What these eyes don't see...

[rumour]

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WELL HELL. If she knew that Ever had worked out she was blind already, she would have cursed herself, and then beat him up. Or something. Being blind was not something Rumour liked to broadcast – hell if only a handful of people even knew. It was not something she let define herself, and if anything people took her somewhat weird actions as a part of her, without ever putting two and two together and coming up trumps like he had. Still, for now she didn’t realise, so that was really neither here nor there.

Brushing off the back of her jeans, Rumours sensitive fingers didn’t stop until she was sure there was no more grass on her butt, or twigs sticking the hem of her cardigan. She was still scowling, mostly because her side ached now than for anything else, and it was quickly putting her into a rotten mood. Being defensive and sarcastic was who she was, it stopped people getting to know her, or asking too many questions that she didn’t really want to answer – but she didn’t often descend into the realm of bitchy. Not like him apparently.

”Twinkies and ho-ho’s my ass. Like i’d eat that crap”She grumbled, turning her back on him and mostly ignoring his comments on the size of her thighs. Truth be told, though she hadn’t seen her reflection, herself, in over seven years, had no idea how she had evolved on from the pimply, gangly teenager she had been, she knew she wasn’t fat, and the words rolled off her like water from a ducks back. However that clichéd expression went.

Still, despite herself she felt bad for being bitchy, rather than just sarcastic, and couldn’t help but turn around and at least say thanks. ”Hey. My thunder thighs thank you. I didn’t fancy breaking my legs today.... so yeh. Thanks. ” With that she let him go, turning back to the tree. She had no idea which way the path was, having no idea as such where she had started off climbing, given that she had gone around the circumference of the tree at least once in her procession upwards. Still. her hat couldn’t be far.

Using the trunk as a guide, she followed the branches that weren’t too high with her fingers until she found the one with her woollen beanie on it, and tugged it free.

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Header by the luffly Drake

*Wearing

[Ever Goodman]

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Ever really hadn’t been expecting the apology. Truth be told he was quickly getting over feeling bad for leaving a blind woman in the thick of the woods considering she’d gotten there on her own, and since the whole ‘Twinkies and Ho-Hos’ comment he was starting to get real hungry.
Anyway, the woman seemed like the type that didn’t like accepting help from people, and honestly, he couldn’t really blame her. He didn’t know how extreme her malady was but he suspected that her attitude came from the fact that people were always taking her for a weakling. Maybe all that coddling got on her nerves. Maybe she was constantly trying to prove to folks that she was just as capable as everyone else.

Maybe he was completely wrong about her. Ever wasn’t exactly the best judge of character. He watched people and saw things, but mostly he would take a picture and move along, later on looking back at said photo and developing his own story for them.
It wasn’t completely pathetic. For a man that had no story of his own (at least one that he could remember) the chronicle gave him some sort of place in the word. As the storyteller…or least the illustrator of the fable.

Casting a glance over his shoulder at the woman after the repentance had fallen off her lips, Ever’s mouth quirked up at the corner. His gaze caught her crystalline one briefly, but he quickly shifted it to one side, at the colored place just underneath her eye. Just as soon as the apology had escaped, the girl turned around, leaving the man’s dark chocolate gaze. The young man watched her fingers dance over the woody bark of the tree, and without even thinking, he grasped the camera hung around his neck and snapped a photo of it.

“They’re not bad, really. The thighs, I mean.” He said vaguely, dropping his attention to the camera and adjusting some setting that really didn’t need adjusting before letting it rest against his chest again. He cleared his throat and shifted his weight from one foot to the other and then lifted a hand to rub absently at the back of his neck. Damn. He needed another smoke. This was all kinds of awkward.

“Anyway, I’m not sure how to get back out of here. You think I can just follow you?” Ever’s voice came from no where, and he shifted again, and then took a few steps toward her and let his fingers pursue the same path that hers had moments before. He blinked, and let his eyes find hers again, but they were unfocused and seemed to stare right through him. He found he could actually look at her when he spoke, which was something he didn’t do with most people. Their eyes always…lied. Hers were a blank page.
Funny, in her opalescent blues, he could see his reflection as if looking at a photograph. Ever didn’t have any pictures of himself in the book. It shook him a little; a slight electric jolt in the center of his chest. The tremor passed just as soon as it had stunned him, and he shook his head and let it go.

