From Yesterday (Young Justice/ X-Men Evolution Fiction)

Chapter Three

I haven't heard Sinte since I was eight years old. Bruce used to try when I first moved into the manor, but I told him he didn't have to. It had hurt too much to hear those words coming from an outsider... and his accent was so bad I couldn't really understand him anyway.

I stare at the white-haired boy. He's a few inches taller than me (like everyone else), thin as a rail and so pale he's almost as incandescent as his hair, but what catches me are those eyes. They're a blue so bright they almost sizzle with energy and a flurry of excitement ripples through me as I recognize this person. I look him up and down. The boy's wearing a Gotham Academy blazer that's a size too large for him over well-worn blue jeans and a black Nirvana t-shirt, and sporting a canvas backpack covered with "I Voted" buttons. He's looking at me, a tentative smile on his lips. He fidgets and taps his fingers against his thighs.

"Dick, do you remember me?" His voice is different, older, but he uses that language, the one from my old life and feelings of nostalgia wash over me along with the smells of mountain air, roasting meats and the sound of boisterous laughter. I feel a tiny hand tugging on my sleeve, and I almost look over to see a little boy with platinum hair 'Dickie! I found puppies! Come see!'

I take a step toward the older version of that little boy, licking the inside of my lower lip. It's been seven almost eight years. What's he doing here now? What's his game? Suspicion keeps me from taking another step. And then there's always the chance that I'm wrong, and it's not him. "Pietro?" I try.

His eyes light up and a wide grin regresses his face from fifteen to seven. "Yeah! It's me! You remember!" He starts to come to me, but I step back and God, watching his face collapse is like seeing Jason after Bruce tells him he's taking me out on patrol instead of him. The hurt there just about undoes me.

"Uh... I..." He bites his lip and he goes back to tapping his thighs, watching me, eyes unsure and anxious.

I'm frozen in place, but my body wants to rush to this guy and throw my arms around him. Pietro Maximoff, a blast from the past. In my old life, on breaks from the circus, my parents and I traveled through the Balkans with my dad's people, the Rom. Living in the caravan was an unending party. There was always music, always dancing and story-telling, and everyone was family. There were no closed doors, no long silences, no pitting one brother against another, no fathers hurting their kids...

I know Pietro has to be here for a reason. Everyone always wants something, right? But you know what? That kind of thinking is "Gotham" thinking. Pietro's not "Gotham", he's not gadje, and I bet he hasn't forgotten...

I let out the breath I'd been holding and go to him like I'd been wanting to and, after a beat, put my arms around him. His arms wrap around my back, too, and he pulls me closer and squeezes until I can't breathe, and I reciprocate with a wheezy laugh.

No, he hasn't forgotten.

We release each other, laughing breathlessly and grinning like big dummies.

Maybe a Rom can never forget how to hug even when they haven't really done it in a very long time. I may be rusty, but my body still knows what to do.

"Pietro! What are you doing here?" I speak in Sinte; I take his wrist and look around for campus security. They roam the grounds between classes looking for strays and trespassers. The kids of Gotham's most elite go here, and kidnappings and terrorist attacks are serious realities. "How did you get in?" I know he's no student dressed like that. The blazer may have fooled a few people not looking too hard, but after an initial glance, Pietro would have some explaining to do.

My cousin shrugs and gives me a little smirk that takes me back a decade. I'm in Grandma Elena's trailer nicking blackberry tarts with Pietro while two other cousins play lookout. "Let's get out of here," I say.