![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
luchiaNOW WITH A SHINY BANNER! SEE, SEE, SEE?!
Banner by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
magicscalpel and we looove her~
AUTHORS:andrealyn and luchia13
TITLE: Azkadellia's Okay! (With Ambrose and the Cains' help), Part 7: Woman Hurt; Ship Sinks.
RATING: PG-13.
PAIRING: Ambrose/Cain (or Cain/Ambrose, whatever), VERY FUTURE Az/OC, Jeb/OC/OC
DESCRIPTION: When the Witch picks another target, everything changes. Including switching out the Roboparents for Ambrose and the only Tin Man who knows what's going on (and his kid).
This Part: Azkadellia continues to be Icelandic, Cain has a horrible day, Ambrose has some very bad poetry, Jeb's brain hurts, and sometimes it just doesn't pay to wake up.
Part 1: Things Explode; Iceland Blamed.
Part 2: Pink House Purchased; Introductions Ensue.
Part 3: Fight In Classroom; Landslide Victory.
Part 4: Cain Doesn't Move; Children Scream.
Part 5: Countries Massacred; Restaurant Warned.
Part 6: Dog In Prison; Keys Lost.
Azkadellia's Okay!
(With Ambrose and the Cains' help)
Part 7: Woman Hurt; Ship Sinks.
It was a lazy summer afternoon and both Cain and Ambrose were at work, leaving Azkadellia to watch out for Jeb and Toto to look out for the both of them. However, the level of watchfulness he contributed was arguable as he was chasing a ball back and forth between the laps of the children as they lay sprawled on the grass. While the heat had rendered Azkadellia and Jeb somewhat lazy, Toto seemed content to rip the ball to shreds as he ran back and forth between the two, receiving strokes of adoration from each of them.
“Dad says you’re going to high school,” Jeb spoke, seemingly upside-down the way he was laying and looking up at Azkadellia. “What’s a high school? On a mountain?”
“Ambrose says it derives its nomenclature because of the upward mobility of education. So because it’s past middle, it’s high school,” she assessed, petting Toto as she sat perfectly upon the grass, her dress arranged in a way that suggested she practiced her sitting just to achieve the technique of artful resting. “He says I have to readjust to new social groups and it’ll be bigger than before. And you’ll get there too, in seven annuals.”
Jeb wrinkled his nose, tracing the paths of clouds in the sky. “I’ll be old in seven annuals,” he said with distaste.
Azkadellia made a show of looking affronted, her graceful features (shifting as she made her way to adulthood) pouting. “Are you implying I’m old?”
“No, you’re Az,” Jeb said in return. “Duh.” As if that explained everything. He rolled onto his stomach and gained a handful of grass and dirt stains in the process before digging his bare elbows into the ground and resting his chin in his hands, staring up at her as Toto burrowed into a comfortable position in Azkadellia’s arms. “You’re…different. Like a sister, kinda.”
Azkadellia softened and crawled over on the lawn to rest beside Jeb where they could both watch the clouds on their backs and Toto could walk over their stomachs – which made Azkadellia, ticklish as she was, softly giggle with delight. “I miss my sister,” Azkadellia confessed, a secret between them.
“Who?”
“My DG,” Azkadellia whispered. “She’s got the Witch in her. That’s what’s making her do all those things. It’s not her and we’re here having lives and being happy and she’s so far away and I miss her.” The confession seemed almost a surprise to Azkadellia, who finished that sentence with the soft rise of emotion in her voice, akin to a hiccup. She closed her eyes tightly and was surprised to feel warm hands encircling her and tugging her close.
As much as Jeb could be like his father in frustrating ways, she was always glad that they shared similarities when it came to protecting her. The hug was exactly what she needed at the moment and she held on as tightly as she could, not even minding when Jeb seemed to burrow his cheek against her collarbone and it caused a slight awkwardness with Azkadellia’s growing bust. In some ways, Azkadellia understood how lucky she was to have the Cains in her life. She loved Ambrose dearly and never wanted him to go, but some days it was Mr. Cain’s protective instincts or Jeb’s sheer existence that made it bearable to be without her parents and DG.
Jeb didn’t let go initially. In fact, it took some time for them to part and Azkadellia’s eyes were shining with tears as she gave a bubble of an anxious laugh.
“I miss Mother,” Jeb confessed right back to her, now fidgeting with the grass that littered the ground around them. “I haven’t seen Dad as happy as he was before. He always fights now.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ambrose fight so much either,” Azkadellia admitted, smoothing out her skirt. “Sometimes I wonder if it’s because of us.”
“Nah,” Jeb waved that off. “S’always about stupid stuff. I overhear sometimes.”
There came another laugh from Azkadellia as she tugged Jeb back down to the grass and they returned to skygazing. Azkadellia missed DG and Jeb missed Adora, but they were both moving on because they had a new life before them. Ambrose had Jane Walker and Cain had…well, them. It would be okay and Azkadellia truly believed that because she had to.
“Jeb,” she said.
She got a grunt in return.
“I always wanted a little brother,” she continued, giving him an apprehensive smile, almost hopeful as she didn’t want to hear any rejection when she had gone and said as much aloud. She could control whole groups of children with ease, but she always felt completely raw and normal around the Cains and half the time she adored it and the other half of the time, she hated the way it made her feel. “And I’m glad I finally got one.”
Jeb looked over at her and slowly entwined his small fingers with hers, holding on tight (just like DG had used to). “I like having a big sister too,” he said, simple as that. “Does this mean now Ambrose and Dad have to get married?”
Now, Azkadellia’s laugh was bright and burst forth as though she couldn’t hold it in a second longer. “No, I don’t think it works like that. This is just between you and me,” she swore in a confidential whisper. “It’s our choice, so we just swear it and we lock it with our pinkies,” she added, holding out the pinky of her right hand.
Jeb got a mischievous grin on his face and he held out his hand to lock pinkies with her and they very seriously shook on the sibling pact they had just made. Slowly, the sun continued its descent in the sky and brought on the late hours of the afternoon, but neither Azkadellia nor Jeb bothered to move.
“Does this mean now that you’re going to high school that you’re going to be a grown-up?” Jeb asked, playing with the long strands of Azkadellia’s hair that he could reach and loosely braiding them. “And stop playing games with us?”
“I’ll never stop,” Azkadellia murmured softly with a kind smile in his direction. “I don’t think being a grown-up would be very fun without the games. Besides, just what would you do without me around to beat you at all the games,” she teased.
When Jeb retaliated with a well-placed tickle attack, Azkadellia didn’t even fight back. She just shrieked happily and writhed about on the grass, letting her pale pink dress become just as dirty as Jeb’s jeans and button-down had become. If (and really, it was more a question of when) Ambrose asked about it later, Azkadellia would insist that they were just being kids.
“Say uncle! Uncle!” Jeb protested.
Instead, she caught him up in her arms and hugged him tight as she could. They stayed like that until the sound of Cain’s truck pulled up in the drive and Azkadellia rested her chin on Jeb’s shoulder. “Best little brother ever,” she whispered before she released him and they both went running to greet Cain home from work, Toto in tow.
--
After a full season of soccer, the summer had to come to an end and fall came around. That meant that the soccer leagues were following suit with their playoffs leading up to championships and giving children sparkling promises of trophies, pizza parties, and praise. Jeb Cain had been on the Rockets – with their indigo shirts that shimmered in the sun -- and though he had been overheard to complain to his father about the material, he wore the shirt with pride. While he hadn’t been Captain of the team, all the kids treated him like he was, anyhow. Sheriff Wyatt Cain had been in attendance of each game, even if he showed up late and still carrying the remnants of a long day at the office (papers sticking out of his briefcase).
Now, in this last game before the finish of the season, Jeb was leading the team to victory, two minutes left on the clock and the ball was in his possession. It was almost like the climax of a film as Jeb raced down the field with increased speed and kicked the soccer ball with a grace and athleticism that he had learned since they came to the Otherside.
The shot went in with a whoosh and the victorious applause and shouts rang out immediately.
But in the other team’s hurry to defend their net, Jeb caught an elbow to the back of the head, causing a sharp reaction from each side. More than one pair of eyes was drawn to Sheriff Cain to see what he would do.
Jeb crumpled to the ground and curled up slightly, a feeble sound of a cry coming from him as a whistle was blown to announce the end of the game (and a rousing win for the Rockets) and Cain barely hesitated as he rushed to his son’s side, curling him up in his arms and making sure that he was sitting up. Immediately, his fingers were rifling through his hair (a bit darker these days) and searching for the bump.
“Father?” Jeb asked, voice sounded muffled and more than a little dazed.
Cain’s glare could warn everyone away and the coach was getting a pack of ice while Cain stroked a broad palm back over Jeb’s hair, trying to look like it was all just fine. Cain was a terrible liar, though. Too many annuals of telling it straight had rendered him incapable of lying well.
Where was Ambrose when you needed him?
“Hey, son,” Cain murmured, taking the pack of ice and pressing it to the back of Jeb’s head, just where the bump had started to form. “You scored the winning goal.”
“Awesome,” Jeb exhaled his favorite new word of the moment. A look of pain made its way across his face and he gave a small whine of discomfort as he writhed and tried to get comfortable. “My head feels like birds are eating it,” he complained, very seriously. “And it went all black.”
“He probably has a concussion,” the coach mumbled to Cain.
Cain already knew that and he scowled as he picked up Jeb in his arms in a bridal-carry, holding on as tight as he could. He didn’t carry Jeb around those days, not since he’d grown too big for it, but this was filed under the Exception Category and Cain didn’t mind in the least.
“I’ll take him by the hospital,” he promised the team. “Congratulations, guys,” he offered, trying to be as cheerful as he could, but with Jeb looking drowsy and pained in his arms, it wasn’t the time for those kinds of things. Jeb mumbled a couple of quiet questions about the team and the game and whether he was going to have to miss the party, but Cain just promised him it would all be okay.
They spent a good deal of time in the emergency room and Jeb flipped through random geographic magazines while Cain found the nearest payphone and called the house. He was angled so his gaze wouldn’t have to pry from Jeb once and he was relieved when Azkadellia and not Ambrose picked up. “Az, hey, it’s me,” he greeted. “Listen. We had a bit of an accident, so we’re going to be a little late tonight. Tell Ambrose to put dinner in the fridge.” And to not panic, but it wasn’t like he could say that.
She asked a couple of simple questions and he filled her in on the likely condition of a concussion and asked her to get Jeb some extra pillows, seeing as if it was what Cain thought, he’d be spending the night with his son to make sure he stayed awake.
“Mr. Cain?” the ER Doctor signaled and Cain said a quick goodbye before lifting Jeb into his arms again (amidst the protests of ‘Daaaad!’) and brought him into the back.
They sat in that little room where the walls were painted an odd combination of lime green and eggshell white while there were scans taken, bumps looked at, and vitals measured. All the while, Cain lurked in the corner of the room with his arms crossed over his torso and hanging on every word.
“It looks like your son has a mild concussion,” Dr. Carter spoke quietly. “Nothing serious, but you should still keep him awake for spans of time, ask him questions to make sure he hasn’t lost touch with reality. You know, who’s the President and all.”
