Work Text:
(Here is how it begins: one day, Eli looks at Marisol, and thinks she has a sunshine smile.
And then he never stops noticing her.)
1900
Eli likes to lay on the floor of the makeshift art room when Marisol makes pottery, because she hums when it's going well and it's relaxing.
He looks towards her as the pottery wheel slows to a stop.
Marisol leans her elbows on the wheel. "Look, I like you, I know you like me, why can't we try this?"
Eli looks away. "You're important to me and I can't risk it," he finally tells her, and Marisol sighs. He meets her eyes, pleads for her to understand.
She restarts the pottery wheel, but she doesn't hum anymore.
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They don't talk about it. Marisol lets it drop and they continue life as it was before.
1914
All the books paint love as this wonderful, beautiful thing, but Eli looks at Marisol at her statehood ceremony and thinks I love her and it feels like fear.
1920
They do not talk about what happened in the trenches- about Marisol putting her gas mask on Eli and knocking him out- but he doesn't forget it.
Marisol scares him. She is always been willing to martyr herself for the people she loves- she'd gone to war so Nate wouldn't be alone, she'd taken off a gas mask in a trench full of poisonous air to give it to Eli and then knocked him out when he tried to give it back.
He hesitantly brings up her tendency of self-sacrifice one night while she spins pottery.
Marisol shrugs. "What's the point of immortality if you don't use it to save the people you love?" Her eyes are equally fierce and solemn, and Eli drops it. He owes her that, at least.
He doesn't mention that he'd rather die than see her give him another gas mask.
1923
Eli is completely speechless. "You made these?" He's holding up one of the perfect little glass test tubes out of the box. She'd only picked out the best ones. She was very firmly not thinking of her box of failed attempts.
(When she'd said she'd made something for him, Eli had brightened and jokingly said as long as it's not another vase.)
Marisol grins. "I got bored and all my pots felt wrong. So. Yeah."
"Doesn't glassblowing require special equipment?" There's her Eli, always curious.
"Yeah, but these are actually lampworked." Eli makes the gesture Marisol translates to elaborate. "Glassblowing uses furnaces, lampworking uses hand torches. Yes, like mini blowtorches. They're made of borosilicate, so you can use them in a lab."
Eli hesitates before he hugs her, and Marisol resists the urge to sigh as she melts against him.
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Nate snorts at the box of failed attempts shoved into the back of her workshop a month later. "Jeez, have you got it bad or what?" He nudges it with his foot, and Marisol sticks her tongue out at him when she can't think of a response.
1941
Marisol reaches over and laces their fingers together while the states argue about declarations of war.
And Eli doesn't have the heart to let go, so he just holds her hand tighter.
1942
The project demands complete secrecy, even with his family. Alfred knows some. Not all.
It means he can't explain why he isn't fighting with them- why he isn't crammed in some foxhole in the Pacific with Jules or sweating in North Africa with Marisol.
Eli can't even begin to explain himself, so he doesn't try.
1945
It burns, it burns so so so bad and just because he knew it would hurt doesn't mean he was prepared for this-
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Alfred tells him afterward that the radiation had damaged his organs and he'd bled out internally too fast for anything to save him, and Eli just closes his eyes and asks him to leave him alone for a while.
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Either Alfred or the president must feel especially awful about the excruciating pain part of the whole project and how he's stuck in a hospital room now in light of the radiation poisoning part, because Jules and Marisol and Emily get pulled from the frontlines.
Jules gets kicked out the very first day because he asked, with the straightest face he could manage, if Eli glowed in the dark now and Eli laughed so hard he ripped four stitches. (He came back the next day anyway, and smuggled in sopapilla because 'green jello is an insult to food everywhere')
They come and go. It's better than being alone, definitely. Emily comes and eats the green jello he hides in the nightstand drawer for her and sometimes reads to him and sometimes she'll get all philosophical, which is cool. Jules comes and fills up the room with mindless chatter and smuggles in food.
Marisol is pissed at him.
She'd called him a stupid asshole in Spanish the first time she saw him and then almost cried and refused to speak to him anymore which really really sucks.
Jules brings him street vendor tacos and Eli could write him sonnets. Well, he could if he actually knew what a sonnet was. And he could write poetry. "Marisol was just really worried. Emily says she was pacing the whole trip across the Atlantic." He chews thoughtfully. "I mean, first the whole thing with Nate and then this? I don't really blame her for flipping out a little."
