Closed Log

[nadine_he_loves]

Who: Nadine, Julie, Lloyd
When: Beginning of February
What: Working through family stuff
Where: Nott



[Things have been tense and awkward since the Dimming, Nadine trying to give Julie her space and avoiding Lloyd more often than not - at least during the day, it's hard to avoid someone when you're currently sharing sleeping arrangements with them. It's been a difficult month, to say the least. And much, much too long.

And Nadine owes apologies to both of her companions - though one is far more pressing than the other. But she doesn't lock the door of the room she's been sharing with Lloyd, as she's been prone to do when she gets home from work - just to give herself a couple of hours to deal with her feelings as best as she can. He's been as helpful as he can be, and she's grateful for that, if she's been awful at expressing it lately. He deserves better. So she leaves the door unlocked and reads through a book on local medicinal herbs, hoping to get a chance to talk to him.

At some point, late in the evening, she makes her way to Julie's door. She has no intentions of trying to justify herself or excuse herself, but Julie deserves an apology. Even if the other woman doesn't forgive her, Nadine didn't do right by her and that needs an apology. She knocks as she announces herself, preparing to be turned away but hoping otherwise.]

Julie? Can we talk? Or at least...can I talk to you? I just want to apologize.

Comments

[princessvegas]

[ Having made up with Nadine doesn't actually make Julie feel much better. It's less Nadine's fault than the fault of everything else going on, but she still feels terrible, both mentally and physically. She can't even concentrate enough to get to the Horizon, which is really just another blow because it's pretty much the only place she feels safe anymore.

Lloyd is, at the moment, not on her radar at all. Again, it's nothing about him in particular -- she's just too tangled up in dealing with the whole Flagg thing in her mind. His gifts had gone ignored over the weeks, left on the floor outside the door until he took them back, or else someone else took them. They weren't enough, not that any little trinket ever could be enough to make up for what he did, and she didn't want them.

After Nadine left, Julie sat in the bath and cried for a while longer, long enough that her face began to hurt and her eyes puffed up. She thought maybe she would be able to deal better in the morning, so she blew out the lamps, crawled into bed with only the fireplace still going. But she's so distraught that she wound up lying in bed, awake, blinking at the ceiling. The shadows there come from not just the fireplace but the lightning lamps she's made, flickering and swirling over everything, a strange warm glow punctuated with flashes of bright white.

Lloyd's voice cuts through the soft crackle of the fire, the quiet rumble of the clouds, and she feels an instant flash of fury again, uncontrolled and burning hot, and it's so much easier to feel angry than sad. It's comfortable, at least comparatively, and she leans into it, throws the covers back hard enough that they hang half off the bed. She pulls her chemise back on in a huff, pauses before she opens the door. Yeah, okay. Lloyd is a convenient punching bag, if nothing else. When she cracks the door, it's with an icy glare, her hair damp and her face still swollen from crying. Her voice is steely cold. ]

What do you want?

[jealousbitch]

[ As much as he was hoping she would open the door, he doesn't expect it and shuffles back from where he was leaning on the doorframe waiting. That icy glare leveled on him is one he knows he deserves, and he runs a hand through his hair to try and piece together what he actually wants to say, not the first thing at the tip of his tongue. ]

Look, I know I fucked up even if I didn't at the time. I went because it felt like what I was supposed to do, okay? I'm sorry. I shoulda known better, but I don't know what I'm doing here. Par for the course, I'm fucking it up.

[ Lloyd gestures a little helplessly. ]

[princessvegas]

[ She doesn't know why it surprises her that he's not prepared, that he didn't think this through long enough to actually know what he was going to say. Maybe just because she figured it's been long enough for even Lloyd to have worked it out, but apparently not.

Her eyes narrow, and her hand comes through the crack in the door just enough to point sharply, jabbing along at each important point. ]

What you were supposed to do? You were supposed to be with me. You knew, you knew what I went through and you left me alone anyway! You abandoned me, and I don't even know how you could ever have thought it was anythin' different. You don't get to play stupid with me, Lloyd. I know you ain't that fuckin' stupid, not when you have time to think. You had days to think it over, and you still left.

[ Her hand withdraws back inside, her arms cross over her chest. ]

The only thing I ever asked you to do, in all the months we been here, is to be my man. My man, not Nadine's. Not even his, now. Mine. And you didn't do it.

[jealousbitch]

You know what? You're right, I did have time to think it over and I still made my choice. I wasn't trying to leave you alone, Jules. I wanted to do it for me. I just.. had to leave you alone in order to do it. I get it was shitty and if I could do it over, I wouldn't fuckin' go.

