Since I was born, I started to decay

[paradoxkitten]

Those looking in the park across from the Conrad might find someone vaguely boyshaped stretched out across a bench. To further confuse the issue, there's the lipstick, eyeliner, and very sparkly nail polish, though close examination will reveal an Adam's apple and a lack of breasts. This someone, one Schrödinger by alias, newly come to Chicago, is

Comments

[taibhsearachd]

Kara is, actually, as sensitive as a cat, if not more so. But she's not scared of the dead - tends to think of herself as not entirely alive at the best of times - and she always did like cats.

She pads over, bare feet in the grass, wearing a black leather jacket that's not hers on top of her usual white dress. Who knows who it actually belongs to. Maybe one of the wanderers left it behind. Or maybe she just borrowed it from someone who wouldn't notice it's gone. A few feet away from Schrödinger, she drops to sit cross-legged in the grass.

Her eyes flicker from Schrödinger. Over to the cat in the bushes. "Maybe he doesn't like peacocks," she says after a moment. Because that's a normal way to greet people you've never met before.

[paradoxkitten]

Schrö looks over at her, seeming to take great care in examining both her and the statement she just made. There's something cold and completely impersonal in his regard for just a moment, and then he grins broadly at her.

"Maybe not. Any suggestions?"

[taibhsearachd]

Kara grins back at him, leaning forward to cup her chin between her hands. "You could put away the peacock feather." Probably not the most helpful of suggestions, but you never know when Kara's trying to be helpful and when she's just being... Kara. "Have you ever met a peacock? They're very unpleasant."

[paradoxkitten]

"I could." He stops waving the feather, tucking one end under the top flap of his backpack. "Usually these things make good cat toys. It's possible that he's met a peacock, though."

He stretches across the bench, dangling his head off the end so for a moment he's staring at the world, cat included, upside down. "Any bad experiences at the zoo I should know about?" He is, of course, addressing the cat, while still not looking directly at it. That would be rude, after all.

"And do you do this a lot?" He's back to talking to Kara, glancing obliquely in her direction. "Giving strangers advice on wooing cats, I mean."

[taibhsearachd]

Kara leans forward a little and reaches out a hand to the cat, making a soft clicking noise with her tongue. Dogs don't tend to like her. Cats are another matter.

"Do you try to woo cats a lot?" she asks, which doesn't answer the question at all. "Have you even bothered asking his name?"

[paradoxkitten]

The cat seems to have decided that this two-legged person doesn't smell Wrong, at any rate, and is cautiously coming closer.

Schrö, for his part, just shrugs, looking vaguely unhappy. "I like cats. They just don't always like me right off. Not the living ones." Every so often, he'll find one that's died and is in rather good shape -- those like him, and he's content with their company until they're far enough gone that it's cruel to keep them there.

But the living ones? That takes work.

"And should I? I'm good at yes and no, like and dislike, I've got a pretty good grasp of ambivalence, but is there a reason I should ask for a name I won't understand and can't use? I'd rather be no one at all than something other than my name once I've given it."

He frowns, creases his eyebrows. "Maybe that's just me."

[taibhsearachd]

Kara grins as the cat starts to come closer, and doesn't move even a fraction of an inch, her hand unwavering when the cat's close enough to sniff her fingers.

"It's polite. To ask for names. They're important." Never mind that a cat wouldn't give a response anyone but possibly Kara could understand if asked its name - it's still polite. She glances over to him, just her eyes flickering toward him. "Is that why you like cats, then?"