#axed.start

the lake water isn’t exactly refreshing as it is fucking-cold-as-balls but hector is hollering like it’s the most exciting thing in the world, jumping off of the dock into the dark lake. surfacing up, hector rolls his eyes at the other still standing on the dock. “come on in, water’s fine!” he lies, goading them on with a smug smile before his stare turns mockingly suspicious, “what, you really think those cult freaks are still at the bottom? are ya scared?”

despite it being officially spring and the fact that it was supposed to be her vacation, the air drifting off of the lake was incredibly cold. wrapping the sweater tighter around her shoulders, lisa’s eyes squinted as they scanned the water, half-expecting something to jump out of it the more she scrutinized it. hearing footsteps behind her, lisa glances behind her and sighs deeply at the other. “i don’t know why they call it crescent lake. looks more like a kidney bean, really.”

“no. no, nothing like that.” mila shook her head as her smile broadened--a breathy laughter accompanying the words. “i’m not like a ... journalist or anything. i mean, hopefully, this’ll be published--someday--but as a part of my doctoral thesis, so sort of a niche audience.” in her experience, people didn’t really want to know once she got into too much detail. usually people preferred to tell their own brushes with horror and she was eager to record them. “i’m hoping to get a more personal history of crescent lake while i’m here. you know, you or your family memories. or just things that have raised your hackles.” now that the conestoga was starting to empty out, she hoped someone would take her up on the querie--a couple beers in made even the most reserved townies verbose in her experience. “i can look up facts, but there’s no richness in that history. it’s the town’s memories--their little legends--that warrant preservation as much as the facts, don’t you think?”

it didn’t matter anyway, because now that she was out and standing inside the crescent lake lanes, she was honorbound to either buy a can of hamms or pbr and watch the bowling league wannabes work on their perfect games, or figure out which shoe size she wore in bowling shoes and play a game by herself--both of which made her seem more desperate than she cared for. with how busy it was, neither looked particularly likely as the attendant seemed to overlook her raised hand every time ( either conspiratorially with conne pryzbylewski  to ruin her night or, more likely, on accident among the fray ). sidling up next to another solitary patron at the counter, nancy tried her luck and cleared her throat. “uh, hey, so do you know what the conversion on sizes is for bowling shoes? the last time i came here, i think i had light-up sneakers.”

it wasn’t her nature to get riled up over a joke, but she was still shaken about the rearranged furniture in her living and dining room that had been some kind of strange, unexplained piece of the break-in. at first she had even attributed it to her mom--a woman who was often so drunk she’d wear a constellation of bruises from myriad unexplained events. sighing in annoyance, joey rounded the corner to the parking lot. “are you really having car trouble or was that bullshit too?” she’d heard it from some other patron of the diner, so she didn’t even know if it was true, but she had some jumper cables in her car.”