xp_logs | Moira and Nathan, backdated to Monday night... (Reply)

Monday night: Moira's been shopping, Nathan's been hiding, and neither of them knows quite what to do with this new little link of theirs.

Moira eyed the door and sighed. This was going to be tricky. Shuffling the boxes and bags she was carrying, she freed a hand to reach out for the doorknob. With a little effort and some inventive hopping around, she managed to get the door open, herself inside, and then close it again. "Nathan?" she called.

No answer. She paused and tilted her head. Ahh, there it was. Snoring.

Shaking her head, she walked into the bedroom and dumped all the bags on the floor, with the exception of the dress bag. That she turned and put gently into her closet. With her hands full, Moira decided to try something. #...Nathan?# Just a touch on the link, really.

Someone was calling to him, inside his mind. Nathan awoke with a start, his heart pounding as his eyes tried to focus on the shape standing by the closet. As it turned to face him, he saw that it was Moira and the moment of panic faded, dwindling into relief. "Hey," he said, his voice coming out gravelly.

"'ey yerself," Moira replied sheepishly. "...sorry fer doin' tha'..." She waved her hands in the air a little, meaning the link. "Me 'ands were full an' I wanted ta see 'ow ye were doin'."

"Good," he lied, sitting up slowly. His head started to spin again, as soon as he moved, and his stomach twisted ominously. "I'm good--did you find a dress?"

"Ye look like a dead fish." She turned and fished out a small sack from amid the mountain of bags and boxes. "Aye, I did. 'Tis...well, I like it an' so did th' entire group, th' ladies 'elpin' us an' some random gentlemen," she said wryly, "so I'm assumin' I picked well." She sat on the edge of the bed and held out the bag. "Crackers, microwavable soup an' orange juice."

"Is that your way of saying 'Eat, idiot'?"

"...well, aye. Besides, got me out o' shoppin' fer girly thin's fer a few minutes." She beamed. "At least start on th' crackers. I need ta see if'n I 'ave somethin'." Moira headed for her dresser and started rummaging about. "So...'ow do ye really feel?"

Nathan startled to wrestle with the bag of crackers. "Tired," he muttered. "Sore. Slightly nauseous. Also rather paranoid."

Moira paused from her hunting and went to open the bag. "Want ta talk 'bout it?" She touched the back of his hand briefly.

Nathan smiled without humor, shrugging. "The tired goes without saying at this point, I suppose. The sore and the slightly nauseous--well, I'm going to write that off to conking myself on the head with a four-foot piece of metal and just be glad I didn't fracture my own skull. The paranoid--" He stopped, his mouth twisting. "Well, I'm being a fucking coward, let's just put it that way. I was laying here this afternoon trying to convince myself that no, Manuel would not be standing outside the door when I opened it."

Moira lowered herself next to him on the bed. "Yer nay a coward, Nate," she chided, waving a cracker at him. "Yer goin' through a lot." She offered the cracker this time. "Eat?"

He took it, nibbling at it apathetically. "I've had a constant parade of visitors today," he muttered. "I must be the latest attraction. 'Come and see the narcoleptic mercenary who tried to kill Manuel!'"

She smacked his knee and glared. "Did ye ever stop an' think they might actually like ye?" she muttered, getting back up from the bed and starting to root through the drawers with much more vigor. "Yer actually fun ta be around, ye bloody grump....damn it, where th' 'ell is it?"

Nathan roused himself from his self-pity and frowned. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"'Tis nothin' major. 'Tis I was jus' 'opin' ta wear th' necklace o' me mum's tha' me da' gave me when she died." She slammed the top drawer. "Seems I left it back at Muir." Moira felt irritated, not only because of the lack of her -only- favorite necklace but because of the helpless feeling that seemed to come back every time she looked at Nathan. She wanted to help him, so badly, but...just..."Argh," she muttered.

Nathan ate the rest of the cracker, watching her. "What does the dress look like?" he asked, mentally filing away the bit about the necklace.

