|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Tue Jan 05, 2010 9:37 pm
Tate was driving the car.
It was nerve-wracking, at least for Giselle; the brunette had a way of almost missing stop signs and ignoring yellow lights that would get anyone a little persnickety. Tate also tended to be very... Well. Passionate. And she would get really into yelling at a passing driver (you a*****e, get out of the left lane if you're going to go FORTY) and well. It was just kind of scary, all right?
Really she was an okay driver, though. She stopped when the light was red.
"So what are you getting," asked Tate, "new stuff for the new year, right?"
She was glad to be going to the mall when there was no work to be done. Tate was starting to worry about meeting Howl Wickham at Teasvatta and then ******** up some measurements. Tate hated ******** up her measurements so badly. It meant she had to measure things twice, and during a rush that could drag you down.
Tate had christmas money. "I'll buy lunch," she said.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 11:00 am
"What?" Giselle said faintly.
Her fists were clinging to the bottom of her chair. She had survived Barren Pines to be killed by Tate's driving, and the prospect was more terrifying than zombies. At least with zombies she could hit them before they came to feast on her flesh. True, she could hit an oncoming vehicle or mailbox, but it would probably be unwillingly when her head went through the windshield and therefore far less satisfying.
"Oh, ah, yes. I need to get supplies and new clothes." she replied, as Tate's words began to make sense for her. "Were you driving before I left?"
As the car finally stopped, Giselle slowly let go of her seat. "No, I can buy lunch for us." she said shakily, getting out of the car. "My mother gave me money, and you know how she insists that you don't eat enough." Giselle's mother insisted this about everyone. The only person that it might actually have been an accurate statement for was Giselle, who was rail thin due to her habit of snacking during the day rather than eating proper meals.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 11:20 am
Tate slammed the door on her car, mumbling about it being a piece of s**t. It beeped when she locked it; she made a face, sticking out her tongue in a way that was probably the most immature thing she'd done since... Well, since the last time she'd gone shopping with Giselle. Or, well...
That did not bear thinking on. Tate caught up with Giselle and looped her arm through her friend's with a minimum of skin-to-skin contact, a thing that was quite a Tate specialty. She was glad to see that she still had the knack. "No," said Tate. "I got my provisional the day after you... got back, actually. Well, I had my permit and all, I could drive, but. Driving with Mariska, not my thing." Lack of experience. That explained it; or else Tate really had that little regard for her life and the lives of the others on the road.
"You sure," asked Tate; "They've stopped even trying to pick out things they think I'll use and are just giving me gift cards to clothing stores and the mall 'in hopes that I'll look less like a hobo'. I don't look like a hobo, do I?"
She kind of did. Her bag was a familiar oversized canvas messenger in well-worn gray that she'd had before Giselle's disappearance; her black turtleneck was the tight darkness of a new shirt and her skinny jeans were unfamiliar, too, but the loose grey-blue shirt over it all was a familiar one. She had worn it last time she'd visited Giselle before... well. Didn't bear thinking on. Her shoes were pretty ratty, too. "Where do you want to go first, then?" She toed a door open and pulled Giselle into Macy's.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 11:56 am
Giselle looked Tate up and down and said "No," quite honestly. If anything, the newer clothes on Tate were more alarming to Giselle than the old ones. Giselle didn't like change, and though she had to buy new clothes for school, she preferred the old ones she had that still fit. "They are getting a little worn though," she admitted grudgingly. "We can both get new outfits, that should keep Mariska quiet."
The last time Giselle had given Tate clothes it had been a deep green Earl Spencer jacket. It had not been exactly a la mode.
She let herself be pulled into Macy's and eyed the shelves. "The dresses here might be worth looking at. Recently empire waistlines have come back into vogue and I may find something acceptable, if not in need of a few alterations." She browsed the shelves idly, feeling the fabrics. New clothes. She hadn't been in any kind of store since before Barren Pines.
Which reminded her. "I don't want plaid skirts or cardigans." she said vehemently, viciously tugging a dress into view for examination. She had quite enough of wearing those.
"Where do you suggest we go, General?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 12:56 pm
"Keep Mariska quiet? Shut your mouth, the day she shuts up is the day I start looking for body snatcher pods," said Tate, accompanied by a lot of eye-rolling. She sighed and poked through the nearest rack for a moment. It was a rack of ties, which she finally noticed after looking at the third. Then she shook her head, sighing and going to look at dresses with Giselle.
She still had that Earl Spencer jacket. It was hanging neatly in her closet.
