Better Medicine - (Original, F)

[Garnet]

Hi, hello. Here is an excerpt from the modern fantasy AU I've posted about a few times, with the current victim being one of the lady witches. I've posted about her in previous stories, but for visual reference you can access Jen here and Abe here.

Enjoy??

---

 

She'd gotten the call a little past midnight, which was far from the most heinous hour her work alarm had gone off. Even so, there was a special kind of desperate frustration in knowing that the last fuzzy numbers she'd remembered before finally, finally succumbing to a hydrocodone-induced doze were something like 11:23 pm.

 

Goddammit.  

 

Despite that a deep, full-body ache protested every small tension of flinging off a sweat-damp blanket, Jen roused herself from the couch and staggered to her feet, ignoring the pang that resonated from the front of her skull to the back. She'd talked herself into this line of work months and months ago, and calling out wasn't exactly an option.  

 

Instead, she grappled for the burner phone that had already gone to voice mail, and thumbed back a groggy response to ply the powers that be.  

 

"k gimme 35-40. Might b a lil highh."

Sent 12:13 AM

 

The response came beeping through as she was unearthing her hoodie from the sloppy, deconstructed blanket fort she'd sort of half-assedly assembled on the sofa. She shrugged into it groggily, feeling woozy but present. Like a slight, surreal buzz that was covering up something too ugly to be really, fully mitigated. That seemed about right.

 

"Jesus. Need me to come get you?"

Sent 12:15 AM

 

"no. sit tigjt."

Sent 12:16 AM

 

"tight."

Sent 12:16 AM

 

It would be faster to just take the train there and back, rather than wait on her employer to make the commute. In the end, being on her feet and going through the motions of assembling her supplies brought some clarity to the coma she'd been threatening to slip into. By the time she'd run her disheveled hair back into a tight, tiny bob of a ponytail and slung a printed messenger bag around her shoulders, Jen could glance in the hall mirror and aaalmost not feel immediate revulsion for the wilted, hollow-eyed figure staring back at her.

 

But the night wasn't getting any younger, and she didn't have anyone to impress, so a few staggering minutes later, she was stepping off the stop at the corner and onto the late-night bus that would bring her into the underground, and the heart of the city.  

 

Typically, Jen was a little smarter about venturing out this late at night, a young human woman alone in a town full of monsters and unsavories. Not that she was entirely defenseless, but tonight she was definitely less reliant on magic and wits than she was the fact that nobody in their right mind would want to approach the slouched figure huddled into at least three layers of coats and a scarf, her complexion death shroud pale and nose scraped cherry-raw. They were better aposematic colors than her usual ones, in the form of bright violet hair and colorful tattoos.  

 

In the end, she might have dozed off or zoned out for a little while in the middle, but she still had her wallet and spell components when she jerked awake to change trains and later, eventually, emerge up from the station in East Central. Here was the most dangerous leg of the journey, but it was also one she knew well, and both a medication high and its subsequent tunnelvision kept her on a straight shot right for the garage, winter air burning into her lungs.

 

The wind stole tears from her eyes and brought some false color to her cheeks, but by the time she'd jammed her set of keys into the side door of the shop and stumbled into the office, the constant sting of just breathing had caught up with her. Slamming the door shut behind her, Jen didn't even bother to greet her surprised host, instead choosing to drop a shoulder against the doorframe and double over into a raised fist with a raucous bout of coughing that jagged at her throat like talons.

 

"Holy shit, Jen."

 

Blearily, she picked herself back up and blinked the film of tears away to regard her employer, seated at the cluttered desk with the forged papers spread out in front of him, and a narrow pair of reading frames perched on the bridge of his nose. In a better mood, she would have ribbed him for them thoroughly, but he flicked the glasses quickly into a fold in one palm, and was up on his feet before she could think of a good zinger.

 

"High on what?"

 

"Uhhh... prescription hycodan for the zombie virus whose ass I'm toootally kicking?" She replied woozily. She made a weak attempt to swat away the hand that reached out to steady her. "Huh-uh. N'do touchi'g," she croaked with a sniff, as her sinuses began to thaw. "I dod't deed you with a cold, you fuckig'k walki'g flambe thrower. Ugh. SNFFHH!"  

 

"Shut up," Abe sighed and ignored her advice, holding her shoulder anyway as she shrugged off her messenger bag with a soft rattle and shuffle of supplies, then untangled the outer shell of her scarf and top coat. "Why'd you come out, dumbass? You look like you already lost that zombie battle."

 

"Pah," she muttered, considered losing the hoodie as well, but ended up deciding to keep it despite the thin layer of sweat she could feel clammy on the back of her neck. "It's not pneumonia yet, and what's your alternative?"

