Chapter Text
Adaine would say that she is a cautious person. Years of walking on eggshells living in the Abernant ‘home’ would do that to a person. The constant fear of being punished for something as small as a sock being too tall or short. The rare sneaking into the kitchen to fetch a scrap of food after hours because she had been sent to bed without supper. The struggle of becoming the elven oracle didn’t help her case either. But Adaine’s oracle abilities would sometimes get confused. The intensity of an attack would override her senses, and Adaine couldn’t tell the difference between prophecy and panic.
All this to say, whether Adaine was a cautious person or not didn’t matter now. Not when Kristen’s clay corn statue was shattered on the ground. The corn statue Kristen created at corn summer camp when she was 9.
Adaine and Kristen had been hanging out in the redhead’s room supposedly studying. All anyone in the manor could gauge was that the two were screech laughing about something Kristen had brought up for the better part of a half hour. Whenever Kristen stood to show the oracle a horrifying yoga pose she learned to praise Helio with at another corn summer camp, she inevitably tripped over her own feet.
Adaine, being the seer that she is (and not totally knowing that Kristen has horrible dexterity) jumped up with the redhead in an attempt to soften the landing. In doing so, when Kristen fell into Adaine, she knocked the oracle into the bookcase while stabilizing herself. As soon as her elbow hit the wood, the world flipped on its head.
Adaine could see the outcome before the statue hit the floor. She could see the outrage and disappointment about to be thrown her way. She could see the tears in Kristen’s eyes as Kristen knelt down to where the shards lay. She could see the hatred in her eyes as Kristen shoved Adaine out of her room, proclaiming ‘you’re not my sister, you bitch.’ Adaine had never been called a bitch by Kristen before. She could feel the tears streaking her face as she sobbed an ‘I’m sorry’ at the locked door.
But the last part wasn’t just in her head. The tears were real. The I’m sorries were real. Before she knew it, Adaine threw herself to the floor, clutching at the clay shards littering Kristen’s hardwood.
“I-I’ll fix it! I-I’ll glue it ba-ack!” She stuttered out, waiting for something that would never come. The oracle kept grabbing pieces and trying to fit them back together into something resembling corn, but every time a shard was placed, another would fall out of alignment.
Adaine didn’t care how much it hurt when a stray piece sliced her hand as she picked it up. She didn’t care that drops of red were dripping down her hand. She didn’t care that there was going to be a star shaped bloodstain on the very edge of Kristen’s yellow rug.
Or maybe she did. She couldn’t tell. All the oracle could tell was that her hands weren’t working right, and she had to fix the mess, and that Kristen was angry, and-
Warm hands covered her own. Comforting hands. Freckled hands. Kristen’s hands.
Adaine looked up, tense and terrified. But what she saw in Kristen’s eyes wasn’t fury or hatred or disappointment. It was concern. Concern for her.
Through the fuzz in her vision and the blood in her ears, the oracle could tell Kristen was trying to get her to copy her breathing. The redhead took an exaggerated breath and Adaine tried her best to comply. Her breath was shallow and ragged, and nowhere close to the level of good that Kristen’s was. So she tried again. And this time was better. Deeper, less ragged. Kristen looked proud.
The oracle kept breathing, eventually getting to the deep breaths that Kristen was taking. If a little shaky. She looked up again. The concern had not wavered.
“Adaine? You there now? You ok?” Kristen asked, trying to keep her voice quiet. In her Kristen way, it still came out as a half shout.
“I-I’m sorry, I-I’ll fix your corn… I didn’t mean to-” Adaine started, her breathing picking up once more.
“Hey girlie, girlie, no, I don’t care about the corn. I care about you.” She said, and the oracle could tell she was being genuine. “And Adaine? Let’s not squeeze the broken corn.”
Adaine looked down to find that, yes, in fact, she had been tightening her grip on the shards unconsciously. Her hands relaxed, and a few pieces fell to the floor as Kristen cast a cure wounds on her. The cuts sealed themselves shut, though the red stain was still there.
“Are you ok, Adaine?” Kristen asks again. The oracle manages a weak nod, her tears slowing.
“I’m sorry about the corn. I’ll fix it.” She repeats again, and Kristen shakes her head.
“Quit it with the corn, come here.” Before Adaine can protest, Kristen grabs her by the shoulders and wraps her in a bear hug. A moment later she relaxes and lets herself be held. She lets herself soak in the love of someone who cared. They stay like that until Kristen gets fidgety and they clean up the mess together.
A few hours later the redhead and the oracle glue the pieces back into a shape that resembles the corn it once was. Kristen exclaims once it’s finished that it’s better than ever now that Adaine helped her rebuild it.
Adaine smiles knowing that even though she screwed up by knocking into the shelf, Kristen still loved her. That she would forgive her for such a screw up.