For Yasmin. I will go down with this ship.
....................................................
Hell and night must bring this monstrous birth to the world's light.
- Iago, Othello.
....................................................
The nine flights of stairs seemed to be going by in slow motion. Every step was like twenty, and every second felt like an hour. Kira was beside her, clutching the handle of her katana in a white-knuckled fist.
"They'll be fine, Lyd," Kira reminded her, even though she looked as terrified as Lydia felt. "They've been dealing with this sort of thing for a long time."
Lydia kept running, ignoring the way her legs felt like they were about to dissolve.
"They've never dealt with Jackson," she said shortly. "They have no idea how ruthless he is."
Kira didn't respond to that.
The ninth floor finally came, and their heavy steps turned to soft, catlike padding to the door of the apartment. It opened as if by itself, and Jackson Whittemore grinned in delight, leaning against the frame.
It was the first time Lydia had seen him in years. He was taller, bigger in general, but he still had that lethal glint in his eyes. Eyes that ran up and down her once, twice, flicked to Kira, then to the empty space on the other side of Lydia. The space that used to be Allison's.
"Oh," he chuckled quietly. "That's right. Your little hunter bitch. She died, didn't she?"
"Don't act like you don't know her name, Jackson," Kira said. His eyes were cold, but hers were bulletproof glass. She wasn't afraid. Lydia wondered how that was possible. Kira's chin came up arrogantly, and she added, "After all, you don't just forget the name of the girl who constantly rejected you."
Lydia took a breath. Number one rule with Jackson: Don't get him angry. She had discovered that years ago. Kira didn't seem to care, though. She waited for his reaction with her lips twisted up into a cruel smile. Lydia suddenly realized what she was trying to do.
Kira knew Jackson. She was the one who used to sober him up when he got too drunk and handsy with Allison at parties, the one who practiced lacrosse with him on weekends while Lydia and Allison did their homework in the stands, the one who had been his friend.
It had been a brief friendship, cut off abruptly when he had been bitten, but a strong one. And Kira had been so upset when he left, she didn't talk to Allison or Lydia for weeks. Now it was different. He was a killer, and she was a Kitsune with full control over her once-temperamental powers. And he had broken her best friend's heart. And he was a danger to Scott. So she didn't care about that old friendship, the same way Lydia didn't care about their old relationship. He wasn't the same person anymore.
And Kira knew about Jackson's obsession with Allison. He had been dating Lydia at the time, but he hadn't cared a bit. It might have been because she was Lydia's, and he wanted to take her away, or because he saw Allison as a challenge. He never left her alone. Kira had been the only one who would call him out on it.
Jackson's icy smile deepened, and he chuckled lightly, glaring down at Kira like she was a bug he wanted to crush. "Well. I guess the little kitten finally learned how to bite. I missed you too, Sparky."
Kira flinched at the old nickname, inciting another laugh from Jackson. Lydia grabbed her hand, almost scorching herself on Kira's glowing fingertips. She held on, and Kira's shoulders squared as she looked back up at Jackson. "Where's my boyfriend?"
"Inside." Jackson took a step back into the apartment. "Do come in, ladies."
Kira didn't think twice, marching into the apartment without so much as glancing back. Lydia followed behind her, their hands still grasped tightly together. Don't you dare let me go, Lydia thought, suddenly panicked at the sight of a shadowed silhouette on the far wall. She gripped Kira's hand tighter, keeping her eyes on her hair, blue-black and ruffled from running.
Lydia saw Kira freeze as her eyes found Scott, blood drying on his cheek and wrapped up in chains. He looked otherwise fine, but Lydia could feel Kira's fingertips heating up again as her heartbeat rose.
"Let him go," Kira spat through gritted teeth, turning on Jackson. She suddenly released Lydia's hand, and Lydia saw a spark flicker and fall like a minuscule comet to the floor. It died immediately.
"Mmm," Jackson hummed as if he was considering it. "Nope, can't do that. Sorry Sparky." He paused for a moment, head cocked to the side thoughtfully. "Tell you what, though, we'll let him talk. That's why we're here, anyway." Jackson cracked a grin, stepping towards Scott.
As soon as Jackson stepped away, Kira rushed towards Scott, tossing Lydia her katana as an afterthought.
