Jamie (litfuse) wrote in commandhq, @ 2018-05-26 21:30:00 |
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Entry tags: | jamie rowan, p: mena, p: mj, waverley rowan |
Who: Jamie and Waverley Rowan
What: Ten years is a very long time
When: Sometime after this
Where: Limbo grounds
Rating: Low
After seeing someone that had looked remarkably like Jamie - or the Jamie that she thought she remembered - in the cafeteira, Waverley had been somewhat in a tailspin. She'd gone for a swim and a drink with Calvin, they'd talked a bit about their families while downing freely made expensive drinks. When they'd run out of bottled water and were both feeling a little tipsier than they had been before, they'd gotten out of the water and gone to sit outside. She learned a bit about Cal; he'd been in the foster care system, he'd been on the streets, he loved his family fiercely but they were kind of driving him insane. And she'd shared bits about herself too; she was in foster care, she and her brother had gone on the run. She'd thought he was dead and she was still sure that he was but there was someone here who looked a lot like him and that had thrown her for a loop. It was after that conversation that she thought maybe she should speak to the guy who looked like her dead brother, to tell herself that it wasn't him, and that worry could be closed off, re-relegate that chapter of her life to the closed section. It had ended with a kiss to Cal's cheek and they'd headed off their separate ways: he was going to check on his sister and she was heading to sleep off the one too many drinks she'd had. A few days had passed since that initial... not confrontation because she'd dropped her tray in shock at someone who looked like a ghost from her past and just fled out of the cafeteria, hopefully before he'd seen her standing there staring at him like he was a ghost come back to haunt her. But she hadn't run into him again, and she was both happy about that and desperately disappointed. She hadn't been walking around the base aimlessly in the hopes of running into him, of course not, that would be stupid. So, of course, that's exactly what she was doing. And she was repeatedly unsuccessful about it, too, so she'd decided that the best course of action was a run. Earbuds in and hair tied back, Waverley's feet pounded on the path, her run smooth and easily paced until someone stepped out in front of her. She slowed with more than enough time for her not to have collided with the person, to readjust her course and keep running but she didn't because standing with his back to her now, having seen his profile was Jamie. It had to be him, he was taller and older but his profile was the same. Jamie. Her Jamie. She stood there with her mouth half open, dumbstruck and frozen to the spot. Jamie unlike Waverley was blissfully unaware and ignorant of his sister's existence at Limbo. He was still operating under the mistaken impression that she was still very dead and he was very much alone. He'd made friends sure but it wasn't quite the same thing as family, especially with his family history and what had happened there. He still missed her to this day. He was currently getting a feel for the base as he'd known his last one like the back of his hand but Limbo? Not so much. And it was out here that he became aware of somebody running though didn't pay them too much mind as if folk wanted to exercise then more power to them, but he wasn't about to join that particular bandwagon. Of course then he became aware that the footsteps had stilled and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end as he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was being watched. He'd gotten something of a sixth sense for it from his childhood and he knew better than to ignore it, but he hadn't been prepared for what he would see when he turned his head. There in front of him was Waverley. She was there in the flesh, present, and very much alive. Waverley met a pair of blue eyes with her own and took half a step backwards. She'd been sure it wasn't him, then sure that it was, then she'd seen him and knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was, but he was dead. That half a step became a second one, her throat closing up as she shook her head. She wanted to run, but the more she tried to move away the heavier her feet felt, like she was just stuck trying to get through quicksand. Ten years, or thereabouts, ten long years where she thought he'd been dead but he'd been here all along, trapped in this Regiment, the same place that had had her for a year and a half. They'd been so close for over a year and she'd not known. She didn't move any further, not closer or further away because if he wasn't real and she was just putting his face on someone who looked very familiar that would be embarrassing and a very serious social faux pas. If it wasn't him and she was hallucinating him again - something she thought she'd gotten over years ago - then she needed to book herself in with the shrink. Drawing her lower lip into her mouth, Waverley's fingers twisted together. Ten years was a long time. If it was him, would he even recognise her? Maybe he was just staring at her because she was staring at him. She was the first to find her voice. Jamie was dead. This was... this was ridiculous. "I- I'm sorry," she managed, words forced out of an increasingly tight throat, lips turned down in the corners and a heartbroken sorrow etched across her features. "You just- you look like someone I used to know." Jamie was staring. Openly so. Without any and all hesitation. He'd always been told if he let his face stay that way for too long it would get stuck and he'd never listened so now was no different. It wasn't possible, she was... dead. Had been for as long as Jamie had come around in the hospital with bullet wounds stitched up and cuffs around his hands. His brow drew together as she began to apologise and was passing him off as somebody else, as not being her brother. "That any way to greet your brother, Waves?" He managed, his own throat equally tight. Ten years. Ten years and he still knew exactly what not to say. She pressed her lips together, fighting the burn in her throat, the way she could feel her eyes filling with tears. But she wouldn't cry, she'd done enough of that after he'd died, for years she'd cried. Mourned. She'd been broken by losing him, something she never got over because her first reaction still was to reach for Jamie when things went