* 𝑆𝐻𝐸'𝑆 𝑆𝑂 𝑴𝑬𝑨𝑵 !!

                        mabelle  is  smiling  at  him  and  it’s  just  like  old  times,  and  forrest  watches  her  affectionately.  it’s  bittersweet,  really,  her  coming  back  here.  he  wishes  it  was  for  him  that  she  returned,  as  selfish  as  that  sounds,  but  knows  that  the  secrets  of  the  town  tended  to  bring  all  wanderers  back  in  the  end.  he  shakes  himself  out  of  it,  and  snaps  photographs  away,  ten,  twenty,  fifty      –      eventually  giving  her  suggestions  of  where  to  look,  where  to  place  her  arm,  to  stop  smiling  as  that  wasn’t  her  instagram  aesthetic.  it’s  not  until  her  phone  beeps  at  him  that  he  stops  to  look  at  the  screen.                      ❝     damn.  sorry  to  ruin  the  photoshoot  but  seems  like  you’re  out  of  space  on  here.     ❞  

   it starts off rough at first, as most sketches do. there are lines that intersect each other at odd angles and other lines that don’t even connect. every drawing starts off as just shapes. and it progressed further, for sure. soon it was the shape of a woman looking down at her phone.

leon looks up at her and then back down at the paper several times in the process of marking it up. by the time the woman notices he’s looking, it’s not too shabby he’d say. for his ability at least. he was still learn-

ah, she noticed.

shit.

“sorry!” leon calls back. he raises the whole sketchbook, pointing the drawing at her. she’s probably too far to see it properly, but he’‘s trying to make it super obvious that he wasn’t just creeping to creep. “i was drawing you!”

she’s still on   the defense,    positively steaming at the idea that someone had been watching her from afar like some creep   (    something that unfortunately wasn’t uncommon in her line of work   )  and then he shows her the drawing,   detailed and so accurate,   lifelike that it makes her pause in her tracks.    oh.

         the air outside mikey’s would be crisp & clean, if the cig tucked between jons lips wasnt polluting it. another drag, eyes closing as the smoke fills his lungs. he isn’t sure why he keeps it up, besides the familiarity. if someone asked him, hed say it helped him feel less anxious. but that was a bigger lie than him sayin’ he was 5′10 on his tinder bio. 

           american spirits’ halfway burnt out but he isn’t any less worried. memories flood through his head and– god. he needs a distraction.

        stubs the rest of the ciggy on the cool brick behind him. throws it into the trash with an ingrained precision before wandering back in. 

        its kinda crazy the transformation his face takes. from gloomy, vagueish panic as his fingers wrap around the door handle, to dopey, cloudy smile while he walks back in. slides himself just next to another patron at the bar, calling the tender over. orders himself an old fashioned and slides his eyes over to the face just beside him.          “help a guy settle an argument. you come to mikeys for the beer or the food? cause when it comes to service, the bars pretty much on the ground.” yes that was the shittiest pun possible.

no hes not sorry.

@itlivesstarters​

mabelle’s hardly a   regular patron of the bar     --     it’s not quite her interest or aesthetic,     far too messy,    the exact definition of a dive bar but after losing out on the brand deal she’d hoped to land she needed a drink.    she’s already halfway through her second vodka cranberry when a figure slides into the bar,     not uncommon for this time of the night,     but then they slide into the seat beside her and speak to her.

she’s not quite used to being approached when she’s not all dolled up,    hair pulled into a messy low bun,   stuffing her face with nachos that she knows she’ll regret when she’s bloated tomorrow but right now sound like just what she needs and then the other patron speaks to her and it takes her a moment to realize that he means her.

