The ironic thing about everything was that Eleanor never thought of herself as a risk-taker. Running into danger? Definitely not her thing. Getting emotionally involved to the point where she could get hurt? Not anything she'd done when she was alive. (She had, however, resorted to low blows to try and push people away and that wasn't something she was proud to have regressed to in Vallo.)
Somewhere along the line, however, Eleanor had decided if she could fall in love repeatedly in spite of all those Bad Place memory wipes, she could take the risk here. Though she was having second thoughts about that as she stepped into Marina's club unannounced. Especially when it came to Marina, who could be unpredictable, and her wards, which could be deadly.
Yeah, maybe Marina was right again and she really needed to think things through more. But she shrugged that off as she seemed to safely enter the building and called out for her girlfriend. Girlfriend, because Marina had asked how many cats they were going to have.
They. Plural.
Eleanor had taken note, feeling as though she'd finally let out a long breath she'd been unaware that she was holding. Relieved.
"Marina! Are you here?"
Marina had been grappling with her own things. She knew that the last person she was certain she’d loved ended up terrible for her, but Eleanor was generally not terrible for her except that she’d hit on a sore subject, one that made Marina kick her out of her apartment and stew in anger because people, it seemed, were still not worth the time or effort she’d put into them.
But now Eleanor had mostly knocked her off her guard. The words I love you were still ringing in her head. Having read them and then heard them, she wasn’t sure what to do or say. She hadn’t really let herself consider the option of love. She didn’t know how she felt. Obviously she cared about her, but it was hard to imagine anyone loving her. Happiness was a stranger, the same as love. Her parents had been…well, she guessed they loved her, but that didn’t mean they knew anything about showing it. She didn’t know anything about it either.
She’d been in the midst of doing something behind the counter, squatted down. She heard and felt someone come through the door. She’d let her eyeball hover up before she heard Eleanor’s voice, standing awkwardly once she’d heard it. She grabbed the eyeball quickly before popping it back into place. “Hi.” She glanced around herself for a moment, watching as the other staff mulled around getting things ready. They weren’t still open, but she was doing her best. It was a minimal staffing situation until they got things fully up and running.
“We can go in one of the back rooms. There’s more privacy.”
Any other time Eleanor may have quipped something about other reasons to go to one of the back rooms but this wasn't the right time for that. Unfortunately. She had to bite her lip to keep herself from saying it, because that was who she was.
Instead she followed Marina, fairly curious as to the full vibe of the place. The fact that her and Marina hadn't been on speaking terms when the club arrived had been particularly painful, if only because she'd been happy for her and unable to share that. She was making up for that now, taking in the place before saying, "I'm excited that this place showed up."
Marina made her way carefully to one of the milder looking back rooms. It was supposed to be a room to help ease newbies into the world of BDSM. It was fairly blank because everything used was chosen when it was time and the workers tended to bring their own things. She glanced over at Eleanor briefly. “Yeah. It was nice to have my own club back. Much as I like Lucifer. Plus, having Kenzi to help run it makes it easier than no one.” She didn’t know what to say regarding the actual conversation they were supposed to be having, so talking business was the default she’d fallen back on because it was less uncomfortable than everything else.
“It’ll be better once everything’s set up.” There was a shrug at that. “Stark and Pepper came and checked everything out and make sure it’s functioning. I have anti-theft wards in place, too. So it should work out for us.”
"Are you going to keep teaching?" Eleanor asked curiously, also delaying the conversation she'd thought would be a good idea to have in person when she hadn't been in person, but now was second guessing herself, and her resolve.
Marina wasn’t going to point it out even if she was curious. She wasn’t a sucker. “I’ve juggled worse. It’s not like I’m teaching every day anyway. But with Kenzi to help run things, it won’t be the most annoying because there’s more than me in charge.” Which helped because then she might actually have days off. She’d found a manager in Tumbleweed, but she didn’t fully trust any of the locals enough to really feel comfortable taking too much time to herself.
Days off would be good, even if Eleanor was thinking more selfishly about that in the moment, wanting time with Marina to make up for the last couple of weeks.
"That makes sense," she agreed, looking at the room for a moment before finally bringing up the reason she was there.
"Marina, I'm sorry," she said, breaking the silence as her words came out rushed. "You know what I was like before I died. I'm sorry I resorted to that. I know all the ways you show people how much you care, even if having to say it would drive you mad. I don't want you to change. I…"
She tripped up there, finding out harder to express herself in person. Had this been a terrible idea? Probably. Maybe. Hopefully not?
"I fell for you the way you are. And if you need more time, I can give that to you but I wanted to say that in person, at least."
