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Marshanna stared out the window, colorful trees peppered the grassy landscape and gleamed in the sun's rays. As Heather, the nurse, rifled through one of her cabinets, Marshanna swung her legs softly. Her mind still searched for the proper way to bring up her dilemma, which now had infested most of her life in her and Nort's shared space in the snow. Perhaps all the years spent working in the dungeons hadn't left her with the right skill-set, however.
“Really, Marshanna, you need to take better care of yourself. You can't keep getting scraped up and expect to stay in good health,” Heather tsked, walking back to the exam table with bandages and a bottle of disinfectant. Glancing down at her hands, rough and calloused with work, Marshanna examined the cuts in question. They were small, shallow, something never noticed when working for the cultists. By her or them.
“You don't need to worry about them, really. They're nothing.” Marshanna replied with a short laugh, hoping to brush off the worry.
“They're nothing until they get infected. Then what will you do? Come crawling back to me?” Placing the items down on the table beside Marshanna, Heather looked up to witness her doubtful frown. “I don't want to see you hurt, okay?”
“I think I've dealt with worse.”
“Well, not anymore. Now let me see your hands.”
Without further protest, Marshanna held them up allowing Heather's hands—adorned with carefully manicured nails—to hold them lightly. Feeling her hands be twisted and assessed, Marshanna allowed herself to simply sit in the contentment of the moment. Relative peace was a commodity not to be wasted in their world. That fact struck especially hard when thinking of the capabilities of the machines she crafted with her own hands—the hands perhaps not deserving of the tender care they were now receiving. Not that she would complain, especially considering Heather would shoot down any protests with an unamused frown.
“So, what did you come here to ask me in the first place?” Heather asked, dampening a small cloth with disinfectant. At the words, Marshanna quickly remembered that the fact she even came at all was for an entirely different reason.
“Oh, yeah.” Inside her chest, she could feel her heartbeat quicken a bit. “It was nothing, dont worry about it.”
“You can't just say that and expect me to drop it. You can tell me anything, you know?”
“Well, it was sort of of a medical question,” taking a deep breath and continuing, she figured she had nothing to lose. “Do you- do you think it's possible to be allergic to a person?” The question was followed by a hard laugh as Heather continued to bandage her hands. However, when her eyes landed back on Marshanna—her expression nothing more than genuine nervousness—she quickly collected herself
“I guess that's a no then,” Marshanna said, almost wishing she hadn't spoken at all and face heating up.
“Here, how about you describe the symptoms and we'll see?”
“It's just whenever I'm with this one person my heart gets all fluttery, and it doesn't happen with anyone else, and I've never had this happen before, and–”
“Hold on.” Heather stopped Marshanna as she fell into a small ramble. “I think I know what's going on.”
“You do? Is it serious? Am I dying?”
“No,” Heather laughed softly, a fondness warming the sound. “You like this mystery person.”
“Of course, I like him. But I like you and it's not happening now.”
“Not like that, I meant romantically.”
All words died in Marshanna's lungs as Heather's diagnosis echoed in her head. Could that be true? It was true she enjoyed every moment spent with Nort, working on shared projects, taking a break in the snow, rambling about her day as he worked on Player's tools. And it was true she couldn't help but smile at the small quirks of his she found while they made the house Player made them into a home. But none of that meant the thought didn't catch her off guard.
“I don't– I mean maybe– I just– Oh, Heather,” Marshanna said, finally finding her words, “I guess you could be right.”
“Trust me, I'm not wrong.” She paused a moment, clearly amused as she took in Marshanna's reaction in full, before continuing. “You've got to be one of the most wonderfully capable yet utterly hopeless people I know.”
Heather was right, of course, at least about the fact she wasn't wrong and Marshanna was utterly hopeless. People and relationships seemed far more complex than machinery; the mathematical precision that went in the lengths of wires or the power of weapons remained hard facts, nothing about the way she felt or acted with Nort felt like a fact. Perhaps that was why as much as it worried her, it electrified her in the best way.
“What am I going to do?” Marshanna asked, swallowing her thoughts and being brought back into reality as Heather put away her supplies.
“Don't worry about that while you have me.” Heather smiled over her shoulder, Marshanna could practically see thoughts and plans forming in her eyes. “I'm an expert in more than medical stuff, you know.”
In return, Marshanna couldn't help a hopeful smile and the thought maybe everything would be all right.