A/N: Sorry about the hiatus! Real-life happens.
Happy Valentine's Day! :)
Also, I'm changing around my writing style (namely dialogue and paragraphs) because even though both are "correct", this version is more aesthetically pleasing. I'll also be slowly updating this style on previous chapters as time goes on.
Disclaimer: I've never been to the San Diego Zoo, so pardon me while I take on author-freedom to the max and make almost everything up. I tried to stick with the zoo-map, but then I gave up. Also, I do not own Young Justice, and am in no way affiliated to any type of zoo.
A Lingering Feeling
XIII. Wonderland
Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn't know you left open.
- John Barrymore
San Diego
January 14, 9:21 PST
Artemis stepped out of the taxi and was nearly bulldozed by a group of running children, followed by a group of running adults as they tried to control their cacophonous brood.
"I've never been to the zoo before."
Her admittance was blurted out before she could filter it. It was an experience that was becoming more common when Wally was in her vicinity. Gone were the days of hiding her thoughts, and peeking through were the moments when the need to darken her windows was nimbly dissipating.
"Really?" Wally replied as he looked at her incredulously over the taxi's roof. "Never ever? Not even as like…a field trip during elementary school?"
Artemis shrugged, but instead of looking away to emphasize any pity, she grinned at him and answered, "Guess I'm just always full of surprises."
Wally's smile evolved into a beam and he fanned out two tickets in front of her. "Same here! Merry Christmas! Actually, present from Joan," he explained as he handed one to Artemis. "She insisted on paying for our tickets. She's absolutely in love with you. I think she'd adopt you if she could, and spend all day with you making scrapbooks with my embarrassing baby photos."
Artemis laughed and accepted the ticket. "You? Embarrassing photos? Preposterous!" Her words couldn't have been drooling with more sarcasm.
The smile remained on Wally's face. "I know right?" he responded, tagging along with the wisecracking train.
Artemis looked down at her ticket, and a panda in mid-chew stared back coolly. It was just a piece of paper from someone who seemed to care for her out of the goodness of her heart; just a trip to a place she's never been before; just a normal Saturday in January with a boy who had slowly evolved into becoming her best friend, so why was there a bubbling feeling in her chest that was in danger of erupting as tears?
"Tell her thank you," she murmured, still staring at the ticket. "This was very nice of her."
There was a brief pressure around her shoulder, but when she looked up, Wally was already gesturing for her to get in line with him. She noticed he was wearing the brown jacket she had gotten him for Christmas, and she was thrilled to note her feverish hours of mental imaging had paid off. The earthy tone brought out his eyes and his hair without rendering his cheery complexion shallow. The collar gave him a surprising tone of sophistication, and overall he exuded waves of warmth. Her eyes also lingered on his black finger-less gloves, and she had to forcibly shove away the sudden desire for his hands and arms to find their way to her waist…
She coughed, and joined him with a clean slate of expressions.
"Caught you staring," Wally leaned in to whisper as the line inched towards the zoo's entrance.
Artemis rolled her eyes at him and scoffed, and tried to ignore the close proximity of his lips to her ears. "I would have taken a picture, but I didn't want my phone to jump off a cliff," she retorted, raising her head towards him.
"If it does, I'll be sure to catch it."
"Exactly why I don't want to take a picture in the first place."
"Ha," Wally chuckled, finally straightening, "one of these days I'll win."
"I wouldn't count on that, bro," came a deep voice from behind. Wally and Artemis turned around to see a college couple smiling back at them. The young man who had spoken had his arm around a beautiful petite blonde, and gave her a squeeze as he continued. "Been dating Arie here for over three years, and she never lets me win."
Arie laughed and playfully shoved her boyfriend's torso. "Oh shut up, Damian, that's not true." She then turned to Wally and Artemis. "So how long have you two been together?" she inquired amiably.
Before the two could even begin to swallow their surprise, Damian cut through. "Let me guess: 'forever', huh?" He nodded at them knowingly. "That's what everyone says. You two definitely act like it."
Artemis was about to retort with "What is that supposed to mean?" when Arie interrupted.
"Hey! I think I know you!" she exclaimed as she stared more intently at Wally. "You're Kid Flash, aren't you? The Flash's sidekick?" She then turned her wide eyes to Artemis, and gasped again. "And I've seen you with Green Arrow!"
Simultaneous alarms shrilled in both Wally and Artemis's heads. Secret identities were still priority alpha in the land of vigilantes, and especially with their current spread of villains. Code red, code red!
Wally answered first, feigning surprise mixed with a precise measurement of bashfulness. "Me? Kid Flash? Whoa there. I know I'm good-looking, but not that good-looking. And then as for Cassandra here—" It was the first name that had popped into Wally's mind, followed by his first thought of action: he placed an arm around Artemis's waist and pulled her in, and then looked at her fondly. "—well I think she's way prettier than Green Arrow's sidekick."
Artemis giggled shrilly, a telling indication of her nervousness. Her mind was holding contradictory thoughts over her gaze; she wanted to look away, but sometimes the force-fields of magnets are difficult to part. She would be lying if she said she wasn't enjoying the feeling of his arm around her, the pressure of his fingers on her abdomen, and the delicate scintillation in his eyes, drawing her in until she almost remained silent for a second too long.
"Well, Jason, I'm glad you find me prettier than Speedy," she finally volleyed back with good humor. She played along with him and wrapped her arms around his neck, and turned to Arie and Damian with an apologetic smile. "Sometimes he forgets I'm not a guy," she whispered, loosening an arm to pat Wally's chest, and with each contact of her hand with his jacket, her mind rejoiced with confetti and cheers of "MUSCLE MUSCLE MUSCLE!"
Arie's eyebrows slowly furrowed together. "I could have sworn," she stammered, "you two—"
Wally laughed, and Artemis could feel the deep sound waves travel from his vocal chords into her hand and through every hyper-sensitive crevice of her body.
"Oh nah," he declined. "We get that a lot. We're definitely not superheroes—"
"—but we are flattered by that notion," Artemis finished.
Instead of refuting, Damian's smile broadened. "Look at that! They're even finishing each other's sentences. Definitely 'forever'."
Artemis felt her cheeks flush a ripe shade of incarnadine. Thankfully however, they had finally reached the entrance's security check-point, and everyone was distracted with emptying their pockets and presenting their tickets. They were waved through the metal detector one and by one, and Artemis was surprised to feel Wally's arm return to their position around her when she emerged on the other side. She turned and caught the farewell waves of Arie and Damian as they walked away, and with a shocking urge of disappointment, understood his previous movement was only to keep up their little act. But before she could silently berate her emotions, she felt his arm trail away at a tortuously reluctant pace, and soon Wally was walking backwards in front of her.
"You are in luck," he announced, "as I have been assigned to be your grand tour-guide!" He spread his arms wide to present the entire park, and then began gesturing around with grandiose motions. "If you look to your left, you'll see a beautifully crafted trash-can. And if you look to your right, you'll be able to witness the cotton-candy maker in her natural habitat! And then if you stare straight ahead, you'll see the most handsome, funny, witty, and all-around-amazing guy in the world!" He stared at Artemis with half-lidded eyes and jollity written all over his expression.
Artemis squinted and brought a hand to shield her eyes. "Where?" she pondered out loud. "I only see the biggest eyesore in this zoo."
"Either you're lying," Wally snorted, "or you just caught a glimpse of yourself off the reflection of my perfection."
It was a lame comeback (attempt at snazzy rhyming aside), and Wally knew it, because "eyesore" was the furthest description of Artemis right now. In fact, if her physical appearance was the sun, Planet Eyesore would be currently 13.2 billion light years away, chilling silently with the furthermost galaxy captured by the Hubble Space Telescope.
Her lips were tinted a shade of pretty; her inquisitive eyes framed with quick feathery lashes. Her ponytail swayed continuously as she took in all the sights around her, and the chardonnay strands glistened over her navy-blue pea-coat like strings of jewels over velvet. Wally's eyes dropped on their own accord to take in her shorts and chestnut leather boots that rose over her legs to clasp just below the knee. It seemed Artemis wanted to take full advantage of their mini-vacation away from the snippy winters of the East Coast—a notion Wally's hormones fully supported.
