xp_logs | Backdated: Betsy and Haller

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Betsy and Haller in London. A lunch date.

The Underground would have been faster, but Bayswater wasn't too far from the Radisson. It was strange -- he'd been in the city dozens of times over the years and never really thought much of the place. Now, making his way down Oxford Street and narrowly avoiding a collision with a chattering group of girls overburdened by HMV bags, Jim realized he'd missed it. The history, the atmosphere, the life of the place. New York had always been home, but London was an old friend.

Exiting the main building of the Park Royale Hospital, Betsy shouldered her purse and with one look behind her set off toward finding something to eat. She'd lost her appetite some time ago but if she continued down this course. It'd only mean more concerned looks in her direction from Brian. And well, she could do without that. Hailing a cab, Betsy ducked in and watched the streets move by in a frenzied blur. She took to the notion of trying to relax and so, leaned back into her seat, closed her eyes and tried not to focus on anything.

Which never works out as well as one would hope.

A light buzzing in the back of her mind and Betsy sat up. No bloody way. She banged on the divider, separating the driver and herself. "Stop, please."

With a screeching halt, the telepath paid her fare and exited the vehicle. She set off toward Oxford Street with a purposeful stride and tried to keep herself from trotting down the busy street in stilletto heels. It couldn't be him, she thought to herself. "Not him," she whispered. Only to feel the air evacuate from her lungs as she found herself staring at the blissful face of David Haller looking unwittengly up at the sky. "I'll be damned."

At his height and as a mutant working in his vocation, Jim was used to the feel of eyes on him. This was different. He sensed the attention a split-second before he caught a flash of purple out of the corner of his eye. Confused by the unexpected awareness even as he moved to turn his gaze from the flight of three dark-necked pigeons and towards the source, Jim was in no way expecting to see what he found.

. . . Betsy?

As if his eyes on her were permission enough to move closer, Betsy only managed a step before faltering. She looked down before looking back at him from across the street. There were people making their way around the two now, crossing in and around them. "Hello," she mouthed to him, feeling somewhat awkward and quite gobsmacked.

Jim's returning smile was tinged with something bordering on gratified disbelief. "Hi," he mouthed back, waving as a teen with blue-spiked hair momentarily eclipsing his view. Jim made an abortive step towards her, then blushed as he almost walked into a well-dressed woman on a cellphone. Gesturing for the other telepath to wait, Jim focused his attention on the street and quickly picked his way through the throng. He'd known Betsy had gone back to England, but it hadn't occurred to him he might actually meet her. Last Saturday's decision to make the trip had been slightly impulsive; between the scramble to make arrangements and his first real experience in the field, incidental details like that had been lost in the shuffle.

He was inexplicably excited to see her. Strange, he thought as he waited impatiently for the crosswalk light to change, a week ago his head had been such a mess he would rather have chewed off his own arm than come within a hundred feet of Betsy. Now, into the second day of the conference and an ocean away from the school, he felt almost himself again. Balanced.

"Fancy meeting up like this," Betsy said as he moved toward her and was within speaking range. He looked well and couldn't help an appreciative smirk as she reached over to give him a hug. "One might think you were stalking me, Mr. Haller."

"I'd be the worst stalker in history. You could spot me coming a mile off." The hug was unexpected, but warmly returned. The contact was welcome. Perhaps more than he'd realized it would be. He was aware of holding her for a moment longer than was strictly necessary in a platonic embrace, but Betsy didn't seem to mind. He pulled back so he could get a good look at her. "How have you been?" Jim asked, noting the slightly drawn cast to her face. "Home been keeping you busy?"

"As per the usual," Betsy admitted though didn't elaborate any further. She tried to lighten her expression, to make herself exude what she didn't obviously feel. "Nevermind that, how have you been? And please don't think I'm being rude when I ask you this. But what are you doing here?"

Jim laughed. "I'm at a conference for the ESTSS. Um, the European Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, I mean. One of my old doctors is a keynote speaker, and I decided to use it as an excuse for taking a weekend off before I actually had a vacation forced on me. I'm still technically working, just . . . away."

