[reverse darkest timeline AU: cellthread #3]

[stilljustandrew]

It's been about two days.

Nobody's come for him.



Andrew's lying down, staring at the far wall.

Comments

[gothamsheiress]

She frowns. "I find that hard to -- understand."

[stilljustandrew]

He frowns in turn, looking down at his knees, trying to find the words.

"I think ..." Slowly. "Like you said before. You, you can't get angry at the center of the universe."

[gothamsheiress]

Brix nods slowly.

(She may disagree, but she understands what he means.)

"You may not have been angry at him, but were you never angry?"

[stilljustandrew]

"... Sometimes." Very soft. "Mostly early on. At Meg, or, or whoever. And I'd ... mouth off at whoever it was, try to like ... score points by talking."



"It never did any good. In the long run."

[gothamsheiress]

"Did they punish you for it?"

[stilljustandrew]

He nods, without looking up.

[gothamsheiress]

She takes a deep breath, lets it out.

"That was wrong of them, Andrew," she murmurs. "It was a way to control you."

[stilljustandrew]

"It --"

His lips tremble, press together hard.




"I know."

[gothamsheiress]

"That's good," she says, nodding.

"Anger . . . is no bad thing, in and of itself. If it becomes all-consuming, it harms us, but trying not to feel it is a poor solution in the long view."

[stilljustandrew]

"But I got angry with Tom." Barely audible. "And Nita, a little. When they were here."

[gothamsheiress]

"Why?"

[stilljustandrew]

He shakes his head, pulling in his arms and knees tighter.

"It doesn't matter."

[gothamsheiress]

"All right."

Brix glances down at her hands.

"You haven't always been happy with me, either. Understandably so."

[stilljustandrew]

Miserably: "But you came back."

[gothamsheiress]

"I'm . . . not as close to you as they are," she says slowly, carefully. "If you lash out at me, it doesn't hurt."

[stilljustandrew]

"I don't want it to."

He looks up, eyes wide and wet, on the verge of weeping again.

"I don't want to hurt anybody."

[gothamsheiress]

"No, I know. I don't believe you meant to hurt them, or wanted to. It's the love we have for our friends that makes fighting with them so painful."

[stilljustandrew]

He blinks as she's talking, and some of the tension goes out of him at I don't believe you meant to hurt them.

When she's done he nods, and rubs distractedly at one eye.

"And I don't ... I don't want to hurt you because I'm angry about somebody else."

[gothamsheiress]

She smiles, slightly.

"Thank you."

[stilljustandrew]

He doesn't smile, even at her thanks.

"I don't want to be like her."

[gothamsheiress]

"Like -- Meg?" she guesses.

[stilljustandrew]

He nods, silently.

[gothamsheiress]

"You can make amends for the hurt you caused to your friends," she points out. "I doubt Meg ever tried to make amends to you."

[stilljustandrew]

"No," he mumbles.

And starts to say something else, pauses, frowns.

[gothamsheiress]

Brix cocks her head.

"Hm?"