Log: Eamon/Laurie

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Back at Crystal and Laurie's hotel room, Laurie takes some time to call Eamon. Several things are discussed, and Laurie makes plans to meet up if they're in the same city.



Laurie's hands shook slightly as she dialed the number on her cell phone, thumbing each of the numbers as she held the small piece of paper Eamon had given her in her other hand. She hadn't used it since he'd given her the number in Ireland, but she needed to hear him now. He was a spot of somewhat strange normality in an incredibly weird life.

The fact that she found a man who did work that she was sure she'd never agree with on a personal level; a spot of normality, made her want to laugh, perhaps a little hysterically.

It was okay though, they were all okay, and she'd be fine as well. No one had been hurt, not even Dr Gaskill. It would be fine.

"Eamon?" she asked, a bundle of nerves as a male voice answered. She liked him, more then just as a friend but she wasn't sure how he saw her, or if he'd welcome such a call at this late hour.

"Aye?" It took Eamon a minute to place the voice. Young, female, American. The list of people who had this number who fit that description was so short it didn't take long before he chose to hazard a guess. "Laurie?" "You remembered." she said, the note in her voice somewhere between surprise and happiness. "I didn't disturb you at all, did I? I wasn't sure what time it would be, wherever you are."

"Aye, I remembered." It was easy to imagine the smile in his voice, a hint of laughter creeping in at the edges. "It's late, but I'm up. What's going on, pet? You don't sound too good."

"It's been a crazy afternoon. Our guide, the one that was showing us around Egypt, well, he went crazy cakes. We're thinking now that he's some kind of mutant who can control objects. Well, anyway, he set a bunch of fake mummies loose in the markets and scared a great number of people. I may be just a little...wired? I think that's probably the best description. I thought maybe we were facing some kind of wizard, or voodoo witchdoctor crazy times."

Laurie had said all of that in almost one breath, and she paused now in her narrative, leaning her head back against the glass window behind her. She was sitting outside her and Crystal's hotel room, and apart from the recent kerfuffle, it had been a brilliant day.

"Wizard? Voodoo witch doctor?" The skepticism was obvious. "You're a mutant and your brain jumps to voodoo and magic?" Eamon shook his head to himself. Go figure, some people jumped for the least likely thing even when there was already enough crazy in the real world to blame.

"There's been some weird precedents." Laurie murmured, a smile tilting up the sides of her mouth. "I know a witch, you know. She's from England, accent and all."

"You know a crazy English bird who says she can do magic?" Eamon made a pffft sound. "Feckin' English. Nutters, all of 'em."

"I love that mutants are completely believable in your world, but magic is nutjob territory." Laurie said with a laugh. "You've never come across magic doing your work thing?"

She settled herself more comfortably in the deck chair, head dropping to rest on it's high back as she felt the slight chill of the night breeze on her face. It had taken a bit, getting used to such a fiendishly hot place being so cold at night.

"Worked with two mutants for nearly a decade, pet. \ Still consider one of them a close friend. A sister." Aleister would have still been considered a friend should he have still been alive. Since he was dead Eamon simply omitted him from the equation. "Magic, though? That's shite blokes in tuxes with top hats do on a stage. Illusion. Sleight of hand. Never met real magic."

"I suppose I've lived in a place where so many impossible things happen on such a regular basis that I forget how strange, and downright impossible things can seem." Laurie admitted, closing her eyes and simply listening to the sound of his voice. This was what she had needed, a voice in the dark, something to hold tight to. "Isn't everyone meant to try and believe six impossible things before breakfast though?"

She couldn't remember where she'd heard that, although she knew it was a literary reference. Kyle would've known, or Yvette. But books were not things she spent time with for leisure, she'd never been able to understand the draw.

"Me, and the lads're alive still, there's three impossible things for you that I believe before breakfast." Eamon laughed, though he thought it was true enough. They'd all had close calls, but he, Mike and Thom were all still about. "Aye, and I've a beautiful girl calling me after she was in a market that had mummies set on it. Suppose that's four. Technically it's before breakfast and all." There was a hint of flirtation in his voice, strong enough to be noticed but subtle enough to still be polite. "Reckon I'll have to work on another two for you then, yeah?"

