Logs:Yet Another Sober Turnover
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| RL Date: 4 July, 2008 |
| Who: N'thei, Shanlee |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| When: Day 28, Month 12, Turn 16 (Interval 10) |
| Empty. Quiet. The Turn draws to a close in front of a dwindling fire in a nearly deserted common room; the party's in the Snowasis, spilling into the lower caverns, filtering out into the cold night air of the bowl. In here, it's just N'thei in one of the low chairs with an afghan drawn across his lap, with his eyes closed restively. Peace and quiet amid the surrounding revelry. Steps from the direction of the lower caverns herald another that's doing their best to avoid Turnover revelry. They halt near the klah then proceed over in the direction of hearth warmth and bundled N'thei. "Couldn't get a date?" Shanlee directs from where she's halted just shy of being alongside him. He'd have to actually move to see her, perhaps that's the idea or maybe its not even conscious that she did so. A quickly-caught breath reveals a little tidbit: N'thei was asleep, or very nearly, and he starts from the verge of slumber with a deeper inhale-exhale to root consciousness. No effort made to see Shanlee, his head lifted but not turned, his two fingers brought up to scrape along his eyelids. "Too ugly, seems. Same for you?" Stitches gone, the seam down the right side of his face still looks shiny and half-healed. "Why don't come here and make me feel better about myself." An old habit long since neglected-- flirtatious pestering. "Aye, too ugly," Shanlee responds hard to tell if it's directed at herself or N'thei then pride trips in with a defensive, "Going out later." Riiight. Another slow swing of one boot in front of the next and she rounds the chair and casts and openly assessing look over the scars, "Should've let me stitch you up. Could have embroidered a daisy right about..." her finger points to his face, "there," grin. As to making him feel better she'll offer him at least the idea of a long lingering once-over and then a snort, "You wouldn't last half an hour." At out-later; "So am I." That's about how far N'thei believes Shanlee's plans for the evening, no further than he believes in his own, tone rueful and dubious. All matter of scars is met head-on; he looks up to allow Shanlee her chance to take stock of his patchwork self, even traces his forefinger around his cheek in daisy-pattern. Nothing said to that end. "Could be a good half-hour. Besides, been a body at rest for weeks, a lot of potential energy there. --Really, shouldn't you be at a party or something? Enjoying your liberated free time." "Am too!" stubborn, almost childish the response on going out later. Shanlee finds a chair off to his left and makes it her own, slinging legs over the side of one of its arms and settling back into the opposing corner. A dip of hand into a pocket and there appears that trusty flask to jazz the klah up a bit with. N'thei's further words draw a roll of eyes, "Not into kicking a man when he's down." Since when? The last lifts her chin up and a look of raised brow settles onto the Weyrleader, "If you're pissed with me, just say so and get it over with." Dry; "Do you want me to be pissed at you?" Because, aside from a little bland, N'thei's tone harbors neither anger nor judgment. And his expression shows, if anything, amusement for Shanlee's posture, her flask, her raised brow, her in-general. "Would do my apathy no good to be mad at you, my lovely, don't worry your pretty head about it. Just seems a shame to waste a perfectly good Turnover." Shanlee shrugs lightly, "Don't need to justify stepping down to myself if that's what you're asking." Legs swing up and down ever so slightly and the first swallow of the klah draws a satisfied sigh from her. From over the rim of the mug at first, "Aye, just a pretty little head is all," a smirk follows for that. Her head tips to one side and N'thei is eyed quietly before she puts the next to him, "Is that all there is with you? Anger and apathy? No joy, no quiet moments of, dare I say happiness?" No answer. N'thei closes his eyes again, red-rimmed and bloodshot, all the look of a wicked hangover and it's not even morning, and leans his head back into the chair with a nod determined to get some rest. "What makes you happy." Tell me a story~. N'thei's eyes close and Shanlee stands, heads for the klah and returns with a steaming mug in hand to hold it out just in front of him, "Not booze, but it'll do for now." Silence fills in the gaps of flames crackling in the hearth and partying from beyond the quiet common room. If the bronzerider doesn't take the mug it'll get set down on the table near him so that the greenrider can curl herself up in her chair with legs tucked under her and retrieve her own brew. His eyes are closed so he won't see the quality of the first smile that comes as her tone takes on a wistful note and she indulges, "Lots of things. A good day's work, the scent of the first rains, dancing, laughter, watching happy people," a short pause and then given quieter, "being understood." N'thei takes the mug, but all he does with it is lower it to the arm of the chair for balance and curl his hand around it, seeping heat through the pottery into a hand as tattered as the rest of him. "All that," he begins in a forced-drowsy voice, one that's not ready to sleep but hardly sounds awake. "All that makes you happy, and you're sitting here with me? Not dancing, not laughing? We've never understood each other, lovely, so no point bringing that one up again." "Wasn't referring to you," Shanlee notes on being understood with a small edge of a smile, "I know which battles to choose," Another sip of klah and the flames find her attention next as she speaks, "Amongst other things," of what makes her happy. She glosses over N'thei's queries on dancing and laughter and puts another thought to him, "You ever held a child so innocent it made you feel dark even in the lightest corners of your being?" someone's feeling introspective tonight. All that introspection meets with blunt-force; "Don't like kids." Adamant too, so at least N'thei still has an apathy-free opinion on /something/. "Why do you ask? Held a baby lately and felt that biological clock ticking?" "Don't neither. Maybe that's why," the innocence and light of them. With a snort on having held a baby recently, "No. Nephew a while back." Shanlee's face screws up into a look of disgust for N'thei's suggestion, "You're kidding