2020-01-22 - Turn and Face the Strange

Since officially moving in with Declan, Dahlia had been making sure to keep in touch with Justin via text in some form at least every day. Now that things were more settled she'd shown up at his house and explained that they were going to the beach! It was too cold to swim obviously, but it would be neat to walk along and see the waves and how the cold was affecting everything. Or something. The intent was that their trip would lead them to the Boardwalk where they could warm up at Espresso Yourself.

So now, they were just hitting the walking path for the beach. Dahlia was dressed in a pair of nice jeans, a thick black sweater and matching fur-lined boots and gloves. "It's so coldddd but the crisp air is nice." She mused. "How have you been?" Looping her arm with Justin's and looking up at him.

Things have been quiet with Justin, lately. Largely, he'd been left to his own devices, since filming for the movie wouldn't start until the spring, and with the house largely quiet save for Caleb, and Hyacinth planning out some of the changes that he'd decided to make to it, there was little to do other than work, and so he had fallen back into his old habits of spending most of his time doing that, aside from that one jaunt into the past, breaking into the Addington House.

"Busy, working, mostly," Justin says as he walks along next to her, letting her loop her arm through his. He was quiet, pensive, lost in his own thoughts, mostly. He was dressed in a comfortable pair of hiking boots and jeans, with a navy blue sweater on, and a dark grey coat over it to keep warm.

Dahlia eyed him for a moment. Making a mental note to really drag him out more. Make him meet people even. "Always working. I'm going to take all your computer equipment one day and force you to find some hobbies." An affectionate teasing. Though there was a touch of concern lingering. "Are you doing okay? You know you can tell me anything." It practically goes without saying.

"You'd have to get into the office first," Justin points out. The office that is locked and protected with a state of the art security system. "You will have to pry my work from my cold, dead hands." There's a faint smile on his lips, though, some humor in him despite the somewhat seriousness of what he says. "I have hobbies," he protests. "Sortof." He turns his gaze back toward the water as they follow the path toward the beach. "I'm fine," he says, though it's clear that there's more than that. "What about you? Things going good? Work okay?"

"Oh no. Nope. You don't get to pull the 'I'm fine' card. That's my thing." Dahlia countered. However, she does relent and answer his question. "Clifford's back in town. Met him for breakfast. We didn't argue too much" Clifford, of course, was her oldest brother and their relationship had always been a bit strained. Especially since her moving back to Gray Harbor. "Things are okay. I had a weird experience...a Dream I think...a few nights ago that nearly had me wanting to relapse. But I resisted and stayed put in the house. Firefly is going good, starting back at Platinum soon." A moment of silence and then, "So, are you going to actually tell me what's going on? Or am I going to have to nag you to death?"

"Oh yeah? How's he doing?" Justin asks when Dahlia mentions Clifford. He'd met her brothers, back when they were kids, but wasn't really in touch with them or anything. They knew /of/ one another, but didn't know one another, really. There's a flicker of concern in his expression though when she mentions wanting to relapse. "You sure starting back at Platinum is a good idea if you're still having the occasional desire to relapse?" It's genuine concern that touches his expression, shaking him out of whatever was on his mind. His lips do twitch though when she threatens him with nagging. "I don't know, Dahl. I'm still deciding if moving out here was the best idea. There are days when it feels like it is, and days when I feel.." He shrugs his shoulders. "There are days I miss the clubs and the noise and the parties and the people, and even the paparazzi, as stupid as that is."

"He's Clifford. He's doing as well as he can I guess. Still kind of an asshole but I keep telling myself he's got good intentions deep down." Dahlia shrugged and then straightened up a bit. "It was the first time it's happened and I think it was just because I was so caught off guard..." She looked out towards the water and then back up at him. "But I want to try. I really enjoyed the work...It's just kind of a work as you want to thing anyway. So if it gets to be too much I can always back off some." Dahlia nodded.

When Justin explains what's on his mind Dahlia shook her head. "It's not stupid. I miss it too. There's so much more there...more to do. More of everything. More opportunities in general." She gave his arm a little squeeze. "Have you thought about going back down for a visit maybe?"

Justin chuckles just a little bit about Clifford, but then he nods when she mentions the possible relapse. He gives her arm a little squeeze and nods, "Whatever you feel comfortable with. Only you know when you're ready. Just know I'm here to support you in whatever you decide to do." He smiles, nodding a bit when she mentions being able to back off if she needs to.

Then he shrugs his shoulders, "Maybe. I've thought about it, but then, if I just go back, and go back to that life, will I forget everything that I've remembered since being here?"

