2020-02-18 - We Need To Talk About Thomas

Back in the Summer of 2019, Hyacinth Addington sent Isabella some soup from that place she liked that was super classy and expensive, at least for a town like Gray Harbor - not that she would ever remember the name because she has assistants who would do it for her. And now here she is, standing outside the building and feeling incredibly underdressed for this lunch date, with its stylized logo emblazoned everywhere. And while she's been to her share of elegant places elsewhere, she doesn't have much opportunity or excuse to do so here in Gray Harbor. Her one attempt had ended in a very particular disaster around four days ago.

But that doesn't stop her from walking in with her jeans, boots and winter jacket, where the concierge in front smiles at her and offers to take her outerwear while judging her with her eyes. She tends to make an effort to make herself presentable most days, her day-to-day ensemble walks the clear line between fashionable and functional, the stamp of big city living mingled with the practicality of a young woman who, occasionally, has to punch or shoot monsters in the face, or crawl through passages or open graves - at least, that's how her life has been in the last several months.

She spots Hyacinth immediately because she is easily the most fabulous-looking person in the room, gravitating to that direction immediately. Her usual self-consciousness whenever mingling with the other more fashionable women of her acquaintance is gone, replaced by a bone-deep exhaustion that doesn't take stock of much else but the Thing She Must Do; her normally striking green-and-gold eyes are puffy and bloodshot, and the hollows on her cheeks look more pronounced due to the lack of actual sustenance in her body that isn't liquid and alcoholic, the dearth of appetite so severe that the enticing scent of the bouillabaisse being carried past her doesn't even elicit a reaction. She looks awful.

But her eyes are keen and alert, set with their razor-sharpness, as if she could consistently keep her brain functioning while the rest of her is in...whatever state it's in.

"Hyacinth Addington." She finds it in her to be teasing. "As always a sight for sore eyes. How are you?"

Hyacinth in fitted jeans and long ivory sweater, matching knit 'legwarmer boots', and a cowl neck sweater that falls away from the short string of Audrey Hepburn approved pearls around her neck. She sweeps around like an entitlement elemental here to bestow support and commiseration on Isabella. She stops, leans back on heel, and leans in for cheek smoochies that don't actually germ or smudge. "Yes. Yes I am..." She squints with that lime green scrutinty judging not Isabella, but the changes. "Hmmmm but cucumber slices will help. You can cancel your afternoon right?" Her phone is already out and kicking a memo out to her assistant to make this so.

A small smile, super pleased for a fraction of a moment, all things finding order again, alights her face triumphant in telling Isabella, "We have a three-fifteen." Well if Izzy had plans she doesn't now. She takes her seat and leans back in her chair, "Well The world is going to hell in a handbasket but in the process of the world burning? I have access to the things we need again so... there's that." She could be happier about it. She's not exactly celebrating.

Looking up she sighs, "Seems Grandfather passed and we're looking into what happened. I didn't think Thomas would carry on for long post-Billy."

"I-- " And her entire afternoon canceled, just like that. Isabella stares at the Addington woman for a moment, before a peal of bright, silvery laughter eases from her lips. "Ah," she says with a grin, leaning back on her chair once she's seated. "I missed you." Said warmly. "It feels like an age. Where are we going at three-fifteen?"

The beauty and magnificence of consulting work, with her thesis pretty much done, is the fact that she can create her own hours.

Her remark about access does lift her brows upwards in surprise. "The grande dame?" she concludes, though the news about Thomas Addington passing is one for the books. "You don't look all too happy about it, however. Everything alright?"

Green eyes widen at the news of her grandfather, her face to evocative to hide it. "My condolences to your family, Hyacinth. How...did he just let go?"

And just like that Isabella's afternoon is cancelled and hyjacked. " Nicole's salon has a place for a mani-pedi...." bright green eyes blink clarifying, "or according to this text a manic pedi...still spends." Her arms rest akimbo shifting weight to her manufactured leg and off her organic one. A smile warms, "I missed you too. Work's eaten me alive and I've been consulting with Justin on a plan the Grand Dame is not entirely aware of. Need to talk to someone who is a contract lawyer to get it settled so I don't have to go through Her for the favors."