 

Abe's tense, annoyed silence confirmed her suspicions. Finding a trusted magic user to scrape off factory-issued VIS's on stolen auto parts was no easy thing, and the longer they sat in the shop, the more danger of being tracked. Better to deal with a drippy witch than the threat of cops breathing down his neck.

 

"Are you even okay to do this, though? I mean, do it right?"

 

"Don't question m'by skills, bossman'd. SnFFH!. Ugh." She poked an accusatory finger at the centerpoint of his chest, then left it there as she closed her eyes and her world slowly swayed. Before she realized it, she'd slumped forward with her brow propped against his collarbone, face feeling stuffy and tight in his radiant heat. Rather than shove her off, Abe propped her a little closer and rubbed both of her shoulders, through the thick material of her sweatshirt. "I'b okay," she clarified, after a moment of finding her senses. "The m'bagic's easier thad the stad'ig upright, if that... snffh... if that makes sense."

 

"Yeah," Abe sighed. Though his magic was different from hers, more fire and lifeblood than spell and artifice, it was still deep, inherent. There was a common thread that she could pluck when she wanted to win him over. Either that, or he was taking pity on her miserable ass. Jen didn't really care which. "Okay, but just... take it easy."  

 

"Yeah yeah," she muttered, grimaced, then abruptly pushed herself away from him when the stinging from her throat gradually crept upwards, until she was whirling aside into a flurrying sneeze against one arm.

 

"HATSHH-shoo!"  

 

"Bless you."  

 

Jen waved him off, but pointedly grabbed a box of tissues from the desk and shouldered her bag of supplies. "Alrighd't. Snff! Show me what we're working with."  

 

Abe led the way out into the main garage, whose bay doors had been rolled shut and illumination limited to a few shop lights. They were pointed on a pick-up truck that had been disassembled into the sum of its parts. A Dodge, she guessed, looking over the chassis and body pieces leaned up against various work tables. Abe had already removed the electrical system down to its components, laid neatly out on one work station, and she guessed that the engine and transmission might have similar fates once she'd done her work. For now, they were intact save for the attachment and accessory parts he'd already scalped for a quick but cheap profit that would bear no identifying sigils.  

 

"Damn, you working by yourself tonight?" The careful organization and cataloguing of parts suggested it. Although Casey was fast, she'd watched him work and he was also a complete fucking disaster, dropping shit everywhere while Abe ran point salvaging some desperate kind of system from it all. She would have whistled low in appreciation, if her lips didn't feel so fucking dry and cracked by both the creeping respiratory ick, and winter in general. After this had passed, she was going to absolutely drown in lotion and hot baths, so help her.

 

"Yeah, Case split earlier. Something pressing, I didn't ask," he snorted, in an eye-rolling manner that suggested it hadn't been worth the argument trying to eek a few hours of work out of the capricious dullahan.  

 

"Where's it from'b?" Jen croaked, as she dropped her bag on a nearby workbench and began unpacking components: salt, ink, oils, bone and herb. Her mortar and pestle was a small, well-loved piece made from green onyx -- it got set aside with a soft and satisfying click.

 

"Out by Last Stand, so there's some wiggle room," Abe said, as he folded his arms and watched her set up for the initial sigil scrub. Some wiggle room, but doing this tonight was still better than tomorrow. "You need anything else? I'm gonna try and finish the paperwork."

 

"Nah," Jen sniffed, scrubbing her knuckles absent-mindedly under the sore glow of her nose. "Leave me to it, you'll know if you hear my de--hhh--hhh!" She hastily stepped back from her temporary altar, unwilling to disperse it with yet another inconvenient fucking sneeze. ".... HETDSHHH-oo!" Hot spray flashed against the back of the hand she'd curled towards her face, which was... disgusting, but survivable. She sniffled groggily, and didn't bother looking up at Abe. "... m'by death rattle."

“Will do,” Abe agreed, mercifully choosing not to comment upon her indiscretion. She mentally wrote him up for one or two incidental fires without chastisement, as future payback, then turned to her work as he retreated back into the office.

The working of spell components was one part learned and one part experimentation, as much rote as it was wild and in-the-moment improvisation. For all that Jen had practiced, she could reliably start by crushing together sea salt and Hawthorne ash, with a touch of oakmoss oil and a dash of dried strawberry. It was a recipe that she’d discovered herself through trial and error, working with junker cars in her high school neighbor’s backyard. Years of playing around with the proportions had refined it, depending upon the factory origin, but she knew the general Dodge recipe by heart. A thin splash of green ink created an ugly slurry that she scooped out by fingertip -- all important -- and worked into a paste on the countertop, uncaring if it picked up traces of motor oil as it went.

Slowly but surely, the gritty mash was pushed into a crude symbol, one she also knew by heart. Her fingertips felt surer by the stroke as she pushed it into place, and even despite the thick congestion and stinging weight behind her eyes, Jen began to find clarity in her work.

