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In her time as an assassin, since the early years of her childhood before she had even struck her first growth spurt, Yor had gotten her hands on all sorts of deadly impliments. The Garden emphasised the importance of finding a weapon you could treat as an extension of yourself; a speciality you could hone to beyond perfection. In pursuit of this the young girl had been outfitted with all manner of weaponry, from short blades to two-handed affairs, to flails and bows, to polearms and classic firearms. In the end she had settled on her stiletto rondel knives, of course, but she had yet to shy away from anything else. If she were given an instrument and instructed to use it, she would do so without hesitation, without fear, without regret.
And yet. And yet, looking down at the pieces of floral fabric clutched tightly in her hands, this skimpy little two-piece swimsuit that couldn't weigh more than a pound, Yor was deathly anxious.
How had she gotten here? The Yor of a year ago couldn't have even concieved of her situation, of being invited to attend a little private get-together at the pool with friends. Even so, had it occured, she would have absolutely declined. It wouldn't do to get undressed in front of others. Already struggling not to stand out in the worst ways, an eyeful of the state of her body would bring to the front too many questions for her to deal with, would cast her under scrutiny she couldn't handle.
The Yor of today should have declined, really, but - well. The words had been halfway formed on her lips, had been a second from being spoken, and then a familiar arm had brushed against hers and Melinda Desmond had stepped into her field of view, those bright eyes brimming with hope and expectation, and it was like the air had been pushed from her lungs. Disoriented by the unexpected feeling, she'd stammered out a 'yes' and let herself be swept up in the enthusiasm of the others, caught in a dizzy haze as Melinda held onto her arm affectionately and lead her to the waiting cab.
Consciousness had returned to her when they broke contact, but by then it was far too late. Even mentioning her lack of bathing attire hadn't been a problem, as they effortlessly rented her a suitably sized swimsuit.
Could she still yet excuse herself from this situation? Surely not... her mind was too fuzzy to conjure a good excuse, stress spinning her thoughts in circles before she could muster a complete one. All that kept coming was 'I need to put Bond in the dryer...' and for what little social skills Yor had, she knew that would not fly.
It was just so skimpy. The last she'd worn swimwear of any sort was after the cruise ship incident, and that had been a full-body affair! How could she act normal about this? What to do, what to do-!"
"Yor?"
The woman in question startled with an 'eep!', pulling her hands and subsequently the garment clutched in them up toward her chest. Twitching to see who had spoken she saw Margarete, an older member of their little group.
Sporting a close-crop haircut years out of fashion, comprised of incredibly frizzy strands that refused to tame even as she dragged a hairbrush through them with stubborn tenacity, Margarete affixed her with a look of great concern. "Are you alright, sweetheart? You've not moved since we arrived, is there something wrong with your swimsuit? Is it the wrong size?"
The anxiety squirming in her gut worsened exponentially as every other pair of eyes turned to affix her, like a spotlight was beaming down. "Oh! Um, no, I uh, there's n-not a problem! I was just lost in thought!" Yor stammered. "I-it's been a while since I've worn something so revealing around people..." she hedged the truth.
The worry in Margarete's face cleared up, replaced by a gentle amusement. The women of the group often looked at Yor that way, and it had taken a few such times for Yor to realize it was affectionate, not judgmental. "I see. I promise you, lovely, it will only be us about, with perhaps the odd member of staff, though they should have little reason to bother us. The Madame has rented the entire centre for the next few hours."
That offered only marginal comfort. Sure, Yor would prefer for as few people to see her as possible, but the ones she feared the most were stood in this changing room with her, the first real friends she had made in adulthood. "That's..." she struggled to find a polite response, still upside-down on what was polite. Without meaning to, without reason or need, her sight ended up drifting on instinct to Melinda.
The chairman's wife was stood at the furthest side of the room quietly watching the exchange, brows lightly furrowed in concern. Having mostly undressed she was stood in her underwear with her silk blouse slung over her arm, the majority of her jewelry still on, and Yor found it abruptly imperative that she maintain eye contact and look no lower, certainly not allowing her eyeline to stray to where that necklace sat. Catching the heat of Yor's gaze, Melinda met it evenly and pursed her lips, setting the blouse down and tilting her head in question. "Yor, if you aren't comfortable then that's perfectly alright." she assured. "If you'd prefer to leave this, we could go to the front and hail my driver to take you home."
"Oh... but, I wouldn't want to inconvenience you-"
"Pshh." Melinda scoffed. "Hardly. The greater inconvenience would be missing you here, but in the end I wanted to invite you out so that we could have fun together, to relax. If you're shivering with nerves then there's little point."
Guilt squirmed in Yor's stomach. "I wish I could stay. It does sound lovely."
Edith, a stout woman around Melinda's age, leant into view. "If it's being undressed that's the problem, then why don't you go ahead after the rest of us have gone out?" she offered. "Then, if need be, you could sit by the pool and wrap yourself in a towel. It can be up to you whether or not you remove it, and if not, you can still be around to converse and dip your feet."
Oh. That didn't sound bad at all, actually! Yor lit up. "That would be great! Yes, please."
A chuckling Edith patted her on the back before turning to the rest of the group, all smiling fondly. With the plan in mind they began to change in earnest again, and Yor went to awkwardly perch at the end of her bench, wiggling her fingers in her lap and waiting for the shuffling to finish. They were all women, she knew, and there was no reason for any of them to have something strange about their bodies or skin - not that she would have judged them had there been - but there was a squirming discomfort in watching them change, like she was violating some boundary. It was especially heightened when she recalled the sight of Melinda undressed, the dip of her collarbone and the swell of her breasts, the knowledge of exactly how she looked underneath her dresses and shirts - and she lowered her head further in embarassment, praying the burning heat of her cheeks wouldn't be visible through the curtain of her undone hair.
Soon enough, the rustling quietened and footsteps came past her prone form. Ruth reached out as she came by and gently patted Yor on the shoulder, telling her they would wait for her. Yor glanced up before being struck dumb as Melinda came to do the same as Ruth, a hand resting on Yor's arm before the chairman's wife sunk to her knees before her and oh no what was this weird feeling help help.
"Yor..." Melinda murmered, and Yor resisted the urge to melt. It was stupidly hard to focus on her words. "You're certain this works for you? Don't let yourself be pressured into doing anything you don't want to do, we really would understand."
The words registered after an embarassing amount of time, and Yor waved her hands in frantic protest. "No, no! I'm serious, it's good this way! I do want to spend time with you all, this really works for me!"
Melinda smiled, patting her arm consolingly, and it was through sheer force of will that Yor stayed conscious long enough to see her closest friend withdraw and stand, granting a fantastic view of herself in her swimsuit, and wow, wow, Yor was a helpless mess as Melinda turned and left after the others.
A full minute was dedicated to steadying her breathing, both hands clasped to the sides of her face as she felt fire sear her skin. This happened often enough now that she had a better handle on dealing with it, she hadn't reacted on instinct and struck Melinda as she'd done more than once to Loid, thank god, but it remained a nightmare to keep her cool and she didn't understand that because while yes her temperament had long been flimsy, she hadn't reacted like this to people before! It had already been an inexplicable anomaly when it just happened around Loid, but she could excuse it in knowing he was a man, a very kind and attractive and attentive man, and one she lived with. Most of her time was spent with him, if not at work. Proximity bred affection, they said.
