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Amara woke up early to go for a run, smacking her alarm and rolling out of bed in one well-practiced movement, no momentum lost in her morning routine. With a shake of her head to clear away any last semblance of sleep, she walked over to her desk to—well, that hadn’t been there the night before.
Upon her desk sat a simply massive bouquet of red roses, resting in a Roman-style marble vase with tiny eagles engraved along both its base and rim. Amara approached it cautiously: there had certainly been stranger threats in that maddening world of theirs, but the flowers appeared to be perfectly normal. She lifted one to her nose thoughtfully. Valentine’s Day, she realized at last, which made the sudden extravagance far less foreboding. But there wasn’t any card.
They couldn’t have been from Mephisto: the simplicity of the roses themselves, each one carefully trimmed of its thorns, lacked the Devil’s taste for danger. Her thoughts jumped next to Roberto, but the details were all off. He would have at least left a card with an invitation to some high-class dinner, and the vase would have been far more ornate…no, the vase wasn’t his style at all. But it was her style, in a way she rarely spoke of, and the inclusion of her familial eagles proved how much thought went into the gift.
Only one person would pay such careful attention and seek nothing in return. If this was how he wanted to celebrate, then Amara was more than happy to play along. She picked out one of her nicest dresses, pinned up her hair, and painted her lips the reddest of rose reds. One of the flowers she took up from the vase, clipping the stem short and tucking the blossom behind her ear. Almost ready, she stopped to look at herself in the mirror and marveled at how bright her own grin.
Once, all she had wanted was her birthright, all the power and glory of a true daughter of Rome. She was drawn to luxury as a moth to a flame, and oh how it burned (once a princess, always a princess), and how much more painful still to run from both the world she wanted and the world she deserved. Though her lessons were well learned, still her heart leaped to be given such a gift, and her eyes darted to her altar, to the images of her household gods, and her very smile was a prayer on her lips.
The house was quiet, the boys not yet awake, and when Amara descended the stairs it took a strained, anxious moment before Warlock peeked round the corner at her, eyes small and almost timid.
“There you are, my valentine,” she called, sweeping forward to kiss him on the cheek and give him a smear of lipstick he would wear proudly all day long.
*
By the time Nate stumbled downstairs wearing only his pajama bottoms, Warlock and Amara had been baking for hours and a full array of heart-shaped cookies and chocolate cupcakes sat waiting on the table. Nate’s eyes lit up as he scrambled into his seat, grabbing three pink-iced sugar cookies at once and biting in with a look of utter euphoria.
Amara raised an eyebrow. “Good morning, Nate.”
He looked up frantically when his rudeness dawned, and choked out a reply around a mouthful of cookie. Warlock swooped in offering a glass of milk, patting at Nate’s head worriedly as he drank. No one was going to die in his kitchen, no way no how. He’d zoom tiny airplane spoons around if his teammates couldn’t be trusted to eat safely on their own. Amara shook her head at them and turned away, reaching for an oven mitt when the timer dinged.
“What’s that?” Nate asked, sniffing at the air. She shot him a withering glare over her shoulder. “I mean, uh, good morning, Amara! You look absolutely stunning this morning!”
“Too far, Grey, too far.” She laughed and pulled the baking sheet from the oven. “Besides, I’ve already chosen ‘Lock as my Valentine.”
“Ohhh, that’s what today is.”
Warlock sat down at the table, tapping at Nate’s shoulder eagerly. “Query: Did Selfriendnate enjoy roseflowers?”
“Never got flowers before. ‘S real nice, selfriend.” Nate bit into another cookie and tried to flash a grin at the same time. It didn’t work very well, though his chipmunk cheeks were most impressive, and he leaned over to give Warlock a one-armed hug instead.
“You didn’t have Valentine’s Day in the Age of Apocalypse, I take it?” Amara asked. She kept her back to them as she busied herself dribbling chocolate sauce over the latest mystery dessert. “So you didn’t remember to send Dani anything?”