However, his weren't the only approving hormones in the park. As Wally turned to glance behind them, he noticed a herd of boys around their age, their eyes shamelessly slithering up and down Artemis's body. It was more than enough to make Wally's skin crawl, and even though he wanted nothing more than to deliver a pack of super-speedy-punches to each of their smirking faces, he settled for a threatening glare.
As he turned back around, he placed a hand over the small of Artemis's back in an attempt to both suggest a path, and to satisfy the sudden uprising of his natural protective instinct. He was sure the rascals saw the gesture; he could feel their eyes still glued to Artemis, and wondered how she was so oblivious. But one brief glance at her face answered his inquisitions.
Childlike—the only word Wally could find to accurately describe her expression—feathered with the pink tints of innocence and pure unadulterated fun Artemis had grown too fast and too soon to have ever experienced.
He had only seen such an expression once—at the park when they were playing with Finnegan, the lost puppy, and she had laughed and sparkled with vulnerability and joy. All other times, the glints in her eyes were either spiked with iron, dancing with fire, or cast faraway and lost like a buoy in fog. Wally then decided that however much he liked the other facets of her soul, he actually truly loved seeing her be nothing but…happy.
And just then, Artemis turned her happy eyes and happy smile at him, and his thoughts evaporated as he switched his focus back outwards.
"So, tour guide," she chirped, "where to first?"
Wally whipped out a map from his back pocket and unfolded it with a dramatic flourish, and angled it towards her so she could follow the path his finger traced. "Well, m'lady Arty, I suggest we start down this path and just go wherever the winds take us."
Artemis followed him, and at a point in-between visually swallowing all the carousels, balloons, and ecstatically waving palm leaves, she closed her eyes for a brief moment. In that single second of blindness, she allowed her other senses to unfurl their wings and absorb the warm sunshine and feathery breeze. She inhaled deeply, and the bouquets of popcorn and grass and fur whirled through her chest cavity and imagination. She could hear the calls and chortling of children and adults, the breathy snapping of cameras, and the distant bays and warbles of animals offering sneak-peeks of their majesty. She tucked away this small droplet of frozen time deep into her heart—a sparkling coin for rainy days.
"This is definitely the happiest place I've ever been to," she admitted when she opened her eyes.
"Then just wait until I take you to Disneyland sometime," Wally answered enthusiastically. "It's like this amount of happiness to the nth-power, where 'n' equals the logarithmic growth of the number of people present at the park times the number of smiles."
Artemis felt a few mental pom-poms being thrown around at the mentioning of experiencing another new activity with Wally. The thought thrilled her so much she forgot to tease his nerdy remark, as well as fail to notice his sideways glance of shock at the absence of such rib-jabbing.
The first animal exhibit came into view among tall trees and playful cries. They walked up the wooden ramp, and Artemis's first zoo-encounter consisted of a spider-monkey jumping onto an enclosure rope a few arms' length from her. In her surprise, she almost knocked backwards into Wally with her fists automatically clenched.
"Whoa there, Arty," Wally replied amidst chuckling and steadying her shoulders with his hands. "Are you sure you're not Supes in disguise?"
She didn't respond, but relaxed her stance and mentally counted to ten with one deep inhale. With her hyper-activated attention, she could see the distinctions between the little primate's red and black fur, down to its fine eyelashes framing two inquisitive brown orbs. It swung to and fro, and chirped loudly before bounding back to the other monkeys.
"Speaking of…" Wally's voice trailed into an impish grin and he raised his phone level to the swinging animals.
"Let me guess," Artemis began before he continued: "Sending a picture to Conner?"
He snorted, and his phone buzzed a response almost immediately.
"I hate monkeys," Conner had typed to no one's surprise.
"I heard you and Robin got him one of those cymbal-clapping monkeys for Christmas," Artemis mentioned as they walked to the next animal exhibit. "How'd that go?"
Wally laughed. "He broke down in tears and hugged both of us tightly, claiming it was what he's always wanted his entire life, and by that I mean he raged until we gave him his real gift."
"And since you and Robin are still very much alive, I can safely assume it wasn't primate-related?"
"We got him Superman-pajamas, and told him the Man of Steel wears the same ones to bed each night."
Artemis rolled her eyes and unfurled a long sigh. Man-culture.
"Hey look!" Wally exclaimed as the next enclosure came into view. "It's Arty the Aardvark!"
Artemis craned her neck and swept her gaze from one end of the desert corral to the other. "I don't see any termites," she observed out-loud before turning to Wally and continued huskily. "That must be one hell of a party you're throwing then."
They managed to hold each other's knowing gaze for only a second before memories resurfaced and their faces cracked into laughter.
"Worst day at school ever," Wally concluded when their chuckles subsided.
"Calling me 'Arty' will only bring you more pain," Artemis responded in a sing-song voice.
"Yeah, you keep telling yourself that, Arty."
Artemis widened her eyes menacingly and made a move to hit him, but he laughed and slipped away to the next exhibit.
Of all the pleasing sounds she could list—bird chirps, flowing water, dulcet cello melodies—her soaring favorite was the sound of Wally's loud and goofy laughter. Every giggle and guffaw was a ripple of happiness that permeated not only as air waves, but little tickles of joy through her psyche as well. She loved making him laugh—because when he was happy, so was she.
She found him hanging over the edge of a wooden bridge, concentrating on the jade river beneath. He leaned over the railing and pointed at the creatures that had snatched his attention.
"Turtles are awesome," he commented. "Sometimes I wish I were a turtle."
"Really? You?" Artemis scoffed. "The fastest boy on earth wants to be one of the slowest creatures on earth?"
"Turtles are badass," Wally defended.
"And slow," the blonde pointed out.
"But they're adorable."
"Not if you became one."
Wally coughed in pretend pain. "Ouch, Arty," he choked out. "Now that would have stung if it was the truth, but I know you're lying."
"Me? Lie about your good looks?" Artemis sputtered with fake indignation as she finished crossing the bridge. "Never!"
The speedster followed her while shaking his head and chuckling quietly to himself.
They leisurely strolled past the exhibits, pausing to regard each creature with awe. Wally especially enjoyed spouting random facts about the animals—the origin of their name, the special needs of its environment, why certain groups of people worshiped its unique attributes—and Artemis listened and nodded along with captured fascination. Each animal seemed more intriguing than the last, coaxing forth every man and woman's desire of towering mountains and sun droplets on forest floors, of moments when butterflies and hawks wouldn't shy away, and of the endless possibilities of sunrise.
Drawn by forces known and unknown, they paused the longest at the tiger enclosure, a habitat of jungle and veneration.
"I think tigers are the most beautiful creatures," spoke Wally.
Artemis turned to him. "Why's that?" she inquired.
"I mean, just look at them," he gestured. "Their brilliant coat, all that potential energy stored in their muscles ready to tear out another beast's throat, all that stately power… but then they could flop over on their side and start licking their paws like a house-cat. Majestic, fierce, unpredictable—you can't help but fall in love with that combination."
Artemis leaned her elbows against the banister and gazed silently at the large orange cat bathing in the sun. It held its neck regally erect and squinted its eyes at the onlookers, as if daring one of them to intrude upon its reverie.
She peeked sideways at Wally, and was especially taken in with his expression. He was entranced by the tiger—his thoughts sambaing through its stripes and muscles, his unblinking gaze enrapt by the fiery orange like the thirsty drawn to water. After a long while, he turned to her and mused, "If you're ever tired of using your real name as your superhero alias, you should go by Tigress."
Artemis looked away but the simper still remained on her face. "Oh?" she replied. "Why's that?"
"Because I think if you were an animal, you'd be a tiger."
