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sleepless-in-starbucks · 4 years

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Pointless Pining (makes for the best love stories)

Ao3

Summary: Sure, Roman could tell aur squishes that au was in love with them. There was even a fairly good chance they’d return the sentiment! But there was also a chance (however small) that they would say no, and well... Roman didn’t want to take that risk. Content: Mutual pining, oblivious pining so oblivious it’s ridiculous (but true!), swearing, referencing making out, running away from family events to avoid said family, confessions, kissing (not on the lips); everyone’s non-binary except andy who’s male (cis or trans, reader’s choice), aro!roman, implied aro!logan + aro!remy Pairings: QPR rolosleep, romo anxton (ts shorts anxiety [Andy] x Patton) Notes: For easy reference, Roman’s pronoun set is au/aur/aurs/aurself (based off of the periodic table element name for gold, not the term for alternate universes), Logan’s is ja/java/jav/javs/javaself (based off the coding language, not coffee), and Patton’s is dai/dais/daiself Also! this fic is dedicated to my wonderful qpps, @lo-gayn and @bitchy-sleep ! i adore them with all my heart, even if I wasn’t very helpful with the getting-together part of our relationship. this one’s for you, loves <3

Roman had an amazing, spectacular, flawless plan.

“This is a horrible idea, dude.”

Some people just refused to understand aur brilliance.

“You know, this is why I don’t talk to you.” Roman said matter-of-factly, ignoring Andy rolling his eyes as au compared two dresses in aur mirror. “Now just tell me which red goes better with my eyes.”

“How would I know? Unlike some people, I don’t spend all day looking into them.” Andy huffed, reclined out on Roman’s bed. “I don’t even know why you’re asking me for help with your clearly doomed plan.”

“I’m asking you because it’s you or Patton, and dai’ll just ignore my dress question and focus on the reason for the dress instead, and you know what dai will say then.”

“To get over yourself and stop ending up in fanfic-esque situations with your squishes because you’re a hopeless pining mess who refuses to open your eyes to the reality that they want to be your partners as much as you want to be theirs?”

Roman turned from the mirror, frowning at Andy. “Well dai wouldn’t say it so rudely.”

Andy just shrugged. “It’s the truth. The sooner you accept it, the sooner I can stop dealing with this bullshit.”

A gasp of faux offense sounded in the doorway, and Roman groaned at the same time Andy perked up, pushing himself into a better sitting position.

“Language!” Patton scolded, though dais words had no heat to them as dai smiled and joined Andy on the bed. Well, joined Andy on his lap, a move that the punk didn’t argue, even as his cheeks turned a rather vibrant shade of red.

“Sorry, Pat.” Andy mumbled as Patton innocently wrapped dais arms around the back of his neck and leaned against his chest. Roman rolled aur eyes. Andy could act as intimidating and tough as he wanted, but as soon as Patton was within eyesight, he melted.

“It’s no problem, an-dorable.” Patton said. Andy just blushed harder and Roman sniggered, amused. That was the wrong thing to do, however, as it drew Patton’s attention onto aur and aur dresses. “Oh, those are some nice outfits, Ro. What’s the special occasion?”

“None! Nothing!” Roman said hastily, quickly moving over to aur closet and tossing the two options back in haphazardly. Two weeks au had kept this a secret, and au refused to be found out now. “Just… showing off some of my wardrobe to Andy.”

Roman didn’t need to be facing Patton to know dai didn’t believe that, and au could practically hear the frown in dais tone as dai responded, “Are you sure? Those are some of your favorite dresses, you don’t normally take them out without a reason.”

“And I had a reason! Showing them off to Andy!” Roman defended, looking at Andy slightly desperately. “Right, Andy?”

Instead of providing Roman with the save au needed, however, Andy glanced at Patton before shaking his head. “Au’s got a date.”

Patton’s eyes lit up at the actual answer, distracted enough by it to not notice the rather violent motion Roman made at Andy. Andy seemed unconcerned and unthreatened, only smirking rather self-satisfiedly at the gesture.

“You finally asked them out?” Patton said excitedly, continuing on before Roman could continue, “This is great, Roro! You should definitely go with the scarlet dress, then- it’s just perfect for a first date-”

“It’s not a date!” Roman interrupted, stopping Patton’s words immediately.

Dai blinked twice, looking confused. “But Andy said it was.”

“Sometimes Andy lies.” Roman muttered.

“Not this time.” Andy spoke up, ignoring Roman’s glare. “I don’t care what you want to call it, dude, but it’s very clearly a date.”

“Those were some pretty nice dresses you were considering Roman.” Patton added. “Not really what you’d wear out casually.”

Roman sighed and glanced back at the dresses au had crammed back into aur closet. “Then maybe I’m just being too dramatic in my choice in attire.” Au mumbled to aurself, trying not to feel too disheartened. Au did like wearing those dresses, and any excuse to do so was one au’d always jump at. It’s not like au wanted Logan and Remy to see aur wearing one of them. Not in particular, anyways. That would be silly and blackmail material, and despite aur sibling’s sweet exterior dai was more than willing to work with blackmail.

Shaking aur head to focus back on the issue at hand, Roman once more faced Andy and Patton. “One of Logan’s relatives is having a birthday dinner, and Logan invited me and Remy to come and stop java from being forced to only interact with jav family for two hours. It’s not a date, just friends helping friends.”

“Ja literally invited both of you to dinner at a fancy restaurant for the express purpose of spending the night talking and dining with you two.” Andy said, repeating the same thing he had said only a few minutes ago, albeit then with more swearing. “It’s a date.”

“I have to agree with Andy here, Ro.” Patton said, once more smiling excitedly.

“You always agree with Andy.”

Patton waved dais hand dismissively. “You were clearly picking out date clothes to go out to dinner with your squishes. It’s a date.”

Roman sighed, moving over to aur desk. Au almost slumped into the chair before deciding the queer choice was to hop on top of the desk and sit there. “Just because it meets the criteria of a date doesn’t make it one.”

“If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck-”

“-then maybe you’re just shit at identifying waterfowl.” Roman cut Andy off, ignoring Patton’s reprimand of ‘language!’. “Besides, dates are for people in love with each other. One-sided pining doesn’t count.”

At that statement, Roman was met with twin stares of disbelief.

“Really, Roman, I thought you would’ve gotten over this by now.” Patton said after a moment, tone lightly scolding.

“My pining…?”

“Your belief that it’s one-sided.” Patton corrected. “It’s very obvious, I’m not sure how you’re still missing it.”

“Just because you guys think it’s obvious-”

“Logan has literally told you ja’d be open to being in a QPR with you.” Andy cut aur off, disbelief now mixing with frustration. “How much more obvious do you need?”

Roman looked away, focusing on a wall. “It was late when ja said that, I’m sure ja didn’t mean it.”

Andy scoffed. “It was four in the afternoon.”

“That’s… kinda late.” Roman said, well aware aur tone wasn’t quite as confident as it needed to convince Patton and Andy to drop the matter. “And that’s just Logan, nothing about Remy.”

“He is literally always flirting with you.”

“Remy flirts with everyone.”

Patton shook dais head. “Remy only really flirts with two people, Ro, and she’s made out with one of them plenty of times.”

“Logan and Remy’s snogging is purely platonic.” Roman dismissed, wrinkling aur nose even as au said ‘snogging.’ Au wasn’t a fan of the word, but au preferred it to some of the other more creative terms au could’ve gone for.

Au left out the part where au was fairly certain it wasn’t purely platonic. There was only so long you could try and live in someone’s lap before one emotion or the other got wrapped into the mix, in Roman’s opinion.

“You’re really just going to ignore all of the evidence they like you back.” Andy said slowly, as if hoping that Roman would correct him.

But all Roman did was smile at him and cheerfully say, “Yep!”

Andy tossed his hands up into the air, flopping backwards on the bed, Patton giggling as dai fell over with him. “I give up. You’re impossible and refuse to listen to any and all logic.

“I listen to Logan!” Roman defended in amusement. “Ja’s the only one I know with a fully functioning braincell, after all.”

“And yet, you refuse to listen to Logan when ja says ja wants to be your partner.”

“Technically, ja just said ja’d be alright with the idea of it, not that ja wanted things to be that way.” Roman corrected, slipping off aur desk and moving towards aur dresser. “There’s a difference.”

“You know, you don’t have to have Logan confess to you first.” Patton pointed out, snuggling dais head against Andy’s shoulder. “Sometimes you just have to read the signs and make your move!”

Roman chuckled. “Patton, you asked Andy out within a day of knowing him. Your advice hardly applies here.”

Patton pouted. “I think it applies here!”

“You’re just refusing to read the signs, Roman.” Andy added, wrapping a hand around Patton’s back and kissing dais forehead. “It worked out pretty fucking well for Patton, after all.”

Roman didn’t respond immediately, waiting for Patton’s ‘language!’ exclamation, only to find it not coming, Patton much more distracted by curling against Andy’s chest. Roman smiled a bit at that. “Well, I am Jared, 19.”

“You’re embarrassing yourself, that’s what you are.” Andy replied. Roman bit back a ‘when do I not’ and focused on shifting through the clothes in aur dresser. Only a moment passed before Andy asked, “What’re you doing?”

“Picking my outfit for tonight.” Roman answered, pulling out a pair of aur black jeans, one of the pairs that hadn’t faded to grey yet. Au dropped it on top of aur dresser and moved on to finding a shirt.

Shuffling on the bed indicated to Roman that Andy and Patton must have sat up, likely to try and see what clothing pieces au was choosing. They didn’t say anything, however, until Roman pulled out two shirts and turned back towards them, displaying aur choices. “Which one do you think goes better with my eyes?”

Patton frowned. “From fancy dresses to jeans and t-shirts? That’s a pretty steep de-escalation, Ro.”

Roman shrugged. “Well, if you guys thought the fancy dresses were for a special date, I don’t want Logan and Remy to feel I’ve made any false assumptions as to our relationship and the purpose of tonight’s outing.” Au said, smirking at the look of shock and annoyance on Patton’s and Andy’s faces, respectively. “So. Which one goes better with my eyes?”

“You’re a moron.” Andy told aur before nodding his head at the shirt in Roman’s left hand. “That one.”

“Thank you!” Roman responded, turning back towards aur dresser and dropping the one Andy had indicated back into the drawer, putting the white tank top covered in sparkly golden dots of varying sizes with the jeans.

Andy groaned. “You know this is a date, no matter how hard you try to sabotage it, right?”

“Nope!” Roman replied, scooping up aur choice in outfit and snagging aur red hoodie off the floor before heading towards the hallway. “I’m going to get changed. If you two are still here when I get back, I’m going to raid Patton’s stash of hidden cookies and give them to Logan’s family.”

Patton squinted at aur. “You don’t know where my stash of cookies is. They’re hidden.”

Roman chuckled as au stepped out of the room, heading towards the bathroom. “If you say so, Pat.” Au called over aur shoulder, confident in aur belief that Andy and Patton would be gone before au had even changed aur shirt.

After all, there was only so much needling Roman could take, especially when it was in relation to aur squishes. Aur squishes who didn’t like aur back, Patton and Andy’s opinions aside and ignored. Roman might be aro, but au was still the expert on love, and au knew in-love people when au saw them. Logan and Remy loved Roman as a friend, and that was it.

And if Roman was wrong, well… it wasn’t like au was ever going to confess anyways.

Roman arrived at the Sanders household ten minutes early, having walked from aur house with the intent to hitch a ride with the family to the dinner. The driveway had a couple more cars in it than usual, and the out-of-state license plates some of them had confirmed Roman’s suspicions they were Logan’s visiting relatives’ vehicles.

Au didn’t bother with the door, cutting across the yard to the side of the house and slipping down and through the low-set basement window that had been left open for this exact purpose. Though the window was more commonly used as a way to escape the house, Roman and Remy often helping to pull Logan out so that they could go star-gazing when they all should’ve been sleeping, it served the purpose of avoiding strangers and prying questions equally well.

Roman landed well, rocking on aur feet slightly to keep aur balance as au glanced around, looking for aur friends. The basement was a small affair, with one side taken up with Logan’s bed, dresser and desk, and the other with a bathroom and an old washing machine that no longer washed clothes but did occasionally hold the elements of Logan’s various experiments. That made it easy to spot Logan, who was sitting on jav bed and reading, so absorbed in jav book that ja didn’t notice Roman’s entrance.

This gave Roman the perfect opportunity to be gay without java noticing.

Because Logan, of course, had already changed for the dinner; jav regular nerdy t-shirt and jeans had been replaced with a simple, knee-length dark blue dress, the top half layered with white lace that outlined constellations across Logan’s chest. Jav hair was held in a loose ponytail by a silver ribbon, and matching star clips held back jav bangs. Ja looked gorgeous, and in that moment Roman wanted nothing more than to kiss jav forehead.

But then Logan looked up from jav book and the moment was over.

Ja spotted Roman quickly, offering aur a smile as ja slipped jav bookmark into place and put jav book to the side. “Hello, Roman!”

Roman smiled back, trying to push aur thoughts away. “Heya, specs. How you doing?”

“I’m alright.” Logan answered. “My relatives still remember the elephant toothpaste incident from last year, so they’re wary of coming down here and bothering me.”

Roman chuckled at the memory of said incident. Despite requesting that ja be allowed to spend jav birthday as ja wanted, Logan’s parents had called jav relatives down for the day and planned a party around them being there. So Logan threw some water, soap, yeast, and hydrogen peroxide into a box and set the concoction up to make a mess of the stairs leading to jav room as soon as someone opened the door.

Ja had escaped out the window after that, where Roman and Remy had been waiting for java to join them. The three of them had spent the day wandering the town, avoiding Logan’s searching family and doing whatever caught their attention. They had ended the day with the greasiest food from the cheapest fast-food joint they could find, eating it on top of the long-closed arcade and admiring the view of their town at dusk.

Logan had been grounded for two weeks afterwards, but ja always held that it was worth it for what had been the best birthday of jav life.

Roman was pulled out of aur recollections by the sound of a door opening. Looking up, however, Roman realized it wasn’t the door to the basement, but instead the bathroom door.

A second later and Remy emerged, dressed almost opposingly to Logan’s style and yet still looking just as stunning. Like Roman, he was wearing jeans, but hers were torn up and well-worn. He was also wearing a black crop top, a fishnet shirt doing a poor job of covering up the rest of her upper body, not that Remy seemed to care. His jacket was slung over her back, his sunglasses were resting in her messy brown-and-pink hair, and his easy confidence in her look were only adding to the rising blush Roman was trying to fight off.

“Finally decided to join us, babes?” Remy teased, seemingly oblivious to Roman’s gay panic.

Roman cleared aur throat and tried to be oblivious to it too. “Excuse you, I’m ten minutes early.”

“Yeah, but I’ve already been here for hours.” Remy complained, dropping down next to Logan on the bed dramatically. “And I’ve only had one cutie to gaze at the entire time! Not that ja isn’t certainly a very gorgeous cutie-”

“Remy’s been helping me ensure no one tries to bother me before I’m stuck at a table with them.” Logan explained, cutting Remy off and ignoring his pout. “She’s been here since my first relative showed up around one.”

“Over four hours of just you two chilling down here?” Roman confirmed, smirking as au did so. “Wonder how you spent that time.”

Logan frowned at Roman in disappointment. “I mostly spent it reading and ignoring the annoyance.”

“Mostly?” Roman repeated, smirk growing at the light blush that entered Logan’s cheeks.

“Well I couldn’t exactly be reading for every single second of those hours-”

“What Lolo means is that I’m not as annoying as ja pretends I am.” Remy cut in, throwing an arm over Logan’s shoulders and leaning against java. “And that I have very nice lips.”

Logan’s blush turned a deeper red as ja swatted at Remy, pushing her off of java. “You are as annoying as I say you are, and you’re a bitch.”

“But you still kissed meeeeee.”

“I will shove you.”

“Ah, come on, you know you love me-”

Roman didn’t bother trying to stifle aur laugh as Logan made good on jav claim.

Remy, for his part, didn’t seem put out, only looking up at Logan from her new position on the floor, slowly shaking his head as she said, “Cold, Lo, cold.”

“I do run a temperature lower than the average human, though I do not see how that could be relevant here.”

Remy pushed himself up, climbing back onto the bed and immediately slotting herself against Logan’s side, resting his head on jav shoulder and wrapping her arms around jav waist. “Because if you don’t have me warming you up, you could freeze! So you really can’t keep shoving me off of you.”

