fic - The Perks of Being a Wall-Man (1/4)
Title: The Perks of Being a Wall-Man
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3000
Spoilers: Perks spoilers galore! Also, it mentions characters from the most recent episodes of Young Justice, but otherwise none.
Summary: The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Young Justice style. Wally stands on the fringes of life and offers a unique perspective.
Notes: For lost_laputian who requested it over at the YJ ficathon! Also, this is my first Young Justice fic and it's very different from my usual writing and am a little nervous to be posting this.
Disclaimer: I don't own Young Justice or Perks. Also, much of this is quoted from Perks, so if it seems awfully familiar, there's a reason.
Part One
So, this is my life. And I want you to know that I am both happy and sad and I'm still trying to figure out how that could be.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was last spring on a day that tasted like summer when they heard Mr. Wayne's voice on the loudspeaker.
"Boys and girls, I regret to inform you that one of our students has passed on. We will hold a memorial service for Conner Kent during assembly this Friday."
Wally didn't know exactly how fast the news traveled, but it was lunchtime when he learned from Jaime with the thick accent that Conner killed himself.
Looking back, Wally couldn't remember much else of the day. But he remembered how Bart came to pick him up, drove him too fast down roads and let him eat until he was sick.
But what Wally remembered the most was how what really bothered him is that he never really understood why Conner did it.
He wished he knew. It might have made him miss Conner more clearly. It might have made some sort of sad sense.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't think there's a favorite kid in the family. He's the youngest of three.
Bart is the oldest. He runs track and is the fastest person Wally's ever known. Iris is the middle child, very pretty, very smart, and sometimes mean.
Wally gets straight A's in science. He thinks that's why his parents leave him alone.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's not even a year since Conner died, but Wally's in high school without him. It's strange to look around the classroom and see Conner's other friends and how they've all moved on without him. It's not that he expected an empty desk to be saved in his honor, but this is strange.
Megan is in some of Wally's classes. When Wally sees her, he thinks about how Megan told him that Conner told her she was the prettiest girl in the whole world. He thought she was pretty when she had braces and whiteheads and didn't know how to wear her hair. She said she missed him terribly not because they used to kiss but because he was her best friend.
Wally sees her now, sees that she's taller and her red hair is brushed nicely and her braces are gone. She's dumber around boys, but she never looks as happy as she did in middle school.
She doesn't say hello to Wally when she sees him in the hallway.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The first time Wally sees Bart on television, his mother cries and his father puts his arm around her. Iris even smiles, which is funny because Wally can't remember the last time she smiled at Bart. Bart runs and runs and runs for his college and Wally misses him.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next day, Wally runs like his brother. He likes to pretend he's Bart, running with his feet against the pavement like it's what he's meant to do.
The coach asks him to call him "Barry" when they're not in gym and gives him extra laps to run sometimes. He says there's an expression on his face when Wally runs and that's something Wally should explore.
"Run. Tell me what you think about when you run."
Wally wonders why he shouldn't just join track like his brother. But Barry says it's not a structure that he needs and it's not going to help him.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't really understand why all the boys are nice to Iris. He really doesn't understand at all except that she's very pretty. She really is mean to the boys sometimes, especially John.
John is respectful to their parents which makes Wally's mother like him and his father to think he's soft. Wally doesn't really agree with either of them, but he thinks Iris agrees with their father and that's why she dates him.
She sits on the couch and tells him he should stick up to his bullies and he should get the bottom of his problems. She sits and nags and snips and never really yells, just uses that mean voice. Wally doesn't mean to be in the room, but he thinks that they shouldn't argue in the kitchen if they don't want people in need of a snack to walk in on them.
He doesn't mean to be there when his sister points at him and says, "Even Wally sticks up to his bullies."
Wally can't remember ever really doing that, but that doesn't matter because the next thing he knows, John is slapping Iris across the face. He wound up and hit her hard.
Wally watches as Iris doesn't say anything. She gets soft and nice and tells Wally to leave them alone and not to say anything to their parents because they were in love and it was okay.
