The Tale You Tell

[andhiswife]

It's been a difficult week.

That's actually an understatement. But she can't let the full weight of it settle on her, not when she's out in public like this. So for as long as she's out here, doing some shopping, it's just been a difficult week.

She's told Baz and Simon about her situation. They'd offered to give her time off, but that wasn't what she wanted. The Gardens are one of the few places where she doesn't feel like climbing the walls. There's too much else going on, too many other things that require her attention. It's everywhere else that's the problem. Her apartment is too quiet and too empty and too immaculate; she can't even justify housework anymore because everything that could possibly need doing has already been done thrice over.

And she knows she has friends who would help her, who would be happy to provide company or distractions or whatever she needed. But that would require telling them. Repeating the story wouldn't make it any more real than it is already, but the thought of burdening anyone else with it -- and how could something this heavy not be a burden? -- turns her stomach. So much so that she's been politely deflecting the invitations she's received, rather than try to face anyone.

She'll say this for texting: it makes it easier to lie.

The thought of food rather turns her stomach, too, but she's getting groceries, anyway. Even if the chief appeal of cooking is making a mess that she would then have to tidy up, it's still a necessary chore. Her clothing is starting to hang a bit looser than it ought to, and she doesn't want to make new garments for what she knows, distantly, to be an impermanent state of affairs. So, groceries. She can do this.

[Find Greta looking terrible either at or en route to a grocery store, or on her way back to Candlewood. Closed unless we've spoken; hmu if you still want in.]

Comments

[madesomenoise]

Dee's faked a smile enough to know when someone's doing it and she raises her eyebrows, studying her friend's face for a moment.

"I was just thinking that I haven't seen you in a while. Everything okay?"

[andhiswife]

Greta's not under any illusions as far as how she must look, and Dee's question isn't really a surprise. It's vague -- perhaps deliberately so, leaving her room to lie and insist everything's fine (not that she's ever been adept at lying) -- but you don't ask if someone's all right unless you've reason to think they're not.

She sighs, defeated. "Not really, no." Her arms briefly spread, the 'clearly' implicit. "I've... been better."

She's also been worse, according to Jesse, but she's not really in the mood for silver linings.

[madesomenoise]

A frown flickers across Girl's brown face, definite concern and she steps in a little, reaching out with her fingers to touch Greta's elbow, gently. "Do you want to talk about it?"

[andhiswife]

She does, and she doesn't. Part of her wants to scream it from the rooftops; the larger part wishes she was able to hide her misery so thoroughly that no one could even guess at it. No matter how much it might ease her mind to speak of it -- each conversation slowly eroding the sharp edges into something more worn, more bearable -- she finds it hard to justify anything that might come at a friend's expense.

She might not always be here. She might leave before Dee does. And there will be no solace to be had in pleasant thoughts of what joy she might be going home to, not if she tells Dee the truth.

"Do you want to hear about it?" she asks quietly. A little warning seems only fair. "I don't want to--to burden you."

[madesomenoise]

"I'm a friend, aren't I?" says Girl, gently threading her arm through Greta's and giving her a quick squeeze. "I've got nothing important to do for the rest of the day. I'm all yours."

[andhiswife]

"That's why I'd rather you didn't know," she says, both wry and a bit weary, as she reaches over to pat the girl's arm. Dee's already seen more friends die than someone her age ought to, and it seems cruel to tell her to expect another one. "It's not just--it would..." she trails off, frustrated. She tries again, choosing her words carefully, "I feel as if I can't tell anyone without making things worse."

[madesomenoise]

"Then you don't have to tell me," says Girl, with a quick shrug, doing her best to keep everything about her demeanor light, trying not to urge Greta in any particular direct. "I'm just saying that I won't mind if you do."

[andhiswife]

You say that now, Greta wants to say, but doesn't. Dee would probably mind rather a lot. Goodness knows she would, if one of her friends here told her they were technically dead back home. How could anyone not mind knowing such a thing?

But she appreciates the offer, and she doesn't want to just snub the girl. Dee's confided in her before, and it seems churlish to just... refuse to do the same.

"I met someone who knows my story," she finally says. "It... ends badly."

[madesomenoise]

Somebody else might have been more taken aback by that, but Dee just takes in a little breath and squeezes Greta's arm.

"Join the club," she says, gently. "Poison's dead for definite back home. Everyone I ever loved is. Hell, the Witch said I wasn't done, but I sure as hell don't remember waking up anywhere but here."

[andhiswife]

She lets out a startled huff of air, not quite a laugh, but closer to that than to a sob, at least. "Not much of a club, is it? I think I'd rather none of us were in it."

Still, there's something oddly reassuring about Dee's level response. If they are all in the same boat, it would feel a bit foolish to start carrying on as if her own situation is so much worse. If the girl can be calm about this, so can she.

[madesomenoise]

"Shitty, shitty club, but at least we've got style," she says, grinning. She nudges Greta gently. "Come on," she says. "I can tell you my whole sob story if you like."

[andhiswife]

That does get a laugh out of her. It's more incredulous than amused, but at least it's there. Style isn't something she's ever had, not really. She couldn't afford it, back home. Maybe she could claim to have it here, but that's by virtue of the fact that she's chronologically displaced (and stubborn), not because she has the means or inclination to obsess over how she presents herself.

But if Dee wants to say so, she's not going to argue the point.

"I don't know that I'd like it," she says. "Though I suppose we could do a swap."

[madesomenoise]

"Do you want to go first or shall I?" says Girl. She's spent so much time telling this story that it doesn't even really hurt anymore. It's as much a part of her as her fingers or the soles of her feet.

[andhiswife]

Greta had been half-joking, but it appears Dee's willing to tell all. Under different circumstances, she might rather the girl just kept it to herself. But her own woes have been so all-encompassing lately that there's a desperate sort of appeal to the idea of focusing on someone else's for a while.

"Why don't you start?" she replies. If Dee can get through her own story without losing her composure, Greta will have no excuse.

[madesomenoise]

"I never got to met my mom," she says, thinking that that's the best place to start. "BLI had her when I was born and it was only the fact that my family came and got me that I had any chance at all. They were only kids themselves - Poison was seventeen the first time he held me."

[andhiswife]

It's not at all unusual for people to lose their parents at young ages back home, but that doesn't make the thought of it easier to bear. If anything, it's gotten harder since she learned she was among the ranks of deceased parents. Her son will hear stories of her, but will he remember her?

"I'm sorry," she says, though she isn't sure if it's for Dee or for Dee's mother that she has the most pity.

[madesomenoise]

Girl shrugs.

"Can't miss what I never had," she says. "It was harder when the others died. I was six."

[andhiswife]

God, maybe she should have gone first. Is that what her son will do, when he's Dee's age and someone asks about his mother? Shrug? Blithely reassure the questioner that he doesn't -- can't -- miss her?

She doesn't blame Dee, not really, but that doesn't make it easier to hear.