Quentin Coldwater (sadkingquentin) wrote in chances_rpg, @ 2023-05-14 19:06:00 |
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Entry tags: | the magicians: quentin coldwater, ~ex the magicians: julia wicker |
Log: Quentin (1) & Julia
Who: Julia Wicker and Quentin Coldwater (Q1)
Where: Julia's apartment
When: Mid-February (super backdated, obvs)
What: BFFs Reconnect
Rating/Warnings: Low/None
Status: Completed via GDocs
Baby Hope blurbled happily where she sat and bounced herself on her Uncle Q's legs. Her uncle was trying very hard not to be utterly charmed by the spit bubbles his niece was producing at a steady rate. Quentin could totally see Julia and Penny in that cute face and those wide, curious eyes. He had a hand at her back to keep her steady, while the other pressed a finger gently against the end of her nose. "How are you even real? You're too cute to be real. Jules"—he glanced up, grin a lot more genuine than it had been when he arrived—"your kid is too cute to be real. She's giving me an existential crisis." Julia laughed at that, trying very hard not to tear up at the sight of Quentin holding her daughter. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen it, but every time it was a reminder that the version of Hope that existed at home would never experience this. She’d barely even had time to come to terms with him being gone from this world, too, when he was back, from a slightly earlier point in time and with no knowledge of his own death. She’d agreed with Eliot that they should let him settle in before telling him about that, which meant keeping her own feelings hidden. “She is pretty cute,” she admitted. “Be glad you missed the grown up version making an appearance. Talk about an existential crisis.” Especially when she had come with a half-brother who was half god, fathered by a man Julia had only just met at that point. Quentin’s future kid had shown up, too, but she was adding that to the list of things she probably shouldn’t tell him about. He grimaced a bit, but smoothed it out when Hope began to squinch up her face as well. She was definitely of the age where she was learning by mirroring and mimicking. And he was going to focus on that and not this sinking feeling he kept getting in his gut that his two best friends might be keeping something from them. It was in their long looks and the things they wouldn't talk about. "This place is really giving Fillory and the Neitherlands a run on weird, huh?" Q looked from his niece (in all but blood) to Julia and tilted his head. "So, you and Penny. Well, Penny-23. That makes her, what? Half-Traveler, half-former goddess? Oh, my god, is she a demi-god? What the f—heck are our lives, Julia? Feels weird to curse around her. If anyone's going to teach her baby's first F-bomb, it's going to be Uncle Eliot, right?" Julia laughed, but then she shook her head. “Not actually a goddess, anymore. Fully human.” That wasn’t something she especially wanted to explain, but she would, if pressed. There was a part of her that was still a little angry at the way the decision had been made for her, even if she wouldn't give up having Hope for anything. “Most of the weird around here is pretty harmless, at least,” she offered. Some of it had been a little more dangerous, but overall it still felt safer in San Francisco that they’d been at home, where it seemed like there was always something. Some quest or apocalypse looming. He smiled over at her, so full of an affection built over a lifetime of friendship that it almost made his chest hurt. "You'll always be my goddess." Q snorted, and then laughed harder when Hope gave a squeal of baby giggles in response to the noise. "We might have a really screwed up barometer when it comes to weird, though, you have to admit." He kept his tone light and booped his niece's nose with a finger. She batted at his hand as he began to do it again, but when he drew it back, she gave a frustrated grunt. "That's right, kiddo, you were born into the wild, weird, and wonderful. I can't wait to see you grow up in it." He slid his gaze over to Julia, his smile slow and devious. "I'm willing to gloss over the whole Penny-23 thing, as much for you as for me, but… Thor? Actual god of thunder, Thor? How did that happen?" “Actual god of thunder Thor, yep.” Julia laughed. “Speaking of weird... we had met, but hadn’t spent a lot of time together yet when these kids from the future started showing up. There were some from people’s home futures and some from here. One of them was our son, Hope’s half-brother.” She laughed again. “We kind of did things backwards, I guess.” "Holy shit…" Quentin breathed, and then laughed when baby Hope let out a grunt like she was annoyed with his language. "I guess if you know a thing is going to happen, it makes it a lot easier to go along with the flow." He smiled up at Julia before leaning in to give Hope a smacking kiss against her forehead, which set her back to giggling again. "Or makes you want to dig your heels in and say screw destiny. Except this one doesn't sound so bad. What's he like? My nephew." “It didn’t hurt that he was hot,” Julia said slyly. Quentin probably didn’t want to hear that, but he’d kind of started it, anyway. “Koll was great.” Julia’s smile turned fond as she thought of her son. “The best of both of us, I think. He and Hope were pretty tight, and I loved that for her.” She laughed. “Definitely