ONCE UPON A DIME I FLYNN CARSEN

Finders Keepers

Author's Note: This is the sequel to Sure As Sin. The reading order so far for all of my Flynn/Clara fiction is: And She Was Not An Adventure, Plato's Step-Daughter, A Christmas Clara, Sure As Sin, and Once Upon A Dime. Each new Flynn/Clara story will include an updated reading order. All my Librarians fiction can be found under the 'My Stories' section of my profile. Videos for characters canon and original, can be found on my Youtube channel via the link on my profile.

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Finders Keepers

"Mine!" Ezekiel exclaimed, snatching up the dime from the floor.

"It's mine!" Clara protested. "I saw it first!"

"Finders keepers," Ezekiel smirked. "You snooze, you lose." At this, the clippings book clipped his ear, a habit Jenkins couldn't - and secretly wouldn't - break it of. As it did, Ezekiel dropped the dime, Clara chasing after it.

"Ha!" she declared, holding it aloft. "Behold my triumph!"

"Behold this!" Ezekiel bellowed, pulling out a sock puppet.

"No!" Clara screeched. Yesterday, the sock puppet had tried to strangle her with her own shoelace, before Cassandra had poured a glass of milk over her, breaking the spell. Jenkins classed the case as a curio, but Clara begged to differ, unable to look at a sock in the same way since.

"Give me the dime, Clara," Ezekiel intoned, advancing on her.

"Finders keepers," Clara said, trying to stand her ground.

"Finders keepers first," Ezekiel corrected her, "so hand it over, or the sock puppet sings."

"Are you threatening Hartley with a sock, Jones?" Eve said, coming down the sweeping staircase. "If so, your standards are slipping."

"She stole my dime," Ezekiel argued, put out.

"Are your standards slipping as well?" Eve aimed at Clara. "Shame on you."

"You're rather joyful this morning," Clara said curiously, slipping the dime into her dress pocket.

"I have a day off coming up," Eve said, leaning against Flynn's desk, ignoring its curses, "if that doesn't put a spring in my step, I don't know what will."

"We all have days off," Clara reminded her, knowing exactly how she was going to spend hers, finally having that Merlin marathon, Flynn making an unwilling third, Clara oblivious to the torture she would be inflicting on him.

"Not here, we don't," Eve corrected her.

"As far I'm concerned, every day is a holiday," Ezekiel said with a grin.

"You can say that again," Clara snapped, "those bags of rubbish you were supposed to put out have evolved from a picturesque pile to a mountain!"

"I was wondering what that stench was," Jacob said, striding through the doorway, winking at Clara. But she turned away, still uncomfortable at the memory of kissing him, wondering if her heart had secretly turned traitor, remembering the words that had fallen from her treacherous lips, what I should have done a long time ago. Had it happened under the influence of magic, or was there a more prosaic reason at play?

"What's wrong with you?" Ezekiel asked her, frowning.

Clara just shook her head, wishing Ezekiel a thousand miles away.

"I don't want the dime back," he pressed, looking worried now. "I have enough lucre to live large."

But Clara just walked away, going out into the corridor instead, wrapping her arms around herself. She knew she was being stupid; that she should keep her cool, and act cool. But the memory of her and Jacob made her stomach churn, and even if Flynn appeared unaffected, Clara wasn't, going on a guilt trip like it was a honeymoon to Hawaii.

"Still upset over that lil smooch we shared back in Rome?" Jacob said, making her whirl around.

"Jake" - Clara began, only for words to fail her.

"Look, just let it go, Clara," Jacob said abruptly, advancing on her, "ever since that day, you've been jumpier than a cat on a hot tin roof" –

- "Hey, you weren't Evil Clara, kissing and crippling everyone, whilst plotting to take down the world," Clara snapped, glancing up as Jenkins glided past, the perennial tea trolley trailing after him by magic. Jenkins was another thing keeping her up at night, Clara struggling to recall what had been said between them outside the Annex, instinctively knowing it would explain his odd behaviour afterwards.

"That's precisely my point," Jacob said, folding his arms across his chest, "it wasn't you, so just forget about it. I know I have."

"Fine, it's forgotten," Clara said just as abruptly as him, both of them lying.

Band-aids don't fix bullet holes
You say sorry just for show
If you live like that, you live with ghosts...