Incense at Dusk: .01.11.03. - coffee and chiefs [rosa-harlequin]

January 11, 2003

.01.11.03. - coffee and chiefs [rosa-harlequin]

[atlantic city boardwalk]

(rosa saks)
It's late, and many of the shops have closed. Of course, many are already closed for the winter. Few people come to Atlantic City for the beaches in the winter, and thus few are interested in purchase kitschy little jewelry boxes covered with shells that someone collected in the caribbean, or sand-dollar necklaces, or even t-shirts that say "My Grandmother Went to Atlantic City and All She Got Me was this Lousy T-shirt!" Even those that remain open through the long, bitter winter months are usually closed by this hour, but the lights at Rosalie's are still on. Neon splashes warm crimson across the salt-encrusted planks of the Boardwalk, gleams off the few remaining piles of dirty icy snow that have clung to the nooks and crannies where the water winter sun does not quite reach.

It's late, and it's cold. The brief spell of 40 degree weather has passed, and the temperatures are falling again. The weather is not as cold as it is in the interior of Pennslyvania, where she was raised, but it is cold enough to make her wrap herself in her warmest sweater, cold enough to keep her away from the wide picture windows that leech heat from the waiting room no matter what she does. Cold enough that she has turned on a pair of space heaters to supplement the ageing furnace.

Need to get that replaced soon. The absent thought filters through her mind as the furnace groans momentarily, then kicks on at last. She hates spending the money when she's still paying back the mortgage on the building that financed the renovations, but there's nothing to be done about it. Her graphite pencil moves in her hand, and above the sketch of the church from her dream, she scrawls - furnace - quotes - as a reminder.

Her hands pass over her face, and she tries to shake herself away. It doesn't quite work, so it's another trip to the coffee pot, another brimming mugful of bitter black. "I can get a straight job. I've done it before. Never minded working hard. It's who I'm working for." she half-hums, half sings along with the Gilliam Welch CD playing on the stereo, in a thin, not-quite tuneful voice (there's a reason she doesn't do karaoke) and returns to the sketch pad open on the front counter, angling her slender body as close to the space heater as she can get without setting herself on fire. Elbow planted against the counter, open hand cupping her cheek, she continues her desultory sketching - doodling, now, really - and waits for the last hour and a half to pass so she can go home to another sleepless night. "Everything is free now. That's what I said. No one's gotta listen to the words in your head."

(nakhti)
there's something that drew him so far down south, something that drew him from the warm confines of his flat, or even the heated interior of Cymaa, something that was able to get him all the way down into Atlantic City, to the nearly deserted Boardwalk, to the boarded up businesses and those that have roughed it through the thin season of travel

the black woolen coat is pulled tight around slender frame, the soft gray scarf wrapped as an adder around his throat - so different than the clothing he has worn for the past few days in the jaunts through the Barrens, these are street clothes, these are expensive clothes, from the neatly stitched leather shoes, to the finely tailored lambskin gloves that wrap his hands, shadowy tendrils of hair flicker about his cheekbones, tasting and touching the sharp angles that construct his half-exotic features

within the strolling walk, there is something else that tugs at him, his curiosity, it's the form within the familiar windows, beneath the famliar red and white neon sign, and it draws him to a stop, his head tilting, hazel eyes watching her, before venturing to withdraw a hand from the warm cave of coat pocket, gently tapping on the door

(Rosa)
The tap at the door rattles the little bells set above it, and were it not for those (in the summertime, they chime constantly. In the summertime, the shop is packed, and she hires another two tattooists to keep up with the demand. In the summertime, she makes enough to pay the mortgage for the rest of the year. The winter months cover the bills, barely. If it was summertime all year, she might start dreaming about investments and retirement. If it was summertime all year round, she might expand.) she might not have caught the gentle tap over the quiet music, through the fog of sleeplessness in which her senses float.

