#barbara’s not in it YET and neither are the others but they will join I’m sure

[rad-batson]

Okay I honestly can’t even explain how this happened but I think I wrote a 50-page-long pilot for a Keeping Up With The Kardashians parody called The Waynes with an Arrested Development kinda feel (based on some tumblr post, everyone’s seen it before) and now I have no idea what to do with it cuz I poured my heart and soul into this comedy shit show (affectionate) like Do I post it here? Do I call up DC and dangle it in front of their faces? Do y’all want snip-its? Do I submit it to a poetry slam? I’m broke af but I need someone else to see it, okay? I worked really hard on it and it deserves an audience >:(

Edit: Here it is!!

[angelofthenight]

You do a terrific job with Last Man Alive, the suspense kills me. I've been wondering, supposing Dano!Ed Nashton and Leslie Grace-Barbara Gordon (I know, not released yet) bond intimately as a sort of 'multiverse couple' over their genius intellect and computer nerdiness, her protecting him from bullies and both sharing a flat by day, both donning their masks, playing cat and mouse and battling each other by night as Batgirl and the Riddler. And neither knows one is Batgirl, the other the Riddler. Like a sort of dark romantic comedy. What would your thoughts be on this?

Omg I’m obsessed with this kind of trope!

The sexual tension, the teasing while they’re masked. I feel like it would be the kind of tension of “are they going to fight or are they going to kiss? Are they going to beat the shit out of each other or are they going to have sex?”

I cant help but think of after the truth comes out and they unmask each other.

It would be like a best friends to enemies to lovers thing. Their relationship would be so complicated, so complex. Like they’re in love with the others unmasked identity but are enemies with their masked one.

The lust, the longing, the betrayal.

I feel Babs would be more heartbroken coz.. y’know, he does CRIMES and is a SERIAL KILLER at night which is everything she stands against; the whole reason she don’s her Batgirl persona

It would be a lil more complex for Ed coz to him they’re kinda on the same side but go about it in different ways. So he would def focus more on getting her to join him but once she denies in betrayal and anguish that’s when he gets heartbroken and angry.

I see them as basically Anakin and Padme or Catra and Adora

Also what Taylor says here perfectly describes the angst of it all

[5-7-9]

I actually liked coodot’s cancer plotline, for inspiration for my own reclamation AU purposes.

So S1 or the Prequel (featuring Eddie! Or Edward) Where Riddler’s debut is hacking into the television for his puzzle show… only this happened AFTER Joker first did it, so the public thinks he’s some “Joker copycat.” Obviously infuriated by this, he sets Joker as a (one-sided) rival! I read a fic that i can’t remember, where Eddie was a fan and his first meeting with Joker was in Arkham but he was completely disassociating, the day after Eddie officially stopped caring and thought he sucked but Joker was present mentally there this time being just as annoying as he usually is but this time slightly interested. Yeah, Eddie never was a fan in my version, but i liked the idea of Joker disassociating (in my AU Joker usually disassociates in Arkham and that’s the explanation as to why he doesn’t leave as quickly as easily it seems).

Anyway, Eddie does his usual interactions and teamups with rouges, being abused in Arkham, that stupid misdiagnosis of OCD is given + other wrong diagnosis's (but this time on purpose by me), and is generally annoying to everyone. He’s not given lots to work with in the prequel besides being convenient for Batman to do vigilantism, so I’m skipping over to-

S2 or the main story: Eddie’s experiencing the new resurgence of Arkham Asylum, getting to do more bonding with the patients that doesn’t involve manipulation or insulting or just to hear his own voice. He gets a proper re-diagnosis, this time he has autism with NPD!!! Leland gets to him with his daddy issues, and the whole ableism and bullying thing makes more… sense now. (In this world, i tried smashing the original Batman’s 1940 date with slightly current-er 2000s together, so the timeline’s going by real life standards but faster and combined with the unrealistic elements) (So actually autism is a new-ish concept) (Still, even with that context, it doesn’t excuse how Arkham’s “doctors” just fucking suck). Anyway, better coping mechanisms! Whoo!

Eddie actually decides to get properly released, since it seemed really easy? He’s partaking in the Wayne’s charitable jobs for unemployable people like ex cons and maybe immigrants and others idk. (I saw a fic do this, but i swear i thought of the idea before i saw it, but haha coincidence). Most of the rouges are apart of this program, so there’s fun shenanigans to happen there. Actually, most of the rouges are also part of the all inclusive queer group from that bar, i think i mentioned that already tho. Eddie fits in pretty nicely with the queer group, people actually support and praise and hype him up awwwww.

Eddie actually joins a different group distanced from the activists and queers, he joins a coding or nerd(?) club. He meets Barbara, a STEM(?) graduate(?), that managed to impress him somehow (i haven’t figured out the why yet). They end up working with each other for some mystery/puzzle solving (anti-villain) (poor Gordon 💀).

So the cancer part is real, and everyone is sad about it. There’s an entire not-birthday party set up just to celebrate him before he passes away. (I wanted Eddie to feel important without needing him to prove it).

So this is where Lois and Luthor actually comes in. Lois was having a pretty successful anti-Lex campaign, his reputation was getting to an uncomfortable point… Until Luthor dropped the fucking “I found the cure to cancer” BOMB!!! So, the media doesn’t know what to think, neither does anyone else (don’tcha just hate it when that shitty guy does a good thing?). Eddie was one of the guys that got cured, so he’s unfortunately indebted to Lex.

I think that’s all i got for now

[butwhyduh]

Yo B!

I was just doing my stuff and then a random thought appear:

Just Jason dating Damian's teacher without knowing that she's Damian's teacher. Like the realisation hits when he brings her to the Wayne Manor. It hits everyone: Damian, Jason, the teacher. Only Bruce and Tim are lik lmao I figured it out at the beginning of the relationship (though shut up you two cuz I still remember the Hanukkah headcanon of both of them celebrating because they thought it's important to one another. Happy Hanukkah btw to y'all celebrating!)

Not to mention if she teaches something that Damian doesn't really like or if he has a puppy crush on her (because those things happen).

And the moment of realisation that your older brother is boinking your teacher and maybe that's why she was so happy the other day.

So much drama, so much awkwardness! That I love it!

What's your opinion B?

Btw. I love your characterisation of Batfamily you can portray every character very true to the original.

Aww thanks ☺️ and this idea is hilarious 🤣

Warning: some bad words and a food fight. Also it’s Alfred’s birthday.

Jason met you at a Whole Foods of all places. You don’t normally go there but a sale drew you in. And you were so drawn in that you didn’t notice until you actually hit a guy with your basket.

“Oh god! I’m so sorry!” You gasped feeling yourself flush. He kinda laughed. A tall, very fit, handsome man smiling and laughing. That was new.

“No no. The sale on tomatoes is a big deal. I’ll move so you don’t have to run me down,” he joked.

“I-“ you stammered. “I’d rather not run you over.” You laughed and he nodded.

“Oh hey, your book fell out,” Jason said picking a book up off the floor. “Hamlet, hu?”

“Oh yeah. I’m a teacher,” you explained taking the book from him. Oh boy, he had the prettiest blue eyes too. “Thanks.”

“No problem. If I’m nice to you, you might not run me over again,” he flirted. You laughed.

Across the produce section, Tim Drake came to a stop and backed up slightly to watch Jason flirt with a woman. Bruce came up behind him and Tim stopped him.

“Look,” Tim motioned quietly. Jason hadn’t noticed either of them.

“Oh, oh. Well, that’s nice,” Bruce said awkwardly looking away. Tim snorted.

“Take a closer look.”

“That’s Damian’s English teacher,” Bruce confirmed what Tim already knew. They watched as you put your number in Jason’s phone.

“Should we tell him,” Tim said like a kid with the hottest gossip. “Damian will flip out too.”

“We’re not telling anyone. We don’t even know if they’ll even go on a date and it’s none of Damian’s business. I forbid you from telling anyone. Dick, Barbara, Cass, Stephanie. No one. Jason… deserve a little happiness. Don’t mess it up,” Bruce said strictly.

“Geez, I get it,” Tim said with his arms raised. “I won’t say anything. But imagine them dating. It’ll be hilarious!”

“Go back down that isle. We won’t come back until Jason is done talking to her. I don’t want him to know we know,” Bruce said all business like.

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be like a ghost,” Tim replied. “I need siracha anyways.”

7 weeks later

It was Alfred’s birthday and that was traditionally when all the family got together. It also happened to fall during Hanukkah this year. So the family prepared a big dinner meal without Alfred allowed to join. He protested multiple times but Bruce refused. Instead they ordered food from Alfred’s favorite restaurant and a dessert from his favorite bakery. Aunt Kate, the only one who actually knew what to do around Hanukkah, was invited as well. Tim and Bruce had yet to admit that neither were actually practicing.

“I want to meet your mysterious friend,” Alfred told Jason one day a week earlier over tea. “I believe I heard you are dating.”

“Geez, nothing gets past you, hu?” Jason said ruefully. Alfred smiled in his tea. “I’ll invited her. But if the family scares her off…”

“I’ll personally burn their meals for a month,” Alfred replied promptly.

“Remind me not to make you mad,” Jason muttered.

“Indeed,” Alfred said with a grin before taking a sip of his tea.

The night of Alfred’s birthday party was turning disastrous by the minute. They sent the wrong cake and added bacon to four dishes and while that was generally a good addition, maybe not on Hanukkah. Bruce at least knew that. Kate wasn’t coming and Bruce was technically raised by an Anglican Christian British man and knew very little about Hanukkah. But he was going to try for Tim to have a good holiday.

Jason hadn’t told Bruce that he was bringing a date but Bruce knew Barbara was coming with Dick and Tim had Bernard and Damian was bringing Jon and they were definitely dating or something. Steph was coming with Cass but she’s been at every family dinner even before they started dating. But she was also Tim’s ex which was weird. Bruce needed an Advil. Or a beer. Luckily Alfred was at the spa that Bruce insist he visit for the day or he would have certainly taken over and it was his birthday.

But finally they had a bacon free kosher meal with the correct dessert delivered. And Bruce managed to do it without going absolutely insane.

The menorah was brought out and Bruce quickly googled Hanukkah traditions that he hadn’t participated in since he was 8. His mother’s side always had Hanukkah dinners and his father’s side had Christmas morning and dinner. But all of that came to a winding halt when his parents died. He had brought Christmas back when he adopted Roman Catholic Dick and until Tim, none of them had any other holiday. When Bruce learned Tim didn’t celebrate because he was always alone for the holidays, Bruce took the time to add some Jewish holidays to his calendar. But he couldn’t remember pretty much any of the traditions that went with them. Bruce wasn’t going to recite any prayers since he felt it unfair to do as someone non-practicing. Tim or Kate could if they wanted.

Tim didn’t know how to tell Bruce he was non-practicing either. Bruce almost broke down when Tim tried to explain he didn’t celebrate any holidays because his parents were never home when they were alive and Tim couldn’t bring himself to say that didn’t exactly feel the need to start as someone who’s firmly atheist. So when Bruce asked if he wanted to recite the prayer, Tim had almost peed his pants before suggesting a moment of silence so people of all religions can have a moment. Both of them were secretly relieved.

But that put Bruce into a tailspin as he wondered what other religions he needed to accommodate for his kids. He should ask them what they needed. What if he already missed a holiday or religious need??

“Master Bruce, I’m home. I shall avert my eyes if needed,” Alfred called in the hallway. Bruce hopped up to meet him. Alfred looked more refreshed then he had in months and was carrying a few shopping bags.

“You can come out. Nothing to hide,” Bruce said and Alfred nodded with a curt smile.

“I’m simply overjoyed that the kitchen is in one piece,” Alfred commented carrying his bags upstairs.

“We knew better than to cook,” Bruce replied.

“Then my stomach is also overjoyed for food safety,” Alfred said before disappearing from sight.

Dick and Barbara showed up with chocolate coins. Bruce had forgotten those and was filled with cold dread.

“We got them. Don’t worry. I once again save the day,” Dick said with a grin.

“I actually thought of them,” Barbara replied with an eye roll.

“And I thought to invite you.”

“Jon!” Damian called out before running down the stairs to open the main door. Jon stood with a casserole dish in hand and a present bag on his wrist.

“Hey Dami! Hello Mr Wayne, Dick, Barbara,” Jon said politely. Damian grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him in. Damian quickly pulled the stuff from Jon’s hands and placed them on the nearest surface despite Jon’s protest.

“I have the newest Cheese Viking game,” Damian said as they ran upstairs. Steph and Cass walked downstairs just as the boys left and they both started talking to Dick and Barbara.

Tim showed up next looking nervous as can be with Bernard in tow. He politely introduced him to everyone slightly more formally that necessary. Bruce shook Bernards hand and welcomed him to his home and Bruce noted that Tim relaxed minutely.

“Jason is late as usual,” Bruce commented a good 30 minutes later. “Has anyone been able to get ahold of him?”

“I texted but no response,” Dick replied. Bruce sighed.

“Let’s get started and he can join us when he gets here,” Bruce suggested.

They all sat around the table with Bruce at one end and Alfred, guest of honor, at the other, at Bruce’s insistence of course. Right before everyone dug into the first course of the meal, the sound of shoes in the hallway came to their attention. Jason’s date was there.

“Hey sorry we’re late. The highway was shit,” Jason said ushering in his lady guest. You moved to the chair he offered and let Jason push in the seat.

“Your scarf,” Alfred started to stand but Jason waved him off and helped you of your scarf and coat and hung them up himself before sitting down. It was only then that you were able to look at the guests at the table.

Mr Wayne smiled politely as well as Dick. The younger brother Tim had a wide grin and just as Jason sat down, you saw Damian. You blinked quickly.

He called you by your last name the way one would a teacher and everyone turned to him. Tim was practically splitting his face in two with his grin. Jason looked between you and Damian before the thought connected and his eyes widened.

“Are you dating my brother??” Damian asked.

“I-“ you stuttered before looking at Jason. “You didn’t tell me you had a little brother in school.”

“It wasn’t relevant,” he replied. “Is he- do you teach him?”

“Todd,” Damian said grasping a table knife tightly. “Did you go out of your way to date my English teacher??”

“No, you little psycho. I have a pretty hard fast rule about avoiding middle schools for dates,” Jason said puffing up a bit.

“Boys,” Bruce warned knowing they were going to start fighting any second and he actually liked the soup.

“Why are you grinning, Drake,” Damian growled. “Did you know? Did you set them up?”

“No one set us up, Damian,” you replied.

“I had nothing to do with this!” Tim protested.

“You are not that important,” Jason growled.

“Yeah, then why are you dating my teacher, you oaf,” Damian sneered.

“Boys,” Alfred warned but Jason and Damian were too far gone and when Damian slung mashed potatoes at Jason, it desolved into chaos. Some food slapped Dick directly in the face and as he was trying to calm the others down, it made him very mad.

Jason grabbed Damian by the collar and went to haul him over the table but in Damian’s flailling, he kicked an entire saucer of gravy in Bernard’s lap. Tim helped him up and grabbed the saucer to throw but it instead hit Bruce in the head. Bruce was currently separating Damian and Jason. Jon hopped up and helped you out of your seat only to be hit with a paper table decoration coated in whipped cream.

“STOP NOW,” bellowed Alfred and the boys stopped fighting. “Clean all of this up immediately! I am going to bed and I want this room to gleam in the morning.”

Everyone had the decency to look guilty while cleaning. And everyone- even Bruce- cleaned until it was Alfred worthy. It took a full 10 minutes since they didn’t let any of the dates clean, including Jon who could have done it in a second. Bruce bought Bernard an entire new outfit to be delivered to his house.

Jason was awkwardly silent on the ride back to your place. You glanced over to look at him and he glanced at you quickly before looking away. You couldn’t handle it when he pulled in your driveway.

“Okay, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. I’m your kid brother’s English teacher. You already knew I was a teacher and I didn’t know you had a kid brother,” you said. Jason nodded.

“So you’ve got to decide if you want to see me anymore or not. Because I really like you and what I do for a living shouldn’t-“

He cut you off with a kiss. His rough fingers cupped your cheeks and his mouth pressed heavily against yours. Jason kissed you until his lungs burned and he pulled back panting.

“I definitely want to keep seeing you. I’m just- just embarrassed that my family acted that way. God. You sure you don’t want to run screaming into the night?” He asked.

“I’ll try to resist the urge,” you replied playfully nipping at his lips but not enough to count as a kiss. Jason tried to follow you each time until you finally gave him a good kiss. “I teach middle schoolers. Do you think I have a bone of fear in my body?”

“That’s my girl,” Jason added with a grin.

[cipheress-to-k-pop]

Hi hi! I was wondering if you could do a dick Grayson x Avatar like fem reader with either a jealous Babs or Zatanna I hope that made sense🥲

True Love’s Kiss

Pairing: Dick Grayson as Nightwing x Reader

Warnings: I don’t think so

Word Count: 4.1K

@writing2sirvive : Hi love, me again but with a request this time. If you have time of course. I was thinking true love’s kiss with Dick Grayson. You can go crazy with it because I know you love Dick Grayson as much as I do. Btw I love your writing so much.

A/N: I think I did it wrong...cuz even though this is a Dick Grayson x reader fic, it’s mostly centred around reader and Zatanna???? Sorry about that???

You were fine with knowing that Dick was still friends with most of his exes. You completely accepted that he was able to keep functional relationships with most of them. In fact, it showed you how amicable and neutral Dick was and how he never held any grudges against people.

Of course, you were surprised by the sheer number. And the fact that he seems to interact with them practically every day. But eventually you managed not to let yourself get too bothered by it.

I mean, how could you? Barbara was the smartest, funniest, most approachable person you had ever met. She always made sure not to overstep her boundaries and was unusually open with you, given that Dick was her ex-boyfriend.

Raquel was adventurous and fun and you always had a good time when you were around her. She was another one who was respectful of your relationship. She never brought up her past flings with Dick, nor did she ever try and put you down. In fact, she was one of the people who really shipped the two of you.

You liked most of his exes. To the point where it made Dick kind of uncomfortable.

You liked most of his exes.

Ever since you had joined the team, being introduced as Nightwing’s significant other, Zatanna had been a constant thorn in your side. She was nice and sweet but there was something about her that rubbed you the wrong way. You could tell almost immediately that she wasn’t quite over her relationship with Dick. Short as it was.

Or maybe she was just the type of person who didn’t want someone, but didn’t want others to have the same person either.

Nonetheless, being around her put you constantly on edge. You lost count of how many times she redirected a conversation to be about her previous relationship with your boyfriend. ‘Oh, Dick took you to a fancy restaurant for your birthday? Well, I remember back when we were dating, he threw a huge party for me on mine.’

‘Oh, you celebrated your one-year anniversary with Dick in Paris? Well during our 3-month-aversary he bought me an expensive necklace.’

It didn’t bother you in the slightest. At least, not in the way that she hoped. It didn’t make you insecure or doubt or feel intimidated by her. It was just an annoyance that you couldn’t shake off, like the teacher you didn’t like or your annoying neighbour.

Unfortunately, Zatanna couldn’t take a hint that it made you and your friends (Barbara and Raquel included) uncomfortable and slightly irritated. Yet, everyone was just waiting for you to express the slightest distaste, not wanting to step on your toes. However, they were quick to change the topic in case they thought she was going too far.

