(no subject)
Who: Luke Shepherson(Eldest Goat), Edie Steinlen(Snow White), Sgt. Sootie Slaughter(The Coon Hound).
Where: Edie's Brownstone, Bedford, Brooklyn.
When: About 1 a.m. Tuesday Night.
What: Disposal of a corpse and cocoa.
Rating: PG-13 for blood?
Just before bed of course! It was as if the world was out to prevent the young woman from ever getting a decent night's sleep.
Edie and blood had never quite got along well with one another. It set off bad thoughts, led to nightmares, and sometimes worse; a mangled raccoon was the last thing that she had needed to deal with before bed time. It wasn't as if this wasn't the first time she had dealt with a hunting trophy, what with Ondine the once feral stray that had by some will chosen her as its master taking to bringing her all sorts of gifts in the way of mice, baby squirrels, birds, and rats; sometimes whole, sometimes bits and pieces deciding on the cat's mood. If anything, the princess had come to steel herself quite nicely as what may have once upon time cause her to run away screaming and crying for Anthony or David to come and take care of the mouse, she had graduated to being able to sweep the offending trophies into a long handled dust pan before tossing them into the outdoor trash can where they belonged.
This raccoon, Edie doubted, would fit into her meager plastic dust pan. For it was an urban 'coon, a big fat sucker that glutted itself on the waste of rich Americans; the fact that the smaller dog had brought it down was enough to amaze her. Though she hadn't congratulated Sootie on her win just yet. The blood streaking her glass door was enough to make her simply turn her back to the gruesome scene and her current quilting project to work on the cocoa for when Luke, her current knight in shining armor finally arrived.
Two cigarettes and a half hour later, honey gaze turned to the clock at it reached 1 a.m. The cocoa now simmering in a dark, aromatic pool in her pot...finished. Edie had to find something else to occupy her time with, something to keep her in the kitchen. Shakily lighting another cigarette, Edie made a blind grab for the mixer that was just within sight of the living room and the french patio door right past it, to start on whipped cream as well.
Luke, meanwhile, parked his station wagon outside Edie's place and went up the walk at a trot. He had dealt with women and dead animals before - best to resolve the situation quickly. He knocked.
A knock, thank goodness. Leaving the robin's egg blue Kitchen aid going, Edie abandoned her post to hastily yank open her brownstone's red painted door, only to get stuck on the chain with a slight yelp of surprise. Eyes wide and grateful from behind the mess of chestnut hair, the door was quickly shut, the jostling of the chain to be heard from Luke's side, before it was reopened again by a vaguely embarassed, pajama clad Edie Steinlen. "Sorry about that hun, and sorry for calling you out here so late..it's just...well you know." With that her upper lip curled up into a sneer that often accompanied a bad smell or taste, all in all it was quite fitting to be honest. Ushering her savior into her the abandoned(albeit now chocolate scented) living room, in which Billie Holiday still sang ringing through the stereo over the whir of her mixer and the large unfinished quilt lay in a heap over her couch.
"S'okay, I was up," Luke said, following her into the house. He breathed in the delicious aroma and resisted the urge to follow it directly into the kitchen. Clean up gore, THEN yummy treats.
He liked Edie's house - very homey. A lot of the True New Yorkers had this modern thing going, with uncomfortable couches and a lot of metal furniture and sterile decor. This was much more comfortable. Well, except for the blood smeared on the glass door. He unfolded a black plastic bag, put on a pair of latex gloves and headed out the back door.
Sootie jumped up on him immediately, her whole back half wagging in the sheer, ecstatic joy of which only young dogs are capable. "Back, dog," he said gruffly, pushing her away with his knee. She continued trying to lick him as he maneuvered between her and the mangled raccoon.
"He's a big one," he said, pausing to pat the dog. "Good girl, good girl. Here." He pulled a piece of rawhide out of his pocket and tossed it a few feet away. Sootie descended upon the bone with fervor, and Luke hastily scooped the raccoon into the bag and tied it shut. He asked Edie for a wet washcloth that had seen better days, and cleaned the blood from Sootie's mouth and paws.
She had taken to setting up their cups of cocoa as Luke took care of the boy's work. When he called for a washcloth, Edie came forth with a wet teeth cloth, her eyes shut tight to avoid seeing any of the carnage. Hands feeling their way over her couch and towards the door to near comedic appeal. As soon as it had been taken from her hand she turned heel and spun to face away and to head back to the kitchen. Turning the music down en route.
