xp_logs | Angelo and Nathan, Monday afternoon (Reply)

After getting out of the medlab, Nathan finds Angelo in the kitchen. They talk a little about his missing weekend, then decide on something Nathan can do to make up for not being able to spar with Angelo like he promised until his stab wound heals.

Nathan stuck his head into the kitchen, smiling a little at the sight of Angelo rummaging through the fridge. "Is it safe to come in?" he asked, the smile lingering as Angelo whirled, the startled look on his face turning swiftly to relief. "I mean, I gather there are a few people in the house who'd like to hold me down and beat me for scaring them..."

Angelo glared at him half-heartedly, unable to sustain a true glare through the relief. "Too right. Not that I'm one to talk, but please don't do that again."

Nathan held his hands out helplessly as he came in and went over to the table to sit down. Madelyn had checked his stitches, changed the dressings, and suggested to him that staying put would probably be a good idea. He was a little sorry he hadn't taken her advice, or the pain pills she'd offered. "I wish I could explain myself," he said with a sigh, "but I can't."

Angelo pulled out the food he'd been after and turned to join Nathan at the table, raising one eyebrow. "How so, can't? I mean..." He trailed off, not wanting to bring up his fears while Nathan had been gone.

Nathan sighed again. "Can't as in 'don't remember'," he said. "I was shocked when Moira woke me up this morning and told me it was Monday." He stopped, adding up all the fragments again. "I have maybe an hour of memory from all the time between this morning and Friday night, and none of it's very clear."

Angelo blinked, not much reassured by that. "D'you know how you got home?" he asked quietly.

Nathan shook his head. "No, I don't. The car I was driving is in the garage, and according to the security system I came in alone." He smiled humorlessly. "I don't remember any of it, though. Just Moira waking me up."

Angelo didn't smile at all, starting to think he might have been right after all. "Can you tell me what you were doin' before that?" he asked cautiously.

"No," Nathan said, more quietly, recognizing Angelo's concern for what it was. He just wished he had any sort of answer to give him. "It's all in pieces, Angelo, what little I do remember... I'm not even sure what order it all happened in." He laid a hand over his side, where the bandages showed beneath his shirt. "The thing I remember most clearly is getting stabbed, and I'm not even sure who I was fighting. Or who patched me up..."

Angelo winced. "Stabbed?" he asked sharply. "An' they've let you out? For real?"

"With some protest," Nathan joked, but then dropped the bantering tone at the look Angelo was giving him. "It's not serious... the knife didn't hit anything vital, and whoever stitched me up apparently did a pretty good job. Besides, the terrible trio are busy oohing and ahhing at my blood tests." He snorted softly. "Apparently part of the reason I don't remember the weekend is that I was high as the proverbial kite."

Angelo nodded, reluctantly accepting what he was being told. "Okay. Still... can't imagine them tellin' you it's okay to be up an' about so soon..." he added speculatively, watching Nathan.

"They would prefer me to have stayed down there, or at least gone up and spent some quality time lying around doing nothing," Nathan admitted, "but I'm... restless." That was true, as far as it went, but it was something of a pale description for how he was feeling every time he thought too hard about his missing weekend. "I'm sorry I missed our sparring session," he said, hoping Angelo would let him get away with the change in subject. "I'll make it up to you... um, in a few days, I mean. I think Moira would probably help Madelyn and Henry tie me to a bed if they caught me doing something like that right now."

Angelo nodded. "Yeah, I wasn't expectin' it right away, an' definitely not now. Wouldn't wanna open up that wound again."

"We could substitute something else for sparring," Nathan suggested, smiling a little. "Give you a jump on one of these hypothetical language classes of mine, maybe..."

Angelo grinned. "That'd be good, actually. Give us both somethin' to do, 'til that heals."

"And trust me, learning languages can be just as exhausting as hand-to-hand combat," Nathan said dryly, giving Angelo a thoughtful look. "So I guess the question now is which language you would want to learn. I figure the courses will probably be Arabic and Mandarin, but if we're doing this one on one we could do any of the others..."

Angelo shrugged. "Don't really know all that much about any of them, so... which would you like to teach most?"

"Well, why don't I give you an early start on the Arabic?" Nathan suggested. "It's probably one of the most useful, and since it looks like there probably will be a class, presuming the Professor okays it, you might as well be a bit ahead."

Angelo nodded, repeating it quietly. "An' what would you answer?"

"Ana bikayr," Nathan said. "And 'Wa anta?' is 'And you?'"

"What does "Ana bikayr" mean then?" Angelo asked, mangling the pronunciation only very slightly.

"Whoops... 'I'm fine', sorry." Nathan thought for a minute, then grinned. Let's see how good he is at guessing... Guesswork played an important role in learning languages, after all. "Matha ismuka? Ana ismi Nathan."

Angelo eyed him for a moment, then answered slowly, trying to get the sound of the words right, "Ana ismi Angelo."

Nathan chuckled. "It's a good start."

Angelo pulled a face at him, then grinned. "Thanks."