Amanda, Angelo - last Tuesday night
May. 18th, 2004 11:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsAngelo answers this email with a visit to the roof, and he reassures Amanda that not everyone is leaving her because of her relationship with Manuel. They also touch on just what that relationship is, and why Amanda is so scared of that L-word.
As soon as he'd sent his reply to Amanda's e-mail, Angelo was up and moving, pausing by the door to grab his cigarettes from his jacket pocket, and then out. He couldn't help remembering the last time he'd seen Amanda on the roof, but he told himself that if she'd been in that state again, she'd hardly have asked for company.
He reached the third floor and the ladder quickly, and as he climbed up through the hatch, he spotted her immediately by the glowing end of her own cigarette, and called out a greeting.
"Hey," she replied, not looking up. She was sitting on the very edge of the platform, legs dangling over the side, and a growing pile of cigarette butts beside her. As he sat down beside her, she summoned up the effort and gave him a wan smile. "Glad you could make it."
Angelo returned the smile, genuine but worried, pulling out his cigarettes and lighting up. "You sounded like you needed it."
She shrugged. "Stuff pilin' up. The headache from hell that won't go away. Manny bein' a pillock - yer'd think I'd be used to it all by now, wouldn't you?" Exhaling smoke with a long, shaky breath, she went on. "Sometimes it feels like it's normal life I can't deal with. Evil magicians, demons, all of that bollocks... I can do that standin' on me head. But a bit of exam stress an' a fight with me boyfriend sends me runnin' for somethin' t' take it all away."
Angelo shrugged wryly. "Define "normal". Evil magicians an' demons used to be your normal life - exams an' boyfriends, not so much, right?"
Amanda gave him a surprised look. "I hadn't thought of it like that," she admitted. "Seems like I'm so busy tryin' t' fit in here, the less I think or say 'bout that, the better. An' when I do say somethin', people react funny, make me feel like a freak. Not that they mean to, they just ain't got no frame of reference." She pulled a wry face. "Fuck, I've been seein' Samson too much - I'm startin' t' sound like him."
Angelo nodded. "Yeah. Gets to me too, sometimes. Tryin' to be a good student for once, and thinkin' about goin' to college, an' all that stuff... sometimes it's too different to how things were. It passes, just 'cause how things were really wasn't anythin' I wanna go back to, not now, but that doesn't mean it never comes at all..."
"We must be daft, missin' all that," she said with a laugh that came out a lot more harshly than she intended. She covered by taking another drag on her cigarette. "Did you see what Nate put in his journal? 'Bout not wantin' t' see me 'cause of what Manny done?" she asked, getting to the heart of what was bothering her.
Angelo shrugged again. "You miss what you know, I figure, at least sometimes, even if it was bad. An', yeah, I did. He's not himself right now, Amanda. You know that. He's in pain, an' drugged up half the time, an' Manny just frightened him. He didn't mean it."
"I know he didn't, still didn't mean it didn't hurt. An' seein' him down there didn't help - poor bastard was _scared_ of me." Amanda's face twisted. "I dunno if I can take this much more, Ange. Shinobi, Sarah... Marie's talkin' 'bout leavin' as well. Seems like the people I let meself get close to are all up an' leavin', in one way or another. If Nate still don't want t' see me, 'cause of Manny..." She glanced down at the drop below them. "Even Rack's gone, an' he's the last person I'd want t' go near, but 's like there's a part of me missin' now, like he took somethin' with him."
Angelo followed her gaze to the drop. "Don't you even think about it", he said, voice low and fierce. "When Nathan's recovered enough to think straight, he will want to see you, an' you know it. An' you're not the only one losin' the people you're close to. Shinobi, Sarah, Marie, I'd put them all on the "real friends" list, an' I've told you before how short that is. But for all that, I am not goin' anywhere, an' neither are you, not like that. There aren't that many here who understand what it was like for us, but we do for each other. Don't you go takin' another person off my list, if you're gonna make me be selfish."
