Title: a place we can both call home
Summary: "Maybe you wouldn't have been the same. I wouldn't have been the same, but I'd also probably still be me. You know?" MacDick
Author's Note: Sorry for the terribly cliched fic, but I always think about moments that Mac and Dick could actually talk about everything and I didn't even really do that but ugh. Sorry. Also, I guess I like to think that Mac and Dick sometimes hook up for shits and giggles (how very Juno)? Welcome to my head!canon?
/
Mac is fucked up. Truly, utterly fucked up, like one of those girls Dick may have preyed upon, years ago. He just wants to get her home now, tuck her into his bed, get her a glass of water, hold her hair back if she pukes, and crash on the uncomfortable couch in the corner.
But she has other plans.
"I don't wanna go home with you tonight," she says, shrugging off his hands from her shoulders. "I wanna party!" She giggles, batting her eyelashes at a boy who walks by with leering eyes, "I wanna party with him."
"Come on, Mackie," Dick mumbles, lacing his fingers in hers. Her fingers tense before staying strong in his. "You wouldn't even remember that guy's name in the morning."
"Stop trying to get me into your bed," she says, wide eyed and loud. People turn around and Dick closes his eyes. He's not known for playing the good guy.
"Is this guy bothering you?" a guy in a wife beater that shows off his big, life threatening muscles. Dick gulps, running his fingers over his barely healed knuckles.
Mac tightens her grip in his hands, realizing her mistake, "No. This is my boyfriend. He just wants to get me home even though I reeeeally wanna have more fun." She grins and puts her hand to her mouth, like she's telling a secret, "He's a real party pooper, sometimes."
She laughs as Dick rubs his fingers over her wrist. The guy gives Dick a knowing look, which gives Dick time to breathe a sigh of relief, before smiling down at Mac, "Well, this party's dying down. Maybe you should listen to your boyfriend."
Mac huffs, "He's not the boss of me or anything. I'm a fem-femin-feminist and Veronica says you should always remember boys can't tell you what to do."
Dick rolls his eyes, "That Veronica Mars, always giving advice."
The guy looks like he's considering hopping in a time machine to take back being a good guy and mouths good luck to Dick, before waving goodbye to Mac and wishing her luck that she finds fun soon.
"He was nice," Mac says, turning to Dick, using her free hand to grab his other hand. "Why'd he go?"
"I think you may have scared him off a little," he says, looking down at her, smiling. "You have that effect on some people, you know."
"That's silly," she says, releasing her hand to swat at his chest. "He was probably scared of you." Her fingers reach up to rustle his hair, "You're the scary one."
Dick is sure he does not look, in any way, menacing with a drunk girl playing with his hair.
"Hey Mac," he says, trying to keep his voice even.
"Mhmm?" she responds, hands still in his hair, hips bumping against his.
"Why'd you tell him I was your boyfriend?"
Her eyes shine when she laughs and her hips keep bumping against him and it's kind of really hard to deal with, okay? She smiles and touches his nose gently, "Because you kiss really nicely and I was worried he was going to steal me away."
Dick smiles lazily, "Are you done having fun, yet?"
Mac sighs, rolling her eyes, "No, but this party is lame and I'm all out of refreshments. Take me somewhere else!"
"Can I take you home?" If her looks were on a gear shift, hers would've slid right into flirtatious - just begging someone to step on the accelerator. He adds, breathing in slow, "I'll take the couch, of course."
She unlatches her other hand and slides her hands across his chest, "You don't have to."
The speed limit is forty five on the highway, but he always goes, at least, sixty five.
He grabs her hands in their quest to seduce the hell out of him and smiles, "Come on, my lady. Let's get out of here."
When he unlocks his car, she narrows her eyes at him, "Did you have anything to drink?"
"No," he says, opening her door. "Like you said, I'm a party pooper."
"Party foul," she tosses at him, carefully getting into the car to avoid causing bodily harm.
He laughs and gets in his side, flicking the car to life, putting it into gear, and trying not to hit any drunken sorority girls on his way out. "Are you okay over there?"
"I'm fine," she groans. "Stop being such a mom."
He laughs when she continues, "Can you even imagine if you were a mom? You'd probably be, like, the worst mom in the world." She snorts, "You'd feed them bacon for every meal and they'd all learn how to surf as soon as they could walk and they'd have your fluffy hair and it'd be the worst."
His eyebrows raise at the thought, but then new ones spring into mind: dark haired kids running around his house with his smile and her eyes.
"At least my kids wouldn't be freaky vegan Ghost World chicks."
"I bet they would be," she says, looking at him with challenging eyes. "Just to piss you off."
He laughs, "Well, here's the flaw, Mackie. I can't really be a mom."
"Why not?" she asks, surprised. "Boys can be… boys can be moms too, if they want."
"Boys can be dads," Dick says slowly, like he's teaching her something new. "And as I'm pretty positive on the fact that I'm a dude and not a chick, I'd say I'd be a dad instead of a mom."
A hand lands heavily on his lap and he yelps as he tries to keep the car between the lines.
"I don't know if I'm sure about that," Mac says, curiously. "I don't feel anything yet."
Dick hisses, "Mac, remove your hand from my crotch before I crash this car."
"Why?" she giggles, removing her hand anyway. "Have you ever felt the touch of a woman, Dickie?"
He almost huffs in annoyance, but he doesn't want to bring up the past, not now, not here, so he says, "I'm not really into getting pulled over because you threw your hand all over me."
"You're not into that?" Mac's voice changes tones as she turns in her seat to look at him properly. "You always seemed like you were that type. You know, the one who likes getting caught."
