Calden White
It's the second-to-last day of the 108th
annual National Western Stock Show, one of the largest and
longest-running livestock shows on the planet. By now most of the stock
has already been shown. The auctions have been held, the sales
finalized and finished. What remains on these final two days are the
crowd-pleasing events, the ones designed for families and tourists and
kids: the stock dog competitions, the magic shows, the miniature
Hereford exhibitions, and of course: the rodeos.
That's where
Saturday, 3pm finds Calden: at the stock show's Coliseum, where a
rapidly growing crowd's noise rings off the rafters. It's a shockingly
warm day for mid-winter, though rainy and wet outside, but the indoor
stadium is brightly lit by dozens of overhead floodlights. Hawkers are
roaming the stands with corndogs and bottles of coke. Kids are running
up and down the bleachers, riding their parents' shoulders, waving
colorful little flags and pennants.
For his part, Calden is exiting the backstage area, calling a good luck!
over his shoulder. The lack of a number tacked to the back of his vest
excludes him from the ranks of the rodeo cowboys, but someone he knows
must be in the competition. He fits his stetson back on his head,
looking about to get his bearings -- and then he starts up into the
stands, taking the steps two at a time.
Lola Hawkes
Sitting
up in the stands is Lola Hawkes. She was never involved in the rodeos
herself, despite having grown up in rural Colorado. She existed in a
culture where animals were supposed to come to be spooked by her after
she passed a particular point in a young werewolf's pubescence. While
many of her classmates participated in rodeo events, Lola herself did
not.
Calden had discovered her at the goats and sheep exhibit. She
was dressed for the warmer weather in a wool poncho with traditional
southwestern colors and patterns on it, a fitted white T-shirt
underneath, and a pair of blue jeans tucked into ankle-height boots.
She was wearing a wide-brimmed brown hat on her head to keep the rain at
bay, hair in a ponytail at the nape of her neck. She was there by
herself, Hector was off doing other things tonight.
He caught her
attention somehow, perhaps by approaching, and Lola wound up keeping
along with him for the rest of the day. He'd asked if she'd eaten, and
she'd said she was about to find food, so they went together.
Want to go to the rodeo?
Sure.
So,
she now sat in the stands with her hat hung down at the back of her
shoulders, dripping rainwater near the feet of the people behind her.
She was taking a sip from her bottle of water when Calden reached her.
It was offered to him after he'd sat down.
"Your friend's up next?," she'd asked.
Calden White
Tonight's
rodeo is the biggest of the entire two-week stretch. Broncs and mutton
and even that bastardized and bloodless and barrel-filled version of
bullfighting the rodeos call freestyle. The stands are going to
be packed to the rafters for that one. This one, the 3:30pm show, is
comparatively less crowded. Twenty minutes before showtime, there are
still plenty of empty seats.
Calden stops on the way up to buy a
couple bottles of coke, plus a handful of corndogs. Making his way back
to Lola, who one supposes is either his friend or his acquaintance or
at least sort of a colleague in the whole ranches-and-farms business, he
hands her one of the drinks and a couple of the 'dogs.
"Thanks,
I'm good," he says in response to her offer of water. "Nah, I think
he's going to be up a little later, with the rest of the steer
wrestlers. My cousin Jimmy, actually. Works on the ranch with me.
Just look for Number 63 in a blue shirt.
"What about you? You know anyone in the show?"
Lola Hawkes
Truthfully,
whether Calden realized it or not, more people were looking at them and
assuming they were some kind of couple. After all, what they were
seeing was a handsome man somewhere in the ballpark of his thirties
walking to sit beside a woman who was undeniably pregnant-- not very far
along, only twenty weeks or so, but visbly apparant none the less,
bringing food and drink to share. Lola could pick up on this from a
woman in her sixties two rows back smiling down at them. She ignored it
in favor of soda and corndogs, though.
"No, I don't. I was just
here checking out the livestock. I have half a mind to get a goat, for
the milk, but I wouldn't stake shit on the poor dumb thing surviving
past four moons before some idiot kills and eats it." These were the
hazards of living so close to the Bawn. Lola had to worry about some
Garou coming and killing any livestock she had on her land while still
riding the high from the Revel.
