2021-11-24 - Coffee, Neighbours, Lifestyle Choices

Oak Avenue is the kind of lawns and handsome craftsman's houses from the first half of the 20th century kind of residential area that testifies to the fact that before it went into a recession, Gray Harbor profited nicely from the lumber industry. Once, these were family homes, good homes. They still are, but like all of the town, they look a bit more tired now, and a number of them house more families, or at least families that aren't the ideal nuclear family of 1950. This particular house has a battered old pickup truck parked outside in spite of having a nice, detached garage. It looks quite mundane from the outside; nothing special, lawn has been recently mowed, no signs of Godzilla footprints in the drive way, no abundance of surveillance cameras. Normal.

The names on the door sound right; Ravn Abildgaard, Aidan Kinney, a small stencil of a cat that's basically a figure-eight with a tail. The actual cat is in the window, watching. She's a small, black thing with clear, yellow-green eyes, the kind that owns this street and don't you forget it.

Tanasha can be heard before she is seen - the purr of a motorbike approaching, the softness of the noise hinting at the electric motor inside the sleek lines of the black and silver Lightning LS-218. Her choice of clothes almost mirrors it, with black jeans, a black and silver helmet and a silver backpack. It glides to a halt outside of the house, and she lets it idle for a few moments before switching the engine off. She removes her helmet, her hair springing loose in a halo around her face, before she dismounts and heads towards the door. "Hey cat." The words are lightly spoken as she lifts a hand to tap on the door.

A gracious slow blink is the cat's response. Then a yawn and a pink maw full of little white teeth, before she curls up again, having lost interest. Yes, yes, somebody arrived. Somebody arrives all the damn time. Whatever happened to her and her adopted, domesticated human living alone, on a boat, largely undisturbed, mumble mumble.

Oh, right. Boats are cold this time of year. And warm spots in the kitchen window are not.

It's no one's surprise to find Ravn wearing black, too, when he answers the door; as usual, the only splashes of colour on the man are the copper highlights in his hair and the blue of his eyes. He lights up in a smile. "That's one hell of a nice ride. I still haven't gotten around to actually buying the bike I promised myself for an early midlife crisis, just before the storm. Maybe I'll manage before the actual midlife crisis happens."

Inside, the large, open kitchen spills into dining room and communal area. The style choices are -- unique. The house might look quite mundane on the exterior, but in here, it is obvious that somebody enjoys not just picking out curious things in second hand stores but restoring them too. The result is colourful, a cornucopia of design history -- and somehow, it kind of works. It feels a bit like watching into a Seattle street art gallery, but maybe that's the intention.

"Coffee, tea, soda?" Ravn at least refrains from making the 'coffee, tea, me?' joke.

Tanasha unzips the jacket, revealing a white vest stop with a cowls neckline, her smile quick to light up her face as he answers the door. "Ravn." The greeting is that marginally more casual than her polite distanced comments from before, an easing between them as she settles in.. "I thought I'd indulge myself. I got a good contract payout..." Something flickers across her face, a puzzle to be set aside until later, as she enters the house. A glance around and she smiles, "Who is the worker?" The question is curious and she adds lightly, "Coffee, black."

"Aidan Kinney, my room mate." Ravn grins; Tanasha's spot on that he's not the artist around here. "He's one of those people who fixes things -- with the shine. Once he repairs something it doesn't break again. And frankly, his ideas for interior design are a lot more interesting than anything I could come up with. I don't have an eye for it at all -- nor really the interest, if I have to be honest. I've spent most my life living either somewhere my grandparents decorated or on the road, or on my boat. The latter which is at least painted blue now -- when I rented it, it was a disco inferno anno 1983, of pink, mint and lime green. Another friend of mine promptly dubbed her, the HMS Cannabis Discowhore. It was accurate."

Water goes in kettle, kettle goes on stove the old fashioned way. Instant coffee goes into mugs. "No sugar? Praise the lord, someone else in this town who understands that coffee needs to contain, well, coffee. And nothing bloody else."

"Handy..." The murmur is soft and she trails her fingers along a surface, admiring the handiwork, before she smiles again. "I suppose I'll have to figure that out. I don't know what I bought a house. I'm more of an apartment girl." The casual comment comes with a lift of her eyebrows, inviting Ravn to laugh with her at the thought, but she doesn't give away any more of her own history. "I got used to it, more because I forget to buy milk. I'm not terribly domesticated. It used to drive... " A small half a breath of time "A friend insane."

