2019-08-27 - Nightmares and Bookscapes

Eleanor is a little bit late getting home from locking up the coffee shop for the night. She also pulls her Honda Element into the driveway at a rather high rate of speed, screeching it to a halt. She gets out and rushes to the door, starting to unlock the various locks, unsure if August is there or not, or maybe forgetting entirely in her rush to get inside and secure the book she brought home.

She's in denim shorts and a cute pale green peasant blouse, with her hair back in a messy bun, and sandals on her feet, and it looks like she's been running at top speed from the sheen of sweat on her forehead.

August is, in fact, already back from work, and has gotten to some dinner prep: homemade pizzas. He's cooking in part to take his mind off the fact that he had not one but three nightmares last night, and probably didn't help Eleanor get much in the way of sleep as a result.

He's in the process of rolling out the crusts when Eleanor pulls up, and the screech makes him frown. He sets down the rolling pin, washes off his hands so he can come out of the kitchen and greet her on her way in. Seeing the sweat, he asks, "Are you okay?" glancing past her. He's not sure what he expects to see; someone chasing her?

Eleanor closes the door behind her and refastens all of the locks again, before she sets her back to the door and lets out a breath. "I think so. Just had some weirdness happen to me, back at work. And I brought it with me. I wanted to get it here and make sure I didn't imagine it's existence before I secure it." She holds out her bag to him. "Tell me you see a book in there? Don't touch it though!"

August is in his 'home from work' clothes, which is a set of dark gray commuter pants and a soft, dark-red t-shirt. He's still got his socks on; his workboots are in the entry-way, to keep the carpet safe. (Same way he does things at home.) He frowns, even more concerned than before, leans over to look into the bag like it might contain a rattlesnake.

In the backpack is a regular assortment of crap you usually find in a purse, as well as a book. It's the book that she is clearly asking about, as it has a bit of a shine to it, a glimmer of its own. The spine bears the words Fractured Island as does the cover, but there is no author listed.

Eleanor murmurs, "It was suddenly on the shelf in my office. Do you see it?"

"Yeah," August says, voice low, like the book might be able to hear them talking about it. He blinks a few times as he watches the initially unreadable text slowly morph into English. "It's..." He looks up at Eleanor, back down at the book. Presently, he says, "It's like us. It shines." Glimmers, sings. "And the writing, it wasn't in English for the first couple seconds there. But now it is. Fractured Island." He bobs his eyebrows at that. "So this just, showed up in your office?"

"Yes, and I picked it up, took it to my desk, took photos with my phone camera, and then I opened it," Eleanor confesses. She closes the bag up again and beckons him into the office. She presses on one end of a floorboard and several of them hinge upwards, revealing a floor safe. She begins putting in the code for it.

"When I opened it and started to read the story, I got sucked into it." She looks over her shoulder at August and waves a hand dismissively. "Not like it was an absorbing narrative, like I became a character in the story. I could feel the rain, smell the ozone in the air from the lightning the storm was generating, hear the sounds of the asylum on the island. At first I was locked into a script, it felt like, but after a little bit, i was able to create my own dialogue and actions, interacting with the other characters in the book. I only came back out, because Agent K tried to get me to go into a forested area on an ATV and, well, you know how well I handle woods."

August trails behind Eleanor into the office, crouches down next to her at the floor safe. "This is where you keep the dangerous stuff?" He can relate; he has a gun safe, after all.

He listens to her description, brow furrowed, staring at the book the whole time. "So like it was trying to drag you into it, somehow. Like it's some sort of...portal. Or trap." He raises his eyebrows, waits to see what she thinks of that description.

Eleanor nods back to him. "Yes, stuff I don't want getting into the wrong hands, or innocent hands," she admits. She opens the safe and pulls on a pair of heavy gloves which are hooked onto the lid. Then she uses them to carefully take the book out and set it in the safe with a few other bits and bobs that may or may not be dangerous. A doll with it's face covered, a set of muffled antique windchimes, an old fountain pen. She removes the gloves, returns them to their hook, and closes the safe. It locks again with a hardy CLICK.

"When I balked hard at the forest, it was like my subconscious reminded itself it was a book, and I closed it. I don't remember doing so myself. But suddenly I was back in my office and the book was shut with my hand on the cover." Eleanor gets up and replaces the wood flooring with a softer click of the latch.

August runs a hand over his face. He is definitely feeling the low quality of what little sleep he got. He watches the book go into the safe, eyes the other things inside it. Each one no doubt has a story. He reaches out to run his hand over Eleanor's back, in part to reassure himself she's right there. "I'm glad it didn't managed to actually suck you in," he says on a weak, wry smile.

