#Mahalo!Riggs <3< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[brooklynislandgirl]

[FMK: Reimagined.] Three people, but no names. Someone you've stolen for. Someone you've hurt to help. And someone you'd murder yourself before letting anyone else do it. //Tall dark stranger with a bone condition not matching her vodka shots but probably enabling them... they need to stop meeting like this.//

Three of a Kind || Accepting {{ tagging: @riggsanity & @mynameisanakin & @lokitheliesmith for reasonsTM }}

The question is almost too softly spoken, and if Beth were inclined, she could have pretended not to have heard it. She doesn't do that often but it is something she's employed to distance herself in the past. This is not the first time she has met her mysterious friend, and likely it will not be the last. But what memories does her friend dredge up? "One of the people I miss most, mostly due to being cross country from one another. We used to play all kinds of board and card games. The goal wasn't to win or lose, but to make the other person laugh an' we used to cheat each other elaborately. I really should write or call him sometime. Maybe even give back those little plastic hotels I still have in my undergarment drawer. Not to mention the fact that I've eaten more than half of the fries he ever ordered, even when he got enough to share. And the shirts I took. And the beers he smuggled out of my fridge that I took back late at night while we watched the tide roll back out under the moonlight." She would swear on this mounting bar tab that her Texas still has at least one of her deeds tucked in his boot or in those curls. She wonders where Martin is. If he's found himself like he needed to so that he wouldn't be swallowed up by his own grief. Some of the light that she'd always held onto had dimmed the day he'd left and she's all the poorer for it. "One I've hurt to help is my..." apprentice. The waif of a youth that turned up on her doorstep those few years ago, rattling bones and death in every wet, congested breath. All she has to do is close her eyes and those blue eyes, the golden waves cutting across his sharp bones, he is alive and thriving and smiling at her shyly. It had taken every ounce of her will power to eventually let him go so he could find his place amongst the Traditions. Where she champions Life, he is the other side of the coin and she couldn't teach him how to be a Thanatoic. "Friend. He's a recovering addict, and he was really sick when he sought my help. There were days where death might have been a mercy, and the curses that rolled off his tongue in that bayou accent of his...I can't even begin to repeat. But I know that transformation was emotionally, physically, an' spiritually excruciating." She's quiet for a time. Maybe this friend was only going to have two memories from her before they hit last call. Maybe because the third answer is the hardest. For so long it would have been so easy to contemplate patricide. That she'd be the recipient of the Admiral's last undeserved breath. But that would be breaking her own kapu imposed by Teanoi; take no pleasure in killing. and if Beth were being honest? It might be the happiest moment of her existence.

But that puts her in mind of the other road she doesn't ever stop to consider. She'd once used all of her considerable talents and power to make the arduous journey to xer not-quite-native homeland in search for a bloom that would ease xer misery. She'd done it for love. And perhaps this is why she'd been turned back by that realm's all-seeing Guardian. If she could not heal xer one way, then Beth could only offer the second, perhaps lesser choice.

What was it that was said? Only you could kill your God? "The third...they say...has an adder's tongue, quicksilver and honey in xer lies. They say...Xe is the source of primordial chaos. Nets and spiders and wyrding. But I see xem as... fire and family, of ephemera and stories. Xe is a harbinger of change, of transformation." Of love, hers being enduring, asking nothing of xer but to be. "If xe has to die? Wishes it after everything? Then I can only resign myself to being xer handmaiden in that, too."

[brooklynislandgirl]

Which member of your family (extended or blood) would win in each of the following games: scrabble. poker. putt putt golf. candy land.

Whispers || Always Accepting

Her face scrunches up a little, not because the question is confusing, but because it's competitive. That's one thing they all have in abundance and it shows when any games are played. For instance, she and Martin have turned Monopoly into a full contact sport. Riggs, ~the only time she uses his surname~, tends to hoard houses and hotels in his pockets, his boots, under the questionable cushions of his trailer... and Beth has been known to hide utilities and properties inside of her clothes. More than once there's been a stray bruise or bite marks after a game is abandoned. And to this day, she still has no idea the little pewter canon ever ended up.

