Log: Kyle, Laurie and Jean log
Dec. 30th, 2008 06:23 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsBackdated to Tuesday 30th December 2008
Laurie and Kyle finally talk, and several things are resolved.
Laurie's hand trailed along the wall of the mansion corridor, her steps unsteady and slow as she moved carefully. They'd finally disconnected her from the IV just yesterday and it felt so good to be able to just move somewhere without having to lug a stand along with her. She'd managed to leave her room as Morgan was busy elsewhere, she thought she remembered her mentioning something about a visit elsewhere.
She finally reached the door to the suite Kyle lived in and knocked softly. She had to hope that his enhanced senses could hear her, as she didn't have the strength to know any harder. Just the trip from her bed to here made her throat burn with the need to cough and she couldn't seem to get enough breath into her lungs.
It had perhaps been a mistake to get out of bed so soon after they'd taken out the IV, but she'd felt up to it back in her room. It was important, especially important that she do it in person so he knew she meant it. On paper wasn't enough, not for her.
Not only could Kyle hear the knock, but the smell of Sick came through strongly enough that he nearly fell over himself in getting from his sofa and new-used Playstation to the door, and it was only that smell that made him not slam it back in Laurie's face. She smelled like the very ill, slightly rank from not being able to properly wash her hair, and like bedsheets and the sickly-sweet smell of liquid medicine with the underlying smell of vegetable broth. She looked about as bad, in a pair of pajamas and her hair loose and unbrushed, and before he could say anything, he had to dive out the door to catch the undersized black-and-white cat making a beeline for the Outside and the Person Knocking.
Laurie blinked at the small cat in Kyle's hands, thinking that she must have missed the moment between Shamu Jr. heading for her, and Kyle grabbing for him, and then up at him, an attempt at a smile foiled by the cough that continued to escape her control. She spent a minute or two simply trying to breathe after the pressure on her throat finally eased, her hand gripping at the side of the door to keep herself on her feet.
"I.I'm s-sorry." she finally managed, one hand on a knee as she tried to push herself back upright.
"Oh for fuck's sake." Kyle said, rolling his eyes at both Laurie and the squirming cat in his hands. "Don't go anywhere, and I mean -anywhere-. Sit down and don't move, I'll be right back." With the cat firmly in his hands, he went back in his room, and Laurie could hear a plaintive meow-mrrt noise, followed by Kyle's "And -stay-there." followed by a door shutting. A few moments later, Kyle reappeared, sans cat, and without another word, hoisted Laurie off the floor and over his shoulders in a fireman's carry. "You are going -right- the hell back downstairs, so any talking you want to do, you do it over my shoulders."
Laurie would have protested but the sudden movement and then the pressure against her middle made her want to vomit. It took her several minutes to not faint, and not evacuate her last meal down Kyle's back. "Just take me back to my room, please? I just came to tell you I didn't think you were an uncontrollable monster." she said finally, finding it easier to breathe now she wasn't also trying to stay upright under her own steam.
Kyle had already slowly made his way to the elevator, and was using the toes of one foot to hit the button down to the lower levels. "Nuh-uh. People who fall over at my door go see the doctor, especially when they're all wheeze-wheeze-hack-wheeze and smell like they're gonna barf. And bee-tee-double-w, you puke on me, I'm totally making you buy me pizza when you're not Sick Girl anymore." He adjusted Laurie a bit, so that her weight rested more on her chest and less on her stomach. "You could've emailed, instead of dragging your sick self all the way to my door."
Laurie leaned her forehead against his back, knowing it was probably pretty useless to argue about it. She wasn't likely to win, and her time was better spent talking about other things, especially since he was talking to her, rather then giving her the silent treatment.
"I don't like paper, or e-mail. Apologies never seem real when you can't look the person in the eye." she admitted, finally winning out against the urge to barf. "I wanted you to know I wasn't lying, or making excuses."
"And you're a big chicken." Kyle said plainly. "I mean, dude, you could have -said- that. Saying that would've meant I knew it. And you could've knocked on my door or left me a voice mail." He kept adjusting slightly as the elevator moved down the floors, bracing himself and Laurie slightly as it stopped, and continued to carry her through the metal-walled lower level to the infirmary. "And yeah, I could have totally been more willing to listen, you don't gotta say it."
