twyla guthrie is a space cadet (fueledbyrockets) wrote in superbabies, @ 2013-08-13 14:30:00 |
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At a quarter past sunset, Twyla showed up at Helena’s door. That ridiculous music, some melodic emotional guitar-and-banjo combo, every Kentuckian’s home sound, had finally stopped following her around and forcing her frog clogged throat to croak out lyrics. Some of them, she admitted, were good and wrote them down to look up later.
Inspiration, it came in the weirdest places.
It also reminded her how horrible she sounded and, realistically, Twyla was desperate to try just about anything to get her sound back. Weeks had passed since she uttered a word in her natural voice, much less sang a single line. Emphysemic patients sounded better off. Per Helena’s request, however, she had found a token in her room of utmost love and irreplaceable.
Unfortunately, it was her great-grandmother Guthrie’s brooch, handed down to her from her grandmother back when they all assumed Twyla wasn’t going to turn into a hissing, spitting, sailor cussing minx (six, since she started swearing shortly after turning seven and hadn’t stopped since). The heirloom was a teardrop of delicate opal, surrounded by Kentucky rubies, hand cut and dug by an old great-uncle or something, and the scattered diamond. Great-Grandma Guthrie had had some style in her time, and though it didn’t fit Twyla’s forever ensemble of black on black, she treasured it for what it meant: family.
And now she was about it over in exchange for something greater: her voice, and quite frankly, her will to keep living. Surely Great-Grandma would have approved of that, right? Or so she hoped, wasting time digging her toe into the carpet, hemming and hawwing. Should she? No, yes. She should.
Sighing, “Helena, open the goddamned door, yeah?”
The thing was, Twyla’s voice was fine. Everyone who was everyone knew that, could tell that it was in her head. Everyone except Twyla, it seemed. And after all this time of silence pierced only by worries about her voice, Helena felt... charitable.
She sighed and chastised herself for going soft, but Twyla was a Hellion. Was her friend. Ish. As friendlyish as she got with most people, and ever since babygate... Helena felt bad about being so bad. This, she realized, was the perfect opportunity to do something nice, for a change, and give her some karma points she could bank on for a bit, while she could sink back into the routine of sex, drugs, and manipulating stupid classmates into doing her work for her.
“It’s unlocked, babe, just come on in,” she cooed, lighting a few candles and flicking off the lightswitch. It was a bit more... theatrical than necessary, but the point wasn’t function; it was style. A show, to give Twyla the impression of heavy duty demon magic, and make her believe. -- and anyone who was anyone knew that a show without proper lighting was a shitshow, at best.
“Holy hell,” Twyla was properly impressed by the show---Helena got it right, she was a noob to the magic thing and had assumed that candles equaled witchcraft. After all, thats what the television said. Movies never lied.
With the brooch tucked into her back pocket for the time being (she really did want to try and barter anything else, even if her resources really were limited) Twyla made sure she locked the door before sniffing one of the candles. “Is that... vanilla?” she sounded like a halfwit Neanderthal, or did to her own ears, even if the creepy coffee guy said otherwise. “What’s the vanilla stand for?”
“It stands for ‘I like the way it smells,’” Helena said, rolling her eyes when she had her back to Twyla. At least the set was having the desired effect. She just hoped Twyla was committed. “You bring something for me, babe? Magic always comes with a price, you know. Can’t do that voodoo that I do if I don’t have something to show for it. Rituals and all that.”
“Oh,” huh. She thought it was something more mythic than that. Helena reminded her of the brooch, feeling it press ominously into her thigh. “Yeah, uh, so I mean. You meant like, shit I treasure, yeah?” a shrug and a tug on the hem of her shirt to pull the neck a little lower. Twyla brushed her fingers across the rise of flesh to draw Helena’s eye’s downwards. “Or... something... else?”
Helena had to force herself not to sigh. The other girl’s efforts, while certainly admirable, meant jack all. After all, she herself had pointed out she gave that away for free.
