angel

Valerie had to do a double take when she had walked into her shift that evening.

Mayor Masters was her employer, sure. Both through ghost hunting and through the Nasty Burger. But she had never really seen him out of office. Especially not in this dump. Especially not with Danny Fenton of all people.

Maybe it shouldn’t be much of a surprise to her as it is. After all, it was no secret to anyone that the mayor and the Fenton’s had a connection. Valerie had even mentioned it once to Vlad about employing them. He’d laughed so hard she thought he was going to have a stroke!

And maybe it’s not a surprise that they’re there together. It’s a surprise that Danny has that look in his eyes. The one he used to look at Sam and her with. His cute baby blues watching up at the mayor with wonder. Squinting every now and then and upturning with laughter as they talk. It’s just… surprising. Valerie thinks she’s good at reading people. At least, she was good at reading Danny. And it’s so obvious that he is trying to flirt with the mayor.

Only that… the mayor doesn’t seem to have a problem with it. Politician grin covering his face as he leans in, snatching Danny’s cup from his hand to sip at it himself. Danny shouts,

“Hey!” With a playfulness she doesn’t get to hear often anymore.

Valerie can’t help it. She moves closer to them. Her shift doesn’t actually start for another fifteen minutes, so she had time to spare. Only for a minute! Just to see what was going on here.

She ducks down at a booth behind the partition wall to them, ear up as she desperately wants to understand why they’re here.

“Honestly Daniel, I can’t believe you convinced me that this was a good rendezvous spot.”

“I’m tired of lobster,” Danny says groans, “fancy places are boring… and too far away.”

“I told you I can always pick you up.”

“And risk dad seeing you and trapping you in conversation?”

“Pass.” They say in unison.

Rendezvous? This was a regular thing for them? But… why? Did Mr and Mrs Fenton not know about it? If she didn’t know any better she would think this is a…

“You could always come to my mansion.”

Vlad never sounds like that. It makes her skin crawl a bit to hear it. Was the mayor… hitting on Danny?

“Oh and I’m sure you’d let me leave afterwards.”

Was Danny taking the bait? This was too weird. Was this a date? Or did they have the weirdest sense of humor between them.

“Would you want to? Honestly Daniel I don’t know if you can live in that house anymore.”

“Oh brother, here we go.”

Valerie can’t help but whisper laugh.

“Don’t get exhausted with me yet, I’m being serious about my offer, it’ll be better for us in the long run if you-“

Then he stops talking. Valerie doesn’t know why. She doesn’t understand why he’s stopped mid sentence but it can’t be good right? Why would Danny go to live with him? Why would he meet up with him there in the first place? Wasn’t mayor Masters just a good friend of the Fentons? Wouldn’t that make him Danny’s uncle or god father or something? Why did he say it’ll be better for them in the long run?

So many questions flood Valerie’s mind she doesn’t even realize there’s shifting going on. Not until a loud voice comes from above,

“Hey Val!”

She jolts back, falling onto the worn vinyl of the booth seat. Eyes wide in panic as she looks up to Danny, who’s now leaned over the partition and looking down at her with slight amusement.

“Oh uh, Danny! What are uh, what are you doing here?” Damn, she didn’t mean to get herself caught.

“Oh, my uncle Vlad promised to get me whatever I wanted if I passed the biology mid term.” She swears she heard Vlad make a noise at that, but she can’t be too sure through her anxiety.

“O-h.” She sits up and rubs whatever sauce that’d gotten onto her elbow off. “Well that’s very nice of him.”

“You’re working tonight?” Danny asks, more relaxed over the partition now as he eyes her getting herself together, trying to get hairs from her face to stay out of her eyes. “I thought you only did weekends?”

“Yeah, Sparky traded shifts with me last minute cause dad and I are seeing family this weekend.” She glances at the clock. Still seven minutes until her shift started. Damnit.

“Oh, okay, I won’t bother you then.” He stares at her a moment, mouth opening to say more but she stops him.

“It was uh, nice seeing you Danny,” she doesn’t want to hear it from him if he knew she’d been listening to their conversation. When she glances back to them from behind the counter, they’ve already left the building.

He did have some good ones in that episode

Dovekie aka Little Auk (Alle alle), family Alcidae, order Charadriiformes, Iceland