Pretend To Be Nice (4)

Science! Girl & Chained Lightning #4: I bet that you look good on the dancefloor / I don't know if you're looking for romance or...

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Science! Girl & Chained Lightning is a spinoff of Radiance; both stories take place around 2013 in a world where atypical abilities have become increasingly common, with the storyline following a group of minor-league superheroes based in Washington, DC. This one is all about belligerent not-quite-a-couple Dr. Marissa Cotlin and her favorite (former) test subject Baz Grimes, who clearly adore each other but keep finding new and interesting ways to avoid getting the point across.

Previously, Marissa discovered at the rehearsal dinner that she’s been out-schemed: Baz seems to be hoping her family will adopt him, while her sister Mal will do just about anything to take attention off her highly-anticipated pregnancy. This time, the situation only continues to heat up…and I finally got my ship playlist together.

<#3 || Directory || #5>

“You are hopeless,” Mallory said, unzipping her makeup bag and leaning up to the mirror. “You know that, right?”

Marissa pulled at something vaguely beige in the pile of clothes spilling from her suitcase, and pulled a face on seeing that it still wasn’t the right bra. “Well, I wasn’t ignoring you the first time you said it.”

“Smart aleck.”

There were two reasons Marissa could think of that Mallory would have grabbed her in the lobby to insist they get ready together: she might actually want to spend some time with her, or she might just have been trying to figure out where she slept last night. The answer to that was a disappointing ‘in my own bed, by myself, thanks,’ but Mal had stayed, so maybe it wasn’t the only reason…

She checked herself as she continued to dig. When did you get so cynical and defensive? Seriously, you can’t give your own sister the benefit of the doubt, just a little bit? So maybe she hasn’t always been completely selfless in dealing with you…even recently…but…no, that’s a fair point. Ugh. Maybe everyone is out to get me.

Well, maybe it didn’t matter. Marissa probably wouldn’t admit it, but even if she did feel the need to be on her guard, she was kind of grateful for Mal’s company. They should have been much closer than they were, and this was exactly the kind of situation where she felt like she needed somebody around who knew what she was doing. Even though she hadn’t acted on it, she’d been shaken by Mallory’s advice. For the first time, she had stared at the darkened ceiling and wondered what Sebastian was doing without her. Four hours wasn’t a lot of time to spend sleeping. If she laid down with him, would she wake up alone? What kind of rhythm would they find if they lived together? Or would he simply always be gone, stalking the rooftops somewhere?

It might be easier that way. She could keep her life just the way it was, except for occasionally being teased into wakefulness, ravished, and left to melt back into sleep. But Marissa had never wanted a supernatural lover passing in the night, and she didn’t do ‘easier’. Easier would have been acceding to the pressure to apply to med school, or staying with her college boyfriend even though the Sonic Vorpal incident had proved he’d let her take a stun ray to the face to save himself. She didn’t do what was easy, she did what she damn well wanted to. But if what she wanted wasn’t possible—

A miserable retching from the direction of the bathroom cut her thoughts short. Unsurprisingly, it was Mallory, trying to steady herself on the wall.

“For someone who wants company, you’re not selling this very well,” Marissa said, reaching over and tucking her hair back for her.

“It’s worth it,” Mal managed. “It has to be worth it, or we’d have all gone on strike decades ago. Augh.” She splashed a little water on her face and buried it in one of the spare towels until she regained some sense of equilibrium. “Now. Do you want to try explaining to me again what your problem is with this man?”

She frowned. “I don’t have a problem with Sebastian.”

“Oh, now we’re getting somewhere. You’ve admitted you’re the one with the problem.” Mal picked up her toothbrush again with a grimace. “Which I could have told you to start with, but you don’t listen to me.”

“Yeah, I wonder why not. Mal, I refuse to believe I’m that predictable.”

“Well, you are,” her sister said. “You know the rest of us still get along, right? You’re the only one who took the divorce so hard.”

That hurt enough that Marissa had to stop for a moment and silently watch Mallory brush her teeth. Ridiculous. She hadn’t taken anything hard. Mal made it sound like she was drowning in unearned angst over here, when she just wasn’t as good as her sisters were at pretending that nothing had changed. “I don’t see your point,” she said.

