Logs:I'm Taken, Remember
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| RL Date: 17 May, 2011 |
| Who: Iolene, Jaques |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Iolene waits for Jaques return and then pounces, hoping to get the freshest of his crab catch. |
| Where: Beach, Western Island |
| When: Day 10, Month 10, Turn 25 (Interval 10) |
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| At low tide, the island gets quite a bit bigger, and moreover, just a little wading can take somebody out to the nearby islands, too. Now that it's getting later, Jaques is coming back, a worn but bulging sack over his shoulder as he trudges back to the main island. Once on that side of the water, he sets his cargo down to take a breather and also dry off just a touch before he gets even sandier. She might have been cued to his return, from her point up on the cliff or some little birdie told her, but there's Iolene looking expectant with a wide, welcoming grin and open arms, despite the fact that she's planted her bottom into the sand. "Took you long enough," chides the younger girl. "I saw you from the lookout point ages ago, and I had time to climb down, race over here, sit, and catch my breath before you even made it halfway." Tsk tsk, goes her tongue, accompanied by a shake of her head. But, she's still smiling, the smile enchanting her velvet voice to be all the more warm. "What've you got there, brother?" Not a brother by blood or Blood, but given the easy way Io imparts that name, perhaps a long used pet name for Cason's unambitious oldest. "Hey, you," says Jaques, looking around at that voice but already donning a smile for the younger girl. One hand gestures to his bag at her teasing. "If you want to carry all that while wading through the tide coming in, be my guest. Not too late for dinner, though, am I? Found a good spot for some crabs so I stocked up. What have /you/ done today?" Iolene, forever the little sister. She tips herself forward off her bottom so she's crouched with her toes digging into the sands and her arms rested against her knees. "Could've done it faster," she says with unrepenting, if teasing, conceit. "Let's just sit here and fire them up ourselves! We can take what we can't fill in our bellies back." We, not he. But again, there's an unrepentant smile filled with as much charm as Iolene is capable of, which could be quite considerable and possibly lethal given the right audience. Is Jaques the right audience? "I'm slated to go out later tonight with Jeremien. Night fishing is when the super big monsters come out to be caught." Otherwise known as breakfast. Wryly, "Don't think Da would like that much. And anyway, don't have any way to cook 'em up down here." He lifts his shoulders slightly, nudging the bag with one bare foot. The contents shift slightly but at least nothing comes sliding out of the tightly tied bag. Iolene's latter words earn a look from him. "Jeremien's kind of a--well. Just be careful, okay? It'd suck if he brought in a monster and we cut it open and you came tumbling out." Iolene slants Jaques a /look/. "You really think he'll feed me to the monsters?" Her lean forward leans all the more, so much so that a hand has to jerk forward to catch her fall. "What is with you boys anyway? Between you and Dev, worrying about night fishing. It's not like the other girls will go with me." Jaques snorts. "I think he's oblivious enough to not notice if you fell in," he replies, with a quirk of his mouth. "Especially if it netted him the big one. Suit yourself, though." As for the other girls? "Maybe that oughta tell you something," is all he'll say. In either an awful mimic of Jaques, or her own actual sentiment, Iolene snorts as well. Derisively though. "That they're all scared of the dark?" Pfft. "I bet Rilka would go with me," the fisher girl says suddenly, "Would that make you feel any better?" Cause an oblivious fool and a crazy girl alleviate /everyone's/ concern. But she doesn't stop to listen to his answer, not really, as she scampers back on all fours to a rock, from behind which she produces a small little pot enough for two crabs, a flint, and some kindling. "Let's eat! Please? I love it when you cook for me." Big, woebegone eyes that try to tug at Jaques heartstring turn upon the man. "No." That's the short version. The long version: "Fact that the craziest person on this whole damn island--which is saying something--would do it s'not really a point in your favor. Wait, what are--" Her scrabbling about earns a look of some confusion, his head tilting just a hair. Then his brows go up. He sighs, the sucker. "Well... since you asked so nicely." She /was/ waiting and is all smug in the knowledge that he was caught by surprise, this time. Back to her crouching, Iolene begins to work the flint to try and produce a fire, but while fishing might be her thing and filling her belly her next thing, the fundamentals of how to actually fill her belly with edible, non-raw