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Rain poured relentlessly from the tar-black sky. It pattered out a steady plic-plic-plic on Jinx's window, streaking long teardrop-trails down the foggy glass. A yellow streetlamp cast its distorted glow into the room, silhouetting a figure curled upon the bed.
Jinx faced away from her window, staring blankly at her shadow on the far wall. Against her chest, she cradled her blue frog plush, the sort of cheap, thin-fabric toy that got handed out as a prize for tacky carnival games. Whenever she held the frog, Jinx was reminded of how Lux had smiled all those months ago at the carnival, the way Lux's eyes had scrunched nearly shut as she'd grinned abashedly, tucking one hand under her silky, blond hair to shyly rub at the back of her neck while she'd handed Jinx the toy.
If only Jinx could travel back to that night instead of being stuck in this one. The gloominess sucked, and her room was too cold.
Oh, the things she'd give to be with Lux right now. Jinx wanted nothing more than to sneak out into the rain, scale up the oak beside the Crownguard estate, and crawl through the window where her girlfriend would be waiting with warm, wanting arms.
Except… Lux wouldn’t be waiting for Jinx tonight.
Lux would be with them.
“People like me, Jinx! All my life, I thought I was the only one, but they found me! I finally have people I can talk to about this.”
Lux offered her hands, palms up. Veins of light danced across her skin, reflecting in Jinx’s eyes like a sky of shooting stars. “You’ve always been able to talk to ME about it,” Jinx pointed out indignantly.
“I know, but… I mean… I finally know people who understand what this is. Who’ll help me figure out what I am.”
The first time that pack of strangers had intruded on the old lot where Lux went to practice her ability, Jinx had wanted to like the strangers, for Lux’s sake. Lux had been fascinated when their leader explained the power he sensed from her. After his cronies showed off the strange, unnatural talents they wielded, Lux had shown them her light, and they’d told her she was one of them.
Jinx, standing by and watching, had been glad that Lux was happy. But Jinx had also been suspicious. The leader – Sylas, he called himself – hadn’t revealed his own powers, and he slyly dodged Lux and Jinx’s questions about what he was capable of.
That, and the way he hovered around Lux like a thief measuring up a sack of gold, put Jinx on edge.
“I’m just saying, I don’t like the way he acts all mysterious. And I REALLY don’t like the way he stares at you!”
Lux kicked her heel against the edge of her bed. Her hands twitched in her lap. “I know he’s odd,” she said softly, rubbing her thumbs together, “but he told me what he’s been through. What people did to him when they found out he was different. He’s secretive because he has to be, to keep people like us safe. And… he doesn’t look at me that oddly, does he?”
Frustration welled in Jinx’s chest. “Can’t you see it? He’s a shark sniffing blood! He wants something from you, I know he does, I just haven’t figured out what!”
Sylas must’ve known Jinx didn’t like him. He’d been whispering in Lux’s ear, telling her things that Lux didn’t repeat when Jinx asked about it. Lux had started spending more time around him and the other newcomers without inviting Jinx along. When Jinx did catch up with her, the air felt more tense than it had before.
“I don’t understand why you can’t be happy for me.” Lux’s face was creasing, a furrow dimpling her brow and corners sinking at the edges of her mouth. “I finally have friends who like what I am, and you want me to just... Do what? Move on like I'd never met them?”
“I want you to stop fawning after them like they put the sun in the sky” Jinx raged. “They’ve done jack shit to prove that you can trust them! We don’t even know why they came looking for you!”
“They found me because I’m like them! And I trust them because they’ve been through what I’ve been through!” That irate grimace was morphing into full-on anger now. “We’re the same! They could be like family to me, more of a family than my parents or anyone else ever was!”
Oh, that was rich. “What about me, then?” Jinx snarled. “What happened to us being family? To us trusting each other more than anyone else? Where’s that trust gone now, huh?”
Scoffing, Lux turned her face. “… I wanted to trust you. I didn’t want to believe Sylas when he said that he could see you getting bitter and jealous, but here we are.”
“That fucking prick-!”
“You should leave.”
Jinx’s heart lurched. Breathing heavily, she felt her hands start to shake.
“I… I can’t be around you anymore tonight. And…” Turning fully away so that Jinx could only see her back, Lux said tightly, “… Don’t stop by my room tomorrow night. The others invited me out, so I won’t be around.”
