Chapter Text
There’s children giggling and running around. The sun is shining down on the red grass of Hexside’s courtyard. A teacher looms over, smiling gently. Why is she so tall? “You’re going home for the day, sweetie,” the teacher says. Two green-haired twins wave goodbye from across the courtyard. A bigger hand takes her tiny one. The figure next to her is tall, serious. Scared? It’s her sister… but not? The figure’s face is blurred, but this hand feels familiar.
Scene change. A fire blazing in the fireplace. Quiet guitar strumming fills the room, a soft and sad voice accompanying it.
“It really breaks my heart- ”
Her sister again. The music pauses.
“Lark, ma and pa aren’t going to come back.”
Scene change. It’s hot. It’s so hot. There’s flames in his eyes. There’s flames everywhere. She runs. Why is she running? She runs. She runs until she can’t. She runs until she collapses, scraping her small knees on the concrete steps of Hexside. Why is everything still so hot?
Lark woke up in a sweat to a concerned-looking Avi leaning over them. He leaned back and scribbled something on the notepad he was holding. “Pillows and bedsheets added to the list of stuff you’ll need.”
The witch looked around the room she had picked to sleep in. The sun was blaring through the curtains right onto the bare mattress where Lark was sleeping, accentuating the July heat. Avi noticed Lark’s concern and nodded. “Curtains, got it.”
Lark sat up suddenly, almost hitting heads with Avi in the process. “What the-? What time is it?”
Avi looked at his watch. “Mmm, about 6am.”
“Wh-”
“I took the day off from my job at the local music store, but that’s where my parents think I am.”
Lark grumbled and rubbed her face with her hands and stretched. Avi could hear several bones loudly pop. “Dang, that was the best night of sleep I’ve had in a while.”
“I-” Avi started, “When was the last time you slept on a mattress?”
Lark made various small noises as she counted her fingers. They looked back up at Avi. “I think it was when I was in the orphanage, so about eleven years.”
Avi sighed and offered his hand to help her up. “Come on, stiffbones, we’re going shopping.”
-
At 6:30 am on a weekday, the shopping center was practically empty, aside from a few people who were probably grabbing snacks last-minute for something at work. Lark stared at several noticeably shiny objects as Avi led them straight to the bedding section, where he took packages of various sizes and tossed them into the cart he had grabbed on the way in. By the time they got to the clothing section, the cart was almost full.
As far as Avi knew, Lark hadn’t pickpocketed anything. As far as Lark knew, her pockets were full, but her bag was not. However, it was slowly getting filled with small shiny trinkets that they nabbed whenever Avi was looking the other way.
In the clothing section, Avi held various items up against Lark, nodding before putting them in the cart. Lark looked at several items curiously, trying some on and looking to Avi for approval (“Lark, why are you wearing it like that?” “Like what?” “You know what, nevermind. You don’t need that and we’re on a budget.” “Fine. Can I get this hat, though? It says, ‘Fish want me, women fear me.’” “...Okay, fine. I guess it’ll hide some of your features.” “And this shirt that says ‘HOMO’?” “It’s two sizes too big… actually I give up. Put it in the cart.”)
At checkout, Avi operated stiffly, as if he was about to get caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to do. Lark swore that there was a bead of sweat slowly forming at his temple. She smirked. “I wonder how much sleep they’ve gotten,” they whispered to him.
He visibly relaxed but scowled. “I’m still making you put on the hat and sunglasses as soon as I’ve paid for them.”
Lark picked up their bags and found the hat and sunglasses she wanted to wear, putting them on. As they left the store with Avi, they overheard the cashiers talking.
“Holy shit, I think I’m hallucinating, bro.”
“Bro, are you okay? What did you see?”
“That person had a weird eye, bro. And pointy ears, too, bro.”
“Bro, how much sleep did you get?”
“...Three, bro.”
“Hours? Minutes? C’mon, bro.”
“Red Bulls, bro.”
“Bro. You were most definitely hallucinating, bro.”
“I know, bro.”
Avi looked at Lark with a comforted smile, which Lark returned with a sly I told you so grin.
As they got into Avi’s slightly rusted red vehicle (was it a car? Lark didn’t know.) Avi hesitated before turning it on. “Lark, can I ask you something?”
Lark leaned back in their seat and picked at their nails. “What’s up?”
“What were you whimpering about?”
Lark glanced at him. “Whimpering?”