“That’s illogical.” Logan pointed out with a roll of jav eyes, but ja made no move to get Remy off of java.

Roman tried to find the best, least awkward way to stand, considering au was near the middle of the room and the only other people in it were cuddling. A small part of aur considered joining them on the bed, maybe even leaning against Logan aurself and joining the cuddles, but the possibility of it being weird or disruptive to the nice little thing Logan and Remy already had was too high to risk, so au remained rocking on aur heels, glancing at aur watch and wondering how close they were to go time.

The door at the top of the stairs opening and Logan’s mother yelling down about how they were about to leave and Logan needed to get upstairs answered Roman’s question for aur.

“Remy, please let go of me.”

Remy made an unhappy humming noise and didn’t move.

Logan sighed. “I can’t get up if you don’t let go of me.”

“Then don’t get up.” Remy murmured back, clearly content to skip out on the dinner and spend the evening with just Logan instead. It was a sentiment Roman seconded, if only in aur mind.

“I don’t want to be grounded again.” Logan replied.

Remy sighed, sounding greatly annoyed, but he finally did as Logan asked, letting java go and standing up. “Can I at least hold your hand?”

Logan stood up after her, only taking a second to think before ja nodded and offered Remy one of jav hands. Remy smiled brightly, taking the proffered hand and nearly pulling Logan towards the door.

He was stopped by Logan’s refusal to move too far, turning back towards Roman instead and holding out jav other hand.

“Coming?” Logan said simply, and after a moment that stretched longer than it probably should have, Roman nodded, hesitantly taking Logan’s hand. Logan’s fingers wrapped tightly around aur own, the gesture warm and sweet, even if Roman only had a moment to appreciate it before Remy was once more tugging on Logan, now dragging both java and Roman along with her up the stairs.

Roman allowed aurself to be pulled along, using that time to try and decide if au should ignore the warmth blooming in aur chest or savor it.

Dinner went just about exactly how Roman had expected it to go. Logan’s relatives tried to talk to java, aur and Remy deflected their questions away, the relatives asked them questions instead, Logan helped deflect those, jav relatives moved back to trying to question java, the cycle went on until they were halfway through dessert. Roman was just thankful most of the relatives allowed themselves to be deterred from their interrogation-style inquiries.

There were some positives as well. The three of them had secured one of the table’s corners, Logan seated between Remy and Roman to further block javaself off from jav family. In that arrangement, it was easy for them to duck over and talk to each other, keeping their conversation separate from the rest of the table’s.

And that was how they had spent most of the dinner, talking amongst themselves, trying to muffle their laughs as Logan made particularly scathing remarks about jav more despised relatives and they discussed where they’d all prefer to be. When their food arrived, they traded bites of their meals with each other, using the opportunity to mock each other’s taste with grins on their faces. That particular activity got some of Logan’s relatives looking at them funny, but Roman just shrugged it off as none of them knowing what having genuine fun with one’s friends looked like.

It was at the end of dinner, when Logan’s family was waiting on the bill and discussing what to do with the rest of the evening, when Logan excused javaself to go to the bathroom. Ja patted Roman’s and Remy’s shoulders as ja stood, clearly wanting to make sure they didn’t forget the plan.

Roman knew au certainly hadn’t, and a glance at Remy’s smirk proved she hadn’t either.

A couple of minutes after Logan’s departure from the table, Roman feigned interest in aur phone, acting as though au had gotten a text. Au then stood up, thanking the collective Sanders for inviting aur to dinner and explaining that aur ride was there and it was time for aur to head home. Au brushed off their confusion at thinking they were the ones taking aur home easily, and slipped away from the table before they could figure out something was amiss.

Au smiled when au found Logan in the lobby, looking only slightly worried over the idea that one of jav relatives might catch java trying to get out of any more family interaction time. Ja smiled when ja saw Roman, however. “Took you long enough.”

“I believe it was you who said if I left too soon after you they’d be suspicious.” Roman replied, matching jav smile. “Why, miss me?”

“Always.” Logan said almost immediately, and Roman fought off a blush at the single word. Au and Logan were close friends, and had been like that for a while. Cheesy lines like that were relatively common between the two of them; it didn’t mean anything else.

Roman cleared aur throat. “Do you want to step outside? Remy might take a bit, depending on whether or not he decides to make a scene, and I don’t want to be too close if that happens, do you?”

Logan chuckled. “Certainly not.” Ja replied, moving towards the double doors of the restaurant and holding one of them open for Roman.

Stepping outside, Roman took in a deep breath of the cool evening air, preferring it to the overwhelming smell of various foods that had wafted throughout the entire restaurant. Logan came to stand beside aur only a second later, and Roman directed them both to the side of the restaurant, where they could wait discreetly for Remy to join them.

“So,” Roman started, not wanting to spend the entire time waiting in silence, “scale of one to ten, how has your evening been so far?”

Logan considered the question for a moment before responding, “An eight, I’d say.”

Roman’s eyes widened a bit. “That’s pretty high, all things considered.”

Logan shrugged. “Being around my relatives is always an atrocious affair, but having you and Remy around helped a lot. It was much more manageable with you two.” Logan glanced at Roman for a moment, expression unreadable, before focusing jav gaze back out on the parking lot in front of them. “I always enjoy being around you.”

“We’re around each other a lot.” Roman pointed out quietly. Au wasn’t sure what point au was trying to prove, but au wasn’t quite sure what point Logan was going for either.

“I suppose so.” Logan murmured, though it sounded more like a filler phrase than anything else. Silence stretched between them after that, and Roman didn’t feel like au should break it.

It was eventually broken for aur by Remy sprinting out of the restaurant, spinning on his heel as she got outside, stopping when he saw Logan and Roman.

“Hey, darlings! We gotta go!” She called out, grabbing their attention as he gestured for them to come join her. “Unless you want this whole plan to go down the drain, anyways!”

“I knew he should’ve snuck out before me.” Logan said, shaking jav head even as ja smiled and started to run after Remy, Roman right behind java.

Remy didn’t start moving again until Logan and Roman were close, close enough that he could grab their hands. As soon as she had them, he took off again, weaving between the cars fast enough to hopefully throw off anyone who might be at the restaurant entrance now, trying to spot them.

Soon enough they were out of the restaurant’s parking lot and on the sidewalk, racing down it as fast as they could. Remy still held their hands, her grip tight and warm, while he constantly checked around them, looking for something or another. Suddenly, she skidded to a stop in front of an alleyway.

“You guys want to see something awesome?” Remy asked, glancing between the two of them as he asked.

Roman fought off the urge to respond ‘I already do’ as au looked at Remy, flushed from the running but grinning as well, looking a wild sort of beautiful. “I’d love to.”

“I certainly don’t have a better way to spend my time.” Logan said.

Remy’s grin only grew. “Great.” She said, right before starting to run again, pulling them into the alleyway. They allowed themselves to be led as he ducked between different alleys and slipped between spaces Roman felt they weren’t meant to slip through, only letting go of Remy’s hands when she released them, coming to a stop in a small, unusual clearing.

The spot Remy had finally stopped on was a ledge of cracked and jagged concrete, the broken concrete spreading out in a circle to fill the small area they were in, most of the space around them walled off by buildings built right next to each other and rusty chain link fences. Crumbling dirt sloped down against the concrete, making a small crater within the border of damaged rock.

In the center of it all was a pond. It wasn’t very large, the crater itself only being three or four yards wide across, but it was well-sized. The surface of the water was pretty with the sunset colours playing across it, but it was clear enough for the group to see down into it. The dirt in the pool was awkwardly packed, leaving it deep in some spots and shallow in others, but amongst the layers Roman could just make out little creatures swimming about.

“I stumbled into this place a couple of days ago when I was bored and wandering.” Remy explained while Roman and Logan leaned closer to the pond, both interested in the animals moving within it. “I think there was some construction mishap that made the crater, and they were too lazy to do anything to fix it, so they left it as was. Over time, it collected rainwater, and-”

“Are these tadpoles?” Logan interrupted, looking up from the pond to meet Remy’s eyes instead.

A broad smile broke across Remy’s face. “Far as I can tell, yep. Saw a few fully grown lads hopping around yesterday, too, though I don’t know if we’ll see them today.”

Logan smiled at that, jav grin somehow bigger than Remy’s as ja quickly turned back towards the pond, leaning even closer to look down at the tadpoles. “Wonderful.” Ja said, under jav breath, looking completely absorbed by the animals.

Roman forced aurself to stop admiring Logan and go back to watching the tadpoles before au was caught, but in aur opinion, the former view was much more incredible than the latter- and the tadpoles were pretty incredible.

“Tonight just gets better and better, huh?” Roman said, the comment technically directed towards both Logan and Remy, but given that Remy seemed to have become distracted with one of the fences, only Logan really heard it.

“Indeed.” Logan agreed, glancing away from the pond to look at Roman. Ja was still smiling brightly, jav entire face lit up and expression excited and happy. Roman couldn’t help but smile back, though aurs was softer, a product of Logan’s excitement, not aur own.

“You look lovely.” Roman said, out of the blue, not entirely sure why au had spoken. It was true, yes, but Roman tried to mostly internalize those thoughts. “Your, uh, your dress, I mean. It’s very lovely- you wear it very… lovelily.”

Logan laughed softly, a beautiful sound that Roman was absolutely in love with (almost as much as au was in love with Logan). “Thank you.” Ja finally said, with a small smile that seemed even more meaningful than the grin ja had been wearing a moment ago. “You wear your outfit very nicely as well.”

If Roman hadn’t been blushing earlier, au certainly was now. “Thanks.” Au mumbled, glancing back out at the pond to avoid Logan’s gaze. Au had the distinct feeling that if au looked too long au might say things they would both inevitably regret.

“My entire family thinks we’re together, you know.” Logan commented idely, ignoring the way Roman jerked at jav words. “Or me and Remy are together. Or you and Remy are together and I’m just third-wheeling. They’re too uptight to accept polyamory’s existence or it being valid, but if I did I think they’d assume we’re all together.”

Roman forced a laugh. “Amatonormativity’s wild.”

“It is.” Logan said, but it was offhanded. “Though I admit, all their conversing on the subject around, and sometimes to, me has… confused me a bit.”

“Holy shit, Lo, don’t tell me you think you’re allo.”

“Wha- no, no Roman, I’m still aromantic.”

“Oh.” Roman said lamely before frowning. Au was looking at Logan now, but jav expression was once more unreadable to aur. “Then what’s up?”

Logan laughed nervously, taking jav turn as the one awkwardly watching the pond instead of the other. “Do you recall, a few months ago, when I told you I would be amicable to the idea of us entering into a queerplatonic relationship?”

“Would I forget?”

“You have the figurative memory of a goldfish so, yes, you would.”

Roman chuckled. “Alright, you got me there. But, yes, Lo, I remember.” Au answered directly, hoping au just imagined the shake in aur voice.

“When I told you that, it was because I felt I was- so to speak- in possession of equal platonic and queerplatonic feelings towards you. I did not mind being your friend, nor would I have minded being your partner, because both made me perfectly happy.”

Roman hummed when Logan paused, trying to show au was paying attention without risking something as embarrassing as a voice break.

“Now, I feel as though I still hold equal platonic and queerplatonic feelings towards you. But I’m… uncertain as to which I should be having. I have always been content with considering us to simply be friends, but the words of my family have forced me to take a closer look at what our relationship is, and I feel as if I must reconsider that view.”

“I’m… not sure I completely follow, Lo.” Roman said hesitantly, trying to crush the unsteady flutter of hope in aur chest. Logan was talking about confusion, not making a confession.

Logan took a deep breath before ja turned from the pond to look directly at Roman. “I believe if our relationship continues as it has, sooner rather than later, I will no longer fully feel content to be your friend alone, and instead wish to also be your… your partner.” Jav gaze dropped down to the ground between the two of them. “That is, if that has not happened already.”

Oh. So it was a confession.

Roman didn’t say anything, feeling speechless and breathless all at once. Logan took the unmoving stare and lack of response poorly. “I apologize if you do not feel the same, I truly do not completely expect you too, I do not want to hurt our friendship with my assumptions-”

“No! Logan, no, I-” Roman paused to take a breath, trying not to focus on Logan’s wide-eyes from aur sudden yell. “Oh, gosh, you’re going to hate me.”

“I find that doubtful.” Logan replied evenly, now tilting jav head on its side in curious bewilderment. “Why do you think I would hate you?”

Roman ran a hand through aur hair, looking away from Logan as au did but turning back towards java when au spoke. “Your feelings are completely requited.”

Logan’s eyes widened again, this time in surprise. “You mean-”

“-And they have been for several months.” Roman added, interrupting Logan.

“Since I told you I would be alright being in a QPR with you?”

“Since, uh, since a couple of weeks before that.”

“Oh. Oh!” Logan said, moving from processing to what Roman could only describe as delight. Ja was smiling again, almost giddily, pressing one hand over jav mouth to try and stifle jav laughter.

“Well, now, that’s just rude.” Roman teased lightly, feeling rather giddy aurself. They had both just admitted they wanted to be the other’s partner, after all, so surely that meant-

“I assure you, I’m not laughing at you, just-” Logan laughed again despite jav words, and when ja leaned forward Roman realized ja had scooted closer to aur, jav forehead landing against Roman’s shoulder as ja laughed in a way that suggested less humor and more joy. Roman’s heart soared. “You’re very cute, Roman.”

Roman grinned like that was the best thing au had ever heard even as aur cheeks flushed crimson. “You’re cuter, angel.”

“Ah, petnames.” Logan said, tone warm and content and happy. “Love, dear, darling…”

“Your love, your dear, your darling.” Roman corrected softly, feeling bold. It immediately paid off as Logan tried to press jav face further into Roman’s shoulder, trying to hide the blush Roman knew was covering jav face. “My cutie.”

“Your cutie.” Logan echoed, sounding lovestruck even in just those two words.

Roman pressed a kiss to the top of Logan’s head, smiling growing as Logan giggled. “My cutie, my angel, my beloved, my Logan.”

Logan only giggled more, and Roman beamed, entranced by the sound and more than willing to listen to it for the rest of aur life. “My Roman.” Logan managed to say between jav giggles, oblivious to the bright red flush that had taken over Roman’s face. Au pressed aur head against the top of Logan’s, not necessarily to hide aur blush so much as to be even closer to Logan.

“Please tell me this is what it looks like, because babes, if I have to go one more day watching your sorry asses pine over each other like you’re the only people in the world I’m going to lose it.”

At the sound of Remy’s voice, Roman turned aur head to face her, refusing to remove aur head from on top of Logan’s. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Rem, we’re just two bros pressed up against each other like bros do.”

“Ha ha.” Remy dropped down beside the two of them, flicking some rust off of his nails. “I still can’t believe it took you two five months, a frog pond, and me looking away to finally admit you’re queer as hell for each other.”

“The best things take time.” Logan murmured. “Though, I admit, I would have liked to have been doing this five months ago.”

“Well, maybe if you had admitted you wanted to be my partner earlier, we could’ve gotten here sooner.”

Logan lifted jav face from Roman’s shoulder to level a sweet but disappointed expression at aur. “That is exactly what I did.”

“Yeah, but you said you could go either way.” Roman pointed out, tone light and joking. “You should’ve known that wouldn’t be enough confirmation for me.”

Logan let out a small laugh, shaking jav head, but the look in jav eyes was only fond. “You’re an idiot, love.”

Roman just grinned. “Only because you keep hogging our shared braincell.”

“You can’t be trusted with it.” Logan replied, returning jav head to Roman’s shoulder, seemingly content to leave it there for as long as ja could. “But that is alright, my dear. I will keep it safe for you.”

“Thank you, my angel.” Roman responded, trying and failing to ignore how hot aur cheeks were. There was a simplicity and ease in calling Logan aurs that only confirmed to Roman that this- that them- was always meant to be, but that didn’t make aur immune to blushing about it.

“You two are cute.” Remy commented idly, leaning forward to rest her chin on Logan’s shoulder. Logan didn’t react, clearly used to the motion. “Does this make me a house-wrecker, now?”

“I don’t think you can wreck a house that has only just existed with past actions.” Logan stated thoughtfully.

