Avalon gently closed the front door, turning the knob so that the sound wouldn’t awaken the rest of the house. Carefully, equally as quiet, she took off her running shoes, laid her headphones around her neck, abruptly stopped the music coming from her Walkman. She went into the kitchen and started the coffee pot with a jab of her thumb. Walking through the kitchen, she went to the sleeping form on the couch, face pressed into the cushions, and pulled the blanket up to their shoulders.
A long night studying, grading papers, wondering if he’d get tenure. David Cranston certainly worked himself harder and harder as the days passed. Working to run away from the darkness and grief that followed him. She knew exactly how that felt, decided to go running simply for the same reasons if she were being honest with herself.
It was easier to push the honest thoughts aside when she distracted herself. From everything. Avalon moved from the living room back to the kitchen. She took the mug fresh from the clean side of the sink and filled the mug with a quick pour. Droplets rolled off the rim and splashed the back of her hand, making her suck in a deep breath then wave the pain away.
She licked the remaining droplets off her hand and made a face. How anyone managed to drink that stuff, she never knew. Turning on her heel, she crossed the kitchen to the door that led to the garage and stepped inside. The cool tiles beneath her feet made her take creeping, long, leaping steps to the work bench that sat at one end of the lab set up inside.
“Rise and shine, Smurf,” Avalon murmured, setting the coffee mug down onto the work bench. With her hand free, she reached out and rubbed Billy’s back, rousing him from a deep slumber. He sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes, prints from the wood grain pressed in his cheek. “Like father, like son,” she remarked, pressing a kiss to the side of his head. “I reckon you had a long night.”
“If by ‘long’ you mean completely uneventful, then yes,” Billy agreed. “I tried to syncopate the frequencies of our morphers and the morphing grid to ensure that power output that came with our suits and weapons when we have to go back into a fight after sustaining damage and…” he gestured with his hands. “Nothing.” He noticed the coffee and grasped the mug. “I’ll have to work on it again after school.”
“If you even make it.” Avalon gestured toward the clock on the work bench. “You’re running late. Almost don’t have time for breakfast.”
Billy mumbled and gestured with his mug, pulling the goggles from around his neck to rest on the work bench. “This is enough.”
“Coffee isn’t breakfast,” Avalon reminded him.
Billy took a sip, rubbing at his eyes. “I know,” he said, his tone betraying his irritation at hearing the same thing nearly every morning. He slipped into the house with Avalon following him.
She went to her bedroom and went inside. She placed her Walkman on the dresser by the door and climbed into the bed nearest to her. Bailey’s eyes squeezed tight, her legs pulling into her chest. After a second, she made space for her sister, who stretched across the bed, wrapping her arm around her sister.
“Five more minutes,” Bailey murmured.
Avalon smiled into her sister’s face. “Take all the time you need.” Bailey smiled and snuggled deeper into her blankets. It was the only calm moment in their days filled with monsters and attacks on Angel Grove.
“I’m running diagnostics on the Zords and determined by the results of those tests I will then facilitate the capacities the hydraulics will be able to handle while under certain pressures of battle,” Billy explained before clarifying with, “Tests, tests, and more tests.”
Yes! They both like to play chess. Billy, as what you’d expect, is the president of the chess club. He studies the game and plays it with his father as much as he can and overall enjoys the game.
Avalon learned the game from her father when she was younger, as a way for him to get her to understand that every action has a consequence and that she needs to learn to think ahead and not be so impulsive. (Like that worked, lol).
When they meet, they quickly find that they both like to play chess and routinely play with each other at lunch and during quiet time at home (usually always playing a game before going to bed). It’s also a way for them to get a chance to really talk to each other when they’re not busy with school work and ranger duties.
A second prompt I was given from OC-lub’s discord.
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“Do we have to talk about this now?” Billy asked. Despite wearing his helmet, and despite the sounds of the waging battle against Goldar around them, the incredulous tone to his voice wasn’t lost.
“It’s as good a time as any, mate,” Avalon replied. She rolled out of the way when Goldar swung his sword toward her. Springing to her feet, Avalon’s Power Staff oscillated in a wide arch, catching him in the chest. Goldar stumbled backwards, allowing Jason and Trini to take the helm with their swords. Kimberly and Zack leapt into the fray afterwards. “Because you won’t talk to me any other time. And at this rate,” she ducked and elbowed a Putty in the chest. “I can make sure you don’t fucking run away!”
Billy, showing a rare sense of viciousness, stabbed a Putty with his Power Lance. It ran through it and the Putty directly behind hit, he’d hit the first Putty so hard. Billy flung his arm aside, the Putties sliding off his Power Lance and fell to the ground, thrashing before breaking apart and dissipating into piles of sand.
“Excuse me if I don’t really feel like it,” Billy said. Avalon stared at him. “There is a more pressing matter to deal with at the moment than you putting blind faith into people that don’t care about you.”
