You step onto a cracked but clean tile floor that was probably once red, but is now a faded salmon pink. A large, rectangular communal table seating about 10 takes up the middle of the floor, with mismatched smaller tables arranged near the large front windows. The long counter in front of the kitchen door sports plates of fragrant bread, cookies, and muffins and bowls of fresh wild fruits. A small, rattling fridge in the corner holds a selection of juices and cold spring water in reused bottles and jars. Atop the refrigerator is a can for cash donations; next to it is a box for barter payments. Scrawled on the box in black marker are the words "Pay what you can, when you can."
Did someone call for 'tall, dark, and handsome'? Well, dark's fairly well covered, at least. Jet-black hair's pulled into a long, loose tail at the nape of his neck, a few stray strands about the face occasionally drifting into his almost equally dark eyes, the irises of which are a brown deep enough that one needs to look closely to find the pupil. Nut-brown skin that sets off the white of his teeth and eyes -- it could just barely be mistaken for a very deep tan, if one really tried. Tall is a miss; he's still several inches off six feet, and he probably won't ever get there. Handsome... well, not a classic beauty, to be sure, but well-proportioned, with a stunning, frequent grin and deeply expressive features. Slim, but in perfectly good shape.
He's clad in... well, black leather pants. Somewhat faded, well broken in, but nicely cut and really =quite= nicely fitted. A simple cream shirt hangs untucked above them, long sleeved and fastened with a row of small, black stone buttons. Over that, he wears a decidedly well-worn old black trenchcoat, almost too big for him -- the cuffs hang down half-over his hands, when he lets them, and the hem hangs perilously close to his heels. Scuffed black leather boots with worn soles adorn his feet; there's a seemingly random collection of bracelets, all on one wrist, and several piercings along the upper section of each ear -- little silver hoops. His right ear also bears a rather delicate silver earcuff.
This young man stands barely 5'8" with a build that is slim but far from fragile. His musculature is compact and wiry, but it's there and well-toned: no wilting flower, this one. His features are on the masculine side of androgynous, enough that there's no doubt he's male, but calling him pretty -- while it might get one glared at -- wouldn't be far from the truth. His hollowed cheeks and squarish chin is offset by naturally pouty lips and a pair of aqua-green eyes framed by a fringe of long lashes. His hair is so dark a brown as to seem almost black in all but full sunlight, where red highlights render it a deep auburn. It's worn unbound in loose curls that fall just barely to his shoulders.
He's dressed in tight jeans, so tight they've split at the seams here and there to reveal glimpses of milky skin beneath, and a black knit t-shirt with a baby-doll cut cropped off just below his rib cage to show the smooth expanse of his stomach and the blood red gemstone imbedded in his belly button. His jewelry is sparse, merely a few hoops and studs along the outer curve of his ears, an eyebrow stud, and a tongue stud.
It's so late it's early, and yet there is a light on at the diner, an oil lamp set upon one table, where Kal reads a book, one elbow propped on the table and his fingers curled through his disheveled hair. He looks tired, a scarce shadow of scruff on his chin showing that he's unshaven. Bleary-eyed, he turns a page, reaching for his cup of tea as he scans the words. It's the hour of night where the world is silent save for the wind whispering in the branches and the lap of the lake against the shore.
In the silence, Kal might hear the soft padding of feet, or he might be entirely surprised when the bell on the front door jingles to announce Serendipity's entry. Ren closes the door behind him, turns, and looks quite startled to see Kalisto there. "...hey, gorgeous," he greets him quietly, "Same book as last time?"
Kalisto looks up as the bell jingles, and he smiles lazily, slouching in his seat as he says, "Hey babe." Shaking his head, he holds up the clothbound text, not that the title along the spine is visible at any distance. "It's a book about pre-Dark America during a period they called the Great Depression."
Serendipity grins broadly at the greeting, and wanders over. "What, was everyone suicidal?" he asks, pulling a chair over to drop into it beside the other youth. "You're out kinda late, yeah? Not that I'm complainin'."
