Status: snippet

The fourth ring cut short as the answering machine picked up, and Lu absently picked at her thumbnail as a long-winded sympathetic voice explained something about abiding privacy laws and the value of finding ones-self, until finally, the beep.

"Hello, my name is Louise and I'm calling on behalf of a —" the words friend and acquaintance and mortal enemy fought each other on the tip of her tongue for a flash of a moment. Her eyebrow twitched with a I don't have time for this bullshit, and she continued with a little bit of spite for her own emotions, "— a colleague, who's having difficulties finding a therapist on her own."

She explained Tavi's predicament in as few words as possible, gave her own own phone number, and begged the sympathetic voice to please call back. She hung up with a sigh, and did the same thing five more times, working her way down the list.

Tavi became "my cousin", "my comrade", and eventually settled into the vague role of "a fellow human" as Lu tried to ignore her internal debate.

She hoped to god Tavi would actually give this whole therapy thing a fair chance.

They'd been back and forth on the topic plenty of times, Lu carefully bringing it up and trying not to push, Tavi disregarding, then jokingly about it, and eventually hesitantly agreeing while trying to maintain that infuriating front of indifference. It takes a lot of guts to admit that you want a therapist, and Lu herself knew how harrowing the process of just finding one can be. Given the smallest hint of consent, she was more than happy to help.