Two spots of bright colour appeared in Laurie's otherwise pale face, a slight blush at the promise in his voice. She could get used to being flirted with over the phone, it was something she hadn't had a lot of lately. "Oh? What sort of impossible things might they be, mister?"

"Oh, over the stars sort of impossible things," he said in a tone that was clearly up to no good. "Sorts of things a man just can't talk about because finding out that they really are impossible might just crush him. I'd be two dimensions forever. You wouldn't do that to me, would you?"

"Nooo, I'd not do that." Laurie replied, smile deepening. This conversation was taking a path she hadn't necessarily thought about when she called, but she couldn't say she minded at all. "Morgan would kill me, or at least be terribly disappointed in me. You've seen the look she gets, it's very hard to explain things to."

"Is that the look when she's trying to make you feel guilty or the look she gets when she's trying to remember why she's not allowed to kill you," he inquired playfully. Though Eamon was sure that somehow it would still manage to be his fault even if Laurie did crush a dimension out of him. After all, it was usually his fault with Vanessa.

"Probably both, or one after the other. It would depend on the reason why I'd decided to make you two dimensional." Laurie said, a slight giggle escaping and then she put her hand over her mouth, eyes wide. She did not giggle, giggling was verboten, especially when talking to gorgeous foreign hunks on the phone.

"Aye?" Eamon laughed, mostly at the giggling he heard starting and then being stifled on the other end of the line. "What d'you reckon would cause you to do such a thing to me? I'm hoping you fancy me just enough to keep me from being flattened, though."

"Oh, I don't think you're in any danger of being flattened any time soon." Laurie said, finger twirling a lock of her hair. "Where are you anyhow?"

"Congo for now, up to Slovenia next week and from there I'm not sure. Busy schedule us low lifes keep some of the time." Sirens could be heard from Eamon's end of the phone, getting louder as he stuck his head out the window to see where they were headed. The sound died down when he shut the window. "You keen on Egypt, pet? Animated mummies aside and all. Seems like an interesting place if you can dodge the fighting and not get taken in by the police. Dodgy sort, that lot. Make men like me look honourable."

"It feels...old, I guess. Makes me feel like a baby, all the history this place has." Laurie admitted, curling her feet under her knees to keep them warm. She could hear voices down below, speaking softly in Arabic; but after a moment they passed by, headed toward home she assumed. "Places like this, you get to feeling pretty small in the grand scheme of things. Especially the pyramids, I still think they couldn't have done something like that without mutants. Even if most people say we're a new evolutionary step."

"Sometimes you're better off not knowing how they did it, pet. Keeps the mystery of it. The sort of magic that's got nothing to do with your English mate. Aye, but you go anywhere with real history and you feel small and young. Africa's like that for me. All of it. Feels like that sorta old man who sits on his porch and doesn't talk to anyone but when you get him to talking he tells you stories 'bout stuff that you've only read in history books. Only he makes it alive. Maybe you understand that a bit from Egypt, yeah?" But maybe it was just Eamon who felt that way about the continent.

"Yeah, that's it. That's exactly it." Laurie replied, and shivered as a cold wind drifted across the back of her neck. "I'd only been outside the U.S once or twice before this, it's been a bit of a shock at times. People aren't the same, even in countries where English is still the primary language, they can be so different that even the most natural things are this alien language. I feel like there's no common thread."

"That's the good bit of it," Eamon told her seriously. "You get out, relax and leave something about someone else's perspective. It's not all the same and it'd be dull as hell if it were. Don't be a tourist, be a temporary resident. Figure out how to live like one of them and you learn something about them, what they treasure, what they love. That's the whole point of traveling, love. Figure out who you are among strangers. Aye, but you need to not be wound so tight for that to work, though."

"I don't think I've really left any of what I had back home behind." Laurie admitted wryly, switching the phone to her other ear, and wiping the warm spot where it had been pressed moments before. "I still check the mansion journal system almost every day. Something I should stop doing, it seems like anything I say there is an excuse to put my foot in my mouth. We're going to be going back to Europe after this, maybe go on a tour, I want to see Venice, places like that."

