[Closed] Do You Hold a Heavy Heart

[Chrysanthe Palmifer]

Evening, 10 Bethas, 2720
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Charlie looked as if he were gritting his teeth through the caprise, and he made absolutely no effort to return it, so far as Chrysanthe could tell. She released anything deliberate about it, her jaw slightly clenched, although she did not pull her field as far away as she had before, leaving them with a bit of awkward mingling made inevitable by their closeness.

Do you want me to caprise you or not? She half-wanted to demand, irritated by his sudden need to make a problem where there had not, before, been one. He was irritated by her trying to be polite, he was irritated by her behaving normally; it was obnoxious and juvenile and, Chrysanthe supposed, entirely consistent with the way he’d behaved to date.

Chrysanthe lifted her eyebrows, settled on her stool, chin raised, when Charlie implied by his denial that she was, in fact, the one with a stick lodged in a particularly uncomfortable place. To his credit, he was not the first to accuse her of such, although just at the moment she felt entirely in the right. If he were an osta, all the hair on his back would have been standing straight up, and he might even have hissed.

Chrysanthe made a little face at his whining non-apology, glancing down at her beer, her lips twisting lightly to the side. As if the beer were the issue! But he had said it, for all that he had been dancing around it so far. She hadn’t quite forgotten the way he’d laughed at Adelaide’s flirtations, and she wasn’t entirely sure she’d forgiven him for it either, though she supposed the apology went a ways in the right direction.

Perhaps, too, so would the beer.

Alice came by, and deposited two more Clever Fellows on the bar beside them. She raised her eyebrows firmly at Charlie, and waited, hand out, until he had paid. She tucked his coins in her pocket, glancing between them as she went back down the bar towards the man leaning intently over the other end. They laughed.

Chrysanthe glanced at the mostly empty beer next to her. She grimaced, put the neck to her lips, and drank the rest of it, then set the bottle back down on the counter. The only thing worse, she decided, then watching someone else chug a beer was chugging one yourself.

“It wasn’t entirely your fault,” Chrysanthe said, taking the beer Charlie had offered her, and quite deliberately. She shrugged. “But I’ll take the beer.” She looked back at him once more; the tense set of her shoulders softened, slightly. It wasn’t entirely Adelaide’s fault either, Chrysanthe knew, but she had less than no interest in unpacking her narrowly-averted disaster of a date to anyone – and particularly, she felt, not to Charlie Ewing.

[Charlie Ewing]

Bethas 10, 2720 - Evening
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Really, he hadn't meant to pick a fight. Not this time, anyway. Normally it was on purpose, of course, and if he had done it on purpose he would have done a much better job of it. This wasn't even a fight; this was just. Nothing. It wasn't funny or interesting at all. Ms. Palmifer released the caprise, and Charlie belatedly realized he had not thought to return it. Manners were not often high on his list of priorities.

Alice came back in time to interrupt his train of thought. She did not let him put the beers on his tab. There was a mournful, long-suffering air about him as he handed her the money. Beset upon at every side, that's what he was. Harassed! And this time he'd not even done anything. Yet. Much.

Ms. Palmifer hadn't quite finished her first beer yet, which was possibly also part of the source of her annoyance. Maybe. Or she was just kind of a wet blanket. Both were also likely, Charlie thought. She knocked the rest of it back in one go with a little grimace.

"It's not my fault at all," Charlie corrected, though he did appreciate her taking the beer. "I didn't make her terribly dull. There are much better women out there, with less pedestrian opinions. And better hair," he added for good measure. Charlie was horrified to think that Ms. Palmifer might assume he was apologizing for ruining her date with Ms. Thureau-Dangin specifically, which he most certainly was not. If Charlie felt like anything he had done needed an apology--which was, again, a dubious concept, as he had acted only out of altruism and a keen instinct for when someone was wasting their time--it was just that he had not set out to ruin Ms. Palmifer's night in a general sense.

Which was, of course, why they were here at the Duckling. And why he bought her another beer, even though Alice wasn't letting him open a new tab because she was a heartless woman with no love in her spirit. Not even for very loyal customers like Charlie Ewing. He shifted on his bar stool. The new group was still setting up, and there was nothing but the sound of the bar itself, that sort of general hum of drunken slurring and fits of laughter.

