seas_open | [Closed - Caden, Coop, Les & Robert]

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[Closed - Caden, Coop, Les & Robert]

Whatever is responsible for this, April doesn't notice when it happens.

She and Caden have been back in town for a few days now and she knows he'll need to go back again in the next little while, but she plans on staying here. Not because she hadn't enjoyed her time in California, but given how much she's banked on Coop's generosity when it comes to her job -- the first legitimate job she's ever had and currently her only source of income -- she really thinks it's a good idea she stay and actually work a little.

She's unpacked, she's settled back in her apartment, and she spends a few days just settling back into town. It's a strange thing to feel, settled in any way, but she does. And she isn't entirely sure what she thinks of it, whether she likes it or hates it, but she's allowing herself to exist in this state, to give it a chance instead of rebuffing it as soon as she feels something out of the ordinary.

Whenever she uses her powers in Siren Cove, she does it almost without thinking. There are times she uses them to get what she wants, times when she's irritated and makes someone do something for her, but none of it is truly harmful in any way. Though it seems someone disagrees.

She's in a coffee shop, she's in a hurry, and she needs to get to the front of the line quickly, so she taps the guy in front of her on the shoulder, gives him a smile and asks him in a gentle, melodic voice if he'd mind letting her go ahead of him. In response he only rolls his eyes and turns away from her.

For the rest of the day she tries it on everyone she meets. She asks people easy favours, she suggests things for them to do, and while some people help her just out of the kindness of their heart, most just ignore her suggestions, and that's never happened to her before. She has never met anyone immune to her powers.

By the end of the day she's so furious she's trembling and she stands near the boardwalk, unsure of what to do or where to go. She needs to see Caden, she needs to tell him something is wrong, but she needs to see her father, too. Maybe he'll be able to track down whoever is responsible for this.

Staring out at the ocean, her jaw clenched tight enough to hurt, April finds the only thing she wants to do is scream.

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Her mouth twitches into a faint smile when he simply makes the clouds go away, especially at the way he does it almost without thinking. He's growing more powerful, even if he doesn't realize it, and she remembers what that was like. Learning how to control her powers, doing it all on her own. She remembers the satisfaction that had come on the day she realized she was the one in control.

But at his question, her smile fades a little and she shakes her head. It's not a denial, just an indication that she doesn't know.

"To be honest, it could be nearly anyone," she says and her heart is thumping heavily, but she can't see a way not to tell him at this point. "I've done a lot of... very dishonest things over the past ten years."

Caden looks up at her, brow knitting in concern, and then bites his lip. She looks a little nervous and he frowns as he processes the information. It's not something that really surprises him, given what he knows of April, but he has no idea how deep that goes.

He wonders if he's about to find out.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Caden asks lightly. He's always been so careful not to push April too hard, or ask her for things that she wasn't willing to give. If she says no right now, he'll be disappointed. But he won't push.

"No, not really," she answers with a laugh. "But I think I have to." He's never pushed her and for that she's been incredibly grateful, but now they're at this point where she has to make a choice. She either gets to tell him the truth and see what happens or she lies again and drives a deeper wedge between them. Most of the time April has no idea what she might be doing when it comes to being in this relationship because she's simply never been in anything like this before, but she's trying.

It's for him she's trying. She owes him this much. She owes him at least some honesty.

"I'm not a good person, Caden," she says, brushing some hair back from her face. It's hard to look at him, but she forces herself to, meeting his gaze for a moment before she looks away again. "I... after I got out of the foster care system I didn't know what to do. I had no money, no education, no family. I just... I knew I could make people do what I wanted them to. I knew I could make them believe me, so I started using my powers to get men to give me things. It started off small and it got bigger as time went on. A lot bigger."

Caden can imagine what that must have been like, to be young and alone with no resources except the power to compel people. It would have been a tremendously hard power to ignore, and he doesn't think he could have done it either. He imagines willing people into giving him food, or a job, or a place to stay while he got on his feet. But he doesn't get the impression that is quite what April is talking about.

"How big?" He asks warily, looking up at her. "What did you do?"

"It's never seemed to you that I have a lot more money than I should?" she asks. She'd paid him back, after all, all that money the sirens had taken from him. She'd paid him back without the slightest indication that it had hurt her financially, because it hadn't. All over this country, there are accounts with her various names on them, more money stocked away than she'll ever possibly need.

"I'm a con artist, Caden. Or... I was. I haven't done anything since I got here." Saying it like that, saying what she is so plainly, it's scary. Saying that she hasn't done it in such a long time is a reminder to herself of all the way she's let things go. Not everything, she doesn't know if she'll ever entirely change, but something happened here. Something bigger than she's willing to let herself see most of the time.

Caden had always been curious about where her money came from. He knew that it wasn't family money, given what she's told him about her past. Still, he never pushed. Maybe he should have, because the news that she's a con artist sort of knocks him through a loop. But then again, he's not exactly surprised, not really.

"A con artist," he says dumbly. He swallows hard and scrubs a hand over his face. A thought occurs to him and he looks up at her, biting his lip for a moment. "Is that what I was supposed to be?"

He knows that it isn't what he ended up as. Whatever they have now is real. He knows it is, and he trusts in that. She wouldn't be telling him if it wasn't, for one, but he just looks at her and he knows that she care. Still, he just has to know.

It's a valid question and one she supposes she should have expected, but that doesn't stop the sting she feels when he asks. There's a part of her that wants to get angry because she's only just said that she hasn't done anything like that since arriving in Siren Cove, before she even knew he existed, but she can't blame him for asking.

It hurts. A lot more than she thought it might, but she can't blame him.

