The afternoon was so ridiculously warm that it felt almost like spring. Has felt almost like spring for most of the ridiculously warm winter, mind, and everywhere the early spring bulbs are already poking up through the ground. The half-neglected planters with last-season's pansies in front of The Bodega have actually perked up and are starting to think about blooming again. For all that the afternoon was warm there's the possibility of snow tonight, at least in the higher elevations.
There's a little more foot traffic in Sante Fe than there usually is on a Tuesday in February. Some couples are hitting the town early for Valentine's day. They can get a table and some privacy tonight, save the money for a sitter come the weekend. Others are just lured outside by the weather and an early case of spring fever. A few of the galleries have stayed open later than usual and the bars and restaurants are bustling.
The Bodega is a bit of all of the above. Gallery, bar, coffee shop specializing in the slow-pour method. Next door - housed in the same gray-brick building and connected to the shop by a framed brick archway - is a little clothing boutique framed that seems to cater to the romantic Victorian S&M chick in all of us.
That's where Sera is - hidden away in one of the dressing rooms but her resonance is everywhere.
Dan's next door in the coffee shop, acting like a proper young professional, his MacBook open on a table, headphones over his ears, a French press and two coffee mugs on the table.
Alexander[Arete, sensing Forces. TN4, -1 for taking time]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]
Alexander[Wrong diff but doesn't make any difference. And Awareness, 'cos there are people around.]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 9) ( success x 1 )
AlexanderWhether you believe that fate drives people together and apart or that random probability pushes and pulls people away from each other like the waves of the sea, the effect recently has been the same for Alexander. There hasn’t been any actual intent to avoid bumping into people – Awakened people – beyond his frequent forays into the mountains to get away from everyone and everything. There’s a peace to be found there that just can’t be found in the land of cell phones and TVs and SUVs and non-stop activity.
But tides turn and the push of fate or random chaos seem to be bringing Alex back into contact with those people who see more of the world than most. The tide brings him to the bar area, where he’s sat nursing a beer. His attention seems to be focussed on a tea-light sat in the bottom of a glass holder, running his hand over the top to feel the heat and watching the dance of the flame as his movement stirs the air. He uses the sensation of the heat to focus his will and expand his own perception of the candle, watching the thermal energy drifting and circling above the glass.
He knows that Sera is nearby, the feeling of her presence lingers in the room and centres on the changing rooms. He doesn’t make his way over – not while she’s changing and trying things on. Partly because hanging around the ladies’ changing rooms tends to get you strange looks and partly because she might ask him to pick something out. So he stays put until the tide nudges them again.
Kalen Holliday[How awake are we?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN7 (3, 4, 6, 6, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
Kalen Holliday[And how distracted by Resonance are we?]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (5, 6, 7, 7, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 6 )
SerafíneAWareness!
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 3, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )
SerafíneWatch the Weaving. Prime 1. Dif: 4.
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )
Kalen HollidayKalen is not looking for them. He is looking for Valentine's Day presents. An exercise in shopping that he does not feel the need to confine to Danny. It is a holiday of some kind. It is a wonder, really, that Kalen hasn't decorated the House with hearts and streamers. He does plan to leave lots of candy, but the decoration and general production is absent from Valentine's day with Kalen.
He's been away too, focused on his library and vanishing to Chile for a few days that turned into a few more days too. Visiting a few of his old acquaintances that he hasn't spoken to since bothering to let the world know he wasn't dead. He's been spotted more often, but if Kalen vanishes for long there are search parties. He's seen the evidence of this on Ginger.
Kalen walks up to Alexander without any particular concern for warning him about his presence, but there is no surprise gesture from behind. Some of the things he has in bags are fragile. Instead of tormenting Alexander and ending up on the ground again, he drops into the seat across from him as though he were fucking invited.
"Hey."