Cain just nodded, even though his brain was automatically substituting President for Queen, seeing as even he couldn’t name the current President of the Othersider country they were in.
“Anything else?”
“I’ll prescribe some painkillers for the eventual headache, but he can’t take any aspirin just yet. It might thin the blood too much,” the doctor warned, scribbling a hasty prescription and handing it to Cain as he turned back to Jeb. “As for you, you might just feel like you have a bit of an empty head for awhile.”
Jeb just glowered back up at the doctor, shifting on the bed and making the paper crinkle as he lifted his chin snidely. “M’not a zipperhead,” he muttered in a petulant way and Cain couldn’t help the broad and too-loud laugh that he gave to try and smooth that comment over.
“Kids,” Cain said, by way of explanation, holding a hand out for Jeb to take. He squeezed his son’s hand a little harder than need be, which had to serve as his ‘you can’t say things like that in public’ warning as they made the journey from the hospital to the home, where Azkadellia was pacing anxiously in the foyer.
“You’re back!” she announced, immediately capturing Jeb in a tight hug. “Ambrose is making soup and I made the bed up for you both.”
“Good,” Cain grunted and let her lead them up the stairs and into Jeb’s bedroom, which looked a lot neater than it had that morning and Cain suspected Azkadellia was responsible for that, too. He tucked Jeb into bed after letting him change into a pair of comfortable pajamas and Cain grasped a book as he sat himself down on the other half of the bed.
Azkadellia didn’t leave. She just settled in on the other side of Jeb, shifting until her head was resting against his shoulder.
Cain watched the both of them for a long moment, but he decided that it wasn’t the worst arrangement in the world and so he settled. He shifted until he was half-lying-down, half-sitting-up and one hand draped over the headboard to idly run a thumb over Azkadellia’s braids as he opened the book and began to read The Princess Bride aloud to the kids.
“Remember Jeb,” he said, in the middle of discussing the farm boy, “only sleep for two hours.”
“Okay,” Jeb agreed in the midst of a yawn. “But what happened to the Princess?”
Well, Cain thought. At least he had his priorities in order.
--
It was an earlier morning than most, and Azkadellia was always the first one up in the house. Jeb teased her about it, but she took pride in her appearance, no matter how long it took to put her hair up or apply all that makeup that Jane had taught her about. Sometimes it took a while to balance the amount of practice she wanted to get in with the array of cosmetics and how much she could manage without sending Ambrose into one of his do-not-cross-me moods and she was sent up to wash it all off and restart the entire process.
With her long hair finally styled as she liked it, she figured now was as good a time as any to get a drink before she put on the lipstick. Clad in her pyjamas and robe, she wandered downstairs and into the kitchen, indulging herself and sliding a bit across the wood floor with a smile. Her hair could take it. That was part of the reason she took so long to perfect it, after all.
Before she could cross to the refrigerator, her sliding feet stumbled and she bit back a curse as she felt something sharp against her toe. When she looked down, Azkadellia saw the crumpled piece of paper and sighed. A papercut. It was almost relieving how simple the pain was. Living in a state of half-wary happiness sometimes made her jumpy, but papercuts she could deal with. Curiosity getting the better of her, the princess grabbed the paper and smoothed it out as she grabbed a glass and opened up the fridge, pouring out some orange juice and closing it back up as she read the paper.
ACROSS THE PRAIRIE, IN THE SKY I SEE
THE HANDSOME FACE OF THE MAN FOR ME
WITH EYES AS ENDLESS AS THE MORNING SKY
TO HIS ARMS I DREAM THAT I MIGHT FALL BY
TO HIS ARMS THAT HOLD ME SO TENDER WITH CARE
LIKE A WHITE DOWNY PILLOW, LIKE A CLOUD IN THE AIR
Azkadellia made an amused noise, trying to not find Jane’s little poem adorable. It was much worse than she thought someone who specialized in ‘cowboy poetry’ could write, though. Much, much worse.
Then again, the Otherside had that old saying ‘Those who can’t, teach.’ She’d always found it bizarre, since Ambrose certainly could, but maybe in Jane Walker’s case, she couldn’t write poetry if her life (or love life) depended on it. Azkadellia took another drink, and read on, smoothing the paper out a bit more. It was written in pencil, and it looked like there had been a bit more trouble with the pencil further into the poem, the lead going lighter.
AND WHEN THE SKY AND DAYS TURN DARK
MY ATTENTION HIS WAY WILL HARK
AND THEN HIS SMILE WILL BE MY DAZZLING SUN
THERE'LL BE NO FEAR THAT THE MORNIN' WON'T COME
BY MORNING, I'LL USE A LITTLE HEART
STEADY BEATING AS LIPS BEGIN TO PART
Azkadellia gaped. For a moment, she couldn’t even believe the next bit, but finally ended up laughing hysterically, fist pounding on the table as she finished it.
“Oh gods, Jane,” Azkadellia managed to get out. “This is so horrible.”
Voice loud and proud and terribly amused, she began to read it, secure in the knowledge it practically took Cain jumping on Jeb’s bed to wake the boy up on Mondays and wouldn’t be able to hear it.
“His kisses are like a sweet bash to the head,
And his hips so lovely it’s heaven, I’m dead
But inch by inch when the zipper goes down
Whatever’s left won’t be any kind of frown!”
She had to pause to laugh some more before continuing on, not hearing Ambrose’s muttering as he wandered out of his room, looking for his own drink before facing the morning.
“His moans are the wind and the stars are his sighs!
A wild bucking horse is the ride on his thighs!
And come that piercing cry in the air,
There’s a climax on the horizon that comes without a care!”
“Azkadellia?!” Ambrose managed to squeak out, standing at the foot of the stairs and going completely unnoticed as the young woman snickered her way through the end of the poem.
“The bed is a mess but I just really don’t care,
Because the man for me is the one right there!”
“AZ!” Ambrose snapped out, blushing furiously and snatching the paper out of her hands, leaving Azkadellia blinking. “What…where did you find this and why were you reading it out loud?!”
Azkadellia tried to look proper and well mannered, she really did, but she ended up laughing anyway, standing up and patting Ambrose on the shoulder. “It was on the floor when I came downstairs for some orange juice,” she said lightly. “Jane is…creative.” The blush only deepened. Azkadellia knew she’d backed him into a corner of explosive embarrassment. She almost felt bad for Ambrose, but the poem was hilariously awful, and the content was just…gods. She shook her head, still laughing a bit. “I’m going back upstairs.”
“Okay,” Ambrose said a bit hoarsely, and Azkadellia did as she’d said, pretending she didn’t notice the man reading it to himself with a big, almost stupid-looking grin on his bright red face.
---
“Want to go see Titanic?”
“I think I’d prefer the history lesson more.”
“But I thought just about every teenage girl wanted to see Titanic,” Jane said, frowning at Azkadellia as she finished off her Hershey bar. Their junk food run had landed them on top of a cable box with soda, pop rocks (which had been pretty fun), and chocolate. Lots of it.
She smiled back. “No, every teenage girl wants to see Leonardo DiCaprio in a wet and practically see-through shirt.” Azkadellia took another decorous sip of soda. “There are already posters for that.”
“Don’t get to see him move around with it clinging to him, though,” Jane said a bit coyly, popping some Skittles into her mouth.
Azkadellia smiled at Jane, eyebrows raised. “I’ll concede that you present a good point.” She paused. “Plus I heard about the drawing scene. That might be interesting.”
“Voyeurism?” Jane laughed. “Azkadellia, I’m sure plenty of boys want to draw you naked.” She got a frown for that comment. Jane knew that frown as the I’m From Iceland expression, since Ambrose got it every now and then too, so she tried to explain. “You know, getting…looked at? Ever heard that expression ‘undressing with your eyes?’ That sort of thing. Voyeurism.”
And yet, the I’m From Iceland look remained. In fact, it intensified into the I’m From Iceland And There Is Something Wrong With You People look. “…Jane, don’t you appreciate the female body?”
Jane blinked at her. “What? What do you mean, Azkadellia?”
Azkadellia leaned forward. “Aesthetically, I mean. You don’t think both genders are beautiful in their own way?”
The statement practically floored the English professor. “…do you mean you…Az, do you like girls?”
“Azkadellia,” she corrected, and tilted her head, just looking confused at this point. “Boys and girls are both attractive. I honestly don’t see much of a difference aside from the obvious physical ones. So I guess that means my answer would be yes. Why? You sound surprised.”
Jane nearly choked on an unfortunate Skittle at the last sentence. “Um, it’s just…well. I know this is a college town and all so I’m aware that bisexuality exists and diversity’s a good thing and all, but aren’t you a little…young? To know, I mean.”
Azkadellia smiled, and relief washed over Jane. That was the understanding smile, the one that meant Azkadellia had gotten through the Iceland-America border and knew what was going on.
Azkadellia nodded, and finished off her soda. “You’re completely right. I’m still very young when it comes to that sort of thing. That’s why I’m keeping my options open. Didn’t you when you were my age?”
Jane took a deep breath, trying to accept the cultural differences and just move along. “No, here in America you’re usually one way or the other. At your age I was a shy little thing.” She smiled. “Had the biggest crush on Jimmy Amos, though. I’m a sap for big brown eyes and smiles.”
That had Azkadellia smiling too. “Well, certainty’s always a good thing to have, at any age. What happened to Jimmy Amos?”
Jane paused for a moment, and found herself with a hand over her forehead. “Oh God, I hadn’t thought of him in years. He got in a car wreck when he was sixteen. I never said a word to him.”
“I’m sorry,” Azkadellia frowned, and put a hand on the older woman’s shoulder. “Would watching a wet-shirted Leonardo DiCaprio run around on a sinking ship cheer you up?”
Jane grinned. “Would it ever.” She pulled open the plastic bag and started stuffing the candy in it. Jane paused. “You know, whenever you…you know. Decide, if you want to put it that way, you can talk to me before you try to explain to your uncle.”
And there was the I’m From Iceland look again. “What do you mean?”
She went blank for a moment as her brain suddenly blurted out ‘Oh, right. Ambrose is from Iceland too.’ She rolled her eyes when Azkadellia wasn’t looking, and cleared her throat. “I mean absolutely nothing, I was just being an idiot for a moment there. But you can still always talk to me about anything.” Jane hesitated. “Even if your uncle and I were to break up. We could still be friends, right?”
Azkadellia’s sunny smile was all the answer Jane needed for that question.
--
The call had come in at an ungodly hour of the night and he’d needed to sneak out from his small house without rousing anyone’s attention. He had insisted on a separate landline to keep the kids asleep in the event of emergencies like this, when Smoky called and in a tone that was completely opposite how he normally sounded, he murmured, ‘Sheriff, we need you to go to 121 Oak Street. Fast.’ The sobriety in Smoky’s tone got Cain moving faster than he could remember going in recent history.
In fact, he hadn’t gotten this revved up since the bomb. He’d yanked on a pair of boots and a shirt and made sure to wrap his holster around himself. The keys to the truck were snatched in a broad palm and Cain wasted no time in navigating the streets of Baker. There wasn’t much traffic during the peak times of the day and it was near-enough a ghost town at 2:35, as the fluorescent clock was telling him it was.
