Patience Tyme

Nerdy Teacher by Day. Nerdy Published Author and Fan Fic Writer by Night.

[patiencetakestyme]

The Betrothal in the Brothel, Chapter 4

At the top of the stairs, they stopped, building in yet another line of retreat:  another circle of iron, another line of iron chains; they now had a clear track down the stairs to the safety of yet another iron circle of chains.  

They finished this task quickly and silently before turning to take in the look of the remainder of the room.  From what Lockwood could see, it had served as a combination of a bedroom and an office, not so dissimilar, he could not help thinking, with a barely repressed scoff, as the rest of the building:  a brothel was, after all, a place of work featuring almost solely nothing but beds.  In the far right-hand corner of the room, there was a four-poster bed, situated at an angle.  

Off to the left, pushed against the wall, was a vanity featuring an obscenely large mirror and a drastic number of spider-webs.  Instantly, Lockwood knew the Source was most likely hidden somewhere in the depths of that vanity.  

Across from it was what appeared to be Ms. Campbell’s desk; there were still papers littering the wooden surface, albeit crinkled and decaying, as they were.  At the center of the room was a high-backed, Victorian-era chair; it looked like its purpose was to be attractive, not comfortable.  It, too, featured spider-webs, but not nearly as many as the armoire.

The temperature here was noticeably colder than anywhere else in the house.  As soon as they claimed the landing, he felt the chill hit his skin in a way it hadn’t previously.  His eyes dried out, watering from the onslaught of the cold.  

Sharply, he recalled that he still had not put his goggles back in place after their interlude on the stairs.  Putting them back on, he saw nothing out of the ordinary, but something knew they were there:  he couldn’t feel it with clarity, like he would’ve at one time, but he just knew it was only a matter of time until the ghost revealed itself.

He chanced a glance at Lucy.  She, it seemed, was just as alert as he was.  Acutely, something changed:  something was coming, and he could feel it, in a more concrete way than he had been able to a moment prior.  He and Lucy closed ranks; they settled into their circle of chains and waited.  With a pulse he actually felt—albeit, not as strongly as he would’ve felt prior to losing his Talents—she appeared, sitting upon the chair as if it were her throne.  

With the goggles, he could make out the shape of ghosts.  He had become intimately familiar with the articles of clothing missing from the men on the floors to be found down below; he was certainly able to see at least that much.  But the details:  the eyes, the lips, the cheekbones, they could be quite difficult to differentiate.  He knew that this ghost was a woman, and that she had been fairly tall, with her hair pulled in a tight bun at the top of her head, but that was about all the details he could discern.   

Lockwood had never shared the Talent that Lucy had:  he had never been able to perceive the minute motivations of a ghost.  Quite frankly, he didn’t overly care. Their client for this particular case was interested in selling this property so that apartments could be built in its place, but building on previously haunted land was a risky endeavor; it needed to be fixed first.  As far as he was concerned, he was here to secure the Source, and nothing else mattered.  

Besides, given what they had seen thus far, he thought it was pretty easy to figure out the underlying motivations of this ghost:  any men that did not treat her employees well were disposed of.  

Feeling a bit reckless, he poked his foot outside the iron circle.  Sensing him, the ghost immediately stirred, sitting up and at attention.  

“Lockwood,” Lucy whispered, warningly.  “Be careful.  You might be rusty.”

“Me?  Rusty?” he scoffed.  “I take offense at that.  I still practice daily with the cheaper rapiers we keep in the basement, a fact that you are keenly aware of.”  She smiled but said nothing in return; he didn’t need her to:  he had caught her watching him practice on more than one occasion.    

As he moved to stand outside of the circle, the ghost took answering actions; she came to stand and took a floating step or two to approach him.  He could feel it instantly:  the ghost’s attempt at ghost-locking him.  He couldn’t hear her—he had never really been able to hear ghosts, even prior to losing his Talents—but he could feel her; she was trying to wiggle around in his brain, much like Le Belle Dame had done so many years ago.  

He suspected she was going through the motions she had exhibited while still living:  she was most likely, in Lockwood’s opinion, attempting to persuade him to partake in some of the activities once afforded by this brothel.  She approached him, and it was blurry—muddled around the edges—but he could’ve sworn he saw her quirk an inviting finger in his direction.  

While there were not many benefits to the fact that he had lost his Talent, this was one of them.  Yes, the average adult was more susceptible to ghost-lock:  unable to see ghosts, they did not have any indication as to when to make efforts to combat the control the ghost attempted to exhibit when it tried to lock them.  But armed with the goggles and his own experiences of fighting off ghost-lock, he found he was quite up to the task.  

“No, thanks,” he responded, with a shake of his head, a quirk of his eyebrow, and a withdrawal of his rapier.  “I think I’ll pass.”  With a flourish, he pushed closer towards her, baiting her with his rapier; he didn’t mount an offensive attack—not yet—but he put her in a position where she would fear it.  

His plan worked; she retreated, heading towards the vanity as she did so.  Lockwood fought back, pushing her away from the vanity and back towards the center of the room.

Lucy slipped behind him to approach the vanity.  If the ghost protected that area when pressed, it was highly likely that that was where the Source was concealed; this, combined with the immense number of spider-webs evident on the surface of the armoire, made for a convincing argument.  

No words needed to be exchanged to establish the plan; they had done this dance together many times before.  Lockwood went on the offensive, charging forward, his rapier positioned to slice through her ectoplasm.  Ideally, she would dissolve for a few minutes, allowing him to help Lucy with finding the Source.  

But Ms. Campbell proved to be a particularly tricky spirit.  He kept trying to corner her—to slice through her with his rapier—but she always evaded him at the very last second.  Alternatively, he now had no other choice but to chase her around the room, jabbing at her periodically and hoping for the best.  

“How’s it going over there, Luce?”

“Perfectly fine,” she answered, the irony dripping from her tone.  “But there’s an endless pile of shit packed in these drawers.  No way to tell which one is the Source.”

“Why not just cast a wide net?” he suggested, as he leapt over the bed and jabbed his rapier forward; yet again, he narrowly missed her.  

Lucy didn’t respond, but out of the corner of his eye, he could see that she had caught on to his meaning.  She extracted a silver net from one of the pockets on her belt and threw it over the entire armoire.  

Nothing happened.  Actually, that was not true; the ghost not only failed to disappear:  she charged.  It was Lockwood’s turn to just narrowly miss her strike, as he dodged out of the way at the last second.  

“Guess that’s not going to work, then,” he conceded, as he once again resumed his dance with Ms. Campbell around the room.  

“Nope.”  But Lucy had already cast off the silver net and settled back into the work at hand:  picking up individual items within the drawers to see if any prompted a particularly contemptuous reaction from the ghost.  

Lucy’s survey of the vanity was undeniably going to take several minutes.  While some agents that had lost their Talents may dread the position they were currently in—under attack, with minimal context as to what the Source could be or how to contain it—it perfectly suited Lockwood’s needs.  

He waited a few moments more, until he could be certain he had found and secured his rhythm in the conflict with Ms. Campbell.  Once he felt assured he had reclaimed his confidence in the fight—and that, therefore, it was safe to divide his attention—he sought out pursuing his other goal:  the goal that was far more important than defeating this ghost.  

“Lucy, I’ve been thinking—”

“Oh, marvelous,” Lucy responded, her tone leaving her meaning ambiguous.

“You found the Source?”  He hesitated, turning slightly to get a better view of what she was doing, but he was surprised to find her still rummaging through the contents of the armoire.  

“No, I just know you well enough to be concerned when you start with ‘I’ve been thinking.’”

He released a humorless laugh; he couldn’t help it—she wasn’t wrong.  “Would you like me to abstain from proceeding?” he asked, all the while sending another pointed jab Ms. Campbell’s way.  Yet again, she evaded it.  

“No, might as well,” she started, with a shrug Lockwood just caught out of the corner of his eyes.  “Not like we’re busy or anything, is it?”  

“Fair.  This is a cakewalk compared to Winkman—”

“Or Hell,” Lucy added.  

“Yes, again, fair.  Anyway,” he paused, drawing in a breath to quell his excitement.  “I think we should get married.”

There was a loud clatter.  Lockwood was not fazed; he cast a singular glance over his shoulder and spotted that Lucy had merely dropped an entire drawer of contents from the armoire.  Nothing overly unexpected there; he turned back, giving Ms. Campbell another jab or two as he awaited Lucy’s response.  

“You think we should get…” she trailed off, and out of the corner of his eye, he could see her shaking her head, as if she were very confused.  “What?”

“Married,” he repeated, not changing his tone or his disposition in the slightest:  he was nothing but his usual picture of calm confidence.  

“Why now?” she asked, and this, admittedly, did throw him for a loop.

“Do you mean why am I asking now,” he started, but paused as Ms. Campbell made another lunge for him.  Once that matter was taken care of, he resumed his course in the conversation.  “Or why do I think we should get married now?”  

“Both—neither—I don’t—ugh,” she stopped, fisting her hair in both hands.  “Lockwood, why are we having this conversation now?” she asked, with a nudge towards Ms. Campbell, just as she mounted another counterattack.  

Lockwood deflected it with ease.  “This is how we’ve lived our entire life together, isn’t it?” he asked, his smile stronger—more confident—than ever.  He threw in another shrug for good measure.  “There’s no better way to ask you to marry me, in my opinion.”  

“And…why now?” she asked.  Lockwood idly noticed that she had completely abandoned her search for the Source.  He couldn’t blame her; his attention was also definitively divided.  “We’ve been together…” she trailed off, and he was fairly certain she was attempting to do the math.  

“Fourteen years,” he supplied, kindly.  “We’ve been together for fourteen years.”

She nodded, signaling to him that, while she may have sought confirmation on that number, she had, at her core, remembered it.  

Ms. Campbell launched another attack.  Having had enough of the ghost—for the moment being, anyway—he stopped deflecting and sought to go on the offensive once more.  With an aggressive swipe of the rapier and, of course, a little added flair thrown in, he pierced her ectoplasm and sent her dissolving—for now, at least.  

Lucy had his full and undivided attention in a matter of moments; he turned to face her and started to approach her, his eyes trained on hers, his heart hammering in his chest in excitement.  Lockwood walked right up to her, grabbed her hands in his own, and allowed his full and unfiltered excitement and anxiety to reflect upon his face.  He didn’t often let people in, but when he did, it was often her, and it was often in moments such as this.  

“Honestly?” he asked, with yet another accompanying shrug; perhaps her favored method of expression was rubbing off on him after spending fourteen years together.  “I don’t know why I’m choosing to ask now.  I guess I just figured…” he trailed off, his smile coming back, albeit still slightly nervous.  “Why not now?  I don’t know why I’ve waited so long.  I suppose I always just sort of felt like we were already married, in standing if not in title,” he admitted, with a small laugh.  “But I know I don’t want to wait any longer.  I want the title too.”  

“Lockwood, titles aren’t really…” she trailed off, with a small shake of her head.  

“I know,” he started, with a nervous laugh.  “Titles aren’t really your thing,” he finished for her, nodding in understanding.  “Maybe that’s why I waited so long to ask.  Maybe I didn’t want to put you in that position.  I know what your childhood was like,” he conceded.  “I know why you’re hesitant about marriage.  But if you’ll let me,” he continued, taking another step to pull in close to her.  “I’d love a shot at changing your mind about that particular title.”  

Lockwood released an anxious breath; even he could hear how shaky it was upon release.  He kept his eyes glued to hers, even as hers wandered the room in thought.  

“Are you sure you know what you’re getting yourself into?” she asked, her eyes coming back to his.  He couldn’t believe what he saw there:  was he mistaken, or were there tears gathering in the corners of her eyes?  

He released another nervous laugh.  “Lucy,” he started, managing to find a way to step in just ever-so-slightly closer to her in the process.  “Did we not just establish that we’ve been together for fourteen years?  We’ve fought countless ghosts together.  We took down Marissa Fittes together.  We ended—well, at least reduced—the Problem together.  We’ve been to Hell together—twice.  

“I’ve seen you at your best and I’ve seen you at your worst,” he continued, with a slow, confident nod.  “It isn’t that you can’t do anything to surprise me at this point—you surprise me literally every single day—but certainly, there’s nothing you can do to scare me off at this point.  

“You are it for me, Lucy,” he stated, echoing a statement he had issued to her many, many times before.  But just like every time he had said it before, it was of utmost importance that he say it in this moment, and say it again; he wanted to leave no room for doubt in his words.  “And if you say no—if you just want things to stay the way they are right now—I’ll gladly accept that.  I’m extremely happy just living my life with you.  I would be very satisfied living out the rest of our days, retired together.”

She scoffed, as her eyes ran to survey the room.  “Retired?”

“Well, we gave it a shot,” he conceded, his own smirk returning at the familiar shift in tone.  “It didn’t stick.  And,” he emphasized, pushing forward before she had a chance to question it further.  “If you want to give this a shot too, I’m ready,” he finished, with a resilient nod.  His smirk had faded; his sincerity had returned, as his eyes remained locked with hers.  

Suddenly, her eyes shifted, and he knew without one word exchanged that their company had returned.  With a flourish, he withdrew his rapier and entered the fray with Ms. Campbell once more.  

He could hear Lucy rummaging around in all the items she had dumped upon the floor.  Lockwood held the line, engaging Ms. Campbell in combat and reading her for any shifts in demeanor.  He just had to wait her out; something would eventually cause a reaction, and he would know, then, that they had found the Source.  

“I still don’t understand why we have to get married,” Lucy complained, even as she tossed a few antiques over her shoulder.  “What difference does it make?”

“None, I suppose,” Lockwood conceded.  

“Then why do it?”

“I want to,” he answered, with a shrug, even as he brushed off another attack from Ms. Campbell.  “Do you?” he asked, when he suddenly realized he had not actually thought to ask her that.  

She was silent for a while.  She maintained the pretense of shifting through shit from the armoire, but he knew it was more than just that.  Every second that passed, he knew she was mulling over his question.  He didn’t mind the delay; it meant that whatever answer he received would be well-considered and, more importantly, final.  

That didn’t mean his nerves weren’t with him.  The fight did not bother him; he had learned Ms. Campbell’s attack pattern by this point.  What worried him was the crushing of his soul that would result if Lucy said no.  

“I think I do, yeah,” she finally answered, and he nearly dropped his rapier; he only salvaged it at the very last second.  “And, honestly, that might be the part that scares me the most.”  

“Lucy,” he started, his tone straightforward and to the point.  Seeking another short reprieve, he threw a salt bomb at Ms. Campbell.  Her ectoplasm fizzled, but she did not fade; she merely struggled for a few seconds.  He used every one of those seconds to his benefit.  He swept over to Lucy in two long strides, scooping up her hands, complete with the ring that still lingered there as a result of her rummaging through the trash.  “Do you trust me?” 

She stared at him, but she didn’t hesitate for long.  “With my life.”

“I trust you, too.  I’d never willingly hurt you, and if you give me a shot at this, I promise to do everything in my power every single day to make sure it doesn’t turn out like your childhood did.”

Lucy did not speak—not at first.  Several seconds of silence ensued, and Lockwood counted every single one of them:  not only as a result of his anxiety, but as a method of ensuring he could guarantee that Ms. Campbell was still struggling with overcoming the salt bomb.  Just when he thought he might be getting close to running out of time, finally—finally—she spoke.  

“Ask me again,” she demanded.  

He didn’t hesitate.  “Lucy, will you marry me?”

“Yes,” she answered, her eyes locked on his.  

His smile erupted; he was genuinely unable to repress it.  “Let’s secure this Source and get the hell out of here.”

But glancing back at his old sparring partner, Ms. Campbell, he began to suspect they may have made more progress than they had given themselves credit for.  She was still struggling through her foibles with the salt bomb, which seemed out of place, given how avidly she had fought previously.  With a flourish, he turned, nabbing the ring from Lucy’s hand.  

“Think this is it?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she answered, sounding frustrated.  “In the old days, I would’ve been able to feel it from across the room.  But now…” she trailed off, with a groan.  

“I know,” he conceded.  “The goggles help, but they can’t do everything, can they?”  He glanced back over his shoulder at the delightfully screeching Ms. Campbell.  “Let’s give it a shot, shall we?”  

As if she had read his mind, Lucy had already started shifting; the ring was encased in silver netting before he had even finished the suggestion.  Sure enough, in a matter of seconds, Ms. Campbell had dissolved—this time with a finality that implied it was for good, or at least, for as long as the silver netting remained intact.  

They turned to face each other, and Lockwood could tell that Lucy feared a lapse into an awkward silence.  Nearly immediately, she asked, “what now?”

“What else?” he asked, holding his hand out for her to grasp; she accepted the invitation immediately.  “We go home—together.  And maybe,” he started, with a tisk of air released between his teeth as they started to disembark down the stairs.  “You can start working on a way to install these lenses in my glasses, so I don’t have to wear these dreadful things,” he finished, with a delicate prod to the goggles in question.

Begrudgingly, though, he could privately admit that he was grateful for the goggles.  Even now, their value was priceless; the first thing he noticed as they approached the landing for the third floor was that the men that had previously occupied this floor had now disappeared.  Perhaps, without the presence of their murderer, they were now free to move on.  

Lucy scoffed, bringing his attention back to the conversation.  “You’re lucky I love you just as you are, Lockwood.  You’re quite obsessed with your appearance, aren’t you?”

He shrugged, even as he removed his goggles and strapped them to his own work belt.  “You love me for it, as you’ve just confirmed.”  He paused his progress down the staircase, as a snarky idea occurred to him.  “I suppose I could be like George instead, if you would prefer?”  

“Ugh,” she scoffed, yet again.  “You know my answer.”  

“Yes,” he answered, unable to check his smile as he thought back on the answer she had already given him tonight.  “Yes, I think I just might.”  

A/N:  And that’s it!  I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this, and if you have enjoyed it, I’d very much appreciate it if you would consider checking out my series of young adult supernatural/fantasy novels!  You can find it here!  Thank you for any and all support!  

[patiencetakestyme]

The Betrothal in the Brothel, Chapter 3

A/N: This is a short one, but it's one of my favorites! One chapter to go after this!

Before they had even reached the house that had been a brothel, Lucy could feel it.  She may not be able to hear ghosts as well as she once had—and seeing them was next to impossible, especially considering she had never really been good at seeing them to begin with—but she still got that feeling of malaise, like an invisible weight pushing her down.  

As they made their way down the street, she didn’t need to ask him for the specific address; she could feel it coming a mile off.  They found themselves standing outside a tall Victorian with chipped red paint and an iron fence—perfect for keeping the ghosts in, she supposed, but the fact that she could still feel them, even through this iron fencing, did not bode well.  

“Lockwood,” she said, for what felt like the millionth time tonight.  To make sure she drew an adequate amount of his attention, she reached out, grabbing and holding onto his arm.  She shook her head, her eyes trained on the building.  “I don’t know about this.  I can feel them, even from here.”

He looked pale—paler than usual, that was.  He nodded, “I can, too, actually.  Should we give the goggles a try?”  Even as he asked, she could hear and see the displeasure coming from him.  She handed him his pair of goggles, and he held them at arm's length, through the clutch of two desperate fingers, almost as if he was afraid to have the goggles make too much contact with his skin.  

“Oh, come off of it.”  She laughed.  “If you’re worried about who’ll wear it best, know that you’ll always have my vote.”  

He glared at her, but he did seem slightly relieved at her sentiment; he shrugged, finally quieted, and pulled the goggles on.  

Lockwood turned back to face the building and gave a start.  This was, in and of itself, uncommon for Lockwood:  he was not one to start; he was really only one to finish the matter, and was never one to show his surprise, even if he felt it.  

Needless to say, it was enough to stir her into putting her own goggles on.  Instantly, she spotted what he was reacting to.  

She could see them, of course, but she wondered if he could see them even better than she could.  His Sight had always been better than hers, and she was unsure how these goggles impacted that.  Were they a tool of equality or equity?  Did they help her overcompensate for her lack of Sight to begin with?  Or would his Sight always be superior, even while wearing the goggles?  

She couldn’t be certain, but what she did know for sure was that there were a hell of a lot of ghosts in this house.  Nearly every window had at least one visible spirit, and several more could be seen lingering in the backgrounds of the rooms.  They were, from what Lucy could see from their position, all men.  

“They look…” he trailed off.

“Different,” she finished for him.  For, this was why she could not be certain just what she was seeing:  just how many she was seeing.  She could see them, but they were ill-defined, lacking definition in a way that sometimes left her uncertain whether it was one larger ghost or two merged together, merely sharing the same physical space.  

Still, she could see them, and that meant her efforts to recreate Fittes’s goggles had, at the very least, been somewhat successful.  

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Lockwood’s nod in agreement.  With a set of sighs released in unison, they took their first steps through the gate in the iron fencing and approached the front door.  

Upon entering the house, her internal defenses were immediately spiked.  There were men everywhere.  From the foyer, she could catch glimpses into nearly every room trailing off of the main hallway; there were four rooms, pitted around a grand spiraling staircase that led to the second floor, and every room had at least a handful of male ghosts in it.  

Quickly, they worked to secure their exit.  It had been years since they had built an iron line of retreat, but she found that she fell into it like she had never stopped.  She had never learned how to ride a bike, but she thought it was supposed to be like this:  you never really forgot how to do it.  

Their retreat was established, albeit not in the near-record time they had employed back in the golden days as Lockwood & Co., yet the men, each dressed in varying states of undress and duress, never bothered them.  Silently, they shrugged to each other, not wishing to verbally comment on the lack of attention they were receiving from their dead, male companions, and settled into yet more old habits.  

They ventured through the first floor of the house together, never leaving the eyeline of their partner.  They gathered data, and while the temperature was on the cooler side, it was honestly quite unexceptional, given the sheer mass of ghosts occupying the house.  

The stairs, however, saw a distinct drop in temperature:  three degrees to be exact.  They had explored the entire first floor without exchanging one word, but the countless glances passed between them did more than enough to convey their thoughts.  The same could be said when they came to stand at the base of the grand staircase.  Silently, they agreed they needed to head upstairs.  

As they set foot on the first step, though, there was a shift in their half-naked companions.  Like a mob, they swarmed.  They didn’t lash out; they made no effort to harm Lockwood and Lucy.  But they did build a blockade; the ghosts had encircled them, forming a circle around them and preventing their course up the stairs.  

Silently, Lockwood and Lucy shared another glance.  This was easy to fix; a mere swish of the rapier would clear the men out of their path.  That wasn’t what concerned Lucy; what concerned her was what the ghosts were trying to warn them off of:  what could reside on the upper floors of the house that they wished to protect Lucy and Lockwood from?  

With each floor, the average temperature lowered, although the average number of male ghosts never wavered, beyond a ghost or two difference.  As with the bottom floor, after touring the entirety of the second and third floors, Lucy and Lockwood found themselves encircled at the mouth of the stairs, trapped by a group of ghosts, the likes of which were equal parts maimed and naked.  

The ghosts got disturbingly close—Lucy saw things she was fairly confident she would spend the remainder of her life wishing she could find a way to unsee—but they remained unharmed; the ghosts issued their warning, and with a flick of a rapier, they were diffused.  

After circling the entirety of the third floor and defeating the foreboding circle of ghosts, and with only one floor to go, they stopped to debrief.  They pulled in close to each other, huddling together on the first step of the staircase.  When Lucy breathed, her breath plumed in a puff of air in front of her; it had grown very cold, as the two to five degrees difference of each floor started to add up.  

“One floor left,” she whispered, not even really knowing why she was doing so, even as she did so.  

“Only one room up there too, I’m predicting,” Lockwood answered.  Lucy nodded; his prediction made sense, as each floor had grown smaller and smaller, with at least a room or two fewer than the one below it.  With how narrow the third floor was, there could not be room for much more than a master bedroom up there.  

“I have a sinking feeling that I know the owner of that room, Lockwood.”

He was already nodding before she had even finished her sentence.  “Best to just rip off the band-aid, then, right?” he asked, with a nudge of his head up the last remaining set of stairs.  

Silently, she agreed, and they settled into building a secondary retreat at the base of the stairs.  They created an iron circle and ran iron chains down the length of the last set of stairs in the house.  

Having taken the precautionary steps needed to feel secure in their position of attack, Lucy started making her way back up the stairs, taking the first few preliminary steps up the staircase in anticipation of their approach.  But just as suddenly, his hand was grasping her own, interlinking their fingers.  She turned back, seeking to meet his eyes and find reassurance that it was, in fact, him holding her hand, and not a desperate, dead ghost that had come, long ago, to a brothel looking for a shag.  

It was, in fact, Lockwood.  Despite his sentiments on ripping off the band-aid, he seemed to be taking a second.  His eyes were locked on hers.  She could admit that she didn’t hesitate to take the opportunity to look at him either.  

Sure, the goggles were goofy—she was sure hers weren’t doing her any favors either.  But while his appearance had undeniably changed in the decade they had been together, underneath the goggles he was, at his core, the same charming and charismatic Lockwood.  

His hair had long since become peppered with gray, a byproduct of their frequent trips to the Other Side, undoubtedly, but he had a way of making the salt and pepper look far sexier than she would’ve thought possible.  Beneath the goggles resided the plastic frames he managed to make look so incredibly sexy and charming and effortless—just like he did with everything.  She dug deeper, digging until she could find the warmth of his brown eyes.  That, of course, hadn’t changed a bit.  

“We’re going to be okay,” he promised, with a nod.  “I love you, Lucy.”  

She knew what he was doing.  Lockwood didn’t like to come off as anything other than confident, but he showed it—you just had to know when and where and how to look for it.  This was the moment:  the moment where he let her in, if only for a second.  He had said they were going to be okay, but he said it just as much for his benefit as he did for hers.  

She swooped in, unable to resist.  She brought a hand up, attempting to weave her fingers through his hair, but the strap of his goggles slowed her progress.  Lockwood, rarely one to hesitate, saw to finding a solution; with a quick tug, his goggles were discarded, dropped to the ground without a care in the world.

“You should keep your goggles on,” she warned.  “Plus, I worked hard on those.  Don’t just drop them.  What are you planning to do if they break?”

He shrugged, casual as ever.  “You’ve still got yours.  You’ll keep me safe.”    

With his casual comment, all concerns ceased.  He picked up the mantle, resuming their previous progress and bringing their lips to meet.  Her goggles remained in place, and could’ve been somewhat cumbersome had her placement two or three steps ahead of him not accounted for the difference in their heights; they were on equal footing, and she took full advantage of it.  Her other hand ran up his arm, and she used the hold to pull him in closer.  His arms, alternatively, dropped to hug her around the waist, pulling her in to be flush with his chest.  

As she ran out of breath and sought to pull away, he gave her the room to do so, but only in the slightest way possible; his arms remained around her waist, and his forehead fell to cradle against hers.  

“This isn’t as a result of all these randy men around here, is it?” he asked suddenly, slightly out of breath as he did so.  There was an irony to his tone, but the evasiveness of his eyes, which were still closed, told her that there was a sincerity to the question:  an insecurity he feared voicing.  

“Lockwood, do you mean to imply that, by wandering through three floors of a brothel and seeing a bunch of randy, old men with various bits of clothing missing,” she paused, to visibly cringe, “and various…body parts missing,” she paused again, to visibly cringe again, “I have somehow become randy, myself?”

“I think it’s a fair question,” he stated.  The irony was back again—and strong; he knew he was being ridiculous—but so was the sincerity.  

She thought on his question for a second, her eyes rolling to look at the ceiling as she got lost in thought.  With a pursing of her lips, she nodded.  “Yes, it is as a result of all these randy men around here,” she conceded, and she’ll admit that she took joy in the impact her words had on him:  the already extremely pale boy grew paler—although, admittedly, he wasn’t really a boy anymore—as he looked as though he could physically throw up.  

She laughed, but she cut it off short; no reason to prolong his misery.  “These guys are disgusting—revolting,” she continued, casting a glance to one in the corner that was dressed in nothing but a ridiculous set of boxers featuring little hearts, if her Sight through her goggles could be trusted.  “You wouldn’t have been caught dead in a place like this, even before we got together…” she trailed off, thinking through her choice in wording.  “No pun intended, of course.”  She shrugged.  “You just aren’t that type of guy, and I love you for that.”  

“You’re evil, you know that?” he asked, his easy, charming smile returning.  He started nestling into her neck, like he was about to make a home for himself there, but she cut that off at its knees; taking a step back, she shook her head.  

“We have to face her eventually, you know?” she started.  He sighed, looking less than thrilled at the prospect.  “What’s wrong?” she asked, casting the question over her shoulder as she once again turned to resume their journey up the stairs; his hesitation had her hesitating in return.  “I thought you’d been waiting forever for this—to get back out in the field?”  

“Perhaps,” he started, as, with a swipe, he reached down to scoop up his goggles.  “But now I find I have other things on my mind.”

Unable to help herself, Lucy blushed.  Still, it was gone in a flash; it was too damn cold, and in no time whatsoever, her breath was back to creating little clouds in the space in front of her.  

[patiencetakestyme]

The Betrothal in the Brothel, Chapter 2

A/N: Another day, another chapter! I hope you enjoy it!

This was, of course, how George had been left ignorant:  not knowing that he had lost his Talent.  Occasionally, he would engage in freelance work:  researching for a nearby, independent agency, helping them with the legwork required to know what they were getting themselves into on a case.  No one at Portland Row took issue with this, as it didn’t require anyone to step foot inside a haunted house, and it allowed George an outlet for his curiosity that was relatively safe, so it was beneficial for everyone involved.  

One evening, though, he had lingered too late at the archives; he had lost track of time, and before he knew it, he was caught out after curfew.  He was still young enough to appear as though he could have Talent, so there was no danger of getting in trouble with any official, but there were still plenty of other problems in London at night.  The story he told to Lockwood and Lucy in the time after they had found him was proof of one such problem.

He had been careless, in Lockwood’s opinion.  He had walked far too close to a graveyard.  When he sensed a ghost and couldn’t see it, he knew he was in trouble.  He attempted to use his most steadfast Talent:  touch; reaching out to grip a nearby mausoleum, he looked for any signs of the impending danger and tried to spark his Talents into working.  

Nothing came to him; he could see nothing.   He froze, instantly unsure of what to do.   

Thankfully, for George, while Lockwood may have long ago lost his Talent for seeing ghosts, he had not, ultimately, lost his abilities as a leader.  He had been watching the clock, knowing that George had a proclivity for staying too late at the archives.  Lockwood and Lucy had sat in the living room, waiting, twitchy as could be, barely even uttering a syllable to each other.  

Lockwood was anxious about going out after curfew.  He’d never admit it, not even to Lucy, but if it was what needed to be done to save George, he had no doubts:  he was going to do it; he would bring George home.  

When curfew came and went, he locked eyes with Lucy.  Words were not necessary, as they both arose from their seats and approached the door, but a holding of hands was:  at the last second before they reached the door, Lockwood reached in, grabbing and maintaining a hold on her hand.  They maintained that position as they took to the streets of London in search of George.  

They were silent for the bulk of their walk to find George.  Even as they followed in the footsteps of the path he always took to the archives, an ominous air hung over them; they had almost lost George once, and they were not prepared to face that reality again.  

They heard him screaming long before they saw him.  Even when they heard him, they still remained silent; their eyes met, confirming the identity of the voice they were hearing, and off they went, running a mile a minute, leaping over tombstones, and pulling out their rapiers en route.  

Outside of a daily practice session in the basement, Lockwood hadn’t held his rapier since the day he and Lucy had agreed to retire.  He felt like an imposter, brandishing it in a legitimate combat situation; it was one thing to practice, but it was another thing entirely to hold it under the pretense of actually being useful with it.  But George needed him, so he set aside his ego, and rushed to his friend’s aide without further thought on the matter.  

They found him huddled in a corner, his back to a mausoleum, his voice screaming in panic, with nothing but a book held over his head as a method of protection.  Lockwood protected him, standing guard—uselessly—over him, while Lucy actually took on the burden of handling the ghost.  

He could do nothing but watch her take on the ghost—and admittedly, even that was becoming a struggle:  he had recently discovered that his regular, run of the mill, standard human vision was starting to deteriorate; he feared he would soon need actual, human, adult glasses, as mortifying as that prospect was—and while he could admit that he still loved seeing her handle herself in a fight, it also made him incredibly worried, to the point of nearly feeling physically sick.  If anything happened to her here, he’d never forgive himself.  

And then, there was, of course, the fact that he wished more than anything that he could fight by her side.  He missed those days more than he could express, and seeing her here, able to still carry on a fight without him…  It made him long for the days when they could do it together.  

Inevitably, as she always did, Lucy persevered; she defeated the ghost and turned to face Lockwood, who was already repositioning himself so that he could move to comfort George.  

George confirmed what Lockwood had already suspected:  he had not seen the ghost, had not had the slightest inclination that he was in danger, until he was, of course, already in it.  

George was the youngest of the three, so it surprised George immensely when he was the next to go.  But he had also been the one to use his Talents the least, choosing, instead, to rely upon his abilities as a researcher, so, perhaps, they were simply not as toned as his and Lucy’s had been.   

Whatever the reason, it didn’t really matter; George’s Talents, like Lockwood’s, we’re fading and fading fast.  Within less than a year, Lockwood’s Talent had drastically deteriorated, George’s had all but disappeared, and Lockwood was sporting a new look:  glasses with dark, square, plastic frames.  

Within less than a year, Lucy was the last one left standing.  

She was the oldest, and therefore, George had always speculated that she would lose her Talents first.  But Lockwood had privately questioned this theory frequently, given just how immensely strong her Talents had always proven to be.  She was the strongest of all of them, of that he was certain, and her Talents proved equally as resilient in the pull to fade.  

George’s Talents faded fast; from that night by the mausoleum until George couldn’t even sense ghosts anymore, it was a meager month.  For Lockwood, the same course of action took two years.  For Lucy, it took more than three years for her Talent to be rendered relatively incapacitated.  

Even so, though, she still had the strongest lingering sense of Talent; every once in a while, she would glance out the window of Portland Row and claim that she was fairly certain the ghost of the man carrying the dead body of his wife was making his usual run down the street; she couldn’t see him or hear him, but she could feel him.  

By the time Lucy had fully lost her Talents—or, at least, in as much as it seemed she was going to—they were all distinctly approaching their 30s.  Without a steady stream of income via cases, they had been forced to seek alternative employment; there were, after all, still bills to be paid, primarily the mortgage.  

For help in this matter, they sought out an old friend:  Holly Munro.  She was excellent at organizing; Lockwood knew that first-hand, given how well she had kept their caseload organized throughout the years.  If anyone would have just the right connections to get the three of them where they belonged, he was convinced it would be her.  

He was not wrong.  In another year, all three of them had settled into fairly stable jobs, which made each of them relatively happy, within reason.  Nothing would ever be as fulfilling as hunting down and securing Sources, but they could find other ways to help.  

Lockwood secured a position as a teacher.  He refused to serve as an adult supervisor, even though he knew he had the leadership qualities necessary for the job.  Under no circumstances would he willingly send youth operatives into a haunted house while he waited safely outside.  

With this option rendered non-negotiable, his choices were limited.  But just when he started to worry that there might not be anything out there for him that could be as fulfilling as personally hunting down ghosts, Holly came through; she secured him a position as a teacher at a local trade school, where they taught necessary skills in a post-Problem world:  combat, securing of Sources, and, most fortuitously, fencing.  

Lockwood was put on their payroll, teaching any and all classes he could.  Typically, his students consisted of desperate night-watch kids:  wild of eye, desperate of air, and enthusiastic to boot.  Armed often with nothing more than the iron-tipped spear they were provided at the start of their employment, his students were typically rough around the edges, but if one dug deep enough, they usually had a big heart at their center.  Frequently, they were merely seeking additional training to help their prospects of staying alive on the job, as quite often, night-watch kids weren’t given much training when they started.

He had experienced working with night-watch kids before, of course, as Lockwood & Co. had often stumbled into a witnessing night-watch kid on cases in the past.  But this was different.  His position as their teacher allowed him to truly get to know these kids.  Over the years, he followed the careers of his students.  Continually, his pupils would pop up repeatedly in his classes, claiming to need a refresher of his previous lessons.  

For some of these students, he was lucky:  he got to watch them grow up, serving their time until they, too, lost their Talents.  Some others were not so lucky; he knew what it meant when an avid pupil disappeared and never returned:  they had met an ill fate, and he mourned every single last one.  

Emotionally, it could be a painful job, but it was full of purpose too.  He rejoiced in the successes of his students—those he got to see grow to become retired adults.  Those he lost, he grieved, knowing that, at the very least, with a reigning in of the Problem, it was likely they had managed to pass through the Other Side to the afterlife, whatever that might entail.  

George’s post-retirement career was quite simple:  he merely continued serving as a freelancer, working as a researcher whenever agencies did not have the time, resources, or fucks to give to research their own cases.  Lockwood found, through George’s work, that independent agencies were appallingly lazy; they often sought his services, and, ultimately, George became the primary earner of Portland Row.  

Then, there was Lucy.  Holly had quite the troublesome time placing her in a job, a fact that Lockwood privately smiled at every time he recalled it.  His Lucy—she was not one to settle down, and she was not one to be told what to do:  two characteristics that are not typically conducive to any form of stable employment.  

Had she had the patience for it, she would’ve perhaps made an excellent researcher, like George; she would’ve been able to control her own pace and the cases she took on.  But truthfully, she simply did not care enough about the history behind the cases to have the patience to see the job through to the end.  When she had been able to hear the ghosts, it had been easy for her to resonate with them; without this connection, she found that she grew easily bored with the task of researching any ghosts at hand.  

Holly tried several paths for Lucy before she found one that stuck.  She tried her hand at making rapiers at Fairfax Iron, constructing silver-glass jars at the Sunrise Corporation, and composing the trick devices afforded by Rotwell’s.  She even composed a journal of their adventures at the request of DEPRAC; Lucy had written the content, and Lockwood had seen to the editing.  Her chronicles now resided in an Anthony Lockwood wing at the archives, and while they had been paid for their efforts, eventually, the work dried up; there were only so many old stories to rehash, and, at the end of the day, there was still a mortgage to pay.

All of these jobs, except the opportunity to tell their story, ended the same way:  a pushy or abrasive comment from a boss, a responding biting comment from Lucy, and the boss, quickly and swiftly, firing Lucy.  As a final nail in the coffin, Lucy often marched out of the building, in a huff, throwing curses at everyone she saw.  

Holly approached Lockwood with every firing, expressing concern at Lucy’s inability to hold down a job.  But there were no complaints from Lockwood; he knew Lucy, and he knew her well:  with every story—with every retelling of some horrid comment from a boss—Lockwood was always on Lucy’s side.  He loved her, and her behavior not only didn’t surprise him—it impressed him.  

Besides, much as he had been when they had worked together as Lockwood & Co., he was never one to overly concern himself with money.  The bills would get paid; he was certain of it.  Lockwood and George brought in enough money to carry them until Lucy found something that left her feeling fulfilled.  

Finally, she found her calling:  at Fittes house, of all places.  She settled into work at a lab there, dissecting the horrific inventions produced by the Orpheus Society; specifically, she sought to figure out how the goggles worn by Kipps worked.  And given where she worked, and how the previous owner had treated her—had nearly killed her—she was given free reign and a wide berth.  