Wally leaves, wondering if he should, and thinks that maybe John stood up to his bully.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iris spends a lot more time with John after that.
She smiles more and laughs more and Wally can hear them in her room when their parents aren't home.
They hold hands and act like everyone is happy. John compliments their mother, which their father thanks him for. Wally watches as his mother just stays quiet and Iris watches him, making sure he doesn't say anything.
When Wally runs, he sees them holding hands at track meets and throwing up in bushes at frat houses and not studying together for tests at college and Iris putting up with all of it.
He feels bad for both of them and runs a little faster.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick Grayson is very funny. He tells jokes in computer class and is very good at impersonations.
Wally thinks this is the hardest he's laughed since Conner died.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally used to go to football games with Conner. They used to talk Conner being on the team when they got to high school.
Now Wally goes to the games alone. He looks at the crowds and wonders who here is in love and who is just hanging out and who's as alone as he is.
That's when he sees Dick.
"C'mon, Tim!" Dick yells to the quarterback.
Wally doesn't know what convinces him to do this, but he thinks anyone who can make him laugh like Dick does is someone he should spend more time with.
"Hey! You're in my computer class!" Dick is as friendly as he is funny.
"I'm Wally."
Dick turns back to the game, leaving Wally with a silent invitation to stay. He yells at the field, sparing Wally a play-by-play analysis like he's someone who really, honestly knows football.
"Oh, Wally, this is Artemis," Dick says, pausing from yelling out to Tim the quarterback as a girl comes up beside him.
Artemis gives Wally a once over before making some decision in her mind and waving.
Incidentally, Artemis has gray eyes and very very pretty blonde hair. Blonde like liquid gold in a ponytail that doesn't make a big deal. Wally doesn't notice this until after the game when they go out for dinner because the stadium lights have washed her out and standing under the Big Boy lights, he thinks she's beautiful.
And even though she's very nice and pretty and he would like to ask her on a date, he doesn't mind that she's taken because she's with someone as nice as Dick.
"How long have you been going out?" Wally asks, seeing how happy they are together.
They look at each and laugh.
"We're brother and sister," Dick explains.
And when Wally looks hard at the two of them, trying to find some shared feature, Artemis explains that they are stepsiblings.
Wally doesn't tell them, but he's happy to hear this because he'd like to ask her out on a date someday.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That night, Wally dreams about Artemis.
She's naked, her legs on either side of the couch. Wally is with her.
He wakes up, feeling better than ever before in his life. But that feeling fades away as he realizes he's seen her naked without her permission. Girls have been on his mind before, but they've never really been talking.
But he wants to talk to Artemis. He wants to be friends with her and make up inside jokes. He thinks it would be nice to have a friend again.
He think he's like that even more than a date.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"It's okay to dream about me," Artemis says after a very long silence, "but don't think of me that way."
She doesn't offer much explanation past that and Wally has no more to say after telling her about his dream.
But when she hugs him, he can smell pine needles and it makes him pull away.
"I'm thinking about you that way again."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick pulls Wally aside and Wally thinks Artemis might have told Dick everything.
"Wally, has anyone told you how it works?"
"I don't think so."
"Well, there are rules to follow here not because you want to, but because you have to. You don't have to get all distraught about it. You just have to get traught. You get it?"
Wally doesn't really understand, but he understands enough to nod.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I look at people holding hands in the hallways, and I try not to think about how it all works. At school dances, I sit in the background, and I tap my toe, and I wonder how many couples will dance to "their song." In the hallways, I see the girls wearing the guys' jackets, and I think about the idea of property. And I wonder if anyone is really happy. I hope they are. I really hope they are.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When Wally tells these thoughts to Barry, Barry listens to every word.
"Do you always think this much, Wally?"
Wally wishes he hadn't said anything.
"Do you want to talk about how you felt after Artemis told you not to think of her that way?" Barry's voice is soft and prodding and friendly and Wally wishes someone would tell him how he's supposed to answer because lately his answers are always wrong.
"I'd rather talk about something else."
