ArchivedLogs:Helping and Enabling
| Helping and Enabling | |
|---|---|
| Dramatis Personae | |
| In Absentia
|
2013-02-04 ' |
| Location
<NYC> Tick-Tock - Greenwich Village | |
The quiet sound of soft music and softly running water greets the entrants to this tea house, playing from speakers hidden and trickling waterfalls cascading down the rocky fountains by the entryway. The ambiance here is subdued, a quiet escape from the bustle and noise of th city, focused on only one thing: tea. Tea of very good quality. They serve it in over eighty varieties, black and white, green and oolong, rooibos and herbals and mate, flavored and straight up. The seating here comes on cushions or kneeling chairs around low tables, the decorations in earth tones, and the knowledgeable wait staff is always helpful with a recommendation or a snack suggestion to pair with your drink. It's quiet in the tea shop. A few scattered customers, mostly just the sound of running water and low music. Lucien has neither tea nor seat, at the moment. He stands near but not at the front counter, an extensive tea menu in hand, perusing it with furrowed brow. He is dressed sharply, today, a vest over his button-down, jacket, slacks, tie. They look sharp. His somewhat worn expression does not. There is a soft bell from the door, and a figure steps in, head buried in a stack of papers. Iolaus is dressed sharply in a black dress shirt and a peacoat wrapped over his shoulders. He looks up only to glance long enough to step over towards the maitre'd. "Hello. Can I have a table, please?" he says, glancing up with a smile.
Lucien glances down, brow creasing in mild annoyance at the sudden buzzing of his phone in his pocket. His lips thin. His eyebrows raise. He glances up from the phone with a slightly puzzled curiosity as Iolaus enters, and his fingers tap against the menu. Tap. Taptap. With another compression of lips, he answers his text quickly, though his bright green eyes do not leave Iolaus.
Iolaus looks back down to his paperwork, but he stops, a frown coming over his face. Blue-grey eyes flick upwards and around the room, coming up to a stop on Lucien. Surprise blossoms in his face, a smile following shortly afterwards. "Good afternoon." he says, stepping away from the server and over towards Lucien. "How are you doing today?" Lucien is still absently swiping at his phone, answering its constantly buzzing texts with an bland expression. It shifts into a quick smile as Iolaus approaches, warming his green eyes easily. "{Good day,}" he offers in quiet French, and then in English: "I was due to restock. My stores are running low. Tell me," he adds, glancing down to his phone and then up to Iolaus, "is there a skinny young urchin who resides with you?"
"{Good day,}" Iolaus replies in French as well, though his accent is tinged thinly both with an American accent and a Hatian accent to end up rather confused. "I am here for lunch." He smiles wider, a bemused expression on his face. "If you are referring to Shelby... yes, though I must admit I find myself unable to remember exactly how that ended up happening." "She does seem to have that effect," Lucien murmurs, lowering his gazet o the menu again. "My apologies, I do not want to interrupt your --" His fingers uncurl towards the table. "How long has that arrangement been going on?" He's still texting. Absent. Distracted.
"No, please. Join me?" Iolaus offers, with a warm smile and a gesture back towards the table. "A distraction from this would be much appreciated," he says, proffering the bundle of papers in his hand with a wry twist to his lips. "A few weeks?" he says, hesitantly. "Honestly, I am not quite sure. I am often not there."
"Ah. Apparently she is in need of clothing," Lucien says, considering this invitation for a moment and then carrying his menu along to the table. He lifts the phone, waggling it indicatively to Iolaus as it buzzes again. "She wants me to give her cash. And ask you how long before her stitches, ah, get -- nasty." He says this a little stilted, looking at the phone's screen. "Have you considered helping find her a job? Incessant mooching and scamming off of --" His eyes flick over Iolaus, and then down, "-- the warm-hearted is not a sustainable career path." "That requires school. I have... recently found an institution that may be willing to accept her. I am going to visit it sometime in the next week or so, and was planning on bringing it up with the Headmaster while I was there." Iolaus says, stepping over to the table and taking a seat across from the other man. "For long-term career prospects, I think education is the best bet in the now." "School requires that she is /willing/ to attend. And learn. And work. Preying on the willing is far less of an expenditure of energy," Lucien murmurs, kneeling on a chair and resting his hand on the edge of the table. "There are jobs that do not require an education. Surely she can be coached enough to get her GED, if it comes to that. I imagine, though," he turns his hand upwards, fingers spreading, "that as long as she has marks willing to support her she will have little incentive to find a better situation." Iolaus nods and shrugs his shoulders. "Perhaps. She may wish for self-betterment in a purer sense and simply have been unable to acheive it without a push, or she may have simply been unwilling or uninterested. Still, there would be tangential benefits for her to be at this institution that may encourage her attendance. I don't know - we will see whether it is even a possibility before we determine if it is an interest." "She is underage. Public schools at least are required to take her. It is not as though she stands out --" Lucien's lips twitch, slightly, "in any way other than annoyance. She is not in school because she does not wish to be in school. Your optimism is sweet, though. It's easy to see why she chose you." Iolaus chuckles and spreads his hands in a little shrug. "I never said that I was not a good mark. All the better of one for being absent-minded and rarely present." He picks up the menu, eyes turning to it as he falls into silence. "We will see what they say, and what she does. It is worth completing, even if it is futile, for having started the question." "Yes," Lucien says, quiet and distracted as he picks up his menu. "I suppose we shall see. Though I suppose I have