om_main | Vance and Harley, Halloween

Vance spots Harley at the Halloween party. Warning: Adorable content ahead. They're pretty much the cutest, and so very, very clueless!

Oh man, this was all kinda overwhelming. One of the nearby decorations made a spooky noise, and then someone screamed in the haunted house...

Harley gulped and shivered a little. Why did everything have to be so dark and scary? And the party itself was loud and confusing (and fun too, but...) and there were the scary things around it and it almost felt like she was dreaming and she'd just needed a break - and a safe place to keep an eye on things, where no one would sneak up behind her.

So here she was, hanging by her knees on a branch of one of the spooky trees by the wall, playing dead - which was working really well, 'cause she was dressed as a skeleton! A good one too, her mom had found a pretty real-looking costume, all black with bright white bones that went in the right places - even on her fingers and toes! And that meant no shoes either, even better, and with the mask on (with two holes cut in the fabric at the top for her pigtails) and holding reeeeeally still, she seemed to pass for one of the decorations.

Or she almost did, anyway. The pigtails were what gave her away to Vance. Of course, he'd been looking for her. He made his way over to her tree, and smiled. "Hey Vault."

A giggle bubbled up from under the mask, then Harley reached her arms out at him like a skeleton coming to life. She gave a brief "rawr" as she pretended to grab at him, then giggled again and pulled up (down?) her mask. "Hi Justice!"

He laughed, his eyes meeting her bright blue ones. "Hi! How's it goin'?"

Her grin slipped a little, and she looked nervously over his shoulder (which was helpfully at about her current eye level) before meeting his eyes again. "Um, good!" She'd forgotten about her nerves for a minute when he'd come over, because Vance! And it was better now that he was here, but still. "Just people watchin'."

Which was a likely story, except she flinched as another scream came from the haunted house.

Vance didn't miss the motion, or the noise, either. "Wanna take a time-out from it and grab a soda with me?" He offered. He raised and wiggled his now-empty Coke can. "I'm all out."

Grateful, she nodded eagerly, then reached her arms toward his shoulders. "Can I borrow you?" she asked, grin creeping back. He was in her dismount zone, and this would be more fun than making him move.

He smiled back, way too used to being used as gymnastics equipment to mind in even the slightest. "Of course!"

Planting her hands on his shoulders and finding the right balance points, Harley pushed herself into the air and swung lightly over him (blowing on his hair to ruffle it as she went) to land lightly on her feet just behind him. She giggled. Vance was good at that! He was strong, and he didn't worry about her or mess things up by moving or trying to help her.

She gave her head a little shake as he turned around. "Woo, that's weird. What's the opposite of a headrush?"

"Feet rush?" Vance offered, reaching out to steady her a little. "I'm not really sure. We should make up a name -- something cool. Harley-rush?"

"Pretty sure that's for when I run directly at someone," she teased, biting the tip of her tongue mischievously (the spots had just about disappeared from her eyes now - how long had she been hanging there?). After all, she did that to Vance in the gym sometimes, running right at him 'cause he'd give her a boost and she could go extra high for flips and stuff. She used to do that with other people like Pietro and Kurt, but not so much anymore. "Brain drain?"

He gave her a look as though he were thinking seriously about it. "I dunno...." Vance said. "I mean, you seem to still have your brains and all that. What about 'whoa, that's where all my blood was'?"

"Ooo! That one!" Harley chimed, bouncing lightly on the spot in her enthusiasm.

Vance grinned. "Awesome. So you havin' fun so far?"

"Yeah!" Harley had pretty much forgotten that she'd been so nervous now, but she was keeping a little closer to Vance than usual as they made their way toward drinks. "Everyone's all dressed up and dancing and stuff!"

"It's great, isn't it?" Vance agreed. He looked over at her, and his smile widened. "I really like your costume. You look real nice. How'd you pick it?"

Harley looked down at her outfit, anxiety chasing over her face despite the lopsided smile. "Um, my mom sent it to me," she said quietly, trying really hard to sound happy. "And I liked it. So yeah! Easy!"

