And he does. It's about two hours' heads up the next day, in case the two of them have things and tidying to do, although he doubts it. They keep themselves pretty meticulously put together. But then, they also seem like the type to get lost in the detail-work of preparing for a guest.
But he finds Ossie somewhere, waiting patiently outside of a door.
"Always a pleasure," Ossie beams, dipping his head into a shallow bow. The gardens, the cottage, both are behind him as they always are; the foreign flowers wilted with the changing of the season. As much as he'd have liked some of them to stay around. He leads Phil up the path to the cottage door, trotting ahead to open it for him.
"May I take your coat? You can leave your shoes by the door as well if you'd like- have you eaten? I was considering brunch, would you care for brunch? Or something less substantial?"
Ossie isn't wrong to fuss; besides the wounds that are still healing, Phil walks with his back straight, but with the unfocused bleariness of someone who's barely slept. It's hard to when your murderous enemy is assuredly awake all through the night. He thought about retreating to Erin's Hollow with Darcy, but, well... the entire tower is made of afternoon sky as a method of lighting. Better they sit in the dark of his locked cabin and retreat if they have to.
Then he went on morning patrol. No sign of her. Then he was out like a light for a few hours, then back on his feet again.
"Uh--yeah. Yeah, sure. Thank you." He takes off his coat, toes off his shoes. The cottage is as beautiful as always. "Brunch is fine, thanks."
As much as Ossie fusses, the cottage fusses too. His shoes somehow end up on the rack beside the door when he's not looking (cleaned and polished, to boot), a coat stand seems to just appear to take his coat.
Ossie bustles them into the dining room. The table is set just for two; not overly formal, but with a sprig of fresh flowers in a small vase and room enough that it's not close quarters.
"Coffee? Tea? Juice? Lemon squash?" he asks, unbuttoning his jacket to sit, "requests for brunch? You ought to try Giles' pancakes, they're just exceptional."
"Ah--" oh this is so much for having gotten two hours of sleep in the last thirty, "--I'd love to, but maybe not pancakes. They make me tired all day. That's how you know I'm getting old."
He takes a seat, marveling at the change of scenery. He's been here before, but it's so nice to have places that are unusual to see these days. So nice. Enough of the same old weather, the same old places, the rows of doors...
"Coffee would be wonderful. And if you've got omelettes...?"
There's barely been time to breathe after Phil's question of a request when Giles appears from the kitchen with a tray.
"Good morning," he says politely to Phil, as he lays the contents of the tray neatly upon the table.
A pot each of tea and coffee, with all the fixings for them both, a plate of omelettes, and a plate of toast, with a dish of butter along side. All fresh and still hot, moreso than should be possible with only one person in the kitchen.
"You wear your age better than most of us," he manages to say just before the doors to the kitchen swing open.
"Thank you, dear," Ossie chimes, fixing his tea how he likes it and leaning up to deposit a kiss on Giles' cheek as he goes past.
"Oh-" Ossie says, as if Giles hasn't just desecrated the sanctity of linear time, "I've been meaning to ask, how is that piece you've been working on coming along? What was it- it was that Schubert one, yes? The one you've been practicing?"
"Oh--good morning," he stammers as Giles comes in. There's already... and it's all hot--
He shakes his head. Roll with the punches, Phil. You're far past the point of trying to make sense of anything.
"The Schubert? Oh. Yeah." He nods as he reaches for the coffee. "Yeah, the sonata. 21st. I haven't learned the whole thing yet, I mean it's over forty minutes long, but I've been working through it. It sounds like a lot, but music's got structure to it, especially these older pieces." A pause to sip. The warmth runs through him like his own blood, and his shoulders loosen just a little. "And the piano bites me less when I play Schubert. It's a nice long project. I tried to see if anywhere possibly had a recording of it. The karaoke machine has everything, I guess. If you ever feel like stopping down there, my favorite interpretation's the one by András Schiff."
"Ah- it's a good thing that someone is working out the peculiar tastes of that little beastie. I'm afraid I've been shirking my practice. The last time I tried, the ruddy thing nipped my fingers."
He lifts a hand for just a second as if to demonstrate. Not only is there not a single scratch on him, there are no creases on the backs of his fingers. But he listens with a warm regard around mouthfuls of tea and a few bites of toast. Nice to see him relax a little.
"András Schiff- I'll make a note of it. I've frequented the karaoke place quite a bit- April- do you know April? You might not- once hosted a little shindig there. Didn't realise they had classical pieces, though, how lovely- I should see if they have any opera."
