[Maya Nevskaja]
He glares, but the woman with the ebony hair and the strange manner is no longer watching him, her attention has splintered off in another direction and she pays him as little heed as she does the subtle shift of breeze, raising the fine hairs on her arms.
Wounded pride was such a common ailment.
No, the Godi is now looking toward the other kinsman, wandering through the parking lot. Henry may sense her eyes on him, or he may choose to ignore it, for she hadn’t the potency of presence to truly affect like the Modi. The foreigner glances back only the once, to spare a look for her Alpha, the thrust of her chin toward Henry.
“I shall go pay hellos.”
Ever the slaughter of english, in her fractured tones.
[Stray Dog]
He grunts in way of acknowledgment to Decker’s order. Glancing between Ryver and Decker as they get acquainted. Or something similar to it. His nose keeps track of the woman. Catching her scent as she lingers near by. The one who had snuck up on them in an irritating and somewhat disconcerting way. Following her eyes towards Henry.
[Decker Rohl]
“Uh huh,” this, in response to Ryver. He doesn’t seem very happy for her achievements. Not much of a happy, friendly, team-playing type, Decker.
He glances away — a touch of his eyes across the Godi, some form of acknowledgment. Then he returns his attention to the Coggie kin.
“You got room in yer shop ta hide somethin’, ‘case’a emergency?”
[Ryver Sheridan]
Not the question she expected to come her way, and she even frowned a touch with puzzlement, mind already running on all the whys. it wasn’t something unknown though. She made the intuitive leap as to possible why’s quickly, remembering similar things from a childhood that seemed too long ago. “I’ve got a few back rooms. Nothing overly huge though. if we’re talking some items or a person or two, then yes. If you’re talking an elephant or something, then no.” He wasn’t the happy friendly type, but she fought off Rage and her tension with her smile and nature. It kept her from simply climbing into the car beside them and high tailing it for home.
Well that and she had a teeny bit of spunk. Nothing to make Garou go ‘wow’ for her gall or something, but she had the sort of sass being an modern American woman tended to generate now.
[Decker Rohl]
“Good ‘nough.” His eyes flick between the kin and the Garou of her tribe. You’d think Decker would get the point and bug off, but he has one more thing to say. “Ain’t nothin’ I need stored right now. Jus’ askin’, in case.”
[Stray Dog]
He nods and glances between them again. Then over his shoulder at the woman walking off to find Henry. He’s perhaps a little tense as well. Being trounced upon while woo’ing a kin could do that sometimes. But it was something to get over like all things. Right now he was picking out the scents of things around them. Keeping a look-out, even for things he couldn’t see. “She is not very involved in our world, but she helps. I am staying with her.”
[Henry Allard]
As he draws closer to the group between the two cars he becomes slowly, acutely, aware of being watched. It slows his steps, shortens his strides, and by the time he has formulated a decision as to whether he will go over and attempt some semblance of civility with the pack that claims his lover (say it: husband) Maya has made that determination for him, has voiced her intention and broken away from the group and started toward him.
He uses the time between when he first comes parallel to the group across the parking lot and when Maya finally joins him to pull loose his cigarettes, to tap one loose and light it and take a drag that indicates addiction, a small time of abstention. When their gazes meet he gives her a smile that is tight, close-lipped, yet nonetheless quietly friendly.
“Hey,” he says.
[Decker Rohl]
The penny drops. So this is the kin he’s staying with. Ryver gets another glance, longer, considering. A woman might be insulted by such a glance. You can betcher ass he’s making all sorts of assumptions.
Doesn’t voice ’em, though. Just nods. “Yeah okay.”
[Ryver Sheridan]
“Just in case… alright.” She nods, because it seemed to fit at the end of that, and everything seemed congenial enough she didn’t even mind much. Again Andrew speaks and again she gets a look, a mind processing his comments into conclusions which were probably far far from the reality of things.
She knows that look and it’s met with a frown. “He stays in my guestroom. My mother would kill me if she knew I’d let a traibemate sleep on the sidewalk when my guestroom was empty.” Assume away, she seemed not exactly intimately close with Andrew. She only wrote about romances.
[Maya Nevskaja]
“Privet, Henry Allard.”
