Kyle really shouldn’t have been nervous about spending Christmas Day with Hal’s family. He’d dated women related to Wonder Woman and Alan Scott, for God’s sake, but spending the day with the Jordans — as Hal’s boyfriend and not just another Green Lantern — was putting him into a panic. He really wanted to make a good impression with them, but it still weighed on him that he had threatened to kill the family while he was possessed by Parallax.
He got along with Susan well enough and Jane was the outgoing type who liked everyone. But Jim still seemed to be uncomfortable with his brother having a boyfriend, though he tried to hide it, and Howard … Kyle sighed. He didn’t know if the boy was still holding Parallax against him, or maybe he was picking up on his father’s feelings about him, but Howard would talk to Uncle Hal about airplanes, and Uncle Guy and Uncle John about sports, but he didn’t seem to have anything to say to Uncle Kyle.
They showed up at Jim and Susan’s apartment mid-morning. The living room was a disaster area of toys spread out around the tree, with the kids happily playing in the middle of it. Jane leapt up when she saw them come in, racing over to them with a piece of paper in her hand. “Uncle Kyle! Look what I made!” She held the paper out to him. She had drawn a picture with colored pencils, a brown horse in a grassy field. “I made it with the cool art stuff you got me!”
Kyle smiled, glad that at least one of the kids thought he was cool. “That’s a pretty horse, Jane.” She beamed proudly and went back to her drawing.
“Do you like your robots?” Hal asked Howard, who was surrounded by an entire army of Transformers.
“They’re not robots, Uncle Hal. They’re Transformers. See?” He flipped the parts of the figure he was playing with until it was back into its fighter jet form.
Hal took it from him. “It’s an F-15 Eagle.”
“Starscream,” Howard and Kyle said at the same time. Howard looked up at Kyle, amazement on his face. “How do you know that?”
Kyle chuckled. “I used to have a whole collection of these. The first time they were popular.” He knelt down on the floor and picked up the yellow Camaro. “Though this guy was a VW Beetle when I had him.” He made a half-size construct of a VW Beetle transforming into Bumblebee.
“Wow,” Howard gasped, his eyes round as he stared up at the construct Transformer in his living room. “That’s so cool!”
“Time for dinner,” Hal said.
“Uh-huh,” Kyle said absently, watching Howard carefully draw Optimus Prime. They had played with the Transformers all afternoon. Kyle used his ring to make the figures move on their own, which was a lot of fun until Susan scolded him for nearly breaking a vase with a flying Starscream. Then Kyle had spotted the art set he had gotten for Howard under the tree and did a quick sketch of Bumblebee.
When he handed Howard the drawing and the boy asked if Kyle would show him how to draw like that, Kyle realized that things had changed between them, that they had found something in common. Even if it was just being nerds about giant transforming robots.
“Don’t make me tell you again, kids,” Hal said.
“Yes, Dad.” Kyle stuck his tongue out at Hal and stood up.
Howard reluctantly put the pad of paper aside. “Will you show me how to draw some more later, Uncle Kyle?”
“Sure, Howard,” Kyle said. “Anytime you want.”