fightmybattles (fightmybattles) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2017-04-11 08:40:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, constance bonacieux, james kirk |
Who: Constance and Kirk
When: April
Where: Cafe
What: Accidental run in
Rating/Warnings: Low/None
Complete: Complete
Constance had kept her promise to Anne and not gone hunting down James Kirk to give him a piece of her mind about using people who were obviously unused to playboy ways. It hadn’t been easy either, everything in Constance was telling her to give him a talking to if not a punch to his smart mouth though she knew there would most likely be more trouble than he was worth if she had. Still she’d been furious at him.
Standing in line waiting for coffee she sighed, Anne had seemed a little better lately, slowly getting back to her usual cheery self. That had been a good sign.
Jim probably deserved to be hunted down, and he knew it. He still felt some guilt over Anne. He genuinely liked her, just not quite the way she would have wanted. It made things complicated, and a mine-field to navigate.
Jim picked up his coffee, turning and nearly running into Constance. Luckily nothing spilled. “Oops, sorry. Are you all right?”
Automatically beginning to say there was no harm done the words dried up in her mouth when she realised who it was who had bumped her, of course the world hated her. Giving a cold smile she replied, “No harm done to me” the last word was said pointedly, though had she been able to think beyond her anger it might have occurred to her that Jim might not actually know who she was.
She looked familiar, in that way that she might have been in a picture he’d seen, but he couldn’t place her. The cold shoulder was noticeable, so he held up his hand palm out. “I’m still sorry. Have we met before?”
“Luckily for you no. But you do know my best friend, Anne Mauricia” Constance enlightened him, as much as she would have loved to see him flounder she didn’t want to upset Anne more than necessary when she found out they’d met.
“Ah.” Jim juggled his drink then held out his hand. “You must be Constance. Anne talks about you a lot.” Friends were important and Jim Kirk knew that well. Even if said friends might very well want to kill him.
But if Constance wanted to kill him, he was just going to be warm and friendly to counter that.
Constance looked at his hand for a long moment before grudgingly shaking it, Anne better be grateful she wasn’t just punching the man in the face because it was only her love of her best friend stopping her. “Yeah that’s me and I’ve heard all about you too” she added though her tone showed it wasn’t particularly good.
“I see. It doesn’t sound all good.” It was hard to defend himself for this kind of thing, and he wasn’t sure he should even try. But honesty tended to work the best. He gave Constance and easy, if somewhat pained smile. “She’s a good friend, and I care about her deeply. It just wasn’t exactly what she might have hoped for.”
“What she might have hoped for?” Constance ground out with a raised eyebrow, “You knew exactly what she expected but you used her anyway. Took advantage of her kindness and naivety and now have the audacity to stand there claiming that you care” Constance knew men like Jim, the playboys who didn’t care who ended up hurt at the end of the day and it made her seethe.
“And I told her what I wanted out of it,” Jim replied, holding his hand back up in defense. “She’s a grown adult, able to make her own, informed choices. My friendship with her is not dependent on any kind of physical intimacy.” If Kirk was honest, he’d admit that he’d been trying to keep from being too alone with Anne lately. To avoid temptation for either of them.
“Keep telling yourself that to ease your guilt all you like, but you took advantage and you know it” Constance said, grown adult or not it had been obvious that Anne wanted more and finding out Kirk was seeing other people had been a big blow for her friends confidence as well as her heart. “You better keep it that way too because if you hurt her again even Anne won’t be able to stop me from smacking you in your smug playboy face”
“That’s fair.” Jim lowered his hand, then took a sip of his coffee. It would give him a few seconds to figure out an appropriate response. He’d been up front about his intentions but Constance was obviously not going to be receptive to that answer. At this point he just wanted to escape without getting hot coffee thrown at him.
Part of Constance did know that Anne had probably thought that she would be the one to change Kirk’s ways which was no doubt never going to happen but obviously she wasn’t going to blame her friend. Before either of them could say anything Constance’s order was called and she moved forward to collect it, unless Kirk said something spectacularly stupid she wasn’t going to waste good coffee on him.
Now as probably a good time to beat a retreat. Jim didn’t really need Constance to make him feel guilty. He felt plenty guilty enough and probably deserved some of that.
Okay he deserved all of it, but still, he was going to retreat while he still had some dignity left.
Constance wasn’t surprised to find Kirk had done a runner when she’d collected her order, it was probably for the best. Anne would kill her if she’d slapped the man and with Constance that was more than likely to happen.