Logs:Tricks and Tells
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| RL Date: 31 July, 2013 |
| Who: Tayte, Telavi |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Telavi comes to see Tayte's card decks, regular and special, learns about card cheats, and witnesses Tayte's tell enough to call her bluff. Girl talk. It's all about H'vier. |
| Where: Tayte's Room, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 25, Month 5, Turn 32 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Alida/Mentions, Anvori/Mentions, Devaki/Mentions, Dilan/Mentions, H'vier/Mentions, K'del/Mentions, Madilla/Mentions, Yvalia/Mentions |
| OOC Notes: Backdated! |
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| Tayte's Room, High Reaches Weyr The peculiar shape of this room suggests that it was unintentionally expanded, cement holding the ceiling together towards the peculiarly shaped alcove build into the back corner. It's larger than most personal quarters as a result, and though the uneven walls mean nothing sits flush, there's plenty of room for more than the usual amount of furniture. The larger lobe of the lopsided kidney shape that the room has might be considered a studio room. A large bed is tucked into the roundest part of the alcove, though there's a gap behind where the straight headboard does not meet the wall. It's piled high with furs and pillows. In this curve there's also a wardrobe, a dresser, and nightstands. Hooks extending from the ceiling over the dresser have been rigged with two layered chain-link that holds a number of bottles of alcohol of different varieties. The highest drawer in the dresser which is bizarrely the largest locks with a key. Opposite it, closer to the door, is a hearth that's had a throw rug and loveseat set in front of it, along with a few low tables. A set of shelves and a small desk sit opposite the curve of the smaller end of the room. Around the curve and into the little lobe, one finds a great change. There's color everywhere instead of the muted things in the front half. Scarves and streamers hang from little hooks installed in the ceiling, their lengths varying, and a crib is set up in the middle with two small boxes that have toys poking out of their not-quite-shut lids. There's a tall table stocked with all the tools a mother needs (well, those that are safe to be at toddler height) and a small dresser and wardrobe. The furniture is all hand-me-downs but in decent enough condition to make the occupants comfortable.
That Telavi, she's simultaneously intrigued and dismayed by the rigged decks. "How do people, with the decks I mean, not get caught? Or maybe I should ask, is there a way that the rest of us can catch them?" Today her hair's in a thick braid, of which one of the strands is itself a braid, and she plays with feathering its tip against her jaw as she looks these last decks over. "That is," and she gives the deckmaster a teasing smile, "if you can tell me without getting disowned." "I'll show you. First, how they do it." Tayte leans toward a deck in front of Telavi on the small table the vintner had pulled over for the occasion, but before she gets there, her hand lightly touches to Telavi's knee, "Make sure you watch me closely." The contact is brief and the lean brought the woman's body closer, but no more than was logically needed to pick up the deck in question. She hands it to Telavi, "Take a close look at this deck. Do you notice anything different about it?" When Tayte leans like that, Telavi's about to reach in too, except that the touch and the words draw her attention to the vintner instead. She does take the deck once it's finally handed to her, but then she protests with some amusement even as she starts to fan it open, "It's hard to notice different things about that and to watch you at the same time. Is that the point?" "It is." Tayte affirms with a smile. Then, "Here, I'll show you." She claims the deck from Telavi's hand, her palm and fingertips making contact before the deck is taken. Almost, as if from out of nowhere, as Tayte fans the deck of cards for Telavi to look at, she'd feel the weight of the small stone in her palm. The one that she could swear (and be right) was in her pocket moments before. Only once Tayte sees the fact that there's a rock there register, does she ask: "Do you always carry rocks in your pocket? Telavi keeps looking at the vintner, but then there are those cards, and seated this close it's hard to look at both, and then there's the... she's distracted, she looks down, she's wide-eyed and, when she looks back at Tayte she's got this absolute grin going on, iike she'd just lost ten Turns. "Did you.. You did, didn't you. That is amazing. How long did it take to learn that?" "Turns upon turns. Anvori prefers I don't juggle the bottles in Snowasis, but things like this-- that take nimble fingers and slight of hand used to be my sole preoccupation. You have a lot of time to learn these things when --" Tayte's cheeks pinken, but it's too late to stop the end of the sentence, "-- you're not getting laid." Then hurriedly, because there's so much in that sentence that could be dangerous just now, "The reason people can be successful is because there's a lot that can distract a person, either intentionally or otherwise, or they're just that clever with their hands. Some are too stupid to not realize their cards are too good once too often, but most tend to play it well. The biggest part is not becoming distracted, which is terribly difficult, really." She sets the cards back down, "There's nothing special about that deck. But if you feel in your pocket, and look at the back of the card you'll find there, it'll show you at least one of my decks that has a few extra cards. I keep it for novelty." Sure. 