A/N: Epilogue for s01e05 "All Tomorrow's Parties." Spoilers should be assumed. As always, questions, comments, concrit, and squee are welcomed. I always appreciate hearing what I did right, as well as what I should try next. Thank you.
Pushed
by LadySilver
Everything Stephen wants to say feels inadequate or incomplete, so he stands next to his best friend in silence for a long time. He wants to tell her about his night, needs to tell her, and yet can't figure out where to begin. How can she understand the awfulness of witnessing someone's powers get taken away when she doesn't yet understand the magnificence of having them? How can she sympathize with his guilt over his part in the Tomorrow People's betrayal when she knows nothing of how much he's fought for them?
His eyes sting with tears and his heart feels heavy, yet for the first time that night, he thinks he'll be able to make it through.
The breeze off the river ruffles his hair, and when Astrid hugs her arms to ward off a chill, he regrets having put his blazer down before bringing her out here. The smile stays on her face. He can't tell if she's awed at the teleporting or the inclusion in his secret or just the more basic fact that he trusted her. The answer is probably running through her mind, but he respects her enough not to read it.
He doesn't push her. The riverwalk is nearly empty; there's no one to see them, and probably no one would care if they did. A couple is strolling a ways down and in the distance he hears the low hooting of a barge horn.
At last he asks, "Are you ready to go back?"
They're still holding hands, so he doesn't need to ask that either.
"How...?" she asks. He can see her struggling to form the rest of the sentence: How did we get here? Or maybe: How do we get home? Or: How did you do that?
Fortunately, the answer is the same.
"Teleporting," he answers, supplying the word. With a shrug, he preempts the next question. "Don't ask me to explain how I do it, because I really can't."
She processes this, her eyes twinkling in the reflected lights of the skyline. He's sometimes stunned by how beautiful she is. He thinks of her so much for all the internal qualities that form the glue of their friendship that he doesn't usually see her looks. "You were telling the truth," she says, turning to him with something like awe in her eyes. She's talking about when she caught him exiting the janitor's closet and about when he told her he had superpowers before he understood how dangerous that world was. "I thought it was just your meds."
"It kind of was," he says. "The meds were getting in the way. They're why it took me so long to figure out what was really going on."
"And what is really going on, Stephen?" she asks. She tightens her grip, a silent plea for him not to pull away before he finishes answering her questions.
"Let's go back." He fingers the bloodstain on his shirt sleeve and tugs at the tie around his neck. "I need to change out of this. Throw it away before my mom sees it."
She nods and holds out her other hand for him to take. He does, but only because her touch, the warmth of her skin against his, is something he needs right now.
They're back in his room before she can blink. Her skirt flutters in the transit-breeze, the ends of her braids sway.
"Give me a sec," he says. He turns away, undoes the tie, strips off the shirt and teleports a third time to a Dumpster nearby where he can dispose of them. His mother will shit when she finds out that they're gone, but a feigned ignorance about where they went is so much easier to deal with than trying to explain the blood. Irene's blood. Emotion clenches his chest as he thinks of her, the girl he had to drop off in the ER, alone. He couldn't stay with her, couldn't even stick around long enough to explain what had happened to her. He doesn't know how much she remembers or what kind of cover story she'll be able to concoct in her pain, and he regrets that she should be burdened with that as well.
The lid of the Dumpster clangs down, its ring echoing through the rank alley. Stephen hears footsteps and the barking of a dog and he goes still until they pass by. He checks that no one is watching and returns, once again, to his bedroom.
Astrid hasn't moved. She's staring at the spot he disappeared from, the one her reappeared in, with open-mouthed shock. "That's... really real," she says.
He nods. He can teleport, and it's still sometimes a shock when he sees the others do it, too, like they've inserted themselves into some private fantasy. "I'm sorry," he says, though what he means the apology for, even he's not sure.
Forgetting that he's half-naked, he pulls her close, presses his body to hers. She tenses for a second, then wraps her arms around him.
