[ Kimiko tips her arm upward to indicate a small, plastic spherical device affixed to the ceiling. A red light on it pulses hectically as it continues to shriek and bellow with its synthesised alarm.
A chair skids noisily across the kitchenette linoleum as she drags it over, stepping on it, reaching up... And then, unwisely, punches the alarm. The plastic crumples and breaks, a few sparks jump out.
[ It takes some days and some nights (where Furiosa is not there), but they eventually move past their biggest flatmate conflict. Things are mostly amicable and Furiosa pays her rent with a surprising amount of ones. (Part of working at a strip club and having a not insubstantial amount of pay from tip-out.)
Even the silence seems to thaw a little, signing with a casual interest in between eating handfuls of cereal from the box tucked up against her side, held in place with her stump. ]
[ Quite a bit will happen, as it turns out, but in the mean time? Kimiko isn't someone who blushes as a matter of course, but there's some sheepishness around her smile. ]
[ Furiosa only shrugs as if to say "maybe" not also "maybe not." Probably one of those things that requires a touch of social grace, and Furiosa knows she's more bullish than ideal. It's not her fault, those things don't matter in the wasteland. Maybe they don't matter here either.
So, after a moment of thoughtful consideration, she throws out a what the hell type suggestion. ]
What's it hurt?
[ To text him now. Be bold Kimiko. That's all Furiosa will offer because Kimiko did not ask, and she needs to get to work. Furiosa brushes cereal crumbs off on her pant leg before she takes a drink of water by sticking her head under the tap. As she goes, she does have one addendum: ]
[ Reaching across the table, over her breakfast plate, Kimiko plucks up her little Nokia-like phone — considers it, his name and number sitting in there with an empty chat window. Tree, Amos. Something flutters in her chest, a consideration. What would she even say to him? Words don't come easy to her in the best of circumstances. Her throat feels like an unswept chimney; all she can offer is smoke.
She puts her phone back down without opening it. Goes back to her cereal.
Later that day, she texts Furiosa. ]
Murder across the hall. Enforcers have blocked off the entire floor. You should stay at your boyfriend's tonight.
[ Kimiko will... figure something out, vis-a-vis her own sleeping arrangements. ]
[ Furiosa fishes her phone out of her pocket. The annoyed groan she makes and tip of her head seems more fitting for someone reading that the landlord shut off the hot water than someone was murdered on their floor. ]
I'll probably just sign up for some late night fights at the Dome.
[ There are a few couches in the fighters' locker room she can crash on after the fact. Besides, they'll always make room for the Unkillable Loudmouth on the roster. ]
[ Furiosa sleeps in her car. Just for one night for old time's sake. Boots and all. She showers at a truck stop before coming back in the morning. Kimiko doesn't have to know.
Eventually, it circles back around to movie night. Furiosa picks at a loose thread on the couch's arm while Kimiko paints her toenails again. Neither of them is really watching Marmot Mania, a film where the protagonist gets stuck in a time loop in a small town continually celebrating a weather-predicting rodent. ]
I didn't talk for... [ Furiosa squints into the middle distance, as if this could help her remember. ] Think it was eight years. Maybe nine. Lost count after awhile
[ Kimiko isn't sure why it's okay for her to paint her toenails on Furiosa's couch but not engage in discretionary time with a handsome, broad-shouldered mechanic, but she knows enough not to ask at this point. But she does tilt her gaze up at the words, turning them over in her head.
It doesn't reconcile well with sure, steady Furiosa. A woman who always knows her mind, economical with her words, holding onto her syllables like they're drops of water in a drought.
For a moment, there's no response. Just the low murmurs of the movie, the crackle of the television set. Then — ]
I daydream about singing sometimes. Maybe on a stage.
[ For realz. And it's hard not to let her expression catch a little, something vulnerable, not quite sad, over signing hands. ]
[ Furiosa considers her answer. She considers the idea of Kimiko singing on stage. Despite having never heard her voice, she can imagine it. Kimiko bright and full of life.
