2019-08-12 - Trailer Trash Pile

The day started with Bennie cleaning out her trailer. It was sticky work in the heat, especially with her failing air conditioner, to drag out bits of broken furniture and one very slashed up and decimated brown and orange sofa. But what started off as a solo mission soon had many helping hands aiding to the task. The Trailer Park is a community, after all.

It all ends up piled together for the trash collectors, and like any good task completed, resulted in an impromptu party. Neighbors are dragging over their grills, coolers are being filled with ice, and folding tables and chairs are being pulled out and set up despite the coming threat of rain.

Bennie stands near the pile of her erstwhile belongings, dressed in a pair of cut off denim shorts and a yellow tank, mopping at her face the kerchief she's pulled off her hair.

There's a lady a few trailers down with an elderly bichon frize, or at least one that looks at least part tiny white fluffball. Neither dog nor owner can easily get into the office, so Gideon has made a house call to drop off a renewed prescription for the poor thing's arthritis and make sure the situation hasn't gotten worse. He steps out of the trailer, with a paper plate laden with blondies. He makes his way down the path, then stops and sort of double-takes at Bennie. "Hey." The scruffy vet is wearing a pair of gray shorts and a pale blue t-shirt with a faded Teddy S. Addington High logo.

Geoff has brought his grill over of course and is in the midst of cooking up burgers and hot dogs, handing them out to anyone who wants one. With an upnod over towards where Bennie is standing he calls out "Hey could you toss a beer over here? Thanks." This evening he's dressed in a pair of cargo shorts, flip flops and a complete absence of a shirt to show off his tats. Where normally one would have grilling implements hung from the grill, he only has a loaded water gun.

Aidan showed up to help, of course! Friends don't let friends drag crap out of their trailers alone. He's wearing a black sleeveless t-shirt with white bones printed on it, in approximately the right place for where they actually hit his body, cheerfully rainbow madras bermuda shorts that are slightly too big for him and keep sliding slightly down and getting absently resettled, and flip flops, because those are the best possible shoes to help carry furniture while wearing. And because of the heat, at some point he put on a headband to keep his curls out of his face. It's got fuzzy pink cat ears on it.

At present, he's carting the chairs from his porch down to join the others for people to sit in, though his grill stays where it is. It's pretty small and grilling seems more or less handled already. "You know what would be awesome?" he inquires of the assembled at large. "Fireworks. Oh! Or a slip & slide. Does anyone HAVE a slip & slide? I have a pool I could get out." Sort of.

Bennie uses the heel of her grey cowboy boot to kick open the swivel top of the cooler, thrusting her hand down into the icy water and snatching out a can of Milwaukee's Beast. She huffs a lock of hair out of her face that's fallen from her pony tail, and offers Gideon a welcoming smile. "Hey Doc. Didn't know you made house calls. Heads up!" The last to Geoff as she underhand tosses the can his way, then back to Gideon. "Want a beer? Or a burger? We're celebrating the untimely death of my couch. I can introduce you to some of my family."

She uses the her iced hand to ring the back of her neck. "Ooh, do you have a kiddy pool, Aidan? We can fill it up and stick our feet in it to keep cool."

"Not normally. Special case. Mrs. Cahill..." Gideon motions down to the trailer he just exited. "...used to babysit me when I was little. And she doesn't have a car, so..." He wobbles his head. "I'm, uh, more or less a vegetarian. But thanks." Which doesn't explain the no to the beer. He stands there a big awkwardly. Well, more than a bit. "Uh, rest in peace to your couch?" He twitches a small smile.

Geoff catches beer easily enough and cracks it open, tilting it back to enjoy several deep gulps of it before he lets out a small sound of appreciation "Thanks for that, I appreciate it like you wouldn't believe." to one of the kids running on by he says "He Travis, run over and grab that can of gas I got beneath the deck." because putting a fourteen year old in charge of gasoline in a great idea. Whether Gideon wants a burger or not, he's getting one as Geoff is already plating it up and passing it towards the man.

