In Vino Patefacio
(And still more with the rockingness. Thanks, Andy. You're truly crack on crack.--Maer)
Monday, 21 Oct 2520
Kuiper II Class Summer’s Gift'
Pericles Station, White Sun (Bai Hu) system
19:50hrs, ships time
Joshua stood up and the room tilted a little. There was no way he could be seriously drunk on two glasses of brandy, he thought. He wondered if the old Joshua that Blue Sun killed, got drunk on two glasses of brandy. Another argument for giving the old Joshua back his life. He could hold his liquor better.
Rina had his hand and seemed to be guiding him away from the brandy, towards his room. He'd miss Rina when old Joshua replaced him. He needed to make sure she knew that, he decided. "When I have to give this body back to old Joshua's memories, I'll miss you, Rina." He gave her his best serious look as they walked away. "I'll miss you terribly."
***
“Ni zdis. Not here,” I said, glancing back at the others. I pulled his arm around my shoulders and grabbed the back of his belt. Our progress to his quarters was more than a little awkward. Joshua had seven inches and sixteen pounds over me and as he leaned into me I felt every single one of them. I had to prop him against the bulkhead and hold him there with my hip as I got his door open, and he simply rolled around the jamb into his quarters. I took the opportunity to tip him into his bunk and once he was stretched out, got to work on his shoes.
***
"Sorry," he said apologetically as she took his shoes off. "I didn't mean I'd miss you in THAT way. Although I would. I meant I'd miss you. You know, like a friend."
He leaned up a little, making his head spin a little. "How much are you planning on taking off?" And he giggled a little as he laid his head back down. He was definitely wittier when he was drunk.
Joshua stared at the ceiling and then closed his eyes. Laying down felt better than standing up, that was for sure. He wondered if he needed that water Nika suggested and then decided it couldn't be that big of a deal. He wasn't that drunk anyway.
***
I made no comment or answer but got those shoes off and got his trousered legs under the blankets. Handling drunks wasn’t something I did often and in truth wasn’t something I’d personally done in years. My roots, however, were Russian and my family tree was well-watered by alcohol. Recognizing and dealing with the consequences of overindulgence was something we all learned early. I’d lost count of the aunts and uncles and cousins I’d helped lead away to sleep it off, or the number of scenes like this one played out while I watched from their bedroom doors. Joshua, I judged, was a lightweight. Moreover, if I’d read the signs right, he was a genial enough drunk, tipping toward the morose depending on the company he kept. His mood lightened quickly enough once I got him out of sight of the Shepherd.
Or maybe it’s because he’s alone with you, the cynical side of me whispered. I pulled off the last shoe and sock and chucked them with their mates under his desk.
“Stay down. I’ll be right back with that water.”
I ignored his protest and ducked down to the galley. If I reckoned correctly, he’d need a fair amount of water to dilute the booze in his system.
***
"Ok, I'm not going anywhere," he shouted down the hall after her as she left. Joshua lay there on his bunk, his eyes fluttering between open and closed. She said to stay put, he'd stay put. He followed orders well. But she didn't say whether he needed to be awake when she got back.
Maybe he'd take a quick ten minute nap while she was gone. He could recover and they could make out some when she got back. Kissing Rina was awesome.
So nap, and then kissing, he thought. Definitely a plan. And he closed his eyes and let sleep overtake him.
***
I returned to find him dead to the world, with an arm over his eyes to block the light. He’d need the water if he wanted to avoid the pain later and I’d get to that in a minute, but I wanted to do a little discreet snooping before getting the water down him. The desk made a convenient landing pad for the pitcher and the mug, and the locker was the first thing I opened. A few toiletry items sat on the shelf: the standard soap, razor, toothbrush, and comb. Nothing else. I closed the locker up and examined the desk.
Joshua kept his meds in plain sight and within easy reach but there was nothing else besides a note pad and a couple of pens. Angling the pad to the light, I could make out some impressions from past notes on the surface. Letters and symbols, spelling nothing. Not a code, per se, but more akin to a personal variation of shorthand. The desk drawer was empty, a disappointment, but the one beneath his bunk held the most in the way of interest: couple of magazines from the passenger lounge, a change of clothes borrowed from Rick, a small contact card, a hardbound sketchbook and a slim box of colored pencils, and hidden underneath that was the odd tool from Trafalgar, along with the tag labeled Rubicon. The contact card bore the name Gareth Lin and sported a handwritten note on the back: I.O.U., G—. The name meant nothing to me.