He blinked and cleared his throat again and his face fell to the bulge at his pocket where the pack of smokes lived. “If you were gonna’ leave anytime soon, I mean. I’m gonna’ get something to eat. I’m starving. Maybe I’ll get a twinkie.”

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[rumour]

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TWISTING her chocolate locks with her hand, she curled her hair into a bun, trapping it beneath the grey wool as she pulled the beanie once more onto her head. The action briefly revealed the butterfly that flew behind her ear and down her neck, leaving a trail that crossed her inked skin, before it vanished beneath the woollen cap. She’d had the tattoo since she was sixteen – it had been one of the last things she had ever seen before losing her sight to an ill mannered father with an empty bottle of jack and sometimes she found her fingers tracing the pattern absently.

She was a little surprised then to find that this other man had not yet left, that he was indeed not only still there, but by the sound of the grass was coming towards her. When he stopped just in front of her no less, Rumour took an involuntary step backwards, an action she might normally have been able quell had her recent circumstances not been what they where. Sure, she may have been in his lap not all that long ago, but she had fallen there – it was not the result of him coming up to her.

She ‘looked’ at him, tilting her head up slightly. She had no idea how tall this man was, but she was not exactly tall herself – often the slight tilt of her head was necessary to give people the impression she was looking at them. ”I can’t stop you following me.”She commented, pushing her hands into the pockets of her cardigan. ”If you wanna eat, eat. I’m not stopping you. But i’m going to head home, yeh.”

Taking a step, Rumour passed him and headed down the slope – luckily for her this was not so much a hill as it was a rise, and given that she had walked up the slope to reach the tree, she knew she was at least heading in the right direction. After a few paces, Rumour retracted a hand from her pocket to hold her side for a second, rubbing her fingers over the material, soothing the ache there.

He’d be waking up soon; if she wasn’t home to nurse his hangover before he became lucid, she could expect far worse than a black eye from Devlin Everley. ”Keep up. I’m not coming back for you – you can pick some other poor schmuck to follow like a puppy if you can’t ”

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Header by the luffly Drake

*Wearing

[Ever Goodman]

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And…she was back. Ever snorted quietly and rolled his eyes as the ghost of that snarky disposition came back to haunt him. It didn’t really bother him all that much, really. The man lived by the cheesy adage ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’ , and her little attitude was just that; smallish.
An easy-going smile was on his face that moment before she shoved her hands into her pockets and trudged past him, and in that transitory instant Ever had the time to let his black coffee colored eyes act like a camera; absorbing all the details of her face. They lingered at the discoloration around her eye, and he could make out the faint outline of a clenched fist there. Though he hadn’t been ‘out in the world’ for very long since waking up in and then leaving the hospital without a memory or clue who he was, but he’d been in a number of fist fights and he knew that kind of black eye. He’d gotten mugged a few times, gotten into it at some dive over a pool game, and landed in a really good bar brawl that had erupted over him snapping a picture of a woman just before her meathead of a boyfriend showed up.

Smart ass mouth or not, this fragile but plucky woman didn’t look right with the shiner, and Ever wondered who in the world would hit a blind woman anyway.

Pulling the pack of cigarettes out again Ever let the woman get ahead of him a ways before he lit the thing and started after her. His eyes danced all around, taking mental photos of things that other people wouldn’t notice right away. A shaft of light through the trees that landed like a halo around a patch of white daisies. A chipmunk…or some kind of little furry thing nomming on a nut. A drop of crystalline moisture clung from a vibrant green leaf.
Before long the dark haired male had his camera up to his face and was snapping away.

Like a magnet, the lens drifted ahead, lingering on the slight figure of the girl leading the charge. Using the camera as an extension of his eyes, he followed the path of the pale hand she had brought out of her sweater to rub at her side. Ever scowled, wondering if she had been hurt by the fall after all.

Feeling a little more like a voyeur than normal since she couldn’t actually see him watching, Ever let the camera fall back to his chest and dragged his tongue across his bottom lip before putting the nearly burnt out cigarette between them.
He scoffed at her next lovely demand, picking up his pace enough to catch up with her, but hanging back just a little. He kept a safe distance in case she felt froggy enough to pull those claw out at him.

