[004] For want of soup and general care

[tristranthorn]

[recap: After playing in the snow, Tristran gets sick.]


When Tristran wakes up the next morning, he feels like he hasn't gotten nearly as much sleep as he would have liked. Not that it matters very much anymore, however, as his stomache is growling very, very loudly in protest.

He is motionless for a long moment, his wide eyes staring at the objects across from him blankly, while no single coherent thought runs through his head. In fact, the only thing currently running, is his nose, and he sniffles in order to do something about it. When he turns over a little from his stiff side-position, he finds a series of loose-leaf papers strewn about the bedspread, filled with strange sketchings -- mostly stick figures that scarily resemble him in some rather disagreeable situations (such as the one of stick!him getting hit with a rather large rock of some sort).

He shifts a little more and turns his sore head to his other side, noticing the star looking very much asleep, and very much unconscious to her surroundings. Watching her for a moment makes him forget about his own predicament, filling him with an odd (and increasingly uncomfortable) sense of peace, but it is soon rudely interrupted by the growling of his stomache, and that overwhelming discomfort as he feels his face growing warm once more.

This warmness is obviously due to the fact that he is sick. Obviously.

Comments

[an_evening_star]

A simple nod.

"I will do no running anywhere for quite some time," the star answers pointedly, smiling almost ruefully down at her broken leg.

"It would take me a good ten minutes to get down the stairs on my own – and twice that long to get back up," she says, tilting her head in return. "You promise not to die while I am away?"

[tristranthorn]

Tristran almost laughs at that, at her seeming innocence when it comes to death and the like.

"No," he says, shaking his head a bit, "I hope not to die any time soon." It is at this point that he would usually explain why -- which would involve much woe and tales of Victoria Forester -- but this time he doesn't. Perhaps it is because he is far too ill to make long-winded declarations of love.

Nevertheless, Tristran sits up momentarily, his hand slowly grasping at the silver chain.

"A promise for a promise."

He reaches for Yvaine's wrist, feeling the familiar tingle upon contact, then begins to loosen the chain.

[an_evening_star]

She blinks - eyes wide and cheeks dusted pink - flexes her fingers and turns her wrist, peering at the pale skin in some sort of surprise, almost out of her depth for a moment.

It has been quite some time since she has been all by herself. Even the slightest bit.

A quiet sigh, shoulders straightening, chin tilted grandly and once again self-possessed.

"Very well then," she murmurs, eyes a clear and bright blue when they meet his. "Downstairs."

[tristranthorn]

Tristran nods. "Downstairs," he repeats after her, his heart pounding in his chest.

He's put a great amount of trust in the star. Let her not disappoint him.

[an_evening_star]

It does take a while - quite a while, if one was to be honest - between the time when the door closes behind her and a familiar voice, biting out phrases not exactly suited for polite company, pauses outside the door once more and a rather bedraggled star makes her way back into the room, tray balanced precariously against her hip and breathing heavy.

Her heartbeat is loud in her ears and she is relatively certain that people hadn't seemed half as loud and just plain everywhere before.

She hobbles over to the bed - dropping her crutch and still muttering curses - slides the tray onto the dresser with a clatter, and fairly collapses back onto her side, fingers pressed to her chest and eyes shut.

"Downstairs," she echoes a short while later, after the throbbing in her leghiphead has settled.

[tristranthorn]

Sadly, the food is all the way by the dresser, and Tristran Thorn is still...in bed, half-asleep. Dozing, really.

"I take it things didn't go too well?" he asks carefully, turning to look in her direction.

[an_evening_star]

"It is very loud," comes the (slightly-muffled) reply. "And I am not terribly fond of stairs. Up or down."

There was no one to lean on. This was more problematic than she had anticipated.

A few more seconds of quiet and she sits up again, leaning over to pick up the tray and offering it out, peering at him for some sort of confirmation.

"Soup?"

[tristranthorn]

He has never been so happy, really, to see Yvaine than he is right now.

He nods, quite eagerly, sitting up so he can better feed himself.

"Thank you, Yvaine," he says to her, his words very grateful and genuine. "It must have been troublesome, but I thank you."

They say that the way to a man's heart was through his stomache, and Tristran appears to be a fine example of that phrase being put into use.

[an_evening_star]

Yvaine flushes brightly and her fingers stray to her wrist to worry at a chain that isn't there. Free. It's very strange.

"Oh," she stammers absently, rubbing at the unbound skin. "I - it is correct then?"

That little voice - the one that usually supplies her with witty and unfavorable things to say about people (namely Tristran) - is laughing. Loudly. At her.

She's not expressly fond of it.

[tristranthorn]

He takes the soup, breathing in its wonderful, hot, steamy scent, his stomache growling angrily at being teased in such a way.

Taking a sip, he swallows shortly and nods. "It is perfect," he replies, grabbing spoonfuls of food and shoveling it into his mouth at mechanical speeds.

