Speakeasy

Her hands twitch on top of each other, eyes narrowed at the floor. She wants to argue. Boy, does she ever want to argue, to make him see that keeping her, keeping Lunath, locked up is not helping them, that each day that passes with the situation like it is just adds to their feelings of frustration.

Their desire to run away.

To run away and never look back at this cage Shand has made.

But she can't bring herself to say it, can't bring herself to retaliate and seem like she hates him, seem like she doesn't get where he's coming from.

"I... Understand."

It's about all she can calmly manage right now, because she does understand as much as she possibly can. It feels like he's the one that doesn't get it, doesn't see how big the divide is that he's creating between them.

And it's hard to trust him when he is allowed to do whatever he feels and, if he isn't, he finds a way around it, but the second they try they're victims of his wrath like they're the only selfish children here.

"I know you mean well."

Her voice is still hard and unyielding and he shakes his head.

“I️ wish, for just one second, you could see how complicated all this really is. Its not so cut and dry.”

He takes a long pull off the cigarette and lets the smoke curl in the air above his head. His eyes are red and tired like he’s stuck in a nightmare he can’t pull himself out of no matter how hard he tries.

If Yvaine had warned him against his vices, against the drugs and the alcohol, why does the lack of them seem to be what’s making this worse?

“Luna, what do you want from me? I️ want you to be happy, I️ really do.”

"I don't know, Shand. I get why it has to be this way but I don't get why it has to be this way as much as it is but I didn't come up here to argue with you."

What does she want? She knows exactly what she wants and she thought he did, too. To sing, to travel, to explore and go on her own adventures around the world just like he had and inevitably will go on again. He'll go do all of these things and talk about how evil the world is to scare her from it, just like he always had.

"I came up to apologize for seeming rude and ungrateful and I am sorry for that. Like I said, I know I seem naive and childish, so I'm sorry. But I didn't come up here to start a fight I can't win."

There is no way she can possibly think of that she can out talk him on the matter. He's more experienced and he's basically a head of this family in his own right, so she listens to Dolan and keeps any mention of tomorrow and thoughts like it to herself.

She really doesn't want to fight, not anymore, it's not good for either of them.

Shand swings around, feet on the floor, so he can sit on the side of the bed with his elbows propped up on his knees, forehead in his hand. He's rubbing it hard, over and over, like it's supposed to calm him somehow, make his worries go away, but it's not working.

He only pauses to take another hit off the cigarette, and he holds the smoke in so long this time she thinks he might pass out.

"Okay, Luna."

That's all he says. Okay. It's uncharacteristic of him to just give up, to allow defeat to have the final word. It's much more like him to yell and scream and go off half cocked trying to convince anyone and everyone of his side, of what he knows is right, even if there's no chance of reconciliation.

But he can't do that here. He knows that anything he does from this point on is only making things worse.

And he's not sure if it's worse for him to keep going like this with the rules, or whether it would cause more long-term damage to lighten up and let her have her fun.

Both options are dangerous and he can see them both ending in disaster. But there is no third option, no good middle ground that he can see and so he's here stuck in the middle with everyone hating him and knowing he can't protect them like he's supposed to.

He doesn't turn back around to her, and he figures the conversation has come to its natural end and she'll go ahead and flee the scene like she's been wanting to do ever since she stepped foot in here.

Something is bothering him. It's been bothering him for a long while now, but the question is not whether or not there is but whether or not she has the courage to ask.

She steals a long glance in his direction chewing on her lip as she thinks things over. As upset as she may be, she's not stupid nor is she heartless.

But what is she expecting that he'll tell her? If he's not talking to Dakara about it, if he's not even dropping hints to Trita and Dolan, there's no way he's going to divulge anything to her. All they talk about are the stories he has to share and the small gifts he brings back for her that line the shelves of her room like little treasures.

These deeper issues, pressing matters... He keeps these from her at all times like she's never had a dark thought in her life and hearing his will ruin her, or something foolish and contrived like that.

"Do you... Do you need to talk about something?"

Well, that was a poor choice of wording. It's far different than the earnest "Are you okay" she had playing out in her head, but it's too late now so she lets the question hang between them.