Maya’s nostrils flare minutely at the stench of the cigarette smoke, but she does not seek to prevent the obvious addiction. Rather she turns and slides her small body onto the bonnet of a parked car — one hopes, not Henry’s and for several beats she merely looks at him — or through him — with a few slow, lazy blinks.
“I have been away.” It’s a struggle, you can perceive it in the way her brow furrows before each word. She is not a creature accustomed to talking for any length of time to anything but a spirit. In their tongue she carries the vaguest form of eloquence, in her own, fluency. But in english?
It is like a sheep walking on its hind legs, much of the time.
“Traveling, on the other side. I find it hard, returning here.” She draws her legs up, and for this space of time, appears less a monster, and more a young girl, barely leached from her teens.
[Decker Rohl]
“Heh,” the Modi shrugs, his thick shoulders moving in the heavy, cheap winter jacket whose logo indicates it’s been around since approximately 1992, “y’all ain’t gotta ‘splain nothin’ ta me.”
Conclusions: still drawn.
[Stray Dog]
Andrew? He apparently has nothing to say. Not that he’s ever chatty or anything. But he’s paying attention to the world and the interaction between Decker and Ryver. He doesn’t pick up all the subtleties of human body language, perhaps, but he makes up for it with smell and some instinctual knowledge. Besides, it’s not hard to tell Ryver is a little nervous and Decker scares the bejeebus out of most folks.
[Henry Allard]
Her nostrils react to the presence, the odor of smoke in the air, and Henry unconsciously takes a step to the side, placing himself downwind of her. While not removing the stench from the air, it will keep its body from blowing towards hers. It will spare her the brunt. He has done this for so many years that consideration for the olfactory systems of nonsmokers has become deeply ingrained. He is no longer physically aware of just how horrible the secondhand smells, but he knows that it has to. That it does. So he tries to minimize it.
The thickness of her accent, the care with which she presents her words, leaves no room for question as to how difficult the language is for her. Whether it is English itself, or human speech in general, Henry can’t readily tell. She says she has been away as she settles herself onto the hood of the car, and he rests his weight on one hip, pushes his right hand into the pocket of his jacket, attention solely on the Godi. Smoking seems as if it has mapped itself into his neural pathways so that they fire, carry out the actions necessary to guide the cigarette from the air beside him to his mouth and back again all without his having to devote a great deal of time to the act itself.
“How long were you there?” he asks.
[Ryver Sheridan]
Not all of the stiffness in her was tension now. Whether Andrew caught the difference or not was hard to say since she wasn’t really looking at him now, or Decker. She was irritated and insulted and rummaging about her laptop bag for her keys, the glass bauble she’d been given disappearing inside it with little thought at the moment. “You’re right. I don’t.” That said she near triumphantly produces the keyring with her assorted necessary keys and she pushes the button to unlock her car and starts around for the driver’s side. “Nice to meet friends of Andrew. I’ll just scoot so you can all do… well whatever it is you want to. I’ve had a long day.” She’s being nice, but she’s not. it was nothing more then a glorified retreat.
[]
At that he perks up a bit and steps towards Ryver’s car. “I am going to ride home with her.” A nod to Decker. “I will stop by the house later.” His eyes flicking over Ryver and she goes for her side of the car. Watching her. Waiting by the side of it.
[Stray Dog]
At that he perks up a bit and steps towards Ryver’s car. “I am going to ride home with her.” A nod to Decker. “I will stop by the house later.” His eyes flicking over Ryver and she goes for her side of the car. Watching her. Waiting by the side of it.
[Decker Rohl]
“Naw.” Abruptly, the Modi straightens; his smirking attitude drops away. “Stay. ‘m leavin’ anyway. Hafta catch up with my packmate,” and he angles his head toward the long-absent Maya.
[AnneMarie Hoch]
Sometimes it is simply luck of the draw, that would have so many Eagles in a place that is not declared their own. Tonight is such a case. From the door of some show or another, she steps into the night, and starts across a certain parking lot where two other Eagles and one kin by proxy currently reside. It doesn’t take even a second to recognize that they are close, as she pulls soft leather gloves on her hands, tugging them into place and smoothing them across long, slender fingers.
