The girl sits on the rooftop of her dormitory at the academy, short silver hair rustling in the breeze. It is near the middle of the night. She has to be up early, her team makes their way to Raven's Port tomorrow - or at least what's left of her team as she saw it. She is well aware of the growing late hour, but she does not care. The past week has been hell for her, if only because most of the month before it had been the closest thing she could've described as heaven.
Riley Vera Eckhart was still coming to terms with the fact that she had feelings for him.
The girl pulls a flask from her coat, flipping it over to glance at the lotus engraved on the front face, then pops the cap & takes a swig. A moment; a gift he'd told her. The liquor burns - a cinnamon flavor - one she swished about in her mouth, feeling it splash over the piercing in her tongue. She leans over the short railing that surrounds the rooftop, looking out across the city landscape that she saw on her first day here. The one she saw with him. She feels something wet slide down her face; something not liquor. And she's well aware that she's crying, but she tells herself that everything's fine. She tells herself everything has to stay fine if she's going to be able to function like a normal person in the Port tomorrow.
Jack is not coming back, & Riley knows this.
It is one month before: Team Four's third training session. The day had been uneventful, and the hour dedicated to actual practice of their arts had just come to a close. An already exhausted looking Opal & Malik were heading back of Moreau's main buildings. The training session had been brutally physical for being only the second one - to prepare them for field combat as their exemplar had put it. Something about how they needed to work on reflexes because monsters in a real fight wouldn't be giving them the chance to stand around figuring out what to do. Mostly it had just left Riley feeling humiliated, as her constant lack of sleeping certainly wasn't helping her to be more alert.
"Jack, wait," she said, tugging at the taller boy's arm just as he had turned to head back to the larger part of the campus. "Round two, you & me, let's go."
"Do we have to? That was tiring enough." Jack replied.
"Come on, I've still got some energy in me, one more quick fight, then we call it quits."
"I'm too tired."
"Really? 'Cuz you looked way more tired a few days ago when you were beating the shit outta your brother."
Jack wasn't even two steps away when he made a full dead stop.
"Okay, low blow, I know. But please?" Riley half-apologized to him. "I need this. I don't want to feel like a burden to the team."
"Alright fine, one round. Last standing wins." the blonde stated, turning back to his teammate.
The knife-handed puppet was already upon him, darting toward his position with a flick of Riley's wrist. Jack dodged a swipe from the bladed fingers, trying to push the thing away before a jab of Riley's elbow pulled the Doll into another slashing swing. Mid-slash, Jack grabs the Doll by the arm, pulling it around him & kicking it full force back at Riley, leaving hardly time for the girl to react. Riley darts to the side, throwing herself to the ground as the puppet lands in a heap where she'd stood a second ago. Jack walks over to lend the girl a hand to help her to her feet.
Riley giggles as Jack stands over her. Her finger twitches & Jack is suddenly pulled off balance. As he falls to the ground, he throws out his arms, landing face to face, inches above the girl with a hand in the grass on either side of her head.
"You let your guard down there." she says to him with that smug grin plastered across her face.
His chest feels breathless. Hers feels full of butterflies. It was the most thrilling moment of the week for both of them.
It is 3 days before he leaves. Jack hasn't told a soul what he & his brother plan to do. He can't bear it. Jack knows he doesn't have much of a choice in the matter. He & his brother have to leave. Their mother is ill, their already broken family is falling further apart with each day & he feels as though he can do nothing from here at the school. And he has to do something. he's always been the one taking care of them. It's his burden, his responsibility. Surely Riley would understand that? But he wasn't sure how to word it - how to express it. She'd always been better with relating how she felt, no matter how infrequently she seemed to do it. It seemed like just yesterday she'd spilled her guts about how she thought she'd seen her dad passing through the school courtyard. Riley had complained to him before, well, confided in him rather, about how much the thought of seeing her father again was both terrifying & exhilarating to her. Despite everything she'd gone though when she was younger, despite her 'family curse' that she'd bragged about, there was still something hopefully in her begging that he was alright.
Jack was leaving in 3 days & he still hadn't told Riley.
But here they were at some small festival in Jecil, wandering the crowed streets where numerous shops had been set up. It was one of their days off from the usual run of classes & they'd spent most of the morning out here. Riley had been excitedly darting from stand to stand, having Jack carry a bunch of different foods she'd picked up. The girl walks back over to him, dumping a large bag of caramelized popcorn & four of those straws filled with honey into his arms. "You can eat some if you want." Riley says to him, clearly puzzled by the worrisome look stretched across his face. "Is something wrong?"
He hides it quickly with a smile, reasoning again with himself that she doesn't need to know. "No, nothing," Jack quickly responds, "You sure picked out a lot of stuff here. Guess it helps that your family was rich or something."
"I figured everyone in our team would want some snacks during down time in the dorm." Riley somberly says back to him. "And we're not really that that rich. Even less so now. Still better off than most I guess."
Jack starts stuffing the snacks into a bag he brought along while continuing to trail behind her through the maze of boutiques. It's clear Riley still doesn't like talking about her heritage, but he's not going to push it. As they pass by another one of the little tent-shops, something catches Jack's eye. Years from now he'd question whether he'd cursed the girl with a lifetime of alcoholism for it, but for now as he talked with the store-owner he only saw it as a trinket that Riley would enjoy.