It was a simple and repetitive kind of hand task. Mix the cast, form the sigil, bind the spell, scrub it clean. Methodical. Her roommate embroidered -- lush, elaborate scenes wrought in colored thread, but she did it while zoning out to Sex and the City. Jen likened this to the same. Her hands were busy, but her slurry mind achieved a strange sort of peace as she scooped her salt mash back into the pestle, scratched it over the VIS of some big business sorcerer who’d earned accolades she neither dreamed of nor cared for, then scrubbed them out in several fingernail-scraped rakings. It was satisfying. Maybe even exhilarating. Sticking it to the man, in its most primal sense.  

Was it better medicine than mild narcotics, or maybe even sleep? Well… no, alright, maybe she wouldn’t go that far, but there was a certain meditative quality to the work anyway. Like this, it was easy to wile twenty minutes away, then thirty, then forty before she’d scrubbed out the bulk of the engine and frame’s stamped parts, and her dripping nose served her an ugly dose of reality.

“Ughk,” Jen muttered softly to herself, turning to wick an indelicate smear of wetness against her hoodie’s arm. With a thick sniffle, she shook flecks of green-dyed salt from her fingertips, and assigned herself a breather. A quick trip to one of the shop sinks and  stolen pump of Permatex rinsed most of the spell components from her hands, leaving only a faint tingle of magical energy in her fingertips and… ugh...

“--hdtssh- SHOO!” An awkward, muffled sneeze buried itself into the crumpled sleeve of her duly-abused sweatshirt, leaving the witch bent-forward and woozy as she recovered. Tissues were about as scant in a dirty, cold auto shop as she could have expected, and in the end she settled for a handful of the scratchy, rough paper towels sitting above the sink, grimacing as the sharp edges dragged on tender skin.

“Motherfucker,” she whispered hoarsely to herself, then jumped a little when she registered a shadow just above and behind her left shoulder. The reaction, in retrospect, was probably a little delayed. Abe looked as if he’d been there for a few seconds, head cocked in pitying amusement. “Wipe that fuckig’k look off your face,” she sniffed, and swiped again at her nose, this time choosing to mask the wince it wanted to engender. “I’b fide.”

“Uh-huh,” Abe drawled, not a bit convinced, and handed her a slightly chipped mug with a cow paint print on it. Somehow, she was a little disappointed to not also find it stamped with a cheeky grandma phrase, along the lines of Mondays Make Me Moo-dy. Or something.

“What’s this?”

“Tea, with honey. I think it’s Yunnan Something? I didn’t really look,” Abe admitted with a slight, not-very apologetic shrug as he tapped a pack of smokes against his hand. He drew out a thin white cigarette, then ambled off towards the back of the garage without further comment. Jen blinked, hands curling around crumpled paper towels and a warm mug, then hauled in a hasty sniffle and followed with enough caution not to tip the steeping brew over the edge.

Beside the rear bay, there was a small shop door that let out into the junk yard -- for when it wasn’t worth the noise and hassle of dealing with the roll-ups. Abe had shouldered it open, and left the door ajar in his wake, a silent welcome of Jen’s presence to join him out on the tiny cement patio as he leaned beside the building and lit his cigarette on a fingertip. Jen absent-mindedly kicked over an old wash bucket and perched herself onto it a little closer to the shop’s warmth and light, with the tea mug clasped between her hands.

“Thanks, boss.”

He waved her off and exhaled a silvery stream of smoke into the winter sky -- squinting up to seek stars, maybe, amongst the light pollution of the city.

“How’s it coming?”

Jen cleared her throat into a rough, pitted sound into her shoulder. Some girls sounded sexier, with a deeper voice, but she’d never counted herself as one of them, and it felt more like a growl when she answered: “Not so bad. Give it another half hour, hour maybe. Feels a bit…” She closed her eyes, absorbing the after-glow of the shop lights that stained into the backs of her lids, and swayed a little. “... good, but surreal.”

When she cracked her eyes again, Abe was looking at her sidelong, his gold irises bright despite the dimness.

“... that’s the meds, or you got a fever?”

Jen shrugged, smiling, and took a slow slurp of her tea. It wasn’t bad -- not quite steeped enough, for her tastes, but not oversweetened either. More importantly, the slick heat of it felt all kinds of good on her ruined throat. “Either, both?”

Abe sighed, with visible frustration. “C’mon, Jen, you gotta take care of yourself…”

At this, she had to laugh. Even in a tiny and incremental amount, however, it hurt. Hurt until her breath sputtered and she turned over into coughing, and Abe had forgotten most of his cigarette in a burnt-down cylinder of ash as he turned to stare at her.

“What?”

