It is twenty-nine degrees outside. There is a light snow. There's a gentle breeze and it's starting to look a lot like an actual winter and not the kind of winter that people from southern California are accustomed to.
If winter is going to happen, they're going to do this right.
River's actually an old pro at setting things on fire in the most mundane of senses. She was the one who was in charge of the camp fire as a kid and she spent good chunks of her formative years burning various and sundry things outside in what she later determined was just what one did when you got cold and were bored and you didn't have an actual stove to cook dinner on. It's just a thing.
There's a ring of stones and pinecone-and-"you're late on the rent" notice kindling and whatever the fuck else one needs to start a fire. Text messages were sent out (recreating the Salem witch trials with marshmallows, want to come hang out?) and bags were set aside.
River took a hit off her flask and put it back in her gigantic purse. Exhales. Watches her breath take to the air. Tosses a sacrificial marshmallow on the pire to appease the camp fire gods.
GraceGrace found out via Samir. Hanging out in the outside when it's below freezing isn't at the top of her list of great things to do, really. It's a good thing she likes Sam.
So she shows up, dressed in two pairs of jeans, her grey zip-up turtleneck on under her coat. Maybe overkill for 29 degrees, but you never know.
"Oh, nice. Fire's already started," she says, and rushes over, pulling her hands out of her pocket and warms herself at the fire.
"How's things?"
Sam LakhaniSam has been here for a few minutes by the time Grace arrives. That tendency of his to hemorrhage out of other folks' awareness is a pain in the ass sometimes. If he's going to be hanging out in the park when there's snow and it's colder than Hell then yes. Yes he did bring a bong inside of a backpack onto public transit.
The things he does for River.
He hasn't busted it out of his bag yet but it's sitting on a picnic table bench and unless he has a fully assembled clarinet in that thing there aren't a lot of objects that could drape the canvas like that.
"I told her we should wait until you got here to get it going," he says. Just because he's taken another step towards ascension doesn't mean he's going to stop busting Grace's balls.
SerafíneYeah, sure, alright, okay, thanks winter you fucking asshole, it is twenty-nine degrees outside and snowflakes are falling or not so much falling as drifting and drifting is okay too but: cold right? November and we've still forgotten how-to-be-in-the-cold, the things it does to us, body and breath, skin and blood and bone.
She must've forgotten. Little black dress that pretty much covers her ass and not-much-more. Long (the suggestion of length, the illusion of height) legs bare except for ripped fishnets and black heels wrapped in sharp metal studs, leather jacket framed in studs, zips, a marching line of oversized silver safety pins down the center of the back holds the damn coat together and suggests the elegant symmetry of a bare spine. So: not made for warmth any more than anything else she's wearing.
She doesn't seem to notice the cold though, or maybe each minute without shivering is another big fuck you to the cold front shivering flurries down over Denver at the moment.
--
Didn't get a text about a fire. Has: about a bazillion texts she has received and not returned but for god's sake her phone is working again which means every time it buzzes she can slip it out of her pocket and glance down at the screen and feel: alive, connected, earthbound, and strangely free.
--
And she's walking on the arm of a tall guy with blond hair and a trimmed blond beard and she's wearing those heels and he still has several inches on her, but there they are, walking together like old, old friends, this animated discussion back-and-forth between them. Coming from the city, circling the lake like it's a shortcut they know rather than a place-to-stroll.
Serafíne(Awareness)
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 4, 6, 6, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 5 ) [Doubling Tens]
Serafíne(Awareness -3)
Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (2, 5, 9, 9) ( success x 3 ) [Doubling Tens]
Ihsan GhaliIhsan was sitting nearer to River than anywhere else, with a blanket spread out on the grass beneath them both. She was from Los Angeles-- Southern California. She had been experiencing heat waves and drought for most of the time that she'd been in this country, and she'd spent the majority of her life in Cairo before that.
Ihsan didn't like the flurries because they made her chilled. She'd traveled, she'd experienced cold before, of course. She would just probably never get used to it. So she was bundled up with wool socks under her calf-high black boots, in dark jeans and a black coat. She wore a hat on her head and her hair was out in curls (flat, curling ironed curls) beneath it. No scarf, at least. No gloves either. She was warming herself near the fire, waiting to be able to shed the hat and open the coat.
She was leaned forward, toward the flame, reading some document or another off the screen of her iPhone with an expression of content-but-mild-boredom on her face.
When Grace arrived, Ihsan looked up and smiled fleetingly for a greeting to her. "Hey there, Grace. How are you? Any more murders for me to investigate yet?"
Because who the hell was eavesdropping on them out here, after all?
Kiara[Spidey senses roll.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
GraceGrace squints at Ihsan. "No. I heard, finally, that your 'investigation' turned out well in the end, though. Good for you." There's a bit of exasperation in her tone, but she really means that last sentence. It turned out all right, at least.
