16. Dinner (Patreon)

“I’m still angry that you didn’t wake me up before.” Shahrazad pouted as she and Aloe walked down the bazaar.”

“You needed to sleep more, Mom,” Aloe said. “If you are going to go to work tomorrow, being a moving corpse won’t do you any good.”

“I guess you are right.” The old woman sighed. “I’m letting this affect me too much.”

“You are not letting anything affect you, this is normal, you’ve just lost your father.” Aloe was brimming with anger, though it wasn’t directed at her mother but at the people who forced her to work this soon after her loss. But that person was the head of Sadina and the whole region, so there wasn’t anything to do.

“Don’t put that face.” Shahrazad alerted her daughter. “A girl with such beautiful clothes shouldn’t have that expression of annoyance.”

Because of the feast at Jafar’s house, Aloe and Shahrazad had dressed for the occasion, taking out some of their best clothes. Aloe looked down at her body, not thinking the clothes were especially beautiful. She wore a simple light brown dress with a pistachio foulard covering her torso and shoulders from the sun, besides also wearing her favorite high sandals.

To Aloe, her mother was more well-dressed.

Shahrazad wore a white dress, more complex than Aloe’s with its floral patterns, and a black shawl that contrasted perfectly with it. Her sandals were more worn than Aloe’s and not as pompous, but she compensated it with her white silk bracelets-slash-open-ended gloves. And as an extra, Shahrazad donned a cayora, a traditional silk veil that women use to cover themselves from the sun.

That was mostly the tipping point. Whilst her mother graciously protected her head from the sun with a white cayora, Aloe just put a simple straw hat on her head. Truth be told, she didn’t have any other head accessories. Cayoras were adult headwear, and she was still technically not one. The saving grace that avoided her hat from destroying her whole outfit was the cloth band on the hat. It had the same pistachio-esque color as her foulard, meaning it complimented perfectly.

Hmm, I could take the hat to the greenhouse. Aloe kept to herself. It does kinda make me look like a farmer.

Not before long, the mother and daughter arrived at her destination. Aloe knocked thrice on the door and an instant later a short figure opened the door for them.

“Oh, what do we have here? Is it little Aya I see?” Shahrazad responded overjoyed as the one who opened the door was Jafar’s daughter. Befitting of her position as a mother, Shahrazad rushed to grab the little girl’s fluffy cheeks and toyed with them.

Aya was obviously very against the gesture, but she had difficulties escaping from Shahrazad’s playful onslaught.

“Sister Aloe, help me!” The girl cried in protest, though Aloe just stood to the side and smiled at the torture session. The heavens knew she was subdued to that many times when she was younger.

As the little girl’s cries for help grew louder, another figure came through the doorframe.

“Dad, help me!” Seeing that Aloe wouldn’t do anything, Aya asked for help from her father.

“But of course, sweetling. Please Shahrazad, stop.” As Jafar said that, Shahrazad stood up from molesting Aya, but both gave themselves a knowing smile. Then Jafar assaulted her daughter’s cheeks.

“Nooooo!” Aya let out a guttural scream as she was betrayed by her own father.

{ · }

“Did you two need to be this forceful with her? She looks like a squirrel!” Mirah reprehended Jafar and Shahrazad once everyone had sat for dinner.

Aloe couldn’t deny that the excessive onslaught from the parents had turned Aya’s cheeks from bronze to red. And also inflamed them a lot. Yet it was sickeningly sweet for Aloe. Jafar and Shahrazad seemed to think the same as there was a smile plastered on their faces.

Aya continued to pout in anger and refused to look at his father.

“I know how Jafar is, but I expected better from you Shahrazad!” Mirah critiqued.

“In my defense,” Shahrazad put a hand on her chest, “she’s extremely pattable.”

“That wasn’t patting!” Aya shouted angrily.

“I agree. My sweetling is extremely pattable.” Jafar ignored her daughter and smiled at Shahrazad.

Mirah sighed at her daughter’s mistreatment, not knowing how to respond. Aya, on the other hand, did very much know how to respond as she began pummeling punch after punch on her father’s side. The little girl’s wild strikes did nothing but take out some laughs from Jafar. The guard was too well-built and the girl too weak to even harm him. Indeed, after a while, Aya stopped and panted in exhaustion.

