[ She knows he won't but she still asked. Is only marginally mollified by his response of gesturing towards the chair β the one they both know he may or may not sit in. She'd protest if he left it there, but he doesn't. Marc says I'm not going anywhere and it seems like that is what does the trick. She may still be worried, anxious, and everything between, but she feels far safer hearing (not knowing, but hearing) that than everything else. ]
..Good.
[ She turns her head back towards the pillows so he doesn't see how relieved she is at that, because some part of her manages to still feel embarrassed at her response despite how arguably normal it is (all considering what has happened, how emotionally exhausted and fragile, distraught at a seconds notice, she's been). She grabs the pillow they used as a table and fluffs it up beside the one she left untouched. Getsβ cozy, sort of. Lottie is really just trying to figure out how to lay down on something soft again, trying to figure out how to get her brain to shut off.
She gets as far as being half in, half out, of the covers, green hair piled up and around her, fingers awkwardly laced at her tummy, feet fidgeting. Sometimes glancing at wherever Marc is, just to make sure he's still there. ]
( it feels oddly intimate even if it's nothing of the sort, for marc to share a room with lottie as she half-attempts (something or other like) sleep, as she attempts to make herself comfortable, somehow managing to both be over and under the covers. if she's comfortable — in the sense that marc knows the bed's comfortable, has passed out on it more times than he can count from more varied circumstances than he can recall. grant had made a point of the house being comfortable almost to the point of absurdity, eschewing marc and jake's different-in-reason but similar-in-outcome propensity for the bare minimum — she doesn't show it.
she fidgets, even as marc stands to turn off the light (but not before turning on the two bedside lamps). she fidgets, too, as marc seats himself in the chair he'd gestured at, even if he has no real intention of falling asleep in it, even if he's not even sure how long he'll stay sat in it.
she glances to him, then away, then back again. it's hard not to catch the movement in the corner of his vision, hard not to turn to glance at her. he thinks that there's something she wants from him, or there's something he should say or do, but it'd beyond him to realise what it is. )
[ There's nothing she explicitly wants that he isn't already giving her. He's giving her his bed, space in his home, he's giving her food and water and a nice shower to soak in before she promptly freaked the fuck out again. Marc has done everything right and yet she is still a little antsy, still a little anxiety ridden in the dim dark of his bedroom (because she thinks she sees figures in the shadows and worries about how quickly Marc could get to them, to get himself bloody all over again). His sheets are soft, not quite silky and not quite thick. It's a great temperature, arguably. And yetβ. ]
I know. [ Sharp, soft, tired. Then alert as she insistsβ ] I'm aware!
[ She huffs to herself, rolls around so her belly is flat on the sheets and her face is pressed into the pillows. Even if she explained it to him he wouldn't understand, she thinksβ he wouldn't get it, how she feels. How her paranoia and anxiety is running rampant in the silence between it all. His breathing, how she rustles the sheets, how he settles into his chair that squeaks when he shifts his weight just right.
( it's an odd state of affairs in that marc would both argue that he has done everything right, but also feels — knows — deeply, intimately, that he's done precisely nothing right. that there's more that he should have done, that there are things he shouldn't have done. his emotional volatility would shout the former, whilst his quiet, unsubtle self-loathing would whisper the latter.
her first response is not quite a bark, but it's not far from it. despite the quietness, the tiredness and the fatigue, it's oddly desperate, sharp, like a knife jabbing at the awkwardness, the difficulty of everything in the air between them.
(marc wouldn't know, but he'd know. he knows how paranoia feels, how it is to expect enemies and terror behind every door. how it is to have expectations of what there is and know that it's just your mind. that realistically, it's nothing, that almost every horror imaginable is a figment of a mind deeply attuned to creating enemies.)
his gaze rests on her, deep and and dark and intense. non-judgemental. accepting. oddly understanding — it's not an expression many people get to see on marc, for as tolerant as he is (surprisingly), he often seeks to hide it beneath a veneer of unreasonableness. a state of being that's not untrue, but isn't a reputation that is in any way beneficial. )
I know, ( he says. it's not soft, but it's not harsh. it just is. it's the type of utterance that says that he's been there, that he knows what it's like to want to sleep and find nothing instead. that there's a lot he's never told her in between the warnings and the reprimands he has. ) It won't be easy.
