Post by Jude Dorrian on Nov 10, 2007 19:23:10 GMT
"So, I've been talking to Daniel recently..."
Jude froze, ankle-deep in the icy water as he spun around to meet his sister's eyes from the bank. She glared back determinedly- just daring him to say something. She was ready for a fight. And the kind of fight where anything Jude said would just go straight over her head.
So if there was no point in arguing- he'd just have to let her talk.
Jude cleared his throat, turning back to his retreat into the Glass Lake. "Really? How come?"
Tameron went silent for a couple of moments, and Jude took a few further tentative steps; sliding his bare feet across the damp bank below.
"Ain't you cold?"
"Freezing," he replied, rolling up his jeans even further.
"Then why are you doing that? It's November, for chrissake."
"Just am." He shivered, pausing now knee-deep and looking out across the glacial surface of the grey steel water. Every step he took barely produced a ripple. No wonder it was called the 'glass' lake. It didn't move.
And its surface looked just like it could shatter- and he half-hoped that when his feet broke its surface, that it would.
Never did though.
"So why have you been talking to him?" Jude asked her carefully, keeping his back to her.
"Because I have," Tameron replied, and he heard a soft flump which told him she'd sat down on the bank. "He's my friend. So I can talk to him, yeah?"
"Yeah," Jude shrugged. "I just thought you wouldn't want to."
There was another, long pause.
"He dumped her, Jude. He dumped Tess."
"Poor Tess," Jude said absently, then giving up completely, Jude sank down beneath the surface- and soaked himself.
"Jude!"
Tameron was on her feet, gaping at him from the bank with a look of appropriate outrage. Hands on hips and lips pursed; her angry eyes followed his progess out even deeper; the freezing water now up to his chest.
Coughing slightly- hell, it was cold- Jude rubbed his sopping wet hair back, slicking it over his head, and blinking his eyes rapidly. His fists encased each other, one rubbing the other frantically.
"See, you're cold now," Tameron said moodily, sitting back down again. "Y'all get all diseased and die."
"We have a wonderful school nurse," Jude reminded her. "And the Carers- I'm a personal friend of the Head, I'll have y'all know."
"Whatever, y'all." She suppressed a smile; but with apparent struggle. "Anyway. Danny dumped Tess."
"So you say," Jude said, crossing his own arms. "And you're his friend."
"And I'm his friend," echoed Tameron, her eyes narrowing. "And I think... I think it could work."
Jude didn't reply, his face carefully expressionless; but he felt his toes curling. "You do, do you?"
"That I do." She bit her lip. "And what do you think, Jude?"
"Honestly?" he asked her.
She nodded, the fight firing up in her eyes as she squared up to him. Jude's toes wiggled and recurled. What did he want to tell her?
I think you're effing crazy.
What should he tell her?
That guy's a dirty, undeserving rat and you're better off without him.
But what did she need to hear?
"I think you know him better than I do, and I think it's your choice, at the end of the day," Jude shrugged.
Tameron's mouth was slightly open. "That's not an answer."
"Hell, yeah it is."
"No, it's not."
"You don't really care what I think," Jude reminded her, uncrossing his arms and bending down in the water to roll down his jeans. His hands brushed past something wet and slimy, and he pulled a face at the surface. He wasn't too keen on slime.
Tameron considered him for a few moments. "Oh. Okay. If that's what you think."
"It is," he replied, straightening up again. "So... what do you really think?"
"What do you want me to think?"
"Whatever you want me to think."
"This is getting us nowhere," she spat, her skinny fists pounding the ground on either side of her. "Goddamit, Jude!"
"What?"
"At least I gave you my opinion about Ailith," she muttered darkly. "Ailith- remember her? After all, you two are always hanging out- so I guess she doesn't find you unbearable, which is something. Besides, she's nice. I like her. And so do you. You're a good match. Now- tell me about Daniel."
"I don't know Daniel."
She sighed. "And I don't really know Ailith, do I?"
"I don't know."
"Stop it, Jude. You're useless."
"I'm very useful," Jude reminded her, trying not to let himself tense up.
He was feeling slightly edgy- but he was determined not to let it show. It was hard though, because he had no way of expressing how he felt. His toes had stopped curling- not a good sign.
Jude decided he should probably get out of the lake now.
"Finally," Tameron sighed, as he came out shivering.
