beingdifferent | Seventeenth little lie ♰ I got no one left to mourn for me

Entry tags:

Seventeenth little lie ♰ I got no one left to mourn for me

[Open spam]
[These last few weeks have been grey and listless for Esther, and today is no different. Still debilitatingly self-conscious, she saves her showers for the strangest possible hours, waking at three A.M. to bathe; she keeps her head down during the dinner shift and follows orders directly; she haunts the art room, both painting pieces (these are skilled, furious, sexual, distinctly adult, with nothing childish at all about them) and playing the piano (she has been perfecting her Rachmaninoff obsessively); and wandering through the gardens or hanging around the door to the CES hoping for access.

She hopes for solitude, but many hopes don't pan out.]

[Private to Lydia]
[After the pairing is announced Esther briefly reviews Lydia's posts to the network and steels herself, slipping back into, if not a childlike role, at least a gentle one. There isn't a real point to denying her age with Lydia, though she still presents herself with an infantile appearance; she knows or she doesn't know, and Esther is not worried about either option. When she contacts her new temporary warden, she's sure to be demure and agreeable, making a neutral observation.]

Your name is Lydia? That's very pretty. I'm Esther; pleased to meet you.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Haven't met him yet. [She hesitates, twitchily frowning.] I don't do so good with grownups anymore. It's this whole thing. Trust issues. [She folds her arms.] That's what the last person who tried to head-shrink me was saying, before I punted her into a wall.

So, it kind of sounds like I'm not the only person who used to read pages out of the dictionary as a vocabulary builder.

I think you'll like him when you do. He is very likeable. [All she offers is a shrug. Adults are frustrating to deal with even when you technically are one, and she nods at the explanation of Needy's actions.]

No. Reviewing reference books is important when learning a new language.

I'll try to keep an eye out for him, then. It's not that I don't want to talk to people, I guess it's just that I'm...kinda out of practice. [It probably shows sometimes. Especially when she's self-conscious about it. Vicious cycle.]

Right. [She did notice the accent. She just didn't want to jump on it right away. She slides her hands in her jean pockets, simultaneously raising her shoulders in a kind of shrug.] So, where were you from originally?

If you don't like to talk, I'm sure Digby would be happy to meet you anyway. Do you like dogs?

Russia. [Estonia, really; she's still telling this lie out of habit.]

They're pretty cool. I never had one growing up, but that was because our house wasn't quite big enough. And my mom wouldn't have time to help me take care of it. [And a cat would scratch up the furniture so...ferrets all the way.]

Did you come straight here from there, or where you like, adopted into America or something first? [Because she knows Russian adoptions are totally a thing. It was on Sixty Minutes.]

Oh, I've never had one either. Only fish. Did you have any pets?

[Esther hesitates. Needy clearly doesn't know her age and she sees no real reason to correct her yet, but doesn't want to be accused of deception later.] No, I lived with a family in Connecticut before I came here.

I had a ferret. His name was Specter. [And now that she's thinking about it, she kind of misses him. It's been awhile.]

Connecticut, huh? Was it nice? I mean, did you like it there?

Which ones are ferrets? Are they the pudgy ones that whistle? [Esther's English is close to perfect but she hasn't distinguished between various small pets.]

It was very pretty. Cold, too, which I liked.

Um, ferrets are the long skinny ones. They come in a bunch of different colors. I think you might be thinking of guinea pigs. [Needy's smiling a little, but not because she's laughing at Esther. She's just amused in general. It's kind of a funny turn in the conversation.]

I'm from Minnesota; it can be pretty cold there too. And wet. But there's a lot of greenery and open spaces.

Oh! The ones with snouts like a fox's? [That sounds about right and she nods. A few of the families she became part of had pets, but most stuck to housecats or dogs. The Colemans had given her the guppy tank as well, but those are more scenery than pets.] What are the very small animals called? Not rats or mice, but the same size. Peschanki. [She means gerbils.]

It sounds very pretty. All I've heard about Minnesota before is that there are plenty of lakes.

Yeah, those. [Needy has to think about it from her description, squinting a bit and looking to the side as she tries to work it out. Small, but not mice?] Either hamsters or gerbils, I think. Hamsters are chubby too, like guinea pigs, but really small and stumpy. Gerbils have long tails but kind of run funny.

Yeah. Lots of bodies of water. Where I live, we're right near this state park, and it has all these rivers and this one waterfall, that's -- weird and almost unnatural, so it's kinda famous.

Yes, gerbils. [A brief smile passes over her features.] It's such a strange-sounding word. Ferrets, though; they're like weasels, aren't they?

What's so weird about it?

It kind of it, admittedly. But then everyone knows English is a super weird language. Compared to most. [She shrugs a bit again, because anyone who's not super ethnocentric knows that it's true.] They are. I think the species are cousins or something. Them and otters.

It goes underground through this deep hole, and no one knows where it comes out. They call it the Devil's Kettle. Our town was named after it.

It's a very strange one, yes. It steals from all sorts of other languages. [Esther nods, glancing back at her easel thoughtfully and then toward the stacks of drawing paper on the shelves.] Weasels don't seem much fun to deal with, but otters are interesting. Ferrets are playful like that, aren't they?

That's an ominous name. [Yes, this "kid" knows "ominous" but not "gerbil."] It must empty out somewhere.

They can be. Specter was a lot of fun. I had a bunch of toys for him, and sometimes he would chase my feet when I was walking around and had him out of his cage.

I know that it does. [She found the knife. She's not exactly sure where or how, but at the time it sure felt like a sign.

Noticing Esther's glance towards the paper and the easel though, she frowns, closing off a little again.]

Look, I -- didn't mean to interrupt you for so long, seriously. I'll let you go back to finishing your painting now. You wouldn't want it to go to waste.

They like things that shine, don't they? Rings and jewelry and the like. [She smiles; animals are not of great importance to her but she is more than capable of appreciating them.] He was friendly, then.

[Esther follows Needy's glance to the painting and shakes her head, looking back toward the image.] Don't worry, it's perfectly all right. I have to wait for the paint to dry before adding more detail anyway.

Do you want to work on something together in the meantime? [Needy is, so far, intriguing in that they truly do have something in common. But Esther, as per her usual tactic, is already calculating how she can be made a friend and made useful.] Do you like to draw?

Oh, totally. I mean I don't think he liked my mom all that much, but then she didn't really like him. She never played with him, so. That's probably why. It's not like he would bite her or anything, I think.

[Needy hesitates. There's no reason to be suspicious of Esther, exactly, but then this is a strange place in general. Still, it's not like there's any harm in hanging out?]

I like to draw. It can be relaxing. I'm not very good at it, though.

What about your father? Did he like Spectre?

So do I. And don't worry - it doesn't matter whether you're good or bad. This is only for fun.

Oh, my dad wasn't in the picture anymore by then. They split up when I was still in elementary school.

Well if it's only for fun...then sure. Why not?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Seventeenth little lie ♰ I got no one left to mourn for me

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]

[spam - art room]