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There's a tall pine tree that towers outside of Terry’s office window, needles almost blue against the pale early morning sky. He absently watches it waver in the breeze.
From across his desk, there’s a long-suffering sigh, one almost certainly accentuated for dramatic effect. Terry shakes himself from his daze to meet the quizzical eyes of his stepdaughter.
“Yes?” he asks after a moment, pushing his monitor and its dozen unanswered emails to the side. Scary is sprawled across the cozy armchair that Terry insists his guests sit in, one leg hooked over the arm. Now that she’s gotten Terry’s attention, she’s back to focusing on her nails. She doesn’t look back up at her stepfather.
Terry smiles and clears his throat. “Scary?” he tries again.
“What,” Scary asks.
“You were trying to get my attention, right?” He crosses his arms and settles back into his office chair. The back support groans and he makes a mental note to swap it out with a chair from home.
“I guess,” Scary says, trying to be noncommittal. But Terry’s known Scary Marlowe for quite a bit now, and he can tell that in her herculean focus on anything other than Terry, there’s a sudden self-consciousness that alarms him. He waits for a moment, taking his mom’s advice, trying to let Scary open up about whatever’s bothering her on her own terms, but the clock is ticking, quite literally, filling the room with its dull thuds, giving this conversation an anxious rhythm it doesn't demand.
Terry changes tact. He knows Scary has probably already dwelled on this for a bit, and he’d rather she not do so the rest of the school day. He crosses his arms and dramatically eyes the clock.
“Well,” he says, “I have cafeteria duty in five minutes, and you know I have to be on time.”
“God forbid Tony does anything on his own,” Scary grumbles, and Terry bites down a smile.
“All I’m saying,” he reasons, feeling guilty for rushing her, “is that if you want to get whatever’s on your chest off of it, you got until the big hand hits seven to do so.” He gestures at the clock and inwardly chokes down his shame at sounding like such an assistant principal.
Terry watches as Scary sits up blisteringly, uncomfortably straight and looks at somewhere below the nameplate on his desk. She opens her mouth, but nothing comes out.
He racks his brain for any disagreement they’ve had recently. “If you were meaning to ask me again about getting your license, I was gonna offer this weekend, actually—”
“—do you think I should ask Linc to the homecoming dance?”
Terry blinks, in rhythm with the clock’s ticking. Scary sits there, in front of him, awkwardly twisted as if she’s just been caught drowning a puppy. She looks absolutely aghast at herself, and if this was any other student at San Dimas High School, talking about any other student, Terry would almost find it funny.
“Huh?” Terry says dumbly, and then kicks himself mentally as Scary flinches. “No, you don’t need to repeat yourself. You just took me by surprise, is all.”
Terry’s quick defense doesn’t seem to matter. Scary is up in a flash, a hand snatching up the big tote bag she’s propped haphazardly against the door. She’s looking down and Terry swallows down the emotional part of him, nurtured by Ron and Samantha, that makes him want to cry and vault over the desk to hug his stepdaughter and apologize, smothering her in love she might not be completely ready for. He hops up; his chair squeaks with the sudden release of weight.
“Wait, Scary,” he calls out as Scary pushes the door to the hallway open. The distant din of high schoolers flooding into the cafeteria rolls into his office.
Scary finally, blessedly, looks up at him. “What, Terry,” she says. It’s not a question, really, but more of a challenge. Terry crushes the instinct to flinch. Sometimes, still, he’s Terry to her, but he’s gotten quite used to dad over the last few years. Today is clearly a Terry day.
“If you wanna ask Lincoln to the dance,” he says slowly, “you should do it.”
Scary visibly relaxes in the doorframe.
“I would never disapprove of you expressing your feelings towards someone,” he continues carefully. “I mean, my god, just look at our family, right?”
Scary nods, and Terry watches the tiniest vestiges of a smile start to loop across her face.
“Thanks,” she says, and starts to ease the door close. Terry catches it on the way out; the pair start walking towards the cafeteria together in lockstep. They’re both quiet; Terry enjoys this daily exercise in synchronization.
“One little thing,” he says as they swing into the cafeteria.
Scary looks up at him. “Uh huh?”
“Homecoming’s tonight , in case you forgot.” Scary blushes and grumbles something under her breath. If you’re gonna ask, it might be better to do it sooner in the day rather than later, yeah?”
Terry walks away before he can catch Scary’s full response, but he does manage to hear an indignant “Terry!” from behind as he takes to the stage, reaching out to grab the microphone from Tony’s impatiently waiting hand.
After two and a half years of being the assistant principal at San Dimas High, Terry has unfortunately grown to utterly despise the second Friday in October. He knows the kids love homecoming, both the dance and the football game, but it always seems to bring in way more trouble than it’s worth. Terry can’t stand the fact that it’s usually an exhausting 16 hour work day, half of which is unpaid. He chafes at having to play nice with the visiting staff from Chaparral High, and isn’t great at reigning in Tony, still somehow principal, who chafes even more. Terry still doesn’t understand the rivalry between the two school’s student bodies, and is sick of calming down booing crowds and picking up the pieces from pranks gone awry. And big occasions like this always leave the school buzzing and on-edge, and that makes Terry feel like something is bearing down on him, ready to snatch him up. He knows why he has that feeling, of everything tipping on a precipice, ready to spill over, burst, shatter, glass or bone, but it doesn’t really help that he knows, but of course, as his mom likes to remind him, that’s not how trauma works. The demon crouches anyways.
