[Rafael Durante] ((NOT IT))
[Danny Jones] [Danny Jones]
“Oh.” she says, with a grin and a little blush. “Guess I’m back in with Twister again – jus’ with different boys.” And she all but beams as her grin warms.
Cool. She ain’t expected that jus’ yet. Rafi’s approval is all she needs, though. Even if he calls her a big stupid. “Well, I was sharpinin my claws on that things hide. While you was bleedin.” It certainly seems like she belongs with him – their comradarie one of siblings, more then strangers trying to force themselves into a mold. Some things are just… easy.
She waves at Evan again, before following Rafi up the stairs to the porch. “Think Santi’s still up?” her voice is low, now, so as not to carry back. “My power to resist is about to wear off, man.. an I’m gonna need his help to shower’n’dress again..”
Stubborn lil bitch, she is.
[Danny Jones] (SO IT! *LMAO*)
[Rafael Durante] ((You fuckin’ cheat.))
[Danny Jones] (DO NOT! you called the pause. *L*)
[Rafael Durante] “Maaan,” Rafi grouses, tossing a glance over his shoulder as they conquer the steps, a look of incredulous disgust on his blood-splattered face, “what makes you think I wanna hear that shit?”
He manhandles the door into opening for them, his motions jerky, stiff. With the door resting on his hip, Rafi pushes open the inner door and lets Danny into the house ahead of him. It is not terribly late yet, not when they’d met just before sunset, not when the fight had taken less than five minutes. Five minutes. Not even, were one of them to have consulted a watch. It seems so much later, what with the injuries, the spent energy, the sweat and the blood.
Mama is still up, Santiago is still up, Carolina is still up. It is a Friday night after all, the little girl doesn’t have school tomorrow and she is joyously allowed to stay up until the adults tire and hustle her off to sleep at whatever hour happens to sound their defeat. Throughout the house there is the smell of cooking pork (which makes Rafael’s stomach simultaneously churn and grumble, a disconcerting sensation indeed) and as the door closes behind them, Mama Isabel comes out to meet them.
She heaves a great sigh, and addresses them in English.
“Upstairs,” she says. “Ahora, now, don’ let Cari see you.”
“Daddy?” Carolina calls from the kitchen, a chair squeaking as she prepares to get down.
“No, baby, estancia en la cocina,” Rafi calls, pushing Danny towards the stairs in a definitive Move Your Ass motion.
[Danny Jones] She has the grace to look sheepish at the sigh and look given her by Mama Isabel, and mumbles a ‘sorry, ma’am’ as she moves by, hustled along by Rafael’s hand. What he doesn’t see, what he hasn’t looked to see, is that Danny’s still bleeding, and the first step sends another splash of red into the stained beyond repair t-shirt. Good thing she wore the one she DOESN’T like tonight, huh? She had a feeling…
She’s walking with her hand pressed tight the right side of her belly, holding tight to try and stop the majority of the leak, but she can’t help what’s coming out the back – being impaled does that to a girl and all. He’s probably in shock about the hair – we mentioned that, right? Currently Royal Blue tipped in BrightAssOrange. Nice. And odd. It wasn’t that way when they met earlier for sure.
She hurries up the stairs though, using the last of her reserves to resist as she hits that last step, and slumps against the wall with a grunted groan. “……ooowwssssssshit.” But she pushes away from the wall, and does her best to stumble toward the bathroom. She doesn’t want to upset Carolina.
[Rafael Durante] Rafael sees the near swoon, the fall against the wall, and moves forward to return the favor from early: he gets a hand under her shoulders, an arm under her knees, and lifts her off the ground, gritting his teeth as something inside pulls and screams at him and toting her down the impossibly long hallway.
“Chingado, he got you good, uh?”
“La boca, mi hijo, no quiero oír ese lingua, eh?“
“Sí, Mama, lo siento.“
“No me ‘lo siento’, no hable como eso.“
The heel of his Converse kicks open the half-cracked bathroom door, and Rafi grunts as he ducks down to deposit the girl on the cool tile floor.