SerafíneAlexander has a pretty good fix on Sera's location and a pretty reasonable basis not to disturb her there. Hell, he has a whole handful of pretty good reasons not to disturb her, and he doesn't know the half of it. She probably wouldn't just ask him to pick something out. She might ask him to try something on. She might ask him to zip or unzip or otherwise assist her with the incommodius work of getting into and out of the pieces she likes -
- and god, the pieces she likes.
Like this one: a one-sleeved little blach dress with see-through metal eyelets in a loose weave. The metal frames half the bodice, creates the spaghetti strap, and is then woven into the fabric of the dress in a swatch that cuts down to reveal the sharp edge of her right hip, and make the already short skirt, thoroughly see through.
Her long hair is a loose mess of toussled curls, with a hit of static electricity from trying on so many dresses in the dry indoor air so that it haloes around her, lovely.
She hasn't - doesn't - bother slipping back into whatever she wore here. She's probably taking that dress so it doesn't matter: but when she senses Alexander and then his magic and then reaches and sees the threads he is weaving. Well, aww. She is excited.
Comes out of the dressing room in that dress, barefoot, tags still on it somewhere, crosses through the boutique to the bar, drops a hand on Dan's shoulder as she passes and kisses him on the crown of his head, then heads on over to Alexander and Kalen's table.
Takes a seat of her own.
"Alexander," Sera breathes, with a little waggle of her fingers toward Kalen. "Lookit you. You're Working."
AlexanderAlexander hadn’t roused the locals to go Kalen-hunting because, even though he’s been distant, he hasn’t been completely out of contact. An occasional text message, voice mail or phone call stops him worrying that people have gone missing and stops others worrying – too much – about him. Even with that occasional contact, people can still drift apart from each other.
But not, apparently, these three. Kalen arrives and Alexander turns to look up at him and smiles as he sits down. The days may have turned into weeks since they last physically bumped into each other, but it doesn’t feel like the time has really passed. “Hey. How are you? And how was Ramon?”
Unknown to him, today wouldn’t have been the first time that others would have tried to get Alex dressed up given the opportunity. This time, at least, would have missed out on Disney characters and a certain song that seems possible to escape. On the other hand, he doesn’t have any interest in finding out how he looks in a corset. Small mercies. He does turn to watch Sera as she walks up to the table, occasionally unsure of quite where to look. He’d come across her wearing even less before, but still… Those lines are still there, and his gaze heads up and stays above the line of the shoulder.
As he looks up, he gets a view of more of the room. Each of the tables has a similar candle sat on it, each one creating a haze of drifting heat above it. But beyond that, Kalen and Sera and the other people in the room cast off their own heat haze. It’s hard to follow any individual source but the whole? The whole is almost a work of art.
There’s a smile for Sera as she greets him. “Trying to. It’s pretty cool.” Given how he’d reacted to some of his previous attempts at opening up his sense to his surroundings, it’s possibly surprising at how well he seems to be taking to this new sense.
Kalen Holliday[I am totally not in love with that Catholic priest you just mentioned....]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 5 )
Kalen HollidayKalen doesn't seem surprised, not by Alexander Working (he's come across that before, after all) and not by running into the two of them here. Alexander can see heat radiating off of things and Kalen can feel winter with every breath, gathering and ready to spill out from the constraints of the approaching spring.
His gaze spends perhaps a bit more time lingering below the line of Serafine's shoulders, though not much. "I did always wonder where you found dresses like that. And now I know. It looks lovely."
Kalen smiles at the mention of Ramon. "He's good. He may have had some...very gently stern commentary after he took my confession, but he's...used to that. Mostly he does this thing with his eyes like 'I have infinite compassion and infinite love and infinite joy about the world' and then I feel guilty about not being a better person. It's...I think he does that to everyone."
SerafíneAre you in love with that priest?
