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le-amewzing · 1 year

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all hope is (not) lost

Considering very few things went the girls' way this ep, I decided to fix that. :3c *Note: This is set after s1e14, "Vials and Tribulations."

Fic: "all hope is (not) lost" [FFN] [AO3]

Pairings/Characters: pre?onesided?Amy Madden/Hartley, Amy & Jake Madden, with cameos from Eva Madden, Vic Madden, & Colby Madden

Rating: K

Words: ~2,920

Additional info: romance, friendship, 3rd person POV

Summary: Amy tries to recreate the concert vibes she and Hartley missed out on, with several (selfish and not) purposes in mind.

The moment she clicks "BUY NOW!" Amy is filled with a mixture of elation and resentment.

Elation, because her plan is one step closer to being real.

Resentment, because she's paid money for these tickets, when the villain in her screams that she ought to have stolen the tickets somehow…or nicked the money off Mr. Tennyson to pay for them. It would serve him right for ruining the girls' original plans in the first place.

But, Amy supposes as she exits the venue's website and pulls up her text history with a certain cheery Sunshine Club member, paying for concert tickets instead of stealing them is yet another way Hartley's rubbing off on her. …ugh, is Amy going soft? The mere idea makes her shudder. Nevertheless, her thumbs fly over her keyboard:

-Guess what?

Those annoying three dots appear while Hartley types. Then her reply pops up a moment later:

-You already finished tomorrow's English composition?

Cheeky. Nice. Good to see Amy's snark is finding a home with Hartley if Hartley insists on turning her into a respectable citizen. Amy smirks proudly and types back:

-We're going to see Fuchsia.

This time, no three dots appear. One minute passes, then two. Still nothing.

…huh. Well, that didn't go as planned. Hartley's one to get absorbed in her assignments, sure, but ignoring Amy's text? Ignoring a text about their favorite singer? Amy gives up after three minutes of silence, tossing her phone beside her on her comforter and flopping backwards on her bed. All that elation for nothing. Boredom threatens to interrupt her evening, making even her homework start to look like fun—

The sudden thunder of footsteps racing upstairs interrupts Amy's wallowing, though, and the footfall screeches to a halt outside her bedroom door long enough to pant (ew) and knock (how, ugh, polite).

Amy props herself up on her elbows and quirks one wary eyebrow at her door. "Hartley?" she calls out.

Her neighbor takes that as invitation and all but throws the door open. Hartley is, of course, out of breath, and she's got a sticky note adhered to her left shoulder. But her eyes are as gigantic as her smile. "Please tell me that wasn't autocorrect," she blurts, half laughing.

Amy smirks. "The only thing autocorrect did to my message was swap the s and the c in her name—I'll never spell it right on the first try to save my life."

Hartley squeals with joy—a piercing note, and Amy's supposed to be the one with vocal superpowers—and half dives across the room, jumping onto the free space beside Amy and resting on her haunches. Hartley lifts her shoulders in her excitement, notices and picks off the sticky note, and looks at Amy. "But—how the heck did you manage it? I thought Fuchsia wasn't going to be local again anytime soon on this tour. Not after the show Mr. Tennyson went to." Her face falls in her confusion, and her shoulders begin to droop.

But Amy sits up and grabs Hartley's nearer hand. "Look, it's not us going in-person to see her, because you're right."

Hartley furrows her brow.

"I got us virtual passes for the livestream of the next stop on her tour."

Hartley's mouth pops open in a large "O."

"I thought…next best thing, right?"

Those big, brown eyes impossibly widen.

Amy twists her lips around, at a loss as to what to do with this Hartley. This is like those three dots come to life. "Hart?"

The next thing she knows, all Amy sees is that big bush of dark ringlets, because Hartley throws her arms around the villain's neck and hugs her, tight. "Holy heck—that's amazing!"

It's cute that she doesn't swear, but Amy doesn't quite have the bravado to smirk right now, not with her best friend this close. She hugs her back, briefly, and then blinks away her stupor and pulls away. She gestures to where her laptop sits on her desk across the room. "Glad you think so. Because the livestream is this Saturday night, and I thought we'd make a night of it here."

"It's a date," Hartley chirps. No hesitation. No tripping over her words. (No hint of that bumbling behavior she has around that sketchy dude, Declan.)

