Lady Lake

JAX RIVERS

32 years old, cis-female (she/her), employee at Alby’s

WANTED CONNECTIONS

Someone to love. Someone who has no idea who she really is. 

Someone who has seen her before 2015, when she was found with no memory, but has no idea who she is, just wants to help.

You hate George Alby, she trusts him, but you are able to give her an argument she can’t get around.

FUTURE PLOTS

Learning to hate George Alby. 

You’ve known about Jax since she was found, and you’ve done your own research, you’re just afraid of how she’ll react when you share with her what you know.

PLOTS IN THE WORKS

OPEN STARTER anywhere!

     "I’M TELLING YOU, I SAW THEM!” sef asserts with the utmost sense of urgency as he tries to convince the other of what he witnessed. “those CITA guys parker their van and pulled out a body bag from the back – that, or they just had a heck ton of laundry they wanted to get rid of.”

Jax made a slightly annoyed and angry face, though she wasn’t sure why, probably because she didn’t like how Sef could be certain about one thing, and then completely backtrack in the same sentence. “Or you’re just making it up. Why would they have a body bag.” 

“Whoa, careful!”

His free hand covered hers where it had latched onto his arm. There was hardly a second to reconcile that someone had just bumped into his person - a feat that much later strike him as strange for the simple fact that this town was small, the population smaller, and the one thing they had in abundance here was room to move around without colliding into anyone, this was not Rio in the middle of Carnival - but there was not a moment to consider any of this before the street was littered with her things.

“Dangerous is one word for it,” he answered, chuckling. He was struck by the sudden thought, a wonder, if that was what Gram might have liked more than the fanciful presents Freddie had given. Something dangerous. He crouched down, and gently picked up a wide, squarish bottle. “Oh, sugar scrub! Do you mind if I - ”

He did not wait for an answer before opening the bottle. He smelled it.

“Hm, apricot. Was your bag new too?”

Jax looked surprised when one of her favourite items was snatched from the ground and opened up right in front of her. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to be mad or if she didn’t feel about it. Maybe she should. She hadn’t even smelled it herself yet. She sat down on her hunches and picked up all the items in her hands. 

“No, it was just some discard item,” she noted, then pointed at the bottle with a finger. “Can I have that back? I like the bath items.” 

Jax pressed the huge warm plushie Christmas tree to her chest, she didn’t get much else from the Christmas morning gettogether at the Alby’s. Something she didn’t need, some jewelry she didn’t use - and would probably sell by the end of the year - and a whole lot of shower items. She loved the shower items. The bag at her side was heavy, hitting her leg with every step she took. She tried to readjusted it, her head disappearing behind the plushie for a moment, when the distraction resulted in her bumping into someone. “Sorry!” She said, quickly reaching out to grab the other’s arm with her free hand. “Some of these christmas gifs can be dangerous.” As if on cue, her bag of shower items split and the contents fell to the snowy floor.

Of the people who’ve mentioned being contacted by that mysterious caller, most, if not all of them, are convinced that it was a ghost. As much as he wants to be open to the possibility that things like that can and do happen, it feels like a too-convenient response to things that are a little more difficult - but not impossible - to explain.

And why would anyone willingly believe something that very clearly upsets them? He can see that the mere thought of it is distressing to Jax. If only he could offer another explanation to soothe their worries, but he’s barely just scratched the surface of his own investigation on the haphazard radio signals; how can he hope to have any answers for this?

“What do you think it wants?” Because it must want something, right? If it were truly a ghost, it can’t just be dialing people’s numbers willy-nilly. There has to be a reason.

“Help,” Jax concluded. It was the conclusion she had come upon right away. It wanted help, so it reached out to as many people as possible in the hope someone would be capable of helping. “Help it knows only the living can provide, or it still thinks it’s among the living,” she added. She looked back at him. “You don’t believe it’s a ghost,” she stated.