A little moment of respite in pleasantries, and then he leans back in his seat, picking up his tea once again.
"There's always the piano in Bellona," he offers. "I don't play there very often because it feels a bit isolating to me personally, but it's not man-eating, and way more private."
He warms his hands around the coffee as he thinks about Ossie's question for a moment, then reaches for the food. He ought to eat while it's warm, it's polite, but right now he's speaking.
"... Honest answer? Nobody has a good time around here, and I'm not an exception. I've been dealing with it, the same as we all have to, but it's... I mean, September has been mostly fine, weirdly enough. But. Stressed. Very stressed."
"Ah- that's the theatre, isn't it?" he doesn't leave the cottage over-much these days, his memory of any of the little places outside his usual haunts tends to fog a little.
Ossie tilts his head in sympathy, tapping his thumb on the saucer gently while he considers his words.
"Worse than usual? Or just... a build-up? We are all in the same boat, er, so to speak, here. But the same cargo on smooth seas may sink on rougher waters, and not all ships are built equal."
"... Both, maybe?" He forks the omelette a couple times. "It's kind of hard to judge whether one incident is worse than the other without some kind of recency bias, but it's pretty... not good. It's a lot." A dry chuckle. "When is it ever not, though? As if I needed to be on the ship for that."
He pauses for half a moment, huffs for another, and then silences himself with brunch.
He chews, swallows, makes a face. “Of course I do.” That moment with Darcy sits like a star in his memory, something to revolve the rest of his world around. “That doesn’t stop the rest of everything happening.”
But. Anyway.
“Well. There’s still the whole. Widower thing. Then I’m pretty sure basically all of my closest loved ones despise someone else who is a friend of mine, like, one of them shot them and another murdered them on an excursion. Another two of them hate each other. Which is, I mean, pretty normal if occasionally frustrating, but it’s so much more of a migraine in close quarters like this.”
He does some kind of waving-off gesture and sighs. “Then my eye is permanent? For some reason? And I kind of messed up talking to one of my kids a few months ago and I’m still thinking about it. And then Jade's gone, and then those flowers, and there are these evil doors that seriously set me off, and then Demona…”
"You've... spoken to people prior to me about all of these too, I hope?"
Not because he can't handle the weight of discussing this, of course not, that little tin brooch burns a hole in his bloody pocket at all times. But...
"Anyone would buckle under the weight of just one of these. I mean it, it isn't unreasonable to be struggling under the circs."
... Ruddy little thing. He'll never be rid of it. Ossie removes the brooch from his inside jacket pocket and fastens it to his lapel, folding freshly entaloned hands in front of himself.
“Yes. Darcy knows more or less all of it.” Some he’s spoken about more than… others. “Security knows most of the older stuff. Erin’s heard of a few from me.”
He sighs, shuts his eyes as he pinches the bridge of his nose.
… And then Ossie pins something to his jacket, and his hands have talons.
“… Those weren’t there before,” he mutters as if to convince himself. (As though he needs convincing.) He blinks himself out of that brief stun, shakes his head, sighs a little too forcefully. “I’m sorry, what are we doing?”
"No, these weren't," he tap-taps the talons on his cup to demonstrate.
"I am offering my services in my capacity as a Blackbird Bishop. Which is to say, someone who is here to listen. You must talk to someone about these things aside from your children and... Erin. Charming as her company is."
He tilts his head, "no pressure to accept, of course. I understand we aren't as close as you undoubtedly are with them. But perhaps a little professional distance may be of use too, wot? I would like to be here for you in any case."
He thinks about protesting that he has spoken to more than just them, he's been working on building a support network since the day he got here, but when his mind goes to drum up examples, it... well, better he look stupid than open his mouth and prove it.
He gives a dry, single laugh. "It'll be nice to complain to someone who isn't so tangled up in the circles I usually run in. Mm. Where do we start?"
God, it's a fucking laundry list. Well, the widower thing surely doesn't need saying; that's just the sort of thing he needs to quietly cradle close to his heart until he can grow around it. The disaster that is the relationships between his company? That feels like gossip, and he still needs to talk with Helena anyway.
If Phil had told someone more responsible, he would've likely lead with that. Instead of the world's most irritable French teenager, someone still getting its head around being a person, and Erin.
"That was from... the Daisy incident, yes?" he remembers it, even if only vaguely, from Dimitri's recounting of it.