Dick had been blissfully unaware of everything and you wanted to keep it that way. The last thing you needed was this turning into some sort of issue, especially since Zatanna was still his teammate.

However today you had enough.

You could look past Zatanna’s petty jealousy but allowing the jealousy to come to the forefront during a mission was where you drew the line.

Dick, M’Gann and Conner had been on a covert mission for Batman and out of the country and under team vote decided that you should be made in charge until he returned, since you were the only other older member (other than Zatanna but you were voted leader unanimously. Something you were extremely proud about). That was well and good, until you had been given a mission.

Regardless of how much you did not want to work with Zatanna without the others there to wrangle her, you had to put your personal feelings aside when you had a mission to complete.

You thought you could both be professionals about it and act like mature adults.

You were dead wrong.

If it wasn’t disagreements, it was insubordination. If it wasn’t insubordination, it was blatant arrogance. She questioned your judgment in front of the other members and even had the nerve to argue with you about mission strategies. You were trying to look out for everyone and put yourself in the line of fire since the squad members were better at stealth.

Zatanna seemed to think you were trying to steal the show and insisted that she be partnered with you even though you wanted someone with the younger members to keep them safe.

When you relented and agreed to go stealth, she accused you of ducking out and intentionally trying to put her in danger. The others had to watch as steam practically came out of your ears when you relented once again and decided you’d be with her because you honestly couldn’t argue with her much longer.

As if that wasn’t infuriating enough.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was when she refused to work as a team, putting the mission at risk and nearly getting the both of you hurt. She was fighting on her own, not bothering to have your back and going into it alone. Obviously, the two of you were overpowered quickly once they realized that you were pretty much behaving solo.

Luckily, the others pulled through and got you both out of there before anything horrible happened.

You sat in the ship, jaw clenched so tightly that they swore they could hear your teeth cracking, fists nearly white as you tried to control your anger and keep yourself from screaming at her while you were still in the air.

Once the ship landed in the docking bay and Zatanna was the first one to leave without saying another word, you snapped.

“What the hell did you think you were doing today!” You growled out, fisting her collar and stopping her in her tracks.

“What are you talking about?” She feigned innocence and you felt your skin burning. Everything around you faded out and all you could feel was fury. In hindsight, you would have liked to handle this issue in a more refined manner, but you honestly couldn’t care.

So, you didn’t notice the rest of the team, along with the a few members of the Justice League watching you chew Zatanna out.

Whatever would keep you from lighting her on fire was enough.

“I’m talking about putting the mission, not to mention ourselves in jeopardy, all because you can’t stop acting like a spoilt brat!” You hissed.

She rolled her eyes and you and the thought of strangling her briefly crossed your mind before she shoved your hands off her, dusting herself off like your fingerprints were dirt, “You need to stop blaming others for your inadequacy.”

She turned on her heel sharply and walked away. Blood pounded through your ears and your fingers twitched by their sides before you formed a whip of water from the bay and lashed it against her feet.

Zatanna, caught off guard, was thrown across the room before she caught herself with a muttered spell and turned around, glaring at you furiously.

“We’re going to settle things, right here, right now!”

“If you would stop being so insecure, then we could sort out our differences like mature adults!” She screamed back at you and before you could control it, flames erupted from beneath your feet and raced towards her, scorching the ground beneath it.

Each puff of breath you took released sparks. Zatanna immediately got into an offensive stance, levitating one of the weapons crates and chucking at you. You blocked it effortlessly using a wall of earth before throwing an inferno at her.

You kept fighting, flames and splashes of water going into the air every time you collided. The others watched in fear as you both raced towards each other, it looked like neither of you were holding back.

Before you could strike her again, you were being pulled away by Superman and as Zatanna was by Batman, they both pulled you yards apart. Even with his strong, authoritative grip on you, you couldn’t stop thrashing in his arms, throwing gusts of air at her.

“(Y/N). Enough.” Superman spoke in your ear and you calmed down, relaxing in his grip. He let you go after and you winced, feeling your skin bruise where he grabbed you. He gave you an apologetic glance at that.

“You both have to put your differences aside and work as a team or you won’t be allowed to go on any more missions.” Batman told you, voice firm but it didn’t shake you.

“No, Zatanna is going to have to put her issues with me aside and learn that when I have been elected as leader of the squad then you are supposed to put your petty jealousy aside and know your place.” You spat.

“You weren’t right for the position!”

“I did everything right! And if it hadn’t been for you, we wouldn’t have been under open fire tonight!”

“You’re not the boss of me!”

“When I am the leader of the squadron then I am! And you’re meant to listen and not question my judgement because you’re being blinded by your pathetic jealously!”

“I’m not jealous of you!”

“Oh, please! That’s the biggest load of crap I’ve heard from you and it was all proved today! Admit it! You were immature and fucking stupid because you can’t get over that fact that you dated Dick for what? 3 months?”

“That’s because he’s supposed to be with me!” 

“LIKE HELL HE IS!” You roared.

Batman felt a little helpless watching the two of you scream at each other. All this fighting? Over a boy? His son, no less? He had other sons and you were free to have your pick. But at this point, he wasn’t even sure what to say.

“You just can’t seem to accept the fact that he doesn’t love you anymore! Get over it! Because he certainly has!” You shouted, spinning on your heel and stomping away from her, determined to have the last word. Superman sighed in relief. He thought another fight would break out.

“You’re just insecure because you know that if he had the chance, he would come crawling back to me!”

A chill went done your spine and you felt cold fury run through your veins, turning around to glare at her murderously and clenching your hands tightly. You were so angry your feet were rooted to the floor, body seizing up slightly.

The others looked anxiously between the two of you as you glared at each other for a minute before you spoke with the calmest, yet most terrifying voice they’ve ever heard from you.

“Zatanna, you can try your damn hardest to win him back. But I promise you, you’re never going to get what you want.” You told her darkly, before walking away.

As Zatanna glared at your receding figure she decided she was going to prove you wrong.

***

To keep you from fighting with Zatanna again, when Batman came to you with a solo mission you couldn’t agree fast enough. Even though you knew you’d miss Dick’s homecoming, you still wanted to get the hell away from here. Not like you’d be missing anything important, other than Zatanna fawning over him.

You’d get to tell him how much you missed him in private anyway.

As soon as you were out of the cave, you couldn’t help the relief that filled your bones. You had been so on edge the past few days, still furious with her so the distance between the two of you was appreciated.

When Dick got home, he was ecstatic to see you again. It had been nearly 3 weeks since he had last held you and his skin was practically buzzing with excitement when he reached a cave, desperate to hug you, kiss you, touch you.

He got to the mess hall quickly, running all the way there and when he opened the door, he was instantly disappointed. You weren’t there.

“Where’s (Y/N)?” He asked Beast Boy, hoping he would tell him that you were just back at your apartment or that you had gone out for a while and would be back soon but he felt his heart sink when Gar gave him a sympathetic smile.

“She’s on a mission for a week.”

“A mission? Who’s with her?”

“No one. It’s a solo mission.”

Now he was worried. You usually didn’t take solo missions, liking to work in a team, knowing that there would be people who would be watching your back was reassuring. He knew you were more than skilled to handle a solo mission but not being by your side made him nervous and slightly antsy.

He was also upset that you weren’t here. So, he decided to do the most adult thing. Go home and sulk in bed while holding your sweatshirt that smelt like you.

But apparently the world had something against him because when he was about to go through the Zeta tube he was intercepted. By non other than Zatanna.

Now, poor clueless Dick had no idea that you had thrown hands with Zatanna just a day ago and was the reason why you weren’t there to welcome him when he got back. If he had he would’ve sulked at her and whined loudly for her to hear while he dragged his feet.

But, poor clueless Dick had absolutely no idea Zatanna was the reason he was being deprived of your kisses. So, he just smiled brightly at her and asked her if she needed anything.

“As a matter of fact, I found an old spell and I need someone to test it out on!”

“I don’t know how I feel about being your non-scientific experiment, Z.”

“Come on, it’s totally harmless, I promise.”

“I don’t know...”

“Don’t you trust me?”

He did. But there was just something about this situation that made him uncomfortable. Maybe it was because he missed you like crazy and just wanted to go home and sulk until you came back. Maybe it was because he felt uncomfortable to go somewhere private with his ex-girlfriend without telling you first. Or maybe it was because of the way Zatanna felt the need to guilt him into it.

Nevertheless, he agreed, albeit reluctantly and went to her room. Inside Zatanna had a bunch of ruins written on a paper and some weird poultices beside it.

“Now this isn’t going to work unless you give me your consent.” She informed, bustling about the room and Dick suddenly felt the air was a little stuffy.

“What do you mean by consent? Consent for what?”

“It’s a love spell.” She told him, smiling slyly but he couldn’t quite understand why. His hands got a little clammy at the announcement. What did she mean by love spell? Was she trying to get him to fall in love with her? Why would she be so open about it then? Especially when she knew he was in love with someone else?

“What do you mean?”

“Oh relax, stop being so tense. It’s just a love spell that proves who you truly love.” She said, immediately noticing how stiff his body was. Though she chalked it up to confusion. Dick was simply confused about who he loved, he was clouded by his attraction to you and he felt guilty about being unfaithful. But deep down, he really loved her. And this spell would prove it.

“In the olden ages, people would use it on their wedding to prove that their significant other truly loved them.”

He nodded, mouth falling open with realization. He already knew what the answer would be so why even bother? He assumed it was because Zatanna was curious to whether it actually worked.

“Too bad (Y/N) isn’t here, I mean I know who I love but I’d like to try it out on her. I mean, who takes a mission the day before their boyfriend comes back to town.” He complained, more to himself but Zatanna still heard it.

“Anyway, can I cast it on you?”

“Sure, couldn’t hurt.”

Oh, how he’d come to know just how wrong he was.

***

You raced through the halls, panicked, hearing your heart beat out of your chest as you sprinted to the Med Bay. Even though you were running as quick as possible you still pumped your legs to run faster, needing to get there quickly.

As soon as you saw Zatanna outside the Med Bay, you skidded to a stop in front of her and grabbing her collar, pinning her against the wall. She hit it with a thud and she saw white for a second when her head collided with the hard surface.

It was then you got a good look at her face. Her eyes were red and face wet. Her lips were bitten until they bled. You gritted your teeth, grip tightening around the collar as tears pricked your eyes.

“What the hell did you do!”

She whimpered, eyes getting glossy again before she started crying, incomprehensible words leaving her lips and you snarled before shaking her again, “You don’t get to cry! What the hell did you do to him!”

“It was a love spell!” She cried out, “It was supposed to reveal who he truly loves.”

“AND?!”

“It’s activated by a kiss.” She sniffled, “And I did.”

“Is it done?” Dick asked just as she finished casting the spell. His body was enveloped by a slight glow that was only visible to her and Zatanna’s lips curled when she realized it had worked. Now there was only one thing left to do.

“Yep.” She said, slinking over to his side and he pouted curiously.

“Are you sure? I don’t feel any different. You said it was supposed to reveal who I love. What happened?”

“We’re gonna find that out. Hold still.” She said, smiling and wrapping her arms around his neck to press a kiss to his lips. Dick froze, feeling her lips move against his and his mind went blank for a second before his chest contracted painfully.

He gasped against her mouth, before his legs buckled and he tumbled to the ground. Zatanna’s eyes widened when she saw the way his body twitched, pained gasps leaving his mouth and tears began falling from his eyes.

“Are you okay?!” She panicked, wrapping her arms around his thrashing figure but he couldn’t choke out an answer.

“Someone help! Anyone! Please!”

“A kiss doesn’t put people through cardiac arrest!” You screamed, feeling your chest tighten as you heard it out loud for the first time. Your eyes began burning and your throat contracted, feeling tears build. It was the first time you had admitted it to yourself.

You were scared. Emotions that you could barely process or understand swirled around you in a dark cloud and you were scared that Dick wouldn’t make it out of his critical state. If he was taken away from you because you hadn’t been there to stop it, you would never forgive yourself.

“I’m sorry.” She whimpered, sobbing and her body went limp in your fists. The urge to rip her head off her shoulders resurfaced. She didn’t get to be upset, not when this was all her fault.

“I don’t give a shit.” You hissed, “How do we save him?”

“A true love’s kiss should stop all the side effects.” She whispered, looking up at you with wide eyes, “If Dick truly loves you, then when you kiss him, it’ll reverse the spell.”

You needed to get in there.

You released your hold and Zatanna and she slid to the floor pathetically, holding her body as she cried. But even with her heartbroken sobs, you couldn’t feel any sort of remorse to her, glaring at her instead, “You better hope this works. Or I’ll kill you myself.”

And then you rushed in.

When you got to Dick’s side your breath stuttered when you noticed just how many things he was connected to and you felt your body shake. Batman was carefully watching him from his bedside.

You carefully walked to his side, gently brushing your fingers against his cheekbone. He looked like he was in so much pain. He looked so weak. You wanted to help him but a part of you was scared. For the first time in your life, you doubted Dick’s feelings for you.

The time you needed his love and devotion to be true the most, you were doubtful. A million thoughts rushed through your head and for a second you were tempted to just avoid doing this at all. But you knew that you had to at least try.

So, with trembling hands, you held the ventilator fastened to his mouth, taking a deep breath before tugging it off. Batman, already knowing what you were about to do, let you pull it off him before pressing a fluttering kiss to his lips. Tears gathered underneath your lashes when you didn’t feel anything happen.

Just when you were about to pull away, Dick took a deep breath through his nose and panted against your mouth, kissing you more firmly. You couldn’t help the sob that bubbled out of your throat and he swallowed it without any qualms.

Even through bleary vision, you were able to make out his blue eyes and the small smile on his face. 

His hands came up to weakly cup for cheeks, gently wiping away the tears with his thumbs, “I missed you.”

You sniffled, letting more tears fall because you knew he’d be here to wipe them away, “I missed you too.”

***

Bonus:

You walked into the mess hall quietly. Dick had just fallen asleep in the Med Bay where he would be kept for a couple days under observation. It was past 1 in the night and you wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed but you had some unfinished business left to handle.

It was dark and it was hard to make out your surroundings until your eyes adjusted to the darkness. As you walked to the kitchen island, your eyes landed on the sorceress that had her head in her arms and wondered if she was asleep. Batman had said you were free to deal with her anyway you liked and that had been exactly your plan.

“He’s okay now, if you’re curious.” You told her. Her head shot up and she looked at you out of the corner of her eye before bowing it away shamefully. But you caught a glance at her face. She looked like she had been crying for hours, eyes bloodshot and face red and blotchy.

“Thank god.” She croaked out.

There was a beat of silence.

“I’m so so sorry, (Y/N).” Zatanna whimpered out before crying again, “You were right. I was jealous. And I did a crazy, wrong thing. And I’m so sorry.”

You sighed, nodding at her apology even though you knew she couldn’t see you. You weren’t sure if you accepted it, and you didn’t have to. For now, it could remain in the air.

“He really doesn’t love me....” She whispered out and you sighed once again, stepping up beside her and setting something on the table.

Zatanna glanced at the bottle of tequila and the two shot glasses you left. You didn’t look at her, instead choosing to stare straight ahead. You opened the bottle, pouring yourself a shot before tilting your head back and downing it, hissing at the burn.

“Obligatory break-up drink.” You mumbled, pouring her a shot and passing the glass to her.

She sniffled, looking at the glass in her hands before gulping it down. You took a deep breath, refilling the glasses. You still didn’t look at her, didn’t speak to her, just poured a refill when either of you finished and downed it in one gulp. The excitement from today and the tense feeling from sitting beside Zatanna kept you from getting drunk too early.

You two ended up finishing half the bottle, drinking in the dark until she passed out first and you followed soon after.

The others found you the next morning, passed out at the kitchen island, clutching empty shot glasses.

***

Bonus bonus:

Batman sighed, smelling the overwhelming scent of tequila as he came closer. None of them were able to wake either of you up. You were out cold, face scrunched up and head against the table in a position that would no doubt have your neck in a crick.

Zatanna was no better. Her hair was a mess, tequila spilt on her clothes and she was drooling all over the table, snoring unattractively.

“All this over a boy?”

Forever Taglist:

@simonsbluee

DC Taglist:

@emmacata

@p--e--a--c--h--e--s

@sometimeseverythingsucks

@sokkas-honour

@unstable1902

@lostgirlheart

@missdisapear

@tadpole-san

[writer-room]

Siblings: Chapter One

AO3

Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

Summary: The Bats reflect on how their thoughts about siblings have changed over the years. Some opinions stayed, others didn't.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dick always wondered what it’d be like to have a little brother or sister.

He recalled asking his parents why he didn’t have one. Not accusatory, just curious.

His mother had smiled and said that they had their hands full plenty with Dick, and he was all they needed. His father, while still kind, said that they didn’t really have the time or resources in the circus at the moment to add another child to the family.

Dick was disappointed, but he understood the reasons.

Even still, he’d find himself staring at the kids that watched the acts with awe. Older kids lighty taunted their younger siblings, ruffling their hair and pretending they were too good for it all, and that they were doing their siblings a favor by being there. Kids who nudged their brother or sister to distract and steal the snacks from concession stands, later whispering words that’d make the other gape or giggle. Young children holding their sibling who was of toddler age or younger, pointing towards parts of the acts, their glee growing upon seeing the excitement of their sibling.

Dick hadn’t been lonely growing up in Haly’s Circus, he had his parents and the other people who worked there, from the handlers to the clowns to the tricksters. 

And yet, he still found himself watching the kids who’d come in with one, or even two or three, brothers and sisters, taunting and laughing and sharing their wonder.

A sibling would’ve been nice, he thinks mournfully. It might’ve even been fun.

Ah, well. At least he had the circus.

,

“Hey, hey Dick. Dick. Dick, lookit.”

“If I turn around and I see you about to push Damian off the roof, I’m breaking your helmet.”

“You wouldn’t.”

Dick sighed, turning back from where he was keeping an eye on the streets below. Jason, who’d only been a few feet away, immediately took this moment to seize Tim, who had been too busy looking through his binoculars to care about whatever the two had been doing, and proceed to chuck him off the roof.

Dick pinched the bridge of his nose with a groan as Tim’s undignified shriek was cut off by him catching himself on a fire escape below, scrambling to get a good hold on so he didn’t fall the rest of the way.

“What?” Jason huffed. “You said not to push Damian, and I didn’t push Damian.”

“Of course,” Dick replied sarcastically. “My mistake, I’ll be sure to rephrase it as don’t push anyone off the roof.”

“Now that’s just unreasonable,” Jason huffed, hand on his hip as Steph and Cass snickered from the nearby chimney they were perched on. “I can think of plenty of people who deserve to be pushed off roofs. Like Scarow, for example. Bastard made me break my good hand last month and I still need to shoot a bullet in his back for that one.”

“Then don’t push your family off roofs, is that enough for you?” Dick sighed, standing up and peering over the edge of the roof. “You alright down there, Tim?”

“Names,” Damian finally chastised, not once having glanced over to the others from where he was on the corner of the roof, farthest as he could get from them.

“Oh, sure, now you worry.” Tim grumbled from the fire escape, finally pulling himself to his feet and brushing himself off. “Dick, please tell me I have permission to stab out Jason’s eye.”

