[Littleton] It was late afternoon bleeding into night. The sun slunk ever lower on the horizon, broadening ever fatter, ever fuller, red and resplendent, until it slipped beneath the seas and was swallowed up whole. Emily has finished her classes on campus, held her office hours, checked in at the lab, and wrapped up as many loose ends on this Tuesday as possible. This route brings her by the farmer's market to pick up some things for dinner and onward, taking public transport and her time, toward Chuck's.
It has been warm today, so there's a lightweight sweater over her summery dress and not much more. Her hemline flirts around her knees again, swirls and sways as she makes her way up the stairs, down the hallway to his door. The messenger bag is present, as it almost always is, and she has to set the carrier bags down to knock (just twice) on his door.
It's a nice thing, a fairly normal thing, a just because it's Spring or even a seeing each other thing. It is also an Emily and Chuck thing: her ransoming his kitchen for the promise of a delicious meal and company. Either which way, the Orphan stands on his door step with a smile and unbound curls. Not a bad way to end the day.
[Carmichael] Oddly, it's not Chuck that answers the door, but a short and hairy man about Chuck's age, who looks at Emily with wide eyes . . . which travel up and down her. He isn't moving out of the doorway yet, and it takes a long moment before he says anything.
"You're the lovely letter Em, aren't you. Chuck!"
"I've got hot dogs on here - don't want to run my . . ."
"Dude, forget the hot dogs."
"Is everything okay, Steve? I don't think I've ever heard . . ."
"It's not anyone trying to save your soul. Unless she is! I'd let her save mine."
"You don't have . . . her. You said her."
And there's Chuck, moving quickly, coming in from the deck outside. It's a gorgeous day, and he's wearing jeans and a t-shirt with 'there's no place like 137.24.8.103' blazoned across his chest. His already wearing his apologetic look, though that shifts subtly when he sees her and the dress she's wearing, and can't help looking her over in much the same way that Steve did.
"Hey, Little. Ignore the troll under my bridge - he's harmless, I promise. You wanna come in?"
"Troll under your bridge? You wound me, Chuck, seriously."
[Littleton] Oh, so terribly amused. Little, as Chuck calls her, is so terribly amused. It is almost difficult to contain, but she manages somehow, with but a wry quirk to her smile when she looks past the shorter man and on to ...
... But that isn't how it begins. Let's start at the beginning! With Emily, waiting, one hand's fingers wrapped around the strap of her messenger bag, a puddle of grocery bags at her feet, a thin black sweater covering her arms (sleeves pushed up the elbows). Dark hair spilling in loose but ordered curls past her shoulders.
The door opens and she is (expecting Chuck) looking at quite the wrong elevation. There's a flicker, now, brow creasing as she glances down to meet the gatekeeper's gaze. Steve is shorter than she is. He's talking, and she can hear the Midwest riddled through every phrase. The look he gives her garners a look in response, but it's hard to take the cautionary warning in her eyes seriously when she's wearing that smile. (Come, said the spider to the fly [Come into my parlor]).
Emily let him run his mouth for awhile, instead of stopping him. Instead of confirming or denying his queries.
Which brings us back to terribly, terribly amused.
"Hey, Chuck," she says, and the consonants catch a little more than is purely necessary. "And pleased to meet you, Steve." A little nod for the troll, who is still barring entry, as much as the groceries around her feet. There is an odd shape to her smile (contained mirth) and a fondness in he way she looks to the taller geek that is, undeniably, a little more than purely friendly.
"I went by the farmer's market. I was going to offer to make dinner but... is that hot dogs I smell?" Oh, yes, this is Emily setting Steve up for something. She is pretending (devilish woman) to contain her scorn for the American favorite (and Chuck's only culinary triumph).
On the matter of coming in, she asks the troll to "Be a dear and help me bring these in, please?" In that accent, with that smile.
[Carmichael] "Yeah, Steve, grab a couple of bags and take 'em to the kitchen."
"I thought you were kidding when you said she came over to cook."
"Keep it up and you're going home."
"Oh, I get it. Danger, danger Will Robinson! At least she likes hot dogs?"
".....yeah, something like that. Here," he says, stepping around the much shorter Steve to grab a couple of bags, and to flash Em a smile, an apologetic look, and a wink. Said bags are promptly handed to Steve, which forces him to take them to the counter, at least, and gives Emily enough room to step inside, even as Chuck grabs the rest of the bags to bring in.
"Hey," he says and leans in to kiss her cheek. "Sorry. It was a surprise visit, you know? He drove from Aurora and ambushed me. And he's not so bad, really, when you get to know him.
[Littleton] She can't help. Her shoulder shake a little with withheld laughter when he leans in to kiss her, and Emily turns enough to wrap an arm around him briefly -- while the troll is otherwise occupied -- to hold him in a loose embrace for a moment. She returns his kiss with one of her own, placed just on the underside of his jaw, and catches his eyes for a moment. Mischeif plays in them, for better or worse.
"No worries," she says, still grinning. "It will be nice to get to know one of your friends," she adds, with that purposeful lilt. Playful. Dangerous. Then she's stepping out of her shoes to leave them by the door, shrugging her messenger bag's strap over her head and leaning it next to her shoes, and making her way to the kitchen.
"So, Steve," she says, her voice mellifluous and tinged with hints and notes of far away places. "How long has you two known each other."
You see. Chuck hacked her history to get to know Emily a little bit better. Emily would need to do no such thing. She started putting things away in Chuck's fridge, and to the longer standing friend-of-Chuck it would seem almost as if she knew her way around the space better than Chuck did himself.
"Do you two mind if I put together a salad to go with the hot dogs? They had such lovely greens at the market; I couldn't resist."
[Carmichael] Emily can't help it and Chuck, too, is amused (but wary) - he becomes more so when Emily starts asking questions of Steve, who clearly says what he's thinking, or at least what's close to the surface.
"Oh, since grade school. Chuck was new to the school. I was getting beaten up by a Valkyrie. Chuck fixed it. The . . . getting beaten up part, not the Valkyrie."
"I still, after all these years, have trouble believing you could have said something so stupid to Tanya Vale, of all people. Sometimes, Steve, I have no idea what's going through your head."
There's a look, sharp, that passes from Chuck to his friend . . . and goes ignored.
"Anyway, he invited me over to play some video games after school, and a fast friendship was born. I still have a crush on . . ."
Chuck's throat clears. "Tanya? Isn't she in roller derby and a lesbian now?"
".....right, right, Tanya." Steve's brow furrows briefly, but it's gone quickly, whatever it was. "Anyway, his mom cooked for us, and we've been buddies since. He's a great guy, Chuck is. Good friend to have."
[Littleton] "That he is," Emily agreed, readily, grinning at Steve and then turning that winning smile over to Chuck. It softened, somewhat (don't worry [I won't hurt him]), when her eyes landed on him. Then Emily went through the practiced motions of making a very nice salad.
She had some delicious looking mesculun, some fresh feta, a can of greek beans with tomato and spices, some adorable cherry tomatos, a small red onion, a hot house cucumber -- the makings of a very nice greek salad (with home-made viniagrette [whipped up in Chuck's kitchen]) to throw together. And it looked just that thoughtless, throwing it together, as she talked with the two of them.
"It's not all that different from the way we met, you know," she offered. Clearly still baiting Steve. Clearly enjoying this. "Chuck invited me over for video games, and dinner, and we've been friends ever since."
There were obvious omissions here, and it was a little too neatly wrapped up. But that was to be expected, in many ways, from the pretty Orphan cleaning greens at his sink.
"You two were probably up to something when I dropped in... if you'd like to get back to that, then pay me no mind," she offered. Emily was drying her hands on a dish towel, then shrugging out of that lightweight sweater.
[Carmichael] ".....oh, the hot dogs!"
Chuck, who'd found a place to lean and watch his not-girlfriend and his friend (the latter of whom is pulling out buns and condiments) straightens quickly, and after a meaningful look, leaves Steve and Emily alone for long enough to see to his culinary masterpiece, while Steve 'excuse me's his way to a cupboard to grab a can of chili sauce to throw in the microwave. Some of the new appliances get side eyes, and a glance sketched Em's way - he's quiet, though, until he comes across the blade holder for the Cuisinart.
"Does Chuck even know what those are for? 'cause I don't, and I've never set a kitchen on fire. What's he need all this stuff for?"
[Littleton] She hasn't really acquired a taste for things like hot dogs, or chili (much less chili sauce) and the smell from the can that Steve has just opened makes Emily a little... no, nothing outwardly, even if her GI tract gives a collective wince.
"I don't even know," Emily answers, amusement filtering through her tone now. Clearly. "He went to get a few things to round out his kitchen, and came home with all of this..." She made a cautious sweep with one hand to indicate the collected devices and gadgets.
If Steve were shrewd, or even bordering upon observant, he might notice that Emily did her work in as tight a section of the kitchen as possible. As free and easy as it was, she dirtied a knife, a cutting board, and dampened the sink. All of it went into a bowl, yes, but the clutter and collection couldn't have been by her direction -- she didn't cook in that manner at all.
"So what brings you to town?" she asks. "Just visiting, or are you thinking of moving this way as well?" It's a polite inquiry, and Emily's feelings (if she has any) on the matter do not bleed into her tone too clearly.
She casts a look over at the door to the patio now and then, as they chat. Out to where Chuck is doing war with the grill and the sad little American sausages.
[Carmichael] "Home, huh? Already, it starts." This is in overblown tones of forlorn, as if there's been some deep betrayal that will take time to get over - it's play acting, maybe. Mostly. "Didn't you just get a new place? 'cause that's what he told me, that you two were at GoodWill looking for stuff for your new place, and smokin'-hot-no-social-skills guy showed up. Oh crap." There's a blush, then a sheepish, "Don't tell him I said that. I'm not supposed to say stuff like that, he doesn't like it."
The look he shoots her is almost pleading (but then, the troll is full of overblown dramatics, it seems) as the chili sauce gloooops into the bowl he then shoves into the microwave.
"I'm just visiting, really, but man. I thought he was exaggerating or something. I may have to stick around for a bit, you know? See if there's any sense in transferring here."
[Littleton] Steve takes affront to her use of the word home and it sets Emily on edge a little. There is a sharpness to her expression and a piercing scrutiny to how she observes his theatrics in the moment.
"Did I get the colloquialism wrong?" she asks, giving the troll an out should he want it. "Is that not what you Continentals say? Come home, go home, was at home --?" A lifted eyebrow, above those beautiful (dangerous) stormy blue eyes.
Then Emily is back to arranging her salad in the bowl. "And Owen has social skills. He's just shy." Defensive, now, perhaps. Or irritated. It was so hard to tell with those Brits -- which is what she was, certainly, because it's the only clear note to her accent.
"I did not realize Chuck thought he was smoking hot though. Perhaps I should pass on the compliment." Ah, here, it's back. The smirk-smile. The warmer tone. But Steve, troll, friend-of-Chuck, likely knows he's in slightly deeper water than expected.
"What is it you do, Steve?" she asks, now. Just curious.
[Carmichael] "Of course it's his home. Just . . ." His hand waves, and then he sets about chopping a small yellow onion with a possibly surprising skill. Then there's the rest (the bit about Owen), and Steve's shoulders tighten a little, almost protective of his friend.
"Look, Emily, you're hot and all, but you're . . . what, twenty-one, twenty-two? Chuck's twenty-eight. And I was there when his ex-fiance left him. It wasn't pleasant. And he likes you - I mean really likes you - or he wouldn't care about the prettyboyninja. So I guess the point is, don't string him along, yeah? Because he's already loyal to you a hundred percent, I can see it in his face when he looks at you. If you want to play, which . . . hell, who doesn't in their early twenties? . . . is fantastic, just tell him before he gets too attached. He's a good guy, despite whatever he did to get in trouble."
It's a long speech, that, and delivered with all the awkward care of any geekboy's geekboy best friend, and then set off by a cheerful smile. "What do I do? Oh, I'm an assistant manager at the old Aurora Best Buy. But I think I might go back to school for . . . something. I don't know what yet."
[Littleton] ((I raised this stat for a reason....))
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 2, 6, 7, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)
[Littleton] Oh, Steve.
Emily is careful to set the knife down on the counter, to uncurl her fingers away from it so just her palm holds down its shaft. To carefully pull her hand away from it, wipe it on the kitchen towel resting across her shoulder.
She steps back from the counter a bit, and turns so that her back is to the patio door. Chuck looking in would see the lines of her back, the way her arms are tucked loosely around her middle. While she talks to Steve, whose expression is neatly eclipsed by her presence.
Convenient.
There's a pinched look to her features now, and gone is the warmth and playfulness. Gone is the affable suffering-of-Steve for Chuck's sake. In this moment Emily is a calm, cold collected presence. And an angry one.
"Look, Steve," she says, paralleling his structure and tone almost perfectly for a moment. "That prettyboyninja is a friend of mine. He is helping me work through something: it's called a crisis of Faith." Perhaps you've heard of it. "We talk about God, and about Church, and whether I am going back to any of it any time soon. And unless Chuck was secretly hoping I would convert and go to Seder with him, he has nothing to worry about in Owen."
There's a pause here, and it is quite obvious that she is biting something back. Letting it go. Almost.
"Do try to remember that you know next to nothing about me. And whatever you have taken of me, in the precisely seventeen minutes in which we have been acquainted, it is not likely the whole of either of us." A tight smile. Emily takes the towel from her shoulder, folds it, sets it on the counter.
"I'm going to step out for a moment," she says. "I left something in my car," she adds. "Please tell Chuck I'll be back in a few minutes?"
Emily stepped out of the kitchen, whatever Steve's answer. She fished her phone (but no car keys) out of her bag and slipped on her shoes. And then she was gone, with the door closing a little harder behind her than strictly necessary. And Chuck would know, but Steve would not, that Emily took the El to school and on to his place these days. Not her occasionally-reliable car.
[Carmichael] Chuck is watching through the sliding glass door of the balcony - has been, in fact, since he went out to see to his hot dogs. He returns with them on a plate, and just as Emily's closing the door on a blinking Steve behind her, he's saying in a nearly dangerous sort of voice Emily's only ever heard him use with Kaya, on that night, "What did you do, Steve?"
The rest is, no doubt, eclipsed by the closed door and Emily's trip down the stairs. It's not long, of course, before Chuck is taking the stairs down two and three at a time, to catch up (but not to stop her if she wants to go - that's her choice) and see if there's anything he can do. Steve may be his best friend, but sometimes other things are important.
"Hey," he says when he catches up to her - wherever that may be. "I'm sorry about that. Steve's a little . . . Steve. Which isn't an excuse, or anything. It's just the way he is."
[Littleton] By the time he catches up with her, Emily has made it back to street level. Back to where the full, fat-faced moon is rising over the city and the sky is only faintly pinked through with ribbons of lingering sunset. She is just beginning to exhale, push out the frustration she felt with the little furry man in Chuck's apartment.
It's a less guarded moment, but still tense and careful, when she looks up and over to him. When she shrugs and rolls her eyes a little, and then steps closer to hug him -- if he'll be hugged.
"I lose my patience with him. I'm sorry," she said, shaking her head a little. "Does he know that prefacing a rebuke with you're hot and all will only lead further down the path of damnation and ruin?" she asks, overplaying the moment, slightly, to hopefully garner a small smile from Chuck.
"He cares for you," she says, now. "A lot. It's a good thing. But I don't think he approves of me, which makes my staying for dinner hard on everyone." There's a little pause. "If you want me to go, I will. I just thought it would be nice to see you, like we used to, before I left. "
"I should have called first."
[Littleton] ((Edit: I *lost my patience with him...[/i]))
[Carmichael] ".....knowing Steve, probably not. He means well, you know? But doesn't always have the most sense. And never has any tact."
Chuck will, in fact, allow himself to be hugged - not only that, but his arms wrap around Emily in turn, to hold her close. There's a small kiss placed on the top of her head and he leaves his nose buried there for a long moment, smelling her shampoo. And yes, there was a little smile, and the hug tightens briefly.
"He doesn't really approve of anyone since college, frankly. We were more or less together from grade school through undergrad, you know? But he at least thinks you're worth the time it takes to say something." Which . . . likely isn't any reassurance, but it's something. And then, finally, "You should stay. He's leaving for Aurora not long after dinner, anyway, so we're good, right? We'll play a game and you can snipe him a few times."
[Littleton] "Ah, yes, well," Emily says into Chuck's shoulder. "Along with implying that I'm too young, too shallow, and just playing with you, he mentioned that you think Owen is smokin' hot...' She tipped her head up to eye him playfully. (Yes, we're good.)
Here a little pause, and she steps back slightly. "Speaking of... I've been talking to Owen about the Chorus," she says, which is innocent enough in unawakened terms to not draw any attention. "It's one of the reasons we've spent so much time talking lately; I didn't want you to worry..." She trails off, not entirely convinced that Chuck was worrying in the first place. But Steve had gone stomping across buttons and she had to follow up on some of them.
Emily raises up on her tip toes to kiss him, quickly, and not on the cheek.
[Carmichael] "Well, he kinda is, isn't he? And I wasn't, really. Well, maybe a little, for a minute, but then you came out of GoodWill upset, and . . . well, I upset you, but . . . oh, I don't know. And Chorus might be good for you - I could totally see you as a Singer. There are some of 'em, from what I hear, who work really well with the tech stuff."
It's with a smile, relief, and then he finds himself kissed and it's likely not as quick as Emily intended it to be when Chuck deepens it a bit [totally SFW], holds it, before letting her go.
"And, you know. I might worry sometimes. But I try not to. We're seeing each other, is all." The 'for now' is implied.
[Littleton] Emily caught and held his eyes, trying to judge his reaction as they spoke. "I can understand that. I'll probably worry too. But Owen?" Emily takes a little breath and presses her mouth into a thin-lipped contemplative smile(?).
"Owen reminds me of my godbrother. Which is wonderful, in ways. And... irritating, at times." There's a fondness in Emily's expression, but not a troubling one. "Greg is the closest thing I have to a sibling and to find someone who may someday be like that, here, is heartening. Especially if I decide to join the Chorus, and we work together."
There's a shrug, now. Friend-of-Chuck has forced Emily to ennumerate and articulate some things she's been only thinking through of late. Much as Owen has pushed a few issues.
"Let's go back upstairs," she says, nudging him a bit and heading back for the stairs. "Before Steve dreams up something new to be upset about, or your hot dogs get cold." Ah, yes, it's back. The disdain. Hot dogs, the sad little American sausages that Emily would be forced to eat for politeness's sake at dinner tonight. Horror.