Rosa blinks up at the bells, and then her eyes focus on the darkness beyond. Stifling a yawn, she drops the pencil to the sketchpad and straightens, the walks out from behind the counter, heading toward the door. As she walks, she rubs her hands across her face and head, in a vain attempt to restore some semblance of alertness before answering the door.

It's not locked. She's still open. And so she reaches out and swings the door open, scooting back and holding the door with one arm outflung to permit him entry. "Hey - " a tired smile, and a moment of hesitation as she sifts through her hazy mind for his name. It's on the tip of her tongue. It's on the tip of her tongue. It's on the damned. tip. of. her. tongue. (She forgot her cats names this morning. Stood there over their bowl as she spooned the warmed catfood into it, and drew a complete blank.) " - Nahkti."

Relief runs riot over her features (that was close). "C'mon in. S'cold outside." And indeed it is, as a stray wind dances off the ocean, salty and clear with that strangely compelling scent of ocean-rot, the primordial soup of life. "Something I can do for you?"

(nakhti)
he may have seen the open sign, but she seemed busy, and he didn't want to interrupt, even if it was just to spread some sort of salutation, and his steps, even in the expensive shoes, are silent across the tiled floor, a soft smile ghosting across his features (Hello) turning to face her completely even if he knows she cannot understand the language of his hands, instead reaching into his pocket and pulling out the notepad which sprawls beneath the neat handwriting

Wondered about the Chief.

he realizes that he never returned, as he said he would, and there is something that may resemble an apology writ deep within those color-swirled eyes, eyes that actually look to her, and study her, now, the lines of sleepless strain that peek about her lips and temples, and the darkening circles that pool beneath her eyes when the light shines just right across her face, and that's when his attention intensifies, focuses, as if peering through some break in the clouds for however long it may last, and a hand reaches out, fingers almost touching her chin

for a silent moment, he watches her, dark lashes drawing closer together in the slightest narrowing of gaze, question igniting in its depths (something is wrong...) but it is discarded, perhaps out of politeness, perhaps out of patience, but he has been around her enough to know how she normally looks, and something strikes him wary, even if it's forsaken for his previous 'something' she can do

(harl)
he had been working the casinos the fools so quick to throw thier money into the mechanical monsters and give it up to the greedy owners of the flash buildings that he wonders if they will even notice the few extra bucks that go missing after he has walked passed. the accidental brush of a stranger. so much easier than working an actual carreer. but now he is bored enough money for this weeks rent and the food. and a new shirt like that one he saw at lucrecias last week now that was nice. for a moment he actually contemplates getting some proper work before breaking into a fit of giggles. dancing merily along the boardwalk. that predatory grace and feline agility flowing with every step almost bouncing along the railing that seperates land from sea. the narrow slippery ledge may as well be a footpath as far as he is concearned...

(rosa)
Her eyes narrow to focus on the words neatly etched across the notepad, and then winged brows rise in question. Though she does not say the words out loud, no doubt he can see it in her eyes, in the faint cloud of confusion that darkens them before understanding dawns. "Of course, Chief Two Moons Merikka." There's a distracted gesture, of her hand, graphite-smudged fingers gesturing toward the interior of the shop. "I have that somewhere in here. It'll take me just a moment to find the file. Come in, come in."

When he reaches out, and his fingers almost touch her chin, she lifts her head higher in an almost sharp gesture, then offers another wearied smile as salve for whatever offense he may have taken. The smile comes easily, a gentle curve of her mouth, that somehow reaches her eyes. The door falls closed, the bells ring, and the cold sea-tainted breeze is banished once again. She shivers - belatedly - as the last of the chill coils through the weave of her heavy sweater and reaches skin below, and quickens her step back toward the counter and the space heater.

"Coffee?" A glance toward the coffee-pot, in the booth beyond. Half-full, it is, and fresher than it should be at this hour of the night. It's bitter and black, a thick brew, and the scent fills the air. She sinks to a crouch, and begins rifling through the files on the shelves behind the counter, lifting her voice as she searches. "There's some paper cups over there, you can help yourself, if you'd like."

