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mypurp1e · 6 days ago

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lucid part three

summary: distractions. you need distractions.

relationship: Agatha x Reader (eventual)

word count: 5.3k

good to know: nothing nsfw but cut-to-black activity, side quest

note: sorry it's been a while. part four shouldn't take two months. 😅 maybe this chapter isn't where you thought it'd go, but there's a plan. i promise.

links: archive of our own | part one | part two

You may have left Agatha’s office physically, but you remained there in your head for the rest of the afternoon. Why hadn’t you just said yes when she’d asked if she should sign the form? You had to keep yourself from shuddering each time you heard your own voice echoing in your head:

They’re not about you. I just want you to know that.

You couldn’t have said anything more incriminating if you’d tried. And you couldn’t stop thinking about it. It was like the moment was on loop in your mind.

You needed to do something to distract yourself.

You asked Wanda to hang out later, but she had agreed to watch the twins she nannied, so she wasn’t available. You’d texted a few of your other friends, but everyone was busy. You’d even reached out to Vision, though, despite your desire for literally anything to take your mind off your professor, you were not all that disappointed when he said he had a chemistry lab he couldn’t miss.

You thought about going out on your own, but your mind immediately took you back to the last time—the missing journal, the panic—and your stomach turned. Going out hadn’t even been part of the reason you’d lost the journal, but they were so closely linked in your memory now that it didn’t matter.

So, you weren’t going out. But you weren’t going to go back to your dorm yet, either. It was too quiet there, despite your neighbor’s best efforts. Being alone with your thoughts right now wasn’t going to help anything.

The library was another option, but you knew you wouldn’t actually be able to focus on any sort of assignment. You opted for the dining hall. There would be no shortage of noise there, so at least you wouldn’t get lulled into your thoughts thanks to the quiet alone.

You sat for hours with only a glass of water and a bowl of cereal on your tray. Even as the crowds died down, there were still enough dishes clinking from the kitchen and conversations rumbling from other corners of the room to block out (most of) your unwanted thoughts.

When the dining hall staff started wiping down tables and flipping up chairs, you knew it was time to go. It was almost 11:00. Maybe Wanda would be back from her babysitting gig and you could go to her place.

You leaned down to grab your bag, but as you did, the sound of footsteps approaching your table caught your attention. When you looked back up, standing over you was the girl from the registrar’s office—Kate, you thought. She looked at you with a lopsided grin.

“Hey,” she said. “I’ve never seen you before in my life, but now it’s twice in one day. Must mean something.”

“Hey,” you responded with as much of a smile as you could manage with a jaw that hadn’t unclenched since that morning.

She scrunched her nose. “I’ll take that as a sign that your professor wasn’t very helpful?”

You sighed. “Not really.”

“Sorry,” she said, sympathetic. “Well, hey, would you want to come hang with me and some friends? We’re in the archery club. We’re going to go loose some arrows.”

She pointed back toward the last group of people in the room. A couple of them were glancing toward you, but the rest were busy watching one of the guys use a toothpick and a rubber band like a crossbow to hit flying gummy worms. It was not going well.

You looked back up at Kate. “I don’t know how to shoot.”

“You don’t have to,” she assured. “It’ll be really chill. And if you do get behind the bow, you’re almost guaranteed to do better than whatever’s going on over there,” she said, gesturing back to the group with a conspiratorial grin on her face.

You looked down at your bowl of half-eaten cereal—the rings soggy and bloated in the leftover milk—and thought of your empty dorm. You didn’t want to go back there. You’d spend the whole night thinking of that office on the third floor of the English building and replaying the afternoon over and over.

But, at the same time, you had no idea where else to go.

Hanging out with a bunch of strangers wasn’t the most appealing alternative. You didn’t know this girl, and you certainly didn’t know her friends. You did know, however, that at this point, they were your only sure option. At least it seemed like they knew how to fill the silence, and despite their collective interest in a potentially deadly hobby, they seemed pretty harmless.

Kate noticed the time you were taking to decide. “It’s a good way to let off steam. Seems like you need something like that.”

Your mouth tightened into a line. You couldn’t disagree. “You can’t make fun of me if I completely miss every shot.”

“I won’t,” Kate said, holding up three fingers, scout’s honor style, and trying to hide a grin.

