InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Is that punishment?"

Marcella Bellini (born_greater) wrote in nevermore_logs,
@ 2021-08-22 01:30:00

Current mood:	romantic
Entry tags:	cathal bhattacharya, marcella bellini

WHO Marcie and Cathal
WHEN Sunday afternoon
WHERE Out at a park
WHAT An afternoon picnic and chats and kissies
WARNINGS probably none

A week had never passed so quickly or so pleasantly in a very long time. Not since the heady days of her first blush of lust with Tragos had Marcie felt so happy and so good. Although her parents knew, nobody else yet did, and it was kind of fun to send sneaky little texts with suggestive emojis. Marco seemed to be surprised at the development, but he came around to the idea pretty quickly, and said Cathal was a good guy with a good work ethic, and certainly was a step up from- and then stopped and stuck his head in the fridge while Celeste far-too-brightly suggested that Cathal could join them for dinner? Marcie gave a blanket No to any and all dinner invites for the time being. At least until she could break the news to Kaden.

Oof, Kaden. She tried really hard not to flaunt her sudden happiness but it was very difficult when Cathal was being so cute. She still lay awake at night, her thoughts racing with guilt and worry, but when the sun was up, things seemed better.

The sun on this particular day was shining down on the two of them on a picnic- basket, blanket, two sneaky glasses of bubbles in the summer sun. Marcie picked a cherry tomato out of her salad and popped it into her mouth, smiling as she tilted her head back to bask in the summer sun. She was cute and summery today, red wedges and a pretty white and red floral dress with her hair out and in gentle waves. She wanted to look the part, and be more feminine than her designer wardrobe of miniskirts and a lot of black. She hadn’t even paid that much for the dress, finding it in a second-hand boutique in town.

Sitting out here with Cathal, she could pretend she didn’t still have so much shit to deal with. She could be a breezy summer girl, with not a care in the world.

(Read comments) - (Post a new comment)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-22 11:57 am UTC (link)

"Yeah, she'd be tutting about me dating any girl who couldn't cook," Cathal agreed with amusement, before putting on a slightly higher voice with an Indian accent. "'Oh, bandar, what will do you if you marry one of these modern women with no respect for tradition? You'll go hungry in a cardboard box and she will kiss a thousand men'." Cathal dropped the accent. "And that is why I learned to make the lightest fluffiest swirls. So I can be a modern independent woman of my own."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-22 12:18 pm UTC (link)

Marcie laughed a little. "Oh, man, and I've only kissed like five hundred men, so..." She shrugged, shifting her position a bit because her leg was falling asleep. "You go girl. You don't need no man." It was a little funny, how Marcie considered herself a modern woman, and yet she still needed men in her life. She didn't particularly want to analyse herself right now, though. She took another bite of her whirl, and washed it down with more bubbles, and nudged Cathal's leg with her own.

"What's Ireland like?" she asked. "Prettier than here?"

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-22 12:29 pm UTC (link)

"Its beautiful," Cathal nodded with a smile. "Very green, very lush, very romanticized in my memory already." Ireland had become a distant beautiful place of magic over the last eight years, and every time someone asked him about it, Cathal felt like he embellished it a bit more. "When I was little there was a lot of division among the people- you've heard of The Troubles? Lots of people fighting over which religion was right and which was wrong, and a little of that still lingers." Which was all so foolish, when the truth was that all of the religions were just as wrong as they were right. What a thing to be killing each other other.

But the subject made him remember something he'd wanted to ask Marcie. "I noticed somethin' about you," he said with a slightly furrowed brow of interest. "You say 'oh my gods', plural. You don't come across that much around here."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-22 12:43 pm UTC (link)

"Oh-" Marcie glanced down at her glass. She knew her beliefs weren't exactly common practice, and a lot of what she did, she made up as she went or tried to crib from internet descriptions of Ancient Greek rituals. But how much to share with Cathal, so she didn't look like some crystal-rubbing hippy weirdo?

"Well," she began, after a sip of wine, "It used to be an affectation, when I was a teen, and it kind of... grew more serious. Especially this last year. I guess you could call it paganism? Although it's not a specific religion, although it is kind of... maybe more spiritual, I don't know. Most people round here are pretty solidly Christian though, so I don't exactly advertise it." She watched Cathal, trying to guage his reation. She felt fairly safe that he wasn't about to kick up a fuss about it, but just in case.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-22 12:50 pm UTC (link)

Cathal listened to her, taking in her words and the meanings behind them. He could tell she felt slightly awkward about this, but perhaps it was just because of how he might react. So when she was done speaking he gave her a small smile. "Yeah, small town American hears the word 'paganism' and reaches for the pitchforks."