[ It feels absurdly weird to have Marc regard her like this. It's something she's never really seen on him before, despite it all. Despite knowing him for this long, which is crazy now that she thinks of it, but their combined existence together has never been so weighed down before. Sure, they've fought. Either of them can argue all they do is fight, and then makeup (forget it all happened).
They exist in states of just being, of ignoring their actual lives because the one they share in her little living room deserves all the attention it can get (for the brief life it has, when they put on Love Island or eat shitty food together).
But back then she never put words to the way they looked at each other. Now, it's all she can do. It's intense and it's odd, how Marc's eyes seem even darker and heavier like this. Lottie, for her part, doesn't tear her own gaze away but she does squirm. Uncomfortable, with its intensity. With what he isn't saying but is saying. Her mouth is suddenly dry, and her heart is racing. Lottie feels like running, doing the opposite of sleeping because this is getting weirdlyβ. Intimate?
Her hands clutch the sheets before she breathes. Swallows down the odd mix of it all because seeing Marc like this only serves to remind her something terrible did happen to her. It is serious. What if she needs therapy? Should a therapist know this? Oh god. ]
Is this how you live all the time?
[ It isn't even judgmental, the way she says it, just overwhelmed. Like maybe she gets why Marc is soβ Marc. Moody and difficult and sometimes quiet at the drop of a hat, odd in ways she's never understood but always readily accepted. ]
his expression reflects it perfectly, a bemused meeting of his eyebrows, lines of his forehead intertwined and questioning. is this how he lives? what a question. what a question—.
the first answer, immediate and instinctual, sits ready to go: yes. obviously. before it dawns on him that he's not sure what she means, not sure what he'd be answering 'yes' to.
he cants his head, gaze sidelong and contemplative. brow furrowed, uncertain. yes, it's how he lives. he can guess at the meaning of the question (the now question and the later questions), even if he's not sure how much she wants to know the answer, really and truly. not sure if she really wants to know the reasons why marc barely sleeps, the reasons why when he does, it's for snatches of minutes, only sometimes hours at a time. it's instability and nightmares. it is uncertainty, it's feelings he doesn't quite know how to put into words. fear and guilt and shame all combined, all at once. what is that? he doesn't know. the closest he's ever settled on is 'debt' and that's not quite the same thing. )
Yeah, ( he answers, oddly. awkwardly. it feels dangerously close to admitting weakness and insecurity. this is how he lives, and it means that so much of his day-to-day (night-to-night) is caught up in worry and paranoia and preoccupation.
the breath, the pause feels heavy and thick before he continues, before he elaborates. ) It can be distracting.
[ In his time mulling over his answer, her question, Lottie watches between moments dedicated to herself. She thinks she hit something of a weird spot, something that settles between uncharacteristic of them and uncomfortably raw, the implication of what she asks. And he doesn't say it, but she thinks he wants to: yes. With a lot more conviction and assurance than what she gets: yeah.
That yeah is awkward and weird, probably tastes as strange on his tongue as it sounds to her ears. It's dangerously close to admitting weakness and insecurity. It doesn't quite cross, but it edges into vulnerable. A different kind to what she shows him so readily, Lottie so unabashed in what makes her skin crawl and her eyes water. She doesn't say anything, just kind of waits to see if he'll say anything else because godβ even in this dark he looks it.
And he does. Lottie leans forward with interest, her anxiety and panic being pushed aside (she is still jittery, still a little breathless despite this because Lottie can't swallow everything down, after all) in favor of what she thinks are going to be divine answers. Marc's masterclass toβ not living well, she guesses, but living. ]
What do you do to not be distracted?
[ (It is here she forgets Marc doesn't live so much as he just does enough to survive and keep himself occupied, his closet full of Moon Knight suits a pointed reminder his duty as the moon man overtakes and precedes virtually everything else to where he's hardly Marc Spector. He's more... Marc Knight. Moon Spector (should she bring this up to him to trademark? She thinks he'd like that a lot).) ]
( marc would describe himself as guarded, if he had to, but it's not quite the truth. he likes to think of himself as guarded but the reality is he's prickly and more of an open book than he'd like to be. he's prone to ranting and raving and emotional outbursts that say more of his self-perception than anything he actually says ever does or ever has.
there are times when he thinks that lottie gets it — or gets him, whatever, he's not sure what the difference is or if it even matters — even if she doesn't realise it. other times, he thinks she doesn't get any of it at all. other times like this.
