The pretty Rain from those sweet Eaves / Her unintending Eyes [closed]

[apidae]

Well, rain isn't the worst thing that could have happened. This was meant to be the day Daine helped her set up the new hive, and it wouldn't be impossible in the rain, but it doesn't feel very welcoming, and it wouldn't allow Bee to spend all her time up on the roof like she would wish. And no one would want to come up to join her! That wouldn't do at all.

She'd sat in her apartment for a while, picking at the book Spike gave her, alternately pouting at the rainbeaten window and staring glumly at the ceiling - wondering if she should try to foist her company on one of her new friends - before she finally decided to snap herself out of it on her own. Which is how she found herself in the park, in the downpour.

Shoeless and armed with an umbrella she just bought from a convenient little sidewalk kiosk, Bee marches through the puddles, enjoying the smell and sound of rainfall, willing herself to feel better. This is certainly preferable to sitting inside. And if the weather clears up tomorrow, then she can set up her hive, and all will be well.

There aren't as many walkers out as usual, given the conditions, but it's not too long before she gets a glimpse of the telltale Rift-patterns - another rifty nearby. She focuses her gaze, seeing a young woman walking a dog - oh, how sweet, wearing a matching raincoat and little boots! Bee's delighted by the sight, so she comes a little closer, focusing on the dog, and - no, no, not a dog at all. It came through the Rift as well - and it isn't of this world. She stops and frowns intently. What on earth?

She comes a little closer, deeply curious, discerning scales and teeth beneath the raincoat, and...

A name flashes through her head: Quarkbeast!

Suddenly she remembers her dream - so real and so eventful, so many people she'd met! And the little man, Aglet, who told her about his friend and her Quarkbeast, who eats metal - what was her name? Jennifer? Yes, Jennifer.

No amount of practiced social grace and keep Bee from hurrying up in excitement and exclaiming, "Are you Jennifer?" to the unsuspecting fellow rifty.

Comments

[jennifer_strange]

"She says she met you in a dream," Jennifer helpfully supplies from the floor, where she's trying to dry off the Beast's paws without tearing any holes in the towel. She glances in the general direction of Aglet's shelf, but she isn't surprised not to see him there. Whether he remembers Bee or not, his first impulse will probably be to hide from a new human.

[watchesthebeans]

Aglet stifles a gasp as the vague familiarity of the woman coalesces into dream-memory. Resisting the urge to stand up and greet her in return immediately, he pushes himself backwards until he can scramble down to his own shelf unseen and emerge from behind the paper barrier that shields much of it from view. He's forgotten to brush the dust off, which will be interesting to explain later when he tries to tell Jennifer about his quiet morning of lounging about on his shelf and Not Borrowing.

"You're named after a bug," he blurts out, not remembering her name but remembering that he'd liked that about it.

[apidae]

"That's right!" Bee beams as he comes into view. She steps a little closer, peering up at him. "Bee. I'm glad you remember me. I was lucky enough to run into Jennifer and I remembered what you told me about the Quarkbeast. And Jennifer was kind enough to bring me here to meet you." She seems to recall Aglet using the word bossy to describe Jennifer, so she's sure to emphasize her particular kindness in this matter.

[jennifer_strange]

Privately, Jennifer thinks it's a pity Aglet didn't remember the dream so well as Bee did - then he could have given her some warning along the lines of 'so, I've told another human about you and the Beast.' But Aglet willingly interacting with another human is novelty enough that she's not going to complain.

Instead, she strips off her damp socks and announces, "I need to change my trousers, but then I'll make cocoa." This will give Aglet and Bee a moment to talk in relative privacy. She pads over to her dresser and pulls out some dry jeans, then heads for the WC, pausing en route to grab a chrome bumper from atop the fridge and set it down on the floor for the Beast.

[watchesthebeans]

On waking up this morning he'd mostly remembered he was supposed to do something with his phone and that he'd met someone nice. Unsure if it had been a shared dream or not (and not remembering Bee's phone number), Aglet had resigned himself to not knowing and gone about his usual business.

And now, here she is! Bashful in the face of a 'new' bean in the flesh, Aglet lingers by the edge of his privacy screen, not quite coming all the way out. "I don't remember much," he admits. "Mostly that it was a pretty bad dream until the part where I met you."

[apidae]

Bee nods at Jennifer as she goes by, then turns her attention back to Aglet. "Well I'm glad I could help you," she says earnestly. "Do you remember anything else? Like what we talked about... going exploring?"

[jennifer_strange]

Jennifer slings her rain-dampened trousers over her towel rack to dry and pulls on dry socks and jeans with a little sigh of relief. Maybe the rain will let up before she has to take the Beast out again.

Said Beast has sprawled onto its side, bumper clasped between its forepaws as it licks at the chrome. Jennifer gives the creature an approving smile as she heads into the kitchen to start making cocoa. She keeps half on ear on the conversation, a little curious to hear Aglet's waking response to the idea of exploring.

