(Kindly read my previous IC post before reading the following meta, please and thank you! =D)

Man there is something perverse about Guy, as ‘angelic’ as he may seem. I’ve been wondering for a while now how I came up with the way Guy collects secrets. This is what I discovered.

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She spoke English, and it was a curious, unanticipated feeling for Guy to feel like he was home. It was two simple words, and suddenly flashes of people he’d met in London came together in his head like a symphony: the girl who believed her mom chose her step-dad over her who’d given him the cross earring he was wearing, the elderly woman who’d had fifty-three unproven affairs who’d given him the B&B certificate, and a number of other prominent face he’d gotten to see and know most intimately. He was thoroughly lost in it for a moment—strange. It was strange. He had no home here. Not really. It was a few seconds before he repeated the question to the woman in a language more familiar to him than any other, if only slightly.

Her eyes turned turbulent in lieu of a verbal reply and she whipped off the hat covering her head to reveal a disarray of mahogany hair and, ink.

“I’m broken.” 

Ink all across the pale skin of her forehead. His eyes flickered between the words, too significant to dismiss, and her eyes—too determined to ignore. He drank in the sight of her, the sound of her voice, already beginning to confide. He lingered on a blink, his eyes closed, feeling those first few tendrils of trust curl around him and warm him like the sun. She wouldn’t know—none ever knew—how she had just helped him. His faint smile was ambiguous (wavering somewhere between the promise of imminent fulfillment and deep empathy), spurred on by her, stood there like an unpublished novel open on her first page. How he wanted to turn the page. His smile just as quickly fell away and he regarded her with all the earnest consideration she and the situation merited.

“Come with me,” he said, but seemed to ask, almost a plea. With the lightest of touches he grazed her wrist—not to seek the truth like with the old man, but to guide her inside the café. He seemed to have no doubt she would follow.

Inside where it was not as cold, he took her to a table tucked away in a corner at the back where it was not as busy. With less activity it would be easier to talk, but it was not the reason why he took them there. He’d been sure if he had wanted to, the girl would have confessed to her deepest secret right there on the front steps. Removing them from the public when he had had the choice had simply been a matter of decency. Of course, had it gone the other way, had he encouraged her to continue on the spot, it was likely that no one in their vicinity would bother to notice what was said or care if they did. No one except for Guy. For Guy it would have been as illicit as allowing her to strip naked in the middle of a crowd.*

The smell of toasted coffee beans saturated the air, which was warm from all the huddled bodies, the large fireplace near the entrance, and the candles scattered about on every surface. The lighting, coming from gently glowing wall lamps, was dimmed down, cozy, and though it got darker as the sun went down, across from him Guy could still clearly make out the words scribbled on the girl’s face. And he wondered, but he would remedy that very soon. 

Not a minute had passed after they had taken their seats when a harried waitress zoomed by their table and dropped off a large steaming mug of coffee as if they’d ordered any. Before either of them could realize this mistake, Guy was quick to give her a merci which sent the waitress away. There were no explanations in the silence that followed. He nudged the coffee closer to the girl.

His eyes never left her face, patiently waiting.

“You’ll be all right, you know. You just need to talk to me.”

He doesn’t urge her. He merely opens a door. 

“I’m Guy.”

If he wanted to turn the page, she would have to trust him. For most people the building of trust was a long and coarse road. For Guy… trust had always been more of a short cut. Some trust came more swiftly than others, but the important thing was that they all came, in the end.

* Additional thoughts ramblings information about this can be found in this post.

(P.S.: WHY ARE YOU PORN BOTS REBLOGGING THIS?)

                                                                I

It was the heat that made Katherine wake up. The sun had risen and settled in front of the room’s only window, hitting her straight in the face. On the other side of the furnished cubicle she was forced to call home, the radiator was blaring waves of heavy heat.  It was her fault, really. Kat had decided she rather not waste an extra four euro in rented bed sheets and slept in the noisy, navy nylon that covered the bed.  The landlady had objected, but Katherine had been as stubborn as always. She then spent most of the night freezing in the chill of winter and the past ten minutes trying to ignore the layer of sweat in between her and the mattress. How could it be so cold yet so hot? Maybe she was getting sick.