He just wishes his kids could alleviate this problem by simply behaving. But the energy has them acting up. Terry is just done with his morning meeting with Tony when his walkie chirps at him; a security guard trying to get his attention. He brings it closer to his face to hear it better.
“Just sent a senior down to your office,” the guard says, apologies softening the usual hard edges of her voice. “Caught him skipping in a bathroom, with a few others, but they ratted him out.”
“What were they doing?” Terry asks, turning down the hallway near the admin suite.
“Not really sure,” the guard says. “Something to do with gambling. There was money.”
“Uh huh,” Terry says slowly. “Thanks, I’ll take care of it.”
He is not surprised when he strolls up to his office to find Taylor Swift sitting outside his door. He gives Terry a sheepish little wave as he approaches. Terry can’t help but roll his eyes. He opens the door wide and gestures at it. “Inside,” he says. Taylor clambers to his feet and saunters in like he owns the place. With how many times he’s been here the last few years, he may as well.
“What’s this, the third time this month I’ve come to my office and you’ve been here waiting for me?” Terry asks as he sits. Taylor sets his crutches aside and lowers himself into the armchair Scary was sprawled over not two hours earlier, huffing as his leg brace protests.
“Something like that,” the kid shrugs. He’s not wearing his glasses today, and he’s missing his hat too. He squints over the desk at Terry.
Terry stares stonily back at Taylor, and then sighs. “You gonna tell me what happened?”
Taylor sits back and tries to play the cool kid card. “What do you want me to say? I was trading pokemon cards with some of the sophomores in anime club.”
“You were skipping.”
“It was just study hall, gimme a break!”
“Did you have a hall pass?”
“Well, no…”
Terry makes a loose finger gun at Taylor; the young man pouts.
“Ms. Bailey said she caught you guys with money. Care to tell me about that?”
Taylor screws up his face and Terry sets his own into one he really hopes looks dispassionate and patient.
“Taylor,” Terry says when he feels his mask cracking into a smile. “You can’t gamble at school.”
“But they’re vintage!”
Terry pauses, tilts his head. “What’s vintage?”
“The pokemon cards, man!” Taylor says, wide-eyed and blustery like he can’t believe Terry is asking such an asinine question.
“Vintage how?”
“Gen Eight, you know, the one where Nntendo had to cut production short because of the Doodler’s arrival!”
Terry settles back in his chair, feels a sharp burst of cold wash over him at Taylor’s words.
“Oh,” he says. Taylor looks at him funny. “Right.”
“They’re pretty rare,” Taylor prattles on, “so we were betting on the battles to win the cards, you know?”
Terry cuts him off with a raised hand. Taylor stops pretty quickly; he’s clearly detected the sudden sour turn in Terry’s mood.
“Taylor,” Tery says, “why are you doing this, man?”
“Doing what?”
Terry sighs. “Don’t be coy. You know you can’t gamble, and you know how irresponsible it is to peer pressure the younger students into behavior like that.”
Taylor fidgets uncomfortably.
“You’re a role model for them, and I know you know that. You’re a cool guy, and I can’t have you going around getting in trouble all the time.”
The bell rings for second period. Taylor sits up and reaches for his crutches. “Seeing as this is where all of our chats usually end, is it okay if I go now?”
“No?” Terry asks, flummoxed by Taylor’s dismissiveness. “Taylor, you’re on truancy watch. You’ve been caught skipping almost ten times this school year, and we’re not even a quarter through. If we still had detention here, the principal would have you suspended in a heartbeat.”
“Well, it’s a good thing you ended detention policies when you got the job, right?” Taylor says with a wink.
Terry squeezes his eyes shut and takes a breath. “All this stuff goes on your permanent record, regardless of the fact that I go to bat for you to keep you from being suspended. It could impact your graduation, not to mention your chances of getting into college.”
Taylor stiffens, just for a second, like he’s been caught, and then relaxes back into sleaziness. “Doesn’t really matter,” he shrugs. “Wasn’t really planning on college anyways.”
“You aren’t—” Terry cuts himself off. “—never mind. That’s a conversation for you, your mom, and the guidance counselor, and definitely not just the two of us right now.” He isn’t entirely sure how serious Taylor is being. He is very sure, right now, of just how much Taylor looks like his father, all coiled bristling energy feigning nonchalance in Terry’s tiny stupid office. It makes him want to scream. He sweeps it all under the rug to deal with later and looks back at Taylor, angling his best authoritarian face at the young man.
“Look, Taylor,” he says. “I’m obviously not gonna suspend you, you know I don’t do that. But you can’t go around breaking all these rules and being a bad influence without consequence. So I think I’m gonna bar you from the dance tonight.”
