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Eloquent Conversationalist
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 Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2012 9:32 am
a roleplay led by welian and mitsuki10191
XXXXXAlong the High River, there are a number of rowhouses-turned-stores - bookstores, cafes, a jeweler, and an old couple who draw a caricature of you, if you're willing to sit on their porch for an hour and listen to them talk about the old days, when gas was thirty cents a gallon and girls didn't wear such shamelessly short skirts, and boys didn't wear such shamelessly skinny jeans, and you were allowed to smoke inside.
XXXXXAnd there was also a house-turned-store that had been empty for at least ten years. The owner never did anything with it, refused to sell it to the town, and so there was a little bit of a stir when one day a truck pulled in behind the run-down and empty store, and a new sign went up:
XXXXX"Black & Gold: Antiques, Heirlooms, Curios, and Relics - Coming Soon"
XXXXXAnd on a smaller poster in the window:
XXXXX"Hiring Temp. Workers; Students Welcomed; Must Be Cat-Friendly"
XXXXXThe owner of the new store was a handsome woman with green eyes and dark hair, whose name was Christabelle Black. And her sign implied, she had a cat. A golden-furred cat, to be exact, allowed to roam the store as he pleased. And on Miss Black's payroll (hidden among the old swords, antique mirrors, out-of-print books from the 1800s, and even, lord knows how she got it in there, a decrepit old Steinway & Sons grand piano, in dire need of a new finish and a profession tuner, and so on) were five student workers, there for the summer to be dismissed once classes started up again.
XXXXXAnd this is the story of a woman, a cat, a few students on vacation, and how Aldenburg and the East and West sides of the High River were never quite the same again.
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Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2012 11:37 am
XXXXXAll Gaia TOS applies
XXXXXAll Refuge rules apply
XXXXXYour character and application must be approved by me before you may post.
XXXXXThere is magic in this story - but this is a (mostly) non-magical setting. You'll all get your chance to do some spellwork, so hang tight and be patient, it's just not the very first part of the role-play.
XXXXXRight now, I'm only accepting 5 players - the student characters who are working in the store. One character per person, and perhaps later in the story, we will open up to a few more players.
XXXXXBeing able to post about twice a week would be nice - even if it's not your turn to post, at least check up on the thread a few times a week, and follow along in case something concerns your character.
XXXXXEnjoy yourselves, and PM me if you have any questions!
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jan 22, 2012 7:45 pm
XXXXXChristabelle Black: The owner of Black & Gold. Though she tries to be friendly, she's a little on the dark side, and it's not because of her long black hair - she broods a bit when left to her own devices and frequently seems deep in thought. She loves to tease her cat, and has a taste for frightening and gruesome decorations.
Played by welian
XXXXXTynan: a gold-colored cat that belong to Miss Black and walks around the store freely.
Played by Mitsuki10191
XXXXXTori Hunter: Tori is extremely stubborn for lack of better words. Determined to a fault, this girl strives to succeed. She's not a perfectionist, but will sometimes be mistaken for one. She'll push herself to the limit and even more so if she has too, especially when it comes to a loved one. This eighteen year old is very observant and has a high IQ, so she will usually go with the rational route instead of jumping to conclusions or leaping before thinking. In her mind, everything can be explained calmly and rationally. Also, Tori is actually pretty stress-free (most of the time) and is an easy going type of girl. She'll be hyperactive from time to time and is pretty blunt about her feelings, but she's kind and thoughtful. However, she can and will be intimidating if she has to be because make no mistake, she is NOT a pushover.
Played by Heaven91
XXXXXLairena Eitery: A very messed up young girl who fits deep into the "young and rebellious" category. At nineteen years of age, she has a bad attitude and is apathetic to most things about her daily life and things that go on around her. As an upcoming high school senior, she plans on slacking her way through her last year of freedom before she goes off to be some variation of an adult in college.
Played by Foxxenne D
XXXXXRandolph "Randy" Marion Kurtz: 19-year-old male; Black hair, dark brown eyes; Typically dresses in muted tones, usually has a large bulging backpack with him, and always has a pair of large headphones on his person; Withdrawn and introverted only begins to describe Randy. He usually keeps to himself, unless someone addresses him directly, and even then, his answers can be short and curt. To many, this behaviour appears rude and uncouth, but to Randy it’s just the way life has always been. The only way to make Randy seem more shy is for someone to actually express an interest in him or in what he is doing. Most of the time, Randy has his head wrapped in headphones, as music is his personal retreat from life. And on that important note: No one touches the headphones.
