[Fluff]

Jayda took a sip of her coffee –courtesy of her redheaded mostly-friend- and stared out the windows of the lounge.

Today wasn't a homework day, she'd decided earlier; she just hadn't been in the mood for staring at pages upon pages of boring text about cladograms and genetic profiling. No, not today. Today the sun seemed too faint, and the clouds too gloomy and dark and stifling. Today, she thought to herself once more, was not a work day; it was a sit-and-think day.

Today, Yuriy watched her watch the world with a subdued expression on her face, her eyes a thousand miles away, only loosely tethered to her physical form in the real world.

Ever since she'd revealed the purpose behind the ribbon she always wore, Ivan had been trying to figure out what illness she had. Not subtly, either.

Then again, since when was Ivan ever actually subtle?

Jayda didn't doubt that the moment she'd left their apartment, Ivan had looked up the symbolism of teal ribbons; he was that kind of person. Excessively curious, always poking and prodding and investigating, like a kitten with a new toy. Jayda wrinkled her nose at that mental image.

While she didn't have a problem with Ivan being curious, he was poking and prodding nerves that were a little too sensitive, a little too raw. Yes, she had accepted that she had this... syndrome, and, to some small degree, she'd made her peace with it –but she wasn't coping with it.

She could make so many comparisons, so many analogies, all drawing on common idioms, or phrases, or concepts. She could call it an elephant that followed her from room to room, or a mess that she hid under the carpet. She could compare it to a brand new tattoo, all tender and raw and hypersensitive, or perhaps to a missing limb, with phantom aches and pains that kept her up at night. She could do a thousand things. Instead, she chose to do nothing.

The world was her hospice, and this was her cancer; coping was her chemo.

She wasn't coping.

It showed, too, she realized; cover-up could only do so much for the rings around her eyes that whispered traitorously of too many sleepless nights.

Yuriy reached over and picked a bit of fluff off her sleeve, almost absent-mindedly –except that Yuriy was never absent-minded. Brought back by the contact -fleeting, deliberate- Jayda returned to the real world, and Yuriy nodded to her, as if he knew.

She took another sip of her coffee, unable to force muscles to smile, to convey the flicker-thought of her gratitude. His eyes rested on her, and the weight felt strangely tangible. After a long moment, he nodded once more, as if he understood.

It occurred to her then that, perhaps, it wasn't a good thing to spend hours and hours within a week being observed and analyzed by an incredibly intelligent and incisive man –particularly when she was feeling vulnerable.

She wondered how much of herself had she given away already, how much of herself had she kept safe?