Darker London

"Thomas!" Stephie called from the kitchen, where she'd been making coffee and messaging Deirdre. At first it had been good - Deirdre was going to come over and Stephie was going to tell her all about Spectre and if Deirdre was on her side, Spectre didn't stand a chance, and also, Stephie wanted a Deirdre hug, irregardless of anything to do with Spectre. And then Jinx had called him a cunt and something about Jinx standing up for her made her ache with the very strong need to hug him, too.

And then Deirdre had suggested with wasn't Spectre and breathing became an issue. "Thomas, where are you!?"

Jinx hadn't seen Josie for a few weeks, and even then it had been brief. Since Josie had put herself in the hospital, Jinx hadn't seen much of her at all. Mostly their relationship had turned into an online thing, where they skyped and facetimed and played co-op games and watched the same movies while IMing. But they'd only seen each other in person less than half a dozen times since then. Jinx waited for Josie to be in a good mood and invite him to visit, because he had no intention of going against her wishes.

Mostly this was for the selfish reason that he didn't want her to throw him into another wall. No, having your girlfriend do that just the once was enough.

And they certainly hadn't been intimate since Josie went to hospital.

It had been a very long six months.

And he couldn't even go complain about it out loud and with great vehemence, since most people still didn't know about him and Josie. Which was bad, because the longer it was a secret the worse it was going to be when it came out. And of course it was going to come out.

Once when he'd arrived at the hospital to see Josie, he'd run into Del on his way. He'd stood there and flat out lied to her face about why he was there. Del, who was supposed to be his best friend. Del, who'd been freaked out and wary about demons even before one had kidnapped her and held her captive for months.

But Del was overreacting about Josie, just like she overreacted about all the demons they knew.

He didn't know if Del was ever going to forgive him for keeping this secret.

Just don't think about it, he told himself as he walked to Del's room, hands down in his pockets. If you don't think about it then it isn't a problem.

He knocked on Josie's door.

One of these days, Stephie thought as she looked over at Marie’s homework, she was going to have to reteach herself some basic maths.

Marie was pretty happy concentrating (out loud) on her homework sheet, which she’d spread out on the little green table in her room. Stephie was sitting with her, cross legged on the floor because the table really was that little, being a soundboard for Marie as she worked things out. Tonight she’d been given a series of numbers and had to indicate which one was bigger, which was made a little more complicated because the numbers themselves were different sizes. “They are very sneaky teachers,” Marie said, circling a small eight and scribbling out a fat three. “Very very sneaky.”

( ... )

Marie was super eager to get back to Vic Lane, now that they were back in London. She and Stephie had spent the night at Thomas's after returning from Bradford-on-Avon and Marie had entertained Lavinia and Abby with all the tales from their trip, which was good, but they already knew Bradford. Eiley and Gabriel didn't, and Marie was gagging to show off all of the new stories she'd learned about the world.

She shed her school bag the second she got in the door, running as fast as she could down to the basement to find the twins. Far too fast to hear Stephie tell her to pick up her bag, those instructions certainly weren't fast enough to catch up with her ears!

( ... )

Looking at himself in the mirror, Jinx thought: Maybe it's time you fucking grew up.

He'd grown out his hair at fifteen and it hadn't changed since then. He hadn't changed much about himself by choice since then, and coming January he'd be twenty-nine. He wore the same clothes, did the same stuff. He owned nothing that looked like it belonged to an adult.

What was he doing with himself? With his life? Everyone else seemed to keep moving onto bigger and better and Jinx worked at the same shop since he'd moved to London, wearing the same clothes, doing the same things. Even when he'd been about to become a dad he hadn't change anything. Bryce, who had worked at All Your Base as long as him, was married now and about to give birth to her first kid. Once she went on maternity leave, she wasn't coming back. She was going to settle into a whole new life.

( But Jinx was stagnant. )

Her first few weeks at RMMH had been awful. There was the initial detox of course, and considering how long she had been strung out on whatever substances she could find, there was so much shit in her body that it took it's sweet time to work it's way out. In the end she had needed medical assistance, since her body was so wasted she could very easily have died just going cold turkey.

Not that Tallulah really minded the thought of dying. At least not in the beginning.

Slowly, however, her body healed itself and she was free to work on her mind and her heart. Those, she found, were going to take far longer than the detox.

