THE QUILL [OPEN]

[abster]

'Hey Sweetheart, I'm sorry if I woke you. I just haven't heard from you in a couple of days and I know college can be- HI ABBY!- Gabrielle sweetie let me just try and talk to your sister. It's just her answer phone, go put on Tangled again I know you like that.- FLYNN RIDER!- Listen, I'm just starting to worry about you. Silly, right? Okay, give me old mom a call when you have chance. Don't work too hard, I love you... I love you Princess.'

Swearing softly as she listened to her mom's message again. Listened to how tired she sounded, how exhausted she must've been and how happy Gabby sounded. Kicking her dumb car's interior, she counted the money in her wallet again. One hundred and seventy bucks and change, that was all she had left and she couldn't keep sleeping in her car forever. The cops probably wouldn't take too kindly to that here, small town and all. She knew exactly what that was like.

Climbing out the back seat of her car, she grabbed her laptop and headed towards the last place she'd seen her father but the only place she at least knew sold coffee here. She hadn't planned on sticking around, she certainly wasn't sticking around for him at least. At least she could get good coffee and free wifi, and maybe she could make the coffee last all day if needed. She was good at doing that and even better if they had re-fills and a bathroom.

Rubbing her eyes, she ran a hand through her hair and went to order muttering the word asshole over and over again. Her own private mantra to keep her going.

"Hey, you don't know if they've got a town paper or something here? You know the kind with cheap places to stay?" Abigail asked, rubbing the dark eye-liner into the corners of her eyes with her thumb as she yawned.

Comments

[needleandink]

"Thanks," Adrian replied with a nod, still appraising the girl with a blank face that gave nothing away. "Been on the road long?"

He kept his distance from her, not wanting to seem like some lech who scoops up homeless girls, but he wasn't going to walk away from one, either. Especially not one this young.

[abster]

"Depends on what you classify as long," Abigail replied evasively before smiling tiredly. Too tiredly. It had been fun driving from her home town cross country to college, it had not been fun driving up to Maine. She'd kinda just run on anger, fumes and a lot of jerky. "And also, if you count gaps longer than a week between driving."

[needleandink]

"To my mind, the trip lasts from when you leave one place and settle in another," Adrian responded with an offhand shrug. "For me, it took years before I stayed in one place for longer than a few months. There's some fun involved in being a nomad for a while, but a lot of the time it sucks."

And Adrian had done it with a mostly liquid bank account and a trade that lended itself well to a nomad's life. Somehow he thought this girl didn't have that kind of situation.

[abster]

"Well, I'm definitely not settling here. So, ongoing the road is ongoing. Or as ongoing as it can get." She hadn't really counted on the cost of gas being quite so high or her car, her beautiful car, being quite so thirsty constantly for it. She was going to need to wait in town for a little while but that was okay, people always needed odd jobs doing. "Having no showers is pretty sucky. I'm Abigail, Abigail Flynn."

[needleandink]

"Nice to meet you, Abigail. I'm Adrian," he replied and extended a hand towards her. "I spent a little bit of time on the road living in my car," he smiled, remembering those first days when he'd been reluctant to use even a dime of his trust. "I didn't mind the gas station bathroom sponge baths as much as I hated not being able to stretch out to sleep. After two weeks of that, my first night in a bed was nothing short of bliss."

[abster]

"Well, that would be a problem for you. Me? Not so much," Abigail replied, reaching for his hand and shaking it with a dark, tired smile. He was taller than her after all. She could stretch out and just touch the panel. She'd figured out all the tricks to sleeping in her car the first couple nights on the road. "Yeah? I don't know... college beds aren't the greatest, sometimes the car seems better."

[needleandink]

"Sometimes the car seems better than just about anywhere else," Adrian confirmed with a nod. He looked into his coffee, then back over at Abigail. "Are you running from something to towards something?"

[abster]

"To something. My dad, I tracked him here. Figured I'd kick the old man in the ass and then head out." Abigail said. There in lay the problem, gas was a bitch and she had like no money to her name and escaping the town post hitting her dad up wasn't exactly in the plans any more. "Isn't exactly working out as planned. Really there wasn't much of a plan though."

[needleandink]

Adrian smiled, more because he understood the sentiment, if not the action. After all, as much as he'd wanted to kick his sperm donor's ass, he hadn't. Instead, he'd put half a country between them and contented himself that they were well out of each other's lives.

"Some of the best plans happen on the fly. What happened with this one? Did you not find him, or did no actual ass kicking happen?"

[abster]

"I tried kicking him in the balls but he's too quick. And he said a lot of stuff, stuff I wasn't expecting." Abigail replied, rubbing her eyes tiredly. She hadn't been expecting sisters and family and drama. And him. She didn't expect to feel anything for him, he was an asshole but there was still a tiny part of her- buried deep, deep down- that wanted him to be... her dad, she guessed.

[needleandink]

Adrian raised an eyebrow, focusing on something he heard in her voice - something that had never been in his. "Hearing unexpected things isn't ever easy, especially when you're already strung out from the road."

He considered his next words, then shrugged. "Listen. I don't live far from here and you look exhausted. If you want a shower, maybe a nap, you can use the apartment over my shop." He held up both hands. "I've got appointments this afternoon and I'll be in my studio. No nefarious intent, just want to help someone else who's on the same road I've traveled."

[abster]

"That's... okay. Nefarious intent aside, I don't like owing people anything. But tell you what, if I can't find somewhere then I'll come hit you up to borrow the shower." Abigail replied. She wasn't stupid enough to go back with a guy she had just met to his place and sleep there. But she'd keep it in mind in case he was you know being just a genuinely nice guy about it and not mad serial killer.

[needleandink]

"Fair enough," Adrian nodded, "and if you give me a little advance notice, I'll see if my girlfriend can come over and act as chaperone." He added the last with a knowing grin and a week. "For now, I'll have to wish you luck and get to my shop, though. I've got an appointment in fifteen minutes."