Roman grinned over Logan’s head at Remy, the solid thrum of adrenaline from one successful squish-turned-partner making aur bold. “Can’t wreck a house you’re a part of, either.”

Though Roman knew Remy would never admit it, his cheeks dusted pink at Roman’s suggestion. “Funny, sugar, very funny.”

“I would not necessarily assume that Roman’s suggestion is meant to be humorous.” Logan said, which Roman could tell made Remy only blush more. “I cannot speak for aur, but I will say that I certainly wouldn’t be opposed to being in a partnership with you as well, Remy.”

“Three is my favorite number.” Roman added, wrapping an arm around Logan’s back to grab one of Remy’s hands.

“You two are going to get me confused.” Remy complained, though she squeezed Roman’s hand, using the grip as an excuse to wrap his arm around Logan’s back as well. “I hope you’re ready to deal with the consequences of that.”

“I’d be more than happy to.” Roman assured her, not bothering to stave off a giddy smile at the thought of having two wonderful partners.

“Indeed.” Logan added, shuffling a bit and forcing Remy to lean closer against java. Remy laughed at the action, but didn’t say anything, only leaning forward to kiss Logan’s cheek before settling down against jav side.

“Well, now, that’s just rude.” Roman teased, getting Remy’s attention. “Don’t I get a kiss too?”

Remy grinned. “Anything for you, hun.” He responded, careful to not crush Logan as she leaned over java and kissed Roman’s cheek. He laughed when Roman’s flush immediately renewed itself, even darker this time. “You knew that was coming.”

“That doesn’t make me prepared!” Roman replied, trying to sound indignant and knowing au was failing horribly. It didn’t help when au impulse shifted over so that au could kiss Remy’s forehead before she could get fully out of range, making it Remy’s turn to blush.

“Oh, that was mean.” Remy mumbled, but given the colour of his face and the slightly strangled way she spoke, Roman got the feeling he didn’t actually mind it much at all.

“Mhmm.” Roman hummed disbelievingly before moving to kiss Logan’s forehead as well, giddy with the knowledge that this was just a thing au could do now.

Logan reacted to Roman’s kiss faster than Roman had expected, leaning up to kiss the tip of aur nose before au could pull away, smiling at Roman. Roman smiled back without a thought. A glance up revealed Remy was smiling softly at the two of them as well, becoming even softer when she caught Roman’s gaze and smiled directly at aur.

Roman reveled in the moment, feeling as though au had never been warmer despite the chill the evening brought with it. With both aur squishes- with both aur partners- held close, Roman felt as if nothing could ever top this moment.

Now all au had to do was make sure Andy and Patton never found out about it.

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beyondthetemples-ooc · 3 years

Text

I... legitimately don’t know if I can imagine life with a service animal. Or therapy animal, as the case will hopefully be.

(tl;dr I’m bewildering myself with the thought of having a bird that Reacts to My Emotional State as an adult who’s still learning how to cope with their emotions. I’m remembering Fizzy and Chuck and I just miss them so much...)

I’ve had to endure so much alone.

It wasn’t until... 3? 4? years ago that I had people in the physical world to hug me. Or at least, had them while also having the courage to admit I needed a hug. ...Well, I had my mother for the short year we were living together, but that was only one short year, and now I’m back to seeing her maybe once a month. She’s great for listening and encouraging, but she lives so far away-- she can’t be there when it’s happening.

I mean, I had online friends who would listen and empathize and gave me love in the ways I needed to stay sane through it all. But I could only ever talk about it after I’d figured it out myself, because putting words to Big Emotions has always been hard for me.

I have very dear friends, a qpp, and a girlfriend who would all do their very best to be there for me, I’m sure of it. (Before we were dating, I once called my girlfriend in the middle of a desperate panic attack because Stomach Condition and Emetophobia, and she talked with me for... gosh, was it two hours maybe? But now she has a job and school and I don’t know how to talk about my emotions out of the blue.)

My psychiatrist has said she’s willing to write letters for my animals being Emotional Support Animals, but we’re not sure, since I have 4 diamond doves and 2 chinchillas, how that would work with so many...

But they’re not trained animals. The diamonds that I didn’t raise from peeps barely tolerate my hands, in fact Soda is still very afraid of my hands after years of gentle attempts at exposure. The other two will tolerate my hands, but never seek out interaction in any way besides singing and cooing. They don’t enjoy being pet and they definitely don’t want to cuddle.

I’m very bonded to my chinchilla Dusty, but he only Responds to my emotional states, and usually in very quiet watchful ways, rather than active preventative ways. When things are calm, he’ll come check out what I’m doing for thirty seconds, and then he hops away to do his own thing. If I’m upset, he just goes very still and Pays Close Attention to me, but again: he doesn’t want to cuddle.

Chuck was the only chin I’ve ever had that actually WANTED to cuddle. He would chill out and sit in my lap while I watched a movie and sometimes even explore the house with me, but he isn’t here anymore.

I love them all dearly, but I also dearly miss the way my ringnecks would actively seek my interaction. Fizzy especially... He was the one who would follow me around, and come sit on my shoulder if he knew I was upset, and preen my hands gently and coo at me until I calmed down, at which point he’d fly off as if to say “My work here is done”.

I haven’t had him for... at least ten years now. And I’ve kinda gotten used to quietly struggling through my depressive and phobia episodes without that calming, grounding, giggle-inducing outside force.

I just wonder if, when I’m ready for a pigeon, a properly domesticated animal with Socializing With Humans in their genes... What will it be like when they start Noticing when I’m Upset? What will it feel like to cuddle a bird that really wants it again? To have that comfort In the Moment that some problem or other overtakes me and starts pulling me down? What will it be like to have someone right there, right then, reminding me “It’s okay, I love you”, without me having to gather the strength to reach out first?

#rhs personal posts #rhs pet adventures #rhs pondering pigeons

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let-me-vibe · 4 years

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Tell us about Hearth

You've made a mistake

Okay, so here's Hearth. He's my baby and I'd die for him. Also this will include Magnus Chase spoilers, so watch out for those.

Hearth, or Hearthstone of House Alderman, is an elf that lives in Alfheim, one of the nine worlds. I learned two languages for him, and I used to read this series every night and sign out his lines. The other language was a dead language I taught myself. I bought runestones for him and learned how to do magic. I need help but also I regret nothing.

Okay so Hearth was born deaf to his shitty parents, Alderman and Greta. You know how everyone in Shu's life treats him like shit because he's a heteromorph? Yeah, everyone hates Hearth because they're ableist shits. Except for his younger brother, Andiron.

Fun fact: an andiron is a pair of metal bars that supports the hearth. An alderman is a wealthy and cruel businessman, also fitting Hearth's father. I love their names.

Well when Hearth was eight and his brother was seven, they went out into the forest to play by a well. Hearth was stacking rocks, so when a brunnmigi (big creature in Norse mythology that pisses in wells for reasons I forget, they also used this name for foxes) came out of the well and killed Andiron, Hearth didn't notice until it was too late.

So obviously since people already hated him, his parents were even worse now, and they forced him to skin the beast after Alderman killed it and wouldn't let him inside until he was done, and then they made the skin into a rug for his wergild, or blood debt.

These bitches outright told my boy that he should have died instead of Andiron, and gave him rules to earn money. That money would have to cover the rug, or else his brother couldn't have a peaceful afterlife. So he made, say, ten coins for every chore he did. And then he lost maybe fifteen for every hour of free time. Meals cost money, water cost money, sleeping with decent bed fittings cost money. I'm very fucking mad.

So he ran away to another world called Niflheim, where he met his best friend, Blitz. I headcanon them as QPPs. They were both unhappy with where they were at in life, so they went to a talking head named Mimir. Hearth could either become abled and return home, or learn magic. My boy picked magic like an icon.

This did make it so that he and Blitz had to work for Mimir though, and they watched Magnus for two years while he was out on the streets. I'll shut the fuck up now, I apologize, oh my god. I didn't even start the actual plot.

#mun #👁👄👁

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incorrectsanders · 5 years

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wait, the babies had separation anxiety?

The babies had separation anxiety!

Virgil is the one who set it off. When he was younger, he had really bad separation anxiety. He could hardly stand being away from his dad, and he had to go to therapy because of it. It eventually went away, but then when he was adopted by Thomas it came back because he was terrified that something would take Thomas away from him. He had to go to therapy again for it.

When he left Thomas’ house and moved in with Logan, Patton, and Roman, it started coming back again. He noticed little things; how he didn’t want to leave home, how he’d get upset if he was away from all of them for more than a few hours, how the littlest mention of a business trip had him straining for breath.

And then one day Roman mentioned that he was going on tour for two months. Virgil broke down in tears. All three of them had to hold him to calm him down.

“Roman, no, please! I don’t want you to go, you can’t go, please, you need to stay here, you can’t, what if something happens, what if you don’t want to come back, RoRo, please don’t!”

After he came down from his panic attack, Logan had given him a peck on the lips.

“Why now, Kitten? Ro’s gone on tours before, how come this one is unsettling you?” He asked, letting him curl up under his chin.

“You’ve been a little unsettled by all of us not being near you lately, actually.” Patton added, reaching out to rest a hand on his arm. “Starlight, are you getting separation anxiety again?”

Virgil just sniffled and turned his head away. He didn’t want to admit it, it would only make him feel more pathetic.

“Ah...” Logan hummed in acknowledgement. “Well that’s alright, my love. We’ll fix it.”

And they did... for a while. Virgil relaxed after talking to a therapist again and relying on his old tactics... but it just wouldn’t work sometimes.

And that’s okay, his therapist had told him. Sometimes we can’t help it, you just need to work through it.

Around the time that Logan and Virgil got married, it started flaring up badly again- but then it started flaring up in the others too. They started worrying for Virgil, they didn’t want to be away from him for too long for fear that he would start spiraling again.

Then they started experiencing the same things that Virgil described.

It was bad for a while, they’d scream at each other and cry and fight because they were all so frustrated and weren’t sure how to deal with it.

“Well what are we supposed to do, Logan?! Just sit in here for the rest of our lives? We can’t be around each other all the time!”

“Look, I know Roman, and I’m not trying to keep you from going out with your friends, go! All I said was that you should call us if you start to feel anxious!”

“You’re trying to guilt me!”

“No, I’m not!”

“Please, stop!” Patton screamed, tugging a crying Virgil into to his chest.

“Stay out of this, Patton!”

Therapy wasn’t helping, being around each other wasn’t helping, taking time away from each other wasn’t helping, nothing was helping. And then the thing with Logan and the glass happened and they figured out they wanted each other as more than friends and became QPP’s.

The anxiety went down for all of them for a good while, until Logan and Virgil started expressing serious interest in adopting and their social worker told them they’d never get approved if they were in “whatever this is”.

And then it was back to the screaming and fighting and crying again.

“Why can’t you just get a surrogate?! I’ll pay- please!”

“Because I need to adopt, Ro! I’ve seen what foster homes are like, I’ve been telling myself that I’d give some of those kids a home since I was in them!”

“God, there you go pulling out every guilt card you have, ViVi! We fucking get it, you had a miserable childhood!”

“ROMAN!” Logan and Patton scolded.

It only got worse when they finally got different houses, despite being right next to each other. They went to group and solo therapy for a long time before they finally got it to settle down again. And even after that, there are flare ups with them all the time.

#not incorrect quotes #mall employee au #mall employee au drabbles

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lefaystrent · 5 years

Text

So help me, I’m not moving from this spot

Fandom: Thomas Sanders, Sanders Sides

Pairings: queer platonic LAMP

Summary: Virgil has the day off from work and chooses to spend it in true Virgil style.

Notes: I just wanted to write some qpr/qpp stuff. If you don't know, qpr stands for queer platonic relationship, qpp is queer platonic partner. While sharing some qualities, it's not a romantic relationship, but it's more than just being defined as friends.

AO3 Link

Roman came home to find Virgil lying on a pallet in the living room. As far as pallets go, this one was rather excessive. In place of where their coffee table usually sat in front of their couch, it seemed as though Virgil had taken all of the blankets and pillows in the house and made a nest for himself.

“You’re left to your own devices for a few hours and this is what I come home to?” Roman asked, brow raised comically high.

Virgil didn’t show an ounce of embarrassment, remaining in his relaxed position leaned back against a pile of pillows. He was dressed casually in his favorite hoodie and sweatpants. A bag of potato chips laid on his stomach. He lazily pulled a chip out while scrolling on his phone.

“It’s my day off,” Virgil explained.

“Have you been here since we left this morning?” Roman asked, referring to their two other partners they lived with.

“Yuh, and I don’t plan on moving from this spot for the rest of the day.”

Roman stood by the side of the pallet, surveying the pile of snacks Virgil had set nearby. “My, my, you certainly have quite the set up. But whatever will you do when nature comes calling?”

In answer, Virgil picked up and waved an empty water bottle.

“Eugh! What the hell is wrong with you, Virgil?!”

He laughed and tossed the bottle at Roman to thunk harmlessly against his chest. “Relax, Princey, I’m joking. I’ll go to the bathroom like a civilized human being.”

“Your jokes are disgusting. And here I was thinking of joining you in splendid relaxation,” Roman scoffed, stepping over Virgil to go to the kitchen. Virgil immediately abandoned his chips and phone and held up his hands in a plea.

“Wait, no, come back. I’m sorry, come lay with me, babe.”

“I don’t cuddle with heathens.” Roman turned his nose up at him and stayed his course. He could still see Virgil’s top half from the open archway that connected the two rooms. They both knew that Roman would join him in ten minutes tops, but for the moment it was enjoyable to peek at him and see the unabashed longing in those dark eyes.

“Babe,” Virgil tried imploringly. Roman ignored him in favor of making a sandwich. He listened as Virgil continued. “Babe. You just here for your lunch break?”

“No, I suffered valiantly to finish up my work early today.”

“Or you called it quits early and decided to put off the rest until tomorrow, you mean?”

Roman put a hand over his heart, gasping in offense. “Excuse you, Amy Lee-ave me alone. I work hard you know. Procrastination is more your territory.”

“Tell that to all your wips.”

The offended gasping intensified.

The next to arrive home was Patton. It’d only been a couple hours since Roman had gotten home.

“It’s not even four,” Virgil commented. Was everyone getting off work early today? So not fair; Virgil’s job never let him off early. He demanded justice.

But you know, it was kind of worth it, seeing the way Patton’s face brightened at Virgil’s set up.

“Oh my gosh,” he squealed and tossed the plastic store bags he’d been holding onto the nearest armchair so that he could dive onto the pallet, landing horizontally across Virgil.

“Pat!” Virgil grunted. Had it been Roman, he’d just be annoyed, but Patton’s giggle took all the fight in him right out. He wiggled his arms out from under Patton to lay them over his back, patting at him. “Happy to see you too, but give a dude a warning next time.”

“Sorry,” Patton replied, sounding too cheery to be taken seriously. “Oh hey, what’s Roman’s katana doing here?”

Virgil glanced over at the sword casually laying by the pallet. “Oh that? Apparently I said ‘fighting words’, so Roman had to wave that around to make himself feel better or something.”

“So he is home!” he exclaimed. “I saw his car outside, but I didn’t expect anyone else except you to be home yet.”

“Yeah, he got off early.”

“Where is he?”

“In the bathroom, probably taking a massive dump because he’s so full of shit.”

“Virgil!” Patton chided, sitting up enough to throw a disapproving look at him. “Now is that any way to talk about someone you love?”

“Who said I loved him?”

Patton frowned and just stared at him in determination.

Virgil averted his gaze to the side. “I’m a pit of darkness. I don’t feel love.”

“Say you love him.”

“Uh-uh.”

“Say you love him!”

“He’s not even in the room; why does it matter?”

Patton just stared harder into his soul. Virgil rolled his eyes. “I thought this was like, an understood thing or whatever.”

“It still makes me happy to hear you say it,” Patton said and a helpless warmth seeped into his gaze, making his stern face melt into a smile.

Virgil covered his own face with his hands. “God, you’re too powerful. Fine. I love Roman, even if he is a huge dork. I love all my QPPs.”

Satisfied, Patton booped him on the nose.

By the time Logan arrived home, Roman had begun working on dinner. Patton must have been busy upstairs, seeing as Logan didn’t spot him. Virgil on the other hand was sprawled out clear as day on a pallet in the living room floor, earbuds on and listening to music from his phone.

“No one informed me of a slumber party,” Logan commented to Roman. He looked up from his place at the stove and grinned.