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 5 ) Re-rolls: 1
Serafíne"Trying nothing," the creature murmurs, her eyes a dark, candle-lit flash as she glances at Alexander and slides in to a seat nearby. He's nursing a beer, and at some point a waiter or barista or whatever will slide back past and ask if Sera and Kalen want anything. With a winsome smile, Sera orders a Moscow Mule and also tells the waitress that she'll take the dress. And the other things on the right hook in the dressing room, please and thank you. Returns her lovely attention to Alexander, then, this half-hum of awareness beneath her voice. He's watch the heat haze, its radiant glow. She is watching the strands of the magic he weaves, the corner of her fine little mouth quirked into very very present half-smile.
"You're doing it. I'm proud of you. Not just because you're doing it, but because it seems like you fucking like it. Yeah?"
An errant shrug of her bare left shoulder, and Sera flashes a quick glance toward Kalen. Preens a bit, because the dress is rocking. "Lovely isn't quite, what I was going for, but thanks. And I find them bloody everywhere. From Buffalo Exchange right on up. I like to shop."
Then, another glance, this one perhaps sharper. Sera is about to inform Kalen that she thinks confession is shit, but - well. Something makes her hold her tongue.
AlexanderAlex thinks for a minute when Kalen wonders where Sera finds her clothes and thinks along the same lines. She certainly has a knack for finding unusual clothes that emphasise her features, but maybe she just makes more out of the outfits than the designers had in mind. Not many people would be able to carry it off with quite as much… presence.
Alex smiles when Kalen talks about his time with Ramon, taking a swig from the bottle as he talks. “Maybe not in exactly the same way with everyone? I’m glad you got to spend time with him, though. You’re looking well. Rested.”
Sera asks if he’s enjoying what he’s discovered for himself and he smiles again. “I do. I guess I’m finally getting to see a little more of that wonder that you’ve talked about.” There’s a flash of apology in his face when the thought of her previous attempt to show him her own wonder backfired somewhat. But it’s only a flash and passes as soon as it arrives. “So, yeah. How’ve you been?”
Kalen Holliday"I'm terribly sorry," Kalen purrs at Serafine. "That dress is spectacular. And really, really hot." He does mean that, though mostly from a carefully constructed distance. There are lines he generally does not cross with Serafine, but that does little enough to change anything about how beautiful she is.
He orders wine, because of course he does. He's gotten used to it again.
"It's been...months since I was concerned about the immediate possibility of the world ending," he says to Alexander. "Given another few months I may have to do something ridiculous. Like...learning to bowl or something. Possibly even cooking, though-" He winces a little. "That might bring us right back to the world being in peril."
Serafíne"Me?" An errant arch of her dark brows, as the waitress returns with her drink it is proper copper mug. This is that kind of place - what else would you expect from a boutique / gallery / bar in a trendy area of Sante Fe. "I'm cool." Neat little shrug here, which is quite as meaningless as you might guess, and for all that she absolutely means her response, it is also a strangely structured, complicated lie. Most niceties are. "I always am."
Then Kalen - from his carefully constructed distance - purrs at Sera and tells her that the dress is really really and there's a beat or two where she just studies his profile and looks oddly - abashed? It's a strange filter to see over her expression, but it's there. The corner of her mouth is quirked, and it quirks wider when he enunciates the litany of mundane things he might have to learn without world-ending tragedies to occupy him.
"Dan'll teach you the guitar," she tells him, quietly. Then, "hey Kalen? You can say lovely if you want. And I'll be right back. I gotta go pay and grab my things before the store closes."
So saying, she takes another draught of her drink and nips off back toward the store to see about her purchases.
Alexander“You know, it wouldn’t be entirely awful if things did stay…” He doesn’t finish the sentence with words, but does gesture with both hands open, palm down, in a ‘calm down’ way. “I don’t want to jinx it by saying it, but it would be nice.” He settles back in the chair and takes another swig from the bottle. “The guitar is cool. You should definitely learn.”
Sera heads back towards her imminent purchases and Alex checks his watch. “I had no idea it was getting so late, time really does fly when you’re having fun. Do you have any plans? We could go find food in a completely undatelike way?”
Kalen Holliday"Indeed." Kalen grins. "And I can give you your totally platonic Valentine. I don't know why people give us the looks they do...."
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