"Oh, Sam, there you are," she says to him, gives a little wave. Truth be told, she didn't notice his presence until he spoke. Samir is like that, the fucking ghost... She moves over toward him, sitting on the opposite side of the obvious bong. At least there will come some good out of communing with nature or whatever the hell it is they're doing.
Grace can commune with some nature in the form of weed...
KiaraSo, here's the thing.
Kiara Woolfe, daughter of nature and walking manifestation of Spring (or so her presence feels like, so much pulsing, writhing life) actually rather enjoyed the coming of the cooler months. Less for the stagnancy of them, the way the world felt as if it slowed, preparing to enter a chrysalis before re-emerging on the other side of the dripping frost but for the progression of them. It meant change was (should always have been) coming. It meant that despite whatever happenings in the greater scheme - nature was not fooled, or halted.
She would (had to) find a way to survive.
Pattern and purpose to the cycle. An evening like this, after everything she's recently endured, felt cleansing. The air was crisp and flakes of snow are drifting in the air like a promise - landing only to melt in the Verbena's wild dark hair, the waves of which are loose and curling around her shoulders; over the (faux) fur lining of her coat. Hands folded into pockets, dark jeans and boots and that mouth, as ever, painted a brilliant, stark red.
She must have been sent an invitation - or perhaps River simply conjured her with the fire and mention of her ilk via text. Kiara Woolfe, a lean apparition leaning her weight against a tree with her eyes on the fire.
"If you're going to be faithful to the trials, that fire needs to be twice as large." Her voice curls out after a beat. "I could speak in tongues, though." A waspish tease. "To get things rolling."
River[I totally notice people and resonances. Per+aware]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
RiverRiver has planted herself near Ihsan and, on occasion, gets up to poke the fire and check to make sure said sacrificial marshmallow knows it is in a place of honor- you must burn so that others after you may be delicious. Thus far, she's been pretty happy to just be around people, hair shoved under a hat and her coat isn't pretty but god damn it, it looks like the kind of thing that you would wear if you're going to go out and wander aimlessly through the wilderness.
Laughs when Sam pokes at Grace. Tries to laugh a little less at the bits of exasperation in her tone when Ihsan mentions wanting another murder investigation to paw through.
Then? Kiara is there- someone River hasn't seen in awhile and she waves- fingers uncovered but the rest of her hands seem pretty well shielded from the weather in what can only be described as mittens having an identity crisis.
"I tried to come up with something witty to say to that, but I've drawn a blank," she offers, laughs anyway, "nothing makes marshmallows tastier than the gross misappropriation of justice?"
And, with that, she offers Kiara a coat hanger.
Sam LakhaniIt's too cold for him to even think about sitting down. He may or may not have thermals on underneath his street clothes. He has swapped out the leather jacket for a peacoat and has a ski cap tugged over his hair. His fingerless gloves have a mitten-type option in the form of flaps. It's difficult to strike a lighter when you can't feel your fingers but it's even harder with wool covering your thumb.
"You should," he says to Kiara regarding using glossolalia. "Speaking in tongues is metal."
Ihsan Ghali"Thank you," Ihsan answered Grace's congratulations in working with River and Mike to bring down the Nephandus that had been melding people into two and triggering a murdering spree from someone entirely different, in a surprise twist ending. She smiled and seemed pretty genuinely pleased with herself, then skewered a marshmallow and put it outside the reach of the fire to toast slowly.
Where this bundle of Mages sat must have felt like a goddamn magnet to other magical forces out there. That many rifts in the hard laws of "reality" would make some waves for sure. It was astounding that they hadn't brought trouble down upon their heads already (knock on wood).
Ihsan pulled her hat from her head and smoothed her hair with her palms, then unzipped her coat some to show the top of a charcoal colored shirt. The fire was warming her and the boots and wool socks were starting to feel pleasantly toasty.
Like the marshmallow.
River"I thought I was speaking in tongues once, but then it turns out I apparently knew Sanskrit at one point," she said with a shrug, as though this is a completely... no, she knows this is not a normal thing for people but she passes it off like oh, yeah, sometimes you just remember crap from a past life and have no idea why you know how to do something. Just roll with it, NBD. Sigh. Chakravanti problems.
Grace"I thought yelling while you're simultaneously trying to clear your throat was metal. The things I learn..."
Yes, this many Mages might be a goddamn magnet. If so, let them come. There must be a few more royally stupid things out there who'd like to shove shadows down her throat or something. They could have an actual burning. Fun for the whole family.
Well, okay. Maybe not fun.
She laughs at River, thinking that's a joke she just made. Who doesn't know jack shit about past lives? This Elite.
"Hey, Kiara."
KiaraThe Verbena is still standing off a ways when River holds out that coat hanger, her lip curled up at the edge in a smile that verged on a few things but her eyes: they seemed wholly honed in on her. Watching River with a sudden, total, focus as if by staring long enough she'd be able to tease loose a beat on the other female's mental state.
