InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "It's de-lovely!"

Alec Harper (tarnishedcopper) wrote in flippedrpg,
@ 2012-11-03 22:51:00

Entry tags:

ch: xbwl: alec harper, ch: xbwl: melinda bobbin, p: carley, p: christie

Who: Alec Harper and Melinda Bobbin
When: Evening 3 November
Where: Gamma 006
What: Alec meets his wife, or the woman who will eventually be his wife.

Alec still wasn't entirely certain he believed this entire situation, but he had read the entire pamphlet, which said something, because Alec had hardly read an entire anything since finishing hitwizard training back in 2004. It wasn't that Alec was dumb, on the contrary, he was smart enough, but he had never been, and probably never would be one to sit and read. But he had read the pamphlet, and puzzled over it, and it was nonsense, but the person over the book saying she was Melinda and the other one who spoke like a cop seemed to both think he was in for the long haul.

This seemed pretty elaborate for a criminal circuit to decide it was through with him. But Alec wasn't ready to believe it until he saw something he had to believe.

He had stashed the briefcase of galleons and taken time to wash himself in his new quarters. They were finer than he'd expect if someone were just going to dispose of him too. Mr. Gamma, his apparent butler slash gaoler, had not left him much to change into. A red bathing suit and some supplies in a black bag, so he stayed dressed as he had arrived. There were worse, he supposed, to meet his wife or the one that claimed to be her.

But he had to wait. So Alec made the best of the situation, lounging on the bed and going through his wallet to see what exactly he had brought with him.

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inelegant
2012-11-04 05:02 am UTC (link)

Melinda hadn't really wanted to leave the jungle. She wanted to keep working on her top secret project with Marek, which was going to be the best thing ever. But she'd learned when Alec was from, and admitted to herself that he'd probably need a friendly face. Hadn't her first instinct been to cling to Marek? That was different, obviously, but still. So she emerged from the treeline and headed down the pier to the compound, glancing around the beach to make sure she was alone. She was in a bikini top and boys' swim trunks, neither of which did anything to hide her Mark, but her coverup top was in the bag that hung at her side. Her hair was pulled up into a high, messy bun, and her sunglasses sat on her nose, even though the sun was mostly down. At least she didn't feel compelled to flee into the shade to apply sunscreen.

She flicked her cigarette into the water when she got to the door and pushed inside, heading to Gamma Block on autopilot. Alec was old, and married to her. And they had kids. How bizarre was that?

It occurred to her she hadn't asked what unit he was in, so she walked down the hall, checking names on doors. She found Alec's, a few doors down from her and Marek, and was suddenly overcome with anxiety. Okay, it was just Alec, right? Nothing to be nervous about. They'd been married for...what, fourteen years? And he hadn't reacted negatively to hearing from her.

Fourteen years ago, you were six, whispered a voice sounding suspiciously like Marek.

Shut up.

She knocked, then pushed the door open, hesitating in the doorway as she looked around. "Alec?" For some reason she couldn't make herself move past the threshold without being invited. What are you, a vampire? Her brother was annoying even in her head.

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tarnishedcopper
2012-11-04 05:43 am UTC (link)

Alec didn't normally feel old. Sure the new hitwizard trainees were annoyingly fresh faced, and he could see how those around him had grown older when he looked at photographs. But he didn't see it in the mirror, and he rarely saw it in Melinda whether because of vanity, delusion, or the slow tricks of time.

But he wasn't certain what to expect from Melinda circa 2001.

When there was a knock, he sat up, though it seemed she was letting herself in. "Come in." He offered, noticing a moment's hesitation in the doorway. But he could see her before she did. And it was like a photograph. She looked exactly as she had during the summer of the war, when Peleus had taken the Mark and she was doing Merlin knew what. There weren't very many photographs then, it wasn't a time most couples looked back on dotingly, but Alec could remember her, the smartass girl sitting on the edge of his bed, grilling him on some detail of the early days of his training. They'd be hard pressed to fake that.

He imagined, and felt, that he looked different. "Sweet Merlin..."

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inelegant
2012-11-04 06:03 am UTC (link)

Okay, so this was completely unfair. Melinda at thirty-seven was probably sagging and wrinkling and softening and...everything, but Alec apparently had the nerve to be a fucking fine wine -- better with age. Her Alec was pretty hot but this was just absurd.

