Author's note: Thank you for the reviews everyone! This chapter is going to contain a lot of character development for Dal and Jacob (who will be a large part of this arc) so I'm sorry about the lack of Raven and Garfield content (although it's there if you squint lol). Obviously Raven's brothers, in terms of their names and powers, come directly from the comic books. That being said, while you'll recognize characters from the comic books, live-action show, the cartoon, really any iteration of the Teen Titans, I take a lot of creative liberties. I try to make the OG Teen Titans as in character as possible but everyone else is bent and molded to fit the outline of my plot. I hope you guys like it and thank you for continuing to read. Also I do not own any Friends characters.
"Woah there, that's a whole lot," Dal chuckles softly, head tilted towards his son who struggles to get a good grip on the container of sugar. Dal smiles at Cris grabbing the container from him. "That's alright, we'll just double the recipe kid."
Raven is distracted by the way Dal's face is completely transformed with a full smile on it. He is an objectively attractive man with thick hair, big eyes, a slightly upturned nose, clear skin and pronounced chin. Raven is willing to bet that most people turn to look at the man when they see him on the street but whether he keeps their attention is another thing entirely. With lips and brows that barely ever even twitched to greet you, the baker is forgettable amongst the mass of objectively attractive men in California.
If people saw him how Raven is seeing him now, she isn't sure they'd be able to look away. Raven can only see father and son through the opening to the kitchen. From where she's standing they're encased by the wall separating the kitchen and the register. Sunlight comes in from behind them, filling the gaps between their limbs and their bodies. Dust particles glitter in the air around them.
Dal hasn't noticed she's in the bakery yet. The displays are practically empty, which would have been surprising to her had she not read the hours on the front door. Daily Dasik is closed today. She should have gone back to the Tower when she saw that but she didn't, something itching in the back of her brain. Every step forward is a needle slowly poking at the balloon surrounding the small family. She stops moving forward when Cris looks up at Dal, wiping at the flour on his father's cheek with his chubby little fingers. She should leave. She takes two steps back towards the door. Her boot smacks against a chair. She clenches her eyes shut.
"You keep on stirring that butter and sugar okay," Dal tells Cris when he hears the sorceress, brushing his hands against his apron. Cris doesn't look up from the pot, his tongue poking out of his mouth in concentration. The baker pats him on the head before turning to Raven.
"We're closed today," Dal says, not impolitely. He doesn't spare her a smile or a frown. His face is as impassive as ever. Raven feels heat crawl up her neck.
"Right...the door was open," Raven says, gesturing weakly towards the door behind her. She shuffles her feet. Her boot slips on her cloak, causing her to fall into the table next to her. She rubs her hip when she regains her footing. Dal looks at her, blinking a few times. He tilts his head to the side. Raven imagines this is what school children feel like when their teacher's look over their shoulders during exams.
"Right," he finally says. "I'm making breakfast with Cris right now but I can set you up with some tea until we're done."
"Would it be better if I came at another time?" the sorceress asks, trying to regain some semblance of power in this dynamic.
"You came all this way to schedule an appointment?" Dal asks, eyebrow arched. Raven sucks her lips into her mouth and resists the urge to pull her hood up. The baker wipes his hands on his apron again. "We're making a big batch of lemon poppyseed muffins, why don't you stay a while?"
"Okay, would you-" Raven hesitates, gulping down her urge to cringe. "Would you like some help?"
"That's alright."
Thank Azar.
"Do you always have a book on you?" Dal asks an hour later, dropping a warm muffin in front of her. She eyes the dessert over the corner of her book, steam wisping off of it. She dog ears the page she's on.
"Most of the time."
Dal takes a seat across from her, folding his hands. Raven takes a bite of the muffin and moves it away from her mouth. Her lips part over the beginning of her sentence before she pauses, taking another bite of her muffin. The baker let's her toe around the ocean of things that need to be said for exactly two more muffin-bites before he shatters the surface water, pulling them both in.
