A/N: I'm sorry this chapter took so long, I had it all written out and then I read it and thought it was crap and rewrote it entirely.
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"My dear, it doesn't say 'Adopta Ghost'. Look carefully and you'll see a space between the middle letters. It says..."
The narrator continued telling the tale surrounded by silent toddlers while I danced in my mind. The local bookstore was having a book reading session and one of the books chosen to be read out had been suggested by me and now, using my niece as an excuse, I was getting to hear Eva Ibbotson's 'Dial a Ghost' being read out loud. It reminds me of elementary school when the librarian Mrs Renoll would read us a book every day.
I miss being a child.
It's been one week since Layla announced that she was moving in with Will and since then I've met her and Madge twice already, both times they began making elaborate plans to get Warren and I together but to no avail as I pointed out the failures in each and every one, criticising how childish all of their schemes were, one of them even included locking the two of us together in a closet! Not only was it a silly plan considering they had no idea how they would manage to do that but also, how horribly cliché is that? Putting two people in an enclosed space is one of the most overused plot devices ever, which is why I'm staying away from all closets around them but if I know Madge well (which I do) she'll find a way around it.
Oh well, at least I got to know Layla a bit better from all the times we'd met up. She's really quite incredibly perceptive for someone who seems to be so trusting. In fact Will is far easier to fool than her although the years of superhero work had toughened him up as well. Speaking of Superheroes...
"Angelica?" Because somehow Warren Peace was there, standing behind me looking confused and adorable and hunky in a dull green Guns and Roses t-shirt and a leather jacket, clutching a book about Horticulture in his hands. "What are you doing here?"
"Using my niece as an excuse to listen to a reading of my most favourite children's book ever, what about you?"
"I thought I might look around for a Housewarming gift."
"I hope you're not giving them that book." Upon hearing that, he looked at the book, a frown marring his perfect brow... I need to stop channelling my inner Shakespeare.
"Why not? Layla loves gardening-"
"And I suppose Will does too? We're supposed to get them a gift not her. Trust me it's a bad idea. You can get that book for her on Christmas though."
He sighs and looks even more perturbed than he did a minute ago and I almost feel bad for bursting his bubble. "So what else could I get them?"
"Well you could get them a gift basket, or some lessons they could take as a couple, maybe some fine cutlery, a coffee machine if they're heavy coffee drinkers, a his and hers towel set, a cookbook or-"
"I'll get them a cookbook that sounds good." He says quickly, cutting into my speech and turns away to look at the Home section of the bookstore before turning to me really quickly. "You're going to be right here right? I might need help..."
"Hey I'm going to be here until the story is finished so you have until then. Get something that matches their dietary specifications."
"That makes sense." He mutters abstractly and wanders off before returning with four books in hand. "I'm just giving them all of these. What about you?"
"I'm going to hand paint a house name plate with the words 'Layla Williams and Will Stronghold' on it, maybe with a vine creeping around it as the border. Shouldn't take too long, my Dad said he'd help me with it and he's got awesome power tools and lasers." Unfortunately the instinctual need for spirit fingers while saying the word lasers took over. Luckily he found it amusing not childish and ridiculous, at least if the slight smile was anything to go by.
"Oh. I suggest you leave the surnames off, Stronghold says he's going to propose soon."
"Called it!"
"You're kidding."
"No really, Madge and I talked about it, she said he'd probably propose before Christmas so that they can have a spring wedding."
"Huh. Well she's right."
"She usually is. It's strange really, she's like Dumbledore. Or Gandalf. So how was furniture shopping with the soon to be Mr and Mrs Stronghold?"
"It was strange. I don't know why they stuck to Pottery Barn when Will could have just flown anywhere in the world and carried the stuff over here." Because Layla and Magenta are meddling witches of course. "Magenta squeaked when I told her the December 2007 thing, what was that about?"
"16th December 2007 is a reference to the only piece of blackmail I have on Magenta." By which I mean the time she dragged me to a Spice Girls concert at the O2 and sang along to every single song on their set list with a gigantic grin on her face and cried at the end of it. Of course no one knows about this as she hides her fangirlism from everyone else.
