vanillajello | Overland Park, KS, Early Wednesday Evening

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Overland Park, KS, Early Wednesday Evening

It was kind of funny how weirdness never stopped being weird, no matter how much you were exposed to different types of it.

Kate had felt weird since the complete disaster that was Monday night. She'd felt weird through Tuesday's family breakfast, and the stuff they did during the day, and the dinner with the gay neighbors and Charmaine and Nick (which Kate and Marshall and Bod hadn't even attended), and through whatever random crap they'd done today. She could barely remember. It was all kind of hazy. But at least she was pretty sure she'd kept her inner confusion hidden pretty well, for the most part.

She hadn't spent all that much time actually alone with Bod, though. That could've led to talking and she didn't want to do that, so she didn't.

And tomorrow, they'd be back in Fandom. Some other kind of weirdness would take this weirdness' place and this would be forgotten. Hopefully.

Right now, though, they were still in Overland Park. Kate was lying on her stomach on her brother's bed with Bod sitting beside her, Marshall's latest yearbook from glamorous Butterworth Senior High open in front of her, and a black marker in her hand. Marshall himself was currently standing on his bed on Kate's other side, fixing a lamp he had hanging from his ceiling.

Kate drew horns on some random freshman's picture and blacked out his eyes. "I don't miss any of these people."

[For the boooy. NFB due to distance, contains stuff nabbed from USoT S02E01 'Yes'. ETA: Warning for discussion of suicide.]

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Something about that made his stomach turn and he felt the momentary urge that he was about to get sick.

"I'm sorry." Maybe that could be a start. "I'm so sorry for what happened, Kate. You have to know I had the best of intentions and it just didn't happen the way I wanted it to. We've both been through so much lately, I think we just took it out on each other."

In a way that they shouldn't have. "It was -- it was something we shouldn't have done. And I'm sorry."

"Well I know that!" They shouldn't have done it. Really shouldn't have, and they had two days worth of tension to prove it. "And it is not your fault."

Had to say it, mildly angry as it was. It wasn't as if she hadn't come close to begging for him to do what he eventually did. He'd given her exactly what she'd thought she wanted.

Not his fault it was the wrong thing to do.

That quieted him for a moment. His hands hung loosely at his sides and he had to reach deep to keep himself motivated and determined to see this through.

"It's no one's fault," he agreed after a moment, "but I still participated and I'm still sorry. And I want you to forgive me because you do love me."

He was inches from just laying his heart out there but he kept it close for the moment. "If you can't forgive me, well, then I'll deal with that. You know what I think about that night. Maybe you should tell me what's been going on in your mind."

"There's nothing to forgive," she replied, a little more quietly. "We fucked up. I already said it. We fucked up."

She should've probably said she was sorry too. She wanted to, she did. But it just wasn't coming out, not right now.

Probably because she thought she had so much more to be sorry for than he did.

"Then, why are you pushing me away like you've been doing for the past two days?" he asked in a clipped, short tone. There were limits to his calm and he was very close to reaching them.

"We made a mistake and I want to move past it. I want to be with you," he reiterated. "Do you want something different? Do you want me to just stay away from you?"

"No, I..." And there went her voice with the breaking again. If it was possible for her poor bare shoulders to get any tenser, that's what they did now. "I just... I didn't know what the fuck I should say after that."

So she'd ignored it, and pretended.

"And that didn't work." Considering where they were now, it was an obvious statement but he didn't care. He was quiet again, staring at her tense shoulders and her back and frowned.

"Kate, I saw a girl set herself on fire," he blurted out, unable to stop his heart from unraveling those secrets. "She was a child and she set herself on fire right in front of my eyes. Every night, I see that. Every single night."

He paused and had to swallow past the lump in his throat. "What we did wasn't what we should have done but that wasn't us who thinks clearly. That was trauma and damage and months worth of horrific things. That was two people who weren't themselves for one night. That wasn't us. That wasn't the me that loves you. That wasn't the you that loves me. That was the me that didn't want to think about a girl setting herself on fire. That was the you that didn't want to think about waiting or seeing dead bodies all around her. It was one mistake and it wasn't us."