"I'm'a hafta say... Andy win at Scrabble. I don' know if ya evah notice but even if he curse like a sailor, man's got an incredible vocabulary an' ya know. He da best at spelling. Also, he no let me use Hawai'ian words on da board."

One down. "Poker...if you nevah count me? Dat gonna be eiddah Gamble or Billy. I mean wi' Brian...it right dere, in his last name, right? An' Billy...he's almost good at math as me, only he a little faster. 'Course, it also depend on which kine of poker an' how much drinkin' was an' is bein' done. Also gonna say it...I t'ink Tabby palms chips sometimes. Playin' kind, not eatin' ones." Two down, and so many people thrown under the bus. "Put-Put is gonna go to Jay. She got a real good eye an' a pretty steady back-swing. I dunno if it counts, howevah, cause usually somewhere 'round da six hole? Someone goddah separate her an' Andy before da clubs get use as weapons." Gospel truth, which is really how Andy bruised his ribs that One Time, and why they got kicked out of the arcade at Coney Island.

"An'...uhm... what is Candy land?"

[brooklynislandgirl]

That horse is looking kind of tired. How about you give it a rest and ride a cowboy instead?

Smoke on the Sinday || Accepting

“Well, le’ me jus’ ge’ my spurs, den, eh?” The joke is off colour, something she’s not used to, especially with her brother standing. Right. Behind. Her. And the way his hand tightens on her hip as a warning makes it so much funnier as she glances across the sea of cops to focus in on Martin. “Hope ya know how I prefer bareback.”

[brooklynislandgirl]

Hawai'i & Texas: ❤ who is more affectionate in public? in private?

Heart Eyes || Accepting

❤ who is more affectionate in public? in private?

“We’re the same,” she says and means it.There’s not really a line that clearly demarcates who’s more affectionate. Martin’s carried her on his back, arms wrapped around her legs. They regularly steal each other’s food to the point that they’re sometimes asked if they need separate plates to mix and match. They hold hands. She’ll try to capture his curls in an elastic band. He’ll wipe a smudge off her face or at least point at it from across the room, with ever increasingly loud gestures.

In private they’re as prone to sitting closer still, sometimes half on the other. She marks small circles against his back. He traces aimless doodles on her leg. There was that ONE TIME Riley almost murdered Riggs for retrieving a monopoly hotel right out of her admittedly shallow cleavage.

The three AM phone calls, the air mattress {again, Riley’s not happy about}}, the long drives in Martin’s pick-up, the how-deep-can-you-dive in the ocean moments.The pair of them are in their own little bubble, most of the time.

[brooklynislandgirl]

💭 having a nightmare

Travails || Accepting

It starts with her toes, then creeps inch by inch up her legs through if she could ever remember the sensations she’d swear it was slower in her damaged leg. Then across her belly. Up to her chest where it sits like a mountain, a weight impossible to move. Chains her arms down so they can’t reach out in the dark. Then her throat so that she can’t even scream even though by the time it gets to her eyes they are locked open and leak tears through her hair and onto the pillow.

But herald to the paralysis is the same dream she’s had when she can’t keep herself awake any more and falls asleep.

Nebulous shadows leak into her room. This time it’s under the door and around the windows of Martin’s trailer. Liquid and mercurial it flows over the floor where she takes up the smallest portion of the air-mattress. Begins to rise up into a vaguely human-shaped void of darkness that radiates a chill aura of breath-stealing malice. It is the absence of everything. Sanity. Courage. Her heart’s ability to beat.

She tries to reach for some source of light. A lamp. His mag-light. A lighter for goodness sake, there’s got to be one around. Light can hold it back.  Second only to her brother, whom this intangible Nether cannot stand to be around. She tries to scoot as far from it as she can without waking Martin because she doesn’t want him to think she’s crazy. She doesn’t want to know what the amorphous Darkness would do if she did manage to wake him.

“Please, please, please.” It’s chanted like a mantra, over and over the closer it comes and begins to cling to stick to her skin. Penetrates its morbid chill into her muscles, her bones. As it reminds her soundlessly, that once it reaches her head...