Luke came back in a minute later holding the trash bag. "Where shall I dispose of this?"
"Metal trash can out front, please?" Edie frowned at the bag though as a now clean Sootie came bounding in, she could keep the smile from breaking out on her face. " You are just a little killer aren't you? You know, I wish you wouldn't do these things though...that big thing could have had a family!" The puppy simply stared at her rather stupidly before dropping the rawhide on the floor with a tail wag. "Did Daddy give that to you?" She turned for a moment to take to carefully folding up the blanket she had been working on as she continued having a one sided conversation with the dog as Luke took care of his load. Really, she would miss her when she was gone.
Luke came back in and dramatically dusted his hands. "Done. Sorry about the carnage." He sat on the couch and whistled softly. Sootie came over and stuck her head in his lap. He petted her affectionately. "I should've warned you she comes from a prestigious line of vermin killers. Her grandmother took out a mink once."
"...and gravy--" The sing song voice was abruptly ended as Luke entered the room again, smiling over the gathering needles. "It's fine, it was just..surprising. Had it been during the day I wouldn't have been so perturbed." Edie mentioned with a laugh, heading into the kitchen to gather the two rather gargantuan mugs of cocoa, dropping a nip of amaretto in each with a large floating island of whipped cream before joining Luke on the couch. "You have no idea how terrifying it is to walk out of the show to a bloody something being thrown at your door. I thought it was Sootie at very first, and I almost died."
Taking a moment to settled herself onto the cushion, folding her flannel clad legs underneath her. "Did you want cookies? I may have some shortbread."
"Of COURSE I want cookies," he said with a smile. He took a drink of cocoa and his eyes rolled back in his head. "You must be trying to rack up points to get into heaven, you blessed angel. God I wish I could cook. But don't even think of trying to teach me," he amended rapidly, "because then I'd have less excuse to eat YOUR cooking. Besides, Mom already tried."
It was slightly odd that Edie hadn't thought of the cookies earlier, though her mind had indeed been on the far more furry and bloody then anything else. "Seeing as I have no promise of an afterlife, dear, I can assure you it is only my wish to make those around me my faithful servants." It came with a slight smirk, as her cocoa- untouched was placed back on the table to head back into the kitchen. A hopeful Sootie immediately abandoning Luke to hop onto Edie's heels.
Rifling through her refridgerator she pulled out two tin foil covered plates. One of which had a slew of some irregularly cut shortbread cookies, the other a few left over lamb chops. Sliding the cookies into her toaster oven to heat up, fingers took to pulling the meat from the bone with an eyebrow set on the dog. "You've probably had your fill of coon already, piglet." It came with a warm laugh of course.."Sit, paw...Good girl!" And with that the cold piece of meat was tossed up for her to catch. "Does she have to leave?"
"Yes," Luke said over the couch. "My brother would skin me if I gave her away. Both my goat-brother Jonas and my real brother, who owns her mama. And my real brothers are a lot bigger than me." He watched her feeding the dog and hoped Sootie didn't expect as much from him. She was in for disappointment.
"But you know, you're welcome to visit her whenever you like."
"Where is it you're moving anyways?" Edie smiled as she leaned against the counter waiting for the cookies to be sufficiently warmed through. Bare arms crossing over her chest as she watched the dog with a bit of sadness. Gathering the cookies back onto the plate once the oven beeped, they were ushered back into the living room to be placed on the table in front of Luke with a smile. Her cup taken back into her hands. "The closest state parks I know of are out on Long Island and they don't have shacks for rent."
"Bear Mountain," Luke said. "It's about an hour away, just north of Harriman State Park. Luckily, they build stuff everywhere, so I'm not tied to New York for work." Hey, what the - "It's not a shack!" he protested. "It's a cabin in need of much love! The shack is the storage space out BEHIND the much-neglected cabin."
"A cabin! I'm sorry!" It came with a good natured laugh, a hand raising in defense before Edie settled down again. "So we finally get to be friends and you're moving out to the boonies? I feel as if we're star crossed, Mr. Shepherdson." A mental note was made to work on a house warming gift for him, while her eyes settled back on the dog and the white cat that was suspiciously eyeing her from underneath the hanging finch cages; finding herself oddly enough trailing back to the last big blow out that she had had with Vegas before the girl had upped and ran off.
