2019-05-20 - (S)He's Not Dead, (S)He's My Mascot

it's down on the boardwalk, and it is probably not the only little shop that survives purely on tourism down there. It's pretty obvious that it is a psychic's shop, too. All the hallmarks of it are right there, in brilliant neon in the front window, or the stereotypical semi-dark shop with the intimate feel furnished by yards and yards of printed fabric, and the super secretive back room behind a black curtain. The entire place is decorated in occult chic, all likely copied right out of the nearest library book.

Frankie is sitting behind a small counter, dressed much like before in Gypsy boho chic, this time she's got on a million bangle bracelets and jingly earrings as well. At least she's not looking at a phone, and is instead reading a book.

Throwing what little remains of a lit cigarette aside, Carver pulls the collar of his usual coat a little tighter around his neck to seal away what he can of the drizzle, the lit cherry and tobacco bouncing off of the boardwalk and soo extinguished by a hazy and unrelenting moisture that seems to assail this town regularly.

Feels quite homey to the guy.

There's a pretty bright expression on his face as the bell above the door jingle jingles to herald his arrival, the man running a hand through his hair that both sends water running in rivulets down his face and gives him the appearance of a startled badger. Tufts. Everywhere.

"Welcome to..." Frankie starts saying the minute that she hears the door opening and that little bell starting to jingle, but she stops when she spots the who. She then snaps the book closed, pushing it towards the side as she slides from the stool from where she's been perching, "Welcome."

She then points towards the curtain, "Please, follow me." And then off she goes. She knows why he's here, after all.

Pulling a hand from those deep, deep coat pockets, Carver unwraps a silver foil from around a stick of gum to pop the latter in his mouth, eyes making a pointed effort to browse around the interior of the establishment before settling on the proprietor. There's a concentrated effort on eye contact as he crumples up the foil to throw it back in an entirely different pocket, giving a quick and easy "Nice place."

And then there's movement. And he's following. There's a little hitch in his right leg as he does so, and a touch of an appreciative tone around the words that come easily as he heads for the curtain. "What, no up-selling? I like you."

"You're not buying, so there's nothing to sell. Remember?" Frankie points out as she steps into the little back room, waiting for him to follow behind her before she closes the curtain, making sure that all light is trapped outside. The room itself is smaller, probably once a storage closet of a generous size. No windows. Barely any light. There is a round table in the center, but no table cloth. It's set up so that doubters are able to see that she's not pulling any kind of strings or tapping under the table. Two chairs...and yes. A large crystal ball in the center of the table.

"If you care to buy, then I can up-sell all day long. I've these wonderful healing crystals, good for the gall bladder....and then there is the iron ore from some fancy mountain, good for the blood." Frankie gestures towards the chairs, letting him choose which one that he wants to sit in.

"Great, I'll get what I paid for, then." Carver's eyes widen and blink a few times as the curtain closes behind him, adjusting to the light as he's stepping through to take up a seat right as it's offered, gently slapping a hand down on the table once he's settled. "Love, I spent most of my 20's in Wrexham. Believe me, I've already got enough iron in my blood."

Fingers drum at bare tabletop, his other hand reaching down to massage somewhere around his thigh as he takes in the size and general layout of the room with an appraising eye. "Cozy." seems to be his total conclusion.

"I find that cozy tends to put people at ease over....whatever is not cozy." Frankie replies as she moves towards the other chair, settling herself down into it. Any usual theatrics that she might employ are not forced upon him. Evidently they have some kind of agreement that she's not going to bullshit the bullshitter. Much.

Once she's sitting down she reaches for the crystal ball, actually picking it up to move it down onto the floor, "Now...I promised you a proper reading, right?" She reaches her hands out, palms up in an open invitation to putting his hands into hers. "You prefer palm, tarot...runes, or whatever other way you want it. Results will be the same, but I'll leave the method to you."

Carver's hands drop into hers with very little fanfare. In fact, a lot about his actions bring to mind the phrase 'Very Little Fanfare' right now. He doesn't really seem bored, or unwilling, or anything along that line, but there's definitely a sense of casual apathy about the guy, that's for sure. Which, considering the whole 'bullshit the bullshitter' thing they've got going, you'd expect him to be tensed to the nines.

