i think that the whole city of amity park should've shifted to another reality more than just the once. i don't really have a reason for this except that it would've made this interaction possible
kwan: don't look now but we've shifted to another reality again
dash: fuck!!!!! shit!!!!! no!!!!!
kwan: i mean i know it sucks but it's happened before it'll be fine
dash: no idiot we've got an away game tonight how are we supposed to get to brantford from another reality??
Danny, Paulina, and Valerie investigate Kwan. It doesn't quite go the way any of them expected.
(ao3)
Chapter 5
Loop 4
Danny wasn’t sure if his burgeoning headache had more to do with sleep deprivation, stress, or Paulina and Valerie’s constant fighting. Whatever the case might have been, the pressure behind his eyes was becoming difficult to ignore.
He just wanted this day to be over.
But, unfortunately, he had to agree with Paulina: it wasn’t going to be Kwan. Partway through freshman year, he’d seen Kwan go through a dramatic change. He couldn’t believe that that was all some years-long act leading to this. It just didn’t make any sense.
Still, Valerie was insistent that they check Kwan first. It probably had more to do with pissing off Paulina than any actual belief that Kwan was the culprit, but Val was stubborn, and she held grudges.
(Danny knew that all too well.)
“Val,” he said as they headed back toward Paulina’s pink convertible, “a word?”
Valerie hung back. “If this is about the fighting—”
“It is.”
“—I’m sorry. I know it has to be annoying. Paulina just…” Valerie bit her lip.
Ahead of them, Paulina had reached the car and was staring at them. Danny waved her off. Paulina glared, tapping her wrist where a watch would be. Valerie rolled her eyes.
“Paulina just drives me nuts, is all.”
“Look, I know you two aren’t friends anymore,” Danny said, “and I know she hurt you back when… y’know.”
“What, when my dad lost his job and we lost our house and then all my friends abandoned me because I wasn’t rich anymore?” Valerie snorted. “No, she didn’t hurt me at all. I’m glad, actually. I got to see her true colors before it was too late.”
“Valerie.”
“Seriously, Danny, I’m over that. I’m better off without them.”
“Okay, okay. But, for right now, the three of us need to work together. So hate Paulina all you want, but you have to stop coming after Paulina anytime she does anything.”
“I have not—”
“You pushed her out a window when she took a few seconds too long.”
“Okay, but we needed to move—”
“She gave us info on the AP Gov students and you got angry.”
“I mean, it’s a little creepy.”
“Hey!” Paulina yelled from across the street where the car was parked. “We’re on a schedule, losers!”
Danny watched Valerie’s hackles raise in real time and put a hand on her shoulder before she could shout back. “Listen. You don’t have to forgive her. I can’t blame you for that because what she did was absolutely messed up. But you gave up your secret in the hopes that it would help save the world. Can’t you let go of a grudge?”
Valerie took a deep breath. Another. And another. “I don’t know if I’d ever forgive her,” she said, clenching and unclenching her fists. “She never gave me a chance to, even. She still hasn’t apologized for anything.”
Danny squeezed her shoulder. “I’m sorry. Even if she isn’t.”
She laid her hand over his. “Thanks, Danny.” She smiled at him. “You’re a good friend. I promise, I’ll do my best to calm down about Paulina. I still want to check on Kwan, though.”
“Of course you do.”
“I just—his whole turnaround is a little suspicious, don’t you think?”
“I think that if you still can’t forgive Kwan after all this time, then you definitely wouldn’t forgive Paulina.”
“Seriously!” Paulina yelled again. “You two can make out after you save the world!”
“You would be able to see if we were making out!” Valerie yelled back.
Danny raised an eyebrow at her.
“What? That was a fair hit.”
Danny huffed a laugh. “C’mon,” he said, “let’s go before she blows her cap even more.”
He stepped toward the road, but Valerie pulled him back into a hug.
“I missed you,” she whispered in his ear.