Since Bee's here, she might as well make cocoa on the stove rather than nuke things separately in the microwave. She sets a saucepan on the range and starts to heat up some milk, then rummages for the powdered cocoa mix. Now that it's summer, it's migrated to the back of the shelf, but there's still some left.

[watchesthebeans]

Aglet does remember, but he was hoping he'd made that part up. "Oh," he says, wondering what it is about beans and being so insistent on taking him outside. She's only just got here! "I don't really remember that," he lies, trying to remember if he actually agreed to anything.

"Do you want to see my room?" he asks too quickly. "Jennifer got me the paper and things, it's really not bad for being so out in the open."

[apidae]

"Hmm," says Bee with a small smile. She can see the lie plain as day, but there's no need to pressure him. He'll come around. "I'd love to see it!" she says gladly. She looks around. "Jennifer? Is there a stepstool or something I can stand on?" She glances back at Aglet and gives him a friendly wink. "I've always thought of myself as very small, before I met you."

[jennifer_strange]

"You can use my desk chair," Jennifer says, glancing up from her stirring. "It's pretty sturdy." Actually, it looks downright severe, simple and wooden and devoid of any cushions. But she's so used to physical discomfort that she finds it rather soothing, so she's never felt the need to shop for anything better.

And it's what she uses whenever she wants to look in on him, so she knows it'll do the job.

[watchesthebeans]

"And I used to think I was pretty tall," jokes Aglet, though of course he was disabused of that notion when he met his cousins; beans had nothing to do with it. He glances over his bedroom, spots something currently out of Bee's sight, and abruptly darts into the recesses of his living space to hide it before she can get the chair set up. A moment later he's back at the edge to watch the proceedings. "And you can come see my phone," he says, oddly proud of the object set up in a dock at one end of the shelf despite how disturbing he's often found its presence.

[apidae]

Bee giggles at the odd little invitation. "All right," she says. She pulls over the chair and climbs up onto it, peering up at his little abode. The phone looks more or less like a phone; the rest of his setup is far more interesting to her.

"Oh, how darling!" she says. Sensing the advantage of playing off his pride, she adds, "And ingenious. Clever you." She smiles, watching him, hoping for some sort of half-penny tour.

[jennifer_strange]

Jennifer has to smother a grin as she stirs in the cocoa powder, though the look she shoots Bee is just a little bit shrewd. Considering how short a time the woman's known Aglet, she's playing him like a fiddle. Maybe Bee's not as guileless as she seems. Jennifer makes a mental note to be a little more careful around her as she pulls out two human-sized mugs, one Borrower-sized one, and an eyedropper.

[watchesthebeans]

But the phone is exotic! Aglet makes a face at 'darling,' but 'ingenious' and 'clever more than make up for it, and he's soon beaming and looking over his own 'bedroom' as if seeing it for the first time and realizing just what a good job he's done with it.

It can all be taken in with one glance, really. "So that's my bed," he says, pointing at what used to be half of a padded case for some kind of electronic device, but has since had a homemade mattress stuffed into it. A little reading light (that is, one only almost as big as its owner) is clipped to one side. "And that's the table," he says, indicating the the battered back cover of a hardcover copy of The Bobbsey Twins' Red White and Blue Mystery, which has had four little wooden legs attached. The whole shelf is like that, really -- one after another he keeps pointing out perfectly visible items of tiny furniture made from stolen borrowed odds and ends. He's got a chair, with what looks like a second one in progress, and the walls are even partially papered with colorful restaurant coupons.

[apidae]

Bee follows his intro course on borrower furniture with rapt attention, smiling and nodding at each announcement (she resists the urge to remark upon how cute everything is).

"Very good," she says with a grin when he's finished. "You've done quite well for yourself I see."

She glances over at Jennifer. "Looks like the cocoa is about to be ready," she says, and looks back at Aglet. "Would you like to come down and sit with us?"

[jennifer_strange]

Jennifer has her hands full with ladling the cocoa out of the saucepan and into the larger mugs, so she doesn't offer to get him down herself. "I could bring yours up to you," she says instead. That's standard procedure, after all. But it would be nice to have him come out, too, provided he's calm enough to avoid any size-related accidents.

[watchesthebeans]

"Um," says Aglet, sorely tempted by Jennifer's offer. Bee came to see him, though, and she likes his furniture. He'd like to hear more about how much she likes his furniture; with Jennifer it's always ruined by him having to worry over whether she'll recognize the things he's borrowed. He doesn't know what to do with himself, and he nervously wipes his hands on his trousers. He doesn't like being picked up, and he doesn't like being out in the open -- and on a barren tabletop, no less. "Hang on," he says, and ducks back into his room to grab his shoulder bag, which he knows still has his hook, string, and knife in it. Beans never seem to realize how disastrous traveling across a room can be if you're not careful, and he insists on being prepared.

Is he going to do the thing, though? He doesn't want to do the thing. But Bee picked him up in that dream and he was okay. "Okay," he says, trying to sound as though letting a new bean pick him up is something he does every day. "Okay, I'm ready."

