- - - set the world on fire [cerian]

[lizzy]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, background-color: dddddd; border: #cccccc solid 8px; width: 420px; padding: 15 5 15 5px;] TONIGHT, WE ARE YOUNG. SO LET'S SET THE WORLD ON FIRE, WE CAN BURN BRIGHTER, THAN THE SUN . . . The Words: 559 The Outfit: HERE The Notes <3 Through her four and a half years of being a mother, Sydney St. Claire had drawn a conclusion – some people were cut out to be parents, and some weren’t. There are a few different types of mothers; one is the type that wants to get pregnant, tries to get pregnant, and is elated once they finally are pregnant. Then, you have the type that isn’t trying, but is excited when they find out they’re carrying. These types of mother’s are almost certainly married, or in a very committed relationship. The next type of mother could be either married or non – she doesn’t want a child, isn’t excited once she finds out she’s pregnant, but by the time nine months rolls around, and she holds her baby in her arms for the first time, she just couldn’t be happier. And then there was the category that Sydney was in. The mother that didn’t feel that spark when holding Stella Marie for the first time. Of course she loved her daughter, Syd wasn’t heartless. But when she’d told her parents she was pregnant, they hadn’t just kicked her out of the house. No, they’d sent their 17 year old daughter to another country to live with a host family for the remainder of her high school career, and made it pretty clear that neither she nor her child were welcome home ever. Stella’s father wouldn’t have been a walk out. Sydney wasn’t sure whether or not she and James would be together, but she knew damn well that he would still be supporting his daughter, taking her out, bonding with her, the things dads did. He’d even been kind of excited for the kid, while Sydney had been dreading it. But her parents made absolute sure there was no way for the two to contact each other; James didn’t even know where she was being sent. Stella was a beautiful little girl. She had creamy skin, blonde hair just a few shades darker than Sydney’s. The little girl had Sydney’s nose and ears, James’s eyes and lips. Everyone was pretty taken with Stella when they met her. She wasn’t quite as wiley as Sydney has always been, nor was she as prim and proper as Syd’s older sister, Lydia. The child fell charmingly in between, saving her monstrosities for her mother only. This afternoon, Cerian was taking the girls out for lunch to Stella’s favorite restaurant. Cerian was great to the little girl, he really was. A better parent than Sydney always had been, in fact. And the blonde was extremely thankful for that. ”Stella, come on, you’re going to make us late.” Sydney and Cerian had just decided to meet at the restaurant. ”Mommy, carry me!” Syd sighed, taking the little girls hand instead as she lead her out of the apartment. ”No, Stell. You’re getting too big to be held all the time.” A pour formed on her tiny features, but Sydney ignored it. She put the little girl in her car seat, and drove towards the restaurant, reaching it in about fifteen minutes. As she collected Stella and headed inside, she smiled, seeing Cerian already there. Stella pulled loose from her mother’s grasp, barreling toward the man and throwing her little arms around his legs. Sydney smirked, following behind and waiting for her own turn with her boyfriend. created by ADE! Pb-ified by LIZZY

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[cerian]

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tell the world
i'm coming home

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To those that had known Cerian for his entire life they knew one thing about him, he was one of the most paternal people that one would ever cross paths with. When it came to children he just became this big ball of cuddle who couldn't be happier than to read a kid a bed time story, or play dolls with them. So he supposed that it wasn't such a strange thing that he'd ended up in a relationship with a woman who already had a child. When he had first met Sydney it had just been her that he'd met. They'd gone on a few dates before she'd even brought up the fact that she had a daughter. When she had told him she'd been nervous, he knew it just by the look on her face even though she seemed to be trying to hide her nerves. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting when she'd told him that they needed to talk. The last thing that he'd been expecting was for a child to be in the picture. But to say that he was upset about it was an understatement.

The very first time that he'd met the four year old, he felt like his heart had just about melted. He'd become a puddle at the girl's feet almost instantly. She was a beautiful little thing, just precious, and the need to protect her from everything bad in the world came quickly. He knew that he wasn't her father, he knew that he would never be her father, and he'd never allow the little girl to call him daddy. He also knew that there was always a chance that he and Syd wouldn't work out and then he'd probably never see the little girl again. He had told himself before meeting Stella that he wasn't going to get attached. No matter what else he did he wasn't going to get attached. The moment he'd laid eyes on her though, he knew that there was no way that he couldn't have his heart on a platter for the pre-schooler. That was all that there was to it.