"Wally, you're in denial."
"I'm okay with that."
Barry doesn't say anything else for a while, his face still serious. But he lets it go in favor of asking about Wally's home life. Wally talks about his quiet mother and how his whole family watched his brother run and how John hit his sister because he only ever promised not to tell his parents and Barry isn't a parent so it's okay.
Barry gets silent and still and something is drawn on his face.
"Wally, we accept the love we think we deserve."
Wally thinks he will never forget that.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally runs home. He knows Barry is going to call home and thinks Barry is a better person for righting wrongs and maybe Wally should be more like that.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I love him!"
"No, you don't."
"I hate you."
"No, you don't."
Wally listens to Iris and their father yell.
"He's my whole world!"
This is when their mother speaks calm and quiet.
"Don't ever say that about anyone again. Not even me."
Iris stops yelling and crying immediately. Soon after, their father leaves to talk to John's father and their mother leaves to make dinner.
Once the room is empty save for the two of them, Iris turns and Wally thinks maybe he can see some hate in her eyes.
"Why did you have to do that?"
"I love you."
"You're a freak."
Wally thinks he did the right thing, but it's hard to tell sometimes.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't dream about Artemis anymore. He dreams about a woman he doesn't know and is just happy to have inside jokes with Artemis.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
While Dick yells at Tim the quarterback, Artemis invites Wally to a party.
"I've never been to a party before."
"Geek." But the way she says it, Wally just smiles.
So the game ends and they pile into Artemis's truck. Music plays, Artemis rocks her head back and forth, Dick hangs his hand out the window, and Wally sat in the middle of his two new friends on the way to his first party.
"I feel infinite," he says when the song on the radio ends and the entire car is silent save for the tires against the pavement and the wind rushing by.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It doesn't look like a party because Wally can't hear thrumming music or see red cups on the lawn. But when Dick knocks on the door, it opens a crack and a single seafoam eye is seen.
"Dick?"
"Kaldur."
The door opens all the way and a guy appears. He's mellow in a way that makes Artemis laugh a little loud.
Wally followed her laugh to the basement to find it full of people.
Two girls named Raquel and Babs sit in the corner, comparing tattoos and piercings. This guy named Mal was sitting to his girlfriend Karen as she talked about how queen bees are more important than male bees and all Mal keeps saying is, "I know, baby." Even Tim the quarterback was there.
Artemis hands Wally a beer and starts chain smoking in a way that Wally knows is very unhealthy, but very attractive in the way the cigarette sits against her lip.
She sees him watching her smoke and blows into his face, his vision soon filled with gray haze.
"Hungry?" she asks. He can almost see her mouth before the smoke clears and his eyes water.
"Always."
The cigarette sits in the corner of her mouth and Wally watches as her legs unfold from under her and her ponytail bobs its way upstairs. He trails quickly behind her.
She walks around in the kitchen like it's her home and Wally thinks that maybe she spent a lot of time here when Kaldur was still in high school.
Artemis is making milkshakes when Wally hears a noise in the laundry room. When he opens the door, he finds Dick kissing Tim. It's a stolen type of kiss and he wishes he could silently shut the door and pretend he didn't see this at all.
Tim looks nervous, but Dick assures him that Wally is a friend and that Tim should just relax.
"Listen, Wally. Tim doesn't want people to know. I need you to promise that you won't tell anyone. This will be out little secret. Okay?"
"Okay."
Wally goes back to Artemis, silent and devouring a scarily delicious milkshake. But he can hear muffled voices and something that sounds like tension and disappointment. Soon after, Tim leaves and everyone ends up back in the basement.
Dick smiles like Wally has never seen before and maybe the disappointment wasn't as bad as it sounded.
"He's something, isn't he?" Dick says, pointing at Wally with a smirk.
"He's a wallflower, the Wall-Man," Kaldur intones. It's a pun, something like a joke, but something in his voice is so slow and sure that settles on Wally's shoulders like the best compliment in the world.
Everyone nods and Dick is suddenly right in front of Wally without Wally even seeing him move
"You see things. You keep quiet about them. And you understand."