~*~

It starts with her toes. They twitch at first until her feet and legs get involved, thrashing. Hands flail wildly and at some point collide solidly with Martin’s shoulder. Viewed from the outside it looks and sounds a lot like a seizure, or the shakes that are very visual symptom of degenerative diseases like Parkinson’s. But Beth doesn’t have these things and it’s not too long until her body contorts in a terrible rigor. The soft gasping exhalations are cut off sharply and she barely looks able to breath.

[brooklynislandgirl]

He didn't make it back from Mexico.

Heading For a Heartbreak || Accepting

Seven words.Each of which she understood as separate, individual things. But put together within a framework of logic and emotion…seconds ticked by as she blinked once. Twice. Neither seeing her brother’s face nor actually listening to whatever it was that Detective Murtaugh was saying in the wake of that one sentence.

Seconds that become aeons. Aeons that become the vast coldness of the universe that drains the life right out of her as her heart sinks to the vicinity of the floor and every major organ in her body screams, but none so loudly as her mind.She doesn’t make a sound.Not at first, any way. But as soon as the first tears spill over the banks of her lower lashes there’s a sound not unlike that made by a wounded animal begging to be put out of it’s misery, and maybe…that’s exactly what she is.Because he could only be one person.Because he went to Mexico without telling anyone, not even her.

Andy’s arms are the only things that keep her upright. That keep her tethered to the shimmering world around her. And maybe for that split second, things were the way they used to be. Just him and her against the world, when she couldn’t imagine that anything could hurt her when he was holding the world at bay.But she also has to understand that…Andy failed her. He let her get close to Martin. Close enough that now…now she can’t…because he…and why…why did he… 

Pained whimpers become racking sobs, whatever her brother is saying not registering over the sound of her heart shattering into unfixable pieces. The look on Roger’s face nothing but blurred features as she squeezes her eyes shut. 

“What?” Andy’s voice feels hollow and coming from a long distance away.

She repeats herself, and still it makes no sense to them. She can’t let her lone star wink out of existence like this. Only one way to make it right.“I. Said. I WANT to see him. Bring me his body…or book me a fucking ticket.”

[brooklynislandgirl]

Fanatics threaten violence again employees of your bookstore because a book you carry offends them. Do you continue to sell the book?

Hard Questions || Accepting

“I mean,” she begins, weighing the options. There’s a small part of her that loathes the idea of giving control of her life and her say to anyone. To be told once more what is right and proper because she can’t possibly figure it out on her own. It just reminds her of her father entirely too much.

On the other hand, she can’t stand the idea of someone being hurt or bullied for her benefit. That her choices and her life would negatively impact someone else’s simply because she’s stubborn and doesn’t want to budge. That reminds her too much of her brother.

“I t’ink I would...compromise. Mebbe take down da display, make sure dat it’s not visible onna shelfs. Mebbe cover books in brown paper, keep ‘em hidden behind da counter or down in da cellar. Mebbe even go so far as t’ have some kine ‘Speak-Easy’ affair...where ya can come in aftah hours, an’ wi’ da right password ya can browse a whole bunch of different an’ controversial books.”

She twists her lips to the side. “Of course, I hope dat wi’ da amount of police in my life....You, an’ Brian, an’ Andy....an’ soldiers, dat I could get a restrainin’ order an’ mebbe some police presence until da kerfuffle die down an’ dese fanatics fine some oddah kine to occupy deir presence.”

[brooklynislandgirl]

✽

Paint Your Pictures || AcceptingHer Emotional Support Cowboy| Martin Riggs

“We’re just...”

Coworkers.  Occasionally Partners, when Murtaugh is not having any of this.      Confidants.        There for each other.             The other’s ICE.                Favourite hug.                    Fry-Thief.                     Two-AM phone call.“Friends.”

[brooklynislandgirl]

10. I've seen how you work, Hawaii. You learn, you adapt, you succeed. I don't have to see it or be on the receiving end to know getting on your bad side would be a terrible idea.

Shades of Lawlz || Accepting

The smile on her face freezes as he talks. And what she expected to be a joke hit some nerve, raw but unexposed, and the way she looks up at him, the way she shivers, it’s coming from somewhere outside that reserve of trust she’s always kept full between them. When she answers, her voice is small. It’s as fragile as her brother makes it out to be. And there’s a shade of honest fear that thickens her normal huskiness.“I’m...I’m not bad, Mar’in. I don’t...I wouldn’t... Not a bad person, ya b’lieve dat, right?”Right?