"You were so angry, I didn't want to piss you off more." Laurie admitted, feeling tension go out of her shoulders as he talked. He hadn't said whether he accepted her apology yet, but it seemed likely. It was a relief, she hadn't wanted her friend to hate her, and he was a friend, even if they hadn't been talking that way for a long time now. "I'm sorry I kept pretending nothing had happened. I just kinda wanted it to all go away, like if I just pretended hard enough it would."
"Yeah, that's not a good way to make me not mad at you." Kyle said, stopping for a second to readjust Laurie and thwack her lightly on the back of the head - just enough that she'd feel it, not nearly enough to hurt. "Dude, when you piss someone off, and you know you're wrong, you say so, as soon as you realize it. That's how apologizing works. I got -more- mad because you were just like, la la, if I pretend it didn't happen then I don't have to fix it."
Laurie snorted softly, poking Kyle in the back after the slap, but it wasn't a hard poke, more playful then anything else. Relief might be making her feel slightly giddy, she pondered. "I'm not sure if you've noticed, and I'm sure it's extremely shocking, but I'm not exactly the best at admitting when I'm wrong. Sometimes it's like the world is going to end if I don't get things exactly right. It's a little silly. I've kinda been an ass...well, okay. I've been an ass because of it for a long time now. Maybe since I started training as an X-man. It felt like everyone was looking at me, and I just wanted to prove I could do it all."
"Dude, congrats, you're human. You fuck up, just like the rest of us, and you spent the rest of the time learning from it." Kyle entered the infirmary, with a "Give us a second, Laurie's actually apologizing, like finally." thought at Jean, who he could smell, if not see, and finally set Laurie down on the exam table in one of the rooms. "Dude, for reals, you do not have to be perfect. I can't do math, Forge can't run, Jan can't ..... " That was probably best left unsaid. "Marius can't use one-syllable words. You don't have to be perfect. Where in the hell did you get the idea that you did?"
"It wasn't that you expected it." Laurie explained, trying to form the thoughts that she wanted to say in her head, which was difficult when it was full of snot, and fuzziness. "I've just...anything I've really wanted, I've been good at. Track, mathematics, I've never had to really try before. But I'm not good at this, and I really, really want to be. But I just keep screwing up, and making people mad, and then making it worse. I don't know, it feels sort of overly dramatic now. I've been wondering lately if I'm really cut out to be a field person. I'm not good at the whole fighting people thing."
Kyle whapped himself on the forehead and looked up at the ceiling with a "Why me?" expression. "So why are you trying to be something you're not, huh? You're not good at fighting people, so why do you keep trying to be somebody like me? I am good at it. Garrison's very good at it. Cain was totally good at it. You don't have to be! Shit, Laurie, that's not a bad thing, that means you're a normal person!"
"Because everyone..." Laurie paused for a moment, and then smiled wryly. "Because I'm a teenage girl, and the idea of being different from my peers was torturous. You're all good at fighting, I just wanted to be the same. And when I try, when I do fight, it gets twisted, and I feel horrible afterward. What I did to the people in New York, it's not what I should be using my gifts to do. But I should know how to fight, even if just to get away. Garrison was right about that. I just don't know how to do it so it's not to be a fighter, I don't know if that even makes sense."
"You are totally parroting whatever you got told in therapy or in some self-help book, right?" Kyle laughed, and shook his head. "Dude, what you did in New York was what you had to do, and that fucking -sucks- and it was an emergency. Stop thinking like some kind of I dunno, whatever, moralistic lecture person, and think like someone who was in a shitty situation. I dunno, dude, talk to Scott or whatever. Call Dr. Mads, talk to someone who was sort of on team and didn't go out hitting people all the time. But stop trying to be -me- or Jennie or Dr. Jean, or anyone else and just be you because when you're trying to be Fighting Girl or Ha Ha Funny Girl or Know Everything Girl is when you are fucking up the most."
Laurie did laugh then, and then had to stop to cough, and it was awhile after that before she could speak at all. "I may have been doing some psych 101 reading while I've been sick, since they won't give me a laptop" she admitted. "Did I really sound all 'text bookey'?"
Kyle crossed his arms and looked down at Laurie. "Dude, you totally used the word torturous and were talking in like, almost third-person essay tone. I mean, you totally sounded like one of my Psych essays. And not one I half-assed either, one I actually busted my butt on or something." He was so very very glad he was done with that class, because it had been hell. "For reals, just stop trying so hard. I mean, you're allowed to fuck up. God knows I have. I mean, hello, I totally have a criminal record and the trophy for kidnappings."
