Humpty Dumpty

[scraps_molly]

Who: Scraps, Glitch
When: January 12, 9:00 pm
Where: 6th floor balcony down the hall from the lab
What: flying

Molly had left the bath in her boring nightclothes and dressing gown.  White.  Plain.  The color of the sheets.  Dull so she’d sleep and not admire the colors.   She went to the lab first. She knew she had forgotten something.  But it

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[scraps_molly]

"I'm walking the rope." Scraps answered back, her arms carefully extended. "There was a pole once, for balance. But no net. Had to be sure. She wasn't me. But hers come forth more than others. I think there may be more of her upstairs than them."

The wind felt right. The smells were off though. The herbs and earth instead of the crowd and animals from the other acts.

"There was a husband. They'd crouch in tern and step over one another. Total trust. I know what that feels like but only from her." Careful steps. No looking down.

She opened her eyes and the illusion in her mind dissolved. No tent. No rope. Just the castle, the balcony, and Glitch.

Glitch looked afraid.

"It is dangerous. But that's the thrill. Was the thrill." She frowned. "It's fading now."

She carefully sat down on the railing, her legs danging inside the balcony. "They fade so I can't always remember at all. What it felt, why I did... I want to know their names, more than my own. Because they're gone and deserve that much. I'm still here."

She felt the sting of tears. "I want to live. I want to stop being the mouse in the wall. I want to face the cats and their claws and their teeth. I want to be a real girl. But I'm only real when I'm them, for those flashes."

"Am I real, Glitch? Or am I just them, pretending to be real? Are you real? Or just a bit of memory from someone else?"

Sometimes, when she was on the verge of some realization, some emotional upheaval, this would happen. The confusion would tumble in. Making thinking so very hard. Making moving on hard. No focus, nothing to hold onto, and she would drift for a day or two.

[glitch_ambrose]

Glitch stepped toward her closer, watching, listening. "I does sound nice, if dangerous can ever be nice that is." He moved to stand next to her as she sat down on the ralling. He felt much better now that she was of of the precarious ledge he watched her as she spoke and felt sadend by her words. "You don't have to be a mouse hiding if you don't want to. I'll help you face the cats." He reached out to put his hand on her shoulder lightly. "You know, I'm pretty sure I'm real. So if I'm a real person, than that makes you a real girl too, even if you are a bit more of a complicated quilt of a girl."

[scraps_molly]

Scraps managed a small smile and her hand moved to lay over Glitches on her shoulder. "I thought you may be a memory, or maybe even made up. I only ever had one other friend. One man looked after me. I remember him, sometimes. More now. Papa Bear. Was he mine?"

Her eyes went cloudy for a moment. "Yes. He was mine. Papa bear had no hair. His was big and scared people away. He didn't have a zip, but his brains were scrambled. I can't recall why." Something to hold on to. "He called me little girl... little mouse. Blood. There was so much blood..."

Not to hold on to after all. Brighter things. Lighter thoughts.

"You're real. You're Glitch. My friend. You're smart, like ..." She frowned as the thought darted away in fear. "And you have things to put together."

Gears and springs and bits of magic, the kind only the mechanical minded knew. Gears and springs didn't hurt, weren't hateful, or mean.

"You're real. And if you say I'm real then I must be. I'm not right. I'm confused, but I'm real."

She slid down from the stone railing to stand with both feet on the balcony once more.

"Thank you Glitch." She moved in to hug him tight. He was the only one she trusted to touch. She hadn't hugged in a long time. She pressed a kiss to his cheek and stepped back. "Thanks for being real. And for being a friend."

[glitch_ambrose]

Glitch smiled at her words and her hand on his, glad that for the moment her mood was lightening and her confusion getting clearer. He blushed a little when she kissed his cheek, had he ever been kissed before even on the cheek? He couldn't remember, but it was sweet. "Your welcome Scraps. I promise I'll always be real, and always always be your friend."

[scraps_molly]

"And you're a very good one at that." Scraps grinned hugely. She needed something. Something to chase the fragmented fear and the melancholy away.

"Can you dance?" The question seemingly came out of nowhere. "Since I can't fly I want to dance. It's like flying on the ground.

She placed her hands in position of an invisible partner and started to sway to music she heard in her head.

There was a snatch of memory. A child dancing balanced on her father's feet. Looking up at a smiling man with a red beard and curly hair.

That was hers, and she tried to grab hold of it in her mind as she stopped dancing for a moment.

"I danced with my father. When I was only little. My feet on his shoes. That was me. His hair was red, like mine." Then the memory faded, and she was left aware that there had been something there. An impression, but not the actual memory anymore.

No. No felling when she wanted to fly. No crying when she wanted to laugh.

"Dance with me Glitch. I'll teach you if you don't know how."

[glitch_ambrose]

"Yes, I can dance." He said watching her sway away with her invisible partner. "Rhythm is something you can never forget-at least I think you cant forget it. I haven't forgotten it anyways. Dancing is in my soul." He took her hands and led her in a waltz to a song only he could hear.

[scraps_molly]

Oh, he did have rhythm! His palm was warm against hers as Scraps followed Glitch’s lead. They waltzed and spun out under the stars and into the hall.

They flew to the soundless music, swirling in silence except for the moments when Scraps couldn’t help the happy laughter bubble up. Lost in the steps, in the music of the mind, in the easy movement of the body, neither past not future touched her. Only the happy moment existed.

Spinning and twirling under the lead of a partner who knew the beat and kept the steps.

Moving, dancing, tumbling, stretching, twisting, all these things tended to still her mind when there was a huge muddle. It was the best medicine. And she could get to like dancing the very best.

“I think I’ve found my very own dancing partner.” She laughed lightly. “Can I keep you?”

[glitch_ambrose]

Glitch laughed along with her, keeping time to his own waltz, he could almost see the ballroom with all the fine ladies and lords. He wondered if that was where he has learned to dance like this as he danced the laughing redhead along the hallway with him. Scraps was a fantastic dancer, the best dance partner he ever had-well that he could remember. He smiled at her pulling her into another spin "Of course you can keep me, I wouldn't have it any other way."