Chapter Text
It had always been Sara. Sara with her bright blue eyes and face full of freckles. Sara looking down at Ava from her perch on their childhood playground, a smirk gracing her delicate features, and a laugh falling from her lips a second later. Ava knew she was fucked from the very beginning. Even now, Ava had this nagging feeling it would be Sara until the very end. Bringing her back to the present moment, Sara asks her question once more. Looking at Ava with as much hope and sheer determination as the day they first met. The same look in her eyes that Ava had spent the last 16 years mesmerized by. Said look followed by, “Will you do it??” And “I can’t imagine anyone else by my side.”
The answer was easy. Sara was the one asking, so it wasn’t really a question at all....Ava would do whatever needed to be done to keep that light in her eyes. No matter how much it might end up destroying her in the process. Ava looks back at her. All half smiles and a genuine love that almost reaches her eyes, “Of course I’ll do it, Honey Bee.” That silly moniker of affection tumbling off her tongue as easily as the first time she mumbled it quietly under the city lights all those years ago. “What part of you have me forever did you not understand?”
Sara’s whole demeanor changes. Somehow she becomes even brighter, a feat Ava believed truly wasn’t possible up until this moment. “You have me even longer.” Sara’s simple reply. Ava’s heart falls in her chest. It was the truth in some ways. But not in the way that Ava wanted it to be.
It could never be that way between them now. Sara had promised herself to another and Ava had just agreed to stand by her side and watch as her maid of honor. The universe was a tricky bastard, that had never been more apparent to Ava. Making them soulmates in every sense of the word and crossing their wires to the point where the only love that Ava had the pleasure of tasting were their fleeting moments through the years at best & unrequited and one sided by true definition. Sara would never truly be hers again.
The Beginning: Age 11.
It was the middle of June. It was hot. Blistering. Suffocating. Ava could spend all day thinking about different adjectives to describe how the weather was currently making her feel, but nothing quite summed it up better than, “Hell on Earth.” She was used to hot summers in Fresno, but something about this day in Star city, the place she was destined to call home for the foreseeable future, put all others to shame in her recent memory.
Ava didn’t want to be here. She wanted to be anywhere else. She wanted to be back home in Fresno. Cuddled up in her own bed, reading a book. The smell of her mom’s home cooked dinner wafting into her room, & tales of the newest one of Auden’s boyfriends audible through their thin walls.
Looking back now, it was odd that this was the kind of memory that brought her comfort. Something so insignificant at one point in her young life, becoming a feeling to cling on to, to keep her grounded in this new reality.
Everything was different now. There would be no more Fresno. No more home cooked dinners...No more Mom...It was just her and Auden now. Ava wasn’t yet sure if that would be the best thing for either of them.
Mom would’ve known what to do. Amelia Sharpe had always had a way of finding the right solution in every situation. A trait she had spent a lot of the time she had been allotted bestowing in her two young daughters. Ava had hung on to Amelia’s every word for 11 years. Soaking up knowledge from her mother like it had been her only job. Maybe, somehow, knowing from the beginning just how vital it would be one day when Amelia wasn’t there to share it any more.
Auden was the opposite. All parts fire and equal in rebellion. She fought back against her mother for 18 years. Fought back until it was obvious to all of them that their mother would be the one in need of fighting the real fight. A battle she would ultimately lose. No amount of fire from Auden, or admiration from Ava would change that outcome.
Now they were left with each other. Ava knew Auden was only doing what she thought was necessary. Stepping up in the way that Amelia would’ve wanted her to. Being there for Ava in the way that Amelia would’ve been there for them both if she had been given the chance.
They had family in Star city. Not the kind of family that either of them knew very well. Amelia had always been a drifter. The free spirit who went where she was called. Fresno had called to her around the time that Ava had turned four and Auden was 14. Fresno had said home in Amelia’s heart and they had never left.
It was unspoken, but the sisters both knew Fresno could never be home without her. So they packed up their things. Auden, now Ava’s legal guardian, had found a small house back in their mother’s hometown of Star City. With a room for each of them, and a wrap around porch the kind their mother had always dreamed of one day having. Using some of the money they had been given like some sick compensation for her death and the hardest point in both of their lives, it was theirs. That was all it took.
So that’s where Ava was currently. Laying on their living room sectional in nothing but a colored tank top and cut off shorts adorning her lanky body; Thinking of all the adjectives she could possibly come up with for the word hot. She. Was. Miserable.