This is the first time Kiara Woolfe has seen her since news came of Farrah's demise.
It's there, somewhere, in that look and the slow, stretching beat of silence - on the tip of her tongue, to say something of it. A heavy awareness lingers as the brunette eventually kicks off her leaning point and moves into the gathering proper. Ihsan receives a lingering tick of Kiara's eyes as she makes progress and comes close enough to receive the coat hanger.
"Thanks." She accepts it with, and studies River's face again, the firelight drawing gold patterns over the Verbena's neck. The warmth melting snowflakes in her hair. Then there's Samir - and there's Grace and the latter gets a quick, bright smile, but the former -
The regard lingers there.
"I'll keep it mind for a party trick later." She looks at Samir for another moment, then drops down to her haunches and her eyes return to Ihsan. "I don't believe we've had the pleasure yet."
Kiara[Ahem. "keep it in mind," tyvm typo.]
Sam LakhaniJust about any other person looking at him the way Kiara looks at him would normally have him wondering what the hell she was staring at. But Kiara is Verbena and he knows what she's staring at besides. His resonance is noticeable now. He is more of a presence than he was the last time they saw each other.
Granted the fact that she is Verbena means she could be staring at a pissed-off spirit hovering behind him or a blight on his aura or something and he wouldn't know until she said something but Sam has a pretty good idea what has her attention.
He throws up a set of rock horns with the hand not holding onto the backpack and drops into a crouch by the Chakravanti as Ihsan and Kiara get themselves acquainted. Time to light this sucker.
Ihsan Ghali"No," said the North African woman to Kiara. She'd watched the woman as people answered to speaking in tongues-- how it was metal and could be confused for Sanskrit. Ihsan was busy regarding the new dark-haired woman with the bright red lips. Watching her like a lion-- relaxed and assured but watchful none the less.
"I am Ihsan." She smiled and lifted her hand to show her palm in greeting. Hey, that kind of a wave said. Her accent was dense and interesting, different to an ear that's grown accustomed to the Western United States especially. Still, she spoke clearly and had a strong grasp of the English language. She wasn't that difficult to understand.
The marshmallow was brought back and tested with a squeeze of her fingers. It was a little underdone, but apparently that was how she liked them, for she plucked it with her fingers and popped it whole into her mouth. She then pulled her hat back on and zipped her coat back up and rose to her feet.
"I'm going back to make a run to the store for hot dogs and buns. Anyone wanna come with me?"
And whoever did or did not want to come with, so it would be. Ihsan was set on getting hot dogs and returning later with brats instead ("yes, hot dogs, right?").
[Sorry, but I need to roll out early. Bedtime comes quick when your alarm is set for 4:30am]
GraceOh, nice, Sam. Abandon Grace over there. Whatever. She looks over at Sam and River and gives him a little smirk.
Well, she knows how it is.
She turns her hands back and forth to the side of the fire, trying to warm the cold side (which is, of course, the side not nearest the fire at that second).
"Hot dogs too? Awesome," she says to Ihsan, but doesn't move to get up. Not going with.
RiverShe has good days, and she has bad days. There isn't much of a baseline for Kiara to work off of but today? Today seems like a good day. She seems alert and engaged and content to be aware of people. She hasn't punched anyone at work (in fact, she still has a job. The other dancers at the Diamond Cabaret are convinced she must be sleeping with the hiring manager, but realistically River came up in a couple of very positive Yelp reviews. She's a classy lady; classy ladies change the atmosphere enough that you attract clientel who spend more.)
River concludes that Samir is close enough to lean on for a minute, and so she does- it's a momentary breach of space until she realizes oh fuck, Samir is lighting stuff and she stops attempting to assert her manifest destiny on his space.
There is, however, something that stuck on her senses. Brows knit for a second as she remembers that there's a presence that she can't actually place. Though, in the way, she does happen to place its source and finds-
"I'm gonna yell at people," she warns. And then, does raise her voice enough that it carries-
"Dan! Tenemos malvaviscos! Come say hi!"
Sam LakhaniLiving in a trailer by himself in the middle of goddamn nowhere must be doing him some good. A few months ago River would not have leaned on Sam. A slew of variables make today a different day than one plucked random from several months back. He doesn't seem like an individual who would react strong to unprovoked physical contact.
Ihsan takes off to go buy hot dogs and Sam doesn't offer to go with her but he does hand her a twenty out of his billfold before she leaves. Then River is leaning on him and he goes still a moment with the novelty of it. But then she pulls away again and he goes back to packing the bowl.
I'm gonna yell at people.
"Uh oh," he says before he plants the bong in the dirt and covers his ears with his gloves.
KiaraI am Ihsan.