Avalon gritted her teeth. How many times would they have this conversation before they finally got to finish it. Come to a resolution. Get to a point where they understood each other. Usually, they were able to do it with ease. Able to understand each other’s point of view.
“Look out!” Trini called.
Avalon’s head whipped around she knocked the Putty’s hand off her shoulder, smashed it in the chest with the end of her Power Staff, and followed up with a sharp right hook that knocked it to the ground, arms and legs flailing.
“Excuse me, we’re trying to have a conversation here!”
“We’re
done
with the conversation,” Billy decided. His fingers fluttered along the hand hold of the Power Lance. “You already made your decision.”
Summary: Even after ten years apart, there are some things that don’t diminish over time. And you fall back into your old ways, just like always.
Words: 1668
Also found on FFN.
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Billy pulled at the neck of his sweater vest, trying to keep it from clamping into his Adam’s Apple any more than it already had. He frowned, looking down at himself. Or maybe it was the dress shirt beneath and not the sweater vest.
Kimberly would’ve said it absolutely was the sweater vest and that no one has worn one in the last twenty years. And yet, she’d immediately turn it around and say that he was the one who could bring it back in style and make it cool again. Honestly, he thought she was lying, but Kimberly was the most fashionable of them all.
Like you really need to think about how you look at a time like this, Billy thought. Scornfully, Billy shook his head. Caring about his appearance at all was ludicrous. There were many more important things in life than what his appearance looked like. He liked himself just fine, didn’t have too many complaints though didn’t quite enjoy the way his eyes squinted when he was concentrating on something…which was caught numerous times in pictures.
Self-conscious anxiety would flow though him when he’d see photos given back to him when he looked like that, it’d been something that’d happened since he was a child. Even when under the darkened haze of the visor of his helmet, he’d find himself squinting, as if it’d make him see clearer—something his contacts aided with.
But that day found himself putting on his glasses rather than sticking in his contacts. He stared at them for a moment then slid them onto his nose. It made him appear more unassuming, he rationalized. That he kept good company. Avalon had made a comment about it before they’d left the house that morning.
“You’d think you were the one who was potentially going to jail, mate. Not me.”
It wasn’t funny, but it had broken the unspoken tension around them. As they sat on the bus, rumbling into downtown Angel Grove—with Zack lamenting he wished they could teleport there—Billy glanced around. Jason, Zack, Kimberly, Trini, and Tommy all sat in the nearby seats, dressed as nicely as he was. Bailey, on the other hand, was getting a ride with Conner and the other rangers. Almost as if they were simply going to a reunion function at Angel Grove High.
Almost immediately, he flashed back to their many times in high school where they’d gone to dances, plays, and other function to support their classmates and enjoy school. How long ago had it been that they’d been able to truly relax? Not very, if Tommy had managed to stumble across his own students who’d become rangers and drag him back into the spandex suit to protect the city.
“Like it’s going to make a difference to what they already think,” Avalon commented when she spotted her friends after they met up at the Youth Center—which still looked the same, though modernized, after many years away from Angel Grove, seeing them all dressed to their best.
“Putting your best foot forward has always yielded good results,” Billy pointed out.
Avalon merely smiled, shaking her head. “You don’t have to come with me,” she said. “It’s just a hearing. I can go by myself.”
“We’re all going to be there for you, Av,” Jason said gently yet firmly.
“Yeah, we’re not going to let you go through this alone,” Kimberly added, squeezing the orange ranger’s hand. “And you know Conner, Kira, Ethan, and Trent are going to be there, too.”
Avalon’s smile pulled at the right corner of her mouth, turning into a smirk. “I meant you lot don’t have to come with me on the bus.” She turned her gaze toward Billy. “I reckoned you’d still be mad about what happened to your truck, yeah?”
Billy did his best to keep his irritation from showing. Of course, the one time Avalon insisted on driving—he was usually the one who took the reins, not quite trusting her to see the road due to her lack of height--resulted in her managing to get his truck stuck in a drainage ditch, bending the axles of his front tires, rendering it useless.
The bus it was.
Sweat dripped down Billy’s back, he shifted back and forth, hoping he’d remembered to bring a can of deodorant in the bag that sat by his feet. Always be prepared. He’d never lasted more than a week in the boy scouts, the bullying over his intelligence was that bad, but it was still something he continued to follow.
His gaze shifted to the side, finding Avalon sitting calmly next to him, looking at something on her cell phone. How she could be so calm, he wasn’t sure, but greatly admired. His gaze flickered to the ‘V’ tattooed on the inside of her wrist, the final initiation that set her into the street gang, The Vipers. The group that eventually led her and the other rangers to her hearing that day, to determine if she’d be charged before testifying at the trial against Chase and the others.
