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what bumps in the night - Nathaniel
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Post by Olwen on Feb 29, 2016 16:33:28 GMT -5
Frozen toes trembled in tattered kicks. The walk from Foresta to the small coffee house had taken longer than anticipated and to her surprise the sun was already setting. It was lovely to observe, she had even paused mid-step to admire the beauty of the falling star. For a brief moment a sliver of fear had taken root, it was the worry that her beloved shop would be closed at such a late hour. Thankfully, a good handful of the creatures on the island were nocturnal and enjoyed the occasional midnight coffee, so there was no need to be concerned about finding a "closed" sign in the doorway.
Although Spring was poking its head out of lingering snow, the bitter bite of Winter still had ahold of her. Olwen had always been colder than those around her and she could only come to the conclusion that it was due to her mutation and the possibility that her skin was thinner than the average person's. Luckily she had quickly learned that big coats were her best friends.
Old Christmas lights still twinkled on the roof, the employees either too lazy to remove them or very eager for next Christmas. Bells jingled as she pushed the door open. All the bulbs brightnesses were dimmed (for the visitors who had "sensitive eyes") and the scent of coffee beans lulled her in, though she never actually bought coffee, she simply respected it and the people who were strong enough to drink it. Soon after ordering, a large cup of hot chocolate filled her shaking hands and she slid into a chair with a window view. Out of habit, her right leg bounced energetically up and down to the beat of her own heart. Blue eyes watched as the stars came out and Olwen awaited the arrival of her, still questionable, Romeo.
Mally
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Post by Mally on Feb 29, 2016 17:40:24 GMT -5
The curse had a way of messing with his plans, and tonight was no different. Nathaniel was up and ready to go before sunset, but he was room-bound until the last light of day. The vampire's leg tapped impatiently as he watched the minutes pass one after the other on his phone until finally, the alarm went off. Sunset had arrived at Foresta.
Nathaniel rushed out the door in his waist-length trench coat that had been recovered a prior night from the lake. There were holes in the left arm where a werewolf had chewed through, and Nathaniel really wished he had a nicer coat to take with him on this... Was it a date? It seemed like a business meeting in his head, but clearly there was a hint of something more going on when they set it up. One drink should be plenty of time to touch base and take care of business, but he wondered how their meeting might develop.
The journey to town took longer than expected. He knew where it was but he had not been there before and had no idea how long it would take to get there from the academy, although he made the best time that he could. To make matters worse, when he finally arrived it took him a couple minutes more to find the correct shop and once that happened, he checked the time on his phone again. Nathaniel had arrived 15 minutes late to a meeting that probably only needed to take that long.
The vampire sighed, but there was nothing he could do about that now. He should have scheduled the meeting an hour later in anticipation of each passing night growing ever shorter now that winter was at their heels. For all of the bad impressions he had made in front of Olwen, Nathaniel wondered why she showed interest in him at all.
The door parted from the frame as Nathaniel made his entrance, and his worries were immediately washed away by the overwhelming aroma of the place. The coffee stench was so strong to his sensitive senses that he was suddenly perfectly alert and Nathaniel quickly grew dizzy from what he could have sworn was a caffeine high, but despite the raging chaos in his head he was able to recognize Olwen sitting beside a window.
Nathaniel offered her a simple wave and a smile while he ordered his lavender-chamomile tea. He wasn't even sure if he would drink it given their environment, his motivation right now was simply to have something soothing in front of his nose to counteract the intensity of different aromas that permeated through the room. Service was thankfully quick, so it wasn't long before the pale man sat himself down opposite to Olwen.
"Sorry to keep you waiting, love. This is my first time in town and I guess I'm not as good of an explorer as I thought - I should have asked you for better directions." Nathaniel gave a half shrug, apologetic.
"It's good to see you, though, you're looking well. What's your poison tonight?" Nathaniel gestured minimally towards her cup of hot chocolate. He didn't even need to see it to smell what it was, but the courtesy felt appropriate at the moment.
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Post by Olwen on Feb 29, 2016 20:06:58 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 1, 2016 6:23:40 GMT -5
She was sweet, he thought. Diplomatic, even. Nathaniel felt then that his assessment of the aspiring candidate had been correct - Olwen would make for a great house leader. She congratulated and thanked him, to which he waved his hand dismissively.
"Ah, thank you, but it was nothing. No one dared run against me," Nathaniel grinned, "They must have known better. And it's no trouble helping you at all, we have a mutual interest in getting you elected. If Stella wins..." The vampire rolled his eyes and shook his head.