Hyacinth is really not entirely thrilled about giving Margaret more reach into her business than she has. There's a pause and she packs on with bullet speed and then moving past, "Oh and I inherited the sawmill so that's not falling into incompetent hands. That's going to need to be assessed." Yes. Yay. She seems oddly pleased by this. Taking a deep breath she goes back to the Thomas affair with a faint pang of emotion she banishes almost as fast.

The inconvenience of being a human with human feelings. Messy business. "I... thank you, Isabella. It's ... I'm still sorting out everything and I don't know. There's just an absense and a really weird dream and I saw him... I don't know if anyone else noticed?" Her voice drifts off thoughtfully like a storyteller wondering trying to remember, "He felt... sad. There was so much regret on him I don't... I don't know. he's not at the cemetery though. I understand someone looked and Margaret said she didn't know. I have ... ideas I don't care for, but progress rarely stops for feelings and opinion. It just is so, we might have to continue looking but. I can't find him"

Her jaw tightens nto her usual stately and imperious expression, though lacking it's usual severity admitting, "He murdered my father. Countless people. He wanted what was best for me and tried to give me that while taking everything else. I know he...regretted it but he still did it and I don't honestly know how I'm supposed to reconcile all of that."

"Byron recently retained the services of an attorney for such things," Isabella tells Hyacinth with a hint of a grin. "By the name of Katherine Kennedy. I don't know if she's any good, but Ronnie will have a better assessment of that than I would. From New England, thereabouts. I asked if she was a relation of those Kennedys, considering the area she was born and raised and educated, but he couldn't tell me either way." She inclines her head a little bit at her. "What plan, if I may ask?"

Mention of the saw mill changing hands has even more of that visible surprise showing through. "You mean....all of the saw mills, or just the main one?" she wonders. "I've been thinking about the abandoned saw mill lately, I know the parcel it stands on is still under your family's name. Still, it's a relief...I wasn't sure what to make about the rumors of you and Erin falling on the wrong side of those graces." There's a concerned frown at that, that only grows more prominent when Hyacinth mentions a dream. "Wait...what dream?" Something sharpens in her demeanor then. "Would you be willing to tell me about it? Because that morning was strange, and I had one too. As for your grandfather..."

She thinks back. "He looked...heavy during the funeral. His sadness was palpable, but for the life of me, I couldn't figure out why other than the obvious. Maybe it was regret, for all the things you mentioned, you think it might've been for something else? Still..." She glances down at the table. "I'm sorry, Hyacinth. Out of everyone, you were the most conflicted out of that entire ordeal. I wish even just one of us were more equipped to help you address it. But your relatives were...there were so many secrets. No matter how many times we all go back to the summer, I don't know if anyone actually knows what happened behind the scenes."

After a pause, she looks up again. "You mentioned you spoke to the grand dame? What did she say, exactly? About all of this? Did she elucidate on anything at all?"

"I'll speak with Byron on the referral." The name likely already slipping her mind. Where's Edison to do menial things like remember people and their names for her? Feh, whatever. If it's important the lawyer will be referred to again.

When the dream is focused on she sighs and says, "Well mine was awful and involved being stuck in the sawmill. Not something I particularly care for going back to before we eat, Izzy. And she's not a Grand Dame unless Grande means old and entirely surly and off her faculties." There's a pause and it is definitely not empathy, but reason, "I suppose were something to happen to Enzo I'd be not my best." She'd fall apart, though never admit this,

The condolences, belated are met with a flinch of a softer expression and gratitude shown in her agreement, "There still are. I...accept she did the things she felt she needed to do to protect the family, but I also feel methods have grown antiquated and stale. What she said is Thomas is gone. Gone gone, and he's not at the cemetery and to go figure it out. So I told her that Grandfather's responsibilities were going to be passed to his son whom is unavailable and that the sawmill needs to be in competant hands of someone who knows lumber and industry. I want it aaand she said fine so. Happy birthday to me." There's a satisfied resignation that comes with that.

