Inception: Ariadne/Arthur/Fischer [All That We Keep, part IV]
Title: All That We Keep, part IV
Author: namistai8
Rating: PG-13 for language
Pairing: Ariadne/Fischer, Ariadne/Arthur
Word Count: 2,826
Disclaimer/Notes/Whatever: Nolan owns, I just borrow. Ariadne dates Fischer, more or less...
All That We Keep, Part I | All That We Keep, Part II | All That We Keep, Part III
And I never was smart with love
I let the bad ones in and the good ones go
But I'm gonna love you like I've never been hurt before
I'm gonna love you like I'm indestructible...
~Robyn "Indestructible
There are things that Ariadne is good with - combining color, drawing perfectly straight lines without the need of a ruler or creating a symmetrical arc without the need of a compass, finding small ways to give comfort to people without being asked. There are things that she is bad with - faking emotions, admitting when she's gone too far, keeping her desk clean.
Fischer's kiss is like a geiger counter. It scrambled... something in her and she's not sure what / how she is supposed to react. Let alone feel. Sure she was surprised, actually she was a few lines past surprised, but there had been a tiny part of her that had felt pleased. Pleased to have been found pretty enough, cute enough, desirable enough to have had an attractive male make it clear that he was keen on her. Part of her was horrified because in that instant, she knew that things had changed. This was no one-date deal anymore, although she wasn't sure it would have ever been. She didn't want to think too much about how she actually 'felt' about the kiss, nor how for a millisecond of it, when her mouth was pressed against Fischer's lips in a too surreal moment, her lids drifted a shade lower, her eyes went out of focus and her mind thought of a kiss that had never existed in reality.
Afterwards, her lips did tingle, and she knew that her eyes were too wide, and she hoped she didn't look too off-put or dumbstruck or alternately, too misty-eyed and gooey. While she definitely would have preferred not to be kissed (because she did, really), it would have been rude, moronic and potentially dangerous to reject Fischer. Again, she had no reason not to like him, and all the reasons to do so.
"You can't ask him," Arthur's words cut through Ariadne's descent into the rabbithole. She focused on the pointman with almost relief, as she really didn't want to know where that particular train of thought lead to, now that it had left the station. The implication in the words stung her, a little though and while it made her brow knit in irritation, a part of her welcomed it. Here was something she could focus on.
"What makes you think I would?" she responds, a little huffily, tapping her finger against the rim of her expresso cup. She knew she was a little too jittery, her nerves too exposed, rubbed raw. She's had two expressos in the span of the last two hours - first with Fischer, and now with Arthur and its starting to show. Normally, she would have felt a little embarrassed at having Arthur see her in such a state. He is so calm, composed, put together but the irritation is helping mask the embarassment. Instead, it just adds a punch to her tone.
"Because I know you," Arthur says so matter of fact that Ariadne would have typically felt a small thrill of pleasure that she would have tried desperately to squash. Or stuff into her pocket, only to pull it out, later, when it's dark and she's in bed alone and she's going through what happened that day. This time, however, it rubs her the wrong way. Arthur has been quietly disapproving, in his quiet Arthur way, meaning there's been a look, a certain tone to his voice, a rougher pitch to her name. She knows she's made a mess of things - although really it's all Fischer's fault - and that Arthur hates having to clean up messes.
"In any case, you shouldn't go about asking questions unless you're ready to hear the answer," Arthur says darkly, with an intense look at her. Ariadne gave him a small glare, even as her heart threatened to skip a beat. It just wasn't fair that her obviously damaged psyche found dark and brooding Arthur even more attractive. For a fraction of a second, her eyes strayed to his lips, the slightly fuller lower lip and the straight line of his mouth that she finds fascinating. She let her eyes keep drifting, across to his shoulder. She knows she's mis-reading the tension, that Arthur is probably worried about the inception job, Fischer and what Saito will have to say about the 'developments', since Arthur looks exactly like he does whenever he's about to pull the trigger on his gun but at this moment, she can't help but wish it were about her.
"I'll be in touch," he says as he gets up from the table and walks away, effortless and graceful, without looking back at her.
