xp_logs | Domino and Angelo, Sunday around lunchtime (Reply)

Spotting Angelo down by the lake, Domino decides she hasn't been nearly enough of a busybody this weekend. Angelo winds up going into the water on his own accord this time, and a rather productive conversation ensues.

Angelo had returned to the dock, trying to think of an answer to Nathan's question. It was something he really needed to think about, he'd decided, with less than a year before he'd need to get his college apps in if he was going to, so he'd need to decide what he was going to do with his life. Armed with a cigarette as a thinking aid, he perched with his feet in the water, not paying much attention to his surroundings.

Oh, this was too perfect, Domino thought, her bare feet soundless on the grass as she moved towards the dock. She'd been getting changed into a borrowed bathing suit, intending to swim some laps before lunch - she was after all going to be stuck on a plane for hours and hours once she got back to New York this afteroon - but she'd spotted a familiar figure on the dock from the bedroom window. The symmetry amused her.

As she got closer, Angelo didn't look around, didn't show any signs that he was aware of her. Lost in thought, apparently, Domino concluded, grinning as she reached the foot of the dock. As soon as her feet touched wood instead of grass, she started to run, launching herself off the end of the dock - and right over Angelo's head - with a gleeful shout of "GERONIMO!" as she cannonballed into the water.

Angelo jerked as the splash hit him, startled, and stared at her vaguely indignantly. "Domino!" he protested.

Domino laughed, treading water and grinning up at him. "What? Come on in, Angelo, the water's nice. Although I gather you're not fond of it?"

Angelo raised an eyebrow. "Not bein' thrown in, no." He considered the water for a moment, then apparently decided what the hell - it was a nice day, and the water did look inviting, put his cigarette out on one of the stone piles of the dock, and slid off the end to join her. "I'm not so good at swimmin', but a little bit won't hurt."

"He once threw me in the Bering Strait, you know," Domino said amiably. "Right out of our Zodiac. Of course, I was shrieking at him and calling him a fucking overprotective bastard at the time."

Angelo blinked. "What'd he done that you didn't like?"

"Left me watching the boat," Domino said, snickering. "It was the first time just the two of us were out on a job together - I was only seventeen." She thought for a moment, then decided a few more details couldn't hurt. "We were rescuing a kidnapped scientist, and Nate decided he could grab the guy himself. I was pissy already about not getting to go in, but when we were halfway back to Alaska and I noticed that he was bleeding all over the bottom of the boat I sort of flew off the handle."

Angelo laughed. "Yeah, he does seem to have a thing about doin' things for himself. So then he threw you in the sea?"

"No, first I punched him. Then he threw me in the water." Domino grinned. "I was wearing an arctic wetsuit and all, and he hauled me right back out, but I shut right up, let me tell you." She laughed again, remembering. "And that poor bastard of a scientist just sat there and stared. I think he was wondering whether he'd actually been rescued."

Angelo looked amused. "Yeah, he got me right out too. Might only've been 'cause I told him I can't swim, but he did."

Domino did a lazy backstroke, rather enjoying the water. Much better than the pool, really. "So why's he the bad guy?" she asked idly, no edge to the words.

Angelo shrugged, not really sure himself any more. "He got in a temper. Scared the hell out of me, 'cause I've seen *that* before, from others than him. He's not so much the bad guy, 'cause he didn't do anythin' much, but..."

"You mean, you've known Nate for almost four months and this is the first time he's scared the hell out of you?" Domino took a deep breath and dove beneath the surface of the water for a moment, coming back up and smoothing her hair out of her eyes. "Fuck, he must really be mellowing."

Angelo shrugged again. "I think he was tryin' hard. Doin' the responsible teacher bit lately, an' before that, he was only here as a guest. But, yeah."

"I guess you'd get in trouble if you smacked a teacher," Domino allowed.

Angelo chuckled a little. "Well, yeah. There was that once, but he wasn't a teacher then. An' he was tryin' to make me lose my temper, anyway."

