Sara

"Oh?" She said with a scoff-laugh-choke hybrid that was most definitely unattractive but very much resonant with her continued despair at the man next to her, and the situation. "Care to enlighten me? It's been weeks and I don't understand." She shook her head and winced as she rolled her foot, glaring at the passers by and the aforementioned Princeps. Fucking Saturnalia. "Not that it matters anyway." She muttered with a shake of her head and a groan of frustration, "My Father let me off with Gaius because you were also a factor, you made it an easy choice to say no. I'm not so sure I'll have the same opportunity with the next man." TAG: @Chevi

That was the million sestercii question wasn't it? Why not? "I don't know." Was the only answer she could give, because honestly, resolutely, to her core she didn't know. He was perfect on paper. He promised her everything she thought she wanted, and it hadn't been enough. It was confounding and painful and she didn't know why it was not what she wanted anymore. "I don't know...I don't know..." She groaned audibly and gently hit her head against the wall behind her as if it would knock some sense into herself. "The last time we met he said he would give me all I wanted...a family, children, a good life...but I had this feeling in the pit of my stomach that I couldn't get rid of that it wasn't enough." She fluttered her eyes shut as people jostled past them. "I don't know what's wrong with me." But whatever it was, she wanted it to stop. Somebody stepped on her foot as they followed the music and she protested with an "Ow!" - at least that broke the tension. A little. TAG: @Chevi

Ovinia saw him, from the corner of her eye. He looked...crestfallen. The wince also didn't go unnoticed. Good. He had messed this up, messed it all up. Both physically - the engagement, and mentally - the swirling, tightening knot of something snaking up between her chest and her stomach. "You don't understand." She said with the shadow of a smile, "You said it wasn't your fault that people like me don't get to do what they want, remember?" She glanced sideways at him now, an inscrutable expression on her face, "It's still true. I don't get to do what I want. I get to say no, or yes, but that's it. I might deserve a husband that..." She let out a little laugh, "Treasures me. Doesn't mean that's what I'll get." Her eyes scanned across his face. He looked wrung out. She felt a frisson of guilt in her chest. With a sigh, she shook her head. "It's not all your fault. Mostly it is. You need to know that, but not all. I was never..." She sighed, "I was never convinced your brother was the right man for me." TAG: @Chevi

A nervous, hostile bubble of laughter left her lips and she shook her head, bemused. "There's nothing to fix. It's done." And it wasn't all your fault, she added in her head. Mostly it was - her father had been incandescent, but his decision to leave and Gaius' to let him were not insurmountable problems had Ovinia been willing to overlook them. Which she wasn't, but her reasons for doing so were as elusive to her as they were to Lucius himself. She wanted him to suffer a little though, awful as it was. "I have a meeting next week with another suitor." She shrugged and let her eyes drift over the crowds, pointedly not looking at the gawping man next to her. "Lucius Sempronius Atratinus. Family the wrong side in the civil war but unmarried and rich." She shrugged, "And not soft-hearted, from what I hear. Gaius is a good man. Too good. He should never have let you ruin your reputation, and his own. I don't need a husband like that." She needed somebody less...well...less good. She wasn't good, she had strung the older Roscius brother along as she prevaricated for no apparent reason. It just hadn't felt...right. Which was an appalling reason to turn down a good man, she knew. "And if Sempronius Atratinus doesn't work out, I think Father has other meetings set up for the end of the month." She shrugged limply again. "Was it still worth it?" TAG: @Chevi

She pulled the loaned cloak tighter about herself as he withdrew his arm, as if it would replicate the warmth. She didn't pay his apology any mind and merely shrugged her shoulders. That would teach him. She would have been hesitant if a patrician had been so familiar, but he was no longer even that. He was a stranger to her, more importantly. Albeit a stranger that churned something deep within the pit of her stomach. She made a non-committal sound that meant 'fine' as he said it would be a while and she slunk back further into the wall - cloak scratching against the stone. She wanted to disappear. Or at least start this day all over again. What she didn't want to do was talk to him, and as he made his little joke, her head whipped round to his, eyes wide and blinking. Was he...making a joke? Her lips parted in surprise before she slammed her mouth shut and pressed her lips into a thin line. "Is it funny to you?" She arched a brow, tilting her head to the side. "Do you really want to make such a joke?" He was utterly unbelievable. And clearly ill-informed. She scoffed and shook her head, letting her head fall back to centre and the stone behind her. Her eyes lazily took in the procession that swarmed past them. "You should speak to your brother...ex-brother, more frequently. My family said no to his suit." I said no. "Any arrangement that might have been made is off the table." She didn't want to talk about it, it was painful and twisted her insides but she could hardly escape now. TAG: @Chevi

