A Cross Between a Fish and a Chair (1/1)
Title - A Cross Between a Fish and a Chair (1/1)
Author - earlgreytea68
Rating - Teen
Characters - Ten, Rose, OCs
Spoilers - None
Disclaimer - I don't own them and I don't make money off of them, but I don't like to dwell on that, so let's move on. (Except for the kids. They're all mine.)
Summary - Fortuna learns that boys are frequently idiots.
Author's Notes - For twenty bucks during the last Support Stacie auction, you won a fic of your very own. This is
amberfocus's, which she has graciously agreed to share with all of you. She had an extremely specific prompt: "I'd like Fortuna (at about age 17 or so) to have had her heart broken by her first serious boyfriend so she teleports to Harvard to visit Brem and Kate, but can't find them, and Athena's not around either, so she ends up running into Brem's roommate from first year, Matt, and he takes her to a carnival to comfort her and make her believe that not all men are dogs. Just lots of fluff and maybe Matt having a realization that in a few more years Fortuna is going to be a force to be reckoned with and she'll be the one breaking hearts instead of the other way around."
Thank you to jlrpuck, as always, for the beta, and Kristin for the read-through.
The gorgeous icon was created by swankkat for me, commissioned by jlrpuck for my birthday.
The thing was that it shouldn’t have hurt her as much as it did. He was just a silly boy, and he’d kissed another girl, and that proved his stupidity, she knew it did. And it still hurt.
Because she’d kind of, for a little while, thought she loved him. A stupid thing for her to do, think she loved a stupid boy like him. But she had thought it for a little while, because she was an idiot. And it had been a shock to hope to surprise him and instead find him snogging somebody else.
It was times like these when she hated being the only kid left on the TARDIS. She didn’t want to talk to her parents about it. She didn’t want them to know how very stupid she had been. They were always telling her that she was young and didn’t know everything, and she was tired of hearing about that, and also unhappy that she had apparently proved them right. She wasn’t really looking forward to that “I told you so.”
She missed Brem and Athena. This was the time when she needed them to be more accessible than they were, when she still wished they were just in the next room, and she could go seek out a hug and a word of kindly advice and maybe some ice cream. What was the point of having older siblings if they weren’t around in times like this?
Time to visit Brem or Athena. Both would be understanding. Brem might be a bit more protective of her, Athena might be a bit more outrageous in her recommendation of what to do to get over him. Fortuna considered her options and, unable to make up her mind, finally settled for flipping an Artusvsi coin.
It came up Brem.
“I’m going to visit Brem for a while,” she told her parents.
Her mother told her to have a good time.
Her father, who could feel her in his head, much as she was trying to block it, looked at her closely. “You okay?”
“Yeah, just…missing Brem.”
“Well, tell him we say hi,” Mum smiled at her.
Fortuna nodded brightly, and then teleported to Cambridge and headed to the flat Brem shared with Matt. She’d been given a key long ago, although that had been basically superfluous, since she could have used her sonic screwdriver to get in whenever she wanted. Still, she knocked as she stuck her head into the flat and called, “Brem?”
Matt was laying on the couch in the lounge, reading. He looked up at her in the doorway. “Hey, Fort. He’s not here. I’m not sure where he is, actually.”
“Oh.” Fortuna paused. The coin flip had led her wrong.
Matt sat up, tossing his book aside. “So what’s up? Did you bring ‘biscuits’?”
“No, I…haven’t baked lately,” she confessed.
“Ah. Busy with the boyfriend?”
“Brem told you about that?”
“He mentioned it.”
Fortuna, sighing, walked into the lounge and sat next to Matt on the couch. “He cheated on me. With a Xunjkl.”
“Well,” said Matt, “I don’t know exactly what that means, and I can still tell you that he’s an idiot.”
“You’re required to say that.”
“No, I’m not.”
“As the big brother stand-in at the moment, you’re required to say that.”
“Alright, maybe,” he agreed.
Fortuna sat in silence and wondered if she should go find Athena.
“You know what you need?” Matt asked, abruptly.
“What?”
“Cotton candy.”
Fortuna blinked blankly. “What’s cotton candy?”
“How do you not know what cotton candy is? Not alien enough for you?” he grinned, and stood up. “Come on.” He walked toward the door, pausing to grab his keys off the table.
She stood and followed, curious. “Where are we going?”
“To get you cotton candy. You’ve got to try cotton candy.”
********
Matt drove. This was not something Fortuna experienced all that often. Driving. In a car. Just a regular, human car. It was a little amazing, and she tried not to show how amazing it was, because Matt probably already thought it was pathetic enough that her boyfriend had kissed a Xunjkl and that she didn’t know what cotton candy was.
Matt drove with a lot of grumbling, and Fortuna thought how all men, alien and otherwise, drove everything, spaceship and car, with the same amount of complaining, and she bit her lip to keep from laughing at him and watched the scenery go by.
