winterxdove | Open RP

Ah, that makes more sense. Do you like being able to kind of pick up and move wherever you want?

I feel like that just means you have a lot pent up that you may not be releasing. And that would be part of the problem, only talking to your brother and sister. For starters, you need someone you're not related to, didn't grow up with, to vent to, to really get the full effect. And they're too close because you're bound to keep some things back to not hurt them or say something you'll regret.

I don't know. I don't actually move all that much, but I like the idea that I could.

You sound like the social worker I had as a kid. She was always encouraging me to open up, too. I'm not even sure I'd know where to start.

Whatever living makes you happy, is the best one.

I'm far from a social worker, unless social workers are willing to bring you a bottle if you need it. Though, I've been to enough therapists in my life that maybe something stuck. As for where to start, generally, you just start talking. If you let go a little, your mind will usually take lead for where to start. Sometimes my rants were as simple as my sister in my room without permission, other times it was deeper but it started similarly.

A bottle's a lot better than the social worker ever did.

Ok. Screw Max's rules. 'Cause that's how it always starts. And just when I think there might be some light left, some hope...it all implodes.

The bottle can be more forgiving than a social worker too.

Sounds like Max's rules are only hurting you. Did you want to do this over a bottle, rather than over texts?

That's for damn sure.

He means well. And, yeah. Over a bottle would be easier.

What would you like, I'll pick it up if you tell me where you are.

Jack's always good. And I'm up on the water tower. Though I can come down, meet you somewhere if you want. View's pretty sweet, though.

I can come up. I'll be there soon with a bottle of Jack.

You are my new favorite person.

Because I bring you a bottle of Jack?

Even to tops of water towers, yes. Most people'd just yell at me to get down.

I'm always up for a new view of a city. And most people are stupid.

Yes. Yes they are.

There isn't an answer to the text, partially because she had to stop and pick up the bottle, and then drive, and then climb up the ladder. He'll probably hear her before she ends up slipping onto that narrow walkway that circles the water tower. It's easy to find him up here, and she settles next to him easily before pulling the bottle out of a small shoulder bag she's got with her. "One bottle of jack." There's a beat before she adds, "I also have like six tacos in my bag because I figure if we get hungry drinking, we won't want to leave to get food."

For all his talk about the view of the town, he's laying back, gaze focused on the stars with a naked sense of longing he shutters away when he hears her make the walkway. By the time she settles, he's pushed back up to sitting, greeting her with a half smile.

"That's some good planning. Thanks..."

He's not wrong about the town though, it's a lovely view. Though as she glances up at the stars she wouldn't blame anyone for choosing that view either, because they're so much more vibrant up here, above the city's lights interfering with the view. She sets the bottle down between them, letting him decide when he wants it and leans back against the metal of the water tower as she offering him a soft smile.

"I've had a decent amount of practice, to anticipate needs while drinking." She stretches her legs out in front of her a little as she tilts her head up to watch the stars instead of the town, giving him both an ear but hopefully not making him feel like he's being watched or that there's anything expected. "So, rules from the right place but still hurting you, I think is where you left off."

He reaches for the bottle, unscrewing the cap and taking a long drink before saying anything. He needs it, though more for Dutch courage, as it were, than trying to drown out anything. Not opening up is how he's lived his whole life. Of course, his life is not much of one. Could be the two are related. Granted, there's good reason for some of it, but not all.

It's a fine line he's thinking of walking. Thus the way he falls silent again after taking a long drink, staring out over the town.

"Everything important, everything real in my life is a secret from someone I love. Or a lie. And I'm really tired of lying to people I love. But...everyone's got rules. And they aren't all my secrets to tell, so, lying feels like a betrayal, but the truth would be, too."

Sansa is quiet as he works through getting to talking, not fidgeting or pushing to get him to answer her. Truthfully, if he had changed his mind and didn't want to talk, she'd respect that too. But she was being truthful about, at least in her case, having it feel better to talk to someone that's not related to the issues bugging her. To get them off her chest, so to speak.

Green eyes finally shift to watch him as he opens up at least a little.

She doesn't reach a handout, but her jean clad knee bumps his gently in an offer of support. It's not easy to talk, and his problems sound extremely tangled. It's no wonder just venting to his siblings wasn't working, really. They're too tangled in it all with him. "Sounds like a painful knot," she offers gently. "Is there any way to untangle your secrets from the others, so you can find some kind of middle ground of being honest with the one you love?"

Michael bumps her knee back gently with his own in turn, has had just enough alcohol to let it rest there. It's a tiny piece of human--for a certain value of "human"--contact, but he lets it ground him in the here and now, even as he tilts his head back to look up at the stars.