She rolled her eyes at him, about to make a quip about being so poor now all he could afford were walnuts, but she bit her tongue. He was helping her, he didn't deserve her complete vitriol. She took it as a sign she was feeling better though, that she was ready to be cruel to him again. She nodded, ducking and weaving through the crowds vaguely in the direction of Melissa's place, or at least where she remembered it to be. It had been late at night and she had been tired and stressed and not thinking clearly. Much like tonight. She paused in the streets as she glanced around, trying to remember the route Alexius had taken her when the rush started. She felt somebody knock into her shoulder and she let out a muted "Ow," but the person had already moved on...as did the rest of the street as they started to run and skip and laugh past them. She felt herself get knocked into again before a hand came around her shoulders, pulling her back against the wall. The arm stayed there and she blinked up at Lucius. She swallowed, her mouth running dry. People hurried past them and she pressed her back against the wall to move out of the way of the crowds. It took her a moment to regain her senses and she glanced down at his arm and then up at his face before she snapped her wits together, trying to shrug him off. "Don't touch me." But there wasn't exactly much room to move away from him. "You don't get to touch me." Men have needs, Alexius' words rang in her ears. Now she had been...illuminated of the ways and means of men it had only served to confuse her more. And make her more wary. "They'll pass soon." She muttered, confident despite no knowledge of the route or the procession or the festival. "Then we can go and you can go and win your fuc-...walnuts." TAG: @Chevi

"Do they?" She chuckled with a bemused glance at him as they finally made their way up the stairs, her legs burning, until they got to a few vacant seats. She nimbly folded herself into one, his words still ringing in her ears. "I don't know what needs the women of your class have, but I suspect they're not the same as women of mine." I don't have needs, she wanted to add but thought it implicit. It was as if he was talking in riddles. It was confounding and annoying and she narrowed her eyes down at the sands to distract herself. He chimed in again though and Ovinia snapped her face sideways to him, blinking. She blurted out, before she could form a coherent, less...overt sentence; "But it's not about pleasure, bedding, is it? It's for children?" She watched his face carefully as the puzzle pieces in her head clunked into place. "Oh." A blush heated her cheeks and she snapped her face back to centre again, eyes narrowed on...nothing, given the fights hadn't started yet. She felt stupid. And small. And like a child. She was a well-read, well-educated young woman with boundless confidence...besides one area, and now that the box had been opened, she felt idiotic for that knowledge gap. "It's...pleasurable for men. That's why they go to prostitutes." She summarised, now she realised what Alexius had meant, something that should have been obvious. But her mother and sister-in-laws harried words about the act had only been around how it was necessary for children and her duty. Never more than that. It was why none of the graffiti she glimpsed from her litter ever made sense, nor did the existence of women like Vibia. She wanted the world to swallow her up. TAG: @Atrice

Ovinia let out a small huff. She knew it sounded awful the second she'd said it but his judgement sat as well on his shoulders as it always did - not well at all. She folded her unburnt, un-honeyed hand around her waist but held the other in front of her as they weaved their way through the crowds that began to form. She blinked, already feeling overwhelmed and this didn't help. She'd never spent a Saturnalia outside of her domus, or a family friends. She knew this was how the plebs celebrated, she'd seen the aftermath in the mornings after, but she'd never seen it in person. She felt herself shrink, despite her height, and dropped her eyes down. At least she didn't look woefully out of place in the plain tunica and cloak. She stayed silent until she was jostled by a particularly rowdy group of middle aged women, so deep into their cups Ovinia was convinced they'd never climb their way out. She let out an an irritated noise and then lengthened her stride to catch-up to Lucius. "After you leave me, are you going to celebrate with your people?" She indicated with her honeyed hand to the masses around them. "I don't want to keep you waiting." She glanced around them again at the groups and the singing nd the laughter. She felt her chest tighten, vaguely, in panic but swallowed it down. She could handle herself, she was fine. "I remember where we are. It's a few streets over." TAG: @Chevi

