A/N: Whaaaat, Gky writing a fic? In 2022? Yep, after many long years, I am writing again! And by long, I mean I had time to grow up, graduate high school, get engaged, graduate college, AND get married between my last fanfiction and now. How insane is that? Thank you to all who still follow and support my really old, kinda cringe fics, even after all these years!
This is a Flinx fic (though it's more so a character study on Jinx with some Flinx sprinkled in), but I have two warnings: 1) I will be writing predominantly on me AO3 (Pockykierra, for those interested), and 2) I probably won't write much Flinx after this. This is pretty much 100% for the nostalgia and for you guys! While I will always love this ship and the joy it gave 12 year old me, I have other people I wanna write about. And I just don't relate to them as much as did when I was a teen. So after this, I will be trying some new stuff out!
Again, thank you all for the support 3 A little nervous, but here we go! Hopefully my writing has improved since I was 12.
At first, she tempted the universe.
Somehow, it made her feel better to do so. Every morning when Jinx forced her eyes open and trudged herself over to her vanity mirror, she would gaze at her slate skin and fushia peculiarities and try to convince herself that she loved them. That they were a part of her. That her powers of misfortune were valuable because they made her strong. And, really- she was alive to appreciate them, so that should count for something.
Every morning, she failed.
They were ugly. Her features, her powers, her everything. She hated them, and wanted them gone more than anything, but knew better than anyone that nothing she could do would make them truly go away. Sure, she could dye her hair. Wear contacts. Invest in the highest quality foundations and concealers and paint her skin until the sickly hue faded to nothing. Never cast another hex again. But what would be the point if she knew what was underneath it all? What would always be there, reminding her every day that the path of goodness was not one she would ever walk? The answer was, there was no point.
So she tempted the universe, taunted it, daring it to throw something else at her. She broke mirrors. Knocked salt shakers over and did nothing about it. Watched and hoped for a black cat to cross the street in front of her. And she ducked under ladders every chance she got (which, granted, wasn't often, but she still eagerly awaited each occasion).
Jinx could never say why she did those things. Why she tempted the universe so. Or even why doing them made her feel better about her life in some sick and twisted way. Perhaps the villainy inside her wanted to be rebellious and shout to the world to bring it on, whatever "it" was. Maybe it was a strive for more power - if she surrounded herself so thoroughly and entirely with bad luck, perhaps she could become stronger. Then, her shortcomings would no longer matter. Because life- was power.
Or maybe, it was a cry for... something. Help? Possibly. Attention? Debatable. Her own destruction? Perhaps (most likely).
As she got older, her tactics for changing herself, changed. More than changed - she did a perfect half-turn and took off in the opposite direction as fast as her metaphorical legs could carry her. Because as she aged, she realized just how stupid she was being - how would bringing more misfortune upon herself help? Bad luck was what made her what she was. What she was trying so desperately (but also secretly) not be.
So, she started seeking out the good fortunes in life, avoiding bad luck like the plague.
A rabbit's foot was always on her person, wherever she went, disguised around her teammates as a morbid statement piece of jewelry. Clovers were cleverly hidden around her room, painted into journals and tucked into cracks in walls. A dream catcher hung over her bed. And never, ever did she clip her fingernails after dark. And as she grew just a little more, she steered her teammates towards stealing from a museum that just so happened - entirely coincidentally - to hold an amulet that was told to bring good luck.
She searched endlessly for something, anything.
And, of course, that was when she met him.
Kid Flash. Or Wally West, but Jinx wouldn't know him as that until much later. He was everything she wished she could be - free, happy, normal. He had his super-speed, but it... suited him in a way that made him feel so regular. Standard. And she envied that - though, for a long time, she tried to convince herself it wasn't envy. Rather, frustration or anger. Which was relatively easy to do because he could be so incredibly, unfathomably annoying. Running to France and back just to show off his abilities. Asking for condiments on a sandwich after she had captured him (really, who does that?). Making a fool of her in front of her idol and childhood hero.
Trying so hard to make her see the goodness she had inside herself.
And possibly the most annoying bit was that, despite it all, he somehow still convinced her to believe him when he said she was better than the life she led. Within days she went from trying desperately to join the Brotherhood of Evil to leaving villainy behind altogether. It all happened so fast (though that was the only way Kid Flash knew how to do things, so that wasn't surprising). And yet - it felt right. Possibly the first thing she had ever done to feel as such.
Though that didn't mean it was perfect right away - it was the farthest thing from. But Wally was there through every single hurdle, no matter the difficulty. Even the identity crisis she went through after the final fight with the Brotherhood (in secret, she mourned for her teammates - they were only kids) and the subsequent convincing of the Teen Titans to let her join them (specifically, their spiky-haired, bird-named leader).
It was a struggle for a good amount of time, knowing she was unable (and unwilling) to return to a life of crime but being so hyper-aware that she didn't quite fit in with the heroes of the world. Nothing felt right. She had, more than ever before, wanted to just- crawl out of her skin and become someone else. Someone who could be the hero Wally said she was. A monster created from the deeds of her past lingered over her shoulder, gleefully whispering her faults and flaws.
But then, life just... went on. Jinx thought - hoped - that there would be a moment, a day, a singular point in time when everything would just - click. And everything would fall into place. Life would be what she wanted it to be, and nothing less. She would be able to think of herself as a hero (not just 'barely an anti-hero'), her powers would no longer bother her, and she would look in the mirror and not hate everything she saw.
Unfortunately, she wasn't so lucky (ha). As she came to learn, age was the best teacher of all - the great appeaser of life. When she was no longer a teen but still a Titan, she started to, dare she say - like herself. She came to respect her powers rather than fear them. And her appearance, well, if Wally liked it (as he told her he did every day), maybe she too could learn to like it. Most days, she would wake up curled in her loving husband's grasp and wouldn't feel the need to break a mirror or keep a lucky foot with her at all times. She could feel... normal. Happy.
But there were still those days. Days when it wasn't perfect. And sometimes, the wounds from her past bled onto those who had never hurt her - like Wally. And each time she yelled, or ignored him, or disappeared for days on end, she always thought - this is it. When he finally realized she wasn't worth the effort, that he had wasted his time loving her, helping her change. It never came. He held unwavering patience in the face of her self-hatred, anger, and jealous rages, and always brought her back down to that peaceful homeostasis she had painstakingly learned over the years.
And at some point, those outbursts ceased. When her hair turned dusky, strands of gray mixed with pink, she would look in the mirror and notice the lines of laughter creasing her eyes and mouth - signs of a happy life, one she never thought she would live. And she would look back and realize that those feelings of doubt, of abnormalcy, of not fitting in anywhere, were gone. Replaced instead by the joy of existence, by love, and being loved in return-
And by complete, unconditional, shameless self-acceptance.