“Reminds you of the old days, right?” Roman laughed in memory of their shared childhood. All of them had been inseparable even then, staying over at each other’s houses all the time. “But no, this is just how Virgil chose to spend his off day.”

“Is this because we’ve banned him from sitting on top of the fridge?”

“Heh, perhaps, but all the same he’s refused to move from that spot all day.”

“. . . not even to relieve himself?”

Roman’s eyes took on a deadly serious glint. “I made sure he went to an actual bathroom even if I had to carry him myself.”

“Good man,” Logan pat his shoulder approvingly. Roman caught his hand and brought it to his lips, the affection making the usually stoic man temporarily short circuit. Roman said something, but Logan had to blink and ask for him to repeat himself.

Roman smiled knowingly. “I’ll give you a dollar if you can get Gloom ‘n Doom to move from his sacred spot.”

“Amazing, a whole dollar? Wherever would I spend that much money?”

“Anywhere your heart desires. Possibly a vending machine.”

Logan smiled a little despite himself. “Is dinner almost ready?”

Roman absently brushed his thumb across the hand he still held. “Yes. Patton brought home stuff for pasta. Should only be a few minutes.”

“Very well.” Logan slipped away to go to the living room. He returned to the kitchen not even a minute later, expression pinched.

“Logan?”

“Hm, my first attempt proved unrewarding. I tried to tempt him with dinner, but he asked for his plate to be brought to him.”

“We could deny him, leave him to have to come join us at the table,” Roman suggested.

“Hm,” Logan hummed again, rubbing his chin. Patton popped into the kitchen. Seeing Logan there, he scuttled over and hugged him from behind.

“You’ve got your thinking face on,” Patton noted.

Roman threw an answer over his shoulder while he stirred the noodles. “He’s brainstorming ways to get Virgil to leave his pallet.”

“Yes, Roman bet me a whole dollar as compensation.”

“Just one dollar?” Patton asked. “Well that doesn’t make a lot of cents.”

Logan groaned to cover up the urge to grin. Patton just nuzzled into his neck, tickling him enough to get him to laugh.

“So why are you guys trying to get Virgil to get up?”

“Because he presented us with a challenge,” Roman said. “Plus, I go to the trouble of preparing dinner and he doesn’t even have the decency to want to join us? Rude.”

“He’s not joining us?”

“He requested for his plate to be brought to him,” Logan told him.

“Oh, well we could just all eat in the living room.”

“Seeing as we are eating spaghetti tonight, that would be ill advised. The sauce could make a mess on all of those blankets or the carpet. It would be better to eat at the table.”

“So we bring the table to him!” Patton suggested with a broad grin.

Roman snorted. “Do you think our little emo would get up then, if we set the table over him?”

“If anything, he might bite our ankles in retaliation,” Logan pointed out.

“This is too hilarious. Yes, we’re doing this. Patton, darling, the table.”

“On it!” Patton saluted and hurried over to the table.

“Patton.”

Patton froze, hands on either side of the wooden tabletop. He looked up from behind his glasses at Logan’s strict posture.

“Come on, Specs,” Roman groaned, turning off the stove and moving the noodles to a colander in the sink.

“Patton should not be moving the table like this,” Logan stated before moving over to the other side of the table to place his hands in a ready position. “It’s rather heavy and could cause strain to his back were he to move it alone. I shall assist.”

Patton beamed at him.

Virgil tensed up when a large thing moved over him. He flinched, dropping his phone and ripping out his earbuds.

“What the fuck, you guys?” he demanded as Logan and Patton moved their dining table over his spot on the floor.

“Sorry, not sorry,” Logan said. He made sure the table legs didn’t knock into Virgil as they sat it down with him directly under it. “If you insist on remaining in this particular spot, then we have no choice but to resort to drastic measures.”

“Okay, who’s idea was this?” Virgil asked. He sent an accusing glare at Patton who merely smiled at him.

“Dinner time is family time,” Patton said cheekily and bent down to kiss the top of Virgil’s head.

“I’m running away,” Virgil threatened, voice monotone.

“Falsehood,” Logan denied, bending down as well to place a kiss on his temple. “After all, you’ve sworn to not move from this spot for the rest of today.”

Virgil hated the smirk he wore when he said that.

Roman brought the food in, and Patton and Logan went back for the chairs. They began to eat while Virgil bemoaned their presence. Once he realized they weren’t going to hand him his plate, he gave up and crawled out just enough to sit up on his knees and eat at the table.

Joke was on them though, ‘cause he still didn’t have to move from his pallet.

Tag list: @spectralheartt @a-pastel-pan @notalwaysthevillian @rose-gold-roman @ijustrealizedhowdumbmynamewas @katie-the-noble-fangirl @yourroyalydramaticanxiousness @aroundofapplesauce @merlybird500 @beach-fan @jemthebookworm @whats-going-on-kiddos (let me know if you want to be added or removed from my general tag list)

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lizzieraindrops · 4 years

Text

Your chance to make the sun rise thrice (Chapter 2)

a river that still runs (8803 words)

Beth Childs has come to Helsinki to meet her best friend Veera for the first time in the Herbs on the windowsill universe, an alternate timeline where the original Helsinki massacre was prevented and DYAD routed by Clone Club Alpha’s successful publicity stunt back in 2001. Veera Suominen and Niki Lintula survived and decided to live in a little apartment together as qpp’s. Numerous Leda clones worldwide are now in contact via a secure online network that Veera maintains.

Note: This chapter is a bit heavier than the rest of the AU. Beth is still struggling with a lot of the same challenges in this universe, even if the events causing them are somewhat different because of such early canon divergence. But the whole point of this story is that things can end up okay no matter how rough it's been. She's getting the help she needs and she's gonna be alright. That said, warning for soft discussion of past abuse, the effects of trauma, depression and anxiety, and some suicidal ideation. And of course, lots of love and learning how to heal, with support from her best friend.

Fun fact: Veera's username is 3mika, and she always sets her font to the precise warm turquoise of hex color #2299aa. She thinks she's hilarious, and she's right.

Also on AO3 | Playlist | Aesthetic sideblog

Part 1: Herbs on the windowsill

Part 2: Someday colors

Part 3: Your chance to make the sun rise thrice | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

***

Beth wakes on a squashy couch that isn't hers. Morning-soft sunlight pours through the window above her, bouncing back off the walls to fill even the shady corners with a warm secondhand glow. Her limbs are soft, splayed under unfamiliar blankets and sinking into the cushions. She doesn't move yet.

The apartment. Helsinki. Beth's really here. She holds herself still, letting the truth sink into her. She half expects the usual anxious tension to clench her into a ball the instant she moves a muscle, but it isn't there. Neither is the invisible weight that so often pins her immobile. She still wakes frequently with both of them holding her body hostage, keeping her muscles unmoving but restless, even in sleep. Right now though, they're gone. She just lies there, soft beneath the window.

It's quiet but not silent. The occasional car on the little road outside chuckles as it passes. A soft rush of water echoes through pipes in the walls, running toward an early riser in another unit. These sounds fall strangely on Beth's Toronto-bred ears, isolated in the stillness of this of this little apartment on the outskirts of the city. Still, the early-morning atmosphere settles comfortably into her jet-lagged bones, murmuring a rhythm for her to sink into. The temporal upheaval of a transcontinental red-eye and a series of exhausted naps yesterday have left her a little unbalanced. And yet, here she is waking up with the day, and the ground under her feels so much more stable than she’s used to.

Beth breaks her stillness with a deep, deep breath that she can feel expanding all the way down to her feet. She stretches, too, but soon pulls the toes that get exposed back underneath the warm, scratchy blanket. The cushions of the old couch creak a little in complaint as she shifts, but her limbs remain supple. For a time, she just observes the sensations. Then, her awareness spreads beyond the couch and the window to the rest of the room.

All around her, an oddly blocky pattern covers the walls. It's one of the first things she noticed when she walked into the apartment yesterday afternoon. The pattern isn't wallpaper like it appears at first glance, but actually a multitude of small photographs. Most of them are unframed, but taped up in crisply aligned rows. In them, she sees the same face infused with a hundred different lives. Just above her, a sleeping, slack-jawed redhead with bulky headphones around her neck sprawls on the very same couch Beth's laying on now. A few rows down, a brunette and a blonde with their long hair in matching wild waves are leaning all over each other and grinning like devils. One of the few framed photos shows a girl with a hospital-short buzz cut and a delighted expression, sitting in front of what looks like a mouthwatering strawberry shortcake. Beth can see at least six others in the background behind strawberry girl. Among them are Mika with her unmistakable scars and Niki with her bright blonde hair, their arms around each other's shoulders.

Morning light glances off the glossy surfaces of the photos on the west wall. The particularly bright reflection off one of the framed photos draws Beth's eye. With a tiny jolt, Beth recognizes one of her own selfies beneath the glass. In it, she's wearing the same old turquoise blue sweatshirt that's spilling out of her suitcase next to the couch right now. Underneath it, she's wearing her track gear, so the photo is at least two years old. She'd had to quit cross-country so she could try to get the shitshow her life had become under control. She vaguely recalls sending it to Mika a long time ago. It's strange to think that her presence has been in this apartment for so long.

She's here. In Finland. Staying with Mika – Mika - and Niki. Far, far away from everything.

Sprawling on the couch she slept on with a sigh as if she hadn’t a care in the world, Beth can't believe she's really gone and done it. She's run so far away that there's an ocean between her and her problems. It’s so much better than she's dreamed, even if it's only for a little while. It’s worth it, even though she'll be going back far too soon. For the first time in years, it feels like she’s where she’s supposed to be right now.

It had all started out as foolish idea she'd floated one Saturday morning, months ago. She hadn't been serious at all. She'd woken up so relieved at not having to get up and go to work, until she remembered her weekly therapy appointment with a hopeless groan.

Putting off the genuinely daunting prospect of hauling herself out of bed, she reached out to snag her phone from on top of her dresser, checking to see if she'd heard from Mika overnight. After all, Helsinki was nine hours ahead, so Mika had already seen most of the day that was just beginning for Beth. They talked so often these days, since they'd first made contact over two years ago. Rarely a day passed without touching base. But there wasn’t anything since Beth had checked last night. She took it upon herself to send the first message of the day.

runwaterblue: god, i dont wanna get up and deal with any of thsi shit today

After her world fell apart, after finding out about Project Leda, after realizing that all her nightmares and more were real, after her father...

runwaterblue: wish i could come visit u and get away form everything for awhile

Mika replied almost immediately.

3mika: you can

It was evening in her time zone, but to be honest, Beth had no idea if she had anything resembling a regular sleep schedule. The girl was always online.

3mika: though you really should go to your appointment. you always feel better afterward

runwaterblue: howd you know i have therapy today

3mika: you always have an appointment saturday afternoons

runwaterblue: yes but how do you remember that? i cant evne remember my own appts lmao

3mika: you mentioned it months ago when you switched from sundays to saturdays

Beth shook her head with a smile. Mika was so good with details.

3mika: anyway. you’re welcome here, if you can get here

3mika: it would be great to see you

3mika: Niki wouldn't mind. we've had a bunch of Ledas visit us here, it's always fun

3mika: except that one time Dani and Ary got into a fight over football. some French-Italian team rivalry thing. that was not fun.

Beth laughed. It was funny how Mika was so good at making her do that, even on days like these. She leaned back against her pillow and held her phone over her head without sitting up, being careful not to drop it on her own face. She'd done that before. More times than she'd admit.

runwaterblue: i was kidding. id love to visit, but idk how id get there

runwaterblue: u should see the americans go off abt their football lmao. they're nerly as bad as the hockey freaks here

3mika: pls no

3mika: no more sports. it was a year ago and I’m still exhausted

3mika: sports are banned in this apartment.

Beth snorted. Mika wanted nothing to do with sports of any kind, and with Beth's athletic record, the topic had become a point of mutual teasing between them.

In so many ways, they were such different people, DNA be damned. Mika was reticent where Beth was outgoing. (Or at least, Beth had been. She was never quite sure how to think of herself these days.) Clone drama aside, Beth had been a pretty average Canadian high schooler. She got reasonable grades, played a few sports, and kept mostly out of trouble because there would be hell to pay if she didn’t. Mika was a brilliant homeschooled autistic orphan who had been raised in near isolation by her guardian after surviving the hospital fire that marked her skin for life. Beth mostly listened to pop music, and where no one else could hear, the occasional classical symphony. Mika held fast to Finland's weird obsession with death metal and dabbled in literally everything else.

And yet, Mika understands Beth like no one else does. And it's not just because they've both been through all this Project Leda bullshit. Though Beth doesn't know what she would have done without Mika to help her through that, too.

Beth won't ever be able to forget the moment that everything changed. Recognizing a her own face from the mirror on the evening news stopped her in her tracks, as something in her gut caved in with the hollow certainty that it wasn't her. Then face after face flickered before her, a flipbook barrage of déja vu. Blonde and smiling. Scarred and pensive. Braids and piercings and a rakish grin. Beth was rooted in place as people she had never been wearing things she had never worn said things she was never supposed to know.

That utter strangeness on the screen immediately seeped into her life like an oil slick into a river, tainting every thing she thought she knew with clinging uncertainty. Her father was inexplicably even more upset about it than Beth was, yet adamant that they shouldn't look into the matter. But it was already too late to stop herself from thinking. With slow horror, the truth of what exactly his behavior must mean dawned on her. And yet, even with the desperate growing certainty about who her Leda monitor must be, it was hard to believe that he could be anything other than her plain stern father.

He was always a bit strict and overprotective - probably well more than a bit, she realizes these days. But she’d thought that's just what it was like to be a cop's daughter. He'd never done anything really extreme, nothing beyond the firm discipline any kid could expect. He was just not a man to be trifled with, that was all. So until everything she thought she knew shifted that day and threatened to topple every assumption she’d built her life on, she had never truly dared to cross him.

Outright daring him to say to her face that he wasn't her monitor was probably considered a step beyond trifling. He did not take it kindly.

Two months later, Beth and her mother were living in an apartment on the opposite side of the city. It took two months for the two of them to lay plans to leave together, for good. For two months, her every move was watched. She spent two months knowing there would be hell to pay if she didn't give the performance of a lifetime pretending everything was fine, even while sirens blared inside her day and night. Two months was more than enough to teach her things she never wanted to know about the hidden marks fear leaves on the body.

Even after she finally escaped, her life was in tatters and nothing made sense. It wasn’t just the sudden jarring discovery of Project Leda, or the crisis it had forced her to confront. It was learning that, deep down, she had known that she’d never once felt free. She’d unconsciously kept herself from knowing to avoid exactly that conflict of wills that she’d known she would lose.

Trying to come to terms with what had happened and how it changed everything, Beth was continuously losing her balance. Questioning which parts of her life had been screwed over by her father and which by being part of some ridiculous supervillain science experiment was like trying to stand on two kickboards in a pool. She couldn't find her footing, and all she could do was try and stay afloat. She had to repeat her whole junior year of high school that she lost to this shitshow, while starting over at a new school, and only barely scraped her way into senior year. Now that she knew how honestly terrible she'd been at judging who in her life she could trust, it was as hard to talk to old friends as it was to make new ones.

Therapy helped her start sorting out what she was feeling, and how the environment she’d grown up in was really not the healthiest. She hadn’t realized how much she’d learned to doubt her own perceptions. That made constructing any kind of new understanding of her situation an uphill struggle. And of course, her therapist couldn’t help her confirm anything about a human experiment that was so illegal it had been an international secret. As she continued to stumble forward, Beth even started doubting her former certainty of the identity of her Leda monitor. She questioned herself and everything she knew until she wanted to scream with frustration or weep with confusion. The floor of the counselor’s office could have been mopped with her tears. It was, quite literally, driving her mad.

So, finally, Beth had taken up the invitation on the banner of every Leda news feature to "Contact the secure, clone-run Clone Youth Group Network (CYGNet) for answers by emailing [email protected]."

She wanted something concrete that would help convince her brain to stop reenacting these head games that warped her reality. It still insisted on playing through the patterns it had been taught, even in its teacher’s absence. She needed something that could brace her against the ideas that she was really just paranoid, overreacting, accusing, that this was all her fault for making a big deal out of nothing. Even with his other faults (cruelties, her mind whispered) aside, at least his involvement with Project Leda was unforgivable, and she wanted proof of it. Maybe if she had that, she could stop being mad at herself for not wanting to forgive. And if anyone had that proof, CYGNet would.

