Well, if it was arguing, it was no doubt the best kind of argument Maya ever had in her life. For a moment somewhere among the tears and the chaos she was almost afraid Twyla was not prepared for this; she was so soft, and fragile, and kissing her like this might not make her stop crying.
Well, it did.
When Twyla stepped back, they probably both looked much more messed up than before the kiss. Maya swayed, suddenly missing the contact, and tried to catch her breath the best she could. She felt dizzy. She looked for the tears. They were still there, but with a promise of drying up soon.

>>"That's probably... not good for....a...concussion."

"Yeah, probably not..." Maya agreed with a smile playing on her lips. The look in her eyes was more gentle now, and she reached out to take her hand "... but it's definitely gonna make me stay awake."

She stepped back to the back, pulling Twyla along, and sat down, resting her back against the wall. She hissed as her shoulder touched the cold surface, and moved carefully till she found a position that didn't hurt as much as the rest. She tugged on Twyla's hand to make her sit on the bed too. "C'mere, Bubblegum." she smiled, lifting the small hand to her face and nuzzling it, before she looked at her again "So. Better now?"

Twyla's breathing slowed down almost as quickly as it had sped up, the anger that had flared up was now reduced to an almost pleasant simmer that may or may not have been more from the physical contact than from any frustrations felt by the blond girl. She listened to Maya agree with her and saw the smile on her face--smirking slightly when 'staying awake' was mentioned. Despite any reasons to smirk because of that statement she was probably right if the other girl's body was humming nearly as much as Twyla's was.

Being close to the Morris kid tended to wire the youngest Ashby girl up in a big way.

Maya sat back on the bed and pulled at the blonde's hand, pulling her down towards the mattress. The hiss was noted and brown eyes dried so they could be filled with momentary worry. Twyla smiled when she was tugged onto the bed with a "C'mere, Bubblegum.", the worry being momentarily pushed aside to make room for enjoying the nickname and the way that it felt for her hand to be touching her girlfriend's face.

After some adjusting the question asked was answered. "Yeah..." A small laugh as she wiggled her hand out of the other girl's to smooth a lock off dark hair off of Maya's forehead. "I just cry when I'm angry, so don't worry about it if you were concerned." An eye roll and a goofy-awkward smile. "I was just really...I don't even know....That used to totally freak Nate out when we argued--he always thought he'd made me cry and then he'd go nuts and apologize." Another small laugh and Twyla's hand came down to find Maya's again. "Your reaction is a bit more--" She looked her straight in the face with a playful twist to her lips. "creative." The fact that it would be epically wrong for Nate to do something like that was left unsaid as it was glaringly obvious...

and Twyla didn't want to ruin whatever kind of playful that comment was by covering all the creeper bases in a much too long response--Maya would get it, she was a smart girl.

"So how bad was your shoulder before that guy popped it back in or whatever?" The back burner hiss had come to front and center as you could only block those thoughts from Twyla Ashby for so long, she was consistent like that.

>>"I just cry when I'm angry, so don't worry about it if you were concerned."

"Yeah I was." Maya smiled, listening to her. The wall was cold behind her head, and it felt good right now. "I don't think I've ever seen a girl cry like that. I can imagine it freaks a guy out." she added with the shadow of a grin "I'll try not to apologize, then. Won't be easy though."

>>"Your reaction is a bit more...creative."

"I'll keep that in mind too." she nodded with mischief, lifting her free hand to run her thumb along her cheeks. They were still damp "Might come in handy next time you cry."
She was not blushing now. Not much, anyway. But her eyes were a little bit red, and her lips were swollen, and it all made a pretty darn lovely sight.

>>"So how bad was your shoulder before that guy popped it back in or whatever?"

"Oh. that." Maya glanced down on her shoulder and the bandages "Almost forgot." she smirked, and produced a shrug, or 50%of one anyway. She tugged on Twyla's hand again, pulling her closer so she could put her uninjured arm around her "'tis nothin' you can't kiss better." she added with another of those half-grins.