Somehow, it's very important to Wally that everyone nodded. Especially Artemis. Especially her.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next night is homecoming and it's nothing like sitting on the floor between Dick and Artemis at Wally's first party. It's nothing like Artemis introducing him to Zatanna as her friend and Kaldur calling him the Wall-man.
Wally ends up dancing more than he thought because whenever he dances, Artemis laughs. Sometimes when she laughs, he can't tell if she's laughing mean or nice, but this laugh is friendly and he thinks it would make him dance even if music wasn't playing. She's pretty in her dress, but she might deck him if he says that, so he doesn't say anything at all.
He's trying not to think of her in that way, but she's making it very difficult with her cigarettes and laughter and hair in a ponytail that doesn't make a big deal.
Instead, he looks around the dance and sees Tim dancing with his girlfriend Stephanie and not talking to Dick at all. He sees Iris dancing with John, even though some other boy had picked her up for the dance.
He asks Artemis if they can leave soon after that. Dick is also more than happy to leave.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
They've only been driving for a few minutes when Artemis pulls the car over. She tells Dick to drive, her voice forceful without any room for argument. But the way Dick is smirking, Wally can tell it's an order he's more than happy to take.
He's not sure what's going to happen, but he thinks it's happened before and how it's happening again and he is a part of it.
Artemis climbs into the back of her pick-up truck, all elbows and green party dress. Her smile is dangerous and happy when she tells Dick to drive.
They approach a tunnel, driving faster and faster, and Wally turns around in his seat to see Artemis stand up, her dress turned into waves in the wind.
When they hit the tunnel, all sound was scooped up into a vacuum in a way that Wally has always understood scientifically, but never witnessed firsthand. Instead, the only sound he hears is Artemis screaming loud and long and piercing as an arrow.
The tunnel ended and the vacuum no longer existed and Artemis stopped screaming and the sound of the world erupted around them once more. Then Artemis sat down and started laughing. Dick started laughing. Wally started laughing.
And in that moment, Wally swears they were infinite.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3000
Spoilers: Perks spoilers galore! Also, it mentions characters from the most recent episodes of Young Justice, but otherwise none.
Summary: The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Young Justice style. Wally stands on the fringes of life and offers a unique perspective.
Notes: For lost_laputian who requested it over at the YJ ficathon! Also, this is my first Young Justice fic and it's very different from my usual writing and am a little nervous to be posting this.
Disclaimer: I don't own Young Justice or Perks. Also, much of this is quoted from Perks, so if it seems awfully familiar, there's a reason.
Part One
So, this is my life. And I want you to know that I am both happy and sad and I'm still trying to figure out how that could be.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It was last spring on a day that tasted like summer when they heard Mr. Wayne's voice on the loudspeaker.
"Boys and girls, I regret to inform you that one of our students has passed on. We will hold a memorial service for Conner Kent during assembly this Friday."
Wally didn't know exactly how fast the news traveled, but it was lunchtime when he learned from Jaime with the thick accent that Conner killed himself.
Looking back, Wally couldn't remember much else of the day. But he remembered how Bart came to pick him up, drove him too fast down roads and let him eat until he was sick.
But what Wally remembered the most was how what really bothered him is that he never really understood why Conner did it.
He wished he knew. It might have made him miss Conner more clearly. It might have made some sort of sad sense.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't think there's a favorite kid in the family. He's the youngest of three.
Bart is the oldest. He runs track and is the fastest person Wally's ever known. Iris is the middle child, very pretty, very smart, and sometimes mean.
Wally gets straight A's in science. He thinks that's why his parents leave him alone.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It's not even a year since Conner died, but Wally's in high school without him. It's strange to look around the classroom and see Conner's other friends and how they've all moved on without him. It's not that he expected an empty desk to be saved in his honor, but this is strange.
Megan is in some of Wally's classes. When Wally sees her, he thinks about how Megan told him that Conner told her she was the prettiest girl in the whole world. He thought she was pretty when she had braces and whiteheads and didn't know how to wear her hair. She said she missed him terribly not because they used to kiss but because he was her best friend.
