2020-08-15 - They're In The Dark Place

It's still dark out, so it's not been terribly long since Alison finally got Gigi to sleep. Maybe an hour or two at most. She'd been curled up on the couch breathing softly beneath the blanket clutched up to the underside of her chin with her eye sfinally closed for the longest amount of time since Ali had almost hit her with the car.

There's a soft sound coming from the living room, though. Sounds like someone whispering and then someone else answering. One voice is definitely Gigi's and the other... is definitely not. Sounding more like an echo through trees or the wind blowing through a forest.

Once Alison was under the assumption that Gigi had settled down to sleep, she left her alone, though not after finding another blanket tucked away somewhere and throwing that on top. Yeah, it's boiling hot, but she'd been shivering.. if it's too warm for her, she can take it off when she wakes up. Harder to do the other way around.

She got to sleep fairly quickly, tired from a shift at work and the emotional energy expended from worrying about Giada. Not long enough to get to dreaming, but after a while, she finds herself waking up with a grumble. Fucking bladder. Alison tears the thing sheet she'd been sleeping under off, and stomps her way to the toilet, sitting down to do her thing. She doesn't notice the voices right away, but after she washes her hands, she pauses, turning in the general direction of the living room, then stepping out of the washroom. "Gigi? Who are you talking to?"

There's no light on in the living room, pitch blackness and the soft sound of Gigi's whispering and then someone else answering her.. It's not until Alison calls out that both go silent. Silent like a child whose been caught playing games when they were suppose to be sleeping, "Nobody.." She says after too long for it to be true. "Go back to sleep, Alison. I'm okay." It's not coming from the couch though.

Alison peers around in the dark. No lights, doesn't look like there's anybody else, judging from the faint moonlight coming in from the window.. "What do you mean, nobody? Wait, where are you?" She steps over towards the couch to look at where she last saw Giada, on the couch under a blanket.

Kneeling down infront of the television is the dark silhoutte. Gigi, with the long t-shirt she was given to wear bundled up on er thighs, rests on her knees face to face with the television. So close that her nose could touch it if she weren't looking back over her shoulder at Alison coming into the living room. Her green eyes glitter softly in the light coming in through the window near her. On the screen, at least for a heart beat, is a face... as if it's actually on, but not producing light. In that brief time it looks like Ember... and then it's gone. "I hope I didn't wake you." The curly haired, sickly looking woman says to her host. "I didn't mean to wake you."

Hmm, couch is vacant.. oh, she's at the TV. And that's Ember's face on the screen? What.

"What."

"Gigi, what the fuck is going on? I thought you said sh--they were gone!" Alison's face shifts somewhat between annoyance and terror as she steps towards the woman, grabbing her shoulder to pull her back from the screen.

Gigi tilts her head, "She is gone.. to the black place." Raising her finger to point at the screen just as Alison reaches her and pulls her back away from the screen. She use to be so strong, physically, but now she's a pale mockery of that. It'll take weeks for her full strength to return, possibly longer, so she's in no condition to do much protesting to being pulled away. "What's wrong Ali?" Looking up at her friend as she falls down onto the carpet near the redheads feet. "I understand now.. It's okay.." Trying to get back to her knees, trying to get back to the blank television. "I can get to her.."

Alison doesn't hold onto Gigi's shoulder for long - it's not like she was trying to restrain her, just pull her away from the TV for a moment. "Gigi, what are you talking about? That's my TV. How did you get her face on the screen? It doesn't even seem like it's turned on.." Her voice takes on something of a frustrated tone to it, but she doesn't try to stop Giada from making her way back to the TV. "Please tell me you're not going to try crawling through the TV like it's the fucking Ring or something."

"No..." Gigi glances back and up at Alison with her brow furrowed, "Don't be silly.. that wouldn't work." Her fingers trace the outside of the televisions blank screen with the tips of thin fingers, "I can just see it now.. see where she is. I'll need help to get there." There's nothing on the screen except for Giada's gaunt reflection as she once again goes nose to nose with the glass. "I'm okay, Ali, you can go back to sleep... you don't have to be upset."

Well, there are worse things that she could be up to at this time of night. And really, the girl's just spent the last few months in a coma or something like it in a shallow ass grave in the haunted ass woods. The thought of leaving her by herself when she's clearly having A Moment doesn't quite rank highly in her mental list of next steps from here.

Ali sighs deeply, then takes a few steps closer, then sitting crosslegged on the floor next to Gigi, dressed in nothing more than a bralette and a mismatched pair of panties. "What kind of help are we talking about?" She gestures at the TV, but something about the tone of her voice and the way she gestures might lead one to think that it's in being asked in a sort of patronizing matter.

Gigi, if she hears the patronizing in Alison's voice, doesn't acknowledge it. Taking the question as a genuine one, "Sparrow." She says with a glance sideways at Ali, "She was working on something so we could .. cross.. kind of. I don't remember everything. It was right before I went to sleep and..." She shrugs a bony shoulder and looks back to the television. "If she finished it since then, she can get me to the black place and I can find Ember." Hypothetically anyways. There's a lot of things there's no way Gigi could possible know.

She could also be crazy as a shit house right.

Malnurished.

Borderline dementia from dehydration.

Honestly, the best place for her right now is a Hospital. What're the chances she'd go willingly though?

Glancing sidelong at Alison again... she slowly leans towards her, resting her head on the redheads shoulder. "Thank you for believing me.. I feel crazy, but it helps that you don't think I am." Take that. Punched right in the feels.

