Logs:Right Here

Right Here
Dramatis Personae Joshua, Lily
In Absentia	2023-09-03 "You know how I learn -- I'll just copy you until I figure it out."
Location Tonsai Beach, Krabi Province, Thailand
The tide is coming in, waves lapping higher and higher up the brown-gold sand. On the other side of the towering limestone cliffs, probably there are other tourists enjoying the sunset from that bustling beach. This one is markedly quieter -- some climbers are wrapping up for the day under the cliffs, some laughter is traveling from a restaurant or a bungalow balcony. Here on the beach, there are hardly any vacationers left. Lily's still here, though, sprawled across her beach towel, climbing gear tucked away into the bag currently pressed into service as a seat back. She's in a loose sheer white tank over a blue bandeau swim top and navy board shorts, the tops of her shoulders still peeling from a sunburn days ago, the shape of her tattoos just visible under the cotton. Her hair, salted with sea spray and lighter from the sun, is tied into a mess of a bun atop her head. She's tanned some, here, some muscle definition creeping back into her willowy frame. There's an open bottle of Sang Som next to her, her slightly sandy glass just recently topped up with more booze and less soda than her first drink, some time ago. "-- what is," Lily is asking now, her speech only a little slurred when she rolls her head to look at her companion, "even on your bucket list. Is there anywhere you haven't gone. Yet. Have you been to. To." This takes a bit longer contemplation, eyes squinting at Joshua for a moment longer, before settling on the absurd -- "Euro Disney." "Haven't been -- a lot of where. World's big." Beside Lily, Joshua is sitting up on his own gear bag, dressed now in black and red board shorts and a quick-dry tank top. No sunburn, just a deep tan replacing his previous weeks of pallor. He has a bottle of Singha clutched between his hands, only half drunk. "... should I?" His brows furrow deep as he considers this, toes scrunching into the sand. "Do you want to go." He sounds slightly skeptical about this idea. "Hear Tokyo's a better park." "I don't know," comes at a delay, Lily's considering frown on her face long enough that it could be an answer to either question. "Never been. Never been to most wheres. Do you like Tokyo? Roller coasters? Spinny cup rides?" She lifts her drink to her lips, drinks deep. "Mostly want to keep going. Where, less important." "Tokyo's great. Very cool bookstores." Joshua's frown remains firmly etched in place. "Mmmn." He's silent for a beat, watching the waves lick against the shore. "World's big," he finally repeats. "You want to run, could probably run forever." Lily tips her head back, looking up into the sky. "Nah. Not forever. Just, maybe long enough to." To what? For a few breaths she's quiet; when she begins again that clause has been left behind. "Are you ready? Or, after your new year, will you be? Ready? For -- all of --" She gestures with the glass somewhere back along the beach, vaguely north, mostly west. "New York. Again." Left behind by Lily, maybe, but not Joshua, who rolls his head to the side. Quirks up a brow. "-- long enough to?" He digs his toes further under the sand, and the slow breath he blows out rings a low whistle across the lip of his bottle before his next swallow. "What's to be ready for? New York doesn't change." Lily leans her head up just enough for another sip, just enough to be able to stare out over the water. Presses her heels deeper into the sand at the edge of her towel. "Long enough," comes at length, "to know why I'm staying, this time." She turns over her free hand, palm up, before bringing it to press against her glass. "I've changed. You've --" Lily glances at Joshua again, brow furrowing. "-- I don't know, actually. Maybe you haven't." She sounds a touch doubtful, gaze dropping to his chest for a moment and then away again. This just gets a slow nod, at first. "Paris," Joshua finally says, quite solemnly, "will make you want to get back to New York." He isn't looking at Lily now but back out over the water, forefinger tapping slowly at his bottle. "I stayed for the team. Guess that's done with." If this thought is either disappointing or exciting to him, it doesn't show, just a slow consideration to his words. "Who've you changed into?" Lily lets out a quiet huff of breath, the corner of her lips twitching upwards. "Don't know, exactly." Lifts her glass up for another sip, but does not actually drink. "Tch. There are better ways to have an identity crisis. I could shave my head." She taps a short, ragged nail against her glass, slowly coming in time with Joshua's rhythm. "What are you going to stay for, now?" "Who do you want to change into, then?" Joshua's brows furrow again. "Not