[Carmichael] Chuck doesn't push much of anything, usually - he goes with the flow, or more accurately, does his thing and lets the flow go along without him. Certain evenings after long hours of hacking notwithstanding, Chuck is a live and let live (do and let do) kind of guy. So, it can't be that surprising when the look in his eyes is genuinely pleased for Emily to have found someone who comforts her in that way that only family really can.
Especially since the closest thing Chuck has to family any more is Steve.
"He might be a little hang dog-kicked puppy when we get back. I kinda . . . read him the riot act." It's sheepish, that, but also a bit amused; Emily knows well enough what his riot act is like. She's witnessed it before, after all. "But he'll be on his best behavior. Which is . . . still Steve, and I can't promise anything like him minding his own business or not saying anything stupid, but he'll try, at least. And . . ."
This is wry, spoken with a grin as he relaxes the hug to take her hand instead.
"If you'd rather, I'm sure there's something other than hot dogs. Steve and I kind of have a thing, anyway."
[Littleton] "When in Rome," she says, also wryly, as they make their way back to the apartment. But really? One hot dog is pretty much her limit. Per Year. So Emily would partake, but only enough to be friendly, and then eat her portion of the salad to cleanse her palate and sooth her stomach.
All bets were off, though, if Steve put chili near her food.
"Don't worry about me," she says, as they're nearing the door. "He drove all the way here to see you, and I'm not leaving until Saturday morning." She meant leaving the country, though Chuck was free to interpret that otherwise if he wanted.
"Shall we?" Lofted eyebrows, carefully replaced smirk. Emily seemed ready to face round two with the little man, his chili sauce, and the hot dogs. Not quite the evening she'd had in mind, but things rarely turned out as planned anymore...
[Carmichael] "Lucky me, if you're not leaving until Saturday morning," he says with an exaggerated waggle of his brows, and then slips an arm around Em's shoulders as they make their way back upstairs and in his door. And from there? Well, Chuck is goofy and Steve is Steve. One plain hot dog, with bun, is afforded for Emily to put her own toppings on as desired, and the boys doctor theirs in several different ways - several each. Far more than can possibly be good for Chuck's health, all things considered.
And they eat them all, as quickly as possible. Chuck wins, in the end, and throws his arms in the air in triumph. "You're losing your touch, Steve. Better get back in practice!"
[Littleton] Having never (never [rarely] that you will admit to) partaken in this strange American custom, Emily asks Steve for his advice on how to properly prepare a hot dog. Friend-of-Chuck might see this as an opportunity to prank the more tightly-strung not-girlfriend-of-Chuck, or may offer genuine assistance. Either way, Emily's inside would not be overly pleased by the offering. However it is prepared.
While the boys -- twenty-eight or not, it's hard to see them as any more grown up than her former housemates just now -- cram as many of these strange foods down their throats, Emily steadily gnaws hers down to nothing. Interspersed by several mouthsful of salad after each helping.
At some point, she learns to just keep her eyes averted and focuses on counting the steadily decreasing army of tomatoes and cucumber slices on her plate, swimming as they were in a light red wine vinegar dressing.
Later, she'll say her polite goodbyes to Steve. Wish him a safe drive. Extend a warmer than expected smile, and a little wave (no hug [do.not.hug.me.]). Later yet, she'll be regretting the hot dog, its myriad of colorful toppings, and its intrusion on her quiet time, curled next to Chuck on this fabulous thing called a couch -- a thing she does not yet possess for her own flat. Might not ever. Likely as he is regretting his food-eating-contest with the short and fuzzy friend.
Not for the first time, Emily is faintly green. "Chuck?" she waits a moment, to see if something more than his stomach groans in acknowledgment. "No more hot dogs, for awhile." Please. (Please.)
[Carmichael] "Carry out whenever you're over, it is," he groans, already reaching into his pocket for the wonderful little machine that takes a tiny drop of blood and spits back a number that tells Chuck what he needs to do and how soon; he doesn't even wince when he pokes his finger, perhaps because he doesn't have to touch any blood, barely has to look at it. She knows by now how squeamish he is about such things, after all. "Unless, of course, you're in the mood to cook. Which you're more than welcome to do whenever you like. Hey, Em?"
There's a short wait for acknowledgment, and then, "Thanks for being cool about Steve. He's pretty much the closest thing to family I have these days, and has been there for me through a lot."
But then? It's cuddling and a movie, or even just music. And a comfy evening in.
30 March 2010
29 March 2010
Faith and Good Will
[Emily Littleton] After two days the pallor of white-washed walls and the expanse of hardwood floors felt interminably huge. Insurmountably empty. It was one thing to occupy the corner of a room, but to live fully in it without embarrassment or reservations. It was quite another to set four carrier boxes, three cases and a futon in the middle of nearly six-hundred square-feet and declare to oneself: I am arrived.
There were no curtains on the windows, meaning Emily changed hidden in her bathroom -- not entirely unlike her frosh year at college -- and could spy her not-exactly-new car on the street below at any time of night. It also meant that the streetlights shone down, the moonlight crept in, and dawn was brutally announced by a bright light to her (kick in the) eyes each morning.
This simply would not do.
So it is to hand-me-down havens, thrift stores, good will and AmVets she goes. Her free time is spent collecting the little things that might make the empty walls and bare floors a little more home-like. Setting down roots is such a bother.
At this very moment, she is contemplating whether a small dining set might be salvageable (it would need some work [but the price is right: nearly free]) at the Lake View Good Will store.
[Owen Page] [Dex + Stealth, -2 Acute Senses, -1 Arcane]
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 7 at target 3)
[Chuck Carmichael] "I got my first guitar at Good Will," Chuck says and this is news; Emily did not know until now that Chuck played guitar - or, more accurately, that he plays. "It needed work, too. But once that was taken care of, she played like a dream."
Which is to say: if Emily likes the dining set, or thinks she might once the work is done, she should get it. Good things happen when you pick random things up at Good Will.
Chuck does not know, of course, that Owen the Ninja is creeping around somewhere. All he knows is that this is not the first thrift store they've been at tonight, and he's still in work clothes but it doesn't really matter what they're doing for a couple of reasons, not the least of which is that thrift store shopping is fun. There are all sorts of cool things to be found, and one never knows when one will find old computer parts, or newer computer parts, or anything else interesting that might be turned into computer parts with enough time and inclination (and talent, let us not forget that).
"I still need to get you a housewarming gift, you know."
[Owen Page] He would probably find the nick-name amusing, were it a spoken title for the dark-haired Chorister that now inhabited a cosy studio apartment nearby. Only streets over, to tell the truth. His capacity for skulking in the shadowy nooks of trees outside the Chantry when summoned by mystical forces, for appearing like some phantom behind gatherings of Awakened Magi in Grant Park, and for scaring the Orphan now contemplating a dining set stemmed, though he would be the last person on the face of the planet to ever admit to it, from a teenage life full of petty crimes and requiring the degree of surefootedness that, of late, was garnering him the reputation of something of a sneak.
You did not, quite frankly, ever know where he would turn up.
Abruptly.
Suddenly.
Like a shadow moving in your peripheral vision that was blinked and gone and then suddenly -- "I like it, if that helps," -- comes a voice belonging to a figure that seems to have appeared in the spate of minutes from entering the store until finding and studying the dining set; leaning his shoulder against a shelf, an old Victorian era lamp held in one hand. As always, Owen Page was dressed in dark colors, the man either owned very few bright colors in his wardrobe, or preferred the blacks and blues he was so often seen in. Today was no great change; there was an old, tired black leather jacket on, matched with a navy blue open collared shirt and the same pair of faded jeans.
The heavy duty worker's boots were on his feet; it was amazing he could be so quiet in such footwear.
When they start, or simply glance up, around; however it occurs, they are greeted with steady blue eyes, and the corner of a mouth suggesting a smile. "Hello."
[Emily Littleton] At least one of the legs wobbled. Emily was crouched down looking up at the underside of the table, trying to see if there was any obvious adjustment she could make to the thing to keep it from easing left, then right, like a drunken sailor (homeward bound). When Chuck mentioned the guitar, she looked up at him and grinned.
"You should bring it over and play, sometime. I hear empty rooms are pretty nice, accoustically speaking, and that's pretty much all I have..." The wry smirk returneth. He had to be getting used to it by now, the understated playfulness and the warmth in her dark blue eyes. "After, of course, I have a chair of some sort to sit in."
She leaned a little further under the table, looking up again, one hand resting on a nearby chair for balance. "You don't have to get me anything," she replied, to the housewarming comment, and it sounded a little echoey coming from under there.
And then, without even the polite warning of footsteps drawing near, Owen's voice broke in. Emily started (she always did) and started up a little too quickly. Her head met the table, made it jump a little (and drop a curse that sounded faintly Germanesque), and then she emerged from underneath with one hand pressed to the top of her head.
She looked at his boots, then his jeans, then allllll the way up to Owen, scowling slightly, with one eye pinched shut. "Evening." She said. "Owen." She added.
Emily used the table (sway left, sway right) for leverage she stood back up. Her hand dropped away from her head, now.
"Decorating?" she asked, catching a glimpse of the lamp now that she was roughly the same height as everyone else.
[Owen Page] This was perhaps the second occasion that Emily had greeted his appearance with a scowl, not that he could entirely blame her. He knew he rarely made a great deal of noise when he moved, even when he spoke, it was always the same quiet, contained tone that emerged. It was worth wondering if he ever raised his voice, even in anger.
Even in fear.
When Emily straightens, a hand rubbing her head, Owen hasn't shifted an inch but to glance down at the lamp in his hands; the cord wound around one arm negligently. "Yeah," is all he answers for in terms of his own intended purchases, his attention straying between herself and the man beside her. There's a beat; and a hand emerges for the Virtual Adept to shake, if it's his nature to do so.
"You must be Chuck," he notes, with a brief glance shot the Orphan's way.
[Chuck Carmichael] Chuck is [six foot four] ridiculously tall - no one is roughly the same height as he, or at least relatively few are. And where Owen is Arcane, is forgettable, Chuck is the [equal and] opposite. He stands out, and has none of that sneakyninjastealth-ness that Owen has. He is, in fact, a bit on the clumsy side. But that is neither here nor there. For now, he simply stands (turns quickly at the sudden appearance [from nowhere] of the guy he's met once and seen twice, but doesn't startle) and rubs a hand briefly over Emily's head, checking for anything more than a bruise.
Strictly by mundane means, of course.
"Hi," he says, amiable, affable, and so very Chuck - he could hardly be anyone else. "Yeah, I'm Chuck. You're . . ." He's heard the name, of course - but only once to connect with the face, and Owen is imminently forgettable. And yes, his hand is offered for a shake, polite and friendly.
[Emily Littleton] It's a better night than most, and the scowl falls away, quickly even. She's standing a little closer to Chuck than Owen, and Emily's eyes roll up (trying to peer at his hand, through her head) as the Virtual Adept smooths his hand over her hair. There'll be a bump, but nothing major. It's not like she caught a nail.
"Chuck, this is Owen," she says, keeping the introductions short and somewhat obvious. "Owen, this is Chuck," but the Choristor had already figured that out. They both, in turn, get warm enough smiles. The Orphan is friendly, and more at ease than usual. It clear to each of them that she knows the other--perhaps clear to them both how well she knows the other, too.
"Chuck's helping me pick things out for my new mystery flat," she says, lilting the word mystery somewhat playfully and lifting an eyebrow for emphasis. It's teasingly said, but serious as well. He has not seen her flat, he's not even sure where it is besides near by.
[Chuck Carmichael] "Nice to meet you," he says. His hand is strong enough, calloused at the fingers (from typing, from blood tests) and the palms (from rowing). There is no manly contest here - his handshake is as he is, comfortable in its skin, friendly. It matches his smile and his demeanor and everything about him.
One of these things is not like the others . . .
"I am, yeah. Why not, right? We all help our friends. I'd have lent my car for moving stuff, but Em didn't need it."
Perhaps it's clear to each of them how well she knows the other - Chuck makes no assumptions - or perhaps it's made clear by her mystery flat, and naming it such. The Virtual Adept doesn't know where it is (could find it, if he tried, but hasn't - he respects her privacy), other than nearby. He hasn't seen it. But then, the way it was said, he's guessing Owen hasn't, either. A mystery to both of them, then.
[Owen Page] Chuck's height levels out a few inches above the Chorister's six one, but it doesn't appear to intimidate Owen. If anything, it makes him straighten off from his shoulder perch and clasp hands with the other Initiate for a beat, holding his eyes as he does before allowing his hand to return to a coat pocket. The other remains as is, holding the lamp downward from his body, the cord dangling like a length of rope he'd wound around his arm for some later purpose.
Chuck this is Owen
Emily introduces him, a crease faintly appears at the ridge of his nose then smooths away, replaced with a smile that somewhere between sedate and ambiguous. His demeanor was ungiving, but not impolite. There was simply a sort of stiffness ingrained into the way the Singer moved; spoke, kept his stance balanced enough that should the need arise, he could slip away in the blink of an eye.
Chuck was helping her pick things out, "I figured," he says by way of a lifted hand-in-pocket gesture toward the dining set and then at the Adept's additional commentary, his midnight-blue eyes settle on the other man, echoing: "Why not, right." Owen shifts the lamp in his grip; his attention returning to the Orphan, his voice doesn't gentle, or really outwardly demonstrate what, if anything, he's thinking right now and that could be frustrating -- the man was as stoic as the day was long.
"How are you liking the books?"
[Emily Littleton] They were neat little stepping stones then, coming in at six-four, six-one and five-nine. All neat and orderly. Almost as if they'd been planned so. Owen and Emily had similarly dark blue eyes, but beyond that did not even begin to look related. And Chuck knew, even if Owen didn't, that the one person around their age that she considered family was elsewhere.
Hmm. Emily glanced between the two of them, gave the table a little push (yep, it still leans). This whole thing -- the apartment, the social thing, the seeing someone thing -- was going to take a bit of work.
"I'm just getting started, but I think they're helping so far," Emily says. Now she's reached across her middle with one hand, caught the opposing elbow. Her free hand hangs down, impassive, at her side. It's a young person pose, made only slightly more grown up by the way the sweater-jacket hangs on her frame (over the dress that she is wearing [in defiance of winter] upon hopes of spring).
"Do you mind if I take one of them with me?" she asks. "I'm going overseas -- well, I'm going home for Easter -- and it seems rude to take them out of the country without asking." This word, home, is spoken with its proper weight and reverence. It is resonant and not entirely aching now.
[Owen Page] "Go for it," he offers to her request to take the books overseas with her and then when she rattles the table and found it was leaning; removed his hand from a pocket and gestured at it. "It's missing one of the props," the Chorister moved around the dining set and set his lamp to one side; the leather protested his lowering himself to his haunches and lifting the uneven corner leg up; running his fingers beneath it.
There was a certainty to the manner he did it that refreshed the memory that this -- repairing, altering, cleaning -- was what he did on a day by day basis. He set it back down, turning to face the pair of them, though his attention appeared far more riveted on the female. "I can fix it, if you decide to go with this one." Owen leaned back, bracing an elbow over his knee, brow knitted.
"After the holidays." He adds, absently, as if he'd forgotten [he had] that Easter was encroaching at all.
[Chuck Carmichael] "Oh, right. Passover started a bit ago." Chuck wrinkles his nose, not particularly affected by having forgotten. "I missed the seder. Oh, well."
It happens, and Chuck is not a particularly devout anything. He's hardly heartbroken about missing the fifteen step ceremony and meal (bitter herbs, unleavened bread . . . most of which is safe for him to eat, at least). Owen isn't particularly interested in socializing, and the Vdept watches him, fascinated.
"I know lefty-loosey-righty-tighty, but other than that, I'm pretty useless if it's not computers. Couldn't you just . . . I don't know, put a matchbook or something underneath the shorter leg?"
Emily's going home for a weak over break, this Chuck knows. He's not particularly happy about it, other than the part where it seems like something that will make Emily happy, and this is an important thing.
[Emily Littleton] Emily had not forgotten the impending holidays. One did not earn themselves the dubious accusation of being a C&E Christian without slavishly observing at least these two holidays. (Not that it had really been that way [just that it might have appeared that way, upon occasion]).
"I'd like that," she said, and they were both used to hearing that tone of voice from her, that turn of phrase, by now. "And then," she says, her tone brightening a bit, eyes widening (happily [cheerfully]), "I could even invite you two over for tea! For there would be somewhere to sit!"
Triumph. (Lo! This is progress!) Emily does own a kettle, and the proper tea making apparati, just not a table at which to sit... or, for that matter, much of anything to dress the table with.
She eyed the table set and made a quick count of chairs. As long as there were three or more, she was golden. If there were only two, well, then she could invite them over one at a time (which might be the better way to handle it, anyhow).
The revelation that Chuck is Jewish, followed shortly by the revelation that he does not care much for ceremony, earns him a slight smile and a glance from the Orphan. Nothing more than interest (okay, a margin of fondness [but who's counting]).
[Owen Page] "For a short term fix," Owen replies to the Virtual Adept, briefly cutting a glance at him, "yeah, but you're better off in the long term replacing the whole leg, or hammering in an extra piece of fitting." He collects his lamp, and rises to his feet once again; gathering the cord in his fingers.
Emily talks about inviting them over for tea, and places to sit and Owen's eyes remain steady on her face; the corner of his mouth moving briefly in some contained reaction to her words; for a moment there's what appears to be a flicker of empathy there, or some shared sympathy with whatever it is he believes he's witnessing in the purposeful, upbeat attitude and cheery words. "Where's home, exactly?" He steps out of the way of an elderly woman browsing the shelves with a basket full of nick-knacks.
[Emily Littleton] Where's home, exactly?
Jarod pressed, and never fully got an answer. Chuck knew, because he hacked her birth data (and at that point, why even pretend to evade the question?). Owen asks, and Emily...
There is an intense (tense) quiet between the Choristor and the Orphan. It supercedes, overwhelms, drowns out the playful banter that usually persists between the Orphan and the Adept. These two modes of communication are two disparate, diverse, to coexist within Emily for long. And given the opposing pulls, she naturally trends back toward her native quiet. Not that the friendly, affable, good-natured-fun-and-teasing Emily that Chuck knew was feigned. Not in any way. Just that it was difficult to be both, and reserved won out.
"Manchester," she said, evenly. "England," she added, just a little behind. As if either American might have trouble placing the country code on that one. As if her accent (the clearer parts of it) didn't give that much away.
"It's a bit of a flight," she says, and the wry little smile returns. Holds better purchase on her expression this time. (Unfeigned).