“Are we leaving the city?” she asked. “I’ve never been outside of the city.”
“That’s because there isn’t much out here.”
“But there’s cotton candy,” she pointed out.
“For a limited time only,” replied Matt.
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll see,” he promised.
“Does Brem drive?” she asked.
“Uh, no,” answered Matt. “What we discovered is that knowing how to drive a spaceship definitely does not mean you know how to drive a car.”
“I bet he could learn.”
“He can learn, sure, just on someone else’s car.”
Fortuna laughed, and then caught sight of a Ferris wheel, in the near distance. “Oh!” she exclaimed, and things suddenly clicked into place. “Are we going to a fair?”
Matt smiled. “Yes.”
“You vinnyot, it’s called candy floss, and of course I’ve had it.”
“What?”
“Cotton candy. It’s not cotton candy where I’m from, it’s candy floss.”
“What did you just call me? Vinn…?”
“Oh, vinnyot? Oh, it’s…Never mind. A fair! This is exciting! I’ve never been to one of these on Earth!”
Matt parked the car and glanced over at Fortuna. Her eyes were bright with excitement, her hand already on the handle of the car door, ready to leap out and explore, and he felt relieved. In the four years he’d known her, Fortuna had always been unfailingly enthusiastic, full of curiosity and happiness. Her listlessness at the apartment had made him uneasy, and he was pleased she looked thrilled to be at the fair. It had been a spur of the moment decision but girls always loved cotton candy, he’d found, and who knew when Brem would have been home to come up with some alternate plan.
“So do you want to go, then?” he asked, teasing.
“Yes!” said Fortuna, and opened the car door.
********
“Are you having a good time?” Matt asked her, watching her munch on popcorn and taken in the view from their Ferris wheel car.
She looked at him. “Oh, yes! It’s amazing. A bit…tame. But amazing.”
“Tame?”
“Well, you know, on Old Olij the rides all go upside down and they don’t strap you in. You have to hang on for dear life.”
“That doesn’t sound safe.”
“Oh, it isn’t at all,” Fortuna responded, sounding unconcerned.
Aliens, thought Matt, looking out over the fair below them, were really impossible to impress.
“Why do boys do things like that?” Fortuna asked, abruptly ending the silence between them.
He glanced at her. She was frowning into her popcorn. “We’re not that smart,” he said.
“Well, it’s just so stupid,” complained Fortuna. “I mean, to tell someone you love them and then clearly not mean it. Why say it at all? There was no need to say it.”
“Fort, honestly, I wish I had a good explanation, but stupidity is really the most eloquent one.”
Fortuna sighed. “I do feel like an idiot.”
“I didn’t mean your stupidity,” said Matt, “I meant his.”
“Maybe I was too…I mean, I could have been too…clingy, maybe. Or needy. Or something like that.”
“I know that you weren’t.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I know you. And I know that boys do really stupid things for no good reason. Honestly, Fort, you’re a catch. You’re beautiful and you’re funny and you’re going to be absolutely devastating.”
“Going to be,” Fortuna repeated, sadly. “Why not now?”
“Oh.” He hadn’t even realized he’d phrased it that way. “You’re just…young, that’s all. Give yourself a bit of time.”
“When you’re the baby of the family, that’s all anybody ever tells you. ‘You’re too young, wait a little while longer.’ Sometimes, I think if I have to wait any longer, I’ll scream.”
“I didn’t mean-” Matt began.
“No,” sighed Fortuna. “I know you didn’t. Sorry. I’m in a terrible mood. I bet you wish my coin had come up Athena.”
“Your coin…? What?”
“I flipped a coin, to try to decide whether I should bother Brem or Theenie. It came up Brem, so here I am.”
“You’re not bothering me. I really wanted to go to the fair, so you gave me a great excuse.”
“You’re very sweet and good at saying the right thing,” remarked Fortuna. “I’m not sure Brem would have been as useful.”
Matt laughed.
“I used to have the biggest crush on you, you know,” she continued.
“I know.”
“You know?” gasped Fortuna, blushing.
Matt looked at her curiously. “Did you think you’d hidden it?”
“You never said anything!” she accused.
“I thought it was kinder,” he admitted. “I didn’t feel the same way, and I thought you’d get over it on your own.”
“Well,” she remarked. “Now I’m mortified.”
He grinned. “Don’t be.”
Fortuna, munching on her popcorn, looked away and was silent for a second. “My father waited nine hundred years,” she said finally. “I’ve waited seventeen. I’ve no right to be so impatient. I keep telling myself that, and the truth is that it’s fine, I can wait, I just…wish he hadn’t been kissing the Xunjkl. I could have done without that.”
“I’m sure,” agreed Matt. He paused. “What’s a Xunjkl?”
“It’s kind of like a cross between a fish and a chair,” replied Fortuna.
And Matt decided not to pursue that line of questioning any further.
