Chapter Text
Lucille stood in front of her newly assigned locker feeling utterly out of sorts. The hallway was tight, with people squeezing by and bumping her shoulders as they passed. It smelled like a mix of body odor, floral perfumes, and something sterile, likely because of the chemistry classroom door propped open across the hall. It was loud, with ten minutes to spare until class, and with each passing minute, Lucille could feel her anxiety mounting.
She couldn’t get her locker open. She had tried the combination four times, checking the numbers once, twice, and thrice. Nobody had offered to help—instead, she stood there hopelessly, trying to seem invisible. And it was almost working until someone spoke up behind her.
“Hey—are you new?”
He was the same height as Lucille, with tan skin and straight black hair neatly swept away from his face. He wore a graphic t-shirt with the Millennium Falcon on it, looking withered from many washes.
Lucille was grateful for the acknowledgment from him. At least he seemed nicer than the guys who had pushed her to the side when she’d entered the main corridor.
She nodded. “Yeah. I’m Lucille. Most people just call me Lucy, though.”
“Cool! I’m Ned. Uh—Ned Leeds. Want me to—” He glanced at the combination, then back at her. “—help with the locker? They can be a little tough.”
Lucille blinked, hesitating, then handed over her schedule. “Sure. Thanks.”
Ned’s fingers moved over the dial, his movements precise. She was about to step back when a blur of motion caught the corner of her eye. “—Ned! Dude, what happened last night?!”
Lucille’s eyes went wide as the world tipped forward. She had been standing her ground, defying the tug of gravity urging her forward, but the boy barreling toward her was not factoring in her…peculiarity.
“Shit—!”
The boy collided with her chest mid-stride. Her feet didn't slide backward, so instead of sending her stumbling, he folded directly into her and knocked them both downward, his arms out to try and catch them, his hoodie sleeve brushing her face. They hit the floor in an awkward, entangled heap, linoleum rubbing against his jeans, her hair falling into her eyes. Ned had sidestepped just in time, a small, horrified “Whoa!” escaping him as he skidded past.
“Okay…” Lucille said flatly, pushing lightly against him. “You’re…heavy.”
“I—I’m sorry! I didn’t…uh…” he stammered, cheeks red, trying to scramble upright without hitting her again. “I wasn’t expecting—well, you…stayed?”
Lucille shifted on her feet. “Yeah, I um…I’ve got good balance–I used to do gymnastics, so…”
He blinked at her, clearly flustered, then jumped back, flinging a hand through his hair. “Right. Got it. Standing still. That’s…impressive.”
From the corner of her eye, Lucille saw Ned trying not to laugh as he backed away from her now open locker. “I have to…uh…talk to a teacher before the bell,” he mumbled, glancing between the two of them. “Good luck, Lucy.”
“Thanks, Ned,” she said with a small wave and busied herself with loading books into her locker.
The boy in a red-and-gold hoodie muttered something like, “Sorry again,” then paused.
He was staring at her like he’d never seen anyone like her before. And maybe he hadn’t. Lucille really hoped he wasn’t dwelling too hard on her “balance.” His hands twitched, fingers brushing the edge of his hoodie, and she caught a glimpse of panic that made her chest tighten. He seemed…nervous.
Shit. Had he figured her out?
“Uh—look, I can walk you to class,” he blurted out, and Lucille felt a tiny pang of amusement quell her rising anxiety. He obviously just wanted to make up for the collision. “To…uh…apologize, I guess.”
Lucille raised an eyebrow. “Apologize by walking me to class? That’s a new one.”
He shrugged, avoiding eye contact. “Yeah. Well…better than just leaving you in the middle of the hall.”
She blinked at him, caught off guard by the authenticity. She should’ve rolled her eyes, been curt, and kept moving, but something about the way he flustered himself made her soften. She nodded. “Fine. But you’re not allowed to trip me again.”
“I won’t,” he said quickly, offering a sheepish grin.
They moved down the hallway, the chaos of students fading slightly as they navigated the crowd. Lucille kept up a running commentary on the events unfolding around her(lockers jammed, someone’s backpack spilling over, a kid talking loudly into their phone about Spider-Man hitting the belltower) while he muttered occasional apologies or comments, too flustered to start a real conversation.
After a few minutes, they reached her classroom door. He held it open for her, fidgeting.
“Thanks,” she said, smiling faintly.
