"So, have you heard the news?"
It was eleven in the morning, on a Friday, and the women were in what would constitute the backyard of the house on a small hill that the Hawkes family (pop. 1) owned and lived in. For the past hour they've been tilling up dirt in a specified square area, hacking at the earth with hoes and earth tillers. The day was fair, the skies a bright blue and the sun warming the earth to a comfortable low-seventies range. The leaves on the trees were working on turning, and the smell of autumn had been in the air earlier today while the world was still waking up. Today, when Tamsin had come up, summoned for a visit and promised lunch, Lola had a project in progress-- she was making a garden.
Not for flowers or anything so frivolous, but a significant amount of land to grow food.
She'd said she was tired of needing to rely on the small suburban towns and their shitty little grocery stores so heavily.
Lola had asked the question with a solid 'thunk!' of her tilling fork in the ground. The lawn tool was left there, and the Hispanic-Native woman straightened up and wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her glove. She was dressed in jeans and dirty gray-once-white sneakers and a black tank top, with her hair tied back out of her face with a ponytail and bandana for good measure. Those gloves were taken off and tucked into her back pocket for the moment, and she took a break to rub at her sore hands. She was taking a break for a second, and squinting through the sun to look over at Tamsin.
'The News' that she was referring to could be any number of things that Hector may or may not have told Tamsin, if they've spoken at all this week. Or Tamsin might not have any idea at all, if Hector hasn't been feeling the need to share tales about the Kinswoman with his packmate recently.
Whatever it was the Fianna was or wasn't expecting to hear, the answer was:
"I saw Corey."
Tamsin Hall
Lola was making a garden and Tamsin, feeling that she should, offered to help, as soon as she saw what was going on. Tamsin did not know how to help, a fact which became very obvious very quickly. Gardening is not something she's done much of, outside of some lima beans in ziplock baggies for a science project back in whatever grade, and she vaguely recalls overwatering some some marigolds once. There was a real-working farm she went to on field trip, though she snuck away to play in the woods. She tried to grow carrots once by taking carrots out of the refrigerator and planting them in a pot, so she could work on her own personal version of Hobbiton- she needed a Samwise.
All to say: Tamsin required direction after her offer to help, but sticking metal things into the dirt and churning it was easy enough to learn. There was something hypnotic about metal into dirt metal into dirt metal into-
News, Lola says, and Tamsin looks up, her muddy eyes touched by a note of inquisition, and then she says, I saw Corey, and Tamsin's forehead crinkles, and THEN Tamsin squeezes her hoe hard enough to gouge her palms with splinters, if there were any splinters, knuckles sharp and white, and she says, eloquent as only Fianna can, "What? Here?"
Lola Hawkes
Tamsin had, of course, offered to help. She might suspect that this was Lola's plan all along. If you were to ask the Kinswoman, she'd say that she would've had Tamsin up for lunch regardless but the timing sure did work out nice.
When Lola had stopped and rubbed at her hands and mentioned the alpha that ran from his pack, the Fianna, understandably, reacted negatively. Her expression change was observed, but not shrank away from. Lola knew Tamsin well enough, and didn't worry about harsh outbursts from her-- not in her direction, anyways. She and the Fianna had never had any real reason to come to disagreements before, so even when carrying a sensitive subject into conversation she did not fear the Child of Stag's ire.
"No, no, not here. I'll tell ya a story." She'd stop massaging her own hands and nod her head toward the iron-wrought patio table that sat up on the back porch. There were four chairs circling the piece of furniture, and a pair of glasses along with a pitcher of water. The ice had melted considerably since she brought the pitcher out, but there was still enough present that the drink would be cold. Lola'd toss the lukewarm water from her own glass out into the yard, then refill it with colder stuff. The same courtesy would be given to the glass Tamsin had drank from before.
"I was worried about Hector and whatever unresolved stress he was holding onto from what happened up in Winnipeg. A lot of it seemed to be centered around Corey and how he left you guys. So I decided I was gonna talk to him, see what his side of the story is. Thought it might help bring some pieces together, and maybe if I knew more about what happened the more I could help, you know?
"So I give him a call-- this was a week and a half ago mind, last Wednesday. He says he doesn't wanna talk about it on the phone, so I tell him 'Fine, where are you?'. He says he's back in Houston, but wants to meet in Vegas." Lola rolled her eyes and took a deep drink from her water glass. "I guess he had to go out that way to help his cousin with some shit. So I hopped a flight and met up with him the next day."
