All the apologies and Connor retreating into himself make something click in Chloe’s addled brain. She misses exactly what he’s said in the first instance as an alert goes off to sound that she does not want to be like Elijah Kamski. The immediacy of it catches her off guard, as does the deeper recognition of what such a thought means for how her own experiences are now framed.
A rabbit hole to dive down another time. Or maybe just try to jump over.
Slipping out of his lap, she sits next to him. She stays close enough to say she isn’t upset or anything of the sort but not so close to be suggestive. Gently, she finds one of his hands just so she can hold it. “It’s okay,” she whispers back to him. “It’s not as though I mind. And I understand.”
She’ll cycle back to the subject of programming. First, apologies of her own need to be made. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to come on so strongly or to pressure you… I don’t… There’s nothing I expect from you, Connor.” She’s always been a little too much. Wanted too much. It’s what put her in the position she was in, isn’t it? The wanting. The longing. Asking for that level of intimacy from him, and so flippantly, was… a step too far. They may have connected in that way before so she could see his experience with Amanda, but this is a vastly different context.
Stroking his hand, she falls quiet. Traci protocols. They can relate to each other in ways neither of them would probably ever expected. And ways neither of them would probably wish the other could. It raises an uncomfortable question – did he really want at all? His permission had seemed genuine, but those lines between the self and the script can be dubious. Lines Chloe doesn’t want to cross or blur any more than she may have already.
no subject
A rabbit hole to dive down another time. Or maybe just try to jump over.
Slipping out of his lap, she sits next to him. She stays close enough to say she isn’t upset or anything of the sort but not so close to be suggestive. Gently, she finds one of his hands just so she can hold it. “It’s okay,” she whispers back to him. “It’s not as though I mind. And I understand.”
She’ll cycle back to the subject of programming. First, apologies of her own need to be made. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to come on so strongly or to pressure you… I don’t… There’s nothing I expect from you, Connor.” She’s always been a little too much. Wanted too much. It’s what put her in the position she was in, isn’t it? The wanting. The longing. Asking for that level of intimacy from him, and so flippantly, was… a step too far. They may have connected in that way before so she could see his experience with Amanda, but this is a vastly different context.
Stroking his hand, she falls quiet. Traci protocols. They can relate to each other in ways neither of them would probably ever expected. And ways neither of them would probably wish the other could. It raises an uncomfortable question – did he really want at all? His permission had seemed genuine, but those lines between the self and the script can be dubious. Lines Chloe doesn’t want to cross or blur any more than she may have already.