[center][img]https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/019e7cbe-43dc-713a-9c31-7e0fc5f6a725.webp[/img][/CENTER][indent][sub][COLOR=9174cb][I]Eve[/I][/color][/sub][sup][right][COLOR=9174cb][b]Death and All Her Friends - III Meet You for Coffee [/b][/COLOR][/right][/sup][/indent][center][COLOR=dimgray][SUP][sub]_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________[/sub][/SUP][/COLOR][/center]

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[i][right]She dreamed of flying. Of dancing through the cloud-wrack; leaving behind all manner of vermiculate patterns. There was no smell of the city up here. It was crisp and clear and beautiful and for a dream it was real; it was so real. [color=a7d52b]I want my wings[/color] This was a memory so lodged to the circuitry of her brain she could not decipher that it had not happened to her. Now, she held the memory in her muscles and mind of occupying the sky for endless hours; free.[/right][/i]

It was always the day after that the veil between Eve and the Awareness was at its thinnest. When the voices were at their loudest and most distressed. Three lines of pure white coke prior hadn’t helped to prevent a wretched hangover either and when her eyes opened, she fixed them to a single focal point above her bed. Her stained glass skylight. She lay like that for some time and watched the shape of birds passing. How she got home, she wasn’t sure, only that she had. She still felt the fur of her jacket, the heavy sequin chain of her dress, and that one damned shoe strapped to her ankle as if she’d simply pushed herself through the front door and collapsed to bed as she had been, as she always was. And now, she was present and part of Calder City’s morning routine, but dressed in last night, and watching the cinematic overload of lives gone by. Traffic was a steady hum from beyond the window, but otherwise the stretch of this morning had a tormenting silence to it and the fabric of her bedding crawled her sensitive skin. It took every ounce of effort to even reach for the dramamine placed atop her bedside table; littered too with a wine glass from predrinks, a water bottle half filled, orange juice bottle only holding the dregs of pulp in the very bottom. An empty diet coke on its side.

She swallowed the pills dry and closed her eyes once more to let them take hold while she contemplated the effort of a shower.

[hr]

Under the run of water, [i]Paloma[/i] kept moving through her mind and casting whispers to Eve of her pain and suffering and the end of her life. [color=a7d52b]I want my wings[/color] All of the visions she'd experienced of torturous procedures. Inflicted sickness and then curing in a seemingly endless cycle and the sensation of the prick of a needle to take yet more blood. Eve tried to comprehend the reasons behind it all. Decipher what and how and why it happened while Paloma's memories replayed. Favourite flights of soaring across the cirrostratus and flying alongside birds and a magenta sunrise; freefalling earthward only to catch herself just before hitting the bottom. 

Paloma just wanted to fly and roll through the masses of clouds. Against the direction of the wind and with it all the same, and to be beside the birds. She loved the birds, but now Paloma was dead and whatever dreams and hopes she had lived inside of Eve, uncontrolled and untethered.

[hr]

On the street, Eve watched the people passing by. Watching their activities and she, not for the first time, thought that it was a good thing they did not know the Awareness and the truth of the afterlife. She was grateful that they still had that mystery and she was jealous of it all the same. Only Eve had the curse to explore the engine of good and bad lives that had gone. She often found great amounts of sorrow and regret scattered in the threads, and when they became hers, she tried to treat them with care and respect, but far more often than not she just held onto them.

There were other times where what she found in the Awareness was, in its purest form, love. The love left behind with nowhere to go and those times were the worst. To wake up again cold and without it. There were many days, she wanted for someone else to suffer it and to release her from circling her darkness. Most days, she simply aimed to survive it.

Across the road Eve watched a woman walking past. Hurried in her steps and dressed in a longline coat of tan colour and wool blend. Navy slacks and a pair of slide on loafers made her look so effortlessly put together. [i]Bitch[/i], Eve thought and glanced down at her own feet and her lace-up satin sneakerinas. They’d been expensive, but their only road had been from her apartment to the coffee shop for purposeless days. They did not walk her to importance, carry her to a meeting or presentation, stomp down the corporate halls or even across a restaurant floor to serve a waiting customer. They were decorative things. The woman’s hair was fastened atop her head in a neat bun and she had a well crafted bag slung over her shoulder and one of those reusable coffee cups probably with a trendy drink for cool, respectable, and chic women. She was weaving the crowd with purpose and to Eve, in that moment, she was perfect. [i]I want my wings.[/i]

She watched until the woman was out of sight.

[hr]

“Shit,” Marcus said under his breath, glancing up over the espresso machine as the bell on the cafe door rang once. He watched the woman walk in; all wide eyed and eclectic looking. Large round purple sunglasses as if she was trying to be discreet. Not only was she a weirdo, twitchy, and inappropriate – she was the weird, twitchy, and inappropriate daughter of Silvio Raciti; a man whose name had a certain kind of notoriety that Marcus didn't want to purposely invoke upon. He elbowed his colleague as he tapped out the grounds from his portafilter. “She’s back,” he muttered.

“Who?” Liam asked, looking straight at the doorway only to follow up with an “oh shit” of his own, only louder and less self-aware.

“She’s going to ask about the job again,” Marcus said, letting the sound of another grind filling drown him out some. “Get rid of her.”

