The sound of the rain battering the windows of the bookshop is interrupted by the ringing of the bell on the door. It opens, bringing a soaked earth Guardian with it.

"I am so sorry! I can explain-"

"The store closed an hour ago," Caleb says from his desk, pretending to read classical poetry. "You'll have to come back tomorrow."

"Caleb, please!" she begs.

"If you think I'm going to listen to you after waiting over an hour," he sighs, "you've got another thing coming."

"I deserved that," Cornelia admits. "But, I also know a great way to make it up to you."

Calen's brows knit together. "Oh yeah?"

"Oh yeah," she says. She feels somewhat awkward, superfluous as she holds her arms, her hair dripping onto the floor. "Does pizza sound good right now or what?"

"Peet-za?" The modern English word is foreign on his tongue.

"Please tell me you've had pizza before." Cornelia approaches the desk where he sits..

"I mean, yeah of course I have!" Caleb says, his breath accelerating. Do not blow your cover, he reminds himself, not unless she tells you she's a Guardian.

She gives him an incredulous look. "If you say so. I'm buying." She reaches for the telephone, but he clamps his hand over hers.

"I don't even get an explanation?" he asks.

"I'm sorry! I was studying and got caught up with the girls and-" she merges several generic excuse in to one before he interrupts her.

"You could have called."

"I'm sorry." She stares at where their hands, notices the energy passing between them, how his touch is both daunting and grounding. Somehow.

"There's something you're not telling me," he says, his tone laden with accusations.

Boy, can't hear that enough tonight, she thinks. They hold each other's gazes for an immeasurable amount of time. Tension and indignation passes between them, and she is almost reluctant to blink, reminded me of the staring contests the kids used to have at school. How am I meant to focus on anything when he's so cute?

And then the phone rings.

"Hello?" Cornelia immediately answers without a second thought.

"I'm...looking for Caleb," answers a woman's voice. It's weak and raspy, and Cornelia doesn't recognise it.

"Uh...sure," she responds. "Who is this?"

"Put Caleb on the phone." Cornelia hands the phone to Caleb, her mouthing turning down in annoyance.

"Hello?" he answers. "I can't talk right now...I'm busy. No, I'm not with her...I gotta go." He slams the phone down, clenching and unclenching his jaw.

"Who was that?"

"No one."

She raises a brow at the retort, notices that he refuses to meet her gaze. "There's something you're not telling me," she repeats cockily, placing her hands on his desk and forcing him to look into her eyes.

"Well, I said we don't have to tell each other everything," he reminds her.

"Oh yeah?" The natural tension between their personalities arises, the instinct to bicker and fight as much as merely enjoy each other's company. Their faces are mere inches away, though, and her breath hitches in her throat. "Why does that only seem to apply to you?"

"Because I wasn't an hour late to our date," he snaps.

She flips her hair behind her, marches towards a bookshelf. "How many times do I have to apologise!"

"Cornelia," he states.

"What?" she asks.

"Leaves just...appeared out of your hair." He holds a golden yellow leaf up to inspect it.

Her panicked expression does something to him, and he feels sympathetic for this girl who is hindering his plans to take her best friend to another world. Caleb pinches the bridge of his nose, composing himself. He moves away from his desk and towards Cornelia as if on instinct. "If there's really something going on, you can tell me. If not I'll drop it and we can eat...peet-za."

She resists the urge to giggle at the botched pronunciation. If all bookstore clerks are this cute, she thinks, I gotta get me a library card. "I really wish I could tell you."

"Why can't you?" He asks, taking her hands in his. Just tell me, he wants to scream at her. Tell me and all this mess will be over with.

"If I told you, I would put all of us in danger!" she cries, pulling her hands away. "Is that what you want? You don't need to be under this kind of...pressure!"

His expression softens, his brow smoothing in affection. "If I trust you, can you trust me?" Caleb asks. He tucks a few strands of golden hair behind her ear, guilt lodged like a stone in his stomach.

Cornelia has seen this boy in a thousand dreams; she has memorised every plain of his face more times than she can count, seen those long tangled lashes framing his eyes and the way his upper lip quirks when he's upset, knows this face as she knows her own, yet his beauty never fails to disarm her. His eyes are the colour of the earth after a storm, his dark hair catching the light as a soft smile settles over his features. She is close to know that he smells like home, close enough to hear his heartbeat, close enough to press her lips to his.

Thunder crashes outside, and Caleb jumps in fright. He turns, somewhat reluctantly, and makes his way over to his desk. Holding himself steady on the edge of the table, he shakes his head. What am I doing? he scolds himself. This is wrong. I can't be doing this, not to her.

"Is everything alright?" she asks.

He turns to look at her, her sunbleached hair and violet eyes and the way she stands with her hands on her hips and a slight pout as if she owns the place, and Caleb doesn't lie when he tells her, "Everything's fine."