Only then, does she turn, steps – long and confident, liquidly graceful with the click of heels against cement – and angles her walk toward the congregation of Eagles.
[Decker Rohl]
Without waiting for the not-a-pair to respond, the Modi turns and heads after Maya. His stride is low, loose, confident; he moves deliberately, but covers ground faster than one might think. Soon enough he’s out of the small parking lot, closing in on Maya and the other unfortunate kin to be blessed with Decker’s presence tonight.
[Maya Nevskaja]
Maya closes her eyes at the question, craning her head back as the moon slides between the clouds — she gives a quiet sigh, as though she had just felt the presence of a lover, experienced their touch.
“Time moves differently there. It is not important to measure.” Her eyes open, irises black as coal. Her voice drifts across the parking lot, quietly alive with her passion for the Umbral plane. “The time I spend there, it makes me whole. To be so close to her,” A gesture above, a gesture below.
“I think I have been gone weeks, perhaps a month.” Her lip draws upward.
[Ryver Sheridan]
“Yes Andrew, you should stay. Run with your pack…” It’s spoke nicely, with a faint smile even, but any man who’s ever known a woman knows that this is anything but smiling happiness. She climbed in but did not seem to be opening Andrew’s door for him. he found his own way into town from her place. He’d find his way back eventually. he was a big boy and she was an irritated girl.
[]
His eyebrows draw down in a frown. The eyes flick to Decker walking away. To where he’s going. Then back to Ryver. His hand goes to the handle of the door and he tugs, cracking the door open and poking his head in. Looking at her as the rain continues to drizzle down in little pitterpatters on the car. “I ride back with you…” His voice trailing off. He senses the irritation but seems confused by it.
[Stray Dog]
His eyebrows draw down in a frown. The eyes flick to Decker walking away. To where he’s going. Then back to Ryver. His hand goes to the handle of the door and he tugs, cracking the door open and poking his head in. Looking at her as the rain continues to drizzle down in little pitterpatters on the car. “I ride back with you…” His voice trailing off. He senses the irritation but seems confused by it.
[Henry Allard]
Time moves differently on the other side. There have certainly been occasions when time has ceased to matter to the kinsman, occasions where whenever is happening simply eats up his consciousness and his attention and makes timelines unimportant. Yet he cannot claim to be able to understand what life in the spirit realm is like. He will never be able to go there, after all, he will never be able to see what they see.
“I can see how you’d lose track of time,” he says, taking a drag off of his cigarette, his speech more of an indicator that he is listening and following along than an attempt to turn this into a two-way dialogue. Henry seems perfectly content to listen for as long as Maya wants to speak.
Even when footsteps sound out behind him, footsteps that could only belong to one being. He doesn’t turn around until they have drawn near enough to matter.
[Decker Rohl]
“You been gone a long-ass time,” Decker interjects, coming up to the pair. He looks over Henry’s shoulder, nods up at AnneMarie. He folds his arms across his chest, a warm, solid, intrinsically threatening presence in counterpoint to the coggie kin’s mild manners and the Godi’s eldritch ways. “Lotta shit goin’ down. ‘ll tell ya ’bout it later.”
Then he falls silent, apparently content to listen to their conversation.
[Ryver Sheridan]
“No, you aren’t riding back with me. Go play wolf with your friends. I have some chapters to work on at home and I’m already tired.” She didn’t sound tired, even if she’d looked like it before the mass meeting in the parking lot. She sounded angry. Glancing at him as she buckled up. If he climbed in and ignored her there wasn’t much she could do about it, and she was wondering what he’d do next. “Try not to tell them tales that aren’t true this time, while you’re at it.”
[]
He seems confused and a little hurt by the anger she directs at him. He seems to recoil from her, even though he doesn’t really move. Like he was hit. A blink or two. But that last words out of her mouth sense a flush of anger through him and she can almost feel the Rage radiating from him like heat.
One step, foot inside the car, a slide to get his butt on the seat, pull his leg inside and slam the door after him. Locking them into the muffled confines of the car. His eyes meet hers and there’s a spark of the animal in them. His voice deep, perhaps with a little warning to it. “Are you saying I lied?”