He slammed the brakes and pushed forward with long strides, pounding on the door with one fist. “Catherine? Billy, open up,” Cain demanded, waiting only long enough to hear Catherine Smith let out a pained cry.
That was all Cain needed to step back and kick down the door with a sturdy foot, leading with his gun as he charged into the house. The details he’d gleaned from the radio on his way was that Catherine had called in a panic, words convoluted by her sobs, but she was intent and sure on the fact that her husband had been hitting her and was going to hurt her, possibly kill her.
That had been when Smoky called Cain desperately.
“Catherine?” Cain called out, calm as he could go. He shoved his shoulder up against the doorway and leaned around the molding to lead his way into the family room and then the stairs up to the bedroom where the sounds were loudest. He couldn’t hear much with any clarity, but there was one word that Cain didn’t even have to try and hear. It was one little word and it was driving Cain into a place that he didn’t want to be in.
Please. Pleasepleasepleasepleasedon’t.
It was a miracle, really, that when Cain rounded the corner and found himself standing with his gun aimed at Billy Smith, who had been staggering about and hitting Catherine with his bare fists, that he didn’t shoot. There was a belt lying on the bed and splattered blood all around the room. For all of Baker’s peaceful times, there was never a complete departure of the base nature of people and Cain found himself staring right down at it. He briefly wished he could headcase Billy, make him suffer in the ultimate way for what he was doing, but he settled for removing the safety from his gun and training the scope on Billy’s forehead, cocking the hammer back.
“Sheriff,” Billy drunkenly greeted him, rising to his feet.
Billy Smith had a gun as well. Cain knew because they went hunting occasionally. If Cain had known that Billy came home with a couple of beers in his stomach and hit his wife, Cain might have accidentally missed a deer or two out there with the guns. Cain didn’t even move and by the look on his face, he was murderously angry. Right now, though, Billy was unarmed. He had blood all over his hands and Catherine’s quiet cries were keeping the room from descending into a chilling silence. Normally, with Azkadellia and Jeb and Ambrose around, Cain’s eyes had warmth to them and glittered like a jewel that was tempered by lightness. Now, though, they looked like pure and deadly ice.
“Don’t make me shoot, Billy, because I’m really about one step away,” Cain warned as he dug out the cuffs from his back pocket. “We’re going into the station,” he informed the man, stepping closer and closer and shoving the barrel of his gun to Billy’s temple as a warning to not do anything rash as Cain cuffed him and read him the appropriate Miranda Rights.
Outside, he could hear the siren being shut off, announcing Smoky’s arrival as backup.
Cain’s eyes fell to Catherine and the way she was knelt down on the floor with blood around her, crying and shaking, all he could think about was Adora. He swallowed thickly and shoved Billy towards the door when Smoky pounded up the stairs and stared at the scene before beginning to stammer his way through a curious question as to what was going on.
“You’re escorting Mr. Smith here to the station,” Cain announced, already pilfering through the closet. He’d tucked the gun away and was yanking down boxes and clothes until he found a woolen blanket, hurrying to Catherine’s side and wrapping it around her shoulders. Briefly, he looked up to see if Smoky was still there and he found that he was, gaping at the scene. “Go,” Cain snapped coolly. “Don’t post bail. I’ll do that later today.” When he was feeling a little less like disposing of Billy in one of the darker ways they had in the O.Z. when someone was really and truly problematic.
Smoky took Billy out of the chaos that was the house and Cain just sank down to the floor to sit with Catherine, rubbing her shoulders and soothing her as best as he could, rocking back and forth and not asking her to talk to him. Eventually, she stopped crying and stared up at him through waterlogged eyes. “He’s never been this bad,” she insisted. “Please don’t think ill of us, Sheriff, it’s never been like this before.”
“I don’t want you seeing him again. You got your Mom upstate, why don’t you spend some time there,” Cain ‘suggested’, which was a very polite way of calling the orders he was giving her. “We’ll keep him locked away long as we can, then push him into some therapy, but I want you to stay away for a while.”
Catherine was still shaking though no tears were tracking down her face any longer. Cain still felt like shooting something or someone and he was instantly glad that he wasn’t able to cross back to the O.Z., because there was a Longcoat and a possessed Princess that he really, really wanted to take this out on.
“Sheriff…”
“Got it?” Cain insisted.
“Yes, sir,” she replied and swallowed with some difficulty.
He waited with her and made her a cup of coffee while waiting for her friends to show up and take over. By that point in time, she had cleaned the house slightly and taken a shower, as if to wash away the memory of the night, and it was 4:13 in the morning. Cain exchanged terse greetings with the women who arrived and dug out his keys before making his departure with a nod. Instead of going home, he made his way back to the station and ignored the jail cells with an amazing persistence. When he got there, he found Annie cleaning up.
She was just ending her shift (just like Smoky) and Lambton and one of Cain’s new hires was coming in later. The moment he walked into the station, she refused to take his eyes off him, all the while he went straight for his office desk and unlocked the lowermost drawer, digging out a bottle of whiskey and holding it up. It had been purchased an annual back and hadn’t been opened since.
“You’re done your shift, right?” Cain verified.
“I was twenty minutes ago,” Annie agreed, staring at him curiously. “Why?”
“Have a drink with me,” he pleaded tiredly. He didn’t have it in him to go home just yet, not until he could unwind somehow and he didn’t think shooting something in the middle of Baker was the preferred way of getting through his ire. “Just a couple before I go home.”
“On one condition,” Annie agreed as she twisted her hands up in her hair, pinning it up in an intricate bun as she pursed her pink lips together. They were extra-pink today and Cain wondered if she’d switched to a new lipstick and he hadn’t noticed. And instantly, he hated even the notion that he had been so preoccupied that he hadn’t.
“What?”
“You take the day off after,” Annie pleaded quietly. “You’re not going to be in any state to work. So yes, Sheriff, I’ll drink with you if you take the day off.”
“Deal,” Cain promised and grabbed a hold of a couple of Styrofoam coffee cups, leading her into the kitchen of the small station, pouring a light ounce of a shot for Annie and a generous helping for himself – a lot more than an ounce; in fact, about four times that. She followed tentatively, setting down her clutch-purse and taking hold of the cup, lifting it up in the air before downing it and sitting down at the table, opposite him. He slowly unwound his gun from the holster and slid it over to her. “Keep hold of that. I need to not shoot anything because I really want to be shooting Billy Smith between the eyes right now.”
He downed the Styrofoam cup in no time at all, wincing at the burn, but needing it. The cup was refilled as he watched Annie lock it away in her safe and he finally began to unwind while sitting in that chair, drinking whiskey until his tongue burned like it’d been lit on fire and his mind started to blur in a pleasant way that let him forget about all the things in his life that could do with forgetting.
Annie watched him attentively, but he wasn’t about to become a stupid lout. He knew he had to be back around sunrise to the house, but he had time to burn and liquor to burn it with.
“Was it that bad?” Annie asked, when she was three ounces into her cups and Cain had had five times as much. The world had begun to skip and hop past little jumps of time and every time Cain blinked, he could have sworn the clock moved five seconds. His limbs felt almost relaxed and separate from himself and his lips felt heavy, but he no longer wanted to murder anyone for a crime. “What you saw,” Annie reminded him, reaching out to rest a warm palm atop his and get his attention.
“I was his friend,” Cain managed to say, staring down at the near-empty bottle of whiskey. That didn’t stop him from pouring another half-glass into his Styrofoam cup, the rim of it bitten by worrying teeth. “We went hunting and we drank beers and never once did I ever think he was doing that to her. I should have know, I should have…” He swallowed hard. “If I can’t see that, how’m I supposed to protect her…”
“Protect who, Sheriff?” Annie interrupted.
“She’s one of two things I’m responsible for and I’m gonna lose them too,” Cain sighed, rubbing his left hand over his face, his wedding ring nearly jolting him into a flashed moment of sobriety. He’d failed once before and lost Adora because of it. Jeb had lost his mother and now he was on a path where things were becoming far too stagnant and settled and Wyatt Cain couldn’t even pick out a domestic violence case in a crowd. He was probably one glass too many over his limit, but he finished off the bottle and let out a weary sigh.
Annie hadn’t taken her eyes off of him, leaning over the table and cupping his cheek with a palm. “Sheriff? Wyatt?”
“Annie,” he murmured, staring at her. “I just don’t want things to go South. With her or him. The last thing we need is for it to be ruined before the end. And I could do that. I could ruin it. I could…”
He sighed and shifted until his head was against the cool table and he could just breathe for a moment to try and sober up.
“They’re all I’ve got,” he realized upon sitting up, a sharp epiphany striking him, but he still felt sick to his stomach and it had nothing to do with the alcohol and everything to do with the scene he had stopped earlier that night. “He should know that.”
“Who should?” Annie asked.
“Should be getting home,” Cain admitted, stumbling slightly as he rose to his feet. Annie braced him and they did an intricate and clumsy dance while he gave her his car keys and she guided him to the men’s room. It was 5:42 and Cain promised he would be okay to walk the mile and a half home. She believed him and he wasn’t sure if that was the right thing to do.
It took him half an hour to get back to the house and he had to use the spare key he kept hidden because he’d given Annie the ring of keys that had all of them on there and when he stumbled into his room, he nearly faceplanted on the couch while trying to ignore the desperate pounding going on in his head.
More than a minute passed before Cain realized that the pounding was actually knocking on his door and someone was calling his name over and over again. Not Jeb, who would’ve just come in. Not Azkadellia, whose tone was never that deep. Which just left one person. Cain sat up wearily, just enough to grab hold of a blanket. “Ambrose,” he growled towards the door. “Go away right now. Unless you’re fixing to stay back from work today, walk away,” he warned, going right back down to lying down.
There was a long pause, but a quiet murmur came before he left. “I’ll bring you some breakfast anyway.”
“Keep the kids away,” Cain asked quietly, knowing he was speaking loud enough for Ambrose to hear, but he either never got confirmation of that request or he hadn’t bothered to hear it.
With the day off from work and too many dismal and dark images of the past and dark premonitions of a bleak future in his mind, Cain closed his eyes and let the alcohol lull him off to an unpleasant, uncomfortable sleep.
I can’t fail them.
But that’s all you’re doing.
--
“Ambrose?”
He jerked awake, breathing hard as he wrestled out of the vicious spider web of half imagined, half remembered nightmares. Azkadellia was next to his bed, and with a growing sense of dread he noticed she was in a frayed light blue dress that was pure O.Z. with the top’s buttons torn out of it. She’d managed to sneak into his closet and steal his black coat, too, the edges of it trailing on the floor. For the first time Ambrose could remember, she looked like nothing more than a scared, lost little girl, and he found himself hugging her tightly, practically pulling her into his lap when she clung onto him.
“She’s eight today,” Azkadellia whispered, nearly sobbing, and Ambrose sighed into her hair, feeling horrible for having someone else feel just as bad as he did tonight. “DG’s eight annuals old. Eight, and trapped and possessed and doing evil things-”
“Things we’re going to fix, Az,” Ambrose said firmly. “We’ll get DG back, we just have to wait until the time’s right, wait until we really can get the Witch out of her…”
“But fifteen annuals? Ambrose, we’re practically sentencing her to death by slow torture-” Azkadellia’s voice was getting a bit frantic, and Ambrose cut her off with a careful kiss to the forehead.
