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xp_logsThe inevitable happens: Amanda and Manuel run across each other.
It was bound to happen, he knew this. He knew she was in the mansion often. Someone told him so. He didn't seek her out, choosing to keep his distance until he had it all planned out, all the things he would say. He had seen her a few times and avoided being seen. Today, he saw her in the hallway and there was a fleeting moment where he could have made it known that he was within the school, yet he ducked into a classroom, unprepared for the twelve sets of eyes that turned on him at the intrusion.
Manuel cleared his throat, "My apologies. Wrong classroom." He stepped out and closed the door behind him, positive they had all caught a glimpse of his burning cheeks. Amanda did too as he suddenly came face to face with her. "Good morning Amanda," he said in a clear and unwavering tone. He made it sound as if their meeting was by his own choice and not just shit luck.
Amanda opened her mouth to respond, but only a small squeak came out. Colouring slightly, she coughed a little and tried again. "Manuel. Hi." She'd been wanting to speak to him, to establish where things were, but she hadn't tried that hard - sometimes avoidance was preferable to what was guaranteed to be an awkward as hell meeting. Like the one they were in the middle of now. "I was just..." On my way home after shagging Angelo senseless... "...heading back to the city. Um. How, how are you?"
"I am well." She was blonde now, confident in her stature though she seemed to shrink under his steady gaze. He forced himself to let go of the door handle and leaned on the cane, keeping the arm with the inhibitor behind his back. He shifted to the right and pressed his back against the locker, letting the cold of the metal sink in through the dense fabric of his shirt. The hallway was nearly empty and the weight of the ache in his body was hard to ignore. "The blonde. It's... different." He preferred the black.
She raised a hand to her hair involuntarily. "Um, yeah. Let it go back to the natural colour a couple of years back." After the Hellfire Club, when she'd killed Askani to save Alison. Wow, this was turning into a walk through every unpleasant memory she had. "You look..." Like a shell of the man he'd been, to be honest, but after a year and a bit in a coma, what could you expect? "You look pretty good, considering. How's the recovery coming?"
There was a flicker in his gaze and his brow creased, as though she wasn't saying what she thought. He couldn't tell. Not with the inhibitor on and he was poor at reading body language. A part of him hoped that he could still read Amanda but she was different. Obviously. "Slowly," he said and made no move to hid the cane. Proud as he was, he realized his fault in keeping a cool demeanor and corrected it. "You seem content now. Sorted."
She nodded. "I am. There's been a lot that's happened, in the last couple of years. Got a job, I've had to relearn the magic. Got an apartment in New York, with the rest of the Snow Valley lot." The corners of her mouth lifted a little. "I've even helped save the world once or twice."
The last part made him smile. "I see. You work at Snow Valley then?" That revelation did nothing to comfort him. She knew I was awake. He said nothing of it because control motioned you to move forward and not linger on the negative. He strained to find some common ground that was light and anything that did not go into depth of the past. "And how is that going for you?"
"Yeah. I'm Wanda's research assistant. I enjoy it. Well, except for the random disappearing acts she pulls." She looked down, where her fingers were twisting in the hem of her shirt, a clear indicator of her nervousness. "How about you? You seem..." She gestured a little helpless. "Better?" Although considering the last time she'd seen him had been when he was doped out of his brain, barely conscious - he'd slipped into a coma only a few days later.
Everything he had wanted to say had left him in these moments and he refrained from pressing his hand to his brow. People kept asking him if he was alright when he did that. For the most part, he could claim only an ongoing headache though it was far more than anything he could ever explain. "I'm tired, however I gain strength as everyday that passes. Perhaps one day, I'll save the world with you. But for now, I'm confined to this," he gestured to the cane and his posture changed, leaning on it for support. It was tiring to stand in one spot for very long.
She hadn't meant physically, but she didn't have the right to push, not any more. "Muir took care of you all right?" she asked instead. "I asked after you, when I called Moira, but the most she'd say was you were stable." She gave a small shrug. "Patient confidentiality, I s'pose. It was a bit of a shock, to find out you'd been awake for a while. If I'd known..." Well, she wasn't sure what she might have done. Probably she would have gone to see him - some things you could never let go entirely.
