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 Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 3:22 pm
Shiri found it harder and harder to slip out of the Pangari house over the prevailing weeks. At first, Mary Jane and Celie were only too happy to follow their parents’ command and try to bar Shiri from her accustomed roamings but soon grew bored with their charge and let her come and go as she pleased. They caught Hell when her parents found out about their laxity.
They soon took it upon themselves to keep her busy with non-strenuous work: clothes washing here, dish washing there….Istra even helped her make batch after batch of cookies—none of which went to their intended recipients as she was not allowed outside for the most part and definitely not to meet with her hobo friends. Shiri’s sisters rapidly put on the pounds, however.
Finally, Shiri begged a reprieve from the monotony and pled to be let out. She was no prisoner, nor a convicted felon, and it was simply criminal that they kept her locked away from fresh air as they did. Eventually, they gave in. She was, after all, not completely blind (though she gave no hint as to the slow deterioration of her vision). They gave her a list, some money, and sent her off to the Scene, a section of town she had yet to explore.
Not like she’d see enough of it to remember what it looked like.
She could still read the paper, but she kept it folded up anyway, saving her visual power to peer and find the indicated building into which she would have to venture in order to complete the errand on which she had been sent. They told her to look for a bake shop-c**-apartment building graffitied within an inch of life. It took her about an hour to find the place, and only after she wandered rather than searched.
Shiri found the seemingly cast iron fire escape, touching the metal with a questing hand. It felt solid. Carefully, she made a slow and laborious way up the stairs, having to hold railing, glasses, and bag with her. Her blurry vision offered nothing by way of safety. Eventually, she was before a window and took her fingers from around her back strap, curled them into a fist and rapped lightly on the window. She hoped. It felt like glass, any way.
While she waited for admittance, she wished Eros would speak to her again. He’d seemingly departed and left her with her thoughts. It wasn’t that she meant to anger him, but, really, he was overreacting. She was careful enough. And she could still make out shapes and colors and could still read, if she held the paper close enough to her face. There was always a silver side to every cloud. Unbidden, her hand began tracing the golden archer’s glove, and she gave a slight sigh.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 3:33 pm
The window slid open and a girl perhaps a year older than Shiri stuck her head out. Her hair was a remarkably similar red color. "Hullo?" asked Strawberry. She looked the girl up and down, puzzled. Slowly, it dawned on her. "Ohhh," she said, "Are you a customer? You'll wanna talk to Sunshine."
She closed the window, yelled something, and opened it again.
"Ohhh," she cooed, "He's not here. Sorry. But I you can talk to Dwayne? He sells, too. Sunshine would give you a better discount 'cuz you're pretty, but I'll see what I can do."
She closed the window again. When it next opened, the girl had been replaced by a tall, green haired boy with a rastafarian beanie. He gave her the same sort of visual once over as the other girl had. "You a first timer?" he asked. "What do you want?"
Inside the apartment, Fish looked up from the newspaper he was reading. He sensed something powerful. Why was it that his porch had replaced Seasons as the main rallying point for Players?
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 3:41 pm
Shiri's head barely had time to whip around in response to the sudden changes in the window. She could only tilt her head in the girl's direction and squint to try and make out her features, but she was gone before Shiri could assess anything. When finally the boy named Dwayne appeared before her, Shiri smiled quietly, readjusted her glasses, and said, "I'm here to get something for my parents." She reached into the front pocket of her bag and produced the quadruple and such folded paper containing list and money. "They said that this should take care of it."
She could pretend that her parents had no drug involvement. Sometimes she wondered if she should, but the only way she could was in the vagary with which she referenced the pot. Other than that, she could say she was out on an errand, never mind what her parents had sent her out for.
Shiri tried to make out more than the bright green hair and the brightly colored beanie, but found it to be more difficult than she'd thought. Once more, she wished Eros was with her, if only so that he could describe to her what she was seeing.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 3:48 pm
Dwayne took the note from her and read it. He grinned. "Ohhhh," he said. "Mr. and Mrs. Pangari. Yeah. Great customers. I can get you this." He was as professional as a pharmacist as he went off to fill the order, leaving the window open.
Fish got up and went over to the open window. He looked at the girl. No obvious attributes, but she seemed old enough to have already grown once. No telling how old she really was. Still, that wasn't any excuse to watch his language. He was the most foul-mouthed twelve-year-old he knew.
"I am ******** tired of all these ******** players on my ******** front porch," he deadpanned. The line had been in a movie he and Dwayne watched last night, though it had been about snakes then. It had sounded more badass then, too. Fish squinted at the girl. "Do I even know you?" he asked.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 3:55 pm
Shiri looked taken aback, but then laughed, not sensing any real venom behind the words. Or, if there was, was oblivious to it. "I don't think we've met before, no." She answered. She tilted her head, squinting to see his face, inadvertently copying his action. "Are you....Are you a player too, then?" She grinned, clasping her palms together. She was always happy to meet the other godlings, even as Eros warned her away from them. "You must be lucky to know so many of the others!" She stuck her hand out. "I'm Shiri!"
