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It’s the middle of a sweltering afternoon in San Francisco, and Morrow is sprawled out in a pool chair under an umbrella, with no intention of actually getting in the pool a few feet from them. There’s nobody around enjoying the water, despite the heat. Everyone else is probably in their houses, watching blaseball with bated breath. Morrow chucks a pebble into the pool, listening to the sound of the splash.
The postseason finals are happening, and frankly, Morrow couldn’t care less. It’s definitely poor sportsmanship, but they stopped watching as the Spies were off the field. Morrow had wanted the Spies to go all the way, definitely, but they also can’t say they were sad to see the end result is that they didn’t have to play anymore games this season. And Denzel is out, finally. They hope they’re okay. In a few more days, Morrow will call them. They’d like to think it’s because they’re giving Denzel time to settle in. But Morrow knows it’s because they’re hoping they won’t have to call. If the elections are more predictable this season, and the plans go through, Morrow is hoping they can say ‘Welcome back!’ in person.
Morrow closes their eyes, and concentrates on the pebble in the deep end. They reach out, and will it to go up and out of the water. It fights them, as all their untrained magic does, but they can feel the water moving out of the way as it bursts forth from the pool, and hear the splashing water over the edges in excess. They hold out their hand, eyes still closed, and try to move it back from the pool to them.
They do feel a bit conflicted about hoping to leave so soon. The Lovers have been very good teammates, and Morrow has, despite their best efforts, gotten attached. Despite Morrow being, statistically, one of the worst hitters in the league, the team had been welcoming from the start. They actually managed to make Morrow feel… excited to try and do magic again. Not for any formal study, that still made them have a bad taste in their mouth, but… just doing their own experimentation. Just for fun. Not for any real purpose.
Morrow hears the pebble click against the ground next to them, and frowns. They missed their hand. Spatial judgement with magic senses is harder than with normal senses, since they haven’t worked with this since childhood. Keeping their eyes screwed shut, they try to reach out a hand of magical force to scour the ground for it. It’s hard, projecting their senses away from the cold plastic of the pool chair and instead into something completely different, but they’re managing. They can feel the concrete surrounding the pool, rough to the touch, and as they skim their senses over the ground, they identify something that isn’t blending into the rough ground. Perfect
With a confident smirk, they pull telekinetically on the abnormality. Morrow thinks, ‘This is much heavier than a pebble should be’, and then someone yelps in surprise as they’re pulled to fall directly on top of Morrow.
“Oh shi-” They manage to get out, before both they and Yeong-Ho tilt over the pool chair and fall directly onto the ground.
Both of them are wearing a fair amount of big droopy clothing, with Yeong-Ho’s wizard hat and both of their capes, so Morrow can’t see anything but fabric. They push themselves up at about the same time Yeong-Ho does the same, so the two of them falter a bit more before managing to both sit up, miscellaneous trinkets and accessories spilling from the both of them.
“Oh my gods,” Morrow can’t help themself from laughing. Yeong-Ho’s hat is pushed down to the point of covering most of their face. “Why were you just standing there?”
“I thought you were asleep!” He says, trying and failing to push his hat off of his eyes. “I didn’t think you’d like, magic-judo-throw me!”
“I didn’t think I would either,” Morrow says, reaching over to fix Yeong-Ho’s hat. “I was just trying to move a pebble.” The two of them manage to pry it off of his face, and Morrow is greeted with a dazzling grin and soft eyes. Well, soft eye. The eyepatch does look soft, though.
“Thanks,” they say. “If that was you trying to move a pebble though, I don’t want to know what it looks like when you actually try to magic-judo-throw someone.” He laughs, and reaches over to them. “Here, let me help you out too.” Morrow gets the dull urge to pull away, but refrains. They’ve only been this close to Yeong-Ho once, but living with the Lovers for a season conditions people to be a lot less jumpy around touch, in general. Yeong-Ho fixes the clasps on Morrow’s cloak, which seem to have swiveled way to the right.
Morrow watches Yeong-Ho’s hands at work as they fiddle with the exact positioning of the cloak, meticulous but jumpy. They remember watching the sages hands with just as much focus, when they were back learning magic. Those hands were much less jumpy, more confident and picture-perfect accurate. It was boring, and impossible and repetitive, to learn all those gestures from and be expected to repeat them with just as much skill as those who had mastered them for decades. But Morrow thinks they could find mimicking these movements much easier.
Yeong-Ho finishes fixing the clasps, and pulls away. Morrow realizes that they’ve been staring without saying anything, and they feel blood rush to their cheeks in embarrassment. When they look up at Yeong-Ho, they find that his face is also a bit pink. They meet eyes with him, and quickly look away, to the side.
“Ah-” Yeong-Ho starts.
“Sorry, I-” says Morrow at the same time.
They sit in silence a few seconds more. Morrow manages to look back over at Yeong-Ho. Feeling like they’ve made the only non-grieving actual conversation they’ve had with them awkward, they resolve to bring things back to more neutral ground.
“So… why were you standing there anyway?” they say.
“Oh! Well, ykno, I saw that you weren’t in the common room,” Yeong-Ho says, eager to talk about something else. “So I wanted to make sure you weren’t lost somewhere. It’s a big Polyhedron, right?”
“... Yeah, that’s true.” Morrow says, then thinks about it. “Wait, you’ve not been here much longer than me. You get lost just as easily!”
