Chapter Text
November rolled in like a steam train and the first week and a half flew by. Jeremy couldn’t believe that it had already been ten days since the happenings on Halloween. Now the second week was almost coming to an end. It was time to get ready for Mid-terms.
He quietly sat at his desk, the sound of the clock ticked softly across the room. Jeremy sighed as he hunched over his History notes.
“So, America’s expansion of the Caribbean didn’t start until the late 19th century…Puerto Rico in 1898, Cuba in 1898 and again in 1906, Haiti in 1915, Dominican Republic in 1916 and the U.S. Virgin Islands in 1917,” he muttered. “Why did I take History again?”
A knock came at his door, and he turned. Joshua was standing across the room, arms folded nervously over his chest.
“What’s up Joshua?” he asked.
“Mom’s called a family meeting,” Joshua replied.
Jeremy rolled his eyes, sighed, and pushed himself out of his chair. His mother calling a family meeting could only mean bad news. But, he had to go or else she would have a fit. Jeremy crossed the room and hung his arm around Joshua’s shoulders.
“Come on bud,” he said.
In silence the two made their way downstairs, where the family was already sitting in the dining room. His mother, Mathilda, and step-father, Warren, were sitting at the head of the table. Bryson, Annalise and Noah sat on either side of them. Joshua and Jeremy sat in the remaining empty chairs.
“Thank you all for coming,” Mathilda said.
Leave it to his mother to run this like a business meeting. Still, Jeremy had to remind himself to not roll his eyes and keep his mouth closed until his mother had finished talking.
“So, as you all know, Bryson has been asked to leave Harvard due to his lack of academic integrity,” Mathilda explained.
Good, he finally needs to face the consequences of his stupidity, Jeremy thought to himself.
“However, education is still very important to us. So, we’re working hard to transfer him to a new University so that he can complete his degree,” Mathilda finished.
Jeremy scoffed. “No matter how many times he transfers, or how much money is thrown at a school, Bryson will never finish his degree.”
All eyes were soon on Jeremy.
“What was that?” Bryson snapped.
“You heard me,” Jeremy replied.
“Jeremy, apologize at once!” Mathilda shrieked.
Jeremy slammed his hands onto the table as he got to his feet. “No, I’m sick and tired of the family constantly paying for Bryson’s mistakes!”
“Well, at least I’m not gay,” Bryson hissed.
There was a moment where Jeremy could hear nothing but his blood in his ears. Before he knew it, he found himself jumping across the table and tackling his brother to the ground. The rest of their family jumped to their feet. Jeremy could hear his mother screaming in the background as the two wrestled on the floor.
Fists and knees flew at each other as they slammed into the wall, knocking a family photo off the wall. Hands grasped at them and they were pulled apart. Bryson pulled away from his step-father as he wiped away blood from his mouth. Meanwhile, Jeremy sat with his arms dangling over his knees, Joshua and Noah hovering over him.
“Jeremy, I think it’s best that you leave,” Mathilda said.
Jeremy clenched his hands into fists. “Bryson fails out of University, and outs me, and I’m the one that needs to leave?”
“You were the one that started the fight with your brother. We will deal with Bryson’s behaviour independently,” she replied sternly.
Jeremy scowled and got to his feet. “Fine, I’ll go…”
“Jer,” Joshua whispered, placing a hand on his brother’s shoulder.
Jeremy looked sympathetically at his brothers before looking at his mother again. “You have to promise me that Noah and Joshua will still get their inheritance despite my absence.”
“Of course, they have done nothing wrong,” Mathilda reassured.
Jeremy turned to his brothers and ruffled their hair. “It’ll all be fine, I’ll still see you at school.”
Jeremy could already see Joshua and Noah recede in on themselves. He puffed out his cheeks and pulled them both in for a hug.
“Careful, wouldn’t want to catch Gay,” Bryson snapped.
Jeremy shot Bryson a look before going to his room. It didn’t take him long to pack. All he needed were his uniforms, books, toiletries and extra socks and boxers. By the time he made his way to the front door, everything was silent. No one even bothered to come to the door to see him off. Without another word he left.
As he made his way to his car, he dialed Jean. The phone rang…and rang…and rang. But there was no answer. He hung up as there was no point in leaving a message. As he slipped into his car, he dialed Laila. Again, he listened to the familiar ringing. After three rings, Laila picked up.
“Hey Jeremy, what’s up?” Laila asked.
“I got kicked out,” he replied. There was a long pause on the other end of the phone. “You still there?”
“Yeah, I’m still here…what the fuck happened?” Laila asked.
“Bryson happened,” Jeremy said. “Mom said that he was kicked out of his University, and you know I can’t keep my mouth shut. Bryson outed me.”
