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First, they tell her she is needed, and then she’s given THIS as a job. What job even is this? Guard it. What’s she guarding? A few empty buckets in the middle of nowhere.
She agreed to it because Silco wanted to give her something to do. Sevika said she wasn’t ready yet, which made her accept the job with twice the enthusiasm. She wants to prove she’s useful, to him, and to the cause. She wants to show them all, like Silco says she will.
They’re too close to the river for anything to even crawl around here, much less walk. The only things that live here are those insane plants that scar her fingers as she picks them up.
This one even has petals. She starts tearing them off one by one, staring at Piltover and the horizon.
“—He loves me—he loves me not—he loves me—he loves me not—”
That’s when the petals end. On “not”. She blows up what’s left of the flower.
Suddenly, Sevika is running to her. “What the hell?”
Jinx shrugs. “It deserved that,” she points to the small crater on the ground with her boot.
“You stupid girl! Now the flies will know where to look for us!” she scolds. “The whole point was to stay low!”
Jinx grimaces. “I’m not a child.”
“No, you’re a brat, that’s what you are,” Sevika pulls Jinx by the intricate braids she herself has helped Silco tie up. Right in time for a hoverboard to pass them by inches. She loads a gun, then throws another one into Jinx’s hand.
Jinx is furious, still. Even more now. Her hair’s been ruined. Sevika is yelling at her again – and she will tell Silco, Jinx knows, and he will be oh-so-calmly fucking disappointed. And most of all – HE LOVES HER NOT.
She loads the rifle. Aims at the flies overhead.
“—He loves me—he loves me not—he loves me—he loves me not—” she intones, changing her chant with each series. “Loves me, loves me not—” Ah, that fucker who tried to climb back on his board is almost too slow to escape this bullet. Whew, he takes the next one. “Loves me!”
He was the last one, so when he falls Sevika shouts out for the men to continue. But Jinx doesn’t care because she’s still celebrating. “Loves me! LOVES ME!” she yells out, for everyone to hear. She twirls around in happiness and then realises she is still shooting.
“Ooops,” she sends Sevika her best smile, but the woman is not easily appeased. There’s a bullet-tear in her poncho and on their way back she doesn’t talk to Jinx at all.
But Jinx doesn’t care, very busy singing. “He loves me—not loves me not. He loves me.”
He has to. Because she was useful.
***
It all started when she was about fifteen. She had grown. The change itself could not have made less of an impression on him, because she remained the little girl who nearly strangled him with a hug. She would remain it, no matter what she looked like. However, very soon after, she started to clothe herself like one of Madame Babette’s workers.
He let her dress how she wanted, expecting she would grow out of it faster if he let her experiment freely. But he wasn’t happy about it. Not at all. The sort of men she had to be around – the sort that worked for him – was not impervious to that kind of teasing, the clothing, the smiles, her general manner of being. No, they took that for an invitation. And while he wished he could shoot every bastard that ogled her, it would not be conducive to business or the general peace in Zaun. Thus, he had to bear it, thoroughly disgusted whenever he noted anyone on the verge of salivating while she was in the room.
Jinx herself seemed aware of that effect – both the ogling and his irritation with it. She asked him, once, why was he allowing it. He told her the truth – that he did not think it was his place to impose on her how she ought to dress. She laughed it off, kissed him on the cheek, and continued doing whatever she wished.
He had thought the matter closed. Funny, how some things had a way of following a person, catching up to them when they least expected it.
His caught up with him while he was sitting in his office inside the Last Drop. Sevika just relayed to him the good news about the newest Piltover deal: the first delivery through the Hexgates has gone through smoothly. They had invested riches into buying off the guards, but now Sevika tells him it will pay back double. It puts him in a good mood – finally something.
He’s leaning back in his chair with a glass of celebratory whiskey when Sevika stops on her way out and asks, “May I have a semi-personal question, boss?”
“Yes,” he graciously allows.
“Did you ever fuck Jinx?”
“Wha—” He doesn’t manage to finish, the question sending him into a coughing fit so vicious Sevika looks for a moment like she’s considering offering him help. “What?!”
“Thought so.”
“How dare you—”
Sevika shrugs. “Well, I did warn you it was going to be personal.”
He keeps staring at her demandingly, so she elaborates.
“—She’s got some people believing that you did. I did not think it was fitting with your reputation, so I thought to ask first. You should know what she’s saying before you hear it in the streets. With all due respect, your kid’s a mess, boss.” With that, she leaves.
Had it not been for today’s deal, he would have her dragged back in here for a scolding. What was she thinking, asking him about it like this? And more importantly – what was Jinx thinking?
***
“Jinx,” he calls out.
