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 Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 7:35 pm
Maxem heaved her bag to a more comfortable spot on her shoulder, grinning like a mad woman for the fact that she had finally found it while on the way over to her new trailer-home. She had spent two days and a night wandering about like a vagabond, and was more than overjoyed to finally have a roof over her head and a bed to sleep on.
She looked at the trailer with a prudent eye as she tried to see just what it was about this trailer that turned her off. It wasn’t shiny, nor bright like Scarlett’s trailer. This was dulled, and if she squinted just right, she could not places where paint had been scratched off and repainted with a different shade.
She hoped, no, prayed that the inside would not be so badly as she hesitantly knocked on the trailer door.
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Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 7:47 pm
Hearing the knock, Lucrezia set down her needle, thread, and leotard and headed towards the door. After dancing around Wing Ting's vacant nest of sheets to get there, she opened it and poked her head out, coming face to face with an unfamiliar red haired woman.
"Bon soir?" she stated. The words were stuck in limbo between a greeting and a question, it seemed. "Who're you?"
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Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2006 8:28 pm
It was times like these that Maxem really regretted skipping out on her lessons as much as she had. Fortunately, she had been drilled in French enough to get the general feel.
Of course, speaking was an entirely different matter; not that it stopped her from butchering the French language, though.
“Ah… Uhm… Je suis contente à rencontrer vous.” She was sure that statement probably made no sense at all, but she tried to continue on anyway, simply to be polite; anyone starting a conversation in a language other than English generally used that language as their primary way of conversation. Maxem was hoping to gain some bonus points by putting this girl in her comfort zone.
“Je m’appelle Marien Mulligen.” At least she was fairly confident in that statement.
‘Oh, forget being polite! I’ll just use English anyway! Everyone else here seems to speak it.’
“Pardon my French, actually. I’ve never been very punctual when it came to lessons.”
She peeked up to the woman, trying to see if she was about to be reprimanded or just stared at in disbelief. If she was going to be living with her, she wanted to make a good impression. In hindsight, she could have just said something very insulting to the woman without even knowing it.
'Curses, this is why classes are made!'
“And I have been assigned to live here from now on.” She babbled on hesitantly, trying to compensate for her earlier mistake.
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 3:35 am
Lucrezia blinked at the woman for a moment before shrugging and beckoning her in.
"I was wondering when someone else was going to show up," she said, leading her into the main room where six very basic looking beds were lined up, three on either side. "After all, there's only two of us in here right now."
She turned and extended a hand towards the woman. "I'm Lucrezia Falco. You said your name is Marien?"
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 7:01 pm
Maxem gracefully yet forcefully shook Lucrezia’s hand, smiling sweetly and offering her greeting once more, this time in English. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Lucrezia.”
Once the greeting was complete, she set to her main task; analyzing the room.
While it was in better shape than she expected, it was still drab and not at all styled. The cots were all the same style with the same sheets, and it mildly resembled an army room rather than an exciting circus! The bed covers should all be different; there should be strange paintings of long gone performers everywhere! Where was the glam? What made this something worth while?
Well, no. She took her earlier statements back. Any army would be clean enough to not have a mess of blankets (that Maxem thought looked almost like a bird’s nest) on the floor.
“Can you… please explain this? Are there pets in here or something?”
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 7:10 pm
Lucrezia looked around for a moment before realizing that the new roomate was looking at Wing Ting's sheets. She laughed.
"Not pets," she giggled, "Wing Ting."
And then, realizing that probably didn't help, she explained, "Short girl. About my age. She can't get onto the bed, so she's got all her sheets on the floor. Does that make sense?"
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 7:30 pm
“Wait… Just how old are you?” She strolled over to one of the beds that looked to be unowned, and sat down, bouncing a bit on the mattress and gaging how low the bed actually was.
“You’d have to be six to not reach this thing. And you most certainly don’t look six, might I add.”
‘Wait, Marien. You’re at a circus! Oh, god, you’ve just insulted the midget girl, I bet!’
“Oh, wait… She wouldn’t happen to be one of the… acts?”
As tactless as she was, she was at least trying to be polite.
As polite as one could get while sitting on a dingy cot in a trailer, of course. Scowling at her bed cover, she scratched at a spot on it for a moment before finally giving up and focusing her attention fully on Lucrezia again.