"I'm okay," Scott reassured her immediately. "Babe. Look at me. Hey." Kira's frantic once-over scan for any injuries paused, and she brought her eyes up to meet his, endless black on endless black. "I'm alright." He offered her a half-smile, and Kira relaxed a tiny bit. Her hand went up to his face, and she ran her thumb over the blood on his cheek. Scott's eyes closed at her touch.
"Is this yours?" Kira asked quietly. Her voice was soft, but she was suddenly tense again, every muscle pulled tight and ready. A living trigger. One wrong word, and the gun would go off.
"It was just a scratch," Scott said. "It probably looks worse than it was. Face wounds bleed a lot."
"Well." Jackson interrupted. "Isn't that just touching." Lydia flinched at just how cold and emotionless his voice was. She looked around the room, attempting to ignore the forbidding shadows that lined the walls.
"Where's-"
"Lyd," Kira stopped her. "There." She jerked her chin in the direction of the kitchen, and Lydia looked. There was a pair of red converse just visible, and Lydia was reminded suddenly, ridiculously of the Wizard of Oz movie, of the scene with the ruby slippers attached to an otherwise lifeless body. That was until the panic set in.
"Stiles."
He was unconscious, and there was a deep purple bruise on his forehead. Lydia fell to the floor beside him, her knees suddenly unable to support her. His skin barely felt warm, and she couldn't see the usual thrum of his heartbeat on his neck. Lydia's throat closed up, and she could barely manage a whisper as she said, "Scott. Tell me his heart is still beating."
It took two seconds for Scott to check, but those two seconds passed like months, and they were agonizing.
"He's OK, Lydia," Scott said. "Just knocked out."
As if to confirm Scott's statement, Stiles' eyelids flickered and his lips parted slightly. Lydia sighed in relief, running a hand over his face, as if to make sure that he was real.
"Wake up," she whispered. "Stiles, please wake up."
Jackson made a noise of disgust, rolling his eyes at her. "When did you get so sappy, Lydia? You used to be fun." Lydia didn't answer.
Jackson watched her with a look in his eyes that wasn't far off snakelike. A viper, poised and ready to strike at any second.
"Oh, how sweet." The snake mask split into a grotesque smile, and Lydia forced herself to meet his eyes, emerald on steel. "You're in love with him."
"Don't be bitter, Jax," Kira's voice rang out from across the room. "Just because she never loved you."
Lydia flinched, but Kira's trick worked. Jackson's attention flicked from Lydia to Kira like a light switch, and Lydia was left in the shadows, while Kira stood in front of Scott under Jackson's spotlight.
"She never loved me," Jackson repeated thoughtfully. "Is that right?"
"Yeah. It is." Kira straightened up a bit, standing as tall as her petite frame would allow. "And you know it. Lydia knows it." She paused for a beat. "I know it."
The silhouettes that striped the walls rippled a bit, like dry leaves disturbed by a tiny puff of wind. Lydia thought she might have even heard an almost silent snicker of laughter. Jackson didn't move or speak, and Lydia knew that he had his eyes closed to hide the flash of blue in them.
"You know something, Sparky?" His voice broke the frigid silence in the room. He moved towards Kira until Scott let a low growl loose, his eyes still black, but threatening to turn red at any second. Jackson stopped as if it was exactly as he had planned it, even though his wary glance at Scott betrayed him. Then he smiled. "I personally don't care the slightest bit if she ever loved me or not."
"Good," Scott said, his voice bouncing around the room. "Then how about you tell us why you are here, if it's not because of Lydia."
Stiles stirred a little, but Lydia's eyes stayed glued to Jackson. The Beta grinned, and Lydia suppressed a shiver. Jackson smiling was almost never a good thing.
"What a fun idea," he said smoothly. "But before that, how about Lydia tells me what happened here to make it smell like this? It's reeking of guilt, mostly. But there's other things. Anxiety, regret, stress..." He trailed off, looking around the room before his eyes came to rest on Lydia. "What happened? Seems like quite a story."
"Why does it matter, Jackson?" Lydia managed to say through gritted teeth. A blur of images flashed through her head: The stairs, two shadowed outlines by the apartment door, red lipstick, his hand on her wrist, and then pain like nothing she had felt before. A deep, hollow ache that wouldn't go away. Like she was a china doll, and someone had dropped her on the floor without bothering to pick up the shattered pieces.
"Oh, but, it matters to you. Doesn't it Lydia?" Jackson looked at her with that old look that she remembered so well. The look that made her feel so transparent, like he could read her mind. It hadn't changed. It was still unnerving.