She should get to have that if that's what she wants. Trade performing at the Dome for it.
The question that follows is a natural one. She could say I couldn't hide anymore, but that isn't the whole of it. She and Jack were the only survivors of that brutal day on the road. They could've worked something out, going from mute garage rat to mute apprentice. She could go another route, sentimental and fond, I found someone worth talking to.
But in the end it wasn't about the other people in her story. It was about owning hers. ]
I decided to start taking back what belonged to me.
Kimiko's gaze skims the top of Furiosa's head for a moment, looking for an answer to that unspoken question between the curve of her ear and the apartment's ceiling, before she carefully screws the wand of dark violent nail polish back into its bottle and sets everything to the side.
Fingertips rest gently on the bulge of muscle in her throat, where the knot of vocal cords faintly jut against skin. Where noise creates vibrations, lays itself into the flesh before extending out into the world.
A faint, air-filled wheeze. No vibration.
She thinks of what she could, or would, say — "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." "うちに帰りたいです." "Hello, Furiosa."
But trying to choke out a single syllable only gets her a second wheeze, a panic in her chest to go with the ringing in her ears. Covering up the misery with a frown, she shakes her head. ]
[ It hadn't been a press to try, but Furiosa isn't surprised when Kimiko braces herself, hand over her throat. Furiosa doesn't know how long she's been silent or why. That's Kimiko's story to own and her story to share only if she wants to. Still, Furiosa watches, chin raised attentively.
For Furiosa, her silence was the single piece of her life she truly had control over for many years. She could never be forced to speak.
For Kimiko, it doesn't happen now. That's fine. Furiosa simply nods in a small movement, just the tiniest bob of her head acknowledging the try. She gets up and dutifully fills two glasses with water before placing them on the couch's side tables. She wanted to get something to soothe Kimiko's throat but mask it behind filling up one for the both of them.
Then, she goes back to signing with a blunt, unimpressed: ]
[ Kimiko accepts the glass of water without making a thing of it. The water might cool her throat from the strain, but at the end of the day her muteness is psychological. The words are there, lodged up in her diaphragm, her chest cavity. Pushing against her lungs, her heart.
And... there they'll stay.
A few more minutes of movie pass by, and Kimiko wholeheartedly concurs. ]
Want to watch Atlantic Trench again?
[ You know, that awesome movie musical about skyscraper-sized robots punching aliens by way of psychic linking of their pilots. In particular, Kimiko appreciates a Japanese leading lady, and gets especially excited when she gets her big solo song. ]
[ And while she may try to keep a stiff upper lip the whole time, Kimiko probably recognizes the soft, almost forlorn expression Furiosa has through parts of the movie. Surprising, not just when the protagonist loses his partner, but her hand curls up in front of her mouth each time the abrasive but undeniably talented mother-daughter duo from Australia appears onscreen with their dog Maximus. Their musical goodbye is touching. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
A chair skids noisily across the kitchenette linoleum as she drags it over, stepping on it, reaching up... And then, unwisely, punches the alarm. The plastic crumples and breaks, a few sparks jump out.
The noise has stopped, at least. ]
no subject
Even the silence seems to thaw a little, signing with a casual interest in between eating handfuls of cereal from the box tucked up against her side, held in place with her stump. ]
What happened to Tree?
no subject
Nothing.
I didn't text him.
Now it's probably too late.
no subject
So, after a moment of thoughtful consideration, she throws out a what the hell type suggestion. ]
What's it hurt?
[ To text him now. Be bold Kimiko. That's all Furiosa will offer because Kimiko did not ask, and she needs to get to work. Furiosa brushes cereal crumbs off on her pant leg before she takes a drink of water by sticking her head under the tap. As she goes, she does have one addendum: ]
But keep him in your room.
no subject
She puts her phone back down without opening it. Goes back to her cereal.
Later that day, she texts Furiosa. ]
Murder across the hall.
