I might crumble, I might take a fall again [open]

[quietsideways]

There's a house on a vaguely upscale residential street. Up until yesterday it only had one interesting thing about it, which was the paint scheme involving blue and green stripes. Not exactly worth a second glance, in a world like this one, but still, it was there

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[itllhurtifido]

John's on one of his occasional walks around town when he notices that someone's apparently over on the Tillotson place's porch. Someone he doesn't recognize... and who's crying. Hrm. He turns off the street onto the path up to the porch.

"Excuse me, miss?" He tips his hat -- a fedora, as befits his older style of suit, in brown today -- as he approaches. "Are you all right?"

[quietsideways]

Madeline goes quiet when he starts talking, and it takes her a while to lift her head from her arms and give John a glossy, not-quite-there glance. There's a small, clear string of snot connecting her nose to her sleeve until she sniffs, loudly, and rubs at her face.

"Nuh - nuh -" she stops, turning away to stare at her arms folded over her knees, and shakes her head, slowly.

[itllhurtifido]

Yeah, there's not going to be much talking from her just now. Not very much of a surprise, given how long, to his eye, it looks like she's been running her waterworks. Well, first things first... He reaches up to his breast pocket and pulls out the handkerchief he has stuffed there. (It's clean, even, since he hasn't needed to use it either for its traditional purpose or, as has been more common recently, as a bandage.)

"Here. You might find this works better." He offers the handkerchief. John's voice is slightly rough, but his tone is fairly gentle. He considers offering her a belt from his hip flask as well, but he knows that attitudes about that sort of thing have changed from back in his day, so he thinks better of it.

[quietsideways]

She stares at it like he's offering her some strange and alien device instead of a square of cloth for longer than seems really right, before reaching out and tentatively tugging it from his hand.

It almost feels like an accomplishment, and that's enough to make her stay as quiet as she can while she tries to clean up. Now that's she got something that's not already slimy with tears, spit, and snot, she can actually manage to mop up some of the mess.

When she's accomplished as much as she has the presence of mind for (not much) she crumples the handkerchief in one hand and nods vaguely in his direction, biting her lip.

[itllhurtifido]

He's patient while waiting for her to pull herself together, as much as she can. Not perfect, but it'll do for now, he supposes.

"There. That's better. Now, what's the problem that's got a nice young woman like yourself all out of sorts like this?"

[quietsideways]

The question is so utterly unneccessary, at least from her perpective, that she looks back at him again with mild, apathetic confusion.

"...e-every," she says, and sniffs, tucking her hair behind her ear with the same hand holding the sticky handkerchief, "E-everyone is -" Dead, but he knows that, doesn't he?

[itllhurtifido]

John nods, looking mildly regretful, not just at her answer, but also at the memories of another town where everyone was dead, so long ago.

"I'm sorry, I'm... Well, having been here the whole time, I've just gotten used to it. Didn't expect that anyone would still be bothered by it."

[quietsideways]

"It - it just," Madeline waves a little at the air, resting her forehead on her knees.

"I-I didn't, really, g-get it until...now, and I -" Her shoulders hitch, sharply, and trying to hold back a sob just turns it into a low, whining sound.

[itllhurtifido]

He hunches down, so he's at least a little bit more on level with her. At the same time, it gives him a moment to consider that it's a bit odd for someone to have gotten up onto a random person's -- well, okay, random dead person's -- porch to have a cry.

"Did you... know the Tillotsons?" He nods back over at the house itself, only just now realizing that he didn't really know whether or not the government cleanup teams had been here, back during the quarantine when they did that sometimes.

[quietsideways]

She nods, silently, and then sniffs again, wiping under her nose with the back of her hand. It's covered by her sleeve, but still.

"I'd like to be alone right now," she murmurs very, very softly, beause it hasn't occured to her that there is a body upstairs. She knows there is a dead person - of course she knows, she can't not - but there is also a body, which is a seperate issue. Bodies require disposal. Madeline can't even think the word 'disposal' anywhere near anything that is Karen.

[itllhurtifido]

Hm. Interesting. Sad, but interesting.

"I'm sorry. They were nice people."

He stands back up, and turns, headed back down the walkway.