The Tomb Raider (lara) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2014-02-25 14:48:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, dani moonstar (mirage), lara croft, sam nishimura |
I go through a bottle and I just go buy another one!
Who: Lara, Dani and Sam
What: Lara discovers how Sam has been dealing with the dreams
When: 2/25
Where: Croft Manor
Status: Complete
Rating: PG-13 for discussions of alcoholism and alcohol abuse
Lara had run out of arrows by the time the orcs were gone, and she had gotten low enough on ammunition that she’d resorted to using her axe more than once when the orcs got too close to the house. After that she’d slept for about thirteen hours before the smell of Dani’s cooking wafted through the house. Sam wasn’t in bed, so she rolled out, pulled on some sweats and headed downstairs. “I thought you’d be sleeping or celebrating with Tyra.”
"I already celebrated with Tyra and if I sleep for much longer I'm going to slip into a coma. All everyone lets me do is sleep, it's like I still have Cancer." Dani snorted, then pointed at the clock with her spatula, "And it's past noon. You slept in."
She was fixing a roast for them to eat later. The smell wafting through the house was the vegetables she was planning on cooking along with it. She went back to stirring them around in the pan, "But I'm glad you're up. I really think we need to talk."
“We just dealt with something straight out of the Lord of the bloody Rings,” Lara complained, in a rare display of still sore crankiness. She smiled though and sank into a chair at the table after making some coffee. “Yes, what about?”
"Orcs, Goblins and Trolls, and all I got to do was make pot shots at them from your window," Dani complained, good-naturedly. She finished what she was cooking and dumped it all out into a big roasting pan. Her movements were slightly stiff. She was sore, too. Rifles had a hell of a kick to them.
She got the roast all settled and popped it into the oven while she kept talking, "I was doing some cleaning around here while I was moving out. There's a box in the hall closet I think you need to see."
"You're a good shot," She told her, before getting to her feet. "Yeah? What did you find?" Lara moved out of the kitchen and down the hall to the closet. She opened the closet and pulled the box out. Glass rattled inside. A lot of glass. A lot of very empty bottles. She pulled one out, inspecting an expensive vodka brand. "What....?" She wandered back into the kitchen, putting the box on the table. "Where did you find these?"
"Various closets. Cabinets in the kitchen." Dani picked one of the bottles up, noting that it was one of those flavored brands of Smirnoff. She shook her head at that, then set it back down, "In case you weren't clear, none of this is mine. I couldn't have kept alcohol down the last six months if I wanted to, anyway."
"I hadn't ...really considered it was you," Lara replied, quietly. It wasn't herself and it couldn't be Renji, she was sure of that. If she wanted to think about it there were signs but even now she was kind of refusing to accept it. She counted the bottles and tugged on her pony-tail.
"She does drink a lot, Lara," Dani warned, her tone a bit solemn. She didn't think Sam was actually an alcoholic per se, not by the definition of it. There were little bits of remaining alcohol in most of the bottles. If it was her, she'd have drained them dry and she knew it.
"She's got a problem, but I don't think it's as bad as mine. I'd have emptied these bottles completely. I just think... this is a lot of liquor. And she's hiding it, so she knows it looks bad."
Denial wasn't going to do her any good. Except she should have seen something. Sam had been drunk sometimes but that was Sam. She partied, but responsibly. Most of the time. Lara tugged at her pony-tail so hard it came out of her scrunchie. She didn't know anything about alcoholism.
"Sam has spent the past few months pretending that the dreams haven't been affecting her but this is how she's been dealing, isn't it."
"I'm not her, but I'd say yes. It's how I dealt with a lot of it, too. Alcohol in my coffee, a little bit on my lunch break, a pick me up when I got off work, a nightcap before bed. You come up with a lot of excuses but it really just boils down to an inability to cope without it." Dani frowned, and shook her head, "And if you're doing it right then no one even notices. It took Obi I think... a few months before he finally said 'you drink a lot'. Even then neither of us really knew how bad it was. But it's not the same."
