Chapter Text
Gideon often thinks about how she is one catastrophic event away from the worst case scenario. She tries to not let it get to her.
It is an extremely resilient feature of hers, among her extensive breadth of charming characteristics. It doesn’t matter that Gideon can only name two things to be of her utmost worldly possessions, and it doesn’t even matter that she only has enough cash to last one more month of rent. She has gone solo and is flying free since she was eighteen, and undoubtedly already escaped her worst case scenario, but there has always been the slight looming threat of financial doom following her trail since then. But Gideon continually releases her inhibitions, as the great Natasha Bedingfield once proclaimed. Wallowing in despair was never her personality trait.
In fact, it is exactly those powerful words what Natasha Bedingfield is proclaiming from the booming (albeit slightly crunchy) speaker of Gideon’s 1969 Chevrolet Nova. Painted obsidian black with the iconic 396 cubic inch v8 engine. Now that is her personality trait, and rightfully so. Her pride. Her joy. It was the first thing she purchased for herself that was not a necessity, but something she wanted with her entire being. All the grueling double shifts and odd jobs in between led her to a junkyard until finally to this beauty, and the sorry state of the car was not enough to bar Gideon from it. She brought her back to life through sheer will and Youtube tutorials, and now it runs nearly as well as its glory days of boogie nights, nature hippies, and the normalization of a certain powder white substance that Gideon painstakingly took two days and a serious arsenal of PPE to try and remove from the interior.
Anyway, it runs perfectly fine. Except when it doesn’t.
Also she just really, really likes the song unwritten by the iconic Natasha Bedingfield. So much so that Gideon needs to listen to the inspiring lyrics, the addicting beat, with extreme deafening volume, and not the deathly spluttering from beneath the hood of her car.
“Staring at the blank page before you, open up your dirty windows…” Gideon bellows over the sound and prays that she will roll into the parking lot in one piece. “Let the sun illuminate the words that you could not find!”
Her center console illuminates the time. 8:24pm. Her arms were pleasantly lit aflame as she tapped her finger to the beat of the song on the steering wheel. She had just finished moving the furniture and boxes of a geriatric couple that moved back into their old house after a brief stint at a retirement home. Gideon had snorted at their recount of their horrible experience, and they had only done so because they wanted to “try something new”. She wasn’t in the business to stick her nose in places it did not belong, and so she did what she did best: make some quick cash. It isn’t quite enough to do something about the gurgling sound in her car, but it is enough to settle the rumble in her stomach.
She reverses into an empty spot at the front of the gas station and thanks the universe that she had made it another trip. Gideon hops out and locks her door, and heads to the uncomfortably bright store. The door jingles but she doesn’t hear it; her headphones are snugly fit over her ears and she is grinning quite broadly because she indeed does have a pocket full of sunshine. The aisles are comically short in this specific gas station, so her head towers over the rows but that just makes it all the easier to find what she was looking for. She also notices that she is the only customer inside, which is more than fine with her. Gideon had traveled far and wide (ten minutes), tested the limits of her vehicle (bordering on empty), just so that she could make it to this exact location. To this exact moment.
Her eyes excitedly scan the extensive instant ramen selection and her mouth waters at the abundance. The diversity is what makes this trip worth it. The gas station being twenty four hours is just another pro. Gideon is already planning on just getting one of each, but a new flavor in the corner of her eye catches her attention. She was so enamoured with looking at the different selection that she had just noticed a dark figure kneeling at the end of the aisle. Her eyes flicker at the person, clearly unmoving, and returns her attention back to the ramen. Oo-kay. Average gas station experience. She is about to reach for the new flavor when she hears the door jingle, quite aggresively. It was the only reason why she was able to hear it through max volume of her headphones and her attention sharpens ever so slightly. For her sanity’s sake, she peers to the front of the store and sees her beautiful car, still sitting so pretty, and her concern lessens. As soon as she checks out, she is going to jump into her car and head straight home so that she could finally enjoy the ramen she was thinking about when she carried boxes up and down for hours. The fruit of her labor.
