 While Gigi was happy about living with her cousin, and the apartment they share, she did find herself missing the old apartment and hanging around with Damian whenever they wanted, so easy since they'd both been right there. It was harder when they weren't living in the same place, but Gigi didn't want to lose that relationship they had. So given the chance to go hang out, reclaim her spot on their couch, she was right there, Nyx by her side and with a bag full of their favorite ice creams.
"Okay, I brought like... a bunch of different kinds," she started as she pulled pint after pint out of her bag, stacking them on the counter so Damian could see what they were. "Pick your poison!" |
 Damian was a social creature by nature, sure he had some anxiety here and there and there were definitely moments when he wanted to be by himself, but for the most part he thrived off the attention of others. Having a roommate had provided him with attention for almost 24/7, he had enjoyed it. But for one reason or another, Gigi had moved in with her cousin and Damian was only slightly bitter about it. He didn’t want to hold a grudge and so he figured it that with singles awareness day coming up very quickly and the fact he was alone meant that Gigi and him could be alone together for at least a day and relive some of their more glorious moments.
Damian had grabbed the spoons, no bowls because they were savages who ate out of the cartons and some napkins and threw himself on the couch next to her. “Hmm, so many choices, so little time. Alright, show me what we’re working with and I don’t mean your ass.” He winked playfully and scanned the ice cream before picking up a pint of half baked by the classic b&j. “How’s the new place treating you? Tell me it’s worse than here or I’m kicking you out.” |
| Gigi parked herself on her spot on the couch, criss cross applesauce and angled to face her friend, her dog settling on the floor beside her. She rolled her eyes at his comments and grabbed a pint for herself, black raspberry chip, taking off the lid and digging right in. It still felt like home, being there like that, and she hoped it never went away even if she didn't live there anymore. Damian was stuck with her forever, whether they were sharing a space or not.
"Oh, it's definitely worse than here," she assured him, managing to keep a serious expression for a few seconds before she broke into a grin. "I mean, Theo was gone for a few days right after we moved in so I pretty much decorated everything without him. But it's fine," she added, obviously downplaying it for his benefit. "For an apartment that doesn't come with a Damian, I guess." |
| “Good!” He would have shouted it from the rooftop that he was the better apartment, but at the end of the night she’d still go home and Damian would be sitting alone at least for the time being until he found a new roommate to fill the space. “You’ll have to invite me over to see it. Or I’ll just end up showing up whenever I want which is probably gonna happen anyway.” Damian peeled off the lid of the ice cream and dug right in for a large scoop before his spoon made its way over to her pint and dug in there too.
“I gotta be honest, it's kinda lonely here without you. I keep making too much food and then I keep yelling for you to get me something and there isn’t anyone there. It’s lame.” Back to his own pint he savored the little globs of various dough in the ice cream. What should my ad for a new roommate say?“ |
| "Um, of course you can come see it anytime!" Gigi took a bite of her ice cream and gave a pleased hum, eyes closing briefly before she looked over at him. "We're having a housewarming slash my birthday party at the end of the month and obviously you're invited. You can come over before then, though. Special Damian privileges."
She frowned, feeling bad since her moving out had left him alone while she hadn't had that same side effect. In a perfect world, she would be able to live both places and no one would be lonely or sad because of something she'd done. "I'm sorry," she said softly, reaching over to get a bit of his ice cream on her spoon. "I've been having a weird few weeks on top of that so I know I haven't been the best friend since moving out, but I'm going to be better at it, I promise." Pausing in thought as she took another bite, her brow furrowed. "Must love fun times, good food, and rockin' music. No creeps allowed." |
| "Fuck yeah, I better be invited before then. I'm not the typical person. I deserve to see it all first. Also, what do you want for your birthday? Don't say nothing. You know I love to spend my daddy's money and try to drive him into bankruptcy so do you want a pony? I'll get it done." He reached over to her pint again with a smile on his face as he stole more than a small scoop.
He didn't want her to feel bad for moving out. It was an eventual progression for both of them and he was ok with it. Sliding his arm around her shoulders, he pressed a little kiss to the side of her head, "you're a good friend. You got shit going on. You're fine and I'm fine and we're still bffaa, you know." He laughed a little bit at the last comment and listened to her ad. "Must love fun times, good food, rocking music. No creeps allowed. Must be willing to give me back rubs and head scratches after nights drinking... These are non-negotiable. I'll put it on craigslists right away. I'm sure I'll have a new roomie in no time." |
| "Next ice cream date, it's at my place," she promised, because obviously that was bound to happen much sooner rather than later if their history of it was anything to go by. Easier when they were both in the same place, but she refused to let that be a hurdle. Not anymore, anyway. "Ummm... I don't know if I have room for a pony, or I'd a thousand percent say yes. I don't want to just ask for something, Damian! Just... something pink. You pick the thing or whatever, but pink, please."