Taylor jolts in place, eyes wide, almost panicked. “Aw, you can’t do that! Please, Terry.”
Terry leans back, alarmed at the serious tenor rushing through Taylor’s voice. “Why not?”
“Because, um, me and Normal were going together, and…”
“You and Normal.”
Taylor hangs his head. “Not like that, come on, man! We’re going platonically, you know? As pals? Best buds?”
“I don’t not believe you,” Terry says. “I’m just kinda surprised.”
“Normal wanted to get in, like, one normal high school experience before graduation,” Taylor snickers at his vocal faux pas . “And since he was too, um, sick the last two years, he figured this was a good shot. And it’s not like he was gonna ask Scary or Linc, or, like, Hermie.”
“Um. Why not?”
“He goes to Chaparral,” Taylor reasons, wagging a hand in the air. “It’d be weird.”
Terry isn’t quite sure that’s the reason Sparrow’s youngest would avoid going to the dance with the Goof Realm’s prodigal son, but he chooses to ignore this.
“I’m sure Normal can find someone else to go with, or he can just go alone. Guys go stag to dances all the time.”
Taylor’s face goes desperate, and Terry very nearly crumbles, damn his softness. “Please,” Taylor says, quiet, begging. “You gotta let me go with him, Terry. He needs this. He needs a friend for something like this.” Taylor looks down into his lap, where his hands are cruelly twisted together. “He needs me,” he whispers, so quietly Terry has to lean in to hear him, and he wishes his hearing was worse, because the words have Terry spinning to the side in his chair where he can better hide his eyes from the view of his student. He tucks his head behind his monitor. He can hear no motion from Taylor; the tiefling is still hunched over in the armchair.
“Fine,” Terry hisses, “fine. You can go tonight. But if you’re caught skipping any more the rest of this semester, it's a suspension, and we’re not arguing about it, okay?” Terry knows he’s making an empty threat even before it leaves his mouth.
He peeks out from his monitor and sees Taylor slumped over in relief, eyes closed. “Thank you,” he mutters.
“Sure,” Terry replies, the word like thorns in his mouth. He hates his job. He hates seeing these kids, their childhoods shattered by what he’s done. This is penance. If he hates it, it means he’s doing a good job, because he’s facing the blistering, nauseating consequences of his actions.
“Now,” he says gently, and thinks of the emails leering at him from his screen, still unanswered, so inconsequential when weighed next to the sniveling husk of an almost-adult in front of him, “go back to class, and have fun tonight, okay?”
It’s only 8:40. The sun is not yet above the crown of the pine tree standing sentry outside Terry’s office window, and he’s already nearly cried once today. Two hours down, only thirteen to go. Terry locks his office door, hunches over in his chair, and resolves to kill as many emails as he can before the next crisis hits, whenever, wherever, and whoever that may be.
He can’t focus.
Terry sees the reflection of the clouds, wavering and pale in his monitor, and gets lost in their ministrations across the sky. He sees in them the storms racing from the vampire’s tower in Rockport. He sees the bloodied iris of the Doodler shrinking from the sky above the fake earth, and sees clouds jockeying to fill its place, bright with the sudden light of the sun. He sees the hard work of four of his students, and the exultation of so many more grasping at their first chance of a real, normal existence.
He’s imagining all of these memories, of course. Terry was dead when the teens recalled the Doodler; gone and in hell. But the bullet never slaughtered his imagination.
Terry shakes his head, scrubs at the moisture collecting in the corners of his eyelids. He has a job to do, he can’t do it if he’s crying all the time, lost in a maze of distractions from his past. Clouds can be clouds. And today, on homecoming day, that’s all they’ll be. No monsters lurking in cobwebbed corners, no dripping maws ready to feed on unsuspecting victims. No crazed lunatic step-grandfathers ready to kill in cold blood. Just a thousand joyous kids and a tired assistant principal.
The bell for fourth period rings. Only a few more emails to go, then the inexorable torment that is lunch duty. For the first time since talking to Scary this morning, Terry lets himself relax.
He feels the explosion more than he hears it. It’s a low thrum, distant, and Terry is up from his chair and halfway out the door before the fire alarm starts blazing, its claxon frantically calling him to its origin. He’s fighting a dense fleeing stream of kids, some panicked, others who just look supremely bored, to where he thinks he heard the blast. He doesn’t think it’s dangerous, at least not to him. He feels, as he pushes through the crowds, as the rush in the halls trickles to only a few stragglers, the electric thrum, the tantalizing thrill of magic. He’s fairly certain he knows who caused this, and he grits his teeth.
Terry rounds the final bend to the corner of the school where seniors take their social studies classes, and scrabbles to a halt. In front of the door to Ms. Mahmoud’s economics classroom is a sizzling, spitting pit, burned straight through the tile floor, and judging from the metallic smoke billowing up into the high-ceilinged annex, through the dirt and bedrock below the school as well. Flame leaps up from the crater, licking the scorched tile with unnatural colors. The work of a warlock, no doubt.