Maybe it was just because of the sheer blunt honesty about her motives, or the inescapable vulnerability of the message Beth sent, but Mika had replied to her within a day. And she'd been so gentle about it, too, enough to make Beth later question where the stereotype of autistic brashness came from. Then again, over email, Mika had all the time she needed to compose her thoughts and lay them out as softly as she wanted. She didn't have to spit them out as fast as she could to keep pace with a quick and painfully overwhelming world.

Hi Beth Childs,

I'm so sorry for what you had to go through. I still don't know how they got away with doing things like this for so long. I suppose people will always find ways to be cruel. But we've survived this long, and the whole point of CYGNet is to help us all heal. The experimental network has been dismantled, and we are assembling resources to help us. We've brought mental health professionals on to the project to develop custom programs for our needs. We can make them available to you, if you are interested.

I attached scans of some of your files that we recovered from DYAD. There are a few case reports with the signature of the person you asked about, spaced throughout your lifetime. There are also financial records with his name in the list of paid employees. He was without a doubt part of the Leda monitor program. I can provide all of the documentation that we have related to you, if you like, but I thought that would be too much all at once. I know these are hard to look at, but I hope they help let your mind rest. They are very real, and every awful thing we have experienced was also real, no matter how they tried to convince everyone that we were making it all up.

Please take your time with these, and stay in contact if you want to. You can join our mailing list, if you want to know when we have new information or new resources available. We're here for you.

And hey, if you just want to talk to someone who knows what it's like to deal with all of this, I'm here, too. You can reach my personal inbox or IM me at [email protected]. It'll be okay.

-Veera

Beth had started crying before she even finished reading the letter, much less opened the attachments. She cried so often these days. She only knew why half the time. But this time, it felt like the tears were extracting some of her pain as they left her, instead of just overflowing from the unending wellspring of her directionless distress. All of this was real, and someone else knew it.

Though she was grateful beyond measure for her mother’s untiring support, they were each other’s too-close, ever-present reminders of what they’d survived, trying to act like they weren’t, trying to convince each other and themselves that they were okay. Beth had needed something else, too, something until now unnamed.

This was a handhold, a backstop Beth didn't know she'd been desperate to find. It wasn't just the confirmation of what she’d concluded about her father. The ability speak plainly to someone she didn't feel the need to pretend around was an exhale of a breath held too long. At least one person in the world not only understood, but really and truly didn't want or expect her to act like any of this was normal or okay, or that she would ever be the same again.

Veera – or Mika, as she often went by online – made good on her offer of a sympathetic ear. Their correspondence started off with awkward, grammatically correct messages about the less painful details of their lives. Mika told her about the farmer’s market three blocks away where she went walking early in the morning before it got busy, and the plant stand there that her best friend and roommate Niki (also a Leda) had to ask her to stop buying so many succulents from.

At first, Beth tried to chatter like she used to, but there were no safe subjects. What had happened had touched all of her life. Normally, she’d talk about school, or sports, or her friends. But she was trying to start all over again at a new school with all the struggles that came with it. She didn’t have the time or energy for sports anymore, and talking about them hurt, now. Running used to make her heart sing. But no matter how she tried, there was no joy in the motion anymore. To top it all off, it was as hard to connect with old friends from her old life as it was to try and make new ones. She spent most interactions either doubting her own character judgement or dreading the moment people recognized her Leda face from the news.

She didn’t know how to talk about any of it to anyone. Maybe she could have if it had been just the clone thing or just the dad thing. But the two were inextricably entangled, and she still couldn’t even explain it to herself. It was all unbelievably horrifying, and any time she tried to be honest about it, people ended up disbelieving or horrified. Shocker.

Maybe, though, it wouldn’t be weird to talk about it with Mika. Mika already knew the worst. Beth didn’t have to hide that hurt from her to keep from shaking her world, or to keep her dismissal from hurting Beth. Maybe that’s what was hurting the most: the feeling that even after escaping, she still had to pretend to be okay. That compulsive stifling feeling choked her whenever it bubbled back up. On her bad days, a simple “how are you?” could reduce her to a blank face plastered over a raw tangle of emotions held motionless her own iron grip.

But Mika mentioned having bad days, too. Days came where she was too scared and nightmare-weary to do anything but make herself some tea and soak up some sunlight in the safety of home. Beth could casually say things like after those two months, i still twitch every time i hear a door open, and i wish my body would quit feeling like it doesn’t exist, my legs feel numb. It barely broke the surface of what it was like in her head, but was discomfiting enough for people that she held her tongue at school.

Sometimes, Beth got tired of constantly thinking about all this shit and tried to lighten things up. On one comically disastrous occasion of cultural exchange, she liveblogged Mika her attempt at eating the infamous Scandinavian lutefisk, along with an audio recording of the incoherent horrified noises she made after tasting it. In return, she received a recording of someone, presumably Mika, laughing harder than she’d ever heard anyone laugh before. It made Beth smile. Not many things did, back then.

Slowly, as the formality fell away from their transcontinental conversations, their heavier stories seething below the surface seeped in. Beth had been in therapy long enough now to know that she couldn't just recklessly unload on people the way she did in counseling sessions. But a counselor couldn't always provide the same kind of unspoken solidarity that someone in the same boat could.

Bit by bit, slipped into the chats that were becoming a daily occurrence, they talked about monitors, about what the experiment had really all been for, why that both was and wasn’t important, and how they'd discovered they were a part of Project Leda. Putting words to the pain hurt, a lot. But the ability to lay out long-unspoken truths in front of each other, knowing they were believed in the way that only people who have shared something can, was a healing kind of pain instead of the festering one Beth had been living with.

The two of them had more in common than they'd thought, growing up a world apart. Beth's experience raised under the subconscious wariness of her father's hovering thumb felt a lot like what Mika described growing up largely isolated with her former guardian. But sometimes, whenever they realized that something they'd both thought was normal was pretty not, they got a good laugh out of it despite the weight of their pasts. Mika seemed somewhat accustomed to her normal being considered pretty weird, so she usually took the revelations in stride better than Beth did. Beth wouldn't find out for at least a year after meeting her that it was because of her Asperger's, since it was a topic Mika seemed quite sensitive about.

Mika explained it once, in a conversation full of long pauses on her part and watching the typing icon disappear and reappear on Beth’s. The way she put it, it just meant that her brain worked a bit differently than most people's, processing sounds and sights and all the information it took in at different speeds and with different emphases. The difference could turn everyday things like the sound of a refrigerator running into a splitting headache, or something as simple as the soft texture of her favorite jacket into a kind of bliss. That alternative way of processing also extended to things like words and emotions as well. Sometimes, it took her longer than the world was willing to wait to process them into something that made sense. It often made communication tricky, trying to compensate for the gap in mutual understanding with most people. The world and the people in it could be so overwhelming sometimes, so fast and bright and full of noise and uncertainty and bewilderingly arbitrary social conventions. But the biggest challenge was other people expecting her to do everything the same way they did, ignorant of the fact there were any ways to exist other than their own, and completely oblivious to the fact that she was already putting in at least twice as much effort to communicate with them as they were with her.

And yet, even coming from such a different perspective, Mika gets it. Beth says sometimes i dream of drowning and its not a nightmare and i wake up not knowing how to feel, and Mika says I still dream of burning and wake up not knowing which fires are real, and they both say yeah. And they sit there across the world from each other knowing these things, knowing that it doesn't fix anything. And yet, it does change something. Nothing's any better, really. But somehow, the knowledge that someone else understands makes it a little easier to bear.

And that's just it. Somehow, without ever even having seen her face, Mika sees Beth clearer than anyone. All of her, all the ugly parts she hides so that they can't hurt anyone, and all the good parts that she also hides so that nobody can hurt them or take them away from her. Mika sees all of that and then just tells Beth another story about the Northern Lights she sees on the regular. Apparently, in Finnish, they’re called "fox fires." Beth hardly ever sees the aurora, living relatively far south in a bright city. But her stories about life in the metropolis by the lake intrigue Mika as much as the tales of the twisting green lights do her. And Beth can talk about something lighter again while not having to pretend that the heaviness isn’t there, too, even while she’s just once more trying and failing to explain poutine. For her, the weight never really goes away. But the effort of pretending she’s not carrying it takes more out of her than the weight itself. Mika understands that.

Maybe that’s why Beth had talked it over with Mika first, even before her mom, when she was considering taking a gap year after she hopefully managed to finish her senior year of high school. (God, it was so hard to think about English or math or whatever when just that morning she’d woken from a nightmare about being back in a not-home house that she never escaped.) Beth's mom had been so unbelievably supportive of Beth's recovery, even while she herself was adjusting to the wrenching change in both of their lives. It was both inspiring and a little intimidating. If her mom managed to run a household and raise a daughter all on her own, even while trying to heal from her own trauma, how could Beth not do her utmost, too? She was grateful to be able to talk to Mika about it, to get a reality check from someone who both understood her situation intimately and didn't make Beth feel that pressure of expectation. In the end, Beth did decide to take a year or two off before considering college, and her mom was again nothing if not supportive. Beth figured, after this entire mess, she deserved some time to herself to work on sorting her shit out, and her mom agreed.

After graduating with reasonable if not flying colors, Beth worked a series of part-time and odd jobs that didn't stress her out too much, letting herself focus on her own healing. In between her mom's support, seeing a counselor regularly, and the security of having a friend she could really trust, Beth felt like she was making progress. Slow progress, sure, but progress, nonetheless. Considering that she had seventeen years' worth of lies to unbelieve and emotional trauma to finally acknowledge, Beth figured that there was only so much she could do in the three years she'd had.

Her days were still hard. Getting sleep and waking up and eating and even just existing were still so fucking hard sometimes, and it was horrible. Some days, the thinnest sheet trapped her in bed like it was a car pinning her down. It felt so stupid for such simple things to be so hard. But then her therapist would remind her that that’s what mental illness and trauma was, that this was what the wounds in her mind and heart made her feel like. And once in awhile, sun broke through the shadows, and she had a day that reminded her what an okay day felt like – that okay days existed. That more might.

Now, she’s here, lying in a bright living room so far from home, with her dearest friend in the next room. She’s comfortable, except for the knot in her neck from sleeping oddly on the couch. The soreness pales in comparison to the usual tensions that are so strangely absent. Beth can’t remember the last time she felt this okay. She’s not steeling herself to go to work. She’s not dreading the next conversation with her mother that goes quiet as they both remember awful things they don’t mention. She’s not bracing herself for the next time her brain runs rampant worrying about whether she’ll run into the subject of her restraining order somewhere in the city and have to wonder if he'll honor it.

None of that reaches her here. There’s something about this quiet little pocket of space. It’s overrun with a proliferation of potted plants, from the sprawling lacy-leafed monster in the corner, to the fern peeping out of the kitchen, to the vine cuttings spilling out of an oddly familiar leaf-shaped glass bottle on the sill. Sunlight streaks through leaves and windowpanes and across the colorful patchwork of rugs on the floor. In the midst of it all, Beth is held by a palpable aura of gentleness. It holds her so softly that she doesn't need to hold herself in. It's like the layer of caution that she always keeps wrapped between herself and the rest of the world has simply dissolved away. In this moment suspended in morning light, she is okay.

She feels safe.

The realization undoes something in her. She feels the tears starting, and she expects the taut tension of involuntary stifling that always comes with them to return. But it doesn’t. She lies still and soft on the couch with the water creeping over her cheeks, breath occasionally catching but flowing freely. She savors it in the quiet.

The soft thunk of an ill-fitted door opening breaks into her odd reverie. Mika’s up. Beth sniffs and scrubs at her eyes halfheartedly, but she can’t hide them right now and she doesn’t want to. Mika notices immediately, and comes trotting over with quiet steps, leaning forward all concern.

"Beth," she says softly. She shifts from foot to foot like a nervous cat, watching Beth with enormous eyes. Beth has never met anyone else with such an intense stare. Or maybe it's just the fact that Beth knows beyond all doubt that she's being looked at by somebody who really sees her in her entirety. It's like she's staring right into Beth's soul. But Mika was able to do that long before they saw each others' faces. They've shared so many thousands of words over screens and seas, so many emotions that have gone otherwise unspoken, so many too-early mornings and too-late nights on the fringes of each other's dawns and dusks.

“What’s wrong?”

Finally, a flash of that sick tension runs through Beth’s body. It’s been okay when Mika has asked that before, when it was just silent letters on a screen. But out loud, the question falls on her ears like every well-meaning inquiry she’s ever had to scramble to find an acceptable answer for. The strain begins to cinch tight around her again like coarse ropes across barely-healed skin, ready to compel her to replace the truth with something safer. Her arms and legs tied, she begins to freeze, railing against herself for tainting the softness, the safety of this place.

"Beth." Mika says again, softer but more urgent.

In the gap between thoughts created by hearing her name, Beth seizes the chance to redirect them to the present. She clings to the welling in the corners of her eyes, the warmth of the sun caressing her back. The leaves of trees whisper outside the third-floor window in a mild breeze. The brightness spills over the sill and across Mika’s asymmetrical, half-craggy face and lights up tufts of her short hair as she steps closer. The couch dips as Mika sits down next to her, tilting Beth toward her.

Without meeting her eyes, Mika lifts a hesitant hand that hovers in the air between them, uncertain yet reaching. Her gentle palm falls onto Beth's forearm as softly as a floating leaf. The fingers curl around Beth’s arm just below the wrist, firm but not tight. Comforting.

The softness surrounding Beth seeps back into her, saturating her. As the memory fades like a ripple into water, the tension slackens. But it leaves her shaky, with traces of a familiar ache in her neck muscles, one that goes deeper than the simple stiffness from the couch. She sucks in a few unsteady breaths while Mika gives her arm a gentle squeeze.

“Sorry,” Beth says in a small, awkward voice.

Mika tilts her head. “Why?”

“Uh, I didn’t mean to bring all – this mess, in here.” Beth rubs the back of her neck with her free hand. “It’s so... soft, and okay, and – I don’t wanna ruin it,” she says, trailing off into a mumble.

“Hey.” Mika moves her hand from Beth’s arm to her shoulder. When Beth looks at her, she’s looking right back. Mika's eyes dart down to the floor for a moment, but then return to hold Beth’s with deliberate steadiness. “It’s alright. It’s like this here because we wanted it to be safe to be messy. You’re not ruining anything.”

“... Oh.” She’s steadied by Mika’s fingers curling around her shoulder, by the tendrils of sunlight spreading across her head and back and arms. Mika’s voice is small but steady, and somehow it comes from the same throat that makes that huge pealing laugh. It’s so strange how they sound nothing alike. Until yesterday, Beth hadn’t heard her voice since the lutefisk incident. They’d mostly kept to text and pictures. It had seemed easier, the way it gave them both plenty time to think before they spoke through their different uncertainties. Beth was already planning her trip before they realized that they’d never actually called each other. By that point, it sounded like more fun to meet in person the old-fashioned way.

"I'll make you some tea." Mika abruptly stands and lets go of her. Beth is sad to lose the contact. She flits across the room toward the kitchen in her soft cotton pajama pants, complemented by yet another black graphic tee for yet another Scandinavian metal band Beth's never heard of. Or at least, she'd never heard of them before Mika, who has something to say about all of them, and now Beth knows more than she'll ever need to.

Mika moves in and out of view behind the half-wall that separates the little living room from the kitchen. The fronds of the fern on the counter make a green rustling as she brushes by them. It sends soft feathered shadows waving across the wall opposite the window. Beth hears the rush of water boiling out of sight, and soon sees steam rising from the mug that's being handed to her.

"It's hot," Mika says unnecessarily. She sits down next to her again, this time leaning into Beth with her arm. Beth’s glad for it.

"Have you ditched the bags and gone loose leaf?" Beth says, eyeing the fragments of bright green leaf free floating in her mug.

"It didn't come in a bag. It came from the window."

"The window?"

"It's basil tea. For the fear and pain. Five large fresh leaves in two hundred and fifty milliliters water. We grew it here."

Beth takes a cautious sip. It's surprisingly sweet, and the savory smell of the steam rising from it curls into her sinuses. The aching in her head and neck begin to relax. It's unfamiliar, but it feels like home should, just like everything else here.

