Author's Note: Cassidy and Ricky from Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated give me a lot of feels... I had a SDMI marathon as a way to chill before the SATs and by the S2 finale I was in tears... Thank God there was a somewhat happy ending. I don't own SDMI because there would be a Season 3 or something and Cartoon Network would never be able to cancel this show if I did.
Please enjoy!
Part 0: Introduction
There is a terrible beauty in their breakup. He tries not to remember but he does anyway because Mr. E is still Ricky Owens—in a more twisted, psychopathic way—and even he can't quite forget the person he had once considered marrying straight out of high school.
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Ricky and Cassidy stuck together after Mystery Incorporated fled Crystal Cove, but the arrangement didn't last for long. Maybe a year, maybe a little longer. Either way, it was far too short. The entire affair was like a slice of hell with a taste of heaven and a sprinkling of regret.
The two of them fought on the road just like old times. They tried to repair their damaged relationship like old times. Ricky and Cassidy did everything to try and make it so their little escapade was exactly like old times (minus Brad, Judy, and Pericles)– but it's not because they can't undo the past no matter how much they want to.
They're different people now. (Betrayal does that to people.)
He was twisting into something darker, and she was losing the innocence he once fell in love with.
(The two of them died along with Mystery Incorporated.)
Now, they're no longer compatible.
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"We bring out the best and the worst in each other, don't we?" she laughs after a particularly angry row one day, but her laughter doesn't quite reach her eyes. He can't even bring himself to reply.
(He can't because she's right to the point where it is sad.)
(It's even sadder that he agrees with her wholeheartedly.)
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They parted in a goodbye full of pain and grief. They weren't the same people anymore—they could never be—but they were still in love (or at least he thought they were, at the time). It wasn't the Brad and Judy's kiss-kiss-slap-kiss-sex type of love. Their friends could have an all out shouting match for an hour, make up sex the next, and a happy ending at the end of the day. Life would be simpler if Cassidy and Ricky were stupid and young like those two. Instead, the two of them are brilliant with so much intelligence that it's unhealthy and borderline detrimental, and the complicated way they feel for each other mirrors that.
Together they burned bright, like a firework. When everything was good – like back in Crystal Cove—they don't feel lonely, and it was like there's no darkness in the sky.
But the fighting, the uncertainty… it all outweighed the occasional benefits of being together. They were killing each other and Cassidy saw it before Ricky ever did, so she stepped away and probably saved both of their lives.
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The goodbye ended with his personal angel giving him a small kiss on the cheek. "I'll wait for you, Ricky," she whispers. "So…come back to me, please…"
He says he will. He really doesn't.
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Their parting, he thinks, dug their hole even deeper.