Another houseguest (Elizabeth)

[Emily Littleton] It has been a long while, now, since the Singer girl first brought Elizabeth up to the third story of the Lakeview building, fitted a key into the lock on a hunter green door and pushed it open to reveal the vast expanse of hardwood and dead space that was her apartment. Arguably, this was infinitely more homey than her previous place, and more fitting for guests as it had -- get this -- furniture beyond an IKEA table and chairs, dressed up by authentic linens from Provence and a restored antique rocking chair.

These things are still present, augmented by a hand-me-down couch (which is quite comfortable for lounging and sleeping), bookshelves, a coffee table reclaimed from Good Will, and a fireplace to warm the flat through the cold Chicagoan winter.

There is, too, a small furry denizen named An which, despite its literal translation, must actually have been Chinese for Destroyer of Tapestries, Guardian of the Rocking Chair. Perhaps also: Snuggly nuzzler of black pant legs. Today one might think to add Huntress of the Unrealized Mouse, for the not-quite-kitten seemed certain that there was something worth stalking between the chair legs surrounding the table.

Emily's place is neat, kept clean to almost ascetic standards. There are a few tasteful ornamentations, but nearly everything has its place and is kept there. Her kitchen utensils are organized within their drawers. By now, Elizabeth has likely found the box of pictures, all in simple black frames, that Emily pulls out and selects a few frames from when she wants to change up the few spartan photographs that hang on the walls. Each frame has a white mat, whereupon is written a city name and country. They are kept in chronological order within that box. Emily does not impose these standards of organization on anyone else but she keeps to them with a thoughtlessness that belies they are both habit and nature.

There are phone calls, now and then, between her and her family. She has a brother (of sorts) in Manchester, which is the only place that she refers to as home. When her father calls, she answers the phone in novice (but ever improving) Mandarin. And tonight is a night when her father has checked in, and they have discussed things of far away places, and something of Emily's future, and they are saying their good byes while she places the kettle onto the stove to heat water for tea.

Tea is a ritual at Emily's home that is almost as ingrained and fluid as her particular neatness. Tea starts most mornings, greets almost any houseguest, stays her temper after a tough day, loosens the knots in her shoulders on Friday when it's time to relax. There is a collection in the cupboard and Elizabeth has been encouraged to make use of it, good use of it, to comment on it and add to it if she wishes.

Most importantly, Elizabeth has been encouraged to make this place her own as well. Emily offers her the bedroom, and has offered to sleep on the couch. She's an easy housemate and does not bring home company, rarely brings home anything more than homework. It wasn't this way a year ago, but it is this way now. This is a Sanctuary, if it isn't quite holy. This is a quiet restful place, without a television or even a radio. These things can be simulated by a laptop. They don't clutter up space. That sort of silence could get to some people. That sort of quiet, empty life could seem strange.

[Elizabeth Zhao] Elizabeth has made her stay at the home as unobtrusive as possible. It isn't that she seems skittish or doesn't consider it home for now, per se, she is simply someone who leaves a very small living space footprint. She carries little with her, and what she has is enough to fit in a small backpack; that backpack is not her luggage necessarily, it is simply that she uses the items that she has on a daily bases.

She refuses to take the bed, as she is perfectly comfortable sleeping on the couch herself. She has slept in far worse places and, after all, her ascetic sensibilities do not jive with making someone else change up their comfort in favor of her own. She absolutely participates in tea and, when she has been able to, has added a few varieties of green tea to the collection.

The one thing that she does make use of is Emily's washing machine, if she has one. Elizabeth does a lot of work for people in various neighborhoods and she is known to come home with dirty clothes to run through.

However, she has not been home in a few nights. She has been…out, probably doing her usual Samaritan work. She doesn't come home some nights, so it's not unnatural for this to be the case. Two nights out is a bit odd, but not outside the realm of possibility. When she opens the door though, shutting it quietly behind her, there's something…oddly tentative about it. She hasn't slept in a couple days, from the looks of her. She pauses, listening for signs of the other in the house, and then moves in further.

[Emily Littleton] There are washing machines in the building basement, and Emily has made sure that Elizabeth has her own keys, her own places to put things like toiletries and any belongings her asceticism allows her to collect. There's access to wifi, if the Akashic has a digital presence to maintain. But never once does Emily seem off put (or even relieved) by the fact that Elizabeth's life is so whittled down she can carry it in a knapsack. It does not seem at all strange to the Singer.

