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[allgotrabies]

Hey, it's Annie, you know what to do.

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[allgotrabies]

"You're a good man," she assures him, but he's made her smile. She holds out her hand. "Come walk with me?"

[madaboutit]

Well, there's that at least. He shifts that he might push himself up without the use of his hands, then slides his gently in hers, ready to lift her.

"Of course."

[allgotrabies]

It's so unlike Sweeney that she wonders again how they can still share a head. She thinks there has to be some common point where they intersect, but she can't imagine right now what it is. She takes his hand because it seems so natural to him even if it isn't to her, and smiles at him when she's on her feet.

"Do you know lots of flowers?"

[madaboutit]

She seems better. That is better. He smiles warmly.

"Of course I do," he confirms, happy to know all those hours of study is good for something. Gerard moves gently, continuing with her hand to try to guide it to the crook of his elbow. She had asked to walk with him, after all.

[allgotrabies]

This much she has done before, with Steve whenever he lets her, which is all the time really. She enjoys it immensely and gives Gerard a grin.

"Tell me about the flowers, then."

[madaboutit]

He laughs lightly, resting his hand softly over hers.

"Well, that is a rather broad topic." Gerard gives her a sideways glance, a smile tucked tightly in his lips. "Care to help a fellow out and narrow it down a touch?"

[allgotrabies]

"What are those?" Pointing to a cluster of pretty purple flowers. "Are those violets?"

[madaboutit]

"Hmm." He knows one part of the answer, but the other takes some work.

"They're not violets," Gerard confirms with confidence. "I...I think it's Rock Cress." He smiles back at her with a hint of playful embarrassment.

"I admit, it's not one I've really worked with."

[allgotrabies]

"Rock Cress sounds prettier," she decides. "How d'you decide which flowers to work with? Because I'd just go with color."

[madaboutit]

"OH. Um." The embarrassment grows more genuine.

"It's...well, there's a symbolism to it. You decide what you want to say, and then you let the flowers speak for you." He starts to blush.

[allgotrabies]

She's decided she likes it when he blushes. "What were you using them to say to me?" She asks, her arm through his, her hand under his, smiling up at him.

[madaboutit]

"Uh..." He straightens with a bit of additional awkwardness. His eyes dart over the floor.

"Just that--um...I was thinking of you, and wishing you to feel better. That I wanted to apologize. And that I didn't think I...well, that I didn't want to take advantage of you." He swallows. "Like that."

[allgotrabies]

"I don't feel like I'm being taken advantage of," she promises softly. "Especially not by you. I just wish there was a way to talk to you that wasn't, um, in the middle of me being with Sweeney."

It is, after all, quite a big shift in mood to go from wanting to be fucked blind, to having a gentle conversation.

[madaboutit]

You could try not having sex with him.

Gerard swallows back the thought.

"I'm not terribly fond of him being in the middle of me either." Not sex, obviously. Just the waking up and not knowing what he'd done. Who he might have hurt.

"But I don't know how to control when I can have my body back."

[allgotrabies]

She would of course argue that she tries frequently to not have sex with Sweeney, but once she's close enough to touch him all those reasons to abstain just vanish. She feels regret only that he didn't get a chance to leave her with a fresh set of bruises on her hips, with gravel and soil ground into her back.

These thoughts are not helpful. "He doesn't know either. How often are you even able to be up? Like, when's the last time you were you? When you gave me my flowers?"

[madaboutit]

"Um..." He tries to remember. "Uh. No." More color in his cheeks. "But I think that's the only time after I sent the flowers.

[allgotrabies]

"Well- let me think." She walks slowly with him along the path. "Okay. So, we gotta figure out a timeline here. Tell me every time you remember being you since the flood."

[madaboutit]

"Hmm." He wants to help, but that's a big ask. "I don't know. Things tend to bleed together." He's quick to correct. "I mean, not things with you."

He doesn't want to be dismissive. Besides, there are so many times he can't focus due to the remembering of having her on him.

[allgotrabies]

"Maybe start writing something down whenever you're awake." It seems like the only way this could work. She's already had a plan to meet with Sweeney nightly, but this way Sweeney can see evidence as well.

[madaboutit]

"Very well. I'll try."

He slows, and a thought tightens his lips.

"I...I don't want to go away. Back to...wherever the in between is," he whispers, the forced confessing cutting at his heart. "I don't know if I can keep it from happening."

I'm afraid.

[allgotrabies]

She doesn't want that for him, either. For either of them.

"Don't think of it as being away," she says, looking up at him. "Think of it as...sleep. If you're here to help me it means helping him, too, right? And he has to be out, and doing things, to learn anything. You're not gone. You're just...waiting."

[madaboutit]

Gerard tries to accept her words, but there's a lot of difficulty in it. It doesn't feel like sleeping. It feels dark and unnatural. And though it makes him feel overwhelming guilt, he isn't sure he wants to help this man.

He's quiet for a few seconds. "Do...do you think he is meant to be my Inmate?" The idea is very uncomfortable, but there is some logic in it.

[allgotrabies]

"I don't know how any of this works," she confesses, and wishes so badly she did. "I think you could help. I just don't know how yet."

She's trying not to think of what the Admiral has done to Sweeney with this last flood, or what awful things it might mean for Gerard. She can't stomach the idea of him simply not existing anymore when he so clearly does now.

"I think you can help," she repeats. That much is true. "If we can figure out a way to keep you out here, maybe you could talk to some of his other friends, too."

[madaboutit]

Some of that makes sense, though he's no less wary for it.

"What should I talk to them about?" How is he even meant to start something so...unorthodox? Especially when he's so new here.

[allgotrabies]

"Get to know them." That seems like the only possible first step: to get them to understand that the flood has simply never ended for Sweeney. "Maybe they'll have ideas, I'm not real...good at things. Like this." Intellectual problems, existential issues. Her solution to everything falls back to the same core idea: get to know the person, then ignore the problem.

"People here are really smart. Scary smart, some of them. I'm afraid I just make things worse for you." But she holds onto him a little tighter. She wants to be here, she wants him to assure her that she isn't simply ruining his life and Sweeney's while she's at it.