as_damaged | ☎ voicemail

I'm sure we'll survive in spite of it.

[She shuts the door behind him, doing up the locks before heading in towards the kitchen.]

I should have picked up a bottle of sake.

Luckily...

[Reaching into the bag, he pulls out the bottle first, holding it up as he joins her at the kitchen counter.]

Somebody else thought of that. I thought you were going to be piping in christmas carols for me?

It's a Christmas miracle.

[She fishes two small ceramic cups from a cabinet and steps back, folding her arms across her stomach.]

I figured I'd leave the carols for dinner.

[There are no carols, but there is a tree in the living room; it's a fairly dignified affair with white lights and classy ornaments, though scattered in among them are smaller, handmade ones. From last year, of course.]

Are you going to sing them to me?

[His tone is lightly teasing, though he focuses a little more than he needs to on getting the pouring of the sake right, rather than the usual preference of watching her reactions. Any effect he has on her is worth noting and keeping.]

Of course not, I want us to have a pleasant evening.

[Cameron knows her limits, and singing is beyond them.]

[He laughs and ducks his head.]

Me, too.

[So does he bring up what he needs to now, or later? Chase has always been a chicken when it comes to facing up to things - he serves the food and settles on later.]

So are we having this on the couch, tonight?

[Cameron's guilty herself of a hundred, but she dislikes lies of omission as much as any other sort. Of course, for as long as she doesn't know something, what she doesn't know can't hurt her.]

Why not? It seems more festive.

Quicker than laying a table, too.

[This time he flashes the smile back at her, scooping the plates into alignment along one arm like a seasoned waiter, and passing over her glass.]

Have you made any plans for the day itself, yet?

Actually, Mindy invited me ice skating.

[As ever her fun's scheduled in advance. Bottle in tow she heads for the sofa.]

Certainly seasonal.

She invited you?

[He'd be surprised if Cameron didn't at least have the same quiet interest he's taken in Mindy since that one particular curse. Not that he really knows what to make of the girl - she seems to have a huge imagination.]

I'd been wondering what she was going to be doing. Good.

[If they're together, that's good. None of the kids in the city should be stuck here alone. He delivers their dinner carefully onto each arm of the couch, and settles in next to her.]

Can you skate?

I'm not sure, I think I might be a chaperon for show.

[More than a little interest, Mindy qualifies as at least half a roommate by now. Or at least a quarter; Cameron doesn't much like her coming and going but it's surely better than her not coming by at all.]

I... think so? I haven't been skating in a long time.

[Chaperon... oh no, seriously? Chase has been keeping an eye out, and can't help grinning at the thought.]

Rudy? I'm not sure you've got enough hands for that handful. [He leans over his plate and scoops up a mouthful, talking through it.] I could have taken you for practice if I knew earlier.

He's something. But I think she'll keep him in line herself.

[She smiles, takes a moment to take a bite of her food.]

It hasn't been a plan for long, or I might have mentioned it.

If anyone can...

[Though Chase still doesn't know what it is that's different about Mindy, he's been attuned enough from the first to know she hides the same secrets almost everyone here does. Those that he'd class as 'ordinary' -- himself, Cameron, almost House, are few and far between. Rudy is closer to ordinary than Mindy is, as exceptional as he might be in certain ways.]

Still, if you're going to be busy on the day, maybe I should give you your Christmas present now. [As was always the intention, but it's as good a reason as any.]

[Cameron knows... more, but certainly not much; much more and she wouldn't have some vain hope of rehabilitation to cling to. It's not a matter of knowing what Mindy's capable of, so much as knowing what she's done already. Ignorance is bliss. Or at least functionality.]

I celebrate a secular Christmas anyway, so technically I don't think the date matters.

Well that's one way to make it feel special.

[The sarcasm is lightly teasing, one way to cover up anxious traces that might otherwise colour his tone. Maybe he should have waited until they were done with the meal, but he's reaching into his jacket pocket by now and bringing out a small jewellery box, though not small enough to be anything to worry about.]

Then again, I did buy this for you weeks ago.

[He holds it on his palm for her to open (http://www.alexmonroe.com/m2/Bracelets/p849/Flower-Burst-Bangle/product_info.html), worrying at the inner corner of his lip as he watches. It's both more, and perhaps less, than the little pot of snowdrops he'd bought last year.]

I've got something to say, after you open it.

[She gives him a funny look, one tinged palpably with wariness. Something to say is, if not inherently ominous, at least... worth being wary. She can guess what it isn't, given the size of the box, but that doesn't help much in the long run.

She opens it and draws a sharp little breath, obviously pleased but more than a little stunned. She picks up the bangle with an appropriate delicacy, balancing it on splayed fingers and turning it to catch the light.]

