slide tackling my mind (OTA)

[armd]

Who: Abby and YOU
What: October catch-all
When: Throughout the month
Where: All about

Content Warnings: Mentions of previous murder, and grief/loss that accompanies that


𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐱 𝐥𝐚𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐦𝐲 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐰𝐞𝐥𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐚 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐎𝐓𝐀

(abby isn't interested in painting her face. she doesn't want to wear a strange costume, either. she wants to join in on the festivities without having to indulge in any of the dress-up element, it's not her style. unfortunately, it's tough to get very far without getting hassled into some form of compliance; for her safety (not that the trenchers seem to care of acknowledge that she can look after herself well enough).

eventually, abby submits. she wants to eat the food.

don't be too startled when somebody wearing a bulky gas-mask suddenly reaches over your shoulder for a tin-foil parcel of roasted pumpkin seeds. in order to eat she has to push the mask up onto her forehead, exposing her unmarked face.)

Sorry. (she doesn't sound it!) Didn't mean to scare you.

𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫? 𝐢 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐦𝐞𝐭 𝐡𝐞𝐫, 𝐎𝐓𝐀

(most people are probably thankful for their gifted photographs, but abby can barely look at hers, an uncommon reaction she can't help. last month- the ravens, all of those perfectly recreated corpses piled high- this month, and the photograph in her hand, tacky with age. dead loved ones smiling up at her, frozen in time.

she's sick of this place reaching into her brain and taking out what's there as if it has the right. sick of how trench airs her dirty laundry out for everybody to see and peruse through at their leisure, for making her relive moments she's not ready to come back to yet. it forces her hand. every single fucking time.

she tears the photograph up in a surge of fury-

-and abruptly regrets it, especially when the weather kicks up and catches a few pieces, lifting them out of her angry hands to scatter in the wind.)

Fuck! Wait–

𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐤 𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐤 𝐝𝐨𝐜𝐤𝐬, 𝐎𝐓𝐀

(out at the edge of the pier the ocean breeze filters the worst of the dead-fish stink that darcmouth has to offer, and abby can be found here on an off day or two. nobody frequents it save for people who are there to trade, and she likes to sit and watch shipments roll in on the waves. sailors bring in all sorts of cargo: fish, mostly, but other things that are dried and salted too, and colourful fabrics, box-loads of patterns so vibrant they make her scoff with laughter to see them.

the boats are of interest too. turns out you can build ships here if you have the money and the time and the resources. abby has none of those things, but she still hangs around near the lucky few carving their own way, staring (enviously?) from the sidelines. for people like her, there are boats to rent, little two seaters, most of them smaller than owen's sailboat but still tempting.

it wouldn't be like california in the summer-time; the curving coast of santa barbara, not when the weather out here is always so goddamn terrible. but a girl can dream, right. and a girl can harmlessly price-check if she's thinking of indulging in what could be a future fun day trip.)

𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐢𝐭

(hit me up at blisters for a starter all your own if you would like one!)

Comments

welcome to the black parade

[lightinside]

[ Laurel has embraced the activities as much as possible, hoping that it will help her to learn more about this place and maybe get to know people. She has Sara here, but Laurel doesn't want to put a burden on her sister to teach her everything. Besides, she is naturally curious and in general, a people person.

The food is great though. She's already treated herself to a candy apple and some non-alcoholic cider. Next on her to try list were the roasted pumpkin seeds and Laurel was about to lift them when the ones she was looking at disappear. She turns to look, noticing the figure in the gas-mask.

Which. Okay. Interesting costume.

Laurel was about to say something when the person pushes the mask up. ]

It's fine. I just didn't expect it.

[ She reaches for the package of seeds next to the one she was going to choose. ]

Where'd you get the mask?

[armd]

(the seeds are good, tasty and spicy. abby knows that she's going to inhale them. she makes no move to take the two of them away from the stall, she'll definitely want seconds.)

From home. (laurel may notice that it's well worn.) They were a necessity.

You new here? (abby doesn't recognise everybody, but she's been here long enough to make educated guesses.)

[lightinside]

Oh. It makes for a good costume at least.

[A necessity. Laurel can only imagine why they were needed.]

I am new here, yep.

[She's lost count of how many times she has had to say that, but it's not an issue for her.]

Laurel by the way. Take it you've been here a while?

[armd]

At least it got me past the gates. (she sounds huffy about that. clearly she took quite the hassling.

abby glances over, pops a seed into her mouth, and wipes her hand off on her pants before she extends it, fist curled, for a knuckle-bump.)

Abby. Yeah, I've– almost been here a year.

(man, fuck that. she's abandoned the idea of trying to go back but it still feels weird to say that out loud. a year is a long time.) Well– I mean, I've been here a month. I was somewhere else, before this. But not home.

[lightinside]

[A knuckle bump wasn't the kind of greeting she's used to, but Laurel is fine with it, curling her fist to bump the other woman’s knuckles, offering her a smile.]

Nice to meet you, Abby.

[She takes her hand back to open up the pumpkin seeds, eating a few as she listens to her.]

Yeah, I've been hearing some things about another place before this one. I wasn't there. [A beat.] A whole year though? That's crazy.

danks, danks, danks

[imaglyphwitch]

"Heya Abby!"

She hadn't seen the girl in awhile, but Luz is actually in a better mood than usual. She'd stuck by Luca to make sure he got the food he needed, and his mere presence made it so that Luz wasn't falling over in pain! So she decided to spend some time by the shore today, not expecting to find someone she'd had conversations with back in Deerington.

"What are you up to? Thinking about renting a boat?"

She's decked out in Dia de los Muertos makeup today: it may not have been the time specifically, but she'd always loved the aesthetic!

[armd]

"Hey, kid."

Luz is a welcome sight. Abby is not in the best mood, but she likes Luz, and she's more than happy to distract herself with this interaction: the two of them window shopping like they're in the market, and Luz decked in a fancy outfit, a mile-wide smile on her face.

"Thinking about it. Kinda expensive, though." She has to work for a bit longer, she thinks... "This is cool."

(She just gestured to all of her.)

[imaglyphwitch]

"It's a boat, so I'm not surprised. To get it I bet you'd have to trade something pretty big, right? It's hard enough to get stuff to trade all regular like. Could probably rent one though. I've already been on a few though. I see the appeal!"

She looked over at Abby. "How've you been, with all this new magic business? You probably can do some stuff of your own, right?"

[armd]

"Yeah," Abby admits, sighing, "I'm– not even gonna look at the price." If she were back home, she'd simply take it if nobody else had staked any obvious claim. Stealing... repurposing. Sometimes she misses that ease, and convenience.

When Luz looks at her, she glances at her hands, as if they're the source of her power. "Kinda. My blood is poisonous, if you want to count that as 'stuff'." She clearly doesn't.

[imaglyphwitch]

"There's no money involved now, so you'd probably have to find something really good to trade up for one. That, or, well, find out how to actually make a boat and do it that way. Are you from a town where there's a lot of sailing?"

She could grasp someone would want to go on the ocean if they were from a town where that was something you could easily do that.

"So you're a vile blood! I know that their powers are probably more related to their blood, with how it can be used and how it aids others. I wasn't sure if it also grants them abilities. My housemate Luca is a vileblood too, and so far he hasn't shown any new abilities. I wasn't sure if that might be the same from others who have the same blood though."

for peter (parker)

[armd]

(as much as abby has come to dislike people pointing out the single, shuffling figure at her back, she now understands that trying to ignore it and pretend it isn't there instead is... weird actually, and deeply uncomfortable (not to mention impossible when it comes to meeting friends of hers in the street). now she understands how the curiousity continues to win out.

peter looks tired, but that isn't unusual. everybody does, it is this month's de rigueur. last month, everybody was angry; maybe next month everybody will be blissfully happy and relaxed, all the time. hahahaha.

anyways.)

... You got something there. (it's all she can think to say in order to address the ghostly presence over peter's shoulder. her own is slightly taller than she is, and dressed in blue: surgical scrubs, upon closer inspection. a mask dangles around his neck.)

Re: for peter (parker)

[quipsandthwips]

[Peter is not remotely shocked when he wakes up one day and finds Aunt May quietly haunting him. For him, what sense of isolation and loneliness had stemmed from the realization that he was all that was left of his family — and without a doubt, family doesn't have to be related by name or blood, that much he's learned all his life... but he was still, regardless, the last of the Parkers.

Still, he's used to enduring these kinds of frustrating tricks, be it Trench or Deerington, so he just shrugs and moves along. If he feeds into her presence (like he did last time, when she was alive and then dead, a zombie with a knife in her hands), it'll only hurt him in the long run; it'll only do something bad to his state of mind.

And the town needs him at his best.

So when he runs into Abby, he's carefully his usual calm self — with that small air of discomfort. He rubs the back of his head and makes sure to look at Abby and not the ghoulish apparition at her back.]

I think you've got a little something, uh, yourself.

... How's it going?

[armd]

(well that's very polite of him. abby does suppose her eyes are down here.)

Yeah. (she knows. at least peter is somebody she doesn't have to shield the curving, silent figure of her father from. it's okay, if he sees.

though that doesn't take away the hurt or the bitter unfairness of it, what lingers at the back of her throat. none of these people know him. abby knows him, his face, his voice, the way that he holds himself, and she is the only one who doesn't get to see.

this place is so fucking cruel it makes her breathless.)

Could be better. (honestly, she's too tired to hold it together in front of him, but that's fine. nobody needs her at her best anyway.) I gotta say... not a fan of Trench so far.

[quipsandthwips]

[He smiles. Winces, really. Same thing?]

It's about as rough as Deerington, I think.

But at least there's some kind of functioning community here, huh?

[Running a hand over his mouth, he says:]

... Wanna go get something to eat and sigh about it? That was my usual go-to back in the dream world. Just sigh a lot, eat a lot, and sleep a lot. It was super useful.

[armd]

(that question makes her mouth twitch at one corner. sighing and eating, huh. it's so like him; fondness blooms in her chest.)

Yeah. Okay. (her gaze flickers momentarily up to the woman standing behind him, a silent sentinel; she'll be coming with them, wherever they go. at least she isn't watching abby, hasn't even glanced at her. she only has eyes for peter.)

My go-to is walking and sighing and not sleeping, so. May as well try your thing out.

( wildcard - text )

[jedies]

Keep your distance from Anakin for a while.

[armd]

(oops. she was hanging out with him just the other day,)

How come?

[jedies]

He's gone over to the Dark Side. He . . . threatened to murder all the Jedi.

[armd]

(welp)

The fuck happened?

I saw him literally days ago. He was fine

your tl;dr option with the youtube link

[facultative]

[While there's a flush to his face it could easily be mistaken for excitement over the festivities and for now his eyes remain the same as always]

You couldn't scare me if you tried.

[He quickly swipes the parcel of food before she could get her hands on them and shoves a handful into his mouth.]

too long didnt click? sad

[armd]

(what an ominous statement)

Hey– (that's her food????? she makes a grab for the parcel, shoving him in the shoulder.) I was eating that!

too long to watch u_u

[facultative]

[They're both far too tall and it means he can't leverage his height against her although he does still try to keep it out of her reach.]

It's mine now.

[It's mostly understandable with his mouth full of seeds.]

[armd]

(what a good dad he's going to be)

Fucker, (abby hisses at him, giving up. there are more packages of seeds anyway she can just have one of those... he could have had one of those!!) My spit was on those, just so you know.

dank dank docks

[bowliever]

[Unlike Abby, Lev doesn't like the dock's much. The smell of fish gets to him and it just... feels wrong. As much as the sound and spray of the ocean was always part of home to him, there's something about this one that feels uncanny.

Still, one day he follows her. Perhaps just to make sure that she's not planning anything wild. Or isn't in a sorry state about it at least.]

If you want to buy a boat, you probably need a better job.

[HELPFUL]

[armd]

(so, so helpful, as always,)

I just started the one I have, (she replies, her hands on her hips. she's still frowning at one of the boats. this isn't a wild plan, lev, this was literally the plan from california except she's test-running it in trench now,) Don't think I'm in for a promotion just yet.

(a glance at him,) D'you ever miss the boat?

(she kinda misses the boat right now. maybe she doesn't have to say that out loud.)