She looked calm, cool, and collected. As if nothing was amiss. The only sign of change was the way she’d decided to dress. Despite being a decade older than her teenage self, on a daily basis Avalon typically continued to dress similarly to the past; her attire, which typically consisting of a leather jacket over any combination of her ranger color, orange, and darker makeup with her long hair loose around her shoulders had been forgone for a lighter spread of makeup spread over her face that made her youthful freckles stand out—and continue to have her carded at R-Rated movies and when buying an alcoholic drink, her hair pulled back into a ponytail with two large strands framing the sides of her face, and a sleeveless orange blouse tucked into a dark skirt.
She kept her head down, looking and smiling at something on her phone. Every few seconds, she’d chuckle to herself before, finally, smiling up at him and angled her phone so that she could show him what she’d been laughing at. But Billy didn’t notice it, didn’t pay attention to the video that’d played, simply stared at her.
The status of their relationship was odd to say the least. Since he’d abruptly left Angel Grove to go to a Peace Conference then to MIT, they hadn’t spoken. For almost ten years they hadn’t said a word to each other. And she was justified in her being angry at him for it, he’d been cowardly and ran away all because he couldn’t handle the feeling of not being a ranger anymore, to know everything he’d worked for was…gone. Because he didn’t feel useful, because he felt that there was nothing more for him in life. So he left, and tore apart something that’d been very important to him all because he couldn’t face how he was truly feeling.
They’d gotten things out in the open, spoke about their feelings and now…Billy wasn’t quite sure what to think of their relationship. He was sure she was still angry at him in some way, many ways. There were many things she still wanted to say to him and he deserved. And yet, she continued to warm up to him as the days passed. He’d missed her while he was gone and it was almost torture to keep himself from talking to her, to keep himself from thinking about her as the days passed. It became easier as the days went on, though it weighed over him.
He wasn’t naïve enough to believe things would be exactly the same way they’d been before, and yet…they’d fallen back into their former relationship quickly. Avalon made fun of him at nearly every turn and he took it, gave it back when needed, and continued to be a calm, supportive force when needed. He was the first she talked to about her upcoming hearing when she became worried.
And now, as he sat next to her, Billy couldn’t help but notice how strong she’d continue to become over their years apart. She didn’t keep things inside and work on them herself, she relied on her friends and family to help her through. (Though her newfound ranger powers probably helped her as well). Nevertheless, Billy couldn’t stop himself from leaning in and placing the ghost of a kiss on her cheek, just below her temple but above her cheekbone.
A reassuring gesture.
Yet, the second his lips left her skin and he got a good look at the surprised expression on her face, he’d realized what he’d done. A flush crept up Billy’s face and he looked away from her, pressing his glasses up his nose. How silly. One gesture to reassure a friend and the next thing he knew, he was back to his teenage self, mentally beating himself up for his impromptu gesture.
He clenched his hands in his lap. So much progress in life; graduated high school early, ran the Power Chamber with the Zeo powers, created the Turbo powers, was a speaker at a Peace Conference, went to MIT, helped create the Lightspeed Rescue powers, and continued to keep in touch with those at NASADA as ranger encounters continued. All that success within his life…and he, a twenty-seven year old man, turned into a teenage boy with no sense of what he’d been doing and the consequences of what he’d done.
Billy clenched his hands even tighter, focusing on the pain that erupted in his hands. He deserved it, he supposed. After all the pain he’d put her through. Billy jumped when he felt Avalon’s hand reach over and curly over his, the steadiness of her contrasting the shaking in his. He glanced at her and Avalon smiled back at him.
Billy relaxed, smiled back at her.
Funny, he was supposed to be supporting her, and she was the one there for him.
Billy had just finished a test with enough confidence that he hadn’t needed to look over his answers. He stood up, the screeching of his chair drawing the ire of his classmates around him. Skull let out a long snore, draped over his desk, while Bulk crumpled his own test and threw it at Billy’s head. It bounced off and dropped harmlessly to the floor. Billy ignored it, used to the taunts.
It took him a long time to get used to the envy and outright jealousy of his classmates to his smarts. The misunderstanding that made him so alone. They thought he thought he was better than them. When all he truly wanted was to fit in. But fitting in wasn’t something Billy was made to do, he was made to stand out and if that was his smarts that did so, then so be it. He’d never downplay his smarts just for a shot at the ‘cool crowd’. Besides, some of the coolest people in school; Tommy, Jason, Kimberly, Trini, and Zack were some of his best friends.
Billy smiled at Ms. Appleby as he dropped off his test at her desk. She lifted her gaze from her book, smiled at him, scolded Bulk and Skull, then bid him an enjoyable rest of the day, a sentiment Billy gave back to her. Then he hitched his bag up his shoulder and moved to leave the room, risking a glance at his friends. They’d all studied together the night before; one last cram session that’d at least increase their confidence. If they didn’t know the material then, they’d never know it, he surmised. But confidence went a long way.
