Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Summer wasn’t quite established enough to warm up the cold Bay Area nights where the frigid sea wind ignored any lingering warmth from the sun and instead set cold into the bones of anyone foolish enough to go out without a jumper. And for that, Pearl was eternally grateful. True, she lived in Scar’s house with air conditioning now, but she couldn’t undo several years worth of conditioning in a few months, and Pearl had too many memories of sweltering Australian or Californian Summer nights where sweat would plaster sheets to her skin and the air felt like it was suffocating her, for her not to appreciate a cool night.

Maybe the size of her room amplified her awareness of the cold. She'd never had a room large enough to fit a queen-sized bed (‘Grian’s not that big, how am I supposed to fit in a queen-sized bed?’ she’d quipped when Tango and Impulse had moved the bed in for her, which had earned her several laughs and Grian starting every sentence with ‘lesbihonest’ for the next hour) and several desks, one piled high with work, the other laid out with pot plants in various states of health. She could hear the wind whistling outside her bedroom window and some shuffling outside her door, like the whole world was alive around her. It was that sort of feeling that had drawn her into studying the environment: the way humans wore paths into their landscapes, the fact that you could pick up a chunk of dirt anywhere in the world and there would be something alive in it without fail. It was reassuring to be surrounded by life, reminders that life was biochemical energy and energy meant taking action and doing things, even if they scared her.

She breathed in the dry air, enjoying the way the quarter moon bathed her bedroom in silver light, and let herself relax back onto her bed, counting all the things she had to be content about when there was a quiet tap at her door.

“Pearl?” Came Gem’s voice, thick with sleep and emotion. “Are you awake?”

“Yeah,” Pearl called, “come in.”

“I’m sorry to disturb you.” Gem opened the door the bare minimum required to let herself into the room, closing it and restoring Pearl’s wonderful silvery darkness. She was dressed in the same old pink pyjamas she’d had when her and Pearl had been roommates back in first year, though they were far more faded now. Her face was blotchy and red and Pearl couldn’t help but feel that it was slightly unfair that Gem managed to make the emotional mess look work for her.

“Aw, Gem, what’s wrong? What happened?” Pearl said, getting out of bed and wrapping an arm around Gem which she leant into, breathing shakily as she did.

“Had a nightmare,” she mumbled into Pearl’s shoulder. “Can I stay here for a bit?”

Pearl remembered long ago, when they’d first moved into their old place when Gem had told her that she was glad her bed and Pearl’s bed were up against the same wall, so when she’d had a nightmare she could press her ear against it and time her breathing with Pearl’s. They were across a hallway from each other now, taking that comfort away from Gem in a way that made knots form in Pearl’s stomach. She didn’t know how often Gem had nightmares, or what they were about. Seeing Gem in the day, you’d never know she was struggling with them.

“Yeah, c’mon.” Pearl got back into bed, lifting the covers up for Gem to lie next to her. “We’ll have a sleepover.”

Gem climbed into the bed next to Pearl, turning so they were looking at each other. Pearl did her best to ignore how close they were, the way she could feel Gem’s breath warming the air between them. 

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Pearl asked.

“I guess?” Gem replied, her eyes searching Pearl’s expression for something Pearl didn’t know how to give her.

“Well, what happened?” Pearl asked, determined to live up to her title as the pragmatic friend.

“It’s stupid really.” Gem said, and Pearl could understand that. She could remember several dreams that had seemed to make perfect logical sense while they were happening but the moment she woke up holes would start appearing in the story of it all.

“Dreams often are,” Pearl agreed. “Tell me about it anyway.”

“Well,” Gem said, burying her face in the pillow a little. “I lost the grant for the app and everyone got really angry at me and kicked me out.”

Pearl, to her credit, didn’t laugh, Gem was being vulnerable and that was basically Pearl’s greatest fear, so she wasn’t about to laugh at her for it. “Gem, I don’t think there’s a single thing you could possibly do to make us hate you.”

“Yeah, well, tell my subconscious that.” Gem laughed.