She got up to go over to him, and picked up one of the towels Jude had wisely brought. He took it from her gratefully, and wrapped it around himself. Tapping his toes tentatively, he registered it would be a while before they could curl again.
Drat.
"Your fault."
"I know."
"Okay, Jude," Tameron got down on her knees in front of him, staring determinedly at him. "I want an answer. Please. No messing about. Just y'all."
Jude chewed the inside of his mouth for a couple of seconds, looking at her carefully. The fight was dying out now- it was still in danger of being resparked- but now, it seemed much safer to tell her what he thought. He flicked a few sopping strands of hair out of his eyes, and inhaled deeply.
"Tameron... I think you'll be the next Tess."
She flinched, and Jude felt a rush of guilt. Keeping his face perfectly expressionless still, he tried and failed not to see the colour drain from her face, and her head droop.
"It's not meant to be this hard, you know," she mumbled- so quietly that had it not been for his enhanced senses, Jude wouldn't have heard her.
"Tammy, you know he's not worth it."
"Goddamit- of course I know!" she exploded suddenly, leaping to her feet. "What in God's name made you think I didn't? Oh, but what were going to say next, Jude? Don't worry, lil' sis, it's just a crush? You'll get over, Tammy, and then you'll never need to worry about mean old Daniel again? Well?!"
Jude bowed his head. "What do you want me to say?"
"So it's a crush," she growled. "So what? Doesn't make it any easier. Don't tell me that all guys are no good. I know that. It doesn't change anything though. It doesn't change me. I still want what Mom and Dad had. Why's that so bad?"
The reference to their stupid parents seemed to crack something in Jude's carefully calm armour.
"Billie and Delilah were besotted high-school sweethearts," Jude spat viciously- more viciously than he'd ever heard himself speaking before; and shocking her into silence. "They were both idiots- their idiocy led to our existance, and inevitably, Billie's death. If Delilah hadn't gone and died like she did, Billie might've gotten out of the goo-goo eyes phase long enough to see that it wasn't working out. They would've gotten divorced, and we would've done a hell of a lot better out of life. As it was, Billie just flew into depression- ended up murdered- and I was stuck raising you, and praying every hour of every godforsaken day that you wouldn't turn out as goddam stupid as them!"
The second he said it, he regretted it. He'd told himself a thousand times that only a monster would tell Tameron the truth- tell Tameron about their pathetic excuses for parents and shatter her rose-tinted vision of soulmates- of a never-ending love that was both beautiful and tragic.
Only a monster would make Tameron cry.
Please don't cry, Tameron...
When she next spoke, her eyes were shimmering, and her voice was cracked. Jude couldn't move, his lips finally knitting themselves together, and his brain screaming at himself for his outburst. What right did he have to an outburst anyway? What right did he have to suddenly flare up like that?!
"J- Jude, you... y-you called them by their first names."
He could've cried- honest to God, he could've. "I'm sorry, Tameron. Mom and Dad loved each other. You're right."
"But you shouldn't... shouldn't have c-called them by their first n- names." She gulped, blinking rapidly, and the first tear fell. It hit the ground with a heartpounding thud, and Jude felt a horrible, raw emotion rise up from the deep.
And yet his face was still blank. Totally blank.
"They loved each other," he repeated numbly. "They did. I swear they did."
"Y- you raised me?"
Jude relented on that one. "Bill- Dad never changed you as a baby, or fed you, or anything like that. He wasn't good with all that baby stuff, really. He wasn't good with kids. But he tried for us in different ways. He always played his guitar and tried to make money. Remember?"
"W- was he making m-money for us? Really... J-Jude? Or was he just..." she laughed suddenly, her voice simultaneously hollow and stricken. "Was he just drowning his sorrows in the wake of Delilah's death?"
"I..."
"Yeah," she said softly, slightly stronger as she wiped at her eyes. "Yeah. Makes sense. You were always riding horses. You always sang. I cut my knee, and Dad never came when I called. You did. You bandaged me up and you comforted me. On my first day of school y'all are the one who put my hair in my ponytail and guided me there every step of the way- pink backpack and all. I just thought you did all that stuff because Dad was working so hard but... but he really didn't care, did he?"
"He did," Jude urged her leaning forward to take her arm, but she slid out of his reach. "He did care. He loved us- and that's why he was working so hard."
Tameron shook her head; the tears drying on her face now as she got unsteadily to her feet. "You can't promise that, Jude."