“Nothing!” She laughed, cleared her throat into the cup of her hand, and at last took a shuddering breath and another sip of tea. “It’s cute, that’s all. You can’t be everyone’s big brother, you know?”

That caught the ifrit off-guard for a minute, as his expression grew tense and gaze darted aside. “I’m not… I don’t--...”

“Hey, I’m not knocking it,” Jen chuckled, still a little hoarse, as she got up from her makeshift stool and ambled the few slow feet until she could pat his arm. Maybe it was a little bit patronizing, maybe, but she’d allow herself that in the moment. She was sick, goddammit. “But people are gonna do what they’re gonna do, you know? I’ve been taking care of myself since I could walk, human and all, and look!” She mimed a thump of her chest, if only because she suspected that an actual strike would invite another tear-spilling coughing fit. “Still here.”

Abe flustered a soft sigh, and stole an anxious pull of his smoke. “I know. Yeah, I get it. I just… worry.”

“Mmm-hmm,” Jen, the newly-minted therapist, hummed as she took another sip of tea and gazed off over the light-blurred silhouette of the junkyard.

“I just,” Abe started, a bit to her surprise. Although she knew that his gruff exterior hid a softer center, she wasn’t accustomed to him being particularly emotionally available to her. “I don’t want to set anyone up for -- well.” He sighed, the exhale a mingled stream of the cigarette and his own smoke, before gesturing behind him. “Shitty schedules, bad health. Coming out at midnight for this bullshit. I’ve been trying to get out of it for a while.”

Jen blinked again, this time more slowly still. Sniffed, and set her tea carefully aside on the abandoned bucket. “Of the resale?”

“It’s a chop shop, Jen. Call it what it is.”

Her hands went up in idle surrender. “Okay, okay. Look, I’m not in the -- snff! -- the best moral place to judge.” She sniffed thoughtfully, again, and gazed out over the junkyard. To ask why was nearly useless, and besides. Was she his fucking therapist? No. Abe might try to look out for everyone, but Jen looked out for Jen. She cleared her throat.

“I’m… guessing in this scenario, though, you wouldn’t have use for a sigil witch,” she commented, with an air of absent-mindedness, but brows knit behind the curtain. Her work at East Central was pretty damned good paying, under the table for an exclusive service. She wouldn’t begrudge Abe for trying to get his life right, but damn if she wouldn’t have to make some of her own arrangements in turn.

Abe shook his head hastily. “Nah, that’s… I mean maybe, no? I don’t wanna cut anyone’s hours, though, I can keep you on as a mechanic.”

Jen fetched up her tea again for a slow, pensive swallow. “Better witch than I am a mechanic.” Not to say that she had no skills, or even few, but if Abe had called her in on a cold-drunk midnight run to disassemble a car rather than to scrape its sigils clean, it might have gone a little differently.

The ifrit just snorted, however, and dropped the last third of his cigarette to the cement below, scrubbed out beneath a boot toe. “First of all, bullshit. I dunno much about magic, but you’re at least as good a mechanic as all that. Second, you’re family whether you want me to brother you or not,” he scoffed, and slung an arm over her shoulders. Jen crippled slightly under the weight, with a grunt and a slosh of her tea.  “I’m not letting anyone go. I… haven’t even really talked about it, even with Casey.”

Ahhh. Jen shrugged his arm off, gave him a light punch in the ribs, then shook some of the spilled tea out of her sleeve. Not the worst of the humors it had absorbed tonight. “I gotcha. Elephant in the room, huh?”

“Yeah.”

Jen let the contemplative quiet afterwards hold for a few seconds, and might have done further. However, the minor rough-housing and cold air had doubled up against her wilting, sensitive sinuses, and it was only inevitable that she finally drew a breath to sneeze, scrambling to distance herself from Abe as she did so..

“--ADTSH’shoo!” Harsh, but relieving, even if it was chased by another snivelling inhale and tears that smudged her shattered mascara further to shit. “--akshss--SHOO!”

The ache lingered on afterwards, as she massaged her throat and chest with a dull wheeze. “Shit.”

“Bless you,” Abe frowned, in person and in tone. “... you okay?”

Groaning softly, Jen nodded, but clutched her half-depleted Yunnan Cow tea close to her chest as she shrunk back towards the door. Even with multiple layers still in place, it was fucking cold out, and she wasn’t interested in cuddling the resident ifrit intimately enough to counteract that.

“Just gonna fin’d-- snff!] … finish up, then put my ass to bed.”

“Okay,” Abe agreed, following her slowly with his eyes, nearly to an unnerving degree, until she’d set her tea aside on a workbench and immersed herself back in the immediate call-and-response of manufactured magic.