He lets out an unintentionally heavy breath that as good as confirms that he needs to talk about something, but he closes his eyes for the shortest of moments and forces a smile.

"No, no I'm fine. This whole thing with Umbra just caught me out of nowhere, I️ guess."

He swallows hard, and for the first time in the longest time, he can feel his eyes stinging like there are tears pressing to get out, so he closes his eyes again and rubs at them hard, follows it with a pull from his cigarette.

Leave it to Luna to ask about him after a talk like this, where he knows she's probably still so mad at him, she could spit. When everyone else in this family had written him off, she was the one who would still look up at him with starry eyes and ask about adventures, look at him like he was the world.

He's not worthy of any of it, he's always known that, and that fact coupled with this situation makes him feel even lower.

"I️ was just a shit to Yvaine the last time I️ saw her. Big surprise there, I️ know."

He waits til he's pretty sure his eyes are done doing dumb things and glances over to the side at her, letting his eyes just rest on her sitting there still.

He remembers the day he and Dolan and Trita had gone to take her from that hell house and he had been so mad he couldn't even think straight.

He remembers the first time he'd set a microphone stand up in front of her and she'd tapped it bashfully, jumping at the feedback. He remembers the first time he'd realized she was lining up every souvenir in her room, displaying them all prominently and proudly.

"Luna, you're really important to me. Just... just, whatever happens, please remember that."

Her eyebrows raise and she nearly jumps at his words, obviously the last thing she was expecting to hear in this moment, catching her so off guard that they almost bring her to her feet, eyes wide, face red.

Where they suddenly came from she doesn't have the slightest idea and they fill her with sudden strong guilt over the thought of going behind his back tomorrow. It's not fair. It's not fair that she can be so upset with him but so concerned and so won over by the smallest things he says.

All those years ago, Dolan was the calm, Trita was the practicality, and Shand was the passion, and some things never change. It doesn't matter what he's saying, kicking things over in an opera star's penthouse or here now looking over at her with all the affection in the world in his eyes, he is the passion of this family, strong emotion and conviction in everything he does.

But there are so many conflicting feelings going on that she feels she may just burst right here in front of him trying to sort through them. Still, she can't help but smile softly, nodding in response.

"I know. And you're important to me, too. Any time I go to argue your rules, think of it that way. If I didn't care, I wouldn't listen to you at all and would just do what I want when I want. But I care about you and what you have to say."

She wants to comfort him more about this Yvaine situation but, honestly, she has little to no clue the details about it so it feels wrong to try to give any input on the matter.

"Besides, that's not the first time you were a brat to her from what I've heard. I'd like to think it won't be the last."

Shand forces a small smile down at his knees as he puffs out more smoke.

"If she's got anything to survive for, it's definitely that. The joy of my wonderful attitude and cheery disposition."

He cocks a halfway grin at her and he knows his eyes don't completely go with the lie that he's alright and everything's fine, but at this point, even a little is enough.

He coughs a bit, clearly having overdone it on how long he's held in the smoke this time, and he stamps the cigarette out with a vengeance this time and makes himself stand up before she can question him about anymore things that he can't answer.

He reaches over to the chair and for his shirt, and although it's wrinkled now, he pulls it on and starts doing up the buttons.

"So what's the situation like down there? Everyone still sucking air, I️ hope?"

Well, that’s a question she doesn’t want to answer.

“Uh, it’s fine. Like I said, Lance is finally asleep. Think he may have passed out, I’m not sure. The rest of us are fine, ya know?”

How is she supposed to explain that it looks like Dolan is about to head out with Trita? No, they hadn’t said anything specifically about it, but she’s not stupid. She knows most everyone wants to keep Dolan away from messes like this and that running out is the exact opposite of keeping him shielded and safe, but that’s not her business to share. She’s not even really supposed to know what’s going on.

Her eyes are trailed away from him, mostly to give him space as he puts his shirt back on, but also to keep them from making eye contact.

Time to change topics.

“So, actually, I do have a question for you... If I were to cut my hair into the bob style I always pin it up to be for work...”

She’s pretty sure she already knows the answer to this lead, and it’s not the smoothest transition she’s ever had, but she keeps up the peppy tone, acting oblivious to it all.

