|
Spicy doesn't work at only one restaurant, or even one that befits her actual skill mind you, she mostly just work when there's a shift available and the owner don't want to do the extra paperwork, thanks to a somewhat lacking set of IDs. It's why she step out of the kitchen after her shift, wearing an apron, drying her hands from washing them, her hair in a net. Carrying a tray of food she made for herself, heading to an empty booth, sliding her big duffel bag beneath the booth.
It's a small diner beside a busy road and the customers aren't all gone yet. The glistening snowskin, the black ice veins, the matching black ice eyes, the ice wrought nail and teeth all seem to pain a rather cold picture, until one catches scent of the fruit and flower on a fresh breeze when moving past her.
It just so happens that June walks into the diner at the same time that Spicy's coming out of the kitchen. Walking in to see one of the Lost who she doesn't recognize makes June pause for just a moment, a split second of threat assessment, before her smile cracks wide and full of pointies and she waves like they're old friends, then she stops and looks around for a sign saying whether she should wait to be seated, or seat herself.
Spicy seems just a little surprised by the other changeling's arrival and she nods her way. "Hey, have a seat, the waitress'll be right here." she waves the girl over to the booth she picked, she spoke just loud enough so the people working the diner would hear her. "Just got done with the shift."
June shrugs and wanders over with her slightly tottering gait, and the warmth of her mantle comes with her. It brings the scents of roasting marshmallows and honeysuckle, the droning of cicadas. "I didn't know I knew any of the staff here," she says with a laugh. Of course she doesn't know the staff, but there's a suggesting of a wink-wink in the way she says it. "Want some company for dinner?"
"Sure!" Spicy uses her feet to move the duffel bag from out of June's way, dragging it from June's side to her own side of the booth, sounds like metal and heavy. "Always good to see someone familiar, are you one of Ari's people or one of Devon's people, can't remember." she sniff, uncertain with the mantle.
June eyes the duffel bag, grins at Spicy, and then takes a seat across from her. She scoots over to the middle in an awkward shuffle, because scooting in booths is always awkward, and then offers a hand across the table. A hand tipped with rather nasty looking claws, admittedly. "I'm one of Devon's," she says cheerfully. "June. That's my name, not the current month. Well, it's both, I guess."
Spicy ticks a little bit when she hears the name, she's obviously trying to remember something. "I'm pretty sure I met someone who mentioned you not that long ago." She reach to accept the hand and shakes it firmly. "'m Spicy, one of Ari's people." she smiles, the claws drawing her attention for a moment.
"Uh oh. What did I do that someone was complaining about now?" June asks with a grin. "I hope they weren't too angry, whatever it was. At least, not without good reason." June has to be a little careful when shaking Spicy's hand, because of claws and the different in the size of their respective mitts, but she seems to be good at new clawing people by accident. "Nice to meet you. I like that name! It's cute."
"I don't think anyone was angry... Oh right, I think we were headed to ..." she snap her fingers as she remembers. "One of the people from Direct Action I met, they mentioned you." she nods. "no one was angry, we were mostly having a conversation on our way to keep a trod clear." a shrug of her shoulder.
June laughs. "I usually try not to make people mad at me, anyway. That makes sense! My partners do like to talk about me, and I them!" She glances around to make sure people aren't likely to hear what they're all saying. "What do you do here? Do you cook?"
"I fill the cook's shoe when they don't come in on short notice." Spicy smiles and leans on the table. "I'm not exactly hirable yet, so I'm on call for when they don't have much of a choice. It's like that with a few restaurant in town." She takes a bit of food from her plate, burger and fries, simple. "And yeah, I'm a cook, among other things."
"Not hirable?" June asks, and she seems to realize what that means part way through the words. "Oh! Yeah, I can see that. I was there for a little bit. Are you good? I'm the worst cook, but I've been trying to learn, and I've been getting better. I don't manage to start a boiling pot of pasta on fire any more."
"I'm pretty good, I used to sculpt all the time too, but I lack materials now, so I garden some special little fruits and work on cooking now." She keeps eating her food. "Been working on meeting new people and shake off the newly arrived bit."
"I haven't been in town for all that long either," June answers with understanding, and a nod to match it. "A couple of months. You just have a bunch of talents I don't. I don't know anything about sculpting, either. I'm a beekeeper, which is a pretty... atypical career choice, I guess."
"That's an amazing job! Do you have any hives?" Spicy asks, setting her plate aside. "And I think I came in here in early Spring, straight from Over There." a gesture of her hand accompany the obvious statement.
