Concerned

Ronnie pulled back and hugged herself, her face red and streaked with tears.

"I... I don't know. What's the point? Nothing I've done has made things better for anyone. Chrys is dead... Indigo is missing... My brother is stuck inside some cave with a prehistoric snake goddess... thing..."

"Why should I go out there again?" she sobbed, "Nothing makes sense anymore and everything I know is falling apart...."

Despite his best efforts, Nils jerked back a bit when Esperanza said Chrys' name. He'd been trying so hard not to let his own distress show, but he was still very fresh off of the booze train and he could feel this starting to wear on him.
He reached out and pulled her in for another hug, as much to comfort her as to make sure she couldn't see his face while he tried to pull himself together.
"I know, dear, I know. Unfortunately we can't hide forever. Things will never look better if you don't peek out of your shell. And... our friends need us. As much as it hurts, we can't just abandon them."
As he spoke he closed his eyes and tried to very subtly shift his breathing and calm himself down.

Ronnie wiped her face and looked at Nils. Even in her own fog of grief she could see that he was still hurting. He may have been sober, but he was still in pain. It shamed her a little that she hadn't been there for him these past weeks. Now that she was thinking semi-coherently again she realized how much she had missed him. How much she'd missed the real him, the one who wasn't encumbered by a fog of booze.

She sniffled some and grabbed a tissue from her desk, wiping her face once more.

"You know..." she said with what might almost have been called a smile, "I knew you'd make it eventually. I never gave up on you."

He returned her smile with a wide one of his own. "I know, that's why I kept going." He replied. "I know it sounds cheesy, and it totally is. But you believed in me and I couldn't stand to let you down."
He bit his lip. "I believe in you too. I've missed you."

She sighed and sat down again.

"Willie is gonna be furious at me." she said as she reached for another cigarette.

"Cogida... I don't know if I even still have a job. He probably thinks I'm dead in a ditch somewhere."

Nils smiled. "You want me to talk him into giving you your job back?"
It wasn't like she really needed to work at this point, Nils himself now had a LOT of extra spending money he wouldn't mind using to help her out, and Aimee had already expressed willingness to help any of them out. He could understand, though, if she'd rather keep her job. Control was a good thing to have. "If not, I can donate what used to be my wine budget, I wouldn't miss it."

Ronnie smiled, but it was a worn, tired smile. She lit her cigarette and inhaled deeply, coughing unexpectedly halfway through. With the amount of cigarettes she'd been smoking the last two weeks she was surprised she didn't have bronchitis already. She wondered if maybe her divine powers had something to do with that.

"Thanks, but no" she said when she'd finished coughing, "I need to deal with it myself. He's a good guy, really. I just... I don't know what I'm gonna tell him."

Nils nodded. "Alright. I don't know him, so I don't know the situation, but you could try the truth? Or at least the chunk that doesn't involve supernatural goings on."

"I'm not even sure what the truth is anymore...", she sighed, "I guess I'll figure out what to say when I get there. At least I had finished most of my class stuff for the semester. I should be able to convince Dr. Davis to let me take an incomplete and finish up over the interim."

She sat quietly for a moment, thinking.

"Nils?" she asked, eventually, "How did Aimee get you to quit?"

And so it was back to this. He blushed a bit, remembering his behavior that night. "It was... she shamed me into it, partly. That night was kind of awful, and I went crying to Aimee because you were busy. But a lot of it was that she flat out insisted. She made me stay with her that night, and she dragged me home with her again the next day, and refused to let me leave. I didn't have the energy to resist."
He swallowed. "I wanted to change for all of you, I'm just... I didn't have the energy for it. I'd been running myself down for too long, otherwise... I would have done it long before."

Esperanza nodded. She rested her head against him and sighed.

"I'm glad you're back."

Nils smiled at her. "So am I. It's kind of surprising how much I'm enjoying this." He tilted his head and gave a ghost of a shrug. "Well, it's still... it's still rather tricky. But everyone is so much more comfortable with me now-I hadn't realized how much on edge you all were until it was gone. And... I don't have to lie to Mary anymore."
He hugged Esperanza briefly. "Thank you. I never could have done it without all that you've done for me."

Ronnie smirked and took another long drag on her cigarette.

"We've both got a lot of work ahead of us..." she said, standing up and stretching, "We're not out of the woods yet. Not by a long shot. Thank me when it's over."

Nils nodded. "That's true." He admitted. "But between the two of us, I think we'll find a way to make it work."

~Fin.~