“Shit you treasure,” she said flatly. “It isn’t for me; it’s a sacrifice. Magic -- real, proper, get-shit-done magic -- works on the barter system, otherwise it’d throw the universe off balance or something.” She waved her hand, this time visibly rolling her eyes. The consequences of magic had been drilled into her head over the years, but that didn’t make her any more likely to really take them seriously. “In order to create something, something must be destroyed. In order to get something, you have to lose something -- something you value about as much as that which you’re getting. Equal exchange. I’m already tipping things to let you get away with something you just like a lot, when your voice is something you need. I can’t tip them anymore so -- what’ve you got?”
Oh, boo. Still stuck on that. Twyla sucked air in between her teeth and drew her feet across the rug, holding out on time. She really didn’t want to part with the brooch, but...
“Fine, yeah, fine,” Twyla huffed and it struck a chord. Hearing that ridiculous old smoker-hitting-puberty voice, as she thought of it, was getting real annoying. Reluctantly, with some dramatics, she pulled the jewelry piece out and offered it on a flat palm. “Will this do? ‘Cause short of my guitar I ain’t got much out. That’s the truth, you know.” And she banked on Helena knowing, having been friends as long as they had.
“That’ll do,” Helena assured her, taking the brooch and setting it on her desk, in a ring of candles. If she were doing things properly, it’d get destroyed in the process, but part of the beauty of faking it meant there’d still be a brooch to give back to the other girl...eventually.
“Now, are you ready?” She asked with a smirk.
“Ring of fire and wax? Around Great Meemaw’s opal? Girl... you... mmm,” Twyla clamped it shut. Vocal prowess was in the cards. Helena was allowed to do what she wanted with that token now. “Yeah. Go for it.”
It took every ounce of willpower within Helena to not laugh at the word Meemaw, and retain some semblance of professional composure as she set a pot of water on her hotplate -- cauldrons were hard to come by, and open flames were slightly against dorm regulations, after all.
“Now, you’re probably wondering why I’m doing this for you,” she said as she dropped a rock into the water, and superheated it with her powers to get things boiling faster. “I mean, I’m not the nicest girl in the world, and I’m giving you a discount...” A few ground up tea leaves, to give it a base, along with a few vials of sugar water dyed various bright colors -- purple, green, . “Well, I’m trying to turn over a new leaf. Be a bit... nicer.”
She wasn’t sure when the music had started, but she didn’t try to fight it as she picked up a wooden spoon and stirred the bubbling mixture.
“I admit that in the past I’ve been a nasty” She sang. “They weren’t kidding when they called me -- well -- a bitch. But you'll find that nowadays, I've mended all my ways -- Repented, seen the light, and made a switch.”
Eyes wide and lip hanging loose, Twyla looked at all this with some confusion. She believed Helena had magical powers but she was turning into Ursula right in front of her---and then the music started and she was Ursula, minus the eels and tentacles. The Little Mermaid had been one of Twyla’s least favorite movies but she still knew it. Every little girl did.
“Um, Helena...” she gestured at her with her right pointer finger, “You know you’re, well,” she probably knew, really. After all, Helena was the one singing and Twyla was the one paying for her voice to come back. After debating internally, Twyla sagged her shoulders and continued to watch, anxiety building in her system over whether or not this would work.
“Look, babe, I can’t exactly help it. Just go with it...” Helena said, rolling her eyes as she reached to grab a few more bottles -- fake potion ingredients. Sweeteners, bitters, things to add flavor that would probably all conflict in the end but, well, medicine never tasted good. “And I fortunately know a little magic -- it’s a talent that I always have possessed. And now Twyla don’t you laugh, but I use it on behalf of the miserable, lonely, and depressed... That’d be you, in this situation, Mimey.” A smirk, as she poured a few of the vials into the pot. “Poor unfortunate souls -- in pain, in need. Danny longing to be smarter, Twyla wants to find her voice, and do I help them? Yes indeed.” A laugh. “Those poor unfortunate souls -- so sad, but true. They come knocking on my door just crying ‘Help, Helena, babe!’ and do I help them? Yes I do.”
