#*reappears in here with ACTUAL WRITING....as this blog was intended to be sjkdlfjsdlfkj*

[ofgentleresolve]

ara. ➜ Ara is not the person she once was- the pieces, familiar yet hazy like looking into a pool of water, are all still there, but the picture they make…it’s different now. Annie can’t quite put her finger on it but even if they’ve picked up their friendship from where it had been dropped off, the Ara who visits Annie in her aunt’s convenience store is a far cry from the Ara of their medical school years.

For one thing, the wounds she brings in have evolved from mere nail marks or slap impressions across the face. The gash on her shoulder could not have been the result of a petty grudge by their ( old ) classmates, the ones who went into the profession for the money first then the people. 

( And for a moment there, like an air bubble, a memory resurfaces- back in the day when Ara would appear by Annie’s side with such minor injuries, the result of fights between her and their snobbier classmates. How Annie would give her both treatment and a scolding for her recklessness, all while knowing full well that the cycle would repeat in the near future. Ara knew it too, always bearing both with the same grace she does now. Unperturbed and resolute because what else is supposed to be? Finnick said something along those lines, didn’t he: it takes ten times as long to put yourself back together as it does to FALL APART.

Better not to give into it. )

Lips curl slightly in disapproval- she’s heard Ara speak of them, vaguely: the boys, whom Annie can only assume are abetting Ara in this crusade she has devoted herself to. Exactly what roles they play, Ara has never disclosed. She hasn’t told Annie too much about them, or about herself either. Like why she keeps coming into the convenience with say, a shoulder blade cut open. 

It’s only fair, really - Annie hasn’t told Ara about the events preceding her return. Or even the life that she led after returning to the states. Ara has never pushed and so Annie keeps that rhythm. It’s easier this way, safer in her head rather than in the open, not with the way the police had pried into the cracks open for the sake of ‘procedure’ and ‘breaking news’, only to ship her off to the psych ward once she had outlived her shelf life.

“Don’t-” She flinches as Ara flings her shirt off. For a moment, Annie swears she sees blood drops follow the path of the shirt; her breath hitches as she has to remind herself that she is standing, she is not sitting and so there is nothing on her lap, no head of her colleague waiting to be found-  Swallowing the lump in her throat, Annie looks away from the bloodied shirt. “If you move too fast, it’ll, you’ll make it worse.” With the wound out in the open though, it’s easy to see that while the cut itself isn’t terribly deep, it does require stitches to heal. And a thorough cleaning too. 

The medical kit in question though,  she keeps in the counter beneath the cashier machine. Arm loosely entangling around Ara’s, Annie gently tugs her behind the counter where she slides her stool over, motioning for Ara to sit. Annie opens the medical kit, pulling out first the gauze and then the saline solution. 

The question rests on the tip of her tongue as she dips the gauze into the solution. How did it happen this time? She wants to say and she’s sure that Ara would, for a fact, tell her the truth. At this point, it might be easier to know so she can prepare for the next time. But Ara looks her in the eye and all Annie can do is press her lips together and shake her head.

No, Annie won’t tell anyone about this. Just as she hasn’t in the time before this one. And the time before that one. Gently, she wipes the gauze over the wound- blood takes into the gauze like a water to a sponge. Annie’s hand tremors before she does the next swipe. One of the arteries was hit- which is probably why there’s so much blood this time. “...Hold here.” Annie instructs her patient before turning to get the suture and needle ready.

“...Will you go back out there?” After this? It’s a stupid question, really- of course Ara is going to. It doesn’t stop Annie from frowning though. Perhaps one day though, one day she'll tell Ara the whole story. But for now, Annie will give Ara this smaller truth. “I don’t…I don’t like it when you get hurt. It scares me.”

“I’m bleeding.”

Ara first answered, her eyes connected with Annie’s.

"I know, I know, Again."

She then added with that signature smirk of hers knowing she got herself into trouble once again. There was no wincing, no signs of pain through her facial expression. It wasn’t that she was insensitive to her own injuries, yet used to them, used to handle them, wear them, keep them as scars that made what her skin was : marked porcelain, tainted purity. It was her path to follow, a path in the night, of bruises and blood, of taken hits and returned ones. Though the fighter she became knew how to defend herself, it was never without a memory or two left on her carnation. Annie was the only person of trust she had when it came to patching her up, one of the rare who knew that Ara by night was turning into someone else.

“Oh it’s nothing too bad love, I just can’t go back to the boys like this, can I?"”

The boys meaning the Black Fang Gang - they all were highly protective of Ara and would start an urban war if they saw this. Especially Taiyang, she knew that. She wanted to appear strong however, undestroyable on this illegal scene filled with men, she did not want to be the Underground Princess to keep safe but a Queen with already patched up wounds like they were nothing but a little scratch. It wasn't the first time they would meet since Annie came back to the continent and each time, Ara could feel it, the heart pinch she felt when watching her friend. It was disturbing to witness : the shell of a woman Annie became. If one was proudly wearing her physical injuries as a shield, a carapace of scars and fights, the other seemed trapped in a realm of a different type of injuries, ones printed down onto her psyche. The former psychiatrist in devenir could see it, the change, the weight on Annie's shoulders, the shadows in Annie's eyes, the signs of post traumatism. If Ara's degree was unfinished, her analysis mechanisms never left her. She did not know however, not a single word about what truly happened, they never had the talk. Her steps lead her further inside, one of her hands covering the wound that was dripping from her shoulder blade, tainting the fabric of her shirt in darker reds. They used to be close yes. Closer, in that past of their younger years, lazy picnics on the stairs in the summer not too far from the dorms, thrift shopping to spoil each other after one successful exam and sleepless nights at the library. The gap of social classes always prevented Ara to want any sort of connection with the others - not that she was ashamed of her story or her status but every single one of them seemed to only see that when they looked at her. Envious. Of how brilliant she was, excelling and yet, a simple survivor. Annie was a survivor, too. Survivors who now have lost so much and found each other again right here, licking their wounds of a life that's never been tender on them.

In a sharp move she removes her tainted shirt, grimacing slightly as her shoulder wasn’t so easy to motion after all, leaving it exposed, in a white bra, in her blue jeans. "On my way here it was quite the show, I didn't know how to hide it anymore. The sight of blood frightens more than it should. It’s not necessary a sign of distress and pain I believe. The more I bleed, the more I learn a little something new you know?” Her voice is calm, echoing in the silence of the walls they are in, just the two of them yet this tenderness Ara has in her eyes whenever looking at Annie. She wanted to hold her, she wanted to keep her close, tell her everything would be okay no matter what it was that changed her, to connect the way they used to - Ara wasn't the demonstrative type however, in all her charismatic and strong aura, she was the type who wanted to speak with her fists, to protect with her violence, to embrace through her social wars and surprisingly turned a little shy when having to wrap her arms around someone she truly cared about. She then pushes a strand of bra down as Annie was now reaching for Ara's shoulder blade, her fingers exploring the wound. Is that what happened to you Annie? Have you seen too much blood? Was the question crossing the vigilante's mind, in silence, her intense gaze observing each sign of Annie's demaneor, her eyes, the pace of her breathing, her unease. Perhaps it wasn't fair to ask the other for help again it's just, Ara had no choice.

“It all stays between us right?” She questioned, her eyes searching for Annie's as she accepts the kit offer with a nod of the head. It – the injury. It – the story behind it that Annie probably won't ask about but that Ara did not mind sharing with her.

"I trust you."

"And... You can trust me, too."