A warm chill blew through her chest as his earlier words echoed in her mind. Majestic, fierce, unpredictable—you can't help but fall in love with that combination. However, maintaining sarcastic apathy, she turned back to him and raised an eyebrow and responded, "And you'd be a turtle?"
The connection to her previous teasing made him laugh. "And together we'd be the Terrible T's!"
Wally enthusiastically raised a hand for a hi-five, and after snorting at his creative creation, Artemis gave him the satisfaction of delivering such a lame joke. When their hands met, their palms and fingers remained touching for a second too long, and the feeling of unfamiliar longing singed through their nerves. They hastily dropped their arms and eyes, and both pretended the hiccup never occurred.
"Um, shall we?" Wally quickly suggested as he gestured to the exit path.
"Yes!" Artemis answered with an overdose of gusto. "To the wolves!"
They trotted across the concrete path to the rocky dwelling of the wolves in silence, each trying to find a distraction from their thoughts.
It was a fairly large pack of eight animals, all scattered around the enclosure and at every degree of activity. As the two observed them, a few uncanny comparisons of the Team came to mind.
"Is it just me," Artemis mused, "or do those two remind you of M'gann and Conner?"
Wally followed the nod of the archer's chin and laughed. "The ones practically hugging each other during their nap?"
"Obnoxiously cute, huh?"
"Oh look," Wally pointed. "There's Robin, obviously trolling and flirting with Zee."
"I'm guessing the pair snarling and barking at each other is us."
"It's so accurate it hurts."
"Is that Kaldur at the top of the hill looking disapprovingly at everyone?"
"Who's the one sulking in the corner?"
"Roy, obviously."
As the two laughed and snapped pictures of the wolves, Wally caught a familiar group of colors out of the edge of his vision. He quickly glanced, and then internally winced. It was that group of boys from the zoo entrance—the same ones who had uncouthly clawed their eyes over his best friend's body, and were currently leering and whispering among themselves while plundering glances at the bare skin between Artemis's shorts and boots.
Wally immediately squared his shoulders and stepped between their lines of vision. One of the boys caught his glare, and nudged his friends. Then they all stuck their tongues at him, and turned around with sneering howls and barks. Thankfully, there was a concurrent blast like a trumpet emitted from the corral next to the wolves, and both the canines and Artemis turned their heads at the noise and away from the retreating boys. Wally was grateful for a reason to lead her away, and they left to examine the source.
The fanfare revealed itself to be two elephants gamboling about their home with a giant soccer ball. By the time Artemis and Wally arrived, the display had drawn a bustling crowd. But with the speedster's knack for seeing opportunities, and the archer's city street-smarts, the two managed to zig-zag and squeeze to the front. Wally arrived at the metal handrail first, and pulled Artemis to the space in front of him. The tight spot resulted in the inevitable touching of back to chest and ponytail to neck, which soon combined with Wally's desire to grab the banister with both hands, and Artemis found herself completely—and protectively—surrounded on all three sides.
Artemis used her focus on the elephants as a distraction from concentrating on every fiber in her body that was connected to the boy behind her. The sensation of strange euphoria was similar to their fake relationship-acting in front of Damian and Arie—she could feel his breath against her hair, along with every quiver of his laughter and speech dart down her spine and branch out into her ribs. His scent of blithe cologne mingled with the solid incense of earth blanketed her against the world, and despite the jostling of the crowds around her and the joust of the elephants before her, her aura remained tranquil. Her daydreaming was only broken when Wally freed one hand to record a video of the playful animals.
"Sending this to Rob," he explained, his voice reverberating down Artemis's body.
She tipped her head upwards and cocked her neck towards his voice. "His favorite animal is an elephant?"
Wally tapped a few buttons on his phone and extended a pensive smile. "Something like that," he responded gingerly.
Artemis didn't question his serious expression and tone, and turned back to the elephants. She knew that if Wally didn't want to reveal the secrets of a mystery, it was best not to pry. He would tell her if he chose, and she respected that.
As far as attention spans go, the two elephants seem to have merged their concentration with a goldfish's, and quickly abandoned the soccer ball to stand placidly while staring into nothingness. Then, much to Artemis's dismay, as soon as the crowds dispersed, so did Wally's body heat as he released the railing and stepped back. She swiveled around to observe him, and grabbed onto the railing behind her and swung gaily to and fro.
"You'd make a great addition to their monkey exhibit," Wally teased, the shimmer returning to his eyes.
Artemis tactically pretended not to hear and nudged her chin at the field across from them. Wally turned to see a languid duo of rhinoceroses leisurely chewing away at their brunch.
"Ah, the critically endangered northern white rhinoceros with only four left in the wild," he noted. "Six are held in captivity, two of which are before us munching on grass."
Both of them fell silent as they watched the armored beasts, seemingly ingenuous to the perils of their kind.
"What would you do if you were one of the few humans left in the world?" Artemis asked suddenly.
Wally didn't respond right away, and the memory of their alien invasion training session with M'gann crept its tendrils into his mind. He remembered the speech he gave, but he also remembered other more anguishing moments, and his eyes darted to Artemis.
"Rebuild and survive I guess," he finally answered, certain words echoing certain memories. "I think your instinct to continue your species would kick in."
"And what if you were being poached to extinction?"
"Outsmart the bad guys, fight back, and win." He tried not to picture the expression on Robin's face right before the explosion.
"You're optimistic," Artemis noted.
Wally shrugged and grinned smugly. "Hey, comes with the ego I guess." He nudged her arm gently and volleyed the same question. "How about you? What would you do?"
"The same thing," she replied, recalling the invasion of Mt. Justice by Red Torpedo and Red Inferno and how her burst of courage had surpassed her trembles of hopelessness. "Get traught, or get dead."
The phrase culled a laugh from Wally. "Rob would be so proud."
They continued past the animals until a three-way fork in the road stalled their momentum. Wally slapped his pockets for the folded map, but Artemis grabbed his sleeve jacket and made a beeline for the Polar Rim exhibit.
"Whoa—!" he exclaimed, the rescued map flapping in his hand. "Alrighty then."
Artemis wove through the indoor crowds until surfacing at the penguin exhibit, a dimly lit room that radiated blue from the water behind a large panorama of glass. Behind this glass, penguins splashed and swam, trailing silver bubbles like birthday balloons.
Why Artemis was so fascinated by the penguins, Wally couldn't guess, but once she had entered the large viewing room, she had found a quiet spot against the glass and stayed there with silent fixation. Her features melted into a rare softness until it was difficult to discern this was the same girl who could start a fire with her tongue.
He randomly glanced over his shoulder, and with a flare of annoyance, saw the same group of boys again. They must have unashamedly followed them. He looked back at Artemis, who was smiling sweetly at the penguins floating by her and oblivious to the four pairs of eyes boring unabashedly into her. While he gazed at her rare intemerate calm and heard the snickers behind him, his primal instincts began fomenting more fiercely than ever before.
He took a step towards Artemis and whispered into her ear, "Please don't freak out, but trust me on this and just play along okay?"
Before Artemis could give him a questioning look, she felt one of his arms wrap around her waist and pull her towards him. "Wally?" she asked alarmingly as she placed her hands against his chest. "What—"
"Shh," he replied softly, and to quiet her, his other hand gently laid her head into his shoulder, facing away from the still smirking herd of immature boys. He lowered his head and breathed into her hair. "Creeps at nine o'clock."
He was worried for a second that she would push him away and slap him, and lecture him until his ears bled about being independent and handling her own, but he felt the tension leave her body, and she tentatively brought her arms around his waist, moving them closer. This startled him, and his heart beats quickened in spite of any advanced self-control he could have possibly possessed. Artemis must have sensed this change, and looked up into his eyes. Her lips sculpted into a smooth smile.
"Whoa there, Speedster," she murmured. "I thought this was all pretend?"
He leaned in closer, and was enveloped by a swirl of citrus, green apples, jasmine, and amber, mixed with an indescribable musky scent—playful, feminine, exotic… erotic.
"Then pretend that didn't bother you," he whispered huskily.