[ He had thought it through, but when it got down to actually saying it, the script went out the window. Lloyd's never not one to fly by the seat of his pants, anyway. ]

I'm not hers, you know that! Before you got here, all we had was each other while Flagg was locked up. Then you showed up and I tried! I fucking tried getting you out, Julie, but if I kept pushing at it, I'd have been right next to you in there and I wasn't gonna do that shit again.

[ He can't even argue the point about Flagg, because even though the man's been gone for a fucking age now, Lloyd can't help but look over his shoulder for him. At this point, he doesn't know whether he wants the Dark Man to be looming behind him or to remain absent. At least being Flagg's right hand, he knew how to handle shit or figure it out along the way. He'd had power then, though. The luster is gone, but Lloyd can't say how it makes him feel. If he did come back, at this point he feels like he'd go crawling back.

He shakes his head, scuffing his toe against the floorboards before glancing back up to Julie mournfully. ]

I miss you and I feel fuckin' lost. I know you don't give a shit, but there it is.

[princessvegas]

[ Julie has perhaps never looked so unimpressed in her life. To her ears, these just sound like bullshit excuses, and he doesn't even respect her enough to come up with halfway decent ones. She cocks her hip and, somehow, sounds even frostier. ]

So let me get this straight. You didn't try harder to help me when I was in a dungeon because you were thinkin' about yourself. You wanted to go back to a place that we know for a fact has tortured at least one person, for yourself, even though I begged you to stay away because they threw me in a dungeon. Even though you knew I've watched people turn their back on me when I needed 'em, so you knew how it would feel for me. And now, you want me to just forgive you because you miss me?

[ The door opens further, so that she can lean into her anger, physically advance on him with a furor that almost seems to make her six inches taller. ]

How would you feel if I left you locked in a cell? If I left you locked in a cell because I wanted to go shopping? If I turned my back when you were callin' me through the bars? And now you think I should just take you back because you want it? Fuck you, Lloyd Henreid. I'm not your fuckin' mommy or therapist, it ain't my job to make you feel better when you do wrong. I have been doin' nothin' but cleanin' up other people's messes since that guy busted us outta the dungeon, and I'm fuckin' tired, and you don't even have the basic human decency to really apologize and mean it? You ain't sorry. You just want me to stop bein' mad.

[ By this point, her finger is actually touching his chest, stabbing repeatedly as she speaks. ]

Newsflash, asshole, I'm still mad! Do you even care about me? Just like, as a person? Because Nadine came here and apologized with her whole heart, but here you are, with nothin' but excuses and a half-assed "I'm sorry", like you ate the last slice of cake without offerin' me any. Guess what, Lloyd? You don't get to have your cake and eat it too. I have not survived two end-of-the-worlds to be treated like shit by the likes of you, and I am not about to start now!

[jealousbitch]

[ Okay, so this conversation has gotten away from him so much he's reeling from it. God, why was Julie always like this? He gets she's mad and knows she can hold a grudge, but he's not trying to make excuses for once. Apparently, when he's being honest he's spouting bullshit. ]

I've been there and fuckin' done that, sweetheart! You know how much better off I'd have fucking been if I'd had somebody on the other side makin' damn sure I got fucking fed? [ He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs loudly in frustration. ]

I'm trying to fucking apologize because I feel like an asshole about leaving you when you needed me, but I guess I'll just go fuck myself because it apparently doesn't mean shit! If I didn't care about you, you'd know it by now, Julie. Fuck. I don't have Nadine's pretty words or her heart. I'm telling you I made a mistake and I want to fix it, but nothing I say or do can ever be good enough without Flagg around, huh?

[princessvegas]

[ He always makes everything all about himself, just whine whine whine. Poor Lloyd, everyone's so mean to Lloyd, but meanwhile, he enacted his girlfriend's worst fear on her and can't even actually say that. Can't just give a genuine apology.

Julie's eyes flash dangerously, and all she can see is red as she takes a step backward. Her voice has dropped in the same way that fire feels freezing when it gets hot enough. ]

This has nothing to do with Flagg, and fuck him too. That motherfucker lied to me, got me killed and then abandoned me, so fuck Flagg. And double fuck you. Like I said, you're not sorry you did it, you're sorry that I'm mad. They aren't the same thing, Lloyd. And you don't even fuckin' care. You coulda shot me and it would've hurt less.

[ There are furious, pained tears glistening in her eyes, but she refuses to let them out. Instead, she goes back inside her room. Before she closes the door, there's an icy hiss. ]

Tell Nadine you can tag along to Cadens, but I'm fuckin' done with bein' the least important person around. There are people out there who actually care about me now. I don't need someone who's gonna hurt me and then blame me for bein' pissed.