[Chuck Carmichael] "I'll bring the . . . um . . ." He muses for a moment, thoughtful. "Something from the grocery store. Unless people want hot dogs." Then there's questions and answers about home, and a Blackberry singing out All the single ladies put your hands up! as Chuck blushes, fumbles, looks at the display. There's a face pulled (fond [amused] dismayed) as he looks at the display, and he moves, leans to kiss the top of Emily's head.
"I have to take this, yeah? Might be awhile." It's apologetic, and this is the closest either of them has come since Owen arrived to anything that might be called 'seeing each other' behavior. "Was nice meeting you, Owen, just in case."
((Which is to say, it's 20 to 1, and CC needs to go to bed. But will wait for following posts!))
[Owen Page] "Manchester," he recognizes the city, knows only what an American high school education tells him about it, second [or was it third] largest city, "Good soccer team," he says it dead-pan but for the quirk of his lips in the aftermath and there's something behind it, something from his personal life, his past. A pleasure once indulged in, she'd seen him playing basketball, knew he had a fondness for sports.
It was a beginning, one supposed.
Chuck's phone rings, and Owen turns himself away a little, glancing at the items on the shelves, the floor, out of politeness, or perhaps simply habit. He deliberately keeps himself occupied while the pair say their lover's goodbyes, only turning back when he's personally addressed again. "Likewise, Chuck," he repeats the other man's name the way you did the designer of a piece of furniture, or movie you wanted to ensure you remembered for later.
He looks back to Emily, raises his lamp like an Olympian's torch. "I should let you get back to it," he nods in the Virtual Adept's direction. "I don't want to intrude."
[Emily Littleton] Chuck's phone issues forth a strange sound (oh, it's supposed to be music), and he blushes and fumbles for it. Emily looks over, with a warmly amused expression, and then accepts the explanation. Chuck kisses her head, she gives him a little one-armed hug, and that's about as far as they delve into the realm of public displays of affection (in front of Owen [tonight]). It's not as comfortable, effortless, as that night at the pizza parlor and Owen (being -Owen]), can certainly tell.
"If you have to leave, just text me," Emily says. It's a simple, perfunctory thing. Technology makes fluid plans so very much easier.
And then it's down to just her, and Owen. And the table. And a store full of potential treasures and plenty of flotsam.
"You're not intruding," she says, warmly. It is easier, now, that Chuck has stepped away. Easier that she's not trying to reconcile the two ends of the social spectrum with one another. She reflects so much of whoever she's with that it's difficult for Emily to handle mixed situations. "Also ... I have a couple questions for you, at some point, if you have the time."
This trended back to the books, and the chats they'd had before. It was also not something she wanted to discuss with or in front of Chuck. So compartmentalized these two friendships were, at least for now.
[Chuck Carmichael] ((Thanks for playing! *pushes Em and Owen together without Chuck interference!*))
[Owen Page] Owen Page did not own a computer, or a cell phone.
It wasn't really that he couldn't scrape the money together to invest in one, more simply that he had no real need for either. He was not a Virtual Adept, such as Chuck, to know the ins and outs of the technological era. He had no family he continued to keep contact with, or anyone to whom he was indebted to call on a daily, or weekly basis.
He didn't however, seem to carry any aversion to those who did possess either, his seemed to be a personal decision; one made years before. Emily reflects those to whom she's speaking, Owen does not seem quite so flexible, though his level of ease does increase with the other man gone, his smiles come more frequently, and linger far longer than any he'd expressed while being scrutinized by another.
"Ask me anything," he offers, without hesitation and leans against the nearest shelf, setting his to-be-purchased item on the shelf lower, and crossing arms over his chest; leather rustling.
[Emily Littleton] It's a strange place to have this conversation, full as it is of slightly worn, somewhat used, (broken and mended [mending]), cast off things. It is fitting, too, for the same reasons. Emily wets her lower lip, slightly, hesitates a little. Thoughtfully. She looks around, perhaps for Chuck or maybe for anyone else who might overhear.
"How does one come back," she asks, but the question isn't finished just yet. "To the Church?" A pause, a less mirthful wryness to her mouth. Emily can't quite meet his eyes. "To God, after having walked away."
She was going home for Easter, which didn't quite jive with this question. And she didn't appear particularly guilty (prodigal child), either. It could be a question aimed a theological differences, save that Owen had heard enough from her to suspect it ran deeper than that.
And now, after a little pause, her eyes find his again. They are calm and curious, questioning but alert. Deeply blue fields flecked through with stormy bits of grey.
[Owen Page] It's not only a strange location for it, it's a terribly difficult question to give an easy answer for. Owen stares at her; his dark gaze unflinchingly focused even when she lowers her own, looks away. There's a new level of attention being paid to Emily right now, and she might not fully enjoy the sensation it brings. The hairs on her arms might begin to stand on end beneath the Chorister's intensity, her cheeks might flush as she wishes he'd quit that.
He doesn't.
Not right now.
"That depends," he speaks finally, allowing her a reprieve of his eyes on her, though the memory remains, imprinted in the space around them. "On why you walked away to begin with." Owen breathes out, sharply, his chest expanding against his shirt, framing his shape beneath the layers. "People turn their back on religion every day, they decide they don't like what God, what Allah, whatever form of him, of it they believe in is handing them and turn away. The thing is, Emily," he says [this rare speech] quietly to her, very solemn, sincere but firm.
Unswayed.
"God, belief," he smiles, breaking the tense atmosphere for a moment. "It doesn't turn away from us, it just waits for you to reawaken." There's emphasis there, meaning to the word he chooses to use. They had both Awakened, for a second time, for the first real time. "If you're serious," he doesn't seem to think she's lacking sincerity, though his eyes do briefly stray to Chuck, the only real barrier he's noted thus far, potentially.
"Start by coming to a service. Go to one over Easter, then come back and tell me what you felt."
A beat, he clears his throat. "That's the first step."
[Emily Littleton] There is no easy answer to it. Never has been, never will be. And if an answer comes easily, then it is neither the truth nor comprehensive. Emily knows what she's asking (even knows most of what she wants to hear), so this round of scrutiny is weathered with surprising grace and countenance. She is calm, even as his resonance rakes over her, plucks at the fine hairs on her arms, down her neck.
There is, at last, a small and somewhat unguarded smile. It is gentler than most that Owen has seen, and she does not elaborate on it or explain it with any greater (growing) look of importance. Just that it is there, for a moment, long enough to be glimpsed, and then gone before it can be snatched away and filed clearly into memory.
"I have not forgotten belief," she says, gently. Perhaps this is unsurprising to him, for all that he's seen of her. Emily folds her arms lightly across her middle without really closing her body language much. Her head tips a bit to one side as she regards him, and the surety he holds, for a long moment. "Though I have often wondered what it is, who He was, that I had such Faith in for so long."
There is a little twitch at the corner of her mouth, then it stills, fades away. "Are you asking why I left?" she asks, but there is a cautionary note to that question. As if the answer is not something that can be put aside, forgotten, rendered unheard at some later time by either will or convenience.
[Owen Page] "No," he says instantly, "I think you are."
He doesn't miss the cautionary note in her voice that hinges on saying I'm not sure I'll give you that even if you are, but it doesn't sway him from telling her the truth, either. It's blunt, and as succinct as she must be coming to learn is what you got from Owen, when you asked him a serious question. He doesn't shift his weight, but he does relent on the pressure of his eyes, so focused on her, and his furious intensity about the subject matter.
What she asks is an inherit part of who he was, and she knew that.
She would not have addressed it otherwise.
"His face doesn't matter," dark brows draw upward, expressing the point. "It's whatever you want it to be. People get stuck, though, on naming it, and they forget." He lifts a shoulder, notes in an undertone, almost like an afterthought. "My Tradition tore itself to hell and back over that very thing."
[Emily Littleton] He is passionate about this, and Emily understands. It calls to something hidden away in the marrow of her bones, loosed only when some of them had been broken (shattered) and disjointed. It was something that had leached slowly out of her over time, achingly, rather than puddled on the floor in a matter of days. Not for the first time, she found herself wishing that this conversation, like so many others, had come before...
... But wishing wouldn't change anything. He turns her question around, and Emily's expression hardens. It is not a subtle thing. There is a flatness to it, now, that wasn't there a moment before. Any openness has fled. As if he'd stepped on her toe, or knocked her in the teeth, or any of a hundred other physical transgressions. There is a coldness that she cannot stop from coming, and beneath that an anger that is not for him.
"I know why I left," she said, and every syllable was carefully, evenly meted. Emily draws a slow breath, then lets it rush out of her heavily. Quickly. Her eyes fall shut, and her shoulders relax a little, but it is forced. And over the space of several minutes will become less so, will turn into something genuine, given enough time.
"I'm trying to decide," she said, a bit more openly, "If I'm able (ready) to move past that."
[Owen Page] There is passion in his words, and in her responses to it, it is a different kind of passion; a colder, firmer sort of refusal to as of yet acknowledge why she left, and why it matters to her that she cleave to that -- why it matters that Owen knows that she is aware of her reasons for walking away in the past.
He watches her, their bodies unconsciously turned toward the other as if they would, by physical means if not emotional, force the connection there and then when she's done; Owen lets a low, steady breath out of his chest. He straightens, and reaches beneath the layers of his clothing, tugging a silver chain from beneath them. There was a tiny cross fixed to the end of the chain; and it gleamed in the light as he wrapped his fingers around it, lowering his chin to focus on it, then reaching for the Orphan's hand.
"This is the core of my faith," he begins very softly, his tone intimate, gentler than before. The chain feels warm, as if it were heated by more than simply being worn against his skin. "I can feel the presence of everything that I am, and that I want to be when I have this on." Owen leans in, searching her eyes. "Search yourself, Emily." There's a trickle of energy in the air, some degree of faith at play, the subtle tang of hope; renewal.
"Ask yourself," he says, his eyes on her, even as he transfers her palm to his chest, and feels the steady reassurance of the beats there. She can count them, like the rhythm of his words. "Right now, are you ready?"
[Emily Littleton] Like calls to like. This is a reason, perhaps the reason, these two have found one another in the vastness of a city like Chicago. And it is the similarities between them, not the differences, that make her hesitant in this moment. Not so much afraid as ashamed.
Her eyes meet his, and there is genuine understanding in them. And pain. They are bright, nearly damp with the tears that are welling up. It is hard to look into his face, to see the faith and rapture there. It was like looking backwards through the mirror to see something in herself from long ago. (Denied [forsaken]). It would have been so much easier, all of this, if Emily had been able to set aside her Faith, her belief, and walk without it.
Her palm rested against his chest, but Emily's fingers curled inward, lightly dragged against his shirt. Not grasping, but faintly withdrawing. Emily swallowed back something (dry mouth [heavy heart]), and spoke very faintly into the space between them.
"I don't know, Owen." Pleading. Some part of this hurt her, cut down to her quick in ways he likely did not foresee. "I want to be. God knows I have wanted to come back so many times but I don't know how." She blinks and looks away, and there are tears in her eyes now. Singly spilling down her cheeks. "He left me to die, in a dank dark basement in Prague. He let them beat me until I didn't have the strength to even pray anymore, and I wanted to die and then he took that from me -- I don't know how to come home after that, but I'm trying. Since I woke up, I've been trying to."
Emily pulls her hand away, wipes at her eyes with the arm of her sweater. She takes a step back, if he'll let her. Her cheeks are flushed, and she won't look over at him. (Embarrassed. [Hurt.] Pushed a little [a lot] too far.) Unworthy.
This is not the place for these conversations, however hushed and to the far side of the store they were. No, Emily had never forgotten Faith.
[Owen Page] He doesn't have a handkerchief on him, and she's crying. That bothers him, a lot. Or maybe it's simply that she's crying at all and how much it reminds him of somebody else, crying because of his actions, because of something that he had done to them. She can see in his eyes, those unfathomable dark eyes of his how much he's feeling her reaction, and her confession of what made her give up.
His jaw clenches, and he drops his necklace in favor of allowing her to reclaim space; put a wall between her wants and her fears of being unworthy; unwanted by a God that would leave her dying in the street, crying out his name, pleading for his intervention.
She has no idea how familiar that story is to him and he wants to her so, there's a wrestling match taking place behind those eyes; flickering around in their depths, struggling to overcome a shame that's as deep down ingrained in him as it is in her. "I'm sorry," he says it quietly; his hands back at his sides, fingers curled inward to stall them for reaching out to draw her back; to invoke the sensation of hope to spring within her again.
"I understand," he closes his own eyes now, turning his face away, down to one side as if the strain were physical; painful.
[Owen Page] [augh, 'wants to tell her so', that should read.]
[Emily Littleton] It's been a long time, she'd said, the first time they met, since His home was my own.
And now Owen knows the things that are holding her back, keeping her separate, possibly even keeping her Orphaned here in this new life. He knows, too, something no one else does: that she wants to come home, that's she trying to find footing on the path.
It is a raw moment, in which they both suffer and neither is too blind, too numb, to see the other's pain. Emily, for all her ache and her damp eyes, despite the arms wrapped more tightly across her middle, cannot help but look to him with compassion and concern when his voice is as quiet (pained) and burdened as her own.
This is the wrong place for this conversation, but perhaps the right place for the acts of charity that they might find in one another.
"I'm sorry, too," she said, gently. Emily used the heel of her thumb to push tears from the corners of her eyes. The crying did not last long, despite the intensity of the moment that passed between them.
"It's never easy, is it?" she asked, more gently now. (It doesn't get easier, either).
[Owen Page] People in the Good Will store must be wondering what the dark-haired man she's standing with has said to make her upset, at least one passing shopper casts Owen a dark glance, cutting between the pair and making conclusions all her own. Probably because Emily was slight, and small and [seemingly] delicate and Owen was taller, broader and looked like he was suffering some degree in holding in his anger.
Of course, that was entirely wrong.
But perceptions are tricky things; they distort what they should make clear, and sometimes reveal things we wish they would not.
"No," he confirms, opening his eyes now and carefully tucking his necklace [prime, unity, one] back beneath his shirt, he won't meet her eyes for any length right now, and can only hope she doesn't not take it to mean he is angry with her, or disgusted, or convinced she will never belong among his own. Rather, Owen collects his lamp, and hovers, stepping nearer to the Orphan, to deliver his parting words to her.
"But the endurance is what makes you," he looks at her, then, and briefly reaches a hand up to cup her chin. "Happy Easter, Emily."
There were no curtains on the windows, meaning Emily changed hidden in her bathroom -- not entirely unlike her frosh year at college -- and could spy her not-exactly-new car on the street below at any time of night. It also meant that the streetlights shone down, the moonlight crept in, and dawn was brutally announced by a bright light to her (kick in the) eyes each morning.
This simply would not do.
So it is to hand-me-down havens, thrift stores, good will and AmVets she goes. Her free time is spent collecting the little things that might make the empty walls and bare floors a little more home-like. Setting down roots is such a bother.
At this very moment, she is contemplating whether a small dining set might be salvageable (it would need some work [but the price is right: nearly free]) at the Lake View Good Will store.
[Owen Page] [Dex + Stealth, -2 Acute Senses, -1 Arcane]
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 7 at target 3)
[Chuck Carmichael] "I got my first guitar at Good Will," Chuck says and this is news; Emily did not know until now that Chuck played guitar - or, more accurately, that he plays. "It needed work, too. But once that was taken care of, she played like a dream."
Which is to say: if Emily likes the dining set, or thinks she might once the work is done, she should get it. Good things happen when you pick random things up at Good Will.
Chuck does not know, of course, that Owen the Ninja is creeping around somewhere. All he knows is that this is not the first thrift store they've been at tonight, and he's still in work clothes but it doesn't really matter what they're doing for a couple of reasons, not the least of which is that thrift store shopping is fun. There are all sorts of cool things to be found, and one never knows when one will find old computer parts, or newer computer parts, or anything else interesting that might be turned into computer parts with enough time and inclination (and talent, let us not forget that).
"I still need to get you a housewarming gift, you know."
[Owen Page] He would probably find the nick-name amusing, were it a spoken title for the dark-haired Chorister that now inhabited a cosy studio apartment nearby. Only streets over, to tell the truth. His capacity for skulking in the shadowy nooks of trees outside the Chantry when summoned by mystical forces, for appearing like some phantom behind gatherings of Awakened Magi in Grant Park, and for scaring the Orphan now contemplating a dining set stemmed, though he would be the last person on the face of the planet to ever admit to it, from a teenage life full of petty crimes and requiring the degree of surefootedness that, of late, was garnering him the reputation of something of a sneak.
You did not, quite frankly, ever know where he would turn up.
Abruptly.
Suddenly.
Like a shadow moving in your peripheral vision that was blinked and gone and then suddenly -- "I like it, if that helps," -- comes a voice belonging to a figure that seems to have appeared in the spate of minutes from entering the store until finding and studying the dining set; leaning his shoulder against a shelf, an old Victorian era lamp held in one hand. As always, Owen Page was dressed in dark colors, the man either owned very few bright colors in his wardrobe, or preferred the blacks and blues he was so often seen in. Today was no great change; there was an old, tired black leather jacket on, matched with a navy blue open collared shirt and the same pair of faded jeans.
The heavy duty worker's boots were on his feet; it was amazing he could be so quiet in such footwear.
When they start, or simply glance up, around; however it occurs, they are greeted with steady blue eyes, and the corner of a mouth suggesting a smile. "Hello."
[Emily Littleton] At least one of the legs wobbled. Emily was crouched down looking up at the underside of the table, trying to see if there was any obvious adjustment she could make to the thing to keep it from easing left, then right, like a drunken sailor (homeward bound). When Chuck mentioned the guitar, she looked up at him and grinned.
"You should bring it over and play, sometime. I hear empty rooms are pretty nice, accoustically speaking, and that's pretty much all I have..." The wry smirk returneth. He had to be getting used to it by now, the understated playfulness and the warmth in her dark blue eyes. "After, of course, I have a chair of some sort to sit in."
She leaned a little further under the table, looking up again, one hand resting on a nearby chair for balance. "You don't have to get me anything," she replied, to the housewarming comment, and it sounded a little echoey coming from under there.
And then, without even the polite warning of footsteps drawing near, Owen's voice broke in. Emily started (she always did) and started up a little too quickly. Her head met the table, made it jump a little (and drop a curse that sounded faintly Germanesque), and then she emerged from underneath with one hand pressed to the top of her head.
She looked at his boots, then his jeans, then allllll the way up to Owen, scowling slightly, with one eye pinched shut. "Evening." She said. "Owen." She added.
Emily used the table (sway left, sway right) for leverage she stood back up. Her hand dropped away from her head, now.
"Decorating?" she asked, catching a glimpse of the lamp now that she was roughly the same height as everyone else.