(nakhti)
it takes more than a lift away from his touch to offend, and that shows, perhaps he has been slighted for what he was in much more severe a way, he knows she is not of his people, and the aversion to touch is not seen as an insult, the slight smile mirrored just as easily as she offers it

then he (instantly) busies himself in finding the paper cups, and pours himself a cup of steaming liquid, the gloves removed, both hands wrapping around the cup to warm them in return to the counter, in claim of a stool, the careful perch of delicate balance that doesn't even shake the stool beneath his slight weight, drinking the coffee probably too fast than should be healthy for an unburned tongue (it heals)

waiting until she looks up again, and the hand covered in deep black ink moves in a familiar gesture (thank you)

(harl)
up on that railing it is like when he walks the rope, off in his own little world, his own private playground, a place where none may enter none can intrude it is just him and the rope, and yet one does enter,

running pitterpat with catfeet all through his soul slidding fur along his spine. a purrrrrrr bursting from between lips before he even realises it eyes scanning for what he can sense what he can taste and smell.

that tantalising sent of myrrh, mixed with something else something more exotic a blend of herbs and spices that seems to follow hiim always. and under it all that wich is just him, a smell like the dry wind of noon as it sweeps over a desert dune. the promise of ice in frigid breeze as seline rises to shine her cold light over darkened sands. the feeling of silken fur lurking just beneath the skin. the musk of a predator. frozen between one step and the next like a mime or a statue placed so delicatly on the frozen perch he draws in a deep breath, that bass rumble getting louder. he has been here and he is close. feet make no sound as he slips from railing to wooded way dark eyes scanning the boardwalk

not seeing him he starts his search following the 'taste' of him. and so that is how he finds himself heading towards rosas shop that place where he got his tattoo eyes fading as he relies more on hs other senses focuses more on the smell so hard to follow with this stuffy human nose. hardly noticing where it is he has found himself till he pressess a hand to the glass pausing before entering

(rosa)
When he returns to the counter with coffee in hand, re-entering her peripheral vision, her gaze flickers over and up. She catches the gesture, and offers another quick smile that slips away as easily as it comes. "Of course. You're welcome." There's something soothing about his silence, she half-recognizes, as she returns to the file. He is an image (the shutter of the camera, the sweep of a pen) captured but still moving in her mind's eye, some half-blank slate, some page written in a language she does not recognize, upon which she must focus to understand.

Faint color rises to her cheeks as she considers that - unworthy, all have a voice, find the truth in the subject, do not impose yourself and your view upon them, and every other little conviction she manages to hold, still, but the impulse is always there, the undercurrent of self that subverts and transforms the other from living breathing flesh to a moment of light and dark captured on the page, and he seems to exist on the cusp of that.

Ka-lumph.

The file (she found it) interrupts the musing trail of her thoughts. She rocks back on her heels and lifts it up onto the counter, rising a half-second later and opening it. "Here." She need shuffle only a few pages aside before she finds the thin stapled copy she made for him: a history of Chief Two Moons and his herb company, accompanied by Xeroxes of the few photos of the place in its heyday, which she found in the archives on or the web. "That copy's for you." Sliding the papers from the file toward him, then closing the manilla folder.

Glancing up - the ringing bells, the wheeze of the hinges not noticed before - gotta oil that - Rosa offers Harlequin a weary smile as he enters. "Evening Harlequin," she murmurs, passing another hand across her face. At least she didn't lose the thread of his name. "How's the tattoo healing?"