“Uh…yeah. No problem,” he replied, ducking slightly under the banner hanging above. “We’re actually in the same first period…so…”
Lucille stepped inside, glancing back. “Are there, like, assigned seats here?”
He shook his head, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “Nah, just sit wherever. You could sit next to me—if you want!”
“Relax,” Lucille raised her brows at him. “Yeah, I want to.”
After they had taken their seats, the boy turned to Lucille awkwardly, as though he couldn’t figure out what to say. Finally, he settled on, “So where did you go to school before?”
Lucille put down the pencil she had been tapping against the soft cover of her blue spiral notebook. “I was online before. I haven’t been in person since, like, seventh grade.”
“Yikes,” Peter said, then his eyes widened. “—Not that that’s a bad thing.”
“No, I get what you mean,” Lucille shrugged, a grin growing across her face. “It was so boring. I thought I was gonna lose it.”
She paused for a moment before letting out a light laugh. “Sorry, I guess I’m kind of out of it today. I never got your name.”
“Oh! I’m Peter Parker,” the boy said, holding out a hand but then thinking better of it and taking it back awkwardly.
Lucille blinked. Once. Twice.
So this was the kid she was supposed to be stalking? Peter Parker. Spider-Man. The boy with the million-dollar suit, while she had nothing. The same boy who had trampled her in the hallway, who couldn’t string a single sentence together without stammering, and, according to the whispers in the hall, had somehow managed to short-circuit the bell tower this morning.
Tony had at least given her a name. Peter Parker. What he apparently hadn't thought to provide was a picture.
Lucille had spent hours last night combing through social media, trying to catch a glimpse of his face. Nothing. Just a feed full of faceless cityscapes, random meals, memes, and, frankly, following an annoying number of Iron Man fan accounts. On paper, he was a total loser.
But sitting here now, she felt her mind glitch. He wasn’t a loser. Not totally. Cute, actually—like unexpectedly cute, in a way that made her really hate herself for even noticing. His hoodie was a little worn, his hair falling in that messy-but-charming way, and those eyes…well, she didn’t need to admit to herself that they were warm, maybe even kind.
Then the realization hit, sharp and unwelcome: this…this was Spider-Man. The kid who got a suit from her father while she’d been left out. Technically, her competition. Suddenly, her admiration soured, shifting ever so slightly, like a glass of water turned bitter.
Their teacher entered then, a bald man with a thick moustache and brows. He leaned against the desk at the front of the room as the last few students filed in.
“‘Sup, Penis Parker?” asked a boy as he entered, taking the seat in front of Lucille. “Any good dumpster dives lately?”
Lucille frowned as the boy turned to her, not even giving Peter a chance to respond. “Oh, hey, you must be new. I’m Flash.”
Despite her distaste for Spider-Man, Lucille disliked jerks even more. She raised her brows in surprise. “That’s your real name? Flash?”
“Well, yeah,” Flash said, eyes flickering briefly to the boy next to Lucille, who began to say something before he was cut off once more.
“Like the sloth from Zootopia?” Lucille asked.
“No, not like—”
“Okay, class,” their teacher clapped his hands at the front of the room. “The bell is broken on account of an…incident…that Principal Morita has not put me at liberty to disclose. So, I’m just going to go ahead and start. I’m Mr. Dell. Welcome…to AP World History.”
He paused for dramatic effect, except nobody reacted. One student in the back corner of the room fell off their desk, where they had been slumped over, and jolted awake.
“Now,” Mr. Dell continued, ignoring the whispers entirely, “AP World History is not just about kings, battles, and who had the fanciest crown. No, we’re going to frame history in…a superpowered context. Supersoldier programs, alien invasions, the Sokovia Accords—because yes, these are historical events too, whether you like it or not. Cause, effect, ethics, public property damage…”
Mr. Dell had moved to the other side of the desk. He began to struggle with connecting his computer to the projector. The rest of the room erupted into chatter as he grappled with it.
“I heard Spider-Man was swinging by and crashed into the bell tower this morning,” mumbled a girl on Lucille’s other side.
“Spider-Man?” Lucille asked, then, for the hell of it, she added, “What’s he doing lurking around a high school? Is he a pedophile?”
Peter made a sound like choking. Flash whirled around in his seat immediately. “Uh, no, Spider-Man is a hero. Have you seen how many people he’s saved?”
“I don’t know.” Lucille turned her phone over in her hands. “Seems kind of fishy to me. A grown man who walks around in tights?”
“They’re not tights,” Flash protested.