Gigi leaned against him, nestling in a little and resting her head on his shoulder as she listened to him talk. "Those are very important additions," she replied, grinning. "This is a no judgment zone so if you're gonna be side-eyeing, do not apply." |
| "Just something pink huh?" He rolled his eyes slightly, people being afraid to ask for what they wanted got on his nerves, but he understood that sometimes people just didn't want much of anything. "Pink everything it is. I'll buy out the Gucci store." He winked at her and took another dig at his pint, quickly realizing it was almost gone. He didn't even want to look at the calories to see what he had just eaten, not that it really mattered all that much.
Damian brushed his hand through his hair and then wrapped his arm around her, "what else is going on, anything new you haven't thought to tell me about? Boyfriends? Girlfriends? Jobs? Music you like? Anything, surprise me." |
| "Okay, well, maybe like a jacket? Like a pink leather jacket? Or boots? But honestly, anything pink." At least she'd tried to narrow it down, even if she felt guilty for doing so. It wasn't like Damian needed to get her something, and especially not anything expensive, but she also understood he really did love to spend his dad's money. So if he wanted to get her something nice, that was all up to him. They'd lived together long enough, he had a good idea of what was her style and what wasn't.
Cuddling in against him, Gigi laughed softly and scrunched her nose. "No boyfriends or girlfriends. Mostly just trying to get settled, you know? And Nyx," she added, moving her foot over to run along her dog's side. "She's the biggest new thing I have going on." There was, of course, her missing week and Theo being stuck in the 1950s, the web shooters she'd discovered in her room, but that was all information she didn't know what to do with, as much as she trusted Damian. "Was your January pretty normal? Like, any weird stuff happen?" |
| "I just ask because I'm a shitty gift buyer so at least I have an idea now!" He smiled and his eyebrow raised at her question about his month of January. For him, it had been pretty normal, minus getting stuck on the pier while it basically burned down around him and then ending up at a party full of supers letting loose. He thought he had told everyone this, but maybe he missed her. "Pretty normal, but I did end up at a party with a bunch of superheroes at some tower. We played drinking games and then I eventually blacked out, they all seemed really sober even though they drank as much as me."
He remembered some of the party, but most of the night was missing. He couldn't picture faces or names, a lot of it seemed blurry. "What about you? Anything weird happen to you?" He figured it had to or else she wouldn't really ask about it. |
| Gigi's head tilted back on his shoulder to be able to look up at him a little better when he mentioned a party full of superheroes. She still wasn't sure about, well, most things on that end of the spectrum, but at least it meant if she said something to Damian it wouldn't be completely out of the blue? He might believe her with very little explanation? She made a little sound of acknowledgement as she took it in, weighing the options before actually saying anything.
"Yeah," she started slowly, her brow furrowed. "I... well, I lost some time. When I came to I had an email about, um, being a superhero? Which seems very silly, because look at me, but I got the email all the same." She didn't want to out Theo, unsure of where he was in terms of secret identity and all, but Damian was one of her best friends so she wasn't going to lie to him about her stuff. "So there's that." |
| Damian put on his serious face as she started to open up about what had happened to her. It wasn't what he was expecting to hear and he wasn't sure how'd she want him to react. To him, this was pretty cool. His best friend was a superhero, it was sick. "That's pretty cool, but also kinda scary. What uhh, powers do you have? Which superhero alter ego do you have? I mean, I heard about this happening, but I didn't think I knew anyone it was actually happening to." His arm rubbed against her shoulder lightly as he tried to figure out the best way to approach the situation. "How do you feel about it? I mean... it's pretty crazy to be honest, but like... you have super powers!"
|
| The questions he was asking were a lot of the ones she still had, which didn't help matters. It was one of those things that made her feel silly, because the email had been helpful in the sense of explaining why she had a week of her life missing from her memory but also not helpful at all in any actual detail or explanation. Gigi ate the last couple bites of her ice cream before leaning forward to put the empty pint on the coffee table, settling in against him easily enough once she came back.