“Are you sure you saw her in here?” a voice hisses from the other aisle over.
“Yes,” another person replies. “Where else could she be? She has to be in here.”
Gideon is about to leave the ramen aisle. She is about to walk over to the half sleeping twenty something year old at the front so that she could pay with her pocket full of sunshine and leave this unsettlingly bright gas station until her next ramen restock. But she knows that the heads of the voices are about to turn the corner and against better judgement, Gideon walks over to the dark blob kneeling on the ground and stands right next to it- them? Her? Gideon isn’t sure, since the hood on the blob is drawn so tight that it is impossible to know who could be lurking underneath. But her sheer size should be enough to block their view and keep the person concealed, despite the stark contrast of black against the bright snacks behind them.
She doesn’t even know what she’s doing until her breath hitches as the figures peer down the aisle. Her luck is running high because they don’t even try to walk down; they just glance, narrow their eyes in defeat, and finally leave the store after a half ass search. Even while standing, Gideon can tell that the dark blob has released some of the tension in their body, like a pufferfish deflating after being puffed. Threatened.
This should have been the moment Gideon walked away, ramen noodles in hand. Instead, Gideon cocks her head to the side. The jingle on the door opens and like earlier in the night, it was just them two and the sleeping cashier.
“Coast is clear, I repeat: coast is clear.”
Her voice muffles into the palm of her hand, acting as a walkie talkie. The blob remains motionless, if not becoming even more still at the sound of Gideon’s poor sound effects.
“No enemy in sight,” Gideon continues. “Hold your position, coast is clear.”
After a few more seconds of radio silence, Gideon shrugs. Maybe they were sleeping. A part of her wants to inform the cashier that someone else besides them were sleeping inside the store, just to be a slight ass, but her energy has finally drained after trying to look intimidating to bar those people away. She had even flexed her arms, but she would do that even if there was no threat. In fact, Gideon is going to flex them now because why not-
“Griddle.”
Her muscles freeze.
The music in her headphones are playing softer now, having lowered the volume substantially since those people barged in. The voice doesn’t even match the song, but Gideon is desperately racking her brain for lyrics that Natasha Bedingfield has written that contains the word ‘griddle’. There has to be, because she hasn’t heard that word in years. Not even in McDonalds, or in any context unless it was-
Harrow. Harrowhark Nonagesimus, crouched on the floor, covered head to toe in black clothing with her chin held up high like she wasn’t the one playing dead like an opossum.
“Abort mission,” Gideon crackles into her walkie talkie, without breaking contact with Harrow’s undeniable bottomless eyes. “I repeat: abort mission-“
“Are they still outside?” Harrow interrupts icily.
God, it’s been five years and she still has the manners of an expired asshole. And yet, Gideon huffs and still peers over the aisle, and scans the outside of the store. There is nothing in sight besides her beautiful Nova, still right where she parked it. Her nose crinkles and looks back at Harrow to nod.
“Yeah, actually they’re heading back inside-“
The speed at which Harrow crumples into within herself was funny as hell, if not for the brief flash of genuine fear in her eyes. That baffles Gideon, to her core, because if this is the same Harrow that Gideon grew up alongside for the first eighteen years of her life, then there must be something truly terrifying in those people. An unfamiliar weight runs down Gideon’s spine and she sheepishly rubs her hand behind her neck.
“Wait- wait, I was just kidding- just kidding!”
Her tight cocoon was impenetrable, until Gideon kicked her softly with the tip of her shoe, which earned her a withering glare from the crack of her hood. Then she unraveled, slowly, and looked around rigorously to ensure there was no one around them. Her knees popped as she stood up and Gideon did not bother to hide her snicker. Harrow’s head didn’t even reach the top of the aisle.
“Loan sharks,” Gideon deduces triumphantly.
“What?” Harrow replied sharply. “No.”
Hmmmm. “You’re wanted by the police for popping all the balloons at a child’s birthday party?”
The scathing glare was neither a yes or no. But Gideon knows that law enforcement does not scare Harrow. Her curiosity is really getting to her now, to the point it’s sending prickles down her neck.
