2019-10-11 - Tribal Affairs

The sun has almost completely sunk in this fall day and Isabella can be seen running through the beach, her ponytail swinging as she jogs across the sand. She's dressed in attire for running, and in layers during the Fall; a runner's hoodie, yoga pants, and a tank top underneath her outerwear. There's an appreciative glance to her surroundings as she goes; being near the water always puts her in an easy, if not completely good mood.

The ravages of her recent bout of illness remains on her; at least five pounds have been taken off her face and figure, the hollows underneath her cheekbones more pronounced. But her green-gold eyes are as keen and alert as ever, and they roam over the landscape so close to the docks. She's on her way home, she has a lot of work to do, but she enjoys the beach no matter what the season, so her quick clip slows to a more manageable jog.

Andy doesn't look a lot better, having lost a good ten pounds after a week and a half of pure misery, and it wasn't all a good ten pounds to lose. Still, he's looking hale enough while he argues with someone in front of a houseboat that has a FOR SALE sign out front. "...told you it needs to have some kind of railing on the backs and sides." The realtor tries to argue, but on realizing he's not going to win this one heads back inside to see if he can get the seller to drop the price or add railing themselves. Andy, dressed in a that classic off duty outfit of loose jeans and a t-shirt that says GOTTA HAVE MY BEANJUICE with a pair of medium-flight shades hanging from the collar. When the realtor goes back inside Andy stands there waiting for something to happen, then looks at his phone, then looks back up to see if the realtor is coming back down, then looks back at his phone but kind of annoyed now.

It's the FOR SALE sign that catches her attention first, Isabella slowing down the closer she approaches, a curious gaze diverted in that direction. But when she recognizes the man standing in front of it, she stops short, surprise flitting across her face. She wipes off her sweat with the back of her hand, before moving towards him, lifting fingers in a slight wave. "Hey, Andy. I didn't expect to run into you again so soon." Another glance at the prospective houseboat. "Thinking about moving into the neighborhood?"

"Oh, are you the friend of Erin's that lives out here? Yeah, I rented a houseboat for about a year in Portland. Though at that point I only had the one dog, so I'm not sure how good an idea this is." Andy turns away from the boat to look to Isabella with a half smile. "You look like you've been through a similar hell as myself." In fact he came down with the Martian death flu shortly after meeting her on the beach! Coincidence, right? "That wasn't a fun week. But I've always wondered what it would be like to spend an entire day crying while laying down in my shower, so I guess I have that life experience to never forget."

"She might have other friends that live around here, but maybe it's me," Isabella replies with a laugh, and a smile that only grows in both prominence and brightness when he drops the next few quips. "Well, hopefully you didn't cry too hard, and even then, at least nobody saw." She pauses, and squints at him playfully. "Unless you weren't alone at the time, in which case, you had a way better time being sick than I did. It was all...aches and misery, and so much takeout because I can't cook worth a damn." How many delivery boys did she manage to infect that entire time? Probably too many to count. "Not that I couldn't keep anything down by mid-week."

Her expression grows a touch more serious. "Actually, I've been hoping to run into you. I was thinking of trying you at Erin's place. Have you heard about the casino project that's on the news lately?"

"I've been paying a lot less attention to the news than I should have. There's been a lot of, uh, personal stuff happening. Kept my attnetion far more than things usually would have." Andy grimaces, mouth tightening into a thin line before he adds, "But I've heard some stuff. Going in at the Seaview, right? Or near it. Maybe in the water, like some kind of Aquacasino? Or all underwater? That didn't work out well for Rapture." He gives a slight shrug. "Seems like an awful idea. Casinos bring money and jobs, but they also bring crime, ramp up divorces, provide lots of business to pawn shops and increase alcoholism something like 80% when they go in. So there's good, but mostly it's the opposite." A brief pause, then, "Of course I say this as someone who has a tribal stake in the Quinault resort and casino, so maybe I'm a huge hypocrite with a conflict of interests."

"Yeah." Isabella's reply is quiet there, before she lifts her hands up to remove her earbud headphones, tucking them in the pockets of her hoodie, before her fingers follow. "Human motivations are complicated like that," she tells him without judgment. "I'm not going to lie and say I know what it's like - because I don't, but I think you can benefit from something while recognizing the flaws within it. I'm honestly glad that you do, to be honest." There's a quick smile there, but it soon fades as she expels a quiet breath.

"I've been volunteering for the environmentalist group that's been retained to consult in the case, for the plaintiff - Joseph Pursley, the guy trying to stop the casino from being built. His lawyers put me in as part of the potential expert witness list given my involvement and interest in marine conservation since it's tied on some level to my work as an underwater archaeologist." Pollution damages finds in the deep, after all. "The chances of me being called are nill, anyway, since I'm not a trout expert and that's largely where the crux of his arguments are going to be. But you can imagine my surprise when two detectives show up at my door one day and tell me that the Kruger double murder might be connected to all of this."

