Room 324, Monday After Classes

[vanillajello]

Kate was twitchy. She supposed it was a natural side effect of knowing one of her best friends was pretty much going to walk into his death in a few days, and she was supposed to go... see him off, or something. That was not something she wanted to be dealing with.

So after classes, she'd pulled on her PVH garb, and sat down in front of her computer. This was easy, this was so far removed from everything else going on in her life. She got to talk about the whole Princess Valhalla mythology, and random other stuff too. In fact, she was just in the middle of a good rant about the latest season of one of her favorite trashy shows when the guy on the screen (fourth_mister, again) interrupted her.

"Uh, I'm sorry but... I don't actually watch The Real Housewives of New Jersey."

Kate blinked, a little taken aback. "Oh," she said. "I... thought you said I could talk about whatever I wanted."

"I did!" the guy assured her hastily, and gave her a smile. "But now I wanna do something else."

Well. This was unexpected, but she supposed she was game. At least to find out what it was he wanted to do. "... Okay. What?" If it involved her taking her clothes off, she was so not doing it.

"Do you have any cake?"

What? Kate laughed, just because that went way over her head. "Cake?" she repeated, then sobered up some, because she really had no idea where this was going. "Why?"

"Um... I was hoping you could, um..." He swallowed. "Sit on it?"

Uhh. Kate didn't even know what to say to that. After a moment of hesitation, she told him she didn't really have the means to fulfill his request at the moment, but that she'd think about it, and then she announced she had to go, and ended the chat.

With a sigh, Kate started changing out of the costume into some regular clothes, her mind buzzing with several different kinds of things all at once.

[ooc: Door is closed, post is open! The contents of the conversation under the cut are NFB, please and thank you. Taken again from UsoT S02E08.]

Comments

[therewaslife]

Bod had been holding his breath after he'd stopped speaking because he hadn't known what to expect. Yelling, staring, dismissal, acceptance, those were all possibilities but he hadn't really thought of kissing.

He wasn't going to argue though. Kissing was a good thing (unless she was kissing him goodbye) so after taking a moment to recover, he responded and reached for her too.

[vanillajello]

Well, she might have been kissing him goodbye. Kate was a little undecided on that point, so for now she was just kissing him, wrapping her arms around him and letting herself be a little clingy and a little desperate.

Desperate for what? Who knows.

[therewaslife]

If she was kissing him goodbye, she'd have to be the one to say that because he'd said his piece. He'd laid everything out for her to know and try to understand and he had nothing else.

He didn't want to say goodbye. He was still worried and still stressed but he tried to keep those out of their kiss so it'd just be a good, strong kiss.

[vanillajello]

And Kate could help with that. She put all her energy and all her focus into that kiss. It was something she was feeling better at than words and talking today.

She could still try and convey that she cared about him a lot even if she failed at sympathy and other things.

[therewaslife]

As much as Bod was enjoying this kiss, he didn't want this to get away from them at a high stress time. So, he gradually eased off the intensity of that kiss until he'd eventually pulled away and was looking down at his feet.

It was hard to leave themselves open to more talking but he also didn't want any awkwardness dealing with acting without thinking.

[vanillajello]

Kate didn't fight him when he eased them out of the kiss, but it wouldn't have been her choice. Unsurprisingly. Talking was her least favorite thing today.

So she said nothing, just seemed to find her own feet with their bright red nails utterly fascinating.

[therewaslife]

He wasn't going to make her talk but he also wanted to avoid a repeat of what happened at her parents a few short months ago. They'd acted out of stress and emotion then and that had turned out so badly.

He just didn't want that to happen right now. He wouldn't have been able to handle it.

[vanillajello]

Kate hadn't forgotten that either, and wouldn't have let it happen again. Not like that. There were some mistakes she could learn from.

But now she didn't know what to do. He was the one who'd just made a big speech, but somehow she was the one feeling weirdly exposed.

She rubbed at one of her eyes.

[therewaslife]

Bod waited for her to do whatever she'd wanted. Technically, it might have been his turn because she'd kissed him but it was her room and her situation so he waited. He'd said he'd wait.

So, he waited quietly, glancing at her every so often and trying to predict what might happen.

[vanillajello]

That had to be a hard task, considering even Kate really had no idea. She thought about sending him away, for a moment, then discarded that idea quickly. She wanted him to be here, even if it was... like this.

So she reached for his hand.

[therewaslife]

Bod took the offered hand a little hesitantly but laced his fingers with hers once he'd done it. He kept his eyes on their hands and not on her face, a little afraid of what he might have seen there.

[vanillajello]

Kate wasn't really looking at him, either, for similar reasons. She tugged him towards the bed instead.

They didn't have to be risking complete relationship implosion in order to use that.

[therewaslife]

Bod followed gingerly, not really sure what she wanted to do but willing to trust her to see what she wanted. He was nervous, really having no idea if his words had done anything and he was trying not to let it show.

[vanillajello]

Kate just figured he was feeling a little awkward. She was, anyway. Or a lot awkward.

Keeping quiet, she climbed on the bed, still gently pulling on his hand so he'd join her in leaning back against her pillows.

[therewaslife]

He didn't know if it was awkward so much as scared because he'd said so much and she'd said nothing in response. He didn't know what he'd done or if he'd made a mistake.

He did crawl onto the bed and did lean back though, having to force some tension out of his body so he'd be a little more relaxed than he'd been since arriving.

[vanillajello]

Once he'd settled down, Kate cuddled up to him enough to be able to rest her head against his shoulder, sighing quietly.

She knew she should say something. She was trying to come up with the words.

[therewaslife]

Bod, meanwhile, just lay there, breathing quietly and staring up at her ceiling. He'd done that a lot lately. He was fairly certain he should have memorized every crack and imperfection.

He kept looking though.

[vanillajello]

Kate had done that a lot lately, too. So much that she'd almost considered putting glow-in-the-dark stars up there just to change it up a little. She wasn't looking up now though. She was more in a staring straight ahead kind of mood.

"I know it's hard," she said, quietly. "I get that. I do. And I'm sorry. And I appreciate that you don't, like, demand to know everything."

[therewaslife]

Bod nodded once, relieved to hear that she understood his feelings, at least. And she seemed to accept them. It didn't take away all the nervous energy but it helped.

[vanillajello]

"And I would probably be incredibly pissed off if I was in your situation," she admitted, still keeping her voice quiet, her tone mild. "So... Thanks for not being me, I guess. And if I was in trouble, I would tell you."

[therewaslife]

"All right," he replied, nodding and accepting that. It sounded like she understood and that's all he'd wanted. "Thank you. I hope it doesn't come to that, you having to tell me that, but thank you."

[vanillajello]

"Any time," she said, meaning to sound wry but not really succeeding. Oh well. "And things really are gonna get better eventually, I promise."

She wanted to believe that, anyway.

[therewaslife]

"I hope so," he said, nodding. He really did hope so. It felt like just one thing after another lately. He was tired. "I'll have to wait and see before deciding if that's really going to happen."

[vanillajello]

Maybe she should've ben glad that her occasionally super shitty life had finally stripped him of his perpetual optimism. She wasn't, though. Actually, it felt kind of awful to hear.

"Yeah," Kate sighed. "I guess you'll have to wait."

[therewaslife]

Sad to say, Bod was getting pretty good at waiting for life to right itself lately. It hadn't been smooth for a long time so he'd gotten rather good at treading water.

"I've become rather good at that," he said but he didn't sound boastful. It was just a fact.