Only the Lonely, chapter 4
Mar. 2nd, 2012 01:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lirillithTitle: Only the Lonely
Fandom: Tiger & Bunny
Characters/pairing: Karina/Barnaby and Karina/Kotetsu, here, and referenced Barnaby/Kotetsu (which he believes to be one-sided)
Length: 5200 words
Rating: I dunno. Maybe T.
Summary: When Kotetsu returns from retirement and starts coming to Karina's performances again, she thinks she has her chance to get closer to him at last... but that also means getting to know his partner.
****
The lingering glow of an evening with Kotetsu - just Kotetsu, no partners or criminals or anyone else - kept her happy for days, enough to distract her from the mysteriousness about Barnaby, and her newest single reaching number one nationally was enough to explain it all to her parents. She couldn't have imagined a better birthday. Well, she could have, and it would still have involved Kotetsu, and the kind of imagining that made her glad she was old enough to buy sex toys now (not quite brave enough, but old enough) but in the realms of plausibility, things couldn't have gotten much better.
Over the next few days, though, as Karina recounted the story of the semi-date to Pao-lin and Nathan and a very edited version to Emily and Jane, the details about Barnaby that she wasn't discussing with them continued to nag at her. They'd talked that one night, at Kotetsu's home, and in the car the next morning. They'd been friendly enough, certainly more than they'd ever been before, but she didn't think she'd said or done anything that would have sparked any sudden interest on his part. Not that these things always made sense, or she wouldn't be so hopeless about Kotetsu.
Then again, she'd been viewing Barnaby more fondly since; not to the extent of a crush or anything, but it was definitely noticeable. Maybe the experience had more of an effect on him? Or maybe Kotetsu just wanted to think there was something between the two of them - he'd been making occasional remarks like that for ages, like that time when she'd had to sub in for Barnaby and Kotetsu had thought she was worried about him. Either way, the blue rose, which had stayed in a half-full bottle of water in Kotetsu's car during their semi-date, resided in a vase on her desk, keeping her from ever quite forgetting.
Then, on Friday, as she finished a song, she looked out over the bar, doing the usual scan of the crowd for Kotetsu, and her eyes instead landed on a familiar red-and-white leather jacket. She still had a few songs left in the first set, but she decided to take her break early. She'd make up the difference later. She must have looked formidable, because Barnaby's smile definitely faltered as she got closer to him. "I... hope you don't mind," he said uncertainly, as she climbed onto the bar stool. Formidability would be easier if only she were taller, she thought.
"Why would I mind?" she asked. She had no idea what she actually wanted to say to him. Should she bring up Kotetsu's weird behavior?
"I know you'd much rather see him," he said.
"He didn't send you or anything, did he?" For more matchmaking.
"Of course not!"
She shrugged. "He's not here every week. I was just surprised to see you here."
"I'm sure if I mention where I was there'll be no living with him, but I did want to hear your own music for once."
"Really?" She considered him, propping her chin on her hand. "It's not too un-classical for you?"
"I don't know anything about other types of music, but that doesn't mean I hate them all," he said. "And I much prefer your solo music to your alter-ego's sound."
She was pretty sure she couldn't hide how nice it was to hear that - not that she wanted to impress Barnaby or anything, but getting him to admit to liking her music was something of a triumph. "Yeah, well... you, me, and maybe a dozen other people," she said. "Still, thank you."
"And Kotetsu," he added. She smiled, but she wasn't entirely sure Kotetsu came because he liked her music. She knew he did enjoy it, but she was beginning to suspect coming to her performances was a way of being less lonely without taking any risks, just like telling the younger heroes how to be heroes had been, or nagging Barnaby to eat right.
She picked up her glass, then set it back down. "So if there'd be no living with Kotetsu... he pulled the matchmaking thing with you too?"
Barnaby winced. "It's probably my fault."
"Oh my God! What did you say to him?" She'd just concluded the secret had been mostly or entirely in Kotetsu's mind.
He was blushing. His ears were turning pink. How... bunny-like. Not the rest of him, though. No wonder he wore his hair like that. "I... that is... maybe we could talk about this later?"
"There is no way in hell. You need to give me at least the gist of it now! My break's nearly over!"
Barnaby stared at his glass of water, clearly wishing it was something stronger. "I may have expressed some degree of romantic interest in you."
She was silent for a second, processing that. Then, "Gosh. I bet you say that to all the girls." And he was too busy being embarrassed to notice she was blushing too, she congratulated herself. "'We'll talk later, if you don't flee the minute I get up there," she said, and took off before he could look at her again.
Barnaby's ridiculously unromantic admission might have distracted her from her first few songs, but she was able to get back on an even keel before long, and when she did so, and checked the bar, he was still there. With a glass of wine, this time, and looking a bit hunched-over and depressed, but he stayed. Romantic interest in her, huh? So maybe Nathan was right. And also wrong, because for a while he'd been maintaining that Barnaby was just as gone over Kotetsu as she was herself, but that was Nathan for you. "Romantic interest." Maybe Kotetsu was right, too, and he really was kind of a shy, nerdy virgin after all, rather than the supermodel-conquering teen idol everyone thought he was. Which was kind of sweet, really.
And he was good-looking. Not as much as Kotetsu - or at least, he didn't have those amazing smiles, and those amazing shoulders, and those abs - but he was handsome, and his own shoulders weren't half-bad, and his smile wasn't bad either, even if he was a little more stingy with it. That did kind of mean she'd earned it when he smiled at her, which he'd done more in the past week or so than in the entire rest of the time she'd known him.
Maybe she should have suspected something from the start.
He was still there when she left the stage for the night. He was back to drinking water, and he managed a kind of nervous smile as she approached. "So, romantic interest, huh?" she asked, once Steve was safely at the other end of the bar.
"Not that it was a very romantic way to say it," he admitted.
"Not terribly."
"I... could really use some help with this conversation."
"So where did this come from?" she asked. "Because this is quite a shift from 'I heard about your CD' on the air."
"What ever happened with that radio show?" he asked.
"Switched to a podcast because I kept refusing to tell the callers to lick my boots," she said. "Answer the question."
"Sometimes it's difficult to believe you had problems with that," he retorted. "How am I supposed to answer a question like that? Why did you fall for Kotetsu?"
"Excuse me," she protested. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Perhaps we could talk in the car, if I gave you a ride home," he suggested. "I only had one drink. I should be more than capable of driving." She nodded, because even if he'd gone all pompous, and even if she had to have an awkward conversation about Kotetsu, she wanted to get some answers out of him.
