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Kate let out a sigh, running her hands through her hair, fidgeting with the hair tie on her wrist. A cool breeze brushed against her skin, pulling the clouds high above her lazily across the sky. Her hands dropped down to the railing surrounding the roof of the Sharp Tank, barely registering the biting cold of the icy surface as she looked to the stars. Left alone, her hair drifted gently in the breeze, tickling the nape of her neck as it danced up and down.
Astra had shown her how to get onto the roof months ago, and since then she’d begun to come here whenever she needed to get away or to think. This was certainly a time for the latter. Below her hair tie was a blue and red band woven together with string. Sterling had given it to her, explaining it was a friendship bracelet, and that people who were close friends would make them for each other.
And here came her issue. Because Kate liked Sterling, Mara hadn’t been wrong in observing he was likely her closest friend. But, she also knew that he made her feel… not safe, exactly, but content. They could talk for hours, about fighting and training, normally, but sometimes he would guide the conversation to different topics. Kate only noticed this when she saw his dopey smile while she talked about Jake and Ana, and the shenanigans they’d gotten up to.
And that was something Kate knew could lead to more than friendship. It wasn’t just his ability to put her at ease while talking, but he’d also been the first adult she was genuinely comfortable touching, even if through a fistbump. And while Backcells hadn’t been great at teaching her much about being “normal”, oddly relationships had been something relatively unaffected. If anything, they were pushed to their extremes, probably to do with the mindset of, “if we’re gonna die, I don’t want to die without telling you this”.
So Kate was potentially developing feelings for Sterling, great, wonderful.
He wasn’t the only one.
And here lay the crux of her issue, because it had taken months for her to get this close with Sterling, and yet it had taken only half that time to realise she really liked being around Mara. They didn’t talk like Kate and Sterling did, in fact they were almost the opposite. They could sit in complete silence and Kate wouldn’t grow antsy or worried about what she was thinking. It was just… comfortable. And when they did talk, Mara had the experience that allowed her to just get what Kate meant when she described the urges to fight even when she was safe. And she had the same level of, admittedly limited, okay contact with Mara as she did with Sterling.
She understood that she may be developing feelings for them both, and for her that was fairly normal. Backcells hadn’t exactly promoted unnecessary prejudice or judgement, mostly people just fought to survive. So, relationships that included multiple people? That wasn’t seen as any weirder than relationships with just two people.
However, outside of Backcells, the perspective on those types of relationships was less kind. Kate didn’t understand it, but she didn’t want to risk losing her two closest friends because of a difference like this. But she also didn’t want to lose either of them, though most likely Mara, after they finished their hunt.
She dropped her head to the rail, pressing her forehead onto the cold metal. Logically, the best next step would be to talk to them, bring it up in a non-defensive, non-confrontational manner. That would get it over and done with, after all. Kate screwed her nose up at the thought, feeling the tip of it tap against the railing. Maybe she should start by talking to Mara about where they were going.
Yeah, that would be best.
- - - - - - -
The end of the pencil tapped against the page of the notebook, a repeating sound filling the room. The lamp on the desk flickered, causing shadows to jump and dance around the room. Mara didn’t notice.
Tap tap tap tap tap tap.
Her hand stopped, the tapping stopping at the same time. In the past half an hour she hadn’t written anything on the page, hadn’t made any additions to the sketch she’d made, hadn’t even thought about the entry she was trying to make. She couldn’t stop thinking, and it was making it impossible to focus.
Her pausing of the fidgeting opened a gap in her mind, enough of a break for an intrusive thought to float across her mind.
Do you think the pencil is sharp enough to pierce into the vein in your wrist? Would the demonics protect you from hurting yourself?
Mara dropped the pencil like it had burned her, pulling her wrists protectively into her chest. With a groan, she reclined against the back of her chair, eyes slipping shut before snapping open as her mind helpfully provided her an image of what that thought might look like in practice.
The thoughts got worse when she was stressed or anxious, and at the moment, anxious was an understatement. She grabbed the fidget from her desk, a wacky track that clicked and filled the room with noise, drowning out the unwanted thoughts. She twisted it, trying to quiet her mind, only for other thoughts to come forward.