Nate swore more vividly than they’d ever heard from him, and Warlock’s hand darted out to cover his potty mouth. “Shhh, selfriend, shhh. Worries begone! Self sent roseflowers to Chiefriendani and put your name on the card.”
“You’re my selfvalentine, Warlock. Seriously,” Nate declared once he pulled Warlock’s hand away from his mouth. “I’ll fight Amara for you.”
“You’ll lose,” she hummed, turning to reveal her masterpiece. “May I present my killing blow: cheesecake brownie hearts.”
Nate leaned back in his chair and made an utterly obscene noise—
Just as Doug walked into the kitchen.
No pregnant pause, no moment of strained silence. One second Nate was moaning while Doug stood frozen mid-step, and the next Amara had dropped to her knees in the most intense laughing fit of her life. She only barely managed to hand the tray of cheesecakes off to Warlock before giving up on all semblance of propriety whatsoever, leaning against the cabinets and clutching at her stomach.
Nate, on the other hand, turned red as the roses. He didn’t even try to pretend the moment was anything other than mortifying, didn’t cover it up by offering Doug a morning greeting or cookie. He simply sank down in his chair and covered his face with his hands.
But Doug was staring straight at Warlock, at the flour handprints dusted all over him and the immaculate lipstick kiss on his cheek, at the feigned innocence painted over his deeply hopeful expression, at the tray of heart-shaped cheesecakes held out expectantly in his hands.
“There are over five hundred roses in my room,” Doug announced, not even sure where he was going with it, or what he stormed down there to say. He just kept looking at Warlock.
“Self attempted to match emotions to flowers. Research = contradictory/frustrating. But all sources said red is for love! Did Self err in color choice?” The tray in Warlock’s hands lowered slightly, anxious tremor barely visible.
This wasn’t a conversation Doug wanted to have in front of an audience. Sometimes he forgot no one else could read people as easily as he did, that no one else had been following their hesitant dance around each other for the past year, that some things—I love you and you are breaking my heart—were for his eyes and ears alone. Everyone knew about Warlock’s boundless devotion, but only Doug had realized how unfathomable it truly was, and how desperate the fear that he’d overwhelm them if he let down his guard. No one else saw how carefully Warlock walked the line, daring only the occasional uninvited hug or touch on the arm now that they were no longer the innocent and bright-eyed children of so long ago.
Five hundred red roses in his room – a declaration that Doug unthinkingly revealed to the entire household. He could’ve said nothing, but no, no. It might have been Valentine’s Day, but that was simply an excuse for Warlock to pamperlovecherish his selfriends the way he had always wanted, and this time everyone knew it.
“You’re too late anyway, Ramsey,” said Nate, saving him from that unanswerable question. “Amara’s already laid claim to Warlock. Guess you’re stuck being my valentine instead.”
“Great.” Doug reached out to pluck one of those cheesecakes from the tray, giving Warlock an indecipherable look. The alien pushed the entire tray into his hands, then ducked his head and went to check on Amara. “Just great.”
*
The phone calls started coming in after that.
Sam rang first, only barely managing a hello through his own deep-bellied laughter – if nothing else, Warlock’s gifts had been responsible for great merriment indeed. “Ya can’t imagine how excited Bobby was t’ find those flowers,” he explained. They could all hear his grin over the speaker. Amara had to bite her lip to control herself, already sure of where this story was headed. “And then when he saw ‘Lock was his secret admirer, well, Ah ain’t never seen him despairin’ so.”
“Get a picture,” she hissed.
“Be nice,” said Sam, “Can’t believe ya think so poorly of me, like Ah haven’t already sent the security vid over. Really though, thanks Warlock, we appreciate it a heck of a lot. It makes missin’ you guys a bit easier.”
Once he hung up, Amara ordered Doug to go for his laptop so they could pull up the video. They watched in high-def as Roberto found the bouquet of a dozen red and pink roses and swept it up into his arms, spinning around before calling Sam in to share the discovery. The desperately confused, crestfallen look on his face once Sam pointed out the name on the care was truly glorious, as was Roberto’s histrionic belly-flop onto his bed, head hidden under his pillow in shame.
