A Matter of Time
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Summary: She wishes she knew what he wanted in a woman. He wishes it wasn't her. Drake/Wendy. For 30kisses theme, "the long road home".
-----------------------------------------Disclaimer: I don't own 'em, they don't like me.
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Once upon a time, there was a boy.
He grew up happy in spite of a natural ability to attract trouble without lifting a finger, and he grew up strong because of a rapidly-developed ability to deal with trouble.
From his childhood, his father taught him to be honest when he could and to keep quiet when he couldn't, and his mother taught him to be kind and respectful to women even when they didn't deserve it. The boy thought over the lessons of his mother and his father, and they made sense and became his own unbreakable personal rules.
Because despite losing more friends than he made with his brutal honesty, his conscience would accept no less, even when his father would.
And despite being branded forever with the stigma of such a nice guy with protective behaviour that more girls saw as fatherly than that of a lover, he couldn't change it and has never wanted to. Even when his mother chewed her lip uncertainly and murmured sadly to her husband, she's going to break his heart.
He loved that girl more than the selfishness of childhood had ever believed possible, and loved her all the more for a desolate past and desperately needy personality that could light easily on the first one on the scene to shower her with attention.
He just had to make sure that he would always be the first one on the scene. And eventually, she would know that he wasn't going anywhere, and she would stay put, too.
But sometimes love makes it easy to overlook things, and this boy overlooked the possibility that needy does not always mean good or kind or honest. The girl that he loved more and more each time he cringed in pain at the knowledge that someone else was holding her learned very quickly that this boy would give more gladly the more she took. He would gladly give a second chance, and a third, and a fourth, and a fifth, until he lost count and she no longer cared to explain and make excuses.
And sometimes, selfishness makes it easy to overlook things. This girl overlooked the possibility that kind does not always mean doormat or spineless or pathetic. The boy that gave her everything and ached to do more reached his limits at last, and told her in disgust that if she left again, she shouldn't bother to come back because he was through giving chances.
But before she could take him on his word and leave, she gave him the one thing that made him manage to not completely regret her.
The tiny infant that spent every second weekend with him while he was home and began to grow into a beautiful little girl who rapidly became his reason for being. A little creature of rainbows and ice cream and giggles who wrote him meticulously printed letters on paper with puppies around the edges when he was out of town and phoned him on his birthday when he wasn't.
For her, he couldn't help but thank the girl who had almost been a mistake.
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"DaddyDaddyDaddyDaddyDaddy!"
Drake's eyes soften, and, settling in the chair next to the phone, he smiles a smile that only a handful of people have ever seen.
"Hi, kiddo."
"Guess what!"
"You met the man in the moon?"
A sweet, girlish little giggle.
"You're silly, Daddy."
"You got a pony?"
"Mommy's bringing me over to see you this weekend!"
He sits up straighter, startled and a little annoyed at Carol's neglect to mention this ahead of time, but hardly ill-pleased.
"That's great, Peanut. Maybe you can introduce me to the man in the moon."
Maggie giggles again.
"Okay, but he's shy, so you have to be nice. Promise?"
He chuckles quietly.
"Promise."
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One day, the boy met a different girl. He didn't think much of the tragically flawed little fairytale princess who might have the hair of gold and eyes of blue and cheeks of sweet pink when she blushed, but had certainly been cheated when it came to the flawless grace and poise common to the breed. She was cheerful and innocent and modest and tougher than she looked, but she was also closer to his daughter's age than to his and taking her first shaky steps out on her own.
And he'd had it with baby-sitting.
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"ARGH!"
Four hands scramble frantically to blot the scalding hot coffee from his shirt before any more can seep through. The smaller two, slim and tanned with chewed-down nails, knock soundly into the mug in one of the larger ones, and send the remainder splashing out.
"Oh, my goodness, I'm so sorry!"
More frantic scrambling, and her elbow connects roughly with his nose. He catches her hands and shoves.
"Look, just back off before you break my neck or something!"