Artemis tilted her head, and the blue glow from the penguin pool reflected in her eyes like a polished mirror. "I never said it bothered me," she replied in the same tone.
She could feel his warmness radiate through her coat. He smelled like laundry detergent and emerald forests. His face was only a breath apart, and she could count all the freckles on his cheeks, and see surprising flecks of gold in his green irises even in the dim lighting of the exhibit. Wally stared back, mesmerized by her eyes like a moth caught in candlelight.
"Creepsters still there?" she asked, her voice so low and soft it almost blended in with the deep splashes beyond the thick pane of aquarium glass.
He gradually shifted his gaze to stare out the corner of his eyes, and then quickly returned to the pull of her endless grey orbs. He sighed and looked at her apologetically, but with a hint of mirth.
"I'm afraid so."
"Drats." She brought her hand to the back of his head and her fingers sifted through his downy hair. "I really want to go see the polar bears…"
An electrifying shiver ran down Wally's spine at her touch and he opened his mouth to inhale sharply. Suddenly, he felt a light pressure from her hand as she pulled him down, and brought her lips to his. He was stunned for half a second, before relaxing and parting his lips to match her movements, feeling her softness and tasting the peppermint on her lip balm. His eyes fluttered closed, and suddenly his body felt like it was on fire, and he pressed back harder. His hands tightened their grip on her waist, and he heard her gasp.
And then without warning, Artemis pulled away, and the feeling of her warm lips was replaced with a tingle of cold. He drew in a long breath of air and his eyes snapped open to find her staring impishly back at him.
"I think," Wally finally said breathlessly, "they're gone."
Artemis smiled, and slowly rose up on her toes to whisper in his ear, "And that's what I call a fake-out-make-out." She lowered herself, and then added, "Oh, and if you ever even mention this to Robin, or Zatanna, or anyone else for that matter… I will shave off all of your ridiculously soft hair and cut off both of your muscular arms, are we clear?"
Wally's eyes smoldered back with his response, "Crystal clear, Miss Peppermint Chapstick."
It was weird, Artemis thought, remembering the tingle and press of their lips together. But it was a surreal aspect of strange; not wholly focused on the foreign; and definitely not revolving around the unwanted. This was a facet from her fantasy; a snippet of those daydreams that occur in the minutes before sleep where she would envision the perfect dream for her life—with the perfect family, the perfect purpose, and the perfect boy. In the past, the face of this perfect boy has been one of rippling ambiguity—a reflection of her reality. But recently, his features had gradually revealed themselves to be a pair of scintillating green eyes, laughing cheeks dotted with freckles, and locks of auburn as soft as air puffs. In those private corners of her mind, Artemis had whirled together scenarios of "what if"s between her and Wally, only to wave them off with a sad flick of perspective. Who was she kidding, she used to think, there's no way he thinks of me like that.
But then that kiss happened. Fake-out-make-out or not, the electric fire she had felt was not from her imagination; it was as real as his hungry hold and his yearning lips—the manifestations of their desire for each other.
Her trip to Cloud Nine was short-lived however, and soon the grappling hook of unanswered questions zipped her back down to earth. Was her spur-of-the-moment action going to complicate their friendship? So far, neither had looked the other in the eye during their walk to the polar bears, and she couldn't discern if the tense silence between them was from anticipation or relish.
She swept her gaze in a panoramic view of the polar bear exhibit on the pretense of eyeing Wally's side-profile. Instead, her plans felt short as she was immediately drawn to his eyes staring right back. When their gaze connected, Wally's forehead muscles contracted minutely in surprise, and he immediately switched his attention to the snowy bear behind the glass.
"Oh hey." He lightly nudged Artemis to avert her attention. "He looks like he's dancing."
The polar bear in the exhibit was standing upright on its hind legs, and had taken to moving around its front paws on a whim, drawing out laughter and camera flashes from the spectators. The rare and comical scene was extremely welcomed by Wally and Artemis, and the well-timed humor broke away whatever barrier had emerged between them.
Artemis turned back to Wally and flashed him a smile, but soon morphed into a nervous lip-bite.
Alarmed, Wally asked, "What's wrong?"
"Eh, nothing," Artemis answered with an averted gaze. "Just hoping those guys don't return because I really don't want to deal with people like them today."
"Hey, I'm sure our, um, show, drove the point home," he replied.
This didn't seem to calm the expression on Artemis's face, and it gave Wally a reason to worry over her sudden state of dependence. Her usual course of action would have been to brush the incident off, and emerge emotionally victorious as usual. Had she really been so vulnerable on the inside all along? It then dawned upon him that Artemis—with her svelte figure, eye-catching golden hair, and ferally beautiful face—must receive deluges of unwanted male attention in the seedy streets of Gotham. She may have the power to knock cold any man in that city, but the verbal sneers probably never cease their paranoid haunting.
With such a conclusion, his yearning to take care of her intensified once more, and he stepped closer. "Those boys won't come near you again, I promise," he reassured her, and wrapped one arm loosely around her waist. When she didn't protest, he tightened his embrace and she scooted into him.
"If Damian and Arie thought we were a couple, then it shouldn't be too hard to keep acting like one for the rest of the day, right?" Wally reasoned.
"And that would keep them away?" Artemis pressed, her tone woven with slivers of doubt.
Wally shrugged, and tried not to sound too eager. "It's worth a shot."
Artemis's willpower to debate with him was losing its grip the longer Wally's hold on her waist became. Soon, her retort evanesced completely as a comfortable sigh of fog against the exhibit's wintry glass.
It wasn't difficult for the pair to pretend to be a couple. Every embrace, every moment of hand-holding, and every stolen glance came as easily as sunshine on the savannah. Their arms naturally found each other's curves, their fingers intertwined without hesitation, and the satin sparkles in their eyes and pink flush on their cheeks indicated nothing short of two lovers lost in their own world.
And Wally was in heaven. Pretend or not, this opportunity to be so physically close to Artemis was all he had ever dreamed about ever since he realized she wasn't really a she-devil in disguise, but someone who had snatched his heart into a roller-coaster cradle. He understood reality would creep forth when the day was over—the need to act like a couple would fade with the setting sun—but he shoved the thought away like a sweater in an overstuffed suitcase. His speedster-mindset told him to live in the moment, and he did just that. To him, every one of Artemis's smiles, touches, and peals of laughter was real, and nothing existed in the world except them.
"Hey." Wally turned to Artemis with epiphany written from his raised eyebrows to his ivory teeth. "Have you ever fed a giraffe?"
"I've never even seen a giraffe in real life."
Wally laughed. "A simple 'no' would have worked."
"I'm more of the creative type," Artemis replied with a grin.
Feeding giraffes, Artemis discovered, involved holding a bouquet of large, green leaves, climbing up to a wooden observation deck, and being greeted by eager giraffes whose heads were probably larger than her entire upper body.
And it was great.
The giraffe she fed was surprisingly patient. It batted its luxurious eyelashes at her, and gently curled its tongue around the leaf to slide it out of her hand. And then, whether from being trained or simply due to its calm nature, leaned its brown and beige head towards her to be scratched. She gingerly reached over and smoothed down its rough fur, until it buckled against her hand and stuck out its tongue to be fed more.
Wally, however, had the luck of being paired with a more spirited giraffe that insisted on a continuous stream of leaves on penalty of having his hands slobbered on.
"Okay okay I'm handing you the leaves as fast as I can, geez," he repeated over and over.
There was a light tap on Artemis's shoulder, and she turned to see one of the zoo workers smiling at her with a camera in hand.
"Excuse me," he spoke, "would you and your boyfriend like to have your pictures taken with the giraffes?"
She was about to correct his mistake on Wally's given title, but remembered their arrangement and stopped herself.
"Sure," she replied affably, and then called Wally over. He moved to her side at the first beckoning of his name.
"Yes, Beautiful?" he cooed as he hooked an arm around her waist.
