not that anyone ever minds me...
Feb. 25th, 2010 11:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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time_converges
Give me one of my own stories, and a timestamp sometime in the future after the end of the story, or sometime in the past before the story started, and I'll write you at least a hundred words of what happened then, whether it's five minutes before the story started or ten years in the future.
time_convergesGive me one of my own stories, and a timestamp sometime in the future after the end of the story, or sometime in the past before the story started, and I'll write you at least a hundred words of what happened then, whether it's five minutes before the story started or ten years in the future.
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Date: 2010-02-26 01:40 pm (UTC)♥
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Date: 2010-02-26 04:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-26 04:18 pm (UTC)Gracias!!
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Date: 2010-02-26 04:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-26 04:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-26 04:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-26 04:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-27 03:13 pm (UTC)Letter Read - the day the first letter arrived.
:D
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Date: 2010-02-27 06:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-02-27 10:40 pm (UTC)But I know how random Steve is with my WiPs, so there will never be pressure from me!! :D
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Date: 2010-02-27 11:22 pm (UTC)That should, hopefully, work itself out as the story(ies) go along.
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Date: 2010-03-04 06:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-03-04 06:38 pm (UTC);)
Part 1
Date: 2010-03-12 04:16 am (UTC)----
Hot and sweating in spite of the frigid temperatures, Cain pushed his hat up on his head and watched his son and daughter-in-law smooch on the porch. He quirked an eyebrow, a slow smile growing on his face. “I got one of those coming my way?”
Amalie released her husband just long enough to reach over his shoulder and swat her father-in-law. “You reek.”
“What, and he doesn’t?”
“Yes, but this is the reek of love.”
Even Jeb groaned. He pulled away from his wife, dropping a light kiss on her upturned face as he did. “I think I’ll go take a bath. Is there enough hot water?”
Amalie jerked her head toward the interior of the house and pushed her glasses up her nose. “Yup. You too, Cain, if you want.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem.” She slapped Jeb’s butt as he passed.
“What am I going to do when Jeb and I finally finish the house? Who’s going to run my water and start my dinner?”
“I don’t rightly know,” she said sweetly, her eyes closed and face upturned expectantly.
Huffing melodramatically, Cain grasped Amalie’s elbows and dropped a quick kiss on her forehead. She caught the cuff of his coat as he passed her. Her eyes, rarely anything but sharp and focused, caught his. “Nothing’s going to change once your house is built, Dad.”
Cain studied Amalie’s honey brown hair as it fell over the curves of her face. You couldn’t see how much she’d lost looking at her face. But it was her peace of mind that driven Jeb to to move so far from Central City.
Cain shook his cuff free and clasped Amalie’s hand. “It will change. But that’s okay,” he added quickly before she could protest. “Change doesn’t mean bad.”
Smiling, Amalie drew him in for a hug. “It doesn’t.” She didn’t mention that stability had been something that all three of them were looking for.
“Hey! Before I forget…this came for you while I was out doing the estimate for Taylor’s porch.” Amalie pulled a battered envelope out of the pocket of her barn coat and handed it to him. “It’s got the royal seal on it.”
Eyebrow going up, he asked, “You sneak a peak?”
Amalie snorted. “Why should I? My letters from DG come instantly. It’s only yours that take four to six weeks.”
Part 2
Date: 2010-03-12 04:18 am (UTC)Cain was washed, shaved and well fed before he went rifling through the pockets of his coat, hanging from a peg on the back of his bedroom door, for DG’s letter. He’d very deliberately hung the coat up and gone about his regular evening instead of opening it. He’d successfully kept his mind from lingering on it too much, he thought. Amalie had only caught his eyes once, her eyebrows raised in question, but he’d shaken his head.
There was a narrow ladder-back chair in the otherwise Spartan room, which was where, wrapped in a quilt, Cain finally found himself. He could hear the kids settling in for the night in the room next to his, though he couldn’t hear what things they said to each other. He always tried not to think what they did in their own room as a married couple too hard. There were memories there that didn’t need unearthing.
Cain was careful as he broke the seal on DG’s letter. He didn’t want to tear the paper. It wasn’t like he could go down the hall and ask her to explain if part of the letter got torn. The palace at Central City was a good three or four days away if you were willing to put up with the hard, sleepless ride. A proper trip with regular stopping could take up to two weeks.
The thick green seal finally gave up and Cain unfolded the letter. He chuckled. The kid had barely been able to fill up the front side of one sheet and—
He turned it over quickly to check.
—she had just barely managed to get a line and half on the other side with her signature. Some letter writer she’d turned out to be, despite all her promises.
His lips set in a line, Cain read through the brief letter once, then twice. On the third time through he found himself shaking his head and stopped. The quilt had fallen from his shoulder. “DG… If you get flustered writing one little letter, what’re you gonna do with a whole treatise?”
But he knew it wasn’t just writing the letter. Pulling the quilt back up around his body, Cain slouched in the unforgiving ladder-backed chair. The shadows jumped and twitched in the flickering candlelight from his tiny desk, capturing his attention and, briefly, drawing his mind away from the princess. Somewhere in the room there was a draft that needed fixing. It was a sure sight easier than trying to fix…
Cain took a deep breath and held it—before letting it out slowly and smoothly from his pursed lips. He could feel the wildness of his heartbeat calming as he inhaled and exhaled again. He did it a third time, focusing on the jumping and twitching candles on his desk.
There was a part of him that didn’t want to answer this letter. It wouldn’t stop DG from writing him. There would be more letters. But they would slowly become distant and awkward as they continued to hit a wall of silence. Sure DG would keep up with him through Jeb and Amalie, particularly Amalie, but it wouldn’t be the same. Eventually her duties as the Princess Royal would occupy all of her time. She would make the effort to stay in contact with Amalie, but writing to Cain instead of asking about him would become an afterthought. He would no longer be relevant to her.
Cain let his head drift onto the back of the chair. “I came out here for the kids…and to be forgotten,” he told the candles. Jeb and Amalie had gone West to forget. “I came out here to be forgotten,” he told himself. He sat up in the ladder-backed chair and looked down at the single sheet of paper in his hand. He read the letter again, for the fourth time.
It needn’t be a long reply, he decided as he pushed himself to his feet. Just a note. There wasn’t time for anything else. He had to get up early in the morning. There was the house to work on with Jeb, and Amalie was off to price a couple of carpentry jobs for folks that also kept sunrise schedules.
Cain dragged his chair to his tiny table. DG’ll get tired of notes eventually, he thought as he sifted through bills and all sorts of miscellany for a pen and clean sheet of paper.
[in]Fin[ite]
Re: Part 1
Date: 2010-03-12 04:24 am (UTC)OH!! Snap :D
Re: Part 2
Date: 2010-03-12 04:29 am (UTC)*Gibbs-slap*
♥ Thank you :D
Re: Part 2
Date: 2010-03-12 05:32 pm (UTC)