Room 505, Sunday Morning

[thismaskiwear]

Katchoo didn't even wait to get out of bed, most mornings, before the smoking started. Today wasn't any different, since today more than anything she just wanted to stay there. She'd have loved to pretend the last few days hadn't happened, but she'd hit maximum denial capacity apparently.

So, denial not an option, she lay staring up at the ceiling, not giving a damn about the ashes drifting to the floor from the cigarette dangling from her hand and severely annoyed that she did still give a damn about a couple of other things. The sketchbook she'd had on Thursday lay open on the nightstand and was now completely filled up with drawings, some of them rough renderings and others more thoroughly fleshed out and shaded, all of them looking a lot like Francine.

[OOC: Post is for sooooooomebody.]

Comments

[thatsamilkshake]

The person outside the door looked a lot like Francine too. Just less lovingly detailed and more like she'd spent Sunday evening with her head under her pillow crying until she had to take a break to re-hydrate. Damp hair from the shower than didn't work to clear her head and a complete lack of Merlin's shirt because the associations were Just Too Weird Now completed this particular piece of art.

Francine had more than one stupid stupid thing to try to fix today, but there was no way she was going anyplace else but here first. "Chewie?" she said softly as she knocked on the door.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Katchoo groaned and rolled over, flailing at the empty soda-can currently serving as her ashtray until she found it, managed to dump the still-smoldering butt in, and then knocked the whole mess onto the floor along with an empty Smirnoff bottle.

At least she didn't step on the mess as she blundered her way out of bed and to the door, looking just slightly that side of purgatory in a long t-shirt, dark-ringed eyes just a tinge bloodshot, and the severe bedhead of Been Here Since Saturday Afternoon.

She pulled the door open and blinked blearily up -- groggy and out-of-focus or not she knew exactly who was there. "Francie?"

If she sounded a little less than thrilled, it hadn't been a fantastic last meeting. Or, well, the problem was really that parts of it had been.

[thatsamilkshake]

"Hi." If she sounded a little less than certain of herself... that would be pretty familiar, actually.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

More than familiar, although Katchoo was normally supposed to sound more confident in counterpoint than she did today when she hesitated for a second or two before she spoke up, and sounded skittish when she did. "Geez, sweetheart, you look like hell. What's wrong?"

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine's answer quickly turned into a helpless snort when she realized she didn't have one. "Oh, everything. I look like hell?" She reached out to brush bedhead of snakes might live in there now out of Katchoo's face.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Katchoo actually flinched -- not away, just a tiny momentary recoil that was over as soon as it had begun. "You'e been crying."

Mmm, deflection. Good tactic.

[thatsamilkshake]

Not small enough that Francine didn't see it and feel something twist in her gut when she drew her hand back. "Merlin and--" And Arthur and wow did she not want to see that whole scene play out again in fast forward, thanks Fandom. Francine shook her head to clear it. "I screwed up. Did I...with you too?"

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

No. Yes. Both. Did it matter? Katchoo thought of Friday night after Caritas, that girl whose name she didn't even know, and bit back all of those answers.

"'s only screwing up if you know it's wrong, and you don't stop."

Funny. That sounded a lot less bitter in her head.

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine shut the door behind her and leaned back against it. "It was. Wrong. Something was messing with us."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Katchoo folded her arms over her chest and leaned against the wall. "Making us do things we didn't want to do?"

That question was more carefully worded than you might think.

[thatsamilkshake]

Not that she was trying for credit, but Francine deserved some, for not taking the easy yes. "I wanted to. Then."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Once again, Katchoo didn't know if that made things better or worse, and the constant question was driving her crazy. Crazier. Something. Still, she'd definitely give Francine credit for that, even if she did want to scream at the same time.

"Yeah. So did I." And, you know, still did. "It wasn't just us anyway, Francie," she offered as if that made things any better in contrast to the last time.

[thatsamilkshake]

"I know. Oh, believe me, I know." Francine didn't mean the bark of laughter to come out so bitter, either.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

"I'm killing Chuck Bass, you know." This conversation would be so much less awkward if she could actually hate Merlin, but dammit, she almost kind of liked the kid. At least there was a convenient scapegoat of sorts.

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine reached up to tangle her fingers in wet hair. "Chuck didn't do anything." Except stare, but come on, he was a guy. In fact, Chuck Bass confronted with a naked girl and not doing anything was a miracle of restraint that even Francine could recognize.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

"He has eyes," Katchoo said darkly, and hard to tell which word there was the most cynically significant in the way she said it. (It could even have been 'has,' as in 'still, and I should get on fixing that.') Dammit, even without everyone's hormones out of whack she wanted to tangle her fingers up in Francine's hair, and Katchoo twitched her hands into fists and twisted them more tightly into the fabric of her own shirt. "You're not something for him to ogle, dammit."

Hey, Chewie, and this is related to that sketchbook of yours, remember that in a few years, okay?

[thatsamilkshake]

"You don't need to protect me." Francine's smile turned a little less lemon-filled for a second, because that tone and those words, at least, were normal. "But I love that you try."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

"Always." Not that either of them realized it, but there was a little something of Tambi in Katchoo's expression. This was where she'd usually be reaching out to touch Francine's cheek, but today she just kept her hands twisted into her shirt and looked up instead. "This mean I can't get on anyone's case for making you cry?"

[thatsamilkshake]

"That wasn't Chuck." That wasn't an answer either. "There was ... I stopped myself with you, but I didn't manage with somebody else, and it was all..." Confusing and awful and weird. "It was me, though. You'd have to get on my case."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Yeah, no, that didn't help matters at all, and now Katchoo felt really guilty, and jealous, oh, and guilty. Mostly that. "It was the entire frikkin' island, Francie."

[thatsamilkshake]

"I noticed." Francine curled her fingernails into her palms in frustration at the look and the sound of Katchoo. Being over there. "But the entire frikkin' island can deal with their own crap. They didn't hurt the person they love most in the world and not know how to fix it."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

"Maybe they did. You don't know that." That was an astoundingly selfless statement for Katchoo, but it was the easier statement to make. "And maybe it's not something that can be fixed. Hell if I know."

[thatsamilkshake]

And Francine had thought she was done with the crying. She stared at Katchoo until the colors started to get fuzzy, then wiped hotly at her eyes with the back of her hand. "I--. Don't even know what to say here. I'm sorry."

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

If there was anything that could get Katchoo and her six fixed water signs to back down, it was that.

"Francie . . ." She moved forward almost before she realized it to wrap Francine up in a hug; it hurt less than seeing her cry. "It's done. It sucks, but it's done, and I love you."

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine wasn't going to turn down the hug or the words or Katchoo right there but her eyes still itched and her stomach still felt like the world had dropped out from under it. "I just. Back in the art shop... When I figured out something was wrong..." She didn't have words for it, and hated that.