"Don't worry, I ain't gunna do anythin' stupid. I'm just rambling; I'm so tired I ain't even thinkin' straight. An' I'm bein' a selfish cow - 'course yer in the same position as me, worse, since yer've known 'em longer." Amanda rubbed fretfully at her forehead.
"Sometimes I think they're all that keeps me here", Angelo admitted quietly, staring out over the darkened grounds and taking a drag on his cigarette. "More often 'n not, actually. Paige, you, Nathan, Bobby, Marie - there's a few others that come close, but that's the list right now. Not sure what I'd do if you all weren't here."
"Get into less trouble?" Amanda said with a small grin. Then she became serious again. "Yer'd survive - 's what you do. Yer friends, they give you a reason to, let you see there's more 'n just survivin', there's havin' a life, but yer strong, Ange. You'd make it. An' so would I, I s'pose. 'S just sometimes I worry that Manny's gunna piss off everyone enough t' have 'em stop talkin' to me altogether, an' that I don't think I'd cope with. I'd probably have t' leave, go back home t' Rom." She pulled a face. "I just wish he'd be more like he is with me when he's talkin' t' the rest of you. He ain't always such a pillock, y'know."
"Yeah, it's what I do. But I'd been doin' it for way too long before I came here, an' then... there's an old song, goes, "If I hadn't seen such riches, I could live with bein' poor". I'm just gettin' used to havin' a life, now. Not sure what it'd do to me to have to go back to survivin', after this. I've not broken yet, but after bein' here, seein' what life can be like, if I lost it all again..." He sighed, then replied to the rest of her words. "No one's gonna stop talkin' to you because of what Manny does. They're still talkin' to the pair of us, aren't they? An' look at all the trouble we've caused between us. Hardly likely they'd give up on you for somethin' that's not your fault."
"We're both goin' soft then," she said with another wry smile. Then she shrugged. "I dunno. The stuff I've done... most of it was either an accident or when I was off me head. An' Manny scares people - he doesn't mean to, but for an empath he's not very good at understanding why other people react the way they do. An' he can't lie t' save himself." She shook her head. "I just see the way other people react to him, an' then what Nate said... Could be people'd prefer t' cut their losses, write me off with him. Since obviously I have no taste at all, apparently." This last was said with a touch of self-mocking.
"They react to him", Angelo pointed out quietly. "Not to you. What Nate said doesn't count - he was too doped up to think about what it'd do to you. An' if anyone was gonna write you off, for bein' with Manuel or for any reason, they'd've done it by now. Everybody knows you two are together."
"Argh," Amanda growled in frustration, flopping back on the platform to look up at the sky, cigarette still in hand. "Me head's just goin' round an' round an' I know all this is stupid, I just can't help thinkin' 'bout it. An' Manny drives me so bonkers sometimes, I start wonderin' why I..." She cut herself off, taking another drag and collecting her thoughts. "Ange," she said presently. "You an' Paige... How did you know you were in love with her?"
Angelo thought about that, lying back next to her and staring up at the stars. "I just... we were really close for awhile before I figured it out. It just sorta happened, I think - snuck up on me. Marie an' Alison helped me figure it out, but I guess what it was... she makes me wanna stay. Be the good person she thinks I am, or can be, or whatever, even if I wasn't that person before I came here. Can't imagine not knowin' her, now. Can't imagine not lovin' her..."
"Not really helpin'," Amanda muttered to herself. "So, if you want t' help someone, an' be with 'em, is that love?"
Angelo tipped his head sideways to look at her. "It can be, I think. If it's as much about bein' with them as helpin' them." He hesitated, then asked, "Are we talkin' about who I think we are?"
"Fucked if I know," Amanda replied, taking another puff on her cigarette. "All I know is it's not just about the sex any more. Or the link - that helps, but there's these... feelings I get that I can't figure out. Like when we fight - I want t' try an' sort things out, instead of tellin' him t' get on his bike, 'cause I feel like shite at the thought of not bein' with him. An' sometimes I'll look up an' he'll be watchin' me with this silly look on his face, an' it makes me feel all warm an' gooey." She blew out smoke in a long plume and shrugged as best she could lying on her back. "If it is... that L word, I dunno what t' do about it."
