Claire gave a small nod, smiling thankfully at Tom. She was more than a little grateful that he’d backed down so quickly and agreed to give her some space. That was better than most of the people around the base were willing to give her. “Thank you. I appreciate it. Really.”
As he went on to describe the base, Claire nodded a few more times, finding the idea interesting. “I’ve heard of a few others when I was…” She paused a moment, pressing her lips into a thin line. “…traveling.” It was getting tiring telling people that she’d been on the run, that she still was in a way. Though to her, it was obvious considering how much most people hated her.
“So–” Claire started, taking a deep breath. “–if I were to come on the show, what would you have me talk about? I mean, I know a lot of people have been wondering where I’ve been and what I’ve been doing all these years, but I’m not sure I want to talk about it.”
“Yourself, mostly.” Tom answered, pointing at the chairs near-by them, hoping they would be talking for a while. “I don’t know, I think you’ve kind of become more of an icon than a human to these people, I want to try and undo that, you know?” He obviously didn’t know how Claire would feel about that, but he felt like she deserved it. People could be so cruel about her, and he strongly felt as though it was because they didn’t see her as a person anymore, she was just an other to them.
They talked for a little bit about the show and where it could go, and the whole time Tom tried not to think about how he was talking to probably one of the coolest people he could think of, lest it ruin his cool.
Eventually he had to run to do his next show, and hated to have to leave, but figured he had a better chance of seeing her again if they didn’t talk about everything right there. For the rest of the day, however, Tom was grinning ear to ear.