"Hi," she said, pulling her sunglasses off her head from where she'd pushed them when he got inside. Now what? "Er...all right, then?" She was still standing in the doorway, with her left hand up on the edge, unthinkingly showing her Mark. He didn't care and even seemed to like it sometimes, she'd long since stopped even noticing it around him.

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tarnishedcopper
2012-11-04 06:24 am UTC (link)

Though it ran completely contrary to his machismo, Alec had a vain streak in him. He took care of himself to fight the onslaught of age, at the gym, at the mirror, but he always had, and he had never spoken about it. Melinda hadn't found out until several months after their marriage.

Melinda hadn't needed that, or if she had, Alec hadn't thought to notice. Then, or now, or now. It had been some time since he had seen her bashful in private, but then, he felt it had been a while since he had seen her at all.

Alec pushed a lock of stray hair behind his ear and stepped aside somewhat to let her enter further. "I think so..."

"You look just like you did back then." It was perhaps a foolish thing to say to Melinda, who was from back then, but Alec just could not get past it.

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inelegant
2012-11-04 06:34 am UTC (link)

"Well, duh," she said, stepping inside. She kicked her flip-flops off on instinct and stepped up to Alec, looking up at him -- further than she looked up to most guys, but less far than he looked down to most girls. Age hadn't shrunk him or anything, so that was good.

One corner of her mouth quirked in a smile as she reached up to finger the lock of hair he'd brushed back. "You're going grey," she observed. Her tone made it clear she didn't mind, though. Her hand rested on his shoulder easily. He might be older but he didn't look that different, overall. And there was just a sense about him that was familiar. She knew him.

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day 4

tarnishedcopper
2012-11-04 07:33 pm UTC (link)

Alec inwardly twinged as she pointed out the proof that while time had left her alone, it hadn't been so kind to him. If it were more grey, or he weren't blonde, he would have taken care of it. But in fact, Melinda rather seemed to like it then if not now. He watched her face as she sized him up.

As strange as this was, things seemed very much the same.

Alec moved a hand to steady her waist, it was much trimmer in a teenager who hadn't had two full pregnancies. "You've called it distinguished." His eyes ran up her arm, and his hand followed, grasping the wrist.

He knew Melinda's body. He knew how it had changed. But he didn't know the tattoo on her wrist. "This is new."

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inelegant
2012-11-04 09:43 pm UTC (link)

Melinda smiled more when he said she'd called it distinguished, and nodded a little. That seemed like a good descriptor for it.

She let him look at her wrist and nodded a little. "I got it here. I got some of this temporary ink that you can wipe off with the special sponge, and had Marek put his handprint. He's got mine around his ankle, too." Thinking of it made her aware of the tattoo showing on the back of her neck with her hair up like this, a bow and arrow shining gold. Apollo. Sun and moon was a pretty fitting motif for them, really. Except that the moon was probably supposed to be less reckless than the sun.

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tarnishedcopper
2012-11-05 10:22 am UTC (link)

In the moment, Alec wanted to wipe it off with the sponge.

He knew Marek was, and always would be, important in Melinda's life. Even now, they lived close to one another, Marek and his wife just a jaunt away from he and Melinda, but the children, and Alec liked to think, the spouses, had begun to take more prominent role, for the both of them. He hadn't thought of it until now, but at nineteen, that probably wasn't the case. He was just an afterthought or a booty call or a bandaid in 2001. He wouldn't be one now.

It felt too much like competition. And while he had been alright with it as a fawnish nineteen year old, he was less willing to share as a man. Alec's hand slid up her arm encircling the tattoo as if replacing it with his own hand, rough from work, He placed a kiss on her palm and looked up at her. "Mmhmm."

It might seem like he wasn't listening, but distraction tactics aside, he'd heard every word--even the ones not said.

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inelegant
2012-11-05 07:28 pm UTC (link)

Melinda just watched him. She knew him, surely, but not like this. He was so different. It would eventually take Melinda several years of marriage and children in the toddler stage to actually fall for her husband, and the idea seemed utterly foreign right now. Why was he acting like they were better than friends and fuck buddies? That was all Melinda expected even out of a marriage of convenience and safety, like the one they'd had.

It took her awhile to decide she was ready to speak again, but she eventually did. "Any more questions about the place?"

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