She sniffles heroically for a long moment, trying to swallow back the lump in her throat enough to apologize properly, then hurries off for more coffee, nearly colliding with her startled boss on her way out.
He shakes his head, and shrugs when Joker asks what that was all about, and would have gone back to forgetting her as promptly as he normally does when she doesn't drench him in coffee, but for the dark stain slowly drying on his front. At one point, he happens to glance at the little side table next to the couch, and finds a fresh cup, then shrugs and forgets about the little blonde walking disaster again.
Until, as he's about to leave, he hears a series of light, rapid footsteps, and she stops him with a hand at his arm.
"I really am sorry about earlier, Mr. Anderson."
"Forget it," he shrugs awkwardly.
"At least let me replace your shirt."
"Seriously; it's fine. Just...be careful."
"What about your dry cleaning bill?"
"This isn't dry clean."
"Can I do your laundry?"
He shakes his head, chuckling at her hopeful, earnest expression.
"Look, if you really want to do something, I'm going to see a movie tonight, and I hate going alone, because I have to move fifteen times to let these huge groups of people sit together. You like Star Wars?"
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This time, although he didn't even know that he was trying again, the boy approached this whole messy love-business through friendship, built out of the undeniable fact that she brewed a damn good cup of coffee, even when it ended up in his shirt, and after nights of listening to her chatter, it began to sneak up on him that he missed it when it wasn't around.
One day, the girl realized, in between trying to find him a nice woman and trying to find herself a nice man, that they were overlooking something very important and right in front of them.
The boy disagreed. He told her that she was too young and too innocent, and he was too old and too grumpy, and he wasn't going to touch the idea of a long-distance relationship with a ten-foot pole.
The girl cried a little bit, and then went about her life, not wholly heartbroken. When he saw that his little fairytale princess was tough enough to deal gracefully and sweetly with rejection and still be the friend he needed, he nodded his approval that she was growing up. She smiled serenely and hoped a little wistfully that maybe she could finish growing up to his satisfaction before he found someone else.
And she did. It was a long time in happening, but eventually the girl finished growing up to another man's satisfaction. Funny, though, that in the process, she became the sort of person that she could never imagine him looking twice at without a healthy dose of loathing. The sort of person that only a man far worse could love, and since that's the kind of man who couldn't love anyone, could only kiss her until she was dizzy and then take her to bed until she couldn't tell the difference between love and lust anymore, the girl became miserably aware that she had just outgrown her chance at being happy. Because all good fairytale princesses knew that love was synonymous with happiness. Even the bad ones knew that.
It wouldn't have mattered anyway, she thought more than once, dully and miserably behind a girlishly adoring smile for the man who expected it in return for breathless kisses or reassuring pats. The man that her smiles were for now, even when she had to force them, spoke often of duty. For example, it was his duty to lead the world into a new era of equality, enlightenment, and peace, and it was her duty to assist a smooth transition.
It was not her duty, she was left to gather when his face grew dark as hers lit up a little too brightly when she heard that the man she wished she was smiling at would be helping another division with some tasks that their full-time manpower couldn't handle, to be distracted by the ruggedly handsome American who had been swearing for years that every job he did for them would be the last.
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"Hey."
She looks up from her position, nestled comfortably against his shoulder where he left her when she snuggled up during the scary part of the movie because he was too tired to push her off and her warm, soft breath against his thigh is nice enough to let her stay there and risk giving her ideas. She's beem ignoring the flicker of the television through the darkened room in her attempt to capture in her memory every detail of his warmth and scent and the sound of his breath.
"Hmm?"
"You haven't told me if you've heard from Yomiko."
"No. I haven't."
Her voice is flat and almost cold, and he pulls back and stares down at her in surprise.
"I thought she'd get in touch with you, at least."
"Well, she hasn't."
"Huh. Probably has a good reason."
"For what? Hurting people? Killing people? Putting a lot of innocent people in danger just because—"
She cuts off the end of her sentence abruptly, and pulls away from him.
"Sorry," she tosses back over her shoulder as she climbs off of the couch and starts towards her bedroom. "We shouldn't even be talking about this. I'm sure Mr. Joker wouldn't like it."
