nishka//loki (nishka) wrote in paxletalelogs, @ 2017-06-14 10:13:00 |
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Entry tags: | hel, loki |
I’ve been moping around I can’t get outta my bed
Who: Jocelyn & Nishka
What: So much for their Saturday plans...
Where: Pax Letale, Apt 502
When: Saturday morning, June 10
Jocelyn stood in the hallway outside Nishka’s apartment, all dressed and ready to head out for an afternoon of wandering through the pop up arts and music fair down by the sea side. She hadn’t wanted to come upstairs, but Nish hadn’t replied to any of her earlier messages, and if they were going to get there before it started they needed to leave soon.
She raised her hand, then paused to look up and down the hallway for any signs of the floor’s other tenant. The coast seemed to be clear, so she knocked firmly on her friend’s door. “C’mon Nishka, we’re gonna be late!”
Nish was still in bed when Josie pounded on her door, wrapped in a cocoon of blankets. It took her a good several minutes to drag herself out of bed and pad over to the door, yanking it open mid-knock and frowning at her through bleary eyes. “Late for what?” she asked, her voice thick with sleep.
Jocelyn blinked in surprise at her friend’s disheveled appearance. “You- you’re not ready?” She fished her phone out of her purse and opened her calendar. She suppressed a frown, and turned her phone around to show Nishka the calendar entry. “We were going to go to that thing down at Marina Beach, remember? The art show? You were going to invite Jen along?” She gave her friend an expectant look, waiting for her to remember their discussion earlier in the week.
Nish squinted at the screen, but it was a little too bright for her still sleepy eyes. Slowly, realisation dawned on her and she sighed heavily. “Ohh my god, I’m sorry, I guess I forgot…” she said, stepping aside to let Jocelyn come in and closing the door behind her. Down the hall, Bear poked his head out of her bedroom and then trotted up to Josie expecting her to pet him. Jocelyn smiled and knelt down to give Bear a scratch behind the ears.
“I haven’t been feeling well this week,” she explained, leading her towards her disheveled kitchen and flicking on the kettle to make some coffee and then pulling the last two clean mugs from the cupboard and shoving a pile of dirty dishes aside to put them on the counter. “I went to bed last night around nine and I’m still tired.”
Jocelyn looked up at her friend and frowned in concern. “That’s a lot of sleep to still be tired...have you seen a doctor yet?”
Nish shook her head, “no. I think I’m just...I don’t know, down,” she said, busying her hands with teabags and then attempting to make the giant pile of dirty dishes look like there was less of them. “I got home from work yesterday just...exhausted, you know? I couldn’t focus on anything, so I just went to bed.”
“So what I’m hearing it that you want to beg off today.” Jocelyn sighed. “I’m not going to lie and say I’m not disappointed, but I get it. You need to take care of you.” She hung her purse on the doorknob, and smiled. “Why don’t you just sit down, and I’ll take care of getting the coffee ready?”
Nish winced at Jocelyn’s assessment, “I’m sorry, Jo,” she said sadly, “I just...can’t people today,” she said, willingly relinquishing control of the beverage making to her. Instead, she turned and heeded the insistent mewling of Bear at her feet and dropped some dry food in his dish. He rubbed his head against her leg and dug into his breakfast.
“I actually really wanted to go to that, but I have to admit, I didn’t end up asking Jen,” she said with a shrug. “After I replied to you, I had a pretty bad day and forgot about it.” She was better now, but the after effects of her arrhythmia were still hanging around.
“I figured you didn’t ask her, or else she’d probably be here right now.” Jocelyn smiled, and carried the mug of coffee over to Nishka. “Next time, then?”
“Yeah,” she said with a shadow of a smile, accepting the mug of coffee from her. She held it in her lap without drinking it, staring at the liquid for a long moment before snapping out of it. She sighed and sat back against the couch, letting her head fall back against it and turn so she could look at her.
“Things were so much easier when we were younger, Jo,” she said. “What I wouldn't give to only have homework and babysitting to worry about.”
Jocelyn snorted. “That’s just because you went to law school. I thought college was much more fun.”