“What is it, Nonagesimus,” Gideon’s words drag, since she was still in glee at Harrow’s apparent discomfort. “Spit it out-“
“None of your fucking business, Nav.”
Her words are lethal. It cuts into Gideon, and it might have been because it was so long since the last time they spoke. Obviously, nothing much has changed considering Harrow is still lurking and being off putting, in a gas station at all places, and getting chased by even weirder people. A puff of anger exits Gideon and the show was mostly to hide the bruise of nostalgia that she is desperately hoping Harrow did not notice in the beginning. Sue her for trying to be a a good samaritan, and she would have turned on her heel and paid with her tap to pay just so that she wouldn’t have to wait for her change if she knew the the blob was actually Harrow-fucking-hark.
Her childhood nemesis. The bane of her existence.
Gideon’s worst case scenario.
“Yeah you’re right,” Gideon spits out before the satisfaction hits Harrow, “Getting involved in your twisted hide and seek of yours is not my speed.”
Her aura would have had signficantly more impact if there weren’t several different brands of instant ramen in her arms. Harrow’s face stiffens at the mention of hiding, and Gideon searches for the unexplainable look buried beneath the usual hostility. That was a mistake on Gideon’s part, because her memories remind her that the last time Gideon saw her, Harrow had sported this same exact look. Her haunted eyes kept Gideon up at nights wondering what it could have possibly meant.
Then, Harrow says casually, like a comment on the weather, “They’re my stalkers.”
Her words hit Gideon like she ran into brick wall. In most cases, people do not want to be in the same vicinity of a black hole. Or a dark void. There was just so much wrong with the statement, but Gideon realizes that the flash of true fear from earlier was real and not a figment of her imagination. Just moments ago they barged in, yet Harrow is still peeking over her shoulder every few seconds, trying to remain as vigilant as possible. Harrow has always avoided a state of relaxation by all possible means, but the exhaustion under her eye sockets are more intense than ever.
Gideon’s jaw clenches.
“So you thought curling into a ball inside a gas station was your best move?”
Harrow’s left eye twitches and answers irritatedly, “It was either that or get chased down the street.”
Now that the options were said out loud, Gideon too would have also chosen the gas station. Harrow is chewing on her lip, undoubtedly in an internal debate inside her head that has probably lasted for years. That has to be the only explanation why her face was always scrunched up the way it was, and why it hasn’t changed since they were children.
Everything about Harrow was so violently reminiscent and Gideon’s head began to hurt from looking at her for too long. It’s painfully obvious that Harrow is still attached to the dreadful nun fashion they grew up with inside the orphanage, as seen in her layered black clothing and shortly cropped hair. However, the changes in Harrow were subtle, like she had worn ebony instead of onyx, which is to say it looked the fucking same. But Gideon notices that she has twice the amount of piercings, and that her hair is curled at the ends, almost as if Harrow took the time to style it.
Her eyes snap upwards to Gideon after breaking out of her internal debate, and it was far too late to hide the fact she was studying her. Annoyance as clear as day flashed over Harrow’s heavily makeup’d face but so did the wave of color flushing her ears.
“Alright,” Gideon exhales, trying to start a fresh slate on the conversation. She opens her eyes and wasn’t expecting to see Harrow’s black orbs looking at her with an unbroken concentration. “I know what I’m doing here,” Gideon says, referring to the instant ramen in her arms. “But what are you doing here?”
“Your skill in retaining memory has not developed since the last time I saw you.”
Gideon rolls her eyes. “I know why you’re inside this gas station, numbnuts. What are you doing here?”
Between all the chaos that unraveled in the span of five minutes, it isn’t lost to Gideon that they are a couple hundred miles away from the damned orphanage. This is the furthest Gideon had the means to be away, but she knew Harrow wouldn’t have left the general vicinity even if she was dragged away in a strait jacket.
Harrow taps her foot, so reminiscent to an angry little Santa’s elf in a Christmas goth movie. Gideon would have bet that she would have been given a snarky remark on her mental capabilities, if Gideon had not spotted an even larger group of dark hooded figures looming closely to the front of the gas station. Her eyes widen at the sight ahead of her and Harrow already knows what that look means.
