In the bar.

[ofthefamily]

Rosalie has been tinkering with the Mercedes. It's hard for Carlisle to be more than slightly agitated about this, though he tries. Rosalie knows what she is doing when it comes to cars so he doesn't begrudge her that small assertion of knowledge.

But she was tinkering with the transmission and Carlisle can hear it shift weirdly on his drive to

Comments

[neuroinvasive]

What about being watched from over the back of the seat. She's nosy and doesn't know a whole lot about... well whatever he has in pieces.

"What's that?"

[ofthefamily]

"The transmission of my car," Carlisle replies quickly, amiably, twisting to see who had spoken to him. The man offers the dark haired woman a polite smile. "My daughter has been playing around with it. Again."

[neuroinvasive]

He gets a bright grin in return. "Why would she do that? Was she bored? I do things that I wouldn't normally do when I'm bored."

[ofthefamily]

"She was probably bored, but this is hardly out of the ordinary for her."

Carlisle's hands are the only part of him after working on the part that have grease on them. He wipes them on a towel to his left before waving the woman over to his side of the booth.

"Have you never seen a transmission before?"

[neuroinvasive]

"Oh." She sounds like she knows but it's debatable as she heads round to sit with him, instead of just being a head and shoulders.

"Nope, never. What's it do?"

[ofthefamily]

"It selects the gear that -- "

Carlisle stops, raising an eyebrow.

"Do you know what a car is? I should probably start there."

[neuroinvasive]

"I do!" She nods. "Just never had the need to own one." She can just appear places or walk with the dogs, much better.

[ofthefamily]

"'Need' is different than 'want'," Carlisle explains. "They can be fun, if you like the speed of them. It's one of the few things that most of my family unequivocally likes. There is always something to work on.

"Now if I could keep Rosalie on her BMW instead of my car, I'd be far better off."

[neuroinvasive]

"So, you keep them because you can do something as a family with one?" She's trying to understand. "I play fetch or hunt when I do something with mine." She's on about the dogs.

"Why not ask her not to? Or keep your car someplace she can't get it? I have to do that when Soda goes after the biscuits."

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle can't resist a small smirk. "We go hunting too.

"As far as asking goes..." the pale blond shrugs one shoulder, working the towel over in one hand. "If Rosalie is happy, I can manage. And keeping the car someplace she can't get to it would mean I could never get to it either, which defeats the purpose."

[neuroinvasive]

"It's fun, we don't hurt anything though."

"So what's the transmission do?" She's still wondering what it is.

[ofthefamily]

"It allows for the shift of torque from the engine to the transmission of a car, for acceleration or deceleration." After a second, "It's what shifts the power around in a car so that it can actually go places."

[neuroinvasive]

"Oh!" She can understand that. "So what places do you go?" Did the narration mention she's nosy? Well she is. In a naive sort of way.

[ofthefamily]

"All over the world. I live a...very liberating lifestyle, with my family. Others might not agree, but it works for us. Most of the time."

A slight wince. "Sometimes I think my children have a hard time with it, but they have yet to disappoint."

[neuroinvasive]

"Well it's good to travel, and it's much better than being brought up in the underworld." Not being metaphorical there.

"And you care about your kids. They're lucky."

[ofthefamily]

Carlisle mentally stammers at the underworld reference."They're easy to care about. I do wish that I understood them better. No matter how long I spend with them, I still find that there are...gaps, if that makes sense?"

Carlisle's tone dips, with, "It's a silly thing to wish for, but all the same it is there."