and the stars in their orbits shone pale through the lightof the brighter, colder moon

Every day was an adventure with Tobias; every day required teaching him something about the real world that he lacked understanding about. Even in Nadya's current more patient state due to motherhood, there was only so much she was willing to teach him. Education about girls in regards to Raven was her limit. She did have a choice there on whether to be spiteful and cause Tobi even more fear towards the opposite sex which had been instilled by Tetty's shunning of him after their tryst or educate him. Nadya chose option C...neither. "You're supposed to be her boyfriend, you ask her that question." With an exasperated sigh she turned her attention to the infant within her arms who was happily sleeping. "Tetty would be happier if you read the book, not listened to it, but you can start learning by listening to it first." She shrugged her shoulder in waning concern for the topic. It was going to be chore enough keeping up teaching the twins all this stuff let alone adding Tobias to the mix. However, if he behaved himself while being taught it could be seen as a two birds one stone scenario. The one thing she could work on right now was helping teach Tobi how to care for the twin's basic needs and one of those involved feeding. Foolhardy perhaps, Nadya set Izzy back in the crib so she could go get the bottle for Tobi.

The fact that Tobias had switched from sitting on the bed to now sitting on the floor wasn't even a blip on Nadya's radar. He was a fidgety thing, one of his traits that was more akin to a child. She resettled next to him with her back now against the bed, handing over both Micah and the bottle with her instructions. The fact that Tobias was at all interested in interacting with the twins made her feel better, let alone his willingness to help out with them. One was work enough let alone having two. A tired smile broke Nadya's features seeing Tobias light up as Micah latched onto the bottle. He wasn't particularly hungry so his suckling on the bottle was slow but at least demonstrated to Tobias how to feed. "Keep it up like this..." Nadya reached over and gently guided the end of the bottle in Tobias' hand to reach more towards the ceiling. "You have to make sure that he's drinking only the milk and not air. If you can see his mouth through the clear part that he's sucking on then that means he's sucking on air. Drinking air hurts their tummy, they'll start to cry." Well it just created gas, not life threatening but it did hurt the infants and meant having to burp them which was more work. If Tobias' triggers for learning were correct then associating the action with something that harmed the twins would get him to remember it.

Once Tobias seemed satisfied with his actions his attention switched from Micah to the wall, drawing her attention to it as well with his exclamation. Immediately Nadya cringed notably at the red smeared drawing on the wall which reminded her a lot of a shade of her lipstick. She sighed inwardly, releasing any pent up agitation at the drawing when Tobi explained who the drawing was of...their family. Mismatched group that they were, they were obviously all important enough to Tobi to be considered family. Again it shouldn't have surprised Nadya that in her absence of keeping an eye on Tobi while looking at the portrait that now adorned her wall, that he was getting into another form of trouble by taste testing the milk from Micah's bottle...breast milk. "No!" Nadya startled and smacked Tobi's shoulder. "That's...ugh...Tobi, that's for the babies only! That's milk..from..from me.. that's what they are eating when I feed them." Nadya could only cringe in disgust of Tobi tasting her breast milk. Thankfully Micah released the bottle shortly after, moving his head away in his way of saying he was done. She reached across Tobi and took the bottle from him to set it down far far away from him. "You did good feeding him. Just, don't drink that again." And for dear lord don't tell Tetty or Raven about it. "He has to be put to sleep now. You can sing to him if you know any songs?"