Participants:
| Scene Title | It Was Unnecessary |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Promises are made, even if both parties know that they are empty. |
| Date | April 29, 2011 |
Cash's Basement Apartment
Cash's place is having a busy week. Little more than a week. And by busy it means that someone has knocked on her door more times than zero. This time, it's not in the dead of night with a great a great need to be in the basement before a patrol gets in. It's the same person mind you, but it's with less urgency.
Which doesn't stop her from knocking again, the soft rap followed by the digging in of her hands into her pockets, trying to avoid looking around all suspicious like. "Cash, it's me" Abigail calls out, neglecting to say a name and counting on the blonde inside - please be inside - to be familiar with the voice.
As with the other times her door was knocked on suddenly, Cash doesn't take long to answer. Lucky for those visitors, they always happened to come by while she was home. A few weeks ago, this probably wouldn't have been possible.
But things have changed, rather quickly.
When she actually prefers things to take time, like water washing away rock to create a canyon.
"Abby," she says as she sees the younger woman through the crack of the door, gray eyes blinking in surprise as she pulls the door all the way open to allow her access. "You just missed Huruma," she says, a leather strap around her neck sporting a distinct canine tooth.
"I did?" A glance over her shoulder, in case the lurking black emotional behemoth might suddenly come around the corner, is rewarded with the lack of such a thing. "I'll see her again, probably, back home" Back on the Island. The ushering open of the door being a permission to enter, the former blonde does such a thing, booted feet thunking to the floor as she descends inwards so that Cash can close the door. She's unhappy - no surprise really - and whereas others might expect red rimmed eye's, there's instead lines of anger her and there. Corner of her mouth, forehead, the way she jams her hands into her pockets after dropping her pack.
Shuffles for the bathroom and that shower. "I met Calvin Sheridan. He warned me away from his Dah or he'd take a crack at killing me"
"He did what?" Cash asks, sounding more surprised than she did when the woman in front of her mentioned the divorce. Surprised, and for a brief moment, angry. Angry. Perhaps the mother's emotions have reflected on the daughter for that instant. But it doesn't last long as the door closes behind her.
Hand still on the doorknob, fingers grip until the knuckles are white— but that's the best sign of the anger continuing. It leaves her face, and for the most part her eyes. And her voice doesn't even hold it. "He should not have done that."
"Why shouldn't he have done such kasha? Because something I did, made me call his Dah and his Dah covered for me? Did I get Flint killed? Did I kill Flint?"
She's leaning down, forefinger and thumbs yanking at her laces, loosening them till she can kick her boots off, yank her socks off. She's got spare clothes in her bag just in case, always just in case. But not spare shoes. They're tossed out of the bathroom, safe from any accident that may happen, despite her stepping into the shower. Means Cash will have to come over there instead of staying by the door.
"Were you going to tell me that He's James Muldoon Kasha?"
There seems to be a decent break before Cash makes her way to the bathroom to look into the shower, where the woman's going as a precaution. Though that won't stop the damage the flames are liable to make if she loses control as much as she might.
"He should not have told you, because some things are better off not known." She tried to get rid of the emotion, the tension. It didn't work as well as she may have liked. But she does admit after a moment, from the door frame of the bathroom. "I was never going to tell you, because it was unnecessary. He did not have to, to stop what happened."
Slender fingers rub across her face, the round about confirmation given as to whether she did indeed Marry James Muldoon eliciting a whine that eventually turns into a groan, fingers sliding up into dark hair, gripping at her scalp, turning away from the other woman.
Eventually, it turns into a scream, building up from somewhere in her gut, traveling through her chest and out, directed at the wall of the shower and hopefully, it won't bring the womans neighbours running. Then It's a heel to the wall of the shower then, in time with the scream, followed by the butt of her hand, opting to beat up the wall as opposed to ripping off any curtain, try to find a way to bleed off emotion in some form other than the heat that's rising dangerously off the former blonde.
Within two steps, the other woman in the bathroom is no longer a blonde either. Instead her hair, her skin, and everything about her, is a pale grainy gray. Cash knows exactly how much heat her body can withstand in this form, but she also knows even if she can't handle the heat her mother would put off— it takes time for it to reach that point. Time she knows she may have.
The cold rock hand reaches in, delicately twisting the small dial and letting water spill down. Cold water, specifically.
It won't remain cold long, but it may help.
"I was relieved when I heard he wanted a divorce. Though perhaps that things had already changed enough. That you would never have to learn the truth." Any attempts to continue the lie are not happening, it would seem.
