Chapter Text
They had decided as a team to send Andy and Joe to handle the cartel job in Belize while she and Nicky stayed in Zurich, but as Nile watched the others throwing bags into the truck in of the rental car, she wondered if it was too late to change the plan.
While Nicky and Andy said their goodbyes, Joe wrapped Nile in his usual bear hug. “Take care of Nicky for me, yeah?” he grinned.
“Uh, yeah, of course,” Nile said. She knew Joe was joking, but the idea of her “taking care” of a thousand-year-old man was still completely nuts.
Joe and Andy swapped places, and the other woman pulled Nile into a brief hug. Over Andy’s shoulder, she saw Joe and Nicky pressed in an embrace, foreheads touching. She looked back to Andy when they start to kiss.
“See you soon, kid,” Andy said, and that was objectively true. If all went to plan—and Copley had sworn up and down it would, as Nicky and Joe glared and Andy cleaned her gun—they’d be back in about a week.
Still, Nile stood next to Nicky watching them drive away until the car was out of view. Nicky smiled and touched her shoulder, then went back into the apartment.
———
Nile spent the rest of the afternoon at loose ends in her and Andy’s room. Not to avoid Nicky, just to chill.
She re-watched a few episodes of the The Office on her phone, creeped on a few old friends on Instagram, and cleaned Andy’s side of the room because it was gross. While she tried and failed to doze off for a nap, she had to admit that she was, in fact, avoiding Nicky.
The thing was, Nile absolutely trusted Nicky with her life. He was ride or die. He’d made her feel safe and welcome from the night they met.
He also made her feel intensely awkward, because she had no idea how to interact with him.
She and Andy had the kind of connection that was automatically forged when someone kidnapped you from your place of work and shot you in the head. Joe was naturally chatty and they quickly identified their shared interests (it was obvious no one else in the immortal boat had any kind of taste of sense of aesthetic).
But she and Nicky still hadn’t spent any significant amount of time alone together, and when they were with Joe and Andy, those two tended to suck up most of the air in a room.
And now it was just the two of them for the next seven-ish days.
She guessed she couldn’t hide forever, so she stepped out into the living area. Nicky was reading on the dusty couch, legs curled underneath him, one elbow on the armrest. He smiled up at her, and she felt like an asshole for hiding away all afternoon.
“What would you like for dinner tonight?” he asked.
“Um, whatever. What do we have?”
“Nothing. But I can go to the store, or we can go somewhere.”
Nicky always did the majority of the cooking for group meals, with Joe as his sous chef. They’d taught Nile a few things too, so she helped when she was around. Andy, Joe had told her, was banned from the kitchen after the grease fire incident of 1889.
Maybe he would appreciate a break?
“Wanna go out?”
“That sounds nice.” He actually didn’t sound like he really had an opinion, but she’d take his word for it. “Do you have somewhere in mind?”
“Not really. Anywhere you’ve been before that might still be around?”
Nicky shot her another little smile. “Ah, the last time we were in Zurich was…1971, I think?”
Shoulda figured. “That’s cool, I’ll look on Yelp.” Nile made her way around the couch and sat down in the equally ancient armchair. Shit. Was that weird? Should she have just sat next to him? She glanced over to Nicky, but he didn’t look put off.
She turned her attention to her phone and, after five minutes of research, ran her first choice by Nicky, who said it sounded lovely. It was only 4:30, so she expected him to return to his book, but watched her for another minute.
Nicky was still and unmoving in the way that he was when lining up a shot. Weirdly (and possibly disturbingly), Nile thought nothing of it in that situation, but with that level of intense focus directed at her, she felt all wrong-footed.
“It is early,” he said, “but perhaps a drink before dinner?”
She was a little taken aback by the suggestion, but it beat sitting around the apartment wondering what to do with herself. “Yeah, sounds good. I’m gonna go change and then we can head?”
“Yes, whenever you are ready.”
Nile swapped her leggings and tee for jeans and a sweater. She slipped on boots and a beanie and, on a whim, put on some mascara and lipstick. Zurich was full of artfully disheveled people her age, and even though the chances of a hook-up were pretty low given all the circumstances, she hadn’t yet hit the “no more fucks left to give” stage of immortality.
When she re-emerged, Nicky marked his place and stood. He was wearing a sweater that was probably Joe’s, so his look passed for “hipster wearing grandpa’s clothes” instead of the usual “sad suburban dad.”
He took their coats from the hook and handed Nile hers. “Oh,” she realized as he locked the door behind them, “do we need to figure out where we’re heading?”
“No need,” Nicky told her. “I have a general idea.”
———
Nicky led them into what looked like the European version of a diner. He pulled out her chair and ordered for both of them, and Nile felt like she was on the weirdest date of her life.
“What’d you order us?”
“Glühwein,” Nicky said, and nodded to the sign on one of the windows. “It's a hot, spiced wine.”
“Cool.” The server came back with two steaming mugs.
“Smells boozy,” Nile said.
Nicky smiled his little half-smile and took a sip of his own. “Not too hot,” he told her.
She took a drink, trying to ignore the fumes that smelled like pure alcohol. Luckily, the taste was all citrus and spice. “It’s pretty good.”
“I’m glad you like it.”
If Joe were there, she’d be treated to a complete history of the beverage. If she were with Andy, she’d be pressured to chug it down so they could move on to the next thing.
Nicky just watched her. Nile took another drink and tried to think of any topic of discussion, but Nicky was almost a thousand years old and he acted like it. She had no idea what she could say that would be interesting to him. Hey, you heard the new Rico Nasty song? probably wasn’t gonna result in a prolonged conversation.
He leaned forward a little, elbows on the table. “How are you doing, Nile?”
The question caught her completely off-guard.
“Um, I’m fine.”
