Note: All right, let's finish this AU!
.
.
.
Deryn's knee hurts.
It's raining hard enough to turn the street into a small river.
Her immediate future is eight hours in a car with her ma.
And she's losing another chance to tell Alek the bloody truth.
"Your bag is getting wet," he says to her, apologizing. He shifts the strap higher onto his shoulder with the hand that's not fighting to keep the umbrella over her head.
"It's waterproof," she says. She'd shrug if she could, but it's a bit tricky with crutches.
"Yes, but your laptop –"
Abruptly, one of her crutches slips on the wet pavement. She wheels back with one arm, fighting gravity, knowing she's going to lose.
She has time to think, Well this is sodding ridiculous – on top of the rest of it, she'll be ending the day on her bum, in a puddle the size of the Thames, in front of the only boy she's ever fancied.
Then Alek's grabbing her by the elbow and hauling her back upright. "God's wounds!" he says, face alarmed. "Are you all right?"
She swears, loudly and with feeling, adding a final "Barking spiders!" when he brings the umbrella too close and nearly skewers her eye.
"We're nearly to your mother's car, at least," he says, not quite hiding a smile at her cursing. While she balances on one foot, he retrieves her crutch, now dripping wet, and hands it to her.
Reaching Ma's car takes her that much closer to the day's worth of scolding that lies ahead. But her knee is throbbing brightly now, and – much as she hates to admit it – sitting does sound lovely.
Maybe flushing her pain pills down the loo, as she's been doing since last night, was a bad idea after all. She couldn't stand to be that muzzy-headed, though. Especially not with Alek around.
"Aye," she manages.
They reach the car and she leans against the side, heedless of the wet, while he fumbles one-handed with the keys. He's as soggy as she is, but he wears it well: auburn hair turned dark and slick, oversize mac hanging on the strong line of his shoulders, brow furrowed in concentration.
Alek suddenly exclaims in triumph and opens the rear door with a flourish, grinning at her, so handsome it pricks at her heart. "Can you manage on your own? I'll put your bag in the boot."
"No, I'll wait," she says. She shifts so that the car is supporting her, not the crutches; now her bum is as wet as her side. Maybe she'll catch cold on the way home, and it'll turn into pneumonia, and Ma will be so worried for her poor ill daughter that she'll leave off whinging. "Go on."
He hands over the umbrella and quickly stows her bag away. The car rocks when he slams the boot shut, and he's twice as wet when he returns to the umbrella's shelter, grimacing and swearing. "I suppose I'll never get used to this weather."
"I lied," she says.
Alek looks at her, surprised and confused all at once. Water is dripping from his nose and eyebrows. "What?"
They're so close, under the brolly; it makes an odd confessional. She curls her fingers tight around the handle. "About the fight. What I've told everyone – it's not quite the truth."
He frowns at her. "Why would you lie?"
She takes a breath and stares hard at the rain-lashed buildings across the way. "Those tossers weren't after my bag. Not at first. They only tried to nick it after I said a few things about the one fellow's ma."
"You started the fight?" He seems torn between amusement and disbelief.
"I didn't sodding stop it, that's for sure." She looks at him, then away. The far end of the street is disappearing in the rain. "They thought I was a boy, when they came up to me. Then they realized I wasn't, and called me – well, that bit's not important, I've heard it all at school. Usually it doesn't matter, aye? But yesterday was different."
It was different because she was going to see Alek, and what happened the first time they met, two years ago in Glasgow, is still a raw place on her heart, no matter how hard she's tried to pretend it's mended.
Alek doesn't say anything. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see that he's studying her, but for a long moment the only sound is rain drumming on the brolly.
"Don't tell Ma or Jaspert," she adds. "They'll only be angry."
"They're fools," he says, then hurriedly corrects himself: "Not your family, of course, they're very – I meant those, ah, 'tossers'. They were fools not to see the truth."
She lifts one eyebrow.
"You're the most amazing girl," he says. His ears are turning pink, and his German accent is getting a wee bit thicker. "Anyone who can't recognize that is… is an absolute fool."
Deryn tries to swallow and finds her mouth has gone dry. Maybe it has something to do with the way his green eyes keep flicking, uncertainly, to her lips. Or maybe it has more to do with the electricity that's crowding under the brolly with them. "That include you?"