A blush grew on Avi’s face. “You were… uh, you were whimpering and mumbling about something before I woke you up earlier.”
Lark stopped picking her nails.
It’s hot.
It’s too hot.
I need to run.
So she ran. She burst out of the car and she ran until she got to the forest, where she turned into a bird and flew up, up and into the highest branches where nobody could find her. She flew until she could see all the way to Gravesville.
The air was cooler up here. It wasn’t freezing, but it wasn’t… blazing. Blazing, like Avi’s car had felt at that moment. Blazing like… like that other thing. Lark let their wings keep them afloat for a while, taking several deep breaths.
This is what she’d always done, wasn’t it?
Stupid Lark.
Always running away.
Always running.
But what else could I do?
Burn?
But he wanted to know.
He wanted to listen.
She slowly let herself descend until she was almost at the treetops. From there, she flew in Avi’s direction until she was at the edge of the forest, where she touched ground and turned back into a witch, hat and sunglasses included. She jogged the rest of the way to the parking lot where Avi was and slowed to a walk until she got to his car. He had his forehead pressed against the top of the steering wheel, his eyes closed. Lark approached the car and leaned on her elbow on the driver’s side window, peering inside at Avi. He looked up, surprised, and cranked the window down. (He had told them earlier that it wasn’t automatic like newer cars, which Lark had no idea what he meant.) He squinted up at her. “You came back.”
Lark didn’t answer, instead going to the passenger side and getting in. The car was slightly cooler now, but still hot. “Have you been sitting in here the whole time I was gone?”
Avi chuckled. “Yeah, I couldn’t just abandon the AviMobile to look for you in the forest.”
Lark went silent for a moment before speaking again. “Sorry for running.”
“No, I get it. I brought up a tough topic. Sorry.”
“No, it’s fine. It’s something I’m just… not used to talking about. I’ve only ever told one person about it. It’s just something that happened when I was younger, no biggie.”
“So you’ve only told one person and you have nightmares about it. Sure, no biggie.”
“Yeah, I guess I can see how it would sound otherwise.”
“...So do you want to talk about it?”
“If you’re willing to listen, yeah.”
“Ok.”
“I used to have a family. They, uh. They’re all gone. When I was five they all…” Lark trailed off, staring hard at something, anything outside.
Avi reached into the backseat and rummaged around in the bags of stuff they bought. In the next moment, Lark felt something soft and fluffy in her hands. They looked down to see a round purple and white cat shaped thing about the size of their head. Avi smiled at her. “It’s a plushie. I thought you might like it.”
Lark smiled, still looking at the plushie. “Yeah.”
They were both silent again before Lark spoke again. “I’m not sure how my parents died, but I know for sure they’re dead.”
Avi hummed. “If you don’t mind me asking, when did they die?”
“I was five. My sister told me that they weren’t coming back, and I knew she knew more than she told me because I was five and she was fifteen. She said that there was a bad man looking for us, and a couple days later he found us.
“There was fire everywhere. Fire in our house, fire in the man’s eyes. Starling gave me a bag of stuff and told me to run to school before she went to fight the man. I haven’t seen her since.”
“Oh… Do you think she’s still alive?”
Lark hesitated. “I’m not sure. The man- General Cynders- is… not super strong. I almost killed him when I was fourteen, but it was definitely tough. But when he attacked my family he was younger and stronger and…”
Avi held his hand out towards Lark. They looked at it for a moment before finally taking it. Lark felt tears forming in her eyes and wiped them away with their free hand. “If she’s alive, though, why didn’t she ever come back for me?”
He squeezed their hand. “I don’t know, but I’m sure she would come back if she could.”
Deep breaths.
Lark squeezed back. “...Your hand is really soft.”
Now it was Avi’s turn to smirk. “Your hands are just rough. And I also use moisturizer.”
Lark laced their fingers together and ran her callused thumb over the back of Avi’s remarkably smooth hand. She smiled gently. “I haven’t held someone’s hand like this since I was little. It’s nice.”
“It really is,” Avi agreed.
They sat like that for a while in silence: Avi with his free hand in his lap, Lark holding their new plushie (which they named Max) in their free hand, and both of them holding each other’s hands over the middle console.
“Lark,” Avi said after a while, “We should probably get back to the cabin.”
“Yup.”
Avi shifted in his seat. “I need both hands to drive.”
“Right.”