They got into his car in silence. Karina hugged the bookbag on her lap, unsure whether to be anxious about whatever explanation was forthcoming, or incensed that he'd brought up her feelings for Kotetsu. Sure, everyone knew, but bringing it up that way was just rude, and Barnaby had honestly never really done that. Certainly not that bluntly.
He started the car. He drove out of the parking lot. As he headed toward the freeway, the silence swiftly became awkward. When he finally spoke, on the on-ramp, he said "I have no idea what I'm doing here."
"What?" Surely he didn't mean driving.
"I only remember having one crush in my entire life prior to meeting Kotetsu. I don't remember ever dating, or kissing anyone, or even strongly wanting to. I never slept with anyone, to the best of my knowledge."
She opened her mouth to speak, planning to scoff at that, and then his phrasing hit her. After a second, she remembered to close her mouth.
"I have no idea if that's what my life was really like," he said. "But that's what I have to work with. Nothing."
"That's..." She'd never really given much thought to Barnaby except as a rival, an antagonist. She hadn't considered that whole incident the winter before last as part of a long pattern in Barnaby's life. "Maverick?"
"Possibly. I don't know. I don't know if I was too focused on revenge to have time for anyone in my life, or if he just made me think that I was after the fact." Or what had happened to anyone Barnaby might have forgotten about, she thought. This was a murderer he was talking about, after all. She shook her head to dislodge the image.
"That's disgusting," she said. "He was-- how could-- that's evil."
"It took me four months in therapy to face what I just told you," he said. "That my memories weren't reliable. When I told Kotetsu, he had the much same reaction you did. A bit more obscene, maybe. I haven't told anyone else."
"You haven't?"
"I was supposed to tell my friends," he said. "But I don't really have many." So that meant she was one of them, she realized, touched. "It's basically... Kotetsu. And you, if..."
"If I pass a probation period?"
"I was going to say 'if you don't mind.'"
"Sorry," she mumbled, looking at her hands.
"You passed any probationary period I would have imposed by worrying about Kotetsu," he said.
"That's... geez, that's setting the bar low. I mean, you knew how I..." She trailed off, still unwilling to say the words out loud.
"I knew how you felt about Kotetsu because I felt the same way about him."
"You... what?" Oh, this was just unfair. Nathan had been right about two things at the same time that should have been contradictory. It must be a secondary NEXT power or something. Wait... past tense? How could anyone just get over Kotetsu?
"When we first started to get closer, I realized I was developing feelings for him. I assumed he was straight, so I just did my best to ignore them. Over time, it's... become much easier to live with." That wasn't actually saying he was over it, she noted.
"Huh."
"And then when we spent that night taking care of him and actually being civil to each other, I realized the same thing was happening with you."
"...what was? You mean, like, getting interested in me?"
He nodded. "It's entirely possible I'll just always do this when I form friendships." Or that you only befriend people if you also want to get in their pants, she thought, but he beat her to it with "Or that I only seek out friendships with people I'm attracted to."
"And Kotetsu took the idea and ran with it." She sighed. She had been kind of gratified by the whole idea, if also weirded out. "Figures."
"If you're disappointed..." he said, with a teasing tone in his voice, and she glanced at him to see that insufferable smirk on his face.
"You were just born annoying, weren't you?" she retorted. "We should at least exchange phone numbers, so you don't have to hang out in bars to talk to me."
"Sleazy dives with underage performers," he agreed.
"Hey!"
"You're a performer, and you're underage."
"I'm not a stripper, which is how you were making it sound," she said. "Costume notwithstanding. Besides, I'm 18 now."
He grinned. They were nearing her house, so she pulled his phone off the dashboard. His wallpaper... was a photo of Kotetsu, with a goofy grin, fingers making a V near his face, and one arm extended. Jeez. She couldn't have dated Barnaby, if only because Kotetsu would probably consider his partner's ex off-limits, and all it took was looking at that man... "He took this himself?"
"Never leave him alone with your phone," Barnaby said. "He can't help himself."
She giggled. Then she found his camera function; his phone was noticeably fancier than hers. "Don't worry, not replacing your wallpaper," she said, and snapped the photo. She looked a little washed out in it, she thought, but her eyes were open and not glowing and her smile looked okay. Not too bad for a nighttime shot on a camera phone. She entered her number quickly and returned the phone to the dashboard. "I don't know how to look up yours," she said.
"I'll enter it in a moment," he said, as he turned onto her street. She kept getting dropped off at home by hot older men she met in bars, and no one even knew. She passed him her phone, and watched him as he entered the number. He really did have nice eyes. He passed the phone back to her, their fingers brushing, and she thought for a moment about kissing him goodbye the way she should have done a week ago with Kotetsu, just because his reaction when she'd kissed him on the cheek had been so memorable, but instead she just thanked him for the ride and climbed out of the car.
She'd been trying not to tell anyone much about what she was beginning to think of as "the Barnaby situation." It was one thing to dissect every interaction with Kotetsu, scheme, and analyze progress; Kotetsu might be more lonely than she'd realized, but she didn't really think of him as vulnerable. On the other hand, ever since Kotetsu had started telling her that Barnaby wasn't too experienced for her - which was more or less what she'd taken from it, even if it wasn't what he'd meant - she'd felt like it would be wrong to tell anyone much of that.
But Nathan was kind of in a special category. It wasn't that she didn't trust Pao-lin, but Nathan understood everything about people, like some kind of glittery pink Sherlock Holmes with a focus on relationships, and he didn't gossip when it was important. Of course, the downside of that was that he usually seemed to guess the stuff she was trying not to tell him, but that still didn't mean she'd actually betrayed anyone's confidence, so she could live with that.
As she wound down her story, Nathan stepped off the treadmill and sighed. "Honey, I could have told you all of this ages ago."
"You could?" She was a bit out of breath by that point. "All of it?"
"Handsome's bi. He's partial to you and Tiger, and way too inexperienced to do anything about it." She hadn't actually mentioned the inexperienced part. He toweled his face off. "Unfortunately, the obvious solution is a threesome, or it would be if it were three other people."
She'd done a little embarrassed searching on that topic the night before, before the embarrassment overcame the curiosity. "That'd be a lot of deflowering all at once," she said, jumping off the treadmill herself. Of course, that was assuming Kotetsu had never been with a man. "Very efficient."
He laughed. "You make me so proud sometimes." He took a drink from his water bottle, then continued, "If you ask me, what Tiger needs is some friends. He'd probably be happy to see you two together. You know he likes to meddle."
"Well, yeah..."
"And I take it you didn't grab Handsome and have your way with him."
And she'd been regretting it all night, honestly. "I don't think I would have gotten as far as having my way with him," she said.
"You could have laid the groundwork!"