***
[Several weeks later...]
"So what do you think?" Robert asks her as he walks into a sizeable living room, the space amplified by the lack of furniture and the white walls. He had just finished signing a year lease for an ultra-chic condo in the Passy neighborhood in Paris, had promptly picked her up from her apartment and was now proceeding to show it off to her.
"I think it's great," she says easily with a smile. The past few weeks of her life have been both surreal and predictable at the same time. She has gone out with Robert so many times, Ariadne has stopped keeping count. Dinner, just to grab a coffee, to a museum, to the theater, the movies, shopping for groceries, lunch, breakfast, to the zoo, picking up croissants as a late morning snack, searching for a tailor, running out for art supplies because she needs to finish her dissertation, to a jazz club, dancing, row boating in the Siene, hanging out in her cramped and messy apartment. She is date, friend, companion, conspirator, muse, sidekick, and confidante. Not quite a lover, and yet... its not platonic. It's comfortable and uncomfortable by twists and turns. She feels offbalance and then righted every single time. It's been beyond her expectations, although she isn't sure what she was expecting after all.
After each outing, Robert kisses her - sometimes its a quick peck on the cheek, sometimes on the forehead, sometimes full on the mouth. It would be a lie that she doesn't expect it, and at times she feels like she meets him half way there. However, the kisses are almost chaste, except for the frisson of heat and the lick of ambivalence. At this point, she knows it's not just her. She's grateful that he doesn't push and that it hasn't escalated into more, but also curious as to why. From what she knows of boys, they're not one to linger in murky waters. And they are definitely at murky waters.
At the beginning, she had thought of him as Fischer, as was her habit to do so, but she had once let it slip in front of him and had seen the almost instantaneous change in him. He got colder, more aloof, and his tone was almost biting as he pointed out, not too kindly, that he had a name. So, she thinks of him as Robert. She doesn't know if he has a nickname, or ever has. She doesn't want to think about him in even more familiar terms. Arthur had warned her that it was dangerous - and had forbidden to refer to Robert as anything as Fischer - when they talked. Because despite it all, she didn't know him and he certainly didn't know her, even if he thought he did.
Except she did know things about him. How he is not a morning person, prefers gin to whisky, has a habit of checking his watch whenever he gets irritated, wanted a puppy but was given a pet fish instead, and has trouble falling asleep. Some are things he's shared, and some of them she's picked up on. And of course, there are things she knows because of Arthur's files. And while she read Arthur's bulleted notes on Fisher's psychological files, she couldn't make herself read his therapist's notes. Before, during the inception job, she would have but now it just ... didn't feel right. It both surprised her and saddened her to think that none of the notes were a surprise to her. She didn't need pilfered confidential material to tell her that Robert was essentially a lonely man with very little confidence in himself, despite the uppercrust upbringing and arrogance. She knows of his conflicting feelings toward his blighted childhood, and has seen him, whenever he encounters children during their outing how he watches them as if they were foreign entities, with a trace of both longing and bitterness.
"What color do you think I should paint the walls?" Robert, asks with a smile, drawing her away from her thoughts.
"Whatever color you want," Ariadne sasses back. As of late, Robert has had the annoying tendency to ask her opinion on things. His tone and manner are casual, but the things he increasingly asks her opinion about are becoming more and more personal. Like her opinion matters. And while there is a tiny, miniscule, really really small, part of her that likes being consulted, instead of having her opinions being discounted either for her lack of experience, for being too naive, or for not being informed enough, another part registers notches of alarm at every question she feels compelled to answer. Like every single time she's sharing a little more of herself with him.
Robert groans. "Why can't I just hire a decorator and be done with it?" he whines.
"Because you said you wanted to do this yourself," Ariadne gently chides him.
"Can I hire a second maid?" he asks, smiling winsomely, wide-eyed and the blue of his eyes strikes her. She'd do this room in a light shade of blue, if it was hers, this condo with hardwood floors and plaster beams and big, high windows. A sky blue, light and dazzling.
