Someday I'm Gonna Be With You (Carmilla One-Shots)

Who's your daddy?

Tags: Hollenstein, fluff, meet the parent, daddy, another half-assed one-shot

"Ground rules! No fighting in front of my dad, no euphemisms, no-"

"Don't worry, Cream puff; Ginger Giant and I will be on our best behaviors when we meet Papa Hollis," Carm assures her in a cheery tone--well, as cheery as she can manage--as she bumps her shoulder against Danny's bicep. The taller girl rolls her eyes but smiles nonetheless.

"Yeah. I'll keep her in check." She bends down and kisses Laura's forehead, hoping to calm the sugar-filled girl's nerves. It seems to work for the moment, as she feels her sigh and lean forward slightly before Danny pulls away.

"I really want this to turn out well..."

"So do we," Carmilla says honestly and squeezes Laura's hand to provide some form of comfort. With that, they walk up to the front door of the Hollis residence. Laura does the honors of knocking on the door, which opens only a few minutes after. A large, balding man in a lumberjack shirt accepts Laura with open arms, wrapping her in a giant bear hug. Carmilla wonders if Laura thought to bring her bear spray, because they just might need it.

"Dad! I missed you!" Laura yelps out amidst being enveloped in a crushing hug, because as it turns out Sherman Hollis is more of a teddy bear than anything remotely dangerous.

"Oh, I missed you too, sweetie!" Finally he puts her down and stands straight up to look at the two girls standing behind Laura. He sizes them up with a measured stare. Danny can't maintain eye contact for longer than a few moments, but Carmilla meets his stare with one of her own.

"These must be your girlfriends," he says with a smile, no less friendly than before he noticed them, which seems to make both Carm and Danny release a sigh of relief, not having to deal with any judgement for their "impractical relationship"--Carmilla's mother's words, not theirs. "I've heard a lot about you two."

"This is Carmilla Karnstein," Laura says, gesturing to Carmilla on her Left, "and this is Danny Lawrence." She then motions to her right, where Danny stands. Sherman Hollis nods to both of them, and while Danny gives him a nervous smile, Carmilla simply nods in return. 

"I'm glad you're able to handle this little ray of sunshine," he chuckles, and Laura blushes lightly but smiles even wider, if possible.

"Sir," Danny says respectfully.

"Oh, call me Sherman! And come inside, we can get the bags later. You all must be starving. How was the drive?" They follow him through the house and into the living room where there's several trays of food set up.

"It was alright. It wasn't too bad, since I had good company," Laura answers and grins at her girlfriends.

"We took turns driving," Carmilla says and smiles at Laura's eagerness as she gathers some finger food onto a small plate and gives it to her, and then fills another plate for Danny and then for herself before sitting down next to Laura on the black leather couch, Danny on the other side of her. Papa Hollis sits in the worn-down brown chair across from them on the other side of the coffee table. 

"Good! It's always good to be safe!" He says, gathering his own plate before settling back down, "Danny, I heard you're part of the Summer Society?"

She quickly swallows a bite of food and nods, "Yeah, I've been part of it since my first year. It's really an honor to be part of the hunt."

"Hunting is dangerous, you know. Many accidents happen while h-"

"Dad-"

"No, it's fine- we're well trained, si-Sherman. Nobody participates in the hunt without going through extensive training and testing first." Carmilla bites on a celery stick and raises an eyebrow, distinctly remembering an incident where she got an arrow to the chest. But she supposes they can overlook that little indiscretion.

"Good, good. And Carmilla, uh, you're Laura's roommate, I've heard."

"You've heard correctly. I've had a fun time making sure this one doesn't run off to save the day every time a classmate's pet snake gets stuck in a tree." She places an arm around Laura and rests her hand on Danny's clothed shoulder, scratching the fabric lightly.

"That was one time, Carm!"

"One time too many," she scoffs in return. Sherman chuckles and shoves a ranch-soaked broccoli into his mouth.

They continue eating and making small conversation. Papa Hollis asks a few questions, but nothing too pressing. Laura may have warned him that she wouldn't be happy if she had to break up a fight at their first meeting, so he's saving the hard-hitting questions for the next time they decide to visit. 

It's when Laura runs out of food on her plate that it happens. Noticing a plate of cheese and crackers in the center of the table, she says without thinking, "Daddy can you pass me the cheese tray?" 

To her absolute horror, more than one person responds. This is it. This is how she dies.

"Sure," both Danny and her dad reply in unison, both pausing in shock to look at each other. Her dad's eyes are wide and his mouth's dropped open in bewilderment, not knowing how to respond. Danny has a similar expression before she realizes what happened and hastily tries to correct herself.

"Oh sh- I swear, I thought she said Danny! I'm so sorry!" She hides her reddening face in her hands. Carmilla takes that moment to clear her throat and lean forward to grab the cheese tray. 

"I believe she was asking me," she says with a smirk and gives the plate to the red-faced cupcake. "Here you go, cutie."

"T-thanks," Laura squeaks.

It takes a good thirty minutes to get her dad to calm down and stop hyperventilating, and another ten minutes to get Carmilla to stop laughing after she was sure Sherman was okay. Honestly, this is better than Laura expected things to go.