Terry sighs and reaches down into himself, feeling the warm, quiet presence of his magic, before drawing the sigil for an extinguishing spell. It’s sloppy, weak, unpracticed, but he didn’t spend most of his life studying sorcery for nothing: it does the trick. A frigid blast of air howls out of the sigil, scrawled in hazy light in the air, and freezes the fire dead. The half-melted tile cracks and twangs as it cools.
He’s a little lightheaded now; he puts his hands on his hips and sways in the corridor for a moment until he catches his breath. He fumbles for his walkie and tells Tony that the fire is out.
The crackle on the other end resolves into the cold, angry voice of his boss. “Please tell me you didn’t do your weird sorcery bullshit, Stampler.”
Terry smiles. “Apologies,” he says, voice reedy.
“10-4,” Tony grumbles. The walkie goes silent. Terry clips it back to his waist and clears his throat.
“Okay, enough hiding. Scary, Lincoln, I know you’re in there. You may as well just come out already.”
Some muttering, some enraged hissing, from behind Mr. Mahmoud’s door.
“Don’t make me go in there,” Terry threatens.
“Um, you don’t know we caused that!” the voice of Lincoln Li-Wilson calls out, stumbling and nervous.
Terry starts laughing. It’s dry, exhausted, but genuine. “Uh huh,” he says, “Sure. Because someone else in this school is a warlock, right?”
“Yeah?” Terry imagines Linc’s face, all grimace and embarrassment, and it almost makes Terry start chuckling again.
“Okay,” Terry finally announces, turning from the smoldering pit. “I’m going back to my office. I’ll see you two in five minutes, otherwise I will call Grant and Marco. And, Scary, I’ll cancel our appointment at the DMV this weekend. You hear me, guys?”
There’s cold silence from behind the door, the type that indicates the two teenagers cowering from their wreckage absolutely, certainly heard him. Terry nods once to himself, satisfied, and strolls back to the admin suite. The least he can do is give them some time to get themselves together before he reads them the riot act.
Neither Scary or Lincoln will meet his eyes four minutes later, when they slink into his office. Lincoln is splashed with smoke, and the amount of angry, red-hot magic zipping through his stepdaughter’s veins is making Terry a touch nauseous.
“You know I don’t agree with it,” Terry starts, as he rummages in his desk for a pack of wet wipes to hand to Linc, “but practicing magic is a suspension-level offense at this school. You know that, right?”
“Of course we know that,” Scary says acerbically, “it’s all you and Tony tell us. And it’s fucking bullshit!”
Terry holds up his hands in an attempt for placation. “I’m not gonna suspend you, Scary.”
“Then why even bring it up?”
Terry levels the two with an understanding, commiserating gaze. “Because, other than that time in tenth grade, you’ve all been great at following that rule.” Lincoln’s mouth dips into an even deeper frown and Terry tries to dismiss his own memories of a swarm of sentient bats materializing in the gym. “I’ve broken it way more times than y’all. You know how serious it is. So I know that something went really wrong for you to lose control like that and cast that spell.”
Scary crosses her arms and shoves her chair back, separating herself from Linc and widening the gulf between her and Terry. His eyes jump to the dust-laden floor exposed by the slide.
“Why don’t you ask Linc what happened?” Scary spits.
Lincoln wheels in his seat to face his friend. “How is this possibly my fault?!”
“How?” Scary repeats. She leans across the divide she just made and gets into Lincoln’s face. The school’s soccer star cringes away from her. “How?! How isn’t it, you fuckin’ coward?”
“Enough!” Terry shouts. He hates pulling out what Tony calls his warden voice, but it does the trick. The pair in front of him whip away from each other and look back at Terry with wide eyes.
“Lincoln, you are an adult. Scary, you’re nearly one. Act like it. Now tell me, calmly, if you can, what happened.”
Lincoln sighs and shrinks down into his seat. It’s odd seeing such a lanky person, so imposing on the soccer pitch, feel so small. “There’s some guys in Ms. Mahmoud’s class who like to poke fun at us.”
“Okay,” Terry says, perversely relieved, despite the admission, that they’re actually getting somewhere here. “About what?”
“I mean, it’s really not a big deal,” Lincoln shrugs. “Just stuff about us being weird because of magic, or hanging out with people like Normal. It’s really lame, you know? Cheapshots. And like you said, I’m too grown for that. So I do my best to ignore it.” He settles back into his seat like that will make him disappear from this conversation.
Terry looks at his stepdaughter. “I’m not totally sure how this leads to the floor melting.”
Scary is grinding her teeth. Terry can see her jaw clicking back and forth, rubbing down the molars, her frustration made material, only hurting her. Terry is nearly overwhelmed by her anger, so righteous, so intensely-directed, a jet of flame from a rocket bolted to the launchpad. The metal bends but does not give, and Terry will have to call the dentist.