"Here." Jack says to Riley as he catches back up with her a few booths down the road. "A memento. A gift for you. Something to remember all these great times we've had together."
In his hand is a small flask with a lotus flower engraved on the front.
It is somewhere in the middle of the month. Riley & Jack sit in the girl's room. Jack is outstretched on her bed, tossing & catching one of her numerous stuffed animals. His favorite among them is some plated & spiky-looking red monster from some old video game she used to play. Riley sits across the room, her back to him, benched in front of her keyboard as she tinkers with the settings on it. Every so often she sweeps her fingers across the keys - testing the sounds before going back to fiddling with the various dials & buttons as if she was looking for some specific sound.
Jack was clearly getting bored. With each toss of the stuffed toy, he propelled it higher & higher until he was smacking the ceiling of the room with it. After catching it once more, he tossed it towards Riley, smacking the girl in the back of the head with it. Harmlessly, it bounced off her landing perfectly in the hood of her usual sweatshirt.
"He shoots. He scooooreeess!" she said sarcastically as she felt the soft material of the toy on the back of her neck. Not even turning around, she posed the that seemed to be one of the silent elephants in the room (the other being an actual stuffed toy elephants). "You bored?"
"Very." Was Jack's immediate answer. It had been a long day of classes, & unfortunately no one seemed to have any solid plans for the afternoon & evening. So the two of them had just been hanging out here, wondering if the rest of their team would slip back into the dorm from wherever they had been. A few chords from the keyboard drew Jacks attention as he saw Riley's hands side across the instrument. The girl started stringing together the beginnings of a song, & it was as if all the air in the room had been pulled to her fingertips.
"I thought I was hopeless, I thought I was broken,
I struggled to laugh when the whole room was joking.
I'd wait in the cold, but the door wouldn't open 'til I,
'Til I heard your voice in a dream..."
Jack sat up as the rhythm continued. He'd never really listened to her play before. It was obvious that puppetry was not the only thing Riley could do well with her hands. He'd often heard the sound from outside the door of her room, but never before had he actually sat down & focused on it, & he'd certainly never...
"I've never heard you sing before." he stated, still mesmerized by the tune.
"I don't often," she replied as she took her hands off the keyboard & turned to him. "Not really a big fan of my own voice most of the time, but at least I can keep on pitch. You ever play?"
"Not piano, no."
"Well come over here."
Riley's had rose, gently waving him over as she turned back around. The soft glow from her fingers signaled use of her magic, but all Jack felt was a small tug as he rose form her bed. it was more of her way of being expressive. Half the time Riley didn't even notice she was doing it. Jack plucked the stuffed animal from her hood as he approached her. As she feels him leaning over, Riley softly grabs his wrists, placing them over the keyboard. Holding her own hands above his, the familiar soft glow again encompasses her fingertips - this time unmistakably intentional. Jack feels the usual tingle of the magic, watching as she manipulates his hands over the keys. The tune begins again, Jacks fingers pressing on each key as Riley's mimic (or rather direct) the movement with her hands only an inch above his.
"And nothing comes easy when everyone's rushing,
The signal's got speed but there's no real connection.
I tried reaching out but it was just my reflection 'til I,
'Til I heard your voice in a dream..."
Riley stops, letting go of Jack's hands. "See? Not so hard. Probably doesn't really count but..." Jack's hands suddenly reach up to stroke her cheek. He kneels down beside her, turning her face to his.
They kiss. Longingly, passionately, for the first time since they'd met. And Riley's heart is pounding at the thought that after these few short weeks, maybe her feelings about the two of them held true.
The girl cries on the rooftop of her dormitory at the academy. It is near the middle of the night. Tomorrow she & her team leave for Raven's port, even though it isn't quite the same team she started with here at Moreau. Riley turns around, hearing the sound of the rooftop door swinging open. She takes another swig of the cinnamon whiskey as she watches Opal emerge from the door & make her way to the railing with Riley.
"Sorry, I hope I'm not interrupting anything." Opal says, the tone in her voice obviously trying to steer clear of the topic of Riley's obvious disposition. "I couldn't sleep, and when I saw you weren't in the dorm, I figured you might've wandered out." Riley held the flask in front of Opal, as if to offer the other girl a drink. Solemnly, she took a sip from it, wincing a bit a the taste. "I never really though you enjoyed alcohol all that much."
"I don't." Riley hastily responded, wiping her face on her arm. "I mean I like it every now & then I guess, in moderation."
Moderation. Opal had only one sip & the flask was already nearly empty, forcing her to wonder just how much had been in there to begin with. "Is everything alright Riley?" Silence. Riley just gazed across the rooftop, briefly ignoring the question & looking out into the haze that hung over the lights of the city in the distance. "Riley?" Opal's concern seemed genuine, but Riley was too blinded by her emotions & the booze to notice.
"No, it's not. But it will be." She pulled the flask back from Opal's hands & made for the door. "Come on, we need to be rested for tomorrow." As Opal watched Riley trudge down the hallway, she could've sworn she heard the girl muttering the tune to some song.
"So siiing to me and I will forgive you, for taking my heart in that suitcase you packed..."