Love Lost, Chapter 10a: Remissions.
#19 of Love Lost
Love Lost, Chapter 10a: Remissions.
Joe sorted through generic school supplies. He had acquired a new backpack for his entry into high school, letting his old one become dedicated to his hobby as a trainer. One could question if one is really a trainer when taking it only as seriously as a hobby, or if training in the sense sixth-tiers knew it was truly deserving of a greater title than "hobby" at all. A chime from his trainer's device within his old backpack alerted him to the news of the day: Percival had just checked in at Rennin Pokecenter, and would soon be home.
Grace drifted inside Joe's bedroom and lent a telepathic hand, looking for things that Joe was struggling to remember the whereabouts of. She also retrieved a few other objects that had been set aside, such as his game console's second controller. "So, are you going to beat him up first round, or are you going to go easy and let him think he hasn't gotten out of shape?"
Joe glanced up at her and the controller she let dangle from her hand. "Beat 'em up. If I can. He's been fighting for real all summer; you won't play with me so I'm probably the rusty one."
Grace set the controller down and switched which game was in the system. "I can't play that sort of game against you."
Joe zipped his new backpack shut and started looking for a few pens, pencils, and an eraser. "Why not? It's not like you hate violence when you're still having me take you to the gym every few days to fight until Medical kicks you off the ladder."
Grace drifted over with a smile, set his backpack aside, and sat on his bed. "Dad's not home and Burner won't be for a while. Marianne is watching a game with the Pearsons. Let's do it while we have some privacy."
"The gill massaging thing?" Joe asked her, casting her a half-annoyed glance. Grace nodded quickly with a smile and a sparkle in her eyes that asked, "What else?" Joe climbed onto his bed and neared its head. "Okay, but just a little. I think Dad got suspicious after last time."
Grace grinned, teleported a cushion from the love-seat into her hands, and gave it to Joe to place behind himself. Leaning his upper back against it, Joe held his pillow against his upper chest as he laid himself down, legs splayed somewhat. Then, Grace laid herself atop him as he folded the pillow over, providing padding and a little space for her dorsal sensory horn.
Grace closed her eyes and leaned her head back into his waiting palms. "Think? I know he did. He wanted to say something, too."
Joe began slowly caressing the roots of her gills, eliciting a gentle moan. "What did he want to say?"
"I don't know. He wasn't projecting that." Eyes still closed, she reached up and placed her palms on his temples and began to synchronize with him.
Linked, they no longer needed to speak. Their conversation was innate, automatic, sublime. And, somewhat distracted as she guided every nuance of his fingers' motions, strengthening the experience for herself. Joe felt a sense of pride and accomplishment--a seed of which he knew she planted in him--but genuine nonetheless. It was a trivial thing he was doing, just rubbing her ears, to speak approximately, but it delighted and pleasured her in a unique and sensual way that could not be described. Indeed, he could feel the speech T.M.'s lexicon inside her mind when they were connected this closely and there was literally no composite term that matched exactly. "Harmonious ecstasy" was a near match, though.
Their link strained somewhat. Something in her mind was shifting; she was going too far again, like the last time they did this. Joe disapproved but her willpower was dominant in this state and he consented. It did not really affect him last time, although it did leave him feeling somewhat "funny." Grace would be the one out of sorts for the next few hours, he expected. She began squirming between his legs, fidgeting as though she were being assaulted by an army of tiny people with tiny spears and tiny attitude problems. With both of her hands proper locked onto Joe's head, Grace employed her telekinesis to serve as a surrogate third and apply ministrations she felt a desperate need to feel applied.
In the moment, Joe no longer merely consented to her going too far; he encouraged it, adjusting his fingers' placements on her gills and their motions slightly. Feeling him defying her guidance but performing as, if not more, effectively, Grace gasped and redoubled her telekinetic efforts. Within seconds her legs pulled up a little and squeezed together and she began squirming involuntarily. Unlike last time, she had not merely gone too far. The point of no return had been passed.
"Uhhh, uhhhhhh, thank you, Joe. Joe! I--I love you, Joe! I--I'm going to--we're going to--"
(Ding-dong!)
The energy of her release coupled with absolute shock at the doorbell's chime caused Grace to force her arms straight, slamming Joe's head against his headboard while kicking her legs in a brief, instinctive run-away response. Sliding downward once her palms passed to press the wall behind them, her dorsal node passed the bottom of the pillow and dug into Joe's belly for a moment. Still synchronized and thereby feeling the same pain he did from both the headboard and her protrusion, her subconscious mind took over as she came away from his bed and somewhat righted herself. Without a thought, upon hearing the bell chime again, she teleported to the front door.
