notsocommon | for Danny

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danny,
tabula rasa

for Danny

It had been a few days and while Will was far from openly hostile, he wasn't warm and loving in the manner he normally was. Any advances were rebuffed and what little conversation they had was mostly focused on Gregory; while Helen was grateful that Will wasn't cross with her in front of their son, things were still tenser than she'd like.

She had very few people she felt comfortable talking to about this. She wanted to talk to Nikola, of course, but felt it was in poor taste to discuss trouble in her marriage with someone she'd already slept with. Phedre might be a good choice except that she didn't want to spark any jealousy...but Danny, well. He would be perfectly neutral, wouldn't he?

Decision made, she decided to go find him. That proved more difficult than she'd originally thought since Danny was so involved with various island things but she finally caught him near the IPD office.

"Danny? Do you have a moment or two?"

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Danny's locking up for the day, intending to head out and make sure that Tunny's got everything he needs for the shop, but as soon as he hears Helen's voice, he knows that he's ready to rearrange his plans, if he needs to. "Hey," he greets warmly. "For you? Anything," he says, gauging her demeanor carefully. "Did you know any of the latest disappearances?"

"Oh, no, it's not about that," Helen assured him. "Though I know that Coraline knew them and was quite upset. It's marriage talk."

And in that, at least, she thought Danny might be the best sounding board.

"Yeah, she definitely had a reaction," Danny agrees, which is putting it mildly. "What kind of marriage talk are we talking about, here?" he asks, gesturing for her to walk with him. "Do we need to be in private for this one?"

"Probably. Not that anything I have to say is terribly explicit but I would rather not make things worse by having Will hear I've been talking about him," Helen said, giving him a sheepish smile. "He's cross with me and while I understand some of it, I don't understand it all. A neutral party will be nice."

"Come on," Danny says, gesturing to the path that'll take them to his place. There's privacy there and there's not usually anyone along that path, so they'll be given some time alone before they get there. "Alright, lay it on me. What's the problem?"

"Well, I suppose I should start with the shocking revelation that I am, in fact, fictional," Helen said, smiling sheepishly. She still hadn't come completely to terms with it but it was somewhat less of a blow at the moment.

"This being where our problem starts, as Will's known for a year and didn't think it was necessary to tell me."

Danny presses his lips together and gives her a sympathetic look. "I found out about me being, you know, apparently a character a while back. Mostly, Steve has to pry me away from finding out what happens in my not-feeling-so-fictional-to-me life."

"Why didn't he tell you?"

"He says it was to protect me so I wouldn't have one more thing to deal with," Helen said, sighing a bit.

"I think his heart was in the right place but I don't think anyone should be deciding just how much information I'm allowed to have about my own life. I got plenty of that nonsense from John and Nikola back in the 19th century and I don't need it now, you know?"

"I don't blame you," Danny admits, given that he'd lose his head if anyone kept something from him to 'protect him'. Seriously, it would not be pretty, not in the least. "So, what's the status now? Are you still mad? Is this a cold war I'm getting in the middle of, here?"

"Ah, well, there's the thing. I thought we'd reached a good place but he still seems...distant. I may, in the heat of the moment, have compared him to my ex and I don't think he took terribly kindly to it."

Helen thought that was, perhaps, a terrible understatement.

"Yeah, you never want to bring the ex into it," Danny agrees, because he knows that Steve would probably pitch a fit if he compared him to Rachel, and probably rightly so. "Okay, so, what I'm getting from this is that he did a shitty thing, you said something that you regret, and now things are tense between you?"

"Yes. I don't know how to fix it," Helen said, sighing a bit. "I apologized for comparing him to John and it's not like Will's...he's obviously still around helping with Gregory but it's like there's a block of ice between us. We only talk about Gregory. It's not exactly what I want in my marriage."

"I can't blame you," Danny says, given that staying together for a kid is one of those toxic and horrible ways to operate and the easiest way for blame to sneak into a person's life. "See, me? I'm a shouter. I like to shout out my feelings. No chance you can thaw the ice with some yelling?"

"Tried that during the original fight. He yelled back and now we're doing an impersonation of US-Russian relations circa 1953. I just..I suppose he needs time to get over it but I want him to just go ahead and get over it. It's bigger than the two of us anyway. We're parents, we need to be on the same page."

Helen sighed in frustration. "I have never married in over a century and this is the man I chose. I would prefer to actually have a marriage where we communicate."

"And, see, now, I don't want to be the guy who suggests an ultimatum, but maybe this is the point in the marriage where you tell him that you need communication or it's kaput, because," Danny points out. "It only gets worse and you know it. First, you don't talk about little things and then it gets worse and worse from there."

"I know, I should push the issue and see where we get. I think we're both too afraid to fight in front of the baby. Not that he can necessarily understand the words but we're afraid he'll pick up on the anger," Helen explained.

"That's the last thing I could want. So, how're things with you? Bound to be better."

"Me and Steve are not fighting like you guys are, no," Danny promises, seeing as things with him and Steve are back to some kind of good. "We ah, we're normal again. We have a giant ugly elephant in our past, but we're normal." As normal as they can get, anyway.

"I can babysit if you want to have it out, you know?"

"I may take you up on that. Will's a bit strange about having sitters but I think I could possibly talk him into it. It won't do Gregory any harm to spend a few hours with Uncle Danny," Helen said with a grin.

"I really think we keep tiptoeing because we're so worried about the baby."

"I've got Jess staying with us for a little while until Rachel gets a little bit better off, so he'll even have company about his own age," Danny provides, seeing as socialization at that age can't really hurt. "Seriously, any time you really want to hash it out, you drop him by."

"How are they? I've been blessed so far with disappearances. Only John disappeared for me and our relationship was fraught with difficulty to begin with. I am not ashamed to say it's a relief he's gone."

Even if, likely, John were much happier here than he could ever be back home.

"They're okay," Danny admits, given that things could be a lot worse. "I think it helps having a second room, even if I'm kind of wishing I had one more. Coraline, you know," he says, given that Helen understands. "I don't like thinking of her alone in such an emotional state."

"Nor do I. There's not much room with Will, the baby and I either but we could manage if we had to. I don't like the idea of a young girl being all alone after so much loss."

Helen had lost a great many people, true, but she had never had to do it all at once before the age of twenty either.

"And unfortunately, I don't think that she'd take the suggestion of staying at the Compound under some guardianship so well," Danny says, wrinkling his nose because he can already sense how that one would play out and it's not well -- it's not well at all. "You have other things to worry about, though, leave that one to me."

"It's true, I do have bigger fish to fry. Still, it's good that Coraline knows there are people who care about her because loss can be devastating even if you've had practice at it."

Helen paused for a moment, thinking about her own losses. "Perhaps it's honestly worse if you've had practice at it."

"I try not to think about it too much," Danny admits, because he's had a lot of loss in his life that just doesn't bear thinking about or he crumbles. "Better to think about the good things left, which means you should be thinking of a speech to get Will to see all the good things between you two!"

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