The title comes from a quote from The History of Loneliness by Nicole Krauss. I haven't read it myself yet, but I plan to.
This is my first prompt fill for my Bad Things Happen Bingo card. If you're interested in requesting something, you can read more about it on my tumblr, which you can find on my profile. The prompt for this fic was "Big Brother Instinct".
Instead of a beer, Zari's drinking a soda. It doesn't bother her, really; she clinks her glass bottle against everyone else's all the same and she gets to experience the delightful fizzy feeling without the less-than-delightful taste, so she's been told. The Legends are all respectful of her practices, customs, and beliefs, which is a refreshing change from the hellscape that was 2042 before Zari was whisked away.
"You guys," Nate is saying, looking at their team—or what's left of it now with Amaya and Wally gone and Constantine off brooding somewhere—sitting around the table. It's approximately dusk, if such a term could apply. In the Woodstock they'd left behind, the stars would be coming out, the night cooling, and the smoke curling lazily against the dark backdrop. Nate goes on, "Today was crazy. Like, can we just think about what happened today?"
"I agreed to move in with my girlfriend," Sara says, covering her grin with a hearty swig of beer. Cheers and whoops go up around the table and, sitting to her right, Ray gives her a resounding high five.
"While we are very happy for you, Sara, and that definitely counts as a crazy part of our day, I was thinking more about the whole unicorn thing. You know?" Nate mimes a horn coming out of his forehead and then pulls his lips back and gnashes his teeth together in a series of loud clicks.
"You mean the part where an icon of magic and purity turned out to be some freakish murderous demon?" Ray says. On his other side, Nate gives him a comforting pat on the shoulder.
"I knew not to trust it," Mick says, raising his bottle to punctuate his statement and then swallowing more of his beer in one gulp than Zari would've ever thought possible.
"No, you didn't," she says, pointing an accusatory finger at him. "You just wanted to kill something."
"It wasn't even a dragon!"
"Well, I'm glad it just got us high instead of cremating us," Ray says. He takes a sip of his own beer, as though just to be polite. Zari can see the beginnings of a disgusted expression come over his face.
"Not all of us," Nate says, aiming a sassy grin at Sara.
She puts her hands up in front of her, fingers splayed except for her drink. "I just reacted instinctively, okay?"
"Your instinct was to hide behind one of your teammates and let her take the hit for you?"
"Not very captain-like of you, Sara," Ray adds, raising an eyebrow.
"Ugh, whatever," Sara says, waving off their comments with her beer bottle. "At least I wasn't making out with a tree." Mick snorts. "What—or who—were you hallucinating anyways, Ray?"
She leans forward to give him a sly smile. His eyes dart away and he takes a quick drink of his beer and says, "An old crush from high school," but he won't look at anyone.
Realizing who he must've really been imagining, and still feeling a certain kinship with him after their earlier conversation, Zari takes pity on him. "I bet you wouldn't have been much better if you'd gotten dosed too, Miss Dopey 'I agreed to move in with my girlfriend'," Zari teases.
"Hey, I'm not dopey," Sara says, folding her arms. "But yeah, okay, you're probably right." She doesn't look at all bothered to be admitting defeat about this.
"Oh, she's definitely right," Nate says, then gestures to Mick. "Even Mick and I were hugging it out."
"I thought you were Axl."
"And I thought you were my dad." Mick pulls a face. "We all saw people—or rats—we loved while on that weird unicorn goop. No need to defend yourself, Mick."
Zari is too busy dwelling on the possibility and repercussions of Ray actually loving Nora Darkh to contradict Nate herself. Instead, Ray does it for her.
"Zari didn't," he says, making eye contact with her across the table. She looks back at him, a little stunned that he'd bring it up—and that she hadn't connected it sooner. Except that maybe she definitely had, and just hadn't wanted to think about why, subconsciously or otherwise, she'd so impulsively brought Ray to see her mother in 2018. But Ray goes on, having not quite put it together himself yet and sounding mostly curious: "Back in Woodstock, she was saying that everything was glowing and beautiful."
"Maybe I just really love nature," she says, not sounding as casual as she'd intended.
Misinterpreting, Nate nudges her and says, "Or maybe you did see someone and you just don't want to admit it."
"Like maybe a certain Jonah Hex?" Sara suggests, waggling her eyebrows.