“You do not.”

“He’d be fine!” Tim complained, snagging a hand on the stairs and instead pulling himself up along the outside of the fire escape instead of walking up the steps like a normal human being. “Harper could probably make him a new functional one in two days if she's in a good mood.”

“I’m not making him a new eye in two days. Maybe two weeks.” Harper informed from the other side of the roof, also ignoring the others as she tinkered with some gadget.

“Get anywhere near me and I’ll cough on you,” Jason threatened, also peering down off the roof. “You have basically no immune system, you’d die in a week. A long, painful death. Poetic cinema, really.”

“If you say it's poetic because you were beaten with a crowbar for two hours, I’m dropkicking you.” Steph warned, eyes narrowed.

“You’re so mean to me,” Jason gasped, placing a hand on his chest as he turned. “What did I ever do to deserve this? I’m nice to you!”

“No, you’re not.” Chorused Dick, Tim, Damian, Steph, and an extra voice through their earpieces.

“Wow, thanks, Babs.” Jason grumbled. “Showing up just to bully me, typical.”

“Names,” Damian warned a second time.

“If it makes you feel any better,” Babs crackled through their earpieces. “You’re not the only one I bully.”

“Everyone please stop harassing Jay,” Dick pleaded, though it came out more as an exhausted sigh.

“Names,” Damian growled a third time, losing his patience.

“I know it's fun,” Dick continued, ignoring him. “But this is supposed to be a scouting mission, and I’d rather he didn’t start taking out petty revenge during patrol.”

“I have no idea why he’s so surprised we get bored when scouting,” Steph mumbled quietly, to which Cass simply shrugged.

“You have no faith in me,” Jason snorted, and Dick could tell he was rolling his eyes under his helmet.

“I have plenty of faith in you,” Dick soothed. “I also, however, know how you are.”

“Don’t worry,” Steph raised a hand. “I already lost faith in you when you tried to kill Tim.”

“Which time?”

“Steph, don’t taunt him. Do it back at the Manor.” Dick lightly scolded.

“How many times do I have to repeat this?” Damian snapped, whirling from his post to glare at the others. “We do not use names on patrol!”

“Doesn’t Jon call you D on patrol?” Harper raised a brow, glancing towards him.

“That is different! He does not use my actual name!”

“Hypocrite,” Jason coughed under his breath.

Tim finally swung back onto the roof, skillfully rolling and dodging when Jason attempted to immediately kick him off again. Tim rolled close to the chimney, quickly pulling out his bo staff and crouching, glaring at Jason. It was reminiscent of two cats in a standoff, arched backs but neither of them making the first strike yet.

“Do not fight,” Cass said calmly. 

“Thank you, C--” Dick hesitated, glancing at Damian for a brief moment. “--Orphan.”

“Fight in Cave,” Cass continued cheerfully. “We have sparring mats for reasons.”

“And I take that back.”

“You wanna hang with the cool kids?” Steph asked, leaning off the chimney to offer her hand.

“Yes. Have I mentioned you’re my favorite person?” Tim grinned, putting his staff away as he took the offered hand and was pulled onto the chimney beside Steph and Cass.

“You could stand to say it more often,” Steph teased.

“Cheaters,” Jason grumbled, relenting that fighting both Steph and Cass to get Tim was a losing battle.

The three were rather squished on the chimney, but none of them seemed to mind. Harper only rolled her eyes and went back to tinkering.

“We really need to bring D--Signal on one of these things.” Dick muttered, shaking his head.

“Because he’s sensible, or because you want him to suffer like the rest of us?” Tim raised a brow.

“Because he deserves the same family bonding time.” Dick said simply.

“Duke and Cullen are next to me listening in on this,” Barbara said through the communicators. “I am here to inform you that Duke is both touched and terrified.”

“The bumblebee was awake and didn’t even bother to join us?” Harper snorted. “Rude.”

“Cullen agrees with you.”

“He better,”

“I’m taking a ten hour nap after this,” Dick complained, sitting back on the edge of the roof, legs dangling in the open air as he leaned back dramatically on his hands. “I deserve it. Self-care and all that.”

“That is the length of a normal amount of sleep.” Damian raised a brow.

“Not in this family, it’s not.”

“Preach!” Tim pumped a fist.

“You don’t count, Tim.” Dick chastised, leaning his head back to look at Tim upside down. “Everyone here remembers to sleep at the latest once every two days. You don’t sleep for five.”

“I’m being harassed,”

“You’re being bullied into a proper sleep schedule.” 

Damian suddenly whacked Dick over the head, startling him with a yelp as Jason hid a snicker. Harper and Cass looked over for a moment before continuing with whatever they had previously been doing.

“Names!” Damian hissed. “Do you all want your identities revealed?”

“Literally nobody is here,” Harper pointed out.

“If Gotham hasn’t found out our identities by now, they never will.” Steph snorted.

“Especially finger-stripes over here.” Tim added, a smug expression on his face.

“A nine-year-old finds out your identity one time and you never hear the end of it.” Dick muttered under his breath before sitting up and proceeding to snatch Damian, who had been previously stalking towards the others, by wrapping an arm around his chest and tugging him closer as the boy squawked.

“You were using a Flying Grayson move, dude.” Tim deadpanned. “You gotta pay the price for being flashy for no other reason than because you can.”

“That’s his entire personality.”

“Why do you all hate me?” Dick whined, holding a squirming Damian close as he gave the boy a noogie. “What did I do to gain such torment?”

“You want the list?” Harper looked up, finally putting away whatever she was tinkering with.

“We alphabetized,” Cass added.

“Wrote on the front and back,” Steph nodded sagely.

“I’m adding three more to the list when we get back,” Damian growled, looking ready to bite Dick if he didn’t stop soon.

“You better be joking about that list,” Dick warned, releasing Damian for his own safety. “Because if I ever find a list of reasons to be mean to me, I will not show mercy.”

“Do you mean you’re gonna attack us physically or emotionally?” Jason inquired.

“Emotionally,”

“You sick bastard.” Steph whispered in horror. “I can’t believe you would use your powers for evil.”

“Does it make it any better if I tell you the list, if it does exist, would probably only exist so that when we notice someone looks like they’re gonna do something stupid, we use the list to remind them of something you did so they take it out on you and not, say, turn all of Gotham into a gang war zone.” Harper said slowly.

“I hate you,” Steph glared. “You mess up one time--”

“You died, Steph!” Tim exclaimed, before getting a batarang chucked at his head that Damian somehow snuck into his utility belt.

“She didn’t even die,” Jason snorted, crossing his arms. “Both of you two had lame fake-out deaths.”

“Why am I the one who’s become the punching bag?” Dick complained, holding Damian back again when he tried to grab the batarang Tim had dodged and threw it again.

“Because you’re actually good at feelings and everyone else is emotionally constipated.” Harper deadpanned.

“And the Ric incident.” Damian added right after, giving up in his thrashing. A shutter passed over the Bats at the mention of the name.

“Aw,” Dick’s face softened, ignoring the Ric comment. “You guys care about my advice?”

“Congrats,” Barbara chuckled slightly. “You’re the therapist brother.”

“Don’t tell him that,” Jason groaned, flopping backwards on the roof. “Now he’s going to be mushy and clingy all week.”

“Lord knows you idiots need it,” Harper huffed as Dick practically glowed.

“I’m sicing him on you later.”

“Jokes on you, he hasn’t found my apartment yet.”

“Yes I have,” Dick raised a hand, turning towards her. “Well, Robin found it, but I still know it.”

Harper stared at him for a few moments, momentarily turning her head to Damian for a moment before going back to Dick, and then turning to Jason.

“You’re a monster,” She whispered, a look of true horror on her face.

“I know,” Jason cackled gleefully.

“None of you are leaving the Manor when we get back.” Dick said matter-of-factly, pointing a finger to his siblings. “We’re gonna bond, and you’re going to like it.”

“We’re already bonding right now!” Damian protested.

“You’ll have to kill me first.” Steph hissed, shying behind Cass.

“Bold of you to assume you can keep me confined to the Manor.” Tim huffed in offence. “Orphan, I’ll stash you in one of my safe houses if you promise to be my bodyguard.”

“Deal,”

“You guys are so dramatic--”

“Hey, guys? Crazed pyromaniac with flamethrowers to the north.”

The group immediately dropped whatever they had been doing, heads snapping up towards the direction Barbara had tiredly informed them of the attack.

It was only a few moments before the sight of flames peaked over one of the buildings, dying out almost immediately. Shouts and rumbles were steadily growing in volume, especially the cackling of Firefly, likely revving up whatever weapon he’d acquired this time.

“Fantastic, can’t even keep watch with you morons.” Damian growled.

“Oh you are not the only one trying to work here!” Tim snapped. “Orphan, for example, is doing a wonderful--where’d she go?”

He and Steph looked around rapidly, their sister suddenly missing from the chimney. How they hadn’t noticed she’d left their crowded space was a mystery that’d likely never be solved.

“Over there,” Jason said boredly, upholstering a gun and pointing across the rooftops.

The outline of Cass’s body could be seen sprinting across the roofs towards where the fire had been spotted, leaping with reckless abandon.

“Life lesson for the rest of you,” Harper hummed, getting to her feet. “Be like Cass.”

“Stop using real names!” Damian barked.

“Last one there is on cleanup duty!” Steph hollered, shoving Tim and taking off in the same movement.

“Asshole!” Tim yelled as Jason, Harper and Damian all bolted after her without a moment's hesitation. 

Dick laughed, just getting to his feet as Tim stumbled up and after the others, swearing obscenities.

He quickly ran after his siblings, though he strayed a little further back, nobody paid attention to who showed up last anyway, his eyes darting from each of his siblings. Someone had to make sure they didn’t face-plant off a roof.

They shouted over each other as they descended down to take out Firefly. The guy had really picked a bad night to start causing trouble. It’d be over in no-time.

Even still, Dick paused on the roofs, scanning the streets below as the others ran to and fro, yelling over each other as Barbara switched between the coms to talk to them. It was a chaotic mess and Dick found himself grinning at it all.

His siblings were a hot mess, and it was amazing.

[hournites]

A lot of ways to love you (teach me through your eyes)

Hournite Week Day 7: Love Languages 

Summary: Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Gifts, Quality Time, Touch. Or, Rick, Beth, and their many languages of love.

Thank you for coming along on this first HN week journey with me! ❤️

~.~

Words of Affirmation

  Beth found Rick by himself at the corner of their shared history class, carving his initials into the desk. She didn’t understand why he’d put himself there. It was like a brooding corner to be miserable. 

  “Hey,” she said, taking the seat in front of his desk. “What’s wrong?” 

  Rick dug deeper to splinter the wood. “They think I cheated on my chem test.” 

  Without asking, Beth unzipped Rick’s bag to pull out the test. Rick let her. 

  She gaped at him as she scanned over the F and comments from the teacher. He always treated Beth kindly when they passed in the halls, but she never actually had Mr. Geralds. Chemistry wasn’t her strong suit like Rick, but there wasn’t a doubt that she’d given some of the same answers with a great grade from the other science teacher. “Are you serious? That’s crazy. You’re going to contest that, right?”

  “You’re not going to even ask if I did?” 

  “I know you didn’t, you’re too smart.” 

  “I used to steal shit,” he muttered under his breath and dropped his pencil. “Haven’t heard you say I’m too smart for that.” 

  Beth slipped his test into her folder to return to at a later time, right now focusing on Rick. 

  “Hey, that’s not fair.” When Rick wouldn’t meet her eyes, she leaned in closer. “Look at me.” 

  Rick did. 

  “You know you deserved a good grade. And you’ve done what you did to get by.” She glanced at the vandalism briefly. “There are people here who know you’re better than what the majority of the town thinks.” She lowered her voice to keep her next words between them. “You’re a hero. You’ve helped save everyone in this town. So show them who you really are.” 

  She smiled when he let out a small huff, she knew he was listening. “I’ll go to the principal’s office with you, and we can get Pat to vouch for us. We both know that for Chem you should be in AP.” 

  “It’s really not that big of a deal,” he lied, shifting uncomfortably from all her nice words. 

  “If it weren’t a big deal, you wouldn’t have done that.” She pointed at the roughened mess he’d made of the school desk. “I know you better than you think.” 

  Act of Service 

  “Has anyone seen Beth?” 

  Rick walked around the main area of Pat’s cabin. It was after 2 AM. Barbara and Jennie were making late-night comfort food in the kitchen. Pat was manning the first aid station, tending to Mike, Jakeem and Yolanda’s injuries from Sportsmaster. Courtney was bonding or something with the staff in some strange ritual she had after a life-threatening mission. Rick just stepped out of the shower, washing the grime from his arms and face. 

  “She’s upstairs, I think!” Yolanda called, holding her ribs from her seat on top of the table. Rick shook his head when Pat admonished her not to yell. Rick made it up the stairs two at a time, stopping when he found Beth with her packed school bag on the floor in front of the couch. She was searching through papers, openly crying. She hadn’t even taken her cape off yet. 

  Rick crouched down beside her. “Hey,” he said softly. She looked utterly exhausted. “Are you okay? You said you didn’t get hurt.” 

“I’m not hurt.” She hiccuped, flipping through more papers, a little hysterical. It looked like it was for school. “I can’t find my math assignment. It’s due tomorrow morning.”

  “Did you finish it?” he asked. 

  “I don’t remember.” She wiped at her tears as she cried harder. “I might’ve left it at home, I can’t find it. I’m too tired, I can’t think.” 

  “Yeah,” Rick agreed. His bones were weary but he had always felt the least affected after battling it out with the ISA. He suffered plenty of superficial cuts and bruises, but he hardly felt them because his hourglass really protected him. He couldn’t imagine the hit the night must’ve taken on Beth’s body. Pat was going to be driving them back to main Blue Valley at 4 or 5 o’clock in the morning to get them back to school. It wasn’t ideal, but it was a random Wednesday. It’s not like they had a choice. 

  “Did you ask Chuck?” 

  “No.” Her lip wobbled, face contorting into another sob. Rick regretted asking. It was clear she was far too drained. It would’ve been simple to have asked Chuck to scan her bag to find out, but she hadn’t thought of it. 

  “Okay, okay,” Rick said. “Go to bed. You’re not going to be able to do the homework now even if you found it.” Rick got up to get to the top of the stairs, calling down for Barbara. 

  When he returned, he helped her up and managed to get her to let go of her school bag. “We’ll look for it before we leave, okay?” Rick ran a hand through his damp hair, his own eyelids started to droop. “I promise you’ll get it done before school.” 

  Barb joined them upstairs and coaxed Beth to change out of her suit, leading her downstairs with her regular clothes and a promise of a warm bed and tea. 

  Rick followed to grab Chuck when Beth wasn’t looking, turning him on once alone to help identify if this alleged math homework was even in her bag. Together they found what she was talking about. Ten problems of pre-calc. She was right. It was rushed and not done. 

  Rick sighed, tucking it under his arm. He said goodnight to the rest and retired to his assigned room. He turned on the lamp on the desk where he first solved the code of his father’s journal, spreading out the assignment and using Chuck as a calculator. It dawned on him an hour later as he rubbed at his tired eyes how he would be staying up all night to finish homework that wasn’t even his. 

  Gifts 

  Beth was immersed in her book when two hands landed on her collarbone. She looked down, touching the skin at the opening of her shirt when she felt the weight of something new at the base of her throat.

  “What’s this?”

  Rick murmured in her ear from behind. “An early birthday present.”

  She let out a soft gasp when he finished with the clasp. A tiny brass hourglass pendant with sand just like Hourman’s trickled steadily beside her rainbow pendant. 

  “Woah.” She glanced up at him. “You got me an hourglass?” She bit down on her lip, dread creeping into her mind when she realized this had to be expensive. She struggled to voice what she was feeling out loud, but Rick must’ve caught the complicated expression on her face. He smoothed his hand along the sleeve of her cardigan and reassured her the cost didn’t push him into any kind of financial ruin. 

  “Did you not realize I’ve been working for Pat before school? I had some spare cash. Trust me, there’s nothing better I’d spend my money on.” 

  The puzzle clicked into place. Beth had been meeting Rick at the Pit Stop every morning before school for what felt like months now. It made sense he was there to work on the cars. Beth felt her face heat up at his implicit soft-spoken confession. “Thank you,” she said in a whisper, still in awe. The necklace was beautiful and she felt fuzzy ever since his hands were on her neck. “I love it.”

  His eyes, usually hardened and defensive, skilled at warding off unwanted attention, now creased at the corners. Gentle, quiet, yearning, he watched her accept his gift. “I’m glad.”

  Impulsively she asked, “Could you unclasp the rainbow one?”

  Rick did. The chain pooled in her palm. She shook her head, pushing it to his chest. “You should have it.”

  His brows furrowed in response. “You want to give me your... rainbow necklace?”

  She flushed when he said it like that. She toyed with her new one, looking at him from beneath her lashes. “Well…” she said. “I have something of you, now you can have a symbol of me.”

  Rick let out a small laugh. Beth was pretty sure if this were anyone else he’d say it was stupid, so she couldn’t help the surge of pride when he nestled her necklace around his own neck. 

  “How does it look?” 

  It was actually twisted. She flattened it so it would look the way it was supposed to over the collar of his shirt. Rick didn’t complain, but it was bright and cheery and clashed with his entire self. Beth bit her lip, withholding another laugh, and took pity on him, changing her mind to tuck the necklace underneath. “Perfect now.” 

  “Beth, I hate to interrupt this moment but you will be late for school if you don’t leave the Pit Stop in the next five minutes.”

  Chuck broke them out of their weird double transfixion. They both found themselves smiling shyly at each other, neither truly wanting to move. 

  “Come on,” he said after another few moments of them smiling at each other without moving. “Put your bike in my trunk. I’ll drive you.”

  Quality Time

  When Rick stopped by at Beth’s locker, she was talking to Charity, a new close friend she made over the summer volunteering at the Blue Valley Community Centre. 

  “Hey,” Rick greeted, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, waiting for Beth to visit. 

  “Hey,” Charity said back. She swept her blonde bangs out of her face to continue their conversation. 

  “Charity had a great idea that we should enter for the sustainability case competition,” Beth filled in.  

  “We’re going to need at least a month to prepare. I was thinking we could meet Tuesdays and Thursdays after school?” 

  Rick stuck a hand in his pocket, sullen. Thursdays were their days, unofficially. Not that they’ve ever said so out loud, but with JSA training afternoons the rest of the week, Beth working on a case competition their days off basically meant not getting to see her. Which was fine. It happened. Rick just wishes it didn’t have to. 

  “I can’t on Thursdays,” Beth told her. She glanced up at Rick to give him a smile. He straightened up, meeting her gaze with obvious surprise. “Those are our nights.” 

  Charity paused, watching the two with curious eyes. 

  “We can cancel,” Rick found himself saying and actually meaning it. “You don’t have to stay on my account.” 

  Beth’s nose scrunched up as she shook her head, mind already made. “Nah. Sorry Charity, Thursday doesn’t work for me. Take out your schedule, maybe we have a shared free period somewhere.” 

  “Oh, yeah, sure! Okay!” 

  Rick ducked his head to hide his smile as Charity fished through her bag for her agenda.