As the door clicks softly shut behind her, she leans back against it and slides wearily to the ground, tears already flooding her eyes as the knot in her throat she's been trying to swallow back finally dissolves and leaves her miserable, defeated, and no more than half-aware of anything.
She thinks it might help a lot if she could go pelting back down the hallway, throw herself back against his shoulder, like she did the day of Elias's funeral when she had to pull the car over on the way back to his hotel because she couldn't see for tears, and cry herself to almost-sleep while he rubbed her back and played with her hair. It would be so nice to talk it all over with him, let him reassure her that Yomiko did have a reason, even if she can't see how any reason could excuse all the dead, mangled, and burned bodies they found in the rubble.
But that's impossible, of course, because Mr. Joker has put a massive amount of trust in her, especially lately, and she can't betray that trust by telling things to Drake that no one but Mr. Joker is supposed to know.
She wants people to believe that she's grown up, right? Well, it's time to prove it.
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But he had a different idea of what it meant to grow up than she did, and when she disappeared, seemingly off the face of the planet despite rumours of her whereabouts from others in the organization that seemed to be falling apart before his eyes, he grumbled over what a silly kid she was to hide like this.
Probably following Joker to the ends of the earth and back again. Grade-A maturity right there, bonehead.
And when he finally found her several years later, and found a severe, icy creature in the form of his snuggly, kittenish little pal, he felt anger choking him that she could let herself be such a stupid little brat, believing without question everything Joker told her and letting turn her into something she'd never really be.
For Mr. Joker's plans. For the good of the world. This is about world peace, not personal gain.
Huh. Not likely, little girl. Not everyone's a naive little idealist roped into working for the devil.
But the world has always had a way of bringing people back together again – weren't those three Paper Masters always saying that? – and he and his tarnished little princess were no exception.
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She must be crazy, he thinks resignedly as she bids him a cheerful good evening without any hesitation or nervousness, and slid into the booth next to him.
"Hi, Drake," she greets cheerfully, looking away from his startled gaze on her and scanning the dark smoky room for a waitress.
"What are you doing here?"
"What am I doing here?" she echoed, mouth twisting into a small smile that looked as though she was either trying to fight it back or had forgotten long ago how to do it properly. He grinds his teeth at the sharp ache in his chest, that the smile he remembers is gone. "Between the two of us, I'm the one who actually lives here."
"Figures I'd have to be the one to find you."
"And why is that?"
"Because I'm the only one who couldn't gladly kill you outright."
She laughs, nearly a sob, and looks so exhausted and miserable that he can feel the beginnings of sympathy poking at him, can feel his arm moving to wrap around her shoulders.
Until she starts talking again.
"I think I might thank you if you did. I don't know what we did to deserve this, but--"
Pity evaporates instantly, and she yelps, startled, as his hand tightens painfully at her shoulder.
"You don't know what you did?" he repeats disbelievingly. "The kidnapping, the murder, the human experimentation, trying to lobotomize the entire world because some crackpot told you to? Any of that ring a bell?"
"It's no use saying anything to any of you; you're too arrogant to listen to anyone, anyway," she says coldly, and for a split second he's proud of her that there's no tremble of fear in her voice or her face, only anger and stubborn pride that he thought once or twice she'd need to learn someday for her own good. "But it was necessary."
"It's what he told you was necessary," he shoots back. "You know only idiots believe everything they hear, right?"
He knows she's going to take a swing at him even before her fist tightens, so it's easy to catch her wrist in his hand and drag her closer.
"Don't try that again," he growls, and she shivers as she ends up half in his lap, thigh pressed warm and firm against his, skirt sliding up around her hips. He studies her for a long moment, but doesn't release her."So, how did he convince you that killing people was morally irreproachable?"
She looks away, and in the funny light, it looks like her eyes are misting over.