She was silent for a while; thought about returning to the previous conversation, and voted against it; thought about all kinds of other activites, and, with a heavy heart, voted against them too. A few moments later she realized she was slowly but steadily falling asleep.

"C'mon Twyla talk to me." she nudged her gently "Ya're supposed to be keepin' me awake..."

Twyla just sat and smiled, deciding it would be best not to mention how much she hated to cry or how unlikely it was that Maya would see her cry like that again--she'd keep it in better next time...or implode trying. The nice thing about the crazy-cry-inducing-anger was that it flared up and put itself out quickly so the girl was a little jittery but her mood was much more normal now, she acutally felt a bit better after her small teary fit.

A small, slightly nervous, giggle at the comment about the 'kissing better'. The blond let herself be pulled closer and rested her head on the other girl's uninjured shoulder. If it was really serious the guy, Garrett?, from the infirmary would have gotten Doc or something...of course...probably...no worries. A content sigh escaped her lips, this was nice even if she wished it could have been more normal circumstance.

Soooo tired...

Things got quiet and Twyla got comfortable, it was about crashing time and her body didn't seem to get the memo that it had to stay awake. Her breathing had slowed and she rested more of her weight against Maya, burrowing into the embrace. Twyla's brown eyes had just slipped closed when she could feel vibrations in the chest behind her and could hear words that even in her sleepy state she could understand.

"Oh, right...Sorry." A yawn and the girl sat up a bit straighter, extending her legs out in front of her in the process. Cheeks pinked as she finally noticed just how short her pajama shorts were. Slightly pale legs were in contrast to the greens of the comforter and Twyla found herself staring at the scar on her left knee that extended halfway down her calf. Pulling the leg in, she found a random topic to talk to Maya about.

"See this?" Her pinky trailed down the long and thin scar that was slightly faded with age before her hand captured one of Maya's so she could feel the raised edges even if she couldn't see the discoloration. "I got it when I was five years old--I tripped and cut myself on the bad end of the saw my dad had been using..." Absentmindedly she rubbed her knee, remembering the day like it was from a movie she watched a long time ago or something. "My mom totally freaked when she saw my dad carrying me to the truck. The funny thing is I don't remember crying, I can just picture her with wet splotches all over her face..."

After a moment. "That's a random story, but I just thought of it..." She still needed to wake up a bit before she could form more interesting thoughts.

Twyla found a topic to talk about incredibly fast. Maya looked at her legs, and she found herslef unable to look anywhere else. It was some short pants, and then smooth skin, all the way. Maya was really glad and really pissed at the same time that she was not Gawain right now.

The fingers of her uninjured hand traced the scar lightly, from Twyla's knee to where it ended, and then back again. It was an old scar; she could barely make it out in the light, and only barely feel it with her fingers. Twyla's skin was warm and smooth. Maya swallowed, her mouth was suddenly too dry to talk without that.

>>"That's a random story, but I just thought of it..."

"I was always full of bruises" she admitted with a light smile "Mom and I had to figure out the way to explain to people why Gawain and Maya always had the same scars. We made up a story about a link that twins share." she chuckled "We made up many other stories too, depending on what we needed them for. Mom was good at that... Sam fell for one too, the first time he saw me as Maya."
Now that was a famous incident.

Maya absent-mindedly ran her fingers along the scar again, and traced her shin to her ankle, and back.

"I always wondered if a tattoo would show on both of my forms. It probably would."

"Oh, so you haven't changed much?" Twyla wiggled herself around so she could look Maya directly in the face, a teasing smile twisted her lips upwards. A tiny but bruised version of Maya she could totally picture--it made sense and explained a few things. The blond wondered what she had been covered with--probably scrapes from falling off her bike or from getting into a tumble with her brother or one of her cousins. She could also distinctly remember being dirty almost all of the time and getting yelled at for ruining countless pairs of the dainty white church socks her mother made her wear on the rare occasion the famoly made it to Sunday School or a service.

