The owl, simply stated and VERY CAPITALISED as it was, made Camilla smile. Thank goodness Susan had the sense to start asking about things. Maybe there would be no more trucker-cap incidents, then! She dashed off a quick reply --
Of course. I'll be at your room in half an hour. - Camilla
-- and she was there when she said she would be, half-hoping all the cats had followed Ryder somewhere. Pied Piper of cats.
The cats had indeed gone off to pester Ryder who, Susan knew, would like nothing more than to skin them all. She let Camilla in--one of the advantages of being Death, in either state, was the ability to know where anyone was at any given time.
"Hello," she said, proud she'd remembered the greeting. Not that it was as hard as it had been--all these little things were trickling back like water leaking from a cracked dam. It was bad, and she wanted it to go the hell away.
"Hi." There didn't seem to be any cats edging their way around Susan's skirts. A blessing; Camilla had begun to wonder whether she might not plausibly feign a newly developed allergy to Susan's pets.
No weird hats, or proliferation of jewelry, or anything else visibly out of the ordinary, either. Camilla's curiosity spiked. She turned Susan's desk chair around so it faced the bed, and sat down, smoothing her own skirt (rueing the cat hair that would surely accumulate on its back). "What's going on?"
There was, in fact, no cat hair--house elves really were wonderful creatures in some respects. Even as Death, Susan was astringently tidy, and that meant no stray hair or claw-marks on the furniture.
"I have...something of a problem," she said, sitting on the bed. She wasn't even sure how to phrase said problem, even to herself--one of the bad things about being stuck somewhere between humanity and Death was that communication became all but impossible. "The thing Shaun calls the Berlin Wall--the thing that's keeping all that humanity locked up--something's wrong with it. And I'm not sure what to do about it." She looked at Camilla with a kind of detached desperation--such a look shouldn't have been possible, but somehow Susan pulled it off.
... The Berlin Wall? That certainly was an unlikely name for it, thought Camilla. Goodness. All graffitied up and with chunks ripped out of it.
She didn't say this aloud to Susan. It would likely only confuse her. The last thing Camilla wanted to do was to recount, from very vague recollections based on half-read Newsweek articles, the last couple of decades of German history.
"Did your grandfather come back?" That seemed the safest first line of inquiry.
Susan shook her head. "No--I don't need him to come back to lose this," she said, gesturing at her face, her eyes. "I can fight it, if I want, and the last few times I've been pulled in to do the Job, I've never let it go this far."
She sat cross-legged, staring into the middle distance, assembling words as best she could. "I want to know how to keep it," she said at last. "It's breaking up, and I can't seem to be able to repair it." It was breaking up very quickly, too--so quickly it was disturbing. Belatedly, shaking herself out of her thoughts, she asked, "Would you like some tea?"
Camilla's brows drew together. "Hm. If you've never let it go this far, maybe it's not supposed to go this far. Maybe you've made it go farther than it should, and you just can't sustain it. If you don't need to maintain it, why not just let it go?"
The question of tea seemed beside the point. She nodded, vaguely, and waited for an answer.
A house-elf appeared, bearing a tray with a large pot of hot water and a selection of teabags, as well as a jug of cream and a pot of sugar. Susan assembled hers automatically--even as Death, she liked her tea the same way. They were small, familiar actions, designed more to put off answering than anything else.
"I want it," she said, and there was just the tiniest hint of actual emotion in her voice. "I want to keep it--I really, really don't want to let it go." Letting it go...it would be silly, wouldn't it? Silly to deal with all those messy human emotions?
"Well, you can't," said Camilla quite practically. "It's breaking. You just said so. And I can't fix it, and I don't think anyone else can. Because it's not supposed to be there and it's not good for you." She was absolutely positive on this point. It couldn't be healthy to hold everything back that way. You'd go crazy, like Tiberius, like Nero -- as Julian had warned.
