This is why I stuck to school, but she may eat cards faster than she could do a reading.
WHAT: Meeting a dream creature for the first time. WHERE: The Barns - Market Day WHEN: Thursday, Dec 17 WARNINGS: Some talk of bad parenting and deserving better, also vague talks of character death. STATUS:Complete!
It was an easy thing to be patient when it came to stealing time for herself with the kids. Persephone knew, without a doubt in her mind, they would make time for her. They always did. With Adam, it was good and comforting to watch him be himself, his tarot table set up nearby. His hands moved with far more precision than they had years ago, when they were nervous and unsure.
Sometimes, he might’ve still had those moments, she had them herself. But the difference was still incredible to see as he’d blossomed into a confident psychic in his own right.
She waited, ever so patiently, shopping and floating around from booth to booth, making small talk and visiting as she did. A less observant person might not notice the tablecloth rustle, or the occasional glimpse of a hoof overextending. Someone who didn’t know him definitely wouldn’t have seen his soft glances or patient hand. It brought a smile to her face, even with the puzzle only being partially complete.
Finally, Adam was free with no one queued up, and Persephone found herself in the chair across from him, cherry coke in hand. She slid it across, before tucking money into the tip jar with a teasing smile on her face. “Tell me, Magician, am I going to be unlucky in love forever?”
Having Opal back at the Barns was an easy rhythm. While Adam's life in Vallo had been just as busy as it had back in Henrietta, Opal's presence was a missing beat—routines that went undone at night, reminders that didn't need his watchful eye, extra bits on his plate during meals that he would save for her to try or random baubles he'd pick up on walks, only for her not to be there to chew on it in her weird investigative techniques. All the empty spaces were filled up, and Adam's demeanor gentled all that much more.
The only new problem was the market and so many people. He had drilled into Opal, with Ronan, about hiding from strangers and always wearing her boots. Rules that he had noticed she hated, and now, now, they had told her it was okay; boots were unnecessary if she wanted here. And yet, habits had caused her to "hide" underneath his table, while Adam read tarot for customers and she chewed on whatever she could find on the ground.
Every so often he would lift the tablecloth to check on her, to see if she was staying warm even though the heaters had melted most of the snow, and Opal would stare wide-eyed up at him from below the brim of her skull cap and yank the fabric back down. Her own little club house .
When he glanced back up, Persephone was across from him—he saw her flitting around the market, and had hoped she'd sit down. He shuffled the cards, cut the deck, and flipped a single card over in front of her.
"I think it depends on what kind of love, don't tip me just yet," Adam said with equal amusement, his fingers ghosting over the Sun card on display. "Something to celebrate on the horizon." He hummed in a knowing little way, as Opal started tugging on the ends of Persephone's skirts—more "tablecloth" to hide under.
It had been a long time since someone had tugged on her skirts - she doubted Blue would like that fond reminder, as much as Persephone herself enjoyed the image it conjured - but she was glad that she went with warm fleece leggings under said skirts for the snowy day. She didn’t need much else beyond a knitted cardigan, as Persephone herself was almost as fond of the winter months as she was the spring. So the breeze as things moved around under the table was minimal, and even a little welcome.
She shifted a foot, careful to not bump anything that wasn’t quite ready to emerge, and slowly started pulling the scarf she’d looped around her neck down, listening to Adam’s words as each inch went further down and down until the dangling was visible under the edge of the tablecloth.
“It isn’t as if you’re going to give me bad service,” Persephone promised, leaving her tip right where it was. “Romantic, of course. I have a home full of the other kinds,” she didn’t skip the pointed look that went Adam’s direction, through a cloud of messy hair. “You know what that’s like.” She didn’t word it as a question, as her scarf suddenly disappeared under the table.
Adam's face flushed, a knot forming in his throat and then gone as he swallowed it down. He knew what she meant, and he drew another card as a way to settle that feeling of familial love that often bounced around inside his chest when Persephone came around.