Kalisto laughs a little and says, "Nah, but maybe they should've been. It was an economic depression." He sits up a little, perking up as he explains, "You see, around the first world war, there was a global economy that was devastated after the incurred costs of the war coupled with the fallout of countries effected by the Treaty of Versa..." He seems to catch himself mid-babble, then attempts to look cool by shrugging it off and saying, "Everyone was dirt poor. Anyway, couldn't sleep."
Serendipity actually looks like he kind of enjoys listening to the perked-up explanation. "Well, poor's okay as long as you got what you need, but otherwise... So what's the Treaty of Versa?"
"Versailles," Kal replies wryly and, since Ren doesn't make fun of him for knowing stuff, he grudgingly continues. "The allied nations of Great Britain, France, and the United States of America defeated the Germans in World War One, and at the war's end they penned the Treaty of Versailles, named after the palace of one of France's ancient kings, where the signing took place. The economic effect of the war on the global economy triggered the Great Depression, when the stock market crashed, causing America's economy to crumble. That, plus a decade of droughts caused shortages of everything. It wasn't just about being poor. It was about the system that supported a large population collapsing, leaving that population unable to function."
Serendipity considers this. "This area was United States back then, yeah?" he asks, though he appears to still be thinking, a little distracted. "So did they have not-so-great depressions later, like when Zelda came, an' when the waters rose, an' times during the Dark? 'cause those pretty much made the systems in place collapse too, right?"
Kalisto nods as he says, "Yeah, either the United States or Canada." He shrugs, "Same difference, really." He considers the questions, closing the book and setting it aside. The lamplight gleams on the gold gilt along the spine that reads The Grapes of Wrath. Kal tops off his teacup and offers some of the pleasant smelling brew to Ren. "I think by then no one was thinking of human history much, so they didn't shuffle the names around. Besides, things are always named in hindsight. They didn't call the first world war World War One at the time, because they didn't realize there was going to be a second one. They called it the Great War. And after the Great War was the Great Depression. Like how you feel bummed out after a fight, I guess."
"I us'ly feel kinda jazzed, actually," Ren replies, accepting the tea. "That makes sense, though. Don't generally call anything the first 'less you expect a second along the way. So was there a depression following the second one, too?"
Kalisto grins, shaking his head wryly. "Apparently the Great War was pretty bad," he informs Ren knowingly. "Not as bad as the second one, I guess, depending on your point of view, but it sure did show humanity how it doesn't need monsters to commit atrocities." He toys with the cover of the book, carefully as he shows an inherent respect for the written word. In the quiet of the dead hours, in the flickering lamplight, he could be some swooning consumptive poet of a bygone era, draped as he is, lazily upon his chair. "Not so much," he replies. "That war actually created an economic boom. Though the depression came a few years after the first war, after the second, the world was fairly prosperous up through the nineteen eighties, where there was a recession, then a peak in the nineties, and a downhill slide after the turn of the century. Of course, it didn't have time to hit bottom before the Dark came and human history ceased. Well, ceased to be what it was."
"I know some about the second war," Ren replies, "...not a lot, but there were a pretty good numbera my people in it, for how manya them there were an' all. Th' ones who came back had stories, prolly more'n the few we still get told. They teach you 'bout all this in school, or's it just an interest?" The question does not sound as though mocking is imminent for either anser.
Kalisto shrugs and says, "They gloss over it. Mostly, I read." He smiles a little, rearranging his drape indolently as he says, "My father is incredibly wealthy. The one thing I have in common with him is a love of books, and his library had some impressive pieces in his pre-Dark collection. I've had the opportunity to read quite a bit." At least if he passes it off as wealthy eccentricity, it might not be nerdish.
Serendipity grins. "You're prolly real unimpressed with the library here, yeah?" he asks, a touch wryly. "'s not a bad one, really, but. You looked at the books over at th' Farm? Or's this onea them?" He doesn't appear to care too much about the rich-father part. Of course, anyone who's seen Kal and been to a city in the past several years could probably have figured that tidbit out for himself, if not the love of books.