With a shrug, Tate said, "I don't really care. I swear I have certificates for every store in this mall." Then, vehemently, she continued, "We are not going to Teasvatta. It is my day off. I am staying away from it. Now, that chocolate store. I could be persuaded to go there--"
Tate tilted her head a bit. "You meant clothing stores, huh. Well, um, they opened a Gap recently. Forever 18 has good casual dresses and is running a good sale. I'm thinking about getting another part-time job there. In the afternoons, you know. I only get weekend shifts anymore..."
The comment about plaid skirts and cardigans Tate left alone, and instead held up a white babydoll dress with a red bow in the back. "What d'you think of this one?" Not for Tate, obviously. Tate looked like a stork.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 1:09 pm
Giselle rolled her eyes in unison with Tate at her comment. "Fair enough." she said, putting the dress she had been looking at back.
"You have a job now?" Tate drove. Tate had a job. Giselle wasn't sure she liked the changes (especially not the driving), but she was more alarmed by the fact that so much had happened since she had left. "What else should I know about what's been happening while I've been away? Do you have a tattoo and a European transfer student boyfriend?" Her tone was edgy, but not hostile. She wasn't too upset to joke about it, but it was definitely a point of consternation that her General had not given her a full update on what had happened while she was gone.
Although she supposed it was fair enough. She herself hadn't offered Tate any update at all, though she had been considering making up something plausible sounding. Even the fact that she had to think about it made her uncomfortable though. She had never been obliged to lie to Tate before.
Did she have to? Maybe if she was just careful...
"That was our uniform." she said hesitantly. "The plaid and the cardigan, all the kidnappees had to wear it."
She left it at that, adding "A bit too Saint Lucia. White and red has too many specific connotations to it for me to ever feel less than ambivalent about it, don't you agree?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 1:57 pm
"I got it the week before Christmas to get out of the 'birthday party'." Birthday party was said with malice practically dripping from every syllable, like it was a poison or a curse. With Tate, it might as well have been a curse; her birthday party was held for everyone in that family but her.
She blinked. "Well, um, no? I wouldn't get a tattoo." Not unless Giselle were there to help her painstakingly plan every single detail of it. "And no European transfer student boyfriend." One possible European transfer crush, but that was about twelve thousand steps from boyfriend and she was pretty sure Howl wasn't interested in her at all. Now, Giselle... boys liked Giselle. She was beautiful, she was intelligent, she was just. Giselle. Tate decided to keep Howl Wickham away from her best friend. Hillworth might be just a school like any other in the end, but her Giselle was a Crystal girl. Tate, being from Meadowview, was much better equipped to scare off someone if things went bad.
With a sigh, she said, "Those sailor senshi are really prevalent now. I haven't seen any, or those Nega-whatevers, but there was this huge scare about a Sailor Nea who was going around murdering people in the name of someone called Astraea. And I passed Algebra 3 and am working on a project on the Bronte sisters with Janice Fitzpatrick. She went to middle school with us, do you remember? A year below us."
Tate put the babydoll back on the rack. "Quite so," said Tate, who felt like an idiot for not remembering that. She laughed; it was awkward. Talking of uniforms for the kidnapees...
She took a deep breath, picked up a pair of black slacks just to have something in her hands. "I kept... having these dreams. I think they were dreams. They weren't... Not, like, my normal nightmares..." Giselle's face in her car. Giselle screaming-- "I dreamed that I was talking to you, over IM. It was your screenname and mine, and we talked about--about prom, and Thanksgiving. Stupid silly things. I sent you a message about college once... you talked for a little bit and then stopped... like you do when you're researching."
With a shuddering sigh, she looked back to Giselle. "I know they say it was an organ trafficking ring, but. This boy, Lucas Hendricks, he said you'd given him my number. He called me. He played Soul Calibur against me. I went to the game cafe, they all confirmed that they'd seen him there. Zell, it wasn't really an organ trafficking ring, was it." After a moment, she amended, "If you can't tell me what it really was, just tell me that. I'll stop asking."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 3:30 pm
"Ah. The birthday party." Giselle knew all about Tate's mother's idea of a celebration.
Not, granted, that her family's birthday parties were what people outside of her family would likely consider a good time. A rousing game of 'pin the blame on the American president: from Adams to Wilson' was not thrilling unless you had invested time studying both American and global history. "You like working there though, yes?"
"Well, there's something that hasn't changed." she said, pulling out another dress and holding it up against her, looking down. A deep blue affair with a white collar and black buttons. "What about this?"