"Why are you so determined to hook me up with Barnaby?"
"Sweetie. Look at him. Someone needs to tap that. It's a crime not to."
Those were the words echoing in her head when she called Barnaby that evening. "Yes?" he said when he answered. Straight to video - but he had her number, now, so that made sense.
"Are you busy?" she asked. "I'm just on call, and I'm bored."
"Same here," he said. "Kotetsu and I have a standing movie night for these situations. Care to join us?"
It was only after they'd finished the call that she realized this might have been incredibly awkward, and that she had no idea why it hadn't been. He hadn't been upset by her deflection the night before, apparently, but... another case for Nathan, it seemed.
"So I'm just curious about one thing," she said, standing in Kotetsu's kitchen, enjoying the view as Kotetsu, bent over, rummaged through his fridge. "Why here, on nights you're on call? If Barnaby's still living on Gold, that'd be more centrally located."
"I'll let him explain," Barnaby called from the couch.
"See, Bunny doesn't believe in furniture," Kotetsu said. "Sorry, Rose, I'm all out of Pepsi."
"Don't worry," she said with feeling. "I have Pepsi coming out my ears. You'd think it prevents osteoporosis the way my mother serves it up. Just some water or tea would be fine."
"Or beer," Barnaby suggested. "Kotetsu's idea of beer is a good way to put you off alcohol for life. A good preventive measure before college."
"Like I'll have time to binge-drink."
"Hey," Kotetsu protested. "I like it. My beer, I mean, not binge-drinking. Though sometimes..."
"I keep trying to explain to him about micro-breweries, but he doesn't believe in them," Barnaby said.
"But how do you not believe in furniture?" Karina asked. "You question the existence of that sofa you're on? You never could get that 'atoms are mostly empty space' thing out of your head?"
"I've just never gotten around to purchasing a couch."
Kotesu dumped microwaved popcorn into a bowl and passed it to her, so she carried it into the living room. "I was hoping for something kind of philosophical," she said. "Or religious."
"Sorry to disappoint." She was pretty sure she'd only ever seen him use that smile on Kotetsu. Nathan might get his wish after all if Barnaby kept this up. She plopped down on the couch, quite a bit closer to him than she would have a week ago, though she was kind of surprised to see there were still several inches of space between them. She felt like she as on the verge of snuggling up next to him.
"It's pretty much a trade-off," Kotetsu said. "Bunny's got this huge TV, takes up a full wall, but someone has to sit on the floor. I have furniture but my TV's a tenth of the size. When you opted in, that was the deciding vote, because obviously the lady gets the only chair."
"Why don't we just buy Barnaby a couch?" she suggested. "I'm pretty sure I could afford it."
"He's picky," Kotetsu said. "Believe me, I've tried." He had a bottle of wine in one hand, with the stems of two glasses between his fingers, and a glass of water for her in the other. "Scoot over," he added, and then plunked down between them when Barnaby moved. OMG TOUCHING TIGER, her leg informed the rest of her. She pictured it sending text messages. He leaned forward to open the wine bottle. OMG STILL TOUCHING TIGER. OMG SHOULDER TOUCHING HIM NOW TOO. OKAY FALSE ALARM. WHEN HE LEANS BACK THOUGH! Her blood felt fizzy and overheated, and she was intensely aware of her left leg and arm. Kotetsu and Barnaby were needling each other about screwcap wines and snobbery, and pouring their glasses full, as she tried to rein in her stupid hormones. She couldn't just climb on him with Barnaby sitting right there, especially given what he'd told her last night. It'd be rude, unless it led to that threesome Nathan had suggested, which seemed unlikely.
"See, it's fine," Kotetsu said, as Barnaby finally took a sip and failed to grimace.
"Yes, it is," he replied, resignedly. "Let's start the movie."
The movie was black-and-white, something Kotetsu insisted was a classic. It turned out to be a comedy, and not half-bad, absorbing enough that Karina completely forgot about the PDA on her wrist until the credits were rolling. She'd kicked off her boots, pulled her feet up underneath her, and snuggled up against Kotetsu's side, and the fact she'd more or less started to take that for granted by the end was another testament to the movie.
"Quiet night," Kotetsu said, and stretched. She sat up, stretching out her cramped legs and really kind of surprised, both at her own daring and the fact Kotetsu had done nothing to move her for the past... not quite two hours.
"Crime's less conveniently scheduled now," Barnaby said. With Maverick out of the picture, she thought. No one said his name, though.
"Time for take-out before the next movie?" Kotetsu suggested.
"Time for delivery," Barnaby replied. "Since you manage to cheat at rock-paper-scissors."
"Bunnyyyy, you know there's only pizza and terrible Chinese that will deliver free here. The good Chinese place is take-out only, and so is the kebab place, and I don't want to pay the delivery fee for Indian tonight..."
"We could have pizza," Barnaby countered. "Karina, what sounds good to you?"
"Well... how bad is the terrible Chinese place?"
"Terrible," they answered in unison.
"Then... good Chinese." She'd turned down an offer to share Pao-lin's lunch, which had been a mistake because it had smelled amazing and the lunch meeting she'd had to attend had offered her salad instead. Barnaby groaned. "It's impossible to cheat at rock-paper-scissors, right?"
"He finds a way."
"Bunny's just predictable," Kotetsu retorted. "Come on, let's do this."
"Is there a menu?" Karina asked, since the guys seemed fully prepared to get into a macho standoff.
"By the fridge," they both said, not quite in unison this time.
They went from a single match, to two out of three, to three out of five, while Karina glanced over the menu. Kotetsu hailed his final victory with arms flung in the air, which seemed a little excessive if that was how it went every time but was still adorable, and Barnaby, grumbling, collected their orders, pulled on his jacket, and left the house. Meaning Karina was alone with Kotetsu. He flopped back onto the couch, arms spread out on the back, almost like he had an arm around her. She had to snag this chance, she thought, and her heart immediately started thundering.
"So how's it going, Rose? Having fun?"
"Yeah," she said softly. She pulled her feet back onto the couch again, because that way she could get some height. "Thanks for having me over."
"Bunny thought of it," Kotetsu said. "Glad he did. More the merrier, right?"
Three's a crowd, she thought, but that was unfair to Barnaby. "Kotetsu?"
"Yeah?" He looked down at her, and she got up on her knees and touched his face. She could feel the edges of his close-cropped patches of beard under her thumb, the light coating of stubble on the rest of his face, and she could see his raised eyebrows even though most of her attention was on his lips. And she saw him close his eyes, so she kissed him, softly, and then she realized he was kissing her back. She wasn't about to stop now. When his lips parted under hers, her tongue slid against his, and dammit, she shouldn't have pushed, because now he was pulling away.
