drown the urge for permanence and certainty; crouch down and scrawl my name with yours in wet cement

[herotypical]

Who: lists_to_port & slaying
What: carpentry; catharsis; cutting a deal
When: october 17th; noon onwards
Where: house seven
Summary: buffy wants to build something for jilly's return. buffy also wants to borrow a boat.
Rating: clean enough to start but it's these two so don't be surprised if the rating climbs a couple hundred tags in.

Today looked just a little bit brighter. Not by much, granted. But enough to make a difference and enough to sweeten the sense of industry that was unfolding her backyard. The heat helped; the day was warmed than the ones before it and strangely warm for a late October afternoon. Buffy had quickly given in to summer's last hurrah and was hoarding her last chance to wear shorts before autumn established its firmer grip on the month and on the village. Misery and grief were very, very slowly opening up to allow silver linings and miniature blessings. And one such something was working just a few feet away from her. Not quite so silver, though, and she suspected his lip would curl if she referred to him as miniature anything. Buffy worked the plane across her chosen soon-to-be-planks of wood and she watched Jack Sparrow from the corner of her eye. Perhaps a tarnished, coated kind of silver that resisted polish like two too similar poles on a magnet. Blessing was a harder one to pin down. The word seemed as though it should be anathema to a rough-reptuationed pirate. But then again? In a number of ways, Buffy knew that Jack was less rough than she was.

The afternoon's project was a simple porch swing and it was a little bit of home improvement to impress Jilly with once she returned. And it was a way to keep busy while they waited for her while they waited out their grief. Keeping busy, she found, helped her focus. The work tricked her now and then into smiling when she hadn't intended to. Silly little mistakes would take place -- fumbling with a tool or trying very hard (without much success) to remember carpentry terms once taught to her by Xander Harris -- and somehow these mistakes weren't discouraging. They were comedic. They were okay. And Buffy knew that none of it would be possible had she been left at the house alone, this week.

So she worked diligently at Sparrow's side and took moments now and then to appreciate his work ethic before it inspired her to press forward with her own. And she soon had another plank smoothed and sanded. Buffy pushed it aside and sat back with her palms crushing into the grass that was just a little too long. It wasn't as though the place was crawling with lawn-mowers, after all.

"What colour, Jack?" She asked as she blew a fine stream of breath up and across her brow. Fluttering bangs and clearing her vision. "We should paint it. It should be painted. What colour?"

Comments

[herotypical]

"Cursed?" She guessed and looked up from the book to the pirate. Maybe cursed. Maybe not. But all Buffy really knew was that she would have to learn how to break into this book. Or perhaps talk to Jilly upon her return.

Jack Sparrow wasn't the only one with a bad case of the curiosities. Buffy wanted to know what was on page one hundred and twelve.

1/2

[all7seas]

"Nah, not cursed. Not..."

Captain Kairavi Prasad of the Terrier is this day sentenced to death for crimes deemed rogue and unsavory according to the Code of the Brethren; let no pirate give her shelter or aid, but by the strength of our Court her life shall be ended and so say all of us.

He knew it by heart, really, for all Jack protested against ever looking at page 112.

"So say all of us..."

2/2

[all7seas]

"I vote, Annie--I vote we go do something much more better! Outdoors, eh? Beautiful out! Sunny! Warm! Winter and frozenness will soon be upon us and I for one want to frolick in the open air!"

[herotypical]

Here was an impressively shrewd look from a woman who spent most of her conversational hours being just flippant enough to possibly come across as not shrewd at all. It wasn't a secret that she was clever and investigative -- it wasn't something she tried, intentionally, to hide. But she did make it rather easy to forget right up until moments like this where her eyes snapped tight to a target and she seemed to be re-measuring and re-evaluating.

There was something very interesting on that page and Buffy vowed right here and right now to find that something interesting out. Her vow was silent and only to herself and it might take a little while and some careful application of what Jack had already taught her in order to get what she wanted but she would get it, she decided.

But for now...? Well, her concern melted away and Buffy hopped down from her awkward kneeling position on the library chair.