“I just want you to stand up, man,” Scary finally says. She’s not looking at Lincoln, rather, directly at her stepfather, but Terry can tell her ire is targeted at her friend. “Those guys say bullshit about me, and I can handle it. They say bullshit about you, and if you think you can handle it, well, it fucking hurts to sit there and watch you take it, but whatever. But they say shit about Normal!” Lincoln’s mouth wobbles; Terry finds himself pushing the tissue box closer to Grant’s son before he can stop himself.
“Normal’s not in that class,” Lincoln says, small, crumpled, defeated. “He’ll never hear it.”
“It’s the fucking principle of it all, man! He’s our friend! He’s been through hell and back; we gotta back him up!”
“Let me guess,” Terry says, once his stepdaughter has settled back into her seat, glowering at the floor without words for a few moments. “You got pissed at the guys saying nasty things about Normal, and you ended up blowing up at them. Magically.”
From across the table, there is only mortified silence, and in it, Terry realizes that somehow, he’s gotten it wrong.
“No?”
“Joel said that Normal freaked him out because he’d never seen him smile,” Lincoln starts, brightly, as if eager to set the record straight.
Scary interrupts, her tone dripping venom, pure disappointment. “And then Caden asked what Linc thought about him. And he fucking laughed. And agreed.”
In the sudden shattering silence that follows, cold and warped, Terry feels his heart break.
“I wasn’t telling the truth!” Linc shouts, frantic, fists clenched on the arms of the chair. “I obviously don’t agree! I just said that to get the heat off of us!” He throws his hands up; where his fingers were pressing into his palms, Terry spots white half-moons impressed by his nails.
“Oh my god, Linc, the heat was never on us!”
“It was gonna be!”
“I don’t give a shit about that, man! You should’ve stood up for him!”
“I wanted to, I wanted to!” Linc howls. “I feel horrible, alright? Is that what you want me to say?”
“No!” Scary slams her fist against the side of her chair. Something in it crunches. “I just want you to do better!”
Silence again. Terry swallows; his throat is apocalyptically dry. “So,” he warbles. “First, thank you for providing the names of those bullies, I’ll deal with them right away. Second, Scary, I’m concluding here that you directed that detonation spell at Lincoln, yes?”
Scary says nothing. She just nods, glum, still, sapped of all her fight.
Terry takes a risk. It’s not professional, really, but he decides to act as a parent for one and family friend to the other, and not as their administrator.
“Linc,” he ventures. “Did Scary ask you to the dance tonight yet?”
Lincoln looks up, alarmed. “Uh. We ended up asking each other, right at the beginning of Ms. Mahmoud’s class.”
Terry shakes his head, simply amazed. Right,” he snorts.
“A decision I’m regretting, I might add,” Scary mutters.
“Okay,” Terry says, collecting all the disemboweled shreds of calm off the walls of his office and assembling them into something resembling composure. “So here’s what's gonna happen. First, the two of you are going to apologize to Ms. Mahmoud for disrupting her class. Second, I’m gonna cover for you using magic to the principal, wish me luck. And third, I want you to still try going to the dance together tonight.”
They both look up like they’re going to protest, both quite halfheartedly. He can tell both Lincoln and Scary are mired in confusion, absolutely lost in the swirling eddies of the emotional maelstrom they just triggered.
“Give it a try.” he suggests, forcing air through his vocal chords, light, easy, casual. “If not for yourself, for Normal. He’ll wanna see his friends there, after all. Sounds like decent enough penance, don’t you think?”
Scary perks up a little. She’s been given an assignment, and knowing her, despite what disinterest she may feign, she’ll be loath to fail it. Linc just looks like he wants to cry. Whether from relief or anguish, Terry can’t quite tell. He feels the same, to be honest.
“Alright,” he says. “You should leave now, before Ms. Mahmoud’s planning starts.” He writes them a hall pass. “I’ll see you both tonight, okay?”
The lunch period is starting momentarily. Terry has maybe seven minutes to kick around before he has to hightail it to the cafeteria. Finding the correct key on his lanyard, he unlocks one of his desk drawers and fumbles around in the detritus within for a large, dusty tome. He calmly, feeling his nerves fray all the while, flips to the page for a deafening spell. It's too complicated to cast from memory, and far too taxing without the assistance of his grimoire. Low, below where it can be seen from the tiny slat window in the door, he draws the sigil in the air, scorching white. He’s already tired, has too many hours on his feet left in the day, and can’t afford to lose any more energy, but the casting buckles his knees despite this knowledge. The air begins to feel like thick cotton, pushing against the walls, his ears, his skin. Terry knocks a fist against his desk; it is absolutely soundless. Perfect. The assistant principal of San Dimas High School, knowing he can’t be heard, can’t be judged, draws up all the oxygen in his lungs and screams. Long, low, raw, he screams and shouts and swears and begs the world to heal his kids. He screams it’s not fair. He screams curses at Willy. He curses Grant, Sparrow, Lark. He curses himself.
He begs the world to heal himself, too.
When his throat hurts too much to go on, Terry Stampler wipes the sigil out of existence, and, while the air twists back into its normal fragranced, air-conditioned composition, slides the grimoire back into his desk. The lock cleanly clicks shut. Then he’s out the door. Lunch duty calls, and his job waits for no one.