[Stray Dog]
He seems confused and a little hurt by the anger she directs at him. He seems to recoil from her, even though he doesn’t really move. Like he was hit. A blink or two. But that last words out of her mouth sense a flush of anger through him and she can almost feel the Rage radiating from him like heat.
One step, foot inside the car, a slide to get his butt on the seat, pull his leg inside and slam the door after him. Locking them into the muffled confines of the car. His eyes meet hers and there’s a spark of the animal in them. His voice deep, perhaps with a little warning to it. “Are you saying I lied?”
[AnneMarie Hoch]
Hands slip into the pockets of her long leather jacket that has made it’s reappearance with the deepening chill on the air. It is unbuttoned though, the length whipping about her knees as she moves, the heat of the fire within well enough to warm her the rest of the way. Decker nods up in her direction, and she returns the same to him first, and then a sweep of pale gaze sliding to Maya and Henry to include them in the ever silent greeting.
She’s been gone a long time, and there is a lot of shit going down. AnneMarie, unsurprisingly, has nothing to add to that as she draws closer, and joins the little group for what may be a momentary pass through, or conversation.
Time will tell.
[Ryver Sheridan]
“How should I know? Have you?” His Rage made her scoot over in her own seat, stretching the limits of those seatbelts uncomfortably but not letting go of that edge of irritated anger and embarrassment. She should not be getting the look she did from strangers simply upon hearing she’s the kin he stays with. She didn’t even look at Andrew, hands wrapping around the steering wheel and knuckles white and pink with the grip. Finally, she fumbled her keys into the ignition and turned it on, if for no other reason the n to flip on AC. His Rage was making her uncomfortable. “The look that guy Decker gave me when you said you were staying with me was damned insulting, and came out of the knowledge of who I was, or who he’d been told I was… and that looked more like sexual conquest then host…. so what have you been telling others I am, anyways?” A flick of a glance his way and she let out a long, hard breath. “Whatever. I don’t want to fight in a parking lot… I just want to get home so leave me alone so I can do that.”
[Decker Rohl]
to AnneMarie Hoch, Maya Nevskaja,
(btw, consider whatever’s said at the Phone Tag mtg common pack knowledge *too lazy to rephrase*)
[Decker Rohl]
to AnneMarie Hoch, Maya Nevskaja, Stray Dog
(btw, consider whatever’s said at the Phone Tag mtg common pack knowledge *too lazy to rephrase*)
[]
“No.” Snorting angrily and looking out the windshield as well. Listening to her tirade, how could he not, but not looking at her while she gives it. Which might just be more infuriating. He sits through it. She can sense him seething over there in the next seat, but he doesn’t retort. He just sits. Glances at the seatbelt for his side, perhaps more glares at it, then out the window.
When he finally speaks again it’s quiet, but intense somehow. “So drive.”
[Stray Dog]
“No.” Snorting angrily and looking out the windshield as well. Listening to her tirade, how could he not, but not looking at her while she gives it. Which might just be more infuriating. He sits through it. She can sense him seething over there in the next seat, but he doesn’t retort. He just sits. Glances at the seatbelt for his side, perhaps more glares at it, then out the window.
When he finally speaks again it’s quiet, but intense somehow. “So drive.”
[Ryver Sheridan]
So she did, shifting the car from park to drive and pulling out of the parking lot a little faster then she might normally.
[Maya Nevskaja]
Decker and AnneMarie arrive, and Maya’s skin prickles at the sudden proximity of two of her pack-mates, the Modi given the most consideration with his notice of a retelling of the events that she’d missed while on her sojourn to the wilds of the Umbra.
She turns back to Henry, rekindling her tale. She was no Skald, with sweet word play, but she sufficed, with the motion of her hand as she spoke. “I climbed a great mountain, and came upon a tree. There was trapped inside a spirit, ‘I cannot get free’, it cried, and tormented itself within its prison of bark.” She pauses here, and drops her leg down, stretching.
“The tree spirit had grown angry and bitter, and lonely without its brothers and sisters so it had taken this small mouse into itself and vowed to keep it so.” The Godi grew silent, remembering.