Jen waited until he’d finished his smoke and adjourned back to the shop office before she shook out a private breath. Fuck, how was she going to pay her tithes now? She could always pick up a third job, she reasoned lamely to herself. Secondhand, boardwalk enchantery where tourists paid out the nose for the cheap sort of magic that they wouldn’t know real from genuine if their lives depended on it. She’d oft had a knack for divination -- was there any aspect of ley cartography that this city might still employ? Maybe a different auto shop, who still embraced the VIS-negating business, and needed--...

Ugh.

She couldn’t fuss about it now. Instead, she ground her mortar and pestle down into a repetitive, satisfying click and moil. In the moment, it was easier to put her mind to the work, and drive through that final push that stained her palms green but left the component parts of a four-year-old Dodge truck shiny and clean. No evidence of who might have lifted it, and from where.

Another brief handwash later, and she was stumbling back into the office, sniffling and wiping her eyes.

“I think we’re good, boss. Double-check me, obvs, but I just gotta look up the train schedule,” she sighed, as she plopped down into one of the molded plastic chairs designed for waiting clients.

Abe peered at her. “I will, but get upstairs.”

Jen looked up, hazy. “Huh?”

“You’re crashing on my couch.”

A reflexive laugh bubbled up in her chest, straying dangerously close to the urge to pitch over into another ugly fit.

“Am I?”

Abe arched his brows. “Text Heather to take Tank out, and then get your ass upstairs and go cuddle Bee. I’m not above bridal-carrying you.”

Sniffling, Jen swabbed her eyes again. It didn’t sound like the worst solution, by far. “Fine, fine, but Mik better not bitch to me when you get this,” she warned, as she thumbed off a series of alerts to her roommate, and gathered herself groggily to her feet.

“He won’t.”

Without much further thought spared to that, Jen found her clumsy way out of the officer and up the stairwell into the second-floor apartment, already unlocked. Although not strictly familiar, since she’d visited a few times, it was with old habit that she crouched to accept the resident Italian greyhound’s barking herald.

“Hiiii Bee, who’s a good girl? Yes you are, yes you are!”

After stealing a beer from the fridge, she scooped the frantic rat-dog up and carried her to the couch. Past experiences told Jen that it could unfurl into a pull-out bed, but her energy was waning by the moment. Instead, she let Bee down, shrugged off her sweatshirt, and stole off the knit blanket from the back of the sofa.

She was still staring blearily into space, working up the energy to turn on the TV, when Abe finally adjourned into the kitchen.

“Need anything?” He prompted, as Bee gave her fingertips a last desperate lick before careening headlong into her owner’s affections. He bent, scrubbing her neck fondly, but with gaze focused on Jen.

“Like,” she coughed, “An endless supply of tissues, an’d maybe some -- snff! -- som’be Netflix,” she complained softly, feeling petty.

“Done and done,” Abe agreed, and mostly delivered. He uncovered a box of Kleenex from who-knew-where, which Jen found a bit funny, because wasn’t he genetically inclined to set said box on fire for its intended purpose? In the end, however, she didn’t complain, and especially not when her boss-friend-surrogate-brother plopped down beside her on the cushions between her bent legs. Bee squirming between his thighs, he navigated Netflix to the Horror subcategory.

“You wanna watch Creep 2?”

Jen sniffed, and cuddled down inside her blanket. “You know I do.”

“Cool.”

Third jobs and financial worries be damned, Jen thought hazily to herself as she pillowed herself on one of the couch cushions. If every employer could put her to bed with shitty horror movies, she’d be happy.

One way or another, in sickness or in health, she’d work it out.

 

 

Edited February 1, 2018 by Garblin

[meepsy]

WOW SO MY KRYPTONITE OKAY.

omg omg, Garnet, you did this on purpose. You know i am such a diehard sucker for anything Abe, and that I have a giant super mega crush on Jen also. So to put them together, with Jen suffering in, umm... the literal best possible way, and Abe at his ''lemme fix' best is really just very unfair, omg. I was late to work today because of this, and it's totally fine, I don't even care. This is was worth it. Omg. 

I am going hard on this one, just so you know. Prepare yourself.

13 hours ago, Garblin said:

Despite that a deep, full-body ache protested every small tension of flinging off a sweat-damp blanket, Jen roused herself from the couch and staggered to her feet, ignoring the pang that resonated from the front of her skull to the back.

Jesus omg right out of the gate with this flipping deathblow, huh? Wow, my favorite sort of scenario, tied up in a collection of very nicely worded details and discriptions. I am so weak already, aghh.

(trying to not quote every single sentence here)... I love seeing the contrast also between Jen's actual reality and the 'nbd' flippancy of her text back also. Smol, tuff, snarky characters are such a weakness of mine, and she hits p much all of my buttons in that respect, so this is... veery good. <3

13 hours ago, Garblin said:

She shrugged into it groggily, feeling woozy but present. Like a slight, surreal buzz that was covering up something too ugly to be really, fully mitigated.

