As intuitive as she is, River can be painfully tactless. He knows this. He doesn't hesitate to alert her to her brattiness whenever the occassion arises. It's hard, though, when it hits him abruptly like this, when he realises that his somewhat disciplinary asides to her work on the assumption that she's being obnoxious to others; and its the thought that she knows how he feels already and yet goes on to twist her words in like a corkscrew into one of Father's ancient bottles of wine.
His room is bigger; though when hers is large enough to include a barre and wide mirror, a reasonably size bookshelf-lined alcove and sleeping platform with sprawling bedlinen, a slight difference in size doesn't account to much. She objects to the reproduction of a human skeleton on a stand in his, but not so much the hand-carved and lacquered jigsaw of human organs that stand in a skinless figure; she's grown into the habit of taking out single organs and hiding them for him to find later. A heart in his lunch pail. Intestines in his underwear drawer.
She ignores them this time, though, and her slipper-clad feet are almost completely noiseless as she pads across the rug. He doesn't turn around as she clambers onto the far side of the bed from where he's cross-legged on the edge, facing away. She drapes her arms over his shoulders and takes the stylus from where it was limp in his hand anyway, not having made any progress on the datapad since he'd left her room.
She doesn't apologise. She never apologises. Sometimes he thinks he should take offense at that, but if he ever examined that particular thought close enough he knew he'd have to admit that her sense of entitlement to his unconditional forgiveness is somewhat ingratiating. And also--
"I forget," she murmurs, and her hair is sticky on his jaw where she's used a gel to smooth down stray strands against her skull. "We're not the same person, sometimes."
It doesn't make any sense if he thinks about it, and makes more sense than he'd like to think about if he doesn't; so he focuses instead on the way her ribs point and push into his back, in a way that should be irritating. They're getting too old for this. He shrugs a little and she rides the movement to settle her pointy chin on his shoulder.
"We're quite different, actually," he says, because even though more often than not she knows what he's going to say before he opens his mouth, it's still important to him that he says it.
"No, silly," she says, and he can't quite tell if there's an edge of irritation to the affection, or if it's the other way around. She grinds her chin into his shoulder. "Not similar. The same."
And sometimes she just doesn't make sense at all. "I have to work," he says, and lets his hand rest over hers for a little longer than necessary as he reclaims the stylus. She peels herself off his back as he starts scrolling, and lies back down on the bed behind him. The blocky points of her slippers dig into his lower back.
"When I was a child," she says in a voice which tells him she thinks of childhood as a thousand years ago at least. "I was going to marry you."
"Everyone says that about their brothers and sisters when they're young," he answers. He's been thinking about marriage a lot, lately, especially since his parents' managed to weather Father's exposed infidelity. He knows that grandchildren are wanted, which will mean either a partner with no immediate aspirations of their own or else a string of nannies. Neither idea particularly appeals to Simon; he suspects that he'd actually quite like to do some of the caring-for himself.
Perhaps he'll wait until he's old, as old as Father, when his hands aren't quite quick enough to knot and plait the thread of other people's lives anymore. That might be nice, to grow ancient with little children all around him.
"Come back, Simon, you're not listening," River complains, jabbing him in the small of the back with the toe of her shoe. "I said, I used to wish I was a boy. So I could be a soldier."
"What changed your mind?"
"Your anatomy books. Your gender is ridiculous."
"Nothing about the human body is ridiculous."
"Incorrect. The epiglottis, the phalanges, and the perineum are all utterly ridiculous."
He can hear the laugh in her voice. The storm is passed, then.
"We should have named you Chow. Your moods are as quick as summer shifts. And anyway, you're just choosing those parts because you think the words are silly."
"I think we'd agreed on 'ridiculous' as the term being bandied, actually. When you have babies, I'm going to knit them hats. Green for girls, yellow for boys. Will your wife be as pretty as me?"
She may be the intuitive one, but he's hardly stupid. He smiles, knowing she'll guess his expression from the set of his shoulders, and says "No, River, there's nobody as pretty as you."
She giggles, and jabs him again. "Flatterer. Do you think I can have babies and still be a Companion?"
Simon sighs. "Not that again. You're only eleven. You don't have to choose anything yet."
"You've always known what you're going to be. You probably chose before you were born, Simon. The equiment monitoring your gestation probably caught your fetal eye."