[Henry Allard]
Decker looks over Henry’s shoulder, driving the smoking kinsman to do likewise, turning his head to take in the approaching female Modi in her heeled boots and her knee-length leather jacket. She is watched for a scant handful of seconds before the man returns his gaze to Maya. Only once AnneMarie has come abreast of them does he offer her another glance back and a friendly enough “Hey” that sounds much more comfortable than his voice has alluded to during past occasions in the presence of more than one–hell, sometimes even just one–Eagle. It is quiet, quick, so as to allow Maya the space to speak without his interrupting.
Maya speaks of a large mountain, speaks of a spirit trapped inside of a tree, and Henry seems as if he is completely enthralled in her story. If not enthralled, then at least like he is sincerely listening and not simply directing his gaze in her direction. He nods in places, furrows his brow in others, and smokes his cigarette with the same absent-mindedness that has been with him since she started speaking.
She falls silent, her memories taking hold of her, and Henry, too, maintains his silence, waiting for her to continue.
[Decker Rohl]
“Didja let’it out?”
Decker has a certain subtle sense of humor. Perhaps it’s better termed wit; perhaps it’s better called dark. And to be sure, he’s not in the best of moods tonight. His packmates would recognize that where a stranger, or even an acquaintance, would not. He was in the sort of mood to cause strife. To be deliberately obtuse, callously insulting. To be, in sort, a bit of an asshole.
“‘r eat it?”
When it comes to Maya, either was possible.
[AnneMarie Hoch]
Decker is feeling a little obtuse, a bit insulting, and a bit of an asshole. Some would term this a bad day for the Modi. AnneMarie knows better. He causes strife, but there’s a subtle humor there, and she – the Eagle who has been longest at his side, but for the violinist kin- takes note of.
There are many things she takes note of. Maya’s story, the way she speaks, the rise and fall of her voice. And Henry’s expressions as she does so, as AnneMarie comes into position to view his face, his stance. His recent weight loss. And, that bit of new bling as he lifts his cigarette for another inhale.
She catches his eye, a brow quirks slightly, but unsurprisingly – she still says nothing. She’s awaiting the answer to Decker’s question, after all.
[Maya Nevskaja]
“I do not like the taste of rodent.” She answers most seriously, either missing or choosing to be deliberately obtuse to his ill-tempered humor. Her dark gaze fluctuates, and then calms back into her story, much like her namesake — she is the calmest point.
“I asked the tree what made it so angry, and it moaned that men had come and taken what was not theirs to have. It demanded seedlings, and then it would let the little mouse spirit free.” She smiles then, a tint of her peculiar sense of humor.
“Such is the way of the spirits.”
[Decker Rohl]
“So you went ‘n got seedlin’s fer it? Let tha mouse out?”
A pause, thinking about it. Or maybe just a pause.
“Why’dja bother?”
[Henry Allard]
A quick, barely audible puff of air leaves Henry’s nostrils when Decker comes back with a duet of questions, a puff that could either be a heavily suppressed sneeze or a successful attempt to kill a laugh before it could be born.
His eyes remain on Maya until he becomes aware of the fact that he is being studied by the Modi who has just joined them. There is little way to ignore it–he can see her head turned out there on his periphery, and when Henry looks over at her, her brow elevates by small degrees. It takes him a moment to put together what it is that has caused the expression to come about. Given that there is only one thing different on his body that could potentially serve to bring about a question in another, the answer comes quickly: she’s spotted the band on his left hand.
He does not look at AnneMarie for a considerable amount of time. Maybe four seconds pass between when her eyebrow lifts and when Henry’s lips pull themselves into a self-conscious smile, and then his eyes are falling, his head is returning itself to the anatomical position so he can watch Maya in her rendition of her story.
Decker asks another set of questions, bringing Henry’s gaze to his other side, and he looks back to Maya to await her answer.
[AnneMarie Hoch]
The smile alone tells a tale, and answers the question unasked. It brings an flicker of something briefly across her face, there then gone as if chased away by more natural impassive expression. It is almost bemusement. Perhaps it could be taken as an unspoken congratulations. Perhaps it’s really nothing at all.
She doesn’t clarify.
[Henry Allard]
(Jacqui you h0r!)
[Decker Rohl]
(oh ffs, i just realized jacqui vanished)
[Decker Rohl]
(LMFAO — and so did jamie, it seems)
[Decker Rohl]
(THAT’S TWICE IN A ROW)
[Decker Rohl]
(aha.)