Mallory returned the look, openly skeptical. “Come on. Where’s my good night kiss?—That’s all you had to say, and I wouldn’t have seen you moping over the gross hotel bagels this morning. You’re literally doing this to yourself at this point, Marissa. I think you’re scared to be his girlfriend.”

“I am not.”

“You are. Under all those excuses, you’ve convinced yourself it won’t work out, so you don’t even want to try,” she said. “I’m right, and you know it.”

Marissa looked down at her hands—she’d chipped her manicure already. Lovely. But even that could only distract her for so long. “Maybe,” she said, looking up again. “Okay, yes. I love him. But I know that’s not enough.”

“Marissa!” Mallory reached over and shoved her a little. “I knew it. I cannot with you. Look, all my life I’ve had to put up with you doing whatever the hell you want and somehow always getting away with it. This is not the time to start worrying about what’s going to happen in ten or fifteen years, all right? Find a little faith in yourself.”

“I can try,” she said sheepishly.

“There is no try. Come on, show me your dress.”

Marissa went back to the closet to pull it out on the hanger, swishing the skirt with an uncertain frown. Mal wouldn’t like it; Christa had been perfectly happy to help her optimize for not your plaything vibes. It was classy and flattering, but seductive? No. The beading was fragile, and even the fabric was stiff and kind of scratchy. Someone had cut half the skirt off in the eighties, so Christa’d made a lot of faces about the hem hitting above the knee instead of at a “more elegant” length. It had that going for it, and it hung just off the edge of her shoulders—hence the hunt for the still-missing strapless bra. That was about it.

Mallory summed it up pretty well, pulling a grimace without pausing in rolling on under-eye brightener. “It doesn’t exactly scream come and get me.”

“That wasn’t what I was going for, no.” She held it against her body and wondered how much the heels would help. As little effort as she usually made, he probably wouldn’t even care, right? …and was she really, seriously, trying to get Sebastian into bed now? This was stupid. The whole idea was stupid.

“Well, maybe—” Mallory stopped at a faint knocking from around the corner. Marissa sighed and went to check the door, dropping the dress on the bed as she went. The smudged fisheye lens showed her the shape of Sebastian, his shoulders rolling back uncomfortably as he looked off down the hall.

Shit! “Just a sec,” she said, already moving again. A sheet thrown over the disgorged suitcase—that made the room close to decent, but she was barely dressed. Add her old reliable ratty Columbia hoodie, good enough. Back to the door. She opened it a couple of feet and tried to lounge casually in the doorway, like she wasn’t way too aware that her shorts were barely any longer than the sweatshirt was. She hadn’t dressed like this since it was still new. “Hey. Yeah? What’s up?”

Sebastian looked like he wanted to call the whole conversation off, but took a second to clench and unclench his jaw muscles in a rare display of embarrassment and then managed to open his mouth. “I need to borrow whatever’s the heaviest concealer you’ve got. Apparently I didn’t pack mine after I put it on yesterday.”

“Oh. Um—” Marissa was suddenly not entirely sure what she had on hand. Christa had tried to tactfully suggest that she could also help update her makeup look, but that’d felt like trying too hard—too far into doesn’t she clean up nice movie makeover territory. Mallory would know what to do, though. She’d basically pre-volunteered herself to help with all Baz problems. “Well, if you come in, I’ll see what I have.”

He didn’t look sure about it, but followed her in and sat down at the desk while she dumped out her toiletries bag and tried to hastily sort everything that wasn’t makeup back into it. Glancing in the mirror, she saw Mallory step out of the bathroom and do a double-take. “Okay. Hi. So, Marissa, I was just going back to our room to get—”

“No, you weren’t. You already made two trips coming over here,” Marissa said, holding up an ancient tube of concealer to the back of Sebastian’s neck and frowning at the obvious color mismatch. “Do you have any bronzer I can blend this with?”

“…oh, boy. Again, you’re hopeless, but I love you anyway. What was the plan?”

He turned his head to show Mal the burn scars erupting from the neckline of his T-shirt. Marissa was used to them, but as she spent more time with him outside of work and hero business, she’d come to realize he made a habit of covering them in the rest of his life. If nothing else, they were awfully distinctive. “Not showing these off.”