It was perfect:  intellectually stimulating, yet not beyond Lucy’s means.  And as an added bonus, she often brought her work home—illegally, of course, but when the previous proprietor had nearly killed you, you tended to get a lot of leeway.  

Lucy and George continued her work at all hours of the night, poking and prodding the goggles, trying to figure out what made them tick.  But that was not what was of interest to Lockwood.  No, what interested him about Lucy’s work was his ability to serve as a test subject.  

She was attempting to recreate the goggles, which would, in turn, allow adults to see ghosts.  Instead of hoarding such an invention, as the Orpheus Society had done, the new Fittes agency wanted to mass produce the goggles, allowing adults to feel safe at night for the first time in decades.  

Lockwood, still a reckless daredevil at heart, was Lucy’s first volunteer.  Lucy, of course, was her own second volunteer.  

After nearly seven years off the battlefield that was the streets of London, Lockwood and Lucy found themselves on a simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar expedition:  a night out hunting a ghost.  

Holly had found them the case, naturally; she always knew just who to call.  Lockwood reached out to Holly, saying they were in need of a case; she didn’t ask why—she had learned better than to do that, at this point.  Within a matter of twenty-four hours, she had returned his call, with a case on the hook.  

George completed the necessary research.  It was, on paper, no different than any of the research he completed for his clients.  But there was a renewed bounce in his step; there was something different about this case, and everyone knew what it was.  With only two pairs of goggles ready for testing, he would not be attending the actual hunt, but still, researching for the benefit of Lockwood and Lucy hit differently than when it was done for a random agency, and they all felt it.    

Lockwood readied the supplies.  He pulled his rapier out of storage—the good one—and removed the layer of dust that had adhered itself to the iron.  He gripped it, weaving his long fingers through the intricate vining of the hilt.  It felt like a part of his arm that had been missing for oh-so long had finally returned to him.  

Lucy completed her preparations with the goggles.  When Lockwood found her, hunched over her old desk in the basement, she was still tinkering with the object at hand.  

He approached her, swiping the second pair of goggles off her desk from where they sat beside the pair she was currently working on.  He had abstained from speaking thus far, for fear of scaring her, but she didn’t even startle; she must’ve heard him approaching.  With a barely checked smile, he realized they had perhaps been together too long for him to have a chance in hell at surprising her at this point.  The chance of that felt like a challenge:  a theory waiting to be tested; it had always been a goal of his, after all:  to keep her on her toes within their relationship.  

But taking in the sight of the goggles, he found himself admittedly distracted.  He picked them up, turning them over in his hand.  “I’m going to look like Kipps in these, aren’t I?” he asked, disdain dripping from his words.  

“What does it matter what you look like,” she started, not taking her eyes off of the goggles in her hands.  “As long as it keeps you alive?”

“Please,” he scoffed.  “You know me better than that by now, I hope.”  

She spared a glance for him, but only just briefly.  “Of course,” she responded, the irony practically leaching from her words.  “How could I be so silly?  After all, you’re still not over the loss of that coat from all those years ago—”

“It was a beloved coat,” he argued.  

“That was sacrificed to save Kipps’ life.”  

He hesitated.  “Fair counterpoint.  But it was important to me.”

“You’ve replaced it!” she screeched, her eyes parting from her work, this time with a stronger sense of permanence.  She stood, and he couldn’t help smiling; he had been hoping to distract her from her work.  “You’ve now worn this one for…” she trailed off, evidently doing some math.  “However long it’s been since the last one died.  Ten?  Twelve years?  You have to have owned this one for even longer than the original by now.”

“That doesn’t matter,” he responded, doing his best to check his smile at the attention she was paying to him and keep his grumpy frown in place; to smile would not fit the tone of the bantering match.  “The other one was precious to me.  My mother—”

“Bought it for you, yes, I know,” she cut him off, and had he not known her so well, he would’ve been hurt at her lack of sensitivity.  But as they had had this very argument several times before, he knew she had no malintent.  “But at least this one doesn’t have those big scratches from Mrs. Barrett’s tomb.”  

“Oh, but it has its own fair share of damage, does it not?  What about the burn marks from the ectoplasm of the Chiswick Changer?”  he asked, turning to indicate the burn marks that were still scorched into the material at his left shoulder blade.  

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, if you’re that upset about it, replace it.  We have the money,” she suggested, with a shrug of her shoulders, as she turned back to the pairs of goggles, scooping up the remaining set.  

Now, he truly put on the air of indignance.  “But it has sentimental value,” he pouted, but he could only hold it for a meager few seconds.  “That was fun,” he stated, dropping the facade.  

“For you,” Lucy answered, not even looking at him, as she released a heavy sigh.  “I was trying to work here, you know, Lockwood?  Our lives depend on me getting this right.”  

“We’ll be fine,” he answered, with a shrug, taking a step to approach her.  He placed the goggles back on her desk and put his hands to better use; looping his long arms around her waist, he turned her to face him.  “We’ll have each other.  When has anything ever gone wrong when we fight side by side?”

She scoffed and added a roll of her eyes for good measure.  

“Okay,” he interrupted, cutting over her before she could protest.  “Yes, you’re right, there have been lots of times we almost died,” he conceded.  “But we’ve never actually died!” he added, his smile returning.  

“That’s debatable,” Lucy answered, lowering her hands so that they could weave over his arms to cup her hips; one hand managed the task while still holding her pair of the goggles.  “We’ve been to Hell, Lockwood.  Twice.”  

“But we didn’t die—not technically,” he leaned in, with a confident quirk of his eyebrows.  “In fact, I think that’s an argument for my point:  we made it to Hell and back twice without dying.  If we can survive that, we can certainly survive a fight in a haunted house.”

“This man was a murderer, Lockwood—a serial killer.”

“We’ve survived attacks from murderers before.  Fairfax—”

“Killed one person,” Lucy denounced.

“Oh, come on!” Lockwood disagreed, with a scrunching of his nose.  “You know he was part of the Orpheus Society.  He may have physically only strangled Annabel, but that isn’t the only time his hands got dirty.  He helped the Problem carry on for a long time, encouraging it to continue so that he could make a profit by selling iron.  You don’t think he holds some of the responsibility for the countless agents that have died on the job?”

“Okay, fine—”

“Not to mention,” Lockwood interrupted.  He was in fine form now; he knew he had won his case.  “He nearly killed us, and we lived to tell that tale.”

“Just barely—his damn Red Room and Screaming Staircase almost killed us.”

“What’s that I heard?” he asked, leaning in, and pointedly directing his ear in her direction.  “Almost?”

Lucy sighed.  Her frustration at losing the argument was abundantly clear upon her face.  Lockwood was certain his elation at his victorious status was equally as abundantly clear on his own.  

“This man,” she started again, with another sigh.  With a swipe, she scooped up his goggles from where they sat on her desk, tying them through a loop at her belt, next to her own.  “What’s his name?”

“Her name,” Lockwood admonished, his smile broadening.  “I’m impressed, Luce.  You assumed the murderer was a man, not a woman.  My, how far you’ve come.”  

“Lockwood,” she started, engaging in some admonishing of her own.  “I don’t hate all women, you know.”

“I’m not so sure, Luce,” he answered, with a quirk of his own eyebrow.  “There was a time, standing in a department store, that I would’ve perhaps said otherwise.”

“That was at least ten years ago, Lockwood!” she screeched.  “I thought…” she trailed off, appearing flustered.

Lockwood, realizing belatedly that he had perhaps taken his teasing too far, shifted to grab her hands.  “I’m sorry,” he apologized, making sure to look her in the eyes.  “You have come far—so very far,” he reassured.  

And she had.  Even this bantering match—it would not have been just bantering, even merely four or five years prior.  In the time since Holly had come to work at Lockwood & Co., Lucy had been forced to come to the realization that she carried a bit of a chip on her shoulder when it came to interacting with other women.  

Lockwood had seen this in practice, of course, over the years:  especially when it came to her relationships with Flo and Holly.  Women, simply put, got under her skin in a way that men, by and large, did not.  George annoyed Lucy, certainly, but it never seemed to border on hatred, as it often had with Flo and Holly.  

Now, many years down the line, and after a visit to see Lucy’s family under his belt, he could say with confidence that a lot of Lucy’s internal struggles regarding women originated in how she had been treated as a child, particularly by the women in her life.  He had met her mother first-hand, and he could practically still taste the bitter contempt that had dripped from the words he had barked at her on that day:  the day they had met.  

He hated Lucy’s mother, and he knew that Lucy hated her too.  He could see how, growing up with a woman like that, it would be very hard for Lucy to disassociate her mother’s behavior towards her from the assumption that all women were destined to treat her that way.  

They had worked through it, as they did all things:  together.  Her relationship with Holly was better than it had ever been, and Lucy even sought Flo out on occasion, to buy her lunch or to offer her a chance to use their shower.  Their interactions were never without a disparaging comment at Flo or Holly’s appearance, but it was an improvement.  All in all, it was very endearing.  Lockwood liked seeing her foster these friendships; he thought it could do nothing but help her.  

He had not intended to discredit her progress with this bantering match, but he could see now that he had.  Lockwood leaned in, his fingers moving to brush the necklace that still hung around Lucy’s neck after all these years—the one his father had gifted to his mother, the one Lockwood had, in turn, given to Lucy, after they had defeated Marissa Fittes.  His hand shifted, moving to cup her neck; drawing her in close, they shared a short, chaste kiss.  “I won’t joke about it ever again.”

“That sounds boring,” she disclaimed, the smallest hints of a smile evident at the corners of her lips.  “Maybe just don’t be a dick about it next time.”

“I was not!”  His voice squeaked, but she did nothing but laugh in response.  

“So, this person’s name?” she asked, changing the subject as she extracted herself from his grip.  

“Annie Campbell, apparently,” he answered, distractedly; he had only partially listened when George had been explaining his findings earlier.  

“Another Annie?” Lucy startled, halting her efforts to make her final preparations to leave.  

“What do you mean?” Lockwood asked, with a questioning shake of his head.  

“Lockwood,” Lucy scoffed; he knew he was in for it now.  “Don’t you remember?  That’s what we used to call Annabel—”

“Ward,” he finished for her.  With a tisk, he released a breath of air through his clamped teeth.  “Yes, an unfortunate coincidence—nothing more,” he conceded, only to resume the argument once more.  “Certainly nothing to concern ourselves over,” he reassured.  

With another roll of her eyes, he gathered that she did not quite agree with him.  Knowing he wasn’t going to persuade her on the matter, he tried a different tactic:  “do you want the details or not?”

“Of course I do,” she answered, and, with a flourish, she snapped her rapier into place on her belt.  

“Well, Annie Campbell,” he started, only to hesitate.  Acutely, he realized he had not only failed to pay full attention to George’s summarization; he actually knew relatively little about the ghost they were attempting to hunt on this particular evening.  

Slyly, he slipped over to George’s desk, and, after a short fumbling of his fingers, he stumbled upon the notes for the case.   Stealthily, he moved to glance over them before placing them in an interior pocket of his coat, in the hopes that Lucy would not have noticed.  

Turning back to face Lucy, though, he realized his efforts were for nothing.  She stood, hands at her waist, a look of utter disapproval upon her face.  All he could do was smile sheepishly.  He extracted the notes; no reason to hide it now, after all.  

“Yes, Annie Campbell,” he started again, attempting to sound as if he suddenly recalled the facts of this case.  He did not; he proceeded to read directly from George’s notes.  “Victorian woman, ran a brothel.  Her…employees,” he hesitated, and he couldn’t help looking at Lucy with a quirk of his eyebrow.  She shook her head disapprovingly; he proceeded.  “Would often lure men in, and sometimes everything would go according to plan, but other times…” he trailed off, glancing one more time at the notes to verify.  “The men were never seen or heard from again.”  

“Great, so we’re looking at a cluster case,” Lucy suggested, turning her back to him as she did a last sweep of her own supplies.  

“Not necessarily,” he cautioned, taking a few steps to approach her.  Silently, he moved in, sweeping up several of her bags.  She picked up the remaining ones, and they started to make their way up the iron stairs to approach the kitchen and, ultimately, the front door.  

“Lockwood,” she started, with a humorless laugh.  “We’re going to the brothel:  the place all these men died.  There’s no way there’s just one hanging about.  And what about Campbell?  Where did she die?”

He shrugged.  “George doesn’t have any concrete details.  She just disappeared.”

“Okay,” Lucy started again, this time with a scoff.  “She clearly keeled over there and is now stewing in a pit, surrounded by the men she killed.”  

“Could you be a little clearer?  I’m not sure I gather your meaning,” he deadpanned as they exited through the front door, a blatant smirk upon his lips as they did so.  

“Lockwood,” she said, with a sigh.  She stopped walking and reached a hand out to clutch at his arm.  He turned to face her, all hints of humor gone; she so rarely reached out for him that he knew this had to be a matter of imperative importance.  Lucy hesitated before shrugging, as if in an attempt to physically cast off whatever was holding her back.  “I’m scared.  Not only have our Talents faded, but we’re not exactly fighting fit anymore, you know?”  

He nodded but took a reassuring step forward.  His hand came up, cradling her neck and drawing her in; it was an attempt to make sure she locked eyes with him, and it seemed to work.  “I refuse to let either of us die tonight, Lucy.  We will enter the building.  We will lay our traps, secure our line of retreat.  If at any time we feel the slightest bit nervous, we will leave.  Be honest—if at any time you are worried, just say the word, and we will go.”

She nodded and looked away, releasing a deep breath as she did so.  “You’re ready?” she asked, turning back to him with a renewed wave of confidence.

“Am I ever not?” he asked, his charm and confidence coming back in an instant.

It was a good thing, too; he would need every ounce of confidence and charm he had if he was going to carry out his plan.  He had a theory in need of testing:  could he find a way to surprise her, after over a decade of being together—a decade spent hunting ghosts together, a decade spent facing down common enemies together, a decade spent sharing kisses together, a decade spent sharing the same bed together.  

He had an idea:  something he had been wanting to do for a very long time, and it presented the perfect opportunity.  

He was going to propose to Lucy Carlyle.  Tonight.  

[patiencetakestyme]

The Betrothal in the Brothel, Chapter 1

A/N: I took the weekend off, but I'm back! This is my third fic in a series of three.  You can find the links to the other two in my profile, “What She Deserves,” and “A Fair Price to Pay.”  But you do not need to read the other two to read this one; it stands on its own.  

I saw a post theorizing what it would look like when Lucy, Lockwood, and George started to lose their Talents and were forced to retire.  Needless to say, it prompted a question that left me contemplating an answer.  This fic is my answer to that question, and it's my final happy ending for the Locklyle I have maintained throughout this series.  I hope you enjoy reading it!

Lockwood was the first to lose it.  His eyesight faded, eventually becoming so poor that he required yearly eye exams and glasses.  

Next was George.  He barely noticed it at first; towards the end of his days as an agent, he spent far more time in the archives than he spent in a haunted house.  

Last, surprisingly, was Lucy.  It was surprising, given that she was actually the oldest of the three; the difference in their ages was only a matter of a few months—so few that they could be counted on two hands—but, still, it felt noteworthy, especially to George and his curiosity, which, of course, knew no bounds.  

It took time—years, even, after the debacle at Fittes.  The Problem had, theoretically, been fixed.  The barriers in place on the Other Side had been removed, by none other than the agents at Lockwood & Co.  Lockwood had not trusted anyone else to do the job and do it well, and Barnes, in his desperate need for help, was not in a position to object or make a counteroffer.

Being uniquely and singularly qualified—as the only living agents to travel to the Other Side previously and live to tell the tale—they had finished the work and had been compensated nicely for their efforts.  Ghosts, for the most part, were now free to pass on to whatever awaited them after death.  

However, just as it had been prior to Marissa Fittes actively attempting to use the Other Side to prolong her life, sometimes, ghosts simply chose to remain behind; while there were far fewer ghosts plaguing London in the time after the Problem, it was still, in some ways, a problem.  

They continued serving as agents for as long as they could.  Lockwood was twenty-five when his Talent completely disappeared, several years older than Kipps had been when he had already completely lost his Talent.  Lockwood was never one to hesitate to remind them all of that.  Still, he only chose to issue this reminder once he actually started openly admitting to the fact that he was losing his Talent.  

He started noticing it around the time of his twenty-fourth birthday, but he kept quiet on the matter for quite some time.  At first, he told himself that he couldn’t be certain that he was losing his Talent—that that was truly what was happening—but, while he wanted to categorize this as a misunderstanding, he knew enough to call it what it was:  willful ignorance.  

His whole life had been built around being an agent.  He literally couldn’t remember a time prior to picking up a rapier.  

And worse yet, his relationship with Lucy had been, thus far, nearly completely defined by their status as agents.  They had always worked together:  fought together, protected each other.  What would happen when he was no longer able to carry his weight?  

He feared the impact it would have upon their relationship.  They had been together since the days that had followed the debacle involving Marissa Fittes—idly, an internal reminder went off in the back of his mind; their seven-year anniversary was approaching, and he needed to do something about it—but was that likely to change once she knew the truth:  once she knew he had lost his value to her as an agent?  

He dreaded telling her, but, ultimately, she reacted as he—well, not as he expected her to, but as he should’ve expected her to.  

One evening, upon returning home to Portland Row after a case, he decided the time was right to tell her.  The house was quiet; George, Holly, and Kipps were still out on an assignment, Kipps equipped with the goggles Lockwood himself would soon require to successfully carry out his duties.  

There had been a close call on this given night.  He had sensed a ghost—he could’ve sworn he had been able to feel it—but he couldn’t, for the life of him, see it.  He could sense when it moved, but he could not see the actual glow of the thing.  It was horrifying; it was as if he were seeing a movie on a several second delay, and he was constantly stuck a handful of frames behind the rest of the audience.  

Lucy had very nearly paid the price.  The ghost cornered her, and it was only through the directive actions of her trained eyes that he was able to position himself to make a counterattack.  

It was time to tell her, and he knew it.  There could be no more avoiding the matter.  

“Luce,” he called out to her as she exited the attached bathroom.  She had been sharing the master bedroom—his parents’ old room—with him for quite some time.  He could hardly remember a time, now, that she hadn’t called this room home.  Like every other evening they spent together, she emerged from the bathroom dressed in her pajamas and ready for bed.  

He was already tucked in, under the comforter, waiting for her to join him.  Already, from the tilt of her head and the quirk of her eyebrow, he got the sense that Lucy had questions.  It was uncommon for him to be in bed before she even got out of the bathroom, unless, of course, he was in a bit of an emotional state, which happened from time to time:  when he thought back on all the hardships they had faced, when he thought back on all the family members he had lost, when he thought back on their time spent on the Other Side.  Really, there were a plethora of options, when it came to their trauma.  Still, he wasn’t one to dwell, and, even if he was in such a state, he wasn’t one to show it often.

So, she probably knew to be concerned.  But did she suspect what he had to tell her?  It was hard to hazard a guess; Lucy could be a tough one to read.  

“Yeah?” she asked, pulling the covers back and crawling into bed so that they lay facing each other.  

His eyes trained on her face.  He loved her so very much.  The last thing he wanted to do in the world was disappoint her, and he feared he was about to do just that, but there was simply no other choice:  he was losing his Talent, and she deserved to know.  

“I’m sorry about tonight,” he started, knowing that apologies always helped ease the awkwardness of a situation.  “I…I wasn’t there for you when you needed me.”  

“What are you talking about?” she asked, her smile tugging at the corners of her lips.  “You came through when I needed you.”  

“That’s not—it wasn’t—” he stuttered:  yet another action that was unlike him.  He released a deep breath and attempted to start again.  “I’m losing my Talent, Lucy.  I couldn’t see the ghost—not fully.  It was barely a shadow to me, and I couldn’t follow its movements to save my life—or yours, apparently.”  

Even he could hear it:  the self-deprecating nature of his tone.  He hated himself in that moment, and in a way he only allowed himself to express in Lucy’s presence, he let the full-force of that dislike push through.  He trusted her in a way he didn’t trust anyone else; he allowed himself to be honest in front of her in a way he didn’t in front of anyone else.  

“I know,” she answered, her eyes not stirring from his.  She didn’t seem worried or judgmental or even angry that he had waited to tell her; she, honestly, just seemed as if she wanted to take some of the burden off of his shoulders.  “I’ve been waiting for you to tell me.”

“How long have you known?” he asked.  Abruptly, he moved to elevate his head so that he could see her better; he brought a hand up to cradle his head and used his elbow to prop it up.  

“Since…” she trailed off, her eyes squinting, as she seemed to try to remember the specifics.  “Maybe the Brixton Banshee case?  Although, I’m still not happy with the paper for assigning that particular name to that particular case,” she meandered, her eyes coming back to his.  “Just because the ghost was a wailing woman, crying over the loss of her children, doesn’t mean she deserved to be called a banshee.”

“You’ve come so far, Luce,” he started, and even he could hear the irony in his tone.  “From your screaming match with Holly in Aickmere’s.”  

“I’ve grown, truly.”  She saw his bit of irony, and undeniably raised him.  “Anyway, you didn’t hear her, which isn’t exactly uncommon for you, but I noticed that you missed a few easy jabs at her with your rapier, which is uncommon for you.

“I don’t think I walked away from that case knowing you were losing your Talent.  I can’t pinpoint an exact moment when I felt that way, if I ever felt that way,” she continued, shaking her head.  “But I just remember being concerned about you—about whether you were maybe sick or off your game.  And then, one day, it just…clicked.”  She paused; her eyes found their focus, as she seemed to return to the present—to the conversation at hand.  “Can you see them at all anymore?”

He nodded, but he could admit that he felt a lump developing in his throat.  “It’s exactly as Kipps used to tell us:  I can sense them, but I can’t see them, and that’s somehow even more terrifying.”  Pausing, he worked to gather his thoughts; he knew he had more to say on the matter, but it was almost as if it were evading him.  Ultimately, he knew his issue:  he feared being brutally honest about it.  

His inability to see ghosts rendered him pretty useless as a leader.  Lockwood had always been their leader.  To face down not being their leader…  He wasn’t sure what his next steps should be, and that was utterly terrifying.  

“Luce,” he started again, his eyes coming back to focus on her.  Seeing her there, laying in front of him, in the bed they had shared for nearly seven years at this point, he started berating himself:  if he couldn’t be honest with her, who the hell could he be honest with?  “If I can’t see ghosts, I can’t be the leader.  I can’t lead us properly when we’re out on a job.  I can’t do anything.  My purpose, my entire life, has been about fighting ghosts.  If I can’t fight them, what am I to do now?”

She shrugged, her expression as casual as ever.  “Retire.”

“Retire?” he asked; his tone was dripping with indignation.  “Lucy, that’s—”

“I mean it,” she cut him off.  The lack of irony in her tone had him hesitating.  “We’ve worked hard, Lockwood.  We’ve done our fair share.”

He continued to hesitate.  There was an implicit conclusion to be drawn from her statement, but he was nearly afraid to ask for verification.  Knowing he had no other choice—he needed to know—he found his courage.  “We?”

She shrugged, again.  He found that he was beginning to hate the maneuver; it was far too casual to competently convey the complexities of the current conversation.  “I’ll retire with you,” she stated, as if it were obvious.  “I’m certainly not going out and looking for another agency to join.”

“Certainly, your loyalty to me has rendered you unwilling and unable to join another agency—” he started, with a fresh batch of irony.

“Oh, I suppose,” she interrupted, with a feigned and dramatic sigh, and he found himself marveling at just how well she was able to top him in packing a punch in a conversation.  “But truly,” she continued, imitating his posh accent—badly; at the very least, it appeared he was not the only one to struggle with mimicking accents.  “What if this hypothetical other agency employs a supervisor?”  She scrunched her nose and shook her head in distaste.

He laughed, temporarily unable to resist the pull of the conversation.  “Of course.  That would truly be the worst of fates,” he responded, doing his best to simply focus on her use of irony and neglect the fact that he had, on some level, been looking for some genuine promise of loyalty in this conversation.  

It was strange; he almost felt as if he had fallen ill.  His inability to see ghosts left him feeling vulnerable, and when he felt vulnerable, he locked things down; he wanted his friends—his family—nearby, closer than ever before.  He had been looking for a reassurance of her loyalty in this conversation, but he understood that Lucy, by nature, tended to avoid that sort of sentiment.  She would listen to him while he expressed his emotions, and she could even express her own on occasion, but she did tend to go for diffusion over compassion.  

He knew this, of course—knew her well enough to know to expect it.  But he could still lament the loss of that reassurance he so desperately needed.  Regardless, he had no choice; he would proceed with the conversation, because that was what he must do.  “And becoming a supervisor,” he carried on, trying to find his footing in this conversation once more.  “The next natural progression in our careers—”

“Isn’t something I’d even consider,” she finished for him.  “Sending kids into death traps, monitoring safely from a distance…” she shook her head, her eyes going out of focus, but only for a moment, as she visibly cringed.  “I could never do it.”  

He nodded, agreeing whole-heartedly.  

“Besides, to do either of those things, I’d have to leave Portland Row—leave during the day…or night, whatever—and go work somewhere else,” she started again, shrugging once more.  Her eyes ran to take in the whole of the room before coming back to meet his, which had snapped up to meet hers sharply.  Was it possible his dose of compassion was forthcoming after all?  “Leaving you and George?” she asked, with another shake of her head.  “I left once.  I’m never doing it again.  No, it isn’t in the cards for me.  So, yeah, if you’re ready to retire, I’m retiring too.”  

He didn’t know how Lucy managed it, but she always did come through in the end.  She’d lead him astray in a conversation, and he’d think he was done for—that he wasn’t going to hear just what he needed to hear, or that she wasn’t going to reach out and grab his hand at just the moment he needed it.  And, somehow, she’d come through at the eleventh hour; she’d say just the right thing and reach for him just at the right moment.

He knew, partially, that this evasive behavior was simply a product of her poor childhood.  She had never properly learned to experience and express her emotions.  He had no real room to talk in that area, but he did consider himself at least advanced in the awareness he had with his emotions.  It was expressing his emotions—particularly when it involved people other than Lucy—that was the bother for him.  Either way, they both had something to learn here, and they were both working on learning it—together.  

“We have the money,” he started again, mirroring her preferred method of expression in this conversation:  a shrug.  “Barnes paid well, considering we ended the Problem, and all.  And we’ve been quite frugal.  With all of our successes over the years, we have quite a bit saved up.”

“Enough to account for George’s monthly Arif’s budget?”

Lockwood winced.  “George may have to restrain himself, but only slightly.  After all, we’ll all have to make some changes.  That’s what one does when they retire.”  

He smiled, but it was false—misleading.  He spoke with confidence, with charm—as he always did.  But what did he know?  His parents had never lived to see retirement.  Hell, he had never anticipated living long enough to see retirement.  He was doing nothing if not playing a guessing game.  But, alas, did he ever do anything different?  As long as he appeared to have everything under control, he knew those around him would follow.  He had to keep strong—for them.  

“We will be fine,” he continued, as much for his benefit as for hers.  “If all else fails, we can always engage in some freelance work.  We do have the best Listener in the country, after all,” he continued, his irony returning to the conversation.

But she didn’t seem to be having it; she shook her head, the severity of the subject matter still clear upon her face.  “If you’re done, I’m done.  I’m not working without you.”  

He wouldn’t exactly say that he had been baiting her with his comment, but, if he had, and if it had been a test, she would have passed with flying colors.  

He loved her in that moment.  He loved her in a lot of moments—they were, after all, in love.  But especially in that moment, he loved her.  

[patiencetakestyme]

A Fair Price to Pay, Chapter 4

Dinner was a relatively silent affair.  They ate in silence.  They drank their drinks in silence.  They paid their tab in silence. 

Lucy kept glancing at the proprietors populating the establishment.  Lockwood found himself wondering if she recognized them—if she felt she could not speak freely as a result of knowing them.  Regardless, whether she was worried about feeding the gossip mill or she simply needed time to reflect, he refused to push her; she would come to him, when she was ready. 

After dinner, they climbed the stairs to seek out their room.  Their bags were strewn about on the bed, just where they had left them when they had dropped them off earlier.  Lucy, seemingly finally free to express herself, picked up her bag by the handle and tossed it across the room.  She took a seat on the edge of the bed, occupying the space physically vacated by her bag moments prior.  She brought her hands to her forehead and weaved them through the hair at the crown of her head. 

Lockwood drifted to claim a seat next to her.  In stark contrast to the actions she had taken, he gently placed his bag upon the floor.  Lucy was lost right now, and he wanted nothing more than to be the calming force that could, hopefully, help her. 

Acutely, Lockwood recalled the concerns Lucy had expressed about seeing her mother before they had traveled to Cheviot Hills.  She had told him that nothing could make this conversation tolerable—not even him. 

He could admit it—privately, at least:  his ego had been hurt, hearing that.  He didn’t like the idea of something he couldn’t do, especially when it came to helping her.  It had made him feel a bit stubborn, he could admit it.  He had become resolute in his goal:  he was going to give her a platform on which to speak, and he would be the one to make it tolerable; he would help her pick up the pieces when it was done. 

Well, here they were.  The confrontation had come and gone.  They hadn’t even gotten past the entryway.  He hadn’t even gotten to see if any of the sisters were in, and dinner had become a relic, a ridiculous idea of a long-forgotten plan for the night. 

He would help her; he knew he would do it.  But he could admit that he had underestimated—not only the situation, but just how mean Lucy’s mother could be, and just how impactful that could be on Lucy. 

Shaking himself out of his thoughts, he turned his focus where it should be:  Lucy.  He placed a hand on her back, rubbing comfortingly in slow, even strokes, up and down her spine.  He half expected her to reject him:  to push him away in a method of rejecting any form of sensitivity.  That was what combat-Lucy would’ve done. 

But quickly, he realized he didn’t have combat-Lucy sitting in front of him.  No, this was the Lucy that wore her heart on her sleeve; this was the Lucy that was easily stirred to be competitive, the Lucy that was easily stirred to be unpredictable, the Lucy that was easily stirred to lose her self-esteem. 

This was the Lucy that showed him how much she needed him.  She fell into him, her head coming to rest upon his shoulder.  His eyes drifted shut as, for perhaps the first time, he realized she needed him just as much as he needed her. 

“I’m sorry,” he apologized.  “I never should’ve brought you here.”

“No,” she started, and he was shocked to hear some sniffling.  Was she crying?  That was even more of a rarity when it came to Lucy.  “You were right to do it.  I’m going to be messed up from this for weeks,” she conceded, and it hit him like a bullet to the gut.  “But it needed to happen.  I have a lot to…process with her, obviously,” she hesitated, before settling on her choice in words. 

“I don’t suppose you’re feeling like sharing what some of that material is?” he asked, and even he could hear the charming smile in his voice.  It worked, albeit only partially; she scoffed slightly against his shoulder. 

“Not tonight.  Tonight, I just want to sleep.”

They went about their usual routine:  changing of clothes, brushing of teeth, entering of bed.  Within twenty minutes, Lucy was asleep and snoring.  But there was very little sleep to be had for Lockwood. 

He laid awake for hours, his eyes glued to the shitty ceiling of the Swan Hotel.  Flashes of the conversations with Jacobs and Lucy’s mother haunted him.  He had been the one to suggest they come here, and he knew how persuasive he could be:  it might’ve appeared to be a suggestion on the surface, but, ultimately, it was not; Lucy had inevitably felt as though she had no other choice than to bend to his will and come here. 

And here they had come, and here he had paid the price for his arrogance.  He had thought talking to these people would help her:  would help her see the deeper meanings behind her struggles. 

Lockwood had a theory.  Lucy struggled with communicating with women.  He was almost certain that this was due to how her mother had treated her.  She had an inherent, intrinsic bias against women:  a preconceived notion that they would treat her poorly, just as her mother always had. 

Lockwood had thought that, perhaps, talking to her mother would help reveal this bias and its origins to Lucy.  Now, though, he feared he had played a hand that, ultimately, had resulted in simply cementing those views. 

As for her relationship with Jacobs…  It was interesting, Lockwood could admit it.  He had treated her just as poorly if not worse than her mother had, but yet, Lucy’s ability to form relationships with men had not faltered.  Sure, she was never one to trust an adult—something she had both her mother and Jacobs to thank for—but she could still build trust and communicate well with men. 

Why was that?  What was different between the two in her mind?  Lockwood spent the night using his considerate powers of perception to not only riddle out the answer to this question—that was the easy part—but to also find a way to help Lucy reach the conclusion as well.  By the first light of the morning, he thought he just might have an answer.  Now, the question that remained was merely how to bring Lucy to that same realization. 

They had one more stop to make this morning, and Lockwood believed that it was perhaps the most important one of all:  the memorial in the town square to all fallen agents that had hailed from Cheviot Hills.  Norrie’s name was listed there, as well as all the other agents that had died due to Jacobs’s negligence at Wythburn Mill. 

This was where he’d make his final play.  This was where he’d talk to her:  where he’d try to help her see the deeper meaning to everything she struggled with.

When it was all said and done, Lockwood got perhaps an hour or two of sleep.  He was awoken by the sounds and sensations of Lucy stirring in bed next to him.  He should’ve been tired, given that he had only fallen asleep just as dawn had broken a meager few hours prior, but he was anything but:  he was driven by purpose, and he found that he was eager to get up, even as he felt the scratch of fatigue itching at the back of his eyes. 

“Good morning,” he said on a yawn as he turned to face an already awake Lucy. 

“Should we get up?  Try to catch the earlier train?  Get out of this hellhole?” she asked.  Her enthusiasm to leave on the first available train was abundantly clear, even in his fatigued state. 

Lockwood shook his head.  “We have one more stop to make, remember?”

She was silent.  To Lockwood, it seemed she had most certainly remembered; she had merely been hoping he had forgotten. 

In an hour, they had packed up the meager few possessions that they had brought with them, checked out of the Swan Hotel—hopefully to never return again—grabbed a breakfast sandwich and a cup of tea, and were on their way. 

They had plenty of time.  While they may have missed the earliest train of the day, the one they had originally planned to take, the nine o’clock back to London, would not board for another hour.  As the memorial was mere steps away from the Swan Hotel, Lockwood, satirically, anticipated no problems with travel. 

As they approached the memorial, Lockwood found that he could literally feel yet another change in demeanor overcoming Lucy.  She was typically quite quiet, except when she was feeling indignant at one—undeniably justified—slight or another, but her silence had hit new peaks here, as they came to a stop in front of the memorial.  It almost felt…reverent, he settled on, and as he watched her approach the engraving of Norrie’s name and run her fingers gingerly over the lettering, he knew he had chosen just the right word. 

Norrie White.

There were no further details:  no date of birth or date of death, no declaration of cause—even if it would’ve been heinously inaccurate, thanks to Jacobs—no individualized statement representing her years and dedication of service.  It was so cold, so detached:  she was but one name amongst many. 

Lockwood had never known her, obviously, but even he could admit that he pitied her, seeing the lack of elegance and flair to the memorial. 

Lucy lingered, her fingers locked in place on Norrie’s name for several minutes.  Her head and shoulders were slumped.  He suspected she was crying, but she seemed to wish to do so privately; she issued no invitation for him to converse with her, so he merely stood by her side as she grieved privately, choosing to wait until she was ready for them to grieve together. 

The sign he had been waiting for happened; her body language changed:  she took a step back and angled her body to face him.  But her eyes—her eyes still evaded him, were still locked on Norrie’s name.  There were no tears, but he could see that she was visibly upset. 

“She was…” Lucy trailed off, and he suspected there was something she wanted to tell him, but she was struggling to find the strength to share it.  With another shift, she sniffed, shook her head, and released a deep breath.  “She was my first crush, my first relationship—my only relationship, prior to you, come to think of it.  I trusted her with my life, and that was…” she trailed off, with another shake of her head.  “A big step for me.” 

He had always suspected what she had just told him, so he was, at least, on some level, prepared for it.  Still, though, the strength it had taken for her to be open and raw in such a way…  He envied her strength; it had taken him far longer to find the strength to share something that had rendered him far less vulnerable. 

But, still, he didn’t want her to feel isolated after sharing such a raw confession; he moved quickly, working hard to make sure she knew he appreciated what she had just shared.  “I can understand why,” he started, with a reassuring nod.  “Given what we experienced with your mother yesterday.” 

“I hate her,” she scoffed, with a roll of her eyes.  One small tear escaped the corner of one of her eyes.  “Norrie and Mary, my sister,” she specified, but he didn’t need it; he had already known her name.  “They taught me I could trust some women, but my other sisters and my mother taught me that most of them can’t be trusted.” 

Lockwood hesitated, quirking his eyebrow in question.  Before he could actually issue the question on his mind, she turned to him, a small smirk on her face, even as more tears escaped her eyes.  “What?  Wasn’t that what you came here to discuss:  How much my mother has destroyed me?”

He shook his head, hoping to immediately dispel that notion.  “I do not believe she has destroyed you.  On some level, you’d have to give her permission to do that—to enter your mind in such a way—and you don’t concede permissions such as that easily.” 

“But your argument is that she has done something to me?”

“Oh, of course,” he answered, attempting to keep his tone casual.  “And you’ve already started alluding to it.  Tell me, why do you have a harder time forming relationships with women than with men?” he asked.

She scoffed, and he could already anticipate what she was about to say.  “I just told you that my first relationship was with a woman, Lockwood.  I think you need to check your facts,” she argued indignantly, as she crossed her arms over her chest. 

“Yes, but you said it yourself:  Norrie and Mary were the exceptions, not the rule.  Flo and Holly—”

“I know, I know,” she interrupted.  With a shake of her head, she seemed to reset; it was almost as if she were not ready to discuss those two just quite yet, but Lockwood was persistent:  he’d get them there, he was sure of it. 

“You have no trouble bonding with me and George,” Lockwood started, his tone quieting.  His eyes locked on hers, even if she resisted meeting his.  “Despite the fact that Jacobs was an asshole to you—literally used you as a scapegoat for his own cowardice—you don’t have any issues with imprinting your hatred for him on me or George—”

“I don’t know,” she interrupted.  “It was pretty rocky for me and George those first few months.”  She scoffed again, this time with a roll of her eyes.

“Did you ever hate him?” Lockwood asked, the question nothing but genuine.

She paused.  It took her a long time, but eventually—begrudgingly—she did find her answer.  “No,” she conceded.  “I wanted to, but I never did.” 

“Did you ever hate Flo or Holly?”

Another pause, another weighted silence, another answer sought and found.  “Yeah, I think I might’ve—if only for a little bit.”

“Holly?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

She did nothing but nod, her eyes still locked on Norrie’s name. 

There was a long, silent lull upon the conversation.  Lockwood could tell that she was gathering her thoughts.  He found himself hoping that it was only a matter of time until she could not contain them anymore and that she actually pushed herself forward—actually pushed herself to share those thoughts with him. 

He waited her out, and sure enough, she found her courage and her conviction.

“Jacobs hurt me,” she started, with a concession.  “He was an asshole and a coward and everything else you’ve called him,” she continued.  Turning to face him, she was suddenly all-business; currently, he had combat-Lucy standing in front of him, but he knew it was all for show:  heart-on-her-sleeve-Lucy was lingering, just below the surface.  “But he was an adult supervisor.  Did I expect more of him?  Yes.  Should I have expected more of him?” she paused, immediately shaking her head.  “No.  From Jacobs, I learned…not to distrust men, but to distrust adults.

