"If the moon smiled, she would resemble you.
You leave the same impression
Of something beautiful, but annihilating.
Both of you are great light borrowers.
Her O-mouth grieves at the world; yours is unaffected,
And your first gift is making stone out of everything.
I wake to a mausoleum; you are here,
Ticking your fingers on the marble table, looking for cigarettes,
Spiteful as a woman, but not so nervous,
And dying to say something unanswerable.
The moon, too, abuses her subjects,
But in the daytime she is ridiculous.
Your dissatisfactions, on the other hand,
Arrive through the mailslot with loving regularity,
White and blank, expansive as carbon monoxide.
No day is safe from news of you,
Walking about in Africa maybe, but thinking of me."
The Rival, Sylvia Plath
He can never quite figure her out. She says people weren't solely meant to be understood ("I'm not here for you to figure out, you speedy dweeb"), and they can't be assembled like puzzle pieces. She says this while holding a sapphire the size of her skull on the side of her hip, during a humid day in France, while working for a private benefactor.
What Wally knows about her—at least what Wally thinks he knows about her—comes about through delicate observation. Because, god knows, Jinx can be a bitch about answering questions.
"Where is the rest of your team?" He breaks the silence inside of a mansion vault, owned by an old and exiled Russian aristocrat family. Jinx has a bag filled with stacks of money and bars of gold, a string of white diamonds swoops across her collar bones, and her face falls at the sound of his voice.
"Playing video games, stealing car parts, scratching themselves, eating, who knows?" She goes about her gathering acting like he isn't even there, "I decided to refill our bank account." Jinx smiles the way cats hiss.
Kid Flash leans against the entrance of the vault. She's too calm, Jinx doesn't just let him defeat her, and the situation looks deceptively under his control.
"Is crime not paying as much as you think it should?" He's smiling pleasantly at her, the offer to end her criminal career hanging in the unsaid air between them. She turns around to sneer.
"Don't be stupid, this is communal, my own private finances are none of your business. But I'm not wasting my money on pizza and porno magazines." She seals up the bag, her hair looks taller, and she stands with her hands on her hips. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way."
"Why do you hang out with those losers, Jinx?" He's said it a million times. Her boys? They're going nowhere. She's worth more than a thousand of them put together. Jinx is so smart and talented and powerful, she has so much potential to do and be good. Wally just wishes Jinx could see what he sees.
"Why do you dress like a condiment?" She seethes. He can't tell at first if she gets angry because he insults her friends or if she's mad because he insinuates that what she does isn't worthwhile. He later finds out that it is neither—she says his questions are too personal.
"Hey," He says playfully in mock-pain, "That hurts my feelings." He runs past her but can't get the bag out of her iron grip—she's stronger than she seems.
"That's what you get for chasing wild things." She enchants the ground below him to collapse and makes for the exit. That day she manages to get away with a little less than half of her original loot.
She's never one to answer questions directly or indirectly. He calls her mysterious. She calls herself smart.
"I think you're guarded." He says one day after finding her alone in a marble museum, a red rose resting in her pearly gray palms.
"Oh, am I?" She smiles like there is something obvious that Wally should know.
"Yeah," Wally smiles now too, standing almost-too-close-but-not, barely brushing his hand against her own, "You are."
There is moment where she looks up at him through her dark blushing eyelashes, and she is taken back by the palpable sincerity of his eyes, blue like aquariums. His hand moves to touch her cheek, her eyes are soft like wet azaleas, there is no flirty-line or charming offer to become a heroine—Kid Flash is just smiling like he always does.
He sees the gap in her façade, a moment of her heart surfacing, but then it's over. And Jinx is pissed.
The mood changes instantly, she's throwing curses at him left and right, and the creamy white room fills with rosy lights. In her furry she cannot help the sadistic glow that glazes over her bright eyes and Wally is struck with a fear that she is lost to him.
She slips away that night empty handed and in tears, she doesn't know he knows, but he sees her angry sobs before they come out of her mouth as she makes her brilliant escape through the window above the Cleopatra exhibit.
All he wants to do is see her again, not so broken, but thrilling and alive. Wally suffers through the police asking questions, then the museum curator endlessly thanking him for the minimal damage to the artifacts and of course that nothing was taken.
But Wally thinks Jinx takes little bits of him whenever she leaves. He always feels emptier after an encounter with the witchling girl.
On an off day he finds himself looking through police files. Her file is surprisingly thin, he figures the majority of it has been digitized.
He is mostly disappointed in seeing her listed as Jinx Doe amongst a sea of Janes. But anyone can change their names so he delves further, looking for something she can't divorce herself from, something inside of her biology.