"I just thought I'd tag along.
Haven't seen ya in a while-- not since I found ya at that Silver Fang
lady's house." Calden's a perceptive man. Even though the woman on the
bench to his left was looking down at the corndogs in her hand and
distractedly situating where the coke and water bottle were sitting,
there was a weight to her last sentence that would probably prickle the
hairs on his skin.
"Thought we could catch up." Following the first bite of her corndog, she added: "Thanks for the corndogs."
Calden White
"Even up north, I can't say I haven't lost a steer or two to one of the ... Cousins."
Calden says this with a blend of resignation and amusement. "My tribe
knows me, and they know they'll find a warm welcome, a meal and a bed
at my house if they need it. Sometimes I guess they can't make it as
far as the house before they decide they have to eat. Usually the next
morning there'd be a bottle of scotch on my doorstep with a sadface
smiley on a note or something, though."
Silver Fang lady's house.
A new weight in Lola's tone, and a certain shifting of the mood.
Calden, who has until now been watching the happenings down-below with
idle interest, glances sideways at his companion.
"Avery," he supplies the name. Maybe there's just a hint of returned weight there too: that Silver Fang lady
had, after all, introduced herself. Still; he's willing to let the
matter slide and rest. As for the corndogs, "No problem. What's a
rodeo without junk food."
Lola Hawkes
What's a
rodeo without junk food? he asked. Lola took another bite of corndog,
chewed and swallowed before answering: "Just a fucking spectacle."
Under
the poncho, the long sleeves of Lola's tee shirt were pushed up to the
elbow. The poncho edge rubbed her forearm a little when she reached or
moved her arm. While Calden had corrected her with inflection she
didn't miss, Lola cast her dark brown eyes his way, but didn't snap at
him or throw shade along with her gaze.
"Yeah, Avery," she'd
simply agreed. "You know, she sent me a fuckin' apology package with
all these treats in it? Like, apologizing for correcting my tone."
Something about the way she told the two sentence anecdote made it seem
as though she'd almost forgotten that it happened in the first place.
Frankly, between the first few weeks of December and now, a lot had
happened to push that particular memory to the back of her mind.
Lola
picked up the soda cup and took a drink, then finally settled back with
the heel of her hand on the back edge of the bench. She leaned her
weight through her arm and cast her eyes down on the rodeo ring, waiting
for the next event to begin.
"Look, man, I don't wanna rain on your parade or nothing...."
It
was probably the worst start to a sentence she could have chosen. It
was a guarantee that she was going to be doing exactly that.
"...But you two ain't being fucking subtle or anything. And you know it's gonna cause contention."
Eva Illeshazy
Down
in front, near the barricades surrounding the ring, a dark haired woman
leans forward, her elbows resting on the metal fencing. Unlike most of
the fans in the colliseum, she is not dressed casually. She does not
wear boots, let alone cowboy boots, nor does she sport any sort of
chapeau. Glossy black hair is pulled back from her features and twisted
into a loose chignon - which is distinctly formal for the venue and
distinctly casual for the woman - and a dark, tailored suit jacket is
stretched across her shoulders.
She is in close conversion with a
dark-haired man, who seems rather intent on the stock at just that that
moment. Who gestures voluobly in the direction of the chute. He is
dressed rather more appropriately for the venue and - yet - somehow he
does not quite fit.
There is no reason for Lola or Calden to mark
the pair of strangers in the crowd, except when the woman turns her
head to the side and she is visible in profile, her winged brows lifting
in the sketch of an inquiry that drifts past his shoulders, up the
metal steps, past the marching rows of folding seats toward the boxes
high above. She's taking in the crowd too, a glancing survey that rises
past Lola and Calden without fully registering them. Something,
though, pings her radar because her eyes drift back down, searching.
If she catches Calden's eyes, she offers an ironic curl of a half-smile and a tip of her head.
