dani-bo-bany!

it's daddy's vase.

i didn't mean'ta! honest! i was just practicin' yesterday like he said'ta and i was tryna balance some moonlight off of this big mirror we got, 'n it was workin'! but then i thought, well i don't actually know how to let go safely so i thought maybe, uh, i could just do it real fast and easy like!

.. so i did it fast and easy like, and it bounced. hit daddy's vase.

you didn’t mean to, huh? I’ve heard that one before. I get it, though, practice can make things go a little… sideways. Trust me, I’ve accidentally turned more than a few things into frogs during my early days.

But it’s alright sweetheart, magic isn’t always as obedient as we’d like it to be. Be careful next time alright? We can’t all afford another vase casualty.

i really need'ta replace it. almost everythin' in daddy's house is magic, but i mean, it could just be a vase. could. sometimes we go antiquing together 'n he likes to pick out old stuff. usually i tell 'em the color and stuff.

i really didn't mean to. i was just tryna get better with m'moonlight. i mean, i did what the book told me! i just. didn't know how'ta make it stop. i'm a self taught sortuv learner.

Hey, it’s okay. Accidents happen, especially when you’re learning something new, magic included. I can help you fix it. But next time, maybe double-check the spell, okay?

How about this, I’ll make you a duplicate. It won’t be exactly the same, but it’ll be close enough, and no one will ever know the difference. Your dad will be none the wiser.

Y're a life saver, thank you. Daddy loves his antiques— he'd have a fit if anythin' in particular happened to 'em. Loves his paintin's too, likes to have 'em described.

Just thought.. you know, glue or a mental illusion of a vase wouldn't be enough. So uh, I figured askin' was a good bet.

it's daddy's vase.

i didn't mean'ta! honest! i was just practicin' yesterday like he said'ta and i was tryna balance some moonlight off of this big mirror we got, 'n it was workin'! but then i thought, well i don't actually know how to let go safely so i thought maybe, uh, i could just do it real fast and easy like!

.. so i did it fast and easy like, and it bounced. hit daddy's vase.

you didn’t mean to, huh? I’ve heard that one before. I get it, though, practice can make things go a little… sideways. Trust me, I’ve accidentally turned more than a few things into frogs during my early days.

But it’s alright sweetheart, magic isn’t always as obedient as we’d like it to be. Be careful next time alright? We can’t all afford another vase casualty.

i really need'ta replace it. almost everythin' in daddy's house is magic, but i mean, it could just be a vase. could. sometimes we go antiquing together 'n he likes to pick out old stuff. usually i tell 'em the color and stuff.

i really didn't mean to. i was just tryna get better with m'moonlight. i mean, i did what the book told me! i just. didn't know how'ta make it stop. i'm a self taught sortuv learner.

it's daddy's vase.

i didn't mean'ta! honest! i was just practicin' yesterday like he said'ta and i was tryna balance some moonlight off of this big mirror we got, 'n it was workin'! but then i thought, well i don't actually know how to let go safely so i thought maybe, uh, i could just do it real fast and easy like!

.. so i did it fast and easy like, and it bounced. hit daddy's vase.

⭑: this awesome special starter goes out to @jillconstantinw

some liked to think; a little girl raised in a cult, how terribly and awfully evil!

and they'd be partially right. maybe with a little more biased notion, but they were mostly at the point. it was innately selfish and awful of e to raise danica in such an environment. how disgusting it was, and how she knew it was terrible, keeping such a secret from her own friend. but nobody would ever understand it, really. e was all she had. if looking past his wrongdoings was what she needed to do in order to have some semblence of normality, then.. well, she'd do it, as guilty as it made her.

“motion in the ocean— ooo waaaaah—”

nothing could make her so guilty, however, to not invite jill to dinner for.. maybe the sixth or seventh time (danica herself had lost count on how much she'd said no). only, this time her father delightfully insisted that she come over. it surprised her! only slightly. she had been talking about her over the past week, about her personality, about her funny accent. e had said something among the lines of, well why don't you invite her for dinner then? and danica nearly jumped over the table to give him a hug.

