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[unshut]

(crystal | written | action)

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[unshut]

Happy news! We are both ill together and can do one another no harm.

[justashotaway]

Then I will find some cord.

[Which is how Laura finds her way to Fitcher, holding a hairbrush and some string, a plaide-weave blanket wrapped around her. She is not, perhaps, at her very best.

Silently, she holds out her offerings, uncertain exactly how this begins.]

[unshut]

[Fitcher, laid up in bed, is hardly the picture of dignified either. There is something about the waxen quality of her complexion that and the hollow of her dark eyes which ages her. Still, she is quite game to pat beside her on the bed in invitation once Laura appears.]

You look miserable.

[justashotaway]

[ This is a clear answer, one Laura takes gratefully. She perches beside Fitcher on the edge of the bed, facing her, and sets the supplies she brought in her lap. ]

You do, too.

[ For the first time, she understands--truly feels--the concern others have for the grippe. Those who have died in Lowtown are faceless, nameless. Fitcher is here, smelling of sickness and looking half-worthy of mourning already. Worry snakes through Laura, pinching her brows. ]

Are you well enough for plaits?

[unshut]

Perfectly fit. But I'll make a deal with you and promise to say so if I tire out, so long as you swear not to tell anyone what an old woman I've become. Go ahead and begin by brushing out your hair. I'll show you how this works as you do it.

[The cord she plucks out of her lap, folding into ito roughly three equal segments. It is, mercifully, just long enough to illustrate the point she wishes to make.]

Now, there are more complicated versions of this but here is the simplest one you should learn first. Pretend these haven't the loops at the end, but watch how I bring the outside to the inside in alternating patterns.

[justashotaway]

I will not tell anyone.

[This sounds like a joke--she's learning to hear those in Fitcher's voice, and even her writing!--but also like something worth promising anyway. No one should know how tired Fitcher looks; Laura will keep that knowledge safe inside her, and everyone will simply see how well Fitcher is when she recovers. That is how it should be.

She brushes the tangles (inevitable) out of her hair, her full attention on Fitcher's careful hands and the strands she moves.]

You cross them over each other. [No, not that.] Over the center.

[unshut]

Just so. It's a simple pattern, but the real trick is in the proper tension. That part is what will take practice.

[She reaches the end of the plait, shows it, then casually unwinds it.]

[justashotaway]

[Which is the thing she's been thinking about, as it happens. To wit:]

Matthias says that if you plait it very tightly, it will make headaches go away.

[unshut]

[Her laugh is low and thick - pleasantly surprised.]

How does he know, I wonder?

[justashotaway]

They told him at the Circle. [Right? Hm. The conversation has gotten fuzzier than her memories usually do. Illness is frustrating.] I think.

[unshut]

I see. [It's one of those knowing (and doubtful) sounds. But--] Well, in my own experience I'd say a tight plait breeds a headache rather than curing it. But perhaps my scalp is over sensitive.

Here. [She takes the brush.] Turn around.

[justashotaway]

[Laura does as told, in silent consideration all the while. Matthias' hair is very short, while Fitcher's isn't. Her experience carries a sort of weight Matthias' suggestion doesn't.

So, inevitably--]

It does not have to be very tight.

[unshut]

[Separating her dark hair into three sections, Fitcher says,] We should give Matthias the benefit of the doubt and try it. If you find it isn't helpful, I will redo it.

[Her grip on Laura's hair is firm, steady, a sturdy series of not quite tugs as she begins to braid.]

How is your kitten?

[justashotaway]

[Laura gives a slight nod, wanting to acknowledge Fitcher's suggestion without making the process of braiding more difficult. As sick as she looked earlier, Fitcher's fingers are deft and sure.

It's comforting, somehow, to feel someone else's hands in her hair, present because they're wanted and working with a slow steadiness. She's reminded of the feel of her mother's shoulder against her cheek, just before she was prodded into sitting up straight.]

She is very soft. But she has her own mind. [That is the thing she likes best about the kitten.] Her name is Philliam. Or Biter.

[unshut]

Philliam is very pretty. But Biter [she says, the curve of her tone pleasant despite the rasp of illness in her voice. Tug, go her fingers] is an excellent name for a cat.

[justashotaway]

Philliam is a bard. [Exclamation point. She read a book, about nugs and foxes, with his name on the cover and liked it. Her own voice has a sort of airy distance to it, despite its hoarseness, as if she's being lulled by the sensation of the little pulls against her scalp.] Biter was Matthias' suggestion.

[There are two kinds of people.]

[unshut]

A very literal minded boy, your friend.

[It's the fever, but there is a kind of pleasure in this - the winding of dark hair, the tug which solidifies each row of the plait. She can't remember the last time she braided a girl's hair, though logically she knows it must have been forty years ago in a narrow interior courtyard in the dye and fabric districts of a place in Antiva. A sister or a cousin, maybe.]

[justashotaway]

There is a different word for it after you kiss.

[She hasn't settled on which one, mostly because she mislikes several of the options. But surely friend is no longer accurate. A pause, thoughtful, and then--]

The kitten does not bite. But she could. I think that is why.

[unshut]

Kissing a boy shouldn't make him not a friend, [is her arch opinion on the whole matter.

And then she has reached the bottom of the plait. With a deft turn of the cord at the behest of nimble fingers, the braid is bound and turned over Laura's shoulder]

[justashotaway]

He is that, too.

[But differentiation. Classifying things accurately. Strange feelings. She reaches for the tail of the braid, brushing the ends of her hair against her palm. When she drops it over her shoulder, it hits her back; she spends a moment tilting her head back and forth, feeling the bound cord swinging like a tiny weight.

It is unobjectionable.

Turning around, she adds--]

And now I will braid your hair.

[unshut]

[Fitcher indulges her with a smil, and fetches up the brush to take to her own dark hair.

It takes a few minutes to untangle. When loose, her hair is long and its coarseness seems more plain than when she wears it in twists or with pins.]

I haven't anything to tie it with. But that's all right; it's for practice anyway.

[It takes some effort to rearrange herself in the bed, twisting to give Laura access.]

[justashotaway]

[It's at once mesmerizing and disappointing to watch Fitcher's hair come down--less because it's unimpressive unbound and more because Laura's fingers itch to brush it out herself. She isn't sure why.

Once it is loose, Fitcher looks like somebody else--as surprising as finding her reclining in bed rather than at work on something, perhaps. (Laura resolves to look in a mirror after this and see if she looks like a different person, too, with her hair drawn back from her face.)

She touches Fitcher's hair tentatively, gathering it up in her hands and smoothing it out. It occurs to her that she's not sure she's ever touched someone else's hair before. As she divides it into three sections, she takes a chance on questioning her.]

Do you have a lover?

[unshut]

[She laughs. It's a low, pleasant sound - all smoky and warm as Fitcher bows her head indulgently to the work of Laura's hands.]

I have a friend.

[justashotaway]

One that you kiss.

[She's staring at the strands of hair in her hands, trying to decide the best way to start. One hand must hold two strands of hair, but which hand? Laying the cord over and over itself was easier when it was lying horizontal on the bed.

But she gives it a try, crossing one over the center and then frowning at her hands. Now one hand must hold all three strands. Her pinkie finger closes around the traveling strand of hair, and it quickly ends up merged with the other outside section. Laura takes hold of the center with her free hand, then finds herself trying to re-divide the other two.

This is slightly more difficult than it looks.]

[unshut]

[It's a matter of practice; luckily neither of them have much of anywhere to be.]

He kisses me. When I want him to.