[locked to Lena]

[smithnjones]

Are you alright?

I saw the entry, and I didn't know what to think.

You don't have to tell me what happened, but I wanted you to know if you ever need a place to stay, I recently got a house. It's Wes and I, David and Anne who're family. There's an extra room, and it's always open to you should you want it.

[Address inserted here.]

Comments

[willnotbemine]

Maybe Martha is right. Maybe all you can do is make choices you can live with, and maybe that's why Sonny--but Lena doesn't let herself finish that train of thought. Even his name makes her throat clog and her chest tighten painfully, and so she shoves it aside. As long as she's not thinking about it, she's okay. She can function. She can even be somewhat similar to who she used to be.

As long as she doesn't think about it.

"Yeah, I used to be one of the ones who tried," she says with a small, humorless laugh. "It never worked, and soon enough I learned that. I'd like to think I've grown myself."

She definitely doesn't have the coping mechanisms she used to, or she'd have ended up right back in Rick's lap and finding all sorts of ways to self-destruct. There's the tiniest part of her, buried very deep down, that yearns for that kind of destruction, but she doesn't listen to it. Much.

"Baby steps," Lena agrees with a smile, and she takes a long drink from her mug. Once she's done with it, she walks over to the sink to wash the cup, turning back to Martha. "I meant what I said. Thank you, for letting me stay here for a couple of days while I figure it all out."

Martha stayed at the Crowbar, and Lena wanted her there for as long as she needed it, so she knows why she's doing it, but she's still grateful regardless.

She's grateful that no matter how bad it gets, she has somewhere to go.

[smithnjones]

Fwaugh, Lena. Daw. Sonny has issues doing the same, but it will all get better at some point. It has to. The narration believes that it will even though it may take a lot of time. They're all too interconnected to be able to let it fall away.

It won't be easy. There's still a long way to go.

"I don't think there's anything wrong with trying at first. I knew someone who was... hundreds of years old, and he'd still be running from his problems. He'd swoop in, fix things, and then leave people to handle what remained. Never stuck around for the aftermath," Martha says, shaking her head with the smallest of smiles as she thinks about the Doctor. It's always with mixed emotions that she thinks about him again. "Just kept... running to the next adventure on some distant planet where no one knew him. It sounds to me like you have grown. We do it quite a bit in a short period sometimes, other times it'll be bloody years and we'll still be the same."

It's strange how life works in that sense.

Martha's given up trying to understand it anymore. It's not meant to be understood. You live as best as you can live and you try to do your best, try to do good, try to love even when it hurts to love.

"As long as you're stepping in a direction whether those steps are tiny or not, that's really something," Martha says, and she means that too, taking a sip from her own mug which is nearly gone.

She looks over at her when Lena walks to the sink and turns around to speak. Martha smiles warmly at her. "You're welcome. I meant what I said too. You're more than welcome here for as long as you need and any time you'd like to visit, the door's always open for you."

It hardly seems like much at all in the grand scheme of things, but what little she can offer, she will.