But Melinda was a woman. A married woman, even. A friend, and nothing more.
Yor had started to suspect what her feelings toward Loid might be, but this frustrated things.
Huffing and trying to brute force her body temperature down to regular, going so far as to splash her face with cold water from the sink, Yor finally undressed in the privacy of the empty room. It was almost a relief to do so when her anxiety had been making her clammy and sweaty for the past hour, the nudity aiding in cooling her body down. Taking a moment, inhaling carefully, she looked down and took inventory of what was there.
Nothing had changed since last she'd looked, but she still winced. Most prominent and damning was the large gash wound that arced diagonally from her upper breast to just below her throat, a gift from the swordsman atop the cruise ship that had nearly taken her life. There were various other injuries from that day, mostly little nicks all over her arms and stomach, the most notable of which was on her right shoulder. A sniper, she recalled. It was harder to know what was on her back, but she knew it was its own canvas of stories. Yor wasn't ashamed of her scars, particularly those from the cruise she could never regret accruing, but...
Hurridly, biting her lip, she pulled on the swimsuit and picked up the towel that had been left by her side, pulling it around herself.
Glancing at the mirror, she shrugged sheepishly. It worked well enough, right? Her body down to her upper thighs were covered, and if she kept her arms tucked in those needn't be an issue either. The scars on her calves and below were far less noticeable and frequent than those above, and the one substantive one circling her ankle should be disguised if she was dipping her feet in the pool.
Well. No time like the present. Gathering herself, Yor stepped out.
"Oh!" she gasped. "Oh, wow."
Oh wow, indeed. Yor had started to grow accustomed to this sort of architecture and grandiosity after so long spent around Melinda, but this was still so beautiful. The entire room was enormous, approximately the length and breadth of a football pitch, with the pool itself taking up a majority of the floorspace. The water was a glittering and pure blue, so inviting as it sparkled in the light cast down from the skylights above, built into the arched ceiling. Loungers and a few benches surrounded the waters edge, a tray of fruit on one. Over the walls were gorgeous painted designs of foliage, and a few actual potted plants were dotted about the place. In the water, she looked just in time to see Edith playfully splash a bit of water at Jutta. Beside them Margarate was paddling in place watching Rosemarie, who had clearly taken great care to tuck her coiffed blonde ringlets under a swim cap, slip into the water slowly. The trepidation in her movements was obvious, and Yor stifled a giggle. It was easy to understand, of all of them Rosemarie put the most into her appearance in terms of makeup and hair, it was actually a surprise she herself hadn't protested this particular get-together. But then, it could always be fixed up afterward, and Yor knew none of them would get her head wet intentionally. That would just be mean.
Sat by the side of the pool and dangling her legs, Melinda glanced back. Lighting up the moment her gaze landed on Yor, a slight quirk to her lips when she took in the sight of her friend wrapped up tightly in a towel, she gestured her over. Wobbly and forcing down the red in her cheeks, Yor did so, trying to sit a respectful but friendly distance from her - about an arms length. Melinda gave her a peculiar little look.
"You're still comfortable like this?" she checked.
Yor didn't trust herself to respond verbally, so settled for aggressive nodding. It earned her a giggle, so it felt like a success.
"The water is very cold, I'm not sure about going in myself..." Melinda hummed, idly moving her feet back and forth. "I'd been told they were planning to warm it up a little for us, so either that hasn't gone into effect or I'm simply more temperature sensitive than I thought. Ah, well. It's for the best."
Yor glanced at her. "For the best?"
"I'm rather like Rosemarie, the idea of having to re-do my up-do doesn't appeal much, even if it's something I'm well accustomed to."
"Oh, gosh." Yor sympathized. "Yes, no wonder. You always look so wonderful, it must take so much time to do yourself up as you do. I'm a little embarassed, actually... I only do some little bits, and it took me so long to learn how to apply certain kinds of makeup. Camilla used to despair at my attempts at eyeliner..." she bemoaned, cupping her cheek as she recalled the first few weeks at her job at city hall, when she was just shy of 23 years old. Camilla couldn't stand her at that time, this she now knew, but the blonde had reacted with actual horror apon seeing Yor's feeble attempt to apply minimal makeup and immediately steered her to the bathroom, instructing her with brutality until Yor got it right. They'd both been penalized for wasting company time on something so frivolous, but Yor had to admit she was thankful for the impromptu lesson. Makeup was 'normal', after all, and normalicy was what she was always chasing.
Caught up in her thoughts, the assassin didn't clock the way her friend's face pinked ever so slightly at the compliment, turning away just enough to obscure it. Chasing away the shy smile threatening to reveal her fluster, Melinda turned to the others half-submerged in the water, giggling softly as Jutta was now herself complaining about the temperature of the water. Rosemarie gently pushed her arm, pointing out that movement would warm her up. Jutta of course playfully challenged her to a swim, the blonde groaning in theatrics.
"I won't be in here long." Rosemarie huffed. "I believe we were promised some refreshments later, no? Do we need to greet them by the doors, or are they alright to enter?"
"They'll poke their head in." Melinda answered. "By quarter-to, I believe. They won't enter unless we give them the go-ahead."
"Quarter-to is nice. I'll take the tray from them at the door, then I'll be on the loungers, else I'm sure to freeze to death in here."
"Wrap up in a towel like Yor, you'll be fine." Margarete chuckled. "There are some on the chairs, fresh."
"Tempting. You're comfortable, Yor?"
Yor blinked. "Yes."
Rosemarie's brows crept up her head until they hid beneath her swim cap. "You're awfully huddled up."
"Ah." Yor squeaked. "I am a little cold."
"Well the air is warm enough, it's the water that's not. But nevermind that! Margarete, no more stalling, you simply must tell me what happened to you at Kaufhaus des Westens last week, you've been hinting at some great catastrophe all day!"
"Oh goodness, where do I even start?"
Yor watched them converse, occasionally interspersing her own comments. She herself avoided KaDeWe unless the others accompanied her, still a little terrified of department stores and their grandiosity, but it could be a little funny to hear what went wrong when it wasn't her it was happening to and no one had gotten killed. Margarete had apparently been shopping with her little one - a troublesome little Eden student who had already accrued four tonitrus, if Yor recalled correctly - when some drunk politican had come careening past. At midday, too! The fool had shouldered into the shelving on apparent accident and brought the whole damned thing down, which then in turn brought another, and another. The entire section had collapsed like dominoes!
"You'd think they'd be held up by stronger stuff." Melinda commented mildly.
"It was the appliances section, you know, kettles and cookers and the like, rather heavy. It's only a miracle we weren't hurt. Another woman wasn't so lucky, though I hear she only needed a checkup and is now free. I do hope that man is charged appropriately."
"I'd have thought not, considering his status, but I suppose KaDeWe has little to be afraid of." Jutta mused.