"Nate?" Eli questions and rolls his eyes when Jules makes a face at him for talking with his mouth full.
Jules nods, suddenly a lot tenser. "He- he's MIA."
That isn't good- not on either front. Especially since Nate was a pilot. "Al can't find him?"
"Says he's somewhere behind the lines. We can't exactly do a retrieval mission."
Eli curses in Spanish. He and Nate didn't get along, but Marisol was close with him.
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He's partially asleep when the door opens, and he assumes it's Emily, cause she'd talked about maybe bringing over a book today.
It isn't Emily.
"Hey," Marisol says softly.
Eli's eyes fly open.
Marisol looks more unsure than he's ever seen her before, hovering in the doorway.
Eli beams at her and Marisol takes a deep breath before she strides across the room to sit beside his bed.
She's silent for a moment, wringing her hands nervously, before she speaks. "I'm sorry."
Eli can never stay mad at her. "It's okay," He pauses, unsure if he has a right to talk about Nate when he criticizes him the most. "I heard about Nate." He finally says softly.
Her face falls.
"Marisol," Eli says and moves over slightly, and that's all he has to do, because Marisol climbs up beside him, burying her face in his neck after a moment.
Marisol's head is on his bad shoulder, the one with the burns, but Eli isn't going to tell her to move because he can feel her tears against his neck and Marisol is crying.
So he sits and deals with it, or at least he tries too, but then Marisol shifts and Eli's pretty sure the new thin layer of skin over it has ripped open again and Eli makes a pitiful noise in the back of his throat and Marisol looks like she's accidentally kicked a puppy, but worse.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry- did I hurt you? Are you okay?" Marisol is frantic, looking like she wants to see the damage but also like she's not willing to undo the sterile white bandages.
Eli grimaces as he shifts his shoulder. "It's okay. Just a burn."
Marisol blinks. "Burn? From what? Jules said you had radiation poisoning."
Eli wants to shrug, and he's angry for a second that he can't. "I've got a couple of radiation burns too."
Marisol looks horrified.
"...you can lay on my other shoulder," He offers after a moment where Marisol just stares at him. He liked that part, except for the crying and the pain.
Marisol mutters something in Spanish under her breath, but her mouth is curving into a smile and she's getting onto the other side of the bed, so whatever it is can't be that bad.
She lays her head on his good shoulder and Eli leans his head against hers, and Marisol hesitates before she grabs his hand, careful to leave the bandages where the IV was alone.
And maybe, they fall asleep like that and when the nurse comes by she just smiles and leaves.
1949
Jules looks at Eli, who's looking at Marisol, and snorts. "I will never understand you. You love each other and you both know it and neither of you will do anything about it."
"It isn't that simple."
Jules rolls his eyes. "It is, you just make it more complicated than it has to be."
1962
There are a lot of reasons it's complicated, but they can be summed up into three main points.
The first is that Eli can't be the reason Marisol gets hurt. Marisol would burn herself for the people she loves because she loves with everything she's got. Eli has some hope that if he keeps her at arm's length he won't ever have to deal with another gas mask, metaphorically or literally.
The second is that Marisol is the warmest person he knows and he isn't willing to risk being the thing that makes her cold. Eli knows that he does better with logic and reason than emotion and that Marisol is the most emotional person he knows. He knows, at some point, he'd find a way to ruin it.
The third is that Eli is afraid. Once the words are out- once he tells Marisol he loves her- he can never take them back. What if it isn't enough? What if he says it and Marisol finally figures out she deserves better? They can't go back after that. No more easy companionship in Marisol's workshop as she spins pottery, no more after-meeting diner food, no more stealing french fries from each other. They can't come back from that, and he can't afford to lose what they already have.
1967
The marks on Nate's inner elbows turn into white scars that won't fade anytime soon, and everyone wants to judge, but Marisol knows that this is just proof of his desperation. This is the result of self-medicating something no one can treat.
If no one else knows how to stand beside Nate- how to be a safety net, then Marisol will.
He's her brother in every way but blood, and they say the blood of the covenant is stronger than the water of the womb anyway.
1970
It's a fact of the matter that immortals sometimes make spur of the moment life choices.
However, Marisol is used to Eli- reasonable, rational, scientific Eli.
