Who: Derry & JJ What: JJ has allergies, but she’s not allergic to Derry When: Evening July 5, 2019 Where: Bunkhouse, Derry’s Room Warnings: Implied discussion of Racial and Being discrimination, Shirtlessness
It wasn’t a Saturday night as exciting as last week, but you couldn’t go to a Gala every week. Derry was still spending it with JJ though. Despite not feeling well, JJ had still come over. Not that Derry minded as he’d always enjoy spending time with JJ. She was napping next to him on his bed while he was reading.
These allergies had been totally kicking her butt on and off for nearly a month now. She got potions for the worst of them, but they left her just as sleepy and lethargic as the no-maj stuff her parents got for her at the drug store when she was little. Both were a necessary evil, but that still didn't make taking them or needing to take them any fun. Wakefulness came over her sluggishly, and she snuffled a little through a nose that refused to stop running. Turning toward him, an unhappy little noise came from her throat before she had the presence of mind to stop herself. JJ settled in against Derry's warmth and moved her head to rest it against his shoulder. "Didn' mean t'fall asleep," she mumbled. "Sorry."
Derry felt JJ shift beside him, and smiled to himself when he heard her whine a little at waking up. She was quite adorable when she was sleeping, and he had to admit even while being sick, she was cute too.
He wrapped his arm around her when JJ moved against his shoulder. “That’s okay. You probably needed the rest,” he said when she apologized. “I just hope it’s not me that you’re allergic to,” he said with a chuckle and leaned over to place a kiss on top of her head.
"No," she protested, with the 'o' drawn out as she pressed her face into him and put an arm across his chest. "I'd stay on potions 24-7 if it was like that anyway. I like you too much to let a dumb thing like histamines keep me away."
Her gaze drifted to his book. "Whatcha readin'?"
Derry smiled at her protest and felt JJ just lean into him more. “I like you too much too,” he said grinning in reply because he knew that JJ’s explanation was an exaggeration, but he believed the feeling behind it.
At the question about his book, he closed it so he could show JJ the cover. “The works of Tennyson,” he explained. Derry set it down on the bed next to him though because now that JJ was awake, he’d rather pay attention to her.
Her fingers traced light patterns against his side, as she smiled up at him. "I've always been a fan of Tennyson, but the same could not be said of one of my English teachers in my no-maj school. Used to call him 'Tennyson-yone,' and made dumb tennis jokes all the time while we had to disect every line. It's like he wanted to imbue his own malice to his students. It hardly worked, however. Every year, new students passing through his class were recruited to the ALT-Society if they even showed an inkling of liking his stuff. We were ridiculous. Initiation included reciting The Charge of the Light Brigade while standing on one foot, or performing The Lady of Shalott in the same vein as the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet. Did I mention we were strange kids? Even for no-majs?"
Derry could feel the path of JJ’s fingers as she traced along his side. It was distracting but he still listened to every word she said. “He shouldn’t have been teaching it if he didn’t like it,” Derry commented simply, but then smiled as JJ continued on about her and her classmates rebellion.
“The mirror crack'd from side to side; 'The curse is come upon me,' cried The Lady of Shalott,” he said reciting briefly and grinned after JJ’s explanation. “Strange or artistic?” he asked to clarify further.
“When I was in school… with no-majs anyway, I used to miss a lot of school,” he said. Derry didn’t mean to bring down the mood but this had a point. “I was either with the healers or just had to stay home, so no one was suspicious. That usually meant I ended up reading more because I had the time,” Derry explained. “But when I went to Sedona… it became useful. In a way. My friends… who dated way more than I did by the way… were never good with words. And I was. So I’d help them out a bit. A Cyrano de Bergerac for teenage boys, if you will.”
Moving her hand onto his shoulder so that she could perch her chin there and not have it dig in, she grinned at both the admonishment of her one-time teacher and the recitation. "In my circle of friends at the time, the two weren't mutually exclusive, but I 'spose the same could be said of my HAHA days as well."
As he continued, JJ very carefully kept her expression pleasant, even while her heart was breaking a little. Her laugh was genuine, however. "Does that make me your Roxanne, but with a much less tragic outcome? But maybe not Roxanne at all, since I get to have you for you, and not through some dumb boy proxy. You may have told me, but I think it may have regular-person slipped my mind—where'd you go to nomaj school? Were you and your dad in the same place when you were a kid?"