He checks for finger prints and finds out that they have been burnt off and made smooth sometime during her years at Hive Academy. Wally looks for DNA, Robin must have something to decipher biological ancestry (all he needed was a country or a region), but her DNA is suspiciously absent from her records.
Wally begins to wonder if she is really a tangible human being or an elaborate trick of light and air.
Jinx takes mug shots like most kids take school photos, he sees the progression of her age and the stylization of her 'bad-luck-witch' come into place.
She starts cutesy, with gothic Lolita dresses and black-lace fingerless gloves. At one point she dyes her hair black and ties them in pigtails. In another picture she is cherry-lipped with a crop-top and denim shorts—looking like something sinful from a Nobakov novel. She is fourteen by the time her current look begins to develop, pink horseshoe hair and stripped stockings, something flexible and dark that she can fight and flip through the air in.
In her earliest mug shot she is eleven with a fuchsia bob and large rosy cat eyes. She is arrested during a boiling summer in the act of stealing a car. They try to convict her for grand theft auto but fail because all of their proof begins to deteriorate and the district attorney is left trying to convict her based on circumstantial evidence. Plus, there are no fingerprints on the steering wheel, and suddenly the officer that arrested her can't remember seeing her in the car.
Wally is surprised to know that Jinx has never been convicted of a crime. Accused—yes, but she's never spent more than two months consecutively in prison and is never found guilty.
She's limping along a park pathway that leads into the forest late on a dark blue night, and Kid Flash spots her on his final patrol around the city.
She's missing her platform boots and he can see a deep red scratch running down the back of her calf where her stockings are ripped. Wally is by her side so fast he doesn't even feel himself move, "Did some of your bad luck come back to bite ya?"
She screams and send a defensive shock wave of pink at him, effectively knocking herself over. "What the fuck do you think you're doing, you idiot?" She bits at him through her pain. Wally cringes, he always does this, he's to abrasive. He offers his hand to help her up,
"Sorry, Jinxy, didn't mean to scare ya." She ignores his helping hand (slaps it away—he laughs, its warm and her spine tingles) and sits on the floor for a few quite moments, her complexion is ashier than usual and Flash starts to worry.
"Are you alright?" He asks gently.
She rubs her temples and grumbles miserably, "What do you think?" Wally thinks it's strange that she's torn up and tired but stumbling into the woods.
"Don't you need a hospital?" He asks. Jinx stretches her legs out in front of her and leans back into the dewy grass.
"Another brilliant idea from the genius mind of the boy wonder, Kid Flash," she says sarcastically. He sits beside her, crossing his legs and leaning his head onto his hand. "What do you think a hospital would do if I walked through the front doors?" She asks.
He waits a moment, thinking her question is rhetorical before answering. "They're doctors, they'd help you."
Jinx takes a moment before sitting up and her vision is blurry. She knows she needs to start moving again. She feels him steady her as she stands and pushes him away as soon as she can before she can't resist the urge to fall into his arms.
"You're a child." She doesn't sound menacing, just tired. "Doctors in the hospital don't want to help me. Doctors in the hospital are frightened of me. They would call the police, I would be seen by a doctor on the bottom of the totem pole, who wouldn't want to be around me, I would get horrible treatment and then be arrested."
"Well then where are you going?" He braces for his head being bitten off and he's almost excited about it, he's never been able to get this much out of her before.
The quite between them is broken by her taking a deep breath, "Some place neutral." She says softly, it makes Wally look at her twice. He's never heard her speak so gently. "So please don't follow me. I'll be alright on my own."
He can't bring himself to leave her alone and injured, so he trails her at a distance. Jinx knows he's there but can't help but feel…something, safer, less alone? She walks, stumbles, and leans on trees for another hour and a half before they are deep in the murky forest and she comes to the mouth of a brown rock cave.
He's waiting for her to pass out from exhaustion so he can bring her someplace safe for medical treatment. He figures that'll be easier than manhandling her because he knows she'll fight him, bloody mess that she is, she'll kick and scream the entire way and end up hurting herself more.
She taps a stone against a wide willow tree, blanketed by moss and wilting vines, three times and it echoes into the cave three times, ringing like church bells in an abandoned chapel.
An old woman, with a spine like a question mark, comes out through the darkness. She is wearing half a skull mask, with antlers coming out of her long scraggly grey hair. It looks like moss and mold and mushrooms are growing on her, like she is alive but decomposing.
"I need you to heal me, grandmother," Jinx says in a small voice. The old woman makes a croaking noise that sounds like a strangled laugh, he sees Jinx cringe as she pokes around and looks at her wounds.
