Quentin Coldwater (lostinbetween) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2019-06-05 20:19:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, hanna marin, quentin coldwater |
Who: Quentin Coldwater & Hanna Marin
What: Quentin's totally lost and confused when it comes to shopping, Hanna helps him out
When: Mid May sometime
Where: Random store
Rating/Warnings: G / None
Status: Complete
Given that Julia had successfully obtained her dream job within weeks of moving to LA Quentin felt that was worthy of some sort of congratulatory gift and had set out into the city in the hopes of finding something. What he hadn't counted on was the amount of choice and how many shops just intimidated the fuck out of him. There were only so many trips he could make to the local Starbucks without the baristas starting to think he had some sort of caffeine problem so with his latest coffee in hand he braved the mall all over again.
Julia was pretty unique and had very particular tastes which honestly made her an absolute nightmare to shop for so by this point Quentin was starting to think he should have just made her dinner and left it at that but he was too far into this thing to turn back now.
He thought about heading into the store on his right but one look at the employees had him turning on his heel and heading into the shop on his left which definitely had a warmer much friendlier vibe about it, it also smelt nice which was a plus, and maybe he'd have more luck here.
Hanna had seen the guy with a sweater and a satchel wandering around earlier, looking a bit like a lost puppy a few times now today. He had the sort of wide-eyed terror of a boyfriend that had been sent into the feminine hygeine aisle without any clear instructions and was now faced with a mountain of choice not knowing which way to turn because he was stuck in enemy territory.
She'd wandered into the store after him largely out of curiosity because she did like what was inside but she'd be lying if it wasn't more out of a need to see how the story of Satchel-Guy unfolded now he'd actually walked into a store.
She watched him do a lap, then another, of the inside of the store, looking more and more stressed as he did, eyebrows climbing higher up his forehead, a look of despair settling in as he started his third lap, weaving through the clothes and accessories.
And okay, so it was beginning to get painful and Hanna didn't like seeing people struggling if she could help it so she walked over, to where he'd pulled what looked like a cordroy skirt off the rack and was holding it up.
"Okay," she started, "so, like, unless you're shopping for a substitute English teacher or a seventy year old, I'd put that back."
Oh wow, Quentin hurriedly put the offending item back on the rack he'd taken it from. "So that's a big fat no then." He pushed a breath out and smoothed his hand off on his jeans as if the skirt had somehow infected him with its grossness.
God, he hated shopping, he really did.
"Girlfriend?" Hanna asked, smothering her smile by ducking her head as Satchel-Guy replaced the offensive skirt on the rack and tried to clean his hands of it. "She'll thank you for pretending you never even thought about buying that."
"Uh, yeah, no," Quentin said hurriedly with a shake of his head. "Best friend." Although there had been that period of time when he'd been crushing on Julia for so many years that he'd been concerned he wouldn't come out the other side. Thankfully he had and that was all in the past. "I wanted to get her something to say well done for getting her dream job."
"Her dream job?" Hanna asked, eyebrows lifting. "Impressive. Okay, so what kind of stuff does she like? Please don't tell me corduroy."
"Yeah, no," Quentin admitted with a soft laugh and shake of his head. "Okay so she likes jewellery, blouses, perfume, cute animal related pillows, that kind of thing." He rubbed at his hair. "Which upon reflection I am so in the wrong area of the store for any of that."
Hanna's eyebrows lifted. "Yeah, uh, you're totally in the wrong part of the store for that. C'mon, let's go looking." She tipped her head, "Do you have a picture of her? Might help if we're picking out jewellery to know what her skin tone's like, because sometimes the colour's really important. Like, I can't really wear gold all that much because it washes me out."
Quentin arched his eyebrows. "What kind of best friend would I be if I didn't have a picture of her?" He rummaged out his phone and unlocked it before he went rifling through his photo album which was filled with all sorts of random shit including some very dumb snapchat filtered pictures that he was far too attached to.
He eventually happened across one of Julia smiling and not at all looking filtered. "This is her."
Hanna smiled a little and took the phone, looking at the picture of his friend and nodding, passing it back a moment later. "She's like, super pretty," she told him with a nod of her head, grabbing his wrist and tugging him over to a jewellery stand. There were some chunky rings there, long, delicate necklaces. "Let's start here and we can work out. First, budget?"
"Uh, like anything from fifty bucks to a hundred," Quentin shared as he definitely didn't have a tight grip on his wallet when it came to buying presents for his friends, Julia in particular. He went with the tug and reached out to catch a couple of the long delicate necklaces as those struck him as the most Julia.
"Oh, well you can get a few nice things for that amount," Hanna said, pleasantly surprised. She watched him reach out and curl his fingers around a necklace and thought about the woman in the picture. "That one," she said, pointing at the golden one of the three he'd picked up, "would look perfect against her skin tone."
