[open] I'll return one day

[thereneverwas]

WHO: Barrow + you
WHAT: catch-all
WHEN: post lyrium detox
WHERE: mostly the Gallows and surrounding areas
NOTES: open starters are in the post body and bespoke ones are in the comments, hmu if you want one, etc

out & about, OTA

One could be forgiven for thinking nothing has changed. Not long after his time in the infirmary ended, Barrow had made his return to the training yard in the mornings: he busies himself there, offering training and maintaining the weapons and being something adjacent to his usual self. The distance is, however, noticeable at times, when his banter is a bit delayed. Or maybe his smile doesn't meet his eyes, or he stares out at the horizon for a little too long in the middle of a drill.

Nearly every evening now he's in the Loose Noose, nursing an ale for hours as though he's periodically forgotten about it. When once he might have played solitaire, lately he just sits and stares at nothing. Sometimes he smokes, letting the cigarette burn all the way down to his lips before he thinks to ash it.

infirmary, OTA

There's work to be done in the wake of his time in the infirmary, and Barrow finally dredges up the courage to address it. He arrives one day with his toolbox and, without offering much conversation, proceeds to go about mending... everything. He starts with the worst of it: the door to the private room, the bed that took the brunt of his and Lazar's altercation, then makes his way down to smaller details, things he may have left unfinished in his initial restless busyness when he'd first gone off the lyrium.

If spoken to, he speaks, and is even friendly, but his overall bearing is awkward. Uncomfortable. Apologetic, if one squints. Maybe he shouldn't be here, but he wants to make it right.

Comments

[thereneverwas]

Barrow scoffs a laugh, but the mirth of it (little that there was) dwindles in a moment or so, leading to a sort of awkward hesitance as he steps back. Still looking at the door, he can't quite bring himself to look her in the eye.

"It just," he stammers, falls silent for too long. "...wasn't me. But I still." He gestures around. It was him, physically.
"Didn't think everything would go so wrong."

[armd]

"... Yeah."

She sort of understands that feeling. In a way.

Abby folds her arms across her chest. "Sometimes things go wrong. But you're our friend — we're not gonna hate you for that. You were coming off fucking lyrium, it's not like the meltdown wasn't justified."

[thereneverwas]

"It wasn't," Barrow begins to argue, a stiffness shuddering through him, "--it wasn't justified, none of it was." Does she know, does anyone know how pointless it ultimately was?

"Didn't even fucking work." A little convulsion across his face betrays the level of distress he's holding in, his lips taut as he glares into the middle distance. "I'm still on the stuff." Fucking hell.

[armd]

"Oh." She didn't know that. It does make it feel all a bit pointless then, yeah. Silence falls and Abby shifts her weight, suddenly awkward, a little restless. She's jawing at nothing while she thinks.

"Are you gonna try again?"

[thereneverwas]

Her quiet reaction feels like a blow: the only thing worse than failing is that people don't know, and he has to explain it, think about it, relive what he can remember of it.
He shakes his head, his face so tense it causes a twitch between his left upper cheek and lower eyelid.
"Almost," he clarifies, closing his eyes in a wince, "...almost didn't make it this time, Strange said." Even after encountering death time and time again, he never really gets used to it.

[armd]

"Shit."

So, no. Not going to try again. Barrow has gone solid and still next to her, a concrete wall of unease. Abby puts a hand on his shoulder, grips him there hard. "I'm sorry."

Sometimes that's all you can be — and she is, she understands the discomfort of having to tell other people, of wondering whether it changes the way they think about you.

[thereneverwas]

His eyes squeeze more tightly closed at the hand on his shoulder; he could crumble from the tenderness of that gesture, and perhaps nearly does. Remaining otherwise still, he gives a small, acknowledging nod. There's nothing else to say, nothing to do except keep going.