Time Goes By

++ Barbara ++

A shocked silence fell over the room at the stammered, broken announcement. A thousand pieces fell into place, things that had never made sense at the time. Things about why and how Carolyn had left us a second time. Things about Dinah that had always seemed oddly familiar. Then Helena suddenly burst into peels of delighted laughter and swept Dinah into a bone-crunching hug. “Hey! You really are family!” Then she set Dinah down, nearly making the girl stumble, and wagged a finger at Dick, leering suggestively. “Dick, you dirty old dog you.”

It worked at breaking up the paralyzing tension. I don’t know how it worked, but it did. Somehow Dinah and Dick looked at each other, really seeing the other for the first time. “That was more than eighteen years ago,” Dick muttered stupidly and I flashed Dinah a sharp look. She winced a bit and muttered in that same tone.

“October third.” At stereo confusion from all but me and her mom, Dinah elaborated. “I’ll turn eighteen. Jeez, mom, why didn’t you tell me?”

“Tell you what?” Carolyn growled bitterly and we all winced at the tone. “I screwed up everything else, why not that important little tidbit of information too?”

Then, something astonishing thing happened. An angry, protective look darkened Kelly’s face and her thick accent cut through the quiet like a machete. “Now, look here, Dinah-girl, this ain’t none of my business, but you should be grateful that your father here is a good man. My baby’s father is a bastard of the worst kind. There’s a damn good reason I’ve been on the run for more than twelve years. Maybe she shoulda told you, sure, but fear makes people do stupid, stupid things. Things that they regret down the road.”

Then something even more astonishing happened. Dinah’s face screwed up in wounded concentration for a moment and Helena flashed me a helpless look. Then, abruptly, Dinah’s head snapped up. “That’s why you did everything, isn’t it, mom? You were afraid?”

“Yes,” Carolyn said quite clearly, despite the agony on her face. “I’d been so scared for so long, that I forgot how to deal with it. Bruce, you taught us to use fear as a force to hone ourselves against, but I was petrified every minute of every day when I was undercover with the Hawkes. It was as though I couldn’t unlearn it, I wasn’t strong enough. So I took refuge in you two, Barbara, Dick.” I was startled to be included in this. “I lost myself in Dinah for those good years, letting her act as a barrier to all that fear and pain and screw-ups.”

“Then you found the bomb under my bed,” Dinah stated flatly.

“Yes,” Carolyn confessed and covered her face.

“And sent me to the Redmonds.”

“Yes! And then there was nothing to keep me from running and running and running. Only to come back too late, so scared when I figured out you were here, in New Gotham. God, what Al Hawke would have done to you…” She was crying openly now. “I’m so sorry.”

++ Dinah ++

Well, I’d always been curious who my father was. Before mom had given me up, I had pestered her off and on to tell me about him, but was stonewalled every time. With little to no information to go on, I had spent my childhood blaming myself.

But now I had all the pieces.

And a decision to make.

Dammit, the glass in the room was starting to rattle. It took a conscious effort to calm my telekinesis, praying that Helena wouldn’t remove her anchoring arm. My mother was hunched into herself, crying out a lifetime of hurt and lies and denial. Kelly was glowering at me, and I returned the look full force. Later, much later, I would be shocked that the strong woman dropped her eyes almost instantly. Then I raised my pleading gaze to my dark hero, the woman I measured myself against. Helena smiled, a soft, bittersweet expression. “It’s okay to be pissed, kid,” she said quietly, soberly. “But it’s okay to be a little happy too. Maybe relieved, a little confused. All that crap is normal. But I’ll tell you something that it took me too damn long to learn. If you can find in yourself to forgive, it’ll heal all the ragged edges. It’ll take a long time, but you can still be pissed and happy and confused while the forgiveness really sinks in. Y’know that, right?.” It was the sweetest, most insightful thing anyone had ever said to me and I stared in astonishment at Helena. Then she shrugged and shifted her gaze to the other end of the table. “Besides, now we’ve both got fathers that maybe we can be friends with.”

