Chapter Text
Phoenix stared with some despondence at the computer screen.
Miles’ profile had disappeared again, which, according to some furious Googling, meant that Phoenix had been blocked. Again.
Isn’t LinkedIn supposed to be for networking? Shouldn’t he want to network with me?
It seemed unnecessarily rude. Then again, judging by the newspaper headlines, Miles had a little more to worry about than just poor social media etiquette.
“Dark Suspicions of a Demon Attorney,” the first one had read. Phoenix had seen it one night at 3am, buying Doritos at the convenience store around the corner from his dorm. At first he’d thought it was an exhaustion hallucination, but he’d bought it on a whim, and it was still there on the floor next to his bed when he woke up the next morning.
It was well past the time he should have been out of bed, but he flipped through the article, frowning at the photos of Miles in his weird flashy suit, and at the accusations of forgery and corruption. It just didn’t make any sense. It had been a long time since he last saw Miles, sure, but in those days he’d wanted to be a defense attorney, not a prosecutor, and he was also the most honest kid Phoenix ever knew.
So what the hell was he doing in the paper, as a prosecutor, with all those rumors swirling around?
Phoenix had tried tracking him down—phone calls, letters to the Prosecutors’ Office, emails, even a few friendly pokes on Facebook. You know, the hey, we were friends in elementary school, wasn’t that a fun time kind. None of them had worked. He’d even started hanging around the courthouse, checking out some of the books there, trying to decide whether a career in law was the logical next step. Still no Miles, though, so eventually he turned to LinkedIn. That was the website for professionals, right? And Miles was definitely a professional by this point, even if the suit was a little weird.
That had been a bust, though. The first few messages were ignored. After the fifth, or maybe the sixth, he’d received a terse reply: I am not interested in conversing with you. Please do not contact me again.
He was blocked after the next message, so he’d made another profile, and then that one was blocked too. He thought he’d been smart this time, calling himself “Nick W.” instead of “Phoenix Wright,” but it looked as though Miles had caught onto him.
Phoenix scrolled through the page of search results one more time, just in case he’d somehow missed him. Miles Edward… Miles Edwin… Milton Edgewater. No Miles Edgeworth.
With an angry sigh, he slammed his laptop shut. Desperate times called for desperate measures, he figured. Maybe if he checked out the courthouse again, he’d get some ideas.
But when he went back to court the next week, he ran into Dollie for the first time, and ended up forgetting about Miles entirely for a while.
Everything about Dollie was perfect. Her hair, her soft way of speaking, the way her eyelashes fluttered when she looked at him. Everything except her ex.
It wasn’t even her fault, really, that she happened to have an ex-boyfriend. She was beautiful—of course it would be expected for her to have an ex or two. But what Phoenix didn’t expect was for her ex to constantly lurk in the background of their lunch dates, crawling back for scraps like the scavenger he was.
He wouldn’t even have noticed until Dollie pointed it out to him one day, her face falling into an uncharacteristic grimace. “Oh. It’s Dougie.”
“Huh?” Phoenix whipped around to get a better look. He finished swallowing a bite of sandwich and wiped a splotch of mayo off his cheek. “Who’s Dougie?”
“Oh, don’t worry about it, Feenie!” she said. “He’s not important. What’s important—” She tugged his hand until he turned towards her again, smiling in that way that gave him butterflies, “—is you.”
He knew, then, that “Dougie” was someone she didn’t want to talk about. That, plus the weird pet name, helped piece together that he was her ex. Despite Dollie’s assurances that he meant nothing to her now, that Phoenix should forget about him, really, he couldn’t help but notice a copper-tinted shock of hair out of the corner of his eye, or the flash of a Union Jack rounding a corner.
It was getting to the point that Phoenix was starting to become annoyed. It couldn’t have been an amicable breakup, if Dollie’s reaction was anything to go by. And clearly one-sided, based on all the lurking. If he’s got something to say, he can say it to my face.
The opportunity came sooner than expected. Phoenix had just finished walking Dollie back to her dorm when “Dougie” stepped out onto the path.
Or rather, “Doug Swallow,” pharmacology major. Phoenix had done some sleuthing—it turned out LinkedIn was still good for something—and found out that Doug was a fourth year and was also the kind of person to list out every single college course he had ever taken under his “Education” section. Probably to make up for a lack of personality.
Phoenix had only ever caught vague glimpses of Doug’s face from afar and from whatever he could make out from the grainy LinkedIn photo, but up close he was subjected to the sharp intensity of Doug’s eyes and the haughty edge to his frown.
“Hey—”
Phoenix crossed his arms and glared back. “What?”