Played by FireSpark
XXXXXJhonathan Thomson: Jhon is a sweet and kind-hearted young boy who has a love for the unusual. What he loves even more though is the super natural and paranormal. Being a follower of a pagan religion, he could often be seen 'talking' to spirits, or at least trying to using many tools of the practice. Has he ever legitimately contacted something not of this world? No one really knows, because few ever want to be around him when he starts doing things that involve spirits. With it being summer and and jobs popping up all over the place, he decided to kill some of his free time and start saving for college by getting a job at a new shop that had opened in a once abandoned building.
Played by Nandoral
XXXXXAbigail Orren: Abigail is an almost painfully shy 16 year old. She is one of life's truest voyeurs, happier to observe from a distance rather than participate. Being the center of attention makes her very uncomfortable. Nonetheless, Abigail has an intense curiosity and hunger for knowledge. She can most often be found in her school's library.
Played by Electric-Kool-Aid
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Posted: Wed Jan 25, 2012 6:34 pm
XXXXXBlack & Gold is full, and is not accepting new characters at this time. Sorry!
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Wed Jan 25, 2012 6:35 pm
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Posted: Wed Jan 25, 2012 6:44 pm
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Wed Jan 25, 2012 8:40 pm
XXXWith a few twists of her wrists, the long, white, horizontal slats of the blinds tilted open. Long golden rays of sunshine came through and glanced off the opposite walls, lighting up her bedroom on the third floor of the house that the woman currently known as Christabelle Black had moved herself, her cat, and her store into. Like the houses on the left and right and down the street, the building was tall and narrow, and built with brick that had been painted many colors, until the local historical association complained, and the city and sandblasted parts of the complex back to the original brick surface. It was all right, Christabelle thought. The brick wasn’t a garish red you saw too commonly on new shopping centers. It was that old, dark red, the nice muted color that had seen decades of rain and wind and at least ten different presidents take the office.
XXXShe looked down at her bed. The sun had long since risen, and hours ago she had gotten up, kissed Tynan on top of his head, and gotten showered and dressed for the day. And there, still on her bed, was a ball of blonde fur, purring in the warm sunshine. Christabelle left silently, tossing her long black braid of hair over her shoulder. She didn’t really want it in her way today, not with the work she had planned. This particular house in the row of tacky small shops and offices had four floors – a basement, a ground floor, and a second and third story. The third story was where Christabelle lived, where her bedroom and private bathroom were, as well as a small study. The first floor was the main part of the store (oh so creatively dubbed Black & Gold), and had a counter set with glass display cases for old jewelry and watches that she had lifted from their previous owners, shelves and shelves of trinkets and wares, weapons mounted on the wall far from a child’s reach, a grand piano in the center of the floor (not for sale, unless you were a professional musician or a teacher) and a single cash register. It was a bit old, and complained a bit in its own electronic way when someone wanted to use a new credit card. And of course, after living quarters and the store, that left the second floor and the basement for storage.
XXXAnd that was where Christabelle wanted to work with her new employees on the first day. The second floor was mostly wall to wall shelves filled with books, those were no great concern, and most of them had been organized beforehand, neatly logged and arranged thanks to a close friend. But the basement, oh lord, the basement.
XXXThe basement, quite frankly, was a mess. It was where she had dumped all the wares, all the ones that weren’t for sale, that still had to be logged and researched and priced, that were broken or chipped and needed to be fixed or have new batteries inserted, or (and she cringed at the thought of the sheer number of things she had packed in here, boxes and boxes and crates and crates!) had a mate, were parts of a set, and needed to be a complete set before it could be priced and sold. A collection that spanned more years than she cared to count, and only a minute portion of it was here in the building, and an even smaller percentage of that ready for sale. With a few willing (or unwilling, she had her ways of making people work for her) hands, and the entirety of the day with the store closed to customers, there would be much progress made.
XXXChristabelle Black glided down the stairs to the ground floor of Black & Gold, tracing her pale, thin fingers across the dark-stained piano, and opening the front door to the store. Though the sign in the window said “CLOSED”, she propped the door open with a brick for a breeze (it was hot and sunny outside, and there was no central air conditioning in the building) and sat on the front porch of her store in an old wicker chair. There was just enough room for two chairs and a small table between them on the porch, while still leaving space for a path up the three gray wooden steps from the yard to the porch, and into the store. She would wait for the teens here, and sipped iced tea that rather seemed to suddenly appear, as she didn’t have a glass in her hand when she first walked out. Maybe they would have an idea of the sort of work they were in for when they saw her paint-splattered jeans, dull sneakers, and plain red halter-top. Yes, they would be in for the long haul today, and it was only 10:00 in the morning.
