vaccination | TLV

He hitches one shoulder in a shrug. "Don't want to be alone. Thinking too much. So maybe we can turn a guitar song into a piano song." He's been thinking on Christmas gifts, and he thinks maybe a full, complete piano piece might be a good thing to give someone. But he needs more practice, and an actual song to use.

Good enough for her. "Yeah, that sounds like fun. Give me a moment and we can go."

She leaves her door open as she heads in, grabbing the guitar case near her bed. Her room is suspiciously orderly and clean--a gift from Joel--and so she's not left searching for her shoes. They're right by the door, and she tugs on her sneakers before joining Bucky out in the hall.

"Whatcha been thinking about?"

You know, just small talk on the walk.

Does B need to become your laundry ghost, Ellie? Help keep your cabin clean as well as Zhao Yunlan's? He'll do it, don't think that he won't....

The thought gets put on the backburner for now, and he doesn't quite wince at the question, but it's close. "The flood. The. Person. Who came here. People who came here. What friendship means. Why Godric gave me a bunch of stuff. Why Rogers is unhappy. Why I can't read the letters the. Person. Who came here left me."

Small talk? What small talk? Everything is deep and serious and uncomfortable, with this guy.

Yikes. Ellie glances over at him with a frown.

"Jesus. Any one of those you wanna talk about?"

He chews on his cheek briefly, then asks, "Did you meet her? The. Person who came here? For me? I met yours."

Ellie shakes her head.

"No. I met--Tess' person, and then after Joel was gone I just..."

Needed time. Alone.

"Who was she?"

He absolutely fucking understands needing time alone, so he just nods.

He can't say out loud what Becca was, can't make himself say the words, but he can fumble out the little notebook she left him-- about four inches tall, just barely small enough to fit into a pocket, with a spiral binding and a leather cover with a ribbon to keep it closed-- and turn it to the first letter, one of the two places he has dog-eared. It explains that "this is Becca, your sister" and her last understanding of him being dead and her being so sorry for everything that happened. And then that she's going to leave him lots of notes while she's here, which is presumably what fills up the rest of the little book.

Ellie can read however much she wants to, of course, but that letter is the bit B's using to answer her question.

Confused at first, Ellie only needs to skim that first page to realize what this is. Moving through a wasted world, she's read dozens of heartbreaking letters, but never really any concerning people she knows.

"Oh. Oh, man... do you--really want me to read this, B?"

It feels like an intrusion.

"If you want to. I can't. Threw it across the room. Twice." And yet he keeps it on his person at all times, so it's clearly important to him. He's even tried to carefully smooth the crumpled pages back out, so they lay flat when it's in his pocket. "But that one page answers your question."

Ellie does read a little, frowning.

"Do you want me to summarize them for you or something? I think..." She turns a page. "I think you'd wanna see this, B."

"No. Just if you wanted to read it, to answer your question. Might throw you across the room if you tried to tell me what's in it." He pauses, then adds, "Don't want to do that."

They're at the art room now, at least, so he can duck inside and head for the piano.

"Yeah, don't think I want that either."

It's why she follows him and hands back the notebook.

"Keep trying, though."

"I will. Later." Probably much later. He really doesn't want to risk damaging it. He takes it back and tucks it back away in its pocket, then pulls the piano bench out a little so he can sit. "Joel wasn't too bad. A little mean until he decided you liked me. But so was I until I realized who he was." So it was fair to be a little mean, back.

Ellie brings over a chair, sitting and setting the guitar down beside her. She'd like to pretend Joel was never here, never touched anything in this place or spoke to anyone, but there's no avoiding it.

"He was just like that. He was a huge prick to me when we first met. I wish I'd have gotten letters from him like you got."

She got a note, a brief note, but she would give anything for books and books worth of words from Joel. But. She never made that clear to him when he was alive.

He watches her feet and the feet of the chair a moment. "I wish you could have, too. You'd probably be able to appreciate them." He wonders if maybe he should have said something, after all. Told Joel just what her deal was, so he'd know how much he mattered to her. Hrm.

But she's clearly not happy. And she'd needed time alone, so she wasn't happy then, either. "We don't have to talk about it. Sorry."

Ellie gives the piano bench a gentle kick with her shoe.

"Don't apologize. I wouldn't talk if I didn't want to. How often do I try to get you to talk?"

"A lot," he allows, ducking his head. "So. Does that mean it's okay to do the same? To you?" He doesn't know how this whole friend thing works, or if they're even that, or what's allowed. But he's getting a little better at asking things, so here he is, asking. It's practice.

"Yeah," she says quietly, but easily. "It's only fair. And I know you won't go running around and telling people my business, just like I won't go around telling people yours."

"Even if you did. Not like it matters, really." His idea of privacy is a little warped and very scant, to be honest. The important thing here is that she said it was okay to prod her a little bit, like he just had, so he says, "But thank you."

And, looking back up in her direction through his hair, he adds, "Are you okay? After the two people you knew being here."

"Not... super okay?" She admits, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her chin on them for a moment. "But could be worse. I expected to be worse."

It helps that there's no one to take her anger and upset out on, in a way. It has no choice but to fizzle out in her chest, leaving her feeling empty and tired.

He tilts his head a little, watching her but keeping his eyes to things like her knees and the top of her head. "Why worse?"

"Joel, he... he killed the one person I knew in the world who knew my mom. I didn't know that. I guess I might have suspected, but... now I know for sure. I thought I'd hate him for it, but after talking to her..."

There's a lot of trailing off there, and Ellie shrugs.

"I don't know. It's upsetting but I guess I'm--maybe I get it more than I thought I would."

There's another shrug.

"I knew she was dead anyway, so. Dead is dead."

Well, dead is not always dead, not here. But he gets what she means. He looks back at the piano keys, though he doesn't touch them yet, still. The conversation seems more important.

The thing to ask seems to be: "Why did he do it?" If it was for a good reason, maybe that's why she's not angry about it. (Just unhappy. Because she's clearly that.)

"Because she was going to use me to make a cure for the infection. He killed... everyone," she says, frowning and looking down at the toe of her shoe on the edge of the chair rather than Bucky.

Abby. Abby, the daughter of the surgeon, Marlene had said. Abby came to avenge her father's death, and she did.

"Everyone" sounds like a thing the Asset would do. He can see the gruff man he'd met doing that, maybe, but he's not sure why. "He didn't want a cure?" he asks.

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