She didn’t have to voice the rest of what was running through her mind. I could feel it almost as clearly as though I had telepathically read her. At least I had a mom.

Selena Kyle’s ghost was very powerful in the moments where I wrestled with myself.

In the end, there was only one choice. Plopping a sloppy kiss on Helena’s cheek, I ducked away from her and went to my mother. Kneeling beside her, I clamped down on my power and cupped her cheek, forcing her to look at me. “It’s okay mom, I’m starting to understand what happened. I forgive you. We’ll get through this. I’m not going to let anything come between us again.”

++ Shan ++

The story had shocked me.

Shocked me almost as much as a very aggressive Dinah waking me up later that fateful morning, kissing me like we’d be separated forever. I’d soothed her down, worried that she was turning to me to avoid her own pain. So, I’d stopped her advances, but even gentleness hadn’t prevented the confused hurt in her eyes.

That was a week ago and we seemed to be stuck at some kind of emotional stalemate. Gabby felt as helpless as I did at Dinah’s bristling at us and Bug was so unnerved that she was avoiding all of us. No one slept in that big bed anymore, just passed out wherever there was a soft spot. My body desperately missed the press of their combined warmth.

Especially Dinah’s.

We were all caught up in the whirlwind of getting the school ready, and personal needs were set aside for the greater good.

So why did I feel so lousy?

Ro noticed my agitation, but I couldn’t vocalize the ephemeral bullshit between me and Dinah. She was such a study in contrasts, limping with the pain of what she’d been through, yet tall and strong in the face of it. I felt shut out, and that mutual pain even kept me and Gabby from drawing strength from each other.

Casey the reporter had been brought in to track our progress for posterity and I felt like a documentary in the making. I hated it. It was like being a lab rat all over again and I pulled away further. Seeing Ro and the rest of her strange little intimate pack so blissfully happy only made me feel more out of place.

It came to a head when I growled at my twin.

My twin. The woman who I shared everything with! But that had been before…

Before Dinah was keeping me at arm’s length.

Before the precious triplets that made Barbara glow.

Before Miss Honey came back.

Before… I could hardly bear to think about it…

Before I had been fully prepared to kill Harley Quinn.

I could still feel her slowing heartbeat pulsing against my palms, her breath rasp beneath the press of the webbing between thumb and fingers. The horror of those minutes I knew Ro to be dead still haunted me.

And everyone was too busy to notice.

++ Helena ++

It had been nearly two days since I’d seen my partner and I was to worried to sleep. Something was wrong with her and I needed to find out what. Slithering out of the bed, I crept into the bathroom to pull on some clothes and slip out. No one in the bed stirred and I was smug that I still had the feline mojo.

The roof was my first destination. There was just something about cats and roofs. In the sultry August night, I stood very still and reached out with my senses. Shan had growled pissily at Ro earlier this evening, startling my lover. It seemed like no one but me had realized that there had been some actual menace in the sound.

“Dammit Leo,” I muttered to myself, disgusted with her obtuseness.

“Yeah, I got that,” came an entirely unexpected voice and I whirled around. I had been trying so hard to find Shan that she was right under my damn nose. “What do you want?”

“Outta character much, Mikey?”

“Yeah well…” Her voice trailed off lamely and she moved away. But the first foray had been made, and I pressed my advantage.

“Running away doesn’t make anything any easier. I learned that the hard way. When I finally stood still, I found out that I could deal a helluva lot better than I thought I could.” While I couldn’t see Shan anymore, I could feel her close by, silent in the darkness. “I’m not gonna lecture you, partner, because that’s bullshit. I do want you to know that you’re not alone and shunning the rest of us is hurting everyone.”

“Me?!” She hissed angrily, suddenly standing up, Slinky lashing around like a dropped fire hose at full blast. “Me? What the hell is your damn problem! Everyone else is too damn happy to help me! I dropped back because I have nowhere to turn!”

Sympathy flooded me at the obvious evidence of the twin’s past catching up with them. “Aw Shan, you can come to me. C’mon, you goof, I’m your partner and I adore you. Did you really think your cuddlebunny angst and the babies were gonna change that?”

