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| Log Title | |
|---|---|
| Participants | Ellen, Layla |
| Synopsis | The butterfly effect. Layla and Ellen encounter one another at the 7-11 in Clinton. Layla does her thing without Ellen knowing. |
| Location | 7-11 - Clinton - Manhattan |
| Time | February 6, 2016 |
| Posted By | Ellen |
When you're too disinclined to travel elsewhere, the 7-11 will suffice for all your grocery needs. While not everything has nutritional value (unless, of course, you're counting chocolate as a major food group), it lets you get what you want, when you want it. Ellen Giordano rarely has time to shop, and most of what she buys is junk food anyway. Naturally, she has chosen to head inside the convenience store this afternoon, instead of a grocery store, ignoring a light rain outside to make her way over from her apartment. Half-empty, it barely stands on the corner. Her neighbor's kid has been banging on the walls for nearly an hour despite protests from an overwrought mother. It seemed an appropriate time to go, if only to escape the noise. And Ellen could really use some stuff to eat. Her cupboards are almost bare.
Dressed in a rain-splattered jacket, she makes her way up one aisle and then down the next, the clerk mostly absorbed by a newspaper he is reading. The banner, "MUTANT CRIME RATES ON THE RISE?", catches her eye, and causes her to pause, a bag of chips in hand, but she distractedly returns to her buying. She's looking for something. A specific brand.
Rain continues to gently pelt the windows, audible if not visible through the white backing of an oversized poster. Another beautiful day in New York.
Not too long afterwards, a damp little street rat makes her way into the store. It's about equal parts avoiding the rain and finding something to eat, so she plans to draw out her browsing for as long as possible. Tucking her skateboard up under an arm, Layla uses her free hand to push back the hood of her jacket, which has provided her at least a little protection from the rain, though the damp has eventually started to soak through the wool of it. The clerk gets a brief glance, hardly one of interest, and her gaze only flickers over the headline, before she ducks up the nearest aisle. Her hand, swimming in an oversized fingerless glove, trails over some of the wares as she peruses them. Lazily, she makes her way down the one aisle before turning up the next. Which is when she notices Ellen there doing some browsing of her own. All in all, the girl doesn't seem horribly surprised, but then, she never does. After a slight pause, she decides to continue up the aisle, bringing her nearer to the woman, all the while looking like she's merely checking out the stock on the shelves.
The off duty cop keeps searching. She needs salty chips, and none of that cheap-ass stuff. Like a fine connoisseur of all things junk food, she pushes the bag back into the shelf, effectively rearranging things as she tries to get at the ones in the back. The clerk, if he's noticed, doesn't seem to care. Just as long as nobody's trying to steal anything, that's all that he's concerned with. Even as things continue to switch places with a rustling of plastic, the cop's face drawn in a frown. "Where the hell —?" she begins before her eyes alight triumphantly as she pulls a silver bag out. That's it. She's got it. She's pleased, but only until she turns the bag over, and grumbles at the label, "Low fat? Jesus." and promptly stuffs it back in where she found it. Really, things should have been better organized in the first place, but try telling that to the absorbed gentlemen behind the glass. He's much too busy at the moment.
Coming upon the racks of chips, Layla watches Ellen rummage about, searching for some Holy Grail of snackfood, but come up short. She glances over the selection herself, just standing silently beside the woman for a long moment. "Excuse me," comes the girl's voice from somewhere around Ellen's elbow. "That one up there on the top. I can't reach," she points out wryly, indicating a bag of cheese puffs at the front. Under different circumstances, she'd probably just take her chances with climbing the shelves like a little monkey, but today this seems a better option. And if all goes according to plan, Ellen may or may not find her own bag of salty snacks hiding in behind it.
