Participants:
| Scene Title | Every Single One |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Sable makes another call on Dee, bearing rather different gifts. Guitars are played, a song's full length is revealed, and Delilah receives another earnest pledge. |
| Date | June 14, 2010 |
Else and Delilah's Apartment.
Better that Sable owe Magnes money than continue to thieve, right?
Such is the justification Sable puts to her hitting up Magnes for yet more cash. She's good for it, he knows that, she just needs to get that job she really honestly intends on getting, no joke. And it's not for her own conscience that she avoids lifting from the supermarket - her qualms are wholly adopted from her perception of another's. She hits the grocery store, her new guitar on her back, and emerged with a plastic bag in hand, and an eye for the nearest bus stop. The wheels of the city are grinding away again, and after some minutes jerking from block to block, stop to stop, Sable gets where she's going. Where else, but Delilah's place?
Rather than beg entrance and sanctuary from the long arm of the law, the totally law abiding if slightly in-debt Sable uses the now totally functional elevator - nice place, new place - and uses her free hand to knock on Dee's door, before swinging the bag behind her, hands clasped over her rear, the almost perfect inverse of their flower-bearing position of last time. She looks brightly expectant, but the nervousness that accompanied that expression before is mostly gone. This is getting easier for her. Hendrix be thanked.
Samson can be heard more easily now, if only because of less carpeting inside. He thumps up to the door like always, followed by the padding of feet a moment later. Delilah peeks through the hole and practically opens the door at the same time. How embarrassing, if she'd have smacked herself in the face out of excitement. She is wearing a coral pink doleman style blouse, and a tan cream skirt. The light colors do wonders for her, especially in the light of the sun through the large windows in the apartment. Dee grins, swaying onto her toes.
"Sable! Hello! Did you find me well enough?" Isn't this place awesome? she means to say, by her tone.
The place is not what gets Sable's attention. It's much rather those wonders being done for Delilah in the light of the sun. That is much more gripping than interior design and residential convenience. Aaand wait, Delilah's asking her a question, right? Sable glances up in her own personal interior log, checking to see what dialogue she missed while attending to description. "Uh… yeah! Yeah, no trouble," she manages. She glances down at Samson and gives the dog a smile. "How goes, hound?" She gets on tiptoes, glancing into the apartment. "Lemme see your new digs? Also! Brought somethin'" she swings the grocery bag forward, "Stupid stuff, but figured mebbe later you'd need it."
The bag is proffered, its mouth open. Inside, classic pregnancy faire: a big container of rocky road ice cream and a jar of pickles. Maybe too early, but they'll both keep, particularly considering how awesome Dee's new freezer must be.
Delilah steps aside to allow Sable in, wagging one hand. Come on. She does take the bag beforehand, peeking inside. "Ho- oh- my. Ice cream and pickles. Haven't had many cravings yet, but preparation is one part of contentment, innit? I hope you didn't- oh, no, there's the receipt. Good girl." She will wean Sable off of Petty theft eventually. Or never. "Let me put this ice cream in the freezer. Come on in and have a gander, will you? It's brilliant here." With this, she sidles away towards the open kitchen and the big metal fridge. Samson stays with Sable, however, apparently wanting to show her his new place. He did get a new bed of his very own, this time. It is plaid.
Sable beams. Delilah's so very British, a quality Sable has never found so inexplicably attractive until this moment - and not for lack of English exposure, considering her musical tastes. "Yup!" she declares, as proud of her lawful acquisition of this gift as she was of her unlawful acquisition of the gift before, "Yer makin' an honest woman of me already."
She pads inside, slinging her guitar off of her shoulder and taking the case's handle into her grip. The yellow-eyed girl reaches down to give Samson a scratch between the ears, and informs him, "Mostly honorable intentions, dowg. Dontch worry." Which doesn't seem to be Samson's concern, so much as Sable's own. Pets bear the burden, in their relative silence, of being the recipients of projection. Eyes rove across the shining windows, hardwood floors and, once she moves into the kitchen after Delilah, the gleaming chrome. She gives a low whistle. "Jesus," she says, "This is nice. Needs some 'f yer color though. Doesn't seem properly lived in, but no new place does. Why'd y' move?"