'Turns upon turns' has Telavi slumping, stagily, a touch of girlish can't-help-it disappointment threading through the woman's knowledge that complicated things take time. Not that she's not listening as Tayte continues, far from it, adding a faintly horrified, "Why not? Was someone that bad?" along the way. Distracting a person. Just that clever. "Or just plain not good at it yet," she has to interject for too-stupid. And then a blink, another blink, and she's diving a hand into her pocket with laughter, crowing as she comes up with the card, "Tayte. This is amazing. I know I said that before, but it is. Or does it seem un-amazing to you, because you know it already?" There's a nod to agree with the addition: the too-stupid. "Well, I didn't for the first twenty because I was a Hold-raised craftbred girl with an apprentice-minder from the Red Star whose horror stories would curdle your dinner while you were digesting. Then I got to my first posting and was pregnant shortly thereafter. As it was foretold unto me by the apprentice mistress from the Red Star." Tayte answer, adding an exaggerated air of prophecy to the last sentence. "And then I didn't again after my daughter was born." She fidgets slightly, but that was all very forthcoming as far as Tayte goes, so they really must be chums after all. There's something more there, though, something that makes her look distinctly bothered for a moment, before, "It's not that I think it's un-amazing, but-- well, like your sewing. When you're working on a project, do you frequently stop to think to yourself 'this is amazing'?" No interjecting from Telavi, not right off, listening closely with her gaze flickering between Tayte and the cards she's riffling through. Her expression's telltale, though: variations on merriment and wryness and a near-laugh for the foretelling. Except then she sobers, and offers, "I hope everything's... well. With your daughter." Not asking about fosterage, or even of survival, in case. As for sewing, "Not frequently, so I can see the parallel." But she explains anyway, "Most of it's too everyday, and for the rest, doing too much would slow me down... but a little, you know, when it really is just right, it keeps me going. It's better than klah, better than just bulling through it." "Oh, quite. She even has a father now, albeit not a blood-related one. And if Madilla's elixirs don't work, she might be in for a siblings in many months." Tayte grimaces, letting her face fall into her palms, scrubbing them across her face. It might not occur to the blonde at this moment that Telavi's not aware of Yvalia's existence here in the Weyr, and her own comments aren't particularly illuminating. "Sorry. I-- just made a really bad choice." She shakes her head, "You know how after a one-night stand," And maybe she thinks Tela might because she's seen her in Snowasis enough to guess, "Sometimes you regret it when you wake up? This is the first time I've regretted it for days after." H'vier: special. The discussion of amazingness, unfortunately, falls by the wayside. "She... does? Congratulations," Telavi can, in her bemusement, also offer that much along the way, "and they had better." Not just for Tayte, either. Then, though, when Tayte does what she does, Tela can't help but lean forward slightly in concern, the deck closed with a flick of her thumb. The one night stand almost comes as a relief, except, "Days? That bad? I'm so sorry." "She does. She wanted one ever since Dee found out he had a dad. They're around the same age and play together in the nursery. Before that, it was just us." Tayte answers this absently, "And yes. I hope so. I didn't have anything like that when I was-- well, before. And that's how it happened. And for all I know, if I did get knocked up, it would actually be a full-sibling, because the guy might be Yvalia's dad, but shells if I know that either." Frustration rises and ends in a sigh. "I'm sorry. I'm a-- well, I was a-- maybe I am again, a--" From behind her hands that cover only her mouth and cheeks. "Slut." It's obviously the self-reproach of the Holder-crafter talking now. Dee, dad, just them, all of that Tela files away without asking more, possibly without even trying too hard to comprehend just now, her focus far more on the other woman. And then she's blinking at her, just a couple quick blinks before, carefully, "You're upset because you got it on with some guy you used to know... and you may or may be knocked up. Do