Room 429, Sunday Afternoon

[raspberryturk]

Okay. Sunday afternoons were officially boring. The days of the week had classes and radio and reports to write for his job, and mornings and evenings meant that the ferret was awake and totally willing to be harassed, but Sunday afternoons?

Reno would like to vote that boring, lazy Sunday afternoons be stricken from the record.

He was in his room, sitting by the window and playing with his lighter. Fire go on. Fire blow out. Ooh. Exciting.

The door was open slightly in case something interesting happened to wander through the hallway, at least.

[Open, like the door~]

Comments

[withoutverona]

"Then she just doesn't think I can keep my mouth shut when something matters," Romeo pointed out. "That doesn't say high things of her opinion of me either, you know."

[raspberryturk]

Reno frowned a little at that.

"Or maybe they got eyes everywhere. Sounds to me like these guys don't mess around." He shrugged. "I dunno, I'm just speculatin'. I think she was, more than anything else? Just scared."

[withoutverona]

"But if they had eyes trained on her, would she be dating me at all?" he speculated. "I doubt they like having their little toy distracted."

[raspberryturk]

Reno scratched at his head, there. Oh, ow. His brain was gonna hurt in the morning.

"Maybe they even figured that she was throwin' a distraction for the other guy to see. But man, like you said, what you, uh. Felt? That, that was real. I mean, there are some things you can act out, man. And some stuff that just don't come off as sincere. Right?"

Oh, wow. Reno hoped he was right.

[withoutverona]

"Right," Romeo had to agree. "Unless she's truly evil, and ... I cannot think that of her."

And that beer label was just fascinating. "How was she?"

[raspberryturk]

"She was... kinda beatin' herself up," Reno admitted. "Sorta came in and called herself a bunch'a names, and went right for the tequila. S'been since Mexico since she hit that, wasn't it?"

Beer labels were awesome. Except Reno's. His was mostly gone, now.

"She wanted to know what to do, if anything could make it better. I didn't know what to tell her. So I kinda just said to give you time. I'm not so good at this relationship stuff, man."

[withoutverona]

"I could probably help should she run short of names," Romeo said sourly.

He didn't entirely mean that.

"Time, and -- I want to speak with her, but I fear she'll give me that look and I'll forget to ask questions."

Reno knew girls. He knew the kind of look Romeo met.

[raspberryturk]

Oh yeah, Reno knew the look. He knew the look really well.

"Maybe the questions gotta come as you get 'em," he mused. "Maybe you go in there with nothin' to say, instead of gettin' a script ready or whatever. Scripts don't work, you know? Just... say what's on your mind."

[withoutverona]

"I keep worrying she'll be killed doing this." That was mostly to the bottle. "And then I think it's stupid, as she's stronger than I knew, and then I think I shouldn't care, but ... that is my fear at the root of it all."

Absolutely no prizes for guessing why Romeo had that particular issue.

[raspberryturk]

"I keep tellin' Rikku... I mean, someday, what I do's gonna get the better of me. It's how this stupid way of livin' goes, sometimes." More often than not, really. "I told Doji, when she told me what's up, that I'm in. I dunno if that helps the fear any, but there it is. Wherever she's goin', she's goin' with a Turk at her disposal, too. I'll keep an eye on her for you, man."

[withoutverona]

"I don't understand why she says she must live this way," Romeo bitched. "Now, yes -- she's made a promise, she cannot back out without more peril. But she had more choice to take it or not than she will admit."

He gave Reno a tiny smile. "It's good to know you would be watching, fi I don't go."

[raspberryturk]

"It ain't easy to swallow," Reno admitted. "I didn't wanna see anybody livin' the same sorta life I live. But at the very least, her reason for doin' what she does seems less... Less stupid than mine. We don't gotta like it, Romeo. It's not our life, zoto."

He flicked an imaginary speck of dust off of his jacket sleeve.

"It's a hard choice. A scary one. S'gonna linger on the heads of everyone she touches- the 'what if,' I mean. S'why I agreed to go out there with her, man. At least if I do, maybe there'll be that much to keep the worst from happenin'." He shrugged. "I think she believes she's doin' the right thing."