"I do! I keep a few on different properties around the area, where people wanted more pollinators around," June answers like this is a topic that she can go on about for some time. "Honestly, the fact that I can support myself on the job, with some help from my polycule, is kind of a dream. It's a great job, if you love bees. You got back to town that recently, huh? It's rough for the first year or so, in my experience. How are you holding up?"
"A lot of this shit makes absolutely no sense to me, but I'm playing along." She chuckles along with a shrug that basically means, 'I'll get there'. "I'm catching up, understanding how I'm able to like, make a fridge out of an icepack and a cooler..." a side eye, she speaks through her teeth. "Theoretically." she clear her throat. "Just need a few papers and I can get a new show going."
"Fake it until you make it!" June replies with a laugh. "I'm pretty sure that 95% of being an adult is faking it until you make it. Eventually it just stops being faking it, and starts being actual competence. Well, usually. Except my cooking. Have you talked to any of the people we know who can help with the papers thing?"
"One recently up and broke the rules, the other I know about is currently in hiding from the law and the person that broke the rules." Spicy smirks. "I think it's mostly a matter of time or bad luck at this point." she rubs her hand together. "I can probably manage for a while, though."
"Ooooh. Right." June is working under the combined effects of a terrible memory and not having had reason to actually look for the people who do that work, and it shows! "You're sure? If you find yourself struggling, people will look out for you. Let me know if you need help for some reason, okay? It's not actually my job or anything, but helping each other out when we need it is what makes a community a community."
"I'm okay for the moment, but it's not like Life can't suddenly just up and kick me in the throat so... we can exchange phone numbers." she pulls her phone out and open the contact app, nothing super fancy there. "I'm handy in a couple situation, by the way, always happy to return the favor."
"Sure!" June says cheerfully, and she takes out her phone as she sort of dances a little in her seat. She seems to be in a good mood, but that's just June. "My number is ###-####" she reads off, with actual numbers, and she puts in Spicy's number too. "One of my girlfriends, Sigrun, is kind of extra when it comes to being handy, so I usually have that more than covered, but once in a while she's busy, and sometimes it's just fun to do things with new friends, right?"
"Sigrun gave me a sword and a leather suit from her stash, she's super nice." Spicy smiles and pokes her foot against the duffel bag beneath the table. "And yes, It's fun to get to work with new people, find new ways to do things."
"Oooh, she did! That's, yeah," June laughs delightedly. "That's Sigrun. Anyone who wants to gear up, she's happy to make it happen for them." The besotted adoration June has for Sigrun is extremly obvious. "You should see the plate armor she made me! It's so stinking cute."
"What does it look like?" Spicy asks, crossing her legs as she listen to the other woman talk about her girlfriend and how adoring it sound, her own smiles brighten a little bit. "Her sword is pretty badass, I can imagine she'd make something really good looking for someone she loves."
"I might have a picture," June says as she gets her phone out again. "It looks like red panda armor," which she doesn't say aloud is because she is a red panda. "Little ears on the helmet and a tail and everything! It made me so happy." She finds a picture and turns the phone so that Spicy can see. It is, in fact, June in ridiculously cute armor, which covers everything except for her clawed fingers.
Spicy laughs a little, it's not a mocking laugh, but she finds the whole get up rather adorable herself. "Oh that looks fantastic, it looks like effort was made for those details too." she squint at the picture, narrowing her eyes to catch the little details on the pictures. "I can picture the aftermath of a fight too, lots of red added to the picture."
"It ends up turning brownish," June says like the results of blood all over her armor is a totally normal thing to talk about. "Once it dries, anyway." She puts the phone down. "What sorta stuff do you recommend from the menu here? I actually came in to eat, so I probably should."
"When I'm on the clock you probably should just go with anything you feel like, I like varied stuff to do so I won't accidentally botch something because it messes with my flow." Spicy explains "The one that's here right now, since it's early in shift, you can grab the fancier Fish & Chip or Chicken meals and they'll be really great."
"Ooh, fish and chips," June says as her already large eyes get wider. "I haven't had that in a while." She looks around for a server, hoping to get some attention and get an order in.
Spicy just flag down the waiter, just as she undoes the net in her hair and then the apron. The waiter would take the order rather quickly. She spend a few moment rolling her shoulders from side to side.
June orders the fish & chips and an iced tea and then returns to the conversation at hand. "How are you doing in general, aside from the work thing? Are you making new friends? It can be hard as an adult in a new place."
"I made one or two. One of them is the one who gave me the nickname." She explains. "I cook for a soup kitchen and he's the one who showed me the finer details of cooking." she nods "I know a few people from our group, get along with most of them well enough. I wouldn't say I'm actively friends with a lot of them. I found people who were Over There with me, but, that doesn't really make for fast friends."