"I'm all ears, Mr Connors," he indicates with a tilt of his head. Has Phil noticed that Ossie has elf-like ears? He does. The Gentry aren't terribly inventive.
Of course he has. There’s little he doesn’t notice, especially physically.
“… Okay. Well.”
He takes a breath, poking at his food while he tries to think of how to even begin on that one.
“Yeah, it was the Daisy thing. Honestly, it’s. We both expected it to go away. Everyone did. That’s what happens, right? So I didn’t really pursue her on it specifically. I didn’t have to. I sort of caught her and talked with her about the, uh, rest of… what she did, but the eye, even though it got in the way every day it was supposed to disappear the next time I died. And then it just. Didn’t.
He hasn’t looked up from his plate. “I don’t know. I thought maybe it was because it was there for so long, but people have had tattoos disappear. I guess it’s just some kind of… whoops in the process that time. I got Daisy to apologize. That was… complicated. She’s complicated. And she’s really trying, and I appreciate that so much from her. But I still. Have this.”
Ossie nods along. And maybe it's the same warp and weft of story that runs through him, the places in which he feels the rhyme, or maybe it's just ego and the assumption that he knows how Phil feels, but as if pulled from him on a cord he continues-
"A disfigurement. A change in your ability, to boot. The man you see in the mirror is not the same man you got used to seeing. And I cannot imagine knowing that the condition is permanent when other things aren't would help, wot? You poor thing."
He hopes it comes across as sympathy for his position, and not condescension.
Phil is not only a man with the most powerful good faith on the planet, he is also desperately grasping for anything that makes him feel validated in being angry and bitter. He forks a piece of omelette and is off from center by one prong too many.
“Yeah. And…” I haven’t had a scar in— “… I know life is unfair, but geez. I worried for a while about being able to broadcast again, but I could probably just wear a contact. Which, that’s the other thing, I—I should probably have a patch because it gives me headaches sometimes, but I would honestly rather drown than draw more attention to it than I already have.
“And I… know it’s still bad and no one’s running a damn competition, and any one of them would cut my head off for thinking this, but there are… I mean, with all the crazy dramatic histories of people here, it. Some part of me feels like it just doesn’t matter. Not here.”
"It isn't a competition, no. But... there's others ahead of you in the soup queue, so to speak. Aren't there? Even if it's a constant inconvenience, one you are still adapting to, one that impacts your every waking moment, one you are unsure of how to manage, how to even complain about the ruddy thing in the right way. Rather like moving into a new apartment and struggling to sort the annoyances from the issues."
Funny, isn't it. He used to talk to so many entirely average people back in London, and how many of them shimmered with the same colours as he weaves here. Not just Changelings- they don't have a monopoly on pain- but people working out how to welcome in arthritis for the first time, accepting the change in their dreams that comes from injury.
"I used to be a gambling man, Phil, and I don't think I ever placed a surer bet than that the very people who would decapitate you for thinking so... are feeling precisely the same thing, at times."
It's like magic. Well, it probably is magic, but he just marvels at the way Ossie so deftly untangles the briar of his thoughts, this frayed snarl of frustration and stress and split ends. Because yeah. Yeah.
There is really something about it, when you realize you are just never going to be someone going through life with ease now. And he doesn't even know how to complain about it. Which sucks, because complaining is how he copes. Frankly he also doesn't even know if he has forty years left of this or two hundred.
"Yeah... yeah," he nods, sighing. And then puts his face in his hands and just, breathes a very long-suffering groan.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2023-10-07 10:10 pm (UTC)It doesn't hurt to be reminded.
I'll let you know if I'm coming over. Thanks.
And he does. It's about two hours' heads up the next day, in case the two of them have things and tidying to do, although he doubts it. They keep themselves pretty meticulously put together. But then, they also seem like the type to get lost in the detail-work of preparing for a guest.
But he finds Ossie somewhere, waiting patiently outside of a door.
"Hey, morning. Thanks for having me."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-07 10:51 pm (UTC)"May I take your coat? You can leave your shoes by the door as well if you'd like- have you eaten? I was considering brunch, would you care for brunch? Or something less substantial?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-07 11:18 pm (UTC)Then he went on morning patrol. No sign of her. Then he was out like a light for a few hours, then back on his feet again.
"Uh--yeah. Yeah, sure. Thank you." He takes off his coat, toes off his shoes. The cottage is as beautiful as always. "Brunch is fine, thanks."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 01:32 am (UTC)Ossie bustles them into the dining room. The table is set just for two; not overly formal, but with a sprig of fresh flowers in a small vase and room enough that it's not close quarters.
