Chapter Text
Graphic credits goes to - jaded_maven
“Kit! Hazel! Wait up! I am still putting on my sword” Jade said as she looked at the girls pretending to spar.
“Azel, keep your arm behind you, it helps your balance. Don’t swing wide!” Kit said as she collided the foam swords together, trying to teach her twin how to properly work her sword.
Frowning deeply, Hazel narrowed her eyes at her sister in a suspicious manner and tightened both hands around the hilt of her play sword. " That doesn't make sense Kit. Two hands is better" She replied with a small grunt as she tried to stab her sword under her sister's arm. " I'm the prince, I know better." She added with a self assured nod of her head, stepping forward again to take another jab at the younger girl.
“This princess is gonna kick your butt” Kit said as she moved sideways freeing herself from the attack. “We watched all the movies, tell her daddy! One hand only!” Kit said in her full, authoritative voice.
" Kit." Sorsha called in a small warning tone, giving her younger daughter a knowing look, full of amusement and a touch of concern." Remember to be careful with her." She added gently.
" Your mother's right, there will be no butt kicking... and you're both right. Lots of movies show people using only one hand, but two hands works when the sword is heavy or your opponent is much stronger." The man answered with a big smile, shaking his head at the way the two girls played.
“I think… we could work a more diplomatic way of deciding this Kit” Jade said as she tried to calm the shorter girl by placing a hand on her shoulder only to get it shrugged off.
“The Gales are about to attack,” Madmartigan exclaimed, giving them an expectant smile. While Sorsha made Sounds of whistling winds, she moved a white sheet in the wind for effect.
Hearing the warning, Hazel froze, looking in the direction of her mother with wide eyes, before stepping in front of Kit, placing an arm in front of her. " Get behind me Princess, I'll protect you." She spoke in her best impression of a commanding and valiant tone, puffing her chest up before placing both hands on the hilt of the sword and pointing it towards her mother.
“I can protect myself, Prince Azel! See that you keep our Knight safe and sound!” Princess Kit Tanthalos spoke loud and clear “Sir Claymore, be ready to attack, these monsters are vicious!”
Huffing at her sister's words, Hazel lowered her sword and turned to face the other girl. " Kit, you're the princess, you're the one we protect. Knights protect the princess." She explained for the umpteenth time in a slightly exasperated tone as she crossed her arms over her chest and tapped the toe of her shoe into the dirt. " Tell her Jade." She implored, glancing at their friend with what she hoped was a pleading look, knowing Kit would listen to Jade faster than her. She could play, but she had a hard time thinking outside rules that were already set in her mind and Kit always seemed to want to bend the rules.
“Maybe these are modern times?” Jade said raising her hands to Hazel “Kit, play along just this time please?” Jade said wanting to get the playtime started instead of another argument and meltdown from Hazel “Hazey… you could pretend the King was a feminist just once, for me please my Prince?
Confused, Hazel furrowed her brow and rocked back on her heels a bit, almost recoiling at the new word, and very ready to protest until Jade's last words registered, causing her to blush and stand up a bit straighter. " I can pretend the King was a Fem, Femn... Fenm.." She tried saying the word, struggling with it and starting to hyperventilate a little in frustration, before tossing her sword aside and walking off, embarrassed and overwhelmed, needing to find a place alone and away from sounds and other stimuli.
“Azel, Focus. Focus!” Kit said, shaking her sister’s arm.
Hazel awoke with a start, blinking up at her ceiling for a second to adjust to being awake, while internally reminding herself that today she was Kit, not Hazel and that dream was just a dream, not a memory of a happier time, another time when she had a loving family, one who hadn't given her up for her differences, who had genuinely seemed to care. Oh how people could deceive you when you were gullible and didn't know how to spot deception.
Shaking her head to try and clear her thoughts, Hazel got up and started her normal morning routine, carefully planned out, a thing she could look forward to every morning, just like her night routine, the two constants to offset the unpredictably of the rest of her waking hours.