Charlie took a sip of his beer. It still tasted like Brunnhold, which he still hated. He hadn't thought to ask for something else. All of this drinking and talking about novels was making him disgustingly sentimental. Here he was, apologizing and buying strange women beers and not even trying to leave Ms. Palmifer's company.

Charlie frowned, squinted at nothing. And then reached out for what was possibly the most shallow and brief caprise in all of history, before quickly dropping it. There. There! That was two apologies. He was being wildly magnanimous. She should feel grateful. Although Charlie felt certain she would only be annoyed.

[Chrysanthe Palmifer]

Evening, 10 Bethas, 2720
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

The caprise was exceptionally swift. Sparks, Chrysanthe decided; they flared hot and bright for a moment within her field, and then Charlie snatched them back as quickly as he had lit them, as if the static mona were glowflies he had caught in a jar, beating their warm wings against the glass. There hadn’t even been time to reach back within it. Reaching in to her field only deepened the sense of heat; if the mona that hovered in the air around her felt like a pit of molten glass, it was a deep one.

For a moment, Chrysanthe was silent.

It took me a while, Chrysanthe had tried to tell him in the bar, in what little space she’d had to breathe while Adelaide had been gone. I did not understand, then. Charlie couldn’t have been clearer that his own experiences had been entirely different; she supposed he had woken up one morning around puberty burning with desire for men, and simply never looked back or doubted even once.

“There aren’t many,” Chrysanthe said, finally, “that I had a crush on in school.” She didn’t look at Charlie as she said it, as if the dark glass of the beer occupied every drop of her attention.

Pedestrian opinions she supposed she agreed with; terribly dull, perhaps, or at least she could see how Charlie would think so; better hair, she couldn’t quite bring herself to. Adelaide did have lovely hair, and she always had. Lovely eyebrows, too, although the arch of them had migrated up, in the years since; Chrysanthe had spent a few moments trying to figure it out, when she’d first seen her tonight.

“No more Clever Fellows, after this,” Chrysanthe glanced over at Ewing, confident he’d have something to say about it – about all of it. Something about how he’d never, once, let someone he had a crush with get away, or how he had the good sense never to have a crush at all, and if he had, it certainly wouldn't have been anyone on Adelaide Thureau-Dangin; in fact, he could not relate in the least. “There's no point in nostalgia, really; it is dull.” Chrysanthe took another sip and set the beer back down on the counter.

The gin and the beer both had gone to her head, Chrysanthe decided; that was the only reason she had made such a confession. She didn’t care if Charlie – or anyone – knew; Charlie certainly didn’t care about her. Adelaide might have cared, in a flattered sort of way; Chrysanthe thought again of the moment when Adelaide had smiled at her, long, elegant fingers resting on the inside of her wrist, and felt an ache somewhere in the memories of the confused girl she had been.

Her head itched again. Chrysanthe grimaced; she didn’t care as much, anymore. She slid her fingers beneath the elegant braids and rubbed lightly at her scalp; pulling them free wisped a few more strands of loose, soft blonde hair into the air around her head, but she didn’t really care.

[Charlie Ewing]

Bethas 10, 2720 - Evening
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Charlie had missed something, and he felt rather uncomfortably like it was an emotion. He had rather gathered that Ms. Palmifer had been somewhat confused, in school. She had said as much, although he didn't quite understand the feeling. He had known other people with similar stories, they just had seemed like generally indecisive people. Charlie could allow that it was perhaps more common to not know yourself in this way than it was to feel the opposite. And he supposed, also, if he really must, he could allow for the idea that crushes from school years might hold some draw. Even if they turned out to be boring, which Charlie maintained that she was.

For a moment he was seized by an absurd desire to tell her that he hadn't had many crushes either, in school. Only a handful, really, and understanding yourself had absolutely nothing to do with understanding others. Whatever he was like now, he had been different. Nobody cared about things like that, though, and least of all Ms. Palmifer. Besides, Charlie Almond was the one who had felt those things. And he was gone. Charlie just took another mouthful of his beer, squinting at the stage. Thoughtfully and handsomely squinting, of course. As he did everything.

