Isabela Rivaini (cptnopants) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2012-03-15 19:52:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, frodo baggins, isabela |
His eyes locked on the bikes first
Who: Frodo, Isabela
What: Frodo attempts to repay Isabela’s kindness with a purchase from her shop
When: Thursday Afternoon.
Where: Crossbones Pawn Shop
Rating: PG.
Status: Complete!
A week ago, had you asked Frodo Baggins if he would have visited such a shop, a shop in such a place as the alleys of Santa Ana, he would have made the sort of face that says, I’m not even sure I understand the question.
But that was before the stolen car, guns, and Santa Ana chop shop; though really, Frodo had to admit, the what that precipitated everything was actually a who: Isabella Rivaini. She had far more to do with the Elan’s recovery than he, and Frodo was rather happy to be in her debt. He so rarely got the opportunity to owe anything to anyone. It was nice feeling. Of course, the anti-anxiety medication--yes, he had decided to take it after all--was probably enhancing it; along with the shot of Jameson he taken before going out the door.
He opened the door and poked his head inside, taken at once by the warm ambient light and musky smells. Was that incense? “Hello?” he called out, closing the door behind him.
The incense was Nag Champa, a familiar smell from her father’s shop back in London. She’d thought of it as something like a good luck charm, though no one had ever told her so. The shop had an old, run down look to it when she’d bought it, and she’d made changes to the interior to make it warmer and more inviting - it was probably one of the nicer Pawn Shops out there.
The shop was lined with counters all around it, and more shelves displaying odds and ends were set up behind the counters. There was an assortment of different things - collectables, antique guns and weapons, old framed posters, curio boxes and jars, knick knacks.
Isabela had been working on doing inventory of one of her jewelry cases when he walked in. She poked her head up from under the counter, and flashed a smile at him, “Mr. Frodo! This is a pleasant surprise indeed! I didn’t think you’d come back to this area of town.”
She paused and smirked a bit, “Well not willingly at least.”
Mr. Frodo, eh? He wondered if he had ever given her his last name. It was quite possible he’d forgotten. But he saw no need to clarify. Besides, he kind of liked the familiar sound of it.
“Apparently, all I needed was a taste. Now I’m addicted,” he replied, fully entering the shop now that she was in view. Hands in his pockets, and feeling quite at ease, he turned a full circle, taking everything in. “Besides, I wanted to make sure I thanked you properly.”
Back to that debt he felt he owed. Her assistance and time, he imagined, were worth a great deal, but handing her a wad of cash was out of the question. Repayment by making a sizable purchase, however, was a grand idea. And that was what he intended to do. Of course, it would have to be something he liked.
He crossed the space to where she stood, so that he was on the opposite side of the counter. He looked down at the case of jewelry now at his fingertips. “You have a bit of everything here, don’t you? This can’t all be from California.”
Isabela slid the pieces of jewelry she’d been taking inventory on back in the case, locked it, and stood up to face Frodo, who probably had told her his last name at some point. She just couldn’t remember it. Mr. Frodo had a nice ring to it, anyway.
“Oh it isn’t, though the bulk of it is. I’ve got some contacts I made over the years, and my employee, Jack, has quite a few herself,” Isabela looked around the shop a moment, indicating the counter Jack would be near if she were in today, “She’s off today securing a shipment for me, so I’ve got the shop to myself just now.”
She was slightly glad that he’d picked a day to come in that Jack wasn’t working. She almost certain that Jack’s appearance and general personality would have scared Frodo away, which would have been funny to watch, but not that funny for Frodo. He might have surprised her, though. He HAD brought that gun, after all.
“Is there something I can help you with? You havn’t lost track of your car again, I hope.”
Frodo laughed. “No no. It’s being painted yellow again as we speak. I had my driver take me here. I was curious to see the shop.” He gestured in a sweeping motion across the general area. “Would you mind showing me around?”
“Not at all!” Isabela looked around, then down at the counter she was behind, “Well, you’ve already met one of our jewelry counters. I keep a nice mix in the case here between the fakes and the real pieces. You know, just in case someone breaks in.”
She moved down a bit to the next case, “There’s some genuine rolex watches in here, and other ones, along with a few knock offs I sell for cheap. I’ve got some other tabletop clocks in here. My favorite’s this one here, the marble with the gold settings.”
Sliding down and around a bit, she motioned to the case of antique weaponry, “Muskets, swords, civil war bayonets, I’ve even got a Deringer in here. It cost me a small fortune to restore. The smaller ones are daggers hand made that I have shipped in. They’re sharpened for use, I don’t let people touch them normally.”
Next was a case with curio boxes hand carved of soapstone, rare woods, metals. She took the time to show him her favorite pieces in each case, the country of origin of certain pieces, the ones she’d had imported in herself. Then she took him out back past a gated area with several alarms and cameras and showed him their stock of rare car parts, a few cars, some motorcycles.
“Basically, we keep the big stuff out here. Jack lives in the apartment above the place so that we always have someone on site in case things go...” she stopped herself from saying ‘tits up’ out loud, “... well, badly.”
Frodo’s eyes lingered on the marble clock, partially because it was so beautifully crafted and partially because she had admitted it was her favorite among those items. He wondered if favorite was code for Item I’d like to sell! or Item I want to keep! But either way, it wasn’t exactly the high ticket item he was looking for. And, unfortunately, neither were her other favorites, though he found some of them very beautiful, especially the wood boxes.