Shuffling into the bathroom, she reached into the shower blindly, turning it on to get it to start warming up, before making her way over to her side of the sink, there were two, but she only ever used the right one, preferring to be closest to the medicine cabinet that stuck out from the wall right beside her right shoulder, she liked convenience and according to her mother and everybody else around her, she was a creature of habit. She liked it that way, it didn't bother her one bit, she preferred predictable because life was anything but, therefore she figured it didn't hurt to keep the things she could control predictable.
Spitting into the sink, Hazel put her toothbrush back in its holder, and gargled the most potent & tolerably flavored version of mouthwash she could find, - cool mint listerine, It had a pleasant flavor and she liked the burn, sue her - flossed her teeth first with normal floss and then her water flosser and finally after all of those items were put back in their proper places, she smiled at herself in the mirror, checking to make sure her teeth were perfectly white and clean before allowing her eyes to slide up to meet her own in the reflection briefly - an act she usually avoided - flinching as she saw a mirror image of her sister staring back at her, her normally longer, shaggier hair cut shorter to match Kit's far more put together style, still roguish but better kept, styled more deliberately with light honey-colored highlights here and there.
She had to blink and look away after only a couple of seconds because she didn't like eye contact even with herself; She'd manage it if she had to, but she'd learned tricks to make it appear like she was looking at people when in reality she'd be staring right above or below their eye line, - that was when she remembered to stop staring at their mouths as they talked - it seemed to work and she was happy enough with that, but this... this was different, all she saw when she looked into her own eyes was a scared child, a broken human, a person she'd buried years ago essentially a ghost of the past and she hated it, hated the weakness she saw there, but today she wasn't just forced to confront herself, she was also seeing Kit, feeling the hatred she'd learned to accept her sister had always had for her, seeing the deception that had apparently always been there but she'd been too naive to pick up on. The sister who treated her nice to her face, but conspired against her behind her back, just biding her time until Hazel was out of the picture and she could take her place. All the while crying into her mother's shoulder on TV as they pretended to care about their lost daughter/sister. Scoffing, Hazel tore her eyes away from her reflection, turned the water back on, and splashed her face several times, scrubbing her hands over it repeatedly in some sort of attempt to scrub away Kit.
Forty minutes later, Hazel was finished showering and dressing, her style has evolved from oversized jeans, button-up shirts, and sweater vests, to well-fitting jeans and button-ups, topped with suit vests, similar in spirit but a lot sharper to the observing world. She still managed to feel like herself most days, but could pass for a productive member of society, and that had been the goal.
She had toyed with the idea of leaving the vest, as it was less like Kit, but their styles were similar enough and she wasn't gonna enter the office until late enough that most people would be out or not paying attention anyways, besides she highly doubted anybody would question the tiny difference in style, most people didn't pick up on details and patterns the way she did. For her nothing felt random, but everybody else seemed to accept things as coincidence. She did decide to forgo the thick chain she normally wore around her neck in favor of a replica of the far lighter Jade stone necklace her sister wore, the stone was slightly jagged and not quite symmetrical, a fact that made Hazel's skin itch a little, but she ignored it, telling herself it was necessary, as Kit never seemed to take that thing off; and finally she slid on a perfect duplicate of the ring Kit wore on her right ring finger, a small gold band, the only difference being this one had a slightly raised pointed portion on the inside, something she could use to ground herself when needed; That finished, she chanced one more glance at herself, straightened out her collar and flashed herself a devilish smile, confident she could pull this off. Sorsha and Kit wouldn't know what hit them or their precious company, by the time Kit got back from her annual two-month-long trip, the damage would be done! - At least that was the plan.
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Striding in like she owned the place because, in a way, she felt like she sort of did, Hazel smiled pleasantly at the few random people still in at ten pm on a Monday night and made her way right up to the 40th floor and into Kit's - No! her office - and physically winced as she ran her finger over the edge of a horrifyingly messy desk. Her mind itched with the need to tidy it up, wanting so badly to organize all of the random papers she found strewn there, maybe even color code them; Squeezing her eyes shut firmly against that thought, Hazel brought the hand that had been touching the desk, up to the bridge of her nose and squeezed hard, both in frustration and as a way to ground herself a bit, a sort of reminder that this was Kit's workspace, this was how Kit kept things and today she was Kit, she couldn't just go rearranging things, people might get suspicious.