"Thanks," Beth says. On an impulse of craving closeness, she leans her head onto Mika's shoulder with a sigh. The sensation of contact deepens as Mika leans against her, too.

Beth holds the cup close, fingers wrapping around its warmth. She takes another sip and gets a bit of leaf stuck in her teeth. The way she scrunches up her face trying to dislodge it pulls a tiny laugh out of Mika.

“You don’t have to be okay here,” Mika whispers. “You can just be. That’s what we do.”

Beth finds her eyes wet again, but she smiles while she sets her mug down and wipes them away. “Kinda already wish I could stay here,” she says with a chuckle.

“... That’s probably not impossible.”

“Really?” Beth asks wryly. “Not even twenty-four hours, and you’d already be willing to put up with me?”

“Twenty-four hours and twenty-seven months.”

Beth melts a little even while waving the idea aside. “I wasn’t serious.”

“I know, but... weren’t you looking at the school here?”

“I mean, yeah, but... really, my mom just thought I deserved a break to get away for a little while. She’d saved up a bit, and I didn’t want to make it a big deal or anything, but she really wanted me to. She knew I wanted to come see you. Checking out the school was mostly an excuse. I know it’s a great place, but... I don’t really think it’ll help with what I wanna do.”

“What do you want to do?”

Beth sighs and leans back, looking at the ceiling. Mika follows her so that they’re still shoulder to shoulder, and pulls her feet up to tuck them in cross-legged.

She flounders for a moment, trying to find where to begin. She hasn’t told anyone this yet.

“This Leda crap has been kind of awful, right? It’s screwed so many of us up. But there’s only, what, a few hundred of us? And that’s not the only reason things get messed up.” She swallows. Her eyes trace irregularities in the ceiling: a knot in an exposed wooden beam here, a sealed and repainted crack there. “Kids like me are a dime a dozen. There’s so many people out there going through hell, just because they got stuck with people who are hurting so much that they hurt other people. And then they go on and hurt more people. It’s a cycle that’s really fucking hard to break.”

Breaths that have become harsh force her to pause and let them lengthen again. A touch on her knee draws her eyes down to a hand resting on it palm up, offering. Beth takes it. Mika squeezes her fingers in reassurance.

“When I was little, I wanted to be a cop like my dad, did you know that?” Mika, eyes wide, shakes her head. “Yeah. That was always my plan. I used to think he was so brave. Wanted to be just like him.” She shudders. Mika grips her hand, steady. “Even if I could do it better than he did, the system is still full of people like him. It’s broken. I couldn’t – I can’t end up like that. I can’t keep being a part of this shit. I want to actually help people.

“I never thought about it before I met you, but the people you brought in to do therapy programs and all for CYGNet? They’re amazing. The stuff I’ve gotten from them has helped me so much. And I don’t know what I’d do without my regular therapist. These people really help people like me. Like all of us. Those are the kind of people I wanna be like.”

Beth’s voice drops and becomes small and secretive, but firm. “I’ve been looking at the social work programs at home. There’s some really good ones at the uni near where mom and I live now. And that’s the city where I grew up. I know how things work there. I know it won’t be easy, but. I could really... do stuff.”

Silence stretches. Beth looks at Mika, only to be completely thrown off by an expression she can’t make heads or tails of. “What?”

Mika’s face is blank yet soft, only barely hinting at her thoughts in the faintest crinkling of her eyes. It’s funny, how quiet her face is most of the time. Beth never would have guessed, going off her online impressions of her. Mika’s so expressive and eloquent with her written words. In person, she is much more subtle. But even after only a day spent around her, Beth is already starting to see how her movements speak volumes in a language of their own. The flickering of her hands flares to life with excitement. The casual shake of her head tosses her hair out of her eyes even when it’s not in the way, like she’s clearing the slate of her mind. And much like Beth these days, she goes very still and tense when she’s getting uncomfortable or overwhelmed, the way she did after a particularly loud whistle at the train station. It shows in her shoulders. They’re soft now though, and she just watches Beth and squeezes her hand once more.

“You’re really amazing, you know,” Mika says.

“Wh- huh?”

“Well.” She looks away and turns their hands over, but doesn’t let go. “After the awful things you’ve been through – nnnh! Don’t pretend,” she says, looking back sharply as Beth begins to protest that she didn’t have it that bad. Mika knows her so well. Beth can’t help but laugh a little. “After all that, you just want to help people. All I ever want to do is get away from them, most of the time.”

Beth quirks a brow at her with a bemused grin. “Really? Because setting up and running an organization that provides mental health resources and extremely important information to a few hundred people is a really shit way to not help people.”

“I never talk to most of them! And CYGNet only has one hundred and thirteen members, not hundreds.”

Beth rolls her eyes with an exaggerated motion. “Yeah, so, you’ve somehow convinced, what, a whole freaking third of a huge group of scared strangers to trust you?”

“A lot of that was Niki and the press team, she’s way better at talking to people th–”

“And you’ve been careful enough and clever enough to keep them and all the information you got from DYAD safe and secure? I can’t even imagine the organization and, and cyber-security and whatever the hell else you put into all this. That you still put in. And look what you’ve done. You’re helping so many people. You found something only you could do, and do it really damn well.”

Mika looks down into her lap, half her face flushed. The raised ridges and swirls of the scarred side are pink, but not as dark. Her shoulders curl in a little, but she doesn’t pull her hand away from Beth’s. If anything, she holds on a little tighter.

“You don’t have to like talking to people to help them. You don’t have to be someone you’re not,” Beth says gently, then pauses as a new thought occurs to her. “Why did you talk to me?”

Mika gives a tiny shrug, eyes still downcast. “You reached out to me. Most people are scared, or suspicious, or hard to talk to, but you were just... honest. You told me exactly what you needed, even if that meant sharing your painful secrets with a stranger. I...” She trails off, looking toward the closed door of Niki’s bedroom. She blinks slowly.

“It reminded me of something Niki said a long time ago. When we first met. We didn’t trust each other at first. But when things got bad, we needed to, and she just... We’d only known each other for a day. She told me a true story that people had called her crazy for, and trusted me to believe her. And when I told her about... my Asperger’s, about being autistic, she just told me something about herself, too, another thing that a lot of people get cruel about when they know. This was back before she came out, too. She was hardly out to herself, then, really. But she told me anyway. ‘Secret for a secret,’ she said.”

“She’s really special to you.” It’s not a question. How could it be, with the sheer softness of love rounding out every syllable and making Mika melt into the couch and into Beth’s shoulder.

“She’s... yes. She’s my family.” Mika looks out the window, and the bright light dances over her nose. “I don’t remember ever having one.”

Beth slings an arm around Mika’s shoulders and smiles as she curls closer into Beth’s side. “Looks like you’re part of a pretty big one, now,” she says, waving a hand at the dozens of photos on the walls circling them.

“I guess so.”

“No need to guess. The evidence is right there. And I’m right here.”

Mika turns those huge eyes on her again. She’s done that multiple times now, even though Beth knows she rarely looks people in the eye. Eye contact is too much, most of the time. She describes it as too intense, too distracting, too intimate. Meeting those eyes – so like Beth’s own, but filled with such a different kind of light – Beth thinks she understands a glimmer of it. If every eye she met were as overwhelmingly expressive as Mika’s, Beth probably wouldn’t meet them all either. It keeps taking her by surprise, coming across their eloquence in an otherwise quiet face. Caught by that gaze, every emotion that lives in it touches Beth. Right now, it’s soft with adoration but shaded with a gradient of doubt. The width and depth of Mika’s eyes reveal a clear view of a vulnerable, aching, healing heart that spent eleven years starving for the love it needs and still hasn’t forgotten the famine.

It might be breaking Beth’s heart. No wonder Niki is always showering her with hugs and kind words and gentle hands on rounded shoulders. Maybe one of these days, Mika will have spent long enough finally getting to soak up all that affection that she won’t look at Beth like this when she says the simple truth.

“Hey. Here I am. Really.” Beth’s voice is a little choked up. She pulls Mika into a proper hug with both arms. Mika squeaks in surprise at being squeezed so emphatically, but returns it all the same. God, but she gives the best hugs of anyone Beth’s ever met. All contact and even, firm pressure and steadiness. “It’s so damn good to see you. I can’t believe you’re...” real, Beth thinks but doesn’t say. I can’t believe I didn’t imagine you. I can’t believe you’re just as kind as your words. I can’t believe how good it feels to be around you. “I can’t believe I’m really here.”

Mika doesn’t say anything. For a moment, one of her hands leaves Beth’s back to fiddle with something, then comes back to give her a little squeeze that Beth returns.

Beth’s phone buzzes a notification behind her on the little glass-top table next to the couch. The table’s wooden base is a round blob carved into the shape of a very fluffy and very ugly sheep with curly horns. Beth’s arms loosen from their embrace as she turns to look at it, bemused. No one but Mika really messages her except for her mom. But if it’s morning here, it’s about time for bed at home. She checks it, just to be sure she’s okay.

But it’s not from her mom.

Mika reaches out to gently grasp her forearm again as Beth shoots her a quizzical look and opens the message.

3mika: I'm glad you're here.

Beth's heart quails.

To think, that her darker days might have kept her from ever being in this moment. Beth might never have gotten to this point, hurt but healing and here. Here, she's seven time zones and an ocean away from the cycle of pain she grew up in, barely aware she needed to escape. She might well feel safer right here in this crossroads of time and place than she has at any other in her entire life. It's a realization that's as humbling as it is nourishing.

Already, the distance this journey has taken her has given her so much perspective. She wasn’t sure, before, whether the work she’s been considering was just a response to what she’s been through – or just a way for the cycle to keep her within its spiral. But she’s seen what Mika can do, what Beth could do one day, if she keeps on.

It won’t be easy. She’ll go back, and deep-seated memories will try to drag her back into small dark places. But being here, even for only a few hours, has already changed her. She can change, and she can grow, and she is already tapping into new strengths that her past has yet to reckon with. She is here, right now, in spite of all of it. And today is not a dark day.

“Me too, Mika. I’m glad to be here, too.” Beth’s tongue stumbles over the name, because she’s never said it out loud before, only read it on a screen.

Surprise sends Mika’s eyebrows up and her eyes wide again, like she’s never heard it before, either. Maybe she hasn’t. She tilts her head again like a question, touching her ear and looking at Beth.

Beth grins. “Mika.” A smile blooms on that curious face, lighting it up. She’s the one who pulls Beth into a hug this time, and it’s both fierce and soft. When she lets go, she leans into Beth’s side again and they stay like that, arms over shoulders and comfortably curled up together, soaking in the warmth of each other’s presence like leaves drink in light. The simple sweetness and companionship of it soothes Beth’s heart, seeking its way into the aching crevices. It’s an odd feeling, both seeping inward and flowing outward, trickling all the way through her until it warms her cold toes in a way that feels both new and strangely familiar.

A long, sleepy yawn announces that Niki’s awake now, too. Soon, she comes out of her room stretching her arms over her head. Mika reaches a hand out toward her to wave in greeting, though she leaves the other arm draped over Beth’s shoulders. Niki smiles at them. That kind smile, too, adds to the warmth washing through Beth. Her feet practically itch with it, and with a growing sensation of déja vu. She fidgets her toes against the floor as Niki walks over to brush Mika’s outstretched hand like a touchstone.

“How'd you sleep? Isn’t that couch the comfiest?” she says to Beth.

“Well, I’ve got a crick in my neck, but I still slept better than I have in years.”

Niki turns her sunny smile on Beth. “Good to hear it. Weird, though, I nap there all the time and my neck’s always fine. Huh. Anyway, I think I might make waffles. You two want some breakfast?”

Mika nods, but doesn’t let go of Beth yet. Beth is lost in thought, trying to remember what that light, floating feeling in her feet reminds her of.

“Sweet.” Niki ambles toward the kitchen and bends down with pursed lips to peer at the fern perched on the counter. “Hmm. You still look a little pale. Let’s get you some more sun.” She brings the plant over to the living room and is fussing over settling it on the sheep table when it clicks for Beth. A physical memory washes over her, for once welcome. She lets it fill her, refreshing like a deep breath of cold morning air her lungs are suddenly hungry for. She flexes her calves and ankles, her legs remembering the joy and freedom of stride and strike. Her bones are finally recalling how they once carried her with ease, even while they're adjusting to the new weight of who she's become. Fully alive again for at least this moment, her soles are practically prickling with the desire to eat up ground.

“How about you, Beth? Do you like waffles?” Niki asks, fluffing the fern’s crinkly green leaves. Mika squeezes her shoulder.

Beth grins and plants steady feet on the blue rug in front of the couch. “Save a few for me? I think I might actually go for a run first.”

#orphan black #clone club #veera suominen #beth childs #niki lintula #mk ob #mika ob #herbs on the windowsill au #lizzie taking up space #lizzie's adventures in writing #welcome back yall #long post #fic #ob fic #that a garden will grow

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irl-dogboy · 4 years

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idk why im getting so invested in adult! cade & charlie shenanigans specifically but here we go

-i LOVE the idea that everyone assumes that cade and charlie are dating because “y’know... two dudes sharing a house in a distant country and caring for dragons together? sounds gay” and cade is literally amazed that they thought of this and is just like “y.. you know the sanctuary is more than just charlie and i right??? RIGHT??? WE DONT EVEN WORK IN THE SAME BRANCHES OF THE RESERVE. FELIX IS HERE THIS ISNT BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN”

- at some point in time it was the ultimate confusion: everybody assumes that cade and charlie are dating. cade and charlie pick up on it and ‘pretend’ (not really they just act super affectionate) to be dating because they think their friends are just joking around. friends continue believing fake relationship. cade and charlie continue going along with the ‘joke’. cycle continues until cade mentions a guy he started dating that isnt charlie????!!!! :^OOOOOO

- yea they live together, they work pretty similar shifts at the reserve so they tend to be in at the same time. sometimes after one of them have had a particularly long shift, theyll both just settle in for a couple hours and nap on the couch w each other. they WILL patch each other up and help each other out when they get badly injured. one time charlie tore his acl and the weeks while it was healing cade took his holiday time and cared 4 him :^))) )))

- cade goes on an exhibition to somewhere far away for like 3 or 4 months and while they kept in contact both of em were relatively down. although to make up for it, cade returns with a little domesticated dragon screaming “I CHECKED AND FOUND LEGAL LOOPHOLES WE CAN KEEP HER” charlie flips his shit and all of a sudden? they have dragon daughter. her name is saskia and she gets lots of love from her two dads

- they go to bill and fleur’s wedding together to people watch & cause harmless trouble bc its been years since theyve been in a place with more than like 150 people. when they come together two days early it’s like “OH MY GOD YOU TWO FINALLY GOT TOGETHER” “what no its just cheaper to travel at the same time. also meet saskia” “CHARLES WEASLEY YOU ARE NOT BRINGING A REAL DRAGON INTO MY HOUSE”

- cade helping charlie come out to everyone as aroace YEAAA!!!! they invite everyone over for Charlie’s birthday and he’s like “ok guys i have an announcement” “oh my god the relationship revea-” “no im aroace” cue realization for everyone, it all comes together while cade does a happy dance in the background because hes proud of charlie

- anybody that has an interest in cade must be approved by charlie sorry that’s just the rule ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ its called “the charlie test” and cade doesn’t mind bc usually charlie is a good judge of character but sometimes they fight about it like “ITS JUST THIS ONE GUY HES SO HOT CHARLES” “HES WEIRD I DONT LIKE HIM”

- basically they’re qpp and u can pry them from my cold dead hands LOL

#cade colton #charlie weasley #jacob's sibling #hphm #hp #SOME1 STOP ME LOL

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zaraegis · 6 years

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Come At The King| Part 3| T

Fandom: Cuphead

Pairings: Ride or Die QPP Wheezy & Dice

TW: haha, blood, violence, descriptions of injuries, unhealthy alcoholism, underage drinking

Notes: Female pronouns are used for Dice in flashbacks before transitioning, just to be clear.

prev|next

/Casino King

So what he may have forgotten to tell Wheezy, was that he wasn't just going to challenge the Casino employees. But that he was going to sell his soul to the Devil to do have a fair chance to do it.

It seems like the most straightforward way. He wants his reputation to be ironclad, and his title to be unwinnable until they've paid the price he had. Also, if the Devil holds his soul contract, then he's automatically off open season for any Tom, Dick or Harry who wants his head.