They replayed it at least twenty times, laughing more with every viewing. Amara initiated a dramatic reenactment and collapsed onto the couch with her hands clutched over her heart. Nate joined her, hollering about his shame as he fell backward over the armrest of his chair, limbs sprawled in obvious distress. Even Warlock gave it a shot, fainting on the coffee table and shouting, “Distressdisgrace!”
With a sudden burst of pink sparks, the living room gained three more inhabitants: Clarice with Kitty and Shan on either arm. “Introducing the Jean Grey School Envoy of Affection!” she called, not even sparing the others a glance before diving onto Warlock and pining him to the table with a jubilant hug.
“Kitty!” The laptop snapped shut, and Doug practically leapt out of his chair as he scrambled over for a hug of his own, much to Kitty’s amusement. They embraced, and the Doug slipped an arm around Shan’s shoulders and pulled her into the hug as well, one that Amara was quick to join.
Clarice freed Warlock so he could join the reunion snugglefest. She popped over onto Nate’s armrest, poking at his bare chest and putting a finger to his lips when he tried to speak. “Shh. No reason to open that dumb mouth of yours and spoil their moment, Eye Candy.”
“I presume Warlock sent you all flowers as well?” Doug asked, watching as the girls all fawned over their resident romantic.
“And chocolates for the entire school,” Kitty said, one arm still wrapped around Warlock’s waist.
“Plus giant chocolate hearts for my brother and sister,” added Shan. “Full of smaller chocolate hearts inside.”
Amara began herding them into the kitchen. “We’ve got cookies, too—you have to try the cheesecakes, they’re to die for.”
“Those are mine!” Nate cried in horror, just as Blink shoved a hand over his mouth and shushed him once more.
*
The Envoy of Affection cleaned them out, returning to Westchester with plate after plate of cookies and cakes piled into their arms. Nate watched them go with such blatant misery that Doug and Amara shared a sigh, marched into the kitchen, and tied on their aprons. Round Two.
Back in the living room, Warlock breezed through the security locks on his selfsoulfriend’s laptop and started typing away. “We have mail from Chiefriendani,” he announced, patting the space next to him on the couch until Nate joined him.
With a sudden rush of dread, Nate asked, “What color roses did you send her again?”
“No worries, selfriend! Self did not send red roseflowers for you because Self is more than capable of understanding socialboundaries.”
But didn’t you smother Doug’s room in roses, Nate thought. Luckily, his fears were all for naught. Warlock pulled up the photo attachments on Dani’s email; one of her holding a half dozen pink and orange roses and offering an incredulous half-smile to the camera; the other of Brightwind happily munching at the basket of apples Warlock sent in his own name.
The biggest smile bloomed on Nate’s face, lighting up his eyes. “You’re an actual hero, selfriend.”
Warlock made a noncommittal noise, looking at the computer screen as he opened the next email. Sent by Brian Braddock, it contained a long overblown expression of gratitude for the roses Meggan received and ended with a questionably joking challenge to a duel for her hand. The one from Psimon read much the same way: Hope says thanks for the flowers. PS. You’re an asshole who made me look bad. With all our love.
“Dude, were you trying to make everyone look bad?”
“What? No, negative, nope.” Warlock shivered slightly, the way he did whenever trying to keep his response in check, quite a struggle for such an emotional metamorph. “Self would never. Look! Mail from Selfriendtabby!” He hit play on her video message before Nate could call him on his transparent evasion technique.
“Warlock, you absolute treasure, I can’t believe, like, holy hell ‘Lock, I woke up to a knock at my door and was pretty damn tempted to blow that delivery guy’s head off for interrupting my beauty sleep, but then he shoves a giant bouquet of goddamn roses at me, and let me tell you, no one’s ever sent me roses before—sure I’ve gotten some shitty carnations and crap, but wow don’t you ever know how to treat a lady! And then half an hour later there’s another delivery with the most expensive chocolates I’ve ever seen in my life and you are just, oh Warlock, thank you so, so much! Love ya lots, selfriend! Talk to you soon!” The video ended with Tabby blowing a kiss to the camera. Warlock beamed at the screen, one hand curling up against the USB port so he could transfer the file to his own data banks.