"No," she says simply. "You were never a job."

Caden knows that he's hurt her with the question, and he immediately believes her, but he had to ask. He nods and then looks down, brow furrowing before he reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose. There's a lot of emotions flowing through him, and he scoots over to pat the sofa next to him. "I believe you. I just-- this is a lot to take in."

He looks over at her, studying her face curiously. "What would you do?"

"I know," she says, then looks down when he asks what she would do. If he wants the details, she'll give them, but she's worried he won't be too happy with what he hears. Still, she deserves him that honesty, even if it might come back to bite her in the ass.

"I'd work my way into their lives using my powers. Influence them toward trusting me. Develop a relationship with them usually, depending on the person and how they responded to me and either I'd get them to give me their bank information or I'd find another way to get it. I've worked in a lot of offices for a lot of very rich men and there are a lot of secrets in places like that."

"Just for the money?" Caden asks. He feels a little shell-shocked and he just doesn't know how to feel about it all. He pinches the bridge of his nose and sits there quietly for a long moment, brow furrowed as he stares down at the hardwood floor.

"I just-- I honestly don't know what to say, April." He looks up at her and swallows hard, shaking his head a bit. "But you're done with it?"

"When you grow up with literally nothing that belongs to you and then are turned out into the world with that same nothing, money can save a hell of a lot," she points out quietly. Her chances without her powers would have been pretty slim. An addict for a mother, poverty, that woman being the only role model she had when it came to survival. April knows where she would have ended up.

"Well, I don't need the money anymore," she says when he asks if she's done with it. "And I haven't taken a job since I arrived in town." But sometimes she misses it. Not even for the sake of the money, but because there had been a sense of pride that had come with being that good at something.

Part of Caden wants to argue that there were other more honest ways for her go about making a life for herself, but he himself from saying anything. Caden grew up with very little, but he had his mother. She is an amazing, supportive woman. She was an amazing role model. Having her and Callie in his life is absolutely priceless, and he knows that he has no idea what it was like to be in April's place. He has no right to say anything about how she's lived her life, and he knows that.

Whatever brought April to where she is today, to be the woman she is, Caden is also thankful for. It could have been so bad. She could have been a tragedy. But she's here.

"I feel like there's a but coming after that," Caden says carefully, looking up at her. He pats the couch and then reaches out for her hand. "Can you sit? You're making me nervous, standing like that."

Truthfully, Caden doesn't know how to feel about all of this, but he knows that he doesn't want April to go anywhere, not right now.

"Sorry," she says, sinking down on the couch beside him, taking his hand when he offers it. It feels strange to have someone still willing to do that, offer their hand when she's told them something that clearly isn't exactly what people look at as good news.

"There's not a but, it's just... you know how you have writing? That one thing you're so good at that when you're doing it, it feels like nothing else could matter? People pay you for that, it's more than an acceptable way to make a living. You get to do the one thing you're best at. I don't. Not anymore."

Caden tries to imagine not being able to write anymore, and just the thought grips him like a vice. He bites his lip and looks over at her, thinking carefully before he speaks. "You can find another thing that you're best at."

He holds her hand, massaging her palm with his thumb. "You're great, April. You don't just have that one thing."

She wants to tell him it isn't that simple, it isn't just a matter of finding something new because he wouldn't find something other than writing if he didn't have to. It isn't just that she's good at it, it's that she enjoys it and she sighs, looking down at their hands.

"What if I like being a criminal?" she asks, looking up at him again. "What if finding something new seems pointless when I know it's not going to make me as happy as punishing rich assholes for the creepy shit they do? Because I went after men who... who weren't good people. No one I took money from didn't deserve that and a whole lot worse."

"Okay, I get that," Caden says, because he does. He can see her only going after people who were bad, maybe who got their money in unlawful ways themselves. He frowns and looks over at her, massaging his thumb into her palm. "You like it... so you're going to go back to it? It sounds like that's where this is heading."

"No," she says, then shakes her head. "I don't know. Sometimes I want to, sometimes I just really miss getting people to do whatever the hell I want them to. Right now, not having my powers, I feel like I'm wrong inside, but I use them so rarely and... sometimes I wonder if you can lose them through disuse. Will I forget how to do things? Will I grow less powerful?"

She shakes her head once more and says again, "I don't know. I have no idea. I like being here, but sometimes I feel so stifled. I'm not a vet's assistant." Except she really does love working for Coop, so it's more complicated still.

He frowns a little when she says that she feels stifled, and even though it isn't the time for it, Caden momentarily finds himself overwhelmed with insecurity. How could she possibly be happy here with him like this, given what she's used to? He must be so incredibly boring to her.

And then there's the question of what happens next. Given what he now knows, can things continue on as they have been? Sure, she said that she only took from bad people, but she's still a criminal. She's still led this life that Caden could never hope to understand, but he cares about her so much.

"I appreciate you telling me all this. I really do," Caden tells her, giving her a watery sort of smile and squeezing her hand. "But I think maybe we should put a pin in it right now, and focus on doing what we can to get you your powers back."

That's what's important right now anyway, and Caden needs time to think.

Well, he hasn't run off, which is a step up from most people, April has to admit that. She squeezes his hand in return and nods, because given what she's just told him, it's fair to give him some time to digest what she's told him. It's a lot of information and it makes her look like a terrible person, she knows that, but she is a terrible person.

She has no idea what she's doing or where she's going. For the most part she looks so pulled together and she's a wonderful performer, she knows no one really expects it of her. But most of the time she feels like she's struggling along.

"Alright," she says, smiling at him in return. "That's... that's fair enough."

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[Closed - Caden, Coop, Les & Robert]

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