He leapt to his own feet now, the towel dropping off him like a dead weight. "I can, and I am. Hey-" he reached out and firmly grabbed her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him- "look- I mean it, Tameron. I would never lie to you. Never."
She sighed, trying and failing to shake him off. "Jude, if what you just said about... about Delilah and Billie is true, then you've been lying to me all my life."
Jude went silent, and Tameron freed herself properly, picking up the damp towel from the ground and bundling it into the bag she'd brought with them. Jude was still standing stock still when she came back over to him with his shoes.
"These reek, dude," she said with distaste, thrusting them at him. "Then again, you're a guy. What should I expect?"
Holding them numbly by the laces, Jude turned his glazed eyes to focus on Tameron. In those few short, endless minutes he'd crushed everything she ever cherished- the very thing that she'd always believed in with unwavering faith- and she was making a joke? It was worse like this. She couldn't do this to herself. He knew- he just knew- that if she didn't come to him, let him cradle her close like when they were kids, and cry herself to sleep- that this would be hell to get over. She'd let it eat her up, and it would make her bitter. It would teach her to be a cynical, twisted old coot before she hit thirteen.
He couldn't bear the thought of a Tameron who didn't believe.
"Please cry again."
She rounded to face him, her mouth hanging slightly open. "What?"
"Please cry again. This time, don't stop."
She snorted. "Don't be ridiculous, Jude."
"No," he darted after her, for she was beginning to head on up to Orchid. "No- listen. You've got to cry. You've got to. Come here." He spread his arms wide hopefully, but she just pulled a face.
"You're all wet."
"I don't care," he said simply- then stepped forward and embraced her. She struggled hopelessly against him for a few, angry minutes, but he refused to let go.
Then she collapsed, and gave up.
Her face crumpled, and began to sob whole-heartedly into his chest- crying properly now. Probably, she would've loved nothing better than to push him away, and run off to stew by herself. But that wouldn't work. He knew it wouldn't. She had to cry. She just had to.
He kissed her on the head- all of the usual sibling awkwardness gone as he rocked her back and forth like she was a baby.
"I won't lose you to this, Tammy," he muttered. "I won't. Forget about Mom and Dad. Don't worry about it. Really, don't. Cos' I don't worry about them- and I believe in love, right? And I love you, Tameron... never forget that, okay?"
Jude froze, ankle-deep in the icy water as he spun around to meet his sister's eyes from the bank. She glared back determinedly- just daring him to say something. She was ready for a fight. And the kind of fight where anything Jude said would just go straight over her head.
So if there was no point in arguing- he'd just have to let her talk.
Jude cleared his throat, turning back to his retreat into the Glass Lake. "Really? How come?"
Tameron went silent for a couple of moments, and Jude took a few further tentative steps; sliding his bare feet across the damp bank below.
"Ain't you cold?"
"Freezing," he replied, rolling up his jeans even further.
"Then why are you doing that? It's November, for chrissake."
"Just am." He shivered, pausing now knee-deep and looking out across the glacial surface of the grey steel water. Every step he took barely produced a ripple. No wonder it was called the 'glass' lake. It didn't move.
And its surface looked just like it could shatter- and he half-hoped that when his feet broke its surface, that it would.
Never did though.
"So why have you been talking to him?" Jude asked her carefully, keeping his back to her.
"Because I have," Tameron replied, and he heard a soft flump which told him she'd sat down on the bank. "He's my friend. So I can talk to him, yeah?"
"Yeah," Jude shrugged. "I just thought you wouldn't want to."
There was another, long pause.
"He dumped her, Jude. He dumped Tess."
"Poor Tess," Jude said absently, then giving up completely, Jude sank down beneath the surface- and soaked himself.
"Jude!"
Tameron was on her feet, gaping at him from the bank with a look of appropriate outrage. Hands on hips and lips pursed; her angry eyes followed his progess out even deeper; the freezing water now up to his chest.
Coughing slightly- hell, it was cold- Jude rubbed his sopping wet hair back, slicking it over his head, and blinking his eyes rapidly. His fists encased each other, one rubbing the other frantically.
"See, you're cold now," Tameron said moodily, sitting back down again. "Y'all get all diseased and die."
"We have a wonderful school nurse," Jude reminded her. "And the Carers- I'm a personal friend of the Head, I'll have y'all know."
"Whatever, y'all." She suppressed a smile; but with apparent struggle. "Anyway. Danny dumped Tess."
