Log [Alison, Jean] The water's fine...

[x-dazzler.livejournal.com]

Early afternoon. As per Jean's request, one Alison shows up at the pool, ready to assist Jean deal with her hydrophobia. This involves much babbling and chit chat of course, since talk of any kind is a useful thing when it comes to distracting someone.

Jean eyed the pool from a fully body length away, trying to figure out if really, anything could be worth the gnawing knot of terror in her stomach. There was definitely a part of her going no, no, no no no nononono but Jean had locked it away under all of the shields and mental control she had, along with the vicious little voice which had gotten as far as You ought to drown. You're supposed to be de... before she'd squashed it. God she was messed up. And thinking about that was a relatively good distraction, at least enough to get her focus away from the terror and back onto, well, not being so frightened.

Jean stepped forward carefully, not bothering to pretend to herself that she wasn't obsessing over where to put her feet so she didn't lose her balance. Three feet from the edge. Two. And she could see the shallow steps that descended into the water, not even as high as her knees at this end of the pool. The steps were right below her, now, taunting her with their nearness, and really, this was progress, right here. This was as close as she'd come to the water on purpose since...

That thought got carefully locked away too. At least there were no waves in the pool to splash about. Really, the sound of water crashing against rock and yet more water was going to haunt her forever.

Jean didn't even realize she'd come to a dead stop, hesitating a few steps back from the edge of the pool as the seconds ticked past.

"Hey." A hand at her elbow, light but present was added to the word. Leaning over a bit so that Jean might see her, though she stayed firmly on her side and not between Jean and the water, Alison smiled, just a bit. She'd meditated before heading down here and had worked her way through more than a few of the Askani calming exercises Nathan had shown her, what now seemed like so long ago. Right now, steady and calm thought patterns would be the most useful thing for Jean, she knew. And the shirt she was wearing over her bathing suit wasn't cheating one bit on their deal, too.

"So. We have two choices for today's goal... either just make it to the edge of the pool, or sit on the side with our feet in the water." It would be more than enough for a first time in, really, as far as Alison was concerned - though she suspected Jean would be likely to try and push farther, once they got to that point.

It was amazing how much mental noise someone who wasn't trying to sneak up on a telepath could intentionally make. Jean had no question that it was Al coming up beside her, nor about her intentions, well before the other woman spoke. The steady patterns resting in the back of Alison's mind was remarkably reassuring, possibly because Jean's own thoughts were flitting back and forth too much for her to try and settle them down. She eyed the stairs again, carefully
controlling her breathing. "Sitting would be... I think I could do sitting." After all, sitting meant that most of her was still out of her water, and it was much harder to lose your balance the lower to the ground you were.

"Sure thing. Then that's what we do - and for the record, I am not going to be doing any pushing or shoving in the water. You set the pace here." This time, Alison did fully step in front of Jean, standing in the short distance that separated Jean from the pool. "I'll take a small step back here, okay? Follow when you're read." It was a simple thing, to simply use oneself as a shield between someone and something, but Alison hoped it might help, somehow.

Jean focused on Alison's eyes, noting that, in this light, they were almost the same color as the pool. "No pushing is a good plan. You push me in and I'll bring you in with me before I flashboil the pool." She smiled as she said it to show she was joking. Mostly. Carefully, Jean stepped forward as Alison moved back, keeping her gaze locked on the other woman and not the water.

"Ooh. Cool, the water heat is up - I wasn't sure I'd gotten to the settings in time to see a difference this morning." Smiling a bit, Alison wriggled the bare foot that was in the water - not enough to cause a splash, though the sound of water stirring wasn't entirely inaudible. "I figured the water being warmer might help," she added, candidly. "And now, as shown by how suddenly so much shorter than before I've just gotten, I've got both feet in. You good for me to take another step down? Top step is yours, I keep the second one as mine..." She reached out both hands, a balancing influence - but also knowing that the contact would make it that much easier for Jean to read her own calm and try to work from it, to stabilize her own thoughts.

Jean took Alison's hands, making a conscious effort not to bruise her. #I know exactly what you're doing with the babbling and the distraction,# she pathed, all breath thinking being concentrated on not hyperventilating. #Thanks.# with al's hand in hers jean had cut out the option off stopping and had to step forward with Alison or pull them both off balance. Her foot entered the water and she got it firmly on the step before freezing in place. #Warm, good call,# she managed.

"I thought it might be. And the babbling well - that's a Haroun trick. He did that when I woke up in the medlab. Did it for a while too afterwards." And he still did it when she woke up from the nightmares, the thought not spoken out loud though Alison had no doubt Jean would likely pick up on it. It hardly mattered if she did too, really. And then, because she by no means wanted to speak out loud about it in a room which echoed so easily as the pool area… #And on a less babbling matter - you said something about possibly plastic surgery later, for the scars?# The focus required to make one sentence stand out in her mind was an afterthought, after all this time.