"Huh?" is Ellen's reply as she looks down over her shoulder at the tall, but still much shorter, teen. There's no flash of recognition — not yet — though she's met this girl once before at Grand Central. It's nothing more than an initial look. Not long enough for her to realize it's a familiar face if her memory is that good. Brown eyes move back up towards the higher shelf. She spots the cheese puffs, and then with a "Oh yeah, sure," she reaches over to take the bag. And, no surprise, there is a second bag behind it; the one Ellen wants. She looks mildly surprised, pulling it out immediately afterwards. The cheese puffs offered to Layla, she beams. "Found just what I was looking for. Fancy that." Pure coincidence, see. She says, "Here you g…" A blink follows. Then: "Wait, I know you. Kid who found my cell phone."
"Thanks," Layla replies, taking the cheese puffs, crinkling the plastic bag in her hand as she grips it by the corner. She doesn't seem horribly interested as to Ellen's own hunt for snack food, though there's some inward vindication that she was, once again, right in what she saw. It's only when the woman recognizes her that Layla finally looks up, giving her head a little toss to get her hair out of her face. "Oh yeah. Small world," she remarks, not sounding nearly so amazed as she perhaps should, considering the sheer coincidence of the whole thing. "Guess you didn't need my help this time." She nods towards the salty chips which, should anyone ask, Ellen found all on her own.
"Yeah," agrees Ellen, but then she rethinks her own answer. "Well, sort of. You helped a little," says the cop, ignorant of anything else that might have transpired. As far as she knows, she just had a stroke of luck. Now she'll have a salty snack to lessen the aggravation of a neighbor's kid drumming on their shared wall, as well as a distraction to keep her from going over to threaten to string him up by his toes. Warm, fuzzy thoughts like that are the last things on her mind as she drops the chip bag in her basket, though; she's still got shopping to do. Ellen notes offhandedly, "I guess that's two I owe you now." Funny how she can make those kinds of promises in the company of a causality mutant, but she does. "Let me guess. Blowing your allowance?" she asks conversationally as she continues halfway down the aisle to find the next item on her list. Instant coffee. Even more nutritious.
"Well, maybe the cheesies helped," Layla decides instead, hoisting the bag up by the crinkled corner. Still, she doesn't rush to brush off this idea of being owed, considering a brief moment before nodding in agreement. "I guess so. But my interest rates are reasonable." There's a faint and wry smile with that, though she certainly won't be forgetting about those favours owed. Never hurts to have those floating around out there, getting good karma. She glances back down at the cheez-flavoured snack food, considering the matter of her allowance. "Yeah, something like that." She hitches the skateboard up a little higher. "Sometimes you just have a craving."
"Interest?" This has Ellen snorting. "Geez, way to milk it for all it's worth," she observes on a laugh. The coffee isn't nearly as difficult for her to find; as it happens, her preferred brand is right up front. Taking the canister and adding it to the contents of the metal basket (which, it should be noted, contain spray cheese, crackers and gum), she takes a half step towards some kind of pasta. As for the junk food cravings, no argument here. Ellen nods. "I hear you. Back when I was your age, I was practically living on Dr Pepper. And — hell, just about everything that wasn't good for me." Kind of like now. "We even used to combine things for a laugh. In fact," she thinks to add, "just so you know: if anyone ever says to you, 'Let's dunk the things in melted chocolate,' it tastes nasty, okay?" A box of dried pasta is shaken pointedly. "'S good advice."
"It's a hard world out there. I got to be practical," Layla deadpans with a helpless shrug. She has to milk it, see. Not her fault. Content to just loiter in the store, and reasonably certain she's less likely to get busted for it if she's with an adult, the girl is content to simply trail after Ellen as she does her shopping. The contents of the basket do get a slightly dubious look, though she doesn't say anything about it just yet. "Yeah, I'll keep that in mind. Avoid the powdered fake cheese and chocolate combination. Not everything can be a discovery like Reese's." As they pass by, she reaches out to snag a box of Animal Crackers. At least those are a little healthier, right? "You still ever try to experiment like that?" She might rule it out on maturity alone, except she can see that tastes perhaps haven't matured as much as some.