“his air hose broke! ooooo waaaaah!”

she'd never been to gotham. e had; e had been plenty of times. he'd brought danica back a couple of trinkets, like music boxes. one time he'd come home with a lovely one still in ripe condition, shaped like an egg. it opened to a delightful ballerina, who spun upon being wound and danced to the nutcracker's dance of the sugar plum fairy. other than that, danica wasn't so sure how.. impressed she was with the place.

it was dank. dark, and sad, and gloomy, and completely disgusting. she wrinkled her nose at the off smell of vinegar and salt.. must've been close, then. all the while, she wondered what she and jill would talk about. it was sort of like her first sleepover— maybe jill could sleep over! that'd be just wonderful. she was sure her father wouldn't mind as long as they didn't make too much noise. they could play parcheesi. they could talk about magic. they could.. well, danica hadn't quite thought that far.

hey! speaking of parcheesi, guess what she had tucked under her arm, ready to pop out and show to jill before they gracefully retired to her bedroom on a whim. danica squinted amidst fog— a boat! on land! just some boat. must've been jill's. danica couldn't exactly think of another person that would live like that. jill was.. a different sort of special. (homeless, for anyone wondering.)

“ji—i—i—ll!”

she was sing-songy in saying jill's name, just as she was with most people when the sort of excitement of new dinner guests happened. danica squinted a little harder.. so much fog, so much gloom. she could've very easily magicked something to make it lighter.. maybe could've even made the fog disappear! but she didn't. that would've been showing off. danica didn't do that.

“jill? it's dani! you'll never guess what've got with me!”

jill had… agreed. it was, without any doubt, the largest blow to her ego since lucifer. but… if was a nice notion, the idea of it all. dani wasn’t bad, despite her attitude jill knew dani was respectable enough to deserve her tolerance. and so, everntually, jill granted it.

she hadn’t had gone to another’s house in some time, not a friends house. jill wasn’t sure why she felt… happy. happy that maybe she had made a real friend. normalcy settling pleasantly in her life, for once.

the anxiety awful. she had begun to get ready immediately after accepting the invite, there only being so much she could do to make herself presentable. homeless living in a boat, the girl had begun to allow herself, hair, clothing, hygiene, to deteriorate. at the ring of an invitation by a maybe, someday possible, friend- she had done her best to clean up.

climbing out from the trunk house of the rotting, green, Downeaster was the worst part. embarrassment burning her ears and cheeks. the boat in a pathetic state, hardly staying upright on the vessels boat stands.

“oi! i can hear y’ just fine!” jill grabs a bag, grimoire having found a home in the polyester backpack, before climbing down a steep metallic ladder to where her… maybe… hopefully…. friend stands on the gravel. she crosses her arms.

“stop the fucking screaming or y’ begging for attention.” she grumbles. eying the box under her arm.

“and thats…?”

“it's parcheesi!”

the classic game of race, chase, and capture; royal edition. danica held it out to her with a big smile on her face. the box was old, having rips and tears in a couple of places. it spoke volumes about the fact that danica was a consistent player, and she probably won on more than one occasion. she showed it off proudly, like it was some wonderful award. it wasn't. it was just parcheesi.

“y'gotta be the first player t'get all yer four pawns into the center. m'a natural at it. daddy taught me how to play.”

she tucked it safe and sound back under her arm, giving it a hearty pat. unfortunately, jill was nowhere near as enthusiastic and fun as her other friends, who (even though they disliked parcheesi and probably would've preferred uno) gladly played with her when the time permitted. thankfully, danica was nothing if not prepared.

without another word, she hooked her arm with jill's. a little bit of a breach, she knew, but it'd be just for a quick second. she cleared her throat.

“relinquimus!”

it might as well have been a magicians act. the puff of smoke, the funny after smell of sulfur as the scenery changed from gotham's sad borders to the room of a teenage girl. an overcrowded room, at that; danica's room. a room with intensely purple walls and trinkets in every corner. shelves of books, and piles of diaries on a desk pushed over in the corner. her bed was unmade with highlighters, and pens scattered all over the sheets. she unhooked herself and kept a distance. about five feet for jill's own comfort.

danica set the board down on her bed, right on top of her many colored pens and highlighters. she was embarrassed, only slightly. her father would've had a cow if he didn't give her any privacy. too much privacy, which generally left her room a mess.