She motioned to one of the bottles that still had a half inch of liquor in the bottom of it, "For me, I have a disease. I have an actual illness that tells me that this alcohol here is a waste. I don't know when to stop drinking it once I start, and I don't understand why people don't drink their drinks dry. It's fundamentally impossible for an alcoholic to leave liquor behind in a bottle like this, so I think Sam's got some hope. You just have to talk to her about it. She maybe needs better coping mechanisms."
"I should have noticed. No one knows her better than I do. I'm sleeping with her for god's sake! I didn't even notice!" She chewed on her lip, looking at the bottle with vodka still in it. She tilted her head as Dani spoke. "That's...good then." She had her doubts about Sam's ability to stop drinking if it came to that, so if she could just get her to find other means of coping it could be okay. She hoped. Because it could get to that stage if it went on long enough.
"Thank you. Can you send her into my study when she gets back?"
"You might want to take these with you. Something tells me you're going to need the ammunition," Dani warned. She started packing the bottles back up into the box. Her hands twitched a bit as she did it. Taking a sip from some of the near empties was a constant temptation, gnawing in the back of her mind.
She was strong enough to fight it, but she didn't need to stare at temptation for hours, either.
Luckily for her, but somewhat unluckily for Sam, she chose that moment to step into the house. She'd been out enjoying a swim now that the weather had returned to normal. There were still a few bottles on the counter, and she arched a brow at them and the serious expressions on Dani and Lara's faces, "Uhm... hi guys."
Well. She hadn't wanted to do this with an audience, for Sam's sake, but maybe having some backup from Dani would help. Her expression was stern, and searched for the right words. Usually she failed at words, but she'd try. "Sam, is there something you've been hiding from me?"
She stepped aside to show Sam the box of booze.
There was a box of booze on the counter. Sam looked at it with a blank expression on her face. What, was that her box of booze? There was no way she'd drunk that much booze.
She blinked her eyes a few times, "I'm secretly learning to kick ass from Mulan?"
"That's great," she replied, shaking her head. "But that's not what I mean." She turned and started to pull out the bottles, counting them out loud as she went. She wanted Sam to realize just how much she'd been drinking, and in only a few months. "You've gotten pretty clever at hiding some of these. We probably haven't even found them all."
Her hair was still down, and the way it framed her face only made her concern more evident.
Sam laughed, a little nervously, "No way are those all mine. Come on, I just... I just drink to have fun, there's no way I drink that much."
Her fingers twitched and she glanced at Dani, then back at Lara, and seemed to suddenly remember that she was late for a date or had forgotten something, because she started backing away from the two of them in a huge hurry.
Of course, Dani knew it was neither of those things and that Sam was just backing away from the situation at hand. She clamped a hand down on Sam's shoulder and shook her head, "No, you aren't running away from this."
"Sam, I know I didn't drink those, Dani can't and we all know Renji doesn't drink either." She gripped the bottle she was holding tight enough that her knuckles were turning white, but it was the only obvious sign of her discomfort. "They're yours, and we need to talk about this. You're not drinking for fun anymore."
"It's just a little..." Sam squeezed her hands together a bit, fingers fidgeting and twitching, "... pick me up..."
Dani winced a bit, “That’s what I said, too.”
“I’M NOT AN ALCOHOLIC!” Sam shouted, in reply. She felt like she was being ganged up on, and it made her insides twist, “I’m just… I just… You never had a problem with how much I drank before!”
"I didn't know it was this much! Sam, you're going through these bottles like they're water!" Lara walked over, grabbing Sam's hands. "I don't believe you're an alcoholic. But I believe you have a problem. Count these bottles, Sam and tell me that you're not trying to forget something. You can't tell me I'm not dealing healthily and turn around and drink away your problems!"
"_I_ didn't even know it was this much!"
Sam wrinkled her brow and looked at all the bottles. She really didn't want to count them, especially in front of Dani. Lara had already done that anyway. It was way more than she ever remembered drinking, that wasn't even a lie.
"I'm not trying to forget anything. I just... I wasn't really keeping count. I like the taste of it."
