Study, Thursday afternoon

[x-polarisstar.livejournal.com]

Scott plays messenger for Alex and makes a few points of his own. Lorna defends herself a little bit but doesn’t make much of an effort.



It was raining and it was hot which suited Lorna perfectly. In an effort to be someplace alone, she’d retreated to one of the sitting rooms near the library that had been turned into a study. She sat by the window, ostensibly looking over classwork even going so far as to have a red pen uncapped in her hand. It hadn’t touched paper yet, of course. She’d spent her entire time in here watching the rain.

It took him longer than he'd expected to track Lorna down, which didn't really serve to improve his mood much. But this wasn't about his mood, Scott reminded himself. This was about delivering a message from Alex, making things easier for his little brother. Important to keep that in mind. Really. In mind. Gritting his teeth, he knocked on the door of the sitting room.

Where does a girl have to hide these days to be left alone? Lorna sighed, answering the knock with a weary, “Come in.” She recapped the pen and slid it behind her ear as she turned to see who else thought this room was a good hiding place.

"Lorna," Scott said curtly, closing the door behind himself as he came in. She looked tired, strained, distracted. He couldn't find it in himself to care.

Well…hell. “Scott.” Lorna stood to meet him. He didn’t look like he was here to tell her how tasty her cooking was. “Did you need something?” She tried to be optimistic about it; maybe he just wanted to put her through a gruelling training exercise or something.

"I'm playing go-between," Scott said, more than a bit of an edge to his voice. "Shall we get that out of the way first? If you have anything to say to Alex about what happened between the two of you, he's willing to listen."

She sat down again abruptly, really more of a controlled fall as her legs went weak. “Oh. Thanks.” She felt sick and was pitifully grateful there was nothing in her stomach to throw up. Who knew the thought of talking to your boy…ex-boyfriend would be so terrifying?

"Don't thank me," Scott said harshly. "I've been avoiding you by choice, since I found out what you said to him. I wouldn't have played go-between except that he wanted me to so badly."

She nodded, “I’m sorry. I can only tell you what I told Paul; I know I screwed up, I realize I’m stupid and selfish and generally horrid. I didn’t say it knowing what she’d done but I should have reacted better when he told me.” Her voice was dull, like defending herself was more work than it was worth.

Scott stared at her. "Shake it off," he snapped. "For God's sake, Lorna, you're an adult. Act like one."

“Shake what off, Scott? It won’t do any good for me to explain and I’ve had the conversation about how I’m self-absorbed and don’t deserve another shot so what would you like me to do now?” Lorna shook her head. “Sit down or something if you’re going to stay and glare at me.”

Scott didn't sit. "You have a couple of options here," he growled. "You can try to make things right with Alex and support him as he tries to deal with all of this, or you can feel sorry for yourself. You can't do both."

“Oh, I don’t know, I’m good at multi-tasking,” she muttered then shrugged. “I don’t, actually, feel sorry for myself. That would require having been left with any delusions that I had any ground to stand on which I don’t. I am sorry that I hurt Alex and frankly, his is the only opinion I care about. He’s the most important thing, right now.”

"Then talk to him, stop kicking yourself, and don't do it again," Scott snapped, thoroughly aggravated. Why was he even bothering with this? He should have delivered the message and turned around and left again. "Save the rest of us the self-flagellation."

“Excuse me?” Lorna stared at him, her eyes narrowing, “Who came looking for who here? I appreciate the message but you could have delivered it and left. You’re the one still standing there waiting for me to…hell, I don’t even know what. I screwed up; I’m admitting it and I’ll crawl over broken glass to apologise. I’m not weeping and wailing in public view nor have I covered myself in sackcloth and ashes. I’m doing my best to deal with this without disrupting the lives of the rest of the house. What more can you possibly want?”

Scott glared down at her, trying to come up with an answer to that question. "I want you to reverse time a week and never do that to him in the first place," he finally said, frustrated. "I want you to think, hard, about whether you can actually help him or whether you're just going to wind up hurting him again. I want to find out where my respect for you vanished to, because I really feel a little harsh having lost it all at once."

Okay, that hurt. Scott was one of the people she respected most in the mansion. Losing his goodwill was harder than she realized. “If I could do that, I would. I’d have done it a week ago and erased everything from the moment Leyu walked into the kitchen. Since I can’t, I have to start from grovelling.” Lorna sighed and closed her eyes, “I love him and I need to tell him that. I may not get another chance with him and I definitely don’t deserve it but I can’t just let him go while he still thinks anything that bitch did could possibly change how I feel about him.” She opened her eyes again and gave Scott a challenging look. “I can live without your respect though I’d rather not. But I can’t live with him thinking that about me.”

"Then go to him. And don't screw it up, because I'd like the chance to find that respect again. Which is not going to be a possibility if you ever hurt him like that again," Scott said, his voice hard.

“I’m not hoping for miracles.” She stared out the window for a moment and shook her head, “Just a chance.”

"Fine. The realistic approach is always good," Scott said, and turned to go. "Don't make him wait too long," he said, slamming the door behind him.