Scene #8437:

Owner	Pose
Lilian Rook	The return from Union New York is long and silently tense one. Though Lilian decompresses ten minutes far away from veryone else, it only causes her to deflate in exhaustion. She responds very little to anything, ventures no topics of her own, keeps her dull eyes at the ground in front of her instead of the horizon, and stays close enough to Tamamo's side to seem clingy, but refuses to place her body against her. A cold, skin-prickling air of unease hangs over the journey, microscopically intensifying, bit by bit, with every one of Lilian's quiet, trudging footsteps. It's another hour after arriving home before she reappears. Her shoes are discarded carelessly, with evident disgust, then a shiver runs up her spine and she fastidiously squares them away. She hugs her arms to herself, and trudges off into her room. The door is locked the entire time. At a few points, Tamamo can hear pacing. A few more times interspersed between them, muffled sobbing through the door. It seems like it could go on all evening and all night, but Lilian doesn't take long. Still wearing those entirely unlikely clothes, still with her hair up, Lilian sits at the table near the balcony where we played board games and holds steaming tea in her hands that she apparently made herself for once in my life. She doesn't look towards Tamamo, but the awkward air and the way she stares at the seat of the opposite chair make it uncomfortable not to settle in too; not that doing so feels any better. Only once the two are face to face, does Lilian drawn in a deep, shuddering breath, and say, "I'm really sorry Tamamo. I should have said something, but I couldn't think of what. I should at least . . . You don't have to worry about me. Nothing . . . that shouldn't have happened, happened." Gingerly, Lilian touches the gauze at the side of her face. The teacup audibly rattles in her grasp. "I really, really screwed up. Worse than it's ever been. It won't happen again."
Tamamo	Even at that uncertain cold, Tamamo maintains her warmth. She's capable of that no matter the dire circumstances, though it's a question of talent and skill as much as thought and feeling. The difference between a wild and natural heat and the steady flame of 'the face she chooses to show' is a subtle one, without both familiarity and a similar talent. She wishes to be warm for Lilian, even if she wishes to not quite touch, and so, she does. Just standing near Tamamo is enough to feel something of her. That must be a trait of divine spirits. But she doesn't press, yet. All questions are innocuous, and no firm plans are made. That lasts long enough for Lilian to retreat to her room, and if Tamamo stays around to spy for overly long, she's politely subtle about it. She wouldn't direct a prophetic mirror past that door. Close enough to pick up sound from the outside, maybe. Just maybe. She doesn't need to guess too wildly to know that there will soon come an opportunity to talk about it. And so, they do. Tamamo made her own tea, with two cups, though she fills only one, setting the small tray close enough to Lilian that she wouldn't have to lean over to touch the other. Tamamo holds it as if to warm her hands, even in the Summer ambience. "It is perfectly ordinary to worry over one whom you love, is it not? It is 'normal,' I would say, to show such care, and to show it always. As to whether I 'must'... it can hardly be helped." The next words slip out like a half-conscious whisper, "It is not as if I could stop myself from loving you." Tamamo sets her cup down, and slowly reaches out one hand, her palm up, fingers not quite together. Her nails are done in a pale, just slightly glossy pink. "I know not what it is you promise that shall not occur, though I cannot imagine that it is 'becoming hurt.' Come, now. Will you not allow me to heal you?" There's a pause that's just slightly too long, a hitch in the rhythm of her voice, a hesitance that shouldn't be there, "Will you say that your wounds are something deserved, and that they should not be so easily recovered?" The thought hurts her, and she can't quite hide it.
Lilian Rook	'It is perfectly ordinary to worry over one whom you love, is it not?' "Ye--s I suppose it is." Lilian mumbles, staring into her tea so that she doesn't have to look at Tamamo. "I just . . . wonder if it's still a good idea to be doing that. Still. Loving." Her teeth grit, and her jaw audibly creaks. A hard swallow, and then she bursts into short-lived bitter laughter. "God. I remember when it was the other way-- when I was pathetically clinging to you and crying like a baby and begging you not to go anywhere. I feel sort of ridiculous in retrospect. That I'd go that far and then do this anyways. I really am a little kid." She takes another slow drink. Tamamo can smell jasmine. 'Come, now. Will you not allow me to heal you?' Lilian's hand claps to the gauze. Her eyes suddenly dart up to Tamamo as she shrinks back. "No. No I-- this is-- I deserved to get these, so don't--" 'Will you say that your wounds are something deserved, and that they should not be so easily recovered?' A strangled wheeze escapes Lilian's throat with the rest of the sentence she'd started babbling over Tamamo with. Her eyes drop to Tamamo's chin. Her voice comes out squeezed tight and strained. "God. Don't . . . if you knew I was going to say that, if you know me that well, then why even ask? Don't I always get everything too easy? Don't I always get everything my way whenever I don't like something? Maybe for once I should just accept what happened like a normal person and stop using people." Lilian takes several tries to successfully breathe out. She tips back half her cup at once, gasps quietly when it hurts, and then squares up her shoulders with a tiny cough. Her gaze drips from the point of Tamamo's chin and settles on her collarbone. "I'm sorry Tamamo. I'm really . . . really really sorry. I was supposed to be getting better-- getting good enough to deserve you and I didn't. When Ishirou died I--" Her voice catches in her throat. The strangled sound of air trying to escape rebellious muscles, clenching as a matter of survival, traitorously taking Lilian's own good out of her brain's hands, takes ten seconds to resolve into words. "I-- . . . did some things to Petra . . . That I can't take back. Because of him. And . . a-and . . . I-I don't know if I can stay the same after doing it. I don't . . . I-I don't deserve help after what I did. Everyone being as shitty as normal is just . . . I'm just glad they didn't change. Everything would change if anyone knew. A-about it."