"You need to stop doing that, you'll give Scott a nervous tic or something." Laurie said with a grin. "Does being allowed to screw up include saying stupid things from time to time, and being bossy when I forget not to be?"
"What do you think?" Kyle asked, arms still crossed, but with a much less 'stop that, you're being a twit' expression on his face. "I mean, okay, to be blunt, Forge shoves his entire metal leg down his throat on a regular basis and we still like him. And Jennie's pretty much a Bossy McBossenStein. So, yeah. You just need to find your... whatever, place in things. Be you, don't try to be Jennie or Forge or me or Marius or Jan." Kyle's expression went faintly distant and he blinked back towards Laurie. "I think you have incoming lecture for being dumb, by the way."
"Mmmm," Jean said from the open doorway as she leaned against it. "I might be able to give the full on lecture a miss. Maybe. If you come quietly for some x-rays, Laurie. I know full well you've been pushing yourself harder than you are supposed to be, particularly seeing as how you're down here at all and not in bed."
"I'll be good." Laurie said, blushing softly. It wasn't so much that she liked disobeying the rules, it was just that she hated being cooped up in her room, and it had been important. "Um, thanks for listening to me." she said to Kyle, before pushing herself off the bed, and then holding onto it for a few moments as the room did a slow spin. "I, uh, think I'm going to need a little help."
Jean was already at her side, arm sliding around Laurie's waist to support her. "I gotcha," she said. "Don't worry, we're not going far."
"I have no idea how the hell you got all the way to my -room-." Kyle sighed. "Without falling on your face." He shook his head and got a shoulder under Laurie's flailing arm. "I swear, for a smart chick, you're pretty dumb sometimes." Once he and Jean - not that his help had been entirely necessary, but Kyle had other reasons for giving it than just physical - had Laurie to the X-Ray room and seated on the table, he retreated out to the doorway. "We probably need to talk more or some junk, but apology accepted. We'll figure it out once you're not plague girl?"
Laurie grinned as she laid down on the table, trying to settle herself so she didn't fidget. She hated exams, which was strange considering she didn't mind giving them. "Sure. Hopefully sooner rather then later, hey? And thanks, for accepting. "
Laurie and Kyle finally talk, and several things are resolved.
Laurie's hand trailed along the wall of the mansion corridor, her steps unsteady and slow as she moved carefully. They'd finally disconnected her from the IV just yesterday and it felt so good to be able to just move somewhere without having to lug a stand along with her. She'd managed to leave her room as Morgan was busy elsewhere, she thought she remembered her mentioning something about a visit elsewhere.
She finally reached the door to the suite Kyle lived in and knocked softly. She had to hope that his enhanced senses could hear her, as she didn't have the strength to know any harder. Just the trip from her bed to here made her throat burn with the need to cough and she couldn't seem to get enough breath into her lungs.
It had perhaps been a mistake to get out of bed so soon after they'd taken out the IV, but she'd felt up to it back in her room. It was important, especially important that she do it in person so he knew she meant it. On paper wasn't enough, not for her.
Not only could Kyle hear the knock, but the smell of Sick came through strongly enough that he nearly fell over himself in getting from his sofa and new-used Playstation to the door, and it was only that smell that made him not slam it back in Laurie's face. She smelled like the very ill, slightly rank from not being able to properly wash her hair, and like bedsheets and the sickly-sweet smell of liquid medicine with the underlying smell of vegetable broth. She looked about as bad, in a pair of pajamas and her hair loose and unbrushed, and before he could say anything, he had to dive out the door to catch the undersized black-and-white cat making a beeline for the Outside and the Person Knocking.
Laurie blinked at the small cat in Kyle's hands, thinking that she must have missed the moment between Shamu Jr. heading for her, and Kyle grabbing for him, and then up at him, an attempt at a smile foiled by the cough that continued to escape her control. She spent a minute or two simply trying to breathe after the pressure on her throat finally eased, her hand gripping at the side of the door to keep herself on her feet.
"I.I'm s-sorry." she finally managed, one hand on a knee as she tried to push herself back upright.
