Good Riddance

When John left the room, Di kicked herself. How stupid to bring up Avonlea like that! It wasn't like John had missed every single trip, but obviously he'd missed enough of them. Di had never really thought about it much when she was a kid, but it did seem odd in retrospect. Lately, she'd made a special effort to include John in Pride House events — to do right by him as a comrade as well as a sibling — but getting him to commit was like nailing jello to a wall. He'd shown up here, though. That was something. Di hoped he'd let himself have some fun.

The music rattling her window was calling Di back to the party. She hadn't even had a chance to dance with Delilah yet, but the night was still young.

Di checked her hair in the mirror and hoisted her proton pack onto her back. As she adjusted it, she felt the left strap tear away from the cardboard. Damn. She couldn't go out like that — the whole thing would rip off if anyone knocked against it.

Di rummaged in her desk drawer for duct tape, finding a safety pin instead. It poked through the cardboard well enough, but tore a gash when Di swung the pack back onto her shoulder. That would never hold. The duct tape must be around here somewhere.

She kicked aside a pile of Delilah's laundry, peered into the trash can, and felt around under the desk. After several minutes, the tape turned up in a rain boot under her bed. Di made quick work of the strap and reassembled her gear, adding the roll of tape to her utility belt just in case.

By this time, she'd been away from the party for several songs. Better get back soon or Delilah would sulk instead of dancing.

Back out on the terrace, Di climbed up on a bench to scan the crowd. She didn't see any telltale electric blue near the drinks, nor on the dance floor, where the DJ was letting the dancers catch their breath with a slower song.

Once upon a time, I was falling in love, but now I'm only falling apart . . .

Di was beginning to wonder whether Delilah might have stormed off in a huff after all when she spotted her on the opposite end of the terrace, away from the dancers. Delilah had her back turned, and was chatting with Sara and Ying. Di hoped they were being civil, rather than picking on Delilah as they always did. Wasn't it just last week they had dumped her expensive just-for-curls conditioner down the drain? Better get over there and make sure she was alright.

That was easier said than done. The volume lessened as Di moved further from the speakers, but the press of people did not. Gaps in the crowd proved to be blocked by benches or planters filling up with red plastic cups. When Di finally did reach Delilah's corner, she found her way blocked by a girl in an enormous Rubik's cube costume.

"Excuse me," Di said, but the girl went on laughing with her friends, oblivious. She was just about to try again when she caught her own name in Delilah's voice.*

" . . . the way Di exaggerates . . ."

Di went rigid. She knew that tone very well. It was the tone Delilah used when she spoke of her estranged parents or her meddling roommates or any of the other myriad ways the world was set against her. But . . . what?

Instead of pushing past the Rubik's cube, Di hunkered down behind it and strained to listen.

" . . . sooooo disappointed in Ingleside . . . the way Di has bragged . . . I expected a mansion . . . it's big enough, I guess . . . only one floor!"

The Rubik's cube girl noticed Di hanging onto her and began to move, but Di shushed her. Very gently, she pushed at the costume, using the girl as a shield as she shuffled a few steps closer to the spot where Delilah was holding her audience rapt.

"Did you see the china dogs?" asked Ying.

"They're nothing wonderful. They haven't even got hair. I told Di right on the spot I was disappointed."

Di's breath caught. Delilah had been delighted with Gog and Magog. Hadn't she?

"I'm sorry for Di," Delilah went on. "Her whole family's nuts. I thought Thanksgiving would be a nice, cozy time to get to know them, but instead they went around inviting a dozen people they'd never even met before! They also have an old lady living out in their back garden. Di said Susan's like family, but I told her the whole setup is extremely weird. I don't know what her job is, but it certainly isn't cleaning or cooking. I had to pick up the slack the whole time I was there. Not that I minded, really, because their silver looked like it had never been cleaned before."

"They made you polish the silver?" Ying asked skeptically.

"Oh, yes. But they always make me work. Didn't I tell you how they made me bail out the cellar when their theatre flooded? I never even got a thank you note. They certainly didn't treat me like a guest this time either. Di's parents weren't even going to let me stay in her room, but I put my foot down and said, 'Do you treat all your children's partners this way, or just the lesbians?' and that shut them up."

"I thought they were supportive?" Sara said.

Delilah scoffed. "Oh, they pretend to be. It's all lovey-dovey on the outside, but they're all terribly two-faced. You should see how Nan pinches Di — her arms are black and blue! And the older sister doesn't even really need that wheelchair. I saw her get up and walk around! It's all a big act. They let Faith's sick little brother cough all over the food so I couldn't stand to eat a bite. And John threw a dish of cranberry sauce at me. It ruined my dress but I don't care. I told the Doctor he'd have to pay for it but he flat-out refused, so my parents sent me money for a new one. Di's jealous, of course, but still I'm sorry for her."