“Fuck,” Gideon whispers. She tosses the packs of ramen back to the shelf and before she could lose all courage, she reaches out to grab Harrow’s hood and puts it over her head so that Harrow could become an inconspicuous glob once more.
The sound of Harrow’s indignation was never foreign to Gideon, but to her ears, it was like coming home.
“Griddle, what the hell are you doing-?”
“We’re going to walk out, get in my car, and put you back from wherever the cat dragged you from.”
“I don’t need your help-“
“The only thing in between you and a crowd of people creepier than the bones you are so infatuated with- is me, my tenebrous overlord,” Gideon replies with forced sweetness. All it was really hiding was how she was going to be able to take on a crowd, but Gideon is confident it won’t be an issue. She’d be damned if she wasn’t the one to tear Harrow to shreds, and only hell would be met to those who would try beat her to it first.
Harrow huffs, but lets Gideon stand half a step behind her. Somehow, the twenty year old worker still hasn’t woken up from all their hushed yet snappish yelling, and Gideon has to give props to where it was due. The door jingles painfully loud, to the point that the crowd inevitably takes notice and snaps their neck to their direction.
The car is just a few steps away but Gideon had thoroughly underestimated the utterly feral speed at which they tried to run up towards Harrow. Gideon had just enough time to get in between and the descending crowd, by putting an arm out and securely keeping Harrow against the door of her car. There Gideon realized just how close she was to Harrow, and she tried to not make it obvious that she noticed the suppressed trembling behind her.
“Woah there, buddy,” Gideon spits out, her brain constantly sending reminders that these are still very soft and human creatures that she could crumple too easily with her fist. However, her words are their last warning, because they are awfully too close to Harrow for her liking. “You guys better watch out and leave her alone.”
A voice squeaks out and Gideon’s eyes widen at the crowd. Of course Harrow’s stalkers aren’t just regular stalkers; they have skulls painted on their faces. Greasy and thick alabaster white and black coat their faces in a specific design that Gideon knows that resides in a particular memory in the back of her mind, but she can’t quite put her finger on it. None of that matters except that it makes this situation worse by tenfold because if they are unhinged enough to run in the middle of the night with painted skulls, who else knows what they would do to Harrow.
“Please- I just need her to sign something-!”
Hot anger bursts from Gideon’s chest. She towers over them and grits her teeth.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Listen to me. I said leave her alone. Now.”
The words cast a spell among the crowd and they begin to dissipate, slowly. Most of them follow Gideon’s instructions but it irks Gideon to know that they are not as influenced by her as they are by Harrow, who is still almost completely blocked by Gideon’s frame. Their eyes are glued to the figureless sorry excuse of a form behind Gideon and the gap left by the vacuum of the crowd gives her enough space to unlock her door and help Harrow inside.
Once the door is slammed shut (she’ll apologize, and make Harrow apologize too to her beautiful Nova), Gideon turns back to the looming crowd. She narrows her eyes and for good measure, flexes her exposed arms. It does exactly what it needs to because as Gideon wraps around to her side of the driver’s seat, there are no meddling skulls close enough to be concerned.
The car turns on with a beautiful and lively roar and to say Gideon does not have the blood pumping in her ears would be a complete lie. She snaps on her seatbelt and glances at Harrow, who unsurprisingly sunk down to her seat with the hood still drawn. The top of her head just barely reaches the window and it wouldn’t matter anyway; Gideon bought the car with five percent tint that was still perfectly intact, even after years of sitting in a junk yard. Another ‘hell yeah!’ for the Nova.
With confirmation that Gideon’s bony package was somehow not left behind, she did the only thing she could do.
She put her car in drive and left Harrow’s group of skulls choking in an unpleasant smell of the Nova's exhaust.
-
“What the hell are you listening to?”
