fandomtownies | Caritas; Wednesday [08/14].

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Caritas; Wednesday [08/14].

Well, it was Wednesday, and, of course, that meant Summer was ready and raring to go for a fun night at Caritas, slinging...juice boxes, probably, she didn't know. For all the activity going on around here lately, there hadn't been a whole lot of actual drinking going on. Probably because that wasn't a thing Good Toys did, or whatever. All she knew was that their little Tea Parties had been getting some unwanted attention...

...thankfully, that meant the tea parties were being moved to a different location, but there was still one going on in the back room at Caritas that night to keep up appearances, and Summer supposed her hardest part of the night wasn't going to be the fake bullshit happy so much as trying to decide who might want to know about the change in location and who could seriously just sit on it and spin.

In the meantime, though, she figured she could get some quote-unquote fun going on in here by starting up a rousing medly of "99 Bottles of Juice on the Wall" with the dinosaur band. She figured the various reactions to that would prove as a useful gauge for who was genuinely still totally brainwashed and who might rightly want to kill her for even thinking of such a devious thing.

Caritas is open!

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Listen, if there's anyone who would insist that karaoke was fun even when she wasn't trying to pass as totally brainwashed, it would be Summer, and was it really bad that, under the circumstances, she was thinking she needed to pursuade someone to Walk the Dinosaur?

How does she even know that song?

Don't worry about it.

Have some juice! Or maybe tea! Or...something else? Are any of these drink even real? They're just plastic bottles, dudes. But Summer will gladly...gladly serve you some. But mostly, she's just trying to vet you, sorry not sorry.

Someone had been caught here last night, and not by Tip.

That. Could. Not. Stand.

So Tip was here tonight, because clearly it was the place to catch traitors. Why would any traitors show when they knew it had been blown the night before?

Look. Tip was a fashion doll. Critical thinking wasn't really part of her whole thing. (She was going to hate herself SO MUCH next week.)

"Sixty-six bottles of juice on the-- HEEEEY, TIP!"

Oh, thank god she could stop! Summer had not thought that out fully and was really thinking it would be a lot busier a lot sooner, but she hadn't counted on that party down on the boardwalk. She took a deep breath as she stopped singing so she could get all Customer Service up in here, while the dinosaur band played on. They were having a blast with this.

"How's it going?"

"Very well, thank you," Tip said, giving Summer a little nod and a slow, deliberate blink. "What a nice song you were singing. Such fun."

"It really is!" Summer agreed with a laugh, and she was beaming brightly but also trying to size Tip up a little. She definitely didn't remember seeing her at the tea party on Monday, and she definitely didn't seem as grotesquely cheerful as some, so she wasn't quite sure what to make of that, but, hey, it was still early, plenty of time to start picking away at it, right? "Would you like some juice? If I take one down now, they'll have to start all over again, but that would be fine! That way, you can hear the whole song from the beginning!"

Summer really was thinking it was a great test.

This is why Summer was prone to being a villain, even when she was technically on the good side.

Tip was a fashion doll. They didn't do petty, uncool things like enthusiasm. "Thank you," she said. "But it would be rude to interrupt them. They might seem happy to restart, but sometimes people who seem happy are only pretending."

Were you pretending Summer? Pretending was lying. And lying was wrong.

Existence was pretending. Summer lived her whole life pretending to be something she either really wasn't or something she desperately wanted to be, and she definitely wasn't going to stop now. But it did mean she was really good at it, too. All that practice.

"Why would anyone pretend to be happy?" she asked, laughing lightly, shaking her head at such a wild concept, while also trying to read if there was any pretending nature to Tip asking it in the first place. "Especially around here! Everything's so perfect!"

"Well," she amended, with a sort of reluctant expression, "nearly perfectly. Seems there's been a few toys that have had trouble being happy..."

Tip nodded at that, actual energy going into the motion.

Fashion dolls lived to judge people, after all.

"It's very sad when toys have to be . . . put away. But it's for their own good, isn't it. The Toybox will help them remember how to be happy."

"I sure hope I never forget how to be happy!" said Summer, with, like, totally extra happiness. "Starting with not even talking about the big bad TB, because that's just, like, the ultimate sad, forgetting how to be happy! How does that even happen?"

"Some toys," Tip said, eyes darting around as she leaned in, like she was about to share a great secret. Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Are just broken."

Ohhhhhh. Didn't that make you shudder to even think about? It made Tip shudder.

Such a delicious feeling, being superior to those poor, broken toys.

And Summer leaned in, too, because it was impossible not to lean in when there were whispers and secrets, especially when it involved feeling deliciously superior to other people. But as Summer leaned in, her first instinct was actually to whisper back broken how, because that felt like it could easily have been a code word.

But there was just something in the way that Tip said it that sent more of a chill up Summer's currently nonexistent spine right now that the idea itself did.

