A/N. Nothing very original here - but dashed off in response to someone sending me a drabble that was lovely take on the "Here's the Day you Hoped Would Never Come" picture but done rather bleak and hopeless. Jareth-in-my-mind snorted and said, no, that's not how it goes.
Title from the Blink 182 song. which gives you some idea of how serious and emo this is...
For L.Baker
Fourth night.
He'd expected her to be stubborn about things, but this was getting beyond a joke.
For three nights running, Sarah had gawked at the crystals he'd sent through her mirror to rest, softly luminous and enticing, on her desk; three nights running she'd left the room wide-eyed and muttering about medication and stress of her finals. And he could tell Sarah was, again, trying to rationalise away what was glowing on top of her Spanish homework in front of her, plain as anything.
Did the girl have no sense of magic and adventure anymore? Hell, didn't she have any curiosity, plain and simple?
Of course she knew who was sending them. He'd seen the instant recognition and wonder and - he'd smirked in vindication - worry play over her face at the first crystal, before she closed her eyes and started reciting Zen mantras.
He'd lost the smirk when she burnt the feather, though.
All right, so maybe they hadn't parted on the best of terms - and whose fault was that? ...Well, hers, obviously - and he hadn't really expected a warm welcome. He'd been quite prepared for temper tantrums, bitter recriminations, flying cushions... But there was no way in the seven hells and either world that Jareth was going to have his existence denied outright.
Well. The barn owl glared though the window at the girl hurrying from the room. He'd tried the magic number three, and then one more time in deference to her bloody-mindedness; but if she was refusing to acknowledge the silent, tactful, patient crystals - he was just going to have to make his message clearer, wasn't he?
One-shot. Pester not for continuation.