Had to quote that one, bc wow. What a mood. That sort of 'suck it up, power through' feeling is so nice, and your wording of it gave me shivers.  

13 hours ago, Garblin said:

but tonight she was definitely less reliant on magic and wits than she was the fact that nobody in their right mind would want to approach the slouched figure huddled into at least three layers of coats and a scarf, her complexion death shroud pale and nose scraped cherry-raw. They were better aposematic colors than her usual ones, in the form of bright violet hair and colorful tattoos.  

Agggh with this. Omg. All of those words are like dripping Jen, jesus. Such a good description and intro into physical appearance, and so fuckin hot also, omg. Unfair, like I said.

14 hours ago, Garblin said:

Jen didn't even bother to greet her surprised host, instead choosing to drop a shoulder against the doorframe and double over into a raised fist with a raucous bout of coughing that jagged at her throat like talons.

Aggggghhhhhhhh. Bury me. Wow.  Just push all my buttons, I don't have to be a functional person or anything. 'Goo forever' is apparently a fate i have to accept now, cool. 

14 hours ago, Garblin said:

and a narrow pair of reading frames perched on the bridge of his nose. In a better mood, she would have ribbed him for them thoroughly, but he flicked the glasses quickly into a fold in one palm, and was up on his feet before she could think of a good zinger.

THE READING GLASSES OMG. I can't. (I definitely can give me all of the tough guy secret reading glasses Abe, please and thank you very much) and the Jen is too out of it to come up with the proper sass to mark the occasion is so telling in it's own wonderful way. Ahhh omggg, I will die happy and take this image with me to the grave <3

14 hours ago, Garblin said:

"Huh-uh. N'do touchi'g," she croaked with a sniff, as her sinuses began to thaw. "I dod't deed you with a cold, you fuckig'k walki'g flambe thrower. Ugh. SNFFHH!"  

wow. wow. Jesus. Nailing me in my coffin veeery fucking fast, just so you know. 

14 hours ago, Garblin said:

Before she realized it, she'd slumped forward with her brow propped against his collarbone, face feeling stuffy and tight in his radiant heat. Rather than shove her off, Abe propped her a little closer and rubbed both of her shoulders, through the thick material of her sweatshirt. "I'b okay," she clarified, after a moment of finding her senses. "The m'bagic's easier thad the stad'ig upright, if that... snffh... if that makes sense."

Jesuuuuus. This is so good I could honestly cry. Abe just fucking... all calm and caring body contact, and Jen's melt from tough shit to "ok let me level with you" is like... hhhvnkjnh <3<3 <3. So many hearts. Infinite hearts. Aghfbdjkdv

Abe's resigned sighing gives me life, and also...

14 hours ago, Garblin said:

 

"HATSHH-shoo!"  

 

"Bless you."  

 

Jen waved him off, but pointedly grabbed a box of tissues from the desk and shouldered her bag of supplies. "Alrighd't. Snff! Show me what we're working with."  

Umm. Wow. Good sound. Sick sound. Very NSFW, and kind of just not helping my 'absolutely cannot handle anything about this' situation at all, thank you.

... I am not even half-way through, so I'm going to cut myself off here and do a part 2, so that i can continue my ravings without this comment getting more ridiculously out of control than it already is. This is what Jen and Abe together do to me, I told you. (Never stop, give it to me forever i will drown in it honestly.)

<3

[meepsy]

OKAY PART TWO HERE WE GO SORRY FOR SPAMMING I HAVE NO CHILL.

...onto car stuff, my new-found love, as it is tied up very close with Abe stuff. <33

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

"Damn, you working by yourself tonight?" The careful organization and cataloguing of parts suggested it. Although Casey was fast, she'd watched him work and he was also a complete fucking disaster, dropping shit everywhere while Abe ran point salvaging some desperate kind of system from it all.

Aggh <3 I love so much the contrast of Abe's 'tough greaser mechanic' image with his need to keep everything neat and organized. It does things to me that i cannot write into actual words, but they are very good things, believe me >u>;  Also i love that Casey is a disaster in comparison. Of course <33

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

she dropped her bag on a nearby workbench and began unpacking components: salt, ink, oils, bone and herb. Her mortar and pestle was a small, well-loved piece made from green onyx -- it got set aside with a soft and satisfying click.

OMGG WITCH STUFF. Feed it to me. I love magicky details so so much, aaahhh, they are like catnip to me. Her special onyx morter and pestle in particular i am very happy/enamoured with <3<3

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

The working of spell components was one part learned and one part experimentation, as much rote as it was wild and in-the-moment improvisation. For all that Jen had practiced, she could reliably start by crushing together sea salt and Hawthorne ash, with a touch of oakmoss oil and a dash of dried strawberry

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

A thin splash of green ink created an ugly slurry that she scooped out by fingertip -- all important -- and worked into a paste on the countertop, uncaring if it picked up traces of motor oil as it went.

