Transitions- Moodboard Chapter: A Night On The Roof With Your Friend
Pairings: Steven Grant x (platonic) Reader, Marc Spector x (platonic) Reader, Jake Lockley x (platonic) Reader, Layla El-Faouly x (platonic) Reader
A/N: Its good to be back. This chapter has been sitting in my drafts since January last year. I made a post some time in December 2022 or January 2023 for my readers and followers to make a mood board for this series in exchange for a fluff chapter. I like to keep my promises and here it is baby! thank you to @justalittlehoneybee, @ihatemyselfmorethanmydepression, and one other person that I can't find for the mood boards, unfortunately. Thank you so much for being patient for the continuation of this series. I appreciate it!
NOTE: This chapter takes place between Chapter Forty-Six and Chapter Forty-Seven of Transitions
“It’s been awhile since you took that telescope up to the roof,” Marc says. You pause in poking your bowl of noodles with your fork and glance at him from where you sat at the table. It was nearing nine o’clock in the evening and you were supposed to work and pick up an extra shift for your coworker, Emily. It will be a little earlier than usual tomorrow since she has to take her grandma to the doctors on the weekend because of a weird rash on her leg. You tried to help Jake cook dinner but the apartment nearly caught fire again because of hot oil splashing and an open stove top don’t mix. Luckily, they didn’t blame you for it this time because Jake was trying to teach you how to cook chicken in a skillet on the stove and it was his fault he wasn’t paying attention.
So, here you are, eating dinner a little too late since it took a while to clean up the mess from your failed attempt and Steven decided that pasta was a better idea than burnt chicken.
“Yeah,” You agree. “It’s been hard trying to find the time to go up there and use it without it being too cloudy.” Your eyes flicker to the window you were just dropped out of not too long ago. The sky has very little clouds which surprised you since there’s almost always clouds during the winter. You can see the moon is in its crescent phase as you absentmindedly poke your noodles. Your eyes trail to his and you stare at him as he looks out the same window you were staring out of just moments ago and hums in agreement.
“Why don’t we take the telescope to the roof in a bit?” You ask as you return your gaze to your noodles and you scoop them with the fork and chew.
You can feel his eyes are on you while you eat as he asks, “Don’t you have work tomorrow?”
You shrug, “I’m always tired.”
“You’ll be even more grumpy when you wake.”
“It sounds like you’re trying to make up excuses.”
“Okay, so what’s the problem?” You ask in between bites. “Are you going to be tired in the morning when you take me to work? You can come back and take a nap.”
“That’s not it…” He grumbles. You stare at him, his eyes are pointed down at something on the floor. You drop your fork against your bowl and lean back in your chair, deciding that you are done with your half empty bowl.
“It sure does sound like something.”
“Well, it’s not,” He snaps. Your fingers tap against your thigh as you trail your gaze back over to the window. You can still see the marks that your fingers made when Horus forced you out of it on the wall. Over the past few days since they returned from Algeria you learned that Marc is the type of person where if he wants to do something fun, it has to be your idea. If he wants to watch a certain movie, he’ll give you hints until you ask him to watch the movie with you. Sometimes, Steven picks up on it a bit better than you do and he’ll invite you to watch the movie or go out shopping or do something mundane with them.
You think Marc just doesn’t know how to ask to spend time with you. Maybe he gets embarrassed to ask or he’s afraid that he’ll be rejected; so it’s better not to ask overall or hint enough for you to pick up. It was a decent night to go up to the roof and gaze at the stars, you would like it to be warmer but you can just layer up and steal Stevens mittens if you need to. Besides, what’s the chances of you falling asleep before eleven tonight, anyways? Jake has to go do his nightly patrolling and you’ll just be wound up until he comes back.
“Okay,” You breathe out as you grab your bowl and stand up. “I’m going to go get a jacket and some thicker pants before I head up, you’re welcome to join me if you want.”
“It’s cold out,” He tells you as you walk to the trash and scrape the remaining pasta into it.