"That's great!" He didn't think she'd spoken to her mom in...a real long time. Since things had gotten bad and she'd had to stop competing, even. Vance was thrilled that maybe they could get it together and maybe get back on solid ground. Harley and her mom, that was. "Well, she picked real well. And so did you."

A little frown tugged at her lips, but she pushed it back into a smile as soon as she noticed. Things were complicated with her parents. She'd stopped talking to them ages ago, when River was missing, but things were different now. And there was no going back, no being that Harley, no place for her back home, would they even love her anymore? She shook away the spinning thoughts with a physical shake of her head, pigtails bouncing.

"It's fun! I'm a spooky tumbling skeleton!" To demonstrate, she cartwheeled next to him, easily staying in time with his pace so she wasn't even out of step when she finished.

"You are fun!" Vance agreed. They reached the refreshment table, and he looked over at her happily. "So, what does a fun person want to drink?"

"Grape!" She'd already spotted the purple soda. A lifetime of training meant she didn't drink soda, but she'd recently nabbed one from the fridge because it was purple and it was soooo tasty!

So he snagged a can of it for her, and one of Dr. Pepper for himself. Turning, he gave her a little bow. "For you, Miss Vault."

"Hee, thanks!" Vance was the best. Their fingers brushed as she took the soda, and her heart did that weird little flip flop thing. That was a good thing, right? She turned very faintly pink.

Then another thought occurred to her, and she skipped down the table to the snacks. Quick fingers put a pumpkin shaped sugar cookie on a napkin, then she darted back over and offered it to him with an expectant look.

He was surprised - both because it was real nice of her to bring him a cookie (he hadn't even asked for one, and she'd still brought it) and because she was pretty cute, all pink like that. "Thanks," he said, smiling. "Wanna share?"

She nodded because, yeah, of course she wanted to share! But she was still beaming and biting the tip of her tongue to keep from giving the joke away too soon. With a quick glance toward the rest of the party, she told him, "Anders can go home now."

Vance blinked, momentarily lost. "Huh?"

She spotted Anders in his cop costume. Ridiculously pleased, she pointed to the cookie. "Justice has been served!"

He burst out laughing. He hadn't even thought of that. Harley was great at those kinds of things. She was clever; her brain worked way quicker than his did. "You're right, he has!" Vance agreed. "I'm not gonna tell Anders to leave, though," he joked. "It'd be a waste of a costume."

Still grinning so big her tongue poked through, Harley cracked open her soda (struggling for a few seconds with her costume's gloves, but eventually succeeding), then pulled a blue bendy straw out of thin air and popped it in. Perfect! She took a long sip and reached her skeletal fingers over to break off a piece of the cookie, then realized she hadn't offered Vance a bendy straw. "You want one?"

"That will never stop being cool," Vance said, sounding thrilled. Harley pulled stuff out of what looked like thin air! She reached into another dimension. Seriously, she was amazing. "So sure, if you don't mind!"

He broke off a piece of cookie and, just before popping it into his mouth, gave her a huge grin.

Vance thought her power was cool, so instead of eating her piece of cookie to free up a hand, she tugged her soda halfway into the pocket so the bottom disappeared, then brought her hand back, leaving the can hanging in empty space. Only then did she reach through again to pull out a straw for him. "Ooh, it's green, you match!"

He chuckled. "Excellent. Always good to match your straw to your shirt." Vance tucked the straw into his soda, and then held it up against his chest. "How does it look?"

She giggled because actually he looked kinda silly, but bit her lip against telling him so. Also he always looked good, because Vance!

"Perfect!" she decided with a nod. "Gotta mighty morph in style, right?"

"Exactly," Vance agreed, grinning. "Otherwise I'd just look ridiculous."

Which, he was sure, he probably did anyway, since he was dressed up like a Power Ranger. And, y'know, was wearing green skinny jeans. Still, Harley looked like she was having fun, so he wasn't bothered by it. Vance took a long sip of his drink. "Yup. Definitely tastes better through a bendy straw."

"Everything does, that's why I nicked 'em!" Harley now had a monopoly on the school's bendy straws, having stolen the kitchen's only box.

Vance's eyes went a little wide. "What, you took the bendy straws from the kitchen?"