"Have you brought payment, little witchling?" She asks in a voice that would better suit a frog. Jinx empties out a bag that Flash didn't notice she had before and clear crystal quarts fall out into an impressive pile at her feet.
The old woman smiles and Flash feels a chill shiver up his spine, "Lovely, lovely like water bones. What have you filled them with?" She bends down to inspect one, "Sorrow?" She bites the rock and holds it between rotting, yellow teeth.
Jinx feels her breaths becoming more labored, her ribs ache, her jaw is swelling, and her voice comes out desperate. "Longing," her reply is quick and the old woman hums in acknowledgment.
They glow like moonstones, lying there in the starlight, like real rocks that fell from the moon. This exchange is beyond his understanding, and he supposes it must be something that witches do. He makes a mental note to ask Raven about it.
Her hands look like mangled tree bark as the forest lady strokes her hair in contemplation, "These will be powerful, quite powerful, perfect," she rambles.
The woman gathers the crystals back into the bag Jinx hands her and turns to hobble back into the cave.
"Come along then, wary witchling girl. We wouldn't want to keep him waiting to long." Jinx braces herself on the walls of the cave and follows the woman inside.
He feels like he waits forever in the glowing moonlight of the foggy forest. Wally nearly falls asleep to the quite croaking of the frogs, the gentle buzz of fire flies, and the soft breeze that brushes past his skin.
The sky turns pale as dawn's gentle fingers warm the sky, and Jinx emerges from the cave alone.
She looks better—healed completely but exhausted. Her tights are still bloody but the wound on her leg is a white fleshy line. He steps out towards her and catches the look of distress on her face.
"Why are you still here?" There is an unsaid accusation in her voice, "What is it that you want from me?" Her voice is loud and bounces off the trees that encircle them.
"I don't know what you mean—"
"Yes you do," There are tears brimming her eyes, strange and beautiful and angry. She takes a breath and starts stalking away from the mouth of the cave, "You are always wherever I am, whenever I am working—no matter where I am working. Leaving me flowers, talking to me like—like…"
"Like I think you're better than what you subject yourself to?" There is an edge to his voice he finds difficult to choke back. She is too emotional at this point to turn vicious, her feelings are too raw, she can't contort them into a defense but she tries with a watery scoff.
"Who are you to tell me what I am? Who are you to tell me what I am better than?"
"I'm your friend!" He grabs her wrist and then catches the other as she tries to smash it into his face. They're so close now—she's shorter than him, he's never really noticed it until now when she's so still.
"No, you're not." There is a tear creeping down the side of her face, her eyes are wide and lined with thick pink lashes, some are white, they're so long he wonders if she can feel them when she blinks. Her jawline is soft and he finds himself wondering what her skin tastes like.
"Jinx," he says her name with a soft exhale, "I—"
"No," her voice is sharp and watery, "You aren't my friend. You are my enemy. Whatever your plan is, whatever this is that you're doing," her voice is cracking, "You're trying to destroy me. And I don't know how to fight this—this isn't a fair fight." She is sniffling and her voice is tight.
The hold he has on her wrists is tender and her arms are relaxed and Wally wonders—is this what holding her hands is like? And he wants to laugh because it probably is, because everything with Jinx is a little violent and malicious.
"You're accusing me of not fighting fair?" He's not the one with the enchanting eyes or the pouty lips or the mysterious history. He's not the one who fights like he's dancing—he's not the one who bewitches luck with fairy lights and dainty wrists.
"Yes." She says with a voice that she probably thinks sounds soft and pathetic. Their eyes are locked in a stare (blue like aquariums) and he feels stupid in his mask.
"How?" His voice is a trance, she feels like a moth drawn to a flame. Their faces are close, so close, and her tongue darts out to wet her lips that are so suddenly dry.
Wally lets go of her wrist, and she feels the tips of his fingers, light as a feather, touch her cheek, his thumb brushes across her lips. She doesn't know how it happens, her movements feel slow and dreamy, but her hands are resting on his shoulders. He has his hand still on her face and the other twitching on her waist line.
She feels alive and tingly, but there is a feeling in her chest…like an owl has its talons tight around her heart, squeezing harder as her pulse quickens. And she doesn't know if she's pulling him down or if he's leaning towards her face but her eyes flutter shut and she wants his lips covering hers so bad. His lips brush her jawline and his tongue tastes the salt on her skin, and he kisses the corner of her mouth as her back bumps a tree.
She's definitely the one who initiates her mouth on his, and they dissolve into a tangle of tongues and lips and teeth. And it is exactly what she imagines kissing her handsome hero with laughing eyes to be, gentle, tender, sweet…destructive. It destroys her. How can falling feel so good? This doesn't feel like defeat.
