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Donald hadn’t remembered the last time he had felt this comfortable. His weary body sank blissfully into the cushions of the couch, to the point he was almost able to ignore the dull throbbing still present in his body. He wasn’t sure which aches were from the island, the battle or from his crash a few weeks prior. All he could tell you was they faded pleasantly in the background of his subconscious for the time being.
He blinked rapidly a couple times to keep his vision from blurring, but he knew that it was a futile effort at this point. About twenty minutes ago he had stopped actively participating in the conversation around him, content with letting everyone else's excitement buzz around him. He was vaguely aware that Dewey was bouncing on the cushion beside him, possibly regaling the tale of their most recent battle, with his own exuberant flare, but Donald’s mind was unable to register any of the young duckling’s words to keep up.
His eyelids became heavier with each blink, and he knew it would be in his best interest to bid his family goodnight, and make his way to his hammock, but the thought of getting up from his spot on the couch to make his way all the way to the houseboat seemed ridiculous.
The next blink had left him surrounded in darkness. It took him a moment to process that it wasn’t his mind wasn’t playing tricks on him, and that the living room was now deserted and dark. There was no sign of the others, so Donald was left to assume that sometime after he had dozed off, everyone else soon followed. A warm weight on his body told him someone had even gone the extra length to find a blanket for him before retiring themselves. Warmth blossomed into his chest at the gesture.
Donald debated whether or not he should make his way to a proper bed (he was sure his neck wouldn’t be too thrilled with him come morning) but he ultimately decided that it wasn’t worth his effort. He was ready to drift back into sleep when he heard a soft sound by the doorway.
He didn’t have to turn his head to know what it was, he had eleven years of knowing what webbed feet padding against the ground sounded like. Donald let his eyes drift shut just as the pair of feet stopped before him. He wasn’t a stranger to the boys finding their way into his bed after a rough night, so when he felt a weight settle beside him on his left he wasn’t startled in the slightest.
Nor was he when a few moments later a second weight joined him on his right. He only grunted slightly when the third decided to climb on top of him, leaving him a bit winded. Donald took a brief moment to adjust for the new weight on his stomach, before lifting both his arms slowly to let the other two ducklings into his arms.
Donald felt, rather than heard, the collective sigh of relief from the triplets before they nuzzled their beaks into his feathers. For a brief terrible moment of doubt, he had wondered what his place would be in the boys lives now that Della had returned. He had never planned on taking the chance for Della to be their mother away from his sister. There was a reason he had always been firm in his decision to remain Uncle Donald to the boys, despite being their sole parental figure for almost eleven full years. A part of him had been absolutely petrified that with his sister back the boys wouldn’t need him anymore, and in that brief instant when his uncle had let him know that they hadn’t realized he had been missing, he had almost believed that his worst fear had become reality.
But no, with Louie settled in on his left, his hand holding Donald’s uniform shirt in a vice grip (as if his uncle would disappear if he let go), Dewey loudly snoring into his ear from his place on Donald’s stomach, and Huey nestled so deeply into Donald’s right, the older duck was sure he was going to have a beak print come morning, Donald knew that no matter what changes would come, he still had a place in his boys lives.
What Donald didn’t notice, once he drifted back into a content sleep, was his sister returning with a second blanket in her arms. Della quietly padded towards her brother and her ducklings, determined not to wake any of the sleeping forms (though she felt that if an earthquake struck the manor right then, the four of them wouldn’t even budge) and quietly draped the second fleece over them. She glanced happily at her four boys, and leaned in to kiss them each on the head before making her way up the stairs to her own bed.
Della hadn’t remembered the last time she had felt this comfortable.