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

Slowly but surely, the gritty mash was pushed into a crude symbol, one she also knew by heart.

 

Wooow, omg, I seriously am in love with all the details of this. So cool and captivating, like an extra treat on top of a thing that already feels very indulgent and tuned to my tastes.  The crushed green paste is very visceral in a very cool way. I love I love. <3

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

her slurry mind achieved a strange sort of peace as she scooped her salt mash back into the pestle, scratched it over the VIS of some big business sorcerer who’d earned accolades she neither dreamed of nor cared for, then scrubbed them out in several fingernail-scraped rakings. It was satisfying. Maybe even exhilarating. Sticking it to the man, in its most primal sense.  

This is very nice, also. Another good, more intimate slice of Jen that tugs at my heartstrings in a special way <333

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

leaving only a faint tingle of magical energy in her fingertips and… ugh...

“--hdtssh- SHOO!” An awkward, muffled sneeze buried itself into the crumpled sleeve of her duly-abused sweatshirt, leaving the witch bent-forward and woozy as she recovered. Tissues were about as scant in a dirty, cold auto shop as she could have expected, and in the end she settled for a handful of the scratchy, rough paper towels sitting above the sink, grimacing as the sharp edges dragged on tender skin.

Wow, god, this whole flipping thing. I am doing a very bad job of not quoting this whole thing, but you are making it very, very difficult. I cannot tell you how hot this is. You have to know, but if you don't... ahnbgb. It's like perfect storm of button-pushing rn. Jen is very good, so good, and this collection of words and, uh.... spellings is extremely fucking lethal, let me just say. 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“Tea, with honey. I think it’s Yunnan Something? I didn’t really look,” Abe admitted with a slight, not-very apologetic shrug as he tapped a pack of smokes against his hand.

Of course Abe has tea <3 And of course the mug has a cow on it. I love that he's all nonchalant about it, trying to save face for both of them <3<3<3

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

Abe sighed, with visible frustration. “C’mon, Jen, you gotta take care of yourself…”

At this, she had to laugh. Even in a tiny and incremental amount, however, it hurt. Hurt until her breath sputtered and she turned over into coughing, and Abe had forgotten most of his cigarette in a burnt-down cylinder of ash as he turned to stare at her.

“What?”

“Nothing!” She laughed, cleared her throat into the cup of her hand, and at last took a shuddering breath and another sip of tea. “It’s cute, that’s all. You can’t be everyone’s big brother, you know?”

Ommmggg, be still my heart. So cute, i cannot deal. I love so much Abe's embarrassed attempt at an "I'm not" defense also, that he can't even finish because he's totally guilty. Ahhhhh, omgomg. Arrow to the heart for real. <33

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

Abe flustered a soft sigh, and stole an anxious pull of his smoke. “I know. Yeah, I get it. I just… worry.”

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

I just,” Abe started, a bit to her surprise. Although she knew that his gruff exterior hid a softer center, she wasn’t accustomed to him being particularly emotionally available to her. “I don’t want to set anyone up for -- well.” He sighed, the exhale a mingled stream of the cigarette and his own smoke, before gesturing behind him. “Shitty schedules, bad health. Coming out at midnight for this bullshit. I’ve been trying to get out of it for a while.”

Abrvnkekjbkh, agh, agh X___X You really know the quickest way to murder me. Secret guilty anxieties spilling out, and feeling like everything is on his shoulders... Aghhh, I love this worrying fire boy so much it is honestly unreal. 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

The ifrit just snorted, however, and dropped the last third of his cigarette to the cement below, scrubbed out beneath a boot toe. “First of all, bullshit. I dunno much about magic, but you’re at least as good a mechanic as all that. Second, you’re family whether you want me to brother you or not,” he scoffed, and slung an arm over her shoulders. Jen crippled slightly under the weight, with a grunt and a slosh of her tea.

aaaahhhhhhhhh  How dare you with this?? Omggg

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“--ADTSH’shoo!” Harsh, but relieving, even if it was chased by another snivelling inhale and tears that smudged her shattered mascara further to shit. “--akshss--SHOO!”

The ache lingered on afterwards, as she massaged her throat and chest with a dull wheeze. “Shit.”

“Bless you,” Abe frowned, in person and in tone. “... you okay?”

Ommgg, I literally am quoting p much sentence to sentence now, but i cannot even contain myself. I can just fucking feel Jen's defeat crumple, wow. And Abe absolutely failing at not hovering and being protective. So perfect, omg, what amazing thing did I do to deserve these words written down for me to read any time I want?? Aggh, I cannot.