Nish smirked with amusement and nodded, though the smile quickly faded. She sipped her coffee and sighed. “Though my college days were….not the best time of my life,” she added with a wry chuckle. “Although I gotta admit, there were times when I was pretty damn happy,” she chuckled. Yeah, before the abuse, Stephen had been an amazing lover. But afterwards, all of the horrible shit she'd lived through had overshadowed the pleasure.
For a brief flicker of a moment, Jocelyn considered pointing out that Nish’s high school days hadn’t really been the best either, but in the end she kept silent, instead focusing on fixing up her cup. She was four years younger than Nishka - a seemingly insurmountable chasm during their school days, for all it seemed insignificant now - but even at eleven Jocelyn had seen what Nishka had hidden from her parents. Had seen, even if understanding hadn’t come until much later.
She leaned against the wall, letting Bear rub and weave around her ankles. “You planning on going to the pool party later this month?” she asked, trying to change the topic.
Nish shrugged noncommittally. “I hadn't thought about it either way,” she said. Then paused and frowned slightly at her. “I didn't think you'd be interested…” she started to say, but then stopped, unsure of whether that was an unfair assumption or not.
Jocelyn shrugged. “I wasn’t planning on swimming. But, I thought it might be a good way to get to meet some of the other neighbors.” She peered down into her coffee mug while she gathered her thoughts. “I’m not sure yet, that’s why I was asking…”
Nish shrugged again, looking down into her coffee. She didn’t want to go. Right now, the way she was feeling, she didn’t want to do anything. But this was Jo, and she was feeling bad for cancelling on her today. “I’ll go if you want me to,” she said, glancing up at her. “I know a few more people here than you do, at least; I can be your wing girl,” she added with a half-hearted smile.
“You know, you can just say ‘no’ if you aren’t interested,” Jocelyn replied, a touch waspishly, setting her coffee on a nearby side table, and crossing her arms across her chest. “I know you didn’t ask me to come waltzing back into your life after all this time...”
Nish narrowed her eyes at her, immediately picking up on the sudden change in her friend’s tone. “Ohh that’s right, my mood is all about you,” she shot back, her voice taking on a new harshness. She could feel herself starting to get angry and hated the feeling. But also, somewhere deep inside, something was enjoying it. It wanted to be angry, it craved a good fight to improve her mood, the same way the sky needed a violent thunderstorm to clear off oppressive humidity. That feeling picked up on the subtle argumentative tone in Jocelyn’s voice and amplified it, taking Nish’s depression and turning it into anger.
“Look, I told you that I’m not feeling well,” she said, her anger flaring and her words stoking the fire. “You don’t need to get all pissy about it…”
Jocelyn raised an eyebrow at her friend’s outburst. “I’m getting pissy? You go off on me because I have the nerve to tell you to not commit to going somewhere if you don’t actually want to go, and suddenly I’m the one getting pissy?” She forced herself to unclench her hand, leaving behind wrinkles in the hem of her tunic top.
“And...so what if I am? You were excited about today and you still blew me off. So forgive me if I don’t want you feeling obligated to do something you don’t want to do.”
“Yes, I was excited, right up until I started feeling like shit,” Nish said just as angrily. “So because I had to cancel on you one time, does that mean I can’t ever make plans to go out with you again? God I thought you would understand, or at least care more about your friend feeling like crap than a stupid outing.” The anger was growing now, forming into a ball of white-hot emotion settled in the pit of her stomach that had no outlet. That feeling inside that fed of the anger smiled. Too long, it seemed to say, has she been moping around in depression. Anger is far more useful than sadness, it reasoned, happily stoking the flames inside her.
“I...you...augh!” Jocelyn threw her hands up in disgust. “Fine, yes! I’m a horrible friend. You’ve got me! Congratulations!” She turned and grabbed her purse of the door knob, slinging it up over her shoulder.
She took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. “And since you seem to be insisting on missing the point, I’m leaving. Just...call me when you’re feeling ‘social’ again...okay Nikki?” She crossed to the door and slipped out into the hallway before she could hear Nishka’s response.
Nish bristled at the use of the old nickname, opening her mouth to fling a retort back at Jocelyn, but before she could say anything, the other woman was gone, leaving her alone with her anger and the beginnings of a headache in her temples.