"Very." He didn't like to think about the pain that often, but everything's been coming to a head now. "I don't know. Maybe, though I got a feeling it's too late on one side, which makes it not matter as much on the other." He knows he's talking in circles, but he's trying to find his way through it all, and it is his first time, after all. "So if it's too late, and, thus, doesn't matter, then I shouldn't keep letting it bother me. I mean...he didn't leave because he knows I lied."

There's something about having that silent support. She's found that it tends to go a long way, and Sansa's glad to offer it. Also gives him the best of both because he can continue to watch the stars above them.

The circles are making her head spin a little, everything definitely sounds like it'd be nearly impossible to separate out. There's a quiet moment as her mind words over everything before she finally asks, "If it's too late for what? And when did he leave?"

Michael frowns a little, trying to think how to explain without giving away secrets and without lying. The stars certainly didn't have any more answers than they ever had before.

"He left a couple of weeks ago," he said, after a moment. "And there's not been anyone I can talk to about him, at all, ever. I mean, my family doesn't know that I...I don't even have a word for it. They've only ever seen me with girls; didn't know about him, that he and I ever were a thing. And I...I thought maybe we could tell my sister. He...did not react well to the suggestions. He's been out for over ten years, so that wasn't it. It was just...me, I guess. And, then, he got pissed about one of my side hustles, where I'm just trying to get by, y'know. And ended it over that. So, the actual secret I was keeping from him, the thing about me I've never told him, wasn't even a factor, 'cause he doesn't know there's anything I haven't told him. And, technically, my brother doesn't know what my sister and I have kept from him, and my sister doesn't know what my brother and I have been keeping from her, and neither of them know that I've been in love with someone who doesn't think I'm good enough for him for ten years, who...used to think I was, but things went bad, then, too."

He rubs a hand over his face. "....that probably doesn't clear up that much, huh?"

There's a lot in what he says, but Sansa is paying attention. Which means it makes at least a little sense to her. Once she goes over it in her head a little more to tease it apart.

"Sounds like the why he didn't want to mention it is a conversation you need to have if you two decide to try to give it a go again." Her head tilted to look up at the sky herself as she takes a breath. "Though I guess the question is, do you want to try again should the possibility present itself. But getting pissed over side hustles doesn't sound great either."

The back and forth regarding the secrets between siblings is the part that gets a little harder to understand because it's still very unclear. "The keeping things from your siblings sounds like you all really need to sit down and have a long talk. Hard or not, family shouldn't keep secrets from each other. And if something happened, family should be the people you can trust to stand by you."

"And if you need an outside ear, I'm happy to lend mine." Because sometimes you need a third party to talk to too. But Sansa gets family, and secrets, and working through those secrets can be hard but they've always made it through.

"I think he felt bad about it, later," he said, grudgingly, taking another swig of the Jack, then setting it down. "But he's walked away twice, y'know? And I don't even understand why I can't do the same...whole thing screws me up."

That he was even admitting to her the ex who'd walked away was a guy was a step, honestly. He'd been ready to tell Isobel, ready to tell anyone, while Alex was there, but when Alex wasn't there, it was far easier to retreat back to the safety of flirting and more with pretty girls. He knew bisexuals existed, in theory, but he'd never met anyone who identified that way--at least not another guy, so his conceptual map of what this looked like was a bit skewed, too.

"I like to think I wouldn't let him pull me back in, and maybe I shouldn't, if I can't be totally honest with him, too."

He glanced over at her. "You're right. I'm tired of the secrets. I just...I'm afraid telling them wouldn't leach the poison so much as destroy us, and...they're all I've got." His gaze turned a bit skeptical. "You sure you really wanna hear all this?" Telling someone, anyone, even if he couldn't go into the details, was both a terrifying and liberating idea.

"I have a feeling I know why, but I'm not sure you're ready to hear it if you haven't gotten to the why yourself." She reaches to take a swig of the Jack herself. Love is a funny thing. It's also something that screws people up when they haven't admitted or haven't realized that's the cause of some of the problems.

Admitting it was a first step. Maybe he just needed the ability to say it to someone less involved. Though, hiding your heart was easier when you fell into past patterns that made people think you didn't care. That and alcohol. Both were easy. Sansa's happy to give him that ear though, to help him take that step.

"It comes down to what you'd want in the end. Do you want him back, to see if you two could work it out?"

She offered a soft smile. "Sometimes you have to trust that the family bond is stronger than the secrets. If they're all you've got, it means you're all they have too. And even if some time might be needed, family usually gravitates back together after it's healed from any wounds." She nodded in the face of that skeptical look. "I'm sure I really want to hear this."

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