[an_evening_star]

The star wrinkles her nose and manages - somehow and all at once - to look relieved, disgusted, and oddly amused.

One imagines that someone able to eat with such enthusiasm isn't going to cease breathing anytime soon.

"Good," she says. "I am not going back down for more either way."

[tristranthorn]

Tristran is far too busy scarfing down much needed nutrients to pay much attention to anything around him.

There is the thought of getting the chain back around Yvaine's wrist that niggles at the back of his mind, but...he has soup (first and foremost) on the brain.

[an_evening_star]

The star lets her head tilt back - hair spilling over her shoulders and thumb still rubbing lightly at the inside of her wrist.

Her pulse is still strangely fast against her fingers and closes her eyes and wonders very hard why exactly promising to come back had seemed like a sensible idea at the time. Why she seems to have become an utterly complacent, completely foolish, soup-getting pastry.

She is no wonderful girl. She is a star and she is no trinket and she is a moron - her head thunks lightly against the headboard.

[tristranthorn]

In mere moments, Tristran is full, and quite apt to pay attention to other things.

This means, he remembers the chain bit. It is awkward, however, because...well, how do you re-chain someone you've let go? Especially since they kept their promise to come back?

"I hope you don't mind," he begins, voice hesitant, picking up the other end of the chain with his fingers, "if you..."

[an_evening_star]

Oh, she is the biggest moron in the history of morons. There is no other moron that could ever have aspirations of being even half the moron that she is right now.

(Unless the moron's name happens to be Tristran Thorn.)

She doesn't need to open her eyes to know what he's asking, though they open all the same, flinching abruptly and shoulders stiffening. Yvaine swallows and the glare comes off significantly more watery than she had intended - teeth biting down hard into her lower lip and fingers stilling in her lap.

[tristranthorn]

He notices the tension coursing through his companion's body, from the way she bites her lip to her general stiffening. A great surge of guilt overcomes him, but he really doesn't know what else to do.

The chain...well, it's sort of...part of the whole deal. He isn't sure why they have to be chained together, but he knows that if they aren't, then he cannot return home the way he is meant to.

He clears his throat, eyes darting from her misery to the bedsheets. "I'm...really, really quite...sorry. I know you'd prefer to...well, you may call me a dunderhead if you wish. Or...an idiot. But..."

His rambles trail off as he makes a move to put the chain back around her wrist.

[an_evening_star]

Her head turns away, hair swishing a silvery curtain between them - she is not going to let him see her cry - and she swipes angrily at a cheek with the back of one hand.

A quiet murmur, a low mantra - "Stupid, stupid, stupid." - under her breath and barely making a sound.

She's not quite certain who she's talking about anymore.

[tristranthorn]

"I'm sorry," Tristran continues to mumble under his breath, trying quite vigorously to not come in contact with her through touch.

Dare he admit he's a little frightened of the star at this very moment in time?

However, after much difficulty, the chain is back around her wrist. "I'm sorry," he says again. And then, to make matters worse, he lets out a rather loud sneeze. He is still sick, after all.

[an_evening_star]

The star doesn't say anything at all, just snatches her hand back and cradles it against her chest protectively.

The chain is cold against her skin and the feeling of being trapped is back again - she doesn't like it. She almost - she didn't - he is a moron.

Shouldn't have come back at all.

[tristranthorn]

Once the business with the chain is done, Tristran flops back against the pillows, the lump of guilt still lodged in the pit of his stomache.

"I'm sorry," he says once more. There are undertones of 'Please say something' in his apology.

[an_evening_star]

'No thank you,' the silence replies rather effectively and she turns back to him, snatches the tray, and thunks it down on the dresser in one swift motion.

Yvaine wants to be alone - it's horrible and she wants to scream and tell him the million and a half ways that she hates him. She does and if she could just say it out loud it would be true again.

She gets out a quiet sniffle instead.

[tristranthorn]

Tristran watches her, his mouth slightly open in mid-apology before he shuts it again.

Perhaps no amount of 'sorry' is going to make her remotely agreeable any longer, but...in his defense, it was just something he had to do. It is part of his quest, and perhaps it is protection for both of them.

[an_evening_star]

She grabs one of the pillows - clutching it close, tucking her chin, and feeling rather spectacularly sorry for herself.

"You are a dimwitted oaf," she mutters, heel of her hand rubbing high on her cheek again. "J-just so you know."

[tristranthorn]

He nods, slowly closing, then opening his eyes. "I know," he says, his voice low. He stares blankly up at the ceiling.

[an_evening_star]

"Good," she replies and her voice doesn't waver half as much this time. "You are lucky, perhaps, that I do not have any large rocks."

Stick-figure!Tristran had suffered in a number of much more creative ways, but she figures it is best not to mention those at the moment.

"Also, that I have wasted far too much time assuring that you continued breathing to kill you."