She had been living at RMMH for over a month now, and she was looking healthier every day. The shadows had disappeared from under her eyes. Her arms still bore the trackmarks from where she had injected heroin into her body, but she was gaining a little weight and her hair had stopped falling out. She attended therapy twice a day, like a good little patient, because honestly she wanted to get better. She wanted to move past this and actually live.

She wanted to live.

Her room was half decorated with sketches she had made, or pieces of music she had quickly scored and tacked up so she could remember later. She was in the middle of tabulating out another piece when she heard someone come through her door. Assuming it was a nurse doing checks, or coming to get her for therapy, she held up one finger, her long blonde hair hiding her face as she frantically scribbled out the last few notes.

Marie was really digging this ‘spend more time at Vic Lane’ thing, because it meant James and Katya were guests in her house, and even though they’d been here so many times before, Marie was really getting a kick out of showing them where everything was, and how things were done around here. She’d been so hyper about setting up beds in her room for James and Katya that Stephie was surprised any of them had actually gone to sleep.

She was glad they did, though, because Stephie was just as excited to get Thomas into her bed, show him how things were done around here. She watched him in the faint light coming in from streetlamps outside as he showed the warning signs of starting to drift off to sleep, but she was far too awake herself and wasn’t going to allow it. “Did I wear you out?” she murmured in his ear, brushing his earlobe with her lips before he could slip any further.

Stephie had said to Flynn yesterday: It’s time and taken him flying. Today, she was taking a really long, agonised shower and trying to tell herself it’s time again, except this time it was about Jinx.

Because he and Josie were... something, and this was a... something that Stephie had to figure out.

She’d texted Josie before her shower with a how you doing, up for a visit? and got back an almost immediate crap but no. Which was kind of a relief. Stephie would have gone and seen her if Josie had been up for it, but it might have ended in shouting. There was still a large part of Stephie that was firmly stuck on the how dare you stage of being attacked by her best friend.

( ... )

Josie escaped the house and walked away, her head a storm of Stephie’s You are stronger than every bad things inside you countered with Josie’s I am every bad thing inside me countered with Ko’s I wish we found you first all repeating in a maddening round in her head.

She knew she’d fucked up. She could barely find the logic now that had led to her pinning Stephie down, or what had compelled her to try scare the living daylights out of her.

Because I’m shit – that was the obvious answer. Trash, just human trash or not even that, nothing better than a leech, an angry leech who ruined everything she gave a shit about. Of course she didn’t want Stephie to hate her, but she knew she deserved to have Stephie hate her.

( ... )

Josie felt morose and twitchy in her hospital room, which she blamed on the hospital pyjamas. It could have been worse; they were soft, at least, not itchy or see-through, not uncomfortable in any way apart from two main ones: they weren’t her clothes, and they were baby blue.

But the shirt she’d been wearing had been slashed through, and the blood had spread all the way down her legs, so keeping her own clothes wasn’t an option. Didn’t stop Josie being annoyed about pyjamas.

( ... )

Usually, Josie didn’t pay that much attention to other people on the street, even when the crowds were thick enough that strangers had to press up against her. Usually it was an ordeal to bear in order to shop; lay back and think of Dorateymur. People would touch you in the street, it was a given. It would make you both frustrated and sometimes disgusted, also a given. It was worth it for beautiful shoes.

Maybe it had been too long since her the days that she and Stephie had challenged each other to steal for the hell of it or maybe the kid was just too good at his job; but in any case, when a blond kid managed to get his hand into her bag, she didn’t notice.

( ... )

Stephie woke up fleeing – fighting to get out of her bed, she tripped in a tangle of sheets and hit the floor, but instantly rolled onto her back and continued to fight herself free.

Fire – and Thomas – the dream was so vivid she could smell it, feel the heat of it on her skin.

( ... )

Four days into the new year and this was the first evening Stephie had actually spent at Vic Lane. Deirdre had made a whole bunch of shrill OOOOOO noises at her as she’d come in the front door. “What?” Stephie said, grinning at her. “Ran out of clothes.” This did not do anything to discourage Deirdre’s noises.

She lay down on her bed and spent a couple of moments letting home sink into her. Thought about forgiveness and crap. Wondered how worried she should be about Spectre living next door to Thomas.