The remainder of the school day, thankfully truncated for the evening's festivities, goes suspiciously smoothly. Lunch is subdued; Terry doesn’t have to raise his voice once. During fifth period, he pulls out the two kids Lincoln named as the bullies and gives them a stern talking-to and promises a check-in with their teachers and peers within the week to see if they can shape up. He isn’t hopeful, but they at least seem spooked. In sixth period, he and Tony receive the visiting administration from Chaparral High and exchange awkward, stilted pleasantries. It’s a boring, dull end to the school day, and that’s blissful and dreadful all the same. The bell rings at 2:25, and while most of the students rush home to prepare for the dance, Terry finds himself still on campus, in the gym, helping the student council set up. His feet ache, his neck burns, and he thinks it would be nice to take a nap in his office, blinds drawn to keep out the mid-afternoon California sun.
He doesn’t get the chance, of course.
The doors to the gym, clad in a sloppy archway of balloons, gold and blue, open for the excited crowd of students at 4:30 on the dot, and Terry is right there, slouched underneath a particularly low-hanging part of the arch, greeting everyone who enters. He by no means is required to do this; Tony reminds him that he’s an overachiever at least once daily. But it just feels right, for the kids to know they have someone in their corner who genuinely wants to engage with them. So there Terry stands, punching shoulders and bumping fists and clapping hands as the student body of San Dimas High pours into the gym. He hopes they can have fun tonight, especially the seniors. The world’s been rebuilding, slowly, painstakingly, since the days of the Doodler, and that change has not passed by the students of San Dimas. It’s been rough for them, including the ones not uniquely intricated in the end of the slow apocalypse that had bled the sky garnet for twenty years previous.
The DJ cedes the stage to Terry right as the dance gets underway, right before he can sidle out the side doors of the gym and get to work ensuring the football field is all situated for the mayor’s cup. He rushes up the rickety steps to the makeshift stage he helped erect only a few hours previously and grabs the microphone with a muttered thanks to the DJ. The crowd cheers; the noise bowls through Terry and he fumbles the mic in his hand, momentarily shocked that his students actually, genuinely seem to like him.
“Alright, alright,” Terry says, trying to play up his bashfulness. “Gimme just a second of y’all’s time, alright?” The crowd quiets. “I just wanted to say, real quick, how proud I am of each and every one of you. You guys don’t realize it, but high school is tough. You’re growing, you’re changing, and you’re fighting to be heard and seen in this huge world around us all.”
He scans the whole crowd, and realizes with a shock just how many of these kids he knows by name. “Homecoming is a tradition that shows how deeply invested our community is in y’all’s futures. Every single person you see tonight at the game, parents, siblings, cousins, alumni, teachers, they all care for you, even if it’s tiny and indirect. So know that you'll always have a home here.”
Four faces, tightly clumped in the back left corner of the gym, call out to him, shining bright to Terry with wound-up magical energy. Eight eyes, eight ears, four of them pointed. They’re all smiling right now, even Normal. Their smiles might be wan and a little wobbly, but the sight makes Terry’s heart sing.
“And to my seniors,” he says, thrashing down the rising lump of emotion in his throat, “I know there’s a lot of year left, but I am so, so, proud of you all. Celebrate yourselves tonight, celebrate your community, okay?”
The kids in front of him erupt into raucous, joyous cheering. “Do me one last favor, everyone,” Terry calls over the tumult. “Just remember one thing, in the highs and the lows, alright? All of you are enough, just as you are.”
The kids know him, dammit; they say it with him, a tired but heartfelt refrain. Hoping his eyes don’t betray too much of his emotion, Terry silently hands the mic back to the DJ, and as the music swells, he steps out of the gym and heads towards the football field. If he sheds some tears on the way, no one has to know.
The night is warm, the air is still, and the stands of Saints Stadium are packed. The west side is home, bathed in the soft glow of the setting sun. The east side is away, teeming with excited Chaparral students, families, and staff. The flood lights hanging over the Orange Freeway just behind the away bleachers provide the home stands a rival to their sunlight. Here, everything’s balanced. It’s a cosmically nice night. Good things happen when the sky is purple, despite Terry’s history with the color. It’s his stepfather’s color, his stepdaughter’s, and those two people can only serve as portents of love. Positive omens.
Five minutes to kickoff, two hours until Terry can go home, and as he surveys the home bleachers, chuckling at the sheer number of his kids who opted to stay in formalwear for the game, he allows himself to drop his shoulders and think that, maybe, the night’s going to end up being alright.
He doesn’t hear the approaching footsteps over the happy buzzing of the crowd, so the quick tap on his shoulder catches him by terrifying, bone-rending surprise. Terry jumps a mile in the air and stumbles forward a few steps, hands instinctively drawn to protect the back of his head. Thankfully, the familiar voice that sputters an apology is enough to cut through Terry’s panic before his breaths go shallow and his vision blurs.