"You got a tattoo?"
Eli winces at either her tone or her volume. Marisol mumbles an apology. "I want to see!"
Eli rolls his eyes but sits up straighter and pulls his shirt up so she can see the full Zia sun inked over his heart. She'd thought it would be smaller, but it's bigger than her hand.
Before she even consciously realizes it, she's reaching out to trace it.
Eli goes still for a moment before she feels the rise and fall of his chest under her fingertips.
If this was one of Cal's movies, they'd kiss.
But it isn't. Marisol lets her hand drop and Eli pulls his shirt back down.
1976
It is the summer of the bicentennial when Marisol asks if he wants to come with her to get a tattoo.
He's half asleep on the floor, and he blinks at her, watching as the pottery wheel slows to a stop as she waits for his answer.
"Sure." He says, and closes his eyes as the pottery wheel starts up again.
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It's supposed to be simple- Marisol had drawn out the tattoo (a band of Navajo symbols), she'd found a place and yet, here they are, with Marisol frozen in the parking lot.
He knows how much she had wanted to do this, and how scared she must be to not be doing it, so he reaches out and takes her hand.
"Come on. I'll get whatever you get, that way we're in this together."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
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They end up with the tattoos on different arms because Marisol spent the entire time squeezing his hand so hard he thought she'd break bones.
"I thought it would be worse." Marisol muses.
Eli shrugs. He'd had a tattoo done before this- the Zia sun on his chest- so he'd known what to expect.
Marisol picks at the bandages on her arm the entire way home.
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The skin heals up the day after next, and when the bicentennial rolls around Marisol wears a sundress that shows the tattoo banding around her arm and she keeps smiling at him, eyes bright and sparkling.
And really, how's he supposed to talk himself out of loving her when she's like this?
1988
She hosts the meeting that winter. She thinks she got to just because it wasn't freezing in her state, but Marisol will take her wins where she can. Nate doesn't come, and she's trying not to worry. Her and Eli get pizza and he comes over to watch a movie afterward, and it's nice.
It isn't a date. It never is. Marisol is trying to learn not to be disappointed by this.
Eli picks all the pepperoni off his piece so he can eat them first, and Marisol gives him half of hers. It's good. It's comfortable.
The phone rings and Marisol sets her plate down on the table. Eli pauses the movie. "Don't steal my pepperoni."
Eli shrugs like no promises, but Marisol knows he won't.
For a minute, she thinks Nate is on a bad trip, and then his voice catches and she recognizes it for what it is. Grief. He chokes out Rosalia, voice stumbling into Spanish after it, and Marisol closes her eyes for a moment.
"Nate. Nate." Eli looks over at her and she turns away so he can't read her expression. "Nathaniel. Where are you?"
"Home," He chokes out.
This isn't always a good thing. Marisol has waited for Nate to revive in the safety of his apartment more than anywhere else. "Don't go anywhere. Don't do anything. Nate. Promise me."
He mumbles something that sounds like prometo. It's enough. "I'll be there as soon as I can."
Nate says goodbye and hangs up and Marisol allows herself to lean her head against the wall and breathe for a minute. Just one. Then she is going into her bedroom to drag the always packed go-bag from under her bed and snag her meeting bag from her desk. Nate had sounded sober if not falling apart with grief, but Marisol had had to watch him revive too many times. She grabs a vial of Naloxone just in case. She shoves her feet into her flats and pulls her loose curls into a ponytail.
Marisol runs a checklist through her head as she moves.
She needs her keys.
She slams into Eli when she goes back into the kitchen, and he steadies her with a hand on her back.
"I have to go," Marisol breathes out when Eli makes no motion to move.
Eli grabs her arm as she brushes by him. "Let Nate learn to clean up his own messes, for once."
Marisol thinks about Nate's hand in hers as she died, how he stayed for her, all because she asked him to.
She closes her eyes. She thinks: the thing about Nate is that he'll learn how to live in the dirt if you leave him there, but that's too cruel and she doesn't say it. "He's my brother," Is what she says instead.
"I don't understand why you keep doing this to yourself." Eli's voice is soft with disappointment.
Marisol does not flinch away from his disappointment. She doesn't wait for him to apologize. She has never been that type of girl. "I don't understand why you keep pushing me away. I don't understand your hesitation or why you stick around even after you say you don't want me." She returns in the same disappointed tone, and then she turns away and leaves.