“No, no, no,” Tariq’s head shook, a hand waving through the air somewhat dramatically, “you’ve got nothing to apologize for. Those phone calls are kind of the big talk of the town after all.” It was silly of him to think just because he was with the department he was the only one who heard anything about it; certainly it was the ‘hot goss’ whispered behind backs with wild theories flying this way and that. 

He was curious about this theory, though. With how many people had dismissed the call(s) as nothing more than pranks Tariq had simply been focusing on an angle like that - but this wasn’t the first time someone who had received a call had believed maybe there had been more to it than that. Claimed that it was someone who needed help. 

But in both cases, the decision had been made not to do anything.

“What made you decide to ignore it?” He asked, before realizing maybe he should clarify that statement. “I’m not blaming you, or anything like that. Just curious - if you thought it was someone that needed help, what made you decide not to?” There were of course people out there that simply didn’t care about others - but Jax didn’t strike him that way. Besides - guilt implied they felt maybe they should’ve done something more, reflecting back. So there had been something in the moment that leaned them one way versus the other. 

Jax nodded and took a deep breath, though she didn’t believe him. If anyone came up to her nagging about Alby or Alby’s, she would damn well think she deserved her rest outside of work. But it wasn’t that easy when you were a cop, certainly not if people were concerned. And right now, she knew people were. “Uhm,” Jax shrugged. “It didn’t feel right, like I was listening in on a conversation that wasn’t meant for me.” She tried to explain. “And when I was called the second time, I worried it might be meant for me after all, but that I couldn’t recognise the voice because it wasn’t part of me right now, maybe someone from before.” She shivered a little. “It made me feel so bad that I decided I shouldn’t be trying to help if I didn’t know enough about it. And… you know despite my case still being… well, I trust that you and the other police will solve it.”

“And yet, everybody seems to accept it like it’s nothing. Or, even more likely, they no longer consider it to be something outstanding.” It was odd to think that just years ago, it was a natural feeling. That the otherwordly feeling was welcoming, and even expected; only for it to be completely gone now. A small smile lingered on Chase’s face for a brief moment before it was gone once more, along with the memories, and she once more focused on the woman in front of her.

“Pretty soon.” She admitted, not even bothering to check her watch. It was easy for her to concentrate on such small things, like Des’ pick up times; it helped her deal with everything else. The world really was all about those small, baby steps, which she hoped were towards recovery. “If you want to, sure. The walks back are always awkwardly quiet, I wouldn’t mind a change.”

Jax nodded, remembering the stares she always got, the knowledge people had about her, knowing her, remembering where she came from, or lack of any home. Sometimes she could move about town and feel almost normal, even if at the back of her mind she would always project her own insecurities on those around her. The Lake Lady, it was so easy to fall back into it. “Maybe on a day to day basis, people are just too busy living their lives, and it’s in those small moments when we don’t have too much responsibility that we pause to think about it,” she suggested. To her it was a daily thought, a daily pull towards the lake. 

But she could understand if others rarely gave it a moment.

“Yeah…” Ellery breathed out the word as a sigh, not really sure what she was supposed to do at this point. Certainly hauling back soaping wet and blackened clothing wasn’t really an option. Did she just keep it going and hope it worked itself out? Or maybe just throw it in the drier as is? None of the options seemed particularly…great. 

“Is your place funky?” She asked before her eyes skirted over to the woman beside her. “I mean - I came here because the water seemed weird at my place and I didn’t really think too much about it but now it’s here too - is it like, the whole town?” 

And if it was the whole town - or really even part of the town - what the fuck was it? 

“You think it’ll like…just wash out if I keep it going…”

Jax shook her head. “No, my place is normal… I think.” She still had to get her phone back, meaning she had no idea if her landlord had noted any black water at home. “Do you live close? Could be the local water supplies, it’s a small town, things like this go wrong all the time,” she noted. Though she hadn’t seen this type of water run through the pipes before. “We should probably call the owner, they can come fix it.” 