"No. You get one maid, and a part-time cook. That's it. That's what you said you wanted," Ariadne said firmly. When Robert had told her that he wanted to live by himself with no help, she had both felt proud and laughed hysterically. It was clearly obvious from everything that Robert lacked a severe number of survival skills, having been waited on hand and foot since birth. She looked about at the empty space and wondered if, left to his own devices, the place would ever get clean. Although everything about Robert indicates that he is a person with neat habits, it's also easy to be neat when you have someone picking up after you.
"It is," Robert says, looking squarely at her, and she is pinned against and by the blue of his eyes. She can't help her pulse from leaping, and twin twinges of alarm and delight course up her spine.
***
"I don't know why you had me do these sketches," Ariadne said, handing a sheaf of paper to Arthur. They were back at the warehouse - not the same one they had used for the Fischer one, but similar enough. It was slightly smaller, but with the same sparse and industrial feel as the previou one. However, it was the base of operations, at least for now. Ariadne had refused to keep meeting Arthur in cafes, although god knows that were enough of them in Paris that the chance of Robert running into them was nearly implausible. She just couldn't handle her nerves on that much caffeine. She had never drunk so much expresso in her life, and was starting to wonder if her heart would survive all of this. Quite literally.
"Why go though all the effort to acquire actual ordinance plans, when you've already there and can give me the exact layout?" Arthur says serenely, reviewing the drawings she has made.
Ariadne sighs and proceeds to fill a glass of water to feed the lone houseplant in the office. Although really it's a misnomer - it's more of a warehouse plant, really. She brought it in hoping to make a difference in the cold, industrial aesthetic of the place. Instead, the plant is completely overwhelmed both by the feel of the place and Arthur. Honestly, she wishes she could give it back and chalk it up to an impulse buy, but she doesn't want to admit that she was, and always is in his eyes, wrong.
She studies Arthur's profile as he pores over her drawings, and can't help but compre the two men that seem to be dominating all her time. They're both dark haired, lean, highly internalized men. Despite all the time she has spent with both, she doesn't feel like she understands them, beyond a rudimentary grasp. It startles to realise that she knows more about Robert at this point than Arthur, and she averts her gaze and looks out the window.
"Any further instructions from Saito?" she asks, staring out at the outline of the city, which seems to stretch out past the horizon. His rich cologne tickles at her nose, and she reminds herself that this is really what she's doing, gathering information on Robert. Dating him is her cover. Here, during her debriefs with Arthur, is when she tries to regain her sense of purpose even when she feels it unraveling in her hands. She doesn't tell Arthur this, struggling to match him in his professionalism even when she knows she is probably failing miserably. She doesn't know if Arthur is seeing her lose it, or not, and can't decide if she wants him to or not. Or why she would or wouldn't.
"To continue as we are," Arthur says. "Unless you have objections?" he asks, with a raised eyebrow.
Ariadne shakes her head. How could she say no? More importantly what would that mean? There's no plausible reason to stop seeing Robert, and no alternative to doing Saito's bidding. If she did stop, she would no longer see Robert... or Arthur. It gives her a lurch to realise that she has spent too much time on this, like some sort of satellite around twin stars. Maybe she should do something with HER friends. Give herself a break. Whether its to regain balance, control or a small act of rebellion, Ariadne can't decide anymore.
Arthur reaches over and cups her cheek with his hand "You sure?" he asks intensely.
Ariadne wants to close her eyes and savor the feeling of his fingers on her skin. Arthur has touched her numerous times, but his touch has always been cool, detached, professional. Not that he hasn't been careful with her or cared about her well being before. "I'm fine," she says a little hoarsely.
Arthur's hand drops away like he's been burned, and Ariadne follows its trajectory like a comet in the sky, downward and until he hides his hands in his trouser pocket.
***
"Come with me," Robert pleads, a winsome smile on his face, his tone playful. It's a lazy Sunday afternoon, and they've both been sitting side by side in the couch engrossed in their reading, a half-empty tea pot and half-full mugs with tepid Darjeeling that continues to cool on the large oak coffee table. It's companionable, even if she is reading a philosophical tract on the nature of space and buildings and he's been involved with reading quarterly reports for an upcoming two-week visit to Fischer Enterprise holdings in China.
