Christmas Fic 2014: Waiting in the Wings
Title: Waiting in the Wings
For: gweakles
It was snowing, huge fat flakes that fell slowly like they had all the time in the world to hit the ground. Hope stood with her hands shoved in her pockets while Loki perched on her shoulder, looking as unimpressed as a bird could look.
“Don’t give me that,” she said. “Ravens play in the snow. I’ve seen it. I thought you might like it.”
Someone people would call her crazy for talking to a bird but Hope had long gotten passed the strangeness that was talking to her adopted raven. Loki was highly intelligent and could solve complex problems so why not talk to him? He seemed to appreciate the attention, even if he didn’t understand the words. Her bird, though, seemed to understand.
It was a strange friendship she had developed with the rescued raven. Three months into their strange partnership and she couldn’t imagine her life without the bird around.
“Well, fine, we’re taking a walk anyway.” Hope adjusted her shoulders, making Loki adjust with her, his large wings extended slightly to help him stay balanced.
The little town she lived in was blanket with white with certain houses decorated with Christmas lights cast colorful dots all over the snow. Hope smiled softly to herself as she felt Loki twisting his head this way and that to look at the bright colors and shinning lights.
“Did you know there is a myth where you fly? Well, you namesake flies. Loki also dresses as a woman, as Thor’s handmaiden specifically,” she said to fill the silence of walking quietly at night. “You borrow Freya’s magical cloak to do so. I haven’t a clue why I keep saying you’re Loki. You’re not a mythological figure, you’re a raven.”
She reached up with a hand to scratch under Loki’s beak. Maybe she was just that lonely around the holidays. Her family was away this Christmas. Michael was off promoting his book in Europe, her father had to go to China to deal with a business issue and Thea had stepped up to handle the company back home. It was one of the few times the Chandler clan couldn’t gather for the holidays.
“You are good company though,” she said to reassure the bird. “What would I ever do without you to keep me busy?”
Loki trilled an answer, his voice rather deep for a bird, and rested his chin on top of her hat for about half a second before he dug his beak under the edge, flipped it off her head and nuzzled his beak into her hair itself.
She sighed heavily, like it was a great inconvenience, but she was smiling. He could be such a brat sometimes, but during others he was sweet, terribly affectionate and fascinated with her hair. No wonder she wasn’t lonely. How could she with such a sweetheart?
“Clint, you remember Clint, has a friend he wants me to meet,” she said when she saw a playful sprig of mistletoe tacked above a door as she turned around for home. “He’s a nuclear physicist. Supposedly quite handsome.”
Loki made an agitated sound and shook his beak free of her hair.
“Ow, ow, careful. Where are you going?”
He leapt from her shoulder and took to the air, circling overhead and squawking at her. He was clearly irritated and upset. She knew the signs of a cranky raven these days.
“What? What’s wrong with you?” she asked, stopping just outside her home where she would have to shovel the walk and driveway tomorrow.
Loki landed in the snow in front of her and kept making a racket, like he was lecturing her. He stopped and glared after a few minutes of noise. She blinked at him, confused about what he was doing.
“You and I need to develop a sign language so I can understand you when you get like this,” she said with a sigh of defeat. “Can we go inside now? My toes are getting cold.”
Apparently, she could but he wasn’t following. Loki took off again and flew up to the highest point of her roof, still glaring at her.
“I don’t understand you at all!” she yelled up to him and then stomped her way inside her house. Her bird was going to freeze and she refused to feel bad about it. If he wanted to be in a mood, fine, she would let him be in a mood.
She would not feel guilty about upsetting a bird. She refused. She would not worry about him out there by himself and she would not let it ruin her previously pleasant evening. That would be stupid. He was just a pet. Pets got upset and it shouldn’t make her feel foolish.
Her huff lasted until she got her coat off and then she let out a frustrated groan. She went to her spare bedroom, opened the window and took out the screen. “If you ever decide to stop being strange I’ve left a window open for you.”
There, that mattered was settled. She made herself hot chocolate and curled up on the couch with a pile of blankets and the Science Channel on TV. She refused to think of it as sulking. No one sulked because a bird was mad at them for an unknown reason. That was ridiculous.
It was also ridiculous that she was relieved when she heard the flutter of feathers and a felt Loki’s presence on the back of the couch. She was not going to acknowledge him. She didn’t want to encourage his fit.
He hopped down onto her hip, carefully walked his way up her side and settled on her chest, one big green eye staring at her. She was horribly weak and shifted so that she was more on her back instead of her side. Loki inched forward and tucked his head under her chin.
“You’re freezing and wet,” she said softly, but ran her fingers through the feathers of his back anyway.