"I was a scrawny kid when Jacob and I were in foster care in 2006," Dal starts. Raven pauses mid chew. "He was five years younger than me but everyone we knew was scared of him…"
Dal tries to focus on 'Friends' as he chews on the meatloaf his foster family had cooked for dinner. He isn't sure if it's because he misses the jjampong his mother used to make or because his foster parents just weren't great cooks but the meatloaf is almost inedible, simultaneously dry and greasy. He's lost fifteen pounds in the last six months though (as if changing in the locker room wasn't hard enough) so he's hoping staring at Jennifer Aniston will make the food taste better.
Dal looks up when Jacob walks in and sits behind him in the corner of the living room. He shifts his body on the sofa, just a few inches every few minutes, to maximize the space between himself and the eleven year old boy.
It's not like he hates Jacob. He just...doesn't like to be around him. The boy is always laughing. When they were driving to school. When their foster parents were arguing. When there's a sex scene in a movie. And he makes these little weird, random comments that always leave Dal opening and closing his mouth like a fish out of water. He throws tantrums when they leave the bathroom door open after using it or when his foster mother would sit on his bed after her shift at work, wearing the clothes she wore outside. Dal never knows what he'd get from Jacob.
And like, just now, he took a seat behind Dal and didn't say a word. Didn't bring anything with him. Dal's pretty sure he isn't even looking at the tv screen. Dal places the meatloaf on the coffee table in front of him and pretends to crack his back but really takes a peak behind him. He makes direct eye contact with Jacob who doesn't even startle at being caught. Dal quickly looks back at the screen.
He's strategizing how to get out of the living room without having to greet the boy when another figure comes stumbling into the room.
"So this is where the party's at!" Angel screams even though the boys are five feet away from him at most. Dal puts a hand on one ear. Angel is always smiling and his cheeks are always red. He can never walk in a straight line. Dal sees him every couple of weeks or so when the twenty-five-year-old man comes to visit his parents, asking to borrow twenty dollars that Dal hasn't seen him pay back once.
Angel is mostly harmless, if not a little annoying. He always comments on how skinny Dal is and asks him if he misses China. Even after multiple times Dal has told him he's Korean and he was born in America. Dal has learned that if he ignores him, Angel usually leaves the room.
"Damn can't nobody say hi?" the man says, slumping his weight into the sofa Dal is sitting on. Dal tries to inch away but at this point his ass is climbing up the arm rest.
Jacob laughs from the corner.
Jacob loves Angel. He is always the first to hand the man an ice cold beer from the fridge. He challenges him to a hula hoop or spinning contest until the man is stumbling around the whole house breaking vases and lamps along the way. Jacob laughs and laughs and laughs.
Angel does not love Jacob. For a man who is fourteen years older than Jacob he sure doesn't know how to act around the boy. Then again, Dal doesn't know anyone who does.
Dal needs to get the hell out of this room.
"That Rachel bitch is hot," Angel says, breathing like his lungs are about to collapse. Dal puts a hand on his neck, uncomfortable that he can share any interests with this man. He continues to watch the show in silence. Suddenly Angel drapes his arm over his shoulder. He leans- well more like tips- forward.
"What's the matter? You don't like her? Who do you like? Phoebe? Monica?"
Dal remains silent, holding his breath so he doesn't have to smell the man.
"Oh I get it. Your tiny prick gets hard for Joey," Angel mumbles, so close his lips brush against Dal's ear. Dal shoots up from his seat.
"That's gay!" Dal shouts and Jacob's laugh reverberates off the walls louder than Dal has ever heard it. "What are you laughing at?"
Dal is hot all over, his fists clenched at his side. Jacob covers his mouth, but a few giggles slip between his fingers. The boy drops his hand, his face suddenly completely straight. Jacob stands up abruptly. Dal's fingers immediately loosen and he finds himself taking a few steps back. Jacob grins, skipping forward. Not for the first time, Dal thinks he looks like an imp.
"You say gay like an insult," Jacob sings. Dal shuffles his feet.
"No, I didn't. I-" Dal feels the hairs on the back of his neck stick up. He looks at Angel who is suddenly somewhere between conscious and unconscious. Dal seals his lips. Jacob laughs again.
