A beautiful fiction I invented to keep out the cold

[desperate_times_right]

Who: Chloe Frazer & others
What: Catch-all; open prompts
When: March and April
Where: Around Milton

Content Warnings: Self-injury content related to the echo effects. Descriptions of canon typical violence and murder. Talk about hunting/eating animals.


Chloe doesn't trust Methuselah as far as she could throw him, and a trip through a mine where she's forced to rely on the goodwill of a bunch of cop types does not sound like her idea of a good time. Also, sticking around Milton when most of the people who 'patrol' (imagine her air quotes) are away is a great opportunity to snoop in people’s houses.

Anyone who remains in or returns to Milton may find her either doing her usual wild running in the woods, checking her snares for snacks, or sneaking around newly empty locations to see what's been left behind.

Aurora nights are a different thing, however. Chloe likes to think that she's done her best to do right by the people that she cares about, but the truth is she's cut a few throats in her day, stepped over others to make sure that she would wind up on top. Something about the aurora this month brings every one of those memories roaring back. It has her running faster, drinking until she can't see, and doing risky climbs onto (and jumps between) rooftops, trying to escape the feeling.

Comments

[desperate_times_right]

Genuinely unfair. Only Chloe is allowed to be annoying that way! Chloe hasn't had fruit since the night Lestat gave her the canned peaches, though, and even a desiccated old lime physically feels good to eat.

She watches the showmanship with no small amount of amusement anyway, and by the time he proffers the spoon for her to taste her mouth is watering at the smell.

“Hey, as long as I'm getting food I don't care.” She leans in to taste it anyway. “Seems good to me. I'm no good at this stuff.”

[salamanca]

Lalo grins. "Trust me," he says, "by the time I'm done having my way with you, we'll turn you into a -- what's it called? -- a Michelin reviewer!" But he seems so pleased with himself. He can tell she's just watching for him to be done, and it gratifies him like nothing else. He's so happy right now.

The pheasant, he cooks in the cast iron; it's a smallish bird, so it cooks fast. He sets it aside to rest. Then, in the same skillet right after: rice, sauteed with some more oil and the pheasant juices and garlic and onion powder. Add water, and it bubbles up. He adds jarred tomato sauce and a packet of Knorr chicken broth powder. Then, stir in canned tomato sauce, any spices he's managed to find that Lalo thinks would be appropriate. Once everything's dissolved, he puts a tight lid on the rice to let it simmer. Chloe might have to wait a little bit for the pheasant, but that's okay. She can wait.

But eventually it's done. Lalo fluffs it with a fork before portion it onto plates with half the pheasant pieces each, one for him and one for her. He pours the honey-lime sauce over the pheasant, pleased with himself as he does so, before whipping the towel off his shoulder as he goes to sit down at the table. He sets Chloe's plate in front of her, with already in the rice, grinning, and drops down into the chair across from her.

"Well? Tell me what you think!"

But sitting down is strangely painful. When he was working, he wasn't thinking. When he wasn't thinking, he wasn't feeling guilty. Now, no longer absorbed in a task, the guilt creeps back up into Lalo's consciousness. He tries to bat it away without letting her see it; he hopes she can't tell. So he keeps smiling.

[desperate_times_right]

Chloe hasn't had a meal like this in a while, and these days she's always hungry anyway, so she's pretty easy to please. Still, it's so good.

She eats in silence for a while before replying, “I think it's a good thing you could touch the pheasant without hurting yourself.”

Yeah, the bad feeling’s still there but she's not thinking about it. It's fine.

cw: drug overdose mention

[salamanca]

"Hey!"

Lalo grins at her and reaches over to gentle give her shoulder a playful shove before he's reminded, too late, of how much that hurts. He grins, sitting back in his seat, rubbing himself.

It's such a nice scene, he thinks. Almost crazy to think less than an hour ago they were hurting each other on purpose.

Crazier to think he deserves it. Lalo has never thought about the consequences of his drug-dealing before, not even a little bit. But he wonders suddenly now, a thought not wholly his own but prompted by feelings of guilt he's been forced to experience against his will: How many people every year die from drug overdoses?

How many of them are kids?

He decides he doesn't want to know the answer and keeps grinning at Chloe like everything is fine.

[desperate_times_right]

Chloe grunts in pain at the shove, but she did kind of deserve that one. “You should have seen your face, man.”

[salamanca]

"Yeah, yeah." Lalo grins down into his food. "Don't make me spray you again."

[desperate_times_right]

Chloe scoffs. “You literally just promised!”

[salamanca]

"Yeah, so? You trust my promises?" But he does remember his promise. He won't do that again. He's learned his lesson, at least for now.

[desperate_times_right]

“You do seem like the type of guy who thinks his word means something.” She absolutely doesn’t trust him, but she does believe that.

[salamanca]

Lalo holds her gaze, and then he snorts. He can't pretend she isn't correct. "Yeah," he says. "You're right." He grabs his plate, ready to head to the sink. If she's done too, he'll grab her plate also.

He winks. "Come back next time. We'll do this again. If you can get past he traps."

[desperate_times_right]

“Oh, you're on.” Chloe winks back. “See you around.”