“Right. Sorry, a onesie,” Lucille corrected offhandedly.
“You don’t like Spider-Man?” asked Peter, looking slightly red in the face.
“Don’t get me wrong, he’s probably a good guy,” Lucille said, but before she could continue, Mr. Dell drummed his hands loudly on his desk triumphantly.
“See? Technology is just like history. Sometimes it works, sometimes it rebels. Which is why studying the past is vital—so you’re prepared when a billionaire messes up your city infrastructure.”
The rest of class passed by in a blur of shorthand notes and tangents about Captain America.
“What classes do you have?” Peter asked, glancing over at her schedule, laid out on her desk.
Despite her better judgment, she angled the paper toward him anyway. He may have been the reason she lost a shot at a suit from Tony, but he knew this school better than she did, and she didn’t want to ask someone else for help.
“Oh, we both have AP Chem after lunch,” Peter tapped the paper, excited.
Lucille took the paper back as they exited the room. “You’re probably the first person ever to be so excited for AP Chem.”
The hall was a jigsaw of students, lockers clanging, sneakers squeaking on linoleum. Lucille kept a small gap between herself and Peter, but not enough to seem cold(though she wasn’t sure she could pull that off anyway). His enthusiasm for the mundane stuff—the bell being broken, where to sit, which teachers were tolerable—was disarming. He was very excited to word vomit it all out in front of her.
By the time lunch rolled around, Lucille found herself sliding into a seat with Peter and Ned at the far end of the cafeteria. The chatter and chaos swirled around them, but it felt manageable with these two. Ned immediately started talking about some weird new meme page he’d found, waving his phone in the air like it was the Holy Grail.
“Wait, give me your Instagrams. I’ll add you,” Lucille said, opening up the search function on her phone.
Ned added himself first. Then Peter.
Lucille scrolled through both of their pages. It was more of a skim for Peter’s, since she’d already done her research the night before, but she had to make it look believable. She groaned, pausing on a picture from the movie theatre and a lengthy caption review from a few weeks ago. “Don’t tell me you’re a film bro.”
“What? No,” Peter scoffed. “I just like when movies pay attention to detail.”
Lucille scoffed. “That was really pretentious.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“Dude, it kind of was,” Ned agreed.
Peter slumped slightly in his seat, though there was a smile tugging at his lips. “Okay, first of all, it wasn’t pretentious, just thorough. Second, you literally just read one caption.”
“One caption was enough,” Lucille shot back, raising an eyebrow. “It was like three paragraphs about lighting.”
“It does matter,” Peter insisted, a little more animated now, hands moving as he spoke. “Like, cinematography can completely change how a scene feels—”
Lucille leaned back, amused. “Is this normal?”
Ned snorted, nearly choking on his drink. “No, yeah, he does this. You should’ve seen him after that Iron Man documentary we watched last month.”
“It was a good documentary!” Peter protested, glancing between the two of them.
“So you like superheroes, like the Avengers and stuff?” Lucille swirled around her orange juice.
“I mean, yeah, who doesn’t?” Peter asked like it was obvious.
You’d be surprised, she thought dryly, before scooting closer toward the table.
“Peter actually has an internship with Tony Stark,” Ned blurted out, and Peter shot him a look.
Lucille blinked before the evil thought came to her. It was just a little bit of harmless teasing, and in her opinion, a bit deserved considering this kid took her place. So she upped the ante. “Really? With the Tony Stark?”
Peter began turning red almost immediately as he stammered, “Well—not directly with Mr. Stark—Just, like, for the company.”
“For the company?” Lucille leaned in closer to the table, her hair narrowly avoiding the green beans on her lunch tray. “Are you, like, an intern-intern?” Lucille asked. “Or is that just what they call it so child labor laws don’t get involved?”
Ned laughed. Peter did not.
“I’m not—there’s no child labor,” he said quickly. “It’s just, like, a program.”
“Well, are you doing scienc-y stuff or is it more like a corporate thing?”
Peter blinked. “What?”
“Actually, I was wondering that too.” Ned took a bite of his pizza, eyes still on Peter expectantly.
“Science. But I’m not really supposed to talk about it.”
Her lips twitched. “Why, is Tony Stark building secret nukes or something?”
“What? No!”
“Chill out, I’m just joking.” Lucille sat back, satisfied.
Maybe babysitting wouldn’t be completely miserable.
Lucille shifted the topic to something she figured would be a better topic of conversation given her intense stalking the night prior.
