people talk about how great love is, but that’s bullshit. love hurts. feelings are disturbing.

[rhinemaid]

Who: Ilde Decima & Ivan.
What: Meg Shao did something for Ilde before she left; Ilde has been meaning to discuss it with Ivan for a while.
Where: Ivan's apartment, Mafaton.
When: Veerdi night.
Notes: The squidbaby cometh. Did you know the gestation period of an octopus is seven months?
Warnings: Uhhh let me get back to you on that as necessary, but the usual probably apply ("reference to trauma").

After a few people know, she stops talking about it; she hadn't wanted to dive right into this conversation with Ivan before they'd both had some time to resettle with her presence in the city, but she doesn't want him to be the last to know, either. It doesn't seem fair, or practical, or a hundred other little things that fit together into this thing she doesn't entirely understand that they are allegedly referring to now as 'a relationship'. If she's planning something drastically life-altering, and he's got some kind of inexplicable investment in her life, then this is one of those things they're supposed to talk about and she doesn't even need someone else to give her the nudge, this time.

She's slowly easing back into work - cello and violin lessons mean working from home, which is easier, and most of her clients have been understanding without asking too many questions (they understand 'Baedal happens' just like everybody else) - and it's easier again than moving back into her wider social spheres. She promises music to Rodolphus and sits in the temple with Jae and sleeps beside Sonja the first couple of nights she's back, which is mostly for her own sake but maybe it can't hurt to be a heartbeat and solid body after emptiness; she thinks about her father, more, and it's a different and easier pain now that door is shut. It feels like survivor's guilt, except she didn't, so mostly it's just shapes without names and her nails pressing into the palms of her hands. She doesn't talk about what happened with Hilmi; she treats Ivan's apartment like her own space, which isn't new.

He's probably getting used to waking up to her eyes, huge and unblinking, and her weight on his thighs. He'll never need to buy a cat.

Comments

[deservesadaisy]

"You know," he observes, perfect lucid as soon as he opens his eyes, "you could actually nudge me, if you wanted me to wake up sooner." He's more amused than bothered. If there's a time for her to tell him, it's probably a good one; he's been agreeable, since she's been back, but treating her very slightly less as if she's made of glass than he had been prior.

[rhinemaid]

"I was waiting," she says, as though that's all that needs to be said on the subject; it is, she's decided. She doesn't mind waiting, and she likes the moments of silence it involves-- she has plenty of time to decide what she's going to say. How much that time actually helps is debatable, but she's of the vague opinion that it's probably a good thing. It's better than lurching into a conversation like a jack-in-the-box, anyway, since at least this way she's calm.

No less abrupt, though: "Prometheus had me sterilized, after the storm. Because I'm not human at all any more, I think." It's not as though they discussed it with her in detail. "It's reversed. It's what I was going to tell Hasi before New York."

[deservesadaisy]

Whatever conversation he was expecting, it wasn't this one. He sits up a little, slowly enough not to make her lose her balance.

"I see." He pauses for a moment. "You know I can't..."

[rhinemaid]

"I'm intimately familiar with your cock, Ivan, I know what it does and doesn't do." Dead things tend not to be all that useful in the creation of life outside of the necessity of eating something, and she doesn't want to think too deeply on the subject of vampire-as-prey when at the moment it's still a thought that leads her back to Lucas before Sonja. That will pass, she tells herself; he doesn't get to win, not even a small victory of sense-memory and gut clenching.

[deservesadaisy]

"But it's still good news, for you, which suggests you want this." He's not drawing away, but there's a wary air about him; Daisy's daughter had been a wedge between them, among other things.

[rhinemaid]

Given the conflicts between 'vampire psychopath' and 'having children', Ilde isn't anticipating this conversation going extremely well and the hints of tension underlying are preemptive as much as a reaction to his wariness. It's something she's slightly defensive of in the first place-- habitually, because she watches and listens and absorbs attitudes like a sponge. Motherhood is a fraught thing, these days, even if you're not a dead fairy.

"Well, it doesn't have to be your sperm," she says, finally.

[deservesadaisy]

He isn't entirely sure how to take this observation. After a moment, he says, "Tell me what you're telling me, exactly."

[rhinemaid]

A beat.

"Not that," she says, having evidently realized the worrying ambiguity of her last remark. "I was thinking of donors. I could find out more about it at the Glory Shada." She has a relatively vague idea of what that entails, presently, but she's on the right track with where she'd go to find out more.

(She watched the ritual in Shada's temple and wondered if Remy was right.)