While he talked he studied her face. She was still impeccably put together, which he was beginning to believe was a nearly eternal state for her, but her face looked pale beneath the makeup. Whatever was going on, the deflection indicated it was something she didn't want to discuss. She was obviously tired -- and, he suspected, stressed. Jim made a quick decision.

"Look, I was on my way to get lunch," he said, his smile widening. "Are you hungry? I know a good place. It'll give us somewhere less conspicuous to speculate on who's stalking whom. I think people are starting to wonder if we're street theater."

Betsy eyed the crowd and then connected with Haller's mixmatch pair of eyes. She nodded eagerly at the idea of actually going elsewhere, if only for a few hours. Feeling her face light up, it was the first true smile she's allowed herself in days and it felt good. "I'd like that," she said, wrapping her arm around his and leaning comfortably close into his larger frame. "I'd like that quite a bit."

Grinning at that, Jim couldn't resist punctuating the brief squeeze of her arm with a brush against her mind to convey his pleasure at her company. Turning them off Oxford Street and onto a sideroad, he was unsure in his own mind why the act of reaching out seemed to come so naturally. The prospect of forcing his thoughts on others had always carried some trepidation; it had taken time before he'd felt confident initiating unsolicited contact even with Nathan, and Jim knew Betsy far less well. Even the brief flash of awareness he'd caught from her on the street had been a surprise. He supposed it must be a result of the . . . what Jim doggedly termed "unavoidable intimacy" of the night they'd spent together and what had happened the morning after. He didn't know her, not in the real sense, but there was a sympathy there now -- unlooked for, but comfortable.

Bayswater was a little farther than he'd have wished her to walk in the heels she was wearing, but Betsy was obviously well-used to enduring the consequences of fashion. Nonetheless, he paused before the rather unassuming front of the restaurant to give her an apologetic smile.

"This is it," he said, gesturing at the plain facade with "Kebabs" scrawled in hand-painted cursive over the door. "I'm sorry. I'd obviously be as bad a date as I'd be a stalker. Um. Did the walk at least work up your appetite?"

"Don't trouble yourself. I could travel the whole expanse of Sahara desert in six-inch Manolo Blahniks. Besides, not discussing my day, you're neither." Betsy said with a nudge of her shoulder. "Actually. Hmm, a date." She chewed on the inside of her cheek, thinking on it. "It is nice to see you outside for once. And I think this place would be more than adequate to benchmark such an occasion. Our first 'official' date, as it were."

To Jim's eternal gratitude, the server working the patio chose that moment to look up from clearing the plates off the nearest table.

"David, marhaba!" the man said warmly, instantly abandoning his task. He pronounced the name Davood. Wiping his hands on a towel with brisk, efficient movements, he moved forward to extend a hand.

"Marhaba, Hamid," Jim said with relief, meeting the man's eyes and moved to accept his hand. "How are you?"

"Very good, very good, il-Hamdulillaah." The handshake concluded, and the man's gaze flickered to Betsy. He grinned and said in Arabic, "~This is the first time you have ever brought a woman here. Is she your wife?~"

The flush of heat in his face, only interrupted after Betsy's declaration, returned in force. "Um, just a friend," Jim replied, holding to English. "Are you very busy today?"

The man's grin only widened. "For you and your friend, we shall find room," he assured him. In a moment Hamid had cleared the dishes from the table and concluded by swiping a towel across the surface. "Sit, sit," he urged, balancing the tray in one hand and motioning with the other. "I will bring tea."

"Friendly fellow," Betsy remarked casually. She had to hide the smirk at Hamid's comments. The man didn't need to know that there really wasn't a need for him to congratulate Haller so covertly. Looking on at her companion, Betsy tried equally hard not to smile at his slightly dumbfounded expression. It was something she was getting quite familiar with and an aspect of the man she looked forward to the most. She opened up her menu and glanced down its' pages, forcing her eyes downward least she start staring. "So, tea What else would you suggest?"