Tamamo	Tamamo lets out a breath. "There was another time, when I saw that you held a scar to yourself, because you believed it was yours, and not because it would not heal. No, I suppose, that is not quite right. There is always a degree to which one chooses one's scars, and a degree to which the same is nonsense." She mulls that over a bit. Her hand is still outstretched. "How could I not ask? You know that those others only left your wounds to you because they believed I would heal them, yes? You deny them just as you deny me. Or... is it that I must speak in plainer language, for you to know? Has my heart not been open to you? Perhaps this is my own fault." Now her hands draw together, and to her breast, her eyes closing as she takes in a breath. They open only narrowly, but the gold glows, as if catching and concentrating the light. "My Lilian, I wish to heal you. I have chosen to make your pain, and your happiness, my own. Do you claim a right to deny me this?" The glint of one prominently sharp canine in her thin smile almost makes this seem like a joke, even if the humor is hard to find. It's mere sense of warm laughter, off somewhere in the distance. There's no sense that she does believe such a right exists. "You could, if you so wished, deny me a place by your side, but you cannot deny love. It was you who taught me this very thing, whether or not you realized you had done so. You may make your excuses and your protests, and they will not change my wish. I wish to heal you, and to not allow me to do so is to deny me. Will you do so, once more?" When she says the next name, it's with all the sense of distance as between the Earth and the Sun. "Petra Soroka, was it? It is more difficult for me to imagine a reason for--" She pauses. "You feel guilt... over her?" Confusion erases the cold apathy. "Why is this? What is it that she did to you?" Not 'you to her.'
Lilian Rook	'There was another time, when I saw that you held a scar to yourself' ". . . That was different." Lilian murmurs at the table. "I got that one in the act of trying very hard to do something awful, and it turned out okay in the end, but I didn't want to pretend it never happened. It's . . . to remind me of what you did. And Xion did. And Phony did too. It stays there because I can look in the mirror and think of the time I pulled back from the brink, and that there are a few people who care about me. Even if everyone else would rather just pretend and forget." 'How could I not ask? You know that those others only left your wounds to you because they believed I would heal them, yes?' "They left them because they think it'll pass." Lilain suddenly hisses, hot and vehement; the first sparks of life out of her are bitterly acerbic. "I'm tough. I can handle it. I always put myself back together when I break. I don't need anyone. They'd just get in the way. I can figure my own shit out. I don't need them, but they need me. They don't know what to do anyways. That's how it always is. They gawk and stroke their chins and feel important they get to see, and then they leave it all to me, because I'm strong when it's convenient, and when I'm weak, they lose their shit and hate me." 'Do you claim a right to deny me this?' Lilian breathes in sharply through her teeth, and stifles a cough. She quickly drains her cup to the bottom quarter. It's a placebo and she knows it. Jasmine tea won't fix her head right now. "No. I suppose not. It must hurt you too, right? Seeing it. But if you get rid of it, it'll just make-- . . . other people, even madder, and they deserve to be furious with me, so I don't want to--" 'I wish to heal you, and to not allow me to do so is to deny me.' Lilian twitches. Only Tamamo would ever recognize the way she looks. Scared. "I-I'm . . . I'm sorry, I just-- . . . I want to try and behave for once, not . . . be pointlessly defiant. I get it. I understand. I don't want to hurt you. But . . . just let it go away on its own. Please. It's better for all of us."
