Starring:
Date Set: August 2nd, 2009
Summary:
Niki and Daphne meet.
Six Months Ago…
"Bon Voyage"
Niagara Falls, New York
The height of summer brings a lot of tourists to the city of Niagara Falls, New York. It's a beautiful day, a bright, hot afternoon being left behind for a warm dusk. A short distance from a small bookstore — one of many stores and restaurants clustered together close to the city's namesake attraction — is a fountain, a small tourist attraction in and of itself. At this very moment, however, no one circles it. Only one person lingers by it — on it, in fact, sitting on the edge.
The fountain looming behind her, the blonde perched on its stone edge looks pretty content. A nametag is pinned to her white blouse, dubbing her to be NIKI. One high-heeled boot is perched up on the ledge, and she reads a book over a denim-clad bent knee. There's not much light to see by — a few lampposts and storefronts and the gargantuan waterfalls themselves, as night starts to fall and a rainbow of lights illuminates them in a glow of nature and technology combined.
People do enjoy their vacations, flocking to historical or whimsical hotspots and soaking up as much 'otherness' as possible before the eventual return to life and its routine: its one, stationary placement. Then there's some people who travel for a living. They get to see places other people only dream of. Then there's some people who just travel. And they get to see all the places people don't even think of.
On this scale, Niagara Falls might be a bit quaint and typical, but Daphne still manages to look like she's enjoying herself. She's layered in a couple of colorful tank-tops with some big gaudy tiki-kitsch necklace engulfing her exposed neck. Legs are also visible beyond the edge of corduroy shorts, toes peeking from flat straw sandals. Strolling up to and around a part of the fountain, she raises aviator sunglasses to the top of her head in accordance with the light fading. There's a glance passed to the crowd then returned before she uses it to examine the attraction beside her— the glimmer of all that abandoned money underneath the cool water.
A page in the book is turned slowly, its reader not seeming to notice the other person at the fountain until she's already a few lines in. Realization comes in the form of a double-take (Daphne's hair is kinda hard to look away from at first). It's easy to recognize the tourists in a place like this and the young woman definitely seems to fall into that category. Niki looks back to her book but, after a second, glances back with a smile and pipes up — soft-voiced, as if not wanting to alarm the passing stranger with a sudden bout of friendliness. "Making a wish?"
There's a cracking sound from Daphne, revealed to be the forceful way she pops the pink gum in her mouth. It makes a brief appearance as a half-formed bubble before she sucks it all inside to better work her lips matter-of-factly in Niki's direction. "Pop machine won't take dollars." So much for romanticism. But she pointedly doesn't bend over and snatch any of those water-logged quarters up. Yet. Instead, she directs a raised chin and curious glance at the other woman. "What about you? Thinking there must be more than this provincial life?"
The girl was thinking about stealing coins from the fountain? Niki can't help but give her something of a bewildered look, a stare which doesn't fade as she's asked a question in turn. She glances down at the book in hand before turning blue eyes back to the fountain and to Daphne. "Oh." Laughing lightly, she shuts the paperback over a purple-tasselled bookmark and flashes the cover. It's a cheap novel with a neon green BARGAIN BIN sticker plastered over an image of the book's cliche crime-fighting heroine. So much for romanticism indeed. "Nah, I'm just on break."
A critical eye goes to the book's cover and the look on Daphne's face only grows more wry as she takes in what it is. "So not my style," she mentions, perhaps for the act of stalking the night and busting up evil-doers, but then she adds, "It's like they want you to think you can't fight crime without body-bagging yourself in leather first." Tsk, tsk. Gum pop. This young woman enjoys her mobility, if her light clothes and the distracted way she stretches arms above head mean anything. "Oh, hey. So you actually have to sell all this cheesy stuff?"
Niki eyes the book's cover with a wry, if somewhat silly look, dark blonde brows lifting. Daphne's definitely not wrong. The book is worth about the couple of bucks she paid for it, if that, but it passes the time. "What, you're not into leather catsuits for your crime-fighting?" she jokes in a casual tone and smiles. "I sell cheesy books," she confirms with a pointed look in the direction of the nearby bookstore. It's quaint. "… aaand… like… Tolstoy— we sell lots've things and not all of them are as bad as this book."
"I'm not even into leather catsuits for my breaking and entering, and that was totally a trend first." Daphne tosses her head in mock — ? — pride and solidarity for those tight-clothed women of nimble fingers. Before that whole anti-hero revolution came around. Then leather was sort of it. "Cheesy books," she files away, sparing eyes for the indicated store, "I guess that's not quite as terrible." Generous, truly. "But books are so… I don't know. Trapped. People who read books do it because they don't have anywhere to go. Or, I don't know, a TV."
Niki gives the younger blonde a decidedly weird look — as in is this girl serious? — once again. There is still a light smile on her lips, though, as if she's amused by Daphne. Hesitantly. "They're… educational," she says slowly. "…okay, not all of them," she amends as she sets down her bargain book along the fountain. Finally, she slides her boot heel off the edge and stretches her long legs out. "But how would you know where to go without reading about it first?"
Daphne doesn't look all that serious — not in her glasses, her shorts, and her tourist necklace — nor in that twinkle of mischief in her eyes. But she still sounds it. In so much that she doesn't sound like she's joking, at least. The smart retort to Niki's comment gets reduced to only raised eyebrows when the woman backtracks first. There's some longer consideration of the next part, the supposed thief picking idly at the edges of her sunglasses as she shrugs. "Who needs to know. Just go. It's all gonna be out there still. Besides, reading just makes people miss what they don't have cause know they know they don't have it."
"Okay," Niki says in accord, nodding a couple of times and giving in to the other point-of-view, at least for now. She tucks blonde hair behind her ear, leaning ahead slighty, her pose ever-so-slightly slouching; much more relaxed than Daphne's, that's for sure. "… I guess I've just never thought of it like that. Maybe that's why I haven't been around the world yet." The latter comment is spoken like a joke, but Niki is not at all sarcastic as she says it. It is very slightly wistful, at least to perceptive ears.
It's a wistfulness the beginnings of Daphne's life have well tuned her to; she recognizes out of sheer familiarity. But instead of surrender to sentimentality, the speedster shifts one shoulder up in a slightly unsympathetic shrug. "No time like the present." So factual and so basic. "I'm getting out," she comments, more casually, while side-stepping to give the whole tourist set-up a good examination. "Enjoying this bright shining beacon of travel, after all. You will so never guess where I came from."
Travelling isn't that easy! Not for everyone. "World travel sounds kinda expensive." When you don't have the help of a teleported. Niki eases to her feet before taking the bait of the apparent tourist. "And you came from somewhere where they call soda 'pop'," she replies, calling back, with a small smile, Daphne's peering into the fountain's change a few minutes prior.
Well, shucks on everyone! "Ohh, good one," Daphne admits, her eyes and smile lighting up when she's called out for lingo. "But I wasn't specific enough. I haven't been back there in… anyway, it's somewhere else. Where, fun fact, I don't even know the word they use for soda. Or pop. Or any kind of drink whatsoever, actually." After that one minor fall in merriment, she returns full-force, giving an encouraging nod that doesn't quite fit with the sentiment of her peppy, "You can give up if you want to. I won't mind."
Instead of naming off random countries that speak languages other than English until her break time is up, Niki only shakes her head. The little traveller obviously wants to share, so who is she to hold Daphne up? There's a hint of amusement about Niki's expression as she waits to be enlightened. "I think you wanna tell me," she encourages, but, as she hitches a thumb around the strap of the oversized, grey leather purse over her shoulder, she holds the rest of her fingers up in a gesture of surrender. She gives up!
That's right, nobody can hold Daphne up, and she preens with especial excellence at the demonstration of surrender. "Paris," is quoted happily, "I have a flat there. It's pretty much the coolest thing ever." And decorated with billions of dollars worth of art and historical pieces. "I'd highly recommend it, from a traveler to a… well, somebody who clearly needs to travel more." There's a careful watching of the way Niki clings to the purse which causes Daphne to back up slightly, perhaps to give her more room should this be a sign of imminent departure.
"Paris," Niki repeats, testing out the word — the thought. The way someone who imagines the city to be faraway and romantic and impossible. She tucks her free hand into the pocket of her jeans, though it can't squeeze far past her hip inside the tight-fitted denim. "Never been. I think I was in New Zealand once." Not so much like Paris. The woman's brow furrows as she realizes how nonsensical that sounds and opens her mouth further as if to correct a mistake, but there is no mistake, and she just— carries on. "I should— " A nod in the direction of the book store. She steps closer to Daphne, and her hand sneaks out of her pocket, a fist holding a prize reaching out to the traveller. "For the pop machine," she offers, her grin softened by kind eyes. Whether Daphne was serious about needing change or not, she's being given some quarters anyway.
Daphne's head cocks to the side as though giving New Zealand some definite thought, though there is none of the romanticism. As a traveler, she may have already been. When she glances away to the bookstore at the half-started excuse, she turns back jerkily when catching Niki's close movement in periphery. Hip jutted out in preparation from an untaken move backwards, she eyes the fist and its prize for a moment before holding out a palm and accepting the small payment. "Huh," she observes, a sort of reluctant not-skepticism her own form of kindness. "You're not so bad." Clinking the coins about on her palm, she hovers there, staring at the things. Then, whether the other woman is yet there to see or not, she mutters, "Meh, it's just a pop." and tips a nail under one of the quarters. It spins in a clean arc and lands with a firm *plop* into the water of the fountain — make a wish.
Niki has started to walk away, but she doesn't venture too far before she stops, looking over her shoulder at Daphne and the fountain — and beyond, Niagara Falls and its multitude of lights. Catching the glint of the coin as it arcs through the air, into the water, she smiles. Daphne wouldn't know how often the woman smiles now in comparison to just a year ago. "I hope it comes true," she calls out, just loud enough to be heard over the ever-present roar of the nearby Falls. "Your wish. I hope it comes true."
Niki whirls away slowly. Her trek to the store is a little faster — she hastens into a high-heeled jog in order to beat the clock.
As it happens, she left the cheap book about the crime-fighting heroine at the fountain.
<OOC> Daphne wished for Niki to make out with her. Btw.
<OOC> Niki suddenly runs back.
<OOC> Niki makes out with.
<OOC> Daphne otp.
<OOC> Niki otp.