"It's okay for boys to like boys," Jacob says, his eyes twinkling. "It's not okay for grown men to like underage girls."
"What...what are you even talking about?" Dal asks. Jacob looks behind them at Angel who is knocked out on the sofa. He cackles, placing a hand over his lips until the sound is muffled. The boy's eyes are tearing up, his face is red and snot is coming out of his nose. The image sends a shiver down Dal's spine. He runs out of the living room, Jacob's laughter on his heels.
"...I did have a crush on Joey. Angel did get caught making videos with young girls," Dal says.
"Why are you telling me all this?" Raven asks. Dal puts his mug to his lips and takes a sip. He doesn't move the mug from his lips for a few beats.
"Do you not want to hear it?" he asks. Raven doesn't respond.
"I want to say it out loud," Dal eventually answers with a shrug.
"Why do you laugh all the time?" Dal asks one night after a year in their foster home. His hand is under his head as he looks at the stars through the window across the top bunk of their bunk bed. It's the only question he's ever asked the boy. It's not like they're ever together in the house long enough. Dal is always working his part time job and Jacob is always...being chaotic somewhere. Dal's eyes flutter shut as he waits for Jacob to respond.
"Don't you think it's funny?" Jacob whispers.
"Jesus!" Dal shoots up on his bed, clutching his chest. He hadn't even heard Jacob shift on his bed and here he was on the ladder to the top bunk, his face right next to Dal's. He inhales deeply a few times, trying to steady his erratically beating heart. Jacob's round face looks like it's made of porcelain in the moonlight.
"Don't I think what's funny?" Dal asks, when his breathing straightens out.
"How we all pretend we can't see when other people are pretending."
Dal rubs his thumb against his chest, thinking that Jacob has a weird way of sounding like he's got one foot in his teens and the other in his nineties.
"You're pretty scary for a twelve year old," Dal eventually says. Jacob grins.
"That's honest."
"...alright then. I'm going to head to bed now," Dal says, turning his back on Jacob.
A layer of grease settled onto his skin during his shift. His feet are tired and his face is sore from smiling at customers. Whoever said smiling in a mirror when you're sad makes you feel better must have only done research on a small group of people. He always feels monstrous and deformed when he fakes a smile.
It's a humid summer night, which isn't making him feel less sticky but Dal finds the walk to his temporary home to be peaceful nonetheless. It's the only time he really has time for himself. He likes being alone. He curls into himself whenever he tries to talk to other people. He was never good at having socially acceptable conversations. He either talked too little or said too much.
It's one am when he enters the house so he's surprised when he sees a body, partially obscured by a bunched up duvet, walking towards the washer. Dal looks down at the legs. Definitely Jacob. He looks at the stairs that lead to their bedroom and then at the boy who is desperately trying to keep the blankets from touching the ground. Dal wiggles his toes in his shoes, assessing the pain. Sighing, he grabs the duvet from Jacob.
"Ew, you just got out of work," Jacob says, reaching for the duvet again. Dal sucks his lips into his mouth. So much for helping.
"Aren't you putting them in the washer anyways?" Dal asks. Jacob crosses his arms over his chest.
"Now I'm going to have to put twice the detergent in."
"Didn't you just wash these last night?" Dal asks, looking at the boy over the pile of blankets.
"Deborah sat on my bed after work again," Jacob says. Dal resists the urge to tell him he's being ridiculous, biting his tongue instead. He drops the sheets in the washer at the same time Jacob preps the detergent. They circle around each other like figure skaters.
Jacob props himself onto the washer. Dal pulls up a chair, the balls of his feet sending stabbing pains up his legs. He takes his shoes off and rubs his feet through his socks. He looks at Jacob through a curtain of bangs, feeling his shoulders curl forward like they normally do when he feels a conversation looming. Jacob grins.
"You're quiet."
Dal doesn't say anything, looking at his socks. He flexes his feet, wiggling his toes. He normally would have stayed like that to avoid talking. Dal's a master at inventing ways to avoid eye contact. Especially with Jacob. Having that boy's full gaze on you always felt all too suffocating. But sometimes the pressure of an unspoken conversation weighs more than his anxiety over choosing the right words.
