2019-10-02 - Totally All Fine. Promise.

It is dead quiet. There hasn't been a case on Magnolia's desk in a week. She's luckily still floating on some cash earned from Byron and Easton, and this little job that had her locating someone's prized missing duck, so she spins around in her chair. She's got her head tilted back, eyes on the ceiling while she spins. Around and around she goes, not getting dizzy. Finally, she stops and looks over at Kevin, "Are you even getting any work done on this supposed 'telecommute' day?" Accusation central.

"I think the whole staff -- those still standing -- are just glad I'm not in there puking. And worse." Kevin still looks a little pale, and he's lost a little muscle tone, although it's difficult to see under his usual loose-fitting clothes. He's seated in the chair in front of the desk, the one that doesn't spin, and is looking a little jealously at Magnolia as she goes 'round and 'round, spinning her head right round, baby. His laptop is out, his socked feet up on the desk and the computer balanced on his thighs, "I tried to write a story about the flu, but every time I did, I started getting sick. And the story about the possible improvements along Oak Street sounded like an acid trip when I read back over it, so I canned it." There's a pause, and he adds, "So no."

"Hell-oooooo!" Bennie's sing song voice is what really announces her, even before her form shoulders through the door. With a basket over her arm, she looks like some Gray Harbor version of Little Red Riding Hood, only instead of a cape over her shoulder, she has a bright scarf wound around her neck and tucked into the collar of a light sweater. By all appearances, she's her jolly cheerful self, but those that know her well enough can see the shadows around her eyes, the wobble around the edges of her smile, and the stiffness in her gait.

"I'm not going to be able to be your sugar momma if you don't at least put in an effort getting paid, Kevin Walters." Magnolia has zero capabilities of being anyone's sugar momma, but she's going to tease Kevin because that's what Magnolia does. When she hears Bennie's voice, she stops spinning to turn toward the door with a bright smile settling into place -- but something about that smile twitches when Magnolia fully takes in Bennie. She puts her hands on her desk as she hauls herself up to her feet. "Benz, was I so sick that it's suddenly Halloween?"

"Wait, I thought I was gonna be your sugar daddy. Look, if you're going to be my sugar momma..." there's Bennie, and he cuts off. Kevin leans further back in his chair, tilting his head back to look at Bennie upside-down over the back of the chair. He instinctively half-closes the lid of the laptop so she can't see the game of Magic Online he's playing. "Oh hey..." that's cheerful, but he frowns slowly as he settles back down in the chair and turns around to face her, "Bennie." That's a little flatter, but he shrugs it off a little, "Where's the Big Bad Wolf? And I hope there's something yummy in that basket instead of weapons. I need to know which Little Red Riding Hood story we're in."

Bennie is normally very on top of innuendo and cheerful quips, but she just looks at them both dumbly for a moment, frozen in place. Blink. "Huh? Oh! Right. Trick or treat." The joke would be much more effective if it wasn't so delayed and delivered a bit flatly. "Kevin mentioned you were out of ginger ale, and on the off chance that you're both feeling better, there's some soup and fresh bread and OJ to help you get back on your feet a little faster." She plops the basket down on the edge of the desk. "How are we!"

"I don't know, Benz... how are we?" Now there's that look from Magnolia. She's stepping across the room toward her friend, and she offers to take the basket from the woman while giving her a serious look. "Bennie, what happened?" There's no room for argument or dismissal there. She glances over toward Kevin now, expecting back-up.

"Oh shit... that was like, days ago," Kevin sets the laptop up on the desk -- but pokes into the basket anyhow, because even after 11 days of being sick, ginger ale still sounds good. Twisting off the top, he takes a swig and offers it out to Magnolia. "Thanks though, Bennie. We appreciate the hell out of it." Now that he's out of the 'client chair,' he pats the back of it, "Sit down, take a load off." He moves over to perch on the corner of the desk like a real gumshoe, "Literally and figuratively."