“Why me?” Liam protested.

“Because I’m duty manager today. Just get rid of her."

Liam stood and watched, waiting for Eve to step to the counter. Something was always off about her, but in a City where people had all manner of gifts, could anything really be off? Marcus didn’t care for her, and that was fair. Some days she was rude and others demanding. More often than not she was impatient, messy, and took too long to order. Would just stare at the chalkboard like she’d never seen one. “Mornin’” Liam said with a smile that he was able to find and muster. “Listen,” he began, not wanting to waste time. “About your resume–”

[COLOR=9174cb]“It’s okay,”[/color] Eve interrupted with a wave of her hand. [COLOR=9174cb]“I’ve got… Freelance work now, I’d be too busy for this, you know.”[/color] She gave a nonchalant roll of her eyes like she didn't know that they'd been whispering about her moments prior, like she couldn't tell the true expression behind the expression.

With his back turned, Marcus rolled his eyes and ran the steam wand.

“Oh good. I’m glad,” Liam answered with a nod. “That sounds great.” He approached the register and watched as Eve’s eyes tracked upward to the chalkboard menu again and he held a breath in his throat, [i]he we go[/i] he thought to himself, especially and now painfully aware of another couple who had just walked in. He watched as Eve placed a hand on the counter.

[COLOR=9174cb]“Just came for a cup of coffee,”[/color] she added a grin but it seemed clunky on her face and her eyes half-closed in the light as if she was fighting against a migraine.

“Sure, what do you want?”

And then it began, for Eve, as everything pushed toward that thinned veil, swarming sounds and thoughts and flickers of images that she stood and held with, enduring the tide of them. Her fingers splayed and clenched against the counter.

[right][color=a7d52b]I want my wings[/color]
[color=6b7653]ᶜᵃᵖᵖᵘᶜᶜⁱⁿᵒ, ᶠᵘˡˡ ᶜʳᵉᵃᵐ, ᵉˣᵗʳᵃ ʰᵒᵗ[/color][/right]
[center][color=537076]ʎos ǝʞɐʇ ʎןuo ı[/color]
[color=a7d52b]Where is he?[/color][/center]

[COLOR=9174cb]"Full cream,"[/color] she said first.

"Suuuure," Liam answered with a raised brow.

[center][color=7ea7d8]𝙸 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚗𝚝 𝚊𝚗 𝚎𝚜𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜𝚘[/color][/center]
[right][color=a7d52b]Let me go![/color]
[color=537076]ʎǝuoɥ ɟo ɥsɐp ɐ puɐ[/color][/right]

[COLOR=9174cb]"With..."[/color]

[center][color=76535c]m̷y̷ ̷w̷i̷f̷e̷ ̷n̷e̷v̷e̷r̷ ̷l̷i̷k̷e̷d̷ ̷c̷o̷f̷f̷e̷e̷,̷ ̷a̷l̷w̷a̷y̷s̷ ̷a̷ ̷h̷o̷t̷ ̷c̷h̷o̷c̷o̷l̷a̷t̷e̷[/color]
[color=6b7653]ⁿᵒⁿᵉ ᵒᶠ ᵗʰⁱˢ ᵐᵒᶜʰᵃ ᶜʰᵒᶜᵃ ᶠᵘᶜᵏ ᵒᶠᶠ ˢʰⁱᵗ[/color]
[color=7ea7d8]𝚗𝚘 𝚖𝚒𝚕𝚔, 𝚗𝚘 𝚜𝚞𝚐𝚊𝚛[/color][/center]
[color=a7d52b]Stop doing that to me[/color]
[color=537076]ossǝɹdxǝ uɐ uı[/color]

[COLOR=9174cb]"Something, expresso."[/color]

"...Uh huh"

[right][color=7ea7d8]𝚒𝚝'𝚜 𝚊𝚗 𝚎𝚜𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜𝚘, 𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚊𝚗 𝙴𝚇𝚙𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜𝚘[/color]
[color=76535c]w̷i̷t̷h̷ ̷m̷a̷r̷s̷h̷m̷a̷l̷l̷o̷w̷s̷ ̷i̷n̷ ̷w̷i̷n̷t̷e̷r̷[/color][/right]

[COLOR=9174cb]"Espresso! Not. Not expresso. It's an espresso, not an EXpresso right."[/color] she stammered, visibly frustrated.

"Uh huh, so full cream and espresso," Liam looked passed and beyond her, and at the couple behind who were glancing at each other in that way people did when they were judging without words.

[color=a7d52b]I want my wings[/color]

[COLOR=9174cb]“Um...”[/color]

“You know, Eve, last time you were here, you got a cappuccino. How about that?”

[COLOR=9174cb]“...Yes, I’ll… Yes, with wings. I mean. Yes. Cappuccino.”[/color]

He gave her a smile, small but reassuring as she tapped plastic to the machine and he scrawled the order in barista shorthand on the lid. "It'll be right with ya." 

When he turned to Marcus to hand him the lid, the two of them shared that same eyebrow raise and wordless glance and Marcus hurried to make the cappuccino and let Liam be the one to shout it out for her. It wasn't until the door was closed and she was simply a shape meandering down the street outside that he turned to Liam again. 

“See? Absolute nutjob.”

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