Normal Girls [Piper]

[Alice Perette-Johnston]

Alice hadn’t been into town since she’d tried to venture there once by herself a few months ago. It had not ended well. She’d gotten lost and put the school into a bit of a panic. It was probably also safe to assume that Downtown wasn’t happy to have an army of yellow kittens the size of roaches crawling about the city either.

Since then, Alice had gotten much better control of her powers. Sure, to her the yellow kittens were still there, marching in straight lines around her feet like worker ants, but at least the rest of the people couldn’t see her. The ‘normal’ people. In fact, today was all about ‘normal’ people. Alice and Piper were going to try and be one.

Two.

Two separate, normal people. One per girl. One normal teenage girl per one socially-awkward, scared, mutant ninja turtle meta-human girl.

So far, Alice thought she was doing a pretty good job. She had been sure to put on shoes today, even though they were just flip-flops, the slightly classier second cousin of the slipper. She had also been sure to comb her hair, though it didn’t do much. She’d thrown it up in a messy bun so that the catastrophe looked intentional.

She bit her lip slightly, waiting for Piper on the edge of Downtown Pilot Ridge. Her toes wiggled against the sole of her flip flops, and her spindly fingers picked at the sleeves of an oversized purple hoodie. She was swimming in the infernal thing, the front decorated in pink swirling patterns, but somehow she managed to pull it off thanks to a pair of rather form-fitting jeans. Well, fitting to the little form that Alice had.

Alice hated pants, and found them confining, but she figured they were the safest bet for a day on the town. One could never tell when an army of little green kittens the size of roaches would pop up to fight the yellow ones. Who knew if the skirmishes would rise up and trip you? Alice would hate to skin her knee just because she hadn’t worn the proper body armor clothing.

She looked over her shoulder to the sleep town and wondered what they would do first. Coffee? Shopping? Alice would have liked immensely to purchase a new pair of socks. She loved socks. Or perhaps a pretty hair bow. Maybe she and Piper could buy matching headbands.

Was that normal?

[Piper Crumin]

Piper pulled her hair back off her face, gathering it up best she could into a low ponytail at the back of her skull. She tried her best to look pretty, but honestly, she couldn't really figure out how to do that. She chewed on her lip a moment, pulling a heavy sweatshirt a little too big for her over her head, careful of the whip of hair behind her head.

She sat on her unmade bed, pulling some converse-style shoes. Honestly, she didn't really care if they were popular or not, she just liked the thin soles so she could feel the pavement or whatever she was standing on easily. It helped her out when she was moving quickly and bounding through places. It was either that or barefoot, and barefoot wasn't normal.

Normal was what she was striving for.

tossing her blankets over the bed so they more of less centered, she grabbed a bag with some of her essentials and tossed it over her shoulder. Piper then turned off the light and closed the door. In the dark room, she trotted over to the window, the late sun illuminating through the white curtains, turning them light orange. With one hand she pushed the curtain aside, and with the other Piper opened the window, the warm breeze of a cooling late afternoon pushing past her face and into the room.

Piper climbed out, her toes on the ledge of the window, one hand on the frame, looking down past the jagged stone walls. She was about three stories up. It would be easy to climb down, but checking the keychain clock on her bag told her that she was already late. Piper sighed, looking down again. It was more fun this way, besides. She turned so she was facing the window, and then pushed off, falling. Backwards and upside-down. She pushed her legs back and over her head, and just as she did this, her converse tennis shoes met the wet grass. She picked herself up from the crouch her body had gone into to land her freefall. She adjusted her sweatshirt and her loose hand-me-down jeans, then took off running toward town.

She had gone to town several times, usually just to get away from the students and to get comfortable with the settings. She also liked to jump from building to building. Outside of the gym and training grounds, it was the only place she could go. That, and her legs would get restless if she didn't run and move enough.