Nate grinned at him indulgently, then stretched and went to investigate the delicious smells wafting out of the kitchen.
A damp dish towel smacked him in the face as soon as he entered the room.
“No cake until you pull your weight,” snapped Doug, trying to sound stern, but Amara had coerced him into wearing the chef’s hat and there was very little he could do at the moment except look ridiculous.
“Aye aye, Captain Cook,” he snickered. After dutifully gathering up all the dirty dishes, Nate started the hot water running and left them to soak in the sink. Next he pulled the wet towel from his shoulder and started scrubbing the flour gunk from the kitchen table. Long past the days of constant take-out, they all knew their roles and performed them with the same precision of the battlefield.
With Doug busy icing the latest angel food cake, Amara hung up her apron and headed out to the living room. She walked up behind Warlock, draping her arms around his neck, and asked, “Got any plans for the evening, selfvalentine of mine?”
“Affirmative. Self made dinner reservations for proxyfamily.” He had everything planned. Everything.
“Sounds wonderful.” Amara hopped over the back of the couch and sidled up to him, resting her head on his shoulder. Funny how she couldn’t stand clingy, overbearing men for a single minute, but could stay curled up next to Warlock for hours.
A few minutes later her phone buzzed, and they ended up searching through the cracks in the cushions for it. “How many gifts did you send out anyway?” she asked as they rummaged, her fingers closing around it at last. When she hit Answer it sounded like a riot on the other end.
“Hello?”
The distant slam of a closing door and then, “Yes, hello. This is Layla Miller. May I speak to Warlock?”
Amara handed him the phone.
“Greetings, Selfriendlayla!”
“That was a pretty good plan, you know. And it’ll work out—next year everyone will really step up and try to outclass you.”
“Self possesses no clues re: what you are talking about,” hummed Warlock, fooling no one.
“Right. Well, we appreciated the chocolate and flowers, and you really saved Jamie’s ass—he grabbed one of the roses and duplicated until he had enough for an impressive bouquet. I didn’t buy it for a second, but I’m not saying it wasn’t a nice sentiment.”
“Conclusion: Selfriendjamie enhanced valentinexperience for all.”
Layla didn’t dignify that with a response. “You’ve really pissed off ‘Star, though, so I wouldn’t show up around here for a long, long while. He’s threatening to mark his territory on Rictor again. If you get a letter of challenge, ignore it. We’ll talk him down. Somehow.”
His third challenge of the day! What was making everyone so aggressive?
Amara hid a smile behind her hand at Warlock’s tiny pout.
“Oh look, your kissing cousin is here,” drawled Layla amid an indignant shriek from her end of the phone. There was a moment of fumbling before Rahne won the phone.
“’Lock, sweetheart, ye cannae surprise a gal like that, roses as far as the eye can see, God Almighty. And ye’ll ruin me with those chocolates, what were ye thinkin’?”
“But Rahne, it’s Valentine’s Day!”
“Ye know how I feel about chocolate!”
“Yes, you love it—“
“And it’s already all gone!”
“Well it’s hardly my fault if you enjoyed my gift.”
Even from the other end of the couch, Amara could hear Rahne’s fondness over the line, and she watched as Warlock’s circuits glowed at the sound of his friend’s voice. Still, it was disorienting to hear Warlock’s voice shift, or rather his scripts switch, especially so suddenly. After the others moved out a few months back, Doug had tried to explain Warlock’s identity issues, hoping Amara could offer advice considering her expertise on the matter. She’d seen pictures of Douglock, but she’d never heard him speak, and this could be nothing else—the warmth of Doug’s childhood whine neatly couched in Warlock’s sharper tone, the two halves utterly at home with each other. It wasn’t anything like the way their gestalt spoke, and she sat there listening to it in quiet awe, mind racing.