--
Soon
enough the stranger at her side turns away from the stock, and the pair
of them are climbing the steps from ground level, a path that will take
them right past Calden and Lola.
Calden White
Ah.
So the topic of Avery was not to be left undisturbed after all.
Though Lola fixes her eyes on the rodeo ring, Calden is now looking
rather directly at her. She doesn't want to rain on his parade. He
laughs a little at that, dryly, because: yes. It's about as auspicious a
start to a sentence as no offense, but...
A moment later
he follows her eyes down the ring after all. The dirt has been raked
flat. The first contestant is already behind the gate, checking the
tack on his horse one more time. The overhead loudspeakers pop loudly
enough to make the kids in the crowd flinch. Then, pretty much without
warning, they start blasting good old American rock 'n roll.
They're
amping the crowd up. They're turning the excitement up to eleven, and
in response a cheer goes up from the stands. Whistles, applause,
stomping feet.
Amidst the controlled chaos, Calden is a focal
point of calm. He takes a bite of his corndog, mullingly, and then
turns back to Lola. "I won't say the possibility of controversy never
crossed my mind," he says. "My family's been with Stag longer than we
can remember, and Avery is a pureborn Silver Fang.
But I suppose I've
just decided to cross the bridges as they come. And so far, you're the
only one who's raised the issue -- at least to me.
"Which leads me to ask: are you going to be the source of contention, Lola?"
--
A
beat of a held gaze. Then he looks down the stands again, and here is
where he catches sight of Eva Illeshazy, who -- in her suit jacket, in
her lack of flannel and denim and chapeau -- is as singular a figure as can be.
His
smile back is perhaps a touch strained. But wry. And as Eva and her
companion start climbing the stands, Calden tips his hat back on his
brow and straightens a little in his seat.
"Have you met Eva Illeshazy?" he asks Lola.
Lola Hawkes
She
flinched along with children when the loud music started, and scowled
at the fact that it had started her heart to thump too hard in her chest
once or twice. The baby flip-twisted at the loud sound as well, and
Lola tucked an arm under her poncho to push at her stomach with the heel
of her hand a little. Through the noise, Calden turned to fix a stare
on her and explained that they would cross the bridge when they got
there.
The question that followed had Lola's brow flexing into a
frown in the Fianna Kinfolk's direction. He held her gaze, and
naturally the Kinfolk refused to be the first to blink. When he looked
down again, Lola kept her eyes on the side of his head, at cheekbone and
ear, and wrinkled her nose a little before answering. "If I were
Trueborn, I would be. Given that this ain't the case, no one will hear
me if I yell about it anyways."
There's bitterness there to her
words, but Calden will get the feeling that she's still trying to find a
way to not let that stop her anyways. He may need to worry about her.
But
then, there's a well-dressed Shadow Lord Kinfolk that both of them
recognized, walking up the stairs with a man dressed the part but not
rough enough looking to really fit the scene. Lola looked at the both
of them, then nodded to Calden's question. "Yeah, a couple times."
She'd raise a hand to hail a greeting to Eva, but didn't say anything to verbally greet.
Eva Illeshazy
It isn't that her companion is not rough looking. He is
rough looking. He's just not cowboy-rough. Not range-rough: no, her
companion's roughness has an entirely different sort of cast. A
dark-haired main with a blunt and mildly pockmarked face. Round but not
childish, with a pair of heavy dark eyes and the sort of mouth a
certain kind of author might call sensual, while another would
characterize as cruel.
He is turning to say something over his
shoulder to Éva when his phone rings, and he starts to pat down his
pockets seeking it out. A blackberry comes out of his right breast
pocket, old school shit, complete with its full qwerty keyboard and his
pressing to answer it with a blunt thumb, shrugging his way into an
explanation or apology. Éva settles a hand on the small of his back to
catch his attention before he barrels off up the steps, and indicates -
quietly and non-verbally beneath the blasting of Kid Rock to be followed
by Skynyrd, no doubt, because what is a rodea without Free Bird - that
he should go.
That she will catch up.