There was never going to be a moment when his steadfast gaze and inviting smile wouldn't melt the fringes of Artemis's heart. In a perfect world, he would always look at her like he did just now—attentive, caring, and with the smallest hint of longing.
"Smile for the camera," she prompted him as she rested one hand against his chest.
"Such an adorable pair," the photographer clucked away as he snapped the photos. "You two would make the most gorgeous children."
Artemis's eyebrows twitched upwards, and she felt Wally stiffen and release a nervous laugh.
"But we're only fif—" Wally choked on his retort and instead unleashed a high-pitched squeal. He darted away while feverishly batting at his head and nearly ran into the photographer, who was doing a horrible job at concealing his laughter.
Amused yet also greatly confused, Artemis turned to her side and received an eye-full of giraffe. The animal was gleefully lolling around its tongue and winking its eyelashes at Wally.
"It's not even the same color as the leaves!" the speedster wailed, rubbing his jacket sleeve vigorously through his hair.
Artemis clutched the banister with one hand and her stomach with the other as she almost doubled over from laughing. "I… really hope… you got that," she said to the chuckling photographer in between guffaws.
The photographer gestured towards the honeycomb of computer screens lining one wall of the observation deck, and Artemis walked towards them. It showed a slideshow of all the pictures the giraffe-photographer had taken that day, and sure enough, the center screen displayed a smiling Wally and Artemis with a photo-bombing and curious giraffe readying itself for a lick of the unsuspecting boy's hair.
"I am definitely going to send a copy of that to Joan," Artemis declared.
Wally could hardly feel his abdominal muscles from laughing so hard. They had just finished lunch, but still remained at their secluded picnic table to digest both their food and Artemis's regalement of what might be the funniest moment in the history of Mt. Justice.
"And then—" Artemis wheezed between tears, "Red Tornado—" At the mention of the android and how his unemotional reaction to the situation must have been, fresh laughter surged between them. Wally slammed a hand against the table and his face turned the same shade as the robot in discussion. "Red Tornado—" she continued finally, "walked in, took one look at the eight bras hanging from the hooks over the stove, slowly turned to stare at Batman and Hal, and just silently walked away before either one could rush to explain what was happening. And then at that moment, Conner came in—"
Wally practically choked on his gasps of air right then. "Oh man, this just keeps getting better and better!" he howled. "Supey must have flipped all his shi—"
Artemis expurgated Wally's screaming of profanity just in time by picking back her story: "—He walked in while in the middle of drinking a glass of water, and once he saw the scene before him, the contents of his mouth went flying everywhere!" Artemis paused for a few seconds to join Wally in the land of barely-conscious-from-laughing, and then finished, "Kryptonian-force water smacking Batman and Hal in the face, all over the bras that had just finished drying… It was amazing."
Wally held up a hand to catch his breath, and then painfully huffed out, "And this entire time you were just—"
"—sitting on the couch, reading a book, minding my own business," Artemis replied with wild hand gestures.
"Oh my god I can't believe that happened." Wally slowly shook his head and began wiping the tears from his flushed cheeks.
"Well that's what Hal gets for bringing bras as his only evidence, and Batman for choosing the Cave's stove hooks to dry them!" Artemis riposted.
The two sat in silence for a few moments to regulate their breathing and composure. Wally flicked a stray crumb from the table and began chuckling all over again.
"Poor Supey," he sighed.
"Yeah, eight bras at once. Never seen him so traumatized before."
Wally paused in mid-flick and looked up. "Eight?" he repeated. "But I thought the stove only had seven hooks."
Artemis shot him her trademark dead-pan stare. "Um, I'm pretty positive it's eight," she responded calculatingly. "Who puts up odd-numbered hooks anyway?"
"Exactly," Wally pointed out. "Which is why I remember it being seven, not eight."
"Wally, I live there. It's eight."
"Arty, my memory is better than yours. It's seven."
"Excuse me?" Artemis scoffed. "That's a bucket of bull-crap."
Wally grinned. "I'm telling you: se-ven," he repeated in a sing-song voice.
Artemis exhaled loudly. What did Wally and an unmoving donkey have in common? They were both stubborn asses. "Fine, let's just settle this once and for all." She took out her phone from her pocket and pulled up Conner's contact information. "We'll ask the most reputable source from this story."
Wally snorted, but before Artemis could click the "Call" button, he placed his hand over hers, sending a momentary tingle through both their nerves. "Wait," he interrupted, "let's put a bet on this-" He winked at her. "—And make it fun."
Artemis narrowed her eyes, but her lips slowly arched into a sprightly grin. "Challenge accepted," she responded. "Name your terms."
Wally leaned back and placed his arms behind his head. "If you lose," he began, his voice dripping with devilish intentions, "you have to hold a tarantula in your hand for three seconds."
Artemis's eyes widened. "Are you fu—" she almost screeched.
"Nuh uh!" Wally quickly rushed forward with a finger to shush her next words. "Mind the innocent," he added with crisp gaiety.
Artemis fell silent. She wordlessly seethed as she eyed Wally with a hawk-like stare.
And speaking of hawks…
"But if I win," she finally spoke, "you have to pose with an owl on your arm for three seconds."
It was now her turn to sit back, relax, and enjoy the show of color draining from Wally's face.
"I should have never told you that," he grumbled.
Artemis laughed, and held out her hand. "Do we have a deal?" she asked.
Wally pretended to spit in his own hand, and slapped it to the inside of her palm with a hearty shake. "Better prepare yourself for the sensation of eight furry legs crawling up your arm!" he teased.
"We'll see," was all Artemis confidently replied before freeing her hand and initiating the conversation with their silly debate's mediator. She turned the speakerphone on and impatiently tapped the table's surface to each anticipating ring.
Across from her, Wally began snort-laughing anew as memories of the story rushed back to the surface, and could be heard muttering through chuckles, "It's just that… imagery… of Red Tornado and Supey's reactions…I wonder if the G-nomes even showed him what—"
"Uh, hello?" Conner's confused greeting cut short Wally's musings.
"Hey, Conner," Artemis responded smoothly, "How are you?"
"Um, good." The perplexed frown on his face was clearly transposable to his voice. "Is everything alright?"
"Absolutely dandy," Artemis answered. "Hey, are you, uh, home right now? Wally and I actually have a quick question for you…"
Wally leaned over the table and turned the phone towards him. "Hey Supes," he greeted animatedly. "Can you go to the kitchen, and count how many hooks are above the stove?"
There was a deep sigh on the other line, and the muffled scuff of a chair being pushed back against the stone floor.
"What have you been up to?" Artemis asked out of curiosity.
"Eating," he answered simply. "I love soup." His words echoed against the stone interior of the dining area. "Um, okay," he continued, "there's… one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven hooks above the stove."
Wally silently fist-pumped into the air and Artemis scrunched up her face in disbelief. "Wait, what?" she recoiled, "Only seven? Conner, are you sure you didn't miss one?"
"Nope," he answered, followed by a deep chuckle. "Did you just lose a bet?"
At his comment, Wally unleashed an amused howl. Artemis pursed together her lips and glared at the phone.
"Well," Superboy continued with an air of lightness, "have fun." A beep soon followed, signaling the end of the call and the beginning of Artemis's impending arachnid-filled doom.
Wally waited for her to meet his eyes before doing anything, and when she finally did, he crossed his arms across his chest and cocked a solitary eyebrow.
"No," Artemis barked through gritted teeth.
"You can't back out of this now!" Wally pushed. "We shook on it."
"I didn't think we were being serious!"
Without warning, Wally unleashed a feral clucking sound, and Artemis twitched her head in surprise. She widened her eyes and spoke slowly, "Did you just—"
"Bok bok bok!" This time, the speedster included head swivels and synchronized clapping to maximize the obnoxious-factor.
Artemis's jaw muscles tightened. "I can't believe you're mocking me," she snarled.
"And I can't believe you're backing out of our sacred pact!"
"It was all just fun and games!"
"Until someone—" Wally gestured at her, "—loses a bet!"
Artemis crossed her arms and remained silent.