Jim lifted his own menu, grateful for something to mask his slight panic. Okay, so I am now technically on a date. Surprise . . . "It depends on what you're in the mood for. The Salad Olivieh is good for a starter. The main courses are pretty big, though. Um, do you prefer lamb or chicken?" He was aware his awkwardness was amusing her, but that was all right. If the faint shadows under her eyes were any indication of her current stress level, Jim was glad to provide her with a distraction.

"Lamb," Betsy stated with little hesitation. She looked up from her menu, sheepishly. "Actually, how about I refer to expertise on what we eat. You pick what you think is best and then we could share a plate."

Jim smiled and folded his menu closed. "Yeah, that'll be fine. The Baghali Polo should be more than enough with the starters. So, now that you've officially left the school do you have any plans?" He'd recalled she had been a model once before her days on staff. That had been an interesting random Google search.

"I've managed to keep busy between my Remy and Pete and well...." She closed the menu and felt the tightness in her face return. Might as well air it all out despite the desperate feeling to clamp down on everything related to family. Betsy hesitated and forced herself to continue. "You see...How should I put this? Well, part of the reason I've returned home is because of an obligation I have....to my brother."

There. That wasn't so bad. Horribly vague, yes. But it was much better than appearing all mysterious and alluring when she felt anything but.

A brother. Jim carefully filed that away for later. "Is it a legal thing," he asked, trying to figure out a way to put this vaguely enough that it wasn't going to make her feel any more uncomfortable with it than she clearly already was, "or just . . . family stuff?"

"A little of both," Betsy said softly. Her fortitude growing with each word. "My older brother is quite ill and we're in the process of relegating title and all other cheerful things one does when you lose a family member to either death, disease, or dementia."

"Oh." There was really not much else to be said to that. Jim felt himself flushing faintly, and this time in a far less pleasant way. "I'm sorry, Betsy. Are you okay?"

"Just dandy," Betsy replied a bit too quickly. Looking up and grimacing slightly, she tried again. With a little less bitterness. "Sorry, it's just been somewhat difficult dealing with this among other things. It's been a practice of compartmentalization, really. Deal with what you can, when you can and save the rest for later. And so happens, I run into you during the 'later' part."

"Don't worry about it." Impulsively, Jim reached out to take one of the impeccably manicured hands that lay across the table. He squeezed it gently and gave her a lopsided smile. "I know how that goes. I'm okay with being around for the later part. Processing . . . kind of sucks if you have to do it alone all the time, with nothing to break it up."

"Thank you," Betsy said a bit breathlessly. "It means a great deal that I can...." Trust? Confide? "Talk." Seemingly shaking herself of her drab mood, Betsy slowly lets herself relax. The signs of world-weariness easing away from her. "So. How long are you planning on staying?"

"Yeah. Talking is good." The smile was, too. Jim's own became less wry at the sight of it. "Just another day. I only took Friday and the weekend off, so Monday it's back to work. It's been nice to get away for a few days, though. See old friends."

"No time for a second date, then?"

"I, um." Sometimes he wondered why his face even bothered returning to its normal shade. There seemed to be no way to avoid the reaction. Jim cursed his inexperience in anything to do with any social interaction that was less than strictly professional. Was she serious? Certainly nothing about her demeanor indicated she was in the mood for anything serious, which was . . . a relief, really. Jim wasn't sure he'd have known how to begin to approach things if that had been the angle. If this was an honest question, well, Betsy seemed like she could use the company and--

Oh, who am I kidding, Jim thought wretchedly, staring into those amethyst eyes. She's funny, intelligent, and an ex-model. Like anything about this could be considered a selfless act.

"Or something," Betsy echoed. Opening her mouth to say something else, but then their food arrived and thought better of it. While it was fun trying to see how many times she could get Haller to show his secondary mutant power; human tomato. His ability to turn bright right on command might have some other uses in the future and she smiled at that. The weight she felt holding her down these past few months was ever-present but for the moment, she felt buoyant.

Jim stumbled a little in giving the entree orders to Hamid as the server set down their tea and starting nan, but he couldn't even bring himself to be embarassed at the other man's knowing grin. Betsy was imminently distracting, and he needed no telepathy to know she was well aware of it.

And now, Jim realized as he passed her the plate of bread, he had a date.