  Touch 

  When Beth stumbled out of the cell she’d been bound in, she hadn’t realized just how long she’d been gone. She was hungry and exhausted and felt horrifically dirty in her soiled Dr. Mid-Nite suit, but then she got a glimpse of Hourman nearly pushing the others in his rush to get to her all she could feel was relief. 

  Rick cupped her face, eyes squeezed shut as he held her close, his thumbs brushed along her cheeks, under her dry eyes. She felt the buzz of adrenaline rushing through him just by being so near, but the way he touched her was gentle, so gentle.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” he whispered, a startling unfamiliar word to fall in succession like that, coming from Rick. His hands flew to the crown of her cowl, tugging it down to kiss her forehead again and again. “Thank you.” 

  I’m okay now, she tried to comfort him, though her words were choked, smothered out by the crushing weight of it all. He was crying as his lips brushed over her face. It wasn’t his stamina. The buzz, she felt. Rick was shaking. It hit her then, that maybe he wasn’t sure Beth was ever going to come back. Beth had scared him. He was scared.  

Beth vaulted with her tired, numb legs, reaching to wrap her arms around his neck. Her mind went calm for the first time since before they left home, muscles relaxing as she let Rick scoop her up. 

  She was safe. She was home.

Beth was loved. 

[birdy-bat-writes]

Headcanon- Birdflash Besties

Requested by @offendedfishnoises I love you to the moon and back, Fish! Theres a second HC coming right after this, because I’m in a wally west mood.

A/N: I’m so horribly sick and I cant even tell if this was actually good, but it got me in my birdflash heart. @river-bottom-nightmare sob with me.

Comments are always appreciated!

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-       Wally and Dick are absolute madlads. When they’re together, good luck to anyone around them.

-       Dick and Wally spend endless hours on the manor. Not in it; ON it. These two geniuses like to climb the exterior and walk on the roof. Dick gets a kick out of giving Wally a little heart attack by doing flips on the roof tiles.

-       Once, Dick almost slipped and Wally freaked out and rushed to catch him, but the little surge of lightning blew the power out of the manor. Needless to say, they ran to central city for a bit.

-       Wally calls Dick for fashion advice. Dick will always tell Wally he looks fine as is. He’s not used to Wally being in anything other baseball tees, and sweaters.

-       Dick canonically hates dressing up for events and wearing ties and junk but over time he’s learned to accept that he has to. Not at all because they make him look hot.

-       When Wally was coming to his first gala, back when they were kids, Dick had to begrudgingly fix Wally’s bow tie. He did it only once and Wally memorized it. From now on, when Dick get lazy and unwilling to get dressed, Wally forces him to put on his suit, and hand ties the bow tie for him. Sometimes he tries different colors.

-       Dick has a favorite sandwich shop in central city and when Wally misses Dick, he’ll go to that sandwich shop and order Dick’s go to order.

-       Sometimes, Wally will order two sandwiches and speed to Gotham city. The first time it happened was cute.

-       “Hi, Alfred��.is Dick here?”

-       *smiles* “He’s on the basketball court.”

-       ***

-       “Hey…...!”

-       “Wally? What are you doing here?” Dick was surprised but happy as heck. He wanted to spend more time with Wally but was afraid to ask or bring it up. One of the perks of having an emotionally stunted dad is that you’re afraid to ask for companionship.

-       “I was at the sandwich shop you liked, and I thought I’d bring this over!” He looked so happy. The emotion was evidently contagious because Dick cracked the biggest smile Wally had ever seen and all nerves melted away.

-       They walked along the manor grounds eating their sandwiches and played a game of horse after. Special rules: No flipping, no superspeed.

-       It became a normal occurrence after that. Wally speeds over and Dick just greets him with “Aww you missed me.” And big sarcastic grin.

-       Dick keeps Wally’s favorite snacks scattered in his room, the yj headquarters and the titans tower. Even in his car.

-       Dick has actually randomly taken a train to central city at 2:00 am to go see Wally after he came back from a long mission because he really missed him.

-       Little did he know, that Wally called Alfred to ask if Dick was back yet and when Alfred said he went to the train station, Wally made his way there and waited for the 3:00 am train arriving from Gotham.

-       Neither of them were even surprised to see each other when the doors opened.

-       “How rough was that mission? You look like crap.”

-       “Gee, what a warm welcome.” And then they hug and head to his place where they catch up over the bottle of beer.

-       Dick feels emotionally exhausted if he spends too much time around other people. He needs time alone in a day to recharge.

-       The only person who doesn’t drain his social battery is Wally because Wally is the only person, he doesn’t have to put up the “smooth easy-going cool guy” persona around.

-       Dick is the only person Wally truly opens up to.

-       They keep a change of clothes at each other’s houses and spare supersuits.

-       Wally and Dick once saved a baby bird in a park outside the hall of justice and every time they visit, they check on the nest.

-       After 3 years of constantly checking, they’ve found that the baby bird grew up and built its own nest in the same tree and even had babies.

-       They named that bird and call it their child.

-       They know each other’s coffee orders and will bring each other coffee and muffins by default if they’re meeting early.

-       Wally has a pair of nightwing swimming shorts and Dick has a pair of Flash swimming shorts. They will wear them to the pool together and never say anything about it. They were matching gag gifts.

-       Dick takes lattes with espresso shots and cinnamon, and Wally takes coffee with a dash of creamer. Wally always takes blueberry muffins and Dick will take a croissant. They never actually told each other the orders. They just kinda picked it up.

-       Wally always knows when Dick isn’t feeling well, and Wally is the only person who can convince Dick to take a break.

-       Dick has felt he’s had to prove himself his entire life to everyone. Wally is the only person who’s been his constant and their friendship isn’t conditional. They both know that.

-       When Dick “died”, Wally ordered Dick’s favorite drink at a bar every night even though he couldn’t feel any effects of alcohol. He also suddenly found himself taking lattes with espresso shots.

-       When Dick came back, Wally gave him the “Ohhh, who said ‘Do me a favor and don’t die again’??? YOU DID. And look what you went and did! Died. That’s hypocrisy. You’re a hypocrite! Omg, how could you?! I love you so much dude, don’t you ever do that again! Get yourself a helmet. Jason’s got the right idea. Never leave me again.” All while he’s hugging Dick so tight, he may have stopped breathing.

-       Meanwhile Barbara and Conner and everyone else is waiting so meet dick after his return and they just can’t because Wally is hogging him and twirling him like a rag doll. Dick just accepted it. So did everyone else.

-       These two have adorable little mementos. The first bullet that dick ever had to pull out of Wally on a mission was turned into a penny and gifted to Wally on the anniversary of him joining the team.

-       Dick goes through a lot of domino masks, but Wally kept the last one he used as Robin in a little case with Flash symbol that was on his Kidflash suit. They both look at the case as Nightwing and the Flash.

-       They are besties to end of time and long after.

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Taglist: @anothertimdrakestan @offendedfishnoises @comicsandhoney @river-bottom-nightmare @catxsnow @cries-in-fangirl-23 @batarella @idkmanicantenglish @hauntingsonofrobin @l-inkage @subtleappreciation @ereaaa Message me or comment if you’d like to be added to my taglist!

[rainingpouringetc]

Hi! I saw you were looking for prompts... could you do "you can't keep doing this to yourself" for Thomastair? If not thats ok. Have a lovely day!

wow i’m so late to this lol i wrote it yesterday but forgot to post.

i love this prompt, hope i did it justice for ya :)

It had been three days since Thomas had gotten any real sleep. At least he thought it was three days. In all honesty, it could’ve been four or five days. Or maybe just two. Time had lost much of its meaning to him lately.

For instance, today Matthew had come round the Lightwoods’ house and knocked rather loudly on the door, claiming it was morning when Thomas finally dragged himself to investigate. This had seemed odd to Thomas, who was sure he’d just finished eating lunch before lying down for a quick nap.

Matthew had insisted Thomas join him for a drink at the Devil. Really, who was Thomas to decline?

After a few drinks and many laughs, Matthew bid Thomas farewell and left. He did that a lot, Thomas thought, bringing his mug to his lips contemplatively. Leave before people could see his pain. Of course Thomas had noticed, he’d be a bum friend and a worse brother for not noticing Matthew’s ache.

It was the same ache as Thomas’s. Matthew just hid it better.

And just like that, the memories flooded in, and all Thomas wanted to do was drown in their depths.

He settled for simply drowning in alcohol.

As he staggered out of the Devil—Polly had finally cut him off, the nerve of her—the London air hit his face and made him suddenly feel violently ill. There was an alley just up ahead. His feet fumbled over themselves in his hurry, his long legs tangling and tripping him until he fell face first into the wall before the alley. He vomited onto his shoes, cursing as he wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve. It was still day, an unusually sunny one at that. The sun shone high in the sky, though it did little to cut through the winter chill. Thomas realized belatedly that he’d left his coat at home, and with it, his bolas and stele.

Time yet again slipped through his fingers as he stumbled away from Fleet Street. It shouldn’t have taken him so long to walk home, and yet by the time he arrived he was fairly certain it was growing dark. He frowned, confused by what had waylaid him. It didn’t really matter, though, so he closed the door behind him and collapsed onto his bed, shutting his eyes to the pains of the world.

---

It was another few days before he saw anyone again. He still hadn’t really slept. Upon waking up an hour or so before dawn, Thomas had promptly decided to spend his day wandering the city. He remembered to bring his coat and weapons this time, just as a precaution, and his head was much clearer than it had been that other morning with Matthew.

Thomas found himself on a bridge, though he hadn’t quite been paying attention to which one. He leaned his forearms on the rail, staring down at the water beneath him—the Thames, he supposed.

Even in his grief, his Shadowhunter instincts refused to rest, and he easily picked up the sound of boots on pavement approaching him. He turned slightly, squinting in the dim morning light to see who it was. The sky was once again clouded, the sun just barely starting to rise in the distance. There was a bit of fog as well that obscured the person’s face from Thomas. He turned back to the railing, expecting the person to pass him by and continue on their way.

Instead, they came closer, leaning their back against the rail next to him. Thomas looked up in surprise, suddenly finding himself face to face with Alastair Carstairs.

“What in the world are you doing out so early?” Alastair asked casually, keeping his eyes on the opposite horizon.

Thomas shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep.” It seemed to him an apt answer, but something about it made Alastair cut his eyes to Thomas quickly. There was something behind them, something Thomas couldn’t quite decipher.

Carefully looking back to the horizon, Alastair asked, “And how long has that been going on?”

A tricky question indeed for someone who wasn’t even sure what day of the week it was. After a moment’s consideration, Thomas answered simply, saying, “A while, I suppose.”

Alastair let out a long sigh through his nose, turning to mirror Thomas’s pose with his arms on the rail and his eyes on the river. Thomas wasn’t entirely sure what either of them were doing. A long silence dragged out, until Alastair finally broke it with a chuckle. “You remember what you promised me last time we spoke?”

“What, that I’d knock you into the Thames if you talked to me again?” Thomas remembered that night vividly. He remembered allowing his anger to get the better of him, remembered pushing Alastair away with his harsh words. A part of him regretted it.

“Well, if it’ll make you feel better, you do have the perfect opportunity.”

That made Thomas look at him sharply. He was surprised to find Alastair smiling cheerfully at him. There was still that something in his eye, but it was crowded out by the light of his smile. Thomas wasn’t sure Alastair had ever smiled so brightly in his presence.

It was startling enough that it actually made Thomas laugh. He was laughing, heartily laughing, and Alastair was too after a moment of hesitation. They were laughing together on a bridge overlooking the Thames, and everything was so perfectly confusing and muddled and somehow so utterly light, light like they hadn’t been since…

Since Barbara died. The thought hit Thomas like a ton of bricks, sobering him immediately. He lowered his eyes, avoiding Alastair’s gaze. Their situation didn’t seem quite so funny to him anymore.

Alastair whispered something in Persian that Thomas didn’t catch, then reached out to grab Thomas by the shoulder, forcing him to look at him. “You can’t keep doing this to yourself, Thomas.” He said it with such tenderness and conviction that Thomas wondered how long he’d waited to say that.

“Doing what.” It was less of a question than it was a challenge.

Alastair released Thomas, almost pushing him away and running his hands through his pitch black hair. “This, Thomas. Drowning yourself in memories to avoid facing your grief, to avoid facing that she’s really gone.”

Thomas straightened instantly, advancing on Alastair with a force that made the other man stumble back a step. “How dare you speak to me like that?” he hissed. “What do you know of grief? What do you know of me?”

There was silence for a moment as Alastair searched his face, eyes finally settling on Thomas’s. “I know that if I lost Cordelia, I would be lost.” Thomas looked away quickly at the emotion coating Alastair’s voice. “I know that you’re hurting, and I know that you’re scared. You’re scared that if you let yourself grieve her, if you move on… it will be like forgetting her.”

Shaking his head, Thomas said, “I’ll never forget her.”

Alastair hesitated. “Are you saying that because you know it, or because you’re trying to convince yourself of it?”

“I don’t know,” Thomas admitted. “Both? Neither?” He dragged a hand across his face, trying to calm himself before he could become emotional. “I just…” He sighed heavily.

“I know.” Alastair turned back to the river. “I know.”

---

Somehow, the two of them ended up back at Thomas’s house. The sun was still low in the sky, so Alastair announced that he would make breakfast, seeing as how Thomas had forgotten to eat before leaving. Luckily for them, Thomas’s parents had left a note saying they were out visiting his Uncle Gabriel, so the house was empty of anyone but them.

They had a simple breakfast of toast and scrambled eggs, sitting across from each other at the table and making idle chat. When they finished, Alastair gracefully took his leave, thanking Thomas for declining to throw him into the Thames. Thomas laughed it off and waved him away, but he played Alastair’s words over in his head.

You can’t keep doing this to yourself, Thomas.

You can’t keep doing this to yourself.

He smiled to himself. I won’t.

Thomas took a shower and changed his clothes before bed that night, and even drank a few glasses of water. The next time he saw Alastair, he thanked him and, on a whim, asked him to dinner. As friends, of course, though he didn’t say it aloud. For what more could they be than friends?

Well... Thomas could let himself dream.

[octalove]

IV: The Dinner

(Batgirl/Red Hood)

Brief note; per demand, this little trilogy will now be an ongoing series🥺thank u all for the support! i was not expecting it at all. ur comments make my day!! i hope u enjoy this chapter bearing in mind that i wasn’t intending on a full length fic, so i hope u can put up with any missteps in the plot or writing. i’m making it up as i go. kiss kiss

Description: Reader makes an ally, and attends a tense dinner. part one, two, and three.

A mild blue dawn was just beginning to flit through the blinds, and I sighed heavily, stretching a little, and running a hand across my face. My skin was cold to the touch. Rolling over stiffly, I glanced at the clock on my nightstand.

5:26a.m.

Nineteen minutes before my alarm. I was too cold to go back to sleep, I knew, as much as Alfred had requested I try and get more of it. Pulling myself up, the sheets slipped off my bare shoulders and folded onto themselves. Once in a blue moon, I would forego making it up again, usually accompanied by an excuse. Today, I didn’t have one. I put my feet on the floor, mind buzzing.

I was done tossing and turning, and decided to get up and shower. Afterward, I threw on my uniform, and got to work on my face. A little bronzy eyeshadow, some mascara and lip balm. I could’ve turned my face into a work of art, but I was tired from my sleepless night and doing much else seemed like a strain.

There was a knock on the door.

“Come in.” I was expecting Bruce or Alfred, but I caught Tim’s reflection in my vanity mirror.

“Hey.” He said.

“Good morning.” I replied tensely. He sat on my bed. Okay. Weird. Tim was a year younger than me- but always ordained himself something of an older brother. His brainpower made learned helplessness and easy state to slip into when he was around- always fixing my PS4, or recovering lost files from my laptop. When we first met, I used to use those things as a crutch to interact with him, as neither of us were particularly forthcoming. These days, we were as close as any pair of siblings.

“What’s up?” I asked, tucking away my mascara wand.

“Oh, I just thought I’d… check up on you. Before school started.”

I was the only one of the Waynes attending Gotham Academy at the moment. Damian was still at Gotham Prep, but by the time he would attend next year, I’d be graduated. I wondered if Tim ever missed it. He garnered his fair share of attention; mostly because of his attractive status and predisposition of agreeability. Before he dropped out, I used the be the subject of mediation for every eligible teenage girl that wanted to get to know my brother- no, the other one. With the soft hair. The chem tutor.

I laughed a little. “Do I seem like I need it?” Tim shrugged. I got up and plopped on the duvet beside him. My window was open a crack, filling the room with a chilly breeze and the scent of moisture and petrichor.

“Did Bruce make you get up for this?” I tried again, keeping my playful tone. He sighed and shook his head.

“Bruce isn’t the only one who’s noticed you lately.” He said, with contrasting seriousness that made my smile fall.

“What’s there to notice? Seriously.” I questioned.

He sighed again and twisted his lip. I knew what that meant. He was about to list everything different I’d been doing for the past three weeks, either alphabetically or by severity. “You look tired. You get home and go straight to your room. You keep fidgeting during briefings. You look distracted. You’re avoiding Damian- which, I get it- but like, more than usual. Dick said you haven’t texted him all week. You usually have something to say about your day at dinner, but-“

“Okay. I get it.”

A brief moment passed, where I watched him pull a looser string from the duvet.

“I know you went somewhere. On the 21st, when we were patrolling in Otisburg. You went somewhere for forty-two minutes.”

I blinked. “Oh.”

“I’m not accusing you of anything-“ He added quickly, looking at me. “Really, I have know idea why you left. I’m sure it was nothing, I just… you’ve been acting weird ever since. Where did you go?”

I swallowed, and my intestines felt like lead. Really, I was relieved. Here I was, in my room I’d decorated with Wayne money, with my brother who evidently cared enough about me to notice my typical word count at dinner, asking me what was wrong. And a lot was wrong.

So, I smoothed my plaid skirt and told him about the night of the 21st- and only that. From Red Hood, to Hoffman, to the warehouse. Every vivid detail I could remember. I decided to leave out my little truancy adventure, along with meeting him in the alley. Lifting up his mask. Having his exposed skin close enough to touch. His gunpowder smell. By the end, Tim was frowning. The following silence could’ve crushed a coke can.

“Shit.” He muttered.

“Yeah.” I echoed. “Shit.”

He didn’t asked why I didn’t tell Bruce. Or Anyone. He didn’t ask why it was so important to me to do this by myself. All he did was take in the information and start putting it together.

“Jesus- you could’ve died. But all that Hoffman stuff. Why you?”

“Exactly!” I breathed.

Another knock on the door, and Alfred’s voice carried through, telling me it was time to go. I got up. Tim nodded and followed suit, no doubt carrying my every last recounting in his piggy-bank memory.

“Please don’t tell Bruce.” I said, some amount of fear slipping into my voice. “I know it was a stupid thing to do and it was stupid not to tell anyone. But he’ll never trust me again.” Tim hesitated at the door.

“There’s nothing to tell.”

I climbed into the backseat of the car, and stared at the cityscape running past the windows. The anxiety had lifted. One of my growing number of secrets revealed. In its wake, the sudden absence left a sense of clarity. I remembered why I had kept it to begin with.