“Wow, why? That’s badass.” Mallory stepped in and set a hand on his head, turning it further so she could see the lightning-patterned feathering disappearing into his hairline. “I mean, what is that, thermal burns on top of Lichtenberg figures? Lightning strike, right? Did it literally electrify your capillaries or something? I never get to see cool stuff like this in practice.”

He smiled wryly. “Badass, yeah, but it does kinda dominate conversations.”

“Oh! …Yeah, I see that. Sorry.” She looked him over for another moment. “Okay, I have a spare foundation stick and some color corrector that should be better than nothing. Just make sure you set it before you put a shirt on.”

“Sure thing.”

Marissa relaxed slowly, because thank you, thank you, Mal, for not asking—

“So you don’t have to answer, but I’m the nosy older sister, so I have to ask. Does that, like, go all the way down, or…”

She had to cough into her sleeve to avoid a less dignified sound of horror. Sebastian snickered a little and kicked his foot up on the desk for a moment, pulling back his pants leg to show her the continuation. “Yeah. Ain’t much to look at, though. All that, and the exit wound vaporized a couple toes.”

“Shiiiiiit, okay. Wow.” Mallory grinned, but thankfully didn’t push it after that, disappearing for only a minute before dropping the makeup into Marissa’s hands and then leaving them alone again.

“I can smack her upside the head for you, if you want,” she said uncomfortably.

“Nah, Mallory’s all right. I like her already.” Sebastian turned back in the chair, letting the side of his arm brush against her bare thigh—on purpose, surely. He was taunting her. Putting ideas in her head. She looked away, wishing she knew how to stop herself from blushing. This was supposed to be what she wanted, wasn’t it? Stick it out. Don’t pull away. “You’re more fun when you take the filter off too, you know,” he said.

“Heh. That doesn’t sound right.” She raised one hand haltingly to touch the back of it to his neck, her insides squirming at the impertinence. His soft smile suddenly had a hungry edge. “D-do you want any help with that?”

He wrapped his hand around her wrist and pulled it away, still smiling as he took the tube and palette from her other hand. She could feel her heartbeat against his palm. “You looked like you were in the middle of something. Next time, huh?”

Her attempt to respond came out as a breathy squeak. Sebastian laughed, squeezed gently, and let her go. The door opened and closed as she watched her hand tremble on the edge of the desk.

Mallory poked her head around. “So, do you want feedback, or—”

“No. Just help me find the rest of my clothes, all right.”

🧪💕⚡️

It was interesting, the change in Marissa. Baz still wasn’t sure if it was the dare he’d put to her, something else he’d managed to get right, or just the effects of taking her out of her element, but the last day or so had been much easier going. She was suppressing the usual belligerence well enough that anybody might have suspected she actually liked him. He’d heard more than a few comments to that effect already.

Overall, not a negative development, but it created one problem: her willingness to hit back was what enabled his shield of plausible deniability. As that unsympathetic voice in the back of his head would have told anybody, when it came to Rissa, he was basically a coward. Having that shield eroded by her shy acquiescence, when he would have expected her to delight in his predicament and give him an excuse to make her uncomfortable in turn, was…challenging. The situation seemed to be working in his favor so far, but who was to say she wouldn’t turn on him again? He still had no idea what was really going inside her head.

Baz had already thought of asking her sister—aside from her obvious background maneuvering, no, he hadn’t missed that enthusiastic thumbs-up—but that would have to wait for later. Mallory stopped him in the hall only to shove a couple of tissue packs on him. “You’ll want these,” she said. “Marissa’s a crier.”

“Mal! Don’t lie to him!”

There she was, tagging behind. Beautiful girl. If she really didn’t know something was up by now, it was because she hadn’t noticed that he could no longer keep a straight face when she showed up anywhere. She was looking right past him, though, all irritation at Mallory.

“You don’t have to feel self-conscious about it, hon. It’s a wedding—everybody cries at weddings,” Mallory said.

“I don’t. He doesn’t.”

“Maybe I do,” Baz said, pocketing the tissues. “Don’t judge me and my sensitive soul.”