Explaining away things like identical bruises would have been difficult, she decided. Twyla looked up at the other girl at the mention of her mother, copying the smile she saw on her face while simultaneously wondering if she'd ever get to meet the missing woman. It was a slightly melancholy thought. What are you thinking? Of course she's going to find her...of course. The optimistic part of her was adamant about this, so was the part that did most of the caring about Twyla's significant other. Of course she'd get to meet the woman who would have had to been crazy strong in order to raise a gender shifting child--how could she doubt it, even for a second? Bad negative thoughts were...bad.

Sam, the self defense teacher, had fallen for a story? What? "You have to tell me about that one." A smile that Maya probably couldn't see since she wasn't looking up anymore. There was a hand on her leg and it required special attention at the moment. Skin erupted in goose flesh along the trail of the other girl's hand and Twyla almost missed the next words in the conversation as she focused on the sensation.

She didn't really know what all went in to a gender shift (as she had never seen it) but she responded to the comment about tattoos anyway. "Maybe it depends on where you go it? Like if the skin stretched funny there or something..." She watched the hand and shivered before reaching down to lace her fingers in her girlfriend's. Pulling the hand closer to her face she unlaced her fingers and flipped it palm up so she could trace circles into the skin there. There was something so interesting with touching at that moment.

"What would you get a tattoo of if you were going to?" Ever since she'd seen Carrick's Twyla had wondered what in her life she'd want documented on her skin like that.

>>"Oh, so you haven't changed much?"

Maya let out a small laugh. "Nah, I really haven't."

>>"You have to tell me about that one."

"Well, the first time I met him I was Gawain... if you remember, that was when I got that shiner from him. Next day, 'cause I'm a good gal, I show up for trainin', and he jus' didn't get it. So I told him I'm Gawain's twin an' we share a link bla bla bla, an' told him my idiot brother was too hung over to come to practice." she grinned at the memory "It took him almost the whole session to figure out I was pullin' his leg."

Maya could feel the goodebumps on the soft skin, and she smiled to herself. She liked the effect she had on her. Moments later she allowed Twyla to pull her hand away, and trace circles in her palm. There was something very intimate in her touch. Maya felt her arm shiver.

>>"What would you get a tattoo of if you were going to?"

"Dunno" she answered "I'd have to choose somethin' that fits both Maya and Gawain. Probably somethin' Medieval... I'd just have to wait a few years, both of my forms are still... um, growing." she smirked, and there was a faint blush on her cheeks "I'm gettin' taller as Gawain than as Maya. It doesn't exactly help with the shifting..."
So far, she only felt it when she shifted awake, and that still didn't happen very often.

Maya lifted her hand, brushing blonde and pink locks over Twyla's shoulder to trace the back of her fingers down her neck and collarbone. "You are really beautiful, you know." she said with a smile. She almost looked shy for a moment.

"I remember that shiner..." How could she forget--the bruise had driven her nuts.The blond giggled at the story--she could believe it and in her mind's eye Twyla could picture such a scenario perfectly. Gender shifting seemed to be a very tricky business and such a mutation applied to someone with a trickster's attitude like the one that her girlfriend had could be a very devious (in an awesome way) combination. I wonder if changing genders makes you need to be tricky or if Maya would have been the same regardless? Interesting conundrum, it was filed away for further contemplation at a later date.

It seemed like Maya didn't know what she'd get either, although she had more factors to think about than the girl with the pink highlights did. I'd need a really good reason, I think. She looked up at the other girl and noted the pink in her cheeks. It was getting less jarring to see it there but she wondered silently what was motivating the color change.

