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"Hey." Beau slides onto the small bench next to Yasha, who startles out of her faraway look and scoots over to accommodate with a smile.
"Hey." She takes the bread loaf Beau offers her, but something of that distance remains in her expression.
Beau holds the bread in her cold arm - it's not really giving her any indication that it's getting better, she'll have to ask Jester about it in the morning - and pulls off a tiny chunk with the other. "You doing okay?"
"Hmm?" Yasha looks at her, then back down. "Yeah. Yeah, I uh…" She blows out a breath. Her voice, wavering: "No, maybe?"
Even though it's what Beau suspected, Yasha's admission startles her. She finds she's not prepared to follow up the honesty and takes a moment. "I think that's probably to be expected, with something like this."
Yasha nods kind of absently. "Do you think he was lying?" Her voice is so soft that Beau would've missed it if she weren't listening for it - weren't always listening for it.
Another chunk torn off, and Beau eats this one slowly. "I think he believed what he was saying," she says. "But I also think that it's probably relevant, you know, that whole thing about lying when you don't know something. Honestly, his own perception of stuff is…" she wiggles her good hand.
Yasha mechanically eats a piece of her own bread, nodding with a little more presence. "What would it change? If he were in there, what would we even do? What could we do?"
That one's easy. "Whatever we have to."
Yasha looks at her fully now, and there's something honest and open and vulnerable on her face that cracks something inside of Beau. You make me feel safe. "Do you even realize it?" Yasha seems surprised by her own words, flushing a little but gathering her courage again rapidly to elaborate. "How deeply you attach to people."
Beau flushes now and stares hard at her bread. "Um," she says cleverly.
"Sorry," Yasha says, hands flailing a little. "I..I wasn't trying to make you feel awkward or…"
"It reminds you of Molly," It's a guess, but not a hard one.
Yasha settles. "Yeah," she confesses. "But not in the same…I mean. I like you in other ways, but you guys share it, kind of." She smiles a little at her hand. "Zuala too."
Beau is keenly aware of the void where she expects…what? Jealousy? Sadness? But there's nothing but a soft kind of pleased feeling. Beau realizes she's kind of honored, to be grouped in with Yasha's two greatest loves.
So of course, she turns it around. "You realize that's a reflection on you, right?" Yasha looks up, surprised. "People like that, like Zuala and Molly." She can't say "like me." That's okay. Yasha doesn't need her to. "They saw something…in you," Beau continues. "And they liked it." She looks away, doesn't give herself time to think too hard. "I like it."
She's aware of the smile inside of Yasha's pleased exhale, and it takes a supreme force of will to drag her eyes up to look at her. Yasha's hand is hovering just over Beau's forearm where it rests on the table, and before Beau can even think to react, she's rested it there. Yasha's touching her, just because.
And Beau's arm is fucking numb.
Yasha frowns a little at Beau's skin. "You're freezing." Her eyes are full of concern. "Are you…?"
"Ah, yeah," Beau says, smiling nervously. "When I stuck my hand in that one guy, with the - the blue glow. Kinda froze a little? It's fine though, just uh. Thawing." She wiggles her fingers stiffly just to demonstrate she can, dislodging the bread, and the movement stirs the faintest sensation. She breaths an internal sigh of relief. It is thawing, just slowly.
Yasha looks at her uncertainly, and then her fingers glow against Beau's skin. It hurts, or it feels like it's going to, but the little bit of healing chases even that away almost before the hiss escapes from between Beau's teeth.
"Okay?" Yasha's voice is soft, hesitant.
Beau's arm still feels residually cold, but it's manageable, like she just came in from outside. "Yeah," she says. "You uh…didn't have to do that, thanks." She can feel Yasha's hand now, the warmth of her fingers wrapped comfortingly around her skin. She feels it when Yasha's grip shifts the slightest amount and her hand slides up slowly to rest in hers.
Can people choke on their hearts for real? Beau feels like she's about to find out. "I read your letter," she blurts, because she's pathologically incapable of just letting nice things happen without sabotaging them.
And she expects Yasha to flinch, blush, look surprised, but a small and knowing smile creeps across her lips instead. "You said you would, so I assumed."
Beau blinks. "You haven't been worried? Because I..I didn't meant to leave you hanging. I haven't. Figured out what to say yet, is all. I wanna get it right."
"Beau," Yasha says, and she can hear how big the smile is even before she looks up to take it in for herself. "I didn't give it to you so that you would say something back. And definitely not in a certain amount of time." She looks down at their hands. "I just felt like you needed to know. From me."
The fire crackles merrily in the hearth behind them, but it has nothing to do with the warmth blooming behind Beau's ribs. "Like the clover you gave Molly," she says. "Not for a reply, for him. If he's in there."
Yasha nods. "And the flowers in my book."
Beau tilts her head and looks Yasha over before gently, carefully maneuvering her fingers to lace between Yasha's without startling her away. When they're interlinked, Beau feels tension leave Yasha's arm and it gets heavier. She'd been holding back, just in case, but now she's relaxed.
"You're not used to getting anything back, are you?" Beau asks.
Yasha's eyes in the firelight grow sad, but it's not the kind that makes Beau fear she's fucked up. It seems more like a choice on Yasha's part, letting Beau see. She may not be a good liar, but she knows how to avoid the situations that might lead to questions, and she'd sought this one out. "Not really," she murmurs. "I think...I'm more used to losing."
Beau shakes their hands just a little so that Yasha looks to her. "I know what you mean," she says. "You think maybe…" she has to look away for a moment, looks up at the mantel over the fireplace. "You think maybe we could get better at it, with time? Enjoying a good thing instead of waiting for the sky to fall every time we get just…just that little bit of happiness?"
The bread has been forgotten, Beau's loaf lying half in tatters and Yasha's largely untouched. Yasha props her chin on her free hand and follows Beau's eyes to the stained glass. "I think maybe we owe it to the people who love us to try."
Beau looks over to Yasha, watches her taking in the colors and the memories. "Yeah," she says. "Maybe we do."