ArchivedLogs:Better Alive

Better Alive
Dramatis Personae Ryan, Skye, Taylor
In Absentia	2018-06-07 "{We'll just put you on bass, nobody will ever know you can't play.}"
Location <NYC> Harbor Commons - Courtyard - Lower East Side
This courtyard is the lush central hub of the surrounding Harbor Commons, bound in on three sides by rows of duplexes and triplexes, cutting upward at the sky with the sharp thrift of a minimalist's style, neat lines and bountiful windows, boldened with accents in wood towards the upper stories, stone towards the base, the whole of the compound sealed in by a low stoneworked wall that opens entrance gates to the streets beyond at its two far corners, smaller gates at building back doors. The fourth side of the courtyard is open to the East River, the ground forming a slight decline, controlled on one side by micro-retaining walls to form wide steps where picnic tables sit beneath the nominative shelter of a trio of dogwood trees, accessible by ramp. The other side is allowed to slope at its natural angle, a wide open yard space, until its cut off at the river's edge, where a massive pair of oak trees stand, a staircase leading away up one of their thick trunks. The yard itself is carpeted in an organic flow of emerald grass swirled through with wending channels of smooth-paved cement walkways, flowing naturally away from the building's front entrances, where some are arced by trellis, some flanked by hosta plants, fern and lilies, a few laid in gentle switch-backing ramps for wheelchair access, before forking off at matching angles to sites of small garden installments. Bird feeders and baths suspended from the necks of small lamp posts, a rock-lined koi pond, a sleek gazebo tucked to one side in simplistic varnished wood, its southern side overgrown with a mass of thriving grapevine and a caged-in barbecue pit under its sheltering roof. A play area and proper garden are within sight off another branch, until finally all paths spiral in like wheel spokes to a shared common house at the center of all traffic flow. The sun has long since set, but it's still bright enough by the grimy and trash-clogged banks of the East River where it wends along by the Commons. There are rainbow-colored lanterns hung from the boughs of the twin oaks and dangling beneath the treehaus's planks. Ryan is lounging in a greenish pool of light, tucked among the tree roots with a cigarette in one hand and his other elbow propped against the colourful quilted fabric of a guitar case. He's kind of disheveled, mussed hair flopped down over his forehead, silver and black creepers and a sweat-damp black fishnet tee peeled off and abandoned behind him, leaving him in a rumpled red tank and torn black skinny jeans. "{Should've grabbed dinner on my way out.}" A lazy sort of self-reproach, the frown that crosses his expression fleeting. He wriggles a little more upright, reaching into an outer pocket of his guitar case to extract a slim silver flask. Close enough? His swig before he offers it out seems satisfied, anyway. "{You can uh...command? The food,}" Skye says, her Spanish still kind of halting. She looks a lot more together than Ryan in a black t-shirt with a shiny graphic of an origami unicorn on the chest, tight silver pants, and black combat boots. Her hair is slightly messy, but just slightly. She has her own cigarette in hand and is half-leaning against a black backpack covered in patches and pins. She takes the flask, salutes Ryan with it, and takes a swig. "{Your show is very good. I like!}" She passes it on. "{Is better alive.}" "{For sure,}" Taylor's Spanish comes more glibly, albeit heavily influenced by his thoroughly American accent, "{Last time zombies crashed your show it wasn't much fun at all.}" He winds a slender arm around the flask, both his hands occupied with pillowing his head against a rock where he lies. One eye scrunches as he takes a swig. "{Dude, don't they pay you enough to buy the good stuff yet?}" Ryan's laugh comes bright and easy, a light flutter of warmth accompanying it. "{Hey, these days if I make proper preparations, I can keep playing /live/ shows long after I'm not /alive/ anymore.} Not sure what kind of crowd would show up for uncontrolled sound cannon with a side of biting, but there's people into /everything/." He reaches to /snatch/ the flask out of Taylor's grasp, his next gulp deliberately longer and ending with a SATISFIED lip-smack. "You don't like my rotgut you should've pilfered something good from work. {Indian sound good?}" Ryan's laugh comes bright and easy, a light flutter of warmth accompanying it. "{Hey, these days if I make proper preparations, I can keep playing /live/ shows long after I'm not /alive/ anymore.} Not sure what kind of crowd would show up for uncontrolled sound cannon with a side of biting, but there's people into /everything/." He reaches to /snatch/ the flask out of Taylor's hand, his next gulp deliberately longer and ending with a SATISFIED lip-smack. "You don't like my rotgut you should've pilfered something good from work. {Indian sound good?}" "{/Live/,}" Skye repeat, "{alive, live. Thanks.} Anyway, life is short but branding is long. 