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[lastgunslinger]

It might be midsummer, but the heat isn't stifling.

Roland is sitting outside by the lake, on the big flat rock he favors. He has a copy of Pride and Prejudice with him, but soon finds it boring.

He's had other things to think about, anyway.

So he settles back, and puts the book over his face, and puts his arms behind his head -- thinking and dozing and trying not to think.

Comments

[lastgunslinger]

"And there are only three people here who'd know what you're trying to say, so I don't see as it matters much."

[river_meimei]

Then there's no problem, says her face.

Sulkily, a little, still. But that's an undertone now.

[lastgunslinger]

"Four," amends Roland. "When Cort is around. If he'll come around again."

[river_meimei]

River is possibly considering swearing in Sellian around Cort, now.

[lastgunslinger]

Roland looks at her.

"Well? Any other curses you'd care to throw at me?"

[river_meimei]

River looks away, down at the lakeshore where the water meets the pebbled land.

The anger has drained out of her posture, now, and the teasing too, leaving only weariness. Her shoulders lift a little in a sigh, and then slump.

She doesn't answer, for a minute.

Tiredly, "That'll do."

[lastgunslinger]

"All right."

And Roland goes back to looking out at the lake.

After a moment: "I let Jake drop. You know that?"

[river_meimei]

She looks at him.

Anger's gone.

She's listening.

[lastgunslinger]

"It's why I can't forgive him." Gabriel Tam. Not Jake. "And I wonder how you can. Just as I still wonder how Jake forgave me."

His voice is low.

[river_meimei]

Silence, for a minute.

Softly, "Didn't mean to. Wanted me to be happy. Wanted Simon to be safe. He just got mixed up."

[lastgunslinger]

"There's no point in saying any of this to you. You can't understand me. And I can't understand you."

A little bleak.

[river_meimei]

A pause.

"Hurt your knee. Blood on her hands." Her soft voice shakes almost undetectably. Almost. "It's all right. That's what you said."

[lastgunslinger]

"That was. This isn't."

[river_meimei]

"Didn't say it was." More of a tremble in her voice, and then it firms. "Done and past. Not his intention. It matters. But it doesn't matter."

Beat. Sigh.

Almost sadly, "People are complicated."

[lastgunslinger]

Roland doesn't say anything.

He bends, picks up a handful of stones, sorts through them.

And then he begins to skip them across the water. He needs something to do that's...disciplined. Even if it's just skipping stones.

[river_meimei]

River watches the stones skim through the air and strike the water, one two three four five and onwards over the lake.

[lastgunslinger]

The last stone flies out of his hand and across the water.

He looks at River. "What do you want me to say?"

[river_meimei]

She looks at him, before her gaze slides off to a point in the air somewhere to the right of him. It's the same look she was giving the stones, a weary regard without visible emotion except a faint sadness. It makes her look older than eighteen, for once.

"Just disagree sometimes."

Pause. Her gaze wanders further right. "Don't have to say anything."

[lastgunslinger]

An audible sigh.

"Fine."

[river_meimei]

She looks back at him.

I don't know either, says her expression. A little frustrated.

She drops to a crouch, bending her head and running her fingers gently through the grass. Grass stems brush against her fingertips and spring away.

"Gonna be okay," she says to the ground, helplessly.

[lastgunslinger]

Roland shakes his head.

[river_meimei]

River looks up at him, through her hair. One hand still strokes the grass absently; the other arm is wrapped around her knees, fingers twisting in the hem of her skirt.

[lastgunslinger]

"You have Simon, and you have your father, and it is very well for you." Calm. "And that, it would seem, is enough."

[river_meimei]

She stares at him.

(To say she has her father is a half-truth at best.)

Her fingers tighten in the grass, clenching on stems until a few break.

Then she loosens her grip and stands, still staring at him, and steps towards him, and leans a little against him, resting her cheek against his chest.

"Being a dummy again," she says fiercely into his shirt. "Miscalculation of the variables. It doesn't suit him."

[lastgunslinger]

He doesn't move.
You gave me away. How was that protecting me?
His face works, a little. Then he brings himself under control.
It wasn't.
And he brings his arms up around River, with another small sigh.