Paradise Street
The comfortable banter that was passed between them seemed to have been pulled fully mature, out of some friendly space. Remy accepted ribbing on his light fingered habits, not at all repentant, and not chastised for his skills. In turn, Lindsey put up with dozens of jokes about he law, conspiracies, and some truly incredible and convoluted inquiries about the legality of certain events.
Lindsey told stories about individuals he'd met, their appearances up for interpretation, and Remy would counter with some of the odder adversaries faced by the X-men, some of whom were strangers that Ororo hadn't met, only heard of.
Neither of them wanted to be controlled, that need for meandering showed through.
Sometimes Ororo saw signs of Lindsey being from a somewhat different Earth. Mutants weren't common to him, demons were more referred to. No fool she, it was clear that he'd driven through the walls of one dimension and into another.
The survivors tended to find their own kind, out of a desire to be near those who wouldn't need to analyze experiences.
Lindsey didn't have any great emotionally expectations; his underlying attitude was one of acceptance, with strength beneath. Certainly, he was no unsure boy who didn't know what a situation called for. He had no visible mutations, though a scar encircled one wrist in such a fashion that she wondered how it was that he hadn't lost his hand. When he saw her eyeing the scar, he looked challenging back at her.
Mature eyes evaluated her. A fighter of some kind. The world was a hard place, without being an outlaw and a mutant.
Lawyer, supposed to protect the people, and a thief. It was a joke that she was aware of, and one that they seemed to pull out every so often. Maybe he'd cheated a client, or exposed his superiors' unclean hands. Not just driving to see the sights, but to leave a place, stage of his life. He'd been pinned down for too long. She recognized the twitches, how he stroked the steering wheel of his battered truck. 'Freedom mattered' was more than an idea.
Remy left his sunglasses in the truck when they stopped for dinner. Lindsey apparently had seen enough to be used to things, and her friend was in a zone. Comfortable around his new friend, and unconcerned about what people thought.
He'd pulled the knee of his jeans open, and bare skin was visible as he sat. One leg on the seat, arm along the back of the booth. Lindsey took what was now his place next to Remy, and she sat opposite them.
Chaperone or guest, she wasn't sure if she was unwanted yet. There were minutes when Lindsey speculated in more than male appreciation at her talents.
They looked at one another when she made the suggestion of them going with her to Westchester. Words weren't used, but incomplete expressions, and minute gestures. Remy had found someone who knew about understatement.
"I suppose we could stop by, I wouldn't want to impose."
Autumn's consorts lifted their heads and gorged on the bounty, knowing that winter was jealous, and those who wished to prosper were to don coats for hiding.
He kept falling in with the strong. A woman that could order the sky to open for sun, or clap shut with her pain.
Remy, who lit cigarettes without a lighter and had a spring in this step that begged for gliding challenges. Among them, he was aware of how unprepared he'd been just out of law school.
Still not aware of how lovers can grab a bystander and tease him onto a plank without giving him their full attention. As a diversion, there were ligature marks and scars that require lectures from senior lawyers. Obsession always accepted new members, and there was no lengthy application period.
Leaning back against Remy didn't hurt. The Cajun let him find a spot that suited him, then made room.
He was writing a song. It wasn't hard to compose music, that was in his fingers, and it came without effort.
Remy seemed perfectly adjusted to his musical outburst, and gamely offered his opinion about the wisdom of rhyming 'prey, fray, and day,' with one another. He wondered politely about why Lindsey emphasized the clean safety of day and didn't ask about angels being off the list as rescuers.
The wind was talking to Ororo it seemed to Lindsey. The way s he swayed slowly in the seat, face lifted into the rushing air, mouth opening every so often, tasting the wind, then whistling back. He thought he might understand the *whoosh* and even the whipping of the rearview pendants.
Remy seemed to grow progressively at ease as he teased 'Stormy' into a fond exasperation that was plainly familiar to both of them.
Ororo was beautiful in the same way a cliff was; elegant, no lack of features, but with edges dangerous if one didn't pay attention. She had an inborn dignity that surrounded her and buoyed her upwards at intervals, she didn't have to come to ground to be the keeper of the creatures.
She also struck Lindsey as the sort of woman whose emotions could pour down to drown a man. To be with her, in any capacity, was to feel how embracing Nature could be, as well as the rest of the Mother's ranging emotions.
They went over the passes when it became clear that winter had seduced fall into going to bed in a stripping of branches and gusty sweep of the orchards.