stands up, flexing his shoulders, ridding himself of soreness where he's set, bent over the flower bed. The birds twitter and trill in the trees.

"Yeah?" he asks, coming up onto the porch. "Is that beer for me?"

"You were working, I didn't want you to get dehydrated," Kavinsky said, taking a sip off the beer with a smirk, and then relinquishing it to Newt. He listens to the birds, different than the flock of finches but good, those bright colored rose finches and the mourning doves that lived there now.

"It's stupid," he said with a shrug. "We are a family. I just...I think about it, sometimes."

Gently, Newt takes Kavinsky by the elbow and draws him to sit down with him on the swing, tugging him in to lean against him, his arm wrapped around his husband's shoulders, hand resting on his bare chest. He takes a sip of the beer and then offers it back to Kavinsky.

"So tell me what you're thinking."

The bottle passed, and Kavinsky smiled a little bit, holding it between them. He hooked his ankle against Newt's and gently set the swing swaying back and forth. Now, to think of it, there was a terrifying notion of having a family here in Darrow. What if something happened to one of them? Or both? It wasn't worth thinking of for more than a moment, as ever.

"I don't think that we need kids to be a family," he said out loud, "and I think, sometimes, it's because I miss my sister? More than anything. But I...I love kids. I grew her up, made sure she got into school and did all that shit my folks shoulda been doing. And, you know, I see people with their kids, and I just..."

Kavinsky let out a little breath of a laugh. "It could be us, someday. Good thing I can't dream people here."

"What would you dream for us?" asks Newt, idly threading his fingers through Kavinsky's hair, tugging lightly on the strands. "Boy or girl?"

"I've got more experience with girls," Kavinsky said with a little bit of a laugh. His sister, and helping with Ripley as much as he had especially at the beginning. "I think I'd fuck up a boy, considering how I ended up. But you'd be there to keep him level. To tell me I can't just let him run amok."

But Kavinsky laughed at that too, and smiled, bumping his forehead gently against Newt's. "You did live in seclusion with a bunch of boys through all of puberty, though, so you might have a weird perspective."

"I don't know anything about girls," admits Newt, with a little laugh. "I mean, I sort of remember my sister now. Sort of. But not...not anything like enough." He swallows, brushes the tip of Kavinsky's nose with his. "You really think we could do it? Not shuck them up beyond repairing."

"I think worrying about messing up is part of ending up pretty okay parents," Kavinsky said. He didn't know if his parents, or his friends parents, ever worried about it, but he'd seen how Beca and Jesse had, and Ripley was turning out pretty well so far.

"Maybe," Kavinsky said softly, "Maybe we could foster. Like, take a kid in when they first get to Darrow and help them adjust or something. There've been a lot of younger teenagers and kids recently, I feel like. It's harder to fuck up someone who's already got a personality."

"Yeah, I don't know about that. WCKED did a pretty shucking good job, and we all had personalities." He sighs, took another long swallow of the beer. "I don't know, man. I don't have any experience of anyone younger than thirteen. You're the one who remembers even having parents."

"They also erased all your memories, so like. Slightly different." Kavinsky held a hand up, fingers close together. Majorly different, in his opinion. Darrow was, by and large, a weird and shitty place, a microcosm that they were all trapped in. But it wasn't bad. It stolen from them--their lives, some people and friends and family--but it did not take who they were. Not like WCKED had done to Newt.

He wouldn't say that he had memories of having parents, exactly. He had memories of the people who birthed him, a brutal fuck of a guy that wanted to beat the demon out of him, and a woman who snorted and screamed away the fact that Kavinsky had saved his own life, and hers. But he didn't say that. He took a sip of beer instead and leaned into Newt a little.

"There's no rush. I just think about it sometimes." He sighed softly. "I think you'd be a really good dad. I think we...we'd be pretty solid. We've worked really hard on being good." He'd worked really hard on being good.