They weren’t intrusive, they weren’t distressing, but she really didn’t want to have to think about it.
She really liked Sterling, she knew this. And, once she and Kate killed Fear Herself and Dresden, she might admit it to him. But that was several months away, and she hadn’t really thought about it properly in weeks.
The thoughts that were currently swirling through her head were about a certain pink haired fighter who Mara was growing confused about. Because she liked Kate, she was a bit abrasive, sure, but Mara never felt like she needed to clarify that her thoughts were intrusive, and that she’d never act on them, when talking to her. Maybe it also had something to do with their shared trauma over Mara’s curse, but even still, her feelings about the other woman were growing more and more blurry and it was freaking her out.
Mara was straight. Hetero. Interested in men, and men only. …Right?
And it wasn’t like she’d stopped liking Sterling when her feelings grew more confusing about Kate, so it probably didn’t mean anything. Except she couldn’t find anything in her that would say no if Kate asked her out. Which would never happen, because Kate didn’t like physical contact or being around people, so there was no problem there. Mara could ignore this and just deal with it.
She could push down the feelings and not worry about thinking about it until it was late at night and she was still questioning herself.
Maybe she needed to talk to Benny about this.
- - - - - - -
Sterling had an interesting dating history, to say the least. His first girlfriend, when they were both thirteen, had ended up stabbing a guy who was pushing Sterling around. His second girlfriend of nearly three years was less aggressive and even offered to take him with her as she ran from the city and the gang she’d stolen a motorbike from. His third girlfriend he thought was the daughter of Lucifer and then turned out to be a god-like being lying about and running from her past before faking her own death.
And now the women who had drawn his eye were both easily capable of killing him. Mara he understood had been struggling, and so he’d drifted away from her a bit romantically. Until she returned to her human form and revealed she was not, in fact, scrawny, and had as nice shoulders as every other woman Sterling had fallen for.
And then Kate, who he was helping improve herself and knew better than to try and make any romantic moves on. It would be a dick move at best and hurt Kate at worst. So, he was content where he was, single and available and waiting for the right moment.
But he’d noticed recently that Kate would look up whenever Mara entered the room and follow her not like how she used to, with tense shoulders and a fight-ready stance, but with a relaxed posture and softer expression. And Mara would look over at her whenever they were in the same room, regardless of whether she’d done anything to draw attention to herself.
So it was entirely possible that not a year after he finally began thinking about starting another relationship, the two women he might be interested in may well end up together. But as much as that idea sucked for him, he couldn’t help but have to hide a smile whenever he noticed how obvious they were being. Wherever they went, he’d support them.
- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -
Kate sat completely still, waiting for Mara in the room they had been meeting in for the past four months before going off world or adding to their plan. At first glance she looked completely calm, but it was taking most of her focus to stop her leg from bouncing or her fingers from drumming on her thigh. It had taken two months for her to build up the confidence to talk to Mara, and it was progressively getting harder to ignore the anxiety she felt thinking about being abandoned after this was all over.
“Sorry I’m late, I got caught up with Alexis.” Kate’s head snapped up at Mara’s voice, the younger woman having stepped through the doorway, shutting the door quietly.
“Mara.”
“Kate.” Mara smiled at her, her eyes dropping to Kate’s lap. Following her gaze, Kate realised her fingers were drumming together in the slightest of motions. Embarrassed, she forced them to still.
“What’s going to happen once we do this?” Mara’s smile faltered briefly.
“What do you mean?”
“After we kill Dresden and Fear.” Kate waved her hand as she spoke, struggling to prevent them from flapping about wildly. “I mean, are we still going to hang out? Like this, one on one?”
“We don’t have to.” Mara offered carefully. “Would you like to?”
“Of course! You’re one of my closest friends in this group, I can actually relax around you, you understand what I mean when I talk about the urges, you don’t care that I can be aggressive, you just- I enjoy spending time with you. And I don’t want to lose that.” She mumbled the final part, trailing off uncertainly. Mara was blinking at her.