“sorry. i meant'ta clean, i promise,”

she raised her hands. books floated into their empty places on the shelves. fake (or, for all anyone knew, real) skulls tucked themselves in a neat line on her bedside table. a yellow-ish board came her way, stopping only shy of her face. she grabbed it.

“if you don't like parcheesi,”

she turned it around, showing it proudly once more to jill like a kid showing off their terrible drawing they made in class.

“i got ouija!”

for a second jill tenses as she’s grabbed and tugged through space. a familiar feeling with this sort of magic (in her experience)waves over her, although thankfully the experience is brief.

the discomfort of the arm hooked around her own quickly relinquishing as jill stands, slightly nauseous, in what appears to be a bedroom. purple walls, decent decor. a bitter feeling of pure jealously rushes through the blond girl, mixing and dancing with the magic induced nasea as she rubs the spot on her arm where she had been grabbed.

“oi bit of a fucking warning next time, or maybe y’ just real into the whole shock value thing now, yeah?”

jill stares at the bed, shifting her arms uncomfortably. is this what normal friends did? show each other their rooms and board games? did normal friends usually invite each other over for dinner and parcheesi? she figured they would. normal friends didn’t feel jealous of how effortlessly the books easily floated into place, or how pretty the glitter pens littering the bed were, or how warm the room is

the taller of the two clears her throat uncomfortably. stepping forward and with a feigned type of confidence grabbing the ouija board.

“y’know these things are fake.”

she mocks while turning over the board… but not putting it down, not *abandoning* the idea.

she hesitates before deciding to sit on the bed, shifting and pressing her hands into the duvet. as she takes off her backpack the girl remains vigilant of her crowded surroundings, where her elbows fly and what looks fragile enough to risk destroying. afraid to break anything in this nice… real… room. ouija board in her lap. she grabs a colored pen off of the bed and fidgets with it, uncapping and capping the pen.

“if y’ *really* wanna, i’m sure we can summon some ‘ghost of false advertisement’ t’ really sell the point home.” she nods at the ouija board, a small eye roll accompanying the action.

“y’know, in the spirit of good capitalism.”

“it's real!”

not that danica didn't believe in the obvious; that ouija boards were made to capitalize off paranoid schizophrenics and more, but she did like to think hers worked. maybe she was the paranoid schizophrenic.. who knew, really? danica nabbed the planchet off of her desk.

“i didn't just buy it from nowhere. found it at one of 'em antique shops daddy likes. thought it would make fer good conversation with my friends.”

because everyone else was just jazzed to play parcheesi.

“'nyway.. we should play! since parcheesi isn't yer style. unless y'wanna play somethin' like sorry or uno or go fish.. i got lotsa options.”

lots of options indeed. most of ehcih belonged to e, who assumed board games and what not would probably assist danica in making friends outside of home, if her rather social personality didn't help her in some categories. she sat down, making the bed squeak and slightly bounce along with her enthusiasm.

“s'all up'ta you! 'cause yer the house guest.”

which might've been more than enough southern hospitality for one person to take. oddly, being a house guest usually meant sitting about and being awkward. for danica, it meant hello, it's your turn to make the choices, because this is your house too now.

jill looks more than surprised and more than overwhelmed at the enthusiasm.

being a house guest is… new. at least for her. hanging out with friends and wasting time on some probably stupid game… is new. new and overwhelming. especially for jill, who found herself actually caring about not messing this up.

caring about being nice, and pleasant, and picking a good game that her new friend (maybe, hopefully) would like.

“uh. right. suppose.. ouija wouldn’t be the worst.” she eventually grumbles, tossing the pen she had been fidgeting with off to the side and leaning back in what she hoped was a casual, cool, manner. ears red from the anxiety of it all.

