(no subject)

[fuck_it]

A little while back, Chris found himself in one of Darrow's bookshops. He hadn't meant to go in, but there'd been this fuckin' amazing display in the window, stacked high with books on flowers, and before he knew it, his face was pressed up against the window, while he tried to figure out how they got it to do that without toppling over.

He went in to ask someone-- the manager or something-- but got distracted, by, of all things, a book on Darrow records. He bought it without a second thought, and spent the rest of the night reading up on Darrow's biggest sandwich and the longest someone in Darrow's stayed awake and the biggest sandcastle.

It ain't even that big, really.

Which is why Chris is spending his day off on the beach today with a couple of those sand buckets, a couple of little shovels and loads of sand. He reckons with a couple hours work, he can manage to beat it. Ten feet isn't even all that tall, when you think about it.

Alright, so maybe he'll have to get a ladder, near the end, but for now, he's got his mound of sand, and he's adding to it, the indentations in the sand his bare feet make getting deeper the longer he digs.

This is gonna take most of the afternoon.

Comments

[warmandsad]

It's summer, so it's not as if he's the only one building a sandcastle on Darrow's beach – but he does look to be the only one making a serious effort to reach the sky with his. Abby's made more than her fair share living so close to a beach for most of her life and so, though it's probably really not her place to intervene, she heads on over. "It'll hold better if you add water," she tells him. "A lot of it."

[fuck_it]

It throws Chris for a second, that she looks like Olive. It's fuckin' weird, and he doesn't think he'll ever properly be over the fact that people en dup with twins places like this. Only, she doesn't really look like Olive. It's enough of a difference that he knows straight away that it's someone else.

"Dunno where I'll get that though," he says, standing up straighter in his sand hole, setting his hands on his hips and looking around like there's not a massive ocean just there.

"Could be out of luck."

[warmandsad]

"Maybe if you dig deep enough you'll hit the water table," Abby quips, glancing down at hole, a little relieved that he's not annoyed at her for disrupting his digging. Gesturing at one of the free buckets, she nods out at the ocean. "If you want me to go collect you some, I'll be here for a while."

[fuck_it]

Chris looks down at his feet for a moment, blinking, not sure what she's on about.

"There's a table down there?" he asks, confused, "Who the fuck buried a table?"

It doesn't make much sense to him and sounds like bollocks that she's made up.

[warmandsad]

"...oh it's not literally a table," Abby says, a little startled. She's no scientific wünderkind herself, but she's pretty sure they covered the water cycle in elementary school. "It's, like, ground water? You know, way underneath the sand or dirt and whatever. They tap wells into it."

[fuck_it]

"Oh. Right, yeah. I knew that," Chris says, though it's probably obvious that he had no idea what the fuck she was talking about. It makes sense though, they're over ocean, aren't they? At some point, you dig down far enough and it's all water, innit?

He looks down at his feet again, considering.

"How far down d'you think it is?"

[warmandsad]

"Oh, uh, not that far," Abby says after a moment. She remembers digging closer to the surf with her sister, trying to race to reach the water at the bottom before the tide washed the whole thing away. It stings a little, the memory, but she's grown awfully good at hiding it behind a smile. "Since the ocean's right over there, I mean. But, yeah, the damper the sand the better. The dry stuff'll just collapse in on itself."

[fuck_it]

"Right then," Chris says, and the matter seems like it's sorted now, "You're on water duty, and I'll keep digging for more sand to build up with, yeah?"

He didn't catch her name or anything, but she seems alright to help out, even if he hasn't exactly told her why he's building it in the first place.

[warmandsad]

"Sure," Abby says with a breath of a laugh, a little relieved that he hasn't just gone ahead and dismissed her help. She's a total stranger, after all, people are well within their rights to be weirded out by things like this. Grabbing the bucket, she starts for the edge of the water before remembering her manners, looking back over her shoulder. "Oh, and I'm Abby, by the way."

[fuck_it]

"Chris," he replies with a grin, his voice raised a bit so she can hear him over the waves. He reckons that maybe she's alright, this Abby. Maybe everyone with an Olive face is, though he's only met the two.

"D'you build sandcastles all the time, then?" he asks, as he drops a shovel-full of sand on top of his pile. It's nearly waist high now.

[warmandsad]

It's not long before Abby's returned with couple buckets of water, admittedly on the smaller side. Putting them within reach of him, she crouches on the sand and considers Chris' question. "Uh, not really. I mean, not anymore. I grew up in Montauk so I made them all the time at the beach with my sister, though."

[fuck_it]

"Cheers," Chris says, 'cause even though he'd started in on this with the idea that he'd do it himself, it's alright to have someone helping out, if only a little bit. It means he'll have to share credit once he gets the record, but that'd be okay.

"Where's Montauk?" he asks, "Is that in America somewhere?"

[warmandsad]

"Yeah, it's in New York, riiight at the end of Long Island," Abby says, nodding. She's met enough people that haven't even heard of America that it's kind of a relief to not have to explain that much. She'd never known how much she'd taken modern geography for granted until she turned up in this place. He sounds he's from somewhere in England, maybe, but Abby decides not to make any assumptions. "What about you? Did you turn up from somewhere else, too?"

[fuck_it]

"Another weird place like this, actually," Chris replies, "Place you can't leave, with people from all over and stuff. Only it was just an island, no city or anything. Everyone lived in huts."

He still misses it, sometimes. But enough people from there are in Darrow that it's not as wank as it'd be otherwise. He still misses Cassie all the time, though, and hopes she'll turn up eventually.

[warmandsad]

"Oh, yeah, I know a few people who lived there before here," Abby says, nodding, wondering what that would have been like for her. Darrow holds the familiarity of any major city, so it's easy enough to forget that she's trapped, sometimes. Regardless, her life is infinitely better than it was back home, lonely and always lingering on the past. "Which do you like better?" she asks, genuinely curious.

[fuck_it]

"You didn't need a job there," Chris says, "So maybe the island. It was alright."

Though, he didn't really know Cissie there. They'd maybe met once or twice, but if going back there meant not remembering any of the past year with her, then he wouldn't do it.

[warmandsad]

"Oh, yeah, I'll bet," Abby says, nodding, although she kind of likes her job. That's less about the money, though, and more about having something to do. If she really wanted for nothing but the basics, she could easily live on the money that randomly turns up in her bank account every month without fail. "So you work somewhere, here, then?"

[fuck_it]

"Yeah, a mate of mine owns a record shop," Chris says, and he knows that's what they call them, even though they don't sell too many records. It's mostly CDs and DVDs and stuff. He thinks maybe he'll ask Eduardo why it's like that.

"It's alright. Better than when I sold properties, back home, at least. How about you?"