if she'd been covered with glitter

[maleficum]

Comments

[geminated]

It's not intentional.

[She does feel bad at the way she snapped, because she really did intend to be good. She takes a deep breath, trying to steady herself enough to be convincing and tries to save the damage she wound up doing, inadvertently, to her brother's relationship (18).]

It was just supposed to be me. We didn't know Shep was in town. We saw him at the bar and came over to say hi. Our family is complicated, as I'm sure you're aware, but Luke wasn't intentionally keeping secrets.

[She offers him an apologetic look.]

You didn't deserve to get snapped at. I'm sorry.

[See? She's been working on it. Tyler's been helping, and she's still not great at other people, but she's better than she was in college. Also the apology is more for Luke than Jonathan, but she directs it at Jonathan, so he can believe it's for him if he wants.]

[pricetags]

( "Look, I'm happy to meet any of your relatives, but I don't think I should be here right now." Jonathan says, giving himself and everyone else an out. )

You shouldn't.

( "Shep!" )

Do you want me to go into where I've been and what I've been doing with whom -- and all the - magic that life offers all of us? With him here?

( Whatever the hell that was, Jonathan does look over to Luke, because he has been bested logically. Jonathan shouldn't be here. But, he could drag Jonathan away. He could come back to this, leave his sister with everything, but he doesn't say any of that out loud. Just thinks it.

"Right. Well, call me when your family reunion has reached its' dramatic apex," Jonathan says. He shakes his head, pained look finding every Laughlin, finally settling on Luke. This was supposed to be something, wasn't it?

"Jon..."

But it's not enough. Jonathan retreats away from all too much going on right now.

Shepherd lets the moment dangle between them all. )

Well, I'm ordering another drink.

[geminated]

I'll take a double. Luke'll have one too.

[She knows that this isn't how he wanted today to go, but she also knows that he isn't going to leave. Not with the bomb that's been dropped on them today. If Jonathan's not a dick, he'll give Luke a chance to talk about it with him. If he doesn't, then he's a dick, and not good enough for her brother anyway.

He'll blame her, crash on her and Tyler's couch for a while, and he'll recover. They always do.

She passes the glass to Luke when it arrives, before knocking back half of hers.]

So. Should we be talking about this here?

[pricetags]

( Shepherd knocks the whole thing, holding fingers up to get another. )

I don't know. Do we have any other siblings coming out of the woodwork?

( He doesn't have the constitution for it right now.

"I hate you both," Luke says, begrudgingly grabbing his drink and sipping. )

No, you don't.

[geminated]

I'm you're twin. You're biologically obligated to like me.

[She's just saying. She finishes the rest of the drink before going back to Shep's question.]

Not that we're aware of. Jo's currently in Portland with her husband, visiting Ric's kid, and then there's the girls - Josie and Lizzie. But there's no one else left. Kai took care of that when he came back.

[drugdeals]

( "What do you mean, came back?" he asks, missing that part of their history, too. )

Damon Salvatore and Bonnie Bennett were duped into letting him out of the prison world.

[geminated]

But when he tried to insist they finish the Merge, Jo won. So it all worked out in the end. Mostly.

[Kai really is terrifying though and she does have concerns about the fact that he's currently floating around inside Jo now. It's weird.]

[pricetags]

I'm hating the adverbs. Mostly.

( How 'mostly?' Should he be concerned with 'mostly?' It sounds like he should be concerned with mostly.

"A few years ago, he emotionally manipulated our nieces and their dad. It's a long, body snatching story worthy of Esther Mikaelson, but it ended in Josie going dark and locking him down inside Jo again. For good this time."

That sinks in and something blue-screens across his face.

"You try," he tells his sister, taking a labored sip from his glass. )

[geminated]

Josie's much better now?

[Everything bounces back to the median in the end. She'll leave out that Josie is dating the tribrid. She doesn't even know about Lizzie's own magical royalty boyfriend yet.

She should probably schedule an Auntie Liv FaceTime session and catch up with them, but that's a problem for future Liv. Current Liv is happily oblivious to the twins current problems right now.]

She got into Tulane. And Lizzie's going to NYU.

[drugdeals]

They're the overachieving twins of the family.

( Luke is in biochemistry, which, still pretty good! But, he still comes with the black sheep label. He and Liv seem to share and pass the label back and forth, but with, previously, only one relative to their name, neither was very concerned with it. )

Really, he's no longer a factor.

[geminated]

Yeah. Josie is ... well, she's much better at magic than she likes other people to think.

