Participants:
Scene Title | Insomniac Vigil |
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Synopsis | Nick and Russo discuss Delia's situation |
Date | December 29, 2010 |
Russo's Grandparent's Home
Melatonin capsules. Ambien pills. A bottle of Scotch. The coffee table is littered with these and more "sleep aids." And while Nick has slept in the past few days, it's been either to the point of collapse or short-lived tossing and turning where the sound of a pin dropping is wont to wake him.
Either way, he has not dreamed.
He's left the sleeping bag at the foot of Delia's bed where he's been attempting to sleep for the last couple of hours to sit and stare at the items on the coffee table, his pale eyes groggy, dark shadows beneath them revealing the stress of the past few days. He reaches for the Ambien, narrowing his eyes and peering at the dosage. Maybe if he takes more.
"That looks like a coma waiting to happen," Russo mutters as he wanders into the room where Delia and Nick are hanging, or, more accurately, where's she's kept and where he's hanging. His gaze lingers on the scotch longer than it ought before he actually turns to face Nick staring at the pills.
"For the record?" his eyebrows arch as he assumes an easy chair in the corner. "I don't advise taking extra." Beat. "'Course," he grins grimly, "I'm no doctor." With a heavy sigh, he allows himself to relax in the chair, resting his arms and shoulders along the back of the chair.
"I take it no sleep yet?" he asks idly while raising a palm to his forehead.
"Not tonight," Nick mutters, tossing the bottle back onto the table with a rattle, his voice just a little irritable. "But I've slept some, the last few nights, and no dreams. Or at least none I remember."
He runs a hand through his short dark hair as he turns to look at Delia on the sofa bed. "Maybe she ain't in there any more. Or maybe she's holed up in that corner and I just don't know it. No offense, but I don't wanna come play slumber party every day just 'in case,' you know? I wanna help her, but…"
He sighs an reaches for the scotch, uncapping it and pouring a splash into a coffee mug he's been drinking from. "You want some?"
Russo whistles and shakes his head, "I'm no expert but I don't think Ambien lends itself to dreaming. Could be wrong and all." His gaze becomes even grimmer at the suggestion, "Hey!" Brad snaps and wags a single finger. "Look buddy, I know it sucks sleeping in some strange house with strangers around. Believe me, this is not how I planned to spend my holiday either, but you can't honestly consider leaving with her still in your brain, can you? I mean… she's one of the few good ones left out there."
He frowns while his arms tug tightly around his chest, his right foot is made to rest on his left thigh, and he sinks further into the chair.
The offer of scotch, however, brings a slight curl of his lips. "Sure," he replies gruffly. "I deserve a drink after the last few weeks events— "
Nick's weary eyes narrow a little at the finger wagging, but he nods and reaches for another mug, presumably from the night before, and pours some of the alcohol into it and hands it to Russo.
"Just that I donno if she's even there still, and I don't really wanna go find some 'path to peer in my head to lemme know if she's there or not, you know?" he says sleepily, and frowns a little at the Ambien. "Maybe that's the problem."
The drink in his hand is also eyed suspiciously. "I guess I haven't tried sleeping sober either," Nick realizes, sighing and setting down the mug a little reluctantly.
He leans back in his seat, scowling a little more at prospect of sobriety but changes the topic. "She's all right, yeah, your sister. From what I can tell."
"Thanks," Brad murmurs as he takes the mug and brings it to his lips, allowing it to linger in his mouth longer, rolling the amber liquor over his tongue and enjoying the rich flavour of this liquor. In a lot of respects, scotch is Russo's drink of choice.
Finally, he swallows, letting it roll down his throat, following which he scowls sourly, but not because of the alcohol, "Yeah, don't let anyone peek in there if you can help it. I'm weirded out enough that Carrots managed to find her way inside my head." And asked him to lay off the pills and booze, causing an automatic pang of guilt in the pit of his stomach. "But if she's there… I want her to be safe. Honestly, she's a good kid, even if she gets it wrong sometimes."
He sniffs and takes another gulp of his scotch, swallowing hard, after which he murmurs, "She's okay though? Like… not hurt or anything?"
'Carrots' makes Nick smile a little, remembering Delia telling him to call her that once, though the Polish word for 'Red' has stuck instead, at least in his mind. "I think so," he says, one hand coming up to scratch at the still-healing cut at his temple. "I mean, she seems okay, in my head. A little lost, but all right."
Nick nods to the sleeping body on the bed nearby. "That part seems all right, if a bit pale and thin, yeah? Just… I donno what her emotional state'll be if she gets out." He doesn't add that his own mind isn't the most healthy of places to choose as a sanctuary, but his brows furrow at the tacit thought.
A solid nod follows, "Good." Russo sighs heavily as he runs his non-drinking hand through his hair. He gulps more of the amber fluid, effectively polishing off the glass. So much for his sobriety. "She needs to be okay."