“Motherfucker, I want to punch him so badly right now,” Laila growled.
“As nice as that sounds, I really don’t want my friends to get in trouble on my behalf,” he sighed. “Anyways…can I stay with you and Jean for a bit?”
“Of course, Jeremy! I’m with Cat right now but Jean should be home to let you in,” Cat explained.
“Jean’s not answering his phone,” Jeremy said.
“Fuck,” Laila hissed. “Then Elodie should be there. I’ll be home in a bit.”
“Thanks Laila, I owe you one,” Jeremy replied.
“Dude, you’re family, okay? See you soon,” Cat said.
“Yeah, see you soon.” He heard the phone go quiet as he started his car and drove off.
~~
Laila hung up the phone and rested her back against the wall in the hallway. When she had taken the call from Jeremy, she figured that he had forgotten his notes from class or wanted to talk about their most recent Exy practice. She hadn’t been prepared to hear that he had been kicked out of the house. But it wasn’t surprising. She had known that Bryson had returned home days before and it was only a matter of time before something broke and Jeremy paid for it.
The bedroom door opened just as she sighed. Cat poked her head out.
“Everything okay?” she asked.
Laila turned and rested her shoulder against the wall. “Not really, Jeremy’s been kicked out of the house because of Bryson.”
“Shit,” Cat replied, pulling Laila in for a hug. “Is there anything we can do?”
“He’s going to the apartment right now,” Laila began as she walked into the bedroom and flopped onto their shared bed. “Other than that I have no idea what else we can do.”
Cat joined Laila on the bed and hugged one of her pillows. “That’s a start. Once he’s settled we can brainstorm other ideas on what we can do to support him.”
Laila sighed and flopped back onto the bed and covered her face with her pillow. Cat squeezed Laila’s hand reassuringly.
“Come on, let’s go do something fun,” Cat said, tugging Laila off the bed.
“Just learned that my best friend’s been kicked out of his house. Not sure if anything will be fun at this point,” Laila replied.
Cat scowled. “Oh shut up and follow me.”
Laila remained silent and followed obediently as Cat led them through the second floor and downstairs. They arrived in the living room where James (Rhemann) and Adijan were sitting back to back holding their tarot decks. Currently, Adijan was holding a card up.
“The Six of Cups,” Rhemann said.
“Well done,” Adijan smirked. “Oh Cat, Laila, how can we help you?”
“We need to get our minds off something for a little while. I was wondering if you could give us a reading,” Cat explained.
Laila raised an eyebrow. “This is your idea of fun? Last time we did this, we had to save the city.”
Cat smiled. “Rhemann and Adijan don’t just give shitty readings, some of them are quite amusing…or at least they’re amusing when they tell me the stories.”
Laila clicked her tongue. “Fine.”
“Excellent, then let’s begin,” Adijan said as he got to his feet.
Rhemann joined him and the two men led the teens to their reading room. They took seats at one end of the table and were soon joined by Laila and Cat.
“So, what kind of reading are you thinking about?” Adijan asked, as he casually shuffled his deck.
“Oh, you know the standard three card reading,” Cat replied with ease. “Let’s see where our relationship will take us.”
“Very well,” Adijan said. He handed his deck to Cat. “What I would like each of you to do is shuffle the deck so it gets a sense of your energy.”
Cat took the deck, the cards were smooth in her hands, as she shuffled confidently. Without a word, she passed the deck to Laila. The cards were awkward, too big, in her hands and kept slipping as she attempted to shuffle the deck. Cat looked at Laila with amusement.
“Yeah, yeah, I know I’m hopeless,” Laila said as she passed the cards back to Adijan.
Adijan spread the cards out onto the table and wove his fingers together. “What I would like you to do now is each pick a card and I will pick the last.”
Laila and Cat stared at the cards. Again, with confidence, Cat chose her card and handed it to Adijan. Laila’s hand hovered over the cards, her heart pounding loudly in her ears. What if she picked the wrong card? Hesitantly, she chose a card and, also, handed it to Adijan. Now, it was time for the last card. Adijan closed his eyes as his hand moved over all the cards. There was tension in the air as Adijan continued for, what seemed like, forever. Soon, he pulled out a single card and placed it beside Laila’s card.
“So, this is how it’s going to work,” he began. “The first two cards will represent each of you and your role in the relationship. The last card will represent where your relationship will be going in future.”
Cat and Laila nodded.
Adijan smiled “Then let’s get started. Cat, you gave me your card first…”
He flipped the card to reveal the High Priestess. A woman dressed in blue robes and a crown, sitting upon a gold throne.