They do not talk for a long time after that.
1990
"You deserve someone who isn't confused about the feelings they have for you," Eli tells her as he kicks at a rock in the middle of the sidewalk.
Marisol is unquantifiable and undefinable in every way, always doing the opposite of what he expects. The only constants are her love for Nate and the other states she thinks of as siblings and her love for him, which are unknown in their own right. She's still a mystery he can't wrap his head around. She's still one of the things he fears losing the most.
Marisol raises her eyebrows at him. "What makes you think deserving and wanting are the same thing?"
The unsaid words are clear. I want you.
Eli drops his gaze.
1991
Nate hasn't been eating and the marks on his elbows are overly prominent and he hasn't been sober in months.
A line has to be drawn, and if no one else will do it, Marisol has to.
In a way, this is her fault, anyway.
Survivor's guilt isn't limited to humans, and her first death had wrecked Nate to the point of traumatizing. Traumatized enough that when a crack of a psychiatrist prescribed him something, he hadn't asked questions. Desperate enough that when it ran out he'd turned to drugs.
It isn't logical to feel guilty, but Marisol and Nate had always been too empathetic.
Marisol may be the copper state, but she has a spine of steel and a will made of iron.
It takes both of those to calmly stock Nate's master bathroom with blankets and non-perishables, and then to lock him in it and force him into withdrawal.
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She doesn't let him out, not when Nate is yelling at her or when he's begging. Not even when she's pretty sure he's crying on the other side of the bathroom door.
Marisol sits against the door and knows Nate is doing the same on the other side, and she wonders what kind of sister has the heart to do this to their brother.
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Marisol forces Nate through withdrawal and into sobriety and she does not allow herself to falter until a month afterward when Nate is clean and unlikely to go back.
She gets home and she falls apart, and then she dials a number. It picks up on the first ring. "Please," She gets out, breath hitching and voice breaking.
Eli hangs up, and he's there thirty minutes before he should be, and she knows he sped the whole way.
1995
Here is what it comes down to: another excuse, and this time Marisol doesn't let it drop.
"You always have an excuse," Marisol sighs. "If you don't love me, just tell me."
"Marisol-"
Marisol smiles sadly. "I love you," she tells him, and it sounds like goodbye and I'm sorry all at once.
And then she turns away to go back to the meeting, leaving Eli frozen in the middle of the sidewalk.
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"What did you do? Marisol is really upset."
Marisol has spent so long protecting Nate it's easy to forget that Nate is just as fiercely protective of her as she is of him.
Eli just looks at him. "I don't know. I fucked up."
Nate raises his eyebrows at the curse word. Eli rarely curses, and usually, when he does it's in Spanish. After a moment, he sits beside him.
He picks at the bracelets around his wrist. "It's about you and her, isn't it?"
Eli looks away.
Nate sighs. "Look, Marisol loves you. She's in love with you, and she's dealt with so much of your crap already that I don't think you could scare her off if you tried. But she can't- she can't just wait around for you to decide whether you want her or not, because you're hurting her. You're letting your relationship go stagnant, and either way, you have to decide or you're gonna lose her entirely. "
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"Marisol?"
Marisol's sigh isn't audible over the whir of her pottery wheel, but Eli has known her so long that he knows it's there.
Suddenly, he isn't sure why he thought this was a good idea. It's been a week since Marisol had said she loved him, and maybe it's too late or it's too soon now.
The pottery wheel slows to a stop and Marisol stands, wiping her hands on her stained apron. "Yeah?"
Eli opens his mouth and chokes on the words. He closes his mouth and exhales and tries again.
"I love you," He says, and it feels like fear still, but the good kind- the rollercoaster kind. The fear you feel when you do something scary, mixed with something like joy.
Marisol's eyes light up, but her face is still carefully blank. "You- You aren't just saying that?"
Eli shakes his head.
Marisol smiles, hesitantly at first, and then the words must fully sink in because her smile practically radiates joy and affection and love and Eli doesn't know how he went so long without saying it.
He smiles back, and just barely manages to keep his balance when Marisol hugs him.
He hesitates just a moment, long enough that Marisol starts to pull away before he wraps his arms around her and hugs her back.
"I love you," He says again, because Marisol deserves to hear it a million times.
Marisol looks up at him, smiling her sunshine smile. "I love you too."