Danny smiled. It really had been too long since they hung out. “I missed you, too.”
Paulina honked the horn. “Sometime today would be nice!”
“Coming!” Danny and Valerie yelled.
----
“After all the shit you gave me about not taking this seriously,” Paulina said, glaring at Valerie in the rearview window. “You guys wasted so much time!”
Valerie’s eyes flashed and she opened her mouth, then sighed and shook her head. “Yeah, yeah,” she said. “I know.”
What? Paulina blinked and focused her eyes back on the road. She wasn’t sure what to do with a Valerie that suddenly wasn’t at her throat. “Right,” she said. “So long as you know.”
She looked in the mirror again just in time to see Valerie roll her eyes, but otherwise she was silent.
What had Fenton said to her?
“So what’s the plan?” Fenton said from the passenger seat. It hurt Paulina’s soul a little to let the dweeb sit there, but between him and Valerie, who she didn’t completely trust not to claw her eyes out while driving, he was the obvious choice. She could’ve put them both in the back, but then she’d look like their chauffeur. No, thank you.
“Well,” she said, “first we can check Kwan’s locker to see if it has the key or the Crown. Then, when it doesn’t, I’ll manufacture some excuse to check his bag. It won’t be there either. And then he’ll be in the clear.” She hoped none of her nervousness showed in her voice. That last text from Kwan skipped in her head like a broken record.
No, she thought. Kwan would never. She knew Kwan. Of all her friends, he was the best. The kindest.
“What if he stashed it somewhere else?” Valerie said. Damn her for bringing up a valid point.
“I don’t think so,” Fenton said. “Whoever it is, they’d want to keep the Crown close to them. Somewhere only they’d have access. If they were smart enough to set this whole thing up, they’d be smart enough to keep the Crown close by. The key, too, now that I think about it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the key is pretty much the only thing that could stop Pariah Dark. We need it and the Crown if we want to have any hope of surviving. Whoever let Pariah out would know that, most likely, and plan for it. Keep it close by.”
“So just checking Kwan’s stuff for the key and Crown? That’s our plan?”
“It’s simple, but I think it’ll work.”
“But if this person wants to end the world,” Paulina said, brow furrowed, “why didn’t they just give the ghost king dude the Crown right away? Why wait?”
“Maybe there’s something special about today,” Valerie said, leaning forward in her seat. “Maybe they wanted to make sure the world ended at just the right time.”
Paulina racked her brain, trying to remember if something had happened to Kwan on this day before. She couldn’t remember anything in particular about February 7th involving Kwan. Her fingers drummed against the steering wheel. That was good, right? If the date mattered, then it wouldn’t make any sense for it to be Kwan.
(Unless there was something she didn’t know.)
No. No. It would be fine. She’d check Kwan’s bag during lunch. Valerie and Danny could watch it then and see that there was nothing bad in there, and then they’d move on to dealing with the real suspects. Like that annoying goth weirdo, Manson.
She pulled into the school parking lot. It would be fine, she told herself, as she got out of the car. Totally fine.
----
Kwan wasn’t at lunch.
Paulina hadn’t noticed it the first few loops, but thinking back, he hadn’t been at lunch any of the Tuesdays so far.
“Probably giving the Crown to Pariah right now,” Valerie said, arms crossed. Even Fenton was starting to look suspicious.
Paulina couldn’t even refute them. Her mouth was too dry.
She moved through the rest of the day in a haze. Kwan couldn’t be the one. He just couldn’t. Kwan was the best of her friends. Way nicer than Dash. Nicer than her, too. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
She went to each of Kwan’s classes. He wasn’t in his fifth period class. Or sixth. Come seventh period, Paulina had thrown up three times. Her mouth tasted like something had died in it. Her heart felt ready to burst. Even Valerie was giving her concerned looks.
Paulina didn’t want to think about how bad she looked if she’d earned Valerie’s pity.
