Lydia (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} watchergrrl) wrote,@ 1997-10-23 18:28:00 |
|
things with Rudi
He brought flowers. Quite a lot of them. But any man caught in the position in which I found him, on his own desk wrapped in a beautiful wicca, has only two options, I think - to say goodbye immediately, or to bring flowers frequently for probably a very long period of time.
We've talked things out a bit and I think that after all we may be all right. Though - I'm not sure yet, honesty compels me to admit.
I should tell you the rest of the story.
When I came into his office, as I said, I found him sprawled on his desk under a very attractive woman, engaged in an enthusiastic embrace.
I realised at once that he had fallen under a glamour, for which I luckily remembered the counter-spell. "Scelesta abi! incantatum relinqui!" I ordered sternly, and for a miracle - for I have, as I think I have mentioned to you, no magical talent - it worked.
Though perhaps when the enraged girlfriend breaks in and catches you in flagrante she could shout pretty much anything she liked and it would destroy the mood. In any event they both started up, she looking decidedly annoyed, Rudi glazed and stunned. "Lydia? But -" he looked at the woman straddling him, obviously confused.
The bitch had taken on my form, of course. At least in his eyes.
Glamours work best, I remark in passing, when they enact a secret fantasy of the ensorcelled party. I have filed away in memory, for a happier time, I hope, that Rudi apparently fantasized about engaging in improprieties with me on his own office desk.
I had no time to pursue this interesting observation at that moment, however, since the wicca flung her hand towards me and shouted something lengthy and latinate, of which the gist was that I had entered as a woman and should leave as either a mouse or a vole (my memory for the Latin terms for rodentiae is not what it should be). I dodged when I first saw her raise her hand, but could feel the hair rising on my arms and the side of my neck where the main force of her spell passed me, and indeed it might have gone very badly for me had Rudi not sat up, throwing her off his legs and spoiling her aim - and I was relieved to see that he was still fully dressed (more than I can say for her), though she had begun to work on his shirt buttons. Full skin contact is necessary for a glamour or any sex-based magic to achieve its full strength, and it would have been much harder to counter if she had succeeded in taking it so far.
To say nothing of my personal feelings on the matter.
She turned to him, clearly enraged, and raised her hand again, but Rudi's head had obviously cleared now that she was no longer in any contact. Luckily he also has considerably more magical talent than I; he sketched a protective sigil in mid-air and said firmly "Exi malefica! te vinco, vincio, maledicta reverto". The air glowed slightly around her and I knew we were now protected; she was bound, unable to cast any curse for fear of its rebounding on her until his protective spell was reversed.
Rudi turned to me anxiously and said "Lydia, you are unharmed?" - which reassured me considerably, because it could have been wishful thinking that led me to believe he was englamoured. But his first thought was of me. I began to reassure him when the wicca hit him over the head with the quarterstaff he keeps by his desk. (He trains with it at lunch hour.) We had been concentrating on the magical dangers and had forgotten the purely physical damage she could do.
I lept forward to catch him as he fell to the floor, and she darted for the hallway, and would have made it had I not kicked a chair into her path. She hit her head on the door in her fall and was out cold. I settled Rudi into his chair - he was still conscious, fortunately - and bound the woman wrist and ankle with her own stockings. Then I called Academy Security to take her into custody, and a cab, and brought Rudi back to my flat.
So far I was not particularly angry. I admit to a decidedly atavistic response at seeing Rudi in another woman's arms, but my instant assessment of the situation fortunately proved correct. As he explained in the cab, she had indeed appeared to be me - she must have acquired some personal object of mine; I've been missing a scarf for a few days now, and perhaps I can now guess where it went. He thought I had come to surprise him in his office; and though he had been a bit taken aback - I'm not usually so aggressive - he had been too pleased to be on his guard. I think has also felt the distance between us, and regretted it. Even though he has caused it.
So aside from the lingering effects of the adrenalin surge I was no longer distressed by the initial scene, or even the ensuing fight.
But I was more distressed than I can say that Rudi had been lying to me for over a month about the danger he was in. After he fell asleep I lay awake -on the couch, I said so as not to disturb him but in fact because I was too upset to lie beside him - for a long time.
He says he wanted to protect me, but I pressed him on that tonight - protect me from what? I was not this murderous wicca's primary target. Though I am sure I was on her list - her intention, it now appears, was not only to kill him, but to disgrace him first, to destroy his life before taking it. I expect it would have crossed her mind at some point that she could cause him pain by damaging me. But telling me nothing about her afforded me no protection; quite the contrary.
Finally he admitted that he was afraid, if I knew that he was in danger, that I might plunge in without thinking and do something foolhardy and dangerous, to protect him. As I did when I burst in on him on Monday, he began to say (and had the good sense not to finish the sentence).
Which made the problem clear to me, in one of those blinding flashes one occasionally has. He doesn't trust my judgment anymore.
I don't know if he's aware of that, or that it's a change. But he hasn't since I went to Prague. And I grant you, the situation there was significantly more dangerous than I was prepared for - but if I had been given all of the information, I would have not have BEEN unprepared. And I would have acted with appropriate caution.
