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Who: Stephanie Brown and YOU??
What: Sighing a lot and getting tar everywhere
When: Today!
Where: The castle grounds
Rating: PG

Tar, tar everywhere. It was black, sticky, and warm to the touch--which Steph discovered, as it clung to her arms and neck. It didn't take too long for her to realize that many in the castle were being afflicted by this, so she tried to tough through it. It would stop eventually, and she had things to do. There was still a lot to be done in the city, before she and Cass left on the expedition.

However, the more she touched, the more tar seemed to come from her hands.

She wasn't going to be useful to anyone today, let alone herself, she came to realize.

What was the logical response?

To lay down on the grass in front of the castle, of course. Maybe if she didn't touch anything for a while, the sticky goo would recede. In the meanwhile, staring at the sky seems like a good option.

Yeah, castle. She gets the irony. She messes up everything she touches. Ha ha.

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"You can make sure Tim doesn't fall into a pit of depression and forget to eat or something," she teases, though a part of her does worry about him getting eaten up by the restoration effort.

Maybe Steph should worry more about leaving Tim home alone with Lucrezia. Her voice is barely a mutter, but the conviction is there. "I care not for him."

Huh.

Well, then.

"Guess that's not too surprising."

She already knows about some of what she and Ezio gossiped about, and it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that they didn't have a lot of nice things to say about Tim. That, and Stephanie's obvious dislike of Joshua... made sense.

It is vindictive, but that is Lucrezia, or no, that is her family and every Italian family. Revenge is a national pastime, no matter how petty, like this one. At least she stops short of saying he could die for all I care and it would not be less than what he deserves.

"Do you enjoy this tug of war?"

"Do you think I do?"

"All the evidence I can see points to... yes."

Stephanie would claw her own face if her hands weren't covered in tar.

"You're kidding, right? You think I enjoy all of--this? You think this is really how I want things to be?"

She moves to sit up, glaring down at Steph. She promises one thing, progress, then goes to do otherwise. Cunning, really.

"I will not be pulling anymore. Careful not to fall too hard."

"Your perception of me doesn't sound very nice, you know. I'm kinda curious about the kind of person you think I am."

It's insulting, and it hurts. She wants to ask why Lucrezia bothers at all, but she doesn't want her to take that as a go away, Lucrezia.

"The kind of person who thinks herself infinitely better than others," and she does mean to hurt. "Better than me too, of course. I was chasing too high."

She bursts into laughter. She can't help it. Lucrezia Borgia, this daughter of a pope and high lady of class and everything, thinks she, Stephanie Brown, has a superiority complex. She, this girl who has spent most of her adolescence scrambling for acceptance, suffering from low self-esteem, constantly thinking she's not good enough, or that she'll be dropped at any moment.

It's too funny.

"Seriously? You've got the wrong Stephanie Brown."

The laughter only makes her angrier. Doesn't that prove her point too?

Lucrezia has never chased acceptance, never needed to. Her family loves her and everyone else hates her through no fault of hers. Spanish bastards. They can hate her all they want. She moves to stand.

"I did get the wrong one. I was looking for the one who loves me."

"Wait--" The laughter abruptly stops when she sees Lucrezia is about ready to storm off.

"Wait, Lucrezia. Please."

Lucrezia still stands but doesn't walk away yet, staring her down. She feels her anger unwarranted when all she should do now is comfort her friend, but are they even friends? This isn't what friends do to each other, even she knows that.

"If I go now, there is no going back," which is a threat but maybe to herself too. "What then? What else have you to say to me?"

Stephanie stares back. She's been stared down by Batman before. Lucrezia doesn't quite compare.

"Just that... I'm not that person. I'm sorry you've come to see me that way."

But she doesn't really have the energy to devote to convincing her otherwise.

"But I do love you. That's hard to shake."

She drops her gaze, wringing her hands in front of her, staining the other with tar too. But no matter.

"Is it?" But she takes a deep breath and sotens her voice. "You hurt me then say you love me. That sounds like a lie. You have not loved me since the letter, you only stopped pretending after you knew about Joshua."

And she doesn't know what to do with the people who don't love her.

"I don't mean to hurt you. If I didn't love you, do you really think I'd stick around? Check up on you after the earthquake?" Stephanie firmly believes that Lucrezia is the one that changed. Not trusting her, thinking she'd hurt her on behalf of Ezio--it makes her sick thinking about it.

She can overlook a lot in a person and still love them. Ezio is a murder. Tim's ripped her heart out. It's just been a little more difficult overlooking Lucrezia's thing with Joshua.

"But you were cruel to us. Cold," she swallows, and feels no shame in crying. "How would you feel if you had to tell Tim to say thank you to Cassandra? Give him the things to thank her with? Are you stone?"

The crying isn't fair. Stephanie looks down at her hands.

"I'm making an effort. That was me trying. I wasn't comfortable there, but I'm still trying. For your sake."

This always happens. She accuses her of not loving her and only then does she show it, perhaps Stephanie is the better one at the game after all.

She hesitates, before taking a step closer to sit beside her again, looking away at the distance. "You can stop then. I am tired of this balancing act."

She sighs, splaying her hands out in the grass.

"... you do understand that you're the one who dropped me, right? You told me you didn't trust me. You told me I was only around to stab you in the back. You don't trust me, but then you worry about me not loving you. I don't get it. You want me to earn your trust, but you always think I'm out to hurt you or get you no matter what I do. I can't win."

"I do not want to lose you but more and more I feel it would be easier," she says with a sigh. There, that's her conceding to defeat.

"There was never anyone to trust but family. Cesare would know but he is not here," she turns to watch Steph. She should know what she means if she has read the letter. "Is it not earned? Do you even trust me in return?"

"It felt like you trusted me before. You trusted me enough to want me to be family." Again, it's difficult not to laugh. What, she has an easier time with Ezio than herself? The guy who wants to murder her brother and father? If only she knew how much Stephanie had put into making sure Ezio didn't do anything against her brother when he was here.

"I'm not going to force you to do anything, or make choices."

"Pretend to be," family is blood and blood alone. "You made me choose when you treated me differently because of Joshua. You still make me choose."

This feels much like with Ezio, going round and round in circles until they run out of weapons to fling at each other and there is nowhere else to go. "No more. No more overtures of friendship if empty words are all you can give me."