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Maeve Wiley ([personal profile] complexfemalecharacter) wrote2022-08-12 03:13 pm
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The really shitty thing about her best friend being her boyfriend is that when Maeve is hurt by something her boyfriend did, she doesn't know who the hell to talk to about it. Even going to Robin would be a little weird, if only because Steve is probably there right now, spilling the whole weird fight to her.

Was it even a fight? Maeve has no idea. It felt awful and adult and while not final, by any means, it's still left her with a sour taste in her mouth and a deep fear she's just fucked something up beyond all measure.

In the end, she texts Gideon.

I need to come over.

Before Harrow, she would have just gone, but she and Harrow have some sort of tentative truce going for them now and she doesn't want to risk it by just showing up unannounced. She needs to walk, though, so she leaves her flat as she waits for Gideon to get back to her, and by the time she's told she can come, she's already halfway there.

The rest of the walk doesn't take much time at all and Maeve rings the buzzer to be let in, chewing on her ragged thumbnail as she waits.
wedobones: (see you on the flipside sugarlips)

[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-12 09:03 pm (UTC)(link)
Harrow is over doing something creepy with Palamedes, so Gideon is home alone when she tugs the door open for Maeve, immediately stepping out of the way so that her friend can walk into the apartment. She looks at her friend, eyebrows drawn together in concern as she closes the door behind them.

"What happened?" she asks.
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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-14 06:30 pm (UTC)(link)

"I mean, probably, but I won't hold it against you. Or Steve." Maeve comes into the apartment, and Gideon shuts the door behind her. "Well, I've got beer and Harrow isn't here, so..." She shrugs. "We can talk about it or not talk about it. Whatever you need. Kitchen or lounge?"

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-24 07:32 pm (UTC)(link)

"Got it," says Gideon, turning and heading towards the kitchen, padding down the hall in her bare feet and her short shorts and a t-shirt. She might have put more clothes on if it was anyone other than Maeve, but they're beyond that. If they were ever there in the first place. She glances back over her shoulder at Maeve. "He did? That dickwad."

It's clear from her expression that she doesn't really know why that would be a problem, even though she recognises it clearly is.

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-25 07:40 pm (UTC)(link)

Her hand on the fridge door, Gideon pauses, glad, for a moment, that's she's got her back to the Maeve as she grabs a beer for herself out of the fridge. She grabs a second one and turns, holding it up with a questioning look on her face.

"At least your mom didn't think you were a war crime, right?" she says. "I take it he didn't take that well?"

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-26 06:46 pm (UTC)(link)

"I mean, I'm pretty sure Wake was on the good shit, based on what I now remember." When Maeve doesn't answer about the beer, Gideon snags a soda to go with it and brings all three drinks back to the table, sitting down opposite Maeve. "That feels like a really...You know." Gideon likes Steve a lot, honestly, mainly because he seems to love Maeve a lot, and that's her basic requirement for success. "Like he's missed the point kind of collosally?"

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-08-27 06:50 pm (UTC)(link)

Gideon twists the top off her own beer and takes a long swallow of it.

"Okay," she says, and, honestly, she has no roadmap for this because a) she's never going to have sex with someone who can impregnate her ew and b) she's never going to be the one doing the impregnating either - though imaginging the look on Harrow's face during that conversation is hilarious. "So I guess you both have to decide how much of a dealbreaker you think it is."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-03 01:16 pm (UTC)(link)

Gideon is way out of her depth here, both in terms of emotions and experience, but Maeve matters to her, as much as anyone else she's ever met in her life, and that means that she'll muddle her way through it.

"Maybe he thinks it'll be different because it's him?" she says. "Like, you didn't want that baby, sure, but that baby wasn't his?"

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-04 03:24 pm (UTC)(link)

It would be a surprise to a lot of people that know her, but Gideon isn't actually bad at silence. She spent most of her life in a penitent's cell and, while she might not have subscribed to everything the acolytes of the Tomb exepcted of her, she did get pretty used to not having anyone to talk to.

"I don't think you're being unfair," she says, finally. "I think you're hurting and that makes a person lash out. There's a difference."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-05 12:39 pm (UTC)(link)

There's all kinds of things that Gideon never sees coming, but she is in love with a duplicitious, awful excuse for a person, so their experiences aren't the same. She loves Harrow more than anything in any world, but that doesn't mean that she's not also entirely wise to her shit.

"You didn't want to think about it," she says. "Maybe."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-06 11:09 am (UTC)(link)

"Where I come from, nobody has kids anymore," says Gideon, picking at the edge of her bottle's label with her thumb nail. "Harrow was the last baby born to the Ninth. The two of us, and Ortus, who's older -- we were the only kids. I guess other houses have children, but not us." She sort of shakes herself, pulls herself back to the conversation that they're having. "I come from an Empire at War, Maeve. If people didn't have kids because they thought they might leave them, nothing would ever get done."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-07 11:57 am (UTC)(link)

"Yeah, okay, that was a shitty example," says Gideon. "And of course you don't need a reason. If you don't want to have kids, you shouldn't have kids." She leans her chin into her hand, thinking, for a moment, about how maybe someone should have had that conversation with Wake.

"I don't know. I spent my whole life trying to live in my own future. Maybe I'm just...I can't do that anymore."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-08 09:53 pm (UTC)(link)

"I was going to join the Cohort. Front line infantry," says Gideon. "I was going to pay off my debt to the Ninth and get rich and laid." She smiles, almost wistfully. Her life has turned out a lot different to what she'd wanted, what she'd expected. Would she change it? No. "What it meant was that I was going to survive the Ninth. One way or another."

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[personal profile] wedobones 2022-09-11 09:22 pm (UTC)(link)

"Sounds like it," says Gideon, still picking at her label with one thumb. After a moment, she holds out her other hand to Maeve, wiggling callused fingers. "You'll figure it out, Maeve. You're one of the smartest people I know. And I know actual fucking geniuses."