“From my mother,” she continued, with a sigh.  Just as quick as she had turned to face him, she turned away once more.  There it was:  the evidence of her tears, reappearing in the corners of her eyes.  “It’s exactly like you said, even if I’m not happy about it.  I hate her—I’ve always hated her. 

“I hate that she did nothing but use me.  I hate that I was nothing but a source of income to her.  I hate that she led me into thinking that she didn’t believe me about Norrie and the others.  I hate that she actually maybe did believe me, and yet she still insisted that I go and grovel to that piece of shit.”  She shrugged.  “She would’ve done whatever was necessary to get her money back.  It was the price she was willing to pay. 

“I hate that she clearly never really cared about me,” she continued, a tear finally escaping and falling down her cheek.  It was then that he knew; he may not know the details of what was coming, but he knew it had to be big.  “I hate that my father, even drunk and actively drinking himself to death, actually seemed to care more about me than she ever did stone-cold sober.  I hate—I hate—” she paused, rolled her eyes, and shook her head in frustration, as she wiped away her tears with a bat of a hand.  “I hate that she's never told me she loves me.”

He didn’t dare to interrupt her, so when she paused here, after releasing such a raw revelation, he waited her out.  She had mentioned this the day before, obviously, but to hear her actually explore it with him, privately—so openly, so nakedly—it was enough to nearly bring him to his knees. 

Clearly frustrated with herself, she reached up, brushing another batch of tears away.  “She’s family.  That alone means that her betrayal will always cost more than anything Jacobs did to me.”

He settled for nodding, despite the fact that he wanted nothing more than to reach out to her, but as he wasn’t absolutely certain which Lucy was standing in front of him, he felt highly concerned about making the wrong move.  Finally, unable to resist, he reached a hand out for one of her own.  When she didn’t push him away, he settled in, giving her hand a hearty squeeze. 

“Flo?” he asked, knowing very well that he may be pressing his luck. 

“I never hated her,” Lucy stated, as if it were a fact that anyone should’ve been able to observe.  “I have no respect for what she does for a living—at least, I didn’t, not for a long time. 

“What Flo does…” Lucy trailed off, squinting as she got lost in thought.  “I know we bend the rules, but not like her.  Relic men—and women, for that matter—are insulting to me.  What she does is too similar, to me, to what Jacobs did:  lying in that courtroom and pinning his crime on me. 

“I’m all fine and dandy with lying to Barnes for the sake of a case, or with stealing a piece of evidence so that we can poke at it and discover something for the greater good, but choosing the life of a relic man…” she trailed off again, with a shake of her head.  “It just took me a while to get over that and trust her.  I kept thinking she was going to betray us.  Jacobs picked his own sense of self-preservation over his agents.  I kept waiting for Flo to pick some stupid relic to salvage and sell, over saving us.”

“Fair,” Lockwood conceded.  He had suspected this, but it was interesting to hear the full scope of it.  “And…” he trailed off, knowing he was approaching the grand meteor hurtling towards this conversation.  “Holly?”

With a sigh, she started.  Finally, she turned to face him, her eyes locking on to meet his, although her arms found their way to cross indignantly, once more, over her chest.  “I’ll be honest, Lockwood,” she promised, and internally, he made a promise in return:  he would not interrupt her; he would let her get everything out, even if biting his tongue led to him literally biting his tongue. 

“I was jealous,” she paused, looking almost as if she were revolted by her own admission.  “She's gorgeous—has curves in all the places girls are supposed to, has pretty hair, and pretty features.  She knows how to dress, and she puts value in appearances, just like you do. 

“Me?” she asked, with a scoff.  “I look like a slob, pretty much daily.  My hips are too big, and my boobs are too small.  I can’t compete with her.”  He felt his head shaking in disagreement, long before she stopped to pause here, but he didn’t dare interrupt her; he kept his promise. 

“She tidies.  She organizes.  She eats healthy foods—like, she actually prefers healthy food over the shit that I eat that tastes good,” she continued, with a roll of her eyes.  “She cleans up after us.  She's basically a mom in really attractive, form-fitting clothing,” she carried on, pointing fingers and tallying up all of Holly’s merits, before rolling her eyes yet again and tucking her hand back in the pit created by her crossed arms.  Lockwood had wanted to reach out and grab her hand to cut the tallying off at its knees—as a method of dispelling the notion that Holly was in any way superior to Lucy—but she had moved too fast for him; he had missed his window of opportunity. 

“I met her—after coming back from visiting here, mind you:  a visit I returned from early because it was going oh-so well—and I just had a feeling that you had hired her because you liked her.  Of course you liked her!” she exclaimed, with a shake of her head.  He wanted to shake his own in disagreement, but he found that the shaking of her head left him believing that mirroring the action would feel nothing but hollow.  “She cooks for you, she cleans you, and she looks and acts like a hot mom from the ’50s while doing it.  What boy wouldn’t love that?

“Or, worse yet,” she continued.  He wasn’t supposed to interrupt, but he could admit that, had she hesitated long enough for him to interject after her last comment, he would’ve.  But she had moved too fast—had left him no room.  “Maybe you were looking for a friend for me—like you wanted me to take her in and form a bond, like the one you and George have.  Maybe you were trying to intervene in some other way, or…” she trailed off, but only for a moment. “I don’t know, but I didn’t like it,” she conceded, with another shake of her head. 

“I got territorial.  You and George—you're my guys.  I didn’t like the idea of someone intruding, especially someone that could emerge from a full-fledged battlefield and still manage to look perfect.  And even post-battle, she’d manage to pull out a healthy sandwich—of her own making, mind you—and have that to offer to you, too.”  Another roll of the eyes.  “She was everything you wanted—everything I perceived as what you probably wanted.  Even if she didn’t want you—although, stupidly, I took absolutely zero minutes to even consider that possibility—it didn’t matter:  I had it in my head that you wanted her, and even if she didn’t want you, it meant you didn’t want me. 

“And with her being so perfect at everything I was bad at…” she trailed off, with another shake of her head.  Biting his tongue was becoming quite the daunting task now, he could admit it, but she was so close—he could feel it; if he could just hold out for a few more seconds, she’d be done and he’d have his chance to tell her everything he wanted her to hear—needed her to hear. 

“It brought out all the insecurities in me.  You’ve met my mother,” she continued with another roll of her eyes.  “You can probably guess that she never taught me how to do anything I might need to know as a girl.  I don't know how to do my makeup.  I don’t know what to wear or how to act in front of people.

“So, every day, I look disheveled, armed with no makeup, messy hair, practical clothing, and a bad attitude.”  She started another tally with her fingers, but this time, Lockwood was quicker on the draw; he reached out, grasping her hand in his own.  Still wishing to abstain from interrupting her, he merely shook his head and strengthened his hold on her hand. 

When she continued to hesitate, he gave a small nod of encouragement; eventually, it was enough:  she resumed course.  “She pulled on other insecurities I had, too—not just about my appearance, but as a result of the fact that my mother didn’t teach me those things.  It made me hate her, and it made me keenly aware of just how much I still hate my mother—of how much I still blame her for. 

“It’s all a price:  I hate people like Holly because of how my mom treated me.  It isn’t a fair price, but…” she trailed off, with a shake of her head.  “It’s the price I’ve paid.” 

Lucy paused, but he continued to wait her out.  He refused to interrupt her; that was his biggest fear.  He had made it this far, and he didn’t dare to risk ruining all his hard work by interrupting her here, at the eleventh hour.  But as the seconds continued to tick on, and his confidence that she had reached the end of her reveals increased, he settled in, easing his charming smile back into place. 

“Are you quite done composing the love ballad of Holly Munro?” he asked, sardonically.  “I don’t wish to interrupt the symphony you are creating.”

With a scoff and yet another roll of her eyes, she nodded. 

“My turn, then?” he asked one more time—just to be sure. 

But she had seemingly felt it:  the change in his tone and demeanor.  While the first comment had been all charm, this one was all concern.  Her smile dropped, and her nod felt, somehow, more genuine. 

His first step was a somewhat unfamiliar one:  he swooped in, dropping his hands to encircle her waist.  He had to check the impulse to run his hands up to cup her neck and weave his fingers through the hair to be found there, at the base of the neck—a physical position he often favored when he drew her in—but given one specific comment that she had made that he wished to address at some point during the duration of this conversation, it was imperatively important to him that he, instead, be within crawling distance of her hips. 

“I love you,” he stated.  “Just as you are, and I will always love you unconditionally.  It isn’t about the money you can make for the agency.  It isn’t about the fact that you are the best Listener in the country—though you are; I want to be clear about that,” he paused to smirk before regaining the severity required of the situation.  “It is about the fact that you are Lucy Carlyle.  You’re stubborn and resilient and powerful and strong and funny and about a million other things, all of which I love equally, and which make you the best partner I could ever consider having at my side. 

“I want that to be clear, because it seems that your mother never made that clear.  If your mother loves you—I can’t speak for her, obviously, but given the display we experienced yesterday, I’m compelled to follow the conclusions you have drawn on the matter—she should’ve told you.  She should’ve told you every single day.  She’ll regret that someday,” he stated, feeling the pricking of tears at the back of his own eyes.  “I wish I could still tell my sister, my parents, that I love them.  I regret not telling them more,” he carried on, with a resolved nod.  “And if she loves you, she’ll regret it one day too.

“But that’s not our concern, is it?  She’ll have to live with that forever, and I know you will, too:  there’s no escaping the feeling that you wish she would do more.  But know that, for what it’s worth, I will do everything in my power to never leave you feeling that way.  You will know that I love you, and I will make it my goal every single day to make sure you know that. 

“Along with this,” he continued, releasing a somewhat admittedly nervous chuckle.  “Is to state the fact that at no time did I desire a romantic relationship with Holly.  It wouldn’t have mattered to me if she had wanted a relationship with me—which, of course, we now know was not the case—but even if she had, I never viewed her that way:  never thought of her that way, never even considered viewing her that way—”

“How?” Lucy interrupted, with a disbelieving look.

Lockwood noticed that her arms were still crossed stubbornly across her chest.  He tried to resist taking it personally; she had admitted to a lot in this conversation, and if she wasn’t ready to return his physical sentiments, he’d respect that. 

Still, in his distraction at this observation, he was not as careful in his response as he should’ve been.  He released a humorless laugh; he couldn’t help it:  perhaps it was not the right move, given the current tone of the conversation, but it had emerged from him before he could even consider checking it.  “Because by the time I hired Holly, I was already well on my way to falling in love with you.” 

That caught her attention.  Her mouth popped open, but she made no room to respond; he took it as a sign that he was okay to proceed. 

“Why do you think I hired her?  We had gotten so busy—taken on so many new clients—that I wasn’t getting to work jobs with you and George anymore.  I…” he trailed off, looking for the perfect word.  “I missed you.”  He shrugged.  “Hiring her to organize the cases would allow us to actually resume working together again, and there’s no one I want by my side when I’m walking into a haunted house more than you.

“Holly is not who I want,” he stated.  “Cooks, cleans, ’50’s aesthetic…” he drawled, making a point to play off of the ridiculousness of her previous statement, before shaking his head, locking eyes with her, and drawing her in even closer.  As a result of him pulling her in, she finally dropped her arms to her side, though he noted that she did not yet move to return his embrace. 

“She may be attractive to some men,” he conceded.  “But she isn’t attractive to me—she never was.  It’s not about how she looks or what she does, it's about you.  It’s always been about you.  That’s what your argument neglects, Lucy,” he continued, easing his charming smile back into place.  “Men are allowed to have preferences, too.   

“I happen to like your disheveled hair, and your clean face, and your very utilitarian clothing,” he said, running his fingers from her waist, down along the line created by the slope of her hips.  He leaned in, dropping his forehead to rest upon hers.  “As for your hips, they are one of my favorite things about you, outside of your personality, of course.”

“You’ve made cracks about them in the past,” Lucy defended.  She held strong, still holding the line; she had not yet embraced him.  “You’re always going on about the part around my hips—”

Unable to check his reaction yet again, a small, humorless laugh escaped him.  He could feel her instant indignation, but he held strong, pulling her in even closer.  “I was going on about the part around your hips because I find them to be one of the sexiest things about you, Luce.  They’re driving me nuts, even standing right here, right now.  Sorry,” he acknowledged, his eyes moving discreetly to cast a small glance to Norrie’s memorial.  “That’s inappropriate, given where we are and why we’re here, but it’s important to me that you know it.” 

She continued to glare at him, but he could see it:  the faintest hints of a blush building at her cheeks.  “You’re right,” she stated, with a shake of her head.  But he felt it; she was leaning in, even if it was only ever-so-slightly.  “It’s insanely inappropriate to say that here, but I can appreciate the sentiment.” 

“It’s more than just that,” he started again, bringing his hands up to the familiar territory of cradling her neck; he wanted to make sure he had her full and undivided attention.  “You believe Holly’s…  What is it you said?  Well-proportioned?” he asked, with a charming smile; he didn’t want to trigger her insecurities again. 

He saw anger flare on her face, and he decided to take that as sufficient confirmation. 

“Well, she doesn’t have your fighting-fit stature, either.  You can hold your own in a fight, Lucy, in a way she’ll never be able to, and you know it, and she knows it.”  He hesitated, his eyes wandering over to the memorial once more.  “And I feel pretty confident that Norrie knew it and loved it about you too.” 

Lucy’s eyes also ran to take in the sight of Norrie’s name once more.  Slowly, almost as if she were moving in slow motion, she reached out, running her fingers once more over the lettering.  “I loved her, Lockwood.  It’s important to me that you know that.  She was my first crush, my first relationship, and my first kiss.  I hope you can accept that.”

He was nodding before she had even finished her statement.  “Just as I hope you can accept that you are my first crush, my first relationship, and my first kiss.”

She looked mildly surprised, and he could admit that he rejoiced in it; he liked being able to keep her on her toes, especially after all the years they had spent working together.  He strove to keep their relationship fresh, and he was seemingly succeeding. 

“You’re it for me, Luce,” he said, repeating words he had said, in one variation or another, to her on several occasions.  “You’re my first, my last—if you’ll have me, that is—and everything in the middle.” 

He knew she needed to hear it—that she deserved to hear it—and, fortunately, she reciprocated in kind.  Finally, she reached in, looping her arms around the waist of his still-far-too-new coat.  “Let’s go home, shall we?”

“Yes, please,” he started, with a scrunching of his nose in distaste.  “I’ve had quite enough of…” he trailed off, irony dripping from his expression and his words.  “What’s it called?  Chevet?  Chevon?  Something with hills because, well,” he paused, with a deadpanned point off to the hills in the distance that served as the backdrop to the town.  “Much like every town in Northern England, shockingly, there’s hills.”  She laughed, and he rejoiced in it. 

Despite the fact that he didn’t want to rescind her offer of affection so soon after only just receiving it, he pulled back, detaching himself from the embrace.  He was quick to make up for it, though, as he moved to clutch her hand in his as quickly as was humanly possible. 

Still, though, he’d pay the price; letting go of this embrace meant reaching the safety of the train, boarding the secure confines of the cabin:  it meant getting Lucy the hell out of here.  It was the loss of one embrace in trade for countless others.  And that, he could admit, was a fair price to pay.    

A/N:  Thank you for reading this story!  I have a sequel to it—a final story in this trilogy, of sorts.  I’ll be posting that as soon as possible.  In addition, if you enjoyed my writing style and are willing and able, check out my book!  It can be found here!

[patiencetakestyme]

A Fair Price to Pay, Chapter 3

A/N: Chapter 3 is here! Hopefully this brings even just one person some enjoyment!

“Well, that was fun,” Lockwood commented, as they presumably set course to head to their next destination:  the childhood home she had shared with her mother and sisters.  But admittedly, he knew nothing of the area:  he was at the behest of following Lucy’s guidance.

“Yeah, I didn’t hate it,” she conceded, although he could see that she was still a little shaken under the surface.  

“Are you okay?”  He looked around, halting their pace once he confirmed that they were far enough away from Jacobs’s that he would not spot them or see any form of a reaction Lucy may have.  

She hesitated but ultimately nodded.  “I am,” she admitted.  “But, honestly, taking on Jacobs is a joke.  I’m not even sure that’s what’s throwing me.  I think it’s—”

“Our next destination,” Lockwood supplied for her, and Lucy nodded her agreement. 

“We could just skip it?” he offered, but, internally, he begged for her to decline that offer.  Still, if it was what she needed, he’d do it—in a heartbeat.  

“No,” she shook her head, her resilience coming back to her just as quick as it had left.  “Telling Jacobs off…” she trailed off, seemingly thinking through her words.  “It was cathartic.  I didn’t need to do it—didn’t even think I wanted to do it, certainly hadn’t planned to do it.  But now that I’ve done it,” she paused, nodding, her eyes coming back to his.  “I feel good.  I’m hoping it’ll be the same with my mom.”  

He nodded.  “Then, let’s go do it.”  

The walk to her house was equally as insignificant as the walk to Jacobs’s had been.  In fact, they found they had an overabundance of time; they arrived early.  Not wishing to intrude on her mother's time—and, privately, not wishing to force poor Lucy into interacting with her mother for, potentially, an even longer period of time than they already had scheduled—they changed course, choosing to walk, instead, in the other direction:  across the street, to the Swan Hotel.  

They checked into their room, dropped off their bags, and fielded Lockwood’s complaints about the mediocrity of the quality of the Swan Hotel’s rooms.  The whole exchange was done in thirty minutes or less, and they were still noticeably early for their six o’clock dinner appointment at her mother’s house.  

The house, much like the building that housed Jacobs’s agency, was unnoteworthy.  Thatched roof, same dirty brown stonework, a plain, brown door:  it was the same, architecturally, as nearly every other house in this town.  

With one last shared look of misery, Lockwood knocked on the door.  He considered reaching for Lucy’s hand, but he second-guessed the inclination at the very last second; he didn’t know if Lucy’s mother even knew who he was, let alone their relationship status.  Knowing there were already far too many unknowns going into this interaction, Lockwood decided to wait and follow Lucy’s lead on the matter.  

He would not be hurt if she did not declare them as being together.  In all honesty, that was not why he was here; he did not need credit in this conversation.  He wanted Lucy to finally get the credit she was due.  

The woman that answered the door was simultaneously exactly what he had expected and nothing like he had expected at all.  She was hearty:  short and stout, she looked like she could take a hit and had no problem dishing a few of her own out as well.  She had Lucy’s dark hair, or at least Lockwood thought she might; it was pulled back in some sort of loose up-do, but very little of it was actually visible.  

Her skin, though, was darker than Lucy’s and, quite simply, more…worn.  The same could be said for her eyes; they were distinctly darker than Lucy’s, both literally and metaphorically.  Both sets of eyes had the fire of a fight, but where Lucy’s was a stubborn, resilient light, her mother’s was a withering, flickering flame:  a flame that had been burning for far too long and had settled into a persistent, yet fleeting, ember.  

Fundamentally, the woman simply looked…tired—like she had spent her whole life fighting unnecessary battles that she still had yet to realize were pointless.  It had left her world-weary.  

“You’re here,” the woman stated.  There was no declaration of joy, no whoop of excitement.  It left something to be desired.  Lockwood found himself actually feeling surprised when she angled her body ever-so-slightly to allow them entry.

“Just like I said I would be,” Lucy bit back.  

“You’re early,” she stated—again.  Her tone was still nothing but monotone; this time she threw in a pointed glare spared to the clock over their shoulders, just for good measure, Lockwood reckoned.  

“That’s my influence, I’m afraid,” Lockwood interjected.  His tone was vastly different from that of the two women standing in front of him; it was a splash of yellow paint in an otherwise brown conversation.  He reveled in it; it fueled him on.  Much like he had with Jacobs, he extended a jovial hand.  

He waited.  Jacobs’s reaction to this maneuver had taught Lockwood a lot about the man.  The same would be said for Ms. Carlyle’s reaction.  

Her eyes ran to his hand, ran to his face, then ran back to his hand.  Cautiously, she shook his hand, but she made sure to extract it as quickly as was physically possible.  

“Lockwood,” he introduced.  

Ms. Carlyle nodded, seemingly recognizing his name.  “You’re the lad that chose to employ her after her screw up with Jacobs.”  

There were several things that Lockwood did not care for in this statement.  First, he was not a lad; to call him a lad implied that he was a small, innocent boy.  He found the term of endearment, uttered from someone he not only barely knew personally, but which he had heard nothing but bad things about, put the bad taste of indignation in his mouth.   

Then, there was, of course, the word choice of chose to employ her:  as if it had been some inherently fraught or foolhardy move on his part, as if it had been an asinine maneuver to pick up such a soiled employee.  He had two points of contention with this implication, of course:  Lucy was anything but a soiled employee, and he was anything but a fool.

But worst of all, of course, was the chosen label for the instance that had occurred while she had been employed with Jacobs:  her screw up.  Well, that simply would not do.  

“Oh, I’m afraid you’re quite mistaken,” he started, his smile and his tone utterly unaffected by her insolence.  “I am the very lucky owner of my own, private agency that was fortunate enough to hire the best Listener in the country after she had been cast out by a negligent and inept adult supervisor following his choice to abandon her and her fellow agents in an extremely haunted mill, armed only with said supervisor’s inaccurate and incomplete reports of the haunting.”  

“The best Listener in the country?”

Lockwood felt his gut churn.  It was the second time tonight he had had his statement on this matter questioned.  It didn’t bother him when Lucy questioned it; that was a textbook case of an inferiority complex, and he would defend her to herself for the remainder of their days, if she’d have him.  

But hearing other people question her value—it was too much for him.  He wouldn’t stand for it.  

As if the prospect of Ms. Carlyle questioning Lucy’s abilities was not enough, there was something more to the question.  Ms. Carlyle looked disbelieving, naturally, but there was something beneath the surface:  a glimmer in her eye that Lockwood did not like.  It seemed to be asking how she could find a way to profit off of this revelation.  

“There was an interview,” Lockwood stated, as if it were obvious, which it was, of course.  He maintained his smile—in fact, he may have managed to pack even more charm into it.  “Three tests, and Lucy passed every single one.  Her results were exemplary.  But, of course,” he continued, taking a step to approach the woman, and interrupting her gasp to speak.  “You already knew that.  That was why you took her to Jacobs’s from the moment you could—from the moment you were allowed to do so by law.”  

“I always knew she was special,” she confirmed, with a nod.  Her eyes were locked on Lockwood’s, and he got the distinct feeling that she knew she was being challenged.  

Lockwood shook his head, his smile dropping; this conversation had entered a territory where kindness, real or forced, was no longer a possibility.  “You always knew you could profit off of her,” he corrected.  

“That’s not true,” she defended, holding her ground.  “When she left, I didn’t chase after her.  When you hired her, I didn’t come begging, now, did I?  When she came to visit two years ago, I didn’t ask you for money, did I?” she asked, turning to Lucy.  

Lucy, seemingly unable to speak, simply settled for shaking her head.  Her eyes, however, stayed locked on her mother.  

“Oh, how nice,” Lockwood started, his smile back, but fully forced; even he could taste the bitterness coming off of it.  “You chose not to beg your daughter for money after she hadn’t lived with you for years.”  

Lucy stepped forward, and the conversation suddenly fell to silence.  Any efforts Ms. Carlyle may have been making to respond to Lockwood were cut off.  She moved to disregard Lockwood entirely, settling her focus, instead, upon Lucy; her eyes, beady and belligerent, trained upon Lucy and did not stir.  

“Why didn’t you believe me?” Lucy asked, her eyes equally as focused as her mother’s.  She paused, clearly awaiting her mother’s response.

“About what?” her mother responded after spending several seconds in silence; it seemed she had finally discerned that Lucy was not going to elaborate further.  

Lockwood could not resist a roll of his eyes.  

“About Norrie and the others,” Lucy conceded, with a frustrated sigh and a crossing of her arms over her chest.  “You wanted me to apologize to him.  You wanted me to beg for my job back!  You wanted everyone in town to stop looking at you like you were nothing but the mother of the girl that—supposedly—killed everyone at Wythburn Mill!”  She paused, even as her volume progressively increased over the course of her accusations.  “So, why didn’t you believe me?” she spat, her volume leveling, but her tone doing anything but.  

“I never said I didn’t.”  Lucy’s mother matched her tone and stance, spitting and crossing her arms over her chest.  “I told you to do what had to be done.”  

Lockwood didn’t know how it was possible, but Lucy didn’t miss a beat; she pushed on, almost as if she wasn’t fazed by what her mother had just said.  “But it didn’t have to be done!” she yelled, with a shake of her head.  “He was wrong, and just because I was a kid didn’t mean he should’ve gotten to use me as a scapegoat!”

“What does it matter now?!” her mother screeched, matching Lucy’s volume and tone once more.  “It’s all done,” she stated, and, admittedly, the sudden absence of screaming was almost more horrifying.

“It’s not—it’s not all done!” Lucy admonished, taking a few steps forward to get in her mother’s personal space.  She had now moved to stand even closer to the woman than Lockwood had been standing.  “You pushed me!  You gave me two options:  apologize for something I didn’t do or leave.  That’s it!” she screamed, throwing her arms up in the air.  “Those were the only choices I had!  I was a kid, and I had no choice but to grovel or run.”

“You made your choice—” her mother started, her tone returning to be just as argumentative as Lucy’s.

“You’re right, I did,” Lucy started, yelling even louder, getting even more in her mother’s face.  “Best decision I ever made!  A fair price to pay,” she finished, borrowing a line of his from earlier; Lockwood couldn’t help smiling at it.  

Silence fell upon the room, and it was deafening.  Lockwood did not dare to move, to breathe; he waited them both out, knowing they were not done.

“You know, it’s somehow worse,” Lucy started, and while her volume had decreased, her voice was now readily cracking as a result of the screaming match.  “The fact that you didn’t think I did it:  the fact that you wanted me to apologize, to grovel, as a result of something you didn’t even think I did.”

“We had no other choice—”

“Clearly I did,” Lucy stated.  “You didn’t,” Lucy argued.  “Because you needed my money.  But I had another choice, and I took it, and it was the best thing I ever did.”

Lucy turned and made moves to approach the door.  Lockwood did not move; he had a feeling she was not yet done, a suspicion that ultimately proved to be true, as Lucy turned back to face her mother.  Her hand, though, was still on the doorknob; she clearly sought to keep her exit strategy active.  

“I can forgive you for taking all my money all those years.  I can forgive you for how cold and heartless you were.  I can forgive you for the fact that you never told me you loved me.  You just don’t have it in you, and it’s shitty, but it is what it is.

“But I can’t forgive you for demanding I go back to that asshole.  I can’t forgive you for demanding I grovel for a job I didn’t want or, actually, need.  I can’t forgive you for the fact that by ordering me to do that, you were completely disregarding how important Norrie and the others were to me—that you thought I could ever work for the man that got them killed.  I can’t forgive you for it.”  

With that, she grabbed Lockwood’s hand and led them back to the Swan Hotel.  Evidently, they’d be getting their dinner out, after all.

[patiencetakestyme]

A Fair Price to Pay, Chapter 2

A/N:  Another day, another chapter! Just a chapter specific note here:  they go to visit Jacobs in this chapter.  He’s still running his agency because this is a Book!Locklyle fic.  In the show, “Penelope” shut Jacobs down, but I don’t remember her ever indicating that she does that in the books. I’m not perfect, though, so I might’ve missed it.  If she did shut him down, let me know; I like to keep my fics canon.  Either way, though, currently, for the purposes of this fic, he’s still in business.  

Much to Lucy’s displeasure, it took several days to arrange the journey to the north of England.  Lockwood knew she was eager to get the trip over with; if she had been able to just pack up and go that afternoon, she would’ve done it, so that she didn’t have to deal with building the trip up in her mind.  

But it was more complicated than that:  they had to contact and solicit approval from her mother, secure lodging—because, rightfully so, Lucy refused to stay with her mother, especially with Lockwood in tow—decide on the method and timing of their travel, close up all outlying cases, and distribute the work of new incoming cases amongst George, Holly, and Kipps.  

Barnes, too, was proving to be a persistent problem; he had requested a meeting every single day in the time since they had defeated Marissa Fittes.  He needed the help of agents to truly end the Problem:  agents would need to travel to the Other Side and derail Marissa’s system of trapping ghosts and prohibiting them from crossing over.  These agents would then have to return repeatedly, traveling to the Other Side as often as necessary, until all of Marissa’s methods of blockading ghosts were removed.  

It would be dangerous work, and they would be paid handsomely for it, especially given the fact that they were, to date, the only agency that had successfully traveled to the Other Side.  In fact, they had not managed the journey once, but twice.  

Lockwood had pushed back on taking meetings with Barnes, particularly after checking in with his associates.  There was a general consensus amongst the members of Lockwood & Co.:  they needed a break.  Defeating Marissa Fittes had been hard work, and only a few meager weeks had passed since the battle at Fittes agency.  

Regardless, Lockwood clung stubbornly to the fact that they were the agency for the job; he had reassured Barnes that they would do the work, but he was determined to wait until his team was ready.  

The mental and physical health of his associates was improving with every day.  When he and Lucy returned from this trip, he intended to check in with them again, in the hope that they could maybe be ready to tackle the next step in ending the Problem.  

After nearly a week of planning and of reassuring Barnes that they would be ready to work shortly after their return, they were finally boarding the train that would carry them to Cheviot Hills, the little town in the north of England that Lucy had hailed from.   

His companion was a beautifully strange one.  At times, it felt like Lucy could be two very different people.  In the field, she was—typically—quite good in a crisis; she knew just when to be spontaneous and just when to be rational.  In the heat of the moment, she could pull herself together and pack a wicked punch.  

Granted, there were times when this powerful practicality could falter.  It didn’t happen often in a fight, but it had happened.  She was far more likely to falter when she had time to think about things.  Her rationality quickly got cast aside to be replaced with insecurities: a fluctuating sense of self-esteem, an unnecessary streak of jealousy and a brutally competitive nature.  

This proved particularly true regarding women.  Flo and Holly had a way of bringing this side out in her in a way that Lockwood rarely, if ever, saw around himself, George, or Kipps.  It was when she was left alone with Flo or Holly on a case that her drive for competition could bubble over, pushing her practicality out the door, with no regard for the costs.  

Lockwood had his own theory for why this was the case, and it was the very reason they were now sitting on this train headed to the north of England.  The impact the prospect of this trip had had upon her over the course of the last week certainly leant itself towards confirming his theory, and he had been primed to truly test it once they had arrived.  

But now, on the morning of their day of travel, he found that his test was already well underway.  The change in Lucy’s demeanor had been noticeable instantaneously:  from the moment they had gotten up this morning—and, of course, from the moment Lockwood had followed through on his promise of breakfast and tea provided by Arif’s—she had been fundamentally different.  

As he felt her slipping from the confident, stubborn, and resilient Lucy he knew and loved from the battlefield into the insecure, stressed, and unpredictable Lucy he knew and loved from the knockout fights she had shared with Flo and Holly in the past, he reached for her hand and kept his eyes locked on hers.  And even though she didn’t bring her eyes to meet his—choosing, instead, to favor the rhythmic release of deep breaths—he felt her appreciation, as her grip on his hand tightened and loosened to mirror the motions of her breathing.  

“So, where are we going first?” she asked, her eyes still not quite meeting his.  The question seemed, to Lockwood, to be a method of attempting to distract herself.  He supported the maneuver and sought to encourage it by preparing to enter conversation.  

“Well, I have three places I’d like to see,” he started, releasing a thoughtful sigh.  “Jacobs’s, then your childhood home before settling in at…” he trailed off, trying to remember the name of the hotel.  “What’s it called again?”

“The Swan Hotel,” she answered, her eyes still out of focus.  “Worked a case there once,” she mentioned, almost as if it were an afterthought.  

“Did you?” he asked, his tone curious but not pushy.  

She nodded.  “No one wanted to stay in the rooms because of ‘strange, unusual feelings,’” she answered, with scoff.  “Turned out to be just a couple of Lurkers causing some hefty malaise.”  

He nodded and bit back a smile.  He liked that he was already learning more about the time she had spent in Cheviot Hill.  

“We’ll have to do the memorial in the morning,” he added.  “I’m afraid there won’t be time to get there this afternoon or evening, on top of visiting Jacobs’s and your mother.”

She hesitated, her eyes glancing to his.  “Wait to make that judgment until you actually see the town.  I think we’ll be just fine,” she scoffed.  

“We’ll see,” he answered, cheekily.  “We’ll swing by Jacobs’s first.  We don’t need to linger there:  no reason to go in and see the asshole, after all.”

“Then why go at all?” she asked, with another scoff and a roll of her eyes.  

“I want to see where you got your grades one through four, of course.”  He smirked.

“You mean my grades one through three,” she corrected.  

He furrowed his brow.  “I’m pretty sure you told me you passed your grades one through four in your time there, didn’t you?  That’s what I told Barnes, anyway,” he added, with a shrug. 

She laughed, and he was happy to see her relaxing a bit, if only slightly.  

“Then, of course, we will have dinner with your mother and any of your siblings that decide to join.”

“Yeah, who knows who’ll be there,” she spat, and he could see that slight bitterness returning to the edges of her disposition.  

Quickly, he moved to change the topic.  

“Finally, in the morning, we will go to visit Norrie’s memorial.”

She nodded but said nothing.  He could feel the sadness rolling off of her.  Instinctively, he gave her hand a squeeze.  

Thankfully, the train ride wasn’t overly long and taxing, at least not from Lockwood’s perspective.  He felt fairly confident Lucy might feel differently, though, as she sprung up and grabbed her bag as soon as the train stopped moving.  She seemed eager to get this started so that it could be over all the quicker.  

Lockwood followed her as she disembarked from the train.  What he found shouldn’t have been overly surprising, given the warning she had issued on their journey up north, yet it still managed to shock him, anyway.  

There was…nothing.  They were at a train station that appeared to be just a short way off from the heart of town, but there was not much ‘town’ to the town.  There was a small pub, nestled not far from the Swan Hotel, which would be their home for the night.  The memorial—or what he assumed was the memorial, due to its placement within the center of the town—was, like the pub and hotel, literally visible from the platform of the train station.  The only destination he was unsure of was Lucy’s home, but that was only because he didn’t know which one of the row homes was hers.  

“Wow,” he started, drawing her eyes directly to his.  “It’s…nice,” he commented, managing to salvage his tone at just the last second.  

“No, it’s not,” she scoffed.  “See why I said we wouldn’t be too crunched for time?”

He started by nodding, as he continued to gather his thoughts on the matter.  “Luce, your life at Portland Row…” he trailed off, unsure of what to say next.  

“Yeah,” she picked up the mantle for him.  “It’s a welcome change from this.”  

Unable to resist the impulse, he ran his fingers down her arm, seeking to interlace his fingers with hers.  Silently, they shuffled their bags to a more comfortable position, before taking their preliminary steps off the train platform.  

“Take me to Jacobs’s,” he requested, allowing her to lead the way.  

Unsurprisingly, they were there in no more than a fifteen-minute walk.  It was a small, unassuming building, with a sloped, thatched roof.  Lockwood found himself struggling with describing it, as there was, frankly, nothing distinctive about it.

“Well, I’m biased of course,” he started, his eyes still glued to the house.  “But Portland Row is vastly superior.”

“You don’t need to tell me twice,” Lucy agreed.  

“What is it I don’t need to tell you twice, Ms. Carlyle?”  A voice broke in, interrupting their conversation.  Instantly, Lucy’s entire disposition changed.  Lockwood heard her draw in a breath; her eyes ran to lock on a spot of pavement at her feet.  Her grip on his hand tightened, and she grew so pale that Lockwood feared she might get sick.  

No further explanations were needed beyond the change in her demeanor.  This man, who had spoken from somewhere behind them, was none other than Jacobs.  

“If it’s ordering you to leave, it appears I actually do need to tell you twice,” the man finished, but Lockwood was already turning to face him.  He refused to let go of Lucy’s hand, so he settled for angling his body so that his head could cast a casual glance at the scum of the earth that was now standing on the pavement directly behind them.  Lucy did not turn to face the man, and Lockwood could not say he blamed her.  

“Ah!” Lockwood exclaimed excitedly, the picture of willful ignorance.  “You must be Mr. Jacobs.”  He extended his right hand, the one that was not currently occupied by holding Lucy’s, with the intention of allowing this wretched man the opportunity to, at the very least, shake politely.  The man narrowed his eyes and seemingly declined to shake Lockwood’s hand.  

He checked his smile; Lockwood had taken the high road, knowing Jacobs would not meet him there, and thus, he had proven that he was even more superior to Jacobs than he had originally theorized.  

“Lockwood,” he supplied, even though the man rudely failed to ask.  

“I assume you are the unfortunate soul that has employed Ms. Carlyle in the wake of her termination,” Jacobs asked.  

“And I assume, then, that you are the unfortunate soul that abstains from reading the papers,” he answered easily, with a humorless laugh.  “Have you not followed Ms. Carlyle’s exploits in the time since she made the extremely enlightened decision to resign from your employment?”  He paused, his smile almost lecherous.  “It was a fair price for her to pay, don’t you think?  Leaving you behind to solve the Problem?”

“I fired her,” Jacobs corrected.

“Oh,” Lockwood put his hand to his chest, as if in apology.  “My mistake, of course.  I suppose I assumed no one in their right mind would’ve willingly fired the woman who went on to end the Problem.”  

“That’s nothing but a lie,” Jacobs defended, with a shake of his head.  “Lies made up to cover yet more mistakes by this callous, cold woman,” he continued, with a nod to Lucy.  Her eyes finally came up to meet Jacobs’s, and Lockwood could practically taste the hatred he saw there.  He didn’t blame her in the slightest.  “There has been no end to the Problem; I’ve certainly seen no change in the number of cases coming across my desk.”

“Yes,” Lockwood drawled.  “That makes sense,” he conceded.  “I assume you had no cases prior to Lucy killing Marissa Fittes, and that it is likely to be much the same now.  After all, any client coming to your office should be able to tell quite instantly, and just from talking to you, that you are full of shit and a bloody awful supervisor.”  

“Yet more lies,” Jacobs answered, seemingly unfazed.  He was all eyes for Lucy; it was almost as if he were challenging her.  Fortunately, Lockwood knew she was nothing if not up for the challenge.  He knew he just needed to buy her time:  buy her time to find her bearings.

“You once told me that you had the privilege of being in the same room as Marissa Fittes, a very long time ago,” Lucy interrupted, taking her turn to enter the conversation.  Her tone was deceptively cold and detached; Lockwood knew, in an instant, that her bearings had been found.  

Lockwood could barely check his smirk.  This was Lucy in her finest form; she was mounting the attack, preparing to strike, and he couldn’t wait to see it all play out.  “That she came to see you training one day at Fittes or some shit,” she carried on, with a dismissive wave of the hand that wasn’t holding Lockwood’s.  “You told Norrie and I that you had been close to history that day—closer than we’d ever be.  

“Norrie never got the chance,” she acknowledged, dropping his hand so that she could go physically on the offensive, taking a few steps to approach Jacobs.  She shifted to cross her arms resolutely over her chest.  “You saw to that when you chose to wait outside Wythburn Mill like the coward that you are.  You killed her, Jacobs,” she spat.  “The court may never recognize that, the ridiculous people of this town may never recognize that, but you do:  I know you do, if the fact that you smell even more like a liquor store than you did when I worked with you all those years ago is to mean anything.   