"My 'fetal eye'? You are so not allowed to go on cortex meet-boards without supervision in future."
"I have to do something with my time. You're always studying. I don't know why. Can't you just remember it all in the first place?"
"Okay, now you're just gloating," he says, and smiles at the sound of her laugh.
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His room is bigger; though when hers is large enough to include a barre and wide mirror, a reasonably size bookshelf-lined alcove and sleeping platform with sprawling bedlinen, a slight difference in size doesn't account to much. She objects to the reproduction of a human skeleton on a stand in his, but not so much the hand-carved and lacquered jigsaw of human organs that stand in a skinless figure; she's grown into the habit of taking out single organs and hiding them for him to find later. A heart in his lunch pail. Intestines in his underwear drawer.
She ignores them this time, though, and her slipper-clad feet are almost completely noiseless as she pads across the rug. He doesn't turn around as she clambers onto the far side of the bed from where he's cross-legged on the edge, facing away. She drapes her arms over his shoulders and takes the stylus from where it was limp in his hand anyway, not having made any progress on the datapad since he'd left her room.
She doesn't apologise. She never apologises. Sometimes he thinks he should take offense at that, but if he ever examined that particular thought close enough he knew he'd have to admit that her sense of entitlement to his unconditional forgiveness is somewhat ingratiating. And also--
"I forget," she murmurs, and her hair is sticky on his jaw where she's used a gel to smooth down stray strands against her skull. "We're not the same person, sometimes."
It doesn't make any sense if he thinks about it, and makes more sense than he'd like to think about if he doesn't; so he focuses instead on the way her ribs point and push into his back, in a way that should be irritating. They're getting too old for this. He shrugs a little and she rides the movement to settle her pointy chin on his shoulder.
"We're quite different, actually," he says, because even though more often than not she knows what he's going to say before he opens his mouth, it's still important to him that he says it.
"No, silly," she says, and he can't quite tell if there's an edge of irritation to the affection, or if it's the other way around. She grinds her chin into his shoulder. "Not similar. The same."
And sometimes she just doesn't make sense at all. "I have to work," he says, and lets his hand rest over hers for a little longer than necessary as he reclaims the stylus. She peels herself off his back as he starts scrolling, and lies back down on the bed behind him. The blocky points of her slippers dig into his lower back.
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"Everyone says that about their brothers and sisters when they're young," he answers. He's been thinking about marriage a lot, lately, especially since his parents' managed to weather Father's exposed infidelity. He knows that grandchildren are wanted, which will mean either a partner with no immediate aspirations of their own or else a string of nannies. Neither idea particularly appeals to Simon; he suspects that he'd actually quite like to do some of the caring-for himself.
Perhaps he'll wait until he's old, as old as Father, when his hands aren't quite quick enough to knot and plait the thread of other people's lives anymore. That might be nice, to grow ancient with little children all around him.
"Come back, Simon, you're not listening," River complains, jabbing him in the small of the back with the toe of her shoe. "I said, I used to wish I was a boy. So I could be a soldier."
"What changed your mind?"
"Your anatomy books. Your gender is ridiculous."
"Nothing about the human body is ridiculous."
"Incorrect. The epiglottis, the phalanges, and the perineum are all utterly ridiculous."
He can hear the laugh in her voice. The storm is passed, then.
"We should have named you Chow. Your moods are as quick as summer shifts. And anyway, you're just choosing those parts because you think the words are silly."
"I think we'd agreed on 'ridiculous' as the term being bandied, actually. When you have babies, I'm going to knit them hats. Green for girls, yellow for boys. Will your wife be as pretty as me?"
She may be the intuitive one, but he's hardly stupid. He smiles, knowing she'll guess his expression from the set of his shoulders, and says "No, River, there's nobody as pretty as you."
She giggles, and jabs him again. "Flatterer. Do you think I can have babies and still be a Companion?"
Simon sighs. "Not that again. You're only eleven. You don't have to choose anything yet."
"You've always known what you're going to be. You probably chose before you were born, Simon. The equiment monitoring your gestation probably caught your fetal eye."
"My 'fetal eye'? You are so not allowed to go on cortex meet-boards without supervision in future."
"I have to do something with my time. You're always studying. I don't know why. Can't you just remember it all in the first place?"
"Okay, now you're just gloating," he says, and smiles at the sound of her laugh.