Panic Room

[Odira Potter]

November 3rd

Open to a Browne, two Brownes, Bennet feat. a Browne jokes that should wait till after their soon to be existing thread, or Elsie if anyone's bothered to tell her Odira's not dead in advance of the newspaper article.

As long as she could remain in her bed, Odira Potter was content. Her father had told her it had been her elder sisters’ room until Calliope had married, that she had grown up sharing with Loretta, but neither bedchamber sparked any recognition in the new mother’s mind. The rooms were simply safety, a door lying between herself and a household that constantly seemed to want things from her—to know how she was doing, to know if she wanted anything, to try to quiz her on the past to see if they could spark some memory. Even if she hadn’t just brought a child into the world, it would have been utterly exhausting.

But doors existed to be opened, and this one was no exception. A soft rap on the wooden surface alerted her to the person on the other side, and while it would have been easy enough to feign sleep, her mother (at least, she assumed) had not raised her to be rude.

With a sigh that would only have been audible if someone had been in the room already, she sat aside her worn copy of Pride & Prejudice (which she found she was enjoying immensely) and said, “Come in.”

Invitational Tag (Not obliged to reply!)
@'Aurelia Browne' @'Gideon Browne' @'Loretta Browne' @'Calliope Riley', @'Elsie Beauregard'

  

[Calliope Riley]

It was entirely odd to pay a visit to her old bedroom at the house, but Calliope supposed that was one of the least odd things about the wider situation at hand. She'd given Odira up for dead - as was only reasonable! - so naturally her younger sister had seen fit to show up and throw a wrench in that, because siblings lived to be inconvenient.

She'd also managed to forget most everything about her life. Calliope had had an inkling that it might just be the sort of thing put on for attention, after months of neglect or whatever it was she'd been through, off in who-knew-where; she'd have called the birthing a baby in a cemetery attention-seeking, too, if she'd thought Odira had had any control of the matter.

She was glad her sister was returned, though, truly she was. And she'd been nothing but nice to her, even if she was begrudging actually personally carrying a tea tray up to her (she wasn't a house elf!). But Calliope was curious, and she wanted to see whether Odira really did not remember anything much, and catching Odira alone would be interesting, undoubtedly.

Upon the come in - she'd been poised to, anyway - Calliope turned the doorknob and sailed in, offering her sister a sweet smile despite no consideration of her activity prior to the intrusion. "I've brought some tea," she said cheerfully, placing the tray upon a bedside table and turning back to pull up a chair (for there was no way she was just going to leave her sister in peace). From there, she lifted her wand to cast a pouring charm on the teapot, without waiting to see whether Odira wanted any.

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   Odira Potter

[Odira Potter]

It took Odira a few moments to place the face that entered her room before settling on Calliope. She had been introduced to each of her (living) siblings bar the youngest in the days since her return, but had spent the most time with Loretta—and scarcely any with her elder sister.

She flinched away quite visibly when the teapot began to pour by itself, still very ill at ease with all things magical.

“I wish you would do that yourself,” she murmured softly, averting her eyes. Odira did not wish to be rude, or an inconvenience, or even to play up her fragile condition, but Heaven help her, couldn’t people lift things of their own power?

@'Elias Grimstone'
Sorry for the delay!

  

[Calliope Riley]

Calliope had known - and been reminded - that the new Odira was a bit twitchy, and she supposed that was expected enough, from anyone who had been kidnapped. It was, presumably, the memory loss that saw her specifically uneasy about magic.

Had it slipped her mind? Well, better to feign having forgotten it, if she had not. 

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" She exclaimed, flicking her wand in haste once more to set the teapot back down, though maybe being a little aware that that second instance of magic would not help matters. She smiled sympathetically down at the poor, pathetic, bed-ridden burden her sister had become, trying to go gently until she worked out quite how much memory Odira truly had lost, after all her trauma. Pacing over to the tea tray instead, she took up the milk jug and asked mildly, "Do you take milk or sugar, or don't you recall?"

  

[Odira Potter]

“A bit of both, please,” Odira said, perhaps more sharply than she might have intended. Even if she didn’t know how she used to take her tea, one could assume that she had had it since! She did not wish to be unkind, but the young woman suspected she might not get along terribly well with Calliope. “Though I’m not sure,” she added, aware she might have come across rudely, “if that’s in line with my previous preferences, it is how I take my tea now.”

@'Elias Grimstone'

  

[Calliope Riley]

Really, Odira ought to be grateful Calliope had so much as asked, and not just given her the precise opposite of the way she'd used to like it in the hopes that her preferences had not changed. The dollops of milk and sugar were done a little heavy-handedly, but that could just as easily be chalked up to distraction on Calliope's part. After all, it wasn't every day one got to spend time with a sister who no longer knew a thing about herself! "Suit yourself," she returned serenely, passing the teacup over and flouncing back down into the chair, expectant.

It was not often Calliope could claim any desire to just prod Odira into speaking and then be genuinely willing to listen, but today was one of those days. What fun she might have! "Reading?" She prompted, nodding towards the Austen she'd interrupted. Terribly in-character, this New Odira. "Right back to your talent, I see," she remarked, smiling. Eugh, of course.

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   Odira Potter

[Odira Potter]

“Yes,” she replied with a smile before taking a sip. The tea was perhaps sweeter than she might have liked, but she was hardly about to tell her sister that. Odira could not help but suspect that it would have given Calliope a certain measure of satisfaction.

“Mr. Potter and our mother both have assured me that I had a great fondness for Miss Austen’s works, and on rereading them I find no cause to call either of them liars. Do you read, Calliope?” the brunette asked, watching the older woman carefully.