"Robert, I can't! I have my dissertation to finish!" Ariadne says, in a slightly scandalized voice. It's not the first time he's issued the invitation. In fact, he's been trying to say 'Yes' since this morning.
"You could use a break. Think about it. When else are you going to be in China? Think about the architecture, the food. Private jet ride, five star hotel, the whole Hollywood starlet bit," Robert sing-songs, trying to tempt her.
"With my wardrobe?" she says sardonically, with a gesture to her worn sneakers, jeans and thrift store prize, a 1960s Rolling Stone tshirt. That not to say that she isn't tempted. A free two week trip to China with all expenses paid and traveling in the lap of luxury? Ordinarily, she would have given her left kidney for such a trip. On the other hand, she does have a small fortune of her own that while may not afford her all of the amenities to the trip that Robert keeps dangling in front of her eyes like some sort of glittering prize does mean that she could afford to go. On her own. She just can't use Robert, even more than she already is, even with his explicit permission.
"I could take you shopping?" Robert says with a side smile.
Ariadne shakes her head no. And retaliates by putting her feet up on the coffee table. She looks at him, smirk on her face because she knows he hates it when she puts her feet up on the furniture, waiting for a rebuke. Instead, she finds him looking at her seriously, and she forces herself to keep being cheeky.
"I'll miss you, you know," he says, his tone abruptly serious.
"I know." Ariadne says, and stops from adding 'Me too', because it would be a lie. Except it's not really a lie, because she is going to miss him. She's not entirely sure what she's going to be doing with all her time, although she will probably spend the bulk of it doing her dissertation. Ariadne doesn't know if she should have said it anyway, but that moment has passed and she can read the disappointment in his eyes. She looks down at her reading, the words a blur on her page, trying to figure out how to make it right by him. Almost instinctively, she moves to his side and snuggles up, resting her head on his shoulder.
Robert just cocks his head to the side, and from the periphery of her eyesight, Ariadne can see a few strands of his hair.
They continue to read in silence.
All That We Keep, Part V
Comments and criticisms always welcome.
Crossposted in arthur_ariadne
Author: namistai8
Rating: PG-13 for language
Pairing: Ariadne/Fischer, Ariadne/Arthur
Word Count: 2,826
Disclaimer/Notes/Whatever: Nolan owns, I just borrow. Ariadne dates Fischer, more or less...
All That We Keep, Part I | All That We Keep, Part II | All That We Keep, Part III
And I never was smart with love
I let the bad ones in and the good ones go
But I'm gonna love you like I've never been hurt before
I'm gonna love you like I'm indestructible...
~Robyn "Indestructible
There are things that Ariadne is good with - combining color, drawing perfectly straight lines without the need of a ruler or creating a symmetrical arc without the need of a compass, finding small ways to give comfort to people without being asked. There are things that she is bad with - faking emotions, admitting when she's gone too far, keeping her desk clean.
Fischer's kiss is like a geiger counter. It scrambled... something in her and she's not sure what / how she is supposed to react. Let alone feel. Sure she was surprised, actually she was a few lines past surprised, but there had been a tiny part of her that had felt pleased. Pleased to have been found pretty enough, cute enough, desirable enough to have had an attractive male make it clear that he was keen on her. Part of her was horrified because in that instant, she knew that things had changed. This was no one-date deal anymore, although she wasn't sure it would have ever been. She didn't want to think too much about how she actually 'felt' about the kiss, nor how for a millisecond of it, when her mouth was pressed against Fischer's lips in a too surreal moment, her lids drifted a shade lower, her eyes went out of focus and her mind thought of a kiss that had never existed in reality.
Afterwards, her lips did tingle, and she knew that her eyes were too wide, and she hoped she didn't look too off-put or dumbstruck or alternately, too misty-eyed and gooey. While she definitely would have preferred not to be kissed (because she did, really), it would have been rude, moronic and potentially dangerous to reject Fischer. Again, she had no reason not to like him, and all the reasons to do so.