"Schoolchild crushes rarely turn out as you'd hope," he said dryly and shrugged. "And then you have beer! No more Clever Fellows, though, I agree." Just had to finish this one, and they were free to move on to something else. Charlie couldn't tell if Ms. Palmifer meant no more of this particular beer, or no more beers generally speaking. He didn't much care; she was free to stop drinking whenever she wanted. Charlie, however, had never had fewer than three drinks at the Duckling before and he wasn't about to establish that trend now.

Sidelong he watched her rub at her scalp and raised an eyebrow. She had mentioned it was heavy before. He hadn't really appreciated how heavy that meant--that it seemed to be tugging on her at all times. How absolutely dreadful. He truly didn't understand the hesitation. Although Ms. Thureau-Dangin had given him some idea, he supposed. He couldn't help but think it seemed like far more of a hassle than it was worth it. Surely even half as long would have been easier to deal with.

"You know, Ms. Palmifer, I'm sure one of these lovely fellows has a knife in their boot. We could take care of that hair of yours right now. Seize the day! Live for the present!" He raised his Clever Fellow into the air with a dramatic flourish that slightly unbalanced him on his stool. He was smirking again, however, unwilling to wallow in the mire of nostalgia for too terribly long. Like Ms. Palmifer said--pointless and dull.

[Chrysanthe Palmifer]

Evening, 10 Bethas, 2720
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

N o,” Chrysanthe said, slowly; Ewing had wobbled on his seat, smirking, the beer in his bottle sloshing about.

“Not while drunk,” Chrysanthe said, very seriously. “I should think I will want to get drunk afterwards.” She ran her fingertips over the braid, slowly, feeling the thick crown of it against her head; a few more wisps trailed after her fingers, so the whole thing was limned soft in the light of the Ugly Duckling. “But I should want to be sober when it happens.”

Anything one could do only by courage of liquor should not, Chrysanthe felt, be done. She shook her head, slightly, and felt a wispy strand curl against her ear; she brushed it back out of the way, though she knew it wouldn’t stay for long. Of course, she hadn’t decided to cut her hair; it was only a thought, really.

Chrsyanthe took another sip of the Clever Fellow. Charlie wasn’t what she’d thought - perhaps. Sometimes, he was every bit as she expected, whiny and so obnoxious she suspected it must have been deliberately put on; others, and he was very nearly sensitive. She resolved not to mention it; she doubted he would find it flattering.

It was very strange to think back to their first meeting - barely a few days ago, though they had spent a surprising number of hours together since, all told. He didn’t feel nearly so much a stranger, although of course by any metric he still was, and an irritating one at that.

“Do you know - I can’t really imagine the dancing here.” Chrysanthe said. She took another sip of her beer; there was a low, tuneful sort of humming coming from the strange, the warm up strands of string instruments. “I quite like music, actually. I can dance, of course; I learned at Brunnhold and I did it well enough, I suppose - not too many crushed toes, I mean. I’ve danced at balls and did enjoy it.”

Mostly, Chrysanthe might have said: mostly enjoyed it. There was a sense at such parties of the dancing being as much for the enjoyment of others as oneself. There was so much to think about: one’s hair, one’s gown, how many dances one had had with this partner or that one, whether one had crossed the line from friendly into encouraging. It was exhausting; it rather spoiled the fun of it. It had ever since Chrysanthe’s second ball, not that she had, really, attended terribly many.

She glanced over her shoulder, back at the stage, at the handful of wicks busying themselves with their instruments. “But never at a place like this, and not just - danced.” Chrysanthe said with a little smile. She didn’t look concerned; the smile on her face, if anything, warmed just a fraction more. She took another sip of her beer, leaning one arm against the bar and resting forward on it, and turned to look at Charlie once more, almost imploringly. Her tongue felt oddly loose; she had forgotten about this part of being drunk. She did not really like it.