The rush has barely left Gideon’s ears, and so she lets Harrow’s words ring until it sinks in. Until everything really sinks in. Gideon keeps her eyes glued onto the road until it eventually leads her to a freeway exit. She still has no idea where to bring Harrow, and she doesn’t know how much luck she still has with her Nova. She has done wonderfully this entire night and it would be a shame to end it on the side of the road with a scowling Nonagesiumus in her passenger seat.
“Huh?”
A sound of frustration exits Harrow, a cross between a huff and a growl. She has slowly inched upward in her seat, although she has remained hunched forward. Her hood still covers most of her face but it was mostly so that the wind from the lowered windows do not violently smack into her skin, which is a feeling Gideon welcomes with relief and glee. Harrow begins to scavenge for something in the cup holders between them like a raccoon looking for their midnight snack. Gideon sighs and knows that waiting it out will be futile; Harrow on a mission is a major pain in the ass.
So Gideon reaches for beneath her ass and hands Harrow her phone. She could practically feel the satisfaction burning from the passenger seat and she scoffs. This is the best part to ‘The Sweet Escape’. Not in reference to escaping a group of stalkers from a gas station, but from the culturally significant 2006 pop song.
“Nothing wrong with a little Gwen Stefani,” Gideon refutes.
“I did not say anything about the artist,” Harrow hums as she taps Gideon’s phone screen. Then her pleased hums turn into a gasp of horror. She did not try to contain her look of disgust at the unnecessarily full brightness of her screen, nor was she hiding her pure contempt at her lock screen. “Your boundless admiration of your own self portrait is still nauseatingly disturbing.”
Maybe Gideon handed her phone to Harrow easily because she expected that exact reaction. All the shock and outrage, and it wasn’t even Gideon’s best selfie.
“I’m sure my sudden presence subdued all thought in that bony little brain of yours-“ (“Brain is not bony, Nav-“) “-but I have no idea where I’m driving to and gas ain’t cheap, night boss.”
For a few seconds, only the lyrics of the pop song reverberated between them. Gideon doesn’t mind it; her fingers tapped on the wheel to the beat of the song.
Then like most things that Gideon had liked in the world, Harrow had crushed it within her tiny little palm. The sudden song skip mid lyric in Gideon’s mouth crumpled in the air and before she could complain, a familiar tune began to play.
This perks her ears instantly, in a good away.
“Just because this song fucking rocks, I’ll let it slide that you skipped Gwen Stefani,” Gideon hums. Then she adds, “Whoever’s playlist this is has cunty taste.”
The sound of the drums and the guitar start the song intertwined, before it descends sharply into a beautiful emo punk drop. Her head rocks back and forth to the melody and the genre of the song fits the way this night is going. She wouldn’t say that there was a lot of angsty songs in her music library, but this song was played everywhere when it first dropped a few years ago, and for good reason.
It was a certified banger.
“Explain to me! This conspiracy against me!” Gideon bellows, rocking her head to the tune of the singer. “And tell me how I’ve lost my power!”
Gideon’s voice can’t quite reach the note, but of course she tries every time. The original singer’s voice is like cool water gliding through the band’s punchy instruments- and Gideon’s voice is reminiscent of a tone deaf hamster. She feels her throat scratch with how hard she is pushing the note out, but the vocalist effortlessly sings the lyrics with a skillful blend of emotion and intensity. The road ahead of her stretches and Gideon is content to just keep moving forward, at least until the song ends, but Harrow lifts her bony hand to an exit nearby. She follows the direction easily enough, and she lets the music blast through the silence between them.
Which is oddly what Harrow had become, right as the first riffs came off Gideon’s car speakers. It’s nothing short of strange to her, considering this is the type of music Gideon imagined Harrow to listen to. However, she does take into account that Harrow is not a regular human being. Her lack of emotion to angst filled lyrics most likely mean that Harrow is still attached to the gothic hymns that were the only available form of music back in Drearburh. This was probably nails against chalkboard to her ears.
“If you don’t like this song, then I don’t know what else to say,” Gideon rasps out, her voice thoroughly spent after three minutes of living vicariously as if she was the lead singer.