"Oh for fuck's sake." Kyle said, rolling his eyes at both Laurie and the squirming cat in his hands. "Don't go anywhere, and I mean -anywhere-. Sit down and don't move, I'll be right back." With the cat firmly in his hands, he went back in his room, and Laurie could hear a plaintive meow-mrrt noise, followed by Kyle's "And -stay-there." followed by a door shutting. A few moments later, Kyle reappeared, sans cat, and without another word, hoisted Laurie off the floor and over his shoulders in a fireman's carry. "You are going -right- the hell back downstairs, so any talking you want to do, you do it over my shoulders."
Laurie would have protested but the sudden movement and then the pressure against her middle made her want to vomit. It took her several minutes to not faint, and not evacuate her last meal down Kyle's back. "Just take me back to my room, please? I just came to tell you I didn't think you were an uncontrollable monster." she said finally, finding it easier to breathe now she wasn't also trying to stay upright under her own steam.
Kyle had already slowly made his way to the elevator, and was using the toes of one foot to hit the button down to the lower levels. "Nuh-uh. People who fall over at my door go see the doctor, especially when they're all wheeze-wheeze-hack-wheeze and smell like they're gonna barf. And bee-tee-double-w, you puke on me, I'm totally making you buy me pizza when you're not Sick Girl anymore." He adjusted Laurie a bit, so that her weight rested more on her chest and less on her stomach. "You could've emailed, instead of dragging your sick self all the way to my door."
Laurie leaned her forehead against his back, knowing it was probably pretty useless to argue about it. She wasn't likely to win, and her time was better spent talking about other things, especially since he was talking to her, rather then giving her the silent treatment.
"I don't like paper, or e-mail. Apologies never seem real when you can't look the person in the eye." she admitted, finally winning out against the urge to barf. "I wanted you to know I wasn't lying, or making excuses."
"And you're a big chicken." Kyle said plainly. "I mean, dude, you could have -said- that. Saying that would've meant I knew it. And you could've knocked on my door or left me a voice mail." He kept adjusting slightly as the elevator moved down the floors, bracing himself and Laurie slightly as it stopped, and continued to carry her through the metal-walled lower level to the infirmary. "And yeah, I could have totally been more willing to listen, you don't gotta say it."
"You were so angry, I didn't want to piss you off more." Laurie admitted, feeling tension go out of her shoulders as he talked. He hadn't said whether he accepted her apology yet, but it seemed likely. It was a relief, she hadn't wanted her friend to hate her, and he was a friend, even if they hadn't been talking that way for a long time now. "I'm sorry I kept pretending nothing had happened. I just kinda wanted it to all go away, like if I just pretended hard enough it would."
"Yeah, that's not a good way to make me not mad at you." Kyle said, stopping for a second to readjust Laurie and thwack her lightly on the back of the head - just enough that she'd feel it, not nearly enough to hurt. "Dude, when you piss someone off, and you know you're wrong, you say so, as soon as you realize it. That's how apologizing works. I got -more- mad because you were just like, la la, if I pretend it didn't happen then I don't have to fix it."
Laurie snorted softly, poking Kyle in the back after the slap, but it wasn't a hard poke, more playful then anything else. Relief might be making her feel slightly giddy, she pondered. "I'm not sure if you've noticed, and I'm sure it's extremely shocking, but I'm not exactly the best at admitting when I'm wrong. Sometimes it's like the world is going to end if I don't get things exactly right. It's a little silly. I've kinda been an ass...well, okay. I've been an ass because of it for a long time now. Maybe since I started training as an X-man. It felt like everyone was looking at me, and I just wanted to prove I could do it all."
"Dude, congrats, you're human. You fuck up, just like the rest of us, and you spent the rest of the time learning from it." Kyle entered the infirmary, with a "Give us a second, Laurie's actually apologizing, like finally." thought at Jean, who he could smell, if not see, and finally set Laurie down on the exam table in one of the rooms. "Dude, for reals, you do not have to be perfect. I can't do math, Forge can't run, Jan can't ..... " That was probably best left unsaid. "Marius can't use one-syllable words. You don't have to be perfect. Where in the hell did you get the idea that you did?"
"It wasn't that you expected it." Laurie explained, trying to form the thoughts that she wanted to say in her head, which was difficult when it was full of snot, and fuzziness. "I've just...anything I've really wanted, I've been good at. Track, mathematics, I've never had to really try before. But I'm not good at this, and I really, really want to be. But I just keep screwing up, and making people mad, and then making it worse. I don't know, it feels sort of overly dramatic now. I've been wondering lately if I'm really cut out to be a field person. I'm not good at the whole fighting people thing."
