I won't pretend that I intend to stop living

[mildwildchild]

Who: erryone in Pride
What: recovering from the events of December 7
When: late December 7/early December 8 - ???
Where: Pride HQ and wherever else they're allowed to go
Warnings: Carnies? references to I Will Twist the Knife


So maybe you've just gotten back from the most mellow kidnapping ever and you're itching to tell your bandmates about what went on with the cool helmeted guys while everyone else was at that stuffy party. Unfortunately, you'll have to wait a little while to tell them, but that's okay - surely you can keep yourselves occupied until everyone else returns.

Or maybe you're one of those who wound up at that party of Naomi's, and your night was a little less fun. Now you're back at HQ, possibly with mended physical injuries and almost certainly with a few new psychological scars. Now's your chance to check in on your friends and bandmates who missed out on all the trauma and deal with things as best you can.

Comments

[traumatizing]

"You sure?" Terry asks as he sits down opposite, (the soft grunt of pain at how recklessly he sits should probably answer some of Jamie's question,) and he's still frowning. Scanning his face as if that's gonna give him some deeper response to what's going on. "You seem kind of out of it."

[mildwildchild]

He follows Terry's movements with the same trancelike focus, brows creasing briefly at that little noise of discomfort. Jamie averts his eyes when he picks up on that probing look trained on him, hunching into his jacket and staring into his coffee.

"You uh. You got hurt pretty bad, huh." Deliberately or not, he's dodging Terry's question as well as his gaze.

[traumatizing]

Terry laughs a little weakly, turning his gaze down to his own coffee. He doesn't really want to talk about it, but they can't both dodge every question all day. "Turns out getting shoved out a window fucking sucks."

As does having some guy kick you in the ribs because you didn't recognise him, but that's neither here nor there.

[mildwildchild]

Jamie risks a glance up, looking concerned, then just as quickly looks back down at his drink. "Oh," he says quietly, and then repeats it after a few slow breaths: "Oh."

He goes silent, jaw slightly agape as though he's at a loss for words or buried in his own head, and then he says, "I'm sorry."

He doesn't know for what; he just doesn't know what else to say, what kind of comfort to offer, because he knows that nothing can be said to make the situation feel better.

[traumatizing]

"It's fine." Terry says, a little dismissive but he does appreciate it it. He's still alive though, right? Probably shouldn't be, but that's an issue to wrestle at a later date. Like never. "A lot of us got pretty fucked up at that party anyway," he shrugs a shoulder, "it's just about figuring out how to move forward now."

He looks back up at Jamie, gaze gentler this time, less probing. Mostly he hopes that resonates enough to get Jamie to open up a little.

[mildwildchild]

Jamie twists his coffee cup back and forth on the tabletop in small, distracted movements, staring into its depths.

"...have you figured anything out?" he asks softly. "About moving forward?"

[traumatizing]

"I've figure out that I can't do it alone." He says, despite being captain 'I don't need to talk about my feelings' of the SS 'if I ignore my complicated emotions then they'll just go away.' But raging hypocrisy aside, he knows suffering alone isn't gonna help anyone.

"Beyond that?" He shrugs, "each day at a time, you know?"

[mildwildchild]

He goes silent for a long time, then, just fidgeting with his coffee cup, breathing quietly in and out. When he finally does speak, he does so slowly, haltingly, but with deliberation, as though he's untangling the words from each other one at a time.

"I just...dunno how we're supposed to keep doing this. Living. Performing. Being these people that everyone loves. Everything feels fake."

He's quiet for another heartbeat or two. "We're supposed to pretend that everything's the same but it's not. Shit happened that we can't explain to anyone and I don't - I don't know how to live with that."

[traumatizing]

"That's why we..." Terry takes a breath before he continues, because he feels like he's bordering on 'power of friendship' territory here and that's disgusting, "it's why we need eachother. All of us who were there."

He frowns down at his hands, fingers tapping an idle rhythm on the rim of his cup in a manifestation of his tension. "We've got no choice when the label wants business as usual, but we know how fucked up this is-- How fucked up everything is." It's kind of dispassionate, the way he says it. He wants to be angry or hopeful or something, but right now the only feeling about everything Terry can muster up is tiredness. It's been a long couple of days. "At least when it's just some of us though, you don't need to pretend."