Lilian Rook	'You feel guilt... over her? Why is this? What is it that she did to you?' "Yeah." Lilian croaks. "I do. And I don't know if you'd still love me if I told you what I did. I was just so-- she killed my friend-- someone I thought was my friend-- and she tried to-- she almost got me failed out, and fired, and barred from-- she knew and she said-- she outed me in public, or tried to, and-- she helped--" Lilian stops just to violently shake her head. "God it doesn't matter, I just did it because I'm sick. I'm not well. Nobody else would have, even if someone did die. And I can't fix it. I can't even talk to her anymore, leg-- There's no way. She did a lot of shit to me, but it wasn't even . . . It sort of . . ." Lilian tapers off into strangled squeaking; she knows exactly how ridiculous what she's saying sounds. "Not her fault." "They lied to her. About me. They told her everything wrong, and made me out to be some . . . fucked up monster. A ticking time bomb. And they all took her side, just because she hated me-- they related to her over that, even though they say they're my friends to my face. They helped her over and over and over again and told her she was good and they let her get away with it and never stopped her and never helped me and lied to her about everything because--" Lilian suddenly slumps forward, slamming her elbows on hte table and lowering her head. She has to, to raise her voice. "I don't know! But they set her up! And it was fucked up! I did all of those abominable things to her and all I found out was that she didn't know anything! And then it was too late to fix anything! And now everybody gets away with it, like always, by looking away, and she's hurting when all she really wanted to do was to help me and be better than she is, and nobody else is going to help her, and I'm the only one who takes the fall; who has to carry everything." Lilian slowly sets her tea back down, holding her breath for the count of ten, then letting it out slowly. Her throat sounds raw just from that short outburst. "It's fine. That everything bad falls on me. I'm the monster in all of this. I deserve to get hurt. But she doesn't, and a lot of other people do, and it won't be like that. It . . . God, it shouldn't have been like this."
Tamamo	'They left them because they think it'll pass.' "Even those who know me little put voice to that I should be the one to care for you," Tamamo says, firmly. "They may be fools, and cowards, and liars, but this is a fact that has come to pass, that I should be relied on so, and that trust should be placed in us that I may do so and that you should allow it, if only from myself. They are right to trust me, are they not? If I cannot do so, then who might? Of course," as if obvious, "they know not what it is they should do, otherwise." But she lapses back into silence for the rest. 'Please. It's better for all of us.' "Often have I trusted you, and it feels a betrayal that I would not. And yet, you have here admitted that you are sorry for not having told me of your pain, and that you should have done so. Should I now trust that I need not know of that of which you speak? I do not know 'them,' or why they should be made furious, or with whom they..." Tamamo's voice, quickening, stops as she blinks back tears. "I do not know, and I do not understand, and I do hurt. You have chosen pain, which hurts us both, yet you cannot explain as to why. For whom is it that you wish to 'behave,' if not for my sake? If that was your only wish, it is one that I could grant." Again, golden eyes blink. As evening comes, the light fades, though it still catches. "But that is not enough, is it? Your aims have ever been grand, and I have resolved not to hold you from them. I love you for these, as well, and it would be... something less than love, I think, were I to spirit you away from everything that pains you, and attempt to make my own feelings your whole world." Again, a whisper, "...not that I do not imagine it." 'Not her fault.' "No," Tamamo says, with sudden, icy firmness. "You cannot absolve her of what she has done, even if others lied to her. You may choose to forgive her for what she has done to you, but cannot erase that she has done so. She has, to me--" Another stop. Another breath. Tamamo's cup is empty, and she pours another. She takes a sip. 'I'm the monster in all of this. I deserve to get hurt.' "You said this yourself, that these were lies told to her. How can you deserve to suffer for another's lies? How can you take responsibility for all that she has done? How could she have done any of this out of a desire to help you? Petra Soroka has transgressed against me, and I have not forgiven her for this. Her sin is this: that she hurt the one I love, and even after doing so, left my love with the belief that all fault lay with her, and none with Petra Soroka." It doesn't quite have the force of a challenge. These's too much sadness, behind ebbing anger. "Have I said anything that is wrong?"
Lilian Rook	'They may be fools, and cowards, and liars' Lilian shudders slightly. A tiny bit of tension leaves her posture. Like just hearing Tamamo saying it makes her doubt her own sanity a little less. Makes her feelings more normal. 'They are right to trust me, are they not?' "They . . . are." Lilian says, slowly. "And they're shitty for forcing you to be strong and carry it all, too. I'm sorry." 'Often have I trusted you, and it feels a betrayal that I would not.' "Please . . ." 'you have here admitted that you are sorry for not having told me of your pain, and that you should have done so' "Please . . ." 'I do not know 'them,' or why they should be made furious, or with whom they...' "Tamamo." Lilian is tearing up as she says it. As if she knows Tamamo is already. One breaks free and rolls down her cheek; she doesn't blink or notice. 'I do not know, and I do not understand, and I do hurt.' "I'm so, so sorry." 'For whom is it that you wish to 'behave,' if not for my sake?' "I can't-- You wouldn't understand." 'Your aims have ever been grand, and I have resolved not to hold you from them.' "No that's not-- It's nothing like that Tamamo." 'it would be... something less than love, I think, were I to spirit you away from everything that pains you, and attempt to make my own feelings your whole world.' "Don't make me choose." Lilian gags, as if she vomited the words and not said them. Her face is so pale it's a wonder she can sit up. "Don't make me choose between you and him. I'd want to choose you. With all my heart. But I don't know if I'd have the guts. And if I did, I'd lose everything else but you." 'You cannot absolve her of what she has done, even if others lied to her.' Lilian reacts to Tamamo's icy tone, jolting, as if screamed at; caught out in long seconds of mind-blanking confusion and threat. "I . . . I-- You're right. I know you are. She even apologized to me. A lot. And I didn't say she shouln't. I just . . . I don't feel like I have any right to be angry. I'm not allowed to, after what I did." Lilian's gaze wanders away, staring intently at a knothole in the wooden flooring. Her figers squeeze around her upper arm. "You don't have to forgive her. I'd just . . . appreciate it a lot, if you understood. That she's a little like me. When I was younger. Trying so hard to be something she isn't yet; willing to die if she can't make it, and set up to fail by everyone else. I don't want everyone to hate her like everyone hated me back then too." "You can not forgive someone and still want to help them, can't you?"