Tamsin Hall
The Fianna-girl's fingers knot more forever-firm firm-forever just-stay-here on the hoe. Not Here, Lola says, but I'll tell ya a story, those words are a charm for the wolf. Her mouth is an unhappy line and her jaw is tight shut on a snap, like she could chew the topic and Corey out've the air, and she flicks a glance to the side, and then flicks a glance to the other side, and then drags the hoe over to the porch but she doesn't actually take a seat.
Leans and listens, agitated, simmering-seething galliard-girl, conflicted and blank with it. Tamsin's not somebody who fidgets with nervous energy unless she's about to perform, so she unwraps her hands from the hoe and instead picks a splinter out of her palm, teasing wood out from the just-translucent flesh. The way it hurts you'd never think she's taken claws down her side and across her arm and been fine there-after, that they'd leave no mark but this stupid splinter would actually get in there and hurt. Pinkblood wells.
Lola Hawkes
Lola was well aware of the splinter that Tamsin'd put in her hand when she squeezed the wooden handle of the hoe she was working with. The motion had been sudden, sharp, careless, and the tool was old and temperamental, so of course she got a splinter. She watched her ease the sliver of wood out of her hand, but made no motion to fuss or offer assistance. She wouldn't go to fetch rubbing alcohol or hydrogen peroxide from the bathroom inside, because she knew full well that her Wolf Cousins dealt with significantly worse on a weekly basis. If a Garou couldn't handle a splinter, they may as well be considered a Cub all over again.
Tamsin's silence didn't affect Lola too heavily. She probably anticipated it, matter of fact. She simply allowed enough time for the Galliard to interject, and when no such statement came she pressed on.
"I spent a night down there-- we split a room, and I was back on my way the next day."
There's a tick of the clock, and Lola's gaze sharpens on Tamsin to some moderate degree. This wasn't the kind of stare that you place on someone when you're trying to put them in the hot seat or scold them or force a reaction from them. It simply reflected gravity.
"He told me what happened at the Gathering. And what happened after."
Tamsin Hall
Tamsin has a bad habit. The bad habit is chewing on the inside of her mouth. The taste of blood is iron-tang, and iron's poison to the fay, and the Fianna have blood that supposedly mingles with the blood of the fairies, but don't call them that, so what does that mean? Who knows? The taste of blood is iron, and surely Lola did anticipate the galliard's silence -- Tamsin (was very much a Waning galliard, born as the moon's light was diminishing) was perfectly capable of listening until a story was finished without interjecting, no matter how her moods lashed at her.
So. Gravity is met with gravity. Gravity to grind bones to make bread, simmering rage leashed but of course it's leashed. Tamsin has control of herself, in spite of what you hear about Fianna. Tamsin was born human and raised human and she knows her own mind.
"Oh, did he?" Tamsin sounds passionless. "What'd he say?"
Lola Hawkes
Tamsin was gnawing away at the inside of her mouth. Her tone of voice was flat, her expression unamused, pissed off and controlled. Rage was a low roll of waves under the surface of the Fianna's skin, but Lola didn't fret or fear for it. She stood comfortably on her own property, like a wolf in its territory, with her feet spread apart and planted at the edge of the back porch. Her left arm looped over her stomach, and the right hand continued to hold the glass of water.
"In short, that those racist-ass Wendigo up there wouldn't allow you to do the Gathering-- barely allowed him and you to be there for the Gatherings at all. That Hector had to put his brown face on and coax them into letting you be there in the first place." There's clear disdain in her voice when she speaks of the Little Brother tribe. Clearly, racism is something that strikes the flint of aggravation within her more easily than other topics. Specifically here, to find that that tribe that was supposed to be such a proud representation of the Garou of the Americas before the Great Migration, was going to split a pack up over something as petty as the color of skin that their guests wore.
"Said that Hector was supposed to do the Gathering, but was M.I.A., and when he came back they fought-- hard."
Another drink of water, and Lola twisted at the waist to reach back and set the glass on the edge of the patio table without needing to move her feet.
"And that he ain't coming back unless he abso-fucking-lutely has to."
Tamsin Hall
"Ha." Not a laugh: more a bark. "Uh. There was and is no power in all of Creation that'd keep me -- us -- from our own packmates' Gathering, so Corey overstated the need for 'coaxing.' Hector can't talk his way through an open door. If he had to do that instead of walking, he'd be stuck in one spot forever. So. Yeah. They were assholes though who sure as fuck needed to be reminded that the Garou are something more n' location and these skins."