"They were nice," he said, cutting her off. She didn't know I'd been awake but she knew that I was here. He didn't want to know what she would have done had she known that he was awake, it was better like this, better not knowing. Ignorant bliss, he supposed. "We worked out some old problems and got involved in new ones. Nothing special." What he didn't say was better left unsaid. His face gave nothing of what he was feeling away, let alone the fact that he couldn't read her, wouldn't have been able to sort through her emotions had he even had the means to try. He did notice, however, she said nothing of her love life and he did the same. Funny, how alike they were. "Will you be returning?" He tried to keep the hope from his tone.
"I visit pretty regularly - I've got friends here still." Amanda looked up, met his eyes. "But you live here now. If it's too hard on you, I can sort something else out." It was, in a way, an apology. And an olive branch.
"I'm fine." He held her gaze, his dark eyes promising to envelope her if she stared too long. "Come and go as you please. I will not get in your way." He didn't recognize the apology, but he didn't want to be her problem anymore. He was no one's problem but his own. "Maybe we could sit together sometime, have tea."
She couldn't help but smile. In a lot of ways, he was the same old Manuel. But he was trying. "I think we can manage all right without dancing around each other all awkward like," she told him. "And tea would be nice." She reached into her pocket and pulled out her wallet, fishing around in it for one of her business cards. "Give me a call sometime?" she suggested, holding the card out to him.
"It would be," he confirmed, backing it up with a smile. When she held out the card, he hesitated as he was leaning heavily on the cane while the inhibitor was hidden from sight with his free hand. Reluctantly, he pulled it out from behind his back, revealing the device and took the card from her. His eyes dropped to their fingers brushing and he held the card until she let go. He didn't want to see her relief in knowing he couldn't read her.
If he had looked up, he would have seen only regret in her expression. She'd been there, the last time he'd worn an inhibitor, known how much he had hated it, seen it as a failure. She was careful to mask it, however, when she let go and he looked up again. Manuel had never wanted pity. "Call me," she repeated, with another smile. "But I'd better get going now. Traffic in New York's a right bastard sometimes, and I've got work that needs doing."
There was anything but hate in his eyes for the inhibitor he wore. He was thankful for it, dreading to take it off but embarrassed that he relied on it so heavily. He was counting the days until it would come off and then, the real work would begin. The hard work. The control. Lifting his eyes, he caught her smile and smiled back. "I will." Thankful that she said nothing about it, nor revealed anything but her good nature. He waited for her to leave and turned the card over thoughtfully, murmuring to himself, "Drive safe."
After her run-in with Manuel, Amanda encounters Nathan, who turns out to be another surprise ally of Manuel's.
Well, that didn't go so bad... Was about all Amanda was capable of thinking as she stumbled back down the hall towards the door to the school garage. If someone had told her two years ago she and Manuel would be making plans to have tea, she'd have laughed in their faces. The whole conversation had been surreal, and the equivalent of walking a minefield. With a blindfold on and hopping on one leg. So caught up in the whirlwind of thoughts - and memories - the conversation had aroused, she didn't even noticed there was someone coming the other way until she'd literally walked into them.
As he tended to do at least half of the nights when neither Moira or Rachel was around, Nathan had decided to head into the mansion for dinner. It meant company, at least, and shaky shields or not he did tend to prefer that at least part of the time. He'd noticed Amanda's distraction as she'd headed down the hall towards him, and had stayed silent, partially out of an unwillingness to interrupt her and have to discuss Certain Topics - When Manuel said he was going back to the school, I didn't think he meant the next day! - partly out of curiosity to see whether or not she'd notice him. Her nearly running into him was the answer to the latter, and he reached out to steady her.
"I'm less painful than a wall to walk into, but not much," he pointed out.
Amanda let out a startled 'eep!' at the narrowly-averted collision and reactively stepped back. "Nate!" she said, belatedly. "Um, hi. I was just..." She made a vague gesture garage-wards. "Sorry, distracted. Obviously. I, ah, just ran into Mann... Manuel." Although the roiling mess her thoughts were in probably gave that away, she realised and tried to concentrate on something resembling shields.
