Greta (pathofcinders) wrote in nevermore_logs, @ 2016-04-01 23:05:00 |
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Entry tags: | greta morgan |
WHO: Greta
WHEN: 1st May
WHERE: Lebanon, Kansas
WHAT: Exploring the new town
Greta woke from another night sleeping in her car with her body stiff and complaining, a crick in her neck and a tender patch on her hip. She climbed out of the car and stretched, morning birds too loud and cheerful for the sort of sleep Greta had just had.
The clock on the dashboard said it was almost ten and, barefoot on the grass, Greta took a look around herself and at her base camp there behind the boarded up hotel. She already knew she couldn't just stay here though, but as yet no further plan had presented itself.
But last night she hadn't dreamt of running through the woods, and she hadn't woken to the moon bright above while she tried to reach out to find a wolf sleeping nearby.
With a yawn she undressed beside the car, balling up her dirty clothes into a plastic bag and dressing in clean ones. No shower, but she couldn't do much about that. She might be able to find a public one in town if she was lucky.
As she brushed her hair she watched the old hotel, the half fallen Do Not Enter sign beginning to lose it's paint.
Do Not Enter, it told her and Greta put her brush down on top of the car.
There were rules that Greta had always lived by and before finding out about the world they had always been chalked up to 'quirks'. If you didn't follow the rules and do as you were told, terrible things would happen. And it didn't matter what really did or didn't happen after breaking the rules, it was simply that how did she ever stop that feeling of dread when she misbehaved? That terror that made her hands sweat and her heart thud.
A fairytale girl, if she is to survive to see the moral of the story, must follow the rules laid down and she must stay the path.
Last night she had parked the car where she knew it wasn't allowed and she had slept without giving it a second thought.
Greta approached the gate.
Do Not Enter, fairytale daughter.
Do Not Stray.
She picked up the heavy lock on the gate and gave it a shake, as though that might undo it. But it was strong even while being slightly rusted. Could she slip through the gap in the fence? No, probably not, she'd need to be slighter for that. But... well, the idea of it didn't scare her. Not at all. Her hands didn't shake holding onto that lock and her gaze didn't slip when she looked through to the forbidden door inside.
Greta laughed, surprising herself, and then took a deep breath of the unfamiliar scents of dry grass and cow manure.
No magic. No gods. The little girl strayed from the path yet not a thing had come to gobble her up.
Delighted with this newfound freedom yet having no idea what to do with it, Greta drove back into the town centre, which this morning was far more busy than it had been last night. (This was relative, however, and the sign coming in had said the population of Lebanon stood at an unimpressive two hundred and six.)
At the one cafe the town seemed to have, Greta settled down to order some breakfast and watch the people going about their day. Not all locals, was what she noticed during her meal, and the trucks outside seemed to confirm that. Despite the low number of people who actually lived in Lebanon, it appeared not an uncommon place for people to pass through on their way elsewhere.
With no plans for the day - or even plans for the foreseeable future - Greta bought herself a sandwich to have for her lunch later and made her way back outside into the sun. Then she sat in the front seat of her car, the door open and her legs outside, and found the book she'd been reading earlier.
A plan would form later. For now she just wanted to enjoy her day without that usual little nagging feeling that she was misbehaving in some unknown way.
When she got sick of reading, Greta locked her car and started walking, exploring the town. Beyond the main street (which was called Main Street) there wasn't much to see. Some closed up factories and one that remained open. A lot of houses - both ones still lived in and those that looked long abandoned - an overgrown railway, and a small park possessing a swing set and a slide.
For a little while Greta played on the swings, eyes closed to better feel the breeze rush past her. She ate her sandwich at the top of the slide, watching the few cars that rolled down the road nearest to her.
It was a very silent town, and the abandoned streets and cracked footpaths were a shocking change from New York. It was eerily quiet, and not the sort of quiet that Greta had gotten used to in the forest either. That was the sort of quiet that actually wasn't, the sort of quiet that became incredibly loud once you realised all the little things that could actually be heard.
Back at the car Greta turned on her phone to check for messages, but when the numbers started flashing on screen she changed her mind. No, she didn't want to know what people back in the city had to tell her. She was trying to be elsewhere right now, trying to be free of baggage. So she turned the phone back off and stashed it in the glovebox.
"You're still here," said a voice behind her and she turned to see a tall man standing by the railing of the post office. She frowned in question and he added, "I saw you last night in the bar, asking about the hotel."
"Oh," Greta said. "Yeah. Didn't find one yet."
"You slept in your car instead?" he asked coming down the steps and peering into the backseat where it was still filled with blankets.
Greta stepped in front of that view. "Just for one night. Probably moving on now."
"Really?" he asked her. "Because you've been here in town all day and there's not exactly much in this town to do. Lebanon doesn't have many things going for it."
"It's the center of America," Greta corrected him.
"You know, it's actually not," the man said and Greta frowned because, yes, it was, that was the whole point. "But people believe it is," he added, seeing her skepticism. "And as we know, people believing in things is what makes them real." He smiled and it was a vibrant sort of smile. He looked like a cowboy, Greta thought. He even had the hat on over his floppy black hair.
"I guess," Greta said warily.
"So if people call this place The Center, well, then as far as everything's concerned, it is the dead center. It's weird the sort of thing that belief'll do to the place. Don't you think?" His expression was one of a joke shared, of two people talking around a thing instead of saying it for the benefit of everyone else. "So what have you come here hiding from?"
Greta shook her head just lightly. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said, her manner completely unconvincing.
"I think you do," the cowboy told her. "Like I said, no one comes here on holiday. People pass through to see the monument for a photo op, or they come here cause they're working the trucks or the factory, but no one just hangs around in Lebanon unless they need to, unless they're hiding - either from themselves or someone scarier than them."
"Who are you?" Greta asked him finally, brow knotted.
"Who?" the cowboy asked. "Or what?"
"Both."
"You want to see my cards before you've shown me yours?" He raised an eyebrow and tipped his hat back off his forehead a little more. "Hardly seems fair."
"I'm no one interesting," Greta told him as honestly as she could. "I'm running from."
The cowboy nodded. "My name is Hakaru," he said, "and here in Lebanon I get to walk and talk like a man, work a job, have friends."
"And outside of here?"
"Have you heard of the Jikininki?" When Greta shook her head Hakaru seemed completely unsurprised and he continued. "They're ghouls, of a kind. As punishment for lives poorly lived they come back as creatures that can only be satisfied by eating human corpses. The myths say that although they hate themselves for it and long to stop, the hunger is stronger than anything else, stronger even than the disgust."
"And you're..." Greta prompted warily.
"Not hungry anymore," Hakuru told her. "Not here."
Greta leaned against the car heavily, watching the empty street. Then she smiled and bit down on her lip, scared she might cry or laugh, either seeming equally bad. "This place really is magic."
"No," Hakuru said. "This place is everything that isn't."