She sat on the bed, wiping with her hand the beads of perspiration on her back. Her arms felt simultaneously like lead and noodles, heavy to rise and difficult to keep from shaking. Still, she managed to pull off her sweater before it got too sweaty and needed a clean.  A groan of both annoyance and weariness escaped her lips, wordlessly cursing the sun. A quick shower would make her feel better, but even as she hurried and scrambled for a pair of clean underwear she knew… This morning, the problem wasn’t that simple. She had woken up bored.

Again.

Water rushed down her bare back, painfully harsh and a little too cold. If anyone would had ever taken the time to get to know Katherine’s inner workings, they would have told you she hated being bored more than anything. She hated the litany of routine, or even what other people would call peace. She disliked stillness, but also actions for the sake of movement. It made her a complicated girl to live with.  Sometimes, most times, she couldn’t even live with herself. Some days, days like today, she couldn’t even figure out whether she had left home or home had abandoned her. It didn’t matter. It had been what she needed. It still was. And with that, Kat decided she would make the best of today.

                                                                II

It was fucking cold out.

She was still a little drunk.

La Maison was full of people trying to scurry away from the bitter frost outside, a few of the many looking her way, their expression ones of slight confusion and amusement. It was probably due to the scribbles on her face, half hidden by her beanie hat, or that she was outside wearing nothing but shorts. What did they care about doodles and skinny legs? Nothing, that’s what. She was bland entertainment taking them away from their meaningless conversations about presents or soccer. Kat scoffed at them and sat on a stair in the entrance, trying to hide in plain sight. Had the day arrived that a couple of looks made her want to cry in public? She guessed so. Then again, she had many reasons to be upset. Today had not only started crummy, but it had resolved to stay that way with every decision she had made.

Decided to carry out her promise to Lisa, Katherine had gone to visit her while she stayed at her parent’s holiday house in Lyon. As always, all Lisa had wanted to do was shop and talk about men and pretend to know her more than anyone. As if she had never stolen her scissors and given a haircut to Lisa’s cat when they were seven. As if she had never drunkenly made out with her boyfriend at Lance’s freshman initiation party. As if she had never separated from their social circle and wasn’t currently living in the upstairs of a café. Kat had been indirectly forced to pretend none of these things had ever happened as well, something she knew how to do as well as it made her uncomfortable.

More than once, however, she tried to bring up these moments with her. Kat had read somewhere that the cure to starting over was forgiving everyone from his or her wrongs towards you and making up for your own. No one had let her do this yet.

Her society was one built on secrets and the ability to shun the past for the sake of image or even wealthy people’s sneaky kind of revenge.

Surely flustered by her attempts at saying sorry, Lisa had decided she wanted a drink and they arrived back at her place for some homemade margaritas.

Lisa had always been a lightweight, and a chatty one at that. In between their laughter and pitiful game of charades, she started sprouting gossip about their group of friends at home. Most of it she didn’t care for; these days she didn’t care much about anything, besides where to sleep and what museum she would try to sneak into.  Still, when she mentioned Kat’s ex-boyfriend had started dating her ex-best friend, she felt betrayed. She had no right, she knew, to sulk at the idea of them coming together after she had left them behind, but she couldn’t help it. After that, Lisa’s mouth became only more treacherous and started to sketch out Katherine’s spiral towards temporary madness.

“You know… I ruueally shouldn’t say these things.”

“You’re right, they are none of my business.”

“Oh… but some are. Some are.”

“What do you mean?”

“I-“, she chortled, “I can’t tell you.”

“But you will!” I couldn’t help but to giggle, even if I had no idea why.

“I know! I won’t tell you-“

“But-“

“-I’ll write it.”

Lisa held her hand and scurried her into the bathroom. She left, she assumed, to try to find a pen in the next room. She looked at herself in the mirror, in the bathroom twice as big as her room, with its pink marble floors and black porcelain bathtub. She looked haggard, and, more stupefying, like she didn’t belong. Her hair had lastly shed its last expert dye job and had turned into its original dark brown. It was much longer, too. Her long face was bare of make-up and pale due to the wintry past couple of months. It made her look younger, she thought, but not necessarily unwise. Still, she wished she could borrow some lip-gloss to plump her thin lips and some mascara to brighten up her droopy eyes. Her hands played around with the skin around her cheekbones, enhancing the overall sleepiness in her face. She yawned. “Maybe I’ll just take a nap.”