"I can't count the number of times I've hauled off and hit him," Domino admitted, a faint smile playing on her lips as she went back to treading water. "Quite seriously. A little less often the last couple of years, but I used to do it regularly."

Angelo glanced over at her with faint surprise. "The overprotective thing again?"

"Sometimes, although he more or less quit with the paternal crap after the first couple of years I was with him and GW. Sometimes it was during an argument, or just because I was in a mood, and he'd looked at me in the wrong way." Domino swam in a rough circle, switching from front- to back-stroke midway through. "I was twenty before I stopped slugging him as a general expression of displeasure. I can date it back to one time just after my twentieth birthday, actually. I lashed out forgetting rule one."

"Rule one?" Angelo asked curiously, treading water.

"I blindsided him," Domino said simply and waited, interested to see if Angelo would pick up on the point.

Angelo eyed her curiously, beginning to get it. "What'd you do?" he countered, equally simply.

"Hit him from behind. Tried to break a chair over his head, actually." Domino snorted. "I picked a bad time to decide that shouting profanities at him was beneath me, and I did it more or less completely on impulse, so he didn't sense it coming."

Angelo blinked, taking that in. "Did you have a reason that time?"

Domino shrugged. "He'd been telling me off about something I'd done on a job. Something fairly stupid - trust me, you don't really need to know the details."

Angelo nodded. "Fair enough. So you smacked him with a chair. Then what?"

The smile came back. "He put me through the wall."

Angelo took a moment to process that. "With his TK, or did he hit you?"

"With his TK. He was on the floor at the time - I did connect with the chair."

Angelo laughed. "He mean to, or was it just the reaction to gettin' hit?"

"It wasn't particularly funny," Domino said, a bit more seriously. "And of course it was the reaction to getting hit - he's never so much as slapped me, before or since, however much I tried to provoke him."

Angelo nodded, sobering fast. "Yeah. Yeah, I can see that - he's been the same with me. An' God knows I was askin' for it down here. Literally."

Interesting, Domino thought. "If I hadn't had the powers I do, he probably would have killed me," she went on, more lightly. "Think about that for a second, Angelo. He was lying on the floor, bleeding and concussed, and still managed to nearly kill me on reflex. And hell, he did do in the house. The TK blast took out that wall and the one beyond it, and the second floor collapsed."

Angelo took that in, frowning. "I'd guess that's why he's so careful now. Your powers're pretty unique. The only time anythin' like that's happened here, the whole Askani thing aside, was with... Manuel."

So not touching that one, Domino told herself. "It's something you have to understand," she said. "About Nathan. It's not that he doesn't like to be blindsided, it's that he really can't handle it, on any level. Not just the physical. And it's not a personal quirk, Angelo, it's something they built into him and twenty years of experience in lashing out at 'surprises'." She paused, treading water again. "He probably regrets what happened with the two of you... in fact, I'm pretty sure he does. That sad look he got when I mentioned you to him yesterday is just like the way he used to look at me after the little accident I just told you about." She smiled humorlessly. "I wasn't badly hurt, but it took him the better part of three months to stop acting like he'd done something horrible and shouldn't relax for an instant around me."

Angelo nodded, understanding. "Yeah. I kinda said a thing or two I probably shouldn't've done, the next time I saw him after. Thought it was true at the time, but I think I was wrong. Or partly, at least."

"I'd like to see the two of you sort it out," Domino said. "He used to talk about you all the time in his emails, you know?"

Angelo raised his head quickly. "Really?"

"Really. You and Amanda... Rahne quite a bit, too, and this kid Jane I've never met..."

Angelo couldn't help a slight grin. "You'd like Jane. Everybody likes Jane."

"I got that impression, from what he's said about her." Domino shook her head, then dove under the water again, coming back up and sighing. "Look, Angelo, I suck at giving advice. If you'd rather keep a safe distance from him, for now or permanently, I really can't blame you. He's not a whole lot of fun to be around at times, and God knows he overreacts."

