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It’s pretty late when Nancy pulls into her own driveway. She’d had a good time— well, good was an understatement— at Gil’s, but she hadn’t felt right staying the night. She wasn’t sure Gil felt comfortable with it either, and after the long day she’d had, sleeping the night in her own bed felt like a deserved refuge.
She’d worked everything out in the end. Nancy wasn’t a fan of lapses in judgement, and she’d had a few big ones today, fueled by the lust of centuries of sexually repressed women. She’d had a few apologies she needed to give, and before going over to Gil’s, she’d tried her best to straighten things out.
Nick had taken the apology with grace, reassuring her that it was okay, that he knew it hadn’t meant anything.
George had taken the apology with less grace, rolling her eyes. (“Don’t be an idiot, Drew. You weren’t exactly in full control today.”) Nancy knew George had more than a little experience with that kind of thing recently; on instinct, she’d squeezed George’s hand. George had squeezed hers back before marching into the kitchen to yell at the new line cook.
Nancy had felt like she’d fixed things up with Detective Tamura, or at the very least, like they were on the same page now. Oddly enough, the wedding dress seemed to have bridged the gap between them.
And Gil— well, things with Gil are moving forward. Nancy isn’t sure in what direction, but tonight? Tonight was great.
She smiles a little as she slips inside her house, leaning against the door after shutting it, reliving the night for just a moment— and then her mind, ever the buzzkill, goes a little further back, to someone Nancy hadn’t really thought about until now.
Nancy has a sinking feeling as she remembers, in the midst of everything, running her hands through Ace’s hair.
Shit, she thinks.
Nancy is a little affectionate with Ace sometimes. Bumping shoulders, touching arms as she looks at his computer screen— he does it right back, casually, no biggie. Sometimes she can feel herself gravitating towards him when they’re all together, like there’s this bubble of space around Ace that Nancy just has to get inside. Like standing just close enough to feel his warmth is her lucky charm or something.
She never goes too far with it, though. She’s careful to be respectful of his boundaries, just as he is of hers.
And Ace’s hair? Nancy’s pretty sure that’s a boundary. A no-touch zone for anyone but Ace. She can picture him running a hand through his hair nervously as they try to find a last-minute solve for a case— but now she knows the exact texture of his hair, the softness beneath her fingertips, the way his eyes darted up to hers, surprised, and then looked around the room, as if he needed help or protection. Both parts are locked away in her memory: precise, exact, uncomfortable.
Nancy Drew doesn’t forget things, but maybe she wishes she could this time.
She pulls up Ace’s contact in her messages. “Hey,” she starts to type. Pauses. Frowns. Backspaces. “I’m really sorry about earlier.” She sends it before she can think too hard about it.
It becomes clear in about half a minute that Ace is busy (she doubts he’s asleep yet— he tends to be up just as late as Nancy, going off of their late night text exchanges and phone calls).
Nancy isn’t going to torture herself with this, anyways. She’s a perfectly reasonable person. Her apology has been sent. She’s going to go shower and then sleep— and maybe do some research about haunted objects in between, just so she’ll be more prepared for the future. They’ve become more used to dealing with straight-out ghosts, but the things that Nancy released from the Historical Society? There’s got to be a whole spectrum of the supernatural out there. She wants to be ready for it.
Her screen lights up, and Nancy mentally pushes her plans half an hour.
“It’s okay.” the text says. Not unusual for a text from Ace. His tone is dryer and his messages shorter than interacting with him in person feels. Nancy finds it sort of amusing. She’d maybe pegged him as more of an emoji type, but straightforward texters suit her perfectly fine.
… except for tonight. Tonight, she looks at those two words and wonders if they’re the truth. She thinks back to the middle of the day (the in-between parts that were more of a heated, frantic blur than anything else), and focuses in on Ace.
He’d felt off, just a little. He’d been checking his phone more than usual, and at the end of the day, after the effects of the wedding dress had worn off and she’d been sitting there with George and Bess, he’d asked Bess over to talk about something. He’d looked serious. Maybe a little worried, or nervous.
“Are you okay?” she texts, instinctively, frowning.
This reply comes even slower than the last. Nancy’s finished eating a late dinner by the time her phone alerts her of a message. She takes her time getting to it, cleaning up the plates, and then when she glances at it, she inhales sharply.
Here’s the thing: Ace had told Nancy about his brother recently. No details, just the outline, really. She’d filled in the rest herself: him getting caught hacking into a federal database. Witness protection being extended to not only the witnesses themselves, but also immediate dependents. Going on Ace’s father’s age, Ace’s brother would’ve been too young to be the witness himself. It had to be his mother. A mother that wasn’t Ace’s.