“You... I mean- as friends, yeah, we’ll still be friends after. And we’d still hang out.”
“As friends?” She internally winced, but it was already said.
“...What are you getting at, Kate?” Kate’s jaw clenched, but she’d committed this far.
“Would you still want to hang out if it was as more than friends?”
“Kate…” No. And she’d probably just ruined their relationship.
“So no, then?”
“It’s not a no. It’s just- I’ve been working some things out and I don’t want to commit to a relationship when it’s possible I might pull out soon.” Kate frowned.
“What do you mean? Do you like someone else?” Mara shifted uncomfortably.
“I like- or at least, liked, Sterling, for a while now. But then we started hanging out more, and my feelings for him haven’t really faded, but now it’s like I like two people instead of just one?”
Kate almost smiled at the ridiculousness of the statement.
“Why not just date us both?” Mara laughed, then stopped when she saw Kate was being serious.
“That’s- no, I couldn’t do that to you two. It would just be cheating-”
“No, not cheating. Just, y’know, all three of us date each other. Instead of two people, there’s three. It’s a thing. Of course Sterling would have to be up for it too, but it wouldn’t be cheating. Just… polyamorous?”
“You want to date Sterling too?”
“That’s what you got out of that?” She asked in deadpan. Mara blushed.
“No, no! It’s just that I’ve never… it would be new. And, y’know, you’d both have to be willing, of course.” Mara frowned as a thought crossed her mind. “How do you know about polyamory?”
“I was raised in Backcells, Mara, not under a rock. Just ‘cause it wasn’t normal doesn’t mean I was sheltered.”
“Ah, right… We need to talk to Sterling now.” Kate sighed.
“Yeah, probably.” Mara smirked at her.
“It’ll be fine Kate. I’ll lead, if you want.” She grinned and Kate smiled back, still surprised this was going anyway positively for her. Whatever, she’d take it.
- - - - - - -
Sterling gaped at Mara and Kate, trying to process their question.
“Are you guys being serious?” Mara shifts uncomfortably. Kate responds coolly, taking over from what Mara had started.
“Absolutely. We understand if you’re not interested, but-”
“No I am! Sorry. Uh, I just mean… and you’re both cool with it?”
“We wouldn’t have brought it up if we weren’t.”
“I… wow, okay. Yeah. So have you two been dating secretly or is this a new thing?”
“This is new.” Kate clarified.
“We discussed it a few days ago, but this was the first time we’ve been able to catch you.” Mara elaborated.
“O-okay. This… this is going to take some time, though.”
“And a lot of communication.”
“We’re serious, if you only want to date one of us say it now.”
“No Mara, I wouldn’t have said yes otherwise! You explained it really quite clearly.” Sterling assured. “Honestly I’ve thought for a while that you’re both… well, amazing, to be frank. As for putting one of you above the other, laying that out now, I would never do that. If we’re gonna do this I’m going to treat you right. Both of you.” Mara beamed at him. Kate was smiling too, though her’s was more reserved.
“Oh, and one more thing!” Mara added. “We need to discuss boundaries. Obviously we need to communicate any issues we have or if we want to open up the relationship, but for now Kate and I agreed on it just being the three of us. Outside of that there’s the stuff like what kind of touch is okay and how fast we want to take things.”
“Mara and I have already discussed ours with each other, and she wrote them down I think. But we may have different boundaries for each other, and it’s important to lay them out now rather than later after something goes wrong.” Mara nodded in agreement and Sterling joined her.
“Of course. Uh, is that something we have to do right now though, ‘cause…” He pointed down to the laundry he was folding. Mara laughed and Kate smirked.
“Not right now, obviously, but soon. Do you want a hand with that?” Mara asked, still smiling.
“That’d be helpful, thanks.” Sterling smiled at them both. Kate ruffled his hair before grabbing a stack of towels to put away. Sterling blinked then looked up at Mara with a curious look.
“Yeah, she does that. How do you fold your shirts?”