Di had heard enough. More than enough. Flushed with fury, she stepped out from the shelter of the Rubik's cube.

"You . . ." she said, pointing a trembling finger at Delilah. "You . . !" Afterwards, she thought repentantly that she ought to have been able to find words for her outrage. But she had been stung to the heart and when your feelings are all stirred up you can't pick and choose your words.

"Di!" Delilah's lovely, traitorous face was the very picture of shock.

"Was any of it ever true?" Di growled. She was dimly aware that people around them were beginning to stare, but she didn't care. "Did Ying and Sara really steal your jewelry?"

"What?" Sara yelped.

"Did your parents really support your brother and then cut you off without a penny?"

Delilah's mouth was working in fishlike silence, while Ying said, "Wait, you have a brother?"

Bystanders were backing away now, forming a widening circle around the little group. Delilah's face had gone very pale under the blue makeup. "Di. Honey. I just meant that your family treats you awfully badly and they shouldn't . . ."

"Liar! Take it back, liar!"

Faith didn't hear the yelling right away. She was much too wrapped up in more immediate sensations: the scratch of pink acetate lace against her palms, the throbbing of her pulse in time with the slow dance, the pressure of broad hands on her hips.

She had first seen Jem Blythe from her vantage point atop a bench, where she was jangling her bangles and belting Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. She had glanced down and there he was, cotton-candy-colored and hooting his admiration from the midst of the crowd. One brief instant of eye contact closed a circuit and if Faith had been dancing before, she was flying after. Whenever she checked, Jem was still grinning up at her, cheering her on with shouts that sent little thrills of electricity spangling over her skin. Nothing about her workaday situation had changed, but the song on her lips wasn't Girls Just Wanna Have Committed Relationships. There were plenty of hours between now and Tuesday morning, and Faith meant to use them well.

With Faith, to decide was to act.** When the song was done, she hopped down from the bench and made a beeline for the unmistakeable streak of pink. She locked eyes with Jem at ten paces, watching his smile stretch closer to the limit with each step. The glitter earrings came off in her hands when she grabbed him by the ears and he laughed into her mouth when she kissed him.

"Well alright then," Jem said when Faith released him.

After that, things were a bit of a blur. Jem was unstoppered joy from the tips of his wig to the toes of his ridiculous, tape-covered Crocs, dancing with much more enthusiasm than grace. He kept Faith in a near-constant state of hilarity with his "moves," which borrowed freely and inexpertly from a wide variety of unlikely genres. There was the Charleston knee thing that really should not be done in such a short skirt, a truly terrible moonwalk, and a disco point that spelled the end of one of his shoulder seams. Faith had rarely had more fun.

Still, she was relieved when the DJ slowed things down, giving her a chance to catch her breath. Jem raised a questioning brow and she stepped into his arms, swaying together as the singer crooned about moons and eclipses and whatnot. Faith wasn't really sold on forever's gonna start tonight, but she was definitely starting to think about whether there weren't any better uses for their remaining stamina.

That's when Jem went tense under her hands. His head snapped up, all his attention focused on something Faith couldn't see or hear. She followed his gaze across the terrace and saw . . . she wasn't sure what. A disturbance of some sort. Then a shout cut through the fading music and Jem was off like a shot.

More shouting. Faith didn't catch the words, but she thought that it might be Di's voice, albeit raised to a pitch she had never heard before. Jem was cutting a broad swath through the crowd and Faith slipped into his wake, arriving at the edge of the clearing in time to hear Di yell,

"There isn't one spark of sincerity in you! Don't you ever speak to me again as long as you live!"

Faith noted Delilah seeming flustered and nervous, and two girls she recognized vaguely as Delilah's roommates exchanging appalled looks. Whatever had happened must have been quite the show.

Jem had not stopped among the spectators. Instead he sailed in to Di's side, holding an arm out in warning lest Delilah try to advance on her.

"Di?" he asked quietly.

"She . . . she . . ."

"It was just a misunderstanding!" Delilah cried, but Jem shushed her with pointed wave of the hand.

Faith caught Di's arm, which was trembling with either shock or fury, and interposed her own body between the two. Then Nan was there as well, tugging gently at Di's other arm and calling her away.

"Di!" Delilah called. "Please!"

Together, Faith and Nan steered a muttering Di through the crowd as people tripped over themselves to get out of the way. Behind them, Faith could hear Jem shouting, "Alright, alright, nothing to see here! Carry on!"

"Can I help?"

Faith was surprised to see John looming near the door to their suite, but Nan snapped, "Clear the common room, will you?"

They led Di to her room and shut the door while John evicted partygoers without ceremony. Nan settled her sister onto the bed and Faith drew the curtain in vain hopes that it might help muffle the noise.

"What happened?" Nan asked.

"She said . . . she said . . . Oh, Nan! I've been so stupid!"