It's lovely...

[she murmurs, and looks at him. She's trying not to look apprehensive, but Cameron finds trust difficult. She leaves the loop of metal resting on her fingertips.]

[Chase can be difficult to trust. He's set enough bad examples already, and they'll continue, despite his heart being in a better place.]

Can I put it on for you?

[And anything to postpone things, although this is an effort he has to make - and it should be a step, in trust terms if nothing else. He's trying the hard path, knowing deception would be the easier. No one ever told him he was worth more than gold for being truthful.]

I wanted to get you something a bit less.... seasonal, this time. Thought it would suit you.

[He smiles, thinking of the shoes, and the flowers that couldn't have lasted. The bracelet wasn't cheap, but isn't careless in the way that expensive gifts can be, to him. Another simple solution to a problem: throwing money at it. He saw this, beautiful and so much more than it looks, and thought of her.]

[Cameron wears very little jewelery, and as such owns next to none. Especially in the City, since all her sentimental bits and pieces-- old gifts, things leftover from a time when she had a proper life outside hospital walls-- are all at home.

She hesitates for half a moment before extending that hand towards him; and when he takes the bracelet from her fingertips she'll let her fingers fall together and her wrist to arch back, straightening.]

[Not many hospital workers do wear much, though Chase still keeps a watch even when it lives most of the day in his pocket. Practicality can become a spartan trap. He presses his palm under the heel of hers and, with the other hand, slips the bracelet over her fingertips, to her wrist. No need to unclasp, but just close enough to her skin that it shouldn't slip free.

And he should talk. He takes her wrist, first, pressing a smudged thumb print to the gold.]

It's not long until we'll have been in the City two years. Have you noticed we're becoming the old timers?

There are still quite a few who've got us beat.

[She smiles, lips a little tight, thinking and trying not to think about that. Two years. As much as she claims to consider time meaningless here, looking back the logic doesn't hold. She rolls her hand slowly in the air, eyes downcast.]

A few. [He clears his throat.] People get married in that kind of time.

[And then he stops, almost too abruptly, as if there's another point that could be made, but the journey is doubled back on at the last minute. When he does continue it's a slightly different tack.]

A lot of my friends have gone, recently.

[Not 'gone home'. No proof of that.]

It... hasn't really happened before. Then, all at once.

[She flinches, only a little bit, and hates it, knowing he's sure to misinterpret it. You can't come to the right conclusions on the wrong assumptions. Cameron wonders if there's such a thing as damaging goods, rather than damaged goods, but that's a worry for another day.]

Are you jealous? That they've-- gotten out, I mean.

[It's an impulsive question, asked gently and (for once) without a tone of judgment. She has a hard time gauging what the City is to him, what he thinks of it, beyond the obvious reactions day to day.]

No.

[That much is at least simple. He bows his head as he shakes it, looking back up through stray strands of blond. He's not jealous, because he doesn't believe they've 'gotten' anywhere. They're just gone. It's been harder than he expected, but then he always forgets how badly he deals with loss.]

I miss them, though. Had a recruitment session to replace my roommate and wound up turning everyone away. And I... need...

[Frustration shows at the corners of his mouth as he turns to face her properly.]

We've known each other five years. You're my best friend in this place and... probably anywhere else, too. If we ever do get home, the one thing I know is I get a shot at more than that, whether I screw it up or not. You're the only real future I might have here.

[The silence pulls around the two, short breaths he stops to take.]

But I want more than what we've had. The only time I've felt stable with you we were cursed out of our heads. Peter left. I felt-- messed up and. Something happened, with someone else. I don't know what it's going to be, if it's really going to be anything. I just think I should give it the chance. I just-- I want to know where I stand with someone, for a while.

[It takes a long, quiet moment for her to roll that around into coherence, and as it comes to mean something she just looks... tired. Not angry. Worn through. Her arms fall a little, balanced on her knees, the bracelet slipping to butt against the base of her hand and for a second too brief to really register she wants to fold her hand and let it fall to the floor and tell him how his consolation prize ends, tell him how he's been drunk on her doorstep and disappeared again. But there's no point to being spiteful, particularly when (as far as she can figure) she loses any way you look at it. Something happened with someone else. She doesn't even want to know.]

Why are you here?

[She asks, tight and tired, and the tone says something more like I'd like you to leave now. What she wishes he understood-- something she's never said because to her, it's too obvious to translate into words-- is that she thought they had something. An unspoken commitment on her end isn't enough, would never be enough maybe to elicit anything similar from him, and maybe she's right when she thinks it's hopeless.]

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