multiversallogs | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Who: Alan Shore and some brave souls
What: A day in the life.
Where: Everywhere. (The El, Flyside, Aspic, the locale of your choice.)
When: Sukkardi
Notes: Format essentially stolen from Samm. Except for the part where I can't get that box thing to work.
Warnings: Smugness. Legalese. Gratuitous discussion of pie, probably.

Tag into one of the threads below or devise a scenario of your choosing.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Morning finds Alan on a train headed north, the dress and conduct of his fellow passengers gradually shifting toward sedate and professional as they near Coin's End Crossing. Alan himself, never much for mornings (to say nothing of public transportation), is absorbed in the sheaf of documents he balances on one knee and grappling with the challenge of producing anything akin to legible notes as the train dips and swerves. He'll disembark, papers tucked securely into his briefcase and a gash of ink along his left index finger, at the Hog Leaving station, intent on locating a cup of coffee.

Few shops in Flyside maintain regular hours—the shopkeepers, many of them inventors, seem compelled to invent their own from day to day. If one's able to forgive the occasional frustration (and Alan is), it's rather charming, this practice of conducting business as the mood strikes. As though commerce should be as much a matter of inspiration as anything else.

At this particular hour of this particular afternoon, this particular shop—it sits comfortably on a somewhat secluded corner, two narrow windows peering out at the street—is open, and a table laden with curiosities (from brain-teasing puzzles to discarded prototypes to things that are just plain broken—good luck telling the difference) has been set outside to lure in or, barring that, confound passers-by. No bell jangles to announce Alan's entrance; instead, a mechanical insect takes to the air and loops once around his head. Ducking (a habit he can't quite shake), Alan calls out a hello and doesn't hesitate to begin browsing. The shop's owner is, if not a friend, an esteemed acquaintance and lively conversationalist.

Brain teasers? Puzzles? Mysterious contraptions?

Of course Hermione is in here. She glances up when Alan comes in and gives him a polite, blank of smile, but aside from that pays little attention; instead, she returns quickly to studying some kind of sphere made of fine silver wire, with little coloured glass beads strung along it. She's not sure exactly what it is, but it might well be the distant cousin of a Rubik's cube. She's certainly treating it as a puzzle, leaning down to where it sits and reaching out to gingerly shift a red bead along a wire.

At which point it clamps down on her fingertip, and she pulls her hand swiftly free with a slight gasp- "Ow!" -before glaring disapprovingly at the contraption.

The shop being what it is, Alan doesn't begrudge Hermione her abstracted air--he simply smiles in return and proceeds to let fancy lead him where it will. He's peering into a kaleidoscope--a handsome, slim wood number poised between a pair of clawlike supports--when she cries out. With a quick jerk of his head, he looks up. His feet carry him a few instinctive steps toward her before reason prevails over surprise and concern.

“Don't tell me it bites,” he says, his smile tentative. “Are you all right?”

It snows that evening, a handful of flakes—gone almost before they hit the ground—flung over the city. It's certainly not enough to deter a displaced Bostonian and his relatively new winter coat from venturing through the streets and to one of his preferred haunts. The bar's called Touché (the name, naturally, is what first drew him to it), and it boasts some halfway decent single malts. Occasionally, when one of the bazaar's vendors finds themselves with a surplus of goods, it serves as a late-auction house.

Alan takes a seat at the bar and starts off with a beer—dark, and, as tends to be the case in Baedal, with a flavor he can't quite pin down.

Maggie isn't sure what brings her to this side of town, especially since she tends to stick close to home and Chimer where the market is. But she's here now, nursing a third shot of vodka that tastes slightly off unlike the kind she's used back in New York. She's been homesick since day one even if being home means being yelled at by her mother. Lonely too, but far be it from her to admit that out loud.

Never a social drinker, this is one of the few times Maggie drinks out her problems in public and not in the safety of her living room with the cats.

The sight of Maggie--of all people--at the bar inspires in him a peculiar reluctance. It's not that it's such a touching scene--she simply looks...self-contained, sitting there with her vodka. For some moments (as he savors the few sips of beer remaining in his glass), Alan gives serious consideration to walking out the door and back into the night, leaving her and everything else undisturbed.

"Finally," he says, setting his empty glass down on the bar and breathing the word out like a contented sigh. He smiles benignly over at Maggie (he's taken care to position himself out of arm's reach and therefore, hopefully, harm's way). "No more the unanswered text, the lone voice resounding in an empty room. No, this time when you storm off, as you inevitably must, I'll be afforded some closure."

Sometimes, she just wants a moment to sit down and stay in her head, thinking about nothing at all. Too bad for Maggie, this is not one of those times.

His voice is grating like sharp nails on a chalkboard and she doesn't dare look over at him lest he take it as an invitation to stay. Maggie digs into the pocket of her jacket, throws a couple of bills on the bartop, and quickly makes an attempt to move to the other side of the bar.

Away from him. Far, far away.

His eyes—and only his eyes—follow Maggie as she hastens to create what he presumes is a sort of buffer zone of bar patrons. Her reaction is surprising only in its lack of severity—he'd opened his mouth fully prepared to be mopping vodka from his face moments later. He watches for a handful of seconds and then leaves her, for the time being, to her own devices.

He orders a scotch and, when it arrives, settles in at the bar for a glass' worth of calm and perhaps a quarter-glass' worth of reflection.

Eddie ducks into the bar, brushing water droplets from his hair. This isn't a part of town he spends much time in, but work brought him here today. He'd just wrapped up shooting a bunch of fluff pictures for some fluff piece he couldn't even begin to care about. But hey, slow news days happen sometimes. He glances around, nodding a little in appreciation at the whole... aesthetic of the place, then saunters up to the bar, his camera bag flung over one shoulder.

Shooting the bartender a winning grin, he orders a Dark 'n Stormy... mainly because he thinks it sounds cool. He never had one before, but he's always wanted to, and now that he's a staff photographer at a fine publication, well...

Clutching his drink in one hand, he casually turns to the man beside him, ready to make conversation whether the stranger wanted it or not.

"Y'know, this is a lot nicer than I expected a place called 'Touch' to be."

Eddie might've misread the sign outside.

[ooc: Go crazy! Alan gets around--I can work with pretty much anything.]

Soon it will be snowing, and by soon, one can take that to mean that the season is winding inevitably to the paler heart of winter. Currently, it's simply in suspension, with bruise-grey clouds and crisp air.

This patch of land is of that urban park variety, with wrought iron squaring it off from the cobblestone streets. The overcast noonday sun makes for an equal and grey distribution of light, but it's very English, Xenophilius thinks, and he has an automatic affection for anything that reminds him of home. Currently, he makes something of an unusual sight, and this time it's simply because he's holding a broom.

A traditional looking thing, with a cluster of brittle sticks secured in uniform to a long branch, sanded down and sturdy. Well-made but not store bought, it is possible he made the thing himself. He stands on the damp grass, currently holding the thing rested on both palms, as if checking its balance. His expression is one of curious contemplation, not really noticing the world around him.

Much.

[ CHANCE MEETING? DELIBERATE? YOU DECIDE. ]

Alan's obliged to circle the park--or, at any rate, walk along a stretch of fence--before he finds the entrance, a gap in all that steadfast ironwork. He doesn't disguise his approach (snapped twigs aplenty can and do attest to that), but when he spots his friend, he stops short, leaving ample space between them. He'd been invited here, true, but trespassing on the man's thoughts is another matter entirely.

"Xenophilius." He says the name warmly, even as the chill air transmutes his exhalation into a white wisp.

Xenophilius is concentrating. One hand lowers, and the broom begins to tip, before he rights it again, pale eyebrows furrowed. He's going to have to do that charm again, maybe, or check with Snape that-- oh, someone just said his name.

Promptly forgetting his cautious handling of the item, he turns enough to spy Alan, hands removing from where it was holding up the broom -- and, of course, the broom hangs in place, hovering on thin air with only the slightest of wobbles. He is dressed not unusually, for him, in the quilt-patch coat of warm wool over trousers that show his ankles, more ordinary sweater above that.

"Good day, Alan," he greets. "How're you today?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

(no subject)

The El

A shop, Flyside

no subject

no subject

A bar, Aspic

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

Whatever, Wherever your little heart desires

A PARK... SOMEWHERE. FLYSIDE.

no subject

no subject