Two Rivers Isle i'm tired of screwing up, tired of going down

Though his brow still fixed with a pensive furrow, Tuathal turned when Ceara reached to clean behind his ear - welcome to her help, and hoping to make the job easier for her. He watched the ground, but he considered his sister. Despite the tough exterior, Tuathal knew she had a heart not unlike his own. Easy to stab, when the guards were lowered. Easy to hurt. And o o o h boy, you N O T want to hurt her when he was around - and good thing she hadn't given this 'not-even-girlfriend' a name...

No. Tuathal closed his eyes and drew a deep breath, and exhaled, to settle into his practised pattern of internal cooling while she spoke. No, no. Ceara didn't need him flying off the handles right now. That would probably only make things worse. Not that he was ever going to be much of a help anyway. Tuathal had about a worm's breadth experience regarding friends and sort-of-friends and not-even-girlfriends - if even that. Actually, worms probably would've been more helpful, but he was here, and worms were not, and honestly, he didn't want worms helping his sister anyway. That was his job - so he would just need to listen, stay calm, and do his best.

So he paused. Considered. Turned his head to look as if he stirred deep in a vat of a vast many thoughts... when actually, his thought-helpers were simply screaming murder at the lack of pencils they could use to scrawl their sage advice across his mind. The canvas stayed blank, and so did his tongue. Okay, fine. Guess he'd be flying solo in this one - a g a i n - thanks brain.

"See, that's why I don't do friends," was basically his best. But - Ceara was his friend, and he caught himself and stuttered as he doubled back to try and correct himself before he made her think she was not, "Well, I mean you're my friend - my best - or, well, whatever - but - you're my sister, so you don't count." Oh geez, that didn't sound like it would help either. "Well, anyway - I mean, you do friends well. Like, really well. I don't really know what a coma is - " but if a just-friend and not a healer was allowed to visit the invalid on his sick-bed, the guy was past the point of contagion anyway, and didn't need a gatekeeper, right? - "but sick friends visit sick friends, right? Just because someone gets angry at you for doing something, doesn't mean that that something you did was wrong - " Right? His thought-helpers still couldn't find their pencils, so finally he just shrugged a conclusion to cover up the fact he just really hoped he was actually, you know. Helping.