angermanaging | IC contact (TuShanshu)

Me too.

[ As much as he appreciated someone to talk to, even if the conversation didn't exactly address the topic head on. Jack finished the tea in his glass, setting it down on the countertop, glancing up at Bruce. ]

You know you can ask for anything, right? If you need it... so long as I'm here, I'd always...

[ He broke off, shrugging awkwardly. He doesn't know how to say it properly; he just hopes the man understands. ]

[Addressing topics head on has never been Bruce's style. He assumes that if Jack wants to, he'll bring it up himself; but it's never really helped him, so he's not about to impose that misguided attempt on Jack unless he seems to want it.

And this offer he does understand. It stymies him for a second with understanding, in fact-- he knows how encompassing that offer is. He feels immediately like it's not fair to let Jack say that without telling him about the Hulk, without explaining, but the words still don't want to come. Bruce hates talking about himself and he still feels like it isn't the time.

Instead he has to look out toward the window Jack had come in, at the burgeoning twilight and the water in the canals out his apartment building, to find his response.] Yeah. [In a moment of bare honesty, he adds, somewhat lighter,] It's a little weird for me. I've been alone for. A long time.

[It's one of those flashes of insight that occur all at once, when pieces slot together in your knowledge about someone. There's a slightly questioning tone, but he's relatively confident when he says,] But I think you know about that.

[ They did a lot of similar things, especially when attention was drawn to them. For Bruce, it was his intelligence, purposely left unaddressed by the man most of the time and yet shining through whenever he put his mind to a task. For Jack it was too much emphasis on being legendary, on being Winter and he'd laugh it off and remind them that he was from Pennsylvania so he was just a guy, not that much different than anyone else.

Jack doesn't move, hands resting inside the front pocket of his hoodie now that he was no longer holding onto the glass, watching Bruce. There's neither agreement nor denial in his posture or expression... waiting, to see where this went. Technically it could be taken either way: that Jack knew about Bruce being alone, or that Jack himself had been alone for a long time. Neither are incorrect. ]

[Bruce doesn't have any reason to suspect that Jack would know more about him than what he's told him, and so far, that hasn't been much, not regarding the real details of his life. So in this case he definitely means the latter.

Whereas before this conversation he'd always respected his distance and never pushed, now he's feeling a little more forthcoming about it.] It is different here, [he says, remembering the conversation they'd both had weeks ago about being not totally sure if they'd go home if they had the choice.] It's... possible. Easier. To know people.

[An unspoken concession that yes, he has let Jack, and others, grow important to him. He's not totally isolated, and he's not trying to push him away. Once, both of those would be true.]

Yeah. This place changes the rules... the ones we thought couldn't be changed.

[ Jack remembers that conversation too and it's something that's been in the back of his mind, lurking just below the surface. Especially given how suddenly people disappeared, here one moment and gone the next and it was an uncomfortable knot in his stomach. The spirit thought, maybe that's why I told him, just now... because there was the a fear (not unfounded) of the risk that he'd never get the chance.

He thinks, he should be uncomfortable about having things guessed about him but the awkwardness doesn't come. So he nodded finally, affirming Bruce's observation. He had been alone for a very long time, in more ways than one. Alone in being unseen, alone in having no guidance, alone in having no one he could rely on except himself. ]

[He's not surprised to have his guess confirmed. It makes sense. The pieces that he knows of Jack's life fit together that way; and Bruce might not know much about spirits, but he does know that part of the definition is immortality. By nature they tend toward the incorporeal, the abstract and the unreal. It's easy for him to imagine it as lonely, with his own experience drifting in and out of other's lives, as unseen as he could be. And for Jack it would be so many more years, when Bruce already felt like the nine he'd been on the run were so long they were erasing the ones that had come before it.

He knows, too, what it's like to lose a chance. He'd known it before he got here, and had it confirmed since with disappearances. Bruce doesn't begrudge him the impulse not to leave things unstated, when you never knew and couldn't trust that sudden external events wouldn't sweep them away from you. But Betty, and those here, had begun to make him believe that period of loss might always be eventually ended.

Lighter and almost wry,] Always seems like just when you give up is when someone comes along to prove you wrong.

[ The change in tone and words prompt a similar reaction from Jack, the heaviness in his gaze lightening once again. ]

You'd almost think they were doing it on purpose, huh? Ought to give those people a piece of my mind.

[ He withdraws his hands from the pocket of his sweater, takes his staff from where it was leaning innocuously against the wall, layering a fresh crackle of frost across the old wood. ]

I should get going.

[Bruce sets his cup aside and straightens up to say goodbye. He's still not sure he'd really helped any, but Jack had said that it made a difference, so he'll believe him. After a certain point, there's only so much you can do for someone else, in any case.

The window's still open from where he'd come in, and Bruce reflexively walks over to it to see him out.] Don't be a stranger, [he says, half-joking, half-serious.]

[ Jack hops up, rests one leg bent beneath him on the sill and nods. ]

I won't.

IC contact (TuShanshu)

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;

Re: action;