"Coffee? Tea? Juice? Lemon squash?" he asks, unbuttoning his jacket to sit, "requests for brunch? You ought to try Giles' pancakes, they're just exceptional."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 03:40 am (UTC)He takes a seat, marveling at the change of scenery. He's been here before, but it's so nice to have places that are unusual to see these days. So nice. Enough of the same old weather, the same old places, the rows of doors...
"Coffee would be wonderful. And if you've got omelettes...?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 04:01 am (UTC)"Good morning," he says politely to Phil, as he lays the contents of the tray neatly upon the table.
A pot each of tea and coffee, with all the fixings for them both, a plate of omelettes, and a plate of toast, with a dish of butter along side. All fresh and still hot, moreso than should be possible with only one person in the kitchen.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 04:08 am (UTC)"Thank you, dear," Ossie chimes, fixing his tea how he likes it and leaning up to deposit a kiss on Giles' cheek as he goes past.
"Oh-" Ossie says, as if Giles hasn't just desecrated the sanctity of linear time, "I've been meaning to ask, how is that piece you've been working on coming along? What was it- it was that Schubert one, yes? The one you've been practicing?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 08:10 am (UTC)He shakes his head. Roll with the punches, Phil. You're far past the point of trying to make sense of anything.
"The Schubert? Oh. Yeah." He nods as he reaches for the coffee. "Yeah, the sonata. 21st. I haven't learned the whole thing yet, I mean it's over forty minutes long, but I've been working through it. It sounds like a lot, but music's got structure to it, especially these older pieces." A pause to sip. The warmth runs through him like his own blood, and his shoulders loosen just a little. "And the piano bites me less when I play Schubert. It's a nice long project. I tried to see if anywhere possibly had a recording of it. The karaoke machine has everything, I guess. If you ever feel like stopping down there, my favorite interpretation's the one by András Schiff."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-08 10:01 pm (UTC)He lifts a hand for just a second as if to demonstrate. Not only is there not a single scratch on him, there are no creases on the backs of his fingers. But he listens with a warm regard around mouthfuls of tea and a few bites of toast. Nice to see him relax a little.
"András Schiff- I'll make a note of it. I've frequented the karaoke place quite a bit- April- do you know April? You might not- once hosted a little shindig there. Didn't realise they had classical pieces, though, how lovely- I should see if they have any opera."
A little moment of respite in pleasantries, and then he leans back in his seat, picking up his tea once again.
"And how are you otherwise, my good man?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-09 06:21 am (UTC)He warms his hands around the coffee as he thinks about Ossie's question for a moment, then reaches for the food. He ought to eat while it's warm, it's polite, but right now he's speaking.
"... Honest answer? Nobody has a good time around here, and I'm not an exception. I've been dealing with it, the same as we all have to, but it's... I mean, September has been mostly fine, weirdly enough. But. Stressed. Very stressed."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-09 07:05 am (UTC)Ossie tilts his head in sympathy, tapping his thumb on the saucer gently while he considers his words.
"Worse than usual? Or just... a build-up? We are all in the same boat, er, so to speak, here. But the same cargo on smooth seas may sink on rougher waters, and not all ships are built equal."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-11 02:19 pm (UTC)He pauses for half a moment, huffs for another, and then silences himself with brunch.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-12 08:40 am (UTC)It's important to him that Phil knows that.
"What else has happened, if you don't mind me asking?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-12 03:33 pm (UTC)But. Anyway.
“Well. There’s still the whole. Widower thing. Then I’m pretty sure basically all of my closest loved ones despise someone else who is a friend of mine, like, one of them shot them and another murdered them on an excursion. Another two of them hate each other. Which is, I mean, pretty normal if occasionally frustrating, but it’s so much more of a migraine in close quarters like this.”
He does some kind of waving-off gesture and sighs. “Then my eye is permanent? For some reason? And I kind of messed up talking to one of my kids a few months ago and I’m still thinking about it. And then Jade's gone, and then those flowers, and there are these evil doors that seriously set me off, and then Demona…”
no subject
Date: 2023-10-21 11:47 am (UTC)"You've... spoken to people prior to me about all of these too, I hope?"
Not because he can't handle the weight of discussing this, of course not, that little tin brooch burns a hole in his bloody pocket at all times. But...
"Anyone would buckle under the weight of just one of these. I mean it, it isn't unreasonable to be struggling under the circs."
