2019-08-16 - Baggage is Overrated Too

Kelsey wandered around Gray Harbor fairly often in her free time. Today she's at the Boardwalk. Eating through a bag of blue and purple cotton candy, idly people watching while she walked. She's, as always, keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary. Her hair is down and her attire is a pair of black jeans with tears in them and a green tank top. The Boardwalk is starting to thin out a bit. That lull between the daytime crowd and the evening one.

Tyler is leaning against the railing of the boardwalk, staring off at the water. He's wearing a pair of board shorts and a pale blue tank top as he holds an iced coffee in his hands. Glancing around as he relaxes in the sun, he notices Kelsey, and tilts his head a bit, watching her. Waiting to see if she notices him.

Kelsey feels eyes on her. She's a hyper aware sort, but she doesn't look over right away. She walks a few more strides, waiting to see if the watcher stops watching. They don't. So she turns on her heels, ready to rail on someone for being a creep - then she sees who's watching. And realizes she knows them. It's the red head from the gym, and the forest. Thomas...Teddy...Tyson? No. Tyler! Yeah, that was it. She stares back for a second or two before finally walking towards him. "What's up?" Tilting the bag of cotton candy towards him so he could take some if he wanted.

Tyler smiles, "Cotton candy?" He laughs, kind of amused at the sight. "Enjoying the nice day. Not enough time to get out the surf board, so I'm really just hanging out." He leans his back against the rail, takes a drink of his iced coffee. "What brings you out here? Just craving sugar?"

"Yeah I guess it's alright out. Enjoying the last little bit of summer we got." Kelsey shrugged and tore off another piece. "What's wrong with cotton candy? It's fucking delicious." Popping the piece in, letting it melt in her mouth. "Nothing weird's happened at the Boardwalk lately. So I figure it's safe enough for today at least." As much as Kelsey loves (and maybe quietly obsesses over) the weird - she's okay with a little bit longer of a breather before unwillingly getting pulled in. "How'd your work out with Elias go the other night?"

Tyler shrugs, "He's um... You know, for all the great he is, he's also kind of ridiculous. He lifted like ten pounds four or five times and then was tired." With a little laugh, Tyler adds, "It's okay. Honestly, I invited him to the gym as a joke. I never actually expected him to say yes."

Kelsey chuckled at that. "Well, weight lifting isn't for everyone. Definitely not gonna be doing it all the time myself. My arms felt like noodles the next day and I didn't even lift that much." She admitted, moving to lean against the railing. Another laugh, "But then you had to follow through so he didn't call your bluff?" A wry smile. Studying the younger man for a moment. "So, you've lived here all your life right? That's what you said. What weird shits happened to you?" Clearly expecting him to divulge a little something since she shared her thing about the worms.

Tyler grins, "Yeah. I don't think he'll be going back, but who knows?" He lifts his brow a bit at her question. "I have. Things are always off around here. Especially for folks like us. I don't know how gifted you are, but I can tell you, the curtain that divides this world from the dream world is all kinds of tore up here. It makes dreams happen more, and bigger. Sometimes it's just odd things. Like a couple weeks ago, it was like, everyone just had terrible luck. I lost my keys three times and kept burning my toast. I've never done either of those things before or since."

Kelsey nodded as she listened. "Yeah, it didn't take long to notice. I uh. Well, I had a moment in North Dakota. When I was there...details are fuzzy but I'm pretty sure I-" She started, re-evaluated what she was going to say, and then continued. "Made some big things fly across a large room." There, good enough."Anyway. Nothing like it happened again until I came here. I can, uh...open doors. Push back the curtain." She confided quietly. "So I've been trying to study the area...the things in it."

"Elias just figured out he can force the curtain open," Tyler says, glancing around to make sure no one's paying any attention to them. He takes another drink, and swallows. "We're planning to do it, cross over, and see what we can learn. He's worried though. The other side of what happens here is that with the thin curtain comes more of the dark people."

"Let me know when you do. If you want an extra hand. It's dangerous over there. And yeah...increased use of our...talents. Encourages them out of the woodwork. I've been trying to lure one...I want to see if there's some way to actually lay eyes on one." Sighing softly. "Anyway. It's beautiful...scary...an experience. But, always keep your guard up."