********
Brem looked up from where he was watching television when they walked into the flat and said, in surprise, “Fort.”
“Hi,” she said.
“What are you doing here?”
She sat next to him on the couch. “I came to visit, and you weren’t here, so Matt took me to the carnival.”
“Oh,” said Brem, as if none of that made any sense at all.
“I’ll be in my room,” said Matt. “I’ve got homework to do.”
“Thanks, Matt,” Fortuna told him. “Really, I had the best time.”
“The carnival?” said Brem, after Matt had departed for his room. “Why’d you go there?”
“Matt wanted to, and I think he thought it would cheer me up.”
“Did you need cheering up?” asked Brem, quizzically.
Fortuna sighed. “Mez was snogging a Xunjkl.”
“He was what?” exclaimed Brem, sitting up straighter.
“Let’s not overreact-” began Fortuna.
“Overreact? Isn’t he dating you?”
“Oh, no, definitely not anymore.”
Brem frowned. “But he was-”
“It doesn’t matter. Really. I was very upset, but then I stopped by to see you and saw Matt instead and he took me to the carnival and explained to me how boys are very stupid and I feel better now.”
“Oh, Fort,” Brem said, after a moment, and then gave her a hug. Hugs from Brem were relatively rare things. Fortuna didn’t know if winning one on this occasion was an honor or humiliating. “I’m sorry. He’s clearly an idiot.”
“That’s what Matt said.”
Brem released the hug and sat back. “Did you have fun at the carnival at least?”
“Yeah. I’ve never been to an Earth carnival before, it was a bit…tame.”
“Yeah, they’re all obsessed with safety and stuff. But I’m glad you enjoyed yourself. And I’m glad Matt told you how Mez is an idiot.”
“Yes, Matt did a very good job as your last-minute replacement. Actually, I might make the switch permanent. The understudy may become the lead. I’ve always said you were a bit too loud and pleased with yourself to suit my taste, and I would have preferred a quieter, more modest big brother-”
“I’m going to kick you out of this flat,” said Brem, good-naturedly, and then added, “Unless you’re hiding biscuits in one of your pockets.”
Fortuna laughed.
********
“So,” said Brem, knocking briefly on Matt’s open bedroom door to alert him to his presence. “Here’s what I’m thinking for dinner: pizza.”
“Pizza?” echoed Matt, glancing up from the textbook he was reading. “What a novel idea.”
“I know.”
“It’s been at least three days since we’ve had it.”
“Matt, I’m a visionary. I’m a thinker of original thoughts. Pepperoni and olive?”
“You live on the edge.”
“Constantly.”
“Where are you getting this pizza from?”
“Three Aces.”
“I’ll walk with you,” said Matt, and picked himself up off his bed.
It was dark, and with the setting of the sun a bit of a nip had entered the air.
“Fortuna left?” Matt guessed, as they strolled toward Mass. Ave.
“Yes. She seemed in good spirits, though. Thanks for taking her to the carnival.”
“No problem. She looked like she was in need of a pick-me-up, and I wasn’t sure when you were going to be home.”
“He cheated on her with a Xunjkl.”
“Yeah, she told me. She said it was a cross between a fish and a chair.”
“That’s pretty accurate.”
“Far be it for me to judge other people’s fetishes,” began Matt, “but-”
“Matt, humans are the least discriminating species in the universe when it comes to sexual proclivities, so I’d remember that people in promiscuous houses shouldn’t throw stones.”
“I’m not one of those undiscriminating humans,” Matt pointed out, “and a cross between a fish and a chair?”
Brem shrugged. “Some Xunjkls, I hear, can be quite charming.”
Matt shook his head a bit and wondered how he’d ended up here. If anyone had told him he’d go off to college and meet aliens, he would have laughed long and hard and then queried where they’d gotten such high-quality drugs. “Well, anyway,” Matt continued, “I don’t care how charming the Xunjkl was, Fort didn’t deserve to be treated like that.”
“Of course she didn’t. In a few years’ time, though, Fort’ll be all grown up and she’ll go and find Mez and he’ll be married to his Xunjkl and absolutely miserable and Fort’ll be able to gloat about how poorly Mez played his cards.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Lucky guess?”
“Uh-huh,” said Matt, skeptically.
“Alright, I sent Fort off to see Theenie and asked my father to skip us ahead so we could see how Mez turned out.”
“God help whoever your sisters marry,” remarked Matt.
“We weren’t going to do anything to him, we were just curious. And, anyway, I thought my parents should know what had happened.”
“As long as Fort knows you broke the confidence and not me.”
“I’ve sworn my parents to secrecy, and they’ll keep it. And yes, I’ll take the blame, if it ever does get out. I just wanted to make sure they kept an eye on her, make sure she’s okay.”
Matt was silent for a second. Then, “He marries a cross between a fish and a chair?”
“Matt, you’ve got to expand your horizons, mate,” replied Brem.