[brooklynislandgirl]

♦ : Slow dancing

Diotima || -

She doesn’t know where they are.

Only realises that the world has stopped and the solid warmth beside her is gone. The seat cover beneath her palm feels almost gritty, and the warp and weft of the weave leaves evidence of its existence behind as she pushes herself up, squinting and blinking out the windshield that is mostly dust right now. The truck door creaks a protest when she opens it, slides her legs out of it, and pours herself onto the blacktop. The asphalt hasn’t completely cooled from the day’s heat and almost feels good under her soles. Almost. She doesn’t really like man-made chemicals and petroleum products, and tar falls into that, hardened or not.She pads her way toward the little oases of light, past the other, empty pumps, onto the concrete. An ice machine gasps a lazy hum at intermittent moments. There’s an out of order sign on it. It gets overridden by the cowbell tinkle when she pushes the gas station door open and is hit full in the face with air-conditioned chill. All of her limbs recoil from the feel of sudden temperature change. It’s like falling into a pool on a summer day. Glassy eyes sweep right and left blinking and squinting at the too-bright fluorescent lighting.The attendant, a middle aged man who is tall and thin and balding, scraped together out of rawhide and banality barely gives her a look but enough of one that she is self-conscious and tries to shift the hoodie tied around her waist lower, to ride her hips and cover more of her leg.The bathroom makes her skin crawl. Not for any one particular reason but just the idea of it. Of sitting in the same place so many others must have come and gone and she doesn’t know anything about them. She yawns and tries to straddle the porcelain without actually touching it. Washes her hands three times. Thirty seconds each. As much soap as she could manage. Lots of friction.

She doesn’t find him when she wanders the aisles. Orange juice...made from concentrate but that’s the best she can hope for. Sweet tea for him, though he probably already raided everything he wanted. She trails her fingertips over the mints, ends up picking up a little tin. A few other things, some bottles of water for later. She pays for it all and takes the bag pushed over the counter. On a whim, she makes one more purchase. It’s a dollar lottery ticket where the silvery scratchy bit is in the shape of Texas, and you have to match the stars hidden under the surface. She has no intention of doing so, but it will go into a scrapbook. She almost gets carded for it.

Beth hasn’t been under eighteen in a long time.

When she goes back outside, Martin’s already at the truck. Washing the windshield. It’s a losing battle. He’s on his toes. The dusty, practically ancient boots, the pale grey jeans, the black shirt riding up a little and exposing a sliver of skin in the space between his belt and his lower ribs...make him look much more at home here than he ever did in LA. And maybe that was what the real definition of home was; the place where you look like you belonged, even if you haven’t been that person in years.

She walks around the front and dumps her treasures onto the seat, and sees that he’s got a couple bags too, just like she suspected. There’s enough processed meat snacks to embalm him in the style of the pharaohs. The radio is on and he’s picked a station on the AM band, because out here ~he told her so earlier ~ FM doesn’t work, and he’s never really bought into the whole Sirius thing.“Hey, Hawai’i. Thought the coyotes got ya.”She smiles, back to the truck bench, palms down fixing to hoist herself up. “Naw, jus’ ya know.”His grin is a little brighter than the lights inside. He flicks the wiper and it makes a wet splatter on the ground. He sets it on the hood and makes his way over, around her door, and settles his hands on her waist. Skin on skin. They’re a little worn and rough, the callouses and nicks from daily use. When they stop for the night, she’ll suffer his mocking expression and smooth them out a little so they don’t crack. Her belly tightens in anticipation of being lifted off her feet, because just now he’s not just a foot taller. He towers over her. Overhangs like tree branches because he leans in, a strange gleam in his eyes.“Man. I haven’t heard this song in ages.”...What? What so- oh. She tilts her head and listens for a minute. There’s a little twang but the song is soft. Doesn’t shove itself in her face, and suddenly he’s pulling her away from the truck. Fingers lacing at the small of her back. She’s quicker on the uptake than that drowsy look on her face might indicate otherwise.

