Room 315 [Thursday Late Morning]
Between Lieutenant Kerrigan's message and the radio announcement, Lee had decided, of his own volition (and not because he was afraid Kerrigan would stick him to anymore walls) to keep himself holed up in his room for the time being
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An excuse for everything. Anything so that she could continue the effort to convince herself that she wasn't concerned, that, when she heard the announcement and matched it up to the fact that the Eel hadn't visited her at the library, she was worried. That the connecting factors almost instantly twisted her stomach like a DNA double helix wrung tightly until all the chromosomes fell out, broken onto the floor. Anything to be able to tell herself that her worry was unfounded, that it wasn't like he always came every week, that it wasn't anything amiss, it was just that he didn't feel like coming, which was absolutely fine, really, and it was just coincidence and two parallel lines of events between his absence at the library and the report of absences everywhere else.
An excuse for everything. Except for the fact that she just about practically collapsed against the support of the open doorframe with relief when she reached his room, saw him through the open door, actually there. Ereht yllautca. She closed her eyes as the relief did a sharp turn into something like anger, which she would have liked to say was toward him, but was mostly directed at herself, for overreacting, for getting worried, for spending all those sleepless hours last night thinking about him when he'd been absolutely fine and there.
She tried to think of something to say, so she didn't look like what she felt, thought she stayed still with her shoulder against the doorframe.
"You've probably been up here the whole damn time, too," she muttered, almost against her will, but it was something to say, though it danced dangerously toward admitting she was worried.
[[ also, psssst, it's Thursday ]]
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[D'oh!]
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Her mouth tightened a bit before she said anything. She was trying to talk herself down from the response she came up with, since she knew that she probably looked quite the opposite of what she was going to say.
But it came out anyway. "Nothing. And I'm fine."
And then a little more slipped out, more than she would have wanted even if he didn't clearly look quite the opposite of what she was going to ask.
"...Are you? Okay, I mean?"
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She tried to blame all that on the lack of sleep. That had to be it. And she fought it back as much as she could.
"I'm fine," she said agian, and she might have believed it a little more because he was there and all right, so she could be. She tried to think about what differences her reaction might have held if he hadn't been and her eyes closed again.
"But, dammit, Lee..."
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She didn't know what the hell to say. But, since her brain was taking too long to decide, it seemed that her mouth decided to go on ahead with out, whispering quietly as she still refused to look up, "Just as long as you're okay."
It was barely audible. What she followed that up with, defensively, was louder. "Absolutely boorish and stupid," she said firmly. "But still okay."
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There was a embarrassed pause, edged with annoyance at herself.
Just once, she would like to know what it felt like to experience stress normally, and not with it all curling her body up into a tight little ball of stiff nerves.
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She trailed off, disallowing herself to say anything more, except:
"This is your fault, you know."
If he was listening carefully, he might notice that the tone was not necessarily unkind.
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