Drinking cinnamon coffee, or decaffeinated tea.

[seestheman]

WHO | Clara and OPEN
WHAT | The first meeting of Clara's breakfast club.
WHEN | Present time.
WHERE | District 10's suite
WARNINGS/NOTES | None right now, will add any if they crop up!


Clara's been meaning to do this for a couple months now, round up her collective of friends/various adopted kids/Districtmates and have breakfast. After waking up far earlier than she has in weeks and shooing a couple Avoxes out of the kitchen, she sets to work, getting the prep stuff out of the way and organizing all the various ingredients on the counter so she can knock out each dish as she goes.

Depending on when they wake up, residents of 10 will most likely smell something cooking, whether it be hashbrowns, scrambled eggs, a variety of breakfast meats, or other breakfast staples. The sight that will meet anyone who comes into the kitchen is one of organized chaos (that will most likely devolve into something much more unorganized as more people join in the food-fray).

Comments

[futilecycle]

"Clara, then," Sigma answers with a false confidence. He had allowed others to call him by his first name if only because his surname and status were used as a slur against him at home, but showing the same familiarity in return is awkward. He grins shyly. "I would not know. Dairy products were almost impossible to come by, when I was from." When, because the where was too difficult to explain. How could he casually mention that they could rarely find a cow on earth, let alone get it to the moon? It would be a cumbersome topic. "If one were to have genuine ice-cream, even freeze dried... well, it would have been a once-in-a-lifetime experience. That goes for most desserts, actually..."

He clears his throat. He has an awkward tendency to ramble as though the other person were as invested in the subject as he was. "...At any rate, you are correct. It is not the same at all. I do not believe I need to say more." He thought for a moment that Clara had understood him, that she had removed the burden of speaking things he was no longer allowed to say, and the idea relieved him, even if it was not quite the truth. He gestures to one of the filled plates eagerly. "...May I?"

[seestheman]

It's amazing the things a person can adjust to. Months ago, Clara would have tried asking more about why someone would say 'when' instead of 'where' when talking about their home. These days it seems almost normal and she just gives him a small nod. Though it definitely makes her think of something. "The next time I make a dessert, I'll have to let you try it before Dave or any of the others get to it," she says with a small smile.

As many issues as she may have with him on principle because of his stance on the Capitol, it's nice to have a conversation where she doesn't have a strand of fear that she'll be arrested for accidentally saying the wrong thing. She gives him a small nod and switches off one of the burners. "Sure," she says as she goes to refill her cup of coffee before calling over her shoulder, "Do you drink coffee?"

[futilecycle]

"Oh, Clara," Sigma is obviously flattered, and his entire demeanor shifts towards something cheerful. "You don't have to do that." He doesn't bother putting up much of a fight.

"I do, thank you. Black." Coffee had been his lifeblood during the decades he'd spent studying, pulling long hours reading and writing papers. After the birth of his son, when he'd try and sneak in sleep between bottle feedings, he'd had to cut caffeine completely - many nights of agonizing withdrawl headaches followed. After that he'd been less inclined to drink his weight in coffee, but he still indulged from time to time.

A thought occurs to him, and Sigma leaves behind his plate to follow Clara to the coffeemaker. "Actually, do we have any sugar? It's been awhile since I've-" For the first time, Sigma turns to look Clara in the eye, or at least speak directly to her face. It's then he realizes something is wrong, and he is shocked to have not noticed before - her eyesocket had been filled with a cybernetic replacement. Rudely, Sigma spends several seconds frozen in horror. Then his eyes lower to the floor, embarrassed. "...Oh. Pardon me. I just noticed-... I am so out of touch with-..."

[seestheman]

Truth be told, his flattery takes her aback a little bit. "It isn't a big deal," she says as she putters around the kitchen, fetching a mug for him from one of the cabinets. "Really, I enjoy cooking. It helps me get my mind off of things." Like the burdens of Mentorship for one. Or how her marriage is falling apart and there's absolutely nothing she can do to fix it.

Clara's stomach clenches at his horrified stare. She knows exactly what he's staring at, she isn't blind (or even half-blind anymore). She practically shoves the hot mug of coffee into his hands before trying to find something to busy herself with. She's tried not to be self-conscious about the changes she's been through since her time as a Victor, but she can't help it. Especially when she's getting a look like the one Sigma's giving her.

"It happened the night all of you were sent into the space arena," she says softly, trying not to remember Alex tasing her to drag her off to her unexpected appointment, or waking up in Justine's office in a panic. "They didn't make as big of a deal as they might have otherwise and...well..." It's no secret she still wears eyepatches sometimes when she goes out, mostly out of fear that the Capitol's installed a camera in her eye to spy on the Tributes. Which is paranoid and she knows it, but she can't help but worry.

[futilecycle]

Sigma seizes his new cup of coffee and stares into it quietly, drumming his fingers nervously around the rim, his delicious breakfast almost forgotten. "...I see. I am very sorry, Clara..." He hadn't meant to insult her- he liked Clara- and is quite ashamed of his behavior. Unfortunately, Sigma does not know when to leave well enough alone: he clears his throat and tries to salvage the situation.