His throat tightens. She's thinking about that one time in the library, he can just feel it. If she brings it up, brings up how his hand was up her shirt when the library aid rounded the corner, he might lose it.
"Hey," Mac says, voice soft, gentle. "Pull into the beach."
"Huh?"
"Just do it," she says, voice still soft.
He fulfills her commands with a clenched jaw and wonders how hard he'll fight if she throws herself on him right now. Fighting a possibly turned on Mac is not really an appealing thought in his brain, nor, ahem, downstairs.
But to his surprise, she unbuckles her seatbelt and opens the door to walk out in front of his car. He turns his car off, gets out, and hears her taking in big gulps of air.
"Are you sure you're okay?" he asks, concern evident in his voice.
"Yeah, I just started thinking a lot, for a second."
She walks to a bench in front of his car and pats the spot next to her. He does as she wishes, like always.
"Do you still think about everything?" she asks, sincerely.
It takes him all his power not to respond sarcastically, because he knows what she's really asking and it would be easy to blow off, but he knows she needs this.
"Yeah, I still do."
She puts her hand on top of his, not looking at him. Her hair is whipping in the brisk, warm air. He smiles, lightly.
"Do you ever think—" she stops, midway, breathes in, "Do you ever think you would redo things?"
"Maybe," he says, folding his hand into hers. "Sometimes, I think… maybe."
She looks at him and her eyes are dark, "But you… you were such… such a…"
"Dick," he smiles.
"Yeah," she says, leaning her head against his shoulder. "A dick."
"Big Dick named me well," he says and gains a laugh from her before her mouth hardens.
"I don't want to bring him up," she says, sternly. "I don't want to talk about him anymore."
"Okay," he agrees, leaning his head on hers. "We don't have to."
She fiddles with his fingers, "But I feel like we should."
"Whatever you want, Mackie."
"You're not a dick anymore," she says, earnestly, and he laughs. "Seriously, you're… you're all… you're not one anymore."
"Thanks," he says warmly. "Means a lot."
She twists her head to look at him and his chin gets caught on the top of her head. "When you were with Madison, you were a dick. In high school and with everybody and even a little in college, you were. But now, you're not."
His lips brush against her forehead, "Yeah. With Madison…"
"You know, I could've been Madison," she says, sagely.
"Huh?"
"We got switched. Switched all around. If we weren't, I could've been her and maybe… maybe you wouldn't have been the same. I wouldn't have been the same, but I'd also probably still be me." She squints a little, yawns, "You know?"
His forehead crinkles in confusion, "Switched?"
"In the hospital," she says, like he knows the whole story. "I was supposed to be Madison and she was supposed to be Cindy, but then, I was Cindy and she was Madison."
He uncurls their fingers. "So you… you were the Sinclair's kid?"
Mac nods slowly, "But I went to the wrong home. But it was home and we couldn't unswitch."
Dick covers his forehead with his hand and Mac shivers in the silence that falls between them.
"Do you think we would've been Madison and Dick?" she says, quietly. "If I went to the right home?"
He doesn't know what to say that sounds right. That sounds fair. What if's have always stumped him, so he doesn't say anything.
Mac picks up her legs and tucks herself into them, "I guess we'll never know."
"Maybe," he says, finally. "But…"
"I wonder," she says, like he didn't say anything at all, "if it would've played out to be a little bit the same. Maybe I would've still ended up with Cassidy, but this time, he didn't kill himself because I made him happy enough and we were all okay."
"We're okay, now," Dick says. But there's desperation in his voice and the what if's fuel the lingering pause in their conversation.
"I'm not okay, sometimes." He pulls her close to him and she shivers against him again. "Other times, I'm okay, but sometimes, I'm not. Still."
"Do you…" his voice almost gives out, "Do you still think about him?"
"Not really," she says, honestly. "I have dreams about him, sometimes, but. Mostly, no."
He inhales sharply, wanting to ask about her dreams, but she speaks again.
"When you kiss me, I can convince myself it didn't happen." She peeks at him from under a piece of her hair, which he tucks behind her ear — call it impulse. "That's why I kiss you sometimes and not all the time. Because I feel like I shouldn't forget, but sometimes I want to forget, and sometimes I want to kiss you, so I do."
He breathes out shakily, "I get that."
"Hey," Mac says, poking his leg. "Can we go home?"
He looks at her and his brain is running in circles. Thinking about Cassidy and Madison and kissing Mac in the library under her charade of I'm bored and what if's and the way she says home, like his home is hers. She looks back at him and his brain focuses in, sharply, on the last word on her lips. Home.
"Yeah," he mumbles. "Let's go."
When he gets up, he holds his hand out to her. She takes it, stands up, and leans in so close that there is no way to interpret her mission.
"You were right," she says, wrapping her arms around his neck. Her lips get so close to his that they breathe the same air. He can taste all the leftover party favors on her tongue. "I think… I think we're going to be okay."
She smiles and kisses him. He wraps her closer into him and he can feel everything around them, everything between them, the past clutching onto them. But they're going to be okay.
He pulls away from her, smiles into her hair, "Let's go home, Mac."
"Okay." She pulls her hand into his, smiling up at him, "Let's go home."
When they get into the car, Mac turns to him, her mouth curling into a different sort of smile he knows very well.
"You know," she says, leaning toward him, "We can still have fun… even when we're home."
In his mind, he thinks that maybe, just maybe, in another reality, she could've made him a better person a long time before now.
But with that mischievous gleam that settles in her eyes, Dick can never be too sure.