Ellen is not expecting the young teenager to give her dietary advice. Not in the junk food aisle of a 7-11. More to the point, how many teens would lecture her on the major food groups? If she notices Layla's look directed towards her basket as she glances back over her shoulder, she doesn't show any sign of it. The brunette is mostly browsing now. A few of the impulse items are catching her eye, but she does know they cost a bit more than they would elsewhere. If she lived in the Upper East Side, maybe she could afford to be extravagant with her tastes, but as it is she's on a strict budget. Only the 'necessities' are being bought on this grocery trip. "Experiment like what?" she asks. "Reese's? No, I'm talkin' 'I'm bored, let's steal your grandmother's chocolate bar out of the fridge and make it inta fine paste, then douse it over fake cheese' experiments. That's what me and the gang did. Doubt we ever had the intelligence to concoct somethin' that could sell for millions." With a shrug, she notes, "Books were never my area of expertise, you know?"
Layla is far from a normal teen, but her own purchases are pretty standard, and anyway, she can hardly see much good coming from commenting on Ellen's shopping habits. So it begins and ends with that look, before she turns her idle attention towards eyeing the shelves as she drifts along after the woman. "Well, experiment like that then," she replies, with a shrug. "Never know what you might stumble upon. Imagine what people must have said to the first guy to try peanut butter and banana." There's a small smile with that, suggesting that this may be at least somewhat in jest, though it's hard to say how much and which part. "But I don't really have a gang." And experimenting with weirdo food combinations by yourself is just kind of sad and strange.
Whether it's in jest or not, Ellen smirks. "Or the guy who mashed the peanuts into butter in the first place. What's-his-face," is her contribution. "People must've thought that was a strange idea too, but it did work out for him." Something gets tossed into the basket with as much carelessness as before. "Right? Hell, why am I askin' you this? It's Saturday afternoon and you're buying cheese stuff. You don't want to talk school." The mention of not having a gang, well, that has her shrugging again. "Gang — that's the term we used to use in my old neighborhood. Just friends. You probably call 'em fellow Boarders or Shredders or whatever." This is in reference to the skateboard Layla carries. Ellen remembers her using it back at Grand Central before she lost the aforementioned cell phone.
"School isn't the best topic, no," Layla agrees, waltzing around the point that her attendance there is about as spotty as can be. "But yeah. I get your point. Or like the first guy who decided lobster would be great to eat." A far more practical reaction would be to run away, considering how terrifying they look. She glances down at her skateboard before letting out a quiet chuckle at the attempt to pick up on the hip lingo. "I knew what you meant." And her own point about not having any still stands. She pauses in front of the Pop Tarts, but is starting to have trouble juggling everything and that skateboard. So things are rearranged, set upon the board which is held now like a tray.
The mention of lobster earns a slight grimace. "Never touched the things before. Lobsters. If I were him, whoever," again, she doesn't remember names, not that the lobster guy would be as easy to recall as the peanut butter guy, "I would have stuck to fish. Tuna. Baccalà." The last one is Italian. "Not something that watches you before you eat it, in that little tank. Freakin' Upper East Siders may like it, but not me," she states with a dismissive hand wave before one last thing from the aisle gets put in the basket. "Uh, grab you a box of those?" she offers as she sees the teen negotiating things between her arm and the board. She doesn't pry into the 'no friends' answer she seems to be getting, but there is a slight raise of her eyebrows, and then an offered hand that points towards the Pop Tarts.
"Yeah, rich people are weird. Fish eggs and things that look like huge spiders. Who'd want to eat that?" Layla wrinkles her nose at that idea. No, she's definitely no child of privilege herself, that's for sure. In fact, she doesn't really know of this Italian fish, but just raises her eyebrows a bit at the reference. "Though they wouldn't have been in the tank when the guy first started trying to eat them." No, that probably would have come afterwards. At the offer, Layla nods. "Sure, thanks. You can just put it on here," she notes, having now successfully managed to arrange the skateboard horizontally, held at either end like a very long tray. "Breakfast of champions," is added a little wryly, with a nod towards the Pop Tarts.