[Charlie Ewing]

Bethas 10, 2720 - Evening
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Charlie's grin didn't fade. He hadn't really expected Ms. Palmifer to want to cut her hair here in the bar with a knife from some roughneck's boot--although that would certainly have elevated the evening. Making drastic changes to one's outward appearance while drunk wasn't exactly the smartest of moves. Charlie would never say he regretted his tattoo, but it was not a choice he would have made while sober, it had to be admitted.

"Suit yourself! You never know, one of these fine fellows could have quite the talent for hairdressing." He raised his eyebrows and leaned back against the bar, all casual. At least they'd moved on from feelings, it seemed like. Thank the Circle. Thinking about Ms. Palmifer's emotions had given him a headache. Being considerate was hazardous for the health. That was why he so rarely attempted to do it.

She went on, talking about music and dancing. Charlie tried to contain his grin, but it was rather difficult. He couldn't help but laugh. Not quite at Ms. Palmifer, even if she chose to interpret it that way. This was a very different sort of dancing from what she described. He couldn't quite picture her doing it, although he couldn't picture her at a more formal affair either. Charlie supposed he just didn't know her very well, but his picture of Ms. Palmifer had somehow become strongly of filthy hands, and that apron covered in machine grease.

Charlie had never cared for balls, or the sorts of dancing one was expected to do in school. He wasn't very good at it, a secret he would carry to his grave, and he couldn't help but feel out of place leading young ladies slightly taller than himself around a dancefloor. He would be equally unhappy being led by some puffed-up swain, but at least the height match might be less ridiculous.

There was a sort of sour realization creeping over Charlie as Ms. Palmifer started to smile. He was dreadfully suspicious--no, appallingly certain--that he actually liked Ms. Palmifer. Alioe only knew why, as she was hardly any fun at all and didn't appreciate his many and varied charms. He squashed the thought down like a bug he'd caught crawling on his coffee table.

"This is a very different kind of dancing." Oh clocking hell, he was smiling wasn't he. Ugh. Disgusting. She looked like she wanted something from him, and he wasn't sure what it was. Fuck, all this drinking was making him lose his carefully refined control. Charlie was pretty sure he was sitting there grinning at Ms. Palmifer not at all mockingly.

There was a commotion from the direction of the stage. The energy of the bar changed, subtly but umistakably. Charlie turned away from Ms. Palmifer's smiling face and back to the band. They had finished setting up it seemed, and all attention had shifted to the music. When they began to play, it was sudden and immediately energetic. As if pulled into it by some unseen force, a good third of the patrons of the Ugly Duckling flooded to the empty floorspace immediately in front of the musicians.

Whatever sort of dancing Ms. Palmifer was used to, this was firmly not it. The kind of dancing one got up to in Brunnhold and beyond was a controlled sort of thing, with steps and an order to be followed. What was inspired by the lively collection of strings and stamping of feet was nothing like that at all. Dancing might even have been a bit of a stretch, but if there was a better word for it Charlie didn't know what it was. A gleeful, stumbling, energetic movement of bodies, sometimes to the music and more often not.

Charlie turned. His mouth widened, smile revealing all of his teeth once again. He held out a hand to Ms. Palmifer then, eyebrows raised.

[Chrysanthe Palmifer]

Evening, 10 Bethas, 2720
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Charlie was grinning; he was all boyish, once more, excitement and enthusiasm bubbling through him.

Funnily enough, it caught up to Chrysanthe only then how terribly open she’d left herself – how very many things he might have said, if he’d had the will to. She tried to sort out whether he was grinning or smirking, but – even aware of it – she couldn’t have said she saw anything but oddly earnest cheer in that smile on his.

Very strange, Chrysanthe decided. She was too tipsy to think on it anymore; she was grinning as well, she realized, widely enough that her cheeks hurt.

The music picked up. She’d heard the like before, or something close enough to be familiar, from a fiddler in the Dives. It was the sort of music which swept through you, and she found her foot, tapping, lightly, against the base of the bar, as if to try and find the beat. There was a movement all through the bar, men and women both crowding into the narrow space of the dance floor; she felt the flutter of more than one glamour against the edges of her field, shying well away from a caprise.

Charlie put his hand out like a question, raising his eyebrows.

