(no subject)
For Tom Hansen, this was the night where everything changed...
It wasn't one night. One moment. It was a collection of minutes. Of days, ticking down to one. For all intents and purposes, things should have been going great. He was drawing again, a growing mess of sketches and half-finished plans tacked to the walls of his borrowed hut, a pencil stuck behind his ear nearly every moment of the day, now, just in case he needed it. It had been years since he'd been so prolific. Years, since he'd had that kind of confidence. Construction on their treehouse was already well underway. His very first workable design, coming to life right there in the shade of that tree they'd chosen.
So, there was no explanation why things had been so tense those last few weeks. Why Paul Helinski, his best friend in the whole world and the guy he'd seen nearly every day for half his life, had been as scarce as a ghost. Well, okay, there was an explanation -- there was a huge glaring reason in neon flashing lights over both of their heads, but this kind of denial was an art.
So, he was up late, in the Compound and far from his temporary home, a cup of coffee in hand and an old, battered issue of NME in the other. Halfway into the rec room, he stopped dead, staring dumbly at the small, potted bush sitting there alone and out of place on the center of a table. It was leafless, twiggy and scraggly, but from the branches hung small, hand-folded paper cranes in metallic blue and red. It should have meant nothing to him, it was only a tree, but for a man like Tom Hansen, something so small and insignificant could mean everything.
Breathing out a sigh, he crossed the room, set his magazine and coffee aside and scowled at the little tree, then he reached out to give one of the tiny cranes a flick and watched it spin. And in that moment, it was like she'd never left him at all.
That bitch.
[[Timed to late evening, before midnight. Open to all, but be prepared for him to unload on you, whether he really knows you or not. Toplevels accepted through Tuesday.]]
It wasn't one night. One moment. It was a collection of minutes. Of days, ticking down to one. For all intents and purposes, things should have been going great. He was drawing again, a growing mess of sketches and half-finished plans tacked to the walls of his borrowed hut, a pencil stuck behind his ear nearly every moment of the day, now, just in case he needed it. It had been years since he'd been so prolific. Years, since he'd had that kind of confidence. Construction on their treehouse was already well underway. His very first workable design, coming to life right there in the shade of that tree they'd chosen.
So, there was no explanation why things had been so tense those last few weeks. Why Paul Helinski, his best friend in the whole world and the guy he'd seen nearly every day for half his life, had been as scarce as a ghost. Well, okay, there was an explanation -- there was a huge glaring reason in neon flashing lights over both of their heads, but this kind of denial was an art.
So, he was up late, in the Compound and far from his temporary home, a cup of coffee in hand and an old, battered issue of NME in the other. Halfway into the rec room, he stopped dead, staring dumbly at the small, potted bush sitting there alone and out of place on the center of a table. It was leafless, twiggy and scraggly, but from the branches hung small, hand-folded paper cranes in metallic blue and red. It should have meant nothing to him, it was only a tree, but for a man like Tom Hansen, something so small and insignificant could mean everything.
Breathing out a sigh, he crossed the room, set his magazine and coffee aside and scowled at the little tree, then he reached out to give one of the tiny cranes a flick and watched it spin. And in that moment, it was like she'd never left him at all.
That bitch.
[[Timed to late evening, before midnight. Open to all, but be prepared for him to unload on you, whether he really knows you or not. Toplevels accepted through Tuesday.]]