She purses her lips. "I've done my own research on the background of the case, in the event that I do get called to testify, no matter how remote the chance. Can't hurt to be prepared, right? But I promised the detectives and a freelance investigator working on the case that I'd tug on the resources I have to see if I can dig up more information about the players in the game. The defendant, Joshua Foster - I knew he was responsible for making the Quinault flagship casino fly, but no one seems to know much about him, not even the detectives. But with that behind him, his profile in your community must be somewhat significant. I was wondering if you would be willing to ask around about him."

Andy mostly just listens as she tells the story of her involvement in the current casino-related intrigue, one eyebrow climbing upward starting at the 'underwater archaeologist' as an expert witness and reaching a forehead apex when she mentions cops showing up at her door. Of course their suspicions aren't exactly news to him, but playing it cool and just nodding is very much part of the job. "I haven't been back to the res for any reason other than to clean out my family's old house in years. I'm not sure how much trust I'll merit up there. But, hell, I speak the language and I'm sure there are people who remember my Gran." He glances away, looking, perhaps unconsciously, off in the direction of the reservation to the north. "Maybe even my father. Hm. Sure, I can go up there and see what people think. Though I wouldn't be surprised to hear everyone agree that he's a living saint if for no other reason than that there are plenty of people who work at the casino and just as many who don't, but still make money off of it. Every member of the nation is entitled to a cut. Which is how you end up with situations like the Chukchansi, who are kicking out members of the tribe for not being 'native enough', but really it's so the shares of the casino get bigger for those who remain. Like some kind of fucked up tontine." Andy reaches down and pats his right arm, his nicoderm patch showing under his sleeve, and shakes his head. "Sorry. Didn't mean to go too much into how weird native politics can get."

She follows his eyes when he looks off towards the direction of the reservation in which he had grown up, though Isabella doesn't know that; there are hints of curiosity there, especially when he freely drops certain nuggets about his life - cleaning out the family's old house, suggestive that nobody lives there anymore, perhaps due to tragedy or something else entirely. The uncertainty as to whether his father is there, indicative that he either doesn't know where he is, or who he is. In the end, Archaeology is a discipline that takes an academic interest in how people have lived their lives - much of those principles directly affect how she interacts with others socially. She can't help but notice.

"I wouldn't be surprised, either," she says in clear and obvious agreement, her attention following the movements of his arm and noting the nicotine patch there. Sympathy crawls on her features in that regard, she's had to quit, also. Bad for diving. "It's not a problem, honestly if you want to go on about it more, I'll happily listen - I don't know much about the Quinault, or the Quileute." He made the distinction the last time they spoke, and she learns very quickly. "And the language and the customs are the reasons why I thought to approach you to begin with. I heard..." She hesitates. "...rumors. That the Quinault can be very secretive about this region. I can't blame them in the least, but I would never presume that I could simply walk into a reservation and start asking questions, and manage to get anywhere without offending someone. Like what you told me about my grave robbing."

"I was always told that even before the Europeans showed up and decided that some sacred ground would be an ideal place for a golf course and one of those developments where it's retail stores on the first floor and then four floors of five hundred thousand dollar condos that the Quinault Nation, which has always been about half a dozen loosely affiliated tribes, though the affiliation is a lot less loose now that we've stopped killing one another and there are white people all over the place, tended to avoid this area anyway. Sacred land. Not that that means much. The Wiyot consider Indian Island the center of all creation and when they got it back from the local government they basically started barbecuing on it every week, so it's entirely possible that what I've heard is nonsense." Andy gives a soft sniff and looks off toward the city. "Though I wouldn't blame them. Underneath all the malls and pizza places and Starbucks and west elms, is there a west elm here? Whatever, is a land older than the country in which it resides and older than the nations that founded that country and the languages spoken by those who live there. Some places are even older than the places right next to them. And a place doesn't get to be that old without picking up something from Tsikáti." He suddenly looks very much like someone who would like a cigarette. "There is an island up off of the coast of La Push, James Island, that the US turned over to the Quileute in the sixties. No one who isn't Quileute is allowed to go there, not even other members of the Quinault nation. It's older than the seas, they say. My father took me when I was a boy and I could feel the age of the place. I feel that in Gray Harbor sometimes." Beat. "A lot of the time." He gives a quick laugh. "I talk too damn much. Sorry. Yes, I will help. Let me see what I can do."