Slow, regular breathes. In. Out. In. Out. Focus on Alison. #It would be possible, or ought to be. There would be... would be...# Words were escaping her. Not good. #Might be difficult, because of things, but I know people who could say better than me.#

#Because we still don't know how the magic affected things.# And because it was getting hard to deny that the blackness of the scars had to be related to what had happened in Limbo. #I can wait. Besides, I still need to walk through the mansion first before I think of plastic surgery.# She'd keep her part of the bargain - one she was glad was in place now, for several reasons. Steering her thoughts away from the latent fear involved in letting people see the scars. #You can hang on a bit more if you want.# Mentally, she meant, something she knew would color the thought well and not need to be specified.

#Ah, not going to cheat your way out of it, then?# The humor tingeing the thought was rather dark, but it was at least there. Jean could definitely see the absurdity of their tableau, and it was that thought that gave her the impetus to shift her weight fully onto her right leg and move her left into the water.

There she was, both feet in the water, just standing there. #Almost seems anticlimactic,# she thought, but she was holding on to the stability in Alison's mind with all her mental might, because there wasn't a shred of her own left.

#Do you want to sit down?# Staying in the water was a part of things, obviously - but sitting down and keeping up the chatting would at least remove some of the strain from her, perhaps. Solid ground to help balance out the feeling of her feet in the water of the pool. #I can either stay in front of you,# and between you and the water, was the mental undercurrent to that thought, #or sit by you. Whichever you prefer.#

#Hmmm, sitting... Well, now, that may be difficult, as I think my knees have locked.# Jean was possessed of the rather irrational desire to glare at them, but her eyes only just managed to drift away from Alison's face before she snapped her gaze back, hands tightening convulsively on Alison's. #Staying there is good. Not seeing it is very very very very good.# Oh, and now her knees weren't nearly so stable and Jean sat back against the edge of a pool with a thump, eyes still firmly locked on Alison's face.

Kneeling in the water in front of her, slowly so until her eyes were level with Jean's, Alison smiled. #Well, looks like we're sitting down. How's the solid ground feel there?# There was a hint of amusement in Alison's thoughts - and a further opening, as much as a non telepath could manage, to show that none of that amusement was in any way about mocking Jean. She tightened her own hands in Jean's, reassuringly so, not about to go anywhere at all. #You know, you don't feel like Nathan does. Or any of the others. I hadn't realized that there were differences before... isn't that silly though?#

Solid ground was a good, good thing. New York was not given to earthquakes, so it would stay solid, and she'd still be out here, and ok, her feet were in the water, but they were feet. That was ok. #Silly there's a difference, or that you never thought about it? Because of course there is, but why should you have?#

There was a touch of solidity to Jean's thoughts that belonged entirely to her, for the first time since they'd started speaking that way, and Alison smiled a bit at that. #That I never noticed. You'd think I would have, after all this time.# Well, no. Anything related to Emma coming anywhere near her mentally had certainly felt different than the others. Ugh. #Huh. I think I'll go poke at Nathan after this, just to get a feel for it.#

#I'm always in favor of poking at Nathan. It's good for him. Although, I admit, I'd be surprised if you hadn't been aware of the difference between Charles and Nathan. And I'm not sure how you could have not noticed how different Betsy feels... Ok, no, definitely all your own fault for not catching on that we're all different.# Jean stuck her tongue out at Alison, her death grip on the other woman's hands relaxing.

#Oh sure, mock the head blind woman!# Alison stuck her tongue out in return, her thoughts dancing with amusement at Jean's teasing. #Be an interesting aspect for Nathan to throw in if he does a psi class for the head blind like the ones we used to have, though. I did nearly a year of that, either with Emma or Betsy, when I first got here. But now I just meditate a lot,# she added, a touch sheepishly so.

#We really do need to restart that class. And not just for the psi's benefit of giving everybody else shields. I wonder if I could convince Nate to take every other class. Or Elisabeth. We could rotate and it would be easier on all of us.# Focusing on this seemed almost like a normal sort of conversation. Hell, it was a normal sort of conversation, since normal people frequently had comfortable discussions poolside. It's just that they weren't normal people. But maybe she could deal with this whole poolside thing.

#Nathan's already thinking about it. I think.# Alison laughed out loud at that, the fact that she was saying so while thinking to a telepath only too amusing. #And I can talk Betsy into it, probably - but she used to do it and I'm pretty sure she'd not be adverse to doing so again.# Jean was holding her hands only loosely by now, she noted absently, not moving hers in the least. It felt good, to be able to do this. Startlingly so. #Hey - between the both of us, they don't stand a chance anyway.#

#You just thought a thought which was about thinking a thought about thinking, I think. And yes, they won't stand a chance, which is a good thing, as the class needs to happen.#

#Now you're doing it too.# Alison laughed at that once more, the echoes reverberating lightly across the room, even as she nodded in assent. And proceeded to keep on babbling away about things both useful and not, until the session was done.