Dr. Gemma Wagner (cockeyed) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2016-01-18 16:40:00 |
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Nina was exhausted. Sleeping sitting up was something she'd intended to leave in the very distant past, in her college days, but she'd fallen asleep on Isaac's couch the night before and, after she'd woken up in the middle of the night and realized where she was, she couldn't bear the thought of making her way back to her apartment by herself. So she stayed put in Isaac and Demi's apartment, drifting in and out of sleep, before it was time for the two of them to get ready for the pretense of another work day.
Olinger intended to meet with Isaac that morning, but Nina had no such special meetings. So she bid Isaac goodbye for now, applied the bare minimum of effort to her appearance once she was back at her apartment, and went off to work. She felt impotent and ineffective, though, pushing papers around on her desk and pretending that her job meant something. If things were at all normal, she'd text Demi during the morning and arrange for them to meet for lunch. That wasn't an option though, not anymore, and every time Nina thought about it she had to push aside a wave of nausea that threatened to overtake her.
No, talking to Demi wasn't an option just then. But Nina knew that she wasn't entirely alone. Not yet, anyway.
One little brightness in the storm that currently made up Nina Clarke's life was the fact that Gemma had actually listened to her vague warnings and stayed at the LBJ that morning instead of making her way back to the Capitol. Nina knew she owed the woman an explanation, but there was no way she was trusting that to a communications method that could easily be traced or tracked. No, it needed to be done in person, and luckily Olinger hadn't confined her to the Capitol yet.
When the clock struck a reasonable hour for one's lunch break, Nina stopped for two egg BLTs and made her way to the LBJ herself, trusting that the Department would be so preoccupied that they wouldn't notice if she was a little late back. She reserved the family building room at the front of the shelter, once she'd signed in, and texted Gemma to meet her there. The sandwiches were placed on either side of the table, with Nina seated facing the door.
Gemma, bored as she was, was on time for once. She came walking through the door with one of Izzy’s shirts on, and her own blue jeans that were washed and soft. She wanted to hug Nina when she looked at her, to grab her and ask why they were playing this game again. Because in Gemma’s mind, this was Nina telling Gemma to stay at LBJ, and not darken her doorstep.
"Thank you for staying here," she said quickly, very much aware of how sterile their meeting room seemed. It was almost like an interrogation room, now that she thought about it. She casually placed a hand in the center of the table. "I'm sorry, I know things must seem real crazy, and the fact is that -- I mean, crazy's just about the best way to describe everything." Where could she even begin? She took a deep breath, steeling herself, then started at the most logical and succinct place: "Austin's Mayor is a crackpot dictator."
Gemma swallowed, she didn’t touch the food yet, her stomach hurt too much. She stared at Nina after that declaration and ran a hand through her brown hair and tried not to snap at the other woman- she failed.
“Don’t blame someone else just because you don’t want me to come back to the Capitol, Nina. I get it- you got away from me in Philly, I showed up here, I’m sorry. Want me to stay put? Fine, I’ll stay put. At least Izzy wants me around,” Gemma said, all the maturity of a middle schooler in her right then.
Nina had been expecting many possible outcomes: questions, confusion, outrage at such an accusation. What she got, on the other hand, was so far out of left field that Nina couldn't even respond at first, her mouth open as she tried to figure out what there was to even say to that. She shook her head, disbelieving, as word started to spill out. "Are you -- Don't even start this with me right now, please. Not when -- God, of course I want you around. Why would you think that I don't?"
Gemma almost started laughing, she had to cover her mouth and she felt like she could cry. No, there was no part of her that thought Nina wanted her back. They’d groped and made out, and if Cal hadn’t waltzed in, well… they would have ended up having sex, she knew that. And while it was nice to think about what a second chance with Nina would look like, they had grown into different women. She didn’t know if Nina wanted Dr. Gemma Wagner when she hadn’t wanted Gemma Wagner.