Dick was gifted. The first. The talented boy who could fly. Babs and Tim were brilliant; genius far beyond the confines of academia. Damian was skilled. Trained from birth, the blood son. It nestled here him neatly, right where he belonged. What was I? I wasn’t born with athletic ability beyond my years, or genius intellect. Without that information- without my secrets- I had nothing else to give.

*

Thursday night was dinner. The whole family. It was Bruce’s excuse to drag Dick out of his apartment in Blüdhaven, and for Alfred to exercise a new recipe, since everyone was on a strict lean-means and superfoods regimen every other waking day. Babs attended occasionally, when work didn’t keep her busy, and Tim was only allowed to pass if he promised to rest instead.

I met his eyes as everyone was rounded into the dining room by Alfred like a herd of sheep; he gave me some imperceptible knowing look that promised to keep my secret.

We sat down and sipped water from crystal glasses as the table was set with food, muttering amongst ourselves about our days. Dick was given a coffee with the wrong name (‘Nick’), Babs met up with her friend from high school (Olivia something or other), and Damian completed a group project with some incompetent classmates (they all were- even the professors). Vigilante talk wasn’t forbidden, but generally skirted around so as to offer a small reprieve of normalcy during the week.

There was an exception to this unspoken rule when there was a particularly exciting case on the table. Unfortunately for me and my anxiety, the case of the Red Hood was a very exciting one.

“Any new breaks with Red Hood?” Dick asked through miso soup. Bruce sighed.

“He made some movements in Robbinsville. Gone before we could get there. He’s got his men on a tight leash- we couldn’t get any of them to talk.”

“Course not. There’s rumors flying all over the department. One of the Ioveanu family branches payed out a huge security detail for their private mansion.”

“He hasn’t hunted anyone in their home, has he?” I asked. I pictured him standing in front of me- maskless, in my academy uniform.

“No, it’s not his MO.” Barbara answered.

“Not yet. It’s only been six months, and he’s progressing rapidly.” Bruce diagnosed grimly.

“Are you scared he’s gonna join us for dinner?” Dick joked, throwing a wink my way.

“Haha.” I muttered. Actually, I hadn’t slept because of the very idea.

“If you’re nervous, you could always stay home next patrol.” Damian suggested pointedly. To him, existing in the realm of crimefighting was a competition, and he was always looking for others to drop out of the race. I resisted the urge to fling a pea at him.

“I’m not nervous.” I said coolly.

“You’ve been practically trembling since we fought his pathetic lackeys.”

“Damian.” Bruce warned, from the head of the table. I flipped the smallest Wayne the middle finger. He resigned, but I swore I saw amusement on his lips.

“There’s nothing to be ashamed of. Red Hood is very skilled and very prolific. It’s a daunting case.” Bruce continued.

“Thanks, but I’m okay. Really.” I said, trying not to sound annoyed, and feeling like a spotlight was over my head, operated by the ghost of Hoffman. I almost laughed as I pictured it.

“That’s good to hear. We’ve been concerned.” Alfred added.

“Wow. I’m the star of the show around here.” I remarked dryly.

“We can’t help it, Miss Independent.” Dick said teasingly. “You’re just a good mystery.”

“Reminds me of Talia.” Tim said casually. The silverware stopped clanging.

It was a shameless subject change. Damian’s mother was an inflammatory topic for all parties. Bruce’s moral contempt didn’t reach the likes of Talia Al Ghul and Selena Kyle, immoral though they were. Beauty makes anything charming- and when paired with an impeccable taste in dress, even murder and thievery can be minimized into something of a quirk. Bruce thought so, anyway.

As for Damian, he had grappled with his dismissal from Talia’s side for what was now a majority of his life, and still possessed this deep-rooted, inextinguishable attachment to his mother. It was the hollow soreness any young boy would have in his position. Tim called him mama’s boy until he finally displayed a frightening amount of disdain for the title and actually begged him to stop. Tim agreed to, and I agreed to pretend I never heard a thing.

Dick disagreed with both of those sentiments and viewed Talia as someone who wasn’t worth the trouble. His dismissal embarrassed Bruce and offended Damian, so I knew the dinner table had been sufficiently turned into a powder keg. Tim and I shared a look as I expressed silent gratefulness, and he resigned to inspecting a dumpling, while I picked around my haka noodles.

The rest of dinner was quiet. Somehow, somewhere in the silence all had been decidedly forgiven. First by Babs who asked me to pass the pepper. Then by Dick who said the vegetables were good. Thank you, Alfred. Damian still looked pissed, and Bruce kept stealing glances at the clock.

I texted Tim under the table.

Thanks for taking one for the team.

The reply: You owe me one. I think Damian’s gonna poison my food.

We both glanced at the youngest, who was darkly mesmerized by what appeared to be Tim’s soup bowl.

He quickly added, Wait, actually tho? And we both fought laughter like two kids in the back of the class. It felt good to have an ally. Even if he still didn’t know the whole truth.

[luciehercndale]

📝 with Thomastair and "I'm not going to yell at you"??? Congratulations 🎊

Hi Anushka! I hope you like the fic 💜

Couple: Thomastair Prompt: “I’m not going to yell at you” Rating: T Title: Live For

Thomas sighed once he was before the beautiful Victorian house at 102 Cornwall Garden, then reminded himself why he was there. He wasn’t paying any of its inhabitants a social a visit, but rather, he was there for business. He wouldn’t call the Clave’s orders business, but still, he was there for a reason and that reason wasn’t a pleasant one.

His parents returned to London the week before and his father Gideon asked Thomas whether he wanted to join in some of the activities of the Clave. Thomas had agreed on the spot because he wanted to keep himself busy. He still wanted to find whoever had killed his sister Barbara and make them pay. Thomas accepted without knowing what he would have to do. He was still eighteen, which meant that he would not be given any task that could put him into dangerous situations.

As he crossed the threshold of the Carstairs residence, however, he believed that the job that the older shadowhunters had asked of him was indeed of the dangerous category.

He did not want to be there. He did not want to meet anyone, especially him. Thomas wished that he would not meet those black eyes as he went upstairs after Risa, the Carstairs’ cook, allowed him to proceed. “You can search as much as you want, Mister Lightwood. There is no one home but me. Mrs. Carstairs told me that she wouldn’t interfere with the Clave’s investigation on her husband.”

Thomas had already searched two rooms, even if search was the wrong term to describe what he had been doing. He opened a few drawers, controlled what was on the desk of one of the rooms. Checked inside the books that were scattered on one armchair – Cordelia’s room most likely, since there were dresses on the back of another chair. Nothing interesting to see there. He was swift, tried to put everything back where he found it, and left.

How much he hated that. He didn’t like to pry in the lives of Cordelia and her mother, but he couldn’t defy the Clave’s orders. His hand hesitated on the handle of the third room. There were only four rooms on this floor, and he knew that either this one or the next would be his room. He closed his eyes as he opened the door, despite he knew he wouldn’t find him there.

“What a mess,” he commented, noticing even more scattered books and newspapers on the desk next to the window and clothes on the small sofa nearby. He decided to start from the desk since it was messier and there could be something interesting hidden. He didn’t think he would find anything there, but he still had to look. Unlike the previous rooms, he was compelled to explore that one. He didn’t know why, but he was curious to know more about him.

Alastair had been quite abrasive in the past and had spread false rumors, but Thomas believed that everyone deserved to be given the benefit of the doubt and everyone needed to be given a second chance. As much as he had felt a hole in his heart once he discovered he had helped spreading those false gossips about his family, Thomas knew that there was much more to Alastair than he let on.

Thomas found a little black book in one of Alastair’s drawers. There were just two letters written on it, A.C., his name and surname, and there was a pencil tied to it with a small cord. He thought that Alastair probably carried it around with him to scribble random things on it – he was, after all, an observer. And he was smart.

Thomas knew that he shouldn’t interfere in Alastair’s business, yet he found himself untying the cord and opening the small pad.

 December 8th, 1903.

He knows. He knows and I can’t do anything but accept it. He would have known sooner or later; better now that later. I probably deserve it, even if it hurts my soul. No, what soul. I don’t have a soul. You’re out of line. Stop. You have already cried once. Move on. Hate is better than indifference. And you can still see him from afar.

 “I didn’t think you were the nosy type, Lightwood.”

Thomas jumped. He tightened his grip on the small diary and tried to hide it, but Alastair had already stridden towards him. “I am not nosy. Meddling in other people’s business is not my style.” Alastair’s eyes fixated on the black object in his hands, and he wanted to say something else, but it was useless. “I didn’t read anything,” Thomas tried to add, but Alastair interrupted him by raising his index finger to silence him.

“I’m not going to yell at you,” Alastair told him, still observing the black diary and noticing that Thomas’ hands were a bit shaky. “I know you are doing your job.”

“I’m sorry I have to do this, but you know the law.”

Something crossed Alastair’s face, and Thomas tried to figure out what it was, but it was impossible because it lasted a few seconds. “And I won’t be stopping you from following orders. Search as much as you want. I don’t care.”

Alastair walked away from Thomas as if he hadn’t been there, as if he was just a figment of his imagination, and he took off his jacket.

“You always wear black,” Thomas said without realizing it. He couldn’t stop himself from saying it. He knew that he told him just because he didn’t want to be ignored. He was already hurt, but that hurt him more.

Thomas saw Alastair’s back tense. “I like black,” he replied, glancing over his shoulder at Thomas.

They stared at each other without breaking eye contact until Thomas spoke again. “I didn’t like your oxygenated hair,” he told him bravely. He never told him something like that and he didn’t know how Alastair would react. He felt the need to tell him, an urgency he couldn’t control. He felt comfortable to ask him that.

Alastair turned towards Thomas and rubbed his hands together. “Me either, to be honest.”

“Then why did you do it?”

Alastair sighed and bit his lip. “We all do a lot of things to please other people, Lightwood. Not everything we do, we do it for ourselves. But you know what is great? That at some point, we realize that we should not let other people dictate how to live our lives. Shouldn’t people accept us for who we are?”

Thomas thought Alastair’s words to be very vague, general. Applying to everyone but to no one at the same time. He was trying to tell him something without being direct. “If we have to change to please other people, it just means they do not deserve us.”

Alastair’s mouth remained half-open as he mulled over Thomas’ words. Thomas saw the change in his features again, because in a span of seconds, Alastair’s face went from stunned to distressed, as if he did not expect Thomas’ answer or as if he knew that he would say those words and he didn’t want to hear them.

And then, Alastair closed himself to the world again. “If you’re done here, I think you should go.”

Thomas nodded and walked towards Alastair. He wanted to talk more, but he knew that Alastair had already shared too much. He was grateful they had talked.

He didn’t dare to look at him in the eyes, but his body was still angled in his direction and he was still looking at him sideways.  “I meant well, Alastair,” Thomas finally declared, extending his hand to pass the black diary he was still holding to him.

Alastair hesitated at first, not able to take his eyes off the tiny journal, but then he grabbed it from Thomas’ hold and their hands touched briefly. Thomas couldn’t help himself and held on Alastair’s wrist, as you do when you want to drag somebody away. His grip was gentle. Alastair’s fingers trembled nervously under Thomas’ touch. He wanted to squeeze Thomas’s hand but he didn’t have the strength to make that move, and neither did Thomas.

“Do not let the past blacken your soul, Carstairs,” Thomas murmured. He let go of Alastair’s hand and walked away before he could reply.

That night, Alastair cried again, but not for the same reason he had cried after Cordelia’s engagement party. He cried because he realized Thomas was right. He thought he didn’t have a soul, and if he had a soul, it was a dark one.

How much he was wrong. He did have a soul. And that night, it only wept one name.

Thomas.

How much he loved him… but he would never tell him.

How it hurt. How it drained all the life out of him, but at the same time, it made him feel alive.

And Thomas was a good reason to stay alive.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

Eccentricity [Chapter 11: You Don’t Come Around No More]

A/N: I apologize profusely for the long wait. Thank you all so, so, so much for your support. Every single reblog, message, comment, emotional rant, and/or screech of despair makes my day, and I couldn’t do this without you. 💜 Only THREE more chapters left!!!

Series Summary: Joe Mazzello is a nice guy with a weird family. A VERY weird family. They have a secret, and you have a choice to make. Potentially a better love story than Twilight.

Chapter Title Is A Lyric From: “More To Life Than Baseball” by Petey. 

Chapter Warnings: Language, angsttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt.

Word Count: 7.5k. 

Other Chapters (And All My Writing) Available: HERE

Taglist: @queen-turtle-boiii​​​​ @bramblesforbreakfast​​​​​​​ @maggieroseevans​​​​​ @culturefiendtrashqueen​​​​​ @imnotvibingveryguccimrstark​​​​​ @escabell​​​​​ @im-an-adult-ish​​​​​​ @queenlover05​​​​​ @someforeigntragedy​​​​​ @imtheinvisiblequeen​​​​​ @seven-seas-of-ham-on-rhyee​​​​​ @deacyblues​​​​​ ​ @tensecondvacation​​​​ @brianssixpence​​​​​ @some-major-ishues​​​​ @haileymorelikestupid​​​​ @youngpastafanmug​​​​ @simonedk​

The Rain

I wish I felt empty.

I’m supposed to feel empty, right? I’m supposed to feel steeped in grey, oceanic misery; I’m supposed to dip in and out of depressive naps all day and sob delicately over creased photos and fading, wistful memories. I always envisioned heartbreak as a soft and inherently feminine sort of affliction: the hems of nightgowns and bathrobes sweeping along hardwood floors, Kleenex boxes and concave couch cushions, weepy phone calls to friends and aunts and mothers, Queen Victoria wearing black for the rest of her life after Prince Albert’s death, Mary Todd Lincoln sinking into dark and hushed obscurity. Women, hollowed out by despair, cross the history of the earth like lines of latitude.

I don’t feel empty at all. I don’t even feel sad. I feel razored by sharp, red, ceaseless anxiety. I am consumed by thoughts of what I did wrong, what I said that started the wheels of doubt spinning in his mind, if he had known how it would end from the start. I dream of white, clawed hands dragging me down through cold waves. I hear words scream to me as I toss at night in my suddenly too-spacious bed, words that now hit me like knuckles to the gut: Shhh, hey, it’s just me, don’t get up, as Joe slipped beneath the Arizonan blankets, wrapped an arm around my waist, kissed my collarbone as I tumbled back into sleep; I love you to death, as his Subaru idled in Charlie’s driveway; Baby Swan, listen to me, nothing is supposed to hurt, okay, so if anything hurts, ever, at all, you tell me and we stop, deal? as we stood in the doorway of our hotel room at the Four Seasons in Chicago. And now...and now...

And now everything fucking hurts.

It doesn’t make any sense; and yet it does. Look at him. Look at me.

The Polaroid photo from Homecoming was still taped to the top of my full-length mirror. I peeled it free like a layer of translucent, friable reptilian skin, tore it straight down the center, burned both halves over a brand new three-wicked, lemon-scented Bath And Body Works candle—a gift from Renee and Paul—and closed my eyes like a child casting a wish over her birthday cake like a spell. I wished for my memories to vanish with the photograph. I wished to get hit by a truck and wake up in the hospital with no recollection of the past two and a half months. I wanted the Lees to dissolve into distant, enigmatic mystery; I wanted to join the rest of Forks in believing that they were nothing more than bewildering and yet harmless freaks, barely worth noticing, one of those glitches of the matrix that were better off ignored like liminal seconds of déjà vu. I wished to carve out every part of myself that they had ever touched.

And Joe’s voice came rushing back from where we stood by that star-lit fountain outside the Church of Saint Lawrence, accompanied by falling raindrops and a crooked grin: I can make wishes come true.

The three tiny flames flickered in the breeze that sighed through my open window. The bright, citrusy scent of the candle reminded me of Lucy. I couldn’t fucking win. What else is new?

I turned back to the mirror. I flinched when my gaze snagged on my reflection: bloodshot-eyed, swollen-faced, utterly unbeautiful, restless like a caged animal. Look at him. Look at me.

I ripped the last memento off the mirror—Official Citation!! No More Sad Spaghetti!!—and watched the yellow square of paper catch fire, curl up around the edges, become unrecognizable, turn to ash. And I wished over and over again, like a poem, like a prayer: Let me forget, oh god please let me forget.

Charlie keeps asking if I’m okay. The answer, of course, is no; but I can’t tell him that. So I wear a serene smile like clip-on fangs, a cheap polyester cloak, crimson smudges of lipstick like trails of spilled blood down the side of my neck. Every day is Halloween for me now. I dress up as someone who isn’t haunted, who hasn’t become a ghost.

And when Charlie turns up the World Series or I’d Do Anything For Love on his geriatric, staticky kitchen radio—the same radio he’s had since my mother was the one joining him for daybreak coffee and Pop-Tarts—I choke back tears like dragonfire.

Missing In Action (Revisited)

Joe wasn’t here. Neither was Ben.

Lucy, Rami, and Scarlett were sipping cups of tea at the Lees’ usual table, their eyes downcast, their voices low and murmuring, their pristine lunches neglected. Lucy and Rami were dressed in matching charcoal grey turtleneck sweaters; Scarlett had come from Fencing Club and was wearing royal purple yoga pants and a black tank top, her duffle bag of gear on the floor by her sneakered feet. Her hair was in a long fishtail braid. Archer hadn’t mentioned her since Joe broke up with me. That either meant that it was going blissfully and he didn’t want to injure me further, or that Scarlett had ended things as well.

Since Joe broke up with me. That sounds so fucking pedestrian.

I stared at the three present Lees, almost leered, commanding them to see me, to acknowledge me, to admit that I had once meant something to them, that this hadn’t all been some transitory delusion to fill the cavernous void of losing my home, my life as I knew it in Arizona. They took no notice whatsoever.

Jess kicked me beneath the lunch table. My attention snapped back to her.

“Sorry, what?”

“You want to go shopping with me and Angela tonight?” Jessica’s hands were folded just beneath her chin, her voice gentle, her eyes large and sympathetic and watery. This was her version of being supportive. I appreciated it...in a perpetually tormented and preoccupied sort of way.

“No thanks.” I forked my cold, sauceless spaghetti listlessly. I’d forgotten to pack a lunch. I didn’t have an appetite anyway. I had deleted the GrubHub app from my iPhone and had no intention of using it ever again in my comparatively short and calamitous human life.

“You could come to temple this weekend,” Jessica pressed.

“Uh.” Mingling with a churchful of sociable, wholesome, marriage-obsessed adolescent Mormons sounded like the absolute last thing I’d want to spend my evening doing. “That’s a really generous offer, but I’ll pass.”

“Well you have to do something,” Angela said. “You can’t just sit in your bedroom alone all weekend and stare at the wall and wallow in self-pity.”

We’ll see about that. I turned to Jess. “How’s Vodka Boy from your Indigenous Peoples of the Arctic class? Did he ever reappear? What’s his name again, Elmo? Ellington? El Chapo?”

“Ellsworth.” She frowned as she slurped her patron-drink-of-Mormons Sprite. “And no, he definitely failed out or overdosed or something, because he never came back.”

“Tragic,” I noted.

“But I’m pretty sure Mike’s coming over this weekend, so we’ll see if I can get some Netflix and chill action going.”

“Jess,” Angela chastised, widening her eyes and nodding to me subtly (but not quite subtly enough). No talking about getting lucky in front of the heartbroken single loser, that look said.

