All I Really Need :: [Calliope + Wolfgang]
Mar 16, 2014 10:31:46 GMT -5
Post by L△LIA on Mar 16, 2014 10:31:46 GMT -5
Time has gotten to be something of a chore for her, cramming hours into minutes so she can be three places at once and forget that her mind doesn't remember how to be present within her body anymore. It's an unstoppable series of contradictions where waking up is into a dream, because reality could never be a day spent agonizing over the last of her two brothers being in a coma or afternoons doing paperwork in a psychiatric clinic that can't be above-board if they're hiring a high school dropout like her as an intern, or evenings alternating between working in a factory line and cooking crystal meth in her kitchen. No, that's not real life. That's a work of fiction.
As it is, she's getting pretty good at this whole dreaming thing. The bills are paid, the patients and co-workers smile at her even though she rarely smiles back and, as for the meth, well, if Poe weren't already in a coma, he would be if he saw her at work on that little project. The crystals might as well be described as being as big as her fist even though it's nothing of the sort, because what she cooks is the stuff of urban legends. Diamonds must be dull and common in comparison, although she's never seen one. That's why a notoriously violent drug lord from two Districts away fell to his knees in her honor when they met, despite the part where she still doesn't understand who he is or what she's getting herself into by selling to him, but it's alright. The bills are getting paid, so surely that means everything is okay.
It's been a long time since things have actually been okay, but she survives by reminding herself periodically how it's all relative now. If someone asked her how she was with the expectation of a sincere answer, her reply would sound more like the incoherent screaming of a broken soul speaking in tongues. The edge of sanity's cliff was something she thinks she maybe saw once, a very long time ago, but after falling so far, she can't remember what it looked like. That's one of those things a person isn't able to see from rock bottom. If ever she wakes up properly again, maybe she'll think about attempting to climb up from this pit she's in, but for now it's still a struggle to sort out the differences between up and down or right and wrong. There are priorities. That's why she hauls herself in to visit a comatose brother she has spent the last few years spitefully wishing death upon. Up and down. Right and wrong. Sincerity or a lack thereof. It's all the same now.
The nurse at the front desk is blindly sweet and naive enough that she still says hello when Calliope trudges in, dragging her feet every step of the way, forever resentful that these visits are part of her daily routine. She grunts in reply to the chipper smile, unable to see the expression because this is a girl who is just this side of hallucinating from lack of sleep and at this point she only recognizes that the greeting is there because of an assumption that this is a morning like any other. The overwhelming tragedy of it used to make her want to burn the world down, but right this second she is too distracted by a desperate desire for caffeine to bother with things like youthful rebellion. The revolution of her life can wait. Priorities, remember? For now the coffee machine is the only way to save herself.
The buttons are large and easy to navigate, even in her state of borderline incoherence. If the designer of the machine were here, she might just hug him for making at least this one part of her life easy; these small things are just about the only thing left for her to appreciate. Bless him. Bless coffee. Bless the small triumphs that can be bought with the spare change jingling in her pocket. A series of small coins are traded away and once the cup is in her hand, warm and full of a promise she can actually believe in, she manages a smile in response to the first sip. Because of this one small thing, she doesn't hate the birds outside for chirping or the nurse for being so happy in a place so godawful terrible and everything is right with the world. "Sweet nectar of the gods, I love you and only you," she whispers as softly as a lover and in her distraction, she doesn't know the end of her bliss is coming until it's all over. A collision. Scalding coffee splattered between her and an unfortunate stranger. The sense of loss for more than one thing that was momentarily beloved in her life, although that is a realization that will take a few more minutes yet to sink in.
"Oh no. Oh god, no." Pawing at the front of her stained shirt, she is perhaps less upset about scalding herself than she is at the loss of her day's redemption. "Not the coffee," she mutters with each swipe of her useless hands as the chipper nurse behind the welcome desk stifles a giggle behind her hand in response to the Bloom girl getting a bit of karma for being so rude each morning. If this truly is karma, it feels less like a lesson and more like par for the course. That's just life. It kills one brother, knocks the other into a coma, and then denies a girl coffee for good measure. "Urgh!" If this were reality instead of just another dream, she would hate everything about the world and what it chooses to be. Maybe she still does. Then again, as the vaguely familiar voice of the person she so unceremoniously crashed into echoes out to her and she finally looks up with a — "I didn't hear what you said because I was busy dying, I'm sorry, could you repeat whatever excuse for words just came out of your mouth?" — she decides this hellish alternate reality she's been stumbling around in is officially worse than anything else she could wake up to. No time-bending amount of minutes or hours will be enough to deal with what is happening in this moment. Now more than ever, her mind is not in her body, because she is legitimately out of her mind on a whole new level if the face looking back at her is his.