He picked up his drink and took a sip. "I believe that there are-" was 'gods' a little too much? Maybe a little too much. "-things that exist beyond what most people know about. I say that I'm an Atheist if asked, but I suppose that's not quite true. I believe," Cathal frowned a little. "I just don't worship."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-22 01:05 pm UTC (link)

Marcie listened to Cathal speak, nodding slowly. "I get that. I didn't used to worship either. But I know that my patron goddesses saved my life. I owe them eternal thanks." She laughed a little awkwardly. It felt weird to explain this to someone who didn't Know. She'd never had to do it before. "So I have, um, a little shrine to, uh- to Hecate, Athena and Aphrodite, and I make offerings to them. I know how it sounds." She blushed, a little embarrassed at being so vulnerable, not for having the shrine. Not at all embarrassed for that. And she couldn't deny her protectors. What kind of ungrateful adherent to them would she be if she did?

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-22 01:17 pm UTC (link)

How did Marcie know that? There were only certain ways for a person to know that the gods were watching out for them... But, of course, Marcie's 'know' didn't have to be literal. Sometimes you 'knew' things because you felt them. Marcie could feel as though Hecate and Athena and Aphrodite were watching out for her in a warm fuzzy way, and not because she'd run into them on a street corner and talked.

(Hecate especially. He couldn't imagine casually running into Hecate on a street corner. Hecate was more of an intense, dark room, smells-like-ylang-ylang goddess, in Cathal's opinion.)

"It sounds nice," Cathal told her with a smile, not wanting Marcie to feel like she couldn't say any of this, even as he put his own weird feelings aside. "There's nothing wrong with having faith in something bigger than yourself."

It felt hypocritical to say when Cathal had abandoned faith in all of that.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-22 01:28 pm UTC (link)

"I lost my faith in the church young. I had nothing, for a while, until I discovered this."

Marcie hesitated for a long moment, wondering how much she should reveal to Cathal. She tucked her knees up under her skirt, and fiddled with the hem. "It's one of the things... that Bethany I mentioned. When I was at high school, I told her about my faith in confidence, and then after we fell out, she told everyone. Like, the whole school knew. High school sucked." Students with devout parents were told to steer clear of her. People who wouldn't have cared about the pregnancy avoided her in case someone told their parents they'd been fraternising with a heathen. "I hope I can trust you. I feel like I can." She looked back up to catch Cathal's eye, so he'd know how serious she was about this. It was only a sliver of everything she carried inside, but it was important to reach out, if only a little.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-22 01:35 pm UTC (link)

Ah, Cathal was well acquainted with high school sucking because of the gods. His and Marcie's story was a little different, but didn't it all sort of boil down to 'religious problems'?

"You can trust me," Cathal told her, reaching out to rest his hand on her knee. "I don't think you're weird or crazy." How could he judge her for believing in things that he knew to be true? "And I'm sorry that kids are bellends."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	born_greater 2021-08-22 02:14 pm UTC (link)
	"They're what?" Marcie blinked at the unfamiliar slang. Had Much ever used that word? She wasn't sure if she remembered. It was a relief that Cathal was being sympathetic though. She did breathe a little easier knowing he wasn't looking at her like she was some crazy witch or something. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	seams_and_scars 2021-08-22 02:17 pm UTC (link)
	"Bellend," Cathal repeated with a grin, leaning into his accent a little more as he did. "Uh, it means dickhead, literally." Except in America you could get away with saying it around children and not get in trouble. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-22 09:48 pm UTC (link)

Marcie laughed. "Bellend. Oh wow that's funny. Bell-End, I get it!" Irish accents were so cute. Cathal was so cute. She ducked her head and tucked her hair behind her ear.

"You know, I have a history of dating assholes. I feel like my streak has finally ended." She finished her wine and set the empty glass back in the basket, and because it was so hard to resist, she reached out to hold Cathal's hand, rubbing her thumb over the knuckles. "You are definitely not an asshole."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

seams_and_scars
2021-08-23 09:32 am UTC (link)

The thought of Marcie only dating arseholes was a depressing idea, and it made Cathal want to make sure he did everything he could to not add to that number, however long this new thing between them lasted.

Fortunately, Cathal had always tried to veer clear of arsehole territory, relying on his actions rather than just his words there. He had grown up watching his parents profess deeply poetic and unending love to each other one week, only to watch his mother get kicked out of the house in tears when his father was sure she'd been somehow unfaithful. Cathal's father, for all that perfect paragon of manhood the world saw him as, was a deeply imperfect man.

"I've never been much good at being an arsehole," Cathal assured her, giving her hand a squeeze. "Being mean makes me feel too icky."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

born_greater
2021-08-23 11:11 am UTC (link)

Marcie laughed over the way his accent sounded on the word "icky". "You're adorable," she giggled.

Most of the time, she'd known a guy was a bit of a dick before she'd gotten too involved, just so she wasn't disillusioned later. But she'd been after a particular thing, and a summer fling hadn't been it. She wouldn't have a summer fling with an asshole.

She leaned forward to take the wine glass out of Cathal's hand and set it aside, then leaned into him to kiss him warmly, finding a comfortable spot up against him to enable more of the same.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

(Read comments) -