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From:

heyboss

Sheehan doesn't command his attention, doesn't even sit across from him. He sits on the edge of the bed, a little catty corner from him.

"How did it go?"

From:

cameclosest

He takes in a breath and shakes his head, his voice unstable, "it...went how most of these sorts of talks go. Nothing I said came out how I meant it. I just... never know what to say. It's Infuriating."

From:

heyboss

He holds up a hand. "Alright. Why don't you - just start from the beginning? Tell me how it went?"

From:

cameclosest

"Sokie called me, said she and Doe needed to say something to me. And I've been actively avoiding seeing both of them at the same time. For months." He'd not wanted to deal with seeing them together. It was hard enough listening to Sokie talk about Doe, but as much as it hurt he didn't hate her for that.

She was in love, what else was she supposed to do?

"But when I came over it was just her...and she told me as fucking delicately as she could, they were getting married next month."

From:

heyboss

He nods, his hands folded. "Handling you?" he offers as a question more than a statement.

From:

cameclosest

"Handling me," he confirms, sucking in a breath before he falls back on the mattress, staring up at the ceiling.

"And I understand, to some degree, she's trying to be considerate, but...regardless of not wanting to be treated like her own happiness is a fucking affront to my own, it just feels too familiar. And I can't... I can't handle that."

From:

heyboss

Sheehan can picture the conversation and just how...well it went.

He frowns.

"And so what happened? How did you react?"

From:

cameclosest

He closes his eyes and shakes his head, "at first I asked her what she expected me to do, like I was supposed to be sitting for it and have a some kind of fit... and I told her to stop trying to treat me like glass. But like I said, it didn't come out right. She looked for a moment like I'd hurt her, so I- I tried to clarify, but she has this idea she just came up with, and maybe it's my fault, that I let her believe it...but what she's trying to protect me from isn't the part that hurts."

But because she's frustrating he gets too angry or upset before he manages to actually clarify or work through much of anything. "So I just left, before I said something else that doesn't come out the way I meant it to."

From:

heyboss

And Sokie herself has trouble with jumping to the first terrible conclusion that she lands out and finding any way of confirming it.

He believes that much.

"So you'd like to...explain better?" he wonders.

From:

cameclosest

"No." He just wants her to know without having to say anything. He's never been great at it, not like this.

The kinds of conversations where you're supposed to be honest and delicate and risk so much just for having it.

"If I could I'd just fucking scrap the lot of it, but I can't keep doing this. Letting it be until it's died from neglect... I'd ask Norton to talk with her, but he's a god damn mess himself and fucking worse than I am with this shit."

From:

heyboss

"So you want me to talk to her," he says with a nod. "That's something I can do, but - can I give you some advice?"

It's actually the same exact advice he'd given Sokie, but he would never reveal what happens in a professional session.

From:

cameclosest

"Oh, how nice of you to offer, Lester." He says as if he had actually offered rather than guessed why he had come knocking at his door at six thirty in the morning.

His head does lift though, breathing in deeply before sighing, "what?"

From:

heyboss

He smiles through the annoyance.

"Take a few seconds before responding. Five seconds will feel like an eternity, but it may help."

From:

cameclosest

Varker stares at him and his smile, listening to his advice before he lets his head fall back down onto the mattress.

"I'm not sure that will help. I might go to give myself five seconds and blink. Suddenly it's five years and I've said nothing at all."

From:

heyboss

He tucks his hands under his chin. "And would that have made it better or worse?"

From:

cameclosest

"I suppose it depends. Its fucking pathetic, but better or worse...it depends on what Sokie would do in the absence of me. Best case scenario I've lost a friend for lack of trying."

From:

heyboss

"It's not pathetic," he assures him. "It's not. You are not pathetic."

From:

cameclosest

Varker runs his hands down his face as he takes a deep breath in, "that's brave of you to say without knowing the whole of me and my mistakes."

From:

heyboss

"No, it's a very simple statement to make when my threshold for pitiful is much higher than any person is able to meet," he responds as he takes a cigarette from his pocket.

From:

cameclosest

He might be mumbling something about how he might be surprised as he sits up more, holding his hand out with the index and middle finger extended, "if you have another, I'll take it."

He stopped smoking in 2003, but with how often people smoke on board, it was only a matter of time he picked it up again.

Edited Date: 2025-09-05 01:34 am (UTC)

From:

heyboss

"You sure?"

He does reach in for his pack, though, and his lighter.

From:

cameclosest

"It isnt like it can make me anymore dead than I already am. Of course I'm sure." And he doesn't think he deserves the second chance so why not?

He does sit himself up at the edge of the bed again, sucking his teeth before glancing at Sheehan, "and...I think you've probably known Stew is dead, so he can't get mad about it, even if he wanted to."

From:

heyboss

He lights his own cigarette before handing them both over to him.

"Yes, Doctor Varker, I had assumed, but - it seemed better to let you have that on your own terms."

From:

cameclosest

Varker takes his time lighting his cigarette, taking a long pull of it as if he hadn't stopped smoking for the past sixteen years.

He does cough a little, on the exhale, but it does help steady him a bit, "it was kind of you, to let me pretend." And he means that sincerely, "I didnt think I would smile like that, thinking about him again, but..."

He rests the heel of his hand on his knee, smoke slowly rising from his little cigarette, "that isn't why I need you to talk to Sokie for me...not the whole of it."