Urban Nordica
Coffeebreak
I hate New York. It's a funny kind of hate, since it probably shouldn't be there; nestled amongst the towering skyscrapers and taxi-rank chaos and hum of commerce I should feel right home. But I don't. Honestly, I probably shouldn't even be here. This isn't my territory, and there are so many overlapping territories in this place already that the place will all-but burst at the seams with the addition of one more, and even though I've faxed and emailed and written to all the right people -- just passing through, you understand -- I still feel like an interloper. Unfortunatley, I have a conference to attend; boring stuff, for work and nothing more, but it still needs doing. Or will, rather, in a few hours. This time I flew in a little early, because there's someone I want to check up on.
Three years, it's been. Nearly four, and it feels a hell of a lot longer. Time in Manheim moves so damn slow sometimes.
When I get there, the apartment turns out to be less of an apartment and more of a grimy tenement. I didn't know the address upon arrival, and still don't by the time I knock on the door, but neither of those things are particularly important. There are stronger senses of direction in this world than some letters on a piece of paper.
After a while, I hear the clanking of dead-bolts, and a moment later a bright red eye appears at the crack between the mouldering door and it's equally warped frame. The eye widens a little, before the door slams shut once again. The sound of mroe locks being thrown fills the air, and after a while the whole door opens.
"Lain! I didn't expect to see you here, ma chere." She sounds surprised though not, I think, wholly in a bad way.
I give a little shurg. "Was in the neighbourhood," I say. "Thought I'd drop by and see how you're doing."
Tara DeLioncourt just sighs dramatically, the movement sending her somewhat comical bust heaving. "Can't complain, I suppose," she says. "Come in, come in!" She ushers me inside with cool, pale hands and I enter obligingly. The rooms smells very faintly like blood and corpses, though it might just be my imagination.
"Coffee?" Tara asks.
"Please. Black, no sugar." I walk idily over to the flat's small, greasy kitchen and watch Tara bustle around with cups. She's about to flip the switch on the electric jug when I say, "Allow me," and a second later the water is happily boiled.
"Ah, merci merci," she says, then grins a ripe purple grin. "Useful skill that, non?"
"I'm very domesticated," I agree, and she just laughs.
Sitting on a stool, I lean casually against the worn formica benchtop. "So, how you settling in?"
"It's different," she says eventually. I somewhat relieved when she starts spooning coffee into a fairly new-looking coffee plunger; I hate the instant stuff. "I went to a con last month; met my actress. Everyone agreed I had the best Nekro costume."
I chuckle. "It's fun, isn't it?"
"Mm, though you'd never get me to admit it." A cup appears in front of me and I take it gladly. Tara sits herself atop the bench on the other side of the kitchen. "I was surprised," she continues, "the amount of us that attended."
I shrug. "Why? It's a pilgrimige. So many people believing in so much; everyone sneaks along to at least one." After a pause, I ask, "So... have you seen any of the others?"
Another slight sigh. "Sometimes," she begins, "I think I hear them. Fighting or talking or laughing, just around a corner. But whenever I go to look..." She trails off into a shrug.
"They'll come," I tell her, and she just shakes her head.
"Maybe it's better this way," she says. "And I see them still, in a way. And we fight and die and murder. But it is all so very far away, like daydreams and make-believe, and when it is done it is done, and I return to my apartment." I nod into the pause, waiting for her to continue. "I miss Miriah," she admits. "Sometimes... sometimes I dream that she stayed. That I can hear her in the next room. That sometimes at night I sneak in behind her and run a blade across her throat, and sometimes she sneaks in a cuts off my head." She is lonely in spite of herself, and I feel reassured; glad that I decided to come.
"It's hard," I agree.
Suddenly, however, she grins. "Ah, but I have another job now too, don't forget ma chere. I am also the Ghost, and all the pale-faced young girls come to worship me, to ask me favours. Some of them," she adds gleefully, "are never seen again. And sometimes... it is their ex boyfriends." She winks at me wickedly, and I laugh.
"Sig says you have a LiveJournal community," I say slyly.
"Ah, oui. It seems I have hit the big time, non?"