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Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2012 1:35 pm
Randy let his legs dangle off the edge of the open drain pipe as he brushed the remnants of breakfast from the front of his grey T-shirt. He watched as bread crumbs and flecks of cream donut fell into the slow flow of the High River below. Shaking his head for a moment at the thought of naming something High, when in fact it was anything but, he reached over to where his backpack sat behind him in the massive drainpipe. The lack of rain lately had left the pipe almost completely dry, but what moisture lay deeper inside, combined with the cool breeze off the river made the shaded spot a most comfortable place for a stop. Brushing some dust from the bag, Randy unfastened the top. He picked at something in his teeth with his tongue as he fumbled around inside the bag with one hand, the other keeping the bag balanced on his lap. Finally with a smile showing he had found what he searched for, Randy pulled out an extremely crumpled soft pack of cigarettes. He jiggled the pack a little in front of his face, and grimaced as only two equally crumpled cigarettes fell into view. With a sigh, he tapped one of them into his waiting lips, before stashing the pack in an outer pocket of the pack.
The pipe was too small for his 6-foot-frame, but he was able to come up into a comfortable crouch as he fished a Bic lighter from a hip pocket. The pipe provided an excellent wind break, amongst all its other qualities, and Randy was puffing smoke on the first try. Putting the lighter back he set about pulling a large pair of headphones from yet another pocket of his pack, all the while, maneuvering the cigarette about in his mouth as only an experienced smoker can. At the end of the headphone’s long wire, there dangled an old IPod, worn and beaten from years of use. Stuffing the IPod in a back pocket, and hanging the headphones around his neck, Randy scooped the bag up and swung it over a shoulder. Taking a last large drag on his cigarette, he tossed the butt out into the waterway. Then standing as best he could, swung out around one side of the drain pipe. His combat boots found good footing as he landed on the embankment that led up to the road above, and so he began the easy climb up.
As he hoisted himself over a guardrail, garnering strange looks from the many morning commuters, he dusted the dirt off his black jeans as best he could. It did nothing for the worn patches, or the darker spots of stains, or the number of broken belt loops that spoke of long use. Shaking his head to get his hair to hang just the way he liked it, he pulled the headphones on. Pulling the IPod out, he flipped through his catalogue before stopping at Symphony X’s Paradise Lost album. Just the sort of thing to put him in good mood. Setting the whole album to play Randy turned the volume up, and tuned the world out, as he trekked toward his first day on the job at Black and Gold.
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2012 5:56 am
Abigail stared at her wristwatch. The little hands read "9:20". She stood in the small bathroom in the apartment she and her mother shared and stared at herself in the mirror. She was ready to go. If I go now, I'll be early, which means I'd have to wait for the others with Ms. Black. That means I'll have to make conversation. she thought to herself. But what if I misjudge how long it takes the others to get there and I'm the last one? Or I'm late? A small frown flitted across the face of the pale girl reflected in the mirror.
She felt silly for having these thoughts but then again, she also felt silly wearing these paint clothes. Her jeans (from a thrift shop) were at least one size too large and she'd rolled the hems up three times to keep herself from tripping. Even with the belt, they hung low around her hips. Abigail was more embarrassed of her shirt though. It was an old sleep shirt from when she was a little girl. It used to come down to her past her knees but now, since she'd grown it only came to mid-thigh. She had turned it inside out in an attempt to hide the large cartoon kitten that was on the front, but the thin fabric only partially obscured the design. The effect was neither flattering, nor cool, not that Abigail ever expected to be either.
She sighed quietly to herself and left the bathroom. She walked randomly through the rooms of the small apartment feeling anxious. In the kitchen she cleared the empty beer bottles off the kitchen counter, rinsing them out and putting them in the recycling bin. She decided not to look in on her mother, picked up her backpack where it lay by the door. Abigail checked her keys and her watch ("9:45") and stepped outside, pulling shut the door behind her and locking it.
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:30 pm
Jhonathan stared at his alarm clock as the early rays of the morning sun crept their way into his normally dark room. The little red numbers said it was only 6:30 in the morning, which he expected. School had ended a week ago for his high school, but the boys body had not yet grown out of the habit of waking up at such an early time. Running a hand through his tangled hair, he tried thinking of ways he could kill some time. His normal, every day routine would knock out about an hour, hour and a half if he took his time about it. First thing was going to be taking a shower and getting all the knots out of his hair. Throwing the blankets off of him, he gathered the cloths he would be wearing for the day and set them out on his dresser before heading into the bathroom.
