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[andhiswife]

Things have been relatively quiet for the past few weeks, and Greta's feeling... good, in a broad sort of way. Saoirse still has the occasional nightmare, and Regan still has the sort of moods you'd get with any teenager, of course. But things have settled to the point where she no longer feels as if her primary occupation is recovering, or like all she has to offer are bracingly delivered progress reports.

So, naturally, it seems like a fine time for company. God, she's missed being able to talk to people without some small part of her, with or without real cause, just dreading their eventual, inevitable sympathy.

It's been some time since she's seen Julia, and the weather's warming enough that the deck is actually a pleasant place to sit. After a few exchanged texts, the arrangements are made, and Greta spends the morning making biscuits and muffins (she doubts Julia and herself will polish off that many between them, but Saoirse and Regan can make a whole tray disappear while her back is turned, so she's not worried about leftovers).

She's just put the kettle on when the knock comes, and Greta heads for the door in the wake of the dogs, who sniff preemptively at the jamb, tails wagging. "Right, budge up, you two," she mutters, wading through them to open the door for Julia. "Hello," she says with a wide, easy smile. "Here, come in. Just nudge them aside if you need to."

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[goldstarwife]

"That's some welcome," Julia says with a smile, huffing out a soft laugh as she carefully makes her way past the dogs and into Greta's house. It's been a while since she's been here — too long, really, since she was able to spend some time with Greta — but she's still accustomed enough to their presence, and they're cute, sweet dogs. Though she's never had pets, she thinks that's only given her an appreciation for other people's, and these are no exception.

Once she does make her way past them, she exhales, rolling her shoulders back, as if abruptly relaxing. She keeps busy around here mostly because she feels like she needs to, and it's nice to have a break from that to see a friend. "How are you?"

[andhiswife]

"They don't want for enthusiasm, do they?" Greta says with a wry, fond smile. At least both of them have good manners; they might sniff at Julia or even nudge at her hands hopefully, but they aren't jumpers, and they're quick to figure out when someone would rather just ignore them.

Greta makes her way back towards the kitchen, her smile widening for a moment as she watches Julia visibly relax. She's proud of what she's made of the cottage, and likes to think that it's a place where her friends might find some relief, when they visit. A little proof of concept is always good to see. "I'm doing well," she says with an ease that still feels deliciously novel. "Things are still a bit weird, because, well." She makes a vague but demonstrative gesture encompassing the city at large; things are always a bit weird in Darrow. "But in a good way. How about you?"

[goldstarwife]

"About the same, I think," Julia says, one shoulder lifting in an easy shrug. "A little weird seems pretty inescapable around here." At least that's one thing she's gotten fairly used to, or at least that she's gotten better at dealing with. It's always going to be weird, and she doesn't think she could ever become someone capable of taking it entirely in stride, but she's aware of the way things are and the strangeness of them, and that seems like a good enough step in its own right.

"But, you know, there've been no catastrophes lately, so I'll take it. Saoirse and Regan doing alright, too?"

[andhiswife]

There's something rather ironic in the way that 'about the same' has started to sound like a blessing and not a curse. Back home, the sameness of her day to day had chafed her raw. Now, the idea of at least some measure of stability sounds fantastic. The worst it might be is startling, not dull or unenviable or exhausting.

"I'll take 'no catastrophes,'" Greta replies with a wry smile, just before the kettle starts to shrill. She turns off the heat and goes about preparing a pot of tea to bring outside, where the cups, sweeteners, and milk are already waiting.

"They're doing well," she continues. "Starting to itch for summer a bit, I think. Regan's got herself a young man, so that's been... interesting." For the most part, Greta's been restraining herself on that front; she knows Regan is more likely to talk to her about it if she doesn't act dreadfully nosy. And she's seen (and heard) enough of Richie to not be too worried. Still: "Trying to find that right balance between being interested and not being a pest is tricky, but... I think I'd rather be someone she can talk to if she needs to than wring out every detail."

[goldstarwife]

"That makes you very gracious, in my experience," Julia says with a laugh, warm and easy. "My mother had no boundaries like that at all. She wanted all of the details, and had... no propriety whatsoever in speculating and making jokes." She never really minded that, though, which is clear enough from her tone. At least she's been here long enough now that she can talk about her mother without feeling too melancholy, though Julia still misses her terribly. For such a long time, it was just the two of them; though she's gained something more in being here, it's been painfully difficult to lose that.

"That's good, though, all of it. I guess aside from itching for summer, but that's always sort of inevitable, isn't it? It was for me when I was young."

[andhiswife]

Greta echoes the laugh, not so much bashful as wryly understanding. "Mine wasn't too bad," she acknowledges, "but that hardly mattered growing up in the Village. It was too small for secrets, so everyone's mother knew your business, and you were lucky if even half of them kept their opinions to themselves." Darrow has its fair share of wagging tongues, she's certain, but at least they're a bit more dispersed throughout the whole population. And the locals, mercifully, don't seem too interest in gossip that involves the non-natives.