She stared at the other woman. “Maybe stop it? I can’t imagine it will get better… it might just get worse.”

“Jesus!” KJ winced, emerging from the woods like a hulking shadow. As usual, he was hoisting a box around, moving things here and there about the lake and docks to begin the winterizing process (which really should have begun weeks prior). He furrowed up his brow, regarding Jax from some distance, cocking his head to one side. “Am I…interrupting something?”

At one time, this question may have come cruelly, with an edge. But KJ himself seemed somehow deflated now, and the query carried a glint of sincerity. 

Jax’s face jerked around to look at KJ, her mind having recognised his voice before the thought of his presence could’ve been fully processed, wild eyes staring at him as she thought of their previous encounters. But she wasn’t angry, anger was about the last emotion she felt in the pit of her stomach. Grief and sadness and constant worrying much more present in her small frame. “No, I was just finishing up,” she said, as if she was standing at Alby’s, doing the last of the work before she could go home.

Edris had the day off - and by that, as the only paramedic firefighter at the station, and the captain to boot – her black 2017 Chevrolet Colorado had been outfitted to be used as a non-transporting EMS vehicle. Given the small-town nature of Pleasance, she and the fire captain were the only paid members in the department with the rest being volunteers. They…weren’t needed too often.

The problem was the water. Sure, in a pinch she’d use it to put out a fire but drinking? cleaning wounds?

She sat down by the lake, pondering the water in front of her when she heard a scream. She jumped to her feet - or tried to, but pushing back to two legs required effort when one leg was a prosthetic. Still, standing and able, she looked over. “Jax,” she called out, “you’re gonna get the bobcats all riled up if you keep screaming like that.” She carefully maneuvered over from her spot. Her two full-grown dogs, walking next to her while the puppy scampered through mud, allowed her to balance easier on the rough terrain. “You okay? The water issue bothering you?”

The scream made Jax feel a bit more normal, a bit more powerful, as if she could rid her body off the horrendous feeling if she just let it out. She blinked when she heard a voice near her, turning to face Edris. She felt a little awkward being seen like that, but then again, she often felt awkward being seen, she enjoyed being invisible too much. She looked at the big dogs and the puppy, then back to Edris. “I’m sorry,” she said quickly, no other words coming to her, and at the question she nodded. At the mention of water her body felt heavier again, like she could just fall forward and plunge into the deep waters. “I feel sick.”

When: Early Friday morning (*ehem* before Bishan closes the place down shh) Where: Bleachers Laundromat Who: open !

Okay, so she hadn’t thought too much about it when the water in the apartment ran a funny color. There were crazier things, the pipes were probably backed up (ugh, she didn’t even want to think about that though - backed up with what? Where? Why though? How did water supplies actually work? She liked to think it by magic but obviously – wait, she was getting side tracked).

So she’d ended up at the Laundromat, tossing her clothing into the washer because she was simply that far behind on laundry day, slipped the necessary coins into the machine, and started it up. 

She watched through the little window as the items started swirling around within, though only a moment later did it go…so very wrong. Sure, she had plenty of black clothing - but not everything in there was black. And certainly not enough to color the water entirely…

Ellery jabbed a finger at the button to stop the cycle and stared into the window a little forlornly. She might be new-ish around here, but that can’t possibly be normal. 

“This might be a strange question,” she remarked as she reached out to still the hand of the person beside her that was just about to start loading their own laundry. “But I haven’t stepped into some alternate dimension where the water is supposed to be inky, right?” 

Jax had always been allowed to use the laundry machine at home, the person she lived with were very welcoming and had always told her that it was fine with them. Only Jax didn’t feel okay doing so, so she always went out to get her laundry done, take a few moments to sit down and read a book or the paper or mindlessly scroll on the internet. 

She didn’t have much, some of the work clothing she was allowed to give to George and he would make sure it was neatly washed and pressed by her next workday. He didn’t seem to trust her with that task, but she was fine with that. 

