Topaz and Amanda - Aftermath

[xp_daytripper]

Following the battle against the ice giant and draining her mentor's emotions, Topaz goes to check on her and finds even the strongest people have their hidden flaws. Backdated to very early Monday morning.



To anyone walking down the hall, Topaz might have been ridiculous sight. She had been standing in front of a door for five minutes, shuffling from foot to foot, raising her fist at random intervals to knock, pausing, and then letting her arm fall back to her side.

She wasn't scared. That was what she kept trying to tell herself. She was never scared of Amanda. Ashamed to face her, maybe, but that was always her own fault. Not scared, though. There was nothing to be scared of. Sure, she had put off coming here. But only because there was no point in talking to Amanda before the emotional numbness wore off. It wasn't because she was scared to face Amanda, to see what condition her old teacher was in. Not at all.

Then knock.

Topaz took a deep breath and rapped her knuckles against the door before the courage left her again. Whatever her own feelings were, they didn't matter. Making sure Amanda was okay did.

There was a long pause and then the door opened, just enough for Amanda to look out. The witch was hollow-eyed and pale from the over-exertion of the mission, but there was something more in her expression, a kind of desperate hunger coupled with deep shame. But still, when she saw who it was, she managed the faintest of smiles. It wasn't more than a twitch at the corner of her mouth, but it was there all the same.

"Come in," she said, stepping aside to open the door only wide enough to let Topaz in.

Maybe she should have waited. Topaz shook the thought off as she stepped in. Yeah, Amanda wasn't in good shape. But wasn't that all the more reason to come now instead of waiting? She paused for a brief moment once inside the suite, clearly uncertain about what to do, before she abruptly went to the kitchen. When in doubt, make tea.

"How are you?" She asked quietly as she dug through the cabinets with an amazing amount of knowledge of where to find things considering she didn't live in this suite.

Amanda laughed, a high, almost hysterical sound. "Been better," she replied. She hadn't sat down after closing the door behind her guest, instead pacing restlessly around the suite's living room. Now and then she stopped, to adjust a picture on the wall, to pull out a book from the shelves and then put it back again, to pick up one of the many decks of tarot cards that lived in the space and start shuffling them with twitchy, nervous movements of her hands. "But you already knew that, I s'pose. Walk a mile in my emotions and all that shite?"

"Yeah." Topaz, in contrast, was almost eerily calm. She had burned off most of what she had taken from Amanda, but enough had remained for her to pick through on the plane ride home. Most of it confused her. She let the water boil, turning back to look at Amanda and watch her shuffle the cards. "What're you feeling?"

Amanda twitched, looking for a moment like a guilty child, and the cards scattered to the floor. She knelt down to pick them up, letting her hair obscure her face as she bent over the task. "Like I'm sixteen all over again and going through magic withdrawal. I thought I had a handle on it, but not feeling it even for a while and then it coming back..." She fumbled at the cards blindly as her voice faltered, and then she sat back on her heels, covering her face with her hands. "I never wanted you to see me like this," she managed to choke out.

The tea was instantly abandoned as Topaz walked back into the living room area with more confidence than she actually felt. She knelt down in front of Amanda. "It's all right," she said quietly. "I mean, know, it isn't. That's bloody stupid. But..." She reached out uncertainly, resting a hand on Amanda's knee. No one wanted to be seen in the weakest moments. Topaz couldn't say it was okay. But she could offer support. She could let Amanda know she wasn't alone. That was worth something, right?

At the touch, Amanda shuddered, but before Topaz could pull away, the blonde's left hand shot out and grabbed her student's in a tight grip. The nails were bitten to the quick. "I'm sorry," Amanda hiccuped, still not looking up. "I didn't want you to know I was a junkie, but I can't do this alone."

Oh. Topaz's breath caught for a moment as she tried to process this. Finally she breathed again, her free arm coming up to lean in and pull Amanda into a tight (if somewhat awkward given their positions) hug. "You're not alone," she whispered. There was no judgment, if that was Amanda was afraid of. No judgment, no disdain. "You've got me."

Amanda let herself be hugged, alternately between crying and coughing out the story of her magic addiction in short, brutal chunks, her forehead resting against Topaz's shoulder. "You're never cured, you know," she said at the end, beginning to calm down and lifting her tear-swollen face at last. Her hair was tangled and stuck to her face with sweat and crying and her eyes and nose were red and puffy. "'S always there, the need. I just got so good at pretending it wasn't that I almost forgot. And then there was M-Day, and losing... you know. And all I wanted to do was to stop feeling so guilty. The only thing that stopped me relapsing was making myself take care of everyone else, to make sure I didn't make the same mistakes again."

Topaz listened, not easing up her grip until Amanda was ready to pull away. There was a lot she could say - like the fact that it wasn't Amanda's fault they had lost the entire magic class from the old universe - but it was useless and not quite the point here. "And then I took everything away."

"I asked you to. You needed a power source and I had plenty of emotions to spare." To hear the self-blame in Topaz's voice helped Amanda pull herself together more than sympathy would have. She was needed. "I knew what I was doing." Her tone was almost fierce.

"Not the point," Topaz pointed out in a surprisingly gentle tone. "Don't use me to ignore your problems." It wasn't accusatory, or harsh. Just simple. Topaz knew ignoring problems when she saw it. She'd never thought it was her place to question Amanda, though. Amanda was the teacher, Topaz was the student. Students didn't question their teachers. And two years ago, Topaz hadn't wanted to know. She had been too wrapped up in her head, in her own problems.

"Don't blame yourself for my choices, then," was Amanda's reply, followed by another of those slightly-quirked corner of the mouth 'smiles'. "Maybe 's for the best, all this. I haven't let myself have time to process all this - p'raps it's time I did."

"Maybe it is." The kettle whistled then, and Topaz looked back in surprise. She'd forgotten about that. She hesitated for a moment before taking Amanda's hand and dragging her up, not about to leave her on the floor.

Amanda allowed herself to be pulled to her feet and wound up sort of slumped on one of the barstools at the breakfast bar. "Sorry," she said again. "But 'm glad you're here, tho'."

"Nothing to be sorry for." Topaz busied herself with tea for a moment, letting silence fall as she tried to figure out what to say. She was probably the worst possible choice for this. "Is there anything I can do?" She finally asked quietly, sliding a mug of tea across the counter to Amanda. "I mean, besides be here. I've got that part covered already."

"There's not much. Distraction's good - takes my mind off it some." Amanda wrapped both hands around the mug and sipped deeply, despite it being near-boiling. Somehow physical pain was easier than the emotional. "And I hate to say this, but I shouldn't be alone - I can't be trusted like this." The self-loathing was clear in her voice. "So I s'pose it's movie night?"

"Hey, it's been a while since I slept on your couch. I'm sure you've missed me," Topaz said with a bit of a smirk, trying to take some of the heaviness off the situation. She'd already decided basically the minute she walked through the door that she wasn't leaving the suite that night. "Should probably do food, too. That's usually good after your break yourself using too much magic."

"Angie already fed me once, before she had to go get her ribs checked, but I never say no to more food."