Five seconds. If she looses it. That's all that it takes for Abigail to ignite without intending to. Instant if she is. But the water works two fold, shocking Abigail, cutting the wail off a few seconds after the first few sputtering drops hit her before the rest of the water rushes out in the release of the gates inside plumbing. The second is that it insures she won't ignite, just stand there sputtering under the water, destined to require a handful of tylenol after.
She shuffles under the water proper, caring very little that the water cascading down her hair, soaking all of her is uncomfortable, beyond uncomfortable. "I wouldn't have known. I wouldn't have known. I thought…" Water jumps off her lips as she talks, little drops hitting the wall, bouncing off her arms as she brings her hands up to pull at her hair, bending over to yell at the floor.
"I married him" Bellowed. "Him"
"No, you married Robert Caliban," Cash says stiffly, the stone fading away into flesh once again, a quick transition, turning the water off most of the way, but allowing it to drip, so that it keeps her feet damp and the rest of her just a little, especially with how she's bending over.
The floor can't answer, but there's someone else there who can. She's on her knees beside the shower, reaching up to take the damp woman's head in her hands, forcing her to stop pulling at her hair some.
"He decieved you, but that was not your fault. It was his fault. His. No one else's. Especially not yours. You needed someone, you wanted someone, and he used that. Part of him may have even loved you, in an obsessed sociopathic way— but it is not your fault, not knowing what kind of man he was. Or who he had been."
She buries her face in the other womans hands, her own hands covering the ones holding her, sinking to her knees in the puddle of water pooled there, added to little by little with shoulders shuddering under the emotional force of the revelation that she held off believing till Kasha could tell her.
"He kidnapped me. He and Logan" The name spoken with the same disgust and venom that she's held for Muldoon all these years. "They nearly killed me, making me heal all those people so that they could fight, and fight, and fight." Water gathers at the bridge of her nose, dripping off, impacting soaked denim, looking over at Kasha when she raises her eyes.
"He Married me"
"I know," the woman says simply, moving her hands to pull the woman against her shoulder, holding her there tightly. It's not the most cushioned shoulder, but it's softer than the stone she'd been a moment ago. Though Cash may wish she could go back to it.
"I know what they did to you. I can not change that. But I was going to change this…" And someone else took that away from her. But that she can't change now either…
"Mom," she says, pulling back and placing her hands on the other woman's face, pushing the dark hair back to try and force her to look her in the eyes. "I need you to promise me something."
Now those eyes are red rimmed, swimming in saline and freshwater, lashes clumped damply to one another. But they're looking at Kasha, head stilled by the gentle grip, her own arms wrapped around the other woman. It's strange, awkward, hard to hear her called 'mom' by someone who's older than her. Two years ago she would have called everyone strange and dismissed it as crazy. Now, she accepts it.
"what do you want me to promise you?" Choppy, voice saturated as the both of them here in the bathroom, but at least it's warm. Comfortably so.
"I know you, mom— I know you sometimes do the opposite of what someone tells you to do, because you think that something else is better," Cash says quietly, even as she begins to move her hands, comforting gestures as she moves the hair out of the way, thumb rubbing against her cheek. "Not this time, though. If you love that child that I used to be— if you love me… Not this time."
There's a shaking in her voice, as she inhales. It sounds closer to the young woman that had been washing her husband, that turned to stone to lock the emotions away.
"Do not seek him out. Robert Caliban, James Muldoon— do not try to find him. Do not try to see him. Robert Caliban is dead to you. Let him stay that way."
Robert Caliban is dead. Likely. Or else why wouldn't he have come to claim his life back. Lower lip trembles, turning her her face downwards, lifting a hand to cover the hand and thumb, hold tight to it. "What did I do? Tell me, please, what did I do to them, to Flint"
"You did not promise me," Cash states simply, rather than answering the question. Her steel blue eyes show she knows exactly what she's doing— exactly what questions she's skipping, while she awaits confirmation of her request. "I came here to change things, to give you a better life— what happened in the past— in my past— does not affect yours, unless you let it. You choose your own future, your own path. So what you did to Flint does not matter— because if you do what I am asking you to promise, it will never happen."
It wasn't intentional, Abby's mind, sometimes, doesn't quite work like others, focused on one thing to the exclusion of others. "I promise" She does. Promise. "I promise you, Kasha, that I'll not try to find him" A better life though? That's questionable. A better life would have been ignorant of her husbands infidelity, running a dessert bar in New York and content with her life even if it had a GPS around her ankle. Others would argue that she does have a better life. A real life.
She looks down, buries her head in Cash's shoulder, holding tight to the woman.
"I promise"