She paused. "I was goin' ta wait ta show ye until Friday but..." Reaching inside the closet and pulling it out of the bag, Moira turned and held it up against her. It was a black sleeveless dress, with a small bit of lace ruffle that traced the chest . The helm was angled, showing a bit of a slit and the lace ruffle continued around the edge of the dress. "...Um...well?"

Nathan realized his mouth was hanging open. "Um--wow," he managed.

Moira blushed and smiled. "I take it ye like it?"

"Let's just say, if it looks that good on the hangar, I can't wait to see it on you."

She blushed and ducked her head before putting the dress back up in the closet. "Thought it was goin' ta take forever t' find it," she groused good naturedly as she came and sat down again on the bed. "'ow's yer 'ead?" She reached for him to double check on the injury.

"I want a new one," he grumbled.

"Well, I 'appen ta like this one," she murmured, hesitating just slightly before pressing a kiss on the top of his head. "Ye'll get better."

"Mmm," he said a bit darkly, and then gave her a slightly uncomfortable look. "I could, um, sleep on the couch. Didn't mean to steal your bed." He should have thought of this last night, but...

Moira backed off immediately. "Sorry." She scowled. "Nay. Yer th' one wit' th' 'ead injury. I'll take th' couch." She started to get up again. "I'll jus' put everythin' away an' then get somethin' t' work on before I crash."

Oh, he'd definitely put a foot wrong there. "I just--" He stopped, watching her fuss with her bags, and then decided to just go for it and screw the consequences. #I don't want to push you,# he sent to her, trying to keep it soft, since he didn't know precisely how she was 'receiving' him yet. #I feel like--I just worry that you're going to feel cornered. Like I'm too close, all the time--a link can be like that, and I just don't want you to feel like you have to push me away just to get some space--# He cut himself off, appalled at how he was babbling. Had it really been that long since he'd talked to anyone mind-to-mind like this?

Moira stopped messing with the bags and went back to the bed yet again. #Yer nay pushin'.# She winced. "Sorry, nay used ta doin' tha'..." She took a deep breath. "If'n I feel cornered, I'll let ye know, okay? I'm jus'...I dinnae know what ta -do-." #'Tis always been at yer pace...# She facepalmed, realizing how loudly she'd thought that.

Nathan rocked backwards a little, his eyes widening. "You've been--" He stopped, frowning. "You're worried," he said slowly, trying to sort it out. "Because--because of Aliya." He couldn't quite suppress the usual pang at speaking her name aloud, but did keep it from traveling across the link.

She looked away and picked at her jeans. "A wee bit," she said. "Nay o' th' times were right, even if I 'ad really known I wanted ta act...yer speed," she said with a weak smile. "Even friendly touchin'..." She shrugged and hugged herself a little. "I'm sorry...bein' stupid..."

"You know it's not--you, right?" Nathan asked a bit uncertainly. "My--um, problem with--getting too close."

"Most o' th' time." She rocked back a little. "But fer all me bluster, I sometimes still think 'tis me, tha' I'm doin' somethin' wron'. An' it, well...'urts."

Nathan sighed, knowing that there was no way he could completely banish that worry for her. "You know," he said after a moment, "you never asked me how I handled that--before. With Aliya."

She paused. No, she hadn't. Well... "Is tha' invitin' me ta ask?" she responded quietly. "Because... aye... 'ow did ye 'andle tha' wit' Aliya?"

Nathan was silent for a few moments, trying to find the right words. He could sense Moira wrestling with conflicting impulses, trying to decide between retracting the question and waiting for him to answer. "I've told you she was a much stronger telepath," he murmured. "I'm not sure if I ever told you that she was one of the instructors at the main Mistra training facility."

At that Moira finally looked at him. "Nay, ye didna." She was surprised. Nathan had rarely shared -anything- about his family. That, Moira understood. But, perhaps now...she couldn't deny she wasn't interested. For so long, she had felt she couldn't say anything to Nate about whatever feelings she had because of what had happened. Moira tucked her feet under her and turned to face him.