“Oh come on- we can barely be around one another without swinging to either a fight or having sex. I’m not an idiot, Nina, you left Philadelphia and you didn’t… nevermind. It doesn’t matter. You don’t have to fake it, you don’t have to pretend for me. I can be happy here, I’m sure. I’ll be out of your hair.”
"You're not allowed to -- you can't just leave." Gemma stood up, she crossed her arms and looked at a spot on the wall that could distract her nicely. She wanted to leave right then, she wanted to do the leaving. That was how Nina saw it, at least, even though both of them knew that if they were to part ways just then it would have to be her that left the room.
Gemma would stay at the Library, probably, with Izzy and lonely memories, while Nina went off to face whatever doom Olinger had cooked up. Nina's throat constricted then, without warning, and she bit her lip hard as a rush of tears threatened. "Just please listen to me, okay? Just for a little bit. I don't want --" Her jaw clenched and she looked up at Gemma, eyes pleading. "Please. I need you to at least listen to me right now. This isn't about that. This isn't about us. They took Demi, okay? There's so much going on, I don't even know where to begin. Just please say you'll listen, and if you don't want... I know it's asking an awful lot, considering everything that's gone on between us, but I don't have anyone else anymore."
She gave pause at the mention of ‘they took Demi’. Who took Demi? Demi who was with Isaac? Why hadn’t Isaac told her that? She looked over her shoulder, her brown hair acting like a veil between her eyes and the sight of Nina looking distraught and raw as she stared over at Gemma, willing the woman to look directly back at her. Was this real? Did Nina really want her, was she really trying to get her to come with her?
“More useful people than me, Nina,” she said, her voice soft. “We both know it, you knew it back when we dated, right? I’m just… I’m just a big damn kid. I don’t know what’s going on at your Capitol with big parties and and mayors and coffee stands. But please… don’t pretend you want to fight for me now, not when you should have done it years ago.”
"You really think I'm pretending? That this is all just some act to try and mess with your head?" Nina pursed her lips as a sudden flicker of anger hit her to further compound the anxiety and stress she already felt. "I'm not just saying that because you're here. Like this is some kind of convenience thing and once the mess goes away, God willing, I'll be gone too. I'm here because I need you. I know I hurt you, and I'm sorry for how things went down between us back then. I wouldn't come to you like this if I didn't really mean it. But this is so much bigger than just you and me, Gemma, and if you don't want to be a part of it then I guess that's it. But I don't want to shut you out of this." She paused, then with clear effort, added, "Like I did before."
Gemma leaned against the wall, it was cool on her back. She slid down to the floor that way, knees up against her chest like a shield while Nina sat there watching her, looking perfect even if she was tired and worried. She knew Nina wasn’t making things up, but her own anger was making it hard for her to see the bigger picture right then. She shut her eyes and counted down from five, using the space between each number to remind herself of something that was calming.
Five, Izzy. Four, candles that smelled like oranges. Three, San Diego waves. Two, Chaz playing his guitar on the family patio. One, Nina smiling.
“What are they doing over there? Is Isaac in trouble?” she finally asked.
Nina paused, waiting for Gemma to take the questions back, before she got up as well. She took the wrapped sandwiches with her and sat down on the floor, across from Gemma, and began the process of figuring out where to start this story all over again -- and figure out how to answer that question about Isaac.
"You know those people who came in the trucks yesterday, to Thanksgiving? They're from the Dog Park, which is where this motorcycle club, the Hellhounds -- a raider group, to use the technical term -- lives. They don't live in downtown Austin like we do. They're a ways away. But they've been at war with the Capitol for as long as I can remember." Nina spoke carefully, eyes on Gemma's all the while. "The hospital's a Capitol shelter, but the LBJ has always been independent. So most of the cases we see, the ones that involve the Hellhounds and civilians, or the Hellhounds and Capitol resources, are related to incidents over at the hospital. They're targeting the Capitol specifically." She paused then, more for necessity and less for need, and took a deep breath before she continued. "The Capitol's run by a man named Reeves Olinger. That's the, er, the 'crackpot dictator' that I mentioned a couple minutes ago. He likes to say he saved Austin from certain death, but as far as I can tell all he's doing is quietly setting up the pieces so everyone else is reliant on him and the Capitol. I mean, you saw what it was like at the ball, and then you saw what it was like here. The Capitol has so much of everything, and they only share it with the hospital: the only shelter that's still dependent."
