Friday, Feb 11: The Music Room

[x-polarisstar.livejournal.com]

Lorna goes looking for Alison and runs across Manuel instead. Awkward conversation ensues during which Manuel realizes Lorna’s scared of him and Lorna offers a lame excuse for why. They almost manage to get along before Lorna runs away. But it's a step in the right direction.



Humming the Green Girl anthem under her breath—and damn Alison for coming up with such a catchy theme song—Lorna skipped down the stairs, headed for the music room to track down the songstress.

Lorna rapped on the music room door perfunctorily then eased it open. If she'd read the insanely complex schedule correctly, Alison was supposedly finishing a lesson with Terry right at this second. "Hey, Ali?" she called, poking her head inside. Hmm, no Terry, no Alison. Maybe that lesson was only alternate Tuesdays in months that end in R. "Hello?" she repeated, just in case she was missing someone hiding behind an amp or something.

Manuel was, as it turned out, behind an amp. He was just finishing unplugging his "electronica gear", as Alison put it. "Yes?" he asked pleasantly, his New Englander accent showing through a little more than normal. "Oh. Hello, Ms Dane. Ms Blaire's not here right now. Something about cucumber masks, or some such silliness. Might want to
try her room." he said informatively.

Lorna, to what she considered her great credit, did not scream though she did go sheet-white. She took a deep breath and spoke slowly, choosing her words and tone carefully. It would be wrong of her to treat him any differently than any other student irrespective of the past. Not when he couldn't remember. "Um…thanks, Manuel. I must have read her schedule wrong." A little shaky and standoffish but better than the alternative.

Manuel looked at Lorna confusedly. She'd gone as white as a sheet. "Are you OK?" he asked with concern in his voice. "You don't look so good. Do you want me to call Medlab? Are you not feeling well?" he asked solicitously.

Lorna jerked back though he hadn't moved toward her at all. "No. I'm fine. Right as rain. Thanks for offering though." Okay, that was more panicked than before, time to calm down. Samson said she had to come to terms with her issues and face them. Lorna wasn't sure if that meant actually speaking to Manuel but she was pretty sure it did. She took another slow breath. "What are you working on?" she asked, trying to sound cheerful and not neurotic.

Manuel looked at Lorna oddly, but took the gesture as it was intended. "Music independent study." he said with a friendly smile. "I have a meeting to go to in a few days, and I'm trying to prep for it as best I can. I detest looking foolish, especially in regards to something that is important to me." he said pleasantly. "If you'd like, I could carry a message to Ms Blaire..." he offered.

Lorna shook her head. "No, that's okay. I'll track her down. Sorry to have bothered you." She started to turn to go then looked back at him. "How much do you remember?" She had to ask though she dreaded hearing the answer.

Manuel shrugged. "Bits and pieces, here and there." he said. "Nothing all that coherent, and nothing that meant anything real to me, either good or bad." he said sadly. "Why do you ask?"

She chewed on her lower lip, trying to determine if he was telling the truth or not. "No reason," she lied finally. "I think this is better anyway." She blinked, realizing that could be misconstrued, "Not that I think what happened was good," she corrected hastily, "just...better to leave the past in the past, you know?"

Manuel frowned. "As I am discovering, not knowing can be just as bad as knowing. I mean, judging by the question you're asking and your posture and tone, I would say that you and I have a little history together. I'm not going to ask you what it is, and I'm fairly sure you don't want to talk about it. But it makes it hard to atone, to apologize for my former self's misdeeds if I don't know what they are."

Lorna leaned against the doorjamb, wishing she had just left when she had a chance. It was absolutely unfair of her to do this. "Manuel, don't...don't worry about it. It's not important, I'm just jumpy because we didn't get along very well before. I was kind of a bitch to you and... It's just not important." There were several people in the mansion who would have been astonished to hear her say it. But all she'd wanted was for this to go away. If she had to lie to get there, so be it.