less confidence than you in the /worth/ of that kind of undertaking. I have known many people like her." "It does not sound like you feel that they were worth your time." he says, a faint look of curiosity in his eyes. " What, then, would you recommend as the best course of action? Find her employment? Simply throw her out?" "My time comes at quite a premium," Lucien says, with a thin twitch of smile. "I think, though, that anyone's time is only worth so much as the other person is willing to give in return. For people actually invested in bettering themselves and changing their sitaution, I have time. For people who just want to leech off of others' generosity --" He does not finish this sentence, dropping his gaze from Iolaus to his menu. "Recommend? You are the charitable one. I only think that there is a difference between helping someone and enabling them." "And clearly you think I have fallen on the enabling side of that line." Iolaus asks, looking over the other man's face. His voice is interested, open, unangry. He, too, puts down his menu, glancing around for the waiter. "I admit, I have been somewhat concerned that I have only created a loca of minimum effort." "I think as long as she has people supplying her needs and asking no effort from her in return, she will have no reason to expend effort." Lucien glances once more over his menu, then sets it down. "There is nothing wrong with assisting those who need it. But what is the end goal, here, for her? She clearly --" His fingers tap absently against his phone, "is not doing much to change the situation." Iolaus nods, and raises a hand to flag down a passing waiter. "Can I get a croissant and a cup of your Yunnan Golden Tips?" he asks, flashing the waiter a smile and passing up his menu to them. Then he turns back to Lucien, waiting for him to order before picking back up where he left off. "No, I understand. The end goal is most certainly for her to be self-supporting." "A carrot ginger soup, please," Lucien asks, "and a cup of the Baihao oolong. Thank you." He hands his menu over, as well, and turns back to Iolaus. "That would be ideal," he allows, head tipping slightly. It takes a moment longer, in quiet, his fingers drumming in one brief roll against the table, before he also allows: "I have been where she is. Perhaps it is just too easy to identify with those patterns." A look of surprise comes over Iolaus' face, but it fades back to a look of understanding quickly. He nods, sympathetically. "Bad patterns." It is not a question. "How did you advance from them? Were you pushed, or did you climb up of your own volition?" he asks, eyes searching the other man's face. This takes a moment of thought, as well. "Circumstances pushed me," he answers, eventually. "It would be more pleasant to have less drastic impetus, though." "And that has been my hesitation. I don't want to simply cut the cord, as it were." Iolaus gives the table's surface a puzzled look as he admits, "Though I'm not quite sure how it /started/. But I'd rather not her rely on me, as I am going to have little money of my own to spare shortly, I imagine." "I imagine that's true." Lucien's smile is a little wry. "I imagine finding her a job would be a better investment in the long run than giving her a couch and shelling out cash when she has a --" His lips press together, here, somewhat amused and somewhat /be/mused. "-- date." "She has a date?" Iolaus says, lips twisting into a faint smile. "Well, I would hope that that means she would do some laundry, but I suspect it merely means I'm going to be missing some conditioner and hair gel when I get home." he says, smile breaking into a larger mold. "So she tells me. At least missing some conditioner means she has showered." Lucien's hands fall to his lap when their teas arrive, unfolding his napkin into halves to lay it across his legs. "How /are/ your plans coming to make yourself hated and destitute, by the by?" He says this rather amiably. "They are coming. The hated part is going along smoothly. Destitute, not yet, but I haven't been fired yet." Iolaus says, with a warm, twisted smile. More seriously, he adds, "Having some trouble getting a building permit, but I think things are going well with the architect. I need to check in with him, actually. Hiring is progressing where it should be, and fundraising... is not terrible." "There is still time," Lucien assures Iolaus optimistically. "Have you set odds yet on the date of your first assassination attempt?" He lifts his tea, not drinking, just inhaling the steam. "No, but I believe there is a pool going. So far, there's been little press, and little interest. The first newspaper article..." Iolaus shakes his head. "Then I think the prices will rise, steeply." "Yes, I imagine they will." This time Lucien does not sound amused. Just serious, studying Iolaus's face and then taking a sip of his tea. Their food comes, now, Iolaus's croissant warm and slightly toasted, Lucien's soup steaming. "I know a couple people," he says, at length, "who might be interested in making a donation. Some of my -- business associates would be interested in seeing this project succeed." Iolaus, too, fades some into seriousness at the discussion of his impending death by assassination. He murmurs something under his breath in Greek, but it is barely audible even so. He smiles at the staff as they deliver the food, nodding politely. When Lucien mentions donations, his ears clearly perk up. "Oh? Well, I'd appreciate anything you can do. We can have the utmost discretion." "Discretion. Good. My clients do appreciate that." Lucien's smile is thin and quick. "You should leave me information. On how they might make a donation." "The best thing for them to do is to contact my fundraising director." Iolaus says, fishing a few business cards out of his wallet and a pen. He begins scribbling on the backs of each, in turn. "Here's her contact information." he says, passing all but a single one over. "Feel free to give those to anyone interested. And here's my information," he says, writing a different phone number on the back. "In case you need it." Lucien glances at the cards, his head tipping in a nod. This time, his smile comes a little easier. "In case I need it," he echoes, thoughtfully. "Mmm. I will see what I can do." Pocketing the cards, he turns his attention to his food. | |