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 7:41 pm
"Sixteen," replied Lucrezia, flopping ungracefully onto her own bed. "Wing Ting has this wand thing that makes these fantastic bubbles. She's funny."
She paused, considering the remark about being six. "And she's about the size of a six-year-old, if it's any consideration."
There was another pause.
"So, what are you hoping to do around here?"
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Posted: Mon Dec 11, 2006 9:27 pm
Maxem nodded as she listened to Lucrezia’s description of Wing Ting, getting a mental image that was probably the exact opposite of what Wing Ting actually looked like.
They were sixteen; that meant that Maxem was four years older than them. Lucrezia had mentioned that they were the only two… So did that make Maxem the mother goose? Would she have to take care of them? First she gained Grete as a sister, and now was she to gain daughters too? She felt she must surely be too young for that.
“I’m a technician, actually. “ She was a bit startled at trying to explain what she did, and blushed as she put a strand of hair behind her ear. “I know, I know. ‘She can’t be a technician! She’s a woman!’ But I assure you, I know what I am doing. I’ve been in my field for as long as I can remember.”
She looked around the room again, noting a fine layer of dust on some of the beds and looking disdainfully at the unvarnished wood and unpainted walls of the room.
“I hate to change the subject so soon… But are we really expected to stay here? The room seems unfinished…”
‘At the very least,’ Maxem thought to herself, ‘I am going to clean this place up. From top to bottom, into tiptop shape. Maybe if I can find some cheap fabric, I’ll make some different covers… Maybe I can even convince them to let me work on the walls and floors~’
Giddiness was slowly but surely creeping through Maxem as she thought of all the possibilities that could be made with the room. Her inner woman was really getting out and screaming that they needed a good set of drapes.
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Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2006 3:49 am
Lucrezia, who had never hear anything along the lines of women not being able to be technitions, gave her an odd look.
"I think we're expected to be here until we qualify for our own trailers," she shrugged, not really sure.
She looked around the room. Now that she considered it, it really could use some love.
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Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2006 9:01 pm
“Then we really ought to spiff this place up, honestly.”
She gave another glance around before getting up and lugging her canvas bag to the bed she had apparently claimed as her own. She opened it up a bit and fitted about looking for a rag or tissue package of some sort. Removing a blonde wig, shaking it out and placing it gently on the bed, she then retrieved a brown one which was gingerly laid beside it. As she looked over her wigs, she couldn’t help but notice that the brunette wig did resemble Grete’s hair to an extent; mayhaps she would tease Grete about this later.
Finally, after her hair distraction, Maxem came across a blue handkerchief. She scowled at it before rubbing gently on the bed frame. It made a difference, to be sure.
“What do you say; would you like to help me get this place in tip-top shape? Nothing like making a place home by cleaning it up.”
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Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 3:50 am
"D'accord," replied Lucrezia, just now realizing how messy it was. Though perhaps the 16th and 19th centuries had different definitions of clean. Neither she nor Wing Ting had found there to be any problem with their accomadations.
"Honestly, we hadn't noticed."
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Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 7:02 pm
Maxem let out a little bit of a chuckle, covering her mouth in order to seem polite. She still didn’t want to make a bad impression.
“You’re going to be quite a hoot; I’m taken back to my younger days of class already. I take it French is your first language, correct?”
She had set to removing the rest of her contents as she waited for a reply. Peering in, she noticed and array of dresses she could put on… But Charlot’s shirt smelt like him, and he didn’t particularly smell bad.
Had it been other any man’s shirt, she probably still would have refused to take it off; the smell of men drove her batty.
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Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 7:34 pm
"C'est vrai," nodded Lucrezia, studying Marien intently. She was wearing what looked like a man's shirt, which wasn't particularly odd. Except for that she recognized that particular shirt.
Lucrezia wasn't naive, but she didn't want to assume, either.
"Er, why are you wearing Charlot's clothes?"
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Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 8:12 pm
Raising an eyebrow at the question, Maxem wondered just how close everyone at this cirque was.
“Well, because he didn’t have any dresses, naturally.”
She had hoped that would be enough of an explanation, because she really did not want to explain getting doused by a drunk woman and then changing in front of Charlot. No, that would be too much to let out so soon.
She set back to unpacking, hoping to avoid any more questions into the subject.
“So, where should we start cleaning?”
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