[Mostly because he's still hungover and it makes him way more suspecptible to suggestion, even when he knows she's just screwing with him. Does that stop him from shuddering from a shiver running down his spine? N O P E it sure doesn't!]
I am and you don't. It'd be so much easier for you if you did. But it does make me wonder what's in your head that you considered even for a second that I'd be there with you.
[Does she expect payback at some point? Oh yes. But it's trouble she's more than happy to receive.]
That's the problem, there's nothing in my head right now except fuzzy sleep-haze. Because sleeping for the next 13 hours sounds better than trying to face the world with the worst headache ever.
So you go back to sleep. Or if you don't think you can manage it, I bring you a sleeping pill or a glass of hot milk. Do you really have to do anything today?
And that was all she said until twenty minutes later when she was knocking on his door, bag in hand. He did look a little worse for wear, but she guessed that he didn't have as much experience with hangovers as she did. Maybe he was a little older than she was, but she'd done the party circuit for far too long.
"The patented Thea Queen hangover cure," she said, lifting the bag. "Ibuprofen for the headache, ginger ale for the nausea, Gatorade for the fluids, saltines for keeping it all down." She pointed past him back at the couch. "My first prescription? Get off your feet. Moving makes it worse, but I think you figured that one out."
There's a lopsided smirk on his lip as Cisco sets his phone on the table next to his bed after reading that last text. He's pretty sure she'll be here soon enough, so there's no sense in texting any more.
He wasn't wrong. Twenty minutes later, there's a knock at his door and he finds Thea on the other side with a bag to shove at him. "You're amazing." he mumbles tiredly, leading her toward the back of the apartment where his room was. Darker than the living room, which was better for that migraine he was still trying to force away. On the desk, there's a single lamp turned on for just enough light to see by.
Cisco drops back down onto the bed, pulling things out of the bag and lining them up on the table beside the bed.
Thea's smirk was almost dirty when she realized where he was leading her. Not that she could blame him because the dark would help, but did he really expect to lead her into his bedroom, to his bed, and for her to have nothing to say?
"Usually people say that after leading me to the bed, not during. And the leading to the bed is usually after the drinking but before the hangover. You're doing this in completely the wrong order, Cisco." She got onto the far side of the bed so she could purposefully crawl over to him and she kissed the corner of his mouth.
"We could fix that, I suppose, but you might not enjoy it until the hangover's gone. I guess I'll have to make do until then."
Maybe she'd leave this particular part out of the story this would inevitably make.
He doesn't ever expect Thea to not have something to say at this point. "Yeah, well, you know, why do things in proper order when you can have chaos?" he smirks, but it fades into something more like a genuine smile as she crawls across him and settles next to him. He'ws kind of miserable right now and glad for the company.
"Might be best to wait on that one. Just a bit." He grabs the medicine and a bottle of gatorade to wash a few pills down with before setting it back on the nightstand and flopping on his side, facing Thea. "Wanna watch a movie or something?" Because what else is there to do in his tiny, boring apartment? "I'll even let you pick." Which could potentially be dangerous, if she decides to be ridiculous about it, but that's a risk he's willing to take.
What else indeed? Except not when he had a hangover and not when they were still doing this dance between them. Whatever it was. Still, it felt a little too comfortable to be curled up on his bed next to him. She kicked off her shoes and settled herself more comfortably. "Maybe Star Wars? You can tell me all about how wrong the science is and I can tell you how Greedo shot first."
And okay, maybe the closeness was making her a little uncomfortable since she felt she had to troll him while he wasn't feeling his best, but it was the price they were both going to have to pay.
"Or else we could go with Clueless. Your choice." Star Wars versus ridiculous chick flick. Which one would he pick?
He doesn't even move from where he's propped up, only perks a brow at her, "Do you even think there's a deicision in those choices?" He smirks and shakes his head, instantly regrets this terrible life choice when it makes the pounding in his head worse and rolls onto his back to lean back against the pillows. "Star Wars. Obviously."
He wonders if she just secretly wanted to watch it and that's why she gave such a ridiculous other option. "And just so you know, you're wrong. Han shot first."
Secretly? She didn't secretly want anything except things that were bad for her. Or maybe not bad for her, but bad for someone else. She was bad for people. But here she was anyway.
"I don't know. You could be a closet Alicia Silverstone fan. Or Jane Austen fan. Never know." She grabbed the remote and ended up squirming a little closer to him as she searched Netflix. "I assume we're skipping the Jar-Jar horror show?"
But then there was no chance to give an opinion because the movie, the real movie with Luke and Leia and Han, was starting up. She leaned in and murmured in his ear, "Greedo. All the way."