As, indeed, I would have on Monday, if I had known that he was in danger of his life from a powerful wicca. If I'm not given all the information, what can I do but act on what I have?
But there is something more underlying this - I can't put my finger on what exactly. More, I mean, or different, than a condescending lack of confidence in my impetuous girlish judgment. More even than a patronizing desire to protect me from the world 'for my own good'. Though of course I cannot put up with even that much. It must stop.
But I don't think that's the real problem - because, before Prague, he wasn't concealing things from me. Before Prague, he was more than willing to tell me what I didn't know - instruction was a pleasure to him, to both of us.
Before Prague, he trusted and confided in me.
Something about my visit to Prague has obviously shaken his faith in me. And being put in danger of his own life seems to have only made things worse.
I've been thinking through these things all day. Dinner last night was a sober affair. He is, I think, as distressed as I at the distance between us now, and I believe wants to heal the rift, but doesn't know how. He told me several times that he loved me; as if anxious that I should know this, and all too aware that at the moment I have cause to doubt it.
I want to heal the rift between us too, but have no more idea than he does how it is to be done. I believe he does love me, and in the end that should, I hope, make it possible to fix this.
I hope.
He slept here last night but we didn't - I began to make an excuse about his head injury but then thought, I should set an example of telling him the truth, and told him instead that I didn't feel that things were right between us yet and I didn't want to become physically intimate again until they were.
He seemed taken aback for a moment, then smiled and said that until now he hadn't believed the old story that making love is something men do to reconcile a fight, and something women do after the reconciliation.
But he slept here, and spending a night in his arms even after I had told him how I really felt made me feel much more cheerful. He seems, that far at least, to be able to accept me as I am. Which must be the first step -
hang on, I've just realised something.
I have been distressed that he no longer seems to trust me, and wondering how to show him that he can. But that's his problem.
My problem is that I don't trust him, at all, anymore. I don't trust him to tell me the truth about things of importance.
No wonder I'm upset with him!
Good Lord - it's nearly 6:30. Well, on that revelation I had better heat some dinner (leftover chili as it happens) and get back to sorting my notes on William the Bloody's "preferred victims". I'm wondering if I should give an itemized list, or a few general 'types'. Perhaps the latter, but keep the list as an appendix.
Rudi will be up on the 31st. I'm still not sure if I will be, but I think I will. Not necessarily because things are all well again, but because we are, at least, talking over the things that matter, and trying to work it out.
If we can't, at least it won't be because we lacked sufficient respect for each other to try.
love, Lydia
He brought flowers. Quite a lot of them. But any man caught in the position in which I found him, on his own desk wrapped in a beautiful wicca, has only two options, I think - to say goodbye immediately, or to bring flowers frequently for probably a very long period of time.
We've talked things out a bit and I think that after all we may be all right. Though - I'm not sure yet, honesty compels me to admit.
I should tell you the rest of the story.
When I came into his office, as I said, I found him sprawled on his desk under a very attractive woman, engaged in an enthusiastic embrace.
I realised at once that he had fallen under a glamour, for which I luckily remembered the counter-spell. "Scelesta abi! incantatum relinqui!" I ordered sternly, and for a miracle - for I have, as I think I have mentioned to you, no magical talent - it worked.
Though perhaps when the enraged girlfriend breaks in and catches you in flagrante she could shout pretty much anything she liked and it would destroy the mood. In any event they both started up, she looking decidedly annoyed, Rudi glazed and stunned. "Lydia? But -" he looked at the woman straddling him, obviously confused.
The bitch had taken on my form, of course. At least in his eyes.
Glamours work best, I remark in passing, when they enact a secret fantasy of the ensorcelled party. I have filed away in memory, for a happier time, I hope, that Rudi apparently fantasized about engaging in improprieties with me on his own office desk.
I had no time to pursue this interesting observation at that moment, however, since the wicca flung her hand towards me and shouted something lengthy and latinate, of which the gist was that I had entered as a woman and should leave as either a mouse or a vole (my memory for the Latin terms for rodentiae is not what it should be). I dodged when I first saw her raise her hand, but could feel the hair rising on my arms and the side of my neck where the main force of her spell passed me, and indeed it might have gone very badly for me had Rudi not sat up, throwing her off his legs and spoiling her aim - and I was relieved to see that he was still fully dressed (more than I can say for her), though she had begun to work on his shirt buttons. Full skin contact is necessary for a glamour or any sex-based magic to achieve its full strength, and it would have been much harder to counter if she had succeeded in taking it so far.
To say nothing of my personal feelings on the matter.
She turned to him, clearly enraged, and raised her hand again, but Rudi's head had obviously cleared now that she was no longer in any contact. Luckily he also has considerably more magical talent than I; he sketched a protective sigil in mid-air and said firmly "Exi malefica! te vinco, vincio, maledicta reverto". The air glowed slightly around her and I knew we were now protected; she was bound, unable to cast any curse for fear of its rebounding on her until his protective spell was reversed.