“And it’s still really a matter of opinion,” he said about strange versus artistic. It was that ability of expressing yourself that made you stand out from everyone else.
He laughed as JJ tried to explain their situation with the metaphor he’d already started. “I don’t really know what we are,” he said. This had all come on so quickly, Derry hadn’t even given himself much of a chance to second guess what he was doing, or be too worried about consequences. Instead, he’d been impulsive and honest, and he was finding no reason to regret his actions, especially if his usual behaviour would have resulted in him and JJ not seeing each other, and Derry wouldn’t be feeling this happiness now.
“In normal circumstances, I probably would have avoided any contact, especially if I knew I was interested. I would have thought it too risky,” Derry explained. “But after seeing you collapse in the woods, I kind of forgot to be scared about my own concerns, and just worried about you instead. And that allowed me to see that maybe you were interested too, and I took that chance.” Derry didn’t even know if this needed explaining, but being in the moment had worked on several occasions with JJ already, and he liked the kind of person he was becoming while around her.
“Dad had moved us back to Lake Tahoe. He did have a lot of work to do there in the forests, but sometimes he had to travel. I had a mediwitch / nanny, Tilly, that helped my Dad take care of me. He married her eventually. I have two young sisters too. That's more than what you asked for though I suppose,” he explained.
Rising up, JJ traced the line of his bearded jaw and smiled down at him. "It's probably terribly selfish to say so, but I'm really glad you took a chance on me. Maybe even that I went and got myself bamboozled by a danged plant. Maybe. Jury's still out on that one, especially since I'm pretty sure I scared the livin' daylights outta you. But if it netted me this? Kinda thinkin' it might've been totally worth it."
She kissed him, but only after he'd talked about his family. It was a sweet, simple one, not really designed to escalate. Then again, most of theirs started out that way, but escalated anyway. "I like knowin' more about you and your family. How old are your sisters? Are they in school? Are they magical too? Tell me everything."
“I think it’s hard to call it selfish if we’re both happy things are this way,” Derry said then and brushed a hand up JJ’s back as she looked down at him. She could have simply ended there when she was poisoned by plants in the wood, or run the other way when she found out he was a cross being. But JJ was still here, and it was amazing.
Derry kissed her back, just another action that felt so natural with them now. Just like he not only wanted, but needed to be in her company in some way even if it meant her taking a nap on his bed.
“Patty is 19, so she’s been out of school for a year. Betty is going to be 17 this summer, and she’ll be graduating next year,” Derry explained. “We all have… nicknames that end in y. My Dad actually used to be Ted or Theodore. He did name me, but Tilly, my stepmom, she liked it and kept up the trend. She calls Dad Teddy. I usually only notice it’s weird when we’re all together and have to get introduced at the same time. Or when I have to explain it,” he added with a laugh. “But yeah, my sisters are both magical. And all human.”
"It's not weird! I love it when families have things like that—especially blended ones like yours." JJ traced his nose down to the tip, onto which she placed with a quick kiss. She used this small time to consider, and then forged ahead. "Medical issues aside, did y'all get on well?"
Derry was watching JJ and he tried not to twitch his nose as she traced it then left a kiss. “Yeah, we’re still all family. My sisters are a bit younger than me, so I wasn’t around as much when they were growing up. Tilly’s been taking care of me every since she knew me, so she’s always been understanding and we’ve got on well. And my Dad needed someone to take care of him. And to have some normal life.”
This made her lips pull down a little. She understood what he meant, but it didn't keep it from hurting deep down. "I…" The words were hard to come by, the right ones, at least. JJ traced the side of his face, across the top of his cheek and his brow. "I don't think you're not normal. I mean, I think you're extraordinary, but I guess I just mean that I don't think you're… weird." She sighed and then laughed at herself. "This is all coming out a garbled mess. I'm usually better at words. I'm choosin' to blame the allergy potions."
Derry was reaching to brush his hand over JJ’s cheek when he saw her smile slip. He knew it was what he said, and sometimes he couldn’t quite forget how he’d felt a burden or different from his family when he’d been growing up.