She listens with the rapt interest of a lifelong scholar, Isabella's eyes fixed on the man's profile and letting him transport her to a different time, a different place - a different body, if that is possible, drinking in not just every word but how the memories and the history affect him. There is a part of her that is cognizant of the fact that she will never completely relate to these experiences, but she can't help but be fascinated anyway - to hear unique terms and how a culture that is so vastly separate from her own is structured. She learns more about these two tribes within five minutes of speaking to Andy Geroux than the rest of her entire life put together, and when he finishes, she can't help but turn her eyes to the ground and wonder what the physical bones of Gray Harbor actually contain. "How did you end up here, if I may ask?" she wonders. "I don't mean to pry but...it's a small town and you don't seem to be that much older than me, everyone who was born here kind of knows or knows of one another at the very least."

She has so many questions; it's in her stare, the tone of her voice - especially the bit about James Island, where no one else is allowed to go (because of course that would snare her interest immediately), but she settles for that, unwilling to impose herself into those memories any further.

His laughter pulls a smile on her pliant mouth, a slight incline of her head at him. "Please, talk as much as you like. I mean, I'm learning something I never knew before, and I'm always appreciative of that. The next time we talk, I'm tempted to bring a tape recorder so I can interview you and take notes." And she sounds very serious about this. Still, there's both relief and gratitude when he pledges his assistance - especially in an area where it's culturally sensitive. "Thanks, Andy. I appreciate it."

"I grew up on the reservation with my mom and my Gran. At the time I remember it being magical, and not just in a 'wonderful and fantastic' sort of way, but more wondrous and fantastical. When Gran died we moved to Gray Harbor. Thirteen on I was a local. More local than the locals, though that joke has never quite flied. Flown? Flown. Graduated TSA High class of 2005. Then I turned and left this place behind like... well, just left it behind. I don't even know why. I was never embittered or anything. I liked high school and I loved my childhood." Andy gives a shrug, looking back to her with a faint smile. "But I left and, I don't know, when you're away from here? Things that were deep start to feel shallow. Like details kept swept away and stuff feels more fake. I told people my father was a bipolar gambler who only came through town when he was on a hot streak. But..." Andy trails off, smile fading into a pensive frown. Finally he says, "Anyway. I ended up in Portland for a few years so I could come up now and again to see my mom, but she got sick a few months back and now here I am. Up a dog and two houses. Life comes at you fast."

There is a lot of what Andy says that resonates with Isabella, especially with a few words he uses - a magical childhood, loving it and high school, and how leaving had left things here feel like a faded photograph; toned in grays and sepia, not quite real until one closes her eyes and Dreams. There are hints here and there, flickering over a face that is oftentimes too expressive for her own good. "I get it," is all she says however, picking at the inner linings of her pockets. "I've been gone for eleven years, all I wanted to do ever since I was young was to leave here. Not because my childhood was bad - honestly, I was luckier than most, compared to the other kids I grew up with." She thinks of Byron, and the rumors of abuse he suffered in his father's hands; Lilith and the man who raised her, perpetually drunk. "But because I wanted to see the world. Life's funny like that, yeah - sometimes things just go full circle. I thought to myself maybe I outgrew this place, was always a go-getter that way, but the longer I stay here, the more I discover the things I missed...second chances to get to know the people I passed by while growing up, things like that. And the longer I stay, the more I remember."

Mention of his sick mother has her features softening, however. "I'm sorry." Sincerely meant; she had recently lost hers to a murderer. "I was hoping your homecoming was due to better circumstances..." But this is how this town rolls, she thinks, with no small measure of bitterness. "Is she going to be alright?"

"She recently got bumped to two treatments a week, chemo, and it's taken a lot out of here. There's a local herbalist, uh, Caoimhe O'Brien, who has worked some miracles with her, helping her get some energy back. Mom loves her since she does the old ways herbalist stuff too and my great aunt Polly keeps trying to get her to take vitamin B-17 and alkali water to cure her cancer which is driving her nuts. But," and Andy's expression crumples here, only for a fraction of a second before he contains himself, but it's impossible to miss, "she's basically said that if they advise a third course every week she will stop accepting treatment. So we'll see. Her kids keep sending her gifts and get well soons. So hopefully she'll get better for them, since this would be a hell of a way to teach a bunch of second graders about cancer and death." With a wan smile he looks back to her. "If you don't mind me asking, what's your story? You seem exceptionally plugged in, given that you're a little bit of everywhere at times."

Chemo.

Her face twists at that, Isabella falling silent and when Andy's face crumples for just a fraction of a second - unable to miss it, knowing the kind of loss that he is facing, her hand lifts and if she's allowed, touches his arm lightly. "I wish I knew what to say," she tells him quietly. "I didn't know, Andy. I hope I didn't..." Didn't pry too much, or too hard. Didn't make him feel uncomfortable by asking about his mother.