Lilian Rook	'How can you deserve to suffer for another's lies' "That's not why." Lilian gasps, desolately. "Even though she did all of that, it doesn't . . . make it right. It's not like that. You can't do horrible things once someone reaches some . . . negative score with you. I should have been better. I'm always talking about being better. But back then--" Lilian squeezes both arms around herself. "You wouldn't be saying that if you saw it. Throwing her in solitary so I could go screaming about Ishirou and what she did; abusing her and making her miserable and hitting her and choking her and breaking things and losing my fucking mind because I just couldn't deal with it anymore." "We wouldn't be talking like this, if you saw that sickness take over. Even you would have to feel something if you saw me just disassociate like that. Holding some powerless girl down and cutting and burning her while she screams and-- until the fog wears off, and I just feel sick to my stomach. I kept trying to stop, and I kept saying I wouldn't go back, and I kept doing it anyways. For weeks. It was like an addiction. Hurting her was the only thing that worked; it made sense, and it made me stop thinking, and it made me feel better about things, for a little while. And I could hardly bear to look at you, because I just felt so . . . filthy. " 'Have I said anything that is wrong?' Lilian takes a long, long moment to herself. She thinks of a hundred possible ways she could find some technical fault, deflect Tamamo's concern, and turn it around. "No." she says, instead. "But you love the best version of me; the one that I want to be for you. Not the disease that eats up the rest of me. You're not wrong, to be angry with her and worried about me and hurt and confused and--" "But he's not wrong to hate me either. He's right that I'm fucked up and I can't be trusted, and I just . . . I can't. Right now. Disobey. I don't have it inside me."
Tamamo	'And they're shitty for forcing you to be strong and carry it all, too.' "I chose this, before they could ever ask. I would be offended were any to try and take it from me." 'You wouldn't understand.' A twitch, like she was slapped. Tamamo's eyes slide away. "Perhaps not." 'And if I did, I'd lose everything else but you.' Gently, "I know. I know, and that is why, I will not. You should wish for more than I. You should wish for love and for the world, and sacrifice neither for the other. That is neither greed, nor foolishness. You have this right." 'I don't want everyone to hate her like everyone hated me back then too.' Tamamo finally takes a sip of her second cup of tea. It's fine. It's still warm. She looks to the side, again, with her, "I see." Thinking of something she doesn't say. Maybe it hasn't fully formed. 'You can not forgive someone and still want to help them, can't you?' "You may," is the grudging response. '. . . filthy.' Tamamo takes longer to process this. A long while with her eyes first on Lilian, then closed. Steam brushes her face, and a little more of the tea is gone. She'd already failed to stop the tears from forming. One finally escapes, and slides down her cheek, though it doesn't drop. "'If only I had been there.' These are the words that resound in my mind. Is that foolish? I am, perhaps, a fool, to think that I... could save you from all that which hurts you, and that which dirties you, even when the one who harms you is yourself. And yet... still. Still...! I wish that I might be there, always, to hold you, and to hurt with you, and to take those feelings, your feelings, into myself. If I could protect you, there would be no need for apologies, and if I could not, I would know all that was done, and forgive you for it." The cup is not refilled, this time. The teapot still steams. "Should I not feel these feelings? Should I condemn you, as you condemn yourself? ...no, I think not. It is my decision as to what should be enough to shake my soul. I told you, did I not? Even if you had returned from that land of shadows as but a shadow of yourself, and even if your eyes could never properly see myself, ever after -- even if only that little of you had survived that place, I would have remained with you, for all your life, so long as you would have me. To speak of that which is 'deserved,' I cannot understand it. Though I still do not yet know the full shape of 'love,' I do not think it is something that is earned. It is, perhaps, instead... something that grows, and lives." A warm breeze. The chill that had been disappears, for just a moment, as she says, "Perhaps."
