Chapter 3- Reunion
The Bayville bus terminal was gray and dirty, its curbs jammed with cigarette butts and last autumn’s leaves. The air was thick with the smell of exhaust fumes, as vehicles constantly arrived and left the area. Another bus pulled in. This one’s occupants were from New York City. Its passengers stepped off and among them was Wanda. She scanned the terminal nervously, looking for a sign of her brother.
She pressed her duffel bag tightly against her side, hoping she didn’t look too scared. Bayville didn’t compare to New York, but there were still a lot of creeps that hung around here. Wanda looked about anxiously, hoping to see Pietro amongst the crowd.
She’d been a nervous wreck on the bus ride over. First she was worried that the bus times wouldn’t correspond or something would happen between communications. Those were just surface worries though. What would it be like to see a brother that she hadn’t seen in two whole years? How much had changed? Would things be awkward at first? What if Pietro hadn’t missed her at all?
This last thought had struck her hard after the initial phone call. Pietro hadn’t sounded excited to hear from her. True, the call was unexpected, but while Wanda had actually started to cry in excitement and happiness, Pietro’s voice had been strained and subdued throughout the entire conversation. She’d convinced herself that he was just surprised. After all, he’d gotten warmer towards the end, and it was he who suggested that Wanda move in with him. He’d even gotten that older brother edge back in his voice, when she had told him that she would take a bus. He wanted her to be sure that she was safe and was careful since bus terminals weren’t the safest places to be around. Wanda loved the authority in Pietro’s voice, and the protectiveness that laced behind it. Pietro always knew what was best. After all, he was her big brother. He’d always taken care of her, and he would do it now that she was coming back.
Now she looked over all the milling faces. "Wanda!" A voice called from behind her. She spun around in surprise. Pietro was waving to her from the next curb. Three boys stood behind him. They must be the guys he’d mentioned on the phone. However, all she saw was her brother.
"Pietro?" She whispered quietly. He was less than fifty yards away, staring at her wide-eyed. She saw him mouth her name again, but she didn’t hear it. The hair, the eyes, the face, it was still him. He hadn’t changed and he was still her brother. "Pietro!" She screamed. Wanda dropped her duffel bag and ran.
Through her watering eyes, she saw his trembling ones. Eyes so blue that they were only exceeded by each other’s.
"Wanda?" Pietro choked out as the blond-haired girl leaped on him. "Oh my God! Wanda!" He hugged her tightly and held the sobbing girl in his arms. He could smell her hair and feel her delicate frame beneath the bulky sweatshirt. His sister… this was his sister. "God, I missed you!" He whispered as he felt the sobs start as well.
The separated twins held each other tightly in this momentous reunion. Lance and Todd watched the emotional scene with surprise and awkwardness, while Fred went to retrieve Wanda’s dropped duffel. Pietro and Wanda were immune to the background, because they were too involved in each other. After two years, they were finally together again.
Wanda thought of her protective brother who hugged her so close, and Pietro thought of his delicate sister he held. All the worries and anxieties temporarily disappeared because they were finally together again.
* * *
The chipped dinnerware was being washed in the kitchen sink as Lance stared absently out the window. After two years of trial and practice, he’d figured out that only he could wash the dishes without leaving a complete mess behind.
Fred always broke something, whether out of sheer clumsiness or silent rebellion, Lance could never figure out. Todd always left gunks of food on the plates, and sometimes even slime, much to the older boy’s disgust. And Pietro, well, he washed the dishes all right, but he left water and suds all over the counters and floor and then refused to wipe it up. Todd had almost cracked his skull one time when he slipped on the wet floor. As a result, Lance always washed the dishes. It wasn’t too bad, because the other three were better at cooking, so therefore shared that task between each other.
Maybe Wanda would end up being able to do the dishes and he could have someone to share that job with. He thought back to the thin blonde-haired girl. She had a striking resemblance to Pietro, with the fine-boned face and clear blue eyes. She was pretty in a frail, fairy-like way. Shy too.
She’d clung to Pietro for most of the night. When any of the three other boys asked her a question, she always deferred back to her brother. Lance wasn’t sure if being around all guys unnerved her or if she was just extremely dependent. In any case, he hoped that she would relax soon because high-strung people tended to irritate him.
Nevertheless, she was a nice girl. Definitely not his type. She looked like she would crumble at the slightest touch. He’d always wondered how her type possibly had sex. He couldn’t picture her being to physically or emotionally handle it. Wanda reminded him of those southern belles from Gone with the Wind. It had to suck to be so delicate like that.
Lance stuck the last dish in the drying rack and wiped his hands. He found Todd and Fred in the living room. They both sat on the couch and stared at the t.v. with glazed expressions. It was one of those stupid reality shows. Lance couldn’t believe those things were still popular. Americans never seemed to tire of watching the intimacies of other people’s lives. Or buxom girls strutting around in bikinis. He didn’t mind the latter, but it was interesting how corporate America could pull its citizens so easily around by the nose.
With that last thought, Lance asked, "hey, where’s Pietro and Wanda?"
"They’re upstairs." Todd answered, without taking his eyes off the screen. "I think they’re talking."