"Sheesh, everyone acts like I'm leaving the country or something. I'm sure I'll be spending a good bit of time in New York. All my friends are here, after all. An hour isn't that far. Besides, it means you city folk have somewhere to go with, you know, sticks." He smiled at her, then his brow furrowed. "You ok?"
"I already have places to go with sticks, and geese and watermills and horses." Edie spoke up defiantly, thinking on Connetquot State Park fondly. A certain calm seeming to overwhelm her just then. "I could even take you to where the last glacial maximum ended and began to recede." She didn't want to bother Luke with her problems. The poor boy had enough of his own at the moment, what with River leaving and his cabin in need of repair. "I'm fine, hun. Just thinking about Vegas is all, I hope she's alright- wherever she is."
Glacial maximum? What was a glacial maximum? He inwardly cursed his boondocks high school. Surely it had something to do with glaciers. "Oh, sounds cool," he said, hoping it wasn't obvious he had no idea what she was referring to. At the mention of Vegas, however, Luke tensed up and forgot about glacial whozzits. "Yeah," he said, a little guarded. "I'm sure she's fine."
"She's tough enough." And that was that. Digging her spoon into the last of the un-melted whipped cream, Edie took to cleaning the top until nothing was left in the cup but a solid pool of dark molten looking cocoa. Distracted gaze returning to her company with a warm smile. "So it's only an hour away, huh? Are you going to need any help getting stuff set up?"
"That's the glory of having been nomadic for years - not much stuff," he smiled. "I actually am going to need to stock up some. Guess I ought to have a couch, that'd be handy. But I don't need much, really. And Watts said he'd come help me."
"And a bed." Edie pointed out with a small laugh, leaning back against the arm of the couch with a raise of her eyebrow. Thinking about what else he might need, and when and where she could help him out. "You can borrow one of my air mattresses until you get one if you'd like. And for silly things like lamps, I'd recommend raiding my basement first- I'm a notorious pack rat of old, dusty flea market finds. It drives Anthony nuts, I must have upwards of fifteen orphaned lamps down there."
"For the sake of reducing the population of unwanted, homeless lamps, I will consider adoption first. I'll even spay or neuter it. As for a bed, I have an old mattress that's been in the back of my car for awhile - used it for cross-country trips when it was warm enough to skip the hotel. Ahhh, I have many fond memories of that mattress," he said, looking a little wistful. "Getting kicked in the face trying to share space with Logan ... Random make-outs, NOT with Logan, mind you ... The time Audra, Vegas and I got stranded with a broken alternator belt and had to sleep in the car ... " He came back to the present with a shake of his head and a gulp of his cocoa. "But it's about time to retire the thing, as soon as I get around to getting a new one."
"You promise? Lamp overpopulation is becoming a big problem in these areas. Especially with the domestic cross breeding with wild species." Edie grinned, falling quiet as he began to fall back into the past of his traveling days, she most certainly could hardly fathom it. While it all seemed so wildly romantic and adventurous, like she had told Seith long ago- she was a woman that needed a home. She preferred to be the one that people returned to, never the other way around. Though to hear him speak so fondly, it almost surprised now to think of his settling down into a place of his own. "It certainly sounds fun, dear. You ought to write a book about it all."
Luke shrugged. "It was interesting, yeah. But I'm no good at writing, I get incoherent really fast. I blame the Flippin, Arkansas high school. It's easier than taking responsibility for it myself," he said with a grin. Those days seemed awfully long ago now - so much had happened since he'd come to New York. Things he'd hoped for - meeting his brothers - and things he'd never anticipated, like getting his ass handed to him by the Bridge Troll.
"Anyway, it'll be nice to be settled for once. And Mom's sure happy about it. She says she's sending drapes. Knowing her, that means drapes, sheets, seeds, tea, some clothes, soap, gardening tools, a sewing kit and a plate of cookies." He thought for a second and glanced at Edie. "You two would get on."
"Record it, then write it out. The stream of consciousness style of writing has always been a favorite of mine." Edie instructed with a smile that peeked over the rim of her mug, taking another long sip as he talked about his mother. She sounded wonderful, warm and homey- the sort of mother Edie hoped to be one day. Though she didn't smile all that much brighter and there was a possibility that Luke may have even caught wind of a softly growing frown as thoughts of her own "mother" came into her mind. Growing up the girl had considered herself lucky to simply get a meal out of the woman on the nights her father was out working late; to think of her at all domestic was a laughable; and she felt a bit of jealousy that quickly ebbed away. "It certainly sounds like it, she seems like an extraordinary woman...What sort of things were you thinking about planting?"