As Tate began to talk about the sailor senshi, Giselle's stomach flipped. Judging from Tate and her parents, Destiny City still thought the senshi were bad news. As for Sailor Nea, Nea didn't even sound like a star name. "Was there? I'm sure it was some kind of mistake. The news misrepresents things." she said a tad sharply. If anyone were the murderers, it was the Negaverse. She remembered the fire. Both fires.
"Yes, I remember Janice Fitzpatrick. I've heard that she's a talented student." Wasn't Janice a transfer into Barren Pines? Hero had mentioned her. Had she been in the hospital? Giselle didn't remember her name on the list of survivors, but maybe she had transferred out like Allie had when the rest of the science club had died.
She paused and listened to what her best friend told her. The IM conversations. They had been real, apparently, unlike everything else at Barren Pines. She could hold onto that. Not all of that year had been wasted on illusions.
"No, it wasn't. I'm sorry about Lucas, I didn't know what to do. He was flirting in my doorway and I was busy and you know how I get when..." She trailed off, blushing furiously. The fact that Giselle Petrova was not able to handle people coming onto her was something that she didn't want published. Tate was the only person she had ever told. "But you're not hallucinating, but the kids thought it was a school called Barren Pines. That's all I can tell you."
She bit her lip. "Let's checkout. Let's go eat."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jan 30, 2010 10:24 pm
Tate enjoyed sitting in on the Petrova birthday parties; true, usually she ended up playing chess on her laptop and losing to the level one computer, but it was nice to be surrounded by friendly debate, to hear arguments that genuinely weren't meant to wound anyone.
She loved it.
"I think you need to go down a size," said Tate critically, looking at the dress. "Not to dredge up bad memories, mein Kommandant, but you've kind of lost weight." She didn't smile. Tate almost never smiled when telling the truth to Zell. She sighed, brushing her ponytail over her shoulder and picking up a pair of plaid vests, one in red and the other in green. They'd go well with the uniform shirts she'd bought off the internet--a nice shocking outfit for that wedding Mariska wanted her to go to.
Straightening her shirts, she sighed. "The videos were pretty conclusive. It looked like a senshi, and she had powers and stuff, so... I don't know. The whole thing seems pretty sketchy to me." She shook her head and draped her vests over one arm. This wasn't something she wanted to get into with her commander. Not now, not ever. How was Tate supposed to explain that she kind of... sided with the bad guys in this one?
"She's nuts," said Tate flatly. "Drinks Megaquench in her tea. Megaquench!" She proceeded towards the registers, oddly quiet. She had thought that Giselle was at Barren Pines... what did that mean?
When Giselle moved on, Tate did too. "Sure, Zell. Where do you want to go?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:11 am
Giselle sighed. "Correct as usual, General." It wasn't like she was about to gain it back anytime soon, either. Giselle had trouble gaining weight with her dietary habits, so when she lost of what she already had, it was quite the inconvenience. She put the dress back and picked up the next size, holding it up against her to make sure it wasn't too short.
She'd probably have to alter the rest of her dresses at home slightly, she realized, and clicked her tongue in irritation. Giselle couldn't stand having her clothing fit anything less than perfectly. Her clothing represented her, and while Tate might be able to put on a shocking outfit for one of Mariska's parties, Giselle wouldn't wear anything that was less than immaculate unless she couldn't help it.
"If you say so, General. I will wait for conclusive evidence." Giselle said about the senshi video. The most frustrating part was she had conclusive evidence, she justt couldn't use it. For a historian, that was like finding a broken time machine, utterly frustrating.
In the silence that followed Giselle's admission about Barren Pines, she seized onto the talk of Janice. "Sometimes people who seem crazy are quite intelligent, you know." Giselle's father was proof enough of that. Most of the kids on the block knew him as Crazy Old Petrova. Giselle chose to view the fact as another symptom of the ills that plagued society.
"However, I don't expect I'd accept an invitation to dinner with her." she admitted. Even her father drank normal tea.
As she checked out, she replied "Somewhere clean." Giselle was a finicky eater, but more than that she was a tidy eater. If she had to choose between sloppy joes or going hungry, she would probably opt for the latter. "Is there anything you would prefer, General?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 11:43 am
Tatiana gave a sympathetic hiss and patted Zell on the shoulder. "We can cruise through a fabric store on the way back, and then you can get stuff to match it. You know, if you want." Tate's belief in her best friend's sewing abilities was immense. Tate's belief in her best friend was immense, period. She held a place in the checkout line, just staring at Giselle like she expected her to disappear at any moment.