[Henry Allard]
(I should insult people more often!)
[Decker Rohl]
(very effective!)
[Maya Nevskaja]
(ahem. Sorry. My wireless went kooky. and — HEY! *bashes you all up*)
[Henry Allard]
(:D)
[Decker Rohl]
(:D)
[AnneMarie Hoch]
(HEY! I didn’t do nothing!! I was waiting patiently!)
[Maya Nevskaja]
“In a year’s time, perhaps longer, the tree would have become twisted with its anger, an invitation to taint.” Maya paused, her jewelry rattling as she shook her head lightly.
“Better to treat the symptom.”
[Decker Rohl]
The corner of the Modi’s mouth quirks briefly. It’s brief, it’s passing, but a hint of true humor.
“Clever,” he says. Nothing more. The Modi starts to move off, clapping his packmates on the shoulders as he passes.
(aaaand with that i need to sleep! i got like… 3-6 hours of sleep last night, depending on how you count it *LOL*)
[Henry Allard]
(Thanks for the RP, Damon!)
[Maya Nevskaja]
(night, dork. *grins*)
[Decker Rohl]
(thanks everyone!)
[Maya Nevskaja]
(kay, I gotta run return some DVD’s, so Maya is sitting there quiet like, remembering. *grins*)
[Henry Allard]
(Aight!)
[Henry Allard]
Decker’s hand hits each of the girls–no, women–no, Eagles–on the shoulder as he takes his leave of them, and Henry raises one of his own to bid the Modi farewell as he leaves the circle and continues off into the night on his own, leaving the kinsman alone with the two members of the pack he knows even less about than the one who just departed.
Given the fact that most of the pack’s members consider him one of theirs, one might think he would make more of an effort to gain familiarity with the Trueborn. One might think that, until one remembers that Henry still does not think himself to be claimed by the pack, officially or otherwise. Associated by proxy is how he looks at it.
One of the Modis leaves, and the other one is given his attention.
“How are you, AnneMarie?” he asks, undeterred by the remaining Modi’s inability to speak.
[AnneMarie Hoch]
Decker moves past, and her shoulder lifts slightly into the clasp of his hand. It’s barely perceptible, just an accepting movement in the touch, by the one who rarely makes such moves herself. There was a time when she would, there was a time she could even be caught with lips curved in a rare smile, there were times when she did not guard herself so carefully, so tightly, so… intently as she does now.
Few remember those times. She refuses to dwell on them. And she never, ever, speaks of them.
[There was a time in recent memory, where she finally spoke to Decker, where she started to speak what was on her mind, and was punished for it. It has not happened again. It will not happen again. Henry is not the only one who knows very little about the Modi. They know she is steadfast. That she is duty-bound. That she is loyal beyond measure. Perhaps that is all that they need to know.
He speaks, undeterred by her inability to do so in return. It is an easy enough question to answer without words. She looks to the sky, where the moon is swelling, and then back to the lanky Coggie. A shoulder lifts slightly. The moon is growing more full, and her inner heat boils with it. Other then that, she is as she always is.
Decker has gone, and Maya has lapsed into one of her many reflective silences. AnneMarie chooses this time to look again at that ring, and back to meet Henry’s gaze. This time the question – unvoiced – is easily understood. Details should be forthcoming.
[Henry Allard]
AnneMarie’s eyes lift skyward, indicating a moon that is nearly obscured by cloud cover, by light pollution, but is there nonetheless. He can see its swelling face as a swatch of gray slides past–the moon is in her gibbous phase, waxing towards the full, causing the internal Rage of her children to throb, to grow in intensity. Normally Henry would be uneasy in the presence of a Garou of high Rage, would be unconsciously trembling when more than one of them is about. The most logical explanation is that he is growing acclimated to their presence, that it is not so strongly affecting him as it would a weaker-willed individual.
Once his question is answered, Henry does not add benign commentary, does not say something like “That’s good.” Perhaps a half-hearted shrug is as good as he is going to get from her considering the circumstances, considering her frame of mind and the aforementioned position of the moon. He simply acknowledges her response with a bobbing of his head, and raises his hand to take a drag from his dwindling cigarette, scissored between his second and third fingers, fourth and fifth bent at the proximal joints, gold band catching what light pours down around them.
