[ Poe lifts her hands, then stops, not sure what he was planning on doing. Kissing her knuckles? No. He just stares at her hands like they'll give him an answer or something else to say.
He's not sure how to exist in a world where he's admitted that he's not all right. It means admitting that Hosnian Prime is gone, that he's been tortured physically and mentally not once now, but twice. His uncle got shot down trying to save his life. His friends are dead and more will die. He lives in a landscape of chaos and violence and somehow--
Somehow, it's become okay.
He raises her hands and presses his face against the backs of her fingers. ]
I have to be okay, Karen. [ She smells like her pillow, he thinks, stupidly. ] Just. Until it's over, all right?
[ She looks back at him when he moves her hands but remains silent. As much as she wants to help him, they are from two different worlds. Two different walks of life. Even with all the similarities they share in experiences, in personality, it feels like there's this chasm between them. Something she's not sure she's ever going to be able to cross.
It's when he presses his face to her fingers like that that she feels she needs to try. Even if she has nothing of value to offer. She's no soldier, no genius or fighter. She's just... her.
She moves forward and wraps her arms around him again, pulling him into another hug. ]
I just--I wish I could help more.
[ Because God knows she can't help her own nightmares disappear. She wishes she could at least do right by someone else. Especially someone as good as Poe was. ]
[ This time, at least, he doesn't flinch from the hug. He wishes he could return some of what she's given him, the steady support and understanding.
(There's that voice again, that demand to be better than this, to pull himself together, the hissing reprimand that lives are at stake and he can't afford to come to pieces like this. They're his responsibility, and he's primed to fail them all.)
He feels a little like Karen is the only thing holding him up, or holding him down. Just like Finn in the hospital: she's keeping him in the present.
Mumbled into the cloth of her shirt: ] You help more than enough.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
He's not sure how to exist in a world where he's admitted that he's not all right. It means admitting that Hosnian Prime is gone, that he's been tortured physically and mentally not once now, but twice. His uncle got shot down trying to save his life. His friends are dead and more will die. He lives in a landscape of chaos and violence and somehow--
Somehow, it's become okay.
He raises her hands and presses his face against the backs of her fingers. ]
I have to be okay, Karen. [ She smells like her pillow, he thinks, stupidly. ] Just. Until it's over, all right?
no subject
It's when he presses his face to her fingers like that that she feels she needs to try. Even if she has nothing of value to offer. She's no soldier, no genius or fighter. She's just... her.
She moves forward and wraps her arms around him again, pulling him into another hug. ]
I just--I wish I could help more.
[ Because God knows she can't help her own nightmares disappear. She wishes she could at least do right by someone else. Especially someone as good as Poe was. ]
no subject
(There's that voice again, that demand to be better than this, to pull himself together, the hissing reprimand that lives are at stake and he can't afford to come to pieces like this. They're his responsibility, and he's primed to fail them all.)
He feels a little like Karen is the only thing holding him up, or holding him down. Just like Finn in the hospital: she's keeping him in the present.
Mumbled into the cloth of her shirt: ] You help more than enough.