fandomtownies | The Perk, Wednesday Morning

Entry tags:

The Perk, Wednesday Morning

It wasn’t like her dorm room was terrible or anything but sometimes Karina actually felt like patronizing one of the stores on the island for reasons more than ragging on Sparkle, who never seemed to mind anyway. Besides, her room wasn’t really all that interesting to spend all her time in and it didn’t have delicious apple cider a mere few steps away, should she run out and need more.

So Karina had figured that, hey, the Perk was as good as any place to spend a few hours. She had her drink, and a cinnamon bun, just in case she got hungry, and her laptop with her as she worked through the vagaries of her latest song.

The baristas could just suck it up and cope when she hummed a few bars now and then.

[Open!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Elsa had been hiding. This wasn't much of a surprise. Elsa had been hiding for the past several years, ever since her powers had gotten away from her and had almost cost her a sister. But... a person could only hide for so long, and the tiny dorm rooms here didn't begin to compare to the massive room she had back in Arendelle.

Elsa was going stir-crazy. And that's why she found herself wandering town, careful to keep her distance from any passers-by, right up until a familiar smell struck her and made her hit a detour.

Chocolate? Drinking chocolate?

Elsa... could keep it together for chocolate. And, if she was standing in line and happened to start humming along, once she started to get a feel for the tune the other girl in the coffee shop was humming, well... singing out of nowhere wasn't really an odd thing to do, in Arendelle.

Edited 2014-01-15 14:54 (UTC)

Karina wasn’t exactly a stranger to hearing other people sing her songs.

Nevertheless, someone humming the song she was working on was a fairly new experience. She blinked and looked up from her laptop, looking for the hummer. Given that the shop wasn’t exactly busy, it was pretty easy to narrow it down.

“Nice voice,” she said approvingly, eyes already drifting back to her laptop. “Come over here once you’ve ordered?”

Being spoken to - complimented even - by a total stranger was still something Elsa was getting used to. She blinked, took a moment to make certain that the girl wasn't talking to anyone else (Who else WAS there?) and then offered her a small smile and a nod.

"Thank you. I'll... be over in a minute."

First she had to figure out little things like 'buying a drink.' She mostly followed the lead of the person ahead of her in line. Step up to the woman on the other side of the counter. Say what she wanted. Balk some, when asked if she wanted one percent or soy (what was a soy?), but get through mostly unscathed, putting her payment down firmly on the counter when the total was given.

A few minutes later, blushing faintly after insisting that the gold coin she was paying with was the only form of currency she had, she made her way over to find a seat near the other girl.

The look on her face, a little mortified after insisting that the cashier not worry about making change, really, she didn't mind overpaying for chocolate in the least, suggested that she was considering whether it was too late, by this point, to run.

Far, far too late to run. Especially since Karina had looked up sometime during the conversation about over-payment and had noticed that the girl’s clothing wasn’t exactly… modern.

Really pretty though.

“New student, huh?” she said, sounding somewhat sympathetic. “I can show you where the bank is later, so you can exchange money, if you’d like? I’m Karina.”

Oh, Elsa's clothing was gorgeous. But it tended to make her stand out a little more than she wanted.

"I'd appreciate that," Elsa replied, ducking her head a little, smiling almost awkwardly at the top of the table she was sitting at. "Thank you. I'm Elsa. And if I'd known getting some drinking chocolate was going to be such an ordeal..."

Karina smiled.

“I don’t know about you,” she said conspiratorially, “but I’d still have gone and gotten it anyway.”

Because as if Karina was going to ever let a challenge keep her from getting what she wanted.

“Take a seat,” Karina offered. “I mean, unless you’ve got other places to be.”

Well, it was chocolate...

Elsa shared that little smile for a moment, and then nodded and made herself comfortable.

"I really don't," she replied. "I was just getting out and exploring the island, and then I smelled chocolate, and I had to investigate. As it turns out, I still have a lot of learning to do."

She’d… smelled… the chocolate?

Well, okay, that was weird but that seemed like a pretty harmless weird. Karina could cope. Karina wrestled with herself briefly before she offered, “I can help out, if you’d like? I’ve been here a while.”

Besides, this was going to give her an excuse to see if she could get Elsa to sing.

Chocolate was a rarity in Arendelle! The coffee was certainly the more overpowering smell here, but a good chocolate...

Elsa's sweet tooth had a nose of its own.

"I would appreciate that, I think," she admitted. "So far, all I really know about this place is that sometimes it gets attacked, and my big sibling, who is apparently a werewolf, is willing to protect me from... from something."

He hadn't been terribly specific.

“… Yeah,” Karina said, blinking, “that’s not enough to get by here. Wow. Have you, uh, figured out how the amenities and electronics work in the dorms?”

Start with the basics, right? God, she’d deliberately not signed up to be a sibling but letting some poor newbie have a horrible time of it due to lack of information really wasn’t her style.

Karina was deliberately not thinking too hard about the werewolf thing. Nope.