                                                             III

“Oh my God, oh my God… oh shit, I’m so sorry. I’m SO sorry! I don’t know- I- Oh God…”

“What? What is it? What’s wrong?” asked Kat with equal aggravation and concern. She had woken up inside the bathtub to Lisa’s sudden breakdown, the reason still unknown. She climbed out and went to the living room to look on her iPhone, the one luxury she couldn’t live without. According to it, she had dozed off for no more than three hours… plenty of time for Lisa to do something severely stupid. She didn’t want to deal with it – she didn’t even want to know what had happened – so she started to put her boots back on and shouted out a goodbye to Lisa.

 “NO! Kat, you can’t leave.” She arrived at the living room, her split second of clarity muddled as soon as she looked at Kat again. Her face became one with terror once more and it looked as if she was about to start screaming again.

“Lisa, whatever it is, it can’t be that bad, but more likely than not, I can’t help you. I must go, I-”

“Fine, just come to the bathroom for a second.”

She followed her, wondering what she had missed to see a minute ago. It looked clean, no one had puked, and there wasn’t even an empty glass in sight. It wasn’t until she placed her in front of the mirror that she realized what had happened.

Lisa had, as promised, written down the secrets she had wanted to tell… on her forehead. It went all the way down to her nose and cheeks! She couldn’t understand a thing because it was all backwards, but when she turned to Lisa for an explanation she knew this was for her to figure out. Lisa felt so guilty she was on the verge of tears, like if she asked her what it said she would instantaneously combust.

In Kat’s head, the mirror shattered as soon as she understood what the letters said.

Ur dad ad-

mitted to the

affair

Ur

bro has HIV

She had left without another word and was now purposely freezing to death outside La Maison Rose; still mute, maybe exasperate forever. Then, a pair of bony knees asked her a question. “I’m sorry?” she said in English by mistake. Her French was permissible on a good day, but, well, this was a bad day.  He repeated himself, this time in a perfect, British English.

“Why are you so sad?”

She looked up to meet an eccentric looking boy around her age.  All she could process was that he was wearing an earring and that his coat could fit both of them before she acknowledge what he had asked her. Now, normally, Kat would have never been so crass. But, normally, her family wasn’t crumbling apart while she was off hating herself. She stood up to meet his level and with one defiant movement she took of her hat to show off the unspeakable words that covered her face. As an afterthought -had it even become a thought? -she added: “I am broken.”

escapingfromthecell:

cocorosie - bisounours

You’re welcome to post anything that inspired you while writing or just generally reminds you of Project Angel. =D As you have seen me doing. They can go into what will eventually be our Project Angel mix! Why this song? Because it’s French rap and we’re currently in France. Hahah, ALSO BECAUSE I LOVE COCOROSIE. I’ll be posting more later.

P.S.: REMEMBER TO USE TAGS, PEOPLE. =D

(Source: x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x)

He slipped on the coat—one long limb first, then the other. His pale fingertips barely poked out of the sleeves. It was made of wool the color of soot, “decades old but it bears it well, and still has enough life left in it for more,” provided the attentive elderly proprietor of the store. It hung loose and long around his bird-like frame, swaying around his knees in a way, he thought, reminiscent of a woman’s dress.

“Hmm,” said the proprietor, a man past his prime, with crossed arms and a pursed mouth surrounded by stubble—like his own, Guy noticed, only gray, as hair was wont to do with ageing. He very much enjoyed the physical manifestations of human maturity.

The man was observing the coat—he had been most helpful picking one out with Guy’s budgetary restrictions in mind. Guy reacted to his scrutiny instinctively, turning and spreading his arms out helpfully. The man caught his openly curious gaze and returned it a second later with an amused smile. He seemed to be thinking something particular to himself. Guy still marveled at the sight of such a simple gesture, proven time and again the more weary a face the younger the smile. 

“Well, I’ve always been an honest man, especially with my clients. It’s the only way to run a business.” Two feather-gray eyebrows shot up. “A moral one, mind you.” 

His strong sense of integrity drew a serene smile from Guy and the man blinked a couple of times in a vaguely dumbfounded manner. “Uh. Yes. Well, kid, the coat will keep you warm, and you’ll be wanting that down here so close to the bowels of France. We bid the year farewell, but winter’s an impertinent guest. It shows up early and stays late.”