Harrow doesn’t budge, except to offer minute direction in the form of pointing turns at the last possible second. She is deathly still otherwise, and Gideon can feel a monumental wall suddenly dropped between them. It’s uncomfortable and cold, and in some strange luck, another song from the same band plays consecutively. This time Gideon does not know all the lyrics, since she had just added it just recently after hearing it on the radio.
Then with perfect stoicism, Harrow asks, “Big fan?”
The direction they are heading towards is the city, and Gideon is trying to rack her brain to what purpose Harrow has here. While she doesn’t want to play uber any more than she has to, Gideon wouldn’t drop her off at the sketchiest part of town just because Harrow asked. Maybe she would at the second sketchiest part, just somewhere preferably with at least a street light. Gideon shrugs with one shoulder at the question, until it finally clicks. There is a reason why there is a sudden shift in the way Harrow is acting, and Gideon’s face breaks with a shit eating grin. She is exhilarated at the realization.
Harrow can bury her intentions six feet underground, but Gideon will always figure it out with undying spite.
“You like the song I just played!” Gideon cries out in an accusatory tone. “You would rather rearrange your brain before you ever attempt small talk with me, Nonagesimus. You are a walking textbook definition of emo punk and teen angst! Of course you would like this song! I put you on!”
She could feel the fumes flare off Harrow and it simply sets Gideon into a fit of boastful laughter, the type that she feels warmly in her stomach.
“You did not ‘put me on’ to this music,” she dismisses with sharpness. “There is nothing on this playlist that I do not already know,” she adjusts her body so she faces away from the driver’s seat, and quips in the same breath, “and I do not have teenage angst.”
Her hand thrusts to turn left, and the sudden turn makes them lean in their seats. Gideon can see people walking in the street now, mostly younger, and they all somehow are wearing the same black platform shoes that Gideon knows is ridiculously overpriced. Harrow tugs on the hood over her face and her mouth is still pressed in anger at Gideon’s assumption.
“There must be a concert or event or something…”
“Truly astute observation.”
Gideon ignores it, and instead notices the humongous vintage theater sign that the crowd was congregating at. There was an electrifying buzz in the air, full of excitement and suspense. She tries not to feel embarrassed at her lack of familiarity with the experience, considering the closest concert Gideon had ever attended was Harrow’s third grade school performance where she played a tree with exactly one line. She had no choice, because if she even tried heckling the performance, Gideon would have been placed in the corner for the rest of recess.
Now she keeps her eyes locked onto the increasingly large crowds of people, and reads that they are waiting for ‘Canaan House; 10pm; Saturday’. The string of words are a distant memory to Gideon, and she doesn’t know where she read it before. Her eyes linger on the sign, so lost in trance that she nearly forgot that she was still following Harrow’s directions.
“Turn the corner and head inside the garage.”
Gideon narrows her eyes, almost completely sure that this entrance leads to the parking lot for the concert.
“Am I to assume that you deliberately cocooned yourself in a gas station so that I can find you? Just so that I could personally chaffeur you and your ticket to a concert?”
She could almost feel Harrow rolling her eyes underneath her hood.
“If so-,” Gideon clicks her tongue as she rolls to the security gate into the garage. “I have to respect the elaboration.”
She rolls her windows down and the security turns to face them. She doesn’t even know what to say, until Harrow leans over the center console to make direct eye contact. Gideon hadn’t expected it, so the unexpected graze of Harrow’s skin almost had her reeling back in her seat like she had touched lava.
“Public parking ended twenty minutes ago, folks-“
One look at Harrow and it was like he saw a ghost. Gideon watches as the security guard scrambles to press a button inside their booth, and soon enough the gate ahead of them lifts up.
“Oh thank god. Dve was breathing down my neck,” the security shudders. “Go through to level three. I’ll let them know you’re here.”
Harrow nods curtly and nonchalantly sits back into her seat. Meanwhile, Gideon still hasn’t moved an inch. This took a turn for the weirder, and she knows there is some crucial understanding that she is not a part of.
“Stop thinking so loud, Griddle,” Harrow says, breaking the spell and nearly making her full throttle the gas. “Or your brain is going to explode.”