“Those sound like excuses,” Lara said, quietly. She brought Sam’s hands up to her lips. “Is it just… you’re drinking like it’s water. Are you really not noticing?” Her voice was a little shaky.
"I don't see what the big problem is here. It's just alcohol. It barely even does anything to me anymore. But no, I really haven't been keeping track. Come on, Lara, you know me!" Sam shook her head, "I go through a bottle and I just go buy another one!"
“And that doesn’t strike you as being a problem? You must be in a permanent state of intoxication.” It scared the hell out of Lara. “And, god, I haven’t been helping. With the... weapon stuff, and the way I’m handling my dreams…” She was just driving Sam to it...
Dani had preferred to remain silent up to this point, but at that she shook her head, "Don't start with that. Drinking is her choice and her reasons for drinking would exist whether you existed or not. You're not helping her with that mentality at all."
She glanced down at Sam. Her hand was still on the younger woman's shoulder, "When you feel like you can't get through your morning without putting something in your coffee or putting something clear in your glass to make people think it's water. Sam, that's a drinking problem. I know them when I see them and you better believe I'm not going to let you go on like this."
Sam pulled her hands away from Lara and wrung them, again. She could misdirect Lara all day and Lara would almost turn a blind eye. She knew that, because Lara had turned a blind eye before when she'd been particularly bad in Uni. But Dani couldn't be misdirected, because Dani knew every single excuse, and every single lie.
It wasn't quite a lie, but the part where she denied there was something wrong? That was a lie, and she sighed, "I really wasn't keeping track. I just stocked up and when it ran out I got more. But... Look, I just... Cheerful Sam doesn't just happen. It takes a lot of work sometimes."
"Right," Lara muttered, looking down at the floor. She was grateful that Dani was there, now, because the woman was right. As much as she wanted to blame herself, this was on Sam. She just didn't want it to be on Sam. It's hard enough admitting your loved one has faults, let alone a fault quite that big. Too many times she'd ignored it.
"Sam, I'd rather you be true to yourself, and no force it. If something is bothering you I need you to tell me so I can help you through it." She tugged at her pony-tail but it was gone so she just tugged at the hair at the top of her head. "You've been strong for me. Let me be strong for you."
"But this is, me! This is Sam! When she can't handle life, she gets drunk, parties, dances, and has sex with random men. That's how I do it, every day! You know that about me!" Sam wrenched herself out of Dani's grasp and started pacing the kitchen. Her hands flew around her head agitatedly, "And that's how I be strong. I drink a little so that my own problem just disappear and I can focus on someone else's."
At that, Dani just sighed and shook her head, "There's a you in there that's the real you, even when you're sober. And that you has just as much fun. It's not real strength if you have to drink to get there, either."
“I don’t want you waking up in some man’s bedroom,” Lara said, voice cracking. She glanced at Dani like ‘no offense.’ “Because you were too snockered to know what was going on. I don’t care if you party but I just want you safe, and I want you...cognant.”
She hugged her own arms. “You never drank like this before you came out here. Sure there were nights, but they were the exception, not the norm!”
That was coming, and Dani just shook her head at Lara to show she wasn't upset.
"Fine!" Sam shouted, throwing her hands up in the air a bit, "Alright! I'll stop drinking so much! Stop making a thing about it, it's not like I pulled a--"
She bit down on her tongue before she finished that sentence, and looked an apology at Dani, then looked back at Lara, "I'll stop. It's fine."
“You have to promise me, Sam. Crofts keep their promises and you’re going to be one.” She smiled, trying to make it sound lighter than it was. “We’re only going to keep things for cooking, okay? For...well however long it takes.”
She swallowed, then added, “And you should have someone to talk to. I met another psychiatrist, perhaps you could see him.”
If Sam was actually an alcoholic, keeping things for cooking would have been a bad idea. But Dani was certain that wasn't the case, so she simply nodded her head in the background.
Sam hugged herself, but there wasn't anything she could say to argue. Lara needed this, right? She could do it for Lara, if not for herself, "I promise. I'll cut back. I'll get it under control."
