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[color=#b76e79]“Was he cute at least?”[/color]

Amara Bishop was a lean, twenty-two year old black girl with a braided ponytail slung over one shoulder. Once upon a time, she had gone by the codename “Relay” and had been represented by PRG, like Dani. That was before she burned out her superspeed rescuing one hundred and seventy-six people from a moving train mid-derailment. Coming up together, she and Dani bonded not just over shared experience but also shared loss: where Dani had lost her father to a structural fire, Amara had lost her mother to breast cancer.

Dani shrugged, lazily stirring her coconut matcha smoothie with a paper straw. [color=#79dbbc]“He had a nice car?”[/color] she offered meekly, smirking.

Shaking her head, Amara let out an exasperated, [color=#b76e79]“Girl…”[/color] They'd spent the better part of an hour catching up on the other night's escapades while hanging at Amara’s current place of employment, a trendy smoothie bar called Verdure. It was the sort of place with minimalist design, drink ingredients no one could quite pronounce (which were allegedly full of “micronutrients”), and $14 smoothies. As Amara flitted from one station to the next, dressed in a matching sports bra and yoga pants, Dani found that the energy of the place suited her. She'd always seemed cooler than Dani could manage. 

[color=#79dbbc]“He texted me yesterday,”[/color] she said. At the raising of one of her friend's eyebrows, Dani continued, [color=#79dbbc]“He said he was sorry. He said he just freaked out ‘cause it was his dad's car, and he didn't want him to know he'd been driving drunk…”[/color] Amara's glare could've burned a hole through her head. [color=#79dbbc]“I'm not seeing him again,”[/color] Dani assured her. 

[color=#b76e79]“Because you know I'd kick your ass,”[/color] Amara replied, pointing a banana threateningly. The loss of her powers had not corresponded with an equivalent – or, frankly, [i]any[/i] – loss in confidence. As she went back to prepping ingredients, she asked, [color=#b76e79]“So, how pissed is your mom?”[/color]

Dani chuckled joylessly. [color=#79dbbc]“Remember how mad she was when she found out we got tattoos? I think this has finally dethroned that.”[/color]

[color=#b76e79]“Ha! I believe it. When my dad found a joint in my room in high school, he made me run bleachers for over an hour.”[/color] Long before his daughter's Gray awakening, Walker Bishop was a championship-winning track & field coach, a role he continued ‘til this day. For as much as Dani complained about her mother being controlling, they didn't hold a candle to the Bishop family. At least Elena never got her up at five o'clock for wind sprints. [color=#b76e79]“She gonna pull you out of CSU?”[/color]

Dani shook her head. [color=#79dbbc]“Nah, she's even more invested in it than I am,”[/color] she admitted. She stared down at her drink and its rapidly degenerating straw. 

Amara raised an eyebrow. [color=#b76e79]“Having second thoughts?”[/color]

[color=#79dbbc]“No,”[/color] Dani responded, a beat too quickly; then, less defensively, [color=#79dbbc]“No, I mean, I'm still glad I walked away when I did. If I had to do one more sponsor meet-and-greet or give one more phoney interview, I would have blown my brains out.”[/color] She sighed. [color=#79dbbc]“I just… I don't feel like I've found my footing on the other side. I walk around campus [i]terrified[/i] of getting recognized, but at the same time, I feel like I'm at a party where everybody knows each other, and I'm just some rando.”[/color]

Amara nodded. [color=#b76e79]“Been there.”[/color]

Dani suddenly felt embarrassed to be complaining about a choice [i]she[/i] made in front of someone whose choice was taken from them. [color=#79dbbc]“How'd you do it?”[/color] she asked. 

Her friend shrugged, but for the first time, there was a crack in her armor; Dani only hoped she hadn't widened it. [color=#b76e79]“It was hard,”[/color] Amara offered. [color=#b76e79]“Still is. You know you're the only person from the old days I still hear from? Harlow sends an expensive fruit basket every Christmas – or her secretary does, anyway.”[/color] She paused to blend a smoothie while also gathering her thoughts. [color=#b76e79]“Nobody knows anybody until they do. You've just gotta find a place where you feel comfortable being yourself. The rest will follow.”[/color]

[color=#79dbbc]“Yeah, maybe.”[/color] The advice seemed perfectly sound, but as Dani sat there, she couldn't picture where such a place might be. So much of her life had been wrapped up in Aurora for so long that she wasn't sure she knew how to be anything else. Dani checked her phone. [color=#79dbbc]“Shoot, gotta run. I've only got twenty minutes to get to my Civics class.”[/color]

[color=#b76e79]“You could always…”[/color] Amara pushed a hand through the air in a swooping motion.

Dani shot her oldest friend a look and went on her way. 