And so the two women, and one adorable cat, are able to share the one bedroom flat without much getting in each other's way. It's a blessing, to have someone who is as considerate as Elizabeth, and Emily has mentioned it once or twice in passing, perhaps as they are sharing a meal or on the rare occasion that she turns her laptop into a movie-viewing-station and attempts to consume pop culture of some film-based variety. Maybe on a visit to Tekakwitha Woods, which Emily frequents more often than one might assume.

But Elizabeth has not been home for a few nights, and this is something that Emily thinks about, quietly, as she leans against the counter and reaches up to place the flat of one palm against the back of her neck. Her dark curls are tied up in a loose bun at the back of her head, long limbs are swathed in yoga pants and a pale pink longsleeve tee. There is a glimmer of silver at her neck, a thin chain that supports and antique oval locket which Emily wears against her skin.

She is barefoot. The fireplace glows with low-burning embers. The house smells like jasmine and green tea and the citrus-hued remnants of whatever she'd made for dinner. At the sound of a key in the lock, Emily's attention flicks naturally to the front door but she doesn't move from her lean against the kitchen counter. Instead she waits. When her housemate enters, she smiles a bit and watches her with a clear, focused attention. A keen awareness.

"Greetings and salutations, friend," she says, her tone touched through with just a delicate wryness, a warm and slightly twisted undertone, a thing that asks without asking. "Would you like some tea?" she asks, inwardly grateful that this is a soothing and restful blend.

Emily is already moving to pull a second mug down from the cupboard before Elizabeth answers. Of course she would like tea. Of course she would like a hot shower, a soft bath towel and to curl up in comfortable clothes before the fire with that mug of tea and one of the throw blankets that An has not been allowed to terrorize. Emily assumes these things, but still makes the pretense of asking.

[Elizabeth Zhao] She sees Emily and gives a faint smile, nodding a little bit. "I would very much like some tea, thank you." She looks over her shoulder…she's a little bit antsy at the moment. She has good cause. She looks back at the Chorister, watching her for a moment through tired eyes. Her clothes are dirty, a few small holes ripped here and there. The holes look at least a couple days old.

Despite all of this, the Akashic puts on the semblance of etiquette. That faint smile ratchets up a notch, and she inclines her head. "How are you?"

[Emily Littleton] There are things that Emily does, for people she hardly knows, people she deems worthy or welcome or finds some measure of compassion for. She invites them in, she makes them dinner, sometimes they stay for unbounded stretches of time. She is warm, in a reserved and almost politically polite way. Sometimes she even softens. But she does not ask obvious questions, or look meaningfully at the holes in Elizabeth's clothing or worry outwardly in evident ways.

Emily is self-contained. She is regimented. She is not wasteful.

The Singer pours tea with a practiced grace, a sort of reverence for the task calling up echoes of her resonance. There is a reason she trended toward the Singers, even if her personal Faith is not up for discussion or foisted off on anyone. Reverence, though, is threaded through the very being of her. Like a lamplight, even when it is low burning, it is bright.

"I'll warm some leftovers," she tells Elizabeth. She doesn't ask. "The towels in the bathroom are fresh, if you'd like to clean up." There's a warmth here, quiet and unimposing. "It's just pasta and greens with a citrus sauce tonight, nothing fancy," she adds.

It is Ash Wednesday, and so begins the meatless weeks. There will be fish on Fridays, but otherwise they're going vegetarian for awhile. Emily isn't mentioning the holiday season outright, but she will keep her observances and alter them only if Elizabeth requests.

Maybe the Akashic goes to clean up, and returns refreshed and renewed. Maybe she elects to take her tea and settle on the pale upholstered couch, knowing Emily a) does not care if it gets soiled and b) likely has some mundane-yet-magical way of working out any contaminant.

As to how she is doing? A slightly broader smile, one that warms her eyes a little, and the faintest nod answer that she is well. There's a particularly erect cast to her posture, a slight hint that she's been talking to her father recently, that echoes of being the Diplomat's Daughter have come forward yet again to pretty up her pronunciation and tuck in the frayed edges of her etiquette.

"Please. Don't let me trouble up your coming home rituals. Be home, get comfortable, and then we can catch up."

[Elizabeth Zhao] She opens her mouth as if to protest the offer of food. She isn't feeling hungry, though she probably should eat. After a moment though, she just gives a little nod of gratitude. Either she doesn't feel like arguing or she is willing to acknowledge that she is not outside of the realms of such trivialities as needing to eat, at least every few days.