Howling with anger and hurt, Jinx chucked her plush frog across the room, wrapping her arms tightly around her hollow chest as it slammed against the wall.
You know what? Fuck them, and fuck her, too. So what if Lux had dropped her like one of her brother's sweaty socks? It was her fucking loss. If Lux didn’t need her, then Jinx didn’t need Lux either. She didn’t. She didn’t.
You do though, the voice in the back of her head whispered. You do, and it’s sooo pathetic!
Jinx dug her nails into her arms, seeking distraction in the sting of her grip. Sniffling, she met the forlorn, plastic gaze of the plush toy belly-up on her carpet, then squeezed her eyes shut.
Let her play with her new fuckin’ friends, Jinx thought bitterly. I hope they all catch pneumonia in the rain. I hope one those people Sylas runs from catches him while he's at the store buying cold medicine.
Even as she tried to convince herself that she didn’t give a damn what Lux and her new friends were up to, a nasty voice in the back of Jinx's head laughed at her. Can’t you see yourself right now? it heckled. Sylas was right about you, you jealous bitch. Lux was right to kick you to the curb.
Shut up, shut up, shut up!
Jinx tried to focus on anything else. She listened to rain splashing on the window. She heard snores from her sister’s room down the hall. Her ears smarted at the chime of her ringing phone…
… ringing.
Jinx’s cell phone was ringing.
She reached blindly back until her fingers found the cell resting on her pillow. The phone vibrated in her hand as she rubbed her eyes, then she squinted at the too-bright screen.
Incoming Call:
Sunbeam
A contact picture smiled at her from the screen. Lux was mid-laugh, one hand raised to swipe at a dash of blue paint Jinx had smeared across her face. She always looked so fucking, goddamn radiant, and Jinx hated that right now.
But you’ll still pick up, won’t you? You’ll come crawling for whatever crumbs she’s willing to give you. Fucking pathetic.
Jinx grit her teeth, and… accepted the call.
“What the hell do you want?” Jinx sniped without greeting. “Gotten bored of your lame new friends yet?”
“…”
A lance of doubt speared her mind – fuck, I shouldn’t have come on sounding so mean, now she doesn’t even want to talk to me anymore – no, no, Jinx was allowed to sound mean. Jinx was allowed to be mad. She had a right to be fucking pissed.
But you miss her voice so fucking much, don’t you?
“You must miss my voice so fuckin’ much, don’t you,” Jinx goaded. “Called me up and won’t even say a word.”
“… J-Jinx…”
The hairs stood up on the back of Jinx’s neck.
Something was wrong with Lux’s voice. She should’ve sounded indignant, or angry, or – in Jinx’s best daydreams – as lonely as Jinx herself felt, and repentant to boot. But her voice…
It sounded faint. Shaky. And there were heavy breaths Jinx could make out now, rapid and deep as if the body on the other end of the call had been running.
Compulsively, Jinx tightened her grip on the phone. “Lux?” all the bite was gone from her tone now, overcome by an uncomfortable, creeping uncertainty. “Hey, is everything okay?”
“… Jinx…”
“… It’s Jinx, yeah. I’m here. Talk to me.”
“Jinx, I… I d-don’t know what to d-do.”
Jinx bit her lip. She’d never heard Lux’s voice sound like this before. Even after her worst fights with her family, she hadn’t sounded so disturbed. “Lux, what’s going on?”
Lux let out a rough, broken sob. “Jinx…”
Wrong, wrong, wrong!
Jinx stood quickly. She set her phone down for only a moment as she thoughtlessly wrangled on a sweatshirt, not caring that the soft fabric would do nothing to keep the rain at bay. “Tell me where you are,” she said, zipping her hoodie shut and seizing her phone once more.
“I…” a loud, wet sniffle snuffed through the speaker. “I d-don’t know. I ran…”
“Where does it look like you are?”
“… S-somewhere along the r-river… An old building. I… I can see a b-bakery through the boards.”
A bakery… Maybe she was in the abandoned cannery across from the shop where Vi bought cupcakes for her girlfriend! “Hold tight,” Jinx said, trying to sound reassuring. “I think I know where you are. I’ll be there in a jiffy, okay?”
“O-okay.” Another sniffle. “J-jinx?”
“Yeah, Sunbeam?”
“… I’m s-sorry…”
Jinx sprinted out her bedroom door, not caring if she woke her sister as she dashed down the stairs and out of the house.
