om_main | Arthur and Lydia, backdated to Oct 18

After one of their sci-fi movie afternoons, Arthur and Lydia engage in their other favorite pass time: being judgy. It ends up being quite the odd little heart-to-heart.

When they exited the dark of the cheap theater into the bright fall sunlight, Lydia dropped her sunglasses over her eyes and straightened her baseball cap. For a bite to eat, they'd go out of town, but as long as she was careful she didn't need to stray so far for her entertainment.

She stepped up beside Arthur and said, "That might be the weirdest movie I've ever seen."

"Well it is David Lynch," Arthur said a little dryly, with just enough of a shrug behind it to make it clear he wasn't arguing. "Weird is kind of the baseline."

"And the source material provides plenty of opportunity," Lydia had to admit. "I think I want a movie that's just about the Bene Gesserit."

"To say the least. Not to mention trying to condense a thousand-some-odd pages into two hours." Though he had to flick her an amused look at the end of it. "Somehow, I'm not surprised."

"What can I say, I'm predictable sometimes." Lydia smiled a little and started down the street towards where they'd parked. "I needed the distraction, though. This week has been seriously ridiculous. Not David Lynch ridiculous, but sometimes I think it's just a matter of time."

"More than just the hiding every time you go out?" Said lightly, but she had all of Arthur's attention now. A lead-in like that couldn't mean anything good.

"Ugh, so much," Lydia pursed her lips into a small frown. "My stalker, Lil, is back at it again. Last week she left a note under my door with just the words 'don't hurt him' on it."

She just paused to let that have the expected effect for a moment.

Both of Arthur's eyebrows lifted. Not what he'd been expecting, at all. "Well that's...ominous," he said slowly.

"My feelings exactly." Even without their history, of which Arthur was at least vaguely aware, Lydia would've found it so. "And then Monday she attempted to blackmail me in to telling Scott I was going on a trip with Damon before I was ready to have the conversation with him. Which was apparently part of her new campaign to cause me pain. Eternally, I assume.

"Good times."

Okay, she probably shouldn't be laying all this on Arthur, but there was just something about his presence that she found calming. Plus, she basically knew what kind of reaction to expect. And it was the reassuring kind. Weird, but true.

"Cause you pain?" He echoed, more than slightly disbelievingly. And okay, Arthur spent a lot of time with some pretty dramatic people, but that was pushing it even by their standards. "How very Gothic literature."

"You should've heard the whole speech." Lydia shook her head slightly, eyebrows rising. "Something about I don't want him back, I just want you to suffer like I did. Gothic in the extreme."

There was a long moment of silence as they walked. Then, "what," Arthur said slowly, "the hell." And getting that kind of a reaction out of him took some serious effort.

"What did you do?" He finally asked, twisting to look at her fully.

"Told her to get the hell out of my way. She refused for a second, spewed some more word vomit, then finally complied." Lydia blew upward. "Don't get me wrong, when she decided to hate me I gave her more reasons to. But this shit is just..."

She didn't even know what it was, so Lydia just waved her hand in a way vaguely meant to indicate crazy.

"Well," Arthur said after a moment's consideration, "presumably as we don't exactly go to a normal school, even the high-school drama would have to be unusual."

"Mmm, unfortunate side effects will occur," Lydia agreed. "Such as bat shit exes. Whatever. Does Eames have any bat shit exes to deal with? There have got to be more than Lil in that house."

"Not that I'm aware of," he said a little dryly, but did pause. Lydia had been somewhat uncharacteristically open about the whole thing (or increasingly-characteristic the more time they spent talking, but still), and something in it made Arthur want to return the favor.

"You asked me if we'd ever fought a while back," he said slowly, "remember?"

She nodded, looking at him curiously from behind her glasses. He had refrained from explaining that one and left her speculating--but having a hard time of it.

"We had a fairly massive fight before we started dating officially," Arthur said slowly, looking at the street in front of them rather than her. "It's largely the reason we became official in the first place."

"It's funny how drama does that, sometimes." And by 'funny', Lydia of course meant 'annoying'. It really should not be that difficult, but it always was. Somehow. Ugh.

Of course, she was aware of Arthur's... not discomfort, precisely, but the Arthur Version. Yet she couldn't help asking, considering the topic of conversation that had brought it up, "Not a crazy ex, but an ex issue, I take it?"

One side of Arthur's mouth curved up a little, though it wasn't an entirely pleased expression. "Something like that. You've seen how he and Pietro are together, presumably." Because it was damn hard to miss. "It's not an issue now, but at the time it did come out that they'd been involved while Eames and I were trying to figure things out. I reacted badly."

"I did wonder about that. Eames is affectionate." She said the word like it was particularly confusing for her. Then one corner of her lips just barely quirked upward, and without anything resembling ire, she added, "I hear that rotten little Maximoff is too. More than I ever wanted to, lately." The joys of Scott's Redneck Roommate taking up with him, apparently.

"Can't say I blame you for a bad reaction, there." Though she did wonder just what it had looked like. Arthur and drama. What a sight that must've been.

"That was part of the problem," Arthur said, apparently in agreement. "They're both so comfortable with the physicality and I'm...not. We worked it out though, obviously," he finished with a slight shrug, though it was chased by a more genuine smile. "It was right around when you first brought me the project, actually. Excellent timing on your part."