Lilian Rook	'You have this right.' "The edges of a strained, guilty smile twitch at the corners of Lilian's lips, before all-too-swiftly falling off again. "I don't know what that is anymore. I feel like I don't deserve anything at all, never mind you, but that it was . . . it was necessary, to grasp and try to hold it all anyways. I could live like that. Now I'm just doing my best to not . . . stupidly drive you away any more than I have. Even if I don't deserve you, you deserve someone who loves you." 'You may' A dizzy sigh of relief half-slips out of Lilian, before she chokes up on it again. Second guessing every sign of unacceptable emotion. 'If I could protect you, there would be no need for apologies, and if I could not, I would know all that was done, and forgive you for it.' Lilian's shoulders silently heave as she breathes in. Her knuckles are white where she squeezes her arms. The sides of her hair briefly obscure her eyes, with that centimeter of incomprehensibly failed cut. Her mouth feels dry. Her heart feels like it's in the pit of her stomach. She's so perfect. "I suppose it's . . . I don't let you protect me much. I'm always saying I don't need it, or don't deserve it, when it's . . ." "It's scary. It's so frightening, when it's someone I know would really try their best to help." 'I told you, did I not?' 'even if only that little of you had survived that place, I would have remained with you, for all your life, so long as you would have me.' Lilian's hands rise to her face. The heel of her palms squeezes into her eyes, as she nearly doubles over in her chair. Tamamo can see her body shudder by the profile of her back; her ears just barely detect the sound of a singular queasy sob where Lilian has no doubt memorized and practiced what would be below human hearing. It's incredible, in the worst way, how small and fragile she looks with those wrong clothes and that look of non-care. "Yeah. Yes. You did. I remember." Lilian says, hoarse and raw, as if she'd cried a great deal already. "I-I keep . . . getting in my own h-head, about h-how, this time, is going to be the time where you f-finally see the same d-disgusting thing I do, a-and I get so afraid of how you'd look at me. I don't know how to stop." "I don't know how to stop being terrified that one day you're going to realize and walk away like you should have forever ago and it'll all be over, like a dream that was too good. I-I don't know about . . . 'living' feelings . . . Everyone just-- . . . I'm so used to people giving up, eventually." "I'm so sorry, Tamamo. I let it get to me because I was trying to keep you from seeing. I finally proved her right once she didn't want to be right anymore, and n-now it's all-- . . ." Gingerly, Lilian touches the cuts on the opposite cheek. They look like she got them from her face grinding against some roughly cracked surface. Come to think of it, the gauze is pretty close to where that bruise was, 'back then'.
Lilian Rook	"I did some really terrible things to him as well, though. Both of them. And I don't know if I'll ever make it up; I probably just ruined things forever; for the people I'm supposed to love, and just . . . don't, and who tried really really hard to love me, and just can't. It wasn't hard to keep those things separate before; them and you. And now it's just--" Lilian sharply breathes in, then blurts out in choked whispers, all at once. "I don't know what to do-- he's wrong, about everything, and I hate-- but I really did do something that-- there really is something wrong with me, just something else than-- it's really all over for me if he tells everyone." "I have to do this. I can't come back from it if I don't. I have no idea what-- I don't know what to do but keep my head down and not make it worse. That's all I ever do. I can't stand it-- wh-when keeping still like this hurts someone else. What am I supposed to do?"
Tamamo	'I feel like I don't deserve anything at all, never mind you, but...' "Oh, my Lilian, we all deserve to wish. To wish is the least that anyone may do. You wished for me, and it was not by deserving that your wish was granted, but by another's will. There are, of course, those that receive as they deserve, however soon or late. And yet... the strings of Fate are more tangled than that, are they not?" Though her cheek is still wet, Tamamo smiles for a moment, eyes half-lidded. 'It's scary. It's so frightening...' "Is it..." No immediate response comes. There's a noise, while Lilian's face is down. It's the noise made by a chair as it moves a little too suddenly. A little too unexpected to be an elegant, graceful motion. Just a little too hurried, and uncaring, as one might be with no eyes upon them. When she looks again, Lilian will see that Tamamo is already upon her. Without being bidden, without anyone reaching out to her, nor taking her hand, she came to Lilian. She leans in and down, one knee touching the ground, and wraps her arms around her, forcing the issue of her closeness, detached sleeves soft and cool, hair smooth and flowing, shoulders and cheek warm to the touch, even with other clothing in the way. Her grip isn't particularly strong, especially compared to anything, Immune and Dame Commander, could consider threatening, but it is insistent. The scent of falling petals and sunshine should be well familiar, by now. 'What am I supposed to do?' "I do not know 'him,' but you, I know, and this, I can answer. If I must frighten you, just a little, I will bear that much." From this distance, it's barely a shift in position for Tamamo's hand to reach Lilian's neck. The sweater is in the way, again, but it's what's hidden between that has her focus. "Do not forget, it was you who freely gave yourself to me, a pledge to which you have, I see, kept." Just a little pressure. Enough for Lilian to feel, from Tamamo's fingers, past the sweater's cushioning, the inner side of her collar pressing to her skin. "What you are to do is this. You will, by the actions of yourself and others, suffer. When this occurs, you shall come to me, and tell me all that you may of the ills you face. We shall speak and cry or scream as we feel necessary, and I shall comfort you, and you shall accept that comfort. Those ills shall still exist, when again you stand to face them, though they will appear some amount smaller than they had, before. You shall entrust some portion of these ills to me, to my care and wisdom, and others, you shall take upon your own shoulders. You shall do these things as I have bid you with full confidence that you act rightly, and that to refuse me is forbidden." The words flow with a forceful heat and smoky sweetness. Halfway through, Tamamo's hand rises to Lilian's cheek, fingers just touching her hair. That controlled, authoritative force lifts, though it's replaced by another, a heartfelt, breath-catching, needy uncertainty. "I have considered the 'worst' that may be, through means other than my mirror and the threads. I have thought of this and that 'what if...?' In all of these, I have sought, found, and made terms with that which allowed us to remain together. Please... have faith, if not in yourself, then, in me. Let that grow into faith in 'us.'"