Nights that the two of them stayed over at his house had become more frequent, and he didn't mind everything that came with having a kid around. Even if it was nice to get time alone with Sydney. And in the past six months that they'd been together they'd been playing some form of house with one another. Cerian had gotten to the point where he knew no matter what happened with him and Sydney there was going to be no way that he wouldn't be in Stella's life. Every little girl needed a father figure, and he was more than capable of filling that role.

As could only be proven by the way that she bolted over to him once eyes landed on him. The man smiled widely all of his teeth showing and his eyes sparkling as he picked the girl up. "There's my darling girl. Have you gotten bigger? Wait, you can't be Stella. You're so big. What happened to my sweet little girl?" he spoke in joking tones before kissing her forehead and resting her on his hip. It wasn't long before his attention was turned to Sydney and he wrapped his free arm around her waist pulling her close to his side. "Hey beautiful," he cooed before pressing a quick kiss to her lips. After pulling away he let his eyes lock on hers for a short moment, just enough to give them one of those brief moments where they could just be them before the attention was pulled back to Stella. For it was always children that would get the spotlight no matter what. "Who's hungry?" he asked turning his attention from his girlfriend to Stella with that huge smile on his lips all over again. "I know that I'm starving. I might just widdle away to nothing," he joked and then set Stella down and released his hold on Sydney so they could both take their seats. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[lizzy]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, background-color: dddddd; border: #cccccc solid 8px; width: 420px; padding: 15 5 15 5px;] TONIGHT, WE ARE YOUNG. SO LET'S SET THE WORLD ON FIRE, WE CAN BURN BRIGHTER, THAN THE SUN . . . The Words: 430 The Outfit: HERE The Notes <3 Sydney had been nervous about Cerian finding out about Stella. How was she to know that he was a born natural? Honestly, she envied him. Syd was a good enough mother to wish she was good, but not good enough to get there. She was a party girl at heart, and hadn’t even come close to growing out of that fact. Her entire life, she’d put herself first, and not really thought about other people too deeply. But now she was responsible for a little human being. She’d had to teach her daughter to walk, talk, be potty trained. She took her to doctor’s appointments regularly, fed well, and clothed adorably. Stella was well taken care of, but the girl was being forced to grow up faster than she should have, due to her own mother’s immaturity. Stella squealed as Cerian picked her up. ”Mommy says I’m too big to be held,” the little girl said in her adorable British accent that she’d picked up from her mother. Because Stella was in day care with American children, her accent wasn’t as strong as Sydney’s who’d lived in London for seventeen years. She hadn’t let her accent fade even a little bit since coming to the United States. The blonde felt she needed at least a little bit of her old life to hold onto. Sydney rolled her eyes at her daughter. ”Because you are,” she said bluntly. Sydney wasn’t one for calling her daughter pet names like ‘dear’ or ‘darling’ or ‘precious.’ She let Cerian and her other friends take care of the coddling. Syd was well aware that Cerian would have to continue to be an integral part of her daughter’s life, even if things didn’t work out between them. She wasn’t that selfish. Finally, he kissed her. She smiled happily, replying, ”Hello handsome.” Stella stuck out her tongue and wrinkled up her nose. ”Yucky!” Sydney turned towards her daughter. ”Stella, honestly. What have I told you about that?” The tiny blonde rolled her eyes in a very Sydney-esque fashion. Syd was about to make a comment, but Cerian interjected. ”Me! Me!” the littler girl said excitedly. He led the to their table, and they took their seats. A waiter was there almost immediately to take their drink orders. ”We’ll have water’s,” she said, nodding a head at her daughter. ”No! I want coke,” the little one retorted. Sydney cleared her throat, looking back up at the waiter. ”Water. Please.” ”Moooooommy!” Syd shot her daughter a warning look, and the little girl crossed her arms, but closed her mouth. created by ADE! Pb-ified by LIZZY

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[cerian]

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tell the world
i'm coming home

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Cerian had been around the two girls long enough that he was starting to realize that for as wonderful as Sydney could be, and for as much as he knew that she did love her daughter, the little girl did not get the amount of motherly love that she needed. So maybe he felt the need to compensate a bit whenever he had the little girl around him. The way that Cerian saw it the most important thing that you could do for a child was give them love and affection. And for all the times that Cerian had watched his girlfriend interact with her daughter, he was coming to the realization that she really wasn't being the best mother that she could be. Which was understandable for her age, and all of that, but, well, it wasn't something that he liked to think on often.