Marina forced her expression into something neutral but not before wincing slightly. She wasn’t sure why that was her immediate reaction, but once she was in control of her expressions, she made a point to keep it as neutral as she could. It just felt like a rush of words and responding to them took a minute because she still didn’t know what to say. She knew it was obvious that she cared because everyone wouldn’t shut up about it. She just…hadn’t really been the person that admitted to things. Sure, she’d admitted to caring about another person to Penny and she’d referred to Anna as her future wife, but that had ended poorly and she’d spent so long getting used to losing people over and over that she was sure it would keep happening.
She let out a sigh, a breath she’d been holding onto longer than she realized. “I’m not…” a beat as she tried to choose her words carefully. “Good at…all of this.” She gestured vaguely at the space between them. “I don’t know what to say. At least without a plan in place and a manipulative spin on things. So I’m just…trying to figure out the honest part of it.”
It was something to say the least. Honest communication wasn’t really something she excelled at. She knew how to take truths and parce them down enough to make some sort of cobbled truth-lie mix that made her look good.
“You’d said you didn’t want me to change and that you knew all the bad things and you still liked me and you…made it sound like a lie.” A sigh. “And I wanted to bury you in it. I almost did. I knew the best ways to apply the pressure necessary to make sure you never came back. I have back up plans always. You can thank Dorian and Kenzi for not letting me. Maybe also Tony. I was kind of hoping he’d support me more in this, actually.” She waved it off like it didn’t matter. “So like just know I can and will emotionally destroy you if you hurt me again.” There was a brief pause before she added, “Probably.” Another pause. “Unless Dorian steals my phone or something.”
It was rare to get honest truth from Marina, especially involving anything emotional, and Eleanor quickly learned that it could be terrifying, because there was no doubt in her mind that Marina could destroy her. If anything, radio silence from the other woman had been an act of kindness the past couple weeks, but standing in front of her now, Eleanor refused to give into fear. She had fallen for the other woman and knew it was taking as much courage for Marina to speak as it was for her not to flinch.
"I wouldn't have you any other way, hot stuff," she said instead. "So maybe we just don't get to this point again?" They probably had other stuff to talk about, things left to work out, and some things that just needed to remain stable for the both of them to feel secure within their relationship. But Eleanor hadn't ever expected a relationship with Marina Andrieski to be easy, just worth the ups and downs and occasional moments of terror.
She crossed her arms over her chest, something of a self-soothing gesture. Being open wasn’t something she did often, but she cared about Eleanor…even if she had been angry. She hadn’t fully decided on forgiveness but she’d told Tony that self destruction was just one of those things she did and maybe it hadn’t been fully necessary. She still didn’t know what they were going to do with three cats now. FB was not going to be pleased with her about this. If they lived together, which was…not something she was going to think about too closely. She’d just dealt with one emotionally anxious situation. No need to overthink herself into another problem.
“Yeah,” she replied softly. “And I guess maybe I can try to avoid yelling when you scare me.” Which was admitting something that she hadn’t exactly voiced but was probably not necessarily something she needed to. But relationships required some vulnerability even if she hated it. “But that doesn’t mean you can run into dangerous situations without thinking about them either or texting me first.” She sighed, affecting a very put upon air. “I’m going to need to figure out how to make something that sends coordinates just by touching it at this rate.”
"Could you do that?" Eleanor asked. Because dropping a pin was one thing, but it required a phone and the ability to focus under pressure, and they both knew that she wasn't always the best at focusing under pressure.
"I mean, even if I'm not deliberately running into dangerous situations, this is Vallo?" She offered Marina a helpless shrug. "But hey, I think we got this." They were navigating their worst fight so far, actually their only real fight. Even Marina had to believe by now that they might actually have a real chance, or so Eleanor thought, even if she held back on repeating what she'd said on the network. She didn't want to scare Marina off right away.
“Probably. I can do everything else. Why not this?” She glanced down at her tattoo briefly. “These are sort of set up like that. If we’re in danger, we activate the sigil and…well, I could see if James can help me make it easier.” She’d figure it out, though. Her mind was already working on the problem.
Marina came back out of her thoughts, frowning slightly. “Just don’t do anything dumb.” But the heat wasn’t in her voice this time. She studied Eleanor’s face for a minute before choosing to step closer and reach out for Eleanor’s hand, twining their fingers. Eleanor reached out emotionally first, so she would move first here and allow for something bordering on PDA. “Do you want to see the rest of the club?”
Okay, what? Marina had taken her hand and now wanted to know if she wanted to tour a club full of her employees? Of course she did. Her voice was nothing short of gleeful as she said, "Lead the way, hot stuff."