In which Scott gets a clue...

[x-cyclops.livejournal.com]

[Kitty's gone and once again taken her books and phased into one of the locked parlours. She's curled up, studying in an big, old fashioned chair. It's one of her 'known' hidey holes.]

There is a knock on the parlour door, and Scott's voice on the other side. "Kitty?"

Kitty looks up, startled from the programing book open in her lap. "Er, yes?"

His voice was soft, concerned. "I'd like to talk to you. Have you got some time?"

"Yeah, I guess..." Closing the book she set it on the table with a few others, making her way to the door. Kitty paused, considering. She could let him in, the lock was on her side of the door, but somehow she hated opening the 'normal' entrances to her little hidey-holes. Instead she phased out, poking her head out. "Um, in here or... somewhere else?"

"Here's fine," he smiled at her as she literally poked her head through the door.

"Yeah, but..." Shrugging, Kitty decided that pointing out that she didn't _want_ to let him into 'her' space would probably actually be even worse than just letting him in. "Right. Let me just..." She stepped back and phased in again, reaching out to flip the lock. Opening the door she said, "Come in then."

Scott walked in and looked around briefly, noting where Kitty had made her nest. He waited until the door was closed again before sighing and facing her.

"Chair?" she asked, gesturing. "I'd offer you tea, but it's cold by now."

"No, thanks, to both," he said, turning away. He looked like nothing so much as someone who didn't want to be here. Scott walked to the window and leaned against it, looking out into the dark grounds. "Did Ms. Braddock ask you not to tell anyone about the surgery?"

Kitty blinked, then sighed, moving towards one of the chairs, but not the one she'd been sitting in earlier. Clearly it was too late to prevaricate. "Yes, she did." Her voice was quiet.

He closed his eyes, his forehead touching the cool glass. "Did she say why?" Scott whispered, afraid to speak any louder or his voice might break.

"She... she didn't want people to worry and she didn't want anyone to interfere. She said..." Kitty paused, then pulled her legs up on the chair, curling up. "She said it was her decision and she'd make it on her own."

He laughed a little, fogging the glass. "Of course." He felt like banging his head against the glass, but refrained. For Kitty's sake, at least. "It was never anything but her decision. But that doesn't mean friends can't be there, can't help...as if we'd worry less after the fact."

Kitty shrinks down in the chair a little bit. "I think... I think she didn't want to be affected by everyone when she made it... Maybe it was somehow easier if she was only imagining what people would say and feel, and not actually hearing it."

Scott put his back to the window, facing Kitty. "Easier to lock everyone out. Make it seem like it wouldn't hurt." He stopped himself and shook his head. "I'm sorry, Kitty. I don't mean to sound like I'm blaming you." He paused, then firmed up his voice and continued. "Did it bother you? Not telling anyone? Did you ever think you should have said something to someone else?"

Her jaw firmed a little. "It's a patient's right to decide how their case is going to be handled. I wouldn't even have known if Dr. Essex hadn't needed my help."

"This isn't a hospital, Kitty. This isn't minor elective surgery. And you didn't answer my question."

"Yes, it bothered me a little bit, and no, I never thought I should have said something. The severity of the surgery had nothing to do with it, it was still her decision to make."

Scott tensed up a moment, then visibly calmed himself. He still looked on edge, now with anger more than sadness. "Thank you, Kitty." He walked toward the door.

She watched him head toward the door, not saying anything. She could tell he was upset, but it wasn't any of his business. He hadn't even been around!

Opening the door, he hesitated. "I'm not mad at you, Kitty. Just..." he turned to her, and stopped himself from what he was about to say. "...not mad."

"Well, it's nice to know you're 'just not mad'," she said quietly, her dark eyes still fixed on him. Curled up in the chair she looked much smaller than usual.

He smiled tightly at her, nodded his head, and left her to her empty room.

Rising quickly, Kitty made her way to the door, closing it and locking it again. Then, without a glance at her abandoned books she turned and walked out the room past the window, starting to run towards the tree house as soon as she was outside, and letting her body move slowly down to ground level.

Scott went back to his room and sat at his desk. There in front of him was Betsy's birthday gift, having arrived just in time. The antique hourglass and the book. He turned over the hourglass first and re-read the inscription. For the first time, the message began to sink in.

"Look not mournfully into the past. It comes not back again. Wisely improve the present. It is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future, without fear."

He set the hourglass back down carefully. He wasn't sure that if he didn't do that, he might not hurl it across the room. Retrieving the book that had accompanied the hourglass, he stared intently at the cover, hoping it might somehow provide the insight he lacked. It did not, and he flipped open the collected works of Dylan Thomas and his eyes once again scanned the brief note she'd left on a slip of paper on the cover.

"A small token of my gratitude, Scott. May it remind you of the road you must take and give you the strength you'll need for the future."

With all my Love,
Betsy

By sheer force of will he kept himself from crying, opened the book, and began to read.