Ovinia listened. Really listened, eyes straight forward, cheeks burning until she couldn’t take it and she was glad of the cold of the coridoor and it’s darkness as Alexius led them up to their seats. She supposed it made it better…a little better at least, his explanation. That the women like the blonde at the party were just proxies for women of her own class who were virtuous and pure and thus unreachable. But it also made no sense. She knew men and women were different in so many ways, but surely not that different? As she blinked into the sunlight, letting his words stew in her mind she bit at her lip, trying to find the right words which wouldn’t make her sound either moronic or…well…impure. ”You still haven’t explained why men go, when we women don’t need to.” She gave him a curious look. “We wait until our weddings and yes, I know, it’s partly so we don’t fall with child before but…” She swallowed, “I don’t understand the appeal.” Because she knew nothing of sex beyond the basics and it was how children were formed, “Men make no sense to me. Surely it’s not worth the price that the…women charge. Besides, I thought love and attraction were all about liking somebody…but how do you like somebody you’re paying?” TAG: @Atrice

“Don’t you have work to do?” She scoffed, but that wasn’t a no. With a grumble, she knew he was right. The slaves had been good natured thus far but she knew she had tested their patience beyond all measure. Asking them to trek and get some other food might tip them over the edge and she knew her father drove them hard throughout the year. This was their one reward. With another groan and a cough, she extended her hand for him to help her up. “Which way to the poor streets?” Was the most Ovinia-way of asking where the insulae were. “I’ll know my way from there.” TAG: @Chevi

“But you knew her.” It wasn’t a question but her tone was plenty accusatory. She cracked an eye at his audible surprise. She wasn’t much in the mood to explain how she had ended up at Melissa’s thermopolia but he could have a sanitised version: “It was insurance. I didn’t know who he was, I wanted somebody to proclaim what was happening so I didn’t end up murdered or worse in the streets. The food was an aside, but he said it was good.” She shrugged. She trusted Alexius, especially after their last meeting. He had been more honest with her than…well…anybody. ”Probably? I…I shouldn’t go though, I should send a slave.” She sniffed, “Father wouldn’t be happy with me out like this.” TAG: @Chevi

“You were baiting me.” She muttered in protest, “I don’t…I don’t know why you always do, whenever you see me.” She flicked her eyes up to his as he finished and caught the tail end of him licking the honey from his fingers. She swallowed and felt the feeling in her chest intensify. “If it’s not singing it’s soaking me with water and then a prostitute and then…” She shrugged and then gave him a sad smile. “But it doesn’t matter now, right?” Shaking her head she groaned and leant her head back against the wall, her crown getting tangled in the low hanging leaves from the orange tree. “I don’t know…Alexius showed me, my bodyguard, when I met him…I met the owner…Melita…Mel…Melissa, I think. It’s by all the poor blocks.” TAG: @Chevi

It might not be for him, but a woman’s work was never done - not even on Saturnalia. And for a woman who follows duty to the letter, it included tonight. She watched him as he started to fish out some honey for her hand. As he began to lather it on, she made a pained noise and crumpled her face up. Ow. Ow, ow, ow. Distraction, that’s what she needed. Unfortunately she also wanted a distraction from him. That would have to wait. “I thought you l-left to lead them all. Fail already?” She was spiteful when she was in pain. And she was. “And chicken. With vegetables. It was a simple recipe.” She sniffed and gasped again as his fingers worked over a particularly tender bit. “You’re enjoying it then? This?” She meant his new life, of course. TAG: @Chevi

She accepted the cloak with a muted, half-smile. They had been here before. This one was less scratchy than the last he’d procured for her, at least. ”You thought it though.” It was plain on his face, at least in her estimation. She swallowed as he touched her hand and winced as his fingers skirted the sore parts.”It’s what’s done. It wasn’t some great rebellion, like joining the vigiles.” She gave him a pointed look, despite her exhaustion, “It’s the festival. I was just doing my duty. Poorly, clearly.” Nodding, she started slipping them off and winced deeply. “Are you in charge of them all then…? In there?” TAG: @Chevi

Ovinia only managed a mild ‘hmmph’ at his answer. She didn’t know why she was making it so difficult for him either, beyond that it was vaguely assuaging the pit that sank in her stomach whenever she looked in his direction. ”I’m punishing nobody.” She protested weakly, and finally dropped the un-burnt hand that was shielding her face. She looked exhausted. The smoke and ash on her face wasn’t helping. But her hand was stinging, especially as the wind whipped around them. Reluctantly, gently, she pulled it from her lap and held it aloft for him to inspect. She’d dressed a slave but hadn’t forgone the heavy gold bangles that jangled on her wrists and the rings that burned against the skin of her fingers. She coughed again and flicked her eyes to his. “I’m a bitch, I know, I know…” TAG: @Chevi

