|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 11:20 pm
checking inThanks to Jack's current state, Ian's sarcasm flew over his head faster than a jet plane. All he heard was a sincere admission of guilt and an apology, which he was happy to hear and happy to show he had heard: Ian was given another pat and a smile for being so brave as to swallow his pride and seek forgiveness. "Don' be stupid," he said as his hand slid off. "'Course people choose people over people all the peo—" blink, correct, "—all the time. Otherwise everyone'd be friends with everyone. People're overrated anyway. After all, you're a unicorn, Parish's swan, Finn's ******** don't even know...a ********' one eyed wolverine or somethin'. N' Crowell can be a pet rock," Jack cackled as he counted people on his fingers. "AK's a rabbit, she ********' wears that s**t on her anyway. Chel...uh...bird? Maybe? ********, no, something more metal than that. Oh, Shitstain's a rat for sure—" Owain cleared his throat and Jack remembered himself. "Uh. Where were....oh. Christmas just sucks." Jack shrugged. "F'you like it so much, though, I'll look for somethin' t'get. Just don't like tryin' t'puzzle out gifts for people if they're just not gonna want it, y'know? Waste've money for fake thanks. M'not good at shoppin' for others is all." He paused, pressed his head back into the pillow, and wiggled his empty cup at Ian in a silent plea. "How's he been doing—you been doing?" Frowning, he tried again. "How've you as in you together been doing?"
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 11:41 pm
the pen is mightier
"Hanna..." Her name felt odd in his mouth, like it was a lump he was supposed to shape into something with meaning using his tongue and teeth but he had forgotten how to do so. Jack closed his eyes and furrowed his brow. "Y'know...I barely see her anymore," he mumbled, and he was surprised to hear how strangely bitter he was about something that wasn't even real. "Sometimes I forget we're supposed to be dating."
Maybe he shouldn't have said that, but who cared at this point? It probably wasn't even a surprise, it wasn't like he went around in public with Hanna like he used to either.
"I dunno about her. Maybe I'll hear from her, maybe I won't." He almost said don't worry about it, but even when out of it Jack knew that that was was stupid thing to say. "F'I do, I'll let you know. But prolly won't, so..." Both eyes opened and half of a smile was visible. "I'm down for it if you are."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 11:48 pm
the pen is mightier
"I wish ya would forget," Chel whined with no direction whatsoever, rolling her eyes dramatically. They were skirting dangerously close to talking about that night, and Chel wasn't sure it was a conversation she wanted to have with a Jack that might not remember it due to pain medications.
His promise was half-assed at best, but it was all she had. "Yeah ... just text me or whatever if something comes up." She could easily find duties that day to fill the void of time if necessary, that was at least a relief.
She looked down at the remainder of her gifts. "Gotta give me my hand back if m'ever gonna finish these," she told him with a daringly cheeky grin.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 12:05 am
the pen is mightier
"But I did, didn't I?" Jack said before he could remember he shouldn't, his smile fading. "When we saw stars." Or was that more forcibly ignoring the fact? Did it matter? He wasn't supposed to bring up heavy things right now. But would he when he was sober? Maybe they'll just get tossed away again (this never ******** happened), but maybe they wouldn't. Maybe something in him had shifted just enough that he could keep his promise for once. Maybe he was thinking way too hard about this, judging by the dull ache growing in his head again.
Either way, something twisted in his chest just skirting the topic, and he eased it by running his thumb in circular motions over her fingers the way he might over a worry stone. He was loathe to let them go and it showed. If Chel never finished gift wrapping, then clearly she'd never get to leave and he'd never wake up alone again. (It wouldn't occur to him to actually ask for something that selfish and unrealistic—no, clearly a hostage situation was the correct path, the only way to get what he wanted without looking that pitiful.) But eventually his grip loosened and she could slip away.
"Sorry," he mumbled quietly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 12:33 am
the pen is mightier
The chills that Jack's rotating finger sends up her arm are unreal, but she forces herself to kiss his knuckles and relent her grasp. Her resolve is solidifying, even as he brings up the starry sky, even as her eyes are drawn to his lips (which at the moment are slightly deterring because they're sickly). She doesn't want a confession he will later blame on medication.