*
"Rose," he said, and he sounded kind of breathless, to her delight.
"At least now you know," she said, kind of out of breath herself.
"That's... Rose, I'm really old."
"You are not," she said fiercely. "You're barely any older than Nathan. He told me. You're what, like thirty-five? Thirty-six?" He nodded weakly. "How old were you when you met your wife, Kotetsu?"
He closed his eyes, and she immediately wondered if that was the wrong thing to say, but when he opened them, he just looked serious, not sad. She hoped that wasn't just an act. "She was the same age I was," he said. "That's the difference. You should be with someone closer to your age, someone you can have all those experiences with - first marriage, first child, first everything."
"So, what, divorced people can only remarry each other? That's not fair to anybody."
"That's not what I meant!" He ran his hands through his hair.
"You were kissing me back," she said softly. "You were acting like you wanted me."
"Rose, you don't need me to tell you what you look like," he said. "That's not what this is about."
"So it's just that I'm too young and immature?" And her voice was going higher-pitched, just to get rid of any doubts.
"It's not that," he said. "I'm twice your age! I have a daughter not much younger than you. There's less difference between her age and yours than yours and Bunny's." He rubbed his forehead. "If she was twenty, and she wanted to put the moves on some forty-year-old, I'd hope like hell he'd turn her down too."
"But why?" she protested. "I'm an adult. I've been playing Blue Rose for years. If you were old enough to fall in love with your wife by my age, why can't I be old enough to fall in love with you?"
"Rose..." he began, looking sad, and of course that was when her PDA went off. Just hers. "First League only, then," he said.
"Of all the times..." She pulled her boots back on, trying to ignore the sting of tears in her eyes. "See you around, then," she said, standing, not looking at him until he grabbed her wrist.
"Listen," he said. "Can we talk about this later? Tomorrow?"
"I guess," she said. "So you can tell me more about how I'm too young?"
"That's not--" He stopped. "Just take care, all right?"
She nodded, grabbed her purse and headed out the door, moving to enter her response on the PDA. She'd meet up with her transport, but she needed to walk for a while first.
The criminal had been a cat burglar, spotted as he was ascending to some penthouse on Gold; she'd arrived just as he was making his way down the building. She flung icicles at him like a knife-thrower, making a rough circle around him, then delivered that stupid catch phrase and created a hand gripping him around the midsection, anchored to the wall. Luckily it was a humid night. Mario said it was some kind of speed record for her, like that mattered. She brushed off Nathan, refused to answer her phone when Barnaby called, or when Kotetsu did, and curled up in bed to be miserable.
And to relive that kiss, because it was like her hands and lips refused to forget. He'd been kissing her back. He hadn't minded that. Was it just her age? That was so stupid. Only the fact that Blue Rose's age was a secret had saved her from one of those creepy "how long 'til she's 18" countdowns online, like she'd seen for a couple of young actresses. Like their fans were just waiting to pounce, and she was sure hers would have been if they'd ever known she was underage. Which, okay, was creepy, but how was it creepy in reverse? It wasn't like he'd made the first move. She'd been chasing him for two years now, and just when she thought she was finally catching up...
She finally drifted off to sleep, and woke feeling a degree less misery. He'd tried to call her last night. Trying not to get her hopes up, she checked her messages.
Barnaby's was first. "Hello, um... Karina, is everything all right? I know you left on call, but now that the episode's over I thought I'd check. Kotetsu won't tell me why, of course, but he seems upset." So much for her hopeful mood. Was Barnaby going to hate her if she told him? And for that matter, how had he managed to be so calm when he told her how he felt about both of them, in the car? Maybe she hadn't outright rejected him, but she hadn't responded like he might have hoped, and yet he hadn't gotten half as upset as she was now.
And Kotetsu's message. "Hey Rose... looks like you did really good tonight. I, um... I don't know what to say. Glad you're okay. Talk to you tomorrow." He sounded as depressed as she felt.
She headed straight for the training center. She needed to punch something. A lot.
She didn't even get that far, though. Kotetsu was waiting just inside, still in his street clothes. No one else was around. When he saw her, his face lit up with a smile that immediately collapsed.
"Morning," she said dully. She started to walk past him to the locker rooms, expecting him to stop her, but when he didn't, she turned to face him. "So why do you look so upset?" she demanded.
His expression went from unhappy to kicked-puppy, and if she hadn't been so unhappy herself she probably would have felt worse at the sight. "Because you're my friend, and I don't want you to feel bad, and... you do because of me."
"And?" She didn't care that she was being mean to him right now.
"It's... like... I never thought of you that way before. Even with your outfit - I always thought it was pretty scummy of Titan to put an outfit like that on someone your age. And then you kissed me, and part of me is thinking 'hell yes,' and another part is thinking 'holy shit, she's just a kid, what's wrong with you.'"
"I like the hell yes part better," she said, trying to smile, and he grinned a little, uncertainly.
"You... surprised me," he said.
"Are you maybe more used to the idea now?"
He winced, and she looked down. "Rose, you're young. You deserve somebody that hasn't already met and married the love of his life," he said softly. "I just want to go back to how we were."
She was not going to cry. "But I don't! I love you, and--"
"We can't even spend time together as friends?"
She was not going to look at him, and she was not going to cry. "Not yet. I don't know. I just can't."
A long silence. She heard a door slide open, new footsteps... Nathan's heels. She hated today so much. "Well... you know how to get hold of me if you change your mind later," Kotetsu said. "I'm sorry." She heard his footsteps, slow, leaving the room. The door slid open and shut. Her hands were clenched at her sides.
"Karina?" Nathan asked gently, and that was when she burst into tears.
****
Notes: This would be where the fanart began, pretty much making my year: here and here.
Fandom: Tiger & Bunny
Characters/pairing: Karina/Barnaby and Karina/Kotetsu, here, and referenced Barnaby/Kotetsu (which he believes to be one-sided)
Length: 5200 words
Rating: I dunno. Maybe T.
Summary: When Kotetsu returns from retirement and starts coming to Karina's performances again, she thinks she has her chance to get closer to him at last... but that also means getting to know his partner.
****
The lingering glow of an evening with Kotetsu - just Kotetsu, no partners or criminals or anyone else - kept her happy for days, enough to distract her from the mysteriousness about Barnaby, and her newest single reaching number one nationally was enough to explain it all to her parents. She couldn't have imagined a better birthday. Well, she could have, and it would still have involved Kotetsu, and the kind of imagining that made her glad she was old enough to buy sex toys now (not quite brave enough, but old enough) but in the realms of plausibility, things couldn't have gotten much better.
