Everything is perfectly normal. (tag Dorian) on Cascade Hall

Tatiana Vorontsova

May 26, 2020 12:16 PM

Everything is perfectly normal. (tag Dorian) by Tatiana Vorontsova

Walking into the Cascade Hall was not normally a combative action, but Tatiana was not exactly in a normal situation. Normally, after all, she did not associate the activity with the fear of a public fight with her sister, or with the defiance of social norms. Now, though, those were all real possibilities.

Defying social norms, she thought, should have been something she was afraid of. She knew how so many people felt about it, after all. She knew that was the thing which Mama had always been worried she wouldn't be able to stop doing - that she would never be a proper lady and therefore would be a burden on her parents for the rest of her life, as nobody wanted a wife who didn't know her place and know how to behave with proper decorum. As she strode into the Cascade Hall, though, she was not afraid; she almost wished someone would dare say a word to her as, without the slightest hesitation, she crossed the marble floor to the Teppenpaw table and sat down with the new Head Boy.

"Dobroe utro, Dorya," she said, reaching for the teapot. The same necklace of opals she had worn the night before shimmered again against her green robes, but she had left off the Pecari-themed elements she had included for the Opening Feast, and the red-themed hairpin Dorian had given her for her next-to-last birthday was stuck into the brown chignon, and she wore sapphire-and-emerald earrings, square emeralds swaying on two tiny, sparkling chains, each scarcely longer than one of her eyelashes, which connected to the round sapphires posted in her ears. "Kak dela? Khorosho li spalos'?"

Good morning. How are you? Did you sleep well? These were all perfectly normal questions to ask on any morning that might occur. Any morning where sitting with one of her closest friends was not somehow a damned political act which might lead to trouble at the first breakfast of her final year of school. This year, it was a damned political act, and it was Dorya's own fault that it was a damned political act, but she did not like that and so had chosen to refuse to acknowledge it unless she was forced.

16 Tatiana Vorontsova Everything is perfectly normal. (tag Dorian) 1396 1 5

Dorian Montoir

May 28, 2020 4:23 AM

And getting better by the minute by Dorian Montoir

“Zaoshang hao, sourette,” Dorian smiled as Tatya came and sat next to him. Originally, when they had crafted the plan of learning each other’s language(s) it had been so that they could each greet the other properly - in the way in which they were accustomed to, and thus bring a little bit of home here for one another. It had slid, of course, ending up more a mix of whoever wanted to be talking whatever language. But that was a bit like his home too. And being able to speak and be understood was just as homely as hearing the words. And Sonora had become its own version of home anyway - it no longer needed to compete like it had done when they were homesick first years. In fact, he thought, wherever he moved onto next would have an awful lot to live up to, and he could foresee being very Sonora-sick next September. Very homesick. It was strange to think that most mornings wouldn’t begin with a smattering of Russian - or start with seeing Vlad, or at least the impression in the pillow that showed he’d been there. He imagined painting the walls of whatever room he ended up in bright yellow, and tuning into Russian stations on the wireless whilst he drank his tea, but those would just be sad echoes of his friends. Even if he saw them all the time, it wasn’t going to stay the same, and he really rather wished it could.

“Da ya spala khorosho. Ni ne?” he confirmed his own good sleep in Russian before returning the question in Chinese. He had been slightly surprised at how quickly sleep had come last night. He’d been riding a wave of euphoria and anxiety over the head boy badge, and… and everything with Vlad. He still had a lot of questions and a lot of worries over that, and he had thought they would all keep him up. It had helped that Vlad wasn’t mad over the badge. Or, on the surface at least, anything else. That, to all intents and purposes, things seemed pretty normal right now. Certainly, it hadn’t felt awkward as they’d settled into bed last night. And the belly full of food, and the time difference with Canada had probably helped too, but the main thing he’d noticed was that nothing had changed about the sound of Vlad’s breathing, and thus it seemed nothing had changed about his ability to fall in synch with it and drift off to sleep.

He was relieved to find that nothing seemed to have changed with Tatya either. Not that he had expected it to, He had seen her at Vlad’s birthday, and it had all been perfectly normal. It was easier to be sure with Tatya too. She did not have subtext. It was simultaneously her greatest flaw and her biggest strength. Right now, it was the latter. It had surprised and shocked him that Vlad had been able to conceal so much hurt and so many confused emotions from him. He had always assumed that Vlad was a fairly open book. But with Tatya, at least, he could be confident of that.