"Nah don't be sorry. I like holding your hand," she said quickly, easily able to drop blunt facts like that, but unable to form half a sentence about how she felt. But she pulled out another small ornament and a piece of paper. "By the way, you still doin' okay? Need water or anything?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 8:34 am
the pen is mightier
Something in his expression sank once the anchor of fingers was gone, but he turned over his hand and became fascinated not just with the spots she kissed but the sensations they spawned when he flexed them, the very structure of the knuckles themselves as though he had never seen them before. Jack pressed the knuckles to his lips as Chel went back to work.
"Water," he replied from behind his hand. "I like it too, hands, miss it...But..." His hand slipped down to the pillow as he have her a quizzical look. "What about the report? Need help?" He seemed to have forgotten their first exchange.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 9:33 am
the pen is mightier
Chel set the half-wrapped ornament in Jack's lap, handing him the tape in a "finish this while I'm up" fashion.
She stood to get the water if only to hide the crimson that tinted her cheeks from his relatively open comment. "I'm avoiding the report 'cause that shits too hard," she said grumpily. Repeating it for Jack was no trouble. "If you wanna give it a shot you can, but I don't think yer gonna get far sweet pea."
The report was deliberately left where she'd set it down before, and she handed him the small dixie cup of water. "Let me know if ya want more er anything."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 10:08 am
the pen is mightier
"Oh yeah, 'cuz've your..." Vague gesture around the eyes. "Sucks. S'okay, I got it. I'll get it. Like to write things: makes them more...permanent, I dunno."
But first he had to do this tape job. Face set in concentration, Jack carefully set his arm cast on the box to keep it still as he tore the tape with some difficulty. It was frustratingly slow work, but he was satisfied with the messy job afterwards if only because he had completed it.
"Beanstalk," he corrected her with a mild but pleased smile as he presented the gift in exchange for water. "Not sweet pea, not small. I touched the China clouds. I rode a dragon." He still sounded awed by that, as though what he did remember couldn't possibly be real. "Did you see?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 10:11 am
checking in
He was one fourth amused by Jack's current state of mind, one fourth exasperated, and two fourths concerned about the long-lasting impact of the medication combined with his injuries. Ian offered him a faint smile, tugging at the bracelet on his wrist as a matter of habit.
"Okay, well, you've got half of that right," he said. "People aren't gonna be friends with everybody, I'm definitely not. But still, Jack, what does that make you?" The Ripley is a pet rock comment he let slide, only because of the current situation, though Ian did make a face at it. "You're Jack ******** Hawthorn, you've gotta be something more than that, though."
He reached out and plucked the cup from Jack's fingers, disappearing around the other side of the curtain again. "I'll be glad with anything, really," Ian said, his voice a little distant. There was the sound of a nozzle turning, water running, and then he reappeared, this time with a full cup. "You know me, I'm easy to please."
A smile was offered as Ian held out the cup. "Maybe I'll get you more dinosaur sticky notes."
It took him a moment to puzzle out what Jack was trying to ask, and when he did, the smile on Ian's face grew a little softer, a little more affectionate. "We're good," he said, unable to completely hide the glow of happiness that seemed to be in his eyes every time he talked about Shiloh. "We're still trying to figure out wedding stuff, you know, when to get married and all that. But hopefully things will settle down enough for it to happen soon."
He waffled a minute, and then said hesitantly, "You're still gonna come, right? To our wedding?"
It was probably a bad time to be asking, but it was important.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 11:03 am
the pen is mightier
Chel sighed, but she was already up and the report was only a step away. "Anything you put down's gonna make more sense than me, beanstalk." She really didn't want Jack writing down the events of the mission, lest it trigger him, but if it was what he wanted she would let him have it.
She took the wrapped present with a smile, calmly patting his head in approval. It went into the plastic bag too, with JASON written across the top.
"You did?" she said with equal awe, putting the report, clipboard and pen in his lap and hand. "I didn't see naw. Was focused on not gettin' a sword in my gut," she patted her stomach, pulling the candycane dagger out of her mouth where it had been held while she got water. "But that sounds metal as ******** dude."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 11:27 am
checking in
He smiled lazily but his gaze became a little more lucid and a little more guarded. What does that make you? Are you still coming? Important questions indeed. His head needed to stop spinning. Or the room. Or both. But if they both spin, maybe it cancelled out...
