Oct. 19th, 2008 at 9:37 PM
I received word that Zara wouldn't be able to cover her shift this evening. I did not have much else to do, and covered.

It is always eye opening when one works the evening shifts--there are so much more to see, so many people.

I always have my knowledge of drinks tested when it gets busy, last week it was Locke's asking for a side car, this week it was a mix of several things. When it gets like that, even I have issues following drinks and orders. I hope that I did not miss anyone.

Amber dropped by while I was working and delivered a gargantuan basket bedecked with ribbon. Inside, she had placed root beer and several harvest fruits. I am grateful and surprised, I do not remember the last person to gift me with some thing out side of Nikolai.

Veejay ate all of the grapes, but I did not mind it. I do not think a gift is truly such a thing unless it can be shared in some way.

I am tired and am looking forward to am hour long shower. But I am ...content.

Oct. 26th, 2008 at 10:12 PM
When I returned to the strange place of endless porch and people outside, it was quiet. A man spit out from the shadows caught me stealing leaves from the pavement and he asked me why--I said that, it is a promise of summer and they smelled like leaves.

He teased me and asked me why I did not bury my face in piles of them or earth. I told him I did.

He was tall, broad and seemed a small mountain. And not that I mean he was the sort of wall-muscle I have seen before...He was...He could be immovable. Stubborn. He said things, about not having any lucks with dates and I do not think I have had someone lie so badly--perhaps some of it was the truth, but I do not think the man has lack of those interested in courting him or being courted.

I do not yet know what mask he wears, but he does. Maybe several. His name was Koyan, but I will call him Leaf.

A young man, thin as bamboo reeds tussled with a short woman who was as bright as rainbows. His name was Mesteno and hers, Paige. Koyan picked her up and spun her until she became dizzy and fell. I am not yet sure why...that happened. From there, a woman who smelled like the star-filled sky came, and her name was Payton.

She was beautiful, they all were in their own way. I do not envy the beautiful, for with such things always comes it's own price.

They have known each other many years. It is an interesting thing to watch, here, people seem more intimate and...at ease with one another. They speak freely, at the very least.

The woman I call Sin returned, she is different some times. And the drow whom is called Cianan followed.

I go and I watch. I go, I watch, and see them touching.

Now that, I envy.

Oct. 29th, 2008 at 4:23 AM
It's cold now. It really does seem like yesterday I was in green grass and warm sunshine. Time is...Time moves so strangely here for me, more so that it usually does for the denizens of this realm I think. I have a pocket of safety that I spent time within, and some times what I think are hours spent there turn out to be days.

I went to the giant porch-tavern, (it really does have a giant porch but it's not just a porch.) to find Right and Left had either followed me there or had been there before. They're living under the porch itself and I wonder if mice are like bears, where they sleep for winter. I didn't really know that bears sleep through winter...I don't know where I picked that up.

I settled with a book and my tea and hoped for another day of watching shades of places, people. It was empty as it usually is when I go there, but it did not stay that way, it never does stay quiet for very long. A woman with a hole in the knee of her olive pants and dark brown hair that looked gold in the sun came to visit and she walked like alley cats tip toeing toward prey across the rail. I asked her if she wished a drink and she did not, she told me her name was Gaelle and she had dirt in her fingernails. I wonder if she knows about plants, or if she buried her heart somewhere? Probably not her heart but I like to imagine.

Sin came in pretty-pink and jeans, she is a great fanged cat that comes to play with all the colorful rolls of people-string, but some times I wonder if she ever grows tired of playing. Pretending. Of being a mask in some masquerade ball that I am not yet sure I want to be invited to. She came and when she comes, like the night throwing her cloak over the sun--everything that bumps in the nightmares tend to come with her. The man with Wolf-eyes followed, the woman with snake eyes, another woman who smelled feral with tattoos. I did not catch the snake-eyed womans name, but the tattooed one is Vasha--I think.

Mesteno came too, weaving through the crowd as if he were looking for the secrets everyone keeps, a gray hat over his hair and eyes, a jacket--some sort of spy. I tried not to notice him but it is hard to hide hair that is like ours; it has to be dark without one lick of yellow sun. He is good at pretending, he tried to charm me I think, but he really doesn't need to--in his own way, all bird-bones and harsh little angles--he is charming enough.

There was...I have to be more careful. I have to keep the flame in my mind and not let it flicker. I must keep my center and focus on it. There were salt packets in my pockets that I do not remember picking up; I poured it in a line at my feet in dreaming-awake and when Sin asked me why I did not know at first, and then when I opened my mouth? All the words I needed were there. Protection, sacred, purification, ritual, barrier. I thought that I had this mostly quieted but apparently not.