She poked at the beans on her tray. “Okay, Film Bros, did you guys see the new Rogue One trailer?”
Ned looked up immediately. “Obviously.”
Peter nodded. “The one that came out last month?”
“Yeah.”
“It looks so good,” Ned said. “Plus Vader’s gonna be in it.”
“For, like, two seconds,” Peter shrugged.
“Okay, well, you don’t know that.”
“I’m just saying, I don’t think he’s gonna be the whole movie.”
“I know that. I’m not stupid.”
Lucille glanced between them, hiding a smile behind her straw.
Ned caught it. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, you’re judging us.”
She scoffed. “I’m really not.”
Peter pointed toward her phone. “You brought it up.”
She furrowed her brows. “I just asked if you saw the trailer.”
“Which means you saw the trailer,” Ned said.
Lucille shrugged. “Yeah. It looked good.”
Ned stared at her expectantly.
“…What?” she blinked.
“What’d you think?”
It was such a simple question that she almost laughed. “I don’t know. I like that it’s not about the Skywalkers, I guess.”
Peter nodded. “Yeah, exactly. There has to be other stuff happening in the galaxy.”
“Thank you,” Ned said. “That’s what I said.”
“No, you said you wanted a Boba Fett movie.”
“That can also be true.”
Lucille looked back down at Ned’s page, scrolling through the posts. “You guys really like Star Wars.”
“Well, yeah, its a good franchise.” Peter looked at her. “What about you?”
She hesitated for a second. “I like it.”
Ned glanced at her. “What’s your favorite movie?”
She felt her face heat up slightly. “Revenge of the Sith—”
Ned let out a groan and Peter shook his head.
“Okay, not just because of Hayden Christenson, but because its objectively the best movie in the franchise. It literally sets up like, the entire context of the movies.”
“But they already established that in the original trilogy,” Ned shook his head.
“Well, you asked movie, so I gave it. You’re grilling me like I said Phantom Menace.”
“Hey,” Peter protested. “It has good parts.”
Ned shook his head solemnly. “No, dude. It just has sand.”
Lucille snorted.
The two of them immediately started arguing over whether The Phantom Menace was actually bad or just the worst of the prequels, and she mostly listened.
It was easy to see how long they’d been friends. They talked over each other without getting annoyed, abandoned half their sentences because the other already knew what they meant, and somehow turned a conversation about Rogue One into an argument they'd clearly had before.
The rest of the school day was less eventful, which was probably a good sign.
Lucille had forgotten how exhausting being around people was.
Online school had been miserable, but at least nobody slammed locker doors beside her head or tried to squeeze past her every seven seconds. Nobody yelled across hallways. Nobody blasted music from their phone during passing periods. Nobody expected her to introduce herself.
By sixth period, she had said some variation of ‘Hi, I’m Lucille, I just transferred’ so many times that the words had stopped sounding real.
Still, she liked it.
She hated that she liked it, but she did.
She liked hearing conversations she had nothing to do with. She liked watching people rush toward their friends when the bell rang. She liked scribbled posters taped crookedly onto the walls, teachers complaining about the copier, and the group of girls practicing choreography in the reflection of a classroom window during passing period.
That one actually made her stop.
Lucille slowed in the hall.
There were four of them, crowded around a phone while one repeatedly rewound the same eight counts. Their movements weren’t particularly complicated, but Lucille’s body followed automatically anyway.
Her fingers twitched against the strap of her bag. For a second, she could almost smell rosin and hairspray. Hear the squeak of studio floors underneath bare feet.
She hadn’t been in a proper dance class in over a year.
Lucille looked at the flyer taped on the window.
MIDTOWN POMS/DANCE TEAM — FALL TRYOUTS THIS FRIDAY
She pulled out her phone and took a picture.
“You dance?”
Lucille jumped.
Peter stood beside her, adjusting the strap of his backpack.
“Jesus Christ.”
“Sorry.”
“Do you make a habit of appearing behind people?”
Peter frowned. “I was just walking.”
“Yeah, okay, creep.”
His brows pulled together, but there wasn’t real offense in it—just confusion, like he was still trying to figure out whether she was joking or genuinely accusing him of something.
Lucille felt a flicker of guilt and softened it with a small smile.
Peter apparently decided not to push it. He nodded toward the flyer instead.
“So you dance?”
“A little,” she said, a bit more honestly this time.
That was an understatement, but she didn’t feel like unpacking it.
