Work Text:
Later that evening, the group relocated to a motel. Not quite as crappy as the one they’d snuck into that morning (gee whiz, had it only been a day since everything had happened?), but it wasn’t so clean that Trixie thought her shower shoes from school were a waste of space. She was pretty sure that she’d seen some kind of mushroom growing in the shower.
“At least there’s warm water,” Erica said when she started complaining. Trixie was standing in the room they were sharing with Mom, who’d gone out to grab dinner, and Zoe, who was in the middle of her own shower. Erica was sitting in the chair, trying to untangle her wet hair. “Back in Vale? Two minutes in and they were barely giving the ice time to melt.”
Trixie made a face, because “warm” was the most generous descriptor that could have been invented for the shower. It had barely hit lukewarm and she told Erica as much.
At which point her sister just shrugged and said, “You learn to count your blessings pretty fast in this line of work.”
Trixie didn’t say anything and went back to just being mad.
“You’re mad,” Erica said.
She did that a lot when they had conversations together, reiterate the obvious emotion. Most of the time Trixie found it endearing and it increased her resolve to beat up anyone who ever hurt her sister.
Although it seemed now that Erica could handle that part herself. And wasn’t that part of the problem?
“Because I had to take cold showers last December?” Erica asked, and at that Trixie realized that she’d been quiet for maybe too long.
“Oh, you know why,” she snapped.
Erica seemed confused by the sudden turn in Trixie’s emotional state, and Trixie guessed she’d be confused by it too, if it was indeed sudden.
But it wasn’t.
It had been brewing for weeks on end. From the moment she’d confronted Mike and Ben in the hospital room. Spending most of it either at boarding school away from her family or in an RV with Granddad, who seemed allergic to any form of conversation that didn’t involve the intricacies of weapons, or the intricacies spycraft, or the intricacies of weapons used for spycraft, had only served to increase the tension.
She’d learned quite a bit about flamethrowers, but nothing about her family.
And maybe it was unfair to take it out on her sister, but it was going to have to come out somewhere.
Erica seemed to pick up on that at the very least. “Trixie, I’m sorry, but it wasn’t my decision to make.”
“Oh, cut the crap,” Trixie responded.
“You seemed normal. Happy,” Erica kept brushing the same section of hair, even though it had already been detangled. “You had friends. You were able to keep them. Your entire life didn’t have to revolve around how fast you could defuse a bomb.”
“And yours did?” Trixie asked sarcastically, but she couldn’t even look her in the eye. A long, awkward moment passed between them.
“I don’t know I’d be if I wasn’t good at this stuff. If I wasn’t a spy.” Her sister’s voice was so quiet it was almost a whisper. “Maybe I resented you for being able to determine your own future,” she took a shuddering breath, “but I wouldn’t have told you. It felt wrong to take that away.”
“That’s not your decision,” Trixie said quietly, all the venom gone from her voice.
“I know,” she said.
Neither one said anything for a little while. It wasn’t a comfortable silence, but it wasn’t nearly as tense. Trixie was about to probe Erica more about why no one told her, but her sister beat her to the punch.
“If you did have a choice, would you do it?”
“Be a spy?” Trixie said, confused.
“No, dye your hair pink,” Erica glared at her a little. “I am attempting to have a serious emotional conversation here, which is a thing I have been told I’m bad at, and I would appreciate it….”
Trixie put her hands up in surrender, and Erica was quiet as she considered it.
Maybe the silence stretched on too long again, because Erica started talking, “Because, fair warning, questions are being asked and things are being considered and we’re in for some pretty big status quo shifts, and I heard Mom and Dad talking about how much you should be involved now and you should probably get your opinions on the matter figured out…”
Shocked, Trixie cut her off, “Wait, for real?” Since she’d found out, espionage had felt like an opportunity she’d missed. A door that had been shut and locked.
And here was her sister, opening it for her.
“I mean, it’s not ideal. But, like it or not, you’re involved now. You should probably learn some skills if nothing else. Martial arts. Guns. Subterfuge. Poison. How to drive.” Erica stopped and furrowed her brow, “Other stuff probably.”
“Hell yeah,” said Trixie.
“Don’t get too excited,” Erica rolled her eyes and the sister Trixie knew seemed to have come back, “There will be excessive danger.”
“Yeah,” said Trixie, nodding her head so enthusiastically she was sure she looked like a bobble head, “Like today. Which we survived.”
“You will be forced to suffer many stupid things.”
“I suffer stupid things by virtue of being a member of this family, period. Or need I remind you the disaster that was Dad’s gifts last Christmas.”
“One of all won’t always be there to save you.”
“But you’ll be there,” Trixie leaned over and hugged her sister. “And I don’t know if I really need anything else.”
Erica hugged her back. “Love you, too.”