“Thank you,” he said, and he did smile as JJ struggled to find the right words because he did agree it was an awkward thing to talk about. “I understand what you mean, and I know it’s difficult to put it into words. My family never made me feel like I was different… at least not intentionally. It was mostly me and other people that ever made me feel insecure,” he said and reached for JJ’s other hand to squeeze in his. “But I know I’m luckier than some people who probably went through worse.” Derry even felt guilty now worrying about his own treatments when Njall was the one facing suspension from his job.
"I don't think there should be a sliding scale for suffering under discrimination." Her voice came out a little more fiercely than she necessarily meant it to, and she winced. With a sigh, JJ settled the side of her face against his chest, listening to his heart. "Sorry. I get riled up about this stuff, even when I don't hold any personal stakes in the situation. I won't say it's not my fight, 'cause that ain't the right of it at all. It should be everyone's fight. No one needs to feel lesser because of who or what they are, so long as who and what they are aren't intentionally harming anyone, y'know? And if we don't stand together on the things that are important, then we're just gonna fall apart—and we'd have no one to blame but ourselves."
She'd wound herself up again, tense now like she was ready for a fight. "And, for the record, best nobody talk smack about my boyfriend while I'm around. I will not hesitate to hex some fool."
Derry did agree with what JJ was saying, but he was never one to put his struggles before someone else’s. He would always be someone who would defer to another, and downplay any problems he was dealing with. “Don’t apologize,” he said and his hand brushed over JJ’s hair before settling on her shoulders when she laid her head on his chest. “I agree. I don’t know why it’s so hard for beings to be accepted but so easy to discriminate,” he said and perhaps was giving a more pessimistic view while JJ was justifying her beliefs.
His hand smoothed over JJ’s back, knowing that she’d worked herself up. At her last claim though, Derry actually couldn’t help it but smile. “I’ve never had a girlfriend so determined to be my protector before,” he said and used the word deliberately because JJ called him her boyfriend.
A tone of hard earned and well-deserved bitterness crept in her tone as she muttered, "It ain't just beings." But that was a topic for another day. She got this weird sense of deja vu, maybe not of this exact conversation, but one very similar. For the life of her, she couldn't work out who it might have been with, however. Hopefully, if it was important, it would. Actually, if it was important, it almost certainly would not. There wasn't a lot she could do about that now. "But I get. I really do. And it sucks."
Picking her head up a little, she gave him a wrinkle-nosed grin, the kind that scrunched up her face a little. "Caught that, didja?" Her expression softened, and she picked a little at the fabric of his shirt. "You don't mind, though, do you? Bein' my boyfriend, I mean?"
Derry heard the bitterness in JJ’s voice. He realized what he’d said after, but this was exactly his point about why he knew he was lucky. There were other things that people were discriminated for that made even less sense, like the colour of your skin or the faith you worship. He gave JJ a brief squeeze with his arm around her and leaned down to press a kiss to her forehead. “I know.” He hoped that JJ did know that. He didn’t say or make assumptions about what happened to her growing up. He would listen if she wanted to talk about it.
He did smile at her softened expression. “I don’t mind,” he said reaching to take that hand that was picking at his shirt only so he could press a kiss to her knuckles. “I do treat you differently, but it’s entirely because of how I feel. I also think you’re extraordinary. You’re beautiful, and I like who I am when I’m with you.”
Her face went bright pink, and she rose up to kiss him again. Several seconds passed like this, until JJ had to pull away just to be able to string two thoughts together again. "I think… you're pretty special too, if that wasn't obvi—"
She broke off as her phone gave a very specific tone, and she very swiftly sat up and grabbed it where it had been resting on his bedside table. Her body swayed a little; the motion had been a bit too fast for the potions she'd taken, but it was fine if she just sat still again. Her gaze flew over the text message, very serious for those handful of seconds, before her face broke into an enormous grin. "It's my brother Marcus. His girlfriend's at the hospital now, about to have their baby!"
Derry kissed her back, his hand brushing over her cheek as those precious moments passed. He smiled at her returned sentiment, staying close as his nose rubbed against hers.
When she sat up to check her phone, he took the opportunity to sit up as well. His hand reached out instinctively when she swayed but after a quick moment, JJ was alright. Her bright grin confirmed that it was good news at least. “That’s great news! Congratulations, you’re going to be an aunt,” he said smiling and happy for her. Of course this was a reminder that Derry didn’t even know about JJ expecting a niece or nephew… or that she even had a brother. “Your family must be very excited,” he said.