right? Think my clock's broken or something," shrug. Not too concerned about that one. Swinging a look to the fire, then back over to the Weyrleader, "You just going to have me sit here all night talking nonsense or do you plan on jumping in sometime?" N'thei repeats amusedly, "Nephew. A while back." His laugh is short, subdued, heavily ironic to underline the /while back/ part of that statement. The rest, Shanlee's disgusted rebuttal, surprises a twitch at the corner of his mouth, something almost like a smile! But it never takes root. "Nonsense seems to be working. Keep at it. Feeling dark in the lightest corners of your mind, you said?" Shanlee flickers a scowl N'thei's way for his laugh and curls down deeper into the chair heedless of boot heels to fabric it seems. A fine brow lifts in silent challenge for his response to her negation of biological clocks. One shoulder shifts against the chair back, an attempted shrug of nonchalance over darkness, "No. Maybe," pause, "sometimes. Don't you ever think about how things could have been different if you'd just done that, or not done this?" almost sounding idle. "No." A lot of people could profess a life without looking-back and you'd have to know they were making it up, but the relentless certainty of that single syllable leaves very little doubt that N'thei-- for all the multitude of his faults-- does not live in the what-ifs. "What would you do differently if you could." The dark red head nods in acceptance of N'thei's response and Shanlee puts a rueful smile out to him, "Doesn't matter. What's done is done and we strive to move past it, aye? The question was rhetorical based on the belief that I could ask you what color underwear you're wearing and you'd still turn it back on me." Reflexive in reply; "Why don't you come over here and find out for yourself what color my drawers are." To judge that drawl, N'thei certainly enjoys the notion; to judge the lack of movement on his part for so long a while, he doesn't believe in the probability. "You like to talk. Why's it so bad a thing that I like to let you?" On discovering the color of underwear, Shanlee's mouth curls around a smirk, "Don't think for a minute I don't enjoy having a man at my mercy, but it's an honor granted almost none," low laughter next, "And I'm afraid you're fresh out of luck." The greenrider disappears behind her mug for a moment and comes up to make correction to N'thei's last, "No. I like finding out what makes people tick. And you refuse to play along, so..." shoulders shrug, "I'll sit here quietly while you doze off and then sneak off with that hot date of mine, m'kay?" N'thei shakes his head quietly, content in silence for a long time but without the slow rhythm of a dreamer's breathing. Still awake for all it's worth. "Never occurred to you that what makes me tic is so simple that it's not worth your effort? Like to fight and drink and fuck. And gamble." Afterthought. "Disappointing, neh? No great mystery, probably better to go on believing it is." The sound of something crashing and breaking jars at the end of N'thei's silence and causes Shanlee to wince slightly. Her response goes to comment, and through a low chuckle as her mug is raised as if in toast, "Then we are not so dissimilar you and I, save for the gambling. Never did quite get the hang of winning." So she's not quite that disappointed then. Or maybe just a little, "That's it though. That's all you want and ask of life?" a side of her mouth curls up into a lopsided smile and the greenrider sounds almost consoling, "Maybe one day you'll tire of living out such a lonely existence." N'thei, half-smiling in return; "Are you lonely?" Sounds surprised-- or enlightened-- the prospect never having occurred to him before. Shanlee's attention drops off N'thei and down to her near empty mug a smile threatening to break through again, "No." And turns it back onto him, "Seems I know this answer but I'll ask anyway. Are you?" "Before I answer." Let's take bets on whether or not he ever will. N'thei cricks open one heavy-lidded eye, a gray glance going sideways toward Shanlee before his lashes close down again. "What makes you think I'm lonely?" "You'd have to tell the truth and perhaps show some vulnerability in order to answer," Shanlee notes, "And to do that you'd have to trust me. Which I don't think you do. Not like that," giving him an easy out to not answer. Lips press together in thought and the look she lifts up and over to the Weyrleader is honest, "Because if you weren't you wouldn't always be so angry and in need of pushing everyone away." Fingers trace over the pattern of the armchair's fabric, "Lonely people," she adds quietly, "are too scared to let anyone in, in case they see." N'thei clarifies placidly, "Not angry because I'm lonely, love. Angry because people want things I can't give them. Weyr full of people who want to thrive without making sacrifices. People who want me to go on being some misguided hero when that's never who I was. Even you-- vulnerability, to be let-in." A wry laugh falls between them succinctly. Then a calm breath; "Not lonely. Just tired." And perhaps that's what Shanlee had been after from N'thei right from the beginning for a contented smile follows shortly after he's finished speaking. Leaning forward her mug is placed on the small occasional table and she turns a considering glance over her shoulder to the bronzerider, "That's my point. It's lonely at the top, it's frightening and it's frustrating. Being held up to be something you yourself never really feel equipped to be." Brows press down and together, "Never expected you to be a hero, N'thei. Just human." Slowly she untucks legs and gets to her feet with a soft sigh as if to leave, "Everyone needs someone with whom they can just -be-." She'll leave the empty mug there for someone else to tidy up, offering softly, "Sleep now." Wouldn't be N'thei without immediate perversity; "Not everyone." At her sleep-now, another contained smile hits the corner of his lips, flourishes, then withers, all eyes-closed and seeming contentment. "Happy Turnover, love." "If you say so," Shanlee gives with a wry shake of head that likely goes unseen as she passes by where he's situated. Only once she's at the archway does she stop, a hand to the lintel and cast a look back to N'thei, her words likely low enough to be meant for her ears only are to a happy new turn, "Could well be," another smile touching out and then she's gone. |
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