complexfemalecharacter | (no subject)

It's almost Christmas and Maeve, for the first time in her life around a holiday, has a boyfriend. Well, not a boyfriend, because she and Steve haven't exactly used those words or even talked about what they're doing and she still occasionally thinks about how much she'd like to shag Rowan, but really, for all intents and purposes, she's got a boyfriend.

That in itself is hard enough to deal with, but now she's realized she'd got to get him a gift or look like a complete asshole. Money isn't a problem, she's still getting her handouts from the city itself, plus she's got her side hustle up and running again, and that is what she's doing right now. Making extra cash to buy Steve a Christmas gift.

Wearing a pair of tight black jeans, her heavy combat boots, and the biggest black cargo jacket she could find, Maeve is leaning against the outside of an Ahab's Coffee, a warm drink in one hand, a stack of papers in the other. She's met three college students so far and they've exchanged essays for cash, and she has two more she's waiting on.

So of course those pricks from the high school wander by. She can't even remember their names now, she'd barely gone to any classes before fucking off and getting her GED instead. Ethan she remembers, because of something Rowan said about his brother dealing drugs. The other two are Ethan's cronies, idiots with close cropped hair and broad chests and she knows exactly the sort of guys they are before they even speak to her.

"Hey, I remember you," Ethan says. "You're that one with the book. Part of the whole sex cult, right?"

"Yeah, you got me," Maeve answers in a bored voice. "You're super hilarious, now move along."

One of the others, the bigger of the two, steps closer to Maeve. He's trying to be intimidating and she doesn't love his proximity, but she only tips her coffee cup back and takes a sip, her eyes on him the whole time. He's not close enough yet, but he will be.

"Sex cult?" he asks and Maeve smiles sarcastically.

"Yeah," Ethan says. "She's a real slut. I bet she'd even fuck you."

"Would you?" the guy asks and Maeve waits. He steps closer. Then closer. He's trying to get a look at her tits, which would be hilarious given her enormous jacket if he wasn't such a complete creep. One more step brings him in range and Maeve lifts her knee as hard as she can, jamming it swiftly into the soft and delicate and stupidly vulnerable balls between his legs.

The idiot drops and Maeve steps over him, moves over slightly, then resumes leaning against the wall and waiting for her clients.

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That he doesn't protest, doesn't do any of that not all men bullshit, or start spouting statistics at her meant to prove her wrong does a lot toward endearing him to her further and Maeve grins as she finds a bench and hops up to sit on the back of it, her boots on the seat.

"And that," she tells him through another mouthful of taco, "is why half the male population of Darrow High hates me. I don't even go there and I've already made enemies of them all."

She says this in a voice that suggests she doesn't care and for the most part she doesn't. Maeve has made friends here, people more like her than any of her friends had been back home. She misses Aimee's cheerful optimism and the way her light could bright just about any day, but she feels most like herself, most comfortable with Rue and Robin and Rosie.

"What is?" Butcher asks with a mouthful of food. "Bit of a buzzkill but you ain't kneed no one in the bollocks in an hour." He shrugs as if to say who knows.

There's something else there, though and Billy feels like he knows her a little bit now.

After swiping at his beard, he asks neutrally, "why do you care, then? Don't say you don't." He's pointing at her with his free hand, but it's no interrogation.

"For the most part, I really don't," Maeve answers with a shrug. "It sucks when someone looks at you and makes a snap judgement, but I'm also not going to lose sleep over some fool with a rich daddy thinking I'm a slag. But that shit sticks. It follows you around. It ruins peoples' lives sometimes. Just because I don't end up slitting my wrists over it doesn't mean some other girl won't and that's fucking bullshit, isn't it?"

And Maeve doesn't think it makes that girl any less strong. Because the girl is always blamed for it. Always.

"I care in the grand scheme of things," she says, gesturing. "Men needs to be held accountable for the shit they start, even if it's just calling some girl a slut because she won't give you a handjob behind the bleachers after school."

"Aye," Butcher says carefully, watching her wrap herself up in it. The only reason he looks amused is because he considers himself absolved. Right or wrong, that's the truth. Sure, there were loads of things he'd done as a boy that he wasn't proud of, but most of it was done in the name of protecting his brother. As an adult, his record with women is less spotless. Sometimes sex was the quickest or only way to get something. When you're on a warpath, it takes more than things like keeping promises and being considerate to keep a person in line.

Raynor's not even the one he did the worst. Before he met Becca, Billy was a very, very different person. He was supposed to get her back or die before he had to deal with any of that. Now, in this new place and its terrible quiet, he may be paying the piper.

"I ain't gonna argue with ya. We do hateful shite because we get away with it. Don't need to be in a boys club like the military to see that."