"Thank you. I will go change and then be back." She slips away to change into another set of clothes. She isn't gone for more than a few minutes before she returns. When she does, her hair is in place and she has scrubbed her face; the clothes have been changed to a simple robe and pants. She is barefoot now as well, and she moves to take a seat, to sip at her tea.

"Have you perchance spoken with anyone? Ashley, or Israel, or…anyone?" She doesn't know who all was aware of what went down…who has passed what on to who.

[Emily Littleton] Emily knows how easy it is to forgo basic necessities when you're tired, or stressed, or haunted, or hurting. She has mastered her own personal form of dysfunction, but Elizabeth has not been witness to that uncoming just yet. So far that Singer has been fairly stable, albeit it often absent. And there has been time when she explains, by a note on the fridge or a warning via text message, that she will be away for a collection of days due to travel. Where the graduate student could possibly need to go with that frequency was anyone's guess. Her passport and its maroon cover were well traveled, worn in and familiar fellows.

By the time Elizabeth returns, Emily has warmed a plate of pasta and brought that out the coffee table with her tea. She's taken up one end of the sofa, folding herself onto it such that she can lean back against the arm and fold her legs up indian style. An has decided to give up the valiant search for the ghost mice, and curls herself up into Emily's lap only to be rewarded with careful fingertip caresses and a softening of the Singer's usually gaurded smile.

"No, not lately. After Gabriel's friends left town," she does not call them The Horsemen, "I've been somewhat divorced from the community." She needed time. She needed solace. She needed to regroup from what had happened with Solomon and to process the shifting politics. Emily needed to re-determine her loyalties, re-assess her commitment to the House and its resident cabals.

"I can contact Ashley, though," Emily says, which intimates that she knows where the Hermetic is staying. There's a slight upward trend to her voice which begs the question: Do I need to?

An ventures out of Emily's lap when Elizabeth settles onto the sofa. She strides in long, lazing seeming cat-steps to where she can butt her head against the Akashic's elbow. The youngling cat does not mewl or meow her greetings, but rather purrs them resonantly as she rubs her lean, lith body against Elizabeth's side, leaving a tawny swath of stray hairs behind.

[Elizabeth Zhao] She sits down, sips her tea. She does not eat yet...she can do so soon enough. The Akashic looks...tentative, at the question that Emily poses without saying. Do I need to?

She looks down at An, and smiles a bit more. It is a proven fact that petting an animal produces more serotonin, which of course relaxes one and makes them more at ease. Elizabeth does not know this scientific detail, but she does know that the action is soothing. Even if not, she would do it anyway.

She looks up after a moment. "There was...an incident in the West Division last week. The tornado? " A question, in case Emily had seen the news. "And I went to go investigate. I have uncovered… some sort of phenomenon happening. A homeless man who wanted to fly, and did. Once, before he tried again and hurt himself badly. The roses blooming throughout the city. I believe they are all connected. Some sort of wish granter."

She pauses, stroking the cat again. "I was down there to see what happened. Ashley was there too, and another of us. I do not know his name, but I believe Ashley knew him. There was a fair amount of chaos…people watching the wreckage of the tornado and such. Something began to occur…a giant hand, scooping out a tunnel. Out of nowhere. And then a lady appeared. The Black Madonna…I had come across her in my research. When she appeared and the hand…we lost our connection to our bodhicittas. Our Avatars. It did not return until we had left the vicinity.

Emily may have heard the news reports about havoc breaking out last Tuesday in the area Elizabeth mentions. She may not have. Elizabeth simply looks at her.

"We separated after. I did not want to return immediately, in case there was some threat of being tracked. I refuse to endanger your home like that."

[Emily Littleton] "I appreciate that," she says, of Elizabeth's discretion. The Singer holds her mug of tea in one hand, with her fingers slipped through the handle and her palm against the ceramic, curled inward, so that when she brought it to rest idly against her sternum there was the insulation of her fingers, her shirt between the heat and her softer skin. She is thoughtful for a moment, lips pursed and eyes downcast and veiled by the sweep of dark lashes.

Emily whets her lips, draws a little breath, and follows up that gratitude with: "But this is not my home. It's where I live, and where my things are, but this is not a place you have to protect at all costs. If it were, I would not let anyone else in. If you need to come here, then come here," she says, even knowing about the fate that Ashley's flat and Molly's had endured. "I don't say this lightly, so I hope you believe me: If my flat burns to the ground, I will worry after the people who lived here, and An, and lament the loss of a rocking chair and few other things. Losing it would be an inconvenience; it would not devestate me."