“Yes,” she sulked and sank back into a crouch. So I moved to where I could see her, arms wrapped around slender shoulders like she was cold. I sidled over until we were almost touching and dropped into an identical crouch.

“Mikey, this is just a phase. All the school crap that has to be hammered out, and Dinah being so weird. I mean, c’mon, she’s had a ton of crap dumped on her in a very short period of time and is keeping her mom and Davie busy.” Something occurred to me suddenly. “This is about Davie too, isn’t it? Shit, I can be a dumbass. She’s keeping her ‘pathy toned to almost nil until she gets used to so many people in the manor and hasn’t noticed you getting more stressed. And the rest of us have been kinda ignoring you. I’m sorry, Shan. We’ll change.”

That made a difference. I had been looking at a scared little girl, raised like an animal in a cage, and now the Shan I knew was coming back to her eyes. “You mean it?”

“I promise. Now, c’mere.”

She snuggled into my hug, sighing heavily, like she was setting a heavy load down. “I gotta lot of stuff I need to talk about.”

“So start talking and we’ll watch the sun come up.”

“Thanks Raf.”

“Hey, anything for family, bro.”

++ Janelle ++

“I’m worried we’ll never get through all of this.”

The comment came out of left field and made me blink owlishly at Barbara. We’d been slaving feverishly over all the details in opening a legitimate school for what felt like forever. The red-head was staring into space, glasses low on her nose. Coming back from the far-off stare, she snatched the lenses off and glowered accusingly at them.

“And these damn things don’t work anymore. Guess I need a new prescription, huh?”

“Or the Fleas have fixed whatever was wrong with your vision.” My suggestion made her double-take and I chuckled. “Oh, don’t look so surprised, Babs. The little buggers will make you as perfect as they know how.”

Her face squinched up into a slightly uncomfortable scowl. “It still freaks me out a little.”

“A little? You’re stronger than I am. The couple times the twins used them on me, I had the heebie-jeebies.”

“They used them on you?”

“Sure. Only twice, thankfully. The first winter they were with me, we were still having trouble communicating clearly and I ended up dropping half-dead with pneumonia. It was stupid, really. I knew better, but let myself get so caught up in them, that I stopped paying attention to my body’s signals.” Relaxing into the story, I leaned away from our endless paperwork and let memories wash over me. “The second time was a combo of things. Russell, my big baby of a workhorse, was as stolid and stodgy as they come. So he didn’t startle easily. I had my hand half under his halter, I think I was scratching him, and the twins came barreling in. They were just goofing off, but for some strange reason startled Russell. When he jerked away, he managed to break three bones in my hand.” In a flurry of sudden energy, I leapt to my feet and stretched. “C’mon, let’s go have Menolly check the Fleas.”

“Okay,” Barbara agreed and carefully climbed to her feet. It was fun to watch her relearn the daily joys and trials of having working legs again. We’d been getting to be pretty good pals, but were still avoiding the giant pink elephant standing on both of our feet.

Rowan Jones.

She had been splitting her times as best she could between me and her two superheroes. At the most random times, I’d woken to find her big, warm body coiled around me, but Helena and Barbara still took up the bulk of her time. Slipping beneath the later’s arm and getting a warm grin, I knew that Barbara wasn’t the problem.

It was Helena.

And it wasn’t so much a problem, as the inability we seemed to have in finding a connecting point.

++ Barbara ++

From the pensive look on Janelle’s face before she grinned and helped me out, I knew exactly what she had been thinking about. For a teacher of small children, the woman had a lousy poker face. So I picked a slightly safer subject. “I’m worried about Shan. She seems a little prickly and withdrawn lately.”

“She’s tweaking over Dinah,” Janelle answered readily as we walked down the hallway together. “She’s never adored someone completely on her own before. And now she has a crippling case of puppy love.”

I had to chuckle over the mocking way she said the last two words.

“Is that what it is?”

Both of us stopped dead in our tracks at the unexpected voice. Dinah sounded weary and pained. We exchanged ‘oh shit’ looks and turned to face the teen. She looked worn out, decades older than her nearly eighteen years. These recent weeks had been hard on her.