Everyone at the table laughed at the child’s failure, even her supportive mother. Aya pouted harder in response, only highlighting the redness of her cheeks even more, though her gesture was interrupted as her stomach grumbled.

“Can we eat?” The little girl’s eyes were redirected to the full table.

“Yes, I think it’s time. Otherwise, Dad may do more bad things.” But before Mirah finished her sentence, both Aya and Jafar were munching on the food, prompting another sigh from the housewife. “Every day like this.” She commented to Shahrazad.

“That’s good.” The other mother smiled.

“Good?” Mirah frowned. “This chaos?”

“A lousy house is better than a silent one,” Shahrazad responded with a hint of melancholy.

“Ehm...” Mirah didn’t know how to respond. She was now thankful that Aya and her husband were too focused on eating to hear Shahrazad. “I... I guess you are right.” She added warmth to her smile, trying to alleviate the tension. “I’m too used to the lousiness to have it stop now.”

Aloe just tasted a bit of everything, putting meat and vegetables in equal measure on her plate, trying to not disturb the exchange.

“But enough of such dark topics,” Mirah clapped her hands to change subjects, “what is this about Aloe and the greenhouse that I heard about.”

The girl in question almost choked on her food at her mention. “Yeah, what about it?” Aloe responded between coughs.

“Well, what are you going to do with your grandfather’s greenhouse?” Mirah asked. “I know that you are hyper-focused on money so you must have a robust financial plan to get rich.”

“...I don’t?” Aloe turned ever-so-smaller and blushed.

“What do you mean you don’t?” The housewife frowned.

“I was kind of a passionate and sudden decision.”

“Oh, I need to hear the story about this.” Jafar stopped toying with her daughter and entered the conversation. “The little plant making a decision with her heart instead of her mind? That’s unheard of!”

“Oh, f-“ Aloe eyed the children at the table and held herself, “screw off, Jafar. What do you take me for?”

“A money-obsessed djinn,” Jafar responded instantly.

“A cold-hearted profit machine,” Mirah added later.

“I asked only Jafar!” Aloe added angrily. “And damn you both! Is that really what you think of me?”

“Daughter,” Shahrazad put a hand on Aloe's shoulder, “you tried to sell your father’s carpet because you didn’t like it.”

“I was six!” Aloe countered. “And it was horrendous!”

The money-obsessed djinn groaned.

“As much as I like to molest the little plant here, you surely have an idea to make the greenhouse work. Don’t you, Aloe?” Jafar shifted his expression to a more serious one, yet not completely his guard-death-stare one.

“The greenhouse allows to cultivate exotic plants unsuited to the desert, and the oasis is fertile. So rather than not making profits, it’s about not having losses. Minimizing the deficit of the enterprise until it grows sustainable. I can grow crops easily to sustain myself, and if I get my hands on hard-to-grow medicinal plants, then the money will literally grow from trees.”

“Hmm, sounds reasonable enough.” Jafar nodded. “But I feel like you are hiding something from us.”

“Ehm... you wouldn’t be wrong,” Aloe admitted. “But I’m not ready to disclose any information yet.”

“Oh~” The guard smiled at the lackluster response. “You have only increased my interest, little plant.”

“Likewise.” Her mother added. “I’m overjoyed that you are going to take care of my father’s greenhouse, but I would like to have information.”

“My lips are sealed.” At her daughter’s response, Shahrazad frowned. “Don’t put that face, Mom. I’m going to disclose information... in the future. I’m still not ready. Karaim left some notes,” Aloe didn’t explicitly mention the existence of the book yet, she had many things to confirm, “an economically viable plan of sorts, but it will take me some time to put it into motion, and I’m still not sure if I’ll find success.”

That was an outright lie. Karaim didn’t set up his ‘cultivation technique’ as a monetary masterplan, but the economic opportunities were obvious. The Aloe Veritas itself was a revolutionary discovery allowing scholars and apothecaries to instantly classify plants (and most likely also animals as it worked on humans). But Aloe was unsure if to make this discovery public, if Karaim hadn’t done so, he must have had a reason. And Aloe had some vague ideas of her own on why.

Even if she thought she should do it, which she didn’t, the scenario would need to be set carefully to present people with these magical plants. The ter’nar also included.

“Alright, I’ll wait patiently.” Shahrazad’s expression relaxed and finally put a hand on the feast.

Hopefully, no one would pry much on her grandfather’s greenhouse anymore.