"I was wondering when you and Mr. Pod Person de la Rocha would have your first encounter," Nathan said dryly. "Not wasting any time, I see."
"I wasn't really planning it," she said, equally wryly, smiling a little at the name. "But since I couldn't really ask my boyfriend to keep slogging over to New York to see me and Remy gave me the okay, I figured I'd take the risk. Of course, I am Murphy's bitch." She ran her hand through her hair. "It went okay. Just such a huge shock, seeing him again. Especially when I didn't even know he was awake again until he'd posted to the journals."
"Ah, well." Might as well cover this bit up front. "It's been about... six months, I think? Since he woke up, I mean. Moira was pretty shocked that he did. Not that we talked about it," Nathan said. "She and I have an understanding - we don't hear what we do tend to hear on the link when it relates to her patients or to X-Men business. Hell, I didn't even see him myself until last Friday. He came looking for me while I was there."
"Yeah, I figured he didn't want us to know, or it was medical confidentiality or something. Still, a bit of warning would have been nice, 'specially after the last week." She glanced up at him. "How'd it go? With him and you?" Since Nathan was probably the next person to have reason to be weirded out by the whole thing.
"Shockingly well. I mean, as far as I can tell he's had a near-total personality change, so that helped." Was his switch permanently set to flippant these days or something? It was a bit ridiculous, the way comments like that tended to come out in otherwise serious conversations.
"You too, huh?" Amanda's mouth quirked in another wry smile. "Tho' I didn't mention the whole part where I'm dating the guy he spent years hating - there were limits to how much I was willing to risk. I see he's got an inhibitor on, tho' - he's having powers issues again?" Hopefully in the receiving side of things - she couldn't believe they'd let him near the school again if he was abusing his powers again.
"Not clear on what, but yes," Nathan said. "He actually asked if we could resume our training. I demurred mostly, on account of current semi-incompetency. Also, probably better places to talk about this than the middle of the hallway?" He inclined his head in the direction of the back porch, questioningly.
"If you don't mind me smoking - I'll keep the smoke out of your way, but I really need one after that," she replied, beginning to move towards the door.
"Rachel is still on Muir, hence the likelihood that I'm going to worry much about the smoke, especially outside, is slim to none," Nathan said. "And honestly, I wouldn't worry too much about Angelo. I don't think Manuel's got much hate left in him."
Amanda nodded, but didn't reply until they were out on the back porch. Busying her hands with lighting a cigarette, she sucked back a lungful of smoke and exhaled again before speaking. "I hope so. I'm not sure I want to go through all that again." The smile was a little hard and brittle.
Nathan's faint smile was a bit defensive. There were touchy aspects of this history, things that he and she should probably avoid unless that was impossible. "I'll be pedantic and point out that whatever he feels, you won't actually be going through anything similar again. The two of you aren't linked, involved, or otherwise responsible to one another. As for Angelo, Manuel is aware of old grudges but quite obviously - at least to me - has no interest in pursuing them. More interest in making up for them, actually, which could be a whole new level of awkward, but at least it's liable to be a harmless awkward."
"True enough." Amanda took another drag. "Sof keeps telling me in sessions that it's not always about me - one of these days I'll realise it, get the chip off my shoulder. And if I'd like to see anyone make something good of his life, it's Manuel." There had been utterly destructive parts of that relationship, but there had been good, too. And she'd loved him. She looked at Nathan again, about to say something, and frowned faintly. "Are you wearing glasses?"
Nathan rolled his eyes. "Yes, I am wearing glasses. They are new. And only for reading." He brandished the book under his arm, his planned reading material for dinner if there was no one who felt like eating dinner with him. "The only reason I wore them inside is to get the laughing and mockery over with."
"They're very distinguished," Amanda told him seriously, although there was a suspicious twitch around her mouth. "Very statesman-like."
"They annoy the crap out of me. Moira came down to Edinburgh with me for the sole purpose of making sure I didn't accidentally 'lose' the prescription." Nathan banished the grimace and eyed her. "The two of
you should talk," he said. "You and Manuel, not you and Moira. I think if all is as it seems, and I'm fairly sure it is, some proper closure might actually be achievable."
