Participants:
| Scene Title | Making Sure |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Post various assaults and phone calls, Deckard rings Abigail as promised to let her know that Joseph's alive and well. |
| Date | July 31, 2009 |
Old Lucy's: Upstairs
Late morning. Deckard's just finished brushing his teeth for the third time and he's already reaching for a squat glass of amber alcohol balanced on the side of the bathroom sink. Hair of the dog. The toothpaste taste on the back of his tongue doesn't do much for the flavor, but at least he feels less like he needs to expel everything he's had to eat in the last month, now. He's still wearing what he had on yesterday — white dress shirt, undershirt, blue jeans. All fashionably generic and all Raquelle's doing, same as the close buzz of his hair and level bristle of his stubble collection grizzled in the mirror ahead of him.
Another laggard wave of nausea sees his head tipped forward into his own reflection, but nothing comes of it. Just a plop of whiskey-toothpaste spit down into the basin of the sink before he reaches back to tug his cell phone out of his pocket and starts dialing.
She not drunk. At the age of 20 she's still terrified to think of touching the bottle of jack her father has tucked away in a cabinet for when a man just needs a really stiff drink. She didn't wake up Victor either. Instead she'd crawled back in her window, grabbed that green coverlet that he's seen in their communal dreams, pillows and went back to the porch swing. So when her phone rings, the blonde jerks awake, scrabbling to catch the pink cell phone and flip it open. The green button stabbed and phone brought to her ear. "Flint?!"
The sound of his voice overloud across the line is enough to make Deckard wince much as he did last time they talked. Everything's magnified by the headache swollen dim inside his skull. The cold press of the mirror against his forehead isn't doing much to help, either. "Yeah." Breathe in, breathe out. Air scuffs static through the receiver. Try not to get annoyed. "Sumter's with me in Isabelle's place. Some bruises, little shaken up. I dunno. I think he's fine."
"Oh thank the good Lord above, thank you Flint. Thank you.. thank you more than you can know. I owe you greatly" Comes over the telephone line and at a lowered decibel. "Praise the lord on high" The call will do much to calm her down, that's for sure. "And you? Are you okay? You have him at Isabelle's?" That's some place safe. Mostly. At least inside and above it is.
Clack. Deckard reaches over with his free hand to flip the bathroom light off, pitching the sink and himself and everything around them into murky shadow. The cell phone light touches bold off the side of his face, but it's not so bad as long as he avoids turning his aching eyes towards it. "I'm fine. There was a shooting or something just outside — police all over the place. But we made it up okay. He may call you later to ask some questions. I'm probably just going to turn it over to Teo."
"Shooting outside the bar?" Confusion colors her voice. "Tell him i'll, be waiting. I'll…" She'll be what. "Okay" Her head tips back in the cool air, looking up at the porch ceiling.
"Sure." Scuff scuff scuff, blunt nails scrape up at the underside of his jaw ahead of a sigh. He reaches for the whiskey glass again. "Everything still okay there?"
"Yeah," Everything's peachy. "Linderman Bitch stole my cross off my neck couple days ago in New Orleans" Not that he'd care. "After she tried to pickpocket me."
"Sorry," muttered unhelpfully on his end, Deckard draws in one last deep breath and shifts his weight uncomfortably against the sink, empty glass replaced with a final 'clink.' "Maybe Cardinal can help you get a new one." There's awkward pause, then: "I should probably get some sleep."
Maybe she can get Cardinal to help her get a new one? Likely not. What brought about that comment from Deckard. "You should. It's too early and my Dah and momma will be up soon. Dah likes to get to chores early. You've been taking care of Pastor Sumter" There's hesitation over the line. "Take care of yourself too Flint. You can't help anyone if you don't take care of yourself as well."
Deckard grunts. As far as reactions go it's probably not the most inspiring one he could come up with, but. Maybe a step above just clicking the phone shut. "See you around, Abigail," is what she eventually gets instead. Then he does lower it to fold it over with a muffled clap, not waiting to hear any farewell that might come across after his.