... Ruddy little thing. He'll never be rid of it. Ossie removes the brooch from his inside jacket pocket and fastens it to his lapel, folding freshly entaloned hands in front of himself.
"Where should we start?"
no subject
Date: 2023-10-21 04:36 pm (UTC)He sighs, shuts his eyes as he pinches the bridge of his nose.
… And then Ossie pins something to his jacket, and his hands have talons.
“… Those weren’t there before,” he mutters as if to convince himself. (As though he needs convincing.) He blinks himself out of that brief stun, shakes his head, sighs a little too forcefully. “I’m sorry, what are we doing?”
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 01:00 am (UTC)"I am offering my services in my capacity as a Blackbird Bishop. Which is to say, someone who is here to listen. You must talk to someone about these things aside from your children and... Erin. Charming as her company is."
He tilts his head, "no pressure to accept, of course. I understand we aren't as close as you undoubtedly are with them. But perhaps a little professional distance may be of use too, wot? I would like to be here for you in any case."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 02:42 am (UTC)He gives a dry, single laugh. "It'll be nice to complain to someone who isn't so tangled up in the circles I usually run in. Mm. Where do we start?"
God, it's a fucking laundry list. Well, the widower thing surely doesn't need saying; that's just the sort of thing he needs to quietly cradle close to his heart until he can grow around it. The disaster that is the relationships between his company? That feels like gossip, and he still needs to talk with Helena anyway.
"I. Guess we could talk about my eye."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 06:18 am (UTC)"That was from... the Daisy incident, yes?" he remembers it, even if only vaguely, from Dimitri's recounting of it.
"I'm all ears, Mr Connors," he indicates with a tilt of his head. Has Phil noticed that Ossie has elf-like ears? He does. The Gentry aren't terribly inventive.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 06:55 am (UTC)“… Okay. Well.”
He takes a breath, poking at his food while he tries to think of how to even begin on that one.
“Yeah, it was the Daisy thing. Honestly, it’s. We both expected it to go away. Everyone did. That’s what happens, right? So I didn’t really pursue her on it specifically. I didn’t have to. I sort of caught her and talked with her about the, uh, rest of… what she did, but the eye, even though it got in the way every day it was supposed to disappear the next time I died. And then it just. Didn’t.
He hasn’t looked up from his plate. “I don’t know. I thought maybe it was because it was there for so long, but people have had tattoos disappear. I guess it’s just some kind of… whoops in the process that time. I got Daisy to apologize. That was… complicated. She’s complicated. And she’s really trying, and I appreciate that so much from her. But I still. Have this.”
Gestures at his face.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 07:13 am (UTC)"A disfigurement. A change in your ability, to boot. The man you see in the mirror is not the same man you got used to seeing. And I cannot imagine knowing that the condition is permanent when other things aren't would help, wot? You poor thing."
He hopes it comes across as sympathy for his position, and not condescension.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 08:54 am (UTC)“Yeah. And…” I haven’t had a scar in— “… I know life is unfair, but geez. I worried for a while about being able to broadcast again, but I could probably just wear a contact. Which, that’s the other thing, I—I should probably have a patch because it gives me headaches sometimes, but I would honestly rather drown than draw more attention to it than I already have.
“And I… know it’s still bad and no one’s running a damn competition, and any one of them would cut my head off for thinking this, but there are… I mean, with all the crazy dramatic histories of people here, it. Some part of me feels like it just doesn’t matter. Not here.”
no subject
Date: 2023-10-22 09:20 am (UTC)Funny, isn't it. He used to talk to so many entirely average people back in London, and how many of them shimmered with the same colours as he weaves here. Not just Changelings- they don't have a monopoly on pain- but people working out how to welcome in arthritis for the first time, accepting the change in their dreams that comes from injury.
"I used to be a gambling man, Phil, and I don't think I ever placed a surer bet than that the very people who would decapitate you for thinking so... are feeling precisely the same thing, at times."
no subject
Date: 2023-10-23 07:18 am (UTC)There is really something about it, when you realize you are just never going to be someone going through life with ease now. And he doesn't even know how to complain about it. Which sucks, because complaining is how he copes. Frankly he also doesn't even know if he has forty years left of this or two hundred.
"Yeah... yeah," he nods, sighing. And then puts his face in his hands and just, breathes a very long-suffering groan.
no subject
Date: 2023-10-23 08:29 am (UTC)"Glad I wasn't overreaching. Are you alright? Do you need a moment?"
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