Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
first released 23rd September 2021
Barbara got home in the wee hours of the morning, tired as always after a long shift. There hadn't been anything really bad tonight. Just... lots of it. At least she'd been able to see the school play before going in for the night.
And the thought of her son as Romeo brought a smile to her lips. He and Claire, who she'd been happy to meet, had been brilliant. And afterward, they had moved around one another with the comfortable assurance of a long-time couple. She wondered what Claire's parents had made of that.
Things between her and Walter, on the other hand, were still... cooler than they had been. She really needed to talk with him. Or maybe it would just take time.
Blinky and Aaarrrgghh weren't watching any early-morning TV, and she didn't hear anything from the basement, so maybe they were out? They'd been given a house key and were both grown men, so as long as they didn't stay out late and get caught somewhere by the sunlight, she supposed she shouldn't worry about them.
(How weird was it that she was Mom-ing over a pair of centuries-old trolls? Well, they were living under her roof, so they were sort of her responsibility.)
(Thinking of which...)
She peeked into Douxie's room first, and blinked, surprised to see both the boys, still fully dressed, and the dragon puddled together on the bed.
Gold eyes opened and looked at her.
"Everything okay?" Barbara whispered.
Archie eased his way out from under Douxie's arm and jumped down from the bed, padding silently across to her before standing upright and adjusting his glasses.
(Barbara fought to keep from touching her own. She'd noticed that she and Archie, as the only two in the household wearing them, could get in a subconscious feedback loop of glasses adjustment.)
"Well enough," Archie answered her question. "Jim and Douxie have been promising to talk one another through the aftermath of some of the nastier things they've endured, and they got a start on that tonight."
Barbara winced. "Which one? Or both?"
"Douxie, I'm afraid."
"Right. Is he going to be okay?"
"Mmm." The dragon glanced back at the bedroom. "He'll probably be better for it. He tends to ignore things and run from them rather than addressing his trauma. Jim, I think, is more likely to stand and face his pain. So he's actually quite good for Douxie."
"I hate that they have to do that," Barbara said.
"Agreed."
Barbara stifled a sudden yawn. "Well, I should be getting to bed myself. Good night, Archie."
"Good night, Barbara. Sleep well."
Douxie's phone buzzed in his pocket prior to his alarm chime sounding. Without his even opening his eyes, his fingers managed to turn the alarm off before it got going.
Feeling heavy, he laid in bed for a minute more before his brain sluggishly caught up to the fact that his phone being in his pocket meant he'd fallen asleep still fully clothed. And while the warm lump on one side of him was definitely Archie, the warmth on the other side of him was not. Someone's arm was draped across his back.
He opened his eyes and saw Jim, his hair going in every which direction, also fully dressed.
Douxie's heart sank into his stomach as he remembered what they'd talked about the night before. Remembered wrecking himself in the shelter of someone else's arms.
In a way, it had been nice to have that. He'd never felt like he had that safety before, of someone he could trust like that.
(Well, there was Archie, of course. But Archie was in his own category, always had been, always would be.)
But...
Hisirdoux swallowed, and carefully moved Jim's arm, trying to ease out of bed without waking the other two inhabitants. He failed; Archie woke, a light sleeper as always. But Jim just made a subvocal noise and burrowed deeper into the pillow.
Douxie quietly selected clean clothes and went into the bathroom to change. He decided to forgo a shower; the pipes weren't exactly quiet, and both Barbara and Jim were sleeping. He was glad, though, that Barbara had thought to bring his hoodie back after taking Strickler to the hospital the other night, and had washed it. This morning in particular, wearing the comfortable garment felt a bit like a hug.
Or a shield.
The aftermath of catharsis was that he didn't feel quite right in his body. Like things were too light, or too loud, or something. Off-kilter; fragile. So after splashing some water on his face and cleaning the morning grot off his teeth, he was extra careful with the placement of his limbs as he stumbled down the stairs in search of breakfast.