Seventh period English with Mr. Lancer. Paulina, Valerie and Fenton each took their seats with mute dread.
A couple minutes before the bell rang, Kwan burst in, face flushed. “Made it,” he said with a grin.
(He’d been in seventh period the first few loops, too. He’d been breathing heavily, like he’d just run from the parking lot. Why didn’t she notice before?)
He held his backpack out in front him with an odd sort of reverence. As he took his seat behind her, Paulina wanted to scream.
How could you? How could you? How could you?
But Paulina was a good actress. She knew exactly how to be the perfect little girl her mami demanded, after all. She knew how to manipulate Dash into carrying her bags whenever she went shopping. She knew exactly how to piss Valerie off. She could talk to Kwan.
“So,” she said, “Kwannie. Tell me about this surprise.”
He grinned at her, crooked. “Wouldn’t be much of a surprise.” His fingers drummed on the desk. “Kinda nervous, though.”
“Does it have something to do with your bag?” she said. “You seem awfully protective of it.”
Kwan flushed. Bingo.
“Lemme see!” she said, reaching down.
Kwan pulled the bag away. “No! It’s not for you.”
Paulina scowled. What, so she was just collateral damage in whatever weird grudge he had? They were supposed to be friends.
Behind Kwan’s head, Fenton was gesturing to the backpack. Kick it, he mouthed.
“C’mon!” she said. “We’re friends, right?”
And she kicked the bag.
Harder than she’d meant to, even. It skidded past Fenton, colliding with the closet in the back of the room with a soft thunk.
Oops.
“Paulina!” Kwan rushed over to the bag. “What the hell?”
She ran behind him, conscious that every eye in the classroom was now on them. She didn’t see them, but she knew Fenton and Valerie were following her as well. Somewhere behind her, she heard Mr. Lancer admonishing her, but she didn’t process it. All she could focus on was Kwan, bending down. Kwan, opening his backpack. Kwan, pulling out…
… a foil covered tray.
Kwan, tears in his eyes.
“I made them this morning but I didn’t have time to decorate,” he said, sniffling. “Mom said I could come back during lunch and get it done in time for class.”
He pulled off the foil and there it was. A tray of slightly smashed cupcakes, frosting smeared all over the foil.
“Kwan…” she said. She didn’t know what to say. Relief buckled her knees, and she collapsed to the ground next to him.
“I put little stars on them,” he said. “It took me forever. I was gonna give them to…” His eyes flicked over to Star. “Well, I was gonna ask someone to the movies.”
“Oh.” That was Valerie, behind Paulina. Paulina turned to look at her and spotted tears gathering at the corners of her eyes. “That’s. That’s sweet, Kwan.”
Fenton heaved a sigh. “Fuck me.”
“I’m so sorry,” Paulina said, covering her mouth with her hand. “I didn’t realize.”
“Kwan,” Paulina whispered. Guilt settled in her stomach like a stone. She was almost glad the world would end again soon.
“It’s okay, Polly. I didn’t need this many, anyway,” he said with a wet laugh. “Mr. Lancer, I think I have enough for the whole class to have a cupcake, if that’s alright?”
Lancer rubbed the crown of his head. “Of course, Mr. Huang. Very kind of you, considering… well. Ms. Sanchez, help him pass them out.”
“Okay,” Paulina said, voice small. She grabbed the tray and held it out to Fenton, and then Valerie. She saw the same dawning horror in each of their eyes: they’d failed, again. The world would end soon.
And all they’d done was smash some cupcakes.
All she’d done was hurt her friend.
She took the tray up and down the aisles, leaving one on each desk. She couldn’t look at Star, opting to stare at the floor as she put a cupcake in front of her. She gave one to Lancer as well, before at last putting the tray on Kwan’s desk, three left.
“Hey,” Kwan said, “you forgot yourself.”