“Oh yeah, naw. I don’ ...I don’ know how f’ dance like dis.”“And that’s the beauty of it. You don’t really need to. Watch.” He widens his boots to keep her feet between them, where he isn’t likely to step on her by accident. Pulls her closer still until her brow rests in the centre part of his chest. He doesn’t really move, and they’re not really dancing. It’s more just swaying in place. He rests his chin on the top of her head, and after a moment or two what she thought was maybe an echo in the chorus becomes clear. His voice..a little scratchy and not quite at the same pitch. But the words. She feels them rattle around inside of him.

“...Standin' in the rain so long has left me with a little rust, but put some faith in me...And someday you’ll see...there’s a diamond under all this dust. I ain't no angel, I still got a still few more dances with the devil…”It doesn’t take her but a minute to loosen inside his hold, and she lifts her arms up to circle around his shoulders. She can’t imagine another song that sounds more like him than this one. She feels her eyes sting and later will say it’s the dust even though the night breeze is soft. She turns her cheek and rests it against him, following along with his slow, circular shuffle. It isn’t really about dancing. Isn’t about the song or the stars over head, or what they’re leaving behind in California. It isn’t about the miles put on the road, or that El Paso is only a few hours away or that the sun would be coming up just as they hit the outskirts of town. She’s not sure what it is about, but they have plenty of time to figure it out.

They dance through three more songs.

{{Better than I Used To Be || Tim McGraw}}

[brooklynislandgirl]

64. The person you like kisses you on the forehead, do you find this cute?

Things You Shouldn’t Ask but Will Anyway || -

It’s one of those nights when they no there’s no work tomorrow and so they let themselves push the beer aside for his poison of choice...bourbon. Only fair, last time they’d done vodka at her insistence. It really takes so little to make the other one happy. Being one of those nights, actual strategy and tactics go right out the window and they’re each squaring off across from each other at the little table he euphemistically calls the ‘formal dining room’. She doesn’t mention it doubles as the kitchen counter, the guest bedroom, the laundry area, the walk in closet, the garage and utility shed. She’s kinder than that. Being they’re hip deep in fifths, they switch over to cards although there’s no real betting or points being scored.

In fact, she’s pretty sure there’s only one small set of rules. You draw a card, the suit dictating what kind of questions are asked, and they’re answered in complete honesty. The higher the value, the deeper the question. Hearts were an obvious conclusion, featuring romance and intimacy and relationships. Diamonds for work, for possessions, material things, favoured treasures and places. Things of the tangible world. Clubs are memories of the past or dreams of the future, which seemed fair. Spades were the darker things, things they both don’t really want to talk about, things that have left their mark. And of course, the jokers were wild, meaning it could be any question, at all, but always deeply personal, bordering on intrusive or offensive. They’re very careful about those. And they always argue about the value of Aces.

She draws the three of hearts. Martin is coy.

He uses the word like...but doesn’t give context or meaning. Whether it’s someone you have casual affection for, a close friend, a family member, or...that elusive other. He doesn’t give a name to offer her as much dignity as he can, and that’s sweet of him.

She tries to accept things gracefully but she still blushes like a teenager. Looks away for a minute, then picks up the card and taps it against her lips, once. Twice.

“I s’pose...depends on..lotta kine. Are we t’geddah? We jus’ friends? We in public? Somewhere else? Is jus’ one sweet ‘hey, I’m here’ peck or more ‘I t’ink of ya like one sistah or one pet?’ kine? Makes alla difference, ya know. But...wi’out goin’ in da specifics...guess...”

She shrugs. “Guess ino maddah. Any affection freely geev should be treat like gifts dey are, yeah?”

[brooklynislandgirl]

Do these jeans make my redneck noticeable?

Grab bag! || Accepting

“Oh, uhuh. I see wha’ ya wen do dere, Mar’in. Ya jus’ wan me go an’ check ya out an’ tell ya wha’ a good an’ handsome boy ya are, an’ dat ya got da biggest... redneck... I ever wen see. So c’mon...migh’ as well go all in. Dat’s it baby, do ya lil turn on da catwalk...”And of course she started humming Right Said Fred.