"I used to live literally in a backpack. Had a principle -- never stay a week in one place. Then Gray Harbor happened and I found myself renting that boat to sleep on. Now I have a house and a fixed address, and I am honestly trying to not freak out too much about it. I like my room mate fine enough -- he was a little surprised at being one, too -- but, you know? Fixed address? Responsible adult? Me?" Ravn grins slightly; he's not one to bark a loud laugh but his blue-greys are certainly sparkling with amusement.

"I guess that at thirty-one it is time to think about growing up and acting like it. But a part of me still looks longingly at every Greyhound that comes through." He brings the mugs to the kitchen table and flops down on a teak chair from the late 1960s. It has no matching partners.

She tilts her head, giving him a thoughtful look, her brown eyes narrowing just a little. "Worst case, you sell up and move on. You can always rent it to the flatmate..." Lightly spoken words delivered with a quick smile, "And you don't have to be responsible. We could burn it right down now..." She lifts her hands, wiggling her fingers. "Do you catch being grown up at 31 then? Only a few moments left for me then!" She curls up into one of the chairs, taking her cup to rest it on her bent knee, her foot tucked up.

"Christ, I hope I still have at least a few years' worth of irresponsibility left," Ravn murmurs with assumed gloom and a sparkle of amusement in his eyes still. "I have a very hard time seeing myself as one of those suburbian men working nine-to-five and raising a family of 2.3 children. The point three kid in particular I am struggling to visualise."

He rests his elbows on the table and curls gloved fingers around his mug -- it is a bright pink affair with a rose print and the words World's Best Girlfriend. These two roommates seem to literally get everything from thrift stores. It might be a matter of principles, rather than finances. "So, app first or chat first? I want to ask how this town has received you so far, but I'll let you decide when I grill you."

"I can see it now... " The murmur is soft, her lips twitching at the corners, as her fingers tap on the mug, those brown eyes studying him. "The stork'll bring them, drop them at your doorstep." The gesture that goes with that suggests that perhaps these babies might not bounce. Thud. Splash. "I haven't really spoken to many since I got here. I had work to do so..." She shrugs, wrinkling her nose a little, "I'm not that up for meeting people right now, kinda getting over a few things so..."

She puts her mug down, uncoiling from the chair to reach for her backpack. "App then." She opens it, slanting him a look, her lashes lowered, the faintest of smirks on her lips. "So, look, this is draft one but you've got your booking page here, so you can block out rooms for meetings. You've got some project management stuff in the background here, and a staffing section..."

"Important thing is to make it idiot proof. Icons are good." Ravn nods. "Some of the people who will end up using this aren't fantastic readers, and by that I mean that they can literally not read -- whether it's due to not having done so in forty years, or never properly learning in the first place. Our target user is -- well, me, and a few other volunteers, but also a number of people who live in sleeping bags under the boardwalk."

He leans in to look at the little screen. "The other important thing is to make it scam proof, for the same reason. Most of those guys are just good folks with problems. But there's always one who will empty your bank account if he gets the chance. So no access to finances from this -- or at least not in a way that doesn't require some kind of authorisation."

"Idiot proof..." She glances at the laptop, her lips twisting but that gaze flies up to him when he explains further. "Ah, so pictures good then. Right." She opens a program, making some notes on it, as she listens to him, her eyes narrowing. "This sounds like you need two access routes. One for you with admin rights to stuff like your finances and your grant bids. Then another for your users..." She looks at him to check, tilting her head again, "Keep the last really simple, and make yours secure... "

Absently she reaches for her coffee, taking a swig, her gaze on the laptop.

"That sounds about right," Ravn agrees with a small smile. "I don't want these guys to feel that we don't trust them. But I also don't want to hand access to HOPE's finances over to anyone who can create a login. I like to think the best of people but -- these are people who are very hard pressed, and some of them are literally hard pressed by other people whom they owe money. Some are drug addicts, some are drowning in debt, some are just plain mental. There's reasons they need help in the first place, after all."

He studies the programmer's face. "You must be used to getting some pretty fucked up requests. And in this town -- I mean, I feel like I should ask if there is a way to password protect against Veil monsters. Truth is, of course, anything we design, they can pick out of our heads and hence, know how to work around."