It was a stark change, honestly. Kimberly, who typically chewed on the erasers of her pencils with her front teeth had her head bent over the desk, scribbling away. Zack, who could never sit still, wiggling around to a beat only he could her was stock still, poised over his test, carefully reading the answers. Jason wasn’t looking around the room, Tommy wasn’t twirling his ponytail around his finger, and Avalon wasn’t staring into space, finding it all a waste of time.
Trini got up from her seat, always the second one to finish, and passed by her friends, flashing them encouraging smiles as she walked by, them looking up at her movement. Avalon smiled back at her then turned her gaze to the front, looking at Billy.
She looked at him then just as quickly looked away. Eyes downcast, her lips tilted into a smile which was, not simply rare for her, but something she didn’t quite do when taking tests. She was intelligent, that was for sure, being able to survive on the streets with only her sister as company was no easy feat. Nevertheless, she still smiled at him. Her smile made her usually tough face brighten in exuberance, showing off her true age of seventeen, youthful beauty radiating from inside.
Suddenly, Billy felt more uncomfortable than he’d ever had before. He’d had experience talking to other girls, had a girlfriend in Marge and Melissa where he didn’t know what to do. Despite the encouragement from Zack, Trini, and Kimberly, he couldn’t bring himself to do much about his interest in them. Somehow, by the grace of God, they’d been interested enough in him to break him from his shell. He couldn’t even gather the courage to ask Marge to the dance that night, he remembered. His own nerves got in the way and she ended up asking him.
This was different. Billy suddenly felt hot under the collar, blinked rapidly, shuffled from foot to foot. He hadn’t done that in a while, a habit he’d left behind since working on his self-confidence and self-worth. The heat crept form his neck to his cheeks, up to his ears. Who knew it was possible to get so worked up. It must’ve been what Jason, Tommy, and Zack meant when the guys were alone and discussed everything from girls to what they did with girls. Not that Billy didn’t understand their conversations, but it was one thing to understand it in terms of scientific specifics than to exhibit it in person.
Ducking his head, Billy left the classroom with Trini hot on his heels. They walked to their lockers, conversing about the test answers they got right and wrong while waiting for their friends to finish. Billy sat in front of his locker, pulling out the notes he’d written down the night before of a new weapon he wanted to create for the rangers. A signal inhibitor lest they were to be brain washed or hypnotized once more.
One by one their friends trickled out of the classroom with different exclamations about the test. Tommy’s bringing a round of laughter when he said, “I was so nervous I almost forgot to write my name.”
“That’s no surprise,” Zack interrupted. “Sometimes I wonder if you recognize your own reflection in a mirror.”
“Well, I’m sure you can easily recognize yours, because your head’s so big,” Trini said, swatting at his arm. She looked up when Avalon finally joined the group, tossing her backpack aside. She settled to the floor next to Billy, her arm brushing his. “How’d it go?”
Again, there was a shot of heat that crept through his neck. It was official, something was wrong with him.
“Pretty good, I reckon,” Avalon said. She ran a hand through her hair and sighed. “There were a few I missed but I at least answered everything this time.” She poked Billy on the arm with her index finger. “And it’s all thanks to you, Smurf. I couldn’t have done it without you, mate. Thank you.”
Billy lifted his fingers from his arm in a gentle motion. “Don’t mention it. I’m glad to have helped all of you.” He made sure to look at all his friends when he spoke, not wanting to blush again. It was starting to get on his nerves. It didn’t work, for Avalon made a face and leaned towards him.
“You alright, mate? You’re looking kind of red.”
“I’m fine,” Billy replied. He looked at his watch. “Actually, I’m going to be late for the science club if I don’t get going.” He didn’t have a meeting for the science club in another twenty minutes. But something was happening to him and he needed to figure out what it was. “I’ll see you all later.”
He scrambled from the floor, practically tripping over his bag, before he managed to stay steady on his feet, walking away. As he went, Billy clenched his hands into fists.
He’d gotten over his nerdy self, over the anxiety, the nervous swaying, the rapid blinking, the insecurity. Only to find himself unable to stay normal when the orange ranger was around him. Intuitively, he knew exactly what was going on.
It was times like these he wouldn’t mind a monster being dropped from the sky and crushing everything in sight. Somehow, working as a ranger was becoming easier than being a regular teen.
Billy risked a glance over his shoulder and found—as usual---Avalon’s gaze move his way. She smiled and gave him a parting wave. Billy felt himself smiling back until she turned to address something Kimberly was saying to her. Billy sighed, moving to face forward once more.
How many times do you think the Cranstons saw Avalon coming out of Billy room before hey stopped thinking/wondering about what they could’ve been doing when she and Bailey lived with them?
