ravi is a (locksmith) wrote in we_coexist, @ 2011-01-23 11:18:00 |
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Entry tags: | atsuko chiba, marisa coulter |
give me liberty or give me a phone [Open to Mrs. Coulter + Anyone!]
The road was wide, paved, quiet and lonely. Half a day was about to go by and yet this placed they called "The City" still assumed a lazy atmosphere that reminded her of an early weekend morning. Or maybe it was just this side of "The City", she thought.
But wherever it was, whatever it was called, Atsuko hadn't the foggiest of a clue. One thing was for sure, though: this was no longer Japan if the cab style was any indication.
"If you head straight and turn right at the second corner, you'll find an apartment building."
"Thank you. That's helpful," Atsuko said plainly to her good driver as she pushed the door open and stepped out. He must have caught her thoughts, she figured: she wanted a bath, a change of clothes, a chair to prop her feet up and a quiet place to think about her random circumstance.
Clutching the folder of papers she had been given for her release (at least she was still sane. Suddenly, that was a relief to know), she stepped onto the sidewalk as the cab drove off and turned the corner to her right. After its disappearance, she popped open her purse bag, slung comfortably over her left shoulder and sorted through it. Her vanity kit was there, so were her glasses, her ID tag, her handkerchief, her breath mints and her flattened wallet.
A sigh slipped out of Atsuko's nostrils as she went through her personal belongings for the third time that hour. "They didn't give me back my phone, either." She closed her bag. No money, no phone -- how was she going to start?
Well, at least they left her license and her credit card alone...
A vehicle honked in the distance as she turned around her heels and looked up to the wide window that served as her background, tinted black with the name of a pawnshop pasted against it. As she read the name, she found herself looking into her reflection.
The brunette stared back at her and blinked with her.
Not Paprika, but Atsuko, she thought to herself as she stood straighter, squared her shoulders and lifted her chin a little, her reflection doing the same. This was one strange dream...or reality? Really, it's been hard to tell between these two this late...
The bell rang as she stepped into the ample, dim space behind the window, the walls covered partly by mirrors and glass shelves and barricaded by separate counters of display. The shop owner was an aging man with a happy smile and a pair of thick glasses on his nose and he received the doctor right when she stepped into his humble store. "What can I do for you?" he asked.
Atsuko had already formed her inquiry in her mind and had moaned out the first half-syllable of it but she caught herself before she spilled the rest and conscious of the folder she held, she lowered it away from his gaze and rethought about her question. Where is this place? she wanted to ask -- but who in the right mind in a very well-respected costume would suddenly forget the name of the place she was in? She worried that it might suggest to the curious owner a defect in thinking, so she clammed up.
Instead, she asked him, "Where is the nearest phone shop?" Now that sounds like a "sane" question to her.