“I am sorry you did not get head girl,” he commiserated, “I voted for you.” She had, admittedly, said it seemed like a lot of work and seemed only lukewarm about the idea. She just also inherently seemed to dislike the idea that anyone would assume she wasn’t utterly capable of anything at all she set her mind to, or that her friends would not believe the same of her. He therefore hoped the actual loss of it would not really weigh much on her once she knew that he personally had believed in her. “I think it would not go so well anyway with these,” he suggested, gesturing to her chosen jewels for the day, “The badges you have already are much prettier,” he added to try to dispel any lingering doubts over the issue.

13 Dorian Montoir And getting better by the minute 1401 0 5

Tatiana Vorontsova

May 28, 2020 11:19 AM

I hope so. by Tatiana Vorontsova

"Wo ye shuì dé hen hao," said Tatiana, for this was true. She had actually slept well. She had never had much trouble falling asleep, even over the summer after she and Katya had particularly sharp arguments and were therefore both feeling hostile and yet still sharing a room.

It had been surprising, really, how easy it had gotten to simply ignore someone else's presence. She wouldn't have thought she could learn to do something like that. Perhaps, she thought, she knew something of what Dorya's life was - had been - like at home, now; she had never remotely considered the possibility that any of her relatives could be dangerous to her, of course, and she had never seriously considered doing more than shaking anyone, but feeling isolated from the others in her own family...that was new. She didn't like it.

She laughed, for a moment feeling normal, when Dorian comforted her over the Head Girl position by pointing out that the badge might not have complimented her jewelry anyway. "Merci quand meme," she said. "You not tell? I also vote for me. But is okay," she shrugged. "And why we talk about me? Pozdravleniya!" she said - congratulations! - pointing at his new badge. "You will be the best for the Head Boy," she said, beaming at him. "I am glad you win. Looks good with you. You...you tell your mama?" she asked, with only a slight hesitation. Of course he could not really tell his mama, but he could write to her - if she was on speaking terms with him right now.

16 Tatiana Vorontsova I hope so. 1396 0 5

Dorian Montoir

May 28, 2020 7:15 PM

I have reason to believe by Dorian Montoir

“That is okay. I voted for myself too. But I had Vlad’s permission,” he added hastily. In his case, it would have been more of a gross betrayal had he not, “I think it’s okay to show you believe in yourself.” He had been learning to do that, steadily, in small ways. Accepting compliments. Not putting himself down. Articulating what he was good at and what he believed in. “Like all the letters that Mr. Row makes us write about ourselves,” he added with a grimace. It had been much more on the social level that he’d been getting used to that sort of thing. Trying to convince a company or a university he was worth taking was a whole other matter. Trying to convince himself that his life was going to be stable enough to make the latter possible was an even bigger challenge…

“Thank you,” he beamed when she congratulated him on his badge. “Yes. I wrote Mama last night,” he nodded. “I think she will be proud and… reassured.” He sipped his tea, assessing what to say exactly. He had noticed Tatya’s slight hesitation at bringing up his Mama, and he wasn’t convinced it was because she’d be searching for the words. “This kind of thing is easy to tell her. And I think it helps… She is convinced my life will be over now. That only bad things will happen. Maybe the more that I can show her that no… Vlad still invites me over. You are still here. People still elect me to be head boy… I know not everyone here will like it, or like me. But I can show her that it’s going to be okay, and maybe she will accept it more.

“I am grateful that you support me so much,” he added with a smile, reaching out to squeeze her hand.

13 Dorian Montoir I have reason to believe 1401 0 5

Tatiana Vorontsova

May 30, 2020 7:10 PM

Hope springs eternal. by Tatiana Vorontsova

Tatiana mirrored Dorian's grimace at the mention of Mr. Row and his letters. This would not, she thought, surprise him - everyone, after all, knew Tatiana did not like writing in English, at least not in a formal capacity. Silly Tatiana, she was, the girl who was still not fully fluent even after all these years - Silly Tatiana and her erratic grammar and ballistic approach to punctuation and spelling - Silly Tatiana, who didn't think about much of anything very much other than the carat value of any jewelry she happened to spot on another girl....

Except, of course, that she never would have gotten through her CATS had she not been capable, after all those years of doing homework twice, of writing English more or less properly. Except, of course, that people kept making her think about things, and once she did that, it was hard to then forget that she had done so. This was the real reason she grimaced at the mention of Mr. Row; he was one of those who regularly made her think about things she did not want to think about.

The one advantages that the idea of Work had over the idea of Marriage was that Work would give her money of her own, which no-one else could take from her or tell her what to do with, and Work wouldn't usually require her to regularly experience physical pain of a sort that ruined her figure and made it impossible to look pretty without recourse to an excess of corsets. Other than that, it didn't sound like a much better deal than Marriage. Either way, she spent her whole life slogging away at someone else's command, having no fun at all, when she wanted to do was go and see and do, all as her own mistress, with no master. This, however, was impossible; aside from their other three daughters, she had two brothers, which meant her odds of meriting such indulgences were...slim. She knew it, knew it couldn't really be otherwise - but she didn't like being reminded of it.