Despite everything going wrong, she could repress her urge to be happy no more than spread her arms, leap, and fly from the fire escape.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:15 pm
Fish stared at the hand and then, when he was fairly certain she was not going to electrocute him, shook it. "I'm Fish," he said, a bit suspicious still. He looked back into the apartment to see how long Dwayne was going to take, but apparently it was a large order and it was going to be a while.
"Lucky's hardly the word I'd use," he said, remembering the frustrations with Quinn and his difficult parting with Writ.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:25 pm
Shiri almost thought that he wasn't going to take her hand and shake it. She was only being friendly, after all. "Fish....What a cool name." She mentally wished that she had some cookies with her as a peace offering, but, alas, her sisters had finished them only that morning. "At least you know what's going on," she suggested as a plus side. She only knew that they were both involved in a game that didn't have any clear rules but dealt with disembodied, powerful gods talking in their heads. "Who's your god?" She asked, by way of making conversation, wishing to set him at ease.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:28 pm
Fish tried to reconcile the fact that she was completely clueless with the fact that she looked like she had already hit her first growth spurt. It was like Maria all over again, come back to haunt him.
"I don't have to tell you that," he sniffed. "It's classified information."
The cute and innocent act might have worked on some people, but not him. "So, you're just here to buy pot and the fact that I live here is a total coincidence?" he asked.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:33 pm
Shiri blinked. "If that's how you feel, about it." She shrugged, pushing her glasses back up her nose, mentally wishing she'd found a pair that actually fit her. "The pot happens to be for my parents, thanks. Why would I go out of my way to find someone I've never met before?" She was a little concerned that he could think that she had some ulterior motives. She chuckled a little. "Maybe it's fate." She stretched, shifting her bag to her back. She looked around, peering as much as she could past Fish. "Interesting set up, with the window as a door and everything. What's up with the front door?"
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:40 pm
Fish blinked at her. "It's in someone's bedroom," he said, as if this were totally normal. What, your front door isn't in someone's bedroom, too? "We don't use it much."
"Your parents smoke pot and you've never been tempted to take a pinch?" asked Fish. A year ago, he might have agreed with her, but his opinion had changed greatly in the interim. "Do you understand how easy it would be to filch a bit?"
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:47 pm
Shiri laughed a little hysterically. "Mary Jane and Celie--they're my sisters--took some once. I don't know what happened when my parents found out, but they swore off the stuff. Besides, I've never had to get it before. They wanted to get me out of the house, I guess." She shrugged. "And no, I wouldn't. I haven't." She frowned. "Is that...weird or something?"
It was a strange feeling, to carry on conversations without Eros. And she hardly seemed as calm anymore. It annoyed her, just how changeable her moods really were.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 5:15 pm
Fish wondered for a moment what kind of pot heads went as far as actually naming their child 'Mary Jane'. He smiled easily at the girl. False ease.
"How old are you?" he asked. "You've never tried it? Seems weird to me, but hey, look where I live."
He shrugged and looked over again to see what Dwayne was doing.
"He's gonna be a while with your order," he said. "Needs to shred some stuff."
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 6:37 pm
"I'm seventeen, actually." She smiled, relieved that he seemed to be easing up around her. She didn't like it when people were tense around her. She wanted to be a source of comfort, not anxiety. "Most people think I'm older on account that I'm so tall." She had no idea what went into preparing pot for its transportation and enjoyment (hopefully not both at the same time), so she assumed that this was normal and went with it. "That's perfectly fine. Mind if I sit?" She gestured at the grating of the fire escape. It promised to stain with...whatever might have been on it, but Shiri didn't mind. It was pleasant to actually be talking to someone who might know what was going on with her, rather than clamming up and acting like a Mother Hen. "How old are you?" She questioned, smiling pleasantly and slowly drawing a sketch of him within her mind's eye.
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 6:51 pm
Fish boggled at her as he motioned for her to go ahead and sit. Seventeen? Really? Really? He'd thought Ciro was the oldest, and even Ciro was fifteen or sixteen, tops.
He thought about it for a moment.
"Twelve and a half," he said, with utter seriousness. "Or nineteen, physically. No one's told you that you're weird among our kind?"
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Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 6:58 pm
Shiri went ahead and folded her long legs underneath her, catching the railing when she told him his age. "T-Twelve and a half?" She repeated with wonder. "My goodness. My eyesight must really be going. You seem so much older. Is it....Is it a side effect of communicating with your god?" She asked, completely amazed that such a connection could affect a physical change. Shiri shook her head at his question. "I....I'm not allowed among 'our kind.'" She admitted. "Eros keeps me...on the sidelines, I guess." She shrugged. "I've only ever met...." Her eyes rolled to take in the roof without seeing it as she silently counted. "Two godlings. Well, three now." She blinked. "Just how many of us are there?"
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