"She knew how the conditioning worked," he said, distantly surprised at how calm his voice sounded as he spoke. "I mean in a practical sense - she wasn't an empath herself. But with that, and the link, she could--" He stopped, lost again for the right words. "I suppose it sounds dysfunctional, doesn't it? Having to telepathically adjust your husband if you wanted to be able to touch him safely."

Moira felt her heart drop slightly but she didn't want to say anything. He needed to say this and she needed to hear it. She hesitated and then reached mentally towards the link and just touched it slightly before letting go.

"It got easier, after a while," Nathan went on quietly. "Sometimes, when I just reached out without thinking about it, it felt almost normal." He gave her a faint, strained smile. "I do remember what normal feels like, Moira. I was fourteen before I wound up in the program. Part of me thinks it might have been easier to have been a child, like so many of the others were."

"Oh Nate." She reached for his hands and curled hers around them. "I'm sorry..." What was it about him that made her lose words. She reached out again. #Tell me 'ow ta 'elp...please...#

"You're doing it, Moira," he said very softly. "Just--have patience with me." He looked up at her, a flicker of mischief easing the bleak tension. "And tell me what you want to do about the sleeping arrangements, okay?"

"I am, I jus'...I dinnae know wha' ta do an' tha' frustrates me." Moira paused and blinked at him, only then absorbing his last comment. "Well...if'n yer nay objectin'..." She scowled at him suddenly. "Yer goin' ta make me say it, aren't you?"

"Yes," he said with a perfectly straight face, the familiar banter allowing him to relax a little. "It's entirely up to you, but yes, you have to say it." The two of them had wound up in the same bed already a couple of times since his arrival. He was fairly sure he could handle it again.

She wrinkled her nose at him in irrititation. "Fine, ye giant...I'd like t'..." She paused and tilted her head. "Ye know, there's really nay good way ta say tha' without it soundin' far more..." 'Interestin'!' Where the hell had that come from, she wondered, quickly surpressing -that- thought. "...wron'. I'd...oh, fine, I'd like ye ta sleep wit' me. Bastard."

"Oh, good," he said with a yawn. "Because to be honest, the bed is a lot more comfortable than the couch." She gave him that look that he knew meant she was aching to reach out and swat him, and he grinned a little foolishly. "Did you ever notice that I've never broken your wrist when you did that? Smacked me upside the head, I mean."

"Aye," she said, eyeing him a little oddly.

"Not sure why. Anyone else--hell, I nearly put Dom through a plate-glass window once when she did that."

She felt this bizarre want to smile. "Tha's oddly sweet...nay tha' ye put Dom nearly through a window...jus'...ye trust me..."

"Well," he said dryly, "don't think I don't sense that the first part of that appealed to you just a little, too."

"She broke me coffee pot. On purpose. By throwin' it. At me 'ead. So, maybe jus' a wee bit."

Nathan decided that discretion was the better part of valor, and laid back down, giving Moira's hands a careful squeeze before releasing them. "I was always sorry the two of you got off to such a bad start," he said with a sigh, squeezing his eyes shut and trying to find a comfortable position. "Suppose I really ought to think about venturing out the door tomorrow," he went on, hearing Moira moving around. "Before I wind up driving myself the rest of the way crazy." He opened his eyes, staring up at the ceiling. "Don't suppose you have anything relatively sedate that I could do?"

"Hmmm, I'll try an' think o' somethin' for ye," Moira replied, stretching out beside him. She propped her head up on her hand. "Ye know, so am I, 'onestly. We jus' never got tha' second...or third..." She paused. "Well, okay, I like Bridge quite a bit an' I'd like Dom if'n she'd stop growlin' at me." She paused, suddenly remembering something. "'ey, I know yer tired, but we need ta talk 'bout somethin'."