She looks pointedly at that ring, looks back to him, and Henry’s brow knits itself together. He is an intuitive, empathetic man, smarter and sharper than some might give him credit for–hell, given some of his actions in the last several months, he does not have much credit to be given, what with his tendency to act in the interests of others without stopping to think–and it does not take a leap of judgment to figure out that AnneMarie wants to know about the ring.
That doesn’t mean he wants to spout off about it without being sure.
He lifts his hand a little higher into the night, flicks his green eyes towards his finger quickly, and blows a stream of smoke out the side of his mouth, away from the Garou girls.
“You want to know why I’m wearing this?” he asks.
[AnneMarie Hoch]
There is a twitch at the corner of her lips. Those who have known her longest, would know if for what it is, a hint of amusement, a flicker of a muscle that if it were allowed too, it could blossom into a smile. It is a largely unused muscle, truth be told, for that is one thing that so rarely blooms. Too much duty, too much death, too much fighting, to much patrolling. There is very little left in her life that would tug those lips into a full expression of delight, warmth, or amusement.
That he gets this much, is perhaps more telling to her mood then anything else. Fortunately, it’s a good sign.
There is a beat, and a moment’s thought that maybe she will make use of the board that is invariably in her right hand pocket, complete with a pen. But it is not pulled free, not yet. Instead, a lift of her chin in affirmation. She clearly has done some deducing on her own, and she clearly will ask him to answer none the less.
[Maya Nevskaja]
Maya stirs, her figure had been still enough to mimic stone — her pale skin only doubling this likeness. As though she had been some maiden in a deeply held sleep, she stretches herself and hops from the car, perhaps startling her companions.
“I believe I will patrol.”
She says, in her peculiar way, her eyes roving beyond AnneMarie and Henry, before snapping back with sudden alertness. “I shall speak to you both soon, da.”
And off she goes, her long black hair flowing in her wake like a matted cape.
(time for dinner! thanks for play, luvvies. *hugs*)
[Henry Allard]
(::hugs:: Thanks Jacqui!)
[AnneMarie Hoch]
(later!)
[Henry Allard]
Life with his father had been an exercise in interpreting the broadest emotions from the slightest of hints. His own father was as tight with his emotions as he was with his money, and he suspects his face did not wrinkle so quickly as other men’s did because he was slow to smile, unlikely to laugh. It took a great deal of attention to circumstance and occurrence to tell when his old man was amused, and by the age of 17 Henry had just barely learned the nuances of his father’s face.
It has gotten easier for him to read the quirks of another being’s face if only because he has grown more attuned to the emotional states of others, understands the general human anatomy better. Though AnneMarie does not grant him even half of a smile, he can assume it is out of amusement.
Maya jumps down off of the hood of the car she has chosen, states her farewell, and Henry lifts the two rested fingers of his left hand to motionlessly wave farewell to her. Once she has started off out of the parking lot, Henry turns back to the Modi and deems it safe enough to answer her question.
She’s a lesbian, after all. At least, that’s what Tristan has said.
“Tris and I went to Jersey this weekend,” he says. “Um… we got a civil union. Had a ceremony yesterday. Just us and our sisters, we didn’t want anything big… well, the girls got a little carried away, ran poor Tris ragged all week getting re–”
He catches himself rambling, a combination of sleep deprivation–they had watched the sun come up over the ocean this morning, just the two of them, after a night of consummating their marriage, and had been unable to sleep for their having to drive, Petra being completely hungover and thus useless for the 12-hour commute west–and uncertainty as to how to explain the situation causing him to overcompensate. This happens when he has to talk on the phone with someone he doesn’t know well, when he comes up against voicemail.
A small, self-conscious laugh leaves his throat, and he cuts himself off taking a drag from his cigarette.
“We got married,” he tries again. “As married as they’ll let us get, anyway.”
[AnneMarie Hoch]
He deems it safe enough to answer her honestly, and though he rambles he does not hold back. For her part, she too studies his face, his expression, the way his words are formed, and even the rambling and self-conscious laugh. She sees it all, as if judging their worthiness to be used by him, to her, by one who is reserved to one who is the same to the extreme. They do have their similarities, though their battles have been drastically different.