That ignites a flicker of recognition. Apparently, the name meant something to the brunette and she returns the greeting with little nod. An affirmative sort of gesture. Kiara's eyes follow the other woman when she rises to her feet and makes her declaration of a store run. The coat hanger is still being held between Kiara's fingertips, her nails are painted the same shade of red as her lips.
The firelight reflects in the varnish as she twists the wire hanger around in her grasp.
It's a habit, perhaps, watching other people. It's certainly one that the brunette seems to be making an attempt at, the way her dark eyes follow Ihsan and then return to Samir long enough to catch the gesture he makes, long enough to witness the way he positions himself by River.
The way she leans into his space.
The Verbena's gaze drops away, then. This brief constriction of her brows and she drives the edge of the hanger into the hardening earth below, wedging it there as she rises to her feet. Drawing the hood of her coat up so her features all but vanish beneath the furred lining. "I'm going to make a quick circuit for more kindling. There's bound to be some leaves around here.
I'll be right back."
Hard to tell what the pagan's expression is in the moment before she starts moving again, leaning over periodically to kick up leaves being buried by drifts of snow. Shaking loose the less saturated ones.
Sam Lakhani[challenge accepted]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 1, 4, 5, 8, 10) ( success x 3 ) [Doubling Tens]
Kiara[I have a mighty 3 dice now. What? I'm inscrutable.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )
SerafíneOf course she's caught by the wild tangle of resonance surrounding the slow-growing (probably illegal but hey: world of darkness) campfire down by the lake and of course she stops, hooked (fish hook/open eye) right? and sometimes it makes her want to breathe: in and in and in and in like she could inhale the world, feel it bubbling in her lungs. Tonight, instead, she feels skewered like those marshmallows on that coathanger and that hook is an odd little interregnum in their coming-from-someplace and going-to-someplace, an arrest, if you will, an institial moment that feels quite as between-things (places, deeds, names, definitions) as she does.
It's a long-ass walk cutting through the park and the sun has set and the sky has that pillowed, shifting, dead-orange tinge from all the ugly lights reflecting off the close-cropped clouds, the fitful swirls of snow and in the midst of that walk is an exchange between them, all statement and query. Her statement; his query evidence in the way he pauses and glances down at her, face on to her profile, sharp against the darkness. Maybe it is that turn of his head that catches River's attention. The beard and hint of tattoos on his ungloved hands. Some lumpen shadow at his back that will resolve itself into a guitar case when he gets closer.
Which he will soon.
Because: River warns that she is gonna yell at people and then she yells at people and Dan lifts a hand by way of greeting (open palm, mildly ironic twist of his mouth) because what else can he do? Drops his mouth to her ear and bumps his forehead against her temple as he does so: so familiar, so close, so careful with her right now.
--
Takes them longer than you might think when they leave the path. Four inches of melting slush on muddy ground that has not yet been settled into a solid winter freeze and, you know, heels and bare legs do not mix very well but whatever. She's solid on those long legs. Knows how to walk on almost any surface in those heels, but here and there, he gives her a hand.
"Hey folks," Dan, when he gets there. Just a glance and a flash of his palm, as his attention returns to the girl-who-yelled, his mouth curves wider. "River." And his attention hangs there for a lingering beat. "I don't think you've met Sera, have you?"
Grace"Hey, Dan," Grace says, through the fire's heat. He's a wavy-lined Dan to her. "Hey, Sera."
She smiles with her eyes at the newcomers to the circle of fire, but then returns her attention to the flames.
"You going to play for us?" she asks the fire. Obviously it's more for Dan than anyone, but who knows. Maybe she really does mean to ask the fire.
Sam LakhaniLast time Sam saw Sera and Dan he was in Quiet. Which means the last time he actually remembers seeing them was at a house party. Which means he was stoned when he showed up and not in much better shape when he left around three o'clock in the morning.
Something in Kiara's gaze has him checking his own expression. He lowers his hands after River has yelled about marshmallows to the Cultist and her consor and lifts one to wave but it's an awkward sort of wave. A not-knowing-how-to-act-in-this-situation wave.
The bong is packed and ready to go. He is not the first one to light it. It sits like an offering beside the fire and then Sam stands from his crouch and takes a few steps back from the circle to light a cigarette.
River"I have not," she carries things like she is used to carrying things because, well, this is just another social situation and River is a social creature. Sees a man with a guitar and his friend who is a spindly but striking creature.
She offers them a coat hanger, like this was a worthwhile offering.
"I told everybody that we were reenacting the Salem with trials with marshmallows, but I don't actually know how to hang a marshmallow so, uh, morbid joke completely lost."
KiaraShe does, in fact, return after a while with a handful of leaves cupped in her hands (trust the earth witch to deliver on such a promise) and carries them dutifully to the small fire; dropping them in a drift of crumbling pieces into the flames where they are greedily consumed and send up the vague, earthy aroma of foliage as it crackles and curls in on itself.
