Logs:Free-Range Mutant Community

Free-Range Mutant Community
Dramatis Personae Anahita, Joshua, Kevin
In Absentia Erik, Ion	2023-01-22 "Maybe I'll finally figure out why sitcom writers love New York so much."
Location <NYC> Tompkins Square Park - East Village
Small but popular, this tree-lined park is a perfect centerpiece to the eclectic neighborhood it resides in. Home to a number of playgrounds and courts from handball to basketball, it also houses a dog park and chess tables, providing excellent space for people watching -- especially during its frequent and often eccentric festivals, from Wigstock to its yearly Allen Ginsberg tribute Howl festival. It could be a nicer day. Cold, dreary and grey -- it is at least not currently raining, although the marshy grass underfoot suggests it recently was and the oppressive clouds hanging heavy overhead indicate it's giving serious consideration to doing so again. For the moment, though, it's just a foreboding gloom -- in the midst of which Joshua looks right at home, for once, tatty grey jacket, jeans soggy at their hems, jowly hangdog face arranged into a resting mournful expression. The kippah he is wearing today is the most colorful thing about him, red with gold embroidery depicting a raised fist -- or the kippah he was wearing, at least, before a gust of wind rudely removed it from his shaggy hair to send it tumbling off down the path in the direction of the basketball courts, leaving in its wake only one sad silver hair clip which is evidently none too effective at its job. Joshua's habitually gloomy expression does not change at this indignity -- he just claps a hand (a second too late) to the top of his head before jogging after the wayward cap. Kevin looks to his left. Kevin looks to his right. Yep, New York City still sucks. Kevin finds it sucks even more when jet lag leaves him with too little energy to don his human disguise. He attracts a few errant stares from passerby as he leans against the meshwire fence, tugging at his hood as he leers down the street. Moving back to America wasn't ideal, but it beat getting the virus and finding out what strange and interesting interactions it would have on his body. Kevin's mental monologue was broken when he's suddenly hit in the face...By a piece of fabric carried on the wind. He grabs it, raising an eyebrow at the Kippah. "Now where did you come from...?" Anahita wends her way through the park, nibbling on the last of a steamed bun. She's wearing a faded black canvas jacket buttoned tight against the cold, a soft gray scarf neatly tucked about the collar, sturdy blue jeans and heavy engineer's boots, all of it shabby and threadbare enough to make the red newsboy cap on her head look bright and new. She has just downed the last of her meal when she spots Kevin and starts drifting in his direction. When the kippah sails past on the same gust of wind that she successfully defended her own cap against, she looks back along its path to Joshua. And stops. Her eyebrows crease, and then lift up. It's a small shift, but the effect of perhaps surprised and certainly pleased recognition is dramatic. "Joshua?" The lift in her tone is mild, almost perfunctory. Joshua pulls up short, glancing from the wayward kippah to the man holding it. "My head," he replies first, on behalf of the misbehaving cap, and second, "Thanks. Wind's being extra antisemitic today." He's holding out one hand for the kippah but lowers it, his mission temporarily forgotten at the sound of his name. His heavy brows scrunch in, eyes landing on -- "-- shit." That probably isn't Anahita's name, but it's what comes out first, low and surprised, all the same. "Yeah, that's New York for ya." Kevin extends the held kippah, but not quick enough before it's rightful owner is distracted by another arrival. Kevin did not remember the fence outside the basketball court with the broken, rusty hoop being New York's social hotspot, but he's not gonna complain. "Guessing she's talking to you?" He pulls his hood down, raising an exaggerated eyebrow at Joshua. "And that you're not happy about it?" Anahita's eyebrows tick just a little higher at Joshua's response, which is perhaps not quite what she'd hoped. She glances back at Kevin, uncertain, eyes ticking over his unusual features too quickly for genuine nonchalance, though her expression is neutral enough. "I think," she ventures, "he just was not expecting to see me here. Though," she adds with an opaque glance to Joshua, "I hear it is not so very uncommon for folks to come back." "Mierda," Joshua says, more heavily this time than the last. Now he actually takes his kippah, with a small nod of thanks, fiddling with it restlessly. "No, I'm --" His mouth thins, which, admittedly, doesn't make him look any happier. "--She's cool. I think. My face is just. Like that." His grimace deepens. "Yeah. Happens. Take it home didn't..." He looks Anahita over, decides against finishing this sentence. Instead he reattached his kippah (kind of lopsided) to his head. "Welcome back." Here, he's darting a brief glance to Kevin's face; for the first time his mouth twitches up into something that almost (not quite) could be a smile. "What's New York for you?" Is it defensive? Maybe his voice is Just Like That. Kevin's eyes glance between the two as they talk. He's clearly missing a wheelbarrow's