Dahlia smiled up at him. "I appreciate it Justin. You really are my best friend. " leaning her head on his shoulder for a moment. "I dunno...I don't really know how it all works. But honestly is forgetting a bad thing?" She sighed. "Okay it's a little bit of a bad thing...but if you split your time then maybe you won't. "

Justin smiles faintly, "I don't know. Maybe forgetting wouldn't be a bad thing. But then, I'll be back here for filming in the spring anyway, so I don't know. Maybe I will just stay. Give it a year, and until after filming, see if things are the way that I hoped they'd be or if maybe this was all a mistake."

"I mean, it wasn't a total mistake. We got to reconnect right?" Dahlia smiled. "That sounds like a good plan. See how things go, how the filming goes. And then decide. This place...isn't for everyone. Even I don't want to stay here forever...I'm slowly trying to talk to Declan about travelling more...eventually so he'll feel comfortable actually leaving this place for good. But that's the long road." Dahlia leaned up to kiss his cheek. "Whatever you decide - I'll support you. Gosh, filming is going to be right around the corner, isn't it. It's exciting...and scary."

"Well, no, not a total mistake.. I didn't really mean it that way," Justin smiles faintly as he looks out over the water, considering. "There have been good things that have come out of being back here. I think I'm just being a little melancholy because some of the good things didn't quite turn out to last. But.. I really should be used to that by now, right? At some point I need to just shake it off. Feeling sorry for myself is definitely not an attractive quality." He smiles a little self-deprecatingly, and chuckles at the kiss to his cheek. "Thanks, Dahl. I am really glad that we got to reconnect here. You are the best. You know that, right?"

Dahlia gave him a gentle tug so they could stop and look at the water. Then she turned to look up at him. "Life sucks, pretty much. Things rarely ever work out like we want. And we both know that nothing good comes without busting our asses for it." Flashing him another smile."I'm confident that you're going to find some things that do work out. Whether it's here or LA. Or wherever else in this big wide world." There's a beat of pause and a playful smirk. "I dunno, some people dig the self pity act." Her expression turned serious again. "But I know you are so much better than that. You're the best too, you really are. You just gotta believe it too." Giving him a tight hug.

Justin comes to a stop next to her as they look out at the water, rocking just a little bit in his boots, back and forth with a gentle sway before he comes to a stop. He gives her a nudge though about the self-pity thing. "Nah, nobody does, really. I'm just being mopey, and I need to shake myself out of it. Poor little rich boy. Like I have anything to /actually/ complain about." He shakes his head at himself. "I know I work hard. I know my company got where it is because of hard work, mine and others'. I'm proud of that. I need to focus on those things."

Dahlia nodded encouragingly as he listed off the things he should focus on. "And you're about to be in a totally kickass movie with your best friend. If you needed another thing on the list." Giving him another smile. "But yeah, exactly. Focus on the positive and everything else will fall into place. I'm sure of it." After another moment or two she would take his hand again so they could continue walking.

"I am," Justin agrees with a little bit of a laugh. "Which I let my mother talk me into, again, because that woman could sell salt to the ocean." He gives her another little nudge and says, "Since when did you become this eternal optimist, hm? Not that it doesn't suit you." He lets his hand slip into hers and gives it a squeeze. "Something weird happened not that long ago to me, too. I was getting cider down at the town center, ran into Bennie there. Then there were these lost kittens that we ended up trying to protect from these giant raptors, like dinosaur raptors.. and the mama cat was none too happy, but left us alone since the kittens seemed to like us. Was kind of trippy. I've never seen animals like that in these woods. I didn't realize that these things could come right out of the Veil like that. Makes you wonder what else is just randomly lurking around."

"I dunno. I guess since I stopped feeling sorry for myself too." Dahlia laughed. "I'm just gonna take shit as it comes and whatever happens, happens." Her brow rose as he explained his weird experience. "That...is definitely strange..dinosaurs? Were the cats regular cats?" She ran a hand through her hair. "I dunno what I would have done if I saw real life dinosaurs." She mused. "Mine was...extra weird...I was in this meadow with two guys - Carter and James...and we ended up down this well that had hidden passages...also apparently I am an Adventurer Grandmaster...or something." Dahlia gave a little laugh. "There's all kids of things I think...just...don't know if they're things I want to learn about."

"No, they were really, really big cats," Justin chuckles. "The mother was the size of a Buick. I'm not even kidding. The babies were the size of lynxes. They were pretty cute, despite having really big teeth and claws." He chuckles, "I just tried to keep the cats calm and stood really still and let other people who seemed to know what they were doing deal with the dinosaurs. That was definitely outside of my wheelhouse." He grins sidelong at her though and says "An Adventurer Grandmaster?"