She is untethered, perhaps dangerously so. Emily's materialism is largely pragmatic. She has nice things, but she does not form overt emotional attachments to them. They are things. Just things. And this is not her Home.

"Has your connection to your bodhicitta returned?" she asks, using Liz's parlance without any hesitation or slip in pronunciation. In the company of Euthanatoi, she calls them Atmen. In her private studies, it is her Avatar or her Soul. With others, it may take of many names. She is not picky about language; language is a tool.

"Do you think the Madonna is connected to the flowers and the wish-granting?" Emily asks. These questions indicate that she was not aware of the happenings in the city. To accent that, she breathes out and adds: "Apparently I need to get out of the lab more." There's a wry twist to it, something with dark amusement that doesn't try to introduce too much levity. Just to give them both a bit of breathing room from the tension and worry.

[Elizabeth Zhao] "It returned soon after we left the vicinity, yes." She nods. "I was...disconnected from my previous incarnations, as well." Oddly, that seems to bother her more than actually having lost her connection to her Avatar and her ability to do magic. One of the two is enlightenment...gained and lost over the various turns of the wheel. The other is something she has lived with her whole life. She forces a smile. "But that has returned also."

"I know that she is connected. Arther had mentioned--the homeless man--that just as he had been wishing to be free and fly away, a woman with golden eyes and cocoa skin had stepped up to him. After this, he flew. And there was a rosebush not far from that location. The Black Madonna--and there are other iterations of this personage in other mythologies...are mother goddess archetypes. The Christian theology posits that such an image has appeared for centuries at times, with sightings throughout Europe and elsewhere. Arthur turned into a dove--a bird with obvious ties to many mythologies--and with wish granting."

She nods a bit. "There is no doubt, there is some connection."

[Emily Littleton] Emily sips from her tea and listens. She's excellent at listening, but less forthcoming with information or advice from her own side. Mostly because she's absented herself from the House, from the ebb and flow of information that passed through its main cabals as much as possible.

"I don't know much about these things," she confesses easily, but there's no regret to it. That ignorance will not remain for long. "But I'm usually good at finding things out when I need to. Have you already looked into the mythologies, or would it be helpful for me to search for cross-references, or any historical patterns or allusions I might be able to find online?"

Perhaps surprisingly for a Singer, Emily views the online resources as something of a modern Library of Alexandria or Tower of Babel. She has even found fragments of a demon's true name burried among the random madness and noise of the blogosphere. This is not an idle thing she offers, though it will seem unassuming enough. It will seem like an off-hand thing, easily brushed a side. Most of her significant offers are like this. She had off-handedly convinced Elizabeth to come stay, and what was that, a month ago? More?

"I have allowed my influence at the House to lapse, but I've no doubt that between you and me and Ashley we could assemble some sort of broader understanding. The flowers trouble me a bit. When we divested the energy from the Asylum Node, it was channeled outward into parks and gardens. It's possible that that is responsible for the early bloom, but I'd be curious to see if the forces patterns and life patterns at the places where these flowers and wish-grantings coincide with the locations Israel chose to hide these bits of grace and quintessence."

She breathes out a little, her expression shifting to something annoyed for the briefest moments.

"I have not spoken with Israel or Mr. Ward since Gabriel died." She says this, because it is the greater tragedy in her mind than losing a rouge Technocrat. "We are not exactly on pleasant terms," she confides. It is a subtle way of saying she's still angry about what had happened.

[Elizabeth Zhao] She nods a little bit, listening. She nods in acknowledgment of what Emily says, about where she can help and where she'll be less helpful. Elizabeth is hardly a plan mastermind; she is used to working on her own as a general rule. That's what happens when you travel from city to city for a nice, long time.

"I have done some research, and cross-referencing into other cultures. Mother goddesses, earth goddesses, it is fairly prevalent. The roses...I believe they have to do with the Madonna in some way as well. There are connections mythologically there as well. But yes, I do believe that we should get together and discuss this."

A pause, as she confides about Solomon and Israel, and she gives a nod of understanding.

[Emily Littleton] "I'll ring Ashley and see what we can't do about gettin' together. It's more complicated than it used to be," she admits, perhaps with a faint tinge of regret, "But I'm sure we can figure out something."

There's that certainty, the firmity that underscores some (someday to be all) of her existance. She's steady (or steadier than she used to be); she's sure.

Emily leans out toward the coffee table to set her tea down, now. She smooths her hands along the lines of her yoga pants and she leans back into the couch. Now there's a bit of gentle concern that colors her expression, something that takes this conversation toward a more compassionate light.