But Amy nods and gives in to one of Hartley's pinky promises, her smirk replaced by a weak smile. "Yeah, yeah…it is."

Come Saturday, Amy catches her reflection in the mirror and chooses to wear anything but that weak smile. She will not let anything or anyone ruin tonight.

And that includes her very own family.

Amy decides to bring up her sleepover with Hartley at breakfast, when everyone aside from Jake is groggy and easy to strong-arm. "Listen up, people—I need you gone between the hours of eight and ten tonight."

Her mother snorts while her father scratches his head as if he missed something on the calendar. "Big plans tonight, then?"

Amy meets Eva's gaze head on and doesn't even blink. "Girls' night with Hartley," she fibs, downplaying tonight's importance, "and I don't want to be interrupted."

Eva shrugs. "Can't anyway. They've kept me at the Round-Up so far…and I best not jinx that," she adds begrudgingly, though she tacks on that last part with a withering look at Jake that's somehow grateful at the same time. Impressive.

But Amy zeroes in on Vic. "Dad? Plans?" she pushes.

"By 'gone,' you mean 'out of the house'?"

"Yep."

"And the secret lair isn't technically part of the house…" Vic raises his eyebrows like a kid wheedling a "yes" or "fine already" from his parent.

So Amy caves, because she knows her dad's really got no better place to be on a Saturday night. She rolls her eyes in response…but at least there's the backup option of locking him down there if she has to. Now there's an idea. Speaking of which—she glances at Colby next.

The poor kid sweats under the weight of her stare. "Uh. I will. Not be here?"

"As in, not present, Colby. Not just invisible and pretending you made yourself scarce."

Colby might have a bunch of powers and new ones keep cropping up every time they turn around, but there's still something to be said about the power of being the scary big sister. He nods twice and crams cereal into his mouth. "Gotcha," he says with his mouth full. Ew.

And last and certainly least, Amy faces Jake. But he's the only one smiling throughout this whole family meal. That throws her off-balance. "What?"

Jake shakes his head, chuckling to himself. "…nah, nothing. You know Mom's working, and so will I. So that's everyone."

"And, Colby," Eva pipes up, "if you're really good at staying invisible, you could come to the restaurant and I could toss you some scraps from the kitchen."

That catches Jake's attention. "Mom, no."

"Why not? It means less cleaning at the end of the day."

Conversation devolves further at that point, but Amy's mostly satisfied when she finishes her food and heads upstairs to start prepping her room. …the only problem is that she's got company on the stairwell. She turns on the second-floor landing and huffs at her older brother. "What, Jake?"

He shrugs but doesn't shoulder his way past her to reach his room. "I find it interesting, how adamant you were at breakfast just now."

"Yeah. So?"

"Months ago, you used to say you could only take Hartley in small doses. Now you actually call her your best friend. And you invited her to stay over?"

She almost blurts the truth—that it's a special occasion, for just the two of them—but she catches herself in time. Jake doesn't get to and doesn't need to know that Amy had high hopes for the previous concert…and he doesn't need to know that she's tempered her expectations for tonight either. But she'll still do everything in her (regular) power to make it a memorable night…hopefully for the better.

And maybe, just maybe, Jake understands a little or picks up on his sister's—fear? (no, Havoc doesn't get scared…so Amy Madden doesn't either)…hesitation and nods. He exhales and bumps shoulders with her as he passes by, but the gesture is oddly supportive. "Interesting," he says once more.

"It's just a concert," Amy blabs, immediately wanting to kick herself. But she continues when Jake glances back, "…for that singer she and I both like." Is it just her, or does her voice sound too quiet, like when they were little kids and their powers hadn't come in yet?

Jake genuinely smiles this time with his nod. "Good luck with watching it tonight, Amy," he says, as if he really means it.

And, though she'd never admit it, Amy smiles to herself, happy to take any luck or positive vibes she can get right now.

Whiling away the rest of Saturday with no one else around to torment while she waits for Hartley to arrive that evening is incredibly boring. But it gives Amy time enough to rearrange her room twice, to rummage through her closet more than a dozen times (enough to tire of the activity), to contemplate future interactions with Starling which she'll no doubt win (or at least where she'll have the last word), and to order early the pizzas the girls will be chowing down on throughout the night.