“Oh, god, um, I’m sorry!” It’s Mr. Yao, rookie teacher and club sponsor for the cheer squad. Terry lowers his hands and shakes them out, turning to face the younger man, who’s looking away, face blanched in shame.
“It’s—it’s completely okay,” Terry says, smoothing his words out from gasps to something a little less alarming. “You just surprised me, that’s all. What’s up?”
Mr. Yao rubs at his wrists. Terry likes the guy. He’s consistently concerned for his students’ wellbeing, far beyond their performance in his class. “It’s probably not a big deal, but I figured I’d ask you rather than Tony.” He trails out. Terry gives him an encouraging nod. “Have you seen Normal Oak, by any chance?”
Terry feels the air go stale in his lungs.
“No,” Terry replies, words low and slow as they leave his lips, “should I have? Where’s he supposed to be?”
“I mean, he’s supposed to be with the cheer squad. They got a routine to do right before kickoff, with Teeny.”
“Right,” Terry says absently, already scanning the crowd in the bleachers, the stragglers hanging out at the base of the stands, the cliques of kids coursing along the sidelines. He finds himself, not for the first time, aching jealously for Grant’s ranger abilities. He does not spot Normal anywhere.
“I just want to be clear,” Mr. Yao says, words rushed, insistent, “I don’t mind if Normal’s in the routine or not. I know he gets, um, overwhelmed, easily. I just wanna make sure he’s alright.”
“We’re on the same page,” Terry replies, thoughts racing. He makes up his mind. “Tell Tony that I want you guys to go ahead with the routine without Teeny the Teen. If he gives you hell for it, just redirect him to me. I’ll take the fall.”
“Thanks,” Mr. Yao replies, genuine gratitude flooding across his boyish face. He turns with determination towards the center of the stands, where Tony is glowering.
“Don’t mention it,” Terry replies, already heading for the sidewalk that will take him under the stands, into the shadows.
When Terry was Normal’s age, in the off-kilter first few years of the apocalypse, when so many of his classmates stopped coming to school as endtime fever ripped through their ranks, and then disappeared altogether, Terry found a perfect place to hide from the insanity of it all in this very spot. Tucked underneath the bleachers of Saints Stadium, there’s an old, corrugated metal supply shed, shoved against the fence that separates the football field from the soccer field that Linoln presides over. Once, it was very clearly painted a crisp white, but age, disuse, disinterest, and disinvestment has leached it of its paint. It’s barely more than scrap metal now; it was just a little bit better twenty years ago, when Terry last frequented it. He has a sneaking suspicion that, attention given to it by the adults in charge or not, this little secluded hideaway from his past has strong-armed its way into the present as a safe haven for the scores of lost children currently in attendance at San Dimas High.
Terry loops around the side of the shed, ducking out of the way of a student he thinks he recognizes as an eleventh grader, slowly strolling by with a family member. He doesn’t have to look very far back towards the fence to see a familiar form squatting against the chain link, bathed in the misty glow of the soccer field’s floodlights that peer over the fence. Terry slowly exhales, once, then twice, and then he clears his throat.
Normal looks up like he’s heard a scream. His eyes are blown wide, but not red, not wet. His hands are in his hair, loosely knotted in the long tangles Normal hasn’t cut in quite some time. They’re tugging, lightly, searching for sensation but as of yet unwilling to bloom pain.
“Hey, Normal,” Terry starts, grimacing at how delicate his voice sounds, like he’s trying to coax a startled animal out of hiding. “Mr. Yao and I were wondering where you’d been.”
Normal laughs. It’s a harsh noise, one drowned in anxiety. Terry recognizes the sound in his own worst days. “You guys need Teeny, huh?” His hands drop down to the fence; Terry watches his fingers curl around the metal, ten lightning rods begging to be grounded.
“No, actually,” Terry says. “We were worried, that’s all.”
“Sure,” Normal replies, dragging the word down a gravel path, tumbling and scraping it.
“I don’t really give a shit about Teeny the Teen, to be honest.” Terry says, fiddling with his keys in his pockets. “I don’t think Mr. Yao does, either.”
Normal just shoots him a deadened look. Maybe he believes him, but it doesn’t really seem to him like he cares. Terry swallows and finds his gaze affixed at the floor for a moment. Normal, out of any of his students, makes him lost. It’s easy to talk to Scary, somehow easy to talk to Linc. Taylor talks to him whether Terry has the time for him or not. But there's a certain resentment in Normal’s eyes whenever they land on Terry. It feels like seeing a ghost, like Terry is seeing a distant mirage of himself, small, teenaged, missing his birth father. Tumbling into purple portals.
Terry’s seeing that ghost now. Because as much as he can relate to what his kids are going through, have been through, there are certain aspects of himself that he grew out of only because of the intervention of others. And he has only been himself, lived in his own skin.
“I’m fine, Terry,” Normal says. His baby blue San Dimas jersey sits askew on his chest. “You don’t need to babysit me, okay? I’m fine. I’m gonna be fine. Okay?”