Over the next few days, though, as Karina recounted the story of the semi-date to Pao-lin and Nathan and a very edited version to Emily and Jane, the details about Barnaby that she wasn't discussing with them continued to nag at her. They'd talked that one night, at Kotetsu's home, and in the car the next morning. They'd been friendly enough, certainly more than they'd ever been before, but she didn't think she'd said or done anything that would have sparked any sudden interest on his part. Not that these things always made sense, or she wouldn't be so hopeless about Kotetsu.
Then again, she'd been viewing Barnaby more fondly since; not to the extent of a crush or anything, but it was definitely noticeable. Maybe the experience had more of an effect on him? Or maybe Kotetsu just wanted to think there was something between the two of them - he'd been making occasional remarks like that for ages, like that time when she'd had to sub in for Barnaby and Kotetsu had thought she was worried about him. Either way, the blue rose, which had stayed in a half-full bottle of water in Kotetsu's car during their semi-date, resided in a vase on her desk, keeping her from ever quite forgetting.
Then, on Friday, as she finished a song, she looked out over the bar, doing the usual scan of the crowd for Kotetsu, and her eyes instead landed on a familiar red-and-white leather jacket. She still had a few songs left in the first set, but she decided to take her break early. She'd make up the difference later. She must have looked formidable, because Barnaby's smile definitely faltered as she got closer to him. "I... hope you don't mind," he said uncertainly, as she climbed onto the bar stool. Formidability would be easier if only she were taller, she thought.
"Why would I mind?" she asked. She had no idea what she actually wanted to say to him. Should she bring up Kotetsu's weird behavior?
"I know you'd much rather see him," he said.
"He didn't send you or anything, did he?" For more matchmaking.
"Of course not!"
She shrugged. "He's not here every week. I was just surprised to see you here."
"I'm sure if I mention where I was there'll be no living with him, but I did want to hear your own music for once."
"Really?" She considered him, propping her chin on her hand. "It's not too un-classical for you?"
"I don't know anything about other types of music, but that doesn't mean I hate them all," he said. "And I much prefer your solo music to your alter-ego's sound."
She was pretty sure she couldn't hide how nice it was to hear that - not that she wanted to impress Barnaby or anything, but getting him to admit to liking her music was something of a triumph. "Yeah, well... you, me, and maybe a dozen other people," she said. "Still, thank you."
"And Kotetsu," he added. She smiled, but she wasn't entirely sure Kotetsu came because he liked her music. She knew he did enjoy it, but she was beginning to suspect coming to her performances was a way of being less lonely without taking any risks, just like telling the younger heroes how to be heroes had been, or nagging Barnaby to eat right.
She picked up her glass, then set it back down. "So if there'd be no living with Kotetsu... he pulled the matchmaking thing with you too?"
Barnaby winced. "It's probably my fault."
"Oh my God! What did you say to him?" She'd just concluded the secret had been mostly or entirely in Kotetsu's mind.
He was blushing. His ears were turning pink. How... bunny-like. Not the rest of him, though. No wonder he wore his hair like that. "I... that is... maybe we could talk about this later?"
"There is no way in hell. You need to give me at least the gist of it now! My break's nearly over!"
Barnaby stared at his glass of water, clearly wishing it was something stronger. "I may have expressed some degree of romantic interest in you."
She was silent for a second, processing that. Then, "Gosh. I bet you say that to all the girls." And he was too busy being embarrassed to notice she was blushing too, she congratulated herself. "'We'll talk later, if you don't flee the minute I get up there," she said, and took off before he could look at her again.
Barnaby's ridiculously unromantic admission might have distracted her from her first few songs, but she was able to get back on an even keel before long, and when she did so, and checked the bar, he was still there. With a glass of wine, this time, and looking a bit hunched-over and depressed, but he stayed. Romantic interest in her, huh? So maybe Nathan was right. And also wrong, because for a while he'd been maintaining that Barnaby was just as gone over Kotetsu as she was herself, but that was Nathan for you. "Romantic interest." Maybe Kotetsu was right, too, and he really was kind of a shy, nerdy virgin after all, rather than the supermodel-conquering teen idol everyone thought he was. Which was kind of sweet, really.
And he was good-looking. Not as much as Kotetsu - or at least, he didn't have those amazing smiles, and those amazing shoulders, and those abs - but he was handsome, and his own shoulders weren't half-bad, and his smile wasn't bad either, even if he was a little more stingy with it. That did kind of mean she'd earned it when he smiled at her, which he'd done more in the past week or so than in the entire rest of the time she'd known him.
Maybe she should have suspected something from the start.
He was still there when she left the stage for the night. He was back to drinking water, and he managed a kind of nervous smile as she approached. "So, romantic interest, huh?" she asked, once Steve was safely at the other end of the bar.
"Not that it was a very romantic way to say it," he admitted.
"Not terribly."
"I... could really use some help with this conversation."
"So where did this come from?" she asked. "Because this is quite a shift from 'I heard about your CD' on the air."
"What ever happened with that radio show?" he asked.
"Switched to a podcast because I kept refusing to tell the callers to lick my boots," she said. "Answer the question."
"Sometimes it's difficult to believe you had problems with that," he retorted. "How am I supposed to answer a question like that? Why did you fall for Kotetsu?"
"Excuse me," she protested. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Perhaps we could talk in the car, if I gave you a ride home," he suggested. "I only had one drink. I should be more than capable of driving." She nodded, because even if he'd gone all pompous, and even if she had to have an awkward conversation about Kotetsu, she wanted to get some answers out of him.
They got into his car in silence. Karina hugged the bookbag on her lap, unsure whether to be anxious about whatever explanation was forthcoming, or incensed that he'd brought up her feelings for Kotetsu. Sure, everyone knew, but bringing it up that way was just rude, and Barnaby had honestly never really done that. Certainly not that bluntly.
He started the car. He drove out of the parking lot. As he headed toward the freeway, the silence swiftly became awkward. When he finally spoke, on the on-ramp, he said "I have no idea what I'm doing here."
"What?" Surely he didn't mean driving.
"I only remember having one crush in my entire life prior to meeting Kotetsu. I don't remember ever dating, or kissing anyone, or even strongly wanting to. I never slept with anyone, to the best of my knowledge."
She opened her mouth to speak, planning to scoff at that, and then his phrasing hit her. After a second, she remembered to close her mouth.
"I have no idea if that's what my life was really like," he said. "But that's what I have to work with. Nothing."
"That's..." She'd never really given much thought to Barnaby except as a rival, an antagonist. She hadn't considered that whole incident the winter before last as part of a long pattern in Barnaby's life. "Maverick?"
