#nancyedrew

❝      you’re   nancy,   right   ?     n͟a͟n͟c͟y    d͟r͟e͟w     ?      ❞      i   stretch   my   hand   out   towards   her,   it’s   littered   with   smudged   notes   —   i   left   my   notebook   at   home.   a   slight   tinge   of   humiliation   colours   my   insides   —      being   seen   as   a   kook   is   embarassing   enough,   i   don’t   need   to   look   unprepared,   too.            ❝      i’m   seren.   francine   called   me   up   here,   i   think   she’s   the   daughter   of   the   estate   owner.      ❞

❝   what   –    ❞    he wasn’t immune to pain.   he blow  stings.  it pierces through his skin and makes a genuine groan echo in his throat as something terribly akin to  agony  washes through him.   a process that lasts only a  moment.    though pain may be mighty,  it cannot be greater than the power of his  confusion.   what the hell was sticking out of his chest?  

benoit looks down at the wooden stake,  frown prominent on his face as he pokes it once,  then twice with  regret,  as the movement causes him to wince.    ❝    did you just  …   ❞   slowly,  he looks up at his offender with  affront  settling in his eyes.    ❝  did you just fucking  stake  me?!   ❞   still standing,  still breathing and still perfectly in control of his faculties,  the detective speaks to his counterpart with the same amount of offence one was due when someone ruined something precious they possessed,  like a  vase  or a  collector’s item.  in this case,  it was his chest.  when his voice rises,  it’s with due reason.   ❝   are you  OUT OF YOUR MIND?!  ❞

          Wings grow tired, sick and ill and weary from flight,  more withered now as what may very well be a direct result of the slight given her by her dear companion.  Exhaustion simmers to anger,  a consuming fury that nearly rips her apart at the seams.  Might she turn red by the way she fumes!  A trick,  on her?  

          It should be understood that fairies are clever beasts,   but awfully prone to misunderstandings   (some more cynical scholars may relate it as malicious twisting of words,  willful confusion)    –––    darling Tink,  filled with malice?  Her heart quivers at the thought.  She misunderstands with all the sincerity in the world,  believing Nancy’s words to suggest that she was fully set on playing some terrible trick on a poor,  defenseless pixie;   one thrust out of her element, at that,  having found herself in the backyard of a terribly curious young girl whose keen eye proved a fateful match for Tink’s own poor skill in disguise.

           Brows knit furiously together as she flits from one shoulder to the other,  expending the little remaining energy she might hold,  arms crossed and stare deadly.  Well,  as deadly as a creature as small as a feather may be.  With the strength of an ant she stomps her feet against Nancy,  a string of unflattering insults escaping her in rapid form,  albeit only in the incomprehensible language of the fae  (sounding out in a wondrous, cacophonous chorus of bells).     ❝  ✦ *゜✧⋆⁺˚｡　・✧ *゜゜・． *✧⋇  –––– !    ゜゜....   ✦ *゜✧ ! ❞

IN BROAD DAYLIGHT, EVEN HORROR CAN BE A CANDY - COLOURED DREAM. / @nancyedrew

Here, on this suburban street, where in the small hours of the morning, a terrible crime had been committed, the colours of the world shone beautifully. The sun had risen impossibly quick that morning, as if eager to paint the scene in the most luminous light possible. Each house that lined the street seemed a pretty pastel colour, each painted to perfection and maintained with a tenacity that showed in the details of perfected imperfections. Tall old elms stood watch on either side of the street, their leaves a lush, rich green. It was all gorgeous. The yellow lane lines dotting the asphalt, the cheerful orange of a child's front yard playhouse, the red blood splashed across a sky - blue fence, the crisp white of the corpse's sheet covering. Luminous, indeed, but not blinding. Not even close.

The pair of them stood at the end of this street, faces hidden behind stylish shades. No one that bustled about the crime scene had yet to notice them; no one who lingered at their living room windows to watch the scene unfold cared to look at them twice. It was a careful equilibrium, this state of quiet, unbothered existence, fragile as a bubble blown on a mild summer day. As soon as they breached an unseen line that, for now, separated them and the officers ahead, no one would become everyone. Everyone would notice them; everyone would look at them twice, maybe even thrice.

THERE'S BEEN A MURDER IN HELL'S KITCHEN.   so daredevil follows.

the police report had detailed the SPLAY of the body.   limbs akimbo.   a JANE DOE,   mid to late twenties,   gored to a fault.   not the first.   still developing an MO,   maybe.   MS. DREW  is a pattern,   but if she did it,   the waft of her perfume covers any leftover markers of the scene.   the only thing left is how stubbornly she stays.   crouching on the windowsill,   he waits for the sound of her to fade out into the sea of screechy humanity playing out before them.   three stories of warehouse,   abandoned when he arrived,   the heavy scent of someone else's death still hanging in the air.   now there's one too many in the room,  crowding the trail he still needs to follow.  

❝     QUIET.   I'M—       ❞        working.   stepping off the windowsill,   offering no explanation,   he throws his senses down into the slough,   rips the glove off his hand,   presses his fingertips across the wood of the decrepit furniture.   faint traces of blood,   long since dried even as the grit catches on the microscopic lines on his fingers.  

on the back end of midnight he knows he casts broad shadows;  at least,  he imagines it,  pricks his ears to the bang - bang - bang of a heartdrop or two,   sets his shoulders wide enough to carry the weight of someone else's sour-tasting fear.   now he slides loose in the black night, acts of violence curling out of the streets gone rancid with garbage,  gunpowder,  wet fists opened and closed.   it's always a second too late like this,  but he does it anyways,  swinging his radar wide.   listening.   waiting.

❝   what now?  are you gonna try to set me on  fire?  i can tell you right away,  i’ll be  very cross  if you do.  ❞    there’s a jest hidden somewhere underneath the syllables he utters,  mixed up with the stored  revolt  that still lingered from their last encounter where she thought to greet him with a stake.    ❝  i hope this is a  social  call,  drew.   or a case you'll  give me freely.  you’ve still a got to  make up  for with me. ❞