Really? That’s good. Lance thought to himself. He’d seem it all through dinner, the way they kept secretly glancing at each other when the other wasn’t looking. They definitely needed to talk and sort out whatever had kept them apart for two years.
The tearful reunion back at the bus station had startled the dark-haired boy. After the initial shock, he’d felt a wave of envy for his white-haired friend. He’d never loved anyone, or anyone loved him, enough that he would start crying. He’d forgotten how to cry after he turned six. It had toughened him at a young age and protected him from barrages of pain that had been thrown at him over the years. But now that he had this family, this love, he wished he’d been able to experience it earlier. He envied Pietro for having blood family that cared for him. He’d definitely never had any of that.
With a sigh, Lance settled on the couch with Fred and Todd. He didn’t feel much like watching t.v., but he didn’t feel like going upstairs right now.
* * *
Wanda was brushing her hair in front of her dresser mirror when someone knocked on her door. "Come in."
Pietro walked in, looking around as he entered. "Uh, hey."
"Hey!" Wanda smiled at him and put down her brush.
"So, you settled okay? You need anything?" He asked.
"Um, nope. I’m good."
"That’s good." Pietro walked further into the room and sat on the bed. "Um, so…" He tried to think of something to say, but didn’t know what to talk about. He looked around the room again. "Heh, this room’s changed a lot from last time."
"Oh, really?" Wanda wondered who had had the room before her.
"Yeah. This girl named Rogue used to live here, but she kinda, um, defected…" Pietro trailed off. Back when Rogue had lived here, the walls had been covered with posters of heavy metal and gangsta rap artists. She’d also had a weird fetish for musky incense and black candles. Pietro had always avoided going into the goth girl’s room because it frankly reminded him of a sacrificial cult temple, not to mention she’d had a major personality disorder. "… well, it looks a lot better now." He found himself saying. He smiled weakly up at his sister, who was hovering uncertainly at her dresser.
They both grinned at each other uneasily, then looked at imaginary spots on the worn carpet or bare walls. Pietro tried desperately to think of something to talk about. The awkward silence was killing him. He glanced up at Wanda, who was staring at the floor as she bit her lip, her left toes digging nervously into the carpet. Then he noticed the fourth Harry Potter book sitting on her nightstand. Why not? Pietro took a deep breath. "So, you see the Harry Potter movie yet?"
Two hours later, the twins were both laughing about an inside joke they’d had from back when they were eleven. Pietro marveled at how easily the conversation flowed now. His sister’s eyes sparkled and her laughter was light and unreserved. It warmed his heart to hear it, after not hearing it in two years.
From Harry Potter, they’d gone to Disney movies (Pietro’s favorite was Peter Pan, while Wanda’s was The Little Mermaid). Then the time Pietro had fallen into the whale tank at Sea World when he was seven (He’d been afraid of whales and large fish ever since), to the time they’d won a pie contest, then gotten accused of cheating because they weren’t the ones who actually baked it. Now they were talking about the time they’d convinced their foster mom to let them bake cookies in the kitchen and had ended up setting the sink on fire.
"And then Jill walked in, and you were like, ‘it’s okay, we’ve got it all under control!’ " Wanda laughed at the memory of their foster mom’s reaction when she’d walked into the kitchen to find flames coming out of the sink.
"And then she went to get the fire extinguisher, and you were yelling for her to leave it alone or the cookies would be ruined." Pietro rolled his eyes. Both twins sat cross-legged on Wanda’s bed, facing each other. " ‘Jill!’ " He mimicked. " ‘Leave them alone, I wanna eat them! The cookies just caught on fire a little, but they’ll be okay. I swear!’ "
She was ready to kill us," Wanda giggled. "She said we were her hardest foster kids to control."
"Well, we knew how to have good times." Pietro said.
"Yeah," Wanda agreed. They’d definitely had fun.
"You know, I’m really glad you came back. I never let myself think about it, but I really missed you."
Pietro said abruptly. Wanda glanced at him quickly. He’d said the words lightly, but his eyes were serious and sincere. She knew that he really meant it, and so she smiled.
Several hours later, Pietro gently closed Wanda’s door behind him and went to his own room. They’d talked for more than six hours straight, and it was past three now. He didn’t mind that though, nor the fact that his throat was completely sore. During the six hours, the initial tension had disappeared and it was like their two-year gap no longer existed. Pietro hadn’t known that it would be so easy.
He stripped down to his boxers and crawled into bed, exhausted. He always piled old clothes on top of his bed, and he hadn’t bothered to clear them off before he’d gotten under the blankets. Pietro irritably kicked away a shirt that had entangled itself around one of his ankles, and then rolled over with a huff. Despite the minor bed annoyances, the speed demon felt a deep peace within him that he hadn’t felt in a long time.
He had his entire family now. Todd, Lance, Fred, and finally Wanda. He didn’t count Magneto. His old man had only been family by blood. And by the mutant gene. But he had the Brotherhood. He had Wanda back again. The only two things he’d ever loved were here for him. Pietro didn’t feel alone. He fell asleep with these comforting thoughts in his head, and he fell asleep tired, but content.