"If Stella wins, I'll have a lot of headaches coming my way. She's definitely the coffee drinking type, whereas you and I? I think we like to take things a bit easier." Nathaniel tested his drink, but it was still too hot and had not yet absorbed the tea. It smelled good though, and the aroma soothed the discomfort he experienced from the room.
The vampire could sense that Olwen was cold, so he clasped his hands around his own cup to warm his fingers. The cold had never bothered Nathaniel. He lived most of his life by the ocean in New York, so he was used to the humid cold that was inevitable around the coast. Foresta's climate proved very similar as it was water-locked by the same Atlantic Ocean he had learned to swim in, and the island's similar climate offered him comfort. It wasn't for everyone, though, and Nathaniel pretended he was colder than he was so that his associate didn't feel out of place.
"But, there's still business to attend to. I caught wind of your reply to Estelle - Beautiful work. I'm sure you've swayed a few hearts in your favor. Have you thought about what kind of improvements you might make to the dorm? The faculty haven't been very transparent about how much we'll be getting in the way of funds to commit to house activities, but... I may have worked out a deal to get us a little more to play with." Nathaniel played with his tea bag, gently swirling it around the cup between making intermittent eye contact with Olwen.
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Post by Olwen on Mar 1, 2016 17:32:23 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 2, 2016 4:13:23 GMT -5
"Same," he replied honestly with a delayed smiled once he caught on it was probably a joke, "although that's a story I'd love to hear." The vampire's human killing days were over, although quitting cold turkey proved to be a daily struggle for him. Nathaniel's fingers tapped uncomfortably at the table next to his drink while his eyes scanned around the room for potential victims.
"I went straight to the source. There's some little brat named Cecilia del Vega Toro... Actually, I forgot how her name goes exactly, it's pretty long but you know who I'm talking about. Anyway, her family pays for everything here and long story short, I convinced her to requisition a little more to sweeten the pot in return for getting her elected."
Nathaniel sipped at his tea again. Still too hot, but it tasted better. "I don't think the faculty knows about the money yet, though. If she can handle the situation the way I asked her to, that money will be something we'll just line our own pockets with, privately. The less anyone else knows, the better." If not, he thought, there were always opportunities to launder. It would be child's play for Nathaniel because he honestly doubted the money would be watched that closely, and it wasn't exactly his first rodeo.
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Post by Olwen on Mar 2, 2016 22:11:13 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 3, 2016 10:41:33 GMT -5
Olwen's words shook him free of his distraction, and when he turned back to face her again, she was already doodling on the window. She was definitely a Lyra girl, and her actions reminded him that he would need to find a new medium because his favored form of blood art was now off limits. Nathaniel smiled at her appropriate depiction of the reaper, curious to learn whether the subject matter was merely a coincidence or a hint that she suspected something was off about him. Either way, for all her recent talk about death, he figured they would get along just fine in the long run.
"You will be too once you're elected, you're definitely cut out for the job. It'll just take a little experience," he said to reassure her. For all of the little mistakes he felt he had made so far, there was definitely an energy brooding between them. They almost certainly shared some common ground and Nathaniel decided it was as good a time as any to break the ice.
"But, let's not talk all night about business. Want to play a game? If you've got the time," he added on hastily as he sipped at his tea, the cup still mostly full.
"I was thinking something like twenty questions? But that always drags on way too long, so let's just call it five. Five questions that can be about anything, no matter how personal, and the only rules are that you have to tell the truth and you can't ask something the other person asked."
The vampire watched for her reaction, no stranger to the game himself. It was a quick way to get to know someone and it was usually a good bonding experience, but the caveat was that you were likely to learn more about them than you expected to.
"We'll alternate turns, so if you're afraid that I'll ask something you don't want to answer, you might want to ask me first. But then I'll know you're hiding something," he said with a grin. "If you're up for it, I'll let you decide who goes first."
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Post by Olwen on Mar 3, 2016 18:44:13 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 3, 2016 19:20:28 GMT -5
"Oh, I might get lucky, will I?" he threw her words back to taunt her but he relaxed his body language to assure her it was an idle flirt. The commentary had bothered him, though, because Nathaniel felt like he had been anything but lucky before he arrived at Foresta. Anything he had ever accomplished in life was due to his own hard work or manipulation, because very little good ever happened to him on its own. That is, he supposed, up until he met her. Perhaps she would be the catalyst to turn his luck around.
