Fast Eddie's, Thursday evening

[myfifthrodeo]

There was an idea in recovery that routine was important for sobriety, so Rosa was back at the bowling alley for the second Thursday in a row. Not actually bowling yet, but perched on a stool by the snack counter, her sketchbook on her knees, as she doodled various features of the whole bowling aesthetic.

The NPC bowlers themselves made great models for gestural drawing.

[open!]

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[stykera]

There was no specific reason for Stark to wander in to the bowling alley other than it was something different to do and he'd gone out for a walk after feeling restless and it was right there. And bowling had been mentioned on the radio once or twice recently.

He hadn't been in here since the building had fallen into the hole last summer. Maybe he could actually learn the correct rules of bowling at some point.

Or maybe he'd just get bowling alley nachos? Who could say.

He offered Rosa a nod when he spotted her because it seemed like the thing to do.

[myfifthrodeo]

Rosa jerked her head up as he came in, the sound coming off of him impossible to ignore.

She'd never heard anything like it before.

She frowned a bit even as she waved back. Maybe it was his mask she was hearing? Some new sort of alien metal, like the Pod Squad's alien glass back home?

Please pardon the wince, Stark. You were kind of . . . loud for her.

[stykera]

"Are you alright?" Stark asked, frowning slightly in return.

He'd noticed the reaction and the wince, of course. He'd gotten much worse reactions before.

[myfifthrodeo]

"Um. Yeah. I'm fine. Um." She waved a hand by her ear. "Tinnitus, maybe."

She knew it wasn't.

"Hi. I'm Rosa."

[stykera]

"I work at the clinic," Stark offered. "They could take care of you if you need it. Hello, Rosa. I'm Stark."

[myfifthrodeo]

"Yeeeeeah, I'm pretty sure they couldn't, actually. It's . . . complicated." She shook her head. "Stark, huh? First name? Last name? Rockstar name?"

[stykera]

Complicated was something Stark was familiar with.

"My name," he said. "I only have the one." And he'd definitely never been accused of being a rockstar previously. "Does that make it first and last?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“I think the term is ‘mononym’. Very rockstar.” Look, he had a strong aesthetic. That was what rock was all about when you got right down to it, right?

Or maybe it was just the noise.

“Um. Weird question: are you from space?”

[stykera]

He could sing at least, when he had the inclination to do so. And he had leather pants occasionally. Stark was basically halfway to a rockstar already!

"I am," Stark said, just a little hesitantly. "Why do you ask? Are you?"

[myfifthrodeo]

Rosa shook her head. “You just kinda. Have a space vibe. Especially, uh.” She huffed out a breath and gave up trying to seem normal. “Okay, don’t take this the wrong way, but the side of your head is really loud.”

[stykera]

Stark blinked a few times at that, then reached up to touch his mask.

"It's...loud?" he asked, visibly confused. "My head is loud to me, sometimes, but no-one else has ever said it was loud to them."

[myfifthrodeo]

“Yeah, well. I’m kinda unique,” Rosa said with a grimace. “I can sort of. Hear the universe. The way it all vibrates. And I’ve never heard anything like that before.”

[stykera]

"My head vibrates?" That was news to Stark, Rosa. He was just going to keep his hand on his mask for a bit.

"I'm a Stykera," he said. "A Banik attuned to the dying. You can hear everything moving?"

That sounded exhausting, Rosa.

[myfifthrodeo]

It was, yes. Yet somehow, she maintained her sobriety!

“My friend Michael says it’s the molecular frequencies of things or whatever, but I’m not the science-y type. What does ‘attuned to dying’ mean?”

[stykera]

Keep up the good work, Rosa.

"I've never met anyone that could do that," Stark told her. "I...deal with the dying. Help them to cross over to where they're meant to go."

And he kept a little bit of all of them in his loud head!

[myfifthrodeo]

Which explained a lot, really!

“Huh.” Rosa poked her lower lip with the end of her pencil. “Do you help them when they come back, too?”