Enforcers have blocked off the entire floor.
You should stay at your boyfriend's tonight.
[ Kimiko will... figure something out, vis-a-vis her own sleeping arrangements. ]
no subject
Do you have something lined up?
no subject
[ There are a few couches in the fighters' locker room she can crash on after the fact. Besides, they'll always make room for the Unkillable Loudmouth on the roster. ]
no subject
[ Furiosa sleeps in her car. Just for one night for old time's sake. Boots and all. She showers at a truck stop before coming back in the morning. Kimiko doesn't have to know.
Eventually, it circles back around to movie night. Furiosa picks at a loose thread on the couch's arm while Kimiko paints her toenails again. Neither of them is really watching Marmot Mania, a film where the protagonist gets stuck in a time loop in a small town continually celebrating a weather-predicting rodent. ]
I didn't talk for... [ Furiosa squints into the middle distance, as if this could help her remember. ] Think it was eight years. Maybe nine. Lost count after awhile
no subject
It doesn't reconcile well with sure, steady Furiosa. A woman who always knows her mind, economical with her words, holding onto her syllables like they're drops of water in a drought.
For a moment, there's no response. Just the low murmurs of the movie, the crackle of the television set. Then — ]
I daydream about singing sometimes. Maybe on a stage.
[ For realz. And it's hard not to let her expression catch a little, something vulnerable, not quite sad, over signing hands. ]
What made you start talking again?
no subject
She should get to have that if that's what she wants. Trade performing at the Dome for it.
The question that follows is a natural one. She could say I couldn't hide anymore, but that isn't the whole of it. She and Jack were the only survivors of that brutal day on the road. They could've worked something out, going from mute garage rat to mute apprentice. She could go another route, sentimental and fond, I found someone worth talking to.
But in the end it wasn't about the other people in her story. It was about owning hers. ]
I decided to start taking back what belonged to me.
no subject
Kimiko's gaze skims the top of Furiosa's head for a moment, looking for an answer to that unspoken question between the curve of her ear and the apartment's ceiling, before she carefully screws the wand of dark violent nail polish back into its bottle and sets everything to the side.
Fingertips rest gently on the bulge of muscle in her throat, where the knot of vocal cords faintly jut against skin. Where noise creates vibrations, lays itself into the flesh before extending out into the world.
A faint, air-filled wheeze. No vibration.
She thinks of what she could, or would, say —
"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."
"うちに帰りたいです."
"Hello, Furiosa."
But trying to choke out a single syllable only gets her a second wheeze, a panic in her chest to go with the ringing in her ears. Covering up the misery with a frown, she shakes her head. ]
me now triple proofreading every tag to you
For Furiosa, her silence was the single piece of her life she truly had control over for many years. She could never be forced to speak.
For Kimiko, it doesn't happen now. That's fine. Furiosa simply nods in a small movement, just the tiniest bob of her head acknowledging the try. She gets up and dutifully fills two glasses with water before placing them on the couch's side tables. She wanted to get something to soothe Kimiko's throat but mask it behind filling up one for the both of them.
Then, she goes back to signing with a blunt, unimpressed: ]
This movie is stupid.
she's furisoa now
And... there they'll stay.
A few more minutes of movie pass by, and Kimiko wholeheartedly concurs. ]
Want to watch Atlantic Trench again?
[ You know, that awesome movie musical about skyscraper-sized robots punching aliens by way of psychic linking of their pilots. In particular, Kimiko appreciates a Japanese leading lady, and gets especially excited when she gets her big solo song. ]
fury sosa
Always.
[ And while she may try to keep a stiff upper lip the whole time, Kimiko probably recognizes the soft, almost forlorn expression Furiosa has through parts of the movie. Surprising, not just when the protagonist loses his partner, but her hand curls up in front of her mouth each time the abrasive but undeniably talented mother-daughter duo from Australia appears onscreen with their dog Maximus. Their musical goodbye is touching. ]