("what do you do to not be distracted?")
he extends a hand and gestures vaguely. it's an action that means what do you think?, an unspoken question that asks what do you think moon knight is? it's flawed and not as effective as he'd always like, having veered to and fro on how much it's part of the problem and how much it helps the problem. the truth is that marc finds it — all of it — all-encompassing and all-consuming, but he knows that without it, he wouldn't have anything. he doesn't know who he'd be.
(steven? jake? not marc—.)
the difference is, marc doesn't let himself forget any of it. marc has boxes upon files upon tapes of his history, his mistakes, his choices, locked away in cupboards in this building. )
I beat people up at night. ( is what he says and even as he says it, he knows how it sounds. is aware, quite suddenly, that compared to lottie person's very normal life, his is the poster child for not dealing with problems. that his solution is frankly and utterly absurd.
(every solution he's tried has been the same: problematic and self-destructive.) )
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no subject
..Good.
[ She turns her head back towards the pillows so he doesn't see how relieved she is at that, because some part of her manages to still feel embarrassed at her response despite how arguably normal it is (all considering what has happened, how emotionally exhausted and fragile, distraught at a seconds notice, she's been). She grabs the pillow they used as a table and fluffs it up beside the one she left untouched. Getsβ cozy, sort of. Lottie is really just trying to figure out how to lay down on something soft again, trying to figure out how to get her brain to shut off.
She gets as far as being half in, half out, of the covers, green hair piled up and around her, fingers awkwardly laced at her tummy, feet fidgeting. Sometimes glancing at wherever Marc is, just to make sure he's still there. ]
no subject
she fidgets, even as marc stands to turn off the light (but not before turning on the two bedside lamps). she fidgets, too, as marc seats himself in the chair he'd gestured at, even if he has no real intention of falling asleep in it, even if he's not even sure how long he'll stay sat in it.
she glances to him, then away, then back again. it's hard not to catch the movement in the corner of his vision, hard not to turn to glance at her. he thinks that there's something she wants from him, or there's something he should say or do, but it'd beyond him to realise what it is. )
Lottie. ( a beat. ) That's not sleeping.
no subject
I know. [ Sharp, soft, tired. Then alert as she insistsβ ] I'm aware!
[ She huffs to herself, rolls around so her belly is flat on the sheets and her face is pressed into the pillows. Even if she explained it to him he wouldn't understand, she thinksβ he wouldn't get it, how she feels. How her paranoia and anxiety is running rampant in the silence between it all. His breathing, how she rustles the sheets, how he settles into his chair that squeaks when he shifts his weight just right.
Eventually: ]
I'm trying. Okay?
no subject
her first response is not quite a bark, but it's not far from it. despite the quietness, the tiredness and the fatigue, it's oddly desperate, sharp, like a knife jabbing at the awkwardness, the difficulty of everything in the air between them.
(marc wouldn't know, but he'd know. he knows how paranoia feels, how it is to expect enemies and terror behind every door. how it is to have expectations of what there is and know that it's just your mind. that realistically, it's nothing, that almost every horror imaginable is a figment of a mind deeply attuned to creating enemies.)
his gaze rests on her, deep and and dark and intense. non-judgemental. accepting. oddly understanding — it's not an expression many people get to see on marc, for as tolerant as he is (surprisingly), he often seeks to hide it beneath a veneer of unreasonableness. a state of being that's not untrue, but isn't a reputation that is in any way beneficial. )
I know, ( he says. it's not soft, but it's not harsh. it just is. it's the type of utterance that says that he's been there, that he knows what it's like to want to sleep and find nothing instead. that there's a lot he's never told her in between the warnings and the reprimands he has. ) It won't be easy.
no subject
They exist in states of just being, of ignoring their actual lives because the one they share in her little living room deserves all the attention it can get (for the brief life it has, when they put on Love Island or eat shitty food together).