He pulled one out and handed it to her. The icing was messy, but she could still see where what used to be yellow stars ringed the confection.
“C’mon,” he said, grinning. “You gotta tell me if they’re any good or not.”
The tears that had been building finally broke free of her eyes. She took a bite.
Sweet. Tangy. The cupcakes were strawberry flavored: Star’s favorite. Cream cheese frosting. Delicious.
She sobbed.
“Hey, hey,” Kwan said. “Seriously, it’s okay. I know you didn’t mean anything by it.”
Behind them, Fenton gasped. The green glow appeared in the window.
Paulina loved Kwan very, very much.
“I’m happy we’re friends,” she said, smiling through her tears.
The green light was getting closer. Kwan would never remember this, but she couldn’t bear the thought that this version of Kwan would die without her having said this.
“Kwan, I’m so happy we’re friends!”
The world exploded.
Loop 5
Paulina awoke 15 minutes before her alarm.
There was so much to do. They still needed to find the person who let Pariah Dark out. They had a whole list to work through. They had to stop the apocalypse.
Kwan didn’t deserve to die like that. None of them did.
Spectra sucks. Dunno what else to tell you.
(ao3) (masterpost)
Part 3: Chapter 1
“So,” Danny said as they approached Casper High, “today's the first day with the shrink?”
Kwan groaned, then clutched at his side as his rib ached. He’d been cleared to return to school, but was supposed to limit his activity. No gym, or stairs, and Danny was carrying his backpack for now. It was more annoying than regular school. “Don't remind me,” he said. “Let's talk about your creepy half-ghost uncle again instead.”
“Low blow, dude. Also, definitely not my uncle.”
“That's right, he's your future stepdad!”
Danny shoved lightly at him, careful to avoid his bad side. “How did you manage to go even lower?”
“It's a talent,” he said. “Besides, there is at least some good news from the whole Vlad-thing.”
“Oh yeah? What?”
“You probably aren't going to destabilize and dissolve any time soon!”
“Well, gee, thanks for reminding me of that possibility.”
“Always happy to help.”
They lapsed into silence as they crested the hill. Kwan's appointment was scheduled for immediately after school; his detentions with Lancer had been postponed on account of both the other teacher's continued hospital stay and Tyson dying. Thus, Principal Ishiyama had said he could use that time instead for his therapy.
Ugh. Therapy.
“So how long are you gonna see her for?”
“Who?”
“The shrink.”
“Right,” Kwan said. “I convinced my mom to let me have just a thirty minute appointment to start.”
“Cool,” Danny said. “I'll be waiting? At the big oak?”
Something warm bloomed in Kwan's chest. Dash would never have waited for him, even if he'd asked. Danny always waited, after detention and now with this stupid counseling. Maybe it was because they were both each other's only friends, but still. It was... nice. “Yeah,” he said, voice breaking in a way that he could only hope Danny hadn't noticed. “I'll find you after.”
Walking into first period gym with a doctor’s note, Kwan still couldn’t help but smile.
-----
“You're in a good mood,” Valerie said at their lab table, measuring out the baking soda.
Kwan startled, twinging his still-healing rib, then looked around to see who she was talking to.
“I'm talking to you, dumbass.”
“Since when?”
“I can always stop.”
Kwan raised an eyebrow. “Then why start at all?”
“Well, with... recent events—I don't know.” Valerie stared at her hands and dropped her voice. “Paulina lost it on Dash. For crying at Tyson's thing.”
“Yeah,” Kwan said with a wince. “I kinda figured.”
“Yeah, me too. But then, I started thinking... what the fuck kind of relationship do we have where that was expected?” Valerie sniffed. “She wouldn't even let me talk, y'know? I had a lot to say.”
“Val...” Kwan reached for her hand.
She jerked it back. “I'm not saying you're right or anything. Just—you knew him. And her. And you're not dating her. So.”
“So I was your best option to complain to?”