“Norrie didn’t make it,” she continued, nodding.  “But I did.  I stood in a room with Marissa Fittes.  I killed Marissa Fittes.  I destroyed her and the Problem.  I wonder, Mr. Jacobs,” she continued, her tone becoming innocent, questioning.  “What is it that you have done with your life?”  

“Oh, I know,” Lockwood supplied, taking a few steps to come to stand next to Lucy, his eyes trained on her.  “He trained the greatest agent of all time:  gave her her grades one through three.”  Lockwood paused, turning his eyes to take in the sight of Jacobs.  “The best Listener in the country, the agent responsible for making my agency the best and most successful agency in London.”  He paused again, nearly salivating at the words he had sitting on the tip of his tongue.  “Thanks for that.”  

And, with that, they walked away, hand in hand.  

[patiencetakestyme]

A Fair Price to Pay: Chapter 1 (A Continuation of "What She Deserves")

A/N:  After completing my own version of what I have come to know as a “the walk” fic, and after Netflix's disastrous decision, I've been hard at work; I have decided to turn my first fic into a series.  I want to explore some key moments in Book!Locklyle’s relationship.  I was writing a fic in which they retire (the now third and final fic in this series) when a throwaway line inspired me to compose an entire additional fic:  what would it look like if Lockwood met Lucy’s mother?  

This fic is a sequel to “What She Deserves,” which can be found here, but you can definitely read this fic without reading that one first!  

One last note:  over the course of this fic, I did choose to integrate one key part of Show!Lucy’s character.  I feel pretty confident you’ll recognize it readily.  

I hope you enjoy reading this!

After defeating Marissa Fittes and theoretically reducing, if not solving, the Problem together, there had been three items of priority for Lockwood:  giving Lucy his mother’s necklace, securing their status as committed to each other, and asking her to move in with him—to share the bedroom his parents had once shared.  

To complete one was to complete them all.  A bit of exposition was required, of course—a conversation to be had; he had it, and, a mere few weeks after defeating Marissa Fittes, he had secured their position:  they were together, sharing not only the physical space of the room, but the mental and emotional space that came with truly being in a relationship.  

Quickly, they settled into a new routine.  The house would share a late breakfast; anyone staying overnight was invited, although that list varied from night to night:  from Kipps, to Holly, to Flo, Portland Row had picked up its fair share of boarders over the last few weeks.  They would then spend their afternoon and evening making progress on whatever their current case may be, whether that meant research, or recon, or an actual visit to a haunted house, or preparing for the task of helping Barnes and DEPRAC put the final nail in the coffin that was the Problem.  

Cases were not what Lockwood would call drastically limited.  While the number of reported ghosts was reducing every single day, the Problem was not entirely fixed—not yet.  There was speculation that it would never be fixed—not fully.  After all, even prior to Marissa Fittes’ efforts to intervene, some ghosts had returned from the dead; it had merely been a far more reasonable number.  

In the late hours of the night or the early hours of the morning—whenever their case wrapped up for the night—the whole lot of them would shuffle back to Portland Row.  Anyone that wanted to stay over would; Lockwood had stopped verbally making the offer:  it was now simply implied at the close of every night.  Kipps would take the couch.  Holly never stayed, but Lockwood had issued an open invitation for her to occupy the guest room.  

Lucy would, of course, do her shuffling back to the master bedroom.  She and Lockwood would complete the minimal amount needed to ready themselves for bed before simply collapsing between the covers; showering was left for the actual light of day in the morning.  

What Lockwood was unsure of was whether the others knew.  Did they know that she no longer occupied the bedroom in the attic?  Did they know that they were openly in a relationship, albeit somewhat private about it?  Did they know that they exchanged a kiss and a declaration of love every night before falling asleep?  Did they know that they enjoyed nothing more than falling asleep in each other’s arms after a hard night on the job?

Okay, he was fairly certain they did not know the last two items, but he was equally as certain that they, at the very least, suspected the first two.  No one ever watched them go upstairs; George liked to make a pitstop in the kitchen for a bedtime snack before heading up to his room, so they had never been spotted—as far as they knew—going into the master bedroom together.  But George was smart; Lockwood knew better than to underestimate him.  

They had never kissed in front of George.  They had held hands in front of George, but quite frankly, given Lockwood’s proclivity for holding hands with Lucy that had originated from her time of joining the agency, this probably wasn’t enough to be deemed a red flag from George.  Still, he had a feeling George knew.

It wouldn’t bother Lockwood:  if and when George figured it out.  In fact, it would’ve made him quite happy for George to know about it.  But Lockwood was, for all of his charm and charisma, a private person by nature.  If George figured it out on his own account, that was perfectly fine, but Lockwood wasn’t about to open up his heart and soul and describe how much his relationship with Lucy meant to him.  

And it did mean a lot—more than he could probably convey to George, even if he had tried.  Their relationship was simultaneously so fresh and so practiced; they had only been together formally for a few weeks, but, at the same time, it felt like they had been together oh-so long.  It felt comfortingly familiar, and on this particular morning, that sense of comfort was enough to prompt him to pull her in just a little bit closer.  

He should’ve perhaps not done that, given that she was still sleeping and that it did ultimately cause her to start to stir, but in his opinion, it was worth the price:  a slightly grumpy, yet awake, Lucy, still afforded him extra time with Lucy.  

He waited until she turned to face him, not wanting to wake her prematurely—well, more than he already had.  

“Good morning,” he said, his smile already at full wattage.  

Lucy groaned; she didn’t tend to be overly affectionate in the mornings, at least, not until she had some tea.  Still, the fact that he already knew her well enough to know to expect this had been part of the driving force behind the radiance of his smile.  

“Sleep well?” he asked.  

He received another groan in response.  

“What time is it?” she asked.  

With a casual glance over her shoulder to the clock residing on her nightstand, he was able to answer.  “Just shy of ten o’clock.  George will be cooking already, undeniably.”  

With another groan, Lucy shifted in bed.  

“It’s okay,” he reassured while moving to sit up in bed; he usually took first shower, as, unsurprisingly, it took him far longer to get ready than her.  “You know what that means:  you’re likely to have your tea very soon.”  

Lucy propped herself up, specifically with the purpose of casting a glare at him.  She threw a pillow at him as he removed himself from bed and made his way to the shower, but she settled back in, intending to make the most of this time, in an attempt to acquire more rest.  

On the way to the en-suite bathroom, he caught a glimpse at some of her possessions.  Over the course of the last few days, Lucy had moved all of her things so that they now resided in the master bedroom.  While they were still in the process of organizing her possessions, one thing had already been displayed prominently:  pictures from Lucy’s time at Jacobs’s agency.  There were several Polaroids displayed, most of which featured someone Lockwood knew to be very important to Lucy:  Norrie.  

While Lucy was probably already back asleep —and unsurprisingly, he had a habit of taking inordinately long showers, which, in turn, provided Lucy an inordinately long period of time to ascertain some supplemental sleep—Lockwood could admit that his thoughts were not quite so much at peace.  The images of the people in her pictures had stirred something in him.  It had given him an idea, but it was one he was, frankly, rather anxious to share with Lucy.  

She did not like discussing her past.  She had shared her history with George and Lockwood, of course, and while it had not taken her as long to open up as it had for Lockwood, it still had taken quite a long time, by what Lockwood assumed were ‘normal’ standards.  He knew the edges of the story—just how wretched her childhood had been, just how horrible Jacobs had been to her—but he knew nothing of the details.  

They were together now:  fully and completely.  In some regards, he suspected they shared more than some married couples.  And while he would never pressure her to share before she was ready, he did find that he would like to know more about that time in her life.  

By the end of his inordinately long shower, he was decided.  He would not push her on the issue unnecessarily, but he would start to perhaps prod her on the matter.  

He exited the bathroom and was unsurprised to see that Lucy had fallen back asleep.  With an affectionate smile and scoff, he engaged in what had become their daily ritual.  He snuck downstairs to the kitchen.  When he found no sign of George, he did as he always did:  he brewed a pot of tea, pouring a singular cup to Lucy’s exact preferences:  a little tea to go with her sugar.  

He returned to their room and found Lucy asleep and snoring.  With a loving shake of the head, he approached the bed, placing the cup of tea on an already in-place coaster.  Leaning in, he ran a soothing hand up and down the course of her back.  The cotton of her top for her pajamas was soft and warm under his fingers, and it moved with every deep, snoring inhalation she drew.  

“Luce,” he whispered gently.  “I made you a cup of tea.  It’s your turn for the shower.”  

She stirred, slowly taking in the sight of him.  He was not fully dressed; he left that matter, nearly equally as complicated as the process by which he washed his hair, for while she was in the shower.  But he did have his pajama bottoms back in place, albeit with no shirt.  Even with the quick detour to brew the cup of tea, his hair was still damp; he could feel the droplets of water running down his back and chest as a result of his hunched position over the bed.  

He saw her eyes find their focus.  She nodded and stumbled from the bed, clearly still very groggy.  With a swipe, she scooped up the cup of tea, taking several hearty sips, even as she continued to walk and carry it with her in the direction of the bathroom.  This was done, clearly, in anticipation of showering with the thing.  As she continued to struggle, he laughed and used a singular hand to lower the cup of tea, clearing her line of vision. Next, he moved to place a hand on each shoulder as a method of guiding her towards the bathroom.  

Lucy was also known for taking long showers—with her tea to keep her company, naturally—but hers were lengthy for a very different reason.  While Lockwood had a complicated and fairly high-maintenance routine to engage in with his hair, Lucy had a habit of falling back asleep in the shower.  

He had yet to gather the courage to break in there and see to waking her with a poke or a prod—nor had the situation required it thus far—but, several times, he had been forced to wake her with a call from beyond the protection of the door.  Still, he feared the day was coming when that would be insufficient:  already, there had been a number of occasions during which she had required more than one reissued wake up call.  

Regardless, he used his time well; he settled into his routine:  picking out his crisp, pressed shirt and pants for the day, choosing his tie, choosing his socks, and, last but, of course, not least, polishing it all off with his new coat.  Thinking through the possibilities of the conversation he wished to engage in with Lucy once she exited the shower, he thought he just might benefit from being armed with his coat.  Beyond that, his continued slight resistance to the coat made him feel compelled to place himself in a position where he could start to break it in from the comfort of Portland Row.  

As high maintenance as his routine was, it was fairly monotonous; he used this time well mentally, too, internally plotting out how he could manipulate their post-shower conversation to meet the ends he desired. 

Lucy emerged from the bathroom after two promptings from Lockwood.  She still looked a bit weary, but, armed with her now tapped teacup, she was definitely in the process of coming back to life.  Her shower typically did wonders for her morning mood.

This was, admittedly, one of Lockwood’s favorite moments of the day:  Lucy, emerging from the shower, smelling strongly of her shampoo and conditioner, her hair wild and untamed and, holistically, not all that different from the way it looked the rest of the day.  It was when he realized just how much he inherently loved Lucy—just as she was.  She, unlike him, was not one for a high-maintenance morning routine.  She exited the shower, and she was his Lucy, and there was something intrinsic that he loved about that—about her.  

“Feel better?” he asked, his smile leaning towards a smirk.  

“Getting there,” she conceded, as she tossed her pajamas on a nearby chair.  Lockwood checked his grumble; this was one thing they were currently working through about living together:  she was far less tidy than he was.  Fortunately, he was fairly accommodating; he understood that that was simply Lucy, and he’d admit that he loved her all the more for it.  “A second cup of tea wouldn’t hurt.”

“Fair point,” he started, before pausing briefly to listen to the reports of the groaning of Portland Row’s floorboards.  “It doesn’t sound like George is up yet.  Must be having a bit of a lie in,” he pondered.  “Want to go grab a coffee from Arif’s while we wait?”  

This move was out of the norm for them, a fact Lucy’s questioning glance confirmed instantly.  Typically, if they were up before George, they would merely make their way to the kitchen and brew a secondary pot of tea there.  To go out was a special treat, and the move immediately got flagged as such in Lucy’s mind.  

“Go out?” she asked, with a furrowing of her brow.  

He nodded.  “Why not?”  He considered elaborating, but he thought better of it at the last moment; when it came to a suspicious Lucy, less information was always for the best.  

“Fine,” she conceded, as she grabbed her coat.  “But you’re buying, since it was your suggestion.”

He smiled, released a humorless laugh, and gave a silly shake of his head.  “Fair,” he offered again, as he followed her out the bedroom door and down the stairs.  

“Are we buying breakfast too?” Lucy asked, holding the front door open so that he could follow her.  

“And risk insulting George by implying that Arif’s donuts are tastier than anything he can craft?” he scoffed.

“Or,” Lucy started, pointedly, “we risk insulting him by going to Arif’s and not bringing donuts back for him.”  

“Hmm,” Lockwood hummed.  “Good counterpoint.  Yes, we should buy him some donuts.”  

Arif’s was but a short walk away, so Lockwood knew that he had no time to waste; he settled in, and moved to strike.  “Did you ever do this back home?” he asked, with a nod down the street in the direction of Arif’s.  At her confused expression, he sought to elaborate.  “Did you have a shop where you could go get some donuts and coffee?”

She nodded, but the squinting of her eyes hinted at her suspicions.  “Yeah, but it wasn’t nearly as good as Arif’s.  I didn’t run off to the shop very often.”  

“Why?  Just because it wasn’t very good?” he asked, already suspecting there was more to it than that.  

“Wasn’t a lot of time for it, I guess,” she started, with a shrug and a sigh.  “I was never home:  spent practically all my time at Jacobs’s, trying to pass my grades one through four as quickly as possible.”

“Because you needed to get out,” he supplied.

She nodded but said nothing more.

“What was it like:  growing up with your mother?”  

She stalled, both in the conversation and in their walk.  Her eyes came to his as her feet stopped moving, and she opened her mouth, but no words came out for a series of several seconds.    

“I’ve told you—” she started.

He shook his head.  “You’ve told me the end of the story:  forcing you to seek employment with Jacobs, depositing your wages into her own account, and, eventually, refusing to believe you about the Wythburn Mill incident.”

She hesitated, and Lockwood could admit that he found himself curious as to what, specifically, had caused her hesitation.  “You remember the name of it?”

“The name of what?” he asked.  

“The mill?”

“Of course,” he responded, easily, with a scoff.  “It was a formative moment for you, was it not?”

She managed nothing but a nod. 

“Then, of course I remember it.  I make it my business to remember the struggles of my employees, Luce.  Cotton Street for Holly, Rupert Gale’s assault against George, the Chelsea Outbreak and the loss of Ned Shaw for Kipps, the chapel for Flo:  these were important moments for the people who are important in my life, so they are, naturally, important to me too.  

“But it’s different for you, I’ll admit,” he continued, looking to the ground, as he admittedly suddenly felt uncharacteristically bashful.  He resumed their walk and hoped she would continue walking with him; he needed something proactive to do.  “You are the most important person in my life, so, therefore, unsurprisingly, your most formative moment is of the highest importance.”  

He chanced a glance at her, and he was unsurprised to find that she would not meet his eyes.  She got like this—when she was trying her best to check her emotions.  The situation with her mother was, undeniably, a traumatic experience for her, but it was of the past; Lucy tended to firmly live in the now, and confronting the past, particularly such a painful part of the past, was not on her list of endorsed activities.  

But that wasn’t true for Lockwood, and they both knew it.  Yes, Lockwood publicly avoided digging into his past.  He wasn’t one to talk about it.  Hell, he still hadn’t told Kipps and Flo everything, and what he had shared with George had been spotty at best.  

But he wore it on his sleeves every single day.  He didn’t talk about it, but there wasn’t a day he didn’t replay the horrific mistake he made with Jessica that had cost her her life.  He didn’t talk about it, but there wasn’t a day he didn’t think of how much it meant to him that she had taken up the burden of serving as his guardian after their uncle had died.  He didn’t talk about it, but there wasn’t a day he wasn’t haunted by the image of the ghosts of his parents lingering in the garden.  He didn’t talk about it, but there wasn’t a day he didn’t think fondly of his parents, of the affection they had shown him as a boy.  

He refused to talk about his past, but he could acknowledge, privately or with just the right person, how haunted he was by it.  Lucy had discussed her past, albeit briefly, and while Lockwood was confident she was haunted by her past, he wasn’t certain to what degree she was consciously aware of it.  Her past—the situation with Jacobs, her relationship with Norrie, her disagreements with her mother—impacted nearly every single decision she had made and relationship she had formed in the time since, but Lockwood was fairly certain she was completely unaware of just how much these events impacted her; it was completely and utterly subconscious.  

Lockwood knew he needed to proceed with caution.  He didn’t wish to destroy her, torture her; realizing just how much these events had impacted her as a person had the power to do just that.  What he was embarking on was a dangerous task.  He needed to find a delicate balance:  help her realize her subconscious baggage without placing her in a position where it set her on a downward spiral.  

But his goal—it was worth the risk.  She deserved to have an opportunity to broaden her understanding of her own character, her own traumas—to start working on healing from those traumas.  She owed it to herself, and Lockwood knew he was the perfect person to get the job done.  She guided him through processing the trauma that had resulted from his experiences with his parents and his sister.  It was only fair that he do the same for her when she needed it.  

“Growing up with my mother…” she trailed off, as she attempted to resume the conversation where they had paused it, but he could see that she was visibly struggling.  “She was mean, and she was cold.  After Wythburn Mill…” she trailed off once more, and Lockwood could see her struggling again.  “She didn’t believe me.  No one believed me.  I didn’t like that she was taking my salary, but I got it:  I still lived at home, so,” she paused, with a shrug.  “It was fine.  

“But when she didn’t believe me—when she legitimately thought I had it in me to put those other agents at risk—especially Norrie,” she continued, only to pause again, this time to resolutely shake her head.  “That was the final nail in the coffin, so to speak.  I had to leave.  I had to be done.”  

“I think we should go for a visit.”  

Once again, this shocking turn of events in the conversation brought her feet to a stop.  While he had expected this shock, he didn’t want it to come off as if he had expected it too much; he slowed his pace and turned to face her equally as slowly.  He squared his shoulders and brought his hands to meet behind his back as he pulled himself up to stand as straight as possible; a fight was coming, and he knew he needed to be prepared.  

“Why?” she asked.  Lockwood wasn’t overly thrilled at this particular question.  It was actually a legitimate question, and it implied that his element of surprise had been lost, if he had ever really had it to begin with.  Taking Lucy by surprise in a conversation had been extremely beneficial for him previously, but it appeared she might just be learning his usual tricks.  

He shrugged and decided to play it safe.  “I want to see where you grew up.”  It was true; this was one of his goals, but his underlying goal was quite different from what he was suggesting here.  “We’re together now, aren’t we, Luce?” he asked, and although he tried his hardest to merely state it as a fact, he felt the spike in his heart rate and knew it was, at its core, a question.  

Her eyes snapped to his, and he noticed that she seemed to recognize his anxiety.  Slowly, she nodded, almost as if she were taken by surprise at his lack of certainty in the matter.  

“Lovely, then,” he answered, his tone resuming its calm and cool nature.  “Then, I think it’s perfectly reasonable that I get to see where you grew up:  see your childhood home, see where you trained, see the memorial for your family from Jacobs’s agency so that we may grieve the loss of them together.”

“Why?” she spat, her voice definitely having a biting edge to it.  To her credit, she winced at the sound of it, moments later.  With a shake of her head, she seemed to reset.  “I mean, why would you want to see that?  It’s nothing but…” she trailed off, her eyes drifting out of focus as she did so.  “Bad energy hanging about.”  

“I understand.  I know this is going to be hard for you to face,” he conceded.  As he continued, his volume decreased, and he took several steps to draw in closer to her.  “But you will have me by your side,” he suggested, his smile small but inviting.  “I will help you through it, will I not?”  

“Lockwood,” she started, with a small scoff and a roll of her eyes.  “Don’t take this the wrong way,” she prefaced, and he found himself bearing down, preparing, knowing, even as he did, that it was not likely to work:  it was very likely that whatever she had to say would leave him feeling indignant.  “I don’t think anything could make this tolerable, not even you.”  

He nodded, understanding, and doing his best not to show that it hurt a bit that she thought that.  Still, already, his mind was at work, preparing the next phase of his argument.  

“This will be hard for you?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Painful?”

She nodded.  

“You will have to face things that have plagued you for many years?”

She nodded.

“Things that have been hard at work creating your worst insecurities for many years?”

She nodded.  

“Perhaps not so dissimilar to how I felt standing on the landing, my hand poised on Jessica’s bedroom door, then,” he suggested, his tone nothing but mildly curious.  There was no accusation to be had there, but he didn’t need it to be in his tone:  his words carried the argument for him.  

Lucy’s entire demeanor changed instantly.  She scoffed.  She rolled her eyes, and they did not return to look at him for several seconds.  She crossed her arms over her chest.  She tisked.  She winced.  She shook her head.  

He had won, and she knew it.  

“And, of course, when I took you to visit the gravesite for my parents.  And, of course, when we discovered—together—that, not only was Marissa Fittes alive, but that she had actually been the one to kill my parents.  And, of course, when I told you what it felt like to see the ghosts of my parents from outside my bedroom window—”

“Yes, yes, yes,” she started, with a heavy sigh.  “You’ve made your point.  No need to dig it in, is there?” she asked, her eyes finally coming back to meet his.  

“I’m not trying to hurt you,” he acknowledged, his voice barely above a whisper.  As if on a reflex, his hand came up to cup her neck and weave his fingers through the hair at the base of her neck.  “I’m not trying to vindictively reopen old wounds by taking you back there.  But I do hope that maybe—just maybe—by going back there and confronting it—confronting her—you can actually start to allow these old wounds to truly heal.”

“They’re healed,” she spat, indignantly.

He did not say a word.  With a quirk of an eyebrow and an accusatory tilt of his head, he allowed his expression to carry the weight of his argument.  

“Well, I’m better off than I was,” Lucy conceded.  

“But not as healed as you could be,” he suggested, with a nod.  “And as we are living together now, I feel it is my personal responsibility to help you in this task.”  

Lucy was silent for what felt like an eternity.  Lockwood did his best to be patient—to wait her out, to give her the time she needed to process this incredibly large request.  But with every second, he could admit—privately, if not publicly—that it became harder and harder to wait.  

Finally, when he felt as though he was about to jump out of his skin, she muttered a very small and displeased, “fine.”  In the blink of an eye, she extracted herself from his hold, turning to resume their pace towards Arif’s.  Before he could even think to start moving to follow her, she had already thrown a biting comment at him over her shoulder:  “but you better buy me tea and donuts on that day too.”  

With a smirk and a scoff, he readily agreed.  It was a fair price to pay, in his opinion.  

[patiencetakestyme]

What She Deserves: Locklyle Fic

A/N:  After watching Lockwood & Co. on repeat for over a month, I dug into the books, and I just finished them.  The ending left something to be desired, in my opinion.  Don’t get me wrong:  I love the books, I love the characters, I love how the plot wrapped up.  But that last scene between Lockwood and Lucy…something was missing, and it wasn’t just a kiss.  This is my attempt to contribute to that scene; it picks up basically right where the last page ends.  Oh, and it’s in Lockwood’s POV!  

What’s to follow is nothing extraordinary, I’m sure; I’m sure this has all been done before and has probably been done better.  I’m new to the fandom, so I have not perused a lot of fics, so I’m sure something like this exists out there.  But there was just something nagging at me when I finished that last page, and I felt like I just had to get it out and get it on the page.  This is my attempt at doing that.  I hope you enjoy it! 

Warning: There are spoilers for the entire book series throughout this one-shot but especially The Empty Grave. You've been warned!

As he waited on the curb where it met 35 Portland Row, Lockwood found himself fidgeting.  He was usually the image of charm, poise:  a cool collective in a crisis.  

But today was different, for a number of reasons.  For starters, he couldn’t stop tugging at the collar of his new coat.  Sure, unlike his old one, it was not plagued by the claw marks from the opening of Mrs. Barrett’s tomb, but what it made up in novelty it lacked in character; he found himself missing the old, familiar, comfortable coat he had owned for many years.  

Still, the coat had been sacrificed in an effort to save Kipps, and as that effort had ultimately proven successful, he did his best not to mourn the coat too much.  It had died serving a good cause.  With a return of his smile, he found that that brought him quite a bit of comfort and joy.  

But it was not only the coat that caused him discomfort on this particular day.  He was waiting for Lucy, and there was a certain measured weight to this waiting period.  

Would she be wearing the necklace?  Every second that ticked by—he counted them.  The longer it took her to join him, the longer she had spent considering the gift.  Did she approve of it?  Did it offend her?  Did she understand—truly understand—the full complexities of the message he was attempting to send with such a gift?  Did she even see it, carefully concealed, wrapped around the legal paperwork he had delivered?  

With a sigh and another counted second, he came to a realization that he suspected he had always known deep down:  he owed her more than that.  A vague—yet weighted—gesture that may or may not be misinterpreted—or, hell, even seen—was not proportionate to what she meant to him.  

He knew what that meant—what he had to do.  He would need to be more direct; Lucy appreciated straightforward, raw, and honest communication.  

He knew that, of course—had known it for many years.  But just as he knew that was what she might need from this conversation, he was equally as aware of his struggle to provide that for her.  

He was great at fooling people.  He was always so good at talking to the others.  Need a motivating speech to breathe new life into your bedraggled army?  Lockwood was your man.  Need a condescending comment thrown casually—yet oh-so pointedly and painfully—that will simultaneously help you become a better person and make you feel like the worst human being alive?  Lockwood was your man.  Need someone to put George in his place when he was on his soapbox?  Lockwood was your man.  This skill—it had many applications. 

Expressing his private feelings was not one of those applications.  Opinions, observations, critiques, compliments—all of these things, he expressed quite easily.  

But anything personal?  His stories, his experiences, his traumas—his actual human feelings and emotions—all of these things came rarely if at all.  

It had frustrated Lucy for quite some time after they had first met; he knew that with confidence.  While he had always appreciated and respected what she chose to share with himself and George, she had struggled to understand why he had, in turn, failed to reciprocate.  

In her eyes, this felt like a lack of confidence:  an undermining of their relationship, worse, an impediment upon their relationship; he was sure of it.  If he wasn’t willing to share with her, did that mean that he, much like she had experienced with her own family, only kept her around for what she had to offer—for what she had to bring to the Thinking Cloth, so to speak?  

Lockwood keeping Lucy at arm’s length resulted in her doing much the same, which was, in a sense, ironic, as, while he kept her emotionally at a distance, physically, he called out to her at every turn.  Lockwood remembered all the times he had reached out to her—the caress of his hand on her arm, the way he would run that hand down her arm to interlink their fingers.  

He remembered, specifically, the first time they had really seen each other after George had been attacked.  His posture had been wrecked, his back aching with the burden he had carried.  He was responsible for what had happened to George; he had been the one to insist on George pursuing his research; he had been the one to keep pushing George towards that boundary.  

He could barely even bring himself to look at her—the stuttering, the stumbling, it was all there, just as he feared it would be again now, in this upcoming conversation.  

He remembered looking at his hands—his fingers.  He didn’t even recognize them as his own.  Then, just as suddenly, he—and those very hands—had led a revolt.  He threw pretense away; he swooped in, pulling her into a hug.  

That was how he communicated.  He suspected the situation with George had been enough to at least hint at this preference he coveted.  

In the time that had passed since the attack on George, he felt fairly confident she had now cracked that code:  that she now realized what he was doing, and how he was doing it.  That was merely how he chose to express his feelings.  He had always been one to reach for her, almost since the start of her time at the agency.  It had only increased with time, and since their first trip to the Other Side several months ago, he had grown increasingly reliant upon it.  

It was, to him, a simple truth:  he simply didn’t open up to people often.  But once he did, he knew it meant something.  He wondered if she saw it now—the weight that it carried; to him, their bond and their relationship had been cemented when he had opened up to her, when he had opened the door to Jessica’s room.  

Lockwood knew she was aware of this, to some extent at the very least.  Their dynamic had changed once he had started opening up.  She appreciated his words, and he could admit that he appreciated the challenge that came along with that:  the push to better himself in the task of sharing things—with her, at least, if no one else.  

Still, he could acknowledge that that was her preferred method of communication; she preferred words and gifts of sharing:  a sharing of information.  That was what she needed in this conversation, here and now:  for him to meet her in the middle and make sure her needs were met, as well as his.  

Another second had ticked by, but he was no longer worried; he could hear her running down the stairs.  Hearing her approach, he became even more resolved to his task.  It didn’t matter if she was wearing the necklace, he decided; he would make sure she heard what she needed to hear, necklace or no necklace.  

He turned to face her just as she reached the curb of Portland Row, his new coat billowing around him as he did so.  It wasn’t quite up to snuff with his old one yet, but he had hopes that it would be broadcasting his energy, sweeping anyone in the vicinity in and along for the ride, in no time.  Even still, the coat may not have been consistent, but his smile was; he could already feel it pulling at his lips before he even met Lucy’s eyes.  

Lockwood knew he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t help himself; his eyes wandered down, looking for the distinct sparkle of the necklace.  He spotted it at her neck, and his eyes couldn’t help lingering, taking in the sight of it.  To be honest, he stared at it.  He resumed counting the seconds again; at three, he forced himself to meet her eyes once more.  

Words weren’t exchanged, but an understanding passed.  He faltered in his goals; was putting words to his feelings strictly necessary, now that she had elected to wear the necklace?  

He thought about Lucy—about all that he knew about her, about all that he loved about her.  

Yes, it was necessary.  She deserved more, and she would get it.  

Silently, they fell into stride next to each other.  Dusk was setting; houses would be closing up very shortly.  With any hope, these days would be numbered.  

As always, he had a goal in mind:  a goal for their destination and the path they would take to get there, both in terms of the physical route as well as the trajectory of their conversation.  

Lockwood, true to form, started talking; he always had topics ready to avoid any form of apprehension:  he wanted to make everyone as comfortable as physically possible, and that meant avoiding uncomfortable silences at all costs.  

He started with familiar and comfortable topics, a fact Lucy seemed surprised by, if the widening of her eyes was meant to indicate anything.  They discussed any updates afforded by his most recent conversations with Barnes—things he had hesitated to tell the others just yet, for fear of a lack of permanence.  

Barnes had solicited their help in the matter of cleaning up the Fittes foils, and Lockwood had turned him down, but Barnes had remained quite adamant—far more adamant than Lockwood had let on to the others; he was still pressing the matter with Lockwood fairly regularly.  

Lucy was his partner.  He had gone to Hell and back with her—twice.  If there was anyone who should know the full extent of Barnes’s pressing, it was her.  He did not hesitate to share this with her, just as he knew he would not hesitate to hold the line with Barnes—just as he knew Lucy would not fear his ability to hold the line with Barnes.  He did not tell her this in an attempt to seek support on holding the line or to bolster his resolve; he was more than equipped on his own in that matter.  

No, he shared this with her so that she could hopefully feel appreciated:  so that she could feel consulted. He wanted her to feel validated.  Hopefully—selfishly, he amended, that voice in his head sounding:  the one that always appeared when he had something to blame himself for—sharing this with her and her alone would reaffirm the underlying initiative he sought in this conversation.  

As the topic of Barnes came to a natural close, he cleared his throat.  Perhaps he was imagining it, but he could nearly feel Lucy’s suspicions rolling off of her in waves; she had managed to feel the change in his tone, and it was reflected in her own mood.  

He could not say he was surprised; he was not one to hesitate, so it was unsurprising that this would raise a red flag for her.  He had done it moments before, in the attic, but that, too, was an uncommon experience for him.  Still, it didn’t overly concern him.  If she drew the connection, she would not be wrong; he was hesitating now, just as he had hesitated then, because of the sensitive matter of the content he wished to discuss.  

“Luce,” he started, once he thought he had found his footing; still, his eyes evaded hers—yet another uncommon sign that he knew she was likely to pick up on.  He hesitated yet again, only to laugh at his own embarrassment.  

With a shake of his head, he started again, settling into simply being honest and relying upon the realizations he, himself, had only managed to come to earlier.  “It’s so funny.  Words typically come so easily to me.  Manipulating Barnes into investigating Fittes?  Easy,” he released a humorless laugh.  “Persuading Kipps into the most dangerous action imaginable?  I didn’t even break a sweat.  But here, right now,” he released a deep sigh.  “I’m struggling to find my words.”  

He took another break, allowing himself to feel the full burden of the task he had undertaken.  He needed to do this—he owed her this.  Still, he felt his fingers flex reflexively; even subconsciously, his hand ached to reach out for her.  

Abruptly, Lucy’s hand was in his, her fingers weaving through to link with his own.  Warmth radiated from the meeting point, and he could feel that very warmth spreading through him from head to toe.  In no time whatsoever, it had reached his face, daring to escape from his smile, his eyes, as he moved his to meet hers.  

“This doesn’t mean you get the free pass,” she started, and he could hear the irony dripping from her voice; somehow, the challenge her words issued made the message he wished to convey even clearer, easier.  “Go on,” she waited, pausing on an encouraging nudge of her head.  

“The necklace—” he started, with another shaky breath.  “It was, as I told you before, gifted from—”

“Your father to your mother—” she continued for him, seemingly deciding to help him out.

“Yes, a very special gift—” he confirmed.

“Given once they had gotten together?” she questioned, her confidence in the facts growing frail.  

“As a symbol,” he continued, releasing a final deep breath, even as he nodded to confirm her understanding.  “Of his…undying devotion.” 

With a subtle turn of his trajectory, he brought them to their arrival point:  his family’s cemetery plots, including the infamous empty grave.  This had been his plan all along:  to bring her here.  But even he could admit that a chill ran down his spine at the sight of the still-empty grave.  

If it hadn’t been for her, he probably would’ve occupied it long ago.  She gave him a reason to go on living.  He knew that.  He hoped that she knew that, but, with any hope, and if things went according to plan, she would certainly walk away from this conversation knowing it.  But that wasn’t the only reason he owed her—the only reason he had her to thank for the fact that the grave remained empty to this day; she had saved his life on numerous occasions, just as he had saved hers.  

It was a partnership.  He saved her; she saved him.  He adapted to meet her needs; she adapted to meet his needs.  That was why, despite the struggle he felt at putting these things to words, he would do it, because she deserved nothing less.  

When Lucy followed his eyeline and spotted the focal point of their destination, he didn’t miss her barely repressed gasp in reaction.  She released a shaky breath, her eyes locked on the gravesites.  

Through their still-connected hands, he guided her towards the fallen headstone—the one they had occupied on their last visit here—and eased them into a seated position.  He nestled in quite close to her; given what they were here to discuss, there was no reason to be coy about it, and, to be frank, the brushing of their knees brought him comfort in an uncomfortable setting.  He needed it, just like he knew she needed to hear what he had to say.  

“I know you’ve worried about me a bit in the past, Luce,” he started, his eyes glued to the empty grave—for now, anyway; he was determined to force himself to look at her, and soon.  “The last time we were here, I told you…” he trailed off, slowly finding the courage to force his eyes to run from the empty grave to meet hers.  “I mentioned that I—I sometimes feel like I don’t want to be left out:  like I’m missing something by not being here.

“In the time that has passed,” he continued, with another humorless laugh.  “I have come to realize how those words could be interpreted.  I want to make one thing abundantly clear,” he continued, his eyes locking onto hers with renewed intensity.  “Yes, I miss my family.  Do I wish they were here?  Of course.  Do I wish I was on the Other Side with them?”  He shook his head.  “As if two trips there wasn’t enough to inform my decision of just how much I do not wish to inhabit the Other Side just yet, there are, still, other factors.

“Maybe I did at one time,” he mused, his eyes wandering back to the empty grave, but only briefly.  “Before I met George, before I met you—and Holly, and even Kipps.”  He stopped, but only to scrunch his nose at his own sense of surprise at his words.  

“I miss my family,” he started again, his eyes coming back to hers, with nothing but resolve in them.  “But I have a family here, too:  you and me and George and Holly and Kipps, and even Flo, come to think of it.  You are all factors that make it impossible for me to wish for death.  

“I wish they could see us, in truth,” he paused, smiling.  “If they knew the things George did with that skull inside their house…” He paused, contemplating the exact reaction his parents would have to such news.  “It would be quite interesting, I’m sure.

“But above all else,” he continued, his tone becoming serious once more.  “I wish they could meet you.  You are my partner, Lucy—my family.  That’s why I gave you the necklace.”  He leaned in, his tone full of passion, his hand reaching for the object in question.  For the smallest of moments, he allowed his fingertips to play with the gem found at the end of the gold chain.  He thought he might’ve heard her react—just the smallest inhalation of breath—but it was gone before he could definitively prove that it had happened at all.  

“I want to reassure you, once and for all,” he continued, pulling back slightly, but his passion was still in his eyes—even he could feel it.  “I do not have a death wish.  The Fittes thing—it had to be done.  It had to be done,” he repeated, his eyes still locked on hers.  “Morally, it was the right thing to do.  Even if Marissa hadn’t killed my parents, she needed to be brought down.”

Lucy nodded but kept silent.  He barely withheld a broadening of his smile; it was the physical reassurance that he needed in that moment—it drove him on, pushing him forward with his confession.  

“But at no time was I looking to die pointlessly.  I would’ve died for you—I still would die for you,” he continued, only to pause; her horror was abundantly clear upon her face, and it needed to be addressed.  “I know that’s what worries you,” he smiled, unable to avoid acknowledging their common understanding.  

“But don’t you think that’s just part of it?” he asked.  “Part of what we’re doing here?  You say you worry about it:  about me being willing to die if it means I can save you.  But did you not go up the elevator to Marissa’s office all by yourself, specifically so you could try to save me?”

It was Lucy’s turn to smile; she looked away from him for the first time since he had started talking, but her sudden bashfulness only made him stare at her with a broadening sense of intensity.  He did not wish to corner her, but he needed to know.  

“That’s fair, I guess,” she conceded, if only partially.  He smiled at her tenacity, but he was not yet done.  

“If you had died up there,” he started—hesitated.  It hurt—it physically hurt to put words to this, but it needed to be done.  He cleared his throat and tried again.  “If you had died up there, and I was left with nothing but a body to bury—here, next to my mother, my father, my sister…” he trailed off, but only for a moment; he needed to push through, or he wouldn’t have the stamina to see this through to the end.  

Next to him, even Lucy was visibly struggling with this; he could feel it, as she broke off eye contact and ran her hands repeatedly over the material of her leggings, almost as if she were desperate for something proactive to do.  “If I was left with nothing to do but to put your body in the empty grave, how do you think I would feel about that?”  

She nodded, and he knew she had seen the logic in his reasoning.  “I did have that thought,” she confessed, her eyes still avoiding his.  “When the pillars fell, and I had nowhere to go, and all I could do was run, and I found myself suddenly dumped back by the elevators, I thought…” she trailed off, her eyes now coming to the empty grave.  “I could do it:  I could go up the elevator and finish her off while you attended to Kipps.  If I was quick about it, you wouldn’t have to play any part in it,” she added, her eyes finally coming back to meet his.  

