And true to her word, around 5:27, Mere shows up at the cafe--still in her work clothes, though she's taken time to touch up her makeup. Because she has to look right to feel right, and also because who knows? It might matter to Yelena (though she doesn't think so...).
Yelena's already there, and has claimed a small table near the window overlooking the street. She's a little pale, a little drawn, but her smile's bright enough when she spots Meredith and lifts her hand in greeting.
"It was all right. Mostly paperwork," she says. It's an essential part of any sort of fieldwork. It's also one the movies tend to leave out. "I think the chaos is starting to die down. How was yours?"
So Winter has something to tell Yelena. He has been putting it off and putting it off, uncharacteristically shy and unsure, but here he is, at long last, spurred into it by a recent conversation. He walks her back from the gym, but walks off the usual path to the apartments, instead heading for a cafe they've been to before. This requires fancy coffee.
"You remember Meredith," he starts, perhaps unexpectedly. "Right?"
She doesn't question his route. It isn't quite blind trust - since the sawdust-filled doppelgangers crawled out from the twisting, twisted paths of Dogtown, they've had catchphrases, call-and-response that doesn't stand out from normal conversation, but lets them be sure that they are, in fact, looking at the right person. But it is trust. If Winter's deviating from routine, there's reason for it.
There's probably reason for the question, too, though the first one that comes to mind is...unsettling. "Yes," she says. And then, "Are people forgetting things again? And if they are, do you know what we need to set on fire?"
"No, not that." Valid question, though, because that is also unsettling. "I just. I was jealous when you two started stepping out. I know the word for it, now," Winter says. "I didn't then. I just kind of wanted to punch you both. I didn't," he adds. "Obviously. But part of me wanted to."
Her shoulders drop a little in relief, though it's short-lived. The explanation is, if not more unnerving than another plague of memory loss, at least more surprising.
"I didn't realize you had feelings for her," she says, because that's the only explanation that makes sense. Meredith had been gorgeous, and clever, and - perhaps most importantly - not someone he'd known and trained as a little girl, sibling in all but blood. And she'd missed the signs, in no small part, she thinks, because Winter hadn't been able to recognize them himself. "I would ask if I am stepping on your toes again, but I know for a fact I'm not...stepping out? with anyone now."
"I didn't, either. So how could you." He shrugs a little. He isn't upset about it, beyond being kind of sad he realized this now when it's a year too late. He wouldn't have gotten in their way, if she'd stayed, because he loves Yelena, too.
"But," he continues, "I wanted you to know. Because it helped me figure out about Steve." Even if Yelena might have already guessed considering how much time he spends with the guy, and his slightly altered behavior around him, in the "maybe a little more natural" but also "kind of baffled and gruff" kinds of ways. "We're not exactly stepping out. I don't know if I can. But we talked about it."
"Oh," she says, and blinks at him for a moment before smiling. "Good."
She bumps him with her shoulder, lightly. "I'm glad for you. Even if you don't know what you're doing quite yet, you deserve the chance to be happy in this shitty, shitty place. Both of you do."
"I'm happy," he protests. "I was before, I mean. I got you and Kate and Cortana, and Steve was always gonna be my team even without. That." He pauses, but adds, "It's good, though. Yeah." He sounds kind of confused by that, but not in a bad way. Like he can't quite believe it still, even though it's been weeks now since their talk.
This time he bumps her back, wrinkling his nose as intentionally as he can. "Please don't. I will make sad faces at you. Or the best sad faces my stupid face can make." He's aware he isn't great at doing anything but a blank stare or a grimace. Expressions are hard and his face doesn't always do what he wants it to.
"And that would just be a tragedy. I already have a sad Kate. I don't think I could handle you being sad at me, too." She says it lightly, but there's a flicker of worry in her expression. It's been a little more than a month since the disaster at the museum, and no cure in sight for those afflicted with permanent transformation.
There is that. And it drains the last of the levity out of Winter, too.
Because there's always entity shit. It's entity shit that finally got Winter to make this confession, nervous though he was about it. For no good reason, really, since it went fine, but there'd been something in his head that made it hard to say out loud.
"Yeah. And Steve keeps grumbling about wanting the serum back," he says heavily.
"Of course he does." She snorts softly, and shakes her head, expression somewhere between admiration and exasperation. "He wants to protect everyone. It's something the Entities can pick away at, the idea that anything that isn't a perfect win is a failure. That there is more that he can be doing, and all he needs to do it is to give away little pieces of his humanity."
Winter nods unhappily. If it were anyone but Steve, he would have punched or shot or be stalking him right now to make sure he didn't get any ideas.
But it is Steve and the idea of punching or shooting him makes Winter feel sick. "You told me. That I helped you. That if it weren't for me you might have gone to the entities," he says. "How."
If he did it for Yelena maybe he can do it for Steve, too.
She pauses and chews the inside of her lip for a moment, ordering her thoughts, before continuing. "I lost everything before I came here. The life I was building, my mission, my sister. All there was left for me was anger and vengeance. And then I came here."
She buries her hands in her pockets to keep her fingers still, head tilting slightly so she can look up at him without losing track of the street ahead.
"And then I came here. And you understood me, even the ugly, jagged parts that mean I'm only ever pretending to fit in with normal people. You accepted me, and you watched my back, and you wanted to protect me from the monsters. And I thought - maybe I could help you, too. Protect you from the people who would only see a weapon, or who would think they get to decide what sort of person you should be allowed to be. Give you someone who understands what it's like to suddenly have to make choices."
"And you did," he says solemnly, maybe a little closer to warm than he can usually manage. "You did do all that. You do seem to understand. And no one has used me besides ADI itself." And he'd agreed to that one so he doesn't think it counts.