food, escape her. "Rilka's not really all that crazy. I mean, she is what she is, just like you are what you are." "Let me," says Jaques, bending down to take the flint and kindling from her. It doesn't take him long to get a tiny little blaze going; he's apparently had more practice at this part of things. "She's loony as they come, kid, no two ways about it. Not sure what that's supposed to say about me. --Go get a couple out and let's do this." Squealing, in spite of Jaques insult of her hut-mate, Iolene races to his pack and plucks out two crabs, then races to the ocean to scoop up some salty, not so clean water. But hey, they're in exile, it's what's for dinner that counts. Walking back more carefully, what with crabs banging around in her saltwater filled pot, Io explains her earlier statement, "Well, she's just who she is and she's ok with that. You're who you are and you're ok with it, aren't you? I like being me. We should all like being who we are." Just get that campfire going and the two of them can start a kumbaya session. While Iolene goes and fills the pot, Jaques works on feeding the fire, getting a small little blaze going and then giving it a little more driftwood to build it up. "I guess if you're going to be that crazy, might as well be okay with it," he concedes that point with a faint smile. "You're very... peaceful about this, aren't you." "Peaceful?" Iolene? There's a laugh for Jaques. "Tell Grams that. She'll think the world's ending." A beat passes, Io thoughtfully quiet. In the mean time, she hovers over the fire with the waiting pot. Then thoughtfulness breaks for, "I've just been thinking a lot more lately. What with Rilka's Strange One in our midst. Just... how so many things are messed up because we make them so messed up. Like people. We're all really messed up." Abruptly, her philosophical session ends with a change in subject, "Were you around when the news broke? Seani and Tom aren't together anymore." The pot's set over the fire so it can start to cook, and Jaques, that part done, settles back on the sand to wait. "Maybe not peaceful so much as--at peace," he struggles to find the right wording, lips pursing up in thought. "You do like being you. --Is it her Strange One, now? Planning a wedding already, are we?" A pause. As for the latter: "Da hasn't told me any of the juicy bits," he interprets her curiosity. "Oh." Disappointed at his lack of knowledge, Iolene flops backwards onto the sands too, her legs flying out in a V and her hands propped behind her at angles. "I thought if anyone would know, it'd be you. I've never heard of the elders approving the break up of a marriage. Those vows are... sacred, aren't they?" Io looks to Jaques for confirmation of this. "I mean, if it were so easy-." Another of those beats pass, except this one decidedly more awkward than the last. Foot-mouth-shove. Jaques just looks at Iolene, for that comment. Foot-in-mouth indeed. After a couple of moments, though, he turns his attention back to their meal, prodding at the fire and stoking it up while the crabs start to cook. "Keep an eye on them," he tells Iolene once it's under way. "I'm going to go turn in the rest and I'll be back." Her sun-dark cheeks can't hide the crimson flush that rises to them when Jaques just looks at her and maintains the silence for more than a breath. His order is a welcome relief two-fold: something to do with herself that doesn't require being awkwardly quiet and Jaques spoke again to her, relieving her of the need to break the silence herself. Venturing a tentative smile, Io rolls to her knees and crawls over, her dark blue eyes fixed to the older man rather than the pot. "I'll make sure it doesn't boil over at least." And that's exactly what she does while the crab-catcher turns in the rest, albeit not very patiently. All the ability to be still to catch seafaring creatures and what few land creatures there might be does not translate into being able to keep still watching over a pot. So she fidgets. She rolls around in the sand boredly. She gets to her feet and hops around in a game that only exists in her head. She pulls her hair up. She unties it so it falls loose. She does any manner of time-wasting fidgety movements while Jaques is gone and probably right up until the moment he returns. It's amazing how slow time goes by when you're just watching a pot. It doesn't take Jaques long to head up to camp with the bag over his shoulder; he drops it off and in just a couple of minutes is on his way back down to the beach, hands now empty. From afar, he can see Iolene moving about; not like there's trees on the island to hide her. so that weird game she plays? He sees it. All the hair fidgeting? He sees that too, and with a bemused smile, he remarks on that when he gets back to their little fire. "Don't have to get all prettied up for me. I'm taken, remember." All's forgiven. "/Jaques/!" Not so horrified that he's seen her fidgeting, but definitely horrified for his