“Look, I just want to talk.”
“Yeah? Well, I don’t.”
He gathered up all his bravado to push past Doug with a shoulder bump intended to put him in his place. Doug promptly ruined the effect by stepping to the side, and Phoenix hated him even more.
“You’re dating Dahlia, right? Look, there’s something about her—”
“She doesn’t want to see you again, okay?” Phoenix snapped.
Doug looked affronted. “What? That’s not—”
“And I don’t want to see your stupid face either! Stop stalking us, it’s weird and gross.” He took a few steps before turning around to add, “And she’ll never take you back!”
“I—wha—okay. God, you’re an idiot,” Doug said, running a hand through his hair. "I don't want her back, I dumped her for a reason—”
“You dumped her?”
That couldn't be right. Dollie was perfect and beautiful, and anyone who couldn’t see that was a fool. Doug was obviously in denial about the breakup, or else was incredibly stupid.
“Yeah, which is what I’m trying to tell you,” Doug said. “She poisoned a guy, did you know that?”
Phoenix expected any number of contrived reasons behind Doug’s apparent jealousy, but this one blindsided him completely. “What—”
“She used me to steal dangerous chemicals from pharmacology. I dropped her as soon as I found out. Just thought I’d warn you, seeing how she might use you for a similarly nasty reason.”
Dollie, poisoning someone? His Dollie, who apologized to doorframes when she accidentally bumped into them, or who looked queasy at even the idea of a hamburger? “What the fuck.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t great. So make sure to get out of there while you still can—”
“You really couldn’t come up with any other reason,” Phoenix said flatly. His rage grew the more he thought about it—jealousy was one thing, but to go so low as an unfounded, wrongful accusation— “You could just say you want her back, you know, rather than try to get me to leave on my own. Because guess what! I’m not gonna leave!”
Doug blinked, shocked that his dumb plan hadn’t somehow worked. As if lying about Dollie’s character wasn’t the most transparent ploy in the universe. “Are you some kind of idiot?”
“A real idiot would believe whatever you say without any kind of proof,” Phoenix retorted. “And do you really think she'll want you again after you've insulted her like this?"
“I told you, I don’t—whatever, dude,” Doug snapped. “If this is how you’re going to be about it, fine. All I ask is that you think of me when she finally decides to stab you in the back.”
“Wha—” Phoenix spluttered, too furious to form coherent words, and watched as Doug brushed past him to return down the path.
Doug’s words continued to eat at Phoenix over the course of the next few days. Poisoning. As if that was a believable excuse. He scoffed and glanced across the table over at Dollie, whose usually-gentle expression was now scrunched with concern as she looked at her laptop screen. He’d had to help her troubleshoot a few days ago, when she’d accidentally deleted one of her assignments. The fact that anyone could look at her—much less date her—and come away with the impression that she was anything less than angelic was inconceivable to him.
“Oh!” she said, startling a bit when she caught him staring. “Is there something wrong, Feenie?”
“No, nothing’s wrong,” he said. “Just wondering if you needed help on anything.”
She blinked, then her face softened into a small smile.
“Oh, no. Thank you for offering though.”
“Yeah, sure!” he said, buoyed by the giddiness of being able to support her. “I’m always willing to help if you need it!”
She cast him another smile and then turned back to her laptop again, hesitantly tapping out a few more words.
Phoenix realized that he should probably start on his own homework, but took another minute to scan around the library instead. They’d managed to get a nice table in a quieter corner of the library, close to the East Asian Studies section for Dollie’s Meiji-era literature course. Sunlight filtered through the window and spilled over the table, making him feel contented and sleepy. The sounds of footsteps echoed down the hall, and, perking up, he saw a telltale flash of red disappear between the shelves. His good mood immediately soured, and he sat up straight, bristling.
“Ugh. That guy,” Phoenix muttered. “I thought I told him to stay away from us.”
Dollie looked up, confused. “Who?”
“That guy. Doug. Your ex?”
“D-doug?” she said. “You...talked to him?”
“Yeah. A few days ago.” Phoenix huffed again and rolled his eyes. “He said some stupid stuff about you to try and get us to break up. Pretty pathetic, huh?”
Dollie nodded, but shrunk a little in her seat as she glanced towards the spot where Phoenix had last seen Doug. Anger surged again on her behalf—that guy had no right going around and scaring her with his jealous rumors.
“Don’t worry Dollie,” he said, reaching over to grab her hands. “I didn’t believe any of that dumb stuff he said. I’ll make sure to tell him off the next time he tries something like that.”