"Oh, come on," Wally continued. "You wouldn't be acting like this if I had lost. You'd already be throwing me into a flock of owls already." No reply; only death-glares. "Okay fine." He rose from his chair and picked their empty trays off the table. "Let's at least start moving and go see the rest of the animals." He placed the trays away on the garbage disposal behind him, but when he turned back, Artemis had still not moved even her eye muscles. He smirked.
"You know how adorable you look when you pout like that?"
At least the comment led her to unfold her arms. "I'm even more adorable when I perform murderous acts," she volleyed.
"Okay, that's it," Wally declared exasperatedly. "It's time to bust out the ultimate weapon." He slowly held out one hand to Artemis, and infiltrated her vision with round, pleading eyes, and just the smallest, most adorable, lip wobble.
It was pathetic, really, Artemis tried to convince herself, but her eye-roll was to hide the birling hummingbird in her chest. She finally sighed and took his hand. Their fingers naturally slid into an intertwining embrace, and he led her away from the picnic tables.
"Spiders are really cool," Wally began in a casual way to mollify her. "Did you know spiders rely on a combination of muscles and blood pressure to move? They contract certain muscles which increases blood pressure in their legs, and then joint extension."
Artemis hunched up her shoulders and shuddered. "I hate thinking about their legs."
"Okay okay, um, did you know Wolf spider mothers carry around their young on their backs? They give them piggy-back rides!"
"That's still horrifying because I'm picturing this giant spider carrying around a million little spiders that will just get everywhere and—"
"What about," Wally quickly interjected, "how spider silk is so strong it can stop a Boeing 747 dead in the air?"
Artemis opened her mouth to unleash another string of frenzied complaints, but stopped and shrugged one shoulder. "I guess that's pretty neat." She paused and looked pensively off to the side. "I wonder if I could create an arrow that releases a net made of spider silk."
"I bet you could." The exhibit for insects and arachnids was now within sight, and Wally was determined to keep Artemis at least somewhat distracted so they could stay on his pre-planned course. "The dragline silk is the part you want. The toughest known is produced by Darwin's black spider."
"Think I can convince the Justice League to let me get my hands on some of that stuff?" she mused.
"Absolutely. I bet Barry knows where and how," he added. "I'll ask him tonight."
Wally was able to work his magically large mouth into miraculously delivering the both of them to the line of people waiting to meet Zir, the zoo-proclaimed friendly tarantula. Artemis, hardly from oblivious, could have never let Wally blindly lead her this far without a fight, but she was secretly excited as much as she was visibly terrified. Her resolve to finally face her fear was gaining momentum against the actual anxiety, and she was genuinely thankful for the push Wally offered her.
However, that didn't translate to a complete nonchalant reaction to when the talkative trainer placed the mud-colored tarantula on the back of her hand. She immediately stopped breathing, and clenched every single muscle in an effort not to fling the arachnid to the sky and bolt for her life. The back of her neck flared and she felt the sickly prickly sensation of sweat rising from her pores.
She hated how hairy the tarantula was; how horrifying its body-to-leg proportions were; how its movements were smooth yet rigid at the same time and thus contradicted in visual cacophony. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was aware of her other hand's vice-like grip on Wally's hand, but the majority of her focus was on the spider's feet tip-toeing up her wrist.
Wally was sure no cell in his right hand was currently receiving any oxygen, but he was too amused with observing her to care. He was feeling a surge of pride at her behavior for finally confronting one of her greatest phobias. How many people can say they've done that in their life?
The smiling trainer stepped back, and her voice was replaced with the chirps of the photographer calling for big smiles. Artemis knew hers was plastic at best as she removed her eyes from the spider, but definitely not her heightened sense of touch.
"You're doing great," Wally whispered out of the corner of his mouth.
Then, undeniably, the sound of his encouraging voice propelled a surge of courage through Artemis, and the cold sweat around her torso slowly faded away. Almost magically, she felt a cocoon of calm float over her, and she was almost in a dream-like state when she loosened her clasp on Wally's hand and lifted the spider back to the trainer. It was only when they had exited the room did she unleash a very uncharacteristic girly squeal and shiver.
Wally laughed, but scooped her into his embrace and rubbed her back methodically.
"Okay okay, I'm sorry for making you go through that, but that wasn't so bad, right?" He leaned back to scrutinize her reaction. "You confronted your fear!"
Artemis's glare turned into a sigh and then the smallest hint of a sincere shrug.
"I guess a small part of me has always wanted to hold a tarantula." It was true; she had always been curious of her reaction, and the entire experience only added fuel to her addiction to adrenaline.
"Really?" Wally retorted, completely baffled. "Because I can't tell if that's sarcasm or not."
Artemis snorted and wiggled herself free from his arms. "Don't ruin the moment."
As soon as she turned around, she saw the entrance to the "Birds of Prey" aviary and excitedly nudged Wally towards it. For his part, he took one split-second glance at the sign and turned into a pillar of concrete.
"Nope. Nope nope nope nope," he muttered with matching shakes of his head. "An owl is a bird of prey and therefore I do not wish to be acquainted with this exhibit—"
"Oh come on," Artemis interrupted with a roll of her eyes, "you gave me a reason to confront my fear, and now I'm returning the favor!" She grabbed both of his hands and pulled, but he remained rooted.
He scoffed at her. "But I didn't lose a bet!"
"I wasn't being sarcastic!"
"Neither was I!"
"At least you don't have to actually hold one!"
"Just seeing an owl stare back at me is freaky enough!"
This was escalating into another one of their frisky arguments—one where neither side was actually being serious, but definitely still stalwart and unrelenting at the same time. They glared heatedly at each other through their smirks, and continued pressing buttons just for the sake of spark.
"But you're supposed to be my boyfriend," Artemis reminded him with a theatrical whine. "Are you really going to let me go in there alone?" As a bonus play, she stuck out her lower lip and widened her eyes.
Wally gritted his teeth and with a growl of defeat, finally acquiesced. He hoped in the future, she would refrain from using that pout, because that look could make him even lasso the moon and stars for her.
Fortunately for Wally, all of the owls were asleep, and merely resembled obelisks or globes of tawny feathers. The only owls awake and active were a clan of four burrowing owls actively darting around like sugar-filled children.
"They remind me of you," Artemis teased.
Instead of replying verbally, Wally looked at her squarely and made an elaborate motion of vomiting on her face. Artemis, however, remained unfazed and unflinching, and her glare was enough for any real vomit to scurry back Wally's esophagus in panic.
"Nothing scares you," Wally noted. "Well, except for sp—"
"Let's not go there," Artemis sliced through with a warning look.
"Go where?" Wally replied facetiously. "We already went to see Zir, the eight-legged, giant, furry—"
"Wally, I am going to wake up all the owls in this exhibit and throw you in, I swear—"
Wally held up the palm of his hand in surrender and laughed. He ceased his goading for the time being, and was even congenial enough to admit the burrowing owls were acceptable and somewhat aesthetically inoffensive.
Next door to the birds was an exhibit aptly titled "The Batcave". For obvious reasons, Wally and Artemis went inside to explore, and concluded its dark, cool, and damp atmosphere to be analogous to what they imagined Batman's lair to be like.
"I hear Rob once convinced Bats to take home a model T-Rex from one of their missions, and it's chilling in the Batcave," Wally randomly stated as they watched a pair of Indiana bats fold and unfold their wings while resting upside down in their roost.
"I remember watching them on TV," Artemis added as a side thought, "and how much they both frightened and impressed me."
"Hey, didn't you say you used to watch me on the News?" Wally inquired, remembering their unforgettable mission in Bialya (pardon the pun).
"I, uh, what?" Artemis was completely caught off guard, but she quickly picked her stumbling tongue off the stairs. "Oh, yeah. Right. You, and Barry." She looked up and caught Wally's jaunty smile.
"Hung on to my every word, didn't you?" he prodded facetiously.
Artemis rolled her eyes. "You never spoke; only stood there and looked pretty."