And off he goes,
seeking some relief from the thunderous music, the roar of the crowd
higher up. She follows at a more leisurely pace, crisp in a pencil
skirt and black suede pumps, pausing at their level, stepping into the
aisle from the stairs so as not to block traffic.
"Calden." A
sketch of her dark eyes over the tension evident in his shoulders.
Perhaps even in the set of his mouth. "Ms. Hawkes."
Calden White
"She's
kin to the Shadow Lords," Calden says. Just a hint of an edge there --
as though in a more immature moment he might challenge Lola to complain
about his choice of friends as well.
Then Eva is there, and Eva's
somewhat disreputable looking friend is seeking a stronger cell signal
and a refuge from Kid Rock, and Calden rises to his feet in the presence
of A Lady, or perhaps just to let the lady slip in past his knees to
take a seat.
"Eva," he returns, some of that tension ebbing into
warm humor, "fancy seeing you here. I can't even begin to make sense of
your presence. Or, for that matter, why you're dressed for court."
Lola Hawkes
"I
know what tribe she is," she shot back at Calden, and the unspoken
curse words that she nearly flavored that statement with were caught at
the back of her teeth. She sounds impatient, and looks it too, but then
the Fianna was standing to greet the business woman, and the Shadow
Lord was greeting the both of them.
Lola nodded her head to Eva to
return the greeting. "Eva." A name, simple and plain, to match the
'Ms. Hawkes' she'd been met with. Lola hasn't once tried to pronounce
the Shadow Lord's surname, and had no plans in trying. She was
fortunate that Hector's father had a short and simple last name, she
would've had a very difficult time learning to say 'Bhattacharyya'.
Whatever
tension there was that was fizzling in and out between her and Calden
was left to the side for now. She let herself slide back into quiet to
let the other two catch up.
Eva Illeshazy
She
does slip past his knees to take a seat, turning as she does to drop the
leather attaché case she is carrying on her right shoulder to the
rather sticky aluminum beneath their collective feet. It has already
accumulated a skin if discarded peanut shells and spilled co-cola, which
will only worsen as the night lengthens.
"Don't try." Éva
counsels Calden, when he remarks that he cannot begin to make sense of
her presence or her wardrobe. There is still that ironic twist to her
mouth as she lowers herself to the molded plastic seat beside the pair.
Conveniently empty still, even as the crowd of spectators begins to
thicken. "I'm on the clock, though. And when I'm on the clock I try to
dress the part."
A lingering glance from Calden to Lola, and
back again, before she drops her gaze to the rodeo ring. "Do you both
have - " a mild gesture down toward the groomed floor, which is rather
charming in its helpless wordlessness. " - animals entered?"
Calden White
"Yeah,"
Calden quips, "I've got Ian in the running." And -- at her likely
blank look -- "Remember that Fianna shindig last year? He was the one
with the white hat. And the really over the top Western get-up."
Because
of course he was. Why else would he be hurtling himself off horses
onto steers? Though, coming from Calden -- in boots and hat, jeans and
vest -- the gentle ribbing of his cousin's over the top get-up hits just
the slightest note of irony.
"What about you? Your client a fan of rodeos?"
Lola Hawkes
When asked if she had any animals entered, Lola shook her head and stated, simply: "I don't keep livestock."
Though
the man that Eva was with didn't seem to fit in the crowd, Lola wasn't
concerned with where he had gone or why he had brought the Shadow Lord
Kinfolk here on work. That was their business, as far as she was
concerned. Provided no monsters tried to make their way out onto the
rodeo arena, Lola probably wouldn't be getting up out of her seat for
the next little while.
Calden had mentioned that Ian was entered,
and Lola smirked a little to herself but didn't say anything. She
remembered Ian from the night spent out at the White ranch. She liked
the guy.
The Fianna was a better mouthpiece than she was, so Lola
contented herself with finishing the corndog she'd begun eating and
shifting her eyes back out to the arena to watch the show. Her ear was
keened in on the other two Kinfolk, though.
Eva Illeshazy
Ian in the running
does indeed draw a blank look, and the lilt of a mildly arching brow.