"No real reason besides needing new surroundings, and my roommate and I sort of wanted to try looking after each other. She's the one that got me started on guitar. I'll bring some color in here yet. And just look at these windows." Delilah seems like she just might run them through for a second, as she spreads her arms out and hops towards them. "It'll get a greener view, eventually. I love looking at the river already. And we only have one neighbor. He's downstairs on the first floor. Some ferrety lookin' fellow."
"I hope that I like it here. It's quite swanky, and practical when you look at all the stuff 'round here too."
Did someone say guitar? Sable moves in range of the window's glow, a bit behind Delilah, and sets down the guitar case, kneeling next to it and popping the latches. Inside is a blue acoustic-electric, a new instrument. The black bandana Sable has tied around her upper arm stands in for the old. Despite this marker of mourning, Sable's spirits seem quite high. She lifts the instrument into her hands and slings the strap over her shoulder. "Y'll have t' introduce us," she says, "Always like t' meet fellows in the fight." And always like to size up potential competition, is the unspoken, unaddressed other motive. Groundless, most likely, but Sable has no good opinion of her luck.
"T' be honest, it's a sight too fine f'r me t' know what I say!" Sable admits, a touch sheepish, "Looks like th' digs 'f a proper rich. But that view is sweepin', arright. That a southern view?" As she asks, she's already tuning her instrument. No reason given yet.
"She's not sure about playing professionally right now, but I'm sure she'd love to meet another player." Delilah smiles at her vague reflection in the glass, before noticing Sable's. She turns herself around, pink and tan aflutter. "North, Actually. Ish. What's up?" The redhead questions, almost warily, about Sable's tuning of the guitar. Either she wants to have an axe battle, or there may be a song coming on. Sable never struck her as the Musical type though, breaking out into song and what not.
"It didn't cost as much as it looks, either. This place only rents to specific kinds of people." Dee learned her lesson telling Magnes all about it, and so she treads carefully with Sable.
Sable strums a chord, frowns, adjusts, strums another, nods, still adjusts, strums one more. She smiles. Satisfied. Her eyes rise to meet Delilah's. "Southern view's better f'r lettin' th' sun in, so I'm told. But I figure y've light enough 'f yer own," Sable says, tipping Dee a wink. She pats the panelling of her guitar. "Wonderin' if mebbe you wanted t' show me whatcha got," she explains, "Said y' wanted t' learn a bit more. And there's few things I think you'd look finer doin' than takin' up whatever adorable goddamn piece you call yer own."
She's a bit set on the idea of getting Delilah with a guitar in hand, but Dee's mention of the low low rent and its special clientele doesn't fail to catch Sable's attention. "Whassat mean?" she smirks, "Please oh please tell me this place is exclusive t' lovely redheads such as yerself. That'd be a heaven I could believe in, given half the chance."
"She and I were already registered with abilities. That's what it is. Some people say this is one fence away from a zoo, but I really don't think so. For various reasons which she does not elaborate on. Instead, Delilah bops off into her room(it is on the right) and returns with her own guitar case. It's a simple black fabric case with some patches sewn on, nothing big. What Sable might start laughing with is the fact the electric guitar she pulls out- is pearly white, with an iridescent red heart on the middle. Fitting, really.
"Be gentle with me, will you?"
"Hey, fuckin' take the perks where you c'n get 'em, right?" Sable says. If asked by someone whose opinion she wasn't immediately inclined to agree with, she might also be highly suspicious of the notion, but as it is she's more than happy to take a positive spin on the matter. Any further reflection, possibility of delayed disagreement or amendment, is promptly shut down as Delilah reappears and reveals her instrument. Sable doesn't laugh, she smiiiles.
"Aw, no way, hon," Sable says, "No fuckin' way. That ain't hardly fair. Come 'ere." Though it's Sable that crosses the distance, swinging her own instrument behind her so she can reach out and clasp Dee's guitar in her hands. She looks down at it, then up and the taller girl, going on tiptoes to kiss her on the tip of her nose. "Too fuckin' much, you are," she informs Lilah, before stepping back, letting go. She nods, "I ain't in my nature t' take it slow and careful, hon," she says, sounding almost a little serious, "But I know a rare and fine thing when I run across it. I'll spare you no tenderness, I promise."
"Now… let 'er speak."
