Hannah Jean Flynn (![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} hannah_flynn) wrote in ![[info]](http://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} free_form2,@ 2008-05-07 21:59:00 |
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Good Timing
Mallory had become very careful with her schedule. Up early to go running just after the sun came up, then back to the trailer for a quick breakfast before cleaning up the dishes and taking Tuffy for a long walk. After that she'd usually go down to the diner to drink a couple of cups of coffee while sitting at the counter and watching Verlie give the evil eye to the truckers who talked too loud when they straggled in from the highway.
The trailer was too quiet. She'd unplugged the phone to keep herself from weakening and using it to call Victoria, relying on the cell phone Agent Markowitz had issued her when she'd gotten her badge because the vampire didn't have the number. She'd done the right thing. Made the mature decision, the only decision. She'd also woken up crying for the past three mornings.
If there was nothing DHS needed her to do, she stayed to herself and didn't seek out company because she couldn't stand being near anybody. Not even Julie, who she loved like a sister, but she knew Julie wouldn't be able to be honest and say she was sorry it was over between her and Vicky. She wouldn't ask Julie to lie for the sake of their friendship, so it was better to keep away from her.
She hurt, hurt worse than she'd ever hurt. And she was so Goddamned lonely that she kept the television on all the time just so she could hear another voice. She cried a lot, randomly, bursting into tears while she was cooking dinner or cleaning the bathroom or carrying the garbage out. Mrs Abnernathy caught her bawling while leaning on the rearview mirror of the truck, a bag of groceries sitting at her feet, and the old lady had offered her a glass of too-sweet tea to make her feel better. That just made her cry harder.
She'd done the right thing. She had to stick to it. Even if it made her feel like she was dying.
Of all the gifts Hannah Flynn had been entrusted with upon her death and rebirth, being empathic wasn’t one of them. Her appearance at Mallory’s trailer was coincidental. It was no longer strictly necessary to materialize in the middle of someone’s living room. Nowadays, the ghostly Agent could access her solid body and follow traditional habits, such as knocking at the door.
This she did now, frowning at certain signs that all wasn’t right in Mallory’s world. Scrubby grass poked up around the front steps and begged to be cut back. A couple of newspapers hadn’t been brought inside the trailer. Hannah held an electronic bill in hand, which she’d found below the mailbox, coated in desert dust, as if the redhead had dropped it and hadn’t even noticed.
This was her old neighborhood, too. Certain precautions had to be taken upon appearing there, lest a nosy person take note of Hannah’s post-mortem visit. She wore nondescript jeans and flip-flops, topped off with a yellow hoodie, which she pulled tight around her face.
Hannah rapped her knuckles against the door a second time. “Mallory?” she called, attempting to project her voice through the door, but nowhere else. “Um… don’t freak out… just an old friend.”
The redhead was in the process of cleaning out the refrigerator, where she'd discovered Chinese food that had grown what actually looked like hair. There were plastic containers and jars of condiments covering the kitchen table like a ruined city in miniature, and she tossed a styrofoam cup of...something-or-other into the trash. Bleach. She was going to need bleach. And some gloves. Did she have gloves?
She was checking under the sink when she heard the knock at the door, and she lifted her head without thinking and bumped the back of her head on an exposed pipe. "Fucking ow," she grumbled, scuttling backwards to sit on the floor and rub the back of her noggin. Even inanimate objects were out to get her now.
She made her way to the door and opened it to find Hannah hovering on her doorstep. Mallory blinked, opened her mouth as if she meant to say something, then closed it again.
"If you're here on business that might be a relief," she said finally, standing aside in case the blonde wanted to come in. Did ghosts need invitations? That reminded her, she was going to have to do a dis-invite spell soon. The break was already emotional, it needed to become physical too. Permanent. The redhead's throat tightened, threatened to close up.
"You just passing through?"
“Just passing through,” she confirmed with a smile. “You’re not on death’s doorstep yet.”