[deservesadaisy]

"I see." It was an opaque remark, rather purposely so. Before Ilde, Ivan hadn't been involved with anyone but a vampire since his recruitment. Never seriously. This conversation wasn't something he was properly prepared for.

"You've decided to have a child, then."

[rhinemaid]

"I always planned to, except then I couldn't--" which is a sore point, still, even if it's changed now; the experience was not erased, "--and there was..." New York, and her world, and so much that she had to do first. Which is done, now, in the most definitive way possible.

She presses the heel of her hand to the side of her mouth, reorienting herself. Then, "Not in the next five minutes. Yes, though. It's--" a hesitation, settling on, "--important to me."

She holds herself very carefully.

[deservesadaisy]

"Alright." He doesn't own Ilde; she's perfectly capable of making that decision on her own. "Thank you for telling me."

He's policing his reaction very carefully, for now. He isn't sure exactly how to sort it out yet.

[rhinemaid]

"It seemed like the sort of thing we should probably talk about." Unprepared as she is for actual conversation, at least she's thinking about what she's doing. Even if she's not entirely sure where to go from that very polite close.

[deservesadaisy]

"Ilde... I'm not going to leave you, but it's going to take a lot of your time. And it's probably not best for me to be around your child, which means in total we'll see a great deal less of one another." He says it calmly, almost careful.

[deservesadaisy]

Much later, after they'd plenty of time in bed, Ivan stirred himself to go out to feed. He wasn't gone excessively long, though he didn't rush back, taking some time to consider the evening as a whole.

Then again, as always, he feels better with blood in his system. She's not pregnant yet, nor like to be terribly soon; they have some time left, and then they'd see.

He looks a bit better, as usual after his trips out, when he lets himself in.

[rhinemaid]

Ilde is still there when he gets back, although no longer in bed; she's been up, cleaned her wounds, had a shower. Borrowed a shirt, checked her schedule for tomorrow, checked her messages and realized what Erik did - she makes arrangements for the delivery and a mental note to thank him - and by the time she's done she's curled up on his sofa with one of the books she got for Catenrat that she's been carting around in her purse to sift through in spare moments.

She closes it over her fingertips to hold her place when she looks up-- "Hey, I had a thought."

[deservesadaisy]

"Oh? What thought?" He comes in and kisses the top of her head: affectionate habit.

[rhinemaid]

It's always a little bit satisfying to have inspired anything like habits; insinuating herself into the routines and interior worlds of other people, where they can't be rid of her. She tilts her head up after he does it to kiss his mouth, briefly, before she says, "Can I borrow your keys tomorrow?"

[deservesadaisy]

It wasn't what he was expecting. He raises his eyebrows. "Why?"

[rhinemaid]

"Because I have some errands to run and I thought I could get another key cut while I was doing them," she says, reasonably. It makes sense to her, given the amount of time she spends here; she's essentially splitting her time between Raven's Gate and Mafaton, she keeps things here. It'd be easier if she just had a key, and she wouldn't mind him having one to the villa, so-- so it's just practical, and sensible, and other things that she usually isn't.

They aren't casual any more, they agreed, so she's allowed to think of these things. She's pretty sure. That makes sense.

[deservesadaisy]

He runs a hand back through his hair. "If you want," he says, finally. He doesn't object, he's just not sure how long she'll need one. But if she wants one... he supposes there's nothing wrong with it.

[rhinemaid]

It's a wrong note and she can feel it, but an irritatingly subtle one and she studies him before she parses her own reaction.

"Well, since-- I mean, the conversation we had when I got back..."

Maybe she misjudged what 'not leaving her' entails; she's hesitating, but not quite withdrawing. For once.

[deservesadaisy]

"No - no, it's fine. I didn't think... I don't mind." He's a bit off-balance now, unsure where they're left, but he's honest. He doesn't mind.

[rhinemaid]

"Since I keep some things here, anyway--" she makes a vague, aborted gesture with the book in her hand and then rests it against her thigh, steadying. (Two steps forward, one step back.) "I'd like it."

[deservesadaisy]

"I suppose it would be convenient. Take the key when you go out, then, I don't have daylight plans tomorrow."

It's perfectly logical.

[rhinemaid]

"I will bring it and myself back tomorrow evening, then. And drag you home with me-- my harp's getting delivered." On that subject, she's more sure, more readily pleased; it's an unexpected bit of good news that she appreciates. "Erik found someone to make it for me in Mafaton and it's-- I'm going to put it in the music room, at home."

She likes the idea of playing it for him first; music is an odd kind of intimacy that she can't quite explain.