Opening one eye, Hazel peeked out over her fingers to venture a glance at the still unkempt desk and physically growled at the sight. - Perhaps she could convince people that Kit had finally seen the need for organization? - Biting her lip, Hazel nodded a bit to herself as though in reply to her own thoughts and quickly got to work organizing her sister's - No her desk. Damn she really needed to remember that .
Several hours later, She sighed with a small sense of relief, leaning back in the office chair and drawing in a soothing breath, knowing she'd let her own very particular needs eat away at a lot of her time. Reluctantly she brought her wrist up to her eye line and scowled at the lack of a watch. - That's right, Kit didn't wear a watch. What kind of disorganized ...- she let that train of thought trail off with her second audible groan of the night and shifted to grab her phone out of the back pocket of her jeans, widening her eyes at the giant neon blue digits that informed her it was now three am and she'd lost five full hours just trying to get everything in enough order that she could even stand being in the space.
"Fuck me." She grumbled to herself, running a hand down her face in irritation, letting it fall back onto the arm of the chair, before swiveling a little from side to side, resisting the urge to spin it all the way around in a fidget of sorts, instead allowing her eyes to scan the room for a clock, relieved when she spotted one right above the office door. Narrowing her eyes, she huffed out a breath when she determined that said clock was stopped - because of course, it was-. Evidently, Kit relied heavily on her phone, something Hazel disapproved of greatly.
She really needed to leave this place, she hadn't done any of what she'd gone there for and she really didn't want to risk running into the morning shift, which at this rate was bound to happen; Kit's office seemed like a black hole of things that needed to be tidied and fixed, so with one last sweeping gaze over the now clean surface area, Hazel allowed her eyes to briefly stop on the picture she found there, the one thing that seemed to be in it's place on the corner of the woman's desk, a picture she was in, and she only knew that because it was both of them, Kit with a firm arm around her shoulders and a huge smile on her face as she pointed at the camera with her free hand, presumably to indicate to Hazel where the camera was, Hazel who's head was ducked a little, eyes peeking up towards the camera through her messy bangs and a small awkward smile on her features, it looked forced to her now, but at the time it had been the best she could do, she figured she had to have been maybe five or six when it was taken.
Scoffing softly, Hazel stopped running her finger over the faces she found there, blinking as she briefly wondered when she'd picked up the framed photo and promptly set it back down in its place as though it had burned her and with a grunt she got up and slid the chair back up against the desk, looked around with a small nod of satisfaction and slipped out of the office with a soft click of the door.
Turning to leave, she stopped dead in her tracks, a neutral expression on her features - one she'd like to contribute to her coolheadedness, but in reality was really just her default expression when she wasn't actively thinking about how she was supposed to look.- raking her eyes over the always taller than her and once too gangly frame of the beautiful redhead standing before her, she marveled at the changes and sameness, the girl -no woman - she mentally corrected, was still taller than Hazel's own five foot two frame, but she'd grown into her longer limbs, had filled out, no longer awkward; In fact she was quite well built, filling out her perfectly tailored suit in all the right ways, a thought Hazel had to mentally shake from her mind as she continued to let her eyes travel up until they briefly met the curious eyes of her childhood friend? Girlfriend? She wondered if adolescent kissing counted and Kit's current head of security, letting them promptly come to rest somewhere directly below the woman's eye line.
"Jade." She breathed out softly, swallowing hard as she registered how odd that must have sounded, and quickly fixed her expression, allowing a slow almost flirtatious-looking smile to spread across her features. She'd learned to smile by practicing copying her favorite person at the time; her sister, always trying to capture Kit's confident and playful smile, but somehow always winding up looking flirtatious instead. "I didn't expect anybody to really be here." She admitted with a deliberately nervous/sheepish sounding laugh, her smile faltering as she glanced to the side and fixed her eyes on one of the many plaques covering the wall, needing something to focus on that wasn't Jade, as she allowed her mind to work out the story she'd give the other woman when inevitably asked why she was there and not on her annual trip.