She teleported into the front door; her body replacing a large oval faux-stained glass window that until that moment featured the image of a feeding hummingbird.
Her subconscious mind had poor accuracy.
A flygon on the front step, showered by shards of glass, jumped back and hovered until the gardevoir finished materializing and looked up with a dazed expression.
The delivery girl checked an electronic device strapped to her right arm. "Special parcel for Rainier, Joe." She then presented a small box.
Grace accepted it and carefully pulled herself back through the door's oval decorative hole and backed away.
The flygon poked her head inside, waving the device on her arm. "Hey, wait, you have to sign for that!"
Grace caught up with Joe as he paced briskly to the bathroom. "Joe? This--"
"Not now."
"But--"
Joe shut the bathroom door firmly behind himself and shouted through it. "Dad was right. Whatever that is, we shouldn't--Just! Give me a minute!"
As Grace heard the water begin running, a faint cool breeze drifted beneath her skirt and made her realize that her surmise that the effect she felt would apply to them both was right. It also made her realize that a faint cool breeze nowhere near an air conditioning vent indicated that they were not alone in their house.
Grace turned about to see Marianne, staring at her, frozen in a pose with one of Pearson's nachos near her opened mouth, waiting for Grace to finish turning before biting into it. Which she then did, as though by remote control she had been un-paused.
Crunch, crunch, crunch.
Grace's stance slackened. "You were watching."
Marianne popped the other half of her chip into her mouth and nodded.
"How long?"
The ghost's grin widened to its limit. "Oh, don't worry about that yet, slut. It'll keep getting bigger until, well, at least through high school."
"What? Oh, God. NO!" Grace glanced back at the bathroom, responding to Joe's mental reaction to hearing her shout; he correctly recognized that NO as a typical consequence of direct Marianne exposure. "I meant, how long were you watching us?"
Marianne ejected another nacho chip from her haze and took a bite solely so she could talk with her mouth full. "From about two seconds after you got too distracted to sense me."
Grace turned away feeling shamed.
"Hey! Don't blame me. I came over to steal a beer because I lost a bet with fat-boy Pearson and owed him one. You chose to put out some irresistible vibes. Speaking of, that freak-out when the doorbell rang," Marianne shivered and floated up against Grace's face, "ooooh, pure panic tastes soooo gooooooood." Marianne rolled her eyes back while fluttering her eyelids during her O's and ended her sentence by hanging out her tongue and dragging it across Grace's cheek.
The gardevoir cringed and staggered away, gesturing with her left arm as she exclaimed, "Ugh, gah, please, please! Leave me," that was too open-ended, "us," that was better, "alone!"
Marianne floated northward. "Ha! Like I want to be around you two anyway." Once she was out of earshot, drifting between the Rainier and Pearson homes, she added to herself, "I know someone who is even more energetic when the time is right."
Joe exited the bathroom fully-dressed, as he was when he entered. Grace had set his parcel beside the telephone and floated toward him but stopped as she felt his mindset. He did not want to interact with her, but he did not want to rebuff her either. He simply wanted not to acknowledge the awkward experience, especially as he now realized how powerful an emotion she could share. She obliged him by simply following him as he moved about his home, maintaining a distance of about a meter and a half as the rooms' layouts permitted, until he stopped wandering and sat in the love-seat. Grace teleported back its absent cushion and sat beside him in silence for some time, until the silence made him uncomfortable.
She sensed that, and broke it. "I can't play that kind of game against you because there's no point."
Joe stared at the television as though it were on. "Because you could read my mind and beat me every time?"
"Only if you let me." She reached across and took his right hand in her left palm.
He looked at their hands, then turned to face her. "I can stop you?"
"If you focus, and if I don't force myself into your mind."
"Like your mother did?"
"Yes, but not really. That was just communication. By force I mean, well, I mean: force. I'm sure it would be painful."
Joe started thinking about what that entailed, which was not what Grace wanted him thinking about.
"Joe, it's because you beating me at that game would do nothing for you, and me beating you at it would do nothing for me."
They looked into each others eyes and reached an understanding.
Grace placed a palm on Joe's cheek and leaned forward while guiding him into a chaste kiss. When it broke, she sneaked a glance over his shoulder at the damaged door and whispered, "By the way, whatever that was, it was amazing, and we are doing it again someday."
Joe spoke low. "I think, a while from now. When I'm a little older, and--."
