#I'll be honest Barry's barely in this chapter either

[mosylufanfic]

Life Doesn’t Always Turn Out the Way You Plan

I was trying to post this on AO3, because it’s going to be a multi-parter. But AO3 is being grouchy tonight. So the first part will go up here, and get put up over there when the database starts behaving itself again. Then the rest of the chapters will go up over there too.

“While You Were Sleeping” is one of my all-time favorite movies ever. It just doesn't feel like Christmas unless I've watched it at least once. And because I love it so much, I won’t be able to resist slipping verbatim quotes in here and there. So, watch out for those. Also, I know this is a Valentine's challenge, but this movie is so wrapped up with Christmas for me that I had to set it then.

I'll be honest - after this chapter, the rest of this so far is pretty much an outline interspersed with scene scraps. I'm hoping to post at least twice a week, but the schedule may be, ummmm, flexible. I'll still try to get it all done in the month deadline.

That said, enjoy!

Life Doesn’t Always Turn Out the Way You Plan

My dad used to say something to me all the time when I was growing up. He would get this distant look in his eyes and he would tell me, "Iris, baby, life doesn't always turn out the way you plan."

l just wish I'd realized at the time he was talking about my life.

But my dad wasn't just about cryptic life advice. He taught me to box, he read everything I ever wrote, he even did my hair. And he would tell me the best stories. Sometimes from his life on the force, because he was a cop, but sometimes sweeter stories. More tender ones. Like the ones about my mom. Those were my favorite.

He'd tell me all about how they met, how they fell in love, how they ran away to get married when they were both barely eighteen. He'd never talk about how she died, which was okay by me, because I remembered a little bit of my mom with cancer, and it's not something I wanted to go over again. I preferred the happier memories.

More than once, even though I knew the answer, l asked my dad what the most wonderful, amazing thing about my mom was.

And he said to me, "Baby, your mom gave me all my dreams."

When I got a little older, I realized that what he meant was that when they were first married, struggling through every day, she supported him, studied with him, and generally made sure he got through the police academy even though it made her life harder and scarier. He became a detective, which was something he'd dreamed of all his life.

But when I was little, I thought of her waving her hand and just making everything right for him.

Well, the first time l saw Eddie, he didn't exactly give me all my dreams. lt was a coffee order and his name, plus seventy-six cents for the tip jar. But l look forward to it. I never know when he'll come in, because he's a cop, too, and his shifts are all different. But he always smiles and he's kind and handsome and -

And he's just perfect. The man of my dreams.

We've never actually spoken - I mean, a real conversation, you know, not one centered around caffeinated beverages.

But l know someday we will. l know it. And I know that when we do, it's going to be perfect. And all my dreams will come true.

Iris studied the cursor blinking on the screen and sighed. She couldn't post this.

Her readers came to her blog for the weird, the unexplained, the things that no newspapers would report on. Men faster than lightning, men who could tear open the fabric of reality.

Not a barista's sad personal life.

She hid it in her drafts folder and shut her computer, sliding it into her bag. She had to get to work.

As she eased out the door of her apartment building, wincing at the bitter cold, she spotted a butt in a pair of baggy jeans sticking out from the open hood of a car. Even though it was four-thirty in the morning, she wasn't surprised. Her downstairs neighbor kept strange hours.

"Hey Cisco," she said to the butt. "Have you got my car working yet?" she added hopefully. If he had, that meant she had another ten minutes that she could go back into her warm(ish) apartment and start working on something that actually was a post and not a maudlin piece of drivel.

"Hey," he said, lifting his head and shaking his head as if to toss his long hair back, although it was bundled back in a little nubbin of a ponytail at the base of his skull. He had a black eye. Cisco also often turned up with strange injuries. Her current working theory was that he was illegally street-fighting to make rent, but maybe that was her wild imagination. Probably he'd run into a lamppost or something. "Still trying, here. So today I'm gonna need a cranberry orange scone." He peered up at her hopefully.

She rolled her eyes. "Everybody wants the cranberry orange. There's never any left."

"Come on, it's Christmas Eve!"

Iris's heart sank. Like she needed the reminder.

"Plus, I'm the guy fixing your car. Purely out of the goodness of my heart, might I add."

