InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Ramen!"

J'aime Everleigh Cavanaugh | Meg Giry (ex_peepshows656) wrote in bellumlogs,
@ 2010-02-07 01:34:00

Entry tags:

cheshire cat, meg giry

Who: James & Rick
What: A phonecall.
Where: Wherever. James is calling from work.
When: Evening, several days after the anon post.
Warnings: None, really.

She'd told Lotte that she would talk to someone about the threats that had been made. James didn't want to, because talking about it made it actual. Although, she wasn't new to the lecture that ignoring something didn't make it go away, didn't make it any less real. Still, it was easy. There was an unfamiliar feeling of anger sitting in the pit of her stomach when she picked up the payphone in the back of the club. She didn't recognize the fury in any sense as her own. She didn't recognize any sliver of it as spawned over her own well being.. she was angry over Lotte. The girl was easily worried and upset and made into such a shivering mess that James' fingers were twisted into white knuckles when she punched in a series of memorized numbers. Rick's cell phone. She didn't know who else to talk to. And although she didn't read much into that, she knew he'd at least be able to suggest a decent alarm system.

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takingsides
2010-02-07 07:02 am UTC (link)

Rick wasn't excessively private about methods of contact, but this particular cell phone number happened to be one he carried 24/7, rather than the one he turned off when he was off the clock. If the phone didn't get turned off, he didn't sleep. Rick liked his sleep; this phone, he kept on, and the other lived fifteen hour days, at most. "Austin." He didn't look at the numbers--there usually wasn't much of a point, they were never the sort easily identifiable.

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	ex_peepshows656 2010-02-07 07:08 am UTC (link)
	"It's me." While even in their scattered time together, James wasn't much for phonecalls.. that introduction was her trademark. A soft murmur into the receiver that was about as delicate as she got. Aware that it had been some time, a year perhaps, since she'd last called him. James cleared her throat with an addendum, "It's James." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

takingsides
2010-02-07 07:15 am UTC (link)

She would be able to recognize the mild surprise in his return. "Ah. Hello. One second." There was some muffled conversation, movement. Rick's smooth voice. An answer, slightly higher, male or female. The source of the impression of multiple bodies was difficult to identify, but it was definitely there, especially once it disappeared a moment later after the sound of a door softly clicking shot. "What can I do for you?" It wasn't a flirtatious or suspicious question, but an honest one.

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ex_peepshows656
2010-02-07 07:29 am UTC (link)

She listened to the exchange, but drew no form of perception from it. Her own end of the line was cluttered with varying interference. The distant pulse of music, voices in the background that were so soft they must have been at least a yard away. Still, there was a muffled sound that suggested she was cupping her hand against the receiver, to distance him. Not that he wouldn't be able to tell where she was, but just to make herself heard.

"You sound so professional." There was a note of sallow amusement in her words, and little else. In the past, when she'd called Rick, it was in nothing but suggestion of a hook-up. He didn't sound like he expected that now, or was even unbusy enough to warrant it. Nostalgic, she listened to his end of the line for a moment before speaking again.

"I don't like even having to ask this.. "

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takingsides
2010-02-07 07:37 am UTC (link)

"I'm at work," he said, a smile in his voice. It was the close-mouthed one that slipped unevenly to one side, and fit him best. 'At work' for Rick probably wouldn't warrant amusement from anyone else, but he wasn't staring at a dead body just at the moment, so he would take what he got.

He grew serious at her next words, however. "Ask." Despite their rather... limited... association, Rick knew James to be the kind of women who liked to deal with her own problems without interference from knights of any kind, be they white or be they black. That she would call him to ask for anything was a significant leap in a direction they had never gone.

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ex_peepshows656
2010-02-07 07:49 am UTC (link)

She exhaled, and the sound was almost pouty. It seemed nothing like her, and maybe that was the only clue to her agitation. People were worried about her. People she knew, like Li and Lotte. People she'd never met, like Daisy down the hall.

"Should I--" Her hand covered the mouthpiece in a brief smother, and a muffled frame of her words took over. "Tell him to skip me."

Drawing a breath, she resumed, "Should I take what they said seriously, Rick?"

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takingsides
2010-02-08 06:09 am UTC (link)

Considering pause. "Paranoia is never helpful. Caution might be." He let out a breath. "I would be lying if I said you were not a tempting target to someone like that." The sex industry made people think human rules did not apply. Too often Rick saw people get hurt because they were "just" an immigrant, or "just" a gangbanger, or "just" a whore. "Just" a stripper wasn't that far off.

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ex_peepshows656
2010-02-09 12:02 am UTC (link)

This wasn't what James wanted to hear, and she stood in bristled silence on her end of the receiver for a long moment. Not that she'd wanted Rick to lie to or disillusion her. She just would have preferred if he'd been able to tell her that the threats were the source of some sadistic housewife or bored teenager.

"Alright," she said with a sigh of resolution. Like she'd been waiting for this -- for something she already knew Rick would say -- before coming to her decision.

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	takingsides 2010-02-09 02:42 am UTC (link)
	"It's probably nothing," he said, as if that was reassuring. "Just because that makes it possibly something, doesn't mean it's not probably nothing. What are you going to do about it?" Obviously, he assumed she was going to, because otherwise, she wouldn't have called. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ex_peepshows656
2010-02-09 02:52 am UTC (link)

"I don't know," the admission was murmured across a plane of dark thought. While the statement was a little uncertain, strained with a tiredness that she rarely expressed, the words that followed it up with firm. "I'll think of something." Resolute and determined, clipped with a soft anger that had nowhere to direct itself. Nobody to point the finger at, and so the heat just scalded the satiny edge of James' voice.

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	takingsides 2010-02-09 04:35 am UTC (link)
	"Might drop by on my way home," Rick offered without offering, just in case she didn't want to be alone after work. "There's a taco place near there I've been meaning to try. What time are you off?" (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

ex_peepshows656
2010-02-09 04:49 am UTC (link)

"Ten," James answered with a break in her disturbed quiet. Lifted out of it with a smile gone soft with the admission. There was a revival of music, like a door being opened, a muffled voice in the background, and then the quiet once again.

"I've got to go," she sighed into the receiver. "Maybe I'll see you later." It wasn't a question, just a subtle offer, a possibility. All mights and maybes.

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	takingsides 2010-02-10 02:47 am UTC (link)
	Thoughtful: "Maybe." He stayed on the line until she disconnected. (Reply to this) (Parent)