[brooklynislandgirl]

Did some modeling for easy cash to get to the west coast.

Tell Me A Secret || Accepting

Beth finds the note when she opens her locker. 

Just as she slips her lab coat onto the hook and starts to pull our her change of clothes ~she hates leaving the precinct smelling of death~ it falls to the floor. It’s a folded piece of printer paper, the words stark black on that just slightly off-white. It’s curious, this little sliver of information. She lifts it to her nose but all she smells is toner and wood pulp. No hint of cologne, no skin oils. No food stains or coffee.

She taps her lips with the folded edge and almost immediately a face comes to mind. A certain cut of jaw, despite the scar that mars it. The couple of beauty marks that dot the planes of his cheeks on either side, half hidden by scruff, half hidden by long curls that seem to have a mind of their own some days. She’s teased him before about it, that it might actually be an odd alien god creeping into the real world. The smile on his face that was rare when he laughed and told her she wasn’t wrong and now her choice was to be a disciple or a victim, and then he flicked her in the face with it. That lanky six feet of him. 

This would have all been before the moustache, which she admits she’s kind of got a thing for. Reminds her of that old show set in Hawai’i she loved so much growing up. It’s that deep drawl that pulls the corner of his mouth up just a little when he talks. But mostly, its his dark soulful eyes that if you get just close enough…are the exact opposite of hers. They’re this clear and gorgeous colour… a sepia wash or fresh brewed coffee but at the edges, creeping in, that same green of new leaves. Wet emeralds, maybe.

And it’s easy to imagine Martin twenty or so years younger. A leaner, maybe slightly less hale version of him. The one that doesn’t have the laugh lines, deepened by that sniper’s squint ~the one she sees in Gamble, the one she sees in Quinn~ that radiate outward. Without the worry on his brow or that unmistakable grief that weighs down on his shoulders sometimes when he thinks no one else is looking.

Martin was probably beautifully tragic then as he is now, only…

Only, she doesn’t really know. He doesn’t keep pictures, and he’s hesitant to really bring up old ghosts.

She reaches into the locker. Gets a pen from her purse…purple and glittery, her signature colour.

Scribbles something on the bottom, and folds the paper up in a different way. Let him have fun unfolding the little lotus shape come morning. Slips it through the open slat in his own locker.~*~

Going To California with an aching in my heartSomeone told me there’s a girl out thereWith love in her eyes and flowers in her hairTook my chances on a big jet planeNever let them tell you that they’re all the same

[brooklynislandgirl]

Two brown paper sacks placed next to the coffeemaker, bearing the iconic surfing pig of Kono's restaurant. Fresh ground coffee from the North Shore. Next to it, a mug with the same logo, declaring "No Coffee, No Workee". Inside the mug, a small Stitch stuffie sits, little blue arms positioned to extend up towards the receiver. Tucked behind him, a handwritten note on a napkin, a homemade gift certificate for French fries from the place of her choosing.

Martin has some serious skills. She hadn’t stirred a muscle when he got up and slipped out of the suite...she couldn’t say bed, exactly, not when they’d wound up in a pile of pillows and blankets on the floor in front of the balcony doors, letting the perfect night air waft over them as they watched old movies until sleep imposed its will on them. And what made that all so impressive is the fact that she’s a light sleeper, and always had been, when she could get her mind to slow down and her body agreed to a cease fire so she could rest.

And she was impressed when he didn’t run away at the sight of her without her make up, and with her hair a little flat. But any worry she might have had of him running away faded away when the smell hit her. Something that took her back fifteen years and made her mouth water now as much as it would have back then.

Because while she was a conscientious vegetarian...she’d be a liar if she said she couldn’t throw down with some kalua pig...and that particular blend of smoke and bacon...was nothing less than a Chuns breakfast bomber.

Eyes darting around the coffee is next and the cup cracks her up because fair play, Martin, fair play. But maybe it’s the Stitch that gets her and there’s a look he gets as her eyes turn just the right hint of misty in the morning light. She doesn’t get a word out, just a strangled little sound in the back of her throat before impossibly tall and solid Texas gets over run by a very little, very touched Hawai’i. The invasion comes with arms wrapping somewhere near his centre mass as she buries her face in his chest with a muffled, “...mahalo nui...” something, something, something.