I have that right? If you don't want to be knocked up and you are, that's a problem but at least you can do something about it, but... where's the rest of the problem?" Since Tayte is clearly, clearly bothered. "It's the guy. And the other guy, her dad. It gets complicated quickly," Tayte confesses quietly. "The first one is far easier to explain." She swallows hard, and then looks right at Tela, "We're friends, right? And you're not going to just disown me for a bad decision even if it was a really bad and possibly the worst decision about who to get with ever on all of Pern?" "We're friends," Tela agrees with a tilt of her head, and she's smiling, as though somehow so far this is more endearing than otherwise... so far! "No? As long as it's not your father, or something. It isn't your father, is it? Or maybe someone with a really awful disease that's catching... no, I'd stick with you there." Tela's words elicit a nervous laugh from the bartender, her hands scrubbing across her knees now as she endeavors to sit up a little straighter, shoulders coming back a touch from their previously hunched state, "Well, you probably could say he has a really awful disease, but I doubt it's catching." Tayte's tongue has to flick to wet her lips because her mouth's gone suddenly dry. "Have-- you-- met, H'vier?" Wince. "H'vier..." and then Tela's eyes have gone wide and her mouth's gone wide and her voice is just about breathy enough to go with it, "He's not the one who tried to beat up Alida... is he? He is?" Tayte can't look. She just can't. Her shoulders curl forward and there's just the smallest nod. After a moment, "You have no idea how badly I want to tell you all about his redeeming qualities and that he's really not such a bad guy when you get to know him, but... I can't. Unless really amazing muscles counts as a redeeming quality." She cringes. Her cheeks are crimson and she couldn't look more ashamed if she were a three turn old caught with bubbly pie filling all over her face and an empty tin next to her. Telavi's still staring until, finally, she has to blink. Under her breath, like she's reciting it to herself, "Trying to beat up on a girl, bad," sexist Tela, "but she won, so not so bad," justifying Tela, "and muscles, muscles are good...," shallow Tela. More to Tayte this time, briskly, "Most of the 'when you get to know him' stories aren't so great anyway." Trying to beat up Alida, bad. And yet, "So was it good? Did anyone see you? And... he didn't try to beat on you, did he?" It's there, at the last, that her voice slows into very serious indeed. "I don't think you understand." Tayte answers, "It's so much worse than that. He think he's Faranth's gift to women. That there isn't a one that doesn't want him. And he gets bedded far too often for someone who thinks like that. He-- I can't even tell you some of the awful things he's said about women. And even that night. And I still couldn't help myself. First, I was just going to let him pass out. Then I was going to tease him and leave him hanging. And then he stopped talking and-- he's so pretty when he stops talking, Tela." She bemoans the redeeming quality. She hides her face again. "It was so good. It was the first time in turns. And it happened more than once. And-- Faranth save me, I want to do it again." Then so quietly, because it's just about the worst thing she could say, "-with him." Judging from the sounds of things, he didn't try to beat her, but she doesn't make a direct answer of it. "Well," Telavi begins, and a giggle might have escaped somewhere in there, no, several of them, "It's not like you're going to weyrmate the man, right? You just do him, and then when you're bored you ditch him." Tayte might not have reassured her in so many words, but Tela seems relieved all the same. "Besides," she realizes with new excitement, "You're practically doing everyone else a favor by keeping him out of trouble," and she nods to seal that. Relief shows in Tayte's face at Tela's words. She's quiet a moment and then laughing. Laughing at herself. Laughing at the situation, at the desperate words she's just been sharing. Then she look to Tela with a grateful smile, "I know you're just saying that to make me feel better. And I appreciate it." And that's enough about that. She looks back to the decks. "Was there anything else you wanted to know about these?" She gestures. Is she? "You're welcome," Tela says anyway, and look, there's a dimple to go with it. She does glance at her hand as though seeing that deck for the first time, then sets it down with the others. "Maybe," she says, "but how about not right now?" She shakes her shoulders loosely, shaking any residual tautness out. "That sundress that you were thinking about, for example, if it's not too late in the season..." And so it is that the women embark on the epic quest of exploring Tayte's sense of style - which, of course, includes her wardrobes (plural) full of clothes. Never fear, fair readers, they have enough booze to see them safely through the evening of girl chatter and nonsense. |
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