“Mueve, Rafi.“
“English, Mama,” Rafi says, clutching his side and stepping into the bathtub to get out of the way as the little woman moves to Danny’s side, pulling the shirt up and away from the little Gnawer’s torso.
“¡Ay!” Rafi says when he sees the tear she has been walking around with.
“Hush,” Mama retorts. “Is okay, Danny, I stitch you up, you be good as new.”
[Danny Jones] She would protest, but she’s out of protesting steam, and just lets him carry her down to the bathroom. Her face twists into a wince as she’s set down, and she sets her jaw against any more then a grunt that suggests it even hurts. Which it does. Quite a lot actually. She does manage a blank look as the two of them fire off rapid Spanish at each other, and an oh so eloquent…
“…huh?”
And even a sputter of laughter at Rafi’s ‘English, Mama’ reminder. She regrets it, but the grin stays, as she mutters and looks down at the damage. “Fucker got me good, yeah. Oops, sorry Mama Isabel. Wanna see the tusk what done it? Got it as a souviner for Rafi… takin it to the Wyrmpole after I cleanse it n shi….stuff.” A for effort, right?
She nods at the last, in agreement that of course Mama can stitch her up. “Got Rafi bad too – had a… well, someone I know patch him up so ya only have to stitch up one. Sides, he was getting too damn heavy to carry any farther…” She grins up at him – though her smile is tight, and white around the edges – she’s a bit pale, really. Paler then normal, anyway.
[Rafael Durante] “He is a big boy for you to carry,” Mama says, standing to retrieve a sewing kit from the linen closet and wash her hands. There is no need to worry about sterility, much, to worry about thoroughly washing the wound. Garou are a hearty lot, are cut from tough cloth–bacteria is an infection they have little need to concern themselves with. There are plenty of other things to worry about, after all.
“I can’t watch this shit,” Rafi says, drawing the shower curtain closed to cut himself off from what’s going on on the floor. The sound of him dropping his shoes between the shower and the toilet sounds out, and as Mama Isabel helps Danny remove her shirt, so is the Philodox pulling off his own bloody clothes.
“¿Haces la doucha?” Mama asks as she kneels and begins to thread a needle, her thin brow kinked into confusion.
“¿Por qué no?“
“Ay, Rafi,” Mama sighs, shaking her head as the water turns on full force. “What am I gonna do with you?”
With the needle ready to go, Mama looks down at her charge, then gives a wan smile.
“I have nothing to help the hurt, cariña, you be brave while I sew, huh?”
[Danny Jones] Danny snorts a laugh – regrets it, sorta – and grins. “He ain’t so big. Only time he look down on me is when he shifted! But heavy. Whew. Ya feedin him good, Mama…” Yeah, she expects to be smacked. Later. Rafi can’t watch, and Danny smarts off with a “Wuss!” before she is being helped out of her shirt. Her jeans are low slung, and out of the way, so she don’t worry none abou those.
“Haces ladoucha?” she asks – curious. “Wassat? Por que no is Why not, si?”
Why yes, she’s distracting herself. And she nods to Mama, and sets her jaw. “Ain’t the first time I done been stiched up, Mama Isabel. Go right on to it.” She grits her teeth, and twists her hands up in her discarded shirt to keep her hands out of the way.
And closes her eyes. Slow and steady breaths, Danny girl… easy does it. Fortunately, she ain’t got a speck of rage left, this one. Not till tomorrow, at least.
[Rafael Durante] “Haces la dou-u-u-ucha,” Rafi sings, loudly, as Mama uses one hand to hold the two pieces of opposing skin together while the quick work of stitching occurs. “To take a sho-o-o-ower…”
It would seem he’s trying to distract her, too, even if he can’t bring himself to watch the gorey work of treating the wound. Thankfully, Mama seems to have done this before.
“Yo, Danny, you know the Spanish alphabet yet? You gotta know the Spanish alphabet. I wanna hear it, sing, puta.“
“Rafi,” Mama warns.