Kyle whapped himself on the forehead and looked up at the ceiling with a "Why me?" expression. "So why are you trying to be something you're not, huh? You're not good at fighting people, so why do you keep trying to be somebody like me? I am good at it. Garrison's very good at it. Cain was totally good at it. You don't have to be! Shit, Laurie, that's not a bad thing, that means you're a normal person!"
"Because everyone..." Laurie paused for a moment, and then smiled wryly. "Because I'm a teenage girl, and the idea of being different from my peers was torturous. You're all good at fighting, I just wanted to be the same. And when I try, when I do fight, it gets twisted, and I feel horrible afterward. What I did to the people in New York, it's not what I should be using my gifts to do. But I should know how to fight, even if just to get away. Garrison was right about that. I just don't know how to do it so it's not to be a fighter, I don't know if that even makes sense."
"You are totally parroting whatever you got told in therapy or in some self-help book, right?" Kyle laughed, and shook his head. "Dude, what you did in New York was what you had to do, and that fucking -sucks- and it was an emergency. Stop thinking like some kind of I dunno, whatever, moralistic lecture person, and think like someone who was in a shitty situation. I dunno, dude, talk to Scott or whatever. Call Dr. Mads, talk to someone who was sort of on team and didn't go out hitting people all the time. But stop trying to be -me- or Jennie or Dr. Jean, or anyone else and just be you because when you're trying to be Fighting Girl or Ha Ha Funny Girl or Know Everything Girl is when you are fucking up the most."
Laurie did laugh then, and then had to stop to cough, and it was awhile after that before she could speak at all. "I may have been doing some psych 101 reading while I've been sick, since they won't give me a laptop" she admitted. "Did I really sound all 'text bookey'?"
Kyle crossed his arms and looked down at Laurie. "Dude, you totally used the word torturous and were talking in like, almost third-person essay tone. I mean, you totally sounded like one of my Psych essays. And not one I half-assed either, one I actually busted my butt on or something." He was so very very glad he was done with that class, because it had been hell. "For reals, just stop trying so hard. I mean, you're allowed to fuck up. God knows I have. I mean, hello, I totally have a criminal record and the trophy for kidnappings."
"You need to stop doing that, you'll give Scott a nervous tic or something." Laurie said with a grin. "Does being allowed to screw up include saying stupid things from time to time, and being bossy when I forget not to be?"
"What do you think?" Kyle asked, arms still crossed, but with a much less 'stop that, you're being a twit' expression on his face. "I mean, okay, to be blunt, Forge shoves his entire metal leg down his throat on a regular basis and we still like him. And Jennie's pretty much a Bossy McBossenStein. So, yeah. You just need to find your... whatever, place in things. Be you, don't try to be Jennie or Forge or me or Marius or Jan." Kyle's expression went faintly distant and he blinked back towards Laurie. "I think you have incoming lecture for being dumb, by the way."
"Mmmm," Jean said from the open doorway as she leaned against it. "I might be able to give the full on lecture a miss. Maybe. If you come quietly for some x-rays, Laurie. I know full well you've been pushing yourself harder than you are supposed to be, particularly seeing as how you're down here at all and not in bed."
"I'll be good." Laurie said, blushing softly. It wasn't so much that she liked disobeying the rules, it was just that she hated being cooped up in her room, and it had been important. "Um, thanks for listening to me." she said to Kyle, before pushing herself off the bed, and then holding onto it for a few moments as the room did a slow spin. "I, uh, think I'm going to need a little help."
Jean was already at her side, arm sliding around Laurie's waist to support her. "I gotcha," she said. "Don't worry, we're not going far."
"I have no idea how the hell you got all the way to my -room-." Kyle sighed. "Without falling on your face." He shook his head and got a shoulder under Laurie's flailing arm. "I swear, for a smart chick, you're pretty dumb sometimes." Once he and Jean - not that his help had been entirely necessary, but Kyle had other reasons for giving it than just physical - had Laurie to the X-Ray room and seated on the table, he retreated out to the doorway. "We probably need to talk more or some junk, but apology accepted. We'll figure it out once you're not plague girl?"
Laurie grinned as she laid down on the table, trying to settle herself so she didn't fidget. She hated exams, which was strange considering she didn't mind giving them. "Sure. Hopefully sooner rather then later, hey? And thanks, for accepting. "
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