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Lucy was painting her nails.
That wasn’t an unusual thing; she liked the way the black chipped polish felt on her nails. It was practical, too. That extra layer of protection against chipping and breaking when she was filling salt bombs, swinging her rapier, or digging out a source from an unmarked grave.
It was also something that Norrie and she used to do together.
They were agents first and foremost. They weren’t typically vain about their appearance. Sitting around, doing each other’s makeup, gossiping, the typical girly bonding things? That wasn’t them. They didn’t have time for that, they were too busy putting their lives on the line against the dead. They “weren’t like other girls” or whatever. The curse of being an agent.
They still enjoyed clinging on to whatever bit of normalcy they could.
Norrie’s aunt who she had never met had bought her a subscription to some London Society magazine ages ago. Some attempt at a good gift for a “sweet young girl” without the understanding of what Norrie was actually like. When Norrie and Lucy would sleep over at Norrie’s house, the two would curl up next to each other in bed, letting the lamplight shine off the glossy pages. They would laugh through the images – not quite jealous at how beautiful everyone was, but more at how calm and mundane their lives must be.
“Look at her!” Norrie said, “those earrings are huge; bet they cost more than both our houses put together.”
“And her face!” Lucy added in, “it looks like she swallowed a full-on frog!”
When the two finally caught their breaths from laughing, Norrie turned the page, and the onslaught continued for another posed full-color spread.
“What’s up with those sleeves?” Norrie said, pointing to an image of a woman in a jewel blue jumpsuit. The sleeves were shear and huge, ballooning out as if suspended by a poltergeist. “They’d get caught on everything; imagine trying to swing a rapier in that?”
“Hmm,” Lucy replied in return. She took in the woman, her slicked back hair and regal expression commanding the piece. She didn’t look as flighty as the rest; something about the way she sat made Lucy feel as if this woman was in charge, in control. Yes, her shoes and sleeves were impractical and probably cost a fortune but… something about her, Lucy liked. “I don’t know,” she said slowly, tracing her finger along the sleeves as if she could feel them through the page. “I think they’re kinda neat.”
Norrie snorted, made to say something, then looked at Lucy’s face. “Seriously?” She asked softly.
“Yeah. Kinda wish…” she trailed off for a moment, before continuing, “that I could look like that?” Lucy blinked then laughed, breaking the spell the image had on her. “That’s stupid though.”
“I don’t think it’s stupid,” Norrie said. Then, suddenly, she jumped up from the bed and rummaged in her desk. Pulling out a pair of scissors, she flopped back onto the bed. She grabbed the magazine and cut out the image of the woman before holding it up at arm’s length, looking between it and Lucy.
“What are you doing?” Lucy laughed, trying to push Norrie’s arm down.
“I’m thinking,” Norrie said with a grin. “Bet we could get you looking pretty close, if you wanted.”
Lucy laughed, then paused. “Wait, are you serious?”
Norrie put the image down and went to rummage through her clothes. “Yeah, blue suits you.”
Lucy picked up the image. She stared at the woman’s stick-like figure and dainty hands, perfectly painted nails running along the carved chair. Lucy’s hands had matted and chipped polish, and she spent more time with them curled around the hilt of a rapier or clenching gravestones than she did draping them over expensive furniture. Or even draping them over cheap furniture, for that matter. “I’m not exactly London Society material.”
“Course you are,” Norrie said. “When we’re in London, we’ll get our chance to be in here.” She walked back to the bed, collection of blue clothes tossed on the covers. She spun the magazine back towards herself, flipping to the Rotwell Agency feature page. “Right here,” she said, pointing to a collection of Rotwell agents, half in their wine-red uniforms and half lounging in party wear. “That’s where they’ll put us.”
Lucy grinned. “Right,” she said. Maybe you, she thought, staring at Norrie’s perfect hair and move-star face. But never me.
An hour later, Lucy was in front of the mirror sitting, trying to copy the woman’s pose. The two had thrown whatever amalgamation of clothes they could together to try and mimic the woman’s jumpsuit, and the result was a ridiculous hodge-podge of items that made Lucy look more like a failed low-budget drag queen than a London Society model. They had slicked her hair back and Norrie had put on her makeup, but beyond her face, it was hopeless.
They stared at her mirror image for a beat, utterly silent. The cutout image of the woman was pinned by the mirror frame, taunting them in its perfection.