He pursed his lips and got a curious expression on his features at Stella's words. "Oh, is that so?" he asked and his attention turned to Syd as she let out her own words about the whole holding thing. Cerian seemed deep in thought for a few moments as he mulled over the topic at hand and then his attention was turned fully to Stella once again. "Well, that's because mommy is small and not as strong as me. So, you're too big to be held by mommy as much, but I'm a big strong man," he said then demonstrated by lifting the little girl up into the air before placing her back on his hip, "so I think you've got a big longer before you're too big for me to hold you," he teased and then kissed Stella's forehead again.

With the little blonde on her feet at his side, and his girl at his other side he smiled at her and couldn't help but chuckle lightly into the kiss at Stella's reaction. He had to keep a frown from coming onto his lips at Syd's words and instead just looked down at the girl and scrunched his own face. "I know, it is yucky, your mom's got cooties and she's getting them all over me. But it's okay, because our cooties are matching colors," he explained to the girl and then touched the tip of her nose. "So how about you don't call them yucky all the time, because it's not mommy and I's fault that our cooties are meant to mush together." Because that was four year old logic if Cerian had never heard it before.

With them all seated at the table he watched their interactions with a bit of a frown on his lips. How many times had he seen interactions like this, he wasn't sure. "I'll have water as well," he said to the waitress then looked at Stella. "Sweetheart, soda is bad for you. It'll turn you into a monster, and not the fun ones like on the Disney movie, true facts," he informed the girl before placing an arm around Syd's shoulders and pressing a kiss to her temple.---------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[lizzy]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, background-color: dddddd; border: #cccccc solid 8px; width: 420px; padding: 15 5 15 5px;] TONIGHT, WE ARE YOUNG. SO LET'S SET THE WORLD ON FIRE, WE CAN BURN BRIGHTER, THAN THE SUN . . . The Words: 559 The Outfit: HERE The Notes <3 The way Cerian explained the cooties? Sydney would never think of something like that. She didn’t know how to handle Stella with child gloves, although that’s what the little girl needed. For all intents and purposes, Stella was treated like a miniature adult. The girl could fasten herself into her car seat, she watched most of the TV shows and movies that Sydney did, and Sydney talked to her like she would anyone. Sydney grew frustrated when Stella did things overly childlike (although it fit her age.) The blonde just wasn’t cut out to be a mother. Of course, she was never especially coddled as a child. Her own mother had to be one of the least nurturing people she’d ever met. Syd didn’t want to be like her mom, she wanted to be better. But she just had no idea how. It was obvious she wouldn’t be better intellectually – Sydney was a manager at Victoria’s Secret and majoring in fashion merchandising while her mother was a published college professor. And now it didn’t look like she’d be better parenting wise either. At least Cerian backed her up with the soda. Stella would listen to him. Sure enough, her blue green eyes grew wider. ”I don’t wanna be a monster….” Sydney smiled softly as his arm snaked around her shoulders and his lips pressed against her temple. She wondered what their relationship would be like if she didn’t have Stella. They’d have more time alone, obviously. More time to just talk and have fun. But he was captivated by the little girl, so she obviously hadn’t hurt the relationship at all. ”Stella, tell Cerian what you did yesterday.” The little girl clapped her hands together once (something Sydney often did when she was excited), and spoke. ”At my day care, we had to draw a picture of anything we wanted, and so I drew a picture of you and me and Mommy, and we were playing at the park, except Mommy wasn’t playing because her shoes were new, but my teacher liked it so much that she hung it on the board. It was better than Tori Lynn’s.”

[/b] Tori Lynn was a girl in Stella’s class that made fun of Stella for not having a dad, but the teasing had gone down a bit since Sydney had had a pretty harsh chat with the girls mom.

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[cerian]

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tell the world
i'm coming home

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When Cerian had first met Sydney he didn't think that they would end up where they were at that point. She was a pretty enough girl, younger than him that was for sure, and by the way that she moved and let go completely when he'd met her at that dance club he knew that she was a wild one. Some kind of party girl that he usually stayed away from. Never in his life would he have guessed that she was a mother, not once. And when he'd found out about Stella he'd almost thought that she was joking until he'd met the little girl.

He had liked Sydney from the start, that much was true enough, and he enjoyed going on dates with her. But it wasn't until he'd met the little girl that he'd decided that he wanted to be in a relationship with her. Maybe it wasn't the right reasoning, but the kid, well, she had been the selling point for a relationship that he'd already been highly considering. He'd never imagined that he would have this so early in life though. Sure, Stella wasn't his own, and he and Sydney had only been together for a short while, but it was nice to go out the three of them and feel like they were some kind of family.