She had her whole load in her arms when a voice caught her attention. She dropped the clothing back into the basket and walked over. “No... it shouldn’t be,” she said, looking at the machine that was pumping out water after being stopped mid-wash. “Uhm... that’s not normal,” she suggested. 

  “If the calls are messages from the great beyond, I don’t want to be on the lower end of the stick, right? I usually pride myself on being a supernatural preference.” Hannah was not so far removed from reality, to think that her logic was perfectly sound - but was simply at peace, with the fact most wouldn’t believe it was. “That’s the best part of Pleasance, to me; finding things that aren’t right, and figuring out why.” She’d offer for Jax to join her mystery squad (a solo venture, presently) but Jax was bound to a mystery more pressing; her own. “Circles give us power, I think; or at least, they’re my foundation. What’d you say your favorite color is?” 

 To summarise her spiritual path without making Jax fall asleep, was a challenge for Hannah - if brevity was the soul of wit, she was indeed a fool in Shakespeare’s eyes. “I pray to many things, really - one god, but many vessel’s. And well…us Yelley’s created our own path long ago. Don’t worry though, I’m not trying to give u a lake side spiel.” She holds out the container of coffee, her gaze still happily trained upon the lake. “The lake can be cruel, but I think that’s the nature of water - it takes as much as it gives. You’re here for a reason, though. I can feel it.” Hannah couldn’t help but prophesies - it was who she was. “KJ was probably trying to pull your leg - but he is right. Lakemen, Pleasance Lake monster, we’ve got it all - if we were in any other part of the U.S., I bet we’d be swarming with paranormal hunters. Probably a tv show? The Pleasance Files.” 

Supernatural preference. Jax stared at her as if she was a stranger, she was, but a strange stranger. Someone who happened to walk into your life only to make it more confusing and then walk out without ever offering answers. That was how she felt around Hannah. She dropped her head a little when Hannah mentioned wanting to solve mysteries. She didn’t want to, not anymore, her own life was such a mystery that half of the type it gave her a headache. She wanted freedom from it. Though she didn’t know what that looked like since she was the mystery. “Blue,” she said. Like the water. That was... interesting but true. 

Jax was feeling weird, odd even, she wasn’t sure what she was feeling, but all of it was wrong and right at the same time. She shook her body, trying to wake up, but it didn’t work. She couldn’t, she was in a daze, in a haze, completely lost to herself. 

“I like to think of it as a delicate balance. It depends a little on the day as far as the amount of cream and sugar might go, but for the most part I think I’ve gotten it down to a pretty good science.” His hands lifted in a model of weighing two sides. “But then it also depends on if I’m going to get anything with it, because that might tweak the formula a little. If I’m going to get a sweet side, maybe I’ll need less sweet in the cup. Or maybe not.” 

“A caramel donut…” Tariq echoed, pondering the concept off adding one of those to his own order, though her next words put a damper on the mood. Breakfast with a side of work, then.

Not that he was surprised, it was certainly at the forefront of most folks minds right now…

“That’s confidential,” he said, though the tone was somewhat sarcastic. “But no, still looking into leads.”

Nodding, Jax considered if she had an exact science, but too often she just threw some sugar in and accepted the taste, whether it was good, good enough, or too much, she would rarely fill it up again. When it was too much it was ruined already, so that didn’t matter. “You should like you’ve been drinking coffee for a long time,” she said. Jax figured her past-self hadn’t much liked caffeine, she hadn’t felt a craving for it, she just accepted whatever drink was placed in front of her. 

