Hazel

[nola_jeangrey]

What did Hazel mean?! She understood what had happened to Katie? Did that mean she was someone else from a universe Katie didn't know, like Sam or Dani were? Katie hadn't recognized Hazel as someone she knew. Did it mean that she only had an artistic epiphany and didn't actually understand at all? Either way, Katie needed to know.

And also, she wanted to see her friend, and her friend's art. And also the face of a Hazel Jean who just told a boy that she loved him.

So Katie had a giant coffee in each hand, a bag full of snacks and water and yes, a bottle of wine, and when she made it to Hazel's shed she knocked with her foot. And by then, she was dying see Hazel, to know what was going on, to understand.

Comments

[nola_jeangrey]

Narnia? Narnia? Katie grinned, absolutely unable to help herself, as she blurted “Oh my god, I’ve read about you.”

[nola_lucy]

"So have I! I don't know how I didn't remember when I was a little girl." She'd first read the books when she was around the same age as Lucy was when she first went to Narnia. "But I remember all of it now."

[nola_jeangrey]

“I didn’t even read all of your books! But I loved Lucy when I read about her, and I love you now. Wow, you’ve had so many adventures. You’re like, a princess? Of Narnia? Wow, wow, wow. wow.” Katie was stunned.

[nola_lucy]

"A queen, actually, but that's not like...important." It was important because Narnia and the way it worked was important, but Hazel didn't actually care about rank. "Who were you? Tell me things!"

[nola_jeangrey]

“Yes it is, because that’s amazing!” Which meant it was important. “It was part of your life. Wow, and this is the best work you’ve ever done, Hazel…” Suddenly Jean’s life couldn’t really compare! "Oh, mine’s….. a lot less beautiful. My name was Jean Grey. I was a mutant? Telepathic and telekinetic, so I could read minds and also move things with my brain. My power was like a phoenix, hence the, you know, phoenix mural.”

[nola_lucy]

"Katie. Katie." Hazel put her hand on Katie's arm, excited and impressed and really, really amused. "I know who Jean Grey is. Like, everyone knows who Jean Grey is. Anyone who's ever seen a cartoon or read a comic or gone to a movie..."

[nola_jeangrey]

Suddenly, Katie laughed. She hadn’t met anyone yet who been excited and geeked-out about her other life! And because Hazel knew, suddenly it felt so much easier to bear. “Well, I’m front a very specific, like, universe? Like, I’ve met people I know who aren’t from where I’m from. This is so dumb, because I know people who are from comics you’ve read but I’m not. You really know Jean?” Katie had barely even known Jean until she realized she was Jean!

[nola_lucy]

"I grew up watching X-Men cartoons on Saturday mornings with my brother. Tons of the artists I follow on social media work in comics, or in concept art, and have drawn Jean either professionally or for fun. Yeah, I know Jean." This was so crazy! Her best friend was an actual superhero! "Wait. You know other people like us?" She'd been so caught up in everything going on with herself that she hadn't made the connection that there were others. Of course there were.

[nola_jeangrey]

“Oh my god, that’s so weird. But... kind of cool?” It wasn’t all, end of the world. At least. Not right now. “Well, I know other people like me. Only they’re all actual superheroes, I just fought an evil ancient god one time. Like, um, other X-Men? And Avengers?” She felt like the level of emotional drama from this information came across without her having to say that there was emotional drama.

[nola_lucy]

"Ahhhhhh!" Rusty had settled very nicely a little ways away from them, but flapped his wings and quacked loudly as he startled away from them when Hazel yelled. "Oh my god. Sorry, Rusty. But oh my god. The X-Men and the Avengers are in New Orleans. This is insane. And amazing. And I can't believe you've been dealing with this the whole time and didn't tell me!" It wasn't accusatory, just...shocked, mostly.

[nola_jeangrey]

“Sorry Rusty,” Katie chimed in, because it was only polite! “And I really did want to tell you. I just didn’t know how yet! It’s been a lot, all at once. Like, I found out, and then I posted about the movie that’s my life, and then I found all these people, and it was like, how do I say this and know you get it, you know?”

Katie gazed off into Narnia, smiling a little. “Don’t forget, I have wine too. Also, do you have a favourite superhero? Maybe they’re here. And I can introduce you. Make things good weird instead of weird-weird.”