"So you say," Jude said, crossing his own arms. "And you're his friend."
"And I'm his friend," echoed Tameron, her eyes narrowing. "And I think... I think it could work."
Jude didn't reply, his face carefully expressionless; but he felt his toes curling. "You do, do you?"
"That I do." She bit her lip. "And what do you think, Jude?"
"Honestly?" he asked her.
She nodded, the fight firing up in her eyes as she squared up to him. Jude's toes wiggled and recurled. What did he want to tell her?
I think you're effing crazy.
What should he tell her?
That guy's a dirty, undeserving rat and you're better off without him.
But what did she need to hear?
"I think you know him better than I do, and I think it's your choice, at the end of the day," Jude shrugged.
Tameron's mouth was slightly open. "That's not an answer."
"Hell, yeah it is."
"No, it's not."
"You don't really care what I think," Jude reminded her, uncrossing his arms and bending down in the water to roll down his jeans. His hands brushed past something wet and slimy, and he pulled a face at the surface. He wasn't too keen on slime.
Tameron considered him for a few moments. "Oh. Okay. If that's what you think."
"It is," he replied, straightening up again. "So... what do you really think?"
"What do you want me to think?"
"Whatever you want me to think."
"This is getting us nowhere," she spat, her skinny fists pounding the ground on either side of her. "Goddamit, Jude!"
"What?"
"At least I gave you my opinion about Ailith," she muttered darkly. "Ailith- remember her? After all, you two are always hanging out- so I guess she doesn't find you unbearable, which is something. Besides, she's nice. I like her. And so do you. You're a good match. Now- tell me about Daniel."
"I don't know Daniel."
She sighed. "And I don't really know Ailith, do I?"
"I don't know."
"Stop it, Jude. You're useless."
"I'm very useful," Jude reminded her, trying not to let himself tense up.
He was feeling slightly edgy- but he was determined not to let it show. It was hard though, because he had no way of expressing how he felt. His toes had stopped curling- not a good sign.
Jude decided he should probably get out of the lake now.
"Finally," Tameron sighed, as he came out shivering.
She got up to go over to him, and picked up one of the towels Jude had wisely brought. He took it from her gratefully, and wrapped it around himself. Tapping his toes tentatively, he registered it would be a while before they could curl again.
Drat.
"Your fault."
"I know."
"Okay, Jude," Tameron got down on her knees in front of him, staring determinedly at him. "I want an answer. Please. No messing about. Just y'all."
Jude chewed the inside of his mouth for a couple of seconds, looking at her carefully. The fight was dying out now- it was still in danger of being resparked- but now, it seemed much safer to tell her what he thought. He flicked a few sopping strands of hair out of his eyes, and inhaled deeply.
"Tameron... I think you'll be the next Tess."
She flinched, and Jude felt a rush of guilt. Keeping his face perfectly expressionless still, he tried and failed not to see the colour drain from her face, and her head droop.
"It's not meant to be this hard, you know," she mumbled- so quietly that had it not been for his enhanced senses, Jude wouldn't have heard her.
"Tammy, you know he's not worth it."
"Goddamit- of course I know!" she exploded suddenly, leaping to her feet. "What in God's name made you think I didn't? Oh, but what were going to say next, Jude? Don't worry, lil' sis, it's just a crush? You'll get over, Tammy, and then you'll never need to worry about mean old Daniel again? Well?!"
Jude bowed his head. "What do you want me to say?"
"So it's a crush," she growled. "So what? Doesn't make it any easier. Don't tell me that all guys are no good. I know that. It doesn't change anything though. It doesn't change me. I still want what Mom and Dad had. Why's that so bad?"
The reference to their stupid parents seemed to crack something in Jude's carefully calm armour.
"Billie and Delilah were besotted high-school sweethearts," Jude spat viciously- more viciously than he'd ever heard himself speaking before; and shocking her into silence. "They were both idiots- their idiocy led to our existance, and inevitably, Billie's death. If Delilah hadn't gone and died like she did, Billie might've gotten out of the goo-goo eyes phase long enough to see that it wasn't working out. They would've gotten divorced, and we would've done a hell of a lot better out of life. As it was, Billie just flew into depression- ended up murdered- and I was stuck raising you, and praying every hour of every godforsaken day that you wouldn't turn out as goddam stupid as them!"