Dance had been the one constant Catherine refused to let work interfere with when Lucille was little.
Ballet first, because apparently every five-year-old girl had to endure at least one year of ballet by law. Then jazz. Hip-hop. Contemporary. Gymnastics for a few years when she'd decided she wanted to learn how to flip without breaking her neck. A brief, disastrous tap phase that ended after Lucille drove her sister insane practicing in the kitchen.
Music had come somewhere in between all of it and swallowed everything whole.
But dancing had stuck.
Peter nodded. “Well then you should try out.”
Lucille glanced sideways at him, surprised he’d said it so easily. “Was that permission?”
“No?” he said quickly, then added, a little awkwardly, “I just mean—you’d be good at it, right? Since you said you did gymnastics.”
“Good is a bit of a strong word,” she said, but there was less bite in it than before.
He shrugged. “Still. You should try out.”
She hesitated, then looked back at the flyer again.
“Maybe,” she said, quieter. “I’ll think about it.”
Peter nodded like that was enough.
By the time the final bell rang, Lucille had three separate flyers folded into her bag.
The Decathlon flyer was Peter’s fault.
“You should come,” he told her as they walked toward the front of the school.
“I’ve already been here eight hours.”
“It’s just an interest meeting.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not interested.”
“You’re taking, like, four AP classes.”
Lucille shrugged. “That doesn't mean I enjoy organized nerd activities.”
Ned caught up beside them. “There’s snacks.”
She stopped. “What kind?”
Peter looked offended. “That’s what convinces you?”
“Depends on the snacks.”
“Usually chips,” Ned said.
Lucille changed direction, eyes glued to her phone as she typed out a text to her mother.
Peter stared after her. “Seriously?”
“Keep up, Parker.”
The Decathlon room was already half-full by the time they arrived.
A girl Lucille recognized from one of her afternoon classes sat at the front of a cluster of desks, organizing sheets into neat piles. She was pretty, with dark hair pulled away from her face and the relaxed confidence of someone who actually knew what she was doing.
“Hey, Peter,” she greeted, then smiled at Lucille. “You’re new, right?”
“Yeah,” Lucille nodded. “Lucille.”
“Liz.”
Lucille took the paper she offered her.
At one of the desks toward the back, a girl with messy brown hair glanced up from a book.
Lucille recognized her immediately. She'd seen her twice that day. Once drawing something in the corner of her notebook instead of taking notes. And once reading during lunch while sitting approximately close enough to a group of people to hear everything they were saying without actually joining them.
The girl looked Lucille over. “You’re the one who called Spider-Man a pedophile.”
Peter made a strangled sound behind her.
Lucille stared. “…Well that got around fast.”
“I was in the class.”
“Oh.”
The girl returned to her book.
Peter gestured awkwardly. “That’s Michelle.”
Lucille held up a hand in an awkward wave. “Lucille.”
“I know.”
Lucille waited.
Michelle turned a page.
Lucille raised both brows. “…Okay then.”
Ned leaned toward her. “She does that.”
“I can hear you,” Michelle said.
Peter straightened immediately.
Lucille bit back a smile. She liked her already.
The meeting itself was surprisingly tolerable.
Liz went over competitions, practices, categories, and travel. Peter became considerably more animated the second the conversation turned toward science. Ned whispered commentary whenever the faculty advisor, Mr. Harrington, talked too long. Lucille became acquainted with two other kids, Cindy Moon and Abe Brown.
Lucille mostly listened.
She’d always been good academically. Very good, if the testing scores her mother kept framed in her office meant anything.
A buzzer sounded from Liz’s phone.
“Okay,” Liz announced. “Just for fun. Practice question.”
Several people groaned.
Liz ignored them. “Which treaty formally ended the Thirty Years’ War in 1648?”
Lucille answered without thinking. “Peace of Westphalia.”
Peter answered at the exact same time.
They looked at each other.
Ned whispered, “Oh, no.”
Liz laughed. “Okay. I think we found our newest member.”
Lucille grabbed the sign-up sheet from her hands and scribbled her name right underneath Cindy Moon.
Her mother was waiting in the car when Lucille finally left school.
Catherine looked up from her phone as Lucille climbed into the passenger seat. “Well?”
Lucille shut the door and furrowed a brow. “Well what?”
“How was it?”
“Terrible.”
Catherine sighed and started the car.
Lucille buckled her seatbelt. “I joined a club.”