Then, out of nowhere, they burst out laughing.
Tears in her eyes, doubled over, hand clinging to Norrie’s, Lucy wheezed with mirth. “I look ridiculous!”
“You look like you fell through a dumpster at a charity shop!” Norrie gasped out.
“I look like I dressed in the dark, then got tossed in a river!”
“You look like you jumped in the river to avoid being seen in that!”
That sent another howl of laughter between the two of them.
“Told you it wouldn’t suit me,” Lucy said eventually, wiping the tears of laughter from her face.
Norrie gave a sound of disapproval. “Right, maybe this doesn’t,” she gestured towards the mess of an outfit they had put together, “but what that woman’s wearing? Absolutely would.”
Lucy rolled her eyes. “Not a chance.”
“Right, I’ve got a bet for you then.” Norrie pulled the image of the woman down from the mirror and handed it to Lucy. “When we’re in London, invited to these stupid posh parties, we’re going to find you a blue dress like this, and I bet you that you’ll look stunning.”
“And I bet you I’ll look just as ridiculous as I do now,” Lucy said, taking the image back. She folded it and tossed it into her bag, a memento for the future. She pulled the layers of clothes off her body, stripping herself back down to her pajamas. It was strange, looking into the mirror now. Somehow, she felt more stupid like this - hair and makeup done up in strange mimicry alongside her normal clothes - than when she had been in the full absurd outfit.
“Ugh, what’s that look?” Norrie asked from where she had sat on the bed, waiting. “That’s your thinking look; never a good sign.”
“Hey,” Lucy protested, throwing one of the discarded shirts Norrie’s way. “I’m allowed to think.”
“Not with that look, you’re not,” Norrie said, tossing the shirt away. “Come on, tell me what’s up.”
Lucy rolled her eyes. “It’s nothing,” she said, rubbing at her face trying to get the makeup off. She ended up smudging it more than anything. “Just, don’t think all this girly stuff is for me.”
“Do you think it’s ‘cus you don’t like it, or ‘cus you’re not used to it?”
“Don’t know,” Lucy said, “Bit of both I guess.”
“Fair enough,” Norrie said. Then she held up a bottle of black nail polish, grinning. “Still want to paint our nails? Piss off Jacobs for being out of uniform tomorrow?”
Lucy grinned. “Yeah,” she said, flopping onto the bed. “That much I know I like.”
In the attic room of 35 Portland Row, Lucy bushed the black polish along her nails, lost in the memory of when it was Norrie’s hand guiding the small brush. The cold covering of color was familiar, but the cold rock of loss in her stomach was not.
Or, well, it was becoming familiar in a way she was not altogether happy with.
She wished Norrie were across from her now, telling her to not squirm so much and to stop moving her hands when she talked because the polish would get everywhere. She wished she could tell Norrie that she had figured it out, that she wasn’t quite used to looking pretty like that, but she also did like it every now and then. How she was perfectly happy looking plain and normal most of the time, but every once in a while, the joy that came by being beautiful was nice. She liked being special, sometimes. Being important.
She wished she could tell Norrie that the dress had looked good on her. That Norrie had won the bet.
She wished she could show Norrie too. That Norrie had been by her side for all of it. Like they promised.
There was the sound of a crash somewhere downstairs, and Lucy jumped, knocking the table with her knee. Faster than she could think, the small glass bottle of nail polish fell to the hardwood and shattered.
“Fuck!” Lucy let the word leave her mouth soft and solid. She stood up quickly, frantically looking around as if that would help the small puddle of polish that was forming on the floor. The brush was still in her hand, and it dripped a small glob of polish to join the puddle. She glanced between it and the doorway, debating if it was worth letting it dry to see what was going on…
“We’re alright!” Lockwood’s voice called from below.
“My dish isn’t!” George called in return, and Lucy herd their voices lower to a low bickering tone, too quiet to make out, probably cleaning up their mess.
Great. Fine. Perfect.
She stared at the puddle of nail polish, suddenly frozen in place. She should be cleaning it up, keeping it from ruining the floor and acting like a permanent reminder of her clumsiness. She should be grabbing a rag, some paper towels, something. She should care. She did care.
But it had been a gift from Norrie.