Di flung herself stormily against Nan's shoulder and wept. Her splotched, crumpled misery made Faith feel that she could have throttled Delilah quite cheerfully. Instead, she went hunting for tissues.

"It's alright," Nan crooned, stroking Di's hair. "Take your time."

Faith located the fugitive Kleenex in the crevice behind Di's desk and held it out to her. Di gulped, took a tissue, and blew her nose with emphasis.

The whole story was sobbed out, somewhat disjointedly. Faith had assumed that Delilah must have said something awful to break the charm so spectacularly, but even she was taken aback by some of the things Di repeated. Delilah had a go at Carl?

"I'll never believe in anyone again!" Di concluded fiercely.

"Now, now," Nan said soothingly. "Do you want me to slash her bike tires? Fill her shampoo with Nair? Hack her social media accounts?"

"I'll help!" Faith said.

Di hiccuped and blew her nose again. "Thanks. I just want her gone. Hand me that grocery bag?"

Di slid off the bed and began shoving laundry and books into the bag. She tore a charger out of the wall and tossed in a hairbrush and an open box of granola bars. No wonder Di's room was such a disaster zone if Delilah had brought down all this junk.

When the bag was overfull, Faith seized it. "I'll just take this out, alright?" She left the sisters kneeling on the floor in the wreckage of Di's room, with the party still shrieking outside.

The common room was empty except for Jem and John and the detritus of an abandoned party.

"Is she ok?" Jem asked.

"She's fine. Angry, but fine."

"What happened?"

Faith summarized, ending with a fervent wish that Delilah would never darken their door again.

"She already tried," Jem said. "Just after you went in. But we sent her packing. Jerry and Carl were here, too. I sent Carl back to the party, but Jerry went off to find some trash bags." He gestured at the common room, which was cluttered with cups and bits of cast-off costume. Now that Faith was paying more attention, the floor under her feet was unpleasantly sticky.

John cleared his throat. "Is there anything I should be doing?"

"Sure." Faith passed him the grocery bag. "Take this crap up to the sixth floor, will you? Suite 619."

John held the bag as if it might explode. "I might head out after, ok?"

When the door clicked shut behind him, Faith was alone with Jem and the muffled music and the pounding of her own heart.

Jem pulled off his wig, revealing sweat-damp curls plastered to his head. A smear of glitter on his cheek made Faith wonder if he had been wearing it all along, or if a bit of hers had rubbed off. He gave her twist of a smile, and if she hadn't had bountiful evidence to the contrary, she might have thought he was a little shy.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"Is Di really ok?"

"She will be. Good riddance, I say."

Jem snorted. "Has Nan managed to avoid saying, 'I told you so?'"

"So far, so good. The effort might kill her, though."

Jem chuckled and ran a hand through his hair, dislodging a few short curls.

"So . . . uh . . . out there . . . I was having fun. Before all this, I mean."

"Yeah," Faith agreed. "Me, too."

So much fun. God, he was a snack. Maybe that was just two months of self-enforced celibacy talking, but Faith didn't think so. She honestly, genuinely liked Jem Blythe. That was probably going to make this rough.

"Can I take you out sometime?" he was asking. "Dinner?"

Faith grimaced. "Look, I had a really good time. But with work and school and basketball, I don't get a night off very often. I'm not looking to date anyone right now."

"Oh. Ok." There was a note of confusion in his voice, along with a tinge of disappointment, but he didn't press or argue. "Well, if you ever change your mind, let me know."

Faith had already changed her mind. Damn, what was wrong with her?

"I still have tonight," she blurted. "We could keep dancing. Or . . ." She gave her own bedroom door a meaningful look.

Jem gave that a rueful chortle, but shook his head. "Better not. Seems insensitive to the bereaved."

Faith laughed, too. Somehow the laughing turned into a touch and then the touch turned into a kiss and before Faith had time to think twice, she had Jem pushed up against the wall.

The boy knew his way around a kiss, she'd give him that. He was open and eager, matching her tempo and pushing just a bit further. Faith liked the solid pressure of his hand on the small of her back, and she liked the way he smiled when he drew back for breath. The smile stretched when she brushed her fingertips over the hem of his skirt, which had rucked up high enough that it wasn't leaving very much to the imagination. His breath hitched and it was becoming difficult to remember why they were still in the common room, when her bedroom was just steps away.

Someone knocked at the hall door. Faith and Jem broke apart with a mutual gasp. Holy fuck, if Delilah was coming down here to whine, Faith was going to murder her on the spot.

"It's Jerry!" Jerry called from the hall.

Faith looked at Jem, mussed and open-mouthed and trying unsuccessfully to adjust his clothing, and laughed aloud.

"I'll get it," she snorted. "You can hide in the bathroom if you like."

He took her up on that, disappearing into the bathroom as Faith went for the door.