[nola_lucy]

"No, I get it, it's just..." Hazel shook her head, laughing. "It's all so much. And you can't just say things like introduce me to my favorite superhero like that's a thing!" Even if it was a thing. "But I don't have a favorite, I don't think. Though I loved Storm so much when I was a kid, I wanted to control the weather and look as good as she did while doing it." Storm had served up so many great looks over the years. "I am feeling so many things, I might actually explode." Yet she still kept drinking coffee.

[nola_jeangrey]

“It’s all so much!” Katie agreed. “And now I have an ex-husband and a brother-in-law and god knows what else. Also, Dani’s a superhero. Also, it’s all so much!”

Katie handed Hazel her coffee and took out the bottle of wine. She didn’t have glasses, so she just opened the bottle and took a swig. Yes, that felt right. “No Storm sightings, sorry.”

[nola_lucy]

Hazel's eyes just kept getting wider and wider as Katie listed things. They were going to have a lot to discuss in depth sometime soon, when Hazel wasn't riding on no sleep and recent awareness and all kinds of emotions. "Okay. I'm just going to cross my fingers that she has her mohawk if I ever meet her, because I love that mohawk so much."

She paused as something suddenly occurred to her. "Wait, Kyle isn't someone you know, right?" Hazel was trying to replay Katie and Kyle meeting in her head to see if there was anything there except a best friend meeting a boyfriend and vice versa, but she came up empty.

[nola_jeangrey]

“Nope.” Katie would have noticed. “But there are people I don’t know who know me, from other worlds, so he might be someone? But he could also just be Kyle. So many people are someone else, Hazel.” It was comforting. It really was.

[nola_lucy]

"I wonder how I would find out. Or how I'm going to tell him about Lucy." Though really, that should be an if she told him about Lucy. Maybe. She didn't doubt she'd tell him eventually, because it was this whole big part of her now, but it could probably wait for a time she hadn't already dropped a huge thing on him the same day.

[nola_jeangrey]

“I don’t know if you to decide that right now,” Katie suggested, drinking more wine. “Like, you just had a big discovery. And you have to be sure he’ll believe you."

[nola_lucy]

"That's true." It took some people longer to believe. Lucy's siblings hadn't believed her about Narnia at first either, and Edmund had gone as far as to pretend he didn't believe, even when he'd seen it himself. "I'll just enjoy being Lucy and enjoy being in love separately for now." Despite making a rather practical decision, Hazel couldn't help grinning like a loon.

[nola_jeangrey]

“How did you know it was love?” Katie asked, leaning comfortably against Hazel. She was still looking at Narnia. She wanted to always come gaze at Narnia. “Like, how did that moment factor into this moment? The Lucy moment?"

[nola_lucy]

"It's like...if magic is real, then so is love." She'd always believed those things, but knowing was different. That was part of it, anyway. "And I loved Narnia. I can remember just being enchanted by Narnia and how that was different, how there was more to it later." Lucy had fought for Narnia and sacrificed for Narnia; it was a part of her, and it was home.

"And I don't know. Maybe I'm just remembering that it's important to say things when you can, because you never know how time is going to work or when you'll end up in a different world." Hazel shrugged a little. She tended to work from her heart more than her head anyway. "I just know that the first thing I wanted to tell him wasn't that I was Lucy, it was that I love him. So I did."

[nola_jeangrey]

“You know, that whole answer is exactly why I love you.” Hazel felt her feelings, and talked about her feelings, and painted her feelings. And it was the most beautiful thing in the world. “Kyle is so lucky to have you.”

[nola_lucy]

Hazel slipped her hand into Katie's and squeezed. "We're going away for a weekend together sometime soon, by the way. Like you suggested. Maybe you and Dani should come too. Get away from the complicated Jean bits and just be happy."

[nola_jeangrey]

“We can’t crash your hot weekend,” Katie protested. “But thank you. You’re right that I’m spending too much time on the complicated bits, though."

[nola_lucy]

"I mean, I'm not saying we would spend all our time with you two and not in our own room," Hazel pointed out with a smile, bumping their shoulders lightly together. "Maybe next time, though. You know, enjoy that for once we're four wheels instead of three. When we're gross, you and Dani can be gross right back."

[nola_jeangrey]

“I don’t know if Dani is a gross-in-public kinda girl. I don’t know if she even knows that about herself yet.” Katie smiled at Hazel. “And you and Kyle are so gross in public.”