Wally sees her now, sees that she's taller and her red hair is brushed nicely and her braces are gone. She's dumber around boys, but she never looks as happy as she did in middle school.
She doesn't say hello to Wally when she sees him in the hallway.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The first time Wally sees Bart on television, his mother cries and his father puts his arm around her. Iris even smiles, which is funny because Wally can't remember the last time she smiled at Bart. Bart runs and runs and runs for his college and Wally misses him.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next day, Wally runs like his brother. He likes to pretend he's Bart, running with his feet against the pavement like it's what he's meant to do.
The coach asks him to call him "Barry" when they're not in gym and gives him extra laps to run sometimes. He says there's an expression on his face when Wally runs and that's something Wally should explore.
"Run. Tell me what you think about when you run."
Wally wonders why he shouldn't just join track like his brother. But Barry says it's not a structure that he needs and it's not going to help him.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't really understand why all the boys are nice to Iris. He really doesn't understand at all except that she's very pretty. She really is mean to the boys sometimes, especially John.
John is respectful to their parents which makes Wally's mother like him and his father to think he's soft. Wally doesn't really agree with either of them, but he thinks Iris agrees with their father and that's why she dates him.
She sits on the couch and tells him he should stick up to his bullies and he should get the bottom of his problems. She sits and nags and snips and never really yells, just uses that mean voice. Wally doesn't mean to be in the room, but he thinks that they shouldn't argue in the kitchen if they don't want people in need of a snack to walk in on them.
He doesn't mean to be there when his sister points at him and says, "Even Wally sticks up to his bullies."
Wally can't remember ever really doing that, but that doesn't matter because the next thing he knows, John is slapping Iris across the face. He wound up and hit her hard.
Wally watches as Iris doesn't say anything. She gets soft and nice and tells Wally to leave them alone and not to say anything to their parents because they were in love and it was okay.
Wally leaves, wondering if he should, and thinks that maybe John stood up to his bully.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Iris spends a lot more time with John after that.
She smiles more and laughs more and Wally can hear them in her room when their parents aren't home.
They hold hands and act like everyone is happy. John compliments their mother, which their father thanks him for. Wally watches as his mother just stays quiet and Iris watches him, making sure he doesn't say anything.
When Wally runs, he sees them holding hands at track meets and throwing up in bushes at frat houses and not studying together for tests at college and Iris putting up with all of it.
He feels bad for both of them and runs a little faster.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick Grayson is very funny. He tells jokes in computer class and is very good at impersonations.
Wally thinks this is the hardest he's laughed since Conner died.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally used to go to football games with Conner. They used to talk Conner being on the team when they got to high school.
Now Wally goes to the games alone. He looks at the crowds and wonders who here is in love and who is just hanging out and who's as alone as he is.
That's when he sees Dick.
"C'mon, Tim!" Dick yells to the quarterback.
Wally doesn't know what convinces him to do this, but he thinks anyone who can make him laugh like Dick does is someone he should spend more time with.
"Hey! You're in my computer class!" Dick is as friendly as he is funny.
"I'm Wally."
Dick turns back to the game, leaving Wally with a silent invitation to stay. He yells at the field, sparing Wally a play-by-play analysis like he's someone who really, honestly knows football.
"Oh, Wally, this is Artemis," Dick says, pausing from yelling out to Tim the quarterback as a girl comes up beside him.
Artemis gives Wally a once over before making some decision in her mind and waving.
Incidentally, Artemis has gray eyes and very very pretty blonde hair. Blonde like liquid gold in a ponytail that doesn't make a big deal. Wally doesn't notice this until after the game when they go out for dinner because the stadium lights have washed her out and standing under the Big Boy lights, he thinks she's beautiful.
And even though she's very nice and pretty and he would like to ask her on a date, he doesn't mind that she's taken because she's with someone as nice as Dick.
"How long have you been going out?" Wally asks, seeing how happy they are together.
They look at each and laugh.
