Wren is a girl mad as birds (ex_oiseau148) wrote in rooms, @ 2014-09-16 14:18:00 |
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Entry tags: | !marvel comics, *narrative, wren henry |
Narrative
Who: Wren
What: Narrative: Finding work
Where: Around NY
When: Nowish
Warnings/Rating: Nope
She was supposed to be with Evie, in that place with wizards. But Evie was still in Italy with Jack, and Wren hoped that trip took a really, really long time. She knew how her friend felt about Jack, and she knew how hard things had been for Jack lately. She worried, too, about all the trouble Jack was borrowing in Marvel, so him being in Italy was safe, and it was good, and it meant no one was getting hurt because of their mutations. Jack loved the kids, and Evie missed Daisy, and maybe Wren should've told Luke that they weren't going to that wizard place in England right away. Maybe, but she didn't, because there were things she wanted to do, and her maman had always said windows opened for a reason. So, she walked through.
She didn't have much money in her pocket, only a few dollars, but she still had a few of the credit cards she'd used to pay the bills before they'd given everything up for the mansion in Westchester. She made her way back to Manhattan, and the very first place she went was a salon. She could've bought a bottle and found a bathroom, but there was something deliberate about walking in and having someone else wash away the brown that she'd slipped on in fear. She couldn't feel Loki in her head at all anymore, and what if she could? If he came, if he found her, so what? Chances were really, really good he already knew who she was, knew everything about her, so why hide? She hadn't been exaggerating when she told Luke that no one noticed her bedecked in librarian brown. Maybe it was a tiny bit of insecurity, that little bit of doubt that had managed to wedge itself between her ribs, but she paid with plastic, and she didn't worry about how that bill was going to get settled. Because by the time it came, things would have changed, one way or another. She wasn't very determined, as a rule, but she was determined about that.
A vintage shop came next, and some clothes that didn't belong to that runaway life. She didn't understand the process, and she didn't really understand what she was doing, but she left with a bag of things, and she tucked them away in the cheap motel she'd rented in Bed-Stuy for the night.
The camera, that she didn't need to buy. The Lumix was something she'd held onto, and it had followed her from Vegas, and she'd carried it from house, to mansion, to villa. It needed dusting, and she looked up a camera shop and went to get it cleaned, to get film, to replace the cracked flash. The man behind the counter took out the old film and offered to develop it, and she remembered the smell of developer and chemicals in the attic darkroom in Las Vegas. She liked to do her own, but she nodded, and the little old man went into a backroom and didn't use a machine at all. He called for her, while she loitered, and the afternoon was lost with fingers that smelled of selenium and prints of stark white and black, things from before the world changed over.
He stared, made a phone call, shooed. He gave her the address for a studio in the city and, prints warm between her fingers, she went.
The owner was an old, grizzled man, and he was expecting her. He'd shot for magazines, and there was proof in the frames that lined the walls of the black-on-white studio space. Big names, waterfalls and countries she'd only dreamed of, exposé and sad faces. Gritty reality lived beside red carpet glamor and model headshots. He shrugged, and he said something had to pay the bills, and by the time the night ended and the sun greeted the fog-warm streets of New York, she had a job.
She went back to her motel, and she rented another night, and she planned to sleep the day away. Luke would need time to find a place, and she knew he wouldn't worry if he thought she was with Evie. Maybe that was a tiny bit of lying, just a tiny bit, but that concern was lost against the comfort of the dingy pillowcase. Tomorrow. She'd call tomorrow.