“Okay,” you said after another beat. You took a deep breath in through your nose, and pushed it back out again, already half-regretting your choice, but trying not to show it. “I’ll come.”

Kate smiled. “Cool.”

About an hour and a half later, you were sitting on the back porch of one of the guys’ houses, having long been ejected from the game of archery knock-out you’d somehow managed to last three rounds in, and you were feeling a little tipsy. You’d shotgunned a full can of beer as required by the game when you’d been knocked out, and then you hadn’t refused the new can someone handed you as you took your seat.

By the time the game was over, after a final shootout between Kate and one of the guys (Clint, if you were remembering correctly, though it was getting harder to do that), it was well past midnight. Kate walked over, victory in her stride, and sat down on the stairs beside you. She nudged your shoulder. “Feel any better?”

Your thoughts were fuzzy, but you were still with it enough to realize you hadn’t thought about anything outside of that backyard since you’d arrived.

“Yeah. It was fun,” you said with a nod. “I’m glad I came.”

“Me, too,” Kate responded, her smile growing just a little softer. “I think we’re calling it a night. You want a ride back to campus?”

You groaned, leaning back against the stairs. “That’s so far.”

Kate laughed. “You can stay with me. I’m just down the block.”

You glanced over at her, eyebrow raised and a smirk settling in. “You invite strangers to sleep over at your house a lot?”

Kate rolled her eyes, playing along. “Only the ones I know are useless with a bow and arrow.”

“Hey,” you said, furrowing your brow. “You don’t know that I’m not good at something else.”

“Guess we’ll have to see,” Kate said with a shrug, before standing up. “Come on.”

You looked up at her for a long moment, thoughts and actions slowed by a combination of delayed reaction times and hesitation—was this a good idea? What did you know about this girl except that she could hunt you down without even trying? It didn’t really seem like she would. But she could.

When she offered her hand, though, you took it anyway.

-------

You’re back in the hallway, and you’ve been waiting for what feels like hours, because it almost has been.

You’re about to get up and leave, just like you had that afternoon, but you look toward the office door and no one comes out. Instead, you hear a muffled voice drifting out through the cracked door. You can’t make out the words, just sounds—low, rumbling, magnetic.

You hook your thumb through the straps of your tote bag, almost like you’re trying to steer yourself in the other direction, but your feet lead you to the door before you even realize where you’re going.

The voice inside is, unsurprisingly, Agatha’s, but as you get closer, you can hear what she’s reading. You recognize the words. Your dreams.

“Ask me,” you hear suddenly from inside—an interruption of the narrative. “I know you’re there.”

Your cheeks heat up—guilty for getting caught.

You put your hand on the door and slowly push it open. The room is bathed in the amber light of a single lamp. Half in shadow, Agatha sits behind her desk, heels kicked up on the tabletop, eyes still focused on the notebook in her hand.

“Ask me,” she says again, flipping the page without glancing up.

“Ask you what?” you finally choke out, your voice breathier than you meant it to be.

She finally looks up at you, and gestures you over to her side of the desk. You’re right where she wants you in an instant.

“Ask if you’re allowed to think about me like this,” she says, raising her eyebrows like she can’t believe you’d misunderstood such an obvious question.

You swallow.

“Am I allowed—”

“Ah—” she stops you, closing the notebook with a clap and bringing her feet down from the desk onto the floor. “On your knees.”

You drop to your knees without a second thought. Your head is level with her thighs, but you know you’re supposed to be looking her in the eye.

“Am I—”

She reaches out and puts two fingers under your chin, stopping you this time without a single sound.

“Say my name.”

“Agatha,” you say, “am I allowed to think about you when I—”

“Hey,” a voice cuts in, ringing—bright and warm—around the small space despite it being just a whisper. Not Agatha’s. She’s still looking at you expectantly from her chair.

“Wake up,” the voice says again.

You look at Agatha one last time as her image fades and gives way to a place much less familiar with much higher ceilings and softer morning light.

You blinked slowly as your eyes adjusted to the room, having forgotten for a few seconds where you’d fallen asleep last night until your eyes landed on Kate.

“Good morning,” she said, hovering above you as she leaned over the back of the couch.