He smiled, but there was a flicker of frustration in his eyes; he could feel it.  “No more doing that, okay?  I think what I’ve learned, at least, from this whole ordeal is that we’re better when we fight together.  When I cleared the debris in the Hall of Pillars, and you weren’t there—”

She sighed, nodding again in understanding.  It seemed, to him, that she had perhaps not thought of that:  of the paralyzing fear he had experienced at not being able to find her, knowing there were ghosts littering the room, knowing that Marissa was just an elevator ride upstairs.  

“What can I say, Lockwood?” she started, turning back to him again.  He could see it there:  she knew he was right, but her tenacity was not thrilled at the prospect.  “Meeting that Fetch in the basement of Aickmere’s…” she trailed off, but only for a moment.  “It got in my head.  That ghost told me this was our future:  that you would sacrifice yourself to save me.”  

“I may still yet,” he interjected, armed with his charming smile.  

“Don’t kid—”

“I’m not,” he interrupted again, his tone now completely serious.  “Wouldn’t you do it for me?” he asked, abandoning his usual go-to smile for a plea for honesty.  

She seemed to consider this, but only for the smallest of seconds.  “Obviously.”

“Then, it’s settled,” he pulled back, his air of charm returning.  “Moving forward, we’re going to categorize this as a perfectly logical reaction to loving someone, not as an expression of a death wish.”  

It was the closest he had ever gotten to directly telling her he loved her.  He knew it, and judging by the expression on Lucy’s face, she knew it too.  He knew it needed to be said—he knew it, just like he knew it was a mountain he had yet to climb.  He felt it—felt it so strongly it physically hurt sometimes.  But saying it…that matter still remained challenging to him.  

He didn’t get the sense that Lucy had experienced an overly loving and affectionate childhood.  One of several sisters and born under a woman that seemed only interested in what her children could do for her, Lockwood had the feeling that, perhaps, Lucy had never actually been told that she was loved.  

This made his task—his purpose—here all the more important.  She deserved to hear it.    

“Because you know that, right, Lucy?” he asked, looking at her expectantly.  She didn’t appear to know, from what he could see written upon her face; it spurred him on.  “Our family is worth living for:  Holly, Kipps, George—and you.  You are worth living for.”  

This, at the very least, seemed to be a somewhat familiar concept to her.  She startled at it, assuredly, but she seemed to adapt to the idea with an ease that had not been present thus far in the conversation.  Still, the fact that she had been startled by this comment at all meant his job was not yet done.  

He had taken a gasp—prepared to push on—when she beat him to the punch.  “You are too, of course—even if you’re occasionally taken under the spell of some extremely promiscuous spirit, causing me to have to use a trapeze wire to fly through a theater and save you.”

This change in topic shocked him, to the point where all he could do verbally was release a humorless laugh.  He would’ve considered this topic done and dusted:  an old issue that was no longer a problem.  Her bringing it back up in this conversation, when no reference had been made to it thus far, told him otherwise.  She still needed some follow-up communication on this topic, and while he could see this now, he could admit privately that this oversight indicated that he still had a long way to go towards learning the best way to communicate with Lucy Carlyle.  

He knew what she was trying to do, of course—what was to be implied by the informality of her tone:  she wanted to imply that this was merely a joke.  But that was not truly the case, and he knew it; inadvertently or purposefully, she had exposed an insecurity here, and it needed to be addressed.  

Settling into the resolve of finding the best possible way of responding, he looked away from her, but only for a mere moment.  “I’ve apologized for this,” he shook his head, his smile beaming, but then he paused, and he screwed up his courage.  “You do know what happened there, don’t you?”

“Lockwood…” she trailed off, with a shake of her head.  

Immediately, he could see from the dread upon her face that she didn’t—no matter what she had perceived within that situation, and how she had perceived it, she did not have the accurate information at hand; this, too, needed to be rectified, and quickly.  

“I don’t know if I necessarily need to hear about your attraction to the creepy ghost girl that slept with everyone’s husbands,” she finished; she had beaten him to the punch again.  

No, this would not do.  Knowing there was no other option, he decided to call on both of their preferred methods of communication; the situation warranted it.  He swooped in, clenching both of her hands in his once more.  

“You didn’t see it?” he asked, shaking his head in disbelief; his eyes were glued to hers once again.  “It looked like you.  It had your hair and your eyes.  It was still in a dress—she couldn’t let go of her dresses, apparently,” he paused, shaking his head, as if to shake off this entirely insignificant detail.  “But it was the color of blue you always wear,” he commented.  His eyes lowered to her arm, even as one hand moved to run a thumb over the sleeve of her blue jacket, before moving back to reclaim its assigned hand.  

“It even had that same stubborn look you always give me,” he continued, his eyes coming back to meet hers, as he felt his smile come back to pack a punch of its own.  “The one you always send my way when I tell you to stay back and let me run into the dangerous situation.” 

Lucy seemed to contemplate on this for a while.  She looked away, almost as if she were attempting to recall the specific details of that day.  He kept his eyes locked on hers; he knew she preferred logic and things she could see with her eyes—which was, unfortunately, impossible, given that they were discussing a tricky situation with an equally tricky ghost—but he just had to hope that she could find something in her memory that prompted her to believe him.  

Before long, she had turned back to him, her confidence back in her eyes.  “I didn’t know that,” she confessed, and even though relief was washing over him at her belief in his statement, he could admit that he was surprised to hear direct confirmation that she had not known.  “And…” she paused.  It was clear to Lockwood that she wanted to ask something, but she was in the process of mustering up some courage of her own.  He waited her out, nodding encouragingly to her in the process.  

Finally, with a sigh and a roll of her eyes, she seemed to resolve herself to posing her conundrum.  “So, you didn’t have a death wish at the time of that case.  So, then, I guess she didn’t go after you because you had a weak connection to life.” 

Her statement:  it was a statement, but it also wasn’t; there was a clear question implied in the way she asked in, in the anxiety he spotted in her eyes.  She was nervous—he could see it, clear as day, on her face.  He wasn’t certain what exactly could be making her nervous, but Lockwood had a feeling that if he just answered her question, maybe she’d answer his as well.  

“No—well, I don’t think so, anyway.  I don’t recall having a head cold at the time,” he carried on, his smile back in place.  “No, I believe Le Belle Dame sought me out because I fulfilled her other category,” he paused, his smile falling away once more, as he allowed the full severity of his confession to show upon his face.  “There’s a reason she looked like you to me, Luce.”  

He hadn’t stated it—not yet, but he was determined; he would get there, if it took all the courage he had at his disposal.  

With a sudden, sharp sigh, Lucy drew in his attention acutely.  She shifted, removing her hands from his grasp.  “If we’re getting confessional about the case of Le Belle Dame…” she trailed off, hesitating.  He could see her struggling, but he had no suspicions as to what precisely she could be struggling with; whatever was coming was quite important, but he had no preexisting knowledge to hint at what exactly was about to come.  “It’s my fault she went after you.  

“She got ahold of me…” she trailed off, her eyes losing focus.  “If George hadn’t been there, I would’ve been done for.  She got in my head; she rooted around for secrets, for ways to get to me.  And she found…” she trailed off again, and he found himself nearly hanging on the edge of the tombstone he had claimed as a seat; he needed to hear what came next.  “Well, you,” she finished, with a shrug, her eyes suddenly meeting his once more.  

Seeking a physical way to convey the severity of what he had to say, he reached in again; this time, his hands divided—one reached to reclaim one of her hands, while the other made its way up to cup one of her cheeks, drawing her in ever-so-slightly.  “You think it’s your fault.  I think it’s my fault.  You know who’s actually at fault?” he paused, his warm smile returning.  “The damn ghost.”  

“Well, with any hope, that’ll all be done soon.”  Lucy smiled, but it was different; her voice was hollow, breathless.  “But for now…” she trailed off, and, although she didn’t look away from his eyes, he knew she was referencing the change in the environment surrounding them.  

The sun had set; ghost fog had started to settle in amongst the tombstones.  They would need to return to Portland Row very soon, but that didn’t stop him from hesitating for just one more moment.  His eyes left his command, roaming her face at free will.  Still, he found them gravitating towards her lips.  

An intervening curl of ghost fog broke his trance.  “You’re right, of course,” he stated, his voice sounding more business-like than it had since they had settled in at the cemetery; he had a secondary goal within this conversation, and the journey back to Portland Row would serve as an extremely appropriate venue.  Keeping their hands connected, he eased her to her feet, and they started the trek back to Portland Row.  

“I do think you should reconsider my offer, Luce,” he started, admittedly—privately, at least—serving his ulterior motive.

“What offer?  You make several of them a day,” Lucy responded, with a sideway glance and a laugh.  “It can be hard to keep up, you know.”

“To move into the guest room, of course.  It would be nice to have you a little closer.”  

“What’s the matter?  Don’t like the idea of me living in your old bedroom?” Lucy asked, with another pointed laugh.  

“On the contrary, I’ve found that to be quite a comfort over the years,” he responded, his eyes sliding to meet hers.  “I merely mean to suggest that, if you should wish for it, I would not object to having you a little closer.”  

“Yeah, but Lockwood,” she started, with a sigh.  “Me?  In your sister’s room?  Wouldn’t that feel a little…” she trailed off, her nose scrunching in evidence of her discomfort.  “Morbid?  Inappropriate?”

“Oh, yes,” he started, his tone calm, cool, collected:  detached.  But his heart was hammering in his chest; this was the very precipice he had been hoping to navigate them to.  “You’re quite right.  That would be strange, wouldn’t it?  No, why don’t you just move into the big room?  With me?”  

She came to a stop, as he had anticipated she might.  Her grip on his hand slackened but maintained.  She stared at him, mouth agape, eyes wide; no effort was made to check her surprise.  

He, alternatively, painted a picture of calm intellect, as he always did.  His heart was still pounding in his chest, yes, but it was excitement that drove him on, not nerves.  

Lockwood couldn’t be entirely certain when this idea had occurred to him.  Perhaps it had been earlier, when he had been visiting her attic bedroom.  It was perfectly adequate, and he had not been lying; he had often found that he quite loved the idea that he was able to share his childhood bedroom with her.  It had created a sort of unspoken bond that had existed from the moment of their meeting, in a sense.  

The truth was, Lucy, much like Lockwood, had outgrown that room.  In his opinion, that room was a room of necessity—of acquaintance.  Kipps was worthy of that room, and Holly had long been worthy of at least that room, but Lucy…she deserved more, and as he had sworn to give her what she deserves, he intended to see that through, even on this particular point.  

“You—you want me to move in with you?” she stuttered.

“Oh, no, of course not,” Lockwood started, with a scoff and a dismissive wave of the hand she wasn’t holding.  “That would be silly, as you already live with me, and have for several years.  Come on, Luce.  I thought you’d at least know that.”

“Lockwood,” she started, taking a step to approach him; her voice was admonishing now, in that way it could be when George did something to really peeve her off.  “Now is not the time for jokes.  Tell me what you want.”  

He nodded, understanding.  It was as he suspected:  words were the method she sought as comfort, and it was his job now to seek to meet her needs in that area.  His grip on her hand tightened, as he noted she had never released it; she was working to meet his needs, and he owed her the same courtesy.  

“I want you to move into the master bedroom with me because I love you.  I have loved you since…” he trailed off, genuinely thinking through the progression of events they had experienced together.  “At least our first trip to the Other Side, if not earlier.  I do not know what I would do without you, and I have no interest in finding out.  Move in with me, please.”  

He let that last word hit and hit hard.  It wasn’t begging, per say; it was a deep, raw drive to be honest:  to honestly express just how much he wanted—no, needed—her companionship.  She was his partner, in every definition of the word, and he would have it no other way.  

He expected a fight.  He loved her because she was stubborn, not in spite of it.  He was not disappointed.  

“Don’t you think it’s too soon?”

“We’ve known each other for two years.”

“But that’s hardly long, given our age—”

“Lucy, we’ve been to Hell together.  Twice.”

“Yes, but that doesn’t change our age—gray hairs, maybe, but not age.”

“I know it doesn’t.”  She gasped to interrupt him—to continue the bantering match—but he cut her off again.  “What it does impact is our relationship, which, I think you can agree, has been fundamentally changed by our time spent on the Other Side.  

“I could never be with anyone other than you,” he stated, his eyes refusing to stir from hers.  “That is an incontrovertible fact for me, because, while George and Kipps and Holly can understand that second trip, they can never grasp the consequences of the first:  the pure fear we felt at realizing where we were, the fight to survive, the closeness—physically and mentally and emotionally—prompted by the loss of your cape.”

He shook his head, recalling the pressing fear he had experienced on the Other Side with her, as if it had happened merely yesterday.  “That is an experience that I will only ever share with you—that only you will ever be able to understand.  I want someone sleeping next to me at night that can understand the horror—the misery—of that:  that might just understand when I wake up in a cold tremor in the middle of the night fearing a little girl—barely more than a child—in a blue dress.”  

She nodded, clearly recognizing the reference to the child they had seen on the Other Side, but said nothing else, as she paused for the smallest of moments.  Lucy seemed to be processing, and Lockwood did his best to simply follow the pounding of his heart.  The nearest ghost lamp flickered on; ironically, the light of it would be casting a shadow on the floor of the attic bedroom they were in the process of discussing.  It shed light on the room, unseen, but, for him, it also shed light on the missing part of this conversation. 

He released her hand, choosing, instead, to run both of his up to cup her chin.  Lockwood paused, as he more felt than saw her draw in a hissing breath.  Her eyes finally made their way up to meet his, and yet, still, he waited.  “Am I pressing too close?” he asked. 

It echoed.  It echoed around the empty street.  It echoed off the iron strips leading to the front door of 35 Portland Row.  It echoed off the window panes of the exact room in question.  

But more importantly, it echoed through his mind—to a time standing on the Other Side, to a time spent sharing a singular cape that was literally the only thing keeping them alive, to a time when he had asked if he was pressing too close, to a time when, internally, he begged that she wouldn’t say no, for he feared that he could not withstand the loss of her closeness, her warmth, her love.  

And, just as she had said then, she settled for a simple, but resolved, “no.”  

Audibly, the ghost lamp turned off, entering its dormant phase.  

Barely able to contain the pounding of his heart in his chest, he closed the distance between them.  His lips met hers.  

Lockwood did not often prioritize taking care of himself.  He took care of all others.  He sought to check in with others regularly, and if they needed anything, it was his job to get it for them.  

He had taken care of Lucy in this conversation.  He had finally—finally—told her he loved her.  He had seen to her needs—her preferences for communication.  

This, alternatively, was his preferred method of communication:  touch.  He craved contact with Lucy; it was why he always reached out for her, especially in the darkest of times.  

Lucy, for what it was worth, seemed to have perceived this.  Whether consciously or subconsciously, she seemed to have an appreciation for the fact that he had been the one to predominantly take the risks in this conversation; at every turn, it had been him initiating the broadening and deepening of their relationship.  Now, Lucy seemed to understand that it was her turn.  

Lockwood initiated the kiss, but she didn’t let it stagnate.  She pressed in closer, her arms moving to snake through the opening in his jacket and encircle his waist.  To his surprise, he heard his own verbal reaction to the move.  His fingers moved, weaving through the line of her hair at the base of her neck and pulling her in even closer.  

He had often daydreamed about sharing this very moment with Lucy, and he didn’t let a second pass unnoted.  He tilted his head, pulling on his height to deepen the kiss.  Lucy’s arms around his waist tightened their grip, pulling him in even tighter.  

This was how she told him she loved him.  Her resolve, her tenacity, her confidence—all those wonderful things she brought to a conversation with him:  it was all clear in this moment, with the ghost fog swirling around them, with the moonlight reflecting on the pavement, for once shining brighter than the dreaded nearby ghost lamp, which still lay dormant.  

Their lips parted, as they tried to catch their breath, but their foreheads sought to connect; he brought his to rest upon hers, and hers met his in the middle.  

“Okay,” she started, her voice sardonic—but he could hear it:  the irony.  “I’ll move in with you, I suppose.”  

“Good,” he responded, his smile returning.  “That was the correct answer.”  At her gasp to bicker, he sought to move quicker.  He reached down, interlinking their hands once more, before moving swiftly to approach the door to 35 Portland Row.  “Now, we can make all the necessary preparations tomorrow, of course.  Moving will be far easier by daylight, obviously.”  He spoke quickly, throwing his words over his shoulder at her.  “But for now, I think we’ll have enough to get by, don’t you?  Just go get changed, whatever you need to be comfortable for the evening, and I’ll wait up for you.”  

“Is that a request or an order?” she asked as they made their way through Portland Row’s front door and started to ascend the stairs, their hands still connected.  

“It’s neither, of course!”  He had the decency to sound indignant.  “It’s a suggestion, naturally.”  

Quick as a flash, he had gotten her up the stairs to reach the door to the attic.  “I’ll see you in a few?” he asked. 

Yes, he asked.  For all his confidence, for all his charm, for all his presumptions, for all his persuasion, he knew how to show his insecurities.  It was rare, and it was difficult to discern; this was intentionally done.  But when he needed to ask, he asked.  

And he was asking here, now.  Sure, he had presented the idea with nothing but confidence—and he was confident, to a certain degree.  But he didn’t want to take a step backward; he wanted to show her his vulnerability, in his own way, with his words—when he could and when he felt comfortable.  

This was that moment.  And, true to form, Lucy didn’t let him down.  

“I’ll be there in five minutes, assuming I don’t get lost on the harrowing journey down the stairs,” she answered, with a small smirk.  

###

He waited up for her, as he had promised.  And, just as she had promised, she was there within five minutes.  Still, he used each of those five minutes to the best of his ability.  He tidied his already extremely tidy room.  He made sure he was satisfied with the furnishings, fluffing any pillows, refolding already folded blankets, turning down the bed so that she knew she was well and truly welcomed here.  

He slipped into his pajamas:  a simple white shirt and pair of black fitted joggers.  He tucked his clothing from the day away in its assigned spots:  dirty clothes chucked in the hamper residing in the closet, new coat hanging from the bedpost, just as the previous one always had.  

He had found just enough time to complete three laps of pacing when she opened the door.  She didn’t knock; he liked that—it indicated this was now just as much her room as it was his.  

Suddenly, she was in the room, in the pajamas he had seen her wear on several occasions.  He released a deep sigh:  a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding in as a result of his anxious awaiting of her arrival.  

“We should get to bed,” he stated, seeking a sense of normality.  He approached her, reaching for her hand yet again, and guided her toward the bed.  “You never know what tomorrow will bring.”

“Maybe the Problem will be over, suddenly and sharply.”

“Wouldn’t that be nice?” he scoffed.  “Far more likely, yet another meeting with Barnes, during which he’ll beg us for more assistance,” he continued, slipping into bed.  Their connected hands led her to slip in behind him.  

When he turned to face her, she was settling in, shifting comfortably on her pillow.  “You’ll hold him off,” she said, with a scrunch of her nose indicating her confidence in his defiance.  “He can deal for a few days.  We’ve carried more than our fair share of weight for a while—earned a leave of absence, we have.”  

He smiled; he couldn’t help it.  Seeing her here, hearing her validate any and all of his feelings:  his heart was pounding painfully with the weight of the happiness of it all.  “Quite right.  Do you mind hitting the light behind you?” he asked, with a nod in the direction of the lamp on the nightstand behind her.  

Silently, she rolled over and did so.  Hoping he wasn’t pressing too close in an unwanted way, he slipped in before she could roll back over to face him.  Settling his arm around her waist and placing his head to share the same pillow that hers occupied, he waited, attempting to read her body language for any signs of displeasure at this move.  On the contrary, she settled in, easing back further into his chest.  The affirmation had impeccable impacts upon him; he breathed a sigh of relief and allowed his eyes to ease close.  

In the dark, she whispered, “I love you, Lockwood.”  

His eyes opened sharply, but his body did nothing to indicate his surprise; he made no movements:  he did not startle.  “I love you too, Lucy.”  

He allowed his eyes to ease close once more, the relief at having her here consuming him, and helping him drift off to the most peaceful sleep he had experienced since the death of his sister.  

His last thought, if he could even call it that, as it was not fully formed, was that she deserved this, but he deserved this too.  

A/N:  Thank you for taking the time to read this!  It means a lot to me!  If you liked my writing style, and if you’re looking for something to read in the fantasy/YA genre, please consider checking out my book! 

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak, Epilogue

Epilogue

A/N:  This is it!  We've reached the end of this story!  I want to thank everyone that stuck with this story to the end; it means so very much to me!  

If you loved this story, and if you’re interested in reading the other things I’ve written, check out my book:  The House of Dormiens by K.A. Saylor.  You can find it on Amazon! 

As always, thank you for any and all support!  

As they emerged from the Upside Down, the sunlight was blinding.  It felt so warm and welcoming; she had never been so incredibly grateful to see the light of day.  

The group disbanded, but she knew things had changed between them; they had all worked together to overcome this horrible incursion.  They had shared trauma now.  Though they were parting ways for now—to shower, to eat, to find some sense of peace after a long night and a long battle—they were stuck together forever.  These people—Nancy, Steve, Dustin…Eddie—they understood her and her suffering in a way that no one else would ever really be able to touch.  

Eddie offered to walk her home, and she readily accepted.  On the way, they exchanged battle stories.  He couldn’t believe all that she had gone through, and she felt rather similarly about his own excursions.  

But she was admittedly distracted during the conversation.  Facing the prospect of seeing her mother again…it worried her.  She still had “These Dreams” thrumming through her headphones—she would continue to play the song continuously for a few more days, until she could be absolutely certain she was rid of Vecna’s curse.  And if there was anything that was going to trigger an episode, it was coming face to face with the woman that was the source behind it all.  

But things felt different now; she felt different now.  She couldn't explain it, but she was fairly certain she was no longer under Vecna’s curse.  She just felt…free, independent from her need to conform to her mother’s wishes and demands.  

She would need to explain her absence, but that was achievable; she would merely claim that she had been staying over with a friend from the cheer squad.  Her parents would be disgruntled, but she was not worried; she had been a perfect angel in their eyes leading up to this moment—they would undoubtedly punish her for her lack of notice, but in the end, she would survive it.  She could survive anything after her time spent in the Upside Down.  

What was going to be harder was dealing with them.  Her perspective on her parents had changed—not only because of Eddie, but because of the steps she had had to take to defeat Vecna.  Experiencing the meeting of their minds—his mind and her mind intermingling, his trauma and her trauma intermingling—it had been enlightening.  She had, in essence, ultimately put her emotional baggage behind her.  In the end, that had been the trick to defeating Vecna’s curse—or, at least, the hold it had on her.  If she processed her trauma, he couldn’t use said trauma against her.  

That did not mean that she was completely over what her parents had done to her.  It would be with her forever; it was a part of her, and it always would be.  

But she could not look at her parents the same way ever again.  She could now process just how horrible they had been to her.  Even now, looking down at the filthy cheer uniform that she had been wearing for days—it looked like it belonged in a horror movie—she knew her mother would immediately have some passive-aggressive comments to throw her way.  

But she had Eddie now.  He looked like he had been through war, too.  And they had, she realized.  Quite the pair they made.  

When they reached her house, she felt her palms start to sweat.  Already, she could feel that impulse—could hear her mother’s voice whispering to her, telling her that her relationship with Eddie would only bring judgment.  She shook her head, locking it down.  She pushed herself, choosing not only to refuse to listen to her mother’s voice, but to stand in direct defiance of it.  She reached down, holding his hand in her own.  

They came to a stop at the front door.  She turned the knob, knowing her parents were home and would be watching—knowing they would be confused into silence at the sight of someone other than Jason on their doorstep.  

“I’ll see you later?” she asked, with an encouraging nod.  

“Yeah, I’d kill for a shower,” he started, his smile enthusiastic—defiant.  “But we can meet up this afternoon?” he asked, leaning in.  

“Sounds perfect,” she confirmed, with a smile.  

Before she could second guess herself—before she could put too much thought into it—she leaned in to kiss him on the lips.  She knew he had little warning or time to prepare for this—so she hadn’t expected much from it—but he proved her wrong; he was quicker on his feet than she had anticipated.  His hand came up, cupping around the nape of her neck and bringing her in even closer—bringing her in for the sweetest kiss she had ever experienced.  

“No conforming while I’m gone,” Eddie pulled back, his joking smile firmly in place.  

“Oh, come on,” she started, with an overly dramatic sigh.  “A little conforming.”  

“Like what?” he spat indignantly, but his smile was still holding strong.  

“You’ve taught me a lot,” she conceded.  “Now, it’s my turn to teach you a few things.”

“Like what?” he repeated; this time, he couldn’t resist laughing as well.  

She thought about it, but only for a second.  “Stop selling drugs,” she suggested; she was smiling, but there was an undeniably audacious edge to her tone.  She wanted to maintain what had always been true about their relationship:  they joked, they laughed, but they also shared serious things they refused to share with anyone else; they learned from each other and became better people as a result.  “I don’t need you going to jail.” 

“That’s fair,” he conceded, his smile becoming more genuine as he seemed to read the change in the tone of the conversation.  “I’ll take it.”

“See you this afternoon?”

He nodded, confirming their plans.  She entered the house, closed the door behind her, and approached the kitchen, passing her parents in the process—both of whom were staring, their mouths popped open, speechless.  She went right for the pantry and extracted just what she had been looking for:  a can of Spaghettios, a now treasured artifact memorializing their time spent at Reefer Rick’s, her time spent letting go of the control food had over her—her time spent finding her freedom.  

[patiencetakestyme]

Chapter 6—Vecna’s Curse

A/N:  This is the last full chapter; there’s only a very short epilogue left!  

There is one scene in this chapter that I took directly from the show—at least, the first part of the scene, anyway; the dialogue is slightly altered in spots, and the end of the scene is different, but it is, inherently, what was featured in the show.  The scene in question was just too good; I couldn’t top it!    

Credit:  “The Massacre at Hawkins Lab,” season 4, episode 7.  Written by:  the Duffer Brothers.  Directed by:  the Duffer Brothers. 

 

Eddie spent the time until Henderson radioed feeling nothing short of extremely anxious about their agreed upon plan.  He didn’t want to question Chrissy and her decision to volunteer as backup bait for Vecna, but he could admit privately that he was very concerned.  

He didn’t want anything to happen to her.  He thought that was a pretty reasonable concern, given that she was about to go face off against the big, bad monster that had actually—literally—cursed her over a week ago.  

“Are you sure you want to do this?” He finally caved and asked once Henderson had radioed that they were on their way; it was just after the break of dawn, and there was nothing left to do but wait and worry, so he found that his concerns had bubbled over much easier.  

“I have to help,” she said, holding her head high.  “They’ve already done a lot to help me.  It’s only fair that I help them in return.”

“I mean…” he hesitated, with a humorless laugh.  “Sinclair?  He certainly wasn’t helping—and his group of Jolly Jocks did anything but help.”  

“Yes, but the others?” she asked, with a shake of her head.  “They’ve done nothing but help us.  They’re going to do it,” she said, her voice full of faith.  “They’re going to kill this guy, and I’ll be free of his curse.  Then, we can leave this house and move on…” she trailed off, with a small smile.  “With our lives, with our relationship—everything.”  

“I like the sound of that,” he started, his smile enthusiastic, but he could hear the concern still lingering in his own voice.  “But I’ll admit I have my concerns about what’s going to be required to get us there.”

“Oh, come on,” she said, with a casual laugh that sounded forced.  “It sounds like you’re going to be playing guitar.  That should come easily for you!”

“With a demo…whatever they called it rushing at me?  Maybe not so much.”  

“We’re going to be fine.  We have to stay optimistic.  They seem to know what they’re doing,” Chrissy offered.  

“Yeah, Henderson certainly put me in my place there, didn’t he?” Eddie asked, with another humorless laugh.  “Still, I wouldn’t say no to a kiss before we go,” he suggested, attempting to sound innocent as he did so.  

“You don’t think we should save that for when we return?” she responded.  Her tone was cool, collected—she hadn’t missed a beat, and he was impressed by that—but he could see it:  the blush forming at her cheeks.  

“I mean, I don’t want to be a downer,” he said, his voice still joking.  “But what if we don’t return?”

“We’ll return,” she responded, with new resolve.  “I know I will, especially if there’s a kiss on the line.”

“Fine,” he conceded, with a sigh.  “That’s a fair point.”

“Besides,” she started, peeking over his shoulder.  “I think they’re here.”  

<><><>

Eddie could admit that, while he was delighted at the sight of his guitar—it had been far too many days since he had seen her, far too many days since he had continued his process of mastering “Master of Puppets”—the sight of the gate into the Upside Down was anything but welcomed.  It was red and angry looking.  The sand was all decaying around the very spot where McKinney had died, and the gate seemed like a massive, red, irritated eye staring at them, daring them to jump in and risk it all.  

He hated the idea of going through that gate.  But he knew he had to do it—it was their only shot at saving Chrissy from this curse.  

They had brought everything—Wheeler had her gun, Robin had some Molotov cocktails they had apparently made, Harrington had a bat with nails driven through it that seemed to have some sort of sentimental value to him, and Henderson had a shield with some more nails spiked through it.  Once Max radioed that she had found Vecna at the Creel house and was in position, they made moves to leave the lake house behind and approach the shore.  

One by one, they made their way through the gate—well, fell through the gate might be a more accurate description.  With his guitar in one hand and his amp in the other, he landed in the darkest, dirtiest place he had ever seen.  

“Watch the vines,” Harrington said as he pulled Eddie up and pointed to said vines.  “Hive mind,” he reminded Eddie.  

Eddie took in his surroundings.  They were right on the edge of a crater that had undeniably formed the bottom of the lake in the other Hawkins—the right-side-up Hawkins.  From here, he could see the lake house he had been occupying with Chrissy for the last few days.  Everything was almost exactly the same, it just looked like the version that would be featured in a horror film.  

Once they had all successfully made it through the gate, they radioed Max with an update.  From there, they would need to split up.  Eddie, Henderson, and Harrington would be going to Eddie’s trailer in the hopes of finding more amps and a power source; Eddie’s trailer was also a few miles from the Creel house—hopefully far enough to afford the girls a chance to accomplish their goal before any of the creatures were called back to defend Vecna.  

Chrissy, Wheeler, and Robin would be going to the Creel house.  If they found Vecna checked out—sucked in by Max’s trap—they would set him on fire with the cocktails and shoot him until he was dead.  

With a touch of luck, they would be done and going back through the gate in two or three hours. Knowing that they were preparing to split the party—and knowing, as a Dungeon Master, just how dangerous such a thing could be—he knew what he needed to do; he pulled Chrissy off to the side, wanting to see her—to talk to her—one more time before they parted ways.  

“You give him hell,” he said, when, really, all he wanted to do was tell her to run; instead, he tried to put on a brave face—not only for her, but for himself as well.  

She nodded.  “If I get the chance, I’m going to pay him back for the last week of misery.”

He tried to cast a witty and flippant comment her way—something to make her laugh—but he couldn’t do it; he didn’t have it in him—not at that moment.  Instead, he very discreetly reached for her hand and gave it one, solitary squeeze.  

“If you need me—for anything—reach out by radio.  I’ll be there.”  

She nodded once more.  “Same to you,” she said, but he caught it—the little catch in her breath.  

They returned to the group, only for Eddie to see that Harrington seemed to be returning from sharing a similar moment with Wheeler.  The similarities between him and Harrington were stacking up, and he didn’t know if that was necessarily a good thing.  Eddie could admit he was curious; he was eager to use this time with Harrington and Henderson to get to the bottom of those similarities and, of course, to embrace their differences as well.  

“Is everyone ready?” Wheeler asked, rejoining the group.  

Eddie made sure he had everything—guitar, amp, shield slung over his shoulder with the nails pointing away from his back.  He was as ready as he was going to be.  

With a round of nods to confirm, Wheeler pushed forward.  “Does everyone know the plan?”

“Phase one:  Max traps Vecna,” Robin confirmed.  

“Phase two:  Eddie, Steve, and I distract whatever is protecting Vecna while Nancy, Robin, and Chrissy head to the Creel house.”

“Phase three:  With the path cleared, Robin, Chrissy, and I enter the Creel house to kill Vecna.”  

“Phase four:  We all meet back here and go the hell home,” Eddie finished.  

Wheeler nodded.  “We don’t move out of a phase until everyone radios to confirm that they are ready,” she said as Henderson passed out radios, one for every group.   

With nothing more to be said, they split the party.  Still, as they parted ways, he couldn’t help it—he couldn’t help casting one last glance over his shoulder to Chrissy, only to find that she, too, was already doing the exact same thing.  

<><><>

Armed with nothing but some Molotov cocktails and her headphones, Chrissy gingerly walked through the forest on the way to the Creel house, with Robin and Nancy on either side of her.

“Do we need to be worried about being quiet?” Robin whispered.

“No,” Nancy answered, with a confident shake of her head.  

“You’ve been in the Upside Down before?” Chrissy asked.  

Nancy nodded.  “Briefly—once.  We just need to keep our eyes open,” she continued, casting a wary glance around the forest.  “And the vines, of course—”

“Yes, yes,” Robin started, taking an odd prance to step around one such vine.  “Don’t step on the vines.  But you seem to be disregarding just how hard that is for some of us.”  

“I’m fine,” Nancy said, taking an extended step to reach over a particularly big vine.  

“Same here,” Chrissy added, repeating Nancy’s maneuver.  

“Well, we can’t all be dancers and cheerleaders, can we?” Robin asked, seemingly jokingly disgruntled.  

“We all bring something to the team,” Nancy said, but she was distracted; she seemed to always have one eye peeled and focused on her surroundings.  “We should be getting close.”  

“Oh, boy,” Robin started, her tone immeasurably nervous.  “I’m scared—I’ll admit it,” she continued, and Chrissy respected her honesty.  “Nothing like a life-or-death situation to bring out some raw honesty,” she finished, with a pointed look at Nancy.  

“If you have something to say, just say it,” Nancy responded, her tone sharp, but not rude.  

“I’m just saying,” Robin started, holding her hands up in surrender.  “If we die here, will you regret not kissing Steve goodbye?”  

This question took Chrissy by surprise, but it did not, evidently, surprise Nancy; she looked at Robin with a small, subtle roll of the eyes.  

“Should we really be talking about this now?” Nancy asked, with a nod to the end of the forest, which had finally come into sight; the Creel house wouldn’t be far off now.  

“You’re the one that told me to just be out with it,” Robin argued, with a scoff.  

Nancy smiled—a tight, impatient smile.  “It’s not like that,” she started, evidently deciding to simply answer the question.  “Steve and I—we haven’t been together for a long time.  So much has changed in that time.  We’ve both changed a lot,” she conceded, looking down to step over another particularly big vine.  “But it’s still not like that.  I’m with—”

“Jonathon, I know,” Robin took her turn to concede.  “So you’ve said, but you’ve also said you’re less than happy!” Robin continued, her tone indicating she’d had some sort of an epiphany.  

“You and Jonathon are having some struggles?” Chrissy asked.  She didn’t want to seem nosy, but she also didn’t want Nancy to think she was apathetic; these people were rapidly becoming her friends—they couldn’t survive this excursion today and not be friends, or so she hoped.  “I’m sorry—you don’t have to share if you don’t want to,” she added as a precaution.  

Nancy shook her head and held her hands up in a disarming sort of way; Chrissy was relieved to see that Nancy didn’t seem to think it was an invasion of her privacy.  “It’s just,” she stopped, sighing.  “I can’t believe we’re talking about this now.”  

“If not now, when?” Robin questioned.  “We could be dead in an hour!”

“We won’t be dead in an hour,” Nancy responded, all determination.  “Fine,” she continued, at Robin’s persistent expression.  “He’s living in California now,” Nancy continued, and Chrissy nodded to indicate that she remembered that the Byers’ had moved away.  “It’s just so much harder—being 2,000 miles apart.”  

“And why didn’t he come home for spring break?” Robin asked, but Nancy’s impatient expression indicated that Robin already knew this answer—had already asked this question and had already received Nancy’s answer prior to today and, as a result, merely wanted to reiterate a stinging point.  

“I told you—his family—”

“I know, I know,” Robin interrupted.  “But if he isn’t willing to spend spring break with you, is he really worth it?  Steve is willing to enter this God-forsaken place for you,” Robin continued, with a disgusted look at the oozing vines surrounding them.  “I’m pretty sure he would’ve come with us to fight Vecna for you, and he would’ve died fighting Vecna if it meant he could keep you safe—if you had let him.  Come on, what loyalty can Jonathon offer that tops that?” 

“You aren’t telling me anything I don’t know—”

“Then know it!” Robin exclaimed, only to cast a wary glance around the forest.  “Jonathon is dragging his feet about going to the same college as you!  Steve stayed here to be close to you—he’s already made the decision that Jonathon’s refusing to make!”

“Jonathon isn’t ‘dragging his feet!’” Nancy responded, with a small, humorless laugh.  

“Oh, wake up, Nancy!” Robin exclaimed again, apparently unable to control herself.  “His acceptance letter hasn’t come?  He wants to be home over spring break so he can get it?” Robin asked patronizingly, and it became obvious to Chrissy that these two had clearly discussed this matter at least once before; how else would Robin know how to make such an insightful argument?  If she were to be honest, Chrissy was impressed.    

“So?” Nancy asked, a look of defiance on her face; it was clear that, even though Robin had impressed Chrissy, thus far, she had failed to persuade Nancy.  

“It’s almost April, Nancy,” Robin answered, as if that was all the answer she needed.  

“So?” Nancy repeated.  Chrissy couldn’t be sure, but she could’ve sworn that she almost saw some degree of obstinance on Nancy’s face—almost as if she were daring Robin to say what she, herself, was already thinking.  

“Whatever letter he received—accepted, rejected—it came in the mail long ago, and you know it.  If he hasn’t heard back from them by now, it's because he never even applied.”  

“You don’t understand,” Nancy started, and it seemed to Chrissy that she might be trying to change the tone of the conversation.  “There are things that Jonathon and I went through together—things that are hard to explain.  

“The last time I was in the Upside Down?” she continued, looking once more to the forest surrounding them.  “It was by accident.  I just barely got out before a demogorgon got me.”  At Robin and Chrissy’s look of confusion, Nancy shook her head.  “Right, neither one of you has ever seen one of those first-hand.  It’s huge—over six feet tall.  And it has no face, just teeth.  It’s nearly impossible to kill.”

“And these are the things we think might be guarding Vecna?” Robin asked, and Chrissy could practically hear her swallow.  Chrissy wasn’t feeling great about this information either; was this what they were sending to Eddie, Steve, and Dustin?  

“Possibly,” she confirmed.  

“But Eddie and the others…” Chrissy trailed off, with a nervous shake of her head.  

“Steve’s fought one before,” Nancy said, her confidence returning to her.  

“Exactly,” Robin responded, swooping in; Chrissy wasn’t sure what she had up her sleeves, but she seemed excited about it.  “Steve told me about some of your traumatic experiences.  Sure, you shared some of them with Jonathon—you bonded over hunting a demogorgon, I get it.  But if you remember, it was Steve that actually came through for you and helped hurt the thing.”

“Not true,” Nancy argued.  “Jonathon lit it on fire.”

“On fire?” Chrissy asked, with a gasp.  

“Yeah, they’re afraid of fire,” Nancy said, as if it were as obvious as the vines in front of them.  