[Danny Jones] She winces, quite possibly equally because of Rafi’s singing, and the quick stinging pain of the needle, surrounding the fire of gentle hands pressing against the wound. Mama Isabel is quick, and Danny is grateful.
She’s even grateful for the distraction. Even though she has to admit… “Too busy learnin all the ways to cuss at you, Rafi… ain’t learned holyshitow the alphabet yet. Sing it for me…” A shallow breath caught and held, and let out only to catch another and hold it again. Oooooohdalolly that hoits!
[Rafael Durante] “A be ce de uh efe hey…“
Mama is shaking her head as her son goes off on his singing attempt, water splattering in big torrents, rust-colored splatters appearing on the opaque shower curtain as he moves his arms around, apparently utilizing an invisible microphone to broadcast his voice.
“You better be taking notes, I gonna quiz you on this later.”
Then, all of a sudden, he stops. The sound of his crashing to his knees comes seconds before words do.
“Wait, I gotta better idea,” he says, curtain yanking open part way as his soaked hand comes out and finds hers, “how bout you just squeeze my hand and I shut up?”
“Gracías por Dios,” Mama says.
[Danny Jones] Surprisingly, she’s paying attention. She’s even muttering under her breath. A be ce de uh efe hey… and blinks as he stops, smirking at the suggestion of a quiz. “How much later – I be busy with Santi I think…”
Like she’s gonna be up to much ‘gettin busy’ – but at least she has the grace to blush as she peeks at Mama Isabel. “Talkin. Really.” Yeah. Sure.
But it’s with certain relief when her hand is clasped in his water soaked fingers, her hand cinching down tight as she closes her eyes again. “Gracias, Rafi…” she whimpers as she presses her free hand against her forehead, counting behind grinding teeth. Mama is well used to doing this, and is fast and gentle, but ohhhhhh yeah. Ain’t pleasant at all, at all.
“Gonna enjoy…. pork… dinner.. tonight….” she grits out with a grin.
[Rafael Durante] Thankfully, Mama Isabel isn’t well versed in the finer points of English. Particularly, slang. When Dannyy says she’s going to be busy with her youngest boy, talking is, incidentally, the first thing that comes to her mind.
“Yes, you are, cariña,” Mama says, her voice dulcet with kindness felt towards this girl who had come into her home a stranger and is now as good as family in her eyes.
“Cariña is like, sweetheart,” Rafi translates.
There is one last fiery sting, one last tug, and then the whispering snick of the scissoring ending the ordeal.
“You are all finished, Danny.” Mama looks up, then huffs out a sigh at her son. “Estas poniendo el agua asqueroso todo sobre el piso, Rafi.“
Rafi gives the girl one last tight squeeze of the hand, then slips his arm back past the curtain and tugs it shut. It’s true, though, what Mama says: Danny has a long trickle of warm water coursing down her arm, cutting through the dried blood, pooling under her shoulder.
“She tell me I’m getting gross water all over the floor,” he translates.
There’s one last bustle as Isabel returns the sewing kit to the medicine cabinet, and then she is wiping her hands on her apron and holding one out to help the girl sit up.
“Daddy?” Carolina calls out, her tiny footsteps sounding on the floor. He can’t hear her through the rushing water, but the sound lures Isabel out of the bathroom and down the hall, chattering in Spanish.
[Danny Jones] “Gracias, Mama Isabel” Danny says, when she can breathe again, considerably paler then she was a few moments ago, but now she’s stopped actively bleeding on the floor. She returns the squeeze before letting go of Rafi, chuckling as she peeks under her and nods. “So ya did. Course, is mostly because it mingling with my ick-stained cloths.”
She grabs her shirt, and does her best to mop up the water, but it don’t help much, and she just leans back against the cabinet and waits her turn in the shower. “Carolina is lookin for ya, Rafi – an’ save me some hot water, huh?”
She’ll get up…. in a minute or two. Right now she just remains sitting there, feet braced against the tub, her back against the cabinet, her head thunking back against the same as she closes her eyes and catches her breath, willing the fire to subside in her gut.
