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Dreamer is cleaning bloodstains out of Shay's ~~boat~~ fort.

It's taking a lot longer than she thought.

Certainly long enough that she forgot why she started in the first place, but hey. Not like she has anything better to do.

Slosh. Clank. Scrubscrubscrub. Slosh.

This is oddly restful.

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I was the only one who could do the right thing, Eden wants to say, but doesn't. Because what good is it? This isn't a competition, and she'd only have to explain.

"I mean...." But Eden doesn't explain what she means - she just makes a noise of frustration and grinds her teeth again.

"Hey."

And Eden gets a proper hug.

"C'mon--"

She can't say it's okay. She can't even make it okay - she wouldn't know where to start. But oh, she can want to.

Oh no, Eden thinks.

Because now she's making a fuss. Now she's being a bother. Now she's being self-centered. It's always about her, isn't it?

That surge of disappointment prompts a sniffle from Eden, then a soft clinging in return. The sniffle becomes a faint sob as Eden watches her tears blur the blue sky and the ship deck.

Dreamer wraps her arms around Eden and cuddles her gently.

For the moment, it is all about her. Dreamer's okay with that. She just spent nearly four decades learning to put other people first. The fact that the person in question is simply adorable doesn't hurt matters.

"I fucking hate this!" Eden snaps, pained and embarrassed and angry because of both those emotions.

She brushes her tears away. Mohinder has been through so much, and he never cried. Chandra and Mr. Bennet wouldn't cry. They're the ones that know how to do things.

Eden just...Eden doesn't even know what she does.

"Shhhh, cherie."

Dreamer raises a hand to Eden's face, helping her brush away the tears.

"I'm here for you."

She's twenty-six years old, she could be the mature one and organize house meetings and sleeping arrangments - but she's not. She's the one who steals crack to tell herself she's never going to use it. She's the one who hasn't spoken to someone who told her she was sick.

"I'm sorry," Eden says thickly, "'M not usually like this...."

Except she is, fuck it, she is. She sobs again, forcing herself to be quiet.

"," she admits.

"Hey."

Eden gets hugged close. The height difference is just right so that Dreamer can rest her chin on the shorter woman's head, if she tries. About Ensorra's height - but she's not thinking that.

"I can help you with that, cherie. Anything you need. I'm here for you."

She is. She needs to be.

What she needs is someone to tell the truth to. That's her first thought and it's immediately dismissed.

"Is--" another sniffle, "-- is there someplace I can do this privately?"

"On the boat? Captain's bedroom is the best bet."

Quick kiss to the top of her head.

"Other places, hell if I know. I don't know how to drive, so I've been limited to anyplace I can walk to from the house."

"Aren't many cars," Eden says, just for something to talk about that's not her slowly unraveling.

She'll move wherever Dreamer leads her.

Dreamer leads.

It's very, very easy to forget what she did with Shay in this room.

Not so easy to forget similar things done with Ensorra in others.

She's here for Eden, however.

With Eden.

Eden keeps herself standing. She's not going to be Sarah and curl up on the bed and cry like when daddy and her stepmommy were fighting.

She is going to stand, goddamnit. Stand and wipe away her tears and feel like shit.

She's standing in Dreamer's arms. Sarah never had that, did she?

Someone to care about her completely, unconditionally. To love her.

Is that what this is? Dreamer doesn't know.

Eden hugs back, her body curling into Anna's. She still stands. She still wipes her tears and snot away (why stain Anna's clothes?). But the sobs are louder and the tears stronger.

When she's done, she feels wet and salty and sticky - and not in the way most people are wet and salty and sticky in the captain's bedroom.

She still feels quite shitty. Especially when she digs around in her pockets and comes up with nothing.

"," she mumbles. She swallows heavily. Then, slowly, she gives a teary smile. "'Course."

"Hey, it's all right."

There are still a few old cloths in Anna's pocket - ones she hasn't yet used to wipe blood off a boat.

"Here."

*SNOOOOORT*

Blowing into Kleenexes is so attractive.

Eden mumbles her thanks.

"De rien, cherie."

She kisses the shorter woman lightly on the forehead.

"De rien."

Eden doesn't move. She stays close.

"I should--" she wipes her nose again, "-- wait a bit. Until my eyes look a bit better."

"Take as long as you need, honey. I'm not goin' anywhere."

Eden knows she's used to living in her own head. She doesn't have a lot of reference points when it comes to other people.

Are other people freaking out about this? All she knows is her own reaction - and Anna's, now. The wishing, the longing. The pain of losing someone close. If she keeps catagorizing it, she can define it, trap these feelings in words so at least when they bother her they'll know what they are.

(It's all useless. It all means nothing.)

"Thanks," she repeats softly, leaning into Anna. "For all this. I-- I don't like being this way."

"Y'welcome, cherie."

Anna snugs her arms around Eden's waist, gentle and comforting.

"Welcome," she repeats. She's saying that a lot lately - and in two languages, no less.

Eden falls silent, not wanting to think or speak or do much of anything despite the feeling that she should be doing all three. She just looks around the captain's bedroom, waiting until she feels like she can face the world again.

After a moment, she moves her arm to lightly rest around Anna's own waist.

Dreamer, too, stays silent.

She meant it when she said she wasn't going anywhere.

And let's just try to ignore how foolishly delighted it makes her that Eden's sort of hugging her back.

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