Work Text:
Drew Tanaka is mean.
She grows up under a mother that cares more for the cameras that follow them around than her. That cares more for her daughter knowing how to keep her posture straight, her smile saccharine sweet, her hair without a strand out of place, than her knowing how to make friends. That cares more for smoothed out and scrubbed clean photos and videos and interviews that show a perfect life, a perfect mother, a perfect daughter, than for her daughter being an actual child, not an actor with a script for every second of her life.
She grows up desperately clawing for any shred of privacy, having given up on looking for honesty long ago. She learns how to keep her makeup sharp, and her walls sharper. She indulges in cosmetics more than most children her age — it's all about keeping any hint of imperfection hidden, any hint of truth buried deep down. She files her nails into claws, paints her face into a mask no one can look behind. She keeps herself mean, because there's only so much of the same drama the media will pay attention to, only so much unpleasantness the people around her will deal with before giving up on getting close to her, only so much her mother can shape for the spotlight without risking controversy.
And then, she's twelve and at Camp, and it's weird.
The kids in the overcrowded cabin she's placed in (no privacy, no space, nothing she can keep to herself) tease and jest but it's never truly mean. Not in the way she knows. The pranks and jokes are too simple, too corny, too messy to be enjoyable to an audience of strangers. Meals are chaotic at the shared table because people push and shove and steal and laugh, and no one aside from her even thinks to bother with proper etiquette — nobody cares for small bites that don't ruin your makeup, for small portions that look lovely on pictures but don't fill you up, for elbows off the table and the correct cutlery for every food. The only rules are: sacrifice a portion to the gods; don't waste; enjoy.
That's the one they care most about, she finds within a week. Enjoy. Have fun. Live your life.
She's not sure she can do that, as she leans away from campfire songs and pottery, from swordsmanship and archery, from pegasus riding and monster fighting.
Instead, Drew Tanaka is mean.
She paints her lips brighter, grows her nails sharper, shadows her eyes darker. She digs and needles and stabs not with a sword or a dagger or a spear but with her words; she begins to write her script for these unfamiliar scenes, just as she's done her entire life. Her remarks are not the soft teasing of the others; they are her knives poised to strike at anyone who comes too close, more dangerous than ever.
Her voice is her weapon, her meanness her armour.
Literally, she learns within weeks, a command falling from her tongue as a dove comes into being above her head.
Cabin Eleven sends her off with a bracelet of colourful wooden beads and a rubber snake that was meant to be a goodbye jump scare she didn't fall for. She scoffs at both but is not allowed to refuse them, so she takes them and shoves them into the heart-shaped box every Aphrodite child gets upon entering Cabin Ten.
Because Drew Tanaka doesn't wear cheap jewelry made by a collaboration of six- to seventeen-year-olds at arts and crafts. Because Drew Tanaka doesn't find dumb pranks amusing. Because Drew Tanaka doesn't like tacky toys with sloppy paint jobs.
Because Drew Tanaka is mean.
And Silena Beauregard is nice.
She's nice, holding Drew's hand as she properly introduces every member of Cabin Ten — every one of her siblings — to her even though Drew digs her nails into her skin hard enough to leave marks. She's nice, coaxing a young pegasus over to Drew to let her practice flying. She's nice, remembering that Drew doesn't eat much meat other than fish and ensuring she gets it.
Drew is sure Silena is an exception. Camp in general is nice in a way she's only ever experienced in stories, but this goes beyond a casual piece of advice on her fighting stance or an arm lent on the climbing wall.
Except it turns out that, no, not really. Not just Silena, at least.
Cabin Ten is nice.
Anders sits her down in front of himself and braids her hair, tucking dandelions and daisies into it in a way her mother would seethe at. Khalid follows her around with a stuffed seahorse, babbling about the deep sea creatures everyone else is grossed out by. Ina shows her celestial bronze nail polish in any colour imaginable and every other way to hide weaponry in places no one would suspect. Sawyer trifles through their vast collection of homemade perfumes to find one she likes, simple as they are in plain, glass jars. Rory pulls her into dances at the campfire and steps all over her feet, his laughter and singing off-key and unappealing. Jasmin paints all over her skin, from sunsets across her forearms to hearts spread all over her face, disregarding the careful lines of her makeup.
They chip and chip and chip at her walls, with cracked nails and bloody fingers, until they startle her into lifting her mask for a second, allowing them a glimpse at the pieces of herself she has long since buried under ring lights and cameras.
They bind her to themselves with soft hugs and silly singing and simple gossip. They drag her screeching and screaming into their circle, into closeness, into softness. They push her scoffing into spending time around other campers, into sitting with people during arts and crafts, into collecting strawberries in groups.
Drew Tanaka is mean.
Drew Tanaka will never stop being mean.
That is a fact.
Nobody ever claims any different.
However, a fact is also this:
She remembers Silena's allergic to bees and ensures they never get too close. She sits Anders down and teaches him how to get his eyeliner as sharp as hers. She follows Khalid to bed some nights and struggles to read through One Thousand And One Nights because he sleeps better with them. She shows Ina the best products for her skin and hair. She trifles through her vast collection of jewelry to find earrings Sawyer likes. She pulls Rory through Camp to show off their matching outfits. She paints Jasmin's nails with designs according to whatever book or flower has caught her fancy recently.
(She wears a bracelet of wooden beads even when it doesn't match her outfit)
(She keeps a tacky rubber snake on the shelf above her bed)
Most importantly, she stays.
And next summer, Anders brings with him newspaper scraps with her and her mother's faces plastered all over them.
She smiles, sharp as a dagger, and burns them as an offering.
And then she's fourteen.
And then there's war.
And then her siblings are dead.
And then Silena is a traitor.
And then she's the Cabin Counsellor.
And then she's building up her walls faster than what remains of her family can tear down, stronger than they can chip away at, taller than they can look over.
And then Drew Tanaka is not mean.
Drew Tanaka is cruel.
(She forgot the most important rule she had set for herself long ago, when she couldn't take a step without cameras clicking and spotlights moving on her:
Give up on looking for honesty.
She reapplies foundation over her blotchy face and decides to never forget that again)