Several minutes later, Jhon returned to his room, a towel wrapped around his waist and another slung over his shoulder. Drying himself off quickly, he discaarded the towel that covered him up and dressed himself from the waist down. Using the towel that he had over his shoulder, he dried his hair as best he could, though it never got fully dry when he did it. The shirt he had layed out was still sitting on his dresser. He didn't plan on putting it on yet, prefering to let his hair air dry some more so that the water would drip down onto his cloths. It wouldn't take too long, since his hair was short, but it would at least give him enough time to grab something to eat.
He went down to the kitchen, fixing himself a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs. By time he was done, his hair had finished drying as he had expected. Making his way back to his room, Jhon grabbed his Nickleback Dark Horse tour 2010 band teeshirt and threw it on before going to his night stand and picked up a deck of tarot cards. Since he had a few hours to waste, he figured t would hurt for him to talk to some spirits to pass the time.
A couple hours passed, and the clock in his room finally read 10:30. It was time for Jhon to start heading out for hs first day of work. He gathered all his cards back together, putting them back into the box before placing them in his backpack. On the way out of his room, he picked up a tiger eye pendulum that doubled as a necklace and made his way out of the house and down the road to the shop that had been dubbed with the name 'Black and Gold'. He was curious to see what kind of things were stashed away in the old building. Antiques always had a bit of mistery about them, and if he was lucky, he might even come across a few that had spirits still attached. Even in death, there were some things that people just can't let go of.
Jhon ended up running part the way to the shop, helping the blood flow in his body and waking him up some more. It would also alloe him to get to work a bit early and get to know his employer a bit before he had to start. Turning a corner and going down the road some, he was soon approaching the store. He saw a slightly older lady sitting in a wicker chair that was outside. Considering her age, he figuered that the woman must be his new boss, and walked up to her with a small smile on his face. "Hello madam. I'm Jhonathan...one of the students that was hired to work here over the summer. Do you know where I can find the owner of the shop?"
((Sorry that the quality started going down after a while. I realized that if I didn't cut back, my opener was going to end up being REALLY long.))
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2012 7:47 pm
Christabelle took a sup of her iced tea, and smiled at the boy who finally found the store. Punctuality was not the strongest suit of teens these days, but it was of little consequence. She’d have them hear until dinner, and then send them home. If Tynan liked them, then she knew they would be perfect.
She set the cup down, and stood up to greet Jhonathan. “Welcome. I know who you are. In fact, I happen to be the owner you’re looking for.” She smiled, but it was a small smile that did not show her teeth., and she held out her hand – her skin was cold from the ice in her drink.
“My name is Christabelle Black, but it’s rather long and ostentatious for my liking.” A little bit of a lie, truth be told. She loved dramatic stories, rich clothes, and ornate decorations. But here, in a town like this, a long name was too formal. She didn’t want to put a wall between herself and these teens even more than there already was. “You should just call me Belle, or maybe Miss Black, if you insist.”
She was, as far as women went, not particularly tall or short, though she had a way of squaring her shoulders that allowed her to loom over even the tallest soldier. Her hair only looked black – out on the porch, in the bright sunlight, it was clear that her long braid was a deep dark brown – and her eyes were an unusually bright green that only graced digitally modified magazine models.
“Is alright if I call you Jhon?”
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2012 8:20 pm
Jhon walked closer to the porch, taking the offered hand in his own and giving it a light, but still firm shake. "I hope you don't mind me calling you by the latter of the two, unless you would preffer that I call you by the more casual name." He half asked the last part as he released her hand and took a step back so that he didn't feel like he was invading her personal space. Taking a moment, he looked his new boss over. She seemed to be a bit average in most cases, though somethng about her gave off that don't mess with me feel. He'd have to keep in mind not to get on her bad side, not wanting to find out if that feeling was more than just a feeling. "I don't see any problem with you calling me Jhon if it's what you'd like Miss Black." He responded to the question asked. Jhon had a question of his own that he needed to ask. "Madam, do you have any rules against wearing acessories while working?" While he was asking this, one of his hands raised and lightly took hold of the tiger eye pendulum around his neck. If he wasn't allowed to wear it while he was on the job, he was going to be rather insecure.