"Yeah, we have," says Newt, knowing that Kavinsky has needed to put more work into that than he had. He shifted them again in the chair so that he could lean Kavinsky back against him more comfortably. "There's probably some more shit you'd need to give up, Joe."

"I managed to raise my kid sister and go to school and be way worse than I am these days," Kavinsky said speculatively. That was only partially true. He'd started to pick things up by the time they were in Virginia and she was walking. By the time he'd shown up in Darrow, she was old enough to sort of be taking care of herself, almost. Either way, he'd managed to make sure she was up, fed, and to school while nursing his highs, and he wasn't nearly so bad as all that anymore.

He leaned into Newt, and gently teased, "Besides, it's not like you're a teetotaler, either. I can stick to the legal stuff, if you can."

"Honestly, I'd feel better if we did," he says, leaning his cheek against Kavinsky's hair. "Especially if we ended up with a teenager instead of a baby. They're like sponges."

Kavinsky whined softly, a joking noise as he wrinkled his nose. He turned his head a little and kissed Newt where he could reach. It didn't matter where. His chest felt huge and full, just at this huge, speculative idea that maybe--maybe they could talk about this and consider this and maybe make it happen.

"We'd probably have to sound proof our room, too," he said. "And you couldn't fuck me in the kitchen anymore. You willing to give that up?"

"I do love fucking you in the kitchen," says Newt, but he's teasing gently when he says it. He presses a kiss against Kavinsky's temple. "But, you know. Soundproofing. And our bedroom and my office have locks on the doors, so..."

"You know, if we have a kid in the house, this is only a two room place," Kavinsky pointed out. They'd gotten it because he and Newt and Al all shared a room, and the second bedroom had just become the office. Kavinsky spent his time in the garage, and Newt was in the garden or the office. But if there was a kid, that kid would need a room.

That begged a question: an upgrade, or switching the office over to a functional bedroom. Kavinsky loved this house, what he and Newt had built for themselves here, the garden and all the little things they'd made for themselves.

"I suppose I could always convert part of the garage into a room, and park in the driveway instead."

"Shit," says Newt, softly, because that hadn't quite occurred to him. He does love his office, but not as much as Kavinsky loves being out in the garage, tooling around with the Evo. He shakes his head. "I wouldn't ask you to do that," he says. "And I'm not leaving this house."

Kavinsky laughed softly, set the beer aside so he could turn and drape against Newt and kiss him sweetly on the mouth. "You sure? We could move back into the city and get some dumb townhouse like Poison and Jack have, and get a whole passel of kids. It'd really cut down on the commute, too, you know?"

There was no urgency to the situation, not right now. They had plenty of time. It was a nebulous idea. Kavinsky didn't even know what was required to adopt or foster or whatever in Darrow. Looking into that would give them time to figure out the room situation.

"I love this house," says Newt, curling both arms around Kavinsky to hold him close. "I love my garden. It's the last place we were with Al." He shakes his head. "I'm not leaving. We'll make it work." He brushes Kavinsky's hair back from his forehead and kisses him. "I don't mind the commute."

Kavinsky's heart ached for a second, thinking of Al. He sighed a little bit, let himself miss him terribly, and then let the feeling settle comfortably in his longs. He didn't think he'd ever stop missing him.

"Plus, moving the birds would be a bitch. At least these ones came away from the forest more easily than the first set."

"Don't. I still miss those little clunkheads," says Newt, smiling, going back to playing with Kavinsky's hair. "So. Us and a little girl. What are we going to name her?"

Kavinsky's mind populated, almost instantly, with the names of all his female relatives, a fair number of saint names, and they all sort of cluttered around in his head for a second, but the one that eventually tumbled out of his mouth was, "Beca."

He wasn't entirely sure that was appropriate. It was just the first one that came out. The second one was, "Ekaterina."

"Beca Ekaterina Kavinsky," says Newt, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "That's a lot of name for a small girl, Joe."