[withoutverona]

Romeo shook his head. Dojima's reasons were different; he couldn't say they were better or worse. He could imagine her life without STN more easily than Reno's without the Turks. "I wanted to share her life," he said. "I still half do, if she would let me."

"I hope for her sake it is the right thing."

[raspberryturk]

"That makes two of us, man. That makes two of us."

And down went the rest of Reno's beer.

It was a good afternoon for copious amounts of drinking, indeed.

"Lemmie know how you two turn out? If anyone here deserves to share lives, it's you and Doji. It's still you and Doji."

[withoutverona]

"You flatter us," Romeo said, not disagreeing. "I'm less furious at her, though. Somehow. We may have a chance."

Somehow, and that reminded him.

"I may have snapped at Rikku a bit." Understatement was Romeo's friend.

[raspberryturk]

It was good to hear that they had a chance. Very good. Romeo and Dojima had, somehow, worked their way into Reno's brain as the most stable couple he'd ever known.

.... Truth be told, Romeo and Dojima were pretty much the only couple that Reno had ever known.

"Snapped at her?" Reno tilted his head curiously, setting his bottle on the counter. "'Bout what? She okay?"

Better to get curious than to fly to some kind of defensive rage. Romeo was, after all, fessing up.

[withoutverona]

"I suppose. I walked out before I could make things worse," Romeo said, a bit cross. "I was trying to explain what had happened and she jumped right to ranting against religion." He glanced up. "I just wasn't in the mood, but if you see her before I do, tell her I'm sorry."

[raspberryturk]

Reno frowned thoughtfully for a moment, and then nodded and went digging for another beer.

One for his ego. It hadn't been stroked. It was just in a mood.

"I'll pass on the message," Reno noted, nodding faintly. "Touchy subject for both of you, huh? Like government for her and me." Time to open that beer. Take another mouthful. There wasn't enough booze in the world, sometimes. "I really don't think she understands that her experience in her world with the one that bit her isn't gonna be the same in every world. Takes some gentle reminding, yoto. When tempers cool. Want me to talk to her?"

[withoutverona]

Romeo shook his head. "I should," he said. "I'm not a very good Catholic, but that doesn't make me not one. My closest mentor was a friar, and, while he was far from flawless, he was one of my best friends for years at home. And I don't ..." he waved his bottle in the air, groping for an example. "I don't press rosaries on her."

"Probably something we should discuss when I'm not half-convinced women are evil, though."

[raspberryturk]

"True," Reno agreed, leaning back against his dresser. "Maybe I'll leave the apologizin' to her to you, too. Probably means more from your mouth, you know?"

Mmmm. Beer. He was going to drink two more after Romeo left and then maybe start on what was left of his rum.

"Women aren't evil, man. They're just freakin' crazy. I'm pretty sure. Hard to tell the difference sometimes though, ain't it?"

[withoutverona]

"And it's not fair to put you in the middle of the mess," Romeo concurred. "I'll talk to her. She's in my class tomorrow."

He drained the very last of his beer, looked mournfully at the bottle. "Crazy. Yes. Evil would mean she planned it, and I'm not sure she did. Just .... made bad choices, then more bad choices to cover." 'She" was Dojima again.

[raspberryturk]

"We all make bad choices," Reno agreed, stooping down and reaching for another bottle to hold toward Romeo. While he was working on his second, he might as well offer one to his friend to keep things even. "The outcome of 'em all depends on what we want to do with the bad choices when they come back to bite us in the ass. Like I said before, man, I'm watchin' her back. It's up to you if you wanna take her hand again."

[withoutverona]

"I need to talk to her before I make any decision," Romeo said simply, accepting the beer. "And how did you get so smart?" Because Reno was kind of God just then.

[raspberryturk]

"Easy," Reno said, raising his own beer in a sort of a toast. "I made bad choices and did somethin' with 'em when they bit me in the ass."

Okay. So it hadn't been easy. But at least it meant he was experienced on this matter.

[withoutverona]

Romeo clinked his beer against Reno's. "Then to bad choices. I hope I learn something from mine, sometime."