ArchivedLogs:Good Chinese Girl

Good Chinese Girl
Dramatis Personae Joshua, Tian-shin
In Absentia	2016-01-17 "Anyway how are you going to give me grandchildren when you're so busy all the time with helping criminals for free and hanging out with all those weird -- mutants and Americans and who knows who else."
Location <NYC> Rainbow Sector - Harbor Commons - Lower East Side
The walls outside may follow an ever-changing theme, but this room cycles through colors with an alacrity that makes the rest of Funhaus look static by comparison. A gigantic beanbag occupies one quarter of the room and a small flotilla of cushions litter the floor in another corner. A platform above the door forms a loft only intermittently accessible by rope ladder, and holds a small altar with an incense bowl and a statue of Guan-yin. Most days, sheets secured to hardpoints on the walls and ceiling give the interior of the room a tentlike feel. The clothes and toys strewn on the rest of the open floor space may make it hard to imagine the room does not belong to a child. Tag's room has been far neater than usual these last few weeks, with Tian-shin taking up temporary residence to vacate her own room for guests. It has not, however, gotten any less colorful. The sheets draping down from the ceiling run the spectrum from bright yellow through deep violet, drawn aside at the moment to let in the meager gray light of the chill, snowy day outside. Tian-shin sits cross-legged on the extra mattress they'd unfolded for her in a corner, dressed in a purple fitted t-shirt with a bulge-eyed cartoon owl upon the chest and black gi pants so old and worn they look gray. She has her glossy black hair drawn back into a loose bun, more casual than most of her acquaintances can ever expect to see. The dark circles around her eyes bespeak too much work and too little sleep. She has a smartphone balanced in her hands, but isn't looking at it or doing anything with it. Her laptop sits beside her, its screen black with neglect, and several tomes of case law lie strewn about the mattress around her. Knock, knock, knock. Joshua looks much the same as he has for weeks, really. There's a certain haggard quality about him -- but then, these days EMS is severely short-staffed and severely overworked, too-much-work and too-little-sleep has been going around Funhaus, it seems. The dark circles under his eyes are nothing new. Nor the slumped slouch-hitch of shoulder against the bedroom doorframe as he waits just outside. Casually off-duty dressed in jeans, rumpled white soccer jersey ('O. Peralta, 19' on its back), thick knit socks. One hand shoved into his pocket, the other covering a yawn after he knocks. Tian-shin starts, looks up from her blank staring and, for a moment, doesn't seem to comprehend the meaning or provenance of the knocking. Then, a moment later she manages a "{Yeah?}" her voice sounding kind of small and distant. Still, she rises to answer the door. "{Hey. What's up?}" Joshua is slow to look up when the door opens, blinking a little bit sleepy-eyed at Tian-shin. He doesn't actually straighten out of his slouch, though for a moment the slight shift of his shoulders suggests that he's /considering/ standing up straight. Thinks better of it. Stays leaning on the doorframe. His hand drops to his other pocket, rummaging out a folded piece of paper. A little rumpled, a little worn, many times over folded and re-folded along the same lines, by now. His eyes don't shift out of their tired heavy-lidded state as he unfolds it one-handed, more out of habit than necessity since he's not really even /looking/ at it when he starts reciting its litany from memory. "Twenty-six years old," he says this, as always, in a flat monotone, "and still no respectable husband. If you would just find yourself a /decent/ Chinese boy and stop all this pointless lawyering. Politics is for men, nobody will take you seriously if you keep on at this. Anyway how are you going to give me grandchildren when you're so busy all the time with helping criminals for free and hanging out with all those weird -- mutants and Americans and who knows who else. And tell me you have stopped with that terrible sword fighting business you know men do not like girls with too many muscles and look, at your age it's going to be hard enough to attract --" Standing in the doorway, Tian-shin's slender eyebrows climb up slightly. Then drop again, her expression shifting to something /like/ neutrality, and then even a faint smile, when she recognizes the routine. But as the litany goes on the smile fades, too. She shifts from one foot to the other, hunches her shoulders inward, grasps her right arm with her left hand as though it hurt her. Then her eyes start brimming quite suddenly. She opens her mouth to speak (<< {I appreciate this a lot,} >> she has this all planned out, inwardly, << {but I don't think I'm in a good place to find humor in my mother's nagging right now.} >>), but the words do not make it out. Just a choked sob as she starts crying. << {I'm the worst daughter she has cancer and all I can think is I don't want to visit her because she's going to go on /that/ rant again what's wrong with me this is my mother I'm /27/ now dear heavens maybe she's right and she's dying and I'm the worst--} >> Joshua lowers his hand as Tian-shin's eyes start to well up. His words cut off, fingers digging into the worn piece of paper and a slow widening to his own eyes. His cheeks puff out very slightly as he exhales a slow breath, carefully folding the page back up to slip it back into his pocket. Now he does straighten from the doorway, dragging his other hand up out of his pocket so that he can take a half-step forward. Curl an arm around Tian-shin's shoulders, squeezing gently. Tian-shin drops her head to Joshua's shoulder and starts bawling in earnest, trying to choke out apologies (first in Mandarin, then in Spanish) between gasps for air. Her internal monologue remains reasonably comprehensible even under a haze of stress, exhaustion, fear, and guilt. << {I'm so sorry, I just found out half an hour ago my brother texted me. Not Tag, the other--oh no, I have to tell Tag and we have to go visit her and it's going to be horrible.} >> She slumps against him. << {I'm crying all over you this is not appropriate I swear I'll be fine any second now. Going to stop crying. Be dignified and badass and together--} >> Joshua doesn't answer the apologies; doesn't reassure them, doesn't dismiss them, doesn't anything except for pat gently at Tian-shin's back, standing quietly through this. He holds her just a little more steadily when she slumps, the tip of his head coming in outward acknowledgment of her internal monologue. "{Not /too/ badass,}" he cautions, in mild and quiet Spanish, expression perfectly serious (together with another gentle squeeze of shoulder), "{you know you'll never get a husband that way.}" Tian-shin quiets when Joshua speaks--not being a telepath, /she/ still has to hear him over her own crying. She lifts her puffy eyes, startled, to look at him. But her stream-of-consciousness trails off, too, just as the sudden chuckle catches her unawares. "{It's hopeless, I kick too much ass.}" She wraps her arms around him, shoulders hitching now as often with laughter as with sobs. "{I'll never get married.}" Joshua's dark eyes meet hers steadily. "{But just think how many badass stories you'll have to tell the kids you're not making. Totally worth it.}"