Indiana, Invincible; Chapter 12, Part 2

by Maryam in A Land Of Desert And Sun

Liam's POV

I've doubled back around the front of the house; it's easier to get to the backyard from there, there's no fence that way...

I pause as I get in sight of the front door, narrow my eyes, and quizzically come closer.

It's a girl standing there, wearing some sort of hat that's eerily familiar, her arms twined around something in them, a glass container of some sort, and one hand is stretched forward. As I watch, she pulls on the bellpull, then, understandably, when it doesn't make any noise, she pulls on it again, more insistent this time. Rocking back on her heels, the gesture is so transparently irritated I can't help but break into a grin. I have to interfere here.

Clearing my throat before it, I shout, 'That doesn't actually work, you know!' the smile coming into my voice, and I know she can hear it.

But it's strange, the way she reacts. She stiffens, and her manner is almost wary. Instead of turning around and laughing... I don't know, I half-expect that - she, slowly, turns around, her arms still around that container, the hat still on her head, her face is downcast and I can't help but feel a little wary myself, but I push that aside and stride forward, my arms swinging at my sides, and I call, 'What's that in your hands? It looks' -

And then I stop.

I am so amazingly stupid -

Well, sometimes -

As slowly as the girl turns, then exasperatedly blows out into the thin air in front of her (it's so cold it comes out as frost; that's how I can tell), I realize -

As she turns again, towards me, a stand of hair falls out of the hat and settles on her back; a familiar color, a tawny-brown-blonde kind of color -

As she speaks, a hollow feeling descends into my stomach.

As she speaks, her voice is biting, cutting - short.

'Yes, I noticed that, Rheston; anything else you'd be so pleased to inform me of?'

Finally, as she raises her face to meet my eyes, I feel a cool kind of recognition go through each of us. I take a breath to scathingly comment back, but before I can, an astonishing thing happens.

She hangs her head and softly swears under her breath.

'Darnit.'

Indiana Finnigan raises her head once again and clearly meets my eyes; her lion-like ones have no trace if hostility in them, merely a guarded wariness. 

'I promised myself I wouldn't attempt insulting you. I came here,' she takes a breath cautiously, 'to redeem myself.'

In a voice clearer than a bell's peal, clearer than she's ever spoken to me before, she says:

'I'm sorry.'