ArchivedLogs:Nobody Understands

Nobody Understands
Dramatis Personae Alicia, Dusk, Eric	2013-12-28 '
Location <NYC> Home - Greenwich Village
Nestled into the heart of the Village, Home is an unobtrusive place, with an unobtrusive name to match. A nondescript storefront opens up into an equally nondescript cafe, plain tiled floors, an assortment of veneered tables with plain wooden chairs or booths with cracking vinyl benches. What it /does/ have to recommend it is the food, hearty solid breakfast and brunch served twenty-four hours a day. Known to locals and little frequented by tourists, its friendly serving staff tend to remember their regulars, giving the place a warm feel that lives up to its name. Home's busy cycles turn less with the daily cycles of tourism and more with the longer flow and ebb of the local resident's interest. Here, in the gap between Christmas and New Year's, it is a particularly slow time. The small cafe is occupied primarily by a bored looking waitress and a single customer sitting at one of the small tables, a steaming cup of coffee sitting in front of him. Eric is dressed simply, today - an earth-toned brown t-shirt with a pair of black jeans to match. His attention is focused down on the table, finger flicking lazily over the screen of his phone as he pages through the latest posts to Reddit, the other hand occasionally bringing the mug of coffee to his mouth for a long sip. Alicia is still fairly new to the city and, with Grandmother, as usual, busy, she's taken some time to do some exploring. She'd always heard about "the Village", after all, and with the relative quiet, it's an ideal time for a somewhat shy girl to do some exploring. The bell at the door tinkles as she makes her way inside, a bit grateful to see the mostly empty seats. She makes her way up to the counter, a heavy jacket over her shoulders and a black stocking cap pulled down over her white-blonde hair as it spills down her back, 'Um...could I have a mocha, please? Large." she murmurs, fundling in her oversized purse for some actual cash. Dusk enters shortly after Alicia, hands tucked into coat pockets. Between his excessive pallor contrasted with night-dark hair, large dark eyes, black floor-length trenchcoat (oddly hunched up around his shoulders to give him a rather humpbacked appearance) he could pull off the goth look pretty well. The image is -- well, perhaps shed, perhaps helped along when he removes the coat. His clothing beneath it is bland (jeans, Vans sneakers, a blue Columbia University hoodie unzipped over blue-and-white striped tee; the truly enormous dark wings (dark and demonically batlike rather than feathered) that sprout from his shoulders to poke through the added holes in the back of his clothing, though, maybe goes along with the rest of his look. His wings shift and flex once liberated from the coat, rolling slowly as though he'd /like/ to stretch them though in an enclosed space it's not particularly feasible. "Hey, Bria." He greets the /waitress/ first, with a warm smile, sharp long canines flashing bright. "What's up, hon -- oh right work." He grins crookedly at Alicia, slightly apologetic. His fist rubs in a circle over his heart -- the ASL /sign/ for sorry rather than saying the word out loud. "The mocha here's great though. /Sup/." That last is directed, finally, to Eric. Dusk unfurls one wing to stretch it over the several feet between him and Eric, brushing up against the police officer's arm. With the cafe largely empty Dusk just goes ahead and seats himself, pulling out a chair at Eric's table and spinning it around backwards. "Coffee coffee coffee, pfft. /I'll/ order enough food to make up for everyone." When the doorbell quietly rings, Eric looks up from his phone and glances over at Alica. As his eyes run up and down the newcomer, his back straightens up from its slouch and a smile broadens onto his face. The smile only widens as Dusk follows her into the room, and he jerks his head upwards once, flashing a grin at the winged man. "Heya, Dusk. How'are ya doin'?" he asks, letting his hand turn to run knuckles gently along the inside of the outstretched wing. "Hey, I've gotta get somethin'ta wake me up. Long night. Takes a lot out of ya, servin' the public all night." Eric's eyes twinkle, glancing back to Alicia as he adds, "Especially when you take that servin' right back to their place. Someone you know?" he asks Dusk, with a raise of his eyebrows. "He's right, ya know. The mocha is really great." Alicia blushes shyly when she's spoken to, looking down at her purse as she finishes finding a fairly