xp_logs | Nathan and Rachel, post-Arlington (Reply)

Wherein Rachel would proclaim "Brooding, Father? Not on my watch!" - if she wasn't three years old. Somehow the message gets across anyway.

This was not precisely how Nathan had expected to end his day. He had gotten back from Arlington after a long and too-quiet drive to relieve Rachel's babysitter, only to find his daughter outside on the deck and making like Picasso on a particularly manic day. Not that he minded her getting in touch with her artistic side, and it was warm enough out here, but she was really getting into it.

"Hey, trouble," Nathan said, glad to see that she was wearing her smock and that the little wooden table where she created her art was resting safely on a tarp, so that she didn't get paint all over the deck again and annoy Uncle Cain. He sat down in one of the deck chairs, watching her. "What are you painting?"

"Insides," was the blithe reply.

"Of what?"

"People's heads."

Nathan did a double-take and then looked more closely at the apparently abstract painting. "... so you are," he said, recognizing the patterns and colors as very rough but somewhat identifiable representations of psi-patterns. Holy shit, he thought, very privately. "That's very..."

"Loud!" Rachel said enthusiastically, dabbing crimson paint on one pattern to finish it. She had apparently eschewed brushes today.

"You're telling me," Nathan muttered under his breath, amused. "You wacky little prodigy. Whatever will you do next."

Rachel shot him a glare over her shoulder. "Not!"

"Not what? You're not a prodigy? Or not wacky?" Rachel giggled at his playful tone and went right back to painting. Nathan leaned forward, watching her efforts more carefully. "I see Mom, and me... Charles, and Jean..."

"Billie," Rachel said helpfully, pointing out another pattern. "Anna."

She did much better with those who were actually psis, Nathan noticed. That made sense. "Who's this?" he asked, pointing out a shaky golden pattern.

Rachel pursed her lips. "Don't know." She looked up at him after a moment, hopefully. "Paint too, Dad?"

Finger-painting with his daughter, or spending the rest of the evening brooding. Oh, what a horrible, impossible choice. Moira had been sneakily devious indeed, leaving Rachel home with him this week.

"You realize you're going to need a bath after this," Nathan said, pulling the chair closer so that he could sit on the edge of it and reach the paints.

Rachel made a face. "Painting now," she said stubbornly.

"Bath later?"

"Painting!"

"Yes, ma'am."