"Good, it's nice to have people you can lean on, and rely on," June says with an eager nod and a smile. "If you want to know the trick I've learned for making friends, at this point in our lives? Just be aggressive about it. Find people who you think are pretty cool, and then just tell them you want to hang out with them more, and why, and then be like 'hey you should come do this thing with me' or whatever. At least, it works often enough for me."
"That's not a bad tactic, but it's one I think I'm going to have to adapt for a few people I think." Spicy gives a little laughs and a shrug of her shoulder. "But it's good advice, thanks for giving it." she gives a thumbs up to June.
"Some people, you have to basically pin them down and tell them 'stop complaining and let me love you, you grumpy fuck'," June says like this is a lived experience she's sharing. "What kinds of things are you into outside of work and sculpting? Are you into video games? Sports? Movies?"
"That's kind of the awkward thing with me is... I... do this stuff because I like it." She points to the kitchen and to the discarded apron and net. "It's what I do, It's what I like. I garden, when I can afford it, I can sculpt, I cook, I enjoy eating too." she sigh. "I don't really do video games, I don't care about people chasing a ball and I don't like staying still long enough to watch a movie."
June laughs. "Well, you aren't at work all the time, right?" She nods like she understands, though. "I'm kind of a gym rat. Panda. Whatever. There's only so much time I can spend actually tending hives, and some times during the year are quieter than others, so I have to fill the rest of the hours somehow. One of my partners is super into video games, but I'm not, so I'm more inclined to watch him play. I'm just trying to find out what your interests are so that maybe I can introduce you to some other people who share them. Do you know Laura? She loves cooking."
"I'm pretty sure I've at least seen her once." Spicy nods. "And yeah, but what I do then is garden or just... watch the weird TV shows that appear in my special little home. I can't exactly recount that to every day people." she whispers that last part. "And even then, i'm usually doing that while I'm making something to snack on..." she scratch the back of her neck. "I think maybe I need to learn to relax or get new hobbies."
June smiles at Spicy. "Hey, if you're happy, then it's fine, right? If you feel like something is missing, though, then you should do something about it. If I can help with that I will, but again, if you aren't unhappy with things, then what's the problem, right?"
"Happy is a strong word for how I feel, to be quite honest, but I'm content enough." Spicy explains "Sometimes I feel as if that's more of a problems for other people than it is for me and I don't know how to feel about that. Am I missing something? Is this just me dealing with what happened by going simpler than I should be going? I have project in the works that I... don't know how to speak about just randomly in the open. But they're still cooking or art based. Or stuff I can't talk about."
"I mean, if you don't have a problem with it, but other people do? Fuck 'em," June says with a shrug. "Even if it's me, then fuck me. It's your life, and you can do with it what you want." She laughs. "Here I am telling this to a Spring, as if you don't understand that, right?"
"Sometimes it's a good reminder, especially when the Spring still feels confused about what that means sometimes." Spicy speaks in a lowered tone, just to make sure no strange concept leaves the booth. "I also think it's good for me to ask question about why I do stuff."
"Self questioning is good, in general!" June agrees with an eager nod. "Even if you ask the questions and decide when you answer them that you actually like the way things are, it's good to ask, right?" When the food comes out she starts digging in, like she hasn't eaten in a week. "This is good," she says. "It was a good suggestion!"
"Thanks! I do try to pay attention to people's strengths around me." Spicy stretches her legs and arms, careful not to bump into June "Well yes, I think if I can look at what I do now and see nothing wrong, it's also good to know why too, at least sometimes." a chuckles. "there is such a thing as just being paralyzed by choice."
"Hmm, that's true," June says around a mouthful of food, which she swallows before going on. "And knowing people's strengths is a really solid skill. I have a tendency to try to assume everyone can do anything, unless they say or prove to me otherwise. It's not necessarily an asset."
"I can imagine that lets you cooperate easier, but I also imagine it can create some... interesting situations." Spicy nods and then her eyes switch to the clock on her phone. "I do need to leave however, I need to makei it to another place shortly."
"Oh, yeah! Go ahead!" June says with a smile, stopping a fry most of the way to her mouth. "It was really nice to meet you. I've enjoyed this." She thinks a second before asking, "do you like hugs? I'm big on hugs, so if you like them, there's a goodbye hug waiting for you."
Spicy blinks once and smiles brightly at June and she nods at the offer, waiting for June to make the move "Sure!"
June scrambles up out of the booth by hopping onto the seat and then jumping down to the floor, where she comes around the table with her arms raised. "Good luck at your next job, cook up some great food, okay? I'll see you around, I hope."
"See you around June! Have a great time and say hello to your people for me!" She then proceeds out of the restaurant, after dropping off her geat to one of the waiter.
|