A rueful half-grin quirks at his mouth. One of his hands comes up to wrap around hers where it's gripping the umbrella handle. "Myself most of all."
Sod it, she thinks. She kisses him. They're of a height, so she doesn't have to stretch up – just leans forward and presses her mouth against his. His lips are soft and cold from the rain, but there's hardness and warmth behind that.
He makes a small noise, more pleased than startled, and kisses her back.
Blisters. It's better than she imagined.
The weather, always cooperative, chooses that moment to send a gust of wind and rain howling down the street. It catches beneath the umbrella and tries to tear it out of her hand. She doesn't want to stop kissing Alek to fight with it, and the brolly is doing sod all anyway, so she opens her fingers and lets it go.
And then she puts her hand to better use, curving it around his shoulders and holding him close against her until she's dizzy from no oxygen and the thrill of kissing Alek.
He's the one who breaks first. Laughs, breathless, the heat of it puffing against the cold water on her skin. "God's wounds," he says in German. His eyes are very, very green. He switches back to English: "That's rather a relief."
"Aye," Deryn says. She's grinning like a perfect looby, her knee is screeching, there's cold rainwater trickling into her knickers, and she doesn't care. "I've wanted to do that since before I met you. Face-to-face, at least."
He searches her eyes for a moment before a grin breaks across his own face, shy and uncertain as the sunrise. "I can't imagine my avatar was that attractive. And I'm afraid I was a bit slower about things."
She shrugs. "You made it in the end."
"Yes," he says. Softly. Reverently. He takes her hands in his, cold wet skin against cold wet skin. Warmth rises in her chest. "Yes, I did."
Well, there's nothing for it. She has to kiss him again.
This time there's a bit of trouble – the angle's off, their teeth clack together – but then it's sorted and she's happily drowning in Alek-scented rain when her ma says loudly, "Deryn! Where's the umbrella? You'll catch your death!"
She and Alek spring apart, the both of them babbling excuses that Ma cuts through with an impatient, "Get in the car, aye? - it's a long enough drive as it is. Or are you set on visiting A&E again? Pneumonia, this time?"
"No, ma'am," Deryn says, scowling at her. Not too bloody much to ask, is it, for a chance to kiss the lad she's been in love with for two years?
"Goodbye, Alek," Ma says, smiling at him. "Best of luck at Cambridge."
"Thank you," he says, his ears blazing scarlet. His eyes flick to Deryn, who's now pretending that her brace is keeping her from climbing into the car. "I hope – I do hope to visit Glasgow in the near future."
"Well, then," Ma says briskly, going around to the driver's side and opening the door, "as I said, give us a ring if you do."
Deryn keeps the astonishment off her face, but only just.
Ma tosses her purse into the car and tells Deryn, "Say goodbye, love, we're leaving."
She looks at Alek. "Goodbye, Alek," she says, which hardly seems to be enough, but what else can she say? Especially with Ma right there.
He smiles at her, wide and brilliant, a twinkle of mischief in those green eyes. "Auf Wiedersehen, Deryn," he says, giving her a little princely bow.
She glances at Ma – already inside the car, fussing about with the air con – then winks at Alek. "We'll talk later, aye?"
"Yes," he says, still smiling. "We have a world to save, after all."
Happiness radiates out from her chest, so bright it almost sodding hurts. She could stand there grinning at him for the rest of her life.
"Deryn!" Ma scolds. "Get in the car!"
Deryn gets in the car. It's tricky and graceless and she nearly falls more than once, but eventually she's squared away. Alek shuts the door for her, then stands there, in the rain, as Ma pulls away from the kerb.
Ma immediately starts whinging about fastening her seatbelt, but Deryn can't: she has to twist around to get a last look.
Jaspert's appeared at Alek's side, an umbrella held over both their heads. He claps Alek on the shoulder, and then Ma turns the corner and she can't see any more.
"Well," Ma says after a moment, the wipers slapping back and forth. Her voice is warm and amused: "My dear wee lass, I think you've been keeping quite a story from me, and I want to hear it. Every bit."
Deryn finds she doesn't mind as much as she thought she would. She leans her head against the window, impatient for the time she'll be able to get back on the computer and talk to Alek once again. "I reckon it all started because Leviathan wouldn't let me play as a girl…"