"Really?" He looked intrigued and intrigue looked good on him.
"Yup, unfortunately it's the only piece of blackmail I have. It's a good thing it's so embarrassing because she has a lot more on me."
"Why Angelica, were you a bad girl?" He says tilting his head with an amused glint in his eyes, clearly teasing and I can't help but tease him right back, crossing my arms and shrugging one shoulder casually.
"What makes you think I'm not one right now?" I ask innocently and he smiles before ducking his head and scratching the back of his neck sheepishly.
Ha, I made him nervous. Payback bitch! Wait, does that count as flirting?
"Anyway, did they actually manage to pick out anything for their house? My mum says the first sign of compatibility is how long it takes to find the right sofa."
"...I wasn't really paying attention."
"Of course you weren't." I rolled my eyes. Boys. They really can't handle any form of shopping can they?
"So are you just here for the book reading or...?"
"No Ellie needs new shoes so I thought I'd take her shoe shopping and then we'd go to the play centre on the second floor but her mom just called and they're going to pick her up early for some reason."
"Ellie, is that short for something?"
"Eloise is her actual name. I wanted to name her Arwen but they refused to name her after a fictional character, but now that I've instilled my bookishness in her they're probably going to get a granddaughter who is named after a fictional character so in the end I still win."
"That's the most twisted piece of logic I've ever heard."
"You have not heard a lot of twisted logic then." I say impudently.
"Yes because when all the villains explain their plan in excruciating detail to me, their logic is completely sensible and not twisted at all." He comments sarcastically and I giggle.
"So what cookbooks did you get?"
"I don't really know, just picked the ones with the word vegetarian on them."
We spent the next half an hour flipping through the pictures in the books and rating how delicious they looked. By the end of it, I was salivating, Warren was wondering if he'd ever actually seen Layla or Will cook and the little tug on my skirt was telling me that the book reading session was over.
"Hallo Ellie, did you like the story?"
She nodded with a glance at Warren and hid behind my legs one hand tangling in my skirt tightly.
"Warren this is Eloise, Eloise this is Warren."
He waved and said hello and she hid even further, her grasp on my skirt tightening just that bit and she looked at me with gigantic grey eyes, not unlike my own. Well, except mine have more of a psychotic, deranged look to them, one of the many side effects of being an 'adult'.
"She's shy." I say by way of an explanation and before I could nudge her forward, Warren squatted down to meet her eye level and held a hand out. I don't know what magic he has with women but even my little Ellie responded to his smile and let go of my skirt to shake his hand and smile prettily.
"And how old are you Ellie?"
"I'm five." She held out an outstretched hand and spread her fingers to show how old she was proudly.
"Really? You're all grown up then aren't you?" He said with a grin and I melted, as did she.
She really liked being called a grown up and giggled. Although in all honesty he could have called her anything and she would have been fascinated. For a five year old she has great taste in men, and I'm not just saying that to validate my own ...liking for him.
I cleared my throat." Ellie your mum, called they're going to pick you up in a bit."
"But I wanted to stay and read!" She pouted adorably. See now I cannot get away with that, when I pout people just look at me weird.
"We'll stay here until your mum reaches here but once she's here we'll have to leave."
"Okay." She says wilting a bit and my heart breaks a little bit.
"Ellie do you want to see a magic trick?" Warren asks and when she nodded her head excitedly he waved his hand dramatically and pulled a flower from behind her ear where there was nothing before and handed it to her much to Ellie's delight. Warren Peace can do magic tricks, who would have known?
And so he spent the entire afternoon showing the two of us magic tricks and by the end of it I was completely forgotten as she watched him do his tricks, no hint of the shyness she had shown before.
That man should wear a 'Caution: Irresistible to those of the female nature' sign around his neck. He's dangerous.
