Chapter Text
Lup gets the first texts as she steps into her apartment building.
Barry: Hey! I was wondering if maybe you wanted to get dinner some time.
Barry: I know we’ve gotten dinner together before dozens of times but I mean like. As a date. Not as two friends getting food together.
Barry: What I’m trying to say is: would you like to go on a date with me? I probably should have led with that.
Standing in the hall, she watches the little ‘this person is typing’ bubble pop up and disappear for a few minutes before it stops completely. She grins, unconsciously but bright and wide, for a moment. What a dork.
Then, without warning, she starts to feel a knot of nervous tension gripping at her stomach.
The apartment is quiet when Lup gets inside, which means Taako definitely isn’t home yet. Any minute now, she figures. She heads to his room and digs a carton of cigarettes out from under his bed. He won’t miss them, she figures. Neither of the twins have smoked regularly in years—not since they were shitty teenagers. Taako probably would’ve thrown the carton away, if he ever threw anything away.
He won’t mind, she decides. This is a special occasion. Or maybe it’s a very mild and entirely unwarranted panic attack. She isn’t sure which. She hears her phone’s text alert again, but can’t bring herself to look.
She stuffs one of the three remaining packs into her jacket pocket and unceremoniously drops the carton, kicking it back under the bed.
Once she is in her own bedroom, settling into the thin section of floor between her bed and the wall. She pull a single cigarette from her pocket and digs around in the drawer on her bedside table for something to light it with. She finds a box of strike-anywhere matches, half a dozen cheap Bic lighters of various colors, and an engraved zippo she’d gotten as a gift from an ex.
She settles on the matches, striking one on the thick rubber sole of her boot. After she lights the cigarette, she lets it burn until it almost singes her calloused fingertips before sharply shaking it to put out the flame. She takes a long, slow drag and ignores the dull burn in her lungs.
I’m being stupid, she thinks, why am I so freaked out about this?
She gets another text and still doesn’t check her phone. After leaning over to crack open her window, Lup flicks the ashes from her cigarette into a mostly-empty can of Cheerwine that’s been sitting on the bedside table for three days.
Distantly, she hears the front door open and slam shut again.
“Lup! You home?” Taako yells. Lup doesn’t even have time to respond before he flings open her door and flops dramatically onto the bed. Taako is too long to fit sideways on her twin-sized bed, so most of his body ends up draped over either end.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asks, studying his sisters face for a moment.
“Nothing. All good.”
“B-ull-shit,” Taako says, repositioning himself face her fully, “You’re curled up in the floor smoking my cigarettes—don’t lie, I know they’re mine. You haven’t bought smokes since, uh, probably since we needed a fake ID to buy ‘em. What is it?”
“It’s nothing.” Lup stuffs what’s left of the cigarette into the can.
“Horse! Shit!” Taako tells her, just as her phone’s text alert sounds again, “We short on rent again? ‘Cause Merle owes me like fifty bucks and—“
“—No! It’s not like that.”
“What’s it like, then?”
Lup groans, “You’re not going to leave me alone until I tell you, are you?”
“Nah.”
Lup realizes she’s probably giving too easily, but she knows her brothers game. The more he has to work at getting her to talk about it, the more shit he’ll give her for it. It’s too late to hope he’ll decide to mind his damn business.
“It’s just,” Lup rakes her fingers down her face, groans with stifled annoyance that she even has to have this conversation, “Barry asked me out.”
“Oh shit!” Taako laughs, smiling like he knows something she doesn’t, “What’d you say?”
Her phone dings.
“Therein lies the fucking problem. I haven’t said anything.”
“Oh. Shit.” Taako’s knowing smile fades into something like worry.
“Mmmhmm.”
“Listen, if you’re not into him like that, just tell him. Or, hell, I’ll tell him for you. Whatever you need me to do.” Taako pulls himself off the bed to sit beside her.
She sighs, “That’s not the issue.”
“No?”
“That’s, uh. That’s the exact opposite of the issue I’m having here.”
“Not sure I follow,” Taako says.
“I like Barry, alright? A lot. I’m into him, if you need me to put it that way,” Lup closes her eyes and leans heavy on the wall behind her, “It’s just… What if it doesn’t work out?” She and Barry had spent the better part of a year and a half spending time together, with her attraction as a slow-building undercurrent. The knowledge that the attraction was mutual? It was exciting, but ultimately unstable.
“Well, if you’re asking for my advice—”
“—Kinda wasn’t, but go on—”
Taako rolls his eyes, but continues, “I say go for it! Like, god forbid something nice happen for once. Get it while the get-in’s good, I say.”
“And that’s easy for you to say. You’re still trying get with a dude who almost got you arrested.”
Taako stands up, “A. He didn’t almost get me arrested, alright? And 2. All the more reason to hop on the Barry train while you got the chance. This is a much safer bet.”
“Right. I’ll keep that in mind.” Lup tells him, as she’s waving him out of the room.
“You do that,” Taako says, needing to get in the final word, “Oh, and stop stealing my shit.”
Lup waits a moment, until she can hear her brother digging around in the kitchen cabinets, before she checks her phone.
The messages from Barry were a few variations on ‘no pressure and also feel free to ignore these messages entirely if you want.’
The last message isn’t from Barry at all.
Merle: wht r u and bluejeans talking about?? i think hes hyperventilating
Well, Lup thinks, at least the two of them were on roughly the same page. She slowly, carefully types a response out to Barry.
Lup: Hey! Sorry! I got distracted and forgot to text you back.
Lup: Lmao dinner sounds great. Name a time and place. :’)