aimedforthemoon | (no subject)

This is starting to be a habit. Not that Esfir minds - your homes are where you can relax, talk openly, not have to pretend.

Which is why when she leads Cal in and points to her bed (presently looking more like a sofa, with how she's arranged the pillows), she turns and locks the door.

Habit.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

aimedforthemoon

"Then he has a good chance."

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal nods.

He doesn't trust himself to speak right now.

From:

aimedforthemoon

"You can stay here until you can breath in your head," she says at last.

From:

isaysimplewords

This surprises Cal into a sort of half-laugh. The phrasing is odd, but exactly right.

"Thank you," he says. His throat is constricted, and the words come out quiet and compressed.

From:

aimedforthemoon

"No problem. You don't mind if I do homework, though?"

From:

isaysimplewords

"Go ahead."

He doesn't mind. A person needs space, as well as time, to remember how to breathe.

From:

aimedforthemoon

A quick smile, and she gets up again. Someone has translations to work on, which is why when she comes back and sits on the bed (her back against the wall, near him but not next) she has sheets of paper, a book, a note book, and several coloured pens.

Aurebesh is a bitch of an alphabet to learn.

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal curls up a little on his part of the bed, staring across the room at the wall and trying to sort out everything that happened. It's easier, a little, now that he's put words to some of it.

He listens to Esfir turn pages, and a sudden old memory rises, from when he was little. He'd been in disgrace with his parents - or with Mother, which back then amounted to the same thing - and was old enough to have learned to keep out of their way, and young enough to still want protection. Grahame had allowed Cal to sit with him in his study, as long as he was quiet. He was (far quieter than a boy of eight should be capable of), and he sat and listened as his uncle turned pages and wrote things down.

(Was that after Cal had started a fight in school, over some of the other boys picking on a kid for using crutches? It must have been. Cal can't think of any other time, any other reason, Grahame would have let him into his study at that age.)

(He might, just might, be wrong about that.)

Cal had forgotten all about that. It's been so long, and his relationship with his uncle became so warped, that it's difficult and always surprising to remember that there was a time when he was small, and Uncle Grahame was just his uncle and nothing more.

From:

aimedforthemoon

Esfir, of course, isn't aware of his thoughts. Her own circumstances had been completely difference, and even her post-mortem contact with her family (if it had been that, and not just a dream) had been...

Well.

It was never her family that was messed up, and she does have to learn this alphabet.

Sometimes, she murmurs under her breath.

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal watches her, a little, the combination of her quiet, reassuring presence and the surfacing of that memory serving to calm him enough to keep him from falling apart.

For the time being, at least.

From:

aimedforthemoon

"Hungry?" She asks after a while (no telling how long).

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal thinks about this, and realizes that, though he's no longer feeling the effects of the whiskey, it's still curdled in his stomach. Eating something would probably be a good idea.

"Yeah," he says.

From:

aimedforthemoon

"Anything you feel like?"

From:

isaysimplewords

"Nothing special," Cal says. "And probably not too much of it." He knows already he won't be able to eat a full-sized portion.

From:

aimedforthemoon

She grins at him, getting to her feet (and wincing briefly at the loss of blood circulation).

"I eat a lot nowdays. We'll manage. I'll be back."

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal sort of returns her grin with a thin smile of his own.

"Okay."

From:

aimedforthemoon

She shuts the door behind her, and it locks automatically.

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal hears the lock click, but it doesn't really register. He tips himself over onto Esfir's side of the bed, head resting on the book.

Just until she gets back.

From:

aimedforthemoon

And she does come back, balancing a tray. Simple things, bread and sliced cheese and butter and cutlery, and a small bowl of soup because she feels like it.

Also two glasses for water - the water itself will just have to be from the bathroom.

"Cal?"

From:

isaysimplewords

Cal sits back up - a little too quickly, as it turns out, making himself dizzy. He rubs his forehead.

"Uh. You need help with that?"

From:

aimedforthemoon

She eyes her bowl of soup sternly.

"Da."

From:

isaysimplewords

As soon as his head clears enough for him to move, Cal gets up and takes the tray carefully. His larger hands stabilize it a little more, making the soup situation less precarious.