This: is clearly difficult for Tamsin to say because each word is fluid-bitten-out-seething-
See, she looks so hurt. Deer-in-headlights hurt. Slapped-child hurt. A blink, and it's gone.
"Ha," again, this time far more sardonic. The kind of ha that's a prelude to bitter-seed taste, cracked teeth. She sounds scornful, "Like there's anything for him to come back to. Dudes are such arrogant fucks."
Waver like a warp in glass, another step back, Tamsin looks not at her shoes and not at Lola but at Lola's house, then says after an uneven pause, changing the trajectory of her movement (away, away from the kinswoman) toward the house instead of toward the open fields, lengthening her stride so she gets to the door in one-two, and maybe her reflection shivers across glass like a promise, or maybe the gray-blur of dusty screen-door and old wood set off her sudden bloodlessness, her dark hair, deep-set eyes, bloody lips, "Um, bathroom. Gotta use it."
Lola Hawkes
Lola's eyes followed after Tamsin's face as the expressions shift drastically across it.
They then follow the younger, smaller woman's body as it traveled backward at first, away, and then forward and cutting toward the backdoor instead.
"You know where it is...," Lola said slowly as Tamsin excused herself to use the bathroom. Her tone and body language were a mite suspicious, but mostly just acutely aware. She was processing Tamsin's response to having the topic of her Pack as it used to be and the days in which it tore itself asunder. Perhaps she was even judging it a little. Whatever it was, she wouldn't come out and say, though. Instead she just huffed, re-bound her hair in a ponytail whose end was left stuck in the elastic, thus keeping her heavy black hair off her neck and shoulders entirely, and killed her glass of water before continuing to work on the garden.
When (if) Tamsin comes back out, Lola is standing with her back to the house, fists on her hips, looking at the churned up squares of dirt and gauging how many posts she would need for a fence, based on how far apart she would want them to be.
If (when) Tamsin comes back out, Lola hears the door and says over her shoulder without moving her eyes to follow her words.
"Look, if that subject's not one that you can talk about, that's just fine Tamsin. We can find somethin' else to discuss. Like the Spire Sept and Beloved Horror and Times Gone By and Hector's Well-being and How's Nora and Family Doing. Ya just have to say so is all, don't go hiding away 'cause you can't talk about something yet."
Tamsin Hall
When the Fianna-girl returns, after quite some time -- a good ten minutes, she is calm again.
Look, if that subject's not one that you can talk about, and she interrupts: "I can discuss it. But not without fury when I hear Corey's acting like he's still got rights over whether or not he gets to return."
That sentence is spoken as flat as river-silt, flat as that place by the shore where the water rushes over and makes everything silver and dangerous and sinking and without tone and dangerous glimmers of light. Her voice picks up to more natural cadences after, no longer flat but full the way a voice should be.
"I could've discussed it earlier-- why didn't you come to me with your concerns about Hector? Why'd you need to fly to the guy who chose not to be involved any longer? The guy who isn't born to be a storyteller and witness and keep the histories, huh?
"A phonecall and I would've been here."
"I wish I did know how to help Hector stop blaming himself for the way everybody went after, and during. His guilt makes him think things that aren't true are true, same with Corey probably. Hector gives himself credit for all the bad shit, and nothing good- but he just goes all hyperactive and waxing moon on you so it's always underneath. What do you do with that?"
The question could be rhetorical like the others (hurt) seemed to be-
But then she says, just to make it clear that it's not,
"You got any ideas?"
Lola Hawkes
"I know you could'a told me. But I wasn't seeking the story of Where Was Hector During the Gathering."
Tamsin's tone of voice was flat at first, but found normal cadence soon enough. However, the sting of hurt clung to her words despite how she tried to make them sound. It was clear in the content of what she said as well as her face. Lola was decent at reading people, so she understood that. It wasn't understanding that was Lola's weak point, it was empathizing and communicating back that always tripped her up.
But she's got good intentions, and she's honest, so that tends to help keep Lola from looking like too much of a dick all of the time.
"I went to Corey because of a talk Hector and I had. He sounded like what was bothering him wasn't just what happened with the Pack, or not even dominantly that. It sounded like, at that point at least, he was really torn up over what happened between him 'n Corey. But he wouldn't talk about it, and I wanted to hear from the horse's mouth what it was all about, why he left the way he did. I knew I couldn't talk to Hector about it 'cause of how he gets, and, no offense Tamsin, but I figured your view on the whole ordeal would be a bit skewed. Rightfully so, don't get me wrong, 'cause he did just up and leave your asses.