Eamon made a tsking sound. "You left the place to do something new, so why're you still holding onto it that much? If what you wanted and what you needed was there then you'd be there. Aye, but you're not. You're in Egypt on the phone with me. Seems New York's not even close to that, is it?" He tried to not make it sound too much like one of those talks you gave someone when your point more or less equated to it being time to shut the fuck up and get on with life and learn to grow up. That was, in retrospect, a bit of what he was saying. He just didn't mean it quite like that.

"The pull of the familiar is strong in this one." Laurie said, going for humor; but ending up with truth. "I have a hard time of letting go. Got a grip like iron there, really. It always seems like it slips through my hands even faster though. I suppose you're telling me I need to let go of the control, and learn to grow up a little?"

"Nah, I'm telling you if you don't let go of your control you never will. You really want to be one of those people who gets to be fifty and never learnt anything because they were too willful to give it up? Just let go and coast for a bit. Let the wind carry you. It's scarier, but it's worth it, pet." Eamon's voice had gone softer, edging on something like concern but more like care. "Live a little. It'd be a right shame if you never got 'round to that because you were too busy bein' in control."

Night breezes fluttered the curtain behind her, and she watched them for a long moment, the silence ticking over as she thought. "I like that, letting the wind take me somewhere. Will I see you somewhere down the track, do you think? I could take you out for coffee."

"How's it always you asking me out, pet?" There was that nearly tangible smile in his voice again. "It's possible, though, aye. I get around. I'm not always in war zones. You let me know where you're going and I'll let you know if I end up any of those places, yeah?" Truth be told, Eamon had missed her after the two weeks he'd spent wandering about Ireland and the UK with her.

"I'll have to talk to Crystal, figure out where we're going to be, and when. And I keep asking you out because I'm a strong minded lass, who knows what she wants." Laurie said, definite amusement in her tone. "Which I'm sure you knew well before I met you, considering I lasted as Morgan's suite mate. I should let you sleep though, you probably need it, and I'm just lazing about here tomorrow before we head back to Europe."

"And I'm what you want," Eamon asked with a touch of amusement in his own voice. He was grinning on his end of the conversation. She'd definitely walked into that one, but that fact that she might respond with an unashamed yes was why he liked her. "I keep odd hours, but aye, I've stuff I should get to. Just lemme know where you'll be, yeah? Text works if I don't answer when you call. Or voice mail. Then I can keep it saved and listen to you talk whenever I want." Eamon's voice was just teasing enough that it was hard to tell if he meant that bit about listening to her voice or if he was just kidding.

"Was that meant to make me go all gooey inside?" Laurie asked with a grin. She wasn't above a little teasing herself, after all. "Just as long as you don't go breaking into my room at night and watching me sleep, because that'd just be creepy. As to what I want, I figure I can tell you all about that over that coffee."

"Didn't work?" He laughed. "Sodding hell, need a new plan for getting into your knickers now, then, huh?" He was obviously kidding when he said it and there was a hint of caution in his voice. Eamon half-expected Ness to have heard him and come out of nowhere and sock him for that comment. But it didn't happen. Right, that's what happened when she was halfway around the world from him. "What if you invite me into the room and I wake in the middle of the night? Can I watch you then?"

"I think you're fairly safe from my wrath then. But only if you make me breakfast in the morning." Laurie said, wondering suddenly what that might be like. Did she want that? It didn't take her long to realise that yes, she did.

"Not a culinary master, pet, but I can make decent pancakes. Hopefully you're a fan." While it was mostly talk, Eamon flirting because who else was there flirt with? Mike? No. But some part of him was more than willing to make good on the flirtation. More than that, it wasn't exactly a small part of him, just one being stuffed down into a remote corner for the time.

"What's not to love about pancakes? Don't think I won't hold you to the offer." Laurie noted, and then grinned when she realised that could be taken either way. Let him wonder, it was more fun that way. "Got to go! Promise I'll talk to you soon though, or message, whatever."

"Aye? Then I'll be holding you to the previously mentioned criteria." Eamon grinned and shook his head. The girl was trouble. The best kind of trouble, maybe, but still trouble and he should be careful to get into less of it before it bit him in the arse. "Avoid the mummies yeah? Night, pet."