Terry sighs and crouches on the ground. Not standing feels wonderful, even as his legs splay out to either side of him awkwardly. “Normal,” he tries, “what’s going on, man? Why are you hiding out here?”
Normal glares at Terry. “I didn’t—” he snaps, and then wrestles his voice into something a bit less bristly, not like Terry cares, “—I didn’t come out here to hide .”
“Then why?” He thinks of all the times he’d skip class and meet Grant out here, underneath a shifting, static sky, just to get away from their responsibilities, mundane or supernatural. “Were you trying to meet someone?” No sooner does he say it does Terry realize exactly who Normal may be trying to meet, and he curses himself.
Normal’s eyes go even wider, his mouth twists like a mountain road, and he steps fully upright and away from the fence. Terry stands up too.
“I asked,” Normal says, voice shaking. His shoulders are quivering. “I asked to see him, but I couldn’t do it,” he says. He’s looking straight through Terry, at the metal underside of the bleachers. A whistle blows, and a loud cheer, thousands-strong, rolls across the bottom of the superstructure, echoing inhumanly.
“That’s okay,” Terry says, knowing exactly what Normal is saying. “You wanted to, but you weren’t ready.”
“I mean, it was perfect for it. Today. Hermie’s whole school is here, you know? It wasn’t asking too much from him. I didn’t even want anything.” Normal sucks in a huge gulp of air, but his shoulders are crunching inwards and his neck is crooked. Terry takes a step forward, then another. His arms are half out before he can realize it. He stops himself.
“I just wanted to see his face again,” Normal says, his voice a candle flame against the roar of Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace. “And it’s not even really his face.”
“Normal,” Terry says. He sounds like he’s mourning. Normal’s very much alive in this moment, but Terry feels like he’s failed.
“Why was it so hard to see his face?” Normal asks despondently. “You’re alive again, and I see you every day, and it doesn’t make me lose my fucking mind!”
“You’re not losing your mind, Normal,” Terry says, as soothingly as he can craft the words around the lump in his throat, “you’re having a panic attack.”
A violent snap of silence. A thunderstorm of human joy rolling by behind them.
“Oh,” Normal whimpers. His voice breaks.
“Do you need a hug, man?” Terry asks. A small part of him bizarrely, disgustingly, hopes the answer is no.
Normal nods.
Terry closes the space just as Normal stumbles forward a step, and Terry all but catches the almost-adult before he trips. He links his hands at the wrists behind the small of Normal’s back and he squeezes, just a little bit, not enough to hurt, not enough to shock him, but enough to remind Normal that in the sea of humanity largely moving on from the disaster of the last thirty years, some people are still straggling behind with him, more than he knows. He gives Normal the hug Ron gave him after he came to terms with his father's death, the hug he accepted nearly too late. He gives Normal the hug that Scary gave him after his life was restored. He gives Normal the hug he gave Grant after his best friend returned from retrieving his anchor all those years ago. Terry gives Normal the hug he wishes Sparrow would give his son more often.
“It’s just not fair,” Normal says, voice thin, exhausted. He’s shivering a bit less. “How Hermie was right in front of me, but I knew, I just knew, that he wasn’t really there. Not in the way I want him to be.”
Terry says nothing. Normal’s hair tickles the shell of his ear.
“I’m horrible,” Normal mutters. “I asked him to show up, he did, and I couldn’t even say anything.”
“You’re not horrible,” Terry says. “You’re not. You’re enough, man. You’re enough. You’re all you can be. We all get it. Hermie, too.”
Normal shakes his head against Terry’s shoulder.
“You hear me, Normal?”
Normal does not reply.
There’s the sound of shifting gravel to the side of him. A sharp, bright spike of magic makes itself known to Terry. He opens his eyes and glances over. Sparrow is here, somehow, unknowingly drawn to the place by the avalanche of emotion rocketing from his son. The son of the unsung hero stands there, in an eclectic combination of sweatpants and cardigan, and wavers in place, arms open in supplication, misery scrawled across his face. In the eerie light of the stadium floods sifting through the bleachers, Terry can make out the scar from the fight with Barry looping across his chin. Sparrow beseeches Terry silently, begging him for answers, begging him for his son.
Normal clutches at Terry like the side of a lifeboat, rimmed with frost, tossed by the waves.
Terry looks back at Sparrow and sets his mouth in a grim line, the closest motion he can make to a shrug. Over Sparrow’s shoulder, on the far side of the soccer field, he spots the pine tree outside his office window, billowing skywards, a stark, spiny shadow. Terry can’t say for certain how Normal will be tomorrow, when the festivities above them have ceased, when the pain in his heart has dulled a bit, softened by the eclipse of sleep. Terry knows, in his own experience, certainly, the morning after a panic attack can dawn sweet. Soft sunny yellow kisses the crown of the foothills that crest jagged and proud to the north. The world rolls by a little easier. But that’s no solace for Normal right now, when everything his sight touches, from Terry’s dress shirt to his father’s mortified expression to that lonely pine standing sentry, is draped in the blue dark of night.