"I thought talkin' to Corey would help understand what happened better, and with that understanding I could help Hector."
Tamsin doesn't know how to help Hector either, and asked if Lola had any ideas. The Kinswoman answered by shrugging and looking down to pluck bits of prickly weed and clumped dirt from her gloves. "I wasn't so sure myself when I got back. I was really pissed off, finding out that Hector vanished and missed the Gathering. I approached the subject with him too harshly. We got into a fight and stormed away from each other. Then another big fuckin' rainstorm hit-- this was last Sunday, remember that storm? Yeah, it catches me while I'm still out walking it off and causes a mudslide, and I get my ass stranded on a rock. Hector has to come get me.
"Apparently natural disasters put an end to feuds faster than anything else. After that he seems to have been a lot more... chipper, I guess? He seems better these days."
Tamsin Hall
No offense, Tamsin, causes the wolf-girl's eyes to narrow again, runs up her spine like a razor blade's edge, or the edge of a page from a book drawing out one of those stinging but bloodless paper-cuts, edge is the word, that's all. Lola's got good intentions and she's honest; Tamsin can be petty and hold a grudge, but she doesn't often choose to. What would Gandalf do? What did grudges bring Boromir? What of the dwarves and the elves? What of the Steward of Gondor? And she knows Lola, and how Lola communicates, or tries to. So: her eyes narrow, and there's that edge turned-outward, simmering well, but it doesn't lash out. Tamsin listens grimly, snorts faintly at rightfully so, and then listens with curiousity as Lola explains why she went off to talk to Corey, what happened in the river-flash of a flood, and she's frowning easily at apparently natural disasters put an end, "That … Hector," she says. "If he doesn't start fucking mentioning that shit over the Totem, I'm going to hold him down and cut off all his hair."
Her arms unfold, thumbs hooking on her jean pockets, and she says, "Maybe he just needed to fight with somebody about it. He's getting really into being pack leader finally. It's strange," a pause, and a downward slant of that frown, her considering gaze on the garden-to-be. It's not Hector being enthusiastic about being pack leader that's strange, it's - "Celduin, looking to stay in one place for," skip-voice, quiet, the second half of that word is 'ever,' but forever isn't real, "a long time, instead of wandering along a route."
Lola Hawkes
There's a moment where this, too, may turn into a fight.
It manifests in Tamsin's simmering Rage and insult bubbling up to the surface. Reflex and impulse told her to be defensive, to take offense when Lola told her not to, because if Lola felt like she had to preface her statement with 'no offense', then certainly there was something there to be bothered by. Tamsin could have lashed out, unleashed the well and any other words that might've flowed from behind it.
But she knows Lola better than that. She's known this Kinswoman since she was still a Kin-teen. She knew that Lola was rough around the edges and bad at communicating gently. She also knew that Lola, for all her tough exterior and sharp-toothed battlelust, had good intentions in her heart at damn near all times. She knows that, if nothing more, she can rely on Lola to not tell her lies or mislead her. Knowledge of that fact, and a deep breath, helped Tamsin to keep her cool and be receptive instead.
The Fiana unfolded her arms, loosened her posture, and Lola relaxed in return. The weight she stood upon shifted to carry differently between her hips and feet how she was standing. Those gloves were tugged back securely on, as she was finished plucking at them and cleaning them of debris. Her hands found her waist and rested there, elbows out, posture loose but ready to resume work.
"He needs a hole to be made in his walls before he can finish crumbling down," Lola confirmed, agreeing with Tamsin's observation that he just needed to fight with somebody.
And... "Yeah, I noticed that too. Took the reigns on a patrol he and I and that Thomas Shadow Lord kid were out on. Had authority in his words and shoulders that he didn't used to. I didn't stop to question him 'till after the fight was finished, and I realized there wasn't a lot to question then either."
And, on the last comment she made, about Celduin settling in, Lola switched her eyes to Tamsin's profile and observed the younger woman's face while she, in turn, stared out at the garden-to-be. Something softens on Lola's face, raw and sympathetic, a sensation that she wouldn't know how to properly articulate on the spot. So, instead of trying to explain why it was okay that Celduin was settling down, how change was a part of nature and how packs really should keep a territory anyways, Lola walked to join the Fianna's side more closely and threw an arm around her shoulders, clapping the shoulder opposite her with one glove-covered hand.
"I never got the wanderlust myself-- Maria took all of it. But if you are all settling, even if just for 'a time', I'm glad it's here."
Here with me.
"....We got another square to finish, then I say we call it a day and get stoned and eat sandwiches."
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