"--and ready to feel what I feel when we're together--" With an accepting nod she stood and floated toward the kitchen for a refreshment, grumbling, "--by ourselves," toward the ceiling that Marianne typically lurked above. Returning with a couple cans of soda, she and Joe barely had time to open them and enjoy a draught when the telephone rang. Grace raised her arm behind her head and attracted its handset to her palm.
"Welcome home! Wh--yes, of course. We'll be over in a couple seconds. See you in a moment." Grace replaced the handset and leaned over Joe. He had not heard and had not yet noticed what happened to the front door; she hoped to keep it that way for now. "It's time to pick up our fried chicken!" With him in her grasp, Grace concentrated and teleported herself with Joe to the Finnegan's home.
As soon as Grace released him, Joe was re-captured and lifted off of his feet by a tower of warm, bright red feathers. Burner made his particular happy bird sound for a few seconds before letting him go.
"It's good to see you too, big guy. Did you have fun?"
Percival interjected. "There was a little here and there, but--being a trainer, a good trainer, is a lot harder than it looks." Somewhat humbled by his experience on the road, Percival went on at length about what he learned during his journey, as much to summarize it for himself as for Joe's benefit.
Burner excused himself and sought Sam, finding him inside Percival's bedroom, examining what had become of his bonsai tree. "Sam? Are you--ah, what's that?"
"A victim of drowning." Sam brushed a branch with a claw. "Our mistress fulfilled her promise to water it for me, but she was too generous. I am not surprised; that is in her nature. She will prepare a large dinner tonight, and invite your family to join in it, I am sure."
Burner was uncertain about what Sam was getting at. "Is that bad?"
"Yes. If the soil has degraded this much, the roots are sure to be damaged. I'll have to re-pot it to see if it can be saved." Sam put the tree back on his shelf and paused.
"Uh, I meant, is that bad that she--"
"I know what you meant, Burner. I have work to do--my own work--before my time is taken from me again." Sam exited through the window, with greater difficulty than he expected since he now barely fit through it, and examined Delilah's garden for any useful soil.
Burner returned to the living room, where Percival was up to the part of his story that was personally annoying.
"I can't believe it, right? The guy was a first-tier gym leader in addition to being a vaguely philosophical bastard. He doubles the offer from the first time, his two against my four, and the house rules only allow trainers a switch option when a pokemon is fainted, thrown, or taps out. Sam's locked in as my registered lead, and out comes his gliscor from the first time. Sam's got plenty of speed now that he's evolved and got some leaf-blades off, but the batty bitch tanks the hit and nails him. Bartholomew makes a switch while I throw Fiona out. I don't even remember what his other pokemon was called, some import breed, but it faked her out, hopped up, and kicked her in the base of her skull. Wham, out like a light. He doesn't switch so I choose Frankie, hoping to at least get a static paralysis on his weasel on its first attack and then take it out. It freaking u-turns on him while he's charging up. The weasel is shocked but gets a free switch, and I get to hear that gliscor cackling like a fiend as she pops into an electric attack that does nothing. Needless to say, Frankie's fucked."
"Language!" Delilah shouted from the kitchen.
"Sorry, Ma'. Anyway, I'm down to Burner so I throw him in. The gliscor tries to pull that acrobatic sh--stuff on him, gets a flaming kick square in the belly. She barely gets off the ground again, tries to quake him but can't get it off before he snipes her with an ember. Wonder weasel comes out, fur still puffed out because of the static, walks right up to him. Smack! Jumps up to his height and slaps him like a pimp. Burner takes a swing, but the weasel's already doing some crazy back-flip while casting stone-edge somehow and batters the hell out of him. They were about to call it a knock-out but Burner started getting up. The weasel was looking ragged and limping to the circle's rim--he must've been getting drained by a life orb--but he hears the official call the match live since Burner's got a knee off of the ground, and does some crazy high-jump stunt across the ring. Burner barely dodges it and the little snot slams into the ground and rolls over the tape. Knocked his own dumb self out, probably broke something, too."
Joe got nudged awake psychically by Grace--she was also tuned-out but detected Percival reaching the end of his recollection. "So, Burner got you your first badge?" Joe asked.
"No. Burner got you your first badge. Since Burner got all the points in the match and he was on loan, the judge gave his trainer the win."
Grace spoke up. "Oh, that must've been what came today." Joe looked at her blankly. "There was a delivery today. While we were--when I left--right when I--abruptly." She glanced around at everyone glancing at her. "Yeah."
The Rainiers returned home after promising to stop in again at dinner time. As they walked back, James' car passed them by and pulled into the driveway ahead. Grace cursed beneath her breath; Joe and Burner realized why a moment later.
