(no subject)

[skygiants]

I'll start by saying that this hasn't been the best week for me in RL. Nothing dramatically bad or anything; nothing's even really happened except for a few mild stressors, which is half to be expected with finals coming up anyways. I've just felt myself slipping back into some habits I thought I'd kicked long ago - i.e., interpersonal paranoia, demands for attention, and general emo and malaise. It's minor slippage in one particular direction more than anything huge, but it's still enough to make me uncomfortable with myself. So: best to curb the habit now, before it grows.

Sun and literature are of course like wonder drugs for me when it comes to putting things in perspective, and I've been dosing myself with them in abundance. However, at the risk of sounding tragically sappy, I do think the best way to cure my self-absorption is to do things for other people.

This is where you guys come in. This post is space for you to tell me what I can do to make you happier. If you want me to write fic, I will do my best! If there's a fic I promised you a while ago and never got around to writing, kick me in the pants for that too. If there's a thread you want with me, tell me here, or if you want me to ramble about a topic (hopefully one that I know at least something about), I will ramble at will. If you want me to make you icons . . . well, they will be crap, but I will do my very, very best. If you want me to send you a song, I can do that. Or, if you want, just comment and I will tell you exactly why you are amazing and I love you.

This is open season on any of those, or any combination thereof. If I can't fill your request right away because it's something that takes time to do, it will definitely be done sometime over the next two weeks. And if there's anything I can do that I've forgotten to mention up there, tell me that too, and I will do my best to comply.

Except possibly 'give me large sums of money,' as, alas, I do not have the large sums of money to give away.

Comments

[skygiants]

It wasn’t unusual to see Mary Lennox sitting at a table in Milliways; nor was it unusual to see her scowling.

However, she did not usually have a small, rather overstuffed valise at her feet.

“What’s all that, Mary?” Ingress asked, looking down at the case in some puzzlement.

“Things I need,” Mary answered, matter-of-factly. “Some books, some things for the garden, two changes of clothing – I should have brought more but I did not have room.”

Ingress’ eyes widened. “Things you need? Mary, are you running away?”

“My uncle locked me in my room,” Mary said, her scowl deepening. “He was going to pack me off to a convent school or some such place – only because he saw me at the brothel! It is not as if he has any room to talk, for he was there when I saw him – and I did not even have a chance to go in – but of course he would not pay any attention to that. He is so –” She gropes for an appropriate word, rolling her eyes, and announces finally “Victorian.”

Ingress nodded sympathetically. She didn’t need to ask how Mary had gotten out, although lockpicking was one skill of Mary’s that Ingress didn’t possess – who needed it when you could Open? “I’m sure someone will be able to talk some sense into him eventually,” she offered, with her usual optimism. “Colin doesn’t want you to be sent away, does he?”

“Colin,” Mary said, with some indignation, “thinks it is all too too terribly funny. He was still laughing when I came here. I do not think he will be of much help for some time.” (Mary, it was very clear, didn’t see the humor in the situation at all.) “But in any case, it does not matter if he does not; I can take a room here for some time, only,” she adds, frowning a little, “I do not know how long my allowance that I have saved will last. But I have saved quite a bit. And perhaps I could take a position as a gardener or something like that –”

Ingress interrupted, laughing, before Mary could say anything more. “Oh, don’t be silly! Of course you can come stay in the House of Arch. Tom and Door won’t mind at all, I know it. You can come to my lessons with me – I know you’ve been wanting to learn swordfighting, I could help to teach you – and you can borrow my clothes if you run out, Tom’ll enchant them to fit, we can talk all night and everything,” she went on, happily, “it’ll be like a long sleepover!”

A few of the worried creases eased out from Mary’s face, though she still looked somewhat anxious. “You are quite sure? I should like that, of course, but I should hate to be an imposition –”

“You’ll be far less trouble than Gavroche,” Ingress predicted cheerfully. “He’s getting into trouble almost all the time now – he keeps stealing things from the nobles he doesn’t like. Of course he gives them back, but it makes them furious. And flirting with their daughters, the ones that have them, and they like that even less.”

Mary looked momentarily intrigued by this – after all, she had never achieved her goal at the brothel – and then shook her head, clearly dismissing the idea. She and Gavroche had never gotten along very well. “Very well, then,” she said, with one of her rare bright smiles, and stood. She picked up her valise, and the two girls headed towards the House of Arch portrait, passing Tom coming out the other way.

“Tom,” Ingress called, as they passed, “Mary’s coming for a sleepover.”

“All right,” Tom answered, happily innocent of any of the greater complexities of the situation. “Remember to tell Door there’ll be one more for dinner, then.” He headed towards the bar to order a drink.

He was still sitting there, going over some policy notes, when Archibald Craven stormed into Milliways and marched over to the bar next to him to demand of a thoroughly confused bartending turtle where his wayward niece had gone.





Aaaand what happens after that should probably be written by either you or Rym. *giggles*

[vivien]

Squees with great squeeing!!!!

This is perfect and wonderful. YAY!

Thanks, Becca Lou Who!

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

*indignantly* He isn't going to send her to a convent school! That would be France, and France is too far away.

...he'll send her to Miss Minchin's.

[skygiants]

Mary doesn't know that!

*giggles* . . . . but that can only lead to the horrible Little Princess/Secret Garden crossover of WRONG. :O

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Actually, it wouldn't work because Mary would be too old for Miss Minchin's. But it's a mental image of quite interesting wrongness.