AN: Obviously, I have not posted any fic for quite a while. While I'm still very fond of WordGirl, it's settled to the back burner of my brain as other fandoms have caught my interest. But I've had a couple almost-finished fics sitting on my computer for ages, just waiting for a bit of editing. I figured it was high time to post them, especially as they both take place around this time of year. I'll have the other one up soon.
This fic is the single most pointlessly fluffy thing I have ever written in my life. That's not the genre I usually go in for, but this idea popped into my head while I was listening to music one day and I couldn't shake it. (If you're curious, the song was a mashup called "It's Time to Run Juliet," which you can find easily on YouTube. It very much captures the vibe I was trying to go for here.)
Becky rubbed at her bleary eyes and closed her notebook. This college essay was going nowhere fast, and she had other work to do. She pulled out another notebook and turned wearily back to her final essay for English.
It was the first week of June, and as Woodview High's seniors began to gleefully shrug off their workload in anticipation of graduation, the juniors' troubles were just beginning. Teachers were bogging them down with papers and projects, finals were rapidly approaching, and the college counseling office had been ominously warning them that it was time to "get serious" about their college search. It would have been a suffocating onslaught even if Becky didn't have to save Fair City from supervillains twice a day. And this past week they'd been especially bad – an endless stream of robberies, take-over-the-city schemes, and general mischief. And so Becky found herself sitting at her desk late on Sunday night, trying desperately to finish the work that was due in the next few days.
She flipped through the pages and began to read the paragraph where she'd left off.
For the young people of Athens, the forest represents freedom from the strictures of their parents and the city as a whole – a "green world" where anything can happen. The "green world" appears in Shakespeare's comedies almost without exception, as the teenaged protagonists escape the structure and rules of the city to the chaos and freedom of the natural world. In this world – whether a forest, an island, or a pastoral village – they are free to invent themselves and their relationships as they choose, without the heavy hand of adult authority looming over them. But – as the characters of Midsummer soon learn – all freedom comes with a price. In the forest, chaos reigns, as the mischievous fairies rearrange their relationships and desires like
"Like … like …" she mumbled to herself, trying to think of a way to finish her simile. "C'mon, focus ..."
Instead, she leaned back in her desk chair to stare out her open window. A warm summer breeze stirred her curtains, and she could see the twinkling lights of the city in the distance. She tilted her head, engaging her super hearing, and listened intently. There – the music, laughter, and shrieks of the annual carnival filled her head. She sighed with longing.
Then she jerked her head and made herself face the desk again. She picked up her pen and tapped it against the table, staring at her unfinished sentence.
Rearrange their relationships and desires like…
Tap, tap, tap.
Relationships and desires like…
Tap. Tap.
Like…
Tap.
Tap.
THUD.
The noise jerked her into alertness. She turned, and saw that a stone was now sitting in the middle of her floor. Confused, she glanced around the room, then stood, picked up the stone, and went to her window.
"Sorry!" called a figure standing in her yard. "I didn't know it was open!"
Becky squinted at the figure, then the rock in her hand, then the figure again.
"Tobey McCallister," she hissed, "what are you doing in my yard at –" she glanced behind her to check the time "—11:10 at night?"
"You didn't make it to the carnival," he said. "Today or yesterday."
"I told you guys, I was busy." Thanks to a mind control scheme from Mr. Big and then yet another attention-grabbing ploy form Victoria Best, she'd been forced to miss Violet's big trip to the carnival not once but twice. And after she, Scoops, and Tobey had rescheduled for her so nicely.
"So we gathered," said Tobey. "We do watch the news, you know."
Becky couldn't help but smile a little. There were a lot of advantages to her best friends knowing her secret identity. It had been a couple years since she'd told them, but the honesty and ease of it still surprised her sometimes.
"So I'll ask again," she said. "Why are you in my yard at 11:10 at night? And by the way, you idiot," she added affectionately, "You're darn lucky the window was open. This thing would've shattered it." She hefted the stone in her hand, then let it drop down beneath her window. Tobey went to pick it up, moving closer to the back porch lights, and now she could see the mischievous grin on his face.
"Well, I guess this isn't going at all as planned, is it?" he said. "I think it was supposed to go something like this." He cleared his throat and extended one hand to take a dramatic pose. "'But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?'"
"Don't you dare!" Becky cried, unable to keep a laugh from breaking through her last syllable.
"'It is the East,'" Tobey continued, "'And Becky is the sun!'"
"Shut up," she hissed, blushing as she looked frantically over her shoulder. "My parents will wake up!" She tried to listen for the sounds of their breathing, but couldn't hear anything. "Tobey, why are you here?"
"To take you to the carnival!"
She stared at him, squinting at his face to see if he was joking. He sensed her surprise and pushed on.
"It's open late tonight, for their last night in town. Let's go! You deserve some fun."
She gaped at him for a few more seconds before she realized he was serious. "Tobey, I have work to do!"
"So do I! Who cares? We're practically seniors! Let's go have fun!"
"Keep – it – down!" Becky checked over her shoulder once more, then hissed, "I'm coming down there." She pushed the window up further and put one foot on the sill, then zoomed down to land right in front of Tobey. In the instant after her landing, she could see his eyes widen ever so slightly. She knew her powers still caught her friends off-guard sometimes, when they were only thinking of her as Becky. But standing here now, it was funny to think how concerned she'd once been with protecting her secret identity, even from the people she trusted most. Amazing how problems that loomed so large over her younger self seemed laughable in retrospect.
Amazing, too, that Tobey now fell in the category of most-trusted. For so long, he had just been a villain to her, and a particularly aggravating one at that. But staring up at the lanky boy now, she could only see a good friend, who understood her jokes and problems and dreams in a way none of her other friends did. Tobey had mellowed considerably upon hitting high school, his mania for robots gradually taking on a more constructive bent as he tackled increasingly difficult engineering courses. And with a little bit of pushing by Becky, he had melded gracefully into their friend group. Now, he was the bridge between her life as Wordgirl and her life as Becky – a reminder that she could be both without sacrificing what was important.
And Tobey was certainly important to her. She knew it, and she could tell her friends – and probably the rest of the school – knew it too. As the years passed she had found herself naturally leaning in to him, touching his arm to get his attention, leading him by the hand where she wanted him to go. It all felt so natural and right – they didn't need to be "official," didn't need to try to cram themselves into the boyfriend/girlfriend roles and clichés. They just needed each other's company.
Becky found herself leaning into him a little now. Tobey had grown literally as well as figuratively in the past years, while Becky remained petite, much to her never-ending frustration. She craned her neck to see his face.
"I have an English essay, a college essay, a US history research project, three sections' worth of precal problems, and two lab write-ups due in the next week. I would have less, if all your pals in the Villains' Association hadn't been tearing the city up nonstop. I can't go to the carnival with you."
He smiled in that irritating way she always associated with their old battles. "Take all that work and add in a final project for my Advanced Engineering course, and you've got everything that I haven't finished. Becky, everyone has mountains of work to do, and no one is doing it! How much are you going to get done tonight, anyways?"
Becky glanced back at her window. "I was planning to go to bed soon and finish my work in the morning …"
"So come to the carnival for half an hour," Tobey said, grabbing her arms. "We don't exactly have to worry about traffic, do we?"
His enthusiasm was infectious, and standing here in the yard in the dead of night, the entire thing seemed so surreal and so possible. He was right, after all; there was only so much more she could do tonight.
"Half an hour," she said, pointing her finger at him firmly. "Let me go comb my hair."
After hours hunched over her desk, the carnival felt like a strange hallucination to Becky, a dizzying blur of sights and sounds and smells. She leaned against the side of a game booth, slowly tearing of pieces of the cotton candy that Tobey had insisted on buying for her. She let the sweet fluff melt in her mouth as she took in the scene, wide-eyed. The pop music blasting from the booth next to her battled with hawkers' cries and delighted shrieks coming from the rides. Further down the lane, the Tilt-a-Whirl and the Cyclone cut swathes of brilliant neon light into the darkness as they hurled their passengers through space. Above it all, the Ferris Wheel turned serenely, surveying its domain.
"Here," Tobey said at her shoulder, and Becky started.
"You scared me," she scolded as she took the drink he was offering.
"Not falling asleep on me, are you?" he said, taking a sip of his own soda.
"In the middle of all this? Not likely." The flight from her house to the boardwalk had woken her up, and the bright clamor of the carnival was keeping her eyes open. She sipped her lemonade and looked across the way, where a group of giggly college-aged kids was trying to convince a ride operator to let them on the kiddie coaster. Tobey followed her gaze and pursed his lips in concentration, a look she recognized well.
"Give me my toolbox and an hour alone with that coaster, and I'll make it into a real ride," he said.
"No," she said firmly, grabbing his hand and leading him away.
She paused to dump her cotton candy cone in a trash can and glanced back at the group. "It's really different at night, isn't it?" she said. "No screaming little kids, just grown-ups. And us."
"Speak for yourself, I'm very grown-up."
"You're very full of it, that's what you are." She nudged him playfully back towards the street, remembering for once to tone down her super strength. "C'mon, I want to go on the Zipper."
It was after their second turn on the Tilt-a-Whirl that Becky saw the first villains. She had been raring for another go, but Tobey, staggering and a little green in the face, had begged off.
"Tilt-a-Whirl, more like Tilt-a-Hurl," he was grumbling under his breath as they looked around for a place to sit. Becky was thinking of a reply when she glanced back over her shoulder and saw Miss Question leaning against a midway booth, deep in conversation with the operator. A burst of adrenaline shot up her spine and she dropped Tobey's arm, her hand flying to her heart, ready to transform. But then Miss Question and the carnival worker burst into laughter, and the man reached up to take down a small stuffed animal from the prize rack. He presented it to her with a flirtatious flourish, and Miss Question smiled coyly as she accepted the gift. Becky slowly backed down from her fighting stance and followed Tobey to a bench, glancing over her shoulder nervously. But Miss Question stayed where she was, chatting with the worker.
After that, as she and Tobey wandered the carnival to work off Tobey's nausea, the villains jumped into focus like hidden objects in a kids' puzzle. The Whammer was shoveling fried dough into his mouth while Chuck looked on warily; the Butcher was trying to convince a worker that knocking bottles over with meat powers was still a legitimate win; she even spotted Doctor Two Brains and Lady Redundant Woman sitting at a secluded table. Every time, Becky tensed, ready to fly into action. But no one seemed to have any interest in making trouble.
At last, Becky turned to Tobey and demanded, "Is every villain in the city here? Was there some kind of memo?" She was only half-joking; Tobey was still technically a member of the Villains' Association, and still took his robots out for a spin a couple times every year, for old times' sake.
"No memo," Tobey said, looking amused at her consternation. "I'm sure they're just enjoying the carnival, same as us."
"Well, I was enjoying the carnival a lot better before –" Becky froze as she rounded a corner.
Her parents were standing halfway down the street.
A hundred dire possibilities leapt into her mind. They found out, they heard us leave, they're going to ground me for the rest of my life, they're going to ship me off to boarding school – but, she realized suddenly, they were not charging down the street to drag her back home. They weren't even looking at her.
They were playing a midway game.
"I'm gonna get this one, Tim!" shrieked her mother, winding up to throw a ball. "Go big or go home!" She hurled the ball, and the sound of shattering glass echoed from within the booth. The attendant, looking relieved to have dodged her powerful throw, handed Sally Botsford an enormous stuffed gorilla. She jumped up and down with excitement and presented the prize to her husband, who laughed and kissed her.
"Are those … your parents?" asked Tobey.
"'We're going to bed now, sweetie!'" Becky mocked. "'We'll see you in the morning! Don't stay up too late!' I can't believe –" But it was hard to be angry with her parents when they were laughing and holding each other's hands like love-struck teenagers. "What is up with this city tonight?"
"Perhaps we should leave, before they turn and see us?" Tobey suggested, a hint of nervousness creeping into his voice.
"Right! Good idea," she said, letting him take her arm and lead her back the way they'd come. Under the glittering lights, with her parents acting so strangely, it somehow seemed like she could walk right up and join them. It would be best to get out of their path before that illusion shattered.
"Let's go down to the beach," Becky said.
After the dizzy, claustrophobic clamor of the carnival, the beach felt massive and empty. A few couples lay scattered further down the shore, but in front of Tobey and Becky there was only cool sand and lapping waves.
A warm breeze came then, stirring their hair, bringing a taste of the summer to come. Becky could almost smell sunscreen and bug spray and campfire smoke. She dropped her shoes in the sand and moved forward to let the water lap at her feet.
"Aah, it's freezing!" she gasped, plowing forward anyways. "My feet are going to go numb. C'mon, Tobey," she added, waving him over.
"Oh, yes, you're quite the saleswoman," he griped, "you make it sound so pleasant …" But he dropped his shoes next to hers and waded in.
Becky stared at the sky above to take her mind off her tingling feet. The lights of the city drowned out most of the stars, but the moon was large and full, seeming to gaze at the distant noise and lights of the carnival with a quiet tolerance.
"'Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon …'" Becky murmured.
"What's that?"
"It's from Midsummer Night's Dream," Becky said. "I chose it for our final paper."
"Not Romeo and Juliet?"
Becky shook her head. "Too sad for spring."
"Summer."
"Almost," she chided. "We've still got a bit of school to go."
Tobey nodded slowly, and his shoulders slumped as realization overtook him. "Oh, my god," he said softly. "I haven't even started my college essay."
Becky laughed and nudged his shoulder. "I have four sentences," she said. "And mine's due before first period."
"Rough," he said. "I have until after lunch, at least." He put his hands in his pockets. "Where're you looking? For schools, I mean?"
Becky groaned and put her face in her hands. She considered her answers: the full list, the condensed list, or, as she'd taken to telling the legions of interested adults out of sheer necessity: "I'm not sure yet." But she didn't want to give any of those answers. She didn't want to talk about college, or schoolwork, or even how much time they had before they should head home.
"You know what?" she said, taking her hands off her face. "No college." She pressed a finger to Tobey's lips. "No school, no responsibilities. Not tonight. Tonight is for fun. Let's stay out until it's light! Let's blow off our homework!" She laughed giddily. "The rest of the city is!"
"Who are you, and what have you done with Becky Botsford?" Tobey asked, staring at her like she'd suddenly sprouted wings.
Becky just grabbed his hand. "Let's go on the Ferris wheel," she said. Then, quickly, she pulled him close and kissed his cheek. "After all," she said, "we're practically seniors."
"I have definitely been a bad influence on you," said Tobey. Becky just laughed and dragged him back up the beach.
In the morning, there would be consequences. There would be a sleepless night and an excruciating day; there would be assignments rushed and half-done and not done at all. But for now, she was young, and it was summer, and the green world was all around her.
She was going to savor every minute.