[apidae]

"Okay," replies Bee quite seriously. It's clearly an important task she's about to undertake. Just because she picked him up in the dream doesn't mean he's ready for it again. She can't imagine what it's like, being pick up - probably rather bothersome and stressful. Solemnly, she cups her hands together and holds them up to the edge of Aglet's bedroom. "I promise I'll be very careful."

[jennifer_strange]

Jennifer tops off Aglet's little mug with the eyedropper, turns off the stove, and sets all three mugs on the kitchen's little island while she eyes Bee and Aglet. She trusts Bee to be careful, and the fact that Aglet's talking to the woman at all is proof that he's a lot more relaxed around full-sized humans than he used to be. But neither of them have forgotten what happened the first time she tried to pick him up, and it's only in recent weeks that she's stopped bothering with gloves on the occasions when she has to shift him somewhere.

"You'll be fine," she adds in general encouragement.

[watchesthebeans]

If she starts to drop him he can always just do the thing.

"'Course I will," replies Aglet with a forced grin. You're blowing his cover, Jennifer, he's supposed to be totally cool with this. Carefully he steps onto Bee's hands, using his own hands to brace himself and sitting down quickly. The first thing he learned about being picked up by beans (okay the third, after 'it's not necessarily a death sentence' and 'sometimes I shrink them') was that beans just plain can't hold their hands still.

"See?" he says, grimacing smiling despite his rigidly tense posture.

[apidae]

"Of course!" says Bee (softly) with a smile. "You're all right."

Bee does have a rather preternatural talent for holding herself still, and she's in top form at the moment, not wanting to startle or jostle her little friend. That was the reason she used both hands, after all, though he could easily fit into one - better stability this way, more of a protective shell than an unstable platform.

Using two hands, however, means that she has no way to brace herself while getting down from the chair, and not even her gift for balance can prevent her from stumbling a bit on her dismount. She's on the verge of blurting a frantic apology when, suddenly, she's in no position to do so. It seems like she's falling, like the floor's just dropped out from under her, and at the same time, she can no longer keep her grip on Aglet - he's getting bigger! Or is she getting smaller? Or...

Both???

She lets her hands fly open, effectively dropping him onto the chair as she stumbles backward and lands, eventually, on her butt. The impact of the floor is staggering, reverberating through her. Suddenly everything is huge. Impossibly huge! The chair, the table, Jennifer, and Aglet - they all tower over her!

She's borrower-sized!

She stares up at her two hosts for a moment of stunned silence, before bursting into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. This situation is a little frightening, yes, but it's easy enough to see how and why it happened, and - well, mostly it is absurd, and hysterical.

[jennifer_strange]

"… Shit," Jennifer says eloquently. It didn't look like much of a jostle from her perspective, but she knows it wouldn't take much to panic Aglet (or panic him enough to employ his rift power, anyway).

The Quarkbeast lifts its head from the bumper and watches the size swap with interest. "Stay, boy," Jennifer says. She's not worried about the creature hurting anyone, but the Beast is a lot bigger from Bee's perspective than it was before, and she doubts the growth spurt has made Aglet any less frightened of it.

Making her way out from behind the island, she glances back and forth between the tiny, laughing Bee and a rattled Aglet. It's the borrower who gets most of her attention, though, both because he's obviously more in need of it and because this is the first time they've been the same size. He looks so normal, he's almost unrecognizable (or he might be, if his stressed expression wasn't so familiar). "No one's hurt, are they?"

[watchesthebeans]

It was barely anything. It shouldn't have set him off. It did, though, and he finds himself perched on the wooden chair, clutching the piece of furniture like his life depends on it.

"Oh, god!" blurts Aglet when he realizes what he's done. "I didn't mean to!"

Apparently not registering Bee's amusement, he hisses at the approaching Jennifer, "Don't step on her!"

[apidae]

Oh, but those voices are thunderous. She stifles her laughter with some effort and claps her hands over her ears, struggling to keep balance with Jennifer's steps - even such light steps! - across the floor. She can see clearly now how difficult things are for Aglet, why he's so afraid all the time. The entire world is dangerous like this.

Still, though - there's a novelty here she can't help but enjoy. She's tiny! Aglet will want to be returned to his normal size soon, so her adventure will have to be brief. Recovering herself, she yells as loudly as she can, "I'm fine!" and scurries over to the bookshelves. Can she climb this? She's pretty good at climbing, but this is a whole new world of it.

[jennifer_strange]

"No one is stepping on anyone," Jennifer says, her tone gentle but firm. She waits until Bee's at the bookshelf before cautiously stepping closer to where Aglet is huddled on the chair. At his current size, it's a precarious position, and she's more worried about him falling off the chair and hurting Bee in the process than she is about the woman getting stepped on (which is far easier to avoid, especially now that she's so close to the shelf).

She hesitates for a moment, then extends a hand. "Come on." Adopting a more professional, knowledgable tone - the one she'd use for particularly prickly clients back home - she adds, "It'll be safer for both of you if you stand up."