They were both quiet for a while after that, and finally Ambrose sighed, releasing his hold on Azkadellia, who very reluctantly did the same, but he immediately grabbed her hand. It was snatched up in both of hers before he could take another breath. “I have an idea.”
And that was how they found themselves out in the gazebo-like portion of their porch, facing the swing that seemed dark no matter how bright a white the paint was, Azkadellia dressed in tatters and black and Ambrose wearing nothing but loose cotton pants and the coat that he kept carefully in the back of his closet, the golden crowns glistening under his chin as he lit the seventh and then eighth candle that topped a tiny cake that had been baked in almost absolute silence.
They sang happy birthday in the middle of November to the memory of a little girl, not what they knew had happened to her, not what they suspected she was doing right then. It was DG’s birthday, not the Witch’s, that they were singing for, and it came through firmly with how strong the name came out in every verse.
Ambrose slept in Azkadellia’s bed that night, keeping the coat on, just like Azkadellia kept the dress on. They let the wind blow out the flames, and let the night’s scavengers eat the cake and candles, and if either of the Cains noticed anything different, they were smart enough not to bring it up and understood enough to not wonder why Ambrose didn’t wear a coat to work in the morning, or why that was the first day that Azkadellia ever wore a shirt and skirt to pants instead of a full-out dress.
Sometimes changes were homage to an ideal or belief. Theirs were acts of defiance, slashes in their world that proved things would and could change, even if it was for a day, and even if it was only clothing. No matter how brief, it was proof that they could change the world, even if it was a very small piece of it.
--
When the sun rose on a brisk and sunny November morning, Jeb had already been up for some time. Since his injury, he hadn't been sleeping so well and the excitement of the second grade still made him wake up a half-hour earlier than usual so he could get ready and pack his bag. He'd been back in school for a little while now and fall was about to make its departure. One of his friends, a boy by the name of Rick, had invited him over that evening to play, but the problem was that he had no idea if Cain would let him go.
Azkadellia still didn't get to socialize and Jeb was sure that he was going to have to tread really lightly. He'd brought some breakfast in a plastic bag out to the pink house, knocking on the door. "Dad?" he called out. "Dad, you here?" Normally, Jeb just waited for his father to come to breakfast, but he really, really wanted to get to ask first thing, maybe when he was off-guard.
But there was no answer.
"Dad?" Jeb asked worriedly, opening the door and peering inside to find a completely empty house. Worry hit Jeb fast and he hurried back to the house, dumping the breakfast on the table and scaling the stairs in a hurry, knocking on Azkadellia's open door. She was braiding her hair and humming while the morning light spilled into the room. "Have you seen Dad?"
"No, not yet," she replied, giving him a worried look. "Why?"
"He's not in the house," Jeb said worriedly and it didn't take more than that for Azkadellia to take his hand as they hurried down the hall in a brisk walk to Ambrose's door. Jeb pounded on it again and again and again. "Ambrose? Ambrose, we can't find Dad."
Ambrose wasn't particularly fond of being woken up by someone shouting and pounding on the door. That's what his alarm clock was for, and he'd recently begun to not like the alarm clock either. He sighed, and opened his eyes, sleep-addled brain finally reminding him that Jeb was looking for Cain, who he was practically sleeping on top of.
With a quick tirade of profanity under his breath he put a hand on Cain's mouth with a warning in his eyes, just in case he suddenly decided to be fatherly and just shout out a 'why yes son, here I am in bed with Ambrose, no need to worry'. He seriously doubted Cain would, but better safe than sorry was always a very good policy when it came to this sort of thing.
Cain woke with a start when he realized someone had a hand over his mouth and he'd been two seconds away from taking action to get that hand off of him. Then his brain cleared and he remembered that he'd gone to bed in Ambrose's room the night before because someone had insisted they could be quiet.
And now...
"I'm here, just give me a second," Ambrose shouted back, and gave Cain a rather frantic look as he practically ran into the closet and pulled out a robe. He wondered if he had time for pants or anything else as his hand clenched in his hair, just about ready to rip out a rather sizeable chunk as his mind began to panic and wonder if Cain could jump out the window or something.
Cain shot a glare right back at Ambrose and mouthed a 'what do we do?' his direction as he yanked up his boxers and picked his button-down from off the place it had been strewn -- the nightstand, last night -- sliding back into it as he sat up, feeling a good knot of panic settling right in his stomach.
"Did he go to work early?" Azkadellia asked, contributing her voice to the query, worry fraught in her tone. "He usually says."
"He leaves a note," Jeb concurred in a hush.
Ambrose really did consider suggesting the window exit. He really, truly did, but finally ended up flapping his arms towards the walk-in closet he'd gotten the robe from. "Hide behind my coats or something!" he hissed out, running his hand through his hair again and again and again until the mess looked almost like he'd slicked it back.
"Ambrose, are you alright?" Azkadellia called through the door, obviously starting to get just as worried about him as Cain.
"I'm fine, I'm just making myself look decent is all," Ambrose called back, and tried to ignore how very true that was. He just kept pointing violently into the closet while he spoke.
"But I didn't hear the shower running, and you don't usually wake up until-" Azkadellia began, only for Ambrose's alarm clock to start up mid-sentence. Ambrose almost literally jumped it surprised him so much, and he found himself cursing some more as he ran over to shut it off.
Cain tugged on his hat and boots as Ambrose ran around panicking and he slowly and gracefully rose to his feet as if there wasn't cause to panic (and there was). He reached over and fixed Ambrose's hair for him, settling it into a vaguely normal pattern as he wandered into the closet, of all places, to hide. He was rolling his eyes and buttoning up his shirt as he went, yanking a couple of coats to hide him.
"Ambrose, where's my Dad?" Jeb demanded petulantly, now past the point of waiting and wanting an answer. "If he's in trouble, I wanna get looking now!"
As soon as he saw Cain was at least decently hidden, he walked over and opened the door just enough for the kids to see him. And only him. He frowned. "You're looking for Cain?"
"That's what we've been banging on the door for!" Jeb practically shouted, which wasn't very normal Jeb-like behavior. "Do you know where he is? He probably told you if nobody else knows, right?"
While Jeb was fuming, Ambrose noticed the look he was getting from Azkadellia, and his eyes went wide. He knew that look. He was genuinely scared of that look showing up right now. Because that look meant that even if she didn't know exactly what was going on, she had a very good idea.
"Ambrose, may we look for him in your room?" she asked a bit coolly, and he swallowed, finally remembering that while he could lie without pause to an adult, he could never do it to children.
"I'm wearing nothing but a robe," he objected, and flinched at the look the princess gave him. "...I'll be getting dressed in the closet then, alright? No entry while I'm in there. And don't forage or anything." He opened the door and immediately walked towards the closet, shouting out a quick, "But Cain's not here and why would he be anyway. He probably just went for a walk or something and will be back any time now."
'What are you doing?' got mouthed angrily in Ambrose's direction, half intending to just step out there and find his pants, which he hadn't been able to find. He was praying they were under the bed and Azkadellia wouldn't have incredible pants-sense.
All the time he was glaring at Ambrose, he was also throwing pieces of clothing at him -- shirt, shirt, another coat, pants, socks.
Ambrose felt like he kind of deserved the clothes-pummeling, but he mouthed back a very strong 'I can't lie to kids!' and gestured out of the closet to the afore-mentioned children.
"Ambrose," Azkadellia very patiently called out from the other side of the door. "Can we open the closet door? Are you decent yet? I found Mr. Cain's pants and he might want them back soon, if he is on a walk."
He got on the pants and socks and was working on the shirt when Azkadellia spoke. Ambrose sagged against the wall, putting a hand over his face. "...No?"
The door was opened with a creak anyway with Azkadellia peering inside and Jeb poking his head around her. He looked angrier than he had been ever before and that didn't slip by Cain's notice. Cain, who had been standing right in the middle of the closet, wearing only a pair of boxers, button-down, boots, and his hat.
And he'd been found by the kids in the closet. "Go have breakfast," he informed them, in the stern I'm-Being-A-Father tone. "We'll talk later." At first, neither Azkadellia nor Jeb moved, so Cain added a growl of, "Move." That sent them hurrying along.
Ambrose was back to nearly tearing his hair out, banging the back of his head against the closet wall. "I'm sorry I can't lie to them and it was a stupid idea to even sleep up here and..." He glanced over, honestly noticing what Cain was actually wearing at the moment. It looked like something very...questionable and non-standard had been going on, with the boots and hat and...
He gave in to temptation. It was utterly Otherside, but so very, very appropriate.
He put his hands over his eyes and ever so eloquently got out a sigh and then a very firm "Fuck."
Cain just sighed deeply, rubbing his hand over his face again and again and wandered over to Ambrose's side to help him into the second of the shirt layers as he just kept quiet, taking in exactly what had happened. When he was finished, he pried off the boots and collected his pants, sliding back into them as he sat down on the edge of the bed, gazing up at Ambrose from where he was.
"I guess we do owe them something of an explanation," he conceded after an incredibly long pause. "After all, it has been months now," he pointed out, giving Ambrose a 'time's up' look.
"And what do we tell them, Cain?!" Ambrose was getting frantic again. He'd lied to the kids, he had lied to Azkadellia, and he just about felt like a bug flailing on the ground that needed a good mercy-stomp. "I don't even know what to call this...this thing we've got going on! No, I mean had." His hand went to his forehead this time around. "You do the thinking, because I don't have a clue what to do."
Cain narrowed his gaze and the first thing he wanted to clarify was that 'had' comment. "You want to end this?" he asked, evenly. "Because as far as I'm concerned, we sit them down and tell them that occasionally, adults have arrangements that don't have anything to do with dating, but solely revolve around a mutual physical attraction. Az is at the age she'd understand." And Jeb, well...if Azkadellia understood, Jeb could look to her to follow suit. He just crossed his arms as he rose to his feet. "Well? Are you in or out? Are we done or can you handle this?"
Ambrose took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down and just feel instead of think. It was hard, and he didn't like a thing about being on this side of the spectrum, but it was what they needed right now. He took another deep breath.
"No, I don't want to end this mutual-physical-attraction thing, as you put it." Ambrose had heard the term 'fuckbuddies' and thought that summed them up better, but he doubted that'd do anything for the kids. "But if Azkadellia says no, I'll be done whether I want to be or not, if that makes any sense to you. I think she'd understand, but..." He sighed. "Cain, I'm here for her, not you. As strange as that sounds when we were just half-naked and hiding, it's true. I'm practically her servant."
He took another deep breath, and gave in, let himself slip back to thinking more than feeling. "I'd like this...thing to not end. But keeping Azkadellia safe and happy is more important. Understand?"
"Yeah, I get it," Cain agreed. "Seeing as the same doubles for Jeb." While Cain wasn't a servant to his son, the boy mattered more to Cain than anything else in the world did and the sheer hint of disapproval would make him shy away from it. He took a deep breath and gave Ambrose a hapless shrug. "Now or never, huh?"