“Hence the Molotov cocktails?” Robin asked.

“Hence the Molotov cocktails,” Nancy confirmed.

“But it was Steve that trapped it, right?” Robin continued, not hesitating one beat in her pursuit of the argument.  “And the fact that he was there—it isn’t just Jonathon that has a claim to stake on your previous ‘shared trauma,’” Robin finished, with sarcastic air quotes.  

Nancy looked troubled by this argument, but she remained silent.  

“Look,” Robin started again, her tone apologetic.  “I’m not trying to ruin your life or force you to do something you don’t want to do.  I’m just asking you to give him a shot.  He’s changed a lot.  And, frankly, I’m not encouraging you to do anything you weren’t clearly already contemplating for yourself.”  

Nancy remained silent, and Robin looked somewhat satisfied.  Chrissy wasn’t sure what Robin’s overall goal had been in this conversation, but whatever it was, it seemed she believed she had achieved it.  

“And what about you?” Robin turned to Chrissy, and she felt a chill of dread run down her spine.  She had just seen Robin argue with Nancy—one of the most determined people Chrissy had ever met—and, arguably, Robin had won.  She wasn’t sure she wanted that type of attention directed at her.  

“What about me?” she asked, hearing her own nerves reflected in her voice.  

“You and Eddie?” Robin asked, with a quirked eyebrow.

“Is there something going on there?” Nancy asked, turning sharply to face Chrissy; she seemed almost as shocked as she had been at Robin’s previous accusations against her own relationships.  “Not that it’s any of our business,” she continued, with a wary look to Robin.  Chrissy appreciated this, but she found herself wondering if it was a result of the insecurities that Robin’s accusations had shaken up within herself; either way, it was considerate—Chrissy could not deny that.  

“Yeah, not that it’s any of our business,” Robin reiterated, with a small scoff.  “But we are about to head into the battle of our lives in, like, thirty minutes.”  

“It’s been an…interesting couple of days,” Chrissy started, not really sure how much she wanted to share.  

She looked at the two women in front of her.  They were so different from each other, and they were certainly different from her.  It was as Nancy had said earlier—they each brought something different to the fight.  They could learn from each other.  

Wasn’t that what she liked most about her relationship with Eddie—that they could learn from each other?  She and Eddie were both very different from each other, and they could learn from each other as a result.  

She could learn something from these girls too, and she knew it.  Had she not just been hoping moments ago to come out of this as friends with these women?  A good first step towards achieving that goal would be sharing some private things with them.  

And should she come out of this alive, her and Eddie would be together—publicly.  She needed to get used to not only being with him, but to being with him publicly—telling people was an important first step in that process.  

“A new relationship, suffering a curse that basically sentences you to death,” Robin started, with a sarcastically flippant wave of her hand.  “I can’t imagine what you have to concern yourself with.”

“Yeah, the visions were horrible,” Chrissy started, with a shake of her head.  “If it hadn’t been for Eddie…” she trailed off, her smile coming back.  “He stayed with me—from the second I almost died in his trailer until you found us.  He didn’t leave my side for one second.  Well, not voluntarily,” she conceded, with a small laugh.  “I left briefly to break up with Jason.”

“That’s why they were there,” Robin realized, bringing her hands to her face.  “The jocks,” she specified, as Nancy and Chrissy continued to look confused.  “He was looking for you and Eddie.  Max told us—she saw you at Eddie’s trailer that night, and if she saw you, it’s not a stretch to assume someone else did too.”  

“Yes,” Chrissy started, with an edge to her voice.  “Jason is very popular.  I’m sure he didn’t need to dig too long before finding his answers as to where I could be.”  

“Oh, come on,” Robin argued.  “It isn’t like you aren’t popular too.  You had to know that someone would see you there and tattle to Jason.”

Chrissy nodded, but she could admit that she had not actually thought of that.  “I was just in so much pain,” she admitted.  “The visions—they were so painful:  emotionally, mentally…even physically, to a degree.  I had hit the point where I didn’t care who saw me do what.  I just needed relief.”

“You went to him to buy drugs,” Nancy said; it was not a question.  

“I just needed the pain to end.  And it almost did—in the worst possible way,” she confirmed, with a small tug on her headphones.  “Eddie and I didn’t know what was happening at first.  He just knew that what he had seen at the trailer had scared him and he didn’t want to leave me alone to deal with it.  And once you found us and told us just how bad it could’ve been…” she trailed off, with a shake of her head.  “There was no leaving after that.  He stuck with me through thick and thin.”  

“You hear that, Nancy?” Robin asked, leaning in with a mischievous smile on her face.  “Stuck with her—through thick and thin.”  

Nancy rolled her eyes again, but Chrissy noticed she didn’t argue.  

<><><>

Armed with nothing more than his axe, his amp, and his shield, Eddie could admit that he felt nervous.  Not only was he a crucial part of the plan to draw some unknown hazard away from his girlfriend; he was in a whole new world—literally.  

The Upside Down was just as creepy as Henderson had made it sound.  Everywhere he looked there were vines he couldn’t step on.  But as if that wasn’t hard enough, they moved—they were alive, confirming, for certain, that Harrington had been right:  everything was alive and connected here.  

He knew the logistics of their plan—get to his trailer, hook up as many amps as they could find.  He’d play his guitar and draw whatever creatures were waiting for the girls to them while Steve and Dustin served as the driving physical forces behind the attack.  

Eddie felt a little cowardly—he was definitely taking a backseat on the fight.  But he was determined to contribute what he could, and playing his guitar was certainly something he was good at.  

They had reached his trailer in no time.  Hooking up the amps and fortifying the trailer took some time, but by the time that they had heard word via the radio that Max was under Vecna’s curse, they were ready to proceed to their part of the plan.  

He geared up, choosing to play “Master of Puppets” as a means of having a little pay off for how hard he had worked in the last few weeks to learn the song.  Immediately, Dustin and Steve turned, sending their attention to him.  If Eddie wasn’t mistaken, he thought Steve might just be a little impressed.  Dustin, unsurprisingly, was ecstatic.  

But he wasn’t playing it for them.  He could think of nothing else but Chrissy.  Every note played equated to one second of creatures not attacking her—and every note was worth it.  

He played, and the creatures came.  They spotted the bats mere seconds after he had started.  Henderson started the countdown to the time when they must retreat to the trailer, but Eddie kept playing until the very last second.  He wanted to buy Chrissy, Robin, and Wheeler as much time as possible.  

When the time came, they settled into the trailer, hunkering down.  Armed with a series of makeshift weapons, they waited.  Eddie hoped the trailer would hold, but he wasn’t optimistic; the swarm of bats was surrounding the trailer, taking turns ramming into it.  

It was the vents that destroyed their well-laid plan.  The bats found their way in through the vents, and suddenly, they had an all-out brawl on their hands.  

Harrington took several bites from the bats, but if it impacted him, he didn’t show it; he held strong, wielding his own bat to take the attacking bats down.  Eddie hunkered down in the corner, his shield extended, and Henderson tucked behind him for protection.  

The nails on Eddie’s shield alone took down a few of their adversaries, but he knew that Harrington’s kill count went miles beyond his own.  He could admit it—he was impressed, and, so far, Harrington was living up to his broadcasted reputation as a badass.  

It came in cycles; bats would enter through the vents, Eddie would take a few out with his shield, Steve would take a few out with his bat, and, together, they would defeat that round of the bats and be left waiting until the next round invaded.  

It continued on in this way until one bat took a bit of a bite out of Harrington—a bigger bite than any of the bats before this one had managed.  The bat got past the swing of his baseball bat, swooping in and attacking Harrington at the ribs.  

Eddie had just moved to push through the current wave of bats to help when Harrington took matters into his own hands.  He reached out, grabbing the bat by its tail.  Doing so shocked the bat into letting go of its hold on Harrington’s skin.  With a swish not unlike what he typically used to wield his bat, Harrington slammed the bat to the ground.  He hit it with the baseball bat several times, and once the bat was left to simply whimper in pain, he placed his foot on the bat, used his hand to grab its tail once more, and ripped it in half.  

Harrington pulled back, his breath coming out in short, rough gasps as he moved to spit some blood out of his mouth.  Eddie could admit that he had considered mocking Harrington at one time—of course the pretty boy jock would use a baseball bat as his weapon of choice.  But not anymore; Harrington had more than proved all the talk Henderson had thrown Eddie’s way since the start of the year—he was a badass, through and through.  

More minutes passed, and more swarms of bats arrived.  Eddie started to worry as the minutes ticked on.  How would they know when the fight with Vecna was done?  How would they know if the girls had succeeded?  

Suddenly and inexplicably—to Eddie, anyway; Henderson and Harrington seemed oddly unsurprised—the bats crashed to the ground, crying out in pain.  All the fight had left them.  Eddie, Henderson, and Harrington were free to resume normal, standing positions with no threat upon their lives.  

“What’s happening to them?” Eddie asked.  

“Hive mind,” Steve reminded him.  “They either killed Vecna or did some damage to him.”  

Eddie nodded, feeling instantly reassured and very appreciative to Harrington for sharing such information.  He should’ve hated himself for having anything resembling appreciation for Steve Harrington of all people, but after the display he had just seen, he knew he had no other option—he was impressed, and that was all there was to it.  

“So, now what do we do?” Eddie asked.  

“We wait.”  

<><><>

As soon as they arrived at the Creel house, they spotted the adversaries that the boys would be forced to tackle.  

“What the hell are those?” Robin asked, warily eyeing the bats flying around the attic of the Creel house.  

“Bats,” Nancy stated as if it were obvious.  

“No kidding, Nancy,” Robin offered, with a small scoff.  “Have you seen them before?”

Nancy merely shook her head.  

“Do you think they look easier or harder to beat than your…what did you call them?  Demogorgons?” Chrissy asked, her concern for Eddie piquing at the thought of the boys tackling an adversary they had no previous experience with.  

“They’re certainly smaller than the demogorgons.”

“Well, that bodes well,” Robin said, but there was an edge to her voice—she was still concerned, and Chrissy would be lying if she said she wasn’t too.  “But I’m glad it’s them tackling the bats, not me.  Rabies,” she specified, at Chrissy and Nancy’s extremely confused expressions.  “It scares the living daylights out of me.”  

Still, they had reached their destination, and they radioed to indicate as much.  They waited patiently as Max laid the bait for Vecna, and with every passing second, Chrissy felt her heart pounding.  

She hated that poor Max had to succumb to this curse, even if it was meant to only be temporary.  She remembered her own visions, and she sympathized with the suffering Max must be experiencing at that very moment.  She did not envy her position, but she didn’t envy her own either; she was about to come face to face with the very creature that had cursed them both to begin with.  

Once Lucas had responded that Vecna had her, the boys wasted no time.  

With a gasp, she suddenly heard the thrumming of Eddie’s guitar.  She knew he had to be miles away, but hearing it brought her such a sense of relief; at the very least, as long as the guitar was playing, she knew he had to be alive.  

As if on cue, the bats flew in the direction of the sound of the guitar.  Her concern spiked instantly; it hadn’t looked like that many bats when they had been swooping around the attic of the Creel house, but now, flying away, she could see just how many there were.  

She hoped Eddie would be okay, but she knew she had her own risks to be concerned about as well.  The prospect of coming face to face with the creature that had spent a week tormenting her was terrifying—perhaps more for her than for anyone else here, as she knew precisely what he looked like and what he was capable of.  

She knew just how careful they needed to be here.  But she also knew just how important it was that they won here; if they were to win, they would not only save herself and Max, but any countless other people Vecna could curse in the future.  

“Ready?” Nancy asked, releasing a deep breath.  With two silent nods in response, they started to approach the front steps of the porch.  At the front door, decorated hauntingly with a beautiful stained-glass rose that failed to depict the horrors that inevitably resided within, Chrissy paused; Eddie’s guitar had suddenly ceased playing.  

“It’s part of the plan, remember?” Nancy asked, not rude, but very succinct.  “They fortified the trailer.  They will use the guitar to lure the creatures, but they will stand their ground from inside the trailer.”  

Chrissy nodded.  She had not remembered this part of the plan, but, admittedly, she had quite a bit on her mind right now.  

They found Vecna in the attic, just like Max had said they would.  He was just as horrifying as Chrissy remembered him being in her nightmares.  His flesh was made up of the vines they had so cautiously stepped over in the forest on the way here.  His eyes were closed, but she could still see it—the seething desire to kill that she knew burned in those eyes on a regular basis.  

His arms were extended, as if he were offering the most dangerous and lethal hug imaginable, and additional vines were streaming off of him; they were wrapped around the pillars upholding the attic, almost as if he were a leech, drawing power from the house.  

He was, as Max had said he would be, in a trance.  His eyes were closed, and no noise they made—including Robin’s inadvertent tripping over her own feet—seemed to startle him or alert him to their presence.  

“Whoa,” Chrissy heard Robin whisper as she fumbled while removing the Molotov cocktails; she dispersed them evenly between herself and Chrissy.  

If Nancy was scared, she didn’t show it; there was no fumbling to be seen here, as she found and held her gun with determined command.  

They wasted no time.  With one final communal nod to confirm that they were all ready, Chrissy and Robin threw their first cocktails.  A scream echoed through the room, even as Nancy started firing immediately, even as the loud bang of the gun competed with the loudness of the scream to be heard.  

The shock of the contact had evidently shaken Vecna from his trance.  He fell to the floor, screaming, his eyes open—he was here now:  mentally and physically.  

He set his eyes immediately on Chrissy.  She did not hesitate, but neither did he; she threw another cocktail, but he seemed barely phased by it as his eyes ached with hunger.  He took a step to approach her.  

Nancy kept shooting.  Robin kept throwing cocktails.  But he was getting closer.  He would reach Chrissy in a matter of moments.  

Eddie’s music was no longer playing, but the implications of that had an impressive impact on her; he had moved on to the next phase of their plan—he was fighting, just as she needed to fight—right here, right now.  It drove her on.  

She held her head high.  She removed her headphones from their perch around her neck, hurling them back towards the hallway.  She looked him in the eyes.  

In a flash, she was not alone—not anymore.  She was in Vecna’s mind, not her own.  She knew the instant he had her.  

She was in the Creel house, but things looked different.  Robin and Nancy were gone.  There was one, small, illuminated lightbulb dangling from the ceiling.  The decorations were dated, and, while the same items that lay discarded in this version of the room were the same as the version she had just left behind in the Upside Down, there was no dust—no signs of disuse or disrepair.  

She was in the Creel house as it had been—when the Creel’s had actually lived here.  

Vecna was gone, but a boy had appeared in his spot.  He sat at a desk, observing what looked to be spiders.  It sent a chill down her spine.  

“Chrissy,” Vecna whispered, and the sound of it was so very familiar to her—just as chilling as it had always been.  He somehow managed to sound both threatening and welcoming at the same time.  It also did not help that she could hear him, but she could not see him.  “It’s time to come with me.  You have evaded me for long enough.  You know what you deserve.” 

“I do know what I deserve,” she said, holding her head high, despite the fact that she could not find Vecna and that the boy seemed to remain ignorant of his voice.  “I deserve to be with my friends—people that support me, no questions asked.”

“Chrissy!”  The voice was different this time.  Suddenly, her mother was here, alongside this boy that still seemed satisfied studying his spiders.  

“Let me take that out for you—”

“You don’t want to look fat, do you?  Well, fatter than you already do—”

“Are you sure you should wear that?”

“Chrissy, what are you eating?”

“What will Jason think?”

“Really, it’s just a few stitches.  I can let it out for you—

“Think about what you’re doing, Chrissy—”

Suddenly, it was a barrage of insults and cautionary statements from her mother.  She closed it out; she placed her hands over her ears and closed her eyes.  She felt the temptation to trace the notes of “These Dreams,” but she squashed it at the last possible moment; she was not going to use a hole in the world to get out of here—she was going to defeat Vecna and her own traumas on her own.  

“Enough!” she yelled, throwing her hands out and opening her eyes.  Unexpectedly, Vecna was standing in front of her, not her mother.  He was still keeping company with the little boy, though, who remained unmoved.  “I’ve had enough,” she said, looking Vecna in the eye.  She even dared to take a step forward.  “I don’t care what you say.  I don’t care what my mother says.  I’ve had enough of worrying about what everyone thinks!”

The boy left, running past her toward the stairs that led to the main part of the house.  Vecna did not stir, but she did; she ran to follow him—something told her that she should follow him.  

Landing at the bottom of the stairs, she found herself—and the boy—standing in front of a very familiar clock.  The boy stared at it, seeming somehow angry at it for the passage of time.  

“It’s time, Chrissy,” Vecna suddenly appeared again, standing on the opposite side as the boy.  “It’s time for you to join me.”  

Echoes of her mother reappeared in the back of her mind.  Suddenly, her mother had appeared again; this time she was reflected in the glasswork of the clock.  

“Look how tight that looks!—”

“We should take this out, shouldn’t we?—”

“Now’s the time, dear.  All you have to do is slide your finger down your throat.  See, just like this—”

“Is it too small?  Pity—”

“If you won’t do it, I’ll put my own finger down there!—”

“You feed on trauma?” Chrissy asked, closing her eyes, shutting it out—shutting all of it out; she refused to hear her mother.  When she opened her eyes once more, she looked back at the clock, and her mother was gone.  “You feed on misery?  You take someone that’s already miserable and you find ways to make them more miserable?” she asked, with a shake of her head.  “Not anymore!”  

With all the elegance and confidence of a gymnast and a cheerleader, she leapt on Vecna’s back, where she used her position to loop her arm around his neck.  Lowering her feet back to a secure position upon the floor, she attempted to find sufficient leverage, and she succeeded—in spite of the differences in their heights.  

With Vecna trapped and struggling, the boy disappeared.  Maintaining the illusion—whatever it was meant to mean to her, to Vecna—seemed to take more brain power than he was currently willing to allot, given his position.  

Her position secured, she dragged him, approaching the burning fireplace of the living room with every passing step.  Every step was a battle—his vines attacked her, wrapping around her neck; it became hard to breathe, but she had to do this—she had to see this through to the end.  She couldn’t let anyone else fall under Vecna’s curse.  

She did her best to remember that this was a fight of the mind.  If she got burned here—in Vecna’s mind—it would—should—expel her from his mind but keep her physically safe; it should enable her to at least continue to carry on the physical fight.    It wasn’t much, but it was enough to fuel the fire of her fearlessness; she found her fortitude.  

It became an all-out struggle—who could hold out the longest:  Chrissy or Vecna.  She fought, she clawed, she dragged, she scraped.  He slithered, he leeched, he clutched.  

But she used it against him; by the time they had reached the fireplace, his hold on her was so strong—so close—he could do nothing when she pulled him down with her into the flames.  She pulled herself back, but she pushed him forward; she was so close to the fire—if she could only push him one more inch, she’d be safe, and he’d be done.  With one last deep breath and push, he was on fire; the fire danced alone every vine, getting closer to her by the second.   

With a gasp, she was back in the dusted and rundown version of the Creel’s attic—the Upside Down.  She was alive, but Vecna was as well.  He was coming out of his trance, just as she was.  

But Nancy and Robin had not wasted the time Chrissy had bought them.  They had burned him to a crisp, and the fire burned even brighter now; he was burning—here, in the Upside Down, and in his own mind.  There was no escaping it.  

Three shots to the face and he was dead.  

Silence fell upon the attic—shocking, yet peaceful, silence.  It was so very quiet after the thunderous sounds of the fight.  All that remained was the crackling of the fire overtaking Vecna’s body and their own labored breaths.  

They had won.  They had defeated Vecna.  

Suddenly, with their part of the battle done, Chrissy found herself wondering about the boys.  Eddie’s guitar had not resumed, but she didn’t know if that should serve as a reassurance or a concern.  

“It’s okay,” Nancy reassured, almost as if she had read Chrissy’s mind.  “Hive mind, remember?  When one thing dies or is attacked, the others falter too.  If the bats are still fighting, they aren’t putting up much more of a fight.”  

Chrissy, having seen Nancy in action, knew trusting her was the right move; she had proven to have her fair share of experience with all matters related to the Upside Down.  

“Why speculate?  We can confirm this,” Robin started, finding their radio.  “Boys, is your concert over?  Are you ready to meet up at the gate?”

The seconds of silence ticked by, and Chrissy felt every single one of them.  She counted them, feeling sicker with every single one that passed.  

“Roger that,” Dustin’s voice suddenly sounded over the radio.  “We’re alive and well.  We’ll meet you at the gate in thirty.”  

“Let’s blow this hell hole,” she heard Eddie say in the background.  

“Jesus, watch your language.  Like the kid needs any more bad influences in his life,” Steve added, sounding distracted.  

She and Nancy immediately exchanged a look.  

“Let’s go,” they both said.  

<><><>

By the time the girls radioed, Eddie was just about to go out of his mind with his impatience.  When they finally got the all clear to meet up at the gate, they set off at a quick pace; he wasn’t sure who was moving faster—him or Harrington.  

They took the shortest path back to the lake with the gate—through the woods.  Eddie was focused on cautiously making his way over the vines when a quiet, yet kind, “hey” found his ears.  

He turned to see Harrington approaching him, falling into stride next to him.  Henderson led the group, walking several feet ahead of the pair of them.  

“Hey, man,” Steve started again.  “Listen, I just, uh…I just want to say thanks,” he paused, and at Eddie’s confused expression, he pressed on.  “For saving my ass back there.”

“Shit,” Eddie started, with a humorless laugh.  “You saved your own ass, man.  I mean, that was a real Ozzy move you pulled back there.”  

“Ozzy?” Harrington asked as he moved to shine his flashlight on their surrounding area.  

“When you took a bite out of that bat,” Eddie started.  

He could see that Harrington was obviously confused.  He couldn’t say he was surprised.  Harrington didn’t seem like the type to share an interest in Eddie’s type of music, and while Harrington had seemed impressed by Eddie’s rendition of “Master of Puppets,” he hadn’t seemed to recognize the song in the slightest; he was impressed at Eddie’s skill with a guitar, and those skills alone, not due to any inherent understanding of the complexity of Eddie’s choice in song.  

“Ozzy Osbourne?  Black Sabbath?” he tried again, thinking Harrington must have at least read about it in the paper when it had happened.  “He bit a bat's head off onstage,” Eddie declared, finally conceding that Steve clearly didn’t know what he was talking about.

“I don’t—”

“You know?” Eddie asked as Steve clearly continued to fumble.    

“No,” Steve answered, but it wasn’t rude; he seemed to at least understand that Eddie was trying to compliment him.    

“Doesn’t matter,” Eddie started again, knowing that it didn’t—knowing that his point could be made without this mutual understanding.  “It’s very metal—what you did.  That’s all I’m saying,” he finished, with an enthusiastic smile.   

“Thanks,” Steve responded, and he seemed genuine in his appreciation.    

But it wasn’t enough—not for Eddie; he had other things he wanted to say.  “Henderson told me you were a badass.  Insisted on the matter, in fact,” he added, with a nod.  

“Henderson said that?” Harrington asked, the shock clear in his tone.  

“Oh yeah,” Eddie confirmed, emphatically.  “Shit.  Kid worships you, dude.  Like, you have no idea,” he continued, with an enthusiastic laugh.  “It’s kinda annoying, to be honest,” he conceded.  

Harrington laughed at his honesty; it drove him on—maybe, Eddie thought, they could find some common ground here.    

“I don’t even know why I care what that little shrimp thinks, but,” he paused.  “Guess I got a little jealous, Steve,” he admitted.  Harrington looked up to meet his eyes, and he could see it—the exact same emotions he was feeling were reflected on Harrington’s face.  

“I guess I couldn’t accept the fact that Steve Harrington was actually a good dude,” he continued, with a disarming smile.  “Rich parents, popular, chicks love him.  Not a douche?” he paused, his expression morphing to show his disbelief.  “No way, man.  No way.  That, like, flies in the face of all the laws in the universe and my own personal Munson doctrine. 

“Still super jealous as hell, by the way,” he conceded.  It worked; they both shared a laugh. 

“You see,” he continued, leaning in and placing a hand on Harrington’s shoulder.  “Before what happened in my trailer—before Chrissy,” he shook his head.  “I was no hero.  Outside of D&D?  Nope,” he shook his head again.  “I saw what was happening to her, and I swear, if it had gone on one second longer—gone one step further…” he trailed off with a shudder; he couldn’t even think about what would’ve happened to Chrissy if the curse had lasted one more second that day.  “I probably would’ve just turned heel and ran.  That’s what I’ve learned about myself this week.”  

“Give yourself a break, man,” Harrington conceded as he reached in and tapped Eddie reassuringly.   

“See,” he started again, batting Steve’s hand away and moving to lean in once more.  “The only reason I came in here was Chrissy—I’ve gotta keep her safe, man,” he said, with a resounding nod.  “I see you, man.  I know why you came in here.  Henderson’s part of it,” he conceded, pointing to the kid in question.  “But there’s something else, right—someone else?”

Eddie paused, and Harrington’s understanding was etched all over his face.  

“You’ve gotta tell her, man.  Wheeler—tell her how you feel.”

“She didn’t even want me by her side in here,” Harrington said, brushing off Eddie’s encouragement.

“Don’t you see why?  She took on the big bad, Harrington.  Do you think she wanted you there, too?  Do you know how big of a risk it was for them to take on Vecna on their own?  Why do you think I offered to go with Chrissy?”  

“Great,” Steve started, with a scoff.  “So, she thinks I’m useless and that I can’t help her defeat Vecna.”

“No,” Eddie drawled, his smile still holding strong.  “She thinks she doesn’t want to risk you getting taken out by Vecna.  And that, my disgustingly popular friend, is as unambiguous a sign of true love as these cynical eyes have ever seen.  

“Now, I don’t know what happened between you two,” Eddie continued, his smile nothing but encouraging.  “But if I were you, I would get her back.”

With one more clap of solidarity to the back, Eddie left Harrington trailing behind him, clearly lost in thought.

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak, Chapter 5—Not-So-Jolly Jocks

Chapter 5—Not-So-Jolly Jocks

A/N:  This is the longest chapter yet!  I hope everyone likes it!  

While there’s technically only one chapter after this, there’s also an epilogue that follows chapter six.  Two more days of posting and this story will be done!  As always, thank you for any and all support!  

The cops arrived not long after the screams and cracks had ended.  Eddie and Chrissy did all that they could do—hunker down, cleaning up the house as quietly as possible.  

“Shouldn’t we go talk to them?” she offered as she reassembled the couch cushions.  “Tell them what we saw?”

“And what exactly did we see?” Eddie responded as he slid the mattress back in place in the bedroom.  “We still have no idea what really happened out there, or who it even happened to.  What would we have to offer them, really?  Plus, you know,” he stopped, with a small, humorless laugh.  “Cops aren’t necessarily my favorite people in the world to talk to.”

“I’m shocked,” she answered, sarcastically.  “Need a hand?” she asked, noticing he had started making attempts to remake the bed.  “It’s always easier with two people,” she added as she approached to help before he could even answer.  

He nodded, but he seemed to have something else on his mind.  Knowing Eddie, she thought, with a smile, it wouldn’t be long until he couldn’t keep it in any longer.  

“Listen, about what Jason said…” he trailed off, and while she was unsurprised that he had finally started sharing, the topic did certainly surprise her; she didn’t know if she was necessarily ready to jump in and discuss this.  

“It’s okay,” she offered, not meeting his eyes as she literally and metaphorically worked to shrug off the memory of the horrible things he had called her—had said about her.  She moved to focus on tucking the fitted sheet around its proper corner.  “I’m okay.”  

“Well, that’s impressive then,” Eddie started again, with another humorless laugh.  His eyes were still on her—she could feel it—and his side of the fitted sheet got discarded, evidently tossed away so that he could focus on the conversation at hand.  “Because he had fewer rude things to say about me than he did about you and I’m still not doing okay.”  

She was surprised when relief rushed over her.  Something about Eddie—what he had said, how he had carried himself in this conversation—relieved her, made her feel free to feel whatever feelings she may be feeling on the matter.  She would’ve smiled if she hadn’t been feeling so actively miserable about the words Jason had said about her earlier; Eddie kept doing that—kept helping her let go, kept helping her find ways to be true to herself.  

“I’m sorry,” she started, mirroring his actions to discard the fitted sheet.  “I should’ve asked you how you were doing,” she confessed.  “He wasn’t exactly nice to you either.”

“Don’t worry about me,” he responded, with yet another humorless laugh.  “I’ve taken far worse hits in my time than what he dished out there.  But you—how are you doing?  What he said about you…” he trailed off, with a shake of his head.  “What Jason said about me pales in comparison to what he said about you.”  

She nodded, not able to deny that she was still feeling an avalanche of emotions in reaction to what Jason had said.  “To be honest, I haven’t even really begun to process all that he said, let alone how I felt about it—how it made me feel.”  

“I get that,” he conceded, with a nod.  Yet again, she felt relieved.  He was giving her an out—giving her a way to stop this conversation right now, if that was what she wanted.  

But his eyes—they were inescapable.  They were warm and understanding.  They were approachable.  She looked at him, and she got the sense that he just got it; even if he couldn’t empathize—even if he’d never been accused of being a slut—he could sympathize:  he knew what it felt like—to be called a nasty word, to have his reputation dragged through the mud, to have people talk about him like they knew him when they didn’t know him at all.  

Without even realizing she had given her voice consent to speak, she found herself confessing.  

“I guess they’ve heard that I was at your trailer the other night,” she speculated, feeling tears gathering at the back of her eyes.  She tried to push them back; she didn’t want him to think that she was just worried about her reputation and the fact that she could’ve been seen with him.  After he had just been blatantly called a freak by her ex-boyfriend, she didn’t want to add to the perception that he wasn’t good enough for her—as a friend or otherwise.  

“I guess they think this means we’re together now—that I broke up with him to be with you:  that something started while we were at your trailer the other night, and I broke up with him so that I could be with you,” she continued to speculate.  

“I think he was trying to defend me,” she continued, conceding, with a nod; the fitted sheet was now completely discarded, lying ignored upon the mattress.  “Trying to make it clear that their accusations—that their belief that I would be sleeping with you already—couldn’t possibly be true.  But while his intentions may have been honorable,” she continued, more tears gathering in her eyes.  “It just came off as…accusatory.

“I think, really, he was afraid,” she guessed, but even she could hear the doubt in her own voice; she wasn’t sure she trusted her own perceptions.  “I think he’s afraid what they’re saying is true:  that I want to be with you, that I dumped him—the person everyone sees as the perfect jock, for you, the person everyone sees as the perfect freak—and that I’m ready and willing to sleep with you when—when—when I wasn’t ready and willing to sleep with him,” she stuttered through the confession.  

“If I’m willing to be with you instead of him—if I’m willing to sleep with you instead of him—what does that say about him?” she asked, with a humorless laugh.  “What does that say about the reputation he has built?  What will people think?” she asked, knowing that is what she would fear, knowing it is what she would be fearing if she wasn’t skipping school right now—if her life wasn’t on the line right now.  

Something had changed within her, she realized.  Learning that Fred had died from the same set of symptoms she had been tolerating for days—it was more than enough to change one’s priorities.  She found that she no longer cared what her friends would say if she emerged from this situation with Eddie as her boyfriend.  Publicly dating Eddie—it was scary.  But it was nowhere near as scary as the prospect of losing her life to this creature.  

Now, she just had to find the courage to tell him that.  

“Did he pressure you?” Eddie asked, and while she respected the question, she wondered if he had chosen it to avoid the topic he probably wanted to discuss far more—the potential for their relationship.  

“No,” she answered immediately, with a shake of her head—and it was true; she had said no, and Jason had respected that.  “And it wasn’t anything spiteful.  I just wasn’t ready,” she explained, with a shrug.

“Then why did you dump him?” he asked, and Chrissy wondered if this was his way of stepping closer to the topic he wanted to discuss most of all.  

She sighed, unsure of what to say—unsure if she had the courage to say what she knew was the real answer.  “I just felt like it wasn’t fair to him.  I—I—I didn’t want to leave him feeling like I was loyal to him when I’m not—not anymore.”  

“Then who are you loyal to?” he asked, and she could almost see that he was holding his breath.  

She shrugged, trying to be as casual as possible.  “You:  you may not have directly saved me in that trailer—the song did that, we know that now.  But you’ve kept me safe since then,” she specified, doing her best to check the tears at the back of her eyes.  

“You know I would never say that about you—call you what he called you,” Eddie offered, almost as if he were trying to validate the loyalty she had just shown to him.  

“I know that,” she responded, with a nod.  

“And I’d never pressure you—and I don’t care what people have to say about it:  me, or you, or…anything.”  

“I know,” she repeated, with a small laugh.  “It’s one of my favorite things about you,” she admitted.  “I envy it, honestly…” she trailed off, lost in thought. 

“This—this curse,” she continued, hesitating—questioning her own use of the term, questioning her own perceptions of the term.  She didn’t know if that’s what it should be called, but Steve and the others—the ones that were working to save her right now—that was what they had called it, and if that was good enough for them, it was good enough for her.  “Fred died,” she continued, emphatically.  “If that isn’t enough to change my priorities, what is?  If that isn’t enough to shake off my fear of what people think of me, what is?

“I could’ve lost my life in that trailer,” she continued, meeting his eyes with more resolve than she ever had before.  “I could’ve died—I still could die,” she paused as she saw him look away from her for the first time.  It was confirmed for her, then—he didn’t like the prospect of losing her any more than she liked the prospect of losing him.  It encouraged her—fueled her loyalty, fueled her natural sensitivity and warmth, fueled her desire to communicate openly with him.  

“Dating you?  Being with you?  I will be honest,” she continued, holding her head high.  “I’m scared, Eddie.  I never expected to be in this position—not before I met with you at that picnic table.  The thought didn’t even occur to me that we could date—that we could be good together.  But now, on the other side of everything—on the other side of everything you’ve done for me…” she trailed off, thinking through what she wanted to say.  “You’ve helped keep me safe, Eddie.  I’m pretty sure I’d be dead without you.

“Being with you—it’s scary,” she nodded, confirming it again.  “But dying, knowing I let that fear—that anxiety about what other people could think—get in the way of my happiness?  That’s way scarier.” 

“The idea of being with you is scary to me too,” he admitted, with a laugh.  “You’re Chrissy Cunningham,” he said, his tone and his smile becoming more casual, less serious.  “Do you know how long I’ve liked you?” he confessed.  

“I’m guessing it has something to do with the middle school talent show?” she responded, with a carefree laugh.  

“Ding—ding—ding,” he imitated a bell.  “We have a winner!” he exclaimed, but just as fast, his tone turned serious again.  “I don’t want to screw it up, you know?” 

She nodded, and an understanding seemed to pass between them—they were together now, and nothing anyone said or thought was going to stop it.  

<><><>

Long after dawn had broken, they had another round of visitors, only, this time, it was the ones they had been expecting—Wheeler, Harrington, and the whole crew.  They had a new addition with them as well:  Sinclair.  

They snuck in the back to avoid the cops, scaring Eddie half to death as they came unexpectedly through the back door that led to the shore.  He found his immediate impulse after the events of last night was to simultaneously reach for a weapon—he found a can opener first—and reach for Chrissy; he had just pulled her in behind him when Wheeler and Harrington appeared, leading the pack.  

There were sighs in relief all around, even as he could see Wheeler’s eyes still lingering questioningly in the direction of the cops outside.  Quietly, they dumped the food supplies in the kitchen, all took seats around Rick's coffee table, and settled in, although Eddie could admit that he kept a particularly wary eye on Sinclair.  

As his eyes swept the group, he heard something familiar.  With a shock, he realized the redhead—Max, he remembered—was listening to music on headphones perched around her neck, just like Chrissy was.  He tried to make out the song, but it was a little too quiet for him to hear.  Still, a chill went down his spine; they now had two cursed individuals in their midst.  

“What the hell happened out there?” he asked, assuming they had at least overheard something from the cops on their way in—and, if not, Sinclair should certainly be able to tell them all about the no-longer-so-jolly jocks.  

“You guys didn’t see?”  Sinclair asked.

“No, we were a little busy hiding from your psychotic new BFFs,” Eddie answered, his smile dry and sarcastic.  “You know they took a knife to Reefer Rick’s couch,” he continued, pointing to the slashes in the cushion behind his back.  

“A knife?” Max asked, turning accusingly to Sinclair.  

“But who am I kidding?” Eddie continued, nodding to Sinclair; he was driven on by Max’s disapproval.  “Of course you know.  You were here.”  

“Things got out of hand—” Sinclair started.  

“Oh, you don’t say,” Henderson jumped in.  Eddie felt oddly validated, hearing Henderson’s support in particular.  

“Okay, enough,” Wheeler started.  “Yes, Lucas shouldn’t have been with them.  But thank God he was, or we’d never know all the details of what happened.”  

“And we just trust him now?” Chrissy asked, with a small nod in his direction.  

“He was our friend first,” Henderson conceded, his eyes trained on Eddie.  

“Until he got captured by the Dark Side,” Eddie contributed.  

“But I’m back now!” Sinclair cried.  “I saw what they did last night,” he continued, pointing to the knife marks.  “I realized how stupid I’ve been.  Let me make it up to you guys.”  

Henderson looked at Eddie with a quirked eyebrow; his question was clear.  Begrudgingly, Eddie nodded and waved for them to continue.  

“The cops gave us a little information,” Wheeler started.  “I’m hoping you’ll fill us in on the rest,” she continued, nodding to Lucas.  

“What are the cops saying?” Sinclair asked.  

“Patrick was killed—”

“Patrick McKinney?” Chrissy asked, with a gasp.  

Wheeler nodded.  “All the cops will say is that it was Patrick that was killed, and a fellow Hawkins High student called the cops.  That’s what we overheard as we drove up.  We saw you, came in here, and here we are,” she finished, with a shrug.  Her eyes were trained on Sinclair; Eddie was impressed by how intimidating she could look.  

“We came here looking for Eddie,” Sinclair started.  “Someone saw Chrissy going into your trailer a few nights ago, and Jason wanted to know…” he trailed off, and Eddie was curious to see how Sinclair chose to word this, given how…tastefully his buddy Jason—the leader of the not-so-jolly jocks—had worded things last night.  “What you two were doing together.  We went to all your usual places—your trailer, the garage your band practices in.  Someone mentioned that Reefer Rick was your supplier, and that’s how we ended up here.  

“We searched the house,” he continued, with a sigh as he looked around.  The house was still a bit of a mess; in all the stress of the presence of cops, Eddie and Chrissy had been careful to move around too much.  “I guess we weren’t very nice house guests; we left it in kind of a mess.  Then, we moved on—talked about whether we should check out the boat house or the shore.”  

Eddie couldn’t help it; his eyes slid to Chrissy, who was sitting right next to him.  Oh, yeah, they had talked about it, alright—where they should look— and Eddie and Chrissy had heard every demeaning word.  

He wanted to reach out and hold her hand more than anything.  He could tell she, like him, was bothered by the memory of the particular conversation that Sinclair was referring to.  But while he knew where they stood—they were together—he didn’t know if she—or himself, for that matter—was ready for public displays of affection.  He erred on the side of caution.  He sat back, releasing a deep, disapproving sigh, and did his best to dig in.  