“I guess. I'm not gonna abandon her. Them.” The like you did was blessedly unspoken. “But, I don't know. Maybe—maybe I don't really blame you anymore.”
“Okay,” Kwan said. “But you can't talk to me if you want to stay her friend. You know that, right?”
“Obviously.” Valerie rolled her eyes. “But we're lab partners. We have to talk sometimes. For class.”
Kwan hid a grin. “Of course.”
“Of course.”
Valerie finished measuring out the materials and passed them to Kwan. “So,” she said, “what’s got you in a good mood?”
“Nothing!” Kwan squeaked. He could feel the heat rising to his face.
“Oh?” Valerie leaned toward him, a teasing smile dancing around her lips. “Did you finally boink Fenton?”
“Boink?”
“So you did.”
“No!” Kwan waved his hands around desperately. “We’re just friends.”
Valerie gave him a calculating stare. “Hm,” she said. “Too bad.”
“You want us to—”
“Me? I don’t care. You, however, clearly do.”
Somehow, his face got even hotter. “I don’t!”
“Kwan,” Valerie said, “you are somehow even more obvious about this than you were about your crush on Dash, and I watched you give him a massage once just because he mentioned his shoulders were a little stiff.”
“What—I didn’t—”
“Kwan. Kwan, look at me.” Valerie leaned down and made sure that she was looking Kwan in the eyes. “Did you… not know you had a crush on Dash?”
“I—” Kwan stopped himself and thought back to the way his eyes had always sought out Dash first and foremost whenever he entered a room. The way he reached for Dash’s hands and his arms whenever he could get away with it. The beating of his heart when Dash smiled.
“Fuck,” he said. “I liked Dash?”
Valerie bent over with laughter. “Congratulations!” she said, gasping for breath. “You’re officially the last to know. Well, aside from Dash.”
Kwan buried his head in his hands. “Oh my god. I had a crush on Dash.”
He felt an awkward patting on his back. “Yeah. You sure did.”
“And… you think I have one on Danny?”
“Dude. You should see your face when you look at him. Or think about him. It’s disgusting.” She fished out her phone and turned on the front facing camera, shoving it in his face. “You’re literally making it right now, look.”
The Kwan on the camera mostly looked confused at having a camera shoved in his face.
“Okay, so you look constipated now,” Valerie said. “Whatever. Just trust me. You looked soft as hell like two seconds ago.”
Kwan thought about it. He thought about long nights, staying up and trying to finish homework except they kept getting distracted by trying to one-up each other’s jokes. He thought about how Danny watched football with him even though he didn’t understand it, how he tried to play Doomed even though he sucked because it made Danny happy. He thought about Danny, saving his life from the ectopus, from the Lunch Lady, from the shapeshifting gorilla ghost.
He thought about Danny smiling. He thought about Danny laughing. He thought about the warmth in his chest whenever he saw Danny.
Well. Shit.
“There it is again!” Valerie pulled back out her phone just as Kwan buried his face back in his hands. “Dammit, are you conspiring against me getting a picture of your smitten face?”
“Valerie,” Kwan said through his hands, “I’ve got a crush on Danny.”
“Once again,” Valerie said, “congrats on being the last to know.”
“As glad as I am to see you two talking again,” Ms. Okorafor said, startling Kwan and Valerie, who had both missed her approach, “I do need you to do the lab today.”
“Right,” Kwan said.
“Yeah, sure,” Valerie said.
Like a spell had been broken, they went back to doing their lab in silence. Still, Kwan caught Valerie’s eye from across the table and she smiled, just a little.
It felt like progress.
-----
Kwan hadn’t expected to wait to see Dr. Spectra, but the student before him had still been inside when he arrived in her office. So he was stuck in one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs right outside, with an odd little man with gray hair and green eyes staring him down.
Kwan shifted in his seat, then groaned as his rib ached again. Right. Keep his torso steady.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the door opened and out stepped… Dash.