"We're brother and sister," Dick explains.
And when Wally looks hard at the two of them, trying to find some shared feature, Artemis explains that they are stepsiblings.
Wally doesn't tell them, but he's happy to hear this because he'd like to ask her out on a date someday.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That night, Wally dreams about Artemis.
She's naked, her legs on either side of the couch. Wally is with her.
He wakes up, feeling better than ever before in his life. But that feeling fades away as he realizes he's seen her naked without her permission. Girls have been on his mind before, but they've never really been talking.
But he wants to talk to Artemis. He wants to be friends with her and make up inside jokes. He thinks it would be nice to have a friend again.
He think he's like that even more than a date.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"It's okay to dream about me," Artemis says after a very long silence, "but don't think of me that way."
She doesn't offer much explanation past that and Wally has no more to say after telling her about his dream.
But when she hugs him, he can smell pine needles and it makes him pull away.
"I'm thinking about you that way again."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick pulls Wally aside and Wally thinks Artemis might have told Dick everything.
"Wally, has anyone told you how it works?"
"I don't think so."
"Well, there are rules to follow here not because you want to, but because you have to. You don't have to get all distraught about it. You just have to get traught. You get it?"
Wally doesn't really understand, but he understands enough to nod.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I look at people holding hands in the hallways, and I try not to think about how it all works. At school dances, I sit in the background, and I tap my toe, and I wonder how many couples will dance to "their song." In the hallways, I see the girls wearing the guys' jackets, and I think about the idea of property. And I wonder if anyone is really happy. I hope they are. I really hope they are.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When Wally tells these thoughts to Barry, Barry listens to every word.
"Do you always think this much, Wally?"
Wally wishes he hadn't said anything.
"Do you want to talk about how you felt after Artemis told you not to think of her that way?" Barry's voice is soft and prodding and friendly and Wally wishes someone would tell him how he's supposed to answer because lately his answers are always wrong.
"I'd rather talk about something else."
"Wally, you're in denial."
"I'm okay with that."
Barry doesn't say anything else for a while, his face still serious. But he lets it go in favor of asking about Wally's home life. Wally talks about his quiet mother and how his whole family watched his brother run and how John hit his sister because he only ever promised not to tell his parents and Barry isn't a parent so it's okay.
Barry gets silent and still and something is drawn on his face.
"Wally, we accept the love we think we deserve."
Wally thinks he will never forget that.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally runs home. He knows Barry is going to call home and thinks Barry is a better person for righting wrongs and maybe Wally should be more like that.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I love him!"
"No, you don't."
"I hate you."
"No, you don't."
Wally listens to Iris and their father yell.
"He's my whole world!"
This is when their mother speaks calm and quiet.
"Don't ever say that about anyone again. Not even me."
Iris stops yelling and crying immediately. Soon after, their father leaves to talk to John's father and their mother leaves to make dinner.
Once the room is empty save for the two of them, Iris turns and Wally thinks maybe he can see some hate in her eyes.
"Why did you have to do that?"
"I love you."
"You're a freak."
Wally thinks he did the right thing, but it's hard to tell sometimes.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wally doesn't dream about Artemis anymore. He dreams about a woman he doesn't know and is just happy to have inside jokes with Artemis.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
While Dick yells at Tim the quarterback, Artemis invites Wally to a party.
"I've never been to a party before."
"Geek." But the way she says it, Wally just smiles.
So the game ends and they pile into Artemis's truck. Music plays, Artemis rocks her head back and forth, Dick hangs his hand out the window, and Wally sat in the middle of his two new friends on the way to his first party.
"I feel infinite," he says when the song on the radio ends and the entire car is silent save for the tires against the pavement and the wind rushing by.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It doesn't look like a party because Wally can't hear thrumming music or see red cups on the lawn. But when Dick knocks on the door, it opens a crack and a single seafoam eye is seen.
"Dick?"
"Kaldur."
The door opens all the way and a guy appears. He's mellow in a way that makes Artemis laugh a little loud.
