Ilia Amitola is color coded for your convenience (amitola) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-04-17 21:33:00 |
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Rachel had finally texted Illia once Chloe was resting again, having been petty enough to wait until she’d had a chance to see and talk to Chloe herself. After all, it wasn’t hard to put two and two together and come up with jealousy.
It had been a long day, and she had quite a few missed calls from Mark, but she wasn’t going anywhere until they kicked her out. She was certain that when Chloe woke up again she’d be disoriented, again. Especially in pain and on drugs. Rachel just didn’t want her waking up alone, and for that, she’d put any jealousy aside.
Chloe was just laying there, sleeping, bruised and battered with one leg pinned and one arm in a cast. Rachel had her head lowered into her hands, a little exhausted from worry and emotions and she didn’t at all feel calm or cool or collected like she usually was. But then her emotions around Chloe had been a mess lately to begin with, even leading to her breaking one of her cardinal rules about relationships.
This didn’t help.
Ilia’s blood had run cold when she had gotten the texts. Suddenly she had felt like she was nine years old all over again. Because after the death of her parents, she didn’t let herself get close to people. She had thought she’d been close to the gang back in Arkansas but she knew better now, that she’d only been used. Ilia hadn’t meant to let herself grow close to anyone here and yet she was failing at that
And now one of the few people she had opened up to? Had grown close to? They were in the hospital and there was nothing Ilia could do about it.
So she had thrown on a hoodie over her tank top and made her way to the hospital. Once she was told the room number, the teen went and stood awkwardly in the doorway. Chloe shouldn’t be so banged up, it was just wrong. She barely registered Rachel’s presence at the moment. She was just trying to get her emotions a semblance of under control.
Rachel heard footsteps and lifted her head. Under normal circumstances, Rachel’s impression would have gone from ‘I kind of hate that you exist’ to ‘oh no you’re hot … but I still kinda hate that you exist.’ But these weren’t normal circumstances, and Rachel was too raw to wallow in negative emotions. Besides, she didn’t think Chloe would be happy if she acted like a total bitch in this case.
She couldn’t blame Ilia for just standing there. It was a lot to take in. Her throat bobbed, and she spoke up. “Posing dramatically at the door is usually my job. Come in. She’ll be happy to see you when she’s awake.”
It was when she spoke up that Ilia finally registered Rachel’s presence and she just blinked at the comment about posing dramatically.
“I wasn’t.. I mean…” Yeah. Ilia had no idea how to handle this. She just felt awkward and out of place and scared and scared just wasn’t something she was okay with feeling. Still, she did step inside as Rachel told her to do so, nodding some as she said that Chloe would be happy to see her when she woke up. It wasn’t like Ilia had plans to exactly leave now that she knew and was here.
Gesturing vaguely to one of the chairs, Rachel replied, “Sorry. If I don’t...thinking too much is…” That way led madness. “The only sound is the machines and her… breathing.”
Which meant she was alive, but it was a little maddening. Rachel pulled her leg up and hugged it. She was tired, and she didn’t even care that her make-up had run or her bruises were showing. Rachel was in protect-Chloe mode. “She didn’t handle it too well when she woke up, at first.”
Ilia just nodded again. She was mostly following along with Rachel’s train of thought. Okay, she wasn’t at all but she did go to the other chair and sat down, pulling her knees up and looking as every bit as small as she felt in that moment. Normally that would be a problem for her but none of that mattered right now.
“I can imagine.”
And she could. There had been a lot of bonding with Chloe since they had met. An openness and understanding right from the get go. She didn’t think too much on it or what it meant, but it was there. Still. Breathing was good. Breathing was very good.
Chloe had that effect on people. Even for Rachel there’d been that instant connection the moment she’d laid eyes on her. She’d made a lot of mistakes since, some of which she was still paying for and still trying to make up for, but that connection had always been there.
And here she was, in bad shape, and Rachel didn’t think she needed to say just how bad it was. Ilia didn’t look like she could handle it and if Rachel was honest with herself saying it out loud would make it worse for herself.
“I’m Rachel.” There. That was a start, and talking was better than awkward silence and the spinning thoughts in her head.
Ilia had never been good at small talk to begin with. Add in emotionally charged settings and she was completely lost. She had survived for so long. Tossed around from home to home, never fitting because there was just something about her, anger, and it felt like she’d lived much longer than she had. And things like this reminded her how young she still was. She may have recently turned eighteen, an adult, but she sure as hell didn’t feel it right now.
“Ilia…”
Well, it was something.
Anger was something Rachel could understand. She couldn’t summon up that fire though. There was nothing to direct it at but some nebulous hand of fate, and she mostly felt helpless. She wasn’t much older than Chloe, just half a year.
And she was pretty sure this wasn’t how Chloe had intended to introduce them to each other, if at all. So she nodded, giving Ilia a few minutes to just… absorb.
Ilia wasn’t sure how she felt about Rachel. Chloe had told her about her of course in one of their late night talks while walking alongside the train track without the Russian Roulette or sex train. As a rule, Ilia just didn’t like manipulative people. But with everything going on right now? Her more suspicious tendencies were mostly subdued at the moment. All that mattered to her right now was Chloe being okay.
This was definitely not the way she would have thought she’d be meeting Rachel though, assuming they would ever have been introduced.
Rachel rubbed her palm with her thumb, head bowed and face hidden by her hair. She hated the beeping of the machines, but it meant Chloe was alive, so she’d tolerate it.
For once she was glad her Dreams were mundane; Rachel didn’t think she could deal with dragons or aliens or animal people or whatever and also this.
“Wish I’d....called her earlier so she wouldn’t have been driving just then. Or something.”
Beeping machines were shit but Ilia would deal with them. She had to. It wasn’t like there was anything else that could be done.
The Dreams had come to a mini halt, or Ilia supposed as much. Nothing since she had dreamt of moving to Atlas and being told to hide who and what she was. Her conversation with Blake. Ilia was dreading what might come next, so them not happening at the moment was great. Or had been but right now she’d take the distraction.
“Mm.” Because what was there to say? Ilia sure as hell didn’t know.
Rachel’s nerves were making her feel oddly chatty. She wanted to hear something, anything, even if it was just her own voice. She shifted her gaze to Chloe, throat moving as she swallowed. Rachel was an actress, in life as well as chosen profession, but there was nothing to act for. The fear and worry she felt were real. “What do you do when you’re not the kind of person that prays? When you don’t believe in god?”
Ilia had stopped believing in god the day her parents died. Oh, some of the homes had tried to force her to church and that had never ended well. But right now, she really wished that she believed in something. But all she had was nothing. A blank.
“I don’t know…” All Ilia knew right now was how small and lost she currently felt. How desperate and scared.
If there was no one up there to listen, there was no one to look out for Chloe. Besides them, anyway. Something that Rachel knew she’d failed on for awhile there but was determined to make up for.
She sighed, a shaky, tired sound. “Are you okay?”
The question finally had Ilia look at Rachel as her focus had been on Chloe. While she had been half listening to the other teen, had been aware of her presence, she hadn’t really looked at her. So she saw the bruises, but they weren’t her place to question. She wasn’t close to Rachel, didn’t know her, and honestly… well okay, if she ever came across an abusive situation, she’d step in. But here and now?
“I could ask you the same thing. But I’m not the one hooked up to a machine. So I’m fine.”
“I’m not,” Rachel admitted. She wasn’t hooked up to a machine, she wasn’t injured or hurt, but seeing Chloe like this? Vibrant, bad-assed Chloe? It had shaken her. “At least not as okay as I thought I’d be in this kind of situation.”
It was all comparative. Of course Ilia wasn’t actually fine. But she wasn’t going to say that. Chloe was in way worse condition and she didn’t know Rachel and thus didn’t feel comfortable even remotely saying that she wasn’t okay. It was pretty obvious that anyone who cared about Chloe wouldn’t be okay or fine.
So she just nodded some.
“Yeah.”
Rachel wet her lips. She was honestly loathe to leave Chloe at all, but at least she wouldn’t be alone if she woke up. But Rachel suddenly needed air, and probably something to eat. And a smoke break. She was desperate for a smoke.
So she stood, “...I need to eat something, and I promised Chloe I’d bring her a marker to tag things with. Do you want something?”
Well, Ilia had no plans on leaving the room unless she was forcibly removed. And even then she’d fight it, so Rachel wouldn’t need to worry about Chloe being alone even on the off chance.
“No thanks. I’m fine.”
She wouldn’t be able to eat or drink even if she were hungry or thirsty.
“Okay,” Rachel started for the door, but stopped. “And. Um. Thanks. The last thing I want is for her to be alone right now.”
“I wouldn’t be anywhere else.” And she wouldn’t. She just had needed to be told which...she had been. So thus, this was where Ilia was going to stay. There was no way she would let Chloe be alone.
Nodding, Rachel walked out. She started slowly, then started walking faster down the hallway, until she was running out of the hospital. She wanted to find somewhere to scream, but for now she’d settle with some comfort food, a smoke, and a trip to the store for markers.
Maybe she’d do her screaming in the car.