By the time she arrived at the cannery, Jinx was soaked. That didn’t matter. Ignoring the shivers crawling through her damp skin, Jinx held up her cell’s flashlight and scoured the inside of the run-down structure. She listened for harried breaths, but couldn’t hear anything over the roar of rain and the rush of the engorged river.
After several seconds of frustrating, fruitless searching, Jinx dialed Lux’s number. From behind a stack of wooden boxes, a ringtone of Jinx and Lux’s favorite KDA song belted out, followed by a terrified yelp.
Jinx charged toward the boxes. “Lux! Hey, it’s me, it’s Jinx!”
“… J-Jinx?”
When Jinx dove behind the boxes, she found a tense shape huddled in a corner. Lux, usually so tall and golden and shining, looked impossibly small and mousy as she trembled in the box-pile’s shadow. She looked up with eyes that were too wide, too watery, and too heart-breakingly frightened. Lux usually glowed uncontrollably when she was startled, but now, all around her was dark.
Without hesitation, Jinx dove beside her, snaring Lux into a hug. “It’s alright, Sunbeam. I’m here. I’ve gotcha.”
Letting her face fall onto Jinx's shoulder, Lux sobbed. Trembling arms rose to mirror Jinx’s gesture, one catching her waist, the other snagging her neck. For once, Lux’s grip was just as firm and desperate as Jinx’s.
Through her raging emotions, Jinx distantly noticed that the wetness on Lux’s fingers felt oddly sticky for rainwater.
The pair rested in each other’s arms for several seconds – minutes? Maybe ten minutes? The early evening’s anger was far from Jinx’s mind as she reassured herself with the solid feeling of Lux in her arms. Lux should’ve been warmer, Lux should’ve been dryer, and they both should’ve been safe in one of their bedrooms, but they were together. Everything would be okay as long as they were together.
“Jinx?”
Jinx gave her partner a reassuring squeeze. “You feelin’ alright, Sunbeam?”
“… I... I did something bad.”
“Oh yeah?” Not letting her grip waver, Jinx tucked her face against Lux's hair, just over her ear. “How bad?”
“I… W-we...”
“… it’s okay. Take your time.”
Lux shuddered – a devastating, full-body shudder that Jinx could feel rattling through Lux’s ribcage and into hers. “We went to a house uptown,” she told Jinx. "Sylas said we were going to do an... An initiation there. That he'd tell me what they all banded together for, and I'd really be one of th-them.“
Jinx grit her teeth. Sylas. Of course this trouble all started with fucking Sylas. "What happened after you got to the house?"
"A man lived there, with his family. Sylas said the man was someone who... who'd hurt him, someone who would hurt us, and then… Sylas… He…”
"..." Jinx smoothed a soothing hand over the waterlogged shirt at Lux's back. "What did he do, Sunbeam?"
“… He took something,” Lux whispered, and the fear in her voice sent an awful shiver up Jinx’s spine. “I could feel it. He took something from me, from the others too, and he used it to… to…” A shrill whimper broke from her throat. “Jinx, I should’ve l-listened to you. I sh-should’ve...”
Jinx shushed her firmly. “Shhh… It’s okay. Just tell me what happened.”
“He k-killed them. The whole f-family. He took something from me and used it to k-kill them.”
Lux’s voice dropped off for a few seconds, and her words rang numbly through the cold air.
Oh, Jinx thought, her heart dropping. Shit.
“... Sylas put his hands on their bodies, and… There was so much blood on his hands. I couldn’t move; I just stood there while he walked up to me and held my hands, with the blood, and he… He said, now that I’d joined them, they were strong enough to kill everyone who stood against us. But...” Lux shook her head roughly, jarring her cheek against Jinx’s. “I didn’t want anyone to die… I didn’t want to… That family… The kids… I ran away after he touched me, but… It… It’s my fault… It’s my fault…”
“No,” Jinx said firmly as Lux broke down in her arms. She could feel Lux’s fingers, tacky with a dead family's blood, digging into her skin. “It’s not your fault,” Jinx insisted. “It’s not, okay?”
“… Jinx, w-what do I d-do now?”
Fuck. Lux sounded so scared, and hurt, and powerless, and she wasn’t supposed to sound like any of those things. It wasn’t right for Jinx’s bundle of sunshine to be sad. Gently, Jinx asked, “Did anyone see what happened? Aside from Sylas and his crew?”