“I know, that’s why I’m taking your thicker sweatpants. Y’know, the ones with the fur on the inside.” You wash your dishes before setting them on the drying rack and passing Marc, who remained in his seat, and going to their dresser to steal his clothes. You rummage through their drawer and pull out a thick pair of socks before taking out the blue threaded bottoms you were talking about. You pull on the sweatpants over your own pajama bottoms and tie them around your waist before pulling on the socks. You grab a sweatshirt from the end of the bed and put it over your t-shirt before slipping on your shoes and walking to the coat rack. You shrug on the jacket that once belonged to Marc- and now it was yours- as you turn towards him.
“It’s a little cloudy out,” He says as he peers out the window.
“I see some patches open,” You tell him without looking out the glass pane. You grab your lanyard, the thin cloth feeling small in between your fingers as you tell him that you’re getting the telescope and going to the roof. Walking down the short distance to your apartment and unlocking the door, you peer into the moonlit room. The cracks in the window are still visible and the floor in front of the door where the intruder was killed is clean of any bloodstain that could be seen just by the naked eye. You know that just behind the picture frame of your parents that there was a hole in the drywall caused by your laptop hitting it.
So much has happened in this flat over the last six months. You spent time on the floor during the summer heat wave, eating popsicles with your neighbor and trying to not peel your skin off when your thighs stuck to the floor due to your sweat. You also tracked blood from the entryway across the floor to the bathroom when you came back from dinner with your neighbor and got ambushed. You cleaned the broken bulb in the kitchen when Khonshu decided to be extra and shatter it. You were pressed up against the window by Horus and held out of it once, although he didn’t confirm nor deny that it was him. He seemed to ignore your statement when he decided to drop you out the window of Stevens flat after you rejected his offer.
You can’t believe that a deity saved your life twice, the first when they made you move and fight the cult member; and the second when they stopped you from hitting the pavement after Horus dropped you. Taweret has healed you before but she was never in an active role such as this god. Taweret healed your injuries after you got mugged and the Eye of Horus paper was ripped. She didn’t save you from hitting the pavement, you’re sure of it.
You spent a little over a year in this apartment being alone but not with the anxiety that seems to be more common these days than it should be. Now you spend more time anywhere but here. You spend more nights at your neighbors and Laylas than you do with your stolen table and couch you bought at a yard sale. So much has happened in such little time. If you didn’t have the knowledge of the things that happened here, you wouldn’t have thought twice about walking on the floor, especially in the entryway. Your hand reaches through the entry way and you flip on the light switch before taking a large step over the patch where you killed the man and heading towards the telescope propped against the wall in the far corner of the room near the couch.
You would have left it at Stevens place but he doesn’t have much room, besides you shouldn’t clutter his space with your things. It's not like you’re paying rent at his place even though you eat his food, sleep in his bed, and take a shower in his bathroom. Your hands grasp onto the cool metal of the scope as you pause in your steps. Are you just laying in their bed and taking up his space without doing anything useful? You’re not contributing to his home even with the amount of time you spend there. You do the dishes when he cooks or you dirty them. You do the laundry and you have tried to pitch in for groceries but they refused to allow you to do so. But, you haven’t done much else.
You should talk to them sometime about that. But how do you bring it up to your neighbor that you should pay some portion of their rent just because you take up their space? Can you even afford to do that? You know that you have some money saved up since you don’t grocery shop as much and your water bill is nonexistent since you don’t use your sinks or shower for your own apartment. But, is that enough to give them every month?
You don’t know, maybe you should think more on this before bringing it up to them. You’re sure that Marc won’t want to chat to you about this, it was more of a Steven conversation, right? It is Stevens' apartment, it is in his name but…Jake and Marc live there too and they are part of Steven just as much as he is part of them. So, shouldn’t this conversation include everyone?
You carry the telescope towards the exit before your eyes catch the notebook and pencil resting on your coffee table. It is nearly filled with notes on your classes about your upcoming exams before the winter break and you are feeling nervous about them. If you don’t pass, you’ll have to contact your counselor and have a one-on-one conversation with them about why you didn’t pass your class and what you can do in the next term to improve your education. It doesn’t sound terrible, but it truly is because you are considered dead and if your counselor recognizes you, you are fucked. You grab the notebook and pencil, tucking the lead into the metal spiral holding the book together before you pick up the telescope. Are you asking them to move in if you bring up the rent issue?
