Actual conversation between actual authors #8:
areyoukiddingmedude: Good nap?
AmberZ10: It's complicated.
AYKMD: *Puts hand on chin, expectantly looks up at AZ* Go on...
AZ10: Yes, well...the film (It's Complicated) was a bit disappointing, given the cast. Perhaps the sequel centering around my nap will be more interesting.
AYKMD: *Nods solemnly, although very confused*
AZ10: *Pats AY on head* That'll do, pig. That'll do.
AYKMD: Ima punch u
/
Team meeting. Probably won't be done until 5:30. Regardless, we should be at your house by 6.
Harley read over the text she'd received from Pam after gymnastics several times. It sounded like they were definitely still on for tutoring, but just that Pam was running a little late. Harley didn't need to rely solely on Pam for rides, though- she could make other friends. She had made other friends. She, Roxy and Talia had spent more of the lunch period talking than actually practicing, although Harley did get to run through her bar routine, which was awesome because it was by far her worst apparatus. Roxy gave her some great tips on building grip strength that Harley knew would help her out a lot if she could solidify it all by their first meet.
"Hey, do any of you have a dollar for the bus?" Harley asked, although her shame almost stopped her. "I had a ride but they're gonna be late and I didn't bring any cash." Hey, everybody, I'm poor!
All four girls looked at her oddly. "No…" Cassandra finally broke the silence. "But I have a car. Do you need a ride?"
"Well I—no—I'll just wait." Harley responded quickly, focusing on lacing up her shoe.
"Seriously, Harley. It's fine. My parents pay for my gas anyway." This was the most Harley had ever heard Cassandra speak consecutively. But they'd had a good practice. Maybe "happy Cass" was more talkative.
Selina emerged from Coach Kane's office and Cass pulled on her stoic mask once more. "It's all right, KiKi. I got it." Selina told her.
Cass shrugged and zipped up her Gotham Prep hoodie, leaving the locker room with Roxy following close behind. Talia offered Harley a sympathetic look before exiting as well.
No, don't go!
Selina sighed. "Come on, Crotchy."
I should have waited for Pam, Harley thought as she hurried with her shoes, Selina's judgmental gaze never wavering.
"You really don't have to do this," Harley reminded Selina as the brunette unlocked her car.
"Yes, I really do. You're on my team, Harley. A captain's job is to take care of her team."
Harley desperately looked over at the tennis courts one last time before closing the passenger door and locking herself into a car with the infamous Selina Kyle.
"Central, right?" the brunette asked as she sped off without first buckling her seat belt.
"Y-yeah." Harley stammered. "82nd."
Harley tried to keep her gaze straight ahead, but it kept wandering back to her driver, whose mouth was drawn into a hard line. The silence wasn't comfortable like it was with Pam, there was something festering, hanging in the air between them.
Selina obviously realized the awkwardness herself because she quickly reached forward and turned on the stereo. Harley was surprised when the speakers began blasting…classical music? Can a person even blast classical music?
Harley must have been making a face because Selina glared at her and said: "It's Bach. Have a little fucking respect."
Now a complex instrumental arrangement was at least filling the silence. Even so, Harley was still uncomfortable. "So…I heard your mom's a plastic surgeon?"
"Why? You thinking about getting some work done?" Selina made a turn, and seemed to reevaluate her answer. "Yes, my mother is a plastic surgeon."
Harley cleared her throat, noting Selina's slight change in tone. "Is that…cool?"
Selina shrugged. "I enjoy knowing who needed a new face."
The blonde sort of grunted in agreement and offered an awkward nod before sinking back into the seat. Selina was navigating the streets quickly and without a map. Harley wondered idly if she had googled her as well.
And then, as if she were reading Harley's mind, Selina muttered: "I was born down here."
"Huh?" Harley looked over at her.
The brunette wistfully glanced out her window as she stopped for a pedestrian. "My real mom overdosed in an apartment about two blocks over. 68th and Church? You know, where all the whores wait for their johns."
Wait, what? Harley opened her mouth to speak, but only a strange squeak came out before she shut it again. "Are you—wait, are you kidding?" Harley wanted to know. "I thought your mom was a doctor."
"I'm adopted, dumbass." Selina sped off, still not looking at Harley.
"When?" Harley asked after another moment of silence.
"I was three, not that it's any of your business." Selina informed her, loftily.