The subway wasn't a particularly glamorous way to travel, but it was fast, cheap, and presented significantly less risk to Dani's anonymity. At that hour, it wasn't all that crowded, either. Walking to the end of the platform, Dani found a car that was all but abandoned; besides herself, the only other living soul was a Latina waitress heading home for the day, brown apron in hand. Dani settled into a corner seat and popped on her usual playlist. “Bags” by Clairo began to play. 

At the second stop, a man entered the car. Dani clocked him right away, as did the waitress. His zip-up hoodie might've fit if he were thirty pounds heavier, and he evidently had no one in his life to tell him that his chinstrap beard wasn't working. Dani was grateful when he seemed to pay her no mind, but then she saw his gaze linger on the waitress. For her part, the other woman had picked a spot on the floor to study [i]very[/i] intently.

The man was content to hang off one of the stanchions at first. After a minute, though, he ambled over to the bench where the other woman was sitting and helped himself to a seat. Dani, watching all of this unfold, surreptitiously removed one of her earbuds. Now facing the waitress, the man said, [color=#bdb76b]“Hey,”[/color] dragging out the syllable. Interpreting nothing from her silence, he inched closer. [color=#bdb76b]“I said, ‘hey.’”[/color]

The woman – who otherwise could have passed for a statue – flicked her eyes up at Dani, so briefly that an ill-timed blink would have missed it. Not that she would've needed the signal.

[color=#79dbbc]“She's not interested, dude,”[/color] Dani called out.

The man looked at her as though she had just announced the weather in Peru. Somehow, he was even [i]less[/i] attractive with his face all scrunched-up. [color=#bdb76b]“I'm having a private conversation,”[/color] he announced, [color=#bdb76b]“do you mind?”[/color]

[color=#79dbbc]“Conversations usually involve two people, and like I just said, she's [i]not[/i] interested.”[/color]

[color=#bdb76b]“I don't remember asking you. If she's not interested, she can say so.”[/color] He turned back to the waitress and addressed her as though he were talking to a puppy or a small child. [color=#bdb76b]“Isn't that right? You'd say so, wouldn't you?”[/color] He began to stretch an arm towards her. 

Anger flared in Dani. She rose to her feet instantly. [color=#79dbbc]“Touch a single follicle on her head, and you'll regret it,”[/color] she warned.

The creep now matched her energy. [color=#bdb76b]“Yo, sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up, bitch!”[/color] He took a lock of the waitress’ hair between his fingers.

Dani turned to the waitress. [color=#79dbbc]<“Cover your eyes.”>[/color] The woman did as she was told, and Dani’s hand shot up.

It had taken a long time to learn how to control her powers. That first time, at ACL, everything had happened on instinct; it was like her body had the answers to a test she didn't know she was taking. For the first few times thereafter, the power had been overwhelming, unpredictable. She felt like she was aiming a fire hose. Eventually, as with all things, muscle memory kicked in. Before long, she could create a beam thin enough to pierce a nickel or a blast large enough to flip a Hummer. In time, she even learned how to produce light absent force.

Dani's hand flared, filling the subway car with light. It lasted less than half a second, but in that time, the car lit up a thousand times brighter than any camera flash. As the flare subsided, the ambient light dimmed; Dani’s body drank in energy to replace what had been lost. After months of holding the light inside, there was a certain sense of relief – like stretching after sitting in an office chair too long. 

The creep was not relieved. In fact, he was holding his eyes and groaning loudly. Dani hadn't hit him hard enough to cause permanent vision loss, but he'd definitely be seeing spots the rest of the day. [color=#bdb76b]“What– what the fuck?”[/color] he shouted with his typical eloquence. [color=#bdb76b]“What the fuck did you do to me?”[/color]

Dani shrugged. [color=#79dbbc]“I [i]did[/i] warn you.”[/color]

The train slowed, pulling into the Union Circle station. As the man continued struggling with temporary blindness, the two women collected their things and made for the exit. The waitress looked at Dani, perhaps a bit strangely but with a generous helping of gratitude. In a quiet voice, she whispered, [color=#a0522d]“[i]Gracias.[/i]”[/color]

[color=#79dbbc]“[i]De nada,[/i]”[/color] Dani answered back. And with that, they went their separate ways. Dani hadn't had a save in months, and while “blinding the subway creep” didn't figure likely to rank among her greatest feats, it still felt great to use her powers to help someone; it felt the way it had in the beginning. And the best part? No press, no fanfare. She could just get back to her ordinary, uninteresting life with no one else being the wiser.

On her way out of the station, something caught Dani’s eye. Taped to a column was a flyer styled after a Sex Pistols concert poster advertising a production assistant opening at WKNT, Calder State’s campus radio. “Taste necessary, experience optional!” the flyer proclaimed. Dani heard Amara's words echoing in her head. [color=#b76e79][i]Find a place where you feel comfortable being yourself.[/i][/color] She had to admit: the girl knew her stuff.

Dani took out her phone and snapped a picture of the flyer.