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[isawallflower]

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, CHEERYCHERRY. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 019.46.820.17 *** CHEERYCHERRY has joined 019.46.820.17 <CHEERYCHERRY> It's Riley! <CHEERYCHERRY> Please leave a message! <CHEERYCHERRY> Please be someone with their priorities sorted out properly!

main: CheeryCherry
anonymous: panthera, aed
retired: gflynn (anon)

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[digiorno]

[One more time: something is wrong.]

[This time it's him who's missing a piece. Maybe he's said it too carelessly. Maybe this wasn't the right time at all. He doesn't know which is true. Watching Riley carefully, he notes her distress and feels it seep into his bones like disease. It could make him brittle enough to break if he let it, hating himself for making her sad.]

[Is he crazy for thinking she needs someone to lean on? That's what memory and instinct tell him. After a moment, he nods slowly, weighing everything.]

You don't have to agree. We don't have to talk about you right now, unless you want to. We can talk about something else. That other place, or the stupid details of what I just told you, or Maple, or nothing. We can just sit, or walk, or you can fly away.

It's up to you, Riley. The only thing you can't do is push me away again. [The ghost of that smile returns.] I'm a lot more stubborn than you realize.

[isawallflower]

[ It's only now, as her gaze finds her own reflection, Riley starts to notice her feathers, literally ruffled from stress. How pathetic she looks. It's because she's looking here that she even sees Giorno's soft expression, painted plain despite her attempt to avert her eyes. ]

You...

[ She presses her teeth together very tightly.

I'll always be on your team—

She had that, once. Probably not anymore. (She was going to fix, she was, she swears...!)

Riley forces herself not to think about that. If she starts getting lost in that night, she'll be stuck looking at the faces of Kate and Annleigh again, faces she thought would haunt her less than the people she killed—falsely. ]

...You know... I liked it 'cause...I could just be normal. It was...nice, having just...a normal family, even though it...you know. It was...like that.

[digiorno]

. . . Mm.

[Not agreeing, not disagreeing. Just a sound of acknowledgment. This is the first time, this moment, that it's truly sunk in for him how the makeup of Riley's family in that other world might affect her in this one. Part of it is unquestionably good. The other part—]

[Not now.]

That part of it . . . wasn't so bad. That part [by itself, in a vacuum] was nice.

[isawallflower]

It all became horrible. And...I- I hate some of the...memories it took, my— [ Don't think about it. Don't think about her. ] But, still, you know...

[ It's with quite a bit of hesitance that she continues, very softly: ]

I liked being friends there. Until you told me all this, I— ...I just considered it you.

[digiorno]

[Just him.]

[He's quiet for a good while after this. Thinking. Instinctively balking in response, then walking around his own distaste at the idea, looking at it from all sides. Truthfully, he's too tired to do this. Truthfully, he doesn't want to talk about it. Truthfully—]

[He sort of wants to tell her again, how it wasn't. How he could never have been that happy growing up unless he was an entirely different person. It just wasn't possible. But he doesn't want to make her sad, either. It's difficult.]

[But also, ultimately, very easy.]

I think the thought of being friends with someone like you in a more normal place was the best thing to come out of the entire experience, for me.

[This is unequivocally true. If he had known someone like Riley before, it probably wouldn't have changed much, but it would have changed enough. It would have meant something. He envies the strange Haruno facsimile that much. They understood each other, he and Riley, in a way that he never did with anyone in his life back home who wasn't a career criminal.]

[Another beat or two, and his smile goes a little wry.] Did you say I was sweet?

cw: intrusive thoughts

[isawallflower]

[ For a moment, Riley's very afraid that she's ruined it again. That even though she'd somehow navigated through the rest of it—tricked him, made him think she's better, more worthy than she is, stupid, it'll just hurt all the more when—this will walk-back all the good will. She watches Giorno with bated breath, her chest tight like her lungs are going to burst from worry.

It makes the smile that spreads across her face even more lovely and gentle. ]

I did! Because you were.

[digiorno]

[Making people smile is one of those things that he’s recently learned he likes to do. In that other world, he was better at it; he had more practice. But he’s gotten better at it, at least with Riley, someone who rarely smiles in a way that’s soft instead of tense. Those are the smiles that feel rewarding to see.]

No one has ever called me sweet before, Riley. I genuinely don’t know what to make of it. Everyone must have gotten the wrong impression of me over there, and now they’ll be disappointed to find out I’m a bastard.

[isawallflower]

[ And, in response, Riley rolls her eyes despite the smile staying firm and secure. ]

Ohh no, you were still a bastard there. [ Riley rarely lets herself swear but it feels sort of natural to. ] You were sweet and a jerk. Both are true.

[digiorno]

. . . Hm.

[He has less of a comeback for that one. She's at least right on one of those counts. Narrowing his eyes at her for a moment, he eventually gives up and just shrugs, acquiescing.]

I'm multifaceted, then. Although I think I was only a bastard to specific people. Consider yourself lucky.

[isawallflower]

[ She missed this. She missed this. Like this, she can pretend it's all...okay. ]

That's luck? Really? Giorno, I need to get you a dictionary.

[ They are close enough that she can gently poke his arm. Something that other-Riley would do, in that other-life, as she was more...comfortable. Secure. Loved. Little things like casual physical contact, casual teasing, they came easier to her, despite the anxiety still bubbling under the surface. ]

[digiorno]

Well. Let me clarify. There's a different between being a bastard and actually being mean, you know?

[She probably saw some of the mean, at least in the beginning, never directed toward her but toward Steffan once or twice, toward his hangers-on more often. They never quite managed to get on. Even with all that, he was really a lot nicer as Haruno in a lot of ways. He doesn't really miss that part.]

I liked you from the beginning, though. You always seemed very safe. So maybe it isn't so much luck [he pokes her arm right back] as skill.

[isawallflower]

[ At such a compliment, Riley truly does crumble. She looks away with a half-shrug, the smile on her face small but bright. ]

Don't be silly. It had a lot to do with you being such a nice person to be around.

[digiorno]

[That smile is slightly different. He makes note of it, if only so he can remember. He likes this version of her, the one that smiles a little awkwardly and can't quite let go of the argument of who is actually the nice one.]

[For the record, it's probably neither of them.]

I'm glad you think so. Most people found me pretty strange, before. [Me, not Haruno. He slips a little.] So maybe I'm the lucky one. It wouldn't be the first time I've had that label put on me.

[isawallflower]

You're kinda strange, [ Riley agrees without missing a beat. ] But, I like it. It's a good strange.