i'm looking for an easy thing [ OPEN MINGLE ]

[hyperlit]

Who: Anyone and everyone! Who wants to look at books?
What: BOOKVALANCHE
When: Let's say from the 25th and onward for simplicity
Where: The Storyteller's Temple, in addition to the library that's finally getting some much-needed attention
Warnings: Mark anything that comes up!



The library is finally getting some renovations! Between some new bookshelves (hope someone here is good at hauling) and a veritable cascade of all sorts of books and supplies, an awful lot needs to be transferred from the Temple to the heretofore unused library, and any help anyone has to offer is much appreciated!

But, of course, there's also so very much to go through for your own perusal. Just look at all this! Coloring books, puzzle books, stories of all sorts, comic books, fashion magazines, all sorts of survival texts...you name it.

This all needs to be put away and stored in those neat little waterproofing book protectors - shelves need to be moved, supplies need to be secured, and someone should probably take inventory. But also...there's a lot of fresh new reading material on an island that previously had none.

Isn't that worth looking over?

Comments

[technicallytechnically]

[Thanks, she picked it herself.

And listen, if whoopee cushions or joy buzzers were a more common thing in her world, you wouldn't be unwise to check. But also, Jester is offended at the notion. She's perfectly innocent. She's never once covered her hand in honey before a handshake.]

Tim! Hey, what's that thing behind you??

[postictal]

[That catches him the way nothing else in this conversation has - though maybe not in the way Jester would expect. He goes still for half a minute, his breath catching in his throat, and an old feeling stirs at the corners of his eyes. Don't turn around.]

[So he doesn't turn around. He just freezes.]

[It's a veritable battle to keep his voice steady when he answers.]

What do you mean.

[technicallytechnically]

[Oh, the freezing is... unexpected. He suddenly looks deathly serious. She didn't mean to scare him.

So she tries to do damage control. Her hands come up and she gestures frantically that no, it's okay, everything's fine.]

Oh, I mean, it's nothing dangerous, it's just something really cool, like uhh, I think it's a... really funny bird?? Its feathers are doing something soooo crazy, you've got to see how crazy this bird is.

[She's practically forgotten what the hell she was even going to do while his back was turned, now, so we're really flying by the seat of our pants here.]

[postictal]

...right.

[God, why'd his shoulders get so tense? When did they get so tense? His back is too stiff, his fists curled at his sides, and...]

[Breathe.]

[He breathes. Slow, easy, simple. It doesn't make any of it go away, but the knee-jerk klaxons no longer thrum away in his skull, and it's clearer now that she's just trying to recover something that he made weird. Quit making things weird, Tim. Jesus.]

A bird. In the library.

[technicallytechnically]

Yeah, that's part of why it's so crazy!! How did that guy get in here!! Man!! Wait, maybe they're one of those talking birds, like they're actually a person that got brought here and not just one of the local, uh, wildlife? That would explain a lot, 'cause this bird person looks really cool.

[He's not looking! She's hyping this up so much! What must she sacrifice to get one man to look over his shoulder!

Okay, obviously she's just not selling it enough.]

HOLY SHIT, THE BIRD JUST STARTED POOPING ALL OVER THE BOOKS!!!

[Nailed it.]

[postictal]

[Tim's...still not looking. He's just staring at her, faintly bemused, his frown darkening increasingly the longer she goes on. The escalation would've been forced even if it weren't obviously a backpedal from earlier.]

[It's not really clear what she's trying here, so eventually Tim just...sighs.]

If you want me to stop talking to you, you can just say so.

[technicallytechnically]

[Jester... immediately deflates. She didn't mean to hurt his feelings!!]

No! I like talking to you! You're super nice and you have, uh, good sideburns? I just wanted you to turn around so I could... put a dick on the shelf.

[Tonally, the way she admits it is absolutely not the way those actual words should ever be said. She offers no explanation for what she means by "put a dick on the shelf". But she apparently takes it very, very seriously, by how disheartened she is now.]

[postictal]

[Wow. It's actually been years since anyone brought up his sideburns, and they used to be his defining trait and everything. He stares at her for a moment, frowning.]

Like...a fake one, or a real one?

[If it's a fake one, that's fine, that makes more sense. If it's a real one that's somehow been detached from its owner, Tim is going to have questions.]

[technicallytechnically]

Both, technically? Like, technically it's a fake dick, because it's not from a person? But also my paint makes things real, technically.

[It doesn't make them Flesh, which she neglects to mention. Her magic paint is essentially a 3D printer.]

[postictal]

Please don't put any dicks on the shelf.

[He doesn't own this place, but he's going to have to try and find whoever technically owns it just so he can be like, hey, let me give you a handy sign of rules and have one of those be: don't put dicks on the shelf.]

There's a ton of kids here, for one. Might get awkward.

[technicallytechnically]

[Jester raises her eyebrows and makes a face very akin to Mike Myers as Wayne Campbell.]

Kids know what dicks look like.

[Just take it from her. She didn't always look like this. Once, she was even smaller.]

[postictal]

Not all of them.

[He does not want to have to answer any questions Ren might have, okay? And if she asks any of them to his face, he's redirecting her to the elves.]

[technicallytechnically]

I mean, if they didn't already, they do now, 'cause I drew a lot of them on the rocks and beach and stuff when I first got here.

[But fine!!! She gets the hint!!! This is why she was trying to get him to look away.]

I'm not going to now anyway, 'cause it's not fun if you already know. I'll just have to think of something else.

[Like maybe... sneaking some of her new pamphlets into the books. Now that's a thought...]

[postictal]

Oh my god. Yeah, please don't do that, maybe. I don't wanna have to answer those questions. No one is gonna wanna have to answer those questions. Jesus.

[He's not going to make her answer them, because he's ninety percent sure she'll make up some sort of bullshit faux information that he doesn't need to hear Ren regurgitating to hapless adults later, all right.]

[technicallytechnically]

[Wow, Tim, it's like you've met Jester before!]

I mean, everyone finds out about dicks eventually, one way or the other.

[While Jester is definitely not one of the "let the kid try alcohol early in life" types... She's also definitely a "it's never too early to be blunt about sex ed" type.

But also, her mother was a courtesan and she grew up in a brothel. Such is life.]

But okay! I'll make sure to only put dicks where the adults are. There isn't a brothel or anything on this island, is there?

[She feels like she would've noticed by now, but you know. Double checking..]

[postictal]

No.

[God, Tim is so fortunate that he has to be the one to have this discussion with her. He loves this.]

Can I ask why you feel like that's - necessary? Do you just think it's funny? [Tim's tone clearly suggests that he's not sure he buys that, but that might just be him.]

[technicallytechnically]

The brothel?

[It should be obvious why that would be necessary. But then she catches his meaning.]

Oh, you mean the dicks. Well... I do think it's funny, but it's more important that he thinks it's funny.

[She smirks a little, her gaze drifting not up, but to the side. Not like she's looking away from Tim, but more like she's looking for something (or someone) that may be invisible.]

[postictal]

[A brothel is very much not necessary, Jester.]

...he.

[Okay, so she's got someone in her head, maybe. Or an imaginary friend. Neither of those things are typically unsettling to someone like Tim, who has contended with both, and in many ways, still does.]

[The issues arises from when she treats it like something obvious.]

[technicallytechnically]

[They can agree to disagree on the necessity of a brothel.

At Tim's parroting of what she said, though, she puts her fingers together and presses them to her lips coyly.]

Yeah, you know. Just a friend of mine. I can tell you all about him if you want. He's super cool, like, way cooler than that Storyteller person. He hasn't shown up here yet, but I know he can still hear me.

[postictal]

That's not really how this place works. If he's not here, then he's not here.

[He already had to go through this shit with Ren, which was more tolerable, at least, because she had the excuse of being a child and therefore not wanting to accept something because she didn't like the sound of it. But Jester is, he thinks, an adult? She's small. It's not entirely clear.]

It's its own...you know, world. Removed from everything.