Dash spotted Kwan, then turned his nose up. Dash wasn’t having doubts like Valerie, then.
Still, with Dash pointedly ignoring him, Kwan had the opportunity to study his face. He’d had most of the day to come to terms with his old crush on Dash, but now he wanted to see if those feelings were still there or not. He didn’t think they were, but he hadn’t known about them to begin with, so his judgment was clearly not the best.
But instead of renewed feelings, he found tear tracks on Dash’s cheek.
Right. Of course. Dash was here to talk about Tyson. That made sense, because the two were still friends. Unlike Kwan and Tyson, who hadn’t spoken in over a month.
Kwan bit back a sigh of frustration. Why had Mom insisted he be here, instead of letting someone else who actually needed it take this time slot? He didn’t really understand why she was so insistent that something had to be wrong.
Whatever. He was here, and he’d promised, so he’d do it. He just didn’t have to be happy about it, was all.
He stood up as Dash walked out, waved on by the odd secretary. He knocked on the door twice and a voice called out, “Come in, please!”
The room itself looked like any other office. He’d half-expected to see one of those long couches designed for lying down like he’d seen in movies, but this was a public school. They would never be able to afford that. Instead, there were two more of those uncomfortable plastic chairs right in front of Dr. Spectra’s desk, which was scrupulously clean. The walls were covered in generic motivational posters. The one right behind Dr. Spectra’s head had a picture of a young oak tree with BELEAF IN YOURSELF written on the bottom.
And, of course, Dr. Spectra herself sat at the desk in a high-backed office chair. Her hair was bright red and her eyes the same shade of green as her assistant. Maybe they were related somehow?
“Hi there,” Dr. Spectra said, gesturing for Kwan to sit down. “You’re Kwan, right?”
Kwan dropped in the chair in front of her desk, barely restraining from rolling his eyes. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s my name.”
“Lovely to meet you, honey.” Dr. Spectra looked at him from over her glasses. “Now, why are you here today?”
“Because my mom thinks I have problems.”
“Do you?”
Kwan shrugged. “Doesn’t everyone? Mine aren’t any worse than anyone else’s though, so I don’t get the point of this.”
Dr. Spectra hummed. “Well, therapy doesn’t have to be just about feeling better. It can be about being better, too.”
“What do you—”
“I mean, I’ve heard from your classmates who’ve come to see me that you recently lost all your friends? Had a fight with them?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“Including the poor student that passed recently?”
Kwan flinched. “I guess you could say that.”
“Oh, sweetie,” Dr. Spectra cooed. “I don’t mean anything by it. Just mentioning it because I thought you might have some… regrets.”
Regrets? Sure, he had plenty. Mostly about being a dick since the start of middle school. But he didn’t regret dumping his old friends. They deserved it, and he needed to be better.
“My friends sucked,” he said after a long moment. “I wanted to be better. They were the ones who chose not to change. That’s on them, not me.”
“Of course, of course,” Dr. Spectra said. “You’re on a journey of self-discovery! Very commendable.” Her smile stretched across her teeth.
Kwan bit his lip to keep from sighing. So far, this grief counselor wasn’t impressing him much.
“I just thought that maybe,” she said, “you felt like you could have done something to stop this tragedy from happening.”
Kwan stiffened. “Why—what makes you say that?”
“Oh, it’s very common. Survivor’s guilt. I thought you might feel like since you stopped being friends with poor Tyson, you weren’t there with him the day he died. Maybe you could’ve saved him if you were.”
“Why would I think that?!” Kwan’s fingers dug into his arms. If possible, Dr. Spectra’s smile stretched even wider.
“Oh dear, of course it isn’t true. I just thought it would be a reasonable response to a horrible situation. That’s all.”
