Landslide
It's early morning and Marshall Lee opens his front door.
He lives in a house-in-a-cave-under-the-bridge now. It's no tree house, but the view is inspiration for existentialist rap and it's always a laugh when Marceline sleep-walks her way into the lagoon out back. When he enters the living room she's still passed the flip out on the couch, just as she was when he left last night. He supposes that's what happens when you stay up for two days working on some kind of magnum opus or whatever she thinks she's doing.
Marshall Lee believes rest is overrated.
"BALDY!" he dropkicks the girl on the couch.
Marceline is sixteen and trained in the arts of bro-dom. He's also likely cracked one too many jokes about her new mohawk. She comes alive in a nanosecond and has him in a camel clutch.
"Watch the bass!" Marshall Lee motions to the guitar strapped on his back.
"Say it's sexy!" she cackles.
"My bass?"
"My 'hawk, Groddamit!"
She looks pretty wild with it, actually, but Marshall Lee is too preoccupied with his axe bass at the moment.
"Too early for lies, Mar-Mar," he protests. Marceline's hold slackens.
"What time is it?" she drops his arms. One look at the wall clock and she's scrambling for the piles of crumpled paper on the floor. "Got it!"
"You found a paper wad," Marshall Lee applauds.
"Shut up," Marceline unfolds the paper. "I took forever writing this baby."
"Ooh, do share," Marshall Lee sets his bass down on its stand by the fireplace. He almost forgets that he sags his pants more these days and when he bends over like he does now, it's a free show.
"What's that?"
Marceline's hand makes a grab for the letter in his pants pocket. Marshall Lee floats out of her reach by centimeters.
"Is it a love letter?" Marceline makes kissy faces. Amazing how much of himself he sees in her, especially his obnoxious side. "Bet it's from Bubba."
"You're still number one," Marshall Lee sidetracks, making to embrace her.
"Hold up, check this out," she repels him with a hand to his face. "I made it just for today."
Marshall Lee stops flailing for her. It's nine years to the day he found her on the shore, not that he's keeping track or anything. They speak of it, sometimes and rarely. But apparently Marceline is sentimental enough to celebrate today. She clears her throat.
"You took me in and
Gave me gas but now I'm glad
We're biffles fo sho."
Marshall Lee finds himself sitting on the couch, staring at her. He's kind of touched. But more importantly
"Pfft," The urge to snicker is too strong. It turns into laughter. "It took you two days to write a haiku?"
A vein appears on Marceline's near-bald head. "You butt-munch, Marsh! All my feels are in this!" She starts stomping out of the room and Marshall Lee repents enough to fly after her.
"That was boss poetry," he hugs her from behind. "I got all sorts of feels."
"Don't cry," she grins.
"Happy nine years," Marshall Lee says in a sickeningly sweet voice (he likes to call it The Gumball). Marceline elbows him off.
"I gotta get ready." She runs up the stairs.
"Hot date? On our anniversary?" Marshall Lee pseudo-complains.
"Don't you dare tell him I'm not here!" Marceline shouts from above.
"No promises," Marshall Lee remarks. He's still going to get her back one of these days. But right now he's going to fiddle with his banjolele on the porch because it de-stresses him like a charm. Marshall Lee isn't wound up at the moment but he will be, all because of that letter in his pocket. Its words are sinking in slowly.
That Simon Petrikov sure knows how to drop a bomb.
\/\/\/\/
Flaskback:
He'll be damned if he lets Marceline catch him strumming out all these indie feels at home. Sometimes, you just have to go somewhere on the logic that there's no reason not to. So tonight he's back at the shore, jamming with his bass on top of a rock.
It's nine years to the day he found her and they've long stopped talking about the past because the present is just that dandy. She's never shown an ounce of radiation sickness and there's never been a message-in-a-bottle floating back from Ooo.
Half way through a song about landslides, his keen eyes spot something across the water.
It's a bottle bobbing up and down, slowly floating back from Ooo.
A/N: What's in Simon's letter? Who is Marceline's date? Is Marshall Lee biffle-zoned for life?
#3 is clearly a troll question. Thanks for reading, be free with those crits!
OH and if you're confused by the timeline: Marceline is 7 in Part I. She's 16 in Part II/now. She's 16 when she's with Marshall Lee in the prologue but that hasn't happened yet. Nonlinear stories ftw.
Disclaimer: I don't own AT but would like to.
