} one more look at the ghost

[vorbarra]

WHO: Gregor and various.
WHERE: Probably primarily DC7.
WHEN: Throughout May.
WHAT: May catch all!
WARNINGS: Definitely read Gregor's general content warnings for the thread with Miles, and possibly Cordelia.

Comments

[vorbarra]

[ He leans sideways into her subtly, Gregor's version of an initiated hug. ]

Any venting you need to do right now, then? [ Guess who he'd learned his persistence from. ]

[keep_nothing]

[ She responds in kind immediately, wrapping an arm around his shoulders.

She also snorts faintly at his persistence. ] Nothing that needs doing right now. Aral got the brunt of it a couple days ago.

[vorbarra]

Ah. He can handle it. [ Merciless, warm-hearted teasing.

But then... there's a pause, before: ] I had something to ask you, actually. It's a little terrible.

[keep_nothing]

Only a little?

[vorbarra]

Well... [ A short hesitation again, humor fading. ]

I wanted to enlist you. In telling my mother about Miles and I. [ Softly, ] I can't bear to hide us, but... I don't know if I can bear to see her face when she finds out, either.

[keep_nothing]

[ She makes a small noise – not quite one of protest or a groan though. ]

I was wondering if you were going to ask. Miles hinted at it when we talked before.

[vorbarra]

You always know how to face these things.

[keep_nothing]

I'm also better suited because I'm the Betan.

[vorbarra]

That, and you never fail to make someone reexamine themselves, no matter how much they don't want to.

[keep_nothing]

I always think of it as talking sense into them.

[vorbarra]

Talking sense or bludgeoning them with their own stupidity?

[keep_nothing]

Aren't they the same thing?

[vorbarra]

If they were I'd find convening the Council of Counts much more enjoyable.

[ A short beat. ]

So you'll do it?

[keep_nothing]

Of course. Though it might take a while for me to approach it with her. I don't ... actually know her all that well.

[vorbarra]

... That's right, you couldn't have been on Barrayar for long at that point. I told Miles we had a deadline of a month. So we couldn't coward our way out of it.

[keep_nothing]

I'd only met her a few times, most of them formal so we couldn't talk casually except maybe once.

[ But her smile comes back at least in part, the corner of her mouth quirking up. ] A whole month, huh? Generous of you, Sire.

[vorbarra]

[ Gregor rolls his eyes. ] I'll trust your judgement if you'd like a different timeline, Lady Vorkosigan. That was mostly for Miles's benefit.

... It'll be an opportunity for all of us to get to know her, it seems.

[keep_nothing]

I'm just not sure how long it would take. Deconstructing a whole lifetime's worth of cultural belief structures isn't that easy to do, or even planting just a small idea to shift it however slightly.

... But I am glad. That was one of my biggest regrets.

[vorbarra]

I don't expect acceptance to happen overnight. I just don't think we should put off actually telling her the reality of it indefinitely. Whatever her resulting opinion ends up being.

[keep_nothing]

[ Quietly, she reaches for his hand, giving it a light squeeze. ]

[vorbarra]

[ He squeezes back. ]

... It seems having more time to adjust would be to the betterment of our argument, [ he says in a soft tone. ]

[keep_nothing]

That's generally true. Increased exposure typically leads to more tolerance and gradual acceptance.

I'll try my best, love. [ Her hand on his goes still for a moment. ] Ah ... should I be refraining on endearments?

[vorbarra]

What?

[ Gregor looks at her in surprise. It's so hard for him to adjust to this less self-assure Cordelia sometimes. ]

No, of course not. This hasn't changed... ah, how I see you at all. [ He lets a little of that peek through the link with her, a small warm stream through the window. ]

[keep_nothing]

[ She is less self-assured at this age, the twenty years she spends forming that relationship with Gregor non-existent for her. She's essentially the same otherwise, but there are moments when she realizes that she doesn't want to presume anything.

The small stream helps though. She reaches through that window right back, a warm breeze blowing softly back. ]

I didn't think it had, not at all, and I certainly haven't changed how I feel about you. I just wasn't sure ... if it was appropriate with your mother here now.

[ She says it that way deliberately; "your mother" rather than using Kareen's name. But it's not about decorum or even necessarily about politeness. Kareen's already been through so much, the last thing Cordelia would want is to hurt her by having her think Cordelia had some sort of claim on her son, something that would take him away from her again. ]

[vorbarra]

[ It's hard for Gregor to explain how he sees Cordelia. He's never been able to remove the foster- from foster-mother in his head, but that's made her role no less vital to his well-being; she is her own unique entity in his life and he's never felt the urge to qualify that.

Yet it's also difficult to admit that directly, how important she is to him, while at the same time how emphatically he does not see her as his real mother. She's always been someone he borrows from Miles, to him, for all that all parties involved do the lending gladly.

Gently, ] The day you worry about what is appropriate rather than what is true is the day I'll really start to be concerned.