Wally followed her laugh to the basement to find it full of people.
Two girls named Raquel and Babs sit in the corner, comparing tattoos and piercings. This guy named Mal was sitting to his girlfriend Karen as she talked about how queen bees are more important than male bees and all Mal keeps saying is, "I know, baby." Even Tim the quarterback was there.
Artemis hands Wally a beer and starts chain smoking in a way that Wally knows is very unhealthy, but very attractive in the way the cigarette sits against her lip.
She sees him watching her smoke and blows into his face, his vision soon filled with gray haze.
"Hungry?" she asks. He can almost see her mouth before the smoke clears and his eyes water.
"Always."
The cigarette sits in the corner of her mouth and Wally watches as her legs unfold from under her and her ponytail bobs its way upstairs. He trails quickly behind her.
She walks around in the kitchen like it's her home and Wally thinks that maybe she spent a lot of time here when Kaldur was still in high school.
Artemis is making milkshakes when Wally hears a noise in the laundry room. When he opens the door, he finds Dick kissing Tim. It's a stolen type of kiss and he wishes he could silently shut the door and pretend he didn't see this at all.
Tim looks nervous, but Dick assures him that Wally is a friend and that Tim should just relax.
"Listen, Wally. Tim doesn't want people to know. I need you to promise that you won't tell anyone. This will be out little secret. Okay?"
"Okay."
Wally goes back to Artemis, silent and devouring a scarily delicious milkshake. But he can hear muffled voices and something that sounds like tension and disappointment. Soon after, Tim leaves and everyone ends up back in the basement.
Dick smiles like Wally has never seen before and maybe the disappointment wasn't as bad as it sounded.
"He's something, isn't he?" Dick says, pointing at Wally with a smirk.
"He's a wallflower, the Wall-Man," Kaldur intones. It's a pun, something like a joke, but something in his voice is so slow and sure that settles on Wally's shoulders like the best compliment in the world.
Everyone nods and Dick is suddenly right in front of Wally without Wally even seeing him move
"You see things. You keep quiet about them. And you understand."
Somehow, it's very important to Wally that everyone nodded. Especially Artemis. Especially her.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next night is homecoming and it's nothing like sitting on the floor between Dick and Artemis at Wally's first party. It's nothing like Artemis introducing him to Zatanna as her friend and Kaldur calling him the Wall-man.
Wally ends up dancing more than he thought because whenever he dances, Artemis laughs. Sometimes when she laughs, he can't tell if she's laughing mean or nice, but this laugh is friendly and he thinks it would make him dance even if music wasn't playing. She's pretty in her dress, but she might deck him if he says that, so he doesn't say anything at all.
He's trying not to think of her in that way, but she's making it very difficult with her cigarettes and laughter and hair in a ponytail that doesn't make a big deal.
Instead, he looks around the dance and sees Tim dancing with his girlfriend Stephanie and not talking to Dick at all. He sees Iris dancing with John, even though some other boy had picked her up for the dance.
He asks Artemis if they can leave soon after that. Dick is also more than happy to leave.
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They've only been driving for a few minutes when Artemis pulls the car over. She tells Dick to drive, her voice forceful without any room for argument. But the way Dick is smirking, Wally can tell it's an order he's more than happy to take.
He's not sure what's going to happen, but he thinks it's happened before and how it's happening again and he is a part of it.
Artemis climbs into the back of her pick-up truck, all elbows and green party dress. Her smile is dangerous and happy when she tells Dick to drive.
They approach a tunnel, driving faster and faster, and Wally turns around in his seat to see Artemis stand up, her dress turned into waves in the wind.
When they hit the tunnel, all sound was scooped up into a vacuum in a way that Wally has always understood scientifically, but never witnessed firsthand. Instead, the only sound he hears is Artemis screaming loud and long and piercing as an arrow.
The tunnel ended and the vacuum no longer existed and Artemis stopped screaming and the sound of the world erupted around them once more. Then Artemis sat down and started laughing. Dick started laughing. Wally started laughing.
And in that moment, Wally swears they were infinite.