abrightboy | Voicemail (IC Contact Post) OLD

abrightboy

This is Bright. Leave a message.

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From:

abrightboy

Did you like it?

From:

cactusy

I wanted to work in the medical field since I was ten. I found it rewarding.

From:

abrightboy

Were you good at the work?

From:

cactusy

[A pause.]

Parts of it. I was good at the technical aspects.

From:

abrightboy

If you’re not a clinician, you don’t need to be much of a people person and the technical work is more important. Bit dramatic of him to tell you that you weren’t suited for medicine at all.

From:

cactusy

If I'd ended up a doctor, I wouldn't be where I am now.

[For better, or for worse.]

I wouldn't change things, even if I could.

From:

abrightboy

That doesn’t make the wrong done to you less wrong.

From:

cactusy

I guess. I just can't really bring myself to be that bothered by it.

[Not by the aftereffects of it, anyway. The interaction itself, and the message she'd taken from it - that she is too broken herself to heal other people, that she is unfit for anything too steeped in humanity, that her intrinsic alienness will always carry more weight than anything else - have stuck around.]

Anyway. I wanted to share that with you, because it's something we have in common.

From:

abrightboy

Thank you.

[He fidgets with his teacup, the gestures to a nearby bench.]

Can we sit down?

From:

cactusy

I guess.

[Shaw un-drapes herself, moving over to the indicated bench and sitting down, hunching over her lap with both hands curled around her cup.]

I'm telling you about this not because I'm looking for psychological help, but because friends get to know each other. Okay? This is what friends do.

From:

abrightboy

I know that. I thought I’d been pretty open with you.

From:

cactusy

Yeah. Which is why I'm being open in turn.

From:

abrightboy

I appreciate that. [He pauses.] Can I ask why you decided to do it now?

From:

cactusy

Because I need an open dialogue with you. And professional stuff is all tied up in personal stuff here; my professional life is literally your personal life now. So if I'm going to ask you to quit slamming doors in my face... I'm going to have to stop slamming them in yours.

From:

abrightboy

That makes sense. That’s… fundamentally correct. Except. I didn’t think I was slamming doors in your face.

From:

cactusy

You do when you think I'm insulting you. Which is... a lot.

From:

abrightboy

I want to ask you a question and I’m not being sarcastic or snide or condescending: I really want to know.

When you tell me, for example, that you don’t think I’m bad at my job but the content of all of your comments about my job performance are negative… how does that math reconcile for you?

From:

cactusy

It means I suck at expressing myself in any other terms but annoyance.

From:

abrightboy

Oh. Well, how are other people supposed to do that math? If you look annoyed and you tell me I’m crap, how am I - or how is anyone - realistically supposed to realize you want them around and you don’t think they’re crap?

From:

cactusy

Yeah, trust me; if I knew that, I'd tell you.

[She sits back a little, rubbing at the bridge of her nose.]

I'm trying to... work on it.

From:

abrightboy

My only point before was that’s not ‘jumping to conclusions’ or ‘making assumptions’. I didn’t try to read it in the way you touch your hair or some microexpression that passed across your features when you said it. It’s not reading someone badly to hear what they say and draw the only logical conclusion put forward by their own words. But - that being said - now that you’ve shared this particular challenge with me, I can take it into account and… not assume that 100% negative feedback means you feel 100% negative about something.

From:

cactusy

Okay. Cool.

[She shifts a little on the bench - taking a long sip of her drink, then setting it aside for a moment so that she can cross her arms.]

I'm trying to think of stuff to share; you got any other questions or points of confusion?

From:

abrightboy

Not off the top of my head. But what you just said is probably the most helpful thing you could have shared. You don’t have to force it.

So… what is it you’re actually worried about with me and Will? Straight up, no dancing.

From:

cactusy

That he isn't currently capable of a healthy relationship and you're too smitten to realize it. If just one of those things were true, it wouldn't be a problem, but, uh-- you haven't exactly instilled me with confidence in this conversation. Sorry.