@itlivesstarters

another day another body. this would be starting to seem comical if it wasn’t so fucking sad. this shouldn’t be the norm for their little town. shouldn’t be what people expect to see. the only thing that ever changed was which family got to hold the funeral that day.

the diner was uncharacteristically quiet. it always got like this when they found another body.  everyone was out at the scene of the crime, crowded around police tape, whispering among each other trying to figure out the identity of the deceased. it was because of this lack of business that leon got to take his lunch break early.

he had an hour. an hour to go to the scene, ask around, and know it wasn’t his dad they fished out of those woods. maybe he shouldn’t even waste his time. he’d take his lunch and go down to the lake instead. maybe do a few sketches of the trees and rocks and take his mind off it. it wasn’t gonna work but he had to try. needed a distraction.

when he got down there he set his food beside him on a bench and put a well-loved sketchbook and pencil in his lap. he was going to do some nature sketches but something about the person who was standing at the edge of the water, deep in thought, captured his eye. his hand almost couldn’t move fast enough as he put their appearance down on paper.

of course she’s   curious,     just as everyone else that flocks to the scene of the crime just as it typical any time a body’s been discovered or someone’s gone missing,     their last known whereabouts usually the edge of the woods or the lake.     of course she’d like to do some snooping herself,    but it’s not good for her image      --      or her mind.   

 and so mabelle chooses the lake instead.    far enough from the woods so that she won’t hear the sirens,     won’t see the flashing blue and red,    won’t hear the whispers of citizens who swear they know what happened.     she can clear her mind,    swipe through her phone,    and focus on setting up her feed for the next week.

she’s just started setting up for wednesday,     when she usually reserves her best photo for,    when she notices someone out of the corner of her eye.     at first she thinks nothing of it,    but then she casts a glance behind her and sees them looking at her.     a  shiver runs down her spine despite herself and mabelle rises,     moving to go confront them.

                      forrest  thinks  for  half  a  second  that  she’s  going  to  flee,  or  make  some  excuse  to  leave,  but  then  she’s  speaking  and  it’s  kinda  like  nothing  has  changed.  she’s  a  big  star  now  ( not  that  he  secretly  follows  her )  but  he  can  still  remember  her  goofy  laugh  when  she  really  finds  something  funny  and  her  big  toothy  smile  when  he’d  show  up  to  walk  her  to  her  next  class.  he  tuts,  faux  irritation,  and  then  he’s  taking  her  phone  from  her  and  waiting  for  her  to  get  into  position.                     ❝     still  as  bossy  as  ever,  i   see.     ❞  

     she  just  wanted  to  have  her  latte  in  peace  ;  aria  had  planned  on  taking  her  lunch  down  to  the  lake  and  having  a  peaceful  afternoon  but  instead  she  was  met  with  someone  she’d  much  rather  not  see  ,  let  alone  speak  to.  aria  lets  out  an  audible  sigh  at  the  question.  within  seconds,  a  smile  is  forced  on  her  lips   —-   the  last  thing  she  wants  is  to  start  anything.  and  then  an  idea  pops  into  her  mind.  “ sure, whatever. ”  aria  agreed  before  getting  into  position  to  take  the  photos.  each  picture  the  femme  had  taken  was  blurry and  unusable.  she  offered  one  last  fake  smile  while  handing  the  phone  back.  as  aria  turned  to  walk  away,  the  “smile”  dropped  instantly  and  her  eyes  rolled.  hopefully  mabelle  wouldn’t  look  at  the  photos  until  she  was  long  gone  … . .

mabelle’s hardly realized who she selected to be her person photographer until it’s too late and the other has her phone in her hand and beginning to snap pictures.     she immediately begins posing,    having been on this rodeo before,    and before too long aria has handed the phone back with a cheery smile.   mabelle’s confused,    thinks perhaps the other has buried the hatchet     --    until she scrolls through the photos and finds blurry photos,   all unusable for her page.    she fumes,    legs pumping as she treks after the other.    “hey    !!     hey  !!    look,    just    ...     talk to me. ”