[Rafael Durante] “Hot water? What are you, a girl?”
That is enough to prod him into action, that request coupled with the fact that his little girl is calling his name. A hand shoots out one side of the curtain to wrestle a towel off of the rack and yank it back in, and a moment later he is stepped out onto the bathmat, wrapped at the waist, his battle scarred torso dripping wet, bruised, hair plastered down on his head. He scuffs off his feet as if that is going to stop the rest of him from dragging water throughout the house, and as he steps over Danny’s legs he squeals in a falsetto, “Don’ look up my skirt!”
A moment later she can hear Rafi making a growling noise before charging down the hall, Carolina’s overjoyed giggles sounding in his wake. There’s the sound of a door cracking open, rustling through a drawer in Santiago’s room. It’s not hard to imagine the look on his face as he traversing the clothing strewn mess around his brother’s unmade bed.
“Okay, turn around, baby, Daddy doesn’t want you to see his pene.“
“Ewww!”
[Danny Jones] She slaps a hand over her eyes as he walks over her, and she laughs, making a face. “EWWW!” Little does she know that a couple seconds later Carolina will be echoing those exact same sentiments.
She gives herself another couple of minutes, listening to the sounds of the house, and those in it, before she peels off her bra and tosses it aside to join her tattered beyond repair shirt. A deep breath, and she hauls herself up to stand, clinging to the counter for a minute until the urge to be a total girl and faint passes. Slow and steady, breath in breath out.
She unfastens and shimmies out of the rest of her clothing, doing her best not to pull on those stitches, feeling the insides pulling and shifting where they couldn’t be sewn, and gritting her teeth against it all. Can’t even shift to help heal until tomorrow. Damn pig used up everything she had to finish it before it finished Rafi.
But she’s in. She’s in, and for the first time since coming to Chicago, it feels damn good to be part of a pack. A steadying breath, and she manages to get into the shower, and under the remaining hot water with a sigh of relief.
Sometimes – she is such a girl…
[Santiago Durante] The sounds of the house are more or less blanketed out by the tumbling of water around her throbbing body. She cannot hear Rafael grunting as his daughter wraps his midsection in a hug, as she squeezes organ that are still tender, as she knows that something happened to her Daddy but that she will not be told what; she will know that she nearly lost him, just as she completely lost Mommy, and that she should be thankful, will know that she is thankful. They will go back downstairs and sit on the couch with Mama Isabel while Rafael tells the story of what happened in not so much delete and biting his tongue to withhold expletives.
They will not notice Santiago slipping away from the conversation, taking his barefooted form upstairs, climbing with some degree of stealth and moving down the hallway and knocking on the door before allowing himself in.
“You okay in here, kiddo?”
Kiddo. Who the hell is he calling ‘kiddo’?
[Danny Jones] First she jumps (….ow…) at the knock in the door. And then she sputtering “kiddo? who the hell ya callin kiddo?” in mock outrage, even as she washes the last of the soap from her hair, and her body – the water finally running clear around her.
Her tone softens though, as she turns off the water, and peers around the curtain while trying to simultaniously reach for a towel. “An I think I’ll live. Though man, if ya thought the crowbar hit colors were awesome, wait till ya see what I done did now….”
She grins a little grin for him, though it’s clear she’s still far paler then normal. She pretends to be tough. Sometimes she is tough. Most times even. It’s when all the rage and adrenalin is gone that she remembers she’s mortal. Eventually she won’t be so lucky.
[Santiago Durante] “You know…”
Rafi had taken off with the one towel that had hung on the rack, waiting to be grabbed. Santiago sees her hand groping, searching, and he peers into the linen closet before pulling a folded, previously unused bath towel and unfurling it, handing it off to her, before leaning against the wall perpendicular to the shower.
“Just because you guys go off and come back hurt all the time doesn’t make it any easier.”
