Heron Lake Plateau Long in the tooth but harmless as can be

He smiled a little at Quixote's comment, not denying it.  Yeah, that was about right.  Honestly... he'd kinda expected it to stay the way it was.  He'd jokingly commiserated about the lack of non-family options before, but he'd expected to spend the rest of his years playing uncle, brother, packmate, and everything but romance.  Niamh had come out of nowhere.

He supposed he should probably start with explaining why, since Quixote seemed pretty confused by the switchup.  He woulda talked about it a while ago, but he hadn't really had a reason to.  "A couple years back, I met a girl.  Name was Nell, which she said wasn't short for anything, but, well.  Bein from my family, I'd give her shit about it constantly."  He'd come up with some pretty good alternatives, and it became a sort of game.  "And bro, she flipped everything.  Suddenly I wasn't roamin, and I started thinkin about kids.  Kids.  Before her, I'd barely stuck around a girl long enough to know her name before.  So definitely never that shit."  He looked down.  "She was gone before we could make good on it though.  Bout a year ago.  I don't think it was karma, she was too good for any of my past shit to touch her.  But I just... I see a girl, and I can't get Nell outta my head.  A guy like me can't be that happy once, let alone twice.  Right?"

Finally he looked back up at Quixote, and as if realizing how heavy what he'd just asked was, smiled apologetically and shrugged.  "If you don't got any advice that's alright.  It's my own damn fault for bein so likeable, really."  The joke didn't quite reach his eyes, but it helped some.