With a gruff scoff, croaky in the back of his throat, he sighs, "We're not close. We only recently figured out we're related at all, but— she doesn't get what she deserves. She's got a good heart that one," the mug is shot a longing glance, "reminds me of someone I used to know."
He cringes a little when his gaze turns to her lifeless body, "I'm just glad someone had been looking after it. Didn't know where she was until Lucille came and saw me." The mug is abandoned to a nearby coffee table. "She's okay in your brain though? I don't know how this whole dream thing works — "
Nick runs another nervous hand over the back of his head as he shrugs one shoulder. "I donno either. I told her it wasn't the best of spots. That my life's dangerous and that my head isn't the best place for someone good to be lurking in, but she was pretty damn determined to stay."
He sighs and turns to give a wry smirk to Russo. "Sorry about that, by the way. I'm sure there are better people you'd rather have sleepin' in your house next to your sister, and all, but it wasn't my idea."
Russo's pale blue eyes narrow suspiciously at Nick, particularly at the strange apology. His hands clutch his knees and his lips curl pull downwards. His chin drops and his gaze turns to the floor. "Ehn," he manages. It's an eloquent response from a man who talks for a living. "At least you showed up. There are cowardly people out there who wouldn't bother coming to some strange house."
He wrinkles his nose as his eyes follow the lines of the dark wood panelling along the wall. "No one lives here anymore, anyways," he clears his throat. "My grandfather died a couple years ago, and I had to put gran in a home shortly thereafter…" but Brad hasn't brought himself to part with it.
The younger man lifts a hand to stave off any sort of praise from Russo and his brows twitch into a deeper scowl as he rests his elbows on his knees and stares down at his hands. "I'll do what I can. After the week's up, I should probably get back to work but I'll try to come and sleep here, 'til she decides to come outta her hidey hole." Hopefully it won't take that long. "Or until I can see if someone can tell me if she's still there."
Nick scowls at that thought — having someone check his head for her seems risky, but if he can't dream, or doesn't remember his dreams, does it mean she's gone? How else could he be sure? "It's nice," he says vaguely about the house.
Public> My Whole Brain Just Went What The Hell Amadeus says, “It's so cold my computer really is running faster than normal.”
"Yeah. Work," the word on his tongue brings a deep-set frown amid his usual pokerface; Russo will need to get back to it next week too, much to chagrin at this moment, particularly with the state of affairs he'd left it in on Christmas Eve. "Make sure you leave with one of the keys. There's enough of them floating around with each of my grandparents' copies, my mother's copy… mine… and it's a good house. One of these days I should sell, but if gran— well, she wouldn't approve."
His jaw tightens, "Nicole will be by I think, so will I. I'd like someone in the house at all times. Maybe I can put our other sister on a shift or something. Holidays are easier." And then, if only to get off the morbid topic he asks, "Where do you work?"
Nick nods in regards to keeping someone by Delia's side at all times. "I can take a shift, just… once I get back it's a little more sketchy on hours. Nights should be okay."
He's not really sure what he'll be doing after this week's "mental-health" vacation… obviously his work with Walsh is done, dead, and rigor mortis'd. The dockwork he'd been doing was just a front for that. "I was working on the docks. Longshoreman, that kinda thing. But I missed a bit, with all this stuff, so I donno if I got a job or not at the same place. Might need to find somethin' new." The lies come easily enough, as easy as the American accent. "You work on that show, right? What's Nicole do?"
"That's honest work," Russo murmurs quietly. "There's something refreshing about working with hands. Like actually. Was in the military for awhile, and while I always went to bed exhausted, I knew I'd managed to get a lot done in my day."
He sits up in his chair, leaning away from the back and firmly planting both feet on the floor. "Yeah, I host a show. K Studio produced— The Advocate. Going on… many years." If you include college, Brad always does. "Nicole is Linderman's assistant, but I think more accurately, she manages to put her interests alongside potential candidates for elected positions. She's got the more demanding job out of the two of us, I think. She might disagree."
'Honest work' is hardly what Nick does — even when he believes he's doing an important job, a necessary job, it's all about dishonesty. He just shrugs his left shoulder and then arches a brow at the name Linderman. "Both of 'em sound difficult to me, but I'm just a wharf rat," he says with a smile that doesn't reach his tired blue eyes.
He stands, tipping his head ear to shoulder left, then right, to crack his neck before nodding toward the sleeping bag on the floor. "I'll try and sleep again, I guess." Sleeping is the most important job he has at the moment, after all — but it's also a way to get out of the conversation before Russo begins asking anything else Nick has to lie about.
The comment and the standing have Russo following suit, collecting several mugs from around the room before stepping towards the entrance, "I'll leave you to it then." Nick is given a two fingered salute as Brad steps out of the room.
Second later, however, he's stepping back into the room to quip, "You can sleep next to her but don't touch her. I may seem unassuming. Don't be deceived." And there it is. With that, Delia's half-brother is gone.