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I glanced up at Bex, the two of us the only ones left on the front porch as the kids worked their way closer, descending on each house like a mob of small monsters on a sugar rush. Which, I supposed, they kind of were.
“Nice costume,” she told me, eyes tracking over the long pink dress I wore with a crown. It was a fairly generic costume, save for the long bubblegum-pink wig I wore, which fell down to my ass. “Princess Bubblegum.”
I’d worn the costume to surprise Bex, considering she was a fan of the showAdventure Time. We’d been binging it the past few weeks, switching out K-Dramas for the animated show before bed each night. I’d taken a personal liking to Princess Bubblegum, for being sweet and feminine while also running a kingdom like a fucking boss. She was also a well-known queer icon, having a slow-burn relationship with a punk-rock vampire throughout the course of the series.
I smiled at her compliment, ignoring the slight tinge of disappointment as I asked, “No costume for you this year?”
I hadn’t made Bex promise to dress up, only telling her she’d appreciate my costume, but a part of me had hoped she’d dress up with me. Give in to the pull of the holiday, even if it meant dressing in the gruesome costumes Ames told me she used to wear as a teenager.
Bex looked affronted, taking a step back with a hand to her chest, “You don’t recognize my costume, little bird?”
I took a closer look at her outfit but couldn’t find anything out of place with her red combat boots, ripped jeans and striped long-sleeved shirt.
“Whoops, I’m forgetting the most important part.” Bex smiled widely, revealing her teeth. More specifically, revealing a set of sharp fangs stuck to her top canines. “I put them in while you were getting your costume on. Oh, and…” Bex brushed her hair behind her ear, displaying the two round black dots drawn on her neck, right on top of her jugular.
“Bite marks.” I chuckled as I touched the marks, the black smearing a bit on my fingertip.
Bex shrugged when she saw my stained finger. “Ames used her eyeliner.”
“Naturally.”
“I refuse to wear a wig, but hopefully you get the gist.”
I couldn’t help myself from flinging my arms around Bex’s waist as I finally recognized her costume. Save for the blonde hair - which I would never expect Bex to cover with a wig, regardless of how crucial to the costume - she was the perfect Marceline to my Princess Bubblegum. The fact that she’d done some digging to figure out my costume and then find a way to match it just solidified every choice I’d made earlier tonight.
Bex was mine, and I’d never regret any decision that allowed me to keep her by my side.
Epilogue
Bex
The cold had finally settledin, turning our breath to fog as we walked to my car. I’d never liked how small Wren’s car was, especially with how chaotically fast she drove through the winding roads up to Alex and Ames’s house. Now that it was winter, I usually insisted on dropping her off at work, worried patches of black ice would send her minuscule car off the road and into a ditch. The four wheel drive of my Jeep would come in handy now, too, as we drove up to their house for Thanksgiving.
We’d already spent all morning at the house with Dev, helping Ames and Alex prepare pies and various sides. Wren and I escaped an hour ago to go back to her apartment and change for dinner, showering the flour out of our hair and washing the smell of raw turkey off our hands.
Wren hadn’t asked me to officially move in, and I hadn’t yet taken advantage of her promise to move in with me whenever I asked. I had just…never left. So even now, almost a month later, I still considered her apartment my home, even if it was short-lived.
Wren emerged from our bedroom - the guest bedroom had firmly become forguestssince I spent that first night in Wren’s bed - to find me pulling an unbaked apple pie out of the freezer. We’d made it together the night before, Wren’s baking skills slowly improving with my supervision.
“Hello, lovely,” I murmured as she walked up to me, wrapping her arms around my waist while I set the pie on the counter. Doing so freed my hands to wrap around her back, pulling her tight against me.
She fit my nickname for her, dressed in a burgundy dress. The material covered her arms in billowing sleeves that cinched at the wrists, the hem of the dress hitting her mid-thigh. She had a matching bow holding back half of her hair and delicate gold flower earrings hanging from her ears. The dress was cut low enough in the front to allow me to kiss her collarbones, which I did after lifting her onto the kitchen counter to even out our heights.
Half an hour later, we finally left the apartment, pie in hand, and got back into my car. The drive had become routine over the last month, and we made it at least three times a week, either for my work or family get-togethers.
Sometimes Dev and I would meet to spar while Wren chatted with Ames, or the three of them would go out while Alex and I discussed work. We had created tracking software for both our women, looking out for any mention of hits or information about Wren or Ames that could be passed around to those who wanted to do us harm.
Despite having no hits since Alfie’s death, the guys and I were still reluctant to leave Ames and Wren out of our sight for long. When we had time, one of us would play bodyguard when the girls wanted to go out. Fortunately, the Cillian job usually put Dev close enough toIn BloomandJuniper Potterythat we felt comfortable letting the women work alone while keeping eyes on the cameras littered throughout their work buildings. But the five of us were usually together.
It always hit me - as we wound through the curving roads up toward what Wren had started affectionately calling our “home base” - how much I’d resisted this. How much time I’d wasted, trying to keep my eyes and hands and soul away from Wren, pushing her and everyone else away no matter how much they tried to let me in.
Now, I was a full convert, inviting myself to Ames’s house whenever I felt the urge, popping up at Dev’s new house to help with the renovations that began a couple weeks ago. He wasn’t always there, but Alex and I pitched in to help oversee what we couldn’t do ourselves while Dev continued to run himself ragged on the Cillian job. We saw him less than we did over the summer, but he still made time to drop by for dinners, even if he often had to sneak out early.
If Dev was lucky, and if the rumblings on the darknet and whispers among some of the informants Alex had in the area were correct, he wouldn’t be doing the job much longer.
Either way, I was almost as bad as the rest of them now, eager to spend time with the family my sister had started by befriending - and later falling in love with - her stalker.
Except today, I wasn’t quite so eager. I drove past our usual turn, continuing down the curving road, waiting until Wren finally piped up. “Um, Bex? You missed our turn.”