Zari's breath catches, but not in good-natured embarrassment. She slams her half empty bottle down on the table, visibly startling Ray. "No, okay? I didn't hallucinate anyone," she snaps. "I just thought everything looked really beautiful. That's it."
A pause follows her outburst, during which Ray looks ashamedly down at the beer in his hand while Nate and Sara carefully school their features and Mick gets up to grab another beer.
His voice low and serious, Nate says, "Maybe we just all saw things we wanted?"
Nobody responds to that. Zari can appreciate what he's trying to do, but it's obvious to everyone there, even Mick, that the implication that Zari doesn't want anyone, especially the family she hasn't stopped mourning, isn't much better. Zari loves several people. Loved several people. And she still wishes, fervently, that they were alive and well and here with her.
So why didn't she see any of them?
"Zari—" Sara starts to say.
"It's fine," she says, picking up her soda again. "Just drop it."
Sara acquiesces, but from her downturned mouth, it's obvious that she isn't satisfied. Nobody is saying anything, eyes drifting from the floor to beer bottles to the table, and to make matters worse, Ray looks so guilty.
Zari is seriously considering just getting up and leaving to save them all from this horridly uneasy situation. But, surprisingly, it's Mick who comes to her rescue, intentionally or otherwise. "This is dumb," he says, loudly popping the cap off of a new bottle of beer. "New Girl doesn't want to talk about her family. So what." With that, he swallows a hefty amount of beer with an air of finality.
Zari is too stunned by the forwardness of it to say anything in response, but she thinks that she ought to be feeling something akin to touched, even if he still thought of her as the "new girl." As it is, she only blinks at him and he continues drinking.
Sara interlocks her fingers and tries to affect an air of nonchalance, but her expression is too somber to be convincing. "I miss my sister," she says. When Zari narrows her eyes, conveying sympathy and suspicion all at once, Sara is quick to add, "You don't have to respond. I'm sorry I let you take that hit instead of me, Zari. I didn't know what would happen, but I'm afraid of what would've happened. I don't know how I would've felt if I hadn't seen Laurel."
It isn't comforting, but then again, Sara isn't trying to be. The candid remark is, refreshingly, not intended to dilute just how screwed up it is that while her other three teammates had all seen loved ones, Zari hadn't seen a single one of the people she misses the most. Or anyone at all.
"Yeah," Zari says, the closest she'd get to thanking Sara for her frank acknowledgement.
"I wonder why that unicorn didn't charge us after dosing us," Nate says, head tilted.
"Let's just be glad it didn't," Sara says.
Zari still isn't completely mollified, but she's at least glad to have the attention off her. The last and only time she'd seen any member of her family because of some magical time travel nonsense (seeking out her mother aside) had been when Mallus had shown her Behrad. Was that what her family had become to her? An emotional pressure point, without any real love or longing? Was she just using them to feel sorry for herself?
Feeling slightly sick and wholly selfish, Zari abandons her unfinished soda on the table. Seemingly far away, Mick is growling about something. Sara has a joking tone and Nate is laughing, but Zari had missed the context, all of it. And no matter how hard she tries, she can't seem to surface again. It feels like there's air rushing unnaturally, mystically through her ears, drowning out the sound of sirens from a faraway year.
"I think I'm going to call it a night," Zari says, standing. She has the sense that she's interrupted something, but she can barely hear herself anyway. "Good night, guys."
Nobody stops her as she leaves.
In her room, Zari stops to toe off her sneakers, then turns the light on. Her room is reasonably clean, she thinks. She isn't used to being responsible for so many things, not to mention her own private, permanent space. And her bed is never made because she doesn't see the point—she's just going to get back in it and mess it all up again at the end of the day. A disorderly nest of her own blankets and pillows will always be more welcoming to her than a cold, rigidly made bed.
Without even changing into pajamas first, she makes straight for that nest and buries herself in it until she's well and truly alone: pillows pressing against her back and blankets creating a warm, isolated cocoon around her. Once she's settled she just breathes for a few moments, blinking slowly and deliberately and relishing the unnoticeable transition between her eyes opening and closing. Either way, everything is black and she's warm and safe.
And alone.
This time, she knows her eyes are closed because she squeezes them as tightly as she possibly can. For a few moments, she tries to pretend that Behrad is just outside, waiting for her. When that doesn't work, she tries her mom, then her dad.
When she realizes that she can't get these fantasies to work for even a second because she can't fool herself into believing that she remembers their voices, she presses her hands against her eyes and wails.