"I know." She took another drag on her cigarette, tapped out ash on the railing. "I gave him my card. He suggested we meet up for tea sometime." She gave a small, disbelieving laugh. "If anything's going to make me think he's honestly changed, it's that. Him asking me if we can talk."
"Sometimes it does take catastrophe before you're willing to learn, or change," Nathan said. "Old patterns can stand up to anything short of a sledgehammer. If it helps at all, for the first time I could watch him anywhere near my daughter and not be bothered at all by it."
That got a raised eyebrow. "That does help," she said. After all, it had been the litmus test she'd passed herself, after coming back to New York. "I just hope he gets the chance to show it to the rest of them."
"Well, a lot of the people he used to have conflicts with have grown up, moved on, or both. Although I can hear Scott's hair going gray and Ororo's going even whiter as we speak." Nathan offered her a lopsided smile. "I actually offered to meditate with him. I'm not entirely sure what I was thinking."
"Probably the same thing going through mine when I gave him the card." She finished her cigarette, tossing the butt in the old sand bucket that was still there for the next generation of smokers. "Well, we'll see, I s'pose? I should be getting on. 'S getting late, and I've got traffic to get through."
"He said something about not wanting to rush things," Nathan said. "Taking it slow. I think we could do to follow his example as much as possible, yes. If he means it, could contribute to much less awkwardness all around." He tucked the book back under his arm again. "And I suppose I should go brave the snickers in the dining hall."
"You were right the first time. Pod person." Amanda shoved her hands in the pockets of her jacket. "Thanks for letting me wibble at you tho', Nate. Over at the brownstone, just about anyone how knows him is pretty much at the pitchforks and flaming torches stage." Turning to go, she paused, and reached out a hand to lay it briefly on his forearm. "And I wouldn't worry about the glasses. They look good on you."
"Juliette says they make me look less thuggish," Nathan said, but laid his hand briefly over hers. "And if people can come back from the dead on a regular basis around here, Manuel de la Rocha can wake up from his coma a decent man wanting to make amends and build a better life. You might encourage the angry mob to stow the pitchforks for the time being."
It was bound to happen, he knew this. He knew she was in the mansion often. Someone told him so. He didn't seek her out, choosing to keep his distance until he had it all planned out, all the things he would say. He had seen her a few times and avoided being seen. Today, he saw her in the hallway and there was a fleeting moment where he could have made it known that he was within the school, yet he ducked into a classroom, unprepared for the twelve sets of eyes that turned on him at the intrusion.
Manuel cleared his throat, "My apologies. Wrong classroom." He stepped out and closed the door behind him, positive they had all caught a glimpse of his burning cheeks. Amanda did too as he suddenly came face to face with her. "Good morning Amanda," he said in a clear and unwavering tone. He made it sound as if their meeting was by his own choice and not just shit luck.
Amanda opened her mouth to respond, but only a small squeak came out. Colouring slightly, she coughed a little and tried again. "Manuel. Hi." She'd been wanting to speak to him, to establish where things were, but she hadn't tried that hard - sometimes avoidance was preferable to what was guaranteed to be an awkward as hell meeting. Like the one they were in the middle of now. "I was just..." On my way home after shagging Angelo senseless... "...heading back to the city. Um. How, how are you?"
"I am well." She was blonde now, confident in her stature though she seemed to shrink under his steady gaze. He forced himself to let go of the door handle and leaned on the cane, keeping the arm with the inhibitor behind his back. He shifted to the right and pressed his back against the locker, letting the cold of the metal sink in through the dense fabric of his shirt. The hallway was nearly empty and the weight of the ache in his body was hard to ignore. "The blonde. It's... different." He preferred the black.
She raised a hand to her hair involuntarily. "Um, yeah. Let it go back to the natural colour a couple of years back." After the Hellfire Club, when she'd killed Askani to save Alison. Wow, this was turning into a walk through every unpleasant memory she had. "You look..." Like a shell of the man he'd been, to be honest, but after a year and a bit in a coma, what could you expect? "You look pretty good, considering. How's the recovery coming?"