“I think I can be emotionally supportive without taking a goddamn vow of chastity, Angela!” Jessica hurled back.

“I gotta go.” I stood, threw on my backpack, discarded my nearly untouched lunch.

“You’ve barely eaten anything!” Angela protested. “You’ve barely eaten for a week!”

“I’ll live.” I picked my umbrella up off the slippery tile floor—peppered with muddy shoeprints and pearlescent drops of water fallen from coats and limp, sopping locks of hair—and headed out into the pouring rain. I hated the rain. I hated it. Maybe I had forgotten that for a while, but it all came hurtling back now like a hurricane, like a hand cracking across my face. I ached for the desert, for blatant and unapologetic heat, for palm trees and cacti and naked stars in the night sky. I had been researching marine biology graduate programs in the Southwest. There were good ones at UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, Texas A&M, the University of Southern California, UCLA. I would miss Charlie and Archer—and maybe Jessica and Angela on occasion—and absolutely nothing else about Forks. At least, that’s what I promised myself.

This is a no-giving-a-fuck-about-Lee-boys zone, I thought morosely.

Ben was brooding at our table in Professor Belvin’s classroom. It was the first time he’d shown up to Chemistry since that day Joe met me on the beach at La Push, since the place I’d once occupied in his universe had closed like a wound. I took my seat beside Ben. The window was shut today, the downpour outside torrential. Ben recoiled, just enough for me to notice; he was wearing his oversized black hoodie and practicing his Welsh, his handwriting messy and unbalanced.

“You could have warned me,” I said.

Ben didn’t glance up from his notebook. “Would that have made it any easier?”

“No,” I realized in defeat. I guess it wouldn’t have. I pulled my own notebook, my favorite pen, and a can of Diet Coke out of my backpack.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Ben said. “You really need to know that. It had nothing to do with you. And none of us are happy with the current situation. None of us.”

None of them. That included Joe. “Interestingly, that didn’t stop him from creating it.”

Ben was thoughtful, debating his next words. “We’re probably going to be moving soon.”

“What?” I startled; my turquoise blue pen dropped out of my grasp and rolled across the table. Ben snatched it up and returned it to me. “Really?”    

“Yeah.”

“And what, just redo this whole college thing?”

Ben shrugged. “We’ll probably start our junior years over again. Gwil will say there was some horrible family tragedy and we needed a few semesters off. I could use the extra time to figure out Calc anyway. Parametric equations make me want to kill myself.”

I just stared at him. It didn’t make any sense. “But...why would the whole family leave Forks? Because of me? One pathetic, aggrieved human? Do you all pack up and relocate every time Joe fucks and dumps someone? That must be exhausting.”

“It’s better for everyone if we get some distance. Put more space between our world and yours.”

“But...” I tried to imagine never seeing any of them again: no Mercy humming merrily as she tossed handfuls of homegrown carrots to the alpacas, no Dr. Lee dabbing away my blood with an ageless sort of patience, no Scarlett or Lucy or Rami, no brief glimpses of Joe as he avoided me in the campus library. It’s exactly what I wanted; and yet it wasn’t. It so, so, so, so wasn’t. It keeps getting worse. How is that possible? My voice was flimsy and quivering, absolutely pitiful. Disgustingly pitiful. “Who will be my lab partner?”

Ben peered over at me with wide, confused green eyes. And then—gingerly, awkwardly, like holding an acquaintance’s baby for the first time—he laid his hand over mine. “I’ll miss you too.”

Professor Belvin lectured about coordinate covalent bonds. I didn’t absorb a word. I conjugated Italian verbs with my turquoise blue pen, sketched disordered whirlpools of ink, tried not to think about whether this was my last-ever Chemistry class with Ben, whether it was my last-ever weekend sharing Forks with the Lees. Those rageful, frantic thoughts were back. What did I do wrong? What didn’t I do right? Why did he have to leave?

My nomadic gaze caught on a flier on the wall next to our misted window. I had assumed it was a leaflet for some club or protest or seasonal dance that I would definitely not attend, but it wasn’t. It was a missing poster.

Have you seen this student? the flier asked in bold, businesslike black font. It was urgent, but not quite despairing; not yet, anyway. I could hear a Dean of Student Affairs cajoling some affluent, strings-of-pearls-adorned mother over the phone: Yes ma’am, you have my full attention and I can assure you that we’re very concerned, but I’m sure it’s all just a misunderstanding...he’s probably gone backpacking or sailing with some friends and forgotten to call home. You know how college students can be. Beneath a large photo of a grinning blond kid—pink polo, flushed cheeks, clever crop job to nix a can of Natty Light clutched in one fist—was a name: Ellsworth Jonathan Griffin.

Ellsworth, I thought, my stomach plummeting. The guy from Jessica’s Indigenous Peoples of the Arctic class. He hadn’t failed out. He was missing. Missing like a 20/20 episode or a true crime podcast, missing like the pregnant stillness before a murder is confessed in some glaringly florescent-lit interrogation room, before a distended and bloodless corpse washes up on shore.

I turned to Ben. He noticed me eventually, crinkled his brow, shrugged in that way that seemed so petulant if you didn’t know him well enough to not be offended.

I pointed to the flier and raised my eyebrows. Ben twisted around in his chair to look. Then he sighed, scribbled a sentence in the corner of a piece of notebook paper, tore it free, and slid it across the table.

Ben’s note read, in atrocious penmanship: Are you seriously asking me if I ate that guy?

Maybe, I wrote back after a moment’s hesitation. Maybe that wasn’t exactly what I was asking; maybe I just wondered if he knew anything about it.

In either case, Ben’s reply was swift and resounding, and underlined three times: No.

Sorry, I wrote, abruptly remorseful. I am a jerk. And I added a frowny face for good measure. Ben chuckled when he saw it, shook his head, gave me a drawn little smirk. His words tiptoed around in my skull, leaving searing imprints like footprints in the sand. I’ll miss you too.

I have to forget about them. I drummed my turquoise blue pen against my notebook as Professor Belvin drew families of molecules on the whiteboard with squealing dry erase markers. I have to find a way to make myself forget.

Jessica was waiting for me in the hallway after class. It was part of her convince-Baby-Swan-not-to-jump-off-a-cliff initiative. “Hey.”

“Okay,” I told her with steely resolve. “I’m ready for you to set me up with one of those guys from your church or temple or whatever. I’m ready to be a nice wholesome wife, pop out like six kids, learn how to scrapbook, give up caffeine and horror movies, do the whole white picket fence thing. Sign me up.”

Jessica blinked at me. There were flecks of fallen mascara on her cheekbones like ashes. “What?”

“You’re a Mormon, right?”

“Girl, I’m not a Mormon,” Jessica said, puzzled. “I’m a witch.”

Lucille

I found Joe where he usually was these days: sprawled on the sofa, engulfed in the same blue Snuggie he’d been wearing for thirty-six uninterrupted hours, gazing catatonically at the big-screen tv. A 90 Day Fiancé marathon was on. Some rodentish guy named Colt was apologizing to his gorgeous, aspiring-green-card-holding Brazilian love interest for calling the cops on her during their last screaming match. He was also apologizing for the fact that they lived in a two-bedroom apartment with his mother. I didn’t need clairvoyance to see where their future was headed.

“Hey,” Ben said when he spotted me. He was sitting next to Joe and occasionally tried to shove pieces of popcorn into his mouth, which Joe accepted passively like coins plinked into a gumball machine. Ben had been his shadow for the past week; he was perhaps the best equipped of us to understand this degree of melancholy, of hopelessness.  

“Ciao.” And then, to Joe: “How are you?”

“Terrible,” he replied, not tearing his eyes from the tv.

“I figured.” I squeezed between them on the couch, curled up next to Joe, rested my chin on his shoulder. He ignored me completely. I could hear Mercy tapping at her laptop keyboard out in the dining room; she was browsing through Zillow listings in Portland, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland. Dear god, please don’t let us end up in fucking Cleveland. “Guess what.”

Joe stared at the tv for a long time before he answered. “What.”

“I had a vision of you. Just now, as I was doing laundry. Crystal clear and very scenic too, I might add.”

“Fascinating,” Joe said flatly.

“What happened in this vision?” Ben asked, far more invested, which I was thankful for.

“It was pretty far away, maybe a year from now. I saw you in the desert at night, under a full moon. There were cacti everywhere. The shadow of the Milky Way was threaded through the sky, and the stars were very bright. I could make out the constellations Pegasus and Cassiopeia. You were filling up a tiny glass bottle with dirt.”

“That’s remarkably helpful,” Joe said.

“It is, a little bit,” I insisted. “It means you get through this. That you have a future. I get nervous when I go too long without a vision of someone in the family. But now I know you’re going to be okay.”

The reflections of the feuding 90 Day Fiancé couples danced in his glassy eyes. “Being alive doesn’t mean you’re okay.”

“That’s dark,” Ben said. “Even I think that’s too dark.” He pushed a handful of popcorn into Joe’s mouth. “Are you gonna hunt at some point or what?”

“No.”

“You’re just gonna sit on this couch and waste away?”

“Yeah.”

“You want me to bring you anything? Grizzly bear? Brown bear? Fuck it, I’ll get you a polar bear if that’s what you want. There’s probably some on the black market. Rami would know.”

“He what?” Mercy called from the kitchen. Her typing had stopped.

“Nothing, Mom!” I shot back.

“I don’t want anything,” Joe said. That was a lie, of course. We all knew what he wanted. Rami couldn’t stand to be around him; the thoughts were relentless, smothering.

I linked my arms around Joe’s neck, laid my head against his chest, sighed deeply and mournfully. “I’m sorry,” I told him. “I know that doesn’t fix anything. But I’m so, so sorry. And I’ll help however I can. We all will.”

And I had accepted that Joe wasn’t going to respond at all when he finally whispered: “I just wish I could forget.”

Cato

My rolling suitcase snagged on the cobblestone driveway. The tiny spinning wheels bashed against concrete as I scaled the front steps. As the taxi pulled away, I dug around in my suit pocket for my keys, found them, unlocked the enormous front door, stepped inside the palace as my suitcase trolled along the marble floor.

“Cato’s back!” Charity announced as she breezed down the nearest staircase, beaming and embracing me. She was a lovely, innately warm woman from Pointe-Noire, Congo; she still wore the silver cross necklace her mother had once given her around her neck. “Did you have a nice flight? Wait, let me check.” She pressed the fingertips of her right hand to my cheek. I felt the memories rush up like blood to a flushed face: the bite of sipped champagne against my tongue, the thin semi-transparent newspaper pages gliding between my fingers, the husky voice of the bearded, bearish naval officer who sat in the seat beside me, the misted silhouette of Vladivostok as it rose up out of the Pacific Ocean. “Uneventful, but pleasant enough. You flew commercial?”

“The jets were otherwise occupied, apparently.” Charity could see things with the predictability and precision that Lucy so often lacked, but only the past. I pushed her hand away. “Was that really necessary?”

“You’re not mad,” Charity declared, confident, impish, helping me shed my suit jacket and draping it over her arm. “You’re never mad.”

She was very nearly correct. “Where are the rest of the kids?”

“In the kitchen. Go say hello, they’ve missed you dreadfully.”

“I know the feeling.” I kicked off my Berlutis, ran a palm over the wiry fur of the Irish Wolfhounds that appeared to greet me before they resumed padding watchfully around the palace, and went to the kitchen, my black socks slipping a bit on the marble floors.

I could hear their voices before I reached the door: laughter, teasing, complaints, requests. The scents of pancakes and cold butter and maple syrup were thick in the air. Charity was one of our four newest recruits, and they all still had that energetic lightness of being human, a youthful enthusiasm, a relative normalness. I spent quite a lot of time with them. It was my job—to help with the transition, to keep them happy, to facilitate the welding of their individual parts into the beastly machine that was the Draghi—but oftentimes it felt more like a reprieve. Some would stay close to me as they matured, others would grow in different directions, like ambitious vines climbing the skeleton of a garden trellis. I usually missed them when they ‘grew up,’ so to speak...although there were exceptions. I had never liked Liesl. I had always liked Ben. I opened the door.

“Ah, you are home!” Ksenia cried from where she stood over the stove, a spatula in her right hand, bouncing excitedly in place on her small bare feet.

“Hey!” Max and Austin called together. They were both sitting with their shoes propped up on the unglamorous kitchen table. There was a massive formal dining room that could accommodate up to twenty-five guests, but we rarely used it.

“Good morning,” I said, aware that I was smiling for the first time in days.

Max groaned as he scrolled through his Google search results on a burner phone. “What the fuck. My name is one of the top five dog names again. I think I’m gonna have to change it.”

I ruffled his long blond hair, stealing a piece of bacon from his plate. Max had grown up a trust fund kid in Perth, Australia. His mother was old money; his father was a professional surfer. “Your name is fine.”

“Really, Kato Kaelin? Is it really? How am I supposed to intimidate people when I have a fucking dog name?”

“So make them call you Maximilian,” offered Ksenia in a heavy Ukrainian accent. She’d only been with us for eight months, but her English was coming along swimmingly. She flipped a massive A-shaped pancake on the sizzling griddle. That one was for Austin.

“Seriously?” Max said. “That is just way too many syllables. They’ll be halfway down the block by the time I’m done introducing myself. ‘Hey, come back mate, I haven’t killed ya yet.’”

“At least you aren’t stuck with a basic-white-boy-circa-1992 name for all of eternity,” said Austin Tyler McInerny, originally of Sheboygan, Wisconsin. He was chomping on a multicolored Fruit Roll-Up, which swung from his mouth like a lizard’s tongue. He’d been working at an ailing skatepark when Larkin found him. He still enjoyed showing off his kickflips, and kept insisting that he was going to teach me how to ollie. I didn’t have the faintest idea what an ollie was.

“Do you want a pancake, Cato?” Ksenia asked, passing Austin his plate and wiping her hands on her pink apron. Her black hair was tied in a high ponytail with a matching rose-colored ribbon. She looked so young. She was so young, actually. Nineteen. And she would be forever.

“No, thank you dear. I’m alright.”

“I like Alaric,” Max decided. “First king of the Visigoths. Alaric is a name fit for a vampire. Creepy, yet dignified. Or maybe Silas. Or Draco.”

Austin shook his head as he swirled a river of viscous maple syrup over his A-shaped pancake. “Definitely not Draco.”

“Why not?”

“Well, the Harry Potter connection is unfortunate. People will hear Draco and think of that obnoxious white-haired kid from the evil snake-people house or whatever.”

“Oh, right,” Max sighed. “Like I said. Alaric would work.”

“So many A-shaped pancakes!” Ksenia poured a K on the griddle for herself.

“It’s good for you,” Austin replied, pointing at her with his fork. “We’re practicing English.”

“Alaric Luther,” Max mused, scrolling through his phone. I didn’t think he’d find that on any list of trendy dog names. “Alaric Lothaire...Alaric Lucian...”

“I like your name, Max,” Larkin said from the doorway. None of us had heard him arrive. He was leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed, wearing a deep maroon suit and a ring on every finger, grinning hugely. He was exactly as I remembered him: stunning, captivating, terrifying. The kitchen fell quiet. I could smell Ksenia’s pancake beginning to burn.

At last Max chuckled nervously, pushing soggy pancake hunks around on his plate with his fork, averting his gaze. “Guess I’ll keep it then.”

“I thought I heard you come in,” Larkin told me.

“It’s always a pleasure to be home.”

He nodded out towards the hallway. “Come. Regale me with the stories of your travels.” Then his eyes flicked down to my socks, and he grimaced—slightly, briefly—before turning away. “And find your shoes.”

I followed him through the hallway, the living room, the grand front foyer with the crystal chandelier, into the elevator. Larkin did not speak, but he hummed as we ascended: House Of The Rising Sun.

It hadn’t always been like this. It was difficult for me to pick out the details of what had changed—the tone of his voice, the proportion of wonder and gratitude I associated with him versus fear, the way this palace (or the one in Reykjavik, or Juneau, or Ivalo, or Murmansk, or any of the others) felt when I stepped inside it—but I knew something had. It had begun before Ben left. It was much worse now. Older vampires, in my fairly learned opinion, are something like the stars. They mellow as they age, temper their character flaws, grow wise and patient like Nikolai or Honora or Gwilym Lee; or they rage until they burn away every last atom of humanity, until they destroy themselves and take entire solar systems down with them. Increasingly, I harbored fears that Larkin was a vampire of the latter variety. And we were all his planets.

In his study, Larkin dropped into the chair behind his desk, brought a hand to his forehead, surveyed a disarrayed flurry of papers: letters, notices, deeds and titles, meticulously managed accounts of finances and disciplinary actions. Larkin had a laptop and burner phone, of course, as we all did; but he liked to work in paper as much as possible. That’s how he’d done things for centuries, since long before the name of the inventor of the internet (or harnessed electricity, for that matter) was a whisper on his parents’ lips. The sky outside was clouded and seeping soft rain.

“Things have been busy?” I ventured.

He frowned, gesturing to the cluttered desk. “I’m in purgatory.”

“I’m terribly sorry to hear that. Can I help?”

“The Lancaster coven says they’ll need an extension for their dues. That’s the second year in a row, now it’s not just an exception, it’s a precedent. If you let one coven bend the rules, others will follow. So something will have to be done. Then there’s Stockholm. Anders’ coven has eaten a few too many locals—including the mayor’s favorite niece—and now the city is launching an investigation. Fucking idiots. They’ll probably all have to relocate. There’s some new territory dispute in Lima between Alejandro’s coven and a group of strangers that just came out of the Andes. We’ll have to make their acquaintance, of course. And as if all that weren’t enough, Rigel accidentally fed on a heroin addict and he’s currently detoxing in a cell in the basement. Would you check on him for me? I’m sure your presence will be a...” He waved his hand distractedly, almost dismissively, searching for the words. “A comfort to him.”

“Of course.”

“How are the Lees?”

“Fine. Typical. Gwil’s putting in a lot of hours at the hospital. Rami’s planning to get another law degree. Ben is, uh, adjusting. Slowly, very slowly. He’s not particularly content. But he hasn’t murdered anyone that I’m aware of.”

“How nice.” Now his eyes darted up to catch mine: focused, luminous, unreadable. “Nothing new at all?”

And instantly, I wanted to tell him everything. I forgot why I had ever planned to blunt the girl’s existence, to conceal her talent entirely; I felt her name rising in my throat. And then I remembered again. I’m doing this for Gwil, for Ben.

I pretended to ponder Larkin’s question, as if it was so difficult to remember, as if there was nothing left to sift through but a trunkful of mundane details from the trip like a grandfather’s tattered correspondence and tarnished war relics. That was something an average family might have squirreled away in their attic, I assumed; I’d never met my own grandfather, and he sure as hell wouldn’t have had anything to leave me if I had. “Joe’s got some new girlfriend, but I don’t think it’s serious. I doubt she’ll be around long. You know how Joe is. Scarlett’s seeing someone too, actually. A Quileute kid.”

“Poor boy.” And Larkin grinned like a shark beneath burning eyes. “He’s in for a lifetime of disappointment. Who will ever be able to hold a candle to those memories?”

Larkin had a moderate preoccupation with Scarlett’s beauty, her...tenacity. Her lack of talent was a great disappointment to him, a somehow more egregious fault than Joe or Gwil or Mercy’s. What a shame, Larkin often said. And I believed I knew what came after in his mind, although never aloud: What a partner she could have been.

