Template:Featured Articles/42-2019

Moment of Awesome - Marie-Ange Colbert/Tarot In the wake of relationship upheaval, Marie-Ange and Doug Ramsey discuss next steps. Doug spent a lot of time in the common area of Marie-Ange and Amanda's suite, curled up on the couch doing work, or watching television, or having a snack and kind of half-napping. It was easy, just being in the same space as his...he cocked his head abruptly and sat up, shifting his laptop. "What...are we?" he asked slowly, turning to face her. "Ah..." It was rare that Marie-Ange was taken aback, and she blinked at Doug several times before cocking her head. "Is this from a movie, or a very real question?" "No, this is real," Doug replied. "I mean, we were..." Damn, trying to find words for this was hard. And he couldn't very well be stopping every five words to make vague hand gestures to try and convey complicated ideas. "We dated, then we were apart, then we were dating other people, and then we were part of..." How to describe the strange four-way relationship they had had with Laurie and Wade... "...a group, but then Laurie decided she was done, and Wade went off to do whatever it is he's doing...and we never really established what any of that means for the two of us individually?" He scrubbed his face. "If that makes any sense at all." He wasn't sure if it did. "Do we need to find words for this? Does it need a label?" Marie-Ange unfolded from her pile of paperwork and endless coloured pens and notes that she could have taken on a laptop but she always made connections better on paper and sat down on the sofa across from Doug, feet reaching out to tuck under his blanket. "I know, you like words, but does it require them?" "Wel-l-l..." Doug drew out the word and scrunched his face. "The last time around, half of our problem was that we weren't talking about important things? So maybe we could, um, try and be more adult and mature about things this time?" The fact that he was uptalking just about every single sentence probably said something about how nervous he was bringing this up. Marie-Ange poked a toe into Doug's ankle. "And the last time we clung to labels and did not talk about anything else, so maybe we should just reverse that. Talk about important things, and not so much about what label we have to put on a relationship?" Doug nodded. "That's fair. I just...want to make sure we don't fall back into old habits along the way." He burrowed under his blanket a bit more and dug his toes under Marie-Ange's leg in an attempt to get warm. A long, slow inhale, and then Marie-Ange closed her eye, and set her hands in her lap. "There is no chance of us avoiding talking about serious matters. You know as much as I do, that is something we cannot afford to do." She shifted, and settled herself closer to Doug, letting him dig ice-cold toes into her legs. "We have bargained far too much, all - both of us, and I am not going to permit us to be silly about it."