green-Leah | blue - Shel
Fen felt like she was
still dreaming, her body had that distinct floating feeling, like it was
suspended in.... Quick!
Open your eyes! Eyes the color of Endor Moss batted open to the
color of....black and grey slats on the floor?
She breathed a sigh of relief that she wasn't floating
in orange, though as soon as the breath was exhaled, she almost wished
she was. Memory came flooding back to her. Wes had left, Hobbie and she
were alseep together on the
couch, and she had a strong feeling of nausea in
her stomach. She had a very hard time deciding if it was morning sickness
or grief and if she should get up to relieve herself of it.
Hobbie stirred slightly in his sleep, adjusting his
arms about her unconsciously.
The tightening of his arms stirred a pang of that
nausea. It was grief. Another sigh as she surrendered to Hobbie's embrace,
settling for being awake and cuddled just now. Afterall, she wasn't the
only one Wes had left in the
middle of the night.
Hobbie let out a shuddering sigh, he didn't want to
wake up just yet. He was comfortable where he was. He wasn't sure WHERE
that was, but right nwo he didn't care anymore.
She felt him stir around her, his
arms tightening just right to tell her that he was awake. "Hobbie?" she
whispered.
He groaned slightly, realising he couldn't just sleep
forever. He didn't open his eyes, "Yeah?"
"Good morning," she smiled softly, freeing a hand
just enough to reach up and blindly feel his cheek.
He froned slightly, "What's good about it?" he said
quietly, tiredly.
"The company?" She guessed only half jokingly.
"Yeah..." he sighed and hugged her slightly.
"What's on your agenda for today?" As she spoke,
she tried her best not to breathe too much from her mouth, wanting very
much to brush her teeth right now.
He sighed, "Work."
"Anything I might do to convince you to take a
day off?" Just like the night before, she didn't really feel like being
alone.
"You just did," he sighed. He didn't want to think
about things, but somewhere along the day he'd have to put some thought
into who would be the new XO.
"Good," she replied, snuggled closer to her best
friend, burying her face against him a bit, taking in a lungful of his
smell. A sort of comforting, clean smell. Though just now, it was tinted
with a bit of the couch. THey both
needed showers.
Absently, as she snuggled comfourtingly against him,
he gently rubbed her back in long circles. He sighed. He could get used
to this.
She could too. Though was it Hobbie, or was it
that she was being held again? Such tough decisions. "Hey, I'm going
to take a quick shower. Do you want to take one here, or back at your place?"
She had meant 'do you want to
wait for me to finish mine, or do you want to go
back to your place and I'll meet you there later' though it hardly came
out that way.
However, he quite caught what he meant, chuckling
at her wording. "I'll go back to my place, I'll need clean clothes anyhow."
Always the gentleman....
Hey, she never caught it. "Alright. I'll meet
you there in about an hour?"
He tightened his arms around her, "I'm not quite ready
to let go yet."
though meant to be teasing, his tone was more... needful.
starved for human contact.
She nuzzled against him some more. "Me either."
So was she.
For a while they stayed snuggled like that, on the
couch... until a very painful crick began forming into Hobbie's back.
He started trying to readjust the way he was seated.
His shifting and twisting made her sit up, stretching
her arms out wide. "I think that's our cue, Hobbs."
He pouted slightly, and then nodded. "Guess so."
He stood and stretched, his back popping loudly.
That noise made her nose wrinkle. "Yeah, guess
so." She leaned closer to him just long enough to kiss his cheek softly
before rising. "About an hour then?"
"An hour it is," he nodded to her as he moved toward
the door, still stretching, back still popping some. Man wasn't meant
to
sleep in that position. It was rather like twenty
hours in the cockpit on the way to a mission.
And in that hour Fen showered, brushed her teeth,
dressed, combed her ahir -but didn't braid it- and even touched a bit of
light perfume behind her ears. After all that was done, she headed to
Hobbie's place.
