toliveagain | you belong among the wildflowers

Entry tags:

you belong among the wildflowers

It's been a little over a week since the grand opening of Thistle Do Nicely, and Riley has been pleasantly surprised by how well the reception to the shop has been. They'd found a prime location, halfway between the boardwalk and a bakery and bookshop, so while they've already gotten customers ordering future arrangements for things like anniversaries and birthdays, they also get people in to pick up the occasional stray flower here and there, just to give to someone special. He's already thinking he and Ryan should eventually consider setting up a small flower kiosk out on the boardwalk itself, though it's still a little too hot for that. Maybe more into autumn, when people are looking for bursts of color to brighten the darker days.

As for today, it's slower than it's been since they opened and while in some ways that's a little disappointing, it also comes as a little bit of a relief because it means he can concentrate on other things. Ordering more inventory, for one, which may or may not include a Keurig machine because having to walk to Quill every time he needs another caffeine fix (which is considerably often) is already starting to get old.

Glancing over his shoulder to see Ryan attending to a customer who seems much more interested in learning about his likes and dislikes than the different kinds of carnations they offer, Riley smirks to himself before turning his attention to his phone. Shooting off a text to the contacts he's made in town so far, he tucks his phone back in his pocket and wanders outside with a watering can to take care of the flowers they've set up for display outside. It's a beautiful day out, Riley observes, and he can only hope that someone else will come along soon to make it even better.

[Feel free to use this post to meet Riley AND Ryan! If you don't specify in your tag or in the subject line, we'll just assume we have permission to tag your character separately :) Everyone come say hi to the qt flower shop boyzzzz~~~!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Adam looks a hell of a lot better today than he had the first time they'd met, and Riley smiles when he sees him because between the two of them, he imagines they've already lived a lifetime of rough days. Sometimes it's just nice to savor the good ones.

"It is," he says in lieu of greeting, gesturing widely at the storefront with a proud smile. It'd taken some time to set things up and they'd hit a brief snag with the lease but eventually, they'd managed to work everything out. Now that they're open, business has going more smoothly than he could have hoped. "Well, mine and my friend's. That guy over there, the idiot with the dark hair? That's Ryan."

He rolls his eyes fondly as he catches a scowl from his best friend then turns back to Adam. "Things been going good for you?"

"Unpacking boxes is a pain in the ass and I hear the matriarch has her powers back again, so I should probably go make my introductions at some point, but besides that, yeah," he answers, matching Riley's grin as he pushes a hand through his hair. Unpacking at this point is quite literally the only thing he's done and he glances around the store, his smile making it clear he's impressed.

Adam's never thought about what he'd do if he wasn't modelling. It wasn't something he'd ever needed to consider before the car accident and while he'd liked photography well enough, that had mostly been an acceptable hobby for him to take up so that he looked more interesting than he actually was. It's a tough pill to swallow, realizes he doesn't have that many interests or aspirations, but that's what Siren Cove is supposed to be about.

"Why flowers?" he asks, looking back at Riley.

It's a fair question, and Riley has always had a pretty generic answer prepared for those who ask it. Shrugging a shoulder, he reaches out to brush his fingertips over the petals of lilies he's just watered and smiles. "It relaxes me." Glancing back up at Adam, he lets out a sheepish laugh. "Remember I told you I had that accident? While I was going through physical therapy, I met this guy, good guy, had it way worse than I did, but he was so positive. I asked him once how he did it, why he wasn't angrier like I was at the time, and he just looked at me and said, 'Get a hobby.'"

Riley laughs again, more boisterously this time as he shakes his head fondly at the memory. "Get a hobby, like that's all it takes. Anyway, I did. We lived near a florist so I made Ryan go with me to ask if we could help out every now and then because she always seemed so happy. Rest is history, I guess."

It's more than he usually tells people and his cheeks flush a faint pink now. "Anyway, enough about me. So you're done unpacking, you have to go pay tribute to... some mother, I don't know, not really up to speed on all that."

