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“I cannot believe we are really doing this…” Jane complained. And she wasn’t kidding. It was unbelievable, and rather absurd, what Darcy was planning. Then again, nothing about her best friend was predictable. Darcy lived to shock and surprise.
Jane was crashed on the couch in her room at the Compound. Her eyes were still puffy and red from the disaster of a date with her now ex-boyfriend. “I’m FINE, Darcy.”
“What are we doing, exactly?” Wanda watched as Darcy pulled out a large metal trashcan from the bathroom and then a box of matches from the kitchen.
“Boyfriend bonfire,” Darcy explained, “It’s an important ritual to speed up the healing process. Plus, as a great woman once said, ‘fire, pretty’.”
“Who said that?”
“Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” Jane said tiredly. “Darcy, we don’t need a boyfriend bonfire. I’m FINE.”
“You, dear Jane, are not fine. You need to burn away his very presence. Sage! We need sage.”
“I don’t HAVE any sage,” Jane grumbled.
With a soft touch of the hand, Wanda offered, “He wasn’t good enough for you anyway.”
“That’s what you get for dating ‘Off Compound’,” Darcy scolded as she opened and shut kitchen drawers. “AhA! Sage!”
“That’s for cooking, Darcy. It’s McCormick brand, for crying out loud.”
“So? It’s still sage.” Darcy practically bounded over to the trash can that was now perched on the center of the coffee table and shook the sage flakes into it.
“And what exactly do you mean about dating ‘off compound’? You date off compound.”
“I don’t get serious with any of them,” Darcy admonished.
“Because you’re in love with Bucky.”
“I’m not in love with Bucky,” Darcy replied back in a way too casual manner.
Jane looked over at Wanda and said as matter-of-factly as she could, “She’s in love with Bucky.”
“Excuse me, but Mission: Super Soldier Smile is not the reason for our little get together. This is about burning away the memory of Shawn the Douchebag.”
“Shane,” Jane corrected.
“Whatever. He was way not good enough for you.”
“See?” Wanda said, with a little pat of Jane’s hand.
Jane almost let the tears start to flow again, but a knock on the door startled her out of her gloom.
A pretty, freckled face poked her head in the door. “Am I too late? I brought wine.”
Darcy bounced over and retrieved the bottle with unbridled enthusiasm.
“Hope, my dear. You are never too late when you come bearing booze. And what did you bring, Sharon?”
Sharon Carter held up a small grocery bag, “Graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows.”
Jane brightened a bit, “You brought s’mores?”
“What are s’mores?” Wanda asked.
“I’m gonna pretend you didn’t say that,” Darcy teased, setting the offerings in the kitchen. “But good job, Sharon. As a wise woman once said, ‘there’s no problem that cannot be solved by chocolate’.”
“Who said that?” Wanda asked.
Jane, Sharon, and Hope all answered simultaneously, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”
“Is she one of the Guardians of the Galaxy?”
Darcy let out a dramatic gasp, “Are you kidding me, Maximoff?”
“Guess what we’re doing after the bonfire,” Jane half-grumbled aloud.
“I haven’t watched Buffy in ages,” Sharon admitted, handing Jane a much-needed glass of wine.
Shockingly, they managed not to set off the fire alarms or sprinklers with the bonfire.
It was unsurprising that they finished off the bottle of wine, plus another….and another.
It was utterly predictable that Wanda loved both the S’mores and Buffy.
Halfway through the first season, Darcy leaned over and asked, “How are you doing, Janey?”
And with complete honesty, she answered, “I’m fine, Darcy.”