Afterall, you were considering paying for their place rather than yours when you thought that they were dead. A small knot in your stomach twists at the memory of those days. Quickly, you push it away and take a breath of air to calm yourself. Should you be the one to bring this up? It sounds like you're possibly inviting yourself to move in one hundred percent. It is their apartment and so far they don't have any problems about your living arrangement. But that doesn't mean they won't if you decide to ask them about it. Who knows, maybe they're going to be against the idea. They are grown men and it is a bit weird that a teenager who is unrelated to them is living with them.
You should wait to see if they'll bring it up themselves, you shouldn't question them if you should move into their apartment and withdraw from your own space. Mentally, you bookmark the topic and decide to focus on the task of getting outside. Pushing open the door to the rooftop, you walk up the steps and immediately get the shivers from the cool breeze. Goosebumps cover your skin and the metal of the telescope seems to make your hands ten times colder in the stairway. You're not even completely on the roof and you are beginning to. It almost makes you return to the boys apartment to be warm on a soft bed and underneath a pile of blankets. But, instead you persevere and push forward into the December night. Dozens of white dots litter the night sky as if brush was flicked among a canvas. Tonight was going to be great, you can feel it in your bones; although that might be the chill.
The gravel on the rooftop, crunches underneath your shoes as you walk further onto the roof. Setting down your notebook, you open up your telescope and place it carefully onto its three legs and remove the lens cover before peeking through the scope and at the stars above you. It took a few extra seconds for the lens to adjust and the blurriness to fade, but there above you in all its might was a beautiful sight. The stars never seem to not amaze you. Slowly, you exhale and vapor leaves your mouth as you stuff your hands into your sweats. Maybe in another life you were in university and studying the stars. Maybe in that life you and your best friend are attending the same school. Your hands clench a bit at the thought of her and your stomach turns in grief. What is she up to? You wonder. She has to be completing her highschool education since you are too; or maybe she took a gap year to process your “death.”
Maybe she has a partner or maybe shes attending school but she’s fucking around in it. Maybe she no longer gives a damn about her education since five years were taken from her and so were you. This time this year you both should be applying for scholarships and studying at each other's homes. You both should be brainstorming christmas crafts and teasing her about her wonky paper mache stars from the previous years. But, instead you took a one way plane ride to the other side of the world and cut all the strings that once tied you to your previous life. You can think of all the alternate lives another you are living all you want, but the simple conclusion is that it is not this one, so why bother? Why think of all the what ifs and the could be when it's no use. It won't change anything, all it will do is make you mourn for the should be’s.
You swallow around the lump forming in your throat. Where’s Marc? You think. It felt like it's been too long since you last saw him. It’s definitely been long enough for you to reflect on alternate lives. Perhaps he wasn’t coming and was just making a mere observation that it has been a long time since you took the telescope up to the roof. They did buy you that as a birthday gift and you only have ever used it once. That's an expensive dust collector for your apartment. Did you really come to the roof all by yourself and set everything with the expectation for him to come but get stood up instead? You don’t doubt it. Maybe he decided to go on patrol instead. You came up here with the intent to have a good night and that's exactly what is going to happen. Fuck it if Horus comes and threatens you when you’re all by your lonesome. Fuck him. You can’t let that fear stop you from living your life.
“Fine,” You breathe out. “He doesn’t have to join me, but he could at the very least have told me they’re going on patrol.” The noise of the door opening behind you causes you to turn and your heart to skip a beat in your chest. Marc's cheeks become tinted red as the winter breeze softly blows into him.
You clear your throat a bit before you tell him, “I was beginning to think that you weren’t going to take my invite.” You watch him cross the space to you. He holds a navy bubble jacket to his chest as he breathes out, vapor drifting from him as he does so.
“I should have stayed inside,” He grumbles and hands you the jacket. “Take it and put it on, you’re going to get a cold and I don’t want to deal with you being sick again.”