Wait. Wait. Wait. Gawain was getting taller than Maya? For a moment Twyla said nothing, thinking over the last statement... ... ... I guess it makes sense...guys are usually taller than girls and all that...hitting a second growth spurt would be less likely for Maya at this point but guys still shoot up in their last years of high school. Alright, it made sense but that had to seriously be a pain. "Does tall run in your family?" She had to ask after picturing herself shooting up to Nate's size everyday--tall and short ran in her family.

The tracing hand stopped as the palm it was drawing on was lifted. Twyla could feel her hair as it brushed across her shoulder and this caused goosebumps to breakout across most of her body before the fingers even made their way to her neck. It was a gentle gesture and it made the weird not-butterfly-butterflies erupt in her stomach. The girl's heart rate sped up and her breathing became a little harder when she looked up at Maya as she spoke. Something about the look on her face, Twyla supposed. The compliment made her blush and then she replied: "No, I don't know." with a slightly playful smile.

Alright, the butterflies couldn't take it anymore. In a quick move the blond twisted around, sat up on her knees, and placed a hand in the other girl's dark locks. She sat there, their faces close for a moment, just looking at her. Another smile before she leaned forward and bridged the space between them with her lips.

The butterflies made me do it.

>>"Does tall run in your family?"

Maya thought about it for a while. "Well, Mom's pretty tall... in her original form, that is. Of course I used to be shorter too, back when she was around." she didn't sound sad at all, remembering her. It was just as things were. "I don' know anythin' about my dad. Or anyone else in the family." she smirked "So, I don' really know. I hope I won't end up with much of a different in height, it wouldn't feel right."

Physically, that is. Not like Maya was planning on shifting awake more often or anything.

Then conversation quickly developed in a non-verbal direction, and Maya smiled into the kiss, pulling her injured arm out of the sling once again to tug on Twyla's shirt until she managed to pull the girl onto her lap. She cheerfully ignored the flash of pain in her shoulder, and she was pretty sure the concussion was not making her light-headed.

Doc's gonna kill me for this...

So it was selfish and a little stupid, all things considered. If they kept up their physical...ness Maya's shoulder could get damaged even more and lack of oxygen was probably not good for a brain that was trying to recover a bit from a concussion. Yes, it was foolish and probably asking for trouble to keep kissing her but at the same time...it felt good, really good, much much better than awkward pecks after uncomfortable dates and kissing frogs (or toads). Currently that good feeling of being close and excited and slightly nervous was covering up her first instinct to make sure that her girlfriend was awake and a.o.k.

Well...she was obviously awake. That had to count for something, right?

After a few more long and selfish moments exploring the good feelings of mouths and hair and soft Twyla pulled back slowly, her pupils slightly dilated and her breath coming in bursts and gasps. The girl rested back on the backs of her feet to get a better look at the other girl. A slight pink tint swirled across the blonde's cheeks that was as much from the kissing as it was from something else. After a moment of dazed breathing she managed to say: "I'm sorry, I talk about not going too fast and then I..." A hand came up to touch her kiss swollen lips and the touch made her bite them. She'd just had a lapse in self control and the thrill of it was scary and worth it at the same time. It would be easy to achieve that thrill again...

Suddenly, Twyla moved back and off the bed. From her standing position she noted the arm out of the sling and guilt flooded through her. "We should do something, let's go and--" The girl half spun around the room, looking for something. Her eyes saw the clock face. "About another hour. We have an hour." A deep breath, her thoughts were becoming clearer. "So there's what I want to do and then there's what's better to do and I think we should do something,er,less harmful for your condition than what I want to do at the moment," The pink tinted deeper, she'd been honest without thinking about her words.

But what to do?

