Chapter 200 - Artem - Parties
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Artem
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October was proving to be very busy for us. Not only did all of the adoptions get approved, but five of the children had birthdays this month. Some of them have already had birthdays that have passed, and we celebrated them when it happened. For instance, Cohen turned eight and Gil turned nine in September, Leslie turned thirteen, Benton turned nine, and Marcus turned ten in August.
This month Dalton was turning seven, Timothy and Kevin were turning nine, Ricky was turning eleven, and Julian was turning fifteen. That was a lot to prepare for, and all of their birthdays were within a week of each other from the nineteenth to the twenty-third. Ricky and Leslie actually shared the same birthday, and they talked about that a lot.
Same as we did for the others, we were going to hold a party for them. There were more than enough people here at the house to fill out the ranks for the party, but we also invited the kids that they were meeting around town. After the adoptions had been finalized, they started to go to the charter school.
All of the boys started to make friends right away. The prejudiced ways of thinking had not clouded everyone in the pack, the children were all very welcoming and receptive to the new boys in school. There wasn't even name calling or weird looks about the fact that there were a few of them the same age and very clearly not related by blood. Instead, all the other kids in the third and fourth grades all thought it was cool.
Even Julian was coming into his own as he attended school for the first time since he was really little. He and Nico were there to keep each other company and help each other navigate through it all. Nico hadn't been as small for his age as the others had been, and he was now growing into a man that resembled his brother a lot. Julian was still small and slender, but he was growing more everyday now. And he had heard that there were going to be clubs for the school on his first day. That had made his eyes shine brightly. I couldn't be happier with how well things were going for my boys.
With friends for all fourteen boys, we weren't leaving Nico's friends out of this, we scheduled the party for the last day in the lineup, and the only day that fell on a weekend for the birthdays. Since it was so close to Halloween, we made that the theme of the party, and everyone was allowed to wear a costume. This wasn't just going to be the first time most of the kids had a birthday in a while, it was also going to be the first time that they ever had a Halloween party.
Star, Chay, Ella, the triplets, Vivian, Mom, and Aunt Criztie were going a little overboard with the decorations and cooking aspects of it all. I thought it was amazing to see how much effort they were putting into this. Not to mention how happy it was making them.
All of us guys were helping the boys with costumes since the women were busy with everything else. The costumes that they wanted varied by wide margin, but we were managing it. There were some that wanted to be a character from a new TV show that they liked, others wanted to be a book character from the series that they had gotten into when they learned to read more. And others wanted to be different animals or dinosaurs since they were still discovering their interests.
We were all going to make the costumes out of different materials that we could buy over in the city, but Aaron told us that as long as we could show him a clear and precise image of what we wanted, he would make it out of magic.
That then started a several hour process of us looking up reference material and images of the costumes in question. Some of them didn't have a good enough picture so we were forced to draw them by hand.
Kent was a wonderful artist so he did everything he could to make sure that the pictures he drew for the kids were spot on and perfect. Aaron had been impressed about the level of expertise that they had been drawn with and the beauty of the drawings themselves.
Using the references that Kent had provided Aaron was able to help us make very interesting and extremely lifelike costumes for the boys. They were all very excited when they saw them after school the day before the party.
Once the party was all set up and ready to go, it was easy to see the excitement on the faces of all the boys. Only a few of them were having their birthday celebration, but all of them were part of the Halloween party and that helped to make them all feel special.
There was Halloween themed music and lots of themed foods and candy galore. There wasn't anything at this party that wasn't following the theme of Halloween, well except for the large banner that proclaimed who we were celebrating the birthday for. And even that banner had been done in black, orange, purple and green to fit the theme.
A few dozen kids from the elementary, middle, and high schools all showed up for the party. Most of them showed up with their parents as well, obviously the younger ones wouldn't be dropped off at a strange house and just left there.
Just seeing the surprise and shock on all their faces when they saw the house filled me with joy. A lot of the kids were wolves from the pack in the city, but some of them were kids from the pack right here in town. I liked that too, getting the packs to intermingle; that would help with interpack relations in the future.
"Hey there, Artem." Will, the Alpha of the Crescent Moon pack in the city came walking in with a young man that was about Julian's age. "I didn't think that I would be seeing you under these circumstances."
"Hi Will, it's nice to see you." I grinned and shook his hand as we greeted each other.
"So, I hear that this party is for your boy. Mind explaining that one to me." He was laughing as he eyed me.
"Well, I have thirteen boys and one on the way." I grinned at him and he interrupted me before I could add anymore.
"Either you're older than I thought. or you've been fathering kids since you were five."
"Hey, don't make me younger, I would have been eight since I am about to turn twenty-four next month." We laughed together. "But no, they're adopted. All the boys that had been abused in the pack. My mate and I wanted to give them a proper family so they're ours."
"And one on the way, does that mean the missus is expecting?" He was grinning. "Where is she? I would love to meet her."
"She's over there with Cohen and Dalton." I pointed to my beautiful Star who was giving a radiant smile.
"She certainly is beautiful. I'm happy for you, Son." He clapped me on my back and grinned again. "I was heartbroken for you when you told me what happened over here, and I would have given you all the support you wanted to claim this pack. You didn't need it though, did you?"
"No, all was good with that."
I watched as Will's son spotted someone across the room and hurried over. He went straight to Julian and the rest of the boys that were from their class.
"That's my middle boy, Spencer. He's been telling me all about the new Cooper kids that started school recently. I'm happy you're all doing so well."
Shortly after that, the party games started in various parts of the dining hall. There was music playing so kids were dancing all over the place. There were younger kids running through the halls laughing and giggling. It was perfect. Seeing all of this made me want to host parties more often. Maybe we could start doing a monthly pack party so the kids and adults could get to be on better terms with each other. It's possible that seeing their kids be so free and happy would help them as well. And since everyone who had actively taken part in the abuse of the children had been banished from the pack, there was nothing to worry about anymore at all.
All of us might have gone a little overboard with the presents for the boys. And add to that, they got gifts from their guests as well they all had a lot to open. That took a while, but everyone was a good sport about it. And when it came time to blow out the candles on the multiple cakes (each birthday boy got his own to go along with the big cake) the whole party sang to them. I was happy to see that everything was going so well. I couldn't have asked for a better turn out for their party.
And when it came time to put the kids to bed, a lot of us needed to carry the younger boys to bed since they had partied themselves into sleep. I could still hear some of the guests leaving too, saying their goodbyes to the others.
"I'll come back to hang out soon."
"You should come to my house too."
"Let's play video games next time."
"That was awesome; see you on Monday."
Seeing things as they were now, it made me know even more that I was doing the right thing with these kids. I could never have abandoned them, and I couldn't have lived with myself if I hadn't saved them all. This was what I was meant to do. This was my purpose as an Alpha.