Holding up her finger, JJ felt the need to clarify. "An auntie. That means I get to spoil the little nibblet rotten without all the familial obligations for care that comes with immediate proximity. My Grauntie was different, though, in that she's the one that practically raised me, on account of my parents were workin' two and three jobs apiece and just tryin' to keep my two siblings outta trouble. That's Marcus and Yolanda, both of them older, but no one else has magic like I do. Made it kinda weird growin' up. But they've settled down a little—at least that's the way Grauntie Lillimae tells it. Well, I hope Marcus has at least, what with a baby on the way. There for a while, we weren't really sure which way he'd go: runnin' the streets or behind bars. But I think his girlfriend's been a good influence. I haven't met her myself in person, but we've Facetimed and she seems real nice. Like she's got a good head on her shoulders, at least."
Derry laughed at the correction that JJ would be an Auntie. This also quickly turned into an explanation about her family (who Derry hadn’t asked about yet, he realized further) and that gave him a bit more insight into who JJ was.
“You must miss them,” he said because even as she talked about her siblings getting in trouble, JJ seemed to hardly stop for a breath as she kept explaining. “What is your sister like?” he asked because JJ had talked about her brother but not her. “How often do you get to see them?” he asked since she hadn’t met her brother’s girlfriend yet. He knew that JJ had to have been busy with her singing career, but she’d gone through some changes to get here. “Are you going to go visit to see the baby?”
With a little shift that saw her perched on her elbows, JJ shrugged. "Is it okay to answer yes-and-no to missing them and going to visit? 'Cause I feel like the answer isn't nearly as cut and dried as it prob'ly should be." She pushed out a sigh. "I mean, don't get me wrong. I love them, I do. I don't know what I'd do without them. But we're not close. Not really. Not nearly as much as we were before the AWC types came and told them why all this weird stuff kept happenin' around me. Ever since then, well, we try, but it's ain't really the same."
She let out a brief sigh and tried to smile, however, it wasn't quite a bright as before. "But you asked me about Yolanda—well, my sister's great, but she kinda suffers from the same thing Marcus does. She's still tryin' to figure out her life, but it's been hard for her. She's had a dozen jobs in the last eight or nine months, and none of them have been the right fit. I keep telling her she should get into hairstylin', but she doesn't really think she's cut out for it." JJ picked up her phone again and flipped through a few photos on her sister's Instagram before showing a couple of really elaboratehairstyles to her boyfriend. "It ain't like she lacks the talent. It's just the drive that's not there. Heck, I think she could even do amazin' things in our world, but she's just too scared to even try."
When JJ laughed, there was definitely a harsh note to it. "I think I stole all the ambition from my brother and sister." She winced. "Well, I had done. Maybe I blew through it all when I was a pop star for a hot minute."
“You can answer any way you like,” Derry said and brushed a hand over JJ’s cheek and up to her hair. He realized now that this was getting into a bit more sharing and he felt bad to put JJ in that position. Their circumstances were different, but Derry could understand.
He looked at the pictures JJ showed him. “It looks like she has a lot of talent,” he agreed. “It’s a shame she doesn’t see it herself. But some people are just like that. They won’t see what’s right in front of them no matter how much you try to convince them,” he explained. He could understand that JJ didn’t go around to see her family if she didn’t know how to help them.
At her wince, Derry wrapped an arm around her to give her a gentle squeeze, and leaned in to kiss her softly. “You didn’t take anything from your brother or sister. They are their own people,” he said. He didn’t really understand why JJ had stopped her music career, but she had to have her reasons. “Ambition doesn’t necessarily mean what you want either.”