A swig of coffee and she is making notes, before she pauses and gives Ravn a thoughtful look. "Only what is in your head though right..." She leans back in her chair, her gaze resting on him unseeingly, "Pick out of your head, but ...dual-layer, physical..." Her words are hesitant, drawn-out as she types notes frantically, "I think I can..." The murmur is soft, coffee and man forgotten alike. "U2F keys." The murmur is soft and she pauses to look up at him, "Do you have one? I can order you one." There seems to have been an assumption that perhaps he could follow some of those disjointed mumblings to the clear and obvious conclusion.

"You might have to order me one. And then tell me what it is." Ravn rests his chin on a gloved hand, looking amused in that slightly clueless way of someone who is very much an end user; an academic who needs to know how the spreadsheet works but for your own sanity's sake, don't ever invite him to peek under the hood.

He's entertained enough watching the processing across the table though. Tempted, perhaps, to get one of those little signs -- Shh, Genius At Work.

"Hm." The sound is faintly disapproving as if everyone should have one of those in their lives. She starts making a list, her mind clicking over, her gaze flickering from him to the screen and back, "Alright then." She shuts the lid gently, a finger brushing the top of it before she tucks it into the backpack. "It might take me some time but I think I can do a few layers of security. They might be able to get stuff out of your head, but a physical key that you'd need as well as the password makes it harder, right? And if you want, it could require two keys to access certain bits....and even fingerprints."

Ravn watches, fascinated. "It feels a bit like overkill -- security measures worthy of a bank or something. But I cannot deny that I tend to take these things very seriously because there are literal monsters out there that do in fact want to shut us down. I run all legal operations through a company in Seattle for the same reason -- the Veil can still get to them if it really wants to, but at least it takes more effort. We don't do anything illegal at HOPE but charities are traditionally great fronts for money laundering. I don't want to make it too easy for somebody on the Other Side to whip up something to shut us down for six months during investigations, you know?"

He thinks. "Two keys might be good. Fingerprints might be shooting cannons at sparrows." Odd Danish expressions are go.

"Foresight response looks like overkill if it works." The mumble is soft, absently spoken, her forehead creasing a little. "I'll get it to you when it's done. Who is the second keyholder? Needs to be someone ..." She bends her knee, wrapping an arm around her leg, her foot on the seat of her chair as she reaches for her coffee. "Do people shoot cannons at sparrows?" Her grin is quick, a brightness flashing across her face. "So, found out anything new since the ... what were we calling it?" The question is curious, an odd expression on her face, a thought held back.

"Christian VII, King of Denmark. Ordered his royal guard to fire cannons at a flock of sparrows in the royal castle courtyard, because they annoyed him. It became a saying in Danish, don't use cannons to shoot sparrows -- meaning, don't overdo it by a mile." Ravn grins; trust a historian to have obscure anecdotes at hand for any given situation or moment.

He taps his lip. "Second keyholder . . . That's a good one. There are a lot of people involved with HOPE but not actually a lot who are at the centre on a daily basis, besides me. That's why I got assigned to daily organising in the first place. Is it possible to somehow make the second person be one of a number of approved identities? Any combination of two regular volunteers off this list, both knowing the password, etcetera -- otherwise, it's easy to lock us down by just taking out one of us." The Dane winces slightly. "Christ, I wish we didn't have to be so paranoid."

Then he sips his coffee and shakes his head, returning to the second question. "I don't think we'll ever know what happened to the missing twelve weeks. No one knows -- and experiences are very varied. Most of us just -- don't remember, but seem to have been around, doing what we usually do. A few seem to have simply not existed for twelve weeks, like they were put on pause somehow. And one was out of town and experienced that the town didn't exist for twelve weeks and no one'd ever heard of it."

"The more you know..." The murmur is soft, and her lips quirk at the corners, "The less you understand." She takes a swig of the coffee, resting the mug on her bent knee as she considers, "Well, it would be a physical key so ... you can hand it to someone each shift." Her forehead wrinkles as she considers, "Leave it with me, I kinda have a ..." She wiggles her fingers by her temple, "Thing, thought. Maybe."

The words are distracted, clearly not entirely focussed on him and their conversation, "No inklings of anything that happened?" Her face wrinkles, her brow creasing, "Something isn't right, I mean, apart from the weirdness." Her fingers tap on her mug, and then she shakes her head. "I don't know. Maybe I'm just worrying."