Nail polish never ran out. It was like the bottles contained some infinite fountain of usefulness, always there when needed. Lucy couldn’t remember a time in her life when she had thrown out a bottle because it was empty. The thought of running out of this polish, of losing it, had never even occurred to her.
And now it was gone.
As stupid as it sounded, it almost felt like losing Norrie all over again.
Sitting on the floor wasn’t really a conscious decision, it was more something that just kind of happened to her body. She sat and stared at the puddle, tears coming to her eyes. She held her hands out in the air in front of her, half wet with polish. Her body still cared enough, subconsciously it seemed, to keep them from being smudged by touching things. Great.
She wasn’t sure how long she had been there, tears falling unwiped and silent, before there was a knock on her door. She used the palms of her hands, fingers stretched and useless, to wipe at her eyes and clear her vision. “What,” she croaked out, voice raw.
Lockwood’s voice came from the other side. “There was a… mishap with dinner,” he said, “Looks like it’s a takeaway night. Thoughts?”
She stared at the door, blinking rapidly to clear her vision. “I don’t care,” she said back, trying unsuccessfully to keep the shakiness out of her voice. She really didn’t care it didn’t matter nothing really mattered anymore, with Norrie gone. “Get whatever.”
There was a pause on Lockwood’s end. “Are you alright, Luce? You sound…” he paused again. “Can I come in?”
Lucy gave a frustrated sigh, turning her eyes back to the nail polish. “Do whatever you want,” she said.
She felt the door open and Lockwood step inside. Wordlessly, he made his way beside her, and sat down on the floor as well.
“If you ask if I’m alright again,” Lucy said, feeling tears well up behind her eyes again. “I’m going to punch you.”
Lockwood gave a small sympathetic laugh. “Noted,” he said, then reached a hand to her shoulder. He kept it there, a solid presence of comfort, and rubbed small circles with his thumb. It was nice.
He let the silence hang between them for a moment before asking the obvious question. “What happened?”
“Knocked over the nail polish,” Lucy said glumly.
“Is that…”
“And it’s gone, Lockwood.” She turned and looked him in the face. She could fell her lip shake in that awful way that happened right before the tears. She probably looked an absolute mess. “It’s gone and she’s gone! I keep thinking that… that she might get better? That I might get her back? But she’s gone Lockwood!” Lucy jammed the palms of her hands into her eyes, breath gasping along her whole body as she tried not to keep crying. She should be out of tears, by now. How could any one person hold that many inside them? There had to be a limit, something she could reach and just be done with tears forever. She had cried enough tears to last a lifetime.
“Lucy,” Lockwood said softly, comforting. He wrapped his arms around her. He cut the world away with that hug, left it so it was just her, him, and that giant swirling vortex of grief that was threatening to swallow Lucy whole.
“I just want her back,” Lucy said, gasping between the new tears. “Why can’t I just have her back?”
“I know,” Lockwood said into her hair, his hands rubbing along her back in a steadying rhythm. “Believe me, Luce, I know.”
She wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, waiting until her grief swirled away back into the usual dull aching calm. Lucy’s head hurt, pounding as she finally calmed her breaths to the feeling of Lockwood’s hand. He was silent, above and around her. She could hear his heart beating alongside hers.
It had been ages since she cried over Norrie like this.
“Careful,” she mumbled with a sniff when everything seemed to finally level out. “My nails are wet.”
Lockwood pulled away slowly, eyes meeting hers. “Alright,” he said softly.
“Should probably clean that up now,” Lucy mumbled, gesturing weakly with her head towards the spilled polish.
“Probably,” he said gently, arms still holding her shoulders. She felt empty.
“Is that all you’ve got to say?” She hadn’t meant it to come out rude, but it did anyway.
“In my experience,” he said slowly, bringing one of his hands up to wipe away the last of her tears streaking down her face, “words don’t tend to help all that much.”
Lucy leaned into his touch, closing her eyes. She nodded, acknowledging what he said. He kept his hand there, warm and comforting.
Having his hand on her face, gentle and still, was the calmest she had felt in ages.
She wished she could stay like that forever.
She opened her eyes and pulled away and Lockwood took back his hand.
“I should do something about this,” she said with a weak grin, holding up her half-finished nails. They were a mess, jagged lines of polish snaking along all of her left hand and only two fingers of her right. It was terrible. She was usually better at this, but then again… Norrie was the one who usually painted them.