And with a deep breath, he went downstairs to have The Talk.
tbc
Banner by
magicscalpel and we looove her~AUTHORS:
andrealyn and luchia13TITLE: Azkadellia's Okay! (With Ambrose and the Cains' help), Part 7: Woman Hurt; Ship Sinks.
RATING: PG-13.
PAIRING: Ambrose/Cain (or Cain/Ambrose, whatever), VERY FUTURE Az/OC, Jeb/OC/OC
DESCRIPTION: When the Witch picks another target, everything changes. Including switching out the Roboparents for Ambrose and the only Tin Man who knows what's going on (and his kid).
This Part: Azkadellia continues to be Icelandic, Cain has a horrible day, Ambrose has some very bad poetry, Jeb's brain hurts, and sometimes it just doesn't pay to wake up.
Part 1: Things Explode; Iceland Blamed.
Part 2: Pink House Purchased; Introductions Ensue.
Part 3: Fight In Classroom; Landslide Victory.
Part 4: Cain Doesn't Move; Children Scream.
Part 5: Countries Massacred; Restaurant Warned.
Part 6: Dog In Prison; Keys Lost.
(With Ambrose and the Cains' help)
Part 7: Woman Hurt; Ship Sinks.
It was a lazy summer afternoon and both Cain and Ambrose were at work, leaving Azkadellia to watch out for Jeb and Toto to look out for the both of them. However, the level of watchfulness he contributed was arguable as he was chasing a ball back and forth between the laps of the children as they lay sprawled on the grass. While the heat had rendered Azkadellia and Jeb somewhat lazy, Toto seemed content to rip the ball to shreds as he ran back and forth between the two, receiving strokes of adoration from each of them.
“Dad says you’re going to high school,” Jeb spoke, seemingly upside-down the way he was laying and looking up at Azkadellia. “What’s a high school? On a mountain?”
“Ambrose says it derives its nomenclature because of the upward mobility of education. So because it’s past middle, it’s high school,” she assessed, petting Toto as she sat perfectly upon the grass, her dress arranged in a way that suggested she practiced her sitting just to achieve the technique of artful resting. “He says I have to readjust to new social groups and it’ll be bigger than before. And you’ll get there too, in seven annuals.”
Jeb wrinkled his nose, tracing the paths of clouds in the sky. “I’ll be old in seven annuals,” he said with distaste.
Azkadellia made a show of looking affronted, her graceful features (shifting as she made her way to adulthood) pouting. “Are you implying I’m old?”
“No, you’re Az,” Jeb said in return. “Duh.” As if that explained everything. He rolled onto his stomach and gained a handful of grass and dirt stains in the process before digging his bare elbows into the ground and resting his chin in his hands, staring up at her as Toto burrowed into a comfortable position in Azkadellia’s arms. “You’re…different. Like a sister, kinda.”
Azkadellia softened and crawled over on the lawn to rest beside Jeb where they could both watch the clouds on their backs and Toto could walk over their stomachs – which made Azkadellia, ticklish as she was, softly giggle with delight. “I miss my sister,” Azkadellia confessed, a secret between them.
“Who?”
“My DG,” Azkadellia whispered. “She’s got the Witch in her. That’s what’s making her do all those things. It’s not her and we’re here having lives and being happy and she’s so far away and I miss her.” The confession seemed almost a surprise to Azkadellia, who finished that sentence with the soft rise of emotion in her voice, akin to a hiccup. She closed her eyes tightly and was surprised to feel warm hands encircling her and tugging her close.
As much as Jeb could be like his father in frustrating ways, she was always glad that they shared similarities when it came to protecting her. The hug was exactly what she needed at the moment and she held on as tightly as she could, not even minding when Jeb seemed to burrow his cheek against her collarbone and it caused a slight awkwardness with Azkadellia’s growing bust. In some ways, Azkadellia understood how lucky she was to have the Cains in her life. She loved Ambrose dearly and never wanted him to go, but some days it was Mr. Cain’s protective instincts or Jeb’s sheer existence that made it bearable to be without her parents and DG.
Jeb didn’t let go initially. In fact, it took some time for them to part and Azkadellia’s eyes were shining with tears as she gave a bubble of an anxious laugh.
“I miss Mother,” Jeb confessed right back to her, now fidgeting with the grass that littered the ground around them. “I haven’t seen Dad as happy as he was before. He always fights now.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ambrose fight so much either,” Azkadellia admitted, smoothing out her skirt. “Sometimes I wonder if it’s because of us.”
“Nah,” Jeb waved that off. “S’always about stupid stuff. I overhear sometimes.”
There came another laugh from Azkadellia as she tugged Jeb back down to the grass and they returned to skygazing. Azkadellia missed DG and Jeb missed Adora, but they were both moving on because they had a new life before them. Ambrose had Jane Walker and Cain had…well, them. It would be okay and Azkadellia truly believed that because she had to.
“Jeb,” she said.
She got a grunt in return.
“I always wanted a little brother,” she continued, giving him an apprehensive smile, almost hopeful as she didn’t want to hear any rejection when she had gone and said as much aloud. She could control whole groups of children with ease, but she always felt completely raw and normal around the Cains and half the time she adored it and the other half of the time, she hated the way it made her feel. “And I’m glad I finally got one.”
Jeb looked over at her and slowly entwined his small fingers with hers, holding on tight (just like DG had used to). “I like having a big sister too,” he said, simple as that. “Does this mean now Ambrose and Dad have to get married?”
Now, Azkadellia’s laugh was bright and burst forth as though she couldn’t hold it in a second longer. “No, I don’t think it works like that. This is just between you and me,” she swore in a confidential whisper. “It’s our choice, so we just swear it and we lock it with our pinkies,” she added, holding out the pinky of her right hand.
Jeb got a mischievous grin on his face and he held out his hand to lock pinkies with her and they very seriously shook on the sibling pact they had just made. Slowly, the sun continued its descent in the sky and brought on the late hours of the afternoon, but neither Azkadellia nor Jeb bothered to move.
“Does this mean now that you’re going to high school that you’re going to be a grown-up?” Jeb asked, playing with the long strands of Azkadellia’s hair that he could reach and loosely braiding them. “And stop playing games with us?”
“I’ll never stop,” Azkadellia murmured softly with a kind smile in his direction. “I don’t think being a grown-up would be very fun without the games. Besides, just what would you do without me around to beat you at all the games,” she teased.
When Jeb retaliated with a well-placed tickle attack, Azkadellia didn’t even fight back. She just shrieked happily and writhed about on the grass, letting her pale pink dress become just as dirty as Jeb’s jeans and button-down had become. If (and really, it was more a question of when) Ambrose asked about it later, Azkadellia would insist that they were just being kids.
“Say uncle! Uncle!” Jeb protested.
Instead, she caught him up in her arms and hugged him tight as she could. They stayed like that until the sound of Cain’s truck pulled up in the drive and Azkadellia rested her chin on Jeb’s shoulder. “Best little brother ever,” she whispered before she released him and they both went running to greet Cain home from work, Toto in tow.
--
After a full season of soccer, the summer had to come to an end and fall came around. That meant that the soccer leagues were following suit with their playoffs leading up to championships and giving children sparkling promises of trophies, pizza parties, and praise. Jeb Cain had been on the Rockets – with their indigo shirts that shimmered in the sun -- and though he had been overheard to complain to his father about the material, he wore the shirt with pride. While he hadn’t been Captain of the team, all the kids treated him like he was, anyhow. Sheriff Wyatt Cain had been in attendance of each game, even if he showed up late and still carrying the remnants of a long day at the office (papers sticking out of his briefcase).
Now, in this last game before the finish of the season, Jeb was leading the team to victory, two minutes left on the clock and the ball was in his possession. It was almost like the climax of a film as Jeb raced down the field with increased speed and kicked the soccer ball with a grace and athleticism that he had learned since they came to the Otherside.
The shot went in with a whoosh and the victorious applause and shouts rang out immediately.
But in the other team’s hurry to defend their net, Jeb caught an elbow to the back of the head, causing a sharp reaction from each side. More than one pair of eyes was drawn to Sheriff Cain to see what he would do.
Jeb crumpled to the ground and curled up slightly, a feeble sound of a cry coming from him as a whistle was blown to announce the end of the game (and a rousing win for the Rockets) and Cain barely hesitated as he rushed to his son’s side, curling him up in his arms and making sure that he was sitting up. Immediately, his fingers were rifling through his hair (a bit darker these days) and searching for the bump.
“Father?” Jeb asked, voice sounded muffled and more than a little dazed.
Cain’s glare could warn everyone away and the coach was getting a pack of ice while Cain stroked a broad palm back over Jeb’s hair, trying to look like it was all just fine. Cain was a terrible liar, though. Too many annuals of telling it straight had rendered him incapable of lying well.
Where was Ambrose when you needed him?
“Hey, son,” Cain murmured, taking the pack of ice and pressing it to the back of Jeb’s head, just where the bump had started to form. “You scored the winning goal.”
“Awesome,” Jeb exhaled his favorite new word of the moment. A look of pain made its way across his face and he gave a small whine of discomfort as he writhed and tried to get comfortable. “My head feels like birds are eating it,” he complained, very seriously. “And it went all black.”
“He probably has a concussion,” the coach mumbled to Cain.
Cain already knew that and he scowled as he picked up Jeb in his arms in a bridal-carry, holding on as tight as he could. He didn’t carry Jeb around those days, not since he’d grown too big for it, but this was filed under the Exception Category and Cain didn’t mind in the least.
“I’ll take him by the hospital,” he promised the team. “Congratulations, guys,” he offered, trying to be as cheerful as he could, but with Jeb looking drowsy and pained in his arms, it wasn’t the time for those kinds of things. Jeb mumbled a couple of quiet questions about the team and the game and whether he was going to have to miss the party, but Cain just promised him it would all be okay.
They spent a good deal of time in the emergency room and Jeb flipped through random geographic magazines while Cain found the nearest payphone and called the house. He was angled so his gaze wouldn’t have to pry from Jeb once and he was relieved when Azkadellia and not Ambrose picked up. “Az, hey, it’s me,” he greeted. “Listen. We had a bit of an accident, so we’re going to be a little late tonight. Tell Ambrose to put dinner in the fridge.” And to not panic, but it wasn’t like he could say that.
She asked a couple of simple questions and he filled her in on the likely condition of a concussion and asked her to get Jeb some extra pillows, seeing as if it was what Cain thought, he’d be spending the night with his son to make sure he stayed awake.
“Mr. Cain?” the ER Doctor signaled and Cain said a quick goodbye before lifting Jeb into his arms again (amidst the protests of ‘Daaaad!’) and brought him into the back.
They sat in that little room where the walls were painted an odd combination of lime green and eggshell white while there were scans taken, bumps looked at, and vitals measured. All the while, Cain lurked in the corner of the room with his arms crossed over his torso and hanging on every word.
“It looks like your son has a mild concussion,” Dr. Carter spoke quietly. “Nothing serious, but you should still keep him awake for spans of time, ask him questions to make sure he hasn’t lost touch with reality. You know, who’s the President and all.”
Cain just nodded, even though his brain was automatically substituting President for Queen, seeing as even he couldn’t name the current President of the Othersider country they were in.