“Honey,” Janelle said in her kindest voice. “I didn’t mean it the way it may have sounded.”

Rubbing her face roughly, Dinah sighed and my heart ached at the sound. “Yeah, okay.”

She sounded anything but okay and I pulled away from Janelle to step closer to Dinah. “Hey, c’mon, Di, it’s me, Barbara. You don’t have to do this alone. Or with just Davie and your mom. I’m family now, remember? I’m here for you for the bad times too.”

Nervously, she did the hair tuck, and actually stepped back so that I was just at the edge of her personal space, unsure of what to do now.

“Yeah, I know. But everyone has to be patient. I can only deal with so much so fast.” Two familiar figures appeared at the end of the hall. Helena, looking sober, and Shan, calm and yet agitated, Slinky dancing in the air behind her. Half-turning, Dinah directed her voice at all of us. “Just be patient. Please.”

My heart ached at the way her voice broke on the last word, the way she rushed past Janelle and I, the way that Shan reached helplessly for her, hand falling uselessly to her side after a moment.

Then Davie stepped out of the same doorway, firing all of us a deep, fathomless look. “If I could erase that one’s pain, I would. But it would make her less than she is. I never expected to play the role of therapist, but whatever works.”

“It’s hard to just stand by,” Shan replied with false calm and Davie softened.

“Shan, you make her feel really intensely, and she has too much to deal with right now. That girl’s bottled up a lifetime of craziness and when she starts to stress, she breaks things.”

Comprehension was starting to dawn, and I felt like an idiot. The same expression was on Helena’s and Shan’s faces. The telekinesis…

“Now you understand better,” Davie said wisely. “Like me, she can’t ‘turn off’ her power, and only rigid self-control can keep it contained. It’s an astonishing ability that young woman has. Not only does she have some serious shit to process, but she has to learn to control the ‘kinesis and touch-telepathy as well.”

“Just be patient,” Shan said miserably and Davie did something uncharacteristic and grabbed Shan in a bear hug. Shan grumble-sobbed into the fierce embrace. We all moved in closer in response to both her confusion and pain, as well as our own.

“It’s hard, Dav, just standing around, and I think I might love her and I feel so helpless.”

The confession made me hurt for her, wishing for the umpteenth time that our lives could be simple just once.

“She knows that,” Davie reassured her friend. “It’s one of the things that keeps her going.”

++ Gabby ++

“Ouch!” My voice carried around the Batcave, setting the bats rustling over my head. The place was still creepy, but I was mostly used to it by now. Sucking on the finger I’d let wander too close to the soldering iron, I leaned away from the Delphi and sighed.

“You okay?” Shan’s voice knocked a decade off my life and I squeaked as I jerked around to stare up at her.

“Man, you are gonna make me old before my time,” I whined, relishing the small smile that danced in the corners of her lately-too-serious mouth. “You’re too damn quiet.”

Arching an eyebrow, Shan whipped Slinky out and sent half my tools clattering loudly to the stone floor. “Better?”

For a moment, I was too shocked to react. Then the absurdity over what she had done and the stress of the last few weeks bubbled up. In seconds I was laughing so hard I was in tears, the happy sound echoing around the cave.

By the time I started to wind down, I found myself curled up in my pal’s lap, and I realized that I was more crying than laughing. Torn in a hundred emotional directions, I clung to Shan’s strong body and let it out.

It took awhile to realize that she was doing the same. It was easy to be honest with Shan, there was so little pretense in her. “Missed you,” I whispered, clinging all the tighter, and squeaked when she squeezed me.

“Yeah, I kinda missed me too.”

That soft comment made me shift to grab her in a crushing hug that made her squeak in return. “Okay, partner, now what?”

“Well,” Shan mused. “With Dinah off on whatever her errand is, there’s no way any of us can deal with that particular baggage.” Her melancholy smile made me squeeze her again. “How about I give you a hand with your Oracle homework?”