Dollie bit her lip, eyes darting between their table and the bookshelves. “Oh, um, that is… you don’t have to, just for my sake—”
“He’s obviously still tailing us, if he’s in this section,” Phoenix added. The more he thought about it, the angrier he became. What was that guy’s problem? “Actually, you know what, I can put him in his place right now—”
“Feenie, it’s fine, really,” she insisted, gripping his hands tighter as he pushed his chair back. “You don’t have to go out of your way for this.”
“I mean, don’t I?” Phoenix said. “If he’s being this much of an asshole to us? To you?”
“Please don’t go out of your way,” she pleaded. “It’s not worth it.”
She was staring directly at him now, eyes wide and determined, and the anger drained from his chest. He fell back into the chair with a soft huff.
“You’re too good for him, Dollie,” he said.
She broke her gaze, eyes dropping to the table, and gave one solemn nod.
Luckily, Doug left him and Dollie alone for a while after that. It was almost weird, at first, to look over his shoulder and not see that stupid red leather jacket that the guy always seemed to be wearing, but Phoenix and Dollie were getting closer every day, and soon enough he was distracted enough to forget about it.
“Feenie,” Dollie said one day in the checkout line at the grocery store, “isn’t that your friend?”
“Hmm?” One of Phoenix’s grocery bags fell over, and the apples rolled across the conveyor belt.
She poked him in the arm. “The man on the cover of that magazine.”
A magazine? Shit, wait, that was probably—
Phoenix turned to look where Dollie was pointing, and sure enough, there was Miles Edgeworth, glaring straight into the camera lens, looking like he was glaring straight into Phoenix’s conscience.
And he had completely forgotten about Miles this whole time. It had been weeks.
Dollie was still holding his arm, giving him a weird look. It’s not normal to stare at a picture of a guy while your girlfriend is right there, Phoenix.
“Oh, yeah,” he said, trying to sound casual. “Yeah, I think that’s him.”
“Don’t you want to buy it?” she asked, squeezing his arm a little tighter.
“Nah,” he said, and turned away, grabbing his bags.
But later that night, after he’d walked Dollie back to her own dorm, laughed off her attempts to take back the necklace, and kissed her goodnight, he lay restless in bed.
He hadn’t gotten a very good look at the cover, but Miles still had the same weird angry face, and Phoenix thought he’d seen some words about corruption. He’d let it go for weeks, and Miles clearly wasn’t getting his act together by himself. But he wouldn’t respond to Phoenix’s messages, on LinkedIn or Facebook or voicemail, so what could Phoenix do?
He sat up, frustrated. What was it his mom had said about making tough decisions? Try to get outside opinions, Phoenix. People will have ideas you’d never think of yourself.
Asking Dollie was out, though. She already seemed more interested in Miles than Phoenix was comfortable with. He didn’t want her to get the impression that he cared more about Miles than her. And… that was it, really. His world had kinda narrowed down, after meeting Dollie, though honestly it was pretty small to begin with. He could maybe ask Larry, but Larry knew Miles when they were kids, and that just felt weird.
Scrunching his bedcovers up in his hands, he looked around the room. It was nearly midnight, according to the clock on his dresser, but he didn’t think he could get to sleep. Maybe he could watch a movie on his laptop? Larry had pirated some movies for him a while ago; he could always check out the selection. Maybe there’d be something to bore him to sleep.
When he flipped the top open, the screen lit to show him his Facebook home page. It hadn’t been that long since he last scrolled through the feed, so there wasn’t much new, but after a second a new post from the Ivy U Confessions Page popped up.
Our anonymous poster writes:
There’s this rlly cute guy in my chemistry class (I wont say which one bc I don’t want him to figure it out!!!!!) but I dont know how to talk to him! Help! How do I flirt with him without being too obvi??
Well. Well, well. This was a pretty safe bet, wasn’t it? He’d never seen anyone get outed, so the moderators of the page were pretty discreet, and if he wanted a bunch of opinions all in the same place, this sure was a good way to get them.
Before he could talk himself out of it, he clicked to open a new message to the page and started to type.
OKAY so there’s this guy I’ve been trying to talk to for AGES, we were friends a long time ago but he disappeared and now I found him again but he won’t reply to my messages even though he totally has time??? He seems really sad and I think he might need my help so I really want to get in touch with him... does anyone have any ideas? (Im a guy too btw lol)
He read it over once or twice before submitting it, then hastily exited the browser and went to find his folder of pirated movies.
The next day he was busy with a few back-to-back classes and having his meals with Dollie, and he didn’t get back to his dorm until pretty late. He almost forgot about the post entirely, except that when he opened Facebook to send Dollie a goodnight message, there was a little red notification bubble.