Lilian Rook	'but by another's will' "That's the part I don't understand." says Lilian. "I don't know if I'm ever going to understand it." Her words come so softly that it's as if she's afraid to breathe them. "Why anybody would. Why sometimes deserving is all they care about, but sometimes they don't care at all. I sort of understand why people hate for . . . usually no good reason. But I can't . . . I don't know when . . ." The rest dies in her throat. Its ghost couldn't be any louder. 'When someone loves me for no good reason. When they'll stop.' When Tamamo scrapes out of her seat and descends upon her, Lilian nearly screams. It isn't even close to the right sound; not even in moments of unguarded shock does Lilian make it. It's by grace of habit and inertia that she strangles it down and frezes up instead, every part of her body tensing with the irrational, adrenaline-drenched expectation of something worse; some immediate and vicious punishment for the crime of stealing touch from Tamamo, as if she weren't-- Lilian's arms squeeze around Tamamo's shoulders before she can feel too afraid to. Her chest presses to the bunrei's head, and a horrible, silent shudder convulses it, invisible only under such a loose sweater. Her fingers ball into fists at Tamamo's back, as if laying hands on her were too much, but at least, with ill-fitting clothes in the way, she can steal that much. I'm already in for it anyways. "Why am I like this?" The words are barely squeezed from her throat, high pitched and crushingly heavy. "Why does it always come back to this-- just trying not to lose my mind in the end? What's wrong with me? I keep trying to fix it and something always ruins it! Why do I hate all the people who only say they'll help and then get scared of the people who really would?! Why is it just one thing after another after another?!" "I'm not that strong! I'm not invincible! I can't deal with it if it's month after month after year after year! And I can't do anything about it, because I don't know how! All I do is-- I just-- . . . Endure it forever! Because I shouldn't get involved! Or I hurt people really really badly! Because I don't know how else to get involved!" "It's always all or nothing and I hate that my whole life is just this! Me! Going crazy! On my own! Because nobody cares or because I'm too frightened to let them! Trying to put up with everything and everyone because I'm afraid of what I'll do, until I fall apart and do it anyways!" Tamamo feels Lilian's face lethargically fall into the crook of her shoulder. Cold cheeks and wet skin presses into her warmth by gravity alone. "Why can't I just be one of those pathetic losers who yells and looks stupid and hurts their friends' feelings? Why can't I just throw something and mutter and gripe on the radio and feel better. I hate this. I hate that it's always me, the only one trying to be decent; the only one trying to keep my fucking feelings inside and do better. And I hate that I always do the worst things when I can't, so everyone is justified in hating and not listening to me anyways. I don't know how I can live the rest of my life like this." Lilian stays like that, face down in Tamamo's shoulder, lukewarm breath against her skin in absence of murmuring into her collarbone, for a painful length of time. Minutes, probably. She tracks better than Tamamo does. Words turn over in her head for ages, before she replies.
Lilian Rook	'You shall do these things as I have bid you with full confidence that you act rightly, and that to refuse me is forbidden.' "It's Matthew." Lilian whimpers. Tamamo knows who that is. "He knows everything. He can take away everything now. All I can do is stay invisible until he loses interest. That's the only thing that works. I can't-- I can't risk it, this time. And he knows it. Because of Petra. I don't know how, but he knows about Petra. So . . ." Lilian breathes in deeply, braces herself, and proceeds to say the worst and most backwards thing Tamamo has ever heard come so effortlessly from her mouth. "They've both been through enough because of me. Please don't put him, them, through more." Lilian's arms squeeze tightly around Tamamo's back. "That's all. It makes more sense for me to trust you than trust myself anymore."
