#this is set right after ysutjrt btw

[joysmercer]

June 2013; pre-uni anubis reunion/grad party at the millington residence; nina and joy.

____________

"you look like hell."

nina nearly drops the beer bottle she'd been nursing in shock. it's nearly 3:30 in the morning; she had assumed that everyone else had more-or-less passed out hours ago, leaving her here alone. but now, joy stands in the doorway, the pale stream of moonlight from the window revealing dark circles under her eyes that rival nina's own.

to her own surprise, she gestures up to the couch she's leaning against. "come sit," she says.

joy hesitates, then nods and comes to join nina on the floor, grabbing a cushion as a backrest and folding her legs neatly before her. even in exhaustion, everything about her is careful, calculated. nina's always simultaneously greatly disliked and heavily admired that about her.

"wanna swap?" joy asks. nina stares at the juicebox (undoubtedly taken from alfie) being extended towards her. "i could use something stronger, and like i said earlier, you look—"

"i'm fine," nina says on-cue, but grabs the juicebox and hands over her beer anyway. she takes a sip and immediately makes a face. "ew, grape."

"no tradebacks," joy smirks, but says nothing more.

they sit there in silence for a while, the ticking sound of a faraway clock their only other company.

nina's almost forgotten that the other girl is even there when joy's voice suddenly cuts through the stillness: "do you think things would've been different if i never left?"

"if you never—?" nina asks, and then it hits her. "oh."

she can feel joy stiffen besides her. "it's not like i forgot," nina adds hastily, "but i didn't know you, you know, before. so it feels less like you came back, and more like you just, y'know, came."

"so you ignore the fact that i knew everyone and everything before you even set foot in this country."

"that's not what i meant."

joy sighs and leans back against the couch, her eyes shut. "i know. i know."

"but i do, sometimes. think about what could've happened, i mean," nina says, mostly to cut the awkwardness but partially because it's true.

"do you think…do you think things would have been different?"

she knows joy isn't asking about the cup, or the mask, at least in the broad terms that outline the obvious answer to that question—that no, nina would have still gotten the locket one way or another, she's sure of it, and it doesn't take a genius to realize that her status as the paragon would have also been found out eventually.

she looks up to the balcony above the foyer, where the boys are asleep. fabian is in one of those rooms, or, at least, she thinks he is—she hasn't actually seen him since their reunion, if you could even call it that.

she had loved him once, and he, her—but neither of those things lasted. she had hated the girl next to her for that same reason, and vice-versa once again, and now here they are. but it's more complicated than just that, because there was also the other girls, whose protective streaks were never meant to be activated in tandem, and the boys, desperate to prove themselves for reasons they themselves couldn't quite explain, and the others, who always knew there were secrets in the house and covered for their friends without question.

the fact of the matter was that joy leaving disrupted a fundamental balance, and nina's arrival only moved the fulcrum farther away from where it started, and the cracks that resulted from all that would probably never fully heal.

"yes," nina answers. her eyes meet joy's. "we would have been happier. eventually, anyway."

"i think—" joy pauses. "we would have been good for each other. good to each other."

the words hang heavily between them, an apology, a confession, and a simple statement of fact all rolled into one.

joy hands back the bottle. it's empty. nina turns it over in her hands, feeling the smooth glass under her fingers. it's so fragile, so perfect. nina impulsively throws it across the room.

joy gasps and covers her ears as it lands in the fireplace and shatters into a million pieces they can't see. nina smirks. joy smiles, then giggles, then roars with laughter, and then nina joins in.

because, in the end, it's the only thing they can do.