The grown-up locals, that is. Goodness knows what the other students at Regan's school might be like. Given her memories of her own adolescence — and her understanding of just how many friends from home Richie has here — she figures the poor girl could use all the grace she can get.

"Honestly, I'm still getting my head round the whole 'summer vacation' thing," Greta says as she carries the teapot out to the deck, leaving the sliding glass door open for the dogs. Neither of them will run off; she doesn't mind them wandering in and out as they please. "It was never really a break back home; most of the children were helping with planting and the harvest and so on. And of course, nothing changes for people who aren't in school, so..." she shrugs a bit haplessly as she sets the tea down, and gestures for Julia to sit. "Maybe I'm just storing up this extra goodwill so Regan won't balk every time I beg her to mind Saoirse."

[goldstarwife]

"I wish the rest of us got a summer vacation, too," Julia says, letting out a breath that's halfway between a laugh and a sigh. Although she never would have recognized it as a teenager, itching to get out of school for a while, she thinks she needs one more now, as an adult, than she ever did back then. Spending all day on her feet, waiting on entitled customers, in a job that she's not particularly fond of at best, seems far more draining than school did. Or maybe that's the result of life's interference. She's not the girl she was back then, confident and sure of what her life was going to be. She isn't mired in grief anymore, like she was in the first months after Michael died, but she'll never go back to being the person she was then, no matter how much she sometimes wants to be.

In spite of such thoughts, though, she still takes a seat comfortably, not about to let it affect her mood. In some ways, she's gotten used to it, anyway. She isn't always sure how she feels about that, but it's part of her life, and if she got too brought down every time it crossed her mind, she wouldn't be able to function at all.

"That's good, though. Hopefully having all that favor on your side helps a little."

[andhiswife]

"We'll see," Greta replies, rapping her knuckles against the wooden table as she sits herself down. Hopefully it won't be an issue, and if worst comes, it's not as if Saoirse will mind accompanying her to the Gardens.

Once they're both settled with their drinks, and Greta's made sure the dogs are behaving — Cu is flopped on the lawn a little distance from the fenced-in run they've built for the chickens, his interest more protective than predatory, and Sadie has had a brief ramble over the grass before returning to sprawl half beneath the table — she lets her focus settle properly on Julia. "So, how are things going with Donny?" she asks, eyebrows raised in a playful approximation of innocence.

[goldstarwife]

"They're good," Julia says with a sheepish smile, ducking her head a little. She's not surprised that the conversation has already turned in this direction, and not just in the interest of catching up. Greta has been encouraging of her relationship from the start, even before it was an actual relationship. A little gentle teasing is to be expected. For that matter, it's not unwelcome, either. Though she wouldn't otherwise compare her friend too much to her mother, the idea of that more than a little strange, she expects she would have had the same sort of thing to contend with at home if she and Donny ever acted on their feelings there. It would be a bit odd to go without it altogether.

"They're... steady," she continues, pausing to take a sip of her drink. "Which is good, you know? I did things very conventionally, and very quickly, once before; I wouldn't want to do the same again now. Which is a little easier here, too." She rolls her eyes in easygoing amusement. "People really don't get married right out of high school like they used to."

[andhiswife]

She really can't help but be a little smug. Not that she claims any credit for the two of them working things out. The most she'd done, really, was make suggestive facial expressions whenever he came up in conversation and project a vague but broad support for the idea of them getting together. It was never her intention to be obnoxious, but she can enjoy the resolution from a polite distance, surely.

"It is," she agrees, lifting her glass a little. The idea of a slower courtship isn't foreign to her. Even in the Village, sometimes there was a stretch of time between knowing you wanted to be with someone and having the means to support yourselves, and marriage was always rooted in practicality as much as romance (well, unless you were a Prince, perhaps). "If you're going to do it again, might as well do something different instead of retreading the same path twice."

Whether she treads that path again or not is still rather uncertain. Thomas's loss doesn't ache like it used to, more of a faded bruise to join the one her husband had left behind. But she's grown rather tired of such losses, and the thought of setting herself up for another one isn't particularly appealing.

[goldstarwife]

"Exactly," Julia says, nodding in agreement. It helps, too, that everyone here seems far more open-minded about what is and isn't acceptable before marriage than people were in her time. Not that it always stopped young couples anyway, but it's still refreshing to be able to go to her boyfriend's apartment, for lack of a better title to give him, and have no one think twice if she doesn't leave until the next morning. She's not about to say so, a little too modest for that, but privately she can admit to being grateful for it.

"I wouldn't want to be..." Trailing off briefly, she lets out a breath as she tries to figure out what to say, expression a bit thoughtful. "Comparing isn't the right word, I don't think. But I wouldn't want to just be thinking about Michael and how we did things every step of the way, either. That wouldn't be fair. To both of us."

She'll always love and miss her husband. She knows Donny will, too. In some ways, that connection makes it easier to move forward, knowing they share some of the same ghosts. In others, it makes her want all the more to keep some distance between the two of them, to make sure she isn't trying to fit one into the other's place.