Alison squints at Gigi a little bit at the mention of Sparrow. "Sparrow, huh. She usually seems a little more.." She shrugs, then looks back at the TV as well. "Her number, I have. Shit. I thought you meant Ember was gone gone.."

An arm goes around Giada's shoulders, giving her a gentle squeeze. "I'm pretty sure that you were at least a little crazy before you disappeared." She gestures towards the TV once again. "And I've seen some really weird shit since you've been gone around here. I can deal with crazy."

The hospital had crossed Alison's mind a couple of times. Even if she was able to drag her there (probably pretty likely given Gigi's physical state), doctors tend to ask too many questions about the Weird Shit. And too many questions are never a good thing. They tend to make people disappear.

Gigi's eyes fall closed easily now, like a weight has been lifted. "I thought I'd left them there... abandoned them." She says in a quiet voice, far away and growing more so, "Now I know they're just where I couldn't find them before.." Does she know whether finding Ember will bring them back? She doesn't. It might just release her, but can she let her friend... first ''girlfriend''... stay in that horrible place forever?

No, she cannot.

"Can I sleep in your bed tonight? I don't really want to be alone anymore." Glancing up with half lidded eyes. "And maybe a ride to Kais' in the morning..." Frowning a little as she nestles against Ali. Smirking at being called a little crazy /before/, "Yeah, I guess I was huh? Hot though..." Looking at herself now.

"Guess a lot has changed..."

The redhead looks back at the TV for a little bit. No, it doesn't make sense. But nothing around here does. She's heard weirder stories than someone being trapped in the 'dark'. Just one more car at the end of the crazy train. "If you think it might help bring them back, I'll do whatever I can. Sparrow's been a little.. absent, lately, not sure what's up with her, but I haven't seen her out much. I can't imagine she'd say no though.." Alison shrugs.

The question catches Ali a little off guard. "O-of course. Told you before, you don't need to ask. C'mon." She picks herself up off the floor, then holds a hand out towards Giada to help her up, the faintest hints of a smile on her face. "Nothing that a few burgers from the Black Bear Diner won't fix."

It takes some effort for her to get up on her own, and ultimately Gigi hangs off Ali to do so. "She wont." She sounds convinced, "I know where to find her... her and Bax. I need both of them." Arm around Alison's shoulder, feeling how light she actually is, Giada shuffles towards the bedroom and crawls up onto it once they've gotten to the edge.

Flopped over on her side and sighs heavily, hands up beneath her chin. "I never should have let Ember go back out there... I knew they would.. I should have told them not to go without me. It's my fault. All that shit with the..." Waving at her head, "It twisted my brains all up."

Alison wiggles back into the bed once Gigi's settled. "Used to be pretty easy to find her at the video game shop. Up until it burned down, anyways. Phone works pretty well with her.." Shrug. "All the shit with what, the cow shit shrooms? Probably didn't help, but it's not like you don't know what you're doing in that department.."

Alison ponders for a moment, then reaches out towards Gigi's temple, giving it a gentle stroke. "I can do something to help you sleep, if you want.." Gigi might sense the faintest feeling of someone knocking on a door, though faintly, as if someone not wanting to disturb a baby inside who just went down for a nap.

Gigi reaches up to the fingers on her temple and moves it slowly to rest around her waist instead, it's as good an answer as any she could say out loud. Scooting back towards Alison, wiggling her bony shoulders until she's back to chest with her, "I know where to find her." She says knowingly, turning a little to look back at her friend. She's smiling, weakly, but there's hints of the old Gigi there. Like she's finally waking up just as she's falling back to sleep.

"Did you ever find someone, Ali?" She asks worriedly. Her voice grows quieter, smile slowly faultering. "I think I remember you saying you were talking to someone.. unless I dreamt that. Did it work out?"

"Kay." No real point in pushing for an answer on where Sparrow can be found. She'll find out soon enough. And that's seemingly a no on the offer of more calming thoughts, but as Gigi lays there, her perhaps not needing it after all seems to become more apparent.

"I thought so. But you know what this town's like. One day someone's here, one day they're gone.. her RV was gone as well, so she's probably alright. Somewhere." Alison stretches out a little in the bed, fingers gingerly brushing across Gigi's skin in little more than an idle moment, but it serves enough as a reminder once again just how thin she's become. "I think I'm taking a break from that kinda stuff, anyways. Doesn't feel right with people disappearing all the time. It's easy for me to get attached to someone, and they just leave town without a word?" The waitress makes a sound approaching a verbal shrug.

The answer probably isn't what Gigi would have hoped for, but it's about what she would have expected. Nodding as her head settles back down on the pillow beside Ali, "I don't think I blame you." Sounding tired, but a lot more herself. Still weak, of course, a few minutes isn't going to suddenly replace all the missing nutrients she's missed, but alive. Wherever she was just a shell.

"I don't think you should give up on it." Turning, slowly, and with a lot of effort, to face Alison. A hand up to cup her friends cheek, "They might disappear, but sometimes if the love is right, they'll come back." That said she rolls back over and curls up. Knees coming up to her chest so she's a small Gigiball. Reaching back to grab Alison's wrist and bring it back around her. "Goodnight Ali. Don't let me sleep too long, okay?"

"It's not like I blame her or anything, it's just what it is." A little more wiggling from Alison's side of the bed as she repositions.

Ali smiles back at Gigi as she cups her face. "Maybe. Who knows. It's not a big deal though." Once Gigi rolls back over, Alison wiggles close, becoming Big Spoon as was foretold by prophecy, but also with an arm draped onto as Gigi'd 'suggested'. "Kay. I'll wake you up.. nini."