"She's a trip alright," Luke said. He resisted the urge to go on a monologue about his family. That above many other topics tended to lead to glazed-over expressions in his audience. "Mostly practical stuff. Vegetables, some berries, herbs, maybe some fruit trees ... I'll eventually plant some other stuff that's useful, like lavender, hibiscus and allyssum, but for now it's mostly edibles. And geraniums, because they keep bad spirits away from your doors." He said it like it was a perfectly natural turn of conversation.
"Fruit trees? I'm afraid you won't get much further than an apple or cherry tree and some grape vines in these parts, hun." Edie offered him with an apologetic smile, leaning back into the couch to concentrate on the cocoa at hand, going over her inventory quietly. "If you need cuttings for the berry bushes you're welcome to go into my garden...Geraniums? I'll have to plant some."
Luke sighed. "Damn; no peaches, huh? It's going to be a challenge, translating what I know from Arkansas gardening to New York. I hope you're up for coaching me through some of it. I'll have to get a kit to test the soil," he mused, half to himself.
He finished his cocoa and licked his lips. "Gah, that was sinful. You should open a cafe or something." He got up and headed to the kitchen to wash out his mug. Sootie followed, looking hopeful.
"A kit? I'm not sure how much good I'll be. I usually just put some things in the ground, water and feed them, and hope they grow." Edie admitted with a laugh, her half finished cup settled down on the table as she watched him head for the kitchen, laughing gently at the dog on his heels. "That's the idea, at some point. Though I'm happy to just feed the people I care about now.."
"And the dogs, evidently," Luke said, casting narrowed eyes at Sootie. "Baby-girl, I ain't feeding you like she does. You'd best give it up now." He washed out his mug and set it in the sink, then leaned against the counter with a sigh. "I'd best be going; it's late and we've got a bit of a drive ahead of us."
"Ohh, sweetie.." Edie pouted a bit, her voice going up an octave as she spoke to the dog, chuckling a little as she bent over to the beckon the dog to her for a goodbye. "..Aunt Edie will be sure to send you care packages so you can eat properly." Mid ear scratch Edie turned to the sigh with a bit of a frown. Really, she had grown far to attached to Sootie in the past few days and was half tempted to offer Luke the guest room for the night in order to spare a bit more time before sending the dog off in the morning. "I suppose..Let me just get her breakfast for you..."
Her breakfast? Her breakfast OUGHT to be dog chow, Luke thought, but he said nothing. Let the woman be crazy. Best to let them do their thing, it was easier. He tried not to laugh as Edie busied herself around the kitchen.
The busying was in Luke's favor really, the dog's breakfast had already been made and wrapped up for the morning. She had raided her refrigerator and it wasn't too long until the self proclaimed domestic goddess pulled together a small basket of eggs, biscuits, and other goodies for Luke, a gladware container of chopped up brown rice, carrots, peas, and what looked like a mixture of duck and beef nestled into top with another ziploc bag of what looked like home made dog biscuits one of which was pulled out and handed to the dog. "Did you need anything? Do you have warm blankets? Pillows?"
"I'm good," Luke said. Smiling, he added, "Believe it or not, I AM a self-sufficient human being. Na ahh ahh, I know you're just being sweet. And I do appreciate it, really." He was trying to reassure her and still get himself and his dog out the door before they got pulled into the black hole of hospitality that was Edie's house.
"Fine, I'll leave you with the basket and that's all." Edie smirked, albeit a bit defiantly at having been called out on her worst habits. Arms raised up in surrender as she backed away with a laugh. Though she found her mind straying to ponder whether or not she should have given him more eggs and cheese. "I tend to get overwhelmed, you know this."
"Yes, I do," he smiled. He snapped a leash on Sootie and collected his stuff. "Seriously, come visit sometime, yeah? Living the city can be killer if you don't get out now and then."
Smiling as she unlocked the door for them, Sootie was offered a farewell pet and Luke a hug with a nod to his invitation. "I will, first chance I get I'll steal the car and head up to bother you two. Promise."
"You better. Thanks for keeping the dog." He gave her an awkward one-armed hug around his burdens and headed for the car.
"Anytime, thank you for getting rid of the mess." And with a small wave, the red door shut at the same time as his engine turning on, a loud yawn escaping before she turned to finish getting ready for bed.