He laughed quietly at her comparing him to some kind of heel sniffing puppy. At least she’d chosen a creature that was easy to tolerate. Ever smirked at the fleeting thought. Like this girl could tolerate anyone. Or vice versa. And didn’t dogs chase cats around anyway? The mental image made the young man chuckle quietly to himself again, and he hurried up enough to finally join her side; his shoulder brushed hers slightly before he put a little space between them, once again, wary of the claws.

“You got a hot date or something Miss. Kitty?” Ever asked with a sarcastic grin, his eyebrows lofted in expectation. “You’re in an awfully big hurry all of a sudden.”
His tone lost some its dripping derision when his gaze fell to the hand at her side again.
“You okay? How’d you get that shiner? You make a habit of climbing up and then falling out of trees?”


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[rumour]

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AND THERE HE WAS. She had guessed of course, given that he had asked that he would indeed follow, though she no intention of either slowing or turning to see what was keeping him behind her – not that she could do the latter of course, but sometimes she liked to keep up the pretence that she still had her sight, that she could see far more than the vague fuzzy outlines of coloured objects, it threw a lot of people off, kept them from guessing, as they always did eventually, that she was in fact blind. Hell, she’d managed to keep her mother from guessing for nearly a year; though that had more to do with their lack of actual contact than any deviousness on Rumours part.

She could smell the smoke as he lit up behind her and Rumour felt the familiar itch in the back of her throat that indicated that actually, she would quite like one too. Ignoring it for now, until she could get back to her room and crawl out onto the roof and dig her packet from the flowerpot she kept out there, rumour concentrated on her footsteps and waited for the change in texture beneath her shoes that indicated she was back on the path rather than the slope, and not for the first time she was glad that the path followed a circular route through the park, and if she somehow managed to end up going the wrong way, ultimately she’d end up where she wanted to be.

The long haired brunette jumped when she felt a shoulder brush against hers, stepping to the side involuntarily at the unwelcome contact and very nearly tripping over her own feet. She had heard him quicken his face to catch up, but hadn’t realised how close he was going to come to her, and as such hadn’t been prepared it. Still, she caught herself and simply altered her course to her new bearings now he was beside her. Dropping her hand from her side, she shoved it back into the pockets of her cardigan, scowling.

”Do you always make a habit out of asking complete strangers half a dozen questions before their name?” she fired back, turning her head to ‘look’ at him as they walked. ”Yeah. Hot date. With my attendants. They only let me out of the home for an hour a day, and i’m already at forty five minutes...”

When he mentioned the bruise Rumour found her hand lifting from her cardigan to her face, her fingertips softly skimming the discoloured skin even as one of the many excuses she had come up with over the years rolled from her tongue like butter from a hot spoon. ”This? Fell out with the neighbours two year old. He wanted to play action man, i was insistent on my little pony. Serves me right.”

There, that was what she was looking for. Rumours leg jarred a little as her feet left the grass and hit the concrete of the path and she faltered, lifting her other leg little higher than what was really needed to miss the small curb that defined the two from each other. Pausing, her ears picked up the sound of traffic in the distance and she turned towards it, regaining her original pace in a heartbeat.

”what about you? You enjoy sneaking up on women in trees?”

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Header by the luffly Drake

*Wearing

[Ever Goodman]

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Ever couldn’t help but smirk at the feisty girl as he matched her quickened pace, and a little amused chuckle escaped his parted lips following her blunt inquiry as to his concern. She was full of all kinds of spunky (and obviously sarcastic) retorts that had his russet eyes dancing with enjoyment as his laugh became louder, and he shook his head, deciding to play with her just like she was with him.

