caty norfolk ❄️sansa stark. (learned) wrote in dunhavenic, @ 2019-05-09 21:12:00 |
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In the en suite bathroom, Eli stood in silence as he watched the water flow from the faucet and into the basin of the sink. He had just brushed his teeth and had been going through the motions of getting ready for bed when everything just seemed to… stop. The day had been a long one. The morning and early afternoon had seemed to simultaneously drag and fly by, anticipation of knowing what he was going to view alongside Sarah, Mikhail, and their loved ones mixing with dread over the very same thing. Part of him wanted it to simply be over, but another part of him had worried that being over was exactly what might happen. There was an optimistic side of him that wanted to believe in happy endings for the good guys, but then there was the other side of him that had watched too many superhero movies in recent years to truly believe that the ending would be completely happy. Reaching out one of his hands, Eli extended a finger to disrupt the flow of the water. His eyes stayed there as it splashed, even as his thoughts went beyond that of which he had watched play out on the screen and instead dove into the memories themselves. It would have been difficult enough had he simply viewed the movie, but instead he was left feeling each moment as though he had lived them -- just as he felt he had lived every other part of Tony Stark's life. He could remember how it felt for his hope to be whittled away as he and Nebula drifted through space, only to turn around and feel the whiplash of emotions as they were rescued and the relief that came with seeing Pepper alive. He remembered every second of the five years that passed and he tried to make the most of what he had been given, living a life with Pepper and Morgan. Morgan. Thinking of the little girl, so full of the sort of fire and sass that only a child of Tony Stark and Pepper Potts could be, Eli's eyes closed. He leaned down, his hands coming to grip the edge of the countertop, grounding him in a way that let his mind continue on. He remembered the heist. Seeing his father as a young man. Losing Natasha. Bruce using the stones to fix the world, before it all went to hell again. Peter, who brought on a wave of emotions akin to that of Morgan. And then using the stones himself, knowing what would happen, but knowing he had to do it because the world needed to be fixed, it needed to be safe -- not only for his daughter, but for all the daughters and sons and everything in between in the world. When they had gotten back to the house, Eli had wanted Caty close, but hadn't wanted to talk. He'd spent his time working on a project that he'd been unable to focus on for days; where his mind had been unable to focus on anything but theories and worst case scenarios before, now it needed something to focus on to hold himself together. It had been a tactic that had worked for him in the past. Many of the current projects that were some of Salazar Industries' greatest achievements had been done when he was trying to distract himself from the despair that came with his mother's cancer diagnosis and eventual passing. It was a coping mechanism and not necessarily a healthy one, given how Eli allowed himself to use his work to ignore his basic needs at times. It was his therapist's voice reminding him of all this that had left him eventually agreeing to going to bed, rather than staying up all night like he might have had he not had Caty there with him. Without the idle work, though, he felt himself slowly unraveling, cracks forming in his armor. He wasn't sure what to do with that. Inhaling a long breath, Eli forced himself to straighten up. He turned off the faucet, then met his gaze in the reflection of the mirror. He looked exhausted, but that was no surprise. It was the scar on his chest that truly caught his eye, though, the one that reminded him too much of the scar left by the electromagnet and arc reactor that had initially kept Tony alive. Now it made him think of seeing the light in the arc reactor of the suit reflecting in Pepper's eyes, dimming as everything went dark. Eli sucked in a breath as he spun away from the mirror, opening the bathroom door and stepping into his bedroom. Jarvis was sitting dutifully next to the bed, staring at his owner in what could only be some sort of doglike concern. Seeing his dog only made Eli think of the real Jarvis, who Tony had glimpsed during his visit to the past. He sighed. "I don't -- I'm not sure I'm going to be able to sleep." It was the longest sentence Eli had managed to string together since stepping out of the small theater. Reaching up, he pushed one of his hands through his hair distractedly, then let his eyes fall on Caty. His expression softened just at the sight of her and he was once again left wondering what he would even do with himself if he hadn't had her there. "But thank you for staying." For the past few weeks, Caty had been barely holding herself together. Having experienced all of it as though she had lived it herself, she knew that Sansa’s journey had been an impossible one, and adding to that the fact that Caty had gotten to experience all of it in a matter of hours, well… Somehow in the midst of her own crisis, though, she had lost sight of the things here that mattered. Like Eli. Like this weekend and this damned movie that may not have been airing new, devastating content every week, but was every bit a guillotine to those it affected. To those who loved them. And so she’d stepped up in the only way she knew how, by just offering to be there for Eli in whatever way he needed. She didn’t want to see the movie, didn’t want to know more terrible truths, didn’t want to know how much worse it could get. But she loved Eli and she wanted to be what he needed more than she didn’t want anything else. The movie had been simultaneously the longest and shortest one she’d ever seen. She’d held Eli’s hand through the whole thing, wrapped a solid arm around him when he needed it, pulled him closer. And she’d been okay. She’d been okay when he’d survived space, and she’d been okay when he’d tucked his daughter in, and she’d been okay when he’d chosen to be the hero she already knew he was. But now? Now she was very not okay and it was so much more impossible to pretend she was okay for him, than it had been over the past few weeks to pretend she was okay for herself. She had managed it, though. She’d remained quiet while he did, and she’d made dinner that he barely touched. She’d busied herself with schoolwork while he distracted himself with a project. She didn’t tell him how much he reminded her of the Tony she’d seen on the screen, and she didn’t look for attention she knew he couldn’t give. She didn’t ask for words he couldn’t afford, and she didn’t try to be anything other than what he needed her to be. And, no matter how many times she replied him dying in her mind as vividly as though she’d dreamed it herself, she most certainly did not cry. Maybe