Quentin turned to look at the blonde and then back at the necklace, the gold one that was, and curled his fingers around it to catch it and take it away before anybody else got a chance to grab it. "Thanks..." And then it struck him he hadn't even gotten the name of his Good Samaritan and he tuned to look at her. "I don't even know your name."
Hanna laughed, "Hanna Marin," she said, holding her hand out for him to shake. "It's nice to meet you..."
Quentin took her hand in his own and offered her a smile. "Nice to meet you too, Hana Marin. I'm Quentin Coldwater." Seemed appropriate to give his full name as she'd given hers.
Hanna's eyebrows lifted again. "Your name's Quentin Coldwater?" she asked, re-shouldering her bag when the handshake was over.
"Well, technically, it's Quentin Makepeace Coldwater, but everybody either calls me Quentin or Q." His parents, they had a way with words and names, apparently.
Hanna bit her lower lip, smothering her initial reaction which was to snort at the name 'Makepeace', because who called their kid that? Who gave their kids a name which shortened to initials that would make a good shopping channel? QMC nightly, or something. She imagined it sold hair products.
"Probably less of a mouthful," she agreed. "So your friend, is she into the kind of boho chic?"
"That's definitely one way of putting it," Quentin agreed with a nod. He generally preferred Q because it was a whole lot less formal and made him feel less like an old man. "And I'd say so yeah." Julia for all her seriousness and straight talking did like to air on the side of a little more bohemian when it came to her wardrobe.
"I don't really have any nicknames," Hanna said, only a little mournfully. She didn't think 'Hefty Hanna' counted. Even if it did, she was discounting it for reasons.
She nodded, humming again before she drew Quentin away from the jewellery and towards a rack that held blouses. There was a cream-coloured one with a trim of maroon around the collar and sleeves that she lifted up and held to the light.
“Not always a bad thing,” Quentin pointed out with a small smile.
He kept a hold of the necklace as Hanna pulled him in the direction of the blouses and arched his eyebrows at the one she was holding. “That’s nice.”
“Nah,” Hanna agreed, “Like, I’m glad no one tried to shorten my name to ‘H’, or something. That’d be stupid.” She paused, adding quickly, “It works for you, though, like it totally works for you.”
She tipped her head, “Can you see your friend in it though?”
Quentin tipped his head in the exact same way that Hana did as he attempted to envision Julia in it.
“I think I would if the maroon colour was more dominant.”
Hanna felt her eyebrows lifting when Quentin accurately described the colour that striped through the shirt. She beamed, thinking that if there was something to be gained out of today it was that not all boys wore hoodies that were the same colour and ripped jeans (not that she was complaining, the one boy in particular who was a fashion disaster was pretty good at other things).
"Okay, so she's a bright colour kind of girl?"
“She definitely likes to be noticed,” Quentin shared with a smile. “So isn’t afraid of colour because she’s got the confidence to carry it off.” Which wasn’t a lie. Julia was super self assured and took no prisoners.
Hanna grinned, putting the blouse back and rummaging through for slightly brighter one. She tilted her head, holding it up. "Too bright?" she asked, squinting thoughtfully at it.
Quentin grimaced faintly. “Uh, yeah. I think sunglasses are a must with that one.”
With a snort, Hanna put it back. "If you go and look over there, I'll see if there's a nice jacket or something..." She patted his upper arm and then wandered off, pausing beside long, loosely knitted cardigans and picking on up, holding it against herself as she got momentarily distracted. It was cute.
Quentin watched her as she wandered off before he went rifling through a collection of blouses until he came across a pretty gorgeous midnight blue one that had touches of black and silver around the collar and cuffs. The buttons were also quirky and unusual so that made it stand out.
Hanna glanced up from where she'd been distracted and made a sound of approval. "That's beautiful, do you think she'd like it?"
Quentin turned his head to offer Hanna a smile. "Yeah, I think she would. It also feels really nice, to the touch that is, so it won't be the kind of blouse that irritates the shit out of her skin."
Hanna's lips curled up into a little smile. "Looks like you might have found your gifts?" she said, tilting her head. "You think?"
"Yeah, I think, and I'll probably grab her some of her favourite pastries on the way home and I think I'm set." He draped the blouse over his arm and smiled over at Hanna. "Thanks for your help. Pretty sure I'd still be wandering around here daze and confused if you hadn't come to my rescue."
Hanna waved her hand, "You'd have got here eventually," she reassured, "you've got a good eye. Now, go pay and give it to your friend. I've found some dresses I like, totally have to go and try on. It was nice to meet you, Q."
She pulled a pen from her bag and then took his hand, scrawling her number across the back of it. "Text me and let me know how much she loves these."
Quentin's lips tugged into a small quirky smile as Hanna scribbled her number on his hand and he nodded. "I'll do that, Hanna. Have fun trying on your dresses and thanks again." He made a mental note of the number of for any reason the ink smudged and then headed over to the cashier so he could grab the gifts and head over to that pastry store that Julia loved.