"So you did pay very close attention to me."
"It's hard not to remember someone as dorky as you," she swiftly riposted, "especially if he looks like a mustard bottle."
"Hey! My costume is awesome and you know it. Haven't you seen how awesome the yellow and red looks when I run? It's like a stripe of epic, gracing your vision with God-sent glory…"
Artemis scrunched up her eyebrows in disbelief and laughter soon followed.
"Okay fine," she admitted sincerely. "Don't let this get to your big head, but I did find you somewhat attractive from the start—"
She was interrupted by Wally fist-pumping the air. "Boom!" he exclaimed.
She rolled her eyes and continued, "I only gave you a hard time because I was nervous."
Wally almost stopped in his tracks. "Really?" he inquired with raised eyebrows.
"Yeah. I wasn't pure evil like you."
"Okay, I'll admit it: I'm not actually the spawn of Satan. You had kind of…" he paused and mulled over the right phrase, "caught me off guard, and I let my mouth take over my head. But," he quickly added with a squeeze of her hand, "that doesn't mean I'll ever stop giving you a hard time about anything and everything you say, do, or think."
Artemis shielded her eyes from the light as they stepped outside, and turned to him with a sunny grin. "Well, I'm glad we feel the same way."
Artemis tilted her head, and to her amusement, so did the turaco. She raised her phone to take a picture, and the reflection from the shiny lens captured the bird's attention. It hopped onto a lower branch and slowly inched inquisitively towards the intertwining of metal separating its haven from the soft-eyed girl until it was abreast against the cage wall. Artemis lowered her phone, and with a strange tender pull, slowly poked her finger through the diamond-shaped opening. The turaco's head immediately twitched downwards to focus on this strange new object, and without hesitation, opened its beak and decided to see if it tasted up to par with watermelons.
Artemis laughed. The turaco's nibbling tickled, and she could see and feel its tiny pink tongue against the pad of her fingertip. She heard Wally walk up next to her and turned to him with a smile.
"That poor bird," he spoke, shaking his head. "He's being poisoned, and he doesn't even know it."
At the sound of another voice, the turaco spat out Artemis's finger and swiveled its head to gaze at the deeper-voiced newcomer.
"Isn't it cute?" Artemis replied, the relaxed smile never leaving her face. "It looks like a dove with a mohawk."
Now it was Wally's turn to make like the turaco and drop his current attention to look at Artemis. No witty comeback? Not even a caustic snort? Had the atmosphere of the zoo addled Artemis's brain so much with feelings of warmth and joy that her head was now empty of any biting remarks she usually had on reserve on the tip of her tongue?
But then he returned her grin, because in all honesty, he liked it. True, it was her fearless personality that first drew him to her, but this rare tender side was what made him stay by her side.
He wrapped his arms around her from behind, and rested his chin on her shoulder. He felt like he was hugging a teddy bear—a teddy bear of serenity and security. He felt… at home.
"Wally?"
"Mm?" he murmured.
"I think this guy's my favorite," Artemis stated.
Wally peered at the colorful turaco and tried to fathom the reasons why, but he knew she would only surprise him with her unpredictability. So, he asked, "Why's that?"
And Artemis's answer proved his correctness. "He wasn't afraid to take a chance," she responded.
Above them, the sky was splashed with the fushia and gold of early twilight, and the soft light casted everything in pastel gentleness. Artemis lowered her finger, and laid her hands to rest upon Wally's clasped around her abdomen. The turaco tilted its head, and after an almost unworldly knowing gaze, fluttered back to its high perch.
It was the last show of the evening, right before closing time, so the bleachers in the large amphitheater were only sparsely dotted with the last enduring audience members. Wally and Artemis chose the top-most bleacher, away from the buzzing murmurs of people. After they sat down, they fell into a spell of comfortable silence, thankful for a chance to relax their legs and wiggle their toes.
Artemis stared at the plastic canopy above them, artificially disguised as green terrain and choppily hiding the cold metal fence from aesthetic criticism. They were all in a cage—the birds, the trainers, and the audience. Her mind wandered to the top of the arena, where it brushed past the forest of tarp and poked at the curves of the wires. She wondered if there was ever a stalwart bird that rushed at the speckle of sky peeking between the fluttering holes of the fabric, only to crunch into the cold and unforgiving criss-crosses of its lifetime sentence. As beautiful as this sanctuary was, she felt sorry for the animals' lack of freedom.
Her gaze floated downwards, and landed on the palms of her hands resting on her legs. She could relate to these animals. She was well-taken care of; she survived, but was she really free? It wasn't a physical cage that trapped her; it was a metaphorical prison of disguises, lies, and secrets—secrets that shouldn't stay buried, as Zatanna had once told her.
The canopy ebbed and ballooned out as a breeze strayed through, wrapping Artemis with a chill that penetrated into her mind. She involuntarily shivered, and immediately felt a comforting pull into the boy next to her. Her body stopped shaking, but the thumping in her heart began anew.
She had never possessed a best-friend—someone who both mirrored and complemented her; someone who held her soul closer than their own; someone who could make her laugh and feel like the happiest person on earth; someone she trusted—until the day she met the most insufferable boy on this side of the galaxy.
She leaned against Wally's shoulder and looked up to find his eyes inches away from hers, his long eyelashes curling downwards like the swoops turning in her heart.
"I trust you," she found herself whispering out loud.
The corners of Wally's lips lifted and she heard him release a soft laugh. "I must have done something right then," he responded just as quietly.
Or everything, Artemis thought, everything from the obnoxious jokes to the blanket-wrapped-hugs under the stars.
She inhaled slowly and deeply, feeling her diaphragm stretch into her rib-cage until she imagined it being used by her heart as a trampoline to leap into her throat.
"Wally, there's something I should tell you," she began in a low voice, forcing all her courage to keep her eyes focused on his. He stared back, unblinking and unmoving except for the slight tightening of his fingers curled around her waist. "And I understand if you—" her heart caught against her tonsil, and she paused for her voice to return "—I understand if your opinion of me changes after this, and… I'm sorry for keeping it from you—and everyone else—for so long."
She picked her words carefully, and slowly but steadily poured out the truth about her family—Sportsmaster, Huntress, Cheshire—and her "origin"—the monster her father had created and the heroine she wanted to become. She explained the turning point when she had pounced into the world to do good, and how she had found the Team that one night. She recalled the sudden burst of longing and passion and hope when she saw them—teenagers her age, using their combined talents and fortitude to rid the world of broken bodies and broken souls. She had realized then that maybe she did have a purpose in the world, and she would slowly work to amend the wrongdoings in her past while carving a better future, even if it meant using her own bleeding bare hands. She didn't want who she was to be who she is, or will become.
"So," she finally finished, "this is me." The final droplet of resolute bravery evaporated in the rawness of her honesty, and her gaze plummeted with a sigh. She then waited for the lash-out she thought she deserved; the abandonment she knew was the foundation of her life; the anger and hurt she understood too well.
There was no verbal response from Wally, but instead he laid the softest, most gentle kiss on her forehead, and the gesture nearly brought Artemis to tears. She blinked away the prickling sensation, and her eyes shot back up to stare searchingly into his. She didn't expect to see the absence of grating resentment and the presence of soft empathy.
"You knew," she spoke at last, her words like erupting puffs. "You knew all this time, didn't you?" Her voice began to rise in volume and octave in her fervor of revelation and relief. "You knew and you didn't—"
"I did know," Wally interrupted her. He touched a loose strand of her hair and carefully smoothed it behind her ear. "But it didn't matter to me, because that's part of who you are."
And as they looked into each other's eyes then, it wasn't with their usual wink of surface spark and snark; it was with the wide eyes of tired sailors as they gazed at the first tinge of land—expectant, nervous, quivering, longing—the look of almost reaching a dream that was birthed eons ago and had sailed through sea monsters and rolling waves, all without charted maps or stars, only with the guidance of a lot of doubt and just a little bit of hope…
And as something like magnets electrified their pull, they suddenly realized: somewhere between the penguins and pandas and peregrine falcons, the pretending had become real. Somewhere intertwined amongst the goading and glares; banter and bickering; laughs and listening; stargazing and snowball fights; pointless texts and point-earning; Artemis had fallen just as in love with Wally as he of her.
