Flavour of the Day (12/07/16), Rocky Road 2 [Divide and Rule]
Title: Out in the Open
Author: lost_spook
Story: Heroes of the Revolution (Divide & Rule)
Flavor(s): Flavour of the Day 12/07/16 (campestral), Rocky Road #2 (countryside)
Toppings/Extras: Rainbow Sprinkles + Butterscotch
Rating: All ages
Word Count: 476
Notes: June 1871; Eleanor Randall Stephenson, Jack Iveson. (These are Edward’s paternal grandparents. I actually have written their initial meeting, but that not being a FotD prompt, it’s still languishing in a notebook somewhere. However, in one fic, Edward says that his grandmother wrote books on nature while his grandfather was (disappointingly) not an actual pirate, and this is them.)
Summary: Eleanor loses herself in nature.
***
Eleanor sat down on a blanket at the edge of the field, putting her pencil in her mouth as she balanced her notebook on her knees. Once in position, she straightened her sun hat and retrieved the pencil, and waited and watched.
She cast a fleeting glance out over the field, apparently empty of anything but grass and wild flowers and weeds, before giving her attention to the immediate details of her surroundings - details that instantly betrayed a far more active and inhabited world than the wider view would allow. She pushed all other thoughts aside and began to scribble down notes, and to draw; one incongruous, small figure in black in the midst of greens and golds and browns with a paper and pencil in hand. She drew a painted lady, landing lightly on a wildflower in front of her. She had no colour pencils or paints, so she shaded in the bright orange and yellows and brown with notes on their hues beside them. She drew an unremarkable stalk among the long grass, broken and bent at the top thanks to some careless passer-by, whether human or other, sketching in the grain-like green head and wispy strands. She hastened to catch the likeness of the odd insect she didn’t recognise as it crawled over the leaf of a nearby nettle, and she made sure to note the time, the date, the location and the weather for future reference. (Sunny, but not especially hot, she jotted down.)
She was one insignificant, quiet observer in a world humming with endless activity, and paying no heed to her or the rest of humankind until forced to by obstruction or active interference or cruelty. She smiled to herself at how the typical city-dweller might well label it merely pretty, green, or restful - or worse, merely dull. How little they saw.
“Miss Stephenson.”
It was almost as if she’d somehow summoned him up with her thoughts of the city. Mr Iveson, more than anybody else, represented to Eleanor town and business, and indeed, busyness. And yet, she thought, giving him a smile, and finding it a not unwelcome if new revelation, she would not have wished for anyone else to interrupt her escape in the fields today.
“No, no, don’t get up,” Mr Iveson said, putting out a hand as if to prevent her as she hastily gathered up pencil and notebook and straightened her hat again.
She ignored him and rose anyway. It was about time she did so, and in any case, she didn’t want to get a crick in her neck from looking up at him as they tried to conduct a conversation. “How unexpected to find you out here,” she said. “Surely you cannot be surveying this place for development?”
“My dear girl,” he said, ignoring her jibe. “I heard the news. Of course I came.”
***
Author: lost_spook
Story: Heroes of the Revolution (Divide & Rule)
Flavor(s): Flavour of the Day 12/07/16 (campestral), Rocky Road #2 (countryside)
Toppings/Extras: Rainbow Sprinkles + Butterscotch
Rating: All ages
Word Count: 476
Notes: June 1871; Eleanor Randall Stephenson, Jack Iveson. (These are Edward’s paternal grandparents. I actually have written their initial meeting, but that not being a FotD prompt, it’s still languishing in a notebook somewhere. However, in one fic, Edward says that his grandmother wrote books on nature while his grandfather was (disappointingly) not an actual pirate, and this is them.)
Summary: Eleanor loses herself in nature.
***
Eleanor sat down on a blanket at the edge of the field, putting her pencil in her mouth as she balanced her notebook on her knees. Once in position, she straightened her sun hat and retrieved the pencil, and waited and watched.
She cast a fleeting glance out over the field, apparently empty of anything but grass and wild flowers and weeds, before giving her attention to the immediate details of her surroundings - details that instantly betrayed a far more active and inhabited world than the wider view would allow. She pushed all other thoughts aside and began to scribble down notes, and to draw; one incongruous, small figure in black in the midst of greens and golds and browns with a paper and pencil in hand. She drew a painted lady, landing lightly on a wildflower in front of her. She had no colour pencils or paints, so she shaded in the bright orange and yellows and brown with notes on their hues beside them. She drew an unremarkable stalk among the long grass, broken and bent at the top thanks to some careless passer-by, whether human or other, sketching in the grain-like green head and wispy strands. She hastened to catch the likeness of the odd insect she didn’t recognise as it crawled over the leaf of a nearby nettle, and she made sure to note the time, the date, the location and the weather for future reference. (Sunny, but not especially hot, she jotted down.)
She was one insignificant, quiet observer in a world humming with endless activity, and paying no heed to her or the rest of humankind until forced to by obstruction or active interference or cruelty. She smiled to herself at how the typical city-dweller might well label it merely pretty, green, or restful - or worse, merely dull. How little they saw.
“Miss Stephenson.”
It was almost as if she’d somehow summoned him up with her thoughts of the city. Mr Iveson, more than anybody else, represented to Eleanor town and business, and indeed, busyness. And yet, she thought, giving him a smile, and finding it a not unwelcome if new revelation, she would not have wished for anyone else to interrupt her escape in the fields today.
“No, no, don’t get up,” Mr Iveson said, putting out a hand as if to prevent her as she hastily gathered up pencil and notebook and straightened her hat again.
She ignored him and rose anyway. It was about time she did so, and in any case, she didn’t want to get a crick in her neck from looking up at him as they tried to conduct a conversation. “How unexpected to find you out here,” she said. “Surely you cannot be surveying this place for development?”
“My dear girl,” he said, ignoring her jibe. “I heard the news. Of course I came.”
***