Giselle joined her, and the look disappeared.
"Tallulah Cowden takes videos of senshi," said Tate, relish in her voice at the long-standing irritation finally proving unnecessary. Giselle knew her well enough to be able to guess that she was envisioning throwing that in Mariska's face next time people Tate should be emulating cropped up as a subject of conversation. "She doesn't report them or anything. She was doing it back when that Sailor Nea s**t was going on, too. Ugh. It just bothers me. There was a video of a playground getting destroyed. I caught her at it."
She laughed. It was an unfamiliar sound, not because of time they had been apart, but because... it was cold. And a little bit cruel. Tate had always been... mean-spirited, and she could be petty, but never cruel. "Your dad's an exception, not the rule. I maintain Janice Fitzpatrick is in fact an android sent to make me go utterly mad."
"Let's go for teriyaki," said Tate, "they have a new Japanese place that makes it right in front of you, like hibachi but cheaper, you know? I haven't had chicken teriyaki since November. It has been insane."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 3:59 pm
Giselle rolled her eyes. Tate had told her about Tallulah before. "That's like going into a battlefield with a target on your back." Even before she died, Giselle had known better than to go out and watch superpowered human beings fight each other. There was ambition, then there was suicidal idiocy. "If she had half a brain she would mind her own business. Is she really one of Meadowview's best students?" She thanked God she was in Crystal.
The laugh unnerved her though. Janice had gotten out of Barren Pines without any reported deaths around her, that was odd enough without Tate joking about her being an android. "I thought we were better than that, General. It takes more than an android to make you go mad."
"Excellent idea." Giselle proclaimed. "I'm paying. I'm sure it's my turn anyway."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 8:01 pm
"Yeah," sighed Tate, "Supposedly she is. I don't see it, though. She gives the biggest parts of the MUN to a ditz like Pavel Khruschev and expects to win? And seriously, she's really... She tried to convince me she'd found those videos on a public drive. I mean, what the hell?" She shrugged, shook her head. Sometimes her peers made her wish that she'd tried to get into Crystal Academy, too.
But then, not really.
With a roll of her eyes, she said, "I work at a high-end tea store. It's more her abuse of the sacred leaf that's driving me nuts."
She paid, idling at the end of the checkout area with her hands in her pockets (she'd put her bags into the gray messenger a minute ago). It was really odd, how easily she settled back into the routine of shopping with Giselle; how quickly she adapted to, once more, being able to text someone at a ridiculous hour and actually get an answer.
"Works for me, but I'm getting garlic noodles with my chicken." She grinned, holding out a hand for Giselle.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 10:31 pm
Giselle actually laughed. "Pavel Khruschev, a leading figure in Meadowview's MUN? That's either blatant nepotism or 'feel-good' education being taken to frightening extremes." She listened as Tate continued and rolled her eyes. "No wonder Tallulah doesn't attend Crystal. How can you stand it?"
"Persevere, General. Once we get somewhere in life we can attempt to make it illegal." One of Giselle's favourite pastimes: Planning the new world order against all the things that drove the pair of them mad.
Catching up with Tate again, Giselle gave her a matching grin, the kind that she reserved for Tate. The historian only smiled for maybe a handful of people in the world. Tate was similar enough to her to be able to elicit one pretty much whenever she pleased. "If you like." she replied. "You know my stance on noodles."
I.E: Too messy to consider.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jan 31, 2010 10:44 pm
"He's Russia," said Tate. Her tone was disgusted enough to make up for her cheerful expression. "I find it coincidental that Pavel becomes Russia and right after his best friend, whoever she is, she went to Barren Pines too... Audrey something. Aubrey. I don't know, it starts with an A."
At the talk of their new world order, Tate smiled. Illegal tea mixing. Mm, delicious--in thought and in deed. "Let's not outlaw androids, though. They'll be useful, don't you think?" The answer was, of course, yes; they'd had this discussion many times before. This one and many others, because when Tate wasn't at home or school she was with Giselle--or as with Giselle as she could get. Even if she hadn't managed to talk her friend into texting in class, they were pretty close.
She nodded, solemnly, and said, solemnly, "Noodles get everywhere." And then she added her own stance: "Noodles are delicious and neat if handled properly." But Tate would never, ever eat linguini. Linguini was just gross.
"There it is," she said, pointing out the shop in the food court. "They have teriyaki steak and teriyaki shrimp, too. And there's rice for you and also forks." Tate would use chopsticks. Clearly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Reply
