I'm a firm believer in you do you but don't take this chapter as me condoning these activities.
Back to the chapter, this was one of my earliest ideas for this story.
Year Two: The Barton-Banner Drug Trial
Earlier - Edison Residence - 16:16 PM
At first, it felt like nothing but then, it felt like everything. They thought it wouldn't hit that quickly but it did. They thought they would notice the difference between the mindsets but it feels like this new one is normal despite being so new. The lights are brighter, the atmosphere is freer and fresher, and everything is great. How haven't they done this before?
Merida and Daniel look at each other and smile, laughing a little. Wow. This is exciting.
"I can feel my heart racing," Daniel says giddily.
"I thought someone was playing the drums," Merida responds, looking up and walking from one side of the room to the other. She has to check if any of Daniel's neighbours are playing a drum set. They decided to get high in his room since they would much rather face James than Angela. Hell, James might even be up to joining. They already had Xavier bust in and he didn't care. He was more preoccupied with looking for Angela so that means she wouldn't swing by here.
"If we get caught, we'll get suspended," Daniel says.
"From a rope?" Merida asks.
Daniel wasn't thinking of that but, considering where they are, that makes perfect sense. " … maybe."
This is SHIELD Academy, after all.
-o-
Merida sits upside down on Daniel's desk chair. Her legs swing over the chair's back as she feels the blood rush to her head, making her face as red as her hair. She looks at Daniel who, for a moment, she thought he was sitting on the ceiling but then remembered that she was upside down. Daniel was actually kneeling on his bed, drawing the chemical formula for THC on the wall with a pencil. She isn't sure why she knew that. Instead of atoms, they were arc reactors and the bonds were arrows. Woah. That looks like a badass weapon.
"I remember every time my parents would go on solo missions," Merida says. Her excitement feels like it's heading downhill like all the blood in her body. "One parent would pretend that everything was fine but I know they were scared for that slim chance the other wouldn't make it back. I was always scared too. I miss my parents so much. You know, I was so used to one or both being out of the house but now I'm the one out of the house. Our parents promised that they wouldn't go on about how dangerous this will all be. Our lives will be more dangerous but we'll always be their little children so there will always be that part of them that wants nothing more than to drag us back home and keep us safe forever."
"Because … parents," Daniel Banner, Ph.D., says.
Merida rolls backwards, somersaulting off the chair and landing on the floor. She feels the blood start flowing back down to the rest of her body as she blows her curls out of her face. When she watches her hair bounce, she becomes hypnotized to it like a cat to a bell on a string.
-o-
Daniel sits on the floor, eating a bag of chips James had in his desk as he watches Merida go through James's closet. She was trying on all of his sweater vests. She wanted to try them all on, taking off the one she was currently wearing and throwing them on the floor before putting on a new one. Merida admits that she looks cute in them. No wonder James wears them most of the time.
"If Emily and I never got in that car crash, do you think we'd be engaged or even dating today?" Daniel asks her. "Because think about it, I've been in love with that girl my whole life but if that whole thing never happened, we would most likely be in the same infatuation state we've always done or maybe she'd meet some handsome Italian man if we weren't engaged. But then that'd mean our lives would be the same except for that one factor which isn't possible. Maybe she would've gone here or I would've ended up like Xavier and brood and cry over Emily despite never being in a relationship with her."
"Nobody wants that," Merida says as she puts on the last sweater vest and keeps it on. The entire floor looks like it's been carpeted with James's sweater vests. An improvement on the ugly wooding, really. " … have you ever watched videos of babies eating lemons?"
Daniel perks up. "I have. Their faces get all scrunched up like crushed water bottles. Why?"
Merida holds up a finger, letting Daniel know to give her a minute. She leaves the room. Daniel looks down and sees a sweater vest on the floor beside him. He puts it on as Merida re-enters the room with a lemon. It's comfy. She forgot to get a knife so she peels it like an orange. Merida blinks rapidly as juice squirts everywhere, dripping on the floor. Daniel stands up as she tears it and hands a half to him.
Everything about this is so wrong … which makes it so right.
In sync, they bite into the lemon, peel included.
They look at each other, lemon peels in their mouths, wondering why nothing happened. Before they could ask, the sourness hits them life whiplash. Their faces wrinkle as they dramatically hunch over. Screaming like babies with colic, they spit their lemon peels across the room and hack ferociously.
-o-
Merida lies across the cold wooden floor that has warmed up where her body lies. Her eyes are fixated on the popcorn ceiling and she watches as the little bumps become swirls like her hair around her. She blinks, sits up, and preps herself with her elbows. As her hair falls behind her, she looks and sees Daniel lying beside her. He, like her, is hypnotized by the ghastly ceiling. But she knows that he's lost in his thoughts like she was before she started getting dizzy.
"Do you realize that we've known each other for our whole lives?" Merida whispers. "It's crazy."
"It's not," Daniel responds, turning his head to face her. "The crazy part is realizing there's not a time in our lives when we didn't know each other."
Merida nods because he has a point. "Maybe the reason why we're all still friends is because we already know too much about each other. Maybe that's why Apollo and Britney are never coming back."
It's the first time any of them have said that out loud and it was due after two years of hearing nothing from Asgard. Merida brings her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around to lock them into place. She rests her cheek on her knees as she keeps her eyes on him. It hurts her heart to say those last words because she doesn't want to believe that they're true but she can't deny that the absence felt like that. So that's why she's looking at Daniel. She needs someone to tell her that she's wrong and act as a beacon of hope for their friends' return.
But he says nothing.
"I fucking miss Apollo," Merida mutters.
"Right?" Daniel says. "So do I! We were like an unspoken trio because we lived in the same zip code. Quartet once you count Britney … I miss her too."
"Me too. Almost can't blame Xavier for brooding. God bless suburban Manhattan. Or Thor bless Suburban Manhattan."
"Do you think Apollo and Britney are ever going to come back?"
Merida doesn't say no because she doesn't want to hear it or even put it out into the universe. Sometimes, there's merit in having a good and deep stoned conversation with a best friend, but she feels a single tear roll down her cheek so she hates this entire conversation.
Merida clears her throat. "Do you remember that time we were eight and …?"
Daniel looks at her, waiting for her to finish but she remains quiet. "And what?"
"Just being eight."
"Eight is a good number."
"I give Apollo and Britney eight years."
"If you turn an eight sideways, you get an infinity sign."
Merida looks over and she watches as Daniel draws sideways eights with his finger in the air. She gasps, pointing and Daniel mimics her gasp. They stare at each other in shock before simmering into laughter.
The part in the middle where Merida questions if Britney and Apollo are coming back was in the SHIELD Academy sneak peek in Emily's story. (Also, Merida might've predicted PNG).
And to answer Daniel's question on if he and Emily would've been together/engaged if the car crash never happened, the answer is yes. My first plan for Emily's story was that Emily and Daniel would've never gotten together in her story, but he would've proposed anyways after graduation (which means they would be together here and in PNG). But plans changed and they got together after the car crash which, honestly, best thing ever.