Delilah is totally uncertain of what Sable is talking about, up until she is kissed upon the nose. She sits down with the guitar next, perched on the edge of the sofa wearing a slightly flushed expression. Maybe it's just the warm weather, or maybe she is just feeling particularly loved. When she finds her fingers on the neck, Dee glances up a couple times before she starts playing some ascending and descending chords, reminding herself.
"She doesn't talk much just yet." Dee is getting better at learning this particular language, at least. She knows the alphabet?
Gotta start somewhere. Sable nods, "She's got plenty t' say once she gets to trust you properly," she says, "Yer still learnin' yer fundamentals." Sable settles to the ground, crossing her legs, setting her guitar in her lap. "Follow me. Just follow how I move m' hands. Don't worry too much 'bout gettin' it right. Just try 'n get used to it, where things are." The yellow-eyed girl starts up with a pentatonic scale, up and down, not unlike what Delilah has already done. She speaks as she does it - her attitude towards playing is very physical. If you're thinking about it, she figures, you're already doing it wrong. Her patter is meant as a distraction for that treacherous part of the brain, the self reflexive demon of consciousness.
"Y' started off in Manchester, is what you said, huh?" Sable says, seeming to be picking up on a long past conversation as if it hadn't really ever ended, "Was it when th' ol' place burned down that you moved here, with yer aunt and the rest? Set me straight, I have an awful memory fer, like, continuous tales. I get things in blips, y'know? Tell me, what was it like leavin' your home country, comin' here, t' this great big mess of a land?"
Delilah cannot read Sable's mind, and so she is stuck trying to think about what she is doing and answer at the same time. It makes her chords choppy. "Yeah. It was. Coming here? Everything is bigger here, for one. First few months I was here, I asked if we could go out to Hollywood or something. Oh, how she laughed." She laughs herself, skipping over a note completely. Oops.
"It was hard to leave what I knew, but I didn't have much left there besides tombstones." Strumming continues, before Delilah takes the next step and plays a few melodic notes. Nothing real, just enough to sound cute.
Sable's an unfair teacher in this regard. To her, mimicking observed motions is simply second nature. She still has no sense that it isn't precisely the same for others. She assumes its just… something people can do. No explanation seems necessary, in her mind. Until she notices the way Dee is stumbling. She frowns, "Yer workin' too hard. Yer fuckin' it up because yer worried 'bout fuckin' it up. Let yerself fuck up. Just watch me, 'n' match me, without givin' it thought." Because it's as easy as that… of course.
The shift in activity causes Sable to shift as well, and to smile at Dee's precocity. "I'd tell y' not t' get ahead of yerself, but I know I've never taken that advice when it was given." She nods, "Dunno that it's too much th' same, but comin' up North was also pretty fuckin' strange. I first came t' New York, kept wonderin' where they were hidin' Lady Liberty. Thought it'd just be, like, there," she tilts her head, "Y' been back t' England since?"
"Nope." There is literally nothing for her there. "Any friends I had grew up, I suspect. I could probably visit the graves, but that would serve no real purpose in honoring anyone's memory. It'd just be for my sake, which I don't need." Not thinking about it is actually working a bit. Enough that it can for a novice. "I've thought about it before though. So its been in my mind."
Delilah pauses in her playing, before starting again onto what seems to be 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star'. "Did you know there's a whole song for this? It's not the American lullaby everyone thinks."
"Y' sure it wouldn't do you some good?" Sable says, "I mean, I ain't one t' dwell on family, but that's cuz I never had any. The way you talk 'bout them… I dunno," she shrugs, "So what if it's fer you y'd be doin' it? Yer the one still livin'. Still needin' 'n' wantin'. Plenty 'f folks talk t' tombstones, don't they? Mebbe y' could introduce Walter t' his namesake." A morbid notion perhaps, but Sable doesn't seem to mind. It's a suggestion made in earnest.
A simple melody, but catchy as hell. Sable frowns, shakes her head, "Naw, I had no fuckin' idea," she grins, "Here I was tryin' t' teach you somethin'. D'you know the whole song?" She arches her brow, a touch of challenge entering her voice, "Couldja play 'n' sing it f'r me?"