"Possibly. I don't know. I don't know if I was too focused on revenge to have time for anyone in my life, or if he just made me think that I was after the fact." Or what had happened to anyone Barnaby might have forgotten about, she thought. This was a murderer he was talking about, after all. She shook her head to dislodge the image.
"That's disgusting," she said. "He was-- how could-- that's evil."
"It took me four months in therapy to face what I just told you," he said. "That my memories weren't reliable. When I told Kotetsu, he had the much same reaction you did. A bit more obscene, maybe. I haven't told anyone else."
"You haven't?"
"I was supposed to tell my friends," he said. "But I don't really have many." So that meant she was one of them, she realized, touched. "It's basically... Kotetsu. And you, if..."
"If I pass a probation period?"
"I was going to say 'if you don't mind.'"
"Sorry," she mumbled, looking at her hands.
"You passed any probationary period I would have imposed by worrying about Kotetsu," he said.
"That's... geez, that's setting the bar low. I mean, you knew how I..." She trailed off, still unwilling to say the words out loud.
"I knew how you felt about Kotetsu because I felt the same way about him."
"You... what?" Oh, this was just unfair. Nathan had been right about two things at the same time that should have been contradictory. It must be a secondary NEXT power or something. Wait... past tense? How could anyone just get over Kotetsu?
"When we first started to get closer, I realized I was developing feelings for him. I assumed he was straight, so I just did my best to ignore them. Over time, it's... become much easier to live with." That wasn't actually saying he was over it, she noted.
"Huh."
"And then when we spent that night taking care of him and actually being civil to each other, I realized the same thing was happening with you."
"...what was? You mean, like, getting interested in me?"
He nodded. "It's entirely possible I'll just always do this when I form friendships." Or that you only befriend people if you also want to get in their pants, she thought, but he beat her to it with "Or that I only seek out friendships with people I'm attracted to."
"And Kotetsu took the idea and ran with it." She sighed. She had been kind of gratified by the whole idea, if also weirded out. "Figures."
"If you're disappointed..." he said, with a teasing tone in his voice, and she glanced at him to see that insufferable smirk on his face.
"You were just born annoying, weren't you?" she retorted. "We should at least exchange phone numbers, so you don't have to hang out in bars to talk to me."
"Sleazy dives with underage performers," he agreed.
"Hey!"
"You're a performer, and you're underage."
"I'm not a stripper, which is how you were making it sound," she said. "Costume notwithstanding. Besides, I'm 18 now."
He grinned. They were nearing her house, so she pulled his phone off the dashboard. His wallpaper... was a photo of Kotetsu, with a goofy grin, fingers making a V near his face, and one arm extended. Jeez. She couldn't have dated Barnaby, if only because Kotetsu would probably consider his partner's ex off-limits, and all it took was looking at that man... "He took this himself?"
"Never leave him alone with your phone," Barnaby said. "He can't help himself."
She giggled. Then she found his camera function; his phone was noticeably fancier than hers. "Don't worry, not replacing your wallpaper," she said, and snapped the photo. She looked a little washed out in it, she thought, but her eyes were open and not glowing and her smile looked okay. Not too bad for a nighttime shot on a camera phone. She entered her number quickly and returned the phone to the dashboard. "I don't know how to look up yours," she said.
"I'll enter it in a moment," he said, as he turned onto her street. She kept getting dropped off at home by hot older men she met in bars, and no one even knew. She passed him her phone, and watched him as he entered the number. He really did have nice eyes. He passed the phone back to her, their fingers brushing, and she thought for a moment about kissing him goodbye the way she should have done a week ago with Kotetsu, just because his reaction when she'd kissed him on the cheek had been so memorable, but instead she just thanked him for the ride and climbed out of the car.
She'd been trying not to tell anyone much about what she was beginning to think of as "the Barnaby situation." It was one thing to dissect every interaction with Kotetsu, scheme, and analyze progress; Kotetsu might be more lonely than she'd realized, but she didn't really think of him as vulnerable. On the other hand, ever since Kotetsu had started telling her that Barnaby wasn't too experienced for her - which was more or less what she'd taken from it, even if it wasn't what he'd meant - she'd felt like it would be wrong to tell anyone much of that.
But Nathan was kind of in a special category. It wasn't that she didn't trust Pao-lin, but Nathan understood everything about people, like some kind of glittery pink Sherlock Holmes with a focus on relationships, and he didn't gossip when it was important. Of course, the downside of that was that he usually seemed to guess the stuff she was trying not to tell him, but that still didn't mean she'd actually betrayed anyone's confidence, so she could live with that.
As she wound down her story, Nathan stepped off the treadmill and sighed. "Honey, I could have told you all of this ages ago."
"You could?" She was a bit out of breath by that point. "All of it?"
"Handsome's bi. He's partial to you and Tiger, and way too inexperienced to do anything about it." She hadn't actually mentioned the inexperienced part. He toweled his face off. "Unfortunately, the obvious solution is a threesome, or it would be if it were three other people."
She'd done a little embarrassed searching on that topic the night before, before the embarrassment overcame the curiosity. "That'd be a lot of deflowering all at once," she said, jumping off the treadmill herself. Of course, that was assuming Kotetsu had never been with a man. "Very efficient."
He laughed. "You make me so proud sometimes." He took a drink from his water bottle, then continued, "If you ask me, what Tiger needs is some friends. He'd probably be happy to see you two together. You know he likes to meddle."
"Well, yeah..."
"And I take it you didn't grab Handsome and have your way with him."
And she'd been regretting it all night, honestly. "I don't think I would have gotten as far as having my way with him," she said.
"You could have laid the groundwork!"
"Why are you so determined to hook me up with Barnaby?"
"Sweetie. Look at him. Someone needs to tap that. It's a crime not to."
Those were the words echoing in her head when she called Barnaby that evening. "Yes?" he said when he answered. Straight to video - but he had her number, now, so that made sense.
"Are you busy?" she asked. "I'm just on call, and I'm bored."
"Same here," he said. "Kotetsu and I have a standing movie night for these situations. Care to join us?"
It was only after they'd finished the call that she realized this might have been incredibly awkward, and that she had no idea why it hadn't been. He hadn't been upset by her deflection the night before, apparently, but... another case for Nathan, it seemed.
"So I'm just curious about one thing," she said, standing in Kotetsu's kitchen, enjoying the view as Kotetsu, bent over, rummaged through his fridge. "Why here, on nights you're on call? If Barnaby's still living on Gold, that'd be more centrally located."
"I'll let him explain," Barnaby called from the couch.
"See, Bunny doesn't believe in furniture," Kotetsu said. "Sorry, Rose, I'm all out of Pepsi."