Her mother looked at her sideways and gave a small smile.
Lucille stared straight ahead. “Not a word.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You’re doing the face.”
“What face?”
“The proud mom face.”
“I’m allowed to have one.”
“Yeah, well, it’s embarrassing, so please stop.”
“Get used to it.”
Lucille turned toward the window, hiding her own smile behind her fist.
Her phone buzzed in her lap.
tony 🙄 sent you a message.
She frowned and opened it.
How was the first day?
Lucille stared at the message.
Then typed:
well, i’m alive, so…
Three dots appeared.
That’s ideal.
Any other pertinent info? Pertaining to…you know.
Her thumbs hovered.
he voluntarily joined academic decathlon so psychologically there's obviously something wrong with him
but other than that he seems like a random guy
surprise surprise 😐
The typing bubble disappeared.
Then returned.
You joined too. 😬
Lucille’s eyes narrowed.
how the fuck do you know that??
Catherine glanced over. “Who are you texting so aggressively?”
Lucille looked up sharply. “Nobody.”
Her phone buzzed.
Language.
Your mom told me you texted earlier. It’s good to get involved.
Lucille stared at the screen.
She laughed incredulously. “Are you serious?”
Catherine sighed. “What?”
Lucille turned to her mother impatiently. “Did you tell your ex about my school activities?”
“Well, he’s a little more than just my ex,” Catherine pursed her lips in faux thought, “like…oh, yeah, he’s also your father.”
“Doesn't mean you have to tell him everything,” Lucille rolled her eyes.
There were a few minutes of silence as Lucille scrolled through people’s Instagram stories and bit her thumb nail. She wasn’t very active there except to see what other people were up to. Her following list was very small anyway, just a few people from her old school who she didn’t interact with more than a like on a post when it showed up and a “happy birthday” under their post when their birthdays came up.
Catherine glanced cautiously at Lucille before sitting up straighter as they got stuck in traffic. “Lucy, can you put the phone down for a second?”
Lucille blinked, giving her mother a bit of a disgruntled look before obliging and shoving it into her pocket. “Yes, mother.”
Catherine rolled her eyes. “You do understand where your father’s coming from with this, right?”
Catherine remembered the kid, meeting him briefly in Berlin before everything went to shit. She remembered confiding in Tony how scared she felt for Lucy, how she was worried she’d be all alone and something might go wrong, just like it had with Loghan. How after weeks of Happy’s complaints about constantly being pestered by the kid, Tony had realized that the boy needed a friend, maybe someone who might understand.
“Uh, yeah,” Lucille said. “He wants me to stalk the guy to make sure he doesn’t pull a Steve.”
Catherine braked a little harshly at that comment, but recovered just as quick. “No, it’s so that he doesn’t pull a Tony.”
Lucille felt a sudden surge in agitation, and maybe confidence too. “What, impregnate a girl and then forget about her for ten years?”
“Lucille, enough,” Catherine snapped. “You’d better lose the attitude because I’m not gonna repeat myself.”
“Okay, sorry,” she said quietly, but she didn’t really mean it much.
“The kid's young blood. He’s eager, he’s excited—maybe a little too much,” Catherine said, turning the wheel. “I don’t fully agree with it, but I think Tony’s just trying to keep him from drowning. Everybody needs a friend sometimes.”
Lucille laughed humorlessly. “So, I’m not here to watch Spider-Man? I’m here to play ring-around-the-rosie with Peter Parker? Seriously? You want us to get matching friendship bracelets?”
Catherine looked straight ahead, gripping the wheel tightly. “Listen, he just seems like the type of person to get consumed by this kind of stuff. And it might be good for you, too.”
“I don’t see how this is supposed to be good for me,” Lucille grumbled. “If you mean to keep me from getting any ideas, then sure.”
Catherine pressed her lips into a thin line.
There was another pause.
“Wait, how do you know what he’s like?” Lucille quirked a brow at her mother.
“I met him in Berlin,” Catherine said casually.
“Mom,” Lucille groaned, dragging her hands down her face. “He knows what you look like and that you’re connected to Tony. If he sees you around me, he’s gonna know.”
“Thought you didn’t want to do this?” Catherine gave her daughter a sidelong glance.
“Yeah, well, I don’t,” Lucille rolled her eyes. “But unfortunately, he is kind of interesting. In a deer-in-the-headlights kind of way. I’ll just take the bus.”
Catherine pursed her lips, and the rest of the car ride was silent.