'Uncontrolled Sound Cannon' could be your undead stage name." This elicits a scattered, no-context memory of the air roaring loud, palpably vibrating, a bright jagged flash of pain to Skye's extra sense. She blinks it away without wincing, and takes a long drag on her cigarette, breathing smoke out at the river. "Or, you know. My {alive} stage name, if I ever make the mistake of going into music." She grins. "{Indian sounds very good, I want the spicy.}" Taylor blinks just a fragment of a second after Skye, fingers clenching momentarily against the back of his smooth head. "{You don't have to decide whose. Just start a band together.} Ideally while still alive. I want rogan josh." His arm flexes, starting to quest lazily after the flask, but dropping to his chest before it gets far in this attempt. "Shane would dismember me. I /like/ my limbs attached." "He'll do that tomorrow anyway, theft or no theft." Ryan flicks slowly at his phone, brow furrowing as he scrolls. "A special /birthday/ dismembering. The kind of present everyone wants." He passes the flask to Skye together with the phone, an ordering menu pulled up on screen. "Uncontrolled Sound Cannon. {I like it. You don't actually have to be any good at music to join a band. We'll just put you on bass, nobody will ever know you can't play.}" "Woah, happy birthday!" Skye takes a swig from the flask and starts to offer it to Taylor, then stops. "I could go get some good shit from my van. Birthday drinks sound a lot better than birthday dismembering, IMO. " She squints at the screen of Ryan's phone, swipes a few times and makes her selection before passing both phone and flask back to their owner. "{Thank you so much. I was meaning that I could play /me/, but probably the bass would be a safer...oh! Oh!}" She snaps her fingers. "{I have play a lot of} Rock Band, {does that count?}" "Why choose? The day is long, I ain't got no shifts tomorrow, I can fit it /all/ in." Taylor's teeth flash in brief bright grin. "{Though /probably/ best not to show up to Fight Club drunk, then I'd be getting torn apart for sure.}" He wriggles upright, thick tentacles coiling and gathering behind him to propel him up. "{Play you?}" He echoes this with a quizzical lift of brows. "{What, like you sing?}" Ryan cocks forefingers Skye's direction, tongue clicking at the roof of his mouth with the waggle of finger-guns. "{You'll be set in no time, how do you think I got started?}" He takes the phone back, deliberates a good long while before adding to and finalizing the order. "Don't knock the birthday dismemberment, though, it's a fine and venerable tradition among our people." With his phone he gestures between himself and Taylor. "{Fight Club?}" Skye says, with a confused frown that soon disappears. "Oh, Fight Club! Not like...random birthday dismemberment. I ain't judging either way, just probably not what I'd want for my birthday." /Her/ birthday fantasy seems to involve a luxurious hot tub filled with shimmery fragrant bubbles and definitely more than two naked -- "Ahhh lo siento!" She tries to focus on anything else, but it's really her embarrassment that flushes the mental image away. Skye shakes her head. "Anyway, you got a preferred poison? I have pretty excellent vodka, Scotch, bourbon, rum, oh and gaoliang, but that's 160 proof and kind of an acquired taste. {And sure, I can sing not too bad, but what I mean is this.}" She pulls hard on her cigarette and blows a long, steady stream of smoke out towards the water. Her mind reaches out for the air she has just polluted and /flicks/. The air resonates, given visible shape by the smoke stream which ripples in hypnotic waves, and makes a sort of low, echoey BWAAM sound. Ryan can feel the full extent of the effect, which is not very musical, but pretty well controlled, a tight cone carefully aimed at the wide river. "Aight but let's be real I'd be down for random birthday dismemberment too. Sometimes you just gotta throw down, you know? We all have our tastes." Taylor's grin is brighter than this should necessarily warrant, wide and amused though he is Totally Not Mentioning any snippets of fantasy he may have caught. "What's gaoliang? I'll try anything once. But rum, in case it's not my taste." He watches the smoke at first with only a casual interest, though his brows lift and he nods approvingly at the ripples that flutter through them. "/Nice/." "Mooost of us like to keep our limbs /on/ during friendly wrassling." Not that Ryan is judging! He is kind of lazily reaching for one of the middling of Taylor's arms, manhandling it in the start of an arm wrestling bout he is sure to lose. "{Oh damn,}" also sounds approving, "{we could work that into an act for sure.} Only I think we'd attract way too many of the vaping bro crowd. We'll have to refine some." Skye hasn't completely stopped blushing, but she laughs. "Well I wish you a happy dismembering in advance. Gaoliang is sorghum liquor from China which tastes like...burning, mostly? With a little touch of sweet. I'm told it's an acquired taste." She glances at her sound blast as it fades with the smoke. "I'm flattered, cuz that's seriously that Inception bwah is like most musical thing I can do with uh.../that./ I would love to have some help refining it, either way." Her relief is easy for Taylor and perhaps even Ryan to sense. << Wow, that was waaaaay easier than I expected. Why was I ever worried?! >> Wobbling a little as she stands up, she waves her cigarette in the general direction of the street. "But right now, birthday drinks. {I'll be back. With alcohol. Alcohol/s/.}"