He placed down the Knight of Cups, interrupted by the harsh whisper from below the table, "Adam."
Opal held the wadded scarf up at him. Adam blinked, glancing to Persephone confused—wasn't she just wearing that?—then back to Opal. There was no hiding Ronan's psychopomp, not really, and it was obvious that Persephone knew, so Adam bent down to whisper something back at her. In a flash, a tiny hand whipped the scarf back across the table, not even making it halfway.
"She's trying to return this to you," Adam explained, as the scarf was dragged back under and tossed again. A better attempt, but not by that much. With his attention on Persephone, Adam spoke a little louder, "You can come out and hand it to her. I think—" Adam's voice went soft, a little hesitant. "I think she would like to meet you." Whether he was talking about Opal or Persephone didn't matter.
A long moment passed before half of Opal's face popped up on Adam's side of the table.
Persephone was torn between the scarf antics and the Knight of Cups. She probably could have predicted that card, but didn’t know if it was actually honest, due to their conversation or just the universe fucking with her. All three were possibilities. The cards didn’t have to tell her to be patient beyond just that soft chuckle, all of the pieces would fall into place around them.
She turned her gentle gaze from Adam to Opal, searching beyond what was just there, and letting the smile play at her lips. Adam was right from her end - Persephone was endlessly curious even about things that she knew.
“I have more of those where that came from, if you wanted to keep it.” It wasn’t an unusual statement, as Persephone gave away half of her clothes on a regular basis when it was something knitted. “I’m Persephone, Adam’s friend.”
It was surreal watching Persephone and Opal look at one another. Even if he was the mitigator between the two, Adam felt on the outsider—not in a bad way, but more like someone who didn't know a foreign language in another country. He was learning, he could pick up words here and there, but the dreaminess of both of them, the otherworldliness that Adam wasn't born with, only just learning, swirled around them in something that Adam couldn't quite understand.
Opal seemed keen on keeping the scarf when Persephone offered, and only glanced quickly for permission (as if Adam was going to say no) before dragging the scarf back across the table. Opal was adding to her collection of items: first Adam's watch, which she still wore, and now Persephone's scarf. In a gasp of surprise, Opal put the scarf to her mouth when Persephone introduced herself. Then eyed her with a assessing look.
Adam wanted to correct Persephone—friend sounded too small for the sheer amount of importance she held in his heart. But Opal seemed to know. She reached a tiny hand across the table, for Persephone to take, rambling something in fast, broken Latin.
Adam translated, "She wants to see your hands. Because—" He repeated a word to Opal for clarification in Latin, and then, "Life lines. Uh, palmistry."
How the tables had turned on Persephone - once, she had looked at those around her with eyes that just knew. She still did, but this was somehow still a role reversal. Quietly, she wondered just how much Opal knew of her, beyond the gaze that made her feel bare. But she wondered what Adam had said and what was left unsaid, what sadness had lingered behind after she was gone. Anything that might have been left unknown was sure to be read on the face of the knowing girl in front of her.
She knew exactly what her life line said about her, the broken line not quite rejoining. The head line, and it’s starred end, gently folded into smooth skin as if it was completely unaware of its deeper meaning.
But Persephone wasn’t one that lived with reservations or regrets, and pulled off her knitted, fingerless glove before laying it out on the table. Opal grabbed it with equal amounts of gentle and frantic, peering down with eyes so focused that it gave Persephone a chance to look back up at Adam. “Are we both going to go out of business? I can lean on psychiatric work, be a housewife for Maura…”
Adam watched Opal take Persephone's hand with an intense fondness that even he wasn't aware of. During the summer he had spent an impossible amount of time fostering her interests and exploring her curiosity with the waking world, and now with her roaming the property as if she never left, Adam was falling into old habits. The kind that Ronan said Adam had—good with kids. Maybe this one.