So Gideon drives up to the third floor. Similarly, there is a gate that blocks the entrance but just like before, she rolled down the window and the security only gave a brief glance over to Harrow, and immediately granted access.
“What the fuck,” Gideon murmurs, over and over again as she notices a lone dark figure waiting by the elevators.
At the sight of the person, Harrow doesn’t quite shrink in her seat but she looks like she is bracing herself for impact. Gideon notices that Harrow is grimacing, like she is preparing herself for a battle. Whoever this person is, Gideon feels almost sorry for whoever is going to get the mean end of Harrow’s cold and cruel words. She’s just glad it isn’t here this time around.
“Just park at the curb,” Harrow’s command is icy, and maybe Gideon thought that she was in the clear too soon.
“You’re getting a zero out five on my post trip customer survey,” Gideon grumbles, finally putting the car in park.
She didn’t really think this far ahead. The stalkers will definitely not make it through multiple security gates, so Gideon has no reason to linger any longer. This whole ride was a fever dream and as Gideon looks ahead at the sight of the parking garage, she feels like she has unfinished business. After all, stumbling upon Harrowhark at a gas station was enough to bar her from her midnight ramen, her weekly dinner stash, and Gideon decides that maybe she has a hand in all of this.
She turns to Harrow and opens her mouth, but Harrow beats her to it.
“Absolutely not.”
“You didn’t even know what I was going to say!”
“Your ideas are more often ridiculous than viable, and so I have elected to ignore it.”
“Well I think your face is ridiculous and I elect to ignore that!”
“You can’t elect to ignore-“
The taps on the window finally break them out of their argument. It was rapt and urgent, from well calloused knuckles that Gideon instantly recognizes as someone who has worked at multiple combat sport and martial arts gyms. Even the figure’s sheer size casts a large shadow outside the window and Gideon feels her chest puff out, purely from instinct.
Harrow ignores the figure, which was a tremendous effort since they were right there, and she instead glares at Gideon. It feels like the first time tonight that she spared her a look, and the feelings that it spurs on makes Gideon’s stomach churn uncomfortably. It tumbles up and down in anticipation at whatever Harrow has to say, now that she finally gained her attention.
Not like Gideon wanted it. Harrow can go fuck off, just preferably without a deranged group of followers or a large ominous figure with a history of mixed martial arts.
“I admit, your presence tonight averted a crisis I had not ultimately prepared for,” which translated, meant that Harrow would have been ground beef if it wasn’t for Gideon. She looks at Gideon, with her bottomless black eyes. “I will ensure that you will be fairly compensated for all the trouble you endured tonight, especially from- my followers.”
The sentence dangles, but Harrow’s mouth is firm. She says nothing more and the silence was resembling the night she left Drearburh and Harrow behind. Except, the situation was in reverse and the anger and disbelief swirling inside Gideon was almost too much to convey.
The only thing Gideon can do is lean back in her seat.
“Sure. Whatever. My Venmo is gid_lifts_urmom.”
She wasn’t sure what she was expecting. Maybe a twenty dollar notification later, right when her car would inevitably rumble to a stop just outside the venue. Or maybe nothing at all and Gideon would just spend the rest of the night doom scrolling for odd jobs to figure out how to scramble up next month’s rent by the end of the week.
What Gideon was not expecting was to see Harrow take one starving look of her entirety. It was almost like she was trying to make up for avoiding her the entire night and put everything she had ever felt for in this one gaze. Her abysmal black eyes were darting all over Gideon’s face, searching deep below in her that it nearly made Gideon turn away from the intensity. The only reason why she didn’t was because Gideon never had before, and there was no reason to start now.
Then Harrow unbuckles her seat belt, and promptly exits the vehicle.
And she doesn’t even turn back.
Gideon could only watch as her figure descend away from the window, until she turns the corner and the figure that was once Harrow becomes a memory. Maybe she wasn’t even real to begin with, and she was just an optical illusion from Gideon’s unfed appetite. She knew how cruel Harrow could be, but this was just unfair. She was just here. It sends a spike through her heart because wow- that hurt. Only Harrow could inflict such cold damage with an equal amount of relief at the sudden emptiness of her presence.