“Thanks,” You snatch it from him and slide it on before zipping it up. You feel like you’re the Michelin Tire Mascot. All puffed up on your torso and arms which is making it difficult to move an inch but you’re warm with the three layers of tops you have on. A warm feeling drips down from your chest and pools in your gut. It was a feeling that you recognize so easily, you are grateful for his appearance even though you told yourself you were okay with them not showing. You are grateful for everything that they have done for you.
“You’re going to catch your death at this rate.”
“Probably,” You shrug as you step away from the telescope and sit down onto the gravel. You reach for the notebook and pencil a couple of inches away from you.The rocks press harshly into your legs and butt and you know that when you stand up again that you’re going to have rock imprints upon your body even through the clothes. You shift in your spot and try to get comfortable upon the cold ground before you feel his eyes burning into you. Your eyes flicker up and he was giving you a questioning look.
“What’s that for?” He asks and points to your lap.
“The notebook?” You raise it a bit and show him your pencil. “I’m charting some stars.” He clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth in response and stuffs his hands into his pockets. The curls on his head blow softly as another breeze passes through you and your papers ruffle a bit. You move your attention to the paper in your lap and begin to chart the stars, glancing back and forth between the sky above you and the notebook you held. You only charted one constellation before you look up and see Marc eying the telescope.
“Do you want to use it?” You ask and he doesn’t answer which causes you to set down your pencil. “It’s okay if you do. You can use the telescope anytime you want, Marc.”
“Yes, Marc, any time.” You tell him and pick up the pencil once more to continue. He bends down and adjusts the height for the scope before peering into it. For a while, the only sound between the two of you was the traffic below, the single plane flying in the distance, and your pencil scratching against the surface of the paper. You were feeling content and at peace with it. Marc and you never really spoke for a long time before and you weren’t expecting to now. It was just how the two of you typically interacted. You would sometimes say something or he would too and you always let the silence settle between you before Steven fronts and decides to interact with you. It hasn’t made you uncomfortable in a long time, not since you first met them and felt like you had to cram in conversation every single second so none of you would be awkward.
It just felt comfortable and peaceful; and you were beginning to settle into it when he said, “Did you know that our sun is a dwarf star?” You did. You learned it in science class when you were a sophomore. It was one of the few introductions to the upper grades astronomy class that your teacher was trying to get your fellow students to be interested in and take within the next two years of highschool. You took that biology class with your best friend and wrote notes back and forth to each other. Marc should know that you already knew it since you were so invested in astrophysics. Which could only mean he was just asking you to have a conversation.
“Yeah,” You tell him as you glance at the constellation you were sketching before returning your gaze to your notebook. “I learned that when I was a sophomore.”
He doesn't look at you but focuses on whatever he was looking at as he says, “I loved space when I was a kid. I used to want to be an astronaut. I wanted to be thousands of miles away from home and among the stars. I wanted to visit the moon.” He pauses, causing you to look at him as you roll your pencil between your fingers. “Maybe I would be an astrophysicist like you want to be.” You still want to be, he knows you do and the longing for another life will never go away.
“What happened?” You ask even though you know the answer.
“I left home as soon as I turned eighteen and joined the army. My dreams stopped.” He shrugs his shoulders as you take in his statement. The adult who you have come to know was a child once. He had dreams and aspirations. He had favorite superheroes in comic books and a favorite cereal. He had a favorite toy and a favorite park to go to. He had preferences over playing on the slide or swings. He once knew the channel number for kids shows. All of that sunk down deep into the starry ocean to never come to the surface again. To never matter.
“The best version of yourself has yet to come, kid.” He says. “Don't give up on them.” How could he say that even though he knows you can't do anything about your old aspirations. It kind of felt a punch to your gut, everything felt impossible to do. The idea of succeeding was just dead hope. Your lips part slightly as you get ready to tell him how wrong he is but quickly shut it. He was trying to boost your morals and give you unnecessary pep talk. You don't need that, you know the reality of everything; although you decide to keep quiet about it for tonight. Maybe some other time you'll argue it but tonight wasn't the night for it. You want to keep the peace and have a good time. It was one of the rare times that there was no danger, but rather you and them and the stars above.
“Can you help me with charting?” You ask him, he stands up straight and turns away from the scope to look at you. His eyes travel down to the notebook in your lap and back to your face with a questioning gaze.