She felt some of the tension that had begun to accumulate in her shoulders and neck dissipate at the light hold she found herself in, but much more at that kiss. It was probably pretty safe to say that she even melted a little. "That it doesn't," she conceded with a smile that had gone a little dopey. "I'm probably painting a really unfair picture of my family. They've all got their quirks—and the Good Lord knows I alone have enough quirks for a whole host of families, let alone just my own—but that doesn't mean I love them any less. We've all just been doin' the best we can with what God's given us, y'know? Or, uh, maybe you don't. And that's fine! Sometimes it's hard findin' people like me, people who grew up with a faith and belief system, only to find out they're a witch or a wizard. It's definitely a test, I can tell you that much. When my parents found out about it, they kept askin' if it was the Devil, if I had too much sin in me, despite the fact that I grew up in the church and was practically raised there. There wasn't a single day when I wasn't there for at least a few minutes, and I was in the choir by the time I could read. Everyone prayed over me a lot back then, and I-I had kind of hard time reconcilin' it all. That's where the distance came in, y'know?"
It wasn’t that he minded listening to JJ speak, or that there were topics that he didn’t want to hear… but Derry was sure that JJ was saying more than she probably wanted to. So he listened but when Derry noted a good stopping point, he leaned in to kiss JJ again. His hand threaded into her hair as the kiss lasted a bit longer.
When he pulled back he looked at JJ as he thought about what to say. “Your family and the way you grew up shaped who you are now,” he explained. “I’m sorry that your parents didn’t understand. I may not be religious myself, but I can understand living a life with duality,” he said. He didn’t want JJ to feel bad for mentioning her faith as it was important to her.
“When I was a teenager, that’s when my condition started getting worse. That’s when things started to get very… real. In order to get treated, I had to be registered. And at home, it was like something everyone had been ignoring for years was something they couldn’t unsee,” Derry explained. “When I finished school, I spent a lot of time on my own for awhile. I’d even visit some communities where American Dryads lived. I didn’t fit with them either as I’d been raised a wizard, and they weren’t too fond of me because I was part Greek Dryad. Apparently we’re different,” Derry said with an ironic smile.
After making a soft sound and melting against Derry all over again, JJ didn't even mind in the slightest that she'd been effortlessly and effectively silenced in an extremely pleasurable way. It settled in a nice little buzz in her head, and she smiled at him as he went on. Although, as he did and she came to realize just how much of their paths were similar—that he'd experienced racism that was every inch as real as her own—her smile faded and was replaced with the slow burn of righteous anger. "Hang on…" She leaned away again, searching his face for some desperate sign that he was joking. He wasn't. "You had to get registered to get treated? When you were a kid?"
JJ wasn't yelling. She was just speaking from a place of very emphatic fury.
Derry realized he should have kept that story back for now. Of course JJ was upset. He’d been upset at the time but unfortunately, the healers hadn’t given him or his Dad much choice.
“I don’t think they wouldn’t have treated me,” Derry said to give further clarification. “It was just... highly suggested I do it at the time,” he said. “It was the typical persuasive jargon. Being registered meant I’d be better protected, or I could get more information about what I was. I’m pretty sure it was just to keep track of me,” he explained though JJ probably could already guess that.
She was hard pressed to remember a time when she'd been this angry—and that had nothing to do with any lapse of memory. Her body was shaking with it. Her hand, which had been resting on his chest, curled into a fist. Something trembled on one of his shelves. This was like the days and weeks and months before she'd found out she was a witch, when strange and inexplicable things would just happen around her whenever she was upset. Recognizing this, JJ turned her face away and began to hum a couple of bars from the very first hymn she ever learned.
It worked just enough to calm her to be able to unclench her hand. JJ was still upset, there was no denying that, but it wasn't quite as bad as it had been. "That's terrible," she said quietly. "And it never should have happened. But there's no way to really change the past. Or it's just ill-advised, 'cause you never know what else would change. Like maybe you wouldn't be workin' here, and I wouldn't be in your arms right now."
Now Derry really did regret getting into this conversation because JJ was getting more upset. He wrapped his arms around her as he moved to sit up. He looked when he heard something trembling on his shelf, but mostly he was concerned with JJ.
He should have known that the singing would have helped, but Derry did his best too with rubbing his hand down her back and bringing a kiss to her brow. He did smile and nodded in agreement. “You’re right. I wouldn’t want to risk it and miss out on meeting you.”
She hadn't impeded him in the slightest as he adjusted their current arrangement. Instead, her arms went around his back, and she nuzzled in close to his neck. Her fingers traced around the patterns she knew were on his skin without even having to see them. "Let's table the multiverse for now and focus on this reality for the time bein'."