“‘least it’d be more bearable than fucking parcheesi.”

the blond passes the board in her lap to danica, grumbling all the while.

“parcheesi ain't so bad.”

of course, somebody who probably came out of the womb with a parcheesi box set would say that. danica sprawled on her stomach, balancing the planchet between the board and her index finger.

“y'know, 've never used one of these inside my own home. just my friends, and sometimes in the middle of the woods..”

surely, of course, there were ghosts in a magical house like mister e's. maybe they followed him around, taunting him about what all he'd done. and maybe he simply turned a blind eye like normal, pretending he knew nothing of them; pretending he couldn't hear them as much as he could see them.

“m'sure there'll be an answer, though. always is when i use it— hey, maybe there'll be some sortuv spooky thing haunting you—”

danica took a pen, waving it slightly in front of jill's face.

“oooooo, spooooooky, jill. spooooooky.”

danica giggled. maybe she did have the humor of a five year old— who really knew? she crawled her way upward beside jill, on top of all of her pillows and blankets in disarray. she sat up again, knees to her chest, chin resting. all the while, she had an extremely stupid smile on her face.

“y'ever smile?”

she titled her head, batting her lashes in an almost comically innocent way.

“just askin'. don't think've ever seen you do it.”

࣪. 𖤐 : moira info post.

please be mindful, this blog contains mentions of : a little too much yearning, fourth wall breaking, and a deep love for the carpenters.

I think I broke a vase trying ta'reflect moonlight. Daddy's gonna have a cow. 😞

a cow? what's that?

y'know, like, he'll have a fit about it. 'nless i replace the thing. but it could be super old or oneuva kind, and i don't know how i'll just fix it.

⭑: this awesome special starter goes out to @jillconstantinw

some liked to think; a little girl raised in a cult, how terribly and awfully evil!

and they'd be partially right. maybe with a little more biased notion, but they were mostly at the point. it was innately selfish and awful of e to raise danica in such an environment. how disgusting it was, and how she knew it was terrible, keeping such a secret from her own friend. but nobody would ever understand it, really. e was all she had. if looking past his wrongdoings was what she needed to do in order to have some semblence of normality, then.. well, she'd do it, as guilty as it made her.

“motion in the ocean— ooo waaaaah—”

nothing could make her so guilty, however, to not invite jill to dinner for.. maybe the sixth or seventh time (danica herself had lost count on how much she'd said no). only, this time her father delightfully insisted that she come over. it surprised her! only slightly. she had been talking about her over the past week, about her personality, about her funny accent. e had said something among the lines of, well why don't you invite her for dinner then? and danica nearly jumped over the table to give him a hug.

“his air hose broke! ooooo waaaaah!”

she'd never been to gotham. e had; e had been plenty of times. he'd brought danica back a couple of trinkets, like music boxes. one time he'd come home with a lovely one still in ripe condition, shaped like an egg. it opened to a delightful ballerina, who spun upon being wound and danced to the nutcracker's dance of the sugar plum fairy. other than that, danica wasn't so sure how.. impressed she was with the place.

it was dank. dark, and sad, and gloomy, and completely disgusting. she wrinkled her nose at the off smell of vinegar and salt.. must've been close, then. all the while, she wondered what she and jill would talk about. it was sort of like her first sleepover— maybe jill could sleep over! that'd be just wonderful. she was sure her father wouldn't mind as long as they didn't make too much noise. they could play parcheesi. they could talk about magic. they could.. well, danica hadn't quite thought that far.

hey! speaking of parcheesi, guess what she had tucked under her arm, ready to pop out and show to jill before they gracefully retired to her bedroom on a whim. danica squinted amidst fog— a boat! on land! just some boat. must've been jill's. danica couldn't exactly think of another person that would live like that. jill was.. a different sort of special. (homeless, for anyone wondering.)

“ji—i—i—ll!”

she was sing-songy in saying jill's name, just as she was with most people when the sort of excitement of new dinner guests happened. danica squinted a little harder.. so much fog, so much gloom. she could've very easily magicked something to make it lighter.. maybe could've even made the fog disappear! but she didn't. that would've been showing off. danica didn't do that.

