OOMM: For Ronan

[nita_callahan]

Nita realizes that when she agreed to start dating a sex mage, she probably should have expected things to get complicated.

And she also realizes that when she gave Matt permission to sleep with other people, she probably should have expected that he would, you know, take her up on it

Comments

[not_in_the_book]

Ronan was, five minutes before his phone rings, wrist-deep in A'mric intestinal tract -- not a pleasant prospect, as their digestive processes are as noxious as their poetry. Which is very.

Luckily, by the time the phone actually rings, he's washed off and flopping down on the cot in the small on-call room off of the clinic he's working in on Olas IV. Even if he does have to wrinkle his nose at the smell coming off his hands as he answers the call. "Dai," he greets cheerfully. "How goes, cousin?"

Caller ID is a wonderful invention.

[not_in_the_book]

Ronan snorted. "Never a waste, talking to you," he pointed out. "But shoot."

[nita_callahan]

"Okay. I, um."

A beat.

"I have no idea where to start," she says, rather helplessly. "It's -- okay. A while ago Matt and I talked and I said I didn't mind if he slept with other people, because I'm still so messed up about sex and I didn't want to make him wait for me to be ready and end up with him unhappy, you know? So I said I wouldn't mind as long as he was safe and talked to me if anything started to get serious."

[not_in_the_book]

That... didn't take much to parse.

"And now he has," he said -- mostly guessing, even, but this was Matt they were talking about -- "and you're not sure you are okay with it, after all. You told yourself, 'I'll be okay!' and now you're going, '... Did I lie? And, also, aaaaargh.'

"I'll point out," he added, "that speaking an untruth you believe to be true is, in fact, not lying, but rather a mistake. And we are, former passengers excepted, merely human."

[nita_callahan]

She snorts, weakly.

"That's about it, yeah. I just -- I don't even know how to feel about it, I guess. I ought to be okay, but the fact that it happened and I didn't know about it freaks me out, even though I said he didn't have to tell me, and it's just -- I don't know."

[not_in_the_book]

Ronan frowned, although obviously she couldn't see it through the phone line. "'Ought to be' is a poor phrase to use here," he said, slowly. Carefully. "I don't think there's any way one ought to feel in any situation, really. If you're freaked out, you're allowed to be freaked out -- you don't need to guilt yourself on top of that.

"And as you are freaking out, stop, take a breath, and ask yourself what part of it freaks you out. Was it the fact that you didn't know? Because there is, in fact, a fairly simple solution to that."

[nita_callahan]

Good advice. She takes a second, closing her eyes, to breath in and out.

"That's a big part of it," she says after a second. "And part of it is that I don't know if the person -- the being -- he slept with is safe."

A breath in and out; another.

"And I guess," she says, her voice a little small, "I'm kind of freaked out that maybe I'm not enough for him? And I know that's stupid when this is already a poly relationship, but it's . . . that's there too."

[not_in_the_book]

"Maybe you need to restate the terms of the relationship," Ronan suggested. "Rather than telling him he doesn't have to tell you, what if you try encouraging him to share his experiences? Not necessarily in detail, but if you can share in the positivity of positive experiences...

"The safety of his partners, or at least this partner in particular... He is an adult, Nita. I mean, I'm not going to say that we shouldn't necessarily keep an eye on him. But we have to accept that he's capable of judging his partners for himself."

[nita_callahan]

". . . The guy he was dating before us was a vampire with really fucked up ideas of consent," she feels obliged to point out. "So I mean, just. Considering his track record."

She sighs, rubbing her head.

"But I see your point."

[not_in_the_book]

"... And I yours," Ronan had to admit. "So... Keep an eye on things, but don't interfere unless we need to?" he suggested.

"And, seriously, think about restating the terms. Don't be afraid to know what he's doing; it'll probably help."

[nita_callahan]

"Yeah. I'll talk to him."

[not_in_the_book]

"It's the only way something like this'll work," Ronan explained. "Secrets... They fester, they cause worry... That said, don't be afraid to admit it if things aren't working for you. This kind of relationship isn't for everyone."

[nita_callahan]

She shrugs.

"I know. But I want to make it work. I still care about him."