She sighed, glad for the instrumental break as she stirred things up. Thankfully the song didn’t intend to make them go through dialogue in the meantime.
“So, basically, I’m making a potion. Obviously.” She explained. “You drink it, it gives you your voice back. Lickety split.”
“Um.” She wasn’t the most gifted with words, so Twyla clamped her trap shut and waited for her turn. Except it didn’t come---thank god---and instead she really wondered what the hell Helena was putting in that mix. Right now it was starting to smell like burnt sugar with a cayenne kick and, what, split pea soup?
If her stomach didn’t murder her first, she would probably be really thankful later.
“What’re you, ah, puttin’ in that?” No, wait. “Fuck it, don’t tell me. Ariel didn’t want to know either. ...’least it ain’t slugs.”
“No slugs,” Helena laughed, moving to pick up the brooch -- and here, here was the hardest part. She could cast charms, hexes, sure, but illusions weren’t her forte, and that was exactly what she was had to do to keep up the facade, but avoid destroying the brooch. The real brooch was slipped into a pocket out of Twyla’s sight, as Helena stepped toward the pot with an illusional fabrication, and threw it in with a small explosion of gold and opal.
“That’s a hundred---no!” squeaked Twyla, reaching out in protest and watching as the brooch vanished.
Forever.
Thank goodness Meemaw was dead.
Holding her hands over her mouth, Twyla stared at Helena with wide, fearful eyes. “What did you do?!”
“What part of ‘magic has a price’ did you miss?” Helena said with a glare, before shaking her head as she scooped some of the boiling substance up in a mug. “Come on you poor unfortunate soul, go ahead. Drink it down. I’m a very busy lady and I haven’t got all night. It didn’t cost much, don’t you frown. You poor unfortunate soul -- it’s sad. But true.”
She leaned in, as she pressed the mug into Twyla’s hands.
“If you want to cross a bridge my dear you have to pay the toll,” she sang consolingly, before turning toward the window. “Take a gulp and take a breath and go ahead before it’s cold,” she bit her lip, mumbling quietly so Twyla couldn’t hear: “C’mon daddy, won’t you look at me, you’re daughter’s on a roll...”
She turned back to face Twyla nodding at the cup. “Poor unfortunate soul...”
Warm to her hands, the odor coming off the liquid inside the cup was foul. Twyla felt like she could maybe identify some of it but there was something like swamp mud smell wafting out that just really... no, she thought, this is impossible. Drinking this would, possibly, kill her.
So she downed it in a hurry, throwing the contents back like a bad shot, eyes stinging and the urge to throw it all back up heavy in her stomach. It went down though and after she gagged, holding her stomach and making a pained expression, feeling some kind of bizarre tingling sensation in her throat.
Lips pursed, hands on hip, she looked at Helena with speculation. A little fear. Some excitement. There hadn’t been a tingling in her throat in a while; it itched and she the urge to sing, something lost to her for the last few months.
Out came a single note, the ones Ariel sang when she regained her voice, pure and straight and definitely Twyla’s voice.
“You... you seriously did it,” she said, a level of amazement in her voice. Quiet, but only because she was afraid of shouting to the world. “You’re fucking amazing Helena. I can’t, ugh, no,” Twyla shook her head, wiping happy tears from her eyes and then rushed Helena, enveloping her in a hug. “I can’t thank you enough.”
Helena smirked as she felt Twyla’s arms around her, hugging her back quickly before pulling away. “You don’t have to thank me. Like I said: public service. Now get the fuck out of my room and go show off somewhere. I didn’t give you your voice back so you could keep moping around.”
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