"I leaned up against a switch on a wall and managed to light a room with it on my first day, so... that helped," Elsa admitted, looking faintly sheepish. "And the running water took some getting used to, but I was not going to give up until I could get myself clean. I'm not in the habit of letting myself wander around in my own filth."

Thank goodness.

"The rest, I'm still getting used to. I haven't really figured out how to work the... TV? And I'm not about to take any risks with the appliances in the kitchen until I know I won't burn the building down trying to cook."

Karina had the sneaking suspicion that someone was laughing at her. Somewhere. She took a long sip of her cider before even trying to figure out where to start with what Elsa was going to have to be taught.

“Okay,” she said, “at least you’ve got the super basics about the dorms. The TV isn’t too complicated to use but I’d need a remote on hand to show you what to do with it.” Karina didn’t think ‘so you press all these buttons’ was going to be much help without a visual aide. “Same with the appliances, though good call on not using them without knowing how. And you can get by pretty easily without cooking if you’re determined.”

And had money.

Another sip of cider and Karina reached for her cinnamon bun. She needed the sugar. “I suppose I should ask—do you want to blend in? Or are you more comfortable sticking with stuff from your own world? Because, um, your dress? Absolutely lovely. But it’s really different from what we wear here.”

And that was just the start of it.

"I..." Elsa looked down at her clothing, and then chewed on her lip for a moment. "I would rather not stand out in a crowd, I'll admit. But there are so many different styles of dress around here, I haven't quite managed to figure out what the most acceptable would be."

And she didn't want to commit some sort of faux-pas just by getting dressed in the morning. Never mind the fact that she had no idea what winter wear around here was supposed to look like. At least her clothing from Arendelle looked warm.

The jacket thrown over the back of Karina's seat was probably a good indicator that bulky was in.

“Right,” Karina said brightly, “so we’ll have to go shopping.”

Like she was going to turn down the chance to do that.

She pulled out her phone to make a list. “Okay, so, bank, and shopping, and general warnings and layout for the island…” Karina studied her list before looking at Elsa. “If you have any questions, make sure to ask? I’ve never done this for someone, so I might miss things.”

But, uh, at least she was trying?

"Even if you miss things, it's... more than I've got," Elsa pointed out, cradling her hot chocolate in her hands. It was rapidly cooling. Too quickly. Fortunately, the cup wasn't clear, and so nobody would be able to see the way frost was starting to form on the inside. "Thank you, Karina. You really don't have to be doing this."

Karina shrugged.

“It’s not like I’m doing a lot,” she said, frowning slightly. “I just think, I mean, if I was someone’s sibling I’d want to make sure they know what they’re getting into, you know? And you don’t have that information, which isn’t just careless, it’s dangerous, and it’s wrong to let someone walk into danger when you can stop them.”

Ugh. Now she was sounding like a Hero.

"That's why I haven't been out very much," Elsa admitted. "I'm not so far out of place that I don't know how to conduct myself around other people, but... as I'm sure you saw... I'm still not exactly navigating the island as though I belong here, yet."

She had a lot of gold, and still wasn't sure where the bank was.

That was… yeah. Karina didn’t have words for that.

“So I’ll help,” Karina said, like that was the only solution, since to her it was. Though it helped that Elsa wasn’t getting on her nerves. “Smooth off the rough edges, huh? It’s not going to cost me anything but time and I’ve got that.”

"And I've got no shortage of it myself," Elsa replied, smiling a little less awkwardly, now. "I've mostly been keeping to myself and studying, at any rate. I know one of my geometry textbooks cover to cover, now."

Which... wasn't a bad thing, really.

Karina would beg to differ. Okay, grades were important but there was a limit.

“That’s… an achievement,” she allowed. “But I can’t say that sounds all that much fun.”

Though given that Karina spent most of her downtime looking for ways to further her career goals, maybe that wasn’t such a terrible thing to do anyway.

“Speaking of fun,” Karina continued, “you were humming earlier. Do you sing?”

"I... do." Elsa wasn't blushing now, but she was giving Karina a curious sort of look. "It's something I picked up when I was little, to pass the time. I kind of thought growing up that everyone does it, but around here, it doesn't seem to be quite so popular."

Shame on everyone. Shame. Singing was fantastic.

It really, really was.

She grinned at Elsa. “I write music,” she shared. “I mean, I sing it too, but um, what you were humming was something I’m just working out. It’s pretty rough right now, but…”

Karina shrugged. “It’ll get better.”

"You wrote that?" Elsa couldn't help but look impressed, smiling a little more. "It was... very catchy. I couldn't help but hum along. Has it got any lyrics yet?"

Something she could be enthusiastic about!

“Some,” Karina admitted. “I haven’t found anything that really sticks with the rhythm and makes me happy yet. But thanks, it’s good to hear it’s catchy.“

Catchy was great.

Catchy was the first step towards making a hit!

"Of course," Elsa replied, still smiling. "It's obvious you're passionate about your music. You care about how the lyrics work with the rhythm. If you ever wanted somebody to run lyrics by... I mean, I'm hardly a great composer, but... I do know what I think sounds good."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject