SEPIA & SOILED-MUDDIED.

Cora smiles patiently and waits until the boy looks okay again before she starts to speak again, “Just that this figure, she’s extremely old. Her date is carved on the bottom, all the way to 1910,” she repeated, with less detail. “Are you looking for something in particular?” 

task 1

@traditionale​ : Matthew

“Well what a turn out…” Glancing at the flyer, she moved closer to the boy in desperation about a lost dog, which was the only reason Adriana would be up so early on a day like this. “I came for the dog, the dog only. Where did you last see it? Did it just ran off? Are you a bad owner, is that why the dog decided to run away?… You know what, who cares? It’s probably lonely and cold and we better go and look for the damn dog right now.” With a hand resting on her hip, an eyebrow was raised in a bit of a judgemental stare. After all she had a soft spot for animal and mother nature and she couldn’t help to wonder why would the dog run away, and if by any means it was due to some sort of negative reasons the person in front of her better be good at running.

it’s CONTRADICTORY. how the months pass, putting more space between how they were and how they are now, and yet sawyer’s struggle in KNOWING only amplifies with each day. it’s easy to calculate how to act post a break-up. but they weren’t there anymore. nowadays it was more post the post break-up  —  and that’s where she faltered. you weren’t supposed to be friends with your exes  ( lesson learned )  but cutting ties altogether was more daunting than anything.  “  oh, i haven’t seen it.  „  more rom-com than action, more cultured with lou than single.  “  anything john travolta post-grease is just… like, really upsetting.  „  her first crush, persisting to this day  —  how couldn’t she mourn his fall from grace?  “  it’s kinda like his face melted or something… but i guess that made him a top candidate for that one.  „

      not quite friends but far from strangers, wading in the limbo between. though there’d been a walk that felt like it, companionship -- -- her small talk a comfort in the moments before he’d get tangled in her gaze and have to unstick himself and put on a class-act where he finds interest in the toes of his scuffed converse instead of her. he sees her in his periphery, and the words that line the back cover of the dvd case become white noise to his heartbeat and the effort it takes to not look over. too late. ‘   hey.   ’ he sputters out, lips tweaking slightly. he flippantly waves the dvd in the front of him, reading the title out casually as though he hadn’t just been studying it for the past five minutes. ‘   face-off. apparently nicolas cage and john travolta switch faces and it’s really gnarly.   ’

        depending on his mood, sometimes he doesn’t mind the music they play at the rink. other days, headphones will sit snug over his ears, the volume loud enough to ensure premature hearing loss. today feels different, it’s a good day. the clack of skates against varnished hardwood eases his tension, and even the yelps of kids just learning aren’t as irritating as he usually finds them. then, there’s dylan who comes into his periphery more often than he’d like, speeding past him without a care, and maybe it’s her carelessness that makes him care. ‘   fucking christ.   ’ he mutters, audible enough to get a rotten glance from a holier-than-thou parent, but more importantly, loud enough for her to hear. 

   sienna scoffs, seat belt pulled over chest. the radio sputters on, some ancient rock and roll tape of her father’s she stole back in high school, one that she’s never had the heart to take out. usually, she just switches to radio.   “   yeah, the life of a BUM maybe.    ”   sienna WISHES she didn’t have to pay rent, but now it’s a store and an apartment instead of just the latter.   “   living in your dad’s basement, sleeping with the boss to get out of having to stock the extra crate of baby food … some people might consider you a loser, matty.   ”   she flashes him a grin, and head is tossed over her shoulder, staring out the back window for a long moment as she pulls out of the parking spot.   “   even if i so graciously — since those juicebox days — have always been the kind of person to show you what life is REALLY like. staying up past bedtime and drinking.   ”   not exactly wholesome life lessons.   “   can you believe sawyer and steven think i’m the family loser all of a sudden ?   ”   a turn out of the parking lot, and as her mental autopilot back to the tiny lot behind the row of shops the attic is nestled into turns on, annoyance fills her tone.   “   i think they’ve been talking to ronald too much, because they’re going all psychotherapist on me. emphasis on psycho.   ”   she’s glad to have a kindred spirit when it comes to baby cousin — a duo bookending a family full of differing personalities. part of her does wonder, maybe, if being on the tail end of her twenties means that she should have a little more maturity than a college student. but that’s saved for another day. 

There’s a warmth blooming in her chest, and she knows it’s because of him. It’s like a goddamn schoolgirl crush, what with the excitement and the way her heart skips a beat and her stomach flutters. She hasn’t felt this way since she first met Joshua, and it’s scary ━ to think there’s someone out there for her besides him. “ Yeah, ” she says with a nod, setting coffee down beside her on the counter. She tucks hair behind both ears with now-free hands, and the dusting on her nose deepens, cheeks flushing pink as well. She’s so shy, and she hates it ━ hates that she can’t be forward with anything. She wishes she were stronger ━ she feels weak, worrying about what he thinks of her. Worrying if he’d ever treat her the way Joshua did ━ the way her brain sometimes tells her she deserves. After all, there’s a reason she ends up in Stefan’s bed. “ I know it will be. ” Smile brightens, and she knows it to be true ━ that even if it’s the most boring date in the world, she’ll enjoy it because she’ll be with him. “ You’d better not, ” she says, leaning over and placing a quick kiss on his cheek.

JACK AWAITS AN ANSWER —— one he won’t be receiving, and he’s a fool to expect otherwise. she’d always been frank with him. in fact, her most defining trait would be the brutal honesty which she insists on handing out. but with this … a matter beyond PRIVATE and SHAMEFUL — for him to request a deep - dive into her psyche was laughable. never did she discuss feelings ( even whilst engaged did she deprive him of this ), and yet : he thinks a slip - up carries higher odds of jitters and gossip and love admitted. odette heaves a sigh, refraining from tossing her coffee his way, although she imagines it’d been quite satisfactory.    “    … why aren’t you and emma together ?    ”    it was a defense used once. and it’d failed once. SECOND TIME’S THE CHARM. at best, it’d be enough to throw him off. at worst, he’d take the route of emma phillips. not that she believed jack would ever respond with    ‘ ew, never’s ’    and    ‘ i’d rather die’s ’    —— paraphrasing, of course. 

       it’s one of his many get rich quick money making schemes. he doesn’t have a busker’s license but figures he doesn’t need one, all things considering. and upside down cap lays by his paws, with a cardboard sign propped up against the wall that reads: ONE DOLLAR, ONE TRICK. he can do it all, tiptoe on his back paws, do a pirouette that would put world class ballerinas to shame. yet, passerby’s refuse to look down. they wanna see a human with him, commanding him, taking his money. no way in hell would he split the profits. he sees a pair of feet stop in the crack of the sidewalk, and his head furls upwards. beady eyes plea for some sympathy and a buck, his head gesturing to the empty ball-cap. 

open.

“Oh! Do be careful with that, it’s extremely old,” Cora gently told the customer who was holding a figurine of a woman in a pink dress. It dated back to 1910, the date carved into the bottom. It’d been crafted 10 years after her death, when she was still learning how to walk this earth in her new life. “Are you interested? She’s one of the oldest things in this town, I’m reckoning,” she said, smiling to herself at the joke she’d made - with herself. 

“And her colors are still in tact - she came from a home of someone who really cared for their collector’s items. They really mattered to her.” Of course, Cora didn’t know this person, but she imagined that they’d been alive around the same time she was, and that unlike her, they’d died warm in their bed of old age.

@traditionale​

“I don’t know if we need to get donuts and coffee like you’d see as those kinds of NORMAL meetings.” Lewis suggests, unsure about what would be appropriate or not. It’s not like he has ever done this before. But his friend seems VERY determined to make it work and he is not one to crush his dreams. “Do you have any set topics for the first meeting or is it just…free for all discussions?”

        ‘   HEY, WATCH IT !   ’ his head whips up to eye the perpetrator, to think he’d nearly fallen victim to four wheels that weren’t a car, that would have been humiliating. the roads are cast with shadows, street lamps illuminating the sidewalks. humans aren’t often out this late, though there’s no denying he should’ve kept his trap shut. so, he scurries away, before leaping atop a dumpster. a better vantage point that way, eyes aglow with keen interest, observant of the girl’s next movements. 

   groceries — pathetic as they might be, they still qualify — are shifted into the crook of her arm, pressed against her chest as she fiddles with car keys. the beep sounds, and she places the plastic of the key fob into her mouth to hold it as she struggles with the drunk. her car is old and junky … arguably worse for wear by the time she bought it, driving it anywhere and everywhere since she was sixteen. brought to college, brought to work … and rolled back into eden each time, lurking in the driveway with only memories of what the empty spot next to it had once been filled by. driving wasn’t traumatic, it wasn’t as if sienna had been there. but there always was a feeling in the pit of her stomach that something would go wrong when she drove. small enough to ignore when she was alone, maybe, but with FAMILY in the car … she preferred biking anyway. trunk is finally pulled over with a satisfying sigh, and groceries — all two bags of them— are placed in.   “   yeah, and i’ll tell him you’re up for a handy in the produce aisle for not helping me.   ”   another click as she rounds the driver’s side of the car, and matty’s finally able to stop fiddling with the door and open it.   “   i forget you’re like, twelve, and don’t have money. am i like, still not supposed to give you juice after eight because you’ll have a sugar high and piss the bed?   ”   key, ignition. a glance is given to her cousin as the car sputters to life.

   for all they had in common, an adoration of love was perhaps the string that stitched together the two cut from the same cloth. love itself, love for others, love that they wished, ONE DAY, someone would give them … but in this case, it was the love of other people. a friend, really, so emma considered it to be less nosy and more concerned. at least, that was the justification.   “   i don’t think he’s like, SOLELY hanging around her on the off chance she’ll one day reciprocate,   ”   she corrects, refusing to concede to the assumption kai is only in their friends’ life for potential romantic endeavors.   “   you don’t stick around that long on a maybe, you know? AND … he doesn’t seem like that kind of guy. i think he really does love her. as a friend, as family and then …   ”   she trails off for a moment, hand moving up into the air in a stacking motion.   “   then has different, romantic feeling on another level.   ”   she pauses, thinking, and then a smile breaks out upon her face, leaning closer to her friend to jab him in the shoulder, still grinning.   “   yeah, maybe it makes you make those choices. if i haven’t fled the country yet, i’m definitely not joining your ranks.   ”   knock on wood, but she was much more the ‘sit in your room and mope type.’ beam fades, and she sighs, settling back into a forlorn desire for affection.   “   i don’t know what i’d do if someone loved me like that.   ”   she thought she had — once. but good things must come to an end, and an end, and an end … as much as emma WANTED storybook, she wasn’t quite ready to reconcile with the fact that she wasn’t going to get it. 

Sayoko wished that this was the first time she’d been asked this question. But Silhouette’s is a shady bar and she has patrons almost daily try and skimp out on paying. She rolled her eyes at the man and placed a hand on her hip. “If you were my type, I’d say yes but unfortunately you’re not, so it’s full price for you.” It wasn’t uncommon for her to buy cute girls’ drinks as she loved to spend her shifts flirting. But she had a bad track record with men in her life and therefore they were the farthest thing from her type.