She's brushing her hands off when Dan and Sera make their approach and the Verbana's dark eyes, dramatized more-so by the liner she's applied to them turn to regard both, her hood pushed back far enough now that strands of dark hair are visible where they slither and curl at her neck, the thick waves of it half tamed by her coat.
"Good to see you, Dan. Sera." The latter's name offered with this quiet, delicate touch of meaning. The Verbena's supple mouth pulled into a little half-curl. She tosses the last handful of leaves toward the fire and and nudges at a stray, escaping one with a boot. Urging toward its demise.
A flicker of some darker, answering humor dawns in the Verbena's eyes as she watches the flames. "Burning them alive has always been a crowd favorite." There's this tiny shadow that falls over Kiara's face as she turns it into the treeline, as if searching for the source of a noise.
"Or so I've heard."
Serafíne"Hey Grace," Dan-to-Grace, through the flames. This quirk, like a smile but checked a bit, framed by the beard. "We could, if you wanted. Couple songs, maybe. We've got a gig though, so we can't stay too long. Sort of a welcome-back thing for Sera, so it'd be pretty shitty if we didn't show. Any requests?"
--
Dan didn't see Sam when Sam was in Quiet. He was waiting in the van, engine off but still ticking in the heat of the day. Watched her leave and come back and knew something was hanging over her when she climbed back in the passenger door. Didn't know how bad it was until she collapsed. Took him forever to scrub the blood out of the upholstery, but he managed it.
Dan gives Sam the self-same quirk-of-a-smile-thing that Grace received and there's nothing awkward about it. Something: prompting, quiet, solicitous in the way he handles Sera in the moment though, cutting a lashed glance down at her profile.
"River this is Sera. Sera, River. So, now you've met."
Sera takes in this: bright, crisp inhale then. "Hey." And it is all very, strangely self-contained, though River has no real context for this, but maybe she's simply: stoned, already, somehow. When Kiara returns with her promised leaves, something a little more animate: warm, less constrained gets woven into her name, "Kiara."
"What about you, River. Any requests?"
That's Dan, he seems to think music is necessary right now and he's letting go of Sera long enough to lift the guitar case over his head and shoulders.
Sam LakhaniAs he traipses further from the fire he puts his back to it and the people around it. He meets Grace's gaze quick and continues his traipsing. They're all sitting around a fire that is giving off a good amount of heat and no small amount of smoke but he wants to keep his carcinogens to himself. What a guy.
He ends up over by Grace again anyway. She's the furthest away from the fire and she's sitting down and he's taller than her when she's standing up.
"You see that thing on Jitbit," he asks, "about the guy who would write cron-jobs for anything that took him more than ninety seconds?"
Grace"Uhhh. No? Sorry. I'm terrible at music-y things," she says. "Something you like."
Her favorite 'song' at the moment is a guy screaming at people to install Gentoo over a throbbing beat, and there's no guitars in it. And if there were, you couldn't play it without a computer.
Samir saves her by talking nerdy at her. "Nope. Sounds fun though."
River"Ukelele anthem!" because something with four chords was totally worth Dan's prowess as a musician. She has managed to piece together though that the bearded man is to music what she is to dancing.
River has made her way over to the communal bong, started on with the necessary prep work because she has no problems being the first person to take a hit for the evening.
"I have full intention of getting ripped and asking people to dance, so- does that inform your decision?"
Sam Lakhani"You need to get a coffee maker with an SSHD. Then you could figure out how long it takes you to walk from the library to the kitchen and, like, have it start brewing and then wait before pouring it into a cup. The guy called it fuckingcoffee.sh or something equally poetic."
It's way colder over here than it is by the fire what the fuck Grace. He finds it difficult to bitch about the cold after the other night though so he digs his smartphone out of his jeans pocket and starts tapping buttons.
"Hang on, I'll send it to you."
KiaraShe moves a little closer to the Cultist, Kiara, her hands finding her coat pockets.
It's a dark navy form fitted thing that hugs in around her narrow waist with a zip and a hood that's lined with a mottled fur trim along the edges and sleeve-ends. The lining was synthetic but it cast the brunette with that twinge of something a little wilder none the less - something she seemed to be manifesting tonight. A certain aloofness in the way she held herself away from the others.
Standing rather than sitting as if her presence were as limited as the two en route to a gig.
She's watching the fire again, the pagan and there's something to that, the way the flames licking and curling into the air, the smoke and the tiny snaps and pops of burning debris, contain and hold her focus. They spoke enough of the Spirit Mages to allow for some assumptions to be made regarding the distraction of the Verbena. Perhaps she was meditating on the way the fire feels to her or senses some fluctuation in the Park itself.
It's the stillness, though. That makes it singular. Her eyes don't leave the fire to comment wryly: "As long as it's not Kumbaya."
SerafíneEmpathy + Perception - aloofness? Empathy Spec: Seeing Past the Mask.