[Owen Page] This was perhaps the second occasion that Emily had greeted his appearance with a scowl, not that he could entirely blame her. He knew he rarely made a great deal of noise when he moved, even when he spoke, it was always the same quiet, contained tone that emerged. It was worth wondering if he ever raised his voice, even in anger.
Even in fear.
When Emily straightens, a hand rubbing her head, Owen hasn't shifted an inch but to glance down at the lamp in his hands; the cord wound around one arm negligently. "Yeah," is all he answers for in terms of his own intended purchases, his attention straying between herself and the man beside her. There's a beat; and a hand emerges for the Virtual Adept to shake, if it's his nature to do so.
"You must be Chuck," he notes, with a brief glance shot the Orphan's way.
[Chuck Carmichael] Chuck is [six foot four] ridiculously tall - no one is roughly the same height as he, or at least relatively few are. And where Owen is Arcane, is forgettable, Chuck is the [equal and] opposite. He stands out, and has none of that sneakyninjastealth-ness that Owen has. He is, in fact, a bit on the clumsy side. But that is neither here nor there. For now, he simply stands (turns quickly at the sudden appearance [from nowhere] of the guy he's met once and seen twice, but doesn't startle) and rubs a hand briefly over Emily's head, checking for anything more than a bruise.
Strictly by mundane means, of course.
"Hi," he says, amiable, affable, and so very Chuck - he could hardly be anyone else. "Yeah, I'm Chuck. You're . . ." He's heard the name, of course - but only once to connect with the face, and Owen is imminently forgettable. And yes, his hand is offered for a shake, polite and friendly.
[Emily Littleton] It's a better night than most, and the scowl falls away, quickly even. She's standing a little closer to Chuck than Owen, and Emily's eyes roll up (trying to peer at his hand, through her head) as the Virtual Adept smooths his hand over her hair. There'll be a bump, but nothing major. It's not like she caught a nail.
"Chuck, this is Owen," she says, keeping the introductions short and somewhat obvious. "Owen, this is Chuck," but the Choristor had already figured that out. They both, in turn, get warm enough smiles. The Orphan is friendly, and more at ease than usual. It clear to each of them that she knows the other--perhaps clear to them both how well she knows the other, too.
"Chuck's helping me pick things out for my new mystery flat," she says, lilting the word mystery somewhat playfully and lifting an eyebrow for emphasis. It's teasingly said, but serious as well. He has not seen her flat, he's not even sure where it is besides near by.
[Chuck Carmichael] "Nice to meet you," he says. His hand is strong enough, calloused at the fingers (from typing, from blood tests) and the palms (from rowing). There is no manly contest here - his handshake is as he is, comfortable in its skin, friendly. It matches his smile and his demeanor and everything about him.
One of these things is not like the others . . .
"I am, yeah. Why not, right? We all help our friends. I'd have lent my car for moving stuff, but Em didn't need it."
Perhaps it's clear to each of them how well she knows the other - Chuck makes no assumptions - or perhaps it's made clear by her mystery flat, and naming it such. The Virtual Adept doesn't know where it is (could find it, if he tried, but hasn't - he respects her privacy), other than nearby. He hasn't seen it. But then, the way it was said, he's guessing Owen hasn't, either. A mystery to both of them, then.
[Owen Page] Chuck's height levels out a few inches above the Chorister's six one, but it doesn't appear to intimidate Owen. If anything, it makes him straighten off from his shoulder perch and clasp hands with the other Initiate for a beat, holding his eyes as he does before allowing his hand to return to a coat pocket. The other remains as is, holding the lamp downward from his body, the cord dangling like a length of rope he'd wound around his arm for some later purpose.
Chuck this is Owen
Emily introduces him, a crease faintly appears at the ridge of his nose then smooths away, replaced with a smile that somewhere between sedate and ambiguous. His demeanor was ungiving, but not impolite. There was simply a sort of stiffness ingrained into the way the Singer moved; spoke, kept his stance balanced enough that should the need arise, he could slip away in the blink of an eye.
Chuck was helping her pick things out, "I figured," he says by way of a lifted hand-in-pocket gesture toward the dining set and then at the Adept's additional commentary, his midnight-blue eyes settle on the other man, echoing: "Why not, right." Owen shifts the lamp in his grip; his attention returning to the Orphan, his voice doesn't gentle, or really outwardly demonstrate what, if anything, he's thinking right now and that could be frustrating -- the man was as stoic as the day was long.
"How are you liking the books?"
[Emily Littleton] They were neat little stepping stones then, coming in at six-four, six-one and five-nine. All neat and orderly. Almost as if they'd been planned so. Owen and Emily had similarly dark blue eyes, but beyond that did not even begin to look related. And Chuck knew, even if Owen didn't, that the one person around their age that she considered family was elsewhere.
Hmm. Emily glanced between the two of them, gave the table a little push (yep, it still leans). This whole thing -- the apartment, the social thing, the seeing someone thing -- was going to take a bit of work.
"I'm just getting started, but I think they're helping so far," Emily says. Now she's reached across her middle with one hand, caught the opposing elbow. Her free hand hangs down, impassive, at her side. It's a young person pose, made only slightly more grown up by the way the sweater-jacket hangs on her frame (over the dress that she is wearing [in defiance of winter] upon hopes of spring).
"Do you mind if I take one of them with me?" she asks. "I'm going overseas -- well, I'm going home for Easter -- and it seems rude to take them out of the country without asking." This word, home, is spoken with its proper weight and reverence. It is resonant and not entirely aching now.
[Owen Page] "Go for it," he offers to her request to take the books overseas with her and then when she rattles the table and found it was leaning; removed his hand from a pocket and gestured at it. "It's missing one of the props," the Chorister moved around the dining set and set his lamp to one side; the leather protested his lowering himself to his haunches and lifting the uneven corner leg up; running his fingers beneath it.
There was a certainty to the manner he did it that refreshed the memory that this -- repairing, altering, cleaning -- was what he did on a day by day basis. He set it back down, turning to face the pair of them, though his attention appeared far more riveted on the female. "I can fix it, if you decide to go with this one." Owen leaned back, bracing an elbow over his knee, brow knitted.
"After the holidays." He adds, absently, as if he'd forgotten [he had] that Easter was encroaching at all.
[Chuck Carmichael] "Oh, right. Passover started a bit ago." Chuck wrinkles his nose, not particularly affected by having forgotten. "I missed the seder. Oh, well."
It happens, and Chuck is not a particularly devout anything. He's hardly heartbroken about missing the fifteen step ceremony and meal (bitter herbs, unleavened bread . . . most of which is safe for him to eat, at least). Owen isn't particularly interested in socializing, and the Vdept watches him, fascinated.
"I know lefty-loosey-righty-tighty, but other than that, I'm pretty useless if it's not computers. Couldn't you just . . . I don't know, put a matchbook or something underneath the shorter leg?"
Emily's going home for a weak over break, this Chuck knows. He's not particularly happy about it, other than the part where it seems like something that will make Emily happy, and this is an important thing.
[Emily Littleton] Emily had not forgotten the impending holidays. One did not earn themselves the dubious accusation of being a C&E Christian without slavishly observing at least these two holidays. (Not that it had really been that way [just that it might have appeared that way, upon occasion]).
"I'd like that," she said, and they were both used to hearing that tone of voice from her, that turn of phrase, by now. "And then," she says, her tone brightening a bit, eyes widening (happily [cheerfully]), "I could even invite you two over for tea! For there would be somewhere to sit!"
Triumph. (Lo! This is progress!) Emily does own a kettle, and the proper tea making apparati, just not a table at which to sit... or, for that matter, much of anything to dress the table with.
She eyed the table set and made a quick count of chairs. As long as there were three or more, she was golden. If there were only two, well, then she could invite them over one at a time (which might be the better way to handle it, anyhow).
The revelation that Chuck is Jewish, followed shortly by the revelation that he does not care much for ceremony, earns him a slight smile and a glance from the Orphan. Nothing more than interest (okay, a margin of fondness [but who's counting]).
[Owen Page] "For a short term fix," Owen replies to the Virtual Adept, briefly cutting a glance at him, "yeah, but you're better off in the long term replacing the whole leg, or hammering in an extra piece of fitting." He collects his lamp, and rises to his feet once again; gathering the cord in his fingers.
Emily talks about inviting them over for tea, and places to sit and Owen's eyes remain steady on her face; the corner of his mouth moving briefly in some contained reaction to her words; for a moment there's what appears to be a flicker of empathy there, or some shared sympathy with whatever it is he believes he's witnessing in the purposeful, upbeat attitude and cheery words. "Where's home, exactly?" He steps out of the way of an elderly woman browsing the shelves with a basket full of nick-knacks.
[Emily Littleton] Where's home, exactly?
Jarod pressed, and never fully got an answer. Chuck knew, because he hacked her birth data (and at that point, why even pretend to evade the question?). Owen asks, and Emily...
There is an intense (tense) quiet between the Choristor and the Orphan. It supercedes, overwhelms, drowns out the playful banter that usually persists between the Orphan and the Adept. These two modes of communication are two disparate, diverse, to coexist within Emily for long. And given the opposing pulls, she naturally trends back toward her native quiet. Not that the friendly, affable, good-natured-fun-and-teasing Emily that Chuck knew was feigned. Not in any way. Just that it was difficult to be both, and reserved won out.
"Manchester," she said, evenly. "England," she added, just a little behind. As if either American might have trouble placing the country code on that one. As if her accent (the clearer parts of it) didn't give that much away.
"It's a bit of a flight," she says, and the wry little smile returns. Holds better purchase on her expression this time. (Unfeigned).
[Chuck Carmichael] "I'll bring the . . . um . . ." He muses for a moment, thoughtful. "Something from the grocery store. Unless people want hot dogs." Then there's questions and answers about home, and a Blackberry singing out All the single ladies put your hands up! as Chuck blushes, fumbles, looks at the display. There's a face pulled (fond [amused] dismayed) as he looks at the display, and he moves, leans to kiss the top of Emily's head.
"I have to take this, yeah? Might be awhile." It's apologetic, and this is the closest either of them has come since Owen arrived to anything that might be called 'seeing each other' behavior. "Was nice meeting you, Owen, just in case."
((Which is to say, it's 20 to 1, and CC needs to go to bed. But will wait for following posts!))
[Owen Page] "Manchester," he recognizes the city, knows only what an American high school education tells him about it, second [or was it third] largest city, "Good soccer team," he says it dead-pan but for the quirk of his lips in the aftermath and there's something behind it, something from his personal life, his past. A pleasure once indulged in, she'd seen him playing basketball, knew he had a fondness for sports.
It was a beginning, one supposed.
Chuck's phone rings, and Owen turns himself away a little, glancing at the items on the shelves, the floor, out of politeness, or perhaps simply habit. He deliberately keeps himself occupied while the pair say their lover's goodbyes, only turning back when he's personally addressed again. "Likewise, Chuck," he repeats the other man's name the way you did the designer of a piece of furniture, or movie you wanted to ensure you remembered for later.
He looks back to Emily, raises his lamp like an Olympian's torch. "I should let you get back to it," he nods in the Virtual Adept's direction. "I don't want to intrude."
[Emily Littleton] Chuck's phone issues forth a strange sound (oh, it's supposed to be music), and he blushes and fumbles for it. Emily looks over, with a warmly amused expression, and then accepts the explanation. Chuck kisses her head, she gives him a little one-armed hug, and that's about as far as they delve into the realm of public displays of affection (in front of Owen [tonight]). It's not as comfortable, effortless, as that night at the pizza parlor and Owen (being -Owen]), can certainly tell.
"If you have to leave, just text me," Emily says. It's a simple, perfunctory thing. Technology makes fluid plans so very much easier.
And then it's down to just her, and Owen. And the table. And a store full of potential treasures and plenty of flotsam.
"You're not intruding," she says, warmly. It is easier, now, that Chuck has stepped away. Easier that she's not trying to reconcile the two ends of the social spectrum with one another. She reflects so much of whoever she's with that it's difficult for Emily to handle mixed situations. "Also ... I have a couple questions for you, at some point, if you have the time."
This trended back to the books, and the chats they'd had before. It was also not something she wanted to discuss with or in front of Chuck. So compartmentalized these two friendships were, at least for now.
[Chuck Carmichael] ((Thanks for playing! *pushes Em and Owen together without Chuck interference!*))
[Owen Page] Owen Page did not own a computer, or a cell phone.
It wasn't really that he couldn't scrape the money together to invest in one, more simply that he had no real need for either. He was not a Virtual Adept, such as Chuck, to know the ins and outs of the technological era. He had no family he continued to keep contact with, or anyone to whom he was indebted to call on a daily, or weekly basis.
He didn't however, seem to carry any aversion to those who did possess either, his seemed to be a personal decision; one made years before. Emily reflects those to whom she's speaking, Owen does not seem quite so flexible, though his level of ease does increase with the other man gone, his smiles come more frequently, and linger far longer than any he'd expressed while being scrutinized by another.
"Ask me anything," he offers, without hesitation and leans against the nearest shelf, setting his to-be-purchased item on the shelf lower, and crossing arms over his chest; leather rustling.
[Emily Littleton] It's a strange place to have this conversation, full as it is of slightly worn, somewhat used, (broken and mended [mending]), cast off things. It is fitting, too, for the same reasons. Emily wets her lower lip, slightly, hesitates a little. Thoughtfully. She looks around, perhaps for Chuck or maybe for anyone else who might overhear.
"How does one come back," she asks, but the question isn't finished just yet. "To the Church?" A pause, a less mirthful wryness to her mouth. Emily can't quite meet his eyes. "To God, after having walked away."
She was going home for Easter, which didn't quite jive with this question. And she didn't appear particularly guilty (prodigal child), either. It could be a question aimed a theological differences, save that Owen had heard enough from her to suspect it ran deeper than that.
And now, after a little pause, her eyes find his again. They are calm and curious, questioning but alert. Deeply blue fields flecked through with stormy bits of grey.
[Owen Page] It's not only a strange location for it, it's a terribly difficult question to give an easy answer for. Owen stares at her; his dark gaze unflinchingly focused even when she lowers her own, looks away. There's a new level of attention being paid to Emily right now, and she might not fully enjoy the sensation it brings. The hairs on her arms might begin to stand on end beneath the Chorister's intensity, her cheeks might flush as she wishes he'd quit that.
He doesn't.
Not right now.
"That depends," he speaks finally, allowing her a reprieve of his eyes on her, though the memory remains, imprinted in the space around them. "On why you walked away to begin with." Owen breathes out, sharply, his chest expanding against his shirt, framing his shape beneath the layers. "People turn their back on religion every day, they decide they don't like what God, what Allah, whatever form of him, of it they believe in is handing them and turn away. The thing is, Emily," he says [this rare speech] quietly to her, very solemn, sincere but firm.
Unswayed.
"God, belief," he smiles, breaking the tense atmosphere for a moment. "It doesn't turn away from us, it just waits for you to reawaken." There's emphasis there, meaning to the word he chooses to use. They had both Awakened, for a second time, for the first real time. "If you're serious," he doesn't seem to think she's lacking sincerity, though his eyes do briefly stray to Chuck, the only real barrier he's noted thus far, potentially.
"Start by coming to a service. Go to one over Easter, then come back and tell me what you felt."
A beat, he clears his throat. "That's the first step."
[Emily Littleton] There is no easy answer to it. Never has been, never will be. And if an answer comes easily, then it is neither the truth nor comprehensive. Emily knows what she's asking (even knows most of what she wants to hear), so this round of scrutiny is weathered with surprising grace and countenance. She is calm, even as his resonance rakes over her, plucks at the fine hairs on her arms, down her neck.
There is, at last, a small and somewhat unguarded smile. It is gentler than most that Owen has seen, and she does not elaborate on it or explain it with any greater (growing) look of importance. Just that it is there, for a moment, long enough to be glimpsed, and then gone before it can be snatched away and filed clearly into memory.
"I have not forgotten belief," she says, gently. Perhaps this is unsurprising to him, for all that he's seen of her. Emily folds her arms lightly across her middle without really closing her body language much. Her head tips a bit to one side as she regards him, and the surety he holds, for a long moment. "Though I have often wondered what it is, who He was, that I had such Faith in for so long."
There is a little twitch at the corner of her mouth, then it stills, fades away. "Are you asking why I left?" she asks, but there is a cautionary note to that question. As if the answer is not something that can be put aside, forgotten, rendered unheard at some later time by either will or convenience.
[Owen Page] "No," he says instantly, "I think you are."
He doesn't miss the cautionary note in her voice that hinges on saying I'm not sure I'll give you that even if you are, but it doesn't sway him from telling her the truth, either. It's blunt, and as succinct as she must be coming to learn is what you got from Owen, when you asked him a serious question. He doesn't shift his weight, but he does relent on the pressure of his eyes, so focused on her, and his furious intensity about the subject matter.
What she asks is an inherit part of who he was, and she knew that.
She would not have addressed it otherwise.
"His face doesn't matter," dark brows draw upward, expressing the point. "It's whatever you want it to be. People get stuck, though, on naming it, and they forget." He lifts a shoulder, notes in an undertone, almost like an afterthought. "My Tradition tore itself to hell and back over that very thing."
[Emily Littleton] He is passionate about this, and Emily understands. It calls to something hidden away in the marrow of her bones, loosed only when some of them had been broken (shattered) and disjointed. It was something that had leached slowly out of her over time, achingly, rather than puddled on the floor in a matter of days. Not for the first time, she found herself wishing that this conversation, like so many others, had come before...
... But wishing wouldn't change anything. He turns her question around, and Emily's expression hardens. It is not a subtle thing. There is a flatness to it, now, that wasn't there a moment before. Any openness has fled. As if he'd stepped on her toe, or knocked her in the teeth, or any of a hundred other physical transgressions. There is a coldness that she cannot stop from coming, and beneath that an anger that is not for him.
"I know why I left," she said, and every syllable was carefully, evenly meted. Emily draws a slow breath, then lets it rush out of her heavily. Quickly. Her eyes fall shut, and her shoulders relax a little, but it is forced. And over the space of several minutes will become less so, will turn into something genuine, given enough time.
"I'm trying to decide," she said, a bit more openly, "If I'm able (ready) to move past that."
[Owen Page] There is passion in his words, and in her responses to it, it is a different kind of passion; a colder, firmer sort of refusal to as of yet acknowledge why she left, and why it matters to her that she cleave to that -- why it matters that Owen knows that she is aware of her reasons for walking away in the past.
He watches her, their bodies unconsciously turned toward the other as if they would, by physical means if not emotional, force the connection there and then when she's done; Owen lets a low, steady breath out of his chest. He straightens, and reaches beneath the layers of his clothing, tugging a silver chain from beneath them. There was a tiny cross fixed to the end of the chain; and it gleamed in the light as he wrapped his fingers around it, lowering his chin to focus on it, then reaching for the Orphan's hand.