Jade looked at the woman and gave her a disbelieving look, confused that somehow the woman who was supposed to be away, was standing in front of her. Was that a flirty look? Is she mad? Her boss and best friend had taken a two-month long trip to isolate herself and shut off the world, something she’s done every year on the anniversary of her twin sister’s disappearance since their 18th birthday. Without failure, Kit would take off the night before the anniversary and not contact anyone, leaving all her electronics behind for her journey. What happened on those trips? Hard to tell, but Jade believed the woman took the time to grieve the loss of her twin, to feel the feelings she wasn’t allowed to feel or show as the COO of a Global security and aerospace company, to decompress and to learn more about herself or maybe she did more of what she couldn’t do in front of others, sleep around, drank a bit more, let loose. Jade wished a few times that Kit invited her to come along, so she could share some of the grieving. When Hazel was taken away, she left Jade too, and Jade missed her daily. Her smile, and curious eyes, were something Jade would always miss and she only saw it a handful of times in Kit.
Jade knew loss, she understood grieving from a young age and had done more than her fair share, but she still wished Kit asked her to accompany her. Looking at Kit now, she noticed the weird intonation in which the woman said her name and the awkward somewhat flirty smile, almost reminding her of… her.
Jade shook her head, nope she refused to think about her, it was still too painful. She smiled back and spoke softly “I thought you were gone.” she said and tugged on her jacket, buttoning the suit jacket closed as if to make herself more serious, not that Kit would ever not think about her as her chief of security. Why didn’t you let me know you delayed the trip?” Jade asked, looking at the woman who was always flighty and aloof but never played around when it came to informing Jade of her plans, knowing how Jade took her job seriously and liked to stay updated on Kit’s whereabouts.
Sighing deeply, Hazel valiantly resisted the urge to close her eyes and bask in the soothing sound of Jade's warm accented voice, remembering many times when that voice had comforted her or read her stories.
~
Peeking out from underneath her covers, Hazel blinked as moonlight painted the branches from the tree outside in eerie shadows across the far wall of the bedroom she shared with her sister and was currently sharing with Jade as well. "Jade." She called in a soft wobbly whisper, one eye on her friend and the other on the source of her terror. "Jade." She called again a little harsher, wincing as one of the shadows moved violently with a particularly powerful gust of wind, a branch slamming against the window so hard the child jumped and scrambled across the room to her friend's bed, crawling under the girl's covers for protection, normally intense need for personal space forgotten in her quest for safety. She would have called for Kit, but her sister slept like a rock, so she'd quickly learned to seek Jade out instead whenever the older girl was around.
“Hazel what’s up? Are you ok?” Jade said startled, waking as the girl climbed onto her mattress, jade dug under the covers and found the girl hiding, halfway tucked into her shirt, only her eyes peeking out from the collar“Hazey, talk to me, bad dream?” Jade whispered trying to not wake up Kit, surprised since Hazel really never left her bed.
Blinking to try and see the girl through the dark, Hazel shook her head quickly. "M-Monster." She stammered out in a quiet whimper, poking her head further out of her shirt and pressing a finger to her lips to indicate Jade should be quiet, convinced something was in the room with them.
Jade looked around and tried to see what the girl was seeing, eventually spotting the shadow, and hearing the noise she smiled “Hey, it’s just a tree, but if you want you can stay here. I will protect you from the monster”. She said with a smile on her lips.
Drawing her eyebrows together in concern, Hazel widened her eyes almost comically. "Why is there a tree in the room?" She squeaked as she shook her head firmly, refusing to come out from under the covers.
Peaking at the girl, Jade smiled at how wide the girl’s eyes were and realized how Hazel would’ve interpreted her words, knowing that Hazel had a literal view of the world and words, something she had learned from spending time with the Tanthalos twins. She focused a bit, her sleepy state not helping in processing digestible information and she hoped she could clarify for Hazel. “It’s just a shadow from the branch outside, Hazey, it’s not really inside the room” To assure the girl everything was fine, she smiled big at her “But as I said, I will protect you, have no fear.”
Skeptical, Hazel narrowed her eyes a little bit, knowing Kit would sometimes play tricks on her, and even though Jade had never, she was still cautious. "You promise Jade?" She asked seriously, wincing and slamming her hands over her ears at the high-pitched screeching of a branch scraping across the window, her whole body shivering in distaste, even her teeth felt achy from it.
