[Somewhere, that laugh is prodding a tender spot, easily and regularly bruised. Just because a shin is well acquainted with finding the edge of tables doesn't make it sting less.]
[ His voice, for once, is unvarnished. Unguarded. Blame the exhaustion, perhaps, or just the frustration of years. ]
I urge you not to mistake this and think that I care how you view me, for I do not - [ The hot strength of his voice gives easy lie to that - ] But you treated me from the first as a disreputable wretch indeed. As is your right to do, of course, a respectable lady such as yourself. But the fact that you now claim to have done otherwise is so absurd that it's nearly shocking. It's only once I became Ambassador that you began to rein in your contempt, and even then only grudgingly.
Oh that is just—just—[grasping for an appropriate word in her fury lands at—] Hogwash!
As if you had not first dismissed every apology, and disparaged or distrusted every attempt I had ever made at being a friend to you even before your appointment! As if the very respect I have endeavored to give your position despite your obvious disdain has not been rooted in the very advice you once gave me to be mindful of the weakness of my place as a Rifter.
I gave you apologies when I wronged you! And gifts for Satinalia, and attempted to tend you in Ghislain and brought you wine when you lay recovering from being stabbed at your wedding! I listened to you and to all the things you had to say about a strange place that I hardly knew and all the strange people in it because you pretended like you knew it all so well.
And the first time I escaped the Venatori—since the subject is so very important to you today—and had no friends at all happiest to see me returned unharmed, you were who I asked for advice. Only for you to treat me like an idiot whenever I acted with the assumption that there was anything sincere between us. I was [she is so incandescently angry and is a different person now than she was then and it doesn't matter] alone and lonely and trying to be well-liked and clever and you refused my friendship!
Maker, he feels like the ground has dropped out from under him. ]
You - You made a great show of displeasure when we were in that carriage together, like it was the greatest hardship you'd ever suffered to be trapped with me. And you looked at me like I was a pervert when I mentioned my past relationship - [ A relationship with a man, he feels too absurdly self-conscious to mention - ] And every instance of tending to me has been accompanied by you making sure that I know you're doing this only from duty. And any time I've tried to defend you or advocate for you, you make it clear I'm overstepping - [ Ugh. ] You are the one who has refused mine!
Because every attempt at doing anything short of implying you're utterly reprehensible is always refused! How else was I to be while in your company? [This is all so—stupid. She doesn't care what he thinks. And she has apologized for so much of this, or at least made every attempt to at least act with more consideration–]
And why in the world should I be grateful that the person who finds me so singularly intolerable that he can hardly bear to keep the peace for the space of a single dance is the only one willing to come to my defense? Why, when you know how important it is for my future here that I should have friends I can trust, should I be pleased to have such a reputation?
Pleasant! We might have danced across a floor of eggshells for all the effort I made to avoid any subject of conversation which might have offended or irritated you!
Oh yes. Because speaking my mind in your presence has been so readily rewarded in the past. Why not attempt the same in front of a whole room of people where any derision I might receive from one of our company's leaders for it would instantly be made a matter of public account?
You said yourself you thought the dance pleasant. Do you really think that if I'd acted any differently then—if I hadn't been so mindful of every other time you have made me out to be so very small—that you would have felt the same? There was no choice in the thing at all!
How would you even know? [Spikes shrill.] You clearly know nothing about me, much less anything at all about what I feel! And every time I have tried to tell you my feelings, you have either denied their existence or made them a point of ridicule! You are doing so this very moment, in the same conversation where you have advised that should some terrible thing occur in the future it would be better I were dead than hoping for rescue.
[For what feels like the first time since they began speaking, silence grips the line. Somewhere, Wysteria is grinding her teeth.]
Briefly. [Is like pulling a tooth. Exposing some raw nerve. Putting a bare arm out to be switched.] Sometimes I thought so. In whatever period existed between reaching the end of one argument and before we had begun the next one.