She had, of course, been furnished with a great deal of details about the lives of her relations, and it was all she could do not to say Mrs. Riley instead—details were, after all, no substitution for true intimacy. Odira knew, however, that her condition was already distressing to her family, and did not want to…want to push them out any more by lapsing into unfamiliarity in her address.

  

[Calliope Riley]

A careful answer, and predictable too. Calliope had used to have a little fondness for Emma, admittedly, but Austen - and indeed books in general - had always been Odira's realm, and she had always been meticulous in cultivating differences from her sisters. She felt like there was some pre-emptive judgement in the returned question, but her smile stayed fixed to her face. "From time to time," she said, "though I suppose I outgrew most fiction a few years ago."

"But you did always adore Austen," Calliope continued, agreeing; not that one had to be close to Odira to know this. "Of course," she lowered her voice in sisterly confidentiality, "I made certain that some of your other books were still safely hidden away for you. It wouldn't have done at all for anyone to find your copy of Fanny Hill while you were missing!" She wasn't sure that the title would be familiar to amnesiac Odira, but she liked to think her hushed tone and wide eyes were suggestive enough of what sort of a book it was to at least create a moment of anxiety. There were a number of untruths to this story - Calliope herself had never even read Fanny Hill, and she doubted Odira had either, but that it had been so widely prosecuted for its obscenity let it serve perfectly as an 'example' - but if Odira fell for it, all the better.

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   Castor Allaway

[Odira Potter]

Other books? What sort of books might Odira possess that would require hiding. Calliope couldn’t have meant anything lewd, could she? Her face was torn between startledness and skepticism, ultimately settling on the latter as she said, carefully, “I’m not familiar with that particular book. I read as much as I could whilst on the farm, but I daresay I did not stumble upon anything of that title.”

Let her sister fill in the blanks.

  

[Calliope Riley]

Of course she hadn't stumbled across anything like that! Calliope stifled a snort. If Odira had seemed to believe it more explicitly, Calliope thought she might have taken enough pity on her poor confused sister to assure her it was merely a joke (and have gotten a good laugh out of it, too). As it was, she confined the laughter to bubbling up in her stomach: Odira perhaps hadn't fallen for it, but Calliope didn't need to press it, happy just to leave crumbs of doubt. She imagined there would be plenty of doubt in Odira's every day, now. 

"Oh, of course," she said, understandingly, continuing in the same hushed tones. "And you have plenty of time to re-acquaint yourself with all that," she said, clicking her teeth in a quiet chuckle. Her eyes widened as she thought of something else to add; "...though I daresay your husband will be ever so disappointed."

(That likely wasn't true either. If she had to wager on which of the two of them - woefully sensible Odira or her gawky husband - was the most awkward and frigid in their marriage, Calliope wouldn't know what to do!)

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   Odira Potter

[Odira Potter]

Odira’s cheeks flushed pink and she averted her eyes, horribly embarrassed. She was not so sheltered, for all that she had been through, that she missed her sister’s implication there. She supposed she would, in time, be expected to attend to her husband’s bedchamber, but the notion of doing something so intimate with a stranger—in spite of the fact that Jane’s existence testified it would hardly be her first time—made her stomach uneasy.

“I-I am sure, Calliope, that your social life must be a busy one—surely you don’t want to spend your whole afternoon visiting your invalid sister?” Tormenting was more like, Odira thought.

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   Calliope Riley

[Calliope Riley]

Calliope offered her yet another sisterly smile, as if she might placate Odira and her priceless embarrassment. (This might have been the most Calliope had smiled at her sister in quite so short a space of time... perhaps ever.)

She took a particularly drawn-out draught of her tea before responding to Odira's question, perfectly happy to prolong the poor dear's agony. "Oh, my dear," she said, a gleam in her eyes, "never mind how busy my social calendar!" (And it was busy. Better that new Odira was never mistaken about that.) "I would be a dreadful sibling to neglect you so!"

She seemed to be beseeching her to leave, already. Well. Perhaps she deserved a clean escape, just this once, just as a show of good faith. "I shall let you return to Austen now, if you so prefer her company," Calliope tittered out a laugh, teetering between the pretence of being offended and being forgiving for it, "but I daresay we'll have plenty of opportunity to catch up further." She smirked. Terrorising siblings, a novelty again! It would be such fun.  

  

[Odira Potter]

Where was her mother, Odira wondered—while she found the woman to be quite overwhelming, Aurelia Browne really would have made for a remarkable buffer between the sisters. Fortunately, the need for such a device faded instantly: it seemed Calliope had tired of whatever game she was playing, at least for now.

“I would truly enjoy catching up further, when I am more recovered. I fear I have less energy than I would like,” Odira offered politely, relieved.

#KayteREALLYSucks2k16
@'Calliope Riley'/@'Elias Grimstone'

  

[Calliope Riley]

Calliope was not certain whether the cautious relief on her sister's face was purely from her exhaustion or instead that she had sunk quite swiftly back to the former feeling of their interactions, as strained as they had always been.

She supposed this might have been an opportunity from fate to make amends, start anew - something of that sort. However, that was a thought that could be immediately dismissed, for, besides not believing in fate, she saw no advantage to suddenly ingratiating herself better with a memory-less relative.

Draining her cup, she set it and its saucer down with a clatter, and sprung forwards to pat her sister's arm in - well, more self-satisfaction than sisterly tenderness, probably. "Perfectly understandable!" Calliope said, sing-song. "You must let me know if there is anything you need - I'm sure you are just all questions, and I shall be happy to ever furnish you with all the answers!" Oh, she almost did wish Odira would come to her - there would be no end to the amusement. There, she would leave her with a dazzling smile and that cheering thought.

/wrap?