Then again, he had to admit he had no concept of the worth of any of the objects. Money had never exactly been an object--and it certainly wasn’t at the moment--and Isabella had to have realized that by now. He wondered if she saw him as a walking bank account. He imagined most people did.
But the sight of the cars and motorcycles sounded a little alarm within, like radar closing in on a target. “Bingo,” he said quietly to himself. His eyes locked on the bikes first. “You know, I collect cars, but I don’t have any motorcycles.”
It might have been that Isabela had purposefully not told him the worth of any of the items - she knew the value of each one, from cash and carry to auction prices. She didn’t see him as a walking bank account so much as a possible friend or a lost kitten trying to put himself out into the world, woefully unprepared for what the world was like. The favorite pieces of hers were ones she liked, that she’d keep for herself if she could. She knew everyone would be better off, though, if she sold them to good homes. People who would take care of the item in question.
“Well we’ve got a nice selection if you’re in the market for one.” she lead him over to a red Harley-Davidson Heritage cycle, “This one came with the shop when I bought it back a few years ago. It wasn’t restored, then, but it’s in working condition now.”
Frodo approached the bike as close as he dared and caressed the flawless paint job with his eyes. He pictured himself leaning against the thing in a leather jacket, polishing it, building additional space in his garage for it. Basically everything but riding it. He flexed his brows. “Maybe I ought to learn how to drive,” he said, not entirely without a hint of regret.
Isabela tilted her head to the side, “You’ll need a special permit to drive the motorcycles, but honestly, I think it’d be worth it.”
She motioned to the seat on the cycle, as if inviting him to take a seat down on top of it, “It’s freeing, you know... Whether it’s your own car, or a cycle - even a bicycle. A ship is the best, because there’s nowhere in the entire world you can’t go if you just trust yourself to sail there. Take a seat, try and imagine the wind whipping through your hair, you know?”
Frodo chuckled, he felt his ears grow red, but he approached the motorcycle nonetheless. He climbed on, his chuckle growing into a childlike giggle. He cleared his throat, leaning forward and grasping the handlebars. “How awkward do I look?”
Isabela laughed, “Oh, only a little awkward. It works a bit better in my head when I pretend you’re wearing biker leathers. And the hair, I mean … it’s so ‘hello I’m stuffy and work in a law firm in Leeds’, you know?”
Without bothering to ask or even warn him, Isabela reached a hand out and fluffed his hair out a bit, into what she imagined was more like the hairstyle of a guy who rode motorcycles and lived life on the wild side.
“There.”
Frodo tensed as her hands seemed to fly toward his head. He almost ducked, like a man trying to avoid a swooping bird. The presence of her hands actually in his hair, however, was a much more pleasant feeling, and his ears turned crimson again. It wasn’t very often that a beautiful woman laid a finger on him.
“I’ll take it!” he said, somewhat tongue-in-cheek. And then he hurried off the damn thing before the rest of his face turned as red as the paint. “Well, I don’t now how I’ll get it home right now, but I’ll take it.”
Isabela blinked. She’d never expected him to come by and actually purchase something, so much as just look around the place curiously. She especially never expected to sell him a motorcycle just like that.
“Well, we can settle the paperwork today, if you’re certain. I’ll sign the title over to you so you can file it with the DMV, then set it aside until one of your men can pick it up. Or, you know, you could learn to drive and then come and drive it home. Whatever works for you.”
Frodo nodded eagerly as he dismounted. “You might be waiting a while then... but it’s something to consider.” They made their way towards the front of the shop. “I never learned because it never seemed necessary, but... well, my luck is looking up as of late.” He was more musing than speaking to her.
“I learned to sail a boat before I even learned to drive,” Isabela mentioned, while locking the gate to the back area. She lead him over to the counter with the cash register, and pulled out some forms, “It wasn’t... practical, you know? I was in high school, I didn’t own a boat, I was probably never going to sail again, but I learned anyway.”
She slapped the forms down on the counter and got out a pen, “The Harley is 18,000 dollars, which... I don’t want to assume you’ve just got sitting in your pockets, despite the fact that you probably do. I can offer payments, or we can do this in cash or check. I will have to wait 10 days for the check to clear before I can transfer the title if you use check.”
The smile on Isabela’s face warmed a bit, “It’s just standard protocol, nothing personal.”
Frodo returned the smile, reaching into the pocket of his jacket and producing a checkbook. He flipped through the pages and took the pen from her, laughing gently at the idea of of having the cash on him. “Despite what you saw that night, I don’t usually carry any money at all. As you can see, I’m prone to making wildly irrational purchases.”
He set to the task of signing the check, while his mind wandered back and forth between images of himself racing down the Pacific Coast Highway and Isabela sailing the high seas. Both were attractive ideas in their own right, one more than the other, of course. Frodo dotted the i in Baggins and ripped the paper along its perforated edge. “Then hopefully this isn’t the last I’ll see of you.”
While he signed the check, Isabela filled out the bill of sale and made a copy for his files. She thought he deserved a ride down the highway on a motorcycle, and hoped he really was going to drive it instead of letting it take up space in his garage, but that wasn’t really her call. She took the check in her hands and looked it over.
“Baggins, I swear that name sounds familiar. And I doubt this will be the last you’ll see of me. After all, you still need to come get this Harley out of here and drive it away, yes?”
She smiled, and handed him his receipt.