i don't feel comfortable talking to my partner about...
June 29th. Nearly half eleven in the morning. The girls are away already, while Hamlet will spend his mistress's absence imposing on Marshall's good will. Television and radio are off. All of the windows are closed, and a few things locked with keys she's taking with her, what she's locked away left behind without second thought.
The apartment is more or less silent except for the exhale that never quite makes it to being a sigh.
Her suitcases have been packed for the past week, but she's got hours to kill before she has to be on a flight in another world, and whatever she says about being needed, she doesn't anticipate interruption. The cases get a hard look that says a lot about how much she'd like to unpack and repack just to be sure she hasn't forgotten anything, about the nagging sensation that there is definitely something she's not considering. It hasn't got anything to do with suitcases, she concludes, rolling them out into the living room and retreating to her kitchen to make coffee.
It's the part of her home she feels least at home in. Oddly, it's the most comfortable right now.
Taking a vacation together is not in the least little bit like cohabiting. Even if it is in a villa. For roughly two months. It's not, because it's a vacation. It lacks several things that would make it living together; for example, her children. Her dog. (Not for the first time she wonders what the hell possessed Nathan to name the cavy 'Mr Sinister'. For God's sake. Still--not the point.) 'Life things', dull and pedestrian things along the lines of paying bills and arguing about whose turn it is to empty the dishwasher and put the laundry in. Like knowing what kind of coffee they want in the morning and adjusting to different alarm schedules.
In a handful of months, they'll hit their one year anniversary. Elizabeth's not entirely sure whether she should be counting from their first meeting, first date, or when she talked him into not leaving her creepy anonymous gifts on the porch and just accepting that he can't easily get her out of his life, instead. Hazarding 'roughly early October' still covers all of those, at least. Still--Marshall stayed with her longer than that, talked about marrying her, and they never lived together. Even without the encompassing list of reasons why doing just that would probably be a really bad idea.
There are so many reasons on that list. Elizabeth figures he could probably add a few more, if it would ever come up.
It occurs to her distantly that she really hates silence (especially right now, alone with her thoughts in a shut up apartment), but a more accurate definition of what it is she dislikes is emptiness. White noise on the radio and nothing and nobody to replace it with. It's not even a whole year ago that she was moving out and selling a house she'd barely moved into, following the sound of people she loved fiercely and needed even more than that.
She can't remember having needed to hold on so tightly to people before what came after. She can't remember having felt like that. Of course, an apocalypse is given to a certain uniqueness (or so you'd think; she's had more than a few surreal conversations on the topic since surviving), and her situation prior probably hadn't helped matters. Her fingers tighten reflexively on the coffee mug and she doesn't think about gentle discussion of counseling options. Stubbornness, now that she remembers with perfect clarity.
It's getting towards lunchtime, and she promised to stop in and see how big Heidi's son has got before she leaves. He's nearly two months old, now -- smaller than the baby she'd briefly acquired, yet, but growing at a rate that doesn't concern anyone. And he's a more healthy color, besides.
Elizabeth sets her suitcases in the hall, and leaves a mug half full of cooling coffee when she locks the door behind her.
Patient Name: Elizabeth Weir
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis (AU)
Word Count: 666 (i lol'd.)
Patient's Partner: Nathan Scaevola (X-Men Movieverse)
The apartment is more or less silent except for the exhale that never quite makes it to being a sigh.
Her suitcases have been packed for the past week, but she's got hours to kill before she has to be on a flight in another world, and whatever she says about being needed, she doesn't anticipate interruption. The cases get a hard look that says a lot about how much she'd like to unpack and repack just to be sure she hasn't forgotten anything, about the nagging sensation that there is definitely something she's not considering. It hasn't got anything to do with suitcases, she concludes, rolling them out into the living room and retreating to her kitchen to make coffee.
It's the part of her home she feels least at home in. Oddly, it's the most comfortable right now.
Taking a vacation together is not in the least little bit like cohabiting. Even if it is in a villa. For roughly two months. It's not, because it's a vacation. It lacks several things that would make it living together; for example, her children. Her dog. (Not for the first time she wonders what the hell possessed Nathan to name the cavy 'Mr Sinister'. For God's sake. Still--not the point.) 'Life things', dull and pedestrian things along the lines of paying bills and arguing about whose turn it is to empty the dishwasher and put the laundry in. Like knowing what kind of coffee they want in the morning and adjusting to different alarm schedules.
In a handful of months, they'll hit their one year anniversary. Elizabeth's not entirely sure whether she should be counting from their first meeting, first date, or when she talked him into not leaving her creepy anonymous gifts on the porch and just accepting that he can't easily get her out of his life, instead. Hazarding 'roughly early October' still covers all of those, at least. Still--Marshall stayed with her longer than that, talked about marrying her, and they never lived together. Even without the encompassing list of reasons why doing just that would probably be a really bad idea.
There are so many reasons on that list. Elizabeth figures he could probably add a few more, if it would ever come up.
It occurs to her distantly that she really hates silence (especially right now, alone with her thoughts in a shut up apartment), but a more accurate definition of what it is she dislikes is emptiness. White noise on the radio and nothing and nobody to replace it with. It's not even a whole year ago that she was moving out and selling a house she'd barely moved into, following the sound of people she loved fiercely and needed even more than that.
She can't remember having needed to hold on so tightly to people before what came after. She can't remember having felt like that. Of course, an apocalypse is given to a certain uniqueness (or so you'd think; she's had more than a few surreal conversations on the topic since surviving), and her situation prior probably hadn't helped matters. Her fingers tighten reflexively on the coffee mug and she doesn't think about gentle discussion of counseling options. Stubbornness, now that she remembers with perfect clarity.
It's getting towards lunchtime, and she promised to stop in and see how big Heidi's son has got before she leaves. He's nearly two months old, now -- smaller than the baby she'd briefly acquired, yet, but growing at a rate that doesn't concern anyone. And he's a more healthy color, besides.
Elizabeth sets her suitcases in the hall, and leaves a mug half full of cooling coffee when she locks the door behind her.
Patient Name: Elizabeth Weir
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis (AU)
Word Count: 666 (i lol'd.)
Patient's Partner: Nathan Scaevola (X-Men Movieverse)