The second he said it, he regretted it. He'd told himself a thousand times that only a monster would tell Tameron the truth- tell Tameron about their pathetic excuses for parents and shatter her rose-tinted vision of soulmates- of a never-ending love that was both beautiful and tragic.
Only a monster would make Tameron cry.
Please don't cry, Tameron...
When she next spoke, her eyes were shimmering, and her voice was cracked. Jude couldn't move, his lips finally knitting themselves together, and his brain screaming at himself for his outburst. What right did he have to an outburst anyway? What right did he have to suddenly flare up like that?!
"J- Jude, you... y-you called them by their first names."
He could've cried- honest to God, he could've. "I'm sorry, Tameron. Mom and Dad loved each other. You're right."
"But you shouldn't... shouldn't have c-called them by their first n- names." She gulped, blinking rapidly, and the first tear fell. It hit the ground with a heartpounding thud, and Jude felt a horrible, raw emotion rise up from the deep.
And yet his face was still blank. Totally blank.
"They loved each other," he repeated numbly. "They did. I swear they did."
"Y- you raised me?"
Jude relented on that one. "Bill- Dad never changed you as a baby, or fed you, or anything like that. He wasn't good with all that baby stuff, really. He wasn't good with kids. But he tried for us in different ways. He always played his guitar and tried to make money. Remember?"
"W- was he making m-money for us? Really... J-Jude? Or was he just..." she laughed suddenly, her voice simultaneously hollow and stricken. "Was he just drowning his sorrows in the wake of Delilah's death?"
"I..."
"Yeah," she said softly, slightly stronger as she wiped at her eyes. "Yeah. Makes sense. You were always riding horses. You always sang. I cut my knee, and Dad never came when I called. You did. You bandaged me up and you comforted me. On my first day of school y'all are the one who put my hair in my ponytail and guided me there every step of the way- pink backpack and all. I just thought you did all that stuff because Dad was working so hard but... but he really didn't care, did he?"
"He did," Jude urged her leaning forward to take her arm, but she slid out of his reach. "He did care. He loved us- and that's why he was working so hard."
Tameron shook her head; the tears drying on her face now as she got unsteadily to her feet. "You can't promise that, Jude."
He leapt to his own feet now, the towel dropping off him like a dead weight. "I can, and I am. Hey-" he reached out and firmly grabbed her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him- "look- I mean it, Tameron. I would never lie to you. Never."
She sighed, trying and failing to shake him off. "Jude, if what you just said about... about Delilah and Billie is true, then you've been lying to me all my life."
Jude went silent, and Tameron freed herself properly, picking up the damp towel from the ground and bundling it into the bag she'd brought with them. Jude was still standing stock still when she came back over to him with his shoes.
"These reek, dude," she said with distaste, thrusting them at him. "Then again, you're a guy. What should I expect?"
Holding them numbly by the laces, Jude turned his glazed eyes to focus on Tameron. In those few short, endless minutes he'd crushed everything she ever cherished- the very thing that she'd always believed in with unwavering faith- and she was making a joke? It was worse like this. She couldn't do this to herself. He knew- he just knew- that if she didn't come to him, let him cradle her close like when they were kids, and cry herself to sleep- that this would be hell to get over. She'd let it eat her up, and it would make her bitter. It would teach her to be a cynical, twisted old coot before she hit thirteen.
He couldn't bear the thought of a Tameron who didn't believe.
"Please cry again."
She rounded to face him, her mouth hanging slightly open. "What?"
"Please cry again. This time, don't stop."
She snorted. "Don't be ridiculous, Jude."
"No," he darted after her, for she was beginning to head on up to Orchid. "No- listen. You've got to cry. You've got to. Come here." He spread his arms wide hopefully, but she just pulled a face.
"You're all wet."
"I don't care," he said simply- then stepped forward and embraced her. She struggled hopelessly against him for a few, angry minutes, but he refused to let go.
Then she collapsed, and gave up.
Her face crumpled, and began to sob whole-heartedly into his chest- crying properly now. Probably, she would've loved nothing better than to push him away, and run off to stew by herself. But that wouldn't work. He knew it wouldn't. She had to cry. She just had to.
He kissed her on the head- all of the usual sibling awkwardness gone as he rocked her back and forth like she was a baby.
"I won't lose you to this, Tammy," he muttered. "I won't. Forget about Mom and Dad. Don't worry about it. Really, don't. Cos' I don't worry about them- and I believe in love, right? And I love you, Tameron... never forget that, okay?"
