Chapter Text
There's a crash against the door and Raven looks up as it's followed by a loud giggle. She can hear Charles fumbling his keys, trying to get it unlocked. She's been watching television, dressed only in her nightgown and not bothering to hide her natural blue form.
Charles peeks his head around the door before opening it fully, his eyes widening when he sees her lounging on the couch. He shakes his head quickly at her while trying to block his companion from seeing inside. "Raven!" he says through gritted teeth.
She rolls her eyes in annoyance. With a glance at the television screen, Raven shifts form just before the girl Charles has been trying to delay in the hallway pushes past him. She stumbles to a stop, staring.
"Hello," Raven waves. Instead of her nightgown, she's now wearing Cathy Gale's leather outfit and kinky boots, her skin pale and her hair blonde.
The girl turns back to Charles. "Hey, I don't do threesomes."
"Wha--" he sputters. "No, no. That's my sister."
The girl look between them, raising an eyebrow. "Your sister?"
"Yes," Charles insists, placing a hand on the girl's arm to try and guide her towards his room. "Don't mind her. It's just this way."
The girl is still staring at Raven. Raven gives her the most seductive smile she can and tilts her head to the side. Charles is glaring daggers at her from behind the girl's back, but smooths his expression into a smile that he must think is both reassuring and sexy as soon as she turns back towards him.
"Look," the girl says, pulling away from Charles and taking a step back towards the door. "I'm just gonna go. You... have fun, or whatever it is you do, with your sister."
"No wait--" Charles tries, but the girl is already out the door, disappearing down the hallway. He finally closes the door and thumps his forehead against it, then does it again a few times before turning around to glare at Raven. "What was that for?"
She crosses her legs, lounging back into the cushions. "Do you like the boots? I think I might keep them."
"Raven," he chides.
"Charles," she sing-songs back at him.
"You did that on purpose."
"You didn't tell me you were going out," Raven says, shifting back to her natural form. Usually Charles comes back after class to pick her up before going out, but he's been out without her for the past two weekends in a row and Raven's feeling distinctly left out and annoyed about it. She hasn't given him any reason to leave her behind. She's an excellent wing-woman; she makes sure he directs his attention towards the girls at the bar and that he doesn't get drunk enough to start trying to chat up the boys as well, and when he gets rejected she walks him home and offers sympathetic pats on the shoulder. She is, in his own words, the grooviest sister ever and she hasn't given him any reason to ignore her.
“I didn’t realize you were my keeper,” he snaps at her.
Raven glares at him. “You could have told me. I might have wanted to go.”
Charles flops down onto the other end of couch, pushing her legs out of the way. “I don’t have to tell you everything,” he says. “You don’t like going with me to pubs anyway.”
That’s a bit rich since Charles always demands she tell him everything. He hasn't tried to read her mind since she'd told him to stop when she was fourteen, but he somehow manages to know when she's hiding anything from him anyway and pesters her until she finally gives in. Charles has clearly forgotten that she’s not the overbearing one in this relationship. Raven nudges at his leg with her toes, earning an annoyed look from Charles as he pushes her away again. “I like going when you’re not acting like a drunk slag,” she says.
Charles’ annoyed frown turns into a glare, and this time he actually puts some strength behind it when he pushes her away. “I am not,” he protests.
Raven kicks him before pulling her knees towards her side of the couch. “You’ve been slurring your words since you walked in,” she points out snidely.
“No I haven’t,” Charles insists. Raven raises one eyebrow pointedly, one of the seemingly useless tricks her mutation allows her but that she’s grateful for at times like this. Charles frowns, brow wrinkling thoughtfully. “Well, okay. I might have had a bit to drink but my judgement is in no way impaired and I’m not a slag. That’s an awful thing to call your brother.”
“Except when it’s true,” Raven says.
Charles doesn’t argue further. Instead he turns to look at the television. “What are you watching?”
“Avengers. That’s where I got the boots.”
He squints at the screen. “What are they doing now?”
“I don’t know,” Raven says. “I just missed the last ten minutes. Someone brought a girl home and distracted me.”
“Ugh.” Charles slumps towards her, draping himself across her legs and laying his head on her thigh. He watches the show silently for a minute, before saying “I don’t know why you like watching the telly. It’s all…” He gestures vaguely in the air before saying, “fake.”