Cornelia's lips turn up at the corners. "What do you say we order that pizza?"


She eyes the dated furniture as she shudders once with the chill, the dusty books piled on rickety tables and chairs. "Well, this won't do," she decides.

"What?" Caleb says from his desk, attempting to wrap his head around the Earth humans' accounting system.

"There's gotta be a blanket around here somewhere," she mumbles to herself, scanning the library for hidden closets or cupboards. She finds one in the back corner, and opens it to meet a family of dust bunnies and an old blanket. "Gross!" she whispers. Cornelia peers over her shoulder before using her earth powers to discreetly remove the dust. "Perfect!"

"Hey, are you cold?" he calls.

"Uh, a little!"

"I think there's some candles in a drawer…" he says as he begins to rummage.

She drapes the blanket on the floor next to the radiator as he lights candles. She scans the shelves and shelves of books with avid curiosity. Grazing her fingers over the spines of the titles, she steals glances at him from behind the shelf. "What are you reading?"

"Pro-per-ty-us," he answers with confidence.

Cornelia giggles. "You mean Propertius? One of the great ancient love poets." She wiggles her eyebrows.

"I have no idea what this guy's saying," Caleb admits. "What's a-" His cheeks colour.

"What?" Cornelia asks.

"Nevermind. I just don't get these mushy Earth types, sitting around googly-eyed obsessed with love all the time."

She walks towards the desk tentatively, fiddling with the strands of her hair. "What, you've never been in love?"

"No." He places the open book down, spine-up. "Have you?"

"Well, no, but I've been around the block a few times." His face his quizzical, as he is unable to understand the Earth jargon. She misconstrues his look for skepticism. "Fine! I have...limited dating experience. But I've definitely had my heart broken."

"Really?" he asks.

"Really."

"Back in…" he stops himself from revealing too much, "where I'm from, I never really got the chance to date myself."

"That's surprising," she says, eyes dropping to the floor as she tries not to stammer. "I thought girls would be falling over you."

He chuckles in response. "What can I say? The ladies got good taste." Though he feigns cockiness, Caleb is equally as nervous as she is. "I'm more surprised that you haven't broken a few hearts."

Her blush darkens, and they gaze into each other's eyes like mushy Earth types until Caleb timidly turns back to his book. "I mean, what does this guy even mean? 'As we cling to each other like this, bind us with a chain so strong that time will not dissolve it'?"

"Well, Propertius loves Cynthia, right?" She nears the desk, ignoring the hammering of her heart as she leans against it. "He wants to be with her as lovers are, but time is something they can't really escape. So he's saying that, like…" Now her hand is resting next to his arm, almost touching but not quite.

"He almost wishes that time could stop, just for them, so they could be together?" His gaze is burning as he locks eyes with her; he seems almost skittish, like a creature perpetually hunted. Cornelia's eyes fall to where their skin touches. The space between them feels alive, electric, the hairs of his arm standing on end with the tension.

A hard bang! on the door interrupts them. "That must be the pizza!" she exclaims, grabbing her purse and widening the gap between them.

Caleb glances down at the book, wiping the sweat from his brow. He begins to wonder if he could understand how Propertius feels about Cynthia.


"No you didn't!" he exclaims, nearly choking on his pizza in delight.

"Yeah, I totally let the dragon out of the apartment and into Irma's house!" she says. The room is warm and bathed in candlelight, and though they have plenty of space, they sit almost right next to each other against the radiator. To a passerby they would appear to be lovers, but to themselves they were something new, something different, something neither could quite fathom yet. "For some reason, she wasn't that mad at me. All I remember after is riding the dragon to school and everyone kind of being okay with it."

"You have the weirdest dreams," he laughs.

"Mmmm," she says through a mouthful of pizza. "Irma was so mad at me the next day, though."

"Like...real life Irma?"

"Yeah! She was all, 'how could you let a dragon into my house' and 'I don't think our insurance covers damage related to mythological creatures'!"

He laughs heartily, before being reminded of a more sombre memory. "When I was little I used to have this recurring dream about my mom and dad."

"Really?" She reclines and props her head up on her elbow to face him.

Something changed slightly in his expression, and someone who did not know him like Cornelia wouldn't have noticed the almost imperceptible change, the slight furrow of his brow, the way his upper lip turns up. "Yeah. I kept having this dream that I'd be with my mom, running so fast I thought my lungs would burst, and I could see my dad in the distance," he tells her. "But it was like, the faster I ran the further away he got from me."

Cornelia narrows her brows in sympathy. "And where was your mom?"

"She was always behind me, but...never running." He stares at a spot on the wall behind her head, in a daze as his eyes begin to glaze over with something that looks like realisation.