Hannah walked across the threshold with no difficulty. Ghosts were rarely kept out of places, though there were some who became trapped within them. As she turned back the hoodie, the spirit’s warm, brown eyes feasted on her friend’s face. Oh how she missed being able to drop in whenever she wanted. There were freedoms in her boring, ordinary life that she had so taken for granted. Freedoms and physical senses…
At the moment, smell was not one of them.
“Though you wouldn’t know it from the stench!” Hannah pinched her nose. “Yick, what smells like Limburger cheese in here?” She extended the electric bill to Mallory, not stopping to consider that the last time Mallory saw her, she was barely visible. Now she looked more or less human, with the exception of a faint glimmer.
"I don't know. If something died in there, though, I won't be surprised." Mallory discreetly wiped at her eyes, her head turned so that Hannah couldn't see her do it. "I was looking for gloves to get started using bleach on the inside. I'd drag the thing outside and burn it, but I don't know if appliances can be burned or not. There might be a...town ordinance or something."
Jokes. Sort of, anyway. That was a good sign, right?
"It's good to see you again," Mallory told Hannah, turning to face her more fully. "You look surprisingly solid. Been practicing?"
Did Hannah already know? Did her new 'station' give her a psychic heads-up? The former waitress had been there when she and Victoria first met. Mallory's chin quivered, and she had to look someplace else so she wouldn't start blubbering. Again, still, some more. "H-h-how have you been, wherever you are these days?"
Hannah could see the surreal refrigerator light emanating from the kitchen. If only the living knew that ‘seeing the light’ after death was a lot like opening a fridge late at night, they might not describe it so poetically.
The yellow-haired spirit made her way towards the table and chairs. The layout of Mallory’s home was similar to her former one, and it made her feel nostalgic, despite the fridge fragrance. “I’m good,” she said. “Been getting tons of practice. There was a natural disaster in Asia this week, and guess who got to pull overtime?” Hannah stalled for dramatic effect. “Me.” She thumbed her chest.
Scraping a chair back, she made herself comfortable before Mallory’s miniature city. She began to stack unopened cartons of yogurt into towers organized by fruit flavor. All of her mannerisms were the same, save for a calmness or patience that Hannah had developed.
“You know what’s weird though, is how I look better than you, and I’m the deceased one.” Hannah shook her head, playfully disapproving, and balanced a blueberry carton. “What’s going on? Is Tuffy okay?” She looked beneath the table for the dog, though it probably would’ve reacted to her presence long before now, had it been so close.
"Yeah, he's fine, he's taking his afternoon siesta in the bedroom. The stink drove him off." Mallory offered a strained smile as she watched Hannah arrange the yogurt containers. She should probably eat some of that before it started to go bad too. The redhead hooked a chair with her foot but didn't sit down.
"I'm kind of glad you came by," she said after a brief silence. "It's nice to have somebody to talk to besides the dog. I had an entire conversation with him yesterday. If I don't cut it out, I'm going to start thinking he's answering me."
She let her weight sag down into the seat, not wanting to admit she'd been even closer to Tuffy than usual, occasionally crying on him while he sat stoically on the couch with her.
"He's a good puppy," she said, and her voice shook at the end of the sentence. God, stop it, already... "I broke up with Vicky."
Hannah gasped. "Whhhyyy?" she asked, dragging the word out plaintively, but her face wore only worry. Perhaps it was a foolish question, considering the unlikelihood of the pair being a permanent item. The optimist in Hannah wanted it to last, however, because the women were her friends, and because her relationship was unlikely, too.
"Did something happen?" She reached across the table and touched Mallory's hand, and her physical presence felt normal and curiously warm.
And the tears were so close to the surface that Mallory was already crying when Hannah touched her, and she rested her brow on her forearm for a minute while she tried to get control of them. Breathe. C'mon, breathe....
"I don't know, it was...it was almost like a fight, but not really," she said once she could speak more or less normally. "There's this thing going on with the government, some kind of program to keep tabs on supernatural stuff, and I signed up. Wanted her to sign on too, wanted to keep her safe. I dunno, she agreed to it. Wish she hadn't told me about Star, though."
It was ridiculous of her to think that a lack of knowledge about the Wiccan could have done much more than stave off the inevitable, but there it was. Mallory shook her head.