Angelo shrugged. "I kinda miss the way things were. But I don't know how t'get back to that, or even if he really wants to... an' yeah, there is part of me that wants t'stay away."

"You know, even if you leave things the way they are, he won't hold back for an instant when it comes to being your teacher," Domino said, after taking a long moment to consider the appropriate response to that. "Whether it's these language courses of his, or self defense - I hear he and Pete are plotting - or anything else. You'll get everything he can give you on that score. Nate doesn't know how to do a half-assed job at anything."

Angelo nodded. "Yeah, I know. Got that part already - it's been a couple of weeks since it all went down."

"So maybe that's all you want?" Domino said deliberately, floating on her back.

Angelo shot her a look. "I don't know. It's better than nothin'. An' we've talked at least since the whole thing - an' not just 'cause Shinobi made us."

"It's all you'll get, unless you decide you want more," Domino said, staring up at the clear blue sky. "Because as much as Nathan might want to get back to where the two of you were before all of this - and I think he does, Angelo, because this 'I must be the responsible adult and keep an appropriate distance' crap he fed me when I asked him is so not him that I laughed in his face - he will not do a thing if he thinks you want to leave things this way. Because he will not believe, for an instant, that what he wants matters." She shifted through the water until she was upright again, and splashed Angelo playfully. "So the ball's in your court, one way or the other. But that's a good thing, no? Gives you the choice."

Angelo nodded, splashing her back automatically, but looking a little uncertain. "You're sure that's what he wants?"

"I think so," Domino said, moving back towards the dock. "But he's trying awfully hard to convince himself that you're better off not being attached to him any more than absolutely necessary."

Angelo followed her, grinning wryly. "Not really sure how I can change his mind on that, if he's set on thinkin' it."

Domino pulled herself up onto the dock, then reached down and hauled Angelo casually out of the water, noticing his surprised blink at her strength. "Well, I wouldn't recommend the method I chose," she said dryly.

Angelo scrambled up onto the dock. "What'd you do?"

Domino smiled cheerfully at him. "Got him drunk and slept with him."

Angelo choked on nothing in particular. "No, I don't think that'd go down too well from me. Hope it worked for you?"

Domino laughed. "Well, it set him off on a particularly long bout of 'I am such a bad person', but at least he couldn't keep shutting me out."

Angelo grinned. "Kinda got you what you wanted, then."

"Not everything I wanted," Domino said, managing to keep the wistful note out of her voice, "but what I needed."

Angelo raised an eyebrow at her, but didn't ask what else she'd wanted, opting to change the subject instead. "Any idea what might work for me?"

Ah-hah. Victory. Domino tilted her head, staring out at the lake. "He told me once he'd promised to help you with some self-defense practice," she said, "but that it had kind of gotten derailed by him getting shot and all."

Angelo nodded. "'s right. Well, I think by him gettin' stabbed first. Then shot."

Domino snorted. "Right. I'd say take him up on that promise."

Angelo nodded. "Will do, then. Outside of the classes him an' Pete might run, I guess."

"Just don't let him stop seeing you as you," Domino said. "If he puts you on the list of people he's failed in his life, it's going to be awfully hard to get yourself back off it." She smiled at Angelo. "You have to be more stubborn than him," she quipped.

Angelo chuckled. "Well, that's a big ask, but I think I can manage it."

"I'm glad," Domino said, then decided to pull the trump card anyway. "Because he does genuinely care about you, Angelo."

That got a definite reaction - a sudden, tentative but genuine smile. "I... well. I hope so?"

"Hard to tell with him, I know," Domino said dryly. "He's sort of backward that way."

Angelo chuckled. "He did have a kind of strange way of helpin' - but it worked. He tell you about that?"

"A little bit," Domino said, her lips quirking upwards in a smile. "I teased him about liking the movie 'Fight Club' too much."