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Shand unintentionally has a slight coughing fit at the question, as if it's irritated something in his lungs, or maybe he's allergic to it. But he takes a deep breath and closes his eyes and tries to be logical, tries to sort out what will keep her safe and what will not.

His fingers have been trying at the same button since she started talking, and they still can't get it buttoned.

"Well... I️ think your hair is beautiful and perfect and wonderful and if you cut it off my heart would shatter into a million sharp little pieces and cut me and I️ would bleed to death."

He clears his throat out again.

"But if that would really make you happy, then I️ wouldn't try to stop you."

The button finally pops into the hole and he curses under his breath at it for taking so long. He's intentionally avoiding eye contact with her, like he knows looking at her will make him change his mind again.

"I️ mean, you'd have to promise to grow it back out again after. There's no sense in keeping it short forever. Your neck would get cold in the winter. You might catch a cold or a chill or something and you could die."

He finishes with his shirt and pulls the tie from the chair, studying it for a second in his hands before discarding it back into the chair with a lip curled in disgust.

"And you'd have to not go anywhere shady. Like someone really reputable who cleans their scissors really well. No rusty scissors. Tetanus is a bad idea. Bad idea."

The more he spills out whatever comes to mind, the more he's talking himself out of it little by little, so he shakes his head to get himself back to the main point.

"But if you wanted to, okay. Okay."

“Sooo... No.”

Luna laughs, standing from his bed, happy the new topic seems to have stuck and much more willing to ride this one out.

“You can just tell me if you don’t want me to cut it. I may argue it a little but that’s pretty par for the course right now.”

She sticks her tongue out at him to keep things light and playful, leading him to the door since he seems ready to leave... Though now she’s wondering if maybe she should be distracting him to give Trita and Dolan time to slip out.

They didn’t ask her to... But she feels the need.

“If you dont think it will look good, tell me. I’m a big girl, I can handle it.”

Another idea for a topic change comes to mind when she fully opens the door, her finger tapping on the door handle. Actually, this isn’t really a topic that’s off-handed, she’s been wanting to bring this one up for a while but just keeps forgetting.

“Actually, before we go downstairs, can I show you something?”

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Shand scoffs out the side of his mouth and looks up at the ceiling.

"I️ think it would look very good on you and that's more or less what I'm afraid of."

She's pulling at him now, leading him toward the door and he can feel the tension fade just a little bit. It doesn't erase the problem that he somehow has to keep her from an awful fate he's already seen that he apparently can't change no matter what.

"You can cut it if you want, but if you do, we make a deal that you can't be upset when I️ start slugging the handsy guys during business hours."

He says it like a grumbling toddler, but she smiles back at him and he tries to let it go, to savor the moment and pretend like nothing at all is wrong. It would feel a little like the old days, if he could let it all go. Like when they'd talk and laugh and he'd tell her all about the world and she was safe.

"As long as you're not hiding a boy in your closet, sure."

He gives her a sarcastic, testy half smile that says he's only half joking as he lets her lead him out of the room.

"You're already slugging guys anyways, I doubt cutting my hair would make that much of a difference."

She's quickly leading him to her room next to his, pushing the door wide open, dragging him inside, leaving him in the center of the well-lit space to rush to her bed, stepping right up on it to reach one of the man shelves above the headboard.

Her entire room has shelf after shelf anchored into each wall and each shelf holds more souvenirs than they probably should, but everything is still somehow organized, like a well-kept collector's room.

The one shelf she's at requires a little bit of sifting through to find what she's looking for but, with a little patience and luck, she finds the two small objects.

Clutching them, she turns and hops down from the mattress with the lightest thud, quickly walking back over to where she left him, hands open and extended much like an excited child.

"I found these on my dresser a while ago and I thought you put them there but you never said anything about them and I've been meaning to ask if you recognized them but keep forgetting."

In her hand are two small crystal rings of a variety of shifting colors, matching and glistening in the warm light of the room. They're beautiful but eerie, calming but disturbing. Familiar but strange.

"You're already slugging guys anyways, I doubt cutting my hair would make that much of a difference."