"I miss osteomancy." He muses, notably going for the greek on that one as his fingers spread open. "I guess throwing bleached roadkill skeletons at people doesn't do great for repeat tourism though. Dying art, it is." A casual sigh, his face pointedly across at his hands.

"Not whole skeletons." Frankie points out as she curls her fingers around the lower half of his hands, and his wrists. It's fairly notable that her fingertips are very casually resting where she can feel his pulse in his wrist. Any shake in his hands. Any tensing. Any jerking. It's a clever move, really. It allows her to pick up on the subtle signs that she's getting close to something with her guess work. "I've a bag, hidden in the back, of bones....but I don't pull them out out for just anyone. Makes most people nervous these days."

But then she closes her eyes, settling in to listening to him, or the world, the quiet room. This is probably where she usually spins some yarn about sensing great-great grandpappy who wants to tell you where the family fortune is buried.

"Nothing gets the blood flowing like a rat skull hucked at your face." Carver somehow both manages to argue and concede to a point in one very telling sentence about how his estranged Aunt may have liked to do her work. And if Frankie's looking for a baseline pulse, first she has to contend with the notion that this guy is either nervous to start with, generally unhealthy, or likes to hyperventilate before walking into a store. He's clearing 90 on the rate, easy.

He seems pretty chilled, though. Otherwise. Watching her face for a moment when she closes off, letting the ambiance take her. Silence, it's becoming. He doesn't say a word.

It's a good trick, trying to take a baseline. But if she's worried about the fact he's twitterpatting at a 90 already she doesn't show it. Her entire expression is rather serene as she meditates a moment.

Just a moment, then she starts in on whatever decision she's made regarding how she's going to go after reading his future. "You're escaping something....like a dead wife." She does not open her eyes as she says it, instead swinging at the previous conversation the other night about mistresses and dead wives. Which might show she has seriously bought into the story, or she's drifted off into the realm of just bullshitting him now.

Carver's face watches, making sure that Frankie's eyes are still closed as she makes her stunning first revelation. The Brit's lips purse up to contain the spreading smile that escapes for just a split second, the twitch in his hand and shoulders from holding it back absolutely being a sign that she's nailed the mark first go. How on earth could she have known such a thing?! Science can't even begin to explai-... British sarcasm really doesn't work in text, does it?

It doesn't really work on her, either. It's obvious he just tried to choke down a laugh. "Oh, yes. I miss my wife so much."

Okay, yeah, verbal sarcasm works well.

"She misses you as well." Frankie replies, letting her tone of voice become quieter, more sing-song as she settles in, wrapping herself up in the entire act. Obviously an act, because she follows this false trail like a cheerful little blood-hound. "She says that you really need to stop drinking....that it'll put you into an early grave."

There is the slightest tilt of her head, like she's listening to something. Obviously the dead wife in this situation. "She's worried about you, about how lonely you actually are. The drinking, it's only part of the things you're doing to fill your life and time with mindless, empty things. You're avoiding..." She pauses, like she's trying so very, very hard to hear something from the great beyond. "You're avoiding your....poetry?" She shakes her head, "No, not that, that doesn't make sense."

"That sounds like Mels, yeah." Carver even goes as far as to add a little huffy sniff of his nose to the words, his hands shaking slightly at the unerring accuracy of the psychic. "She... she never was a fan of the drinking. Just for those reasons." Look, he can roll with it too. Actually, that might as well be his job description. 'Alistair Carver: Rolls with it.'

He'd have to get new cards printed up, though. Hassle.

"She-" His voice even catches in his throat for a second there. "She'd always call me her 'Mindless, Empty thing.' Yeah." He even leans in a little when she starts talking about what he's avoiding. Mostly, it's to scowl at something unseen off to Frankie's left, but it totally seems like he's interested. She's hooked the fish. Reel it in!

Luckily for him she doesn't even see him looking off to her left, her eyes are still closed. Otherwise she might notice it. Maybe. Honestly, she seems to absorb what he says, and can feel any shift in his hands. But that is about as far as she seems to be able to go, other than tone. She can hear that, too.

But instead she tries another trick so see just how much he's actually bullshitting her. Instincts tell her that he's making everything up from top to bottom, but sometimes people are unpredictable.