“Actually, yeah…but they’re usually laid down on a couch.” He remarked with a playful smile, coming up with an alter-ego for himself like he did often, for too curious strangers. “I’m a trained psychologist you see. Dr. Goodman. You can call me Ever, though...or, Doctor Ever, if you want.”
The young man snorted, arching a dark chocolate eyebrow at her and pretending to give her a closer look. “Wait…so -you- are the escaped patient, huh? They told me if I found you, you’d give me some lame excuse about being let out. I’ve got a syringe in my pocket for you. They said you should be considered very dangerous…”

He was still chuckling, quite happy that he turned the young woman’s defensive humor around on her, but the smile fell and the laughter lit eyes darkened when they followed the path of her alabaster hand to her face; fingertips lingering on the contusions marring her pale skin. The excuse she gave would have made Ever chuckle had it not been obvious that the bruise was made by a much bigger hand than one belonging to a child, but he didn’t press, completely understanding the need to keep some things to yourself. Things that weren’t met for strangers to know.

Such was the case with his own unique circumstance.
People often wondered about him. Some even got curious enough to ask, but he never came out and admitted he had no idea who he was or what had landed him in the hospital he’d awakened in nearly a month and a half ago. There was always some better story to feed them; the narrative of his exciting life as a deep sea diver or an international spy.
He’d been a traveling insurance salesman; the personal photographer to a big shot model, a man running from the law on murder charges…
Each story he’d detailed meticulously; filling the lives of each personally with things that he longed for. Memorable moments. Memories, period.

Ever scoffed when she accused him of sneaking, and he pulled the smoke from his lips with an exaggerated flick of his wrist to shake the ashes, as they made the transition from grass to paved path. “I wasn’t sneaking.” He informed her and took another pull from the cigarette before dropping it beneath his boot. “I was out there taking pictures…of nature.” He explained and lifted the camera he had hung around his neck, letting it drop with a satisfying thump against his chest. “I do that on the side. Gotta’ do something to distract me from all the nuts I deal with…” Ever laughed a little. “I got a pretty good one of you, ya’ know. Definitely one for the book.”


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[rumour]

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”A PSYCHOLOGIST HUH?” Rumour asked, turning her head slightly and maintaining the facade that she was looking at him more out of habit than because she felt any need to play it up for this stranger. Apparently called Ever Goodman. Now if that wasn’t a fake name, or at least the sign of parents feeling as evil as her own, she didn’t know what was. ”So you’re telling me these patients come in and get drilled by your questions before you even know their names? How do you know whose who? How do you know a hobo hasn’t walked in off the street ‘cus he was feeling a little lonely, and isn’t actually paying for your services? There are many hole’s appearing in your story Dr. Goodman. Wanna try again?” She smirked.

Now, Rumour wasn’t pushing for the truth or anything of the sort; why after all would she expect such a thing when she herself had a tendency to feed people one bullshit line after the other? But if he was going to lie to her, he was going to have to come up with better material than that. Not saying that hers was any better – she had told one girl she’d gotten into a fight with a kangaroo- but that’s not to say she didn’t enjoy the challenge of trying to make such nonsense seem real.

Still, she let out a short, humourless laugh at his joke that didn’t quite manage to tilt her lips all the way, but certainly had a go. ”Dangerous? Well hell. I do feel flattered. Grrr” Rumour smirked, skipping a step slightly as she spoke which resulted in her taking a half step ahead of him. Flexing her fingers a little inside the depths of her cardigan, they curled for a moment around the pen sized steel rod that she was supposed to use when out on her own, but most often times refused to. Blinking, she let the pen go, letting it weigh down her pocket and instead withdrew her hands from their woolly confines and hooked her thumbs in the pocket of her jeans. Biting down on the head of her piercing, Rumour drummed a tune on her thigh with her fingers briefly before arching her brows at his words.

”You were taking pictures of me? For a book? Voyeur much? What are you, a stalker? Is that why you’re following me? Wanna know where i live? I’ll save you the trouble. 341 west street, it’s not far from here. My boyfriend or my dad catch you out there, and they’ll rip your balls off.” She winked, well aware that she was yet to give him her name, and quite happy to waylay that little bit of information for the time being. She did not make a habit of giving her name out to random men, even those who saved her from falling out of trees.

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Header by the luffly Drake

*Wearing

[Ever Goodman]

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Ever winced, lifting a hand to rub absently at the back of his neck and wishing he’d paid more attention to the details in his little ‘story’. He usually spun his web of lies with such amazing detail people couldn’t pick them apart but -usually- people didn’t sit there and try to dissect them. He’d gotten lazy with her, damn it. He was loosing his touch.
Still he did notice a little twitch at the corner of her lip which was contagious, turning his upward as well. It was the playful growl out of her that really did him in though, and Ever let out an audible laugh that lit his chocolate eyes up with golden flecks; the color of the mid day sun streaming through the trees.
“Just call me Ever.”
He told her around the laugh, not willing to make up another story just so she could play emergency room doctor on it.