Kicking her feet with a little more energy, Yor leant forward, not noticing the way her towel began to slip. "It was someone you recognized?"
"Gosh, I know most involved in that side of the debate. It comes with having a husband in the party, though I'm sure he isn't happy with how this reflects on it. Not like he's much better." Margarete rolled her eyes in frustration. "Honestly that man will drive me up the wall, he drinks half his weight. How he carries on with his talks and meetings is a miracle beyond me."
"Tell me about it!" Jutta huffed. "Mine was much too rowdy over New Years, it's ludicrous that he had the nerve to accuse my own behaviour when I was the one who had to clear up the mess he left when he was too sodding hungover to even open his eyes."
"I thought your new boy was much better than the old!"
"He is." the younger woman asserted, a twinge of defensiveness entering her tone. "Compared to Werner, anything is better."
"You can say that again."
"Werner?" Innocently questioned Yor, tilting her head, now entirely preoccupied with the changing conversation.
"Jutta's previous husband, who used to beat the bloody dickens out of her." Margarete quite bluntly informed. It left Yor reeling. "For a time we'd hardly even see her, he wouldn't let her out the house. We'll take any option over that."
"I'd went to the confessional, once, at the local church. Vented my heart out. The pastor came out and told me that had I followed the virtues of the bible and showed subservience to him, I would have been spared the blows."
"Heavens."
"I was desperate enough to believe it, back then. I did love Werner for a time. I wanted it to work more than anything. It's a pity. Honestly."
Yor was pitifully quiet. There were words she wanted to say, things she wanted to ask, to try to understand, but everything gummed up in her throat as she listened to them go on. Tales of previous relationships, of current partners, of fighting and drinking and arguing over when to sleep together. Of accusations of cheating, pressure from religious authority, expectations all the way from childhood to elder adulthood. Pressure that had been inflicted since they could remember. A friend of Rosemarie's had become addicted to 'mommy's little helper' some years back - barbiturates. Edith's mother-in-law had been lobotomized after exhibiting signs of psychosis after years of violence from her then-husband. The lot of them spoke of these things like they were normal, a part of life, and Yor supposed they were. It didn't help the clammy feeling in her palms or the way the room seemed to lose all temperature.
It was surreal to realize that this was normalicy. This was what women her age endured. Yor Briar had been terrified of being discovered for her abnormalities, but she had the 'benefit' of having largely raised herself with only the aid of an organization that truly could not give less of a shit about her fertility or housekeeping skills so long as she could wield a blade and use it. The distance between herself and the others no longer seemed like a few metres of air and water, but a gaping and impassable chasm.
But wait.
Hadn't she too been raised to simply endure? To follow orders and to deliver above all else? Hadn't her purpose merely been to survive and provide? Was there not some similitude in her desperation to prove herself to her husband, her careful awareness of his changing moods? It had not been instilled on her as it had them, yet it came to her regardless.
If Loid struck her, would she leave him?
Despite the warmth of the room, Yor shivered. The towel slipped a little further with the tremble in her shoulders.
It was impossible to imagine. Had it ever been a possibility at the start of their commitment to their shared ruse, she thought she would have cut things off immediately. Even with an obligation to stay in the marriage for the sake of blending in among her peers, she wasn't sure it was a slight she wouldn't have responded to on instinct, striking back and likely taking his head off. Thank mercy that Loid wasn't like these men she was hearing of, as even the thought of that made her ill. Even the memory of when she had struck him in a drunken stupor made her ill.
Things were so much different to how they had been at the beginning of their arrangement. Yor had entered a new world, seen facets of life she wouldn't have concieved. Found comfort and stability and something to drive her beyond the long-obselete ideals that had fueled her engine as a teenager. Quiet chats late into the night once Anya had gone to sleep and Loid returned late from an emergency shift, frayed nerves soothed as they conversed as naturally as if they'd known each other for years. As if they truly were husband and wife in any sense other than legality. Sitting together on a park bench, seperate yet close enough to not look strange, the heat of his hand mere inches from her own, enough that there had been a longing for so long to reach out and touch. Hearing his quiet chuckles when it came to bath time for Bond and the poor dog's form was revealed under all of that thick fur. The times she had had his head in her lap, those sky blue eyes half-lidded or shut, humming a tune from the past and waiting for him to fully come-to. Eating his delightful home cooking. Dressing his child for school. Simple companionable silence spent by the radio, nursing matching cups of coffee.
If Loid struck her...
The familiarity of being in their shared home. The subtle curve of his smile. Concern in his voice when he checked her schedule for the day, finding it seemingly packed to unreasonability. The simple acceptance when believing her to have been a Working Girl. The warmth of his palm when he would reach to tuck stray hair behind her air. The sight of him beneath her on their sofa, closing his eyes, accepting her bold attempt to kiss him in front of her brother. When he knelt before her on the ferris wheel and declared that he wanted no one but her.
It was a strange thing to realize, that she wouldn't be able to leave him now unless he made her.
A touch at her shoulder brought her back to reality from unsettling musings, the familiar sight of Melinda's hand. Curiously, her wedding ring remained on her finger. Yor knew that the others in attendance had removed all of their jewelry, including their rings, likely to avoid damaging them in the chlorinated water. "Yor? Darling, are you with us?"
"Yes! Yes, I'm with you!" the assassin prayed her voice wouldn't falter. It was imperative to shoo away those intrusive thoughts before they could unstabilize her. "I just zoned out, please don't worry!"
"It's more that I wanted to warn you of your current situation." Melinda told her, subtle and careful in her wording as her hand glided from Yor's shoulder, sending weird tingles down her skin as those manicured nails stopped at her lower arm before gesturing gently to her midriff. "You're bare, sweetheart. Is that alright?"
It was then that Yor registered the loss of her towel, the soft material now pooled around her hips in a clump on the tiles, soaking slightly in the water drifting out from the pool's edge. Though panic surged along with acid bile rising in her throat, she knew even as she reached for it that doing so was now pointless. The heat of the group's eyes were apon her, scrutinizing and boring through her flesh. They had seen it all. All of them had. Including Melinda, who Yor now couldn't bring herself to look at.
The cold of the water crept up her skin. What if they saw these wounds for what they were, saw the little entry wounds that could only be from bullets, the too-broad slash scars in too-strange of places to be from any household accident, the burns and litchenburg etchings from electroshock weapons. Indeed, she could already see Jutta visibly documenting all of it, the older woman's face pale. Boldly, she spoke.
"What... what on earth has happened to you?"
Yor shrunk into herself. Despite the caring tone, it could only sound confrontational to her. The way her voice failed her was troubling, only able to warble out a few uncertain sounds before Margarete contributed.
"Good heavens, those wouldn't happen to be from- surely not. But there are so many!" Margarete looked like her mind was running a mile a minute, aghast as her hand came from the water to cover her mouth, scandalized. "It looks- oh, but you were much too young to have enlisted!"
It was hard to even keep up with her words.
"Many lied about their age to assist in the war effort." Jutta pointed out, quieter, eyes flicking anxiously between Margarete and Yor.