“Th-the house was full of cameras. Sylas led us by them, looked right into them. I think… I think he wanted people to see what he could do. What he could use me to do.”
“Alright then.” There. There was a way Jinx could make everything better. “Don’t worry about a thing. I’ll take care of the cameras before the cops even know what happenned; you just gotta show me which house to sweep.”
“No!” Lux squeaked. “If you end up recorded too… What if the police think you were involved? Or what if S-sylas gets mad about you interfering?”
“C’mon, you know I’m good at sneaky shit,” Jinx replied, injecting confidence into her voice. “No one’s gonna catch me.”
“J-jinx…”
“You trust me, right?”
Lux’s breath hitched. Her trembling stilled as she pulled Jinx ever tighter against her body, her nails painful as they carved divots into Jinx’s skin. “M-more than anyone,” she whispered. “But…” Taking a deep, shuddering breath, she said in a tone that utterly failed to be even, “I should be the one to take out the cameras. I’m already on video; I can’t get incriminated any more than I already am. I… I don’t want you to get hurt because of what I did when I… When I didn’t listen to you. Jinx… You don’t owe me any care, not after what I said to you. What I let Sylas make me believe.”
Jinx huffed. “You don’t have to owe me shit,” she scoffed. “You’re not doing this alone. I’m with you, no matter what.”
The body in Jinx’s arms sagged, going suddenly limp. When Jinx peeled back to scan Lux’s face, her partner looked terribly tired, as if she’d lived a whole, hellish lifetime in a single night. Jinx’s heart panged to see her like this – she wished the night could be over for Lux, but she had a feeling that no amount of coaxing would make Lux leave her to take down the deceased’s security cameras alone.
Was it wrong that a part of Jinx felt glad that Lux would cling to her side after a night like this? Who knew. Maybe Sylas had been onto something when he’d told Lux that Jinx was the jealous type.
She’s my Sunbeam, Jinx thought bitterly to herself. Not his, not anyone else’s. That’s all that matters.
“I think he might try to find me again,” Lux murmured numbly. “He wants me on his side. He’s not just going to let me go.”
Fury writhed like a viper in Jinx’s gut. “Maybe he needs a taste of his own medicine,” she said darkly. “Want me to kill him for you?”
Lux bowed her head, squeezing her eyes shut. “Jinx…”
“I’m serious.”
“… I know,” she said softly. “You shouldn’t be so willing to kill for me, after the way I treated you. You should be mad at me. You warned me something bad would happen. I don't understand why you bothered to pick up when I called.”
Jinx shook her head slowly. “When I’m mad at you," she said, "when I’m so fuckin’ furious that I can’t even think straight... I’ll still have your back. Yeah, I’d kill for you. I’d burn that fuckin’ house down to clear up the evidence, then torch the rest of the city just to make extra sure that Sylas and his pals go to hell.” Placing her hands just over the knees of Lux’s trousers, Jinx curled her hands into the fabric, steadying herself as she pinned her burning gaze onto Lux. “Whether you want my help or not, I’m not letting you go.”
Tears beaded at the corners of Lux’s eyes.
When her hand unstuck from the back of Jinx’s neck to instead palm her cheek, Jinx didn’t mind the way Lux’s fingertips drew tacky blood-trails across her skin. She leaned into the touch with a rush of need, closing her eyes and meeting Lux’s lips halfway.
They were both hungry and desperate to reaffirm their bond. Mouths sucked, teeth grated, and tongues lolled through open lips. With a feral moan, Lux dragged Jinx into her lap, and Jinx succumbed easily to her whim, letting her knees spread on either side of her partner’s waist.
It felt like a small eternity passed before Jinx came to, her sweat-slick forehead pressed against Lux’s, heat radiating through her despite the night's cold as she panted out gasping breaths.
“We’ll worry about Sylas later,” Lux whispered against her lips, her breath tasting sweet on Jinx’s tongue. “Let’s focus on destroying the cameras, and then…”
“… Then you’ll stay over at my place,” Jinx rasped, her voice haggard from loss of breath. “I’ll be your alibi if someone sniffs this murder back to you.”
“Thank you.” Lux dropped a soft kiss on Jinx’s lips. “I love you so much.”
As rapid as the rain, hot satisfaction poured into Jinx’s body, flooding her chest until she felt full and warm.
That’s right, Jinx thought. You love me. You’re mine.
“I love you too, Sunbeam," she assured her. "Now, let’s go destroy some evidence!”