better than my fucked up family.” Q rolled his eyes and snorted; somehow it didn't surprise him that Jules had found a hot Norse god amid all this madness. The kid was one, though, but then again, so was Hope, who was chewing her own hand and making little motorboat sounds against it. Quentin's charmed smile turned slightly rueful as he shifted his attention to his best friend. "They're a second chance to get things right, right? Or get things better than we had it, maybe." Maybe that was a lot of pressure, but that was parenthood, usually. "So, what did you wind up doing job-wise?" “I’m teaching at the high school,” she answered. It was a good job. She found she liked teaching a lot, which wasn’t really all that surprising. “Literature, mostly, but I do have a Latin class, too.” She’d thought about shifting gears, looking into teaching magic, but she didn’t know if there were even enough kids here who would benefit. "Yeah? That's pretty cool." Quentin lifted the baby high enough to blow a raspberry on her stomach, and had to wait until her shrieks of laughter subsided before lowering her again and telling her very seriously, "I hope your mommy is telling her students about the importance of not summoning things by accident. Those dead languages can be pretty darn dangerous." Julia laughed. “Not everyone in my classes is magical, but I have been thinking about getting permission to teach some magic classes, maybe even open a special school for the kids who have magic or powers here,” she admitted. "There's that many of them?" Q's brows shot to his hairline as he looked Julia's way, but his expression broke into a grin with the next breath. "Look at you, opening up your own Brakebills. Hopefully without all the functional alcoholism and casual disregard for students' lives? Seriously, who creates a whole damned school and doesn't put safety measures into the freaking foundation? Like, I get it. Magic's an unreliable source at the best of times and should be treated with care and respect, but why would you perpetuate an academic institution where the registration explicitly grants immunity to said institution against being liable for student death? Put a few goddamn spells in place to make sure your students don't accidentally blow themselves up! And don't even get me started on the attrition rates. We never actually graduated!" Julia smiled fondly as Quentin ranted. It wasn’t that she was amused by his words or anything, but she’d really fucking missed him in the time he’d been gone. He was her best friend in all the world and knowing what he’d gone back to, knowing she wouldn’t see him again for a very long time, if ever, back home had been almost as devastating as losing him in the first place. Of course, she couldn’t tell him any of that. “There are quite a few, especially here in The Station,” she admitted, only pausing a beat before adding, “have I mentioned I’m really glad you’re here? HQ’s glad to see you, too.” He smiled over at her, and it felt like the easiest thing he'd done in a long, long time. And that was even contending with the baby who decided that the lock of hair hanging over his face belonged in her mouth. Quentin winced when his head was tugged sideway by a tiny fist, but he only laughed while he gently tried to extricate himself from her itty bitty iron grip. "It was implied, but I'll take whatever reminders you want to send me." Quentin got a hand free and leaned out of his hair's imminent danger only to find Julia's and squeeze her fingers gently. "Feeling's mutual. After we set out to the Library to get to you—well, to get to the Monster and his sister, I should say—I wasn't sure what was going to have to happen to get my best friend back. I never thought this would be the endgame, though. The baby, not the crazy alternate dimension." “To be fair, I wouldn’t have predicted either of those things,” Julia admitted, pushing back the pang at the knowledge of what Quentin had sacrificed for her, for Eliot, for all of them. She had so much to thank him for, but she didn’t know how to do it when he didn’t know. How was she supposed to tell him everything that had really happened? Especially when Eliot had made it clear he thought they should wait. “It’s good, though,” she added. “Life has been pretty good here.” He squeezed her fingers and then went back to making faces for his niece to copy and laugh at, and made a few at Julia as well. Something settled in his chest, but he couldn't put a name to it. Not really. There were still so many things up in the air to make him feel truly at ease. He thought maybe he could possibly get there, even while he missed their friends who weren't around. And that was as much for his sake as it was for Eliot and Julia and even little HQ. She'd grow up here, never knowing Penny-23, and that was kind of sad in and of itself. But Q pushed that aside so he could smile at his BFF and tell her truly: "I'm so happy for you, Jules. Life really dealt us some supremely crappy hands in our own lives. Maybe here we get the chance to do a few more things right. Hey, do you want to order some food? Make a night of it? I'll even attempt to be on diaper duty." “I love that idea,” Julia said, agreeing easily. “Food, maybe we can find a movie to watch, too, if you want.” A quiet night with her best friend and her daughter. It actually sounded kind of perfect. Q grinned. "Sounds perfect." |