Angelo gave her a sympathetic smile. "Sounds like it might be, t'me. An' you do... what you gotta do. Whatever feels like the right thing to do about it - an' no one says you have to figure out what that is right away. Look at me - I spent months in denial 'cause I thought the right thing was to leave Paige alone to work things out with Jono, only that meant I ended up avoidin' her, an' I've never been good at pretendin', so it's not like she didn't know somethin' was up, and it came pretty close to wreckin' everythin' - friendship an' all." He paused, sorting through his thoughts. "Point is, it takes time to work this stuff out, an' sometimes help, like I got from Marie. Don't expect yourself to get it all sorted out right away."
Amanda reached over and squeezed Angelo's hand. "Ta, mate," she said, looking over at him with a smile. "This can't be easy t' talk about, considerin' who we're talkin' about, but everyone else either don't wanna hear 'bout Manny, or don't understand why the whole idea scares the shite out of me." She looked away again, up at the stars glittering like jewels, and eventually said, in a voice almost too quiet to hear. "Rack used t' say that he loved me. He said that was why he had t' do the stuff he did, t' teach me t' be a better person." Her voice caught and she coughed a little, blinking hard as the stars blurred in her vision.
Angelo looked over at her, frowning in concern and squeezing her hand back. "Rack", he said, voice low with anger, "was a manipulative, vicious lyin' bastard who probably never loved anyone other'n himself in his life. Doesn't mean no one'll ever love you for real. I'm not gonna pretend I'll ever like Manny, but he means a lot to you, whether it's the L word or not, so I'll deal, long as you want t'be with him. The only other way'd be to make you choose, an' that... well, I've seen enough t'know it wouldn't go well. An' I'd deserve t'lose you as a friend - as family - for makin' you make that choice."
There wasn't anything Amanda could say to that, so she didn't, merely held onto his hand as they continued smoking in silence.
As soon as he'd sent his reply to Amanda's e-mail, Angelo was up and moving, pausing by the door to grab his cigarettes from his jacket pocket, and then out. He couldn't help remembering the last time he'd seen Amanda on the roof, but he told himself that if she'd been in that state again, she'd hardly have asked for company.
He reached the third floor and the ladder quickly, and as he climbed up through the hatch, he spotted her immediately by the glowing end of her own cigarette, and called out a greeting.
"Hey," she replied, not looking up. She was sitting on the very edge of the platform, legs dangling over the side, and a growing pile of cigarette butts beside her. As he sat down beside her, she summoned up the effort and gave him a wan smile. "Glad you could make it."
Angelo returned the smile, genuine but worried, pulling out his cigarettes and lighting up. "You sounded like you needed it."
She shrugged. "Stuff pilin' up. The headache from hell that won't go away. Manny bein' a pillock - yer'd think I'd be used to it all by now, wouldn't you?" Exhaling smoke with a long, shaky breath, she went on. "Sometimes it feels like it's normal life I can't deal with. Evil magicians, demons, all of that bollocks... I can do that standin' on me head. But a bit of exam stress an' a fight with me boyfriend sends me runnin' for somethin' t' take it all away."
Angelo shrugged wryly. "Define "normal". Evil magicians an' demons used to be your normal life - exams an' boyfriends, not so much, right?"
Amanda gave him a surprised look. "I hadn't thought of it like that," she admitted. "Seems like I'm so busy tryin' t' fit in here, the less I think or say 'bout that, the better. An' when I do say somethin', people react funny, make me feel like a freak. Not that they mean to, they just ain't got no frame of reference." She pulled a wry face. "Fuck, I've been seein' Samson too much - I'm startin' t' sound like him."