implication, Io is in mid-hair pull up when that movement shifts into a not insignificant punch aimed at his upper arm. "It's not like that. You're not my type anyway," she adds, tossing her, now fallen loose, hair about -- it makes so much more of an impact this way, lucky that. "I think they're almost ready." There's maturity somewhere in Iolene's sometimes disciplined work ethic, just not now. Especially not now, what with the tongue sticking out at the brown-haired man, before she's pointing to the pot. "I almost feel bad for them sometimes. At least with fish, you spear 'em and they die. With crab, they just boil to death. It must be an awful way to go. What do you think? Would you rather be staked through the heart and die instantly, or boiled slowly while alive?" "Hey, hey," says Jaques, but with a wide grin as he rubs his upper arm. "I bruise easy, and anyway, you're going to hurt my feelings. I don't even know who my competition is." He leans over to check the pot too when she points at it, his lips pursing slightly now, when he studies the crabs. "Another minute or two," he agrees. And, "Don't be morbid, please." Iolene, wont to do her own thing regardless of what others say, obeys almost instantly. And since all has been forgiving of her earlier faux pas, it's done with an affable panache. "Oh, there's no competition. If I ever fall in love, I'll let you know first, promise. But I find the idea of it all- distracting?" The fisher girl looks to Jaques a moment, dark eyes ruminating with what she could say versus what she should, but ultimately, it's the careless joie de vivre of her tongue that carries on with, "The elders'll decide who I pair up with. Falling in love would just ... ruin what could be nice. It makes you want something else and confuses you. Well, that's what I think at any rate." A beat passes. "Has your pa mentioned me?" Jaques agrees, "Good plan. Don't go being all like... Well." He won't say who, exactly, but his mouth twists into a wry smile. They know. "You know what they all say. Love is a thing that grows. Nothing comes easy. You have to work at it." The platitudes are delivered lightly, but it's not quite matched by expression, and he hesitates visibly at the latter question. Picking his words carefully, he says, "No more so than any of the other unmarried girls, I suppose." "Not even a hint as to who the elders might be thinking of?" Oh woe! One over-dramatic arm reaches up to fling over Iolene's forehead and eyes, but the telltale grin gives her away and eventually, the big gesture brings her back down to the sands. Her legs sprawl, at first v-shaped, and then push back further into a split and she leans forward into it so her chin might rest atop two fists while her elbows brace into the sands. "I'll be seventeen soon." As if that should matter as to when she can get married. The bendiness of Iolene earns a faint grimace from Jaques, who just shakes his head and turns to eye their dinner again. "I was seventeen," he agrees. "Evie was... well. Only fifteen then. I didn't think we were young, then, but thinking about you? It's strange that you're of an age for it now. I feel old." The last is joking, accompanied by a grin, though he shrugs off her first question entirely. Perhaps, Iolene's learned a long time ago not to press Jaques too much for answers; taciturn though he might be, he is, after all, a leader's son, albeit one that utilizes silences as a weapon rather than words. With the mention of his wife, Io shifts her stance once more, going from a full split to easily sliding her legs behind her so she's suddenly on her belly, knees bent with her feet up in the air kicking like an idle child. She feigns the wound his words stab at with another over-dramatic little sigh, bracketed as it were, by a not quite hidden smile. She's not very good at the whole keeping the act going thing and ends up in a bubble of laughter. "You were never as young as I was, Jaques. And I don't think I'll ever be as old as you are. Not nearly." More wincing, out loud this time. "You make my legs hurt when you do that," complains Jaques, making as if to cover his eyes with one hand so he doesn't have to watch anymore. But he remembers the food, and that's a welcome distraction as he pulls the pot from the fire with the hem of his threadbare jacket for a potholder. "That's how it should be, anyway," he tells her. "You deserve a nice childhood before you have to go havings children of your own." "Just your legs?" teases Iolene, but she's on her belly now and not doing the crotch-painful splits. With the food coming off the fire, Io draws herself up even more, but not to stand. No. She just sits, cross-legged, waiting for Jaques, the chef, to bring her some delectably cooked crabs. "I think, Jaques," begins the girl, the first hint of a more realistic sober venturing into her velvet voice, "I lost my childhood long ago when Thread fell." Pause. "But it's ok." Lest things get too maudlin. "We're a hardy