“Yeah, well.” Pearl said, letting them lapse into silence. If she’d been more awake, Pearl liked to think she'd have had more to say, but it was late and her pillow was comfortably luring her back into sleep and she was more captivated than she had any right to be by Gem’s sleepy expression. Pearl liked the idea that Gem felt better just being around her, it was comforting in a way she didn’t often let herself feel.

“Hey Pearl?” Gem said, her voice so quiet Pearl could barely hear it above the wind outside.

“Yeah?”

“Did you mean that? That you’d never hate me?” Gem sounded so small and Pearl was far too tired to fight the urge to wrap an arm around her.

“Yeah. Why? Did you secretly kill someone or something?” Pearl asked.

“Well, no,” Gem replied. “But I just never want to lose you.”

“Gem.” Pearl said, dead serious, probably more serious than she would have been if fully awake. “There is literally nothing you could possibly do that would make me hate you.”

“OK,” Gem said, taking a deep breath that made a few flyaway strands blow off Pearl’s face. “So, um, are you sure?”

“Yes,” Pearl was trying not to get exasperated. “Obviously-” And suddenly whatever Pearl had been about to say didn’t matter one bit because Gem was kissing her and every thought Pearl had ever had was stopped in their tracks and disintegrated.

Gem’s lips were soft and smelled faintly of one of the thousand strawberry chapsticks she kept strewn throughout her coat pockets, purses, and inside drawers that had no business housing one of Gem’s chapsticks.

Pearl would have been content to stay like that forever, but Gem pulled away almost as quickly as she’d rushed forwards.

“Sorry,” she said, really falling into the Canadian stereotype. “I can go now if-”

“No no no,” Pearl said, exerting as much self-control as she had to make sure she didn’t use her full grip strength as she grabbed Gem’s hand to keep her there. “We are not the boys. We don’t run away from our feelings like this. And that’s beside the point: I kissed you back! What made you think I didn’t want to do that?”

“Well, I just.” Gem paused, looking like a deer caught in headlights. “You never said- I never said. It’s been years! You mean I could have been kissing you all this time?”

“I mean, uh, yeah.” Pearl responded eloquently. “I mean, thank you for not doing it while I was freaking out to Grian about being into you but, it’s been a very long time since then.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Gem asked.

“Why didn’t you?” Pearl met Gem’s eyes, sparkling with mirth and they both burst into laughter. 

“We’re idiots.” Pearl groaned once she’d caught her breath. “Grian and I had an agreement not to meddle in each other’s love lives and I ruined that, and he’s been dropping hints that he was gonna do something to make me tell you and I just-”

“Oh my goodness that’s hilarious! Mumbo and Impulse have been saying the exact same stuff to me.” Gem said, falling back into laughter.

“Wait, Impulse knew about you as well?” Pearl was going to strangle him as soon as she was done laughing. “And he just lived with us tip-toeing around each other?”

“They’re going to be so smug when we tell them.” Gem said and her face fell. “We are dating or something now, right? I’m sorry if I assumed.”

“Stop panicking,” Pearl said, trying not to panic herself. “Yes, I’d love to be your girlfriend if that’s what you want as well.”

“Ok, ok good. Girlfriends.” Gem repeated, smiling once again. “But they are gonna be so smug.”

“Intolerably smug,” Pearl agreed. “Looking back it's almost funny how much they tore their hair out over how oblivious we were.”

“Oh yeah?” Gem said, her tone making Pearl shiver delightedly. “What if we pretended to be even more oblivious.”

“Ooh, that's basically evil. I love it. Like if they see us kiss and we’re just like, ‘that’s our best friends for life secret handshake, actually’.” 

“Oh my gosh, they’ll die!” Gem laughed. “Also what did you mean about your freak out when you realised you like me? Weren’t  you already out as queer?”

“Yeah, but I’m on the ace and aro spectrums so it had been a seriously long time since I’d felt anything like that. I drove Grian up the wall asking if I was still valid.” Pearl smirked at the memory, Grian hadn’t been much better, always trying to get Mumbo’s attention with some new, stupid prank.