Manuel looked more closely at Lorna, seeing right through her attempts at nonconfrontation. "I scare the living shit out of you." he said simply after staring at her for a few moments. "And that's sad, because I think that I could get to like you." he grinned. "Give me another chance? I can promise you that whatever I did to you, whatever it was, it won't happen again. Can't happen again. Nobody here but just me." he said, tapping his forehead lightly.

Lorna’s brow furrowed, he was so different than he’d been. “I don’t know. It…I don’t know if I can. But it’s not something you should worry about and…well, it’s not personal. It’s not you any more.” She frowned. “I would like to ask you a favor though. Don’t tell anyone about this, okay? They’ll just worry. About us both.”

Manuel shrugged. "I can't make that promise." he said. "At the very least, I'll talk to Dr Samson about it." he clarified. "You should too. Maybe the both of us should go. Together. Explore this issue, get all the demons out. If there is _one_ thing that I have learned, it is that keeping your demons bottled up inside you will just destroy you from the inside out." he said sadly. "I could be considered a walking case-in-point."

Lorna jerked “Len is fine. I’ve spoken to him about it myself.” Her hands moved in sharp, nervous gestures before she fisted them into her pockets. “I meant everyone who doesn’t have a doctorate in psychology. I’d just rather you didn’t talk to anyone not him or the Professor. It would cause more problems than it’s worth.”

Manuel ahhed. "Well, that I can do, if you will make a promise to me as well." he said simply, putting his own hands in his pockets - to match her gesture.

“What?” she asked warily, resisting only barely the urge to say no without hearing him out.

"Get some help. Talk this through with someone. It's obvious even without my power that this has been eating you alive inside - probably for as long as since it happened." he said calmly. "That's not healthy. If I must, I'll enlist Alex's help. He and I share a common bond, a common experience. If I asked him to, he would."

“I have been talking this through,” she snapped without thinking. She flushed, “Sorry.” She swallowed hard and took a deep breath to compose herself. “I think Alex would be a great person for you to talk to. He’s really come a long way himself in the last year.”

Manuel grinned. "Yeah. We talked a little bit, but we need to do more. It doesn't help that he can be almost impossible to understand. The word "dude" is almost like the word "fuck" - it can be used as a noun, a verb, just about anything really."

“Ah, you’re lucky if all you get is ‘dude’. When he’s really excited, he’ll degenerate entirely into surfer slang and even I lose him at that point.” Lorna managed a smile, Alex having that effect on her even in a situation like this one.

"I miss being able to cheat that way and guess from emotional context." he said sadly. "Never thought I'd say it, but I miss my power sometimes. But, given everything else, I'm far better off without it. Even if it does make me a mental defective."

“Just as mentally defective as the rest of us.” Lorna pointed out automatically.

Manuel snorted at that, but then smiled. "We're all mad here, down through the rabbit hole?" he said with a grin, and then looked confused. "Dammit, I hate it when I do that. What the hell did I just say?"

Lorna frowned and edged back slightly without realizing it. “Lewis Carroll. You just quoted the Cheshire Cat. ‘We’re all mad here, down the rabbit hole.’ I tend to use ‘I don’t want to go among mad people’ myself.” She tilted her head to the side, “Does that happen a lot?”

Manuel sighed. "I can't remember." he said with irritation. "And yeah, it happens quite a bit lately. Bits and pieces, here and there. Just the other day I asked Jubilee to pass me a bottle of Gatorade - in Latin. Didn't even realize it until she asked me what the hell it was that I just said."

“You used to speak Latin.” Lorna said slowly and the fear was back in her voice. “And I’ll bet you’d read Lewis Carroll. Len says memories are never erased entirely.”

Manuel nodded. "I know. Latin, Spanish, Basque, and English." he said. "Now, just English. And my accent has changed." he added. "And you're getting frightened again - do you have something against Latin?"

She shook her head. “No. Not a thing.” She shuffled her feet, “Anyway, I should go. Good luck with your music project.”

Manuel scowled. "You’re lying to me again. But that's OK - we all have our little secrets, the things we hide in the dark. Good evening, Lorna. Remember what I said."

Lorna gave him a half-wave and hurried away.

Manuel watched her walk out and then sighed deeply. Serenity was going to be a long time coming at this rate.