Something groans in his ceiling. “Huh-uh?” She throws down her hair, two braids sweeping through his desk. He moves his glass from their way, preventively.
“Come down here,” he asks again. “We need to talk.”
She swings her legs down, her bare calves scratched a little. “What did I do?” She twists, peering down at him with her huge blue eyes.
A loaded question. “I’m not sure yet. That’s why I want to talk to you.”
She jumps down onto the desk, then promptly slides closer to him. For once, he’s not glad about that. “What’d’you wanna talk about, then?”
“I’ve been told…” How he wishes he could smoke next to a child. She’s witnessed worse, be it with Sevika or the others, but it would be different if it was him. “I have heard you were telling some people about things that didn’t happen, involving you and me.” There, as diplomatic as he possibly can be.
She scratches her bottom lip with a pink nail, trying to recall, then glances at him again. It takes her a moment to piece it all together. “Oh-ah-that!” she exclaims finally. “Yeah. I did. That I got this from you,” she points to her neck, showing him a bruise. No, a love-bite. “You’re mad, aren’t you?”
“Not at you.”
“Right…”
“Truly. Who did you get that from?”
“That?” She tilts her head side to side, like she had gotten too many to count or remember. He hopes it’s not true. “Some cargo man. They all wanna fuck me, you know. He’s away now, so I could go on and tell them whatever I wanted. Half of them thinks you’re like that with me anyway.”
“Is that so?” He is going to need names. That, and Sevika’s or Lock’s fists. “And do you want them to think that?”
“I don’t know. But everybody wants to fuck me—I mean—” she corrects herself quickly, perhaps seeing the expression on his face, “—love me that way, same thing. So, what’s wrong with you that you don’t?”
He reaches out for her hand, unsure whether it’s wise to offer touch while they’re talking about this, but certain that she needs it. “Would be the exact other way, Jinx. Wrong if I did want to. Which, for the record, I do not, nor will I ever. If that’s what your… efforts are about, I suggest you give up on them, because no amount of brassy clothing is going to make me see you that way.”
She pouts. “Why not?”
“Because you’re my child.”
She slides her hand from between his and shifts again, putting her palms underneath her thighs. “They don’t believe that. They think I’m your weapon, or that I sleep with you, or—”
“Who is ‘they’?”
She thinks for a moment too long, as if she didn't want to tell him. “Them. Finn.”
Of course. He sighs. “And when has he ever had something valuable to say?”
Jinx looks at him, considering. Bends her neck left and right, and then lies on the desk, arching like she’s stretching in some bizarre parody of gymnastics. “You’re right,” she says at the ceiling. “Even Sevika’s smarter than him, isn’t she?”
“Most definitely. I would suppose even Lock is.”
She laughs, throwing one of her explosive toys up and catching it in her free hand. “Right.”
“And what does Sevika have to say about this whole ‘being a child of mine or not’ business?”
Jinx groans at the name, then turns her head to him. “That you ‘spoil me like your own’.”
“Listen to Sevika, then.”
The suggestion makes her get up, full of energy. “Finn’s an idiot, isn’t he?” she asks rhetorically, lifting both her braids up. “He wanted to touch me once, you know? But I broke his finger.”
“Is that why you told them that story, to have them leave you alone?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not.” She grimaces, then shuffles towards him again and throws her braids onto his lap. “It bothers me, you know.”
She sounds tired. Suddenly looks it, too, leaning against the frame of his chair. Their heads aren’t touching, but he feels her close. His Jinx.
“—It’s like… if I’m not what they think I am, then I’m of no use to you. And you can’t love me if I’m of no use to you, now can you?”
Silco closes his eyes for a moment. He is going to have to say it, isn’t he? Or else she will keep believing that it’s some sort of a transaction. Delicately, he grabs her cheek in his hand to make her look at him. She does, her chin a little over his nose the way they sit now.
“It’s not a tit-for-tat game, Jinx. Love. It’s not supposed to require anything back.”
“Oh,” she says flatly, wide-eyed like she’s really hearing it for the first time. “So you’d still love me if I was useless?” she tests.
He nods, which make her head fall a little, the tip of her nose nudging his forehead.
“And if I messed up? Real bad.”
“Still.”
“And if I let that firefly run?” It is as if she’s searching for a scenario that can prove her right in her suspicion. “The one today. She told you – right?” she lights up for a second, so proud of herself.
“Yes, Sevika told me.” She also told him there would be no fight if they had been no bombs going off earlier, but this wasn’t a right moment to discuss that. “And yes, I still would. I will. No matter what you do.”
“Oh,” she says, flatly again, and suddenly she’s on his lap, hands wrapping around his neck as she buries her face in the crook of his shoulder.