wrong. "JJ-" she started, "You- they told me you'd died. I- I heard them sho-" It was a talent what could he say? He felt his hands flexing at his side, restless, but the moment he saw tears in Waverley's eyes he moved closer and pulled her into a hug. That was more than enough to cement that this was real and more importantly that she was real. "They told me the same about you," he shared quietly, against her hair, arms tightening. He had been shot, multiple times, and he'd nearly died, but now wasn't the time to mention that. Arms lifting and wrapping around Jamie's shoulders, Waverley clutched at him, burying her face in his neck, one hand against the back of his head as the other twisted in the fabric of his hooded sweater. Despite how long it had been, her body moulded against his and she was held up purely by the strength of his arms around her. "I'm so sorry- I- if I'd known- I- Jamie I-" she didn't even know what she was apologising for, what she would have done if she'd known. Got herself caught sooner? Hoped that they'd see each other beforehand? Then they'd have both been caught and there was no guarantee they'd have been put together. She frowned, leaning back and touching his face, like she just wanted to check that he was there, that this wasn't a really intricate hallucination. "Wait," she started, her eyes darkening with anger. "You- they told you I'd died?!" Jamie's arms tightened that much more around Waverley as she pressed closer and he turned his head to bury his face in her hair, determined to burn this moment into his mind's eye. She was real, vividly so, and right here. She wasn't dead, she was alive and breathing. "Yeah," he answered back after a few moments as he couldn't quite bring himself to look her in the eye. "They told me that the explosion had killed you." It had made him utterly terrified of his powers for the longest time. Waverley ducked her head to get into Jamie's eye line without moving from the protective and borderline desperate circle of his arms. She used her touch on his face to draw his head upwards so that he was looking at her and then she just touched their foreheads together. She closed her eyes and just breathed, past the quiver in her voice, the shake of her hands, the way her throat felt tight and suffocating. "That's not what happened," she managed tightly, "see?" Jamie briefly thought about fighting Waverley but thought better of it and allowed her to draw him up so he was looking at her before sure enough he closed his eyes at the same time as she did, hands lifting to cup the back of her head and hold her quite firmly in place. "Should've known they were lying," he offered after a few moments of silence. "It was a really big explosion," Waverley shared. "I- I never shoulda let you do that, Jamie." His hands were warm, she remembered that; they'd always been warm. The memory hit her so suddenly along with a grief that she knew was now misplaced but that didn't take away the time she'd spent mourning his loss, that she couldn't breathe for a moment so she just leaned her head forward until it was resting on his shoulder, clutching at him again. "I'm sorry." "Don't think you had much choice in the matter," Jamie pointed out as he tightened his hold on her once now, fingers curling in the material of her t-shirt. "I'd already made my mind up and you know how I get." Damn stubborn was Jamie through and through. He shook his head. "You ain't got nothing to be sorry for." "Ten years changes a person," Waverley pointed out softly. "I've had a lot of time to think about what I shoulda done differently, that wouldn't have meant that you-" She swallowed past the lump in her throat, not at all embarrassed by the fact that she was clinging to her brother. "I got everything to be sorry for, JJ. They shot you, I- That was on me. Shoulda just kept my cool, shoulda just-" Her voice broke. "Goddamn, I missed you." Ten years did change a person. Look at Jamie for instance, he was no longer quite such a hothead. Still had his moments that was for sure but he had much better control, mostly. Just don't piss him off and there shouldn't be too much of a problem. He frowned at the sound of Waverley's voice breaking and he merely tightened his embrace on her, smoothing a hand through her hair. "I missed you too, Waves. So fucking much." Waverley, conversely, hadn't been in the clutches of the government for the better part of a decade and so she was less interested in the nonsense here, but she, too, had changed. Time messed with everything but his arms around her still felt exactly the same, or maybe it didn't- nostalgia had changed her memory of a lot of things: he smelled different, he was taller, broader - obviously better fed than they'd ever been. She'd missed so much, so many birthdays and Christmases, so much time. Would they have to get to know each other all over again? Her fingers twisted in the fabric of his hoodie again, arms around his waist as she let him brush his hand over and through her hair. "Never thought I'd-" she swallowed, unable to bring herself to let go of him even though she knew they might have been making a scene. "Shit, JJ. I've ruined my make up." "Like you need it," Jamie returned easily and without much thought. His sister had always been pretty but over the last ten years she'd really blossomed into a beautiful woman. The compliment was not hard to give, not at all. He didn't really care all that much if people were staring and even if they were he'd bark at them and tell them to go find something better to gawk at. He did however lean back after a moment, taking Waverley's head in his hands to give her a much broader smile. "What'd you say to us getting a drink and catching up?" Waverley brushed her fingers under her eyes and looked at the mascara that had collected there, that had started to try and run down her face and she let out a weak laugh. "Sounds like a plan. I just- need to fix this." She was going to suggest that they meet in the cafeteria but she didn't want to let him out of her sight, just in case he disappeared again. She turned her head to press a kiss to his palm. "You wanna come with me and then we can find somewhere quiet to talk?" Jamie gave a ready nod of his head. "Yeah, let's do that." And with that he slipped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against his side as he settled in beside her, not willing to let go of her just yet. He probably wouldn't for a couple of hours as it had been ten years after all. |