"Me too," she admits. "If I look into this one further, I need to make sure I'm not alone to do so." She rises and looks him over, noting the exhaustion written on his features. "Last night was really bad, wasn't it?" she asks him quietly, putting a hand to the side of his face to stroke his beard. She seems to love the sensation of that, as she does it quite a bit. "How much sleep did you actually get?"

"Yeah," August says of the book. "What can you even do about something like that? Find a library Over There and...return it?" He doesn't seem to actually expect an answer, just turns his face into Eleanor's hand and kisses her palm. "It wasn't one of my better nights. I hope I didn't keep you up with all of that." He manages a small smile. "I got some. Enough to do work, not enough for Cy to let me near a harness. I got to do paperwork and greenhouse shuffling today." He puts a hand over hers, stays like that a few seconds. "I was gonna make us some pizzas. Got a bunch of toppings we can toss on them, brought my pizza stone last night. Sound good?"

"That sounds amazing. I can tell you all about the story in the book at least. It was some place called Red Gull Island, and I'm pretty sure this was one of those mystery thriller stories. I read a lot of those, admittedly." She heads back into the kitchen so she can help him cook.

August trails after Eleanor, with a final glance over his shoulder at the hidden spot on the floor. "I was just rolling out the crusts. You can start adding on things soon as it's done." There's a series of prep bowls with a few options: bell peppers, onions, mushrooms, olives, red sauce, a larger bowl with big chunks of fresh mozzarella, and a couple of bowls with pepperoni, salami, and sausage. There's one additional, smaller bowl with a mix of olive oil, crushed garlic, and some herbs in it. He takes up the rolling pin to finish with the first one, dusts it with flour and resumes turning the disc of pizza dough into a crust. "Red Gull Island," he repeats. "And you said it had an asylum on it?"

"Eversun Asylum, it was called. I was Agent A. I was the partner of Agent K, who looked like one of those typical men in black sorts of secret government agents. We were there to see Doctor Louis about an escaped patient who had some sort of control over energy. His name was Walter Haven, Patient 4520. He looked about 18 years old from his file. We were there to capture him with these weird stun gun things we had." Eleanor chatters away about the story as she works on one of the pizzas. She brushes the entire crust with the olive oil mixture before adding red sauce, mozarella, all the meats, black olive, and mushrooms.

August works on the second crust, glancing between Eleanor and it as he goes. Once it's rolled out he brushes the olive oil mixture over it and spreads on the sauce. "Sounds like the sort of story where you find out the asylum is actually tormenting the kids, or something along those lines, and the agents have to decide whose side they're really on, or to blow the whole thing open." He glances up between placing pieces of mozzarella to smile at her. "I might, read some things like that," he admits.

Eleanor smiles and shoulder bumps him lightly at their shared reading likes. "That was the impression I was getting. It looked like things weren't above board and I felt like that doctor and his assistant were hiding things. There were only paper records in a heavily locked room. That's not suspicious at all." She snorts.

"There was a really bad storm coming in and there were some ground tremors that I think were caused by the patient, but I wasn't positive. We went into some sort of building where there were ATVs and there was a gate system leading out into the wild there. That was when I balked and woke up. I wonder if I looked good in the suit though."

August returns the bump, adds a kiss to the top of Eleanor's head. "Absolutely above board," he agrees, wry. He glances over his shoulder to check the oven temp, gives Eleanor a once over. "I'm reasonably sure you looked amazing in it. And my opinion is completely objective, so you can trust it." He smiles, a real proper one. "Okay, ready to put yours in? Only takes about fifteen to twenty for them to cook on the stone."

"Ready!" she declares, blushing at the compliment. She lets him take the reins on that because she has no clue how to get it from counter to stone. "And don't worry about keeping me awake. If you need to talk after one of those dreams, please talk to me, August."

August waggles his eyebrows, reveals his trick: the crusts have been rolled out onto parchment paper. He pulls that onto a cutting board as a make shift pizza peel, then carefully tugs it from there onto the stone. "This parchment's okay up to 500," he says. "No need for a peel if you don't want to cook above 450, really." He adds his to the stone, closes up the oven and sets the timer.

After he's washed his hands he moves to slip his arms around Eleanor. "I don't always...wake up from them properly. They just sort of stop and I fall back asleep. But sometimes I do. But if I do, I will." Something about the topic of keeping her awake makes him smile, but he doesn't say what's on his mind.

She slides into his arms and tilts her head up to give him a wry smile. "You know, I really wouldn't mind if you kept me awake for other reasons, August," Eleanor offers, before turning scarlet at that bit of innuendo.