The day passed quietly while me and Shan worked on the Delphi and goofed off. Even in such a short time under Oracle’s tutelage, I had learned a ton about the amazing machine. With Shan’s genetically-engineered brains backing me up, we made some real progress, and had a ton of fun doing it. My stomach growled at me again and I had to wonder how long I could ignore it, when Shan suddenly crowed, “Bug!”

My head came up to peer over the console to watch Menolly flinch, but gamely accept the sweeping hug that Shan wrapped her up in. “Hi Squeakers. Alfred is making macaroni and cheese. Are you hungry?”

“Starved. C’mon, OJ, vittles await!”

Watching Menolly smile shyly at me from under her big sister’s arm, I realized that I needed to spend more time with her. So I let Shan gather me up under her other arm and away we went.

++ Dinah ++

They sounded happy.

And I felt so apart from them.

I’d been gone for nearly a week, off finding myself or whatever it was that I had been doing. Wandering the hot, crowded urban jungle of Los Angeles had been therapeutic in a strange way. There had been several reasons that I had visited that particular place, but now wasn’t the time to reminisce. Now, I had to screw up enough courage to do what I needed to do.

Shan was crowing wildly, while Gabby and Bug screamed with laughter, the barn noises morphing into monkey calls. A smile almost made my face hurt.

“It’s not too late.”

Jerking around in shock, I stared into the shadows where Ro had materialized. Languidly, she stepped up beside me, arms crossed casually and looked in the direction where her sister’s wildness echoed through the manor. I couldn’t take my eyes off my partner. After a moment, she looked at me, nothing but sweet kindness in her gaze.

“They’re still waiting for you. They’ll always wait for you. You’re family now, and forever is a small price to pay. Did you find what you needed? It sure looks like you found something you were missing.” I so badly wanted to believe her, searching the calm violet eyes for reassurance. A small smile curled Ro’s mouth and she leaned over to breathe on me. It was a primitive, animal gesture that calmed me and I willingly rubbed my cheek against hers.

“Yes,” I finally managed to rasp around the choking lump in my throat, anchored by the feel of her silky cheek on mine. “It was isolation without being alone.”

“Yeah, I know how that can be helpful.” Pulling away a bit, Ro smiled indulgently at me. “Do you know some of the things I like about you?” Mute from emotion, I could only shake my head. “Your strength and your honesty.”

Me? She couldn’t be serious. It seems that all I could feel was dishonest cowardice. Ro chuckled gently, a throaty purr of affection.

“You aren’t always honest and you aren’t always strong. That’s okay. I admire you for being able to be both. I didn’t have a lot of positive role models growing up.” The expressive roll of her eyes made me smile at the understatement. “But I sure do now. Don’t care that you’re scared and seventeen, I still admire you.”

It was possibly the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me and I let the cooped up sob loose as I threw my arms around her neck and squeezed. “Thank you, Ro,” was all I could whisper around the lump in my throat.

Dunno if it was telepathy or a tiny scratch of sound or just my deep, deep awareness of her, but I just knew that Shan was standing right behind me. Feeling oddly guilty, I stepped away from Ro, embarrassment making my face flame. There was a tense quiet in the hall, Slinky dancing as though it couldn’t decide if it was agitated or not.

‘Your strength and your honesty,’ Ro’s words echoed in my mind and I swallowed hard. When I raised my gaze to Shan’s shadowed eyes, I could see what all this had caused her. There was a wariness that seemed so alien to her, and it made my heart hurt.

“Can we talk?” I heard my voice whisper hoarsely and Shan gestured me to proceed her to a quieter section in the manor. It was an uncomfortable walk, suffocating emotions like diesel fumes in my face.

++ Shan ++

Hoping I wasn’t being self-destructive, I quietly followed Dinah to the front of the manor. We’d been doing this dance for an awful long time and I was beginning to question whatever the hell was going on between us. Not to mention the last week, where we had all wondered where she had gone and if she was ok.

But despite all my conflicted emotions, it still hurt to watch Dinah wander aimlessly to the enormous windows that flanked the front door, hugging herself as though she was worried that she would fly apart if she didn’t hang on for dear life.