(nakhti)
there are times when one knows when he is being studied, or being thought about, ears burn, ears minutely ring, the scents pouring off another changes in some little way which pinpoints exactly what it is that is going on within them, so deep inside, that they don't even want to exactly admit what it is that creeps and rolls through their thoughts

the inked hand reaches for the paper, leaving the relative comfort and safety of the steaming cup, drawing the papers closer for the quick, intent study of the images, before those eyes snap upwards - the scent of cinnamon, the scent of oils, the familiar skin beneath, but it is the spice that always grabs his attention, the spikey sweetness that one can never mistake - and it draws a smile, no ghost, but the truthful smile which belies, perhaps, what it is he is thinking about deep within

obviously, he remains quiet, his language only gestures towards the other male (Hello. Harlequin.) and then those eyes, those soul-searching, soul-dissecting eyes, return to the papers at hand

(harl)
healing? try healed but he cant say that now can he. his voice is still that sensual purrrr although it seems to have lost a bit of its tease since last time.maybe its because hes fully clothed "it is coming along quite nicely the scab finally came off yesterday man did that itch like crazy"

or prehaps it is because the other in the tattoo parlor distracts him...

head tilts to the side as he looks at her the smile creeping over his features a dancing meriment in his eyes. yes hes in a good mood tonight and the way his glance cannot seem to stop drifting over nakhti doesnt hide what has him so happy. it is a concious effort that stops the purrr from again tumbling between parted lips as he basks in the presense of him the feel of his presence... body finally flowing that slow sensual glide carries him quickly across the distance between the door and nakhti circling behind him slowly a sweeping carress of fingers over the back of his shoulders tracing the intricate design he knows is hidden beneath the material of sweater. and then down one arm only pausing at the wrist. that inked in wrist with its intricate designs etched into the skin. eyes rising to once again study rosa (is this her work?) the question not spoken as he looks at her studies her. admires her. stepping away in the last. she is not one of us to hang alover each other may be distressing.

(rosa)
"They do that." She replies, in her quiet voice. The tired smile deepens briefly, lilting amusment echoing across her features. She lifts a slender arm, fingertips lightly brushing the inky tattoo - the dragon, coiled in shadow - etched into the flesh of her scalp. "Imagine this one. I had to sleep on my stomach for two weeks."

Harlequin pads quietly (moves with such effortless, bodily grace) away from the pool of cold air that ever-lingers by the door and the windows, and across the gray slate floor to the counter. Hazel eyes - bruised with sleepless, watering as she stifles another yawn - follow his progress. As he comes behind the counter and circles Nahkti, Rosa ensnares her own coffee mug, delicate fingers wrapping around the cooling ceramic, soaking up whatever warmth remains, and steps back to make room until she can lean against the wall behind. "There's coffee, if you'd like some. Cups and creamer and sugar beside the pot." Half-a-glance in that direction, eyes flickering back to the pair. Another smile. "You two know each other, I assume?"

(nakhti)
there's a flex of shoulders, a gentle stretch of muscle which brings what ink is hidden beneath coat and sweater up towards the tickling trace of fingers across his back, and a smile wanders serene across his features, where he did not find offense in her avoiding his touch earlier, it seems he finds a quiet joy in the touch that has been graced to him now, a glance to Rosa, the smile fading to some sly, demure thing (Yes we do)

but its the way that his hand turns beneath Harlequin's, some return of the touch, as if even without looking perhaps he knows there is a question there, but the ink is old, it is foreign (I know what that's like) his hands move in a dance all of their own, looking to the other man to translate the words for the woman that cannot understand the gestures that include reference to the dragon coiling itself across her scalp

(harl)
"where family" mmmm coffee. eyes move to measure the distance as if to decide wether the effort to again move that far is worth it or if should continue to lounge where he is finally the caffinated goodness wins out. so it is with a certain level of reluctance that he leaves his post beside nakhti to where the coffee pot is kept it made with both a lot of cream and sugar the almost syrupy liquid sipped at delicatly. stray traces of the mocca liquid licked delicatly from his lip as he turns to look at them both watching hands flickering in reply to nakhti even as that voice wraps around them both. "slow down i cannot keep up" his signing finnishes much after his words.

body moving with that sensual predators grace to again fall into a crouch against the bench another sip of his coffee. "he says he sympathasises with you" a hand raised to indicate the tattoo that can only just be seen from this angle.. .