"You know, Tip," she whispered back instead, her tone going almost warning, "talking about this sort of thing isn't very happy, especially not in whispers, because secrets don't make friends. I think we'd both feel much better talking about something else..."

She took a few seconds to see if that got much of a reaction out of Tip before leaning back and charging in with an over-exhuberant opening of her arms, "Like that super cute outfit that you've got on! Ohmygosh, you are so lucky to have clothes that aren't just sewn on! I am totally jealous, but not in a mean way, but, like, a friendly and happy-for-you way."

Ugh, Summer, you were almost cool.

Tip blinked pleasantly at that turnaround, and then lowered her eyelids and chin in an obvious facsimile of modesty. "Oh Summer. You're so nice to say that. Some of us were just lucky to be made the way we are."

Unlike you, Summer. Tip was almost sad you didn't seem like you were broken.

Nope. Not broken. Just really....soft. Although she did almost have a giant head disproportional to her body, but with much, much more soulless eyes. That got at least a small quirk out of a stitched eyebrow though. Yeah, she hadn't really had the chance to talk with Tip much since she got back, but this was clearly not the girl she knew in high school. Oh, man, though, when this was over...oof. She pushed those thoughts away with a smile and a little shrug. "That's true," she said, "but all toys are good no matter how they're made as long as they're having fun and bringing happiness into the world, right?"

When this was over, Tip was going to be pissed.

Mostly at herself.

"Oh yes," she said, after just a moment too long. "Of course they are! Any toy can be a good toy. Just some of us are . . ." She cocked her head to the side. ". . . Different."

And there it was again, Summer having a slight moment of wondering if Tip was trying to drop a code in on her, and the fact that she just couldn't quite figure it out could be a good indication that it might have just been that she wanted to think Tip was in on it and not just being kind of, like, classist about toys.

Because, yeah, here Summer was practically straight out of a bowling alley claw machine right now...

"But variety is the spice of life!" she chirped, practically pumping one of those spindly stuffed arms of her in a cheery fist. "It takes all sorts of toys to make the world go 'round!"

Edited 2019-08-14 23:23 (UTC)

Tip was absolutely being classist about toys. Just one of the many things she'd hate herself for later.

"It does," she said easily. After all, if there weren't a variety of cheaper toys, the fancier ones like herself wouldn't stand out at all. "And the most important thing is that we can all be played with."

It was a good thing Summer's nose was just kind of stitched on right now, beause she probably wouldn't have been able to help wrinkling it a little at that. That just sounded....unsettling. Kinda gross. Definitely not good.

"Exactly," Summer enthused with a sort of dreamy appreciation for unsettling, gross, not good fact. "It's a shame, though, there's not a lot of people around here to play with tonight. Everyone's at that party, I suppose, which, hey, good for them, who doesn't love a fun party?"

"It's a very fun party," Tip agreed. "I was just there." She tilted her head at Summer again. "Why aren't you?"

There was a correct answer to this question. Let's see if Summer knew it!

And Summer laughed, though, if she was honest, the laugh was just to buy herself a little more time as she tried to figure out what the right answer to that could even be in a world like this.

"Oh," she said blithely, "I wasn't invited.

"JK, everyone was, but, well....this is my job, isn't it? And what's more fun than knowing you've managed to do a job well done? It's important to have fun for everyone all around the island, too."

She was starting to feel like she might be trying to oversell it a bit much, but she figured she could temper that down a little by tilting her head and smiling sweetly at Tip as she asked, "Why'd you leave?"

If it was so much fun and all.

Tip stared at Summer for an uncomfortably long moment, then nodded.

"Because I wanted to see if there was another tea party here tonight," she said. "And make sure everyone there was having the right kind of fun."

Yeah, that was...not pleasant, and Summer almost squirmed, but she stayed firm in looking back as pleasantly vacuous as she could, all the while thinking that if Tip tried something on her, she would kick that oversize head right off her skinny littl neck--

--ugh, Summer! Tip was your friend, and there you were thinkink of her head as a soccer ball. This was the worse.

"Oh, there's a tea party," she said, channeling her relief into her smile. "In the back room, like it has been, but no one's really shown up yet. You'll be the first guest, Tip."

Tip almost looked disappointed. "Really. And here I thought I'd be fashionably late."

It's just so...lounge-y!

Just like before, it's a No Squirrels Allowed tea party in the back room, but, unlike before, it doesn't really matter because it's not the real tea party, it's a FAKE tea party, bam! Take that! Expectations subverted!

So, yeah, Summer is really hoping the word got out about it, but she's keeping a close eye on everything either way.

Okay, so, who went and told Life there was a BDE going on so that it could just sweep in and show up on my doorstep this week, huh?

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Caritas; Wednesday [08/14].

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Lounge - 08/14.

Back Room - NFB - 08/14.

OOC - 08/14.