"Sorry, I just…" Harley was interrupted by a Where are you? text from Pam. got a ride, meet me at my house she replied before turning her attention back to Selina. "Were you there? When your mom…That must have been really hard."
"Umm…I'm sorry, Dr. Crotch Rocket-Quinzel. I can't remember you billing me for this session." Selina sneered. "Now where the fuck is your pineapple?"
"Wha-?" Harley furrowed her brow. "Are you calling me Spongebob Squarepants?"
"Yeah. You're too fucking happy all the time. It's gross," the brunette answered absently as she turned onto 82nd Ave. "So which one is it?"
Harley pointed to her building as it came into view and Selina pulled her Corvette over to the curb. Her passenger hopped out quickly, grabbing her bag and giving herself a good five feet of room on the sidewalk. The car pulled away without Selina offering so much as a word to Harley.
The blonde was still standing there, dumbfounded, when Pamela pulled up in Harley's convertible. She slammed the door harder than was necessary and came around the car in a heated approach.
"Harley, why didn't you tell me you had a ride? I gave you ample warning as to—"
Pamela's momentum was stopped when Harley ensnared her in a hungry kiss. She cupped Pam's jaw in both hands and brought their lips together with an intensity fueled by the time they'd spent apart. Pam's eyes remained open for a moment in surprise before she relaxed, wrapping her arms around Harley's waist and pulling her closer.
A car rumbled down the street and they separated quickly, but one of Pamela's hands managed to stay on Harley's hip.
"I missed you." Harley said, shyly, from beneath her eyelashes.
Pam grinned, and they just stood there, looking at each other for a moment in the early-September dusk before Pam's expression turned a bit more serious. "Who gave you a ride?"
"Umm…Selina, actually." Harley told her, shoving her hands deep in the pockets of her sweats.
There was something surprisingly close to fear in Pam's eyes that Harley found almost amusing, but the redhead shook it off. "I don't think we'll have time for both driving and tutoring tonight."
"OK." Harley grinned. It would be more comfortable in my room, but we'll be more alone in the car…Harley! You can't just base this decision on a better kissing location. You need a driver's license and you need to pass Biology. Real things are at stake here! With an internal sigh, Harley said: "How about we study. The sun's gonna go down soon. I don't know if I'm ready to drive in the dark."
Pam nodded sagely. "A valid concern."
Harley kissed her one last time before opening the door to the apartment and finding…Mom!
"Mom!" Harley said, trying to play off the blush in her cheeks as excitement. "I-I thought you were working tonight."
Ms. Quinzel shook her head. "I picked up a lunch shift tomorrow. Hey, Pam." The older woman smiled. "Is that a new car?"
Both girls froze. If she saw the car from the window, she probably also saw…
"Well—n-n—not exactly." Pam stammered, all her usual confidence drained.
"Actually, Mom." Harley stepped forward. "That car is…that car is my car. Pam bought me a car."
Ms. Quinzel now wore the same stunned look as Harley did when she opened the front door. "What?"
"I'm very wealthy." Pam assured her. "Exorbitantly so. Truly. It was no problem at all."
"And she's teaching me how to drive it! We were going to go tonight but we have to study instead because there's a test coming up on Friday and Pam is actually my biology tutor did I tell you that? Of course I told you that but yeah so um busy busy busy. I'm probably just going to have some taquitos for dinner or something is that cool? Or did you already make dinner or—it doesn't really matter it's just—"
"Harley." Pam said, softly, beside her. "You're talking really fast."
"Am I?" Harley asked. Her mother was still silent.
Pamela cleared her throat. "Ms. Quinzel, I purchased Harleen a car because relying on public transportation can be tedious. I am also paying for the monthly insurance, so I assure you this gift will come at no cost to your family."
"So…yeah." Harley grinned. "Mom, we can talk about it a whole bunch later, but right now I need to study."
"O-Okay." The older woman was still at a loss for a coherent sentence, but it was too late anyway, since Harley was already dragging Pam by the hand back to her bedroom.
/
"This feels like math." Harley complained, setting her pencil down on her notebook in defeat.
"Well…" Pam sighed, picking up the pencil and handing it back to her. "In some ways, it is like math. I suppose one could think of the traits like variables, if that makes it easier to understand."
"It doesn't make it easier." Harley pouted. "Nothing makes it easier. You may as well be speaking Latin right now."
"Si tibi placet Latine loqui…" Pam offered.