Another quick glance around her room. There were a few magazines stacked haphazardly in one corner--those always had stupid quizzes or ugly outfits to draw on in pen. There were books scattered everywhere but reading was more of a solo activity...she didn't have a TV or anything like that...a pack of cards was staring at her from under a pile of clean socks. They had options and none of them were nearly as...entertaining as what part of her mind was still stuck on. The girl crossed the room. Bending down, she scooped up the deck of cards and brought them back over to the bed that she sat hesitantly on. "It's kind of lame but we could play Go Fish or War or something..." She trailed of. "We just need to keep you awake...or there's always drawing mustaches on models--that makes me laugh sometimes." A shrug and eyes trailing anywhere in the room but near Maya's face where her lips were.

An hour, she could handle an hour.

Twyla, the less foggy part of Maya's tortured brain concluded, was one hell of a kisser. Well, maybe every girl was if you were head over heels enough, but as far as Maya's experience went, she was the best, ever. She was also physically very close, and a tad less shy, and she was starting to put ideas into said brain.
And then she backed away.

Maya moved after her, hoping she would come back and continue the kiss, but apparently Twyla's mind was more occupied with, well, being worried about her, as usual. One couldn't really blame her for it. Knowing that, however, didn't stop Maya from looking at her like a five-year-old looks at ice cream with candy on top. Behind glass.

>>"So there's what I want to do and then there's what's better to do and I think we should do something,er,less harmful for your condition than what I want to do at the moment,"

"Uhum?..." Maya agreed hesitantly, still trying to reboot all the necessary areas in her brain. Had she been in Gawain's body, he would have fainted minutes ago due to lack of oxygen in said department. Twyla was right, it was really not good for a concussion.

I'm gonna go, drag Doc outta bed, make him heal me right now, come back here, and...

>>"It's kind of lame but we could play Go Fish or War or something... We just need to keep you awake...or there's always drawing mustaches on models--that makes me laugh sometimes."

Maya watched her cross the room, still trying to conjure up some self control, and her words barely registered by the time she returned to the bed. Looking at the cards, the only game she could come up with was a particular kind of poker, but she suspected that idea would really qualify as 'pushing it'.

"I'm awake." she whined, running fingers though her hair to calm herself down.

One hour.

"Ooohkay." Maya sighed, looking at the deck "I only know serious games on this one, so ya'll have to teach me. Or I can teach you. Either way." she smirked "I think we can do one hour without going nuts."

She ha never been looking forward to a cold shower this much before.

One hour wasn't such a long time if you really thought about it. What was sixty minutes anyway in the scheme of things? Not all that much, right? Part of Twyla suspected that when ever other second was focused on not focusing on something...it would take a while. How many seconds were in an hour anyway? The blond did the quick mental math. 3,600 seconds. It seemed like a longer time frame when put into terms like that.

We'll play cards, distraction and all that...

"Wait, what do you mean? You've never played Go Fish before? What about Old Maid--we used to play that all the time when my grandma Ashby babysat us..." Twyla's eyes went far away as they traveled to memories of crawling around on the knotty wood floor of a familiar farm house back in her family's valley so that she could sit in a circle with her siblings in front of a frail old woman. As long as she could remember Grandma Ashby (she couldn't be Grandma Twyla, that would be way too confusing) had looked frail, it was deceptive--she'd seen those thin limbs encased in a typical wool sweater move fast as lightening to whap her brother with the wooden spoon she always seemed to have in the kitchen. When she was little Twyla had learned not to mess with her father's mother and it was a lesson that Nate had never really grasped the importance of.

But she was getting lost in memory. The blond shook her head abruptly and readjusted herself on the bed, getting into a cross-legged position with her knee near Maya's leg. "We should play Old Maid." A strong nod, there would be no discussion. The cards were pulled from the packaging and one of the Jokers was pulled out. The girl held up the other one, deciding to explain the game. "This is the Old maid' you don't want it at the end of the game." She put it in the deck and began to shuffle. "Basically we both try to get the other person to take it--after the game is over the person with the Old Maid looses. You get rid of cards if you have matching pairs." She started handing out cards until there were none left. "Get rid of your pairs and then you can go first."