"How are you, Elizabeth?" she asks, and there's something intimate and personal to the sound of the Akashic's name, spoken plainly and without reservation, partnered with that rare press for a more empathetic answer. After all of this, which could amount to a status report of a sit rep or business, the personal question is a stark change. A concession. An inquiry that gently beseeches but does not press. Never pries. Never expects an answer.

[Emily Littleton] [ PAUSE! FADE! Something! ]

Never apologize

[Emily] It is overcast and cold, tonight, and the moon hangs slip-thin behind a blanket of clouds. The moon would be little more than a fish hook if Emily could see it and somehow that sat right with her, this half-hidden false moon, the pretension of luna-light, this weakened pull on the moonbright that sloshed about in the marrow of her bones. It is cold, but not freezing. She's been here long enough to appreciate the nuance.

Emily wears no hat. No gloves. Her heavy winter coat has been left, closeted, tucked away for another time. Tonight it is her leather jacket, fast becoming and favorite and staple in her wardrobe (and not only for what it can conceal), over a soft amethyst-hued sweater. Dark slacks. Boots with a slight heel that left an audible click with each footstep's passing.

Her messenger bag is slung across her body, its bulk nestled against one hip, moving with her in a practiced and easy way while she walks. There's purpose in her strides today, even if that press and certainty has to be feigned at times. Her hair falls in loose curls and waves to just beyond her shoulder blades. There is something composed about her that wasn't there a year ago. Time changes a person; time passes quickly.

There is a bench, here, in the park, where they'd first seen each other again. After he'd gone away. After he'd come back. It'd been a time of uncertainty, of reacquaintance, of shifted and shifting expectations. This is where she says she'll meet him, watching the fountain which is still and silent in the darkness. Remembering.

[Jarod] Time changes a person; time passes quickly.

This was the month he'd left, a year ago. This was the month he'd gotten Rada's letter, the month he'd found Ilana. This time last year, he'd still been working full time as a model. He'd still spent most of his weekends flying back and forth between here and Asia. He hadn't had to think of the welfare of any person besides himself. He had not been accountable.

He'd been drifting.

This time last year, he'd have greeted Emily differently. He'd have touched her - put his hand on the small of her back, leaned into her space, kissed her temple affectionately. This time only a few months ago he'd have greeted her this way. He didn't do any of those things today. Instead he approached with a slow, thoughtful gait, and sat down beside her on the bench with a polite bubble of space between them. Not close, not distant. The kind of space that acquaintances kept.

He'd been reserved when she'd called him earlier. Aloof, but not unfriendly. And now... here they were in the park, at night, while winter's breath touched the landscape once more. And it felt... both like and unlike many times before.

He'd been on campus today. The clothes he wore reflected this much: a black wool knee-length coat, left open in the relative warmth, a pair of tailored black pants and a burgundy sweater layered over a white collared shirt. It made him look both professional and academic.

"So how turns the world of Emily Littleton?" he asked with a soft smile.

[Emily] They both knew how tenuous anyone's hold on another person was. He'd left, this time last year, for whatever the reason. He'd come back six months later, to a city that had changed. They had been close, in some certain ways, when he'd returned but she had never been the same. There was a sadness in Emily that she kept close, bundled up and buried. Tonight it was all but invisible; he caught glimpses of it in the silences between what they said and what they didn't dare to.

Last year she had been warmer. Bright and untested. But time passed, and Emily had grown closer to winter herself, colder, a little more rigid and concealed by the first blush of frost.

And still, somehow, there's a flicker of something at the corners of her mouth when he joins her on the bench. Kept distances, or not. Personal space bubbles, or not. It is just the ghost of a smile, something subtle and tinged with regret and tarnished with time -- but still, a small smile, delicate thing, incompletely hidden. His.

"Smoothly, some days, and on others like a thing off-kilter," she replies, keeping her voice likewise soft, falling into a cadence more like what she might keep with Kage. It feels like dancing, this, and she has forgotten all the steps.

"I hope you and Ilana are well," she says, with less guile and trickery than she might have managed. It is not playful but rather genuine, stark and honest and bare beneath the moonlight. It is a step toward center without pretenses.

"I have your Christmas gift," she says, curls the last word with sadness and amusement, coddles it like a broken thing, fragile. This admission reminds them both of how long it has been, and perhaps it is the wrong thing to say, but once it's out in the open she cannot bring it back, swallow it down again. It is. It turns, like her world. How? Well, that will be up to him tonight.