"Thirty. Give or take." She mumbled. Herself, her parents, her three brothers, Gaius' wife, their little one and a whole household of slaves. It hadn't occurred to her before that moment that potentially, this late on Saturnalia night, there'd be nowhere that could accommodate that. She blinked. She blinked again as his hand found her forearm but she allowed herself to be steered away from her house and to the crates where she deposited herself, winding her arms around herself. At least she hadn't kicked him this time, or batted his arm away. "Why do you care." she groaned, but didn't frame it as a question. She unwound her arms and dropped her head into her hands, hissing as her face found the burn. She recoiled that hand but kept one in front of her face. "Please just leave me alone for once." TAG: @Chevi

Of course. If it was not Gaius, then her other tormentor would make an appearance. She felt like her energy was being tapped though, like when one drew out the sap of a tree. She cracked open one eye and then when he drew to a stop in front of her, forced open the other. She sniffed. When did it get so cold? "No. I'm fine. I needed to clear my head." So she thought standing outside her domus, dressed in a tunica on a December night was a sensible thing to do. Had she learnt nothing from the night she had met Alexius? She blinked and shook her head. "I just...can't, right now." She shook her head again, "With them," Her family, "With you." She sniffed and shook her head, the cold of the stone now eating into her flesh rather than relaxing her. She couldn't quite pry herself away yet though. "I need to go and get dinner." She coughed. "There's somewhere only a short walk away. I'm fine." TAG: @Chevi

Ovinia was overwhelmed. The fire. The feelings. The smoke. Her family. She felt like her head was full of honey and she couldn't get it out. She pressed her back against the stone wall of the outside of her domus, feeling as the coldness seeped into her skin and her bones as she was drawing breath after breath, trying to calm down. She needed to get away from her brother and his smirk, and she needed to get away from the smell of smoke and Lucius Vip-fucking-sanius Roscius and she needed to get dinner for everybody. That was what a good host did, didn't they? Make sure everybody as alright and well fed and watered, then she'd worry about herself. If she could just peel herself from the wall... She heard the door bang open again. It was usually bolted and locked shut, but she'd pilfered the key from one of the slaves. She didn't look, supposing it was one of the slaves to fetch her back in. Maybe Gaius wanted another go, or her Father this time if he'd sobered up enough to realise the gravity of what she'd done. She took another breath, trying to steady herself more. It didn't work. She just needed to remember the way to the thermopolium Alexius had taken her to...where was it? She shut her eyes as she leant against the wall, trying to remember the way. TAG: @Chevi

Titus had been watching the back and forth in the garden with an amused, if not slightly wary look on his face. He clocked that this was the same spoiled woman who had accosted Lucius that first day on the job, and watched with growing unease as they sparred back and forward - culminating in a plucked flower and a kick to a shin. He winced. Rich people - even if one of them wasn't rich anymore - were an enigma to him. As Lucius stormed back towards the kicthen, he caught up with him, lengthening his stride to match his pace. "What was all that about?" He jerked his head to the figure behind them, now dunking her hands in the fountain. "Trouble in paradise?" He pulled up his cloth over his face as he stepped back into the smouldering ruins that once housed the domus' kitchen. From somewhere far off, he heard the slave door to the street slam shut on its hinges. TAG: @Chevi

"No," She protested with a shake of her head, "This isn't...there's nothing....this isn't about anything!" She glared at him, flustered. Her cheeks were as red as her smoke-stung eyes and she swallowed down a gulp of air. It made her cough again. She was going to quip something about being cowardly, but he was already turning on his heel as he instructed her to dunk her hands in cold water. She blinked down at them. One was barely singed, the other was raw and painful from where she'd been clutching the cloth that had caught alight. It stung. She grit her jaw and dunked it into the fountain, sniffing as it collided with the cold water. She blinked back tears at the sensation and frustration as he skulked off, for his place in the garden to be replaced by another male voice, droning in her ears. "You can't serve roasted hands for Saturnalia, Little Nia." Her eldest, most irritating brother chimed in with a drunken snort. He made to lean against the pillar but stumbled on drunken legs and ended up sat on his arse in the dust, chuckling to himself. "Father will take a new kitchen out of your dowry you know," He snorted again, making himself laugh. "Shut up." she mumbled, "Don't see why you care...not like it's going to be used anytime soon is it?" Ovinia bit her tongue to keep from snapping. "F-fetch a medicus for the hand," Gaius suggested unhelpfully as he stumbled to his feet. "Thanks for your concern." She sniffed and he merely shrugged, giving her an oafish, drunken smile. "And then fetch some dinner, won't you? We're starving." Shut up shut shut shut up.