It feels like she's exorcising a physical pain, arching her back and whimpering into her blanket fortress. She feels it deep in her chest, hollowing her out until she's nothing but damp with tears, strands of hair stuck to her cheeks. And when she focuses on that, she isn't Zari Tomaz, daughter, sister, friend, or Legend any more. She's just existing in a liminal, negative space, crying like it's all she can do.
What does it say about her that it's easier to imagine that she isn't a person than it is to imagine her family's faces and voices?
"Ms. Tomaz?"
At the sound of Gideon's voice saying her name, she's Zari again. And she's being kind of pathetic. Heaving to catch her breath and rein in her tears, she takes a few moments before saying, "Yeah?"
"Ms. Tomaz, my hearing is good, but not that good."
Reluctantly, Zari wipes her tears as best she can and then pulls the blanket away from her face. She feels especially cold without it.
"What is it, Gideon?"
"I'm sorry for interrupting, but I thought you might like to know that you have visitors."
Zari sighs and leans her head back against the wall. "Not right now, Gideon. Please."
Gideon is quiet for a few moments. "They are not taking no for an answer, I'm afraid." Except that she doesn't sound very sorry about it at all. And quite frankly, Zari doesn't have the energy to be angry any more, not now.
Begrudgingly, she says, "Fine," and pulls the blanket away. When she answers the door, she's greeted by all of the Legends—her teammates—waiting for her, even Mick.
"You don't look great," Ray says.
"Yeah," Nate says, holding up a hand and wiggling his finger. "Your hair's all messy and your face is wet and your eyes—"
He finally stops when Sara elbows him in the ribs and he realizes what he's been saying. He smiles sheepishly.
"What's wrong with you?" Mick asks her. Sara looks as though she's considering turning around and drop kicking him.
But Zari doesn't like all this pussyfooting, so she says, "I was under my blankets."
Looking past her, Ray says, "You sure have a lot of blankets."
"And pillows," Nate adds.
"Yeah, they're comfortable." Tired, Zari leans against the doorjamb and folds her arms. "So what do you guys want?"
Clearly, they haven't thought this far ahead. They all look back at her wordlessly, blinking dumbly. Even Sara seems like she's at a loss.
"You didn't think you'd get this far, did you."
"Not really," Sara admits. Ray shrugs.
"Can we go now?" Mick asks. He's the only one with a beer still in his hand.
Seeing her look at the bottle and then their empty hands, Nate says, "We didn't want to make you feel…"
"Other," Sara says.
"And you, Mick?" Zari asks.
"Didn't think it would bother you."
"Or didn't care," Sara says, getting that threatening look again.
Before any imminent violence could come to fruition, Zari shrugs and says, "Eh, he's right, anyway. Okay, you know what." She waves a hand at them and steps aside, out of the doorway. "I'm sick of you all standing out here just looking sorry and dumb. Just come in or whatever. You can take pillows and blankets from my bed or something. Just don't spill that, Mick."
They file in dutifully, all of them wearing smiles except for Mick, and settle themselves on the floor. It's weird to see her bed so bare, Zari thinks.
Once they're all comfortable, she joins them sitting around the floor, her back to her bed and her knees pulled to her chest. They're trying not to look at her expectantly but she can tell that they're following her cues, waiting for her to say something. She doesn't take too long to think about it.
"So, is this what sleepovers are like?"
It wasn't what they were gearing for, but it works. The tension diffuses and the expectation dissipates. Zari nearly hears a collective sigh of relief.
"So I hear," Ray says.
"More or less," Sara says. "There are usually more games and gossiping, though."
"Girly things," Mick says. He looks a little out of place with only a pillow behind his back, but with Mick, he wouldn't be here if he didn't want to be.
"Hey, I like party games," Nate says.
"We should play one!"
"Ray, how old are we?"
"Come on, Sara. I bet Zari's never played one."
Sara's expression softens and suddenly they're all looking at Zari again. Pinching the bridge of her nose, Zari says, "Okay, fine. Teach me a game."
Sara, Nate, and Ray look at each other, trying to come up with something. Meanwhile, Mick knocks back the rest of his beer and sets his empty bottle on a bare patch of floor. At the sound of glass against hard surface, the three of them look over and perk up.
"Spin the bottle!" they all say in unison.
"Whatever," Mick says. Nate reaches over to grab the bottle and sets it on its side in the middle of their circle. He points the opening at himself, then leans back.
