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Her eyes sparkled like gold coins, and her hair shone like fire, and Stan Pines really should have known from the get-go that she’d be trouble. Not because she was the kind of weirdo who wore a fake gold fang (sure, pretty much all of Stan’s own teeth were fake at this point, but at least he didn’t make them gold and pointed) and tried to cover her pointed ears with a goofy sort of bandana-acting-as-a-headband instead of a hat. And not because she was the kind of con artist whose sleight of hand was impeccable at the same time her distractions were ridiculously obvious (because, honestly Stan is exactly the same). It’s not even that she was very clearly supernatural in some way. No, Stan should have known that “Marilyn” (and Stan still honestly has no idea if that’s her real name or not, and no he’s not bitter about that at all, even if he did tell her his real name(or part of it, at least)) was trouble for one very simple reason: she was too good to be true.
They’d met at the slot machines in a Vegas casino, hands bumping as they accidentally reached for the same lever. Stan had slowly looked up, eyes scanning her long and sharp fingernails, her oddly pale skin, her neon pink “Over 30 & Very Flirty” t-shirt, her smirk. He’d seen himself reflected in eyes bright but both weary and wary, in hair streaked with more gray than one would expect, in the conniving smile of a sharp edged scammer who will bleed you dry. The hand reaching for the slot machine was instead offered to shake.
“Stan,” he’d begun with his most charming smile, “Stan Pines, Mr. Mystery, at your service.” He’d hoped she’d ask him about the “Mr. Mystery” title. She hadn’t.
“Marilyn,” she’d returned instead, “Owl Lady. You're blocking my slot machine.”
“Is this yours? I don’t see your name on it.”
“I don’t see yours either.”
Stan had laughed, a big full bodied laugh that was rare from him those days. Maybe he was just still high on the euphoria of having enough money to spend on gambling for fun instead of desperation for the first time in his adult life, or maybe Marilyn just made him feel understood. Either way, Stan had offered his arm next. “You know, a little while ago I lost my number. Do you think I could borrow yours? I can buy you a drink to return the favor.”
“I don’t usually go for old men,” Marilyn had teased, and Stan had spluttered the beginning of an argument, but then she’d said: “I think this time I’ll make an exception. Make that covering a round at the poker table instead of the number, and buy me a nice margarita, and you’ve got a deal, Mr. Mystery.”
A few days later they were drunk off their asses (one maybe more so than the other), Marilyn practically dragging Stan around town, and their pockets were bursting with money cheated and stolen. They’d been stumbling past a chapel when Marilyn had stopped him to say: “Let’s get married.”
Stan had stared at her for a long blurry moment, trying to fit the words together in his head. Finally he said, “Yooooouuuu uh shtole me a hotdog earlier.”
“I did.”
“Ya ran your fingers through my hair and called me pretty even though I’m old.”
“We going somewhere with this?”
Horrifyingly, Stan had started crying at that point. “You’ve been so nice to me.”
“Yeah, well,” she’d admitted with a shadow in her pretty gold eyes, “I was feeling pretty tired of hurting people. Thought I’d try somethin else for a lil bit. Don’t go making a big deal out of it, ya big eared clown.”
“Okay,” Stan had said, and kissed her. “I’ll marry you.”
He’d woken up the next morning in an empty motel bed with nothing but a killer headache, Los Vegas divorce paperwork sitting on the nightstand, and a cheap plastic ring on her pillow. The money he’d gotten from the casino was gone, as were the keys to the Stanleymobile. By the time he’d found his car 70 miles away abandoned in a ditch (but thankfully unharmed) the shock and panic and regret and insecurity had all mostly transformed into anger. How dare she do such a thing to him! To the Stanleymobile!
He should have known from the get-go that she’d be trouble, that she’d take him and then hurt him and leave him. He should have known no one like her could possibly be as good as they seemed. It’d been a bad gamble. Broken glass doesn’t repair broken glass, and the two piles together certainly do not make a rose. But still, her eyes glittered like gold coins, and her hair shone like fire, and it’d been nice to feel cared for for a little while. Stan kept the ring.
...
His charming smile was as false as his teeth and the attractions at that absurd tourist trap he ran, and Eda Clawthorne should have known from the get-go that marrying him would be stupid. Not because he was the kind of weirdo who liked Pitt Cola and disliked cats. And not because he was the kind of con artist whose fake documentation wasn’t realistic enough to fool even the youngest Witchling, while at the same time was capable of some pretty impressive lying (much like Eda herself, admittedly). It’s not even the fact that he was clearly far too cognizant of Eda’s less human traits for comfort. No, Eda should have known that marrying “Stan” (if that’s even his real name) was stupid for one very simple reason: he was too good for it to ever have lasted.