Stiles stirred again, and Lydia caught a half-mumble of something unintelligible, before he was still again. She wasn't sure when she had taken her hand away from his face. She placed her hands in her lap, instead.
"It doesn't," Lydia whispered. "It doesn't matter." She looked Jackson in the eyes again, fighting the shiver that ran down her spine.
"Good," he said. "Then you won't mind telling me what happened."
"No." Lydia barely recognized her own voice. Her voice was never that harsh. Never that acidic. It was like that one tiny word was a ball of flame let loose from the back of her throat. Like it had been there for years, waiting. She had never told Jackson 'no' before. Not like that.
He gave her a look of slight surprise laced with almost entirely concealed irritation. Lydia held her breath, waiting.
"Tell you what," Jackson said diplomatically, ignoring her defiance, "I'll guess, and you'll tell me if I'm right. Sound good?"
"Leave her alone," Kira snapped. "You asked her to tell you, and she doesn't want to."
"True," Jackson replied, smiling with the smug amusement of a child who knows he's about to win a game. "But here's the thing: I'm not asking."
"Neither am I," Kira said, that same bulletproof look in her eyes. "I said, leave her alone."
Jackson's hand twitched like he wanted nothing more than to reach out and strangle her. He had a look of violence on his face that reminded Lydia of the sea in a storm, all bottomless, icy darkness and uncontrolled fury. Then his expression smoothed over, and he smirked down at Kira, who glared at him in return.
"You know, you really have changed, Kira." He regarded her thoughtfully, electively ignoring Scott's warning growl as his eyes lingered on her body. "Quite a lot."
"Amazing what a change of scenery can do to a person," Kira said, her voice an almost-snarl. "But obviously not to you. You ran all the way to London with your tail between your legs, and you're still as much of a pathetic, narcissistic prick as you were before."
"Ouch. I'm wounded. Truly." Jackson placed his heart over his chest and grimaced as if he had been shot.
"Your sarcastic little comebacks don't fool anyone anymore, Jackson," Kira responded, smiling patronizingly. "We know the truth. We've known it since you started killing everyone who got in your way; you're nothing but a scared little boy."
The shadows on the walls shifted uneasily, and Lydia found a small amount of vindictive amusement in watching Jackson struggle to keep his temper in check. He never had been good at verbal fights, but he knew better than to touch Kira.
"I may be all that and more," he eventually said, his voice soft and careful. "But I'm not the only child here." He paused, chuckled, and said, "You may be pretending to be this holier-than-thou adult, but I see you for what you are, Kira. I see you for the socially retarded fox kitten you have always been. The little girl with no friends because she chased them all away with her freaky electro-touch. I see you for the pretender, the reject that the most popular girls in school took under their wing and made into one of them. I see you, and I see a fraud."
There was a moment of pure silence, and the quickly darkening room might as well have been a graveyard. Kira stood facing Jackson, her face entirely impassive. Lydia searched her expression for a tell, something that gave away what Kira was feeling, and there was nothing. Until she smiled.
"No wonder Lydia fooled you into thinking she was a bubblehead for all those years," Kira laughed. "You're an actual moron."
The shadows gave a tiny reaction, exchanging almost silent murmurs at Kira's response. She stepped forward, fearless, and stared Jackson down.
"You should know by now, Jax," she said sweetly, "there's not a thing you can do that will hurt me."
Jackson blinked, slowly, lazily. And when he opened his eyes, he lunged for Lydia. He was a blur, and suddenly, he was holding her by the throat, fangs bared at Kira.
"I thought you were smarter than that," he taunted, wagging a clawed finger at her mockingly.
"She is," Scott said, loud enough that everyone in the room could hear him. If Jackson had been a blur, Scott was practically invisible. There was the clink of chains, and then Jackson was flying into a wall on the other side of the apartment. He was on his feet again in an instant, eyes glowing and lips pulled back as he growled at Scott and Kira.
They stood side by side with Lydia and Stiles behind them, Scott fully shifted and grinning at Jackson with razor sharp fangs, and Kira with one hand on her katana and the other holding up a bobby pin.
"Oh Jackson," Kira said, her voice sweet and teasing, "you've really gotta stop underestimating people."
....................................................
1. Okay, there was a lot more that I wanted to fit into this chap, but it's been SO. LONG. I figured you guys deserved a new chapter for putting up with me and my mini-hiatuses that are actually just severe cases of writer's block. I love you all for your patience. (But seriously guys, my catchphrase is "I write fluff fics, not tragedies." I'm so out of my element here, it's not funny.