Adam's mouth twitches when Riley laughs and he finds himself wishing he could still laugh like that. Maybe it's yet to come, maybe he just hasn't figured it out yet in the months after his accident, but it feels like it's been a long time since he's smiled or laughed at anything in such a free way.

Get a hobby. He's never really had one of those. He started working when he was sixteen and with that life comes alcohol and drugs and sex, but he doesn't think any of those count as hobbies, and are all probably best avoided while he's still healing. As far as he's let himself consider, sex is one of those never again things, because he doesn't want to even think about showing someone the scars he's been left with.

"That's nice," he says, his voice a little quiet. He means it, though, it is nice, and he wonders if it's that easy. Just get a damn hobby.

Riley mentions the matriarch, though, and Adam's eyes roll, almost against his will. "It's nothing, it's just..." His hand flaps dismissively. "A siren thing. We're all supposed to answer to the matriarch of whatever enclave we're in, but my family has never really done the whole enclave thing. It's still best to just pay my respects, make sure she doesn't hate me."

Admittedly, it hadn't just been the hobby that had helped Riley move past the worst points of his bitterness, and it hadn't happened in the blink of an eye either. He stills feels it sometimes, all that anger and frustration toward the asshole who'd hit him, the one who'd managed to walk away with a few scrapes while he'd been subjected to months of painful rehabilitation and an ugly scar on his chest, not to mention the problems he's had with his head. Living with all this hasn't been easy, and nobody had told him it would be but even so, he'd found himself having to hold himself back from a biting remark anytime someone had told him to hang in there, that things would get better, that he'd back back to normal in no time.

He's not normal, not in any sense of the word, and not just because he might be a witch. At any given moment during this conversation or the next, Riley could be overcome with the kind of pain that would bring him to his knees. It's happened before, he's been overcome with a migraine that'd led to another blackout, and it's freaked some of his friends out so much that they'd started coming up with the most transparent excuses not to hang out again.

Riley understands that, nobody wants to be held responsible for someone's health in a situation like his; but then he thinks of Ryan, how his best friend has stuck by him through every horrible thing that's happened in their lives, and it helps Riley get back to a place where he can let himself believe that the entirety of life doesn't actually suck. Everyone needs friends like that, he thinks, and he feels for the people who don't have them.

"Well, I know we've only met a couple times, but I don't get any vibes from you that would make me think you're very hatable," Riley says with a playful smirk. "I mean, I obviously no nothing about what makes a siren douchebaggy but this whole matriarch thing sounds a little old-fashioned to me. Wouldn't blame you for not wanting to go pay her a visit."

"Yeah," Adam says with a laugh, his mouth pulling up higher at one corner than the other. He rubs the back of his neck, grateful there are other people in the world who doesn't necessarily buy into the idea of the matriarch, but the rules are old-fashioned and they come from a long line of tradition and Adam knows it's best to just avoid any sort of trouble where and when he can. She doesn't need to be his matriarch, but he still needs to let her know he's in town.

Then hopefully she'll leave him alone and he can go back to doing whatever the hell he wants to do.

"It's a strange system," he says. "My parents hate it, my mom especially. She was always so insulted by the idea that she couldn't control herself and instead had to answer to someone else and listen to their rules. I suppose everyone has laws to follow and I guess the idea of the enclave is to make sure sirens are running wild all over the place, influencing people to do whatever they want, but..." He trails off and shrugs. "I guess I just like the idea that I'm trusted enough to not be a complete dick to everyone I meet."

Because he could be. He could influence Riley to do most anything he wanted right now, he could have all the customers in the store leaving with just the merest suggestion. Adam has used his power to get stuff before, but he's never hurt people in the process.

Riley isn't really sure how to respond, just because he doesn't actually know any other sirens in this town. Or he might and not know it, that's a very distinct possibility, and it still kind of surprises him just how open people here seem to be about the existence of magic. He'd never heard of Siren Cove before his parents had told him this is where his birth parents are from, he'd never seen a mention of anything strange happening in this small place in Maine, but maybe he just hadn't been looking in the right places. Now that he's here, he's been avoiding doing the research on his original roots that he's supposed to, and he's grateful that Ryan hasn't pushed him toward it but Riley knows what's holding him back.