When he heard the door buzz, he called "It's open!"
knowing it was probably Feni, as nobody ever visited him since he'd moved.
There were still a few boxes here and there, and
Hobbie was bent over one, wearing black slacks but bare chested, looking
for a clean shirt. Drawbacks of working all the time were lack of laundry
time.
Fen entered, but leaned back against the door as
soon as it closed, something of a smirk on her face. She whistled approvingly.
He stopped moving a moment, then chuckled to himself
as he kept looking, "have a seat, I'll be with you soon."
"Nah, I like the view from right here." What?!
She can't check out her best friend?
Hobbie just shook his head in response, and finally
dug out a prussian blue shirt. He quickly pulled it on and buttoned it
as he turned to look at her. A smile played on his lips at her image.
Odd that he chose blue as she was wearing a mix
of blues and soft greys. All only mildly formfitting of course. Can't
be too girly afterall. "What?" she asked lightly.
He shrugged, "You look well." He wasn't about to
admit that he would fall to her feet if she but asked.
"Ditto." Where his voice was the picture of even
toned and very schooled, hers was a bit more packed with....cockiness.
He raised an eyebrow, "Well, you asked me to take
the day off... what are we doing?"
She shrugged "What would oyu like to do?"
"Thats... uh, classified. For life expectancy purposes."
She blinked confusedly for a moment. "My curiosity
is too strong. You know very well I like having you around too much to
do anything to you for wanting to do anything. So spill it."
"Other than working, be it deskwork, simwork, blowing
things up work, I can't really think of anything."
"Fibber. I'd tell you," she almost mock whined.
"Really!"
He folded his arms and looked at the ceiling as he
thought really hard for something else. "Oh."
"Sitting on the bottom of a pool, and brooding." he
almost smirked.
"Alright, well, I'm not going to let you do that,
so lets think of something else and fast."
"I'm sorry Fen, I honestly can't." he wove through
the few boxes in the small apartment, less than half the size of the one
he'd shared with Wes, and moved to sit on the couch, motioning for her
to do likewise.
Glancing about at all of the boxes, she suggested,
"Maybe get you unpacked and settled in?"
"You odn't relaly want to help me with that, Fen."
"Sure. It's something, and it keeps you from hiding
in that second home of yours all day."
He got up, "Just a moment." he disappeared into the
other room, then reappeared with the lucky elastic he'd filtched from her
over a month earlier.
"Here, you may want to tie your hair up of you're
gonna be helping me unpack."
SHe'd totally forgot about it. "Hey! You kept
it! Wow, Hobbie, I figured you'd thrown it away or something." Just as
he'd suggested, she quickly braided her hair back and bundled it ont he
crown of her head.
He shook his head, "No, if you remember, I told you
I n eeded all the luck I can get."
he smiled as he watched her. amazing how women could
do that sort of thing.
"I finally figured out your luck problem." She
grinned, having figured it out, or rather cooked it up, just on the fly.
Right now.
"What's that?" He wasn't looking at her now, he was
working at rolling up his sleeves.
She slipped free of her overshirt, hanging it on
the doorknob before readjusting her tank top. "Well, I think you're more
of a goodluck charm to those around you, but then any goodluck that you
have naturally just kidna well...gets
give to others." Alright, so it wasn't completely
water tight, but it was a start.
Not only did it leak in water... "I think you have
it backwards, Fen."
"No, seriosuly, think about it. How many times
have you crashed or something bad happened to you instead of someone else?"
"Point conceeded, but that doesn't explain how many
MORE bad things happen to those around me," he said mildly as he moved
to open a box of curios and pictures.
She picked a box next to that one, finding it full
of clothes and shoes and gear. "Everyone has bad luck, Hobbs. You can't
take the blame for bad things happening to others." Course, that only disproved
her little theory, but
the point was to cheer Hobbie, not actually come
up with something.
"Fen, I belive the term for what you're doing is 'grasping
at straws'." he half chuckled.