She's quickly leading him to her room next to his, pushing the door wide open, dragging him inside, leaving him in the center of the well-lit space to rush to her bed, stepping right up on it to reach one of the man shelves above the headboard.

Her entire room has shelf after shelf anchored into each wall and each shelf holds more souvenirs than they probably should, but everything is still somehow organized, like a well-kept collector's room.

The one shelf she's at requires a little bit of sifting through to find what she's looking for but, with a little patience and luck, she finds the two small objects.

Clutching them, she turns and hops down from the mattress with the lightest thud, quickly walking back over to where she left him, hands open and extended much like an excited child.

"I found these on my dresser a while ago and I thought you put them there but you never said anything about them and I've been meaning to ask if you recognized them but keep forgetting."

In her hand are two small crystal rings of a variety of shifting colors, matching and glistening in the warm light of the room. They're beautiful but eerie, calming but disturbing. Familiar but strange.

“I️. I️’m.”

Shand’s eyes are immediately transfixed on the rings glimmering in her palm. He’s seen them before somewhere... he knows them, they’re very familiar and yet... they give him this feeling of dread.

“You found those on... on your dresser?”

He knows he didn’t put them there, and he had a strange, vague feeling that somehow they belong more to her than to him, but he doesn’t know why.

Who else comes into Luna’s room? Who would put something like that here?

Something pokes dully at the back of his mind, like a knocking on a door in a dream, and he sees huge red and purple clouds, cyclones like a tornado full of all his worse memories.

But wait, not his memories... they have to belong to someone else. They feel like they belong to him- they elicit a visceral emotional reaction from him, like they’re ripping his veins out of his body, but none of those things, those violent, gory things, have ever happened to him. Have they?

“I️ don’t think I️ put those there.”

He can’t wipe the paranoia off his face, and he swallows hard, feels little beads of sweat start to tickle at his hairline. He immediately thinks of that damn fox, the vision at Yvaine’s. Those pink cigarettes.

He needs this feeling, sharp like a rat gnawing at the back of his brain, to go away, to not tease and torture him now of all times. But Yvaine is gone, and so are her drugs. He won’t be finding any clarity from this in the foreseeable future.

“Maybe put those in the back of a drawer somewhere.”

Shand rubs at his forehead, and it’s starting to feel strangely hot, his fingertips starting to tingle.

“I️ think I’m gonna go back and lie down for a bit... I️ don’t feel too good.”

"Shand?"

Luna frowns with her brown knit, pulling the rings back from him like she thinks he's allergic to them, stuffing them behind her back.

Unbeknownst to her, a vision starts to materialize on her shoulder, the small form of that white fox resting on her like he belongs there, like he belongs perched on her more than he's belonged anywhere else in the entire world. He's comfortable and sly, tail swishing like a living cape behind them both, paws against her upper arm to keep him upright and looking at Shand with those knowing eyes.

His posture, his silent tone... Luna is his and he is hers and it looks like they've been that way forever, which seems impossible considering she doesn't even notice him, but the level of familiarity the fox expresses speaks enough for both of them.

You're such an emotional person. What a child.

It mocks him, form mostly fading out of sight but, if Shand looks close enough, he can just barely make out the outline of it still standing on her like he's always been there but Shand just managed to notice for the first time.

"Hey- Earth to Shand. You okay?"

Luna waves her hand in front of his face, tilting her head, even snapping her fingers a little to bring him back into focus.

As the fox's form fades to a soft white outline, Luna snaps in front of his face.

His head jerks up like he's coming out of a trance, but he still feels disoriented, like something about those rings makes this feel like a dream again.

"I️ don't....I'm sorry."

He says slowly, blinking a few times, but not able to get rid of the outline of that fox and its swishing tail perched on Luna no matter how hard he wills it to go.

Breath hitches in his chest and everything feels like too much. The visions, Umbra, keeping this family safe, the damn fox, all his vices. He feels overwhelmed, like he's two feet in front of a steamroller that's chasing him down. Like a dream where he's so tired, all he can do is lay down in the middle of a busy street with a truck headed right for him.

He clears his throat and forces a smile.

"My brain is probably just confused that I'm not drinking right now...you, uh, you can head on back downstairs if you want. I'll be fine."

"...If you're sure?"

