Second Floor Common Room, Saturday Afternoon

[wantstodirect]

Tony put the DVD for the Roman Polanski version of The Scottish Play into the player and went to make popcorn while the FBI warning came up on the screen. He plopped down on the couch with his popcorn and pop and waited for a few people to arrive before starting the movie itself.

[Open to all!]

Comments

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Up for everyone!" Dinah said, pointing to the stir-fry and snacks she and George had been making. "Chicken and veggies and noodles, want some?"

[glacial_queen]

"Yes! I am starving! I tried not to leave my room today, which meant that I was stuck eating what I had squirreled away. I practically perished." She grabbed a plate and began loading it up with as much food as she could without feeling guilty or greedy. Which was still a lot. Hey, she was a growing girl, who wore a Dark Jewel. That translated to needing a lot of food to keep going. "Awww, Hell's fire. Missed my monologue."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"But there's still the murder scene," Dinah said comfortingly, biting down on a strip of chicken and smiling. "And the mad scene! That's the best part!"

[glacial_queen]

"No way," Karla disagreed, awkwardly trying to eat the noodles. "'Unsex me now' is much for intense." She frowned, "I'm glad we didn't have to rehearse that this week."

Glancing back at the screen, "And there are still several other instances where she antagonizes MacFinlay," she comforted herself. "I wish all males were so easily controlled." Not really, but it would be useful on occasion.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah snickered. "I don't know if I could stand that. Booooring." She grinned at Karla, and floated a drink over to her, tilting it back and forth questioningly. "And yeah, that part's in next week's, or the week after that, maybe. You'll be ready for it, right?"

[glacial_queen]

Karla grabbed the drink. "Great job!" she said, grinning. "We'll have you doing all sorts of Craft any day now--just like a proper witch!" She took a swallow, and then ate a few more bites of food. "This is really good," she said appreciatively. The food was disappearing off her plate quite rapidly, almost as if she were vanishing it with Craft.

"Yes, I'll be ready. I'm a fairly quick study. Comes from years of memorizing Craft text for bitchy witches during their moon time," she took another bite, chewing medatatively. "Oh! Or did you mean ready-ready?"

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Pbbttt." Dinah grinned at her after blowing a raspberry at her for the 'proper witch' remark, and said, "I mostly meant the lines. If you were already *really* ready, well. It wouldn't help. Geoffrey would make you change it." She picked out a pepper for herself and nibbled. "Hopefully we won't be feeling hormones opposite the guys onstage on Tuesday."

[glacial_queen]

"What?" Karla protested. "It was a compliment! Maybe I should have said a proper Kaeleeran witch." Karla could be a tiny bit arrogant sometimes.

She paid for it by also taking a pepper. "Oh, this looks--Mother Night!" she choked, tossing back the rest of her drink. "What in the name of Hell was that thing?!" She asked when she could speak again.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah looked surprised, then her eyes crinkled up. "Whoops! Sorry, I forgot about the different foods. That was a pepper. Um. They're really spicy-hot?" She bit into her own, and held it up. "Some people like them?"

[glacial_queen]

"Got that. Thanks," Karla said, still choking a bit. She held her cup out for a refill while trying to stifle a cough. "...Please," she croaked.

This was like the cayenne on Ronan's ice cream, but without the ice cream to take some of the burn away.

Without the Ronan too, sadly.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah handed her one quickly, then said, "It's better if you eat noodles first, to dull the burn. Water or a drink can spread the spice around a bit more." She cocked her head. "Remind me not to feed you jalapenos, that wouldn't end well."

[glacial_queen]

Karla took the advice, gobbling down several forkfuls of noodles. "I don't know what those are, but I already hate them," she told Dinah when speaking was possible again. "Glacia's pretty northern. We don't have many plants designed purely to cause pain when eaten."

She took a few long sips of her drink. "To answer your question from before I nearly killed myself, I'll be ready-ready. Assuming this plague ends by then. I'd recovered from...everything else...by last Sunday. Now it's just...this." She sighed, and carefully began removing all of the peppers from the remains of her meal.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"One word: pickleberries." Dinah grinned. "Even if it wasn't on purpose." She took a mushroom out of the stir fry and nibbled on it, then said, "We can always skip, if we're not, you know. Geoffrey won't want to see us if he's all fired up either. Classes were bad enough last week."