I opened the sketchbook next, cracking it open to the center and bringing it to my face, I took in an indulgent sniff. Crisp clean paper scent met my nose and I itched to do something with it. Curious, I flipped through the pages and discovered they were blank and halfway in I found something. It was smaller sheet of higher quality paper, a loose colored pencil sketch of a pretty redhead smiling at the artist and giving him the finger.
The sheet had been folded into quarters at one point early on and turning it over I could see the creases had worn and taken on the dirt of handling and travel. Being cotton rag, it held up pretty well until being tucked into the sanctuary of the sketchbook. I examined the drawing again. Adriana? Likely. The finger with a smile struck me as befitting a woman who’d pretend to love a man for money.
My, aren’t we catty? Jealous much?
Oh, shut up.
I very carefully put the bitch back as I’d found her, in the sketchbook covered by the clothing. The tag scratched my hand while smoothing the clothing down and I’d picked it up to examine it when Joshua stirred.
***
He felt like he had been asleep a while, but it couldn't have been that long when he heard Rina coming back in. It took him a minute to crack an eye open and when he’d managed it, he saw Rina looking through his bunk drawer. The logical portion of his brain was telling him that he should be offended that she was peeking around in his stuff while he was asleep, but he couldn't really make himself get upset about it. He had said he hadn't wanted any secrets, after all. Although it looked like the make-out session might be toast. Curiosity got the better of him, and he decided to keep his eyes cracked open just a little and see what she did.
He watched Rina discover his sketch of Adriana and stare it for a minute, before carefully putting it back. Laying here, half drunk, Adriana seemed like a lifetime ago, distant and unreachable, like a movie of someone else's life. Funny how quickly things changed.
He shifted a little and tried to sit up. "I don't even know why I keep that. Maybe because I like the moment. Moments are sometimes bigger than the people involved, right?"
***
Caught in the act with no chance of passing it off as something innocent, I deliberately examined the tag a few seconds more.
Rubicon. How apropos.
I put it back, closed the drawer and rose.
“She apparently didn’t think much of it,” I said as I poured him some water and glared at him until he took it. “Or the artist apparently. Was it you?” I thought back on the quality of the pencil strokes, confident and quick, and the attention to detail that bespoke the artist’s regard for the subject despite the pose.
Suka.
***
The look Rina gave him as she handed him the water convinced him to drink some. You didn't mess with that look. He took a sip and nodded at her. "I haven't drawn any since that sketch, actually." He took another sip. He was thirstier than he had realized. "I don't know if she didn't like it. That was just the way she was."
***
"If you mean she was self-absorbed and dismissive of other people's efforts, then I'd say you captured her likeness perfectly." I crossed my arms and nodded at the cup he held. "Drink up."
***
He started to say something, but then thought better of it and took a large sip of water instead. He really must be drunk if he was defending Adriana.
"You like the sketch though?" It was suddenly very important to him that Rina liked it.
***
I drew breath to tell him what I thought of the execution of it when something in his tone stayed my tongue. Being Lem's mother had sharpened my ear to certain nuances and I realized that Joshua very much wanted me to like that drawing. I hated the subject but genuinely cared for the artist, and answered him truthfully.
"I like it well enough, but I'd like to see you draw someone else, preferably someone who wouldn't insult you for your trouble." I refilled his cup and sat down with him as I thought aloud. "You could ask Nika to sit for you. Christian did that portrait of her you see hanging up here." I gestured vaguely at the surrounding walls, sure he'd already seen it and needed nothing more accurate than a wave.
"It took him over a month, but that's oil for you. Pencil's a drier medium and made for speed. I'll bet you could just catch her on the bridge and do her there. She's spending tons more time in the Chair now that the Cortex is down and getting her to park herself shouldn't be problem."