"I rather tell you," she summarized. "You don't care how many words."

She felt things she hadn't even known were tense when Dorian said that he had written to his mama, and that he thought she would respond positively to the news. "This is good," she said with relief, taking a sip of her tea. She returned the hand squeeze. "I - I see not, why I would not," she grumbled. "You cannot have heir with Jean-Loup, that is thing you must talk about with family, but it is not their business," she said, with a jerk of her head toward the room at large. "So why do they care? You act no different to us. You are still you. People stupid," she concluded. She remembered that he had said he was grateful and added, "I wish you did not - it was not so you have gratitude, that I am not stupid - but tu bienvenus."

16 Tatiana Vorontsova Hope springs eternal. 1396 0 5

Dorian Montoir

May 31, 2020 5:38 AM

Further good(?) news by Dorian Montoir

Tatya grimaced, which he took to be either a sign of solidarity or a shared distaste for professional writing. Perhaps if probed, he would have suggested it was because she did not enjoy writing at length in English, or having to learn a new (and perhaps for her, pointless) task in it. That seemed entirely reasonable to him. She clearly could make her point well enough in English to pass exams, and was obviously far from stupid. Not wanting to do something laborious and pointless didn’t indicate that she was - if anything, it suggested rationality.

He laughed at her comment that he was better to tell because he did not set a minimum word count. He lifted his teacup in salutation.

"Tak mnogo slov, everywhere but here," he murmured. "Is there any opposite?" he asked, "Like… Priyatnyye slova. Dostatochno malen'kiye slova,” he tried, pretty sure he had just said a far too literal type of ‘comfortable’ words, and ‘small enough words’ which did not quite convey the idea of amount… “Funny," he added, raising his eyebrows playfully, "It has never come up before now. Even with me," he pointed out with mock surprise. Even if he was not as bad as most perpetrators of the English language, he knew that brevity was not amongst his usual gifts.

"You are very wise," he smiled, as Tatya evaluated the situation, stating that nothing had changed in how Dorian acted towards her, so why should she change in return? He wished everyone could see it so logically. It made sense to him.

"I wish that too," he agreed, when she stated that it seemed odd to express gratitude for having someone not turn on you, and that it should have just been normal. "But, as this is the world we live in, I am grateful where I find goodness." He held back from further philosophising, not wishing to stray away from having priyatnyye slova, or whatever else they could call it. And really, that was all there was to it - he could think it was morally wrong that such niceness was not guaranteed but that did not diminish those who gave it out. He was not sure how lucky he had been in finding friends that felt that way - whether statistically, there were more good and kind people in the world than bad ones - but he certainly felt lucky. Especially given the backgrounds of his friends. People from those types of families weren't likely to support him in general. Were the ones he was friends with different because he was their friend, or were they his friends because they were different? But however many tangents he went on, the core remained what he had already said.

"Speaking of Jean-Loup, I have exciting news," he added, breaking into a grin. He rather suspected he should break the 'don't talk about him' rule to forewarn Vlad too, but he could not look forward to that - he had a feeling that would be an uncomfortable conversation. And that sucked because it was somewhat mixing up his feelings over something he should have been able to be happy about. But he could tell Tatya, and share his excitement, indulge the good side of his feelings about this. "They approved that he can do more internshipping here!” English could turn anything into a verb. He was pretty sure the fact he was doing it could be construed as proof of his comfort with the language instead of ineptitude - he knew how he was allowed to break the rules. “He will start this week and do several days a week helping here," he beamed, slightly nervous for how complicated that might make his life but trying to ignore that in favour of feeling happy.

13 Dorian Montoir Further good(?) news 1401 0 5

Tatiana Vorontsova

June 03, 2020 12:29 PM

As long as I don't end up having to hex someone. by Tatiana Vorontsova

"Can be," said Tatiana, considering the idea he had presented her with. Pleasant words, small enough words. "Or maybe - at least? - maybe pravil'nyye slova." The idea of 'correct words' seemed to align well, in her head, as the opposite value of 'too many words.' If there was too much of something, then the amount was not correct. Therefore, the correct amount of words would not involve too many words. She grinned at his joke about his own verbosity. She suspected that, under other circumstances, he might have struck her as someone who talked too much too, especially since French was even worse than English for inserting extra words where there was no good reason for them to be, but she wouldn't say so.