"I don't need to breathe!" She protested, but then annoyingly had to draw in a breath regardless. She wasn't a child - despite the kick saying otherwise, she didn't need to be spoken to like one. She shot him a glare and wound her arms across her chest in a protective stance. "I want you to leave." She said on a sharp exhale, eyes roving between him and the detritus from the kitchen now being carried out by the vigiles, by his colleagues. "My family don't know who you are." She jerked her head in their direction, "My father is not best pleased with you - or isn't best pleased with Lucius Vipsanius Roscius, not that he knows what he looks like, so I suggest you get out of here before I tell him who you are." There. Once he was out of sight, she could push him firmly out of mind. It hadn't worked for the preceding few months, but nothing to say it wouldn't work now... TAG: @Chevi

"Do I look like I'm enjoying this?" She spluttered an incredulous choke but then clamped her mouth shut, lips pressed into a thin line as he reached up to take a flower from the garland in her hair. She immediately batted his hand away, but he'd already plucked it out. "Don't touch me..." She muttered under her breath. She felt her face crumple. She had just wanted one thing to go right. She'd said no to Gaius, which - whilst it felt right not to bring him into her mess (a mess she couldn't articulate or unpick), it still felt like a loss. Her father, likewise, hadn't given her a smile in days. Her mothers health was also getting worse and she had needed to step up even further. It should have been simple. It was one meal. And yet, of course, like everything at the moment she had ruined it. She choked and before she could stop herself, she kicked out her sandalled foot into his shin. It was stupid, and petty and childish - everything she strove not to be anymore, she was supposed to be a refined young woman who was on the verge of marriage, not somebody who succumbed to easy childish teasing. "Leave me alone." She glared and then pushed herself up from the bench, wincing at the barn on her hand as she did so. "Just go away." She hissed, "Go away! Why are you here? Why are you always here?" She felt that familiar swirling, tugging sensation in her chest and she let out a sharp, frustrated exhale. TAG: @Chevi

You, Jason and I have that in common! I think I can sometimes be as focused as Horatia...and I also love to read!

Ovinia did glare this time, hard enough she wouldn't have been surprised had his face started to splinter and crack from the pressure of her gaze. It seemed obvious now. But it hadn't been then, when she had been trying to sort out the breads and dips and the meats and cheeses and the fire was dying. That was why they spent so much money on decent slaves, and she realised quite quickly as smoke started to fill the room, that she wasn't worth half as much. She rolled her eyes. "I am calm. They," She jerked her head to the sound of the laughter from the dinner table she should be lounged at through in the triclinium, "Are calm. Job done, well done." As he demanded to see her hands, she frowned and shook her head. "No." It was petty and petulant but she was in absolutely no mood to see him, not one iota and now he was here in her home making demands. "You work for me, remember? I don't take demands from you." She gave him a self-satisfied little smile. "Go and tell my father everything is fine with the kitchens and you'll tidy it up and then leave. Off you go," She gestured again to the sounds of her family, "Run and be a good little vigile." TAG: @Chevi

Ovinia let out a breath as he confirmed she hadn't single-handedly managed to burn down their domus. The rest of her family - judging by their relaxed attitude to the disaster - had been heavily imbibing the wine as she was slaving away in the kitchens. Still, she should tell her father. When she could summon the strength to. "The stupid kitchen girl told me to use oil." She bristled at him, shifting up the bench as he moved to sit down next to her. "How was I supposed to know where to put it?" Logic should have prevailed, but it hadn't, and now the whole domus stank of smoke and they'd have to send out for food from a neighbour or a thermopolium. At least Alexius had shown her where to get decent food. "No, I'm fine." She lied, petulantly shooting him a glare. "Why do you care? Is this part of the vigiles premium service?" TAG: @Chevi