Aidan tilts his head at Bennie, faintly puzzled. "That's what Bay said, too. You know you keep cooler if you put the rest of you in it too, right?" He grins, and shrugs, adding, "Though I guess if there's a lot of us, feet'll fit better. A bunch of us'd be like playing Twister." Now he's thinking about playing Twister in a kiddie pool. Of course he is. Catching Gideon's demurral, he offers, "We've got soda too! Also, hey, I'm Aidan, nice to meet you. You're a doctor?"

"Then we'd have to take turns!" Bennie chirps about the pool and putting the rest of her in it before Aidan draws the same conclusion. "We may be able to find you a tofu dog..." Bennie starts to tell Gideon as she takes a step back as a young dark skinned girl rushes past, "Careful Tee!" The blonde calls out with laughter in her voice after the girl wearing her hair in Mickey Mouse poofs goes chasing a frisbee. Collapsing into a plastic webbing lawn chair, she drags her arm over her forehead. "I'm sure it had it coming." She comments of her couch. "It was always a little shifty eyed."

Gideon eyes the plate being handed to him. He takes it out of politeness, but doesn't seem eager to eat. He does twitch another little smile. Then to Aidan, "Ah, a vet. Gideon." He doesn't seem to know what to do with himself. He sort of stands there, holding the plate, like a kid waiting to get picked last for dodgeball. "I don't want to interrupt. I feel like I'm interrupting."

Geoff seems pleased with Gideon takes the plate, giving the man a strong clap on the shoulder "The name is Geoff, good to have you at the party." tilting his beer back he takes another long swig from it before having to call out towards his trailer "No playing with matches." flashing a grin towards Aidan and Bennie he says "Kids, whatcha gonna do about them?"

"You can't interrupt a random trailer party," Aidan says, "...well, not just by showing up, anyway, unless you're, I dunno, Godzilla or bleeding heavily." He considers the way Gideon's holding that plate, and offers, "Want a seat? There's still some free." A gesture to the ones he just brought down; they look like they're in perfectly pleasant condition for fairly cheap beach-type chairs. He goes to claim a burger for himself, and, after a fleeting glance toward a couple of the trailers, one of the beers as well. "I dunno, capture the flag?" he suggests, giving Geoff a grin back.

"Or the Police!" Bennie offers who could crash a party, "But most of the time they just crack open a beer and join us too." She reaches out to lightly touch Gideon's elbow. "Please, stay. You're totally welcome. We'll just arm you with a water gun and if anyone gets too close, just shoot 'em." She's reaching for her own beer now, rolling the cold can against her cheek. "We should totally bonfire this bitch." The bitch in question being the trash pile of course.

"I just, I was...a dog..." then Gideon seems to give up. He sinks into one of the chairs, still holding the paper plate with burger, but not moving to eat it. "Thanks." His shoulders are rolled forward, but at least it doesn't look like he's going to imminently flee.

Geoff flips off the last of his burgers and plates it, before heading back to his trailer "I'll be right back out guys." He was not in fact, right back out.

Aidan gives Gideon a look like maybe for just a second he's considering whether the guy was in fact just a dog. Or maybe he's simply trying to work out why he seems so skittish. He sticks his unopened beer into his pocket and snags the water gun from where it hangs on Geoff's grill, now that Geoff's not here to object, and offers it over to the vet, making good on Bennie's suggestion. Well, the first one. To the second, he suggests, "We should, maybe at the beach? Beach bonfires are the best ones." And it definitely won't get the cops showing up or anything. "So is the dog okay now?"