"I'm hardly the only one to take an innocent life. Do you think that everyone we found after your mad tear through the facilities deserved to die?" Her voice steadies, even as it grows slightly hysterical, and she's looking at him now, but he wishes she wouldn't, because her eyes are heartbreaking and someone else's, and achingly familiar, and it scares the hell out of him. "And what about Yomiko? She just swept in, caused a disaster that killed hundreds, and ran off to play in a pile of books while the rest of us dealt with it. There was no reason for it, nothing to gain, and it certainly didn't help anyone. Even her friends."
He stares, wondering if she's trying to be funny, and it only takes a moment to dawn on him that she's not privy to everything he is, and Joker's always had a habit of telling her absolutely everything, except the important things, things that might bring her to a decision that isn't in his favour, things that might take her out of his employ and out of his bed.
It's disgusting, but with everything that sonofabitch did to cut her off from everyone else, where else was the little bonehead supposed to turn?
Part of him feels like a huge weight's been lifted off his chest; somehow, it makes it easier to take what she's done to Yomiko if she thinks she had a reason. Revenge is human, and she's warm and soft and solid and very, very human. His hand tightens a little more at her wrist, and he braces for the fight she's going to put up against the truth. Then he stops.
Sure, it's the right thing to do. She deserves to know the whole story, not just the abridged version starring her boss as the would-be savior of humankind. And Yomiko wants her sweet, adoring little friend back as much as he does. But
part of him wonders if she can take it right now. There's a
desperate, livid panic in her eyes that suggests not. If this is what
she needs to cope with what she helped to do, to believe that she
deserves to live, damned if he wants to take that away before he
gives her something else to replace it.
He'll tell her someday.
But not now.
That narrows down his options. Her cheeks are flushed, eyes sparkling with anger and despair and a thousand other things, thigh pressed warm and firm to the side of his, those long legs that sent him for a cold shower just thinking about them even back when she was his baby sister tangling with his, and he's either got to hit her, or…
"Look, I don't want to talk here."
She shoots him that awkward little forgot-how-to-smile smile again as she climbs hastily out of his lap.
"More, you mean."
"Yeah. Whatever."
"I can't take you home; my flatmate might object." And I came out tonight to get away from the horrid, cramped, tumbledown little flat that we took because the landlord was the only one we spoke to who didn't ask questions, she doesn't add aloud, but she thinks that he must understand anyway, because his eyes soften a bit.
Unless that's just the light.
"That's fine. I have a room. The lights don't work, and the mattress squeaks, and I swear the people in the next room are sacrificing a goat, but it'll do, right?"
"Of course," she replies immediately. "We just need somewhere to talk."
Approximately twenty minutes later sees her completely abandoning that ill-conceived notion and acting on an even more poorly thought out idea. He spends a stunned moment trying to figure out what the hell just happened when she bounces off the bed and into his lap in one leap forceful enough to make the rickety little chair that stands proudly as the room's third piece of furniture creak ominously, before his hand bunches in her hair, tightening when she yelps in pain.
Somewhere in the back of their
minds, both of them know that he's drunk, and she's upset, and this
is stupid, but it doesn't stop her from clinging desperately to his
shirtfront and moaning softly into his mouth as he tugs her prim
little sweater out of her skirt and rubs wide, quick circles over the
her back, hard enough to leave marks.
Why quit when you're already acting like an idiot, he thinks hazily, pulling her head to the side and nipping at the soft skin behind her ear. She yelps again, the sound melting into a continuous gasping whimper, and he doesn't know if its that or the way she's squirming in his lap and tugging ineffectively at his shirt that makes him move one hand around to squeeze her breast roughly, the other drifting down her back to that cute little ass to drag her closer until he's all but taking her, even if it's through a few flimsy layers of fabric. She's warm and yielding and already soaked through the little cotton bunny-print he wonders briefly if she still wears, and he's overcome with the urge to make this icy little girl-woman in his arms scream long and loud before the night's over.
When she grabs at him, squeezing carefully and rubbing while she nibbles skillfully at the side of his neck until his teeth begin to crack with the effort to hold back a groan, he pushes her firmly away, and slides one hand up under her skirt. His palm grinds against damp cotton, and those pleading little moans and cries are going to make starring roles in his dreams for months.