Chrysanthe took it.

It was entirely inappropriate, and all the better for it. There were no steps or patterns which Chrysanthe could find, except the beat of the music which hummed through, and the melodies which were woven on top. It didn’t really seem to matter; it wasn’t as if anyone else had them either, and Chrysanthe the only one left unknowing. It seemed to be entirely enough to move with the music, to follow the light buzz in her head, to stamp here or there and shift and sway.

At one point Chrysanthe found she was laughing, and she hadn’t the least idea why.

Theirs weren’t the only fields in the crowd, but there weren’t many either. There were glamours enough, at least, and if some of those dancing shifted away, Chrysanthe didn’t find she cared overmuch.

The next person who caught her hands was a wick, as tall as Chrysanthe, lean and long, with a tanned face spotted in freckles and wild dark hair. She grinned, her calluses brushing against Chrysanthe’s palm. Chrysanthe grinned as well, not thinking about anything at all.

It still wasn’t much like a formal dance, but there was leading and following, and Chrysanthe found herself twirled, once, and went with it unafraid, coming out with a little stumble, which caught her against the wick, arms trapped at her side. Hot breath caught her earlobe, slightly sour with the smell of beer.

Chrysanthe proved then that she could, indeed, blush, when the situation called for it.

[Charlie Ewing]

Bethas 10, 2720 - Evening
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Charlie's expectations had been low when he held his hand out to Ms. Palmifer. His excitement was irritatingly genuine, and he thought she might even be able to tell. And yet she'd been tapping her foot against the base of the bar, just at the edge of his field of vision. So maybe it wasn't such a surprised that she took his hand, after all.

They were not the only gollies at the bar, but they were firmly in the minority. This became increasingly obvious as they wove through the tables and out to the makeshift dance floor. The benefit to what had been such a source of agony for him in school was that very few people knew him immediately for what he was, and when they did they didn't seem to care. It helped also that he was a fairly regular face, and knew a good portion of those here tonight.

Charlie lost track of Ms. Palmifer almost immediately, which was ideal really. The worst thing would have been if he'd gone through all the trouble to bring her here and drag her out onto the dance floor, only to have her stand stock still in the middle of it. Luckily, no such dreadful events came to pass. Ms. Palmifer even laughed--so she was capable of real laughter, after all! Charlie had his doubts before.

He was passed around between hands he knew and hands he didn't--he paid very little attention. Maybe on another night, he was have been more focused, but he hadn't meant to come here and wasn't really interested in that kind of company. Currently. Who knew what the future held, but for now--no. Probably.

Charlie stumbled and turned, catching sight of Ms. Palmifer again--so she could blush after all. Further proof that he had made an excellent decision, as he always did, because he was a genius in every respect. Charlie tried to catch her eye and give her a somewhat indecently enthusiastic thumbs-up, before he was pulled back away.

After a while he broke away from the crowd to crawl back to the bar, lightly sweaty from the press of bodies and more than a little disheveled. What he needed was water. What he asked for and got was whiskey, which he knocked back so quick he made his head spin. Instead of heading back out immediately, he decided to step outside and have a cigarette. The cold air would do him good--clear his head, make him less sweaty, all that important nonsense.

He thought to take a backward glance and see if Ms. Palmifer was still doing alright, but didn't allow himself such an excess of sentiment. Charlie slipped out the front door and leaned against the wall. He struck a match, lit his cigarette, and watched the smoke curl into the cold night air as he exhaled.

[Chrysanthe Palmifer]

Evening, 10 Bethas, 2720
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

For a little while, there were only impressions.

There was a warm hand with rough calluses holding hers, and a crooked grin on a very lovely face. There was a glamour which fluttered, curiously, at the edges of her field, and Chrysanthe did not know, quite, whether to caprise it. She tried it once, gently, and was met with a startled gasp; she pulled back, then, and she felt her face quite red. The woman laughed, and there was a curious sense of mingling at the edges once more, very different than she’d ever felt, and startlingly intimate.

It was mostly dancing, really. Chrysanthe couldn’t have pulled the songs apart; she knew sometimes the music changed, and the swaying of the crowd with it, but she never quite knew where one stopped and the next started.

