The Shavings Off Your Mind are the Only Rent [Open to All]

[applesaucemod]

Picture a house. Actually, picture two houses. They're (almost) identical structures that share an uneasy coexistence, tangled together on a quantum level. One of the houses is Good: bright, cheerful, full of comfortable furniture and a pervasive feeling of safety. The other house is Evil: dingy, dilapidated, and haunted by the dreamers' greatest fears.

The good news - and bad news - is that travel from one house to the other is as simple as passing through a door. All a dreamer has to do is walk through a doorway, any doorway, and they'll find themselves in whichever house they weren't in before they crossed the threshold. Perhaps they'll step out of a beautiful library and find themselves in a threatening hallway - or perhaps they'll flee a menacing kitchen and find themselves in a perfectly safe dining room. That is the nature of the houses' entanglement: every door is a portal between the two.

There are, of course, complications. Dreamers in one house can't perceive the other; if you're in the Good house and looking through a doorway, the space beyond will look as nice and inviting as the space you're in now (until you step through that doorway, of course). Dreamers also can't really perceive one another if they're in the same room, but in different houses, though they might see a flash of movement out of the corner of their eye, or think they heard something.

Perhaps the greatest complications are the houses themselves. They have rather strong personalities, and they aren't very fond of one another. Each house will want to keep you if it can (keep you safe, in the case of the Good house, or keep you for itself, in the case of the Evil one). Dreamers may attempt to cross a hall and find the door that looked open and inviting a moment ago is now barred shut, leaving them trapped in the hall - or have doors suddenly close in their faces before they can end up anywhere unpleasant. Still, there's only so much either house can do, and even a locked door can be jimmied open or busted down.

Escape from the houses is possible, but the formal gardens beyond are similarly entangled, with neatly trimmed lawns and expertly plotted flower beds becoming overgrown tangles of nettles and algae-choked reflecting pools. An archway is as good as a door, as far as the gardens are concerned, and there are plenty of arbors and arches over the paths. Of course, dreamers may find that a sound arbor in the Good garden has collapsed in the Evil one… and heaven help anyone who dares to explore the hedge maze.





[ooc: y'all know the drill. ALL characters are welcome, regardless of whether they're in the game. Characters can remember or forget the events of the dream at the players' discretion.

Also, this dream party marks the aforementioned calendar freeze. For the next three weeks, the IG date will sit on July 3rd. Posts dated July 3rd or earlier are allowed and encouraged. The calendar will resume forward motion at a 4:1 ratio on Saturday, July 26th.]

Comments

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy's running down a long hallway. She could swear something's following her, but she's yet to see what.

There was blood, so much of it, and it's covering her shoes. They used to be light blue, matching her summer dress, but now they're stained deep red. And screams, and the sounds of something pursuing, and every open door slams shut before she gets to it.

She tries door after door, willing one to be open, but nothing seems to give.

Until suddenly something does, and she rushes in the room, slamming the door shut behind and standing her hands pressed against it, breathing hard. When she realises the noises have stopped, she leans her forehead against the wood with a sigh.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter jumps at the sound of the door slamming and drops the bottle in his hand. It shatters on the floor at his feet and he swears automatically, perfunctorily, in the moment before his brain kicks into gear and he addresses the more important issue at hand.

"Lucy." He shifts, frowning at the blood spatters in consternation, and takes a step forward. Glass crunches under his shoe, and he halts again, afraid she's going to dart right back out the door if he gets too close.

[essentiallyharmless]

She barely has half a moment to catch her breath when a crash makes her jump, and the voice fills her stomach with dread. She doesn't turn around yet.

When he says her name, she slowly turns to face him, leaning back against the door. There's blood on the front of her dress, too. Some it looks like she used it to wipe her hands.

She doesn't answer, just crosses her arms and looks at him coldly. Or what she hopes is coldly, trying to suppress the emotion that inevitably wells up in her at the thought of him.

[fucking_ebay]

"Fuck." Peter takes in a sharp breath at the sight of all the blood. Is she hurt? He doesn't see how there can be all that blood if she's not. "What the hell happened to you?"

Ignoring the glass underfoot, he grabs at a bar towel before crossing the room to join her at the door, doing his best to ignore that stare. Once he gets there he's really not sure what he's doing, though; he hesitates a moment before just sort of holding it out in her direction. "Where are you bleeding?"

[essentiallyharmless]

"I'm not," she answers shortly, but then she takes the towel from him anyway, not offering a thank you. She doesn't want to go out there if things are actually peaceful in here. She can just refuse to talk to him, right?

She goes and sits down in a comfortable chair, and uses the towel to try to get some of the blood off her dress and shoes. It helps a little on her shoes, but not really on her dress.

[fucking_ebay]

Well, isn't that promising. Peter is left standing at the door, wondering what he expected. Recriminations, maybe. An explanation of why she's been avoiding him so long. Yelling would have at least given him the chance to yell back.

"Lucy, talk to me," he says, following to stand beside the chair and watch her work at the blood splatters. "I haven't seen you in a fucking month, then you run in covered in blood. What happened?"

[essentiallyharmless]

"I had to abandon my regular life to become an assassin, and this job was a little messy," she answers sarcastically. Or maybe she's just been reading too many books. Probably that one.

She gives up on the blood stains. She's gotten most of the excess off, so she won't go staining everything else much, but it doesn't make all that much difference on her appearance. She's a bit upset about her dress, though.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter's expression darkens into a scowl, and for a moment he feels an outburst coming on. It would be easy to slip back into old habits and just tell her to go fuck herself, but he's had too much time to think about what he'd say if he got a chance to have this conversation.

Alright, not this conversation exactly, because why is she covered in blood, but this conversation in a general sense.

"I'm sorry I scared you when I threw shit at Rabbit Man," he says instead.

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy looks up in surprise at that. The last time she met him, he hadn't been that forthcoming. Of course, he doesn't remember that, because it never happened, and she didn't let it go on all that long.

She doesn't want to forgive him. Or, she doesn't want to let him know that she did forgive him ages ago. It's not okay that he did it, but it's understandable, and she did worse to him. But that's not really the problem. It's a lot more complicated than that, though at least it seems Peter's inability to apologise isn't necessarily one of the problems all the time.

"His name's Johnny," she corrects, refusing to accept his apology, even though her voice has taken on a much softer tone.

[fucking_ebay]

"I know." He tells himself he shouldn't be disappointed. Whatever they had, he's known it was over for a while now. "I ran into him in Gabriel's apartment and he reminded me." Also Peter nearly broke both Johnny's jaw and his own hand.

He sits down in a nearby chair and stares at her, trying to decide how he feels about this encounter. He's had time to mull it over but the hurt feels fresh again now that he's looking at her and she's refusing to make this easy. Well, fuck it. They're going to have a conversation if it kills him. "Did you hear about what happened to him? Gabriel, not R-- not Johnny."

[essentiallyharmless]

Why the hell was Johnny in Gabriel's apartment? They know each other? That seems a bit of an extreme coincidence. Of all the guys in New York, she manages to pick one with mutual friends. Not just that, but her ex bumping into her one-time lover in the apartment of her friend, it all seems very EastEnders. She can't imagine it went down smoothly. But she can probably ask Gabe about this.

Or can she? "No," she answers, frowning with concern, waiting for Peter to elaborate. She'd tried calling him once or twice, but she hasn't seen him a couple weeks now. Perhaps she's been hiding from the world a bit too effectively.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter wasn't exactly expecting to find him there either, alright? "He disappeared," he explains. "Couple weeks ago. Apparently the rift finally spat him back out, but I haven't seen him. Seth told me what happened, though."

Wait, there's another thing. "Do you know Seth?" he asks, feeling very keenly that he's not at all up to date on Lucy's life.

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy bites her lip at this worrying news. She hopes he's alright. Maybe she'll text him after she wakes up, check if there's any way she can help. She's been pretty useless lately.

"I never met him," she answers. She's heard him mentioned by both Gabe and Peter though, especially in connection with Peter's power.

And she's still feeling pretty uncomfortable talking to Peter, but he's being civil and not pushing the conversation she doesn't want to have, and she really wants to hear what's been going, since apparently no one thinks to update her.

[fucking_ebay]

Maybe he'd keep her updated if she didn't go into fucking hiding on him.

"If you haven't been hanging around Gabe's place, where the hell have you been?" he asks, unable to stay off the dreaded topic for long.

[essentiallyharmless]

"I moved," she answers in a voice implying it was obvious. Surely he must've invited himself into her apartment and found it empty at some point. And no, she's not going to tell him where. But after this, maybe, just maybe she'll answer his texts.

[fucking_ebay]

"What happened to us?" asks Peter, who's still generally bewildered about just how their relationship suddenly fell apart. It's not like he was totally oblivious before he found her cheating, but he hadn't thought things were that deep in the shitter yet...or that she would literally move just to avoid seeing him.

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy doesn't answer, doesn't even look at Peter at this point. Peter may have imagined this conversation plenty times - well, so has Lucy. Only she's never found out what she wants to tell him. Part of her wants to say something spitefully mean, just to stop him asking, to throw him off the trail. But most of her doesn't really want to hurt him any more than she already has.

[fucking_ebay]

While it had not occurred to him when it all first came to a head, Peter's had plenty of time to ruminate on the possibilities. She always used to tell him when she had undone things...or at least, he'd thought she was always telling him. With no concrete explanation, though, he thinks he can be excused for suspecting.

"Is it at least something I remember?" he asks, tone getting a little sharper in his frustration.

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy rolls her eyes in about equal amounts frustration. "Look, it's not like that," she answers. She knows he deserves at least an explanation, but finds it very hard to give him one. "I just.. I freaked out, okay?"

[fucking_ebay]

"You just freaked out." Also understandable. Also having a hard time just doing what he knows he probably should and giving her a pass. "For a month."

[essentiallyharmless]

"Just give it up, Peter..." She doesn't have the emotional energy to fight him over this, and she doesn't want to hurt him even more. There's so many conflicting emotions inside of her, and it would hurt her too much to let him see that.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter makes a disgusted sound in his throat and hops up to go back to the bar. "Is it even something I did?" he asks, not exactly ready to let it go. "And what the fuck am I supposed to do, Lucy, just pretend we never had anything together?"

[essentiallyharmless]

"If you'd like," she answers, in a voice that attempts to be casual but doesn't quite pull it off.

"What exactly did we have together?" she then counters. They had some fun, good sex, and occasionally some comfort, but were they even really going anywhere? Wouldn't it have gone the same way, anyway?

[fucking_ebay]

"Not much apparently," snaps Peter. It's not like he thought they'd get together and get over everything and get back together if they had this conversation. He kind of thought she might act like she gave a shit about what happened, though.

[essentiallyharmless]

The words sting a little, but it's far too obvious that Peter definitely thought they had something. She takes a deep breath and tries to pull herself together.

"I'm sorry you're hurting," she says, making an effort to keep her voice steady. "But I'd known for a while things weren't working out. I didn't mean for you find out the way you did. And after you scared me, I thought a clean break would be better for everyone."

Never mind that she didn't think to consult Peter in any of this. Never mind that it's all bullshit anyway.