I have seen men and women appear out of thin air, I have seen a dragon fit himself into a door so that he could drink ale. I have seen cat-men and women, magic that left glitter-glow in the air, but you would think all of that paled in comparison to one woman and her salt-lines in the dirt. Sin asked, and then the Wolf-eyed man came rap-tap-tapping, tapping at my porch floorboards. Mesteno did his best to try not to look at me and several others I have no name for yet pretended to look out over the porch onto the yard....But I could feel them. Like a tickle-touch of feathers from an old pillow nagging away sleep, their eyes were on me, all eyes were on me. (All eyes on me, mens eyes and women's eyes, greedy, hateful. Why should a little girl with no joy be able to see so much? Why not them?)

The wolf-eyed man lowered himself as one adult would to a child to appease them, trick them into safety. I must give him credit for playing at human so well, for even I cannot do so. They asked me how old I was so I told them I shall be twenty in January, and I had I known they were so keen on knowing I would have invited them all to my birthday---

Something snuck in then. For a moment I thought I saw something at the back of my mind in my thoughts, like an after effect of distant memory, but it was gone when Sin began trying to beat her own head in with her hands.

The wolf eyed man had prettier things to flutter off too after, but I think I know. He listens and he watches just like Mesteno who spent the next hour of so asking me questions.

I like questions, even though it is habit to never answer them in anyway straight.

My head is a jumbled mess, I keep seeing a cracked mirror for no reason and images of cob-webs.

Koyan came and made sure to make Mesteno's life difficult as best as he could while Mesteno pretended to be terribly upset by it. I am intensely amused by the two of them; there is much respect and perhaps even affection there that is masked in fistifcuff words. I told them about secret Keeping while Leaf told me about his books. I wonder what it must be like to live in rooms of them. Books, I mean, not leaves.

They kept looking at one another when they thought I was not seeing them. Just because I do not look at them in the eye does not mean I cannot see the way heads turn or the silence that overtakes questions not put to air.

I don't think I could ever answer if they asked anyway.

I also think the two of them are going to some party on the day of the dead, I would have liked to see that I think. But I realized that I must work on that day, I work every Friday behind the bar, so I do not think I can make it.

I drank too much tea so I had to leave to find the little coffee shop down the street for a bathroom. There are things living in the sinks of the bathrooms at the tavern..I...I do not want to recreate that experience every again. Half way back to see if Koyan and Mesteno were still there and everything went blank. I think I dreamed but do not remember anything that I saw. I hardly remember anything I see anymore, it's as if what happened...what happened....what happened....

I want to sleep, but I know that if I do all I will see fire.

It burns. It always burns.

Oct. 31st, 2008 at 7:16 PM
You would think that the four letter word: w o r k would not invoke such thoughts as peace, tranquility and pride as they do within me. Several people I have watched or listened to speak of their line of work as a day to day grind, something distasteful or something bad enough that they look forward to days off rather than days on the job.

I, however, look forward to my once-a week shift so far. Every shift is something absolutely new. Last week, I am sure I saw men made out of Jello dressed in fedoras and trench coats. The week before that, a salt-shaker came alive and attempted to flirt with one of the strange species of bird people.

This week, I had two enormous green things with shiny, wart-covered skins...I think they were called trolls? ...I had two trolls dressed in pink with tutu's and false fabric wings come in and harass the two patrons I had for candy. I am never bored when I work. Even when it is in the kitchens and washing dishes, I take a break and head behind the bar for tea and there's always something unusual going about.

From the Red Dragon to the people gathered on the porch, it is like I have stepped into another world within the same one. Both of them offer me two faces of a bright moon to study, though I do not think I would like to work at the other place...It would take me years to scrub the grime off everything inside.

Last night, I was able to ask Sin several of the questions I have always wanted too. But, she was pulled away.

I cannot help but think my personality--or complete lack there of--is part to blame as to why people come and go from me. Like bees switching from dandelions to roses; I do not blame them however. Roses do smell far sweeter and are soft as satin.

November 21st 2008 11:35 P.M.

The learning curve with this job is far steeper than you would think. I do not know if I have ever seen a booklet instructing one on how to mix drinks reach proportions such as this. It is massive and well worn, dog earned and stained with rings of coffee, tea and what aught else as countless other trainees have no doubt spent evenings bent over it learning how to make mulled wine as well as understanding the difference between blood whyne and blood wine.

There are notes along the edges too, various languages that I cannot read, some common and some semi-familiar; notes on where patrons long past and still reoccurring store secret stashes or enjoy drinks made a certain way. It is and can be overwhelming if you look at it as just drinks. To me however, I think perhaps each notation and scribble becomes a small insight into another--be it the one who wrote it or the one it is written about.