"Hah! Are you going to drag it all the way down to the beach? It took me weeks just to get up the gumption to get it out of my living room." Bennie flips out a pocket knife and punctures the bottom of her can, then holds it to her mouth and cracks the tab. Apparently cleaning out her trailer is a shotgun beer kind of occasion. She gulps, and gulps with a little bit of amber liquid dribbling out the corner of her mouth and down her chin. Someone cranks some tunes. Children are laughing. And yes, someone sets off a bottle rocket.

"Well, the dog is old and has arthritis. The dog's more comfortable now." Gideon looks a little perplexed when he's armed with a water gun. "Thank you?" His face twitches again. He doesn't seem to fully smile so much as his facial tics kind of coalesce into something like a smile. "Sorry, I'm not...very good at parties."

"We can shove it in the van!" Aidan replies to Bennie. It comes quickly enough one might just about believe he'd actually thought about that before it was pointed out. "I know a couch fits in it, mine did." Gideon gets a bright grin at the thanks as if it hadn't had a questioning intonation. "Welcome! And good work on helping the dog, then. But not being good at parties is a good reason to stay at them. Practice makes perfect and all that. This is a pretty good training party." He gets around to eating some of his burger, and extracts the beer from his pocket again to wash it down, while watching the bottle rocket. A small nod. He was correct. It is awesome.

Bennie crumples her beer can between her two hands with a twist of the aluminum and then tosses it into the growing pile of trash. "Think of it less of a party and more of a casual get together of people who are are geographically similarly located?" The blonde offers helpfully, reaching for another beer and flicking icy water in Aidan's direction playfully. "Why does that sound dirtier than you probably meant it? What else can you fit into your van, Aidan?"

"I've been failing at parties my entire life. I'm...probably not going to get good at them anytime soon." Gideon's tone is self-effacing rather than self-pitying, and there's a wryness to his tone. That suggests he's actually relaxing, if only a little. Still not down with the beef, though, it seems, because he ends up setting the burger plate aside. He keeps holding the water gun though, because what else is he going to do with it. He squeezes the trigger and a little water dribbles down his leg.

"Okay, we can go with casual get-together of people who are in about the same place then," Aidan says, "Maybe it'll turn out you're good at those!" He barely gets that out before ice water's being flicked at him, and he gives a small startled yelp and steps aside before it turns into a laugh. "Man, what can't I fit in my van?" he replies to Bennie, grinning. "Couches, chairs, plastic flamingos," there are a couple outside the turquoise trailer he hauled chairs down from, "groceries..." He gives her a sidelong look and then an innocent one, "Once I had an entire soccer team in there." He finishes off his burger, and then helps Gideon out by picking up the plate with his, putting it on his empty one, and taking a bite of the sandwich. A young teenage boy who'd been heading their direction looks a bit put out, having apparently had designs on the burger himself, but alas for him Aidan doesn't immediately notice.

"Are we talking with or without their gear?" Bennie leans towards Aidan at the mention of the soccer team, chin propped on fisted up fingers but her serious expression can't hold out for long, and her smile splits wide on her features. Her feet kick out and she rolls to a stand. "Alright totally gotta pee."

"Well, you did just shotgun a beer," says Gideon to Bennie with one of those twitchy smiles again. And then to Aidan, "I do hope you didn't have more than the maximum safe weight in there." He deadpans that. Hard to tell if he's being serious, especially since he tends to avoid eye contact. "I, uh, I should go though. I have some fosters at home that need a walk. And some wildlife that needs feeding."

"With, we couldn't just leave it in the park!" Aidan replies, and intentional joke or not, the bit about the safe weight makes him laugh. "No permanent damage so I think it must've been okay." The leave-taking gets a slightly disappointed look, but then a nod. "Come back some time and practice casual get-together with us," he invites, and Bennie just gets a nod for her self-excusing. Her, he expects back. "Nice meetin' you!" He does notice the kid now, who's just turning away, and calls over, "Hey, Toby. Come take half this. Also I think Geoff might've left one over there..." Someone lets off another bottle rocket nearby, over the sound of the music, and overall, things look set to continue for a while.