"I don't know, is the problem." She scrunched her nose and sighed. "I can't do anything different than normal so it doesn't seem like I have powers? I'm not really sure about my alter ego, either. My — I have a friend who goes through it too, has been for longer, whose alter ego knows mine I guess? So at least they have each other. But so far I have no idea what's going on or how to feel about it. I think maybe I'd have bigger feelings or thoughts if I felt different or could do different things, but so far there's nothing. There's just this email and no sign of super powers yet. There's, um, I had some gear show up? But that's not powers. So I don't know. It's confusing and a lot." |
| Damian nodded, of course she wouldn't have all her emotions sorted out about it yet, but he still had to ask. "That's fine too. It makes sense you wouldn't know it all just yet, it only just happened, but you'll figure it all out. Maybe I can help, what gear showed up?" He shrugged his shoulders before taking her hand and giving it a comforting squeeze. Damian had only just found out about Liam going through this as well. He really couldn't give too many answers either. Just that he burned thing a lot.
Parts of him were maybe a little jealous all his friends were waking up with cool powers and Damian, huge fan of all things supernatural and otherworldly was just a simple human man with nothing going for him but his good looks and charming personality. All jokes aside, he tried to think of better things to say. "Maybe it'll never happen again?" |
| His support meant a lot, even just him sitting there holding her hand. It felt good to talk about this stuff to someone other than Theo, someone outside their apartment, like it made it more real. Gigi returned the squeeze to Damian's hand and nipped at the inside of her lip, wanting to say things in an understandable way since she was used to only talking to Theo, who had a bigger knowledge than her and maybe the words they used together wouldn't make sense to people who weren't them.
"They're like... web shooters? My friend has some too, but different. Same basic mechanisms and idea but they're not the same." She wished she had them with her to show him, but it hadn't crossed her mind to put them in her bag. Why would she have brought them? Next time. "I think it will, just because I got the email and all and the things showed up. If it wasn't going to happen again, I don't know why they would have bothered, you know?" |
| He gave a shrug of his shoulders, he didn't have an answer to her question. It was probably going to happen again, maybe frequently, but he wouldn't know anything about it. He wanted to read the email but at the same time he didn't know what kind of rules they gave her. Damian was a rule breaker, but he wouldn't make her break any. "Web shooters huh? So you're like a spider girl, huh?"
Damian got off the couch, collected their trash and disappeared into his kitchen, coming back with two new pints of ice cream. He raised them into the air like they were a party in his hands. "Time to re-up, if you've got roooom, don't punk out on me." Sitting back down, he assumed his cuddle position once more. |
| That made Gigi smile, and it stayed even though she brought her hand up to rub over her face a little. She hadn't really thought of what her name or alter ego might be, even with knowing Theo's. But if he was Spider-Man, maybe she was Spider-Girl. "Yeah, I'm like a spider girl," she replied with a grin. "Still only have the four limbs though, hope that doesn't change."
She watched him get up, stretching a little and reaching down to pet at Nyx before he came back. "Rude, I'd never punk out on round two, I'm a professional." Once he got settled in his spot again, she nestled in and dug her spoon into the fresh pint. "What would you want as your super power, if you got to pick one?" |
| "Spider girl, spider girl, doesn't just know how to twirl. swings along from tree to tree, watch your back, she's kinda mean. I got your theme song right there." He laughed and winked at her as he finished singing. It wasn't his best, but it was a rough draft and a good start. "I hope you wake up with at least four arms and two legs, at least. It would be pretty cool." Damian cheersed their spoons and then dug in after her.
He had to think for a minute or two what he would want his powers to be if he could pick them. If he even wanted powers. His lips pursed off to the side of his face and he sucked his teeth. "I think I'd want to fly or go invisible or turn to like stone or something like that. All lame powers, but I can't think of anything on the fly like this. I need time!" He laughed softly, taking a deep breath before shoveling another huge spoonful of ice cream into his mouth. "Just gimme some of your powers." |
| Her eyes lit up when he started singing, pure delight on her face the whole time. Gigi missed hearing him sing all the time, just sitting at home, one of the perks of living with him that she was lacking now. But that song was easily her favorite ever, as selfish as that was. "Okay, excuse me, that was amazing and I wish I'd been recording it! Maybe if I had more arms I could've gotten my phone in time."
She took a bite as she listened to him consider the different powers, huffing out a laugh to match his after. "Flying would be really cool, or going invisible too. You could do so much with those things!" She stole a spoonful of his ice cream and gave a hum. "I'd give you some but I don't have any! Not that I can tell. I can let you try my web shooters sometime if you want." |
| "You should really consider getting more arms. I really think it's the way of the future and you already got a head start." He watched her dip into his ice cream and was about to protest when he remembered how many scoops of her ice cream he had stolen.
"Hell yeah, I wanna treat the web shooters, buuut." Giving a small yawn, he closed up his ice cream and kicked back on the couch, his arms open for Gigi to snuggle right on in. "I am a little tired tonight, let's do it later after a nappy nappy." Once she was in next to him, he pulled the blanket off the back of the couch and wrapped them both up. |