The man placed his hands on round hips and looked Guy up and down—who kept perfectly still under his gaze. A beat later, he seemed to casually let slip, “This was one of the first items ever sold to me. It’s been hanging in that corner for as long as I can remember. Probably… been around longer than that. It belonged to a man who believed in goodness and second chances. In people, of course. Puh. What a waste.”

Guy rubbed the soft worn edges of a sleeve thoughtfully as the man grumbled. It was nicer than most of the clothes he toted around with him in his beaten backpack.

“And here comes the honest part: you’re skin and bones, kid! You look like a drowned rat climbed out of the sewers. Rats in France, they are big, but the ones in the sewers? Risen from the dead.”

Guy looked up, surprise candid on his face at the unusual metaphor. He wasn’t sure how to proceed, but the man laughed and shook his head and spared him from having to guess. “You are not from around here. Tell me, where do you come from?”

When Guy finally spoke, his French was spotless and unremarkable, yet strangely similar in tenor and inflection to that of the proprietor’s own French, down to the last nuance. “I come from England.”

“Up there, eh?”

Guy instinctively looked up at the ceiling, catching on a second too late as to his intended meaning. When he looked back down, there was the old man, laughing again—at him?—as he came up to him and tucked in his threadbare scarf safely around his throat and beneath the flaps of the coat. Warmth began to settle into his skin and he relished the feeling with closing eyes. He’d accomplished what he had set out to do in stepping into this establishment. Without the additional layer of clothing, his poor attire (consisting of a fragmented sweater and black pants several sizes too small) was not nearly enough to keep the waning—but still strong—winter chill at bay. It helped that it was already quite warm inside the store, cocooned by walls of secondhand treasures.

In a way, this man believed in second chances as well. Guy didn’t hesitate as he lifted a hand to press over the weathered one still moving over his chest. Almost instantly, he felt the Burn of Enlightenment, flames licking at the center of his palm, growing hotter and hotter. The pain was always an obstacle, but he refrained from any physical sign of discomfort easily enough by focusing his mind instead on the small voice in his consciousness; a voice, growing stronger, firm and sonorous:

I think I made the right choice. 

The man was looking into his eyes resolutely.

Guy almost felt compelled to ask how he could convey both sadness and relief in one look. Instead he asked him about a park.

“Parc de la Tête d’Or? Kid, why would you want to go there?”

“Am I wrong in believing it’s open to the public?”

The man tilted his head. “No, no. It’s definitely a tourist attraction… during the summer. You go there now, you know what you’ll find?” 

Guy opened his mouth, and then closed it with shifty eyes, holding back on his answer. Sometimes what appeared to be a question directed to him was really a question directed to the person themselves. This seemed like one of those times. And sure enough the man answered his own question.

“Vagabonds and drifters. The worst Lyon has to offer. You don’t want to go wandering around there at night. Wait until the weather is nice again.”

“When will that be?”

The man stared at him a little funny, but not unkindly. “Around Spring. Will you be here that long?” 

Spring, his mind echoed back to him. He came too soon.

After paying the man for the coat, and after thanking each other profusely, Guy reached the ornate door—which seemed even more at home among the secondhand items than the coat he wore—before the man called out to him (shouting ‘kid’ again) and effectively stopped him from leaving. He turned on the spot.

“You don’t need to go there, kid. Take care of yourself.”

Guy hesitated again. This time because he could not deny that he still intended to visit the park. He had to before he moved on. He turned hollow eyes to the man now behind the counter as another thought occupied his mind.

“You’ve addressed me as ‘kid’ a number of times. How old do I appear to you?”

The man didn’t seem bothered by his evasiveness. In fact, he seemed quite welcome to the inquiry. “Oh, I call everyone kid. When you get to be my age you earn the privilege. But I suppose you’re right… You’re clearly not a kid. I’d say you’re about… 25, 27? At a glance. Then you talk and I feel compelled to ask how anyone can appear both young and old at the same time.”

It was while the man seemed taken aback by his own candor that Guy let go of the door to face him properly. He would have to leave soon. He could never stay long enough.

“You appear young to me, too. When you smile. You have a very young smile.” Which earned him another smile and a bow from the proprietor’s head, both actions tinged with embarrassment.

“You said I appeared 25?”

“Give or take, yes.”