“I’ve shut you out,” she whispered, focusing my attention. I made myself stand still, just out of reach, and listen. “And walked out with no explanation. I’m sorry, Shan.” I could hear her tears, smell them sharp and saline, nearly tasted them in the still air. “Everything’s just been… so overwhelming. I just needed some time to think.”

Something occurred to me.

Without thinking about the repercussions, story of my life, I stepped in close, grabbing Di’s hand where her arms tucked it close to her body. In an almost dance-like hold, I tucked her against my body, staring deep into the expressive blue eyes. I stroked her bare hand with my fingers, brought those cool fingers to my face. “Show me, Dinah. Make me a part of you. Shared pain is a burden lessened.”

Startled doubt danced in her eyes, her hand trembled.

“Share with me.”

It hit like a flash flood and the last thing I felt was my breath suck into my lungs in a gasp of astonishment.

Brutal, burning pain, like molten glass and wood splinters pounding through my veins. That more recent torture swirled in a maelstrom with far older hurts that my body had suffered. The cold, cold gaze of the monster that had inflicted the inhumane agonies. No creature should have to endue what we had. Harley’s madness, her ability to turn those we loved to mindless puppets. It was a suffocating tidal wave of memories and hurts.

I dug my toes into the sand and prepared to face the oncoming wave, knowing it would crush me, but standing defiantly nonetheless. Dinah struggled there with me, in this nightmarish landscape that barely made sense. We stood together, her hand feeling completely real in mine, and waited to be tested by the pain.

And there were many, too many for any one to stand out.

Distantly, I heard the sound of shattering glass and an old house groaning for mercy. The forest sang a song of safety and sustenance, and I triggered that internal shift that was a integral to me as breath. Even in that familiar nothingness, I could still feel Dinah with me, and I marveled at the never-before-felt sensation.

The forest wept with us, cracked and splintered beneath the force of the pain being lanced in one last, violent burst. Like a tornado, we roared through the trees, the pain given life by a young metahuman who could have never guess the true extent of her power.

++ Dinah ++

Consciousness came back slowly.

Sunlight warm on my cheek and side, the scent of crushed grass and fresh split wood sweet in my nostrils. Soft earth beneath me.

Shan purring softly where she was wrapped so tight around my smaller body.

How I had missed her touch. My body and heart couldn’t even fathom another person making me feel this safe and needed. “See?” She murmured almost soundlessly against my aching skull. “We make hell of a team.”

A smile curled my mouth, slow and warm, making my heart feel the same. Reaching back, I curled my fingers into her silk-fine hair, caressing her round skull. Nuzzling my hair, Shan purred louder and I felt myself settling inside my bones, like I hadn’t felt comfortable inside myself in a very long time. The long breath that shuddered out of me expelled the last of the splintering pain, leaving behind cleaner wounds that felt like they were finally able to really heal. Shan shifted to raise herself up to an elbow, casting her shadow over my face. Trusting her to shield my eyes from the sunlight, I gazed up into her serious face.

“Next time someone fucks with you, try to remember how you did this.”

Puzzled, I looked around and nearly fainted with shock.

It looked like someone had dropped a cluster of missiles in what had once been a patch of deep forest. Trees thicker than both of us combined had been torn up and spun away like sticks, now cradled awkwardly by their still-standing brethren. Several larger trees looked as though they had been sandblasted, bark and branches stripped away. Undergrowth lay in a massive dam around the new clearing, a circular patch of raw earth at least a hundred feet in diameter.

“Oh… my… god…” was all I could manage to whisper as Shan let me sit up. This patch of forest had been decimated by my telekinesis.

“I had a hand in it,” Shan offered quietly and I twisted to look at her. “Added my pain in to fuel the fire, so to speak. The forest will grow back. In fact, this’ll make a really nice meadow until the trees take it back.” Her expression turned thoughtful as she squinted up at the sun. “I think somehow we amped each other’s powers. Damned if I know how, but I’m not tired from teleporting us, and you look pretty decent for becoming a human tornado.” Abruptly, she grinned and I felt myself smile helplessly back. “I actually feel pretty good, Pretty Bird.”

