Clearly he doesn't understand metaphors. If only we had time for a long discussion and debate about how you refer to your pre-transition self, whether I consider myself to have always been a man or if I was a girl who changed her mind a realised that she wasn't a girl anymore, and how all people's experiences are different.
Unfortunately, it looks like there is still chance he's going to beat me up, so complex, nuanced discussions are going to have to wait.
"What do you want me to say?"
"I-- say it's not true!" He looks genuinely desperate.
"What's not true?"
"That you're not her- not Meredith!"
"Oh, well then, of course. I'm not Meredith. I used to be, but she's dead now. I'm all that's left."
I'm taking part in @did-i-do-this-write's monthly challenge, Finding the Write Time!
This month, the prompt was "We have to try", and even though I'm submitting this at the last minute, I still managed to have some fun with writing some backstory for Phoenix and the Band taking part in the Karaoke Kontest!
I let this idea brew for a while, but I managed to plan and write it in about 45 minutes, so I'm happy!
I'm starting to like it here at the A.R.A. - I've managed to work my way into the others' lives, ad they've made their way into mine.
As I think about this, lying on the couch with a sci-fi book, I can hear Niamh training, Riley on a call with a senior agent, and Ash and Kai laughing at some episode or another of what I assume to be Doctor Who. The realization that I understand these people and know as much as I can about all of them isn't an unpleasant one, and I feel a small smile creep its way across my face as the thought develops.
Of course it's this moment that someone chooses to knock on the door.
"Phoenix, could you get that?" Riley's voice echoes from the back room, and I shout a confirmation as I pull myself up.
Stumbling towards the front door of the "Lair" as the blood returns to my legs, I reach for the handle and just manage to wrench it open in time to see a flash of orange hair disappear round the far corner at the end of the hall.
"Hey! Was that- oh they're gone." I give up on shouting after whoever it was just as quickly as the words leave my mouth.
I'm about to shut the door when a small spark of neon yellow catches my eye. Below me is a small flyer, with bright colours and a cartoon microphone almost leaping off the page.
"What the..." I mutter as I bend down to pick it up. It's nice quality paper, and the colours are even more striking up close.
Above the microphone are emblazoned the words TEAM BUILDING EXERCISE along with a date, time and location - 12/06/25 17:00, Grand Hall.
November 12 - it's in a week. The Grand Hall, though... for as long as I've been here, which I'll admit isn't that long, I've never heard of anywhere like that. It might be offsite, but that seems like a lot of effort for something that doesn't seem compulsory.
"Riley!" I call out as I shut the door, hoping that he's done with whoever he's talking to.
"Yeah?" He doesn't seem too annoyed at me shouting for him, so hopefully that means he's done.
"Do you know what this means?"
I run into the back room and show him the flyer.
His eyes immediately narrow.
"Where did you get that?"
"Uh- I think someone left it outside? It was just lying on the floor outside the door. What is it?"
"It- well."
He takes a deep breath, and moves over to one of the chairs in the corner, collapsing on it with a slow exhale.
"Okay, well. So, for the last few years, there's been a monthly event for all the taskforces, organised by my friend Jae - you remember them?"
I nod.
"Right, them. The faculty told them that we - the taskforces, that is - had to all bond somehow, and so they came up with the monthly team building project. We used to participate a lot, but now..."
"Oh. Right."
I don't need him to tell me what happened to stop them from taking part
"But what is it?"
"It's a-" He looks up at the cieling with a small laugh. "It's a karaoke competition."
"Sorry, what?"
"You heard me."
"And the Band... took part in this? Willingly?"
His eyes flick away from me for a second.
"Not all of us were as- enthusiastic," he starts, clearly choosing his words carefully, "but she made up for all of us."
"Oh."
Somehow, it always links back to her. Carmen worked her way into every single part of their lives, and now she's inescapable. Everywhere I look, traces of her memory remain.
"Wait- if Jae's organising this, don't they know that you're not doing it anymore?"
From my admittedly limited interactions with Jae, they seem to really understand Riley and what Carmen's death did to him.
"That's what I thought." Riley sighs and stares at the wall opposite him for a minute.
It doesn't look like I'm getting any more information out of him, so I wander out of the back room into the lab, where Ash and Kai are still watching Doctor Who, Kai lying on top of the couch with Ash sitting cross-legged on it in front of him.
"Hey guys?" I start.
"Yeah?" Kai glances over and points his "screwdriver" - apparently a glorified TV remote - at the screen, pausing the episode as I walk over.
"Do you guys have any idea why someone would leave this in front of the door?"
I hold up the "team building" flyer, and I see Kai's eyes widen for a second.
"Is that-" He looks from the flyer, to Ash, to me, back to the flyer.
"Yeah. I asked Riley what it was, he told me it was some kind of karaoke thing?"
"Shit..." Ash sighs.
"Someone left that outside?" Kai asks.
"Yeah. I didn't see who it was." I shrug.
"Huh..." He tilts his head to the side slightly, thinking about it.
"Do you have any idea who it might have been?" I ask, but he shakes his head.
"Could be someone trying to fuck with Riley. Might not be an actual invitation."
"Is there any chance it might actually be? A genuine invitation, you know."
"It's unlikely..." He starts, but Ash perks up her head with a start and interrupts him.
"Wait-"
"Yeah?" Kai jumps.
"It might actually be an invitation - if not from Jae, then maybe from someone else? Ollie, maybe?"
"Why would anyone want to invite us back? We were pretty clear when we said that we wouldn't be coming back."
Ash shrugs.
"Maybe they heard that we had a new member, thought we'd want to rejoin."
"Why would we? It's not like Phoenix is going to jump at the chance to spend one night a month singing random songs with us."
"Can you not talk about me like I'm not here?" I interrupt. "Who says I don't want a part of this?"
I don't really know why I'm encouraging this - it doesn't sound anything like my kind of fun. There's just this thought, somewhere in the back of my mind that somehow... I could bring them back together, the way that Carmen seemed to when she was still around. Some optimistic corner of my mind seems to insist that I could be the one to fix this broken group - and maybe karaoke is the way to do it.
I cringe even as I think it, but the thought won't leave me.
"Do you- want to do the contest?" Kai sounds just as surprised as I feel.
"Why not? It might be fun. Especially if you all used to do it, people might like to see you all back doing it, especially now there's a fifth person."
Ash nods. "It's not like we can use the four man band excuse anymore."
I don't know where the courage comes from, but I straighten up and finally decide to stand up for my idea.
"We have to try, right? Someone clearly wants us there, so we might as well take them up on it, don't we?"
Kai's wings bristle as he glances back and forth from me to Ash to the floor.
"I don't know..." he mutters softly, "Riley might not be as enthusiastic about it..."
Ash exhales heavily before pulling herself up and standing beside me.
"You know what?" She says finally. "If you're really serious about this, then we should go for it. Show Jae and Ollie that we're back in business, even if it was some kind of shitty prank."
"Seriously?" I can barely believe that she's on my side.
"Seriously." She smiles. "I'll handle Riley, don't you worry. You and Kai work on what we're going to sing next week."
Her face breaks into a grin and she lightly punches my shoulder.
"Carmen'd be proud of you, kid."
I try not to show how much that means to me, and I mask my joy with a small smile.
