Crossposted on ao3.
The night is a cold one, and it's a welcome reprieve when the warm air of the diner hits his body. Kendall walks towards a booth while cataloguing familiar things in his periphery: the broken jukebox, the working radio playing the chorus of a same old Christmas song, dark hair with streaks of red in one of the booths, the tired waitress—
His mind does the equivalent of a record scratch when he realizes dark hair with red streaks is most certainly not familiar in the well-frequented diner of his hometown and childhood. He turns his head and there she is.
Lucy is staring into space, not noticing him and apparently lost in thought. Her hair is shorter than he's ever seen it, barely reaching her shoulders. She looks as pretty as ever, but there are notable shadows under her eyes that don't come from make-up. Her guitar is next to her in the booth, safely contained in its bag.
Kendall realizes that he's just standing there gawking at her, but when he tries to move, it feels like he's as frozen as the ponds and lakes outside. I try to move, but I'm stuck in my shoes, you got me paralyzed, paralyzed…
Hilarious.
Heart pounding, he realizes Lucy's turning her head, and she's about to see him. I try to speak, but girl, you got me tongue-tied…
Lucy blinks, nonplussed, when she sees him. Then he sees her do a visible double-take.
"Kendall?"
She can't really be that surprised, though, can she? This is Duluth. This is Minnesota. This is the diner where his mom once worked as a waitress, though to be fair she probably doesn't know that part.
He finally finds his voice again. "Hi."
He lifts his hand in a half-hearted wave. She smiles, friendly enough, but fleeting.
And he has the choice. Return the smile, be two old acquaintances running into each other in the night, and move on, or… Or stay, for catching her and her wig when she fell, for a cheek kiss that proved her point, and for all of the other old memories. Take heed to the lyrics of a song that he'd gotten written and performed out of spite because the girl in front of him had called his music cute.
Now, I've learned a lot from my mistake. Never let a good thing slip away.
"Got room for one more?"
Lucy's smile returns. "Sure."
Kendall walks down the narrow aisle and slides into the seat across from her.
A waitress comes over, and he orders coffee. She walks away.
"What are you doing here?" Kendall blurts out, his tone in hindsight perhaps too confrontational.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Lucy asks, her tone that combination of teasing and mocking that he used to know so well. "Am I not allowed to be here?"
It brings back other familiar things that go under Lucy Stone in his head, has the memories come rushing back. The quirk of her eyebrows when she challenged something. The way she frowned when she thought something was stupid. The slant of her eyes when she glared.
"I didn't say that," Kendall says, a little exasperated. "I just meant—this is Minnesota. Aren't you…a little far from home?"
She shrugs. "I've been travelling. It's been hard to find inspiration for new songs, so I'm looking for it in places I've never been before."
"Still doing music, then," he says, as if he hasn't listened to every one of her songs.
"Sure am," she agrees. "And you're not."
"The band broke up."
"I'm aware. I don't live under a rock, you know."
"It's not like we're not still friends or anything," he says, feeling oddly defensive. "It was just time to go our separate ways, career-wise."
"I'm aware," she repeats, her mouth twitching. "I still talk to them. Occasionally."
"Right," he mumbles. "Of course."
The waitress returns and hands him his coffee, and he thanks her. He starts adding sugar after she walks away.
Lucy watches him do it. If he didn't know better, he'd say her expression is fond.
"They told me you moved back here, but I don't know what it is that you do here."
"I'm a hockey coach. They knew me from back then, you know, and it's still doing something that I love so I think I'm doing alright."
She doesn't seem to share that opinion. "A hockey coach?" she asks, voice dripping with scepticism. "Really?"
That same odd feeling is still nestled in his stomach, and it has him throwing her words back at her. "What, is that not allowed?"
She frowns but doesn't answer, taking a few sips from her own drink instead. He looks out the window, the view familiar and unimpressive. A parking lot and a street, both dark in the night. Seeing Lucy again after all this time feels awkward, gratifying and surprisingly painful.
"I heard about what happened between you and Jo," she says, causing the tight feeling constricting his ribs to increase. Who is she to keep tabs on his life? They were…friends, once. Could have been more than that until he chose otherwise. But that was all a very long time ago. "I'm sorry," she offers, with a commiserating smile.