“Anything else?”
“I’ll prescribe some painkillers for the eventual headache, but he can’t take any aspirin just yet. It might thin the blood too much,” the doctor warned, scribbling a hasty prescription and handing it to Cain as he turned back to Jeb. “As for you, you might just feel like you have a bit of an empty head for awhile.”
Jeb just glowered back up at the doctor, shifting on the bed and making the paper crinkle as he lifted his chin snidely. “M’not a zipperhead,” he muttered in a petulant way and Cain couldn’t help the broad and too-loud laugh that he gave to try and smooth that comment over.
“Kids,” Cain said, by way of explanation, holding a hand out for Jeb to take. He squeezed his son’s hand a little harder than need be, which had to serve as his ‘you can’t say things like that in public’ warning as they made the journey from the hospital to the home, where Azkadellia was pacing anxiously in the foyer.
“You’re back!” she announced, immediately capturing Jeb in a tight hug. “Ambrose is making soup and I made the bed up for you both.”
“Good,” Cain grunted and let her lead them up the stairs and into Jeb’s bedroom, which looked a lot neater than it had that morning and Cain suspected Azkadellia was responsible for that, too. He tucked Jeb into bed after letting him change into a pair of comfortable pajamas and Cain grasped a book as he sat himself down on the other half of the bed.
Azkadellia didn’t leave. She just settled in on the other side of Jeb, shifting until her head was resting against his shoulder.
Cain watched the both of them for a long moment, but he decided that it wasn’t the worst arrangement in the world and so he settled. He shifted until he was half-lying-down, half-sitting-up and one hand draped over the headboard to idly run a thumb over Azkadellia’s braids as he opened the book and began to read The Princess Bride aloud to the kids.
“Remember Jeb,” he said, in the middle of discussing the farm boy, “only sleep for two hours.”
“Okay,” Jeb agreed in the midst of a yawn. “But what happened to the Princess?”
Well, Cain thought. At least he had his priorities in order.
--
It was an earlier morning than most, and Azkadellia was always the first one up in the house. Jeb teased her about it, but she took pride in her appearance, no matter how long it took to put her hair up or apply all that makeup that Jane had taught her about. Sometimes it took a while to balance the amount of practice she wanted to get in with the array of cosmetics and how much she could manage without sending Ambrose into one of his do-not-cross-me moods and she was sent up to wash it all off and restart the entire process.
With her long hair finally styled as she liked it, she figured now was as good a time as any to get a drink before she put on the lipstick. Clad in her pyjamas and robe, she wandered downstairs and into the kitchen, indulging herself and sliding a bit across the wood floor with a smile. Her hair could take it. That was part of the reason she took so long to perfect it, after all.
Before she could cross to the refrigerator, her sliding feet stumbled and she bit back a curse as she felt something sharp against her toe. When she looked down, Azkadellia saw the crumpled piece of paper and sighed. A papercut. It was almost relieving how simple the pain was. Living in a state of half-wary happiness sometimes made her jumpy, but papercuts she could deal with. Curiosity getting the better of her, the princess grabbed the paper and smoothed it out as she grabbed a glass and opened up the fridge, pouring out some orange juice and closing it back up as she read the paper.
ACROSS THE PRAIRIE, IN THE SKY I SEE
THE HANDSOME FACE OF THE MAN FOR ME
WITH EYES AS ENDLESS AS THE MORNING SKY
TO HIS ARMS I DREAM THAT I MIGHT FALL BY
TO HIS ARMS THAT HOLD ME SO TENDER WITH CARE
LIKE A WHITE DOWNY PILLOW, LIKE A CLOUD IN THE AIR
Azkadellia made an amused noise, trying to not find Jane’s little poem adorable. It was much worse than she thought someone who specialized in ‘cowboy poetry’ could write, though. Much, much worse.
Then again, the Otherside had that old saying ‘Those who can’t, teach.’ She’d always found it bizarre, since Ambrose certainly could, but maybe in Jane Walker’s case, she couldn’t write poetry if her life (or love life) depended on it. Azkadellia took another drink, and read on, smoothing the paper out a bit more. It was written in pencil, and it looked like there had been a bit more trouble with the pencil further into the poem, the lead going lighter.
AND WHEN THE SKY AND DAYS TURN DARK
MY ATTENTION HIS WAY WILL HARK
AND THEN HIS SMILE WILL BE MY DAZZLING SUN
THERE'LL BE NO FEAR THAT THE MORNIN' WON'T COME
BY MORNING, I'LL USE A LITTLE HEART
STEADY BEATING AS LIPS BEGIN TO PART
Azkadellia gaped. For a moment, she couldn’t even believe the next bit, but finally ended up laughing hysterically, fist pounding on the table as she finished it.
“Oh gods, Jane,” Azkadellia managed to get out. “This is so horrible.”
Voice loud and proud and terribly amused, she began to read it, secure in the knowledge it practically took Cain jumping on Jeb’s bed to wake the boy up on Mondays and wouldn’t be able to hear it.
“His kisses are like a sweet bash to the head,
And his hips so lovely it’s heaven, I’m dead
But inch by inch when the zipper goes down
Whatever’s left won’t be any kind of frown!”
She had to pause to laugh some more before continuing on, not hearing Ambrose’s muttering as he wandered out of his room, looking for his own drink before facing the morning.
“His moans are the wind and the stars are his sighs!
A wild bucking horse is the ride on his thighs!
And come that piercing cry in the air,
There’s a climax on the horizon that comes without a care!”
“Azkadellia?!” Ambrose managed to squeak out, standing at the foot of the stairs and going completely unnoticed as the young woman snickered her way through the end of the poem.
“The bed is a mess but I just really don’t care,
Because the man for me is the one right there!”
“AZ!” Ambrose snapped out, blushing furiously and snatching the paper out of her hands, leaving Azkadellia blinking. “What…where did you find this and why were you reading it out loud?!”
Azkadellia tried to look proper and well mannered, she really did, but she ended up laughing anyway, standing up and patting Ambrose on the shoulder. “It was on the floor when I came downstairs for some orange juice,” she said lightly. “Jane is…creative.” The blush only deepened. Azkadellia knew she’d backed him into a corner of explosive embarrassment. She almost felt bad for Ambrose, but the poem was hilariously awful, and the content was just…gods. She shook her head, still laughing a bit. “I’m going back upstairs.”
“Okay,” Ambrose said a bit hoarsely, and Azkadellia did as she’d said, pretending she didn’t notice the man reading it to himself with a big, almost stupid-looking grin on his bright red face.
---
“Want to go see Titanic?”
“I think I’d prefer the history lesson more.”
“But I thought just about every teenage girl wanted to see Titanic,” Jane said, frowning at Azkadellia as she finished off her Hershey bar. Their junk food run had landed them on top of a cable box with soda, pop rocks (which had been pretty fun), and chocolate. Lots of it.
She smiled back. “No, every teenage girl wants to see Leonardo DiCaprio in a wet and practically see-through shirt.” Azkadellia took another decorous sip of soda. “There are already posters for that.”
“Don’t get to see him move around with it clinging to him, though,” Jane said a bit coyly, popping some Skittles into her mouth.
Azkadellia smiled at Jane, eyebrows raised. “I’ll concede that you present a good point.” She paused. “Plus I heard about the drawing scene. That might be interesting.”
“Voyeurism?” Jane laughed. “Azkadellia, I’m sure plenty of boys want to draw you naked.” She got a frown for that comment. Jane knew that frown as the I’m From Iceland expression, since Ambrose got it every now and then too, so she tried to explain. “You know, getting…looked at? Ever heard that expression ‘undressing with your eyes?’ That sort of thing. Voyeurism.”
And yet, the I’m From Iceland look remained. In fact, it intensified into the I’m From Iceland And There Is Something Wrong With You People look. “…Jane, don’t you appreciate the female body?”
Jane blinked at her. “What? What do you mean, Azkadellia?”
Azkadellia leaned forward. “Aesthetically, I mean. You don’t think both genders are beautiful in their own way?”
The statement practically floored the English professor. “…do you mean you…Az, do you like girls?”
“Azkadellia,” she corrected, and tilted her head, just looking confused at this point. “Boys and girls are both attractive. I honestly don’t see much of a difference aside from the obvious physical ones. So I guess that means my answer would be yes. Why? You sound surprised.”
Jane nearly choked on an unfortunate Skittle at the last sentence. “Um, it’s just…well. I know this is a college town and all so I’m aware that bisexuality exists and diversity’s a good thing and all, but aren’t you a little…young? To know, I mean.”
Azkadellia smiled, and relief washed over Jane. That was the understanding smile, the one that meant Azkadellia had gotten through the Iceland-America border and knew what was going on.
Azkadellia nodded, and finished off her soda. “You’re completely right. I’m still very young when it comes to that sort of thing. That’s why I’m keeping my options open. Didn’t you when you were my age?”
Jane took a deep breath, trying to accept the cultural differences and just move along. “No, here in America you’re usually one way or the other. At your age I was a shy little thing.” She smiled. “Had the biggest crush on Jimmy Amos, though. I’m a sap for big brown eyes and smiles.”
That had Azkadellia smiling too. “Well, certainty’s always a good thing to have, at any age. What happened to Jimmy Amos?”
Jane paused for a moment, and found herself with a hand over her forehead. “Oh God, I hadn’t thought of him in years. He got in a car wreck when he was sixteen. I never said a word to him.”
“I’m sorry,” Azkadellia frowned, and put a hand on the older woman’s shoulder. “Would watching a wet-shirted Leonardo DiCaprio run around on a sinking ship cheer you up?”
Jane grinned. “Would it ever.” She pulled open the plastic bag and started stuffing the candy in it. Jane paused. “You know, whenever you…you know. Decide, if you want to put it that way, you can talk to me before you try to explain to your uncle.”
And there was the I’m From Iceland look again. “What do you mean?”
She went blank for a moment as her brain suddenly blurted out ‘Oh, right. Ambrose is from Iceland too.’ She rolled her eyes when Azkadellia wasn’t looking, and cleared her throat. “I mean absolutely nothing, I was just being an idiot for a moment there. But you can still always talk to me about anything.” Jane hesitated. “Even if your uncle and I were to break up. We could still be friends, right?”
Azkadellia’s sunny smile was all the answer Jane needed for that question.
--
The call had come in at an ungodly hour of the night and he’d needed to sneak out from his small house without rousing anyone’s attention. He had insisted on a separate landline to keep the kids asleep in the event of emergencies like this, when Smoky called and in a tone that was completely opposite how he normally sounded, he murmured, ‘Sheriff, we need you to go to 121 Oak Street. Fast.’ The sobriety in Smoky’s tone got Cain moving faster than he could remember going in recent history.
In fact, he hadn’t gotten this revved up since the bomb. He’d yanked on a pair of boots and a shirt and made sure to wrap his holster around himself. The keys to the truck were snatched in a broad palm and Cain wasted no time in navigating the streets of Baker. There wasn’t much traffic during the peak times of the day and it was near-enough a ghost town at 2:35, as the fluorescent clock was telling him it was.