Oh, the war. Yor suppressed a nervous giggle. It wasn't totally wrong. Many of her scars were from the war era, the eldest were even from shrapnel from the bombing that took her parents. There remained a surreal comedy in the idea of her tiny teen self fighting on the front lines, though.
"The one across your collar looks recent..." Edith murmered. Yor ducked her head further down, pulling up the towel, too wracked with anxiety to pull it fully around herself. Speaking as they did then, their voices merged together, leaving her unable to parse the individual speakers.
"Don't tell me... that had better not be a bullet wound!"
"Oh gosh, my father fought in the first war, and he had scars just like yours... he wouldn't speak of them."
"So they are from the war?"
"Perhaps we shouldn't be so nosy... she's gone pale, see?"
"Yor? Are you with us? Yor?"
The room span on its axis, and Yor held tightly onto the fabric of the towel, ripping it in her grip. This was too much! She had to go, she had to go, she had to go-
Melinda cleared her throat.
Silence broke. Then held.
Yor slowly gathered the courage to raise her head.
The chairman's wife, who had been sat still beside her through the entire exchange and had said nary a thing, had her arms crossed over her chest. There was a rigidity to her spine that hadn't been there before, an iciness in her eyes. Yor had yet to understand it, but there really was something quite frightening about Melinda when she had a certain look to her.
"My, my!" Melinda said, her tone somehow both airy and scathing. The insincerity was apparent. "I wasn't aware it was in our habit to use our time together to pry into others' personal matters and insecurities. Why, if we're going to be so intrusive about scars and their origins, I would expect myself to be the first object of questioning, no?" Melinda's expression became an unpleasant smile. "Shall we start with my story? I don't mind at all."
The other women wilted. Absolute quiet reigned over the space, discomfort thick in the air. No one could meet their eyes, not Yor's nor Melinda's.
"I thought so." Melinda hummed.
Then came a knock, a soft rapping of knuckles against the far door, by where they had came in. Before any else could react, Melinda was up, on her feet and on the move.
"I suspect those are the refreshments- it is the appropriate time." she said. "I'll retrieve them and leave them with all of you, and then I might refresh myself. Make the most of the remainder of our time here."
For the minute longer that Melinda shared the room with them, that awkward silence remained. There was even little movement in the water, the women making a concerted effort to be as stationary as they could. Again, Yor wondered about Melinda's effect on people. How a woman so slight and kind could inspire such fright and obedience.
Maybe it came with being the wife of a former prime minister?
Melinda, movements graceful and confident, took a large tray from the door staff before ushering the man away, stepping back inside just enough to set it down on the nearest lounger. The fruits adorning the little plates atop were decadent, some Yor were sure must be imported as they did not grow anywhere she knew of in Germania. Beside them was a pitcher of a cloudy liquid, Tom Collins, Yor suspected. Rosemarie's favourite, and acceptable for the rest. Then, Melinda was gone.
Jutta pulled herself out of the water first, looking incredibly upset. "We've really made a pigs ear of today, haven't we?"
"I don't think madame is truly upset, just dissapointed." Edith comforted. "It was a minefield of subject matters back to back, we should have been more considerate."
Looking like she wanted to sink into the water and stay there, Margarete affixed Yor with a look of such contrition that it made the woman herself want to drop into a kowtow and give her own apologies. "I cannot possibly apologise enough, Yor. Melinda was entirely correct, it is absolutely none of our business. We shouldn't have pressed."
Biting her lip, Yor glanced between them and the door, caught with the sudden need to go after Melinda. "It's okay!" she said anyway. "I know it's a lot! Um... my husband was really taken aback too, so it's a reaction I kinda expect."
A crumb of truth in that. Loid hadn't seen most of her scars, of course, but she had once forgotten herself and opted for a sleeveless dress and promptly encountered a surprised Loid, looking at that notable scar striking across her shoulder. There had been much stammering as she'd made up some cooking incident long ago... if she were lucky, he had no way of deducing that it was from a bullet. He shouldn't. Even if she'd caught him giving it askance looks once or twice. Even if he'd looked skeptical at her excuse.
....she was worrying over nothing. And anyway, what she worried about most at the moment, the person she really wanted to check on was- "Melinda." Yor said aloud. "I should check on her."
Rosemarie cringed. "I don't know if that's a good idea. Sure, you aren't the one she's upset with, but... we really did bring up some touchy things. The madame likely needs some space."
And that made sense, it did, Yor understood it. But there was a low buzzing in the back of her head, a sensation of pressure that had her nerves shot and the bright lights overhead felt like they burned her retinas, a sweaty prickling feeling running over her skin. Being in here was just too much after what has happened, too stimulating, and she couldn't get her mind to focus. The only certainty she had, though she couldn't understand why she thought it so fervently, was that she would feel better if she sought Melinda. "If she tells me to go, I-I will! I want to make sure she's okay."
The other women gave each other an anxious look, then turned to her and each gave unsure nods. Margarete especially grimaced, scratching absently at her neck. "Well, the best of luck. And if it isn't insensitive to ask of you, could you tell her that we truly apologize for our conduct and ask for her forgiveness?" The other women nodded in agreement with the request. "It is never our wish to offend you- either of you."
Yor gave a sheepish smile, unused to being apologized to repeatedly. "It's okay, it's okay! I'll see all of you in a second. Enjoy things without me, continue talking-!" Then, before she could stumble her way into saying anything more, the young woman got to her feet and took an olympic sprint out of the grand natatorium, heedless of her state of undress in stark contrast to earlier, and went on the prowl in pursuit of her closest friend.
It only took a minute to locate her. Though she hadn't bothered with the restroom attached to the changing rooms, likely wanting to put more space between herself and the others, the next one was just down the hall by the stairs to the (currently shut) upstairs café. Slipping inside, Yor wavered in the doorway.
Stood nearer to the farther wall, Melinda stood with her hands braced on opposite sides of a sink, gazing at something indeterminable in her reflection, in the spotless mirror. There wasn't any visible distress in her countenance, but, oddly, it appeared she had started to take down her hair before giving up on it halfway. What was free hung elegantly just past her shoulders, and Yor fought the selfish urge to reach out and run her fingers through it, as she'd long wished to.
Forcing her thoughts to redirect, Yor marvelled at the fact that, in an establishment as high-class as this, even the washrooms were ornate. The bases of the sinks were indented with a subtle geometric pattern, like diamonds, and the faucets were a shining gold. A similar gold trim ran around the entire appliance. Seeing Melinda's hands, Yor startled to see her knuckles had gone white from tension - then, looking up, saw she had been spotted. Melinda was looking right at her through the mirror, gaze still so indeterminable.
"I'm sorry!" Yor immediately squeaked. "I didn't mean to sneak up on you!"
Melinda held her gaze a moment longer, blank, before exhaling and hanging her head. Whether from relief or exasperation, it was hard to tell. Either way, she straightened herself up and turned a little to face the other.. only a little. With her friends' shoulder still pointed toward her, her feet turned away, Yor thought it was a bit of a defensive posture. Then, Melinda spoke.