I love Jen's immediate secret worries that start welling up also. A struggle between autonomy and loyalty that feels very real, and makes me lover her all the more. <33

Homestretch now, so gonna keep goin even though this one got ridiculous also...

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

Abe peered at her. “I will, but get upstairs.”

Ahhh, Abe <333 Must fix, always. I was so happy to read this sentence, honestly. There was an actual !!!! light up response of excitement in my brain when I realized this fic wasn't coming to a close quite yet, bc honestly this is my favorite shit. Only squeals and hearts-over-head melting from here on honestly, as if I haven't been doing that already...

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“You’re crashing on my couch.”

A reflexive laugh bubbled up in her chest, straying dangerously close to the urge to pitch over into another ugly fit.

“Am I?”

Abe arched his brows. “Text Heather to take Tank out, and then get your ass upstairs and go cuddle Bee. I’m not above bridal-carrying you.”

So firm, I love it 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“Fine, fine, but Mik better not bitch to me when you get this,” she warned, as she thumbed off a series of alerts to her roommate, and gathered herself groggily to her feet.

“He won’t.”

No, he definitely won't, haha! 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

After stealing a beer from the fridge, she scooped the frantic rat-dog up and carried her to the couch. Past experiences told Jen that it could unfurl into a pull-out bed, but her energy was waning by the moment. Instead, she let Bee down, shrugged off her sweatshirt, and stole off the knit blanket from the back of the sofa.

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“Need anything?” He prompted, as Bee gave her fingertips a last desperate lick before careening headlong into her owner’s affections. He bent, scrubbing her neck fondly, but with gaze focused on Jen.

 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“Like,” she coughed, “An endless supply of tissues, an’d maybe some -- snff! -- som’be Netflix,” she complained softly, feeling petty.

Wow, ummmm... all of this. Wow. My kryptonite, for real. Abe's 'what do you need?' presence and Jen's trying-to-play-it-off surrender is like....fhvhjbj. If i could be more coherent than that i definitely fucking would, but agghh... omg. I cant, I am goo. 

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

In the end, however, she didn’t complain, and especially not when her boss-friend-surrogate-brother plopped down beside her on the cushions between her bent legs. Bee squirming between his thighs, he navigated Netflix to the Horror subcategory.

16 hours ago, Garblin said:

“You wanna watch Creep 2?”

Jen sniffed, and cuddled down inside her blanket. “You know I do.”

“Cool.”

Omgg, the best, nicest note to leave it on,too. <33333 There is literally nothing that could make this fic better. It is perfect, and i love it so much, and will read it probably a million more times omg.

Wow, I went super overboard I know, but like, I kind of needed to. This is the literal best, and i died too many times to count. I don't know how you do what you do, making amazing characters that i go head over heels for, and writing scenes that encapsulate so vividly so many good complex feelings and imagery, but plz dont ever stop. 

--alright, meepsy out 

[March Hare]

BUT YES MEEPSY TRUTH SICK SOUND GOOD.

Your writing will always, always, DO IT for me. The tone. The vocab. The tough-as-nails-and-true characters.

FOREVER.

[mysterysneeze]

First, wow the comments already said are awesome to read ^^ I do not want to repeat what is already said, but I still wanted to comment and say that the story you wrote has a flare of its own.

The style and characters themselves are believeable and genuine. The banter they have is relatable and fun to see happen. Characters are more important than sneezes to me, and this story has awesome characters! 

I like how the world itself has so many possibilities. It is obvious you care about details on what the abilities are. It was very funny to hear Jen call Abe a walking flamethrower. Jen herself in your drawing you showed at the beginning has a very cool design. Both drawings have great lines and detail to them. 

The sneezes themselves were sweet to read. I like the spelling choices you did with Jen's releases. 

Thank you for taking time to show what you write! I enjoyed reading the story. 

Also, 2 side notes. In a world of magic abilities, it seems as if Netflix is still a dominant force XD I liked reading that little detail near the end! The second thing...I enjoyed reading the cameo of Bee. That dog if I remember right is someone I remember from recent and long ago past things here on the forum ^^

[AngelEyes]

I love this universe and characters. Your writing is as always brilliant!

[Dusty15]

Eeeh! This is SO FUN and the writing is incredible, as always! What great characters too! You always have such imaginitive and awesome worlds and characters, but I particularly loved this one!

[RiversD]

Hey Garnet, I have no idea how I missed this one, but I love it. I love the characters so freaking much I can't even explain. I love suffering-and-slightly-high Jen. I love big-brotherly concerned Abe. I love is awkwardness when she kinda calls him on it. I love every piece of their story I can get my grubby little paws on, I love Jen's sneeze sounds, and I love love love Abe's slightly awkward attempts to take care of her since she's clearly not looking out for her own best interests here.

All that, plus everything Meepsy said with bells on. You da best.