There were a lot of pairs seeing as it was a whole deck between two people but it didn't take long for Twyla to come to the disheartening discovery of the Old Maid. Fanning out the remaining cards in her hand the girl held them out with what she hoped was a normal smile on her face. "Take your pick." A larger smile.

It was a silly game but it would work as a good distraction...hopefully.

((OOC: Feel free to skip/continue to the game (or something else entirely if you think of it)--I don't care who wins but Twyla is a bad liar ))

Old Maid?

Maya watched her shuffle the cards and wondered where people learned games like that. She played all kinds of games when she was little, mostly with Mom, and with other kids too, but somehow she managed to grow up without learning any of the basic card games. Later on, when she hung out with all kinds of groups and gangs, she learned to play the most serious kind of games pretty fast.
She was a good liar.

She was good enough to let Twyla win (or convince herself that she let Twyla win). She lost another game fair and square, and then she won, for a change. The game was pretty entertaining, even under the above metioned circumstances - once in a while she let her gave wander and forgot her turn, but all in all, Twyla was right, cards proved to be a good distraction.

When Maya finally looked at the clock, the hour had been long up, and it was surprisingly close to morning. The soreness in her shoulder reminded her she was still wounded.

"All right" she smirked, dropping the Old Maid onto the pile of cards "I think I should go see Doc an' get myself patched up, one night of bein' a wounded hero 's more than enough." she leaned over to kiss her on the cheek "Go to sleep now, Bubblegum, you must be tired. Thanks for keepin' me up."

They managed three games with no real hitches and Twyla won two out of three. Usually she lost when she played with her siblings (it wasn't until she was almost six that she realized that showing Nate the cards that you have is not in your best favor) but she figured if Maya hadn't played before maybe she had some kind of advantage or something. In any case, she managed to only blush a little bit (mostly from holding the Old Maid in her hands, honest) and she was about to turn and look at the clock when Maya beat her to it.

It's really later...early. That explains why I'm so tired. Without anything to focus her attention on the girl suddenly realized how exhausted she was. Twyla stared dazedly at the other girl as she leaned forward and planted a kiss on her cheek. The touch made her smile, even if she was rapidly blinking to keep her eyes open. Before Maya's face could make its escape she planted a kiss of her own there, half on cheek and half on lips.

The tired had really hit her now that there was nothing to worry about--she'd done her job and now Maya was going to get all fixed up.

"I'm fine, really." She managed to choke out through a yawn. "Hardly tired at all..." A hand came up to rub at an eye. "Anytime..." A few more blinks and then the decision was made to worm her way under the comforter, kicking the cards all on the floor in the process. The mess was quickly forgotten as she found a comfortable spot on her pillow. For a moment she wondered if she should be walking the other girl out. She knows the way out...I can sleep with the light on... These thoughts were slow as sleep began to slowly overtake her mind.

Rolling over, she looked at her girlfriend muzzily, her face half hidden by her blankets. "I'll see you later, okay?...Night..." Twyla's head hit the pillow and after a second she was asleep, wrapped in the warm arms of a dreamless sleep brought on by exhaustion.

"Good night, Bubblegum" Maya chuckled as she watched Twyla bury herself in the blankets and pillows. She really looked cute. And extremely tired. Maya suspected Twyla still looked better than she did, though.
She turned off the lights before she walked out.

Doc was already up and about by the time Maya got to the Infirmary. She only half listened to his speeches and scolding, and let him do his thing while she just sat and smiled a tired smile at the world. Doc stopped grumbling after a while, and the pain stopped too, Maya was as good as new.

"Thanks, Doc."

"Don't thank me, girl, next time you end up here we are going to have a talk."

"Sure."

Good thing we have a healer...

Maya walked back to her room, too tired to use the mirrors; she was too tired to do anything, for that matter, so she just fell into bed as she was. She'll deal with the rest tomorrow. All of it.

((The story continues for Gawain in Let's talk about a girl))