"I dunno, I guess I just couldn't....do it anymore. Love her and be with her at the same time. I just wish it didn't feel like it'd kill me."
"That's the hardest part about it," Hannah said, and since she had been through one serious break-up, she could commiserate on this. "It won't kill you. It'll just ache for a long while, like a band-aid coming off in slow motion." Hannah didn't have any tissues to offer Mallory, but she did have her sleeve. Pulling the soft yellow cuff down over her fingers, she offered it up to her friend. "You can cry and snot on me, if you want." A one-shouldered shrug. "It snot a big deal." The cornball nature of the comment was so old school waitressy Hannah, but her smile was wimpy. Oh, she hated this. Not being able to give Mallory a reprieve. If she could, she would. Just take the pain into her own heart for one day, to give her friend a break.
The sound the redhead made was watery, but it at least resembled a laugh. She wiped her nose gingerly on Hannah's sleeve, leaned a little further towards her so that her cheek was resting against the blonde's upper arm. This was what she needed, for someone to be very gentle and careful with her, and the blonde had never been otherwise. The mortal closed her eyes, sniffled loudly.
"I still love her, that's the thing. It's why the phone doesn't work right now. I'm afraid I'll call her and it'll just start all over again. Sometimes it's like there's no air in the room." She sounded forlorn, forlorn and worn out.
"Did you know?" she asked Hannah in a small voice. "Is that why you came by?"
"Nuh uh." With kind and caring fingers, Hannah combed through the locks of Mallory's bright hair, stroking each from root to end. "I just missed you," she said, which was the truth.
As she weaved her magic with Mallory's scalp, the blonde considered the situation. "I think it's better not to call... Ending a relationship's like quitting an addiction, I think. If you say to yourself 'just one more time', it only prolongs the hurting. What's so unfair is that the very person who makes you hurt is the only one who can make it all better."
Hannah leaned her cheek against Mallory's forehead. "What you did feels awful, but it'll be right in the long run." The sharp line of her teeth cut into her lip, and the stinging pain surprised her. Oh please, please, please God, don't let this apply to me and Oliver.
"I'll stay for a while, if you want," Hannah said. "No place to be."
Mallory had become very careful with her schedule. Up early to go running just after the sun came up, then back to the trailer for a quick breakfast before cleaning up the dishes and taking Tuffy for a long walk. After that she'd usually go down to the diner to drink a couple of cups of coffee while sitting at the counter and watching Verlie give the evil eye to the truckers who talked too loud when they straggled in from the highway.
The trailer was too quiet. She'd unplugged the phone to keep herself from weakening and using it to call Victoria, relying on the cell phone Agent Markowitz had issued her when she'd gotten her badge because the vampire didn't have the number. She'd done the right thing. Made the mature decision, the only decision. She'd also woken up crying for the past three mornings.
If there was nothing DHS needed her to do, she stayed to herself and didn't seek out company because she couldn't stand being near anybody. Not even Julie, who she loved like a sister, but she knew Julie wouldn't be able to be honest and say she was sorry it was over between her and Vicky. She wouldn't ask Julie to lie for the sake of their friendship, so it was better to keep away from her.
She hurt, hurt worse than she'd ever hurt. And she was so Goddamned lonely that she kept the television on all the time just so she could hear another voice. She cried a lot, randomly, bursting into tears while she was cooking dinner or cleaning the bathroom or carrying the garbage out. Mrs Abnernathy caught her bawling while leaning on the rearview mirror of the truck, a bag of groceries sitting at her feet, and the old lady had offered her a glass of too-sweet tea to make her feel better. That just made her cry harder.
She'd done the right thing. She had to stick to it. Even if it made her feel like she was dying.
Of all the gifts Hannah Flynn had been entrusted with upon her death and rebirth, being empathic wasn’t one of them. Her appearance at Mallory’s trailer was coincidental. It was no longer strictly necessary to materialize in the middle of someone’s living room. Nowadays, the ghostly Agent could access her solid body and follow traditional habits, such as knocking at the door.