As it is, she's getting pretty good at this whole dreaming thing. The bills are paid, the patients and co-workers smile at her even though she rarely smiles back and, as for the meth, well, if Poe weren't already in a coma, he would be if he saw her at work on that little project. The crystals might as well be described as being as big as her fist even though it's nothing of the sort, because what she cooks is the stuff of urban legends. Diamonds must be dull and common in comparison, although she's never seen one. That's why a notoriously violent drug lord from two Districts away fell to his knees in her honor when they met, despite the part where she still doesn't understand who he is or what she's getting herself into by selling to him, but it's alright. The bills are getting paid, so surely that means everything is okay.
It's been a long time since things have actually been okay, but she survives by reminding herself periodically how it's all relative now. If someone asked her how she was with the expectation of a sincere answer, her reply would sound more like the incoherent screaming of a broken soul speaking in tongues. The edge of sanity's cliff was something she thinks she maybe saw once, a very long time ago, but after falling so far, she can't remember what it looked like. That's one of those things a person isn't able to see from rock bottom. If ever she wakes up properly again, maybe she'll think about attempting to climb up from this pit she's in, but for now it's still a struggle to sort out the differences between up and down or right and wrong. There are priorities. That's why she hauls herself in to visit a comatose brother she has spent the last few years spitefully wishing death upon. Up and down. Right and wrong. Sincerity or a lack thereof. It's all the same now.
The nurse at the front desk is blindly sweet and naive enough that she still says hello when Calliope trudges in, dragging her feet every step of the way, forever resentful that these visits are part of her daily routine. She grunts in reply to the chipper smile, unable to see the expression because this is a girl who is just this side of hallucinating from lack of sleep and at this point she only recognizes that the greeting is there because of an assumption that this is a morning like any other. The overwhelming tragedy of it used to make her want to burn the world down, but right this second she is too distracted by a desperate desire for caffeine to bother with things like youthful rebellion. The revolution of her life can wait. Priorities, remember? For now the coffee machine is the only way to save herself.
The buttons are large and easy to navigate, even in her state of borderline incoherence. If the designer of the machine were here, she might just hug him for making at least this one part of her life easy; these small things are just about the only thing left for her to appreciate. Bless him. Bless coffee. Bless the small triumphs that can be bought with the spare change jingling in her pocket. A series of small coins are traded away and once the cup is in her hand, warm and full of a promise she can actually believe in, she manages a smile in response to the first sip. Because of this one small thing, she doesn't hate the birds outside for chirping or the nurse for being so happy in a place so godawful terrible and everything is right with the world. "Sweet nectar of the gods, I love you and only you," she whispers as softly as a lover and in her distraction, she doesn't know the end of her bliss is coming until it's all over. A collision. Scalding coffee splattered between her and an unfortunate stranger. The sense of loss for more than one thing that was momentarily beloved in her life, although that is a realization that will take a few more minutes yet to sink in.
"Oh no. Oh god, no." Pawing at the front of her stained shirt, she is perhaps less upset about scalding herself than she is at the loss of her day's redemption. "Not the coffee," she mutters with each swipe of her useless hands as the chipper nurse behind the welcome desk stifles a giggle behind her hand in response to the Bloom girl getting a bit of karma for being so rude each morning. If this truly is karma, it feels less like a lesson and more like par for the course. That's just life. It kills one brother, knocks the other into a coma, and then denies a girl coffee for good measure. "Urgh!" If this were reality instead of just another dream, she would hate everything about the world and what it chooses to be. Maybe she still does. Then again, as the vaguely familiar voice of the person she so unceremoniously crashed into echoes out to her and she finally looks up with a — "I didn't hear what you said because I was busy dying, I'm sorry, could you repeat whatever excuse for words just came out of your mouth?" — she decides this hellish alternate reality she's been stumbling around in is officially worse than anything else she could wake up to. No time-bending amount of minutes or hours will be enough to deal with what is happening in this moment. Now more than ever, her mind is not in her body, because she is legitimately out of her mind on a whole new level if the face looking back at her is his.