“Please tell me ye didn’t give roses to Dougie as well,” Rahne groaned.
“Of course I did! W-why wouldn’t I?”
“Ye silly bairn, a’course ye did.”
“Rahne,” he whined desperately, clutching at the phone like his life depended on the answer.
“Ye cannae just give roses to a grown man, ‘Lock! Not even Dougie. How many did ye give him?”
“But I sent some to Rictor too and—“
“An’ Star’s already half determined to gut ye! Warlock, how many did ye give Dougie?”
Amara had rarely witnessed such utter panic in her alien friend and chose that moment to yell, “Doug! Rahne’s on the phone!”
“Ach, is that Amara?”
She snatched the phone from Warlock, who let it slip from his fingers without protest. “Hey, Rahne! You been basking in Warlock’s affection, too?”
A laugh. “That’s one way a’ sayin’ it.”
Doug rushed in from the kitchen, wiping his hands off on his apron and gesturing for Amara to pass him the phone. She pulled a face and refused to hand it over—it wasn’t like she got many chances to talk to Rahne either! While they fought over it, Warlock slunk away upstairs.
*
An hour later, Doug discovered Warlock in the middle of an award-winning impression of Roberto’s shame sprawl on his bed. “You okay there, partner?” he asked as he wove his way through the endless ocean of red roses in glass vases. It was a miracle that Warlock had managed to get them all into the room without waking him, considering what a light sleeper he was.
“No,” Warlock replied miserably, unmoving. “Self gave you too many flowers.”
That was the problem? Doug cleared a space on the floor and sat down with his back against the side of the bed, head tilted back as he gazed out at his room. Though the smell was stronger than Warlock had probably intended, it made for an oddly peaceful scene. Not really what he expected to greet him that morning, though. “Well, it is an awful lot of flowers,” he admitted. “But who told you it was too many? Rahne?”
Warlock mumbled into the bedding, and Doug took that as a yes. The alien was still caught awkwardly between scripts, shape fritzed between frazzled black and sleek golden forms, too distressed to coalesce his disparate parts into any sort of whole. It wasn’t something Warlock would allow anyone else to see, but Doug didn’t mind when his pieces didn’t all fit together, didn’t flinch no matter how razor-edged his selfsoulfriend's fragments.
“Even Rahne doesn’t know everything,” he said. He couldn’t look at Warlock without reading him, and though Doug had a good idea of what was going on already, at that moment it still felt like a serious breach of trust. “Besides, doesn’t everyone want a surprise for Valentine’s Day?”
Techno-organic fingers curled gently through Doug’s hair, scratching at his scalp, and he leaned his head back even further in silent assent: yes, words were difficult, but this did not have to be.
“It was a good surprise?” Warlock murmured at last.
The language of flowers was a difficult one, split into various dialects with a different interpretation for each culture, yet red roses were increasingly universal. Perhaps surprise was not the proper word for what Doug felt that morning. There wasn’t a better word to express how deeply it shook him to wake to a physical representation of the enormity of Warlock’s devotion. He never expected to translate something so perfect in its simplicity. “Yeah, good surprise,” he said, mouth dry.
Warlock’s fingers stilled and drew away.
“Do you think I can transmode things?” Doug asked suddenly, snatching up one of the nearest roses. They needed a change of topic, stat. The idea had crossed his mind now and again, though since there was no reason he’d ever want to, it was more a flight of fancy than anything else.
“No. Your variant is passive, not active. Mostly.” Warlock slipped off the side of the bed, ended up sitting right next to him, and added, “If you’d stop trying to hack it.” He had mostly pulled himself back together into a golden humanoid, the blank-eyed kind that gave Doug a weird feeling in his gut, and the borrowed scripts lent a new level of annoyance, as if Doug’s own conscience had risen up to berate him. “I really wish you’d stop trying to hack it, for the record.”
Doug didn’t bother apologizing; they both knew he wouldn’t stop.
“Besides, your body wouldn’t have any way to convert lifeglow.” Warlock reached over and infected the rose in his hand, drained it dry, then touched his fingers to Doug’s shoulder, passing along the meal. “Not without Self as a conduit.”