Had Susan known what Camilla was thinking, she would have said that going crazy might almost be preferable. Practical experience, though, was teaching her that it really wasn't possible to hold it all back forever, however much she might want to.
She passed a hand over her face, hiding whatever expression had flitted across it. The very idea that it might have been something...well, something soppy, as she put it...was absolutely appalling. And she couldn't bloody stop it for the life of her.
She looked back at Camilla, and some of the arctic blue had faded from her eyes. "I don't bloody know how to deal with this," she said. "I mean, honestly...it's just so stupid." The hard lines of her face had softened slightly, though her expression was almost more irritated than anything else.
"... What are you trying to deal with?" Camilla blinked. Surely she wasn't calling this wall thing stupid, when she'd only just said she very much wanted to keep it?
Oh, bloody hell--if she said it aloud, it would make it that much more real, and thus that much harder to control.
"Everything," she said, her voice unusually quiet. "Everything--well, you know. Everything I locked away and sat on." She'd said something about it at the tea, though she knew it had been vague--vague enough that Camilla might not understand what in hell she was talking about. "It's stupid--it shouldn't bother me--but it does. It does, and I don't know how else to make it go away."
She passed a hand over her face again, lingering this time, clearly not wanting Camilla to see whatever expression lurked there.
Susan did mention something to do with Stephen. Camilla, who visited Stephen from time to time, had not heard him mention Susan in some while, and had put two and two together.
"You mean all this has been about a break-up?" She was honestly astonished. "I wouldn't call it stupid, but ... you know, he's not dead or anything, you're just not dating any more."
"The man said he hoped he'd never disappoint me," Susan said, suddenly savage. "And then, quite abruptly, he simply stopped speaking to me. Didn't say why--left me to figure that out on my own, and I'm still not sure of the entirety of the reason. I was a stupid fool to say a bloody thing to him--if I'd known what a cruel...a cruel son of a bitch he could be, I'd never have gotten involved with him in the first place."
The words half were half an explosion--a tide of resentment that had been festering for the last months. "I was idiot enough to think he actually cared, but quite obviously he did not, and now I don't know what to do. Part of me wants to kill him, but most of me doesn't understand how I could have so misjuged him--I've known him as far back as I can remember here, and I had no idea he could be such a...such a twatShe'd never said any of this aloud--had really not let herself think it, even. It was hot and red and painful, but at the same time cathartic, in a way she could not define. "I loved him, dammit, and
( ... )
Camilla sat wide-eyed in the face of this rant. It was less like the crumbling of an ordinary wall, more like the bursting of a dam.
Her first impulse was to say But he was good in bed, because Camilla knew very well that he was, and it had been her initial impression, back when they first started discussing all this, that bedding him had been the main objective.
Ultimately, Camilla had never been disappointed in the way Susan had. Her problem was not with men suddenly and inexplicably losing interest, but with their failing to lose interest, and/or developing inappropriate interest.
"How is indifference worse than hate?" she finally asked.
Susan sighed, and the sigh was an uneven sound--the strangled breath of someone swallowing down God knows what embarrassing emotion. "Hatred would imply some depth of feeling," she said. "Indifference...well, indifference is easy. Hatred takes work." She wasn't sure she was articulating it right--wasn't sure she could explain it properly even to herself.
She groped for some appropriate comparison, all the while trying to ignore the burning in her eyes, the tightness in her throat. "Look at it this way," she said, the words as choked and uneven as her breathing, "how would you feel if, for some bloody unknown reason, Henry decided to drop you?" Susan couldn't imagine that happening, but then she'd never imagined Stephen would do it to her, either.
Of course. I'll be at your room in half an hour. - Camilla
-- and she was there when she said she would be, half-hoping all the cats had followed Ryder somewhere. Pied Piper of cats.
Reply
"Hello," she said, proud she'd remembered the greeting. Not that it was as hard as it had been--all these little things were trickling back like water leaking from a cracked dam. It was bad, and she wanted it to go the hell away.
