Chapter Text
It’s supposed to be her birthright. Her destiny, her heritage, her legacy. All that and whatever other crap the greater powers-that-be lay on as thick as the layer of snow they scattered over parts of Canada nine days ago.
It’s not that Lou doesn’t like it—it’s fine. The lights are soft, and things are never unexpected. Maybe that’s why she hates it. Hates the way each tick winds her insides a little tighter; hates the way she sees so much of everything, but can’t touch anything. Breaks and shatters for the realization that nobody will ever touch her—not really. Not here.
Her existence is meticulous in the ways that she loves—
the way the cogs and gears slot together as they turn;
repetitive in all the ways that drive her mad.
Keeping time will be the death of her.
Not in the ways that would mean she gets to find a peaceful moment of her own. Just in all the ones that will turn her into a shell, empty and hollow as her father; weathered and grey and echoing through the halls.
The shift is especially bothersome today—the extra piece of a leap year. The dialsprings don’t like it. They like routine and order. She feels their groan deep in her chest while she forces them into line for an extra turn.
That’s when Lou sees her for the first time—when her heartbeat is momentarily out of sync with the mechanical extensions of herself; when it’s all just a little off-kilter. Sees her slipping through the shadows; sliding between the delineations of the minute hand, just-just in-time with the second-hand; wrapping the hours around her body while she whispers into diamond-laden ears, leaves lipstick smudges on white collars, nicks bills and magpie-treasures and sips bourbon, bending space to her will.
She shouldn’t be able to do that.
Mortals aren’t supposed to know how to do that anymore.
Unless—unless.
*
It’s hours before she can step away. Leap years are like that—especially finicky. Hours before she’s sure the gears will stay aligned for their full rotation, and by then she’s almost convinced herself she didn’t see what she saw at all. But if there hadn’t been anything to see, she wouldn’t have seen it. That’s the thing.
But when she finally can take her hands off for a little while, when the gears have settled back into themselves, she circles down the staircase. Wanders through the labyrinth of stone walls and plush carpets, follows the light from brass wall sconces, to the library. With all the dead philosophers upstairs one would think the place would be busy. As it is, there’s never anybody else around but Lou. Philosophy is for the living.
She knows there was something here, God, years ago. Knows she came across it during her studies—is sure of it. It takes her an hour meticulously rooting through the annals, wishing she could tear the books off the shelves, the pages from their bindings until they’re confetti falling around her. Not like anybody would be likely to ever notice if she did, with the frequency anybody else comes in here. But nonetheless.
Weavers.
And there it is.
Benders of time: With the turn of the century and science finding favour with the elite, their craft came to be thought of as witchcraft.
Most prominent of these bloodlines were the Ocean’s, blazing through space and time; leading revolutions; earned their name and note for the way they bow time out in waves—the space between minutes crashing over in their regular intervals making the bends almost indiscernible to even the trained observer. The Becker’s followed behind; never as powerful, equally as cunning.
Slowly, the Benders of Time were chased underground, eventually dying out.
None have been seen in millennia.
And yet—and yet.
*
Lou learned to be alone a long time ago, right from the beginning, really.
She’s never known anything else.
That makes it easy.
Or, it makes dreaming of anything else abstract.
And abstract is easier to push to the back of her mind than concrete.
It isn’t a bad place to be on her own, all things considered. The tower is hers, and hers alone, with its deep mahogany floors, and fan-vaulted ceiling, walls made up of the cogs and dialtrains, weights and counterweights that keep everything turning on the right axis. She likes the floor-to-ceiling windows too. Can see for light years into light years reflecting off the gleaming brass of the gears and shimmer around the room.
She can’t see Earth all the time. Which makes it even easier. Can only see through the space between where and there when things there don’t quite align the way she’s set them; when something pushes back against the rhythms she keeps. She feels the dissonance deep inside her chest, her lungs, her legs. Feels so, so heavy until she can set them right again.
She watches her, and that’s fine because she can’t see her all the time and so it doesn’t distract from her work.
Mostly, Lou can see her at night, in high-high heels, and red lips, and short cocktail dresses weaving through back alleys and side streets, in and out of back entrances and emergency exits and the inhales between moments, lit up by neon signs.
Time is more malleable when the sun isn’t up—always has been. The cover of dark makes things more fluid, less linear. It isn’t something humans imagine—the blurred edges and hazy shadows. Lou sees her most clearly during the midnight shift between days; sometimes at noon’s reset, but only her outline, just the shape of her. Just the way she holds her paintbrush with a loose hand; long, dark, hair almost-nearly piled on top of her head; eyebrows furrowed in concentration. The way she’s on her own—almost always. The way her painter’s shirt hangs off of her with rolled sleeves, otherwise her hands would disappear entirely in the length.
She knows it’s her.
And she knows she’s beautiful with barely-tamed brown waves falling from their twist, halfway down her back, and scandalous brown eyes, wrapped up in flannel and moments and pure willpower.
*
She’s curious.
So, Lou watches.
Watches the way she seems to push her body to the brink of utter exhaustion—falling into her bed still wearing her make-up, heels scattered across her bedroom floor. Wonders what she looks like waking up; wonders if she drinks coffee; wonders if she ever really sleeps at all but she can’t see those things because they fall into the lines that time creates for them.
So, she watches what she can.
For now it’s enough.
Honestly, she’s been by herself for so long that she isn’t even sure her voice still works.
Isn’t sure she remembers how to use it.
The pressure in her chest bubbles in the way she’s become accustomed to after shift one night.
The time between 1:45am and 1:46am bending out, second ticking in their usual place, and she sees her weaving through the seconds crashing down in-time—an Ocean—and then bending just a little further, a steady hand reaching through the new space to pick an over-stuffed wallet from the pocket of a smarmy trust-find boy in the dark corner of a club in Brooklyn called Nine's that has a disco ball made to look like a pool-table ball casting ribbons of orange, and white light around the place. There’s just a little more space than there usually is, and Lou can’t resist.
Slides through the slats into thumping bass, and haze, and sticky floors and bodies throwing off heat. Can smell her perfume coming up behind her.
“I saw that, you know.”
“Saw?”
“Yes. That.”
“People don’t see thinks that aren’t there.”
“No. People don’t.”