Point being, she understands.
And better yet – she approves.
The latter is gathered in the lift of her chin, in the allowance of a very brief softening of her expression, the smallest of smiles born in one breath, and gone the next. This time, the whiteboard does come into view, and into play as she places words into being from the edge of a felt tip pen, marring the perfection of the board with her thoughts.
Congratulations, Henry. I wish both Tristan and yourself many years of happiness together.
There is a lot said in that simple sentence, and perhaps even more could be inferred. He understands the pains of being kin in a society such as theirs, though he may not understand quite the pitfalls once such as she must face. Though she has a sexual preference, by virtue of her birth, she is expected to have none. She can lay claim to none, no matter her own preferences, and many a mule before her has been punished for sullying a pristine kin of the opposite sex, let alone the addition of homosexuality tossed in for added disgust. Even here, in Chicago, some have faced judgment for daring to love, daring to care, daring to grasp one moment of happiness in a life built of agony and hatred.
Her very birth judges her lower then even his standing as purebred son of the nation.
For those that look, that see, that know her more then anyone else – which would be no one here, not any longer – there is another facet of that expression. There is an unending sadness, a mourning. There is love and loss, and there is an unmeasurable amount of pain.
[Henry Allard]
Though the kinfolk who either refuse to breed or are unable to by virtue of the fact that they are not wired that way–because they are imbued with some fault, is how some would like to look at it–are considered to be in a low state all their own, they are no worse off than the metis. The metis, at least, some will view as having worth as warriors, as warm bodies to help support the cause. Most, however, do not view them this way. They, both faggots and metis, are abominations who only serve to mock Gaia. They serve no purpose to the Nation.
Henry can only imagine what it is like to be both gay and metis. He removed himself from the Nation after he was unveiled as a homosexual, had been avoiding that subculture for over a decade as a result. This girl has not gone that route. She has been fighting since her First Change, if not before. That, he cannot imagine.
He can try, though, and that separates him from most kin.
For the first time tonight, the Modi removes her dry erase board from her pocket and etches out a message, a congratulations and a blessing, and Henry’s lips haul themselves into a hesitant yet genuine smile that would most likely crack to reveal teeth were it not for the edge to her gaze, that near agony that most might miss. It is that mourning that causes his smile to slow, to stop, and the look on his face is one of muted understanding. It seems as if everyone he runs into lately has lost someone, is attempting to work through an endless sea of misery. All around them is death. This War is taking everyone from everyone.
But that understanding is there, and he’d like to think it matters that he sees it at all.
“Thanks, AnneMarie. I… we really appreciate it.”
He drops his cigarette onto the pavement, crushes it beneath the toe of his sneaker, and when he looks back up his smile is but a ghost on his lips.
“I’ve got to get back, but if you need anything, you’ve got our number, right?”
[AnneMarie Hoch]
She sees the understanding, as good at reading the guarded as he is. As he looks down, she slides the board across her thigh to clean it, before it disappears into the pocket of her coat once again. The hand that holds it remains there in the pocket, and it is the other hand, the left, that lifts to clasp Henry’s shoulder much as Decker had done her own earlier. It is acknowledgement, it is acceptance, it is understanding, all in one.
It is, perhaps, the first seed of eventual friendship.
A lift of her chin is the final gesture, as yes she does have their number, and with that her lean form slides into movement once more, long strides carrying her across the parkinglot, with the click of heels growing softer as she disappears into the darkness at the edge of the lot.
And proof that she does indeed have their number, and their address arrives the next day. It is a beautiful fall basket, of flowers, of fruit, of nuts, of a bottle of champagne that is not overly expensive, but tasty just the same, and two beautiful glass to drink it in. With it, a note penned in her own hand. The rolled note is wrapped with a strip of leather lace, with two smallish round wooden disks, polished to a high sheen on the ends. On each of the disks is carefully carved runes, which when deciphered (or she is asked to translate) say simply ‘health’ and ‘happiness’.
And the note: Congratulations on your wedding. Accept this on behalf of the Eagles – but don’t tell them I said so.
Best wishes, AnneMarie.
Clearly, she is not completely without a sense of humor of her own.