"So, you've graced me with the privilege of going first," his voice trailed with a knowing grin that suggested he already knew what his five questions were going to be. Nathaniel cracked his fingers dramatically as he pretended to think about what he was going to ask her.
"Alright, no short answers accepted so you'll have to give me a little context, and I'm going to start you off with a hard one. The first answer I'm going to pry out of that spry little brain of yours is..." he took a long sip of his tea to playfully add to the tension.
"Where are you from?"
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Post by Olwen on Mar 3, 2016 20:15:08 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 3, 2016 21:37:06 GMT -5
Olwen gave a descriptive account of her home, and the vampire listened to her intently. Her verbal imagery painted a beautiful portrait in his head, but Nathaniel thumbed at his mouth uncomfortably to the mention of werewolves. He flexed the fingers of his left hand, grateful to have feeling left in them. Thankful that he wasn't human. If he were, he would have lost half of his arm to that werewolf. Olwen teased him with her delivery of her first question, and he definitely deserved that.
"Precious, now that's an interesting qualifier... I have had many interesting memories, very few of them I'd consider precious." Nathaniel sighed and briefly wondered if she asked the question out of genuine interest or to guard something she wanted to keep secret from him, but he figured it was too polite of a question for the latter motive.
"My most precious memory is when I got my first job. I left home when I was 14, and I had a very complicated life before that. But once I ran away, I was homeless. I dove through dumpsters for scraps, begged my friends for places to sleep, you know. It was hard not having a home to go back to," he shrugged, remembering the many alleys and sidewalks he slept on. Not having a place to shower. Not having anything.
"But one day I was out peddling on the street just selling whatever I could scavenge up, and things hadn't really been working out. It had been a day or two since I last ate but I guess I was working the right corner at the right moment because I managed to hustle a hard sale, and it turns out that guy was part of a local family who decided to put me to work for them. By family, I mean..." he thought for a moment, unsure how to explain it politically although he was pretty sure she knew what he meant, "The organized crime kind, and of course I was the low guy on their totem pole. I didn't make much and the work was dangerous sometimes, but I earned enough money to split an apartment with some friends." Nathaniel smiled softly at her, not the least bit shy to recount the memory.
"It's my favorite memory because even if it wasn't the most glamorous experience, that was the first time in my life I ever felt independent. That was the moment when I knew I'd never have to rely on those bastards who pretended to be my parents again."
Nathaniel toyed with his cup of tea, but declined to drink it in favor of enjoying its scent. The questions never got easier as the game progressed, and things were already heating up. There was no need to add play tension now that the warm-up round was over, so he posed his second question without any undue dramatics.
"Have you ever been addicted to anything?" he tapped the inner part of his elbow to suggest substances, but he left the question open to interpretation.
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Post by Olwen on Mar 3, 2016 22:37:24 GMT -5
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Post by Mally on Mar 3, 2016 23:38:06 GMT -5
Nathaniel frowned at her recollection, going so far as to grimace when she mentioned everything breaking inside of her. When they met during Valentine's Day she had showed off a cool aspect of her power, but he hadn't considered all of the negative aspects that could have plagued her because of her ability to manipulate bone. Even for the verbose vampire, there weren't any right words to follow up on an admission like that. The only two things that Nathaniel could offer were an empathetic smile and a hand that gently rest its cold fingers on the table near Olwen, inviting her unstable touch.
Regrets.
"Not meeting you sooner," he opened up lightly. Now this was a question asked in self-defense, and that was fair enough given the intensity of what she just admitted to him.
Nathaniel needed a moment to think for this one because by and large, he had always done his best to make his life better. Not necessarily by moral means, but he wasn't the type to sit around and wait for things to get better on their own and that kind of life generally doesn't lead to regret. Still, there was the obvious one that he had otherwise been doing very well to block out of his mind, so Nathaniel touched at the red scarf around his neck.
"I regret that I couldn't control myself. I don't have much self control in general and a very good friend of mine died because of that, just recently. I almost died because of it too, and I will die if I leave Foresta any time soon. We made some very bad mistakes together and we had a lot of fun making them, but other people didn't see it way we did. They hunted her down, and they're still looking for me," he said and clutched the old friend's scarf tighter. "If I mess up this second chance I've been given at Foresta, if I get expelled for any reason and I can think of a dozen ways that I might, they'll send me back home."
Nathaniel looked down at the table, staring into his tea. "So, I'm hoping not to do anything else that I'll regret for a while. What was your most serious relationship?"
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Post by Olwen on Mar 4, 2016 15:40:56 GMT -5
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