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 8, 8) ( success x 6 ) [Doubling Tens]
Serafíne"Couldn't even begin to compete with Amanda Palmer." Dan tosses back to River with another supple, subtle expression rising to the surface and sinking back beneath. "Plus I misplaced my goddamned ukelele somewhere between Raleigh and Denver - "
" - you left it in fucking Macon," Sera interrupts and Dan isn't expecting that and he cuts a sort of searching glance back down at her face and she's giving him a mildly pointed smirk that subsides as quickly as it arose in the first place, dark eyes cutting away from him. Lingering on Kiara as the Verbena circles the fire and starts watching the flames: that singular stillness.
"Apparently I left it in Macon, which isn't between Raleigh and Denver at all. Point is: never replaced. Closest I have is a mandolin and that's back at the house. How about a country song, since we've got a bonfire. Ever heard of Jason Isbell?"
GraceGrace pulls out her own phone, and now -- true to stereotype -- the two Mercurial Elites of the party are staring into their phones in the great outdoors, communicating to each other with them while the rest get all sociable.
And it's about a shell script named fuckingcoffee.sh.
It is fucking hilarious though, and has Grace laughing at her phone. "Ohh, man. Kumar-asshole.sh. Lol," she says. And yes, she actually says the word lol as if it were one. In-jokes are a thing over here.
"He had a cron job for hangover excuses. I think I want to try that. Not that I need to call in at work, hah."
Sam LakhaniBy the time Grace receives the link Sam has moved onto other things. On his phone. They are living the dream over there.
"Yeah but still. You see the words 'vampire' or 'Washington Park' or 'police' on Ginger, you can just have that bad boy fire off and not have to deal with it."
He's joking. Hangovers aren't an excuse when you're BFF with a Verbena.
KiaraThere's clearly something on Kiara's mind. A certain ... it feels like the lingering aftermath of something. An emotional bruising she's nursing. Some unspoken trauma. There's almost an edge of something sharp and dismissive in the things she says tonight. The humor is there as always but it's flavored with a sort of punctuation.
She looks as if she's deliberating on whether or not to stay. And as if looking into the campfire is soothing to her, for whatever the reason. Unsettled, edgy. The impression that Sera is getting from Kiara Woolfe right now is that whatever is on her mind, distracting her, provoking a sharper tongue - it's not anything she wants to discuss.
At least, not here. Not with the gathered.
RiverShe's holding her breath while he's talking, nods. Pays attention because, no, one can't compete with Amanda Fucking Palmer. No, she has not heard of Jason Isbell and eventually she exhales. It's a long, slow breath like meditation because why the fuck shouldn't getting stoned be like meditation?
"We lived outside of Macon for two months during peach season," River clarifies, "you would think that I would have picked up something about country music in Georgia but it was all Willie Nelson."
Which is weirdly appropriate.
"So, you guys are in the same band?"
GraceGrace snorts. "Yeah, that's what I need. A 'Handle Emergency' cron job. Just fire it off, and it will do everything that takes more than ninety seconds."
Which, you know, includes taking care of whatever the latest thing to happen in Washington Park is.
"I have never heard of Jason Isbell," she says, into her phone. If anyone were thinking she wasn't paying any attention...
Serafíne"Willie Nelson is kind of a badass," Dan tosses back to River as she is getting high. "He did this cover of Pancho and Left that is one of the most perfect things on the planet. If that's what you took away from two months in Georgia outside of Macon, you could've done alot worse."
--
There's work to be done. Like, you know: tuning. The overtones of fingers-on-strings, that strange, patterned language, the internal tones as he listens to the acoustic he was carrying-through-the-park and it should've been an electric but: maybe magick? There's a fire and no outlets and Sera doesn't even really quite understand that she knows Forces magick and she has been capable of it for two fucking years.
"Afterparty at my place," this to Kiara. Supple, subtle thing, the invitation a coil of smoke from the strangely-reserved creature. (Maybe: to River she will always be like this: first.) " - when the bar closes. Two, two-thirty? You should stop by."
--
"Yeah, we're in the same band." Dan, to River. "Don't usually do country but he's a killer songwriter and we always have a few off-the-wall covers up our sleeves." Glances sidelong at Sera. "Elephant, then Super 8?"
"Fuck, Dan, that's like tearing someone's heart out, shredding it, then smoking a bowl of the remnants, getting so stoned you wander into traffic and figure out how to make the stars shut down."
He favors her with a quick, quiet smirk. Likes that spark of animation in her eyes and voice.
"Used to be with this band called the Drive-By Truckers," Dan-the-hipster tells Grace. "It's more alt-country than country. He doesn't sing about how sexy girls are when they hang out in trucks or how fun it is to hang out in trucks and get drunk in corn fields so he's probably not gonna get on commercial country radio."
Serafíne(Hey I can has dice. Dan - guitarishness?)