—But [she hurries to say, mean and brisk like snapping a visor down on a helmet to made for shielding vulnerable parts.] Whenever I began to think it and allowed myself to be easier to account for it, you would purposefully make an ass of yourself or get your back up over some remark I thought perfectly inconsequential and it would begin all over again. And I have no more patience for either standing so I may be berated like a child, or for being purposefully cajoled into acting cruelly.
He's actually startled into silence. Not a long one, mind - this jabbering loudmouth will never stay quiet for too long - but perhaps that makes it all the more notable for occurring. ]
You certainly did not let on that you found me anything other than utterly intolerable.
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That is a terrible lie and you know it.
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[ His voice, for once, is unvarnished. Unguarded. Blame the exhaustion, perhaps, or just the frustration of years. ]
I urge you not to mistake this and think that I care how you view me, for I do not - [ The hot strength of his voice gives easy lie to that - ] But you treated me from the first as a disreputable wretch indeed. As is your right to do, of course, a respectable lady such as yourself. But the fact that you now claim to have done otherwise is so absurd that it's nearly shocking. It's only once I became Ambassador that you began to rein in your contempt, and even then only grudgingly.
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As if you had not first dismissed every apology, and disparaged or distrusted every attempt I had ever made at being a friend to you even before your appointment! As if the very respect I have endeavored to give your position despite your obvious disdain has not been rooted in the very advice you once gave me to be mindful of the weakness of my place as a Rifter.
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And the first time I escaped the Venatori—since the subject is so very important to you today—and had no friends at all happiest to see me returned unharmed, you were who I asked for advice. Only for you to treat me like an idiot whenever I acted with the assumption that there was anything sincere between us. I was [she is so incandescently angry and is a different person now than she was then and it doesn't matter] alone and lonely and trying to be well-liked and clever and you refused my friendship!
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Maker, he feels like the ground has dropped out from under him. ]
You - You made a great show of displeasure when we were in that carriage together, like it was the greatest hardship you'd ever suffered to be trapped with me. And you looked at me like I was a pervert when I mentioned my past relationship - [ A relationship with a man, he feels too absurdly self-conscious to mention - ] And every instance of tending to me has been accompanied by you making sure that I know you're doing this only from duty. And any time I've tried to defend you or advocate for you, you make it clear I'm overstepping - [ Ugh. ] You are the one who has refused mine!
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And why in the world should I be grateful that the person who finds me so singularly intolerable that he can hardly bear to keep the peace for the space of a single dance is the only one willing to come to my defense? Why, when you know how important it is for my future here that I should have friends I can trust, should I be pleased to have such a reputation?
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That dance was pleasant!
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You said yourself you thought the dance pleasant. Do you really think that if I'd acted any differently then—if I hadn't been so mindful of every other time you have made me out to be so very small—that you would have felt the same? There was no choice in the thing at all!
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All right. Then let me ask questions. Tell me how you feel. First, have you ever enjoyed my presence?
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[ Even though he knows the answer. ]
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Briefly. [Is like pulling a tooth. Exposing some raw nerve. Putting a bare arm out to be switched.] Sometimes I thought so. In whatever period existed between reaching the end of one argument and before we had begun the next one.
—But [she hurries to say, mean and brisk like snapping a visor down on a helmet to made for shielding vulnerable parts.] Whenever I began to think it and allowed myself to be easier to account for it, you would purposefully make an ass of yourself or get your back up over some remark I thought perfectly inconsequential and it would begin all over again. And I have no more patience for either standing so I may be berated like a child, or for being purposefully cajoled into acting cruelly.
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He's actually startled into silence. Not a long one, mind - this jabbering loudmouth will never stay quiet for too long - but perhaps that makes it all the more notable for occurring. ]
You certainly did not let on that you found me anything other than utterly intolerable.
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Every attempt to be pleasant came with little snips and snipes. Forgive me if I mistook your apparent hostility for real hostility.
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[Clipped. Hacking herself free.]
Will that be all, Mister Rutyer?
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Fine. So we should start over, then.
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[Can you hear the crossed arms energy? Because her arms are crossed.]
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