Chapter 3

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"So, where were you last night?"

Alex shrugs absently and continues with the notes he and Gina are assembling on Dia's last appointment.

A man has to be in a certain mood to humbly apologize, and he is far from it.

He might have been late because of his own carelessness, but it took only fifteen minutes for his place to be filled.

But Robyn is carefree like that, and like skipping into the Clinic in the middle of the morning and giggling over the sight of the doctor and his nurse drinking tea together, like a pair of confirmed, dyed-in-the-wool old maids.

"I was running a few minutes late, and by the time I got there, you seemed busy."

Robyn frowns, and Gina tries to make herself invisible without the disruption of leaving.

"I was in all night."

"But you had other guests."

"Ohh, you should have come in anyway!"

He stiffens at her arms around him from behind, but even though Gina wishes she wasn't here, she is, and Robyn doesn't like scenes. Robotically, he lifts one hand to grasp the sunbrowned ones folded at his chest.

"I'll come in next time."

She shouldn't be convinced, he almost wishes that she wasn't becaues her mind must be very far away not to notice the artificiality in this whole scene, but she's still Robyn, and she's still carefree, so she sparkles and giggles and announces that she's going back home to finish her chores before her chickens spring a mutiny on her.

And just before she goes, she drops a kiss on Gina's smooth pale oval cheek just as warm and sweet as the one he receives.

As the quick, light footsteps of his one true love fade, he turns back to his work to find a pair of honeybrown eyes fixed curiously and anxiously on him. He smiles reassuringly, trying not to feel sick at how easily the little farmer kisses other people.

He's seen Robyn fiddling idly with Dan's ruby pendant, a dreamy smile on her lips, for months. Why should should it only bother him now, when he spent this morning shaking off last night's echoes of pale silverblue in place of warm nutbrown?

"Doctor, are you feeling ill?"

The base of her wrist at his forehead is cool and smooth, and the citrus and clover scent lingering faintly around her quiets his worry and anger far more than it should. His smile this time is more genuine.

"No, Gina, I'm just fine. Would you like another cup of tea?"

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It is two days before an inkling of worry can work its way through the everything else Robyn has on her mind, and well into the afternoon before she can find a second to make a special visit.

Gina made special plans with herself to visit the Library this afternoon; Alex told her that.

She walks quickly toward the Town Square, even though she really doesn't want to do this. Might as well get it over with. Pull off a Band-Aid and do it quick.

It only takes a minute to stiffen her resolve, images filtering gradually into place, illuminated by horrified exaggeration, of her Alex's eyes lighting up when they light on blue hair and crisp white aprons; the two-in-the-morning social call he mentioned in passing last night; his hand resting gently at a scrawny little shoulder swathed in ugly striped cotton.

Alex might not be perfect, but he's hers, he has been for months, and if he wants to change his mind, he can change it on his own and not leave it to a third party because, well, Gina's closer.

She'll be upset, the third party in question, but it's for her own good.

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"What're you reading?"

Gina looks up, startled right out of the struggles of Jane and a secret, fierce, half-ashamed longing to find her own Mr. Rochester. She doesn't have a chance to reply, barely has a chance to blink before a brown pigtail is almost tickling her nose as Robyn leans in for a closer look.

"Oh, Jane Eyre. Yeah, I figured you probably read bleak, depressing garbage like this for fun."

"I don't find it so depressing," Gina protests, brow furrowed as she puzzles through how anyone could think that. "Except for the part about Bertha."

Incredulously,

"The crazy wife?"

"I just wish I knew how she went mad, and why Rochester shut her in the attic instead of trying to help her."

"I guess there's only so much you can do when your wife goes off her nut," Robyn shrugs indifferently.
"But what if Jane were to go mad?"

"Living with that guy, any woman who wasn't already nuts would."

But Gina doesn't laugh, and Robyn's fingers itch to smack her until she stops looking despondent before they've even touched on the purpose of this visit.

"Would she be shut up in the attic, with someone new in her place?"

A long-suffering sigh.

"Talk about borrowing trouble. Does it really matter?"