Dice: 8 d10 TN5 (1, 3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6) ( success x 3 ) [Doubling Tens]
Serafíne(This is for mah next post, and oh Dan. :( Sera: singing?)
Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 5 ) [Doubling Tens]
Sam Lakhani"You do. You need this so hard."
Break from reality over. Sam shoves the phone back into his pocket and wanders back over to the fire. That's where he left the bong and his backpack anyway. When he comes to stand beside River it's almost as if by coincidence. It's easy to forget he exists when he isn't talking.
"Hit me," he says and holds his hand out for the bong.
KiaraIt's been lightly snowing tonight, as if the weather hadn't quite settled on what it desired but the drifts of it come down, every so often. Can't penetrate far where the fire is of course, melt before they're close to that emanating source of heat but they find placement in hair, on sleeves. Kiss the edge of cheeks and it's after one of these finds Kiara's that her fingers emerge from her pockets and she sweeps a hand up.
Suddenly alert to the surroundings, tipping her chin up to stare up at the dark skies, at the clusters of trees. Touching her face as if she'd forgotten, momentarily, where the source was of the sudden dampness on her face.
She brushes it aside and turns her face, just slightly, at Grace and Samir's conversation. Her attention captured by the mention of vampires, by Ginger and Washington Park and handling situations. The Verbena's eyes drop away and she bends down to find a leaf, lashed to the side of her boot, pasted there by the snow. Squats there and peels it off, carefully uncurling the edges.
"They're amazing. You should hear them play a gig sometime." This, almost absently to River at her question as the Verbena twists the leaf around, sets it open on her palm and curls her fingers around it. Finds the other woman's gaze through the flames. Holds there a beat.
Pulls up, opens her fingers and crumbles up the leaf, smears it over the flames. Glances at Serafine as she offers an after-party at Corona Street. "Yeah." Those red lips quirk, give over to one of her smiles, the pagan. Flash of teeth. Curl at the corner that makes it that side of crooked.
"I'd like that." She doesn't offer more, say they should talk. Just - studies Serafine's face for a moment as if committing it to memory and then returns her eyes to the campfire.
GraceGrace follows Sam, her face still stuck in her phone though. Light from the phone paints her face with blue, battling it out with the fire.
Well, maybe she won't be their chaperone or anything. Grace just wants a hit.
"I don't even know a thing about commercial country radio. Girls hanging out in trucks?" she shrugs. Whatever, to that.
River"I'm not a pretty crier," she tells Dan and his cultist-friend, "Sam and Grace can attest."
And it's true. though she isn't sure if Grace has seen her cry from underneath the mountain of blankets beyond the little giggling whimpter of a happy ending amidst the zombie apocalypse. River is pretty committed to her makeup staying on tonight, though, because it's cold and her face can feel it and somehow being freezing bakes on your foundation.
She's standing, has the bong in hand and hands it off to him like this is some sacred rite- like this was the passing of the Olympic torch instead of, you know, just hanging a guy a bong and calling it good.
"And hanging out of trucks and getting drunk in corn fields is fun if you can find a cornfield... does colorado have corn fields?"
Bonus points if it's not your corn field.
SerafíneSera isn't wrong about that pairing of songs and Dan needs space to move to play and she steps away from him, careful in her ridiculous goddamned heels but god she can move in them, even on the spongy, half-frozen ground.
The cold, the goddamned snow mean that Dan's bare fingers are stiff as they skim over the strings but he pulls the first evocative chords out of the instrument and there is something quite remarkably intimate about the way they balance each other; about the way they watch each other, rhythmic, familiar. This point where she takes in a breath like she's about to join him, but no, and he just repeats those opening bars, eyes on her face, the dance of reflected light in her eyes.
Elephant starts off all-quiet, reflective, nostalgic, but you get pretty early that the song's as close to a requiem as you can get for someone still alive. Unsentimental, ("If I'd fucked her before she got sick / I'd never heard the end of it") clear-eyed - goddamned sad. Sera sings it alternately watching Dan's hangs and staring into the fire and when her voice is supposed to soar, goddamned, it soars -
We'd burn these joints in effigy,
cry about what we used to be,
and try to ignore the elephant somehow.
I buried her a thousand times,
giving up my place in line,
but I don't give a damn about that now.
--
River is committed to keeping her make-up intact tonight but by the end of that there are tears in Sera's eyes and on her cheeks, and both her mascara and her eyeliner are waterproof but there's the eyeshadow too, which isn't. Maybe it just adds to her rock-star vibe and there's no time to dwell on the chord that strikes up in her or how deeply and feelingly she sings or whatever is happening in her or anyone else because: Super 8's a honky-tonk barn-burner and yes, River, you can dance to it. You could probably take off all your clothes to it, and there's not enough time to catch your breath between them:
Having such a sweet night
Audience is just right
Drinking like a pirate do
Don’t want to sleep yet
Buddy it’s a good bet
I’ll raise more hell than you -
And the song keeps going. There's paramedics, pedialyte, and maybe a defibrillator. Haven't we all had nights like that?