"You can't ask him," Arthur's words cut through Ariadne's descent into the rabbithole. She focused on the pointman with almost relief, as she really didn't want to know where that particular train of thought lead to, now that it had left the station. The implication in the words stung her, a little though and while it made her brow knit in irritation, a part of her welcomed it. Here was something she could focus on.
"What makes you think I would?" she responds, a little huffily, tapping her finger against the rim of her expresso cup. She knew she was a little too jittery, her nerves too exposed, rubbed raw. She's had two expressos in the span of the last two hours - first with Fischer, and now with Arthur and its starting to show. Normally, she would have felt a little embarrassed at having Arthur see her in such a state. He is so calm, composed, put together but the irritation is helping mask the embarassment. Instead, it just adds a punch to her tone.
"Because I know you," Arthur says so matter of fact that Ariadne would have typically felt a small thrill of pleasure that she would have tried desperately to squash. Or stuff into her pocket, only to pull it out, later, when it's dark and she's in bed alone and she's going through what happened that day. This time, however, it rubs her the wrong way. Arthur has been quietly disapproving, in his quiet Arthur way, meaning there's been a look, a certain tone to his voice, a rougher pitch to her name. She knows she's made a mess of things - although really it's all Fischer's fault - and that Arthur hates having to clean up messes.
"In any case, you shouldn't go about asking questions unless you're ready to hear the answer," Arthur says darkly, with an intense look at her. Ariadne gave him a small glare, even as her heart threatened to skip a beat. It just wasn't fair that her obviously damaged psyche found dark and brooding Arthur even more attractive. For a fraction of a second, her eyes strayed to his lips, the slightly fuller lower lip and the straight line of his mouth that she finds fascinating. She let her eyes keep drifting, across to his shoulder. She knows she's mis-reading the tension, that Arthur is probably worried about the inception job, Fischer and what Saito will have to say about the 'developments', since Arthur looks exactly like he does whenever he's about to pull the trigger on his gun but at this moment, she can't help but wish it were about her.
"I'll be in touch," he says as he gets up from the table and walks away, effortless and graceful, without looking back at her.
***
[Several weeks later...]
"So what do you think?" Robert asks her as he walks into a sizeable living room, the space amplified by the lack of furniture and the white walls. He had just finished signing a year lease for an ultra-chic condo in the Passy neighborhood in Paris, had promptly picked her up from her apartment and was now proceeding to show it off to her.
"I think it's great," she says easily with a smile. The past few weeks of her life have been both surreal and predictable at the same time. She has gone out with Robert so many times, Ariadne has stopped keeping count. Dinner, just to grab a coffee, to a museum, to the theater, the movies, shopping for groceries, lunch, breakfast, to the zoo, picking up croissants as a late morning snack, searching for a tailor, running out for art supplies because she needs to finish her dissertation, to a jazz club, dancing, row boating in the Siene, hanging out in her cramped and messy apartment. She is date, friend, companion, conspirator, muse, sidekick, and confidante. Not quite a lover, and yet... its not platonic. It's comfortable and uncomfortable by twists and turns. She feels offbalance and then righted every single time. It's been beyond her expectations, although she isn't sure what she was expecting after all.
After each outing, Robert kisses her - sometimes its a quick peck on the cheek, sometimes on the forehead, sometimes full on the mouth. It would be a lie that she doesn't expect it, and at times she feels like she meets him half way there. However, the kisses are almost chaste, except for the frisson of heat and the lick of ambivalence. At this point, she knows it's not just her. She's grateful that he doesn't push and that it hasn't escalated into more, but also curious as to why. From what she knows of boys, they're not one to linger in murky waters. And they are definitely at murky waters.
At the beginning, she had thought of him as Fischer, as was her habit to do so, but she had once let it slip in front of him and had seen the almost instantaneous change in him. He got colder, more aloof, and his tone was almost biting as he pointed out, not too kindly, that he had a name. So, she thinks of him as Robert. She doesn't know if he has a nickname, or ever has. She doesn't want to think about him in even more familiar terms. Arthur had warned her that it was dangerous - and had forbidden to refer to Robert as anything as Fischer - when they talked. Because despite it all, she didn't know him and he certainly didn't know her, even if he thought he did.