“jill? it's dani! you'll never guess what've got with me!”

jill had… agreed. it was, without any doubt, the largest blow to her ego since lucifer. but… if was a nice notion, the idea of it all. dani wasn’t bad, despite her attitude jill knew dani was respectable enough to deserve her tolerance. and so, everntually, jill granted it.

she hadn’t had gone to another’s house in some time, not a friends house. jill wasn’t sure why she felt… happy. happy that maybe she had made a real friend. normalcy settling pleasantly in her life, for once.

the anxiety awful. she had begun to get ready immediately after accepting the invite, there only being so much she could do to make herself presentable. homeless living in a boat, the girl had begun to allow herself, hair, clothing, hygiene, to deteriorate. at the ring of an invitation by a maybe, someday possible, friend- she had done her best to clean up.

climbing out from the trunk house of the rotting, green, Downeaster was the worst part. embarrassment burning her ears and cheeks. the boat in a pathetic state, hardly staying upright on the vessels boat stands.

“oi! i can hear y’ just fine!” jill grabs a bag, grimoire having found a home in the polyester backpack, before climbing down a steep metallic ladder to where her… maybe… hopefully…. friend stands on the gravel. she crosses her arms.

“stop the fucking screaming or y’ begging for attention.” she grumbles. eying the box under her arm.

“and thats…?”

“it's parcheesi!”

the classic game of race, chase, and capture; royal edition. danica held it out to her with a big smile on her face. the box was old, having rips and tears in a couple of places. it spoke volumes about the fact that danica was a consistent player, and she probably won on more than one occasion. she showed it off proudly, like it was some wonderful award. it wasn't. it was just parcheesi.

“y'gotta be the first player t'get all yer four pawns into the center. m'a natural at it. daddy taught me how to play.”

she tucked it safe and sound back under her arm, giving it a hearty pat. unfortunately, jill was nowhere near as enthusiastic and fun as her other friends, who (even though they disliked parcheesi and probably would've preferred uno) gladly played with her when the time permitted. thankfully, danica was nothing if not prepared.

without another word, she hooked her arm with jill's. a little bit of a breach, she knew, but it'd be just for a quick second. she cleared her throat.

“relinquimus!”

it might as well have been a magicians act. the puff of smoke, the funny after smell of sulfur as the scenery changed from gotham's sad borders to the room of a teenage girl. an overcrowded room, at that; danica's room. a room with intensely purple walls and trinkets in every corner. shelves of books, and piles of diaries on a desk pushed over in the corner. her bed was unmade with highlighters, and pens scattered all over the sheets. she unhooked herself and kept a distance. about five feet for jill's own comfort.

danica set the board down on her bed, right on top of her many colored pens and highlighters. she was embarrassed, only slightly. her father would've had a cow if he didn't give her any privacy. too much privacy, which generally left her room a mess.

“sorry. i meant'ta clean, i promise,”

she raised her hands. books floated into their empty places on the shelves. fake (or, for all anyone knew, real) skulls tucked themselves in a neat line on her bedside table. a yellow-ish board came her way, stopping only shy of her face. she grabbed it.

“if you don't like parcheesi,”

she turned it around, showing it proudly once more to jill like a kid showing off their terrible drawing they made in class.

“i got ouija!”

for a second jill tenses as she’s grabbed and tugged through space. a familiar feeling with this sort of magic (in her experience)waves over her, although thankfully the experience is brief.

the discomfort of the arm hooked around her own quickly relinquishing as jill stands, slightly nauseous, in what appears to be a bedroom. purple walls, decent decor. a bitter feeling of pure jealously rushes through the blond girl, mixing and dancing with the magic induced nasea as she rubs the spot on her arm where she had been grabbed.