That did it. All my repressed feelings for her spiraled up and I pounced. Pinning Shan to the bare dirt, I kissed her like I needed her to keep me alive. Hard and soft, she cradled me with her larger body and gripped me close with strong hands. I had never felt so alive, laying there in the blazing sunlight and kissing this woman I loved so dearly.

++ Davie ++

Jerking awake as though someone had poked me with a hot poker, I dizzily cast out mentally for the emergency that had intruded so violently into my sleep. Only half-awake, I reflexively shied away from Dinah’s fog-horn blast of mental energy, even as it began to bleed away. After a moment, I could feel Shan with her, their minds swirled into a morass of rending pain that at last began to fade in the face of her their combined strength.

For a moment I observed them, wincing at the total destruction of the forest around them, before quietly letting them be. “Good girls,” I admired them quietly and only then began to take stock of my immediate surroundings.

And startled when a gentle hand stroked my hair.

“Good girls?” Carolyn echoed me in soft curiosity and I abruptly realized that I had been sound asleep with my head in the woman’s lap. Woo boy, I’d definitely been spending too much time with this little family lately. Things were taking on an intimacy that I wasn’t allowed to have. Yet, when I tensed to move, she pressed my skull to her warm flesh, firm beneath worn-soft denim. “Stay.” The firm, but completely gentle order actually worked and I found myself relaxing. “Is Dinah home?” I hummed a wordless confirmation, and suddenly realized that I could clearly hear the static of her calm mind. It wasn’t the usual noise either… I had slipped up by slipping in. “Don’t,” Carolyn ordered again. “If I’d been threatened or disturbed by your presence, I’d have woken you up quite some time ago. You being in here with me makes the fragmented memories easier to piece together.” Now I had to roll my head to the side and look into her brown eyes. With a peaceful smile, the woman rested her stroking hand on my forehead and I basked in the unaccustomed contact. “I think that maybe I’m piggybacking your telepathic focus and control to explore my own mind. Several things have cleared up in the last couple of hours.”

Couple of hours?

I was so shocked by my lack of control that I completely missed the first rambling memory that Carolyn was sharing. Refocusing, I caught a stray wisp of memory about a childhood dog, and the emerging panorama of another train of thought.

“And there was this ridiculous looking statue in front of the school. We all hated it, like some kind of obligation, but when it fell in the earthquake, I think every student that ever graduated from that high school was strangely devastated by the loss.” It was a statue of what looked like some grandiose rooster trying to take flight. Carolyn grinned playfully at me and I felt something in me respond, something that I knew I had to keep a tight rein on. “We were the Central Phoenixes. Guess some things weren’t meant to rise from the ashes, hmm?”

Aww man! She was so not playing fair! Being all sweet and nice and… don’t go there, Davinia Periklastinos! Just don’t.

Then Carolyn’s face took on a faraway, dreamy quality that made her look luminous and that weird feeling in my gut grew sharper. I was in so much trouble…

“When Dinah was four, she brought some raggedy stray kitten home from preschool. Poor, bedraggled thing looked like a cartoon character reject.” Her expression grew even softer, a warm, maternal glow that only her child could inspire. “She was a great cat.”

A blue wave of melancholia washed over Carolyn’s mind and I reflexively reached to give her nearby knee a squeeze.

“A neighbor was kind enough to take her when I took Dinah to the Redmonds.”

“She turned out pretty good,” I heard my voice say and Carolyn smiled in a half-amused and half-sad kind of way.

“The cat?”

“No, smartass,” I sassed back and forced myself to relax again, settling into the sprawled pose I had woken to. “She and Shan have worked things out. Healing should come now.”

A tension neither of us had been aware of suddenly drained out of Carolyn’s body and she let out a long, shuddering sigh. “Good girls, indeed.”

++ Janelle ++

Giggling with the effort, I shooed away Alfred’s offer of assistance and let myself be walked into the manor. Like I was gonna be able to stop him…

It had taken weeks to find the perfect addition to our big household. Now I just had to hope that Apollo liked him. And that he liked the twins.