( ... )

As Astrid had suspected, drinking was a terrible idea. It had been years since she'd gotten drunk and when she woke up in the morning, half wrapped in Miles' arms, she had thought she was dying. She'd only been able to open her eyes for a moment before having to close them with a whimper, curling in on herself to block the light - both of the day and the ones belonging to Miles himself. She couldn't managed to really open them for the rest of the day, and she spent the next four days doing little beyond lying in his bed, moving only when she had to.

But Miles was good to her. He made sure she ate, he even helped her to shower when she decided she desperately needed it despite the pain. If he was annoyed by her presence, debilitated in his bed, then he didn't say anything and she had to simply trust that. The few times she looked at him it was like being stabbed directly in the brain, his lights far too much for her to handle. She was glad that he was human. If she'd been with Nancy or Ava she was sure they'd blind her even through closed eyelids.

On the fifth day she could look at him again, and she curled up on his couch and ate creamy pasta sent up by room service, watching him while he read a book and not really saying much. She felt damaged and delicate and volatile, but she felt like that a lot since getting back.

( see the pieces of hearts missing )

Stephie was annoyed that Josie wouldn't spend the rest of the night at the hospital with her, but Josie couldn't bear it. Maybe on another night she could have stayed, drinking hospital coffee and watching late night telly or slaughtering each other at whatever card game they both thought they could remember, but not tonight.

Stephie should have been enough but she wasn't. Josie felt a craving for Jinx that no one else could satisfy, and it wasn't just sex and she really hoped it wasn't for his soul... it didn't feel like that sort of craving. She was shaking with exhaustion and the shock of finding a body and sitting with it - him - watching him for what felt like hours before the helicopter arrived.

( ... )

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A proper medical crew met them at the hospital, and Stephie sat in the van near his head, trying to keep out of the way as they moved him. Lucas was waiting when she finally emerged, and gave her his hand to help her jump down. She looked pale – not Miles pale, but pale.

“Ruined your hoodie,” she said, wiping a bloody hand on the bloody hoodie. One sticky clot fell to the ground from where it was clinging to the centre pocket. Stephie made a face.

“Gross,” said Lucas.

( ... )

Wait here Miles had said, but like hell Stephie was going to wait. Not after he'd left, not when she didn't know when he was coming back or what he was going to say to her. She couldn't wait, because she was waiting on his terms and everything they'd been doing together this past month had been about making sure that his terms never overrode her own.

So she shoved open the windows and climbed out, banging them shut behind her. The midwinter drizzle cooled her down, but she was drunk enough, and on fire enough that she wasn't cold, not yet anyway.

She wasn't cold, but, she realised, as she stood in the back yard, she didn't have anywhere to go.

( ... )

In some ways, being back at work was better. Especially over the Christmas period, while the shop was full of people looking for presents or killing time while loved ones looked for presents elsewhere. The more customers All Your Base had, the less Jinx had to think about everything else. About Alice, about Tal, about Stephie.

Serve customers. Explain games. Stock shelves. Dust action figures.

It was harder when he got home, back to Cherry Orchard Lane, because there was less to distract him. He slept in Yvonne's bed but he didn't touch her. Any other time and he would have at least considered trying something, but not now. Stephie was still burning bright in his mind.

( Read more... )

When Jinx arrived at Cherry Orchard Lane, Yvonne was sitting outside on the step smoking one of Chloe's cigarettes. Whatever this conversation was about to me, Yvonne was fairly sure she wasn't ready to have it. She wanted to start with the easier conversation, the one where Jinx had slept with his ex-girlfriend. His ex-girlfriend who had thrown him into a wall, his ex-girlfriend that he'd pined for, his ex-girlfriend that was capable of literally tearing him limb from limb, his ex-girlfriend that Delilah would freak out about if she ever heard about this most recent dalliance.

But Yvonne knew as soon as she saw him that it had to be the other conversation first, the worse one: I almost raped Stephie. Because Yvonne had to know right now every detail of that. She had to know how it had happened, every word spoken, every action taken. She had to know all these things so she could know if it was time to punch Jinx or if it was time to sit him down and have a long hard talk about his current life.

( Two weeks would make it three months since Alice had been born into the world dead )