Jade nodded at the girl and pulled her close when the noise became too much for her “Of course, Hazey. I am your knight” she said as she smiled at the girl and reached out to her side, giving Hazel her headphones “Try this on. You like rain sounds?”
Relaxing into the tight embrace, Hazel let out a big breath and nodded slowly as she looked up at the girl and then to the headphones, reaching out and running a finger over the ear pad part of them curiously, testing the texture. "Yes." She answered softly, before burying her face against the older girl's chest, liking the softness of her shirt and the comforting warmth she found there. "Can you read to me?" She asked quietly, not sure about the headphones just yet since she'd never tried them, but very sure about the sound of her friend's voice, knowing she found it comforting.
“Ok, I am reading the story of Princess Taramis, so here we go,” the girl said as she started reading quietly, checking on the girl every few minutes, and within two pages, Hazel was asleep. “Sweet dreams bestie number two.”
~
Sliding her eyes back to Jade, Hazel gave the woman a well-practiced apologetic look, noticing the way the woman adjusted her suit, but choosing not to acknowledge it. "I know, I'm sorry. I know you're probably upset" She spoke in a contrite tone, averting her eyes a little again. "Thing is... It was a last-minute decision. I just think that maybe this trip isn't really doing any good, ya know?" She asked, turning soft eyes back to Jade, watching for understanding. "I decided to try and be productive..." She let her words trail off and perked up a bit. "I think you'd be proud actually." She chirped, curling a finger towards her in a come hither motion as she took a few steps backward and opened Kit's office door, and slipped back into the oversized space. "I uh... I organized." She finished in an almost bashful tone, looking down at the ground as she waited for Jade's reaction. - All those years studying her sister's behavior finally being put to use.
Jade looked at the woman with a raised eyebrow, following her and slowly entering the office, looking suspiciously at the desk and then at Kit’s slightly childish behavior, something she used to do all the time to not get Jade yelling at her. “you canceled the trip and you cleaned? Are you ok? I am not mad you canceled the trip Kit, I am mad you didn’t tell me. You know there are nutty people out there trying to kidnap and you, you can’t leave me in the dark, ok?” The woman said watching her best friend “And good job, that desk was nasty! It beats me how you can get anything done or find anything in this office”
Wincing at the mention of being kidnapped, not just because it's something Kit might do, but because she herself had a physical reaction to the mention of it, her blood boiling at the mere thought of the show her family had put on to make it seem like she'd been kidnapped and killed when in reality they'd paid those people to take her, she was essentially thrown away and it made her sick that she couldn't just say everything she felt in that moment, but she kept that all inside, hidden behind a carefully constructed mask she'd learned to put up over the years. "I know it sounds silly." She started, looking down at the desk and picking up the picture of her and Kit, smiling at it sadly for Jade's sake. "It's something Hazel would have done, ya know? I thought..." She trailed off, frowning deeply and swallowing hard for effect. "I thought maybe it would make me feel closer to her." She breathed out and shook her head before bringing her eyes back up to meet Jade's "I know I should have told you... I just thought it would be like the trip, only instead of being there, I'd just stay in town, keep my phone off, and come here in the evening and try and collect my thoughts, channel my feelings into something more productive, and maybe make her proud. This was supposed to be her office after all." She spoke in a nostalgic tone as she let her eyes travel back to the picture still in her hands. "I'm sorry." She finished, looking up with the most sincere look she could muster as she met the woman's eyes briefly, using her trick after a second to look like she was maintaining it longer than she was.
Jade looked at the woman and nodded sadly “I know what you mean. Every week I organize my sock drawers because Hazel taught me how to put them in a roll and put them in a little square. “She is proud of you Kit, she always was,” the woman said, having grown up with the twins as their best friend, Jade knew how highly organized and focused Hazel was. “Maybe next time, text me. I hate to see you go through this alone. Hazel probably would’ve hated the stuffyness of this office, Kit.” she said looking over to the furniture and the windows.
