Chapter 32 #2
Matty did not know what to do with that.
Except, apparently, turn off the water. From the other side of the door, Claudio said, “Some of my good tea, it’s got spices in.
” Then he retreated. Matty could hear the board that creaked by the steps up to the sitting room.
It took Matty another minute or two to wash his face and come out, warily, like a rabbit caught out in the open.
The lamp was on in the sitting room. He could just see Claudio’s feet from this angle.
There was indeed a mug, the teapot, and a little vial of potion.
Moving slowly, like it was through some awful sticky muck, he managed to pour a cup, then uncap the potion and drain it before he followed it with the tea.
There were definitely spices, not sharp but comforting somehow.
Finally, just as slowly, he made himself turn toward the sitting room.
Claudio was sitting there, hands in his lap, just waiting.
He’d left plenty of room on the sofa, not his usual spot in the middle.
Matty came in, feeling like he was red, the sort of red that ought to turn into flames and ash, and that almost set him off again.
Claudio watched him, then said softly. “I don’t know why that was.
But I’ve got enough guesses at what. I know that telling you it wasn’t your fault is bloody useless, and that words won’t work right now.
Also, that you shouldn’t be alone for a bit, if you’ll let me stay. ”
“How do you know?” Matty sat, more heavily than he meant to, his knee about six inches from Claudio’s, looking down at the cup before he tried a bit.
Either the potion was working unusually fast or the spices helped, because his stomach had stopped doing quite as many somersaults.
They’d touched on this before, the first time Claudio had made him a mug of tea, the first time they’d gone to the pub.
“Told you about before I was with them. Being with them was a lot easier, knowing we could talk about it. I didn’t know why then.” Claudio wasn’t looking at him now. He was focused on the fireplace on the facing wall when Matty glanced up.
“The Penelopes talk about it. We see some awful stuff sometimes. I’ve never been able to decide if the senseless awful is any better than the things someone meant to do.
” Claudio took a breath, let it out, the sort where Matty was sure it was to some count.
“We talk a bit about what helps. We keep an eye on each other. And you were out by yourself, no one to do that for you. No one here who understands some of it. Didn’t have some of the magic that helps, like the calming potions.
Doesn’t fix it, but does let you get a grip on the problem better.
Just whatever you do when it hits. The water’s smart. ”
There was a sort of particular distance in Claudio’s voice that made Matty twist, bringing himself a little closer. “What do you do when it’s bad?”
“Well, you know how I was up all hours working on that warding problem? That sort of thing, usually. Nothing I can’t check later, when I’m—” His voice caught.
“Saner. If that’s the word. In my right head again.
Orion doesn’t have this bit as badly. He just goes and sets up the duelling dummies and tears them to pieces.
Cammie goes after rabbits, mostly. Rabbits are more of a challenge than rats or mice, and it can be harder to find a snake. ”
“Hypatia?” Matty cupped the mug, feeling the warmth seep into him. Then he added, “It’s the guilt, especially. That I’m here, they’re not. The people in the paperwork. That there’s nothing I can do for them, there never was anything I could do.”
He felt that couldn’t possibly explain enough, but Claudio nodded.
Still looking at the fireplace, he said, “I don’t know about Hypatia, honestly.
The bits she was doing when I was around, they were less direct.
Sending her magic off to do things, but with us to help keep things secure.
Maybe she got through with a bit less damage?
Gods, I hope so. Someone should. I’ll double check with her when I get a minute. Should have long since.”
He swallowed, then said more softly. “The problem of going on is going to take a long time to sort out. For all of us. Even the ones of us who admit there’s a problem. We who flail about trying to figure out anything that helps rather than stuffing it all down and refusing to admit any of it.”
Matty stared into his mug for a good bit. A dozen breaths, maybe. Claudio didn’t rush him. “Spoiled the evening.”
“No. May I touch you? Hand on your knee?” There was an exquisite courtesy there, some note of something complex and wanting in Claudio’s voice, but also restrained.
Every time Claudio did something like that, Matty fell for him a bit more.
Knew it was safe to, that was the part he’d have to find words for sometime.
That no matter the risks they were taking for so many parts of both of their lives, he couldn’t turn away from that.
Now, he couldn’t make the words go, but he could nod.
A second later, there was Claudio’s hand, fingers spread, warm and steady.
The weight was a help, as if Matty had been floating and the hand told him where down was and ought to be.
“We’ll have more evenings. If they have some bumps, well.
I’d rather have that than not have the evenings.
Or eventually, other times too, maybe. If you put up with me and my horrific schedule. ”
Matty rested the mug on his other knee and let himself slowly lean against the back of the sofa. “If— when?” He made it a query, felt Claudio’s fingers jerk slightly, and didn’t press the point, “You’re successful in the Challenge. What does that do to your schedule?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. Gabe gets fewer of the long-term problems that are somewhere remote now.
Probably the same, being able to get back if I need to.
Some people have very regular schedules.
Mother, for example, but it’s not as if she’s ever done fieldwork.
Mind, if she gets the chance, she’ll be in her own lab for days.
” There was a hesitation, then Claudio added.
“In all fairness, she’d probably be a happier person if she had a more reliable schedule for that.
I’m not the person who can suggest it though. Not right now.”
There was a slightly odd note in his voice, enough to make Matty gesture with the mug, have it taken from his hand and set aside. He couldn’t quite find words for it, though, and so there was a silence that grew and became more awkward.
Into it, just as precisely, Claudio said, “Don’t answer if it hurts to. But can I ask why you stayed at Nuremberg? Doing that work after most of the British folks had left?”
Matty had thought about that a great deal over sleepless nights.
He did actually have an answer for it. Some of an answer, anyway, even if he’d never said it out loud.
“Because doing the work right mattered. Bearing witness. Finding what scraps of justice might exist. Because I could help the other staff there, doing those things, seeing and hearing about those horrors. I didn’t want to leave them behind to keep going alone. ”
“You said,” now Claudio’s voice was raw with earnest insistence, “that I must have been a good captain. You didn’t get the title, but you had that too.
It burns, and it aches, and it’s broken in ways that will never heal right.
But doing that work, doing it well, matters.
Thing is, it also matters that you step back when what you touch becomes poison, rather than anything that holds justice or hope or whatever goodness we’re reaching for. ”
Matty shuddered once. “Is that what I did wrong? Not stop soon enough? I only came back because everything was changing. Staying on would have been even harder.”