"Don't worry," she said with feeling. "I have Pepsi coming out my ears. You'd think it prevents osteoporosis the way my mother serves it up. Just some water or tea would be fine."
"Or beer," Barnaby suggested. "Kotetsu's idea of beer is a good way to put you off alcohol for life. A good preventive measure before college."
"Like I'll have time to binge-drink."
"Hey," Kotetsu protested. "I like it. My beer, I mean, not binge-drinking. Though sometimes..."
"I keep trying to explain to him about micro-breweries, but he doesn't believe in them," Barnaby said.
"But how do you not believe in furniture?" Karina asked. "You question the existence of that sofa you're on? You never could get that 'atoms are mostly empty space' thing out of your head?"
"I've just never gotten around to purchasing a couch."
Kotesu dumped microwaved popcorn into a bowl and passed it to her, so she carried it into the living room. "I was hoping for something kind of philosophical," she said. "Or religious."
"Sorry to disappoint." She was pretty sure she'd only ever seen him use that smile on Kotetsu. Nathan might get his wish after all if Barnaby kept this up. She plopped down on the couch, quite a bit closer to him than she would have a week ago, though she was kind of surprised to see there were still several inches of space between them. She felt like she as on the verge of snuggling up next to him.
"It's pretty much a trade-off," Kotetsu said. "Bunny's got this huge TV, takes up a full wall, but someone has to sit on the floor. I have furniture but my TV's a tenth of the size. When you opted in, that was the deciding vote, because obviously the lady gets the only chair."
"Why don't we just buy Barnaby a couch?" she suggested. "I'm pretty sure I could afford it."
"He's picky," Kotetsu said. "Believe me, I've tried." He had a bottle of wine in one hand, with the stems of two glasses between his fingers, and a glass of water for her in the other. "Scoot over," he added, and then plunked down between them when Barnaby moved. OMG TOUCHING TIGER, her leg informed the rest of her. She pictured it sending text messages. He leaned forward to open the wine bottle. OMG STILL TOUCHING TIGER. OMG SHOULDER TOUCHING HIM NOW TOO. OKAY FALSE ALARM. WHEN HE LEANS BACK THOUGH! Her blood felt fizzy and overheated, and she was intensely aware of her left leg and arm. Kotetsu and Barnaby were needling each other about screwcap wines and snobbery, and pouring their glasses full, as she tried to rein in her stupid hormones. She couldn't just climb on him with Barnaby sitting right there, especially given what he'd told her last night. It'd be rude, unless it led to that threesome Nathan had suggested, which seemed unlikely.
"See, it's fine," Kotetsu said, as Barnaby finally took a sip and failed to grimace.
"Yes, it is," he replied, resignedly. "Let's start the movie."
The movie was black-and-white, something Kotetsu insisted was a classic. It turned out to be a comedy, and not half-bad, absorbing enough that Karina completely forgot about the PDA on her wrist until the credits were rolling. She'd kicked off her boots, pulled her feet up underneath her, and snuggled up against Kotetsu's side, and the fact she'd more or less started to take that for granted by the end was another testament to the movie.
"Quiet night," Kotetsu said, and stretched. She sat up, stretching out her cramped legs and really kind of surprised, both at her own daring and the fact Kotetsu had done nothing to move her for the past... not quite two hours.
"Crime's less conveniently scheduled now," Barnaby said. With Maverick out of the picture, she thought. No one said his name, though.
"Time for take-out before the next movie?" Kotetsu suggested.
"Time for delivery," Barnaby replied. "Since you manage to cheat at rock-paper-scissors."
"Bunnyyyy, you know there's only pizza and terrible Chinese that will deliver free here. The good Chinese place is take-out only, and so is the kebab place, and I don't want to pay the delivery fee for Indian tonight..."
"We could have pizza," Barnaby countered. "Karina, what sounds good to you?"
"Well... how bad is the terrible Chinese place?"
"Terrible," they answered in unison.
"Then... good Chinese." She'd turned down an offer to share Pao-lin's lunch, which had been a mistake because it had smelled amazing and the lunch meeting she'd had to attend had offered her salad instead. Barnaby groaned. "It's impossible to cheat at rock-paper-scissors, right?"
"He finds a way."
"Bunny's just predictable," Kotetsu retorted. "Come on, let's do this."
"Is there a menu?" Karina asked, since the guys seemed fully prepared to get into a macho standoff.
"By the fridge," they both said, not quite in unison this time.
They went from a single match, to two out of three, to three out of five, while Karina glanced over the menu. Kotetsu hailed his final victory with arms flung in the air, which seemed a little excessive if that was how it went every time but was still adorable, and Barnaby, grumbling, collected their orders, pulled on his jacket, and left the house. Meaning Karina was alone with Kotetsu. He flopped back onto the couch, arms spread out on the back, almost like he had an arm around her. She had to snag this chance, she thought, and her heart immediately started thundering.
"So how's it going, Rose? Having fun?"
"Yeah," she said softly. She pulled her feet back onto the couch again, because that way she could get some height. "Thanks for having me over."
"Bunny thought of it," Kotetsu said. "Glad he did. More the merrier, right?"
Three's a crowd, she thought, but that was unfair to Barnaby. "Kotetsu?"
"Yeah?" He looked down at her, and she got up on her knees and touched his face. She could feel the edges of his close-cropped patches of beard under her thumb, the light coating of stubble on the rest of his face, and she could see his raised eyebrows even though most of her attention was on his lips. And she saw him close his eyes, so she kissed him, softly, and then she realized he was kissing her back. She wasn't about to stop now. When his lips parted under hers, her tongue slid against his, and dammit, she shouldn't have pushed, because now he was pulling away.
*
"Rose," he said, and he sounded kind of breathless, to her delight.
"At least now you know," she said, kind of out of breath herself.
"That's... Rose, I'm really old."
"You are not," she said fiercely. "You're barely any older than Nathan. He told me. You're what, like thirty-five? Thirty-six?" He nodded weakly. "How old were you when you met your wife, Kotetsu?"
He closed his eyes, and she immediately wondered if that was the wrong thing to say, but when he opened them, he just looked serious, not sad. She hoped that wasn't just an act. "She was the same age I was," he said. "That's the difference. You should be with someone closer to your age, someone you can have all those experiences with - first marriage, first child, first everything."
"So, what, divorced people can only remarry each other? That's not fair to anybody."
"That's not what I meant!" He ran his hands through his hair.
"You were kissing me back," she said softly. "You were acting like you wanted me."
"Rose, you don't need me to tell you what you look like," he said. "That's not what this is about."
