(Untitled)

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton sat down in the wooden chair and rested his forearms on the desk. The office area of the Boarding House wasn’t particularly big; it didn’t have to be. It held a desk, a chair and a couple of simple shelves for papers and miscellanea. Everything was impeccably neat and looked as if it hadn’t been used for months - which, Lipton considered, it

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[bennet_beauty]

Jane did think he was the picture of fitting in that chair and Lydia did seem to agree as she let out a pleased and delighted cry of greeting, a resounding "Hello!" that did come out quite gummy as she had a full fist jammed up against her jaws. She rested her head shyly against Jane's shoulder and Jane did see no point in lingering now that their entrance was announced.

"She could hardly stand to wait another moment to introduce herself," Jane noted with warm merriment. "Mr. Lipton, this is my daughter, Lydia."

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton looked up at the high-pitched noise, his instints, training and experience causing his body to immediately tense into readiness for fight or flight. It was only a fraction of a second before rationality and the sense of where he was kicked in, and a grin spread over his face instantly when he saw who was in the doorway.

"Miss Bennet!" Lipton stood from the desk and moved to meet them halfway, giving her a welcoming smile and then looking down to Lydia, his voice warm. "And hello to you too, little Miss Lydia."

[bennet_beauty]

Lydia was instantly reaching two small arms out to him. For nineteen months, she was a small child for her age and Jane never did have issue carrying her. "She could not wait a moment more to meet you. She is very curious, of course, of the new man in the large house."

[niceofyoutoask]

It was automatic for him to meet one of her little reaching hands with one of his much larger ones, to give her something to latch on to. He gently brushed his thumb over her small, pale hand, a soft smile on his face. "I was just as looking forward to meeting her." He looked up at Jane, hoping she didn't mind that he was touching Lydia's hands. He had been around children many times before, but it had been a long while since he'd interacted with one so young. "Is she always this pleasant?"

[lionelthayer]

The boarding house is nothing like the compound, which Lionel likes, so whenever someone new pops up, it's hard not to notice or hear about it.

As he rounds the door into the office, one hand halfway up to knock on the frame, he notices the man's already looking up, and he turns it into an awkward wave. "Hi."

[niceofyoutoask]

"Hey there," Lipton said, leaning forward on the desk with a friendly smile for the other man. "Do you happen to live in this fine establishment?"

Chances were that he did, which really narrowed who he was down to one of the six male names on the list on his desk. Lipton put the pencil down on the desk, thinking perhaps he wouldn't have to go door to door to introduce himself like a travelling salesman and suddenly grateful for it.

[lionelthayer]

"I do," Lionels answer as he walks in, and holds out a hand for him to shake. "I'm Lionel Thayer, I live in the room right above this office. Are you moving in soon, or helping Jane out?"

Being in the office alone seems a good indicator for the latter, but the question gets a direct answer, and he likes talking to new people either way.

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton stood up, leaning over the desk to give Lionel a firm handshake. "Carwood Lipton, great to meet you." He nodded, smile still on his face. "Yeah, I'm helping Miss Bennet out," he clarified, moving out from behind the desk. It was only a little office with one chair, and it felt odd to be sitting behind it when the person he was talking to had to stand. "Doing this and that to keep everything running smoothly."

[nothingtomiss]

Brad's looking for Nate. There's only so much time that he can spend with Ray before he feels the need for conversation with an actual human adult. Still, when he walks through the door of the boarding house and sees Lipton sitting there, there's an easy grin on his face. Even for someone like Brad, who can take people or leave them, the other guy is pretty easy to like.

"Put to work already?"

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton laughed, leaning back in his chair, pencil still between his fingers, when he saw Brad through the doorway. He's got a calm about him that Lipton finds reassuring and can sort of relate to. He knows Brad has seen some of the same awful things that he has, and yet he still has an easy-going way about him. That was hard to do.

"Funny how that works, huh?" He shrugged, pencil rolling between his fingers. "Guess I just didn't know what to do with myself when given all that free time."

[nothingtomiss]

Brad slouches into the office, hands in the pocket of his jeans. He's actually managed to find a black t-shirt today, complete with faded Iron Maiden logo. He's looking more and more like a surfer by the day.

"Man, there's surfing, there's food, there's girls in bikinis. You need to learn how to be on vacation."