There was a flicker in his gaze and his brow creased, as though she wasn't saying what she thought. He couldn't tell. Not with the inhibitor on and he was poor at reading body language. A part of him hoped that he could still read Amanda but she was different. Obviously. "Slowly," he said and made no move to hid the cane. Proud as he was, he realized his fault in keeping a cool demeanor and corrected it. "You seem content now. Sorted."
She nodded. "I am. There's been a lot that's happened, in the last couple of years. Got a job, I've had to relearn the magic. Got an apartment in New York, with the rest of the Snow Valley lot." The corners of her mouth lifted a little. "I've even helped save the world once or twice."
The last part made him smile. "I see. You work at Snow Valley then?" That revelation did nothing to comfort him. She knew I was awake. He said nothing of it because control motioned you to move forward and not linger on the negative. He strained to find some common ground that was light and anything that did not go into depth of the past. "And how is that going for you?"
"Yeah. I'm Wanda's research assistant. I enjoy it. Well, except for the random disappearing acts she pulls." She looked down, where her fingers were twisting in the hem of her shirt, a clear indicator of her nervousness. "How about you? You seem..." She gestured a little helpless. "Better?" Although considering the last time she'd seen him had been when he was doped out of his brain, barely conscious - he'd slipped into a coma only a few days later.
Everything he had wanted to say had left him in these moments and he refrained from pressing his hand to his brow. People kept asking him if he was alright when he did that. For the most part, he could claim only an ongoing headache though it was far more than anything he could ever explain. "I'm tired, however I gain strength as everyday that passes. Perhaps one day, I'll save the world with you. But for now, I'm confined to this," he gestured to the cane and his posture changed, leaning on it for support. It was tiring to stand in one spot for very long.
She hadn't meant physically, but she didn't have the right to push, not any more. "Muir took care of you all right?" she asked instead. "I asked after you, when I called Moira, but the most she'd say was you were stable." She gave a small shrug. "Patient confidentiality, I s'pose. It was a bit of a shock, to find out you'd been awake for a while. If I'd known..." Well, she wasn't sure what she might have done. Probably she would have gone to see him - some things you could never let go entirely.
"They were nice," he said, cutting her off. She didn't know I'd been awake but she knew that I was here. He didn't want to know what she would have done had she known that he was awake, it was better like this, better not knowing. Ignorant bliss, he supposed. "We worked out some old problems and got involved in new ones. Nothing special." What he didn't say was better left unsaid. His face gave nothing of what he was feeling away, let alone the fact that he couldn't read her, wouldn't have been able to sort through her emotions had he even had the means to try. He did notice, however, she said nothing of her love life and he did the same. Funny, how alike they were. "Will you be returning?" He tried to keep the hope from his tone.
"I visit pretty regularly - I've got friends here still." Amanda looked up, met his eyes. "But you live here now. If it's too hard on you, I can sort something else out." It was, in a way, an apology. And an olive branch.
"I'm fine." He held her gaze, his dark eyes promising to envelope her if she stared too long. "Come and go as you please. I will not get in your way." He didn't recognize the apology, but he didn't want to be her problem anymore. He was no one's problem but his own. "Maybe we could sit together sometime, have tea."
She couldn't help but smile. In a lot of ways, he was the same old Manuel. But he was trying. "I think we can manage all right without dancing around each other all awkward like," she told him. "And tea would be nice." She reached into her pocket and pulled out her wallet, fishing around in it for one of her business cards. "Give me a call sometime?" she suggested, holding the card out to him.
"It would be," he confirmed, backing it up with a smile. When she held out the card, he hesitated as he was leaning heavily on the cane while the inhibitor was hidden from sight with his free hand. Reluctantly, he pulled it out from behind his back, revealing the device and took the card from her. His eyes dropped to their fingers brushing and he held the card until she let go. He didn't want to see her relief in knowing he couldn't read her.
If he had looked up, he would have seen only regret in her expression. She'd been there, the last time he'd worn an inhibitor, known how much he had hated it, seen it as a failure. She was careful to mask it, however, when she let go and he looked up again. Manuel had never wanted pity. "Call me," she repeated, with another smile. "But I'd better get going now. Traffic in New York's a right bastard sometimes, and I've got work that needs doing."