"Did you not want to spend any more time with them? Forgive me for leaving you there. My frustration got the better of me."
It seemed there would be a lot of apologizing today, on all sides.
"Are you... alright?" it came out tentative.
Melinda blinked several times, then looked away. "You're asking me that?"
"Um."
"Aren't you upset?"
"I'm not upset." Yor answered honestly. Then paused. "I... don't like being the centre of attention. Not in that way. But they didn't mean anything bad - Margarete wanted to extend an apology to you, by the way."
Melinda arched a brow.
Was it a blessing or a curse to be socially incompetent, Yor wondered. Having never been blessed with people skills, it was tricky to know if she was causing aggravation. Deciding that Melinda ought to tell her if that were the case, she forged on. "It comes from all of them, I think. Um. They said they should have noticed that they were getting onto really bad topics, so-"
Melinda rose a hand. Yor fell quiet. Finally, Melinda turned to face her fully, leaning back against the basin, hands coming to brace against the rim.
"Forget me." she said bluntly. "You're well?"
"I, yes, I'm okay."
"Good." Melinda said. "I've collected myself. If you want, shall we go back?"
"What?"
"To the swimming pool, sweetheart."
"N-no, I know-" Yor protested, a tad indignant. "Weren't you upset?"
"As I said, don't mind me."
"I do mind you!" was probably not the most eloquent refutation, though Yor only registered how it sounded when Melinda brought a hand to her mouth, hiding a small smile. Crimson branded the assassin's cheeks. "No! I wanted to say that I don't want you to go back if you're upset! If you wanted, I could even stay here with you!"
This seemed to startle back some life into the other woman, some of the put-on placidity fading. "Goodness me Yor, that isn't necessary."
"But you're upset!"
"I'm not upset."
"Yes you are!"
"I- this is ridiculous." Melinda brought a hand up to her face, sighing as she shook her head. "Alright. Yes, I was a little offput. The topics of discussion were very unpleasant to me, and to my continued displeasure were then replaced not by lighter ideas, but by nosing in where noses oughtn't be. It was aggravating. Is that what you wanted me to say?"
Yor blinked. "Yes."
"And for heaven's sake, is it really so difficult to think of where your wounds came from? Why would they attempt to have you spell it out?"
"Um."
"The topic of discussion just before, how you froze up- yes, cigarette and bullet wounds can look similar after a certain stage of the healing process, but-"
Yor was no longer following. "Cigarettes?"
Melinda went red. "Forgive me."
"What for? I'm sorry, I really am, but I don't know what you're talking about." Yor admitted weakly.
Melinda was quiet for a good, long moment. Accompanying the silence was a prolonged instance of eye contact, and Yor couldn't help but squirm, sweaty with the urge to look away. The Garden had practically beaten it into her that she must maintain eye contact whenever possible, as averting it would give a guilty impression, but it had never come naturally. Finally, Melinda slumped back bodily against the counter beside the sink, massaging the points of her fingers at her temple. "I would like to ask you something, but I need you to know that you are under no obligation to answer me truthfully, or to answer me at all. I have no interest in making today any more difficult for you."
That didn't sound like a promising opener. "Okay?"
"Your scars. Were they of a... marital dispute?"
"What?" Yor asked on instinct, the words not yet setting in or making themselves understood. Yet Melinda said no more, watching her closely and offering no clarification, so Yor thought. After a moment it hit her with the speed of a train, and her eyes blew impossibly wide. "Oh my gosh, no! No, no, no, definitely not! You think that-?!"
Her friend looked a little ill, pallid in the face. "I understand, please don't feel you need to say anything more-"
Driven by a desperation to sluice the immensely unpleasant concept out of the percieved realm of possibility, Yor surged forward. Melinda was given no time to react before the other woman was right before her, hands bracing on her upper arms, faces mere inches apart. "You have to believe me, I'm not just saying it not to get him in trouble, Loid would never, he absolutely would not!" she insisted, frantic. The words coming from her mouth sounded less convincing than she wanted. "I had most of these long before I met him - they're nearly all from b-back when I was a child! So no, they have nothing to do with him! Please never think that! Please!"
It was true. Scars came as a result of mistakes, after all, and folly was a closer companion of the young and inexperienced than of the adult and seasoned. Yor's newest scars had been rare circumstance, results of an overwhelming situation fraught with emotion she hadn't expected to need to wrassle with. The only time in recent memory she could think of being seriously injured besides the incident of the cruise ship was, and it irked her to recall it, when a man who had somehow survived her went and shot her in the rear from behind. Urgh. So rude.
The idea of Loid doing something so severe to her to make her body look as it did, it set off shudders of horror through her body. There was no question in that scenario, she would kill him. If not for herself, but to save Anya from a father capable of such things against his own partner. A man who would do such things to his wife, regardless of the validity of their marriage, could never be trusted around a small child.
But Loid had not. And she knew, with deafening certainty, that he would never.
Before her, so near that their noses nearly brushed, Melinda swallowed. "It's difficult to disbelieve you when you're so passionate."
"Believe me!" Yor insisted. "I would never, ever, ever let him, or anyone do that to me! Why would you even think that?"
Melinda cringed.
Sensing that she had become a bit of an intimidation factor, Yor stepped back. Returning from her fervor also had her acutely aware of how close they had been, how she had touched Melinda's bare skin, how her half-naked body had been right up against hers- oh, Yor wanted to run back to that pool right this instant and submerge her head.
"You looked to... dissociate, when they spoke of Jutta's husband, of Edith's father in law. Seeing your condition immediately afterward, you can't blame me for jumping to conclusions!" Melinda defended, a little pink with embarassment. The atmosphere had lightened somewhat, at least. "At least I had the good grace not to interrogate you."
"That was what made you so angry?" Yor finally realized. "It wasn't really because of the others, it was thinking that Loid had done..." she trailed off.
"I'm relieved to be so aggressively rebuffed on my assumption. But then, where are they truly-" Melinda caught herself, shaking her head. "Nevermind. You don't need to tell me that."
An odd feeling took Yor over. "I wish I could."
"Do you, now?"
"Yes." Yor said, and realized it for the first time. "I'd like nothing more than to tell you about stuff like this, and get it off my chest. I don't have anyone to talk to, about so much of what's happened to me, and-" she caught herself, and swallowed. "But it's... it's too much. It's too much to put on anyone, and really, I do trust you, Melinda. I trust you more than anyone I've ever known, anyone that wasn't family."
Here came to mind the obvious sight of Yuri, the mindscape version of him that liked to squat in her head, squeeing her name. He was only marginally less shrill than the real deal, and always brandished a large bouquet of roses. Next, then, came Anya. Perhaps it was presumptuous or selfish, but Yor really did think of herself as the sweet little girl's mother. Lastly came Loid, and she'd have reflected on that further had his mini self not immediately started sparring with the mini Yuri. Oh gosh, her mind was overactive.
"I um, I zoned out because I was in thought. About how I got them, about what our friends were saying, and about... some other things, too. And I wish I could tell you about all of it, just to get it out of my head! But I can't."