Has she wanted that her life? You're damn right she has. "Let's be honest he and my father were not sterling business people." Pausing she adds, "Enzo and I are going to try to locate him. I can work n someone using other means to do so."

Where is Edison Baxter? She's heard his name several times but has never met him; even the most recent pow-wow of the currently discovered Baxter descendants, he was conspicuously absent.

It's a divergence that Isabella doesn't dwell upon, however, when Hyacinth moves on towards the topic of Margaret Addington and the surprising news she delivers. "I had a dream about the sawmill as well," she confesses to her friend, picking up her menu once she's reminded that they were supposed to eat, and failing miserably in mustering an appetite. Still, she tries, a hand coming up to rub her cheek as she peruses the selections. "Only it sounds like mine comes from an entirely different perspective." Her bones feel heavy in remembrance of it. "And while I feel that congratulations are in order of your new acquisition, I wish it were under happier circumstances. Does that mean all of its operations are yours now and the parcels that belong to them? What about the abandoned mill?"

There's a hint of a smile. "I'm not quite certain what your grandfather or your father specialized in, business-wise, but considering your expertise, I think the business on that end, at the very least, is in good hands." She pauses at the last, regarding the efforts to locate him, brows furrowing faintly. "I'm not exactly an investigator, that's..." Alexander's name chokes into the back of her throat, and she looks down at the tablecloth. "But I might have a few ideas. What are your efforts so far in locating him?"

Hya sighs and speaks, perhaps very frankly, "I'm not certain anyone really knew but they were really proud of it let. them. tell you." She, however, is pointedly...disappointed. "Well!" This sounds promising, "Justin and Byron are. So. At the very least Justin is going to help me figure out who I need and how to find the people I should be trusting.." There's a pause and her green eyes sharpen, "They're really not going to enjoy me being hands on."

The discussion of the dreams is ... something that has Hya's attention. Aloof? Standoffish? She's been rightly accused of all these things but presently, foremost, she's judging. Judgy Hya is always judging, and the survey says, "I've my concerns as to what this may mean. Have... all of yours had a shared experience? I'm wondering if all the parts are trying to meet to tell us something."

"If something is going to improve, I think getting hands on is definitely clutch," Isabella remarks. "But I'm as far removed from the corporate and business world as it comes. Byron would have a few ideas, definitely." She doesn't know who Justin is.

The last question is definitely sound, however, and the archaeologist nods, though she tables that for the time being, settling for some soup when the waiter finally arrives to take their orders. It's only when he leaves that she addresses Hyacinth's query. "Yes, at least on the Baxter side. Whatever Baxters I know, anyway, including Miss Carr." She is aware of her close friendship with Vyv Vydal. "Same dream, but different point of view. We were the gristle that lubricated the saw." She makes a face. "Seems to me that our family's relationship with yours is more fraught than we all initially thought, but I had my suspicions since the summer already. Not that any of the descendants on my side are particularly..." She hesitates. "Honestly, most of the enmity I came across about the entire affair was from Margaret. A lot of the current-generation Baxters aren't even aware that there's family history to be concerned about. Hell, I didn't, not really, until last year's summer when I was told that we keep dying." She takes a sip of her water. "What about you? What are your concerns?"

Hyacinth waits for the minion to dismiss themselves and turns back to business at hand. Her smile isn't coquettish, it's carnivorous. "Yes. I heard. Ms. Carr, Vyv's PA? yes, she's a Baxter, as is my PA whom I wish wrap his family business peaceably because my coffee manker is working funny." she pauses flapping her hand in a circle. "And you know, concerned. Anyways. " There's a pause and Hyacinth draws a deep breath and her expression changes. The imperiousness is washed a moment and there is a quiet concern and green eyes find green-gold and she admits, "You're not... wrong, nor underselling it. I... we saw it. My brother and I." There's a pause and gently she sets her teacup down and manicured hand presses palm flat to the table. She looks at it for a long moment and then up again.