Tyler studies her for a moment. He's thinking something, but he doesn't say it. Instead he nods, and stares off at a sunglass booth. Then he turns, leaning his elbows on the railing and staring off at the water. "You want to lure one. Have you ever actually seen one?" Then he looks at her, waiting.

"Oh no. No no. Say it. Whatever's on your mind. I'm a big girl - I can take it." Kelsey mused, gaze lingering on him and then looking back out over the water as well. Though she doesn't look back when he turns his attention back to her. "Nah. I haven't. But I wanna." She says it and something about the way she says it sounds like she's pretty damn determined to make it happen. "How about you? Ever laid eyes on one? Or just the fruits of its feeding?"

Tyler doesn't say whatever it was. Instead, he just moves along with her question. "They are attracted to when bad things happen. People weeping over a dead loved one. Children lost because they don't understand what it means to see their home burn to the ground. The trauma of a car crash. It's not even the accident itself, but the feelings the accidents cause that they seem to feed off of. So, yeah. I have. I'm a fireman." He takes another drink of his coffee and then asks, with no judgement in his tone, "Why do you want to see one? When you lure one out, what do you plan to do?"

He doesn't say his thing, Kelsey isn't so inclined to answer this next line of questioning. "A fireman huh?" Focusing on that for a minute. "Yeah, sounds like a magnet. They feed off negative emotions. Fear. Anger. Sadness. All that, you're right in that respect." She kept her gaze on the ocean. Falling quiet again. Exhaling. "I wanna kill it. But, pretty sure that's impossible." She finally looked to Tyler again, pushing a hand through her hair. "So it might just be a death wish. We'll see what happens. It's gonna take a lot more research and study."

"You want to kill it?" Tyler turns to lean his elbow on the railing and face her. "Why kill it? Assuming they even can be killed, they may just be doing their part of some kind of balanced cycle for all we know. You don't kill a lion for being a lion."

"It's absolutely none of your business." Kelsey says flatly. Clearly done with that line of conversation. Eating another piece of cotton candy. "Like I said, it's probably impossible anyway." But that's all she adds to it. "So what can you do?" New conversation? "What sorta special abilities you go?" Wiggling her fingers some.

Tyler smirks, and rolls his eyes. "Oh. You have baggage." He sighs, shaking his head. "I told Elias you had a secret. He didn't believe me." He finishes the coffee and takes a few steps to the trash, dropping the cup in there. "I'm not that powerful. Sounds like you and Elias got all the skills. I pick up flutters of people's emotions, but that's about it."

"Everyone's got fucking baggage." Kelsey rolls up her cotton candy bag and straightens up. "Everyone's got secrets. I don't have many. I'm an open book about almost everything. Just not that particular area. Give it a few more years, I'm sure you'll need a luggage cart." She's trying not to get worked up and it's failing. One. Two. Three...Eight. Nine. Ten. She exhales slowly, closing her eyes. "Yeah?" Latching on to the other part of their conversation and opening her eyes again. "That seems kinda useful. Practice makes perfect I s'pose. Tricky line to walk though. Between wanting to improve and not wanting to get your shit pushed in by these things."

"Baggage is overrated," Tyler declares. "My mom died in a fire when I was a kid and my dad is in jail. Sometimes bad things happen and there's nothing you can do about it but get over it. You especially don't want to be carrying that baggage when you're face to face with a dark thing." He offers a smile then, "Who knows. Maybe we'll figure out they aren't really so bad and letting them burn it all down is the best thing we could do." He laughs at that, and then knocks on the wooden railing. "I have to be at the station in a couple hours, so I need to get going." He pulls out his cell phone, "Gimme your digits, though. Maybe you can tag along when we cross over if Elias is cool with it."

Kelsey's jaw works, like she has a few things she's going to say to this fucking kid. But, by some miracle, she manages to shut it down. There was a visit to Kelly's Gym in her near future. "Right." She stares at his phone a moment. As if debating on withdrawling her offers for help entirely. Inner debate. Then she takes his phone from him and puts in her number. When she hands it back he will find that she's put herself in under the name 'Baggage.' "See you later Red." Not waiting around for his own farewell before walking off. Some random lucky (unlucky?) person gets a half finished bag of cotton candy shoved into their unsuspecting hands as she makes her way off the Boardwalk.