Tamamo	'Why do I hate all the people who only say they'll help and then get scared of the people who really would?!' "There is much that I do not understand, but as to this..." Tamamo's grip just won't relax, like she has to keep Lilian there by force, even if it's only an ordinary, easily broken one. "Those whose actions do not follow their words. Is it not reasonable to be upset by them? I can understand this, too. Some are too weak to act, though they wish to do so. Others cannot remember their own promises, and yet others cannot be honest with themselves, and promise too freely. Whatever their reasons, they pain you, and can, at best, seek to make amends, and hope for your forgiveness." She breathes in. Her voice rises and falls, ebbing and flowing to subconsciously hypnotic effect. One tall ear, in Lilian's view, turns just slightly, then returns to that straight posture. "As for those who will... have you not said this, yourself? You cannot understand it. It is the most ordinary thing, to be fearful of that which cannot be understood, no matter the benevolence claimed. You should, perhaps... have a little fear, of women like myself. That would be... reasonable. It is not so strange." Tamamo sighs, but still sees no need to change her position. "To be immune to all things, this is a wish that is easily understood, as well. And yet, to grant it would... avail one little. One must show vulnerability, to become so close to another... no? Perhaps I have done so too little, for you to think that only through such perfection, in yourself, could the two of us remain together. Perhaps it is that I should have shown you more of my own foolishness, rather than always and forever try so hard -- did you know this, my Lilian? Have you seen that my own feats are accomplished with effort, and even then, it is, at times, not enough? I had thought you must have known this, for all that you have done to protect me. And yet, you account not for your own efforts, your care, and your love." A small shift, to look up, and lock golden eyes to grass-green. "No one else has done what you have done. Can you not be proud for having done so? None have shown me what you have shown, and I cannot imagine that any others I meet in this lifetime shall do so. It is well to think what you may do for my happiness, as I think of yours. But if, ah... if some mistake is made, some failure weighs upon you, can you not entrust that I will look past it? Would you not do the same, for my sake, should I be imperfect?" 'Please don't put him, them, through more.' "If you so wish this, I shall bring no harm to them they invite not unto themselves." That's not quite a promise not to hurt them. It really isn't much of a promise at all, unless they stay in the background and don't do anything to incur her divine wrath. 'He can take away everything now.' "Please remember this, and remember it well. There is only one person who could take me away from you. It is only you, and only by your own will. There is no one else, in all the worlds, who may do so. No matter what else is taken from you, please rest in this knowledge, that there will ever be a home to which to return, and that I will build it for you, even if I must use these two hands until my palms become rough and my cloth frayed." 'It makes more sense for me to trust you than trust myself anymore.' "Good." There's so much promised behind that word.
Lilian Rook	'Whatever their reasons, they pain you, and can, at best, seek to make amends, and hope for your forgiveness.' Lilian holds Tamamo by the shoulders, remaining tense by the arms and limp by the neck, unwilling to let go and unwilling to look up. Her chest spasms again, before she croaks out "I suppose." and a miserable-sounding "I don't know if I ever would. I can say I do, and leave it alone, and try to act normal, but that's just . . . that's just a ceasefire. I never forget it. I can't not think about all the times I just wasn't important enough. And then how am I supposed to go on secretly hating and never trusting all those people?" 'did you know this, my Lilian? Have you seen that my own feats are accomplished with effort, and even then, it is, at times, not enough? I had thought you must have known this, for all that you have done to protect me. And yet, you account not for your own efforts, your care, and your love.' Lilian shifts her weight, pressing her cheek into Tamamo's neck, resting her chin on her collarbone and trying not to sniffle into her shoulder. "It's frightening because I can't figure it out. Not because of anything else." Lilian says to Tamamo, first doing her best to be firm about that self-doubt. "Everyone-- the entire world is frightening for everything else; what they'll do and what they'll think and how they'll come after me and what they'll take. I'm ready for that. I always am. It's what they don't do what hurts. And the fact that you don't is . . ." She breathes in heavily. "I don't know. Nothing good ever happens without something bad happening right after. Whatever I do, it's just a little burst of speed; it all catches up sooner or later. So I still don't know what to think, about someone who's . . . nothing but good things." A shaky sigh turns to a singular hiccup. "It's not as if I screw up and show all of my weaknesses and flaws on purpose. That's not . . . that's not a love thing. I want to be the best I can be for you too. Every time I do this-- every time I fuck it all up and I'm miserable and you're miserable and you have to scrape me up again, it-- I don't know how it makes you love me any more. People keep saying, that I'm-- prettier for being broken and put back together, but I hate it. When's the last time? When do I get to stay together and just stay pretty?" Lilian shifts restlessly, without lifting her face enough to look into Tamamo's eyes; just to feel her warmth on her skin. "I know it's tough for you. I know you try really hard. And I suppose on some level I must . . . know you aren't . . . perfect. But I don't want you to-- even if it's true, that, you have to be vulnerable to . . . I don't want bad things to happen to you, just to make me feel less . . . outclassed. Because then something bad happened, and you deserve-- so much better." "I'd protect you even if you were invincible. I'd be here for you even if you were flawless. Even if you didn't need me at all, I'd still want you to feel loved. Just . . . that's only fair, isn't it? For everything I got. And even if I got nothing. I want to make up for everything you can't do, and give you everything you want, and-- it's so shitty that I can't just-- let go even a little bit, to let you do that for me."