"Hello?" Cornelia waves a hand in front of his face. "Earth to Caleb?"

"Sorry!" He is suddenly fascinated by the pattern on the blanket, plays with the frayed fringing on the enges. "I've just never told anyone that before."

"Are you and your mom close?" she asks, finishing her slice of pizza.

He snorts. "About as close as the first sun and third moon."

"Huh?"

"Oh, I mean...no. We aren't close." He sighs heavily. "She doesn't really get me, I suppose. She always wanted me to be something I'm not."

"Tell me about it," Cornelia whines, taking a sip of her soda. "I swear my mom doesn't listen to me half the time."

He stares at the ceiling. "It's just that," he says, "I don't want to die having done nothing with my life other than brushing shoulders with people in high places. I want to be part of something bigger than myself, I want to fight for something important!" He meets her eyes with an earnest expression. "I want freedom."

"A rebel without a cause," she remarks.

"Not a rebel," he insists, reminded of those...traitors on Meridian. "more an idealist."

"Is that not the same thing?"

He smiles crookedly. "Maybe. And what do you want, Cornelia?"

"Same as you."

"And that is?"

"Freedom. For me, and for others." She thinks of the rebels, too.

"I'll drink to that, Blondie." He taps his cup against hers.

"If you don't stop calling me Blondie, I'm gonna call the police and accuse you of...some bookstore-related crime!" Caleb grins and wonders what a 'police' is. "I'm serious!"

"Ok, Blondie," he teases.

"Caleb, I swear!"

"Hmm, how about Goldie?" He smirks.

Her lips twitch in a smile against her will. "Stop that!"

"Or what's the one Irma calls you that you hate?" he wonders.

"I will call the police," she says through gritted teeth.

"Corny! That's it."

"I'm leaving!" she announces, rising from the floor and trying not to laugh.

"No Blondie, don't leave!" he sits up, almost knocking over a candle in the process. "It's not my fault you have all this pretty hair."

Cornelia's face flushes crimson at the compliment. "Here," he says, "a peace offering. You can have the last slice of pizza."

"Remember," she warns, taking the slice and pulling her knees to her chest, "Irma's dad's a cop. I can have you arrested like that."

"Oh yeah?"

"Oh yeah," she says. Cornelia's eyes are drawn to his lips, and he gulps, the scent of roses overwhelming his senses.

"You know, where I come from, we don't make empty threats."

"And where would that be, Caleb?"

He stiffens, lowering his gaze.

"I'm…" she begins. "No, wait, I'm not sorry. How can...how is any of this going to work if we're keeping secrets from each other?" Cornelia gestures between them with a questioning look.

Caleb bites his lip, knowing that they must face the inevitable sooner or later, whether they dreamt of each other before or not. "Well, you started it," he reminds her, crossing his arms.

"You said you could trust me," she snaps.

His face reddens with anger. "That's not what I-"

"Why won't you just tell me the truth?" She springs to her feet, rage overtaking her. "What are you trying to hide?"

"You're not listening! I told you-"

"I just don't understand-"

"Cornelia, stop-" he pleads, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Gosh you're what like, fifteen?" she rants. "And you have a full time job, you won't even tell me where you're from, and I know nothing about your dead dad!"

Thunder claps outside, and for half a second the room is blinding white. The rain batters against the window with ferocity. Caleb clenches his jaw. Her comment stung, but not as much as losing her would. You made a promise to yourself, he reminds himself. Only if she tells you the truth, too. It's for...the best.

"I think you should go." His words fall flat; he doesn't even believe himself.

"Fine!" Cornelia gathers her belongings and slams the door on her way out.

Caleb lays his head against the door once she leaves, cursing under his breath. He can tell that Cornelia is doing the same on the other side of the threshold. Only an inch of wood separates them, and he can feel her.

She sprints home through the hailstones as fast as her legs can carry her, a presence's avid gaze following her as she runs.


a/n: dun dun duuun. sorry guys, gotta balance ridiculous marshmallow fluff with some good 'ol fashioned theatrical angst.

so! i'm a giant classics nerd. fun fact: the augustan poet propertius had a pretty star-crossed relationship with a woman named cynthia, whom he loved dearly before she died in a fire. there. that's a thing you know now. the quote is from a gorgeous poem named after his lover, and i'd totally recommend you check it out.

also, meridian has several suns and moons in my headcanon for no real reason. i think, even though caleb isnt the rebel leader in this au, the whole rebel spirit thing is something intrinsic to him and may or may not come up again in future.

who is the mysterious presence, you ask? who was on the phone to caleb? all will be revealed soon, and the next chapter is going to be just as, if not more, theatrically angsty. probably not as lengthy, though! stay tuned and in the meantime, reviews make me very very happy!

Big love,

A xxxx