With a firm and very suggestive tug, she began pulling up the back of his shirt as she kissed the soft skin of his throat. Just feeling his warmth through the layer of fabric wasn't enough for her; suddenly she wanted his skin—all of it, even the parts she knew he didn't really want her to see. "Please," she whispered as she pulled him with her as she leaned onto her back, putting them in the opposite position from before. "I wanna see you."
“Agreed,” he said about changing subjects, especially with the way JJ was touching him, and pulling at his shirt suggested a very different topic instead. He moved with her as she laid back on the bed, and Derry leaned over her.
Even if he normally hesitated at such a request, Derry couldn’t say no to JJ. He leaned back so he could reach pull up his t-shirt and pulled it off over his head. The shirt was tossed away and forgotten for now. There had been no time for illusion charms to hide anything, but Derry knew that JJ wanted to see all of him. But even if JJ had asked to see him, that didn’t stop Derry from leaning down to kiss her first.
A soft sound left her, and she became consumed by the warm thrill that stole through her. Given any other time, she would have hesitated, but now her hands roved over his back and sides, mapping every inch of skin whether it was normal or not. She could feel when the skin was about to change, how it went rough beneath her fingers, and she never flinched away or skirted around those areas. As she reluctantly leaned away, she deliberately kept her hand against a large patch on his side. It felt vaguely mossy and soft beneath her palm.
For as much as she'd been very serious about her request to look at him, she found herself gazing instead at his face, into his eyes. "You're gorgeous, y'know? All over. I know it ain't easy, and I know you need help gettin' it gone or stopped or—I dunno—somethin', but it don't bother me none. It's a part of your lovely self, and I just… I wanted you to know that you never have to hide from me. No matter what."
Derry didn’t know how he could ever stop kissing JJ or stop touching her when she made sounds like that. He continued to kiss her and felt JJ’s hands explore his skin… all of it. He felt no hesitation in her touch, and he sighed against her lips before JJ pulled away.
This was also him without his latest treatment. There was a patch on his shoulder that was just creeping up to his neck. In a few days he would have to use some illusion charms to cover anything on his face. But here was JJ saying the opposite of what he’s always felt about himself. The truth was, it was never going to go away completely no matter what healers could do. Perhaps what Derry needed was someone to help him accept that. “Thank you,” Derry said pressing another soft kiss to JJ’s lips but pulled back again so he could look at her. His hand reached up to brush over her cheek. “I don’t… usually let anyone get this close. And I don’t want to hide from you,” he agreed. “And I don’t want you to hide from me either.”
A shiver ran the length of her as she took in his chest and the column of his throat and then his face. Her fingers came around to his front, doing more tracing, more charting, gentle but bolder than before. She leaned into his touch, humming her approval against his lips, and then pulled away again. A doubt rippled through her mind. Talks she'd had with Will, about getting caught up in the moment, about going too far, echoed back to her. JJ paused, waited for the guilt that usually came when doubt had been introduced…
It didn't come.
She abandoned touching his chest to catch on the hem of her own tank top and deftly pulled it off. His skin was so warm, and she arched her chest and stomach against it as she leaned up to kiss him again. "I won't hide," she murmured against his mouth. "Not from you."
Derry was surprised when JJ moved to remove her top. He had meant more figuratively that he didn’t want JJ to hide. His secret was more physical and could be hidden with clothing. Those moments that JJ seemed to forget… that was something else, and Derry still continued to consider that and be worried. He also remembered what JJ had implied on their first date… and Derry never wanted to pressure her into doing anything she didn’t want to do.
He’d let go of JJ to let her remove her tank top but very quickly after Derry wrapped his arms back around her. It felt so good feeling JJ leaning up against him, chest pressed to chest. He held JJ to him with one arm around her waist, while his other hand smoothed over the skin of her back.
“My fragile soul's in half and my head and heart both choose different paths, let me hide here with you, away from public view, where their eyes can do no damage,” Derry uttered against her lips as he kissed her back.
Her heart fluttered at his words and at the feel of him. The bark-like patches didn't make her flinch, and she didn't shy away from touching them or letting them touch her. "Derry, I…" She shivered, and her hands folded over his upper arms and then slid up onto his shoulders and up his neck and into his hair. But rather than any more words, she just kissed him again. They were past words now.