[That makes her sob a little harder into the handkerchief.] The title and the pictures! [How typical.]
Well if it's very terrible, I will tell you so. For there is nothing more disrespectful than refusing to give your honest opinion on something, you know. Even if it's about a gift. Maybe especially then.
[Wysteria loudly blows her nose into the soggy handkerchief.]
[She draws the handkerchief abruptly away from her nose so that she might twist a little back toward him in distressed bafflement, all blotchy and very red in the face and in fact crying still.]
But it is true! One's true opinion! It is—it is a—a gesture of respect!
[Hurriedly, Wysteria balls up the handkerchief so she might scrub at each eye with some dry corner.]
[ His eyebrows quirk in quizzical amusement. Does she truly believe that? - Maker, yes. She seems utterly sincere. ]
Perhaps we favor different schools of respect. I've always been of the opinion that the best thing one can do is ensure that one is safeguarding the other's feelings. [ Well. ] Besides, my honest opinions are always dreadfully shitty.
[Blubbered and warbled across five different pitches:]
But what if safeguarding a person's feelings requires lying to them, Mister Rutyer! You can't possibly mean that it is preferable to be untrue to a friend! How could you ever trust anything they said to you in return if half truths were made the rule?
[ - are they talking about this. How did they get here. The poor girl is one-armed and pallid and weakly and sobbing and they're talking about, what, the philosophy underlying honesty.
Well, it's better than the alternative, right? Better than making awkward conversation about her plans for her life now that she's maimed. ]
Why, you just trust them to be honest about the things that matter. You can lie about, say, someone's shoes, but you should be honest about it if it's their choice in partner, for example.
Oh well that's just dreadful. If my shoes were really so very awful, I would hope that a friend would simply say so and save me the mortification— [The blubbering stops abruptly so she can lift her face out of the handkerchief and accuse him:] I will hear nothing bad said about de Foncé, if that's what you're after. He has had no ill word to say despite—
[Despite the fact that now she is useless, and will look silly in all of her dresses.]
Oh, how terrible, [might be an assessment of their philosophical differences, or might merely be on account of now that she has thought of her dresses she is thinking of how much it will cost to have them altered. Regardless, it cues her burying her face in the soggy square of the handkerchief once more and a fresh cacophany of honking tears.] You must always be honest to your friends, Mister Rutyer. Anything less is liable to cause at least a little pain. If not a great deal of trouble.
I - shall endeavor to do so. At least with those friends who prefer it.
[ Will he? He's certainly not convinced by her arguments. And the times when he's been honest have resulted in far more strife than the times he's offered her distant politeness. Does she really think she'd be well pleased if he offered a frank assessment of everything he thought?
Already, he's lapsing into giving her gentler truths. So he amends, to nudge himself closer to what she wishes: ]
Just so long as you're aware that I have a cruel eye and a crueler mind. There's no real generosity in my soul, and the truth I see is likely rather different from the truth experienced by most people.
Then perhaps you ought to try to see things differently on occasion. And I don't mean as a way of being silly, but to give an honest go at it.
[This, she punctuates with a great wheeze of a blown nose into the handkerchief. She folds the cloth over again after, at last reducing it to such a small size that its benefits at a means to wipe her face are rendered somewhat negligible. She sniffs. She uses both it and the back of her hand in an attempt to dry her puffy eyes.]
Oh, I should be most pleased to exchange my villain's heart for a kinder one. Unfortunately, the shop is closed, and the stock depleted besides.
[ His voice is a little soft as he says that, a little distant. He doesn't sound nearly as flippant or wry as he wants to. But that simply drives home how it is not the time for him to be self-indulgent; he's here to comfort her. So, more brightly: ]
Which is why I do prefer to find associates who are much better-souled than me. Why do you think I keep bothering you, eh?
Oh, that is pure nonsense Mister Rutyer and you must be aware of it! Hearts are nothing at all like—it merely takes a considerable deal of practice, you know. And perhaps, yes, the company of one or two models of virtue and compassion and what have you. But they are muscles like any other thing, you know. You must only exercise it. That is clearly true.
[In some other place, in any other circumstance, this would have the upturned nose tenor of handing down a lecture. She has given him them before, and has more than demonstrated that she is capable of that sort of shamelessly self absorbed intellectualism. But maybe it's the tears, or the one arm, or the sad little sick bed or the fact that she's exhausted, but here in these very exacting circumstances it's all painted with a faintly desperate tint.
That must be true. She has been trying very hard believing it to be so, and it would be dreadful to hear otherwise now.]