He slammed the brakes and pushed forward with long strides, pounding on the door with one fist. “Catherine? Billy, open up,” Cain demanded, waiting only long enough to hear Catherine Smith let out a pained cry.
That was all Cain needed to step back and kick down the door with a sturdy foot, leading with his gun as he charged into the house. The details he’d gleaned from the radio on his way was that Catherine had called in a panic, words convoluted by her sobs, but she was intent and sure on the fact that her husband had been hitting her and was going to hurt her, possibly kill her.
That had been when Smoky called Cain desperately.
“Catherine?” Cain called out, calm as he could go. He shoved his shoulder up against the doorway and leaned around the molding to lead his way into the family room and then the stairs up to the bedroom where the sounds were loudest. He couldn’t hear much with any clarity, but there was one word that Cain didn’t even have to try and hear. It was one little word and it was driving Cain into a place that he didn’t want to be in.
Please. Pleasepleasepleasepleasedon’t.
It was a miracle, really, that when Cain rounded the corner and found himself standing with his gun aimed at Billy Smith, who had been staggering about and hitting Catherine with his bare fists, that he didn’t shoot. There was a belt lying on the bed and splattered blood all around the room. For all of Baker’s peaceful times, there was never a complete departure of the base nature of people and Cain found himself staring right down at it. He briefly wished he could headcase Billy, make him suffer in the ultimate way for what he was doing, but he settled for removing the safety from his gun and training the scope on Billy’s forehead, cocking the hammer back.
“Sheriff,” Billy drunkenly greeted him, rising to his feet.
Billy Smith had a gun as well. Cain knew because they went hunting occasionally. If Cain had known that Billy came home with a couple of beers in his stomach and hit his wife, Cain might have accidentally missed a deer or two out there with the guns. Cain didn’t even move and by the look on his face, he was murderously angry. Right now, though, Billy was unarmed. He had blood all over his hands and Catherine’s quiet cries were keeping the room from descending into a chilling silence. Normally, with Azkadellia and Jeb and Ambrose around, Cain’s eyes had warmth to them and glittered like a jewel that was tempered by lightness. Now, though, they looked like pure and deadly ice.
“Don’t make me shoot, Billy, because I’m really about one step away,” Cain warned as he dug out the cuffs from his back pocket. “We’re going into the station,” he informed the man, stepping closer and closer and shoving the barrel of his gun to Billy’s temple as a warning to not do anything rash as Cain cuffed him and read him the appropriate Miranda Rights.
Outside, he could hear the siren being shut off, announcing Smoky’s arrival as backup.
Cain’s eyes fell to Catherine and the way she was knelt down on the floor with blood around her, crying and shaking, all he could think about was Adora. He swallowed thickly and shoved Billy towards the door when Smoky pounded up the stairs and stared at the scene before beginning to stammer his way through a curious question as to what was going on.
“You’re escorting Mr. Smith here to the station,” Cain announced, already pilfering through the closet. He’d tucked the gun away and was yanking down boxes and clothes until he found a woolen blanket, hurrying to Catherine’s side and wrapping it around her shoulders. Briefly, he looked up to see if Smoky was still there and he found that he was, gaping at the scene. “Go,” Cain snapped coolly. “Don’t post bail. I’ll do that later today.” When he was feeling a little less like disposing of Billy in one of the darker ways they had in the O.Z. when someone was really and truly problematic.
Smoky took Billy out of the chaos that was the house and Cain just sank down to the floor to sit with Catherine, rubbing her shoulders and soothing her as best as he could, rocking back and forth and not asking her to talk to him. Eventually, she stopped crying and stared up at him through waterlogged eyes. “He’s never been this bad,” she insisted. “Please don’t think ill of us, Sheriff, it’s never been like this before.”
“I don’t want you seeing him again. You got your Mom upstate, why don’t you spend some time there,” Cain ‘suggested’, which was a very polite way of calling the orders he was giving her. “We’ll keep him locked away long as we can, then push him into some therapy, but I want you to stay away for a while.”
Catherine was still shaking though no tears were tracking down her face any longer. Cain still felt like shooting something or someone and he was instantly glad that he wasn’t able to cross back to the O.Z., because there was a Longcoat and a possessed Princess that he really, really wanted to take this out on.
“Sheriff…”
“Got it?” Cain insisted.
“Yes, sir,” she replied and swallowed with some difficulty.
He waited with her and made her a cup of coffee while waiting for her friends to show up and take over. By that point in time, she had cleaned the house slightly and taken a shower, as if to wash away the memory of the night, and it was 4:13 in the morning. Cain exchanged terse greetings with the women who arrived and dug out his keys before making his departure with a nod. Instead of going home, he made his way back to the station and ignored the jail cells with an amazing persistence. When he got there, he found Annie cleaning up.
She was just ending her shift (just like Smoky) and Lambton and one of Cain’s new hires was coming in later. The moment he walked into the station, she refused to take his eyes off him, all the while he went straight for his office desk and unlocked the lowermost drawer, digging out a bottle of whiskey and holding it up. It had been purchased an annual back and hadn’t been opened since.
“You’re done your shift, right?” Cain verified.
“I was twenty minutes ago,” Annie agreed, staring at him curiously. “Why?”
“Have a drink with me,” he pleaded tiredly. He didn’t have it in him to go home just yet, not until he could unwind somehow and he didn’t think shooting something in the middle of Baker was the preferred way of getting through his ire. “Just a couple before I go home.”
“On one condition,” Annie agreed as she twisted her hands up in her hair, pinning it up in an intricate bun as she pursed her pink lips together. They were extra-pink today and Cain wondered if she’d switched to a new lipstick and he hadn’t noticed. And instantly, he hated even the notion that he had been so preoccupied that he hadn’t.
“What?”
“You take the day off after,” Annie pleaded quietly. “You’re not going to be in any state to work. So yes, Sheriff, I’ll drink with you if you take the day off.”
“Deal,” Cain promised and grabbed a hold of a couple of Styrofoam coffee cups, leading her into the kitchen of the small station, pouring a light ounce of a shot for Annie and a generous helping for himself – a lot more than an ounce; in fact, about four times that. She followed tentatively, setting down her clutch-purse and taking hold of the cup, lifting it up in the air before downing it and sitting down at the table, opposite him. He slowly unwound his gun from the holster and slid it over to her. “Keep hold of that. I need to not shoot anything because I really want to be shooting Billy Smith between the eyes right now.”
He downed the Styrofoam cup in no time at all, wincing at the burn, but needing it. The cup was refilled as he watched Annie lock it away in her safe and he finally began to unwind while sitting in that chair, drinking whiskey until his tongue burned like it’d been lit on fire and his mind started to blur in a pleasant way that let him forget about all the things in his life that could do with forgetting.
Annie watched him attentively, but he wasn’t about to become a stupid lout. He knew he had to be back around sunrise to the house, but he had time to burn and liquor to burn it with.
“Was it that bad?” Annie asked, when she was three ounces into her cups and Cain had had five times as much. The world had begun to skip and hop past little jumps of time and every time Cain blinked, he could have sworn the clock moved five seconds. His limbs felt almost relaxed and separate from himself and his lips felt heavy, but he no longer wanted to murder anyone for a crime. “What you saw,” Annie reminded him, reaching out to rest a warm palm atop his and get his attention.
“I was his friend,” Cain managed to say, staring down at the near-empty bottle of whiskey. That didn’t stop him from pouring another half-glass into his Styrofoam cup, the rim of it bitten by worrying teeth. “We went hunting and we drank beers and never once did I ever think he was doing that to her. I should have know, I should have…” He swallowed hard. “If I can’t see that, how’m I supposed to protect her…”
“Protect who, Sheriff?” Annie interrupted.
“She’s one of two things I’m responsible for and I’m gonna lose them too,” Cain sighed, rubbing his left hand over his face, his wedding ring nearly jolting him into a flashed moment of sobriety. He’d failed once before and lost Adora because of it. Jeb had lost his mother and now he was on a path where things were becoming far too stagnant and settled and Wyatt Cain couldn’t even pick out a domestic violence case in a crowd. He was probably one glass too many over his limit, but he finished off the bottle and let out a weary sigh.
Annie hadn’t taken her eyes off of him, leaning over the table and cupping his cheek with a palm. “Sheriff? Wyatt?”
“Annie,” he murmured, staring at her. “I just don’t want things to go South. With her or him. The last thing we need is for it to be ruined before the end. And I could do that. I could ruin it. I could…”
He sighed and shifted until his head was against the cool table and he could just breathe for a moment to try and sober up.
“They’re all I’ve got,” he realized upon sitting up, a sharp epiphany striking him, but he still felt sick to his stomach and it had nothing to do with the alcohol and everything to do with the scene he had stopped earlier that night. “He should know that.”
“Who should?” Annie asked.
“Should be getting home,” Cain admitted, stumbling slightly as he rose to his feet. Annie braced him and they did an intricate and clumsy dance while he gave her his car keys and she guided him to the men’s room. It was 5:42 and Cain promised he would be okay to walk the mile and a half home. She believed him and he wasn’t sure if that was the right thing to do.
It took him half an hour to get back to the house and he had to use the spare key he kept hidden because he’d given Annie the ring of keys that had all of them on there and when he stumbled into his room, he nearly faceplanted on the couch while trying to ignore the desperate pounding going on in his head.
More than a minute passed before Cain realized that the pounding was actually knocking on his door and someone was calling his name over and over again. Not Jeb, who would’ve just come in. Not Azkadellia, whose tone was never that deep. Which just left one person. Cain sat up wearily, just enough to grab hold of a blanket. “Ambrose,” he growled towards the door. “Go away right now. Unless you’re fixing to stay back from work today, walk away,” he warned, going right back down to lying down.
There was a long pause, but a quiet murmur came before he left. “I’ll bring you some breakfast anyway.”
“Keep the kids away,” Cain asked quietly, knowing he was speaking loud enough for Ambrose to hear, but he either never got confirmation of that request or he hadn’t bothered to hear it.
With the day off from work and too many dismal and dark images of the past and dark premonitions of a bleak future in his mind, Cain closed his eyes and let the alcohol lull him off to an unpleasant, uncomfortable sleep.
I can’t fail them.
But that’s all you’re doing.
--
“Ambrose?”
He jerked awake, breathing hard as he wrestled out of the vicious spider web of half imagined, half remembered nightmares. Azkadellia was next to his bed, and with a growing sense of dread he noticed she was in a frayed light blue dress that was pure O.Z. with the top’s buttons torn out of it. She’d managed to sneak into his closet and steal his black coat, too, the edges of it trailing on the floor. For the first time Ambrose could remember, she looked like nothing more than a scared, lost little girl, and he found himself hugging her tightly, practically pulling her into his lap when she clung onto him.
“She’s eight today,” Azkadellia whispered, nearly sobbing, and Ambrose sighed into her hair, feeling horrible for having someone else feel just as bad as he did tonight. “DG’s eight annuals old. Eight, and trapped and possessed and doing evil things-”
“Things we’re going to fix, Az,” Ambrose said firmly. “We’ll get DG back, we just have to wait until the time’s right, wait until we really can get the Witch out of her…”
“But fifteen annuals? Ambrose, we’re practically sentencing her to death by slow torture-” Azkadellia’s voice was getting a bit frantic, and Ambrose cut her off with a careful kiss to the forehead.