“When it comes to this relationship, Cat, you were the one who didn’t make the first move. You were patient when it came to Laila flirting with you and took the time to reflect on what you really wanted from the relationship,” he explained.
“Wow, that’s eerily accurate,” Cat said.
“Well, he has been doing this a long time,” Rhemann finally said.
“Laila, let’s see what your card means…” Adijan flipped the second card to reveal The Empress.
On the card was a blonde haired woman wearing a white dress with fruits and a crown of stars. She sat on a cushioned throne, holding a golden sceptre in her hand.
“The Empress…you were very confident in what you wanted and were the one to fall in love first. You’re passionate about being with Cat and are committed to making her feel happy and loved,” he said.
“Awe, that’s so sweet, Laila,” Cat said.
A smile spread across Laila’s face as she looked lovingly at Cat. “What can I say? I’m just that in love with you.”
“And now the final card…”
Eyes glanced down at the last face down card. Hearts pounding, breathing caught in chests. Adijan flipped the card to reveal the Ten of Swords card. On the card was a man lying on his stomach, seemingly dead, with ten swords stabbed throughout his body. Laila and Cat looked worriedly up at Adijan, who seemed to be lost in thought.
“This is not a card that I like to pull during readings like this,” Adijan finally said. “The Ten of Swords often represents an abrupt and painful ending. Something is going to happen where you will hit rock bottom and one of you will die.”
There was silence in the room. After a moment, Laila got to her feet, her chair squeaking under her, and she left the room angrily. Cat followed soon after.
“Laila!” she called.
“That went well,” Rhemann said.
~~
The house was everything that Jean had expected. Too big, too gaudy and too loud. The only reason why Jean had agreed to meet Zane was because Zane promised to show him how to control his dreams. And, if he was going to be any use to anyone, he needed to control them.
Jean sighed as he made his way up the steps towards the front door. Before he could even knock, the door swung open. Zane stood on the other side with a smile plastered on his face and his arms open.
“Jean! I was wondering when you would get your ass over here!” he said.
Without permission, Zane wrapped Jean in a hug before leading him inside. The inside of the house was just as bad as the outside. The foyer had been painted white with gold trim with a painting of the Reacher family hanging off to the side. The sound of music blared from one of the many side rooms. Zane ignored Jean’s obvious discomfort and motioned for him to follow him. Without argument Jean followed in silence.
As the two made their way further into the house, Jean’s eyes flicked over to one of the other rooms. Sprawled across the couch, in an unconscious state, was Zane’s mother; the lights from the television washing over her. How could someone live like that, Jean wondered.
“Take a seat,” Zane said.
Zane’s voice finally snapped Jean out of his own thoughts and he finally realized that they were in the kitchen.
“Oh, right,” Jean replied, slipping into one of the seats at the table.
Zane soon joined him with two sodas and pushed one towards Jean. He took it politely, even though he never drank them.
“So, you brought me here because you said you could help me with my dreaming,” Jean said.
“I sure can buddy,” Zane replied.
“Well, my question is, how?” Jean asked.
Zane wove his fingers together and pointed at Jean with both his index fingers. “Excellent question and to answer that, I will have to take you back a ways.”
Jean raised his eyebrows.
“You know Richard Gansey and his little rag-tag team of misfits right?” Zane asked.
“Yeah, who doesn’t?” Jean replied.
“Well, several weeks ago, while I was hanging out at Nino’s with a few classmates, I overheard them talking about these magical highways called Ley Lines,” Zane began as he cracked open his soda. “Apparently, they had woken them up and all sorts of magic was now stronger.”
“And how do you know that the magic around here is stronger?” Jean asked.
Zane sipped his drink before answering. “Because, since then, my own dreaming has been stronger.”
Jean crossed his arms. “Prove it,” he challenged.
Zane smirked and got to his feet. “Follow me.”
Jean got to his feet and followed Zane again. This time he led Jean to a door that, no doubt, headed down to the basement. Zane flicked the lights on and, in silence, the two descended downstairs. Jean’s eyes widened as his eyes locked onto shelves of Exy equipment. But it wasn’t just any Exy equipment. Zane had shelf upon shelf of Raven equipment and memorabilia. Jean would recognize the familiar red and black anywhere.
“Where did you get all this stuff? The only ones who have access to any of this are the…” Jean said.
“Ravens?” Zane smirked. “I told you that my dreams had become stronger since the Ley Lines awoke. I dreamed all these.”
Jean wasn’t sure what to say.
“Jean, I know that you can also do great things with the right amount of help. Do you want to take the first step into finding out how far you can go?” Zane asked.
“And how are you going to do that?” Jean replied.
“With this.” Zane fished around in his pocket and pulled out a green pill.