smilestopscars | A House, Currant, Maine, Saturday

"No, I know you're busy," she said. "And I've been busy, too, these last few months." She ran a nervous hand through her hair, sitting up to regard Ezra with dark eyes. "Started school again. Started therapy. Got a dog." She smiled a bit, though it was a little sad around the edges. "Moved. Again."

"Oh?" he said, watching her carefully but masking it into something approaching idle curiosity. "Where to, this time?"

You already know where, Ezra. You do. It was the nervous gesture, the tilt of her smile, he knew what those spelled.

"You know where, Ez," Kathy said quietly, unknowingly echoing the narration. "Otherwise you would have gotten an invitation to come visit me there, help warm the house."

She paused, and added, "I mean, the invitation is still open for you if ever you want to take me up on it. But I know better than to ask."

She raised a hand to caress his face again, but paused, inches from his skin, uncertain if he'd want her touch right now.

Ezra took her hand and pressed it to his palm, his fingers pushing between hers just a little bit. But he didn't say anything.

The light behind his eyes had dimmed, considerably, and his expression was carefully arranged neutral.

"That's why I want to make more time with you here," Kathy said, lacing her fingers through his. "Because I don't want to lose you. And I don't want you to feel you're losing any more of me."

"Mm-hmm," Ezra hummed. The agreement was genuine, and soft. But he was keeping his mouth closed for a moment.

Lest he say something he'd regret.

Kathy cast around for something else to say, something to make it better, to make him understand. To explain how she'd lost people one by one on the island; Raven was gone now, and Alluka and Ringo, and even Eliot and the crew were looking for somewhere else to live. How she'd be losing everyone, lonely and sad, waiting for those few days when people visited to perk up again.

How she didn't want her fear to define her, to keep her from doing more than it already did.

But she didn't know how much any of that would change, how much of it would even matter. "I'm so sorry I'm hurting you with this."

It wouldn't have made a difference, because it wasn't really about her. Everything about her reasons to move were obvious and they checked out completely. That wasn't what his reaction was about.

It wasn't anything she'd done, and therefore it also wasn't anything she could undo.

"It's Limbo City that hurts me," he said, as matter of factly as he could. "Not you."

"I know," Kathy said. "I'm still not a huge fan myself and Limbo City only scared me, it didn't hurt me." She pulled his hand up to her face and lightly kissed the back of it. "But I also know how distant it felt when the guys moved there, a place I hated. And how far away they felt when they were there. And how much I had to fight not to ask why I wasn't enough to stay."

Dante had even offered. But she'd turned him down, knowing he'd smother on the island. But that didn't mean she hadn't wondered that anyway.

She shrugged at him. "Maybe you don't feel that way at all. But I know how I felt and I don't want you feeling that way, too."

"Darling, I love you," Ezra replied, the backs of his fingers brushing against her cheek, "but I don't want to talk about it. Not now."

And it wasn't really that he wanted to shut the conversation down, it was just that --

"I can't." He couldn't, he didn't have any of the words that he needed.

"Okay," Kathy said, nodding. "I can go, if you want. If you need time." She'd get that, she really would. "I would like to stay. I'd like to cuddle up with you and talk about random nonsense, but I can go, if that's what you need."

"It's not."

He should've said more, should've reassuringly been more like his usual self, but right this second he couldn't muster up a front like that. But what he could do was reach for her, and try and gather her up close to him.

"You can stay."

He shouldn't have done anything but what he did. He didn't need to perform for her, especially not now.

She slid into his lap, wrapping her arms around him and resting her head on his shoulder. She didn't start chattering though, not right away. She wanted to give him some peace to work through things, if that's what he needed.

She was content to be quiet, cuddled around him, letting him just be.

But he always had to perform for everyone.

He found her weight on his lap to be a comforting thing. His arms wrapped around her, tightly. Not too tightly, of course, but so that they were a solid circle around her, keeping her close to his chest. He rested his head against hers.

Didn't say anything. Not just yet.

One day, she'd like to see what happened if he didn't. Not for her.

Kathy was content to be still, to hold and be held, cuddling close and offering her warmth even as she stole some of his. If things were different, she'd try to soothe and comfort him another way, but now she was worried that even a kiss would be read in the light of her news; that she offered it because she was worried or guilty, not simply because she wanted to kiss him. The only thing that moved was her hand, sliding into his hair and playing softly with it, hoping that said some of what she was trying to get across.

Ezra closed his eyes as he felt the hand in his hair, and sighed, trying to let some of the tension bleed out of his shoulders. Though he would've preferred not to acknowledge the tension at all. But it was there. Just another inconcenient truth.

Slowly, his hand began to draw gentle circles against the small of her back.

"So, the reason I was so late today?" Kathy murmured, taking that lessening of tension in his shoulders as a sign. "Because I had to tell my giant lovebug that he wasn't allowed to come along. He was so sad that there was somewhere he couldn't follow me to. But I figured I wasn't allowed to bring a giant dog here without at least three pies to make up for it."

"Mmh."

That wish of hers, about what it would be like if he didn't perform for her? This was it. He sounded subdued. Hadn't really yet crawled up to managing to sound like... much of anything.

But he could prompt her to keep talking to him. It'd probably help him get out of this hole.

"What's his name?"

She was willing to prattle along so he didn't have to. She'd wanted to give him time to think and not just talk at him while he tried to center himself. "Ronin," she said. "He was a stray and came to my rescue." Had saved her life, in fact. "Turns out he was a puppy in service training when he lost his trainers and his intended recipient and that's when he went stray."

Kathy figured he'd get it.

More or less, he did.

Managed a soft snort that was more a quiet puff of air than it was anything else. "You and your strays, cupacke."

She chuckled. "It's cause I'm a soft touch and everyone from miles around can see it," she said. "I exude an aura of 'let me feed you and give your kisses.'"

Another snort.

Then a sigh, as his hand moved up to pet her hair.

Kathy made a happy little noise at the touch. "You know it's true," she teased. "I think one of the reasons you like me so much is that you're a fox and I'm a tiny baby lamb."

"That's for wolves."

Yeah, like foxes would leave lambs alone, Ez.

Kathy snickered. "You're a fox and I'm an adorable baby chick?" she offered, since Ezra could hardly argue that simile.

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