***
Why was she asking him to draw Nika? It was getting harder to organize his thoughts, but that didn't make any sense to him. "Why would I want to draw her? If I was going to sketch again, I'd want to sketch you, Rinochka." The Russian came out a little slurred as his tongue felt thicker, but he was pretty sure he had gotten it right.
***
I shot off the bunk as if it burned me. The friendly conversation about art had turned deadly serious.
"Don't call me that," I said flatly, retreating as far as the door. I put my back to it and faced him, not wanting to hurt him and hating that I had to. "I'm not... not that. I can't be that. Not for you. I'm sorry, Joshua, but I thought I'd made that perfectly clear from the beginning."
***
He had misstepped somehow, but Joshua couldn't quite get his brain to backtrack and figure out how. "I'm sorry...I mean...I didn't mean..." The words wouldn't quite form right. He paused for a second to collect the words into a coherent thought. "I'm sorry," he said, "I wasn't asking you to love me. I know that's not going to happen."
He got the rest of the water down his throat in a couple large gulps and as he drank, the mug slipped and hit the deck. He stared at the mug for a minute. As clumsy with that as with everything else tonight, it seemed. "It was a misspeak. It won't happen again, Rina." He held his hands up in front of him and looked in her direction, squinting a little from the light. "No hard feelings?"
***
Dammit. Too twitchy. Too twitchy by half.
"No hard feelings," I sighed. I retrieved the mug and put it in his hands. "You're drunk. I should have taken that into account. Drink at least two more of those before turning in, you got that? I'll come by and check on you a little later."
I gave him a nod and patted his knee and rose to go.
***
"Thanks," he said. "I'll make sure to drink it all. And then I plan to pass out." He moved the mug to one hand and softly waved good-bye with the other as Rina walked out the door.
After Rina left, closing the door behind her, Joshua lay on his bunk, staring at the ceiling. Was he in love with her? He didn't think so, but though they weren’t lovers he’d claimed her as his with his use of the diminutive. Maybe his drunken instinct knew better than he did. Such a mess.
The only thing to do, really, was just to keep his mouth shut and step carefully. She'd bolt if he wasn't careful, and in love or not, he didn't want that. Whatever he was feeling for her, he wanted to hang on to it as long as possible.
One last thing, he thought, before sleeping time. He leaned over the side of his bunk. The blood rushing to his head made him dizzy. He shook his head a little and opened up the bunk drawer, reaching under the clothes to pull out the sketchbook. Finding the drawing without looking for it, he tore it in half, and then in half again, leaving small shreds of brightly colored paper fluttering to the floor. Then he stowed the book, closed the drawer, and lay back on his pillow.
There. It had been stupid to keep it in the first place. And he'd rather not remember tonight's events every time he got his clothes out. Then he closed his eyes, hoping sleep would do its job and let the memories, both fake and real, be washed away.
***
DVD Special Features: Deleted Scenes
***(Extended ending)***
I saw the paper on the floor the second I came back to check on him. And as the bitch would have it, he'd missed tearing her upraised finger in two. I stepped carefully around the trash and refreshed his water pitcher before looking him over.
He'd managed to get tangled in the blankets and straightening them was a matter of a minute. He murmured in his sleep and I was struck again by how much he resembled a little boy...but this was a grown man I was dealing with, not a child, with a man's needs. And heart.
I made sure the blankets didn't bind him but resisted covering him to the chin as I would have done for Lem and automatically reached for the paper on the floor....and stopped.
He tore it up for a reason. It's his business, not yours. Let him deal with it. Don't embarrass him.
Still, I had to wonder. He'd carried that drawing with him for however long he had, possibly through multiple missions, for a reason. Likely a strong one. And to tear it up now?
It was a declaration, one I wasn't willing or ready to speculate on yet. Instead I left him sleeping, dreaming whatever dreams he dreamt, and left.
And tried not to think of that upraised finger lying on the floor.
Since this season turned out to be RP heavy, it's only fair to include the link to everyone's efforts.
Go back to Backstop | Go to Before and After
Go to Peripatetica - Rina's Journal entry and RP log
Go to Rina's Russian Glossary
Go to Rina's Crew Page
Go to EPISODES or TIMELINE
