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 Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2016 8:17 pm
It's in that quiet window of time, when they're warm and close and he hasn't had a chance to get weird, yet. She's curled up, face pressed against the bony jut of his shoulder as his hands idly wander, feeling out her personal topography with a freedom that's a far cry the skittish shyness he has at all other times. She'd comfortable and soft limbed, sleepily accommodating restless hands until she hums softly and asks, "What sorta ink is best? For shaping out meaning?" America reaches up to touch the dark curls at Taym's throat.
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2016 9:10 pm
He's had just barely enough time to learn that she grows incoherent if she talks when she's sleepy, and it takes him a moment to register that this is not one of those times, that she means it. In truth the getting weird is already happening, behind his wandering eyes; not least motivated by her wandering hands which are easier to deal with now but not necessarily easy despite that. The constant effort not to betray himself by going tense under her fingers is wearing him down, even now, when the effort is softened and hazy. He tips back his chin, lets her have his neck, a dog offering a vulnerable spot despite its shaking. "Is that a philosophical question?" he ventures.
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2016 9:20 pm
The press of her nose and mouth against his neck soon follows the glancing pressure of her fingers. Inhaling deeply, she answers, "No, I just need to find ink. But it doesn't have to be ink. What sort do you like best?"
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2016 12:59 am
"Ink that isn't necessarily ink is a hell of a large category of things," he points out eventually. "Why do you need to find ink? Ink for what? I had," he adds, somewhat irrelevantly and with a vaguely wistful air that he'd gotten once or twice already on recalling some particularly delicious thing he'd eaten, "some really incredible squid ink pasta once. Seawater, and dark--like oysters, but quiet, if oysters tasted like deep water instead of--like tide pools. And a squid ink baguette with brown butter, another time--god."
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2016 1:05 am
Her teeth graze his neck as she grins against it. "Squid ink...may as well try. Sounds weird enough." Shifting slightly, she answers the question, "It's to learn a piece of magic. Needs something important to me with meaning, something to make marks with be it ink or something other, and magic dust from the Other Place." There's a quiet huff of laughter. "I don't know what I'll do about the dust. Probably clean the whole damn ghost town and put it all in little jars to see what works."
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 9:00 am
There's a long silence. He's still not good at this--whatever this could mean in this particular instance, he's not good at it regardless. He tries to get his hands wandering again but it doesn't stick, and he reaches for his cigarettes instead. "There's a lot to unpack in that," he says finally, flatly, acerbic. "Where do you wanna start, or do you wanna leave me in the dark?"
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 11:58 am
"Do you want to be left in the dark?" America asks the question with solemn eyes, withdrawing a bit as he reaches for cigarettes. She wondered if he'd stay in bed or head over to the door, the window. A countdown to the end of comfortable proximity was beginning. "It's the mice with tiny swords sorta thing, if that helps."
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 12:24 pm
The question is answered as he swings his legs off the bed, unlit cigarette propped in his mouth as he fumbles with his belt. Ivy thumps her tail as he goes past, her chin on her paws, and he stoops to smooth a hand over her ears before he opens the door, the quiet night noise of traffic and motel electricity hums pouring into the comfortable silence. While he might normally take a little care to stand in a doorway in such a way that he is, if not attractive, at least appealingly broody, the backlight is doing him no favors absent a shirt, slicing sharp highlights over every jutting rib that seem to jut a little further every day, nor is the way he fumbles again, this time with his lighter. Some days his hands are worse than others and on the bad days watching him light a cigarette is an exercise in vicarious frustration. "No," he says finally through a hard-won exhale, a lie. "Tell me."
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 2:39 pm
She just looks at him for a few moments before waking up more fully. Stretching her arms, then torso, then legs the girl takes up the remainder of what had been his space on the bed. "I've been to the Other Place. It's where the magic comes from, pretty sure. Where we put those shapeshifters at the library. Last time I ended up there, I made a friend. Fellow named Gloom, a marten of sorts , but all shadows and glowing eyes. If I gather those things, he'll show me how to do the piece of magic they're used for." She smiles suddenly before adding, "When I borrow Mr Bitterberry's eyes, it doesn't give me any headheaches or anything Over There."