Piper was quick, with her breath in her throat, her feet moving faster and faster, the beat it created in time with her heart, mixing with the symphony that her bag bouncing against her hip made. Her eyes twitched as she ran, scanning over people as they gave her a double-take, wondering if one of them would be Alice, though the brunette was almost positive that the taller woman would already be at their meeting place. A few times her big periwinkle eyes would glance to the building tops, it would be a lot faster if she didn't have to weave through people, but she wanted to try to be normal. That was the point of this trip, right?

Not that running at a speed like this was normal at all.

She skidded to a halt as she spotted Alice, quickly catching her breath and putting it back in her lungs. She smoothed a few flyaway pieces of hair back, and stuffed her hands in her pockets as she walked toward Alice as calmly as she could.

The girl smiled her awkward half-smile as she moved toward the other. "Sorry I'm late. I wasn't watching the time like I should have been." Piper sat down next to the other teenager. "So, what do you want to do first as normal girls?"

[Alice Perette-Johnston]

Was that normal? Alice was wondering is Piper really moved that fast, or if she was telling her body to do it, or if she was seeing things again. Piper’s form still seemed to vibrate as she halted, smoothing her hair and taking a few deep breath. The shorter girl seemed to become totally tangible again after that, as if smoothing the frizz from her hair made the rest of her body settle down.

Alice giggled a bit, noticing that both girls had managed to decide that an over-sized sweater was something a normal girl should wear. Granted, the were different sweaters at least, but it was still a little comical. They certainly looked very laid back, to say the least. Alice liked it. It made it easier to relax.

Shrugging her thin shoulders, Alice looked down the street, leaning over so that her body was nearly bent in half as her hands grasped the underside of the bench to keep her from careening into the street. “You’re not late.” She looked suddenly to Piper, craning her neck up from her awkward position so that she could see. “Unless we’re on a schedule. Are we on a schedule?” Alice inquired.

She whipped her head back around, her hail tickling her neck as it followed her inertia. “I hope not. There is so much to do.” She murmured. “At least there is so much that we could do.” Alice smiled and leaned back again, drawing her legs up so that she could hug her knees. “So~ much~.” she sang playfully.

She laid her head on her knees, looking to Piper in a dreamy way. “Should we walk up and down, and if we see something, go for it? I haven’t been in town since it was infested by tiny yellow kittens—a few months—“ she babbled charmingly “So there may be knew stores or other things that I’ve never seen.”

[Piper Crumin]

"I guess we're not.. on a schedule, that is. I wouldn't expect to, but I didn't want to keep you waiting too much." Piper said gently, feeling a little foolish.

Of course Alice would never have a schedule. She was like the creatures of the Endless. She was a faerie-tale in a world of facts. It didn't make her any less real, though. It made her more real, undoubtedly. After all, Piper rarely remembered any facts, but she would always remember faerie-tales. And Piper knew that facts could be proved and disproved and eroded away and dust and ashes, while things like faerie-tales and dreams would endure. Those were more true, and being less true made them more true.

In Piper's mind, that's the way things were in Piper's mind. Perhaps her years of solitude and loneliness had gotten to her, and her thoughts had taken over her. Maybe like the creator was destroyed by the created, as done in the old stories of Frankenstein or the sci-fi tales of clones and creatures that were abominations of nature. Her thoughts had become a person of its own, beyond what Piper was.

Piper shook her thoughts away, focusing herself back onto Alice. Inside her shoes she curled up her toes, feeling the heavy material tighten over them.

"I guess- I come here in town and everything pretty often, but I usually don't stop anywhere." Her lips twitched a bit as she thought through everything. "We could start at the antique store or something. Or a boutique; there's one nearby that wouldn't be too hard to get to..." Her voice trailed off, she glanced away, into the horizon. There were dark clouds foretelling a storm.

Nonetheless, Piper pushed it out of her mind, trying to keep in mind that she was a normal girl right now. Normal girls wouldn't worry about a storm. It might blow over and past the town.

