Disclaimer: I don't own Thor.
Summary: A broken air conditioner and the stifling summer heat cause Darcy to resort to desperate measures to stay cool - a trip to the public pool is in order and her Trickster boyfriend is along for the ride. LokiDarcy, twoshot
And, another Thor fic. This one is a twoshot, though (a rarity for me)! And very crack-y. Oh, my gosh, it's crack-y. And AU. I don't think I'll ever get tired of writing for this fandom, for real. And I'm taking a bit of liberty with Loki's abilities in this just because. Artistic license and the crackfic, I suppose, and it was fun to twist things. Haha. Anyway, I just thought this was a cute idea and I hope that y'all enjoy this fic! I would love to hear your opinions and everything! Thanks so much for reading!
Beating the Heat
Part I
The sun shone through the curtains, bathing Darcy Lewis in the frantic morning light.
Her apartment, of course, faced the wrong way. Well, at least her bedroom window did, casting the sunlight in her direction every morning if she didn't close the curtains the right way, or if she managed to not put the blinds a certain way. Or, really, if she just looked at the window wrong, she was likely to burn out her corneas.
She digressed.
Darcy groaned and rolled over, pressing her palms into her eyes and wishing that her apartment wasn't in such an unfortunate position. The sun also heated up the room a great deal, causing her to kick the covers and growl in annoyance. That damned ceiling fan of hers wasn't working, and the air conditioner happened to go on the fritz last night. And it seemed that summer chose this very day to rear its stupid, too-hot face. She stuck her toes out from under the sheets in a desperate attempt to salvage some kind of comfortable coolness. In that same moment, she stuck her arm underneath the pillow, wondering if the cool side of the pillow was, in fact, still cool.
And at that moment, her arm brushed against someone else's. Someone who, apparently, had the same idea. That very someone that robbed the coolness from underneath the pillow, causing it to be just as hot as the rest of the place.
She grabbed the thin wrist in her fingers and stared at him. He was blissfully asleep. Or, well, that was what anyone else would have thought. She could make out the faintest upturn of his lips in that familiar smile of his. Darcy knew if he was awake, his eyes would be glinting mischievously.
"Oh, honey…" she cooed, an edge to her voice.
He didn't stir.
"Loki," she crooned in a sing-song manner, "my dear little mischief-maker. Wake u-up."
His nose twitched.
Darcy smirked.
"Go ahead and laugh," he started, eyes still closed. "You know I cannot stand it when you use those terms of endearment towards me."
Her smirk turned into a full-blown grin.
"What do you want?"
"You stole the cool side of the pillow from me."
This caused him to open his eyes and stare at her. The crisp green of them always took her off guard, and this morning, no matter how hot, wasn't an exception. She stared right back at him, trying to seem unaffected, and offered him a snide smile.
"I believe that is impossible to actually steal," he replied calmly.
"No it isn't," Darcy argued, "because you did it. Just now. Like yeah."
"Convincing argument."
"I know," she said, tilting her head slightly in an imitation of his usual regal stance.
Loki moved his arm out from underneath the pillow, finding that Darcy's fingers were still in a bracelet around his wrist. He stared at the slender fingers and sighed. "What is this?"
"Just getting your attention."
"Any excuse to get your hands on me, I suppose."
Darcy grinned, knowing that he was half-right. As he was most of the time. She wasn't even shameful in admitting it. The pulse under her fingers was steady, strong, and she relished feeling that. He quirked a brow at her in that eloquent way that only he could and pressed his fingers to the ones locked around his wrist.
"What?"
"Do something about it."
"About what?"
Darcy expanded her free arm as if she was displaying the room for a potential buyer. "This."
Both eyebrows lifted this time in an incredulous expression.
"What?"
"The…the heat problem." She glared at him, her eyes flickering with something akin to pleading. "Or the lack-of-a-cool-side-of-a-pillow problem."
Loki scoffed. "How do you expect me to do that, then?"
A pause.
"Pull a David Blaine on this place."
Loki laughed, albeit a bit confusedly. He had yet to master all of the famous magicians that she taunted him with. "Well, I could always freeze the pillow completely solid. There would be no limitations of a 'cool side' there."
"Nice. But I like my pillow."
"Really? It's rather lumpy."
"Buy a new one for yourself, then."
Loki smiled, clearly liking that he got a rise out of her. He sat up, and in doing so freed himself from her grasp. The heat didn't seem to be getting to him, which made Darcy slightly jealous, and she sighed. Taking in his appearance, she felt slightly better that he wasn't as immune to bedhead as he was to the heat. Snickering, she reached out and pressed down the flyaway strands of his hair. He only looked slightly uncomfortable as she did so, so that was a plus.
"You just need to work on your endurance, is all."
"Endurance? I've spent months with Jane Foster running around the desert chasing lightning or whatever like we were the freakin' Storm Chasers. I have loads of endurance."
"Maybe tolerance would be a more appropriate word, then."
"Maybe," she acquiesced. "But you still need to fix it."
"Aren't you capable?" he asked, a knowing smile on his lips.
"No." The time in which she tried to fix the ceiling fan came to mind. She'd ended up pulling on the strings too hard and the whole thing came crashing down on her bed, plaster and all kinds of mess everywhere. Loki had been the one to position the fan back on the ceiling, but it hadn't worked since. And he was teasing her about it.
Loki leaned back against her bed frame, crossing his arms over his chest. "Ah, yes. I remember several incidents of your attempted cunning."
"Yes," she said, "so help a sistah out."
"It would be rather disturbing if you were my sister. Why would you say such a thing?"
Caught off guard, Darcy burst into laughter. It took her a while to gather herself, and then she looked at Loki, who had no idea what the problem was. Just smile and nod, someone had told him before, just smile and nod. This seemed to be one of those situations, but he was unable to decrease the clueless look in his eyes.
"Aren't you able to do something?"
Loki pursed his lips for a moment and then said, "I could set fire to that chair over there. And, according to your explanation of why that was inappropriate during the winter, those 'sprinkler' things will go off and soak the place." He looked at her and then amended, as if she needed special explanation as to where he was going with this, "Water is cold."
"Yeah, but then my whole place would be soaked!"
"But you would be cold. Is that not what you desired?"
"There are a lot of things I desire," she said, imitating his voice almost pitch-perfectly on that last word, "but living in Waterworld is not one of them."
"Yes, but you wanted cold, not dry."
"Dry would be preferable, Loki."
"But preferable is boring," he drawled, lifting a hand and examining it.
"Yeah, yeah, because you're the god of mischief, I know," she said, smacking his hand and burying her face in the pillow at the same time, "but I don't want too much mischief. Not now. I'm in the late symptoms of heat stroke."
Was it always so unbearably hot in her apartment? It seemed ridiculous. She really needed to get someone to fix it. If it wasn't her Houdini of a boyfriend, it could be Thor. Or she'd call the repair guy assigned to the apartment complex she lived in. And he was creepy as all get out. Calling him was like calling a stalker.
If only there was something she could do…
And then it hit her.
Darcy's head shot up and almost knocked against Loki's, who had been leaning down to whisper something in her ear. "The pool! Let's go to the pool!"
"Pool?" Loki blinked.
"The apartment complex's pool. It's right around the corner. The gated thing. Yeah. That should help. Going swimming." She sighed dreamily at the thought of it.
"But how does that solve the problem here?"
Darcy let out a breath. "It doesn't."
Loki quirked a brow.
"But it's fun!" she said, sitting up and throwing the covers off of her legs. She started toward the kitchen. "And we could use some fun."
Loki started to laugh as he followed her.
"Not that much fun," Darcy said, turning to face him. He immediately put on an innocent look. "I won't like it if you decide to turn the pool water purple or something."
"I was thinking more…red. Actually."
"Okay, Elizabeth Bathory."
Silence followed. She really needed to get him a dictionary of everything that was culturally important.
"What are you doing?"
"Going to make breakfast."
A sharp chuckling met her ears. "By that you mean, I'll make breakfast while you watch."
Darcy felt her cheeks flush. But he wasn't wrong. She arranged her features into a shit-eating grin and said, "If you insist."
"I'll cook you breakfast," he said, watching her as she walked back to her bedroom, no doubt to get prepared for whatever hell she had in store for them in their trip to the pool, "but I get free reign at the pool."
"Free reign," Darcy called, scoffing as if he said something particularly amusing. "You get free reign if you fix the heat problem in the apartment."
"You are talking in circles, Lewis."
"But you said you could freeze my pillow - that you could set things on fire…what…"
"I lied."
"Evil," she gasped melodramatically, far too used to his tales. "Evil."
Loki just smiled as he began getting things together for their breakfast. "I try."
"Try less." He heard the bathroom door close behind her.
"Since I'm evil, can I manipulate the pool water to be whatever I choose?" he called, knowing her answer.
"No!" she cried back, though he could hear the weariness to her voice that suggested something different.
He smiled to himself. "I believe you want to witness it."
A pause.
"Fine," she relented. "But if we get caught, I don't know you."
End Part I.