"You've been fixing my car for three weeks, and the goodness of your heart sure seems to want a lot of day-old baked goods."

He thumped the fender. "That's because this car's a piece of crap."

She had to agree with that. But she couldn't afford better. "I'll try," she said. "But if some yoga lady bites my head off for not giving her the damn scone, it's on your head."

He saluted her with his wrench.

She glanced down the street. No bus yet. "So how's the job hunt?"

He made a face.

"You'll get something," she said. "You're smart. And you're a great engineer."

"An engineer who hasn't done anything with his degree except fix your car for the past six months."

"You could put that on your resume, right? Automotive - something or other." She was usually better at finding just the right word, but come on. It was four-thirty in the morning.

"Ha. Yeah." He snorted. "Bus is coming, you better run."

She looked up in time to see the bus wheeze around a corner three blocks down. How did he do that? she asked herself, sprinting for the bus stop across the street.

At work, after the first rush had died away, her boss cornered her. "So. Hey. How do the words double overtime pay hit you?"

"I'm not working tomorrow," Iris said immediately. "It's Christmas."

"Come on," Gina said. "Please? Jay just called and said he has a sore throat - "

"And you believed him?"

"Rachel's got a big family thing out of state, and I promised my kids I'd be there on Christmas morning."

"Ask someone else, Gina."

"Everybody else has already turned me down. It's just half a shift, honest! You're opening at nine and Lana will be here at twelve and you can go home at one. Or earlier if it's dead." She leaned forward, her eyes compassionate. "Look. Iris. I know you worked Thanksgiving, that's why I asked you last. And I know it's the opposite of fair. You've worked every holiday. But you know, you're the only one - " She hesitated, biting her lip.

Iris finished her sentence, with a sinking feeling in her stomach. "Without any family."

Gina looked at her pitifully.

Iris tugged her Santa hat straight and growled under her breath, "Work Christmas for me, Iris. Double overtime pay, Iris. It'll be dead, Iris. Yeah, right!"

She'd been running since she got here this morning. It had been three hours and she hadn't had a chance to sit down yet. This was the first moment she'd had to breathe, even, and the state of the counter meant she had to be cleaning it.

To make matters worse, it felt like all her customers had been happy family groups, people clearly on their way to gatherings, wearing silly sweaters, loaded down with Christmas presents. Looking forward to a day of warm togetherness.

What did she have to look forward to? Just sweeping up the coffee grounds she'd spilled. Oh, and her replacement to get here in half an hour, if she actually remembered.

"Hey," said a gravelly voice that sent a thrill down her spine. "Merry Christmas."

Her head shot up. She gaped at Eddie.

He smiled back, his bright smile, his twinkling eyes, oh my god -

"Isn't it the worst, working holidays?"

She clutched her broom like an idiot. "Um. Yeah."

He waited, as if she was expected to be coherent right now, with him smiling at her and the little piece of holly pinned to his lapel, and his eyes so blue she wanted to fall into them, and the mistletoe dangling from the loft above his head.

"Well," he said. "First break I've gotten all morning. Um - Where's your bathroom?"

"That way," she said, flailing a hand. Luckily, it was in the actual direction of the bathroom.

"I'll be right back," he said. "Don't get away."

"Okay," she breathed, watching him go.

She stood, kicking herself. The man of her dreams actually started a conversation and this was how she reacted? She was a mess.

His regular, what was his regular? He didn't really have one. He ordered all sorts of different things. What about hot chocolate, with a shot of peppermint? That was festive. Would it be creepy, having it ready for him? Or a nice Christmas surprise? Or maybe he wanted something else - oh god, she was such a mess.

The door jingled and one of her other regulars walked in, a doctor from the hospital down the street. From the looks of her, she was on her break too. Iris shook her head hard and tried to smile. "Hi there. What can I get you?"

"Chai latte, please."

"Sure thing. Caitlin, right?" She always ordered the same thing. Iris could make her drink on automatic. Good thing, too, because she was still involved in kicking herself and trying to come up with suave, witty, sexy working-on-Christmas banter that would make Eddie instantly fall in love with her.