“Of course it’s fake, it’s the telly,” she says. “It’s supposed to be fake. They’re acting.”
The laugh track starts and Charles’ brow wrinkles up again. “But they’re not even funny. What was the joke?”
Raven pats his head. “It’s not funny if you have to explain it,” she says. Charles has never understood the jokes on television, or any other emotion from an actor on screen, really. He always says it’s because they’re recorded and don’t have thoughts to go with them, but he doesn’t like the theater either because the actors’ thoughts never match up with the part they’re playing.
After a few more minutes of Charles complaining about the show and television in general and resting more and more of his weight on top of her, Raven nudges his shoulder and pushes him back upright before standing herself. “Come on,” she says, taking his hands and pulling him off the couch. “Time for bed.”
Charles stumbles as she pulls him up, but doesn’t protest as Raven pushes him into the bathroom and hands him a toothbrush. He’s definitely drunker than he seemed when he first got home; normally he doesn’t let her mother him like this. Raven gets him into bed, then goes back to find that the show is over and there’s a commercial for laundry detergent playing.
She switches the television off and looks around the dim apartment. It’s not very late--Charles must have gotten an early start at the pub--but there’s really nothing else to do.
She sighs, and goes to bed.
---
A week later Raven is well and truly bored of being bored. She’s spent the last six years trailing after Charles as he completes his higher education without minding much--Charles was always so much younger than the other students that he’d turned to Raven for any companionship. They'd also stayed in New York, where she knew her way around and everything was familiar. Now though, they're in a foreign country--Charles might have spent enough time here as a child that he never got rid of the accent, but even he hasn't been back since the Blitz--and with Charles working on his doctorate he's been increasingly leaving her behind for peers that he actually fits in with. She keeps finding herself with nothing to do but wait for him.
Raven’s never been fond of waiting.
“You could take some classes,” Charles suggests, when she complains to him about it.
“In what? You know I hate school,” Raven says. With the grades she had in high school she’s unlikely to get accepted even if she tried.
“Philosophy? Or English?” Charles suggests. He winces at the flat look Raven levels at him. “You might like English Lit. But it's a lot of reading.”
“No.”
“Well…” Charles frowns thoughtfully, “what about a job?"
Which is how Raven winds up at the White Elephant pub, enquiring about the help wanted sign in the window. It’s early in the afternoon and the pub is empty apart from the man doing inventory behind the bar.
“Hello,” Raven calls. The man looks up, which is when she realizes he’s younger than she first thought, probably close to Charles' age. “Hi,” she says again, waving at him and walking further into the room. Her heels clack on the floor and she wonders if she should have worn a different skirt. She’d been planning to try asking for work at the bookstore--Charles' suggestion--so her outfit is more conservative than what she'd usually wear at the pub. “You’re hiring?” she asks.
“Oh, yeah,” he says, setting the notepad he’s been writing in down on the bar. “We need a new waitress.”
“I can do that,” Raven says, giving him a wide smile. She never waited tables before, but she’s pretty sure she could. Take order, deliver food, collect tip. How hard can it be?
He looks her up and down with a slight frown. “Are you a student?”
Raven shakes her head. “Do I need to be for this job?”
“It’s better that you’re not, actually,” he says. “The last girl walked out yesterday because she had to study for finals.” He says it like he thinks it's silly that the girl was even taking classes to begin with, but Raven's willing to overlook the attitude if it gets her the job.
“Oh, well, that won’t be a problem for me." She smiles at him, trying to seem eager but not too eager. She doesn’t want to come across as desperate for the work, especially since she really isn’t; Charles' inheritance is more money than the two of them could ever spend. The bartender is looking at her thoughtfully, so Raven walks the rest of the way to the bar and holds out her hand. “My name’s Raven.”
He shakes her hand. “Ken,” he says.
“Pleasure to meet you,” she replies primly.
“Indeed,” he says, smiling at her. “Have you ever waitressed before?”
“Of course,” Raven lies. “And I can start immediately.” That part’s true, at least.
Ken still looks thoughtful, so Raven keeps smiling. “You’re American?” he asks.