Lockwood grinned sympathetically and took her hands, inspecting her work. That certainly sent a feeling through her body that she was certainly not ready to deal with now. “I can help with that, you know,” he said.
“Really? Didn’t take you as the nail polish type.”
“I’m full of mystery,” he replied.
Lucy snorted. “Can’t argue with that.”
He stood up and helped her to her feet, still holding onto her hands. Gently, he reached a hand up and pushed a stray strand of Lucy’s hair away from her face and behind her ear. And now was absolutely not the time to be thinking about how that made her feel. She looked up into his eyes, and he looked back into hers. And then, just as suddenly, they shuffled away from each other, and he scratched at his nose as she gave a small cough.
“Right, let’s get downstairs then. George is still waiting on your takeaway vote.”
It turned out, once they had gotten to the kitchen, that George had gone out already. A message was scrawled on the thinking cloth, and Lucy caught a quick enough glimpse to read it before Lockwood had scribbled out the first half frantically.
No votes for those too busy making out to answer. Grabbing pizza. Be back soon.
“Right, George has gone out for pizza then,” Lockwood said, his voice cracking slightly.
Lucy felt her face heat up. “Cool,” she said, fighting to keep her voice level. Again, not the time to deal with those feelings. She sat at the table, hands laid out in front of her. “Let’s get started then.”
Lockwood set down the bottle of black polish he had picked up from his room on the way and sat across from her. Grinning, he grabbed her hand and got to work.
It was familiar and new all at once, having Lockwood paint her nails.
The way he maneuvered her hands around, gently, and as if she was a precious artwork waiting to be appraised, was entirely new. He moved like he practiced the rapier, precise and perfect. His hands were soft against her calloused ones. How did he keep them that way, with how often he practiced?
Everything else was familiar, though. The brush against each nail, cold and sealing. The little snips of conversation broken by the concentration of keeping the polish away from skin. The blissful waves of calm and domesticity of it all. She had missed this.
Part of her wanted him to stop entirely. Felt like he was stealing something away that had been hers and Norrie’s alone, that he had no business butting in on. But the rest of her was happy he was here to fill in despite that. It wasn’t like Lockwood painting her nails was taking away from all the times Norrie had done it in the past. It was just a new addition to those times, a new chapter. Different, but familiar.
The kitchen door had opened not long after Lockwood had finished, just as he was putting the lid on the polish. George pushed himself in backwards, pizza balanced in his arms. “You two better be decent,” he called as he turned around to face them. “The kitchen is a common area, you know.”
“What’s that supposed to mean,” Lucy said defensively, pushing herself up from the table, careful to keep hands flat on the table.
“Nothing, nothing,” George said shaking his head. He dropped the pizza box down, grinning. “Dinner is served,” he said smugly, taking in the red faces of the other two.
“Thanks mate,” Lockwood said opening the box and grabbing himself a slice.
Lucy stared between the pizza and her hands and back again. “Shit,” she said, coming to a realization.
“What is it?” George grabbed a slice as well.
“My nails.” She waved her hands in the hair, as if to dry them any faster. “I can’t eat pizza like this!”
George and Lockwood laughed.
“It’s not funny!” She said, even though a grin was forming on her face. “I’m in distress!”
“It’s so good,” George said, taking a bite.
“You’re really missing out, Luce.” Lockwood was giving her the biggest shit eating grin.
“Next time there’s a Visitor coming at you two,” Lucy said, sitting down in defeat. “I’m going to let it Ghost Touch you both.”
“Hey, that’s uncalled for,” George said, gesturing towards her with his slice of pizza. “It’s not our fault you have bad timing.”
She kicked him under the table, earning a short yelp. “Not my fault you’re so kickable,” she said in return.
“We’ll save you some,” Lockwood said, “won’t we, George?”
“I don’t know, I’m still debating,” George said.
Lucy grinned, leaning back in her chair as the others ate. This was nice. Moments like this were nice. Still, like an undercurrent below it all, she missed Norrie. She wished she could have her there alongside them at the table, one more member to the family that they had formed at 35 Portland Row. Yet still, this was nice. She loved moments like this. This was home. Lockwood and George were family.
Lucy well and truly belonged. If this was how her life was going, then… well, Norrie by her side or not, everything was going to be okay.
Lucy was going to be okay.