"You have got to be kidding me…" Harley grumbled as she turned back to her textbook.
Pam giggled. "So I take it that's a no, then?"
"I have no idea what you said, but yeah. No."
Pam smiled kindly as she put her hand beneath Harley's chin and directed it upward so they could look each other in the eyes. "Da mihi osculum." Harley clearly didn't understand the words, but their lips were too close to miss an opportunity for a kiss. So Pam allowed her to lean over and plant one on her lips. "See?" Pam giggled. "You're already on your way to learning Latin. I told you to give me a kiss, and you did."
Harley flushed, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "I think you should tell the teacher at school. Maybe he could incorporate that into his curriculum."
"Mmm…" Pamela considered it for a moment. "I imagine you'd have considerable pushback from the school board."
"That's a shame." Harley sighed.
Pamela wanted to reach out and kiss her like she had in the car. With passion and hunger and, well, tongue. But that was not the task at hand. That could wait until Harley had a basic understanding of a Punnett square. So Pam sighed as well (although likely for a different reason) and turned back to Harley's paper.
"A capital letter signifies a dominant trait. Brown eyes, for example, are a dominant trait. While blue eyes, like yours, are a recessive trait and will be represented by a lower-case letter." Pam explained. "Because a fetus incorporates the genetics of both its mother and father, you must set up the Punnett square to give both traits equal opportunity."
"OK…" Harley said, squinting slightly. "So two big B's and two little b's." She drew the letters around the square. "Now what?"
"You can think of each box as a child. That's what our text book asks us to do." Pam informed her, and Harley nodded, pencil still at the ready, concentration unbreakable (for the moment). "And now we're essentially going to multiply the variables, similar to what we would do in mathematics. Look, dominant-dominant, dominant-recessive, dominant-recessive, recessive-recessive."
Harley bit her tongue as she followed Pam's direction and filled out the squares with the appropriate letters. "Well fine, now we got a buncha letters in boxes. So what?"
Pam smiled and scooted closer to Harley, taking the girl's hand and using it to point to the first box. "This child has brown eyes." She slid the finger over. "Brown eyes." And again. "Brown eyes." Her voice was a whisper when she made it to the final box. "Blue eyes."
"Aw, Pammy, we made a baby!" Harley grinned. Pam rolled her eyes affectionately, kissed her cheek and then backed off again.
"So how come my brothers and me all have blue eyes?" Harley inquired, turning her hand to interlace her fingers with Pam's.
"Well, what color are your father's eyes?" Pam asked. "I already know your mother's are blue."
Harley had to think for a second. "His are blue too."
"Then set up another square with only recessive traits- little b's- as variables." Pam instructed.
Harley did as she was told, but realized the point halfway through. "Oh! So without the big b's, the little b's are sorta like the dominant ones."
Pamela giggled at the simplistic language. "I suppose."
"Yay!" Harley clapped her hands together. "Whew! That was hard work. I should probably get a reward, right?"
"What did you have in mind?" Pam grinned. "How about one of—these." She kissed Harley, slowly, and it built in intensity until Pamela once again summoned her courage and ran her tongue across Harley's. The blonde's hands- again -threaded through her hair, and so Pamela probed further, slipping her tongue into Harley's mouth. The moan she got in response sent that familiar electricity down to the pit of her stomach, and then further as Harley continued to reciprocate. Pam reached a tentative hand to Harley's neck and began to trail her palm downward towards her chest-
There were suddenly little feet running down the hallway and a voice screaming "Harley! Pammy! Mommy got pizza!"
They separated just as the door was swinging open, revealing a grinning Zeb already in his pajamas. "Pammy! Do you like olives on your pizza?"
"I—Umm—" Pam was out of breath. Concentrate, Pamela. Do you like olives on your pizza? "Yes, Zeb." She smiled, recovering as best she could. "I do like olives on my pizza."
Harley giggled, her face flushed almost beyond recognition. "We're coming out…of this room…now. We're coming out of this room now."
Zeb heard his sister's bizarre response. Attempted to process it. Gave up, and then ran back into the living room.
"Best tutor ever." Harley whispered, her breath hot against Pam's ear before using her teeth to briefly tug at the lobe and skipping out after Zeb.
M-m-maintain decorum, Pamela. Maintain decorum.
Bonus question: What is Selina Kyle/Catwoman's alias? (Catwoman (vol. 3) #53)