"Naw," says Ellen with an agreeing nod, while still on the subject of the lobster man. "He would've pulled the thing straight outta the ocean. Imprisoning them in a tank with elastic bands came later." Reaching again, she selects a pack of the Pop Tarts. "No problem. And you got that right. Quick, easy and don't take any work," she summarizes nicely as she eyes the board and then sticks the box on it. Sideways. Less difficult to balance that way. "As for the fish eggs and spiders… I'm not sure what you mean. I know what the fish eggs are, I got that part," she clarifies, "caviar, they had it at a function I went to once, actually, but you lost me on that last part. Some kind of buffet food?" She misses that her reference to the Italian dish didn't register and instead focuses on the mystery food Layla has mentioned.
"I guess he must have known something no one else knew," Layla muses, as to why the heck someone would pull a lobster from the ocean and not just throw it right back or maybe burn it and bury it in consecrated ground. She nods her thanks as the Pop Tarts are added to this tray of healthy foods. She looks thoughtful for a moment before shrugging. "I was thinking crabs. Maybe lobsters too. All those legs, they remind me of spiders. Big ones. Though I guess they aren't really all that related." She isn't too worried that her metaphor hasn't stood up to scrutiny. "Really, they're worse than spiders what with the claws and all. Imagine what people would do if spiders had those."
A nod answers Layla's thoughts. "Maybe, I don't know," casually replies Ellen, and then slightly more carelessly, "or the guy might've just been some nut job who saw something he thought was food, and ate it before he knew whether or not it was gonna give him indigestion. You can't just know things, hey?" Says the ignorant. The clarification on Layla's end of things has Ellen understanding what the teen was talking about now. "Crabs. Ah. Yeah, they're kinda weird too. Never cared for them either, though there's some dishes from my mother's side of the family, Greek, that I used to see around the family dinner table. Always preferred fish." She briefly considers her basket as though double-checking to make sure she has everything she wants. "Honestly?" she decides, forgoing any discussion of a spider's anatomy (not that she has any smarts in that area either), "people are already afraid enough of spiders. I doubt it'd make any difference if they looked like, you know, half lobster."
"You'd be surprised," Layla replies rather enigmatically, to the matter of whether or not one can just know things. "But he was probably just crazy, yeah." It seems unlikely, even to her, that someone would have had a similar affliction back then and used it to select weird foods that the rich would go nuts over. "Fish is simpler. No claws and no shell. I guess maybe some people need a challenge with their food, though. I'll stick with fighting to get packages open." She considers this point about spiders before shrugging again. "I bet you could make them even more afraid though." Not that she's saying she would want to, but theoretically…
The enigmatic speaking aside, Layla makes perfect sense to Ellen. More nods are given, but the last part merely has her shrugging. "Well, yeah. Anyway," Ellen says, "I outta get my butt to the checkout." She lifts her free hand in a wave, but she proceeds to head in the direction of the glass protected clerk, half turning as she walks. "If you're in these parts again, feel free to keep an eye out for anything else I might lose, hey?" she adds jokingly. "Good talking to you again, uh — I never got a name, did I? I'm Ellen," she offers, stopping.
"I'll keep my eyes open," Layla replies with a nod, not joking quite so much as the woman is, though neither does she play it up as an entirely serious thing. "I'm Layla," is offered, along with a faint smile and a nod of acknowledgement. "I'll be around. Just try not to lose anything in the meantime." She shifts her own load a little, pausing for a moment, before she turns back into the store. She won't check out just yet, wanting to draw this out as long as possible. At least she's nearly dry now.
"Hah. I'll try," replies the woman. She completes her walk up the aisle a moment later, approaching the clerk, though there is a somewhat uncertain expression on her face before she departs. The kid's a bit of a mystery, isn't she?