Lilian Rook	'But if, ah... if some mistake is made, some failure weighs upon you, can you not entrust that I will look past it? Would you not do the same, for my sake, should I be imperfect?' Lilian's fingers squeeze Tamamo's shoulders. She starts to lift herself back up, though she doesn't look, just yet. "I don't know. It doesn't feel as if I'd feel . . . like something is going to tilt something between us, away from me, if I fuck up. Maybe it's not because you're 'too good for me', I suppose. I might just be conflating things." A sharp breath passes. "Maybe it's just because I'm not the sort of person who deserves it all. From anyone. No matter what I do. God I hate thinking about it. Being forgiven and helped. I hate when people won't because it shows they're part of the enemy too, but . . . someone like me isn't supposed to just accept it, if it's offered." "I'm just acting good. I'm not actually good on the inside. I'm trying my best, but everyone can tell my heart's not really in it, can't they?" 'If you so wish this, I shall bring no harm to them they invite not unto themselves.' Lilian releases a shuddery tension-sigh. "Thank you." she says, obliviously. "I can't stand-- not until I've made it up to them." 'There is no one else, in all the worlds, who may do so.' Shakily, Lilian laughs. Not much, and not strongly, but enough to propel her up to actually looking Tamamo in the face. Even up close, no matter what she wears or doesn't wear or how she ties her hair, she looks the exact same. The attempt itself is a farce. "Now you're just sounding like me." she says. "I'm always saying ridiculous things like that. 'Nobody can stop me. There's nobody in the world. I'll do it no matter what'. And I mean it when I do. And I'm pretty much always right. So I'd be fair stupid to say no." Moments pass by, full of nothing but soft, exhausted breathing, and slow, repetitive blinks, where Lilian gradually reacquires Tamamo's face. "Thank you for looking at me, Tamamo. All of me. Not just the good parts. I can't . . . when people avert their eyes from the bad and say they love me and I deserve everything, I just can't believe it. So thank you, for not making up a 'Lilian Rook' in your head." She pinches the corner of the medical tape between her fingers, peeling back gauze from angrily swollen purple-red skin, freshly scabbed at where it split. "Okay. If you say so, then I trust you. But I'm going to hide it for a little while, okay?"
Tamamo	'I want to be the best I can be for you too.' Tamamo's hand strokes the back of Lilian's head. "Of course. I feel this, too... the drive to show my depth of feeling, my care and affection, by what I am willing to do, to become, for you. To be the best that one may be... I feel your care in these acts, as well." 'People keep saying, that I'm-- prettier for being broken and put back together, but...' Tamamo waits a few moments before responding to these words. "I do not understand this well, and so, my words may have little value, though I have had some thoughts on this matter. Is it truly that they wish to see one broken, or is it that one unbroken intimidates them, or is it that they wish to see one who needs them, and cannot stand without their aid? It is well to be needed, is it not? And yet, to instill need for oneself in another is... suspect, at times. Though I have wished to be necessary to you, I wonder if that feeling is truly a part of 'love.' Such a feeling as for you to lean on me..." A breathy sigh, and then, "...is wonderful, even as I know there were tears that made it necessary." She says this with the conflicted air of one confessing to having enjoyed something sinful, together with that aura of heated, enveloping warmth. 'Even if you didn't need me at all, I'd still...' With Lilian not quite ready to meet her eyes, Tamamo rests her cheek to the top of her knight's head. 'Her knight,' still, even if she's neglected to keep up the usual appearances of one. "Oh, would you? My Lilian, I--" The words don't quite come. A divine figure, if a small one, yet still susceptible to choking on words and feelings. "...thank you. None could ask more of you than this. To even ask this much is less than fair. I-- ah-- please pardon me, for I do not know what it is that I am saying, now." She's finished blinking by the time Lilian does look, though the sign of tears is still there. 'Okay. If you say so, then I trust you. But I'm going to hide it for a little while, okay?' "As you like. To heal your hurt is my wish. Now... this will not take but a moment, and shall not pain you but a moment longer, if my touch is as tender as my intent. Breathe in, and hold... there. Very good."