The basket is held out at arm's length. The normally touchy feely woman who air kisses and never passes up on the opportunity for a hug is keeping her distance. "Was it?" Days ago. "Everything is still sort of blending together. Oh, you know the flu hit everyone pretty hard, but Gray Harbor will recover!" She even goes so far as to counter Kevin's movement, just a little subconscious side step. "I'm good." Quick to turn down the offer for a seat, "Just a little time between shifts, so I thought I'd stop by and check on you guys. Sorry I didn't have much of a chance before. Hard to play nursemaid when you need your own."

Magnolia frowns at her friend, even while taking the basket. She looks at it, and then to Kevin, and then to Bennie again. The PI usually so quick and snappy is holding back, taking in the other blonde with a little tilt of her head. Then she takes in a deep breath and advances toward her desk with the basket. "Yeah. It was shitty flu. I had Lark go stay with her grandma." Which would be Magnolia's mother, but who is keeping track. "She was fed too many M&Ms while I was gone." She pops down the basket and starts to dig into, frowning thoughtfully while she looks over to Kevin.

Keeping your distance from two people getting over the nasty-flu is reasonable, but it's still pretty different from Bennie, even as little as Kevin's crossed paths with her lately. He frowns a little, then nods at Magnolia, "Yeah. My dad did his best. Somehow he didn't catch it. So I don't think you're risking your good health being here, not for sure." Pausing a moment, he looks back over to Magnolia, "Wait, there's such a thing as too many M&Ms?" But he lets that drop, "We appreciate the check-up. This is the point where we poke around at you until you tell us what's going on, Bennie. I mean, we can totally dance around it for a while, right? But we've been nursed for more than a week, we'd like to help someone else."

"Isn't that what grandmothers are for!" Well, most grandmothers. Bennie tries to be positive, but here especially she fails. "If, you know, I thought it was from a place of love and spoiling Lark and maybe not some twisted underhanded slight against you personally." Bennie waves a hand at Kevin to dismiss his worries. "Just making the rounds. Most people seem on the road to recovery soon. Hopefully it'll be gone as soon as it came. I'm just tired. Went from sick to taking care of Easton nearly back to back. Trying to get back in the swing of things, but finding yourself lethargic is hard on a girl like me! So if you want to help, come get 3 am eggs and bacon from the diner and make sure I'm not asleep behind the counter."

Magnolia forgets the basket, turning now to rest her butt back into the edge of her desk with her arms crossed at her chest. She flickers her gaze briefly to Kevin when he just walks on through the door that she had been nudging around. But Bennie deflects, and Lia just shakes her head slightly at Kevin. "Alright, Benz. You're just acting weird. Like, you usually try to break my ribs, or choke me out, or suffocate me with hugs." But that's all she says before she's popping open the basket. "How about I send Lark down there at 3 AM instead? Is that illegal?"

Now there are two of them perched on the edge of the desk, and until Kevin reaches out to snag the ginger ale bottle again and take another swig, both with their arms crossed. He nods just a little at Magnolia's glance, then looks back to Bennie, "I'm pretty sure that means that she'd wake you up at 3:45 AM, Lia... so... um... maybe a little later than that? Or earlier?" But that's sidelong as he watches Bennie, "And yeah, we're feeling way better, and we're both totally glad that you're feeling better too, and Easton? He is feeling better, right?"

"Just germs!" Bennie's smile blooms fully, even if it doesn't get matched in her eyes. But she does look tired, so maybe that's all it is. "I CAN NOT afford to miss any more work. I think my bank account is crying. Easton's...kindly staying with friends for a few days to until he's back on top of this." Yup, it looks like she's just going to continue to play it off, though her hand futzes with the scarf at her neck pulling it higher. Damn fall chill, amiright? "Just a warning, any unattended children will be given three shots of espresso and a kitten."

Magnolia narrows her eyes slightly as she pops the tab on the ginger ale. She takes a sip as she continues that narrowed eye look, but then she lets it go. Again. This going to be in waves, people. She sips more of the ginger ale, and then she sighs out a quick breath. "I wonder how any of us stay flush anymore. We should ask Byron how it does it. Or just go live with Byron." She takes another drink from the can of soda. Then she snorts at the threat. "Espresso is fine. No puppies."