“Morning,” you said back between yawns.

“Who’s Agatha?”

You had only been half-conscious a moment ago, still in sleep’s grasp, but suddenly you were wide awake. Your eyes instinctively flicked down to the floor where your tote bag was still leaning against the coffee table, and the face that had flickered away moments earlier returned to your mind’s eye in full force. Blue eyes you couldn’t forget if you wanted to. Still, you tried.

“What?” you asked cautiously, doing all you could to keep your face from looking any sort of way.

Kate grinned, amused. “You said her name in your sleep. Whoever she is.”

“Oh,” you said, resisting the urge to sigh at yourself. “I don’t know. Must’ve been someone from a dream.”

“Were you dreaming you were in 1927 or something?” Kate teased before vaulting over the back of the couch to sit beside you—or really, on top of you, since you hadn’t reacted quickly enough to move your outstretched legs before she’d jumped. She was practically in your lap.

“Maybe,” you shrugged, hoping by claiming that nothing had stuck with you, you would be saved from the conversation.

Kate tilted her head, undeterred. “Isn’t there a professor named Agatha?”

You tried to suppress a flinch.

“Yeah, Harkness, right? People drop her classes all the time.” She chuckled briefly, but then her lips parted in realization. “Is that the professor who’s giving you trouble? No wonder you’re trying to get out of there. I’ve heard she’s scary as hell.”

Your legs twitched, suddenly very aware that they were trapped beneath Kate’s weight. She mumbled an apology before lifting herself far enough in the air that you could curl them up against your chest. “Kind of, yeah.”

“I mean, she’s literally giving you nightmares,” she murmured, with a pointed raise of her eyebrow. She was clearly invested now despite your best efforts. At least she’d assumed nightmares were the problem. “Did you email her? What’d she say?”

“She hasn’t signed yet,” you said as you stretched your arms above your head, playing it off as casually as you could in spite of your racing heartbeat.

Kate snorted. “Yeah, she always gives people a hard time.”

You let out a snort of your own in turn. She had no idea.

Eager to change the subject, you stood from the couch, twisting from side to side in an awkward stretch. “What time is it?” you asked, leaning toward your bag to fish out your phone. Kate had hers in easier reach.

“It’s about eight thirty,” Kate said, before locking her screen again and looking up at you. “Want some breakfast?”

You shook your head. “I should go. I have a nine A.M.”

“Oh, okay.”

You looked over just in time to notice her face falter, but only for a second.

“Thanks for letting me stay,” you said.

Kate shrugged it off. “Like I said—no big deal. Got a whole house here.”

You peeked in your tote bag to check its contents, and when you saw that you had everything, you shouldered the bag and stood from the couch.

“Hey,” Kate said quickly. You turned to look at her, still in her pajamas with a grin planted on her face. “Do you want to trade numbers? I mean, I can let you know if the club has another hang. Work on your aim.”

“Oh,” you said softly. The idea hadn’t really crossed your mind, but maybe it should have. “Sure.”

Kate held her phone out to you, contact page at the ready. You put in your number and handed the phone back.

“I’ll text you,” Kate assured.

You nodded. “Thanks again,” you said, before walking toward the entryway.

You took a last look over your shoulder as you opened the door and found Kate watching you, the same little grin stuck on her face. Your lips twitched upward quickly in her direction before you stepped out into the gray November morning, closed the door, and tried to figure out which way would take you to campus.

-------

Your morning and early afternoon were, thankfully, uneventful. You went to class, took notes, responded to some texts from the friends who had bailed on you the night before (with good excuses, but still).

Kate had texted, too, just like she promised, but beyond the little preview Hey, it’s Kate! Just… you hadn’t read it. Some piece of you wasn’t ready to open it.

But aside from that, things almost felt normal. Almost.

You were still tempted to check around every corner, and you were still compulsively touching the notebook in your bag before you left a room. But… progress. Right?

After your afternoon seminar, you thought seriously, for the first time, about going back to your dorm. You needed a shower and clean clothes—your shirt smelled like day-old anxious sweat and a bit like the beer that had run down the side of your pierced can during the game last night.

But you didn’t. You weren’t ready to be that alone yet.