Nancy knew all about complicated family situations now, about growing up with one family and then discovering that there was a whole other story beneath the surface. She’d wondered if Ace felt the same way. What drove him to find that phone number? Had he ever even meant to use it?
He’d told her, though, that he’d finally reached out that night, the night before they all almost died. He hadn’t mentioned anything since; or at least, not until now.
“Sort of,” the message says. “I went to meet my brother but he didn’t show.”
Nancy’s hitting the call button before she can even think about it. She sits down at the kitchen table and waits; after a long moment, he picks up.
“Hey,” Nancy says. “He didn’t show?”
“Yeah,” he says, and Nancy slumps down a little in her chair, as if she’s a puppet and her strings have been cut. In the fever dream that has been today, she’s missed just hearing his voice. “I went to the Canary like he said. He wasn’t there, but he left a box.”
Hmm. Another lover of puzzles? Or maybe this brother is just being cautious. “Was there anything in the box? How did you know it was from him?”
“There was a picture of my dad,” Ace says. He sighs. Nancy can hear it over the line. “It was ripped, but it was a picture of him when he was younger.”
Ripped? Most likely, that would be to protect the identity of someone else in the photo. But it could be an indication of aggression as well. Taking a look at the edges of the photo, the place where it had been torn, could give an idea of the motive. Looking at the box, too, couldn’t hurt.
She’s about to ask— can he send photos? They could figure out identifying features. They work well together— they have a private server for a reason, to upload these things and work on them together.
But then Nancy looks down at the table and realizes that maybe there was a reason he hadn’t said anything himself about this. Maybe he needs a friend now, not a detective. It’s a distinction Nancy had only begun making recently, but an important one all the same.
She lets her mind slow down, stores all of those theories away for later, and just says, “I’m sorry. It sounds like you were really close to meeting him. Are you okay?”
He’s silent for a moment. Nancy can imagine him running his hand through his hair. She smiles, just a little.
“I don’t know. I mean, I don’t think— it didn’t feel real yet, anyways. I’ve spent so long imagining what he might be like, but the idea of him in Horseshoe Bay isn’t something I can wrap my head around.”
“Hey, who knows? Maybe soon he’ll be sitting at the Claw.”
Ace laughs. She knows he’s imagining it too: Bess fluttering around, anxious to make a good impression. George, unimpressed; Nick, introducing himself.
“What if he— what if he’s already been?”
Nancy’s already shaking her head. She knows that fear, of the unidentifiable face within the crowd, of people knowing you and judging you without giving you the opportunity to do the same. She’s only looked at “Nancy Drew News” twice, and there had been photos of her during moments that she had no idea she was being watched. It’s uncomfortable, and violating in a way.
“No,” she says. Not because she’s sure, but because she knows he needs to hear it. “People who’ve just come to town don’t come to the Claw. He won’t see you until you’re ready to see him.”
“I hope so,” he says. “Are you okay?”
Nancy takes a breath in the comfort of her own kitchen. It’s been a long day, but it isn’t by any means the longest day Nancy has had recently. This thing with Gil is finally turning into something, and— “Yeah, I think I am,” she says. “I’m— uh, I’m still sorry about your hair though. That wasn’t okay. I should’ve asked for consent—“
“You know, you did,” Ace laughs. “You just didn’t—“
Nancy grimaces as she remembers. “I didn’t wait for it. Yeah.”
“Don’t beat yourself up about it. It was the wedding dress. It’s not every day we run into something like that.”
Just the wedding dress, Nancy thinks. Huh. Out loud, she says, “God, I sure hope not. I don’t think I could handle another hour like that, let alone a day.”
“I’m not sure we could either,” he says, still laughing. There are too many memories to choose from: restraining her, locking her in the freezer, feeding her the antidote like a baby.
She laughs too. “Just wait until our next case. I’m sure we can find something to embarrass you too.”
“You wouldn’t,” he says.
He’s right; she wouldn’t. She likes him just fine the way he is, comfortable in his own space. She wouldn’t wish today upon anyone.
She waits for a moment, oddly reluctant to hang up. But she’ll see him tomorrow anyways, at work. And she does have to shower still.
“It’s getting late,” she says, finally. “I should go.”
“Me too,” he says. “Good night, Nancy.”
“Good night, Ace.” She hangs up and smiles at her phone for a second before shuffling upstairs. God, being supernaturally horny really tires a girl out.
(She’s glad she texted. It was nice to hear from him— really hear from him, not just the SparkNotes from Bess. She’d maybe missed him a little.)