The pizzas arrive five minutes before Hartley does, which is fifteen minutes before the concert proper starts, while the opening artist gets Fuchsia's crowd warmed up. Hartley enters the Madden home unannounced, as if she and not her grandmother owns the place, and smiles when she meets Amy in the kitchen with the food. "Ohh, perfect! I'm starving."

Amy chuckles. "Then grab a box and we'll move this party upstairs."

Hartley all but prances behind her, but she calms down once they enter Amy's room. Hartley descends on the soda Amy brought up earlier and is halfway through her second slice before she unzips her hoodie to unveil her Fuchsia-branded shirt. "Are we celebrating this occasion properly?" she asks.

"Well, duh." Amy reaches for the t-shirt she left on her bed, to don after she's put away the pizza as well as any chance of getting red sauce on her. Plus—Amy hits the lights, and the string of fairy lights she has hanging over the corkboard behind her laptop glows a soft magenta. "And these arrived just in time, too," she finishes, digging out a pair of wand lights and passing one to Hartley before sitting back down on the floor with her friend to continue dinner.

Hartley laughs in utter amazement. "You really meant it when you called it the 'next best thing.'"

"Eh, can I deliver or can I deliver?"

They put away the first pizza and drain half the first liter of soda when the crowd begins to chant Fuchsia's name. That's Amy's and Hartley's signal to shove their trash out of the way, grab a wand light each, and get on their feet. Hartley, at the last second, produces a set of magenta-colored, heart-shaped doodle-boppers, but Amy quickly turns down the offer to wear them. Hartley shrugs and yanks the headband on, but the bouncing hearts are only emphasized by how she styled her hair in bubble tails tonight. The overall look is very Hartley.

The livestream does an excellent job of emphasizing the crowd's thirst for Fuchsia. The people present chant her name, and Amy and Hartley scream along with them, and Fuchsia claps to the two syllables, leading into the opening song of her first set. It's the title track of her most recent album, and Fuchsia's entire crowd, both virtual and live, have every last word memorized. Thank goodness for microphones and Fuchsia's windpipes—otherwise no one would be able to hear her over her fans.

Fuchsia launches into two more songs immediately after, turning this opening set into a vibrant medley, before pausing for water and asking how everyone's doing tonight.

Hartley squeals and all but jumps up and down beside Amy as the livestream drone camera zooms in on Fuchsia's face and she gives them a little wave, which is a nice, personal touch for anyone who splurged on these tickets.

Fuchsia's next song is one of her more somber pieces with darker, angrier lyrics. If it had an upped pace, it'd be a head-banger for sure, but the fans know the beat and the sea of wand lights moves in time with the songstress' vocals.

Amy's attention is caught by this song as it winds down—Fuchsia's lyrics here, "The time between us was too good to be true," hit a little too close to home, more than she'd like—but then she yanks her eyes to the glow of her desk clock on her nightstand off to the right side of the room. Has half an hour really passed already? Her face falls with the realization that this night could slip through her fingers like sand if she doesn't seize her chance.

"Amy?"

She tears her eyes away from the clock and faces Hartley. Hartley's brow is pinched in confusion, so Amy tries to smile. "Yeah?"

Still a bit confused, Hartley matches her smile nevertheless and links their arms as Fuchsia launches into a peppier tune. She doesn't let Amy go and even has them sort of half dancing in front of the laptop as the concert continues.

It's enough to remind Amy why she mainly did this. Of course she's a Fuchsia fan, but there's nothing like being a Fuchsia fan alongside Hartley and getting to see the singer with Hartley. So maybe there was an ounce of truth in what Jake said…the Amy of several months ago never would've imagined finding Hartley this endearing…but that's yesterday's truth. Today's truth?

Hartley beams up at her, her eyes crinkling and the glowing lights casting a soft warmth over those big brown eyes.

Today's truth is that…Amy imagined them going to that first concert without incident, just the two of them, with no one to complain about the noise and no one they had to kick out of the house. Today's truth is that Amy's got a lot of hope, some of which stems from the notion that Hartley hasn't mentioned Declan in a long while and has been focused only on Amy. Today's truth is that…well…this could be more than friendship, right?