Instead, you went to the student union, took a table, and pulled out your laptop to try to get some work done. You didn’t do much with all that was going on around you, but at least the constant chatter seemed to neutralize anything else that tried to come to the surface.

Around six, you got a text from Wanda.

Dinner?

You responded almost immediately.

Yes, please. Anywhere. Your choice.

You ended up at a diner about half a block from campus, one that still had a jukebox that hadn’t been updated since the 50s, but that was the way the owner (and Wanda) liked it.

Wanda was already there when you arrived, and her face contorted with barely-disguised concern as you approached.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?”

You’d done what you could in the restrooms throughout the day—straightening your clothes and splashing water on your face—but you clearly weren’t fooling her.

“I’m fine,” you nodded. “Just a weird couple of days.”

She tilted her head, unconvinced but silently telling you to go on.

You gave her a sanitized version of the last thirty-six hours, with no direct mentions of Agatha. It was just forms. Office hours. Bows and arrows. Beer. Sleeping on the couch of a girl who maybe seemed like she might like you—though you were never good at telling those things for sure.

“She could’ve just been being nice. I did probably look pathetic in the dining hall like that,” you finally finished and took a long sip from your glass of water.

Wanda looked at you thoughtfully from across the table.

“Do you like her?”

You shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“You should go for it,” Wanda said before taking a bite of her veggie burger. “I mean, you haven’t seen anybody since…”

She trailed off, but you knew what she was referring to. You and Wanda had been friends, then a little more then friends in the pre-Vision days, but now, you were back to just being the kind of friends who didn’t sleep with each other. You knew sometimes Wanda thought you might be a little hung up on her, but you’d rather she think that than admit to the crush on your professor, especially now that it had taken such a weird turn.

“No, not since,” you said, shaking your head. “Maybe I will. I mean, she seemed nice.”

“Nice is good,” Wanda agreed, her eyebrows raised and her voice pitched up half an octave higher than usual, but she didn’t say anything more about it.

When you finished your meals, you paid the check, partly because it was your turn and partly because you felt bad making her listen to you talk about yourself for as long as you did. You walked back together and parted ways at the campus gate—you to go back to your dorm, and Wanda to go to her off-campus apartment.

Wanda stepped forward and wrapped her arms around you in a hug.

“Get some sleep, all right?” she said as she stepped back to stand at arm’s length. She kept her hands on your upper arms, though, and squeezed them briefly in emphasis. “And a shower.”

You chuckled. “I’ll try.”

Seemingly satisfied, she let go of your arms, and gave you a small smile. “See you later, detka,” she said before turning and walking away.

You watched her until she disappeared, putting off what you’d been avoiding for as long as you possibly could.

You sighed.

It was time to face it.

You walked back to your dorm building and up to your floor. When you unlocked your door you just stood for a moment, not even turning on the light.

Maybe it wasn’t so bad. Maybe you’d been psyching yourself out.

But almost instantly, you were hit with the flash of scene. You. Agatha. That very room. The bed you didn’t sleep in last night.

It wasn’t a real memory. It was from a dream. One you’d written down months ago and forgotten about until just now.

Fuck.

You dropped the bag to the ground, then grabbed for your shower caddy and towel and backed right out of the room, prepared to take the longest, hottest shower of your life.

-------

You’d told Wanda you would try to sleep that night, and you did, but sleep wasn’t coming.

Even after you showered long enough to turn your fingers pruny and your skin raw from scrubbing under hot water, and after you’d changed into your comfiest pajamas, there still couldn’t relax.

It had been hours since you’d returned from the shower, and you’d busied yourself with tidying up the room, trying here and there to read something for one of your classes, but never managing to get past the first page.

Around ten, you finally decided to try getting in bed and just letting the day come to an end. You turned on an audiobook and let it play low from your phone, hoping it would lull you toward sleep without letting your mind slip to other places, but you hardly registered any of the narrator’s words. Instead, you found yourself standing at the front of an empty classroom yet again, feeling the weight of the journal as Agatha placed it back into your hands.

You flipped onto your stomach and reached out to grab the phone. You’d been trying to avoid it, the mindless scrolling, but it wasn’t like laying in bed in a futile attempt to sleep was doing you any good.

You liked a few Instagram posts before turning your attention to your email. Seven new messages had apparently arrived since your last check.