And that's when they had their first true kiss; the first drop of a roller coaster after the slow climb upwards—this was when the real ride began.
It was different this time. It was as if the window between their two worlds was suddenly flung open, and the winds from the outside could finally dance with the fire within, twirling in a spiral of sparks, glittering with the desire to be so much more closer; touching, burning, igniting.
And then suddenly there was an explosion from the center of the stage, and they ripped away from each other in a jolt of alarm. Trained to expect the worst, they both started laughing when they saw it was only the theatrical commencement of the show, filled with golden sparklers and a rush of colorful birds zooming over the audience. The energetic voice of the host burst through, and the crowd cheered.
If asked about what tricks the birds did that evening, neither Artemis or Wally would be able to answer accurately. Both minds were so occupied with whirlwind thoughts that the show was merely a continuous flicker of visible light and auditory waves.
Artemis had leaned back onto Wally's chest, and his arm returned to its protective encircling around her. Neither looked at the other, but they just knew this was real, and the fast beats of their hearts mirrored the racing of their thoughts—excited thoughts about their future together.
As Artemis slowly slid her hand down the length of Wally's arm to his hand, the smoothness of his skin on his wrist was suddenly interrupted by a bump of something supple and foreign. She circled her hand around it, and brought up his wrist in curiosity. She unwrapped her fingers and a familiar band of emerald appeared. Startled, it took her a few seconds to remember this was the hair-tie she had flung at him at the end of the sparring session in October.
Wally watched her silently with entranced amusement.
"This whole time?" she finally asked, her eyes returning to his.
Wally swiveled his hand so his fingers found hers and clasped them together. "This whole time," he replied. "Creeped out?"
Artemis snorted. "I was going to say 'surprisingly flattered', but sure, that works too."
"Oh wait!" Wally suddenly exclaimed as he veered to the left, tugging Artemis with him. "One last stop!"
Artemis looked up and mentally rolled her eyes. The souvenir shop—of course.
A blast of heat greeted them when they entered, but there was no time for Artemis to stand and comfortably thaw. Wally was soon pulling her like a hyperactive child through the carousels of stuffed animals and toys. At one point he wandered off by himself, and she was finally able to stand still. She turned her head, and found herself staring back through a long mirror meant for the clothing section nearby.
Her hair was frizzing on the edges, her mascara was casting shadows beneath her eyes, and her cheeks were flushed pink—whether from the cold of the night, or the warmth of her heart, she couldn't tell. But this reflection was of a different girl than the one who had stared tentatively back in her bathroom this morning; this was a girl who was moving on to a new and more luminous chapter.
She slid off her hair elastic and ran her fingers through the wind-blown knots in her hair. Some strands wove silkily by, while others remained persevering and painful, and took more coaxing to untangle. Finally, she gathered her hair up for a new ponytail, only to have the elastic snap in half.
A pair of frustrated dark eyes stared back, and she relented to her hair's desire to cascade over her shoulders. The day was over anyway, so let the wild things be wild.
"Do you often let your hair down at souvenir shops?"
Wally had returned to her side with a bright plastic bag and an arm around her. She tilted her head towards his voice and was met with the squish of his lips to her cheeks. She giggled and made a motion to push him away, but there was a rustle of plastic and she instead found her palm touching a firm wall of downy softness.
"I got you a stuffed one," Wally murmured, "since I can't get you the real thing."
Artemis brought the object before her and found a near-replica of the red-crested turaco she had played with staring back.
"Souvenir," he whispered into her ear, sending droplets of anticipation sliding down her spine.
Artemis exhaled an airy laugh in response. "Souvenir for me, or souvenir for you?"
"Well," Wally softly responded as he moved her hair to the side and lightly kissed the back of her neck, "that would depend if you're talking about the turaco, or yourself."
Artemis turned around and pulled him into a hug. She looked up into his eyes, and all the tenderness in her heart gently washed over her expression. No amount of verbal gratitude would be stronger than her gaze—gratitude not only for the whimsical stuffed animal clutched in her hand, but also for Wally being her best friend, her confidant, her superhero, and her silly, stubborn, sweet boy.
Their walk to the taxi-stop was unhurried—neither one really wanted their perfect day to end. They were wrapped with an air of content fizzing with bubbles of disbelief that somehow, their stars had crossed, and the grey areas had finally melted into black and white.
Artemis was inured to the cold—long stake-outs on rainy rooftops and pursuits through snowy forests had trained her to strengthen her mind over body—but she couldn't sacrifice huddling against Wally with his arms wrapped tightly around her as they waited for their taxi. With each breath, she filled her lungs and heart with his scent and warmth, and with each heart-beat, she filled her body with comfort and joy in the purest form.
"Hey," Wally spoke, "remember that time we watched Paranormal Activity together?"
"Mmm," Artemis mumbled into his chest, "I try not to."
"Remember how I won our little argument?"
"As I said, I try not to remember that bleak day."
"Well, can I still redeem my rain-check?"
"Nothing involving spiders!" Artemis yipped as she jolted her face away and stared at him squarely.
Wally smirked and pushed back a strand of her hair. "We-l-l-l," he answered slowly, "that depends if the Valentine's date I'm asking you on contains spiders or not."
Artemis's initial scowl morphed into a grin, and then the brightest beam Wally had ever seen. It was a laugh without sound—just honey happiness wordlessly personified.
"Thinking that far ahead, are we?" she replied.
"Yeah." Wally's reply was breathy through his chuckle. "You have that stupid effect on me."
In reply, Artemis reached her hand up and ran her fingers slowly through his hair. His grip around her waist tightened in response. Artemis's fingers paused, and she slowly brought both arms to circle around his neck. The stuffed turaco bumped into his jawbone, and he tilted his head towards it with a smile. When his eyes turned back to her, she was tugging him down into a kiss, and he was sure there would never be a time when the touch of her lips to his wouldn't send his heart into the Milky Way.
"So, I take that as a yes?" Wally concluded when they finally pulled apart at the arrival of their taxi. He opened the car door and stepped aside.
As Artemis passed him on her way inside the vehicle, she gave him a shrug and a lopsided grin. "I guess you have no more rain-checks now," she answered.
"Are you allergic to saying the word 'yes' or something?" Wally quipped as he slipped in behind her.
"Perhaps," Artemis teased back.
Wally sighed, and raised his arm to tuck her into him.
"Thank you for today," Artemis murmured after the car pulled out of the zoo's parking lot.
"You're welcome. Did you have fun?"
"Absolutely."
Wally pushed back her hair and rested his lips on her forehead. "That's all that counts."
And as Artemis felt her entire being snuggle into the soft dip on Wally's shoulder, her mind traveled back to when this journey started: that random night in Gotham City when she had decided to chase a white streak in the sky down the rabbit hole. She had determined she was no Alice; there was no Wonderland for her to spiral into and discover a world created by her daydreams. But she had been wrong—only in the basis of what she had thought Wonderland consisted of. Maybe, she thought as her eyelids floated shut, maybe she had arrived there after all. Wonderland—she finally concluded-wasn't out there like a hidden valley between silver mountains; it was inside… past her pearly rib-cage and deep within the golden locket of her heart… and maybe her white rabbit was actually a speedster with red hair; a speedster who had arrived just in time.
A/N: One more chapter and an Epilogue until the end! I won't be covering their Valentine's Day date; I'll just leave that up to your imaginations ;) If anyone would like to write about it, feel free! I'd love to read it!
Most of the animals were by request on Tumblr. Thank you all for your suggestions! I apologize for not being able to fit in every request. There were like, 20!
Thank you everyone for your continuous support and undying patience! I'm looking forward to reading your feedback on this chapter, and as always, I will try my best to respond to all of them!