"I'm concerned about two things. One? That antiqued means are failing to subjugate an evolving problem. New times mandate newer, more creative solutions and I'm hoping with the technology of our age we can find a less... uncouth manner of fixing whatever may be broken. The other? The other is while I-" her fingers lift in as close to apologetic gesture as she's seen on television to imitate to get the point across, "mean not to be vulgar, but when I can find someone who can master my craft better than I or Alexander has? I'll have some questions because I can clean a whole room for a day. Margaret's house was cleared like some null element engulfed it and of all my knowledge of knowing my Great-Auntie? This is not a skill she was close to possessing. SO! When something shifted? It shifted big and left her composure...fragile from where I'd expect it. It was a subtle thing but its reach seemed immense, Isabella."

"Your brother's the courageous sort," Isabella tells her quietly. "I've seen him in action."

She listens to Hyacinth's additional assessments with the intense scrutiny that is part and parcel of her when it comes to the city's most dangerous mysteries, taking a sip of her water to wet her lips. "I'm sure there's always another way if such a thing is necessary, but I don't know whether we can fix the problem if we don't know the true shape of it. Back in the summer, I attempted to go back to the beginning, the root of the relationship between our families. History says it started with a land transaction, so I attempted to track down its origins and..." She smirks faintly. "Was derailed. Maybe we ought to pick the trail back up again, and then once we unravel that, maybe we can find a way to remove this reliance to antiquated means. I have a few ideas, on that end."

Her nursing of her water stops, blinking once when Hyacinth mentions what happened to Margaret's residence. "Does she know others with your strength in that area who might assist her in that fashion? Maybe she knows a few who came in to null the house. Still, if what you say is true in that she's isolated herself, isn't speaking with anyone and is in such a fragile state, I don't know how she could be doing it for precisely the reasons you describe. Unless..." She pauses. "...unless the house she lives in is alive, in a fashion. As strange as it is, that isn't exactly an unheard-of phenomenon in Gray Harbor." Her mind wanders to Byron Thorne, then, and his family house on Oak.

Hyacinth listens and sips her drink nodding in slow consort. "Enzo has many human qualities," flaws, but she's not using this word on an Addington or one so damn close. This also leaves the argument that if she could be further fabricated she might take up the offer. "Cowardice is not among the pantheon of personal traits I come to question, and I feel bad for the one that makes that mistaken distinction. Now..."

Alive? Her eyebrows crease and the cup is set down between her fingers tapped with one nail thoughtfully. "Alive?" This gets voiced and a lot of consideration. "She didn't have this feature to her foyer until the unfortunate failure to find my grand father." Her gift for casual alliteration has to broken, but also a hallmark of mild distress. "I... don't think it's alive. My money would be on someone at the Hospital helping her. The one that was helping her bind William." There's a pauses fingers tap her jaw wondering, "Just because they are deplorably unethical doesn't mean that hospital isn't on the side of the people as disturbing as that is. They might have interest in protecting her as an asset from whatever's going on with THomas because she is willing to work with them?"

"You mean the Asylum?" Isabella pauses in thought at that, brows furrowing. "From what I managed to gather from that place, there are certain dangerous individuals there that we ought to note and keep an eye on." She inclines her head towards Hyacinth. "I had no idea that Margaret's relationship with the place ran that deep. If that's true, then..."

She drums her fingers lightly on the table in thought. "He was your grandfather, has he given you anything that he could have owned? Keepsakes and the like? If you're unable to read anything from where he's rested his head over the years, you might be able to read something of his that's been given to you, or things he could have donated to the Addington House as part of the exhibit that once belonged to him. Maybe such items will give you some clue as to where Thomas ended up."

There's a faint smile. "We'll figure it out," she murmurs. "Or at least, I hope so anyway before this town keeps eating members of my family and yours." There's a glance towards the door. "Shall we get to our spa appointment? Now that you've cleared my schedule and everything." The last is teasing.