You opened the app with a sigh, preparing for a wave of ads with emojis in the subject line, and that was mostly what you found.

But then you stopped scrolling.

In the middle of the gradebook updates and messages from the same brands as every other day, you saw it.

From: Agatha Harkness

Subject: Office hours tomorrow

Last chance. Won’t be in on Friday.

-AH

Sent 20 minutes ago.

You resisted the urge to bite your lip, which was still a little sore from how much you’d worried it lately.

It was hardly anything. Two sentences, barely. Clear as could be.

And yet, you were staring at it, in bed, at almost midnight, like you were trying to crack some ancient code.

Why was she sending emails at almost midnight? Was that normal for her? You’d never noticed when her class emails went out. You’d emailed back and forth with her a few times earlier in the semester, too, and never noticed anything that had arrived this late. But maybe you’d seen them in the morning and just assumed that’s when they were sent.

If it were any other professor, you’d assume they were extending that they’d maybe just forgotten to send earlier in the day. But no. Agatha didn’t do courtesy. But if it wasn’t just a reminder (as if you could’ve forgotten), what was it?

If you squinted hard enough, it almost read like an invitation. Maybe she was taunting you. Daring you to come to office hours again just so she could watch you walk out with an unsigned withdrawal form for a second time?

Or maybe she just wanted to torture you. She knew—she had to—how far under your skin she was. Maybe she was using it as a way to punish you. Keep her in your thoughts until you broke down, like you weren’t already halfway there all by your own doing.

If that was the case, she was probably enjoying it, too.

You pressed the Reply button and watched as your cursor began to blink at you, but what were you going to say? Thank you?

With a forceful swipe of your thumb, you left the app.

You weren’t going to respond. Anything you could say would feel like a confession you weren’t willing to make, because yes, you were thinking about her. And no, it wasn’t because you got that email. But also, yes, you were thinking about her because of that email and… is that what you wanted? It would be almost impossible not to ask.

A notification badge on your home screen alerted you to one unread text, which you were suddenly very grateful for. Whoever sent it, it didn’t matter. You knew it wouldn’t be Agatha.

When you check your message threads, you realized the unread message was the text that Kate had sent you that morning. You’d meant to come back to it, but clearly you hadn’t.

Hey, it’s Kate! Just making sure you had my number. Text whenever.

You ran your tongue over your teeth.

It was well past the time that you should’ve been responding to a text like that. New friends didn’t just randomly text each other at midnight for no reason. You knew what it would suggest if you replied, no matter what you said.

Hey :) Thanks again for last night. Guess I can cross playing knockout with the Westview U archery team off my bucket list.

You sent the message off, but your fingers were still poised over the screen—hesitant to type even though you had your next text drafted in your mind, as if your first response hadn’t been enough.

You doing anything now?

You sent it. You didn’t really expect her to answer. But to your surprise, she did. Almost immediately.

Nothing. You?

You swallowed, your throat drier than usual, before replying.

Me either.

Three dots appeared and then disappeared and then reappeared again and again before her response came through:

Wanna come over?

You let out a shaky breath.

There it was. The invitation. The implication of “Yes, I want you.”

That was what you’d asked for, right?

Still, you took another second before tapping out your response, like maybe time would reverse itself if you waited long enough to hit send.

It didn’t, so you watched as the tiny Delivered notification appeared under your message:

Yeah, I’ll be there soon. -------

In the morning, you woke up in Kate’s bed. The room was unfamiliar at first, but you were starting to get used to the smell of the house—something like blackberries and vanilla, maybe.

Kate was still asleep beside you, face soft and hand outstretched in your direction.

You sighed as a heaviness settled into your chest, from where, you weren’t sure.

You slid out from beneath the covers and walked as quietly as you could into the attached bathroom, gathering your discarded clothes as you went. You weren’t surprised by what you saw in the mirror—eyes half-cracked open, lids still heavy with sleep, a bruise clinging like a shadow to the side of your neck. You splashed some water on your face to try and revive yourself before getting dressed.

When you walked back into the bedroom, Kate was awake and looking at you from the bed with a satisfied, sleepy grin.

“Morning.”

“Morning,” you mumbled, feeling leagues less bold than you had the night before.

