fandomhigh | Library [Sunday, March 9]

Adah's response to a question like that was, of course, a dull, hard sort of gaze that demanded to know how, after as much as he knew about her, the Eel could honestly think that was a question to ask. Behind that look, though, there was a little tingling at the back of her head, probably along the medula oblongata, that sparked a small bit of a question as to whether or not she would be. As much as she liked to insist that she was as perfectly capable as anyone else to do anything, she couldn't exactly avoid the fact that she wasn't, or that there was a good chance that there could be a time when something unexpected happened, and there wouldn't be anyone the--

She blinked, and her expression shifted, frowning at herself. What the hell was she thinking? Just because she'd always had people around, didn't mean that they were ever really there in that sense. Her nose wrinkled. "I disappeared for entire days into the jungles of Africa before," she pointed out, because, when she did, no one barely even noticed until they thought a lion had eaten her, and then they were only concerned because Tata Kvundundu was claiming that this meant that Jesus had abandoned them, and it would lead to a whole bit of trouble for Nathan Price that had nothing to do with his daughter possibly being dead. "I'm pretty certain I'll be a-okay."

She drew in a slightly sharp breath. "But, if it would make you feel any better, don't hesitate to check up on me or anything, although I'll probably pretend to hate you for it."

"I didn't think you wouldn't be," Lee said, half smiling and nodding. "That doesn't mean I won't ask. Call it...my unneeded concern. for you. It's a thing."

"A thing, huh?" Adah asked, half-smiling back. "I guess I can be okay with that. If anything, when you pursue this thing only to find out that I'm still okay, I can tease you your unneeded concern. It works."

"Aww, you'd tease me for being all concerned and fretful?" Lee asked, sticking out his lower lip in something of a pout.

"If you're honestly surprised by that," Adah deadpanned with a tilt of her head, watching his futile attempt to pout carefully, "I'll tease you about that instead. I'd tease you about the color of your hair if I had nothing else to tease you for; you being needlessly worried about me is definitely up there on things to tease you about."

Lee mock gasped and one hand went to his hair, tugging on it. "Our hair is almost the same color. If you made fun of my hair, you'd be making fun of your own hair."

"Not," Adah announced as she straightened herself up mostly by the lift of her chin, "if I made fun of it because, for its color, your hair is a stupid length."

"No, your hair's a stupid length," Lee replied. "Way too long. Gets all in the way and all tangly."

Adah had to laugh a little bit, mostly out of sheer astonishment that she was actually having this conversation. "But it's pretty," she countered. "And Leah keeps her hair short; I have to keep it long for fear that most people wouldn't be able to tell us apart, because most people are too stupid to realize that half my body doesn't work right. Things like that, they don't notice. Things like hair, they do."

"Are you comparing me to your sister?" Lee asked, arching an eyebrow. "Better yet, are you comparing me to a girl?"

He frowned at her. "My hair is awesome."

"Oh, don't worry," Adah mused, although her attempt at a soothing, consoling voice was ruined a bit by the need to chuckle slightly. "Leah always was the boyish one; it actually caused a bit of an uproar in the village when the ones who didn't realize it yet found out she was actually a girl. If I wanted to compare you to a girl, I would have brought Rachel into the picture."

She reached out a little to brush her fingers through the Eel's insulted hair with an apologetic simper. "It is awesome hair, you're right there. I never really said it wasn't. I said that I might have to make a case that it wasn't awesome hair if there weren't other things to tease you about, so it's a good thing you give me so many other things, so your hair can be good and safe."

"My hair is awesome," he repeated, leaning into her hand a little. "You'd go insane if you didn't have anything to tease me about. One day, that'll happen. I'll just be perfect all the sudden and you'll just have to gawk and be speechless at me."

"And then the earth will stop spinning, hell will freeze over, and the universe will buckle under the sway of impossibility," Adah countered loftily, though her fingers kept shifting a little through his hair. If he wasn't going to object to his awesome hair being mussed by her fingers, she certainly wasn't going to concern herself with stopping. "Perfection is impossible; I'll always be able to find something."

She said this with the utmost certainty, because Adah felt that she had good logic behind it, though it was logic that she would fight tooth and nail against ever having to explain. But, the fact of the matter was (or perhaps it just seemed that way in the familiar comfort of the library, looking over at him with her fingers in his hair) he was practically on the edge of perfect as it was, anyway, but, then, there she was, with a list longer than a mile of things to tease him about.

"Yeah," Lee said and closed his eyes, leaning into her hand a bit more. "And perfection's boring anyway. Who wants to be perfect? They'd have nothing to talk about, nothing to improve on."

"Exactly," Adah said quietly, watching him close his eyes and hating what it did to her chest, still, and wondering if she'll always hate it. "Boring. Then again, I've always been pretty biased against perfection, being almost the exact opposite of it."

"You're perfect the way you are," Lee said quietly, nodding. "Just like you are."

Adah's eyes narrowed a bit, but her mouth was tightening to keep a smile back. She'd been doing that a lot lately; she'd have be careful or else she'd end up snapping her jaw.

"So, you think I'm boring, then?" she muttered with a sharpness to her teasing.

"Did I say that?" Lee asked, cracking open one eye. "I didn't say you were perfect. You're perfect how you are. Meaning don't change."

"It's all pulling the same string," Adah had a light grin to meet the cracked-open eye, "and wondering why the different parts of the marionette aren't moving. Perfect how I am is still a variation of perfect, and you said perfect is boring. Although, I could just be saying that out of defense; I'm not fond of perfection. It's too suspect, and I'd rather be acknowledged for my faults than have it seem like I'm fine even though I have them. I know I have them. I have a lot of imperfections, and I'm quite fond of a lot of them."

"So am I," he said and closed his eyes again. "You should know that by now."

"Yeah," Adah said, drifting her hand from the Eel's hair to cup the side of his face and lightly brush her thumb against his cheek. "Just like you should know by now I'm only just teasing you anyway."

"Oh, I know," he said and grinned. "I just like to pretend I don't. Keep that clueless image up."

"That's smart," Adah grinned a little more. "It suits you well, cluelessness."

"I thought you'd like that," Lee said, laughing quietly. "Fake cluelessness to go along with my real cluelessness, right?"

"Eventually," Adah mused, "I'll be able to actually tell the difference between the two. Until then, though, I'll have to admit, I'm going to go ahead and consider it all to be genuine."

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