ArchivedLogs:Keeping It Together

Keeping It Together
...if only barely.
Dramatis Personae Aloke, Jackson
In Absentia	2013-05-22 '
Location <NYC> 303 {Holland} - Village Lofts - East Village
This apartment is cheerful, in its way -- bright and airy, its floor plan open and a plethora of windows providing it with an abundance of light. The tiny entrance hall opens into a living room, small, though its sparse furniture and lack of clutter give it a more open feel. The decor is subdued and minimalist; black and white is the dominant theme, with occasional splashes of deep crimson to offset the monochrome, though of late bright coloured sealife has made its way into being painted on the wall. The couch and armchair are upholstered in black corduroy, the low wide coffee table central is black wood and glass-topped, and a few large pillowy beanbags provide additional seating by the large windows that dominate the back wall. Towards the back, a couple of doors lead off into bedrooms and bathroom, and to the right, the kitchen's tile is separated from the living room's dark hardwood floors by black countertops. Above the bedroom to one side, there is higher space; a ladder climbs up to a lofted area looking down on the living room. Standing in front of the partition between living and cooking area is a large fish tank: one lone Betta, blood-red, swims regally among several species of black and silver fish. A hallway beyond the kitchen leads further into the apartment. Another bathroom stands just into the hall and the farthest door leads to the apartment's final bedroom, the door usually kept shut to hold in the acrid fumes of turpentine and paints from within. That sneaky sun keeps getting up earlier and earlier as Spring marches on to Summer. Shafts of light are streaming in through the unblocked window Aloke must have used to beam through last night, and warming his spot on the couch. Aloke groans softly and adjusts, but pretty much is still sprawled on his back, on the comfiest couch. Left leg is draped over the back of the couch, the right hanging off the front. Left arm is tucked behind his head, and the right is curled around the fluffy cat perched on his chest, almost nose-to-nose with the man, rising up and down with each breath. Aloke is wearing a black, zip-up hoodie, with the hood pulled up and over to cover just his eyes. The jacket is unzipped to to reveal a Social Distortion t-shirt, under the cat. He's also got on dark jeans, and black converse sneakers. Snooooore. There are quiet noises in the bedroom. Shuffling, the quiet open of a closet door, footsteps. Then the quiet opening of the /bedroom/ door as Jackson slips out, barefoot and dressed in black terrycloth pajama pants but no shirt -- though with his /wealth/ of tattoos he's still about as colourful as if he /were/ wearing one. He has a towel over his arm and, for once, no makeup. Just plain black hair. His eyepatch is missing, too. With it gone it is clear that it is not just part of his eclectic /fashion/ sense -- the eye it usually covers droops closed, lid sunken-misshapen over emptiness beneath. He is heading into the kitchen but freezes, single eye widening in time with a sudden catch of breath as he looks out into the living room. There's a ripple of light and then he vanishes entirely; at the same time a faint shimmer of /something/ translucent and vaguely prismatic springs to life in front of one of the closed bedroom doors. Just for a moment. And then a sharp /hiss/ of shaky laughter. The shimmering wall vanishes, Jax un-vanishes, and: "/Aloke/," it sounds a little /manic/ really, edged with that same unsteady laughter. Jax turns to start a pot of coffee. "Gonna give me a freaking heart attack." Aloke stirs at Jax's noises, and then jumps a tiny bit to find the cat. Staring. "I-" Aloke begins, and then he's quiet again, worry and pain clear as day on his face. He's not injured, not physically anyway, but the man is in pain. He gently moves the cat so he can sit up, and sets the cat next to him, who seems content to curl up there and keep purring. He scratches it behind the ears without really paying attention, and says, "Jax... I met with Murphy last night..." "I heard. He called." With the coffee on, Jax turns aside, eying Aloke for a long moment. Then putting a kettle of water on the stove to boil, too. "That's Sprite," he says of the purring cat, "you show her a little love she won't /stop/ pestering you. Until you want her and then --" Then she is a cat. So will probably not give the time of day. He slips around the counter into the living room, leaning back against the wall. "You look," he says, "kinda like hell." "Well thats good," Aloke says, barely able to jest. "Because that's a little better than I feel. But I can't even imagine what you must be going through. I'm sorry, here I am, acting like..." He leans forward, elbows on knees, head in hands, and just stops for a beat. Head still down he asks, "Is there any chance, any at all, that someone has a cigarette stashed in this apartment somewhere? I quit years ago, but today..." Today, fuck quitting. "Shane smokes," Jackson admits, and even as he says this he is pushing away from the counter to head to one of the bedroom doors. The twins', clearly, when he opens it -- matching beds (currently pushed together to form one larger one in the centre of the room), matching dressers, matching desks, though half the room holds a good deal more /clutter/ than the other half. One desk is stacked neat with books, a laptop, and -- what appears to be a collection of /bones/; the other is bare save the closed computer. The emptier one is the one Jackson goes to, opening the top drawer to pull out an untouched pack of cigarettes. Still sealed. "Don't apologize." Jackson emerges to offer the pack out to Aloke. "Y'can smoke on the fire escape." He gestures to the large windows dominating the living room's far wall. "... it was bad, weren't it. What you saw." The slight tremor in Aloke's fingers as he accepts the pack probably says a lot more about how bad it was than he could express in words. "Yeah, I'm sorry man, I wish I could pull the punch, we have to fucking get them out. Like you didn't know that already. Get them out, and fucking..." /Hurt/ some people. But he doesn't have the words. Or a violent bone in his body. Crossing the room, he hauls the window open and climbs out onto the fire escape, apparently not worried in the least about the height, but then, why would he? He tamps the pack like a pro, knocks one out for himself, and gets it lit, drawing in a couple deep puffs before leaning back against the low railing, eyes closed, at a loss for words. Jackson doesn't follow, immediately. He watches Aloke, and nods to himself. His towel is left draped over the back of the couch, and he returns to the kitchen as the water on the stove starts whistling. The kitchen is filling with the smell of coffee but for Aloke he prepares a tea, loose-leaf Nilgiri in a small mesh tea ball. Eventually he brings the tea out to Aloke, a large square-ish black-and-red mug. "We'll get them out." It's probably deceptive, the quiet calm of his voice. He /looks/ steady enough. The tea is trembling in his hands, though. The air around him is just a hint darker than it really should be. "Thank you. For going. That -- I don't imagine that's /easy/, seeing things like that --" His lips press together, and his teeth wiggle at one of his many lip rings. "Well," he exhales sharply, "-- jumping into the deep end." Apparently Aloke isn't the first visitor to smoke out here. He ashes his smoke into the ash tray left out, and sets the butt down to accept the tea with both hands. His jaw is clenched, and is somehow avoiding any actual tears, but its obvious this is the man's first foray into anything so traumatic. Anything he experienced, taunted as a mutant, hard times in his life, /nothing/ compares to his experiences of this week. Without taking a sip yet, Aloke sets the tea down on the little table with the ashtray, and pulls Jax into a rough hug. He doesn't shy away from the almost scalding heat coming off of Jax, but holds on until his own tremors have finally stopped. Eventually he releases the other man. "I'm sorry, I just-" Then he's going to apologize for apologizing, and just offers a weak smile before picking up his tea again. "Thank you." Jackson tenses, at first, but then lifts his arms to wrap them around Aloke, holding the older man tight. "Y'don't got nothing to apologize for," he says, when Aloke releases him; he leans back against the fire escape railing, palms resting atop it. "There's a whole lot of terrible in the world and you kinda just got dumped with a huge dose of it. Are you --" His nose wrinkles up. "Well, maybe not /OK/ but -- uh. OK? I -- don't think art school exactly prepares you for all that." Aloke takes a deep breath and finally sips at his tea, giving himself a long moment before speaking again. But finally, he nods, and says, "Yeah, actually, I'm getting there." A dark chuckle, "Art school doesn't really prepare you for /shit/. But you know that." A humorless grin and he lifts his mug in salute. "You know whats funny though?" Aloke's mood is stabilizing. "I dreamt of /Lakshmi/ last night. It's the only reason I'm not completely on the deep end this morning. And I even think the old gods... were probably just warped stories of early mutants, but still, I like the /stories/. And I prayed, man, in my dream. I haven't prayed in /years/. But it felt good. Praying to the goddess of light." He takes a deep breath, openly skeptical of his own behavior, and probably afraid to say more without knowing Jax's reaction. He watches the other man out of the corner of his eye as he busies himself taking another drag on his cig, carefully blowing the smoke in the opposite direction. Jackson's head tilts to the side. He regards Aloke thoughtfully, and eventually his gaze drops. Belatedly, an eyepatch /appears/ where it wasn't before, like he's only just remembered its lack. "The goddess of light," he echoes, and a small smile plays on his lips. "It helped? To pray?" He's kind of quiet as he admits: "I pray every day. It don't help everyone. But it's always helped me. Sometimes I don't really know how I'd get /through/ some of the things we've been through without --" He shrugs. Aloke visibly relaxes when Jax admits to praying as well. How retro! "Well, yeah, she's many things, but that part always appealed to me the most for some reason." Aloke shrugs and smiles, not able to laugh at his own joke, but at least he made one. He's looking more just tired now, rather than utterly destroyed. He stubs out the cigarette and seems content with just the tea now. "So look, Murphy said something about gathering people to go in. And I want in, Jax. But... I can't... I don't know /how/ to fight. I /can/ get those kids to safety though. Only one at a time, I think, but I can go back and forth pretty damn fast." He puts a hand on Jax's shoulder, forcing himself to put up with the heat rolling off. "Don't leave me out of this, ok? I have to help." "Are you going to be OK to help?" It's a quiet and serious question, and -- less solicitous and more intently /appraising/. The look Jax sweeps over Aloke is long and considering. "Don't need you to be able to fight. Need you to be able to stay calm when everything's falling apart. Falling apart is for --" He waves his hand towards Aloke and his mug of tea. "Here, with tea, and hugs, and nicotine. But out there it -- people die." One palm still rests against the fire escape railing, and his arm is kind fo restless-jittery in its bouncing. "If you can handle it, I could definitely use another teleporter." Aloke swallows hard, but the normally indistinct light in his eyes swirls and becomes two bright, focused points. And indication of the personalty and moods, perhaps? "No, I get it, yeah. I'll have together, for as long as I need to. No guarantees for afterwards, but I'm there, no matter what. On it, one hundred percent." Jackson just nods at this. Once, curt and quick, accepting. He straightens, reaching to clap Aloke on the shoulder -- briefly, out of consideration for the uncomfortable nature of his touch at the moment. "Good." That's all. His hand drops to his side. "I gotta get my youngest ready for school," he says, with a glance back inside towards the other, still-closed, bedroom door. "Keep your schedule free tonight, then." His smile is a wry. "We got a date with some cops."