James spoke when he heard footsteps behind himself. "What the hell is this? Did someone break in?"
Grace held her hands together and let her head hang somewhat. "I'm sorry, Master James, I--"
Marianne appeared upside-down, peering through the door's hole's upper rim. She spoke with a rapid, monotone inflection. "You failed to control your primal impulses and got yourself into a situation you were not ready to handle."
James looked at Marianne and Grace alternatively. "Either of you care to elaborate."
The ghost seized her opportunity, drifting through the solid portion of the door toward James. "All you need to know is that we shared a moment of beauty. And, it ended with Grace putting her head through a pane of glass." She turned to face away from everyone as though she were snubbing them. "Any further details belong just between us girls."
"Does the repair cost belong just between you girls, too?"
Marianne turned herself around and right-side-up. "No. I threw her. It's my responsibility. I don't care, it was worth every penny."
"You have money?"
She thought for a moment. "Actually, better: I have a few doors I'm not using."
James waved her aside, stepped over most of the glass, and entered his home. "I don't want to know. Just fix it."
Joe and Burner followed James inside, Burner with a wide stride over the glass since he wore no shoes, but Grace lingered behind. "Why did you tell him that?"
"Because I know of a door that can replace this one. Duh."
"No, I mean, why did you protect me?"
Marianne's tendrils fell limp as she stared blankly at Grace. "After what you've been through today, you're still thinking only about yourself. I didn't protect you, Grace. I protected James. Which do you think is easier to swallow? I kicked your ass and threw you out without phase-shifting your matter this time, or that you lost your grip on your powers when someone rang a doorbell while you were busy forcing his son to give you an ear orgasm?"
"It's not an--and I didn't force--"
Marianne stabbed a tendril through Grace's neck, arresting her voice. "I didn't ask for clarification from you. I asked which truth is easier for James." She withdrew her tendril with a sweeping flourish.
Grace rubbed her intact neck and stormed inside. Marianne descended upon the broken glass, drew up a shard, and licked its edge while her smile spread.
Mister Pearson did not look away from his ball game. "Ale, imported; not that domestic swill you brought last time."
Marianne accumulated herself beside him. "You drive a hard bargain, Baldy, but you understand the law of supply and demand. You've got the supply, so you get to demand."
"I couldn't afford to sit on my fat ass and watch footy half as much as I do if I didn't." He snatched from her haze a nacho she attempted to sneak.
"It's a deal, then. Ale--not swill--imported if they have it, otherwise you take what you get with a smile, and as a gesture of appreciation, I won't do my fun thing to you when you sleep tonight."
"Good enough."
Returning to her home away from home, Marianne made a grand entrance by punching through a garbage bag that covered the door hole to keep the early evening air outside. "James, you're licensed, it's driving time. Burner! We'll need some muscles. Grace! You broke it, so you're coming along!" Not hearing a response, she entered Joe's bedroom through its shut door.
She found Grace standing beside Joe's bed as he slept, lights out, just watching him. Marianne whispered, "Hey, Pervert, it's door fixing time."
Grace responded after a delay. "What?" She looked around as though she were surprised to be standing there. "I wa--you, whe--what do you want?"
Marianne ensnared Grace's upper body and pulled her gently through any potentially intervening matter on their way to the living room. A purple tint faded from Grace's body but Marianne did not let her loose. "Okay, boys and," twisting to face Grace, "you: time for a little road trip once we get that old door off of its hinges. I'm no good with a screwdriver unless it involves orange juice, so who wants to do the honors?"
With a quick phone call placed while James and Burner removed their ruined door, Grace enlisted Frankie to serve as a security guard while everyone was out and the home was an open house. Not that added security was likely necessary, but Frankie worked cheap--his fee was permission to make use of the entertainment center and all the hot dogs he could eat--and Grace felt a lot better about it than leaving Joe alone.
Mister Pearson's pick-up truck was not a particularly large model. Burner rode in its bed, as his height and horns conflicted with the cabin's roof. He recognized the path they followed. When Marianne told James where to stop, he was not sure if he was pulling up onto a driveway or just part of the lawn. The whole surface seemed a patchwork of overgrowth and bare spots.
Marianne sighed. "Ahhh, hovel sweet hovel. Well, time for you kids to get to work taking another door down. I'll go tell the vagrant what's what and get it opened up."