[ He can hear the desperation. And so he reaches up and rubs her back soothingly, gently, steering well clear of her injured arm. ]
Maybe so. Maybe so.
[ He'll be damned if he understands why this is a thing that matters to her, but he'll also be damned if he starts a fight about it in this moment. ]
Perhaps I'll give it a go. Maybe I'll turn into a good man. [ Lightly, jokingly: ] Though I'd worry so dreadfully about the other people here. Nothing is more distressing to a source of light than having no shadows to compare itself to.
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no subject
Well if it's very terrible, I will tell you so. For there is nothing more disrespectful than refusing to give your honest opinion on something, you know. Even if it's about a gift. Maybe especially then.
[Wysteria loudly blows her nose into the soggy handkerchief.]
no subject
That could not possibly be less true.
no subject
But it is true! One's true opinion! It is—it is a—a gesture of respect!
[Hurriedly, Wysteria balls up the handkerchief so she might scrub at each eye with some dry corner.]
no subject
Perhaps we favor different schools of respect. I've always been of the opinion that the best thing one can do is ensure that one is safeguarding the other's feelings. [ Well. ] Besides, my honest opinions are always dreadfully shitty.
no subject
But what if safeguarding a person's feelings requires lying to them, Mister Rutyer! You can't possibly mean that it is preferable to be untrue to a friend! How could you ever trust anything they said to you in return if half truths were made the rule?
no subject
[ - are they talking about this. How did they get here. The poor girl is one-armed and pallid and weakly and sobbing and they're talking about, what, the philosophy underlying honesty.
Well, it's better than the alternative, right? Better than making awkward conversation about her plans for her life now that she's maimed. ]
Why, you just trust them to be honest about the things that matter. You can lie about, say, someone's shoes, but you should be honest about it if it's their choice in partner, for example.
no subject
[Despite the fact that now she is useless, and will look silly in all of her dresses.]
Oh, how terrible, [might be an assessment of their philosophical differences, or might merely be on account of now that she has thought of her dresses she is thinking of how much it will cost to have them altered. Regardless, it cues her burying her face in the soggy square of the handkerchief once more and a fresh cacophany of honking tears.] You must always be honest to your friends, Mister Rutyer. Anything less is liable to cause at least a little pain. If not a great deal of trouble.
no subject
[ Will he? He's certainly not convinced by her arguments. And the times when he's been honest have resulted in far more strife than the times he's offered her distant politeness. Does she really think she'd be well pleased if he offered a frank assessment of everything he thought?
Already, he's lapsing into giving her gentler truths. So he amends, to nudge himself closer to what she wishes: ]
Just so long as you're aware that I have a cruel eye and a crueler mind. There's no real generosity in my soul, and the truth I see is likely rather different from the truth experienced by most people.
no subject
[This, she punctuates with a great wheeze of a blown nose into the handkerchief. She folds the cloth over again after, at last reducing it to such a small size that its benefits at a means to wipe her face are rendered somewhat negligible. She sniffs. She uses both it and the back of her hand in an attempt to dry her puffy eyes.]
no subject
[ His voice is a little soft as he says that, a little distant. He doesn't sound nearly as flippant or wry as he wants to. But that simply drives home how it is not the time for him to be self-indulgent; he's here to comfort her. So, more brightly: ]
Which is why I do prefer to find associates who are much better-souled than me. Why do you think I keep bothering you, eh?
no subject
Oh, that is pure nonsense Mister Rutyer and you must be aware of it! Hearts are nothing at all like—it merely takes a considerable deal of practice, you know. And perhaps, yes, the company of one or two models of virtue and compassion and what have you. But they are muscles like any other thing, you know. You must only exercise it. That is clearly true.
[In some other place, in any other circumstance, this would have the upturned nose tenor of handing down a lecture. She has given him them before, and has more than demonstrated that she is capable of that sort of shamelessly self absorbed intellectualism. But maybe it's the tears, or the one arm, or the sad little sick bed or the fact that she's exhausted, but here in these very exacting circumstances it's all painted with a faintly desperate tint.
That must be true. She has been trying very hard believing it to be so, and it would be dreadful to hear otherwise now.]
no subject
Maybe so. Maybe so.
[ He'll be damned if he understands why this is a thing that matters to her, but he'll also be damned if he starts a fight about it in this moment. ]
Perhaps I'll give it a go. Maybe I'll turn into a good man. [ Lightly, jokingly: ] Though I'd worry so dreadfully about the other people here. Nothing is more distressing to a source of light than having no shadows to compare itself to.