She stretched her arms above her head, and the comforter slid down to expose more of her chest—not for show, just with the carelessness that came with the haze of the first few minutes of the day. “Did you sleep okay?” she asked with a yawn.

“Yeah,” you said, nodding. “How about you?”

“Pretty well,” she said before snuggling back into the covers. “I hope I didn’t snore or anything.”

You chuckled once through your nose. “I didn’t hear anything, if you did.”

Your eyes scanned the room, and, over in the corner, half-hidden under a chair, was the jacket you knew had been flung somewhere shortly after you’d gotten there. You crossed the room to pick it up.

“You’re really the get up and go type, huh?” Kate asked, sitting up a little straighter against the pillows. She was teasing, but you could sense something very careful at the edges of her voice.

You hesitated before replying, and you wondered if Kate noticed.

You shrugged, but offered a sympathetic quirk of your mouth. “I have class.”

Maybe at this time a couple of weeks’ time, you wouldn’t be able to say the same thing, but you still had a few hours to make that decision. Either way, you’d said you’d be in class that morning, and something was keeping you from going back on that.

Kate folded back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the bed. “If you wait for me to shower, I can drive you. I have my shift in the office a little later, anyway.”

“That’s okay,” you said softly. “I should probably get back so I can grab a change of clothes and my notes.”

Kate responded with a grin, but you could feel disappointment permeating the room. She pulled on an oversized t-shirt from a dresser drawer before turning back to you. “Well, I’ll walk you out.”

You walked downstairs together in silence, and you picked up your winter coat from where it hung haphazardly at the bottom of the banister. You put it on, then fished your hat and gloves out of the pocket to put them on too.

When you turned around, you realized Kate had opened the door so quietly that you hadn’t even noticed. You followed her outside.

She leaned against the side of the house. You wondered how she was standing in the cold in that thin t-shirt; you were shivering in your layers. “Text me if you want to hang out again,” she said.

You nodded. “I will.”

She hesitated for a moment, but then stepped forward to adjust your cap. It wasn’t romantic, but it wasn’t nothing.

“Bye,” she said, once she’d determined the hat was positioned just right.

“I’ll see you,” you said, nearly in a whisper.

You could feel her watching you as you walked down the path to where it joined the sidewalk, but you didn’t look back, like if you didn’t you could forget what you were walking away from.

Last night had been good. It had. But it hadn’t done what you’d hoped it would.

Even after everything, you’d woken up with someone else’s ghost lingering from yet another dream.

It wasn’t Kate’s fault. You wanted to say it wasn’t yours either, but that would feel like a lie. You knew what you were stepping into when you’d left your dorm last night, and you knew this was a possible—likely, even—outcome.

Still. It would’ve been so nice if a switch just flipped inside of you somewhere and you could leave the ghost behind. But, unfortunately for you, it didn’t seem to work that way.

You were only a few houses away from Kate’s—you could still probably see her front door if you looked over your shoulder—when you had the distinct feeling that you were being watched.

When you looked up, what you saw stopped you in your tracks.

The ghost herself.

Standing in the driveway you’d be crossing next was your professor—long hair free around her shoulders, wearing just a tailored coat and slacks—nothing more suited for the weather. You couldn’t see her eyes clearly from your distance, just the idea of them, but you could picture them—blue like flame, and they bored into you just the same.

You tried to think of something to say, but your mind and your mouth were not cooperating, which was probably a good thing. Who knew what would come out.

Instead, you just stood there, eyes locked on her and hers on you.

After a few long moments of nothing, Agatha’s eyes flicked, just for a second, behind you—at Kate’s house. She knew where you’d come from; maybe she’d even watched you walk out the door and let Kate, barely clothed, fix your hat. No doubt, she would be able to fill in the blanks herself.

You traced her face for any sort of reaction—surprise, confusion, disdain, even just recognition. But all you saw was absolute indifference.

Without so much as another glance in your direction, she opened the door to her car and climbed in.

You didn’t move. Not when the door thumped shut. Not when the engine revved to life. Not even as she backed out of the drive and disappeared in the direction that you now knew would take her to campus where she’d teach the class you said you’d be in this morning.

Of course, this was how your day was starting. And you weren’t even on campus yet.

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