“oi bit of a fucking warning next time, or maybe y’ just real into the whole shock value thing now, yeah?”

jill stares at the bed, shifting her arms uncomfortably. is this what normal friends did? show each other their rooms and board games? did normal friends usually invite each other over for dinner and parcheesi? she figured they would. normal friends didn’t feel jealous of how effortlessly the books easily floated into place, or how pretty the glitter pens littering the bed were, or how warm the room is

the taller of the two clears her throat uncomfortably. stepping forward and with a feigned type of confidence grabbing the ouija board.

“y’know these things are fake.”

she mocks while turning over the board… but not putting it down, not *abandoning* the idea.

she hesitates before deciding to sit on the bed, shifting and pressing her hands into the duvet. as she takes off her backpack the girl remains vigilant of her crowded surroundings, where her elbows fly and what looks fragile enough to risk destroying. afraid to break anything in this nice… real… room. ouija board in her lap. she grabs a colored pen off of the bed and fidgets with it, uncapping and capping the pen.

“if y’ *really* wanna, i’m sure we can summon some ‘ghost of false advertisement’ t’ really sell the point home.” she nods at the ouija board, a small eye roll accompanying the action.

“y’know, in the spirit of good capitalism.”

“it's real!”

not that danica didn't believe in the obvious; that ouija boards were made to capitalize off paranoid schizophrenics and more, but she did like to think hers worked. maybe she was the paranoid schizophrenic.. who knew, really? danica nabbed the planchet off of her desk.

“i didn't just buy it from nowhere. found it at one of 'em antique shops daddy likes. thought it would make fer good conversation with my friends.”

because everyone else was just jazzed to play parcheesi.

“'nyway.. we should play! since parcheesi isn't yer style. unless y'wanna play somethin' like sorry or uno or go fish.. i got lotsa options.”

lots of options indeed. most of ehcih belonged to e, who assumed board games and what not would probably assist danica in making friends outside of home, if her rather social personality didn't help her in some categories. she sat down, making the bed squeak and slightly bounce along with her enthusiasm.

“s'all up'ta you! 'cause yer the house guest.”

which might've been more than enough southern hospitality for one person to take. oddly, being a house guest usually meant sitting about and being awkward. for danica, it meant hello, it's your turn to make the choices, because this is your house too now.

⭑: this awesome special starter goes out to @jillconstantinw

some liked to think; a little girl raised in a cult, how terribly and awfully evil!

and they'd be partially right. maybe with a little more biased notion, but they were mostly at the point. it was innately selfish and awful of e to raise danica in such an environment. how disgusting it was, and how she knew it was terrible, keeping such a secret from her own friend. but nobody would ever understand it, really. e was all she had. if looking past his wrongdoings was what she needed to do in order to have some semblence of normality, then.. well, she'd do it, as guilty as it made her.

“motion in the ocean— ooo waaaaah—”

nothing could make her so guilty, however, to not invite jill to dinner for.. maybe the sixth or seventh time (danica herself had lost count on how much she'd said no). only, this time her father delightfully insisted that she come over. it surprised her! only slightly. she had been talking about her over the past week, about her personality, about her funny accent. e had said something among the lines of, well why don't you invite her for dinner then? and danica nearly jumped over the table to give him a hug.

“his air hose broke! ooooo waaaaah!”

she'd never been to gotham. e had; e had been plenty of times. he'd brought danica back a couple of trinkets, like music boxes. one time he'd come home with a lovely one still in ripe condition, shaped like an egg. it opened to a delightful ballerina, who spun upon being wound and danced to the nutcracker's dance of the sugar plum fairy. other than that, danica wasn't so sure how.. impressed she was with the place.

it was dank. dark, and sad, and gloomy, and completely disgusting. she wrinkled her nose at the off smell of vinegar and salt.. must've been close, then. all the while, she wondered what she and jill would talk about. it was sort of like her first sleepover— maybe jill could sleep over! that'd be just wonderful. she was sure her father wouldn't mind as long as they didn't make too much noise. they could play parcheesi. they could talk about magic. they could.. well, danica hadn't quite thought that far.

hey! speaking of parcheesi, guess what she had tucked under her arm, ready to pop out and show to jill before they gracefully retired to her bedroom on a whim. danica squinted amidst fog— a boat! on land! just some boat. must've been jill's. danica couldn't exactly think of another person that would live like that. jill was.. a different sort of special. (homeless, for anyone wondering.)