She scrunched her nose a bit at the idea of seeing a therapist, though, "I don't know about that, though."
“At least try once or twice?” Lara’s heart ached. This just wasn’t something she knew how to face or how to deal with it. One step at a time. She was going to carefully measure the bottles they kept, and the rest she’d give away. “It’s nice to have someone else to talk to, who’s willing to listen to just about anything and won’t… be emotionally attached.”
"I went to a counselor for a long time after I hit bottom," Dani admitted, encouragingly, "I had a lot of stuff to work out and puzzle through. We realised that a lot of my self destructive behaviour started way before I moved here. And it helped me to... be able to do more intimate things with Shepard. Things I was terrified of doing before."
It was a hard thing to admit, actually, but if it helped Sam it was worth it.
Sam's frown deepened at first. Talking to a shrink wasn't really a thing that she normally did. She usually just drank and partied through it until she made her peace with it. The dreams were harder to do that with because they kept happening. One of her hands curled up into her hair, and she tugged a bit, "I don't want to talk about them. Right now, they aren't real and they aren't winning and they aren't a thing. If I talk about them it just gives them power."
"If you let them drive you to numb yourself with drink it just gives them power too. Maybe more power than talking about it would. Because if that's why you're drinking, then they're winning." Lara's voice was a low rasp. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I never saw this before, but I'll help you through it." They'll need to be sober for the expedition anyway, and that was in a month.
"It's not your fault, Lara." Sam shook her head, "I'll talk to someone, okay? But I want to find them on my own."
A therapist was a pretty personal choice, and if she was going to have to do this, she wanted to pick someone who was a right fit for her. Not just a shrink Lara had met somewhere. Obviously Lara’s shrink wouldn’t see her, but maybe someone else was available.
Dani remembered something, then, and fished around in her pocket for her wallet, “Let me give you the card for the Ranch counseling center. Maybe one of the therapists we have on call there could help you.”
Lara chewed her lip, then nodded. That was a good idea, she wanted Sam to be comfortable. "I'm not blaming myself, I just...wish I'd seen it sooner, that's all. But maybe that would have turned out badly if it happened during one of my...more stubborn periods."
Sam took the card from Dani, giving her a grateful nod. It was somewhat begrudgingly grateful - Dani was probably the reason that she was being confronted by all of this. But still… it was unhealthy behaviour anyway. She received a pat on the shoulder from Dani in return, who decided to check on the roast.
“Honestly, I don’t think you would have wanted to see it, even then,” Dani said, over her shoulder. It was the truth, and right now was the time to be truthful above anything else.
The asian woman nodded her head in agreement, “You’re kinda blind to a lot of my faults, sweetie. It’s true.”
"I… guess I am." She rubbed at her shoulder. Part of her worried that Sam would quickly fall back into habits, but she trusted Sam to at least give it an honest shot. That she was being truthful. "It's hard to see fault in the people who are your family."
"Well, it's easy to see fault in your family sometimes, but you like to believe the best in people and that's not a bad thing, Lara. You need to keep doing that because if you stop then you'll get all jaded and cynical and I'll have to smack you." Sam joked, then blinked her eyes and waved her hands in the air in front of her, "In a completely not abusive manner! Just... a gibs-smack!"
“I wouldn’t be a very enjoyable person if I got jaded and cynical,” Lara admitted. She’d probably turn into a loner who only dealt with people professionally and the occasional emotionless shag and that wasn’t particularly appealing to her. There was still some idealism left inside of her.
“I’d deserve that gibs-smack.”
"Well as fun as it might be to gibs-smack you for a real reason, I don't want to have to gibs-smack you. Not for something like that." Sam decided. She glanced over at Dani and the bottles, and let out a sigh, "I'm scared I'M going to become jaded and cynical. Would you gibs-smack me?"
Lara reached over and silently thwapped Sam upside the head, lightly and a little playfully.
Sam giggled, and Dani was laughing in the background, "Now if you just keep doing that, we'll get through this."
As long as her coffee maker remained intact, anyway...