bunch, isn't that what Cason says? Northerners, bred to survive." "I think that's the case for most of us." Jaques sets the pot in the sand and gives it some time to cool off before trying to fish out dinner. "What little childhood you get, out here. But Da's got a point, doesn't he? We've made it this far and I figure our kids'll have a nice go of it after us. Providing Thread doesn't come back again." "Providing. Providing the seas don't dry up of fish and we're still able-bodied and not feeble-minded," parrots Iolene, likely in a mimic of her grandmother. "Tell me, Jaques. Tell me a story. Tell me," a finger lifts to tap against her cheek, "What you would do if you could do anything in the world you wanted?" What a question. Jaques doesn't even know what options there are in the world, so he just... sits there, for a moment. And he finds the crabs far more interesting than they probably really are, as he fishes one out of the water, passing it from one hand to the other as the hot shell burns his fingers. Finally, when it's cooled enough he can actually hold on to it, he passes it to Iolene and says, "I don't know. I'm no use at stories, you know that." Iolene is eager with her hands. She might even be salivating a little about the mouth and certainly, she seems unable to help the tongue that pokes out above her lower lip as it licks nonexistent crab meat off her lips. "Mmmm." She doesn't have to crack it open to intake that aroma and appreciate it in all its simple preparation. Genuine flattery sweetens her voice and those dark eyes of her seek out Jaques, pleased, "You always know how to cook it just like I like it." For now, the desire for stories is forgotten. "It's a talent. Suck up," answers Jaques, with a smile for that. He starts on his own crab next, with much the same hot-potato routine. In the meantime, he wonders, "You?" "Muh?" Sitting cross-legged, Iolene is definitely a lot more interested in slurping crab claws free of meat and digging fingers past gills to the sweet and salty meat inside. So when Jaques returns her inquiry back, she could be considered a comical sight, with some crab stuck in her loose hair and those big blue eyes darting up to frame a face that has a crab shell covering her nose and mouth. "Me? What about me?" is her elaboration once she's managed to pry herself away from the crab. "You're disgusting, for one," Jaques points out as he leans over to pluck the crab meat from her hair. He offers it back out to her; nothing wasted on the islands, after all. Then, "It's only polite to reciprocate, when one asks for stories." Iolene manages a look of complete woebegoneness. "I was hungry," is her excuse. But for the rest of the meal, she appears to try her best to be a little less disgusting and a little more Evie-like. She certainly eats with less gusto and joy though. "Weeeeeeeeeell," drawls out fisher, considering, "If I could do anything in the world I wanted. If I was your dad...," she adds, an unrepentant sauciness setting a twinkle in her dark eyes, "I would build a boat and just start paddling out that way." She makes an aimless gesture with a crab claw towards further west, away from the supposed main land. "Catch enough to feed myself. Sit and bake in the sun when I'm too tired. Be free." Wistful that. The comparative mutedness of eating habits earns a faint smile from Jaques, wistful more than anything. "I was only teasing," he tells her after a minute, since she looks so sad about it and all. He even makes a big show of slurping one of his own crab legs, see? But he dreams are sobering, and he can't even try to spare her feelings when he notes, "There's nothing out there." "I don't mind nothing." Saucy gives way back to sober reality, that not even the war of crab claws against each other can break. It's Iolene's very own sock puppet theater, minus the socks and add in the claws, one crab claw seeming to be quite earnest in explaining something to another and the other not liking it one bit and attacking. "A little bit of nothing might be nice for a while. You could come with me." For just a minute or two, the only sound is the waves breaking on shore and the crack of crab claws as Iolene and Jaques both make short work of their meals. Finally, all he says, without looking, is, "I could." Satisfied with this answer, Iolene resumes eating with a little more gusto than before and seems happy to maintain a companionable silence. That is, until she starts weaving an actual story, one filled with fierce seastorms and a wreckage at the bottom of the ocean. It involves mermaids and mermen, pearls and diamonds beneath the waters, and fantastical sea creatures that are both good and bad. It's a story that is carried with the velvet ease of multiple retellings on her sweet-toned voice, and it takes much of the evening, until the cooking fire all but peters out, at the end of which, Io's ended up curled in the crook of Jaques' arm. |
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