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Jan 20, 2013 12:59



hallo, all! i hope you guys had very happy holidays and a great turn of the year. vacation with my family and then problems with my internet connection now that i'm back in berlin have stopped me from being more active here and in my other haunts, but hey, at least i've been writing. =) here you go, chapter 33 is complete now, so here's an excerpt.


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She was just coming out of the shower when her doorbell rang. She knew her roommate had to be at dinner, so she was surprised by it. Who could be coming to visit at that hour? She barely had a second to wonder before she opened the door and was immediately hit by the freight train known as Posy Hawthorne.

"Madge!" the girl exclaimed cheerfully, wrapping her arms tightly around Madge's waist. "Where have you been? Why haven't you been having dinner with us? We've missed you!"

"I- I've been working," she stuttered, caught off-guard, only managing an awkward pat on the girl's head. Raising her eyes she noticed Posy wasn't the only Hawthorne who had graced her with their presence that day: Gale was standing there, very visibly holding back a smirk. He almost took up the whole doorway, she noticed off-handedly, both in height and in the width of his shoulders. "What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at dinner?"

"We're going, we just had to come pick you up first!" Posy exclaimed again letting go of her and bouncing a little on the balls of her feet.

"She's been coming up every day before dinner just to check if you're here," Gale intervened, finally letting just a slip of that smirk come through. He crossed his arms and rested his shoulder against the doorframe. "She had this idea that you've been avoiding us, for some reason," he added, pointedly.

She wasn't sure what to say. She didn't want to bring the girl down, she seemed so happy to have found her in her compartment for once. "I just-- Posy, I can't have dinner now... I'm not scheduled for it until the second shift, I'm sorry," she said, sticking to her "new routine" excuse. Gale's expression let her know she was busted either way.

Posy wasn't having it either. "Aw, please. Who writes the schedules? You do! Nobody's even gonna notice," she said, in a tone Madge had heard her use on Vick often enough. Something twinged in her heart at the idea that this little girl was treating her like she treated her own family.

"But Posy, I-" It was only when the girl skittered past her and moved toward her clothes drawers that she noticed what she was wearing. "I'm in my pajamas!" she squeaked, and when she turned to look at Gale again, his raised eyebrows let her know this had not escaped his notice. She fought the urge to cover herself, even though she knew it was a ridiculous feeling to have. Her Thirteen-assigned sleepwear was perfectly conservative, the same model of grey t-shirt and sweatpants that were assigned to everyone because of how cold it got underground during the night. But it was the principle of the thing.

As Posy started looking for some clothes for Madge to wear as if going through her drawers was something she did every day, Gale dropped his smirk. He leaned ever-so-slightly closer to her (something she was suddenly very acutely aware of) and spoke in a lower tone, so Posy wouldn't hear what he was saying. "She came to get you to come have dinner with us," he repeated, his steely eyes looking down at her, seriously. "I came to tell you... we found her."

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i have so much fun with the hawthornes (and madge). is it noticeable? xD on the other hand, madge chapters always seem to come out more dramatic than i intended them to be, at least at first draft. then i have to rewrite or edit things around so that it doesn't sound like the poor girl is on the verge of a nervous breakdown every other paragraph. i guess, in my head, madge just feels things very intensely. but oh well, i guess i manage to make it work, somehow.

chapter 28 will be posted tonight! (well, this afternoon, for most of my readers). i'll definitely get to it after i finish my coursework.

fic: ricochet

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