crinkled five to hand to the girl behind the counter, "I just love choco--" she says, and then she actually looks up and sees Dusk. Her pale blue eyes go wide and there's a little startled squeak from deep in her throat. Perhaps more interestingly, there's the sound of tinkling porcelain as a line of mugs hanging on hooks behind her all crack simultaneously, along with shiny chrome napkin holder that flicks off of a table and flies across the room to smack into the wall. "Er...um..." she looks over at Eric, too, as she's spoken to. She knows about mutants, of course, although she doesn't watch the news much. Girls worried about being possessed by demons don't spend much time on newssites (especially not when Paris Fashion Week is ONLINE). Still, she prides herself on not being prejudiced and manages to swallow, "I...hi. Chocolate. I like chocolate. Hi," she stammers, blushing again. When she hears one of the mugs finally fall to the floor with a crash, she winces and sighs. It happened again. Dammit. "Don't say that word," Dusk says with reflexive /prickle/ as Eric speaks. His fingers scuff through his hair, easy smile returning a moment after the bristling, though. "Yeah, I'll /bet/ it does. -- Most things here are really great, actually. And no, we haven't met." The next tap of his wing against Eric isn't a brush, though, but a sharper /thwap/. "/Dude/. Girl looks like she's fourteen. Forgive Eric," he says to Alicia, "he's a giant perv, it's better if you just tune --" His words cut off sharply with the crackling of mugs, though. /He's/ at least /well/ used to mutants with all /kinds/ of malfunctions; he watches the napkin holder fly with a deep frown, standing to go get at. "/Dude/." His tone is kind of prickly again, as he looks back to Alicia. To the breaking mugs behind her. "/Watch/ it. These people are actually cool, don't fucking /trash/ the joint." "I ain't a perv, and I was talkin'ta /you/, not her." Eric says, amusement in his tone as much as defensiveness. At the loud crackle of ceramic, though, Eric's body reflexively tenses, eyes narrowing on the broken mugs, then on Alicia. His brown eyes give her a second pass, this time more in a movement of concerned appraisal. "Careful, yeah? All that aside," Eric gestures to Dusk. "Do that around the wrong person, and you're gonna get written up. In case'ya forgot, public display ain't legal 'round here." He gives a little shrug and picks up his own mug, as if trying to shield it with his hands. Alicia bites her bottom lip, partially to keep it from trembling. It's always like this. It - whatever -it- is - does something rotten and she ends up getting blamed for it. Same in New York as it was back home. Same as it'll always be. "I...I'm sorry...I..I can pay for...for..." she murmurs, fumbling in her purse again to try and find her credit card, the one Grandma gave her for "expenses". She feels the tears welling up in her eyes, but just sniffs once. Not going to cry. She doesn't entirely understand what the two men are talking about, finally finding her card and pressing it on the girl behind the counter, "Just...whatever you want. Whatever would be enough," she says softly. She wants to flee, but knows she at least has to pay before she runs out of here in utter humiliation... "Oh, good, well, perv on /me/ all you want then but don't think I didn't se the way you were /eying/." Dusk's first two fingers point to his own eyes and then to Eric. WATCHING YOU. He frowns again, though, as Alicia speaks. "-- Or /that/ word, either." There's a distinctive tension that creeps through his muscles, less at the shattering mugs and more at the use of words that he has gotten so used to excising from his vocabulary in the wake of the zombie plague. His fingers scrub through his hair again, relaxing as Alicia offers to pay. "Good. There's just few enough places in town that'll even let us /in/. Just -- /watch/ yourself, okay?" "You'll regret givin' me that okay later, I bet." Eric teases, smile flitting about his lips. He takes a sip of his coffee and then glances down into the now-empty glass with a slight frown, and a sad look at the remains at the bottom. "Aw. Can I get'ya somethin', Dusk?" Standing and stepping over next to Alicia at the counter, Eric places the mug down on the countertop. "Can I get a refill, whenever you get a chance, darlin'? And whatever that guy wants, too." He tugs his wallet out of the back of his jeans pocket, pulling out his credit card and sliding it across the table. Turning his attention to the girl next to him, Eric gives her a reassuring smile. "Ain't nothin' to cry