Éva's gaze skews sideways to double-check the Calden's eyes for a glint
of humor to suggest that he is having her on, but no. The guy in the
over-the-top Western get-up.
"Ahh," recognition sparked with
bemusement. Naturally, she remembers him. Naturally, her dark eyes
touch with delicate precision on Calden's stetson and Calden's boots.
Again, the edge of her mouth is curved with a quietly supple humor. "He
was dressed quite stylishly over Labor Day, as I recall.
"And my
client," a brief glance back over her shoulder, and up the long flight
of stairs climbing toward the skyboxes. "finds himself quite enamored
of the Western lifestyle. I suppose he is the living embodiment of the
cliché when in Rome."
Eva Illeshazy
Then, to Lola, " - no livestock? I thought you owned a ranch?"
Calden White
"Well, he's dressed stylishly today too," Calden replies -- equal measures affection and wryness.
His
gaze skates up the long incline to the skyboxes again, then back. "Not
a local, then?" Humor downright twinkles in his eyes. "I would have
never guessed. And -- though I suspect you're going to tell me it's
attorney-client privileged and also none of my damn business -- I
just have to ask you what that guy did. Because right now, my
imagination is filling in the blanks with concrete shoes and
paper-wrapped fish arriving by bike courier."
Eva asks Lola about
her agricultural practices, then, and Calden takes the momentary lull on
his end of the conversation to take a big bite of his corndog. And
also, just maybe, to stew a little more on the previous topic.
Lola Hawkes
On
the surface, Lola appears to have let the topic that she and Calden
were butting heads at go. It wasn't appropriate for company, and she
wasn't going to shame herself or her friend (and yes, she would call him
that, rough and prickly though her relationship with and behavior
toward him may be). Of course, in her mind she was probably still
ruminating on it a little-- keeping her temper consciously low and
plotting her next manner of approach.
Eva inquired about the land
she owned, and Lola looked up at her and blinked, then shook her head.
More rainwater that was caught in the brim of her hat splashed on the
floors behind her. As far as she figured, she was doing the sticky
surface a favor.
"No. If I tried to keep animals the poor dumb
things would probably die within a year. I live too close to the
mountains, if you know what I mean." Her home was right along the edge
of the Bawn, and some of the property in her name crossed into it as
well. She's never tried to keep animals before out of a sense of
practicality and frugality alike. She glanced up at Eva and Calden both
to speak, but now cast her eyes down to the arena once more.
She then added:
"I've been entertaining the idea of owning a goat, though. For the milk."
Eva Illeshazy
"Technically,"
Éva returns with a quiet equanimity that sparks a certain grim humor in
her eyes. "I am representing his son. And it is a matter of public
record that Raul has been charged by the United States Attorney with
racketeering and felony murder. Since you could easily read that in the
paper, I'm comfortable in asserting that naming the actual charges is
not covered by attorney-client privilege.
"Everything else, though."
--
Then
Lola explains that she doesn't keep animals. Éva lifts her brows in a
show of reciprocation: yes, she's listening. She understands, the
non-verbal response, though in truth Lola's unspoken, half-spoken
considerations about the dangers of having livestock near the Caern
would not have occurred to Éva, and even beneath the supple thread of
kin-code, she does not precisely grasp the nature of Lola's concern.
Just makes an interested noise, a sort of polite placeholder, which is
repeated when Lola remarks that she is thinking about getting a goat.
For the milk.
This time, though. "Ahh."
Éva has never considered getting a goat. For any reason.
And
she might go on making small talk about goats, except - there is Calden
biting his corndog like that and Lola beside them and the strange,
unstudied tension she sensed earlier, from down below.
"Excuse me
- " she says then, quite frankly and quietly to the both of them. " -
did I interrupt something? If I did, I'm happy to leave to you it and
kill time by picking out a few souvenirs for the children," which is
followed by a brief aside to Calden, "Ellie wanted to come but I'd
rather men like that not know that I have family."
