Laissez les bons temps rouler! [Second Mirror]

[dancingwillows]

The island had done it again. Whether it was pure chance or benevolence none of them would ever know, but somehow, someway, the place had seen fit to give them all booze again

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[playingtheenemy]

She had been extraordinarily good, but it hadn't been anything to do with willpower. Ainsley had been in the room when the sudden whiff of food came her way, but she'd barely glanced up, so engrossed was she in her writing. She hadn't even moved from her place, wearing a softball jersey and a pair of jeans, while people mingled all around her.

She didn't even touch a single plate.

It was, to some who knew her, probably apparent of a miracle in action.

[alittleofboth]

Anthony set the glass of wine in front of Ainsley without greeting.

"Put the pen down, my dear. Really, I'm surprised you can even concentrate."

[playingtheenemy]

Ainsley barely glanced up, only seeing the rim of a glass as she focused a determined look on Anthony that had been meant for her pen and paper. "Not that you don't know, but clearly this is bound to be here for...well, some time," she said, realizing she had no watch to check. "And my thought process in regards to the sentences I'm writing don't have that kind of time," she protested, tucking her legs under herself as she curled up in the corner of the couch with her notepad.

[alittleofboth]

"That doesn't mean you can't have a glass of wine," Anthony pointed out with raised eyebrows. "Drink, it's actually decent. What are you working on?" The transition from cool cajoling to curious inquiry was seamless.

[playingtheenemy]

Ainsley gnawed at her lower lip, but eventually set the pad and paper down as she leaned forward to take the glass with both hands, leaning back to sip at it. "It's my article. It's...difficult," she admitted.

[alittleofboth]

Anthony sipped from his own glass of wine, expression skeptical as he peered down at the paper. "Since when have you had any trouble expressing your opinion? Quite the opposite, I would say."

[playingtheenemy]

Ainsley rubbed at her forehead, tufts of hair falling over her fingers, which were cracked with dryness. "Since I'm writing an article that opposes all that I've been working for over the last year."

[alittleofboth]

"The laws?" Anthony guessed. He looked mildly curious, moving beside her and looking down at the paper. "Why in God's name are you doing that?"

[playingtheenemy]

"Because they won't work," she tiredly said, gesturing obscurely in the air. "Because the more I study them, the more I see people from other societies who just show me how even the simplest of laws aren't going to have one shared meaning to the people here."

[alittleofboth]

Anthony gave her a 'is that all?' look. "The American Constitution was written under illegal auspices, Britain's Glorious Revolution that finally provided us with a Parliament with half a brain was organized by half a dozen grumbling bishops. You think any government ever starts out with any shred of shared meaning that isn't superimposed upon them a hundred years down the road?"

He shrugged. "But I am a Leninist. One does not stand around hoping the Revolution will happen. One leads it."

[playingtheenemy]

"Shared meanings can be forged, yes," she agreed with a firm nod and an even firmer grasp on her words. "But the connotations of certain laws change and beyond that, the population demographics here are so wildly unstable. What happens when someone new hasn't been acclimated to the new laws they're serving under?"

[alittleofboth]

"Instability is precisely the reason we need laws, or at the very least written organization," Anthony insisted. It was the same argument he had been making for weeks. "What happens when there are no laws and a newcomer thinks something is the right thing to do that an old resident is vehemently against? Lists of 'do's and 'don't's are easier to understand than impromptu moral arguments - and less messy.

"But more importantly, and much more ignored, what if the clinic staff goes, or whoever it is that keeps the building crew on task? What's to keep us perpetually organized in the fact of such uncertainty?"

[playingtheenemy]

"Succession plans," she said simply. "Which aren't laws, exactly, but something more along the lines of policy. I don't know. I don't know!" she said, rubbing at her forehead. "I just don't think they're going to work."

[alittleofboth]

"I'm not fond of 'laws' myself, though I've long given up caring what one calls them." He smiled, cool and humorless. "I would argue that no government ever actually has. And yet, for reasons passing understanding, we keep trying."

[playingtheenemy]

Ainsley smiled up at Anthony, taking the glass of wine and finally indulging slightly. "Maybe you should have been on the law-forming committee."

[alittleofboth]

Anthony grimaced slightly and sipped from his own glass. "But then I would actually have to take into account the opinions of others, and you know how I feel about that sort of thing."