Could Kwan have done more? He was at the mall that day, after all. He had advance warning. He’d gone along with his mom, and let her take Danny away, instead of letting Danny help. He hadn’t just not saved Tyson, he’d helped prevent the only person who could have saved Tyson. Mom hadn’t seen for herself how useless the Fentons were, but Kwan had. Kwan knew that Danny was their best chance, and Kwan had packed him away in the car anyway.
Acid burbled from his stomach into his throat. He lurched forward and vomited into the trash can at the side of Dr. Spectra’s desk. His rib burned.
A hand rubbed at his back. “That’s it, dear,” Dr. Spectra said. “You’re okay.”
Kwan coughed and spat out the remnants of bile. The taste was almost bad enough to make him barf again, so he poured some water in his mouth and swished it around before spitting it into the trash along with his vomit.
“Oh,” Dr. Spectra said. “I wish you hadn't—I mean, I feel bad for the janitor who has to clean that up.” She laughed and waved her hand as though waving that idea off. “Of course, not your fault, dearie.”
Mom was so stressed now, because he'd brought this whole thing upon them. Him, not Danny. He'd dared Danny to go into the portal and all of this had happened. Danny kept getting hurt. Mom was about to collapse under the pressure of keeping them both safe. Even now, he was making Danny wait on him while he worked on his own problems.
How selfish could he be?
No, no, he'd done nice things for Danny, too. Comforted him. Helped keep his secret. Destroyed his only other friendships.
Fuck.
“Am I—am I ruining people's lives?”
“Of course not, sweetie. What on earth makes you think that?”
“I just—I was a jerk before, and I'm trying to be better, but maybe I'm not as good as I think I am. Maybe I'm only being better because it gets me what I want.”
He did have a crush on Danny, after all. Being nice to Danny was a way to get him to like Kwan more. This whole time, he'd probably been trying to get Danny's attention. He was taking up his time because he craved it, just like he'd craved whatever Dash had been willing to give him. If he really wanted what was best for Danny, he'd try to fix his actual friendships, with Manson and Foley, not hoard him all to himself.
Dr. Spectra hummed. “Well, I suppose that's possible, but it's nothing we can't fix!”
“Really?” If this was all his fault... well, of course it was. How stupid of him to think that just dumping his friends was enough to make up for anything. Instead, here he was focusing on his own happiness and making everything worse.
“Of course. I'm here to help.”
“You said, at the beginning...”
“Yes?”
“You said this didn't have to be about feeling better.” Maybe he didn't deserve to feel better. Not yet. He thought he'd gotten better, but here he was making everything worse for everyone around him. “You said it could be about being better.”
“Of course!” Dr. Spectra's smile stretched impossibly wider. “Is that something you'd like? A self-improvement focus?”
“I—yeah. Yeah, I'd like that.” He couldn't be a problem for his mom or for Danny anymore. He needed to start being a solution. If Dr. Spectra could help...
“Excellent!” She tied off the garbage bag, but Kwan could still smell the sour stench of his vomit. “Let's get started, then, shall we?”
kwan is an animal lover, but frogs have a special place in his heart because he used to go looking for frogs in the summer with dash when they were little before dash got so bad and even though dash claims to not remember whenever he brings it up kwan still holds out hope that one day dash will go frog hunting with him again
well, i've talked about this a little before, but.... i didn't, really. when i first started writing switch it was more just to experiment with fleshing out kwan, who had no real development, and to have fun Putting Danny In Situations. me falling in love with kwan (or at least my version of him) was unexpected. partway through writing one of the first few chapters, i realized "oh. kwan and danny are going to fall in love" but it wasn't something i planned from the fic's inception.
plus, saying i put danny with kwan over dash/paulina/valerie isn't super accurate, i think, considering that i've written/am writing other fics pairing him with these exact people lmao. the big one just happens to be danny/kwan ajgksl
really, this all started with one of my dumb aus which i decided hey what if i wrote that as a fic and four years later here i am! still obsessed with my boy kwan and slowly working on it piece by godforsaken piece