Sucking in a breath at the sudden rush of—ahem, Doug quirked his lips in the funniest smile. “Geez, warn a guy.”
Warlock scowled before snaking out one finger to shatter the fragile metallic husk of the rose. Yanking it away in a useless preservation attempt, Doug sighed and watched it collapse into silvery dust. He rubbed it between his fingertips thoughtfully.
“They’re beautiful like that, you know.”
“No, they aren’t,” Warlock snapped, more confused than angry. “They are merely a waste product.”
It didn’t surprise him that Warlock found beauty everywhere except in the byproducts of his own existence. There was something hauntingly beautiful about those ghostly skeletons, and Doug was certain an art critic or two would envy them, if only they lasted longer than a few seconds before turning to dust. But there was art in that, too.
“Is that what you’re wearing to dinner?” Doug asked, standing up and tiptoeing his way around the flowers to reach his closet.
“Oh.” Warlock glanced down at his golden hands, then looked up again as if for permission.
Doug smiled at him, brows knit. “Wear whatever you want, pal. That form’s plenty handsome enough.” He turned back to his closet and rifled through the hangers. “How fancy is this place, anyway?”
“Don’t wear a suit,” Warlock told him most firmly. “I do not like you in a suit.”
Ah, yes, Doug could imagine why. He picked out his nicest turtleneck, and when he turned back around Warlock was watching him with proud approval. The Technarch had shifted himself into a button-up shirt and vest like a waiter from some posh teahouse, immaculate save for the faint imprint of lipstick still on his cheek.
“Can you go remind Nate to actually wear shoes?” Doug nodded in thanks when Warlock strolled off to do just that, then called after him, “And don’t let him near the fishnets!”
He could practically feel the moment Warlock switched back to his usual speech pattern, scripts snapping back into place as soon as he left the room. Shoot, Doug hissed under his breath. He stared at himself in the mirror and ran a hand through his hair. He’d dodged the conversation well enough thus far, but it would have to be soon. It wasn’t fair to either of them this way.
*
Every other customer at the restaurant was clearly there on a romantic date. Amara managed to score them a corner table where they could laugh and talk without bothering the others much, and where hopefully no one would look too closely at Warlock. When the waiter raised an eyebrow and asked if they were on a double date, Amara kicked Nate under the table before he could open his mouth, and proudly declared they were all hers. With a nervous laugh, the waiter sped away to fetch their drinks.
After a long day of stuffing his face, Nate could have managed a normal portion, but everyone ordered massive plates of pasta anyway—the leftovers went to Warlock, always happy to make sure nothing went to waste. While Nate and Amara ordered another round of drinks and dessert, Doug sat deep in thought, tracing his finger through the techno-organic dust on his plate in some lithe, looping language.
They caught a bus to the beach afterward and found a nice little spot without any hopeless romantics. Nate had been itching to get out of his shoes ever since they left the house, and a look of bliss came over his face the moment his socks were off. He might have stood there wiggling his toes in the sand forever if Amara hadn’t pulled him and Warlock along to go dip their feet in the surf.
Driftwood in hand, Doug returned to tracing patterns in the sand. He’d always been prone to doodling when his mind wandered, but now he was more fond of calligraphy, of beautiful scripts that rejoiced in form instead of function. Still, no matter which language he tried, he couldn’t find the perfect words, let alone the perfect metaphor. The weight in his chest defied expression.
Once, on a lazy afternoon, Doug had convinced Warlock to play some of his childhood memories from Kvch. Amara helped with the charade by begging to see the little baby Technarchs and asking so many questions that Warlock never realized Doug was focusing solely on the language. Requiring a range of pitch and tonal control considerably beyond the ability of any mere human, the language was so foreign that Doug couldn’t recognize half the phonemes at first, and even for him it proved utterly impossible to pronounce. He focused on picking out Warlock’s true designation before anything else, committing it to memory just in case of emergency.