It's brief, and light, and her hand falls to her side, somewhat awkwardly. She has never been comfortable with the softer side of the human emotional spectrum, leaning towards the sheer, active preference of planting a boot into doors, or diving in headfirst, or falling into trouble with all guns and bravado blazing, whatever is in her disposal. But that has never stopped her from trying, from reaching for significant connections that alleviate the yawning empty that had been torn into her, has she has lived with for over a decade. And she seems intent on keeping up the attempt, lips parted to speak, when he asks.

The silence lasts for so long it's almost as if she didn't hear him, or has decided to.ignore the question entirely. But eventually:

"....I had a twin," she offers, her voice pitched low and quietly. "We were connected from the womb. And I don't mean just...how it normally goes. It went beyond simply finishing one another's sentences. A month after we turned sixteen, he vanished...and I felt him go." She pauses, but to her credit, it doesn't last long and after a breath, she meets his eyes directly. "This town's always been strange, and my mother knew it, so she sent me away to live in New Orleans with my aunt. Boston, after that, though I think I told you about that part already. And then Oxford for my post-graduate studies. I came back here for work, and then I ran into a childhood friend who told me that someone was looking into my mother's family, because apparently they've always been plagued by strange deaths. Things just...spiraled crazily from there." Her face tightens further. "The serial killer over the summer, he murdered her. So...even if I wanted to get out of being plugged in, I can't. I won't." Her fingers balling into invisible fists, clutching hard against the lining of her pockets. "I have to help finish it."

As she tells her story it's clear that the cop in Andy, the agent, really, wants to ask more questions. Especially about a missing persons case that has apparently gone unsolved for just over a decade. But he won't pry further. She's telling a story and he doesn't want to disrupt that. Doesn't want to make certain things harder. And anyway, he's got access to those cold cases. If he wants to pry it'll be in an Official Capacity. Prying backed by the man, y'all! When she gets to the serial killer stalking Gray Harbor his expression hardens considerably. "I can understand that. You're in it. No way out but forward, they say. In that instance, like I did with Erin, I'll help any way I can. I may have been gone for a decade, but... but I'm still from this area. And I remember."

"I know." Isabella's smile warms and becomes all the more genuine, especially when he's so willing to throw his weight and unique insight behind the efforts that are trying to mitigate these disasters. "I know you would."

There's another long silence, somewhat awkward in the end - she isn't prone to talking about her history, let alone someone she had just met. But Andy was so open about his own background, so willing to converse without hesitation about the things that brought him here, the roots that drive him, that she is compelled to return the favor somehow. Quid pro quo in a more personal sense. But now that some of it is out, she can't help but sink into a pervasive sense of relief, and she rolls her shoulders back slightly. "Makes two of us anyway - not quite local, not quite outsider, right? Most of the people I know around here are either one or the other, it's not every day that I come across someone who occupies the same..." She gestures vaguely. "Limbo. That same gray area as me."

After a moment, she reaches into her wallet and fishes out a plain white card with the famous University of Oxford logo upon it, and hands it to him. "I'll update you with what I have about the casino thing and if you find anything out on your end, you do the same? Thanks again, Andy. I really appreciate this. And not just for the help, but for the insight."

"Limnal spaces," says Andy with another half-laugh. "That's what they'd say about people like us if they wrote a novel about the town these days. Literature loves its limnal spaces." When she holds out his card he takes it, glancing to the logo and then the number. "Not a problem. I was headed out there this weekend anyway, so I'll go where the locals go and see what they have to say." The card gets tucked away. "I'd give you my card, but you know where to find me. And if it's an emergency my number is nine one one." He holds up a hand. "I appreciate your trust. These things..." Half shrug. "Well, we get what we get and we don't get upset, as my mother said far too many times." At this point the realtor comes back out from the for sale boat, smiling like someone with very, very good news. Though he stops when he sees that his customer is occupied.

"I do know where to find you. Plus you could always text me so I have your number. There are ways." Isabella winks at him. "And I'm not un-resourceful, when I really want something done, or if I really want to find someone." There's a glance at the resurfaced realtor, before a comradely hand lifts to clap him lightly on the shoulder. "Anyway, I'm not about to get in the way of what is possibly the most important transaction of your life." Quoting a few real estate commercials, and how they stress similar sentiments. "So I'll leave you to it. Keep in touch, yeah? I'll do the same."

And with a final wave, she steps away and quickens her pace, her long ponytail swinging behind her, back and forth as she moves towards her houseboat.