It should never have worked in the first place. Broken glass doesn’t repair broken glass, and the two piles together certainly do not make a romance. Edalyn Clawthorne isn’t gentle, and Marilyn Pines wasn’t tender.
But every time Stan pulled a snort or giggle out of Eda with one of his awful jokes, she couldn’t have helped but kiss that giant ruddy nose of his. And every time he drunkenly tried to replicate a performance from his tours as they wandered down the street, Eda couldn’t have helped the affection creeping into her insults. His hair had shone silver in the moonlight, and his hazel eyes were dark, and maye Eda was just a little too drunk herself one night. So when the conversation turned to family, when they passed a chapel, when Stan had proclaimed with a confidence that felt almost like Magic that: “Family is da most impor- impo- ‘portant thing, Mar. Always gotta have family. Family is good. They fill up all them holes in your soul. An’ if you don’t got a family, well it’s not like I’m close with mine, so then maybe I can be your family. Pretty sure it works like that.” Well. Eda couldn’t have helped it. She had proposed.
Later that night, Marilyn had held her new husband close in a motel bed, and ran gentle fingers over the scar on his shoulder. It was big and blue and rough and shaped in a very specific way. It wasn’t the only scar. Oh, it was far, far from the only scar. There was a line on his arm he’d told her he got at 19 in a fight with a bouncer with a knife when he tried to sneak into a bar. He’d laughed as he added that it might not have scarred if he’d taken it to the hospital for stitches straight away instead of trying to take care of it himself. There were matching circles on either side of his torso from a gunshot wound. His whole body was covered in the marks. One he’d even attributed to being 17 and attacked with a pitchfork he’d recently sold to said attacker. Eda knew even back then how to read between the lines.
She had just spent several nights sharing her own scars with him, after all, in between bad jokes and insults lobbied back and forth like grudgeby balls.
In her arms Stan twitched in his sleep, and grunted, and mumbled. Eda never found out exactly what he was dreaming about, but the “I’m sorry”’s and the “I’ll save you, I swear”’s told her all she needed to know. Eda had watched the dark brown feathers starting to painfully break through the skin on her arms, and whispered: “I guess we’re both runners. But I think you’re running to, and I’m running from. So goodbye Stan Pines, Mr. Mystery. You should never have blocked my slot machine.”
In the Boiling Isles it’s customary to exchange jewelry or clothes with one’s partner, as a symbol of mutual dedication and sharing and partnership. In the Human Realm Eda learned it’s customary to buy an expensive ring for one’s spouse. Eda took her husband’s money, and his car, and almost left him with nothing at all. But it’d been nice, for a little while, to have someone to care for. It’d just been stupid to think, even for a moment, of staying long enough to start hurting each other. So Marilyn stole a plastic ring from a vending machine, and left it on her pillow, alongside the divorce paperwork on the nightstand.
And then she was gone.
Years after the fact, a lonely Stan Pines on a fishing boat empty of kids had joked, “My ex-wife still misses me, but her aim is getting better!...Her aim is getting better! See, it’s funny because marriage is terrible.” He’d ignored the voice in the back of his head reminding him that he might never have agreed to take the kids for the summer in the first place, had he not been messing with Marilyn’s ring and feeling nostalgic when Wirt called. Stan already had enough regrets about nearly missing out on the two little gremoblins, he didn’t feel the need to mope over a long-gone Witch too. And besides, that doesn’t make much sense. Broken glass does not repair broken glass.
Years after the fact, Eda Clawthorne had cuddled her tiny son roommate close, and told him tales of her adventures in the mysterious Human Realm to lure him to sleep. Her breath had caught when she got to the part about Stan. Because she’d been thinking about him, on that rainy night she’d found King. She’d been thinking about what he said, about family. And she’d felt so lonely and so lost and so angry and so bitter and then…then there’d been the little guy. A demon, obviously, but of a kind Eda had never seen before. Alone, and evidently a baby. Eda hadn’t even realized he was sentient back then, had just thought she was getting a pet. But she’d been thinking about what Stan had said. And he’d been right, in a way, even if King wasn’t family he’d still filled up some kind of hole in Eda, a hole she hadn’t even noticed until it was gone. It doesn’t make sense, really. Broken glass does not repair broken glass.
...
The only other explanation is that maybe, just maybe, there was more to them both than broken glass to begin with.