"No. No-no," Jo says very close to the heels of his two words. "You can. You were lighting the torches, and you made that thing—" She gestures with her hand back in the air. "—in your hand earlier, whatever it was. When we first got here."
Yes. Jo can be extremely observant even when it's not apparent.
"Look, I know these are not the circumstances either of us would choose—" And god is that an understatement. "—but maybe if you talk about whatever this is, maybe you can help me make a better door out of whatever the hell this is." She raises a hand that hovers, making a circle, before her fingers pull back, gesturing to the whole of him. "So." Said with a beat, like she's giving him that one beat to take a breath. To follow her, without the chance to say no first.
But her voice doesn't demand, it coaxes, something warm sparking in her chest, "What is all of this?"
She'd never seen him so much as flinch at anything she'd said until that room. And this. This was nothing like that. This was nothing she could label.
"Is it the space? Is it too small?" Jo groped, just taking her annoyance with a breath in out on her words, too. As much a release of her tension as just letting her voice fill the space, so maybe he would only focus on her and her questions. "Is it this horrendous smell that I swear has kicked up 2-3 more punishment notches since the door wouldn't form like someone decided they could turn children's cough syrup and, I don't even know, dirt?, into the bastard red headed stepchild of candle scents? Because I've got to tell you, I feel like it's trying to grow a colony on the back of my throat right now."
no subject
Yes. Jo can be extremely observant even when it's not apparent.
"Look, I know these are not the circumstances either of us would choose—" And god is that an understatement. "—but maybe if you talk about whatever this is, maybe you can help me make a better door out of whatever the hell this is." She raises a hand that hovers, making a circle, before her fingers pull back, gesturing to the whole of him. "So." Said with a beat, like she's giving him that one beat to take a breath. To follow her, without the chance to say no first.
But her voice doesn't demand, it coaxes,
something warm sparking in her chest,
"What is all of this?"
She'd never seen him so much as flinch at anything she'd said until that room.
And this. This was nothing like that. This was nothing she could label.
"Is it the space? Is it too small?" Jo groped, just taking her annoyance with a breath in out on her words, too. As much a release of her tension as just letting her voice fill the space, so maybe he would only focus on her and her questions. "Is it this horrendous smell that I swear has kicked up 2-3 more punishment notches since the door wouldn't form like someone decided they could turn children's cough syrup and, I don't even know, dirt?, into the bastard red headed stepchild of candle scents? Because I've got to tell you, I feel like it's trying to grow a colony on the back of my throat right now."