They were both quiet for a while after that, and finally Ambrose sighed, releasing his hold on Azkadellia, who very reluctantly did the same, but he immediately grabbed her hand. It was snatched up in both of hers before he could take another breath. “I have an idea.”
And that was how they found themselves out in the gazebo-like portion of their porch, facing the swing that seemed dark no matter how bright a white the paint was, Azkadellia dressed in tatters and black and Ambrose wearing nothing but loose cotton pants and the coat that he kept carefully in the back of his closet, the golden crowns glistening under his chin as he lit the seventh and then eighth candle that topped a tiny cake that had been baked in almost absolute silence.
They sang happy birthday in the middle of November to the memory of a little girl, not what they knew had happened to her, not what they suspected she was doing right then. It was DG’s birthday, not the Witch’s, that they were singing for, and it came through firmly with how strong the name came out in every verse.
Ambrose slept in Azkadellia’s bed that night, keeping the coat on, just like Azkadellia kept the dress on. They let the wind blow out the flames, and let the night’s scavengers eat the cake and candles, and if either of the Cains noticed anything different, they were smart enough not to bring it up and understood enough to not wonder why Ambrose didn’t wear a coat to work in the morning, or why that was the first day that Azkadellia ever wore a shirt and skirt to pants instead of a full-out dress.
Sometimes changes were homage to an ideal or belief. Theirs were acts of defiance, slashes in their world that proved things would and could change, even if it was for a day, and even if it was only clothing. No matter how brief, it was proof that they could change the world, even if it was a very small piece of it.
--
When the sun rose on a brisk and sunny November morning, Jeb had already been up for some time. Since his injury, he hadn't been sleeping so well and the excitement of the second grade still made him wake up a half-hour earlier than usual so he could get ready and pack his bag. He'd been back in school for a little while now and fall was about to make its departure. One of his friends, a boy by the name of Rick, had invited him over that evening to play, but the problem was that he had no idea if Cain would let him go.
Azkadellia still didn't get to socialize and Jeb was sure that he was going to have to tread really lightly. He'd brought some breakfast in a plastic bag out to the pink house, knocking on the door. "Dad?" he called out. "Dad, you here?" Normally, Jeb just waited for his father to come to breakfast, but he really, really wanted to get to ask first thing, maybe when he was off-guard.
But there was no answer.
"Dad?" Jeb asked worriedly, opening the door and peering inside to find a completely empty house. Worry hit Jeb fast and he hurried back to the house, dumping the breakfast on the table and scaling the stairs in a hurry, knocking on Azkadellia's open door. She was braiding her hair and humming while the morning light spilled into the room. "Have you seen Dad?"
"No, not yet," she replied, giving him a worried look. "Why?"
"He's not in the house," Jeb said worriedly and it didn't take more than that for Azkadellia to take his hand as they hurried down the hall in a brisk walk to Ambrose's door. Jeb pounded on it again and again and again. "Ambrose? Ambrose, we can't find Dad."
Ambrose wasn't particularly fond of being woken up by someone shouting and pounding on the door. That's what his alarm clock was for, and he'd recently begun to not like the alarm clock either. He sighed, and opened his eyes, sleep-addled brain finally reminding him that Jeb was looking for Cain, who he was practically sleeping on top of.
With a quick tirade of profanity under his breath he put a hand on Cain's mouth with a warning in his eyes, just in case he suddenly decided to be fatherly and just shout out a 'why yes son, here I am in bed with Ambrose, no need to worry'. He seriously doubted Cain would, but better safe than sorry was always a very good policy when it came to this sort of thing.
Cain woke with a start when he realized someone had a hand over his mouth and he'd been two seconds away from taking action to get that hand off of him. Then his brain cleared and he remembered that he'd gone to bed in Ambrose's room the night before because someone had insisted they could be quiet.
And now...
"I'm here, just give me a second," Ambrose shouted back, and gave Cain a rather frantic look as he practically ran into the closet and pulled out a robe. He wondered if he had time for pants or anything else as his hand clenched in his hair, just about ready to rip out a rather sizeable chunk as his mind began to panic and wonder if Cain could jump out the window or something.
Cain shot a glare right back at Ambrose and mouthed a 'what do we do?' his direction as he yanked up his boxers and picked his button-down from off the place it had been strewn -- the nightstand, last night -- sliding back into it as he sat up, feeling a good knot of panic settling right in his stomach.
"Did he go to work early?" Azkadellia asked, contributing her voice to the query, worry fraught in her tone. "He usually says."
"He leaves a note," Jeb concurred in a hush.
Ambrose really did consider suggesting the window exit. He really, truly did, but finally ended up flapping his arms towards the walk-in closet he'd gotten the robe from. "Hide behind my coats or something!" he hissed out, running his hand through his hair again and again and again until the mess looked almost like he'd slicked it back.
"Ambrose, are you alright?" Azkadellia called through the door, obviously starting to get just as worried about him as Cain.
"I'm fine, I'm just making myself look decent is all," Ambrose called back, and tried to ignore how very true that was. He just kept pointing violently into the closet while he spoke.
"But I didn't hear the shower running, and you don't usually wake up until-" Azkadellia began, only for Ambrose's alarm clock to start up mid-sentence. Ambrose almost literally jumped it surprised him so much, and he found himself cursing some more as he ran over to shut it off.
Cain tugged on his hat and boots as Ambrose ran around panicking and he slowly and gracefully rose to his feet as if there wasn't cause to panic (and there was). He reached over and fixed Ambrose's hair for him, settling it into a vaguely normal pattern as he wandered into the closet, of all places, to hide. He was rolling his eyes and buttoning up his shirt as he went, yanking a couple of coats to hide him.
"Ambrose, where's my Dad?" Jeb demanded petulantly, now past the point of waiting and wanting an answer. "If he's in trouble, I wanna get looking now!"
As soon as he saw Cain was at least decently hidden, he walked over and opened the door just enough for the kids to see him. And only him. He frowned. "You're looking for Cain?"
"That's what we've been banging on the door for!" Jeb practically shouted, which wasn't very normal Jeb-like behavior. "Do you know where he is? He probably told you if nobody else knows, right?"
While Jeb was fuming, Ambrose noticed the look he was getting from Azkadellia, and his eyes went wide. He knew that look. He was genuinely scared of that look showing up right now. Because that look meant that even if she didn't know exactly what was going on, she had a very good idea.
"Ambrose, may we look for him in your room?" she asked a bit coolly, and he swallowed, finally remembering that while he could lie without pause to an adult, he could never do it to children.
"I'm wearing nothing but a robe," he objected, and flinched at the look the princess gave him. "...I'll be getting dressed in the closet then, alright? No entry while I'm in there. And don't forage or anything." He opened the door and immediately walked towards the closet, shouting out a quick, "But Cain's not here and why would he be anyway. He probably just went for a walk or something and will be back any time now."
'What are you doing?' got mouthed angrily in Ambrose's direction, half intending to just step out there and find his pants, which he hadn't been able to find. He was praying they were under the bed and Azkadellia wouldn't have incredible pants-sense.
All the time he was glaring at Ambrose, he was also throwing pieces of clothing at him -- shirt, shirt, another coat, pants, socks.
Ambrose felt like he kind of deserved the clothes-pummeling, but he mouthed back a very strong 'I can't lie to kids!' and gestured out of the closet to the afore-mentioned children.
"Ambrose," Azkadellia very patiently called out from the other side of the door. "Can we open the closet door? Are you decent yet? I found Mr. Cain's pants and he might want them back soon, if he is on a walk."
He got on the pants and socks and was working on the shirt when Azkadellia spoke. Ambrose sagged against the wall, putting a hand over his face. "...No?"
The door was opened with a creak anyway with Azkadellia peering inside and Jeb poking his head around her. He looked angrier than he had been ever before and that didn't slip by Cain's notice. Cain, who had been standing right in the middle of the closet, wearing only a pair of boxers, button-down, boots, and his hat.
And he'd been found by the kids in the closet. "Go have breakfast," he informed them, in the stern I'm-Being-A-Father tone. "We'll talk later." At first, neither Azkadellia nor Jeb moved, so Cain added a growl of, "Move." That sent them hurrying along.
Ambrose was back to nearly tearing his hair out, banging the back of his head against the closet wall. "I'm sorry I can't lie to them and it was a stupid idea to even sleep up here and..." He glanced over, honestly noticing what Cain was actually wearing at the moment. It looked like something very...questionable and non-standard had been going on, with the boots and hat and...
He gave in to temptation. It was utterly Otherside, but so very, very appropriate.
He put his hands over his eyes and ever so eloquently got out a sigh and then a very firm "Fuck."
Cain just sighed deeply, rubbing his hand over his face again and again and wandered over to Ambrose's side to help him into the second of the shirt layers as he just kept quiet, taking in exactly what had happened. When he was finished, he pried off the boots and collected his pants, sliding back into them as he sat down on the edge of the bed, gazing up at Ambrose from where he was.
"I guess we do owe them something of an explanation," he conceded after an incredibly long pause. "After all, it has been months now," he pointed out, giving Ambrose a 'time's up' look.
"And what do we tell them, Cain?!" Ambrose was getting frantic again. He'd lied to the kids, he had lied to Azkadellia, and he just about felt like a bug flailing on the ground that needed a good mercy-stomp. "I don't even know what to call this...this thing we've got going on! No, I mean had." His hand went to his forehead this time around. "You do the thinking, because I don't have a clue what to do."
Cain narrowed his gaze and the first thing he wanted to clarify was that 'had' comment. "You want to end this?" he asked, evenly. "Because as far as I'm concerned, we sit them down and tell them that occasionally, adults have arrangements that don't have anything to do with dating, but solely revolve around a mutual physical attraction. Az is at the age she'd understand." And Jeb, well...if Azkadellia understood, Jeb could look to her to follow suit. He just crossed his arms as he rose to his feet. "Well? Are you in or out? Are we done or can you handle this?"
Ambrose took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down and just feel instead of think. It was hard, and he didn't like a thing about being on this side of the spectrum, but it was what they needed right now. He took another deep breath.
"No, I don't want to end this mutual-physical-attraction thing, as you put it." Ambrose had heard the term 'fuckbuddies' and thought that summed them up better, but he doubted that'd do anything for the kids. "But if Azkadellia says no, I'll be done whether I want to be or not, if that makes any sense to you. I think she'd understand, but..." He sighed. "Cain, I'm here for her, not you. As strange as that sounds when we were just half-naked and hiding, it's true. I'm practically her servant."
He took another deep breath, and gave in, let himself slip back to thinking more than feeling. "I'd like this...thing to not end. But keeping Azkadellia safe and happy is more important. Understand?"
"Yeah, I get it," Cain agreed. "Seeing as the same doubles for Jeb." While Cain wasn't a servant to his son, the boy mattered more to Cain than anything else in the world did and the sheer hint of disapproval would make him shy away from it. He took a deep breath and gave Ambrose a hapless shrug. "Now or never, huh?"
And with a deep breath, he went downstairs to have The Talk.
tbc