The door jingled again, and two men came in as she came back from bringing Caitlin her drink. "Hi, fellas," she said, even for some reason though her skin crawled and she desperately wanted the counter to be thicker, higher. She cranked her customer-service smile up to eleven. "What can I get for you?"

"Mmmmm, let me thiiiink - how about a mocha latte and all your money?"

Iris stared at the gun in her face and thought, Who robs a coffee shop? and Gina, if I die, I'm so going to haunt your ass.

"Now!" he yelled, and she jumped.

"Okay, okay," she mumbled, popping open the cash register. Jitters policy was clear - give them the money, let them get away, call the police after. No amount of money is worth your life.

All the same, her eyes flickered toward Caitlin, who -

Who had a gun pushed in her face too, the second robber barking at her to keep her hands where he could see them. She was staring up at him, her eyes narrowed, her jaw set, and a cold chill ran down Iris's spine.

Just - god. Don't let any guns go off today.

"Faster!"

She jumped and dropped a stack of fives, scrambling for them when he waved the gun.

The back door, the one that led to the bathrooms, opened with a squeak. Iris knew who it was before she even looked around.

Eddie walking through that door, his eyes widening, his gun coming up, his mouth forming the words stop, police -

The second robber's gun went off with a boom like a cannon blast. Eddie's shoulder jerked back and he went down hard, his gun flying one way, his badge another. His head bounced off the doorjamb and he lay still.

"Fuck!" the second robber shrieked, his gun waving wildly. "A cop! Man, you shot a cop!"

"Shit," the first robber said, and his gun swung away from Iris to bear on Eddie's unconscious body. "He saw us - "

Without thinking, Iris grabbed the nearest thing at hand and hurled it at his head. It wasn't until the thing shattered, sending glass and stickiness spraying, that she realized it was a bottle of hazelnut syrup. The robber yowled and dropped his gun, and the second one whipped around, aiming his gun in her direction -

She squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the next bullet to drill into her forehead.

A sudden blast of cold air buffeted her. She thought, huh, that's not what I expected from dying - and realized she was still breathing, her heart still thundering away in her throat. She risked opening one eye.

The Flash stood at the counter. Behind him, both robbers were tied to chairs - festively, with some of the sparkling bunting from the square outside.

She gaped at him.

"You okay, miss?" he asked her.

"I - Yes? But - " She pointed at Eddie. "He's not."

"He was wearing a vest, but he hit his head pretty hard," Caitlin reported. She was crouched over Eddie, checking his vitals. "You need to get him down to Central City General as soon as possible."

"Eddie," the Flash breathed, which struck Iris as strange - how did he know Eddie's name, and why did he say it like that?

But then he and Eddie were gone, leaving Caitlin and Iris alone in the coffee shop, watching syrup drip slowly off the table. Caitlin reached up and picked some glass out of her hair, making a face as several strands stuck to her hand.

Iris felt numb and floaty, which was probably why she put her hand over her face and mumbled, "Oh, Eddie. I was going to marry you."

She started to pick up the phone to call Gina - Hi, guess what, your Christmas is ruined after all - and Caitlin grabbed her arm. The handset clattered to the counter.

"Let's go," Caitlin said. "We're going to the hospital."

"But - I - " Iris tottered as Caitlin dragged her out from behind the counter, astonishingly fast on the crazy high heels she was wearing.

"Call your boss later. I'm sure she'll understand that you've just been robbed, for god's sake, and that Eddie was hurt. That's his name, right? Eddie?"

"I - I need to lock up - " Iris managed to grab her key out of her pocket and lock the front door behind them before Caitlin was hauling them down the street to Central City General. The ER was a complete zoo, and when Caitlin hustled her through, saying something to the nurses, Iris didn't catch it over the din.

Caitlin guided her to the nearest free chair and pushed on her shoulders until Iris sat down with a thump. "Okay, you sit here, and as soon as we can, we'll get you in to see him, all right? As soon as we can."

Iris said wisely, "Eurgbhl?"

Caitlin's hand on her shoulder gentled. "He's going to be okay. I promise."

Iris nodded, more because the other woman seemed to need it than because she had any idea what was going on.

She nodded back, then charged off, still in her coat, on an Eddie-saving mission. Iris watched her go, feeling her head spin.

Well, Merry Christmas to her.

To Be Continued