[glacial_queen]

Karla snickered. "I was hoping you weren't going to think of that," she admitteded. "Mother Night, classes. At least I didn't run out of any. Though it was close, a few times, in the salle with Leto."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah smacked herself in the forehead. "I knew I forgot something. That went okay?" she asked, semi-anxious, but assuming it had. "You actually learned stuff too?"

[glacial_queen]

"Oh, it went fine," Karla assured Dinah. "He told me I was holding my weapon improperly and showed me a few drills. He was a true Prince--I was the idiot who kept practically throwing myself at him." She frowned a little, feminine pride stinging. "I don't think he finds me attractive."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah gave her a look. "It's Leto. He was probably just worried you weren't yourself." She paused. "And despite his rep, he does take no for an answer."

[glacial_queen]

"No, no. He was like that even before the salle. He's been this way towards me since the first time we talked in class, I think." She waved in unconcern. "I'm not being pouty. This desire to be considered pretty will hopefully fade with everything else. It's also new. I mean...I wore my Widow's Weeds the other day." She rolled her eyes at her own vanity. "I'm good with being a witch, I don't need to be pretty. You can be pretty enough for both of us," she said in complete earnestness.

"And I don't doubt Leto. There is much in him that reminds me of a Kaeleer male. I call him 'Prince' sometimes, because of it. He gets confused because he has no idea why I do." She grinned a but naughtily at that.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah facepalmed at that, not even sure which thing to address first. Maybe the simplest one?

"Okay, first? Thank you. And you are pretty too. Just for the record." Dinah bit her lip, then sighed. "Second. I might have said something to him, before you guys talked-- Leto gets, um. Touchy. Space-invading. Flirty. Some people find it unnerving. I might have told him to ease up on that, if he met you, until he got to know you better, because it was that week, and well..."

[glacial_queen]

"Oh, you're welco--" The rest of Dinah's response sank in. "Wait...you told him about that?! About me and Craft and...?!"

The temperature in the room dropped a few degrees, and no, it wasn't (just) from Karla's tone. The fork she held became spiderwebbed with frost.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Whoa, no!" And it's a tribute to Dinah's inherent inability to believe people will hurt her that she reached toward Karla, then sent, even though she couldn't hear Karla herself: No! I wouldn't give that away! After how upset you were? I just told him you wouldn't like it, and were sensitive about that stuff. I didn't mention your period, or anything about those guys back in Kaeleer. He took my word for it, I guess, without any details. Aloud she said, "That stir fry is not meant to be frozen, 'kay?"

[glacial_queen]

Karla kind of sank down in her chair a bit, waves of relief rushing through her. "Oh, Mother Night...thank the Darkness." She pried her fingers off the fork, wincing, then stood up on shaky legs. "I'm sorry, Dinah. I shouldn't have...but you said, and I thought...and I was scared! And sad, because I didn't think you'd've ever...which, clearly I should have remembered, because obviously...I'm sorry." Complete sentences are for smarter people. She went to give Dinah a hug.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"I should have been clearer," Dinah said, returning the hug hard, and sending very softly, It's okay. This is why I talked to him. I didn't want you upset, or him hurt. That's it. That's all. And then, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner. I should have."

[glacial_queen]

"Oh, that?" Karla would have waved that away, but she was too busy hugging Dinah and sending waves of remorse and apologies. "That's fine. In fact, that's incredibly sweet. It shows how much you care for both of us. And that you're very thoughtful--I don't know if I would have thought to warn a male about meeting me, if I weren't me but I knew me."

So complete sentences were back, just not coherence.

The emotions over the link changed to gratitude and warm friendship. *You are an amazingly good person, Dinah Lance.*

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

The verbal incoherence got a small giggle, and the internal statement got another squeeze, and the same warmth back. "I just figured, that's all." And of course, Barbara had talked about this with her, a long, long time ago. Crime victims, and how to handle them, and what to do, and what not; and how long it took them to get over it. Helena's rescue of her was never that far away either, sometimes. Encountering the Crawler's victims had only reinforced what she'd learned.

Thanks? And you're welcome? And I'm glad it worked and Leto didn't cross any lines with you, when you weren't used to him.