He pauses at the corner opposite the coffee shop he's aiming for, not wanting to bring this conversation inside just yet for anyone to hear. "So I just need to be there. For him," he guesses, trying to compare the situations. He's not sure if understanding is going to the same thing, there, because he doesn't understand Steve sometimes. And he's sure Steve doesn't understand him a lot of the time.
She nods confirmation, though her slight frown suggests that's not quite it, in its entirety. "That's part of it, but also - you helped anchor me to my humanity, for long enough to find other reasons to not go looking for strength in horrible places. To really understand that it's a lie - nothing I could get from them would really serve me. Just them. But I've never been powerful. I think maybe it's easier for me to say 'no, I'll make do with what I've always had' than it would be to give up on something I was used to relying on."
Winter considers that, chewing on the inside of his cheek a moment. "And I never wanted to be powerful," he says, half-realizing it as he says it. He never wanted the thing he turned into. That's why they had to put those words into his head, had to wipe him, had to hurt him. He didn't want it. So now that he can only have it by hurting people, it's not as hard to turn his back.
Except: "Steve. He always did. He wanted to be. To be useful. To be strong enough to protect people. Except that strength isn't going to protect people here."
"Not without a very high cost, and I think letting him see that on his own will not help. Hurting people who aren't your enemy isn't something everyone can live with."
How many people who fell wholly under the sway of the Entities did so because they thought themselves irrevocably damned? It's a question that's been plaguing her more and more, these past few months.
"So that leaves showing him that he doesn't need to be more than he is to protect people."
"I might need your help," Winter admits, though he starts walking again, moving to open the cafe house door for her. "With that. I can try to show him all day long, but I don't know if he'll believe me." Because, paradoxically, Steve knows him better. And has more expectations. (Though he's been good about keeping those expectations to himself, at least, and not laying them at Winter's feet.)
"I am much weaker than you," she concedes, though the slightly lopsided smile and crinkling of her nose suggest she isn't entirely serious. Less physically strong, perhaps, but she makes it up in other areas, and knows it.
She squeezes his flesh and blood arm as she steps past him into the cafe. "I'll do what I can to help."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
text; un: looselystrung
un: jelica
Coffee after work?
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And true to her word, around 5:27, Mere shows up at the cafe--still in her work clothes, though she's taken time to touch up her makeup. Because she has to look right to feel right, and also because who knows? It might matter to Yelena (though she doesn't think so...).
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"Hey, you. How was your day?"
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Backdated to before the current event sometime
"You remember Meredith," he starts, perhaps unexpectedly. "Right?"
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There's probably reason for the question, too, though the first one that comes to mind is...unsettling. "Yes," she says. And then, "Are people forgetting things again? And if they are, do you know what we need to set on fire?"
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"I didn't realize you had feelings for her," she says, because that's the only explanation that makes sense. Meredith had been gorgeous, and clever, and - perhaps most importantly - not someone he'd known and trained as a little girl, sibling in all but blood. And she'd missed the signs, in no small part, she thinks, because Winter hadn't been able to recognize them himself. "I would ask if I am stepping on your toes again, but I know for a fact I'm not...stepping out? with anyone now."
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"But," he continues, "I wanted you to know. Because it helped me figure out about Steve." Even if Yelena might have already guessed considering how much time he spends with the guy, and his slightly altered behavior around him, in the "maybe a little more natural" but also "kind of baffled and gruff" kinds of ways. "We're not exactly stepping out. I don't know if I can. But we talked about it."
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She bumps him with her shoulder, lightly. "I'm glad for you. Even if you don't know what you're doing quite yet, you deserve the chance to be happy in this shitty, shitty place. Both of you do."
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Because there's always entity shit. It's entity shit that finally got Winter to make this confession, nervous though he was about it. For no good reason, really, since it went fine, but there'd been something in his head that made it hard to say out loud.
"Yeah. And Steve keeps grumbling about wanting the serum back," he says heavily.
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But it is Steve and the idea of punching or shooting him makes Winter feel sick. "You told me. That I helped you. That if it weren't for me you might have gone to the entities," he says. "How."
If he did it for Yelena maybe he can do it for Steve, too.
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She pauses and chews the inside of her lip for a moment, ordering her thoughts, before continuing. "I lost everything before I came here. The life I was building, my mission, my sister. All there was left for me was anger and vengeance. And then I came here."
She buries her hands in her pockets to keep her fingers still, head tilting slightly so she can look up at him without losing track of the street ahead.
"And then I came here. And you understood me, even the ugly, jagged parts that mean I'm only ever pretending to fit in with normal people. You accepted me, and you watched my back, and you wanted to protect me from the monsters. And I thought - maybe I could help you, too. Protect you from the people who would only see a weapon, or who would think they get to decide what sort of person you should be allowed to be. Give you someone who understands what it's like to suddenly have to make choices."
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He pauses at the corner opposite the coffee shop he's aiming for, not wanting to bring this conversation inside just yet for anyone to hear. "So I just need to be there. For him," he guesses, trying to compare the situations. He's not sure if understanding is going to the same thing, there, because he doesn't understand Steve sometimes. And he's sure Steve doesn't understand him a lot of the time.
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Except: "Steve. He always did. He wanted to be. To be useful. To be strong enough to protect people. Except that strength isn't going to protect people here."
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How many people who fell wholly under the sway of the Entities did so because they thought themselves irrevocably damned? It's a question that's been plaguing her more and more, these past few months.
"So that leaves showing him that he doesn't need to be more than he is to protect people."
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She squeezes his flesh and blood arm as she steps past him into the cafe. "I'll do what I can to help."
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Then he follows her inside, feeling a little bit better about things. "Order whatever you want. Fanciest coffee they've got. I'm paying."