He clicked to open it, and saw that it was a message from the confession page.
You got some anonymous replies on your post, it read. Go check it out!
So he did. The confession page was the one to post most of the replies, too; it seemed like most people used it as an intermediary. Most of the advice was pretty useless, and some of it was really stupid (Ooooh, you got a crush???, one of them read), but there was one reply that was quite a bit longer than the others, posted under what seemed to be a pseudonym (“Patrick Hauméot”, really?), and written like a professional advice column.
If you’ve been pursuing him for a long time, maybe he’s starting to get freaked out by the intensity. I think you should let it go for a while, then once you’ve both had a chance to cool down, send him one more message. Just reiterate that you're sorry if you’re putting pressure on him, but you’re worried about his health and safety and just want to make sure that he’s okay, because you care about him.
He might not reply immediately, but that’s okay. If someone’s in an intense situation, it can help just to know that someone cares about them. I think you can check in occasionally with him, so he knows he still has someone on his side. Ultimately, though, you can’t force him to respond.
Phoenix rankled a bit as he read it. This was Miles! Phoenix had seen him cry over origami cranes and over that scene with the spaghetti in The Lady and the Tramp. He couldn’t just let it go.
He didn’t want to reply directly to this Patrick Hauméot guy, though, since that would be outing himself. He figured that since others seemed to be using the confession page as a go-between to remain anonymous, he could do that too. He replied to the message they’d sent him earlier that day, asking for them to post a reply to Patrick’s response.
Can u post a reply with actual SERIOUS advice? Tell me how to get this person to ACTUALLY listen lol. I’m not asking for a stupid copout. Ths guy obviously needs help, and if he isn’t gonna listen, Ive gotta find a way to make him listen.
With a spiteful flourish, he hit send and watched with satisfaction as it was posted mere moments later. Whoever ran the page must not have had much of a social life. Though, considering he was asking for anonymous advice because of his own lacking social life, he supposed he couldn’t judge.
He sighed and clicked away. It would probably take some time for the jerk to respond to him, if he responded at all. In the meantime, Phoenix might as well do something productive.
He opened his schedule for the next quarter. Right now it was filled up with mostly compulsory drama courses, but he had a couple of elective slots that he had to figure out what to do with. The times he’d gone to the courthouse in search of Miles, he’d always ended up in the library there, for lack of anything better to do. The books there were dense, and mostly unintelligible, but he usually ended up flipping through them anyway. Once you could look past the sheer volume of Latin used in law, some of it was actually kind of interesting.
With a frown, he clicked to Ivy U’s course listings. It wasn’t the first time he’d considered switching to law—or, at least, giving it a try to see if it was a viable option for him—but given his failure in connecting with Miles in any other way, maybe it was time to take more drastic action.
He didn’t really understand the meaning of most of the first-year law course names: The Law of Contractual Interpretation, Mandatory Minimums and Other Debates, Securities Regulation 101. Still, he clicked on some of the first-year offerings. He read the descriptions, and they contained words that he understood separately but not in conjunction with one another. What the hell were “substantive questions about interpretation and application of law and discretion,” anyway?
This was hopeless. With a grumble, he checked the professor’s name for the first class he’d clicked on and then went to Rate My Professor to type it in. Her reviews were pretty good—a couple of gripes about her being tough on marking, but apparently the course content was fair and her explanations intelligible.
She also had the little chili pepper which apparently meant “hot professor,” so with some trepidation Phoenix clicked on her photo. She was pretty enough, he guessed? She looked to be in her late thirties or early forties, and the photo was certainly flattering. With a shrug, he closed the photo and went back to the reviews, then checked the course listing one last time.
The lecture and tutorial fit perfectly in his schedule, assuming he dropped one of his electives—some literature class he wasn’t interested in, anyway. He took a deep breath, and squeezed his eyes shut, and registered for the course.
Between the giddiness of finally committing to trying out law, plus that of seeing Dollie whenever they both had spare time, he forgot to check his advice post on the confessions page for a couple of days. By that point, it had been pushed down in the feed, and he had to scroll for a while to find it.
HE helped you when you were struggling HE lifted you up and carried you HIS Grace is that which moves mountains!!!! Do not turn your back on HIM!!!!!!!!! You will always find your way back to HIM trust in the LORD and HE will save you!!!!!!! LIKE IF JESUS IS LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Repost this to spread HIS message to others!!!!!!!!!!!!
Image: [A baby is looking tiredly away from the camera, head propped up on one of its hands. At the top and bottom of the image, in impact font, read the words ‘Yes, Janet. Tell me more.’]