He was still grinning at me. His expression was hollow, vacuous. A shiver clawed down my spine. He was waiting for something. No, he was searching. I stared back, and I willed for that intangible, contagious harmony I carried around like a wedding ring to hit him like carbon monoxide or bromine: undetected and yet inexorable, knocking him off his path of inquisition.

What does he suspect? What does he already know?

“Anyway,” Larkin continued abruptly, turning his attention back to his paperwork. “I’m glad there’s nothing to worry about in Forks. Liesl will be back in the next few days, Rigel will be ready to work again, I’ll come up with a plan to handle all this and my mood will improve tremendously.”

And where has Liesl been? I almost asked; and then I didn’t. It was a good sign that she was coming home. I had looked for her once while I was in Forks. When I made up my mind to find someone—when that switch flipped in my skull or in the tangle of nerves of my solar plexus or wherever it lived—it wasn’t like poking around on Google Earth: zooming in here, scrolling over there. A goldish trail lit up on the floor, a ‘Yellow Brick Road’ Honora and I sometimes joked, and I followed it. And I had no way of knowing how far that trail might lead. A route heading dead east from the palace might stop in the next town over or continue across the Pacific Ocean; my search might last one day or a hundred. In Forks—as I perched in a soaring western hemlock tree in the forest outside the Lee residence on a cool October evening—Liesl’s trail had led north. North to Vancouver, to Victoria, to Dawson, to Alaska? Who the fuck knew. I was just relieved it hadn’t led to the tree next to mine.

“Well, as always, I’m happy to assist however I can,” I told Larkin. “Just let me know and I’ll be on the next flight out of Vladivostok.”

“I appreciate that, Cato.” He smiled, paternally this time. And then he spun his chair around to peer out the window into the episodic flares of lightning that illuminated great dark clouds like neurons in a celestial brain. I hate thunderstorms. They remind me of South Carolina. “But I think you’ve earned a rest.”

After checking in on Rigel—irritable, frenetic, pacing, and yet predictably pacified somewhat by my visit—I trotted up the main staircase to the second floor of the palace. I found her in our bedroom: sitting at her easel, a paintbrush held in one graceful hand, an image like a photograph on the canvas. I promptly pried off my Berlutis for the second time today and tossed them into the closet.

“Ciao, amore,” I said.

“Ciao!” Honora replied, beaming. Her curly brunette hair was pinned up and away from her face; wayward tendrils spiraled down to brush her bare shoulder blades, the back of her neck. “Just give me five minutes...I have to finish the shadow of this tree...”

There weren’t many in the Draghi who survived the transition from Nikolai’s leadership to Larkin’s, but Honora had. She was gentle to a fault, a hopeless warrior, turned into an immortal on her forty-fourth birthday when Rome was still an empire; and she was without any talents whatsoever, except for one which was useless in combat. Her paintings, drawings, and sculptures adorned every palace the Draghi owned. Each year, Larkin would ask her to paint all of us together, incorporating any new faces, erasing the memories of those who had proven themselves unworthy. One such portrait, I knew, hung in Gwilym Lee’s home office.

I went to the woman I called my wife, laid my palms on her shoulders, leaned down to kiss the top of her head. “Take your time, love.”

“Everything’s alright?” Honora asked, looking hopefully up at me with large, wide-set jade eyes. No, not just hopefully. Trustingly.

“Everything’s alright,” I agreed, not knowing if I believed it.

Shadows And Spells

“He just...just...disappeared?!” Jessica sputtered, scandalized, gaping at me as she held a Styrofoam cup of spiked apple cider in her clasped hands.

We were on a quilt near the outskirts of the sea of beach towels and blankets that circled the bonfire. Women—wearing flowing dresses or robes or tunics or not very much at all—flounced around the flames banging tambourines and reciting chants that I didn’t know the words to. Some carried torches, beacons of heat and light in the darkness. Jessica was wearing a short black shirt, fishnet tights, and a black crop-top turtleneck sweater; I had opted for a bohemian blue dress patterned with stars, an old thrift shop find and the closest thing I owned to Wiccan festivities apparel. I had a cup of hot apple cider as well, enhanced with a generous splash of Captain Morgan, but hadn’t quite conjured up the rebelliousness to drink it yet.

I suddenly recalled Mercy bringing me an endless supply of virgin autumnal sangrias as Joe and I swam in the hot tub on the Lees’ back porch. As soon as you turn twenty-one, you can have the real thing. I frowned, shuddered, took a bitter and burning sip.

“Yeah,” I replied. “He told his roommate he was going to a frat party or something and never showed up and never made it back home either. The parents are blaming the university, the university is insisting he must be off with a girlfriend or on some hipster soul-searching nature adventure or whatever, it’s a mess.”

“Jesus,” she murmured. “What does your dad say?”

“He’s been helping the state police with the investigation. There’s really no evidence of anything. No witnesses, no footprints, no surveillance footage, no handy anonymous tips...”

“No body,” Jessica finished.

“That’s morbid.” I downed the rest of my cider. Was the world already beginning to list like a ship on choppy waves, or was that just my imagination? I guess it would be possible. I’d barely eaten all day.

“You were thinking it.”

“Well, one’s mind does tend to wander towards homicide under such circumstances.”

“It is the season of the dead.” She grinned wickedly, then took my empty cup. “He’s probably fine. I bet he wants to drop out to become a weed farmer and hasn’t worked up the guts to tell his parents yet. You want another?”

“Sure.”

“Cool. I’ll be right back.” Jess rose to balance on black boots with five-inch heels and staggered off to the foldable table piled high with cans and bottles and snacks. I was getting the impression that her Wiccanism was more of a novelty than a spiritual commitment.

The season of the dead. Now that’s VERY morbid.

There were some guys laughing, smoking home-rolled cigarettes, and toasting glasses of red wine on a nearby mandala blanket, bespectacled intellectual types who were probably getting PhDs in Anthropology or Medieval Studies at the University of Washington. One of them—curly-haired, pale-eyed, wearing a sweater vest and a cautious smile—raised his wine glass in my direction. I waved back without much enthusiasm.

“He’s cute, right?” Jessica asked, plopping back down onto our quilt and shoving a full cup of spiked cider into my grasp. She motioned for me to drink. I did. “That’s Sebastian, but he likes to be called Bash. He’s twenty-three and speaks fluent German.”

“Charming.”

“He’s very...uh...gifted. I’m not saying I know from personal experience, but I’ve heard it from a very reliable source. And his parents own a beach house in Monterey. You could go skinny-dipping.”  

“In the ocean?” The world was definitely wobbling now. I was warm all over, numbed, fuzzy; it was becoming difficult to picture Joe’s face, to hear his voice. This was good. I kept drinking. “No thanks. Too many sharks. They have great whites down there.”

Jess tossed her long, loose hair and sighed impatiently. “I’m just saying that the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else. So you should pursue that.”

“I’ll totally consider it.” I lied. I would not consider it.

She smiled, sympathetically, fondly. “I can’t believe you thought I was a Mormon.”

“I can’t believe I’m out in the Washington wilderness commemorating the Gaelic festival of Samhain, but here we all are.”

Jess glanced over my shoulder. “Oh my god. He’s coming over here.”

“Ugh.” I craned my neck to see. Sebastian—whoops, my mistake, Bash—was approaching. “Please distract him. I don’t want to talk to anyone. Also I’m pretty sure I’m getting drunk and I don’t want to do anything humiliating, like sob uncontrollably about how much I miss my ex-boyfriend.”

“Don’t worry. I gotchu, Baby Swan.”

“Hey Jess,” Bash said, but he was looking at me. He pitched his cigarette off into the trees. What the fuck, who does that?

“Only you can prevent forest fires,” I told him in a woozy, mock-Smokey Bear voice.

“What?” he asked, baffled.

“Ignore her, she’s drunk,” Jess said quickly. “So what’s up? Come on, sit with me. Keep me toasty. Teach me some German...”

As they chatted and giggled and snuggled closer together—I’m starting to think that Jessica might have been her own reliable source—I studied the forest, watching to make sure the cigarette didn’t begin to smolder in the damp brush. The voices and crackling of the bonfire and sharp ringing of the tambourines faded into one muted, uniform drone. The trees reeled in the haze of the spiked cider; the cool wind moaned through them. And then, for only a second: a glimpse of something impossibly quick, something silvery and reedy and sunless.

What was that?

I blinked. It was gone. I blinked again, staring penetratingly. The swarming heat from the cider evaporated from my skin, my blood. There were goosebumps rising all over me.

What the hell was that?

I remembered how Calawah University students sometimes reacted to Ben: flinching, withdrawing, autonomically fearing him on some primal, evolutionary level. They knew he was a predator. They knew they were prey. It was chillingly similar to what I was feeling now.

I have to get out of here. I have to go home.

I shot to my feet. Oh, wrong move, that was too quick. I swayed, and Jessica reached up to steady me. “Are you—?!”

“I’m fine,” I said. “I gotta go home now.”

“What?! We just got here! Look, chill out, let me get you some vegan samosas or something—”

“No, seriously, I have to go.”

“Okay, okay,” Jessica conceded. “I’ll finish my drink and we’ll call an Uber, alright?”

“Really?” Bash asked, crestfallen.

“I’ll call an Uber,” I told Jess. “You stay, I’ll go.” Maybe she shouldn’t stay, I thought foggily, irrationally. Maybe it’s not safe.

“I can’t let you go alone. I got you drunk and now you’re a mess and if you end up murdered it would be my fault. There are unsolved mysteries going around, you know.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Girl, there’s no way I’m gonna—”

“I’ll call you as soon as I get in the Uber and I’ll stay on until I’m physically inside my house, okay?”

Jessica considered this. Bash leaned in to nibble her ear. I could smell the red wine and nicotine and animalistic lust sweating out of his pores. And unexpectedly, agonizingly: a biting flare, a muscle memory, Joe’s fingertips skimming down the small of my back and his scent like winter nights saturating the capillary beds of my lungs. Stop, stop, stop. “Okay,” Jess agreed at last.

“Awesome.” I was already opening the Uber app on my iPhone.

My driver was a Pacific Northwestern version of Santa Claus: wild grey beard, red flannel, L.L.Bean boots, rambling about his upcoming trip to hunt caribou in British Columbia. I honored my promise to Jessica and kept her on speakerphone for the duration of the twenty-minute drive. I rested my whirling head against the seat, let my eyes dip closed, watched the intermittent streetlights appear and disappear through my eyelids. I let myself into Charlie’s house when I arrived, wished Jessica goodnight (and reminded her not to get pregnant), and meandered clumsily into the kitchen for a glass of water and a cookie dough Pop-Tart to ward off a possible hangover. Charlie was snoring quietly on the living room couch. I watched him for a while, smiling and achingly grateful, before heading upstairs to my bedroom.

My window was wide open; that’s the first thing I noticed. I didn’t remember leaving it that way. I was always neglecting to lock the window, sure—I kept forgetting that there was no one to leave it unlocked for anymore—but I hadn’t left it open when I went to meet Jessica this evening. Icy night air flooded in. The stars were bright and furious in an uncommonly clear sky.

“You trying to give me pneumonia, old man?” I muttered, thinking of Charlie. I tossed my iPhone down onto my bed and crossed the room to close the window. And as it creaked and collided with the sill, I heard my closet door open behind me.

Someone’s here. Someone’s in this room with me.

I turned, very slowly; it felt like it took a lifetime. She was standing in the doorway of my closet, sinuous and white-haired, wearing black leather pants and stiletto heels and a long-sleeved lace blouse the color of blood, the color of her eyes. And she was harrowingly beautiful; not like Lucy or Mercy, not like Scarlett. She was beautiful like a prehistoric jawbone, like a serrated crescent moon, like a blade.

The owl. The goddamn albino owl.

I recognized her immediately. I heard Joe’s words as he introduced each vampire in the immense painting hanging in Dr. Lee’s upstairs office to me, though I desperately didn’t want to: She’s literally Satan, only blonder.

Her name tumbled from my trembling lips. “Liesl.”

“Wonderful, we can skip the introductions.” Her voice was like windchimes, cutting and brisk, with a hint of an Austrian accent like a shadow. Now she was at my bedside and picking up my phone, scrolling through it with lightning-quick and dexterous thumbs. “Hm. No texts from any of the Lees in the past week. So we don’t have to worry about them dropping by, I suppose. Joe got bored with you already, huh?”

“Evidently.” My own voice was brittle, anemic, weak; just like my ineffectual human body.

“That’s quick, even for him. How sad.” She sighed, tucking my iPhone into her red Chanel purse. “There’s a private jet waiting at the Forks Airport. Pack a bag. You have five minutes.”

“Please don’t hurt my dad,” I whispered, scalding tears brimming in my eyes.

“Of course not,” Liesl replied with a savage, saccharine smile. “Not yet, anyway.”

[chronicbatfictioner]

Exchanges and Compromises - Chapter 16

Just as Tim predicted, a week later, Bruce Wayne requested to meet him at work. While the request itself - sent through proper channels that is Tim's secretary - it specifically requested Tim by name. It had made a little stir with the other members of the company's Board of Directors, as they all thought that 'little Timmy' shouldn't be meeting the 'big and scary' Bruce Wayne by himself. "What if he manipulated Tim into a merger??" some had asked. It wasn't until Tim assured them that he would not make any corporate decisions without prior consulting - and stating that he 'doesn't like Bruce Wayne at all. He's a doof,' - that the rest of the BOD relented.

Bruce came in accompanied by Alfred Pennyworth, the family's butler. Bane, Tim knew, was accompanying Dr. Thomas and Mrs on a trip overseas. For some reason, the Waynes did not promptly send Bane away, even after he literally and physically got tossed out of the Wayne Manor's living room's bay windows - courtesy of Jason - when he tried to attack Damian.

"If this is a business meeting, Bruce, I would appreciate it if you wait for the rest of my BOD members to come up here," Tim hinted.

"No, no, no it's not..." Bruce seemed a little thinner than when Tim last saw him in person, a little disheveled and worse for wear, which would be odd given the fact that Alfred was right by his side. No self-respecting butler would have allowed their masters to leave the house looking like Bruce then - Tim knew, his dad had one since Tim was very young. Tim might not opt to keep the butler when his parents passed, but he knew the tenets fairly well.

Yet, Alfred just looked mildly disapproving but had walked into the office in the same eager speed as Bruce did.

Tim briefly wondered to whom Alfred's loyalty lies.

"I need... I need to know that there are no recording devices in here," Bruce stated.

Tim took a few blinks to choose an answer, "I'm not of the habit of having recording devices in my office. You, however, came with a tracking device," Tim pointed out.

"What?? I've left my cellphone in the car! Is it... can it listen? Record?" The shock on Bruce's face was more prevalent than when Damian came out of nowhere and called him 'father.'

Tim checked his monitoring system, courtesy of Harper Row, which can detect the type and model and broadcast type of any gadget and displayed it on Tim's cellphone. "No, it just tracks your location and is GPS-based. Why...?"

"Oh thank god..." Bruce slumped in his seat. "Alfred, can you make sure that no one would come here until I'm... until we're done?"

"Certainly, Master Bruce," Alfred bowed lightly and walked out the door.

"Wow, okay... whatever this is has got to be... better be important. I mean, you sent your butler out the door..." Tim commented.

"It is. It's about..." Bruce still hesitated. "Look, I don't usually do this. I don't know why. But you, your work-- your company and its line of business would make you-- would get you in touch with your end-clients, right? The common people who used social security benefits to get their meds, Doc Leslie Thompkins' patients and all that..."

He paused, so Tim shrugged. "I do try to personally meet my end-client to figure out what kind of medications they would need more; and Dr. Thompkins is one of my clients, too, whose assessment I can quite trust. You're not planning to get into the generic meds business also, are you?"

"No, no, no... This has nothing to do with WE. I mean... it should be, in the long run. But in the short run... Look, this would sound odd. But when you talk to your clients, have you ever hear of the Birds of Prey?" Bruce asked. Tim studied the man before him for a good long while. Before he could answer, Bruce continued, "my cousin Kate... she has just gotten kicked out of the military academy. She said she thought of donning a costume and joined the Birds of Prey to fight crime, so she could feel useful again, you know? I told her they're criminals, vigilantes. She said I should go down to meet the common people of Gotham and ask them what they think of the Birds of Prey. And then I thought of you."

"Yeeea... I'm not following..." Tim feigned - but only partially. He could already tell where the direction of Bruce's conversation was trying to take.

"Do you think they're criminals or heroes? I mean, does anybody ever mention them doing like, extortion, murder, stuff like that...?" Bruce insisted.

"Are you like, worried for your cousin Kate or... is there anything of significance that I should know about?" Tim finally decided to just bite the bullet and ask right out. There is no recording device in his office, all right. But his tiepin doubles as a camera that would send to Barbara as soon as Tim turned it on. And he had turned it on the instant Bruce walked in.

"As far as I've heard, the Birds of Prey -- ooh, I hate the pun, but it's right there-- preyed on criminals. Those who take advantage of the weak and all that jazz. I've experienced their... service if you will; when my delivery trucks were hijacked by some supposedly-metahuman group. They stopped the hijacking and arrested the group. They even found out that the group had an inside man right here." he elaborated.

The case was widely publicized, after all, when three trucks in succession that contained generic medications to be delivered to Gotham General and several free clinics were hijacked. The short version was the Birds of Prey stopped the hijacking as it was happening, then the glorious GCPD arrested those men, and they also discovered the inside man within Drake Industries - one of the Directors who had planned to jump ship while sinking DI along with it.

In reality, it had been Tim's work. The Birds - Dinah and Helena - helped with physically stopping the hijacking; while Tim dug out the paperwork and discovered the traitor. Barbara had then sent the evidence to the police, along with video footage of the man talking to a competitor of the company.

"Oh yeah, I've heard of the case. So you don't think they're bad people?"

Tim slow-shrug, just for the sake of dramatization. "I won't say they're totally good people - I mean, them hijackers looked like they've gone 12 rounds with Ted Grant the boxer. And they supposedly have like, superpowers or something. But I'm not gonna say they're bad people - they knew exactly where those shipments were going and who'd be using them, and they worked hard to stop the hijacking, you know. Financially speaking, DI might be able to weather like, a dozen hijacking. But for those people who needed the meds..." he let the sentence trailed for Bruce to fill in the blanks. He knew that the man has the same metaphorical bleeding heart as Martha Wayne, his mother.

"Okay..." Bruce actually looked a little more alive after the explanation. "Do you know how to contact them? I need to ask them for help."

"Oh, wow... Heh. It's not like I have them on my speed-dial... I think they maybe have an inside man in GCPD? They showed up right after I made the report of the third hijacking." Tim hedged, internally cursing himself for not finishing his project of the Birdcall app. The cellphone app would have made it easier for anyone to call the Birds or to alert the Birds of crimes. Alas, the whole issue with Jason and Damian's appearance has delayed its development. Tim made a mental note to assign Harper on it.

Bruce looked disappointed. "I see... then I will need you to relay this to the GCPD for me, Tim, can I trust you? I mean, it's... crucial," he said.

"What is this about, the kid and his guards?" Tim tested, just for kicks.