worth of context; Come back from what? Jersey? He opts not to pry, smart enough to know when not to get between two people's personal matters. His contorting face shows that he's a little taken aback by Joshua's question, but not enough to stop him from answering truthfully. "A bit of a dump. You grow up here with this beautiful mug, dealing with cops who're so jealous of it that they'll fine you for having it...You develop a distaste." "I have been accused of coolness," Anahita admits, "though not typically by anyone over the age of 15. But thank you. Home..." Her hesitation is small. "...didn't. And New York has a certain gravity." She reaches into an ancient canvas satchel hanging at her flank and, without looking or even feeling around, produces another hair clip that she offers to Joshua sans comment. "Unfortunately, quite a lot of pigs, too." There's a definite edge to that, but her voice is gentler with, "I'm sorry that they plague you so, and that you've been drawn back here against your better tastes." He shrugs at Anahita, hands comfortably resting in his hoodie's pockets. "It's not all bad on either front. I've learned how to keep out of reach of the long arm of the law when I need to." He leans closer to Anahita, a too-big grin across his face. "And who might you be? I hear you're...Cool." Joshua listens to Kevin's reply thoughtfully -- studies the younger man's face thoughtfully, too, without any further hint of distaste than his droopy scowl already seems to hold. "Yeah," he allows, "guess pigs are pigs anywhere. Sorry this, ah, dump's got its hold on you." His brows knit again, and he's hesitant before his next question: "--s'it been better anywhere else?" There's a very mild skepticism that has crept into his deep voice. "I haven't found much --" But like half his other sentences this, too, drops off, around when Kevin mentions keeping out of the reach of the law. "Staying out of a cage is a solid start." The short huff of laugh that comes with this is wry. His brows lift at the clip Anahita produces, and he takes it, with no comment but a small twitch of smile. "Sorry," is what comes out in lieu of thanks. "New York is like the fucking Hotel California for freaks." "I've stayed in worse hotels." Anahita's expression does not change appreciably with this, but there's a suggestion of amusement, all the same. When Kevin leans closer, her eyes go briefly a little bit wider, and though she does not flinch away it looks, perhaps, almost like she had to stop herself. But when she replies she sounds relaxed enough, and gives a small incline of her head, "Anahita. And what may I call you, young man?" "Nice name. I'm Kevin. As for it being better anywhere else...Marginally. It was a lot easier to stay away from prying eyes in Scotland, anyway." He straightens up, stifling a yawn that stretches his jaw halfway down his chest. "So, how is the ol' NYC Mutant Community™️? Lively as ever in the past few years if the world news is to be trusted." The corners of Joshua's eyes crinkle at Anahita's reply, warm and genuinely amused. It's short lived -- his skepticism has returned, at the mention of Scotland, easily visible in his expression although he doesn't give it voice. He bends the hair clip open between his lips -- is just starting to affix it to his kippah at that uncannily wide yawn; instead he knocks the cap askew yet again with a startled widening of his eyes. He flushes as he haphazardly straightens it and pins it back in place. "Never boring." He looks briefly at Kevin, then away towards a spider-like police Sentinel patrolling the edge of the park. "Doubt you needed the news to tell you that." His hand drops to his side, idly toying now with a white knotted tassle dangling beneath his jacket. "-- sometimes nice having a community, though. Not many places do." "Thank you." When Anahita does smile, it's bright and joyful and brief. "Kevin." She repeats the name carefully, as though it weren't so commonplace at all, though nothing in her intonation suggests it's by any means new to her. When Kevin yawns, she does actually flinch, though once recovered she evinces no embarrassment for the reaction. "I've only been back a short while, but it seems livelier now than..." She frowns and amends, "I was only here a short while before, and not exactly at my best." She smile again, ruefully now. "It's rare, and it's nice, and it's complicated. But, come what may, I mean to stay this time." Kevin glances at the Sentinel nervously, chewing the inside of his cheek. "Yeah, communities are swell. I guess I 'mean to stay' as well, at least until the pandemic clears up. Who knows? Maybe I'll finally figure out why sitcom writers love New York so much." Joshua's brows hike up at the mention of the pandemic clearing, and his mouth pulls down. Very dry: "Long haul, then." He's still twisting at the knotted cord, twitchy between his fingers. "Got a plan while you're here?" He's glancing between both of them now, with this curious question. His deadpan expression doesn't change as he adds: "-- This many yids in one town? City's inherently hilarious, is why. All the world's funniest people flee genocide and wind up here." Anahita doesn't laugh, but the quick breath she huffs comes very close. "Sometimes humor is what gets you through." For all the graveness of her expression, this does not