Fourth little lie ♰ 'Cause I'm half-sick of shadows, I want to see the sky

[beingdifferent]

[Once again it's a video today, and Esther is fresh-faced and bright-eyed, obviously not too disturbed by recent events. Her communicator is set up on her bedside table, catching the gauzy canopy of her bed behind her and allowing her to use her hands to sign.]

Excuse me. I would like to ask a favor.

Some of you are teachers for the older kids. I don't want to go to school, but is there anyone who could teach me something fun? How to make something or play something. This place can be so boring sometimes. [She quickly amends, so as not to offend anyone:] But I like the library and the art room and the kitchen. During the port I learned how to fish, and I liked that too. Sometime, I'd like to do it again.

Do any of you know how to do things like that?

[OOC: Esther is affected for the flood and has memory dates with Lua, the Emperor, Dent, and Ned, though everyone is welcome. CW: The memory threads may involve themes of violence, death, and sexual abuse, and are marked.]

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[beingdifferent]

[It takes Esther a little longer and she arrives a few moments after Lua. She returns the small wave with a bigger enthusiastic one, and reaches up for her hand once she's closed the distance between them.]

I remember. Did you enjoy going home?

[surrenders]

[Before she answers, she reminds herself she's allowed to be honest here, but the only sign the question hurts is when she stays quiet half a second too long before answering.]

It's better being here. [She softens, reaching her hands out to Esther.]

While I was gone, I forgot a lot of important things. If you say something, and I don't know... it's not you, all right?

[beingdifferent]

I'm glad you like it here.

[She looks up at Lua curiously, studying her face as if looking for something that isn't there anymore, then she shakes her head.] Do you remember seeing my picture?

[surrenders]

[She shakes her head, but her breath catches as she tries to say no.]

I know you paint. You did all the time. But I gotta start from nothing, all right? I didn't even know anybody's name.

[beingdifferent]

I do like to paint! [Rather than upset, she sounds pleased that Lua remembered even though she mentioned it recently. She reaches up to take the woman's hand and pull her toward the plants.]

By the way, my name is Esther. You never told me yours.

[surrenders]

It's Lua. You never knew me?

[The other her hadn't ever touched Esther, but she doesn't know this, and she takes the hand she's offered with a smile.

There's another friend in front of her now, a limp, brown-haired girl about her own age. They almost never go outside, the two of them, Lua knows that even if she doesn't understand who or why, but she's for once thinking about nothing in particular as she's sitting on the ground, relaxed.

The other girl's sitting on a bench with her hair over her face, masking herself from anyone around them. Her eyes aren't for flowers but the black-striped snake wound around her arm, nose to nose with her. Lua's head perks up at a hissing sound, and her eyebrows raise when she sees which mouth it's coming from. The serpent's head traces a pattern in the air, and it swiftly unwinds to slide down the bench and into the bushes.

"It's good for him, right?" It's good for you, Lua really means, for her to be somewhere new. The girl wasn't like her, she hadn't gone very far wrong at all, she was just afraid of herself and the rest of the world around her.

"I never thought about it that way." The girl anxiously watches where the snake has gone, and Lua reaches up for her hand, heart full. "Your world had more life than mine," she tries. "Tiny village, right? So you know more than I do about this place right here. Tell me what's what."

Her hand slips out of the girl's a moment, and in Esther's, the same. She gives her a long look like something else is going to slip out, but memories don't come.]

She a friend of yours? Because...

cw: murder, fire

[beingdifferent]

[This is new to her, to share the intimacy of a real friendship with someone. Seeing the other girl sitting and mirroring her snake's hisses, there's no calculation and no curiosity about destruction. There is only goodwill, and that surprises Esther more than the strange girl in the memory or even the memory itself.

When she feels Lua's grip slip she withdraws her hand, astonishment still plain on her face.] No. [It answers both questions equally well, although it's plain she knows Lua a bit better now.] I've never seen her.

[There's something wrong with Lua's memory, she now presumes. Perhaps shock? She's familiar with it. When the initial animal thrill of her first kills had passed she'd done similar, walking into the room with the intention of talking to her father. The details of that first murder seemed too extreme, too macabre, to be real and for some time she had convinced herself they weren't.

Her delusion had quickly faded into the knowledge that she'd finished him, and could now cast him aside as easily as he had her.

And who knew it would be so easy, really? The hardest part had been pulling his bitch wife's body over to his, then it was simply a matter of lighting the funeral pyre and all the evidence went up in smoke. At least, such was the idea.

Yes, perhaps shock is what Lua's suffering from, in addition to the flood. And at the idea that she might still be sharing Esther suddenly feels naked, vulnerable, and tries to keep her sudden surge of fear in check.]

In any other situation I would have been pleased to meet you, Lua. This may not be the best day.

[surrenders]

[She takes it as an answer to the second question, but as she nips at the end of her tongue, trying not to dig further, she feels that same invasion Esther must have and holds her breath, waiting for the sensation to pass, like she isn't dreaming, she's right there and doesn't want the girl to see her.

Now I know why there's a kid here, she thinks when she's herself again and breathing. That memory answers a question she didn't know she'd been asking. She must have wondered during her first time here.]

It... I won't ask about it. It was your story to tell me.

[beingdifferent]

[Esther's eyes narrow and she scrutinizes Lua's face, as if her thoughts might be etched into her skin. That was not a memory she intended to share and for a moment she feels Lua stole it.

But at least she responds to it with a level of sensitivity.]

Aren't you afraid?

[surrenders]

[She hasn't had the time to be afraid, having only seen what she could in the time it took to release Esther's hand, but now, when she asks, her heart starts a little faster.]

You think I should be?

[There are times when you answer "yes" or "no". When a child's asking if you're scared of them, "no" could be a challenge, and "yes" could make them think all they're good for is scaring people.]

[beingdifferent]

[Her question came of genuine curiosity, of measuring this woman against the background she came from. So far Lua seems undisturbed, which is... interesting.]

Some people are.

[surrenders]

Depends on why it happened.

[That much, at least, is true, and something opens in her eyes as she turns her head to that same spot in the memory she gave Esther like she wants to sit, an offer of that same security if it's what she wants.]