“Oh, OK,” Gem said, “With the ace and aro stuff is there anything I should know? Like stuff you don’t wanna do or anything?”

“I’ll let you know if it comes up, but if it’s you I think I’m alright,” Pearl said.

“Aw that’s really sweet.” Gem reached out to stroke Pearl’s cheek.

“I take it back, I’m never sweet or nice and don’t you forget it,” Pearl said, ruining the message by leaning forwards again and connecting their lips in a kiss.

Chapter Text

In a move Grian would forever deny if he was asked, he waited with Gem at the front door for Pearl and Scar to come home. And if he jumped up like an excited puppy at the sound of a car door opening and closing then that was between him and Gem, who’s reaction had been just as embarrassing as his own. But unlike Gem, he had no shame in throwing himself into Scar’s lap, only remembering to give him enough warning to engage the brake at the last second.

“Why hello there!” Scar said, wrapping his arms around Grian so Grian could disengage the brake and wheel them both inside. “Did you miss me?”

“What? No!” Grian replied, definitely not leaning back into Scar and letting his responding laugh reverberate in his own chest. He could see Pearl saying something to Gem and Gem heading back inside but it was hard to make out what they had said over the sound of Scar pressing kisses to his cheek and jaw. But he could see the dopey smile Pearl got on her face as Gem left.

“I am begging you,” he said, “just ask her out already.”

“I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Pearl shot back.

“Oh come off it,” Grian said, “I’ve got half a mind to lock you both in one of Scar’s creepy robotic bathrooms until you’ve kissed.”

“Those bathrooms lock from the inside,” Pearl replied, “and besides, you might be willing to risk friendships for stupid pranks, but I wouldn’t risk Gem’s friendship for anything.”

“Hey!”

“That actually worked out pretty well for Grian from where I’m sitting,” Scar pointed out.

“I couldn’t agree more.” Grian said, turning around so he could kiss Scar back. 

“Gross, if that’s what being in a relationship is like then I’m glad I haven’t asked her.” Pearl mimed throwing up onto the lawn.

“That’s not what you said in first year when you were asking me every five minutes if you were still valid because you wanted to-” Grian began.

“OK that’s enough of that,” Pearl said. “You may have no shame but I seem to have gotten your fair share of it as well, so we will not be talking about any of the things I told you in confidence back then.”

“Fine, fine, but it really wasn’t that bad, I mean I’m sure I mentioned way worse back then, like remember when-”

“Absolutely not! No. If you will stop this topic of conversation I will go ask Gem out right now.” Pearl begged.

“Wait really?” Grian narrowed his eyes, if it had really been that easy she would have offered that deal ages ago. Grian knew schemes, and Pearl had a scheme face on.

“Not a chance,” she said.

“Ok, so can I get the rest of that story please?” Scar asked and he said it in such a polite tone that Grian almost forgot how thoroughly Pearl was going to murder him for telling Scar the story.

“OK so, its just after exams and Pearl pulls me aside at the Lounge and asks me to explain to her what's so great about se-”

“Grian! I will tell Scar about the dawn dishsoap thing.”

“Never mind, shutting up right away.” Somehow that threat was worse than murder.

Impulse handed Gem his drawings for the UI of her app, he hated coding anything if it was just going to go to waste, so Gem got his strange coloured pencil drawings until it was all approved. Still, she took it with a smile and couldn’t help but grin back. True, living with two idiots who were clearly in love with each other wasn’t easy, but he’d had plenty of practice with Grian and Mumbo, and Zedaph and Tango if you went back far enough, but it was nice having Mumbo, Grian, and Scar around to commiserate with and he was beginning to see the first sign of hope he’d had in a long time.

“So,” he said, doing his best to sound subtle, but neither Gem nor Mumbo fell for it, both of them looking at him with alarming speed. Was he really that obvious? “I went to go find you for lunch earlier and I went looking in your room and it was really dusty.” He began, because it was important to give context before jumping in with the inevitable question. “And, uh, when I did find you, you were in Pearl’s room. Is, uh, is something going on there?”