"I think she's wrong, there. You're not mindless....and not entirely empty. Maybe bits and pieces of you are empty, and you're looking for something to fill that void. But I don't think you are entirely empty.." She pulls his hands towards her as she leans forward, her eyes opening to fix on his face, "Stop avoiding your purpose. Plus, the cops are still looking for you, and are only three states away."

Carver really can't help shake the notion he just missed something. There's a slight prickling on the back of his neck, which usually means he needs to pay attention, but the second he tries to focus on, there's the sound of a dog barking along the boardwalk, and a yelled shout that manages to seep through the shop walls of "BRUNO NO NOT THE SEAGULLS!"

So he's meeting her opened eyes and fixed look at this face with a brief glimmer of confusion. (Geddit?)

And his hands twist slightly to pull clear of her, one rubbing the wrist of the other as he bunches his mouth to one side, pondering for a second or two and breaking the look with a glance to the ceiling. "So, you talked to..." He quits rubbing to snap his fingers together for a second, searching for the name. "Ah, fuck. What was it? Gerry? Geoff!" He actually seems impressed with her, to be fair. There's even a nod of approval. "The emptiness was good, vague enough to latch on to something most folks would have simmering under the surface. But the wife, really?" Aaaaand there's the disappointment. "Really? Do I look like a guy who could ever stay married long enough for a wife to pass? C'mon, Frankie."

"You look like the kind of guy that probably has a punch card for the local free clinic and a string of hookers looking for your car sliding down the streeth." Frankie replies with a laugh, leaning back in her chair, legs crossing, "But seriously. No, you don't strike me as the married type, they usually exude desperation and sadness like lost, whipped puppies."

There is possibly not any real belief in that, though. Or maybe that just speaks to the type of men that usually come through the door to a place like this. "Geoff did give me the story about a dead wife that you killed, and a mistress, though. So I just wove the narrative around that. Then Gina's card, that helped fill a little more between the lines."

"Credit where it's due, you've got balls." Well, there's Carver's utmost praise uttered in a single sentence. "You believed something that guy said about a stranger, saw I had a card that explicitly states 'Fuck if I know.' and thought 'Yeah, I can read this guy, no problem." Really, it looks like he's about to give her a round of applause as he leans back in the chair, the gum in his mouth getting a little more worked against a back tooth as he does so.

"I bet tourists fall over themselves for it, right?" The second bit of praise. Frankie's done good. "You've got a knack. Family trade, or...?"

"My mother." Frankie replies with a shrug of her shoulders, "I believed you were capable of murdering someone, maybe not a wife. And you do seem the mysterious woman sort. But those are the sorts of things I usually save for when I actually get someone back for the second or third visit." There's a flash of amusement, though, and a wink that follows. She teases.

"Anyways, yeah, my mom worked in the trade growing up, and I learned everything that I know from her. But..." Frankie shrugs, still looking fairly cheerful about everything, "I enjoy it, and I think I'm pretty good at it, too."

"Oh, well, thanks!" Carver's instinctively pulling out a cigarette from that battered pack of Lucky's in response to being labelled as a potential killer, but quickly remembers that A) He's in a store. and B), he's chewing gum. It goes up behind his ear instead. "And you think right. At least you latched on to a generalisation that might have hit home. Met this guy in Ohio who was certain I'd achieve that business merger I was so worried about if I only went all-out on it."

And thinking Carver's a businessman? That's not missing the mark. That's missing the building. The county. even.

When he reveals what someone else thought she just laughs, "You?" She shakes her head, tilting her head to look him over, measuring him from top to bottom before she shrugs, "I guess maybe...if I was blind and dumb."

Noticing the cigarette, because it is hard not to, she gets to her feet, crooking a finger at him before she heads back through the curtains, pushing them open. Only she doesn't head for the front of the shop, instead heading towards the back, if he follows. If he doesn't, there is a whole world of things he can stick his nose into around the shop.

Carver's easy smile fades a little as Frankie gets to her feet. Not out of any annoyance, but the fact he has to content with a leg that was just getting used to not having to take his weight. The grunt that comes when he too stands is far, far beyond his years. "The guy made his play. I respect that." He continues musing, mostly to ignore the dull throb in his leg moreso than anything else. "Y'know, someone crooking a finger at me never usually ends well. Your face isn't nearly angry enough yet, though."