At any rate, I have learned to mix drinks I have yet to learn how to pronounce. I like my job, very much. I do not understand those who might find it tedious...I suppose that is because I am 'new' and 'young' and not yet experienced?

More and more, I am finding that Nikolai is always there when I am hosting. He is not always on time and he does not always stay, but he is there. There are parts and placed, pieces of me that are beginning to look up to the stairway which overlooks the commons within the Red Dragon....and I am starting to expect him there.

Half of me runs circles around herself, telling me that I should not expect anything. That Nothing Good Will Come. The other part of me is...rather silly over it. Caution, in everything that I do. I want to know but I want to know from the heart, the mouth, not steal it from skin.

Ah, I meant to write this about slinging drinks and I have been side tracked. Maybe later.

He said his eyes were green.

April. 13th, 2009 at 4:49 AM

Nikolai,

Spring is here, it came when the winter lions finally laid their white heads upon ice rimmed paws. I have been so very busy with my garden.

There are trembling little shoots; little saplings that sing to me in the bright, cloudless moonlight of summer promises. I touch them when they are afraid and tell them stories about you. They listen and they hum contentment, much like I catch myself doing from time to time while digging in the earth.

It feels like I have known you forever; yet I have not yet begun to unravel all the pieces you are. I do not know what your mouth tastes like after you drink your tea. I do not know the secrets of your palm to my skin--I see spring unwinding in the blood of many and can only wonder if some day I will know these things.

You tell me it is all right, that you are a patient man.

I wonder however, how long you patience lasts. It it very much like the oak, you think? Do you stretch far and wide to the sun, awaiting her return?

I have neglected the things which are important to me for my Garden. Friends. Places. People. You. I know however, down to my toes and the rocks beneath them, you are with me. My garden when the wind comes shakes out the green-and-life patterns of your name.

Soon, summer will come and all of the young things in my garden will have taken hold. Soon, I will come back with flowers in my hair and perhaps a poem in my pocket.

Wait for me.

--Ran




Thorn,

I have sent you daffodils. I hope that this note attached to them remains intact and that Becky remembers to give them to you next she sees you at the tavern. I did not know where else to send them.

--Ran


Leaf,

I was digging in my garden and found this blue bead. It is for you, of this I am certain. It is my hope that Bess, Becky, or whomever is behind the bar does not misplace it. There is a flower in my garden growing stronger now.

--Ran


Twig,

This root if called Angelica Root. It grew near a tall, lanky lotus. It was given to me by my garden for you. I do not know what use it will be or for why--but some things, I do not question. Do not let Bess eat it. Summer is coming, do not let it pass you by too fast.

--Ran


Wings,

The shipment of tea I ordered should finally be arriving. Bess will be displeased that I am 'taking paying customers away', but with the swamp water she calls tea, I believe she is doing that all by herself. I hope that you like Morrocan Mint green tea, Green Pekoe, Coconut green tea, Mango Green and Earl Gray black, Irish Breakfast, Darjeeling, and Lapsang Souchong. They are all loose leaf and in tins, sorry, I do not do tea with bags. Good tea should be shared.

--Ran

August 1st, 2009

Flowers must grow. It is what they do, either below or above to the naked eye.

I am growing, beneath the surface. If I were a flower I might rejoice, instead I feel as if I am withering in myself.

I have done all that I can with gloves, with avoidance, with careful awareness of each glance and where I am at all times, as much as I can. It isn't enough anymore. If I do not see in the day when I close my eyes I dream. If it is not my nightmare than it is a dream which is never mine. I cannot describe here the sensation of seeing a life laid out for me like unfolded origami, seeing the lovers tangle, the children lost, born, the death, the joy and the fear which when I wake I understand--it isn't mine. It never was.

I thought perhaps, the more I did not see the more I would lose it.

Now, not only do I see what comes but glimpses of what was.

The night when Nikolai laid his mouth on my cheek; I saw her. She was beautiful and she was blond and he could never have her. I think I knew sadness.

Now, some times I see things when I am standing in one place I awake in another with no recollection of where I am going. I see stars falling in my dreams and do not know what it means, I cannot stop it.

I see all the roads ahead. Nothing is written in stone, the words 'fate' and 'destiny' do not mean one path from one place to the other, straight. All it takes is one errant action, word, thought, divergence and the single path splits into two. Another, and two becomes four, four becomes five, five becomes six until there are so many paths. Which is right and which is wrong? Which one is taken? I see all of them in my head, worming and branching off in one thousand snakes.

I am growing and yet, I wish that someone would salt the roots.