"This is the core of my faith," he begins very softly, his tone intimate, gentler than before. The chain feels warm, as if it were heated by more than simply being worn against his skin. "I can feel the presence of everything that I am, and that I want to be when I have this on." Owen leans in, searching her eyes. "Search yourself, Emily." There's a trickle of energy in the air, some degree of faith at play, the subtle tang of hope; renewal.
"Ask yourself," he says, his eyes on her, even as he transfers her palm to his chest, and feels the steady reassurance of the beats there. She can count them, like the rhythm of his words. "Right now, are you ready?"
[Emily Littleton] Like calls to like. This is a reason, perhaps the reason, these two have found one another in the vastness of a city like Chicago. And it is the similarities between them, not the differences, that make her hesitant in this moment. Not so much afraid as ashamed.
Her eyes meet his, and there is genuine understanding in them. And pain. They are bright, nearly damp with the tears that are welling up. It is hard to look into his face, to see the faith and rapture there. It was like looking backwards through the mirror to see something in herself from long ago. (Denied [forsaken]). It would have been so much easier, all of this, if Emily had been able to set aside her Faith, her belief, and walk without it.
Her palm rested against his chest, but Emily's fingers curled inward, lightly dragged against his shirt. Not grasping, but faintly withdrawing. Emily swallowed back something (dry mouth [heavy heart]), and spoke very faintly into the space between them.
"I don't know, Owen." Pleading. Some part of this hurt her, cut down to her quick in ways he likely did not foresee. "I want to be. God knows I have wanted to come back so many times but I don't know how." She blinks and looks away, and there are tears in her eyes now. Singly spilling down her cheeks. "He left me to die, in a dank dark basement in Prague. He let them beat me until I didn't have the strength to even pray anymore, and I wanted to die and then he took that from me -- I don't know how to come home after that, but I'm trying. Since I woke up, I've been trying to."
Emily pulls her hand away, wipes at her eyes with the arm of her sweater. She takes a step back, if he'll let her. Her cheeks are flushed, and she won't look over at him. (Embarrassed. [Hurt.] Pushed a little [a lot] too far.) Unworthy.
This is not the place for these conversations, however hushed and to the far side of the store they were. No, Emily had never forgotten Faith.
[Owen Page] He doesn't have a handkerchief on him, and she's crying. That bothers him, a lot. Or maybe it's simply that she's crying at all and how much it reminds him of somebody else, crying because of his actions, because of something that he had done to them. She can see in his eyes, those unfathomable dark eyes of his how much he's feeling her reaction, and her confession of what made her give up.
His jaw clenches, and he drops his necklace in favor of allowing her to reclaim space; put a wall between her wants and her fears of being unworthy; unwanted by a God that would leave her dying in the street, crying out his name, pleading for his intervention.
She has no idea how familiar that story is to him and he wants to her so, there's a wrestling match taking place behind those eyes; flickering around in their depths, struggling to overcome a shame that's as deep down ingrained in him as it is in her. "I'm sorry," he says it quietly; his hands back at his sides, fingers curled inward to stall them for reaching out to draw her back; to invoke the sensation of hope to spring within her again.
"I understand," he closes his own eyes now, turning his face away, down to one side as if the strain were physical; painful.
[Owen Page] [augh, 'wants to tell her so', that should read.]
[Emily Littleton] It's been a long time, she'd said, the first time they met, since His home was my own.
And now Owen knows the things that are holding her back, keeping her separate, possibly even keeping her Orphaned here in this new life. He knows, too, something no one else does: that she wants to come home, that's she trying to find footing on the path.
It is a raw moment, in which they both suffer and neither is too blind, too numb, to see the other's pain. Emily, for all her ache and her damp eyes, despite the arms wrapped more tightly across her middle, cannot help but look to him with compassion and concern when his voice is as quiet (pained) and burdened as her own.
This is the wrong place for this conversation, but perhaps the right place for the acts of charity that they might find in one another.
"I'm sorry, too," she said, gently. Emily used the heel of her thumb to push tears from the corners of her eyes. The crying did not last long, despite the intensity of the moment that passed between them.
"It's never easy, is it?" she asked, more gently now. (It doesn't get easier, either).
[Owen Page] People in the Good Will store must be wondering what the dark-haired man she's standing with has said to make her upset, at least one passing shopper casts Owen a dark glance, cutting between the pair and making conclusions all her own. Probably because Emily was slight, and small and [seemingly] delicate and Owen was taller, broader and looked like he was suffering some degree in holding in his anger.
Of course, that was entirely wrong.
But perceptions are tricky things; they distort what they should make clear, and sometimes reveal things we wish they would not.
"No," he confirms, opening his eyes now and carefully tucking his necklace [prime, unity, one] back beneath his shirt, he won't meet her eyes for any length right now, and can only hope she doesn't not take it to mean he is angry with her, or disgusted, or convinced she will never belong among his own. Rather, Owen collects his lamp, and hovers, stepping nearer to the Orphan, to deliver his parting words to her.
"But the endurance is what makes you," he looks at her, then, and briefly reaches a hand up to cup her chin. "Happy Easter, Emily."
26 March 2010
Where is it you've come from?
[Owen Page] It isn't until they put some degree of distance between themselves and the other Magi that the man beside Emily really seems to relax. It's gradual, but at some point between waving farewell to Ashley and walking across the still-snowy grounds to exit Lincoln Park, Owen Page's capacity for rational thought and speech resurfaces and he's even casting the young Orphan beside him occasional glances to assess her mood, or thoughts, as they cross out onto the street.
It's almost dusk by this point, and the temperature has not gotten any warmer; all trace of earned body heat from physical exertion have long since left the Chorister's bones and he nods his head, indicating the way he's intending to stroll if she wants to come with with a returning smile at once reserved and encouraging. "My new place is this way, you want to come warm up? I'm fairly sure I have coffee."
It might be one of those times when a woman has to consult her own judgment and decide if she fully trusts the person she's with not to suddenly turn into a lecherous creep once secured away behind closed doors. At first glance, Owen Page certainly doesn't appear as if he has dark designs in store for Emily should she accept; he simply looks cold, shoulders hunched like herself against the rapidly cooling day.
[Emily] ((Leave unasked unanswered, dif 6))
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 5, 5, 6, 8, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)
[Emily] Perhaps it is a testament to how far she has come that such things do not (seem to) enter Emily's mind. Owen is, and has so far been, a comforting presence. Solid, calm, if a little prone to appearing in the most unexpected places. And though Emily has more reasons than most to be skeptical (fearful) it does not appear to be the case today.
The further they are from the gathering in the park, the calmer the Orphan seems to be. She is tall, for her gender, but does not stand shoulder to shoulder with the Choristor. She can match him in purposeful quiet, though, and such is the case just now. Emily does not quail away from silent spaces, she does not need to clutter them up with words, or imply words and questions into them with obvious emotions -- not now. She is thoughtful, yes, this much shows in her expression but there are few times (fewer times yet, in the collection of moments Owen has seen of her) that she is not actively thinking, considering, reacting to something.
"I would like that," she says, all careful consonants and foreign vowels. There is a warmth in Emily's expression (guarded still [growing]). Perhaps Owen must consider, as well, whether he trusts her enough to welcome Emily into his home. If he knows her enough to invite her across that threshold, share the communion of space and time.
She draws her arms a bit tighter across her middle. "Pity," she says, to no one in particular as she looks after the receding daylight. "I was so enjoying Spring."
[Owen Page] She was so enjoying Spring.
"It'll return," he attests for her, to the apparent return of Winter in the air around them, and casts her a side-long smile; as brief and contained as ever most of the young man's expressions seem to be. The street where Owen Page has taken up residence is, as promised, not far at all from the Park itself. Over another block is the church that he spends his days doing the sort of modest work most would feel slightly ashamed to admit to but which he seems openly pleased by.
The apartment block itself was housed between a second hand book store and a small green grocery; the street-side door made of glass and steel and graffiti-strewn heavily across the buzzers. As of yet, there was no button to depress that read Page but rather a blank spot beside apartment 3B. The Chorister shifts his basketball and bag around in his grasp once they reach the door, and finds a set of keys; unlocking the main entrance and waiting for Emily to enter ahead of him.
"There's no elevator, I'm afraid." He confesses, and nods at the staircase. It's only three flights before he stops and marks their progress down a serviceable, yet clean hallway to the second of five doors painted a dark green with gold lettering screwed into each. Owen unlocks the door and feels around for the light switch, stepping inside and setting his belongings down on a desk just inside the door. He hadn't been joking, the Chorister, when he told Ashley at the Church that the place he'd rented was small. In truth, it was mostly comprised of a single, floor-boarded room that had a kitchenette tucked away in one corner with a bathroom adjoining it and masked behind a cut away wall was what passed, one assumed, for Owen's bedroom.
It had a Queen sized bed in the corner, a bed-side table and little else in terms of furnishing. There were a few moving boxes stacked in corners, and a TV set had been propped atop one such box; surrounded by a mish-mash of clashing sofa chairs. It was, in short, the sort of place you expected a college student, or someone on a limited budget to abide in. Owen stops, just inside the door and begins shrugging off his layers; allowing Emily to look around.
"So, this is home."
[Emily] There are things that they don't know about each other and those stories would fill volumes upon volumes. There are subtle hints, cues toward the themes of those stories, in the way they view and interact with one another. There are shadows and shapes of far away lives, memories, in the way that she stops just inside the doorway, to take off her shoes, however bare or cold his floors may be.
There's a careful scrutiny approaching appreciation in the way Emily moves into the small space with its efficient groupings of furniture and open space. She reaches up to tug a thin band out of her hair, to loose her curls and let them fall down around her shoulders. She does not pry, or wander into areas that are set aside and separate, but it must be curious to him to watch the curiousity in her.
"I like it," she says, without any pretense or falsehood. She tucked her hands back into the front pocket of her sweatshirt and offered him a small smile. (Approval.) Observant as he was, Owen might notice that Emily walks on the balls of her feet (more obvious, here, in stocking feet), that she gravitated towards the kitchenette in the corner when finding an out of the way place to stand as he went through the motions of coming home.
"It's a good home."
[Owen Page] Owen's apartment had no obvious signs of heating, but he had gone far enough to toss some old and tired [pre-loved] rugs across the expanses of bare floor. Especially beneath his bed, and around the TV and couches. There were two desks in the place, one by the door with a phone-set and another perched where one supposes it suffices as a dinner table of sorts for Owen; cluttered at present by piles of newspapers and an opened book; the corner marked on the open page.
Closer inspection shows it to be some great tomb of a biography about the Dali Llama -- interesting.
He smiles, pleased perhaps, when Emily confirms that its a good home and turns; stripped now to his hoodie and draw-string pants; his feet bare against the floor. "It's my first, so," he shrugs and moves across to join her where the kitchen tiles began and opens cupboard doors, pulling out the requirements for the promised coffee. Two cups; teaspoons, sugar, instant coffee.
Owen fills the kettle with water; continuing on with the motions Emily is observing.
"Remember I said Ashley came to see me?" He waits for a nod, settling his body in the adjunct of benches as they wait for the water to boil. "She seems concerned with you finding a Tradition that fits."
[Emily] There is a kettle; this is deemed a good thing. Instant coffee; not so much. If their friendship is to be a long one, Owen will eventually be fostered in the quiet, contemplative tradition of taking tea. Emily cannot help it, the snobbishness can be attributed to time abroad in Asia, to heritage and roots in England, to any of a handful of influences that have made her particular about seemingly inconsequential ritual. In time, they would teach other many things. Today is not that time; today is a day for instant coffee (and for feeling [showing] gratitude for that hospitality).
He addresses her and Emily does nod (yes, she remembers). She listens. There is a moment, careful, observed and taken meaningfully before she replies. "She and I have spoken to this many times," Emily admits, perhaps shyly. Feeling, not for the first time, a little shame in her spiritual homelessness. "She seemed pleased when I told her we'd met," Emily recalled.
Her hands come out of her pockets now, fold politely in front of her. Emily stands at the margin of his kitchen not unlike a student in recitations. A little hesitant (curious [wary]). "I didn't realize she'd meant to speak to you on my behalf."
[Owen Page] Owen straightens when the kettle whistles, and flicks it off. It's an older sort, no doubt purchased second-hand as so many of the things in his apartment seemed to be -- maybe that's some sort of reflection on him, too. This strange, slightly insular guy who can't be that much older than Emily herself, surely.
Maybe he's a little battered and out of date.
He holds her choices up in either hand with raised brows; tea, or coffee, and then as he sorts the beverages out, replies: "She didn't want to make choices for you, she and I were just in agreement, I guess, that finding where you fit in seems," Owen hands her a cup, and palms his own, his eyes dark and unfathomable in the soft apartment light. "Well, important to you. What I told her," he leans back again, resettling. "I'll tell you. If I can help, I will, but in the end, that choice is yours and yours alone."
The corner of his lip quirks, as if he were reading her thoughts [it was irritating, that ambiguous smile of his]. "Have you considered any others?"
[Emily] If Owen's home (possessions) said that much about him, one would have to wonder what he would glean about Emily from hers (lack thereof). After a handful of homes (dwellings [residences] but never home), Emily stopped assuming that the space where one laid their head reflected overmuch on the contents therein. There was a reason, though, that she has been welcome into (taken into) so many people's homes and taken so few of them back to see where it was she rested in the quiet hours of the night.
"Tea, please," she says, with little hesitation. There is a thank you, when he hands it to her. In time, Emily goes through the small, practiced motions of steeping her tea as if they are rote, thoughtless (but not mindless) details.
Have you considered any others? he asks. Emily dips her head in thought for a moment, then answers, unobfuscated: "I studied briefly under a Verbena, but he has left. I do not think he will return."
It is almost an answer; a side step. Graceful enough that Owen might not notice how carefully it answers without answering.
"There is another Orphan; I have considered remaining as I am."
These are offered without meeting his eyes. It is coincidental, surely, that she studies the other spaces in his home and not the lineaments of his features.
[Owen Page] [Perception + Alertness: >_0 ]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 4, 8, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)
[Emily] The answer, in short, is no. Emily says the right things, answers him literally, but Owen is perceptive beyond the bounds of reason at times. Perhaps it is why they were drawn together, cast into the same place at the same time by a higher, all-knowing will.
She is at a crossroads on her path back out of the darkness. Between the place of Faith remembered and Grace regained. There is a struggle, still, and Owen cannot see or know why, but she has been Called back to God. There is trepidation to overcome, shadows and trials she has not yet put behind her.
He asks if she has considered any others. How could she? She is stumbling down the path that will bring her home again. This is no small thing, returning. As he found her in the sanctuary, Owen can see the beginning of it in her now (borrowed faith [the will to believe] rekindling).
[Owen Page] He watches her when she answers and avoids looking at him. He knows enough about the body language of people to glimpse the reluctance to come to terms with what she already knows, or what is beginning to seed as understanding within her. She's caught; like an insect in a spider's web; struggling because it seems the only way to get free but in the process capturing herself only further.
[resistance]
Owen Page had not known Dylan, the Orphan who also lost his way, fell beneath the onslaught of too much, too fast, too painful but he can empathise with the conflicting emotions of those left in his wake -- left in what shell took control of his limbs when the core of him had been chipped away at until there was nothing left within the form to struggle its way free again.
He is not Euthanatos, to try and find the unity of life in death.
He was a Singer among those of the Celestial Chorus; he was a member of a subsection that argued vehemently against many factions of his own Tradition, that knew that to truly unite those like him, they needed one unified belief of how everything, how the One connected them -- not the squabbling of long-spoiled children of men who mistook greed for wisdom, and segregation for progress.
How many had been burned for the glory of men who could not see past their own noses -- hundreds, thousands. Churches that stood against the people; against God, against creation itself in the past. Owen observes Emily Littleton and sees a spark that is beginning to regain its own source of power.
[belief]
He hears what she says, and his eyes don't read judgment when she finally meets them, if she does, but a strange degree of compassion; he sets his coffee down beside him on the bench and frames his body with one palm flat either side of him. "That's an option, too," he agrees softly, and studies her a beat.
There are worlds unspoken between them, but he doesn't seem to want to stretch those boundaries yet; he houses all that comprehension within him and reclaims his cup, nodding her to follow him to the comfort [relatively speaking] of the sofas.
"I have some books you might like, they offer some interesting opinions on faith, and belief and its role in our day to day lives. Once upon a time, I found them pretty helpful."
[Emily] Once upon a time, she too had been a diligent student of world views, religions, philosophies. Her background was far from traditional, and there would be many within the Chorus that might look at her askance, question her theological footing from which to (re)start a life of Works and Faith in Him.
She wrapped long fingers around the mug of tea, carried it carefully before her as she followed him into the living area. (It is difficult to consider the spaces separate rooms, conjoined as they were.) It was a lifeline, stringing together moments like these, from her past, through her present, stretching on into the future. So many moments, in which her views on God, grace, reverence had been molded and set, tried, fired in the crucible of conflict, owned.
Compassion is often harder to bear than judgment. When Emily settles, she draws inward somewhat. Makes herself smaller. (Denies the light within from shining brightly, proudly).
"It has been a long time since I had someone to talk to about these things," she observes, almost by way of an apology. "I hope you don't find me poor company or conversation." Shyly. She sips at her tea and yes, her gaze strays to find a bookshelf or stack that might be the collection he alluded to.
[Owen Page] Owen clears a spot for her to sit down on, there seem to be an unearthly amount of old newspapers, misplaced books and clothes scattered around the place. It's comforting to an extent though, signifies that he considers this his own space to do what, and be what he wants, without feeling a need to disguise himself, or his beliefs -- or lack there of.
He takes the easy-chair and when she tells him she hasn't had anyone to talk to about these things, a faint flush of color crawls up his neck and he's looking down at his coffee cup, laughing silently, suddenly as shy and uncertain as she. "Sorry, sometimes I forget. I get carried away," a corner of his mouth quirks as the blush flees his face, replaced with that quiet, controlled sense of self-deprecating humor he tended to utilize in public.
"It's been a while since I really spoke to anyone this much."
[Emily] Emily chuckled a little. It was an easy thing, fairly unfettered with other intent. Warm. She shook her head a little and offered him a wry smile.
"Your world seems much quieter than mine." There is a warmth, then, that touches her eyes. Dark and blue like his, they aim to catch his, hold them, just long enough to be reassuring. (How quickly roles reverse [comforted becomes comforting]).
"Tell me," she says, and it's seeking, gentle. Asking for permission to ask further after things they've left unsaid. "Where is it you've come from?" Not where home is, not where he's headed. Just the last stop on his journey before here. Emily suspects, but does not know, that Owen may have a similarly fluid (inexplicable [unspeakable]) past.