"Three people died tonight," he whispers into the crook of her neck. His breath is warm against her skin and he can feel her pulse against his cheek. "Someone else is in the hospital and I don't know yet if she'll make it." He doesn't mention Kurt because he's not sure how. The guy just wanted all the things Stephen had: a continued relationship with his mother, a home, a normal life. In siding with ULTRA, he ended up outcaste and stripped of his powers.
"Oh, Stephen," Astrid replies. She pulls them down together to sit on the side of the bed, still wrapped in each others' arms. Her skin smells of roses.
"This is my life now. Because of what I can do." He thinks again of Kurt and wonders how differently things would have turned out if Jedikiah had given him that shot in the beginning. Would his friends still be alive? Would he? Would it be worth it to give up his powers so that he could have a real normal life and not the facsimile of one he has now that requires him to disappoint and lie to everyone?
Astrid holds him as he starts to cry. The tears drip warm and wet down his face. There's no holding them back; the grief is too strong. It's a long time before he realizes that she's crying, too.
When he pulls away, her face is red and puffy. She still looks beautiful. Stephen grabs the edge of his sheet and dries his face, knowing that he's also red and puffy. "I don't know what to do," he confesses.
Her brow creases. She drops her gaze then raises it back up to meet his. "Stephen, what can you do?"
His fingers have raked through his hair so many times that night that when he drags a hand through it again, the strands feel spiny and clumped together like some kind of cactus. "You figured out there's more, huh?"
A wry grin twists her lips. "Well, you did tell me you could move the basketball. How come that didn't work? Were you trying to throw me off the scent?"
"God, no, Astrid. It didn't work because I didn't know what I was doing yet. I still don't. I'm getting better. Teleporting with you tonight is one of the first times I've taken someone else and not landed on my ass. What else is there?" He concentrates and turns the water on his bathroom, dampens a clean washcloth, and floats it out to them. As he catches it out of the air, he says, "That's telekinesis. I'm still getting the hang of that, too. There's...a couple other things." He holds the wet cloth out to her like a peace offering.
Accepting it, she dabs at her eyes, cleaning away the smeared mascara. "Like how you knew that Emily needed help?"
"Yeah." Getting that lie off his chest is a relief and the sigh that follows is long.
She sits in silence for a moment, twisting the now-stained washcloth around her fingers. Water drips on her dress, but she doesn't seem to notice. "So, how are you learning all this. Is someone teaching you?"
He nods, impressed with how fast she's putting the pieces together, especially considering how little he's told her. "Others like me. They're kind of a group of outcasts. They've been teaching me. The ones who died, they were part of that group."
"And the Secret Service agent?"
He thinks about how much to tell her now, whether it's still worth keeping some secrets back. He'll never be able to forgive himself if something happens to Astrid because he brought her too far into his world.
She sees his hesitation and lightly punches his arm. "Don't you dare pretend that I can't handle it, Stephen Jameson."
He smiles at her tone. The humor, the light chiding in it, is the way they've always talked to each other. When he hears it, he knows everything is okay between them. "Darcy," he answers, supplying his partner's name. "She's like me, but she's not part of the group. It's hard to explain." He throws up his hands in self-defense before Astrid can reprimand him for holding out on her. "It really is hard to explain," he insists. "And there's a lot of it that I don't understand very well."
"If it helps," Astrid offers after studying him for a minute, "I can wait. I just to need to know that I won't have to wait forever."
It's an out he's grateful to accept. He doesn't want to try to untangle the history of the Tomorrow People and ULTRA right now, doesn't want to deal with explaining Jedikiah and John. His father. "I promise," he answers.
She licks her lips, nods. Her fingers brush his forearm where the bloodstained sleeve had been. Then she wraps her arms around him once again and draws him to her. He doesn't push her away. He's learning that none of his powers are strong enough for that. Giving up, he sinks back into the security of the unquestioning friendship Astrid has always offered and the stability that she brings to the turmoil of his night, and his life. "It's OK," she assures him. "I'm not going anywhere."
END