(rosa)
"Family?" The slow rise of a skeptical brow - faint, so faint, but present - which ebbs into a rueful half-smile. Her parents: their belated interest in Judaism, their attempted insistence that she have a bas mitzvah when she was seventeen (seventeen!). The ravages of adolescence, the extended trauma of early adulthood, and the memory of all that contained in the singular curve of her mouth. "All families should be so close."

The amused glint shines through her eyes, despite incipient exhaustion, shines through the exhaustion and banishes it, for a moment or three. "It was an ordeal." There's no pain in the memory, online the lingering sense-impressions of youth and desire. She leans back, the upper curve of bare skull against the smooth wall behind, half-caress of the treasure (and treasured memory, her teacher, his hands still steady despite his age) that she cannot see without contortions and three-way mirrors. "I'm still not sure what possessed me. Some half-formed, mal-formed notion of rebellion, the need to be different, or something. And I like the way it looks. Who can quantify motivation, anyway?"

(nakhti)
a smile curves again, it is knowing more than sympathetic, some strange understanding of what she put herself through, and, perhaps, there is an element of amusement within it, as well

he remembers his own motivation, he remembers the hands of his mentor soft over the skin they pumped ink within, their motivations would mirror each other, in another world, some rite of passage from an unmarked juveline through the beaded curtains as a first step through adolescence and into the adults they seem to be now, a momentum that began in the incense riddled shop on a forgotten street in Cairo, the ink spilled from his back and down to his arm, time marked as the passage of sands in an hourglass, falling until they mounted and tumbled and gathered about the slender bones of his wrist (None can) for it is a mystery of a whisper each of them can hear, alone, there's a scandalous look towards the butterfly (intimately) know to fly across Harl's hip - even if he folds to crouch, it is as if the dusky man could see through clothing and folded flesh to see it anyway

there's a gesture towards his back, then hands held to quantify the amount of ink that covers his shoulderblades, sharing the information with Rosa for what she cannot see or know about

(harl)
his own brow raises slowly as an almost mocking smile spreads slowly across his face placing the coffee beside him on the floor he leans forwards rising with the motion before sinking down again a wave flowing gently through the interveening distance. arms wrapping around nakhti from above enveloping him in a hug as he brings his chin to rest on his shoulder. breathing in the scent of him the way the sweet coffee smell on his breath mixes with the smell of his hair his clothes his skin. watching as it stirs the small hairs on the side of his neck and the longer ones as it plays gently against his face a breathy whisper "it is the families we make that are closest. often more so than the ones we are born into" just a tinge of something there not quite anger almost regret yet also a happiness that is in his voice carried in his touch in the ability to share nakhtis presense.

"sometimes we need to mark ourselves to show the world we are different even as we understand it inside. or prehaps it is a mystery that one still has to discover?" glancing at the paper nakhti holds as if thats a mystery he would like to discover himself.

(nakhti)
the soft chuckling laughter is almost audible, some sighed breath that could only approach holding sound, and somehow there's an impossible stretch and lengthening of slender form up until the backwards embrace, his jaw tilts, laying out the expanse of throat for Harl to draw the musky scent from, some twist of myrrh and frankincense and foreign oils and things that speak of ancient mysteries were one to only get so close, it's in his skin, in his clothes, wrapped up in the air that hovers just touching his body - it's something that seems to absorb the other male, drawing him into the depths of the shadows that crawl through the Bastet's hair and inks and even in the darkness of rich hazel eyes

(There is truth in that) from the delicate movement of hands, it is only something that can be whispered, murmured somewhere in the darkness, a bond much deeper than blood, perhaps explained in that semblance of silence to Rosa, perhaps only agreed with his partner, then the fine line of jaw lifts, an indication back the collection of ink in her scalp (How long have you had it?)

