Musings

Someone mentioned they had you to stay but people don't seem to like him (or her?) very much. Was it an unpleasant visit? Is everything all right, Jennifer?

[written in the kind of copperplate that only comes from a lot of handwriting lessons and careful attention -- it's on a piece of foolscap, torn from one of the journals Joss carries around and on the back, she's probably forgotten, is about half a page's worth of story, of peacock-colored people with jewels for eyes -- it's unsigned]

I'm sorry I hurt you

There's morning tea and there is afternoon tea and there is even goodnight tea but there's nothing that calls itself evening tea. Nothing to drink in the evening that isn't cheating another part of the day and stealing its tea-drinkers.

And goodnight tea doesn't even help to make you sleep.

[Posted to the forums tonight, a day after this.]

This is somewhat unprecedented, so brace yourselves: this has absolutely nothing to do with my restaurant.

Alright, that's a downright lie. I always have something to say about Centro, and tonight is no exception. However, Centro's news desires a certain element of class that is simply not awarded to an online forum -- so I say, be sure to check your mailboxes frequently within the next couple of days and expect an announcement of significant importance that is guaranteed to remedy the dreadful languor of your daily lives.

Like I said, the top statement was a lie. It got your attention though, if you're at least this far.
I'm of the opinion that you should be awarded for your efforts, so here it is.

( What's this? Cats on the internet? Unheard of! )

Obviously, no sociopaths and/or clowns need inquire.
Your kitten priveleges have been revoked.

[Yes, fine, I wrote a whole narrative just so that I could show off the new kittens we have at work. Pay no mind! I insist that Brigs would be a champion of helpless kittens everywhere, so this isn't crack. Feel free to adopt your kids a kitten or two.
You may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.]

[Right at the very back of the library, below a light that flickers and does not quite illuminate the books enough to read their spines, there is a case of very particular books: high adventure mixed in amongst deep fantasy -- the old kind, prior to science fiction's flights of whimsy, this is fantasy where magic roams and adventurers bend knee before their liege. It is dim and dusty in the very back here, quiet away from the centre of the library (such as it can be called 'more quiet' when the library itself is a tomb, a crypt of silence and wordless reverence) There is an armchair drawn up to the nearest window, one where the paper shade has been bent just enough that a crack of light could chase across the pages of any book held in the lap of someone sat curled up tight inside -- it is an armchair with cracked leather arms and a soft beaten spot that looks like someone has rested bare feet there one too many times.

At the left of the case is one particular book, one she knows the librarian recommends to those who might ask for something other. It is an adventurer, sole and alone, journeying far and wide and questing -- a little like Don Quixote, if he were less sad and much less mad, and if there were the occasional fantastic beast to encounter. It is this book she selects, pulls it out and scans the library card tucked in the back just to check -- there's her name, over and over, but not another newer one. When she leaves the library, the card has an addition -- a note on the back]

( Wolf )

is it working

how can you tell if the post goes THROUGH HOW DO YOU TURN BIG LETTERS OFF STUPID LIttle letters

oh there

If you - general you, darlings - are an hour and a half late for work, the reason should never be that your bad hair day gave you a conniption.

And if that is the reason, then for god's sake make up something slightly less ridiculous and lie your about-to-be-unemployed little ass off.

( Sent to Detective Warda, via her department )

Mary, Mary, quite contrary. How does your garden grow? With pretty MARIGOLDS all in a row. Wolf, your noise to INTOLERABLE. Stop the incessant HOWLING. It is worse than The Howling 3, even with Christopher Lee.

And someone who was dead is not? This will not do. Follow the rules, people.

[After this.]

It has come to my attention that there seems to be a strange, prevailing notion that I am dead. I am here to tell you that, well.

Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

Now’s probably the worst time to be doing this, seeing as how it’s the 1st of the month and all our wallets are lighter. But if anyone needs anything fixed around this place I can probably help out. I'm usually pretty handy. I’ve been here for a few weeks and had to fix the sink twice.

Maybe I’m just a lucky one but figured it wouldn’t hurt to offer. Guess that goes for anyone outside of the Hamartia too.

Are you leaving me poetry, Detective Warda?

[Left on the "desk" of Joss Makepeace at Verisimilitude at some peculiar hour of the evening is a small folded note on parchment, handwritten in cursive with a fountain pen.]
( Autumn. )

[Wolf already likes Seattle, in part because of its frequent cloud cover. It doesn't render sunglasses completely unnecessary, but even a degree of pressure off his senses inspires profound joy. Besides, a couple of days in the new digs and he's already encountered interesting people. (Which means information, which means picking up a long-cold trail.)

Today he puts on a mask of respectability, positioning it deftly so as to cover up his (canine) lizard brain; a man doesn't need money to live, but he sure as little green apples needs it to find the unfindable. He'll visit the library Joss mentioned, dip his head down near the stacks and huff the scent of much-loved books, of fantasy, trial, tribulation and happy endings. First thing's first, though.]

Say you're a guy in need of income -- all the better to maintain room and board, my dear -- but you've never been much for wage slavery. Any recommendations on where to make a buck?

[spinneret24 enters the room: 22:47 PM]

spinneret24: can anyone recommend anything with a happy ending? too much anger and futility of late to consider reading about it.
spinneret24: :)

( Left outside 106, delivered with the newspaper by the doorman )

in between the walls and the walls have pain. she said but she didn't say, she spent a lot of time here. you can see it. there are stains, worn places for the fingers to find, places on the edges of the bed. you touch them and you know what she was like

meeting places, gathering places.

1. they bring together

2. they separate. inside you there is a magnet, and we all hold one. some of them have opposing polarities, they snap together like they were meant to be connected. some of them are too much they same, and they repel. these are forces of nature. they are not to be argued with. they don't compromise.

3. sometimes you have no magnet and they put one under the skin. acupuncture. they stick the needles in and the needles are supposed to fix or improve upon various connected parts of the body, and sometimes the needles are filled with fluid and the fluid has no name and the fluid burns

4. speakers. you listen. everyone's speakers are connected to their magnets, to their natures. and when the sound flows out you know the truth.

the truth is simple. the woman knew her truth, and her truth was to jump. i couldn't save her. i could say nothing. they tell you to hush and you hush because these are the ones that bind you and these are the ones with needles and these are the ones that improve you. improvement by breakage. like the binding of feet. they shape the break into what they want to see.

Why the secretary couldn't just send out notes or something equally ridiculous

I hope you all enjoyed the ball.

[He skulked into the city on a stealthy scavenger hunt, sensed what he was looking for was enticingly near, and with the toothiest of grins used what little cash he had to set up shop. Wolf's arrival at Hamartia is punctuated by a merry tune as he whistles his way down the second floor. When he finds the proper apartment, there's silence. Twenty minutes or so, then the walls and floor of #204 shake: A box of something heavy is dropped. Silence again, shorter this time. Another heavy thump, then another, then another. It stops after the fourth thump.

Hamartia goes quiet (as it ever is) again. Wolf familiarizes himself with the lay of the land. Then:]

Tea shops! Stores! Cafes? No, that's coffee. Where's a body get a scone in this neck of the woods? And books! The discerning kind, what about those?

I'm going to leave a newspaper for the Starbucks Girls, clearly they're missing out on their dreams coming true.

SG1: “Superheroes are seriously sexy. Why can’t they be real?”

On that note, since I'm a giving kind of guy, if any of you are looking for a date...I'd be glad to set something up.

I even have insider information:

SG2: “When he said he didn’t want a blow job, it made me wanna give him one!”