Chapter 31: Fiona's Acceptance
Ben woke to the smell of garlic and tomatoes.
His body ached like he'd been beaten—muscles sore from tension, head pounding from power overuse, nose crusted with dried blood. But the scent pulled him toward consciousness with the insistence of something real and domestic and completely unexpected.
Fiona stood at his makeshift kitchenette, stirring a pot on his hotplate. She'd changed clothes since last night—jeans and a Gallagher house sweatshirt, hair pulled back in a messy ponytail. The domesticity of the scene against the backdrop of his criminal spiral was almost absurd.
"You're awake," she said without turning around. "Good. Soup's almost done."
"You made soup."
"Homemade. Lip's recipe, actually." She finally looked at him, expression mixing concern with something harder. "You've been out for thirty-six hours total. Kevin's been checking on you. Frank stopped by with antibiotics he got from somewhere. And I've been here since yesterday because someone needed to make sure you didn't die."
Ben sat up slowly, testing his body's limits. Everything protested, but nothing felt broken. "Thirty-six hours?"
"Yeah. Whatever you did for Marcus, it nearly killed you." Fiona ladled soup into a bowl, brought it over. "Eat. Then we're talking. For real this time. No deflections, no mysterious past bullshit. Real conversation."
The soup was good—chicken and vegetables, seasoned properly, the kind of comfort food that suggested care. Ben ate while Fiona watched, arms crossed, waiting.
"I'm running cons with Frank," Ben said finally. "Have been since I got here. Started small—repair work, helping people. Then it escalated. Gold scam across three states. Money laundering for Marcus. Fraud layered on fraud, all justified as survival until I couldn't tell the difference between necessity and choice."
Fiona's expression didn't change. Just waited for him to continue.
"I'm in debt to dangerous people. Marcus has me locked into monthly obligations that require skills I—" He caught himself before saying "powers." "—that I barely have. The investigation into the gold scam is closing in. Steve knows enough about my criminal activities to destroy me if he wants. And every solution I find just creates bigger problems."
"Are you going to survive this?" Fiona asked. The only question that mattered, delivered without drama.
Ben wanted to lie. Wanted to promise her yes, guarantee his survival, make commitments his Danger Intuition already told him he might not keep.
"I don't know," he admitted.
Fiona processed this. Ben watched emotions cycle across her face—fear, frustration, acceptance. She uncrossed her arms, sat beside him on the bed.
"I've spent my whole life with people who are disasters," she said quietly. "Frank's an alcoholic con artist. Monica's bipolar and can't stay. My siblings are barely holding together through chaos and luck. I know what disasters look like."
"Fiona—"
"Let me finish." She looked at him directly. "You're a disaster too. Criminal activities, mysterious skills, secrets you won't explain. But you're a disaster who gives a shit. Who showed up for Ian, helped Debbie, taught Carl. Who fixes things without expecting payment. Who's here even when it's dangerous."
"That doesn't make the rest okay."
"No. But it makes it something I can work with." She took his hand, careful of the scars and recent injuries. "I need rules, though. Boundaries. Because I can't handle losing someone else, and you're heading toward disaster fast enough to take casualties."
"What rules?"
"You don't involve my siblings in your criminal activities. Whatever cons you're running, whatever deals you make—my family stays out of it."
"Agreed."
"You don't bring your problems to our house. Marcus, Steve, whoever else wants you dead—they don't follow you to my doorstep where my kids sleep."
"I can do that."
"And if things get too dangerous, if I tell you to run—you run. No heroics, no staying to fight, no Lucky Ben saves the day. You just leave."
Ben hesitated. His Danger Intuition showed him futures where running meant abandoning people who needed him. Where survival meant cowardice.
"I can't promise that," he said. "Not without qualifiers."
"What qualifiers?"
"If you ask me to run because you think I'm in danger? I'll seriously consider it. But I can't promise to abandon your family if they need help. Can't promise to run if Ian's in trouble or if something threatens you directly. That's not who I am."
Fiona studied him with complicated expression. "Compromise. You run if I tell you to, unless someone I love is in immediate danger. Then you get to make the stupid heroic choice, and I get to be terrified about it."
"That works."
"I'm terrified of caring about someone who might disappear or die," Fiona admitted, voice soft. "I've already lost too many people. Mom keeps leaving, Dad's checked out, even Steve turned out to be temporary. So if you're asking me to care about you—really care—I need to know you're fighting to stay alive. Not just surviving day to day, but actually trying."
Ben squeezed her hand. "I'm fighting. For the first time since I got here, I've found something worth surviving for. That's you. This thing between us. The chance that maybe, despite everything, I get to be with someone who sees all my shit and chooses me anyway."
Fiona's eyes were bright with unshed tears. "I do see it. The criminal activities, the secrets, the danger. All of it. And I'm choosing you anyway because I'm apparently as stupid as you are about heroics."
She kissed him then—not desperate or grateful, but deliberate. A choice made with full awareness of consequences.
When they broke apart, Fiona stood, pulled him toward the bed properly. "Come on. If we're doing this disaster together, we're doing it right."
They made love with careful tenderness.
Not the frantic coupling of people running from consequences, but the deliberate intimacy of two people choosing each other despite impossible circumstances. Fiona was careful with his injuries, Ben was gentle with her vulnerability, and afterward they lay tangled together in sheets that smelled like her shampoo and his sweat.
Fiona traced the scars on Ben's hands—calluses from tools, burns from soldering, the remnants of wall-punching and fights. Her fingers found each mark like reading braille.
"Tell me about your life before South Side," she said.
Ben's first instinct was deflection. But she'd earned honesty, or at least as much as he could give.
"I had a different life," he said carefully. "Made mistakes. Hurt people without meaning to. Then I got a second chance—woke up here with an opportunity to do better. So I've been trying. Failing a lot, but trying."
"Everyone here's running from something," Fiona said against his shoulder. "At least you ran toward us instead of away."
The weight of every lie he'd told settled on Ben's chest—the transmigration he couldn't explain, the foreknowledge that guided his choices, the powers that made everything possible and impossible simultaneously. But Fiona's warmth against him felt real in a way that transcended those lies.
Maybe I don't deserve this. Maybe I've manipulated too much, lied too often, interfered too deeply. But she's choosing me anyway, and that has to mean something.
They dozed. Ben woke to find Fiona watching him with soft expression.
"What?" he asked.
"Just memorizing this. The calm before whatever storm's coming next." She kissed his forehead. "Because there's always a next storm in South Side."
"Yeah."
"But we'll handle it. Together. Disaster partners."
"Disaster partners," Ben agreed.
Eventually, Fiona had to leave—work shift starting, siblings needing supervision, life continuing despite the brief island of peace they'd created. She dressed while Ben watched, committing the mundane details to memory.
At the door, she turned back. "Don't die today, okay? I've got enough to deal with without adding your funeral to the list."
"I'll try my best."
"Good enough."
She left. Ben lay in bed that smelled like her, feeling the Marcus situation looming, the investigation closing in, Steve's threat still active, Monica's inevitable departure approaching. The disasters were stacking higher, converging faster.
But Fiona had chosen him. That single fact felt like an anchor in churning water.
Ben got up, showered, found the note she'd left on his workbench: Went to work. Don't die today. -F
The casual command made him smile despite everything. He was in love with Fiona Gallagher, which meant he'd chosen to stay and fight instead of running. That choice would define everything that came next.
But for the first time since arriving in this universe, Ben felt like he was fighting for something real instead of just surviving through lies.
That had to count for something.
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