"Ah, Master Douxie!" Blinky, looking trollish once more, said from where he was sitting on the sofa reading the newspaper. The blinds were closed. Aaarrrgghh was nowhere to be seen.
"Good morning, Master Galadrigal," Douxie replied.
"Please, my dear boy. After what you did for Aaarrrgghh and myself last night, I think we're past such formality, don't you?"
Douxie paused, surprised. At his ankles, Archie murmured, "Well, that was quick."
"It was my pleasure, Blinky," Douxie said quietly.
"And seeing the play in person was mine," the troll serenely replied.
Douxie went about procuring toast with jam, and a glass of juice. He was pleased that his hands were steady enough that he managed it all smoothly. The ghosts of last night's conversation, and all the things about himself that he hated, kept whispering up in his mind, making him feel unsteady. He wiped up the crumbs when he was done and put his dishes in the washer.
"Are you all right?" Blinky asked softly, though, so Douxie's lack of keel must have been obvious.
"Yeah. Just a bit of a rough talk with Jim last night."
"Mmm." Blinky passed no judgment, didn't press for details. Douxie wasn't sure he'd have given them in any case.
He quickly checked the fridge in case there was a lunchbag prepped for him, but there wasn't. His breakdown the night before must have disrupted Jim's caretaker routine, so he was on his own for lunch today. Well, the ramen in the back room of the bookstore had been getting lonely with no one to eat it, he thought.
"I must say," Blinky said as Douxie prepped his exit, checking his pockets for phone, keyring, and the couple other items he never went without, "even for a human, you do work an inordinate amount."
"Yeah, well, under the table minimum wage work really isn't enough to live on," Douxie absently replied.
"Could you not, now that you have guaranteed shelter in Barbara's house, cut back on your hours?" asked Blinky.
And... the thing was, Hisirdoux had honestly been waiting for someone to make that suggestion to him. Trading shifts around with his coworkers so he could get two specific evenings free in a week was an anomaly for him; other than for Ash Dispersal Pattern's sporadic gigs, he'd never asked for days off before. And cutting back on his hours would leave a lot more time free to help Claire with her magic, to practice fighting with Jim and Toby, teaching them how someone wielding a staff moved, to try and get a handle on planning out everything they needed to do...
But on the other hand, he felt guilty about not contributing financially to the Lake household. Feeding two teenagers with magic-enhanced appetites had to be straining Barbara's budget. And the chance to actually build up some small pool of savings just in case felt like an opportunity Douxie shouldn't ignore.
(And the potential ability to do something like give birthday and Christmas presents that weren't just magical items he'd cobbled together himself on a shoestring budget? That felt like a dream.)
"I'm considering it," Douxie said, which meant nothing. He knew he was unlikely to change until a real, solid reason he couldn't avoid landed in his lap.
He put on his knee, elbow, and wrist guards, and pulled his helmet down from where it hung on a hook near Jim's. He wouldn't have gone for safety gear... but the image of Barbara's worried, disappointed face if he didn't had prompted the cash outlay to invest in it.
"See you this evening?" Douxie asked.
"Indubitably," Blinky replied as Douxie went out the door.
Archie hopped on his shoulder and Douxie hopped on his skateboard. "You know, I really do prefer brooms as a method of transport," Archie commented as the wind picked up in their faces and Douxie concentrated on balance and momentum. "Much more dignified. And stable."
"Someday, Arch," Douxie promised, choosing for just a few minutes to leave all his problems behind himself and simply live in the moment. "Someday."
Jim woke up in sunlight, comfortable and content.
That lasted until he opened his eyes and realized that he wasn't in his own bed. He was in Douxie's room, and there was no sign of the wizard. In fact, if the sun was high enough to be waking Jim, Douxie was almost certainly already at the bookshop.
Jim had a bad feeling that the wizard had chosen to cut and run after last night's conversation. Not physically, maybe - Douxie was too involved with saving the world, and too conscientious to throw them all over just because of a talk about feelings. But probably emotionally. He'd close himself off again, like an injured cat trying to hide its wounds.