He huffed out a laugh while Opal seemed oblivious to their unfolding conversation, too obsessive with Persephone's hand. "Maybe. This is why I stuck to school, but she may eat cards faster than she could do a reading. We might be safe if—Opal."
He had only glanced away a second, but she was putting her face abnormally close to Perspehone's palm, and that usually resulted in biting or sniffing or licking out of interest. He had watched her do it enough to his feet.
Opal's face scrunched up, and she scuttled back beside Adam. She still stared wide-eyed and seriously at Persephone, and Adam felt a need to apologize as he dutifully helped Opal put on the scarf. "I told her about you. Before. And—" Adam sounded a little sad. "You're unexpected and not a dream thing. Not made of somnium supellectilem, dream stuff. It's probably why she wanted to look at your hand."
Persephone was pleased, even as her hand was being examined, even as she was sure Opal was confirming she was real. It felt a little-- nice, in a way, to have that pointed expression and clear eyes look straight into her core. It made Persephone feel real, more real than she did on a regular basis.
“Blue’s eaten her fair share of cards, it’s not an unusual trait,” she flicked a smile over to the girl in question, who was oblivious to her tease and likely would have some disarming quip right back to make Persephone proud.
She knew Opal wasn’t quite a child, but Persephone had always been a fan of talking to children as she would adults, and it was no different here as her eyes flicked back down. “This entire place is unexpected, isn’t it? Sad sometimes, but--” Her eyes went up to Adam with motherly-like fondness before back down to Opal, “Hopeful. Full of second chances and the freedom to run wild.”
Opal was enraptured when Persephone spoke, her eyes never never leaving Persephone's face. Adam spent his time watching the both of them, witnessing a private conversation he had somehow been allowed permission to listen in on. At the same time, Adam nonchalantly picked off bits of dirt and dead grass that had wormed their way into the knit of Opal's dress. But instead of throwing them back to the ground, he steadily built a pile that Opal would, inevitably, take.
This place was full of second chances in so many ways. A what if reality that Adam had often asked himself at the crossroads of his life. What if, what if, what if. He didn't have to wonder anymore.
"Adam said—" Opal replied in that small but fierce voice of hers, then stopped like she knew she shouldn't repeat what Adam said. Instead, "I like it here."
Adam smoothed down her cap, and she leaned in to whisper something in his right ear. He flashed a look to Persephone, then nodded to Opal. With a shriek of joy, Opal galloped away from them, the edges of the scarf already loose and dragging behind her through melted snow.
If Adam watched her run to the other side of the market toward Kerah just a bit too long, he didn't notice. "You said her favorite words, run wild." He stretched out his hand to Persephone. "Can I see what she was looking at on your hand?"
I do too, was left unsaid, unnecessary and a little sad as it floated around her mind even as Opal galloped off happily. It was good to watch, though, to see freedom reign supreme even in a world where they were technically stuck.
But stuck was a difficult term, when death was supposed to be a release that ended up a hindrance, even a place like this felt more of an escape. Even with what it lacked, which was a hole in part of her heart, it made up for in other ways that she wouldn’t have had time with.
So she gently placed her hand in Adam’s, palm up. “You may not like what you see,” she warned, quietly. It wasn’t anything surprising, but hurt could come even when you expected it, and she knew her death had impacted the ones closest to her. “But it makes sense, now.”
Adam hadn't studied much palmistry. It wasn't his focus, and practicing on himself seemed counterintuitive. He had never truly been a psychic for individuals, and his abilities reflected that; he needed bigger things, tools that would give him the opportunity to see the world. But he knew enough when he dabbled around in the spring of his senior year—he had been afraid that he couldn't pick up Persephone's cards again, worried he might not be full of greatness when he couldn't prevent her death.
"I don't think it will be anything I don't already know," Adam responded quietly, his fingers tracing over the broken head line and it's fractured end in the middle of her palm. It seemed so obvious now, but there was a strange unfamiliar guilt that settled in his gut.
