Username: 
Password:    
Remember Me

Search by :  Username E-mail Region Interest AOL IM ICQ Number Yahoo! ID MSN Username Jabber

Daughter of the Sea (lord_admiral) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-07-16 04:42:00

Who: Jaina and Chloe
What: Hangover cures
When: After Max showed up
Where: Jaina's
Status: Complete
Rating: PG-13



The previous night, Chloe had been rather beside herself. She hadn’t been able to handle it, so she’d decided to get blindingly drunk with Ilia. And of course, that had helped until the morning came and she woke up. Then the hangover set in, along with the realization that Max was here. She eventually made it back to Jaina’s with a pounding headache.

“God, fuck,” Chloe grumbled as she walked in the door, rubbing her forehead. “Jaina, are you awake?” She asked. It wasn’t loud enough to wake the other woman if she was asleep.

“There’s a glass on the counter,” Jaina called out, softly. “I suggest you drink it, it’ll help you feel better.”

She was observant and Max showing up on the network hadn’t gone unnoticed.

Turning her head, she saw the glass and went over to grab it. Chloe took a drink of it before moving towards the living room. “Thanks,” she responded. “You’re a god send.”

Jaina’s cure was a mixture of things with a little bit of tequila. Hair of the dog, as they say.

“I know I am,” she replied. “Do you want me to make you breakfast?”

Hair of the dog was definitely the thing. Chloe sat down on the couch with her drink. At least she only had a hangover. She hadn’t gotten high last night, only drunk. Which tended to make things easier. Though if Chloe ever stopped to think about it, with a possible couple exceptions, she never got high whenever she was around Ilia. So that, at least, seemed to be a positive influence.

“You don’t have to, I’ll be fine.” Of course, she hadn’t eaten anything recently. Once she’d seen Max’s post, she’d been occupied with other things as opposed to getting food.

“It’s okay. I should eat something too. Egg on english muffin sound fine?” Jaina got up to go into the kitchen.

“Yeah, that’s fine,” she responded and took a slow breath. Chloe still didn’t know how to handle Max being here. She’d agreed to get coffee with her, but overall? Her feelings were extremely complicated on the matter.

Jaina didn’t know how to ask about it. How Chloe was feeling, or if she even wanted to talk about it. She cracked some eggs and got to cooking, before settling on, “Are you going to see her?”

Chloe sighed softly. “Yeah. She offered to buy me coffee. But I’m not getting my hopes up.” Sure, Max was here for school, but that didn’t mean that she wouldn’t go radio silent on her again. And it had been five years of silence. There was a lot to be made up for.

“But you said yes,” Jaina guessed. She’d have done the same thing, but then Jaina was a bleeding heart liberal and willing to forgive almost anything. Except maybe voting for Trump.

“Yeah. But one meeting over coffee doesn’t magically fix five years of silence. It also doesn’t stop me from wondering if she’d stop talking to me all over again.” Chloe wouldn’t blame Max if she didn’t want anything to do with her after seeing what she’d become. She definitely wasn’t the same Chloe she’d been five years ago.

“Of course not.” Jaina wasn’t going to disagree with that. “But I agree that you should at least talk to her once. I’m probably the kind of person to be too easily forgiving, though. So I don’t blame you if that’s all you give her.”

“We’ll see,” she responded. “I’ve missed her so much. Sometimes I wonder if I wouldn’t be as fucked up if she’d at least kept in touch with me. I needed her and she wasn’t there in any capacity.” No one was there for two years, until she’d met Rachel. And then Rachel had ultimately done the same thing to her.

Sometimes she wondered if Ilia would do the same to her. Or Jaina. Or basically anyone that she came to care about because it was her experience that no one stuck around.

Jaina didn’t say it outloud, but she thought that Max’s abandoning her had affected Chloe so badly because of a combination of the timing, and also because of the radio silence after. One or the other, Chloe might have handled it better. But not both.

She brought Chloe the sandwich, setting it down in front of her, “Be honest with her. I wish I could say I knew her at all to give you advice on how to approach her. She needs to know how much you’re hurt, but how you tell her… I guess that depends on if you want to let her stick around or not.”

She glanced at Jaina. “We don’t always have a choice on letting people stick around, you know. Some people just up and leave without a word.” The drink helped ease the hangover enough to where Chloe could think a bit more clearly, and there was definite anger and pain under it all.

Picking up the sandwich, she took a bite out of it. Not to mention, in her experience everyone lied. She wasn’t even certain if she could take Max being sorry as being genuine, or if it was just in response to being in a place where she couldn’t ignore her any longer. Would Max have ever contacted her if she hadn’t shown up on the network?

Hell, would Rachel have ever contacted her again if they hadn’t run into each other here? In Chloe’s mind, neither of them would have if she wasn’t here.

“Some people turn out to be not what you thought,” Jaina agreed, thinking about Arthas. “But you’ve had some luck with one girl. Maybe you’ll have luck with this one. But then, I’m a person that forgives easily. Not counting my father anyway.”

“I rather think that applies to me more than to Max. I’m most likely the furthest thing from what she’d think I am.” It was probably a matter of whether or not Max wanted to be around her once she knew certain things. “I don’t know. I’m not exactly a lucky person. At least not when it comes to good luck.”

“Luck changes. Give it time.” If life evened out, Jaina hoped that Chloe’s adulthood would be a lot better than her childhood. She just had to live long enough to make it to her late 20s and 30s.

“Assuming I have time to give.” Given her suicidal tendencies, there was a chance that she wouldn’t live to see her twenties at all. It was a miracle that she’d lived to see nineteen.

“Chloe.” Jaina sighed, giving her a patient look. She wasn’t a psychologist, but she’d encountered her fair share of depressed people. And Chloe was depressed, and traumatized. She wished she could do more than just listen. “I know it’s hard. I wish I could give you more than platitudes.”

“It’s fine. Platitudes sometimes sound hollow anyways.” She shrugged a shoulder and ate a little more of her sandwich. Chloe needed professional help, but she wasn’t at the point of admitting she needed it. She needed to actually take the mood stabilizer that she’d been prescribed a couple years earlier, but she had no wish to.

All Jaina could do was gently plant suggestions and hope Chloe took them eventually. “True, even when we actually need them.”

“Yeah. Sometimes they aren’t so bad. Others, I’d prefer if they were never spoken.” Chloe was touchy like that. It tended to depend on what her mood was.

“I understand.” Jaina took her own sandwich and sat down next to Chloe, putting her arm around her. It was an odd feeling, a combination of feeling useless and also protective.

When Jaina put her arm around her, Chloe leaned into her. She liked the comfort, and despite the fact they’d slept together after Chloe had arrived in Orange County, she kind of liked where their relationship was going. “Thank you, for being here for me. I know I don’t exactly make it easy.”

“You make it you. Warts and all, that’s still you.” She kissed the side of Chloe’s face. “And I like you. Which is pretty hard for you to believe, I know. But it’s the truth.”

“Do the warts make me a toad or a witch?” She was largely teasing about that. “Thanks, though. Maybe one day I’ll believe it.”

“Frogs are cute, but witches are badass and sexy, so that makes you a witch,” Jania decided.

“As long as I’m badass, I’m cool with it.” She was a badass and definitely liked having that kind of persona. It just came naturally to her in that respect.