maskormenacelogs | if you wanna stay

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if you wanna stay

WHO: Sarah, Sarissa, Clara
WHERE: De Chima
WHEN: Nebulous points between the 18th and the 26th
WHAT: Just some freakouts
WARNINGS: Will add as necessary

for sarissa: [ After their short text conversation, Sarah goes outside to wait for Sarissa, pacing up and down the street. She doesn't smoke cigarettes, but situations like this make her understand how easy it would be to start. She needs something to do with her hands, besides wring them together, which is what she's doing right now.

Jesus. Can't they ever catch a break? It's one thing after another, and it never seems to stop. ]

for clara: [ Since Cosima and Alison have gone missing, Sarah has taken to spending time at the places they can usually be found. She'll spend a couple hours skulking around near Alison's house, then a few hours at Cosima's, then make a trip to Cosima's lab. Just in case. She knows it's getting ridiculous, but it's a way to pass the day.

On this particular evening, she's wrapped herself up in one of Cosima's old blankets and fallen asleep on the couch in the lab's Chill Zone. She doesn't even wake up when the door to the lab opens and someone appears in the doorway. Whoops. ]

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Uh. That makes this easier, then, I guess.

[ It takes a couple minutes, but she manages to find what she needs: a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, a set of long tweezers, and some fresh bandages. ]

Last time I had to do this, all I had was a bottle of whiskey and my fingers. Lucky you, eh?

Yeah, I'm getting the royal treatment.

[She smiles, a bit too bright and forced for the circumstances, as she unwinds the rest of the bandage.

The wound looks just as it did twelve hours ago - small, round, and incorrect. There's no angry tissue inflammation, no pooled blood. Just a dark hole, leading down to a single bullet embedded in bone.]

[ That's. Okay. That's not what she was expecting to see, and she's not sure how to react. Not feeling pain she'd written off as one of Clara's superpowers. Handy. But the way her wound looks is... wrong. Sarah can't see a way to ask about it without being rude, but since she's about to go digging the bullet out... ]

What's the matter with it? [ Tactful, as always. ]

[Clara thinks for just a moment, her eyes fixed firmly on the wound, before she calmly reaches for Sarah's hand. She moves the fingers down her arm - cold, still skin - and places them right where her pulse should be. Right where her pulse isn't.]

I'm a bit less normal than you probably hoped.

[ Sarah's first thought, above all else, is: God dammit, Cosima, why can't you ever date anyone normal? Her second thought is that she's glad that George, despite technically being dead, isn't dead like this, with the cold skin and the pulselessness and... then her third thought is that, oh, she's touching a dead person and the dead person is sitting there talking to her like everything's fine, and she jerks her hand away, startled. ]]

Jesus Christ, oh bloody hell—

[ Then, taking a deep breath, she recovers somewhat. ]

Sorry. Sorry, just wasn't expecting.

It's okay. You're allowed.

[She sits patiently, chewing on her bottom lip, as she waits for Sarah to recover from the confession.]

Hey, normal's overrated anyway, yeah?

[ It's a lame attempt at making up for being an asshole, but it's all she's got. She unscrews the bottle of peroxide and holds it up, considering. ]

I guess you don't need this.

[She wrinkles her nose a little, uncertain.]

Might want to stay on the safe side. I still need your sister to help me figure some things out.

Okay. Uh, maybe it'd be better if you didn't watch, yeah?

[ Since Clara seems new to being a corpse, and if she's anything like Sarah, watching this might make her sick. ]

Alright.

[She tilts her head away, steeling her jaw, and squeezes her eyes closed.]

Okay, go for it.

[ Sarah pours some of the peroxide over the wound. The fact that it fizzes, despite Clara's condition, is a strange relief for her. She pokes at the wound with the tweezers, hesitantly at first, then more confidently. It helps that Clara isn't flinching or trying to pull away. Once she locates the bullet, it's not hard to get the tweezers on it and with a tiny bit of wiggling, she pulls it out and sets it on the lab table next to them. All that and no dry heaving into Clara's lap! Victory. ]

There it is.

[Clara's shoulders fall in relief, and she lets out an unneeded breath.]

Oh, thank god. [A single, nervous laugh.] And thank you. I'm guessing you've done this before?

Yeah. Once.

[ Sarah starts winding the clean bandage around Clara's arm, more out of a desire to not have to look at the wound anymore than to prevent infection. Still, her touch is surprisingly gentle. ]

[Clara doesn't blame her a bit - it took her hours to muster up the courage to examine it herself.]

I don't have much experience with bullets. Only gun I've ever held was more of the "ray" type.

So what the hell happened, then?

[ She's not judging, but she's confused. And honestly, she's having a hard time picturing Clara with a gun. ]

I've been doing some investigative work. [She doesn't know Sarah well enough to entrust her with the details, even if she is Cosima's family.] Didn't make it out the door fast enough last night.

Does—did Cos know you're doing this shit?

[ Not that it's any of her business, but she'd at least like to know that her sister wasn't encouraging this dumbassery. ]

No. I didn't want her to worry.

[She's only just gotten into it over the summer, anyway, without the distraction of work.]

My life has never been safe, not back home. And it's what I chose, to roam the universe and save people and planets, at the risk of myself sometimes. But here, with Cosima and Brianna... I love them. I wanted this life to be enough.

[ Sarah's lips twitch in a wry smile, not because she can't relate to what Clara's saying but because she can relate a little too much. It's always been her problem, too—trying to keep moving for the excitement of things, loving her family so much but her love for them not enough. Not enough to make her stay, in the end. ]

I've got a kid too, [ she settles on, because saying everything else would be too much. ] Used to want the same thing.

[Clara looks back up at her, eyes soft and gentle and a little bit sad.]

... I thought I'd settle down and have my own, one day. I always wanted babies. [She says it like she knows it's foolish, with her lifestyle. Adventure is the one thing she can't live without.] Lost my chance, though. So this was nice.

It's not over, yeah? Cosima could come back. Even if she doesn't...

[ She takes a deep breath. She doesn't know how to say these things, really, but it's important to her. She has to at least try. ]

It's a good thing, what you're doing for that kid. Even if Cosima's gone, you can still be a family.

[A tentative smile.]

As long as she'll stay. Cosima was the fun one. [It's meant to be a little joke, but... it's entirely true. Clara's a schoolteacher. She has a university education in how to gently but firmly direct rowdy preteens towards making wise decisions.] I used to be a nanny, for a living. I'm told I still have the voice.

Fun's good and all, but. It's the feeling of being safe that's important.

[ She clears her throat and averts her eyes, a bit awkward. ]

I grew up in foster care. It's important to me.

[Clara's eyes widen a bit, and she tries to hold back the flash of concern that follows. Sarah doesn't seem the type to accept anything that looks like pity.]

... I'm sorry. [Okay, so sometimes formalities are necessary.] Glad to hear you've got such a big family now, though. I always wished I'd had sisters.

Yeah, pretty sure I've broken some kind of record for "most biological siblings."

[ Oh wait shit they're supposed to be quintuplets. She recovers after a barely-noticeable pause. ] Feels like it, anyway.

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oddbod - 2016-08-28 18:16 (UTC) - Expand

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coppelganger - 2016-08-30 01:07 (UTC) - Expand

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