Almost like her sister could read her thoughts, Auden had suddenly materialized in front of her. Her long blonde hair, always two shades lighter than Ava’s own, thrown up casually in a messy bun in the same type of impossible way where not a single hair was out of place. Just like Amelia used to do hers. Ava felt the familiar pang in her chest. A feeling that had become a constant reminder of how things were now. How they would always be from the moment they had sat her down in those too hard hospital chairs and told her that her mother was gone.
“Aves, are you okay?” Auden’s light green eyes tracing over her in the same way they had many times before. Imploring. Searching. Trying to find a way to soothe, but secretly being terrified of never knowing quite what to say.
Ava had seen this look one too many times on her sister’s face and she wasn’t about to be the cause of Auden’s internal struggles over being a good caretaker one more time. Not today at least. Ava needed air. An ungodly request on a day like this one, but God did she need air.
“I’m good, Aud. Just burning up in here.” Ava’s reply is smooth. A small smile gracing her lips, “I think I’m going to go out to that park we saw driving in here and explore.”
Auden’s eyes squint. Giving her sister a glare that says one part I don’t quite believe you, and equal parts I’m going to let you get away with it this time because I don’t have the energy right now to unpack why.
They understand each other. The push and pull they have with one another a blessing on days like today. Auden let’s her go.
Ava is halfway out the door when she hears her sister’s voice behind her, “Be careful. Don’t be back too late. I’m making dinner.” Ava throws her a look over her shoulder, turns around letting the screen door shut, “I will be. Don’t ruin it. I want something actually edible this time.” Auden just laughs and sticks out her tongue. Ava would be lying if she said it wasn’t a sound she had truly missed.
——
From a distance Ava can see the park is mostly empty. A young mom is pushing her son on the swings, and a group of kids who look to be about Ava’s age are huddled by the jungle gym. Their laughter loud and evident even where Ava was standing a good number of feet away.
Normally Ava would be all about the swings. A chance to relax on her own, in her own little world. Just the wind on her face and her feet kicking at whatever pace she deemed necessary.
That’s why she surprises even herself when she starts making her way towards the other kids. Maybe it was fate, or her own bravery that pushed her in their direction that day. Maybe it was something else entirely.
With this decision, for the second time in the short span of years in her young life, nothing would be quite the same again.
“What do you want, lady?” Ava looks up at the young boy who addresses her. A quizzical expression on his face. He’s tall and stocky with baggy clothes, his hair styled into a classic crew cut.
Before she can respond, a young girl throws herself down from the top of the jungle gym. She lands in the grass right next to Ava.
Her energy is boundless. Her blonde hair, vibrant. Freckles as far as the eye can see. Ava is entranced. From one look, She is certain she’s never met anyone quite like her.
Ava doesn’t spend too much time on this thought before the girl is talking a mile a minute, coming to her aid like she already knows just what Ava needs. “Leave her alone, Mick! This is why we can never make any new friends! You scare them away before we have the chance.” The girl is laughing while simultaneously reaching her hand out to Ava.
“I’m Sara. Sara Lance.” When Ava finally finds the courage to return Sara’s gaze, she is floored. Staring back into impossible pools of blue. Ava’s cheeks flush and the only thought that comes to her mind is, “How did it suddenly become hotter?” To her horror, Sara laughs. Throwing her head back.
“We have some water chilling in a cooler on our picnic table if you want some.” Sara is not fazed in the slightest. Ava decides she hates her a little for immediately having this effect on her.
Recovering from the realization that she had in fact said that out loud, Ava finally opens her mouth to respond. “Water. Yes, water would be great actually. Give me all the water you’ve got. It’s so hot I’ve barely been able to think about anything else all day.”
Sara laughs again. Ava likes the sound of it too much not to hate this beautiful stranger just a little bit more.
“She’s right!!! It’s a scorcher!! Hottest day of the year in 10 years! It’s broken Star city records!” A tall boy who had been relatively quiet up until this point, excitedly exclaims.
Ava throws her hands up to her eyes blocking her view from the sun and staring in the boy’s direction. He smiles. It’s a genuine smile that Ava can only compare to sunshine. “I’m Ray!” Ahhh and the perfect name to go with his demeanor.
Ava doesn’t know why, but she likes this small group of kids already. Her grey blue eyes linger a moment longer on each of them before finally stopping on Sara.
She feels warmth building in her chest, a feeling she hasn’t felt since before Amelia. Long before Star city. She smiles a small smile, the corner of her mouth ticking upward just a tad before replying, “I’m Ava Sharpe...Now about that water??” The kids around her start to laugh.
Sara simply takes her hand and pulls. The intent being to lead Ava to their table. Not knowing she had just taken the first couple of steps that would catapult them both into a completely different life.