"I wondered why you were so gung ho." Lydia snorted--delicately. It was her way of laughing without laughing. Obviously. "Words I never thought I'd say to you. But it's all clear now. I guess I have your troublesome boyfriend to thank."

"I would have done it anyway," he said in mild protest and shot her an amused look. "But the distraction was handy."

"I'm sure." She gave another little not-quite-laugh. Then she paused. She could've sworn she'd seen them talking at parties and... things. So, "You're friends with Pietro, though, right? Or--at least, friendly?"

Lydia sincerely doubted that her own little triangle would have such a happy ending--at least, for Lil.

"I am," Arthur agreed. For some value of friend, anyway. Honestly it was the kind of thing that was hard to quantify, and he really shouldn't have been trying to in the first place. Which just meant he had to focus more on not doing it. "If I was going to forgive Eames, it would be hypocritical not to forgive him as well."

Lydia saw his point and nodded once to show it. Of course, cheating was not the worst thing int he world, to her; if Scott did it, or came near, she would probably forgive it, so long as she knew he was truly sorry. Even if Eames hadn't technically been cheating--or so it would seem--she was certain he and Maximoff had been made to apologize properly to get that from Arthur.

"I wish I could say we'd all get such a happy ending," she admitted. "But so far from ever wanting to be her friend, I doubt Lil is interested in my forgiveness--or in forgiving me for whatever imaginary slight made her mouth off in the first place."

"You offend her by existing," Arthur agreed in a complete deadpan. "Which is pretty impressive, as that kind of thing goes."

"She wouldn't be the first, and I doubt she'll be the last," Lydia said with a little huff of a laugh and then a smirk. "But hopefully I can count on any and all threats of beatings coming from outside the school in future. I think I was just... surprised she seemed to think that was all right--even though she flat out said 'I can't hit you like I want to because that'd get me kicked out'. So. Weird."

He went completely still for just a second before forcing himself back into walking. "She threatened to hit you?"

In anyone else, it would've been a perfectly normal reaction. In Arthur, it was tantamount to a freak out. Lydia didn't know precisely why it had hit a nerve; she only knew that it had. She was curious, but more concerned, so she went on carefully. "A few times over the course of our unpleasant association. I took it... less than calmly at the time. It was last week when she acknowledged that she couldn't."

There was another moment of quiet while Arthur worked his way through the kneejerk reactions -- they weren't likely to help and he'd already taught Lydia how to throw a punch as it was. She wouldn't thank him for overstepping.

After a little while longer, he just shook his head. "At least she knows better."

"If I thought for a minute she was a threat to anyone else, I wouldn't hesitate to work against her." Lydia watched him, wondering but knowing better than to ask. "It's really just evidence that she needs the stability the school is trying to offer. But obviously, not at anyone else's expense."

"Obviously," he echoed more than a little dryly. "What exactly would you considering going over the line?"

"Threatening anyone else, spoken or unspoken. And yes, I realize that's ridiculous. But I don't know if it's a pattern, or just something brought on by intense frustration with me alone." She glanced at him sideways. "You don't think it's possible that it's an isolated incident."

"I think it's...unwise to just wait until it becomes a larger problem," Arthur said carefully. "I don't know her well enough to judge one way or the other. But it's not really my place to make a decision." Which was as close as he would come to saying he trusted her judgement on the matter.

"I hate to admit it, but I'm probably not the best person to make a sound judgment on the matter." Lydia wasn't now, maybe, but she certainly had been, ah, emotionally compromised, to borrow a phrase from Star Trek (god help her, what had he done to her?). "I'll mention it to the Professor, at least, and he can keep an eye on things."

"Seems fair enough," he agreed mildly. And Arthur would be keeping his own eye out, but that was nearly a given.

Lydia was quiet for a beat, but then thought she might as well ask, "You okay?" Not making a big deal, but she didn't want to pretend it hadn't been there. And probably still was.

"Me?" He arched a surprised eyebrow. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"You just seemed a little out of sorts for a moment," she replied carefully, but with a small smile. "It's nice to know you care, though."

"I've had experience with classmates taking exception to me before," Arthur said with a slight shrug. He hinted about it to her before, but there was no real reason to be circumspect now. "I didn't particularly enjoy it, I don't see why you should have to."

"I didn't want to make you uncomfortable, but I mean what I say. It is nice to know." All that time spent with a punching bag, she'd known he'd learned to hit for a reason, and that he thought self-defense was important enough to teach a total stranger. She ought to have guessed, maybe. "I wouldn't be half as calm about it as I am now if it wasn't for some of the things I've learned from you--and just generally having people in my corner." To continue the metaphor.

"It does tend to help," he agreed with a faint smile. "Glad I could be useful, then."

They only had half a block to go, but on impulse, Lydia took Arthur's arm in both of hers. She wasn't sure why, it just... seemed to communicate something she wanted to say.

Arthur gave her a look bordering on the bemused in return, but didn't pull away. It wasn't as if he hadn't had something of a crash course in physical affection lately.

"How would you feel about tapas?" she asked.

"I could be convinced."