"So it's just that I'm too young and immature?" And her voice was going higher-pitched, just to get rid of any doubts.
"It's not that," he said. "I'm twice your age! I have a daughter not much younger than you. There's less difference between her age and yours than yours and Bunny's." He rubbed his forehead. "If she was twenty, and she wanted to put the moves on some forty-year-old, I'd hope like hell he'd turn her down too."
"But why?" she protested. "I'm an adult. I've been playing Blue Rose for years. If you were old enough to fall in love with your wife by my age, why can't I be old enough to fall in love with you?"
"Rose..." he began, looking sad, and of course that was when her PDA went off. Just hers. "First League only, then," he said.
"Of all the times..." She pulled her boots back on, trying to ignore the sting of tears in her eyes. "See you around, then," she said, standing, not looking at him until he grabbed her wrist.
"Listen," he said. "Can we talk about this later? Tomorrow?"
"I guess," she said. "So you can tell me more about how I'm too young?"
"That's not--" He stopped. "Just take care, all right?"
She nodded, grabbed her purse and headed out the door, moving to enter her response on the PDA. She'd meet up with her transport, but she needed to walk for a while first.
The criminal had been a cat burglar, spotted as he was ascending to some penthouse on Gold; she'd arrived just as he was making his way down the building. She flung icicles at him like a knife-thrower, making a rough circle around him, then delivered that stupid catch phrase and created a hand gripping him around the midsection, anchored to the wall. Luckily it was a humid night. Mario said it was some kind of speed record for her, like that mattered. She brushed off Nathan, refused to answer her phone when Barnaby called, or when Kotetsu did, and curled up in bed to be miserable.
And to relive that kiss, because it was like her hands and lips refused to forget. He'd been kissing her back. He hadn't minded that. Was it just her age? That was so stupid. Only the fact that Blue Rose's age was a secret had saved her from one of those creepy "how long 'til she's 18" countdowns online, like she'd seen for a couple of young actresses. Like their fans were just waiting to pounce, and she was sure hers would have been if they'd ever known she was underage. Which, okay, was creepy, but how was it creepy in reverse? It wasn't like he'd made the first move. She'd been chasing him for two years now, and just when she thought she was finally catching up...
She finally drifted off to sleep, and woke feeling a degree less misery. He'd tried to call her last night. Trying not to get her hopes up, she checked her messages.
Barnaby's was first. "Hello, um... Karina, is everything all right? I know you left on call, but now that the episode's over I thought I'd check. Kotetsu won't tell me why, of course, but he seems upset." So much for her hopeful mood. Was Barnaby going to hate her if she told him? And for that matter, how had he managed to be so calm when he told her how he felt about both of them, in the car? Maybe she hadn't outright rejected him, but she hadn't responded like he might have hoped, and yet he hadn't gotten half as upset as she was now.
And Kotetsu's message. "Hey Rose... looks like you did really good tonight. I, um... I don't know what to say. Glad you're okay. Talk to you tomorrow." He sounded as depressed as she felt.
She headed straight for the training center. She needed to punch something. A lot.
She didn't even get that far, though. Kotetsu was waiting just inside, still in his street clothes. No one else was around. When he saw her, his face lit up with a smile that immediately collapsed.
"Morning," she said dully. She started to walk past him to the locker rooms, expecting him to stop her, but when he didn't, she turned to face him. "So why do you look so upset?" she demanded.
His expression went from unhappy to kicked-puppy, and if she hadn't been so unhappy herself she probably would have felt worse at the sight. "Because you're my friend, and I don't want you to feel bad, and... you do because of me."
"And?" She didn't care that she was being mean to him right now.
"It's... like... I never thought of you that way before. Even with your outfit - I always thought it was pretty scummy of Titan to put an outfit like that on someone your age. And then you kissed me, and part of me is thinking 'hell yes,' and another part is thinking 'holy shit, she's just a kid, what's wrong with you.'"
"I like the hell yes part better," she said, trying to smile, and he grinned a little, uncertainly.
"You... surprised me," he said.
"Are you maybe more used to the idea now?"
He winced, and she looked down. "Rose, you're young. You deserve somebody that hasn't already met and married the love of his life," he said softly. "I just want to go back to how we were."
She was not going to cry. "But I don't! I love you, and--"
"We can't even spend time together as friends?"
She was not going to look at him, and she was not going to cry. "Not yet. I don't know. I just can't."
A long silence. She heard a door slide open, new footsteps... Nathan's heels. She hated today so much. "Well... you know how to get hold of me if you change your mind later," Kotetsu said. "I'm sorry." She heard his footsteps, slow, leaving the room. The door slid open and shut. Her hands were clenched at her sides.
"Karina?" Nathan asked gently, and that was when she burst into tears.
****
Notes: This would be where the fanart began, pretty much making my year: here and here.
no subject
Date: 2012-03-28 12:24 am (UTC)You've got a lot of fantastic lines, both in narration and dialog. Nathan as a "glittery pink Sherlock Holmes with a focus on relationships", Karina imagining her leg sending text messages were both particularly great.
And, of course, the plot content. Wow, I'm just now realizing just how much you fit into this chapter, and it didn't seem crowded or rushed at all. Karina's reaction to Barnaby's admission is wonderfully realistic (especially her awkward handling of it), and then the movie night, and the kiss scene, and then the aftermath.
Also, I really love that you're working in realistic fandom/societal/whatever issues that the Heroes have to face -- that Karina _would_ have to deal with creepy until-she's-18 countdowns and so forth. (I mean, I'm not happy that she'd have had to deal with creepy stuff like that if her hero's age wasn't a secret, but it's great that you're including little details like this in your story.)
You're also handling the issue with the Kotetsu-Karina age difference really, really well, in this chapter and overall. (I bring this up because this is an issue Fraught With Potential Peril and even established authors like Tamora Pierce get flack for writing May-December romances) You did a lot of things to make it much less Fraught With Peril: getting Karina past her 18th birthday, writing the kiss with Kotetsu from her POV so it is abundantly clear that she is not being taken advantage of etc etc (I mean, okay, you're doing the whole thing from her POV anyway, but the same scene from Kotetsu's POV would've been a much more Problematic beast), Kotetsu's _reaction_ (including reference to Kaede's age), and from the pairing tags on the upcoming chapters, establishing the Karina/Barnaby leg of the triangle first.
no subject
Date: 2012-03-28 07:19 pm (UTC)Once I decided I was going for the OT3, I knew the Karina/Barnaby part would come first, and I knew I'd have to age Karina up a few years before she and Kotetsu actually hooked up. That's what the planned sequel is for - the way I was writing this one, long time skips wouldn't have fit.