There was anything but hate in his eyes for the inhibitor he wore. He was thankful for it, dreading to take it off but embarrassed that he relied on it so heavily. He was counting the days until it would come off and then, the real work would begin. The hard work. The control. Lifting his eyes, he caught her smile and smiled back. "I will." Thankful that she said nothing about it, nor revealed anything but her good nature. He waited for her to leave and turned the card over thoughtfully, murmuring to himself, "Drive safe."
After her run-in with Manuel, Amanda encounters Nathan, who turns out to be another surprise ally of Manuel's.
Well, that didn't go so bad... Was about all Amanda was capable of thinking as she stumbled back down the hall towards the door to the school garage. If someone had told her two years ago she and Manuel would be making plans to have tea, she'd have laughed in their faces. The whole conversation had been surreal, and the equivalent of walking a minefield. With a blindfold on and hopping on one leg. So caught up in the whirlwind of thoughts - and memories - the conversation had aroused, she didn't even noticed there was someone coming the other way until she'd literally walked into them.
As he tended to do at least half of the nights when neither Moira or Rachel was around, Nathan had decided to head into the mansion for dinner. It meant company, at least, and shaky shields or not he did tend to prefer that at least part of the time. He'd noticed Amanda's distraction as she'd headed down the hall towards him, and had stayed silent, partially out of an unwillingness to interrupt her and have to discuss Certain Topics - When Manuel said he was going back to the school, I didn't think he meant the next day! - partly out of curiosity to see whether or not she'd notice him. Her nearly running into him was the answer to the latter, and he reached out to steady her.
"I'm less painful than a wall to walk into, but not much," he pointed out.
Amanda let out a startled 'eep!' at the narrowly-averted collision and reactively stepped back. "Nate!" she said, belatedly. "Um, hi. I was just..." She made a vague gesture garage-wards. "Sorry, distracted. Obviously. I, ah, just ran into Mann... Manuel." Although the roiling mess her thoughts were in probably gave that away, she realised and tried to concentrate on something resembling shields.
"I was wondering when you and Mr. Pod Person de la Rocha would have your first encounter," Nathan said dryly. "Not wasting any time, I see."
"I wasn't really planning it," she said, equally wryly, smiling a little at the name. "But since I couldn't really ask my boyfriend to keep slogging over to New York to see me and Remy gave me the okay, I figured I'd take the risk. Of course, I am Murphy's bitch." She ran her hand through her hair. "It went okay. Just such a huge shock, seeing him again. Especially when I didn't even know he was awake again until he'd posted to the journals."
"Ah, well." Might as well cover this bit up front. "It's been about... six months, I think? Since he woke up, I mean. Moira was pretty shocked that he did. Not that we talked about it," Nathan said. "She and I have an understanding - we don't hear what we do tend to hear on the link when it relates to her patients or to X-Men business. Hell, I didn't even see him myself until last Friday. He came looking for me while I was there."
"Yeah, I figured he didn't want us to know, or it was medical confidentiality or something. Still, a bit of warning would have been nice, 'specially after the last week." She glanced up at him. "How'd it go? With him and you?" Since Nathan was probably the next person to have reason to be weirded out by the whole thing.
"Shockingly well. I mean, as far as I can tell he's had a near-total personality change, so that helped." Was his switch permanently set to flippant these days or something? It was a bit ridiculous, the way comments like that tended to come out in otherwise serious conversations.
"You too, huh?" Amanda's mouth quirked in another wry smile. "Tho' I didn't mention the whole part where I'm dating the guy he spent years hating - there were limits to how much I was willing to risk. I see he's got an inhibitor on, tho' - he's having powers issues again?" Hopefully in the receiving side of things - she couldn't believe they'd let him near the school again if he was abusing his powers again.
"Not clear on what, but yes," Nathan said. "He actually asked if we could resume our training. I demurred mostly, on account of current semi-incompetency. Also, probably better places to talk about this than the middle of the hallway?" He inclined his head in the direction of the back porch, questioningly.
"If you don't mind me smoking - I'll keep the smoke out of your way, but I really need one after that," she replied, beginning to move towards the door.