"I found the trash bags!" Jerry announced, stepping into the suite. "Oh. Did Jem and John leave?"

"John did," Faith said, biting the inside of her cheek. "Jem's just powdering his nose." She jerked a thumb at the bathroom door and Jerry nodded sagely.

They began to pick up the mess, tossing garbage into the bags while Faith caught Jerry up on the outlines of Di's troubles. Jem joined them a few minutes later, looking as presentable as it was possible to look in the shredded remains of a terrifically ugly dress. There was nothing objectively funny about eye contact, but one look at the wicked spark in those hazel eyes had Faith choking down another round of laughter.

They worked together until the common room was passable, if not precisely clean. The party was still in full swing outside, but Faith was not particularly interested in returning. It had also not escaped her notice that Jerry kept darting nervous glances toward Di's door.

"I'll take it from here," she said. "Thanks for your help."

Jem shot a look at Jerry, seemed to consider something, and said, "Let me know if Nan and Di need anything, ok."

"Sure. Just . . . uh . . . I don't think I have your number."

Jem held out his hand for her phone, then typed in a contact with entirely too many letters. How many Jems did he think she knew?

When Jem and Jerry had said their goodbyes and left with instructions to give Di their best, Faith opened her contacts. The new one was filed under N for "No Strings Attached."

By the time John reached the Crow's Nest, he was thoroughly sick of parties. He wanted nothing more than to go back to the dorm, crawl into bed, and pull his quilt over his head until everyone else passed out and he could have the morning to himself.

But he might run into Carl there. That would be awkward. Nothing had happened between them, not really, and there was no reason John should be feeling as if he'd fumbled the puck. Maybe he should just go to Ingleside and hunker down for a few days.

But it was Wilkie's birthday and he was already unforgivably late.

There was a line at the club, but John gave his name to the security guard and waited while he checked the list. Most of the people in line were in costumes of the Sexy Fill-In-The-Blank variety, though it wasn't always easy to tell where that ended and normal club wear began. John was aware that he was conspicuous — not to mention freezing — in his plain white t-shirt, but there hadn't really been a chance to nip into Di's room for his clothes. He ran a finger over the sunglasses hooked on his pocket, but left them where they were. He didn't know enough about Top Gun to field half-heard jests about it in front of Wilkie's friends.

Security waved John in and pointed him toward the balcony, where private tables overlooked the dance floor. Colored lights flashed, music throbbed. John concentrated all his attention on the narrow, spiraling stairs, putting one foot solidly in front of the other and trying to block out everything else.

Wilkie's party had taken the big circular booth in the corner. The table was littered with glasses and the seats crammed to capacity with Wilkie's cronies, most of whom John knew by sight if not by name. There was the tall blonde who thought playing poker for money was boring, and Marcus, the old boarding school chum who flew in from London from time to time, and Tyler Hallett, who currently had his tongue halfway down Wilkie's throat.

John took a steadying breath.

"Look who decided to turn up!" called Marcus, sloshing a glass of champagne in John's direction. Heads turned and somebody elbowed Tyler, who slunk back looking a bit sheepish.

John was only watching Wilkie. Of course it didn't matter to him who Wilkie kissed. They didn't have that sort of relationship, a fact which had been made very clear to him on a number of occasions. Whatever, it was fine.

What did matter was the way that Wilkie was looking at him right now. His amber eyes glittered with a fury that was not softened by the outward shape of a smile on his lips. Just because Wilkie liked to keep his options open didn't mean he'd tolerate being anyone's second choice. Yes, it definitely would have been better to go straight home or perhaps to skip town altogether.

The blonde man stood, offering John his place on the edge of the bench, but Wilkie called him back. "Let him stand," he said crisply. "Wouldn't want to to tie him down when he obviously has better places to be."

Several of the other guests exchanged nervous glances and Tyler Hallet seemed ready to crawl under the table, though none of this was his fault. John had known he was cutting things close, and he had still stayed at the party far too long. He might have stayed even longer if Di's commotion hadn't stopped him from saying, Wait, no, I mean yes, I could try.

Well, now he'd fucked up twice instead of just once and didn't have the least idea of how to put any of it right. Fuck it.

Without bothering to make his excuses, John turned on his heel and walked out.

Notes:

*Various quotations throughout this chapter are from Di and Delilah's breakup in Anne of Ingleside, chapter 38.

**Rainbow Valley, chapter 16, "Tit for Tat"

Special hello and thank you to the KatherineWithAC and the Guest reviewers I can't thank in person. Hello! Thank you so much for your thoughts and suggestions! I'm so glad to have you around and I am taking your feedback to heart.

(Note: There was a movie reboot of Jem and the Holograms in 2015 and rebooted comic that ran from 2015-7, so I'm assuming the kids know about it through those, rather than through the original '80s cartoon.)