Harley balked, freezing and looking fearfully up at him as she realized what she'd said. She'd never told anyone about stealing things before! Would he get her in trouble? Would people be upset that she stole the straws? They'd just been there in a cupboard, and she'd never seen anyone else use them but she liked them and wanted them and who knew when she'd need them and they looked so good stuck in Sokka's ponytail! "Um..."

He didn't really condone taking stuff, but he didn't really like how upset Harley looked, either. "It's okay," he said after a moment. "You can pick out your favorite ones, and we can put the rest back later."

Harley was guiltily rolling her straw between her fingers, bright pink with embarrassment now. She kinda wanted to go crawl in a hole and hide. ...with the straws. "Kay..."

Vance nudged her with an elbow. "Don't worry. I'm not mad. And I won't tell on you." Stealing was wrong, and she probably should put them back. But they were also just straws.

Big blue eyes looked up at him as she bit her lip. "Promise?"

"Pinky swear," he said seriously, holding his pinky out for her to link with.

That made Harley grin, almost shyly, and she happily shook pinkies with him - which made her giggle, because of course her little finger was just skeleton. "Okay!" She took a big sip from her soda, which was still hanging in the air next to her.

He grinned back and took a sip through his own bendy straw. "It's really cool how it kinda...hovers there like that." Vance said, gesturing towards her floating drink. "I mean, I could try and hover mine, too, but I'd probably just end up getting soda all over us."

"I've got a better idea," Harley said brightly. She reached over and tugged the bottom of his soda into the Pocket space too, leaving it hovering in front of him. "Tadah!"

She might as well have told him that she'd brought him a unicorn, that was how thrilled Vance looked. "Sweet!!"

"Like ghosts!" she proclaimed, swaying back and forth, causing the sodas to sort of bob along with her.

"Definitely," he agreed. He smiled at her as she swayed - she was nearly dancing. Hey! Maybe he should ask her to dance. That'd be fun. "Hey, Vault...you wanna dance with me?"

Yes! Yes she did, and it would be better than the last dance when Vic was mad at her and she didn't know why but he wasn't here to be angry this time! (Vic seemed to be mad with her a lot lately...) She was nodding enthusiastically. "Yeah, of course!"

In a quick flash of motion, she tugged both of their sodas further into the Pocket, leaving just the straws poking out. They'd be safe there, and she could bounce without them spilling or splashing. Then she grabbed Vance's hand and turned to tug him toward the dancefloor (two floating straws leading the way). "Let's go dance!"

Vance grinned as she pulled him out to the dance floor - she always had such a great attitude! The song "1985" was still playing, and that was a great one to dance to. Even if he didn't understand something like half the references.

Harley wasted no time in starting to dance. She'd been dancing all her life, really, wasn't shy at all - she just enjoyed it even more nowadays! Didn't really matter to her what the music was. And being a dancing skeleton was extra fun!

Harley put her all into everything, and Vance thought it was awesome. He didn't hesitate in all in dancing along side of her, energy and excitement and no filter at all, because it was fun and that's what she was doing, too!

Hee, dancing with Vance! This was awesome! But then the music started changing to the next song, and it was slooooow. She glanced around, and everybody else was getting into pairs... She looked up at Vance in confusion. "What do we do?"

He paused a minute, and then gave her a shrug and a smile. "Well, we dance to it, if you wanna."

She nodded eagerly, then frowned uncertainly. They were already pretty close, but where did her hands go? Oh, first they went into the Pocket to move the sodas, 'cause Vance's straw was about to poke him in the face. Invisible hands moved invisible drinks to the side, then reappeared to hover uncertainly between them. "Um...?"

Vance reached forward and took her hands, guiding them to his shoulders. Once she'd rested them there, he carefully, chastely, set his hands on her hips. "Like this. If you're comfortable."

Good thing Vance knew what he was doing, Harley had never danced with a boy before. And weird, how even though she touched him a lot, this barely touching thing felt... funny. And it was weird to remember how much taller Vance actually was, too. He was smiling at her though, and that made her relax and grin again. "It's not very hard, is it?"

"Not hard at all," He promised her, beginning to move them slowly to the music.