"Where are your parents?" he asks, not looking up from his feet. It's the wrong question. He's asking too much. He doesn't know why he asks; he hates it when people ask him the same question. He drops his feet to the ground immediately, collapsing into the back of his chair. "I'm sor-"
"In here," Jacob says, tapping his head. The smile he gives Dal this time is different. Not as loose and slippery. It twitches, like he's malfunctioning.
"Mine too," Dal says.
"I didn't know what I was talking about," Dal says, wrapping his hands around his mug. He purses his lips, looking somewhere behind Raven. "I didn't want to see my parents, but Jacob was running away from his."
Raven's finger twitches against the table.
"I-I think Jacob gets his abilities from his parents. Is that...true?" Dal asks, fidgeting for the first time since Raven has meant him. He's looking at her through his bangs. Raven's lips remain in a straight line.
"I couldn't tell you what kind of relationship Jacob had with his parents," Raven says, ignoring the way Dal's eyes move over her entire face. "Why didn't you want to see your parents?"
Dal leans back in his chair, laying his hand flat against the table.
"They figured out I liked boys a couple of months before they got deported," Dal says. He doesn't add anything after that.
"So you knew about Jacob's-" Raven looks around. "-abilities?"
"Not until we were older-"
Dal doesn't know why he's here. He's already been asked if he speaks Korean twice (he doesn't). His girlfriend's cousin didn't even hesitate when he told Dal that he had, "really big eyes for an Asian." Her brother scrambled for something to say to him before deciding to talk about anime for approximately two hours, which Dal can admit is great entertainment even though he's only watched two episodes of two unrelated shows in a friend's dorm room back when he was in undergrad. In her defense, Maverick was cringing more than he was during these interactions, mouthing sorry as many times as she could without her family noticing.
He decided he was going to break up with her two weeks ago. He just hasn't been able to find the words to.
On top of it all a man has been checking Maverick out all night.
Dal is not, by any means, the insecure, scrawny boy he was. He started going to the gym in college and even though he's still skinny, he knows he's got broad shoulders and a firm body. He's smart and has a job that pays him well. Plus avoiding conversation has made people cling to whatever few words, however uninteresting, do end up coming out of his mouth.
Still Dal can't help but eye the man. He's unjustly sexy. So sexy Dal feels like glancing in his direction is an indulgence. Like eating a giant slice of dark fudge cake. Tall and tan with a sharp jaw and high cheekbones, the man looks like he is carved out of marble. He has a sleeve of tattoos on one veiny arm and one dangling earring in his right ear that catches the sunlight whenever he turns his head.
Like Dal, the man does not belong here. He screams indie music and incense. Maverick's family screams golfing and flowery brunches. The family keeps glancing in the man's direction; Dal's just not sure if it's because he sticks out, because they know him, or because Dal isn't the only one who is able to recognize that the man is a walking MoMA display. As unjustly attractive men often do, the man sits comfortably by himself at one of the back picnic tables, sipping a dark beverage that would probably make Dal gag. He eyes the guests, never once bowing his head, even when he does make eye contact with people. Dal can't even watch him make such unflinching eye contact without feeling like fingers were crawling up the back of his neck.
Dal lifts his hand to his neck, in good time too considering that the man settles his unblinking, thickly lashed eyes on him soon after. He doesn't want to radiate nervous energy in front of the man who is trying to catch his girlfriend's attention (even though she won't be his girlfriend much longer). That's the same reason why he doesn't break eye contact, even as the man saunters in his direction. Dal looks around for Maverick but can't find her.
"Park yi-dal," the man says, swirling the ice in his drink- whiskey, it definitely smells like whiskey. Dal lowers the hand on his neck, his eyebrows crinkling.
"Sorry, do I know you?" Dal asks. No one ever says his name in the right order. The man laughs, the vibrations transporting Dal back in time instantaneously. He takes two steps back, almost twisting down the embankment they're standing on. Jacob grips Dal's t-shirt in one fist before he can fall over. "Jacob?"
Jacob grins, raising the glass to his lips.