Angelo nodded. "Yeah. Gets to me too, sometimes. Tryin' to be a good student for once, and thinkin' about goin' to college, an' all that stuff... sometimes it's too different to how things were. It passes, just 'cause how things were really wasn't anythin' I wanna go back to, not now, but that doesn't mean it never comes at all..."
"We must be daft, missin' all that," she said with a laugh that came out a lot more harshly than she intended. She covered by taking another drag on her cigarette. "Did you see what Nate put in his journal? 'Bout not wantin' t' see me 'cause of what Manny done?" she asked, getting to the heart of what was bothering her.
Angelo shrugged again. "You miss what you know, I figure, at least sometimes, even if it was bad. An', yeah, I did. He's not himself right now, Amanda. You know that. He's in pain, an' drugged up half the time, an' Manny just frightened him. He didn't mean it."
"I know he didn't, still didn't mean it didn't hurt. An' seein' him down there didn't help - poor bastard was _scared_ of me." Amanda's face twisted. "I dunno if I can take this much more, Ange. Shinobi, Sarah... Marie's talkin' 'bout leavin' as well. Seems like the people I let meself get close to are all up an' leavin', in one way or another. If Nate still don't want t' see me, 'cause of Manny..." She glanced down at the drop below them. "Even Rack's gone, an' he's the last person I'd want t' go near, but 's like there's a part of me missin' now, like he took somethin' with him."
Angelo followed her gaze to the drop. "Don't you even think about it", he said, voice low and fierce. "When Nathan's recovered enough to think straight, he will want to see you, an' you know it. An' you're not the only one losin' the people you're close to. Shinobi, Sarah, Marie, I'd put them all on the "real friends" list, an' I've told you before how short that is. But for all that, I am not goin' anywhere, an' neither are you, not like that. There aren't that many here who understand what it was like for us, but we do for each other. Don't you go takin' another person off my list, if you're gonna make me be selfish."
"Don't worry, I ain't gunna do anythin' stupid. I'm just rambling; I'm so tired I ain't even thinkin' straight. An' I'm bein' a selfish cow - 'course yer in the same position as me, worse, since yer've known 'em longer." Amanda rubbed fretfully at her forehead.
"Sometimes I think they're all that keeps me here", Angelo admitted quietly, staring out over the darkened grounds and taking a drag on his cigarette. "More often 'n not, actually. Paige, you, Nathan, Bobby, Marie - there's a few others that come close, but that's the list right now. Not sure what I'd do if you all weren't here."
"Get into less trouble?" Amanda said with a small grin. Then she became serious again. "Yer'd survive - 's what you do. Yer friends, they give you a reason to, let you see there's more 'n just survivin', there's havin' a life, but yer strong, Ange. You'd make it. An' so would I, I s'pose. 'S just sometimes I worry that Manny's gunna piss off everyone enough t' have 'em stop talkin' to me altogether, an' that I don't think I'd cope with. I'd probably have t' leave, go back home t' Rom." She pulled a face. "I just wish he'd be more like he is with me when he's talkin' t' the rest of you. He ain't always such a pillock, y'know."
"Yeah, it's what I do. But I'd been doin' it for way too long before I came here, an' then... there's an old song, goes, "If I hadn't seen such riches, I could live with bein' poor". I'm just gettin' used to havin' a life, now. Not sure what it'd do to me to have to go back to survivin', after this. I've not broken yet, but after bein' here, seein' what life can be like, if I lost it all again..." He sighed, then replied to the rest of her words. "No one's gonna stop talkin' to you because of what Manny does. They're still talkin' to the pair of us, aren't they? An' look at all the trouble we've caused between us. Hardly likely they'd give up on you for somethin' that's not your fault."
"We're both goin' soft then," she said with another wry smile. Then she shrugged. "I dunno. The stuff I've done... most of it was either an accident or when I was off me head. An' Manny scares people - he doesn't mean to, but for an empath he's not very good at understanding why other people react the way they do. An' he can't lie t' save himself." She shook her head. "I just see the way other people react to him, an' then what Nate said... Could be people'd prefer t' cut their losses, write me off with him. Since obviously I have no taste at all, apparently." This last was said with a touch of self-mocking.