He thought of his relationship with Ronan. He thought of Gansey's death and resurrection. He thought of that humid and happy summer at the Barns with Opal. He thought of how Persephone could see the changes in him, knew he didn't have to explain the how and why of them. Not when they were all together, each piece laid out in front of Persephone like a tarot spread: past, present, future.
"You missed so much. Not just with Opal, but everything. And I—" His hand took hers and squeezed, not wanting to let go. "I like it here too."
Persephone was quiet, and pensive. With her abilities, it had always been difficult to not believe in fate. To not believe that one’s life is planned out for you from the moment of birth, and no matter how you might want to change that, no matter how much you try to skirt around a prophecy… it would always find a way.
But that way wasn’t always firm. Death was never the end. Their King proved that, but even before, Persephone had seen it with others. And now with herself. She was soft and gentle as she squeezed Adam’s hand back, and brought her other up to close over his. “It’s a vast universe with infinite time stretched around it. A second blip of a break and then a continuation, here to experience all that Vallo has to give us. Death is not an end, it’s a pause. Besides,” she was even more gentle now, and squeezed her top hand. “It didn’t feel as if I had left you completely, did it? Just the confines of a human body, as limiting as they are.”
It was such a motherly thing, holding his hand between her own, but Adam wouldn't know. There weren't signals telling him to correlate the affectionate gestures, to assign them to parent. He had no basis for this—they both knew—but the reaction of being cared for in this way caused Adam's face to scrunch up, the emotions too confusing for his analytical brain to process.
He focused on what Persephone was saying instead. Adam knew the vastness of the universe, had seen it on many occasions scrying into large unending greatness, but concepts like death still plagued him. Persphone's death still bothered him. It had been because she was right—she hadn't quite left him. He had full conversations with her in front of the general store, he had heard her voice when all his senses were betraying him as Ronan was being unmade.
But Adam was too attached to the physical body. He couldn't have this tangibleness. Adam needed this too.
He let out a soft, bitter laugh. "Limiting, I guess so." His attention unconsciously drifted to find Opal, but she had disappeared into the market. "But there're so many other people who couldn't hold on to you. I had to tell Opal stories, I don't know if I did a good enough job keeping you alive after you were gone. I don’t know if I could again."
Persephone squeezed again, because she couldn’t not. She had picked up on his thought process, on his worries and fears, and the complex emotions that made up Adam Parrish. He had always been like this, though it had been a good thing for her to see his growth when she’d arrived in Vallo. Changes, for the good.
“You do, even without realizing it.” And he would again, but she didn’t say that, and risk making things even more sad. But there would come a time, and Persephone knew it, but the younger ones still had a lot to live before it was easier for them to accept that sort of fate.
“But Vallo took that away and I’m not complaining. We have time to just be us, with not as much to worry about as before.” It was a gentle reminder, as much as it was meant to be soothing. She stared at him long enough to hopefully catch his gaze. “Don’t get stuck in your own head, being stubborn, coca-cola. Blessings come in a variety of ways.”
"I'm lucky," Adam said slowly, barely registering the words. It was hard to give himself credit to things that had felt impossible years ago. Luck was not something that happened to him, it was something he created. So to feel lucky right now, staring across at Persephone, with everyone he loved and cared for nearby—Adam Parrish was lucky.
He caught Persephone's gaze then, the serious intensity of it.. And Adam met her right back. He got it, he understood.
"And I won't—get stuck that is. Just feeling a little undeserving." That self-deprecation was normal, and Adam made sure to quickly clarify, "But I know I deserve it, I know. Trying to break some bad habits, that's all. It's a lot, all at once. Those blessings." As if on cue there was a familiar shriek of happiness from Opal in her wild way off in the distance. Either she was being chased or chasing someone.
"If Ronan is okay with it, I hope she could spend more time with you? It feels weird for her to be so aware of everything, she's so attune to emotions. I think you would get along on a level that would be—" He didn't have a word that was better than good, but it felt inadequate.