Impulse made eye contact with Mumbo who was sitting up so straight in his chair Impulse was tempted to make a joke about his back being out of touch with his sexuality when Gem spoke with a wide smile.

“Oh yeah! I’ve been having a lot of trouble with nightmares lately and since I don’t share a wall with Pearl anymore I can’t just listen to her breathing like I used to so I asked if I could have a sleepover with her.” Gem was still smiling and Impulse really wasn’t sure how he was supposed to react to this.

“And she doesn’t mind at all! She just moves over and we snuggle.” Gem sighed which really just highlighted how much Impulse was holding his breath. “Pearl really is such a great friend. I mean, I have no idea what I’ve done to deserve her friendship but it must have been pretty great.”

“Gem, you are quite seriously killing us here,” Mumbo said, “I think Impulse is turning blue.”

Gem tilted her head and gave Impulse her lost puppy eyes. “Impulse, you need to breathe.”

“Yeah, I’ll get right on that.” He replied. That was it, Impulse was going to fade backwards into the shrubbery like in that one meme. Goodbye cruel world.

Impulse should have been used to this shit by now. Gem had never actually said anything explicitly about liking Pearl, but Impulse could read between the lines, hell those lines were so far apart even Mumbo could read between them. But when Gem set a boundary she set it clearly, and whenever Impulse or Mumbo had tried to get her to say something, anything, that would explicitly say that she liked Pearl she shut it down and wouldn;t turn back into her usual sunshiny self until the topic had been thoroughly dropped. He could only hope that dinner that night would be at least slightly less rage inducing. 

Impulse couldn’t help but watch Gem and Pearl over dinner. They were sitting next to each other, so close that their arms brushed together when one of them reached for the salt, despite the large size of Scar’s ridiculous marble dining table. Part of Impulse wanted to yell at them, but the calmer part of him wanted to take a photo so he could preserve this moment as evidence that the two of them were idiots. Nobody smiles like that at someone they aren’t in love with. And Impulse would know, having gotten his romantic nonsense out of the way three years ago.

And hadn’t it been embarrassing to have assumed that Tango and Zedaph had spent all their time together making out and not talking about their feelings for the person who had brought them together? Impulse still felt the dull ache of embarrassments past when he considered the two weeks he’d spend feeling sorry for himself in Grian and Mumbo’s dorm when he could have been showered with affection from his boyfriends.

Zed was talking to Grian and Impulse made a mental note to stop being annoyed with Gem and Pearl and to instead pay attention to Zed.

“So we’ve been doing this huge unit on sleep, they let us read the sleep study reports and we had to read up on the effect of sleeplessness on the mind and body,” Zedaph was saying.

“Do they have any information on nightmares?” Gem asked from across the table.

“You haven't been having more of those have you?” Pearl asked immediately.

“No, not since we started our sleepover,” Gem smiled, “but when you eventually kick me out, I’d like to be prepared.”

“As if I would!” Pearl said, “you’re my best friend in the whole world, I’m not leaving you to suffer.”

Tango made a strangled noise on Impulse’s left which just about summed up how Impulse was feeling as well.

“Aw Pearl! You’re the bestest friend ever,” Gem said, reaching around to give Pearl a hug. Impulse turned to look at Tango and saw his own frustration reflected back. Tango had helped them all move into their old place. He’d literally built Gem and Pearl’s beds so they shared a wall. Impulse took a deep breath and homped Tango had the sense to mirror it.

“Well, er-” Zed said, but Pearl and Gem had devolved into Pearl ruffling Gem’s hair and the both of them laughing. Tango’s chair made an awful scraping noise as he stood up and walked out of the room.

“It’s my turn.” Impulse told Zed who went to follow Tango.

“What do you mean ‘turn’?” Scar asked.

“When you date someone as hot-headed as Tango,” Zed explained, “you find yourself incredibly grateful to be part of a polycule, and therefore not the only person responsible for going after him.”

Impulse chuckled at that, “You should’ve seen him in high school. Before he had the sense to get up and walk away it was a mess. I’m just gonna go ask him if he needs anything, but mostly he just calms himself down and comes back when he’s ready.” Impulse told Scar. “He’s working on the anger issues, but the point isn’t to make the anger go away, its about giving him the tools to experience his anger without hurting himself or others.”