Maybe it's the raw ache of that wound still, or maybe it's just that he's feeling argumentative in the presence of Lucy, but—
"Are you?" It's out before he can stop it, his mind on her hit single. Nevermind that she didn't name him as the subject, and nevermind that she got along with Jo later on.
There's that glare.
"Yeah, I am." She scoffs. "You'd really think I'd be so spiteful to be glad of a break-up, just for one elevator kiss years ago? Get over yourself."
He realizes that he dug this hole, but instead of trying to climb out, he digs deeper.
"One that you wrote a spiteful song about," he points out. He gives a scoff of his own, and quotes, "'He said he's glad she's gone, and I'm his miss moving on'?"
"I take inspiration where I can get it," she defends.
"Right, like here, in this no-name diner in my hometown." He lifts his eyebrows.
"Not just your hometown," she says. Carlos, Logan, James. It's fair enough. "Is this really what you're going to do for the rest of your life?"
Jo is still an actress the same way that Lucy is still a a singer-songwriter. He's back in Minnesota, but he never imagined leaving in the first place.
"I don't know about rest of my life, but for now—"
"You could go solo."
Kendall glares. "I never wanted to go solo." That was the whole point of declining Gustavo that first time. "I never even wanted to go to LA. That was James' dream, and yeah, it was fun, but it's over now. I'm just trying to move on."
For a moment, all they do is look at each other. The set of his jaw. The fire in her eyes. He's the first to look away. His gaze finds the diner's silent patrons while he sips from his coffee.
Moving back to Minnesota had seemed logical at the time. It had seemed logical five minutes ago. He settled into a new routine easily, enjoying the quiet for a change after concerts and paparazzi. Every day is always the same, and the realization that he hates it is not unlike a cold shower.
"I wasn't trying to start a fight," she says after blowing out a breath. "I just meant…" She seems to be picking her words carefully, which is uncharacteristic or at least it used to be, before she finally settles on, "You don't seem very happy."
He studies her. Short hair with fiery streaks. Dark eyes with lines under them. Different, and yet, the same. "Are you happy?"
Her eyes widen, a little. "I'm trying to be," she says honestly.
And doesn't that say it all, really?
They share soft, understanding smiles before breaking eyecontact.
They don't say anything after that. Maybe it'd feel strange in the daylight, but they're both out here in this diner instead of in bed, and the night always brings out a sense of peace unheard of under the sun.
Lucy has already finished her drink by the time that he does.
For a moment, neither of them move. This is it. This is the part where they say goodbye and go their separate ways, and it feels like…
Like old heartbreak, like blood rising up through a wooden floor. He missed her, he realizes. But they've never been… He made his choice. And he doesn't regret that choice, even though things with Jo ended again anyway. But he regrets that it hurt Lucy. He regrets that that choice prevented them from ever really becoming friends again. Instead they became mere acquaintances, hanging out when their mutual friends were, but never having a conversation again, not really.
"I guess I get it," she says. "Why you moved back here, I mean."
"You do?" Sometimes (right now) he doesn't even feel like he gets it. Brimming with curiosity, he waits for her response.
"All stars burn out eventually." She gives a helpless sort of shrug and the kind of smile he's only ever seen from her when she talks about her parents. "I think it's happening to me, too. I'm just still trying to outrun it."
"You can't run from your problems," he remembers, something he had to learn when Jo returned the moment that he kissed Lucy.
"Whoever told you that wasn't running fast enough," she says wryly, her eyebrow rising. It makes him smile.
"I don't think so," he disagrees gently.
She sighs. "Yeah, maybe."
Silence again. The moment to say goodbye again. Except…
"Hey," she says instead, "you want to show me around?"
His eyebrows skyrocket. "What—now?"
"Yes, now. Why not?"
Because it's the middle of the night, he could say. Because we're not friends, he could say.
"…Yeah," he says instead, "okay."
They go outside.
"Why did I decide to come here in the winter?" Lucy mutters to no one in particular. Her guitar is on her back. She hunches her shoulders against the cold.
Kendall shrugs. "Here."
He takes off his beanie and offers it to her. Without hesitation, she takes it.
After she covers her ears, which were starting to become the same shade of red as the streaks in her hair, she gives him a smile, familiar in a different way. "Thanks."