“ji—i—i—ll!”

she was sing-songy in saying jill's name, just as she was with most people when the sort of excitement of new dinner guests happened. danica squinted a little harder.. so much fog, so much gloom. she could've very easily magicked something to make it lighter.. maybe could've even made the fog disappear! but she didn't. that would've been showing off. danica didn't do that.

“jill? it's dani! you'll never guess what've got with me!”

jill had… agreed. it was, without any doubt, the largest blow to her ego since lucifer. but… if was a nice notion, the idea of it all. dani wasn’t bad, despite her attitude jill knew dani was respectable enough to deserve her tolerance. and so, everntually, jill granted it.

she hadn’t had gone to another’s house in some time, not a friends house. jill wasn’t sure why she felt… happy. happy that maybe she had made a real friend. normalcy settling pleasantly in her life, for once.

the anxiety awful. she had begun to get ready immediately after accepting the invite, there only being so much she could do to make herself presentable. homeless living in a boat, the girl had begun to allow herself, hair, clothing, hygiene, to deteriorate. at the ring of an invitation by a maybe, someday possible, friend- she had done her best to clean up.

climbing out from the trunk house of the rotting, green, Downeaster was the worst part. embarrassment burning her ears and cheeks. the boat in a pathetic state, hardly staying upright on the vessels boat stands.

“oi! i can hear y’ just fine!” jill grabs a bag, grimoire having found a home in the polyester backpack, before climbing down a steep metallic ladder to where her… maybe… hopefully…. friend stands on the gravel. she crosses her arms.

“stop the fucking screaming or y’ begging for attention.” she grumbles. eying the box under her arm.

“and thats…?”

“it's parcheesi!”

the classic game of race, chase, and capture; royal edition. danica held it out to her with a big smile on her face. the box was old, having rips and tears in a couple of places. it spoke volumes about the fact that danica was a consistent player, and she probably won on more than one occasion. she showed it off proudly, like it was some wonderful award. it wasn't. it was just parcheesi.

“y'gotta be the first player t'get all yer four pawns into the center. m'a natural at it. daddy taught me how to play.”

she tucked it safe and sound back under her arm, giving it a hearty pat. unfortunately, jill was nowhere near as enthusiastic and fun as her other friends, who (even though they disliked parcheesi and probably would've preferred uno) gladly played with her when the time permitted. thankfully, danica was nothing if not prepared.

without another word, she hooked her arm with jill's. a little bit of a breach, she knew, but it'd be just for a quick second. she cleared her throat.

“relinquimus!”

it might as well have been a magicians act. the puff of smoke, the funny after smell of sulfur as the scenery changed from gotham's sad borders to the room of a teenage girl. an overcrowded room, at that; danica's room. a room with intensely purple walls and trinkets in every corner. shelves of books, and piles of diaries on a desk pushed over in the corner. her bed was unmade with highlighters, and pens scattered all over the sheets. she unhooked herself and kept a distance. about five feet for jill's own comfort.

danica set the board down on her bed, right on top of her many colored pens and highlighters. she was embarrassed, only slightly. her father would've had a cow if he didn't give her any privacy. too much privacy, which generally left her room a mess.

“sorry. i meant'ta clean, i promise,”

she raised her hands. books floated into their empty places on the shelves. fake (or, for all anyone knew, real) skulls tucked themselves in a neat line on her bedside table. a yellow-ish board came her way, stopping only shy of her face. she grabbed it.

“if you don't like parcheesi,”

she turned it around, showing it proudly once more to jill like a kid showing off their terrible drawing they made in class.

“i got ouija!”

yer not gonna regret it! promise you'll love it. i'll even come pick ya up! it's the same place, right? the uh, the dock-thingy?

the boat. it’s on land.

alrighty! expect me in.. uh

soon. just soon.

yer not gonna regret it! promise you'll love it. i'll even come pick ya up! it's the same place, right? the uh, the dock-thingy?