"I would never judge you." Melinda said. The sincerity in her voice was so earnest it made Yor want to cry.
"I know. But, like I said. It's too much. It's not normal. You wouldn't look at me the same again. If, if you don't already see me differently."
It was a terrifying idea, but Melinda already did seem to be looking at her differently, sizing her up in a new light. Leant heavily against the sink counter despite the discomfort she must feel at the edge sticking in her back, she looked Yor over a few times, biting her lip.
Yor tried to diffuse the awkwardness. "Should we head b-"
"In the closing days of the war," Melinda said, "I attempted to take my own life."
The words dried up in Yor's throat. There was little she could do other than stare.
"Gods, it was chaos back then." Melinda murmered. "I felt so guilty, to be as shaken as I was. What right had I to startle at noises, to wake from nightmares every night, when I was the furthest I could be from the conflict? I would have the most graphic and bizarre night terrors, and drove my husband to the verge of madness tossing and turning. After a point, he kicked me out of the bed and assigned me to the guest room until I got my wits about me, else he swore he would take me to have my head checked. I wandered the halls nearly every night, hoping to exhaust myself until even my mind would grow too weary, praying I could have ease of sleep. It never worked, of course." Straightening, Melinda placed her hands in her lap and looked idly down at them, turning her hands over. The wedding ring on her finger seemed to glint beneath the lights. "I'd been in a poor state since the war started, but there was never anything to do for it other than try to distract myself. Friends would come to me, acquaintances, business partners, and each time there would be a story to tell. Another person lost. And there I was, a wife of the prime minister, with nothing to do for them other than give my condolences. I was less than useless."
Yor silently stepped over. With a quiet glance to the door, listening to ensure they were truly alone, she leant back against the counter. Melinda looked up, steepling her fingers against her lap.
"You must never tell anyone what I am telling you." she said. "Promise me that."
"Of course." Yor's response came in a heartbeat, without a shred of hesitance.
Melinda's eyes crinkled, a sad smile forming. "There is something terribly, terribly wrong with me. It has always been so, even when I was a little girl." Reaching, she poked gently at the side of her head. "The stressors of wartime only exacerbated what was already there. I am a deeply unstable woman, masquerading as though I am not. It's a performance I must hold at all times, even before my loved ones, even before friends I have known all of my life."
Yor couldn't help a little frown. It wasn't about trust, she knew, but there was a squirming feeling of rejection at thinking that- "Even to me?"
"Of course, sweetheart." Melinda said fondly. "I can hear the betrayal in your voice- you truly are a strange one. If it is any consolation, you make it quite difficult for me. There is something so disarming about you, it makes me forget myself. I've slipped up a few times. Each time I thought for certain it would shoo you away, but..." she tipped her head. "Here you are."
"I wouldn't leave you. Not unless you really, really wanted me to. And even then I'd be sad to go." was Yor's sheepish response.
"Believe me, no thought terrifies me more. If you would be alright with it, I'd prefer to know you for the rest of my life."
Yor wondered if she had at one point swallowed some of the Shopkeeper's butterflies by accident. They seemed to be flitting about in her stomach at mach speed, and it was a tricky thing to stop herself from blurting out something embarassing.
Melinda continued before she could, at least. "I suspect it's something I inherited from my own mother. What I recall of her in my childhood are traits we now share, though, she is no longer around for me to make certain. What I know is that I do not feel as most people do, that I feel far too much. And there is typically no reason for it. I have spent weeks in an energized state, unable to truly control myself. I spend carelessly, I speak incoherently, I act out. I've gotten myself in several dangerous situations this way. If you recall the day we met, that was one such instance. That was a 'high' day, as Nola and Jeeves put it." making a face, the chairman's wife huffed. "I've told them that it embarasses me. They, beside my husband and eldest, are the only people I have no choice in hiding my situation from. They simply are around me too often. I often feel we pay them too little for what they put up with. Regardless. It doesn't sound so hard to handle when spoken of, but I am sure you remember how I acted, how irregular and offputting I was. The fact that my haste brought me into danger, that it risked ending my life- it isn't nearly the first time that has happened."
Unknowing if she ought to contribute and ask questions or was merely wanted as a passive listener, Yor opted for something in the middle and hummed to show she was paying attention. It was hopefully a sympathetic sound and not a dismissive one, she'd been told of her problems with conveying tone.
"But that is the better side of things. To balance out those highs are lows, and they are dreadful. I cannot even describe the despair I feel, it is beyond my vocabluary to express. Once, a long time ago, I wouldn't have even thought it capable to feel so terrible. Before the war, in my teens and twenties, they weren't so bad as they would come to be. The longest of them was.. a few weeks, I'd like to say. After the war began, when I lost my father, too, to sickness and the attention of my husband to his work, I entered the worst of my life. It lasted the better part of three years."
Yor's mouth fell open.
Melinda glanced at her. "Looking back, I'm almost surprised I endured for as long as I did. Suicide-" and apon saying that word she flinched, "My parents were quite religious, and you're well aware that my husband is staunchly conservative. It would be a sin, nearly unforgivable in nature. I already felt so vile, it seemed like the least I could do to hold on. There were cycles that I would feel something similar to my highs amongst the lows, days that I had better energy, when I could force myself to present more normally, but they were dangerous in that way, as well. In the depths of my despair, I hadn't the strength of will to do anything to myself. On those 'mixed' occasions, I very much did. Still, I held on, with slowly declining rationale to do so. Until... one day in winter." she closed her eyes. "I'd not seen sunlight in weeks. I woke only to eat, and even then it was fewer than my attendants preferred. The strikes were reaching closer to the capital, close enough that I heard them from my home. With nothing but my imagination to string out the worst scenarios, it felt like I was in hell. I could see no future. And then, one night, my husband entered the room."
Dread curdled in Yor's stomach.
"I had been in the guest room, then, that he had banished me to. I asked him what he was doing, and he told me he wanted to see me. There was little I could do to resist as she crawled atop me. Nothing I said would change his mind. It wasn't the first he had simply done as he pleased with me heedless of my words, but it was the worst of it. I was in such a state already, I burst into tears and wept before he had finished, and begged him to leave me be. That man told me that if I were to withdraw from all other aspects of life, if I were incapable of speech and work and caring for the home, then the least I could do was fulfil my marital duties. In a sudden burst of rage, I told him I wished him dead in the next bombings. He struck me and finished his business, before leaving me there."
Melinda recited the story with detached coldness, but there was a subtle tremble in her voice that made Yor sick. She desperately wanted to reach out and gather the older woman into her arms, but it seemed crass to touch her after such a thing. Moreso, she wanted to storm out of this room and find Donovan Desmond herself and take his head before Garden could stop her, but rationally she knew that was even more unwise and would do little to help Melinda now. The temptation remained nevertheless.