Ah, the idle musings of a man in slight discomfort. Always optimistic. Always hopeful. Always-wait, Glaring?

Someone unseen would be pointing at a few of the more trinket'y items on sale and demanding he buy it. She's resolutely ignored.

There are so many trinkets out there, too. The usual 'occult' bullshit for the tourists. If she believes in this stuff, she isn't sporting anything real, nothing that would tip him over into thinking that she's for real, and not just a con.

"You haven't pissed me off, and I'm not a killer. Or going to roll you for your cash." Frankie gets to a door in the back, pushing it open to the alley out back, and she props it open with a metal foldable chair that she leaves empty. "You can smoke out here." She gestures around to the alley as she steps out into the alley, her arms crossing, "You often get rolled for your cash by your hookers?" She's never, ever, ever letting this joke die.

"You're a psychic in a tourist shop on a boardwalk." Carver points out, stepping by to take the metal chair as a seat and leaning against both it and the door as he rummages about his pockets for the slightly dull bronze lighter he usually carries about his person. It's found, eventually, and the cigarette is lit with a hint of pleased satisfaction that at least, for once, it's not a downpour outside. "And you're telling me you don't roll people for cash?"

"Rarely." Is all the answer she gets to the question. Which doesn't exclude 'never'. That needs to probably be noted.

"I usually just con them out of it. Rolling them for it implies a level of violence that I don't usually take part in." Frankie glances up and down the alley way before she moves to lean against the wall, "I'm an artist, though. Not a thug."

One that clearly is willing to be open about her work to some stranger from outside town. For some reason. Which brings her around, cheerfully, to her question, "What's your real story? No bullshit...no fun little stories and lies. Your actual story."

Carver darts an eye down to the end of his cigarette, watching the orange glow creep up through the paper as a slowly lengthening finger of ash hangs there, patiently. "My real story?" The talking sends that ash on it's way. At least he's leaning far enough out that it misses his coat. "Let's see-" A sigh. A stretch. His hands reach out far above his head, clasping each other around the wrist as there's a small arch in his back to see if he can get a couple of vertebrae popping. There's a little look of relief after a moment, so, maybe?

"I'm a collector. Of information. Un-married, thank you very much, pet, and I've come here because I've never heard of a town that has as thin a wall as this place. A building? Sure. But an entire town?" More ash is flicked off to the side. "It piqued my interest."

"Un-married." Frankie parrots his comment with an amused smile, but the rest of the story he shares she listens to with some small degree of seriousness. Small. She looks almost like she's about to ask him if he's bullshiting her, trying to bait her into coming across as a crazy or something. But then she buys into the story a moment later.

"I've never heard of anywhere else like here, either. I've not exactly dug into it, though. It's just been the way life is here, the way it works. You never know what might happen, and either you're...special, or you aren't." Frankie reaches a hand up, absently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, the bangles on her wrist jingling with the movement. "What do you know about it, though...the strangeness here. As an outsider, of course."

Carver softly raises an eyebrow, turning his head to look at the quote-unquote psychic's expression as she offers a rough gist of what she knows, taking up the cigarette in his hand to free up his mouth for talking. Well, she asked what he knows about such things, and he's all to willing to oblige.

Knuckles are cracked, his shoulders are rolled out, and his legs part slightly to settle his feet on the floor in a more comfortable lean forward, his head craning up to watch her with those deep brown eyes, a small smile starting to creep along the corner of his mouth. This is not the soft smile he usually wears. This is something new. "What do I know about it? What do you want to know? It's not a general topic, love."

"Yeah, what do you know about it." Frankie agrees as she studies him, then she shifts, gathering up the hem of her skirt so that when she crouches down there is not suddenly yards of fabric getting wet and gross in the alley ground, and she's not risking flashing anyone in the process. Neither are goals of the moment.

"I mean, exactly what I said. It's a very general topic, though. Broad strokes of what you know about the...wall, as you call it, here." After making sure her skirt is secured she leans her back against the wall, then she lifts her hand up, palm up, spreading her fingers out before she tries a trick literally straight out of a certain television show, plucking a coin from the air. Only, there is no coin, she's not plucking shit out of air, and it's pretty obviously a really shitty illusion that fails to make the point she was probably trying to make. "Or this stuff." That stuff.