“He’s also the only person here besides Scar who isn't in crippling debt and can afford to go to therapy,” Grian pointed out.

“That too,” Zedaph agreed, “the rest of us can just be a bit traumatised, I guess.”

Chapter Text

Pearl exchanged a guilty look with Gem. Sure, there had been something very entertaining about playing footsie with Gem under the table while she referred to her as her ‘best friend in the entire world’. But even if it was true, they hadn’t meant to actually upset anyone. And as much as Zed reassured them both that Tango was fine, and even though it wasn’t technically a lie, Gem was at least as close to being her best friend as Grian was, she just had other feelings for Gem as well, but she still felt bad.

Pearl could remember the first time this had happened with Tango. They were freshly moved in to their old place and Tango had very kindly moved their stuff over in a trailer he’d attached to a quad bike , and was putting together some furniture for them while Pearl tried to repair the bookshelves some old lady had been more than keen to get rid of at a yard sale. Pearl was pretty sure Tango had hit his thumb with a hammer or had misread the particularly awful and very old ikea instructions and had sworn so loudly Pearl had jumped a little (and being the group’s token Australian, it took a particularly violent swear to get her to have any sort of reaction). And had marched himself out the door without another word, quickly followed by Impulse. 

“Sorry,” Tango had said when he’d come back, “I er-” Tango cut himself off. “You know how toxic masculinity teaches men that the only way they can express their emotions is with violence?”

“Yeah?” Gem said. She had kindly come downstairs to help fish a splinter out of Pearl’s hand after Tango’s outburst. 

“Well toxic masculinity is also known as ‘my dad’. But I’m working on it, I just need to not be around people when it get frustrated ‘coz I don’t wanna hurt anyone.” Tango looked at the ground as he spoke.

“Well, your dad sounds crap and I am not above glitter bombing him,” Pearl told him, the offer hanging in the air. “But props to you for cycle-breaking.”

“And I’m sorry I scared you, I didn’t mean for you to drop your hammer on your finger,” Gem said, which made Pearl’s head spin. Gem did that?

“Thanks,” he said, still not really meeting their eyes. “There’s a reason I basically lived at Impy’s house when we were in school.”

Pearl could tell Gem was thinking about that same conversation, she reached across and squeezed Pearl’s hand. Yeah ok, the jig was up. Mumbo and Scar cleared away the plates in a disgustingly romantic fashion so by the time Tango came back inside, the kitchen was clean and they were exchanging kisses over the countertops. 

“Hey, um Tango?” Pearl said. “We owe you an apology.”

“Nah.” Tango waved it off, “you’re all good. I’m sorry I got all wound up, it’s been a rough week.” 

Normally they would have let Tango launch into the story of whatever nonsense various clients had gotten up to at the garage, but Gem spoke.

“No, we owe all of you a bit of an apology. Pearl has been my girlfriend for the last two weeks.”

Pearl baulked at how plainly she’d said it, but her reaction was quickly overshadowed by everyone else at the table.

“I’m sorry what?” Was Zedaph’s rather restrained response.

“You have got to be joking,” Mumbo said, sounding rather exhausted.

Tango had just let out a sort of tired-sounding chuckle. “Of course you are.”

“That checks out,” Scar said, wrapping an arm around Grian who was shouting at them.

“Finally!!” Grian crowed.

“You made me live with your pining for two years and then decide to tell us you’ve finally gotten together like this?” Impulse groaned. “I don’t know what I expected from Grian’s best friend.”

“Actually it was Gem’s idea,” Pearl told him, reaching over to press a chaste kiss to Gem’s hair in appreciation of her brilliance. 

“Gem?” Impulse said, giving Gem a look of complete and utter betrayal. “Sweet Gem did this?”

Gem just grinned back at them, her sharp smile reminding Pearl exactly why she had raced over to Grian in first year. She looked over at him and he smirked, Pearl had a sinking suspicion he was thinking the same thing.

