Abigail Theien (resistance_) wrote in the_colony, @ 2011-01-01 23:18:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | ^ week 24, abigail theien, nathan theien, | abby and nate |
Week 24: Wednesday
Characters: Nathan and Abigail Theien
Location: Their room, late at night
Summery: Neither sibling can sleep, turns out the same thing was on their minds.
Rating: PG-13 (Abby swears like a sailor sometimes)
Abigail had been trying to sleep for at least an hour, maybe more. Or maybe less: it was hard to accurately gage the passage of time in the fact of a tired and growing frustration. It’d been a long, physically exhausting day--no reason for her not to zone out as soon as her head hit the pillow, but something kept gnawing at her.
Finally, after the three hundredth rustle of covers and shifting position, Abby realized what was out of the ordinary. Nate wasn’t snoring.
She turned a look across their darkened room, seeking the faded outline of her brother in the other bed. She just watched for a moment, subconsciously looking for the subtle movement of breath. It was there, but so was the slow realization that he was looking back at her.
“What’s wrong?” She asked instinctively, though her tone made it more of a demand for information than an inquiry.
Nate rarely had trouble sleeping, but tonight, he found himself incredibly interested in drawing pattern onto the darkened ceiling with his eyes. Every once in a while, his mind would turnover the conversation he’d had with Bridget in his head, thinking of the best way to approach the subject of Greg with his sister. She’d seemed to think that they were a couple, and maybe Nate had missed something (its not like it wouldn’t be the first time, Nate wasn’t exactly the most observant).
“One could ask you the same thing.” Nate said after a few moments of silence, “You’re the one who has been tossing and turning like a mad woman. You’ve been keeping me awake.” He teased, chuckling just slightly. They both knew that it typically took a lot more than that to keep him awake.
“God help me, I got used to your fuckin’ snoring.” She teased back, and slumped back against the mattress, pushing a hand through her hair before she let it fall limp.
“Right.” Nate said slowly. There was another long silent pause, and Nate stretched in his bed. “I... heard an interesting piece of gossip today. Well, not really gossip I guess, but I was asked about it anyway... What exactly do you think about Greg, Abs?” It was slightly awkward, Nate never particularly knew how to bring up the subject and this seemed like the best way at the moment. He sighed a bit.
His sister went quiet for a minute... working through the unexpectedness of the subject he brought up. Gossip? What sort of gossip could possibly involve her and Greg? She quirked brows at him, even though it was likely he couldn’t see. “Whaddya mean what do I think of him?”
“Just... everything. I don’t know. How do you feel about him?” Nate asked, still not entirely sure what the best way to get the answers out of her. It was a simple question, wasn’t it?
Where the hell was this coming from? Abby sat up on a bent elbow, her hand propping her head--all of which faced her brother in the dark. Her lips fell apart, waiting for speech, but it was delayed. Then finally cracked through a slightly exasperated scoff. “I like him...” A lot, though that part was left out through no effort of her own. Her answer was purposefully vague, and followed quickly with something that sounded like an accusation. “Why?”
Nate sat up in his bed, turning to face his sister again as she spoke. He felt just a tad like a gossiping middle schooler, as he leaned forward just a bit. “Like him how... Like him as in ‘Oh, yeah, I like Greg, he’s pretty cool, I’d grab beers with him’ or like... ‘Yeah, I like Greg, he’s such a dreamy stud muffin’. Which one?” He asked, completely ignoring her question in favor of answers to his own.
Stud muffin? “What the fuck, Nathan..” She hadn’t seen him like this since she was twelve and he was fifteen, and eyeballing the first boys who were looking her way. This was way out of the blue, and it started gears turning a little faster. “I dunno... I like him, okay?” Christ, now she was acting like a preteen. Abby fell back in her covers and sighed, ignoring the little twist in her stomach when she thought of the ‘Chevalier’, as he always called himself.
Unfortunately, it was impossible to ignore, now that the subject had been breeched--but that still didn’t answer her question.
“Don’t ‘what the fuck’ me,” Nate rolled his eyes, practically pouting into the dark. He didn’t like not knowing this, how had he not seen it. Of course it took Nate being asked by some completely unrelated party to bring it to his attention and now that it was there, he had trouble believing that he hadn’t seen it happening himself. “That’s not even an answer anyway.” He muttered, falling back onto his bed dramatically.
“Well what am I supposed to say?” She was really getting confused. “What the hell did I miss? You’re actin’ like I’m hidin’ somethin’.”
“Maybe you are.” He pouted slightly, he really didn’t like that he hadn’t noticed anything. He was supposed to notice stuff like that, wasn’t he? “I was talkin’ to Bridget and she asked me if you two were a couple or something. Just weird is all. I didn’t even knew you liked him.”
She gave him a good glaring, even if he couldn’t see, then plopped back on her bed, shaking her head. “Nathan, I ain’t hidin’ nothin’ an’ Greg an’I ain’t a couple.” There should have been a little rancid annoyance in her voice, but there wasn’t. If anything, it sounded a little distant. Maybe even anxious.
“I jus’...” Abby rolled her lips, trying to explain something she didn’t exactly understand herself. “He doesn’t make me nervous like th’rest’a them.” That part was quieter. Not that she thought any of the other men would do anything to harm her, but trauma died hard. Her brother and Greg were the only men she trusted left in the world... and he was acting so surprised?
“I know, I know.” Nate sighed so softly she might not have heard him and rolled over so that he was laying on his stomach, his face buried in his pillow. Nate closed his eyes and let the silence enter the room. It was a few moments before he spoke up again.
“I like Greg, for the record.” It was more of a muttering than anything else, “Just don’t like not knowin’.”
“Wasn’t nothin’ not t’know.” Abby reminded him, now restless and a bit uncomfortable because of the conversation--not it’s exact subject, but certain dark feelings that it inevitably brought up. She fell into a silence then, just breathing into the dark...trying to think of something to say.
Course, then it hit her, and her smile was back. “An’I’m pretty sure he ain’t a woman.”
There was a light, tired chuckle from the next bed. It was pretty obvious that the subject needed to be changed, and Nate was pretty sure there was nothing else to say about it anyway. “I really don’t like you sometimes, Abby.”