"...At one point I, too, received cybernetics against my will. Even if my 'quality of life' improved, well..." He hesitates, wondering how to articulate his feelings so they might sound sincere. Personal conversations were not his strong suit. "Having some agency in the choice would have been important to me. It took me a very long time to think of my 'enhancements' as a part of my own body. It is not a comfortable feeling." His eyes occasionally dart up to see how Clara is taking his thoughts, but he loses the nerve before he can process her expression and goes back to watching his coffee swirl about the mug. He swallows. "It is not exactly a good time, but if you ever wanted someone to talk to..." As if she would ever take him up on the offer, pro-Capitolian that he was.

[seestheman]

Clara wishes she could say that she's made her peace with it. That she's basically gotten past Alex's betrayal, that she now understands that it's a good thing (or at least that her smiling and nodding and playing along is a good thing). But the truth is that she hasn't, as much as she wants to play up otherwise. "You have nothing to be sorry for," she says, since it's the one true thing she can force herself to say right now. He, to the best of her knowledge, had no hand in it. Justine, Alex, whichever Gamemaker or politician came up with the idea, they had hands in it, but not him.

It's not that she dislikes Sigma as a person. Really, the only person in their District who she could, without a doubt, say that about was Tom. But she can't help but disagree with him being on the Capitol's side. And while she's free to talk to Albert about these things...well, it couldn't hurt to have someone who she shared a space to talk to. "I'll definitely keep that in mind," she responds. It's not a lie, she will, but at the same time it's by no means an agreement that she'll turn to him first and foremost.

While, overall, the egg of the day is scrambled (mostly because it's easier to make for mass amounts of people), she can't resist offering him a choice. And if anyone were to accuse her of doing it just to change the subject, she'd protest otherwise, even though it's true. "So, how do you take your eggs? Scrambled? Poached? Sunnyside up?"

[futilecycle]

Whether or not it is what she meant to impart, Sigma does get the impression that Clara has no intention of seeking him out. It saddens him, like most of his interactions with other people - he collects disdain until a thick coat of depression has settled over his life. But this wasn't about him - this was about Clara and her feelings, and Sigma had to respect her decision. He nods in approval.

At the very least, she was still offering him his choice of fresh egg, and that manages to cheers him up. "Sunny side, please and thank you," he answers. It sounds juvenile coming out of his old lips, but his mother had never called it a 'fried egg' or 'eggs up,' either. He waits eagerly, watching her cook with all the anticipation of a hungry young boy.

[seestheman]

That definitely isn't the impression she meant to give him, but it's still true. Not when she talks to Albert about these things on a regular basis, and she doesn't have to keep her disdain towards the Capitol on the downlow with him. And she's certain she would have to do so with Sigma. But that doesn't mean she needs to be hostile towards him. Really, she's well aware that wouldn't benefit either of them.

Clara makes her way over to the fridge, grabbing out two eggs and some butter before grabbing a clean pan to cook them in. She doesn't find anything juvenile in the way he responds, though she does find the way he watches her slightly unsettling. Not only because he's decades older than her and watching her so closely, but also because she can't help but notice the similarity with how closely David watched her make breakfast back home. "So, as your mentor, I should probably find out if you have a basic plan for the next Arena," she says in an attempt to make small talk as she cracks the eggs into the buttered pan and tosses the egg shells towards the sink so she can clear them away later.

[futilecycle]

Sigma nods, only half-listening as he watches the almost hypnotic movements of her hands, until the question sinks in. He has to force himself to look away from the pan before he can start to articulate his answer. "A-Ah," he stutters, surprised to have even been asked. He had become rather used to butting heads with his mentors, and in all of the time he had been in the Tribute Tower, very few of them seemed to care what his strategy was. Clara, he decided, was an especially good person for making the effort.

Still, Sigma knew how Clara 'won' her Arena, and as a victor of a different kind of Games, himself, he wasn't certain what sort of advice she would have for him. He saves them both the trouble: "To be honest with you, I just want to survive," he admits. "I... am planning on petitioning out after this one is over, you see. I am getting too old for a young man's game," he chuckles quietly.

[seestheman]

Clara figures that she can make the effort, at the very least, even though she knows full well that she's not the most well equipped for the job. She can't really help anyone train for combat, and she still has miles to go until she feels like she's qualified to teach anyone about survival skills. And the idea of her teaching Sigma first aid is laughable. But she can try to find out what he needs and how she can help him get those things, whether provided by her or by the sponsors who she's started sucking up to on behalf of her tributes.

She can't judge him for petitioning out. It would make her a hypocrite for one, considering her own husband petitioned out, and he has a point. And he has a point about it being for the young (though, in her opinion, no one is the right age to fight for their lives in the Arenas). "Well then, what do you think you need to help you get as far as possible? I may not be able to train you, but I can make sure the right sponsors know what you need. Who knows, maybe with the right things, you won't have to petition out and we could have another Victor."