This she did now, frowning at certain signs that all wasn’t right in Mallory’s world. Scrubby grass poked up around the front steps and begged to be cut back. A couple of newspapers hadn’t been brought inside the trailer. Hannah held an electronic bill in hand, which she’d found below the mailbox, coated in desert dust, as if the redhead had dropped it and hadn’t even noticed.
This was her old neighborhood, too. Certain precautions had to be taken upon appearing there, lest a nosy person take note of Hannah’s post-mortem visit. She wore nondescript jeans and flip-flops, topped off with a yellow hoodie, which she pulled tight around her face.
Hannah rapped her knuckles against the door a second time. “Mallory?” she called, attempting to project her voice through the door, but nowhere else. “Um… don’t freak out… just an old friend.”
The redhead was in the process of cleaning out the refrigerator, where she'd discovered Chinese food that had grown what actually looked like hair. There were plastic containers and jars of condiments covering the kitchen table like a ruined city in miniature, and she tossed a styrofoam cup of...something-or-other into the trash. Bleach. She was going to need bleach. And some gloves. Did she have gloves?
She was checking under the sink when she heard the knock at the door, and she lifted her head without thinking and bumped the back of her head on an exposed pipe. "Fucking ow," she grumbled, scuttling backwards to sit on the floor and rub the back of her noggin. Even inanimate objects were out to get her now.
She made her way to the door and opened it to find Hannah hovering on her doorstep. Mallory blinked, opened her mouth as if she meant to say something, then closed it again.
"If you're here on business that might be a relief," she said finally, standing aside in case the blonde wanted to come in. Did ghosts need invitations? That reminded her, she was going to have to do a dis-invite spell soon. The break was already emotional, it needed to become physical too. Permanent. The redhead's throat tightened, threatened to close up.
"You just passing through?"
“Just passing through,” she confirmed with a smile. “You’re not on death’s doorstep yet.”
Hannah walked across the threshold with no difficulty. Ghosts were rarely kept out of places, though there were some who became trapped within them. As she turned back the hoodie, the spirit’s warm, brown eyes feasted on her friend’s face. Oh how she missed being able to drop in whenever she wanted. There were freedoms in her boring, ordinary life that she had so taken for granted. Freedoms and physical senses…
At the moment, smell was not one of them.
“Though you wouldn’t know it from the stench!” Hannah pinched her nose. “Yick, what smells like Limburger cheese in here?” She extended the electric bill to Mallory, not stopping to consider that the last time Mallory saw her, she was barely visible. Now she looked more or less human, with the exception of a faint glimmer.
"I don't know. If something died in there, though, I won't be surprised." Mallory discreetly wiped at her eyes, her head turned so that Hannah couldn't see her do it. "I was looking for gloves to get started using bleach on the inside. I'd drag the thing outside and burn it, but I don't know if appliances can be burned or not. There might be a...town ordinance or something."
Jokes. Sort of, anyway. That was a good sign, right?
"It's good to see you again," Mallory told Hannah, turning to face her more fully. "You look surprisingly solid. Been practicing?"
Did Hannah already know? Did her new 'station' give her a psychic heads-up? The former waitress had been there when she and Victoria first met. Mallory's chin quivered, and she had to look someplace else so she wouldn't start blubbering. Again, still, some more. "H-h-how have you been, wherever you are these days?"
Hannah could see the surreal refrigerator light emanating from the kitchen. If only the living knew that ‘seeing the light’ after death was a lot like opening a fridge late at night, they might not describe it so poetically.
The yellow-haired spirit made her way towards the table and chairs. The layout of Mallory’s home was similar to her former one, and it made her feel nostalgic, despite the fridge fragrance. “I’m good,” she said. “Been getting tons of practice. There was a natural disaster in Asia this week, and guess who got to pull overtime?” Hannah stalled for dramatic effect. “Me.” She thumbed her chest.
Scraping a chair back, she made herself comfortable before Mallory’s miniature city. She began to stack unopened cartons of yogurt into towers organized by fruit flavor. All of her mannerisms were the same, save for a calmness or patience that Hannah had developed.