But he is shy, and her awareness of that catches up with Emily. She pulls her eyes away, casts them at the mug in her hands instead. "That is, if you don't mind. I just feel we ought know more of each other than you're Owen and I'm Emily."
There is a smaller smile, quiet and hidden, eclipsed quickly by the edge of her cup as she sips at her tea again.
[Owen Page] Where is it you've come from
There's a hesitation there. It's physical as well as anything else. It does not take any deep amount of perception to catch the flicker of pain that passes through the Chorister's eyes at the questions regarding his past. His fingers tighten around his mug; the knuckles pull bone white.
He can't look at her and say any of these things, he can barely stand to hear himself repeat the words, any of the words, that sketched back the picture of his past twenty-three years of life. "South Dakota." He's retreating back behind the walls contracted to protect himself from feeling the memories the name dregs up.
"My parents still live there, in our family home." A beat, and his eyes travel beyond Emily to find the wall across the room, his brows furrowed deep in whatever thoughts he's currently reliving. "I moved out though, when I was eighteen."
There are other things, deeper, hidden things about this period he's deliberately shying from; that if the careful modulation of his tone is any indication, just like Emily and her reawakening faith, he's not ready to deal with, yet. "I studied for a few years with my Mentor and then, uh," he shapes the cup between his hands, looks across at her, smiling benignly.
"I came here." He returns after a minute to an earlier comment of hers, nudging the conversation away from his demons. "I kind of enjoy the quiet, I like being able to think without," he gestures at the room, the door, the world without. "all that getting in the way."
[Emily] This is familiar. This is achingly familiar. She can feel the echoed tightness in her own bones, her tendons pulled tight, skin taut : remembered; it is not now. Now, for Emily, is the careful play of compassion across the canvas of her features. It is the way she leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees, bows her head a bit. Listens, without trying to look into him (through him). Looks over at moments to catch the set of his features, but not to let her gaze rake over him (scouring [searching]).
She knows too well what it is to speak without saying, to disclose without giving much of anything away. In Emily, Owen will find no judgment; instead a softness (I know [there are things left unsaid, unknown] and that's okay]).
She shifts enough to reach out, to lay a warm and gentle hand on his knee for a moment (his shoulder is too far away [but would be more appropriate]). It is a simple thing : touch : communion. Two spirits in witness of the pain and struggle in one another, in the joy of beginning a new. The shyness of sharing with new people.
"Thank you," she says, pulling her hand away, bringing it back to wrap around her mug. Now she'll look to him, catch his eyes briefly. Smile, softly. "It is a hard city to find quiet in, this one. I'm glad you've found some place to call home."
It is an important word to her, home. Owen can almost feel the longing in it, the way it tries to catch in her throat. Resonant. Weighty. But they were moving away from such somber things. She sips at her tea, again, and lets it pass.
[Owen Page] In some ways her understanding only makes it worse. He had not sought a moment's peace, or forgiveness [for there was none, for some actions] since arriving in the city. He had sought the most menial, the humblest of jobs that did not involve anything more or less than his own two hands and his sweat and sometimes his blood.
It felt fitting.
It felt right.
But then they had come, invading his private penance; his self-imposed denial of everything that had come after the fact. After -- [rending metal, shattering glass, the acrid stench of burning rubber] -- everything. He had attempted to push the knowledge [Him] aside but he knew that wouldn't last. That he'd never be complacent with Owen denying himself what was meant to be.
So He pushed.
And pushed.
And Owen gave in, and here he sat, being comforted by a hand on his knee by a near stranger. Except that she wasn't. Hadn't felt much like one since the moment they met, and he can't help the instinct that sets his own warm palm atop Emily's there on his knee; can't help looking over at her with those [intense, way too intense] eyes of his and just absorbing the tactical sensation of another [warm, inviting] human being being so near to him.
Because how long has it been since anyone reached out for him?
There's a pulse in the air, an indefinable crackle that seems to almost devour the oxygen when Owen regards Emily like that, feeling what he does before he seems to shake himself clear of it; whatever it was he was experiencing and remove his hand from hers -- her skin feels hot; so does his. He curls his fingers inward, and clears his throat.
"Thanks," he offered.
[Emily] Bear witness. It is one of the sacred duties that holy people perform for one another. It is one of the duties that lesser, fallible, [broken and mending] mortals provide for one another. It is the sacrament of touch, communion, nothing more magical than asking and taking the time to truly listen. These two, for all of their differences, stand together in something greater now : fellowship. If only for a moment, her hand on his knee (his hand on hers), it is enough.
Thanks, a warmer smile (growing [warmer yet] broader). She weathers the scrutiny, intense as it is, without flagging. Odd, perhaps, this immoveable moment in the Orphan he has often seen verklempt, like a ship tossed on story seas.
"Would you like a housewarming?" she asks, which may seem an odd question. Out of place (yet it isn't). "Your own place; it is something to celebrate," still soft, gently coaxing. There's nothing to Emily expression that implies a housewarming need be more than tea and conversation, but if he knew her better he might suspect that there would be something baked (so the space smelled like home) in his tiny kitchen, something of a gift offered to brighten the place.
She is an odd one, this Emily, whom he feels as if he might have known far longer than a scant few weeks. Not a stranger, not yet a friend. She watches him, kindly, and sips at her tea some more.
[Owen Page] Her question has his dark eyebrows pinching together; his frame leaning back against the chair. Owen was a young man possessing both height and broad shoulders, though his figure drew in toward the waist and upper thigh, lending him an athletic, but lean figure. His musculature suggested a person who did a great deal of physical labor, or sport, as did the tan to his forearms, and face. The fact that he held it even during winter to spring spoke a lot about his job, his habits, his life before he had known any of the awakened in Chicago.
"A housewarming?" He echoes her words back at her as if they confused him utterly, he sat back and after shaking his head a touch, cast her both a bittersweet and vaguely bemused smile. "I don't have anyone to invite," he says practically, with the air of a sensible diplomat at work. "Except you, and maybe Ashley, if she'd come."
Owen doesn't seem hurt by the idea that the Hermetic might not show, just sensible of the very real possibility. He knows she dislikes crowds almost as much as he does.
[Emily] He doesn't have anyone to invite. He doesn't think anyone will come. One of Emily's eyebrows arches, curiously, as if she is at once amused by this conjecture and bemused. Confused. These are pragmatic responses, but not what Emily was looking (fishing) for.
"I think you mistake me," she says, and the sentence style is just foreign enough to sound odd, but not out of context. Emily's speech is occasionally a curious, muddled thing. Now, especially, in quieter moments and more serious discussions.
"It's not for them," she explains, something bittersweet touching her expression as well (but farther off than his [occulted, occluded]). "It's for you. Something to make this place feel a little less like the place you lie your head, and a little more like yours."
There is a pause. A little shrug. She tucks away a quieter expression, pulls it back from the corners of her eyes and the edge of her lips. It fades, almost before he has a chance to recognize it for what it might have been.
"I've lived a lot of different places. It used to help me settle in." She looked around a little, and shrugged again. "Then again, maybe you're doing just fine at that on your own." A slightly wry quirk to her smile, then Emily looks away and down into the bottom of her mug. It is nearly empty, so she finishes her tea and sets it aside.
[Owen Page] It's not for them, it's for you
Something flickers again in the Chorister's dark eyes, but it's here and then gone so quickly that the frustration becomes what emotion, what reaction it truly was. Even now that he's begun to get to know the Orphan, even though he has overcome a natural shyness to speak to her more than most, he is still holding back; still caging whatever inner monologues, or sensations her words might have inside him. His fist, so to speak, was still firmly clenched.
Or perhaps that is literally, as he houses the one that had touched her against his thigh, the coffee cup resting on the other.
"I don't really need that," he gently declines, and then seeks to explain, somehow. "I understand," why you're offering, why I'm touched that you care enough to, why it might matter to you to offer it, "But wherever I am, is mine as soon as I choose to own that I'm there." There's something learned in his words to her now, something sought and comprehended at some point in his past; a faith.
[Emily] She was careful, when she explained herself, not to use the word home. Emily can use that by extension, she can casually toss it around in colloquialisms (They're not home), but she avoids diluting it with overuse. It has a specific meaning, but that is neither here nor now.
I don't really need that, he says. And it is, in truth, all he need say. She's already nodding, before he finishes explain. Which is not to say that she doesn't listen, no!, only that he didn't owe her any explanation at all.
"I've overstepped," she observes, and it is a politer thing (ever so slightly more guarded [like his fist, clenched]). "My apologies?" she offers, and there is genuine regret in her expression for a moment. For the assumption, for overreaching, for letting some piece of herself into a conversation that was, presently, shaped more around him.
[Owen Page] She says she's overstepped, and he's denying her words and the apology that follows it, his expression growing, for the moment, warmer. "No," he sits forward, caging his big palms around his near-finished coffee cup, twirling the dregs around in it for a minute. "I told you before," there are hesitations in Owen's speech when he's struggling with words, with how to pronounce what it is he wants to say.
"I'm bad," with people, is unspoken but acknowledged. "I'm ... touched," he's careful on that word, with the smile that's clinging to his lips. "That you want to help me. I appreciate it." He rises then, dwarfing her abruptly with his height, with that strangely intense gaze that settles on her face; scours it for meaning, casts about for comprehension, with how close it brings him to her, still seated. He reaches for her empty cup, to collect both for returning to the sink.
"Did you want another?"
[Emily] He struggles, and Emily waits. Not out of cruetly, but out of a long-suffering patience. It matters not to her that Owen is tripping over his mother tongue; it is not that different from the struggle to overcome a language barrier. Perhaps Owen's truly native language is not in words, but rather in works, or some artistic outlet. Emily does not know, and it is not the type of question one asks, bold-faced and insensitively. This is an answer (understanding) that comes only in time, with the slow, drawn-out getting to know one another that she has rarely had the time or luxury for.
She listens, and watches. When Owen stands up to clear their mugs, Emily seems even smaller. She is slight and bean-pole tall anyway, and the sweats do more to fill out her frame than jeans and sweaters, but she is also whip-thin, fragile (broken and mending). In some ways, it fits the transience of her life. She is a ghost, this is a whisper, and someday (perhaps someday very soon) she would not be a shadow on his sofa or a friendly presence by his side. She is often (always) one foot out the door.
"No, thank you," she says. "I'm quite alright," she adds. It is a shy thing, now, too, in the wake of his struggle and stammer. Emily is not sure what to say, whether to steer the conversation one way or another. So she waits, watches and listens. And the space between them grows silent once more.
[Owen Page] He's very aware of her being in his apartment, that much she can glimpse in the manner he attends to her comforts before he himself attends to his own. He asks her if she wants another cup of tea, and then hesitates a minute when she declines it as if not sure what to do with his own two feet if this is the case.
He can't always have been this awkward around others, can he? There are moments where he seems almost another man altogether; like the night outside the pizza parlor, his eyes suggesting playfulness, his tone and manner almost flirtatious against this version; almost child-like in its uncertainty, in the manner it almost requires guidance on social accuracies. Still, after the brief moment where he stands, so still and looks at her, he turns, albeit a touch stiffly, and pads over to the kitchen; standing, back to her as he rises the dishes out and sets them on a drying rack.
He remains there after he's done for a few seconds as if he's forgotten that he had company at all before he seems to regain his comprehension of her and turns back; moving around the apartment with his quiet, sure tread. When he returns its with a handful of the books he offered to give her earlier and something else that possibly draws her eye. This time he doesn't sit across from her, but beside her on the other side of the sofa.
There's a sketchbook in his hands. "I'm not good with people," he explains, opening up the first page, which was a sketched drawing of the Church, Emily might recognized the snow-dappled trees, the arched windows of St James', faithfully etched into a still life memory, housed in the pages of his book. "But I do see them." He adds, and seems to be willing her to understand, holding her gaze as long as he can before he feels the need to look away. The hand that had drawn the sketches in the book was no polished artist, but it did do them justice, and it did have a talent for capturing the tilt of a sparrow's head as it tripped over the grass in Grant Park; or the laughter of a mother and child, rejoicing during a Church service.
It was a journal, drawn in picture; and it sung as if it had a voice of its own.
[Emily] They are, each, the composites of all the events and ideas, trials and triumphs, sorrows and joys that have led them to this moment. They are, each, in their own way whole; each in their own way seeking something greater. It is the way with people, like Owen, like Emily; like people, everywhere, with something greater to attend to, aspire to, long for, reach after. It is possible that this fundamental underlying truth existed before their Awakenings, and it is some piece of a mortal life (unchanged [unchanging]) that calls to the other in echoes of self (acceptance).
His footsteps carry him away, and Emily is left for a moment on the sofa with her own thoughts. She does get up and follow him to the kitchen, natter on about one thing or another -- as she might do (often does) in other places, with other people. Instead she fishes the silver locket out from under her sweater, wraps long fingers around it and bows her head thoughtfully. The hand encircling that small bauble (Home, it cries out [Home, like a heartbeat]) lifts up so that the back of her knuckles just touch her lips. It is a moment, stolen, taken apart from her fellowship with him. (An ache.) It is something she hopes that he might miss from across the room.
So that thin thrum of belonging is there, threaded around her and into the space he now occupies, book in hand, as she shifts to be just a little nearer, to look into the book of sketches he's offering.
"They're... lovely," she says, struggling for the right word. Lifting it up (elevating) with the same gentle awe that underscores her resonance. There is a quiet smile now, characterize by subtle shaping and the warmth in her eyes.
Again, her hand strays into his space. Finds his arm, rests there gently. "You're quiet," she says, and it is not chiding in any sense. "But that doesn't make you bad with people, Owen." A little pause, her eyes try to catch his, to hold them, to will some understanding to him in return. "I hope, in time, you won't feel that way with me."
[Owen Page] It's the second time she's touched him and this time she can feel the constrained tension that comes as a result of the physical sensation. His muscles tighten; and a tiny spark ignites from where her hand rests all the way through his body. He doesn't quiver, or make any other outward remark about it; but he does seem to tense up for a moment as if this, as if touch, were something foreign [or forgotten] to him.
That doesn't make it wrong, though.
She says his sketches are lovely, and he smiles; laughs, actually, a brief, brittle breath worked from his chest. "They're alright," he qualifies the compliment and sets them aside. She hopes, trying to catch his eye, that he won't feel that way with her and he frowns, contemplative.
"I'd like that." A moment; another hesitation; they're closer now, physically and other and it prompts him, like the hand on his arm. "That guy you were with, at the pizza parlor, who is he," a moment, a gathering of meaning. "To you, that is."
[Emily] ((You had to ask..., dif 6))
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 6 (Success x 3 at target 6)
[Owen Page] [I really did, I'm pushy.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 2, 3, 7, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)
[Owen Page] [Erm. I'm spechul. Re-rolling with Acute Senses Diff Mod.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 5, 6, 6, 8, 8 (Success x 5 at target 4)
[Emily] "Ah, that's Chuck," she says, because Owen cannot be asking about Nathan. Would not be asking about Nathan. Her hand comes away, meets her other, folded into her lap a little. Primly or shyly, it's a bit difficult to tell. And it is Emily's turn to struggle, with words (with the feelings that underlay them), to take overlong to answer.
He has touched on something delicate, something kept close to vest and played so very carefully. Owen, being who and what he is, can see the play of it across her features -- subtle, so carefully restrained. She recoils, again subtly, draws her hand back, rounds her shoulders a little. There is an edge (uncertainty) to her words when she replies.
"He's a good friend," she says, but it does not stop there. That, alone, does not warrant the caution, the unease. "We are... seeing each other? Is that the right term?" She struggles with the idiom, trips over it as if it's foreign (though for all Owen knows, this is her mother tongue too). She doesn't say they're dating, or their sleeping together, or use any possessive in any sense. It is as if Emily does not know the answer to his question any more than he does.
Emily shrugs a little. There is a flicker of something gentler, and the shadow of worry in her features as well.
"I am... not good with people, in some ways, too," she admits.
[Owen Page] Whatever he expected when he asked; it seems to be answered in the [non]reply that Emily gives him. They are both of them careful to explain as little as possible while delivering what can be, on the surface anyway, a perfectly diplomatic answer. It's there and it isn't; like the mirror, the thoughts might be in the reflector's eye, but they cannot be read through it.
She calls him Chuck, and the Chorister files the name away for later use, as he does the term she puts to their arrangement; that they are friends that see one another, but that she's bad with people too. Perhaps the intimacy of naming whatever she had with Chuck frightens the Orphan; to say he is my boyfriend is to give the situation wings, and to perhaps curtain anything further from happening in other venues.
"Oh." He says, and draws back a little to arrange his books; to sort through the ones he meant to give her; there's nothing to read on his impassive face that shrieks jealousy, or disappointment, or anything other than what he'd cast back at her answer, as if it had been perfectly acceptable. Just oh, as if it all made sense somehow and he'd only been needing the confirmation. "These might interest you," he turns back, meeting her gaze if offered steadily. "If you want some variety."
A shadow of a smile.
[Emily] It is not just the naming, but the intimacy itself that frightens (worries) Emily. It is a shared Hope, faith invested in another person, and these things are uncertain. She is just as uncertain of her ability to carry it, foster it, let it grow into something new as she is of the situation itself. Emily's mouth purses a little, and she is very still. Overly conscious of what moving away from Owen might mean, just now; equally conscious of what moving toward him might mean. Caught. (Kept.) It is a deeply unsettling thing.
This would be a good juncture for I must away or Oh, look at the time! or any of the other small, contrived, forgiveable exits (stage left [with grace and decorum]), but she doesn't offer them. It does not seem fair, somehow, to politely whisk herself away, away from scrutiny and observation, when he had struggled so to share with her.
He offers her something, but Emily is momentarily unhearing. She recognizes the weight of his attention on her, though, and looks over, meets his eyes as much by accident as intention.
"I'm sorry..." she says. No attempt to explain is made, not just yet. He hasn't asked, and she hasn't offered. But the apology (whatever it is for) is genuine.
[Owen Page] They are talking around corners, cutting out the dialogue of what should be said and leaving only these morsels of not-quite-revelation. It's the sort of awkward word play that casts the mind back to adolescents in the fishbowl of High School. All the does he and will she and how do I ask ifs that circle and flow around without ever actually ironing out their proper meanings and casting light on an already strained situation.
It's probably why she feels the impulse to apologize to him.
It might be why he looks at her with that slow, steady scrutiny that suggests he's absorbing what's being said to him and taking in half a dozen things that aren't.