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 2:57 pm
"I don't--the real world," he says plaintively, with an agitated jerk of his hand, "--isn't supposed to, to--to follow fairy tale rules. But if it does are you sure that something that's all shadows and glowing eyes-- named Gloom--is gonna teach you something good? What's he teaching you how to do?" This conversation, he thinks, is insane. Not for the first time, the twinge of real and genuine fear that all those late-night irrational panics that he's finally lost his mind weren't so irrational after all. That maybe he took something he shouldn't have and now he's in a place he shouldn't be and doesn't even know it. How are you supposed to test that again? Read something--turn on a light switch. He reaches out and flips the lights on, and then immediately right back off, and doesn't bother to explain why. "I can't tell you what's important to you, anyway, I think that's on you."
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Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2016 3:19 pm
"Because it's an exchange, and I know what's being exchanged. The things I bring in exchange for a bit of knowledge. Maybe it backfires and I might regret it, but if I didn't try, I know I'd regret it. I don't like what if's, they'll circle near forever and drown a person if you let them." She doesn't seem bothered by his agitation, can hardly be surprised by it. "Sides, I like him." The light switch has her sitting up slowly, with a certain resignation. A new form of post-bang weirdness? She begins searching for her panties, just in case. "I've already got that part in my pocket. Just thinking about the second bit, the ink. Not sure if any old sort will do and I like to cover my bases."
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Posted: Tue Jun 21, 2016 8:59 pm
"I feel like if he didn't name any specifics he ought to be satisfied with whatever you bring," he says, and the brooding here isn't staged or attractive, just petulant. "But I also think it's not just him you're trying to satisfy here. So what are your specifics?" He's got nothing for the rest of it--or rather he does; he has lots of thoughts about what if, but none of them need airing. Nor does he ask her what she has that's important; the hint was uncalled-for and he lets it go. And then, impulsively: "How do you go there?" He wants it to be simple. He wants the back of a wardrobe and a sudden snow. He wants to think that he can follow her there, even while he's aware that he doesn't want to.
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Posted: Tue Jun 21, 2016 9:37 pm
She pauses looking for her bra and looks at him, answering simply, "I don't think something like magic should come cheap." Or without thought. "This is the first piece of it I'm trying to earn for myself." America sits back down on the bed and then flops back, gaze fixing on the ceiling. "I met a guy named Zac, he was the first to really tell me about it. Said you could just go through a door and suddenly there it is. A the library, Jeremiah had some sorta visiony thing, he was able to see a portal had opened in an elevator. Bit later, a lady came and created on. But so far for me..." She sighed, "I just turned a corner the first time, and there I was. It was suddenly raining and cold, and it was...a bit of color had been leeched from the world." Turning her head, she gave him a half smile, "Sounds awful, but I don't know...I liked it. Second time I was going through the gate of a cemetery. It'd be nice if I could learn how to go back and forth by my own deciding."
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Posted: Tue Jun 21, 2016 9:49 pm
He considers this for maybe a little longer than one might have guessed, a long and inexplicable silence punctuated by his exhales and then by his flicking the cigarette butt out into the already-clogged and waterlogged gutter. The night noise is swallowed up once again by the closing of the door. "How are you going to find your friend again, then?" He was scooping his shirt off the floor, shrugging into it, and then making an aborted movement towards the chair. Hesitant and not quite touching her, he ended up back on the bed instead, curled around to accommodate her careless flop. "Was it the same cemetery? As the angel."
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Posted: Tue Jun 21, 2016 10:01 pm
"No...there's a lot of them around here, have you noticed? Lot for a town this size, at least. But I guess it's old, probably some pilgrims and s**t buried in a couple." She shifts and then wriggles into the mattress more firmly. "If he's not there, maybe I can just say his name three times." A pause, and then she adds, "Really loudly."
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