sure I am staying." This comes after slow consideration, as does: "... dunno what staying means. Could get an apartment in Tel Aviv or Berlin or Buenos Aires and still never be late for a NYCAM meeting." "How's the rent in Tel Aviv?" Lily's head tilts to one side, then back with a small shake. "That sounds like staying, to me. If you did still come. Just a different commute." This time she does drink, deep enough to finish the rum. "... Lily, I suppose. Not his sister, not the eldest, not a doctor, not a collaborator, not a spy. Just --" Her power flexes through this, reaching for some impossible pattern in the empty air. "-- someone who can just be, without having to be useful." She peers down through the sand on the bottom of her empty drink. "...Alternatively, someone who is more drunk." "-- Cheaper than Manhattan, but that bar's in hell." Joshua's eyes cant to the side, and Lily's now-empty bottle. One corner of his mouth twitches. "Gonna be that second, soon enough." He's not hurrying his beer any. He rotates his wrist slow, and taps the bottle idly against his knee. "Win the lottery, might manage the first." "Without having to be useful all the time," Lily amends, with a light roll of her eyes, "I heard capitalism still gives out one day off every so often." She's eyeing the empty bottle, put out by its betrayal, before she sets her glass down beside it. Scoots down her towel so her head is resting on the bag. "Without hurting anyone else," is a smaller addition to this portrait of Aspirational-Lily. She looks away from Joshua's arms with a slow roll of her head, up towards the darkening sky. "-- don't think we have the kind of luck you need for the lottery." "We?" Joshua's brows hitch upward. "I like being useful. Don't plan to stop." His mouth twists to the side, and he starts to lift his bottle but then lowers it again undrunk. "... different, I guess. Feeling like you have to be." "I like -- some kinds of being useful, I think." Lily frowns at the sky. "Used to like. Still want to be?" The edges of her words are not getting more slurred, but the pauses between words, the breaths of commas and stops, are becoming more pronounced. "So much has been -- having to be, yeah. You never feel like that?" There's doubt in Lily's inflection, and maybe just a touch of envy. This question takes some evident contemplation -- at least, Joshua is silent even longer than usual, scrunching his toes down until the sand has all but covered his feet. "Used to." When he finally replies his gaze has gone a bit distant, off over the water. "I know my worth, now. Got noone else to prove it to. I don't stay in situations that make me doubt that." His fingers have tightened around his bottle, but his grip eases as he takes another small swallow. "... wish that was a lesson I knew how to pass on." Lily pushes some sand towards Joshua's feet -- she's helping! "Well." Her voice lightens a touch. Maybe the last of the rum is hitting her system, maybe it's the twinkle of the first stars slowly becoming visible. Maybe it's Joshua's presence that's easing her mind -- there's no sharp fear-worry flash in her eyes, ever-present through the first days of this trip, when she looks up at him, but even without that step Lily seems reassured to find him there. She pats the sand (and just the sand) down over one foot. "You know how I learn -- I'll just copy you until I figure it out." It's a moment longer before Joshua's eyes tic out of their faraway stare to glance back to Lily, but when he does look back at her it's with a faint twitch of almost-smile. "S'a skill I stole from someone first, so. Fair enough." When their eyes meet Lily does smile, small but pleased. Pats the sand a little bit more firmly down before pulling her hand away. "Hope they don't mind someone borrowing it again." There's a fainter curiosity in her inflection, but no pressure -- she's busy digging her own pointed feet into the sand, anchoring herself, however temporarily, to this shore. "Feel like it's the kind of thing meant for passing along." The mound of sand tamped down over Joshua's feet wiggles briefly, though he doesn't yet disrupt it by moving any more. He looks down at it mournfully as he finally finishes his beer. "This means you gotta fetch the next booze." "Hah." The next flex of Lily's power does have a direction, changing her mutation to fit the relief impression of Joshua's genes. She disappears -- -- and returns just a moment later, two chilly beers in hand. She hands over one, not bothering to hide the blossom of relief on her face when Joshua is Exactly where she left him. Roots her feet back in the sand, taps the neck of her bottle against his. "You don't got to go anywhere." "Don't worry," is all that Joshua says, clinking his bottle lightly back against hers. "Got no plans to."