"Okay," he murmured, turning his head to look at her and trying to suppress the wince. "Shoot. In the metaphorical sense, I mean." The fatigue and the concussion was making him a bit goofy, he decided.

"Me guns are locked up," she reminded him wryly. "Yer e-mail ta me. I...think th' vision affected me as well. There's a bit o' time where I thought I 'ad fallen asleep but I dinnae remember it. I know yer worried 'bout tha'."

He was a great deal more awake, all of a sudden. "Shit," he muttered, staring at her worriedly. "I was afraid something like this would happen--"

"Don't be." It was simple, straightforward. "Ye know, I wasna able ta 'elp Kevin. Not wit' 'is pain an' not when it counted. Nay th' way I wanted ta. But if this link means ye dinnae 'ave ta go through -tha'- alone, if it means I'm able ta find somethin' ta 'elp ye, then I'll take it on."

Nathan opened his mouth, only to have to shut it again as no words came out. "I don't--" he started, then stopped, biting his lip. "If this starts to affect you negatively, we find a way to solve the problem," he went on, managing a gruff tone this time. "I'm not having my damned visions driving you crazy."

"We're tryin' ta find a way ta solve th' problem anyway," Moira replied dryly, rolling over onto her back. "An' they won't. 'opefully they'll make -ye- -less- crazy." She hesitated. "If'n I tell ye th' idea I 'ad 'bout why I was bein' pulled in, do ye promise nay ta do somethin' weird an' make me want ta yell at ye?"

"I--promise to try," he said warily.

"I think th' link gets stronger when we touch. I think tha's why I was jus' knocked out th' one time, when I was downstairs, instead of getting pulled into it. I'm assumin' tha'll it means th' visions will be stronger fer me as well when we're close." Moira stopped and glanced over at Nathan to watch for his reaction.

He didn't let himself react right away. "We need to be careful, then," he said finally, watching her. "I wasn't joking about the driving you crazy bit. The one you got pulled in--" He stopped, a thin, humorless smile tugging at his lips. "It wasn't all that bad, Moira. Comparatively."

She closed her eyes. "I know. Or, at least, I'm assumin'." She sighed. "But...damn it, Nate..." Moira sat up and huffed at herself. "I cannae do any o' th' stuff anyone in this bloody 'ouse can. I'm jus'...'uman an' if this is th' only shot I've got ta make sure yer okay, then so bloody well be it. Me sanity be damned."

"'Just human'," Nathan said dryly. "As a description of you? I think that's the funniest thing I've heard in months."

"Why's tha', 'tis th' trut'. It's jus'...I get meself so bloody frustrated..."

Nathan considered the problem for a moment. He knew this pattern; Moira would get frustrated at all the things she wasn't able to do, forgetting everything she had accomplished and was accomplishing. She would internalize the frustration, relapse into being dangerously driven, get more and more upset at not being able to solve the world's problems, and before he knew it he would have to find a handy body of water to throw her in again.

"We'll sort it out," he said, wondering when he had fallen into the role of the reassuring one here. He was the pessimist, after all. "Right now, I think we could both do with some sleep."

She sighed and flopped back onto the bed. "Aye, I suppose yer right...shopping bloody well wore me out." Moira stretched and winced as several spots in her back popped at once. She glanced over at Nate and then waited, again. After their talk tonight, she was going to let him make the first move with anything he felt comfortable or uncomfortable with.

Nathan opened his mouth, only to surprise himself with another yawn. "Imagine so," he muttered, closing his eyes. "Had more help than you needed, sounds like--"

"Aye, but it was fun." She looked slightly mischevious as she nudged off her shoes. She was actually too tired to bother with getting undressed, never mind putting her purchases away. "Shoppin'...talkin', th' usual." She snuggled further into the pillows as she copied Nate's yawn.

"My idea of hell..."

Moira glanced over, wondering if she should tease him a little, but found him dozing off. She shook her head and then moved over so that her back was against his side and found herself falling asleep along with him.