Yet he hadn’t expected the Technarch language to hurt. Amara may have been content to watch the crechelings compete in shapeshifting games and gymnastic feats, tussling among themselves, but Doug heard only the beginnings of Warlock’s isolation, a runt trying to name the mysteries inside him, reaching for words that didn’t even exist in his language. Small wonder he was so quick to run, so desperate and grateful to adopt the team as his proxyfamily, assuming a new name that was never said without fondness and manipulating English to fit his nameless affection.
Maybe it should have been comforting that Warlock had no words for this either, but it only frustrated Doug even further. The conversation needed to happen. Words were necessary. They had no issues as gestalt; it was the natural separation that proved impossible to navigate, and here words were all they had. Utterly useless words.
Doug glanced down at the sand, at the patterns he had drawn, then stared out at the sea. In the distance he spotted Amara running through the shallows, fleeing from a thoroughly soaked and sandy Nate hell-bent on revenge. As the two of them took off down the beach, Warlock drifted over to join him. He’d changed back to his original shadowy black form, blending into the night with ease, his circuitry a dull glow in the darkness—a labyrinth of fireflies.
“Selfsoulfriendoug? Query: What are you writing?”
“Sini, I think.” Doug frowned and stared down at his sand-writing once more; he had shifted in and out of at least three different alphabets, but it ended in Sini, at least. He kicked at it in a hurry and wiped the slate clean. “I was just doodling.”
“…Self can fetch others if Selfsoulfriendoug is bored.”
“Don’t bother, partner.” The others knew what they were doing. It was now or never. “I need to talk to you anyway.”
Warlock folded in on himself, knees drawn up against his chest. The same misery from before fell over him, weighing down on his shoulders and leaving his crest drooping along his jagged spine. “Self gave you too many roseflowers,” he mumbled in an echo of his earlier despair.
In a moment of clarity, Doug asked, “How many were there, again? Exactly?”
“Five hundred and twenty-seven.” Warlock’s voice was quieter than before, and he hunched down even smaller, looking away.
It was too precise of a number to be meaningless.
“Oh.” Doug freed the word like a secret, realization dawning. Days. 527 days, almost two years. Each one cherished, each one more than Warlock ever thought he deserved: the days of their childhood. “No, Warlock, no. It wasn’t too many.” He reached out to grab Warlock’s arm, then faltered, letting his hand drop back to his lap. What was he supposed to say to that?
“If anything, it…it wasn’t enough,” he managed feebly.
Warlock didn’t answer.
Doug fidgeted with the driftwood in his hand, and then, suddenly, he knew exactly what to do. It was about boundaries, a thousand conflicting boundaries framing their baffling, extraordinary lives, all clogged up in the useless languages they’d learned to navigate an inexplicable world.
“Query...?” Warlock watched Doug circle around him drawing an arc in the sand.
“You want to know where the line is, right?” Doug asked, finishing up and flinging the driftwood away. “Because you’re terrified that we’ll turn away if you come too close or if you overstep. If you give someone one flower too many.”
The uncomfortable silence was proof enough.
Doug sat back down next to him, so close their shoulders were touching, and smiled with all his heart. “This is the line.” A ring drawn around them, bounding them both inside. “Us against the universe, partner.”
But the tension didn’t break, and Warlock kept looking away. His long fingers curled along the line in the sand, blurring the boundary then digging it once more. Doug didn’t know what else he could say, how else he could try to express that he would never be burdened by Warlock’s friendship (words, words—as though friendship was the crux of the problem). Frustration burned in his gut; he should have been able to do so much better than this, but his every attempt shattered like ashen roses.
“Truth?” Warlock asked at last, hopeful, almost daring to believe it.
Doug laid a hand over his heart, gold creeping into his eyes. “I’d never lie to you,” he promised.
“False.”
Startled by the sharpness of that single word, Doug bit at his lip and searched his memory for displays of dishonesty, but Warlock lifted a hand to stop him.
“Assertion is true, however, after removal of subcategory: whitelies.” He winked. “Parameters of declaration = Acceptable.”