But back then she never put words to the way they looked at each other. Now, it's all she can do. It's intense and it's odd, how Marc's eyes seem even darker and heavier like this. Lottie, for her part, doesn't tear her own gaze away but she does squirm. Uncomfortable, with its intensity. With what he isn't saying but is saying. Her mouth is suddenly dry, and her heart is racing. Lottie feels like running, doing the opposite of sleeping because this is getting weirdlyβ. Intimate?
Her hands clutch the sheets before she breathes. Swallows down the odd mix of it all because seeing Marc like this only serves to remind her something terrible did happen to her. It is serious. What if she needs therapy? Should a therapist know this? Oh god. ]
Is this how you live all the time?
[ It isn't even judgmental, the way she says it, just overwhelmed. Like maybe she gets why Marc is soβ Marc. Moody and difficult and sometimes quiet at the drop of a hat, odd in ways she's never understood but always readily accepted. ]
no subject
his expression reflects it perfectly, a bemused meeting of his eyebrows, lines of his forehead intertwined and questioning. is this how he lives? what a question. what a question—.
the first answer, immediate and instinctual, sits ready to go: yes. obviously. before it dawns on him that he's not sure what she means, not sure what he'd be answering 'yes' to.
he cants his head, gaze sidelong and contemplative. brow furrowed, uncertain. yes, it's how he lives. he can guess at the meaning of the question (the now question and the later questions), even if he's not sure how much she wants to know the answer, really and truly. not sure if she really wants to know the reasons why marc barely sleeps, the reasons why when he does, it's for snatches of minutes, only sometimes hours at a time. it's instability and nightmares. it is uncertainty, it's feelings he doesn't quite know how to put into words. fear and guilt and shame all combined, all at once. what is that? he doesn't know. the closest he's ever settled on is 'debt' and that's not quite the same thing. )
Yeah, ( he answers, oddly. awkwardly. it feels dangerously close to admitting weakness and insecurity. this is how he lives, and it means that so much of his day-to-day (night-to-night) is caught up in worry and paranoia and preoccupation.
the breath, the pause feels heavy and thick before he continues, before he elaborates. ) It can be distracting.
no subject
That yeah is awkward and weird, probably tastes as strange on his tongue as it sounds to her ears. It's dangerously close to admitting weakness and insecurity. It doesn't quite cross, but it edges into vulnerable. A different kind to what she shows him so readily, Lottie so unabashed in what makes her skin crawl and her eyes water. She doesn't say anything, just kind of waits to see if he'll say anything else because godβ even in this dark he looks it.
And he does. Lottie leans forward with interest, her anxiety and panic being pushed aside (she is still jittery, still a little breathless despite this because Lottie can't swallow everything down, after all) in favor of what she thinks are going to be divine answers. Marc's masterclass toβ not living well, she guesses, but living. ]
What do you do to not be distracted?
[ (It is here she forgets Marc doesn't live so much as he just does enough to survive and keep himself occupied, his closet full of Moon Knight suits a pointed reminder his duty as the moon man overtakes and precedes virtually everything else to where he's hardly Marc Spector. He's more... Marc Knight. Moon Spector (should she bring this up to him to trademark? She thinks he'd like that a lot).) ]
no subject
there are times when he thinks that lottie gets it — or gets him, whatever, he's not sure what the difference is or if it even matters — even if she doesn't realise it. other times, he thinks she doesn't get any of it at all. other times like this.
("what do you do to not be distracted?")
he extends a hand and gestures vaguely. it's an action that means what do you think?, an unspoken question that asks what do you think moon knight is? it's flawed and not as effective as he'd always like, having veered to and fro on how much it's part of the problem and how much it helps the problem. the truth is that marc finds it — all of it — all-encompassing and all-consuming, but he knows that without it, he wouldn't have anything. he doesn't know who he'd be.
(steven?
jake?
not marc—.)
the difference is, marc doesn't let himself forget any of it.
marc has boxes upon files upon tapes of his history, his mistakes, his choices, locked away in cupboards in this building. )
I beat people up at night. ( is what he says and even as he says it, he knows how it sounds. is aware, quite suddenly, that compared to lottie person's very normal life, his is the poster child for not dealing with problems. that his solution is frankly and utterly absurd.
(every solution he's tried has been the same: problematic and self-destructive.) )