Moving didn't seem to make it much harder, and Harley followed him easily, grinning even more at the simplicity. This was barely dancing - but the song was pretty, and Vance was warm, so she was happy to stay relatively still. It was kinda nice, even.

After a moment (a long one, by her standards), she bounced lightly onto her toes. "Is this what normal high school dances are like?"

He looked contemplative for a moment. "Well, I really only went to a couple, before switching here, but....mostly. I mean, I don't remember this much alcohol, but everything else." Vance stepped a little closer as he got more comfortable, so they could dance more naturally. "Did you go to dances before?"

She shook her head, pigtails bouncing. "Didn't have a school. Dance classes, but no dances."

Right. Famous gymnast bouncing in his arms. Vance grinned. "Okay. Do you like dancing?"

"Yeah! That's why floor's my favorite, you get to do dance and tumbling and--" She stopped abruptly, looking down. "N-not that I miss it. Or anything. 'Cause I don't." Her hands found each other behind his neck more as a nervous gesture than anything else, twitchy fingers fidgeting and tangling together, though it did pull him a little closer. "Um, you like dancing too, right?"

Vance hadn't meant to bum her out, and hopefully he'd be able to fix it! He was quick to nod, hair flopping a little into his eyes. "Yeah, yeah. I like it a lot. And it's a lotta fun, dancing with you."

That did make her smile (and it made her heart do that funny flip-flop thing again, what was that about?) as she sort of peeked back up at him. "Really?"

He smiled and blushed a little, though he couldn't have figured out why. "Of course."

"It's fun dancing with you too," she told him, grinning again and playfully wiggling her hips a little since he was holding them. "Even when it's sloooow."

Vance's eyes went a little wide as she wriggled a little. She was really pretty up close, and her eyes were kinda sparkling, and he couldn't help it as his face heated up some more. "You like fast dancing better?"

Hee, Vance was turning pink! He was warm, maybe his costume was too hot? Hers was kinda too warm, especially so close.

"Yeah," she confirmed with a nod, "you gotta, like, behave to dance like this." And she was doing a really good job of behaving, because dancing with Vance was worth it! But even with the pretty music and all, she was starting to get anxious, and she wasn't sure why... So she kept sort of fidgeting in his arms, not to get away, just to keep moving. "Normal dancing you can just do whatever!"

In looking at some of the other people around them, Vance didn't really know that slow dancing meant behaving for some of the others...but he sure as all heck was not going to point it out. She seemed to want more action-kinda dancing so, grinning, he reached up to take her hands, and then twisted so she would spin.

Harley caught the game immediately and added enough power to twirl twice, the dancer precision a strange complement to her skeleton costume and lopsided grin. She stopped herself neatly, then lifted her arms to try and send Vance for a spin too - but he was tall!

Careful to avoid the straws that had gone spinning with her, Vance let her spin him. Hey, fair was fair! Besides, spinning was fun, and he grinned back at her as he spun back in to face her. "You're good at that. Spinning, I mean."

"With two feet and no beam it feels like cheating," she told him with a laugh.

Vance chuckled. "Well, I promise I won't tell."

"Gee, thanks!" She grinned and sort of flopped into his chest as she rolled her eyes at him. Maybe slow dancing wasn't so bad after all. In fact, it was kinda sad the song was ending. Oooh, but look at that! "Look, they're gonna sing! The ghosty guy is setting it up!"

He turned to look and see. "Oh, cool! You gonna sing with 'em, Harley?"

She flushed bright pink and shook her head vigorously. "N-not in front of everyone! No way!"

Vance turned back, and smiled at her. "You sure? I bet you're a good singer."

"Not in front of people!" More headshaking. "But wanna go watch? Ghost guy is funny! I ran through him once!"

"Ghosty guy?" He was slightly confused, but tried to follow her line of sight to whoever Ghost guy was. He ran through a list in his head. Ran through him...Shinobi, maybe? He could make himself run-through-able, right? Vance decided he'd go with that. "Sure, let's go watch a little!"

Harley was still a little pink, but she was grinning again and tugging on Vance's sleeve, pulling him after her as she took off toward the karaoke. "Come on Justice, we can make you sing instead!"