Except she did know things about him. How he is not a morning person, prefers gin to whisky, has a habit of checking his watch whenever he gets irritated, wanted a puppy but was given a pet fish instead, and has trouble falling asleep. Some are things he's shared, and some of them she's picked up on. And of course, there are things she knows because of Arthur's files. And while she read Arthur's bulleted notes on Fisher's psychological files, she couldn't make herself read his therapist's notes. Before, during the inception job, she would have but now it just ... didn't feel right. It both surprised her and saddened her to think that none of the notes were a surprise to her. She didn't need pilfered confidential material to tell her that Robert was essentially a lonely man with very little confidence in himself, despite the uppercrust upbringing and arrogance. She knows of his conflicting feelings toward his blighted childhood, and has seen him, whenever he encounters children during their outing how he watches them as if they were foreign entities, with a trace of both longing and bitterness.
"What color do you think I should paint the walls?" Robert, asks with a smile, drawing her away from her thoughts.
"Whatever color you want," Ariadne sasses back. As of late, Robert has had the annoying tendency to ask her opinion on things. His tone and manner are casual, but the things he increasingly asks her opinion about are becoming more and more personal. Like her opinion matters. And while there is a tiny, miniscule, really really small, part of her that likes being consulted, instead of having her opinions being discounted either for her lack of experience, for being too naive, or for not being informed enough, another part registers notches of alarm at every question she feels compelled to answer. Like every single time she's sharing a little more of herself with him.
Robert groans. "Why can't I just hire a decorator and be done with it?" he whines.
"Because you said you wanted to do this yourself," Ariadne gently chides him.
"Can I hire a second maid?" he asks, smiling winsomely, wide-eyed and the blue of his eyes strikes her. She'd do this room in a light shade of blue, if it was hers, this condo with hardwood floors and plaster beams and big, high windows. A sky blue, light and dazzling.
"No. You get one maid, and a part-time cook. That's it. That's what you said you wanted," Ariadne said firmly. When Robert had told her that he wanted to live by himself with no help, she had both felt proud and laughed hysterically. It was clearly obvious from everything that Robert lacked a severe number of survival skills, having been waited on hand and foot since birth. She looked about at the empty space and wondered if, left to his own devices, the place would ever get clean. Although everything about Robert indicates that he is a person with neat habits, it's also easy to be neat when you have someone picking up after you.
"It is," Robert says, looking squarely at her, and she is pinned against and by the blue of his eyes. She can't help her pulse from leaping, and twin twinges of alarm and delight course up her spine.
***
"I don't know why you had me do these sketches," Ariadne said, handing a sheaf of paper to Arthur. They were back at the warehouse - not the same one they had used for the Fischer one, but similar enough. It was slightly smaller, but with the same sparse and industrial feel as the previou one. However, it was the base of operations, at least for now. Ariadne had refused to keep meeting Arthur in cafes, although god knows that were enough of them in Paris that the chance of Robert running into them was nearly implausible. She just couldn't handle her nerves on that much caffeine. She had never drunk so much expresso in her life, and was starting to wonder if her heart would survive all of this. Quite literally.
"Why go though all the effort to acquire actual ordinance plans, when you've already there and can give me the exact layout?" Arthur says serenely, reviewing the drawings she has made.
Ariadne sighs and proceeds to fill a glass of water to feed the lone houseplant in the office. Although really it's a misnomer - it's more of a warehouse plant, really. She brought it in hoping to make a difference in the cold, industrial aesthetic of the place. Instead, the plant is completely overwhelmed both by the feel of the place and Arthur. Honestly, she wishes she could give it back and chalk it up to an impulse buy, but she doesn't want to admit that she was, and always is in his eyes, wrong.
She studies Arthur's profile as he pores over her drawings, and can't help but compre the two men that seem to be dominating all her time. They're both dark haired, lean, highly internalized men. Despite all the time she has spent with both, she doesn't feel like she understands them, beyond a rudimentary grasp. It startles to realise that she knows more about Robert at this point than Arthur, and she averts her gaze and looks out the window.