about, there, little miss. Just gotta be more careful, yeah?" He shrugs his shoulders, glancing at the waitress. "'m sure Bria here ain't mind, s'long as you're payin'." Alicia actually does let a few tears leak out, shaking her head softly, "It's not me...you don't understand,' she murmurs, 'Nobody ever does..." she sniffles, "It just...happens. I'm not doing it. I'M NOT DOING IT!" she finally shouts, fully breaking into tears. She turns away from Eric and Dusk, her credit card forgotten as she buries her face in her hands. Near the wall, the linoleum begins to peel up off the floor with a soft, sick sound. There's a soft vibration in the air, as if the windows were humming, a quiver that makes the view outside look momentarily distorted, as if pressure were building on them, although it's hard to tell if from outside or in. The long, white strands of the girl's hair begins to rise behind her cap, as if from static electricity... Dusk actually rolls his eyes at this, looking kind of irritable. "Nah, I'm good. /Bigots/ I can deal with but self-loathing mutants make me kind of queasy. Think I'll get my lunch at home." He gets up from the table, spinning his chair back around to push it in. "Apologies, hon," he says to the waitress, "I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?" His wings shift slowly at his back, and he watches Alicia's outburst with mingled distaste and discomfort in his expression. "Uh, yeah. Who /else/ do you think is doing it?" His shoulders tense. "You'd best get yourself under control," his voice is actually calm, now, not irritated, "or get outside." Eric glances down at the ground and listens to the sound of the floor creek. "Scratch that." Eric says, and his voice is no longer the teasing, gentle kindness of his usual, but the hard, commanding one he uses on the job. "Get outside, get control'a yourself, then come back and pay. In that order. No tears, little miss. Time to man up and show your true colors." Eric glances at the waitress, look apologetic as well. "It just happens cause you ain't controllin' yourself. Get a grip, yeah?" Alicia shakes her head, "It wasn't supposed to follow me here...it was supposed to stay at the house..." she says, now openly crying. She gets her credit card back from the startled woman behidn the counter, stuffing it back into her purse. "You think I like this? You think I don't...I don't want it to STOP? You think I haven't...I don't know what else to do. Priests couldn't help..." she shakes her head and starts to make her way towards the door. The garbage can turns over as she moves past it, literally flipping over onto its top, all the garbage still inside. "Things were supposed to be different here..." she mutters, pushing at the front door to get out. "/Priests/? Jesus fucking Christ, girl, you're living in New York not the gorramn middle ages it's not like people still think mutants are magic. Read the fucking /news/ once in a while." Dusk only looks further disgusted at the tears and moreso at the words. "What to do? Maybe get your head out of your damn ass, accept what you are, and grow a spine and deal with it." "Priests?" Eric, too, look surprised at this. "I don't care what ya parent's are telling you, but you don't need a priest, you need a fuckin' doctor!" He yells after her, shaking his head and crossing his head as he looks at the garbage can. "Jesus." He mutters and shakes his head, folding one arm over the other. He turns and glances to the waitress, giving her a conspiratorial look. "Teenagers." he mutters. Alicia pushes her way out the door, and pauses for a second, gathering herself as she looks back over her shoulder, "I...I don't..." she hugs herself and glares back over her shoulder at them, "Sorry I'm a...a...freak..." she says and, sobbing, she closes the door and walks quickly down the street and away, the occasional bit of mayhem trailing in her wake... "Fucking Christ." The disgust really hasn't left Dusk's expression. His posture is tense, wings shifting restless and irritable. He scrubs his knuckles against his dark-bearded jaw, shaking his head once. "Dumbass. Have people stopped teaching their kids how to read? Or even just turn on the goddamn news once in a -- /priest/, seriously, I feel like I just got /trolled/." His jaw clenches, hand dropping to his side. His wing stretches out, brushing lightly against the (rather /shaken up/) waitress's arm. "I apologize. Let's -- uh." He exhales a heavy sigh, heading towards the garbage can to hold its lid on while he rights it, just one step of cleaning up the damage left in the teenager's wake.