xp_logs | Terry & Jay - backdated to November 19th

Jay and Terry talk after the fight with Forge. Terry heard all and the advice from a good friend falls on deaf ears.

Jay marched into the kitchen, setting his guitar roughly against the counter and went straight for the fridge. His jaw set stubbornly, gritting his teeth as he jerked the freezer open and fished through it to find a flavour of ice-cream. Any ice-cream. He grabbed vanilla and fetched himself a spoon, then headed for outside to take flight and situate himself on the roof where he said he would be.

Terry was carrying a notebook as she headed up the stairs to the roof and there was indeed a song half-finished inside it but really that was all for show. Part of having the most sensitive hearing in the mansion was being keenly aware that the soundproofing was not what it should be everywhere but the music room, Sean's old room and the basements. Everywhere else was fair game and she could usually pick up almost any conversation that she cared to actually tune in on. There weren't all that many, she had a great many other things to worry about and didn't have nearly the free time that she used to have, but anytime Jay got upset, she was obligated to tune in. "Ice cream again? You're going to get fat as well as ugly."

Settled on the edge of the roof, Jay scowled at the ice-cream, stabbing at it and shoving it into his mouth. He had forgotten that Terry could hear better then any of them, and hadn't even given it a second thought to her wanting to come and see him. His mind was on the fight, rolling it over in his head, dissecting it. He looked behind him at her approach, turned away and slouched, shuffling his wings in irritation. "Shut up," he said in a pouty tone.

She made a face at his back and poked his shoulder hard as she sat down next to him, legs folded so they weren't dangling over the edge. "Don't you start with me, boy-o. I'm not going to indulge your moods." Terry settled her chin in her palm and assumed a patient look, "Tell me about it so that I can pretend I wasn't eavesdropping. Then once you've gotten that out of your system, we can fix the bridge to this thing."

"Good, then Ah don't have ta repeat wha' happened cause ya heard it all." As mad as he was, Jay would not go without offering her ice cream to settle herself into the mood he was in. "Why tha hell should Ah be tha one ta fix it? Why should Ah always be tha one ta be sorry? Ah thought Forge was happy fer me..." he trailed off, obviously disappointed about it, "Ah guess ya figured out why 'e should be happy fer me."

She shook her head at the offer, not particularly tempted by store-bought ice cream and shrugged. "I hear things, sure. Try not to make too many assumptions on them. I don't hear everything and who's to say that what I do hear means anything at all?" The wind pulled a lock of hair loose and tossed it across her face, she tucked it back behind her ear. "What ...is it, exactly? You and Kevin, I mean? Where's it going?"

Now that he confirmed she had been listening, he had no illusions of how much she actually heard. "Kev an' Ah, well, we ain't.. Not, if tha's wha'cha mean. He's ma boyfriend... sorta. We hadn't really clarified tha part yet. Ya know? But do Ah gotta know exactly where it's goin'? No. It ain't like we're gonna run ta Vegas an' get married." He took a moment to regard her, slipping the spoon into his mouth. "Not like some people Ah know."

"It was an accident," she corrected primly and automatically then wrinkled her nose, "I'm not that sort of smug married, thanks. I just want to know that you're getting into this eyes open. Just because Forge is tactless and idiotic doesn't mean he's clueless. He's worried because you've been hurt before. And you're still not one hundred percent." Lifting a hand, she ran it lightly over his wings.

He blew out a long sigh and closed his eyes. Strangely enough, her touch was soothing and small feathers were eased out, and blowing away in the chilling breeze. "Don' mean he gotta be a jerk 'bout it." He picked at the ice-cream a few times with the spoon and then dropped it into the container, setting the cold comfort food aside."Are any o' us a hundred percent when we get inta a relationship?"

"Forge doesn't know how to be anything other than a jerk about some things. It's just how he is." She continued to stroke his wings gently, as delicate a touch as playing her harp. She'd always been fascinated and not a little infatuated with Jay, though always content with just friendship. "I'm just saying, relationships don't fix what's wrong. They only magnify everything. If you're not okay now, Kevin isn't going to fix it. The same goes for him."

"Yeah, he's real good at that." He linked his fingers together, and stared at them for awhile, chewing the inside of his cheek. The cold numbed him, keeping at bay the feelings welling up within. He stared hard at his fingers, his thumb scratching at the inside of the other palm, listening to her voice, but not truly to what she was getting at. He didnt want to hear it. He was fine. He and Kevin were fine. There was nothing to fix. "There's nuttin' wrong. Why's everyone think there's somethin' wrong?" Doesn't everyone think that?

Terry pulled her hand away from his wing and held out the most recent feather to have come loose. "This isn't normal. This isn't healthy. Don't lie to me, Jay. Even if I couldn't hear it in your voice, I'd know it by the trail you're leaving. Telling me nothing wrong is about as believable as Bobby and I telling people that getting married was an accident."

"Wha' ain't normal? Me bein' happy fer once?" He gave her a side long glance, eyeing the feather she had in her hand. "Hell ya, Ah'm still mad 'bout Kyle, but Ah'm ignorin' it. Even thou' Forge is an ass, he's right 'bout Kyle bein' young an' stupid at tha time. So it's a lil' sore fer me, but leave it alone an' it'll go away. Just need a lil' time."

"Is that really it?" Terry let the wind catch the feather and tug it from her fingers, watching it spiral off the edge of the roof. "You're telling me that all this is because of Kyle?"

"What'd'ya mean 'all this'? Ya mean tha fight wit Forge, or," he didn't know anymore. There was so much wrong on every angle he looked at, that the only perfect thing in his line of sight was Kevin.