(rosa)
"Indeed." Half-a-smile accompanies the quiet voiced agreement. "Though I've found that those families usually fall apart. You're tied inextricably to the natural one, the one you inherited when you were born." Amusement, though fleeting, an a faint dismissive gesture of a slender hand, stained and calloused and scarred, the fingers, by ink, by heat, by chemicals and tonight smudged with graphite from the pencil with which she was doodling absently, the images from her sleepless, inevitable dream. There's time there, wisdom, loss perhaps, lingering but accepted as part and parcel of the whole. That much serenity she has achieved, and despite the drawn pallor of her features, despite the lazy tug of her weary smile, that, too, shines on through. "Though I'm not sure I'm trying to show the world I'm different, anymore. I suppose - "

"It's more that I'm the same." There's some truth in that, some inchoate truth in that (words are such empty vessels). She lifts her gaze, and it encompasses the whole of the ceiling (look up - original stamped tin uncovered during the renovations.) and somehow, by extension, the whole of her shop. "This is mostly - well, partially - just a job, anyway. Some way to support my art-school-drop-out self." There's no bitterness there, either. She remembers those days, and the way the world opened, and the - a sudden inhalation (Burning man. Reality no longer flat, but a pool into which she could dip her finger, the concentric circles that spread outward, wide, wider.) - memory, no more.

"As for this," her hand rises from the mug, touches the coil of the dragon's tale visible to them on the right side of her skull, beneath the faint shadow of new-growing hair, sunk into the skin. "Eight years. Nine soon. I got it when I first moved out here and starting working for the owner of this place."

(harl)
head tilts to the side, watching, mesmorising, every geasture of the two of them drunk down as if it was liquid studied as if a living creature an peice of art a philosophical problem with no solution all in one and finally he just kisses nakhti lightly on cheek "sometimes the one we inheret is not worth it either" now however he is tired and has to go a yawn almost cracks his jaw, its looking at rosa she just looks so tired. "i will leave you two to converse but me i have to go." a lingering carress as he slowly disentangles himself from nakhti

(nakhti)
(You have a job, that is what counts.) softly smiled as Harlequin translantes for them (a job that you love) he speaks of the passion that he knows is contained within her art, the flash on the walls that is not the generic panthers wrapped in barbed wires and flames, the intense study she granted his arm upon their first meeting, it seems he understands that passion, and it is something that burns deeply within himself, it feeds the ravenous hunger

there's a nuzzle of his head against Harl's jaw after the soft kiss, some warm affection that is shared between them, the ghosting smile of another type of understanding, then a smooth dance of his hands (Goodnight Harlequin) before they reach once more for the papers she copied for him

You are open tomorrow, yes?

the pad revisiting the space between them on the counter, fingers gently swirling it so that she may easily red, he has not looked at the sign, it is a query in response to how late it is, how tired she looks, for there is also another issue of business between them

(rosa)
"It's a job that lets me use my talent, and support myself in the things that I love," she blinks, and draws in a breath, then offers a surrendering shrug. "...and I suppose I do love it too, sometimes." Rosa's eyes follow Harlequin as he rises and leaves, and she offers him a wave and smile in farewell.

Then she steps closer, head canting to the side, watching the movement of his hand as he writes. Lashes lower as her eyes sweep across the notepad. "Indeed. I'm open tomorrow." She steps around him, gathering Harlequin's cup in her free hand and taking it back to empty in the sink before throwing it away. The dregs of her own coffee follow, and the mug clinks quietly as she places it in the sink. She'll wash it, tomorrow. "In the morning and early afternoon, and then again later in the evening and into the night." The words are offered over her shoulder as she rinses out coffee cup and lifts the carafe from its cradle, turning off the burner. "Want more before I toss this?" She saw how he consumed it. Art has taught her both patience and observance.
[fade]

Posted by nakhti at January 11, 2003 12:00 AM

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