[But that being said, there's one thing they still have to cover.]

Do you want us to tell Jo?

[pricetags]

( On the one hand, Liv and Luke know and everything hasn't gone to shit - for Shephard. On the other, he hasn't gone into his own exploits, where he's been, what he does, or why. And does he want anyone in his family involved? Not that that's a guarantee. Everyone can keep to their corners, just with checking in with each other more. And that could be nice.

But, his name is recognizable and he's still on the run.

Is he worth knowing?

How long will this secret be kept? Alexander knows who she is. And Alys. Is this something he deserves? Will it put any of them in danger? )

Do you? My life's - your life's -- I mean, Luke, the guy was a real wad, but --

( "Maybe we weren't star-crossed--" )

But you'd find out. You never meet me, never connect again, and you could've made your mistake on your own. Sorry. Decision.

( Until Liv knocked some sense into him. )

[geminated]

Whatever you're up to can't be any worse than anything we've already been through.

[And the way she says that isn't as though she's tempting fate, but more a statement of fact. Their lives have been a shit show for so long nothing can really surprise them. And more to the point:]

And maybe you showing up actually did him a favor. Not that it can cure his terrible taste in men but better to know now than later when you're sharing an apartment and have to work out joint custody of your dog.

[pricetags]

( "We're cat people," Luke says, defiantly, possibly just to defy his sister's sound logic. )

Cat people are sociopaths.

( It's proven! (He's a cat person. Shush.)

"I hate both of you." )

He loves us. How about, we start easy. You two were in Baltimore for a meet-the-sister brunch?

[geminated]

Yeah.

[She glances down at her watch.]

I can crash in the city tonight. I just have to call Tyler and let him know I'll be back tomorrow.

[pricetags]

Who's Tyler?

( "Liv's common-law husband." Shepherd turns his head toward Liv at that. )

[geminated]

[Her nose wrinkles at that explanation but ... she's also not going to contradict it. (Honestly, that's progress.) She just grabs her phone and slides off the stool.]

I'll be right back.

[It'll give Luke and Shep some time to bond. And Liv some space to have a little tiny minor freak out. She heads away from the bar and steps outside for some fresh air, before placing her phone to her ear.

Ring ring Tyler phone.]

[recrudesce]

( Tyler always welcomes Liv's life or witch updates. It takes him out of the more library-focused side of his post at the Armory. He likes being more boots-on-the-ground, but sometimes he can't avoid the research elment. )

Hey, do we hate the guy?

[geminated]

Total garbage. But, oddly enough, that is not the news.

[She shifts to lean back against the wall of the restaurant, and since she doesn't know how to say this in a way that's delicate or less shocking than she's about to say it but it's either this or she doesn't talk about her feelings at all.

Tyler is probably used to it at this point, right?]

So remember all those dead siblings I have? One of them might be significantly less dead than we originally thought.

[recrudesce]

( Not the news, so there's news. He listens, expecting her brand of bluntness. She never fails to surprise him. )

Like in hiding?

[geminated]

I assume. We didn't really get around to the where he's been end of things. We were mostly all just shocked at his being alive. Or us, in his case.

[It's still a lot and she's not sure how to feel about it because while they have made progress in her being happy about things and life, it's still hard not to feel like the other shoe is going to drop at some point.]

And I'm mostly just trying to make it seem like I have my shit together.

[recrudesce]

You never lost your shit.

( Like the Armory grounds him, it grounds her, too. It gives her purpose beyond her family's legacy and worrying about her brother's moronic dating decisions. His words. Also sometimes they're her words, but it sounds nicer coming from her, doesn't it? )

So, this is a Baltimore coincidence. Well, I know he's not dating your brother so where does this trash bag fit into all of this?

[geminated]

Well, he kind of showed up just as we were figuring out that it was Shep and when we introduced him as our brother he was rightfully confused and he wound up being the focus of me trying to keep my shit together.

I did apologize, but he took Shep's sudden appearance as Luke not being completely honest and didn't seem willing to give him the time to explain and he left.

[She wrinkles her nose, not that he can see it.]

So him being trash might be a little my fault.

[recrudesce]

Sounds like he wasn't willing to hear your brother out. I'm going with, you can't make someone trash.

( They just are. )

Do you know what your brother is doing in Baltimore?

[geminated]

Not yet. He was on some kind of video call when I went up to him, but I don't know what it's for. We're going to have brunch so I'm sure Luke will handle interrogating him about where he's been and what he's doing here.

[They'll figure it out.]

But I just wanted to let you know I may be crashing here tonight.