multiversallogs | if one day is good, is a day sufficient?

Who: Benji Ryans and You!
What: The city is rebuilding itself, and as does everyone else. Benji about town.
Where: Various places!
When: Many times!
Notes: An open log! Refer to the post content for starter ideas. Hit me up if you'd like me to set up anything! Otherwise, go for gold. Suggestions: daylit Mafaton, Aspic, Badside, Brock Marsh, but you know, wherever is clever, Trevor, ask if you're unsure. (Also dream things are welcome, if you are keen, but let me know first in plurk or PM.)
Warnings: Dead eye stares, and teal deers below. Will add as they occur.

There is a morning where she brings her violin with her. The case gets laid out on the street, and her first attempt at playing levels off into obscurity; that no one wants to listen to mediocre musicianship for long at least saves her from the agony of completing the piece. She never necessarily performs; she sits on the stone steps of some building that's being advertised for lease, lanky legs together and aside, ankles crossed, a demure shape in black and grey and an aura of unkemptness that speaks more of habit than it does being windswept and interesting. She thinks of Victorian literature with unusually talented orphans busking for bread, and remembers her cousin playing the piano with her to an audience of three to five, cigarette smoke in the air and then slightly condescending applause, and quietly attempts to play again.

She won't earn much even then, but at least this time, the music winds complete over the cobble stones, mewling out its stilted melody.

Her errands take her to different reaches of the city. She has an allowance for cab fare and train rides, but likes to walk; it's a good way to get to know the city, even if it means setting aside a couple of hours for slower travel. Since signing up with the Personification Initiative, she's been able to earn wages for the first time in her life. Frivolous forays into playing music on the street corners have been exactly that: frivolous. She teaches literacy to adults, those who arrive in Baedal without the necessary skills to survive. She hears about the Spatters, as well, and the House that offers similar services, and occasionally winds up walking those streets, attempting to avoid the ones where it seems like the Fog is thicker than usual.

Food is bought in outdoor markets in early mornings, contributing a little to what she takes from Njoki's pantry. Sometimes she will even sit down somewhere and buy some tea and a muffin and feel incredibly indulgent for it. Clothing is primarily bought from second hand places, judged by its practicality and comfort and whatever aesthetics she's feeling that day. Books are usually borrowed from the Library, dependent on their availability, and usually not for herself, but those she tries to teach. She is not an expert, but knows that people will only do things if they want to do things, and she selects nonfictions of vivid interest, slim short story compilations, things she thinks those she tutors would find interesting.

At night, she sleeps. Sometimes she dreams.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

In the kitchen, there's a bread tin cooling on top of the oven, containing a crisp, brown slab of what presumably was once nuts, before they were minced and reformed into a loaf shape. Shrieky tips the tin over and taps on the bottom lightly so the loaf falls onto a cutting board. This done, he cuts two generous slices, and puts them out onto plates. There's a large bowl of hummus on the side of the counter, and he adds a dollop of this to each plate as well, before grabbing a loaf of bread, and taking the whole loaf as well as both plates over to the dining table (or rather, to the many small tables which have been shoved together to form one long dining table).

"I-- I'm not very good at cooking, I don't think? I don't really like using the ovens." Shrieky offers, somewhat apologetically, as he glances back towards Benji, "But I like making things. That's why I like hummus, actually, because normally, you'd have nut roast with potatoes, or carrots or something? But you need to cook those on the hob, and I really dislike using the hob..."

So instead you get... a somewhat mismatched meal, Benji. But it was made with love!

Fortunately, Benji is legitimately used to eating a great manner of mismatched meals set in front of her, to the point where not commenting on the oddity isn't just her being kind. This one is certainly new, anyway, but not unwelcome, moving to sit down and draw her plate over. The messenger bag is set down to lean against her leg, and she keeps her coat on sort of out of habit rather than rudeness or intention to leave any time soon; it's comfortable, so.

"To be honest, I'm better at baking than, you know, that sort of cooking," Benji says, watching as the food is set down before reaching to tear some bread for herself. Table manners are subjective. "It's just being careful about quantities and then letting it work on its own. Anything harder and I'm really very liable to hurt myself."

Edited 2012-05-12 11:51 (UTC)

There's a stack of knives and forks in the middle of the table, but Shrieky doesn't bother with them. Instead, he breaks off a morsel of the nut roast with his fingers, and pops it in his mouth. Yes, table manners are subjective.

"What kind of things do you bake?" He breaks off some more of his nut roast, tilting his head speculatively, "There used to be someone on our cohort, who baked things. He made a souffle, and flan. He disappeared a little while ago though."

She's happy to alternate between both, slivering off some of the nut roast with her fork, trying it with the hummus. There's a glance up at the mention of someone disappearing, a fact of life here that never leaves her feeling very secure, but it's not the part of Shrieky's words she pursues. "Nothing so fancy. There's-- my aunt, she called it 'flies graveyard', I don't know, it's just a slice. It's sort of a cakey thing with fruit; raisins and dates, apricots.

"I was going to make that for the person who's been housing me, actually. I'm moving soon, again." And they will absolutely talk about dreams, but maybe not while they both have an appetite. Benji is a relatively dainty eater, mostly because she just generally is about most things.

Shrieky takes a break from picking at his nut roast to tear off some bread for himself, and sweep it through the hummus. It's like a delicious edible spoon, "Flies graveyard? And... the fruits are supposed to be the flies? Because they are small and dark in the same way?"

He takes another sweep of hummus, and pushed the bread all the way into his mouth, before holding his hand up to block the view of it while he chewed. "Who is housing you now? And where are you going?"

Mouth now emptied, he wipes the back of his hand across his lips and glances at Benji's plate, "Is it good? Oh, would you like some water as well? Sometimes I forget to drink..."

A nod in confirmation. "Not a desperate effort to sound appealing," she concedes, before nodding at the offer of water, along with a smile. As Shrieky sets about with that, Benji continues at the gradual diminishing of her plate, tearing shreds off her helping of bread. "There's a house in Badside that, mm. Someone I met, Wolfgang, he's fixing it up a little," she says. "I was living in Mafaton with this very generous lady, Ki, who let me stay there for a while until I could find something better, but I think moving out here would be better."

He's running her a glass of water when she mentions Wolfgang, and he spins on his heel to fire a suddenly overwhelmingly happy grin at her, "Wolfgang? You mean, the boy with the long white hair? I'm going to live with him as well!" He keeps his attention on her for a moment too long, and the cup overflows, chilling his hand with cold water. Pulling it out from under the tap, he turns off the faucet and goes to approach the table again, "He is incredible, isn't he? He looks like a statue, or a painting..."

Too perfect to be real. Apparently Shrieky is pretty shallow...

Well.

To be fair. Wolfgang.

She lets that conversation line end there, however, responding to it with a quirk of a smile as she studies the other xenian. "The house in Badside? Well, that's good. It's very lovely-- I mean, it's old and needs some work, but it will be very lovely." The news of Shrieky's moving in-ness is taken with grace enough that Benji manages not to express how much of an improvement that will be for the Mermaid.

"That helps us, I think. With your dreams."

"I'm really excited about living with more people again. This place always feels terribly quiet now."

Water delivered, he sinks back down to his place at the table, opposite her, and returns to pull off another piece of his nut roast.

"Living together, you mean? I guess, it would be more convenient, would it?"

if one day is good, is a day sufficient?

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