2. Yes, new chapter of Enchanted is coming. I want to make it a long one, since you guys have waited so long. Cheers to Neyla/Wifey and Ebony/Also My Wife for kicking me up the butt and not letting me stop writing it, and also for helping me come up with ideas. (I'd also like to thank @obriens.maze on Insta for that.)
3. If any of you guys haven't read Smash by now, I really think you should, even though the new chap could be a while away. It's a punk pack / band wars AU, if that helps?
4. Also: If you're not reading my oneshots, you're missing out on a ton of post-Room Mates fluff. Go.
5. Holy shit, there's like 5 thousand of you guys. That's crazy. And I hit 200k a while back, what's up! As well as that, it was the anniversary of Room Mates on the 21st of April. My child. I can't believe it's been a year. That's insane. AND I turned 17, which was cool. Much love to everyone on Insta who wished me a happy birthday. I love you, but I'm too lazy to tag that many people. So BLANKET THANK YOU TO ALL OF MY LOVELY PEOPLE FOR EVERYTHING YOU DO FOR ME.
6. I would like to apologize to everyone who thought I was a decent human being before I got a fan account on Instagram. I'm problematic. What can ya do? But seriously, just imagining your reactions to my rants like: "Woah... Zaligirl is a bitch." yeah. Lil bit.
7. Re-reading your comments from when I brought Malia back is so funny, I'm sorry. It's all, "I TRUSTED YOU." and I'm just... well that was your first mistake. I feel like I'm becoming a writer when I do stuff that pisses you guys off, does that make any sense? Idk.
8. Kira is amazing in this chapter oh my lordy. Jackson's dialogue is shitty, Lydia's pissing me off a bit, Stiles, well, he's unconscious, so he's boring, but at least Scira is on point. Anyway. I shouldn't be critiquing myself for you guys, but meh.
9. I wrote a list of little bits of advice that I think is helpful. So here:
1. Don't trust fuckboys.
2. Eat the fucking cake if you want to.
3. Run every day to good music.
4. Sometimes you just need to put on heels and cute underwear and tell yourself you're hot as fuck.
5. Do the thing. Even if you get in trouble, it'll make a great memory.
6. Long socks are 100% effective in making you feel cute as hell.
7. Wear makeup if you want to. Don't wear makeup if you don't want to. Don't let yourself give a flying fuck what people think about it.
8. Do your assignments as soon as you can. It alleviates a shitload of stress. *she said hypocritically*
9. If it makes you better, do it.
10. Punctuation is your friend.
11. Write shit down.
12. Flush your blades. They will never make you happy.
13. Find people who make you feel loved, and surround yourself with them.
14. Nothing makes you feel more badass than wearing a shitload of eyeliner and black boots.
15. Light candles.
16. Pay attention. People are like books. You just have to know how to read them.
17. Punk music.
10. I also wrote a thingy for the RM anniversary, but I didn't have a chapter ready (BOO, I'M A WHORE) and so I posted it to Insta instead. For those who didn't see it/don't have insta, here it is: (fair warning: it's gooey.)
When I first decided to write Room Mates, I had no idea just how much it would influence my life. When it first started gaining popularity, I was amazed at just how many people liked my stupid story about these idiots being stuck together. For me, it was an idea that I just needed to get out of my head. Without Room Mates, without you guys, I would still be the lost little girl I was a year ago, who practically had an anxiety attack whenever someone asked what I wanted to do when I grew up. And because of this, and all of you, I now at least have an idea. I know that I want to major in English lit at uni, and then see where I go from there. What I know for sure is that I will always be a writer.
As well as figuring out where I'm going, I found people to keep me company on the way there. I've made such amazing friends, people who I couldn't imagine life without. I have no idea how I survived 16 (17*) years without them. They're my ohana, and I'm so thankful that they love me as much as I love them.
Room Mates has given me something to work towards, incredible friends, and more than anything, it has been the one light spot in my life that is entirely constant. Even with the pressure and the anxiety that comes with not updating, Wattpad has become like a safe haven for me. I can't tell you how many times I've felt completely alone, and went onto Wattpad just to read through old comments from you guys. It's helped get me through. So I wanted to let you know how grateful I am, because honestly, I would be a mess without you.
And on that incredibly sappy note, I'm out.
À bientôt, Zaligirl.