Rudi turned to me anxiously and said "Lydia, you are unharmed?" - which reassured me considerably, because it could have been wishful thinking that led me to believe he was englamoured. But his first thought was of me. I began to reassure him when the wicca hit him over the head with the quarterstaff he keeps by his desk. (He trains with it at lunch hour.) We had been concentrating on the magical dangers and had forgotten the purely physical damage she could do.
I lept forward to catch him as he fell to the floor, and she darted for the hallway, and would have made it had I not kicked a chair into her path. She hit her head on the door in her fall and was out cold. I settled Rudi into his chair - he was still conscious, fortunately - and bound the woman wrist and ankle with her own stockings. Then I called Academy Security to take her into custody, and a cab, and brought Rudi back to my flat.
So far I was not particularly angry. I admit to a decidedly atavistic response at seeing Rudi in another woman's arms, but my instant assessment of the situation fortunately proved correct. As he explained in the cab, she had indeed appeared to be me - she must have acquired some personal object of mine; I've been missing a scarf for a few days now, and perhaps I can now guess where it went. He thought I had come to surprise him in his office; and though he had been a bit taken aback - I'm not usually so aggressive - he had been too pleased to be on his guard. I think has also felt the distance between us, and regretted it. Even though he has caused it.
So aside from the lingering effects of the adrenalin surge I was no longer distressed by the initial scene, or even the ensuing fight.
But I was more distressed than I can say that Rudi had been lying to me for over a month about the danger he was in. After he fell asleep I lay awake -on the couch, I said so as not to disturb him but in fact because I was too upset to lie beside him - for a long time.
He says he wanted to protect me, but I pressed him on that tonight - protect me from what? I was not this murderous wicca's primary target. Though I am sure I was on her list - her intention, it now appears, was not only to kill him, but to disgrace him first, to destroy his life before taking it. I expect it would have crossed her mind at some point that she could cause him pain by damaging me. But telling me nothing about her afforded me no protection; quite the contrary.
Finally he admitted that he was afraid, if I knew that he was in danger, that I might plunge in without thinking and do something foolhardy and dangerous, to protect him. As I did when I burst in on him on Monday, he began to say (and had the good sense not to finish the sentence).
Which made the problem clear to me, in one of those blinding flashes one occasionally has. He doesn't trust my judgment anymore.
I don't know if he's aware of that, or that it's a change. But he hasn't since I went to Prague. And I grant you, the situation there was significantly more dangerous than I was prepared for - but if I had been given all of the information, I would have not have BEEN unprepared. And I would have acted with appropriate caution.
As, indeed, I would have on Monday, if I had known that he was in danger of his life from a powerful wicca. If I'm not given all the information, what can I do but act on what I have?
But there is something more underlying this - I can't put my finger on what exactly. More, I mean, or different, than a condescending lack of confidence in my impetuous girlish judgment. More even than a patronizing desire to protect me from the world 'for my own good'. Though of course I cannot put up with even that much. It must stop.
But I don't think that's the real problem - because, before Prague, he wasn't concealing things from me. Before Prague, he was more than willing to tell me what I didn't know - instruction was a pleasure to him, to both of us.
Before Prague, he trusted and confided in me.
Something about my visit to Prague has obviously shaken his faith in me. And being put in danger of his own life seems to have only made things worse.
I've been thinking through these things all day. Dinner last night was a sober affair. He is, I think, as distressed as I at the distance between us now, and I believe wants to heal the rift, but doesn't know how. He told me several times that he loved me; as if anxious that I should know this, and all too aware that at the moment I have cause to doubt it.
I want to heal the rift between us too, but have no more idea than he does how it is to be done. I believe he does love me, and in the end that should, I hope, make it possible to fix this.
I hope.
He slept here last night but we didn't - I began to make an excuse about his head injury but then thought, I should set an example of telling him the truth, and told him instead that I didn't feel that things were right between us yet and I didn't want to become physically intimate again until they were.
He seemed taken aback for a moment, then smiled and said that until now he hadn't believed the old story that making love is something men do to reconcile a fight, and something women do after the reconciliation.
But he slept here, and spending a night in his arms even after I had told him how I really felt made me feel much more cheerful. He seems, that far at least, to be able to accept me as I am. Which must be the first step -
hang on, I've just realised something.
I have been distressed that he no longer seems to trust me, and wondering how to show him that he can. But that's his problem.
My problem is that I don't trust him, at all, anymore. I don't trust him to tell me the truth about things of importance.
No wonder I'm upset with him!
Good Lord - it's nearly 6:30. Well, on that revelation I had better heat some dinner (leftover chili as it happens) and get back to sorting my notes on William the Bloody's "preferred victims". I'm wondering if I should give an itemized list, or a few general 'types'. Perhaps the latter, but keep the list as an appendix.
Rudi will be up on the 31st. I'm still not sure if I will be, but I think I will. Not necessarily because things are all well again, but because we are, at least, talking over the things that matter, and trying to work it out.
If we can't, at least it won't be because we lacked sufficient respect for each other to try.
love, Lydia