(Not that Arcadia Oaks had ever had many of those. Jim just knew why now.)
And there's nothing I can do about him shutting us out again, Jim thought unhappily, pushing himself off the bed and standing.
He could, he thought over a bowl of cereal, go to the bookshop and talk to Douxie again. But that felt too much like cornering him at his job. And the wizard might just need some space.
Douxie had Archie with him. Archie would help him if he needed help, right?
Jim stared glumly at his bowl.
Archie would never actually draw a firm line with Douxie. They were too intertwined.
A text message wouldn't be too much, would it?
Hey, you doing okay? he sent.
The answer was a long time coming. Jim tried not to be antsy about it. He looked up recipes instead, finding a couple new interesting ones to try, and deciding on a few old favorites, easy in their familiarity. He made two sets of menus for the week, one for the humans in the household and one for the trolls he was now feeding as well. He wrote down a corresponding shopping list and added on a few things he knew they were running low on. Like the oregano that was somehow a vital component in a Cinderella spell. As well as salt. Did they need more salt? Still no reply to his text. Douxie was just busy at work, right? He probably got more customers on Saturdays because it was the weekend.
Crap, I forgot to make a lunch for him today. He's probably eating that shitty ramen again.
Jim growled, annoyed at himself.
He breathed out, tried some of the meditation exercises Claire swore by to center herself. He mostly failed. His fingers itched to text Douxie again, or call him, but he reined himself in. He needed to give Douxie time, and space.
He needed to wait.
I hate waiting.
Douxie's phone was burning a hole in his pocket as he made small talk with customers, found items, made recommendations, took special orders, and rang up totals. Customer service was second nature by now: turn on a smile, give a listening ear, be endlessly patient, flirt a little if necessary. Easy peasy.
What was harder was figuring out how to respond to Jim.
He was not okay, and he was self-aware enough to recognize that. But would he be better, when things settled back into place in his mind? And how long would that take?
On the other hand, replying "No" just felt churlish, and would only make Jim worry.
Did they really have time for Hisirdoux to spend getting his head on straight?
Could they afford for him not to, when they'd won by such a narrow, Pyrrhic margin last time?
What did he want?
Friends came easiest to mind. Real friends, not just people with whom he shared a passion for the craft. But he already had them, didn't he? Over a year of relentless hardships and hard work had cemented their group together in a way he didn't think could be broken.
Merlin came next, and he knew already that one was going to be painful. Whenever they woke his master up, he was going to assume that Hisirdoux was still his bumbling idiot apprentice, and treat him as such. He'd only ever started seeing pride and approval in Merlin's eyes after he'd earned his staff. Well, there was nothing for that but time.
Nari. That thought was fraught and he didn't know how to categorize it. But he'd grown to love the little goddess as much as he'd loved anyone. She was definitely his sister, and his friend, and he dared hope that he had been hers. Given she'd seemed to know that Jim would use the Time Stone, and what it would do, there was even a possibility she might still know him.
All of which needs, he realized, boiled ultimately down to some nebulous concept of "home." Not the one he'd lost as a child. Not even Camelot, the literal castle in the clouds. Maybe something more like the Lake house: a place where everyone knew what he was, and loved him for it, and loved him regardless of it. A place to belong, where he wouldn't have to drift on in a few years and tell himself it was anything but what it was: running scared all the time.
Nine hundred years of running scared.
Jim had told him to put down roots, and shared his own home with him. And Douxie had promised Nari no more running.
"Douxie," said Archie softly, "you're crying."
"Am I?" He wiped his sleeve across his eyes. "Sorry."
"You don't need to apologize for feeling things," his familiar told him.
(Charlie had referred to Douxie, more than once, as Archie's familiar. He liked that thought. That he was the dragon's as much as the dragon was his. But almost no one else ever saw it that way.)
He pulled out his phone and finally replied to Jim: happiness is elusive. but I'm trying.
Author's Note: I cannot write "I hate waiting" without hearing it in Inigo Montoya's voice. So that's a The Princess Bride reference.