“What do you need?” He asks. Honestly, you don’t need the help. You can see the night sky clearly and you can easily tell what the constellations were. He knew that and you know that he knows, but you still want to keep the conversation rolling.
“Just the location of the stars and the constellations.” You tell him. He stares at you for a moment with a look of something you can’t quite place. Perhaps he was calling your bluff and getting ready to tell you no and leave to go patrol. Maybe he was thinking about how you managed to invite him to a cold ass rooftop at ten in the evening and he agreed to it and now he’s regretting it because of your stupid request. Maybe he was listening to Steven beg him to help you.
“Yeah,” He tells you.“It’s no problem.” His acceptance somewhat surprises you. You thought he was going to reject you and tell you that you can do it without his help. “Where do you want me to start?”
“Okay, cool,” You pause and glance down to the sketch of what you already started. “Uh, can you start with the one next to the Big Dipper?”
“Did you begin with that one?”
“Yeah, it's easier to go from there than to start with any other one,” You lie, really it was just the easiest one to draw and seek out. It was also your favorite so you put more detail into it than you will with the other constellations. You don’t want to be burnt out by the time you get to it and do a halfass job at doing it justice. He turns around and looks at the sky.
“Okay, so… I think the next one has a kind of shape to it like a rhombus and a triangle for the left side.”
“Like it's a wonky hedgehog without legs?” You ask and he laughs.
“I guess you could say that.” He says and you swear you hear a smile in his voice as he speaks
“Or a gnome without limbs.” You add.
“Some might say it's a house but turned on its side.”
“That’s too boring.” You shake your head a bit and release a breathy laugh as you sketch it. You spent the next hour drawing his descriptions and making small talk and jokes as the time passed. It wasn’t until you finish your fifth drawing that a yawn escape your mouth and you feel sleep pulling at your eyes. It was getting late and you do need to get ready for bed. You do have to go to work tomorrow as much as that sucks. You know that you’re not going to get any rest until they come back but you do have to try. Besides, the sooner they leave the quicker they come back and the more rest you’re going to get.
“Okay,” You say. “I’m ready to call it.” You sign your own name before placing the pencil on the notebook and lifting it up towards him. He raises an eyebrow at you and you sniffle from the cold. Being underneath the blankets in a warm and cozy bed sounds amazing and you are so ready for that.
“Sign it,” You tell him, trying to balance the lead on the page so it wouldn’t fall off.
“Why do you want me to sign it? I barely even helped with it.”
“You did though, you told me where the constellations were and what shapes they should be.” You nod your chin to the notebook. He wasn’t going to get out of not signing it. He did help and he deserves the credit as much as you do. Besides, it will be a fun memory to come across in the future. He takes the book from you and scribbles his name down into something barely legible. As he hands it back, you can recognize the first two letters of his first and last name. You can feel the corner of your lips tilt up and you do your best to hide your happiness as you stand and brush off the pebbles from your body.
“You have work tomorrow.” He comments as another yawn leaves you.
“Yeah, yeah.” You grumble as you tuck the book underneath your arm as Marc collapses the telescope. Silence is between the two of you and it's not uncomfortable at all. It feels more like the type of silence where the party is over and you both had a good time and now it's time to focus on the other tasks at hand. You head down the stairs and he shuts the door behind you with the items in hand.
“This was your idea, you know.” He tells you. It was, kind of. Wasn’t he the one who originally commented on the night sky? You can’t really remember, your brain feels too tired to recall any memories leading up to the last couple of hours.
“Yeah,” You breathe out as you unlock your apartment door. He brushes past you and sets the telescope next to your couch. “I know.” From the hallway, as you watch him return to you, you can see his face is flushed red from the cold but his eyes are a little brighter than before you went up to the roof. He had a good time and you feel glad that you can clearly see that on his face.
“Bedtime,” He tells you and you roll your eyes.
“I’m not a kid,” You grumble as you lock your apartment door and head towards their apartment.
“You’re going to be grumpy in the morning like a child would be.”
“Speak for yourself, you’re always grumpy.” You tell him. He exhales like a laugh leaves him.
The corner of his lips tilts up in a smile you don’t mention, “We’ll see.”
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