"You shouldn't be drinking. You're only…" Dal does the math in his head. "Nineteen?"
Jacob cackles, downing the rest of his drink.
"Twenty."
Dal remembers his previous thoughts and his face grows hot. Jacob smirks at him causing Dal to immediately look towards the pebbles at his feet.
"Looking a little red there Dal," Jacob sings. "You been drinking?"
Dal doesn't answer, focusing on a distant boat.
"What are you doing here?"
"You know I love to laugh..." Jacob starts. Dal can feel his eyes on him but he keeps his eyes on the boat. "Connecticut's a running joke."
Dal takes a seat on the ground. Jacob mirrors him.
"You've grown up," Jacob purrs. Dal snaps his head towards him. Jacob's leaning forward, leaving only three inches of space between their faces. A breeze blows and Dal can smell the pepper and cedar in his cologne. Jacob's eyes are heavily lidded; his lips still wet with whiskey. Dal leans back.
"Are you drunk?" Dal asks. Jacob's lips part over the top row of his straight white teeth.
"No," Jacob hums. Dal doesn't know why but the space around them is starting to blur into indistinguishable shapes. He licks his lips. Did he drink something? Have Jacob's eyes always been green? He leans forward a little bit, looking at the details in the other man's iris. He feels a tug in his stomach when the wind blows Jacob's scent around them again. He breathes deeply, his mouth filling with saliva. He gulps it down, watching as Jacob's Adam's apple moves under the skin of his own neck. He wonders if Jacob's scent would be stronger near his Adam's apple. He wants to press his face into the spot where Jacob's shoulder meets his neck. Jacob's laughs again but for some reason it sounds like hazy music. Suddenly Jacob's hand is gripping his neck roughly; his thumb is moving up and down his jaw.
"I could make us both feel drunk though," Jacob purrs. Dal's lips part; he finds himself involuntarily swaying forward. Jacob grins, pressing his thumb into the corner of Dal's parted lips. He rubs his lower lip. Then all of the sudden Jacob lets him go and it's like everything around them comes into clear focus again. Dal scrambles away from Jacob, putting a couple feet of distance between them. Jacob laughs so hard he almost falls over.
"What?" Dal asks dumbly, panting a little. Jacob calms himself down, wiping a tear away from the corner of his eye.
"What what?" Jacob asks, bursting out into laughter again.
"How-"
"Who? Where? When?" Jacob jokes, moving to stand again. Dal grabs Jacob's wrist, pulling him down before he can stand up fully. Jacob's smile falls from his face, his irises getting swallowed up by his growing pupils.
"Careful, I might start to think you want me on the ground," Jacob says, leaning towards Dal again, eyes predatory.
"How did you..."
"How did I what?" Jacob asks, leaning even closer. Dal let's go of Jacob's wrist, looking down at the pebbles near his feet again. He's being ridiculous. Jacob grips Dal's chin, forcing him to look up.
"If you figure out what you want to ask me, I've got your answer," Jacob whispers. Dal opens his mouth. Jacob pokes his cheek.
"Handsome," Jacob purrs; he stands up again.
Dal digs his hands into the solid ground beneath him.
"You might want to look for your girlfriend," Jacob starts.
"I saw her go into the cabin of that boat over-" Jacob looks around before pointing towards the dock, "there. I'd cover my eyes if I were you. I don't think she's decent."
Jacob winks. Dal looks at the boat Jacob's pointing at.
"What?" Dal mumbles, looking back up at Jacob but he had already slipped away. He grabs his head.
"Maverick was with another man in the cabin."
"How do you know Jacob wasn't playing-"
"She told me she'd been seeing the man for months."
"You continued to talk to Jacob? After he did that?" Raven asks, her voice a little sharp. Dal drums his fingers against the table. He scans Raven's face.
"Some people have love like roses, like your leader and the pretty alien. Some people have love like weeds."
"Love?" Raven asks, eyebrows crinkling. Dal gets up, grabbing Raven's empty dishware. "What happened?"
"You saw what happened," Dal says. His lips close. "I've got to make Cris lunch."