[Jarod] [Starting with the subterfuge already are we?]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 5, 5, 5, 6, 8, 9 (Success x 2 at target 8)

[Jarod] Emily hoped that he and Ilana were well. Jarod offered a small nod of response to this. An acknowledgment. "Ilana's well. She'll be done with elementary school come summer." (And everyone knows what that meant. Middle school. Puberty. Boys. Teenage rebellion.) "The company is doing well. I retired from modeling last month." He paused before continuing. "And I'm back in school." Like her.

A Christmas gift, she said, and it brought with it memories of the woods, of crisp, frozen air (not like tonight, when the cold in the air was just this side of freezing and humidity lingered.) Christmas was a letter written in verse (not his own - he wasn't a poet) and white roses that existed beyond the laws of nature, because sometimes memories had enough force and meaning and will behind them to take up roots and leave a lasting mark. At least, for a time.

They hadn't spoken of Christmas gifts this year. It had come and gone.

But she had one for him now, evidently. Christmas in March. There was a long stretch of silence before he raised an eyebrow curiously. "Oh?"

[Emily] [Rarely-rolled dice pool, don't fail me now!]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 4, 4, 5, 5, 10 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Emily] He tells her about Ilana, and the impending end of her elementary school career, and Emily's smile softens a little further. She had always cared for his daughter, since their first tentative meeting, when he handed her a red-stemmed leaf and stepped away to talk to the strange Singer woman in private. Ilana and Jarod, together, had drawn more warmth out of Emily last Fall than most had seen in her during the latter half of the year. Certainly more than any had seen this winter.

So it is a fight to keep the familiar walls from slamming up again, pushing him out. She's only gotten better at it since last year, the half-truths, the misleading smiles. Emily slips a hand into her messenger bag and pulls out a small, rigid box. It's about the size of her palm, on each side and is almost perfectly cubic. If he opens it, there will be a small, delicate thing, wrapped in paper to excise, to unwrap and then: a faintly blue cut glass bell. Tuned perfectly to the key of A, not even a fraction of a step off perfect pitch.

"I owe you an apology," she says, hands emptied now that he's taken the box from her. Emily takes those blank plams and rubs them along her thighs for a moment, then settles them, hands clasped, in her lap.

"I went to Praha this Winter and I thought that I would just be able to come back," she says, and there's a clear accent to how she says the place, like she'd learned its name from a native speaker. There's also a little art to how she lays out the words, faint but telling. She is trying to communicate more than she is trying to obscure.

"I thought I would either hate the city, find nothing redeemable, convince myself that I have not been missing all these years and write it off wholesale -- or find something to love in it, and that maybe by facing what happened there I could come home again." She says the word without reservation. Nestled in it was the broken hope that she might come back, to him, a bit more whole.

"I thought of you and Ilana when I saw this, and I got it for you without even thinking..." Emily's voice trails off for a moment. She breathes in a little, lets it go. "But when I came back I..."

A longer pause.

"I didn't call. I didn't know how to, and I'm sorry for that."

[Jarod] And there it was. There was the thing, you see. It was care. It was gentleness. It was thoughtfulness. Mostly, it was honesty when honesty was the last thing he'd been expecting.

The last time he'd seen Emily, at Ashley's, there'd been this impossible span of distance between them, as if they were speaking to each other from very far away. Perhaps he'd expected more of that tonight. Perhaps he'd assumed she would pretend that nothing at all had happened last year, between the months of October and December.

But she didn't. And she'd gotten him a present. He took the box from her slowly and opened it, unwrapping the bell carefully. He held it in his hand. Rang it once, very softly. It looked like it was made of ice. It looked like it should burn him like ice - a frost burn - when he held it. It didn't. He smiled a little, softly (nostalgically.) "Thank you. It's lovely."

Then she said she owed him an apology. He looked at her while she spoke, wrapping the bell back up and placing it inside the box once more for safe-keeping.

He kept his eyes on her until she said the last... that she didn't call because she didn't know how to. He glanced away then, looking out at the empty park. At the fountain in its stillness.

"I know," he said. Simply. Quietly. Not cold, but understanding. I know. Because he did know. Because he understood better than he wanted to. "It's alright, Em. Never apologize for looking after yourself. However you need to."

But the tone of his voice had a slight echo of sadness in it. Something he couldn't entirely keep hidden.

[Emily] [... Pause! ... Only one subterfuge roll so far, I'm proud of you kids. ;) ...]