"Fucking 'broad strokes', she says." Carver huffs out a cloud of smoke, watching the grey wisps drift away with the slight breeze before he turns to watch her little magic trick with a curious eye. And an unimpressed eyebrow. And still, it's better than he can do. She can probably tell that, though. Look, he'll prove it: by mimicking her motions exactly to pluck another stick of gum out of thin air. Or from up his coat sleeve.

It's from up his coat sleeve. That's not hard to tell.

"Juice go in, power usually comes out. In some places, like here, all the lines between normal shit and this stuff are a little more blurry. Usually a place of trauma. Or shit like that. Where the walls are really thin, folks can pull back the curtain easier. Like me. That's the one damn trick I've got left." So matter of fact, a little bothered in tone to try and summarize so quickly.

"Oh, and ghosts are totally real but also not like... ghosts. And there's one behind you."

And he's not wrong. Mimicking Frankie's hand pose with the coin, leaning up against the wall, would be Melissa, beaming wide as she rolls her own coin back and forth over her fingers.

"If I wanted fucking broad strokes I'd ask in an entirely different way." Frankie replies with an entirely too upbeat tone for her failure to actually perform a 'for real' magic trick. Such failure. The coin vanishes as she glances towards the side at the mention of the ghost, then up towards the face of Melissa, her brows twitching upwards.

There is decidedly no screaming in terror and running away from this ghost that is right there. Mimicing her. Which is amusing, honestly. Enough that she laughs at the sight, then she glances towards him, "But what do you mean not like ghosts? How can something be real but not like itself?" She straightens her arms out, giving the bracelets on them a bit of a shake so that they fall down towards her hand, then she laces her fingers together, no more tricks, evidently, are forth coming. "There's been tragedy here. Plenty of it, in fact. Lots of murders in Gray Harbor history, but is that usually enough trauma to account for shit like this? I'd think any big city with a high crime rate would be able to have a thinner wall between worlds."

"Well, when I say ghosts, what do you think of?" Carver asks, leaning forward a little more to watch Melissa show off far more hand dexterity than he's ever had. He's probably just jealous, but seems to come to terms with it when he remembers technically the coin is a part of her. Which is like, totally cheating. "She's not that."

Melissa, for her part, seems content to keep on rolling that coin, sending it from hand to hand as she goes.

"Any big city with a high crime rate does." the sitting Brit agrees, placing the cigarette down by his feet to scruff it out with the sole of his shoe before leaning back in the chair, folding up his arms around his chest as he shifts and shimmies a little to sink more against the hard metal. "But only in places. Got a warehouse that had a whole bunch of death? Thin as shit. But not in like, the next building over. Here?" There's a generalized vague hand gesture, indicating everything. "Kind of the same thing, except the local grocery place is par with that warehouse, and that abandoned saw mill you've got is probably one of the thinnest walls I've ever seen in my life." And to be frank? To Frankie? He looks impressed.

"A lot of people died there in a short period of time, I think." Frankie is not the expert on town history that she probably should be, honestly. But she knows broad strokes. "So..." She rests her chin on her still clasped hands, watching him as she muddles through the information, and her thoughts, nad her thoughts on what she's thinking, and the things that he is saying. "Alright, so some how, for some reason, for...whatever fucking reason, we're special here."

Special. It doesn't sound like she's always thrilled with it being special. But there are other things, big, glaring, standing right over there thing.

"You mean ghosts are not the dead unable or unwilling to pass over?"

"Nah, you're not special."

Carver's a real charmer, sometimes. He's even aware she used the term 'We're Special Here', But maybe the sheer brutal bluntness in his tone acts as something of a safety buffer, his own weird way of cushioning the blow. "This place?" He's settled into his comfortable, easy smile again, watching her face with a casual impassiveness. Mostly because he's trying to ignore the ghost doing coin tricks behind Frankie, but also because that's just how Carver do. "This place is special. Because it draws people like you to it. I get it, you're a local. But your family moved here once, right?" He gives a little 'there you go' gesture with his hand, following up with a shrug of his shoulders.

"I mean, maybe!"