“I mean… well, I have the birds,” they say, motioning to a few seagulls perched on a roof near the pool. “So it wasn’t hard to find you.”
Morrow narrows their eyes. They’re fairly certain they heard Yeong-Ho complaining about getting lost in a few dilapidated Starblucks over dinner more than once. “But they don’t exactly show you how to get back anywhere, do they?”
“Well…. y’know….” Yeong-Ho says, and then doesn’t elaborate.
“So you came to help out someone that could be lost, by possibly getting lost with them,” they conclude.
He smiles, and shrugs. “Pretty much, yeah, you got me.”
“You’re missing the playoffs,” Morrow says, starting to disentangle their spilled accessories from Yeong-Ho’s. “I’m not exactly lost, so if you want to go back and catch those, you still have time.”
“Nah, it’s fine,” Yeong-Ho begins to help with the disentangling proces. “It won’t be hard to figure out who wins, and who I have to send congrats messages to.”
“You sure?” Morrow asks. It’s not like they want Yeong-Ho to go back, but they aren’t trying to be a burden. “I’m really not lost, and I was doing fine. Wasn’t hiding out here to cry my eyes out again, or anything like that. You don’t have to be my babysitter.”
“I’m not trying to be a babysitter.” They say, quietly.
“I mean, you actually came to find me to check on me, I assume,” Morrow says, managing to stand up out of the pile they had just been sitting in since Yeong-Ho fell. They offer him a hand up. “I appreciate it, really, but if you’re just here out of obligation, don’t worry. I’m good.”
Yeong-Ho takes their hand, pulling themselves up as well. They don’t let go of it though, keeping a grasp on it and looking directly at Morrow.
“Morrow, I am here because I want to be,” they say concretely. “I think throwing rocks into the pool with you, or whatever you were doing, would be fun to do. With you. If you don’t want me here, I can leave. But I’d prefer to stay.”
They’re a little speechless for a moment. Then, they shrug, and bend down to pick up a pebble off the ground. It’s the same one as they originally threw, and Morrow wastes no time hucking it into the pool.
“Alright,” Morrow says, grinning. A season on the Lovers has taught them to try to take those sorts of things at face value, if they can. “If you can get that out of the pool and into your hand with your eyes closed, you can stay.”
Yeong-Ho loses his serious expression immediately, breaking into a grin. “Oh, you’re totally on. Birds allowed, or birds banned?”
“Are you kidding? Birds are a hundred percent banned, oh my god.” Morrow laughs. “People swim here, don’t go putting seagull juices in it.”
“I’ll have you know that my seagulls are juice-free,” He says, mock-indignantly, then straightens up their back to begin trying to figure out what spell to cast. “I will say though, I don’t normally cast blind. Only half-blind. So this is going to be an experience.”
“Hey, I normally don’t cast at all,” Morrow says, watching Yeong-Ho closes their eye and begin to mutter things under their breath. Their hands begin moving in the same meticulous and jumpy manner. “You’ll be fine.”
“Yeah, probably. I’m the court magician, after all.”
The pebble begins to smoothly rise out of the water, disrupting it only minisculely. Morrow marvels at the accuracy of movement that takes, and watches as it begins to float slowly above Yeong-Ho’s now outstretched hand.
But… Morrow can tell the positioning is a bit off. Not in an inaccurate magic sense, but in a ‘it’s harder to perceive depth with one eye’ sort of way. And… they don’t really want Yeong-Ho to go. So ever so slightly, they use their magic to adjust the pebble so that it will land in his hand when it drops.
They can tell Yeong-Ho notices, because a hint of a smile curls over their face. But they don’t say anything, and the pebble drops soundly in their hand.
“I did it!” He celebrates, slinging an arm around Morrow and handing off the pebble like he's showing it off, despite Morrow being the person that threw it initially. “Master magician, right here. Best court magician San-Fran’s ever had.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Morrow rolls their eyes fondly. “I guess that means you get to stay. Though, I bet the seagulls could have done it way faster.”
“Maybe so! But they’re like, extensions of my power,” Yeong-Ho says, motioning to the birds. “So technically, them doing it faster would just be an extension of my personal best time.”
“They’re birds, Yeong-Ho.” Morrow says. “They don’t count as an extension of you, unless you are made from a flock of birds.”
“Maybe I am,” he says. “That’s not that out there, for a blaseball player.”
“True enough. I do hope you’re not a flock of birds though,” Morrow says, turning the pebble over in their hand. “Then you wouldn’t be able to give me some tips about how to make telekinesis that smooth.”
Morrow swears they could see both of Yeong-Ho’s eyes sparkle , when they suggest that.
“Oh, really?!” They say, immediately patting their pockets to find some trinket to help with this. “I could give you a few pointers, definitely! Don’t worry, nothing intensive-”
“Yeah, really.” Morrow says, slipping the pebble in their pocket. “How about we get lost trying to find your wizard tower? It’s a safer place to practice, probably.”
“Oh, don’t worry! I know where that is from here!” Yeong-Ho proclaims, grabbing Morrow’s hand and starting to pull them towards where they’re fairly certain their wizard tower is from here.
On the trip there, Morrow is too focused on the warm hand in theirs to realize that they’re getting hopelessly, utterly lost.
The two of them enjoy their time nevertheless.