“Oh, um, yes,” Raven nods. She hadn’t expected him to ask about her accent, especially since Oxford had a decent number of foreign students. “Why?” she asks cautiously.
“Do you have a work visa?”
“Uh…” Raven scrambles for an excuse; she hadn’t even considered being asked for a visa. “I do, of course I do, I just don’t have it with me right at this moment. I can come back with it, if you want.” Maybe she can bring Charles back with her and he can make Ken think she has a visa. He's done similar things before to keep people from asking questions about her, up to and including rewriting his own mother's memories.
Ken’s not buying it. “Right. Well, you could do that,” he tone says that he clearly doesn’t believe her about the visa. “Or I can give you a trial run tonight, and if you do alright I can just pay you cash. Under the table. I wouldn’t normally,” he adds quickly. “But I really need someone sooner rather than later.” He grins at her. “And you seem like the type who wouldn’t turn me in.”
“Of course I wouldn’t,” Raven assures him. “So, I've got the job?”
“Come back at half past four. We’ll see how tonight goes.” Ken’s smile is a bit mischievous, and Raven grins back at him.
---
Raven arrives back at the pub exactly two minutes early. This time she’s wearing a miniskirt and boots, and Ken looks her up and down approvingly before handing her a little apron to wear around her waist. There’s a pocket for pens and a notepad to write down orders. She ties it and then twirls around, arms held akimbo. “Do I look the part?”
Ken laughs. “Quite. Come on, I’ll show you how to work the till.” He leans over her shoulder, standing just a bit too close, as he shows her which keys to press and how to print a receipt. She must still look uncertain, because he pats her on the shoulder and assures her, “Don’t worry, I’ll walk you through the first couple and you’ll have it down in no time.”
Ken eventually hands her two pints and points her towards one of the booths. “They’ve already ordered their first round, so you can take the drinks over and see if they want anything else.”
Raven dutifully carries the drinks and sets them down in front of the two men in the booth, trying to recall and mimic all the waitresses she’s ever seen. She gets through the first two hours fairly well before Charles shows up.
She doesn't see him until she's already halfway over to the booth he's grabbed. She rests a hand on her hip when she stops next to the table. "What are you doing here?"
Charles gives her an overly dramatic hurt look, hand over his heart. "I can't just come see my little sister at her first job?"
She rolls her eyes. "Not without an ulterior motive. Who's your date?" She nods her head at the boy sharing the booth with Charles. He looks tall, dark, and broody, she thinks, leaning back in his seat, one elbow propped on the table and a cigarette dangling from two fingers. So, man instead of boy, and exactly Charles' type.
The man starts sputtering denials, drops his cigarette in his lap, and begins a frantic attempt to brush it off onto the floor before he burns a hole through his pants. Charles watches him fondly. "This is Daniel," he says, waving a hand to gesture between Daniel and Raven. "Danny, this is my sister, Raven."
She sticks a hand out towards Daniel, though she's fairly sure she won't see him again after this evening. "Pleasure," she says.
Daniel finally seems to have gathered himself and shakes her hand firmly. "Uh… nice to meet you too," he says. "Charles didn't mention that his sister worked here. Or that he had a sister."
"Of course I did," Charles says. "Today's her first day," he adds, before Raven gets a chance to. He grins up at her, excited. "So how's it going? Is your boss nice? Did you get a lot of tips from horny college boys?"
"Good, yes, and obviously," Raven answers. "That’s what this skirt is for. And I expect a big tip from you as well."
Charles looks affronted. "Why would I tip you? The money’s just going to go right back into the same account.”
She crosses her arms and glares down at him. "Because I'm an excellent waitress and I deserve a tip.”
"You haven't even brought us our drinks yet," Charles points out.
Raven shrugs. "I don't see how that matters."
Charles rolls his eyes, but pulls out his wallet. He pinches a five pound note between two fingers, and holds it up to her.
"You can do better than that,” Raven tells him.
He grumbles but swaps the five for a twenty, which Raven happily plucks from his hand. "Thank you very much, sir,” she drawls, mimicking Charles’ accent as she tucks the money into her apron. She turns to Daniel to ask, "And what can I get you to drink?"
Daniel has been watching her and Charles, looking a bit bemused. "Just a pint," he says.
