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

[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."

[raspberryturk]

"If you don't, man, then you just ain't payin' attention." And down went some more beer. Because a toast to being an idiot was something that deserved a mouthful or three. "I got faith in you, man. If I can learn, anyone can."

[withoutverona]

"When I got here, I was convinced I was never going to love again," Romeo said meditatively. "So at least I've learned I was wrong about that much."

"What have you learned?"

[raspberryturk]

What passed over Reno's face at that question was a rare moment of true thoughtfulness, coupled with the lingering affects of the earlier rum mingling with the second bottle of beer and the leftover warm fuzzies of a stray kitten, creating a rare anomaly known as vulnerability and deference.

"How to breathe," he said, maybe a little too simply. "For maybe five minutes at a time. Or three. Or one."