Fandom Post Office, May 17

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Fandom Post Office, May 17

Éponine wasn't even remotely surprised any more when they got seemingly random, strange deliveries.

Like the pallet of toothpaste that had just materialized along with the rest of the incoming mail this morning, for example; it had no address information on it and none of her efforts to figure out why it was there or where it had come from turned up any information whatsoever.

So she shrugged, took a couple of cases off the pallet, cut the tops open, and put them out front beside the door with a shakily hand-lettered sign that read TAKE SOME, PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD attached to the front of one case.

Also, there was a small arrow pointing up to the NOW HIRING sign that was in the front window.

[OOC: No OCD, open, feel free to mod your toothpaste flavor, no, I have no idea. There are several shifts available; poke me via email if you're interested.]

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Tip paused by the pallet full of toothpaste thoughtfully. There was a pretty good assortment here, including some of J.Lo's favorite flavors, and she had been thinking of sending him a sort of reverse care package, maybe help with how clingy he was being towards her mom now that Tip was off at school.

So she started sifting through it, stacking up a few varieties of mint (especially any that had those weird little micro-bead things in them, which Tip thought was horrifying but J.Lo insisted added a delicious texture, "like little popping crunches") and setting aside the more food-like flavors like bubblegum or vanilla. She quickly had more than enough toothpaste to last J.Lo for several months, even if he was feeling particularly snackish, but she kept digging, anyway, just in case there was something new and different he hadn't tried at the bottom.

"Oh good, you're going to help me get rid of some of it," exclaimed Éponine, who'd been watching out the front window in hopes that someone would do just that and just come over to poke her head out the door. "I don't know where we get these things, but no one would take them back."

"My friend likes them," Tip explained. "So you'll kind of get them back, but, you know, as a package to mail with postage and stuff. So only temporarily." Yes, Tip, she likely understood how her own mail service worked. "It just -- showed up?"

She was still new to Fandom. Its ways still confused her.

"Yes," Éponine said with the resigned sigh of someone who'd been here a while, "it happens from time to time, d'you see? There's letters that get lost along the way sometimes, and turned up in this dimension instead of where they were meant to go. And sometimes things like this just turn up all by themselves with no reason. I've checked, and no one's claimed it, but I can't have it taking up all the space."

Besides, she was missing enough of her own teeth that it sort of felt like an insult.

She waved a hand. "Take as much as you like, there's more yet in back."

Tip looked over the pretty large stack she'd already collected. "I think Mom might find a way to murder me long distance if I send too much home," she said. "Is that why you're hiring? To find people to help keep the space clear when stuff shows up?"

Éponine let out a rough bark of a laugh. "Good lord, no! I only mean to have some help around here, minding the lobby and looking after the customers, and some of the kids like a chance to earn a bit of money. D'you want the job? I've a few days open, you can take your pick."

That didn't sound too hard. And maybe she could get a discount on shipping things back to J.Lo. But "I don't have a work permit."

Tip wasn't used to the whole "US laws need not apply" thing going on on the island, no.

Oh, now Éponine really threw her head back and laughed. "Good lord, d'you think I do? I don't know if any of the others who've worked here so long's I've been around do either, for that matter, 'specially since most of us oughtn't even exist in this time and place."

She took a breath, shook her head, and got a hold of herself before continuing in a calmer and less flippant tone. "Place like this, that sort of thing doesn't much matter. Good lord, how would they even check? The job's yours if you want it."

Fandom might have helped her develop some modicum of moral sensibilities, but a sense of legality? Not so much.

"Really?" Tip blinked, startled at both the laughter and the speed with which the job was offered. "You don't need to interview me or anything?"

The J.Lo in her head was poking her in the side going "DO NOT JINX THE JOBS OFFERING TIPFOOL!" so she rushed on. "I mean, that'd be great. I could work . . . Thursday?"

The lady had seriously just offered her any day for doing a job, right? So her mom couldn't even complain about her taking a job when she was supposed to be learning things. You didn't get much more part-time than a one-day-a-week commitment.

"Thursday," echoed Éponine, and got that slightly glassy-eyed look she sometimes did when she was trying to think. That boy of Cosette's hadn't shown up the last week or so, and if he hadn't gone and disappeared, and then turned back up to wonder where his shift had gone, his loss. "Yes, that'll do. It's simple enough, really, it -- say, what year d'you come from?"

The inquiry made sense, even if that wasn't apparent from the complete lack of a segue.

"This one." Velma had at least explained time travel to Tip. "Uh, 2016."

Who knew, maybe the island traveled through time as well as space when it decided to change locations.

"Ah, that's good then," Éponine said, with evident relief. "I expect you'll have less trouble than I did learning how to use the computer in that case."

It probably did travel through time and space. At least, no one should rule out the possibility.

Tip smiled at that. "I'm an internet native," she said. "I learned how to read on a computer screen." Which may not be as obviously a formative experience for Éponine as it was for Tip. "So, um. When are you from, then?"

Tip had no guesses. Other than "before dental hygiene was pervasive and relatively easily accessed."

"What was it now, 180 years ago?" Éponine was talking to herself as much as she was talking to Tip, and frowning. (She could do math, she could! It wasn't easy for her, but she'd do it.) "No, a bit more, I think, yes. It was 1832 when I left home, if I remember the dates right. Good lord, what a time I had learning to use everything! But it's all right now, I can manage well enough."

Tip boggled. She'd heard about people coming from all sorts of times, but that didn't make it any less weird to realize she was talking to someone who was from 169 years before she was even born. "Wow. And you're -- French, right?"

She was pretty sure 19th century France wasn't an awesome place to have been. It was a little late for the Reign of Terror, but it still didn't exactly sound nice.

At least the first half of the 19th century in France had been made up of some revolution or another. Okay, maybe not quite that much of it but it would have been easy to assume as much.

Éponine dipped her head slightly in acknowledgment. "You've got it right, you do. I'm not going back, though. Not ever, if I've my way."

So no, not an awesome place to have been.

"Of course not," Tip said. "How would you explain any of the amazing 21st century advancements to anyone? They'd lock you up."

Hell, they might do that in Tip's era if she tried to explain Fandom to anyone. And Tip's world had flying cars.

This time, when Éponine laughed, it was a little too loud. "For good this time, most likely," she muttered. "Hardly worth it."

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Fandom Post Office, May 17

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