It was only a storm, after all.

((sorry it took so long, between my unusually busy schedule this weekend and my inability to write, getting this out was harder than usual.))

[Alice Perette-Johnston]

Alice watched placidly as Piper was momentarily lost in herself. It didn’t take long to get very, very lost. Alice was aware of that. Sometimes she got lost in herself. In fact, some would argue that Alice was continuously lost in herself, and that if she wasn’t careful other people could get lost there too.

In Alice, that is.

Not as if Alice were a place.

Looking down at her toes and laughing, Alice shook her head. “We both spaced out. Whoopsie!” She declared excitedly. Tapping Piper on the nose, Alice nodded wisely. “I know because you shook yourself. Like the person driving you in a car hit the brakes to fast and the car shook you around.” Alice explained, nodding again before affectionately seizing Piper’s arm, looping her own thin limb through the other girl’s.

“But the best way to get out of being lost is to keep moving forward, right?” (That was completely wrong). Alice pulled gently on Piper’s arm to get the pair of them moving into the town. Truth be told, Alice was terrified of the town, but with Piper attached to her (willing or unwilling, as it may have been) it all seemed a little less terrifying.

“I like antique stores. They sell antiques.” Mused Alice, tilting her head lazily to one side. “Like broken sewing machines and moth-eaten quilts. Once I saw a spindle dancing with knitting needles in an antique store. That’s why I like antiques, they dance all old-fashioned.” Alice paused at the first antique store the crossed and mashed her face against the glass display window, staring wide-eyed at the display.

The storm meant nothing to Alice. The only thing that was important was Piper, the window, and the miniscule world around it. If it rained, it rained. If it didn’t, it didn’t. Piper would still feel awkward, Alice would still be with Piper feeling both slightly awkward and happy at the same time, and the antiques would still dance (but only if Alice looked at the sideways and half way upside down like a dog that had heard a very high noise).

[Piper Crumin]

Piper laughed, "I get lost in my thoughts a lot," she said gently, her ponytail swinging back and forth as she walked, "I usually don't have anyone to talk to, so thinking about stuff and tuning things out has become a bad habit of mine." She turned to the blond, looking up with her eyes. "I'll try to stay with you a little bit more, I promise."

But Alice also got lost in herself; that would be evident even if she hadn't said it right out like she had. So maybe the two of them made rather good friends. Plus, Piper liked the feeling of someone with their arm looped around hers. It was new and interesting and she decided that she loved the feeling of a kindred spirit.

"Okay, this is my favorite antique shop." Piper said pleasantly, opening the door to a dimly-lit shop. Most of the light was obviously meant to come in through the windows, but it being early evening, the sun wasn't pouring into the room as it was designed to, but the dim light gave it a strange, but nice old-world feeling to it.

"They don't sell broken anything here, though. There isn't much market for them." Piper touched the sequined bodice of an old black flapper dress. Her fingers then swept down, running over the tassels, which moved smoothly in life, jangling. Every time she came into town she looked at this dress, which was never bought. There was something about it that she really loved, whether it was it life within or its history. She smiled to herself, then looked back to Alice. "I don't know if there are many moth-eaten quilts here, either. I think that what's on your mind is more of a thrift store. Antique shops try to repair what they can and if they can't then they try not to sell it; unless its a one-in-a-million object, you know?"

[Alice Perette-Johnston]

“I’m going to remember your promise.” Alice said in a sing-song voice as the entered the musty smelling shop. That was a good sign. Whenever an antique store smelled old, that was proof that it was old. Since that was the point of an antique, a placed that specialized in selling them ought to smell just that way. She inhaled deeply and smile. “I can see why this place is your favorite. It smells just right. Nice work.” Alice chirped, gasping and releasing Piper to touch the fringe on the dress as well.

“Wow…this is amazing.” She murmured off-handedly, continuing at the same soft volume to counteract Piper’s argument, even as she continued to admire in wide-eyed wonder at the dress. “and anyway, if they sold broken things, I would buy them. And people who like to fix things would buy them. There is plenty of market for broken things because if usually if you take two broken things you can mash them together and make one big not broken thing. Artists do that you. One big not broken thing, I would make that. Yes.” Alice said, nodding to herself and suddenly looking over at Piper.

“Well…are you going to try this on?” She asked, as if the answer were an obvious yet and it was absurd that Piper hadn’t put it on yet. “It looks sturdy. I bet with a few modifications you could wear if for a high-wire costume.” Alice pointed out, beaming over at her fellow student. “Wouldn’t that be neat? You’d be like a big sparkle in the sky! How beautiful.”

[Piper Crumin]

Piper looked at the black dress. It was far too long for her, though the rest of it may fit her rather easily. It looked like it would fit Alice more easily, but it didn't seem like the kind of thing that the other girl would wear.

Piper shook her head. "I don't think so, I could never wear it right." She smiled up at Alice, "Plus, black isn't all that good a color for stage. I would rather wear something with miles of crinoline as a skirt. I don't know. I've always wanted to wear something that would make me look ethereal."

She looked back to the dress, and suddenly something in her head looked at it differently. She wanted to wear it, and even if she couldn't wear it right it would make her feel lovely for a moment. Maybe she would get it, just to have it hung in her closet and reminding her of a future that she could have.

"You know what? Nevermind." Piper picked the dress up by the hanger, and spun to look towards the old curtain that showed where the small dressing room was. "Just... don't laugh, okay?" the girl said quietly, before pulling the curtain shut.

Piper quickly undressed, letting her sweatshirt fall to the floor and unzipped the dress where its cleverly-hidden zipper lay on the side. Each of the sequins were sewn snugly on, though Piper was terrified of tearing the sturdy fabric. She pulled the black dress over her head, after finding her ponytail was in the way, she tugged the elastic out of her hair and tried again.

This time it slipped over her like water, heavy and drapey and wonderful. Her fingers pulled the zipper up on the side where her ribs were, and she found that it actually didn't fit her that badly. It was a tad loose, but that was to be expected of a dress from the roaring twenties. Piper did a quick look-around, making sure that the dress wasn't tucked in awkward places or bunched up in a place she couldn't see.

Finally, she pulled the curtain aside, smiling small at the prettiness of her dress and how she felt in it. She looked up at her friend, "Well? How does it look, Alice?"

[Alice Perette-Johnston]

Alice waved her hand in front of her face. “Magicians wear black all the time, yeah? It’s a great color for stage. Just put it on!” She encouraged excitedly, nearly squealing with anticipation. Alice was sure that if she listened hard enough she could hear that dress calling Piper’s name, just begging for the other girl to try it on. Alice wrung her hands in excitement, gasping and jumping when Piper reached out and pulled the dress to her.

“Oh goody! It’s going to look awesome.” Alice assured her, nodding like a bobble head for a solid two minutes or so. “Besides, looking right on the hanger and looking right on you could be two totally different things you know.” Alice added, scuttling over in front of the curtain and pacing a bit as she continued her little speech. “They have tailors and such now to make anything look right on you, given that it’s the right size. Besides those twenties dresses are all floaty like soap on top of the water. They’ll make you look real bouncy.” Alice added, grinning from ear to ear at the thought of her friend in such a flirty, effervescent style.

“Hey, Piper?” Alice called, continuing before the other girl could respond. “I’d never laugh at you. I’m sure it will be---“ Alice paused, blinking her large, sunken eyes at Piper as the girl cautiously stepped out of the dressing room. She looked simply stupefied for a moment, frozen still like a small forest creature at the snap of a twig. Then slowly, a grin crept onto her face and she managed to finish her sentence.

“Beautiful.” Alice said resolutely. “You look just amazing. It was like it was made just for you!”