"Don't be," he says eventually, and reaches over to set the books on her lap. Owen wasn't the sort of man to push, were he so devious, or cruel, he could cut into her mind itself and pry loose every last morsel that he wanted of her before she could, potentially, raise the mental guards to prevent it. He has yet to raise a single magical hand to her, or against her, aside from the barest fluctuation of his resonance earlier, in response to some emotional surge.
He does try, though, to comfort her, in his own way, by circumnavigating his own issues with touch and reaching out to tender a strand of hair from her eyes before his hand falls away. "It's fine." His eyes stray to the inky twilight beyond his window. "It's late, though." Noted as if to bring them both back from whatever precipice they'd stepped too near to.
[Emily] It's late, he says.
"I should go," she responds. It's a familiar thing, the sort of call and response as ingrained as any part of the Sunday sermons. Emily doesn't hesitate, doesn't stumble over the agreement.
Her hands find the books he's put in her lap, take them up, even before she looks down to see what their titles are. She regards him carefully as he pushes the wayward curl away from her face. It is a truce, of some sorts, and Emily knows it.
And it is better, in so many ways, that Owen does not go pushing into her mind or across her boundaries too much (subtly yes [seekingly yes] irrespective of them, conquering, no). Emily has little left that has not been overturned, upended, violated or upset. It would not go well for them, if such a thing happened. She would not be look at him, finding the courage to say:
"I would like it if we might try, in time, to be friends." Shyly. Uncertain. There is something about the young man beside her that calls to Emily, in ways she has not yet unwound and understood. It is a something that makes the word friends more resonant, as if it were trying to encompass something (greater) else, something she did not yet have words for. "I know we've just met, and I... am tripping over myself, here," a wry smile, self-jesting and self-conscious, "But I think that I would like that. If you might."
Yes, awkward and ungainly. Much like Emily imagined high school would have been like. Or younger forms, even, if she'd attended anything resembling normal schools. Emily curled the books in toward her, and looked away before Owen could answer (as much to give him privacy, as to keep him from looking in so keenly).
[Owen Page] He's rising with her when she does and walking with her to the door to see her out; his hands folded now into the pockets of his slacks; his forehead creased in thought, or consideration, or concern about whatever she's saying to him. It's not until they reach the door; she with her lend bundle of books [there are three of them, one on finding faith, one on finding harmony within yourself and one about connecting with your inner self; all marked at certain pages with a younger Owen's notes, or his thoughts as he read them] and he with all his newly accumulated knowledge of Emily Littleton, and what made up her life; her wants, her fears.
Her unrealized desires.
He opens the door for her, and leans against it; watching her with the remembered open kindness she'd seen in him fleetingly before; it's a gentler smile, almost wry. Almost boyish. "I think we are friends," he responds, comforts with. "Or getting there." A beat, he reaches out to press her arm at the elbow, brief [wanted] contact.
"Be safe." There's no doubting he means more than just tonight, walking home.
It's almost dusk by this point, and the temperature has not gotten any warmer; all trace of earned body heat from physical exertion have long since left the Chorister's bones and he nods his head, indicating the way he's intending to stroll if she wants to come with with a returning smile at once reserved and encouraging. "My new place is this way, you want to come warm up? I'm fairly sure I have coffee."
It might be one of those times when a woman has to consult her own judgment and decide if she fully trusts the person she's with not to suddenly turn into a lecherous creep once secured away behind closed doors. At first glance, Owen Page certainly doesn't appear as if he has dark designs in store for Emily should she accept; he simply looks cold, shoulders hunched like herself against the rapidly cooling day.
[Emily] ((Leave unasked unanswered, dif 6))
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 5, 5, 6, 8, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)
[Emily] Perhaps it is a testament to how far she has come that such things do not (seem to) enter Emily's mind. Owen is, and has so far been, a comforting presence. Solid, calm, if a little prone to appearing in the most unexpected places. And though Emily has more reasons than most to be skeptical (fearful) it does not appear to be the case today.
The further they are from the gathering in the park, the calmer the Orphan seems to be. She is tall, for her gender, but does not stand shoulder to shoulder with the Choristor. She can match him in purposeful quiet, though, and such is the case just now. Emily does not quail away from silent spaces, she does not need to clutter them up with words, or imply words and questions into them with obvious emotions -- not now. She is thoughtful, yes, this much shows in her expression but there are few times (fewer times yet, in the collection of moments Owen has seen of her) that she is not actively thinking, considering, reacting to something.
"I would like that," she says, all careful consonants and foreign vowels. There is a warmth in Emily's expression (guarded still [growing]). Perhaps Owen must consider, as well, whether he trusts her enough to welcome Emily into his home. If he knows her enough to invite her across that threshold, share the communion of space and time.
She draws her arms a bit tighter across her middle. "Pity," she says, to no one in particular as she looks after the receding daylight. "I was so enjoying Spring."
[Owen Page] She was so enjoying Spring.
"It'll return," he attests for her, to the apparent return of Winter in the air around them, and casts her a side-long smile; as brief and contained as ever most of the young man's expressions seem to be. The street where Owen Page has taken up residence is, as promised, not far at all from the Park itself. Over another block is the church that he spends his days doing the sort of modest work most would feel slightly ashamed to admit to but which he seems openly pleased by.
The apartment block itself was housed between a second hand book store and a small green grocery; the street-side door made of glass and steel and graffiti-strewn heavily across the buzzers. As of yet, there was no button to depress that read Page but rather a blank spot beside apartment 3B. The Chorister shifts his basketball and bag around in his grasp once they reach the door, and finds a set of keys; unlocking the main entrance and waiting for Emily to enter ahead of him.
"There's no elevator, I'm afraid." He confesses, and nods at the staircase. It's only three flights before he stops and marks their progress down a serviceable, yet clean hallway to the second of five doors painted a dark green with gold lettering screwed into each. Owen unlocks the door and feels around for the light switch, stepping inside and setting his belongings down on a desk just inside the door. He hadn't been joking, the Chorister, when he told Ashley at the Church that the place he'd rented was small. In truth, it was mostly comprised of a single, floor-boarded room that had a kitchenette tucked away in one corner with a bathroom adjoining it and masked behind a cut away wall was what passed, one assumed, for Owen's bedroom.
It had a Queen sized bed in the corner, a bed-side table and little else in terms of furnishing. There were a few moving boxes stacked in corners, and a TV set had been propped atop one such box; surrounded by a mish-mash of clashing sofa chairs. It was, in short, the sort of place you expected a college student, or someone on a limited budget to abide in. Owen stops, just inside the door and begins shrugging off his layers; allowing Emily to look around.
"So, this is home."
[Emily] There are things that they don't know about each other and those stories would fill volumes upon volumes. There are subtle hints, cues toward the themes of those stories, in the way they view and interact with one another. There are shadows and shapes of far away lives, memories, in the way that she stops just inside the doorway, to take off her shoes, however bare or cold his floors may be.
There's a careful scrutiny approaching appreciation in the way Emily moves into the small space with its efficient groupings of furniture and open space. She reaches up to tug a thin band out of her hair, to loose her curls and let them fall down around her shoulders. She does not pry, or wander into areas that are set aside and separate, but it must be curious to him to watch the curiousity in her.
"I like it," she says, without any pretense or falsehood. She tucked her hands back into the front pocket of her sweatshirt and offered him a small smile. (Approval.) Observant as he was, Owen might notice that Emily walks on the balls of her feet (more obvious, here, in stocking feet), that she gravitated towards the kitchenette in the corner when finding an out of the way place to stand as he went through the motions of coming home.
"It's a good home."
[Owen Page] Owen's apartment had no obvious signs of heating, but he had gone far enough to toss some old and tired [pre-loved] rugs across the expanses of bare floor. Especially beneath his bed, and around the TV and couches. There were two desks in the place, one by the door with a phone-set and another perched where one supposes it suffices as a dinner table of sorts for Owen; cluttered at present by piles of newspapers and an opened book; the corner marked on the open page.
Closer inspection shows it to be some great tomb of a biography about the Dali Llama -- interesting.
He smiles, pleased perhaps, when Emily confirms that its a good home and turns; stripped now to his hoodie and draw-string pants; his feet bare against the floor. "It's my first, so," he shrugs and moves across to join her where the kitchen tiles began and opens cupboard doors, pulling out the requirements for the promised coffee. Two cups; teaspoons, sugar, instant coffee.
Owen fills the kettle with water; continuing on with the motions Emily is observing.
"Remember I said Ashley came to see me?" He waits for a nod, settling his body in the adjunct of benches as they wait for the water to boil. "She seems concerned with you finding a Tradition that fits."
[Emily] There is a kettle; this is deemed a good thing. Instant coffee; not so much. If their friendship is to be a long one, Owen will eventually be fostered in the quiet, contemplative tradition of taking tea. Emily cannot help it, the snobbishness can be attributed to time abroad in Asia, to heritage and roots in England, to any of a handful of influences that have made her particular about seemingly inconsequential ritual. In time, they would teach other many things. Today is not that time; today is a day for instant coffee (and for feeling [showing] gratitude for that hospitality).
He addresses her and Emily does nod (yes, she remembers). She listens. There is a moment, careful, observed and taken meaningfully before she replies. "She and I have spoken to this many times," Emily admits, perhaps shyly. Feeling, not for the first time, a little shame in her spiritual homelessness. "She seemed pleased when I told her we'd met," Emily recalled.
Her hands come out of her pockets now, fold politely in front of her. Emily stands at the margin of his kitchen not unlike a student in recitations. A little hesitant (curious [wary]). "I didn't realize she'd meant to speak to you on my behalf."
[Owen Page] Owen straightens when the kettle whistles, and flicks it off. It's an older sort, no doubt purchased second-hand as so many of the things in his apartment seemed to be -- maybe that's some sort of reflection on him, too. This strange, slightly insular guy who can't be that much older than Emily herself, surely.
Maybe he's a little battered and out of date.
He holds her choices up in either hand with raised brows; tea, or coffee, and then as he sorts the beverages out, replies: "She didn't want to make choices for you, she and I were just in agreement, I guess, that finding where you fit in seems," Owen hands her a cup, and palms his own, his eyes dark and unfathomable in the soft apartment light. "Well, important to you. What I told her," he leans back again, resettling. "I'll tell you. If I can help, I will, but in the end, that choice is yours and yours alone."
The corner of his lip quirks, as if he were reading her thoughts [it was irritating, that ambiguous smile of his]. "Have you considered any others?"
[Emily] If Owen's home (possessions) said that much about him, one would have to wonder what he would glean about Emily from hers (lack thereof). After a handful of homes (dwellings [residences] but never home), Emily stopped assuming that the space where one laid their head reflected overmuch on the contents therein. There was a reason, though, that she has been welcome into (taken into) so many people's homes and taken so few of them back to see where it was she rested in the quiet hours of the night.
"Tea, please," she says, with little hesitation. There is a thank you, when he hands it to her. In time, Emily goes through the small, practiced motions of steeping her tea as if they are rote, thoughtless (but not mindless) details.
Have you considered any others? he asks. Emily dips her head in thought for a moment, then answers, unobfuscated: "I studied briefly under a Verbena, but he has left. I do not think he will return."
It is almost an answer; a side step. Graceful enough that Owen might not notice how carefully it answers without answering.
"There is another Orphan; I have considered remaining as I am."
These are offered without meeting his eyes. It is coincidental, surely, that she studies the other spaces in his home and not the lineaments of his features.
[Owen Page] [Perception + Alertness: >_0 ]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 4, 8, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)
[Emily] The answer, in short, is no. Emily says the right things, answers him literally, but Owen is perceptive beyond the bounds of reason at times. Perhaps it is why they were drawn together, cast into the same place at the same time by a higher, all-knowing will.
She is at a crossroads on her path back out of the darkness. Between the place of Faith remembered and Grace regained. There is a struggle, still, and Owen cannot see or know why, but she has been Called back to God. There is trepidation to overcome, shadows and trials she has not yet put behind her.
He asks if she has considered any others. How could she? She is stumbling down the path that will bring her home again. This is no small thing, returning. As he found her in the sanctuary, Owen can see the beginning of it in her now (borrowed faith [the will to believe] rekindling).
[Owen Page] He watches her when she answers and avoids looking at him. He knows enough about the body language of people to glimpse the reluctance to come to terms with what she already knows, or what is beginning to seed as understanding within her. She's caught; like an insect in a spider's web; struggling because it seems the only way to get free but in the process capturing herself only further.
[resistance]
Owen Page had not known Dylan, the Orphan who also lost his way, fell beneath the onslaught of too much, too fast, too painful but he can empathise with the conflicting emotions of those left in his wake -- left in what shell took control of his limbs when the core of him had been chipped away at until there was nothing left within the form to struggle its way free again.
He is not Euthanatos, to try and find the unity of life in death.
He was a Singer among those of the Celestial Chorus; he was a member of a subsection that argued vehemently against many factions of his own Tradition, that knew that to truly unite those like him, they needed one unified belief of how everything, how the One connected them -- not the squabbling of long-spoiled children of men who mistook greed for wisdom, and segregation for progress.
How many had been burned for the glory of men who could not see past their own noses -- hundreds, thousands. Churches that stood against the people; against God, against creation itself in the past. Owen observes Emily Littleton and sees a spark that is beginning to regain its own source of power.
[belief]
He hears what she says, and his eyes don't read judgment when she finally meets them, if she does, but a strange degree of compassion; he sets his coffee down beside him on the bench and frames his body with one palm flat either side of him. "That's an option, too," he agrees softly, and studies her a beat.
There are worlds unspoken between them, but he doesn't seem to want to stretch those boundaries yet; he houses all that comprehension within him and reclaims his cup, nodding her to follow him to the comfort [relatively speaking] of the sofas.
"I have some books you might like, they offer some interesting opinions on faith, and belief and its role in our day to day lives. Once upon a time, I found them pretty helpful."
[Emily] Once upon a time, she too had been a diligent student of world views, religions, philosophies. Her background was far from traditional, and there would be many within the Chorus that might look at her askance, question her theological footing from which to (re)start a life of Works and Faith in Him.
She wrapped long fingers around the mug of tea, carried it carefully before her as she followed him into the living area. (It is difficult to consider the spaces separate rooms, conjoined as they were.) It was a lifeline, stringing together moments like these, from her past, through her present, stretching on into the future. So many moments, in which her views on God, grace, reverence had been molded and set, tried, fired in the crucible of conflict, owned.
Compassion is often harder to bear than judgment. When Emily settles, she draws inward somewhat. Makes herself smaller. (Denies the light within from shining brightly, proudly).
"It has been a long time since I had someone to talk to about these things," she observes, almost by way of an apology. "I hope you don't find me poor company or conversation." Shyly. She sips at her tea and yes, her gaze strays to find a bookshelf or stack that might be the collection he alluded to.
[Owen Page] Owen clears a spot for her to sit down on, there seem to be an unearthly amount of old newspapers, misplaced books and clothes scattered around the place. It's comforting to an extent though, signifies that he considers this his own space to do what, and be what he wants, without feeling a need to disguise himself, or his beliefs -- or lack there of.
He takes the easy-chair and when she tells him she hasn't had anyone to talk to about these things, a faint flush of color crawls up his neck and he's looking down at his coffee cup, laughing silently, suddenly as shy and uncertain as she. "Sorry, sometimes I forget. I get carried away," a corner of his mouth quirks as the blush flees his face, replaced with that quiet, controlled sense of self-deprecating humor he tended to utilize in public.
"It's been a while since I really spoke to anyone this much."
[Emily] Emily chuckled a little. It was an easy thing, fairly unfettered with other intent. Warm. She shook her head a little and offered him a wry smile.
"Your world seems much quieter than mine." There is a warmth, then, that touches her eyes. Dark and blue like his, they aim to catch his, hold them, just long enough to be reassuring. (How quickly roles reverse [comforted becomes comforting]).
"Tell me," she says, and it's seeking, gentle. Asking for permission to ask further after things they've left unsaid. "Where is it you've come from?" Not where home is, not where he's headed. Just the last stop on his journey before here. Emily suspects, but does not know, that Owen may have a similarly fluid (inexplicable [unspeakable]) past.
But he is shy, and her awareness of that catches up with Emily. She pulls her eyes away, casts them at the mug in her hands instead. "That is, if you don't mind. I just feel we ought know more of each other than you're Owen and I'm Emily."
There is a smaller smile, quiet and hidden, eclipsed quickly by the edge of her cup as she sips at her tea again.
[Owen Page] Where is it you've come from
There's a hesitation there. It's physical as well as anything else. It does not take any deep amount of perception to catch the flicker of pain that passes through the Chorister's eyes at the questions regarding his past. His fingers tighten around his mug; the knuckles pull bone white.
He can't look at her and say any of these things, he can barely stand to hear himself repeat the words, any of the words, that sketched back the picture of his past twenty-three years of life. "South Dakota." He's retreating back behind the walls contracted to protect himself from feeling the memories the name dregs up.
"My parents still live there, in our family home." A beat, and his eyes travel beyond Emily to find the wall across the room, his brows furrowed deep in whatever thoughts he's currently reliving. "I moved out though, when I was eighteen."
There are other things, deeper, hidden things about this period he's deliberately shying from; that if the careful modulation of his tone is any indication, just like Emily and her reawakening faith, he's not ready to deal with, yet. "I studied for a few years with my Mentor and then, uh," he shapes the cup between his hands, looks across at her, smiling benignly.
"I came here." He returns after a minute to an earlier comment of hers, nudging the conversation away from his demons. "I kind of enjoy the quiet, I like being able to think without," he gestures at the room, the door, the world without. "all that getting in the way."
[Emily] This is familiar. This is achingly familiar. She can feel the echoed tightness in her own bones, her tendons pulled tight, skin taut : remembered; it is not now. Now, for Emily, is the careful play of compassion across the canvas of her features. It is the way she leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees, bows her head a bit. Listens, without trying to look into him (through him). Looks over at moments to catch the set of his features, but not to let her gaze rake over him (scouring [searching]).
She knows too well what it is to speak without saying, to disclose without giving much of anything away. In Emily, Owen will find no judgment; instead a softness (I know [there are things left unsaid, unknown] and that's okay]).
She shifts enough to reach out, to lay a warm and gentle hand on his knee for a moment (his shoulder is too far away [but would be more appropriate]). It is a simple thing : touch : communion. Two spirits in witness of the pain and struggle in one another, in the joy of beginning a new. The shyness of sharing with new people.
"Thank you," she says, pulling her hand away, bringing it back to wrap around her mug. Now she'll look to him, catch his eyes briefly. Smile, softly. "It is a hard city to find quiet in, this one. I'm glad you've found some place to call home."