It was enough to do the trick; Sinclair received the message—he saw the remorse in Sinclair’s eyes.  Now, he just had to decide if that was sufficient to earn his favor back.  Chrissy, alternatively, would need to decide on her own time when—or if—she forgave Sinclair; she had taken far worse hits than Eddie had last night.  

“When we reached the shore, something happened to Patrick,” Sinclair started again, and despite his still brewing frustration on the matter, Eddie allocated his attention to Lucas; he needed to know what had happened.  “He froze.  His eyes glossed over—all white and foggy.  He didn’t move for a few minutes.  Then, suddenly, he was levitating in the air.  Each arm broke, then each leg.  Finally, it was like his head just…exploded.  It was…horrible,” he settled on, much to Eddie’s horror.  “I’ll never stop having nightmares about it.”    

The impact of Sinclair’s description could be felt immediately.  There was, of course, now not only one cursed person in this room, but two.  He was describing the fate that they were narrowly avoiding, even now.  

Everyone in this room had known that Fred had died, but they didn’t know a lot of the details.  Wheeler presumably knew something; she had talked as if she had seen Fred’s body.  But as far as Eddie knew, she was the only one that had gotten close to one of this thing’s victims—and she hadn’t been there when he had died; she hadn’t seen first-hand just how bad it was to go out like this, from this curse.  

To hear the fate of someone cursed by this creature—to hear the fate that Chrissy could’ve suffered—it nearly did him in; he couldn’t imagine how Chrissy and Max were feeling right now.  

Chrissy physically reacted, a choked sob escaping her.  Eddie didn’t hesitate—he took the opportunity to swoop in, placing a reassuring hand on her back.  Max, though quieter in her suffering, was clearly bothered; she drew her headphones in even closer, turned the music up a little louder.  

Privately, Eddie reconciled a previous mystery; Red was playing ‘Running Up That Hill,’ by Kate Bush; he would’ve smiled—would've addressed it publicly—but he was far too traumatized by the description Sinclair had provided.  

“What’s wrong?” Sinclair finally asked, seemingly reading the room.  

“Max and Chrissy have both been cursed by this thing,” Henderson explained.  

“Cursed?” Sinclair asked.  “What happens when you’re…cursed?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Henderson started, sarcastically.  “Maybe exactly what happened to Patrick?”

“Okay,” Harrington interrupted, waving between the two boys.  “But Patrick wasn’t seeing Ms. Kelley.”  

“No, she didn’t have a file about him,” Max answered.  

“I guess he was suffering in silence,” Henderson responded.  

“What do you mean?”

“This thing—” Wheeler started.  

“Vecna,” Henderson supplied.  

With an eye roll, Wheeler resumed speaking.  “Vecna—it seems to curse people struggling with some form of trauma.”

“There are symptoms:  headaches, nightmares, visions—” Max described.  

“And, ultimately, it appears, death,” Henderson finished, casting a nervous glance around the group.  

“But we can beat it, right?” Eddie asked, hearing the nervousness in his own alarmed laughter.  “We can find a way to defeat it?”

“Did you see anyone attack Patrick?  How about with Chrissy?  Was there anyone there actively attacking her?” Henderson asked.  When everyone that had knowledge of the situation responded with a shake of the head, Henderson sighed.  “It must live in the Upside Down—attack from the Upside Down,” Henderson answered.  “To defeat it, we’ll have to find a way into the Upside Down.”  

“The what?” Eddie asked, shaking his own head.  

“The Upside Down is basically an alternate dimension—one that runs parallel to ours,” Henderson explained.  “It’s dark—literally dark—and there are creatures that live there that want to kill us, and all of these creatures run on a hive mind:  you kill one, it hurts another.”

“What?” Eddie guffawed, with a sarcastic laugh.  “That’s—I’m not gonna lie, Henderson, that’s a lot to take in.”

“Well, start taking it in,” he responded, his tone firm.  “We need to accept that this is real, find a way to enter the Upside Down, and fight Vecna if we want to have any hope of saving Max and Chrissy.”

“Have you been there?” Eddie couldn’t resist asking; he tried to make his voice sound sarcastic, but, ultimately, his curiosity won over.  

“Yeah, as a matter of fact, I have,” he answered, firmly.  

Eddie looked to Henderson.  He liked to think he knew this kid pretty well, and Eddie could see no signs that Henderson was in any way kidding.  In fact, if anything, he seemed to have considerable pride in his experience with…whatever this place was that he was talking about.  If he’d really been there—and his tone seemed to assure Eddie that he had—who was Eddie to question it?  

“Okay, we need a plan,” Wheeler interrupted his train of thought.  “After doing some research—”

“Yeah,” Robin interrupted.  “It turns out, Nancy’s shot in the dark was a bullseye.”

“We think we know where Vecna might be hiding in the Upside Down—or, at least, where to start looking for him,” Wheeler explained.  “At the library, we dug through old newspaper articles—anything that resembled Fred’s death.  We found something pretty specific.”  

“Victor Creel,” Robin continued.  “He’s pretty infamous in Hawkins, apparently.  Or, at least, he was a couple of decades ago.  He supposedly killed his whole family and gouged out their eyes, leaving them for dead in an old Victorian on the outskirts of town.”  

“That’s kind of what Patrick looked like,” Sinclair offered.  

“Exactly,” Wheeler confirmed.  “It was the same with Fred.  After doing some digging, it seems that Creel believed his house was possessed by a demon—”

“Vecna,” Henderson interrupted.  

Wheeler nodded.  “So, we figured we should start at Creel’s house in the Upside Down.  Maybe it has something to do with this.”  

“That’s great,” Henderson offered, but there was an edge to his tone.  “But how do we get into the Upside Down?  The gate’s still closed as far as we know.”  

“I might be able to help with that,” Sinclair started, with a cautious hiss.  “When Patrick died, something happened.  None of the other guys recognized it, but I sure did.”  

“What was it?” Wheeler asked.  

“It was pretty small—much smaller than the one we saw at the lab—but I’m pretty sure it was a gate.”  

“You didn’t think you should maybe mention that earlier?” Harrington asked, with a shake of his head.  “You know the shit that comes through these gates,” he continued, the volume of his voice rising in his panic; it gave Eddie a new sense of understanding about the Upside Down—it was a place to be feared, even if he did still suspect that Harrington was little more than a cowardly, popular, rich kid.  “Shouldn’t someone be keeping an eye on it?”

“The cops are out there!” Sinclair answered, indignantly.  “Besides, it didn’t open immediately, but it was growing.  I just noticed it getting worse and worse the longer we all kept standing there, the longer the cops kept asking me questions.  If it isn’t open by now, I bet it will be soon.”  

“So, there’s a gate right here, in our backyard?” Eddie asked, with a scoff.  “Sounds great.  Let’s gear up and go kill this thing.”  

“Not so fast,” Henderson cautioned.  “It’s like Steve said—the things that come out of these gates are hard as hell to beat.  We’ll need a plan.”  

“What is it like?” Wheeler started, looking between Chrissy and Max.  “When you see the visions?”  

“I only had one before I started playing Kate Bush,” Max said, shrugging off the very personal question.  

All eyes turned to Chrissy.  He once again felt defenseless—like he wanted to do something to help her, but he knew he couldn’t; she and she alone had experienced her episodes.  

“I had two visions,” she said.  “Not counting the clocks.”

“Oh, yeah, I saw a lot of the clocks too,” Max offered.

“Clocks?” Wheeler asked.  

“Yeah, it’s old—like a grandfather clock.”

“But that isn’t the worst part of it,” Chrissy continued.  “The creature—”

“Vecna,” Henderson reminded her.  

“Vecna,” Chrissy corrected.  “He would come to me in different forms, looking and sounding like my mother, but saying things—some she personally said to me and some that were exaggerations:  nightmares that were even worse than the reality.  It would look like my mother—sound like my mother—then I’d turn around and it would look like…well, what I imagine Vecna normally looks like.”

“What does he look like?” Eddie asked, his curiosity piqued; he hadn’t heard this part before.  

Chrissy hesitated, subconsciously reaching for her headphones as she did so.  “Squishy?” she asked, with a small, irrepressible laugh.  “He’s got, like, vines all over him.”

“The hive mind,” Harrington and Henderson said at the same time.  

“That’s very common for things from the Upside Down,” Henderson clarified.  

Chrissy nodded.  “It’s like he’s there and not there at the same time.  He can jump around—appear in areas that should’ve been impossible for him to reach.”

“And what did it look like when Chrissy was experiencing this?” Wheeler asked, directing her attention to Eddie.  

“Just like you said McKinney looked,” he answered, nodding towards Sinclair.  

“Hmm,” Wheeler started, her lips pursing in curiosity.  “You called these visions, so are they solely in your head?”

“The only physical component seems to be how he kills,” Henderson offered.  

“Do you remember when Eleven used to try to find people?  She’d get really still; she’d be doing all of these fantastic things, but she wouldn’t move a muscle?” Wheeler asked.  “It was all in her mind.”  

“Who’s Eleven?” Eddie asked as everyone else—other than Chrissy, of course—nodded in understanding.

“She’s this girl—she had superpowers, she used to be how we fought the creatures from the Upside Down,” Harrington said.  

Eddie tried his best to take this in stride, just as he had with all the other bits of information that had been hard to believe in this conversation.  

“What if this is like that?” Wheeler continued.  “What if Vecna isn’t fighting a physical fight?  What if he’s only doing it with his mind?  What if he’s sitting in the Upside Down somewhere, unaware of his surroundings, just like El used to be?  That would make him—”

“Vulnerable,” Max supplied.  “Very vulnerable when he attacks.”  She paused, but only for a second.  “I have to be the bait.  I ditch Kate Bush; I go to the Creel house—where you guys think he’s hiding—and I make it easy for him.  He can swoop in and take me.  While I’m going through the visions—keeping him on the run—you guys can attack him in the Upside Down.”

There was a resounding chorus of protestations.  But Max held strong; she refused to do anything else but play the bait.  

Eddie knew it was selfish, but he was extremely relieved that this incredibly brave girl was willing to be the bait.  It took Chrissy off the chessboard as an option.  

“Max will be the bait if she's sure,” Wheeler responded, cautiously.  “But we’re bound to have other problems.  Wherever this thing is, you know it’s going to be protected—”

“What are you thinking?  Demogorgons?  Demodogs?” Henderson offered, using yet more words that Eddie had never heard before.  

“Or something different.  Either way, we’ll need someone to distract them—use the hive mind against them, just like we did when Joyce and Hopper went in after Will,” Wheeler responded.

“Wait…” Eddie started.  “Hopper?  Chief Hopper?  The guy that died in the mall fire?”

“Yeah, we may or may not have been the cause of that…” Harrington trailed off, bringing his hands up to create air quotes.  “Mall fire.”  

“That’s debatable,” Henderson scoffed.  “The Russians—”

“The Russians?” Eddie asked emphatically.

“And, of course,” Wheeler interrupted, cutting over any chance Eddie might’ve had to ask follow-up questions.  Still, his curiosity was piqued.  “We’ll need a group to go in and kill Vecna,” Wheeler finished.  

“So, two groups…” Harrington trailed off, as if he were dreading this next part.  “Anyone want to volunteer for one task or another?”

“I think I should be the one to go after Vecna,” Wheeler answered.  “I’m good with a gun—”

“You’re good with a gun?!” Eddie asked, sputtering over his surprise.  

“Okay, but, you won’t be the only one going after him,” Harrington interrupted, completely disregarding Eddie’s question.  “Sure, you can lead that group, but I’m coming with you.”

“No, you aren’t,” Wheeler argued, already shaking her head.  

“Don’t even—”

“I need you to—”

“Say it—”

“Stay with the kids.”

“I knew it—I knew you were gonna say that,” Harrington said, finishing off their back and forth argument.  

“I’m staying with Max,” Sinclair declared.  

“See?” Harrington called, motioning animatedly to Sinclair.  “That’s two less kids.  It’ll only be…” he trailed off, his eyes coming to rest on Henderson, who already had a mischievous smirk on his face.  “Not again,” Harrington declared.  

“What’s the matter?” Henderson asked, looking hurt.  “You don’t like it when we get partnered up?”

“It’s not that,” Harrington scoffed.  “We’re just always partners!”

This explained something for Eddie.  Henderson had frequently talked about Harrington—how badass he was, how awesome he was; it was clear the boy idolized him.  That had been really hard for Eddie to understand.  On the outside, Harrington was nothing but a popular playboy.  Maybe Steve, much like Eddie—much like Chrissy—had something more going on beneath the surface.  Maybe they had fought together in this…Upside Down.  

Harrington’s bravery still remained to be seen, though.  Eddie would reserve his judgment until he had some first-hand evidence.  

“Okay, Steve and Dustin will distract whatever is defending Vecna.  I’ll go after Vecna,” Wheeler started.  

“I’m coming with you,” Robin offered.  She shrugged at Harrington’s whimper in complaint.  “What?  We made a good team at the library.”

“The only question that remains is what do we do if Vecna doesn’t fall for Max’s trap,” Wheeler posed.  “What if he becomes conscious before or during our attack?”  

For the second time in this conversation, all eyes came to Chrissy.  

“If I’m with you,” Chrissy started, slowly, unsure.  “I might be enough to distract him.”  

Eddie hated the sound of this.  But who was he to tell her what she could and could not do?  She had been living with this curse for days.  If she thought she could survive this close of a call, who was he to question her?

He looked over and caught a still-stewing Steve, whose eyes were locked on Wheeler.  Suddenly, it clicked for Eddie.  It wasn’t that Harrington had no interest in being partnered with Henderson in the Upside Down; it was that he didn’t like the idea of leaving Wheeler there alone, especially in a room with some big, bad creature.  He looked at Harrington, and he saw the expression he knew had to be riddled all over his own face at that moment.  

Perhaps Eddie and Harrington had something in common after all—well, more than just a strange relationship with an equally strange high school freshman.  

“I should come with you,” Eddie offered, looking at Chrissy.  

“Actually,” Henderson drawled, with a squeak.  “I had an idea of how we could draw the bad guys to us,” he paused, a mischievous smile overtaking his face.  “If you’re up for it.  You’re kind of the crucial figure in the plan.”  

Now, Eddie couldn’t help noticing that new emotions were overtaking Harrington’s face—and they were, yet again, emotions that Eddie himself had felt in the not-too-distant past.  Harrington, it seemed, had the ability to feel just as jealous of Eddie as Eddie had felt of Harrington—jealous of the relationship he shared with Henderson, jealous of the way Henderson idolized him, jealous of the fact that Henderson could view him as a paradigm of good.  

It seemed Henderson was willing and able to express those feelings towards Eddie as well.  It also seemed to bother Harrington just as much as it had bothered Eddie in the past.  

They’d certainly have a lot to discuss in the Upside Down.  

“We’ll need to get a few things,” Wheeler started, nodding in approval of the plan they had established.  “Max and Chrissy, you should continue to stay somewhere safe—”

“No,” Max said.  “I should go to the Creel house—get set up, use the lights to see if we can confirm that Vecna is there.”  

Wheeler nodded.  “Okay, we’ll drop you off there, but take Lucas with you.”  

“Everyone gets a radio,” Henderson started, suddenly removing several radios from his backpack and distributing them.  “One for you,” he said as he handed one to Eddie.  “Another for you,” he added as he gave one to Max.  “And, for now, the rest of us are staying together.  We’ll meet back here once we've got everything we need to defeat Vecna.  We’ll radio when we’re on our way back.” he finished, with a final nod to Eddie.  

They gathered up their things and prepared to return to their cars.  But, at the last second, Henderson turned back, meeting Eddie’s eyes once more.  

“Oh, yeah, one more thing,” he started, that same mischievous smile on his face.  “Where do you keep your guitar?”

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak, Chapter 4—Jolly Jocks

Chapter 4—Jolly Jocks

A/N:  Another day, another chapter!  This one is a little on the short side, but the last two are anything but short, I promise!  As always, thank you for any and all support!  

They walked in silence back to the main house as Steve and the others piled into two cars, each hurling off towards their assigned tasks.  

Chrissy knew it was a regression, but she had been oddly relieved to see Nancy and Steve amongst the group today.  They were both…well, for lack of a better term, popular.  Yet they had come here knowing exactly what she had undergone; her feelings and experiences were somehow validated by their status, their position, and their understanding.  

She didn’t necessarily like how relieved she felt at their validation.  But it did make her feel better, so she had to make the best of the situation, she supposed.  

“How are you feeling about all this?” Eddie asked once they had reached the cone of safety that was the main house.  They took seats on the couch facing each other, and she noticed that his eyes never once left her.  

“Better,” she admitted.  “And, yet, somehow worse at the same time.  Fred—”

“He died,” Eddie finished for her, leaning in, like he felt the move was a necessary one to really get a look at her.  “He died less than twenty-four hours after your last episode.  That could’ve been you,” Eddie continued, looking devastated.  “You could’ve died right in front of me.”  

Chrissy settled for nodding; she wasn’t quite sure what to say.  

“But listen to me,” he interrupted himself, with a laugh.  “Here I am, worrying about how I would’ve been crushed if you had died in front of me.  Meanwhile, you’re the one that would’ve died.  I can’t even imagine how you’re feeling right now.”  

She knew what he was doing—leaving the floor open for her to share her feelings on the matter.  She wanted to share—she really did, especially after his very raw confession that he would’ve been devastated if she had died—but she didn’t even know where to begin.  

“I—I’m—I don’t—” she stuttered, but she gave up.  Finally, the tears just came.  She lowered her head, allowing it to fall into her hands, and just let them come.  

His arms were around her in an instant—not pushy, but certainly comforting.  She didn’t fight the contact; it had been a rough couple of days, and she wasn’t going to say no to some support.  

“They’re on it,” Eddie encouraged quietly, his voice muffled by the wisps of her hair.  “Henderson—you should hear the way he talks about Harrington,” Eddie continued, with a rough laugh.  “I didn’t believe it, but after today…” he trailed off.  “Maybe he’s got a point.  I think Harrington’s going to come through for us.”  

Us.  She was a part of this now.  Steve, Nancy, Robin…Eddie.  They were forming their own community here.  They had taken her in—they hadn’t questioned what she had experienced.  

Would Jason have offered the same blind support?  She couldn’t be certain, but she suspected not.  

She worried about being viewed as an outsider—she still wasn’t fully comfortable with that.  But with this group, she wasn’t an outsider—she was anything but.  She did still feel nervous and insecure about it, but it was a start.  

“What do we do now?” she asked, pulling back to meet his eyes and seek a plan.  

“We wait,” he offered, with a shrug.  “Hopefully they’ll be back soon with some food and some explanations.”  

<><><>

Someone came to see them the next day, but it was not Wheeler.  

They heard a car coming down the road as it started to get dark.  Despite the fact that they were expecting Henderson’s crew with supplies, they still silently made the pact to slip to the boat house, with all of its affordances of added safety.  They followed their procedures from the last time they had had visitors—they tidied up, walked silently and slowly to the boat house, and hid under a tarp within one of the boats.  

When Eddie heard the visitors approach the main house—not the boat house—he knew they had made the right call to hide.  When he heard their actual voices, he nearly shit himself.  

It was Jason and his band of merry men—his jolly jocks, as it were—including Sinclair.  He felt like he was going to be sick with betrayal.  

His eyes met Chrissy’s.  She looked just as confused as he felt.  What the hell could these guys be doing here?  He would’ve asked—full of brash and bold bravado, no doubt—but a chill ran down his spine and halted his actions; he couldn’t quite place why, but he didn’t like that these guys were here, and he thought it best to keep as quiet as possible until they left.  

They started pounding on the front door of the main house, yelling Eddie and Chrissy’s names repeatedly and confirming, to some degree, Eddie’s concerns about their intentions.  With a crash, they seemingly broke in and entered the house.  

He silently thanked whatever deity that would have him for giving him the impulse to get them out of that house.  He could still hear them—yelling Eddie and Chrissy’s names, making catcalls.  But he couldn’t make out any details yet and was, therefore, left wondering why the hell they were here.  

He had his ideas, of course, but he didn’t dare put a lot of thought into them.  Part of him was concerned—hopeful?—that Jason had heard Eddie and Chrissy had been seen together at his trailer, and he was here now to make accusations about Chrissy breaking up with him.  Did Jason think Eddie and Chrissy were together now?  Part of him hoped for it, but part of him—the smarter part of him—knew the dangers that could come from such an accusation.  

Eddie didn’t know if they were together—he didn’t know what they were.  And, frankly, it wasn’t any of Jason’s business.  But him throwing a temper tantrum—coming here to bang down the door and try to take Chrissy back—would certainly add validation to it; once people heard Jason had done this—had come here to break up an allegedly budding relationship—it would be pretty clear that there was at least some form of a budding relationship to break up.  

He felt giddy at that prospect, he could admit it—even if the sound of the jolly jocks busting shit up in Reefer Rick’s house nearly made him shit his pants.  He couldn’t take them—he was smart enough to know that—but he could delight in their jealousy.  

They left the house, causing Eddie to pause his giddiness.  He and Chrissy seemed to barely breathe as they heard the jolly jocks move around the boat house.  They were arguing with each other—debating where to check next.  

Fortunately, they seemed ignorant to the existence of the boat house—for now, anyway; they moved around it, settling on checking the beach as one of the jocks cringingly suggested that maybe Eddie and Chrissy were having sex on the shore.  

The suggestion was crude, and the impact could be felt immediately.  Chrissy blushed, her eyes evading Eddie’s entirely, even as his sought her out with nothing but an apology in them—he didn’t want her to feel pressured, objectified, or slut-shamed by these assholes.  

While the members of the party in the boat were having their own struggling reactions to this accusation, so, it seemed, was Jason.  Eddie did his best to convey his apologies to Chrissy silently through his eyes while also listening for the jock’s reaction.  It was not a reasonable one—he immediately threw the offender against the side of the boat house, sending a shivering rattle through the items found there.  He screamed—don’t talk about her like that, she isn’t a slut, she wouldn’t dare sleep with someone that fast, and she definitely wouldn’t dare to sleep with that freak.  

Eddie swallowed—hard.  He cringed when it happened; it was too loud, and he was instantly even more worried that they would be heard—that they would be found.  But he couldn’t help it.  The things Jason was saying—they were horrible; he was horrible.  

Eddie knew—in some twisted, demented way—Jason probably thought he was defending Chrissy.  He probably thought he was defending her honor or some shit like that—his ex-girlfriend wouldn’t sleep around, and she definitely wouldn’t sleep around with someone as freaky as Eddie Munson.  

But that wasn’t how it came off to him, and he was pretty confident that wasn’t how it came off to Chrissy either.  She had had her own reaction, perhaps equally as loud to his—and perhaps equally as dangerous as a result—but also equally as justifiable.  She leaned in, hiding her face from him—but he heard it, the suppressed, sobbing, sigh that she released into his chest.  Trying to move as quietly as possible, he somehow managed to slip an arm around her shoulders; he figured it was the least he could do.  

But as the topic of conversation turned for the jolly jocks, Eddie feared he had done too much—had made too much noise.  Having pushed one of the jolly jocks into the side of the boat house, they had now noticed said boat house; their lovely, safe hiding place had been discovered.  

The jolly jocks started arguing again—debating which location to check first.  Eddie sent another silent prayer—only the second he had ever sent in his life—in the hopes that the jolly jocks could be persuaded to look elsewhere.  

He didn’t know if it was a miracle—and, if it was a miracle, he didn’t know who he should thank—but they stuck with their original plan; they were heading to the beach.  

As he heard their voices retreating, Eddie got an idea.  He eased Chrissy back, forcing her to meet his eyes.  

The silent tears he found there nearly did him in, but he held strong—he had to make sure they got out of this without the jolly jocks finding them, and with all the shit they had just said about her, under no circumstances should Chrissy be forced to make a plan right now.  He had to pull his shit together and keep it together.  

He put a finger to his mouth and nudged his head in the direction of the door.  Silently—as silently as he had ever done anything in his life—they got themselves out of the boat, made their way back to the door of the boat house, and crept back to the main house.  

“They’ve already checked here,” he whispered, as he closed the slightly battered door behind them.  “I think we’ll be safer here.”  

She nodded, agreeing, but as her eyes left his, he found his following hers.  He looked around at Rick’s house—what he had come to think of as their house.  It was destroyed.  Tables had been overturned.  Closets had been emptied, their contents spilling out onto the floor.  The mattress had been flipped, cast casually aside in a way that made the small bedroom impossible to navigate.  The couch cushions were not only discarded to the floor, but they had slashes in them as well.

Did they have knives?  That seemed like a bit of overkill to Eddie.  Another chill ran down his spine.  

His fear at the thought of these jolly jocks possessing knives was cut off by another source—a series of screams coming from the shore.  

Eddie and Chrissy quickly yet silently made their way to the back windows—the windows that looked out upon the lake.  Something was wrong, but he couldn’t see many details from here.  If he squinted, he could just make out the image of something hovering in the air.  He thought he heard several snaps—not unlike bones breaking.  But then, nothing—echoing, painful silence rang out across the lake.  

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak Chapter 3—An Undeniable Truth

Chapter 3—An Undeniable Truth

I managed to get another chapter done today!  I want to thank everyone that has stuck with me through the first two chapters!  Your continued support means so much to me!  

I hope everyone enjoys this chapter!  We’re at the half-way point; there’s only three chapters after this one!  

Chrissy awoke early the next morning.  Honestly, she wasn’t even sure she had really ever truly fallen asleep to begin with.  

She couldn’t stop thinking about the interaction she had shared with Eddie the night before.  Being a gentleman, he had offered her the bed and had taken the couch for himself.  But it was wasted on her; she did nothing but toss and turn that night.  

Eddie seemed to think they had a lot in common.  Chrissy would not have agreed at the beginning of this endeavor—that day she went to meet him at the picnic table.  But now, on the other end of a near-death experience and his efforts to keep her safe, she could admit that this truth was becoming just that—a truth, and an undeniable one at that.

They had both suffered.  They had both survived.  

This was the very thought she had had the night before.  It had not left her since.  It kept echoing, pinging around in her mind.  

This commonality alone was enough to qualify them as close friends.  She had not shared the information she had shared with him yesterday with anyone.  To have shared it with him…  It immediately classified them as being close.  

But she could feel it—the pull to become more than close friends.  She didn’t know if he had contemplated kissing her last night in those final moments before they had turned in, but the mere fact that she had been left contemplating it was enough to tell her something.  

To her surprise, she had wanted him to kiss her.  This was utterly shocking to her, not only because he was Eddie or because these feelings had come on quite suddenly, but because she still currently had a boyfriend—one she had not seen in days, one she had not told what she had already told Eddie.  

For these two reasons—the shocking desire to kiss Eddie and the fact that she could share with him so openly, so freely—she knew what needed to be done.  She needed to go see Jason and end things with him—once and for all.  

It scared her.  She had remained safe thus far—with “These Dreams” and with Eddie.  Her safety, to her, seemed almost contingent on those two items.  He may not have personally saved her from the creature, but he had kept her safe in the time since.  Leaving him felt like a very scary risk.  But it was a risk that had to be taken; she refused to leave Jason on the hook when she was clearly having feelings for someone else.  

She brought her hand up to play with her necklace—a golden 86 set around a gold chain.  It was Jason’s, given to him as a senior on the varsity basketball team.  He had given it to her, and she had, at one time, considered it as sacred as pinning; she was his and he was hers.  

But Eddie was not wrong; it had always been in the back of her mind—this concern about what their life together would look like.  She suspected marrying Jason would ultimately turn her into her mother; she would never stop worrying about her weight, and she would, eventually, create a daughter that had the exact same complexes she was suffering from right now.  

She had never been able to share her struggles with Jason—just as Chrissy knew that her father, if he even knew, did nothing to help the situation with her or her mother.  It was, in essence, like she was setting herself up to repeat the mistakes her parents had made—sacrificing her own genuine happiness for the appearance of perfection.  

With a glance through the threshold of the bedroom door to a slumbering Eddie resting on the living room couch, she knew she had no concerns of that if she chose him.  He had heard her, and that alone was more than Jason had ever done—more than her father had ever done.  

With a newfound resolve, she quietly removed herself from the bed.  With a glance down at herself, she felt a wave of dread overcome her.  She was sure she’d look like a freak to Jason—dirty cheerleading uniform, “These Dreams” playing from headphones looped around her neck, make-up at least two days old and runny.  

But as she heard and witnessed Eddie—the freak, she recalled—roll over in his sleep from the living room, she saw how at peace he was.  With a smile, she cast aside her insecurities at the reaction Jason would have to her appearance.  With a smile, she thought maybe—just maybe—Eddie had already taught her her first lesson in refusing to conform.  

<><><>

He awoke to the sound of the door closing.  It immediately had him shooting up in surprise and looking around for Chrissy.  Had she left?  

No, he realized; it appeared she was returning—she was walking through the door, not out of it.  

“Where’d you go?” he asked while taking efforts to catch his breath.  

She looked up, surprised; it was clear she had been lost in her thoughts.  “Oh,” she started, then hesitated.  She seemed to still be pretty distracted.  Her hand came up to play with her necklace, only for her—and Eddie—to realize it was no longer there.  She paused, the smallest smile coming across her face as she did so.  “I just had something to take care of.”

“‘Something to take care of’?” he repeated, coming to a stand, and approaching her.  “Well, thank God I’m a late sleeper.  If I had woken up and you weren’t here, I probably would’ve panicked.  It wouldn’t have been pretty.”

“Sorry,” she apologized.  “I just wanted to get it done and over with.”

“Get what done and over with?” he asked, taking another small step to approach her.  His eyes—beyond any control of his own—lingered once more on where her necklace used to be.  

“Oh, nothing,” she answered, her eyes evading him.  “It’s getting late.  Should we eat?” she asked, suddenly making her way towards the kitchen.  

While he was delighted to hear her instigate the act of getting food, his curiosity almost overpowered his enthusiasm.  Had she broken up with the jock?  Had she had to return the necklace because it was his?    If so, why was she being so evasive?  There was no reason to hide it from Eddie; after everything they had shared the night before, this felt like a minor thing.  

It definitely had his curiosity—and his perceptiveness—piqued.  

As they settled into rifling through the food supplies afforded by Reefer Rick’s kitchen, Eddie found his thoughts wandering.  He tried to remember as many details as he could from her descriptions of her visions; if he couldn’t crack the code of the missing necklace—and, potentially, the missing boyfriend—he’d work with what little he did have.  He remembered the passive-aggressive mom.  He remembered the silent and blind dad.  

Is it possible Chrissy had contemplated the role he played in her situation?  Did she feel that her dad knew what her mom was doing and chose to say nothing?  Or did she contemplate the fact that he didn’t know—that he chose to not see anything?  

Chrissy hadn’t admitted to anything regarding the role her dad played in her situation.  But her vision made it clear that, whatever he did or didn’t know, she blamed him a bit too.  

Is this what had led her to break up with Jason?  She had admitted to Eddie that she hadn’t shared any of what she had told him with Jason.  If she felt like she couldn’t talk to him about it now—before they were married—did she fear that her future would look like nothing more than what her parents currently shared?  Did she fear that, since she hadn’t talked to Jason about this, that it was implied that he might agree with how her parents were treating her?  Did she fear that, if she married Jason—had kids with Jason—she would do the same thing to her kid that her parents were doing to her?  

In her visions, she had seen decaying food and had been literally trapped inside her family’s house.  He didn’t need to be a psychic to figure out the meaning of that; her fear of food—her fear of sitting at a table full of food that she was supposedly not allowed to eat—had her feeling nothing but trapped by her family.  Maybe, Eddie couldn’t help but think, she didn’t want to find herself trapped in a marriage with Jason—a guy she couldn’t even share her deepest, darkest secrets with without an accompanying fear of judgment.  

As the day carried on, he found himself watching her very closely.  With Jason potentially out of the way, Eddie would openly admit that he was more than interested in Chrissy.  He had always had a crush on her—he knew it.  Ever since he had seen her perform at the talent show in middle school, he hadn’t been able to get her out of his head.  

He knew now what he hadn’t known then:  it was because they had something in common.  They had both suffered and survived.  The cheerleader and the freak—they should have nothing in common.  He was at the talent show to perform with a band called Corroded Coffin.  She was at the talent show to perform with the cheer squad.  But at the core, they were both there for one purpose:  to perform.    

Eddie knew who he was—he knew himself, and he never compromised who he was for appearances.  But he was also a performer—and not just on stage with the band.  He had a big personality, and, while that was true to who he was in his soul, he also had a lot of baggage he was constantly trying to put behind him.  

From what he could see, Chrissy also knew who she was—to some degree.  But she, alternatively, had a hard time fighting the impulse to compromise who she was for appearances.  She performed—far more than he did.  He performed to help maintain the morale of those around him—his little buddy Henderson came to mind.  She performed to help maintain her reputation, her appearances.  

Given what she had told him about the hell her mother had put her through, he couldn’t blame her.  It sounded as if appearances and reputations were very important in the Cunningham household.  

Reputations ran rampant in the Munson household too.  If his status as a Dungeon Master or drug dealer wasn’t enough to earn him the reputation of being a freak, his father’s history with being in and out of jail certainly did the trick.  

Perhaps that was the difference.  Chrissy had been surrounded by an established family reputation her whole life; expectations to uphold that reputation were shoved upon her at every opportunity.  Eddie had been surrounded by a perceived family reputation his whole life; assumptions that he would uphold that reputation were shoved upon him at every opportunity.  

Everyone expected her to be the cheerleader.  Everyone expected him to be the freak.  

They had played their roles well.  But it was an undeniable truth—their roles were not the undeniable truth.  

Maybe she had finally come to terms with that this morning.  Maybe she had broken up with Jason as a result.  As they ate their way through Reefer Rick’s pantry, he noted that she seemed just as friendly as she always had, although he thought he did see her eyes lingering on him once or twice—but maybe that was just his blind hope speaking.  

As night set on the lake house, Eddie heard something he had yet to hear in their time spent at Reefer Rick’s—a car.  He could hear it winding down the road, and its presence surprised him:  it wasn’t exactly warm in Hawkins in March; who could possibly be coming to the lake for a vacation?  Other than the occasional fisherman, they hadn’t seen anyone since arriving at the lake house.

“Do you hear that?” he asked, but he saw that she already had as she, too, came to stand at high alert.  

“Someone’s coming.”  

Silently, as if they had been working together for years, they made moves.  They tidied up the house in an attempt to make it look like no one had been there.  They crept over to the boat house and settled in under one of the tarps—the furthest from the door, just in case someone came looking; it would give them time to prepare.  

Settling in next to Chrissy in the extremely confined space, Eddie contemplated how and why they had both managed to come to the same conclusion:  that they should leave the main house.  He wasn’t really sure what had driven them to this conclusion.  Were they worried Reefer Rick could be returning?  Were they worried because she hadn’t been home in two days and her parents could’ve come looking for her?  He supposed there could be a number of reasons they were hiding, but he wasn’t really sure which one had driven them to actually do it.  

Still, he wasn’t complaining.  Laying down in the boat with Chrissy created quite the tight quarters.  

They waited.  Eddie could hear someone checking the main house, confirming his suspicions that, no matter what, they had made the right call—in choosing to hide.  He felt like he recognized some of the voices, but he couldn’t hear them well enough to really distinguish anyone just yet.  

But as they approached and entered the boat house, he knew who was coming—he had heard at least Henderson, Harrington, and Wheeler amongst the group, and maybe even Robin from band.  

Harrington picked up an ore, and Eddie knew their moments were numbered.  He looked to Chrissy, mouthing silently to tell her to prepare.  Harrington approached their boat, but Eddie struck out before Harrington could; he popped up from underneath the tarp, grabbing Harrington’s ore and prompting a round of screaming from all involved.  

It was Henderson that calmed everyone down—that got everyone thinking logically again.  After several rounds of soothing shushing, Eddie and Chrissy stood across from Harrington, Wheeler, Robin, and a redhead Eddie had seen hanging with Henderson in the past—the one that never wanted to play D & D.  Henderson was in the middle, trying to mediate between the two groups.  

“Jesus Christ,” Eddie cursed, trying to move past his shock at just how many people were standing in front of him.  “What the hell are you all doing here?”  

“We’ve been looking for you!” Henderson called emphatically.  

“Why?” he asked, after hesitating for a moment to look at Chrissy to see if she had any explanations to offer.  

“It’s a long story,” Wheeler started, looking at the redhead.  “Max and Dustin have a theory—”

“It’s more than a theory,” Dustin corrected.  Eddie could see Harrington’s eyes roll from here.  

“Humility,” Harrington said, emphatically.  “It wouldn’t hurt you to be a little humble, you know.”  

Eddie nearly laughed; he had experienced the same struggle when interacting with Henderson himself in the past.  

“Fine,” Henderson started, cutting off Eddie’s thoughts of laughter.  “But I’m still right—”

“Fred Benson died,” Wheeler started again, this time with a sigh and a slight glare of frustration at Harrington and Henderson.  “I was with him before he died, and he started acting…” she hesitated, her eyes squinting as she seemed to search for the right word.  “Strange.  He was distracted, talking about seeing things that I couldn’t see—”

Wheeler kept talking, but Eddie couldn’t help it; his attention left her and went to Chrissy, and he found her already staring at him, looking nervous.  

“You know why we’re here, don’t you?” Henderson suddenly asked, cutting off Wheeler and drawing Eddie’s attention once more.  

He glanced at Chrissy once more.  He wouldn’t speak for her—he refused to do that after everything he had heard from her in the last few days, after how much he knew the other people in her life did that for her every day.  

Chrissy merely nodded, but she seemed to be waiting for them to confirm what she already knew.  

“So, we paid a visit to Ms. Kelley,” the redhead—Max, Wheeler had called her—started.  “She wouldn’t give us much,” she conceded.  “So, we broke into school and read her private files.  Fred had a whole roster of symptoms,” Max continued, but she looked different—troubled.  “Headaches, nightmares, visions.  We started looking through all her files—”

“Sorry,” Henderson conceded, with a guilty glance to Chrissy.  

“Trying to find anyone else that had the same symptoms.  Your name came up,” Max stated, crossing her arms over her chest.  

“But how did you find us?” Chrissy asked.  

“That was a bit harder,” Henderson started.  “We checked cheer practice and Jason’s—sorry to hear about you two, by the way,” Henderson interrupted himself, his voice dripping with sarcasm as his eyes lingered pointedly between Eddie and Chrissy.  

Eddie nearly laughed—he only managed to check it at the very last second.  He should’ve been frustrated with Henderson—for making assumptions, for putting those assumptions on display, for invading not only Chrissy’s privacy but his own.  But damn it, he was just too likable; Eddie couldn’t muster up enough frustration to make anything of it.  

“I saw you at Eddie’s trailer two nights ago,” Max intervened.  “When we struck out with all the other possibilities, we started to wonder if something had happened that night.  I thought I saw something—something familiar:  flickering lights.  We looked into his known associates and ended up here.  Fred’s symptoms started a week ago; he died yesterday.  By that math—”

“I should’ve died days ago,” Chrissy interrupted, her voice hollow—like a ghost.  

Wheeler nodded.  “So, we just sort of guessed that maybe something had happened to you that night and that you two were hiding out, trying to figure it out.”  

“How did you do it?” Max asked, instantly eager.  “You should be dead—by Fred’s timeline, you should be dead.  How are you not dead?”  