Listening to the woman's words, Hazel kept the same sad-looking expression on her face, as she let her eyes roam over the office space idly, taking everything in, convincing herself that she would have loved it, engineering was just a hobby, not her passion she told herself silently, while trying not to think about Jade organizing her sock drawer the way she'd taught her too or the way her heart constricted at the thought-, instead she focused on the way her mind buzzed in slight irritation, quietly contemplating whether or not Jade actually believed her sister gave a fuck or if she'd just lied to herself long enough to sound sincere. - Hazel always struggled with sorting out people's emotions and sincerity though, so it was also possible the woman didn't sound sincere at all, but she was pretty sure she did and that left her confused and on edge-
"I don't know Jade... what if she would have hated me? This was all supposed to be hers and here I am..." She trailed off, motioning around the office in a sweeping motion, before placing the picture back down in the exact same spot as before, unable to put it anywhere else, needing things to be in their exact right place. "I'm sorry, I would have, but you know...the whole shutting off communication thing?" She added, giving the woman a sheepish look, followed by an equally sheepish shrug. "Forgive me?" She asked, flashing wide hopeful eyes up at the woman in a perfect impression of a sad puppy, bottom lip poking out without thought. It added to the effect but was also just one of the many habits she'd had since childhood, one she wasn't even consciously aware of.
Jade approached Kit and squeezed her arm. “Kit, Hazel could never hate you,” the woman said looking at her friend, eyes watery with emotion. “Of course I forgive you… but you need to know you don’t have to go through this alone. I am here for you.” the woman said with a smile, hoping her best friend and crush since forever, took the comfort she was offering.
Clenching her jaw and pressing her thumb into the underside of her ring to calm her nerves and curb the urge to flinch away from the touch, Hazel nodded slowly and licked her lips lightly in a nervous manner. "I hope you're right Jade. I really do." She spoke softly, looking down, unable to look at the woman as she blatantly lied, she hated Kit and she wanted to scream it from the rooftops, but here she was having to play nice. It would all be worth it in the end, just a few weeks, that was all she needed and then it would all belong to her 'real family' and by extension her. No more having to hide or pretend, she'd finally be able to prove her worth and expose the Tanthalos family for the liars they were.
"I know Jade... " She let the words trail off as she brought her stormy blue eyes back up to meet the older woman's brown ones, letting herself see her childhood friend and crush for a second, needing to conjure up some sincerity. "You were always there for me... You're the best friend anybody could ever ask for." She spoke earnestly, giving the woman a searching look for a moment as she again tried to figure the other woman out, and in a moment of perhaps curiosity? weakness? She spoke again. "If you're done here... we could maybe grab take out from our favorite diner? Maybe watch a movie at your place?" She offered quietly and decided right then and there it was neither of those things, no, it was because Jade was the closest person to Kit, she knew her inside out and backward, and it was a calculated move; If Jade thought she was Kit, it was the perfect way to get more information. It had absolutely nothing to do with any doubts she'd had over the years; she hated Kit, hated Sorsha, and wanted nothing more than to destroy them both. Her thumb was still pressing her ring into her finger hard, pushing the little raised edge of it into the meat at the base of her finger in what might be a painful way, but for her, it kept her grounded, kept her from fidgeting too obviously and let her breath easier.
"I'd say my place but I kind of misplaced my keys last night." She winced and raised her eyebrows a little in a sheepish manner. "Come to think of it... maybe that's what got me thinking about organizing." She joked in a light-hearted manner, taking the opportunity to take a step back from Jade, turning her back on the woman and opening and closing one drawer after the other as she pretended to search for the missing item.
"I figured since I'd be out of town, that would give me plenty of time to get a new key, but now..." She trailed off, throwing another wince over her shoulder, closing the last drawer, and turning back around to face Jade again. "Still not there, I was really hoping the little sprite who stole them might have put them back by now." She chuckled softly and shook her head as she crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back against the edge of the desk, legs extended to keep her in a half-sitting, half-balanced position. "Not one word about my alleged ADHD." She added head tilted towards Jade and one eyebrow raised in a playful warning as she used air quotes to indicate her disbelief in that possible diagnosis. She really hoped Jade had a spare key, if she knew Jade like she thought she did, she was almost positive the woman would have practically insisted on having a spare, knowing Kit was a scatter brain and that's what she was banking on.-
Jade shook her head, knowing how her friend was and always anticipating her needs, she spoke softly “I really wish you stopped saying alleged ADHD when you and I both know you have a prescription for it, Kit!” the woman said as she looked over at her “You’re lucky I always carry my spare keys to your place. I’ll drive you, I am sure since you don’t have house keys your car keys are also missing” she said with a knowing look. It wouldn’t be the first or the third time Kit had lost her house and car keys and Jade refused to be unprepared.