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"Bye Ellie!" I say waving my hands in goodbye vigorously but her eyes stay glued to Warren as she waved over her Dad's shoulder making me feel horribly replaced. She'd spent the whole time giggling with Warren and completely ignoring me while I had no idea whom to be jealous of, Ellie for getting all of Warren's attention or Warren for getting all of Ellie's attention! Luckily I was saved from contemplating it too much because her Mum and Dad came by barely an hour after and Warren and I once again found ourselves alone.
"So, what now?"
"I don't really want to go home, I have this feeling...this little voice telling me 'Don't go home!'."
"Do you hear voices often?"
"Sometimes I think I do but then it turns out that the sophomore class's resident telepath can't stop broadcasting his thoughts into people's minds and the entire school has been hearing his voice." Having a hormonal teenager's voice in your head talking about the dirty thoughts he has when the girls smack him around in Save The Citizen is very disturbing.
"Oookay," He gave me a strange look before clearing his throat, "So what do we do now?"
He said we and by that we he meant the two of us, it gives me butterflies just thinking about it!
"I don't really want to shop," Next to me Warren sagged in relief the minute those words were out of my mouth, "Although-"
"No, you said you don't want to shop so we won't shop, anything but shopping."
"Goddess, how do you get anything done? You know you have to shop sometime or the other right?"
"I'd rather put it off indefinitely."
"Not even for clothes?" He shuddered so minutely I almost missed it. Almost. "Don't tell me your mum still does the shopping for you, the great Warren Peace, superhero extraordinaire afraid of shopping." I teased and he changed the subject with the speed of light.
"We could go eat."
"Oh good idea, I am starving after looking at all those pictures of food."
Food!
So we tottered off to a tiny bistro tucked into the corner and awaited the arrival of our food. To distract myself from getting food envy (which did not work at all, the people next to us had this incredible platter of appetizers that looked so, so yummy!) I initiated the chit chat.
"So the tattoos, did they hurt?"
"Why, are you thinking about getting one?"
"I already have a few but yours look much larger than anything I've ever had done. Did it hurt a lot? Say on a scale of one to ten."
"Probably a five maybe a four. I don't know if it's just my semi invincibility though." He shrugged."Exactly how many tattoos do you have, a few makes it sound like a lot."
"I have five. Does anyone notice that your SuperHero alter ego has the same pattern printed onto the costume? I've never understood how a pair of glasses can blind the citizens to secret identities."
"Flames are relatively common right now, they're the equivalent of having Asian characters tattooed."
"Oh I know, I saw a man with the kanji for sushi tattooed onto his shiny bald head and I kept on wondering if he had no idea what it meant or he just really liked sushi!" He burst out into laughter.
"So what are your tattoos?" He asked once he'd calmed down.
"Just general stuff." I thought if I evaded enough he'd let it rest but no such luck.
"Oh come on Mercado, I showed you mine, you show me yours."
"Nope." I popped the 'p' impudently and before he could object our food (finally) arrived.
"At least tell me what they are." He picked up the thread while we, or rather I because the great Warren Peace along with having a fear of shopping also has an aversion to the sweet stuff, waited for dessert.
"I have a bow on either side of my hip, a smiley face on my big toe, a tiny owl on my wrist, a poem on the nape of my neck, same as Madge." I said simultaneously pointing at every body part I mentioned that had been inked.
"An owl on your wrist, you must be a Potter fan?"
"Of course."
"Is that why you wear the watch all the time? So that your students don't know you're a crazy fan of a children's book series?"
Now there were two ways to react to this, I could either say 'Oh no, apart from being a fantastic fashion accessory my watch is also a power suppressor that I have to wear because if I don't I might die in a few weeks as it sucks the life out of me and if I wear a neutralizer I'd probably die within minutes.' or there was the more convenient 'Yes I don't want my students to know I'm a Potter fangirl that haunts the Pottermore website like Moaning Myrtle haunts the first floor girl's bathroom at Hogwarts.'.
Of course I went with the second option, but for some reason he had this look in his eye like he knew something but was going to keep it to himself. Before I could question him however, my dessert was served. I can think of no better way to disrupt a train of thought than a slice of cheesecake. Now that I think about it, it's strange how we were both interrupted by food. How suspicious.