sound like a lament. "I had been getting ready to settle down in Freaktown, but now I don't know. I'm new to free-range mutant community." Her smile is not quite a smile. "So far it's consisted of wandering the city until I run into other freaks." "Not particularly. I'm chipping away at student debt still, otherwise... I'm kinda at the city's mercy. What do mutants do in New York, anyway? Besides get harranged by police?" His joking aside, Kevin truly didn't have a plan for his time in New York, however long it may be. "Don't know --?" Joshua prompts, his brows lifting curiously. "You looking to bump into other freaks, I'd think that's a good start." Kevin's question pulls his gaze back to the other man. His eyes linger for a moment on Kevin's pale face, odd features -- without judgment but with a certain intensity. "Hang out in the park, looks like," he eventually answers, "catch stray kippot. Didn't -- you say you grew up here?" "Oh, it is, but." Anahita does not trail off when she hesitates. Just stops briefly. "A man assaulted and threatened me there. I have reason to doubt anyone would hold him accountable for doing it again, and don't care to see anyone come to harm trying." In stark contrast to the flat delivery of that explanation, she sounds almost cheerful when she adds to Kevin, "We're talking about an all-mutant neighborhood in the Bronx, if you're not familiar with it already, and don't let me put you off checking it out. I had baggage with that particular man and did not handle it cautiously enough." Her smile is incredibly sincere. "I understand it's generally quite safe there. No cops allowed." "Yeah, but I wasn't the most social kid. Never really got into the mutant circles." Kevin raises an eyebrow at Anahita's explanation versus her recounting of events moments ago. "No cops is good. Assault...Less good." For a brief but visible moment Joshua's face is, regrettably, continuing its consistent betrayal of him -- he looks relieved when Anahita mentions getting assaulted in Freaktown. Just a moment, before his expression sags back down into its previous arrangement of jowly gloom. "Assaulted? Did you talk to I-- do you know Ion? Man would not," he sounds confident of this, "stand for that shit, if he knew. Very protective mayor." He is looking back to Kevin with a slow wrinkle of his brows, an uncertain dip of his head. "I don't know," he says -- far less confident -- "what the mutant circles are. Freaktown's exactly what it says on the tin, though." Anahita does not seem particularly put out by Joshua's evident relief at her misfortune. "Ion." The furrow in her brows is definitely thoughtful and not upset. "I think so. Exuberant biker? Amazing cook?" Another slight pause. "Mayor? I wouldn't like to put him in a difficult position, but I will ask." Her shoulders hitch obscurely beneath her stiff jacket. "And really, I shouldn't assume it's an isolated incident. One of his companions seemed surprised. The other, not." She inclines her head at Kevin again. "No community is perfect, and no person, either. It's can still be worthwhile, on whatever levels you engage with it." "Maybe I'll check it out. Would make for a good hideaway when my face melts." Kevin said this non-chalantly, rolling around the information he's been given on this 'Freaktown'. Not exactly the nicest sounding place, but being able to let his metaphorical hair down in a place seemingly run by mutants was appealing. He could go out in public without his human face and/or dressing like an 80s PSA drug dealer. "You said it's in the Bronx? Is there like a sign or something?" "Unelected," Joshua clarifies, with a warmer crinkle at his eyes. "Enthusiastically endorsed. Good man." He tucks his hands into his pockets, rocking a half-step back on a heel with a slow blink. The flat-low cadence of his voice hasn't much changed, though he's giving Kevin a curious once-over: "Melts?" His eyes skate up to the heavy clouds overhead, still pregnant with a threatening storm. "We talking like. Wicked witch." He's pulling one hand back out of his jacket pocket, bringing with it a folded black umbrella (... it's compact enough but still looks -- too big to have been in that pocket? Maybe the jacket is much roomier than it seems) that he offers to Kevin. "Put 'Freaktown' into Google Maps. There --" His brows knit as he considers this, before deciding, "are. A few signs." "The neighborhood is Riverdale, but." Anahita tilts her head, considering. "Some necessary changes have been made. It's hard to miss once you're nearby." She does not look particularly alarmed by the mention of melting faces. She does look more closely at Kevin's face for a moment. "They will offer any mutant a place to stay, food, basic medical care. Probably other things as well, I was only starting to find my feet there. It would be nice to go back." There is perhaps a shocking amount of wistfulness in her tone here. "Perhaps I will see you there," she tells Kevin. Then her gaze slides over to Joshua, thoughtful. "And you." "Oh right. My abilities let me temporarily take human form, but it's only for a coupla hours and doesn't work when I'm dog-tired, like right now." He takes the phone, doing as Joshua says and making a mental note of the route. "Cheers, good to know where a place like that is. Hopefully I see either of you two there some day."