Delta wouldn’t meet Jocelyn’s eyes, which was suspicious. She was beginning to think that his friend was purely hypothetical and that he was talking about himself. It was one of the oldest tricks in the book. 

Hang on…if Delta was Keith…she was Keith’s best friend! Only friend but it was basically the same thing. 

Did he seriously like her?! Why? What goodness could he have possibly seen in her to inspire that? Was that why he wanted to spend more time with her lately outside of their usual schedule at work? Was it why he had been acting so strangely the past couple of days after they went to the arcade? Had he thought of that as a date? 

Jocelyn was bursting with questions she wasn’t allowed to ask. She had to force herself to stay calm the way she had a million times when dealing with shocking things people told her at work. 

“Why can’t you afford to lose them?” she asked in her usual tone with great effort. 

Delta sighed. “Because she’s the only one who has ever accepted how much of a dork I am. She knows I’m just a dumb goofball and still cares about me. I can’t remember the last time someone did that.

“So it doesn’t matter how beautiful, funny, smart, or kind she is. I’m not allowed to like her because if I screw things up like I tend to do with people she’ll be out of my life forever. I can’t risk that.”

Beautiful? Funny? Kind? Was he talking about HER?!

“You think she’s beautiful?” Jocelyn squeaked. 

Delta nodded and leaned back on his hands, not noticing anything was off about her. “Yeah. Especially when she smiles. She has a great laugh too. The kind that makes you feel warm when you hear it. When she finds something funny she sort of just…lights up. It’s hard to explain. 

“It’s flattering, you know? That someone that smart and beautiful laughs like that at dumb things I say. I should have known I was a goner ages ago. She’s been the highlight of my day for such a long time and I never stopped to think about why.” 

Jocelyn didn’t cry. She learned early on that it was dangerous so if she was sick or hurt as a child she let the tears fall in silence until she learned to prevent them.

Tears occasionally came to her eyes from pain during villain fights but that was a completely different sensation than what she was experiencing right now. Her mask was getting wet. 

Why was she crying hearing potential compliments about herself? She wasn’t even positive Delta was Keith! He could be talking about someone who had absolutely nothing to do with her. There was no point in getting emotional about this. But if he was talking about her…How was she supposed to feel about someone she cared about thinking so highly of her? 

Jocelyn had never once thought of getting romantically involved with anyone because all her parents ever did was fight when they were together. She had seen an awful lot of the ugly side of relationships in her work too. 

She had barely been handling the idea of having a friend when she was hit not only by potentially having the burden of his secret identity on her hands but this. How was she supposed to handle this?!

“Frostine?” Delta asked, bringing her back down to earth. 

She was still here and she needed to act like it. “Sorry. I was listening. Just trying to think of something to say.” 

“Are you…crying?”

Jocelyn realized with dismay that the tears hadn’t stopped. Oh dear. “I think my allergies might be acting up.”

“I didn’t know you had allergies,” Delta commented with slightly narrowed eyes. 

“You don’t know everything about me.”

“Lately I’ve been thinking I don’t know you at all. You keep surprising me, Frosty, and I don’t surprise easy.” 

“How exactly have I been surprising you?” Jocelyn thought it was high time to change the subject and that was the first thing she could think of to make it happen. 

“I thought I had you figured out but now I realize I don’t. I don’t know a thing about you. None of us know a thing about any of us. We see each other almost every day and I only recently found out your favorite food is macaroni. That’s so basic!” Delta said with a disbelieving shake of his head. 

“Why would something like that matter? We don’t need to know things like that about each other in order to do our jobs. If anything I think it’s more distracting.”

“Why would you—oh. You’re talking about knowing Mercury’s secret identity, aren’t you?”

“Yes. I neither needed nor wanted to know that but it fell into my lap and there’s nothing I can do about it,” Jocelyn sighed, thinking more of Delta/Keith than she was Mercury. That was far more concerning. 

“I still can’t believe he married his nemesis. Or that you found out because you know someone who knows them in your secret identity. That’s crazy,” Delta said with another shake of his head. “But hey…does that mean you don’t want to talk about what’s going on with me? If talking about private stuff bothers you—”

“It doesn’t bother me. I like to be of help where I can.”

Jocelyn meant it. She may not have wanted to know about this whole secret identity mess but she couldn’t regret helping either Mercury or Delta. She helped save her old colleague’s wife and unborn child; how could she ever regret that?

And Delta (even without accounting for the fact that he was probably Keith) was one of the most consistent people in her life. She had wanted to help him with his lack of direction when he asked. 

Delta smiled at her indulgently. “You’re too nice for your own good, Frosty.” 

“I’ve never been told that before,” Jocelyn said in surprise. 

“Probably because you intimidate people. But there’s a real softy in there somewhere. It’s a privilege to be able to see that.”

She actually blushed. When was the last time she did that? She honestly couldn’t remember. Delta was saying the strangest things tonight and it was really throwing her off. They had never talked like this before. 

He noticed too. “Are you blushing?! What’s going on with you today? I’ve never seen you like this!” 

“I think I’m losing my mind,” Jocelyn said honestly. 

“What’s going on? Or can you not talk about it? This is weird. Honestly, I’m getting kind of worried about you.” 

She was worried about herself too. She was an impenetrable wall of ice according to everyone else. So why couldn’t she stick with that the one time she truly needed to? Was this the price she was paying for getting involved with other people on more than a surface level?

“I can’t really talk about it. Sorry.” 

Delta frowned. “Is it too much of a giveaway to who you are? You can use generics like I did.”

Generics weren’t safe either! Jocelyn put things together too easily because of them. What if he could do the same thing? He would be so angry if he found out he had outed himself to her if he was Keith. 

“It is,” Jocelyn hedged. “Sorry. I just have a lot on my plate right now. I’ll be fine.”

“Do you at least have someone you can talk to this about in your secret identity? It isn’t good to bottle things up.” 

The irony that he was telling this to a therapist was too much. She knew better than anyone that you weren’t supposed to bottle things up but who could she tell this to? Maybe she should get her own therapist. A lot of her colleagues had them to help process everything they dealt with at work. 

Due to client confidentiality they wouldn’t be able to reveal the truth about her or anyone she talked about. But did she really want anyone else to deal with the burden of the knowledge she had too? 

“No,” Jocelyn admitted with a sigh.

“That’s not good. Is there anything I can do? You’re always looking out for me, Frosty. Who looks out for you?” Delta asked. 

No one. No one had ever looked out for her. She always had to do things by herself. The closest she ever came to being able to rely on someone was knowing Delta had her back in a fight and with occasionally bringing her food. That was the extent of their relationship. 

At least as heroes. If he was who she thought he was…

Jocelyn shrugged helplessly. “I don’t have anyone like that. I’ve always been on my own.”

Delta furrowed his brow before biting his lip hesitantly. “Hey…this is kind of random but can I hug you? Because that’s really sad.”

He wanted to hug her because he felt sorry for her? She couldn’t remember the last time she had been hugged by anyone. Not properly, anyway.. Keith putting his arm around her to shield her from the crowd didn’t count.