Blackwood Grove, Fandom, Wednesday Afternoon

[witchoftheflesh]

Adrian really appreciated winter. It wrapped the grove up in silence and stillness, a hush blanketing over the woods. Winter was a time of rest and restoration; a hard season yes, especially for animals, but the world slumbered and the rhythm of the cycles slowed and the season itself brought beauty, especially if you knew where to look.

Today, he was taking some time to just enjoy the season, become as one with it as possible. He sat out on his porch, a cup of coffee in hand, wrapped in a thickly-knit blanket, and just enjoyed the serenity.

Surely it would last.

[For one, please!]

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[witchoftheflesh]

The door was open and Pam was once again stepping into Adrian's cozy, cottagecore cabin, full of beautiful woodwork and witchy accoutrements. Boston was napping on the couch and in the kitchen, a broom was industriously moving itself across the floor. It was toasty warm inside, something herbal-scented bubbling in a caudron over the fieldstone fireplace and a pot of what smelled like homemade marinara simmering on the wood-fired iron stove, which was giving off plenty of heat. Closing the door behind them, Adrian slipped around Pam and went into the kitchen to put the kettle on.

"There," he said. "Hopefully by the time we get you settled in the greenhouse, the water will be boiling."

And then he led her out back to his greenhouse, which looked a glassed-in patio the size of his cabin full of a profusion of plants. The windows themselves were steamed up from the humidity inside and when he opened the door, they were hit with warm, wet air and the smell of greenery. He stood aside to let her enter, wanting to make sure that the door was properly sealed behind them.

[joan_of_bark]

Adrian's remained-- criminally nice. The way Pam, in her more idealistic days, had liked to daydream people used to live before capitalism got a hold of everything. She let the feeling of it settle on her skin, but only for a moment.

Then they were at the greenhouse, and she rubbed her forehead as she stepped inside.

Brisk, betraying very little of that brief, fond little-girl-thought. "I hope your week was better than mine," she said.

[witchoftheflesh]

"From the sound of it, yes," Adrian said, leading her further in. They passed a giant bathtub, next to a smaller iron stove, one was deep enough and large enough to allow even Adrian's lanky frame to lie submerged. "From that question, it sounds like yours wasn't great. What happened?"

[joan_of_bark]

"I kissed someone I absolutely shouldn't have," Pam said, "And then called someone who was also a bad idea."

[witchoftheflesh]

"Ooof," Adrian said. "Yeah, okay, that sounds pretty bad."

He led her to the center of the greenhouse where there was a small meditation circle set up. Some colorful blankets and pillows were folded and placed tidily to one side, four unlit candles were in holders placed in the cardinal directions, and there was already a tea tray handy, just missing some cups and the hot water. "Feel free to wander around," he offered. "But I figured this would be a good place for tea. And to talk if you'd like. Did you leave a message, or...?"

[joan_of_bark]

"I hung up."

She'd just... take this moment to sit down, with all the dignity and grace she could muster with her story still mostly untold.

[witchoftheflesh]

"Before or after they answered?" Adrian asked, also sitting down, clasping one knee as he listened.

[joan_of_bark]

Pam gave a faint shrug. "It doesn't matter which," she said. "She probably knows it's me."

[witchoftheflesh]

"She...?" Adrian prompted. He was willing to ease the story out of her in dribs and drabs if that's what she needed.

[joan_of_bark]

"Harley," Pam said, looking up at... something. A plant. Plants were soothing; people weren't. "My Harley, specifically. I've been sending her letters, sporadically. But I haven't... talked to her in a long time."

[witchoftheflesh]

"Protecting her?" Adrian asked softly. "Or worried she'll judge you? Or something else?"

[joan_of_bark]

Pam rubbed her forehead. "I got very angry with her before I left," she said. "And I left to do some very stupid things. Hence the lamia, among other things."

She took a deep breath. "I don't think she hates me," she said. "Maybe it sounds self-involved, but I don't think she ever would. But... everything else..."

[witchoftheflesh]

"Have you said you're sorry?" Adrian asked. "Are you sorry? It certainly sounds like you're not mad anymore."

[joan_of_bark]

"It's complicated," Pam said. Weighing, perhaps, how much to tell him. (The full story would definitely change how he thought about her.) "I'm sorry for leaving her in tears. I don't know..."

[witchoftheflesh]

"Is this how you want to be?" Adrian asked quietly. "You here, and only calling her to hang up?"

That didn't sound like a good place to be at all, Pam.

[joan_of_bark]

Pam's fingers slid up to rub at her forehead. She stretched her legs out, and leaned back. "It's complicated," she said. "The things I did before I came here-- well, they'd definitely make you think less of me."

[witchoftheflesh]

"Okay," Adrian said, nodding. "Stay here, let me get us that tea."

He picked up the tea tray from the ground and headed into the kitchen, radiating a thoughtful air. And, several minutes later, he was back, the tray now laden with a teapot, two mugs, and a plate of cookies. "Sorry they're not fresh-baked," he said, settling down next to her again. "But they're still good."

He busied himself making tea for himself, glancing up at her to see if she'd like him to make her cup, too, and then leaned back, long limbs splayed out, watching her as he took his first few sips. "You don't have to tell me anything," he said. "But you're not happy, Pam. And just stewing over past mistakes isn't going to make you any happier."

[joan_of_bark]

"I don't know if 'happy' is what I'm looking for."

She took a cookie. She reached to pour her own tea. Of course she did; Pam didn't like being waited on, least of all him.

"What does your connection to the Green feel like?" she asked, lifting her teacup. "Does it speak to you? Can you sense it?"

[witchoftheflesh]

"It speaks to me of cycles, of life," Adrian said slowly. "Not just plants, but animals, too. All of the living things that my Grove cradles. It tells me places where things are off-balance, where my attention is needed...but it also hums with contentment, too. The deeper I fall into it, the more I can sense, but it's always a soft voice in the back of my head."

[joan_of_bark]

"Someone brought me back from the dead once," Pam said absently. She cradled her cup between her hands, thoughtful. "But someone else siphoned off a little part of my humanity. When I woke, the Green was everywhere. It reached down into the very heart of me, and I reached back. We were almost the same."

She sipped her tea.

"I rooted myself under Gotham. I could make the city shake by the roots in its foundations."

She set her cup down.

"It was killing me all over again," she said. "'Eventually, there would be nothing left of you but some trace DNA in a really big houseplant', that's what Bella - the woman who took that little bit out of me - told me."

[witchoftheflesh]

"The one who worked with you in the lab," Adrian said, making sure he remembered properly. "Your rival? Why did she do that? Not bring you back to life - though that's pretty huge, I'm not trying to overlook that - but remove that bit of humanity? Was it because that was the only way she could save you? Or...?"

[joan_of_bark]

"She thought it was the only way to save me, yes," Pam said quietly. "From what I'd become when I came back."

She looked at her tea. "She and Harley didn't care all that much about what I wanted."

To be with the Green.

[witchoftheflesh]

"You didn't want to be brought back to life?"

Sorry, Pam, that just wasn't computing.

[joan_of_bark]

"Do you know what it feels like to be so part of the Green that it's everything you are?" Pam asked. Her tone-- she sounded more plaintative than she'd like. "When they shoved my soul back together, they ripped me out of the Green. They snipped my wings."

[witchoftheflesh]

Adrian shook his head. "We're trained not to go down that far," he said. "For exactly that reason - we can lose ourselves to it. Become one with the growth and the vastness and either forget our way back or choose not to."

Another contemplative sip. "Is that what you were angry about? When you left? That she had brought you back?"