Her eyes were on him from about the first instance of the word fire. Her red, teary eyes fixed on him over her shoulder as she listened to him saying all of that.

And once he'd stopped, she wanted to say something, and even opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

She looked just about ready to collapse, now. But at least she wasn't hiding anything. All the pain was right there on her tear-streaked face.

Edited 2010-08-26 16:27 (UTC)

It was there and he was seeing it and it was incredibly difficult to see. He didn't turn away though. He kept looking at her, kept trying.

"I don't want one mistake to haunt us," he said, quieter now. "It was one mistake and it shows that we're human. We weren't thinking clearly and it happened on a night after a traumatic event. After months of dealing with trauma. I want you to stop pushing me away like I'm not who you want. I want us to forgive ourselves."

And he stopped talking there, just unable to find any more words that he hadn't presented already. Instead, he covered his mouth and looked briefly pained before casting his eyes down at his feet so she couldn't see his hurt.

It didn't matter, she still knew it was there. It still added to hers.

But she broke out of her frozen stance, now. Pushed herself away from the closet door and took unsteady steps towards him, one hand clutching at her towel to keep it up. Her legs felt weak, she felt weak.

Her voice wasn't much better. "I want you to forgive me."

Bod had been a little too focused inwardly to realize she'd come closer so her voice surprised him. He glanced up though and dropped his hand from his face.

"Forgive you for what?" She hadn't let him ask for forgiveness so he had to ask why.

She still felt like she had done more to feel guilty for. Couldn't help it.

"For... trying to push you away."

Kind of felt hard to even admit that was what she'd been doing, and she looked down.

"Do you want to be with me?" he asked. He had to check. After everything, after getting pushed aside, he had to check just for his own peace of mind.

She looked up. "Yes," she said, standing in front of him, feeling about as miserable as she ever had. "I do. I love you."

"I forgive you," he said immediately, nodding. "I forgive you. Don't push me away. Be with me, instead. I love you too. Please."

"Thank you," she breathed, like a complete idiot. At least she felt like one.

That might have been a factor in why, after saying that, she just stood there, awkwardly. It was probably okay to touch him but right now she didn't really know how.

Bod took the initiative there. She was standing there, still wet from her shower, wearing only a towel and looking emotionally wrecked.

Bod reached for her face, cradled her cheeks between his hands and leaned forward to rest his forehead against hers, breathing in the smell of soap and water on her skin.

Cherries. Kate smelled like cherries now, like the soap she had here for when she came to visit. No point in lugging stuff like soap around between Overland Park and Fandom.

She closed her eyes and let out a ragged breath that could've been a sob, could've been a tiny bit of laughter. Even she didn't know. It was just a quiet sound.

Bod rubbed his thumbs up and down her cheeks, almost like he was re-familiarizing himself with how she felt.

"Come here," he said, reaching to try and pull her against him for a tight, overdue embrace.

Kate didn't resist, just let herself be drawn closer into his embrace without saying a word.

She wanted to be there, she really did.

And he'd let her stay there for as long as she needed. He didn't say anything either, just held her and kissed her still wet hair and smelled the cherries on her skin and kept her close.

After a moment of just leaning against him, she got her own arms around him too. Clinging. Clinging hard.

A few more tears joined the ones already on her cheeks and on the top of her chest. It didn't matter.

"We're all right," he whispered. Even if it wasn't completely true because of the still raw emotions, he knew they would be and that was what was important.

"You smell good," he added idly and kissed the top of her head again.

"Cherries," she muttered, her voice rough.

First normal thing she'd said to him in two days.

He nodded and just stayed close to her, quiet again. When he spoke again, his voice was low, just for her ears only.

"Do you want me to take care of you right now?"

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