[brooklynislandgirl]

Does your muse like using toys?

Sinday Awkward Sinday || Accepting for All Verses

She knew Truth or Dare was a dangerous game. Especially when the unspoken consequences are a shot of bourbon for not fully disclosing, or a double shot if you avoid the question or the challenge outright. Half the bottle’s gone already, and it feels good to hold onto the edges of the mattress on the trailer floor, doors and windows open to bleed off the sticky heat of the night from the confined space within. Just at the edges of her ~arguably blurred~ vision, she can see his articulate fingers  bending and waving and it reminds her of those pretty weed things that grow on river edges that she’s forgotten the name of right now.

She’s particularly proud that the words are drawled but not slurred, just a brush of his timbre against her ear, but he’s any more sober than she is. Texas has his secrets, some of them buried deep under so much mental scar tissue that no one might ever dig them out, but sometimes he’s surprisingly honest about things. It’s quite endearing. But then, they have never really had trouble with this kind of intimacy, this open sharing of ideas and fears and struggle. They were much alike in that way and there comes a kind of absolution when you are as close to someone as Martin and she are. That doesn’t mean she can’t tease him though. Very slowly she turns to look at him, and for a moment loses herself in the way the tendons in his neck contract when he smiles and turns away long enough to take a drink of his Coke chaser.“Like...we talkin’...rubbah duckies or mebbe GI Joes or some kine?”It’s not wholly unbelievable to think she doesn’t understand the question, even if their banter had been slowly becoming a little more risque each time. A slightly sloppy grin takes form and she continues on.“Cause I’m kind of a fan of Nerf guns, play-dough...is very malleable, ya know. Hmm. Oooh, or mebbe dem radio cars wi’ like da controllers.”An inner light sparkles demonically in her eyes as she worms her way closer to Martin. Fingertips glancing across his ribs.“Or are we bein’ more serious. An like... A very sharp knife. Ice an’ candle wax? cause I can get behind dat. But t’ be honest...no kine is mo’beddah dan hands an’ tongues an’ teeth if ya know f’ do it right. Salt on skin, sweet bourbon like potent brown sugar in ya mouth. I know dis is LA, but why ya need a whole prop department?”

[brooklynislandgirl]

What event from the past weighs on them the most?

Pick Me Apart || Not Accepting

“Why...why didn’t you tell me...Jake had a gun?”

They’re sitting on the hood of the car, Martin’s hands in his hair, elbows braced on his knees. His boot heels rest on the bumper and he’s not exactly looking at her, is he? So the question hangs between them much like the dust and the fading sunlight, and she’s got nothing better to do than fiddle with the straw sticking out of her half-finished soda.The other two are out of ear shot in the gas station bathroom because Molly wanted him to wash his hands, change his shirt. It was barbecue sauce, not blood. But that doesn’t change the fact that her boyfriend had robbed a liquor store four towns back, and had to know he was making the rest of them accomplices after the fact, and Martin the get-away driver.

“Honest truth? I kinda forgot.” And she knows as much as he does, that’s a lie. You didn’t forget a rifle in the back seat. He tries again. “I...It was a mistake. Haven’t you ever made one, Hawai’i?”

And that gives her pause.

She swallows hard because she doesn’t like the answer. Because she has to relive the whole funeral, the look on her father’s face that told her he’d give anything in the world to exchange his children, that she was the one being lowered into ground. And all she has to show for it is the scar still fresh and pink in the cusp between her left thumb and forefinger from where his watch had caught her when he snatched the flag they’d presented to her. The same flag she didn’t have the foresight to steal when a couple days later she effectively ran away from home. 

She’d gotten all the way to Alabama before he’d cut off her credit cards, and so she had to rely on infamous Southern hospitality and her ability to shoot pool to make it to that bar, where she left with three strangers and absolutely no plan on what to do next.

“’K, den. Wha’dda’we gonna do?”

He tilts his head toward her finally, and she can see underneath it all, maybe he’s just as scared as she is. He waggles a finger at her. “I hear tell California’s pretty nice this time’a year.”