“You know what’s weird though, is how I look better than you, and I’m the deceased one.” Hannah shook her head, playfully disapproving, and balanced a blueberry carton. “What’s going on? Is Tuffy okay?” She looked beneath the table for the dog, though it probably would’ve reacted to her presence long before now, had it been so close.
"Yeah, he's fine, he's taking his afternoon siesta in the bedroom. The stink drove him off." Mallory offered a strained smile as she watched Hannah arrange the yogurt containers. She should probably eat some of that before it started to go bad too. The redhead hooked a chair with her foot but didn't sit down.
"I'm kind of glad you came by," she said after a brief silence. "It's nice to have somebody to talk to besides the dog. I had an entire conversation with him yesterday. If I don't cut it out, I'm going to start thinking he's answering me."
She let her weight sag down into the seat, not wanting to admit she'd been even closer to Tuffy than usual, occasionally crying on him while he sat stoically on the couch with her.
"He's a good puppy," she said, and her voice shook at the end of the sentence. God, stop it, already... "I broke up with Vicky."
Hannah gasped. "Whhhyyy?" she asked, dragging the word out plaintively, but her face wore only worry. Perhaps it was a foolish question, considering the unlikelihood of the pair being a permanent item. The optimist in Hannah wanted it to last, however, because the women were her friends, and because her relationship was unlikely, too.
"Did something happen?" She reached across the table and touched Mallory's hand, and her physical presence felt normal and curiously warm.
And the tears were so close to the surface that Mallory was already crying when Hannah touched her, and she rested her brow on her forearm for a minute while she tried to get control of them. Breathe. C'mon, breathe....
"I don't know, it was...it was almost like a fight, but not really," she said once she could speak more or less normally. "There's this thing going on with the government, some kind of program to keep tabs on supernatural stuff, and I signed up. Wanted her to sign on too, wanted to keep her safe. I dunno, she agreed to it. Wish she hadn't told me about Star, though."
It was ridiculous of her to think that a lack of knowledge about the Wiccan could have done much more than stave off the inevitable, but there it was. Mallory shook her head.
"I dunno, I guess I just couldn't....do it anymore. Love her and be with her at the same time. I just wish it didn't feel like it'd kill me."
"That's the hardest part about it," Hannah said, and since she had been through one serious break-up, she could commiserate on this. "It won't kill you. It'll just ache for a long while, like a band-aid coming off in slow motion." Hannah didn't have any tissues to offer Mallory, but she did have her sleeve. Pulling the soft yellow cuff down over her fingers, she offered it up to her friend. "You can cry and snot on me, if you want." A one-shouldered shrug. "It snot a big deal." The cornball nature of the comment was so old school waitressy Hannah, but her smile was wimpy. Oh, she hated this. Not being able to give Mallory a reprieve. If she could, she would. Just take the pain into her own heart for one day, to give her friend a break.
The sound the redhead made was watery, but it at least resembled a laugh. She wiped her nose gingerly on Hannah's sleeve, leaned a little further towards her so that her cheek was resting against the blonde's upper arm. This was what she needed, for someone to be very gentle and careful with her, and the blonde had never been otherwise. The mortal closed her eyes, sniffled loudly.
"I still love her, that's the thing. It's why the phone doesn't work right now. I'm afraid I'll call her and it'll just start all over again. Sometimes it's like there's no air in the room." She sounded forlorn, forlorn and worn out.
"Did you know?" she asked Hannah in a small voice. "Is that why you came by?"
"Nuh uh." With kind and caring fingers, Hannah combed through the locks of Mallory's bright hair, stroking each from root to end. "I just missed you," she said, which was the truth.
As she weaved her magic with Mallory's scalp, the blonde considered the situation. "I think it's better not to call... Ending a relationship's like quitting an addiction, I think. If you say to yourself 'just one more time', it only prolongs the hurting. What's so unfair is that the very person who makes you hurt is the only one who can make it all better."
Hannah leaned her cheek against Mallory's forehead. "What you did feels awful, but it'll be right in the long run." The sharp line of her teeth cut into her lip, and the stinging pain surprised her. Oh please, please, please God, don't let this apply to me and Oliver.
"I'll stay for a while, if you want," Hannah said. "No place to be."