It sounded the description of a third world country and why they still had the same president after twenty years. Gemma looked at the food and began to pick at it, needing the food badly enough to finally take a big bite, chew, and swallow. It tasted good, it tasted almost wrong. A month ago, she hadn’t been above eating canned cat food when she could find it. With her eyes on the food, she could pretended that Nina wasn’t talking about things that directly affected them.
But it did.
“That isn’t fair,” Gemma said. It sounded like every time she’d said that in Pennsylvania. Her old habit of seeing things as either fair or unfair, with very little space between the two of them.
"It's not. There's nothing fair about it at all." Nina's own sense of justice, fairness, and morality had once been so black and white, but the last couple of months had broken it all up into clear shades of gray.
She, too, finally unwrapped her sandwich and began to eat it. She allowed a silence to lapse between them before she swallowed, cleared her throat, and spoke up again. "Isaac's girlfriend lived there, at the Hellhounds' camp, for a while. More than a year at least, I'd think. She was…" Nina managed to stop herself from saying 'bitch,' knowing Gemma's rightful propensity towards feminist values, and chose her words carefully. "She was a consort of the Dog King, the MC's leader. She was involved in a crime that they ran and she went to jail. She was there for several months."
And then, her voice tight: "They raped her -- the Capitol's men, I mean, the prison guards. Several times, trying to get information out of her about the club and the Dog King. The warden knew about it, too. When Isaac found out about it, he managed somehow to put a stop to it. He made a deal so she could be released into his custody. That was a few months ago." She gave a small, sad smile. "Demi and I have been friends ever since. And that was really the first time that either Isaac or myself really knew about what had been going on in our shelter. But he's… Isaac's still firmly on the Capitol's side. Even knowing what they're capable of… he still rates the Hellhounds as much worse."
Gemma’s face fell. How was she supposed to be angry at Nina when something so much bigger was happening? Shame hit her, and then nausea as she realized how childish she’d been. She had built up Nina’s choice to banish Gemma to LBJ as some sort of mean, cruel act. Instead it had been Nina trying to remove Gemma out of harm’s way. She could recognize it, and it made her stomach clench.
“Oh,” she said. It was a pathetic response. “That’s horrible, I don’t… what can I do?” she asked. That was always Gemma’s default: how can I help? How can I make it better? How can I make the storm clouds clear and tomorrow appear bright and beautiful for you? She wanted to make tomorrow a better day, she was a redheaded orphan singing to a shaggy dog. The offer was perhaps futile in this situation, but the reliability of the reaction still brought a brief smile to Nina's face nonetheless.
Gemma tucked brown hair out of her face and gave a weak laugh.
“I thought you were trying to get rid of me. That after the party you were embarrassed of me.”
"That's what you thought I wanted to talk to you about?" Nina gave a sigh, shaking her head. Discussing whatever was going on between them -- she certainly couldn't write it off as 'nothing,' not anymore -- seemed off-topic and irrelevant in the grander scheme of things, but it was important to her nonetheless to try and smooth things over as best as she could. Get them both on the same page, so to speak. "I'm not going to lie, I did consider making something up to try and keep you out of the Capitol for good. I'm not entirely convinced it's safe for us to return there at all, all things considered. But certainly not because of that. I just… I needed you to know everything that you would be getting yourself into, staying mixed up with me. I didn't want to lie or pretend like everything's okay when it's anything but."