"Frolicking it is, then. Ever play frisbee?"

[all7seas]

"No! Does it sting?"

And Jack shut and locked the book that represented so much of his personal history as well as the code, law, and lore of his kind.

[herotypical]

"Only when you're playing with me."

[all7seas]

"Right. Will I survive?" With a great deal of effort, Jack lifted the heavy book once more and staggered slightly under its weight, but only for a moment. It had to be replaced under the table, with several innocuous-looking items placed on top of it to keep it somewhat hidden.

[herotypical]

"Maybe. Depends on how quick of a study you are in the arts of ultimate frisbee."

Buffy was rather obliging at this point and helped by tossing a few smaller, clutter-inducing books on top of the larger one.

[all7seas]

"Sounds almost date-like, really." He looked at her and smiled as all that history was reduced to an ordinary-looking pile of books. "Shall we?"

[herotypical]

"There are...rules. Involved. You'll have to follow them. One of those rules is that you're not allowed to throw the frisbee at an unethically high height just so less-than-tall players can't even jump to reach it. It's pretty much the most important rule of the whole game and breaking it means instant losing."

Buffy chucked a final finishing touch of a book onto the heap and dragged Jack towards the exit.

[all7seas]

And Jack Sparrow was a man who was very happy to be dragged.

"Unethically high, eh? Have I mentioned I'm a pirate, Annie?" Then another thought occurred to him. "Can Slayers not jump remarkably high?"

They had the super strength, after all. Why not flea-like jumping abilities?

[herotypical]

"...I can jump higher than you'd think but not as high as you'd throw a frisbee in order to cheat." A non-answer for an answer. Buffy had leaped her way over school gates and fences, before. But it was always easier when you had something to jump over rather than jump at. And she was better at jumping distance than at height.

[all7seas]

Talking about jumping with Buffy Summers while knowing what he knew about her was always a ticklish thing with Jack Sparrow. But he strode gamely on beside her, tucking her arm in his once more.

"What if, Annie," he suggested, "we play on the same team for once. Hmm?"

[herotypical]

"...Same team?"

She took the time to consider such an offer. "Where's the competition? The strategy? The winning? I mean -- I guess we could just throw easy, catchable throws. But..."

A glance. "Fine. Same team." Although she fully expected it to devolve into something different.

[all7seas]

And it very likely would because her competitiveness and his so often clashed, and because he so very often enjoyed winding her up. But today there was a lot on Jack's mind, between missing Jilly and missing McCoy and resurrected-and-put-back-to-sleep ghosts of his past.

"I suppose I could just throw you high into the air to catch the worst of them?"

[herotypical]

"...Okay. We're really going to be starting at square one with this frisbee lesson, aren't we? It's like playing catch, Jack. But with a...disc. A plastic disc."

[all7seas]

"Sounds highly exciting. I throw this disc to you, and you to me, and back again?"

[herotypical]

"...It sounds dull when you put it like that. You're missing out on all the running and jumping and diving and miraculous last-minute saves."

[all7seas]

"Sounds positively heroical. What would I be saving you from, though?"

[herotypical]

"...You? Saving me? More like me saving the frisbee from getting past me. After you throw it."

[all7seas]

"Ah. Buffy? I'm going to slaughter you at this."

....don't let me tag on my phone while drunk ever again, saralinda.

[herotypical]

"You think? Cause I'm pretty sure I'm the more athletically inclined. Super strength. Amazing, super aim? Easy."

GOTCHA. XD

[all7seas]

"Erm---are we forgetting that Captain Jack Sparrow is also athletically inclinated? Hmm?"

[herotypical]

"...But you? You were never on a cheerleading squad."

Her pace was quick. Ignited. Excited. So much was riding on the fun-ness of this frisbee game.

[all7seas]

"Fair enough." And it was, even though he had no idea what cheerleading had to do with frisbee. He'd rather thought, from her description of it, that it was something different entirely.

"Where is this plastic disc I'm meant to trounce you with?"