That line isn't Carver. That would be 'Lissa, equal in accent, far, far more bright in tone. The coin's gone, and she's making an absolute face in the man's direction as she answers Frankie's question for him. "But when you boil it right down to the nitty gritty, I'm just an analogous blob of memories." The line about 'nitty gritty' has her hands making a mortar and pestle motion, the smile never fading. "Maybe Melissa is here because of not wanting to pass over, but I don't know. Or couldn't tell you." She shrugs. It's pretty similar to Carver's gesture. "I'm a bundle of memories in a magic suit. Like... Shit. Allie, what's that dish? It's what your nan would put together out of roast leftovers."

"Bubble and Squeak."

"Yeah! I'm bubble and squeak."

"My mom couldn't do anything like what I could. She was a complete con, and skipped town on me when I was in high school, so I call bullshit on the idea that this place charms people like me to it. My mom wasn't like me, and yet..." Frankie spreads her hands outwards as she gets to her feet, the motion almost irritable as she shakes her skirt back out. Charmer is probably right.

"Memories." Frankie laughs at that, "Residual memories. Yes, I've heard that before, but that doesn't negate the fact there was a Melissa, right?" She glances towards the ghost, studying her for a moment before looking at Carver, "Unless she's your imaginary friend...I'm still right. A formerly living individual that has remained on this side instead of passing over."

Now that is sheer stubborness.

"Ugh. Allie. She's one of those." Melissa has the impatient tone of someone who was hoping for a surprise, only to be met with a pair of socks for Christmas. And she looks about 17, so that's not a great gift yet.

And then, at least, it's Carver's chance to talk as soon as Frankie's looking back at him. He's got another cigarette out. And it's lit. The guy can do that with haste when needs must. Standing? Notsomuch. That actually takes him a moment. "Sure. Sure." It's the acquiescence of a man trying to avoid an argument. And it's not a hard one to spot. "That's totally the restless spirit of Melissa, and not some bundle of..." His hands do a wishy-washy wavey gesture of absolute mush. "stuff from the other side of the curtain that needed something to take a form of." Oh look, they both might be stubborn. Great.

"Anything else you want a rough idea of before you discard it as wrong?" He asks. Melissa isn't here to help any more. he's on his own. She scarpered the second Frankie's eyes were off of her.

"No." Frankie replies, her tone softening a bit, "You don't have to stand, you know." Since he seems to dislike the activity so much, and she's not leaving. Well, not storming off, if she left that would possibly be the manner that she'd have exited, stage right, a moment ago.

Instead she settles her shoulder against the wall, arms crossing, "You're saying that this one..." She glances around for Melissa, who seems to have gone to splitsville fairly quickly, then back to him, "Is just a jumble of energy from the other side that opted into the vague form of Melissa, who...did or did not exist once upon a time in reality? As a live girl."

"Eh. Kinda? If I actually knew, I'd lay it out for you like a blueprint." Carver always gives the best answers, flapping out the collar of his coat for a moment as he talks. "But basically, that's the rough gist. Dunno the how the why or the what, but I know the..." Uh oh, dawning introspection. He shrugs. He's good at shrugs. He loves the shrugs, holding his palms out in apology before lifting a hand to scratch idly through his stubble. "I think they've got the memories. That's all. Like a coalesced soup of being. She might actually be my old friend, but that'd be too..." A beat. "Simple. And this shit is never, ever simple."

"Maybe it is that simple." Frankie suggests, because that is even more complicated than it being honestly complicated. Right. Maybe, maybe not. "So how long has Melissa been with you?" She glances around, doing a quick double-check to make sure that the ghost hasn't reappeared somehow. Not that is probably matters too much to her one way or another, in the end.

"There are a few ghosts around town, if you haven't had a chance to run into them yet, at least." She gestures out towards the front of the store. "There's one I see outside a lot...woman, looks like she's from the 20s or something."

Carver's inhaling that cigarette like it gives him life. Y'know, actually, it might do. A nicotine craving Carver is an irritable, angry mess that would probably get murdered by anyone with a chip on their shoulder within, say, twenty minutes? "Twenty years, give or take a few months." He answers, rummaging around in the pockets of his coat as he talks, not bothering to glance Frankie's way as she turns to check there's not a third occupant of the alley.

"Pretty sure there's a bunch in that old mill, too." He agrees, then suddenly, as if remembering something, turns his head to one side. "Have I got any dirt or anything there?" His thumb jabs up to a spot around where the back of his head starts to segue into jaw and neck. And a pretty solid soot stain that he can't see, but can totally feel.