Biting her lip to hide her smile, Hazel raised her eyebrows with an amused and guilty look. "Caught." She chuckled and pushed off of the desk, taking a step closer to Jade and looking up at her. "What would I do without my Knight?" She asked in a teasing tone, poking at the woman's ribs playfully. "Also, I'm pretty sure Mom and Dad got me diagnosed with something just to make Hazel feel better." She added with a dismissive wave of her hand, her chin held high in determination, digging deep to remember how Kit liked to banter with Jade, only hoping she could pull it off, as the proximity was slightly overwhelming and she was pretty sure she was starting to sweat with the effort to calm her nerves.
Blushing profusely, Jade looked down then at the mention of Hazel, she looked at Kit, letting her sadness show a bit, she missed her best friend or bestie number two how she referred to Hazel back when they were twelve and fourteen. “Oh come on Kit you know it’s not true. High school was rough because you insisted on not taking your pills. You barely made it out” she said simply If it wasn’t for that girl in your chem class Freshman year of college, basically saying it was very hot that you had a superpower or some shit and made you take the pills, you wouldn’t have graduated college either. What was her name? something… something that rhymes, ah yeah, Stella Rebecca” Jade said with disgust all over her face.
Noticing the blush that spread over Jade's face, Hazel cocked an intrigued eyebrow at the woman, wondering if perhaps Kit's friend wanted to be more than just her friend, something that really shouldn't feel surprising at all, considering her own small history with the woman. "That's my story and I'm sticking to it." She spoke with a matter-of-fact sort of nod before spinning on her heel and striding towards the little couch in the corner of the office, falling back onto it in the most ungraceful way possible. "Besides, why take meds when it stifles my creativity? Personally, I just think people are jealous." She chirped in a flippant tone as she curled her fingers towards her, checking her nails in a bored manner, looking fully relaxed. "As for college, I hardly remember, you should know that." She added, tearing her eyes away from her fingers and leveling Jade with a knowing look, deciding she was gonna take full advantage of this interesting new development.
“Too much partying, not enough class, yes I remember. I had all the classes. I barely saw you then,” she said shaking her head “You’re a business woman Kit, it’s important to be on your best footing.” she said with a serious look, but not failing to let a smile form on her lips at the carefree way kit sat with one arm stretched over the back of the couch, manspreading, her jeans, coordinating dress shirt and black vest making her look a lot more appealing than the stuffy suits she wore to the office some days.
Laughing wholeheartedly, Hazel threw her head back with it, thinking about Kit in college partying, and Jade worrying about her, like it would have mattered if the woman had flunked every class, the family had enough money to buy her degree, unlike Hazel's, ones she'd had to actually work for, not light classes like art, but serious stuff like engineering. Her laugh might have sounded mirthful, but it was bitter. Composing herself after a moment, she let her eyes find Jade again and smiled with a small agreeable nod. "I know Jade, but today... let me have my fun, yeah?" She implored softly, taking on a contrite look as she glanced towards the windows with a far-off look, making sure it looked like she was genuinely thinking about her lost sister.
Suddenly hit with another pang of sadness, Jade nodded “Yeah, of course” she said, her voice thick with emotion. “I miss her too”.
Blowing out an almost irritated breath Hazel sat up a bit straighter, slapping her hands down onto her knees and pushing herself back up. "I know you do, Jade." She sighed. "How about that takeout? And ride?" She asked softly, raising a questioning eyebrow, her head tilting towards the girl with a playfully imploring look, not trying to be flirtatious but somehow managing to make it look that way.
Sobering up, Jade wiped a tear and shook her head, “Right, yeah… we need to stop at my office, I need the extra helmet” she said with a quick glance at Kit.