"Oof, that's terrifying." Dahlia laughed. "I probably would've panicked and run away." She mused and nodded. "There was this room...with giant stairs...and golden eggs...I made some kind of comment about Jack and the Beanstalk and suddenly random voices were congratulating me and calling me Adventurer Grandmaster! It was...weird. Especially since like I don't even play games much at all." She shrugged and chuckled a bit. "Then we escaped out a window in a maze...and I was back in bed."

Justin laughs a little bit at that and says, "That's, kind of trippy, but in a less terrifying way than being potentially eaten by feathered velociraptors." He shrugs his shoulders, "Guess you're an adventurer at heart, even if you didn't know it. But, glad you made it out of it okay, and back safely in your own bed." He says, "We never really left the park, I don't think. Or maybe we did. Things were strange and distorted for a bit. But we were back in the park when it was over."

"Way less scary. I'm glad you're okay and didn't get eaten by giant cats or dinosaurs." Dahlia squeezed his hand. "It's really hard to tell sometimes. Like the meadow thing. Definitely not...in this reality...but when I was attacked by that shadow wolf with Eve and Eli...and then when I had that whole horrible experience with mom...those felt really real.."

"I'm pretty relieved that I was not consumed by strange beasties, myself," Justin laughs and gives her hand a bit of a squeeze. "Which is .. another thing about being here. That kind of weirdness just doesn't happen other places I've been, and I'm not sure what it says about me, that I kind of don't want to lose that by going somewhere else. It's.. like knowing that it is real makes you reluctant to want to forget, even if forgetting is a whole lot safer." He glances over at her and nods.

"That's fair. It is kind of...as amazing as it is terrifying. I can feel it sometimes...like I'm capable of something. I've tried to focus in now and again but...that's the only drawback to Declan. Is that I don't feel like I can really talk to him about the...weird...psychic stuff. But it's a drawback I'm willing to keep because I know there are other people I can talk to about it. Now that I'm more stable, I'd like to explore my potential more." She exhales softly. "I understand not wanting to forget that. Because...it is a big thing."

"But if you want to get him to leave Gray Harbor, and you'll forget it all when you go, is there any real point in working on exploring that potential if the idea is to just give it up? Wouldn't it make more sense never to learn it? I don't know if I could just give up what I can do now that easily.. now that I know that I can do it," Justin says. "It's part of what makes it hard to think about going when I'm finding it hard to think about staying."

Dahlia sighed softly. "That's true. Maybe I should wait...but there's other places right? There has to be more places than Gray Harbor where stuff like this happens. Though I could be wrong." She shrugged. "Maybe I'll get a sense on how he feels about the idea of moving down the line...and that wouldn't be for a long while anyway I'm guessing. So it might not hurt to dabble." She shrugged a bit. "Or maybe it would. Who knows,."

"Sure, there's other places, but what's the point in leaving if you're just going to go to another place just like it?" Justin asks a little curiously. "Wouldn't the point be to get away from all the strange?" He tilts his head a bit as he looks over and down at her. "It's up to you, of course. Just thinking about the possibilities."

"Yeah. I guess that's a good point...just to see what they're like?" Dahlia shrugged, wiggling the fingers of her free hand. "We'll see how it plays out. Maybe it is better just to not touch it. Safer too maybe." A little shake of her head and then she smiled again. "Either way, I'll keep you in the loop. Have you learned to do any other neat tricks and things?"

"A couple of things," Justin says with a little smile and a shrug of his shoulder. "I'm, I guess, kind of a generalist. I can do a bunch of small things, while someone like Hyacinth who is a specialist can do really powerful things, but in a narrower range. Which is fine with me, I think. I don't really need phenomenal cosmic power." He chuckles. "Pretty sure I have enough going on already."

"I can see the headline now. Justin Cooper- Superhero Jack of all Trades." Dahlia chuckled. "I don't know what I'd do with a huge level of power." She shook her head. "Hopefully I won't ever have to find out." She looked around a bit and nodded ahead. "Almost to Espresso Yourself! I can already taste the hot chocolate."

Justin snorts just a little bit at that when he laughs, shaking his head, "Yeah, because Superhero Playboy Philanthropist is supposed to be Tony Stark's gig, remember?" He gives her another little nudge and then says "Yeah, let's get some carbs, and chocolate, and caffeine. I need my Three Cs before I go back to work this afternoon." And with that, he turns back up toward the boardwalk itself, so that they can head over to Espresso Yourself.