She turns to walk away and Charles calls after her, "Hey! You didn't ask what I wanted. I'll have to take that tip back.”
Raven twirls back to face him, tilts her head, and taps two fingers against her temple. "Scotch on the rocks, top shelf," she says with a smirk.
Charles laughs as she spins back around and heads towards the bar.
---
By the end of the night Raven’s feet are killing her, but she has a nice stack of cash tucked into her apron and Ken takes more out of the till for her. She hops up onto a barstool to count it out.
After a few minutes, Ken pushes a glass across the table towards her. “What is it?” she asks.
“Radler,” he says. “You said earlier that you didn’t really like beer, but this is pretty light so give it a try.”
Raven smiles. She had said that, when Ken was showing her how to pour the drafts. She hadn’t expected him to remember. She takes a sip and then grins up at Ken. “That is good! Kind of sweet. I’ve never found a beer I liked before.” She takes another sip before adding, “I usually drink rum and coke. What’s this called again?”
He repeats the name for her, then says, “Rum, huh? I pegged you for a wine drinker.”
Raven laughs. “Wine was the one thing that got noticed if it went missing in our house, so my brother and I always stole the rum instead.” She and Charles had made quite the habit of taking liquor from the kitchen and hiding out in one of the unused wings of the house when they were younger. Sharon had caught them once but her only advice was to make sure and drink a glass of water before falling asleep. Charles had eventually started stealing Kurt’s bourbon from his study as well, but Raven was pretty sure he’d done that just to make Kurt angry.
She twists to look up at the clock on the wall. “Speaking of, I told him I’d be home by now. Not that he’s likely to notice, since he had a friend over tonight, but I should probably get going anyway.”
Ken walks out from behind the bar and offers her his hand. “I’ll walk you home.” Raven starts to protest, but he says, “It’s too late to walk by yourself, when all the pubs have just closed. Come on.”
Raven looks down at her money and smiles to herself before gathering it up and taking Ken’s offered hand. “Alright.”
---
Ken walks her to the door and then takes her hand again, bowing over it playfully while Raven giggles. “Your palace, m’lady.”
"Why thank you for escorting me, kind sir" she says, playing along.
Ken grins and kisses her knuckles before letting her hand go. He waits on the curb until Raven's unlocked the door and waved back at him.
She jogs up the stairs to the flat with a grin still on her face. Charles is lounging on the couch smoking when she comes in. He's got a book open on his lap, but doesn't seem to be reading it. Raven plops down onto the sofa, bouncing the cushions.
"What did you think of Ken?" she asks. "He walked me home."
"Who?" Charles asks.
Raven reaches over and plucks the joint from his hand--ignoring Charles' indignant "Hey!"--and takes a drag herself before saying, "The bartender. You met him."
Charles reaches for the joint, but Raven holds it up out of his reach and he flops back down onto the couch with a sigh. "He seemed nice enough, why?"
"He walked me home," Raven said again. "He was very gentlemanly."
"Well obviously you should shag him then, if he was gentlemanly."
Raven smacks his leg but Charles just grins. "What happened to your gentleman?" she asks.
"Left a little while ago." Charles shrugs. She hands him back the joint and heads to her room to get ready for bed. When she comes back out Charles is still lounging on the couch and looks like he's actually reading this time. She curls up next to him, resting her head on his shoulder.
"What are you reading?" she asks, as Charles wraps one arm around her shoulders.
He flips the cover over. "Theory of Population Genetics and Evolutionary Ecology."
"You never read anything fun anymore," Raven complains.
"This is fun," Charles says. "For a given value of fun."
Raven rolls her eyes. "Read to me," she says. Charles has been reading to her before bed since they met, at first because Raven had trouble reading herself and later because it had become a tradition. She misses the fantasy novels he read when they were younger.
Charles picks up where he'd left off reading, "Smaller populations achieve fixation faster, whereas in the limit of an infinite population, fixation is not achieved. Once an allele becomes fixed, genetic drift comes to a halt, and the allele frequency cannot change unless a new allele is introduced in the population via mutation or gene flow. Thus even while genetic drift is a random, directionless process, it acts to eliminate genetic variation over time.”
Raven tucks her feet up under her, closing her eyes and focussing more on Charles’ voice than his actual words.