Calden White
There
is, indeed, a certain tension beneath the surface. It puts a touch of
restlessness into Calden: one knee bouncing up and down as he gnaws on
his corndog, scans the dirt arena below for some sign of the show's
start. He's even forgotten to offer one of the corndogs -- there are
two or three more -- to Eva, even after she's taken a seat beside them.
To
the goats, which is surely a topic he has more expertise in than either
of his companions, he has only a single comment: "They're pretty easy
to keep. They can be hard to milk, though. Testy."
And then a
sort of appraising glance up the stairs at Eva's client as she reveals
-- to the limits of privilege, anyway -- the nature of her business with
the man and his son, and his laundry list of sins.
"I don't blame
you." Less distracted, that. He does understand that, and better than
most. The loyalty to one's family. The desire to protect. The
protection of anonymity. All that. "Maybe you could bring her
tomorrow. They've got magic shows and another rodeo planned."
A
beat, then. A hesitation, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he
squints in thought. Then a quick shake of his rather shaggy head --
beard-bristle untrimmed today, thick auburnish hair getting to the point
of desperately-in-need-of-a-haircut. A decision in the form of
information:
"You didn't interrupt. Lola was just ... reminding
me that certain less liberal factions might find my association with
Miss Chase objectionable."
Lola Hawkes
The
question posed about interrupting was left fielded to Calden. Lola
didn't answer, but she did look sharply up at Eva first, then to the
Fianna kinsman that she had spent the afternoon tagging around with.
Instead of speaking, she picked up her cup and took a drink of the Coke.
When
Calden decided to state openly enough what he and Lola were being
prickly at one another about, the Kinswoman's dark eyebrows rose in mild
surprise and consideration. She huffed a little and leaned back so she
could openly, unabashedly adjust the waistband of her jeans where it
was sitting low on her stomach.
"Just lookin' out," she followed up, as though she had to defend herself.
Eva Illeshazy
"She
might have more fun with you," Éva remarks, quietly, back to Calden.
"If you're headed back this way. You might actually have more fun with
her, too."
A brief glance at Lola; it is not precisely
conspiratorial, though were they better acquainted it could be read as
such. There is humor beneath it, but that humor is banked and supple
and difficult to read in the quiet reflection of her dark eyes. Unless
one knows her well enough to have read it there before. "I like to lend
my children out now and then, to friends. All the pleasures, none of
the responsibilities.
"Calden if you ever have a hankering to see a Disney film in the theaters - "
Then,
Calden explains precisely the current of tension between the two of
them that Éva sensed beneath the surface. Tasted like the metallic hum
of a still-live nine-volt battery against the tongue.
And Lola says she was just lookin' out.
Éva
arches a brow, glancing back to Lola from Calden as she inhales, low
and quiet. "Just looking out? Or perhaps expressing some more personal
concerns?"
A glance back at Calden's rugged profile, a moment of
silent consideration. Beneath the road of the sound system, the blare
of some bizarre country rap-rock song, they have plenty of privacy for
their conversation, and Éva's voice is pitched to carry just to the pair
of them.
"Ellie's father was not my blood. I don't regret her for a minute."
Lola Hawkes
"Ya
don't regret 'em after they happen," Lola explained to Eva curtly. Her
nose had wrinkled, and her expression had gone quite sour. The
remaining two corndogs that were in the little paper basket were
abandoned on the bench when Lola stood up. The soda was left behind
too. The Uktena mountain woman did pick up her bottle of water as she
rose, though, and fixed a look onto the older woman that was flavored
with stubborn resolve and only a hint of offense taken, however
unjustified it probably was.
"But this ain't a people of much
forgiveness. And we stick to the laws that we have. It's stirrin' up
trouble, and that's gonna come right down on Tamsin's head for not
looking out for you." Some point in the brutishly borderline-forceful
manner of speaking, Lola had switched from directing her words at Eva to
looking straight at Calden, as though she had every reason to be upset
with him.
Even though it really was none of her god damned business.
"Excuse me," she said curtly to the pair, and made her way to the aisle to see herself on out.
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