Insufficient Funds

Participants:

joseph_icon.gif kaylee2_icon.gif

Scene Title Insufficient Funds
Synopsis Joseph and Kaylee have half a conversation.
Date June 12, 2010

Over the Phonelines


"You just had to do that didn't you?" Kaylee huffs softly, as she crouches on hands and knees, in her new apartment at Gun Hill, picking up pieces of shredded card board box, "I wasn't gone all that long… just down the hall." The culprit, Missy, sit watching with much amusement, while laying in the late afternoon sun streaming in through the window. With a puppy grin and lolled tongue, she is rather proud of her work, that evil box will no longer be a problem.

Kaylee shakes her head, going back to picking up the little brown paper pieces, mindful of her arm. At least til her cellphone starts buzzing in her pocket. Straightening til she's kneeling in, the telepath takes a moment to point at the puppy. "You shoosh." Of course, Missy gives a high pitched bark in return.

The phone is fished out and she slides her finger across the screen and hits the talk button, before tucking it under her hair, to her ear. "Hello?" Her tone is falsely pleasant, as she goes back to picking up pieces.

Sun struggling to come through the patchwork design of New York cloud in the sky, more successful in some corners than others, it's a dreary, humid day to be anywhere. Most residents, however, are just going to be glad that it's not snowing. It wasn't so long ago that ice and snow lined the streets, whether in thick blankets or crusty melted patches — or maybe it just seemed shorter to Joseph, all things considered. He studies, now, the spitting beginnings of a light rain making needle marks on the glass of the phonebooth, despite the sun above them.

Summer thunderstorms. There's one on the horizon. Joseph's posture immediately gets better when someone answers, and he presses a hand against the side of the booth, where glass has a shattered web pattern spraying out from its corner, just like every other phonebooth in an urban environment.

"Kaylee?"

The familiar voice has Kaylee's heart stopping in her chest. "Joseph?" Pushing to her feet isn't an easy feat, but she manages it. "Oh, thank God… Are you okay?" She doesn't even try to cover the worry, or anxiety. The mess forgotten for the moment, she moves to the window, looking out as if somehow he might be standing out there, though she knows otherwise.

"Where are you? Are you hurt? I can come get you…" The words all tumble out of her mouth before she can stop them, a hand pressed to her forehead in disbelief.

"No, no, it's okay, you don't have to— do anythin'." There's some amount of relief in Joseph's voice that he managed to get in touch with someone, or maybe Kaylee specifically. "I don't got a lot of time— mostly I don't got a lot of change, I'm at a payphone. But yeah, I'm— I'm alright. I'm not hurt or nothin', but…"

But, and he trails off, despite his emphasis that time is an economy of which is as tricky as the current one.

Paranoia seems to make his voice go quieter, but then again, that's also just the way he talks. "I don't actually remember much've anythin', not since midweek, last. Is everything alright with— ?" And he leaves this incomplete sentence open ended.

Eyes close and Kaylee nods slowly, of course he can't see it so she says softly, "Yeah, everything is alright." Not that she's going to tell him otherwise, not with what happened. "Everyone is a little shook up about you and Gillian going missing. Had a meeting about it and what needed to be done."

Her hand lowers and the bandage on her arm catches her eye, she bites her lip and looks out the window again. "I was — we were worried that Sheridan got you again." Kaylee's brows tilt upward as she turns her back on the window, leaning against the wall. "Pretty sure the Institute got you… Used you…" She trails off biting her lip.

"The — ah — city got hit by a mass vision." There is hesitation, before she utters that. "That's… why we figured they had you and her." She trails off, going silent.

A huff of a breath is the only indication Kaylee gets that he's still there — that and muffled traffic sounds of a city trying to get its act back together, again. Broken bridges, snow, mass visions — what next? "Yeah," Joseph says, for wont of anything else to say, a little helpless. It's hard to hear, from his tone, whether he knows what Kaylee is talking about, or whether this is news to him. Pragmatism is easier. Inside the booth, he raises his ringless hand to rub at his brow, as if trying to invoke thought.

"Okay, here's— if you can let people know I'm alright, I think that's— the main thing. And that I'm steerin' clear of the network for a while, 'til I know for sure." For sure what? "But I'll get in contact with someone when I figure it's okay — I've talked to Flint."

So Joseph has a guardian, of kinds, a grizzled ex-con. Maybe this will set Kaylee's mind at ease. Maybe.

"I don't know anythin' about Gillian," he thinks to add, guiltily, anxious.

"Yeah, trust me, as soon as we hang up, I'm letting them know your okay." Kaylee is nodding, there is a hitch in her voice that speaks volume for the relief she's feeling. "I was so worried, Joseph." The words are sighed out, her back sliding down to sit.

"Flint better watch out for you, or he and I will go rounds. That or I'll sic Abby on him." Gently she rests her wounded arm on her raised knees, Missy moving to try to crawl into that space, the sound of her snuffling filling the phone for a moment, "Missy.. down." The young woman snaps gently.

"Try to contact Eileen." The telepath offers confident that should clear him. "She knows someone who can check to see if they pulled any information out of your head and if you want I can even see if your mind is wiped or just blocked." It's what's been discussed with others, so she might as well offer it.

Joseph is nodding, as unhelpful as this may be, over the phone, but when he speaks, it's a more hesitant, "Maybe," at the idea of Eileen as his first— or second— point of contact.

"But yeah, we can— we can figure stuff out. Kaylee…" A pause, as if trying to decide what to say, the heel of his shoes scuffing the gritty floor of the booth. "I'm sorry you were worried. I'm gonna make some changes to try and— stop bein' such a liability to everyone. I think I know what to do. But I met this other precog, is what I think she was, and she kind of made me feel like everything that's happened is necessary. It's not easy bein' a hinge, you know?"

Whatever that means. "Anyway what I mean is that I know we haven't talked much, not since… I guess not since you, uh. Had other people to talk to." One can almost hear a blush rising on his face. "But that don't mean I haven't appreciated— "

This call has been disconnected, says a voice in Kaylee's ear, reassuringly cool and female, due to insufficient funds.

"Oh, darnit," is muttered on the other side of a deadline, a hand steering to his coat pocket for coins his knows aren't there, before Joseph puts the phone back in the cradle, and lingers alone for a moment with the broken off phonebook ledge and the cigarette butts littering the damp floor. Two more seconds, before he pushes back out into the humid New York air.

Keeping an arm around the dog kinda hurts, as it threatens to pull on the stitches, but it keeps Missy calm so that Kaylee can listens to the man on the other end.

Then then that annoying female voice interrupts and it has Kaylee sighing heavily. "Dammit." She murmurs as she pulls the phone away from her ear and stares at it, as if willing it to ring again. Finally, the hand drops setting the phone on the floor and looking at the dog on her lap.

Suddenly, the telepath smiles gently and pulls the dog into a hug. "He's okay, Missy. Thank you, God." She murmurs against the tan fur, getting a tongue in her ear. "Ug… Missy!"

The moment ruined by dog drool.


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