"Any further instructions from Saito?" she asks, staring out at the outline of the city, which seems to stretch out past the horizon. His rich cologne tickles at her nose, and she reminds herself that this is really what she's doing, gathering information on Robert. Dating him is her cover. Here, during her debriefs with Arthur, is when she tries to regain her sense of purpose even when she feels it unraveling in her hands. She doesn't tell Arthur this, struggling to match him in his professionalism even when she knows she is probably failing miserably. She doesn't know if Arthur is seeing her lose it, or not, and can't decide if she wants him to or not. Or why she would or wouldn't.
"To continue as we are," Arthur says. "Unless you have objections?" he asks, with a raised eyebrow.
Ariadne shakes her head. How could she say no? More importantly what would that mean? There's no plausible reason to stop seeing Robert, and no alternative to doing Saito's bidding. If she did stop, she would no longer see Robert... or Arthur. It gives her a lurch to realise that she has spent too much time on this, like some sort of satellite around twin stars. Maybe she should do something with HER friends. Give herself a break. Whether its to regain balance, control or a small act of rebellion, Ariadne can't decide anymore.
Arthur reaches over and cups her cheek with his hand "You sure?" he asks intensely.
Ariadne wants to close her eyes and savor the feeling of his fingers on her skin. Arthur has touched her numerous times, but his touch has always been cool, detached, professional. Not that he hasn't been careful with her or cared about her well being before. "I'm fine," she says a little hoarsely.
Arthur's hand drops away like he's been burned, and Ariadne follows its trajectory like a comet in the sky, downward and until he hides his hands in his trouser pocket.
***
"Come with me," Robert pleads, a winsome smile on his face, his tone playful. It's a lazy Sunday afternoon, and they've both been sitting side by side in the couch engrossed in their reading, a half-empty tea pot and half-full mugs with tepid Darjeeling that continues to cool on the large oak coffee table. It's companionable, even if she is reading a philosophical tract on the nature of space and buildings and he's been involved with reading quarterly reports for an upcoming two-week visit to Fischer Enterprise holdings in China.
"Robert, I can't! I have my dissertation to finish!" Ariadne says, in a slightly scandalized voice. It's not the first time he's issued the invitation. In fact, he's been trying to say 'Yes' since this morning.
"You could use a break. Think about it. When else are you going to be in China? Think about the architecture, the food. Private jet ride, five star hotel, the whole Hollywood starlet bit," Robert sing-songs, trying to tempt her.
"With my wardrobe?" she says sardonically, with a gesture to her worn sneakers, jeans and thrift store prize, a 1960s Rolling Stone tshirt. That not to say that she isn't tempted. A free two week trip to China with all expenses paid and traveling in the lap of luxury? Ordinarily, she would have given her left kidney for such a trip. On the other hand, she does have a small fortune of her own that while may not afford her all of the amenities to the trip that Robert keeps dangling in front of her eyes like some sort of glittering prize does mean that she could afford to go. On her own. She just can't use Robert, even more than she already is, even with his explicit permission.
"I could take you shopping?" Robert says with a side smile.
Ariadne shakes her head no. And retaliates by putting her feet up on the coffee table. She looks at him, smirk on her face because she knows he hates it when she puts her feet up on the furniture, waiting for a rebuke. Instead, she finds him looking at her seriously, and she forces herself to keep being cheeky.
"I'll miss you, you know," he says, his tone abruptly serious.
"I know." Ariadne says, and stops from adding 'Me too', because it would be a lie. Except it's not really a lie, because she is going to miss him. She's not entirely sure what she's going to be doing with all her time, although she will probably spend the bulk of it doing her dissertation. Ariadne doesn't know if she should have said it anyway, but that moment has passed and she can read the disappointment in his eyes. She looks down at her reading, the words a blur on her page, trying to figure out how to make it right by him. Almost instinctively, she moves to his side and snuggles up, resting her head on his shoulder.
Robert just cocks his head to the side, and from the periphery of her eyesight, Ariadne can see a few strands of his hair.
They continue to read in silence.
All That We Keep, Part V
Comments and criticisms always welcome.
Crossposted in arthur_ariadne