"Ochen' wise," she said dryly when praised. Very wise.. "If I am more wiser, then I will think - Tat'yana! Maybe you should not put knife in own nose!" she exclaimed in tones of mock revelation, picking up her knife and brandishing it briefly to make her point. "People stupid. Not your fault."

Exciting was a word Tatiana liked, as it usually meant that something interesting might happen. Given that it was followed by 'Jean-Loup' and Dorian looking very very happy, though, she thought this was likely to be something more exciting for Dorian specifically than in general, and was quickly proven right. She had assumed it would be something about him finding some kind of position where he would not starve or have to stay too far away from Dorian for long periods of time, but she was surprised enough to raise an eyebrow when he said that the job was here again. After the fool had gone waltzing with a student in front of everyone last year, she had rather assumed the school would be seriously annoyed with him and Dorian both....

"I am glad for you," she said with a smile. She wanted to tell him to be careful - that she had been fighting with her sister all summer over that incident last year, and that she did not want to have to choose between their friendship and dueling with her own sister to prevent Katya from cursing him in the back, so could he and Jean-Loup please keep their hands to themselves in public from now on? - but he looked so happy, and she didn't want to ruin it for him. There was bound, she supposed, to be a reckoning - a point where someone else made him unhappy - and they could talk about serious things then. "And am glad that Jean-Loup...that there is place for him. His family has much anger?"

16 Tatiana Vorontsova As long as I don't end up having to hex someone. 1396 0 5

Dorian Montoir

June 03, 2020 8:12 PM

Hopefully not by Dorian Montoir

It took Dorian a minute to parse what Tatya was saying - that the level up from the wisdom being displayed by everyone else was not sticking a knife in your nose. He giggled. Thank Maugris she was on his side. She would have been a pretty fierce opponent just from how she could cut people up with comments. Not to mention how very much it would have hurt- But that had not happened.

However, the conversation did shift from cheerful to sombre just as quickly. Whilst she was happy for him, she brought up a less than great subject and he grimaced.

“I don’t know all about it,” he admitted. “We did not get to see each other a lot during the holidays.” And when they had, there had been priorities other than talking. Well… Dorian wanted to do both. He wanted to share what was going on and to comfort each other with words as well as actions, but Jean-Loup was definitely more about the latter. He seemed to want to pour himself into kissing Dorian and blotting out the outside world instead of discussing it. It bothered Dorian that there seemed to be whole parts of Jean-Loup’s life that he could barely touch, and family was very definitely one of those subjects. “He won’t talk much about them,” he admitted to Tatya, wondering how much of the few snippets he had gleaned he should pass on. They felt private. He remembered the tear-soaked confession in his bedroom when Jean-Loup had wanted to ask him out. That they knew, or had known. That they weren’t necessarily the same thing because Jean-Loup had been dating girls for years before meeting Dorian to try to convince everyone there wasn’t a problem... “I know… I know they had one conversation before now, many years ago, but it wasn’t good,” he summarised for Tatya.

“He says his dad is now… more on his side. He agreed that Jean-Loup can come here. His mother was… not so much.” He got the impression she had been pushing a different course of action, one that involved staying in Canada and learning to do as he was told, and that Jean-Loup seemed scared as well as sad and angry. But he wouldn’t talk about it.

13 Dorian Montoir Hopefully not 1401 0 5

Tatiana Vorontsova

June 10, 2020 6:47 PM

Yes, but I won't rule it out as a possibility. by Tatiana Vorontsova

“Ah,” said Tatiana flatly, when Dorian summarized Jean-Loup’s family situation. What else, really, was there to say?

“At least his papa is not so stupid?” she tried. She was not the best at comforting anyone in the best of times, really, though she thought she had done better there than she might have. She could have said the first thing she had thought, which had involved surprise that his Monsieur Arceneaux was apparently less stupid now. It was one thing for her to decide not to be stupid, but very much another for parents to decide it. Parents were old and had to concern themselves about the family reputation besides. Tatiana had even wondered, sometimes, what would have happened, had she followed Anya and Sonia and Grisha to school in Russia, where her family was known, and had had something like this occur….

She did not want to believe she would have abandoned Dorian just because it would have looked bad for the family. She wanted to think she was better than that. Considering how much more dramatic a reaction the people around her would have had, had this happened in Russia, though…it was hard to believe it wouldn’t have been harder at home, anyway. She wanted to believe she would have still refused to be stupid, but it seemed likely that it would have been harder to be smart in that context.

“We will be all right,” she said abruptly. “Me and you – and eh, Jean-Loup too, now – all of us, we go out in strange place, yes? We come here. We are alone, no language. But we do okay. So we will be all right.”

16 Tatiana Vorontsova Yes, but I won't rule it out as a possibility. 1396 0 5