“Hey Gem,” Grian said, “did Pearl tell you about the full on gay crisis she had in first year over you?”

“She did,” Gem said and Grian’s face fell as Pearl’s feeling of relief rose. “But I’m sure she left out the embarrassing details, so feel free to tell it again.” Nevermind Pearl made awful choices.

“Ok so you know the turtle in a pond metaphor?” Grian said, only for everyone but Pearl to look at him like he’d just announced that he was going to be celibate and give up pranking for the rest of his life. “Right. Er, so the idea is that it’s really hard for people to define the absence of something, like asexuality or aromanticism, because if you’ve seen turtles in your pond you know there are turtles in your pond, right?”

“Love, what does this have to do with sexual orientation?” Mumbo asked.

“I’m getting to it!” Grian said impatiently. “But if you have a pond and you’ve never seen a turtle you don’t know that there aren’t any turtles, because you might have missed them, or looked at the wrong time or something. Anyway the point is, if a twenty-one year old Australian with control issues comes up to you in a panic because she thinks her aroace label might not be valid anymore, you have to remind her that the label is there as a tool to describe the pond, not a label to tell the pond and the turtles what to do. And some ponds only have turtles when exactly the right conditions are met, or just very rarely and all of those are valid ponds as well. I mean, you don’t call Scar gay just because he has two boyfriends, he’s still pan regardless of who he’s dating, you know?”

“I hate that I understood all of that,” Pearl said.

“And yet I seem to recall you were very grateful the first time around,” Grian shot back.

“Screw you, I was emotionally vulnerable,” Pearl replied.

“You love me.” Grian grinned.

“Unfortunately.”

“Not as much as she loves me, though!” Gem said with a smile. “I'm so glad I finally kissed you.”

“Wait, Gem was the one to actually make a move?” Tango said, looking at them both with wide eyes, like he was waiting for this to be another prank.

“Yep,” Pearl popped the ‘p’. “She just up and kissed me.”

“Ok show of hands,” Mumbo said, “who was betting on Pearl being the one to make the first move.”

Every hand save Pearl’s was raised.

“Gem, put your hand down,” Pearl said.

“But you’re so practical, I thought if you had feelings for me you would have done something about them already.” Gem toyed with Pearl’s ponytail.

“Not when it comes to you apparently.”

Grian mimed throwing up into a nearby monstera. Snorting when he was Pearl flip him the finger in retaliation. “What? You’re allowed to go on about how gross we all are, but the minute I do it back, it’s nothing but rudeness? Typical.”

“Grian, Grian, Grian, if I’ve had to announce my presence every time I come close to entering a shared space to avoid seeing something I don’t wanna see, then I’m entitled to call you gross as often as I want to.” Pearl told him as though she was a teacher and he was a particularly thick student.

“That was one time! And Scar put his shirt back on-” Grian objected before being cut off by Pearl.

“The fact that you need to ‘that was one time’ me, proves my point.” Pearl said, smirking as Grian pulled a face at her, his way of conceding that he didn’t have a good comeback for her.

Pearl couldn’t help but feel unbelievably smug as Gem wrapped an arm around hers. Her skin was so soft and gentle, Pearl could sympathise with the animals that Gem always seemed to be able to lure into her hands. They got it. And the fact that Gem was clearly some kind of fairytale princess that had somehow ended up being born in Canada 24 years ago was a secret between Pearl and the animals.

“Hang on a minute? Did Grian just accuse me of having control issues?” Pearl said, only realising as she looked back on their conversation.

“Pearl, I love you, but that wasn’t name-calling, that was stating facts.” Gem told her soothingly.

“Gem? Gem betrayed me? Oh this is too much for my little heart to take. Scar, tell Gem I loved her.” Pearl dropped to the floor, which was a difficult task to complete with Gem clinging to one of her arms and laughing.

Scar rolled his eyes affectionately. “Somehow, I think you’ll find it in your heart to forgive her.”

“Yeah, I mean, you got over that time she hid a duck in your spaghetti, so this is nothing.” Impulse agreed.

“Wait, that was Gem? Gem did that?”