“This thing,” Henderson started, placing a calming hand on Max’s arm.  “It works like a curse.  We think there’s someone—a dark wizard, you could say—out there, cursing people.”

“Like Vecna?” Eddie suggested.

“Yes…” Henderson whispered, in the form of a sigh.  “Exactly like Vecna!”  At a look of impatience from Wheeler and Harrington, Henderson proceeded.  “He puts his spell on them, they have some headaches, some nightmares, and seven days later, they’re dead.  But your symptoms started—”

“Nine days ago,” Chrissy supplied, nodding.  

“So, how are you doing it?” Max pressed again.

“With this,” Chrissy answered, bringing her hands up to fiddle with the headphones around her neck.  Eddie could still hear the small echoes of “These Dreams” coming from them.  “In Eddie’s trailer that night, the creature—this…wizard—almost killed me.  But my favorite song interrupted him; I can avoid having episodes as long as I keep listening to my favorite song.”  

Max immediately turned to look at Henderson.  But Eddie knew it wasn’t the look of two people trying to work out just a theory.  

“Why?” Eddie asked, already suspecting he knew.  

“I’m cursed,” Max stated.  “I’ve been having symptoms for five days.”  

“Do you know a song that could—” Henderson started.

“Save my life?” Max interrupted.  She paused, crossing her arms over her chest again as she thought through the question.  “Yeah, I’ve got an idea.”  

“Okay, you all work on getting Max what she needs,” Wheeler started, pointing to Henderson, Harrington, Robin, and Max.  “You two stay here—keep playing that song, keep safe,” she continued, pointing to Eddie and Chrissy.  “I have a shot in the dark that I want to research at the library.”  

“Whoa, whoa, no,” Harrington started, approaching Wheeler with a shake of his head.  “No—nope.  Under no circumstances are you going to the library by yourself.”  

Wheeler shook her head in disbelief.  “I’ll be fine.  I’ve faced worse than the library before.”

“Oh, I know,” Harrington started, with a humorless laugh.  “But that’s no reason to keep pressing our luck.  No, you’re not going to the library on your own.  Not with this—this Vecna guy out there.”  

“I’ll go with her,” Robin offered.  

“No—no—I’m going,” Harrington countered.  “You drive the kids to Max’s house, get the song—”

“I don’t think you want me driving your car,” Robin said, in a sing-songy voice.  

“Why?” Harrington asked abruptly.  

“I can’t drive!”

“What—why—”

“I don’t have my license!” Robin added.

“How?” Harrington asked, emphatically.  

“Fine,” Wheeler interrupted the argument.  “If you insist, I’ll take Robin with me.”  

“I do—I do insist,” Harrington stated as his eyes came to rest on the kids.  “The babysitter—always the babysitter.  Let’s go!” he ordered, heading towards the front door of the boat house.  

“Hey, if you’re going out,” Eddie started, making sure to be as charming as possible.  “Could you get us some groceries?  We’ve eaten Rick out of house and home here.”  

Henderson nodded, stepping around Harrington to approach Eddie once more.  “There’s more to explain—more you need to know.  For now, just hide out, keep Chrissy safe, and we’ll be back with some food as soon as we can.”  

He looked at Chrissy.  He couldn’t help it—a smile overtook his face.  At last, they weren’t alone in this fight.  At last, they might have some chance of killing this creature and permanently saving Chrissy.  At last, he could have a chance at being with Chrissy forever—without “These Dreams” constantly thrumming in the background, not that he wouldn’t take that if it meant they kept her alive.  

At last, there was a reason to hope.  “I think we can do that.”  

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak, Chapter 2--A Hole in the World

Chapter 2—A Hole in the World

A/N:  I managed to get a chapter posted on the weekend!  I can’t guarantee that will always happen, but I managed it today!  As always, I hope you enjoy this chapter, and thank you for any and all support! 

You can also find this fic on fanfiction.net.

@youngandidle: To answer your question, yes, I will be writing more! This fanfic is actually finished; I'm editing and posting one chapter a day! It will be six chapters long.

Hawkins was a small town; they were able to get the tape from Chrissy’s house and settle in at Reefer Rick’s before the sun had even risen.  

To get the tape, Chrissy was able to walk through the front door, feign fatigue, grab the tape, and sneak back out her bedroom window before her parents even went to bed.  Her song had been playing since, and every time it ended, she merely rewinded and played it over again.  So far, it seemed to be working; she hadn’t had any additional episodes or visions—she hadn’t even seen or heard the ticking of the clock.  

While orchestrating the plan to extract the tape had been her job, she deferred to Eddie once she landed on the soft and dewy grass outside her bedroom window.  He seemed to have an idea in mind for where they were going to go, but he wouldn’t give her specifics; he just ranted on and on about how they’d be safe—how they’d make a plan when they got there.  He seemed to talk without really knowing what he was saying—without really knowing what point he ultimately wanted to make.  

It could’ve annoyed Chrissy.  Perhaps if she were in a more diligent state of mind, it would’ve.  But, instead, she found it nothing but pleasantly distracting.  It allowed her to focus on other things; it allowed her to keep from experiencing flashes of her mother—mutilated, her eyes gray, saying the most horrible things:  things that were not that far off from what she already said in real life.  

“Well, here we are!” he suddenly announced, his enthusiasm echoing off the lake she knew laid waiting, off in the dark distance.  

It wasn’t exactly the fanciest place in town.  It looked a little run-down, as if the owner hadn’t been home in a while.  But looking around at the surrounding empty woods and equally as empty surrounding houses, they weren’t likely to be found out here, and that alone made it worth it to Chrissy.  

“Where are we?” she asked, knowing she might regret asking.  Still, when he took a step forward, she followed him; Eddie had helped keep her safe so far, and he had proven himself to be very tolerant and open-minded, far more so than anyone else in her life—than the countless people who seemed to constantly have an opinion on how she should look, act, and talk.  

“It’s my supplier’s house—Reefer Rick,” he explained, with a laugh and a quirk of his eyebrows.  

“He won’t come back?” she stopped, with a concerned shake of her head. 

“No, he’s in jail,” he responded, with another laugh.  

Chrissy wasn’t sure whether she should be reassured or concerned by this statement.  But as Eddie resumed his forward motion, she found herself following him.  

They were settled in by morning, not that there was much to do to settle in.  They only had the clothes on their backs, Chrissy’s tape, and the limited stock of food that Rick had evidently left behind when he had gone to jail.  Still, in looking around the dilapidated lake house, Chrissy could admit that she felt safe—with the thrumming of “These Dreams” echoing in her ears and Eddie’s quiet, yet steady humming along to the song constantly in the background, she felt as if she could breathe for the first time in days.  

By nightfall, she felt something weighing on her once more—something completely different than the trials she had suffered over the last week:  a need for a plan.  They were here now, and they were safe, but they had also been hiding for an entire day.  What was she going to do?  She couldn’t just disappear.  Her parents had seen her last night, and she often did leave early for cheer practice on the weekends; it was excusable that they would not see her for one day but stretching her absence into the evening would not go unnoticed.  

Eddie, however, she noticed, seemed unbothered by their lack of plan.  He spent the day combing through Rick’s music, playing some quietly on a stereo to avoid disturbing her anthem.  When he ate, he made food for her.  When he turned the TV on, he solicited her opinions on what to watch.  He was a very considerate house guest, but Chrissy felt the lack of permanence pressing down upon her.  

“What are we going to do?” she finally asked as they shared a less than ravishing dinner of Spaghettios.  She had tried her hardest not to be that person—persistent and impatient for a plan.  But as time wore on, she began to see that it was inevitable that she was going to have to be the one to make a plan.  Eddie’s lack of predictability and focus was charming—and had worked wonders on taking her mind off of her troubles—but to really, truly feel at peace with her situation, she would need to make a plan to get out of it.  

“What do you mean?” he asked, with another charming laugh.  She didn’t want to admit it, but his enthusiasm was contagious; when he laughed, she felt as though she could simply settle into a routine with him here forever.  

“Well, so far, the music seems to be working.  But if I don’t want to walk around with “These Dreams” playing in the background for the rest of my life, I suppose we need to find a more permanent solution.”  

“That’s fair,” he conceded, sitting forward in his chair.  “But I think for us to really make a plan, we’ve got to discuss what happened in my trailer.  We won’t know how to get you out of this until we figure out what’s going on.”

She knew he was right, but she wasn’t thrilled about it; the last thing she wanted to do was discuss the visions she had seen.  She was afraid talking about them would trigger another episode.  On top of that, she just didn’t like the idea of sharing this information—she feared how his view of her would change once he knew who she really was and what she really had to do to maintain appearances.  

Eddie was so very different from her.  He was…free, she settled on.  He liked weird things—things she wasn’t so sure she approved of just yet.  But she could admit that she envied his devil may care attitude about it—pun not intended.  He knew who he was—what he liked, who he liked—and he simply lived his happiest life accordingly.  

But she wasn’t like that.  She was constantly worried about approval—her mother’s, the other cheerleaders’, Jason’s.  She had worked so hard to be the person she was seen as today; she feared what opening up that door and contradicting that image would do to her.  

Would he criticize her?  If he did that, she was likely to get very upset; she didn’t handle criticism very well—it bothered her on a very deep level.  

Or would she want to throw it all away?  If he did criticize her—didn’t she need to hear it?  Arguably, her dislike of criticism was what had landed her in her current predicament to begin with.  

Things weren’t working as they were; she was literally being tormented by memories of her mother.  Something needed to change, and maybe—just maybe—Eddie was the man to help offer some perspective.  

“You want a compromise?” he asked suddenly, startling her from her thoughts.  She hadn’t been asking for that—she hadn’t even really figured out what she had wanted from this conversation yet.  But as soon as he offered it, she realized that was precisely what she had wanted.  Somehow, he had known—even before she had.  “I get that.  I’ll show you mine if you show me yours?”

She wasn’t exactly sure what he meant by this, and her uncertainty had a chill of fear running down her spine—or was it curiosity?

“My dad,” he continued, thankfully putting an end to her speculation before it could run away from her.  “He’s in jail—dealing drugs, go figure,” he added, with a sarcastic scoff.  “I always told myself I was going to be better than him,” he continued, with another scoff.  “But here I am.  

“I won’t touch the stuff,” he disclaimed, with a shake of his head.  “I saw just how much damage that could do with my dad—sampling the product.  But I do sell the stuff.  So, am I really any better than him?” he shook his head once more.  “Probably not.”  

“I think you are,” she reassured, with a shrug.    

She saw what he was doing now—sharing some of his dark secrets in the hopes of easing her pain at having to share some of her own.  Instantly, she felt relieved, even if it made her feel horrible to experience such a reaction.  She didn’t want to delight in his dysfunctional childhood, but the fact that he was willing to share something so private really helped her feel as though he understood—he’d get it, no matter what she had to say.  

She nodded and sighed, doing her best to gather her courage.  “It started about a week ago.  At first, it was just headaches and some really vivid nightmares.  But as the week’s carried on, it’s gotten worse and worse,” she admitted.  “About a day and a half ago, I started having visions—essentially the same things I’d see in my nightmares, but during the day.  I started actually seeing the things from my nightmares.  They were…interacting with me, saying horrible things—things even more horrible than what I already hear in real life.”

“They?” he asked, his forehead furrowed.  “So, there’s specific people?”

She nodded.  “Yes, typically only one person.  But this last time…” she trailed off, with a shake of her head.  “There were a couple of people.  It’s my mom, mostly,” she continued when he remained silent; she appreciated it so much—that he just let her talk, that he just listened.  No one listened—not like he did.  “She—she isn’t very nice.”  

He remained silent.  She knew he wouldn’t press—he seemed to refuse to do that—just as she knew she couldn’t stop here.  She had come too far—further than she had ever shared with anyone else in her life.  It was equally exciting and nerve-wracking—being this open, this vulnerable.  

“My mom was a cheerleader for Hawkins High.  She married my dad right out of high school; he was on the football team—”

“Sounds familiar,” Eddie injected, with a warm, non-judgmental smile.  

“I know,” she rolled her eyes, not sure how else to respond.  He was fairly unpredictable in a conversation; she wasn’t always sure how best to respond to his comments.  But that being said, he seemed to have a habit of calling her on her actions.  It both scared her and intrigued her.  

“She’s always been so beautiful—I’ve seen pictures of her from high school.  She's won beauty contests.  She's still the prettiest of her friends to this day.  She doesn’t look like she ever even had a child—and yet she managed to have both me and my brother.  

“As a result,” she hesitated, but only for a second.  “She’s very critical…of my weight,” she continued, lowering her eyes from him for the first time in the conversation.  “She monitors what I eat, what I look like, what the scale says.  The second she thinks I’ve gained any weight, I’m put on a—a—a diet,” she hesitated, knowing that wasn’t really what it was.  “She threatens me passively-aggressively, telling me she's going to take out my skirts until I can fit in them again.  She says it like she's doing me a favor, but, really, she wants me to feel the pressure:  the pressure to meet her expectations—society’s expectations—of what I should look like.”

“And these diets?” he asked.  She didn’t know how he had known—how he had seen right through her explanation—but he had.  

Before she could even question whether she should tell him, she was.  “I’m not allowed to eat.  If I do, I’m forced to purge.  She’ll go so far as to put her own finger down my throat if she has to.  I’m pretty sure it’s what she's done to herself her whole life.”  

Eddie seemed to sit on this for a moment, and Chrissy found that she felt almost reasonable—logical for the first time in days.  She felt anxious and stressed—worried that his perception of her was changing right in front of her eyes.  But as she often felt when she got stressed, she looked to the facts to control herself, to avoid conflict.  Everything she had said was true, and he was the only one that would know it; her reputation might be changed in the eyes of Eddie Munson, but he had proven to be an understanding and tolerant person.  She would be okay.  

“That’s the definition of shitty,” he said, and, even though his words could’ve sounded like a joke, he came off as perhaps the most genuine she had ever seen him be.  “Fuck her,” he said, the rebellious edge he had a reputation for coming out.  “You should eat whatever the fuck you want.  Do you want cake?  I’m going to get you some cake,” he said, standing up abruptly.  

“No,” she interrupted, placing her hand on one of his to still his actions; though his reaction may have been a little over-the-top—but, really, was he ever anything but over-the-top?—she could admire how sweet and endearing his attempts were.  “We still have to solve this problem.  I almost died back there—in your trailer,” she reminded him.

“But, Chrissy, you could die from this too,” he responded, resuming his seat.  “What your mom has done to you—it’s not fair.”

She nodded.  “And I’ll struggle with it for the rest of my life.  But let’s first make sure I have the rest of my life to struggle with it.”  

“Okay,” he conceded, but he didn’t look happy about it.  “But I’m going to the store tomorrow and getting you some good food—no more of this Spaghettios shit.  If you’re gonna eat, then you’re gonna eat something better than this.”  

She nodded but said nothing else.  

“So, what specifically did you see, then?  Back at the trailer?”  

She sighed, feeling as though she almost dreaded this part more than the previous part; she didn’t want to risk triggering another episode.  

“I saw my mom—she was sitting at her sewing machine, taking out my cheerleading skirt.  But when she turned around to face me…” she hesitated, trying to figure out how to describe what she had seen.  “It was her, but it wasn’t her.  She was mutilated—her skin was waxy and looked dead and decaying.  Her eyes were white and fogged over—”

“That’s how your eyes looked,” Eddie interjected.  

She nodded, not sure what to think of the commonality.  

“What else?” Eddie prompted.  

“I ran away from her.  I left the room, turned around, and suddenly I was in my house, not your trailer.  I found my dad where he always is—the living room, watching TV.  But his eyes and lips were sealed shut.  He tried to talk, but he couldn’t get anything out.  

“I heard something on the stairs behind me,” she continued, squinting her eyes in her efforts to attempt to remember what had happened.  “Someone was chasing me.  I had seen it before, too—at school this week.  That was the first time I had a vision.  I was in the bathroom and…” she trailed off, remembering what she had been doing in the bathroom.  She didn’t want to dip back into that part of this story again—not yet.  “I heard my mom’s voice.  But then something happened to it; it morphed, just like it did in the vision I had at the trailer.  It sounded…different.”

“Different how?”

“Like a guy,” she said, thinking it was the simplest distinction she could find.  “And scary and intimidating.  It just kept saying my name over and over again.”

“It?”  Eddie asked.  “Not he?”

She shook her head.  “It sounded more masculine than my mom, yeah, but it didn’t sound…human,” she settled on.  

Eddie nodded, but he didn’t say anything else.  She appreciated the opportunity to continue.  “Once I heard it coming, I started running again.  I ran away from my dad and through a dining room full of decaying food, covered in flies and spiders.  I gagged, but I pushed through and ran for the front door, only to find that it was blocked off.  I was trapped inside my house.  

“The creature…whatever it is,” she continued with a shrug, as a chill ran down her spine.  “Had just found me and started approaching me when the song started playing,” she said, reaching up to secure her headphones a little tighter around her neck.  

“A door opened behind me—not the front door of the house, but a different one.  It was almost like a hole had opened up in the world,” she continued, slowly.   “Through the hole, I could see us—you and me, standing in your living room.  You were yelling at me, shaking me—doing everything you could to wake me up.  And all of it played out as the song continued.  I focused on the song, turned my back to the creature, and ran.  I went through the hole in the world, and I woke up, back in the living room with you.”

“Okay,” Eddie drawled, seemingly still processing all that she had told him.  “So, we just basically have to keep this creature away from you, and the song seems to be our way of doing that.”  

She nodded.  “But that’s a temporary fix.  How do we kill the creature?”

“I have no idea,” Eddie admitted.  “But we have the song,” he continued, nodding towards her headphones.  “And that’s enough—for now.”  He paused, his eyes moving to look out a nearby window.  “Come on,” he urged, turning back to her.  “Let’s go sit by the lake.”  

She wasn’t sure why this was completely necessary, but as soon as they closed the back door behind them, she could see the appeal.  The moon was high in the sky, and the stars sparkled beautifully.  Eddie led the way, plopping down in the sand and clearly leaving an unspoken and open invitation for her to sit next to him.  

The sand was so soft under her legs.  It felt so freeing—sitting in the sand with Eddie, with “These Dreams” thrumming subtly in the background.  She had never felt as free as she did in that moment.  

“Thank you,” he said suddenly, prompting Chrissy to look at him in question.  “For sharing so much with me earlier,” he clarified, with a reassuring nod.  “I know that couldn’t have been easy.”  

“You shared too,” she reminded him, with a shrug.  “That couldn’t have been easy either.”  

“Yeah,” he started, with a disarming laugh.  “But my family baggage has nothing on you.”  

“I don’t know,” she responded, with her own answering laugh.  “You’ve struggled,” she continued, her tone turning to sound more sincere.  “Don’t sell yourself short.”  

He nodded before looking down to his shoes in contemplation, but it was just for a moment—his eyes quickly came back to meet hers again.  “You know,” he started, with yet another humorless laugh.  “I used to wonder if you had it easy.  Cheerleader, popular, jock boyfriend—probably fated to become your jock husband someday.  Your life was set—your path was set, and it was a clean and happy path.  

“It looked easy,” he continued, with a knowing nod.  “But, somehow, I knew it wasn’t.  Somehow, I suspected things just weren’t as they seemed.  Yeah, I was worried that day at the picnic table that you would prove to be just what you seemed to be on the surface—the mean, yet popular cheerleader.  But just as I suspected—just as I hoped—you turned out to be the opposite.  

“You’re nice and funny and charming and you’ve suffered—really suffered,” he continued, looking at his shoes again.  “I don’t know how, but I think I always knew that.  I think I always felt like you and me—we had more in common than we thought we did.”  

She didn’t know what to say to this.  In a sense, he was right, of course.  They had both suffered.  They had both survived.  

But it was more than that—what he was saying meant so much to her, and, as quick as she realized it, she knew just what to say.  

“Thank you,” she responded.  “For complimenting me—not on how I look, but who I am.”  

He nodded, but his tone quickly turned to joking once more.  “Well, tell me, then—am I what you expected?”

“Oh, you are exactly what I expected,” she answered, with a laugh.  

“Thanks,” he replied, sarcastically.

“No,” she rushed to explain.  “I mean that in the most amazing way,” she continued, taking her turn to look away in thought.  “You are who you are—you know who you are, and you wear it on your sleeve,” she said, coming to look at him once more.  “I envy it,” she admitted, quietly.  

“You could do that too,” he said, quietly, his voice and expression full of emotion—even more than he usually revealed there.

“Maybe you could teach me,” she responded, her smile returning as she sought to change the tone of the conversation once more.  She knew he was right—she needed to find a way to be true to herself—but it scared her, and she knew it.  

But her answer had a different impact on him than she had expected.  Instead of prompting another laugh or another furrowed forehead, his smile seemed genuine—determined.  He leaned in, surprising her and sending a shocked chill down her spine.  He gasped, and Chrissy was just beginning to wonder what his intentions were when—finally—he spoke.  “Challenge accepted.”    

[patiencetakestyme]

The Cheerleader and the Freak, Chapter 1

Chapter 1—These Dreams

A/N:   This is only the first chapter, but this fic is completed; I’ll be posting one chapter a day (except weekends—things get crazy around here!).  In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this chapter!  You can also find this fic on fanfiction.net!

If you like this fic, check out my book:  The House of Dormiens by K.A. Saylor.  You can find it on Amazon!

Thank you for any and all support!  

If someone had told him this morning that Chrissy Cunningham would be ending the day standing in his trailer, he would’ve laughed in their face.  Yet, she was here—standing, in his living room, waiting for him to return with the Special K.  

When he had met her at the picnic table earlier, the only thing that had surpassed his shock had been his intrigue.  It wasn’t that he was curious as to why Chrissy Cunningham was buying drugs​​—or, at least, it wasn’t solely that he was curious as to why Chrissy Cunningham was buying drugs.  It was that she intrigued him—she had always intrigued him, ever since he had seen her perform in the talent show in middle school.  He hadn’t been exaggerating; he still remembered her performance, and it made him feel eager that she had remembered his performance too.  Even if it had taken a bit to remind her, it hadn’t taken that much to remind her, he told himself.  

He had always had a crush on her, he could admit it.  He was a sucker for the unexpected—for anything that flew in the face of what society expected.  The pair of them?  They’d certainly be unexpected.  And with their relationship, they could make one thing abundantly clear:  happiness could be found in choosing not to conform.  That was a message he could get behind.  

But it wasn’t just the message.  It was her—he couldn’t explain it, but he just felt like he got her, and she got him.  He believed that was why she had come to him—of all people—for drugs.  And that was why he was determined to let his actions speak here—he would provide the drugs and hope that she got it:  that he was here for her, that he wanted to help her in any way he could.  

Having found the Special K, he returned to the living room, prepared to do just that.  But what he spotted there seemed to call his goal into question in a way that he never could have anticipated.  

Chrissy did not look well.  Her eyes were glazed over, almost as if she were in a haze.  She didn’t seem to be able to see him—to hear him.  No matter what he did—yell for her, shake her shoulders, beg for her to hear him—she was unresponsive.  

He heard the panic in his own voice—the repeated requests of “Chrissy, wake up!” and the extremely lame and inadequate descriptor of “I don’t like this, Chrissy!”  

He was just beginning to lose hope when things changed; someone drove by, blaring a song he did not recognize—or, at the very least, could not process in his panic—out their car windows.  It echoed, bouncing off the lackluster and unnoteworthy walls of the trailer he shared with his uncle.  The music—it was deafening, but it did nothing to alter his panic.  

No, the change in Chrissy’s demeanor was all that could shake him from his own dismay.  The song continued to play—evidently, the owner of the car chose to linger outside his uncle’s trailer—and Chrissy seemed to flinch; the moment was small—he almost missed it in his hysteria—but he did catch it and continued to catch it as her expression progressively changed.  Her eyes were still hazy, but she seemed somehow more resolute.  

With a sputter, she suddenly came back to him.  She collapsed, falling into Eddie as her breaths came out in sharp gasps.  He caught her but only out of reflex; they were soon crashing to the floor together, his arm clasped around her neck as she came to fall with her back against his chest.  

He clutched at her as she clutched at him, his arm locked securely around her neck and her hand coming to rest on his forearm.  He took a few seconds to process, but his mind was too eager—too impatient.  

“What the hell was that?”  

“I’m—it’s—it’s n—nothing,” she stuttered around her gasps for air.  

But she wasn’t fooling him; he knew a hesitancy to share when he saw one.  

“Oh, come on,” he started with a laugh, even though he could feel the weight of it—it was humorless, and they both knew it.  “I think finding you in a standing coma in my living room qualifies me to know what’s going on with you.”  

She released a final gasp as she seemed to force herself to calm down.  She pulled out of his grip—much to his dismay—and turned to face him in their still-seated positions.  

“I know,” she conceded.  “It’s just…” she trailed off, looking away nervously.  “I haven’t told anyone—not even Jason.”

Jason…  Eddie tried to trace the name.  Hawkins was a small town; he was pretty sure that was the jock she was dating—the one he had belittled in the cafeteria mere hours ago.  If so, Eddie considered it nothing but promising that she had not only neglected to tell the jock this bit of information, but that she seemed to be seriously considering telling him—Eddie the Freak—the information she was withholding from the boyfriend.  

“Chrissy,” he started, with another humorless laugh.  “Whatever this is…” he trailed off, thinking through how he could reassure her.  “You were willing to buy drugs from me to cope with it,” he continued, taking a chance—he didn’t know for sure that that was why she was choosing to buy drugs from him, but why else would Chrissy Cunningham be seeking Special K?  “If you can’t talk to your drug dealer, who can you talk to?  It’s not like I would—or would be able to—tell anyone,” he added, with another laugh. 

She laughed—that same insanely sweet and adorable laugh she had issued at the picnic table earlier; it conveyed her emotions so clearly—nervous, yet interested, or, at least, he hoped that was what he was picking up on.  

But just as quick as the laugh came, it went; she got serious, looking down at her shoes and releasing a deep, thoughtful sigh.  

“I’ve been having nightmares—memories from the past that are just…” she trailed off, shaking her head.  “Just horrible.  They’d only been happening at night until…” she raised her eyes to look at the spot she had just been standing in.  “Until the last few days.  I’ve started…” she hesitated, releasing a small, humorless laugh.

“What?” he asked, with a small shake of his head.  

Her eyes came back to him, and he was unsurprised to find a few tears collecting there.  “You won’t believe me,” she smiled, but it was a hollow smile—full of fear of rejection.  

“Chrissy,” he started, making sure his smile and his tone were warm, welcoming.  “What I just saw…” he trailed off, taking his own turn to look to where she had stood earlier.  “I’m not sure there isn’t much I won’t believe at this point.  Whatever it is, I’m just glad we managed to shake you out of it.  At this point, anything we know about it could help us to keep it from happening again.”

She nodded, and Eddie rejoiced; he seemed to have managed to reassure her enough.  “I’ve started seeing things,” she confessed, her eyes holding steady on his.  “The things I used to just see in my nightmares at night?” she paused, and he nodded to let her know that he was still following her.  “I’ve started seeing them during the day—out in the real world.  It’s like I’m having living, waking nightmares.”  

“What do you see?” Eddie asked, his stomach churning in his concern for her.  

“Different things…” she trailed off, looking once more to her shoes.  “My mom, mostly,” she added vaguely.  

Eddie nodded; he understood family baggage more than most people would, and he particularly understood why she might not want to share these things publicly.  Everyone knew Eddie’s father—the reputation Eddie had inherited from the man was well-known in a small town like Hawkins.  It was natural for her to be hesitant to share these types of things so quickly.  

“Has what happened today ever happened before?” he asked, hoping she understood that he wasn’t going to press her for any information she was hesitant to share.  

She shook her head.  “Not that I know of.  But I’m usually alone when it happens.  But it was also just…different today,” she added, with a shrug.

“Like, in what way?” he asked, with another shake of his head.  

“Worse—far worse,” she started as her eyes lost focus; she was clearly remembering just how bad it had been.  “It felt…” she hesitated, seemingly searching for the perfect word.  “Real.  It felt like I was trapped—like I had no way out.  There was a man chasing me.  Or was it my mom?” she questioned before shaking it off, almost as if she feared she sounded ridiculous.  “Until…” she trailed off, and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t sitting on the edge of his metaphorical and literal seat.

“Until?” he prompted, hoping he didn’t sound too pushy.  

“Well,” she started again, as a smile suddenly overtook her face.  It was unexpected—it had him sitting back with an arch of his back and a smile of his own returning to his face.  “You—you’re going to say it sounds ridiculous,” she stuttered, with another laugh.  

“Haven’t we already been over this?” he asked pointedly.  

“Fine,” she answered, with a small, much more serious sigh.  “There was this…song.  It started playing and…” she trailed off again as she seemed to struggle to find a logical way to explain what had happened.  “A door opened.  The man was still there—my mom was still there.  But I could get out.  If I could just run and go through the door, I could get out.”  Her eyes returned to him.  “So, I did.”  

“Oh, come on, man,” he started, with a bright and disarming smile.  “Me?  The guitarist of Corroded Coffin?  I wouldn’t understand the healing power of music?”  

For the smallest of moments, Chrissy looked like she feared he was about to belittle her—call her a liar, tell her she had to be remembering things incorrectly, tell her she had to be exaggerating.  But as she processed his words and their true meaning came to be agreed upon, he could see the relief wash over her; a laugh came from her, and she seemed to get some of her coloring back for the first time since waking up from her coma.  

“I guess that’s a good point,” she conceded.  “You believe me?” she asked again, almost as if she couldn’t believe what he was saying.  

“Yeah, of course I do!” he answered enthusiastically.  Suddenly, he found himself wondering if others tended not to believe her.  He became extremely driven to make sure she never felt like that around him.  “What was the song?” he asked as he recalled that, in his panic, he had been unable to truly focus on the song playing earlier.  

“‘These Dreams’ by Heart,” she responded, with a laugh.  

“Why are you laughing?” he asked, but, once again, her laugh made it impossible for him to resist mirroring her reaction.  

“Because I know what you’re going to say!” she accused, with another laugh.  “You’re going to judge my taste in music!”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he said, but he would admit that he couldn’t keep a straight face.  “Hey,” he started, as a means of resetting; he remembered his goal of ensuring she didn’t feel pressured or unaccepted.  “Everyone has their preferences.”  

“And a guy frontlining a band called Corroded Coffin isn’t going to spend his free time listening to Heart,” she finished for him, her smile still strong.  

“They’re not my favorite,” he conceded.  “But I can admit that they have their merits.”  

“So, what is it you listen to, Mr. Corroded Coffin?” she asked, leaning in.  

“Metallica,” he answered, without hesitation.  “Their new album just came out.  I’ve been working my ass off to learn “Master of Puppets”.”  

“Of course,” she responded, with another small laugh, but he could feel it—the severity of the conversation was returning to them both.  

“What are we going to do?” he asked, his smile and his laugh gone.  

“I don’t know.  I guess I should tell Jason, but…” she trailed off, looking away from him again.

“What?” he asked gently; he didn’t want to sound pushy, but he could admit that he was more than a little curious as to what was keeping her from sharing this with her boyfriend.  

“He won’t understand,” she said, with a shrug.  “He—he has this image of me.  Perky, cheerful cheerleader.  To tell him this—to have him fully understand, I’d have to tell him the things I’m seeing:  that my family life isn’t great.”

“So?” he asked, not rudely, but genuinely curious.  “Jason’s family life can’t be perfect.  Everyone has family baggage, don’t they?  He’s gotta get it, right?”  

He felt assured in his assumptions, but one look at Chrissy told him he shouldn’t be so sure.  “You’re kidding,” he continued before she could answer.  “Mr. Perfect is really just that—perfect?  He has no problems at home—everything’s great?”

She merely nodded.  

“Well, must be nice to be him,” Eddie muttered sarcastically, but even he could hear it—the slightly genuine resentment and envy in his voice.  “I get it,” he told her.  “I may not get everything,” he continued, with a nod.  “But I’ve definitely seen some shit in my time.”

She nodded again, but it was somehow different this time.  She had discovered it for herself now—the sense of solidarity that seemed to be developing between them.  

“So, don’t tell Jason,” Eddie suggested.  “We can figure this out together.  We’ll get a copy of that song, and we’ll play it 24/7 if we have to until we can find some way to keep you permanently safe.”  

She smiled, and he could tell that she truly appreciated his efforts.  But she looked wary—worried.  “That…sounds great.  But…” she trailed off, unable to finish her thought, but she didn’t need to.  

“You’re worried what people will think if they see us together?” he asked, wanting to give her an out in this conversation, even if it churned his stomach to do so.  

“No, it’s not that…” she trailed off, making it clear to Eddie that it was, at least in part, just that.  “It’s just…I have a boyfriend, and if he sees us together—”

“It probably won’t go over very well,” he conceded, and, while he knew Jason was at least partially a factor in this situation, he did also suspect she worried about her social status—and the perception that would result from them being seen together.  He wasn’t worried about it, though; he’d win her over—to the point where she didn’t care about her social status so much anymore.  He just knew he had it in him to do it.  

“Yeah, I get that.  So, we do it in secret,” he continued, with a shrug.  “We’ll sneak to your house tonight, grab the tape, and hold out somewhere until we can figure this out.”  

“What about school?” she asked, with a disbelieving laugh.  

“It’s Saturday tomorrow,” Eddie argued, with another smile.  “That buys us some time.  But, anyway, what’s more important—school or keeping you alive?”

She hesitated, but when her eyes came back to him, he knew her answer.  “Did you have some place in mind?”  

[patiencetakestyme]

Master of Puppets

Hello!  This fic is just a super short one-shot, something I created as I mourned the loss of Eddie and contemplated how he came to the conclusion that he was willing to sacrifice himself in the Upside Down.  

Not to be too self-advertising, but if you like this fic, check out my book:  The House of Dormiens by K.A. Saylor.  You can find it on Amazon!

Thank you for any and all support!  

Summary:  Hurling towards the Upside Down in an RV, Eddie Munson contemplates his failures with Chrissy and finds his resolve to not repeat his past mistakes on his mission with Dustin.  

Master of Puppets

 He didn’t know what was on the radio, but it wasn’t Metallica—definitely not that new song that he had spent every free moment not planning his campaign learning in the last few weeks, definitely not that new song that seemed simultaneously unimportant and the most important thing in the world right now.  

 He looked out the window, but he wasn’t looking out the window—not really.  He didn’t know how much longer it would be until they reached their destination.  If he were to be honest, he wasn’t really concerned about it; once Harrington stopped driving, he’d get out of the car.  For now, his thoughts were consumed by one thing and one thing only.  

 Chrissy.  

 It wasn’t how she had died that occupied his mind at this particular moment, although he’d be the first to admit that he’d never forget that—not until the day he died, not until the day that he drew his last breath, even if that day was to be today.  

 He knew things now that he had not known on that day.  He knew just how she had suffered in the days leading up to her death.  He had seen Max—Red—go through the exact same curse Chrissy had suffered through before she had died.  

 Headaches.  Nightmares.  Visions.  

 He had caught her at the tail end of her suffering, he knew that now.  By the time she had sought him out, she had undeniably already started having her visions.  It was clearly why Chrissy Cunningham—of all people—had chosen to buy drugs from him in the first place:  she was looking for a little control in an uncontrollable world.  That meant that, by the time she had come to find him, she had already survived days of headaches and nightmares.  

 He knew what had brought her to him:  the visions.  

 What he didn’t know was what she saw.  Red had a theory—Vecna only came after those that had suffered, that had some form of trauma in their past.  

 On the outside, Chrissy looked like nothing more than a cliche cheerleader—controlled.  Eddie was sure her jock boyfriend still saw her that way.  

 But he knew better—she had suffered, just like him.  She had survived, just like him.  He didn’t know the details of what she had suffered, and he wouldn’t do her the disservice of attempting to guess; she deserved her privacy, even in death—especially in death.  

 But the details didn’t matter.  They had something in common now—they had suffered, they had survived, and they had worked their asses off to control it, to cover it up at all costs.  Chrissy put on the image of the cheerful cheerleader.  Eddie was the manic freak.  He hated conforming—and he really did hate conforming—but that was, much like Chrissy’s cheerfulness, an exaggeration.  

 He had always known he was interested in her—more than the confines of a conforming high school hierarchy would allow him to be interested in her.  He could remember watching her cheer in the middle school talent show; the image was sharpened by his own steely nerves at the prospect of performing.  He had always been drawn to her, and now, with his curiosity satisfied, he understood why.  He knew then what he knew even more now—they were simultaneously different and yet the same.  They were both there to perform but in very different capacities.   

 Chrissy had always performed for her jock boyfriend.  But that day, in the woods, at the picnic table, she didn’t perform for Eddie.  She was true to herself.  He got to see her be true to herself.  

 And, unfortunately, for Eddie, she had seen him be true to himself in her final moments—running, leaving her there to die—alone.  

 It still made him sick to his stomach—what he had done that day.  He had thought of himself as this brave and bold individual—willing to stick it to the man, willing to give society the middle finger, willing to stay true to himself no matter the consequences.  

 That task became decidedly harder once he realized he maybe shouldn’t actually like himself.  Experiencing his own cowardice had certainly been enough to trigger an identity crisis for him.  He had thought he had been in control—the master.  But, in reality, he was nothing more than the puppet.  

 He looked at the people surrounding him.  He didn’t know the full details of what they had suffered, but he knew they, too, had suffered—just like him and Chrissy, probably far worse than him and Chrissy from the sounds of it.  

 Harrington, of all people, had perhaps surprised him the most.  In a life-or-death situation—not necessarily unlike what Eddie had found himself in with Chrissy mere days ago—Harrington had fought.  He had not only saved himself, but Eddie, Wheeler, and Robin that day with the bats—the battle, as his no-longer-so-little sheep Henderson had called it.  

 He could see why Henderson looked up to Harrington, even if he didn’t want to admit to it—even if he wished he couldn’t understand it.  

 Eddie knew Henderson looked up to him too, even though he couldn’t understand why he did—especially after what had happened with Chrissy.  He found his eyes settling on Henderson.  He wasn’t a sheep anymore—and he had never been a puppet, even if Eddie had had the ego to view himself as the master—as his role model—at one point.  And, in fact, in all matters involving the Upside Down, Henderson obviously had way more experience than Eddie could ever dream to have.  The master would be deferring to the so-called puppet today.  

 He looked at Henderson, and he just knew that he wanted to live up to the image this kid seemed to have of him.  Eddie wanted nothing more than to be the cool and strong figure Henderson had seen him as at Hellfire.  But did he have it in him?  Especially once they entered the Upside Down?  

 Chrissy’s face, frozen in fear, flashed before his eyes once more.  He had run.  He had left her for dead.  

 He looked at Henderson.  He wouldn’t be doing that again.  If the opportunity presented itself—if it was a matter of his safety or Henderson’s…  He’d fight like hell.  He’d give it everything he had.  He’d play his axe until his fingers bled.  He’d send the boy back through the gate if he had to—whatever he had to do, he’d do it—to keep him safe.  

 He wasn’t a Hero.  He wasn’t a Master.  He wasn’t a Puppet.  But he would do right by Chrissy, and he would do right by Henderson—until the day he died, until the day he drew his last breath, even if that day was to be today.