Q had a different view of the town - but then, the people that he had grown up as elders were starting, or had already, passed away. Now he was nearing the point where he was stepping into that position for the younger group of people. “The cat?” he asked, going along with the previous train of conversation before he looked to Kane. He whistled once and pointed down - the dog laid down, another hand gesture,a quick quirk of his wrist, and the dog crawled forward, a motion to stop, then retreat back before sitting back up. “You get the idea,” he said. He had worked hard with Kane to ensure that he could take the dog into the field with him, not as a trained K-9 officer but as a search and rescue dog. “He knows the same commands but with sounds,” Q explained, calling for Kane who trotted forward to receive his praise and the toy that he liked to chew on. Q gave real thought to what Jax asked him. ruminating as some would say. “Growin’ up,” he said, picking his words carefully, “there was always one tv show or another with a boy an’ his dog goin’ out an’ havin’ adventures. If you haven’t noticed, there’s not a lot of people my age in town - at least not those that want me around – adoptin’ Kane gave me someone to focus on, take care of –” and because he lived by the motto of people won’t know that seeking help is a good thing to do unless it’s normalized in society Q admitted – “an’ my therapist thought me havin’ a dog would give me an outlet for my caretaker drive or somethin’. To be honest, I didn’t get much listenin’ done with her prior to trustin’ her, and the adopt Kane bit was around the trust time.” It might be oversharing - or not. “Anyway - I’ll take care of this for you, an’ I’ll give it back if it’s clear. Give me a couple of days?”

Jax smiled a little until she found some pang of guilt for smiling at a dog doing tricks for cookies, something about it felt… wrong. Even though she knew it was socially acceptable. She often wondered if she was the same, doing tricks just to have some feeling of being acceptable. She often wished she was living more, doing stuff for herself. She watched Kane with his toy and felt jealous of that playful nature. To be enjoying something without question. “He’s well trained,” she decided to say, not sure what the right compliment was for a dog who knew tricks. 

Chase shrugged lightly, not really sure how to answer first. Would telling the truth ever be socially acceptable? “I’m fine.” She lied eventually; what else was supposed to be said? She wasn’t out there, trying to tell anyone her life story. She simply wasn’t willing to, not when it hurt her to even start talking about it.

“Fair enough.” She couldn’t argue about that, and instead, she offered a smile. “Sometimes, this place feels like it’s just another world, doesn’t it? Like we’ve entered another universe overall.” It surely felt like that when she was a child, and it was a welcoming, warm feeling. Now, Chase was here, wanting it back. “You could always move through the less populated streets.” Chase frowned a little then, at the mere question. Did she want to go back? “I think. I need to pick my son up soon.”

Jax nodded in return, where her answer had been true, Chase’s was a lie, obviously. She could see all the small lines on her face, as if unsure of the question, unsure of the truth. She didn’t try to get a full answer from her however, that would be unkind, and Jax never wanted to be unkind. Honest, real, present, that was what she wanted to be. That was what the lake had given her, a chance to be that. To be. A lake that had taken all she was from her, and also returned her her life. 

Tariq was somewhat familiar with Jax’s story. After all, it wasn’t so often that a body showed up on the edge of a lake (still breathing) with no recollection of who they were once they woke. Particularly the fact that she hadn’t been claimed by anyone in town was a it’s own strange little twist to the story itself. An outsider showing up in Pleasance and staying a while? He supposed maybe Jax just didn’t have anywhere else to go. 

‘Lady Lake’ as she’d so been dubbed had definitely been quite a story for a long time, though that had fizzled out over the years as Jax became just another face among the Pleasance natives. While Tariq himself hadn’t been super closely involved in her case he certainly was familiar with it, with her, regardless.

“Classic. I like it,” Tariq gave a nod and a gentle smile. “And something along side it, I think that’s smart. People who just have a cup of coffee on it’s own without anything else in the morning - I dunno, I feel like my stomach can’t handle that. I need a little something to soak it up or whatever. You know?” 

Jax offered a small smile. “Yes, I agree. It’s… coffee by itself is a bit too much, somehow having something alongside it makes it easier to swallow. Even if I already sweeten up my coffee,” she said. She rubbed her hands together, and took another look at the menu, then stared back at Tariq. “I’m going to have a caramel donut,” she informed him, then bit the inside of her mouth. “Have they figured out who called people yet? I gave my phone to Q,” she added.