wingstosee | ic inbox (duplicity)

got it. give me thirty and i'll be over

[ as it turns out, thirty's an overstatement. the trains here run on time, for all the negatives of the place, and barely twenty minutes later venus finds herself standing in front of the designated room. she checks, double-checks, and when she's finally ready - she knocks on the door.

at which point it occurs that, oh, fuck. she probably should have put on the blazer and skirt for a conjugal visit with sherlock holmes, huh? boy, does she look silly. ]

[ all things considered, it has to be noted that making direct requests for sex is an extremely efficient and highly successful enterprise. it's been, what, thirty minutes total from initial message to arrival? and in the meantime he's been filling in his diary with other offers.

looks like he won't have too much difficulty keeping to quota. good to know.

heading for the door when it goes, Sherlock pulls it open with a small flourish, making the most of the pleased-with-himself feeling to override any underlying nerves...

ah.

it's very rare for anyone to find one Sherlock Holmes in a state of silence, let alone surprise. but surprised he happens to be.

after a moment of stunned quiet, he says - ]

Well. I suppose I know why you were looking for the windows.

[ could've asked, never did. here, presumably, is the answer? a flying break in? classic.

nevermind that the real reason he looks like a rabbit in the headlights is relatively little to do with everything it should be (she's glowing, and yet stranger things have happened) and quite a lot to do with the fact that she's probably still at school.

slightly woodenly, he steps to the side to let her in. ]

Edited 2019-01-03 20:08 (UTC)

Huh? Oh, right. On the ship.

[ if she notices the stiffness to his steps, she doesn't say anything. she just walks on inside the room, taking a look around but not bothering to turn back towards him-

-oh jesus. she doesn't have to. the eyes on the backs of her wings seem to be doing that job for her - looking towards sherlock, making eye contact. ]

I, uh. Like your apartment? [ it comes out a bit stilted herself. after a moment, she sighs and tries again: ] Sorry. I'm still sort of figuring out how you're supposed to talk before this kind of thing.

[ hm.

hm hm hm hm hm.

Sherlock spends an extended moment locked in fairly vacant (on his end) eye contact with a wing-eyeball, searching it for the answer to this ? entirely extraordinary situation. is there an answer? he was always going to be slightly out of his depth, but this is ridiculous.

but she talks, and that's something he regularly deals with, which makes it a good point to latch back in on. a beat, a closing of the door, and then instead of offer any kind of actual conversation, he just - ] I didn't realise you were...

[ twelve. no, but. not far enough from to be comfortable.

it feels like a moment to apologise for contacting her at all. but apologies aren't exactly his field either, so he dwindles off into silence. ]

[ to its credit, the eye very politely looks back at him. venus drops her gaze from sherlock and takes in the room instead: reaching out, gently laying her fingers atop the edge of an end table. she's not surprised he's hesitant, of course, but it's still... disheartening?

then again, this IS sherlock holmes. he was probably like a super atheist, right? that's gotta be weird. ]

Yeah. I thought I'd told you, but- it's still kind of a lot, either way. I get it.

[ she tries to flash him an apologetic smile. jury's out on how successful she is. ]

Oh, no. That's—

[ a wave of his hand but he doesn't finish the sentence. that's neither here nor there shouldn't really be true, but is, in a way. if she were 35 and had eyed wings, he's fairly sure he could take it in stride. they're fascinating, after all, and he'll get to that.

but - ]

Should've worked it out from your texting style.

[ she looks at him. she squints for a moment. and then, when she's finished puzzling it out in her brain, she politely asks- ]

-is that really enough to know? Texting, I mean.

[ yeah, sorry, sherlock. she still hasn't realized the conversation's not about that yet. ]

On the balance of probability, older people tend to adhere to written grammar rules in digital communication, if only because it takes active effort to bypass predictive texting -

[ — oh. an abrupt halt comes as it sinks it that they're talking at cross purposes.

she's not asking about the indicators of age in texting. ]

... No.

[ no it's not. enough to know... about any of the the rest. though the contents of their conversation should perhaps have tipped him off. ]

[ well, that was. a lot of words? at least she understood most of them, like. individually. ]

Oh. [ and then, once "older people" has had a bit of time to percolate through her brain- ] -oh. Oh. Um. Sorry, I guess I probably should have said something about that? I kind of figured you just knew, what with being... You know.

[ what with being sherlock holmes. ]

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