“Oh, please.” Marissa looked back at him and pressed her lips together in what she seemed to think was a successful motion to control her expression. It did nothing about her widening eyes. “At least you don’t look too bad,” she said. “You won’t be embarrassed to stand next to me, right?”

Oh, see…this was why the part of him that thought Marissa was too much damn trouble was never going to win. He wasn’t going to pass judgment on her outfit; he was sure whatever he might choose instead would be wildly inappropriate, anyway. His attention had been hijacked by the unexpected stretch of skin between her neck and shoulders, begging him to find out how soft it was. Don’t you want to see what she’d do?

He pushed that thought away because yes, but not now. Not yet. Instead he made sure to telegraph a critical once-over before raising his eyes again to meet hers. Her shoes had to be four if not five inches tall, because she was nearly at his eye level already. “Makin’ a point, there?”

“I would never.” She reached across him for his hand and pushed back his sleeve to look at his watch. Baz momentarily struggled with, and thankfully defeated, the urge to innocently knock her off-balance and into his arms. “Shit, I didn’t think about traffic. Let’s go. Mom’ll kill me if we’re not early enough.”

“I’ll put in a good word for you. She likes me.” So far as he’d ever had a plan, getting in good with Marissa’s family had not been part of it, but he’d always been good at that kind of thing. And it was definitely a perk.

She shook her head. “Ugh, don’t remind me. Come on.”

🧪💕⚡️

It was hours later—how many hours?—before Sebastian finally got a few moments for thought again. After all, he was here mostly to keep Marissa safe, and she didn’t make that easy.

The rehearsal dinner hadn’t bothered him, because there were few enough people that he could keep an eye on them all, and the hotel rooms were reasonably secure. The wedding venue, though, was almost as bad as the airports had been. Marissa seemed to be having the time of her life forcing him to chase her down on the way in. It was a relief to get her sat down in one place for the ceremony, even if she did end up doing an uncomfortable amount of crying into his shoulder, whisper-hissing between sobs for him not to look down at her weepy face. It was not a side of her he was used to, to say the least. (Mallory’s husband had given him a sympathetic look from the end of the row—apparently it ran in the family.)

They’d had to stand around for pictures afterwards. Nobody liked doing those, as far as Baz could tell, but they dragged on anyway. Bafflingly, he found himself roped into at least half of them, referred to as the bride’s other brother-in-law without anyone bothering to correct the photographer. Marissa hushed him and pinned him in place with a hand on his arm just out of sight, so that was that. The most irritating part was that the angle kept him from getting a good look at whoever was hovering by the doors.

Everything’s been fine so far. Nothing’s going to happen. You’re worrying too much again.

Maybe. Maybe not. But he didn’t like being this far away from backup. Between the TSA and what depressurization would have done to the tech, he didn’t have his suit, either, or even a decent knife, only a $30 hardware-store substitute that still felt cold in his hand. If she really intended to make him a permanent addition, then they were driving next time, damn it. He could make that in two days. Chattanooga had nice hotels. Rissa could deal with it.

That was the question, he guessed: did she?

They were at the reception now, past the heartfelt speeches and the choreography. Sebastian had a good idea of where his attention needed to go and, finally, nobody was trying to talk to him, so—he could think. Specifically, he could work his way through the fact that Marissa had slipped seamlessly into acting like he belonged here. Was she serious about it? He could tell it felt confining for her, and he could understand that, but he had been on his own for too long now to agree. Whatever problem she had with them, it couldn’t be worse than what he’d grown up with. Even if it had been, he wanted to have a family again. If they would take him…

He’d never seen Marissa as the type who could dangle something over him on purpose; her revenges usually took the form of whatever was closest to hand, and her frustrations burned out fast. He didn’t even think she’d thought far enough ahead to realize when she invited him along that this might happen. Considered alongside her sudden acceptance of close contact…yeah, she was probably serious.

It was not an entirely comforting thought. In fact, it kind of made Baz wish he still drank, at least a little. He was going to start overthinking this if he let himself, and the fact was that her cooperation was only going to get him so far. She’d seemed just as serious about wanting to keep him around the last time he’d screwed this up.