"I think it does," the bespectacled little maiden objects, startled into a huffy tone of voice by this unexpected attack on what she chooses to occupy her own personal thoughts with. "I think it can be interesting to give literature a little more thought than what did happen, and consider what could have happened."

It's not the greatest opening, but Robyn is good at settling for less.

"Okay, then. Here's another hypothetical situation for you. Say Rochester gets this new job."

"Um, he was maimed in the end," Gina points out hesitantly.

"That's why it's hypothetical, Gina. Play along."

"Well, alright…"

And the hypothetical situation goes, already a familiar story to Robyn from hours awake last night trying to decide whether to be furious or devestated.

A man obsessed with work, with no time for a girlfriend who doesn't like to be stifled, but might prefer a little more affection. Even though Gina busily scours her mind and still can't recall Mr. Rochester relaxing very much, job or no job. But that isn't the important part. The man is so obsessed with his job that nothing else matters, even the things that men are always interested in.

Gina's cheeks flash bright red, and Robyn kind of wants to cry, because the little nurse is really cute when she blushes, and maybe it's not so impossible to see what Alex sees in this mousy little thing.

Just like the man in the story; his new assistant is practically his female doppelganger, and she works all the time, and she blushes when someone says panties.

And the story continues. The mysterious assistant is really cute, and the lousy workaholic talks about her all the time and thinks about her the other half. But he is still totally oblivious to everything that isn't work, and almost totally asexual besides, and the cute little assistant is too shy to hold a guy's hand, so—

"Robyn!"

"Yeah?"

"Are you talking about the doctor?"

"Hey, now that you mention it, that does kind of sound like him!"

"Well, it doesn't sound much like Jane Eyre," Gina points out disapprovingly.

"I don't blame you, you know. I just want to know what's going on."

It's almost satisfying, when all the colour of that cute warm blush quickly drain's from the little nurse's cheeks, leaving her pale and horrified.

"Pardon me?"

"You were over there at two in the morning."

"I woke up, and I saw the light still on. I went over to get him to bed."

I'll bet you did.

"By making a pot of tea and staying to help him empty it?"

"He seemed so sad when I went over to tell him to turn out the lights and go to bed. I didn't want to leave him alone."

The brunette laughs softly, and stands.

"I know, Gina. You're a little sweetie. And Alex likes sweet little girls. Especially sweet little girls that make him tea and pick up after him."

"Robyn, I swear to you, absolutely nothing has happened."

"And I believe you. But you're his type. For your own sake, you might want to think about turning jaded and bitchy before you get sledgehammered into making a bad decision for him."

"Robyn." Gina's voice is soft, almost inaudible, but maybe there's a reason that people only start yelling when they know they've lost the argument. "No matter what he thinks of me, the doctor loves you very much. He was upset that night because he thought you'd forgotten your date."

A soft noise of amused disgust.

"He's just lucky he's got his sights set on a girl who's gullible enough to fall for that crap."

Gina squeezes her eyes tightly shut against a rush of tears, and gulps desperately around the knot gathering in her throat. She can't cry in front of Robyn, can't prove that she really is just a sweet little girl instead of an intelligent woman, capable of taking care of herself and the ones dearest to her.

But after the past few days, she came here, to the library and to Jane Eyre, to escape from all the things that are making her head ache just now.

Like Dia running away whenever she's confronted with a stranger, when part of the reason behind the move here was to surround her with kind people as much as fresh air and healthy food.

And the problems they're still having with the plumbing, even worse because she tried to fix it herself after that Kurt who seems so interested in Dia, went home because he thought his presence upset the pretty dark-haired girl.

And the puzzling issue of her boss acting so strangely for about a week now, watching her closely at all times as though not trusting her to move without making a mess, even going so far as to visit the Sanitarium again last night when his date ended earlier than he had expected.

And now, Robyn is upset because she's misinterpreted the doctor's concern for the well being of his Clinic as attraction to his nurse.

"I wish you could bring yourself to trust him, Robyn," she murmurs, mostly to herself, which is just as well, because by the time the tears gathering at her eyelashes begin to dry and she feels safe opening her eyes again, Robyn is gone.

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