Apartment Above Luke's, Sunday Afternoon

[spin_kick_snap]

The quiet was nice.

Kathy looked around the empty apartment, wandering from room to room. If asked, she'd say she was picturing where all their stuff would go when she and Raven left Eliot's place (okay, Eliot's and Parker's and Hardison's, but it had been Eliot's place in her mind for years and it would take some adjusting to) and moved in here, but really, she was just appreciating the quiet. It was nice, being somewhere that no one else was for a little while. She didn't have to worry about whether her smile was convincing or she appeared happy--and grateful! One mustn't forget grateful!--to be alive again. Not that she wanted to be dead again or anything. But sometimes it was hard to be happy about anything. But around people, she felt like she owed it to them to try. Or at least to put up a decent enough facade that they could convince themselves she was.

Alone, though, she didn't have to pretend. She could just do her own thing, try to distance herself from her recent spate of nightmares and just wander for a bit. She would have thought she'd gotten enough walking in as an ex, but maybe her body'd just gotten used to the repetitive motion. Maybe idly poking around the place really would give her some ideas for what to do with the place. Or maybe it was all just bullshit and she should focus on thinking less altogether.

Yeah, it was probably the latter. But until she found a decent substitute for her previous activities that shut her brain down (besides zombieism, ha ha, she was hilarious), walking and appreciating the lack of people would have to do.

[Post open! Link to Anders' thread]

Comments

[tigerundercover]

"Too?" Raven asked, frowning. "You -- it scarred?"

She didn't know why that surprised her. Of course it would scar. Why wouldn't it?

[spin_kick_snap]

"It never really healed," Kathy said. "Or, at least, I don't think it did." The dreams where it remained a gory circle on her shoulder were just that. Dreams. "I don't think any of the injuries that exes ended up with healed enough to scar. But it feels like it should have. And that it should still be there."

It had literally changed her life in fundamental ways. There should be something there to commemorate it.

"Where'd yours come from?"

[tigerundercover]

"A rifle," Raven said. "In Texas. I was trying to warn people about a new ex in town and they . . . didn't take it well."

In no small part because they'd known Raven as a pet dog, not a blue girl.

Details.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Fucking Texas," Kathy said with a grimace. "Bunch of ingrates."

She looked down at her shoulder again and blurted out, "I'm thinking of getting a tattoo. There. As a reminder, kind of."

[tigerundercover]

"Fucking Texas," Raven agreed. "Tattoo of what?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Ilh-eo beolin salamdeul-ui gieog sog-e," Kathy said, then translated, "In memory of those we've lost. But in Hangul, in a small circle on my shoulder."

The inked characters would lay where the memory of teeth still haunted her, an indelible mark on her skin.

[tigerundercover]

"That's beautiful," Raven said softly. She thought of all the people Kathy had lost in this, her friends, her family. Her entire city.

And in her mind's eye she saw Sarah, lying broken on the floor, her ravenous father perched above her. Her eyes burned, and looked away sharply, turning towards the bedrooms at the back of the apartment.

"So how many rooms does this place have, anyway?"

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy raised a hand down Raven's arm, then slipped her pale hand into Raven's blue one and squeezed. "Two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and this really awesome open floor plan kitchen/living room deal," she said and if her voice was a little thick, she didn't think Raven would blame her.

"The bedrooms are almost as big as our old dorm." An exaggeration, but not much of one. "We should figure out which one we want to claim."

And because she loved you, Raven, she hadn't already yelled dibs on the one with the master bath.

[tigerundercover]

"Which one do you want?" Raven asked. "I'm good with whichever." It wasn't like she'd do much sleeping in there.

. . . maybe she could set up some kind of nest or something.

[spin_kick_snap]

"There's one with a connected master bath," Kathy admitted. "But if you wanna flip a coin or something for it to be fair..."

[tigerundercover]

"You said two bathrooms, right?" Raven said. "So . . . either way I get my own bathroom." She smiled. "I didn't even have a bathroom most of this last year."

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy grinned and gave Raven an impulsive hug. "Yesssss!" she said, punching air a moment later. "You have no idea how much I've always wanted my own bathroom!"

Growing up with four people sharing one had made Kathy a little territorial. "And we can ask Eliot to install a door leading from your room to the bathroom directly if you want?"

So you didn't have to walk that extra three feet in the hallway like a goddamn BARBARIAN.

[tigerundercover]

Raven leaned in the door to the bedroom, then looked from that to the bathroom.

". . . That seems kind of unnecessary."

[spin_kick_snap]

"But what if you're not dressed and--riiiiiiiiight," Kathy said, snorting back a laugh. "Never mind."

[tigerundercover]

Raven snorted, then giggled. Then let it grow into a full blown laugh.

"Worried your gentleman callers will be scandalized by your roommate's wanton nudity?"

[spin_kick_snap]

That did an effective job of killing off Kathy's amusement, honestly. "Think it'll be awhile before I have any gentleman callers to worry about, I think," she said softly.

[tigerundercover]

Whoops.

"They came to LA to help us get you, Kathy. They can't be too mad at you, can they?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Anders said he went to make sure nobody else got killed," Kathy said. "And even if they're talking to me again, it's not the same as it was. They haven't forgiven me, they don't trust me, and they've moved on." She shrugged, because pretending like it didn't hurt was the second-best thing to it not actually hurting, right? "Can't really blame them for doing any of that, so...here we are. You're free to run around naked and scandal-free."

[tigerundercover]

"That doesn't sound like as much fun," Raven said, though she'd lost a lot of the joking energy. Kathy knew the boys much better than she did, but she suspected the situation wasn't nearly so cut and dry as Kathy made it out to be.

For once in her life she wished she had Charles' power, instead of her own. It must be so much easier to deal with things when you could know exactly what everyone was thinking.

"Maybe we just need to go out and find you some new gentleman callers?"

[spin_kick_snap]

Raven was underestimating the depth of Dante's anger and Anders' betrayal--though Kathy was also inclined to think the worst of anything that had to do with her, especially now.

"Might have to go to Baltimore for that one," Kathy said with a tired smile. "Pickings on the island are a little slim. We'll find you someone, too."

[tigerundercover]

They had taken her out for drinks this weekend, though. Unless the whole zombie thing was a deliberate ploy, that didn't smack of utter hatred and contempt forever!

"Mine wouldn't be a gentleman caller, though," Raven pointed out. "Or a lady caller. I'm thinking I might look for a rapscallion."

Or she'd moon over people from afar because they weren't a bearded person in a long wool dress.

[spin_kick_snap]

Even Kathy wasn't melodramatic enough to think it was going to be hatred and contempt forever. But it also wasn't enough to put them into the realm of gentlemen callers.

"Oooh, a rapscallion, huh?" Kathy asked. "That sounds like it might be nice. What traits make up a proper rapscallion, so I can keep a lookout for you. You know I'll wingman for you any day."

[tigerundercover]

"You know, I'm not sure what one would look like in today's fashions," Raven mused. "What do you wear when you want to express an utter, but lighthearted contempt for law and order?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Dapperpunk, obviously," Kathy said, though she wasn't sure if that was a thing anymore. She'd been away from Tumblr for nine months after all. Anything could have happened. "Nicely dressed, but with that punk aesthetic that says they go protesting on weekends now."

Dante had told her Trump was president on their earlier phone call. She'd spent a few hours furiously googling everything.

[tigerundercover]

". . . Isn't punk, like, the literal opposite of dapper?"