"I took to the bathroom and slit my wrists in a fit of spite. The next I was cognizant, I was at a ward in at the Berlint General Hospital - yes, Yor, the very same one at which your husband works - and told in no uncertain terms I would not be leaving until I was set to rights. They were terrified of dealing with me, you know. Whether it was due to fear of my husband or of my own then-sour attitude, I don't know. I can't say they helped me much, but I was ultimately grateful to have been temporarily institutionalized there. The seperation from my home helped. I evened out. I met many I would have never otherwise, I spoke to strangers and soldiers and foreigners alike, and learned so much. For a time after my return, even my husband softened toward me a little. Out of pity, perhaps." Melinda opened her eyes, the familiar beautiful shade of gold making Yor's heart skip a beat. "I still bear the scars from that day. Normally I cover them with makeup, but, well. Water." she snorted. "And all those in company today were aware of this and knew better than to ask. Everyone but you, Yor."
The flit of the assassin's eyes to Melinda's wrists was wholly instinctual, and the immediate guilt had her wrenching her gaze back up. Seeing this, Melinda only chuckled fondly before unfolding her hands, lying her arms limp against herself. And there, Yor finally saw them. Would have seen them sooner if she hadn't been doing her absolute best to not gawk at the woman's body before, and thus avoided looking below her collar entirely. They had clearly faded impressively, but they still stood out, carving thick pink lines all the way from the base of her palms to about halfway up her inner arm. She couldn't help but think it amazing that the other woman had survived such a thing, the severe blood loss that cutting somewhere so vital must have caused. Her position would have afforded her the best medical care they would have had available, she supposed. Then it struck her that her friend had almost died, not only that but in such a gruesome way, that she had been driven to do so by her own hand largely in part due to treatment by her husband, someone she was meant to be able to trust more than anyone, and-
"Yor?" Melinda exclaimed, sounding horrified. "Yor, are you crying?"
Oh no, she was, wasn't she? "Nooooooo..."
"I should have been more careful with my words. Lords, I've been absurd, piling this all on you. I knew you had a softer heart than us, and to tell you about this out of the blue-"
"I want to tell you about me." Yor blurted desperately. "You told me about you, you trusted me. I w-want to tell you."
"You don't have to do anything."
"I know!"
"Look-"
"When I was 12," Yor stammered through her tears in a rush "I lost my parents to shelling that hit Eastern Nielsberg."
Melinda froze.
"I didn't accept it at first. I don't think Yuri did, either. It was just s-so unexpected, I mean, we were so out of the way, we were near the mountains!" Yor giggled nervously, swiping at her eyes. The tears kept falling, no matter her efforts to compose herself. "We'd seen what was happening in the war, but until then it seemed so far from us. Most of the skrimishes were happening to the west, or in the capital. It was the first time one had gotten so far from the border, and it just so happened to hit our little settlement. It was unreal. For a time, every day I'd wake up and call for my mother, because it hadn't sank in yet that it wasn't a dream and she really wasn't coming back." it startled her how rough her voice was growing already, how choked up she felt. The passing of her parents felt like a lifetime ago now, an event seperated from her by the great changes she had undergone since. There was little to remember them by, all memorabilia had been lost or sold away, and all that remained now was the still-fading imprint on her memories; the whispered beginnings of a lullaby, or the sensation of a hand carding through her hair as she laid her head to rest on a lap. So why now did merely thinking of them sting, when it hadn't in so long? "There was no one to take care of us. The entire village was devastated, having relied on limited trading beforehand with local towns, no real network to the nearest city. Rebuilding took forever, and orphans like us became a non-priority. Invisible. Even before it we'd scraped by, and now we had nothing. Nothing but each other."
Melinda reached out and took one of Yor's hands in hers, her soft and delicate fingers overlapping Yor's coarser ones. The warmth of her palm was soothing. Yor tried to take slower breaths before continuing her account, knowing if she let herself go on like this she would devolve until she became incoherent. That prescence beside her, warm and comforting, provided more understanding than she had ever known. It was destabilizing, and she wondered if this was how Melinda had felt throughout all of her own account with Yor there. If so, she certainly held her distress better than Yor did.
"I was awful at everything I tried. Mama hadn't wanted to teach me how to care for the home until I was older, so I only knew the bare minimum of how to clean, and I didn't know how to cook at all. I didn't even realize it at the time because Yuri was such a angel about it, he would eat everything I made without complaining, but he was always so sick on the days I made his meals. I tried to take things from town, or beg for help, I went to the doors of all of our neighbours, and every time I'd get chased away. When we ran out of what we salvaged from the non-perishables, I went into the mountains. Yuri was too young to look after himself, so I had to take him with me. He'd walk for the first part, but then he'd get too tired and fall asleep, and I would have to carry him." her heart flooded with warmth at the sweet memory. "We'd use whistle sweets to frighten off the wildlife, and pick anything that looked edible, even though we didn't know what to look for. Nuts, berries, leaves, flowers- I'd try them first to make sure they were safe, and then if they were I'd let Yuri. Sometimes I think it's how I started to get such a strong tolerance for-" Yor hesitated, biting the inside of her cheek. Too far. Couldn't go there. Shouldn't. Melinda's thumb rubbed a soothing circle on her palm. "Nevermind. It still wasn't enough anyway. Yuri was getting so thin, he was only 6, he needed so much more than I could give him. I couldn't figure out how to hunt animals, and when the weather turned cold and the plants dwindled in availability, we really started to starve. I could see Yuri's collarbone, he had been such a chubby little baby before everything and now I could feel his ribs when I hugged him, and-" that brought the flood of tears back immediately, quickly bringing a hand to her mouth and gnawing at her pointer finger, a self-comforting behaviour she couldn't remember developing.
Until she had met the Forgers, Yuri had been her everything. Yuri had been why she bled, why she worked, why she lived. There had been so much love and care in her with nowhere else to go, and to cope with their circumstance she had poured all of herself into raising him. He had been so easy to love too, as ardent toward her as she was to him, never complaining, never throwing a tantrum. Even when all she could give him was the bark shorn from trees and blades of grass to eat, he'd taken it with a smile and thanked her. Hugging his tiny form tightly to her night after night, feeling the way his bones began to poke through his skin, the way his skin grew cold and pallid, how his favourite clothes began to hang off him. There had been no worse feeling. That was why it hadn't even been a question.
Something surreal crept into her as she spoke the next words. "And then I met someone."
The Shopkeeper's face flashed into her mind like a strike of thunder, younger and colder. Those black eyes bore into her, judging her for admitting this. Admitting it to someone who could ruin her life in an instant, had she the inclination.
But Melinda would never. As with Loid, Yor had no hesitance or doubt in that. She could fear neither of them, because she loved both of them, loved them with a fervour she hadn't known was possible.
"That person found me in the woods one morning. I had been out on my own since dawn, and I was on the verge of fainting. There was just so much frustration in my body. Yuri wasn't waking up, he'd eaten nothing for two days, and I'd not for three. Frost had taken what little I used to gather and I was so furious I couldn't think straight."
Looking back on it, the memory felt like a dream. There had been so little coherence left in her, the world had seemed upside down, absurd in its unwavering cruelty. Adrenalin kept her moving more than anything else, her body should have already given in hours before, but she kept moving as if driven by a motor, destroying whatever she could see. Destroying things a teenaged girl on the brink of death shouldn't have been able to destroy.