amelle nodded as she listened to girls instructions, “ variety, okay – and lots of it, don’t worry i gotcha! ” she beamed, eager to impress as always she took a step back and she help up the girls phone. first taking a few portrait, and then landscape ( for variety! ), and then some more portrait again. carefully adjusting her positioning of the phone and taking steps side to side to make sure she got every possible angle; amelle confidently smiled at her work, handing the girls phone back with about fifty new images on it. “ oh, you look stunning! if these pictures don’t go viral then i give up on society - even more so than i already have, which is a lot. ”

mabelle’s posing along with the clicks of the camera,     finding an ease with this  ‘  shoot    ‘   that she doesn’t normally find,    even with those who typically take the photos for her.    after a little while it’s over,    and once amelle hands back her phone,    mabelle diligently swipes through her photos and is impressed with what she finds.    she looks back at amelle,    smiling brightly,    a great contrast with earlier.    suddenly,    she’s welcoming.   “oh,   these are perfect    !!    there’s no way these won’t be a big hit with my followers.    thank you   !!     do you have an instagram   ??    i’d love to tag you as my photographer.”

                       forrest  has  been  trying  to  give  her  space  since  she  came  back  to  town,  really  he  has.  since  she  left  to  become  this  big  social  media  star  he  figured  it  might  be  easier  to  forget  about  their  past  if  she  wasn’t  around  to  remind  him  about  it.  (  though,  mabelle  moon  didn’t  ever  really  have  to  try  to  be  on  forrest’s  mind  ).  he  pauses,  wondering  if  she’s  even  noticed  who  she’s  talking  to,  if  this  is  supposed  to  be  some  test  or  something,  but  he  ends  up  shuffling  closer  and  nodding  carefully  anyway.                     ❝    oh  no  princess  moon,  don’t  tell  me  your  entourage  didn’t  include  a  photographer  …  somebody  is  going  to  get  fired  now  i  bet.     ❞      

mabelle’s more than surprised to see forrest     --     well,   face to face,   as she’d seen him in little moments in town before he’d quickly ducked away out of her sight     --     and she’s even more surprised that she didn’t recognize him at first.    him,    someone she’d shared so many evenings with,    so many nights curled up in plush blankets,    whispering their hopes and dreams to each other.   “well.    you might if you don’t get to taking pictures.”    mabelle replies,   finding it easy to fall back into this with him   --   even after all these years,    after what she did.    mabelle swallows,   then moves to pose back against the wall,   knowing that he knows how to take the pictures.    after all,    he always takes her best photos.     or he used to.

after spending half the night up watching gaming live streams, amelle had been a little startled by the prominent shading of the circles under her eyes this morning. figuring getting a caffeine fix at no doze cafe would be the best course of action to take before heading to work, she went straight to it upon leaving her apartment. however before she could enter her attention was grabbed by another – “ me? ” amelle approached cautiously. “ oh, sure! any particular angles you want? head shot? full body? want me to get the full building in the background? oh my gosh, this is kinda a lot of pressure. ”

“honestly,   i probably need a variety   ...”    mabelle trails off,   seeming to think on it as she takes a look at her phone,   and then spares a glance behind her at the wall she’s situated herself at   --  tones of tan and grey sure to make her pretty, bright outfit pop.     “you know what   ??    just snap a bunch of pictures,   all kinds of them.    i can always pick which ones look best when i look over them later,    right   ??    right.”    she pushes her phone into the girl’s hand,   moving to lean back against the wall.  

♡    --   a small introduction to mabelle moon.

24 years old,  influencer.

mabelle has lived in town her entire life with her older brother and parents.

recently,  she moved away for a short time to pursue life as an influencer;  however,  she moved back in about a year ago.

mabelle is a rather popular influencer with around 100k followers.

she is rather vain,  focusing greatly on her appearance.

mabelle is closed off,  friendly to others but only genuinely close with very few people.

she fears what might be in the woods and lake,  but does not want to appear weak and so she denies it,  though secretly she believes something is amiss.