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are,
When the blazing sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
Then the traveller in the dark,
Thanks you for your tiny spark,
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
In the dark blue sky you keep,
And often through my curtains peep,
For you never shut your eye,
Till the sun is in the sky.
As your bright and tiny spark,
Lights the traveller in the dark,
Though I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
Sable listens with a crease between her brows. This is… all new. And so strange, the extension of the song she has heard time and time again, just being alive and in the English speaking world. It's an odd way to experience pleasure, but it is pleasurable, a fact that is revealed by the smile that slowly curls her lips. She looks… maybe a little perplexed. "How th' fuck did you learn 'bout that?" She narrows her eyes, faux suspicious, "Y' didn't got t' college, didja?" Another sign of how little Sable must know of college, to assume that that is the sort of thing universities teach their students.
"Oh, no. My mum." That explanation is surely enough to explain where Delilah learned it. She answers softly a bit after Sable asks, looking quite pleased with herself. "It's an English song. Influenced a bunch of composers too, I think." She is not sure of that part, but it sounds right. "Did you like it?"
Sable nods, though she does so slowly, as if there is some qualification, or some tinge to her agreement. "There's somethin' to it," she says, a bit slowly, "Makes me figure there's a reason th' rest got left out. Not 'cause it's poor. Nothin' like that. Just that…" she hesitates, not sure exactly what it is she thinks, nor how to express that unformed thought. "I dunno. It's meant t' comfort. But it's against the darkness, y'know? 'n' the darkness gets left out usually. Like…" she lifts a finger, "Like the prayer. 'Now I lay be down to sleep./I pray th' Lord my soul shall keep.' All fine, eh? Sweet. Only then it goes on. 'And if I die b'fore I wake,/I pray th' Lord my soul shall take'. Comfort, eh? But against darkness."
"That is what lullabies are for. Not just putting babes to sleep." Delilah smiles knowingly, setting her guitar over her knees and watching Sable intently. "Comfort against the dark. Hope for that comfort. It's deeper than most people here think. I was baffled when I learned nobody else knew the words."
"Most folks prefer the darkness 'f closed eyes," Sable says, nodding sagely, "Figurin' it banishes the dark all around. Preferrin' not to see t' the limits of their vision, preferrin' a darkness of their own making. A babe wakin' in the dark, alone, in their crib… Lord knows that's what teaches folks t' fear darkness for itself," she tilts her head, "How d'you intend t' tend that child of yours once its born? How'll you keep 'im from cryin' in the dark?" Somber words, and maybe a a touch overwrought, but a question honestly asked. "You'd surely know of loneliness yerself, your life bein' as it has."
"I'll always be there for him. Always." Delilah lifts her head a bit. "And I'll make sure he knows that even if I'm gone, like my own parents." Sable's gotten a bit into this, hasn't she?
"'n' how c'n you make sure of that?" Sable says. There is an unmistakable hint of challenge there, but there's no defiance. She cannot imagine Delilah's answer… but that she'll have an answer, that Sable trusts implicitly. She hasn't disappointed so far.
"I won't be alone in loving him, that's why." Delilah gets a little defensive now, putting aside the guitar and seeming somewhat flustered at the same time. "My son will know he is loved even if I'm not there."
Sable slips her guitar from her own shoulder, setting it aside and scooting forward, getting onto her knees so as not to be so entirely overshadowed by the girl perched on the coach. She reaches out, clasping Dee's hands in her own. She looks straight up at her. "So yer sayin' he will, 'cause he will? Simple as that?" No challenge this time. She sounds… hopeful.
"Simple as that." Dee isn't in the mood to argue, regardless. If Sable had pressed, she may have barked. As it stands, she locks hands with the other girl and smiles hesitantly.
Sable gets to her feet. Her smile is fierce. "That's all it takes. If that ain't enough, nothin' the fuck is." She says this with remarkable conviction. "Hon, believe me when I say, I will do everythin' I can f'r you. Anything y' ask, anythin' you need, 'n' any burden you need liftin' while your arms are busy with that child… I'll do whatever I can t' take care of it, 's long as you ask. Simple as that."
There is no verbal thank you, though Delilah's answer of leaning forward and wrapping her arms around Sable is perhaps enough, cheek hugging close to her stomach. Sable is not the first person to say such things. Not the last. And Lilah is grateful for every single one of them.