“Alicia Silverstone was cute for the 90’s. ...Whatever happened to her, anyway?” He gives a facial shrug and moves on pretty easily from that. “It’s like you read my mind.” He grins a bit, all too amused at the way she didn’t wait for his answer anyway. He shakes his head a little at the whisper in his ear, but doesn’t say anything about it.
One thing that Thea may or may not have noticed when they’ve hung out before is Cisco? He’s a snuggly person. At least, he is with people he’s comfortable with. And it’s sort of amped up to 20 when he doesn’t feel good. So she might notice that as the movie progresses, he inches closer and eventually, he has his head on her shoulder.
It had nothing to do with him. Or maybe it had something to do with him and something to do with her. She usually didn’t have a problem with physical contact, but things with Cisco weren’t exactly usual and the fact of his hair tickling her neck every time he breathed didn’t help matters. But neither the movie nor the hair that kept distracting her were at the forefront of her mind. Instead, it was the cause of the hangover. She’d never seen Cisco as much of a partier and she had a feeling that she wouldn’t see Barry or Caitlin or the new Harrison she’d heard about having just as much of a hangover.
Eventually, her body got used to the contact and even to the hair and she rested her cheek against his head. Her eyes watched the movie, but her mind considered what was going on. She hadn’t seen any sign of Barry outside and she’d heard that he’d moved to Cisco’s until he found his own place. Either he’d found a place already or…
“So how bad did Barry screw up?” she asked, softly enough that he could pretend not to have heard it if he didn’t really want to answer.
Cisco is perfectly content laying here, watching a movie he’s seen a billion times and can quote from start to finish if he wanted, with little to no talking breaking up the movie. Just time to chill and not think and lose himself to something that was far better than the hand he’s been given. The hand dealt to him by someone who was supposed to be his best friend. He still doesn’t know how to feel about any of it. He hates it, he knows that much. He’s angry and he’s hurt, and he can’t pretend to understand how Barry thinks it was okay, that no one else mattered the way he did. His parents, his family, his life, it was all that he cared about and it hurts more than Cisco wants to admit.
He’s pretty zoned out, absorbed into the movie when Thea speaks up. Hits the nail right on the head in the first go because of course she’d piece it together. He tenses at the question and he’s silent for a long stretch. Finally, he mumbles quietly, “I- I don’t wanna talk about it.” Even if he probably should.
Thea’s hand caught his and she slid their fingers together. So whatever it was, it was pretty bad. He was willing to admit it was something, but couldn’t bring himself to talk about it. Sometimes she thought that Barry, for all his morality and eagerness, reminded her of her brother. He could be thick-headed sometimes and she couldn’t help but wonder what he’d done now. But as much as she wanted to know, Cisco wasn’t talking.
She sighed a little and her thumb absently ran along the length of his as she tried to bring her attention back to the movie instead of the dilemma that was Cisco and Barry.
Unless she was prepared to either badger Cisco or leave him to find out from someone else, she was going to have to wait for her answer and neither was an option at the moment.
Cisco is quiet for awhile after that. He’s not necessarily focused on the movie anymore, but he’s good at pretending and he’d rather fake it than pretend he has the spoons to actually deal with anything that is real life right now.
Except the longer he sits here, pretending nothing’s wrong now that it’s out in the open that something is, the more it seems to weigh on him. The more it weighs on him, the harder he finds it to not say something. The words tumble out of his mouth before he has time to think about them or even consider stopping himself from saying them. “He changed everything, Thea. He ruined our lives.”
“Changed?” she repeated, frowning at his use of the word. It obviously had some deeper meaning that she wasn’t seeing. She had to admit that he’d been different since his brother died. There hadn’t been the prank wars that had come to be there thing, even if things still seemed lighter between the two of them than they seemed with the rest of the team.
Not that she’d seen the rest of the team much. Not since she’d stopped hiding and had convinced Ollie that she wasn’t putting on the Speedy suit again. She’d come to see Cisco a few times and was using the money she’d acquired from Malcolm to make sure she always had a ride to and from Central City. She hadn’t quite bought herself a jet, but she had first class tickets whenever she made her way over.
“None of the stuff that’s been happening is supposed to be. Probably. There’s no way to tell, really, I guess, but--” He shakes his head and pushes himself to sit up, flicking the tv off because honestly, it doesn’t matter any more. He won’t be able to go back to it right now anyway. “After we defeated Zoom...Barry went back in time and stopped his mother from being killed. And it created another timeline, and...then he tried to fix it, and set everything back the way it was and...it didn’t work like he thought it would. It’s not the same.”
She’s not wrong in thinking it’s something bigger, deeper than the hollow explanations he’s given so far. The part that bothers him the most, the part that hurts the most is what’s next. “Dante was alive in the other timeline.” The words are quiet and his voice shakes a little with the weight of them.
