Who: Tink and Capable When: January Where: Tink’s work What: Fixing things Rating/Warnings: Low/None Status: Complete
Tink could hardly believe that January was almost over. The year was off to a crazy start, and she had a feeling it was going to be a crazy ride all the way through. Especially considering she’d started up this Dream stuff. And the wings and the pixie dust… it was a lot for a girl to take. But still, she was doing her best. Juggling graduate school classes and working part-time at the shop… living at home wasn’t amazing, but her brothers didn’t bother her that much. She had time to invent, too, which was nice. Sometimes. Some days.
She was in the shop behind the counter, wings tucked away inside the sleeves of the jacket she’d sewn to hide them, and was fiddling with a pocketwatch one of her customers had brought in. It needed repair, but Tink was hesitant to clean it. The Patina was something that antiques dealers looked for in pieces like this one.
Capable had been clearing out the stock room after a delivery when she had discovered a box of old knick knacks including an old musical box. After speaking to Tessa she’d decided to try and get it fixed since it didn’t seem to be working. She wanted to know what the tune was and if the little ballerina actually turned like the old music boxes she’d seen on the internet.
Entering the store she gave a smile to the girl behind the counter, “Hello” she said, “Are you busy? I can come back later” she offered in case it would help.
Tink looked up at the sight of the girl coming into the shop and gave her a warm smile. She was wearing a pair of glasses that magnified her eyes to a ridiculous size. Her blonde hair was pulled away from her face with a couple of clips.
“Hi! No, not busy.” Tink said, setting down her tools. “What can I help you with?”
Capable grinned when the girl looked up, her eyes looked funny under the big glasses, almost like a proper mad professor type.
“Oh well, I found this old music box and was wondering if maybe it could be fixed?” she asked coming forward and placing the wooden box on the counter carefully.
Tink lifted the glasses off her face and turned her full attention down to the jewelry box. It reminded her so much of the lost things she’d found in her Dreams. A warm smile broke out across her face. “I’m sure we can work some miracles here,” she said and pulled the music box out to inspect it. “It’s lovely. Where did you say you found it?”
“Oh I hope so” Capable said with a smile, “It was in the store room of my work, Much Ado About Books. My boss hadn’t ever seen it before so she said it was up to me if I’d like it and I just really want to hear it. It’s a little sad it can’t fulfill its purpose” she said, blushing a little as she was sure she sounded silly.
Tink totally knew that feeling. She wanted things to fulfill their purpose so much that she made it her life’s work to fix things. And looking over the music box, she was piecing it all together. “I’m curious by nature, too,” she added with a smile, then her eyes flicked up to the other young woman. “And I feel… I don’t know. Almost like things want to do what they’ve been made to do. It’s--it’s like The Brave Little Toaster. Did you ever see that movie?”
Capable smiled glad the girl seemed to understand she shook her head at the question, “I’ve not seen many movies but I’ll remember to look that one up. It sounds sweet” she promised, she liked watching things others had recommended.
“It’s really sweet.” Tink said, grinning. “There’s this one totally scary part with a vacuum who goes a little crazy, but the rest is really good. I like the idea of machines as living creatures.” Tink pulled out a couple of tools so she could open up the music box to get at the parts inside. It wouldn’t take too much work to take it apart and put it back together again. Maybe that’s all it’d need to start working once more.
Capable nodded, “I like that idea too” she definitely had to watch it, maybe Splendid would like to watch it with her and little Valerian too. She watched in fascination as Tink set to work, it was fascinating to see how easily she seemed to know how the internal workings of the music box worked.
Tink explained some of the things aloud once she realized that the other woman was watching her. She pointed to gears and nuts and bolts, she motioned to the rust on the inside, and then frowned a little. “I think we might have to replace a couple of these pieces. It looks like wear and tear has done a number. Hang on, I’ll check to see if I have the right parts.”
There was a wall of little bins behind her. They were all labeled with part numbers, and when she dug through them, they jingled. Tink emerged a moment later with some nuts and washers, and then set back to work. “Just about finished, here, then we’ll put the case back on and see if she’ll play for us.”
“You’re incredible” Capable told her, “I could watch you work all day. I mean not in a creepy way or anything” she added when she realised that might sound strange to some people.
“Thank you.” Tink gave a little laugh, going pink at the compliment. She shrugged her shoulders as she put the case back together, then drew a screwdriver and put it all back together. She turned the music box over and set it on the counter. “Would you like to do the honors?”
Capable was glad the girl hadn’t minded her saying that, sometimes she just said what came to mind. But it was true, it was incredible what the girl could do. “Oh I’d love to thank you” Capable said with a smile, slowly and carefully reaching out to see if it would work.
Tink watched as the girl turned on the music box, and then grinned brightly as the little dancer started to twist and turn on the top. The music came through a little tinny, but wasn’t that the case with most music boxes?
“Oh, she’s beautiful. Thank you so much, you’re a miracle worker” Capable said her whole face brightening as she watched the little figure twirl to the music which to her sounded perfect.
That was a job well done, Tink thought. She watched the dancer spin for a moment, then leaned her hip against the counter. “That was an easy fix! Really, it’s no big deal. Just fifty cents worth of pieces. Though, if you want to leave it here I can take it apart and clean it all out, then call you when it’s ready to go. Might improve the sound a little.”
“Oh absolutely, that would be lovely” Capable nodded, “Do you need me to leave a deposit or anything?” She’d never gotten anything fixed before so she wasn’t sure how it would work.
“No, I’ll just have you fill out your information on a ticket.” Tink said, pulling one off of a pad by the register. She grabbed a pen and held both out to the other woman. “Here you go. Just name and address. I can give you an estimate, too… I can’t imagine it would be more than twenty dollars parts and labor.”
“Of course” Capable said taking the pad and pen, “Really?” she said, glancing up as she wrote, “That doesn’t seem enough for bringing it back to life again” She’d leave a good tip of course, when she returned to pick it up, as a thank you.
“Sure!” Tink grinned softly. “Nah, it’s no big deal. It’s actually really easy to clean inside there. And it’s in full working order… I’m afraid I can’t do anything about the aesthetics, but once the insides are fixed, you can probably take her to someone for a paint job.” She accepted the paper back when the other woman was finished. “Capable? I’m Belle. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too” Capable said, “And thank you so much. Truly, I wasn’t sure it would work ever” she smiled obviously pleased with the magic Belle had worked.