Now Luna is almost afraid to leave him. He looks legitimately ill suddenly, like he could fall over any second and she's terrified of not being there to catch him if he does. No, he doesn't look like he wants to talk about it further, whatever just happened, even when she asks.

"Okay."

He never tells her what's actually wrong when there's something wrong so she's learned she can't really fight him on the matter more than just making sure to ask if he's okay and then letting the subject go once he refuses to let her in. It's obvious she wants to say and ask a million more things, though.

She sets the rings down on the dresser she had originally found them, nodding her head as she passes by, a little defeated, shoes clicking as she makes her way down the hall back towards the stairs, unsure of whether or not one could call all of that successful in mending their relationship.

But she's back down in the bar in a matter of minutes, taking stock of Lance again before slipping back into the booth with Lunath.

Shand doesn't make it back to his room. As soon as she's gone, he grips the side of the dresser hard, so hard his bruised knuckles go white, and slides down the side of it until he's hugging his knees to his chest in the floor.

He presses his forehead into his knees and tries to get his brain to shut up, to stop throwing hallucinations of foxes in front of him- cute, how he's hallucinating foxes when the thing that's most preoccupying his subconscious is the Fox family itself- but he can't get himself to think logically no matter how hard he tries.

Everything feels unreal. Everything feels like a dream. Like if he held a flame up and passed his hand through it, it wouldn't even burn him. Like this is the middle part of a dream about falling and never hitting the ground.The moments when you're killed in a dream, right before you wake up.

He wants to wake up, yet he doesn't. Luna, Dakara, the family- if what he does with them and for them is so important, if that dumb fox can after all be trusted, then he has to stay and protect them from whatever awful storm this is that's stalking them.

But he wants to wake up. He can't take the sting of it all anymore, being stuck between a rock and a hard place, draining bottle after bottle of liquor for any kind of comfort.

What makes him the one that gets singled out for this? No one else seems to know that this is a strange limbo world none of them can escape from- so why him? He wants to burst at the seams and tell someone, anyone. He'd almost spilled it to Luna, but she would have thought he was crazy and she'd be genuinely concerned.

Maybe he is crazy. Maybe someone should be genuinely concerned. He clutches the side of his head, handfuls of his hair, and rests his forehead on his knees and tries to drown out every thought he has so he can rest in the nothingness. Without the alcohol, it's damn near impossible to do.

"You know, you're such a fascinating little experiment."

The same damn fox rests on the dresser, looking down at him like a scientist observes how an animal responds to stimuli of different kinds.

"Tell me: Do you hate your life here so much that you keep trying to convince yourself it's a dream?"

It tilts its head, giant ears flopping over, but disappears again, only to reappear on Luna's bed several feet away, walking along the top of the headboard like it was a path made just for him.

The room is strangely quiet. Yes, most people in the house are gone, but it's still too silent, like the space is cut off from any and all noise: From the family members that remain downstairs and from the busy city streets outside. It's just the two of them in this moment.

"Because, if so, then you're wrong. Hate to break it to you."

“Then what the hell are those!”

Shand’s hands stay around his head and his teeth are gritted against the yell. He sounds desperate, insane, and he hates that that’s exactly how he feels.

“Those damn rings, where the hell are they from? Why do they feel...”

He doesn’t know what they feel like, can’t put it into words, just digs his hands into his hair further until it feels he might rip some out.

“I’m not... me, I️ remember things happening to me that aren’t me. What the fuck is going on?”

He’s screaming now, furious and unhinged and almost before he’s finished speaking, the room crackles with a light blue, electric looking light and a shock runs through his body that makes his neck crick hard.

It terrifies him, he wants to scream more, to grab the fox and beat him against the wall until he’s a bloody pulp, but he’s too scared to move from where he’s huddled against the dresser.

The fox sighs, shaking his head, the flowing cloud-like fur from its ears shifting with the movement. It seems annoyed but also disappointed.

“Calm down, you’re going to break things.”

The room has a few new black singe marks around it now that suddenly seem more interesting to the creature than Shand. It moves to the closest spot on a wall, standing on its hind legs to pat a front paw against it. The wall’s paint begins to crack and shift into little pieces like a million miniature cards flipping over, revealing a new, fresh, untouched spot.

