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Darcy sighed to herself as she realised she was about to go and do the one thing she never wanted.
Maybe she was a little overdramatic?
Whatever, she was just going on a date.
Sure, it was the first time she had been on a date in many years, after all, how could you even pretend to date someone after the whole fiasco involving New Mexico and the realisation that she (or rather they as a human race) weren’t alone among the stars.
On second thoughts, maybe she should just invest in a lifetime supply of tinfoil hats?
She couldn’t work out how to explain (or brush under the carpet) that she had tazed a man, found out that said man was a God, the hammer-wielding god (associated with thunder, storms, oak trees, strength, the protector of mankind and hallowing and fertility, which whoa trippy), watched as her boss somehow fell in love with said god (whoever said that the course of true love ran smoothly had clearly never met Jane Foster on the backs of a science bender), then watched as the God flew away. The fact that Darcy had developed a friendship with her once prickly and dismissive boss was just gravy. Oh, but once she got past all of that, how was she supposed to explain that she had followed after the woman to Tromsø (which was a beautiful city) when the aliens had crashed down in Manhattan and caused a buttload of pain and anguish and horror with the weird space slug. Oh, and then how could she explain that she was one of the few people running around Greenwich with sticks of saviourdom saving the world AGAIN from the weird Space Elves which Darcy was sorry but didn’t remind her of David Bowie. Those elves didn’t look like either Legolas or Dobby, ugh they just gave her the creeps (and nightmares, Darcy’s subconscious really couldn’t forget those). Oh but then who could explain that Darcy’s name had popped on a weird hit list.
All Darcy knew, was that she couldn’t very easily explain away those years, she wasn’t even sure if the myriad of NDAs she had signed back in New Mexico could apply. So she didn’t mention it, not even sure how she would go about explaining that particular show of nastiness.
So, here Darcy was about to go do the one thing she really hated doing.
A first date.
But, hey it could be worse, it wasn’t a blind date, it was with that cute barista in that nice coffee shop in Central Park, so she (hopefully) wouldn’t be completely and utterly blindsided. At least she hoped she wouldn’t be blindsided.
Checking her small wristwatch, Darcy hurried up to the small apartment block on Bedford Street. Buzzing herself into the small apartment block, Darcy looked down at the address noted on her phone and made her way up the stairs, muttering to herself about pushy mother figures, who wanted nothing more than to see their children engaged and pushing out babies. If her mother hadn’t seen those Facebook posts posted by the people, Darcy had gone to school with, all engaged or pregnant, or married. Some of it just made Darcy want to scream, why should she model her own life of a bunch of randomers she just had been stuck in the same building with six or seven hours with a day for years at a time!
Whatever, Darcy was so relieved she had been able to leave behind all of those rejects, why was she still friends with those sad sacks?
How had her mother even seen those pages? Had her mother somehow gotten into her Facebook account?
Oh, dear Lord had that woman friended all of those miserable skin suits?
Dang, it! But she was starting to talk like Loki.
Bad Darcy, bad!
Those cretins that she had gone to school with would inspire psychopathy in anyone!
Still, onwards and upwards as they say! Raising her fist, Darcy drew in a deep breath, before she knocked on the door already nervous about the date that she really didn’t want to go in the first place. Still, the least she could do was paste a smile on her face, as the door swung open;
“Hello, is Ben there? My name is Darcy Lewis, we’ve got a date tonight.” Darcy introduced herself when the door swung open revealing a tall blonde wearing a green jacket. Belatedly Darcy thrust her hand out, realising that she should be polite.
“Hi, Ben’s just finishing getting ready, I’m his auntie Phoebe Buffay-Hannigan, you’re welcome to come in and wait for him, he shouldn’t be long.” The woman introduced herself as she swung the door open to allow Darcy entrance.
Darcy stepped past the woman, gulping a little when she saw the fifteen unknown faces peering at her. She did have the right address, didn’t she?
