(Untitled)

[scheherazading]

Who: Velvet Lyon (Scheherazade), Alex Chase (King Shahryar)
What: Meeting on the subway after her afternoon at the Met with Murdock.
Rating: TBD? PG-13, probably, because Alex has a mouth on him.

Comments

[kingofstories]

Wandering thoughts. Far enough away to almost miss that the train had drawn up and the kid who'd been behind him steps back was now pushing past, elbows and artfully trailing striped scarf and iPod jammed in, unaware of surroundings. Alex jostled on, breathing in the scent of stale bodies and reconditioned air with a sigh of gratitude for plastic seats and the act itself of sitting downDon't carry a fancy bit of paper stamped with gold saying you'd been at college and you were errand boy in a silk tie that felt like a noose; a delayed execution by fifty years of being trapped in an office, behind a desk that felt too small to fit and photocopying useless bits of paper for kids younger but with the all important 'BA', magical letters, post-name. The office was one of a nondescript name, marketing firm that was bland enough not to command attention of anyone but not piss-poor enough to be infamous. It was a job, a job with a paycheck that came each month and with each signed contract, he felt as though he'd written off his soul to pay

[scheherazading]

Weaving in and out of her ruminations upon the art she'd seen that day, were just little observations about the people surrounding her in that car. People watching was something Vel did constantly, without even thinking about it. She took note of the way the girl with the red backpack on the far end of the car was standing, slouching, shoulder against the pole, but her head tilted in the opposite direction, tired but alert like a sentry on duty. A man's choice of socks - mismatched, bright colors, slacks raised just enough when he sat to show. Idle little fascinations with small things, a moment spent on spinning a reason and a why and a how, and then her thoughts moved on

[kingofstories]

There was a different sort of tug to a Tale of your Tale. Different little catch in the throat, twist in the gut. It felt, usually like being punched unexpectedly, attention dragged unwillingly to a person who quite often, he didn't feel like paying attention to. Accompanying the sensation came a prickling of knowing; quite different from an 'ordinary' encounter with a nondescript Tale. He could feel it, beneath the numb weariness of the mindset of a journey home and without meaning to, sought out the reason for it this time

[scheherazading]

Automatically, Velvet smiled back, small and shy befitting chance encounters on a subway car, before she realized the sarcasm in his greeting and looked down into her lap, where her hands played with the strap of her bag. They hadn't had a very... well, civil conversation since she'd lashed out at him, and oh, how she regretted it. Yet, she'd apologized, and she wasn't really sure what she was supposed to do next - not in terms of putting their friendship back on track, or in terms of their current meeting.

The 1 train rumbled and shrieked into the next station; the woman sitting on Alex's left got up, and Velvet mirrored her. Where the other woman got off the train, Vel took her place, sitting gingerly next to Alex, offering a thin-lipped, apologetic smile. "Hi."