xp_logs | Hope and Laurie: apologies

In her search for Doug, Hope runs into someone she had not expected.

"Miss Collins?" Hope tilted her head when Laurie opened the door to the office and not Doug as she had been expecting. "It's... it's been a while since I have seen you." Translate... avoided her ever since they came back from Ksavia.

"You were expecting Doug?" Laurie theorized, before smiling at the younger woman. "He'll be back soon, I'm mostly just keeping him company while he works on something. Did you want to come in to wait?"

Laurie stepped back from the door and waved Hope in, avoiding any of the number of topics she might have raised that would have made things uncomfortable, including their time in Ksavia. She wasn't interested in re-hashing details, or attempting some sort of bonding experience. As far as Laurie was concerned, the less people made her talk about the entire thing, the happier she was.

That, of course, didn't mean she was unaware of the fact that this was a bad idea, and that repressing things had never done her any good in the past. Right now she simply figured that she was allowed to be childish about certain things, she had in fact, earned it.

Managing to summon a small smile, Hope nodded. "One of the assignments he set me is proving to be vexing. I decided to see if he could clarify some things. Thanks." She nodded at Laurie as she pulled over another chair, neatly tucking her bag below the chair.

"Well, I'm no Doug, but if you wanted to run your questions by me I could try and help, at least till he gets back," Laurie offered, picking up the medical journal she'd been reading about communicable diseases and prevention techniques in remote communities.

She placed it on Doug's desk and settled back, looking at Hope expectantly. Doug had told her of Hope's request, and while Laurie wasn't completely sold on the idea of Hope continuing her studies in these areas, she couldn't fault her for ambition.

It wasn't like Laurie hadn't had several ambitions herself that sometimes took her down unexpected avenues.

Bending down, Hope extracted her tablet and a file folder, but she hesitated as she sat up again. She fingered the folder for a moment as if to open it up, but finally she put it on the desk along with her tablet and bent her head. "I am sorry..." She spoke in a very low voice. She wasn't sure if she should be doing this at all, but now that she finally had the chance...

It was not something could leave unsaid.

"About what?" Laurie asked, slightly confused. She shifted in her chair as she reached forward with her good hand to tilt Hope's head upwards. "Why would you need to apologize to me at all?"

"Ksavia..." Hope shrugged a little. "Everything that happened there. We would not have been there if I..."

"Oh, Hope, no. None of what happened at Ksavia was your fault." Laurie said, her gaze serious as she met and held Hope's. "Not only could you not have known what was going to happen, you also tried your best to do something once you realized the danger. There was only so much you could do in the position you were put in, and what's more you didn't lose your head. There is nothing to be sorry for, I promise you."

"I wish it worked that easy." Hope muttered. "You came to Michigan because I asked for someone to come with me. I cannot help but feel responsible for all that happened. My time there... it was not too bad. But what happened to you..."

"Hope, why exactly do you wish me to blame you for what happened?" Laurie asked carefully.

It had taken Laurie quite some time to come out of the disassociation that her torture had caused, and she still had trouble from time to time believing that she'd actually gotten out of that place.

Add in the anger and guilt that she hadn't been capable of protecting Hope and her friend from being taken as she should have, having been trained as an X-man for just such occurrences, and it was one of many reasons that she was no longer on the rosters by her own request - not that they'd had much choice after her current injury.

She was not about to let Hope blame herself for something that as an adult, and an X-man had been her job.

"Because I carry some responsibility in this as well. Asked for the FGH to be checked deeper or something like that..." Hope's voice trailed of, not quite sure.
"I find that often when bad things happen we wish to take responsibility, or spend an unwarranted amount of time second guessing situations or choices we made in favor of what we suppose were better choices, or more favorable conditions."

Laurie smiled softly, aware that she was talking to her own proclivities as much as she was advising Hope. The younger woman had a fire in her, a need not just for knowledge but a desire to see and control her destiny.

It wasn't a wholly unfamiliar urge.

"There will always be days where no matter how aware or ready you are, things will go wrong. It does nobody any good to second guess choices made in severe duress. You must simply accept that you and I did the best we could with the tools and the knowledge we had in those moments."

She didn't quite have reply to that... yet she still could not shake the burden she felt lying on her shoulders. "I see where you coming from, but..." She raked her fingers through her hair, fighting to find the words to explain more. "We can keep telling ourselves that, but that will not prevent things... not something else..."

"Accepting what was, does not mean moving blindly forward," Laurie replied gently, pulling Hope's tablet toward her. "What you are doing currently, learning from experience and seeking to be better in the future, that's a good thing. There is no changing the past, we can only seek not to repeat it. Now, show me what Doug has been teaching you, maybe we can both move forward together?"

Hope gave her a tiny smile. "It will take some work to get that one to sink in..." Then she pointed out something on her tablet. "We have been working on..."