Log: The Diner Who: Seven & Marta What:Coffee Where: Diner on the good side of town When: Present Warnings/Rating: Language, TBD.
There was a sense of association that permeated his day. The notion of a reunion, that started out familiar enough. The presence of void where there had been things known, about a person. Conspicuous. Hard to avoid, hard even to not think about. Sharing days with them. Nights. Touches, casual and intimate. Not like that - no. The really intimate stuff. Elbows brushing at the bathroom counter while somebody flossed and somebody else combed their hair. Knowing how they liked their eggs: whites still a little transparent, soft, but crisping up at the edges. How the pillowcase would smell on the other side of the bed, lilac and spice even hours after the cotton went cool.
And it went without saying that it was hardly his first reunion. Sometimes he entertained the thought that his life had evolved into a series of patterns, at least to do with the people he cared about. First there was the dance. Playful flirting, dial up the charm. The seduction of getting inside somebody’s head, prying his way in with a smile only to have the favour returned. Somebody who wanted to know him, the oracle of his secrets and whims. A waltz.
And for whatever reasons, things turned the way they did. Intimacy carved out a home for hurts most profound. Seven learned to cauterize the holes left in his heart, told himself he’d learned this time. And wasn’t it an irony? Ever the boss of everything but his own affections. The last place an iron fist could have helped keep him whole, instead of having to figure out new ways to pick up his pieces.
He’d meant what he said to Marta. He hadn’t ever wished her harm after she’d left. He hadn’t ever hated her. Had tried to, at first. But Marta was the first person who had ever left him with more than just an absence. Their daughter wasn’t just a distraction - she was the world. But she needed everything, all his time, all his feeling and his love and she didn’t leave any room for hating Marta. He’d even had to compartmentalize his panic and his worry about where she was, if she was alive. Had to figure out how just to keep going. And there’d been nothing left to consider if she was sorry. Seven had no need to reconcile what she’d done with who she was in their lives, his and Sawyer’s. He’d always known that it hadn’t been some easy thing, for her to leave.
And after Sawyer got sick… well. Almost losing a child had put the last vestiges of Seven’s selfish pain into a perspective that drove him now. Despite what Marta thought, he’d meant what he said. So maybe this part was familiar, where he took a break from logging inventory in the keg fridge at The Bar to shower in the bathroom attached to his office, changed out his work clothes for something a bit nicer. Where he tried not to get too inside his own head as he tucked his phone and wallet into his jacket and tugged a scarf around his neck against the November bite. Turning over the wonder of whether she still looked like he remembered. Whether he looked like she remembered. If she remembered (because there had been other reunions, and Seven still thought about how it’d felt, when Liam hadn’t remembered).
So maybe it was all sort of familiar, but this time wasn’t those. Not yet.
He slid into a booth at the diner at quarter to four, facing the door and hooking his aviators in the neck of his shirt so that Marta would be able to spot him when she came in. He ordered himself a coffee immediately so that he wouldn’t be tempted to stare, but still glanced up each time the chime above the door jangled in announcement.