Give A Bitch A Break [October Open]

[crushed_pearls]

Who: Erin Peters and YOU
What: AAAAAAAAA
When: Mid October Forward
Where: Library, Bobby's, possibly elsewhere
Warnings: Tiamat fallout, suicide discussion, depression & stress


There Is No Silver Bullet [Closed To Valdis | Library]

Finding Erin won't be hard, once Valdis is herself again; she's the only soul on the ship currently meditating into a killing trance, a state of no-mind she's hoping will be effective against Tiamat. She's...

Having obstacles. Intrusive thoughts, feelings, anxieties, these impede her meditation, but she's getting there. This has gone on long enough.

Maybe tell her the good news?

Grade A Hypocrisy [Library | After the Previous]

Erin keeps coming to the library to read, on the theory that she's definitely not isolating, look, it's a public space. What actually keeps happening is she gets three chapters in and passes out, drooling on the comfy chair. Coffee? No help. Tea? No help. Turning into a toy robot? The toy robot snores and turns back into Erin after an hour, leaving her sprawled on the table.

The Smoking Prompt [Bobby B's]

I'm writing this on a phone, Erin smokes multiple times a day, find her here. She's still drinking pretty heavily too.

Wildcard

It warm in Hell.

Comments

[crushed_pearls]

Oh.

Erin's heart flutters, and she gives Valdis a soft kiss. "Why would that change? It's okay if it sounds crazy, me trying to explain the Ash thing definitely will."

[redlightgreenlight]

Valdis kisses her back.

"I don't know why it would change, it just...feels like it would."

She tips her head.

"What Ash thing?"

[crushed_pearls]

"Being jealous." Erin sighs. "It's. A lot of things. Sometimes I feel like you're gonna wake up and realize I'm not worth the trouble, which is. Again. Insane. But those feelings look at this guy with so much in common with you waltzing into your heart and they get scary and mean. Which is also insane; I've got things in common with you he can't understand."

"...Like I said. There's a roof on how much you can help. I gotta work on me."

[redlightgreenlight]

"Ash would feel bad if he knew you were jealous."

Valdis snuggles closer.

"He's very insecure when it comes to me, just like you I suppose."

She'd say she doesn't know why she has this effect on people, but Max sometimes also feels as if he isn't enough.

"If I have chosen you, there's no need to doubt me."

[crushed_pearls]

"I guess when being with someone feels like a dream, you get scared to wake up." Erin's smile is wistful, and so very, very fond. "...You get to plan the date this time, I think. I'm playing the forbidden princess card."

[redlightgreenlight]

"I don't know what that means, but I am quite capable of planning a date, my love."

Valdis looks back at the TV, wishing that those she loves could recognize their reality instead of worrying about waking up to find she isn't real.

[crushed_pearls]

Valdis, you're being Chomped. It's gentle yes but Erin is in fact giving in to the urge to bite people she loves.

It's very soothing for her.

"It means," Erin says after a bit just...like that..."it means that I've been persuaded to take my own advice. Helena, Crabb, Ylva, Cass...you... everyone's been worried. So I'm summoning the courage that I usually use to beat gods to death with meteoric iron and asking you to pamper me some."

[redlightgreenlight]

Valdis squeezes her hand when she feels Erin's teeth on her skin.

"Does me showing up at your door in a sexy dress and taking you out dancing count as pampering?"

Because that was her plan.

[crushed_pearls]

"It definitely sounds real nice," Erin murmurs. "...God what I wouldn't give for a fancy party to be your arm candy in, but alas. Even if we hosted one I've got no rich people to bully here."

Well. There's one. But Erin doesn't know him well enough to do it right.

"...And, hey. If the other folks in my life are like, plotting something? I dunno. An intervention, kidnapping me to an excursion to the Care Bear dimension, whatever...I dunno. Maybe lend 'em a hand? Knowing my bullshit and having any control over it are very different and I might need to get dragged kicking and screaming to the spa or somethin'."

[redlightgreenlight]

"I will lend them a hand, we all have your best interests at heart. But if you kick me I will knock you out before dragging you to the spa."

[crushed_pearls]

Under her breath: "Goddamnit why is it hot when she threatens me."

Out loud and significantly more of her own will: "As you decree, my love. Hey...thanks for...not letting me stay in my own head. 'm bad about that, and it's not friendly in here. It's...amazing, to have someone in my life where I don't even get the temptation to dissemble, y'know?"

[redlightgreenlight]

"I know that feeling, very, very well."

She nuzzles into Erin's neck and kisses her on the cheek.

[crushed_pearls]

It's so tempting to just relax now, to be unburdened and calm in the heart. But Erin already put her big girl pants on, so there's one last thing to confess before she chickens out like she did last year.

"...November seventeenth. My Homecoming, the day I got back to Earth. If I was among my people it'd be something a lot like my birthday. Do anything you like with that knowledge."