Re: The woods
Any existing fight had gone out of her when he ordered her to sit. It was so easy for her to fall back into a lifetime of bad patterns, no identity and no say for what she wanted herself. She folded her hands in her lap, and her fingers twisted around the fabric there, winding it in a winkled circle that wouldn't smooth out once she stood.
Unlike Luke, she didn't realize that fluidity when the older version sat down was a studied and schooled thing. She, in her silliness, thought it meant he wasn't hurting anymore, even if he used the cane. She didn't like the way he look at her, with his fingers steepled like that, like he was trying to see through her. Maybe it was stupid, and maybe it was naive but, until that moment, she had believed they'd care for each other anywhere, in any reality, in any anything. Her maman would tell her she was believing silly things about love, and she would be right. Everyone always told her they were different, and maybe she'd started to believe it just a little. But the man sitting across from her didn't like her very much, and he didn't trust her, and that was plain enough.
His casual question, the flippancy of it, made her shake her head quickly. "No, you've never met me," she said sadly, twisting that fabric even more unforgivingly between her fingers.
When he stalked about Nell, about Sebastian, she wanted to tell him that Sebastian had left the family buisiness altogether, and that the pair were together in Las Vegas now. But she didn't. She left it at, "I knew Sebastian. He just needed some time to make a different choice for himself."
And unlike Luke, she didn't realize the lack of elaboration was a bad sign at first. She just thought he was trying to decide if he trusted her enough to keep going. But then he leaned forward, and that dark coldness in his expression made her want to press back, back against the chair. She didn't, though. She didn't want to show him that, so she just nodded when he asked if she wanted to know. "I left because I was pregnant, remember?" she asked, her voice shaky. "Nothing had gone bad yet. I don't want you to lie. I just want to know." But then he was hissing, and she did edge back slightly when he rose from his chair abruptly, a lifetime's worth of learned behavior that she couldn't prevent.
She shook her head when he said Gwen killed herself. It was an unthinking thing, an unthinking reaction, one that nearly eclipsed the news about Max. It was the mention of the prison, though, of Laura that got her sitting forward in her chair again. "Why was she in-" she began, the question related to Laura, but he was moving on, and it was all she could do to keep up with him. "I can understand why Jack was on death row. He was always lethal," she said knowingly, "but why won't he talk to you?" she asked, perplexed. Luke was the only person that Jack would consistently talk to.
When he mentioned Thomas dying in a prison, her face went paler than it already was. "Jude still kidnapped you?" she asked, and maybe that was giving away too much, especially with the blatant confusion on her face. But if Thomas had died in prison, then...
But that snarl made her slide right back into her seat. And she wanted to turn, and she wanted to grab her Luke's hand, and she wanted to run. But she didn't. Instead, after a few seconds of quiet, she stood, and she walked over to the older version of the man she loved. "It's not better, but yes. I want to know." Pause. "Please."