The mismagius struggled to keep from laughing; it was too good of a chance to pass up. A lucario on the top floor was so out of it that not only did her aura sense not detect her, but it let Marianne pull free her bows' ribbons and use them to carefully blindfold her and tie her muzzle shut. She expected Alice to be confused and frustrated when she awoke, but when Marianne ticked her nose, Alice reacted with a constrained fury. Muffled completely by her bound mouth, Alice tried to scream while she clawed at the ribbon with futile effort for a moment, until she heard Marianne laughing. An adrenaline-powered reaction, the lucario unleashed an aura-sphere that went straight through Marianne and then straight through the window behind her, blasting away a storm shutter that would never again feel unable to decide between open and shut and also the glass pane that it enclosed. Alice fled, guided only by a now hyper-active aura sense down her stairs, slipping and skidding half-way down the first flight, and onward until a powerful entity blocked her path. It was a vaguely familiar pattern, and she remembered the last time she was blindfolded and sensed imposing aura before her. She was not a mere riolu this time, and unleashed another aura-sphere, blasting the monster out of her way. A different kind of entity appeared behind her suddenly. Alice readied to attack again but could not focus as a piercing waveform in her mind drove her to her knees. It did not relent until a great tension came away from her face. She could move her jaw again. Although the darkness was practically total, once she calmed down her sixth sense gained resolution and she began to identify the forms around her. She recognized Grace standing beside her. She recognized Burner, lying in a hallway, out cold. A short distance away, something shadowy: Marianne was floating through walls mumbling about knowing there was supposed to be a revival crystal stashed away somewhere.
"I'm not going to say I'm sorry, because I'm not. It was going to be hilarious, if she didn't go berserk for no reason." Thus was the limit of help Marianne provided while a somewhat unsteady Burner and a somewhat dismayed Alice loaded the Rainiers' old new door into Mr. Pearson's truck and while Grace finished tightening the screws of the hinges on the new old door to a supposedly vacant building.
Alice spoke at hardly more than a whisper as she passed by the ghost. "It wasn't for no reason." She went inside and looked around for supplies.
Marianne shouted inside behind her. "No good reason. That's probably why you're as abandoned as this house! Got your master killed or something, and now you're a relic wishing to have a place to belong. Just like this house."
Burner moved toward the front porch while Grace approached Marianne, feeling herself a hair's breadth from attacking the ghost. "You mean to say, just like you."
Marianne smiled wide, her face becoming like a purple jack-o'-lantern, eyes glowing like flame, and mouth too, illuminated from below by the gems of her suddenly-glowing necklace. "Just like me."
Alice approached what was now her front door with a few short planks of weathered wood and a hammer of her very own. She started covering as much of its hole as she could and spoke between nails. "I didn't get him killed. He's--he's doing what he has to do to square things away and then he'll be back. And, I'm going to see him soon."
Burner handed her another board. "Is he coming here?"
"No, I did something to arrange a special visit someday." Her low tone returned to a near-whisper. "I know you want to ask but I don't want to talk about what I did."
James stood leaning against the truck's front left fender, smoking in silence. A fixed front door seemed to be the only good coming of this interaction. "Are we done here?"
Marianne floated into the truck cabin. "Here, yes. Now, we go to downtown up-town."
Burner heard, and ignored, James' exclamation, consoling Alice who was beginning to tear up. He reached across her back, beneath her antennae and gripped her left shoulder gently. "It was an accident, and it was her fault. It's also not the first time you've needed to knock sense into me."
She sniffed but smiled a little. "I'm afraid I might have knocked it back out of you."
"Burner, truck, now!"
Burner responded with a glottal cluck and turned back to Alice. "Get lots of rest. I'll come by tomorrow night. I have a surprise planned for you, but I need to go shopping to get it, so if I can't--"
"NOW!"
Alice poked him in his very sore chest. "If you can't, it's the thought that counts, anyway. Go, you bighearted oaf, don't make Da-da get mad." She waved goodbye to them with a fake grin that fell away as soon as three Rainiers, and one presumably Tavers--as Alice learned when investigating the attic--rode out of view. She went inside, collected from the floor her ribbons, trudged up her stairs, and turned on a faint lamp by which to see.
Feeling more herself with her bows tied again, she sat on her sleeping bag and gazed through the broken-out window, trying to think of what she might have that could cover its gaping hole, having spent the good wood on the door. Then, she started trying to think of why Marianne would do to her what she did. Then, she started trying not to think of a particular night long ago when she was blindfolded and bound. Then, she scooted into the corner of her room, pinning her pillow behind herself against it, drew the sleeping bag up over the legs she pulled tightly up to her chest, and cried alone.