And he gives her the tour.
He can't take her to stores or landmarks or anything because of the time, but he doesn't have to. Practically every street here has a memory, and he shares them with her in the grey mess of winter.
He's telling the story of Broken Arm Hill when they arrive at said hill, and they're both laughing, and a hole he didn't even know existed for all of these years finally fills.
There's a playground on the hill. They sit down on the swings after Lucy gently sets down the bag holding her guitar.
She's watching it contemplatatively, actually. "Okay, so no more music career, but," she nods to it. "Do you do still play?"
"Of course I do." Stopping with music entirely would be like asking him to stop breathing: feasible for a few minutes at the most, after which life gets downright impossible. Impulsively he adds: "I'll show you."
Kendall looks at her for permission because it is her guitar, and at her nod of assent, he takes it out of the case, handling it as gently as she had.
For a moment, he's at a loss. He considers Cover Girl, but immediately discards that idea. Then he looks at Lucy, brow quirked as she waits, nose red with the cold, and he realizes exactly what song he wants to play.
He strums the guitar.
"You," he sings. "You walked into the room, on a friday afternoon."
He watches Lucy recognize the song. He wonders how long it's been since she's heard this one.
"That's when I saw you for the first time. And I was paralyzed."
It's an acoustic version of a song that wouldn't exist without her.
After he plays the final notes, she gives him a big teasing grin. He already knows what she's going to say before the words come out.
"That did not rock at all."
"You're the one who brought an acoustic guitar," he shoots back, unable to fight a smile.
"Face it, Kendall. Even your rock songs are just so cute." She makes this face to highlight just how positively adorable she finds it.
His younger self would already be in a debate about how much that is not the case, thank you, while drafting a new song in his head to show her just how much he does rock. Now all he does is shake his head, still smiling.
He puts the guitar away. His fingers are numb.
"I wanted to hurt you," she blurts out. He blinks rapidly.
"What?"
"The song. The one I wrote about you. It's why I put those lyrics in."
He doesn't know what to say.
"I remember, that day, saying something like, 'I'll understand if he chooses her, but I just don't want to be around to see it'. And I meant it. I really meant it, you know?" She's not looking at him. "But then you actually did. And I moved, like I said I would, and I felt…hurt. I wanted to make you and Jo feel it, too."
"That's…understandable." He looks down. "I never wanted to hurt you, Lucy."
"I know that. And I'm over it," she assures, "it was years ago. It's just…"
The trees wave their broken hands, dark silhouettes in the moonlight.
He's nodding. "Yeah."
Their eyes finally meet. The absurdity of it all hits him. He's in the old playground where he played countless of times with Carlos, James and Logan. Those memories play out in the back of his head in vivid technicolor, and he's unable to stop it, just like everywhere else in Duluth. He's sitting on the swings with Lucy Stone, and she's wearing his beanie, and it feels like they're at a crossroads.
There are so many ways this night could go.
The constant memories feel like an assault, all of a sudden, and he doesn't get his decision to move back here just as much as he understands it keenly.
Lucy heaves a sigh, which fogs in the air. "I really don't know how you stand this cold. I think it's about time we go somewhere with heating."
"It's not for everyone," he says graciously, smirking only a little. She glares at him, only a little, as they get up from the swings. "Are you going to get some sleep or are you hitting the road again?"
Her apparent nomadic lifestyle in search for inspiration sounds undeniably appealing. As does leaving this place. She seems to be able to tell.
"You could come with me," she offers.
His eyebrows shoot up. "Really? That's—you'd want me to?"
"Believe it or not, you're not terrible company," she teases. "I told you. What happened back then was a long time ago. And I think you and I are due some good times, don't you think?"
And it's this, above all else, that resonates. What what lost the moment those elevator doors opened, and what was missing the moment he knocked on another girl's door. They owe each other laughter.
He grins at her.
"Definitely."
She winks.
He stifles his grin. "Dust in your eye?"
"No." She makes a show of pretending to think about it. "Must be the snow."
He can fight a smile anymore, but still nods seriously. "Must be."
They drive away, and they head towards the sunrise.
I hope you enjoyed this fic! Consider leaving a review if you did, they make me very happy.