December 6: Daria/Jane, Afternoon Date

[kinetic_elaboration]

Year of the OTP September prompt: “Date night gone wrong.” But I took a lot of liberties with “date night.”

Daria/Jane, established relationship, all parts of this verse on the tag “alternate esteemsters”

Some dialogue taken or adapted from Lane Miserables

~1,100 words in about 34 minutes

*

Daria knows that asking ‘are you sure we’re alone?’ is a good way to jinx this quiet afternoon at the Lanes.’ But she does it anyway. She just has to be sure. Whenever they’re by themselves, they end up making out. And if they’re by themselves in Jane’s bedroom, that’s fine, but in her living room, right next to her front door, one room away from the kitchen, around the corner from the stairs, where just anyone could walk by and see them..? 

“I’m sure,” Jane promises.

“What if we went upstairs and watched TV instead?”

“What if you let me play you this record instead?” Jane counters, kneeling down by the shelf of vinyl next to the busted TV. “I don’t have it on CD. You’ll like it.”

 

Daria sits back against the couch cushions and tries to actually relax. After a moment, Jane finds the record she wants, sets it playing with a gentle, rustling, sound and a brief skip, and then stands up again. She looks, to Daria’s surprise, a little nervous.

“Hmmm.”

“Hmmm?” Jane raises her eyebrows. She perches carefully just on the very edge of the couch, and Daria takes her hand and pulls her closer. Jane ends up falling, heavy, against her side, and then they’re slumped down against the cushions together, staring at each other face to face.

“Slower than I was expecting,” Daria answers.

Jane reaches out and gently traces her fingertip down Daria’s nose. “That’s because I’m trying to be romantic here.”

Daria is loathe to admit it might be working. Instead of answer, he starts to lean in, a breath away from kissing her, when she’s shocked to a perfect, wary, breath-held stillness by the whining sound of footsteps on stairs and then the creaking sound of an opening door, just there on the other side of the living room wall.

Her gaze flicks to the doorway, back to Jane. “We’re alone?”

Jane shrugs. “It’s probably ghosts.” She tries to lean in for that kiss again, but Daria pulls back, so that they’re touching now only where her fingers are still threaded through Jane’s hair. Like she forgot about her hand, like she’s afraid to move even enough to pull it back, and in that manner somehow give herself away.

She listens carefully, and hears the distinct noise of the freezer door opening.

“Are you sure your mom’s not home?” Daria asks.

“Um—mostly sure?”

She sounds not at all sure.

Another set of footsteps, on the stairs leading to the second floor, and Daria jumps all the way back to the other side of the couch. Jane sighs, and turns onto her back, still slumped uncomfortably low and now staring up at the ceiling. She doesn’t pay any attention to Trent, as he walks through the living room, and Trent pays no attention to either Jane or Daria, but heads straight toward the kitchen.

“I thought you said he was at rehearsal,” Daria whispers.

“I thought he was!” Jane throws up her hands, and then pulls herself into a less tortured position. “Maybe he’s running late.”

“Or early.”

From the kitchen, she hears Trent’s low voice ask, “What’s that? Cherry soda?”

Then Amanda Lane’s lilting, wafting, tone: “I think it’s strawberry syrup.”

Daria shoots Jane a look, and Jane at least has the shame to look abashed. “I really didn’t know they were here! I haven’t seen Mom in three days at least. She’s probably been living down in the basement.”

“I keep telling you, you have to check your basement for intruders at least once a day.”

Jane snorts, and the bit of smile she allows herself makes Daria want to smile too. “Intruders or unexpected parents.”

“Especially unexpected parents.”

Somehow, they’ve moved closer again. The self-aware part of Daria, and the self-preserving part, knows she should not be smiling at Jane Lane after they came so stupidly close to getting caught making out on her couch. After their afternoon alone has been revealed to be an afternoon with Amanda and Trent. But they could both be about to leave—to get lunch somewhere else, maybe, since they’ve clearly found nothing in their kitchen. And Jane is just so—pretty, when Daria looks at her up close.

She tilts her head, and Jane leans in—

Close enough that Daria can feel Jane’s breath against her lips—

And then the doorbell rings.

They jump apart again, and a moment later, the freezer door closes and Jane’s mother and brother are passing through the living room. Daria curls her hands around the couch cushion, digging her nails into the fabric as hard as she can. 

“Who can that be?” Amanda asks, and Daria adds to herself: so I can wring their neck.

Still, she follows Jane’s lead in leaning forward and craning her neck to watch the door as Amanda opens it.

She can’t quite make out who’s there, but she can hear Jane’s mother exclaim, “Wind! What an unexpected treat.”

Daria turns to glare at Jane, and finds that Jane won’t meet her eye. Instead, she stands up and starts to creep a little closer to the front entryway, like she’s driven by a morbid curiosity about why Wind of all people is here. Daria sighs heavily, and gets up and joins her.

“It’s so great to see everybody!” Wind is saying, as he pulls back from hugging Trent. “Mom, and Trent—and Janey!” He grabs her for a hug, too, which Jane decidedly does not reciprocate, scowling at him as he finally lets go. “And—” He stops short, brow furrowing as he tries to place Daria in his family tree. “Penny?”

“This is Daria. Penny’s in Costa Rica,” Jane corrects. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, I was hoping I could stay for a few days. I would have called first, but I had to clear out of the houseboat in a hurry.”

Jane raises a brow. “When tidal waves strike?”

“No, Katie and I are separating for a while.” He already sounds near tears, bursts into them completely, in a way that makes Daria’s shoulders inch awkwardly up closer to her ears, when his mother tries to comfort him. 

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” she soothes. “We’ve got plenty of room.”

“See?” Jane tries. “Plenty of room. The house is practically deserted!”

“Doesn’t look deserted to me,” Daria grumbles.

And from Jane’s other side, Trent mumbles a thoughtful, “Um…”

Jane deflates. “Uh oh.”

Trent looks down at his left palm, squints at some faint pen marks. “There are some phone messages I almost forgot about. Let’s see… Penny’s not in Costa Rica. She’s coming back, some kind of problem with a volcano. And Dad’s finished taking pictures of Celtic rock formations. He’s on his way back to print.”

Daria tries to catch Jane’s eye again, and actually manages it this time, sets the full force of her disapproval on her but Jane just shrugs. She tries to smile. “So… still up for hanging out in my room?”