Image: [A minion smiles at the camera on the left side of the picture. To the right of it are the words ‘Yeah, I’m tired… Tired of your BULLSHIT!’]
OH MY GOD!!!! Steve just proposed!!!!!! I can’t believe this… only three months of dating and we already KNOW. Life can be amazing sometimes…
Finally, he found the post. His mysterious advice-giver had indeed replied to him.
What sort of advice do you want, then? Or do you not want advice at all? It sort of sounds like you just want validation of the decisions you’ve already made.
Seriously, you can’t just swoop in and save this guy. If you’re a student here, and he’s the same age as you, then I assume he’s an adult. Adults have the right to make their own decisions, even if you don’t agree with them. And even if you’re right, and he IS in a bad situation, there’s still nothing you can force him to do.
I stand by my advice to reach out to him and offer support with no expectation of getting anything in return. That will be more helpful to him than if you try to force him into something he might not be capable of doing safely.
What a sanctimonious prick. With a disgusted noise, Phoenix began to scroll back to the top of the feed, and a post halfway up caught his eye.
It appeared to be another appeal for advice, this time from a first-year student.
i’m most of the way through my first quarter here and i think i made a mistake with my major… but i’ve been telling my parents for years that this is what i wanted to study. i’ll feel so stupid if i change my mind now. what do i do???
There was the usual series of joke answers, but one stood out.
Is your concern only that you’ll feel silly if you backtrack? You don’t say anything about whether or not your parents are forcing you into this major or not.
If you’re just worried about backtracking, well, maybe it’ll be a bit embarrassing for a day or two but it’s better than ending up in a career you hate. That’s the rest of your life on the line!
Though for what it’s worth, it took me a couple years before I really started enjoying what I’m studying. First year courses are just kind of boring. You might end up changing your mind about your current major. It might be worth sticking it out for the rest of the year, depending on how much you used to love the topic.
Well. That was pretty good advice, honestly. Phoenix even thought he might need it, if he did end up switching to law in the end.
And… it was written by Patrick Hauméot. Ugh.
It irritated Phoenix that his advice on this issue was so good. It made him feel like this guy was reasonable, and he would really rather have thought of him as a jerk.
He frowned and shut his laptop. The newspaper with Miles on the cover—the one he’d bought at the convenience store a couple months ago—was still sitting on the floor next to his bed, a little dulled and yellowed from the sunlight. He stared at it for a moment, thinking of what he’d do and say when he finally managed to get through to Miles. Hey, I took law courses to have the chance to see you, let’s grab coffee.
Ugh. This didn’t feel like it was helping his case. With an irritated grumble, he reached across to his bag and grabbed the script he was supposed to be working towards memorizing. Focusing on fictional people’s problems was a lot more fun than focusing on his own.
The next afternoon, Dollie invited him to have a picnic with her in the quad. She was already sitting on a blanket when he arrived, legs curled gracefully beneath her. He felt the usual flip of butterflies in his stomach, especially when she smiled shyly at him.
“I made lunch,” she said, taking his hand in her two small ones. “I didn’t have enough time to ask what you wanted, so hopefully it’s all okay…”
He squeezed her hand back and smiled sturdily at her. “If you made it, I’m sure it’s delicious,” he said, and his stomach did the little flip again when she ducked her head away and bit her lip.
After a second, she reached out to the basket, pulling out small plates and containers of food. “Are you all right with mini-omelettes?”
“Of course,” he said.
She gave him a quick smile before taking the last container from the basket, and they ate quietly. Even though it was fall, it was quite warm still, and as they finished up Phoenix felt himself become sleepy. He stretched and then flopped onto his side on the blanket.
“Are you tired?” Dollie asked. She looked worried. “Were you up too late again?”
“Maybe,” he admitted. He didn’t want to tell her that he’d been unable to sleep because he was stressed about Miles. “I might take a nap here, if it doesn’t bother you.”
“Of course it doesn’t bother me,” she said, shaking her head. “But if you’re going to nap, don’t you want to take off your necklace?”
“What?” he said, offended. “Why would I do that?”
“Well, it’s so pointy,” she said, reaching out to touch it. Phoenix shivered. “Doesn’t it poke you when you sleep?”
“Sometimes,” he said, frowning. “But it’s not much of a token of your love if I just take it off whenever I feel like it, right?”
Dollie looked bothered by that. “I wouldn’t be upset if you took it off.”
He smiled and reached out to take her hand. “I know. I just don’t want to.”
After a second, she smiled back. “Okay, Feenie,” she said, squeezing his hand.
He squeezed her hand back, then yawned and rolled over to nap. As he drifted off, he thought he could feel her finger tracing along the chain of the necklace.