She's Not Done Talking

 

You’re touching me.” Tinkletoes says. “On purpose.”

“I am.”

“Just makin’ sure you know. What do ya want?”

“To discuss your behavior.” Writer Lady responds.

“Yeah what about it?”

“You weren’t very nice to House.”

“She wasn’t nice to me first.”

“You’re an adult.” Writer Lady says.

“She’s not?”

Writer Lady contemplates her answer. “If she was human she would be. But she isn’t.”

“So anything that is not human doesn’t have to be nice?” Tinkletoes asks.

“No.”

“So what are you saying?”

“You shouldn’t have been mean to her when she was going through something so difficult.”

Tinkletoes looks at Writer Lady with an irritated expression.

“Men don’t understand how devastating aging can be for a woman.” Writer Lady says.

“Mural Man did okay. He’s a man, sort of. And he was supportive.” The self-proclaimed mercenary counters.

“Yes he was.” Writer Lady agrees. “Why weren’t you?”

Tinkletoes holds up his left hand and counts off the reasons as he responds. “I ain’t her boyfriend. She’s mean. She had it coming.”

“Had it coming?”

“Yeah. For bein’ so mean.”

Writer Lady shakes her head. “There are children here. Did you ever stop to think you were being a bad example to them?”

“The kids aren’t here right now. Aunt Purdy took them out.”

“The other kids.”

“Other kids?” Tinkletoes asks.

“Spots and Smudge.” Realizing she is reaching a bit, Writer Lady turns her attention away from Tinkletoes’ face and looks at the floor, the wall, the shower curtain, anything else.

“They aren’t kids.”

“If they were human they would be kids. Impressionable ones.”

“You’re really pushing the ‘if they were human’ thing.”

“Okay I might be reaching with that one.”

“Ya think?”

“We all do our best to get along with House and TP when he gets mischievous. You don’t. Why is that?” Writer Lady turns away from Tinkletoes and studies the wall House and Mural Man had disappeared into minutes ago. She looks at Tinkletoes, “You get along with TP most of the time, Daemon, Diomedes, Furnatche, even Mural Man but not House.”

“She’s mean, she hides my stuff, and goes out of her way to be mean or make my life difficult. TP is just as obnoxious to everyone here as he is to me. It’s different. If you want her to be treated the same she has to call you, Carp, Ray, Diomedes and the kids stupid and hide their stuff too. Then I’ll be nicer.”

Writer Lady releases a sigh of frustration. House is never going to change her ways.

“You seem awfully preoccupied with my behavior.” He looks into Writer Lady’s eyes. “Maybe the question shouldn’t be why can’t I be nicer to House maybe it should be why do you care so much how I behave?” He asks leaning in close.

“You think I care how you behave?” A guilty expression crosses Writer Lady’s face. “You’ve caught me.” She crooks a finger and gestures to the self-proclaimed mercenary to come in even closer. He complies. “I have to confess it has become important to me how you behave. You do spend a lot of time here.”

Tinkletoes grins.

“Do you know why it’s important? It’s important because you keep screwing things up!” Writer Lady turns and leaves the room.

“I keep screwing things up?” He repeats, catching up with her in High Command just as the words “This entire messed up day has been your fault,” crosses her lips.

Tinkletoes begins to argue until he notices Writer Lady’s current work in progress is still sitting open on her desktop. Open and waiting to be finished or in his case waiting to be read. The self-proclaimed mercenary reads as Writer Lady stands on the other side of the room, saying angry things and pointing a lot. No one is paying much attention at this point. Tinkletoes coughs clearing his throat. “I didn’t screw up. You did.”

Writer Lady looks at Tinkletoes. “How can this be my fault? I haven’t left the house today.”

The self-proclaimed mercenary points to the story displayed on Writer Lady’s monitor. “This is what the residents were reading, remember? You are writing the story, you got the roof replaced. If today’s events are anyone’s fault they’re yours.”

“I already took ownership of the roof problem and House is doing okay again.” Writer Lady sighs. “I guess it would be best to drop it.”

Tinkletoes grins.

“For now at least.”

“TP said Faerie replaced the words on the pages the residents were reading from. That she’s bored. I acknowledge that we do have some problems.” Writer Lady picks up her eraser and begins cleaning off her white board. “Okay. We have two problems. One: How to track what Faerie is doing in her boredom and how to manage damage control. Two: How to apologize to Nana and her friend without sounding like complete lunatics. Although I still don’t see how the incident at the assisted living facility is my fault.” Writer Lady says. As she begins diagramming all of the variables they would need to consider when it comes to Faerie and what she might do keep things manageable. One side of the board fills up quickly and starts leaking on to the other side.

“If you hadn’t been writing that story about that Lord Nathan guy standing on the cliffs in the rain brooding, the female ghost and their...visits. This never would have happened. You need to learn that Nathans are nothing but trouble.”

Writer Lady turns around and looks at Tinkletoes with nothing but pure anger. ‘You’re back to that again?!” She turns around and begins writing on the white board furiously. “Do you know why there is a story about brooding Lord Nathan and his hot ghostly lover? You! You kept insisting there was a Nathan somewhere in my life. You insisted on acting like an ass when I told you you were completely wrong. I got tired of the crap. You wanted a Nathan so I created a Nathan. A hot brooding, rich sexy one! As far I can tell the only problem with Nathan is you don’t know how to let it go. Do you see anyone named Nathan in this room? No there isn’t one. There are no Nathans here!”

Writer Lady turns around. “It’s that simple!” She says to no one in particular.

Tinkletoes is gone.