He's just begun to push the fabric aside, when he feels something warm and wet land at his shoulder, and her breathing begins to sound a little trembly.
"What?" he demands quietly once he's disentangled her and readjusted to a safer position.
"It-it's not fair," she finally manages around a heroic sniffle, catching his hand as he moves to brush away a teardrop. "I always wanted you to want me like this, and now you finally do, but you hate me too, and if all you wanted was a little girl who couldn't be bad if she tried, why did you always tell me to grow up? I didn't change for you, because everyone else was telling me to grow up, too, if I ever wanted to be anything, and I know Mr. Joker's proud of me, and everyone else with Special Operations was finally beginning to look at me as an equal, but I hate it, and you hate it, and that's worse! But it's too late now, because I don't know how to be anything else anymore."
When she finally finishes, sounding more tired now than upset or angry, he stares at her for a moment, as well as he can while she's got her face buried in his shoulder, aching for her as much as he knows that she doesn't deserve a damn thing.
And he ends up taking her to bed after all, and undressing her, but it's not to make her scream. Instead, he cradles her against his chest and lets her cry herself limp and exhausted like she's needed to since she lost Elias and Yomiko and Mr. Joker and herself all at once.
And he hopes it'll help.
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Sometimes, all it takes to break a spell is a little kindness, and when the boy woke up the next morning with his princess still in his arms, a peaceful smile curving her lips despite the tear stains still on her cheeks, he could see the beginning of a homecoming in that smile, familiar from before she became lost to him, but more. Something in that smile spoke very clearly of maturity and hard lessons learned, and that she would never become lost that way again. Something that took the bright, sparkling smile of a pretty little girl and turned into the softly shining smile, full of grace and kindness, of a woman.
Just a little bit, but it was a start.
He couldn't take her home with him right away, of course, even when he thought it would kill him to leave her behind, because he had learned something from the first girl after all, and would never again make the mistake of trying to do everything for someone who needed the struggle and experience to grow. And she had a lot more growing up to do than she thought she did, now that she knew what being grown up really was.
But both of them knew that, when she finished growing up for real this time, she would come to him, and they would have their happy ending.
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"Hello, is Drake there?"
"Speaking. Hey, Bonehead."
She huffs in annoyance.
"I have a name, you know."
"Sorry, Kitten."
"Drake!"
"What? You snuggle, and purr when I scratch behind your ear, and you've got claws like daggers when someone pisses you off."
"I don't think you want to know what animal I'd compare you to."
A soft chuckle.
"Now I'm curious."
A mischeivous giggle.
"I don't want to make you mad right away, Drake."
"Brat."
"I know," she assures him cheerfully. "How's Maggie?"
"She's good. Just started dating her first boyfriend, so now she thinks it's her God-given right to meddle in everyone else's love life. It's kinda cute. But I think she's getting suspicious that her dad's got some hot babe out of the country."
"He'd damn well better not!"
A sigh.
"I meant you, Wendy."
A brief, sheepish silence.
"Oh. Well, that's alright, then. Thanks."
"How's old Joe?"
"He's alright," she says guardedly. "He still gets a little lost sometimes, and he's a little afraid of lightning lately, but he seems happier than he's been in a long time. Why?"
"Just wondering if my hot babe might swing by for a visit sometime soon."
Her flush of shy, giddy happiness is nearly audible, and he can as good as see her fidgeting with the phone cord and smiling that cute little trying-to-fight-it smile.
"When did you have in mind?"
"How soon can you get here?"
She laughs.
"I'll have to get back to you on that. How long do you want me for?"
He gives a laugh that sounds more like a snort.
"You already know the answer to that."
"I think I might," she agrees vaguely, and then falls silent for a long time. "Drake?"
"Yeah."
"I'll be home in a week, okay?"
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It's only a matter of time.
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End Notes: Whoooooooooooa, massive rewrite time! It sucked before. It still sucks, but a little less. Go me. :D