It'd be nice to live without the crushing paranoia he's had for the past ten years after his "retirement".

So that leads him to here, in his new white shoes and slacks, all carefully padded so nothing clinks and all ten decks are well hidden within the finely tailored suit. Lucky purple bow tie in place and all. Waiting.

In the Devil's Casino. For his appointment.

He sits still enough that wandering denizens of hell, do a double take at the sight of him. He's kept the full force on his smile on the skeleton across from him for the past half hour and hasn't batted one perfectly lined eyelid.

The skeleton shifts the slightest bit and he can feel his smile turn mean, thankful Wheezy isn't here to try to save the hapless victim-

"Sir? Your appointment?"

He looks at the skeleton secretary. He nods to her and pretends not to notice the rattling of the skeleton in the other waiting chair. It's Polite not to call attention to other's fear responses.

"Thank you, I'll make my own way up, don't trouble yourself."

"Oh!" The skeleton flutters before smiling and waving at him. He doesn't know if skeletons can do anything else but smile, really. Well, he hums as he enters the ornate elevator that will take him to the owner, he knows they also shake in fear like everyone else.

What a fun trip it's been so far.

"You...made an appointment." The Devil repeats incredulously. The Devil was...fuzzier than Dice was led to believe. The horns are cool though. So is the trident propped up behind his ornate desk.

"Yes. I didn't want to trouble you unduly. So it seemed like the thing to do." King Dice feels like Wheezy would be proud of him at this moment. Not the selling the soul bit oh no- he's going to be furious about that. But look at him, being a law abiding member of society and all that jazz. Making appointments and being an adult. Someday he might even go to a doctor instead of stitching up his own wounds. Wild.

He might be a touch too giddy. But lifelong dreams and all that.

The Devil rubs a clawed hand over his face. The cigar in his mouth puffing wildly. "This is so weird." he can hear him mutter. Inhaling loudly the Devil looks back up and tries to explain:

"Usually, people burst in dramatically, or summon me, or play in the casino and then we make a deal."

Dice blinks two perfectly lined eyes."Well, I didn't want to get a leg up on the competition beforehand. It's not sporting."

The Devil is temporarily distracted. This whole situation was throwing him off. Time to get back to familiar ground.

"So what do you want in exchange for your immortal soul?"

The lights in the office flicker omniously, there's a darkening in the colors of the room, like something Dice couldn't see was weighing everything down.

Dice places his terms in front of The Devil. The dramatic lighting cuts short and The Devil grumbles loudly, "Don't tell me you're a lawyer."

Biting back an undignified laugh, Dice shakes his head.

The Devil reads the paper, and looks back up with a raised eyebrow. "You don't just want me to make you king of all games or something?"

King Dice smiles. It seems like he'll never stop having to say it to people. "I'm already King. I just want to prove it once and for all."

"You might not even get the title kid, and then you'd have sold your soul for nothing."

"Are all the casino employees the best in their field or not?" King Dice asks sharply, leaning forward.

The Devil frowns at his taunting, "They are." He growls.

"Then that's all that matters to me. Winning. It's not a game if there's no risk." He doesn't remember standing up to try to loom over someone who probably invented looming. "A chance. That's all I need. And I'm willing to pay my soul for it."

He hold his gloved hand out for a shake. "Deal?"

The Devil shoots out an unnaturally strong hand to grip his in a handshake that feels like liquid fire.

"Deal."

He and his small luggage are taken to a guest suite that looks like a bigger nicer version of his own apartment. Sans the tipsy hothead on his sofa.

He hopes the bar is doing well. He's never been away so long before.

A knock on his door moves him from his absent gazing out the window into what is most certainly Hell. He opens the door to a beautiful elegant woman who inclines her head at him. "King Dice?"

"Ma'am." He bows slightly and lets her in.

"You are the one who wishes to challenge?" She perches daintily on the pure white sofa. Dice is kind of afraid he'll stain the sofa if he so much as breathes near it.

"Yes, you must be Pirouletta. It is an honor to meet you."

She smiles and arranges her checkered skirt, "You have manners, how... refreshing."

They make chit-chat. The exact kind that grates on his nerves but he's still giddy from everything so he serves her tea and finds some cookies to plate up. While they nibble on snacks she gives him his 'schedule' for the upcoming week.

"You'll fight each of us everyday this week. Pip and Dot always fight together so 8 challengers in 7 days. It's the only way we can continue to run the Casino while this is going on and bring in a good crowd. You understand."

Dice nods, and before he can stop it, laughs out of sheer excitement. Pirouletta pauses in the act of bringing her cup up to sip.

"What a lovely smile, dear. I hope you survive the week."

The first fight takes place in the Casino, strangely enough. There's a pool table that the Devil shrinks them for, so that every curious casino goer could see the fight. Dice looks down at himself, now the size of a hand, and feels something welling up in his throat.

Looking up at the Devil, who's lounging at the other end of the table amongst cheering demons, ghosts and skeletons he wonders if it's fear.

When he sees his opponent squaring up, Mangosteen, now many many times smaller and only a head (presumably his arms would get in the way?) he feels his heart racing and smiles.

"A good day for a swell battle!" He hears over the noise of everything. "You're UP!"

Then he laughs, an eerie sound that seems to cut through the crowd's cheers. He doesn't pay attention to how the crowd quiets at that for a bit, everyone strangely unsettled. The Devil keeps his grin in place, eyes focused on the white-suited challenger.

Finally, minutes later and with Mangosteen worryingly vomiting up what seems to be his guts, Dice realizes what he's been feeling.

Excitement.

Wheezy sighs at finally reaching Inkwell Hell. He's dusty, tired and still vaguely nauseous from the boatride but dammit he's going to watch his best friend beat the Devil's Casino no matter what.

It's emptier than he thought it'd be.

He makes his way to the bar, something soothingly familiar. A short man in a server uniform is on a stool, standing to try to see over what seems to be a crowd but sounds like a boxing match. The lady nods at him and quirks a brow at his suitcase.

"What'll ya have darlin'?"

"A glass of water ma'am."

There's a guy as big as he is who frowns at him, "You a teetotaler or somethin'?" Wheezy laughs at that.

"Naw, just celebrating something. Do you know where I could find someone called King Dice?"

As the man sets his drink down in front of him, the gal jabs one finely painted nail to the middle of the screaming crowd.

Wheezy sighs into his water, "Figures" he mutters before he knocks it back.

He makes his way through the crowd, thankful of his bulk. He didn't have Dice's pointy elbows or his willingness to use them to make a path.

He ends up in what seems to be a domino table. Except, there's a grinding wall of spikes on one end of a conveyor belt. That his friend is running on.

He rubs his eyes.

Dice is...like five inches tall. What the hell...

On the other side of the conveyor belt are two dominoes swinging with the meanest grins he's ever seen. Dice is dodging strange winged creatures and seems to be shooting...cards.

Oh god I hope he's not using the deck with the sharp edges.

He'd seen Dice slice a block of wood in half with one well flicked card, it was kind of horrifying.

The two swinging split open and spit out a bright pink many sided die. Ooo, bad move.

Dice bounces himself off the spike wall and just...punches the dice back at them. Wheezy is pretty sure his brass knuckles are under those suspicious gloves now that he thinks about it.

A loud bell announces the end of the match, the vicious lower domino kicks the upper one in an impressive show of flexibility and rage. But Wheezy only has eyes for the tiny white-suited figure of his friend.

Without thinking he reaches in and picks up the small Dice. Dice whirls around with one of those terrifying sneers, still panting from presumably running nonstop the whole battle. But he perks up right quick when he sees Wheezy.

"WHEEZE!" His voice is TINY. Wheezy is going to die because he cooed at Dice and got his fool self murdered. "HOW ARE YOU HERE??"

He seems to be unaware he's shouting, although that might be the only way to get heard over this crowd. Dice collapses back on his open palm as Wheezy raises him up to eye-level.

"I couldn't miss this. You've only been talking about it for the past eight years Dice."

Out of nowhere Dice grows a couple of feet and Wheezy is left holding him up until he fills out completely. Luckily, he's as bafflingly light as ever.

Dice thanks him but Wheezy catches the annoyed flicker of an eye towards a corner. He casually glances that way and sees what could only be the casino owner.

The Devil.

He's ...fuzzier than Wheezy thought he'd be. He's also got one of those terrifying smiles in their direction.

Distracted with that, Dice steals his handkerchief from the inside of his coat, to pat at the sweat on his face before it stains his clothes. Wheezy tries to put that unsettling yellow and red stare out of his mind.

"You're out of shape."

"Shut up." Dice beams. Jeez, he's positively giddy, Wheezy hasn't seen him be this chipper since the last time someone challenged him to darts. He's grabbed and dragged back to the bar to escape the pressing crowd that's slow to disperse.

"Wheezy, these are Ms.Martini, Mr.Whisky and Mr.Scotch." He introduces the three. Wheezy takes off his hat and shakes hands with everybody, kissing the back of Ms. Martini's hand to her delight.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all."

They make polite small talk while Dice drains three cups of water in rapid succession. They kind of watch him incredulously, but Wheezy has long grown used to Dice's ability to just...not need to breath for a long time.

"Three matches left my dear, how are you feeling?"

A beautiful lady in a roulette checkered dress glides towards them, she's got a sly smile on and Wheezy can barely keep her gaze. She moves like a dancer, he thinks.

"I'm feeling good. Ah, Pirouletta this is my good friend, Mr. Wheezy."

"It's an honor to meet you ma'am." Wow, he's never felt so grubby in his life. He forgot to shave this morning. Oh god, this is terrible-

"Another gentleman I see," She hold out her hand and curtsies shallowly as he places a kiss on the air above her knuckles. Dice is smiling widely at him, canines dangerously glinting in the casino light. He's never going to live this down, he knows.

"Will you be staying to support your friend, Mr.Wheezy?"

"Ah yes, I wouldn't miss it for the world." He puts an arm around Dice's shoulders, squeezing lightly. He thinks he can feel Dice vibrating in place.

"Will you be requiring a guest room? I can make sure you're accommodated." Was she the manager? She seemed like an important person if she could do something like that.

"Well, I-"

"He'll be staying with me." Dice interrupts, green eyes pale and smile still in place. Wheezy has half a mind to object out of fear of declining anything to the lady's face, but that was basically what he'd been hoping for as well.

Pirouetta raises one fine eyebrow and inclines her head with a smile. "Very well. I'll see you tomorrow then, King Dice. Mr.Wheezy."

She glides off and Wheezy is left feeling his cheeks redden. He looks down to see Dice's judging eyebrow. "Shut your gob. Take us to your rooms."

They waved to the bartenders, who had been busy filling out orders as patrons trickled back to all corners of the casino.

Wheezy stares. "It's..."

"Big, I know. I keep feeling like someone is hiding in it, it's so big."

He's set his dusty suitcase by the door, looking at the fancy white walls and white carpeting in trepidation. Then he sees the sofa.

"I'm kind of scared to go near it."

Dice laughs, carefully stripping off his suit and vest. Despite his words, he seems already used to the opulence of the room enough to mess it up with hangers everywhere and what seems to be three different decks splayed across the dining table.

"There's a table. How's it feel to be so fancy?" He ribs.

Dice snorts while unbuttoning his shirt. Everything is white except for the bow tie he'd bought Dice as a present. He makes his way over, suit jacket in hand to help Dice with his binder.

There's some slight bruising, and Dice probably hadn't been breathing well by the end of all that running with it on. Wheezy makes a protesting noise but Dice flaps his hand at him. "It's fine, those were just some hits that Chips Bettigan got in yesterday."

"Leave it off for a while," Dice opens his mouth, but Wheezy cuts him off, "I know- I know. Ruins the lines of your suits and all that. Just for tonight then. Give your ribs some rest."

Dice laughs and shoots off an insouciant "Yes, mother.". Wheezy slaps his ass in retaliation like some nickering horse at the races and has to duck the spray of harmless cards. He's never forgotten that poor block of wood.

"So, how long can you stay?" Dice asks, folding his pants up neatly and meandering towards the bathroom in nothing but his boxers and sock garters. He looks like some strange advert for menswear.

Wheezy shrugs, even though the other can't see, wandering the strange suite,"As long as it takes you to finish, I guess. I got two weeks off."

"Nice!" comes out muffled from the open bathroom. Steam is coming out from the fancy glass shower. There's a hot tub next to it. Wheezy is kind of insanely curious about it, but ducks back out and checks the next room. It's the bedroom.

Where the living room is all white, the bedroom is done in tasteful shades of black. The bed could fit five people comfortably and has what are probably silk sheets. It is of course, scarily neat and looks unlived in. Dice's work.

He goes back and is entranced by the fiery depths of hell out of the big windows until a freshly showered Dice throws a plush black towel at him.

"Go shower, you smell like a bar."

"Piss off."

Cackling, Dice dodges his halfhearted swipe and goes to the shiny black phone to order dinner for them both.

A while later he hears Wheezy shout from the bathroom, "There's fancy shaving cream in here!"

Dice snorts and shouts back, "It's to keep my mustache nice and groomed!"

There's a laugh before the clinking of bottles. "I'm going to use it!"

"It's too late, Pirouletta saw you with that scruff." Dice sing-songs back, rifling through Wheezy's stuff for a change of clothes he forgot to take with him. "She won't recognize you otherwise!"

There's a pause and then Wheezy sticks his head out of the bathroom, chin and cheeks lathered up with shaving cream. He points the straight razor at him. "You think you're funny, Dicey, but you're not."

"I think I'm hilarious."

They're interrupted by a soft knocking and Dice goes to take the platters from the server while Wheezy finishes beautifying.

After the fancy dinner, Wheezy will just call everything in this place fancy, they avoid the couch and decide to lounge around the bed. It's not as nerve wracking.

"Black hides the bloodstains best, didn't you say that?" Wheezy mumbles sleepily, victorious after gathering half the pillows around him to keep them from Dice's pillow thieving ways. There comes a sleepy affirmative from the other side of the bed, where Dice is curled up almost into a ball. They've made strange nests out of the exaggerated amount of pillows on the bed.

Who would ever use so many pillows?

They've shared a bed before, but it was Dice's small one. It was either curl up together or fall off. Dice didn't make much noise but woke up on a hair trigger and came up swinging. This huge bed would hopefully keep Wheezy out of punching range.

That was the last thought he had before he dozed off all the way.

#cuphead #king dice #mr wheezy #the devil #pirouetta #my fanfic tag #come at the king!au #also titled #'Dice makes an appointment to sell his soul #and hides things from his friend'

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violetemerald · 7 years

Text

So my queerplatonic partner just broke up with me as I was trying to go to bed at 10pm and now I’m still awake… typing on my phone and posting this near midnight EST… I can’t tell if me still being awake is necessarily his fault but I think it is. When he broke up with me the first time (in June last year) I was a crying mess. This time I’m just… I’m not crying. I’m upset but it’s more anger and frustration. I hate that I kinda saw this coming but was afraid to let myself go here. I hate that I made up countless thoughts in my head about what my future with him would look like and now it’s all a ridiculous waste of mental energy and I hate how much I was counting on us working out. I really hate that he tricked me into at least thinking he was invested in us lasting through August given the specific events he planned to go to with me and bought tickets for and this and that. Like why did he do all this and now… are we going to do any of it? Am I gonna have to do the walk for suicide prevention next month ALONE because I didn’t sign up for that and ugh should I immediately be looking for a team to join?? That might be better anyway, I might have a better experience overall, but like…why is he torturing me like this?

Why get back together with me while he was in Afghanistan, only one month in to a 6 month deployment, and insist he regretted breaking up with me, and insist he did want the same future I wanted fostering and probably later adopting kids and all of the rest of it… and so many other little things in these 5 months… and then he saw me again for the first time since he’s back and his deployment ended. Both Saturday and Sunday. And then… he avoided responding to my texts Monday asking him how the end of Sunday went since I had to leave early because I injured my eye and… telling him I was taking a sick day and not going in to work because of it. And when he finally gets back to me. It’s JUST like when he broke up with me before. We have plans to go camping soon AND and to do something next month (last time it was yes, camping then too, and also his sister’s wedding, this time it’s the Overnight Out of the Darkness Walk) and I’m talking about those plans (last time it was buying a new dress for it probably that coming weekend, this time it was making sure to get my medical waiver turned in before the May 19th deadline) and he just… he’s… he’s not who I was convinced he was. I don’t even know. He’s. He’s “I can’t do this relationship anymore” and it’s not like there’s a good reason for it that he can pinpoint, but he insists it’s nothing we can fix even though this time I’m… I’m more confused than ever how he can be right back where he was breaking up with me before, because he explicitly changed his mind and regretted that and stuff??? And like…

I really kinda saw it coming, like way more than last time, although I was uneasy last time too.