Once I was done with my wondrous dessert during the eating of which I had been treated to Warren staring at me like I was crazy with the occasional strangled sound coming from him, we left and were soon standing in the parking lot.
"So do you want to take a cab or walk?" He asked shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket.
"Walk definitely." I said and not just because the walk would take faaaaaar longer than a cab ride and would allow for much more interaction or at least sneaking peeks at him from the corner of my eye, I just needed the exercise.
No really, I did.
"So how's the crime reporting going?" I say taking the lead in the conversation.
"Slow."
"So what happened about the actual serial killer? Or was it MacroManiac all along?"
"No he just killed the one DSSI guy."
"Dexter."
"Yeah him, but things have gotten a bit more complicated for the trial, apparently he says since he was stripped if his powers he should be prosecuted in a normal court as a civilian rather than as a Super Villain facing a jury trial by his Superhero peers. It's all semantics really but his alter ego was a lawyer so he knows how to twist the facts around to suit his needs. It won't get that far but until then he's just being detained as opposed to the Maximum Security Prison he should really be in."
"That sucks. Harold's having enough problems dealing with all of this as it is. This is just going to make him into an even more moody teenager."
He tensed next to me, presumably because he'd been turned into a moody teenager because of his father's actions too.
"How's he coping?"
"See here's the thing, I don't know if he's being so sullen because of that," After all, saying 'because his father's a super villain' would be far too insensitive considering current company, "Or because of girl problems. I'm leaning towards girl problems personally, because he refused to talk to me about that whereas he had a lot to say about MacroManiac. But that might just be because he's reluctant to discuss girls with me."
"What, no bits of friendly advice to give him?" Warren grins at me and I realise why Ellie clung to him so much today. It is quite an experience having those pearly whites flashed into a smile that's just for you. Speaking of pearly whites...
"Your teeth are really straight, did you have braces?"
"Headgear and all."
"What a lovely mental image."
"Well you had them too."
"Yes but they were just the –hey, how did you know that? Are you stalking me? You should know that I know kung fu..." I said and put up my hands threateningly (which he just laughed at).That would have been strange, if he were stalking me while I was stalking him.
"No, I'm not stalking you, I remember from school."
"I thought you didn't remember me from school." I said suspiciously.
"You're right I don't, I just thought I'd try to creep you out."
"Don't try to be creepy, that's my job! Which is really quite disheartening now that I think about it."
"You are the only person I know who actually says disheartening."
I elbow him sharply for that jibe momentarily forgetting that he isn't ...well anything other than my neighbour really and before I could say sorry a million times over for taking liberties with his person he playfully nudged me back lightly. I'm pretty sure my heart and my throat had fused to become one as I shoved him back.
"You know, you're not as grumpy on weekends." The observation comes out of nowhere, but it was true, I mean I don't think he would have come up to me a week back if he'd seen me loitering in a bookshop. He would probably have hidden behind a shelf actually.
"I think by grumpy you mean scary."
"Oh you're never scary."Apparently my answer pleased him because it earned me yet another smile (I was momentarily blinded) and we continued home in the same fashion, shoving each other and bantering the entire way there.
The elevator doors opened to floor four and we stepped out just as I was giggling like a maniac at some story Warren was telling me, when I saw Magenta sitting down outside my apartment, back against my door and a magazine in hand while a variety of luggage bags and suitcases surrounded her and began smirking up at the two of us who just stared in confusion.
"Well, well, well what have we here?" She said, voice dripping with implications of the romantic kind flicking her gaze between the two of us.
"We have Magenta sitting outside my house looking homeless." I deadpan ignoring her innuendo in hopes that she would fill me in.
"Yeah about that, do you mind if I move in with you?"
Well crap.
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Note: Arwen is a character form Tolkien's Lord of the Ring's trilogy, Moaning Myrtle is a ghost from Harry Potter that haunts a bathroom, owls were used in the Harry Potter-verse to deliver letters and the quote in the beginning is a from Eva Ibbotson's children's novel titled 'Dial a Ghost'.