Mixed up. What a perfect expression, what an accurate way to describe them. They were two batters being poured into the same bold, whisked. They could mix perfectly, but if they were left alone for too long they’d end up parting naturally. Gemma swallowed, a lump in her throat. Why hadn’t she realized that Nina had been trying to do the right thing? When had Nina ever done anything but that?
“I’m sorry.” It was soft, she knew it, she knew she had to say it louder. “I’m so sorry,” she repeated it like a shot. It was loud, and ended with that one burst as she ran a hand through her dark, sweaty hair and hugged her knees closer to her chest.
“I can go. If that’s… easier. I can grab Izzy and we’ll go.”
"Go where? Where on earth would you two go?" Nina had been in Austin ever since the dead started walking; unlike Gemma, she had no idea what it was like outside of the city. Her awareness of the woman's journey here did nothing to assuage her concerns about the viability of such a plan, so she barely even gave the idea any thought.
"Just because things are like this right now -- as horrible and as concerning as things are, and I realize I'm not exactly selling the place to its fullest -- doesn't mean we have to jump to the most rash conclusion first thing." Except that was how Gemma operated, wasn't it? Grab hold of the first idea that popped into her head and refuse to let go? "I just needed you to know the truth of everything." Nina was being selfish, though; even she could tell. If it would be safer for Gemma to leave, she ought to let her. She shook her head, then added, "But if you really think it's better for you to not stick around, there isn't much I can do to stop you, is there?" Gemma’s head snapped up and the words were out of her mouth before she could contain them.
“You could ask me to stay,” Gemma said, her voice almost breaking as she said it. “I never asked you to stay and that haunted me for years. Tell me what I need to know, and then either ask me to stay or tell me you don’t care where I fly off to. Austin is not the only safe camp, I traveled to half a dozen of them before I made it here. I can do it again,” Gemma said, she was begging Nina to ask her.
Not to ask her to be her lover. Or to be her friend, But to acknowledge they wanted one another still, even if it was only to have the presence and the ghosts of what had happened before around them.
She wished she was in Philly. Wearing the pink top, flirting with the cute law student at the library. Stopping halfway towards the Mexican place and kissing Nina. She could have reached out, told Nina she’d made a mistake, and walked away. It would have stung a little to walk away from a stranger named Nina that day. But to be told to roam away from Nina today… killing. Gemma wasn't the only one reminiscing, either; longing for simpler times was par for the course these days, and Nina was just as susceptible to it as anyone else.
There was a silence first, while Nina sorted through her words. It was still easier to think through what she wanted to say than to speak without checking herself. "Of course I want you to stay. I just don't want you to feel like you have to." When had her life become this? When had it become dangerous for her to keep the people she loved close to her?
Nina lifted her eyes up to meet Gemma's. "I don't want anything to happen to you because they're after me. But I want you to stay." A smile flickered on her face briefly, despite herself. "I don't know what I'd do if you left." Now that Gemma was back in her life, even if they weren't together, it was hard to imagine a life without her again even after six years of just that.
And there it was- all Gemma needed. She knew then she could kick her shoes off and make a nest for herself. She stuck her hand out, rigid but warm. Nina didn't hesitate before she took it in her own.
“I’m Gemma. I’m going to be staying at the Capitol. I’d like to be your friend.” It was so simple, it was a snap decision but one she felt very confident in. And like all choices made from her gut, she’d follow through on it. And right then, in the soft lights and the exhaustion they’d produced just by being in each other’s space, she felt safe. She could curl up, fall asleep, and dream of something other than death and her lost brother.
"Friends," Nina echoed, her tone carrying the finality of agreement. Somehow, despite everything that had happened over the past 12 hours -- hell, over the past month and a half, a span of time that covered the arrests, Gemma's arrival, and the ball -- that smile of hers appeared on her face once more as she held onto Gemma's hand for dear life. "I have more, about everything. How about we eat, and I'll tell you everything I know?"