“I was not asking about right now,” Nicky said. His voice was gentle. “I meant how has it been for you.”
Nile blinks and the last eight months flash before her eyes. They spent the first month after London “off the grid” in a tiny village in north Vietnam, holed up in one of Andy’s caves that was trying to pass for an actual dwelling. They basically lived on top of each other, venturing out for thirty-five cent pho and Joe telling stories to pass the time.
Once Andy was satisfied any heat had died down, they stayed at one of Joe and Nicky’s places in Killarney, which was a big upgrade in terms of living conditions, since the little house had actual rooms. The three months they spent there also lacked any real agenda, but at least there was a TV.
Then they were on the move again. This time they ended up in Nebraska, of all places, on a farm that Joe and Nicky, honest-to-God, purchased as part of the Homestead Act. Nebraska was so close to, and yet so far from Chicago that it was hard for Nile to think about. She wanted to cry every time she someone asked if she wanted a pop.
But Nebraska had wide open spaces and lax gun laws, so instead of watching TV, Nile spent most of her days getting a crash course in Mercenary 101. Between the three of them, Nile learned how to disassemble every firearm known to man in less than thirty seconds, drop someone twice her weight, and cut a person’s head clean off with five different medieval weapons. (She also learned the tipping etiquette in twenty different countries.)
After nearly four months of being put through her paces, everyone deemed Nile’s physical training up to snuff, and they headed to Zurich to rendezvous with Copley.
Before she deployed, Nile had never traveled to another country. Now she’d been to five in less than a year. It was…a lot.
Nicky was still watching her.
“I mean. I don’t know. I haven’t had a lot of time to, you know, process?” She took another drink. “It was hard being back in the States,” she admitted.
“I wondered.”
“It felt like home, but…not quite.”
“I understand,” Nicky said softly. “Italy feels much the same for me.”
“Really? Still?”
“Yes, of course. Italy was not always Italy, but the memory of what it was before remains.” He smiled wryly.
“Think it’s the same for the others?”
“For Joe, yes. I cannot be sure about Andy. She has lived much longer than us, and she despises nostalgia.”
The mention of Andy made her think about something else, but she wasn’t sure if it was too personal.
Nicky must have been able to see there was something else on her mind. “You can ask me anything, Nile.”
She smiled, embarrassed, then took a deep breath. “Andy told me she can’t remember anything about her mom. Or sisters. Can you?”
Nicky looked thoughtful. “My mother’s name was Contessina. I remember we resembled each other. I had an older brother, Luzio—he was the head of our household after my father died when I was young.” He hesitated. “I cannot recall much else.”
“And you don’t…you don’t really think about them?”
His face was regretful, like he wanted the truth to be something other than what we was about to tell her. “No. But things were different then—when I left home, I already knew I likely would not see them again.”
Nile nodded, processing.
Nicky touched her hand. “It’s not wrong to mourn your family, Nile. They will always be a part of you. Even if you forget their names or their faces, you will never forget that you loved them.”
Her eyes started to burn, and she had to look down.
“And, Nile—I don’t suggest we will ever replace what you have lost. But. We are your family now, too.” He squeezed her hand, then sat back.
When she was (semi) confident she wouldn’t start making a scene, she looked back up at him. He looked so earnest.
Nile cleared her throat. “Thanks, Nicky. I really…” she floundered, looking for the right words. “I guess I really don’t know what to say, but it…it means a lot, to me.”
“I understand.” Then Nicky smiled as widely as she’d ever seen, and winked. “We cannot all be like Joe.”
Then she laughed, and it felt like one of the layers of icy awkwardness she’d been feeling since Andy and Joe left had melted away.
“Hey,” she said, seized with inspiration. “Are you attached to going out to eat?”
“Not at all.”
“Want to go to the store and get something to cook? I have an idea.”
———
Back at the apartment, they unpacked their groceries. Nicky had picked up the usual staples while Nile searched for more specific ingredients.
Together, they made her mom’s baked mac and cheese and ate it directly from the pan.
Several bites in, Nile felt a lump rising in her throat. She took another forkful and her eyes burned.
“Nile?” Nicky asked when she was openly weeping over their dinner.
She put her fork down and pressed her palms against her eyes. “Sorry, sorry. Shit.”
Nicky came around to kneel beside her chair. He drew her into his arm and she started crying big, gasping sobs.
He stroked her hair, rubbed her back. She repaid him by snotting all over his sweater.
“Sorry, this is really embarrassing,” she croaked into his chest.
“Grief is normal. You have no reason to be ashamed.”
Once she got herself under control, they packaged up the leftovers and settled on the couch. The apartment didn’t have a TV, but Nile propped the communal tablet (courtesy of Copley) up on the battered coffee table.
“What do you wanna watch?”
Nicky shrugged. “Whatever you like.”
“Come on, give me something. What have you seen? What did you like?”
Nicky hummed. “The last one I saw was…the one about the pregnant girl?”
“Um. Gonna need a few more details.”
He huffed a breath. “She was young? And she let an older couple adopt the baby?”
“Okay, how long ago was this?”
“Hm. Five, ten years ago?”
How the hell was she supposed to—“Wait. Juno?”
“Perhaps?”
She pulled up the trailer.
“Yes!” Nicky beamed at her. “It was this one.”
“And you liked it?”
He shrugged. “Joe did. I thought it was all right.”
Nile felt hysterical. “Okay, so there’s a new movie with Issa Rae I wanna see. It’s a romantic comedy. That sound good?”
“I like romance and comedy,” Nicky told her, squishing back into the couch.
When the movie finished, Nicky assured her he liked it very much, though Nile had no idea if he was being sincere or just trying to validate her choice. (For the record—she thought it was good, but not great.)
With Nicky’s blessing, she put on The Office.