[stykera]

Stark thought about that for a moment before answering.

"Coming back is very rare. Very. I've only seen it... only a few times. Why?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“I was dead for ten years. Was kind of wondering if maybe someone was supposed to be there for, like. Reorientation or something.”

[stykera]

"Ten years?" Stark repeated. "That's...how? You don't have to say, if you don't want to. And I don't know. I've never heard of that. I'm sure it would have helped."

[myfifthrodeo]

“Alien stasis pod,” Rosa said with a shrug. “Hence the funky hearing now. It was a whole . . . thing.”

[stykera]

"It healed you, very slowly? I helped bring a friend back once..."

Not willingly and he'd just been the power source, really, but it had happened. "She was only gone a short while. Ten years must have been very difficult. I'm sorry."

He realized belatedly how that might sound and quickly added "not that you came back. That you were gone so long."

[myfifthrodeo]

“I mean, what really sucked was dying at all,” Rosa said, deciding not to go into the whole ‘my future brother-in-law brought me back because of his massive martyr complex’ thing. “But, uh. Thanks.”

[stykera]

"Dying is rarely pleasant for those involved," Stark said. "I help when I can. And...if I'm too loud I can go."

[myfifthrodeo]

Rosa shook her head. “Loud’s okay. Especially once I know where it’s coming from. But, you know, if you’re hankering to bowl, don’t let me stop you.”

[stykera]

"I don't really know how to bowl," Stark admitted. "I was just out walking and decided to come in. You're sure I'm not disturbing you?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“I’m just here to draw. I can totally do that and talk at the same time.” She held up her sketchbook for him to see, showing a range of little drawings from dramatic, vaguely human-shaped squiggles to nearly photorealistic studies of shoes and bowling balls. “There’s a lot of visual interest in here, you know?”

[stykera]

"Do you not know how to bowl either?" Stark asked, peering at the sketchbook. "Or was this just a good place to look for things to draw?"

He stopped and glanced around. "There are a lot of things to look at, aren't there?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“. . . I know the basics. Roll ball, knock down pins. But yeah, I’m mostly here for the aesthetic. It’s like . . . this crazy encapsulation of mid century middle class middle America.”

[stykera]

"Is it?" That was some phrasing that didn't mean much of anything to Stark, Rosa. "I wouldn't know. Do you draw in here often?"

[myfifthrodeo]

Rosa chuckled automatically, then bit her lip. “Wait, no, you’re actually honestly asking.” She cleared her throat. “Uh, this is only my second time. But in NA we talk a lot about routines, so I’m thinking of making it a regular Thursday thing.”

[stykera]

Stark offered a slightly confused smile in response to the chuckle. "Routines can be helpful. I do better with things to do, to keep busy. What's NA?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“Narcotics Anonymous?” Rosa said. No one in this town ever understood her acronyms. “It’s, um. An addiction recovery program.”

[stykera]

Stark didn't understand many acronyms, to be fair.

"Oh, I didn't mean to pry."

[myfifthrodeo]

Rosa shrugged. “I brought it up. I’m just not used to having to define it.”

[stykera]

"There are still a lot of things I don't know about here. But now I know that, at least, so I won't have to ask again."

[myfifthrodeo]

“That USA very healthy way to look at things,” Rosa said. “Very NA.”

[stykera]

"You would know better than I would," Stark said agreeably. "I haven't had any experience with that sort of thing."

Or with anything even remotely similar.

"Does it help, your program?"

[myfifthrodeo]

“I’m almost two years sober,” Rosa said proudly. “So yeah. It’s been really good for me.”

[stykera]

"That's good!" Stark flashed her a smile. "Is congratulations the right word for that?"

[myfifthrodeo]

"Congratulations totally works," Rosa said. "It's the longest I've managed to stay sober. You know, not counting the time I was dead for."

[stykera]

"That's very good then," Stark said. That probably explained why he hadn't ever seen her at Summer's bar nights. "Two years can be a very long time."

Especially if you lived somewhere like here and could hear the universe.