Wally wishes he could spend all of his time kissing Jinx. He's so nervous for her to change her mind, to be unsure and push him away so he presses on hot and heady, holding her fast against him and molding their bodies close together. Her response is enthusiastic, she bites his lip and rakes her fingers through his hair. ("This is what you get for chasing wild things.")
They both have swollen lips and messy hair by the time the sun's golden halo touches the tops of the forest trees. She is cradling his hand in hers, his glove is gone and she is tracing the lines on his palms. Wally wonders if she can read into his future, he wonders what she can see.
"This was probably a mistake." She says blandly but makes no motion to move away from him, her hair has wilted to rest around her shoulders and he can see the wind catch the ends and blow them across her pensive face.
"I don't think so," His voice is easy and cheerful, "I think it's the best decision we've made together. Hand-to-hand combat? Annoying. Dodging your attacks? Dangerous. This? This is perfect." She laughs because he sounds so sure of himself and Wally wants to hear her laugh a million times more.
"So, next time you catch me someplace I shouldn't be, you're just gunna kiss me?"
"Maybe." His voice is low and soft by the edge of her ear.
"That's going to make fighting you much easier." They laugh but she covers his mouth with her hand before he talks, "I'll be swimming in sapphires by summertime."
"Hey, wait a minute—" He's laughing and Jinx feels her heart swell with the way his smile touches his eyes, fills them with light—fills hers with longing.
"I'll have the crown jewels by sun down and an enchanted tiara by tomorrow." He finally gets her hands away from his face and pulls her closer to him, he doesn't remember ever seeing her smile so innocently.
"Maybe I'll even take the Hope Diamond, I'm sure it's cursed nature and bad luck will really only enhance my spells."
"I think you're underestimating me." Their fingers are intertwined and he's kneeling beside where she perches on the thick root of a tree. She's looking down at him with sunlight filtering through the rosy wisps of her hair.
"Am I?" He's at her level now and she sighs as he kisses the crook of her neck and then the side of her jaw leading his mouth to hover over hers.
"Yeah," He breathes, "I don't think you'll have any of that on your mind if I kiss you mid crime." The second their lips touch his communicator goes off and shatters everything. The spell of their forbidden romance tears across Jinx's mind and she struggles to find her footing again.
Cyborg's voice cuts through the static, "Flash we need you in Jump City on 7th Street at the William & Forester Bank, do you copy?" She looks away as he unhooks the yellow communicator from his belt and flips it open. She sees Cyborg's face and is sure to stay out of view.
"Be there in a flash." Is Wally's cheerful reply.
"Good," He says as a green monkey screeches past him at an unseen assailant. "We need all the help when can get. The boy can turn into a dinosaur, but here he is fighting as a monkey. Doesn't make any damn sense." And the screen goes blank.
He looks over at her dusting the skirt of her dress off with her back turned to him and he can tell her defenses are up again. Their eyes meet.
"See you around, wonder boy." Her voice is young and raspy and Wally's heart breaks because he thinks this time when he leaves her, Jinx will be holding it, beating and bloody, in her powerful pearly palms.
"See ya." She blinks and he's gone. His voice was so sad.
He's outside an electronics store because although the outside side sign reads, "closed," the inside is alive and bright. The room is flooded with the radiating glow of every television screen the store owns. Of course he finds Jinx there, her hair limp like wilting rose petals, standing in front of a wall of moving pictures and booming static voices.
"An earthquake has shaken the very foundation of the Mediterranean," A blonde anchorwoman announces in a low pitch during a 2 am rerun of the 11 o'clock news. "And a national monument, a temple built in ancient Constantinople, has fallen into ruin."
She's weeping—openly, hiccuping and muffling her broken sounds. Wally feels so far away from her at that moment; something dark and primordial lives inside of her, he reasons. Something that remembers Roman roads, worshiping stars, and bloody alters. Why else? Why else would she weep for an old temple that has no place in a modern world, falling to dust?
Maybe that is her secret—that she was young when civilization was young, and now she is ancient and beautiful like the ruins nature reclaims. A girl lost in time and a boy fast enough to follow her through it.
But he knows none of that matters anymore—who she was or her origins. Because he's in love with the malicious glint in her eyes, the moral grayness of her heart, and the way she refuses to break the fragile treasures she holds with her hands.
He would follow her anywhere, through anything, fighting for the abundance of kindness he knows she possesses. So when he walks into the store and she wipes away her tears, he holds her close to him and they watch the world crumble around them.