At one point Chrysanthe drank a shot of vodka, or something like it, clear and strong enough to make her eyes water, leaning against the bar; she didn’t hesitate, although she thought perhaps she should have. After that, the wick’s hand was in hers again, and her fingertips were drawing Chrysanthe’s sleeve up, slowly and carefully, and for all that they were surrounded by others on the dance floor, Chrysanthe felt as if they were entirely alone.

Things blurred, but very pleasantly.

Chrysanthe couldn’t think of the last time she’d drank so much, but then she couldn’t think of much of anything. They went out into the cold, but she scarcely noticed; there were a variety of other things to think about. She was aware of the exploring of a careful hand beneath the edge of her shirt, hovering just on the bare skin of her waist, and the static tingle of electricity it sent shivering through her. She was aware of a cascade of pale hair tumbled down by the side of her hair, and soft pale strands which caught on lips and cheeks.

She wasn’t, Chrysanthe had tried to say, once, usually like this. They had still been inside then, and she would have had to shout to be heard over the music, and by the time she’d realized that she’d rather thought better of it. Did it matter, really, what she was usually like? Did it matter what she did or didn’t do most nights? This wasn’t most nights.

Chrysanthe rested back against the wall, breathing a bit hard. There were the sounds of string instruments drifting through the door to the alley; there was scarcely any light to see by, but for what little phosphor glow drifted in off the street, and the pale echoes of the moon above. It didn’t matter; she didn’t need to see. Carefully, Chrysanthe eased forward again, and found she didn’t quite mind slipping away. There was another strange fluttering caprise at the edge of her field, and she met it, even though she did not quite push back.

[Charlie Ewing]

Bethas 10, 2720 - Late Evening
The Ugly Duckling, King's Court

Eventually, Charlie thought, he was going to go back inside and have another beer. Oh, and maybe make sure Ms. Palmifer was still doing alright. He was much less certain he'd want to do that one, but it did seem like the decent thing to do. At least she was reasonably likely to still be alive. Probably? Eh. It was fine.

While he was standing there, thinking about the merits of keeping track of Ms. Palmifer and finishing his terrible cigarette, he heard the door to the alley open. Music and light spilled out; music did anyway. He just assumed about the light. He heard the murmur of voices, and he thought one of them sounded distinctly like Ms. Palmifer. Maybe? What she was doing in the alley, Charlie wasn't certain--but he thought he knew.

Now, the decent thing to do would be to leave her alone. He hardly needed to ruin two of her dates in one day. Did he? He was terribly curious who had gotten Ms. Palmifer so enamored as to do something as terribly crude as come out to the alley of the Duckling with her, though. Charlie considered his options. He threw the butt of his cigarette to the sidewalk, ground it under one heel. And he stuck his head around the corner and into the alley.

Ha! He knew it! It was Ms. Palmifer, after all, and a witch he remembered seeing her dancing with earlier. The one who had made her blush. She hadn't seen his thumbs-up then, which he could forgive. Charlie wasn't wildly voyeuristic, but he couldn't seem to resist the chance to be crass. He grinned, standing in the mouth of the alley, and shouted down it:

"Excellent choice, Ms. Palmifer!" He laughed, and the witch turned to him. He'd seen her around before, enough that she felt fairly comfortable flashing a rude hand gesture at him that he happily returned.

"--back inside, Gita! Whatcha wanna mess around with them for?" The voices came from inside the Duckling, followed by a statement that he thought included his name. Well they didn't have to be insulting about it. That was wicks for you. Or something--Charlie didn't have much ire in him for the comments. Ms. Palmifer's witch leaned forward as if to murmur something in her ear, and Charlie did at least have the grace to look away while they parted. There was bright laughter, and cheerful voices, and then the door shut again.

Ms. Palmifer had not gone back inside. Charlie couldn't see her very well from where he stood. "Well she looked exciting. Another beer?" As Charlie got closer to her, he frowned and peered at her again. He didn't know how much of a drinker she was, but perhaps she had had quite enough. If she was going to be sick, he really hoped she was going to do it later, or at least while he wasn't standing there.