"Oh, no. The kid... Damian and his guards were actually a kind of reprieve in the household. They made sure that everything would be... proper and in order." Bruce smiled thinly. "It's about Bane. I have evidence that he has murdered a lot of people."

"Oh my," Tim gasped earnestly, really. Jason and Dick, and even Damian, have reported that aside from Bane's obvious animosity against them, he had tried nothing - yet. They were also the ones who told Tim that Bane has placed nanotech trackers on all three Waynes' clothing. Unfortunately, they were not able to actually snoop around - as there would always be one of the Waynes in the house.

Bruce handed him a small USB drive. "It's all here. Please, Tim. I mean, before this, I couldn't care less if that brute would leech all of the family's fortune. But now I have a son to think of... Talia might have made sure he's physically well-guarded. But Bane is a long-con kind of person and is really patient. He came to Gotham specifically for us after so many years. He..." he paused. "I believed my father when he told me that he had not betrayed my mother. But without a shred of physical evidence, there is nothing either of us can do. And how are you going to ask for a DNA sample from someone like Bane?"

"Spoon? Toothbrush? Hairbrush?"

"He's bald," Bruce replied dryly. "I'm not even sure he'd showered. Alfred said his bathroom has always remained tidy."

"Ew. No. Okay. Uh... I can't promise you that any bird would come your way, but I'll figure out a way to let this fall to the right hands, yeah?" Tim replied, putting the USB drive into his suit jacket - where Barbara could remotely access it through the circuitry in said pocket.

"Okay," Bruce looked relieved. "And now, since Bane is tracking me and I'm sure he knows what this building is, how about we come up with a stupid cover story?"

A proposal landed in Tim's sight just as Bruce finished talking. He grinned mischievously. "How about we collaborate to expand Leslie Thompkins' Free Clinic? Everybody's happy, and neither of us won't lose sleep over it."

"You'd have made a great corporate spy, do you know that?" Bruce grinned back, looking a thousand times happier than when he walked in.

"Oh yeah, but I already have my own ways to get secrets," Tim winked as he handed the proposal over. "Have a look at this, and let me know what you think. I think we can spend the discussion over lunch. Would Alfred mind if we ask him to acquire our lunches?"

"I'm sure he would be delighted if he hasn't already..." Bruce replied, getting up and opened the door. Alfred stood there with several paper bags in his hands. "He has already, it seemed," Bruce reported.

"Indeed, sirs. It is most rude to visit an associate without bringing anything. I daresay a quick lunch is sufficient for you, Master Timothy?" Alfred replied as he entered and set up the contents of the bags - several types of sandwiches and salad mixes.

"Oooh, more than sufficient, thank you, Alfred!"

"Not a problem, Sir. Please indulge, gentlemen." Alfred smiled. "Might I remind you, Master Bruce, that the Doctor and Mrs. Wayne shall return in two hours? It would be prudent to conclude your discussion by then." he hinted.

"Definitely, Alfred. We're just talking about what needs to be done to expand a hospital." Bruce grinned triumphantly at him, showing him the proposal. "Mother would be delighted at this."

[fun-family]

These feminist films of 2020 are actually the most disempowering.

After I watched the film “Promising Young Woman” I spent days in an internal tangent over what I did not like about the film. I realized that this internal tangent was very similar to the one I’d had after watching “Wonder Woman 1984″. I’ve concluded that it’s because both of these films were marketed as feminist films centering on powerful female protagonists and neither delivered.

(SPOILERS & LONG REVIEW AHEAD)

First, let’s look at Wonder Woman 1984. In the first film, Diana was curious, naive, and playful. We watched her learn about the world. We felt her heartbreak when people weren’t as good as she believed them to be. We saw her eyes opened a little bit more. 

While the sequel may have taken place decades later, there seemed to be nothing of Diana left. The 1980′s were an iconic time in America and Diana had little interaction with any of it. She was in a mall, okay, but her style was unchanged. Her home decor was bland. Her hobbies nonexistent. Why has Diana stopped engaging in the world?

The film seemed to want us to believe that Diana was stuck on Steve, that she had been pining (more like Chris Pining....sorry) over him for actual DECADES. He was the first man she’d ever been with and there’s nothing to suggest he isn’t the ONLY man. Diana is a GOD. She is an Amazonian princess. Why does she have to be a saint? If you’re going to make a female superhero virginal, at least give me a reason for it aside from “Her heart is broken.”

You know what would have been better? If another Amazon joined Diana in the city and she was the fish-out-of-water, not Steve. Diana could have shown her everything she loved about the 1980′s. We could have learned more about Diana’s life. Every other superhero gets to have a life outside of being a hero. This movie deprived Diana of that.

Now, let’s talk about Barbara Minerva (Kristen Wiig). Why is it that in film when a woman is becoming “more attractive” she loses her glasses and starts wearing heavy eyeliner? WHY? Give me a break. And the film wouldn’t even let us have Barbara as a true villain, she had to be “losing her soul”. Her evilness was out of her control. Why did Barbara have to be a victim? Why do women have to be the victim so often? Why are women only allowed to be strong if they have superhero strength in this universe? Barbara was deprived the chance to be a formidable opponent for Diana. Are we really so afraid to have two women battle in a film that we must turn one into a big cat? In the first film Diana didn’t want to save Ares, she wanted to kill him. If you don’t want Diana to kill a human, give her another God to kill. This sequel seemed to forget that Diana was once called the God Killer.

Finally, the elephant in the WW84 room is that Steve is in another man’s body, a man who is not conscious of what is happening and is not able to consent to what is done to said body. This isn’t okay, and if this was the movie “Promising Young Woman”, the character Cassie would give Diana a stern talking to and then walk away.

And yes, with that I am going to transition to “Promising Young Woman.”

The trailers for “Promising Young Woman” gave me the impression that, while the film was going to be a bit “on the nose” I was going to watch a bunch of shitty dudes get murdered. Or at the very least, I thought they would get a nice big tattoo like Lisbeth gave her rapist guardian in “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.”

I imagine the suggested violence and then the lack of it was intentional. The character Cassie almost never breaks the law. She is always in the “right”. The men are in the wrong and we live in a culture that has allowed men to sexually  assault women without consequence. That message was loud and clear.

But in this film the assaulters still don’t have any consequences. Are we supposed to believe that Cassie’s intimidation is making a difference and that her death makes a difference? It seems likely the men she confronted will keep assaulting women and just find ways to make sure their date is truly unconscious. The men who were arrested at the end would probably get away with it because they’re rich, white, and, if none of them confess, it would be hard to prove which person in the group killed her.

The biggest question the film left me asking was: Why do women always have to sacrifice themselves for men?

Aside from that very big issue, I also felt the character of Cassie was all style and no substance. Her outfits, her environments were so manicured. Her final outfit felt designed specifically to become a Halloween costume; the nurse costume and the wig are probably coming to a Spirit Halloween near you. It’s like they portrayed this very real problem in our society in a very unrealistic way.

I know everyone is raving about Carey Mulligan’s performance, but she’s played far more dynamic characters in her career. For example her roles in “Wildlife”, “Mudbound”, “Shame”, and “Never Let Me Go”.

I suppose this role was more subtle, but I got the sense that Cassie was supposed to be a stereotypical Manic Pixie Dream Girl. And I understand that what happened to Cassie’s friend and the response by the school and the authorities has left her traumatized, depressed, and apathetic. But I find it hard to see how the men didn’t win in this film. Cassie lost her best friend, she lost her education and her career, she lost her social ties, and then she lost her life. Maybe I’m missing the moral of this story, or maybe I just don’t like it.

The final point I want to discuss with “Promising Young Woman” is one that bothers me in society in general. There are multiple points in the film when we’re told how smart Nina was, how she was the top of her class, and how they both would have been amazing doctors. And I actually yelled at my TV, “It shouldn’t matter how smart Nina was!” Even if she was failing her classes she didn’t deserve to be sexually assaulted. It’s a societal problem that we need victims of abuse to be promising in order to care that they were abused.

And if the character of Cassie is trying to be a defender of women, a martyr of sorts, why is she so dismissive of the teenage girl in the coffee shop? Her character sets out to punish men and in turn protect women from being assaulted, and yet she treats a teenage girl like garbage, like she doesn’t matter. I guess in this universe you only deserve respect if you’re a smart, successful female, not a teenage girl who dares to ask the barista for another coffee.

The protagonists of “Promising Young Woman” and “Wonder Woman 1984″ exemplify the very things they’re supposed to be fighting against and maybe that would work if it seemed at all intentional. Both of these films marketed themselves as the feminist films of 2020, but ultimately diminished the strength of the very female protagonists they had set out to empower.

There are far better films out there with strong female protagonists. Here are a few of my favorites: Winter’s Bone, Alien, Furie, First Wives Club, Okja, Mad Max: Fury Road, Girl’s Trip, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009), Mulan (1998), Sweetheart, Westward the Women, Waitress, Annihilation, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, A League of Their Own, Little Monsters (2019)

[wizardouxie]

Evil!Douxie au Team Mom solidarity between Morgana and Dr. Lake

YES, but I would also like to present this: They’re neighbors.

We know Jim doesn’t tell his mother about the whole ‘trolls exist’ affair to begin with. And he tried to keep this secret away until Toby figured it out. Now do you remember that scene where Jim and Toby are testing out Daylight on different things? The episode where Draal trains him? Morgana sees them from her backyard and is startled. That’s the trollhunter amulet. The one she and Merlin made.

How... how does a human child have it?

She doesn’t tell Merlin about it. For the first two seasons of Trollhunters she doesn’t. She can do this, she has 900 years of wisdom and Merlin would only interfere and try to hold her back.

Instead she reaches out to Dr. Lake more, becoming her friend. The mother is pleasantly surprised, and she welcomes the support. On days when she’s working a busy shift, she often sends a quick text to Morgana, asking her whether Jim’s doing okay while she’s gone. Morgana in this time learns to cover for Jim, especially when he’s running out of excuses. Toby finds it to be a convenient coincidence, but Jim? He’s suspicious.

Eventually he confronts her and she admits that she’s been aware of everything that he’s just now getting exposed to. He’s a little hurt that she didn’t tell him earlier, but Morgana assures him that everything she’s done up to this point was to protect and support him.

And she’s not wrong.

Some days Jim struggles to deal with his mom because she doesn’t understand what he’s going through the way Morgana does. Morgana knows this, so when Dr. Lake complains about Jim being difficult all of a sudden, she texts the boy and works things out with him. After that Jim comes down the stairs and voices his frustrations (without giving away his other life) and Dr. Lake is relieved to see her son open up to her. Morgana receives a text two hours later.

Barbara: I know you’ve got something to do with this. I swear it’s like you’re raising this kid with me! Thank you though :)

Other times Morgana is the one patching Jim. He jokes that she’s exactly like his mom, a doctor except magical. She smiles sadly. This was the least she could do since she couldn’t heal Guinevere or Hisirdoux. She scolds him for relying too much on himself. He has allies who can help but he refuses to let them. He groans and tells her that he’s got it handled. And it’s not like she doesn’t believe him. It’s just how long can he hold on for, yknow?

For school Morgana refuses to help him with homework, only because his handwriting is terrible and she simply cannot forge it. But she can help with girls. She notices that he has an eye for Claire, and encourages him to join the Romeo and Juliet play.

“Girls would find that quite romantic in this age,” she teased, enjoying the way Jim stuttered and tripped on his words. Cute. 

Morgana also repeatedly messes around with Strickler because she knows who he really is. Neither Jim nor Strickler know about each other yet and frankly Morgana doesn’t have the heart to tell them that the history teacher turned principal was a changeling and that the student was the trollhunter. She just knew it wouldn’t be long before they would figure it out, and when they did, Strickler would try to exploit Jim’s weakness: his mother.

So she makes up excuses to stop by Barbara’s house, much earlier than Strickler can make time for. And when he does finally arrive, he’s very displeased. Not that Morgana cares.

“I’m sorry but we’re having a lady’s discussion, so if you wouldn’t mind... come back another time?”

Except there usually is no other time and honestly Barbara thinks it’s funny because she’s starting to believe that Morgana is jealous of Strickler. And then it starts to get a little overbearing. She loves her friend, but she deserves to enjoy some freedom after work.

So when Morgana is shouting at Strickler for supposedly spiking their drinks, Barbara politely tells her friend to leave. Morgana is taken aback.

“But he, I saw --”

“I don’t want to hear what you have to say about my boyfriend, Morgana. I know you care but this.... this is too much. Please leave.”

And Morgana is nearly in tears as she watches her friend drink the poison through the window. How was she going to tell Jim about this?

Fast forward to Trollmarket, where Barbara and Strickler are clutching the side of their necks. Morgana is pushing her way in with Jim, demanding to see Vendel. Her heart is racing again; this would be the third person she’s lost to her own mistakes. She can’t let it happen again. She can’t.

Her faith is renewed when Claire throws the page in and wastes no time in preparations. She can save her friend.

Her heart broke upon hearing Barbara’s screams while she uttered the incantation with Vendel, but the satisfaction of Strickler experiencing more pain had somewhat mended it. He deserved every bit of hurt that he’s caused everyone.

Afterwards they head to the hospital. While Jim and his mother are alone in the room, Morgana is discussing with the nurses about the scenario she had made up on the spot. She signs the paper and places the pen on their clipboard.

By the time she enters to check on them, her friend is fast asleep. She looks at Jim expectantly.

“Did you tell her about everything?”

“I... I didn’t get the chance?”

“James Lake Junior!”

“I know I know, I made a promise to her! But please, she’s still recovering and I really don’t want to stress her out right now...”

Morgana sighed. He did have a fair point. Barbara was by nature a very expressive person and too much exertion would only worsen her health.

“You bring up a good point. Very well, but you must tell her soon,” she replied. Jim let out a sigh of relief. Morgana clasped his hands with hers, smiling.

“You’ve come so far, little champion. I’m proud of you. And I’m sure she is too.”

[hournites]

We’re living better than we did last night

Hournite Week 2021

 Day 5: First Date/First Kiss  ~.~ 

“Thanks for dropping me off,” Beth says again when Rick parks in the Whitmore-Dugan driveway. Her hands twist the leather strap of the purse in her lap. Rick leans back and cuts the engine completely. 

She feels pressure. Stupid pressure. 

Not from Rick. No, Rick is amazing. He drove her out of town that afternoon and they went on a walk by the lake. She tucked Chuck into her cute backpack purse for moral support, but didn’t want to impose her goggles on Rick on their date, so she never took him out--until Rick suggested she should. That was the moment Beth let go of her nerves and had fun at the lakeside. They collected rocks and shells together and analyzed their properties to have something to talk about. Then Rick rented a canoe to settle lazily on the water in the sun and relaxed. Beth packed lunch for the both of them and Rick got ice cream, then they took the leisurely drive home. 

It’s not Rick, making Beth shift in her seat under pressure. It’s the way she knows the date has come to an end, and doesn’t want Rick to go. 

“I know it’s a bit weird, not inviting you in but they wanted us to have a sleepover and I wish you could come but it would be weird, right?” She nods to herself and scrunches up her nose, just thinking about the lack of privacy they’d have if Rick joined Yolanda and Court for a living room late night session right after their date. It would be uncomfortable and awkward and Beth wouldn’t know what to do. 

“It’s okay.” Rick interrupts gently. “Court wants to gossip about me with you. I get it.” 

His gaze sweeps over her as she calms. “But I’ll see you tomorrow?” 

“Yes,” she promises. She flattens out her hands to stop fidgeting and raises her head. Her heart pounds and she swallows hard in the silence when neither of them move. 

“Do you--”

“If you’d like--” 

She titterrs, blushing at the way they spoke over each other. 

Rick’s smile grows a little wan. “You go first.” 

 “Alright.” She lets out her shaky breath. Here it goes. “Do you want to kiss?” 

“Oh!” He genuinely looks surprised. 

Beth backpedals. “I mean we don’t have to, if you’re not comfortable. Or don’t want to.” She bites her lip and glances aside, mortified. “I’m sorry. I just…” She peeks at him again. “I want to, if you do. I’m just...shy.” 

“You?” he says. “Shy?” 

“About this, yes,” Beth whispers honestly. “What were you going to say?” 

“I was going to say…” Rick inches closer. “That nobody makes me feel the way you do.”

Beth grins. “That wasn’t what you were going to say!” 

He raises his hands. “Yes, it was! I was going to say, if you’d like, we could be officially together?” 

Beth springs forward in her seat, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Yes!” 

His shoulders sag underneath her and that soothes her heart. He’s also nervous, but he shouldn’t be. She’s known this was coming for a long time. It just doesn’t make it any less scary. When she pulls back, it’s not very far. Just enough to see his nose and moving eyes as they dart back and forth, watching her the same. 

Beth’s phone rings in her purse. She doesn’t need to look at it to know it’s Courtney. “Wanna bet she’s being pulled away by Yolanda from trying to spy?” 

“God, I hope not.” Rick cups her face with one hand, running his thumb just along the curve of her thick glasses to stroke her cheek. “They don’t need to see this.” 

Beth imagines kissing Rick so many times, it’s become second-nature. She’s pictured them on the couch in the Pit Stop, inches apart, drawing closer to each other like magnets. She envisioned Hourman interlocking her gloved-fingers with his and twirling her around in the last moments of his day’s boosted strength, sweeping Dr. Mid-Nite  off her feet. She hoped for a quiet moment before school in this very car, checking in her courage balance for a stolen peck on his lips. 

Rick’s the one that gasps when her mouth is on his. A wave of confidence ebbs through her every corner and smoothes her poise. She tilts her neck up to find a right angle and closes her eyes. His thumb presses down lightly on her face, returning everything she gives. Everything she’s ever imagined comes alive in the moment. She realizes there are no better dreams than this. The pressure melts away, Beth melts away. She feels his smile and initiates another kiss. 

When they finally part, she’s still lightheaded. The crisp night air hits her aching face as she reluctantly climbs out of Rick’s car. 

~.~ 

“Finally!” Courtney jumps on her the second the front door is closed. “How was it? Did you do it? You were in the car for a long time. Did he kiss you? He totally kissed you. You look like you’re not even here.”  

“Court! Don’t bombard her!” Barbara scolds from the kitchen. 

“Hi.” Beth takes her time walking in, still dazed and amazingly inarticulate. “Um. Can I put my bag down?” 

“So is he your boyfriend? Where did he take you? Are you in love yet?” Courtney dramatically flops over on the couch in the living room, bouncy hair flinging over the edge. “Please tell me you’re in love.” 

Yolanda pads over in her slippers and takes Beth’s bag. “You can change in the bathroom, we found your pyjamas from the last time you slept over.” 

Beth nods. Barbara calls for Courtney to help her with brownies in the oven. Court groans and gets up. “You’re telling us everything when I get back,” she warns.

Beth pulls her legs up on the armrest chair and grins into her knees. 

“You’re a bit googly-eyed there, B.” Yolanda smirks. “Doing okay?” 

“Mmhmm.” She looks up again when she gets pelted by a soft plasticky thing. 

“You might wanna take care of that before Courtney comes back and notices.” 

Yolanda uncrosses her arms over her black hoodie and points at the package of kleenex on the ground. 

Beth frowns at it, confused. “Hm?” 

“Your lip gloss is half smeared off.” 

“Oh.” Beth burns and takes the kleenex. “Thanks.”