There's a large part of him that doesn't want anything to do with his birth parents. They'd abandoned him, and he knows they must have had their reasons but as long as he doesn't know them, those reasons don't matter. Eight years had gone by before his parents, the mother and father he considers his real family, had adopted him and for most of his childhood, Riley had felt wholly unloved.

Things are so much different now, he's had a family for long than he hasn't, but he thinks the bitterness will always linger. Adam, it seems, understands that in his own way.

"You're the first one I've ever met," Riley admits, and he isn't sure whether it's smart to say or not but Adam is standing here saying that he doesn't want to be regulated so it stands to reason that he wouldn't do anything to betray the reasons why he maybe should be. Riley can't form a real opinion, not until he gets to know this place a little better and what it means to be a part of Siren Cove; but from what he can tell, Adam appears to be a good enough guy. He's willing to take that at face value.

"Just for the record, if you really want me to do something, ask. I'm pretty easy."

For just a second Adam's a little worried he's given up too much information, that maybe Riley thinks he might be the type of siren prone to abusing people for his own gain. While he has used his powers to get what he wants more than a few times over the course of his life, Adam doesn't think he's ever hurt anyone. At least not anyone who didn't really deserve it. Maybe he's a bit impulsive and doesn't always think it through when he decides to use his powers suddenly, but he hopes he's still a relatively good person at the core of it.

Of course, he imagines everyone hopes something like that, and it's entirely possible he's blind to all the shit he's caused over the years.

"I don't use it on friends," he says, his expression a little sheepish. He knows they've only just met, but he likes Riley well enough and he doesn't want to start his time in Siren Cove with making enemies at every corner. "Not unless they really want to know what it feels like and then I'll make sure it's something completely harmless."

He's been told it's a rather pleasant experience, which is something he's worked hard at. Adam doesn't like the idea of leaving people feeling used and he's crafted his power so that people are often left feeling like they wanted to do what he'd asked of them all along.

It warms him a little to hear Adam's reassurances, if only because he's glad that they're talking about being friends even abstractly. Siren Cove is a small town but while most people seem to be very open about their magic and what they can do, Riley still gets the sense that there are a lot of secrets being kept here. He doesn't so much mind that but sometimes, he gets the feeling that people are looking at him suspiciously, as if he might have brought trouble with him. In a way, he supposes they're not wrong, but the blackouts are specific to him.

He isn't sure what he's supposed to do with them, if he's expected to save every person he sees even when he doesn't know who they are or if he's just doomed for the rest of his life to know that someone out there is going to die; but either way, he'd rather figure it out having made some friends along the way. He has a feeling he'll need the support.

"If people want to know what it's like to be coerced, they should just visit Wall Street," he teases, grinning in hopes that it's enough to show Adam that he isn't worried about being manipulated. There's some naivety in that, maybe, but he's willing to overlook it for the moment; at least, until someone does do something that Riley can't ignore. It's bound to happen here, considering it'd happened among friends in New York and they hadn't even been magical.

"Anyway, you don't have to be a siren to be persuasive," he reasons, "and all you're really persuading me to do so far is like you so I'd say we're on pretty solid footing."

Adam laughs at that, not uncomfortable exactly, but also not entirely sure what to do with it. It isn't hard for him to look back at his life and realize he hasn't really had friends in a long time. There had been Leigh, of course, and he thinks she had cared about him in her own way, but he'd also been a means to an end. He'd used his powers to help get her as far as she is already and while she's a talented enough actress in her own right, he's also not sure she'd be as famous as she is now without his help. He'd done it because he had thought she was in love with him, because she had wanted to get to Hollywood so badly, because he'd wanted to give her everything, but in the end it hadn't been him she'd wanted at all.