Guy glanced at his boots thoughtfully before nodding once, as if in agreement. “All right.”

And he was gone, with only the antique doorbell swinging from the threshold, chiming in his wake.

                                                              II

No one looks him in the eye as he walks the picturesque streets of Lyon, slower, much slower, than the people rushing past. The ones that do, give him a wide berth, but not before looking at what they felt they needed to put space between. Guy guessed a number of reasons why. He had heavy-lidded eyes, sunken and dark, as if he’s gone an eternity without sleep. This effect was enhanced by the late afternoon sun throwing his other features into sharp relief: a wide mouth that sticks out, a rather large, bumpy nose, and a sharp, square jaw—much too strong for a body so fragile. His torso was very long, but his waist so very narrow. His proportions were otherworldly—stretched and tightened and bony. Cadaverous. He drowns in his new old clothes, his scarf hiked up over his chin, cross earring dangling on a long chain over the cloth, pale face barely peeking out, and his dark mass of hair simply defying gravity. But at least he’s warmer than before. He slides his hands into the deep pockets of his coat where his fingers encounter something small at the farthest end of his right pocket. He pulls it out curiously to find a yellowing scrap of paper, tightly folded. Guy unfolds it, counting five times it was bent, and holds either end of the paper as he slows to an ambling pace.

It read:

‘I’ve never sold this coat because I never wanted to give up the last remainder of my Father. If you’re reading this note right now it’s because I saw some goodness in you. I can let go now.’

It was a whole minute before he tucked the note away safely, as he thought of the man, another treasure for his growing trove.

The icy streets are not forgiving, but he bears it as best he can as his mind races and he continues his walk.

He made a mistake coming so soon. He realized this now as he trundled down the narrowing road into the town square, still bustling with action. It’s mid-January and cold, but there are smiles everywhere. A mouth-watering sense of determination and hope permeating the air around him. It was nearly enough to lose his thread of thought entirely. But he grasped onto it still. 

Moving on before visiting the park wasn’t an option. He’d promised Lydia. She’d shown him kindness after she’d confided in him, more so than the others, and gifted him with what she called a ‘certificate’, a piece of paper that gave him access to shelter at a comfortable B&B (apparently they offered both a bed and breakfast, and although Guy appreciated the bed part, he was afraid breakfast would be wasted on him). She’d stayed at this place before, she’d said, but hadn’t been in a very long time. She’d even told him which room he had to stay in. Just outside his bedroom window was a marvelous view of the Parc de la Tête d’Or, and she’d made him promise he’d take a stroll through the historic gardens for her. She’d greeted his first New Year with him. On that night she’d described them so vividly he yearned to see what she saw, feel what she felt. So he’d left right away.

Which had been a mistake. He tries not to focus on his mistakes, but they continue to surprise him with the frustration they bring. She hadn’t mentioned the park during the winter months. He’d go regardless, and despite the man’s previous warnings. It’s the reason he’s there. He’d promised.

Guy reached town at last. It seemed replete with life, manifested in restaurants and cafés on every dimly lit corner. The coffee shops were full with people seeking shelter from the cold in a hot cup of café au lait. That’s where he’s drawn. Where the people are. He moves as if in a trance, following his feet, wherever they may lead him.

He ardently takes in the squat shack of a building with dusky pink walls. ‘La Maison Rose’ humblysits in a faded elegant script above the arched entrance and below the windowsill with the flowerless flowerbed. Nestled closely behind the café was a towering white building of marked age, half-marred in crawling ivy the same earthy green as la Maison Rose’s wooden shutters. He nearly walks past the girl on the steps leading up to the entrance, nearly doesn’t get a chance to meet her.

She grabs a hold of him in a simultaneous incarceration of all his senses, in a familiar but no less inescapably magnetic pull of both body and soul. Hers was calling out to him, and he knew, not definitively, but with instincts born and bred within him, he knew: she was keeping something hidden away deep inside. He says exactly what’s on his mind (try as he might, he does not yet know how to obscure the truth with words that serve only to stack upon each other, intentions buried beneath them). Sometimes it was a mistake to do so; other times were nothing less than serendipitous. He approaches her unhurriedly, stopping only when his boots knock softly against the bottommost step.

“Why are you so sad?” he inquires in gentle French.

(P.S.: La Maison Rose is real! =) I changed a few things, but check it out.)