[niceofyoutoask]

"One day, I'm sure I'll learn." Lipton agreed, amused. Brad seemed to be far better at taking advantage of the free time and lack of responsibility, whereas all Lipton did was feel useless and listen to himself think. There were plenty of friendly people around, food, beds, and no one shooting at him, so it was hard to be too morose, even if the ring on his finger prevented him from admiring any of the beautiful beach-going females too much.

"I've run a Boarding House before," Lipton told Brad, in an unusual mention of his home without being prompted. He rarely spoke of the family and wife waiting for him in Huntington, but now that he was back in a Boarding House, it seemed pointless to keep it to himself. "So helping out here isn't really too far out of my skill set."

[endlessdel]

Delirium was bored at the Compound. Beee-Oh-arGH-ee-DEE. Bored. With Capitals. And whilst she was supposed to be relaxing and taking things slow, boooring, before the big baby birth palooza but she really wasn't doing any of those things. Apart from having mass cooking sprees which tired her out or cleaning the compound obsessively, she really wasn't doing much and it was starting to get her down. So she'd borrowed Not!Asher Ashby's golf cart and had decided to drive herself down to Jane's house to see her favourite niece type person.

Delirium smiled brightly as she waddled into the boarding house and stared at a man who was not Jane.

"You'RE noT JanE oR ARe yOU JANe and ARE SecrETLY TRappED in a man'S bODY?" Delirium asked tilting her head to look at him properly.

[niceofyoutoask]

"I'm pretty sure I'm just myself, and not Miss Bennet, but I'll let you know if that changes." Lipton was a bit taken aback by the opening words from the obviously pregnant woman at the door, but he'd heard more absurd things. Hell, he was on this mysterious island, wasn't he?

He got up from his seat, and pulled the chair to the front of the desk. "Here, sit down for a moment, Ma'am." He didn't really know much about pregnancies - his daughter had been too young to have been married before he was sent out, and his wife JoAnne and he hadn't had any children before the war started, for better or worse.

[endlessdel]

"i'M NOT A ma'AM, i'M DeLiriUM. mA'am... hEEE." Delirium said with a smile as she waddled, like a nightmare duck with sharp fangs and dripping blood, to the chair and sat down. She thought about playing the 'Oh My God My Water Just Broke' game with the man but decided not to for now. Although it might be fun just to watch him squirm for a while. She hadn't made anyone uncomfortable or squirmy in such a long time. "yOU'rE New. ShiNY AND gLowinG. wHEN arE You FROm?"

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton gave Delirium a bemused look, as he leant back against the front edge of the desk. She seemed delighted about something, and Lipton couldn't help but smile along, even as he was a bit confused as to why.

"No one's ever called me shiny and glowing before." Lipton said, not quite sure the description suited him. He wasn't exactly the life of the party, like Harry Welsh or George Luz. "But I am pretty new. I dropped in from 1945, from the front line of the war in Belgium. How about yourself?"

[nerdinacape]

Most of the time, when Grigg was noisy it was by accident. He stomped and shouted like everyone else, but years of growing up under the thumb of people who could and would shush him every chance they got, had made him careful.

Sometimes, he forgot. Which was what had happened today as he clomped past the doorway to the office, mostly oblivious only to notice that there was someone inside. Backing up, he poked his head into the doorway.

"Oh, hello, are you new?"

[niceofyoutoask]

"I am," Lipton nodded with a friendly smile, leaning forward at his desk. He lifted up the sheet of residents' names, tilting it towards the door so the newcomer could see the list of names on it. "I guess that means you're somewhere on here, and live in one of the rooms upstairs?"

[nerdinacape]

Right in one, which if Grigg had been into golfing and this had been a game would have made for quite the score.

"I do. Grigg Harris, I live upstairs and all the way at the end of the hall."

Which was inconvenient at times, but he didn't mind it.

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton stood up to move out from behind the desk - with no chair for the other man to sit in, it felt strange to do proper introductions with him sitting. He offered out his hand for a shake. "I'm Carwood Lipton, and I'm going to be helping out Miss Bennet by doing all the day-to-day business to keep this fine establishment a decent place to live."

He looked down at the desk now that he was standing over it and frowned. "Well, if you're sure that your name is 'Grigg' and not 'Greg' then my resident roster appears to be wrong." He said, amused but apologetic. He'd cobbled the list together from bits of papers here and there and from what Jane had told him, so the minor mistake was his fault.