"Or. Or all of it. Everything that brought you back, everything that's making you sick. Everything that has you diving into a carton of store-bought ice cream. Sure and I'm not blind, Jay. What are you doing to yourself?" Her American accent faded a bit as she let a little bit more concern into her voice. There was no harm in letting him know that she cared.

First Forge, now this? "Ah ain't sick Terry," he corrected, though he didn't bother to elaborate on it and looked away, down into the yard. His wings shifted irritably and he frowned. "Ah'm fine. Ah don't get wha' yer gettin' at. Ya think there's somethin' wrong, but there ain't nuttin wrong. Ah'm happy, Ah feel happy. Ah mean, not right now but overall."

"Oh, aye, because you molt so often normally," she replied a bit sharply then sighed, "If you're really happy, then good, I'm glad for you. And I wish you and Kevin only the best--you both deserve it. I don't want to see either of you worse off, is all. Have a care, Jay. Don't throw in your whole self on something that's not going to last."

"Ah am," he confirmed, bringing his knees to his chest and hugged them, resting his chin on top. "Happy Ah mean." As if he didn't think he could frown anymore, but he did. "Wha'd'ya mean not gonna last? That's just like what Forge said."

"I mean that, my extremely dubious example aside, the average relationship is three months. I don't want you to get your heart broken." Not again.

"Maybe we'll be yer statistics an' make it four. Wha' Ah'm sayin' is its unfair ta judge it. Forge did an' he didn' care when he said he did. An' tha' hurts. A lot. " A lot of what Forge said hurt. He didn't know which one to be upset about more - the stab at Kevin or the one about him not sticking to anything.

"I'm not judging. I'm worried. Because I see you investing a lot into the idea that being with Kevin is going to make up for everything else and it doesn't work that way." Terry frowned, looking down at her hands. "Look, just...promise me that you won't forget that you've got a lot of people who care about you? Can we at least settle on that score?"

"So wha' yer sayin' is tha ya wouldn' be offended if yer friends told ya not ta marry Bobby cause 'e ain't tha solution ta all yer problems. An' let’s just say, hypothetically, ya didn't have any probs ta begin with, but everyone kept sayin' ya did. Would ya still be offended or would ya get mad?"

Terry laughed wryly, "Jay, Bobby and I have more problems than we know what to do with. I love him but he's not perfect. I didn't marry him, either time, thinking that he was going to solve anything. I'm not offended that people think I'm an idiot for marrying him--or him for marrying me. It hurts, sure. Mr. Summers..." she paused and shook her head, "I'm not saying that you should break up with him or that there's no way it's going to work. But I'm worried that you're looking at this as a solution and I think that's dangerous."

"Wha' bout Mr. Summers?" he asked, not missing the way she held back. He didn't think they had so many problems but then, Terry was good at laughing it off. She was also good at taking the focus off herself. "A solution ta wha? This 'ere is where it starts ta get confusin' cause Ah don' need a solution ta anything."

"Mr. Summers didn't approve. Doesn't, whatever." She rolled her eyes, brushing it off because it still hurt under it all. She'd looked up to him for years, he'd been almost a father when her own had chosen his job. "Look, maybe I'm totally off base. Maybe there isn't anything wrong and you're going about your life in perfect physical, mental and spiritual health without a care in the world."

He thought that he should say something about Scott, some words of comfort but he fell short, dropping his gaze. He hadn’t thought it was a sore subject but by her reaction, it seemed it was. "Maybe, but maybe not. Ah don' know wha' Ah'm doin'. Ah'm just tryin' ta get by an' find some sorta direction." He looked down at his palms and rubbed them together. "Kev's just a constant in ma life, an' Ah like 'em that way."

Terry signed, "Okay. But he's not the only one. I'm not going anywhere either, all right? I know we had our problems but...you're still important to me."

He smiled faintly. "Ah know." She knew she was important to him as well, but he felt he didn't have to say it. He didn't feel he was hiding anything from her, just confused with his future. He let his legs down, dangling off the side, and placed his palms on either side of him. "Ah wish ya both wouldn' be so protective. Kev ain't that bad yanno."

"Whoever said that he was?" Terry looked over at him, genuinely startled. "I like Kevin. Have since he first got here with his own personal storm cloud of gloom. I don't have to dislike someone in order to think that maybe you're not right for each other."

"How can ya say tha' thou when ya don' even know. Yer both just takin' it at face value, an' it ain't like that. We have somethin' special, an' .." And? He blew out a long sigh and placed his hand over hers, pleading. "Jus' trust me on this Ter. It ain't ever been so right."

She looked down at their hands and turned hers up to meet his, palm to palm. "If you say it's right...okay. I'll believe you. Just remember that I'm not trying to ruin anything for you. I'm overprotective, that's all." Terry gave him a wry smile, "You can't blame me for that."

His hand tightened in hers and he gave her a reassuring smile that he knew what he was doing. He just wished Forge was as understanding as Terry was and as trusting. "No Ah can't. But Ah can blame ya fer not fillin' the freezer with Bobby's ice-cream while yer 'ere."

Trusting, not really. Just smart to know that arguing with a Guthrie only got you more pigheadedness. They were a beautiful but stubborn breed. "You want Bobby's ice cream delivered, you should have married him. That's one of the perks of having a living ice cube as your one and only." Tugging one hand away, she retrieved her notebook from beside her, "Now, are you going to help me with this bridge or what?"

Jay moved closer to her and reached for her notebook, feeling melodramatic enough to write not one song, but three. "Ah would've if 'e gave me a chance, but 'e seems ta think that 'e got someone better lookin' than me."

"And that's because he did," Terry responded serenely, letting Jay flip through the book past pages of half-written and scrapped songs, usually annotated with a large red X through them. The latest thing in the notebook was mostly done, with chords scribbled above the words. "Don't be too hard on yourself about it though. Not everyone can be this good looking."