The feeling of her knuckles breaking against the tough oak hadn't mattered, because the damn thing split, and the hysterical euphoria of the success had kept her forward as the tree teetered and threatened to fall on its splintered trunk. Running into a human in the woodlands, dressed in strange attire with long flowing hair, eyes piercing through her like he knew everything about her from a look, her rage had soared into a crescendo. It was horrifying to think of, now, the way she had went at him with a vicious and animal intent to hurt, despite having no good reason to do so.
The next she could recall was of herself flat on her back, her emaciated form atop an old towel that shielded her body from the frozen leaves that blanketed the surface of the earth. The man knelt over her, his hair falling like a curtain and blocking out the pale sun, casting most of her in shadow.
"They told me they could help me, that they could give me everything I would ever need, money, food, resources, if I just helped them in return. I told them I needed to look after my brother, and they assured me it would be no extra inconvenience. I accepted in a heartbeat, not needing to hear anything more. And they meant it. In a day my entire life changed. I had bread, fruit, clean water, books. I was given clothes to wear tailored exactly to my size, as was Yuri. He was too weak to question where I'd gotten everything, and when he finally had the strength to think to ask, I'd been taught to lie and told him I'd gotten a job. I've always hated to lie to Yuri. The things I had to do-" Yor paused, thinking how to hedge around things. "I came home hurt a lot. Some of it I could excuse away, but sometimes it'd be things like," gesturing to her ankle, she watched as Melinda followed the movement, and saw in turn when the older woman spotted what was being displayed. It circled just above the heel, an ugly mess of jagged scar tissue, pointed from where the teeth of a bear trap had sank into her flesh. One of the most frightening experiences of her growing years. How Garden had healed the mess of her skin and bone after it happened, she still did not know. Shock had taken her 14-year old self under pretty quickly. "That. And I had nothing to say that would make sense of it for him. So I got better at the work. I learned from every time I was hurt, I dedicated everything to it. Just so he wouldn't worry."
"You are an unimaginably kind person." Melinda told her softly, parting their hands. Yor wanted to chase the warmth, but found a worthwhile replacement when that delicate hand came to cup her face, tracing a gentle path downward. "Your brother was lucky to have you."
"He says that a lot." Yor laughed, wondering if Melinda could feel the burning of her cheeks beneath her gentle touch. "Even now he insists he wants to stay by my side forever. Whenever he comes to visit he and my husband get into this territorial little war over me, it's silly."
"It would be hard to not be jealous, having your time monopolized. I do think I empathize with his plight."
Yor huffed in amusement, shaking her head. "I'm just glad we're so close. It felt like lying so much had to inevitably ruin things, like I was tempting fate, ruining his unthinking trust in me."
"Well, when did you cease this line of 'work?'"
"Oh. Um." was there any way out of this? It seemed painfully ironic to lie at this stage after all that she had said, after what she had literally just said. "I still occasionally do work for them. A lot less than I did back then, but. It's come up."
Melinda didn't look happy about that, though at least there wasn't suspicion or anything that indicated she'd sussed out exactly what the nature of Yor's work was. Yor wondered what conclusion, if any, she had come to. She knew that people had made some less than kind assumptions in the past, and she'd just accepted them as preferable to correctly guessing the real thing. "Like an independant contractor?"
Yor wasn't sure she knew what that meant off the top of her head, but nodded anyway. "Something like that."
"Are you still being hurt as you were. Forgive me, but some of your scars..." Melinda let her hand drop to Yor's upper chest, splaying her hand against the breadth of the other woman's worst and most obvious scar, one which had now robbed her of the ability to wear lower-cut garments. The fact it was too great to heal into invisibility, even with a salve from Gympie and immediate attention on the scene, irked her more than she could express. "They look recent. Too recent to be more than a decade old."
"That was six months ago." Yor admitted. "I thought I was going to die."
The pressure on her chest only increased, as if Melinda were feeling for her pulse. That, or the anxious vulnerability of opening up to something so secret was catching up to her. At least the tears on her face had had time to dry.
"It was really bad. The worst part of it was that, for a second, I didn't care anymore. I'd failed, and I was going to die, and I didn't care. I was okay with it being over." worrying her lower lip, Yor fought to iron out the waver in her voice. "Yuri is so independant, his career has taken off, he doesn't need me anymore. Miss Anya has her father, and Loid-" oh god, she couldn't dive into that now. "Well. I thought it was a good place to stop. I felt so tired. I almost let it end there, I really did."
"But you're still here, now."
"I'm still here." Yor agreed, taking Melinda's hand between her own. "And I'm so happy I am. And- and I'm so happy you're here too, more than anything in the world! I'm so happy you lived, Melinda. I'm so happy I got to meet you."
"Oh, come here." Melinda complained, her own eyes shining, before yanking Yor into a crushing hug.
Yor immediately threw her arms around her in turn, taking care not to assert her full force and crush her but also doing as much as she could to hold her tightly, burying her face into the other womans hair and desperately wishing she could just keep her there forever, keep her safe. From the threat of war, from her husband, from herself. Protectiveness surged like a tidal wave, alongside the inevitable anxiety that came from realizing all that she had just revealed.
"I've never told anyone about all of that. Not everything, not the work I did." she said weakly. "Especially not that I started when I was a child."
Melinda sighed, cupping the back of her head.
"You don't see me any differently, right?" It felt like an asinine question, particularly when Yor had still not been 100% transparent and had vagued the details, leaving Melinda with a woefully incomplete picture of things, but insecurity wouldn't let her keep it down. She knew the answer, but she needed to hear it from the woman's own mouth.
"I'm insulted you feel the need to ask that." Melinda retorted as she withdrew, only to roll her eyes when Yor went 'eek' and tensed. "I'm kidding. Of course I don't. Wasn't my own tale equally disturbing? I'd say neither of us have a right to judge the other, now."
"You'd never do something like that again, right?" Yor asked weakly. "You haven't felt like that since you did it?"
"It's... come up. It's not a thought I can fully escape. But it isn't something I linger on. For as hard as things have been, at times, I do want to live. Don't worry about me."
"I'll always worry about you." the assassin argued. "I just wish I could save you."
"I would allow you to with open arms, if you found a way."
"I could kill your husband." Yor grumbled before she could think better of it, more venom than was strictly normal. Panic flooded the second the words left her lips, only to pause when Melinda hesitated, startled, before laughing.
"Don't do that. But I appreciate the thought, dear."
"I'm glad I haven't met him." 'For his sake, that is.'
"I'm equally glad I've not met those who brought you into such danger as a child!"
"Without the reflexes they taught me, I couldn't have caught you on the stairs that day." Yor poked, smiling. "I don't regret any of it."
"You beautiful, wonderful, ridiculous woman." Melinda patted her back. "Let's go and see the rest before they come after us or assume we've gotten into a fight of our own."
"Oh, no!" Yor realized. "What's the time!"
"Not to panic, we've an hour left. Let's make the most of it."
Despite the swirling anxiety in her gut, despite the cold of the water, despite the grief of what she now knew-
It was a good day.