She closed her eyes. Well, damn. On the one hand, she knew what she’d do to bring her mother back. She’d been in the position Barry had; she’d seen it happen. She’d gone through a hell of a lot to fix her own mistake and bring Sara back, despite everything Malcolm warned her would happen. They’d only gotten her back because of someone Ollie happened to know. She knew what it was like, too, to have your choices come back to haunt you. Her choice to leave with Malcolm was what had led to Sara’s death in the first place.
But she also knew what it was like having your entire life rearranged because of someone else’s choices, something you never had a say in and weren’t able to change. If Ollie had never run off with Sara, if he had never done whatever he’d done to Slade Wilson, their mother would still be alive. If he’d trusted her instead of trying to keep her ‘safe’, she wouldn’t have run away in the first place.
She probably would have done the same thing in Barry’s place, but she also knew too keenly what it was like to be in Cisco’s. She took his hand again and squeezed it tightly. “I’m sorry.” What else was there she could say?
He squeezes her hand back, just to assure himself he’s not alone, but he’s quiet, not really sure what to say for a moment. “I must have asked him a thousand times to go back so we could fix it, so I could save Dante. He refused. Over and over, he gave me all these excuses about how we can’t, how he’d never do that, but…” He shrugs one shoulder. “I guess what he really meant was that he’d never do it for anyone else.”
He’s so twisted up inside about all of this and he doesn’t really know what to do about it. He’ll do his job, he’ll help with metas the same as he always has, but everything between Cisco and Barry is changed. Maybe beyond a point of repair. Cisco isn’t sure you get to come back from being the reason a family member is dead.
There was a question in the back of Thea’s mind that she wasn’t ready to voice yet. That she didn’t think Cisco was ready to consider yet. That the very reason Barry was reluctant to go now was that he’d changed so much the last time. But she wasn’t ready to work out the logistics of that and the last thing Cisco needed right now was reason. For someone to explain away his hurt.
“It makes you wonder what else has changed,” she said softly. “The metaphor movies always give is dunking a rock in a lake and seeing the ripples expand. Is my life any different?” Okay, so maybe she wasn’t ready to accept reason, either. The idea that her life might have been different was definitely terrifying. What if she’d actually...been happy? No Malcolm in her life, no death.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2016-11-27 05:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-11-27 07:19 am (UTC)[Mostly because he's still hungover and it makes him way more suspecptible to suggestion, even when he knows she's just screwing with him. Does that stop him from shuddering from a shiver running down his spine? N O P E it sure doesn't!]
no subject
Date: 2016-11-27 07:22 am (UTC)[Does she expect payback at some point? Oh yes. But it's trouble she's more than happy to receive.]
no subject
Date: 2016-11-27 07:29 am (UTC)That's the problem, there's nothing in my head right now except fuzzy sleep-haze. Because sleeping for the next 13 hours sounds better than trying to face the world with the worst headache ever.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-27 09:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-11-28 04:38 am (UTC)But company would be kinda great.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-28 05:03 am (UTC)...you promise not to throw up on me?
no subject
Date: 2016-11-28 05:41 am (UTC)Swear. Come on. Come keep me company. We can watch movies and be bums for the day.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-28 06:30 am (UTC)And that was all she said until twenty minutes later when she was knocking on his door, bag in hand. He did look a little worse for wear, but she guessed that he didn't have as much experience with hangovers as she did. Maybe he was a little older than she was, but she'd done the party circuit for far too long.
"The patented Thea Queen hangover cure," she said, lifting the bag. "Ibuprofen for the headache, ginger ale for the nausea, Gatorade for the fluids, saltines for keeping it all down." She pointed past him back at the couch. "My first prescription? Get off your feet. Moving makes it worse, but I think you figured that one out."
no subject
Date: 2016-11-29 05:32 am (UTC)He wasn't wrong. Twenty minutes later, there's a knock at his door and he finds Thea on the other side with a bag to shove at him. "You're amazing." he mumbles tiredly, leading her toward the back of the apartment where his room was. Darker than the living room, which was better for that migraine he was still trying to force away. On the desk, there's a single lamp turned on for just enough light to see by.
Cisco drops back down onto the bed, pulling things out of the bag and lining them up on the table beside the bed.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-29 05:52 am (UTC)"Usually people say that after leading me to the bed, not during. And the leading to the bed is usually after the drinking but before the hangover. You're doing this in completely the wrong order, Cisco." She got onto the far side of the bed so she could purposefully crawl over to him and she kissed the corner of his mouth.
"We could fix that, I suppose, but you might not enjoy it until the hangover's gone. I guess I'll have to make do until then."