He’s speaking for the kin. For the loved ones. The mothers, the brothers, the daughters who see their warriors go off in the night for some so simple as to run for cigarettes, run for milk, not knowing what they will run into in the night, what they will think they have to fix when they run into something awful in the streets. Who worry incessantly when a hunt is going on, when a battle is planned. Their lifespans on their own are horribly short–look at Rafael’s mate. Not even twenty-three years old when she fell, when she was nearly cleaved in two and went down with the rest of the pack. She left behind a husband, a daughter, as if to prove that the kin, too, are in danger.
They are all in danger. But it is the kin who worry.
“I’m glad you’re okay.”
[Danny Jones] She takes the towel he hands her, and runs it across her hair, down her body, and does a quick dry before she stops, and blinks, and looks at him. She doesn’t answer right away, however, taking the time to wrap the towel around her torso, tucking it in so that it stays, as she carefully manuevers her way to stand on the bathmat again.
She still doesn’t answer, right away, chastened as she fidgets a little, and then finally looks up at him. “I know. I do. Think I ain’t worried like all shit when Rafi fell? An’ I knew I’d have to come back here, an’ might not get that last shot in in time? I ain’t ever wanna have to carry him back here, an’ not be in time to get him healed up first.” She scuffs her bare foot against the mat, and watches the movement, her arms pressed tight around her aching belly.
“We worry too. We make jokes so’s we kin do what we gotta. But we worry too.”
[Santiago Durante] “I know you do.”
Santiago stands looking at her for a moment, brown eyes taking in the weariness on her face, the residual concern for her fallen friend, for his brother, now downstairs continuing on as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn’t almost been killed tonight. That, the young man is having trouble wrapping his head around, how they can carry on like that. It makes sense, in a way, this refusal to wallow.
He looks at her for a moment, before his chin inclines slightly, indicates.
“How bad is it?”
[Danny Jones] She doesn’t quite look up yet, not trusting the ability to hide the shadows in her own eyes just yet, nor the pain, or weariness either. It’s deeper in dark eyes then even that bit that touches across her face, and she ultimately tries to spare him that.
blunt nails scratch behind her ear, idly, as she tries to figure the best way to answer – then, finally settles on plain, ungarnished truth. “Pretty bad. I didn’t wan’ Rafi to know how bad, cuz I got him healed an’ didn’t me. Be alright 3-4 days. Ain’t got a speck of rage left in me till tomorrow, least – used the last to kill it ‘fore it could hit Rafi again. Fucker impaled me on’is tusk. Ya Mama jus’ stitched me up.”
[Santiago Durante] There’s a nod at that, a nod that is meant to show comprehension and not concern. His face betrays nothing, not even as he stands up straight away from the wall, as he takes a few steps across the room to wrap his arms around the girl’s shoulders, warm and damp from her shower, and hug her without jostling her body. Downstairs Rafi starts singing a song in Spanish, seems to be dancing around judging by the sounds of thumping, by the giggles drifting up from his daughter’s throat.
“You’d better take it easy tonight, then.”
[Danny Jones] She doesn’t melt into him for oh… 0.3 seconds, before she does, and tucks her head against his chest, and slides her arms around him. She just holds him close for a moment or two, before inexplicably, she gets the giggles.
Ow.
She muffles them against his chest, her shoulders shaking, as she tries to control the assault on her abs. “S…sorry… Rafi… Mama…” she can’t get it out, not without giggling again. “Rafi say he give me quiz in Spanish – I tell him I be busy with you later cuz always makes him squirm. Said it In front of Mama. I added ‘talking!’ and she just went ‘of course’ an’ I think she really believed me and now ya say taking it easy an’ well… talkin’….”
Her fingers tighten in his shirt, holding onto him – as the giggles deepen into something else, a single moment of weakness, something she’d never ever show Rafi – who’s dancing downstairs with his daughter, something she weren’t sure he’d be able to do again just a couple hours before.
She takes a deep breath, and sniffs once. Eyes tighten closed, before she forces herself to relax, bit by bit. “Yeah.” she finally says, as fingers smooth along his back again.
[Santiago Durante] “I think the blood loss is making you loopy.”
It’s a stab at levity, a thin show of gallows humor that he never did quite pick up–Mama, either, she was very serious when it came to injury, would just shake her head whenever Rafael came home covered in blood, shake her head and clean him up and make sure he was okay. That’s all she could do. All Santiago can do is hold his girl and make sure she’s okay.
“Mama’s English is even worse than Rafi’s. She probably thought you meant I’d be working on your Spanish with you or something, knowing her.”
With that he’s pulling away, putting his hands on her shoulders and looking at her intently. Whatever he was going to say remains cordoned away, and he ruffles her wet hair with his right hand before something catches his eye.
“Your hair’s different colors.”
[Danny Jones] “Probably…” She agrees, and then she looks up and meets that intent gaze, his lack of voicing what he’s thinking giving birth to question she doesn’t ask so that he doesn’t have to say… it’s a lovely cycle, isn’t it? She just smiles a little smile and then blinks…
“it…huh?”
She turns away enough to look in the mirror, then lean to look closer as if that will make it change back to what it really is supposed to be. She runs her fingers through it, and even looks back to the shower, as if something in the water mighta changed it. Then to the mirror again. “…the hell? BLUE? an’ ORANGE? I never woulda picked blue n orange! What kinda.. Well!!”
Weird. She stares at herself and then glares – as if by willpower alone she could make it….
….now that is weird, as by willpower alone, it seems her hair reverts back to normal (for her – Red n Teal baby!) once again. “….I’ll be dipped in shit…”
[Santiago Durante] Santiago actually steps back when that happens, so confused is he by that display before him. He watches her hair revert, listens to her exclamation, and blinks a few times before running a hand down his face.
“I’d rather you weren’t…”
[Danny Jones] “huh? oh! Me too.” She laughs a little and runs her fingers timidly through her hair again, and shakes her head. “Ok – you saw that too, right? Cuz that was fucked up. I think maybe my time all zapped by the wyld and lost in the flowers and shit did somethin funky to my hair. Least I ain’t still smellin like flowers.”
Yeah. That’s something. Right?
“I’ma total freak, ain’t I?” Murmured softly, as if she spects him to go runnin away an’ never comin back. The fact that she’s in HIS bathroom completely irrellevent there in that thought, and all.
[Santiago Durante] “I wouldn’t say a total freak…”
There’s a bit of a laugh, there, as he reaches out to touch the back of her head, stroke his hand down to her shoulder, squeeze a bit. There are things in this life that are beyond explaining, let alone grasping, and being struck wyld is something that just has to be accepted. It makes more sense than a lot of things he’s heard, after all, is far easier to grasp than some stories his brother and his packmates have come home selling, after all.
“Not as bad as my brother. C’mon, let’s get you dressed and fed.”
[Danny Jones] He touches her, then, and she turns to him again, and back into the relative safety of the moment in his arms. With him, she is more the girl that Rafi accuses her of being all the time. With him she lets her guard down, she can be a little weak, she can be in pain, she can be a little loopy.
And apparently she can change her hair color on whim. Or something. With him as well. Every couple is unique, hm? She nods against his chest, as her belly complains suddenly and loudly about it’s mistreatment as she has ignored it’s empty state far long enough. She takes a breath, and then pulls away, and tucks her towel more firmly around her. “My pack in ya room?”
It is where she remembers having left it, after all. She follows his lead to his room, and lets him help her get dressed. Shorts, for now, and a soft t-shirt grayed by constant washing. Nothing to harsh on skin that breathing across can cause to ache, something simple that can be easily removed later – should she feel up to it, and should he be able to get past her injury to feel up to mischief as well.
Sometimes it’s worth a little extra pain to remember why they fight so hard to begin with – the Kin, who worry. The kin who need just as much reassurance that she is in one piece, and alive. But that is later, and now is time to join the family for dinner, tease her (packmates!) friend’s daughter, play my little pony and watch the 12 Dancing Princess movie until Rafi sends the little girl to bed in self-defense.
Then, then she will curl up in the safety of Santiago’s arms, and there she will sleep, content.
…eventually. When the ‘talking’ is done.
[Santiago Durante] ((FIN!))