It is an important word to her, home. Owen can almost feel the longing in it, the way it tries to catch in her throat. Resonant. Weighty. But they were moving away from such somber things. She sips at her tea, again, and lets it pass.
[Owen Page] In some ways her understanding only makes it worse. He had not sought a moment's peace, or forgiveness [for there was none, for some actions] since arriving in the city. He had sought the most menial, the humblest of jobs that did not involve anything more or less than his own two hands and his sweat and sometimes his blood.
It felt fitting.
It felt right.
But then they had come, invading his private penance; his self-imposed denial of everything that had come after the fact. After -- [rending metal, shattering glass, the acrid stench of burning rubber] -- everything. He had attempted to push the knowledge [Him] aside but he knew that wouldn't last. That he'd never be complacent with Owen denying himself what was meant to be.
So He pushed.
And pushed.
And Owen gave in, and here he sat, being comforted by a hand on his knee by a near stranger. Except that she wasn't. Hadn't felt much like one since the moment they met, and he can't help the instinct that sets his own warm palm atop Emily's there on his knee; can't help looking over at her with those [intense, way too intense] eyes of his and just absorbing the tactical sensation of another [warm, inviting] human being being so near to him.
Because how long has it been since anyone reached out for him?
There's a pulse in the air, an indefinable crackle that seems to almost devour the oxygen when Owen regards Emily like that, feeling what he does before he seems to shake himself clear of it; whatever it was he was experiencing and remove his hand from hers -- her skin feels hot; so does his. He curls his fingers inward, and clears his throat.
"Thanks," he offered.
[Emily] Bear witness. It is one of the sacred duties that holy people perform for one another. It is one of the duties that lesser, fallible, [broken and mending] mortals provide for one another. It is the sacrament of touch, communion, nothing more magical than asking and taking the time to truly listen. These two, for all of their differences, stand together in something greater now : fellowship. If only for a moment, her hand on his knee (his hand on hers), it is enough.
Thanks, a warmer smile (growing [warmer yet] broader). She weathers the scrutiny, intense as it is, without flagging. Odd, perhaps, this immoveable moment in the Orphan he has often seen verklempt, like a ship tossed on story seas.
"Would you like a housewarming?" she asks, which may seem an odd question. Out of place (yet it isn't). "Your own place; it is something to celebrate," still soft, gently coaxing. There's nothing to Emily expression that implies a housewarming need be more than tea and conversation, but if he knew her better he might suspect that there would be something baked (so the space smelled like home) in his tiny kitchen, something of a gift offered to brighten the place.
She is an odd one, this Emily, whom he feels as if he might have known far longer than a scant few weeks. Not a stranger, not yet a friend. She watches him, kindly, and sips at her tea some more.
[Owen Page] Her question has his dark eyebrows pinching together; his frame leaning back against the chair. Owen was a young man possessing both height and broad shoulders, though his figure drew in toward the waist and upper thigh, lending him an athletic, but lean figure. His musculature suggested a person who did a great deal of physical labor, or sport, as did the tan to his forearms, and face. The fact that he held it even during winter to spring spoke a lot about his job, his habits, his life before he had known any of the awakened in Chicago.
"A housewarming?" He echoes her words back at her as if they confused him utterly, he sat back and after shaking his head a touch, cast her both a bittersweet and vaguely bemused smile. "I don't have anyone to invite," he says practically, with the air of a sensible diplomat at work. "Except you, and maybe Ashley, if she'd come."
Owen doesn't seem hurt by the idea that the Hermetic might not show, just sensible of the very real possibility. He knows she dislikes crowds almost as much as he does.
[Emily] He doesn't have anyone to invite. He doesn't think anyone will come. One of Emily's eyebrows arches, curiously, as if she is at once amused by this conjecture and bemused. Confused. These are pragmatic responses, but not what Emily was looking (fishing) for.
"I think you mistake me," she says, and the sentence style is just foreign enough to sound odd, but not out of context. Emily's speech is occasionally a curious, muddled thing. Now, especially, in quieter moments and more serious discussions.
"It's not for them," she explains, something bittersweet touching her expression as well (but farther off than his [occulted, occluded]). "It's for you. Something to make this place feel a little less like the place you lie your head, and a little more like yours."
There is a pause. A little shrug. She tucks away a quieter expression, pulls it back from the corners of her eyes and the edge of her lips. It fades, almost before he has a chance to recognize it for what it might have been.
"I've lived a lot of different places. It used to help me settle in." She looked around a little, and shrugged again. "Then again, maybe you're doing just fine at that on your own." A slightly wry quirk to her smile, then Emily looks away and down into the bottom of her mug. It is nearly empty, so she finishes her tea and sets it aside.
[Owen Page] It's not for them, it's for you
Something flickers again in the Chorister's dark eyes, but it's here and then gone so quickly that the frustration becomes what emotion, what reaction it truly was. Even now that he's begun to get to know the Orphan, even though he has overcome a natural shyness to speak to her more than most, he is still holding back; still caging whatever inner monologues, or sensations her words might have inside him. His fist, so to speak, was still firmly clenched.
Or perhaps that is literally, as he houses the one that had touched her against his thigh, the coffee cup resting on the other.
"I don't really need that," he gently declines, and then seeks to explain, somehow. "I understand," why you're offering, why I'm touched that you care enough to, why it might matter to you to offer it, "But wherever I am, is mine as soon as I choose to own that I'm there." There's something learned in his words to her now, something sought and comprehended at some point in his past; a faith.
[Emily] She was careful, when she explained herself, not to use the word home. Emily can use that by extension, she can casually toss it around in colloquialisms (They're not home), but she avoids diluting it with overuse. It has a specific meaning, but that is neither here nor now.
I don't really need that, he says. And it is, in truth, all he need say. She's already nodding, before he finishes explain. Which is not to say that she doesn't listen, no!, only that he didn't owe her any explanation at all.
"I've overstepped," she observes, and it is a politer thing (ever so slightly more guarded [like his fist, clenched]). "My apologies?" she offers, and there is genuine regret in her expression for a moment. For the assumption, for overreaching, for letting some piece of herself into a conversation that was, presently, shaped more around him.
[Owen Page] She says she's overstepped, and he's denying her words and the apology that follows it, his expression growing, for the moment, warmer. "No," he sits forward, caging his big palms around his near-finished coffee cup, twirling the dregs around in it for a minute. "I told you before," there are hesitations in Owen's speech when he's struggling with words, with how to pronounce what it is he wants to say.
"I'm bad," with people, is unspoken but acknowledged. "I'm ... touched," he's careful on that word, with the smile that's clinging to his lips. "That you want to help me. I appreciate it." He rises then, dwarfing her abruptly with his height, with that strangely intense gaze that settles on her face; scours it for meaning, casts about for comprehension, with how close it brings him to her, still seated. He reaches for her empty cup, to collect both for returning to the sink.
"Did you want another?"
[Emily] He struggles, and Emily waits. Not out of cruetly, but out of a long-suffering patience. It matters not to her that Owen is tripping over his mother tongue; it is not that different from the struggle to overcome a language barrier. Perhaps Owen's truly native language is not in words, but rather in works, or some artistic outlet. Emily does not know, and it is not the type of question one asks, bold-faced and insensitively. This is an answer (understanding) that comes only in time, with the slow, drawn-out getting to know one another that she has rarely had the time or luxury for.
She listens, and watches. When Owen stands up to clear their mugs, Emily seems even smaller. She is slight and bean-pole tall anyway, and the sweats do more to fill out her frame than jeans and sweaters, but she is also whip-thin, fragile (broken and mending). In some ways, it fits the transience of her life. She is a ghost, this is a whisper, and someday (perhaps someday very soon) she would not be a shadow on his sofa or a friendly presence by his side. She is often (always) one foot out the door.
"No, thank you," she says. "I'm quite alright," she adds. It is a shy thing, now, too, in the wake of his struggle and stammer. Emily is not sure what to say, whether to steer the conversation one way or another. So she waits, watches and listens. And the space between them grows silent once more.
[Owen Page] He's very aware of her being in his apartment, that much she can glimpse in the manner he attends to her comforts before he himself attends to his own. He asks her if she wants another cup of tea, and then hesitates a minute when she declines it as if not sure what to do with his own two feet if this is the case.
He can't always have been this awkward around others, can he? There are moments where he seems almost another man altogether; like the night outside the pizza parlor, his eyes suggesting playfulness, his tone and manner almost flirtatious against this version; almost child-like in its uncertainty, in the manner it almost requires guidance on social accuracies. Still, after the brief moment where he stands, so still and looks at her, he turns, albeit a touch stiffly, and pads over to the kitchen; standing, back to her as he rises the dishes out and sets them on a drying rack.
He remains there after he's done for a few seconds as if he's forgotten that he had company at all before he seems to regain his comprehension of her and turns back; moving around the apartment with his quiet, sure tread. When he returns its with a handful of the books he offered to give her earlier and something else that possibly draws her eye. This time he doesn't sit across from her, but beside her on the other side of the sofa.
There's a sketchbook in his hands. "I'm not good with people," he explains, opening up the first page, which was a sketched drawing of the Church, Emily might recognized the snow-dappled trees, the arched windows of St James', faithfully etched into a still life memory, housed in the pages of his book. "But I do see them." He adds, and seems to be willing her to understand, holding her gaze as long as he can before he feels the need to look away. The hand that had drawn the sketches in the book was no polished artist, but it did do them justice, and it did have a talent for capturing the tilt of a sparrow's head as it tripped over the grass in Grant Park; or the laughter of a mother and child, rejoicing during a Church service.
It was a journal, drawn in picture; and it sung as if it had a voice of its own.
[Emily] They are, each, the composites of all the events and ideas, trials and triumphs, sorrows and joys that have led them to this moment. They are, each, in their own way whole; each in their own way seeking something greater. It is the way with people, like Owen, like Emily; like people, everywhere, with something greater to attend to, aspire to, long for, reach after. It is possible that this fundamental underlying truth existed before their Awakenings, and it is some piece of a mortal life (unchanged [unchanging]) that calls to the other in echoes of self (acceptance).
His footsteps carry him away, and Emily is left for a moment on the sofa with her own thoughts. She does get up and follow him to the kitchen, natter on about one thing or another -- as she might do (often does) in other places, with other people. Instead she fishes the silver locket out from under her sweater, wraps long fingers around it and bows her head thoughtfully. The hand encircling that small bauble (Home, it cries out [Home, like a heartbeat]) lifts up so that the back of her knuckles just touch her lips. It is a moment, stolen, taken apart from her fellowship with him. (An ache.) It is something she hopes that he might miss from across the room.
So that thin thrum of belonging is there, threaded around her and into the space he now occupies, book in hand, as she shifts to be just a little nearer, to look into the book of sketches he's offering.
"They're... lovely," she says, struggling for the right word. Lifting it up (elevating) with the same gentle awe that underscores her resonance. There is a quiet smile now, characterize by subtle shaping and the warmth in her eyes.
Again, her hand strays into his space. Finds his arm, rests there gently. "You're quiet," she says, and it is not chiding in any sense. "But that doesn't make you bad with people, Owen." A little pause, her eyes try to catch his, to hold them, to will some understanding to him in return. "I hope, in time, you won't feel that way with me."
[Owen Page] It's the second time she's touched him and this time she can feel the constrained tension that comes as a result of the physical sensation. His muscles tighten; and a tiny spark ignites from where her hand rests all the way through his body. He doesn't quiver, or make any other outward remark about it; but he does seem to tense up for a moment as if this, as if touch, were something foreign [or forgotten] to him.
That doesn't make it wrong, though.
She says his sketches are lovely, and he smiles; laughs, actually, a brief, brittle breath worked from his chest. "They're alright," he qualifies the compliment and sets them aside. She hopes, trying to catch his eye, that he won't feel that way with her and he frowns, contemplative.
"I'd like that." A moment; another hesitation; they're closer now, physically and other and it prompts him, like the hand on his arm. "That guy you were with, at the pizza parlor, who is he," a moment, a gathering of meaning. "To you, that is."
[Emily] ((You had to ask..., dif 6))
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 6 (Success x 3 at target 6)
[Owen Page] [I really did, I'm pushy.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 2, 3, 7, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)
[Owen Page] [Erm. I'm spechul. Re-rolling with Acute Senses Diff Mod.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 5, 6, 6, 8, 8 (Success x 5 at target 4)
[Emily] "Ah, that's Chuck," she says, because Owen cannot be asking about Nathan. Would not be asking about Nathan. Her hand comes away, meets her other, folded into her lap a little. Primly or shyly, it's a bit difficult to tell. And it is Emily's turn to struggle, with words (with the feelings that underlay them), to take overlong to answer.
He has touched on something delicate, something kept close to vest and played so very carefully. Owen, being who and what he is, can see the play of it across her features -- subtle, so carefully restrained. She recoils, again subtly, draws her hand back, rounds her shoulders a little. There is an edge (uncertainty) to her words when she replies.
"He's a good friend," she says, but it does not stop there. That, alone, does not warrant the caution, the unease. "We are... seeing each other? Is that the right term?" She struggles with the idiom, trips over it as if it's foreign (though for all Owen knows, this is her mother tongue too). She doesn't say they're dating, or their sleeping together, or use any possessive in any sense. It is as if Emily does not know the answer to his question any more than he does.
Emily shrugs a little. There is a flicker of something gentler, and the shadow of worry in her features as well.
"I am... not good with people, in some ways, too," she admits.
[Owen Page] Whatever he expected when he asked; it seems to be answered in the [non]reply that Emily gives him. They are both of them careful to explain as little as possible while delivering what can be, on the surface anyway, a perfectly diplomatic answer. It's there and it isn't; like the mirror, the thoughts might be in the reflector's eye, but they cannot be read through it.
She calls him Chuck, and the Chorister files the name away for later use, as he does the term she puts to their arrangement; that they are friends that see one another, but that she's bad with people too. Perhaps the intimacy of naming whatever she had with Chuck frightens the Orphan; to say he is my boyfriend is to give the situation wings, and to perhaps curtain anything further from happening in other venues.
"Oh." He says, and draws back a little to arrange his books; to sort through the ones he meant to give her; there's nothing to read on his impassive face that shrieks jealousy, or disappointment, or anything other than what he'd cast back at her answer, as if it had been perfectly acceptable. Just oh, as if it all made sense somehow and he'd only been needing the confirmation. "These might interest you," he turns back, meeting her gaze if offered steadily. "If you want some variety."
A shadow of a smile.
[Emily] It is not just the naming, but the intimacy itself that frightens (worries) Emily. It is a shared Hope, faith invested in another person, and these things are uncertain. She is just as uncertain of her ability to carry it, foster it, let it grow into something new as she is of the situation itself. Emily's mouth purses a little, and she is very still. Overly conscious of what moving away from Owen might mean, just now; equally conscious of what moving toward him might mean. Caught. (Kept.) It is a deeply unsettling thing.
This would be a good juncture for I must away or Oh, look at the time! or any of the other small, contrived, forgiveable exits (stage left [with grace and decorum]), but she doesn't offer them. It does not seem fair, somehow, to politely whisk herself away, away from scrutiny and observation, when he had struggled so to share with her.
He offers her something, but Emily is momentarily unhearing. She recognizes the weight of his attention on her, though, and looks over, meets his eyes as much by accident as intention.
"I'm sorry..." she says. No attempt to explain is made, not just yet. He hasn't asked, and she hasn't offered. But the apology (whatever it is for) is genuine.
[Owen Page] They are talking around corners, cutting out the dialogue of what should be said and leaving only these morsels of not-quite-revelation. It's the sort of awkward word play that casts the mind back to adolescents in the fishbowl of High School. All the does he and will she and how do I ask ifs that circle and flow around without ever actually ironing out their proper meanings and casting light on an already strained situation.
It's probably why she feels the impulse to apologize to him.
It might be why he looks at her with that slow, steady scrutiny that suggests he's absorbing what's being said to him and taking in half a dozen things that aren't.
"Don't be," he says eventually, and reaches over to set the books on her lap. Owen wasn't the sort of man to push, were he so devious, or cruel, he could cut into her mind itself and pry loose every last morsel that he wanted of her before she could, potentially, raise the mental guards to prevent it. He has yet to raise a single magical hand to her, or against her, aside from the barest fluctuation of his resonance earlier, in response to some emotional surge.
He does try, though, to comfort her, in his own way, by circumnavigating his own issues with touch and reaching out to tender a strand of hair from her eyes before his hand falls away. "It's fine." His eyes stray to the inky twilight beyond his window. "It's late, though." Noted as if to bring them both back from whatever precipice they'd stepped too near to.
[Emily] It's late, he says.
"I should go," she responds. It's a familiar thing, the sort of call and response as ingrained as any part of the Sunday sermons. Emily doesn't hesitate, doesn't stumble over the agreement.
Her hands find the books he's put in her lap, take them up, even before she looks down to see what their titles are. She regards him carefully as he pushes the wayward curl away from her face. It is a truce, of some sorts, and Emily knows it.
And it is better, in so many ways, that Owen does not go pushing into her mind or across her boundaries too much (subtly yes [seekingly yes] irrespective of them, conquering, no). Emily has little left that has not been overturned, upended, violated or upset. It would not go well for them, if such a thing happened. She would not be look at him, finding the courage to say:
"I would like it if we might try, in time, to be friends." Shyly. Uncertain. There is something about the young man beside her that calls to Emily, in ways she has not yet unwound and understood. It is a something that makes the word friends more resonant, as if it were trying to encompass something (greater) else, something she did not yet have words for. "I know we've just met, and I... am tripping over myself, here," a wry smile, self-jesting and self-conscious, "But I think that I would like that. If you might."
Yes, awkward and ungainly. Much like Emily imagined high school would have been like. Or younger forms, even, if she'd attended anything resembling normal schools. Emily curled the books in toward her, and looked away before Owen could answer (as much to give him privacy, as to keep him from looking in so keenly).
[Owen Page] He's rising with her when she does and walking with her to the door to see her out; his hands folded now into the pockets of his slacks; his forehead creased in thought, or consideration, or concern about whatever she's saying to him. It's not until they reach the door; she with her lend bundle of books [there are three of them, one on finding faith, one on finding harmony within yourself and one about connecting with your inner self; all marked at certain pages with a younger Owen's notes, or his thoughts as he read them] and he with all his newly accumulated knowledge of Emily Littleton, and what made up her life; her wants, her fears.
Her unrealized desires.
He opens the door for her, and leans against it; watching her with the remembered open kindness she'd seen in him fleetingly before; it's a gentler smile, almost wry. Almost boyish. "I think we are friends," he responds, comforts with. "Or getting there." A beat, he reaches out to press her arm at the elbow, brief [wanted] contact.
"Be safe." There's no doubting he means more than just tonight, walking home.
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