He turned a little to find Marissa again, trying to pull himself back into the moment—he was tracking her intermittently, from the corner of his eye, so it didn’t look like he was staring. She’d made friends with another girl and they were dancing on the stairs next to the bar, lip-synching enthusiastically to “Man! I Feel Like A Woman”. Fine, but did they really have to be on the stairs? Rissa was still wearing those heels. She was going to fall and mess up at least one ankle, and then…well, then she’d have to sit here and behave, so that would be something. He would also have to offer to carry her to the car at the end of the night, and he could just imagine her getting all flustered, trying to figure out how to pretend she didn’t want him to. And that would be adorable. All right. He’d tolerate it.

The back of his neck prickled in the way that meant someone had moved in between him and the nearest air vent. He turned around calmly to see an older man—not old, but older than he was; maybe sixty—in the process of sitting down at their table, a couple of chairs away. The man stopped halfway, looking surprised to have been caught. “I’m sorry. Do you mind?”

“Go ahead,” he said before turning back. Now, Marissa—where was Marissa, she’d disappeared again…there. Someone had convinced her to step down onto a surer footing. Oh, well.

“On duty, are you?” the man said behind him.

There was something about his tone that Baz didn’t like. He turned his whole chair this time, so he could see him without taking the other eye off Marissa. There was an edge to the guy that he hadn’t noticed at first. “How d’you mean?” he said.

A casual, but pointed folding of the hands. “How many exits would you say there are?”

“That depends.” Exit was a very flexible thing, even without reality-warpers around. More of a concept than a location, really. “Are you tryin’ to get to the street, and would you consider a window?”

“Yes. No.”

“Three, then. Maybe four. But I wouldn’t make assumptions about whether the kitchen’s up to code.”

“Well, there you go,” the other said. “I know the look when I see it. You didn’t even have to think about that.” He nodded toward Sebastian’s water glass, a little friendlier now. “I suppose I’ll forgive you for not drinking at my daughter’s wedding.”

Ah. Looking at him again, Baz did see something of Marissa and her sister. So this was the man who’d merited no description beyond let’s just cross that bridge when we come to it. Very helpful. He’d picked up from gossip that their father wasn’t generally liked—thought himself too good for the likes of them—but that was it. He offered a thin smile. “Don’t think we were introduced.”

“We weren’t. My fault, I’m afraid.” He extended a hand. “David Cotlin.”

“Sebastian Grimes,” he said, and shook it. It was very thin.

“Yes…you’re with Marissa, right?” He noted Sebastian’s pause. “Or was that the wrong question?”

“No, well…” He considered this. “I’m startin’ to get the idea I’m on probation.”

David smiled slightly. “There are worse places to be.”

The conversation was mercifully interrupted by Marissa approaching from his other side; she didn’t seem to have noticed who he was sitting with. Baz noticed it was a new drink she had, and he slipped it from her hand when she came within range. “You’ve probably had enough for now,” he said.

She pouted openly but leaned against the table without a problem, somehow still steady on her feet. “You’re no fun.”

“I said I’d look out for you. Can’t have you embarrassin’ yourself out there.” Baz took a drink out of her cup and was sorely disappointed to realize the only thing he felt was the carbonation. Sure, he’d suspected he’d gotten his brain chemistry screwed up somewhere along the line, but…oh, well. He probably deserved it.

Marissa raised a hand to run her fingers back through his hair, grinning like she’d wanted to do that for a while. “Yeah, I remember. Embarrassing me is your job.”

“I didn’t say that.” He wondered if or when he was expected to mention they weren’t alone.

“You didn’t have to. It’s a safe assumption with you, babe.” Her gaze shifted past him then, suddenly tense, and her hand closed into a fist across the side of his head. He wouldn’t have to mention it, then. “Oh. Great. Exactly what I need right now,” she said under her breath.

“Hello, Marissa,” her father said.

“…Hi.” She looked down at Sebastian again. “I want to dance.”

“All right, go on,” he said; he wasn’t going to hold her here just to cause more friction.

Marissa bit her lip for a second, shredding lipstick onto her teeth, before grabbing him by the arm. “No, I mean with you. Come on.”