So, yeah. That's the impromptu concert. When it's wrapping up, Sera-and-Dan aren't hanging around for hits from the bong, they're packing up. Have somewhere to be: and soon.
Serafíne(The songs:
Elephant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg1oYRo9yVk
Super 8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Fr2Gv3HyqA )
River[I'm totally good. Manip+sub]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )
RiverShe's a good audience member, though halfway through the first song she determines that she's going to need a second hit. There's silence, because she knows it isn't polite to applaud but eventually she does because it was really fucking good and she can appreciate a good performance regardless of the responses that it provokes out of her.
"Go have fun!" is what she says out of haze, eyes back to the fire for a moment.
Kiara[Per + Empathy on River: is she?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 6) ( success x 1 )
KiaraMusic has that way about it, of course. Good music can lift you. Inspire you. Tear you to pieces with nothing more impressive than the slow build of a guitar, a note sculpted and held. The Verbena's been witness to Serafine and Dan performing before - she knows they're that good.
She'd said about as much to River, only moments before.
Music has that way and at some point during the first song the Verbena's dark eyes place River's face again and she watches it; watches the way the firelight plays over it. Watches her the way she had when she first turned up, leaning against that tree in the shadows as if she were an interloper rather than one of the invited.
Whatever Kiara Woolfe does or doesn't see it takes until the end of the song for her to look down, to tip her chin down and draw her hood back up and bury her hands deep into her pockets. She's not inscrutable, the healer. Not accustomed to trying to be, to concealing whatever thoughts or feelings skim across her face.
She's only beginning to understand the ways she can protect her own mind from infiltration.
So maybe there's that glimpse before she draws it up, after she drags her eyes from River's face, where that's clear. What the music does to her. How it presses down on that bruise she's wearing, however deep it runs, however she's attempting to disguise it. A twist across her mouth, a haunted quality to fine dark eyes.
She stands there, hood drawn while the second number happens. That stillness settling back in. She doesn't applaud at the end of it but she does draw her hands out of her pockets, does move to press a hand against the Cultist's shoulder as she makes some bid for departure might not even understand how to articulate.
"You sounded great." She affirms and there's this brief glance back at the gathered. "I've gotta go guys. I'll catch you later."
SerafínePer + Empathy, River.
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 3, 3, 3, 5, 6, 10) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]
River"See ya," she says. Smiles and gives a wave and she seems fine. She seems fine and of course she is fine, because River has never given any indication that she is not anything other than fine, even when she has to turn off large portions of her brain to keep up the ruse. She is committed, you see. She is committed to any number of things, but right now she is committed to the idea that she is not going to be emotionally wrought over the fact that there was a song that moved her in such a fashion that she's waxing close to nostalgic.
She wears it well, that denial. She wears it like it's a shield and she carries a sword and in some other life she was some brave gladiator. still is.
she'll process later.
"Graaaaace," she says, offers her a hand, "do you know how to tango?"
GraceGrace gives River a squinty-eyed look, and then makes a grab at the bong. Tango? The fuck, River. Going to break the poor woman. She takes a hit, holds it, lets out a smokey, creaky "No."
But still, she adjusts herself, hands the bong over to Sam, and stands rather stiffly as she holds her arms out -- one of them positioned like it might hold on to somebody, the other in the air above her head like it might be holding another's hand.
She's never really cared about looking ridiculous, Grace.
"Show me?"
RiverRiver looks at Grace and the look on her face can only be described as delight. She steps in, holds her up arms and preens like she's an instructor because, at her core, she can be an instructor of sorts. She's a good enough that she doesn't seem to have a problem.
She beams.
Moves her arms down a little.
"This is probably going to come up again with me. Just for reference."
Serafíne"Stop by later, yeah?" Sera to Kiara, as Dan is packing up the guitar. A longer glance at River, then, sharper. This almost bruising awareness about her that gets honed in that moment until it gleams, and that's what she was made to be right there, bright, aching, in the moment. A hitch of awareness that hooks, catches, dissipates.
Lovely as the edge of an ever-elusive rainbow.
--
Had she been aware of recent history, she might not have chosen that song. She wasn't. Isn't. Couldn't've gotten on Ginger if she'd wanted to: her phone didn't fucking work. Dan checks it anyway and he couldn't see her, and he kept it up but mostly he was looking for anything from anyone about her. No dice.
All of that etches the air around them. Frames out both the intimacy of their interactions and that strange reserve that Sera breaks out of only in these odd flashes of awareness.
--
"You should drop by too."
And she could be saying that to anyone or everyone, but she's not. Mostly, she means River. Unspoken in there: no more sad songs tonight. "The Edgefield."
And off they go.