Hartley's ecstatic tonight, sure, and she hums along with the next song to give her voice a rest. One of her bubble tails brushes Amy's shoulder as the girls sway along in time with the music, and she smiles, slowly facing Amy.

Amy blinks—once, twice. She's a villain; she knows an opportunity when she sees it, and this vibe between her and Hartley is good. Amy leans down half an inch and just starts to part her lips…

The roar of the crowd fills the room, snapping her back to her senses.

Amy swivels her head, desperate to focus on the screen even though the concert doesn't register with her right now. No, all she can think about is her failed attempt at a first kiss and getting cold feet at the last second.

Worse still, she wonders what she'd blurt right now if she were still under the effects of her dad's truth gas…and how Hartley would react.

Amy chews on her lower lip for the rest of the first half of the concert, focusing on Fuchsia's music and not on the arm linked with hers. When intermission comes, she breathes a sigh of relief when Hartley ducks out to the bathroom, because Amy knows she's got to get it together! So what that this night hasn't turned out as she hoped, either? At least the night isn't ruined…

…well, she tells herself that. But when she catches her reflection in her mirror when heading downstairs to grab more soda and dish up some ice-cream, Amy notes she's traded in her weak smile for a grumpy one, which is pretty hard to get rid of once it's arrived. Great, just great.

Back upstairs, Amy returns with two dishes and the other liter under her arm. Hartley takes the soda and pats the floor beside her, which at least makes Amy chuckle. "Oh? Done dancing for now?"

"Maybe for the night," Hartley admits. "I have to give Fuchsia credit—leaping around on the stage like that, in full costume and makeup, takes stamina I don't have."

Amy grins, thinking it could be that or the pizza they put away earlier, but she's happy to settle in for the rest of the concert and not be on her feet this way.

And, as it turns out, this livestream setup has its own benefits, too, because after they've finished their dessert, Hartley links her arm with Amy's again, as if she means to dance even while parked. Yet…she doesn't.

Amy sneaks a peek at her.

Hartley links their arms but snakes her hand down to reach for Amy's hand, threading the girls' fingers together. Then she snuggles close, content at Amy's side while her eyes are glued to the screen.

…oh. The night hasn't been ruined, and the night hasn't quite turned out as Amy planned, either, but…maybe this means there will be other opportunities, after all. And that's a thought that plasters a genuine, feel-good smile on Amy's lips for the rest of their weekend.

8D Y'OKAY. SO. This draft was…deffo unlike my others. XD Clearly it's my longest VoVV fic so far, but this one evolved a LOT from my original notes. I thought this might be a two-scene fic and I might do some art. …then I got to writing it and three scenes blossomed and angst threatened to creep in (I beat it back as best I could! X'D), and we have this final version you see before you. :D Granted, I'm still thinking of drawing at least part of this as a comic/comic page, but I gotta find the time for that, oof. But after Hartley did such a good job lying to Tennyson to protect the fam…i.e., her inner villain's starting to show…how could I not write a Hartmy Fuchsia date?? :'D And YOU BET Amy oughta have hope. UGH. Bby gays. Life rly be that tough, tho. TT-TT Also, the Madden fam brekkie scene was the unexpected scene, but it was fun finally getting to write everyone and having Amy intimidate everyone, telling them to scram. XD Eva using Colby as a trashcan, tho…! And Jake. I love Jake. He's empathetic and reads the Hartmy vibes from miles away, same as the rest of us, yo. AHHHH. I could scream all day long, but I just watched s1e16 and I'm still laughing at the perfection of it. :3c (I also have another draft burning a hole in my pocket and I WAS SO TEMPTED TO POST IT BEFORE THIS, but it's not Hartmy and I know most of y'all are thirsting, so yeah. XD) Final musings: Bubble tails on Hartley bc it's a cute style and v fun to draw and also two teens putting away two [implied to be large] pizzas on their own is accurate af. I speak from experience. XD

Thanks for reading, and feel free to leave an anon/unsigned review via the FFN link or comment via the AO3 link at the top of the post, especially if you enjoyed this!

~mew

#vovv #villains of valley view #hartmy #amy madden #hartley (vovv)#fanfic #mew writes too much #jake madden #eva madden #vic madden #colby madden

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