I love him. I hate this. I don’t love him that much right this moment but…

I really wish this wasn’t happening. Yeah now I’m finally kinda crying a little.

I hugged him when I first saw him. He’s taller than I remembered, kind of. My face was in his chest. For a second. Too brief a time really. It was really nice. For one second. And I felt like he was pulling away too quickly even then. We’ve never been much for physical touch as qpp’s but still.

I should’ve known – i did know, honestly, i really did know – that he wasn’t as committed to this relationship as me when he started shopping for houses with his parents as soon as he got back from Afghanistan. He wasn’t… including me. He wasn’t really acting like I’d you know… live there one day. He was telling me everything but he… it was weird and I knew it and I didn’t want to admit it to myself. He wanted me to be happy for him. I want to be happy for him. But it’s hard when he’s… he’s shattering all my plans for my own future I was so clearly imagining for myself, and now I have to start from scratch all over again. I’m an asexual person who wants to foster and adopt kids with a co-parent I click with and I’ve never met anyone I click with the way I click with him, at least not who also wants children in the way I do. I don’t know how to begin looking for someone who wants to coparent foster kids and who will jive with me as an atheist (and this is actually kind of a big thing in some ways), me who doesn’t want to even so much as kiss anyone and is definitely not having sex in the future… me who has a fine job that is a bit too low paying and which just isn’t the career I want long term because it’s not nearly challenging/stimulating enough… and if I do decide to adopt or foster on my own, I can’t quite picture how it would work. I kinda feel like I *need* a partner.

And it’s just… I want to be DONE with him AND YET I want to try to convince him to go back to his thought process while he was on that civilian contractor deployment. I want him to be back to imagining a future with me the way I was with him. I want him to be happy when he’s around me and it was killing me this past weekend because I could tell that he just… wasn’t. And when I tried to talk to him he was so… closed. Quiet.

I want to move on but I don’t know how to begin. I want to be able to be friends with him but that is painful to think about, like real friends who hang out and have all our mutual friends in common still and still could potentially do some of our planned things together?? Like in some ways it’s easier to imagine never seeing him again.

And yet I wasn’t even done talking to him when I said goodnight and went to bed. I know we’ll text more about… everything. I’m sure we will. We might even see each other again soon. Idk what he’s fully thinking.

I really really am upset. I’m in my twenties, there’s still a lot of my life left, but I feel too old to be this lost with no prospects for finding a new qpp, on top of everything else. When I was with him I felt like everything was going right but near the end of his deployment, maybe even the whole last month, or two?? … It stopped feeling that way. But idk 3 months of it feeling perfect was still cruel to tease me with while none of it was real, not really, because we were so long distance and… why did he get back together with me?? That’s the part I really can’t believe. Why did he do this. I’m… now it actually is midnight, great. I need to go to sleep or at least do something to distract myself from these feelings. This isn’t productive. I’m waking up in 6 hours to go to work.

I just needed to get all this off my chest and maybe someone here would be sympathetic. (I think I crave validation that it’s fair to be this upset. Because my stupid EX queerplatonic partner… he’s basically acting like it’s not going to hurt me this much which is the absolute worst part of it all. How can he not GET this at this point, how huge of a deal this is, that telling me this right AFTER I say I have to go to bed is… like beyond… I want to say cavalier! I don’t want to forgive him for *this*, especially, which is petty probably and stupid but like I was resenting him for a long time for what he did deciding he wanted to get back together the day of my probably most extreme grief of my life when I was convinced he knew I was grieving… I only was able to mainly forgive him by realizing I didn’t want to be a person that expects people to read her mind and maybe I was overly confident in how well I’d conveyed my emotions, after all it was all only in text form and even my family I live with kind of missed how much I was a complete wreck… But yeah I’m back to resenting him I think. I can’t help it. It’s so hard. I feel so frustrated and exasperated and overwhelmed and disappointed and not in the mood. My grandmother is coming to town Friday. I need to be in a better state of mind for this.

If I am so lucky to enter a new qpr one day, or maybe even a romantic relationship idk… I’m not gonna let these things build the way I did this time. I’m not gonna worry about the state of my relationship or what the other person is thinking but keep all those things to myself. I… I’m kinda hoping I can have a queerplatonic relationship with a woman or nonbinary person next time actually. If there even is a next time. I really don’t see that as… well as a given. I imagine it’s like 50/50 whether I’ll have to give up on that dream. I could do it with someone of any gender but there’s something about the past 6 months… or more… that’s really got me latching onto femslash when it comes to fandom and the like and idk… I hate so much passing as straight?? Not as much as I hate not being in a relationship with my queerplatonic partner anymore of course but I think I’d rather be falsely assumed to be gay than straight at this point in my very asexual life…

The past… almost two years, like 22 months since I’ve known him, have been a little bit of a roller coaster, mostly happiness, and I have a lot of good memories and he’s… if not “the” love of my life, (which of course is a lame thing for someone on the aromantic spectrum to say… I’m sorry) he’s been “a” love of my life for sure. He’s been such a hugely life changing relationship and it’s…

I don’t know.

I’m gonna tag some people. Sorry this is long and super personal and I’m such a mess. It’s 12:30 AM and you all mean so much to me and know parts of this part of my life already.

@purrplelace @bookgirlfan @notrocketsurgery @quarticmoose @peppersandcats @supsi85 @aceadmiral @only-fragments

Tell me, please, if you read this? Thanks.

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lizzieraindrops · 7 years

Text

Your chance to make the sun rise thrice (Chapter 1)

a fire that did not burn (2019 words)

The concluding work in the Herbs on the windowsill universe. An alternate timeline where the original Helsinki massacre was prevented and DYAD routed by Clone Club Alpha’s successful publicity stunt back in 2001. Veera Suominen and Niki Lintula survived and decided to live in a little apartment together as qpp’s.

A few years later, Veera and Niki have only grown closer, and they’re slowly healing and growing into a more fulfilling existence. Numerous Leda clones worldwide are now in contact via a secure online network that Veera maintains. And now, one of them is coming from continent away to meet Veera face to face for the first time.

Also on AO3 | Playlist | Aesthetic sideblog

Part 1: Herbs on the windowsill

Part 2: Someday colors

Part 3: Your chance to make the sun rise thrice | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3

Note: The conclusion to this project has been simmering on the back burner for quite some time, but what with the events of season 5, now seemed the best time for it get out in the world. Because I’m tired of the violence, and this is my answer to it. This piece is dedicated to everyone in need of something kinder.

From the other room, some repetitive sound pats out a muffled rhythm, so softly that Niki only realizes after a moment that it’s what woke her up. Yawning, she rolls out of bed in her long t-shirt and stands. She thinks she knows what it is. She pulls the door open.

Yep. Veera is restlessness in dusky purple and she’s pacing the length of their living room ceaselessly, a half-saturated silhouette of color in the dawn shadows. Her hands are twitching.

“This was a terrible idea,” she says in a low voice without looking at Niki or breaking the perfect meter of her stride.

“No, it wasn’t,” Niki says from the doorway. She rubs her eyes. The sun is just now barely rising, and it’s the longest day of the summer. This far north, that means it’s something like three in the morning. In Niki’s opinion, that’s way too early for anything, but Veera never can sleep well the night before something big is happening.

“Yes it is,” Veera insists. “Why did I want to meet her? She’s going to look at me and see my - see me, and I’m going to be - it’s going to be awful. Why did I do this?!”

“Veera,” Niki says, somewhat exasperated, “She already knows what you look like, she’s literally your clone. And you have literally sent her photos of us, so she knows what you look like, too.” She waits until Veera reaches the endpoint of the line her feet keep retracing to cross it without interrupting her rhythm, and plops herself onto the couch to at least have this conversation sitting comfortably. Balls, she thinks. Here we go again.

“No, no, no,” Veera says, staring down the carpet and shaking her head as she walks. “I’m going to have to talk to her, and you know how the words get tangled up inside when I get stressed, and I’m already - already - argh.” She suddenly stops in the middle of her circuit and presses her face down into her hands. Then, just as abruptly, she looks back up, flings her arms back down, and resumes her pacing, now in a more circular track. Past the doors to the bedrooms and bathroom, down toward the kitchen, past the big philodendron in the corner and Niki on the couch in front of the faintly lit window, and then around again. Her hands twist back and forth at the ends of her arms with more vigor now, like an inverted gesture of silent applause, but one that she doesn’t want anyone to see. There was a time she would not have let Niki see how distressed she was, and the way that distress expends itself through the the twitch of her hands, of her feet, of her head.

“Veera, it’s okay,” Niki says, softer now. “You’ve talked to her practically every day for, what, two years now? And she already knows that this is something that happens sometimes, because you already told her, because you already thought of this ahead of time, because you always think of everything. She knows you and she’s here to visit you, she’s not gonna run for the hills.”

“But what if I do,” Veera says dejectedly. “I don’t know if I can do this.” She flops onto the couch next to Niki and closes her eyes, her limbs suddenly gone limp with the admission. “And we haven’t talked. They’re instant messages.”

“I know.” Niki reaches out to take Veera’s hand in hers. Veera automatically tangles their fingers together without opening her eyes. For someone usually so guarded and sparing with touch, the utterly casual intimacy of the gesture is a condensed, powerful shorthand for a long history of familiarity. It makes Niki’s heart melt a little bit every time.

“It’ll be fine. Trust me,” Niki says. “Beth’s like, your best friend.”

Veera’s eyes snap open. “But you’re my best friend,” she says, giving Niki an almost wounded look.

Niki rolls her eyes. “You can have more than one of those, you dork,” she says with a smile. “Like, just because you’re my everything - and you know that you are - that doesn’t mean you have to be the only thing. Like, we talked about this when I started seriously seeing Suvi again, remember? And we made sure that we were still okay and on the same page with everything, and you were fine with that when it was me. Why not you? Nothing has to change how we are. Or, well, it can, if we want. But not what we are to each other.” Niki squeezes her hand just a little.

“There are a lot of great people in our lives now because of what we did four years ago, and because of the online network you set up for Project Leda,” Niki continues, “and I think it’s worth getting to know some of them. And it sounds like you’ve found one of the best of them, one who thinks so too, so much that she decided to jump an ocean to come see you.”

“She’s coming to look at the university, too, she’s not here just to see me,” Veera protests.

“Yeah, she pretty much is.”

“Rrrngh,” Veera says, flopping her head against the back of the couch again. Then she changes direction yet again like a wayward wind, sitting up and curling her legs under her in a single, carefully coordinated motion.

Veera stares into space for a moment, then turns her gaze to meet Niki’s and holds it as steadily as her hand. That fear that perpetually clings to her looms large now in those eyes, dark in the dimly lit room and framed by the dark hair that she’s cut pixie-short once again. But the fear is also being tempered by a powerful hope for the good things that could happen, hope that Veera hasn’t allowed herself to show until now. Niki runs a thumb over the back of Veera’s hand and blinks gently into that intense gaze, like a cat. Apparently that means I love you in cat language. Veera told her that once.

Then, Veera does something that makes Niki’s breath stop for several heartbeats in the morning stillness. She takes the hand she’s holding with both of her own, and presses it against her cheek - her scarred cheek.

Although their daily coexistence is a never-ending study in just how much meaning can be packed into these small intimacies, Niki has never once touched those scars in all the three years they’ve been living together. She never would have presumed to try, knowing how self-conscious Veera is about them. But now she can feel them against her knuckles. Although Veera usually acts like they’re a gruesome open wound, they simply feel like an irregular pattern of calluses. Nothing scary or repulsive. Just skin.

Gently, gently, Niki unfolds her hand to hold her face, fingers flush against the living filigree left by a long-ago fire. Veera sighs and tilts her head into the touch, as if seeking solace in the lines of her palm. A silent tear or two seeps into the space between Niki’s hand and her cheek. Niki’s heartbeat stumbles, and she brushes them away with her thumb and a sniffle of her own.

“I love you,” Veera says quietly.

Okay. Now I’m really gonna bawl and it’s not even four o'clock yet, Niki thinks. This really is gonna be the longest day.

Veera rarely says the words out loud, preferring as usual to let her actions and affections speak for her, and they never fail to do so eloquently. Niki’s the talkative one. But the words are there, hanging in the air with the first light of day. Maybe for today, we can swap for once.

Niki wipes her eyes on the back of her free hand. Then, she uses it to delicately turn Veera’s head to the side, so that she can lean forward and brush the lightest of kisses onto those marks that mean Niki will never, ever lose her among the hundreds of faces out there that look just the same and nothing alike. Then, she lets go to mop at her streaming eyes with both hands.

Niki feels hands on her shoulders, then arms arcing around to pull her into an embrace, and the weight of a head leaning against the side of hers. She lets herself be held. It’s okay to cry here, she reminds herself. That was one of their earliest rules in this tiny haven they carved out of the world together.

They stay like that for a time, Niki doesn’t know how long. Only that her eyes are half-closed and her soul is open, and that the whole place is turning more and more golden as it fills with light from the east.

***

Several hours, assurances, and cups of tea later, the resonant chime of the clock sounds a quarter til noon over the busy murmur echoing in the main terminal, and a train pulls into the Helsinki station. Its streamlined sides gleam in the rich late morning light.

On the platform, Niki has an arm around Veera, and she can feel her shoulders flinch slightly as the squeal of brakes echoes off all the hard concrete and metal in the awning-enclosed platform. But the motion passes through her and vanishes as if hardly noticed. Veera is leaning a little forward, her gaze locked on the train.

The doors clatter open. A small crowd of passengers emerges onto the platform, and most of them start immediately making their way toward their next destinations. Soon, the flow thins and there are only a few people left, including a girl in a long navy wool coat and a messy bun, who is stepping carefully in her heels off the train and into the sunlight. She’s staring away from them down the other side of the platform, searching.

The girl leans forward to better see down to the far end, but doesn’t find what she’s looking for, and straightens back up. Her posture is impeccable. She turns toward them slowly, leading with her head, revealing a very familiar face framed by little flyaway hairs, lit up by the sun in sharp golden contrast to the subtler blues and blacks of her ensemble. When her eyes find them, that face cracks into the kind of huge, toothy grin that will give her laugh lines early in life if it’s kind to her.

Niki waves and smiles at her, then looks at Veera, who is still standing motionless at her side.

“You gonna go on?” Niki says to her quietly.

Veera looks back at her with eyes wider than she’s ever seen. Their hazel is now brilliant, aflame with emotion and the bright light of the station. Then she takes one step, and she’s running right at Beth, who has dropped her single piece of luggage and is trotting to meet her as fast as she can.

They halt sharply half a meter apart and spend a frozen moment in some kind of preliminary assessment or wordless communication. Veera’s arms are flung slightly backward and out, like wings about to launch her skyward at any moment. Beth manages to give the impression that she’s hovering on tiptoe even in her heels, like she’s perched on a precipice and waiting to make a leap of faith.

Then Veera has collapsed that last distance between them by diving forward and seizing Beth around the middle and, apparently, squeezing her with all her strength, because Beth stumbles and wheezes with the force of it. Then Beth is hugging her back fiercely and making small incoherent yelps of delight, and she’s picked Veera up bodily to spin her around in sheer uncontainable exuberance.

Niki’s face is hurting from the breadth of the grin there that won’t go away. Veera starts laughing, filling the entire station with the sound of pure joy. It echoes as loudly as the chiming of the hour, and it’s as warm and brilliant as the midsummer midday sun streaming in through the gaps in the awnings far above.

Title deliberately misquoted from the poem in the epigraph of Games Wizards Play, by Diane Duane. Some of you nerds are probably aware of the reasons for this. The original ends with: and do not miss, ‘twixt fire and ice / your chance to make the sun rise twice. It’s about suns and stars and second chances and finding lost things and bringing them home.

#orphan black #veera suominen #niki lintula #beth childs #clone club #lizzie taking up space #lizzie's adventures in writing #mika ob #mk ob #herbs on the windowsill au #remembering the strength of this softness #with the earth down on your knees #for so high and honorable an estate

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