The smug little smile on his partner’s face finally chased off the guilty unease that had been lurking in Doug’s chest all day, and he threw his arms around Warlock’s shoulders, pulling him in for a hug. His forehead rested against where the alien’s heart would be, and the tendrils of Warlock’s hair snaked down to tickle gently at the nape of his neck. For a moment the rest of the world faded into distant static.
Then a tremor, a shout, and a mighty splash.
Doug laughed, and with a shake of his head he rose to his feet. After brushing the sand off his pants, he looked back at Warlock and said, “Come on, selfsoulfriend. Let’s go rescue Nate before the ocean swallows him whole.”
Warlock followed after him, then took a few quick steps until they were side by side. “We can make a new language,” he hummed quietly before they reached the others.
“You know,” said Doug, eyes shining, “I think we already have.”
*
They grabbed a taxi back to the house, and Nate emptied his pockets tipping the driver triple in apology for all the sand he shed in the back seat. Amara had avoided him until the bitter end and did her best to gloat over the victory. When they reached the front door, there was a collective moment of indecision as they gazed at their sandy feet, and then Warlock took charge and herded them all into the backyard.
Doug and Amara only had to wash their feet, enduring the freezing water from the hose until their toes were deemed sufficiently clean for house entry. Although Nate mustered his very best puppy dog face, eyes wide and pleading, Warlock proved resolute in his decision.
“It’s February!” Nate pleaded.
Warlock narrowed his eyes and brandished the hose menacingly.
“We’re setting a dangerous precedent here,” Doug hissed to Amara, “If this is what happens the one time he actually wears clothes.”
They were both laughing so hard they almost missed Nate’s frantic squeal when Warlock turned on the hose full-blast.
Amara awoke on the couch, curled up under a blanket with her head on the armrest and her feet in Warlock’s lap. So much for their movie marathon. Thank goodness it was still dark out, because she definitely had work in the morning. She scooted into a more upright position, clutching the blanket tighter around her, then nearly jumped clear off the couch when the blanket squeezed right back at her. Warlock’s eyes slid open in the dark and sparkled at her mischievously, and she scowled even as her grip on his blanketconstruct eased. There was some sort of cape growing from his shoulders that he’d wrapped tightly around them all.
In the dark she could only barely make out the boys on the other side of the couch: Doug curled in around Warlock, half-facing him, head buried against the alien’s shoulder with one of Warlock’s arms wrapped around his waist, and Nate completely cocooned in the big fluffy bathrobe Amara lent him earlier in an act of conciliation. Back-to-back with Doug, he had his head pillowed against Warlock’s left arm and his legs strewn over the opposite armrest. The other end of the blanketconstruct rested over him.
Amara pulled up her feet, rearranged herself until she was snug under Warlock’s right arm, and rested her cheek against his chest, softer than any pillow. He draped the blanket around her, nudging against her head with his chin before pressing his face back against Doug’s hair once more. “Wake me at seven,” she whispered, and he hummed softly in response, lulling her back to sleep.
Warlock didn’t need to dream, not when everything he ever wanted was right there in his arms. And this time he had a word for it.
Perfect.
In a secret underground location, in the even more secret base of the New Xavier School, Illyana slipped into her quarters and locked the door tight, spending one quiet moment in that familiar, welcoming darkness before she bothered to turn on the lights. At once she reached for her sword, noticing something amiss, but her hand slowed, stalled, and fell slack at her side.
A bouquet of yellow roses sat on her bedside table.
Once, they would have made her smile. Now they gave her only a vague confusion, as though she had slipped from her universe and landed in another just slightly out of sync. She had no lover, she had no friends. They all thought her a mad witch, and in her world there was no use for flowers. Yet she found herself reaching for the card anyway, perversely interested in this useless farce.
Very very long ago, when I did not believe in myself, you believed in me. Now you are the one who does not believe, who does not know what part to play. I do not care what part you play. You are my selfriend, always. Please be happy today. Self believes in you.
“What a fool,” she whispered, and her voice was so foreign to her own ears, for it sounded almost—fond.