“Anyways, other than throwing a little fit like a toddler... You like those? I put them on her dresser a little while ago. Only slightly upset she’s just now showing you, but what can you do? I’m surprised they got brought up now with Yvaine being locked away. Kinda figured that would be more important.”

It takes a moment to scratch its ear with its back leg then shake out its fur, making sure everything is in order before jumping down and walking over to a damaged spot on the floor, fixing it just the same.

“How much do you think a fortune-telling hybrid’s antlers go for nowadays? Gotta be a pretty penny.”

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Shand points a shaky finger the fox's way, a snarl on his face, accusation in his tone.

"She better not fucking die. Whatever you have to do with it, you better not let anyone in this fucking family die."

And although the fox is playing coy with him, trying to poke and break him at every point with his refusals, Shand knows that this fox is connected to it all, or else why would he have shown up at Yvaine's connected to what he'd seen happen to Luna.

Thinking of that scene makes Shand narrow his eyes, remembering the way the thing had sat on her shoulder like he'd owned her.

"Who is Luna to you?"

His voice is quieter now, placated, piecing things together in his mind. Now that he thinks about it, all his memories of the past, of everything that had happened before a certain day, feel hazy, like they'd been pulled out of a super realistic dream that he'd watched on a screen instead of lived.

He remembers the day they'd gone to get Luna from that horrible opera house, and he can see surroundings, but they're grainy and the whole memory is filled with the impression of details instead of the recollection of them.

Everything is like that, and it only adds fuel to the fire that this place isn't real, isn't reality. But if that's true, then how can he explain his drive to keep them safe, his undying need to protect them from this thing he's seen?

He decides on an even better question as his eyes narrow further at the fox.

"Who is Luna... to me?"

There's an odd look on the fox's face, an odd sort of annoying knowledge like he thinks he is above anyone and everyone here by how much he knows and how little they know. In a way, he isn't wrong, but the amusement he gets from that is nearly cruel.

"To me, she is simply the one I foresaw and now am leading towards a higher goal. I gave her a purpose when she had none."

His answer is confusing and vague but intentionally so. He won't clarify, that much is obvious, and it seems to amuse him further how much that annoys Shand.

The fox isn't here to make friends and sit happily around to chat, he has some sort of goal to all of this and enjoys dancing around saying what it is to make Shand keep guessing.

Well, if he didn't like the first answer, Shand will hate the second one.

"And to you? Well, isn't that up to you to decide? You are close acquaintances. I'd dare say your minds are one and the same. What you two will be in the future, though... There's potential for a great closeness and soulmate-level understanding."

It's an answer, but not a good one, both of them know it. Surprisingly, the fox continues like he's going to clarify what he means.

"I say potential because whether or not you two get there is up to you, pirate boy."

Its eyes narrow in a sly smirk. He didn't clarify.

A shaky chuckle slips by his lips and Shand's not sure if he's amused or just that mentally overwhelmed.

"When are people going to realize that they shouldn't be leaving things like that up to me. To the degenerate addict fuck-up."

He keeps laughing a little to himself, and it's definitely because his nerves are so worn, leaving him looking a little off his rocker, he's sure. But what does it matter, in front of a figment of his imagination, or Luna's fox friend, or whatever the hell he is.

"Well, for your information, Luna has a purpose that has nothing to do with you and your shitty little games, and regardless of what hell my life sinks into, she's going to make it out of place and be something if it kills me, and the first decision I'm making to that end is to ignore the fuck out of you."

Shand pushes himself to his feet, rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand and turning away from the fox toward the door. His hands are still shaking and his skin is even still ashen. He knows he won't look normal when he goes downstairs, but thanks to all his well known bad habits, he can always blame it on something less concerning than hallucinations of reality bending foxes.

He doesn't look back toward the fox now, just opens the door and slams it behind him as he goes, hoping that somehow reality had shifted enough that no one had heard him yelling, heard that terrible crack of electricity, whatever that had been.

He has to grip the spiral stair railing hard to keep himself from falling, but he makes it down with white knuckles to the main bar area where mostly everyone is gathered and Dolan and Trita are making for the back door.