"Okay, so, this is how it works. Every person spins the bottle and you're supposed to kiss whoever the bottle points to."
"Ew," Zari says, wrinkling her nose.
"I'm with her," says Mick.
"Maybe no actual kissing," Sara says.
"Seconded," says Ray.
"Thirded," says Nate.
"Yeah," Sara says, "definitely no actual kissing."
"Maybe just hugs instead?" Ray looks so hopeful, Zari knows there's no way she's getting out of this. He so badly wants to make this right.
"I'll start!" Nate volunteers, leaning forward to grab the body of the bottle and spin it. After a few moments, it comes to a stop pointing at Mick.
"No," Mick says.
"Aw, why not?" Nate looks genuinely disappointed.
"I don't hug."
"You hugged me when you thought I was Axl," Nate protests. Not a moment later his eyes widen and he looks guiltily over at Zari. "Um, I mean…"
Zari groans. She's had absolutely enough. They're all well-meaning, but she prickles at being treated like fine china. Just to get him to shut up, she positions the bottle so that it points to her and then leans over and gives him a brief, somewhat unnatural hug. "Will you stop feeling bad for me now?"
"You can't just make it go away, Zari," Sara says. She isn't looking as enthusiastic about the party game any more.
"Ugh, I can't even play turn the bottle—"
"Spin the bottle," Nate corrects.
"Whatever! I can't do anything without you all worrying about me!"
"No, you can't," Ray says, looking directly at her. His face is filled with so much annoying earnestness that Zari doesn't know what to do with it, but she knows she wants it to stop.
She sits back and wraps her arms around her knees again. Cautiously, she asks, "What do you want from me?"
"You can't just hold this stuff in and bury it, Z. Trust me." Sara looks a little pained, which more than anything convinces Zari to stick this out. She's not thrilled to be like this in front of her whole team, but they all saw her reaction and they all just want to help, so she makes the conscious decision to concede. Besides, Sara would probably make her talk about it to someone later if not now and she isn't sure how she'd pick who to talk to, anyway.
"Fine. When we were little," Zari starts, knowing she doesn't have to specify who she's talking about. All four of them are at least looking at her if not totally riveted. So she takes a deep breath and pulls her knees closer, self-conscious now. "When we were little, I'd cry when Behrad got punished. It didn't matter why, or when. Any time he was scolded or put in time out, I was right there with him, making a fuss." She huffs out a short laugh. "Finally, my parents told me that I was being a great big sister, but I couldn't always be there with him, so the best thing I could do for him was to make sure he properly learned his lessons." Somehow she still has it in her to tear up, even if no tears actually fall. It surprises her so she takes a moment to wipe her eyes with her sleeves before continuing. "I didn't really understand what they were talking about, but I really wanted to do anything I could to help him, whatever was best. I would have done anything for him." She has to stop when her voice caves and breaks, splintering under the weight that has finally become too much.
Sick of crying, and with still more to say, she swallows. She squeezes her eyes shut and sniffles until her throat stops hurting. Voice tight and small, she forces out, "I don't know when I grew up and became so selfish."
"Z," Ray starts to say before Zari cuts him off.
"Sometimes," she takes a deep breath and looks up to the ceiling, unable to handle any of their pitying looks. "Sometimes I see my family in my sleep and the truth is I don't know if they're dreams or nightmares." Finally letting out a sob, she says, "I should've protected him. I should have protected them. Every moment I'm here with you guys is a moment I'm not saving my family."
As she'd done earlier, she just focuses on breathing. Except there's light behind her eyelids, which clearly means her eyes are closed, and she's not alone. She doesn't even have to try to imagine that one of her loved ones is waiting on the other side; she already knows the Legends are there.
Her voice shaky but stronger, she says, "And yet, I'd still rather be here with you guys than back in 2042." It sounds like a confession, full of permanent shame.
"We're glad you're here, Z," Nate says. It's platitudinous, but Zari loves him for it anyway and is surprised she does.
"It wouldn't be the same without you," Sara says, and winks. Zari thinks of the time she was stuck in a time loop and heard Sara echo that sentiment to Ava when she didn't know anyone could or would overhear, let alone Zari herself. Zari shudders to think of that experience, but hearing Sara say it to her face reminds her of its validity. It doesn't make her feel much better, but she does believe it.
"Yeah," Mick says. She thinks he's only saying something so nobody will bother him about it later, but it's so out of character for him that she bursts into laughter, real laughter. "What?" he demands.
"You really mean it," Zari says.
"Of course we do," says Sara.
Zari shakes her head and gets her breathing back under control, into a rhythm she doesn't have to think about. "Okay," she says.
"Okay?" Ray asks.
"I'm still not comfortable with all my family stuff," Zari says, readjusting so that she can more easily reach forward. "But we were playing a game, and I think it's my turn."
She spins the bottle and after a few suspenseful moments, it comes to a stop pointing at the space between Nate and Ray. "That means you have to hug both of us!" Nate says, Ray looking all too gleeful about it. Without protest, Zari crawls over to them and lets them practically clobber her as they envelop her in their arms. Somehow, she manages to wrap her arms around them in return, looking only slightly distressed. After barely just a couple moments she starts wiggling away, only for Sara to all but throw herself on Zari's back with a cheeky smile.
With Zari now unwillingly trapped between the three of them, Sara hums and presses herself closer. "Didn't know you were such a hugger, Zari." Zari whines and Sara pulls away a little. Relaxing in relief, Zari starts following suit.
"Not so fast," Sara says.
"Hey—!" Mick begins to say, then he's being pushed against her side and Sara's at her back again and Zari finds herself uncomfortably in the middle of a team huddle, unable to move even if she wanted to. She's contorted somewhat awkwardly and isn't used to being so close to anyone, let alone four people, but her position is warm and safe.
"Enough," Mick says and begins to struggle against Sara, who's been holding him in place.
Though Zari is actually kind of happy where she is, she isn't sure that she would be able to keep tears at bay for much longer. Besides, she has an image to maintain, and for good reason: to avoid exactly this. "Yeah, I've had just about enough," she says, trying to extract herself from the tangle.
Sara snorts. "Whatever you say, Z." She releases them and Mick wrenches himself away with an annoyed bellow. Zari ducks away more slowly and returns to her cozy, if less warm, spot by her bed. She misses the pleased look exchanged between Ray and Nate and the satisfied smile on Sara's face.
"This doesn't fix anything," Zari asserts. She's right, but her tone lacks her earlier conviction and anger.
"Still as pessimistic as ever," Nate says, but he's careful to say it gently. He knows as well as anyone that there's no fixing Zari's troubles.
"But you do feel a little better, right?" Ray asks. "We didn't take it too far?"
"Don't make a habit of it," Zari replies, "but okay, yeah, maybe I do feel a little better."
"Can we go back to drinking now? I need another beer." Mick gets to his feet and makes for the door, leaving his singular pillow behind.
Nate and Ray, saying something about party games and giving Zari back her privacy, scramble to follow him out. Sara gets up too, but before she leaves, she pauses to put a hand on Zari's shoulder.
"Are you coming with us?" she asks.
"No thanks," Zari says. She begins collecting the abandoned pillows and blankets on the floor. "Even if I do feel a bit better, you guys intruded on my necessary alone time."
"Fair enough. We'll leave you be. But Zari?"
"Yeah?"
"You know that stuff you were saying, about how you'd do anything for your brother?" Sara makes sure she has Zari's attention before continuing. "Well, I know you're still the newbie here but you're one of us now. And we feel the same way about you."
Zari deposits her collection of pillows and blankets on her bed. "Thanks, Sara."
Sara pats her on the shoulder and leaves, the door closing behind her and leaving Zari alone again. "Thanks, Gideon," she says, sitting on her bed.
"For what, Ms. Tomaz?"
"For closing the door, but for opening it in the first place too, I guess."
"You're welcome, but opening the door was your doing, Ms. Tomaz. I only warned you that you should."
Realizing that Gideon is right, Zari says nothing, but reaches up and unhooks her totem necklace and lets it fall into her lap. She can see her reflection looking back at her in the gleaming red gem set in the middle, the source of what is now her power. Her protective instinct surges as she remembers Behrad doing the same thing before they knew how much power it held, pulling silly faces and goofy smiles, completely oblivious to what that gem could do. It's that power now that, at her disposal, makes her think of the team of which she's now firmly a part.
Though Sara hadn't given her the choice, Zari would've happily taken that hit—any hit—for her or for anyone else on the team. She would do anything for them, too. Anything to protect them. She closes her hand around the totem, feeling its power thrumming under her fingers and throughout her body.
She would never make the same mistake again.