This was a much less helpful development, and Baz had to consider his options for getting out of it. “Thought I was too short for you?”

“Don’t be difficult.” She kicked off her shoes under the table, dropping to a more familiar height. “I swear, one more complaint about that and I’m buying you boots with lifts in the heels. Now let’s go.”

He still didn’t want to, but saying no to that tone of voice seemed liable to escalate things in the wrong direction, so he went. Marissa pulled him around the edge of the dance floor to the opposite corner of the room, stopped, and looked up expectantly.

“I don’t…do this,” he said, frowning a little in confusion.

“Figure it out,” she snapped.

Because she seemed genuinely upset about something, Sebastian suppressed the urge to figure out how to make her regret this and focused instead on logistics (critical: keep her bare feet out from under his shoes.) Fortunately, she didn’t complain, and it gradually dawned on him that Marissa had very little interest in dancing, per se. She’d wanted an excuse to get out of the conversation and hug him very tightly at the same time.

He leaned down. “Are you gonna explain at some point what the matter is?”

“No.” A pause. “Maybe.”

“Maybe, huh.”

Through his jacket, he felt her fingers dig a little further into his shoulder blades. “Maybe Mal’s right, and I am just like him. I mean—I could have tried to get his number. And I don’t even know when I last talked to my college friends. Maybe I do just drop people. Maybe I’m the problem.”

“Somehow I don’t think you are,” he said.

“I could be,” Marissa said, her voice small. “What if I really don’t know how to make up after things go wrong?”

Baz couldn’t help but laugh. “You? Come on. I piss you off all the time, but here I am.”

She pulled back to scowl at him. “Yeah, but I…well, you’re different.”

“How?” he asked, amused.

She blushed silently for a few moments, her mouth twitching open and closed as if that even needed an answer, really, but finally gave up and pushed her hot face into his shoulder again. Somebody giggled nearby, and she popped back up, looking a little ashamed of herself. “Look, I’m sorry I just dragged you over here. I’m sure you were getting along fine without me.”

“Nah, it was in the brief,” he said. “You had to act like you like me, at least a little.”

Marissa half-smiled, still unsure. “How’m I doing?”

Baz decided to lean back into the shadow of plausible deniability, as much for her sake as for his own. A light touch along her cheek, and an unconcealed smugness when she shivered. “Well, you were doin’ okay, but I’m gonna need you to stop escalatin’,” he said in a low voice, watching her closely. “There’s only so many places I have left to take this if I really want to make your life difficult…you make me dance, I kiss you, you kiss me back, you end up turnin’ down a public proposal…nobody wins.”

Rissa’s eyes were dark and intent. “Who says I’d turn you down?”

He chuckled. “You’d really get married on a dare?”

She let go of him to throw her arms over his shoulders, probably the better to act like she didn’t care. Good luck with that. “It’s like you don’t even know me,” she said, leaning in.

“I don’t know, I think I know you pretty well,” Baz said, and she gave him that look. That how dare you make me want you look. He could live on it.

He couldn’t help it. He kissed her.

Marissa held very still, exhaling softly only as he let go. Her eyes darted back and forth across his face anxiously, warily. “You’re not laughing at me,” she said.

“No,” he said, though he could feel himself smiling a little.

“That—wait, that was—serious.”

“Yeah.” The song had changed, and he pulled her out of the way of some kids running by to join the line dance. She took her arms back and moved back half a step without answering. From her face, he couldn’t tell why. “That a problem?” he asked.

It was too loud now for conversation at that distance, and she just shook her head and nodded towards the nearby door. They’d come in that way. Second-floor level, small deck (railing, no roof, unenclosed), partially enclosed staircase down to the parking lot. More exposed than he’d like to a blind approach, but it was off the street, so—would you turn those goddamn thoughts off for five minutes.

Sebastian nodded back, took her hand, and walked her outside.

<#3 || Directory || #5>

Thanks for reading! Science! Girl is posting weeklyish through October. Next time, some people might finally just talk to each other. But there’s only two more episodes left, and didn’t I promise violence…?

If you enjoyed this episode, you can show it by leaving a like or comment, sharing this post, or just continuing to read. :) Everyone’s welcome in the fan club!