"You do." Frankie agrees, but then she tugs the sleeve of her shirt down over her hand, moving right into his personal space to help a brother out by trying to scrub that soot stain off. "I'm sure there are plenty of ghosts down there, I remember the stories of a bunch of dead people." Again with the dead people.

"But I've never gone out there....that place is next level creepy if you ask me. A bunch of kids used to head out there to make out though, in high school. I don't really see the appeal, but people are rather strange little bunny rabbits."

"Knew it. One day I'll get used to seeing a raccoon and not forget little things like 'making sure I'm not covered in dirt.'" Will he mention that dirt is from the saw-mill? No. No he won't. Carver's a man of some tact, after all. "Ah, kids. Whatever gives them a little extra excitement." He agrees. Or explains. Maybe both. Eitherway, he turns when she's done scrubbing soot off. This means they're friends.

"You know of any other places around town with that kind of reputation? I need to know where to avoid. Or not avoid. Honestly..." A big. Ol'. Carver. Brand. Shrug. "I'm in town for the ambiance."

"Other than the sawmill?" Frankie hesitates a moment before she shakes her head, "No where that I can think of off the top of my head that is just...As much." She tugs her sleeve back up, carefully tucking it so that the new soot stain isn't nearly as obvious on her sleeve, "I'll think about it, though. See if I'm just missing the weird in the haze of it all being...normal."

There's a small pause, then she taps her fingers against her chin, "Tell you what..." She trails off for a moment, considerin something before asking, "What's your nights look like the next few days."

Carver throws a glance up to the almost ever-present sight of dark clouds rolling in. God, this place feels so much like home. "Now that, love, is a loaded question. Probably rain filled. Might have to see a woman about her magic hands. And probably seeing how well the bars serve." Carver should write travel guides. He really should.

The third cigarette since he arrived is added to the list of stub-outs, hands tucking deep into his coat pockets. "Why? And will I like the answer to that?"

"A woman about magic hands?" Frankie's brows lift a fraction, "Sounds like a scam to me." She then shrugs, "I was just going to say that if you're free, and I can remember a few things. You should pick me up after the sun sets." There is an absent look upwards towards the sky, noting the clouds with the expression of someone that has been so used to clouds they usually don't register.

"How you feel about that answer is not something I can tell you, though. Your thoughts are your own, right?"

"Hm. Vague and mysterious." Carver's expression doesn't really reveal much about the answer to how he feels, pulling his hands free of his coat pockets to once more sinch the collar of his coat tight around his neck. There's a little stiffness in one shoulder as he does it, by the looks of things, but anyone who hangs out with Carver for more than a day would soon get used to the sight of something on his body bothering him.

Finally settling on what opinion he's going to give outwardly, his bottom lip pouts out for a second in approval. The nod is just a bonus. "I like it. 'After the sun sets.'"

"Tomorrow, then. Or the day after...whenever you're not trying to woo your lady with the magic hands." Frankie pushes herself away from the wall, moving so that she can peer through the door, checking to make sure that no one mysteriously slipped into the shop while they were out back.

Surprise. No one did.

"Dress for being outside, and don't wear anything you wouldn't want to have potentially ruined." Which, oddly, she glances at his feet to check his footwear situation.

Carver just gives Frankie a slow, slow look. His eyebrow kinks slightly in the middle as it raises, those eyes of his scanning her face before dropping down to his own outfit. And then back to her again. The eyebrow is even more up. Just. Up. "I love that you think I own clothes that at some point in their lifespan have not been potentially ruined. That's cute." The coat is a testament to his sins alone, although it's of note that any repairs done have certainly been by a skilled hand, that's for sure.

"Some time after the sun sets it is, Frankie." He adds, making what can only be described as 'An unmistakable move to leave', hands in pockets after she's given a quick wave and he's heading down the alley. Walking. Dreaming. Doesn't matter how he goes, Alistair's real good at just picking a direction and heading in it. "Hope you got what you wanted from that reading!"

The chair that she'd been propping the door open with is moved as he starts to leave, then she laughs, "I got something I wanted from you, yeah. We'll see if I get more." Then Frankie vanishes back inside the shop, the door swinging closed behind her with a loud thud.