milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Once again, River heads straight from the front door to the hallway that leads to the Security office. It's a long while before she reappears. There was a tension to her body, a faint troubled frown on her face, a stressed and wary watchfulness in her gaze; all of that is still there, undiminished.

She heads for the far wall of the bar, where she climbs rapidly from bench to table to booth back and settles into the rafters.

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"Connect them," River whispers to the rafter in front of her.

"Ink is optional."

"...I just like the dots," she says honestly and offers River a marker that smells like pine needles.

"Want to help?"

River takes the marker carefully, rolling it slowly between her fingertips as she lifts it to eye level.

She looks at Del over the top.

Softly, "Can I?"

River's questions often sound like statements. This one... doesn't. It's a clear question.

River's antecedents are often unclear.

Del considers her before saying, solemnly, "No."

And then she reaches over and pulls the lid of the marker.

"Now you can."

River blinks at her.

After a moment, a startled flicker of a half-smile.

She grins and pokes gently at River's forehead with one finger, before saying, "So?"

River watches her thin white finger approach, goes cross-eyed to keep watching when her forehead is poked, and keeps watching as Del pulls her hand away.

She ducks her head a little. The barest faint shadow of a smile, and then slowly, her face relaxes into weariness.

When she exhales, it's a sigh that makes her shoulders sink.

Del ducks her head too, to look up at River.

"You know what the wise men say?"

River's eyes lift; River's head doesn't.

"It'll get better. Or it won't. But in the meantime, stop bitching, woman, and make me my dinner."

She frowns.

"Maybe not that one."

...Uh, says River's face.

"I'm not allowed to cook."

River's not supposed to play with the heat sources and sharp utensils unsupervised. Imagine that.

Del looks confused.

"Why?"

River makes a face.

A grumpy face.

It says I don't know, but they seem to think it's important.

Earnestly, "Bob could teach you."

Sadly, Touga has Bob now, waiting for him.

Waiting.

Patiently.

Bob can wait forever.

"It's silly."

~~Where Bob is from, is there always music in the air?~~

Blank look.

It might get blanker.

Because now Del's pacing.

Back. Forth. Back. Forth.

And THINKING.

"You should learn." Seriously.

There's more wariness, now, in the way River's eyes follow the pacing Endless.

"You could make brownies. And cookies. And snickerdoodles. And macaroni. And eyeball smoothies."

Absently, "The culinary supplies are minimal."

Beat.

"The flavoring is unorthodox."

"It is like decoupage. And knowing how to break someone's collar bone. And crochet. Every girl should know how."

Del has been reading Parenting Books.

"I can," River assures her earnestly.

"Even brownies?" Hopeful, now.

Uh-oh.

River considers that.

"The relative density of the clavicle is superior. We'll have to make it very stale."

"Cement is good for the bones," she says seriously.

"Makes the texture difficult," River says.

Somewhat tentatively. She's getting confused.