"In this town, a constant state of -- well, not worry, but caution, is not a bad thing." Ravn likes living here, he likes it quite a lot - but he is not blind, and he is aware that the life expectancy of shiny people around here is well below the national average. "It's obvious that something happened during those twelve weeks. No one has figured out what, though -- and the Veil has been acting a little like it's not entirely sure, either. It's possible it all really does pertain to that one kid making a wish from a trickster god. If it really is, I think we all need to be very grateful that Grant Baxter is essentially a kind and decent human soul, because that's probably the only reason things haven't gone straight to hell. Wishes never end well. But sometimes, just sometimes, a genuinely innocent one, can turn out -- not too awful."

Her lips curl at the corners, a rueful acknowledgement that he is right, those fingers tapping on the side of the mug. "Maybe so. I just have a nagging feeling." But then she shrugs, brushing it off, letting it go. "Grant Baxter?" Her eyebrows arch, the quizzical look making it clear that it does not register on her memory, and perhaps... she does tend to live under rocks when coding. "Wishes? What are you on about?"

Ravn sips his coffee. "Grant Baxter, local kid. Early twenties, skater, graffiti artist. Are you familiar with the legend of Baba Yaga, the Slavic trickster goddess? Lives in a cottage on chicken feet, flies around the world in a mortar, using a pestle for an oar?"

He chuckles, fully aware of the absurdity. "She turned up here, shortly before the storm. Or the Veil created a Baba Yaga based on the myth, more likely. Either way, she predicted the storm. Said that there would be a physical storm and a magical one, and that there would be great change. In folklore, her function is to portent change, so I was rather worried about it -- I am a folklorist, this is literally my field. But the thing about Baba Yaga in Russian fairytales is, she tends to take the side of the genuinely innocent kid. The peasant hero, the youngest sister -- that lot. Somehow Grant wheedled some kind of wish out of her -- and he is very much that kind of kid. He wished for his family to not be tortured in the Veil after death anymore -- and that's the only thing we do know has changed. The haunted lumber mill and the haunted carousel are no longer full of dead Baxters."

She tilts her head, her eyes narrowing a little as she listens to the story. "That is ...." She wraps both hands around the mug, fingers intermeshing, as she studies him. "I mean, this place is just more bizarre by the day." She releases a breath on a laugh, her quick headshake dismissing her own confusion. "So witch grants a wish for a kid, and the ghosts go, but all this goes too. Is it part of it or because of it? I mean did the whole thing happen for his wish or ..." She puts the mug down on the table, shaking her head again. "I think it is just too much to deal with sober."

"If I ever live the dream and open my own dive bar somewhere, that's going to be the tagline, printed on the sign, right under "Ravn's Joint": 'This town, too much to deal with sober'. I'll make a killing." Ravn shoots Tanasha a commiserating glance; the folklorist is quite aware that he's just about the only person in nearly two hundred years' worth of Gray Harbor history whose response to all of this is an enthusiastic 'Awesome!'. Most people are saner. And intend to live to see their grandchildren. "We'll probably never know if the witch came here to grant Bax' wish, or she came here because she sensed that something was about to change. Sometimes, I find it's best to just -- shrug and move on, because we'll never get a proper explanation anyhow."

He gets up and heads to a kitchen cupboard for a couple of shotglasses and a bottle of 12 year Glenfiddich. "I hope this is an acceptable poison. It's my go to coping juice when the town gets a bit too weird."

She shakes her head a little, the slight withdrawal subtle as she considers, "You'd do well with a bar. You talk to everyone..." The smile this time is a little awkward, and she pus the mug on the table, wrapping her arm around her bent leg. "Shrug and move on. I like... data. Information. To keep things in order." She uses her free hand, a gesture putting invisible objects into lines and sorted... "I don't know that drinking is a good idea." The flicker of a smile comes and goes, before she adds lightly, "Nice drink though." She hesitates before she shrugs, going with it.

"I talk to everyone but usually just one or two at a time," Ravn smiles and looks a little apologetic. "I am not good with larger groups of people. It's why I decided against pursuing a teaching career in an actual classroom: I can't stand having twenty or more people staring at me, expecting me to keep saying useful things. It freaks me out. I worked as a barback for a stint but that's different -- you're pretty much invisible, and you spend most of your time cleaning up after patrons, not talking to them."

He sips his whiskey, leaving it up to Tanasha whether she wants to succumb to temptation. "I like knowledge. I like explanations, like understanding how the stories work, what the entities are trying to do. But I've had to come to some kind of terms with the fact that a lot of the time, I will never know. Not even if I talk to everyone involved, try to get all the pieces of the puzzle. And sometimes, there simply aren't any answers to be had."

