Archive of Our Own ^beta

In a Kaleidoscope, a small twist can drastically change what you see. When it turns out that Dan was coerced into joining the Cowhands, it changes how everything about him is perceived. To make sure nobody can leverage his secret against him again, Dan is up front with the BWGs and the rest of the Glen Road crew: He's gay. The Bob-Whites have his back, so even though the mid-1990s aren't the best time to come out, it's common knowledge at Sleepyside Junior-Senior High School before too long. Judge Armen lifted a lot of the travel and other typical probation restrictions when Regan and Dan explained what was going on, and neither Regan nor Mr. Maypenny are worried about Dan's idle hands anymore, so Dan gets to join a lot of the Bob-White adventures he was left out of in the series. Still, he's got a lot of trauma in his past and some concerns that Dan in the books didn't have. Mart is happy to have Dan lean on him, and they fast become inseparable.

The tainted timeline would need some fixing anyway, but I made two specific alterations: Bob-White Cave doesn't happen until much later because they run out of spring breaks in Year 1, and the linked Missing Heiress/Uninvited Guest mysteries don't happen until the end of the second summer Dan spends in Sleepyside for reasons that will become clear when Kaleidoscope catches up to that point in the series. There are other, minor tweaks, but mostly to solve for known timeline quirks.

For ages: Dan starts as a freshman with Mart, but is a year older because he missed time, so he turns 16 shortly after moving to Sleepyside. He stays in that same class through high school graduation. Mart turns 15 that June, while all three girls turn 14 between May and July as they finish eighth grade. Jim turns 17 in July and he and Brian are juniors in the first year of the series. They start senior year after Mississippi and Uninvited Guest now happens shortly before they leave for college, when Dan and Mart are about to be juniors and the girls are starting sophomore year.