"They react to him", Angelo pointed out quietly. "Not to you. What Nate said doesn't count - he was too doped up to think about what it'd do to you. An' if anyone was gonna write you off, for bein' with Manuel or for any reason, they'd've done it by now. Everybody knows you two are together."
"Argh," Amanda growled in frustration, flopping back on the platform to look up at the sky, cigarette still in hand. "Me head's just goin' round an' round an' I know all this is stupid, I just can't help thinkin' 'bout it. An' Manny drives me so bonkers sometimes, I start wonderin' why I..." She cut herself off, taking another drag and collecting her thoughts. "Ange," she said presently. "You an' Paige... How did you know you were in love with her?"
Angelo thought about that, lying back next to her and staring up at the stars. "I just... we were really close for awhile before I figured it out. It just sorta happened, I think - snuck up on me. Marie an' Alison helped me figure it out, but I guess what it was... she makes me wanna stay. Be the good person she thinks I am, or can be, or whatever, even if I wasn't that person before I came here. Can't imagine not knowin' her, now. Can't imagine not lovin' her..."
"Not really helpin'," Amanda muttered to herself. "So, if you want t' help someone, an' be with 'em, is that love?"
Angelo tipped his head sideways to look at her. "It can be, I think. If it's as much about bein' with them as helpin' them." He hesitated, then asked, "Are we talkin' about who I think we are?"
"Fucked if I know," Amanda replied, taking another puff on her cigarette. "All I know is it's not just about the sex any more. Or the link - that helps, but there's these... feelings I get that I can't figure out. Like when we fight - I want t' try an' sort things out, instead of tellin' him t' get on his bike, 'cause I feel like shite at the thought of not bein' with him. An' sometimes I'll look up an' he'll be watchin' me with this silly look on his face, an' it makes me feel all warm an' gooey." She blew out smoke in a long plume and shrugged as best she could lying on her back. "If it is... that L word, I dunno what t' do about it."
Angelo gave her a sympathetic smile. "Sounds like it might be, t'me. An' you do... what you gotta do. Whatever feels like the right thing to do about it - an' no one says you have to figure out what that is right away. Look at me - I spent months in denial 'cause I thought the right thing was to leave Paige alone to work things out with Jono, only that meant I ended up avoidin' her, an' I've never been good at pretendin', so it's not like she didn't know somethin' was up, and it came pretty close to wreckin' everythin' - friendship an' all." He paused, sorting through his thoughts. "Point is, it takes time to work this stuff out, an' sometimes help, like I got from Marie. Don't expect yourself to get it all sorted out right away."
Amanda reached over and squeezed Angelo's hand. "Ta, mate," she said, looking over at him with a smile. "This can't be easy t' talk about, considerin' who we're talkin' about, but everyone else either don't wanna hear 'bout Manny, or don't understand why the whole idea scares the shite out of me." She looked away again, up at the stars glittering like jewels, and eventually said, in a voice almost too quiet to hear. "Rack used t' say that he loved me. He said that was why he had t' do the stuff he did, t' teach me t' be a better person." Her voice caught and she coughed a little, blinking hard as the stars blurred in her vision.
Angelo looked over at her, frowning in concern and squeezing her hand back. "Rack", he said, voice low with anger, "was a manipulative, vicious lyin' bastard who probably never loved anyone other'n himself in his life. Doesn't mean no one'll ever love you for real. I'm not gonna pretend I'll ever like Manny, but he means a lot to you, whether it's the L word or not, so I'll deal, long as you want t'be with him. The only other way'd be to make you choose, an' that... well, I've seen enough t'know it wouldn't go well. An' I'd deserve t'lose you as a friend - as family - for makin' you make that choice."
There wasn't anything Amanda could say to that, so she didn't, merely held onto his hand as they continued smoking in silence.