Maybe she'd leave this particular part out of the story this would inevitably make.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-29 03:28 pm (UTC)"Might be best to wait on that one. Just a bit." He grabs the medicine and a bottle of gatorade to wash a few pills down with before setting it back on the nightstand and flopping on his side, facing Thea. "Wanna watch a movie or something?" Because what else is there to do in his tiny, boring apartment? "I'll even let you pick." Which could potentially be dangerous, if she decides to be ridiculous about it, but that's a risk he's willing to take.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-29 09:31 pm (UTC)And okay, maybe the closeness was making her a little uncomfortable since she felt she had to troll him while he wasn't feeling his best, but it was the price they were both going to have to pay.
"Or else we could go with Clueless. Your choice." Star Wars versus ridiculous chick flick. Which one would he pick?
no subject
Date: 2016-11-30 02:08 am (UTC)He wonders if she just secretly wanted to watch it and that's why she gave such a ridiculous other option. "And just so you know, you're wrong. Han shot first."
no subject
Date: 2016-11-30 11:18 pm (UTC)"I don't know. You could be a closet Alicia Silverstone fan. Or Jane Austen fan. Never know." She grabbed the remote and ended up squirming a little closer to him as she searched Netflix. "I assume we're skipping the Jar-Jar horror show?"
But then there was no chance to give an opinion because the movie, the real movie with Luke and Leia and Han, was starting up. She leaned in and murmured in his ear, "Greedo. All the way."
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 03:49 am (UTC)One thing that Thea may or may not have noticed when they’ve hung out before is Cisco? He’s a snuggly person. At least, he is with people he’s comfortable with. And it’s sort of amped up to 20 when he doesn’t feel good. So she might notice that as the movie progresses, he inches closer and eventually, he has his head on her shoulder.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 03:50 am (UTC)Eventually, her body got used to the contact and even to the hair and she rested her cheek against his head. Her eyes watched the movie, but her mind considered what was going on. She hadn’t seen any sign of Barry outside and she’d heard that he’d moved to Cisco’s until he found his own place. Either he’d found a place already or…
“So how bad did Barry screw up?” she asked, softly enough that he could pretend not to have heard it if he didn’t really want to answer.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 03:51 am (UTC)He’s pretty zoned out, absorbed into the movie when Thea speaks up. Hits the nail right on the head in the first go because of course she’d piece it together. He tenses at the question and he’s silent for a long stretch. Finally, he mumbles quietly, “I- I don’t wanna talk about it.” Even if he probably should.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 03:55 am (UTC)She sighed a little and her thumb absently ran along the length of his as she tried to bring her attention back to the movie instead of the dilemma that was Cisco and Barry.
Unless she was prepared to either badger Cisco or leave him to find out from someone else, she was going to have to wait for her answer and neither was an option at the moment.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:01 am (UTC)Except the longer he sits here, pretending nothing’s wrong now that it’s out in the open that something is, the more it seems to weigh on him. The more it weighs on him, the harder he finds it to not say something. The words tumble out of his mouth before he has time to think about them or even consider stopping himself from saying them. “He changed everything, Thea. He ruined our lives.”
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:01 am (UTC)Not that she’d seen the rest of the team much. Not since she’d stopped hiding and had convinced Ollie that she wasn’t putting on the Speedy suit again. She’d come to see Cisco a few times and was using the money she’d acquired from Malcolm to make sure she always had a ride to and from Central City. She hadn’t quite bought herself a jet, but she had first class tickets whenever she made her way over.
“Changed how? I don’t understand.”
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:02 am (UTC)She’s not wrong in thinking it’s something bigger, deeper than the hollow explanations he’s given so far. The part that bothers him the most, the part that hurts the most is what’s next. “Dante was alive in the other timeline.” The words are quiet and his voice shakes a little with the weight of them.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:03 am (UTC)But she also knew what it was like having your entire life rearranged because of someone else’s choices, something you never had a say in and weren’t able to change. If Ollie had never run off with Sara, if he had never done whatever he’d done to Slade Wilson, their mother would still be alive. If he’d trusted her instead of trying to keep her ‘safe’, she wouldn’t have run away in the first place.
She probably would have done the same thing in Barry’s place, but she also knew too keenly what it was like to be in Cisco’s. She took his hand again and squeezed it tightly. “I’m sorry.” What else was there she could say?
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:04 am (UTC)He’s so twisted up inside about all of this and he doesn’t really know what to do about it. He’ll do his job, he’ll help with metas the same as he always has, but everything between Cisco and Barry is changed. Maybe beyond a point of repair. Cisco isn’t sure you get to come back from being the reason a family member is dead.
no subject
Date: 2016-12-12 04:05 am (UTC)“It makes you wonder what else has changed,” she said softly. “The metaphor movies always give is dunking a rock in a lake and seeing the ripples expand. Is my life any different?” Okay, so maybe she wasn’t ready to accept reason, either. The idea that her life might have been different was definitely terrifying. What if she’d actually...been happy? No Malcolm in her life, no death.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From: