Pepper is the sword-arm of crazy (pickledpepper) wrote in blurred_epilog, @ 2009-10-21 12:21:00 |
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Entry tags: | ! narrative, octavius pepper |
Who: Pepper and his sister Magdalene
Where: Pepper's cabin near Gairloch
When: early 1982
Rating: PG
What: Family have to stick together.
The house in the woods was almost not even a house at all, perhaps more properly classified as a cabin. In the wet chill of the Scottish winter it seemed picturesque, snow like marzipan icing on the tilt of the roof and spreading over the ground. There are animal tracks to mar it, but only her own feet show definitive proof of human life - Magdalene is used to this state of affairs.
Her knock on the door is only perfunctory before she unlocks it and steps inside, turning on an angle so that the box she has resting on her hip won't catch on the jamb. "Otto?" she calls. She doesn't expect an answer, but in case he missed her approach she won't be taking him by surprise now. It's not hard to find him though. He's sitting on a stool in the kitchen, the only place with a decent flat surface, open journal in front of him. Again.
She puts the box down just out of his way, glancing at the page to see where he's up to. Late in '79 by the looks of it, though there are large blank areas where wards block the writing from her sight. "November?" she guesses, and he hesitates only a moment before nodding slowly, jerkily.
Meat, wrapped in oil paper, needs to be put in the chiller, and she looks around the small room with its white washed plaster walls, noting how bare it's getting. There's still some pieces left of the last deer he'd taken down, but he clearly hasn't been hunting for a while.
When she comes back out he's looking at her, rather than through her, and she pulls back on a smile. Later, she thinks brusquely. Right now she just needs to let him work on his own pace, not fake things to please anyone - let alone her. "I need." His voice is low and a little rough, but he doesn't use it much. Then his eyes go unfocused and she thinks she recognises the sign, in this context, that he can't quite think what he was going to say. Glancing down at his fingers, she sees the first three of his right hand tapping and fidgeting, and reaches into the box of groceries to break the plastic wrapping on a carton of B&Hs. She hands him the carton and fetches a lighter, and even if he couldn't remember the word, he does just fine at working one cigarette away from its fellows and lighting it.
Satisfied that he's settled for now, she starts to put the rest of the food away, making a mental list of those things that are running low. He's been out at some point, though; there is a bag of chocolate croissants in the pantry, and she glances at him before discretely dumping those into the bottom of her box. She knows, after all, who they're for.
"I got some interviews for you," she tells him as she's finishing up, wiping down a couple of benches and putting things back where they should be. She doesn't know if he's still in therapy and won't ask, but she suspects that the woman's advice of writing about what happened might actually be decent, so she's perfectly happy to get him notes. His memory isn't the best these days, and four warded journals isn't always much to go on. "Department of Mysteries and Werewolf Support services. Should add a bit of detail.""
He nods again, and she crosses the living room to set the pages down next to his battered typewriter. On the other side was a few sheets of his own, unedited so far, work, and she itched to take a pen to it. No. Later. Let him get a bit further along, first.
She turns back to Octavius then, watching him and trying to recognise him as the ragged big brother of her youth. He'd been skinny then, but everyone had been, and now there was a definite edge of haggard that she doesn't much like the look of. His dark hair seems even darker compared to his skin, freckles standing out a little more than they used to. His eyes, though... She can never help but wonder what he actually saw when he was staring at nothing, when they aren't focused on anything in the room. "Teresa says they're thinking about trying for a kid," she tells him, blurts out really, as though the news will make him go back to normal and they'll sit there laughing about new mothers and their babies and how ridiculous the whole thing is.
Instead he simply makes eye contact with her, a swift raising of his eyes, half a second's hook, and down again.
"He wants a Christmas baby," she continues, trying desperately to feel like she's not speaking to a wall, "but that would be horrible, I think, so I'm hoping they don't get a hit until September. Mum's really just thrilled that one of us is breeding, so, you know."
His expression, she realises, is tight and drawn, and his cigarette is burning at fast pace. She has probably hit another tough spot she didn't know was there, and if she were alone she'd swear. Conversation with Octavius is always like this.
When he rises he doesn't say anything, but the door he leaves by leads to his bedroom, so she supposes she's to assume he's going back to bed. She doesn't believe that, of course - she has seen the cupboard down there, with pictures plastered over the walls, a macabre sort of shrine to people who've been lost. She doesn't know all their names, either, but she recognises the old Minister, and she knows that the girl with the long dark hair is her sister-in-law Josephine.
Sighing, she picks up her box, the cardboard bending inwards now that it's not full of supplies to hold it in place. It's only when she's locking the door behind her that she wonders if taking away the croissants might not just feed into his delusions.