"Well then I guess that you should never drink soda again, or else you will be. Then we'll have to change your name and everything and send you where the wild things are," he spoke in teasing tones before winking at the little girl. He looked towards the woman at his side with a raised brow, then back to her daughter. The smile on his face grew even more if that were even possible. It just pulled nice and wide to show off those white teeth of his. "Baby girl I am so proud of you. And I am so honored to have been in your picture," he cooed at her leaning over the table to ruffle her hair. "And that sounds like a very accurate picture. We both know how mommy is with her new shoes," he commented looking over at Sydney to give her a teasing grin before his eyes went down to the menu deciding what it was that he wanted to eat. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

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[lizzy]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, background-color: dddddd; border: #cccccc solid 8px; width: 420px; padding: 15 5 15 5px;] TONIGHT, WE ARE YOUNG. SO LET'S SET THE WORLD ON FIRE, WE CAN BURN BRIGHTER, THAN THE SUN . . . The Words: 343 The Outfit: HERE The Notes <3 Cerian reached across the table to ruffle Stella’s hair, and the little girl let out a squeal, swatting playfully at his hand. Sydney just didn’t have these interactions with her daughter. She just wasn’t sure how. When Stella was a baby, things were a bit easier. Sydney just had to hold her, change her, feed, her bathe her… the basics. But now she was responsible for shaping who her daughter would be for the rest of her life. And that was a scary thought. Sydney wasn’t blind; she knew that she hadn’t turned out all that well. And now she was responsible for shaping a young mind. Hell, if the blonde had wanted to do that, she would have become a teacher of something. She rolled her eyes at the comment about her shoes, and reached across to grab Stella’s children’s menu. ”What’s it going to be, Stell? Fish sticks and macaroni?” ”Mama, I wanna order from the grownups menu!” Sydney looked at her daughter with a raised brow. ”Stella, no. You hardly even eat your whole kids menu.” ”You said I’m a big girl,” Stella pouted, crossing her arms. ”I get big girl food!” Her voice had been raised a bit and Syd inhaled sharply. ”Stella Marie St. Claire, lower your voice right now,” Sydney hissed. ”You’re ordering off the children’s menu, and that’s that.” By the look on Stella’s face, Sydney wasn’t sure whether she would cry, start screaming, or simply drop it. The little girl looked between her mother and Cerian, and Sydney could tell she was going to scream. ”No,” she said quickly, reaching across the table to place a hand over her daughters mouth, muffling what would have been an era piercing scream. Sydney blushed as the people at the table next to them turned to eye the young mother judgmentally. Glancing at Cerian, she shook her head. ”I’m sorry, I’ve got to take her outside.” Sydney stood, keeping a hand over her daughters mouth as she picked her up and headed to the front of the restaurant. created by ADE! Pb-ified by LIZZY

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[cerian]

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tell the world
i'm coming home

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Sometimes it was hard for Cerian to watch the interactions between Stella and Sydney. He adored them both. After all he had been in a relationship with Sydney for quite some time now and he simply loved Stella. But the two of them, they never seemed to have those little fun interactions that Cerian had with the little girl. He supposed a big part of it could be that Syd hadn't been ready to have a child when she'd had her daughter. He didn't doubt that she loved her baby, but he knew things were hard. Quite possibly for the both of them.

Which really was why he tried to step in as much as possible when it came to the mother and daughter. Play some sort of hero role for Syd who shouldn't always have to be the bad guy, and then for Stella give her the attention that she craved. The attention from a father figure that he more than happily gave to her. A frown moved onto his features though as he watched the pair of them. He saw what was coming like some kind of train wreck but there was no stopping it. There was no pulling the breaks or slowing this down, because before he knew it Stella was screaming and Syd was apologizing and taking her outside.

A sigh came from the man as he watched the two leave and he ran his fingers through his hair. He only waiting for a short moment before letting his waitress know they would be back and then making his way outside towards the girls. There was a bit of a weak smile on his lips as he closed the distance between himself and them. It was needless to say that he'd been in Stella's life long enough that he had some kind of paternal right to her. The man placed a hand on Syd's shoulder and gave her a soft expression. "Sydney, go ahead and go inside, I'll talk to Stella," he said softly. His girlfriend, she didn't always need to be the bad guy. She didn't always need to be the one that was making her daughter live out the consequences of her actions. She deserved a break, at least, that was how Cerian saw it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

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