"I know, right? It's a good thing I'm on salary. I mean, theoretically a good thing." Kevin shrugs a little helplessly, "Until it comes time to do overtime. And it would be better if the salary was higher. A lot higher." His eyes flicker down to the scarf, and he shakes his head, glancing over to Magnolia, "No puppies and no living with Byron -- even I get jealous of someone that pretty. And he does it by working harder than any two people, I'm pretty sure." Casually, in the same breath, he drops, "How are the bruises, Bennie?"

"Hey, sometimes fuzzy animals are all that keep a girl going. And yeah, Byron always has the 'next best thing' in the pipeline. Even when we were kids, he had all these lucrative ideas. Pretty sure his childhood lemonade stand was somehow an effective Ponzi scheme." Bennie shifts the ever present weight of her overly large purse by running her thumb beneath the strap. She gives Kevin a big doe eyed blink, "Hmm? Which?"

Now Magnolia sighs out a short breath when Kevin just goes ahead and swings for the nail head. She squints slightly at him, quite perturbed a moment. "Is this how you do your investigative journalisming? Just ask the question outright?" She then looks at Bennie. "Seriously, girl... it's alright. We all know there's something going on here, but honestly... you tell me and maybe Kevin," she gives him a vague hand-waving, "when you're ready." Or when Magnolia gets the truth by being a noisy PI and snooping around where she shouldn't.

"It was," Kevin confirms, "Or at least, a bunch of the money went into marketing, which was him, while only a little bit made it down to the squeezers and pourers, which was me and... I think it was Tobin." The thinks for a moment, "Still more money than we would've made delivering papers or anything, but..." Shrugging that off, he reaches up to adjust his glasses, then looks over to Magnolia, "It's how I try to help a friend, okay Lia?" And then he's back to Bennie, "And yeah. I can totally butt out, or Lia can, or we both can. But seriously, we want to help, Bennie."

"Nothing to help with! Trust me." Bennie ducks her head a little, feeling chided perhaps, as she curls a falling lock of hair around her ear. "Anyway, I'm going to dash. Check on Sutton and see if the dangerous blonde duo is going to be back on the rig this week. I'll catch y'all later!" Insert attempt at reassuring smile here as she breezes towards the door with a, "Kiss kiss!" In parting.

Magnolia's jaw tightens a bit at the words from Kevin, and she looks like she's getting her feathers ruffled up, ready to bite back. But then Bennie is leaving, and she starts forward several quick steps, "Bennie, wai -- " And then she's gone. Like the wind. She slumps back into her desk, and she glares slightly at Kevin. "Nice going." Then she rubs slightly at the bridge of her nose. "Something's happening. Something happened."

Kevin grimaces a little as Bennie ducks away, holding up his hands, "Okay... okay, I'm wrong..." He pauses a heartbeat, "Look..." grimacing, he just goes with, "Bye, Bennie." He slumps himself, wilting a little under the glare from Magnolia, "Look I..." he blows out a breath, "Yeah. I screwed up. I'm sorry. And yeah, something happened." His brows rise worriedly, "You think she's got bruises under the scarf too, right? I mean, I didn't think she'd stick around for us to ask 20 questions, but I do think I screwed up."

Magnolia sinks down against the edge of the desk with a heavy exhale. She squints slightly at door that is now closed, the reverse lettering of SNEAKERS reflecting slightly in the hallway light. Then she looks down, rubbing at her arms as she thinks through Kevin's questions. "Yeah... I think so. I've seen that trick before." She shifts uneasily. "I've used that trick before." She looks down, and then back up at Kevin. "She doesn't want to tell us, so she doesn't want us to know, so that means -- either shitty Veil stuff, or someone she knows."

Kevin looks sidelong over to Magnolia, his frown building over his glasses before he reaches out for Magnolia's arm. She said her ex-husband was horrible. She might have even mentioned he was abusive. But that kind of makes it real. He squeezes lightly, his eyes tightening. "Or she's embarrassed, right? And yeah. She's either trying to protect us or she's embarrassed or she's trying to protect whoever did it." There's a pause, worry strong in his expression, "It's always someone you know, isn't it?"