chlorophylliac | 30 ❦ Video

30 ❦ Video

[Ivy is sitting in the lovingly upgraded greenhouse, on the edge of the fountain pool she's created at the centre, and absolutely nobody was surprised. There's a plant/animal hybrid on her lap; anatomically a small rabbit, but what it's covered with is more like moss than fur and its eyes are completely black.]

The first greenhouses used on Earth were recorded by Pliny the Elder, two thousand years before my time.

The Roman Emperor Tiberius wanted cucumbers all year round, so, his gardeners made it happen. Their specularium predated the invention of glass; they used oiled cloth or sheets of mica. They weren't used constantly, only at night, to protect the plants from the cold after they'd had the benefit of the sunlight during the day.

More sophisticated versions appeared over a thousand years later. The Vatican, in the thirteenth century, to house plants brought as trophies from tropical exploration. Korea, two centuries afterward. What my contemporaries would consider a modern greenhouse didn't appear until the eighteen-hundreds.

By my time, commercial technology allows plants to be grown out of season, thousands of miles from the environments where they evolved, untroubled by parasites or predators or the vagaries of the weather. Even the most diseased specimens can heal in a place designed for precisely that.

[She falters, briefly, gaze going out of focus. It looks like she's fighting something off, consciously or otherwise.]

Which is perfectly fine, if all you want is something that will thrive in an artificial environment. But when you return it to its home -- with all the threats and dangers that plant is subject to --

[Ivy tunes out again, gaze going flat and empty.]

The following Warden and Inmate have been paired:

A.J. Crowley //

sauntervaguelydownwards → Arthas Menethil //

darknessb4me

The warden should expect a file to be delivered to his cabin shortly. Please familiarize yourself with the information therein and introduce yourself to your new Inmate as soon as possible.

[She blinks slowly, coming back to herself.]

Sometimes the rot runs particularly deep, of course. I hope you'll be very happy together.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Good.

[Ivy can't help but feel her thoughts snag on that sentence. A fairly gentle observation:]

...There's never a point at which you owe someone the right to have you do something you don't want to do.

[Tiffany pets the rabbit's ears, still avoiding eye contact with Ivy.]

Once, back home, there was this guy who I used to have sex with sometimes.

[Ivy makes a quiet sound of acknowledgement and doesn't push for more. Whatever Tiffany has to say, she can say at her own pace.]

Yeah. But he... he wasn’t very good at it, though. He didn’t know how to make it good for girls. I didn’t even know it could be that good for girls back then. But I did it anyway - and it was because I wanted to. I did agree. I'm not saying I didn't.

Anyway, I used to have sex with him, but I stopped when I started going out with this other guy. Then my boyfriend moved away, and the old guy started coming back around. I told him I wasn’t really interested in him anymore, but he grabbed me and put me up against the wall and we had sex anyway. And I let him. I told him no and I tried to push him off at first, but then I stopped trying.

He was an asshole, but I kinda get why he thought I’d be okay with it, ‘cause we did used to do it regularly, so... and he was trying to be nice. He came and found me. He brought me a six-pack of soda. I can't blame him too much for getting confused.

So what about times like that? 'Cause... there's been times like that.

[No point mincing words.]

You told him no and it happened anyway. That you stopped fighting him doesn't equate to consent.

[She looks across to Tiffany.]

I'm sorry that happened to you.

[She looks up, finally.]

Yeah, but I don't want you to be right, though. And I'm supposed to make my own opinions about things now, so what if I want my opinion to be that you're wrong?

[But there's a difference between having a different opinion because it's what she actually believes, and pretending to have a different opinion because it's easier that way. This is the latter.]

[Softly:]

That's your choice. But why do you want that, Tiffany?

'Cause it's better than what you're saying.

...I know it feels that way, at first. It did for me, for a very long time. But the alternative was spending the rest of my life blaming myself. 'That's just how men are, so I ought to have been more careful.' My choice was between hating what happened to me or hating myself for letting it happen.

But it is how a lot of men are. Am I supposed to fight it every time or something?

Not necessarily. Not if it puts you at risk of something worse.

[Ivy shakes her head.]

This isn't about planning for the possibility of a next time. It's about being honest with yourself.

[Which Ivy constantly struggles with, in some ways - but not others.]

But it feels awful. I feel awful now, and I didn't before.

I didn't mean to do that to you.

[Ivy rises from the bench and moves over, sitting cross-legged opposite Tiffany.]

....Tiffany, I think a part of you wanted to acknowledge this. You kept talking to me, when you could have stopped. You accused me of brainwashing you yesterday - but you still came here, now.

[She suppresses a hiccupy sob, bringing her hands up to cover her face.]

I didn't want to.

[She doesn't know anymore if that's true.]

[She's not going to argue that.]

...I think it takes a very strong woman to look closely at her past and accept things in it that hurt. And it will stop hurting. What happened to you, you survived. You weren't ruined, or damaged, or made any less than what you were before.

I don't wanna be a survivor. I just wanna be me.

You still are.

[Ivy's voice is quiet and level. It took her a long time to come to this conclusion herself, but it seems as natural as breathing now.]

Nothing has changed. You just know yourself a little better.

... I'm just wondering if maybe you got it wrong. Maybe I didn't explain it right, and I made it sound worse than it actually was.

If that's what you think.

[But she very deeply suspects that this is not what Tiffany thinks.]

[Tiffany hunches over, curling into herself further (but still careful of the rabbit in her arms). Her voice is small, almost inaudible.]

... I didn't always want it. I really didn't.

[Ivy hesitates, just for a moment, then reaches out and puts her hand on Tiffany's upper arm. Her body runs cool, a few degrees below human, but there's no toxicity in her skin.]

[She leans forward enough that her forehead rests against Ivy's shoulder. She's too intimidated by Ivy to attempt a full hug the way she would with a lot of other people, but she desperately wants to seek comfort.]

Please don't tell anybody. Please. I know you think I told everybody about Paris and maybe you're gonna want to find some revenge, but please pick something else.

For the love of - come here.

[And it is not Ivy's thing, at all, but she pulls the woman into a hug nonetheless.]

I will not tell anyone.

[She goes willingly and easily, pressing her face hard against Ivy's shoulder.]

Do I have to tell anyone?

No. No. Your life and your past are your business, Tiffany. Nobody else's.

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