And if she wasn’t positive that tonight was influenced by some toxin in the air that made everyone crazy, Gideon is truly convinced she has lost all marbles because she is unbuckling her seatbelt, completely hell bent on following her.
One small problem arises, in the fact that it actually wasn’t quite so small. She becomes face to face with the six foot something tank looming outside the entrance, and her face is as threatening as Gideon had expected. Her leathered skin has more scars up close and her shoulders make Gideon look small. She stands in front of her casually, not purposefully blocking Gideon but rather that she had happened to be plopped up right there.
Strangely enough, the person tilts their head at Gideon. A brief flash of shock passes over before acceptance. Her voice is as deep as Gideon expected, but it was liquid smooth and pleasant to anyones ears.
“What a sight for sore eyes.”
“Uh- do I know you?”
There’s silence. Gideon can’t read jack shit about body language, not like she had a history of being good at it. Her instinct still tells her that she wouldn’t have been able to guess, even if the woman wasn’t wearing dark sunglasses well after dark.
Her lips quirk upwards, like she said something humorous.
“We’ll get to that another time. Harrow has not talked about you in a while.”
The mention gives Gideon an abrupt shock. She puts the first part of the sentence on hold, only because the momentary revelation that Gideon existed to Harrow nearly made her knees wobble. She tries playing it cool, but knows she is failing with the shake of her voice.
“What? Like I’m the singular most awesome person in her entire world and had the pleasure of growing up alongside with?” Gideon asks weakly.
“Only that you have the most obnoxious eyes.”
She shrugs. “Can’t argue with that. The girls love my blazing hot irises.”
Even if they weren’t on the (strange) topic of Gideon’s ocular vessels, she could feel the magnitude of the woman’s gaze. It was so strong that Gideon could feel it shift away from her, only just past her to Gideon’s Nova.
“Your ride?”
Gideon can’t help but beam in pride. “My joy. ‘69 Nova.”
“I had a ‘72 Chevelle myself, when I was around your age. Best set of wheels I ever drove.”
There are more words threatening to spill out of Gideon’s mouth. Like who are you, why do you know me, what’s your gym routine to get your shoulders so big like that, where were you when I was a baby masc thrown head first into the world, and an infinity more. But none of that tumbles out of her mouth.
Instead, Gideon says, “You’re really cool. Although, I do need to get through to Harrow.”
“Everyone does, don’t they?”
“Yeah, but like trust me that I’m not a raging weirdo like the people I fought off at the gas station, so I’d really appreciate it if I could just squeeze past through you-“
“That wouldn’t help much, kid. She’s already on stage.”
Gideon falters. She must look like she slammed face first into a wall with how the woman looks at her. She’s thankful it isn’t with much pity, considering the situation. How foolish of Gideon to drive through literal signs of what was occurring, and to have passed through them without a second thought. Her heart drops right to her bottomless stomach and she can’t do anything except follow the woman, who had silently beckoned her.
They don’t speak, but the sound of the venue is getting louder and louder. Gideon passes by crew members in all black with headsets and she catches sight of various guitars and sound equipment and she isn’t even the one performing but her heart is literally about to beat out of her chest.
Finally they make it backstage, and the truth could not have been any clearer. Gideon’s mouth drops at the close up view of Harrow, center stage, with her face obscured with a painted skull. Her bony hands that were jabbing directions all night are now holding tightly to the mic stand and everything about her is so unfamiliar to Gideon, but so blaringly Harrowhark that she cannot tear her eyes away from her.
Gideon couldn’t have not seen her, especially with the enormous video screens capturing almost every angle of her image. A bead of sweat rolls down the side of her forehead and her eyes shut as she lets out the lyrics amidst the sound of the guitar shred and punchy drums.
“Explain to me this conspiracy,” Harrow roars out in perfect synchronization with the crowd chanting in tune. “And tell me how I’ve lost my power!”
Leave it to Harrow to make Gideon’s worst case scenario even more catastrophic, and look cunty doing it.