When the woman bounced a little Ever instinctually reached out for her, but she righted herself before his hand made contact with her arm and it dangled out for a moment at an awkward position before lifting to run through his usually tousled russet hair. It was much longer on top than the back and was now sticking up at sharp angles, but the careless young man didn’t really care. He knew he needed a hair cut but who had the money for that? He’d much rather have foods in his stomach and smokes to puff on and sometimes a beer or two. Construction didn’t pay all that much, really.

He was playing with the camera again, sometimes snapping pictures and sometimes just watching through the lens when Rumour teased him about being a stalker and then threatened to sick some seriously violent men on him if he didn’t give up the habit. Ever’s smile was cocky when let the camera come away from his face, a dark brow lofted in amusement. “Are you kidding? I already knew where you live. By the way your new bedroom furniture needs to be rearranged. It doesn’t flow with feng shui. I can feel the bad ju-ju all over you.” He scoffed dramatically and then laughed a little and his hand fell instinctually to the junk in his jeans.

“I think I’d rather keep my balls, lady. I’ll just stalk your next door neighbor instead. You know she’s having a go with the mail man? It’s like watching porn in real life.” Of course he was joking and maybe a little bit too forward for a guy that had just met this girl, but Ever was guileless sometimes. He hadn’t formed a high standard for etiquette yet.

Pushing his hand into the pocket of his jeans Ever lengthened his stride, as she had gotten up ahead of him again. What was this girl? A race walker?
“You never told me your name.. Should I just call you Miss. Kitty then? I will. I’m that type of guy. The type of guy that might not even bother to call you -that- I’ll just mew when I see you instead.” He was smirking, being obnoxious, but it was only because he had quickly figured out this girl’s humor. She liked it dry. No olives.

“Is that where you’re going in such a hurry? To see that boyfriend?” He was wondering out loud, a habit of his. He was curious, sure. He really was getting hungry and Chinese food was tastier with company. Or so he imagined.



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[rumour]

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RUMOUR SMIRKED, the kind of smile that, if her eyes could ever truly give away what she was thinking, feeling, the emotions that lay deep in her breast, they would be lit up with triumphant at her success in ripping apart his little story about being a psychologist. ”Ever it is. Considering that you just gave up on the psychologist thing, but kept the name? Yeah, i’m gonna believe that it’s actually your name, and you’re parents were feeling as evil as mine that day.”

Reaching the park gates, Rumour paused, caught halfway between the peace of the park and the noise of the road. She knew where she would much rather stay, but at the same time she knew exactly where she was going to have to be soon – back home, to see if her father was coping with his hangover, or even to see if he had already left, disappeared off to another work day, would be home that might for dinner and acting as though the bruise on her face did not exist ; would simply comment on the meal, before watching TV.

Turning part way towards home, she snapped her fingers. ”damn... I knew the couch was a bad idea, but i just had to listen to the guy in Ikea. Hell, maybe that’s what caused me to fall out with the neighbour after all? And the mail man? Really? You know her bedroom wall is mine too, i just knew that was not her husband!” Smirking still, Rumour lifted her hands back to her pockets. ”Rumour. My names Rumour. And n’aaw. Tom’s a marine. He’s not back for another four months. I need to get home to feed the cat.” Or clean vomit of the bathroom floor. You never knew.

Sometimes, she loved her ability to make up complete nonsense on the spot. Who the hell was this tom guy? She had no idea, but in her head he definitely had a tattoo. And possibly dark hair with blue eyes, though she hadn’t decided yet. He could just as easily be blonde.

”Right. We’re at the road. I need to go this way, and the closest place you can get food lies in that direction.” She pointed the opposite way to what she was heading, and took a couple of steps backwards. ”It’s a burger place i think. Though the Mexican that’s way too. Depends what you feel like. Chinese is this way, so’s the Indian.”

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Header by the luffly Drake

*Wearing