The fame and fortune, she would take that, but when it came down to it, when he'd really needed her she hadn't been able to give him that support. He supposes he can't really blame her and he isn't terribly angry, but it had still stung. The friends he'd made in New York, one by one they'd all stopped calling, and now he's here in Siren Cove. His brother is dead, his girlfriend has gone off to Hollywood on her own and his friends don't even know where he is.

So it's rather nice to have someone say they like him. Even if they don't know each other well, it makes him feel like maybe this place wasn't such a crazy idea after all.

"I'm winning you over with just my personality, huh?" he asks, grinning a little. "That's good to know, my brother always said I was the most boring person he'd ever met."

"Well, you haven't done anything especially shitty like spit in my face or destroy my store, so I'm going to go ahead and call that a victory in the personality department," Riley says, shooting his new friend a playful wink. To be fair, nobody in Siren Cove has done anything like that and in fact, pretty much everyone he's met has been kind and genuine, if not the slightest bit cagey here and there. It's a town made up of witches and sirens, though, so Riley supposes secrets aren't exactly out of the norm here. Or anywhere, but these secrets are just a little different.

Adam, at least, has been fairly open about who--what?--he is and somehow, that's put Riley more at ease. At the very least, he doesn't feel like he has to tiptoe around everyone here while he tries to figure out the mess that is his head.

"And I'm sure you're not boring. I don't think anyone's boring, with the right motivation."

"Well, my brother was a siren, too, obviously. But he liked to use his power to do things that were a little more reckless," Adam admits. "He was a bit of an adrenaline junkie." And it had gotten him killed. It had resulted in Adam being physically scarred for life, the burns on his right side, the insides of his thighs where the skin grafts had been harvested. It's not pretty, not under his clothes.

And he has his brother and his brother's not-boring life to thank for that. He tries not to be angry with Keller -- he's dead, after all, what good could it do? -- but it's difficult at times.

"If you weren't driving at dangerous speeds, you were boring as far as he was concerned," he says, then forces a laugh when it's really not funny at all.

Riley had known people like that and of course, the one of them he knows who'd died seeking out a thrill had been driving a car when it'd happened. Street racing through a New York neighborhood has always sounded to him like one of the dumbest things a person could do and yet, Jordan had refused to let up. He'd paid for it with his life and four years later, Riley had gotten a taste of the fear his friend must have felt before he'd taken his last breath.

For a moment, he's shaken, busying himself with rearranging flowers that don't need rearranging, and he doesn't want to say anything that will offend Adam or make him uncomfortable.

When he glances back at him, Riley just offers a tight smile. "I don't drive at all anymore," he admits. "I mean, I couldn't anyway, considering I could black out behind the wheel. Your brother probably wouldn't have given me the time of day."

"No," Adam says simply. "I don't either."

He'd never done much driving at all before the accident, having been working since he was sixteen. He'd been driven almost everywhere, he'd had drivers sent by the companies he worked for, by his agency, by everyone in between, and he'd never particularly enjoyed it. Now, though, the thought of getting into a car sends him into a panic he doesn't even like to think about.

"My brother wasn't very smart," he continues and he tries to make his voice sound a little less angry than he's feeling. "But he's not around here to judge either of us boring anymore, so fuck it. Boring might not be such a bad thing." Neither of them are boring and he's sure they both know it, but if Keller had wanted to label them as such, Adam thinks he could have gotten quite comfortable with it.

As true as that may be, Riley finds himself staring down at his shoes with a tight smile. There's a part of him that's glad he's found someone who's been through something like what he had but at the same time, Adam's experience had been so much worse in so many ways. Riley can't imagine how he'd feel if Ryan had been in the car with him that night; all he really knows is that he'd blame himself if anything were ever to happen to his best friend, and he wonders whether Adam feels that way about his brother in spite of what he's said.

Clearing his throat, he reaches for a handful of lilacs then holds them out to Adam, his smile softening. "Here, take these. Lilacs. They're supposed to represent a fresh start and seeing as we've both just moved here, it seems appropriate enough."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

you belong among the wildflowers

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject