Liona hummed a happy tune as she got ready for the day. After formally inviting Erik to her birthday, she had been bringing him daily lunches. It somehow pleased her that every day she brought him lunch and picked up the previous day's lunch so that the lunchbox came back nearly pristine. All the food had been eaten, except for once when the layer of sweets she had prepared had been left untouched. After hearing the reason, she took that into consideration and only included naturally sweet things from then on. Mandarin orange slices, honey crisp apple slices, seedless grapes, and other sweet fruits were included with each day being a different type of fruit.
As she did her makeup and styled her hair into a simple ponytail for the day, she smiled at each of the notes that she had given Erik and had placed around her vanity when she got them back. Each of the notes had been returned to her with Erik's scribble of handwriting on the back of them, detailing what he liked and didn't like about each of her lunches. At first glance they were abrupt and seemed unfeeling, but after getting to know him and his manner of speech and writing, she realized that was just his way of communicating.
Finishing getting ready, Liona stood up and grabbed her purse from the top of her dresser, she double checked the contents and made sure she had everything she needed. Glancing once more into her vanity, she smoothed the skirt of her outfit and adjusted her blouse's bodice to cover a bit more of her cleavage. She wasn't in the habit of showing off her boobs. In fact, she hated men ogling them and typically wore more modest outfits that covered her bust a bit more. However, this was one of her favorite blouses, but sadly it too was a touch on the small side now and was a bit tighter around her bust now that she had grown more.
She thought by now she would be done growing, but her mom had told her that she would continue to grow well into her early twenties as an omega. She harrumphed at that thought as she left her room. As she headed down the main stairs of the house, she could hear the laughter of her brothers as they playfully jeered their friends as they were playing games in the living room. They were playing a popular RPG that their grandpa's game studio made last year, and it was finally available for them to play. Although they got advanced copies of a lot of games from their grandparents, this one they had decided to wait for so that they could play it with their friends.
Her mom was working half a day today, and her dad was stuck working late again, so she would be meeting up with her later at the mall after she got off work. Before that though, she was going to be shopping with Erik and his siblings. Her own siblings were off either at band camp for a few more days or playing games with their friends over the spring break. She made sure to pop her head into the living room before she left, to let her brothers know she was leaving before heading out to the garage.
After running it by her dad, her dad let her borrow one of the big cars he often used for work purposes. It sat eight comfortably and was also self driving like her little car. This car was close to being considered a limo, but it wasn't. It was just a nice car that her dad used when their were visiting diplomats from other branches of the EEA from around the world, when they would come here for various reasons. Between her dad and Grandpa Kaito, they would show the dignitaries around the branches and give a tour of how they operated the Northwest Branch.
Ever since her Grandpa had taken over the US EEA Branch, the Northwest Branch had become the highest rated training facility in the entire US. Oftentimes, the highest rated officers and other aspects of the EEA came from the specialty training program they provided that was part of the local college her Grandpas Lionel and Asher had once taught at. Now they were both happily retired and spent their days with their mates and any day now they would be coming here to visit for her birthday which is less than a week away, now that it was Monday.
Getting into the large car, Liona adjusted everything to her needs, then glanced in the back and saw that the child seats that one of her brothers and sisters had used many years ago was already placed in the rear. After explaining to her mom and dad that she was going to be taking Erik's little siblings along too, they had explained that even though the car was self driving, she still had to provide car seats for those under 4 years old. After being told that there was a height and weight limit for those between 4 and 8-years-old, she had taken into consideration that Erik's youngest sisters probably didn't meet that requirement. So, she had opted to bring all four seats that were convertible from infancy up to booster sized so that they would be safe in the car too. Otherwise, her mom and dad wouldn't have allowed her to even borrow the big car.
After checking the back, she turned around again and programmed the lake park as her destination. For some reason, Erik was a little hesitant to let her see where he lived, so she had decided to respect that for now and agreed that she would pick him and his siblings up at the park before they headed to the mall.
On the way to the park, Liona thought about her attempt to give Nichole, Erik's next younger sister, her hand-me-downs, earlier in the week. When she had asked about how she had liked the clothes and if they had fit alright, but had been awkwardly told by Erik that his sister had sold them to a secondhand shop because she wasn't comfortable with receiving such expensive clothing. He had only told her that, but she got the feeling that there was more to the story than he was telling her. However, she didn't feel like it was appropriate to pry just yet. She would take her time getting to know Erik as well as his sisters.
That was part of the reason they were coming shopping today with her. She had essentially bribed them with the offer of purchasing for them each a single outfit of their choice from wherever they wanted to shop in the mall. When they protested that the mall was too expensive, she had insisted they pick something out since she was going to pay for it. Honestly, they could all pick out something from the most expensive shop in the mall and they wouldn't put a dent in her savings.
Although she was a big spender and bought a lot of clothes and accessories, she limited her spending to seasonal updates to her wardrobe. Most of the major clothes purchases her mom had bought for her at the beginning of the school year. She had a generous allowance and spent a lot of it, but still managed to save a lot of it too. Her mom liked to lecture her on her spending habits, but mostly let her be. When she had mentioned this shopping trip at the mall the other day to her, her mom wanted to come along for part of the day and meet Erik and his siblings. She had been regaling her mom with all kinds of fun stories of her time talking and hanging out with Erik on his lunch and work breaks over the last few days.
Alli and Chloe had joined her a few times, but mostly they only came around for a lunchtime greeting and left shortly after. The girls were having fun teasing her about her newfound friendship and were making a big deal about the time she was sitting around doing nothing while waiting like a lost puppy for Erik to talk to her. Of course, she just rolled with it and smiled at them since they were being good natured about their teasing.
She knew the girls were having fun and were slowly warming up to Erik the more time they spent together, but they still had their reservations about his tendency to apologize. She figured once the girls really got to know Erik, they would see that he was using it as a defensive wall to keep people from looking too closely at him. She was slowly learning that about him as she got to know him better.
Before she realized it, the nav unit was announcing that she had arrived at her destination while she had been lost in thought…