Hotaru
Of course he has no way of knowing that she is not upset with him, if upset is even what she's really feeling. Everything still feels blown wide and tender, and far too fresh to begin to categorize into little boxes of emotion. Her breath is just starting to come a little too fast when his arm comes around her, and she shudders like her bones are collapsing and tilts sideways into the vague mimicry of an embrace until her shoulder touches the height of his ribs under his offered arm. The smell of alcohol on him burns her nose - or so she tells herself, refusing to acknowledge the sting that sweeps from eyes to nose to throat - but beneath that is his natural scent, still so familiar to her. Still capable of calming her even when she isn't sure she wants it to.
Through it all she refuses to blink. It keeps the moisture from gathering in her eyes, and lets her hold her visible composure easier even as her body language betrays her. "Was it work?" she dares to ask, clinging to that potential out, a way to excuse this hurt. This betrayal. Because if Sunjata doubted that it was work to her...well, Ru still believes in him, still puts weight in his opinion, his outlook.
Anger and injustice stirs beneath her breastbone at the mention of Edmund, Locke, rumors. It's an emotion easier to focus on than heartbreak, and her face twists, darkening as his words falter and he reaches through the bond to her. Her hand immediately settles upon his knee to squeeze firmly, the first platonic place she can think to grasp in her disoriented state. "I am so sorry," she hisses, but it comes out more poisonous than she intended, directed at the unfairness of the situation at large. "Why would outbursts even be necessary? She isn't putting a stop to the rumors?" Moments ago Hotaru's tone would have been slightly more confused, but now she is rethinking everything she knows of the Nightshade.
Through it all she refuses to blink. It keeps the moisture from gathering in her eyes, and lets her hold her visible composure easier even as her body language betrays her. "Was it work?" she dares to ask, clinging to that potential out, a way to excuse this hurt. This betrayal. Because if Sunjata doubted that it was work to her...well, Ru still believes in him, still puts weight in his opinion, his outlook.
Anger and injustice stirs beneath her breastbone at the mention of Edmund, Locke, rumors. It's an emotion easier to focus on than heartbreak, and her face twists, darkening as his words falter and he reaches through the bond to her. Her hand immediately settles upon his knee to squeeze firmly, the first platonic place she can think to grasp in her disoriented state. "I am so sorry," she hisses, but it comes out more poisonous than she intended, directed at the unfairness of the situation at large. "Why would outbursts even be necessary? She isn't putting a stop to the rumors?" Moments ago Hotaru's tone would have been slightly more confused, but now she is rethinking everything she knows of the Nightshade.
But I am just a broken machine
And I do things that I don't really mean
And I do things that I don't really mean