"Yeah m'still goin'," he replied as he tilted the cup to his lips. "Have to. Best friends, right? Free booze. Said you'd be t'gether. Have to watch it happen so I know m'right. S'good for you, bein' happy. Have to see happy sometimes; bein' all sour makes it boring, nothing to complain about except complaining. Need something happy in a shitty world. Bein' right's not always bein' happy, but I wanna be there 'cause it's both this time. 'Cause it's friends." Jack was glad he didn't have to worry about inviting other people, though: he distantly recollected that Ian wanted a small ceremony.
He drank some more and considered. What are you? He liked the what so much more than he did the who, but he didn't' have an answer either way.
"N' cause I've never been to a wedding, just funerals," he added with a shrug. "Might be a nice change. Can I bring Barbara? You need music, right?"
And then a belated, slowly dawning expression of hope lit his face up.
"Wait...didja say say more sticky notes?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 11:47 am
the pen is mightier
Pleased, Jack forced himself to sit up with a grunt and pushed his hair out of his face in preparation for...s**t that was a lot of black ink on that white page. It wasn't that he couldn't read it necessarily, but it was like the meaning of the words themselves kept floating away. He read the name space just fine, but the date prompt became a floating series of numbers in his head until he realized it was meaningless binary. He didn't even know what day it was anyway.
"Yeah," Jack enthused as he tried scanning the same line multiple times, eyes growing increasingly squintier. "I don't remember much right now, but we were...." Flying. A snippet of open air and too much sky hit him and he froze as he trailed away. Then Jack pressed the pen to the report, slowly writing one word on the mission summary: dragon. It was in cursive just to be fancy (and because the flow made it feel better to him in the way an orange laugh did). "Really, really, really ridiculously high up," he finished with less energy.
The page became a jumble again, and he wondered if this was how Chel felt when she looked at it: needlessly difficult and hard on the eyes. Making a soft noise, he put the pen down and rubbed his eyes.
"That was Chiyoo, right?" he asked. "What was it like, fighting him?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 11:58 am
the pen is mightier
"He wasn't war general for nothin'," Chel said, unable to hide the admiration in her voice. "Possessed Serah for a while too. Ya can thank Wren we did anything at all."
She took a gulp and said, "One of the visions ... it was the battlefield, but like- whatcha callit- an alternate universe? Chiyoo stabbed me through." Her hand went to her stomach, fingers lacing over the scar Evan had given her. "Then I came back, and I knew someone had to take him out ... that was what made it hardest." But she put on a smile for Jack, if not a somewhat sad one. "But I did it right?"
All of this would be compiled into a report later, albeit with much less feeling in words on paper. "Last one," Chel announced, wiggling the box of candycanes. The entire thing. Obviously it was Dawson's present (albeit, she had also intended to make cookies out of them, but now it felt relatively disgusting to do so). "Sure you don't want one 'fore I pack it up?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 12:31 pm
the pen is mightier
He flinched and instinctively reproached her, "No more dying, remember?" But he observed the sadness in her smile and wondered why it was there, why she always had to feel sympathy towards what they were fighting. It just made things harder. And yet this had been a strangely difficult mission anyway, not just physically strenuous but emotionally draining; the dragon's cry reverberated in his ears if he thought about it, the fall of the earth, she ditched us--
He shut his eyes hard, took a breath, and opened them again.
"You did it," he agreed, putting on a not-so-sad-but-still-tired smile in return. "I did it. We did it. We're alive. Will celebrate on Christmas, then." Jack slipped the pen into the clipboard holder and put it on his tray for now. Maybe he'd come back to it later if Chel didn't take it with her.
Which meant she was leaving.
He eyed the box. "I can have all've 'em?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 1:48 pm
the pen is mightier
Chel cracked a laugh at Jack's immaturity. "Ya can't have all of 'em." She pulled one out and unwrapped it from its plastic confines (she wasn't sure how difficult or not difficult that would have been for him), then handed it to him. "But ya can have one. If the lifers yell at me I'm kickin' yer a** later."
You know, when his a** was actually in a state to be kicked.
After the candy was handed over, she put her elbow on the bedside, chin in her head as she looked at him with a tilted head. "God I am just so generous, damn."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