Persephone knew what a step it was, for Adam to admit he was lucky, to dial back on the self-deprecation. So she didn’t push at him further, because in all the time she’d known him, recovering to agree he did deserve the good he had was newer, and good for him.
It was in another string of things that made her proud to see how far he’d come. That was showing on her face, no doubt, the little beam of sun reflecting off of the snow and to her wild blonde hair and captured a frame of the proud parental smile touching at her lips. Distance and time was something she’d known Adam had needed, away from the toxicity he’d grown up with.
With this family he’d made, he had that. Her eyes finally flicked over to the boyfriend-in-question and she nodded. There was no real hesitation, she was pleased that he trusted her enough with that idea. “If Lynch approves and she likes the idea, she’s welcome to spend time at the house, or just with me. It might actually be nice to have shrieking in the house again occasionally.”
"If you wanted shrieking in the house again, I could tell Blue to go over more often," Adam said, teasing. He had grown accustomed to the shrieking and the shouting and the laughter that permeated through the Barns. He didn't understand how someone could miss that noise until he tried to put himself in the silence. He hated it, knowing how alone Ronan must have felt in that house when everyone was gone.
How was he ever going to be able to go back to the way things were before this? Harvard was another life. Not being here all the time was unfathomable.
He looked over to where Persephone's attention had gone, his whole expression softening at seeing Ronan in the distance, at watching Opal run past him and others. It was his turn to squeeze Perspehone's hand again, back, to assure himself she was still here. "I'd like to come over more too, and you to come over here. Not for tarot or scrying or anything like that. Just, together."
Adam knew how awkward he sounded, how uncomfortable he looked at suggesting that Persephone slide into a spot that was more than being his mentor, more familial. But they were already there, right? With the way Adam wanted to brag about his family, he needed someone to be proud. Persephone always was of every accomplishment. "I don't think we do that enough."
Persephone was already grinning at the Blue ribbing, she did her own teasing of Blue when they didn’t see her for a day or two, due to other obligations. But she never held it against them, knowing just how much these young adults needed to find their own way in the world. “You should, I’ve started adding things to her room to see if she notices when she visits.”
Jokes aside, family was a tough beast of burden, and Adam had deserved more of the good than the bad. Persephone had never intended to push herself into that role, but it was one she’d fallen into naturally, finding him something of a kindred spirit. She’d never had children, and never would now, but that bond wasn’t about blood.
It was about something more, and that spark of knowing was a welcome addition to her life. “As much as you’d like, if you have the time. Though,” she finally pulled her hand away, with a pat, before tapping the tarot on the table. “I know someone that’s managed a business and getting a Ph.D if you need any advice. After you tell me about how successful I’ll be at romance.”
Something unexplainable settled in Adam's chest, nestled beside the love he held for Ronan and the space Cabeswater held. It pushed on an emotional button, one that nearly brought tears of relief, but Adam shoved them away quickly. Crying out of happiness was not something he did often, crying was not something he did at all, but his eyes burned all the same as he smiled at Persephone.
"I'll make the time. I always do," Adam said in response. In an effort to do something to make sure his hands didn't unintentionally reach for Persephone again, he grabbed for the cherry coke that she had slid to him earlier. He fiddled with the tab as she spoke, nodding. "And of course I want your advice. You're one of the most educated people I know, and you still manage to be—" Adam didn't get to finish the thought.
Opal, appearing out of nowhere with a quiet he forgot she was capable of, looking windswept and disheveled, pulled a card from the top from Adam's deck, apropos of nothing. The Lovers. He blinked at the card, then up to Persephone, and then to Opal, who was grinning feral and wild and pleased.
"Maybe you were right about putting us out of a job."
Persephone went from smiling oh-so-fondly at Adam and teasing him, to barking out a laugh that belonged to the woods when Opal popped up. Persephone leaned forward, her own hair wild and free and gathering around her as a matched set, voice a whisper as if her and Opal were the only two at the table.