“Everybody this is Darcy, Ben’s date” Phoebe called out to the room that all swung round to peer at Darcy as she walked in.
“Hello, my name is Mike, I’m Phoebe’s husband, that’s Joey, Chandler, Monica and Rachel,” Mike said as he pointed to each individual person “that’s Ross, Ben’s Dad standing next to Rachel and that’s Ben’s mothers Carol and Susan standing near Ross.”
Well, that explains the adults but who were the children? Had she entered into some kind of weird commune?
“That’s Emma Geller-Green with the blond there, Ben’s half-sister, the teenagers standing near my wife are Frank Jr. Jr, Leslie and Chandler, who my wife had with her brother, and the twins standing near Monica and Chandler are Erica and Jack.”
Darcy gave Mike a sharp look when he said that his wife had had babies with her boyfriend. What the hell kind of situation had she walked into? Maybe there was something more going on here, at least for her sanity!
“Oh, but you need to explain there, Mike before Darcy here thinks, Phoebe carried the triplets for her brother Frankie Jr. and his wife Alice Knight through an IVF treatment, not through incest” Rachel called out as she walked over.
“Hi there Darcy, my name is Ross, I’m Rachel, I work at Ralph Lauren, what do you do for a living?” Rachel stuck out her hand to Darcy, who glanced down at hand before reaching out with her hand to shake.
“Wow, straight in there huh? I work in the science department at Stark Tower, in Midtown, Manha—“ Darcy started before she was interrupted by Ross coming over, walking goofily towards the group and interrupted them;
“Oh, not Stark Tower, or is it Avengers Tower nowadays? What are those freaks in capes up to nowadays, it’s only a matter of time before they set fire to the world” Ross laughed loudly, Darcy wrinkled her nose thinking rather uncharitably that the laugh sounded weak and brittle.
“ROSS! You know you can’t say something like that” Rachel chided the man, who looked only slightly sulky at being told off.
“Hey, guys! What are you talking about?” Ben bounded up to the group before Ross turned around to his son
“Ben dear, did you know that Darcy here works at Stark Tower? Why didn’t you tell us about Darcy and where she worked!” Ross tried to swing out and pat Ben on the shoulder.
“I didn’t know Dad, how would I know after all? We’re just going to go on a date, not marry each other; we haven’t really asked each how we think about those whackos.”
‘Just stay the course Darce, you just have to go on one little date, even if just to get your overly-pushy mother off your back.'
The rest of the date passed in a bit of a blur, Darcy wasn’t sure if she wanted to punch the guy or to run away screaming. This date was an awful, terrible date. Why would this guy not shut up before Darcy actually did something altogether drastic? Did he just like to hear himself talk?
“So, my family is quite annoying; they are always hanging around me, getting into everything, no matter if I want them there or not. It’s like they have an internal alarm system, anytime they think that they could possibly wind me up? I don’t even know why they turned up to this date tonight; they are so weird, I want nothing more than to be free of them.”
“The only reason I still hang around them, is because Dad occasionally has the right idea, I mean the Avengers are terrible people, do you have to work in close proximity to them?”
The whole date had carried on in this fashion before Darcy remembered that her roommate hadn’t gotten sick, because that was it, and Darcy had to perform stomach surgery on her roommate. At least she hadn’t said the bit about stomach surgery out loud.
That was an awful date; Darcy was just going to go home and curl round a pint of ice cream and then go to bed, ready for another day of work tomorrow. She didn’t need to meet anyone! No sirree! She was perfectly happy being alone, more time for her sock knitting and watching movies.
It was one of Darcy’s dreams to watch the entire movie content of Netflix. Maybe she should buy a big TV to watch the movies on? Darcy was that distracted thinking of more pleasurable things that she didn’t notice until she got home, what excuse had she given that guy again? Oh, yeah the sick roommate.
Note to self, don’t go on a first date and introduce your date to your family, ON THE FIRST DATE, because it didn't rocket science people!