“Shan! Ro! Everybody, come see!”

Unfortunately, Menolly peeked out first, and vanished with a squeak of alarm. I suppose that maybe I really should have warned everybody.

Too late! The look on Shan’s face as she trotted out from the kitchen was worth all the trouble I’d gone through. Grinning wildly, I nodded my head at my companion and explained.

“I thought you could use another little brother.”

Ro made an anxious cat sound when she stepped up behind her twin, Helena looking startled behind her. The great, hairy adolescent barely restrained by my small weight seemed a bit wary, but he quickly began wagging his tail.

“A dog?” Helena asked skeptically as the twins inched forward, their attention totally riveted on my new pal.

“I had a promise to keep,” I explained softly as Shan crouched down and made an animal sound at the big dog. He whined plaintively and yanked at his leash hard enough to nearly bowl me over. It was love at first sight, as the twins knelt and began fussing over the dog. There was no hesitation in the meeting, he was wagging tail hard enough to shake his whole body, yipping and licking with abject ecstasy at his new packmates.

“A dog?” Barbara echoed Helena as I strode over to them, rubbing my tired wrists. The beast was already huge, and he was only six months old. “I found a really neat breeder in Virginia that breeds white German Shepherds for temperament and intelligence. One of his girls got out a while back and got herself knocked up by a local sheep farmer’s Great Pyrenees. Fluffy here is the biggest of the pups.”

“He’s wonderful,” Ro gushed like a six-year-old where she was fondly roughing Fluffy up near my feet.

“He’s perfect,” Shan went one further, resting her ear on the pup’s chest to listen to his heartbeat. And that was that. All the doubt and alarm on the New Gotham crew’s faces evaporated into tenderness at the twin’s delight in the big dog that would now be part of their pack too.

To Be Continued…

This title change was a last minute things, because I didn’t like the original choice. There is a line in this song that has inspired me a dozen times over, including my best and most favorite couple of all time, Art and Janet.

It goes: “I see in you the one who now completes the half of me I used to be.” It’s sappy, but I don’t argue with inspiration.

I wanted something that echoed the angst and sweetness of this chapter. This is a song with surprising depth, despite it being the Spice Girls, and has some truly rousing vocals. So it suited the feel.

Time Goes By -The Spice Girls
I’ve never had a feeling so right
Like I have with you
Can’t explain the things you do
But boy when you tell me softly you love me too

It’s like I know we were meant to be
So for eternity you will have a part of me
And all I need is for you to stay right here with me
Yeah

Time goes by but we stand still
(know it does I know it does)
Love you for eternity I will I will
I know that we were meant to be
(we were meant to be my love)
That’s how I feel when you’re with me


You are the reason that my heart beats
I know I never thought I would ever fall so deep
But now I see that the love that we share
Is oh so sweet
What if I told you that I believe
That you are my soul my destiny my destiny
Yeah
What if I was to say in every way
Deep in my heart is where you’ll be
Time

Time goes by but we stand still
(I’m still right here)
Love you for eternity I will
(I’ll never go)
I know that we were meant to be
(we were meant to be)
That’s how I feel when you’re with me
(how I feel when you’re with me)

Time goes by but we stand still
(oh time oh time)
Love you for eternity I will
(eternity I will)
I know that we were meant to be
(baby love)
That’s how I feel when you’re with me

As you hold me close so tenderly
And watch you fall to sleep
I see in you the one who now completes
The half of me I used to be

Time goes by but we stand still
(yeah)
Love you for eternity I will
(eternity I will)
I know that we were meant to be
(were meant to be)
That’s how I feel when you’re with me
(feel when you’re with me baby)

Time goes by but we stand still
(but we always stand still babe)
Love you for eternity I will
(stand still babe and I know)
I know that we were meant to be
(yes we were)
That’s how I feel when you’re with me

Time goes by but we stand still
Love you forever yes I will
I know we’re meant to be
That’s how I feel baby