She is studying him through lowered lashes, her expression giving nothing of her thoughts away. The slight curve to her lips might be amusement, or just resting amused face. "I prefer just one person, or two. I don't much like crowds, it does feel just too loud." She shakes her head quickly, "I've done a few bar shifts, and the sound is...." She lifts her hands, illustrating with a wave of her hands by her ears, the wince on her expression making her feelings clear. She hesitates before she reaches for that whiskey, pouring herself a glass, before she carefully puts the lid on it. "I like data." Her voice is soft and she hesitates before putting it more clearly, "People don't make much sense. They are the biggest puzzle, but I'm not sure I want supernatural puzzles any more than that."

"The noise isn't what bothers me as much as the inevitable complications." Ravn makes a little face. "Single guy working in a bar. At some point, somebody decides that you're so desperate you'll follow any pair of tits home. Then things get awkward because no friendship survives the 'I like you but not that way' talk. Someone opens themselves up to you like that only for you to try to put them down gently, they end up resenting you. At best they end up just ignoring you because of a bruised ego."

He hitches a shoulder. "Gray Harbor forces me to not be a hermit. I'm not convinced it's a bad thing. I've made some very good friends here. Enough that I am willing to accept all the supernatural fuckery as a price to be paid to have a home."

The look she shoots him comes with lifted eyebrows, her lips quirking into a quick smile. "You are telling me. Working in a bar makes people assume you are available and I'm just not interested, not after the last time..." A firm shake of her head, "I just tell the guys I am gay. It avoids the whole threesome question..." She hesitates, taking a sip of her drink, before she adds lightly, "I'll make friends, eventually. I've got one at least..."

"Hey, whatever works." Ravn laughs softly. "I'd tell you that you should just tell guys no up front and be honest about it, but to be honest? Women tend to assume that I am gay as well, and it does sometimes save a hell of a lot of unpleasantness to just -- well, go along with it may be going a little too far, but not bother to correct them. If I'm not hoping to get them in my bed anyhow, what does it matter?"

And yet he can't helchuckle: "They should open a market for that. Extra-large beds, for the discerning connoisseur who simply can't face sleeping without at least two other people. Really, that is remarkably silly -- last I checked it's possible to like chocolate and pickles, but maybe not always at the same time."

She grins, liting her eyebrows, "I mean, it isn't far away. I'm bi, but mostly my relationships have been women so..." She shrugs lightly, "Rejecting a drunk guy is risky, you know?" The wrinkle of her nose goes with a set to her jawline and she adds softly, "Especially when you look like me." There is a touch of heat to that, anger hidden under a mask of amusement.

"Yeah." The Dane knows better than to argue that point. He leans back on his chair a little. "It's dangerous even when you are another guy, and even when you're fluorescent white. Bloke feeling entitled to feed his hard-on and taking a rejection as a personal attack, nothing new. Another reason I don't really do the whole dating thing, I'm not up for dealing with that look on a woman's face. The one that goes, oh shit, there's a 6'3 guy hitting on me and I really need to find an excuse to get the fuck out of here right now. I'm not really into casual relationships in the first place. Neuropathy's a bitch, and getting dropped off on someone's curb at three am in the morning because you won't put out is overrated no matter what's in your pants."

He hitches a shoulder. "It's not something I see happen around here a lot. For what it's worth, Gray Harbor -- and our little community in it -- is too small. I hear a few friends complain jokingly that finding someone here is impossible since the whole town's either gay or already taken. But I don't hear a lot about people feeling pressured or having to deal with stalkers, at least."

"I'll stick with single all the way..." The murmur is light, and she shakes her head, her jaw jutting out for a moment, lips pursed. "I'll avoid that dating game the whole time. Burnt before, and I'll never do that again." She shakes her head, her hair flying around her, before she puts her glass on the table, hesitating before she adds lightly, "I ought to go." She uncoils, dropping her foot to the floor, giving him that quick smile. "Code to write."

"Nothing wrong with single. Heaven knows it's pretty chronic in my case and I'm happy enough that way." Ravn gets up. "Let me walk you out. And, don't be a stranger? Contrary to common belief, it is possible for people of opposite genders to get along without either planning to trip the other."

Tanasha laughs, a short sound with her eyebrows raised. "Friends it is... Come over whenever you want." She swings the bag onto her shoulder, resting her other hand on her cocked hip. "Seems I decided I needed a massive house during that time. I can't find any paperwork about my decision making but..."