Reply
No weird hats, or proliferation of jewelry, or anything else visibly out of the ordinary, either. Camilla's curiosity spiked. She turned Susan's desk chair around so it faced the bed, and sat down, smoothing her own skirt (rueing the cat hair that would surely accumulate on its back). "What's going on?"
Reply
"I have...something of a problem," she said, sitting on the bed. She wasn't even sure how to phrase said problem, even to herself--one of the bad things about being stuck somewhere between humanity and Death was that communication became all but impossible. "The thing Shaun calls the Berlin Wall--the thing that's keeping all that humanity locked up--something's wrong with it. And I'm not sure what to do about it." She looked at Camilla with a kind of detached desperation--such a look shouldn't have been possible, but somehow Susan pulled it off.
Reply
She didn't say this aloud to Susan. It would likely only confuse her. The last thing Camilla wanted to do was to recount, from very vague recollections based on half-read Newsweek articles, the last couple of decades of German history.
"Did your grandfather come back?" That seemed the safest first line of inquiry.
Reply
She sat cross-legged, staring into the middle distance, assembling words as best she could. "I want to know how to keep it," she said at last. "It's breaking up, and I can't seem to be able to repair it." It was breaking up very quickly, too--so quickly it was disturbing. Belatedly, shaking herself out of her thoughts, she asked, "Would you like some tea?"
Reply
The question of tea seemed beside the point. She nodded, vaguely, and waited for an answer.
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"I want it," she said, and there was just the tiniest hint of actual emotion in her voice. "I want to keep it--I really, really don't want to let it go." Letting it go...it would be silly, wouldn't it? Silly to deal with all those messy human emotions?
Reply
Reply
She passed a hand over her face, hiding whatever expression had flitted across it. The very idea that it might have been something...well, something soppy, as she put it...was absolutely appalling. And she couldn't bloody stop it for the life of her.
She looked back at Camilla, and some of the arctic blue had faded from her eyes. "I don't bloody know how to deal with this," she said. "I mean, honestly...it's just so stupid." The hard lines of her face had softened slightly, though her expression was almost more irritated than anything else.
Reply
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"Everything," she said, her voice unusually quiet. "Everything--well, you know. Everything I locked away and sat on." She'd said something about it at the tea, though she knew it had been vague--vague enough that Camilla might not understand what in hell she was talking about. "It's stupid--it shouldn't bother me--but it does. It does, and I don't know how else to make it go away."
She passed a hand over her face again, lingering this time, clearly not wanting Camilla to see whatever expression lurked there.
Reply
"You mean all this has been about a break-up?" She was honestly astonished. "I wouldn't call it stupid, but ... you know, he's not dead or anything, you're just not dating any more."
Reply
The words half were half an explosion--a tide of resentment that had been festering for the last months. "I was idiot enough to think he actually cared, but quite obviously he did not, and now I don't know what to do. Part of me wants to kill him, but most of me doesn't understand how I could have so misjuged him--I've known him as far back as I can remember here, and I had no idea he could be such a...such a twatShe'd never said any of this aloud--had really not let herself think it, even. It was hot and red and painful, but at the same time cathartic, in a way she could not define. "I loved him, dammit, and ( ... )
Reply
Her first impulse was to say But he was good in bed, because Camilla knew very well that he was, and it had been her initial impression, back when they first started discussing all this, that bedding him had been the main objective.
Ultimately, Camilla had never been disappointed in the way Susan had. Her problem was not with men suddenly and inexplicably losing interest, but with their failing to lose interest, and/or developing inappropriate interest.
"How is indifference worse than hate?" she finally asked.
Reply
She groped for some appropriate comparison, all the while trying to ignore the burning in her eyes, the tightness in her throat. "Look at it this way," she said, the words as choked and uneven as her breathing, "how would you feel if, for some bloody unknown reason, Henry decided to drop you?" Susan couldn't imagine that happening, but then she'd never imagined Stephen would do it to her, either.
Reply
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