Kalisto regards Ren gravely as he informs him, "Hey, the library has a roof now." He sounds terribly, terribly impressed. Then he relaxes with a lazy, somewhat sleepy grin, and he trails his fingertips along the spine of the book on the table. "I borrowed this from the Farm. They've got some good books up there."
Serendipity laughs. "Yeah... that signs been there since I got here, at least. I gotta wonder what it was like in Wint b'fore they found one for it... They got a lotta good things at th' Farm. Books included."
Kalisto sighs, shaking his head. "This place..." He sounds somewhat disbelieving, but amused. "Yeah, but they've also got a lot of bad things at the Farm. Like work. Me, I'd rather just have a look at the books."
Serendipity grins, watching Kalisto. "Whatcha got against work?" he asks, "Or's it just certain kinds of work, or work other people say you hafta do?"
Kalisto rolls his eyes. "What do I have against work? Okay, first of all? It's work. Second of all, I don't get paid. So it's not even work. It's slave-labor. And I don't know how to do most of the stuff people are asking me to do, because I wasn't raised in Rural Hell. When I say my dad's a farmer, I mean he's the CEO of a company that does R&D for hydroponic units. I don't like getting my hands dirty."
"You're gettin' room and board, right?" Ren asks, casually. "'s what I've done mosta the work in my life for -- food an' a place t' sleep. Stuff's gotta get done, yeah? So you trade somea your effort into doin' it an' get back somea what other people's effort did." He shrugs. "It works, even if it mean's havin' t' do things you'd rather not be sometimes. Maybe if you asked 'round you could find somethin' you liked, though. Keep th' lovely hands clean." The last sentence is teasing, though friendly, and he touches the closer hand in illustration.
Kalisto frowns as he says, "Room and board? It's a prison cell. This whole town is a prison cell. I'm not here because I want to be. If old lady Smith booted me out the door, I couldn't care less. Just let me get my stuff, and it wouldn't matter." He sighs, simmering down a little as he's touched. "Sorry," he glums. "It's just frustrating. The only thing I get for working is the 'privilege' of getting to stay somewhere I never asked to be."
Serendipity leans over and slips an arm around Kalisto's shoulders, giving him a squeeze. "Well, mostly. I mean," he slips into a parody of a 'jolly father' sort of voice, "there's always the satisfaction of a job well done, eh, son?" He grins, letting it go. "...Given th' options you got, here's better. People here also respect you more'f you work. They warmed up t'me a lot after they realised I wasn't so lazy as they figured I'd be," he remarks, somewhat wryly. "But there oughta be somethin' you could do that you'd like doin' more'n -- what was it, gardening? ...wonder if maybe they could use someone in th' Library or somethin', y'know?"
Kalisto utters a mirthless laugh, but he leans into the arm around him, his tousled curls splaying over Ren's shoulder. "I don't care if people respect me," he says listlessly. "Besides, I do the dumb work. I just don't have to like it."
"You'd be happier if y'liked it," Ren replies, the arm relaxing into a close, affectionate drape. "An' if you were happier, you'd smile more. An' you're even lovelier when you smile." He grins again himself, a bit cheekily.
Kalisto smiles, as if unable to help it now that it's been mentioned. He lounges against Ren comfortably, not squeamish about the touching, and hey, he's even sober. "Liking stuff sucks," he grumbles, but his own self-deprecating tone hints at humor. "I dunno. It's not like anything I used to do. I'm not good at this hands-on stuff. I'm a conceptual person."
Serendipity counterlounges comfortably. "I'm mostly a hands-on kinda guy, myself," he replies with all innocence, "...though I do like plannin' things. Sometimes they turn out like I meant 'em to, even. But, y'know, get better at things by doin' 'em, yeah?"
Kalisto snorts a laugh and gives Ren a playful poke in the stomach. "Hands on. That's our pervedude. I don't know. I just do what the old woman tells me, and then when my own time is my own, I try to pass the hours doing something that doesn't suck. It's just that there isn't a lot in this town I -can- do that I enjoy. The stuff I used to do required, you know, living in civilization."
[...game called on account of zzzzz...]