that was a gift Sansa had given her, this ability to break without showing her cracks. But now Eli was so close and she could feel his turmoil as though it were a storm ripping at the shutters. She unfolded her legs and scooted to the edge of the bed after having already slipped into one of his old MIT tees that she’d decided the night before would be hers for a few nights. She wanted to scream, and rage, and throw things but, instead, she reached out a hand toward him, wanting to give him whatever comfort she could offer. “That’s okay,” she promised, “we don’t have to sleep yet, but you really should get some--” She pulled up short. Rest. No, that wasn’t the word she wanted, not by a long shot. She swallowed past the rock in her throat. “Sleep at some point,” she finished. “We can just be here until you’re ready for it.” Closing the distance between himself and Caty, Eli took her outstretched hand in his own. His fingers, calloused from a near lifetime of working with tools to create things, brushed over hers, then laced together. He knew that she was right. He would need to sleep eventually. History told him that sleep would likely come simply through exhaustion, unless he broke down and took some sort of sleep aid to coax it along. He'd had the foresight to take a couple of days off, both thanks to the movie and also knowing that Sunday might be a difficult one for Caty and he'd wanted to be in Dunhaven and available as she needed him; now he was especially glad he'd made those efforts. Releasing a breath, Eli dropped to his knees in front of Caty. Leaning forward, he let his cheek rest on her knee, keeping their hands linked as his free hand buried itself in the thick fur at Jarvis's neck. He could have just as easily sought out closeness from her by laying in bed with her in his arms, the dog likely jumping up to join them at the foot of it, but this felt right in the moment. After a few quiet moments, Eli finally spoke, his voice quiet and his eyes unfocused and staring across the room at a pile of books. "I knew something bad would happen. I don't know why it's so hard to accept." Almost immediately, Caty’s free hand went to Eli’s head, her fingers brushing through his hair as her heart broke for him. She hated this. She wanted to hate Dunhaven for giving this to them, but she couldn’t. Not when Dunhaven had given them so much good, too. Her fingers traced over his ear and along his neckline before returning to his hair and she shook her head. “It’s hard to accept because it’s bad. It’s wrong,” she replied, quiet, and wondering if it had been meant the words to be rhetorical. “Bad things aren’t supposed to happen to good people, or so they say, and yet here we are and the bad things just keep happening to the good people.” She pressed her lips together and looked away, feeling her foundation cracking just a little more. Her fingers pushed through his hair again. “And you’re the best, my love.” Eli's eyes closed at her words. A lifetime of uncertainty in more or less any social situation set before him had left him questioning many of his decisions and, to be frank, his morality. Though he used his intelligence and now his means to better the lives of others, he had never known if it was enough. He always wanted to do more, to leave the world he'd been born into at least marginally better when he one day left it, to be a good person, as Caty had said. Sometimes it felt like he was making progress toward it. Other days it felt like he was doing nothing at all. It was a mental struggle that had been amplified when he started sharing a life with Tony. He had gone through a transformation over his years. Eli might not have agreed with many of his decisions, but he could always see and maybe understand the drive behind them. He wanted to leave the world a better place, just as Eli did. He had succeeded. Swallowing, Eli's eyes opened. They were watery, which came as no surprise to him. It had felt like he had been on the brink of those very tears for hours and it had only been a matter of time. With his hands no longer busy and his mind not forced to focus on complicated math and machinery, the deep sorrow that had been trailing him was able to catch up and settle around his shoulders. One blink of his eyes later and the tears fell. He drew in a breath and it caught in his throat, turning into a sob instead. He straightened up, releasing his hands from hers and Jarvis's fur, to instead slip onto the bed and wrap his arms around Caty. Caty wasted no time pulling Eli to her, not able to be fully aware of everything that was going through his head, but knowing that he didn’t deserve anything that made him break like this. And she understood then how deep her love for him ran because, after all she had been through and after feeling for weeks like there was no room left in her for terrible things, she knew that she would take every ounce of his pain from him and carry it herself if she could. That was an impossibility, though, something that she couldn’t do for him no matter how much she loved him, so she wrapped her arms more tightly around him, instead. She couldn’t carry his pain, but she could help carry him. She lost her own fight against the tears, then, as they silently slipped out hot and angry from the dam that had been holding them at bay. This wasn’t fair. None of this, none of any of it was fair and she was so beyond tired of muddling through the injustice of the world as though it was only to be expected. As though there were nothing that could be done for it. Her palm splayed out across his back, her fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt as she held him close. “I will fight anyone who tries to take anything else away from you, Eli,” she said quietly, cheek pressed protectively to his head as he eyes closed against the unyielding onslaught of tears. “I may lose, it’s true, but I will give them the fight of their lives. I promise you. I promise you that I will fight for you for always.” Eli wasn't sure just what he had done to deserve this woman and the love and support she offered him not just now, at one of his more trying moments, but each and every day. It was something he'd considered many, many times, though usually in moments of levity, when she was making him smile or his heart feel particularly light as she laughed or kissed his every thought away. This was different, of course. This was her offering to be there to support him through the moments that weren't so easy, just as he knew that he would be there for her and had been trying his very best to do so as her own alternate life grew more and more complicated thanks to the politics and dangers of Westeros. It was also, he thought, something else he had in common with Tony. He'd had his own Caty through Pepper, after all. Though his arms stayed securely around Caty, his head still dipped to press against her shoulder, Eli managed to take in a shaky breath before speaking. "I know you will," he started, because he knew that too well to be true. "Just like I'll always fight for you." |