OOM: Room #100 - drinking aftermath

[ikissdhimbck]

[from here:]

With Doc carrying her, and Esfir holding the key, it's not so hard getting Kate to her room. She doesn't open her eyes or move, though she does continue to groan drunkenly, seemingly desperate to impart all of the important thoughts buzzing around her head.

Whether her two companions can make any sense of her mutterings, however, is another thing entirely.

The room is clean and organized. There's a chaise by the door where shoes can be removed and placed, and a desk to the right where they can set the room key. The chest of drawers in front of them has various clean clothes, including a few chemises and pajama sets.

Before anything else, however, a trip to the bathroom wouldn't go amiss.

.

Comments

[aimedforthemoon]

Sense? Not so much - English is really only Esfir's second language. Although she's very fluent, this fluency does not extend to drunk.

Starting to run the bath (and leaving Doc to continue holding Kate for the time being), Esfir walks back out (into the pretty, but rather capitalist bedroom) to find whatever she wore to bed. Silk chemise, it appeared.

"Could you put her on the chair?" She asks Doc once she has the garment in hand. And shut the door behind you, she doesn't say. Not yet.

[scurlock]

In the time it takes for them to make it upstairs, Doc only manages to pick up a few broken fragments of her mutterings - generally all on the subject that he is not to leave, and not to get hurt - but it gets the point across.

He's already moving to settle her on the chair once Esfir re-enters the bathroom, carefully handling Kate, making sure to keep her head up, and a watchful eye on her focus.

If she's going to be sick again, he wants to pick up the warning signs before she's ill.

With one hand, he brushes some of her still damp hair away from her face, trying to catch her eyes with his.

"Gonna git you cleaned up, don't you worry none," he murmurs, tucking the strand behind her ear before he rises from his crouch.

His eyes go from the tub, to Esfir.

He doesn't doubt she can handle it, but he's not going to move from Kate's side until Esfir is near enough to keep her from falling off that chair.

"Is there anythin' else I can git from Bar, while you're helpin' her wash up?"

[aimedforthemoon]

Esfir stays close to Kate, one hand slightly extended in readiness should Kate need it. The other thing she holds is a (clean) bucket on Kate's lap, in case she vomits again due to all the moving.

"A book in Aurebesh and a notebook with a pen - just tell Bar it is for me, and she'll know what you mean. And any thing else, if you think it is needed." No matter what she thinks of him as far as his relations with Kate go, he's still Doc Scurlock.

Once he's gone (and Esfir murmurs 'he'll be back' to Kate), she crouches down to better support Kate.

"Hey," she says, gently, "Katyushka, how you going?"

[ikissdhimbck]

To say Kate is a little green around the gills would be an understatement.

"I don't feel so good."

Which, clearly, will be the surprise of the century.

[aimedforthemoon]

"Not surprised."

Esfir puts Kate's hand around the bucket and then, keeping an eye on her and ready with a pilot's reflexes to help balance things, starts to work on Kate's boots.

[ikissdhimbck]

Her fingers are trembling a little, but she keeps her hold on the bucket firm.

She helps Esfir as much as she can, in getting her boots and wet clothes off, but she's moving slow and uncomfortably.

And, inexplicably, she begins to cry.

[aimedforthemoon]

Fortunately, the crying starts once Kate is actually in the tub. Bucket placed on the chair, Esfir just starts to sponge her back, green eyes concerned.

"It's oke, Katya," she murmurs, "we're not leaving you."

[ikissdhimbck]

"M'sorry," she chokes, her shoulders slumped, her head drooping forward.

Crying makes her head pound, but she can't seem to stave off the tears. She's just so... frustrated.

"I didn't mean t'cause trouble. I'm so stupid."

[aimedforthemoon]

"You're not. You are drunk, and angry, which is different."

[ikissdhimbck]

"He's old."

[aimedforthemoon]

"...And?"

[ikissdhimbck]

"He isn't happy."

He was supposed to move on, live his dreams, find happiness. Ten years later, he's still Doc Scurlock.

Regulator. Poet. Doctor.

Outlaw.

[aimedforthemoon]

"...Neither are you, and you are person I am more worried about."

[ikissdhimbck]

"I'm still in. He's out. Was s'posed t'be out. But he ain't, he's still, still..."

She lurches for the bucket and gets sick again, leaving her arms and shoulders slumped over the edge of the tub long after she's finished.

Sniffling, she murmurs:

"I'm bad. Bad. I hurt people."

[aimedforthemoon]

Esfir pauses in her sponging for a moment, looking at the slumped figure of her friend.

"If you were bad, you wouldn't feel so bad."

[ikissdhimbck]

"I killed him."

[aimedforthemoon]

Eyes narrowing, Esfir takes the bucket over to the toilet and then sink to empty and rinse out.

"Why do you say that?"

[ikissdhimbck]

"'Cuz I kissed 'im."

Whether she's talking about Doc or Sam (or both) at this point is anyone's guess.

[aimedforthemoon]

Esfir moves back and starts to clean Kate up again. Finally, "My mother was killed, you know. She shoved Antosha and me, made us run ahead before the bomb landed. She could have dropped us, run into the shelter and live, but she didn't. She loved us, and it was her choice, and it was the Germans who killed her.

Same with Sam. He loved you, and kissed you, and that was his choice. It was the men with guns who killed him.

Not you."

[ikissdhimbck]

Kate doesn't speak again for a long time.

In fact, given how she's so quiet and motionless, one might begin to think she's passed out right there.

But, eventually, she murmurs:



"Goddamn Germans."

[aimedforthemoon]

"That's the spirit."

Esfir's fingers are gentle in Kate's hair - she had long, semi-curly herself less than a year ago - and then she wraps a small towel around it, squeezing it dry before finding a brush and getting to work.

[ikissdhimbck]

It's extremely soothing.

Now that Kate's tears have dried, she only occasionally mutters the off, absent remark, mostly about Doc and Boo and Sam and what happened this morning; but every sentence is convoluted and abrupt -- and generally lacking in proper nouns.

It takes effort to climb out of the bathtub without falling once Esfir is done, but she manages, letting her friend take care of toweling her off. It makes her feel young and stupid -- both of which she is -- but she knows she needs the help.

[aimedforthemoon]

Mostly, Esfir keeps Kate seat while she dries her off - given how unsteady her friend is, it's only sensible. Thankfully, the chemise isn't hard to put on.

"Think you can walk to bed?"

[ikissdhimbck]

"I c'n walk," she says immediately, trying to hold on to what's left of her pride.

In practice, of course, it's not that simple. Her whole equilibrium is off, and it takes the strong support of her trained cosmonaut companion to get her to the bed and under at least some of the covers.

Kate is instructed to drink a glass of water before she lays down, which she manages.

"Fira?" she mumbles before settling back against the pillows. "Do you hate me?"

[aimedforthemoon]

(For the moment, Esfir ignores Doc sitting on the armchair)

"Lie on your side," she tells Kate, pulling over a little stand on which to put the bucket. Gently but securely (with a pang of grief; she used to tuck in her little cousins when visiting) she tucks the blankets around her, and then stops at the question.

Oh, for-

"No," Esfir says, tone almost...scornful. "Otherwise, why would I be here?" She shakes her head. "Just...sleep, oke, Katyushka? I'll just be here."