Logs:Looking Glass
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| RL Date: 7 October, 2015 |
| Who: Jocelyn, Leova |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Motivations, however personal, get examined. |
| Where: Resident Common Room, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 9, Month 13, Turn 38 (Interval 10) |
| Weather: A blanket of cold, dense fog fills the bowl with its oppressive presence and obscures vision. |
| Morning: late enough that the main cavern's not so much a feeding frenzy, early enough that childish noises echo from the nursery's tunnels more loudly than usual. One mother, one greenrider has survived drop-off but barely. She's come to earth on the edge of one of the clusters' chairs, dark-auburn head bent, forehead resting on her thumb's lowest knuckle. After some moments she sighs, and starts to straighten. Jocelyn hasn't spent significant periods of time around the nursery since being scooped up by Giorda to join the headwoman team, so it's hardly surprising that she emerges from the nursery looking more than a little uncomfortable. Confusion, too, worries at her brow as she awkwardly pats at a milk-drunk baby who looks all but asleep against one shoulder. There's a cloth inserted between shoulder and infant for the inevitable post-meal spillage as the redhead tries to keep her steps steady and swaying while she takes a frazzled-looking turn about the common room. Amber eyes lift. Drift. Focus. Hold. Leova slides back in her seat, just a notch: not volunteering. Not stepping up, literally or figuratively. Not it. Though she does lift her brows their own notch when the pair circles their way, with something like commiseration. Half-scowling as they round the room, Jocelyn's expression clears somewhat once some recognition dawns as she nears Leova. "I am never having children, " are the first, definitive words she gives, a startled look for the baby on her shoulder who shifts immediately after with a small whimper. Voice lowering, she tries again. Cautiously, "How do people do this and learn what to do? It's so - so unpredictable." She may as well have just pronounced it a torturous sentence. "Wasn't going to either," Leova says, dry. Not that one corner of her mouth doesn't tip up. "'Unpredictably predictable,' maybe." Still back in her seat. Still not offering. While she's at it, "Different knot you got there." Baby gurgles and promptly demonstrates why that cloth is so placed, eliciting a distinct grimace from its current caretaker. Gross. "There's a mostly logical order to feeding time, " Jocelyn allows, "but I'm not sure that anything else is really - " A pause, while she shifts to pull a corner of the cloth up to dab at the infant's mouth. Then another, as pale eyes flick automatically to her white-knotted shoulder. "Astute as always." Exhale. "Someone asked for the first time in almost seven turns." Leova's own shoulder twitches: perhaps an echo of her usual shrug, perhaps in sympathy. "Going to say you're doing it, just because they asked?" That's dry too, complexly so; Jocelyn was an infant herself when Vrianth broke shell. "If that's what people want to think, " and Jocelyn lifts her non-burdened shoulder into a shrug of her own; let others form their own opinions, as they will. "I could be making use of what's likely my last chance. I could just be doing what I feel is my duty to my home when we're expecting a large class. If I'd wanted to between then and now, I could have asked." But she didn't. Despite her lack of experience, the hand patting the baby's back switches to absently drawing soothing circles. "Aye. Lots of coulds." It's a two-cornered smile now, Leova's. She keeps her voice down, for the baby, for Jocelyn. "So, why?" Amused: "I'm asking." Jocelyn's silent for a long moment, having taken to lightly bouncing her small charge while digestion continues. "We'll need bodies, " which would sound just ominous out-of-context. "Maybe I just need to know if I'll ever get to know what it's like, underneath the need to serve." That's quieter, but she doesn't elaborate on whatever "it" is. If anyone's eavesdropping to hear such ominous words, Leova isn't looking out for them. "'Maybe,'" she repeats. Quotes. But any elaboration, it's not about it. "I do feel that I should, " sniffs Jocelyn as she impatiently tugs the spit-covered cloth to and fro while seeking an unchristened patch to use. "Anything beyond that is more my business than some passerby's in the hallway, isn't it?" Still, there's a subsequent admission, even if some explanation yet seems forthcoming: "Beyond duty feeling like it's calling, I'm curious." "Seems to me, you're passing the rest of us by," Leova all deadpan about it. "There you go. Curious and curiouser. Good..." she eases up to stand at last, though well out of the baby's way. "Luck, hm? Joce." Jocelyn's mouth opens and closes briefly, nose wrinkling faintly. "I - thanks, Leova." It's almost apologetic, as is the quieter, "Ma'am, " which follows as she resumes walking with slightly flushed cheeks, this time to return a quiet baby to the nursery. |
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