"Rachel is still on Muir, hence the likelihood that I'm going to worry much about the smoke, especially outside, is slim to none," Nathan said. "And honestly, I wouldn't worry too much about Angelo. I don't think Manuel's got much hate left in him."
Amanda nodded, but didn't reply until they were out on the back porch. Busying her hands with lighting a cigarette, she sucked back a lungful of smoke and exhaled again before speaking. "I hope so. I'm not sure I want to go through all that again." The smile was a little hard and brittle.
Nathan's faint smile was a bit defensive. There were touchy aspects of this history, things that he and she should probably avoid unless that was impossible. "I'll be pedantic and point out that whatever he feels, you won't actually be going through anything similar again. The two of you aren't linked, involved, or otherwise responsible to one another. As for Angelo, Manuel is aware of old grudges but quite obviously - at least to me - has no interest in pursuing them. More interest in making up for them, actually, which could be a whole new level of awkward, but at least it's liable to be a harmless awkward."
"True enough." Amanda took another drag. "Sof keeps telling me in sessions that it's not always about me - one of these days I'll realise it, get the chip off my shoulder. And if I'd like to see anyone make something good of his life, it's Manuel." There had been utterly destructive parts of that relationship, but there had been good, too. And she'd loved him. She looked at Nathan again, about to say something, and frowned faintly. "Are you wearing glasses?"
Nathan rolled his eyes. "Yes, I am wearing glasses. They are new. And only for reading." He brandished the book under his arm, his planned reading material for dinner if there was no one who felt like eating dinner with him. "The only reason I wore them inside is to get the laughing and mockery over with."
"They're very distinguished," Amanda told him seriously, although there was a suspicious twitch around her mouth. "Very statesman-like."
"They annoy the crap out of me. Moira came down to Edinburgh with me for the sole purpose of making sure I didn't accidentally 'lose' the prescription." Nathan banished the grimace and eyed her. "The two of
you should talk," he said. "You and Manuel, not you and Moira. I think if all is as it seems, and I'm fairly sure it is, some proper closure might actually be achievable."
"I know." She took another drag on her cigarette, tapped out ash on the railing. "I gave him my card. He suggested we meet up for tea sometime." She gave a small, disbelieving laugh. "If anything's going to make me think he's honestly changed, it's that. Him asking me if we can talk."
"Sometimes it does take catastrophe before you're willing to learn, or change," Nathan said. "Old patterns can stand up to anything short of a sledgehammer. If it helps at all, for the first time I could watch him anywhere near my daughter and not be bothered at all by it."
That got a raised eyebrow. "That does help," she said. After all, it had been the litmus test she'd passed herself, after coming back to New York. "I just hope he gets the chance to show it to the rest of them."
"Well, a lot of the people he used to have conflicts with have grown up, moved on, or both. Although I can hear Scott's hair going gray and Ororo's going even whiter as we speak." Nathan offered her a lopsided smile. "I actually offered to meditate with him. I'm not entirely sure what I was thinking."
"Probably the same thing going through mine when I gave him the card." She finished her cigarette, tossing the butt in the old sand bucket that was still there for the next generation of smokers. "Well, we'll see, I s'pose? I should be getting on. 'S getting late, and I've got traffic to get through."
"He said something about not wanting to rush things," Nathan said. "Taking it slow. I think we could do to follow his example as much as possible, yes. If he means it, could contribute to much less awkwardness all around." He tucked the book back under his arm again. "And I suppose I should go brave the snickers in the dining hall."
"You were right the first time. Pod person." Amanda shoved her hands in the pockets of her jacket. "Thanks for letting me wibble at you tho', Nate. Over at the brownstone, just about anyone how knows him is pretty much at the pitchforks and flaming torches stage." Turning to go, she paused, and reached out a hand to lay it briefly on his forearm. "And I wouldn't worry about the glasses. They look good on you."
"Juliette says they make me look less thuggish," Nathan said, but laid his hand briefly over hers. "And if people can come back from the dead on a regular basis around here, Manuel de la Rocha can wake up from his coma a decent man wanting to make amends and build a better life. You might encourage the angry mob to stow the pitchforks for the time being."