August's smile grows at the blush. He ducks his head and brushes his lips over Eleanor's. "And here we just put those in the oven," he murmurs. He kisses his way down her neck, each one light and lingering. "I'm perfectly happy to lose a few hours sleep with you." A final kiss at the hollow of her throat. "After we eat, because I'm starving."

The red sauce has NOTHING on Eleanor. As his kisses trail along her skin, she lets out a shuddery breath and a little sound of delight. "After dinner then, right, yes, that mmhmmm...right...after....dinner." Here's to hoping she doesn't burn her tongue trying to set a landspeed record for eating pizza.

One last light kiss for Eleanor's lips, then August pulls away from her to start cleaning up with a wicked little smile. Because there's zero chance that's happening later, and pizza really does result in a lot of cleanup. "I got some ice cream too, but maybe we can have that tomorrow." He almost but not quite breaks into a laugh when he says it.

Eleanor's face when he seems to indicate there will be further delay for ICE CREAM is a thing to behold. She looks like someone just told her the Russians launched all their nukes at Gray Harbor. Then she seems to get that he's joking. She puts on an aggrieved sigh and tells the ceiling, "...and here I was going to be wearing his flannel shirt....JUST his flannel shirt..."

August laughs, manages to get himself under control. In a diplomatic tone, he says, "Please don't let me dissuade you. We can save the ice cream for tomorrow. Or, you know, later. Between proceedings." He gives her an innocent look, focuses on washing the bowls and rolling pin for a minute.

Yes, she is scarlet from toes to ears at this point. But there is also a gleam in Eleanor's eyes. "Keep that up and I'm going to point out pizza can be parbaked and thrown in the freezer..."

"If you don't want me passing out from low blood sugar in the middle of things then we need to wait for the pizza." August barely holds back another laugh. Barely.

It's a few more minutes before the pizzas are done, during which time August refrains from further comments and keeps his hands to himself. He doesn't stop giving Eleanor the occasional look, maybe imagining her in the flannel. He doesn't do anything so foolish as insist on letting the pizzas cool (he suspects that might get knocked down right there in the kitchen), but he doesn't dive into his until he's sure it's not going to burn his mouth. Some Rainier cherry sodas to drink to go with them, a nice light, fizzy flavor.

"Cool, damn you, cool!" Eleanor encourages her pizza. "Why aren't there glimmer powers for reducing the temperature of your food!? Why has no one come up with those!" She is getting wound up like a top, getting up to open the freezer and waft cold air over her food to try and get it to non-molten-lava level as fast as possible.

August stands to one side, hand over his mouth to hold back more laughter. This is a losing battle, and when he succumbs it takes him a second to sober enough so he can say, "I think they're cool enough," and get out some plates for them. He slices the pizzas carefully with the pizza cutter--the one thing not Eleanor which he pays close attention to--and now, now! They can eat.

To his credit, August doesn't proceed to work through his pizza at a glacial pace. Nor does he scarf it down; he keeps an eye on Eleanor, though, noting when she's likely to be done.

Eleanor starts scarfing it down, then seems to realize that is about as sexy as Ernest Borgnine in a speedo, and slows her pace to something still rapid, but not at the speed of a stoned fratboy. "It's really good," she notes.

August doesn't mind the scarfing. If anything, he's flattered. Nothing says 'I'm into you' like 'homemade pizza be damned let's get down to business'. "Thank you. I always prefer home made." Despite his amusement with the situation surrounding their dinner, he's quite sincere. "Not that delivery isn't good too, just, it's worth it if you can find the time."

He manages to finish about the same time Eleanor does. If the prep for pizza is hefty, the cleanup is a snap. Plates into the dishwasher, parchment into the trash, and they're good. So maybe in the end it was the faster option.

And the moment that is done, Ellie gives him a ‘wait here’ sign. She disappears into the bedroom and master bath, with the sound of furiously rapid teeth brushing. When she emerges in the doorway, she strikes a (oh lord girl you’re a dork) awkward sexy pose wearing his flannel, as promised.

August nods and stays put, leaning casually against the kitchen counter. He nods in appreciation for the teeth brushing, and since there's two bathrooms, takes the time to do that himself. (They were just having pizza with a garlic spread on the crust after all.) He's just come back out of the other bathroom when she emerges. There she is, in that shirt of his that went not-so-mysteriously missing.

He doesn't even care that the pose is dorky. It's the last thing on his mind, because regardless, it's for him. So he takes his time, enjoying the sight for what it is.

When he finally pushes away from the kitchen counter, he's smiling in a way that's too mischievous to be any good. "So that's where that went," he says, toying with the collar. He leans in, presumably to kiss her, but what he does is pick her up. "I've kept you waiting long enough," he says, and carries her into the bedroom.