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Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2012 8:31 pm
With the morning sun now coming through the window, the slim, furry cat stretched on his back, his front paws coming up over his head as he stretched as though he were human, his mouth opening wide in a silent yawn.
His name was Tynan. He was a long, lean cat with curious blue eyes that tended to darken in ecstasy when he was scratched in just the right place. At the moment, those eyes were shadowed with sleep, though by the time he rolled onto his stomach, the shadows were already being blinked away. It was a new day, after all. And a new day always brought new things to study, new places to explore. Why waste any more of it laying about?
With one last stretch and a flick of his long tail, Tynan leaped off the bed, noting that his mistress was already up. Of course she was. Dear Mistress Black had always been the early-to-rise sort, and from time to time he chose to join her. But today had just seemed like a why-bother sort of day, and a quick glance at the clock told him he'd lazed away the day until ten. Not such a waste, all in all, as he'd woken ever-so rested. And his Mistress had kept him up quite late last night, after all.
Padding down the steps, Tynan followed his mistress' scent out onto the porch, pausing when he saw that they already had company. He dug around in his memory for a bit, remembered that she'd mentioned hiring help. It appeared the 'help', as it were, was of the teenage variety.
Cocking his head to the side, and a bit annoyed to be deprived of his morning bonding time with his mistress, Tynan leaped up onto the arm of Christabelle's chair, rubbing his head against her arm once.
When, instead of a scratch behind the ears, she instead spoke with the teenager - 'Jhon'- Tynan frowned, his eyes narrowing in annoyance. With a shrug, he climbed further up the chair, walking on the back of it before leaping gracefully and landing with a quiet thump on top of Christabelle's head, his tail coming down to bat lightly at her face.
Satisfied that he'd gotten his point across, Tynan smiled -as much as a cat could smile- and lifted a paw to lick at it, his tail moving back and forth like a pendulum in front of his mistress' face as he stared unblinkingly at the early morning guest.
His eyes narrowed when the boy called his mistress 'madam', and if a cat could scoff, this one did, shaking his head. However, when the boy pulled out the pendulum, Tynan stared once more, this time at the unusual accessory. Always interested in new things -and simultaneously resisting the urge to follow instinct at bat at the dangling shiny thing- Tynan leaned closer, sliding a bit on Christabelle's head.
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Posted: Sat Jan 28, 2012 4:48 am
Abigail's watch read "10:32" by the time she had reached the curio store. A small sigh of relief escaped her lips as she could see as she approached that she was not the first one there. There was a boy, young man really, in conversation with her employer. Most likely a fellow new employee, she decided before giggling very quietly to herself. Her giggle was caused by the fact that the orange cat she'd seen lounging around when she had picked up her application was currently perched on top of the head of the owner of the store.
She composed herself and took a deep breath before approaching. She came up as the boy asked a question and since she didn't want to interrupt their conversation, she waited to introduce herself. As she waited, Abigail watched the cat still on the woman's head and a small smile fixed on her face despite herself.
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Posted: Sat Jan 28, 2012 9:11 am
Randy slowed his quick jog as he rounded the last corner that led towards the little antique shop he was headed for. Ahead, he could see that there was a small group of people on and around the porch of Black and Gold. Miss Black, whom he had met when he had inquired about the job, was sitting with her cat in her lap in clothes that even he would call ‘beat-up’. The other two, a boy who seemed close to his age and a young girl, he had never seen before. Miss. Black hadn’t mentioned how many people she was hiring on, that she would’ve to him, but Randy wasn’t entirely certain all of a sudden how things were going to play out. Moving things about and taking out the trash was one thing, but having to deal with people only ever served to complicate matters, in Randy’s experience.
As he drew near the building, Randy slid the large headphones off of his ears, and let them hang around his neck. He didn’t stop the music though, allowing the now faint tunes of shredding guitars coming from the headset to provide his own personal background music. As he came near the porch, he slid his backpack onto just one shoulder, and then used the other to lean against the support holding up the porch’s roof. He gave a single nod towards Miss. Black, once he was confident that she had seen him, and then turned his head to gaze out over the river. The music intensified slightly, reminding Randy that it was there. Not seeing anything that needed his immediate attention, Randy pulled one side of the headphones onto an ear, leaving the other able to hear his surroundings. And as he gazed, and bobbed his head unconsciously in time with the music, he wondered just what exactly he was going to be doing here. Not that he was complaining about doing work, just curious. But then the little bit of common sense in the back of his head smacked him and reminding him that above all else, he needed money. But still, the look and feel of the place made him curious to look inside for some reason.
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