(Untitled)

[maintain_right]

High in a sixteenth story window on the outskirts of Tifton, a feather pillow was being fluffed in the early evening air. So vigorously was it shaken that the delicate cotton caught against the iron rung of the balcony and tore, spilling its contents into the teeming street below

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[blackhole_heart]

Trailing down the sidewalk, sorta aimless after leaving a restaurant in Tifton I like enough to get me to make the trip out here, I turn to duck into a store to grab some beer and nearly run headlong into the asshole blocking the door.

"What the fuck-" I break off, one hand on his chest to keep myself upright and one corner of my mouth twitching into a grin, "You okay there, Benton?"

[maintain_right]

Fraser looked away at last and went a bit crosseyed, grinning at the feather stuck in his eyebrow, and then at Neil. "Good evening! It's a fine night, isn't it?"

[blackhole_heart]

If this were anybody else, I'd be pretty fucking quick to think they were riding high on some pretty fucking good shit, but it's Fraser, and I know better.

"What the fuck are you doing?" I snort, reaching up to pluck the feather off his eyebrow with a confused sorta grin.

[maintain_right]

"A pillow seems to have ruptured," Fraser cheerfully explained. "It looks rather like snow, doesn't it?"

[blackhole_heart]

"Guess so," I shrug, stepping back to give him a little room and twirling the feather between my fingers, "Don't get snow too much around here."

[maintain_right]

"That's a shame." The city was loud and colourful. Fraser often longed for snowfall, fresh and clean and white, to drown the chaos in quiet, if only for a short time. "It's not snowed once since I've been here."

[blackhole_heart]

"Only snowed once or twice since I've been here," I shrug, and I remember how weird it was, after growing up on a fucking planet of nothing but heat and dust.

"You got broccoli on your shoe."

[maintain_right]

"Oh dear." Fraser looked down at the broccoli, then tried bouncing it off his toe into the bag. He missed. "Ah well, Ray insists that he doesn't care for brocolli anyway." Fraser sighed. "Though he could certainly use the vitamins."

[blackhole_heart]

"You cookin' for Ray now?" I ask, brow arching curiously, stepping back when the broccoli pops up and nearly hits me in the chest.

[maintain_right]

"Until he gets his strength up, yes," said Fraser. Reconsidering, he plucked the broccoli from the ground and stuck it back in the bag. "Soon he'll be too strong to avoid having a well-balanced meal forced on him."

[blackhole_heart]

"So, uh, he's okay? I haven't talked to him in a few days," I say, trying to sound unconcerned but probably failing pretty fucking miserably.

[maintain_right]

"He's been on bedrest for more than a week," Fraser replied, presuming Neil's concept of time to be more lax than his own. "He's well enough for a visit, however, if you'd like to come by."

[blackhole_heart]

"Uh, yeah... I guess," I shrug, shifting my weight from foot to foot with a nod, "I mean, I just called him up a couple days ago, but... yeah, I guess."

[maintain_right]

"Ah, well then, I'm sure he'd like to see you." Fraser leaned in, lowering his voice to something more suited to conspiracy. "Between you and I, I think he's gotten a bit of cabin fever."

[blackhole_heart]

"What, you telling me you can't think of a way to keep him occupied?" I ask with a teasing smirk.

[maintain_right]

"Of course I'd do anything to avoid another incidence of cabin fever," said Fraser, appearing quite innocent. "One experience with a man trying to eat his own sled dogs in the dead of Oublien winter is enough for any man."